MSNBC "Interview With Senator Debbie Stabenow" - Transcript

Interview

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MR. WATSON: With me now to talk about all this live is Senator Debbie Stabenow. She's a Democrat from Michigan. And every day I'm joined by a very special guest; today's guest host is my good friend economist Jeffrey Sachs.

Senator Stabenow --

SEN. STABENOW: Morning.

MR. WATSON: -- when you hear those poll numbers that many Americans are concerned about what's happening with Chrysler and GM, and when you hear some of your colleagues, like the Republican senator from South Dakota, John Thune, saying, "I want to be out of these investments by July 2010," what's your response?

SEN. STABENOW: Well, first, Carlos, it's great to be with you, and I send my condolences to the family of the pilot that you've been talking about.

MR. WATSON: Thank you.

SEN. STABENOW: On the issue of GM and Chrysler, the reality is that the president, President Obama, I believe did exactly the right thing to save jobs, save as many dealerships as possible and suppliers in this country.

And the administration wants to get out of the auto business as quick as possible, and certainly I want them to do that. But we have an industry that's a basic manufacturing industry for the country. One out of 10 people in some way are employed related to the auto industry. It would have been outrageously irresponsible for the president not to step in and help them.

Chrysler came out of bankruptcy with their new company in a record 42 days; GM now says they're going to be able to come out quickly. Pensions are protected. Health care's protected. And we're going to see a strong new industry that's going to create jobs.

So in my perspective, it was the right thing to do. I think that the company and the government want to get the government's investment out, on behalf of taxpayers, as quickly as possible.

MR. WATSON: Senator Stabenow, I know that Michigan's had the highest unemployment in the nation --

SEN. STABENOW: Right.

MR. WATSON: -- but I've been -- but I've been fascinated recently to see a number of ads on TV. It sounds like Michigan's trying to encourage tourism: a lot of ads, "Come and visit Michigan." Any good signs, any positive signs in the Michigan economy right now that are meaningful and leading, perhaps, to new jobs for many of those who are unemployed?

SEN. STABENOW: Carlos, there are. First of all, come see us in the summer. As you know, the Great Lakes are gorgeous. We've got more lighthouses than any other state. We've got more beautiful beaches. Come see us. You're going to love it.

Secondly, we are building on the clean-energy economy.

Yesterday, on behalf of our Senate Democratic majority, I was pleased to organize a green-jobs summit focusing on clean energy, new clean- energy innovations.

And you know, a lot of the great engineers and people involved in manufacturing in Michigan that have been making great automobiles can also turn that to wind turbines, solar, geothermal. We have new announcements now coming on battery technology development. We're going to be manufacturing batteries in Michigan, the first in the United States and in North America.

And the 8,000 parts in a wind turbine, we can manufacture every single one of those in Michigan. And we have new companies coming in and expressing interest every day.

MR. WATSON: Senator Stabenow, I want to bring in somebody who's got a lot of experience helping turn around struggling economies, Dr. Jeffrey Sachs. He's got a question for you.

MR. SACHS: Well, Senator, great to be with you.

I just want to concur with what Senator Stabenow's saying, that Michigan is an engineering powerhouse. And even with this incredible downturn in the automotive sector, there's a lot of retooling ahead of the whole U.S. economy as we shift to new forms of energy and new forms of automobiles.

SEN. STABENOW: Right.

MR. SACHS: So I think we're going to see a renovation in Michigan and in the Midwest.

And I agree, you know, what the president did was to prevent a calamitous collapse of the whole manufacturing economy in the United States.

MR. WATSON: You really do believe it would have had that ripple impact that some warned of.

MR. SACHS: Well, it would have been a direct hit by itself; even without the ripples, would have been absolutely catastrophic. To just have a complete liquidation of this industry would have been a horror.

And the interesting thing, the reason I always thought this was such an important thing to do, was that on the other side of these bankruptcies is a whole new automotive era. We've left the internal combustion era, which lasted a hundred years from the Model T till now. We're going into the electricity-propelled vehicles of the future -- hybrids, plug-in hybrids, all battery, fuel cell.

And GM, for example, has tremendous technologies that it's going to bring online, and, I believe, will become one of the world leaders of a whole new generation of automobiles.

MR. WATSON: Senator Stabenow, I wanted to give you the final word. We only have about 30 seconds. I apologize.

SEN. STABENOW: Well, I just want to agree completely. Amen to that. We're opening battery-manufacturing facilities. We're -- GM just opened the first advanced manufacturing battery laboratory in North America. We want to partner federally in the recovery plan. We've invested $2 billion in battery innovation and manufacturing. We have other areas of incentives.

Now the federal government's going to partner, just like every other country in the world has been partnering for over a decade. We finally have an administration working with us, and the jobs are going to come here.

MR. WATSON: Senator Stabenow, thank you so much for joining us.

SEN. STABENOW: Thank you.

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