through the undersecretary flournoy but that is a whole separate undertaking i will certainly find out where it stands. lastly check it was still a work in progress. >> the notion of the 60 day review does that mean there could be some sort of delay in terms of a surge of operations and more forces going in and i

guess we are expecting to see at some point a change in terms of operations particularly in the south. >> i think you're seeing a step change already has additional forces hit the ground your seeing them utilized. nobody is waiting for all the forces on the ground and get this review undertaken before we put them to good use. as forces are right and their equipment arrives with them, they are being pushed out and engaging. they are engaging with the enemy. they are protecting the population. they are clearing, holding and building. that is what they are doing and they are not going to wait for this review to undertake it. >> so they are going out according to an old plan and in the meantime reviewing the plan as they go -- >> with the secretary has asked is they with the strategy once they hit the ground. that doesn't mean if it's or data or wrong. he asked them -- they've both

been out of theater for a year now. i mean, general rodriguez has been out a way for more than a year now. stan came out a way the same time. if the have to be modifications made it, they will make them. in the meantime, it's all the forces being utilized to the maximum of fact according to the game plan we have now. that doesn't preclude the possibility that general mcchrystial wants to make changes he's obviously within his power to do so but fundamentally the secretary wants a review of the situation from their perspective within 60 days. >> can i ask a quick -- last week secretary donnelly of the air force said airforce would soon be presented to secretary gates the plan going forward on acquisition strategy for the

tanker. can you give a sense when gates may be briefed on this -- >> i blood, tony, locule away from this notion there is one briefing or one meeting that is going to determine the course of the tanker replacement bidding process. the secretary engaging has been and will be engaging in a number of meetings about this and i don't know when the next one is scheduled for. i think the idea was always keep wants to push out rfp as soon as possible and we hope that will take place in the coming weeks. >> [inaudible] >> that is what we hope to be the case. >> not the meetings but the rfp. >> i think -- listen, i will go back and check to see where we are in terms of his meetings and when this request for proposals will go out. i think his desire always has been -- you know, originally it

was spring. i think we are here now in the summer. we want to commence this as soon as possible. >> you are going to get goral on it tomorrow so you might as well check today. >> thank you, tony is always helping out. >> nato top officials recommend now to cut the alliance forces in kosovo by one-third by january. i was wondering if you could tell if the pentagon is preparing for that withdrawal of u.s. forces participating in the operation? >> i have not heard that, daphne. although i'm sure in operations meetings in brussels it will come up. i mean, kosovo will certainly be a subject of discussion when we are in brussels later this week. >> are you aware of any recommendation of that sort? >> i am not. i mean i'm aware that we were together out to get there. so i wonder how paring down the force impacts that and whether or not u.s. forces would be part of that. i have not heard discussions internally about of gaining any

forces as a result of some sort of nato drawdown in kosovo. obviously that would be nice. it would speak to the success of the operation but also free up additional forces to elsewhere and hopefully alternately increased well time. okay? thank you so much. [inaudible conversations]

hall is c-span funded? >> private donations. >> tax payers. >> i don't really know shapira read >> public television. >> donations. >> i don't where the money comes ramesh. >> federal de. >> contributions from donors. >> 30 years ago america's cable companies created c-span as a public-service, private business initiative, no government mandate, no government money. next educator erin gruwell delivers the commencement address at deepak college, she is best known behind the freedom riders diary and freedom riders

association. >> [inaudible] [inaudible] -- as of this moment and so i would like to talk about stories. the freedom riders believe everyone has a story. they look out at these 454 inches graduates i realize each and every one of you have a story. a story about what brought you here, a story about what kaptur here and more important the legacy of the story will continue once you've left. so i take you back to my first

day sitting in the audience and thinking about my future. at that point i thought i was going to be a lawyer, god forbid. and i thought i was going to be a lawyer because my father thought that was the only way i could afford to buy a home in newport beach, the community in which i lived. when i made the decision i didn't want to fight battles in the courtroom, that i would rather fight battles in the classroom and not those safe classrooms i grew up in the classrooms that had kids that were struggling, struggling with civil strife, discrimination and racism and abject poverty my father didn't take the news so well. in fact he commented teachers don't make any money, which is true. he said i would never afford a home in newport beach, which is still true. and he thought i needed to wear a bulletproof vest every day. i'm here to tell you i quickly learned there is a huge disconnect between theory and practice, which i learned in my halls of academia. because of on the very first day when i walked into my classroom

in long beach, california i was absolutely clueless. the first day i wore polka dots and pearls and as i was about to go to the 45 minute drive from my home to the city my father called in panic and said no matter what you do please do not eat apples. he convinced himself all of the apples were either leased or had razor blades. [laughter] okay, dad. as i made the drive from newport beach into the city i learned in this community there was a lot of hopelessness. 126 murders had taken place along that summer. i walked through metal detectors, went into a classroom, it was elected. there were no textbooks, no technology and there was no eager reston's like yourself ready to dive in and learn about shakespeare. and i quickly found out students knick team everyone in the syllabus white guys with tights.

these students learn if they put down their fists, put down the gun or this break-in and increase education. as most of you know education is the greatest way to equalize it very on freer play infield and my life changed on that very first day when a young woman walked into my classroom. a young woman like many graduates today. a young girl that never sat at her daddy's lap and read about the green eggs and ham, never identified waldo and instead this young girl was angry because she spent the better part of every weekend driving eight hours to visit her father who was incarcerated. a man and an orange jumpsuit who would have five minutes to pick up a telephone, put his hand on plexiglas and try to teach this young latina to be strong, a woman warrior or aztec princess. little maria walked into my class that day and wasn't carrying a shiny apples like my father predicted. instead she walked in with an ankle monitor around her leg and a probation officer.

14-years-old. she was a freshman in high school and by the time this little girl was a freshman in high school she had already been and what can and juvenile hall and in her mind she thought it was a revolving door. and matter of time before i make a mistake again and am back behind bars because in her mind, because she had done bad things therefore she was a bad person. as i looked at little maria in the back corner in my classroom i think she must have used an entire khanna of gwyneth hair spray. her bangs were out to here, she had dark lipstick and dark makeup to disguise a black eye she had received days earlier when she was released from the juvenile hall. when i gave her her journal to tell her story at that point she didn't think she had a story. she thought my store has already been told in the back of my mother or my grandmother or everyone else in my community. so the first two weeks little maria and her journal wrote i hate erin gruwell and fiber is

not on probation i would probably shake her. every day i would pick up the journal eagerly awaiting to see her story and read about how much she hated me. alas, when i asked her to tell me about her journey in the same term that odysseus had an odyssey and he went from point a to b she named him a homey and had to told me she had to go to point a to b to get back to his home boys safe and sound in the same way she did. so i asked her to elaborate on this great many of you have as well. maria told me her story began with this hopeful little girl, this hopeful little girl, 5-years-old was going to be sent to kindergarten and 5-years-old she had a big box of crayons and she was going to take those crayons and were abcs and 12 three's, and she was going to use this blank canvas for all kinds of possibilities. and as this and zero girls took the bus stop waiting for the boss to take her to kindergarten she realized the weight of the world was on her shoulders.

the weight of the world for this american dream that her parents never actualized. how could they? at the age of 11 her father had aspirations he was going to be this professional boxer, muhammad ali, but he was poor. he was marginalized. he didn't have a voice. rather than joining the local gym at the age of 11 he joined the local game and found himself in the better part of his life in and out of jail cells. her mother was sent to kindergarten just like maria put by the age of seven in second grade she dropped out of school. she found herself at home helping her mother make sure everyone else had clean clothes, enough to eat and at the age of 15 she made a bad decision. she got pregnant. by the age of 20 she had three little babies, a one-bedroom apartment and a husband in and out of jail and like so many women in the audience she was proud. she didn't want government assistance or pity so she worked. and as many of you can imagine

what the second grade education her options were limited. so her first job maria would watch her mom get up at the crack of dawn to go clean these big beautiful homes. homes and communities just like this. holmes maria realized at the age of five or two expensive and they would never force. then she would watch her mom, home, change clothes and go off and scrub toilets and fancy hotels. once again, hotels marie realize that the age of five we are never going to afford. and her third job maria but watch her mother changed her clothes again and go to sweatshops to solve these beautiful outfits and beautiful clothes she realized even at the age of 5i am never going to wear and we will never afford. as maria was standing at the bus stop with a box of crayons with this legacy of her parents she saw her cousin and in her mind her cousin was larger than life for the simple fact he was there. he was able model every single night to tucker in bed and told her bedtime stories about the

goodbye making it, nights in shining armor being whisked off on the horse. he was there to heat up food in microwave while her mom was at her third job. so maria

and head off to kindergarten and learn those abc's and 123 c's and she didn't know post-traumatic stress disorder but what she did know immediately at the tender age of five when she looked around the classroom was i look different, i talked different and when i raise my hand what comes out is a combination of english and spanish, some english and people laugh at me and she found the person that left the loudest and longest was a woman with chalk and her hands at a chalkboard, her teacher. at 5-years-old maria, like so many in her community realized it is easier to make people laugh with you that you. it's easier to be a class clown and to be a bully. it's easier to be in on the joke and so maria gave up on school and her teacher i ron ackley became her father.

her father who came home and bought his daughter this present she will never forget that 5-years-old it will send a barbie doll, it wasn't a bicycle, it wasn't a book by dr. seuss, but he bought this little girl shiny red boxing gloves and told her life is tough and when it locks you down you better get back up swinging so at 5-years-old this little girl learn how to swing first and fast, how to keep a stiff upper lip and never show weakness in public, never cried because if she started she may never stop and never rat or snitch on the homeboy. at the age of five this little girl watched her father get handcuffed by the fbi taken to a maximum security prison and spent the next ten years of her life in and out of a low word chevrolet impala driving eight hours to talk to this man in an orange jumpsuit. as she sat in the back of my classroom like so many little girls in our country maria thought her story had been

written. she didn't have hope, didn't have promise and certainly didn't know the word possibility so i decided to find stories written by and for and about kids who actually lived and was and didn't pick up their fist oregon but picked up a pen and told their story. they told the story about what they knew, the hardships that adversity, little girls like and frank, girls in a tiny attic that would look out her window and watch her friends led off like sheep to slaughter. every day for two years ann frank immortalized her story. when i gave the story to maria first she was upset. she looked at the cover and said i don't look like her or talk like her or even preach the same god she prays to. in marinas mind how was this little girl who wasn't latino, didn't speak spanish and was sent from her hood supposed to help her change? i remember asking her to take

this book, and maybe she would find herself in the pages of this book. we picked up a plastic champagne glass and toasted for change and in the back of her mind i know she thought there was no way this will grow from a country i can't identify on a map, how is she supposed to help me change and on her toast for change that date it wasn't about number two pencils or scan shrontz, it wasn't about five estes or book reports. maria's change was profound. this little girl at 14 picked up a plastic champagne glass in one hand and the diary of ann frank in another and simply said i don't want to be pregnant by the time i turn 15 like my mother and i don't want to spend the rest of my life behind bars like my daddy, and i don't want to be 6 feet under by the time i turn 18 like my cousin. i want to change. so this little girl took this book home to her house and thought i'm going to come back

the next day and tell that crazy woman anguished teacher with her polka dots and pearls there's no way i can relate to this little girl from amsterdam. but the saving grace of that particular day was maria was still on house arrest. still had the income monitor around her leg which meant she had to be indoors so she stormed into this little one-bedroom apartment and the lights had been turned off again. there was no food in the refrigerator, again. and her mom was working the third job, again. she cracked open the book for the first time and began to read and there was one sentence and frank had written as if for maria to discover and all it said was sometimes i feel like a bird in a cage and i wish i could fly away. at the moment it was like a lightbulb she had seen in the cartoons before and she felt like ann frank had written that for her because like maria and so many other young women she was the bird in the cage and she

never used her wings to fly so for the first time maria had hope and what finally, finally the good guy is going to make it and anne frank is going to bust out of the attic and all will be right with the world and she kept reading and every day she would come to class and ask these questions and i would think she didn't go to the video store and rent the movie or get the cliff notes or down vote somebody's paper. this little girl is actually reading. the first question she asked when i realized she actually read the book is when she quickly renamed the others in the attic her posse and she wanted to know when they were going to smoke hitler and take him out and i said it's not that kind of book but keep reading. a couple days later she stormed in and maria realized peter, this man in the attic developed a crush on anne frank so maria wanted to know when they were going to look up and do a little sumthin', sumthin'. keep on reading.

every day i thought what kind of question is she going to ask next and then she came in and was furious, yelling and screaming and calling me all kind of naughty names in spanish so i had to find my cheat sheet to find out what she was calling me then she took this $4.99 book and dramatically through it across the room and said why didn't you tell me and i stumbled and said tell you what and she said why didn't you tell me anne frank dot i's and if she doesn't make it what are my chances? at the moment it hit me. this little girl who never picked up a book had finished it and anne frank doesn't make it and a marias' mind she was devastated because in her mind she had done bad things and therefore she was a bad person and she wasn't going to make it. and this good little girl didn't make it work maria's chances and i looked at her and fumbled and i wanted her to realize that in this book, in spite of

everything that there was hope and maybe maria could find if we learn from our history we won't be doomed to repeat it and so maria had this idea rather than writing that boring book report, the five s.a., can i write a letter to the woman who saved anne frank, this simple secretary, a woman who for two years did everything she could to sacrifice her life for the lives of the others and i remember when maria sat down and picked up the journal she used to write i hate erin gruwell and if i wasn't on probation i would probably shake her and perfectly crafted the letter about promise, letter about possibility and the letter about hope so the day before this tiny little woman walked into our lives we thought what are we going to do with this literary icon. a woman who was 87-years-old flying from amsterdam to meet

150 gangsters, what are we going to do with her, where are we going to put her, how can we celebrate this transformation, this metamorphosis? and it was maria's idea to decorate and to make up signs. she got all her gangster buddies to make science and we decorated this room and i wish it was as beautiful as they pass college and but it wasn't. at that moment i realize everyone of those banks terse became picasso and at the very end maria offered her mother's mean sweet potato pie and tamales. at the morning this simple secretary came into our lives that hid anne frank in the distance i saw maria, this little girl that used to have a net ankle monitor around her leg and for the first time i realized she's not so tough and as she came up to me it looked like it was the most important day of her life, a graduation and she was holding on to something like it was her prized

possession, like her leave it on purse and as she got closer i realized it's not a purse, it was a book, $4.99 book that was ripped and torn because she had thrown it across the room but as she got closer with this book, the diary of anne frank she said is there any way we can order this book in spanish and i looked at her and said sure, honey, how come? she commented because my mom wants to read about the little girl that changed my life. and change she did. and as i look at all of you, all of you amazing young women, women who are going to reach their 16th birthday this year sprinkled with, and a few men. [laughter] but as i look at all of you when and i want you to know all loveless on this stage we know the struggles that it took to come here. the strides you took, the early

mornings -- those in the audience i want you to realize women that go to the one day class every saturday, some of these women get up at 4:00 a.m. and drive an hour-and-a-half to this campus and get to the campus at 6:00 or 6:40 and they study and stay here until the lights go down, it's dark and they get home and cook dinner, put their kids in bed and then they study and they are up again at the crack of dawn, struggle. and those women that go home, there are those little kids who look up to their mothers and they say i look like you and i talk like you and i want to be just like you because i believe in super heroes and mommy, you are my superhero. you may not wear colorful underwear and jump over tall buildings in a single bound, but i want you to know each and every one of loss on the stage want to validate the struggles

you make, the mites that you've gone without sleeping and are up the next morning to go to school or work and to make those kids proud, to make your family proud, to make your community proud. so i watched this little girl, maria, who didn't have hope get a second chance, to have hope, to graduate high school, to graduate college and i realize i've created a monster because she recently told a room of members in washington, d.c. she was going to be the first latino secretary of education and she snapped. [laughter] and while she was stepping she was giving a name and face and story to every one of these 450 graduates, because you have that story, you have that snap and swagger and the ability to go home and their to dream and while you dream, realize affairs are going to hitch their star to

you and follow you. so before i commence with all you graduates i would like every single child in this audience that has a proud mother or proud father, you to stand with dignity and raise the roof and hoot and holler and i want every one of these mothers to realize how proud you are so can i look out to see the faces, if you are a proud child, please stand and let's hear it for your mom or father. [applause] the [cheering] [applause] so to the graduating class of bate have college, 20 of nine, i want you to realize your story is yet to be written. you can change the cast of characters, you can rewrite the ending, and you can become

immortal and make all of us proud. you, too, can finish the story. thank you. congratulations. [applause] this week on "the communicators," a discussion on the federally mandated transition to digital