Bobby Jindal in CNBC 2015 GOP primary debate

On Budget & Economy: I'm the only one who actually shrank government

JINDAL: Republicans all tell you they want to shrink the size of government. Here's the truth--of all these folks talking, I'm the only one that has cut the size of government. There's not two of us, there's one of us. The rest of it is all just hot air. When politicians talk, we need to pay attention to what they do, not what they say.

Sen. RICK SANTORUM: I think it's one thing to shrink the size of a state government I'm the one that has actually gone to Washington, said we would shrink government, and actually delivered for the conservative cause.

Gov. GEORGE PATAKI: I shrunk the size of New York State's government when I left. We had reduced [state] employment by over 25,000 and cut taxes.

JINDAL: What we did is we cut state spending. We've cut our budget 26%, according to Cato and other analyses, the only candidate that's actually reduced government spending. We've got a choice: You grow the government economy or the American economy.

On Budget & Economy: $18 trillion debt means economy is running off a cliff

On Budget & Economy: Balance budgets by zero-based budgeting; they're not "cuts"

On Corporations: Get rid of both corporate tax and corporate welfare

JINDAL: I'd get rid of the corporate tax. We do have the highest corporate tax rate in the developed world. I'd get rid of it. I'd get rid of all the corporate welfare. Make the CEOs pay their same tax rates the way the rest of us do. Get rid of the corporate tax, bring those jobs and investment here to the United States, stop sending jobs and investment overseas.

On Education: Dollars follow the child; parents decide

JINDAL: They should be accountable to their students through the market. For some reason, the private sector is a bad word to this president. It's not in the real world. In Louisiana, we fought so that the dollars follow the child and so the child following the dollar. What that means, from K-12, what that means is that parents and their families can decide what's the best way for their children to be educated. You either trust the American people or you don't. I know the Left doesn't. That's why you get ObamaCare. That's why you get Common Core, they want to take away our gun rights under the Second Amendment. They want to take away our religious liberty rights. So, yes, there's accountability. There's accountability to students through choice and competition. We don't need the nanny state to protect us from ourselves.

On Education: TOPS program: free tuition for good college grades

JINDAL: Absolutely they should be accountable. They should be accountable to their students through the market. Look, you either trust the American people to make their own choices or you don't. I know the Left thinks we need to be protected from ourselves. President Obama is trying to limit competition to the higher education market. In Louisiana, we have a TOPS program, where we will help if a student maintains a 2.5 GPA, we'll pay for their tuition. They can take those dollars for private school of their choice in the state as well.

[OnTheIssues note; TOPS, the Taylor Opportunity Program for Students, is a program of state scholarships for Louisiana residents who attend public colleges or technical schools. The TOPS Program includes: TOPS Opportunity Awards, TOPS Performance Awards, TOPS Honors Awards, and TOPS Tech Awards.]

On Energy & Oil: Energy jobs are good-paying jobs, but EPA disallows them

On Government Reform: Cuts to reclaim American dream & end European-type nightmare

On Principles & Values: Save the idea of America before it's too late

On Tax Reform: Set tax brackets at 25% and 10%, then 2% even for the poor

JINDAL: I'd simplify the brackets to 25%, 10%, 2%, so that an average middle-class family that pays 25% today, would pay 10% under my plan. I think everybody should pay something, even if it's only 2%. That's the most important 2% in my plan. There are millions of folks that wouldn't pay taxes in Jeb's plan and Trump's plan. I think that's a mistake.

Q: But every working American pays 6.2%, when it comes to Social Security taxes. They pay another 1.45% of Medicare. Isn't that skin in the game?

JINDAL: You're talking about payroll taxes that fund programs. People pay for their Medicare, they pay for their Social Security. I want every American to worry and care about how those folks in D.C. are spending our money. I don't want us to continue to create one class of Americans that pays income taxes, that pays for government, another class of Americans that's growing more and more dependent on government. That's what we have today.

On Tax Reform: FactCheck: JFK lowered top income tax rate from 91% to 65%

Jindal was referring to a 1962 speech in which JFK pledged "across-the-board, top-to-bottom cut in personal and corporate income taxes" for the purpose of stimulating the economy. So is Jindal making a fair analogy?

No, because the top marginal tax rate in 1962 was 91% and JFK proposed lowering the top rate to 65% (compared to a top rate of 37% today). In the context of much higher rates in 1962, cutting tax rates meant something very different than today--Jindal knew that context, and hence was lying about JFK's proposal. No politician of any party today would even consider RAISING tax rates to the LOWER 65% levels proposed by JFK in 1962!