What Forbes Has to Say

In a telephone interview Monday, Republican presidential candidate Steve Forbes addressed some of the most controversial opinions from his magazine columns over the past twenty years.

On calling televangelist Pat Robertson a “toothy flake” in 1988: “I once was critical of Ronald Reagan, too. Well, [Robertson] ably represents a certain thought and viewpoint, and I respect that. But at the time he was a candidate.”

****

On recently saying he could support a balanced budget amendment after opposing it in the past: “It’s not so much a shift. It’s the fact that the way they had written the Balanced Budget Amendments in the past were a prescription for increasing the power of Washington . . . . That’s why I think the House Republicans had it right that it should have a tax-protection provision in it [requiring a three-fifths of Congress to raise taxes.]”

“I think we must have accompanying legislation to take care of things such as [the power of the] courts, unfunded mandates, making sure we distinguish between capital and expenses [in federal spending] . . . . Otherwise Washington . . . . will find ways to make a mockery of it.”

****

On his 1985 statement that illegal immigration supported “an important portion of this country’s prosperity”: “In the mid-1980s, there was a real labor shortage in much of the country and that’s what drew the illegals in...”

“There is a lot that can be done to cut the flow of illegals . . . . Beefing up Border Patrol . . . [and] a lot can be done to streamline deportation procedures. . . . I’ve never been in favor of trying the employer [sanction] route. Obviously that has not worked.”

****

On Proposition 187’s ban on public schooling for illegal immigrants: “They shouldn’t be here” illegally, but “I would rather have those people in school rather than roaming the streets.”

****

On admitting Taiwan to the United Nations: “I see no harm, especially when the Chinese are in a flexible mood . . . . I think that it is very important that we maintain trade with China, but that doesn’t mean we should stiff-arm the Taiwanese.”

****

On his 1987 column asserting that Americans were unlikely to support relegating abortion to the “‘back alley”’: “This gets to my whole thrust today. If you want abortions to disappear, you have to change the opinions, attitudes, consciousness of the American people. I think we have a consensus today to ban abortion in late term pregnancy, for purposes of sex selection, mandatory government financing and certainly [to support] parental notification. If we want to go beyond that we need persuasion.”