News 7's Nadine Grimley sat down with Independent Candidate for the United States Senate Daniel Freilich for an exclusive interview.

Grimley: Who is Daniel Freilich?

Freilich: I am an Independent Candidate for the U.S. Senate, I also ran as a Democrat against, challenging Senator Leahy in the primary in August 24th.  I'm from Wilmington and that's sort of an initial intro.

Grimley: What was your previous profession?

Freilich: Still is, I'm a physician, I'm a naval officer, I'm a navy captain and the last 11 years I've been in Washington doing clinical care and research and I teach at the medical school.

Grimley: What are your thoughts on Senator Leahy?

Freilich: You know, I don't actually have a specific beef with Leahy other than the fact that he plays the game of Washington politics and my beef with the party and the hypocracy and the conflict of interest, the incramentalism, and I think that Sen. Leahy, frankly, has become part of the problem.  I've always voted for him in the past, but I have very specific issues with both parties.

Grimley: What are your thoughts on social security?

Freilich: In terms of social security, there is no question in my mind that the social security trust fund in the future is going to be broke if we don't fix it, but I think it's very fixable.  First thing is, you probably know, you don't pay social security and medicare on capital gains and you don't pay social security after you reach a certain cap.  This is ridiculous!  This is nonesense!  It's the kind of thing where the wealthy have such a small contribution towards America and towards our future.  If you just remove the cap and if you make capital gains where, which is unearned income the same as earned income, then you would have no problems in maintaining viability of the trust fund.

Grimley: What about raising the age of social security?

Freilich: I think that if you were desperate that's what you would do, but I think what that is, is sort of not addressing the core issue.  The core issue is: is there sufficient revenue in order to keep it going?

Grimley: Don't ask, don't tell, would you repeal it?

Freilich: Of course, I think that it's ridiculous.  I mean, these are wedge issues and it is old-fashioned.  It is not condusive to anything constructive in America anymore, and most importantly, it's an enormous distraction.  You know gay rights is kind of like civil rights, kind of like gender rights, and it really isn't any different.

Grimley: What are your opinions on the stimulus?

Freilich: President Obama was a little bit stuck.  He was delt a pretty bad set of cards in terms of the status of the economy when he came in.  In the short term there's no question that stimulus, fiscal policy are something you have not much of a choice of.  Of course you wanted to do monitary policy, but you couldn't because the interest rates were so low the federal reserve couldn't lower them much more in the first place so, he was kind of stuck.  What I do not support at all is that the stimulus went to banks that didn't necessarily need the money.

Grimley: What are the three best economic engines in Vermont?

Freilich: There's no question that we need agricultural, though it's threatened on an enormous level.  I don't know if agriculture is economically viable that some of the others, but it has to be because this is the history of Vermont and I criticize that we don't get past this issue.  The viability of farmers and the ability to pay reasonable amounts Nadine, it's been going on for decades and generations.  It's incredible that in 2010 we are having the same conversation that was had 10 years ago and 20 years ago and 30 years ago.  So, from my point of view, 100% no question about it ensure that small farmers make sufficient income that they can stay viable, otherwise Vermont is going to look like Connecticut, Massachusetts, and New Jersey in no time and that's really contrary to the history.

Grimley: Small farms in this state are closing, what would you do to help them remain alive?

Freilich: Well, what I would do is use tax policy because the only thing that I can imagine doing rapidly that we would have complete control over in order to ensure that they get a reasonable return on their income.  Look, farmers tell me by and large they need about $18.00-$20.00 per 100lbs what Bernie Sanders and Leahy and frankly others are trying to do right now is have a quota.  I'm not trying to say I'm against the concept of a quota if the farmers are to go along with it.

Grimley: Do you support Nancy Pelosi as Speaker of the House?

Freilich: That's a very specific question, I don't, and it has nothing to do with Nancy Pelosi personally, it has to do with Nancy Pelosi as a representative of the party with the conflict of interest.  She has taken an exorbanous amount of money from special interest, and by the way mostly corporations.  We're not talking about Save the Whales, or we're not talking about Green Peace, or Sierra Club, or something kind of sweet and nice like that.  We're talking about pharmaceutical companies.  We're talking about banking companies. We're talking about the Big Ag industry, the same thing that Sen. Leahy has participated in.  There might be slight differences as to which companies contributed to which campaign, but I find it very dishonorable to put your arm up and to swear to represent the people of your state, but to take special interest money, which I frankly believe is corruption.

Grimley: What about term limits?

Freilich: One of the general premises of my campaign is what I refer to as a Vermont Political Revolution, starting in Vermont, and political not violent.  It really does have to be somewhat of a revolution and Americans don't like that word and if you use it dramatically we are expecting violence and sort of overthrow of the government and it's ridiculous.  But if you mean is a change of paradigms in terms of how we do things with in our system without turning it 100% upside down, I think it's a good word to use.  Our three ethical principles of this Vermont Political Revolution that I believe in is number one term limits, number two that you take no special interest money, and three that you are firm to Vermonters that you will always put country ahead of party.  As you know Senate and Congress are different.  You know the U.S. Senate is six years per term.  I think that two terms is more than sufficient.  For Congress you might do something equivalent so its total of no more than ten, twelve years.

Grimley: Would you support an Arizona style immigration bill?

Freilich: No, but I commiserate a little bit with Arizona.  Arizona is desperate because the federal government has done nothing.  I think there are two basic solutions.  Number one, we got to close our borders because if you don't secure the borders we are a sovereign state.  Nothing will ever change, but I think everyone has to have a reality and the reality is that we probably are not going to send 11 million people back to Mexico and Central American countries.  It simply won't happen even if some people think they want it done and as a consequence I think a path towards citizenship, an amnesty program where you pay a penalty, and you work towards citizenship, and you pay your taxes.  I think is the only right thing to do.

Grimley: Would you join other states in a lawsuit against healthcare reform?

Freilich: I would not, I, despite having run as a Democrat in the primary, I completely oppose the Healthcare Bill.  Now I don't think it is right to say it has no good elements to it, and in fact it has some very good elements.

Grimley: Would you sign a bill decriminalizing a small amount of marijuana?

Freilich: I would sign a bill to decriminalize or to legalize depends on a nuances of the bill.  I'd be willing potentially to go either way.  What I disagree with is proponents of marijuana rights to the extent to which this is their primary issue when there are much bigger issues in the world.

Grimley: Small jobs are struggling to survive in Vermont, how would you try to keep them within our borders?

Feilich: The first thing you have to do is you need a manufacturing base.  We don't have a manufacturing base and the second thing you need to do is a plan and you don't have an economic development plan of any comprehensive intigrative way in this state.  So, you have to say to yourself how are you going to be competitive and how can we bring those kinds of jobs and the way I look at it is it should be the same way that we do it throughout the country.  It's just Vermont just has a little piece of an edge and that's throgh green energy.

Grimley: How would you keep students here after graduation?

Freilich: The biggest way is that they have jobs.  Right now many of them want to stay, in fact most of them want to stay because of the quality of life in Vermont.  The problem is they simply can't find jobs and, like I said a minute ago, there are mulitple ways.  The absolute number one quick answer is through the development of alternative energy and renewables.

Grimley: Back to your campaign, "I'm on a cow," what was going through your mind when you created that?

Freilich: It's a funny story, people wanted to do something on the campaign that was a little less serious than the very serious issues that we discuss and I was not willing to do it throughout most of the campaign Nadine until we spend enough time talking about the serious issues that we were willing then to poke fun at ourselves.  I want you to know we've had over 100,000 hits.  Even though it's silly and ridiculous, ultimately it said one thing and it said don't take special interest money, have term limits, and commit yourself to represent the people rather than others.

Click on the links below to watch the interview.

Freilich on himself.

Freilich on Sen. Leahy.

Freilich on Social Security.

Freilich on Don't Ask Don't Tell.

Freilich on the Stimulus.

Freilich on jobs.

Freilich on Nancy Pelosi.

Freilich on term limits.

Freilich on immigration.

Freilich on healthcare.

Freilich on his campaign.