Station:   KFTM, 1400 AM

Show:      Big Morning Show

Guests:    Gardner, Cory

Link:        http://www.kftm.net/talk-show-guests.html

Date:       March 10, 2014

Topics:     Israel, Senate campaign, Harry Reid, U.S. Senator Mark Udall, Debt, Deficit, Oil & Gas Industry, Energy, XL Keystone Pipeline, Renewable Energy, Ukraine, North American Energy Security, Geopolitical, Russia, Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG), Europe, Vladimir Putin, Foreign Policy, Politifact, Obamacare, Iran, Syria, Western Europe, Farmers, Farming, Reuglations, Weld County District Attorney Ken Buck

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[The following represents notes and transcribed portions from an interview.  All portions, except where identified as transcribed sections, are paraphrased from the questions and responses between the host and the guest.]

HOST JOHN WATERS:  Jet lag from time change

U.S. REPRESENTATIVE (CD-4) AND CANDIDATE FOR U.S. SENTATE, CORY GARDNER: 

• Hard waking up,
• Beautiful day with the family yesterday

WATERS:  Announcement for senate campaign

GARDNER:

• I announced for the U.S. Senate seat last week
• I believe that the best way that we can change the direction of this country is to change the direction of the United States Senate
  • Get economy moving again
  • Get people back to work
  • Address the big problems
    • Debt
    • Deficit
    • Means:
      • changing mark Udall, who  has voted 99% of time w/ Barack Obama
      • replace Reid
    • Start solving America’s greatest challenges

WATERS:  Weld County District Attorney Ken Buck was running for Senate and now changed to the Fourth Congressional District race

GARDNER:

• CD4 is safe Republican seat – will remain in Republican hands
• Hoping for bigger R majority in House
• It’s no good staying in a safe seat if we don’t have a US Senate that is willing to solve the problems facing our country
  • We need a change in Senate
  • Wife and I came to realization that we have to make sure that we’re doing everything possible to put Colorado in play and win this race, so we can pass legislation
    • Reduce frivolous regulations
    • Balancing the budget
    • Issues that we know we need to do

 

[The following section is a transcript with direct quotations from the interview]

WATERS:  How long had this process been in effect, Cory?  How long had you been thinking about making this run?

GARDNER:  You know, we had been thinking about it for some time and it particularly picked up last year. I thought about reconsidering running for the U.S. Senate, but it really picked up last year when we received our healthcare cancellation notice.  You know, we’ve talked about that on the air. Three hundred and thirty-five thousand Coloradoans have had their health insurance cancelled.  We know that 65% of small businesses are going to see their health insurance premiums increase as a result of a bill that Mark Udall passed with his vote.  He was the deciding vote on Obamacare.  And again, one more reason why I believe we need to have someone who is truly representing the voices of Colorado in Washington [D.C]. 

WATERS:  Now some of the pundits that I’ve read and listened to nation-wide – political pundits, have said that with your entering that Senate race, that has made Mark Udall particularly vulnerable.

GARDNER:  Well, I think this is a competitive state.  I’ve never particularly seen Colorado as a red, blue, or purple state. I’ve always looked at it as a state that pushes back against people who are no longer working in its best interest, and that’s Republicans or Democrats, we’ve seen at the state legislature over the past fifteen years.  Several years ago, they were pushing back against Republicans.  This year, whether it’s the recall in the state legislature, or the challenges we’ve seen in the polling against Mark Udall or John Hickenlooper, we can see the people of Colorado starting to push back against the overreach that Democrats have had.  So, this is a state that simply wants people to do their work, to work hard, to make this government work in a way they can be proud of. 

WATERS:  […] Well, I know it’s going to be an interesting number of months, here, as you run for that Senate seat.  But in the meantime, work continues on the House side, as well.  And we wanted to talk about a couple of things there.  First of all, of course, the big news over the past week or so has been Russia and Vladimir Putin really, it looks like, at least from my perspective, beginning to put – try to put those pieces of the old Soviet Union back together. 

GARDNER:  Well, it is a disturbing development in Russia when we see this so-called “Russian Reset” with the United States completely gone.  There is no longer a reset with Russia.  These relationships are now as continuous [sic:  ‘contentious?] as they have been in a long time.  And we see a Russian government that is flexing its muscle, moving into foreign territory – moving into foreign countries that used to be its territory, of course, of previous regimes in Russia, and there’s a lot that the United States ought to be doing.  And unfortunately, over the past few years of this administration, I think the world has realized that the United States has become rather ambivalent when it comes to its foreign affairs, and that’s a scary position for international security.   

WATERS:  Well, and you know, something I’ve found interesting, Cory, is that some Republican leaders have been warning of this happening for a number of years.  I think of, for example, Sarah Palin who what, five, six years ago, sort of  sounded the warning bell of this sort of thing happening.  I also remember back during one of the presidential debates, Mitt Romney talking about Vladimir Putin possibly doing this sort of thing – moving into the Ukraine, and being pooh-poohed by Obama as that being a ridiculous thought.  But all of a sudden, here we are.

GARDNER:

• You’d think in this age of global economics, global power that we are in, that there would no longer be a level of naïve – uh, naïve policies, when it comes to foreign affairs, but that is exactly what we have seen.  And that’s exactly –. […]
• But we’ve seen a level of naivete in this country that we’ve never seen in foreign policy before and that’s a harmful thing for this country. 

[end transcript, resume notes from the interview]

WATERS:  Does this embolden other countries, other regimes

GARDNER:

• We’ve seen this
  • Iran
  • Syria
• In Israel, officials were concerned about US policy
  • We’re starting to see with Russia
  • Nobody believes that we’ll back up our words

WATERS:  Hopefully this can be rectified

WATERS:  Legislation:  I know that you don’t put your House work on the back burner.  Like Tax issues

GARDNER:

• Yes
• Rural CO farmers and ranchers buying and repairing farm equipment
  • Increasing paperwork to get allowance  ($500)

WATERS:  Unfortunately, more and more red tape taking away from productivity

GARDNER:

• Very expensive to be in farming
• Farmers brought this concern
• Working with House ways and Means to address this

WATERS:  Oil and Gas in the news. XL Keystone Pipeline and energy independence

GARDNER:

• Just look at situation in Ukraine
• Energy independence is so important
• We have a chance to affect the geopolitical systems
  • Natural gas controlled by Russia in Western Europe
  • We should increase production to increase exports
  • In order to decrease dependence on Russia supplies

WATERS:  Taking away power from Russia and Middle East

GARDNER:

• That’s right
• Reports in Congress:
  • Abundance of energy, because they can access non-traditional methods
  • Allows them to continue to flex muscle
  • And holds us at bay, because we don’t have that opportunity

WATERS:  Save a tree

GARDNER:

• Do what I say and not what I do
  • Regulations make energy dev. More difficult
  • Their actions are different from their words

WATERS:  Similar to Obamacare

GARDNER:

• They lied to us – Politifact

WATERS:  Contact info

WATERS:  Thanks, good luck, bye-bye