CARSON: There is no question that hateful rhetoric, no matter which side it comes from, is something that is detrimental to our society. Our strength in this country has traditionally been in our unity and we are allowing all kinds of circumstances to divide us and make us hateful toward each other. When you have outside forces, global Islamic radical jihadists who want to destroy us, why would we be doing that to ourselves? We at some point have got to become more mature. No question the hateful rhetoric exacerbates the situation, and we should be doing all we can to engage an intelligence, civil discussion about our differences.
Q: Should those who oppose abortion rights tone down their rhetoric?
CARSON: I think both sides should tone down their rhetoric and engage in civil discussion.
CARSON: What I would really like to see is an administration that seriously sits down with our experts in that region and ask them what is needed in order to accomplish our goal of eliminating this group of terrorists?
Q: So you don't know whether you'd want those rules of engagement loosened?
CARSON: Those of us who are not experts in that area can sit around all day long talking about doing this or doing that. But why don't we listen to the people who actually are the experts in that area, find out what it is that they need?
CARSON: I think the military solution is to try to exterminate ISIS and the other radical jihadists who will not allow peace to occur under any circumstances until they achieve their goals. But in terms of a place like Syria, the likelihood of an Assad regime maintaining peaceful control is extremely small. And the likelihood of El Masrah or any of the anti-Assad factions maintaining control is also very small. So, you need to be working on some type of mechanism to keep it from being in perpetual turmoil. I think the most compassionate thing when you're fighting a war is to do it quickly. The longer you drag it out, the more people are hurt. And I think we need to work in close conjunction with our Department of Defense, with our Pentagon, with our experts.
CARSON: My point is let's not sit here and talk about what we can't do. Instead, we have some terrific military intelligence and advisers who know how to get the job done. Let's ask them.
Q: Are those advisers not being consulted? What do you think that they're saying that is not being paid attention to?
CARSON: All you need to do is go out and talk to a number of the generals who have retired, in many cases prematurely. You want to know the exact reasons why we're not winning and ask what advice has been given and how it has been ignored. I would suggest that you talk to them.
CARSON: I agree that there's no such thing as political correctness when you're fighting an enemy who wants to destroy you and everything that you have anything to do with. And I'm not one who is real big on telling the enemy what we're going to do and what we're not going to do.
Q: But you would do that even though many consider waterboarding torture?
CARSON: As I said, I'm not real big on telling them what we would or would not do.
CARSON: Well, I said in the larger capacity that we should monitor anything -- mosques, church, school, you know, shopping center where there is a lot of radicalization going on.
Q But how would you know that is happening?
CARSON: Intelligence. We have intelligence on the ground already. We do need to enhance that. For instance, we've learned last week that the FBI seems to be only to be able to monitor 30 to 60 people at a time. And we know there's a lot more than that that needs to be monitored. We need to get very serious about our intelligence.
CARSON: Well, as you, I'm sure, know, there are a lot of people on that watchlist and they have no idea why they're on that list and they've been trying to get their names off of it and no one will give them information. You know, I am a big supporter of the Second Amendment, and I don't want to deprive people unnecessarily of that. There needs to be better due process. And that's one thing that I'm very interested in finding a way to make government more responsive to the people. It's really unfair that people can't get a real hearing. And they get put on a list and nobody can tell them why they're there, and they go through for years and years and they have to be tormented. It just doesn't make any sense.
A: Provide vouchers, so that they would have choice in terms of the schools that they go to. We know that the best education is homeschool, the next is private schools, the next is charter schools, the next is public schools. If we want to change that dynamic we've got to offer some real competition to the public schools. We do everything we can to facilitate school choice, a voucher system. Incentivize the states to enact voucher systems.
CARSON: No, that's false. I have outlined using health savings accounts, which eliminate the need for people to be dependent on government programs. The plan for funding the health savings accounts is using the same dollars that we use for traditional healthcare and then the government comes in with Medicaid for the indigent.
Q: How does the health savings account work if there's no government subsidy?
CARSON: With the indigent people, $5,000 goes to each man, woman and child. What could you buy with that? A concierge practice generally costs $2,000-$3,000 a year and if you're a regular person you already get some health benefits. So, instead of that money going into the inefficient system that it goes in now, it gets divided into your family's health savings account over which you now have control.
Q: Doesn't that mean there's government money going into my health savings account?
CARSON: But not new government money.
When Beck asked Carson if he wanted to continue the War on Drugs, Carson responded, "Absolutely." A slightly confused Beck clarified "You do?" And Carson replied confidently, "I would intensify it."
After his initial answer, Beck pressed the retired neurosurgeon on his enthusiasm for the War on Drugs. "Let me ask you a question," Beck said, pausing to figure out his next words. "How -- I mean, it doesn't seem to be working now."
Again, Carson appeared steady. "Yeah well, go down to the border in Arizona like I was a few weeks ago. I mean, it's an open highway, and the federal government isn't doing anything to stop it," Carson said. Beck then asked if Carson would legalize marijuana and Carson said, "I disagree with it."
CARSON: Well, I guess it depends on what that faith is. If it's inconsistent with the values and principles of America, then of course it should matter. But if it fits within the realm of America and consistent with the constitution, no problem.
Q: So do you believe that Islam is consistent with the constitution?
CARSON: No, I do not. I would not advocate that we put a Muslim in charge of this nation. I absolutely would not agree with that.
CARSON: I would use every resource available to us, which includes financial resources, covert operations, Special Forces, and ground troops if necessary. Because it's unlikely that a coalition will form behind nothing.
In terms of going into Syria, I think we need to push them out of Iraq, which is the largest part of the caliphate ISIS has established. We also can't let them continue to control Anbar, one of the largest energy fields. I would be in favor of pushing them up into Syria. There's a very complex situation in Syria. You have the Russians coming in there now and establishing themselves. You have China starting to do the same. You want to be very, very careful before you jump into the middle of that situation.
Q: So you're one of those that says, "Let Assad and ISIS fight it out amongst themselves, and then clean up the mess later?"
CARSON: That is certainly something to consider.
CARSON: I would recognize that bringing in people from the Middle East right now carries extra danger. And we have to be extra cautious. You know, we need to tighten it up and be very careful, because we cannot put our people at risk because we're trying to be politically correct.
A: I made no bones about the fact that I used to be a Democrat. Over the course of time, my views have changed dramatically. In 1992, I personally was against abortion, but I was not for causing anybody else to do anything. I changed because I began to think about, if abolitionists a long time ago had said, "I don't believe in slavery, but anybody else can do it if they want to," where would we be today?
A: Well, I think it highlights the necessity of us taking a very strong stance for our allies. South Korea is our ally. There should be no doubt about that in anybody's mind, including North Korea, that we will stand with our allies, no matter what is going on.
A: I said that the drones are excellent for surveillance. In no way did I suggest that drones be used to kill people. We have a huge security risk [at the border], and it seems like we have not only the cartels to deal with, the drug smugglers, the people smugglers, but we have the federal government, which is not being helpful. Over the last couple of years, they have released 67,000 people.
Q: But you said that you were considering drone strikes on cartels down there at the border.
A: No, that's a lie. What I said is, it's possible that a drone could be used to destroy the caves that are utilized to hide people.
Q: Who would be hidden in these caves?
A: The scouts. There are caves that they utilize. Those caves can be eliminated. I am not talking about killing people. We have excellent military people and military strategists; we need to get them involved.
CARSON: Well, you have to go back to the beginnings of the organization. Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger believed that certain people, including blacks, were inferior and that the way you strengthen the society is you get rid of them. She basically believed in eugenics.
CARSON: I think that when conception occurs, life occurs. But I do believe in contraception. So let's say someone has been raped and they are administered that drug, it can prevent ovulation which allows that egg to come down, because a healthy sperm can live for up to five or six days, but if ovulation doesn't occur, then you're not going to have conception.
CARSON: All you have to do is go to Israel and talk to average people. And I couldn't find a single person there who didn't feel that this administration had turned their backs on Israel. And I think the position of president of the United States should be one where you begin to draw people together behind a vision. Not one where you castigate those who believe differently from you.
Q: what specifically is anti-Semitic in what the President is saying?
CARSON: I think anything is anti-Semitic that is against the survival of a state that is surrounded by enemies and by people who want to destroy them. And to ignore that and act like everything is normal there and that these people are paranoid, I think that's anti-Semitic.
A: I want things to be fair for everybody. When you do things on a proportional basis, it works very well. 10% is an easy number to use because it's easy to do the calculations. But you know, you make $10 billion, you pay a billion. Now there are a lot of people that say that's a problem because the guy still has got $9 billion left and we need to take more of his money. But that's called socialism. But the problem with socialism is that it ends up looking the same, with a small group of elite at the top, and a rapidly diminishing middle class and a vastly expanded dependent class. That's not America.
Q: So include low earners as taxpayers?
A: When you have a tax system that includes everybody, it's very difficult for the politicians to engage in raising taxes.
CARSON: What we have to think about is, "How do we fix the economy so that it encourages entrepreneurial risk taking and capital investment? How do we create a ladder that allows those people in the lower income brackets to move up that ladder?" That's what we need to be concentrating on. Not how do we make them comfortable in that situation. That's not what America was all about. And we can do that.
CARSON: I say the thing that is really impacting that person making $30,000 or $40,000 is all of the regulations that we're coming up with. Every single regulation costs us in terms of goods and services. It increases the price of everything. Who gets hit by that the most? The people in the lower economic brackets. That's what we need to be concentrating on. Those are things that are driving income gap
In cases such as those, Carson said you have to "look at the individual situation," but called the "life of the mother" question "largely a spurious argument" because advances in medicine have made it so "that situation rarely occurs."
While abortions performed solely to save the life of the mother are rare, doctors have asserted that they can be medically necessary. And even the National Right to Life Committee has stated its position is "to allow abortion if necessary to prevent the death of the mother."
CARSON: Well, I don't recall calling it silly, but what I called silly is political correctness going amuck. When, I guess it was Martin O'Malley who said, "Black lives matter, white lives matter." He got in trouble for that and had to apologize. That's what I'm talking about is silly. We need to be a little more mature, but certainly in cases where police are doing things that are inappropriate, I think we ought to investigate those promptly and justice should be swift.
Q: So do black lives matter?
CARSON: Of course all lives matter, and of course we should be very concerned about what's going on, particularly in our inner cities. You know, for a young black man, the most likely cause of death is homicide. That is a huge problem that we need to address in a very serious way.
Carson suggested people would work harder if they suspected their coworkers of monitoring their work. "And we make it possible to fire government people!" he said to loud cheers. It's true that firing government employees who underperform can be notoriously complicated--so much so that most agencies don't even try to do it, a GAO report found earlier this year.
A spokesperson clarified Carson's comments: "Covert division? More like Secret Shopper, a quality control strategy used worldwide to improve customer service and customer care."
Soon afterward, several GOP candidates seized the opportunity to attack Obama while touting their own foreign policy platforms. A spokesman for Ben Carson wrote that "Dr. Carson believes that ISIL presents a very clear, very real threat and the U.S. should be aggressive and committed to ISIL's destruction."
Foreign policy will likely be a key issue in the 2016 race. All of the GOP candidates, with the exception of Sen. Rand Paul, are hawks (and even the Kentucky senator has supported airstrikes against ISIS).
CARSON: All options includes all options. That doesn't mean that would be my first option. When we look at Russia and we look at Putin, we can realize that he has great ambitions. His ambitions have been thwarted of late because of falling oil prices. And we should take note of that and realize that the economic weapon is a tremendous one in his case. We have incredible natural resources in this country in terms of oil, in terms of natural gas, but we have energy exportation rules from the '70s when we had an energy crisis that need to be gotten rid of, so we can use that to make Europe and other portions of the world more dependent on us. And that decreases his influence and his ability to expand.
CARSON: No, I wouldn't go to war over Ukraine, but I would handle Ukraine a very different way. You know, Ukraine was a nuclear arms state. They gave up their weapons. You know, it was agreed they would be protected if something happened with aggression. Have we lived up to that? Of course, we have not. And what does that say to our other allies around the world? It's not a good sign.
CARSON: Well, what I said is the president doesn't have to agree with it.
Q: No, of course not. But does he have to enforce it?
CARSON: The way our Constitution is set up, the president or the executive branch is obligated to carry out the laws of the land. The laws of the land, according to our Constitution, are provided by the legislative branch.
Q: But, since Marbury v. Madison in 1803, we have lived under the principle of judicial review: if the Supreme Court says this is the law, this is constitutional, the executive has to observe that.
CARSON: This is an area we need to discuss, because it has changed from the original intent.
Q: So, you're saying this is an open question as far as you're concerned?
CARSON: It is an open question. It needs to be discussed.
Carson: ObamaCare fundamentally changes the relationship between the people and the government. The government is supposed to respond to the will of the people. Not dictate to the people what they are doing. And with this program, we're allowing that whole paradigm to be switched around.
CARSON: I like the idea of a proportional tax. That way you pay according to your ability. And I got that idea from the Bible, tithing. You make $10 billion a year, you pay $1 billion. You make $10 a year, you pay $1. And also, if everybody is paying, it makes it very difficult for these politicians to come along and raise taxes. It's easy to raise it on 1 percent or 2 percent or 5 percent. It's very difficult to raise it on 100 percent.
CARSON: Wrong.
Q: Low and middle- income families would get a big tax hike, while wealthy families would actually get a tax cut.
CARSON: I don't agree with that assessment, let me put it that way, because I've been in contact with many economists. And, in fact, if you eliminate loopholes and deductions, then you're really talking about a rate somewhere between 10 percent and 15 percent.
"Absolutely," Carson replied. Asked why, he went on to explain his prison theory. "So did something happen while they were in there?" he said. "Ask yourself that question."
He continued, invoking his argument against same-sex marriage: "Why do gay people want to get married? Because they want to have various rights," he said. "Property rights, visitation rights--why can't any two human beings, I don't care what their sexual orientation is, why can't they have the legal right to do those things?"
Later in a statement to CNN, Carson backed down a bit from his morning remarks. "I do not pretend to know how every individual came to their sexual orientation," he said. I regret that my words to express that concept were hurtful and divisive."
CARSON: I find a very good measure of correlation between my religious beliefs and my scientific beliefs. People say, "How can you be a scientist, how can you be a surgeon if you don't believe in certain things?" You know, I'm always willing to sit down and discuss things. And people who say, "Well, you have to believe this and you have to believe that," I'm willing to discuss with them why they believe what they believe, and why I believe what I believe. A person's religious beliefs are the things that make them who they are, give them a direction in their life. But I do not believe that religious beliefs should dictate one's public policies and stances. And our laws that we enforce have nothing to do with our own personal beliefs. They have to do with the Constitution of this country.
CARSON: Well, first of all, recognize that ISIS and some of the other radical Islamic terrorist groups -and let's not forget about the Shia which are based in Iran-- are responsible for a lot of terrorism. They would like to destroy us and our way of life. We have a couple of options. We can sit back and say, "Nah, they're not that big a deal," or we can recognize that the longer we allow them to grow, to spread, to root, get their roots well established, the more difficult it will be to eradicate them later. So what I mean is we have to eradicate them now. We have to use every means possible to do that. And we certainly don't want to have people who know very little about military strategy micromanaging a very competent military that we have.
"Certain communicable diseases have been largely eradicated by immunization policies in this country and we should not allow those diseases to return by foregoing safe immunization programs, for philosophical, religious or other reasons when we have the means to eradicate them," he added.
Carson's comments came amid a contentious political debate over vaccinations, spurred by an outbreak of measles. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and Sen. Rand Paul both came under fire for saying it should be up to parents whether to vaccinate their children.
Carson's interactions with Mannatech date back to 2004. Mannatech was started when Congress passed the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994, which greatly loosened restrictions on how supplement makers could market their products. In 2007, Texas charged Mannatech with an unlawful marketing scheme that exaggerated health benefits. In 2009, Texas reached an agreement: Mannatech paid $4 million in restitution to customers while admitting no wrongdoing, and was prohibited from saying that their products can cure disease. Yet Carson's interactions with the company continued for five more years.
CARSON: That does happen.
Q: Has that ever happened to you?
CARSON: Yes. The attorney general of Missouri, last year, had a report that came out that said in the Ferguson area [where a police killing of a young black man sparked riots], blacks were seven times more likely to be stopped, and twice as more likely to be arrested.
Q: Whose fault is that?
CARSON: Well, the real question is, what can we do about this kind of situation? You know, everybody's going to be off in their little corners. And people are product of their life experiences. But can we actually solve this problem? And there are a lot of things that we can probably talk about.
CARSON: There are a lot of things. For instance, police being equipped with cameras.
Q: There is a movement of having the cameras on this.
CARSON: 85% of these things would be stopped by that.
OTHER GUEST: Rialto, California equipped their police officers with body-worn cameras, and the crime rate dropped, and the also the complaints about abuse by police officers.
BEN CARSON: I think the issues are really much bigger than what has been portrayed to be. I've seen police excesses, living in inner city Detroit and inner city Boston. But I've seen a lot more situations where the police saved the situation. And I'm not sure that this is a police versus black community issue. You know, anger issues get in the way. And if you take race out of the issue altogether, and you take a group of young men and you raise them with no respect for authority, not learning to take on personal responsibility, having easy access to drugs and alcohol, they're very likely to end up as victims of violence or incarceration. It has nothing to do with race. So, yes, is there racism? Are there problems? Yes. Yesterday, today, and tomorrow. But we need to start looking at bigger issues here. We have to develop our resources appropriately.
CARSON: I'm in about five states a week, with huge record-breaking crowds [at book events]--
Q: They tell you, "We've never had a crowd this big"?
CARSON: Yes, they say, "We've never had a crowd this big." And that is always what people want to say, "You've got to do it; you've got to run." It's just everywhere I go. And I think what people really are looking for is common sense and courage and somebody who understands the Constitution and the principles of freedom, innovation, social responsibility. And if someone can come along with those things & really gain a lot of traction, I would be delighted, and if they don't, I would certainly give it serious consideration.
Q: So are you saying you don't want to do it, but you might?
CARSON: I don't want to do it, but if we're left in a situation where there is not a lot of enthusiasm for anybody else, I would never turn my back on my fellow citizens.
DR. BEN CARSON: What is at stake is what kind of place is America going to be? Are we truly an exceptional nation with a different core of values than the rest of the world? Is that what led us to the pinnacle position in the world? Are we a nation that's for, of and by the people? Or are we for, of and by the government? This is what this election's about.
DR. BEN CARSON (ON TAPE): Obamacare is really, I think, the worst thing that has happened in this nation since slavery. And it was never about health care, it was about control.
Q: People who have health care now who didn't have it before, I suspect would disagree strongly.
CARSON: Recognize what I said, "in a way." In a way, anything is slavery that robs you of your ability to control your own life. And when you take the most important thing that you have, which is your health care, and you put that in the hands of government bureaucrats, I think you have done the wrong thing. This is not what America is about. Do I believe in health care for everybody? Absolutely. But I think there are much better ways to get there, which leave the care in the hands of patients and of doctors.
This reminds me of our federal government, which was once agile and responsive, but now is so large and cumbersome that it has difficulty with the simplest of tasks.
We now have a federal debt of $17 trillion, which continues to grow. The current administration proudly points out that it is growing slower now than before. Such a claim makes it clear that they do not appreciate the seriousness of our spending problem. If a balloon is so full of air that is about to burst, it would be far better to begin deflating the balloon than to put just a little more air into it.
(VIDEO) BEN CARSON: I have to tell you, ObamaCare is really, I think, the worst thing that has happened in this nation since slavery. And it is in a way, it is slavery in a way.(END VIDEO)
Sen. ROB PORTMAN: Well, he's a doctor who feels passionately about this issue, obviously.
Carson has spoken publicly about his views on evolution and creationism, once telling a convention of the National Science Teachers: "Evolution and creationism both require faith. It's just a matter of where you choose to place that faith."
But Carson said that the Review article had not published his complete quote and that he does not think evolutionists are unethical: "Those of us who believe in God and derive our sense of right and wrong and ethics from God's word really have no difficulty whatsoever defining where our ethics come from. People who believe in survival of the fittest might have more difficulty deriving where their ethics come from. A lot of evolutionists are very ethical people."
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The above quotations are from Sunday Political Talk Show interviews during 2013-2015, interviewing presidential hopefuls for 2016.
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