only one -- sir, sir -- >> let me ask -- on medicare i'm for doing it. where the federal government controls it i'm for doing what you say. [inaudible] >> medicare picks up the whole -- we can't run -- >> i would prefer that. i have found medicare to be a very good system. although people said it was socialized medicine 40 years ago and were against it. i think it's been a very well run government program compared to some of the private ones. but i'm not in the majority there. sir, i think we -- [inaudible] >> all right. thank you so much for taking our questions here tonight, congressman. i have a general -- i have a general point of view that h.r. 32 should be scraped in total. and starting from fresh. primarily because i think the congressional budget office and

contrary to what you mentioned a moment ago regarding funding, i think the congressional budget office has indicated that this bill would practically bankrupt the economy of the united states government. but notwithstanding that, you've read twice now pertaining to illegal -- illegals and the coverage that would be denied them but on section 152, page 50 and y=ñ51, i believez there's ay detailed description of how illegals and immigrant illegals, in fact, will be covered under this legislation. >> what section -- >> section 152. section 152. >> page 50 -- >> page 50 and 51. >> 50 and 51 of the text now is sections 451 and -- or 451. so -- let me -- it's not on the page you said in the final

version. >> what version do you have, sir? >> the one that was just reported out 3200 as reported out of the three committees. >> what was the date -- section 152, prohibiting discrimination in healthcare. except as otherwise explicitly permitted by this act and subsequent rejections all healthcare covered by this act shall be provided without regard to personal characteristics. that does not --. >> would have you continue sir. >> in 18 months after the day of act promulgate regulations necessary to the healthcare and related services are provided without regard to personal characteristics, extraneous of high quality healthcare services but you notice it says except as otherwise explicit permitted by this act. the language i read is that reference. in other words, this says no discrimination based on race or gender or sexual orientation or religion.

what the bill says is -- i read you a section that says no one who's not here illegally. here's what it says, except as otherwise explicitly permitted by this act. the language i read excluding people who are here illegally is explicitly permitted by this act. so that's why your reading of this is not correct. because this provision here is modified by that explicit permission more than permission, mandate to deny it to people who are here illegally. the antidiscrimination -- the antidiscrimination deals with what you generally have with antidiscrimination, race, religion, sexual orientation, et cetera. as to illegal aliens, this says except as otherwise explicitly permitted by this act and the language i read is the explicit permission to do the discrimination as it were fwlaishg. -- in this case. [applause] >> all right. i'll keep reading.

you want me to keep reading? >> no. >> no, no. but some don't and some never will but -- i want to keep reading. the next section says, whistle blower protection. that's the next section. it has nothing to do with discrimination. so i kept reading and the next line after what i read says, whistle blower protection. i don't want to be excused of having read the bill by people who object when i do. yes, sir. >> good evening. [laughter] >> just for the record, i'm not a member of the mob or the brooks brothers brigade. i am a union member. teamster from local 251 for 20 years.ih' my concern -- i need to ask you a question. do you really favor this bill? do you like it? >> i favor most of it. i would like to amend it with regard to the extent to which

there's a tax based on employment. small businesses are exempted up to payrolls of half a million. i'd like to reduce it. i would like -- by the way, i will have to differ with the previous questioner who said contrary to what i said the congressional budget office. no, i never disputed what the congressional budget said. i know this bill will cost money. i want to raise the money and i think it will cost money so we don't have to raise money for earmarks for the hospital and fishermen can get healthcare. i don't want to take though the way this bill does but taxing people who are unemployed. i like the tax of bill who taxes incomes above $350,000 a year. i like the part of the bill that deals with -- with tax evasion overseas. there are several provisions there. [applause] >> and as i said with regard to the war in iraq, i believe america is making a great mistake by becoming the military

protector of the whole world. [applause] >> i think we could substantially reduce -- we could substantially reduce military spending. i just sided with the president killing the f-22 a wonderful weapon that was aimed of defeating the soviet union in the war. i will go further -- the fact that the kurds and the arabs in the northern part of iraq are mad at us is no reason to spend an additional tens of billions of dollars to referee that fight and reducing cold war weapons and cutting back -- i don't understand why a wealthy european nation allies have to have military budgets one-quarter of ours as a percentage. why they can't do more themselves. and that would generate enough money. i will say this, if we hadn't gone to the war in iraq, which i thought was a terrible mistake and voted against, we would have had more than enough to pay for healthcare. [applause]

>> i was wondering, can you pledge to all of us here tonight that if a new government single-payer system is instituted that you will opt out of your cadillac insurance and into the same one that we will be forced to take? [applause] >> well, as i said before, first, unfortunately, there won't be a government single-payer and i would join it. secondly, i wasn't clear when i said -- i'm just curious do you really think that's thoughtful conversation. do you think that advances your argument? i thought you were thoughtful people here to have a conversation. i'm disappointed at the level of response. [inaudible] >> well, i would hope but not on the same grounds. i'm trying to respond to your questions, responding to hoots is kind of hard.

as far as this is concerned -- and i do say this, i get -- to be honest with you -- [inaudible] >> quiet! >> can we let the congressman answer the question so we can get to everybody's question tonight? >> i just have to tell you, sometimes you're not sure what you're getting right. i feel very confident that you start hooting, i guess, i think that must be a good answer. i'm on medicare. i've been on medicare since 1965. i'll continue to be on medicare. i'm not going to get any younger. [inaudible] >> which one wants to yell first? i have the same as the other federal employees. it's in blue cross blue shield. here's the argument, if i'm going to vote for a bill that will have a public option as an option, people will have the option. no one will be forced into the plan. if people -- and here's the

great contradiction i get from people. >> quiet! >> one is oh, if you have this public plan, it's going to be bad because it will ration and the government can't run things and, two, it'll be so popular everybody will go in and undercut the rest. it can't be both. so the answer is, we will have a public option out there. there's no inconsistency. i am not voting for any bill that forces anybody into anything. it will have a public option and some people will want to go into it and some people will not want to go into it. my guess is if you are on medicare, that virtually nobody who is on medicaid will go into it because medicare -- the public option will be for people who don't have medicare and it will be much broader in coverage. and those of us who have medicare will continue to be looking for a supplemental plan rather than a full plan. that's simply a matter of logic. yes, sir. >> we can't afford supplemental plans now. >> well, yes, that's one of the things i like about this bill. people who cannot afford supplemental plans who are

working people but aren't getting paid sufficient to get a supplemental plan will get a degree of support from the federal government, as long as they're not illegal aliens, remember, to be able to pay for it. and that's a good thing. i have a lot of people that i represent who work very hard who can't afford healthcare. it's not offered by their employer. and this bill will provide them some subsidies to go and get it. yes, sir. >> chairman -- i mean, congressman. i have a question. >> hold on. hold on. >> i actually have a question from somebody who could not make it tonight. so i just wanted to get it in, you know, before we can get to the rest of the questions. this is from john sylvia, jr. as chairman of the banking committee, if the banks charge 6.5%, why can't banks live off 2.5% and use the remaining 4% as interest on cds and general savings accounts? >> because we have essentially a

free enterprise system and we don't control prices. i am disappointed that the banks -- >> quiet! >> somebody sent in a question -- what can disturb you? the answer is essentially that banks are free to do as they wish in terms of the prices they set. i do believe there have been problems with consumer abuses. one of the things that i will be working on most when we return is the establishment of a consumer financial protection administration to protect consumers against overcharges and abuses by banks. i think with regard to credit cards and overdraft fees -- [inaudible] >> what, sir? [inaudible] >> i'm sorry. you're yelling -- what? >> don't acknowledge it. >> you're right.

>> answer the question. >> we are trying to pass a bill that will provide much better protection. right now if you have a complaint about a bank practice -- and one of the problems the banks -- what we've had is banks aren't making as much money as they used to from loans. loans are being made outside the banking system. that's part of our problem. they are not regulated. so the banks have been increasing the big banks, community banks by the way have not been the problem here. let's differentiate. but the bigger banks have been trying to raise more money from fees so they give you overdraft protection even if you didn't ask for it and whack you when the check is written. they have not been fair on credit cards. they have done other things. we did pass a bill to restrain them on credit cards. going forward, i hope we will establish this consumer protect -- this consumer financial protection commission that will regulate bank practices to make them fair. and particularly with big banks and the nonbanks the

check-cashers and the payday lenders and others who have been scamming others. [inaudible] >> my name is robert, and i'd like to try to bring some civility back into this discussion by trying to remind people that in 1787 four handwritten pages, four handwritten pages, authored by 55 men, a total of 4553 words wrote the constitution of the united states. we have a 1,000-page -- we have a 1,000-page article today that people are very confused about and don't understand what's happening. my concern is that when the constitution was written, the farmers and the trades men dealt

with their representatives head to head. today the only people that you deal with, 99% of the times, are lobbyists, special interests, unions and all of that. [applause] >> we're not represented today. and to prove it, when you listen to washington talking about this health bill, even though 85% of the people are satisfied with their health insurance and don't want to change, the politicians in washington are saying, we're going to do what we want. [applause] >> an example of tort reform would be, attorney john edwards,

did $160 million of business off 63 malpractice suits, okay? made 50-plus million. it's all over the internet and all kinds of stories from both sides. this is what malpractice insurance is costing doctors, okay? the first thing you should do is abandon the law groups. thank you. [applause] >> first -- my first disagreement -- my first disagreement is -- my first disagreement is with your lumping unions in there and special interests. i disagree with that. i'm sorry, if you want more sir, but i'd like to be able to respond. are you finished? okay. let me go back again.

i think that denigrating unions that way is a great mistake. no, you said all i talk to -- we talk to are lobbyists, special interests, unions. if that's praise, boy, i'd hate to hear your criticisms. you were lumping unions in people who were not valid working men and women. i disagree with that. i found maybe unions to be here in massachusetts, here in southeastern massachusetts very important. the building trades, the food and commercial workers, the people who represented the fishermen, the -- [inaudible] >> does that mean they don't count? 13% of the population is kind of a lot. [inaudible] >> i guess i don't understand -- is it because you don't like what i'm saying? [inaudible] >> what's that? i was answering the question by saying that i disagree -- i'm proud that i work with unions and working men and women, and i think they are very representative of people who

need some help. [applause] >> secondly, when you say that's who i spend 99% of my time with, you're extremely wrong. i am very proud of the fact that i spend a lot of time here in my congressional district meeting with a wide range of people. i don't generally call meetings. i frankly think those tend not to be terribly useful. i have not been wholly dissuaded from that view by this evening's performance by some. [laughter] >> i have found that it's most useful for me to accept invitations from people in my district and go and meet with them on their turf, where they feel comfortable, where there's no effort to kind of turn out the troops on one side or the other. there's nothing wrong with that but it seems to me less likely to give me a representative group of people. so i am glad to accept invitations as i've done all over my district where i have done here. i know there was something in the standard i'm sorry

complaining that i was in situ because they asked me not to come. i haven't been able to do as much with people outside my district since i became committee chairman. i was in plymouth the other day going to meetings that other people have. so your suggestion that i don't listen to average people is dead wrong. i also -- i was new bedford last week. a couple people came to my office to talk about healthcare and anybody in my district wants to come see me. i reject. the fact the that the constitution was a small number of pages and this bill is bigger is not really a valid argument against the bill. the constitution was meant to be broad general principles. it wasn't -- and by the way, even then it was too short because the guys who wrote the constitution forget a bill of rights. so they admitted that in their haste -- and i'm very glad that they corrected themselves by passing the bill of rights.

they had a lot of things. but the fact is the constitution is different than a law as it should be because the constitution has broad general principles and the law is much more specific. in fact, some of the complaints that we've had is that there weren't enough specifics. people thought that the language about illegal people here wasn't tough enough or some of the other protections weren't tough enough. but the general point that i don't listen, no, i spend a lot of time talking to fishermen who don't have healthcare. you're telling me i talk to lobbyists. i've worked and i've toured the new bedford community health center. there's not a lot of lobbyists there. really not. a lot of poor people who need healthcare and the very dedicated people who work there for very little money and i try to get them more money so i don't apologize for the people i have responded to. i've been through st. luke's. i've been to the people from the unions, not lobbyists and the unions who represent hospital workers and people who clean bed

pans and clean up messes that sick people make and it is their interest that i'm pushing for healthcare. [inaudible] >> what's the matter with you all? >> you! >> i don't know if you get angry when i answer the question. i don't think you like it when i do? yes, sir. >> how are you doing, mr. congressman. my name is victor and i'm from fall river. with all due respect i see a lot of smart people in this room. i don't understand how they keep electing you back to congress. [applause] >> you say that, you know -- you want us to trust you with healthcare. >> i didn't say that. >> let me finish that question. >> quote me correctly. i never said that i wanted you to trust me. >> you're part of the process, are you not? >> yes. >> are you going to vote for the bill? >> probably. >> okay. all right.

so let me finish my question. a few months ago there's an article in the "new york times" highly conservative bashing for conservative philosophy where you were quoted back in 2003 saying that the lending practices of fannie mae and freddie mac were fine. and in 2005, you said the same thing. and now you're here blaming bush for the mortgage meltdown. how can we trust you with healthcare, sir. can you answer that question? >> yes. >> we pay 35% of our income towards income tax. you're going to bankrupt this country. you and the democrats and you're making a mistake. you're going to end that with my generation and we're going to pay more taxes because of you, sir. [applause] >> first of all -- first of all, the biggest single waste of money in front one fail swoop in federal history was the war in

iraq. [applause] >> it was a terrible idea. [booing] >> the more you don't like it the more you yell. [inaudible] >> i'm sorry. i don't understand your mentality. what do you think you accomplish by yelling. what do you accomplish by yelling? we're having a situation here where people can ask questions. they asked the questions. i answer the questions. maybe one of you will get up to the microphone if that's not too much of a imposition of why you think yelling is helpful. i think the war in iraq was a terrible mistake and i continue to believe that the military budget -- the military budget -- [inaudible] >> the military budget is excessive, not just in iraq but going forward. by the way, the war in iraq is not over and it should be. we are still referees an internal set of fight.

there was never a threat to the united states. if you thought there was one there's not one now. they want to spent tens of billions dollars more and that's a mistake. [inaudible] >> i will explain this to you, sir. you said you're worried about the deficit. then you said you weren't talking about the war. who do you think paid for the war, santa claus? the deficit was exacerbated by the war. that's a problem in your thinking. you say you're not talking about the war. >> i'm talking about healthcare. >> sir, you said the deficit. now, i'll tell you what. if you have any more comments you make them. i've got to respond without disruption. i didn't interrupt you. >> you did. >> all right. the point is -- the question was not about healthcare it was about fannie mae and the deficit. it wasn't about healthcare. and the deficit -- the single biggest factor in the increase in the deficit in my judgment recently was the war in iraq and the -- much more economic recovery bill and with no return to us.

and so what we have here is a continued excess military spending. there are other areas i want to cut back agricultural subsidies. i don't want to send a man to mars for hundreds of billions of dollars. as far as fannie mae and freddie mac -- these are the things that causes the deficit. here's the issue with fannie mae and freddie mac. yes, in 2003, i said that i didn't think they were in crisis. i didn't think there was a crisis in lehman brothers or merrill lynch or any of the others. what happened was, yes, i invite you to read mark zandi's book. it was in the globe on sunday. it was in the "wall street journal" a week ago. the bush administration decided that their way to help low-incomed people was greatly to unlike mortgages for lower-incomed people. i thought that was a mistake. i said that i thought we should help lower-incomed people by building rental housing for them. we should build rental housing for them. well, give out the paper that shows you the quote from 2003,

2004. in 2005, i joined an effort by the republican chairman of the financial service committee, i was in the minority, to pass a bill to regulate fannie mae and freddie mac. the republicans in the house passed the bill. [inaudible] >> are you incapable of a conversation in which you talk and then i talk and you have to interrupt? i don't ask you to trust me. i ask you to have a civil conversation and not interrupt all the time. now, the point is that's a fact. i was in the minority from 1995 till 2006. in 2005, i did try to help the republicans pass the bill. i then didn't like it in the end because what they did to rental housing but -- and we were also trying to restrict subprime mortgage lending. we tried to pass a bill to do it. the republicans got into a fight. the house republicans, the senate republicans and george bush. they controlled the whole congress. so how could it be my fault that no bill passed from 1995 to 2006? in 2007, i became the chairman

of the committee. several months after i became chairman of the committee, we passed the bill to regulate fannie mae and freddie mac very toughly because it included a special provision for low-incomed rental housing that didn't cause any of the economic problems. the senate didn't pass it till 2008. so those are the facts. yes, i didn't think there was a problem until bush started to increase subprime mortgage lending. laughter is a substitute -- let me ask you now. what that i just said is inaccurate. let me summarize it for you and you respond. [inaudible] >> let me summarize it and then you respond. here's the summary. in 2003, i thought that they didn't have a crisis. in 2004, i objected when bush sneaked -- increased the -- and in 2005 the republicans in the

senate defeated that bill, wanted a different bill. the chairman of the committee and the house republican mike ilsley said george bush gave them the one fingered salute and nothing happened. in 2007, when i became the chairman, first time i had the ability to do anything we passed the bill within six months. so now what's wrong in what i just said? [inaudible] >> to answer your question, because it's never your fault -- >> what's in accurate in what i just said. >> let me finish. can i finish you. >> i'm going to interrupt you in what you interrupted me? what in what i just said is inaccurate. >> first of all, the bush administration actually proposed at one point to -- i don't recall what year it was but they proposed -- they were asking questions if there were problems with the subprime mortgages of lending system and you said -- you were quoted several times there's no problem. it's your fault, sir.

>> i'm going to respond -- [applause] >> it's only their fault -- [inaudible] >> yes, i'll tell you what was my fault. not when the republicans were running the house. i did in 2007 -- first i filed a bill to register hedge funds. there was a lot of criticism that that was too much regulation. i backed off. i shouldn't have. but i want to go back. you notice you didn't differ anything i said. yes, bush -- he did not raise the question about subprime mortgages. we tried to pass a bill to regulate subprime mortgages bush opposed. he opposed fannie mae and freddie mac when the republicans were controlling congress. the republicans in the house passed a version he didn't like. the republicans in the senate objected. it didn't pass. two years later when bush was still president, i got the bill passed when i became chairman that bush wanted. those are the facts. i only blame the republicans

when they were in power. [inaudible] >> what specifically -- i want to stick with this. what specifically -- please. i think it's important to take some of these things to a logical conclusion. the republicans were in power from 1995 through 2006. i was not in charge of legislation. when i became in charge of legislation in january of 2007, i helped the committee i chaired pass the bill. so the problem was and the problem was among the republicans and do i blame the republicans? yes, when they're in power. i will take full responsibility for anything that happened once we came into power but that wasn't until january of 2007. yes, sir. >> i'm a physician living and serving this town, all right? i see patients every day at my outpatient practice and i'm appalled by the fact that i have full insurance -- insurance, i'm

sorry. healthcare rights in my other country, turkey. i'm a dual citizen. i'm proud to be an american. [applause] >> however they give me full health insurance for free because i'm a citizen of that country and they have that in their constitution, healthcare is a right for all the people of that country. we don't have it here. ..

>> and i have to pay $75 every time i walk in the emergency room. i told my daughter was in traffic accident not to go to the hospital. she didn't die. she said i signed the paper, to get an endless. what is this, a joke? if it is is broken down to the ground. [applause] >> well, first of all, different societies have different systems. we're never going to be in the united states given our traditions and political situation, we're not going to the kind of filter that many other countries have. i do have to go as a physician, is the quality of health care in turkey substantially worse than the quality or? >> it is perfect with one. my father had a heart attack. had all kinds of procedures. is a person who serve for his

country and he gives them free. is retired. >> i think we are not going to get -- let me say first we have done that partially in america with medicare. and in fact, if you listen to the critics, medicare is subject of course to all of the criticisms even more of a criticism that people dispel. the medicare system has more control, etc. then this bill does. so i am puzzled how people who support now, it is to medicare was part of that. i lot of people had to get part of medicare. some of what you complain about when you're trying to deal with, the health insurance companies have made some agreements it because of this bill going forward, they will not be excluding people for preexisting conditions. they will not be doing some other things. sold it will be as a result of negotiations in this bill some improvements in the private health insurance. the second point is that's the argument for the public option.

i believe in free enterprise system, but there is an element that is important for the free market system to work well, and that choice. i have a love choice about what i buy as to food or clothing or entertainment or where i live. but what health care, most of us don't have choice. you cannot decide not to get health care. that's why i think the market system does not work as well in health care as it does in those commodities where the consumer -- because the main thing the consumer can say no. but you cannot say no to help you. that's what the public option will do and it's a test that there are people who say the public option will restrict your choice. wheldon, people won't take it. i think it will save us money because you will take away the element of profit in the insurance industry, but they will compete with each other and then we'll see which works better. [applause] >> go ahead.

>> good evening, congressman. i would take you so much for coming to visit your constituents in massachusetts tonight. and i want to applaud anyone here who did show up here it is a hot, steamy night here in august and i know all of you folks would rather be home with your loved one so thank you all for showing a. congressman frank, do you think the population into my be representative of your constituent base? because to me i hear -- >> i have no way of knowing. >> i hear they don't want their health care reform as it is written currently, i'm a question to you is very simple. if your constituents are overwhelmingly opposed to it the way it is now, is there anyway you would go against the obama administration in your own party and reject it? >> let me do a couple things here. [applause] >> first -- first, no one has a way of.com 650,000 people who live in this district that no one has any way of knowing nor is irrelevant whether this particular group is representative or not because

that's not how you make decisions based on a few people who come out on a hot night. so the answer is no one knows. secondly, will i sometimes oppose my constituents? i think a majority of the people i represent were for the patriot act. and 2001, after that terrible mass murder of so many americans, the patriot act look like it was very popular. i thought was a mistake. i thought it did not fully respect our tradition of liberty and i thought there were ways we could protect ourselves without that. so i voted against it. i think was unpopular at the time. i think because people believed in the majority, and correctly it turned out, that saddam hussein had weapons of mass instruction, i think that might've been popular. i voted against it. i will vote based on what i think is the best public policy. there are a lot of people who are for it, a lot of people who are against it. at this point by the way, i don't know how anybody can have an absolute firm opinion because

there are some important choices still to be made. i would like to go back to the extent we raise health care money for this bill by taxation and increase it by finding funds elsewhere. but that's the answer to your question. >> hello. my name is aaron and i am with. [inaudible] two years ago i came to you in the congress at the cafeteria and you freaked out. because i introduced you to the homeowners and bank protection act which was the only solution for the economic crisis we face in this nation. you went with the bailouts. you said no, we've got to save wall street. >> i never said that. >> you went with that. that's what you went with. and goldman sachs and all these other banking apparatus is, cost billions of dollars of u.s. taxpayer money. instead of doing what was necessary for this country, number one, bankruptcy

reorganization. put the federal reserve in bankruptcy. shot, shut it down. in the process of building a hamiltonian system which this nation was founded on. national banking system that you have got to get rid of the worthless debt -- >> what is your question? >> you have to get -- >> what is your question? >> that's what we're here for. >> let him talk. >> you have to get rid of all the worthless derivatives and other debt that has no valid -- nothing, no validity to u.s. taxpayers. we're going to put the whole system, charter banks, bankruptcy organization. if you do not do that, you screw the nation. >> first of all, i did just that it is true when the secretary of

treasury and the chairman of the federal reserve came to us last september, in the bush administration, and said if we don't lend money to the bank were going to have a terrible crisis. i felt we had no choice. we did not do it the way they wanted us to. we put some restrictions on. some of those -- by the way, many of those banks have now pay back their money with interest. we haven't lost the whole 700 billion. we've gotten back from several of those banks. in fact, the first $200 billion went in less than a year, 75 billion has been returned, and i believe we will get more. secondly, we insisted on compensation restrictions. we try to force them to do foreclosure relief. i disagree with the secretary treasury on that. asked to bankruptcy, i do favor and house did pass a bill to allow to declare bankruptcy with regard to their primary residence. and they're not allowed to do that from a law goes back to the '70s. unfortunately, that died in the

senate. so we weren't able to get the. i am disappointed with the banks on foreclosure. i do have one proposal now, and some of the money that is being repaid from the bank rescue plan, the t.a.r.p. plan, comes back as they pay back dividends and interest we have made profit from some of them. i want to make that available as a loan to people who had good mortgages. not subprime mortgages, but good mortgage. but it was their jobs. we have a new way of foreclosures from people who are very responsible when they got their mortgage. they did get some mortgages they couldn't afford, but you can't pay a mortgage at a unemployment compensation. we can lend them the money and get it repaid, do them some good but also avoid more foreclosure. i will be fighting for that when we get back. >> and i just say something? if anybody has a political stance and not a question, the microphone will be cut off. we want to get the questions so everybody should be her. thank you spirit and i do want

to respond because the gentleman identified himself. they're the ones giving out the picture of a president with a hitler mustache. i do want to make clear how contemptible i think that is. and it is -- i think it is an example of the strength of the first amendment. they have a perfect right to be utterly contemptible. [laughter] >> thank you for coming. i just wanted to mention something that i've noticed a few blogs that are talking on the internet that these banks all across the country are overvaluing their assets, their mortgages that they hold in their books. and i've actually been to a few foreclosure auctions and i have noticed that banks are buying back houses from themselves in order to have -- to prevent themselves and having a marked on the value of these assets. and they are basically lying to us about their solvency. this is all made possible by the federal reserve lending money to these institutions.

and i just want to ask you, when will you put a jar 12 oh seven, up for a vote to committee? >> one, i complete disagree the fed is the cause of this, but yes, i have been pushing for more openness in the fed back when the democrat were in power and we did get some of it. here's what we plan to do. i want to restrict power to the federal reserve in a number of ways. first of all, they will be the major losers of power if we are successful as i believe we will be, and setting up that financial product protection commission. the federal reserve is now charged with protecting consumers should they were supposed to do sub prime mortgage -- congress in 1994 gave the federal reserve the power to adopt rules to ban that subprime mortgages. alan greenspan refuse to do. they had the power to ban credit card abuses. they have the power to deal with overdrafts.

greenspan did nothing. under bernanke, they started to do things but only after congress started when i became chairman of the committee we begin to act on these things, subprime mortgages, credit cards on over drafts. and every case after we started the fed did. so that's one of the reasons why in the new consumer protection agency, we will take away from the federal reserve the power to do consumer protection. secondly, they've had since 1932 a. right under herbert hoover under democratic congress combined, the right they had and used until recently to intervene in the economy almost whenever they thought. last september the federal reserve came to us and said that they were going to advance $82 billion to aig. i was kind of surprised and said you have $82 billion? mr. bernanke said i have $800 billion or under section 133 of the federal reserve act they can lend money to everyone they want. we're going to put some restraint on it. finally, we will subject them to

complete on. i've been working with ron paul, who is a main sponsor of that bill, he agrees that we don't want to have the audit appear as if it is influencing monetary policy because that would be inflationary and ron and i agree on that it would also say one of the things the audit will show you is what the federal reserve buys and sells. and that will be made public, but not instantly. because of that was made instantly you have a lot of people trading off of that and it would have to much impact on the market. we will probably have that data released after a time period of several months, enough time, so it wouldn't be market sensitive. that'll be part of the overall federal regulation that we are adopting. the house will pass are probably in october. gets. [inaudible] >> testing testing. okay. has anyone in your office or in

the budget office looked at if we adopted for reimbursement of hospitals and doctors the massachusetts schedule for medicare how many billions of dollars we would save? if you are in florida and you need a colonoscopy, it's $4200. in massachusetts, it's $1200. i haven't seen any doctors from here leave and go to florida. there must be something, you, rather diseased there so that's part of the. the other part has anyone looked at removing the cap on salaries and fica as a way of paying for this? >> yes. let me take a last question. >> from what is. >> the last question, well, there is no fica cap on medicare. there is on social security. medicare is now not capped. it was originally. the social security cap, fica,

that social security taxation. it's on the first 90 some odd thousand of your income. as woodbridge, social security is now in good physical shape but it will begin to start to have a problem in 2000, late 2030. there will be a need to do some adjustments then. and one very possible adjustment will be an increase in the cap on the wages. as to the fee setting, i want to differentiate. there will be some -- there is some key setting mechanism in your. part of it is goes back to the doctor mentioned before. there is an effort in this bill to increase the attractiveness of being a primary care physician. there is a problem with compensation with primary care physicians. and there are efforts in there

to incentivize more people to be primary care physicians. at two hospitals, we have a special issue here in massachusetts by the way. look, health care is important messages like other places into his. give, our hospitals saint luke's and saint anne's are big employers. as morton. and in hospitals, and the greater particular boston area they are very important for the states to balance them. a degree of first rate medical care that people coming from all over the world to get and spend money in massachusetts and one of our products, we also have a burgeoning medical products industry which is a high-tech industry less likely to be outsourced. and i., in fact, the were worried about some of the proposals to cut costs, we would impinge too much on our hospitals particular are teaching hospitals which are very important here. so i'm a little bit cautious about that.

>> good evening, mr. frank. >> pull my gun a little bit. >> my name is violet perry and i am 89 years old. and this has something to do with it. of. [inaudible] >> there are approximately 300 million people in this country, approximately 250 of which have health insurance. if we include 50 million more people into the system without increasing the amount of doctors, nurses and facility to treat these patients, how am i or anybody worse than me, for that matter going to be able to get a timely appointment with the doctor once you add in all these new patients? could you please explain. [applause] >> yes. first, i guess i know some of those people don't have health care.

fishermen in new bedford. and i am not comfortable saying to them tough, you don't have health care, and other people do. and i don't want to make room for your. in fact, in the short term, you could do that through -- well for instant the way of been doing this and it would've a terrible shortage of nurses a. that is a great mistake. we have dealt with it in part by improving -- bite importing nurses. that is a short-term approach that i think that is one of the areas we need to be spending more money. i was very pleased with it a day when the president announced great increase in funding for community colleges. i had a conversation with jack springer, the president of community college about nursing. and he said he wishes -- we have a need for nurses around her and we have young people who could be nurses to get people become nurses, by the way, we don't have to worry about outsourcing. you can't stick a needle in somebody from mumbai.

if somebody becomes a nurse it will be working here and the jobless figure. but the cumulative college has too few slots. so increased funding is important. and what i'm saying in the short term it may be for immigration. in the intermediate term i believe we can increase the supply of medical practitioners. and there are some people. we heard of doctor dublin, some people have left the medical profession because of conditions that i believe that the right and approach can draw some of them back in. so i do agree we have to have a good supply but i'm not covetable saying look, some of us have it and a few of you, you know, one that you don't want six of you don't and you get frozen out. so i think in the short term there may be some immigration issue there with people coming here. and in the not to longer term i believe we can increase the supply. >> congressman frank, thank you very much for coming and trying to get some answers to us and to the world.

here in dartmouth. i am joe, and i'm on the chairman of the veterans advisory board here in dartmouth, and i served it in him. and i have quite a few constituents who are worried about their care right now and they are in a special group that is growing very quickly because we are doing a very good job out in the field in iraq and in afghanistan bringing back more of our boys and girls that are doing a great job. but they have a lot of ailments. you did say that you are looking for other sources of revenue, and i understand the situation because dartmouth is looking for other sources of revenue as well. but my question is, as we introduce this new health care for everyone in the united states, including the extra 50 million that don't have any care, the rationing of, you know, resources is going to be very, very tight. how do we avoid the progress

that the pa, the veterans administration, and the veteran groups have made so far in getting the care that they need in bringing up the level of care that they need, and not jeopardize that end, you know, rob peter to pay paul in order to introduce this other larger health care program? >> first, i said the increase will come -- some of these people they should let me go back a step. i should've answered this before. when we say people don't have health coverage, that doesn't mean they're not kidding health care. many of them are getting it. they are getting it in a hospital in urgency rooms a very inefficient way. so it is not they are not getting care. there are some adobe care at all but hospital emergency room are an expensive and inefficient way to do it. so i better use of resources, it's not like more pple getting care as much as more frequently. secondly, and i should've said this first. as far as service is concerned, the debt we owe you and other vietnam vets as well, it has totally registered.

this bill, steve bowler who was the chairman of the veterans affairs committee as a republican in the last chairman who is now the senior republican on the committee offered the amendment to make it recorded nothing in this bill will change the health care. it will not be affected if they will continue to get it. by the way, for those who think government health care is a terrible thing, i suppose you stay out of the veteran's affairs hospitals which are government run hospitals. but which have been a very good job of providing health care. so there will be no change whatsoever in the v.a. and in fact, one of the things that happened over the last couple of years has been a substantial increase in the level of health care. the president had an ill-advised proposal and try to get back. he withdrew it. we are going to go forward, and as you pointed out, medical care has advanced. people are surviving terrible wounds today who would not have survived years ago.

i don't want to say that's good news. george orwell, the author who was shot in the neck during the spanish civil war, and when he survived someone said how lucky, to survive. he said yeah, well all the people who were never shot in the neck in the first place are even larger. there is nothing like you surviving a terrible when. but it does put more of a strain on us and we are all have a better understanding. so that will continue to be a very high priority and there will be a continued increase in the resources. and i don't think it's going to come to that. veterans will come first and continue to comfort and that is very explicit in this bill. >> thank you very much. [applause] >> earlier on your talking about stage actually being in the way of some of the lower reforms that would bring down costs. is there anyway that we could actually sit there and paramount

is to the states and let them be the laboratories of democracy? and sit there, bring it back, allow them to see what still under a stage to do well and then adopt them as well? >> there is an element in the bill that allows the states that want to do something different. one of the questions i have, and i'm working with my colleagues is, massachusetts took the lead in a state program. and again, some of what some people are concerned about your won't affect them because massachusetts is already doing it. there is an effort to give the state some flexibility. the only thing is it won't be that nothing will happen until they do. so that i think what you will probably see is a national approach, but with the states allowed to do some of that differentiation if they want to. >> what about allowing some of those states to do medical savings accounts that are taxer and then also to simply remove

the medical tax deduction to the individual rather than the employer? >> that becomes hard with the federal tax the. i think it might have been separated. the latter i think is a problem, the former could be part of an overall plan and they might pick up some steak came up with a plan that included that i think it would get consideration. >> thank you. >> my name is sheila leavitt. i am from newton, massachusetts. where congressman frank i believe is also from the first of all i would like to thank him for his many, many years of service and for being such a strong advocate for medical care for all people in this country. [applause] >> i am a physician. my husband is a physician. my son is a physician in training at the university of massachusetts medical school. he hopes to go into primary care. i would say that one way that we could try to make sure that there were plenty of people to

serve, people such as the person before the person before me was worried about getting a doctorate is by funding better people who go into primary care, making it more financially possible to do this. because right now, the way the fee schedules are set up, search and get paid a lot for doing procedures, and people don't primary care, pediatrics, ob/gyn, did i get paid very much. so that is one thing. but my question for congressman frank is this. there was a question before about whether or not you believe that the people in this room, the majority of the people in this room, represent the people's opinion in this country. and i would say that i have been to a number of these town hall meetings out of curiosity. around the state. and i've heard the same talking points repeated over and over again. in dvd, i had an elderly woman come up to me in tears, shaking saying that she did not want the death penalty between her and

her god when it came for her to die. now, i think that this is a heinous abuse of peoples days of peoples credulity. i think that the people -- just a minute later i think the people that -- just a minute. just a minute. i said -- >> quiet. >> i'm going to ask a question if you'd just be quiet and let me. asked the question to. >> they had to come a convert to the rule. [laughter] [applause] >> i believe that these poor people are the dupes of people in the insurance industry and other people who have vested interests -- just a minute please okay? who make a lot of money the way the system is set up now. and what i would like to ask congressman frank is why this

was not anticipated, and why the obama administration did not get out ahead of these people? because i met these people, the same people at the sarah palin rallies, before the last election. and guess what? just a minute. and guess what? their side lost. so it must be that the majority of people in this country want the democratic agenda, which includes serious health reform. thank you very much. [booing] [applause] >> let me answer the question. part of the problem i think is from the standpoint of public, the economy being in bad shape when the economy is hurting, people are more inclined i think to be skeptical. nervous but we also have this with regard to institutions. someone said what i ask you to trust in.

i have not asked anybody to trust me. i am judged on what i do. i am pretty explicit about it, but i would say this. there were some of the most respected institutions in the country, in america, the financial institutions turned out to have screwed up very badly. and people lost a lot of confidence. the other thing though you asked how can we anticipate. somethings can't be anticipated. and you talked about the death penalty or this notion that something in this bill would require people who are elderly or sick to be denied medical care and killed is the single stupidest argument i've ever heard in all my years. [applause] there is nothing remotely relevant to it. as i said, you had the investors business daily announcing that it would have killed stephen hawking when it back on it he said no. quite to the contradict some of that was deliberate misinformation. some of it was i think a sign that people and in bad shape. but i do think that part of it

was, as the economy does badly, it's hard to always anticipate how people will react. >> next question. >> i think the administration is missing something in these town hall meetings, which is that it is not just one group. the economy is collapsing. we have 30% real unemployment, 48 states cannot balance their budgets, and they are cutting programs to the bone. this is the context in which the obama administration has said we need health care reform here. >> let me tell you -- >> i'm not done. the reason why is because they say we need to limit medicare expenditures in order to do that, in order to reduce the deficit. that's the origin of this policy. this is the key for policy of

the hitler, of the hitler policy in 1939. where he said certain -- certain lives are not worth living. certain people we should not spend the money to keep them alive, which is exactly what ezekiel emanuel has said. so my question to you, one is this policy is actually on its way out. it already has been defeated by larouche. my question to you is, why do you continue to support a not a policy as obama has expressly supported this policy? why are you supporting it? >> i will -- >> a real solution. >> i will revert to my ethnic carriage and ask untrimmed answer your question with a question. on what planet do you spend most of your time? [applause]

>> [inaudible conversations] >> do you want me to answer the question? yes, as you stand there with a piure of the president defaced to look like hitler, and compare the effort to increase health care to the nazis, my answer to you as i said before it is a trippy to the first amendment that this kind of vile ntemptible nonsense is so freely propagated. [applause] >> ma'am, i try to have a conversation with you would be like trying to argue with a dining room table. i have no interest in doing it. [applause] >> sitdown. >> is this thing back on?

congressman frank? my name is tyler and i've been out of work for 12 weeks. my home mortgage is about to rejust. there isothing i can do to refinance my home right now. what, anything, will this legislation or anything else you are doing right now do to hel me with this? and then i have a follow-up to that. this legislation will, but what i am working on will. as a major before, i have introduced a bill to take the profit we have made on the t.a.r.p.epayments in the form of interest, dividends and warrants, which is now on the first 200 billion, about 800 billion of the first year. and recycle it partly to citi like new bedford which has a terrible problem where there have been foreclosures, which blighted nghborhoods to give the city the money to buy up that foreclosed prerty and use it more constructively. but also to create a loan fund

precisely for people like herself. people who make sound disions to get a mortgage who didn't get an irresnsible mortgage, but if i nacelles outf work and they can't pay a mortge on her unemployed compensation. i am going to be pushing for the bill. i am sorry that the president opposed it. i had a hearing on it. i'm going to push for it when i come back. and as i said take the t.a.r.p. profits and lend them to people who arout of work so they can make their mortgage payments to be repaid cehey get their jobs back. >> i asked for a folw up their candidate a follow-up? myollow-up tthat question is my situation is my own. i walke into a. i al responsib for it. why would i obligate the people who are surrounding me in this room rig now to pay for my personal strife? the government is not the church. socialism is taking money that people don't want to give,

assuming that you can do better with that money than they can. >> i disagree that it is socialism to have unemployment compensation. are you finished? >> turn the mic back on. >> the answer is, first of all, i differ with you that it is socialism to help people who through no fault of their own have lost their jobs. unemployment compensation, by the way, is not just good for individuals. it's very important w to get out of a recession. it's a countercyclical policy that is, as people lose their jobs and can't make purchases, that drags down the whole economy. so unemployment compensation for a limited period of time, which is money from some to others, who've lost -- if you lose your job and it's your fault you're not supposed to beligible. that is not always well enforced. so i do think that it is legitimate to try to help peopl out. secondly, i tnk you came beside which are going to tell me without listening to me. because what i said was we would lend the money to people, not

give it to the -- yes, it comes from -- okay, can i -- again you're not listening to me. it doesn't have to come from somewhere it is going to be repaid. is advanced by the profit we make in the t.a.r.p. but i said, i think you are prepared to respond without listening to me, but that it has to be repaired. are not talking of the subprime mortgage youere not getting money to subprime mortgages. we are telling the bank, not so much whoever lend the money, that they have to accept that. that is not public money. what i said was we would lend the money to people who were in trouble not because they had a bad mortgage, but because they lost their jobs through no fault of their own. i would differ with you when you said that was your situation. if you are included your mortgage -i'm sorry, please.

[inaudible] >> no, what you said -- i was quoting you, you sd you don't see why everybody should hao he with yo personal situation. did you not say that? okay. th is at i was saying. i know, but that's -- i was in thsamehen you said -- i was going what you said and what i'm ying is this. i would differentiate bet someone who is in difficult it sushi was impruddnt, and meone w was in difficulty because of national economic product of the crisis caused them tlose their job for no fault of their own. i would say ithe circumstance of someone whoost a job in this recession, lending them the money, and i keep stressing you, lend the money,t would be lent toeople who didot takeut and prod mortgages which meant that if they gotheir jobs bk they would be o repait i dohinkhat would be a useful thing to do and it uld be a loan to beepd.

>> congressman frank, good evening. thank you for taking my question. my name is don. i believe that this bill, specifiaally the public option, is the first incmental step towards a single pay system. in the past, obama himself has said that he is in favor of an eventual one pay system. how will the private system be able to survive underhis plan? >> well, i also think -- [applause] >> it will survive and prosper, the private insurance comely, if they provide better service. remember, the argument against the single, the public option is that when the government gets in it will run it badly and that it will be too restrictive. i think there are contradictory arguments made against that plan. one is that when the government

runs it will deny people free choice and it will be too restrictive. and two, will be so attracted everybody will join in. you know, if you're a lawyer you can go in court and argue to opposite views. is called arguing in the alternative. you can do that in any of the case. the answer is if the private plan provides better, faster service and doesn't restrict, then it will prosper. the public plan, it's up to the people. people aren't stupid. the public plan doesn't have a subsidy. it doesn't have the profit. the profit that goes to the private insurers stockholders will be out of there. so the question is, and these are the two competing polls. a public plan would have less up front expenses, but people fear that it would be too restrictive in terms of choices. if it is, rational people will not join it. so that's the answer. it will or will not lead to a single-payer. by the way, i am not opposed to single-payer. i like medicare. and medicare is single-payer for elderly people.

[applause] >> what? [inaudible] >> i'm sure, when you all yell at once. so the answer is -- what? >> bankrupt. >> bankrupts. >> a couple things i will say about that, personal, yes, i am in favor of single-payer and that's why i like medicare. you act as if -- you people have discovered in august that i benes cosponsor of the single-payer bill. i think that would be better -- [applause] -- let him go, please. go ahead what did you want to say. >> and then we watched tapes of him and everyone else equally say they are in favor an eventual single pay system. >> sir, it has been 20 years since i had a secret.

[applause] >> and i don't have one now. you have discovered that i am a single pair. i laid been a cosponsor of single payer for years. i'm sorry, sir, may i please, when you're due i will explain this to you. would you prefer? arai. i do believe this. i don't have the votes. the votes are not there in congress for a sing of your. they may not even be there -- [applause] >> once again people have made discoveries that everybody knew for a long time. but the fact is that here's the argument against public option. it will lead to a single-payer is people overwhelmingly prefer it. now if you are one who thinks that when the government runs health care, it will do a lousy job and be too restrictive, you shouldn't worry that people voluntary choose it. i think many people may, because i think having to get health insurance and pay the profit element of it drives up t cost. but no, i have made no secret of

this and i don't understand your is down and the telling item for a. i do believe that we will have competition, and did you think that the private sector will do it much better than the public sector, why are you worried that people voluntarily choose what you think will be the worse plan? [applause] >> let me address medicare being bankrupt. medicare is hurried right now. i put more money into medicare. i know you guys like the iraq war, many of you. i did not. if we could have taken 10% of the money wasted in that table war in iraq and caused young men to die and cause political problems -- [booing] >> you know, you think somehow that this terrible war that did so much damage is irrelevancy. no, it is an example of a mindset.

>> yes or no? >> r. i. let me answer. as medicare bankrupt, no, it is not technically bankrupt. [laughter] >> i am struck by those who think laughter substitute for logic and i guess if that's all you've got that's what you go with. the fact is that medicare does need an additional source of revenue. and i believe it can come from several places. one is increased taxation on people making -- [booing] >> yes. when you are through yelling, call me. one question at a time. quiet down. >> again, here is the deal. if i say something that they think might be popular with the people, they don't want me to get it out. i think taxing people over 300

wi-fi thousand dollars income is a good thing and it will have no negative effect on the economy. [applause] >> your proposals in here, the proposals in here can tighten up overseas tax evasion are good things. there are proposals in here to tighten up -- you know, just because you don't doesn't mean the facts are going to get out. the proposals in the bill to tighten up on american corporations that are shipping activities overseas and evading taxes which could raise tens and tens of billions of dollars each year are good things. i don't understand why you are against them. just because obama propose an. they in this bill. that money would go -- that is what is in the bill to help pay for medicare. it is increased taxation of incomes above 300 wifi thousand dollars, and dealing with overseas tax evasion. yes, that would bail out medicare very easily. and i think it makes a great deal of sense.

>> i am surprised at this offensive overseas tax evasion. i wouldn't thought many of you thought that a good idea. but we have american corporations that send business overseas and evade taxes, and the tax evasion is an incentive to send jobs overseas. we could in that and save -- and make tens and tens of billions of dollars each year. that is a good thing in and of itself. >> congressman frank, my name is reverend steve kelly and i am from norton. and i first want to thank you and your office for what i was going home, with my wife due to disabilities, we called your office and within a week we were in subsidized housing, and i really appreciate that. [applause]

>> my question today is we are seeing a pattern since the obama administration started of people sneaking in the night making amendments, such as, you know, congressman watson. there wasn't on the bus bill that was thrust through very quickly before people will he got to go ahead and read it. the stimulus package, sinking. we finally got a hold on this, on this health care package so that people might be able to read it. and it is in line with that i can't understand. now, we were promised without change that we can believe in. so far, if we are going in having all of these changes, and i haven't got a clue as to what they are, how can i believe in it? how can we trust the government that is shoving things through without letting us have a reasonable discussion about it?

[applause] >> the answer is we are having a reasonable discussion, occasionally interrupted by hooting, but is it is generally a reasonable discussion that this is not being hurried through. we are here talking about it. it's been debated most of the year. is being debated now. it's not going to be voted on until the fall. so it is being discussed. that you talk about the language. yes, bills have to be precise. and so, and there is a reversal of the section so it does take a little bit of extra work. that is why people have been willing to talk about it to put it up on the internet. so the answer is i don't understand how that criticism applies to this bill. i am working very hard on the financial regulation to try and deal with the manipulation that got us in trouble. we have had hearings on those, that people have complained about too many hearings. wall street doesn't like it if you have a lot of supported those of you who don't want us to tax the overseas tax evasion,

also probably don't like is restraining derivatives and cutting down on leverage. we are going to do both of those things. we have been debating them for a very long time. we passed the bill on executive compensation. we will set up a consumer protection agency. we passed the bill to restrict credit cards. over the objection of many people, including the people on allstate. and we are debating those for a long time. so the answer is with this bill, it is not being rushed through anywhere. is now being discussed very openly or sometimes. >> i believe this was caused by an action, being done and holding it up so that, that's the only thing that caused it to be held up so there is discussion. that it has been tried to go ahead and get it done before the recess. >> no. >> and my real question is, how do we trust the government that goes ahead and showed these

things through before we have a clue as to what is in it? >> because transixty mac there are earmarks put in and then voting on them the next day. that is not true about this bill. it is until. look, people don't like things. people don't like the homeless programs would have. people think that's socialism. people don't like medicare. people don't like a lot of things. we do them, and i am just baffled i guess you don't want to take yes for an answer. were having a long discussion about this bill. it was people objected to it going through quickly. so we haven't gone to quickly pick how you can argue this bil has gone through too quickly baffles me. well, it isn't. usb how could you trust the government? let me answer the way i answered before. who ever told you to trust the government? you live in a democracy. don't trust the government to use your own individual initiatives. excuse me, sir. may i respond? [inaudible conversations]

>> some of you object. some of you object when i answer others if you pick your the second one asked me about trusting the government. i never asked anybody to trust the government. the government is not your mother, your father, your doctor. the government isn't anything separate. [inaudible] >> i'm sorry. >> you will get your turn. >> i guess, can, my meter is that winsomely said sunday it doesn't hold up and i respond, that's when the yelling starts because people don't like that. no one has ever said you should trust the government. that's not an appropriate thing for democracy thing to do. you participate, you get involved, you go, you lobby. nobody should ever trust the government. people should use their rights as citizens. >> congressman,. [inaudible] >> who is putting u down, ma'am? [applause]

>> excusing. i want to respond. who is putting you down? [inaudible] >> what have i said? i have been critical of peoe who behoove and heckle and don't want to have a rational conversation, but one of i said that put anybody down? would you tell me ask. >> about dining room table. >> yes, sir. did tell a woman standing there with her president looking like hitler who compares us to the nazis that i thought she was out of her mind. i did put her down. if you want to be on her side, okay. but you say i putting -- i'm not putting anyone down. we are here discussing this. i object. frankly the people putting people down are the people who behoove and laugh. that is putting people down. >> excuse me, ma'am. [inaudible conversations] >> i want to respond, ma'am. you talk about i am here tonight, i am not accountable for what is it all over the

media. i am not putting anybody down. i think, in fact, the denigration has been on the other side of people who have laughed and hooted and rather than rationalize, so it seems to me you are objecting to something that is not happening here. >> congressman, i first want to address something you have been saying all light about the iraq war. article one of the constitution gives congress the ability to declare war. it does not give the federal government the power to enforce health care upon its citizens as you would like. now, for the next question -- [applause] >> can i respond to that? >> no. >> you don't want a response no response all right. >> you want to respond, respond. >> i disagree with you on the constitution. first of all, bush didn't -- [inaudible conversations] >> excuse me. when people ask a question and i

respond, i don't understand why i am not supposed to respond. the war in iraq, like other wars, unfortunately, was initiated by a president who said it's not up to congress, it's up to me. i was trying to reinforce to you that yes, congress should have more of a say when we go to war. this congress didn't vote to go to war and i voted against it. he brought it up. why didn't you put him when he brought it up? the fact is it was by other presidents since world war ii without a declaration of war and i think that is a mistake. so i think congress shouldave more will. as welfare, no, i think you a fairly think medicare is unconstitutional. i do not. you say there is no constitutional mandate to do this. i am glad that medicare was voted. i got on for years, it did a lot of good for me. you and i disagree if you think it is unconstitutional. and you think it is unconstitutional? do think medicare is unconstitutional, sir?

do you think it is unconstitutional? you said that the constitution doesn't give us the authority to do it but medicare was done, and do you think medicare is unconstitutional? >> i think that medicare needs to be reformed. >> but you won't tell you whether you think it is unconstitutional. i'm not a constitutional lawyer. >> i have an actual question for you to pick what sort of in. of data can you give us, not just rhetoric as you have, as the president has been giving us, what is your data that health care reform will save american's money, will not put private companies out of business and will help us fix the economic crisis we're in right now? because all i'm hearing is talking and no data. >> i don'trgue that it can help fix the economic crisis we are in right now so i will not give you that. there are other things that we were going to try to do that. secondly, for example, stopping foreclosures for people who are unemployed i think would help us avoid further deterioration in

the economy by holding up health crisis. so i don't make that claim the only claim i would make of the three u.s. defense was it won't put health care, it will papyrus interest out of business and the answer is medicare. we have had medicare a much more extensive government run program that anything contemplated in this bill since 1965. and you're the one who said we had no constitutional authority or i think that is wrong and i cite medicare. but medicare has been -- the private insurance cubbies have tried with medicare. medicare has in fact i think probablyeen too generous to them. so my empirical data is history and facts. medicare has not put private insurance coverage out of business. after 44 years, i don't think -- yes, it is for people over 65 essentially. well, no health care is mandatory that medicare is -- after 65 most people on medicare don't work.

i want to thank you for coming tonight. i want to actually think the democrats are throwing the event and so many of my fellow south close residents and dartmouth residents for attorney. it is a great opportunity for you to come down and express our democratic rights in this republican form of government to have you address our questions and i really appreciate that. when you do say in the interest of full disclosure, yes, i am the repugnancy committee for the district and the regional chair and to say that i did vote for president bush twice, quite proud. but i'm not here for the. i am here as a constituent with really a personal concern. i haven't read the health bill. my personal -- >> don't wait for the movie. it's not coming. [applause] >> but i am not here to throw out a question at you, you and i will agree i think that some of the things have gone on, i agree. i think the pictures of our

president portrayed as hitler is deplorable. i would agree with you on that. >> thank you. [applause] >> but my personal questions and is this. i am 31 years old. i am a child of hard-working middle-class parents. my father is on medicare for medically retire due to an accident. let me just say this. and here's my concern, i know racism we don't want to be afraid. i have fear of health care. i agree, i think we all agree health care needs to be reformed is not a perfect system. it doesn't work the way it should. how to fix it is a question. my personal concern is interdistrict as i said i am 31 years old. from age four to 69 approximately 25 searches. i had 25 surgeries. none of them life-threatening. for my head that i think you need is an important quality of life pics. sometimes i value it more than other times. >> i will be sure not to attack your spirit but i was born substantially deaf. had both the surgery so i could

hear. my fear is a simple question of rationing under reform. and again, i haven't read the bill. i trust you have. could you please address the extent of rationing under the proposed reforms because my fear is my parents private health insurance, my father, truck driver for all those years, helped me with the surgery so i can hear today. i'm afraid my children or grandchildren will be in a system where at 31 maybe there is to wait for the surgery so they can hear. that is my concern with this legislation that i appreciated. >> legitimate concerns and the answer is nothing in this bill would in any way to that. as a matter of fact, what it will do is the opposite. to the extent there is a government role here with private, it will be to urge them to do more, and in fact there had already been an agreement between the health insurance industry and the obama administration and the senate democrats, house colleagues annoyed they were left out, the health insurance industry has

dropped some of the restrictions, preexisting conditions will not be a cause for exclusion. there is an annual cap on co-pays. there will be planted in the outside of that, but to get certain other benefits you will have to do that. so the answer is there is nothing in this bill that would do that to the one argument which was made by the 89 year-old woman for who looks great. she lobbies are doing good with the health care so far. and the answer is -- and this bill does try to do this. expand the supply. again, i want to stress its not that these people who are on covered aren't getting health care. they are getting it in emergency rooms with that generally means is they get less of it at first and then they need a lot of it because they haven't gotten the kind of preventive care beforehand. but there are other things in this bill to try to expand medical education, to try and do some financial incentives so

people who become primary-care bazaarcarephysicians. in my experience, more people complain to my office that they were denied health care they wanted from private insurance companies and from medicare. more, that is, to the extent that they have been denials of service they have come from the private insurance companies. i think under this plan that will happen less. [applause] . .

i don't understand how in good conscience as the chairman of the senate or the house finance committee you can try to push through a bill like this which will add so substantially to our deficit that i as a 20-year-old person will have to deal with this for the rest of my life and i will have to pay for this. i don't get it. [cheering] [applause] >> i don't want it to go through in that forum and that is why i am pushing to pay for it. i'm sorry, please finish.

>> i hope this makes up for my hooting and hollering with irrational question. >> i don't think it will make up for it because i don't think that is inappropriate way for a democracy. i'm sorry i hurt your feelings. i thought you were through with your question. turn on the microphone. there you go. >> i just don't understand how you propose to pay for this in any other way as you just said without raising taxes, and i understand you want to raise taxes on a portion of people who eckert significant amount of money but i don't understand where you come across saying that people who urged under -- sorry, under $500,000 you want to lower that to $325,000, that tax?

>> you got that wrong. tell me when you're ready for me to respond. >> go. >> i don't know where you got that low wording 500 to 325. i'm sorry, sir. >> [inaudible] >> no, 500,000 you confused. 500,000 is the cutoff in the bill right now where small businesses -- 500,000 is the payroll. if you're a small business and pay was under 500,000 or xm from the tax. i think that 500 is too low. i want to push that further. 325 is the income level for individuals where you pay a surtax. so i do think that when bill clinton became president in 1993i voted to raise taxes on upper-income people on the of the amount when you raise taxes it's on that part of the income, not that average. we raised it from 36% to 39% that helped reduce the deficit and had no negative of fact.

i do not believe the people at that income stop working at that relatively small marginal tax. i'm sorry, sir. can i continue? these are complicated issues. i will try one more time. if you have more to say but at some point i am up here. >> [inaudible] >> is it my turn yet? it depends. that is assuming -- i don't think it is 55% for most people. it depends on your state tax, federal, so you can't make that statement. >> [inaudible] >> i'm sorry. when do i talk? these are complicated things. here's the deal. it's not bring to the 55% most places. we raced from 36. by the we when you try to accumulate those taxes some of the other taxes are deductible from the federal income tax so you're 55% figure is badly mistaken. so then the question is okay

then george bush asks congress to lower it back to 36%. we did, it cost us money and i don't think it was helpful. also the republicans and by different site obama should be a state tax. it only applies to the top% of earners. we are talking about an estate tax in the millions that would cost a lot of money so i do believe we could raise taxes on the wealthiest, 325,000 about, and this is something i'm surprised the opposition to it there is a lot of tax eve edition that goes on from companies that are american that do business overseas. the obama administration bought a good case against ubs, swiss bank and are going to get money back so i am for doing those, too. there is a legitimate difference of opinion, the military. i believe america is the granddaddy to the whole world on the military. if you look at the military

budgets of germany and spain and england -- boo, very cogent. the fact is if you want to subsidize the military of the western europeans why don't you send them a check personally? i think it's a great mistake. i do not think we need the weapons we -- i am not talking about the past iraq war. president obama is wrong to say we are going to stay until 2011. the time has come to leave iraq and save tens of billions of dollars. i believe a combination of those things and i think more americans are in danger from not having their health needs met appropriately the are in danger because the kurds and arabs are fighting in iraq [applause] >> [inaudible] >> we have to make room for

about five more questions. [inaudible] we let this go on, congressman frank was nice enough to let this go on an extra half-hour. >> it was ten minutes because we started early. >> so i am asking 54 tannin? ten more minutes -- [inaudible] next question. >> how's it going today, sir? my question is the federal reserve is unconstitutional in my opinion. you ke an oath to obey the constitution, so shouldn't you'd resign if you're breaking your oath? >> if i was breaking my oath, yes. i do not believe the federal reserve is unconstitutional.

i do plan to put legislation through that could curtail some of its power but no, i don't think it is unconstitutional. no court has ever held that. every president from woodrow wilson all and in fact thought it was a very important role. every country has a central bank and developed economy and i don't think you can do without one. >> [inaudible] >> next question. >> i work in a hospital in fact i'm going to work when i'm done here. i work at welford regional hospital and the reason i want to tell you that is they were not able to get a cost-of-living raise this year so instead of having to lay off anybody to make ends meet every single manager in that hospital including the board and ceo took pay cuts to keep from having to fire anybody and to build up these huge corporations and then are taking millions and millions of dollars in packages so that being said, i want to read page

five h.r. 32, section d says, this is about how it's going to be paid for, initiate shared responsibility among workers, employees and the government so that all americans have coverage of the essential benefits. now i take exception where it says and the government because number one the government doesn't have money, we pay you so if we take the government and put taxpayers it says it would be paid for bye employees, workers and taxpayers, which is the workers. so with what my hospital did my question is instead of the government which has no interest in this at all because you are not in the system and not putting into the system we are, you are taking from off and putting it back, we as taxpayers and workers should be able -- this is my question -- should be able to get the good people like the ceos and people at my hospital who are willing to save people at the bottom line, not the dollar get together with good people for insurance companies all over the country, get together with pharmaceutical

companies all over the country and get together with the good people and say we need to cover everybody, we need to do this, how can we do it? can you take a little cut in your profit? can you take a little bit? where can we meet in the middle? let the private citizens to this. this is not a federal government issue. this is a people issue. the people need to reform health care, not the government. [applause] [cheering] you have got nothing tested. [inaudible] >> we only have ten minutes. >> first of all i would disagree with the argument the government can stay out of it because then we wouldn't have medicare -- i'm sorry ma'am, do i get to respond? >> [inaudible] >> i don't think charity would do for medicare. i do want to respond to your first comment that these people

got a big money. i've been fighting besio salaries in fact on the friday before -- >> [inaudible] no, i understand that. although i disagree -- ma'am, do you want me to respond or do you want to keep talking? >> you want the government to tell us we should take less -- [inaudible] >> why don't, man and you're not listening. first when you say the government should stay out of it we wouldn't have government medicare and that would be a great loss. secondly, secondly the administration has been trying to do what you are saying. how can i talk with you yelling? i don't understand the mentality that yelling like this is helpful. all of you, i don't understand those who interfere with a

conversation, the point is this, obama has met with the health insurance industry and pharmaceuticals and hospitals. >> [inaudible] >> i'm sorry, ma'am, that is what you said. you just said he should meet with them and try to negotiate -- i apologize this is not rational -- >> [inaudible] >> in the hospital industry -- the other point i want to make when you talked about the people in the private sector who got money from the financial rescue program, we have been tough on them and i got a bill passed through the house on the friday before we left to cut down substantially on the irresponsible bonuses they are getting. we will be curt schilling the top executive pay and the only other thing i would repeat is i don't want the government totally out of health care because medicare and the children's health insurance

program for example which i think is a good one which we just passed people said it was socialized medicine significantly reduce the number of uninsured children. yes? yes, ma'am, go ahead. >> my name is angela and i hear from dartmouth. thank you for coming out and sweating it out with us tonight. my question is you said we would be allowed under this plan to have a public auction as well as the private. i want to know how the private option will be able to compete with the public option when you have unlimited resources as with government money. [applause] >> because the bill says that the public auction will get a $2 billion up front appropriation for costs and thereafter will have to break even. there will be no subsidy amount from the treasury. you won't have the profit-making that goes to the shareholders or the private insurance companies. the offset will be it will be

too restrictive but there will be no ongoing federal subsidy of the public option. >> [inaudible] -- let me ask you this -- >> you asked me a question. >> -- are you going to be required to get government sponsored insurance? you're not? >> man, i tell you this, you asked me a question i give you an answer. you say you don't believe it. nothing i say will have any influence so what is the point? i told you what's in the bill. you don't want to believe it, don't believe it. people are entitled to believe or disbelieve anything they want. >> [inaudible] >> we are going to pay for it by raising taxes on wealthy people. [booing] yes we are going to raise taxes

on corporations that are evading taxes overseas and of people making more than $325,000 those of you who are the defenders of the people sending money overseas we will fight it out on the floor of the congress. >> i am a registered nurse and have worked and elderly care for over 30 years and it has been improving over the past 30 years and we do a lot and advanced care planning on an individual basis with people all the time and i just wanted to say that for every one here if he would download on your computer pages 424 through 430 you will get a feeling of what the had danced care in consultation is all about. it says on here that an individual involved if they have not had a consultation within five years such consultation shall include the following, and

their advanced care planning directives. so i just think everyone here should do that and see what they are three also a lot of us have been doing our own homework. i know i've been trying to do my homework and go on the internet and i've listened to people from the united kingdom, norway and canada and i was recently listening to dr. mccaul, who was very instrumental not having this go forward before, and some of the agreement of all these countries and people representing them is that once this is put in place the administration becomes extremely top-heavy and once you're involved there's no way to turn around and get out of it and they are not happy in their countries with this so that is one of my concerns. the other thing was dr. mccaul -- the way this is going to be paid for is through granted half of it through raising taxes and the other half through cutting medicare by about $500 billion over the next ten years yet there are about 50% of the population going into medicare

and to the enrollment of medicare. so how this is going to be paid for is my question like the lady before. >> first of all yes, people should read the advanced care, that is what happens at the end of life, it is all entirely voluntary of course. it is added -- all that this says is your doctor can now get paid for it if you ask him to do it. that is the planning for the end of life is. it is an entirely voluntary thing on the part of the individual. many people now do it. doctors cannot get paid for it. this would allow doctors to be paid for it so that's what it says. >> [inaudible] >> it's not -- >> [inaudible] >> it pays -- if you want to get advice -- if you want to get advice about how to plant what you want the people close to you to do at the end of life, you

can get them to the doctor and there is no medical treatment involved here. it's purely advice from the doctor. secondly, as to pay for it, i am opposed to cutting medicare that way for hospitals and many of loss they said on the democratic side and the massachusetts delegation have been opposing that. i do have some differences in the way they plan to pay for it and i think those will be changed. search? i'm sorry, ma'am, you're not being fair to other people. >> [inaudible] okay, one last question, the one last man at the mic. >> -- the business in the business park that's been massachusetts 150 years. we currently have 100 dependence on our health care plan. it's 14% of our payroll. how do you expect us to compete with other companies if there is an 8% option for our competition, okay?

you worry about everybody keeping their taxes, their earnings overseas. there's a reason for it, sir. they are being taxed out of control over here. [cheers and applause] i would like to know if he would consider doing what australia just did. australia just cut taxes on businesses doing less than $2 million by 50% and cut the taxes on business is doing less than $5 billion annually by 30%. this administration has done nothing for small business. [cheers and applause] we employee 80% of americans. when are you going to help us out instead of taxing us into oblivion? and by the way most of us are sub s corporations so when you say you are going to tax the rest we fell into that category not because we take the money home we leave it in our business to invest. thank you. [cheers and applause]

>> first of all, the first thing i would say is this: if you leave the money in the business it won't be taxed. we are talking about what is taken out in personal -- >> [inaudible] that is what the business -- why is it when people get anxious state of -- >> [inaudible] >> i understand they are angry. i don't understand what that means they can't have a rational conversation. ander and rational shouldn't be opposites. we are talking but only taxing the amount taken out of the business that's personal profit. secondly, when you say that nothing has been done for small business here's the point, nothing has been done to raise taxes. you say all we are doing is raising taxes. not a simple tax has been raised under the obama administration. >> [inaudible] >> what went up? what went up? >> [inaudible]

excuse me, excuse me, wait a minute. i said nothing has been done under the obama administration. i did think people understood of the state level and the federal level. that is my technicality states versus federal. i will take the last question. >> thank you. in the interest of full disclosure i am not from your district i am from district seven however he wasn't available so i came down here. thank you for taking my question. my question involves how do you plan on reforming prescription drugs and the drug companies? i really don't see how you can have a profit based model when you are working in the health care system because -- >> first of all there is in the bill a restriction being debated over how long they get patent protection for biologics which

are -- the bill gives 12 years of patent protection less than they now have, more than the present. secondly, the house bill does go for negotiation over prices, which didn't happen in the prescription drug bill. i'm sorry, you want to say more? >> [inaudible] >> well, no, i didn't finish answering. well, what do you want? >> [inaudible] -- still wouldn't be able to -- >> i'm trying to get to that, sir. >> [inaudible] [laughter] [applause] >> first of all -- >> [inaudible] >> there's a lot of that going around like this but i would say this, i don't -- if you find me telling you something you think is it true maybe that's justified but you said you came down to talk. i don't understand the attitude that doesn't want to talk.

i am trying to respond but before i finish you want to rebut what i haven't said. really very on useful. the point is i was about to say in the house bill the senate does not have that and the president has been opposed. he says instead as i was going to say he got and 80 billion-dollar concession from the drug companies, which they are going to use primarily to fill what is called the doughnut hole, that is the requirement people who are on part b, the prescription drug plan of medicare have to make payments. i disagree with that. i was in favor of both for allowing the importation of drugs from canada. we've been told it is not safe to import drugs from canada but i have not seen the number of did canadians that would convince me they have on safe medicine up there. thank you. [applause]

[inaudible conversations]

on monday egyptian president mubarak met with president obama also that day a coalition of egyptian organizations reviewed u.s. egyptian relations. they discuss upcoming elections in the country and alleged human-rights abuses and look at future of the u.s. role in the middle east. from the national press club in washington it is almost an offer and a half. >> i feel we are ready to get going. good afternoon ladies and gentlemen. thank you for coming and for your patience. we are here on the occasion of the first visit of the egyptian

president mubarak to the white house after a number of years by way of introduction we are a coalition of the egyptian american organizations comprised of muslims and nubians alike representing the segments of the egyptian society and we are here he might buy a common desire to see a democratic egypt that respects human rights and is guided by will -- rule of law. i will be introducing all of the panelists here. i will begin by giving a statement on behalf of my organization which is voices for a democratic egypt and then we will have the president of the international center and founder of the movement and after dr. monsoor we will have the president of the assembly of america. after that, we will have the

president of the american egyptian alliance followed by the new beah project and after that will be mr. afifi and then mr. usian who is representing the individual members of the question followed by the muslim american society and then dr. rahim the chairman for the center of development studies. >> i will go ahead and get started with a statement on behalf of my organization as i said. i am here today on behalf of voices for democratic egypt to express my great concern over a path egypt is taking it is increasingly witnessing the abridgement of freedom is respect for human rights and rule of law and principles of good governance. i am additionally concerned despite promises by candidates

obama to abandon old u.s. policies of supporting, quote, friendly dictators the administration is stating the status quo with egypt thereby sending the wrong signals to the government of egypt and alienating the people of the region. my fear is the administration is insufficiently attending to the goal of supporting aspirations of the people of the middle east for human rights and good governance both of which are becoming strategic imperatives in my view. only a false biopic foreign policy framework would see working toward the regional of peace in the middle east and security should come at the expense of advancing the cause of needed reform in the area of governance and human rights while egypt is a key strategic u.s. partner the administration must recognize a democratic egypt that respects human rights and is guided by a rule of law is the strongest most reliable ally in advancing peace and security in the region. while the status quo in egypt will yield anything but stability with coming egyptian

parliamentary presidential elections scheduled for 2010 and 2011 respectively the u.s. has a keen interest in seeing the process be transparent and fair, that a deal is credible results and incorporates political forces that respect space principles. turnoffs alfonson -- turning off cell phones. instead however and the lead up to those elections the government of egypt failed to undertake necessary changes that will ensure such a process in fact the government of egypt significantly progress on the government and human rights on this list disturbingly much of that regression continues to take place after obama cairo speech which gives cause for serious concern and highlights the need for the obama administration to act to ensure principles highlighted in the khyber pass beach are not forgotten and were not intended as a meaningless exercise in public relations. in cairo president obama stated the importance of, quote the

ability to speak your mind and have a say in how you are governed. yet in the past year alone egypt witnessed regression on several fronts including ones ability to say how one is governed. the emergency law which has been in place since 1981 believe it or not 28 years ago and which basic constitutional protections prevails. it was extended another two years in may of 2008 despite promises to the contrary. in cairo president of, talked about the need for people to have, quote, confidence in the world law and equal administration of justice yet emergency law continue to undermine the judiciary notably through the imposition of administrative detention orders which supersede normal court decisions, the trial of civilians and military and political courts and what are known as hezbollah lawsuits brought by ruling national democratic party affiliate's and abuse to settle scores against dissidents and artists among

others. dozens of cases were also documented in 2008 and 2009 including several resulting in death. as of may 2009 the egyptian organization for human rights document at least 40 cases of torture since 2008. at least 14 ended in death at the hand of police officers. more than fourfold increase over 2007. it is widely known most cases go unreported and undetected and torture is largely unaccountable accept in a few highly publicized cases. amnesty international and other human rights organizations regularly release reports criticizing egyptian security excessive use of force. furthermore, rule of law has been challenged in donner might through hastily passed constitutional amendments in 2007 which restricted the ability of the judiciary to nitor elections. a serious blow to an already tenuous process. president obama talked about the need for government to, quote, please interest of their people

and legitimate workings of the political process of their party yet ironically by u.s. government under the obama administration has agreed to a condition that would allow funding only for egyptian government approved registered organizations under the u.s. and egyptian bilateral aid from work. this represents a seriously disconcerting step in the wrong direction that only serves and consolidates the power of the ruling national democratic party. furthermore the egyptian government has taken steps a fleet that indicates the paving of the way for the succession of the likely ndp candidate and upcoming presidential elections to the exclusion of all of their forces and the president obama talked about the need for, quote, richness of religious diversity being upheld whether it is for barites in lebanon or in egypt yet since the cairo speech there have been at least 20 documented incidence of

secretary and violence targeting the middle east largest christian population and other religious minorities including -- the egyptian government response continues to be inadequate and not guided by much-needed political accommodation aimed at ensuring equal rights and protection of all for all religious minorities and for their full integration and government and society. president obama and your speech you conclude it, quote, it is clear governments to protect these rights, namely political and religious pluralism and respect for human rights, those are my words are ultimately more stable, successful and secure. you exhort the government to maintain power through consent, not worsen. now is the time to put these words and action by stating to mubarak and u.s. interest in seeing immediate reform agenda take hold. while we commend president obama efforts and reestablishing a strong and positive relationship with cairo based on mutual

respect we insist that this not be done at the expense of the legitimate rights of the egyptian people for universal rights and freedom. it is those people whose voices you must stand up for in your talks with president mubarak to market and overall bilateral eve relations. that concludes my statement and just on behalf of the coalition i would like to state that we support a strong u.s. and egyptian strategic relationship built on mutual respect and interest yet we support the relationship with a democratic egypt that respects human rights. thank you. without further ado i will hand the floor over to dr. mansour. [applause] >> my name is dr. mansour, the president of the center in washington and i represent also

qur'anic movements as peace, justice, tolerance and loving humanity. we are also activists for political reform beginning with a space states an unlimited freedom of speech, and human dignity. muslim scholars because they are very qualified [inaudible] the have been persecuted by mubarak and have suffered for

waves of unrest from 87 on till 2007, 2008 and 2009. this proves that mubarak refuses the reform that come from within egypt, from within islam. he also refused the reform that come from outside. i think it is the time to be stopped. we need reform. we need reform because i am talking about that qur'anic muslim scholar. we need reform because we are concerned about mubarak himself and his family we want him to leave the power and to enjoy peace of mind and live sound and

safe. we want reform because we believe that if this situation continues egypt will softer in the near future under the chaos and that stability in the middle east will be in danger. we want the reform peacefully and what mubarak himself, president mubarak to pave the way for this reform and the rest of his time, and making graduate reform beginning with reforming

the egyptian legislation to the basis of human rights and justice reform and justice also to release [inaudible] to stop the applying the law. this is the graduate steps. we want egypt to have a space state, a state owned by the egyptian people, not to own and the egyptian people. we want to egypt, the egyptian army to defend the egypt border, not to fight the egyptian

people. we want the egyptian police to protect and serve, not to torture. we believe that the egyptians, we are here to argue mubarak, to make this a good deed and the last days [inaudible] thank you. [applause]

>> good afternoon everybody. im mr. halim. i welcome you all here and i mepi dr. mansour for i think has said everything so i am not going to repeat what the two of them have said. i am just going to say about this colish and i will explain to the panel who we are and why we are formed. i am a coptic man and have been in the coptic movement for many years. we have organized, we have done wonderful job fighting for human rights of the christians in egypt. we went to the congress, obama went to talk in egypt and now is the time to talk about egypt and

i think this has to do with everybody in this coalition. we continue to fight for human rights but we have to look at our country. we have to see what's going on in egypt. egypt since the 52 years have went in the state now we have cholera, sue wargo is in the drinking water, human rights abuses to all minorities abusing everybody, the u.s. constitution is completely outdated and gives the president so much power that they think that this 88 people in egypt they govern themselves and take care of them, guard for them. i think the middle east -- first thing what is going in egypt now

that mr. mubarak is late in his age i think the middle east itself we saw in iran and the last election people are hungry for democracy. everybody in the area wants to be free. i salles a blogger was giving -- he was giving his testimony in front of the congress and he said i just want to be free. give me my freedom. it was so emotional when you listen to this man he said i want nothing more just give me my freedom and this is a state of all the people of the middle east. we want our freedom. we are sick and tired of people telling us what to do, not to go here or come here. we want our freedom and this coalition here is formed because we want to fight for our freedom. we are going to ask for our freedom. we are, that the egyptians, i

think maybe i know there are 700,000 coptics in the united states and 700,000 muslims so we are about 1.5 million egyptians here and we were not doing our job fighting for our country and this coalition here is a start. we are people in america living here to work on our country and demand changes. mr. mubarak -- mr. obama getting mubarak here to bless him and make a deal with him in spite of the condition of our work country we reject, we do not want that. we want him to talk about our country, how to change the democracy, how to give power to the people and not like a herd of sheep telling us what to do. we want our freedom and i think the people in the united states, the egyptian people have the duty to think of their country. we want human rights for the minorities and human rights for

women in egypt. we want to be represented in good parliament that defend us and we want the corruption to end. so much corruption. so mr. obama, is it okay for you to meet with president mo park and say everything is okay because you want peace in the middle east. this is not acceptable. the middle east has to come out from the middle ages and has to come to the new ages of democracy. thank you very much. [applause] >> the american egyptian reliance >> i represent the alliance of egyptian americans. the alliance of egyptian americans was incorporated in

2005 in the state of florida as a nonprofit educational nonsectarian it has to ames, to empower american citizens and permanent residents of the egyptian descent in their communities in the chosen country of residence and to contribute to developments in egypt leading to true democracy, sustainable development and social just. while being an independent organization formally affiliated with any other organization we work very closely with egyptian american organizations who have shared our goals and objectives

and that is illustrated from being part of the coalition. our strategy at the alliance includes encouraging its members and the egyptian american community at large to become involved in the american political process supporting the elected officials and candidates whose platforms are based on informed balanced and objective views on both domestic and foreign policy issues especially those dealing with the middle east in general and with egypt in particular.

we have clearly declared from day one that it has no political or financial ambitions in egypt neither as a group more as individuals. while aea doesn't support or endorse any specific party or movement, we follow with interest the reports that indicate efforts by some parties together to coordinate their position and possibly offer one candidate in the forthcoming presidential election as well as other efforts in that direction. we feel that all or most at least of all of us have been complaining and have reasons to

complain about the exceedingly deteriorated in situation in egypt going down for years. and we believe it is about time that we offered very specific remedies, alternatives to what is the status quo. there has been many writings by scholars and activists in this direction. but we endorse in the alliance a very specific recipe, a formula that has been articulated by a prominent political scientist in egypt who is a professor of political science at the cairo university and he published in

october of 2008, and it has very detailed and very specific scholarly formulated articles on how to do it and in this house we endorse the form former article by the doctor, it calls on president mubarak on the other things to do the following: appoint a transitional government to prepare the country for full space transparent national parliamentary and presidential elections under a new constitution. repeal the emergency laws and free all political prisoners. under this formula, president mubarak would relinquish the

chairmanship of the national democratic party and let it compete on equal basis with other parties. appoint a nationally respected prime minister with no political ambition beyond the term of the transitional government. possible candidates in our opinion alliances opinion would include dr. mohammed, a prominent activist, [inaudible] -- just to name a few. bestow the prime minister the fall presidential authority for domestic affairs with president mubarak retaining control only on the military and foreign affairs and dr. nafa just

anticipating some people might criticize that really articulated very convincing reasons to do that during the transitional period. the prime minister, the prime minister's mandate would be to run the daily affairs of state to equally competent, non-partisan cabinet members, and without future political ambitions, also the cabinet members have to any future political condition. to convene a constitutional convention of recognized scholars representing the entire spectrum political and

ideological landscape to draft a modern constitution that guarantees separation of power and supremacy of the role of law for all egyptians. in the meantime, the cabinet will undertake to repair the damage done to all institutions through long years of nepotism, panache and subjective choices of both individuals and policy alternatives. we at the aea endorsed this specific formula because it seems to be so detailed specific objective and scholarly prepared above all its offer clearly declares from the beginning his

lack of interest in any future political ambitions. thank you. [applause] >> thank you, mr. el-shazly. we now have mr. abdelmannan. >> ladies and gentlemen, good morning. i am a former sudanese diplomat, and the head of sudan human rights organization and nubia project in washington, d.c.. i have been here the last 20 years struggling for the causes of the oppressed people of sudan, and i am here to address the issues concerning them nubians marginalized by both the

sudanese government and the egyptian government. nubia sacrificed its land for the prosperity of egypt, and egypt is keeping its waters for the last 45 years on our land for free and we are living in darkness, no electricity while egypt is shipping its electricity across the swiss come now to some neighboring countries over their just across the border the nubians are in total darkness, poverty, marginalized, their land is destroyed by both the sudanese and egyptian regimes, and we want to the egyptian government to be sincere and listen to our problems and grievances.

we don't want to give up our land. we don't want to give of our land for free to those coming to invade our land, established along the miles from alexandria [inaudible] they start biting a whole land across egypt and sudan to the leaks in africa, deep in africa. the rich and wealthy arabs of the gulf, the start of the body and all the land. they are going to kick us out into the desert. we don't want to be second-class citizens in our land. enough is enough. we gave more than we can for the prosperity of the egyptian people. and we do love and respect the egyptian people, but we do not

love regimes. since 1902 when [inaudible] was built we gave and gave, but we were not recognized a were deft, our free gift wasn't recognized. so as nubian americans, yes, we told the obama administration and the congress that we are the taxpayers and we don't want our money to go to a regime that is destroying us, building and the nubian land. new beah will be gone within a few years and we will fight back this time. because we have nothing to lose after this. if we lose our land, then we have nothing to lose after that.

so this is a friendly message to all our brothers and sisters and egypt and also to our brothers and sisters who are oppressed like ross didn't cost that we are going to fight this policy of destruction in nubia and we will also ask the american people and the congress and the administration to slash part of the money given to the president mubarak regime because this is our money. they come to destroy us with our money. already this is moving inside the congress now. egypt's president mubarak i'm sorry to say egypt -- egypt isn't a culprit in this matter, only the regime. president mubarak is pretending to be very friendly and protecting the government.

[inaudible] he is wanted by the international criminal court as a war criminal and president mubarak is the one giving the blanket or protection to this wanted president. why president mubarak is occupying the charming all the size of jordan? how can an occupier protecting an occupied country? there is no logic. so if there is sincerity in making unity between sudan and egypt and so on, these aggressive policies must stop. we have the land with. we have the resources, the natural resources in abundance. everything. and we have enough land to accommodate not only egypt, even

other neighboring countries and so on. not to become second-class citizens. we want to be first class citizens. equal to all people of the land. nubia, which protected jerusalem in 701 b.c., 3,000 years ago and army and jerusalem is under attack now. they are coming to replace us because we are the only pocket between egypt and sudan. so this is an message to our brothers and sisters and egypt they must take us seriously. we stand firmly in support of

the rights. we were one through history, even the nubians were leaders of the coptic religion. we share many things. the history, we are the owners of the land, the makers of history of the nile, this is the only language which is spoken for the last 3,000 years, the nubian language is written in coptic. we rode this after 800 years and brought it back to life. so we are on a very big journey. we want to resist. we want to live. we want to stay on our ancestral land and also live in peace with other components of the egyptian and sudanese communities.

we are not enemies to anybody, but we will resist any kind of destruction to nubia. we want you to help us in stopping building these dams on the model because it is going to destroy theichest of the world. ..

>> we want to fight back. we want to resist. we want to live on our ancestral lands. thank you very much. [applause] >> thank you very much, of the nubian project. i think his statement illustrates precisely the redness and uniqueness of this coalition. insofar as it brings together diverse elements of the egyptian population that recently have been alienated from each other. so we are certainly very sympathetic to the cause, and we hope that everybody that is listening pays attention to this critical cause. next, we have mr. omar afify who

is the president of the rights of the people, who made need translation assistance. >> [translator] he is the president of the rights of the people, which is an organization that tries to bring together the people or sort of bridges the gap between security forces and agent with the people.

[translator] >> he believes that torture and treating people with indignity is the main driver of terrorism and insecurity, not just in the middle east region but across the world. [translator]

>> so we joined the coalition and its demands to end the state of emergency in egypt and release political prisoners and ratify the unified houses of construction of abortion law. and these are all demands that we placed in a letter to president mubarak which was hidden in the name of the coalition are [translator] [applause] >> for those of you who don't speak arabic he said we still hope that president mubarak will respond positively to these demands and that that will be the first step towards a national reconciliation that will bring together muslims and topics and all the children of the egyptian homeland.

next on behalf of the individuals who are not part of the organization within the coalition, we have mr. ibrahim hussein who was nominated to give awards on their behalf. >> good afternoon. my name is ibrahim hussein. i retired here from washington, d.c., about 10 years ago after a long career in mental health administration. in michigan and new york. i am delighted to be here on behalf. i really speak for myself, but i think i am reflecting the views of hundreds, perhaps hundreds of thousands of egyptians across the united states who are settled here. and they are part of this coalition without being a member of a specific group. what we are witnessing this

afternoon is really a historical event. to have eight organizations concerned about egypt is remarkable. i mean, we have differences. we may have use of certain issues, but we are all united in our desire to have democracy, freedom, and the supremacy of law, religious freedom throughout egypt. i don't want to repeat what has been said, but i would like to rescind the story of two speeches. both were in june and were both in cairo. the first one in june 20, 2005, by former secretary of state condoleezza rice. or do you remember? she said 60 years -- for 60 years the united states pursued stability at the expense of democracy in the middle east and

we have achieved none. and she went on to say that they support democracy. as we all know, nothing followed. just talk. five years later on june 4, president obama made a similar speech, a similar declaration in cairo on the same subject of democracy. he said i do have an unyielding belief that all people yearn for certain things, the ability to speak your mind, and to have a say on how you are governed, confidence in the rule of law. i sure hope that president obama will not repeat what the former administration did, to walk, talk. and talk is cheap. what we need is to take necessary measures. when i'm hoping that president obama, when he meet tomorrow with president mubarak, is to pressure the four or five issues we talked about in this

conference. and expect him to give answers. because this is not for the interest of the united states or egypt. the two countries are linked. the interests are common. what happened between us affects both egypt and the united states. the so-called stability under president mubarak is a façade. and it could fall apart, and in the united states policy in the middle east could be exposed. i would like to ask president mubarak, we sent him a letter, but if he and his talk tomorrow with president obama can make a down payment to show his interest in reform, he can make tomorrow a declaration to free political prisoners. he can make a declaration tomorrow that emergency laws will be suspended, and other three or four things he can show his good will.

i doubt it, but if he is serious, he has the opportunity to make such a dramatic, bold action. and what is needed from president obama is to pressure mubarak to do what's good for egypt and what's good for the united states. i think that's all i have to say. thank you. [applause] >> i would like to show this. this is a real-life picture of operation in egypt. this is the police, some poor guy who was trying to express their views in a civil, and i'm violently. and see what happened to him. [applause] >> thank you. the next to last speaker is.

i am here to read a short statement on behalf of the muslim american society. mass is fully transparent, grassroots american organization representing all sectors of muslim society including a very large egyptian american segment. and on behalf of that segment today, we are calling for the following. free and fair elections. to allow for full judicial independence. to allow for the judiciary to supervise the electoral process. mass is also called for international and local monitoring of the election process. mass believes that free and fair elections will lead to a healthy and more robust egyptian society. we are also called for the immediate replacement of emergency law with constitutional law, finally we strongly encourage the government to allow for nonprofit grassroots organizations to take a greater

role in civil society and remove restrictions placed on those organizations. thank you very much for your time. [applause] >> thank you. last but surely not least is, who will conclude this press conference by articulating the message that we would like to send to president obama and president mubarak when they meet tomorrow. >> thank you, deena. and thank you all for coming this afternoon. and sharing this press conference with us. i think my colleagues had said everything that ought to be said. we have been in touch with the

senior advisers of the obama administration. before this press conference, before the planned demonstration tomorrow. again, to make many of the demands expressed here, highlighted, president obama had repeatedly said during his campaign ended in his inauguration speech, and then in his cairo eech and many other patients that he will uphold democracy, human rights. he will not stand with dictators or tyrannies in you are in the world. however, as some of my colleagues said, this was all

very welcome talk. with people both here who supported him and in egypt, the arab world, the muslim world, are waiting is for him to walk the walk. having made the talk, now they are waiting for him to walk the walk. we are concerned about similar backsliding by the obama administration. similar to that that we saw in the closing years of the bush administration. so despite his deliberate effort tto distinguish himself from his predecessor, we see unfortunately all politics coming back to play.

80 million egyptians, four expedient, short range strategic objectives. we say that both could be achieved, only through principle foreign policy. and this country has history of having at times followed very principled foreign policy, from the days of the president wilson during the first world war, all the way to carter and clinton. we have seen american administrations which followed very principled foreign policies in egypt, toward egypt, toward

arabs, toward the muslim world and also it served american interests. we do nothing that is in contradiction between the two. so that is a message. i know you are eager to probably ask questions, and i would like just to say over the last 28 years of mubarak's rule, egypt has slipped down. on every development indicator. and you only need to look even at the u.s. state department annual report on the state of human rights to see that steady deterioration under mubarak, at least since the last 10 years. amnesty international confirms that. human rights watch confirms that. so does human rights first.

and of course, egyptian and arabic organizations have equally confirmed all the above. i am saying that because of the promises of mubarak had made during four election campaigns. we counted them, and they preside over. he had made overheated promises in 28 years, and four election campaigns. i can list those, if you have time, but i am not. i'm just going to talk about three or four that my colleagues talked about. and we hope that president obama will hold him accountable on these promises. he promised in his last election campaign, in 2005, that he will

uphold the independence of the judiciary and would restore the independence. he had pledged to end the state of emergency. he had promised to have free media. he promised to have their and free elections. what did we see after that? two very hasty clever, to the constitution, to undermine even the modest gains that the egyptians had made in the previous six years. in the year 2000, supreme court in egypt asserted that any election that does not totally and fully supervised by the judiciary will not be considered legitimate. well, the egyptian government grudgingly observed that

stipulation. and in 2000, 2005, we had two elections. while they were not perfect, but they were far better than anything that preceded them in the previous 40 years. now, even this modest gains in the year 2000 have been undermined by two amendments to the constitution that would basically, that have basically stalled everything that we have gained. and that is what my colleagues refer to. article 76 and article 88. and let me just take one minute to tell you how trick -- how tricky the regime has been. if anyone of you americans, egyptians, foreigners, anybody, if you have seen, if you can find an article in any

institution in the world from the time of the magna carta in 12152 today, one article, one article in any institution that is 300 words, 300 words. almost as equal as the rest of the constitution here at his article 76. and why? in order to make sure that one person will be elected, and only one person, and that person is mubarak or his son. putting all kinds of impossible conditions for anyone to contest these two gentlemen. article 76. the other article that they amended again, consider that

still the firsorder is article 88, which devoid the supreme court stipulation of the judiciary supervision of the election. it really interdict completely. so now we have to have two elections in 2010 and 2011. one parliamentary and one presidential, without any credible supervision, and with impossible barriers for any egyptian citizen to run in a fair competition against the president or against his son. and that is what we are pressing president obama to take up with president mubarak. we have submitted our demands,

very dutifully, last federate 28th. like my colleagues at. and we submitted it first, mubarak or can we submitted it again. we have not heard any answer. we have submitted all of these demands to both of them a few days ago before the meetings. and were prevailing on obama and the bark to take the egyptian people seriously, and for a change to give them a chance to join the rest of the world that has been democratizing very swiftly in the last 30 years. and what is called the third wave of democracy, have been democratized in the last 30 years. egyptians need to join that wave of democracy. thank you. [applause] >> and now we take questions.

either directed to me or to any of my colleagues. >> in what way would you like the administration to put pressure on the egyptian government and the practical way? are we talking about for example, you receive more aid than any other arab questions that would like to see a suspended or tasha some conditions? >> well, you know, this is a very explosive issue. because whatever we say here is always reworded, we distorted back in egypt. let me just give you something from american own policy. back in 1975, when the soviet union needed aid, trade and technology from the west, the west led by the united states obliged and said yes, we will. on one condition. just more freedom for civil

society. more freedom for civil society. within five years, we had solidarity in power and within 10 years another 10 years, it was dismantling of total terry nissen in the whole eastern and center your. and that was all peaceful so what we're saying is that there are president and american foreign policy where we have put principles i had of expediency, and it produced good results with a win-win situation. and that is what we would like to see. conditional, but creative conditionality to bring the egyptian people back into the political process.

>> would you please tell me, if you consider the organization and terrorist organization, i have received a few and some have not. terrorists or not? >> professors do not answer questions like that. they always have -- i know. i know. you asked your question. i have the freedom to answer. i believe, personally, not my colleagues. i can't speak on behalf of anyone here. i am speaking on my -- in my own right, as a social scientist. i say the muslim brothers, the terrorist organization, at certain period in the evolution. now a day, i do not think they are. >> thank you. >> michele calamine with national public radio.

i want to ask about these restrictions on u.s. aid now that the egyptian government decide which ngos receive a. kendricks played a little bit, the evolution of that and what are your concerns there? >> the u.s. gives something like $2 billion a year to the mubarak regime. a few years ago, under something called baby, the middle eastern partnership, initiative they decided to earmark very tiny part of that, 1% of that to civil society and to be given directly by aid or other civil societies to enjoy. even that very time, less than 1% of that aid that was given freely to ngos in egypt is now

after the visit by both secretary of defense, robert gates, and secretary of state hillary clinton. they said even that part will be subject to the egyptian government own administration and a detailed. and we consider that to be the wrong signal to the democrats in egypt, and to the autocrats in egypt. and again because of the gentleman asked about the, this is the battle we are fighting as democrats. we are fighting on two fronts. we are fighting the autocrats on one hand, and the theocrat that many of you are frightened of on the other hand. so even that little room, and was tiny finding, we are being squeezed out. and i think the beneficiary of that will be the enemy of

democracy, both autocracy and theocracy. >> what does the obama administration say to you when you raise that? >> well they said, well, we will find other ways of helping, but this is something that you have to do because the mubarak regime has pressure and because we need them for other issues in the middle east. again, the cynical trade off, principles for expediency. >> my question, they announce in egypt that mubarak is a candidate for the presidency. do you think that this you really represent the views, especially in the u.s.? >> the announcement i think, i just came from egypt.

and i will say that the regime has played a very tricky game against its own country. >> i'm sorry excusing. and everybody here? no? you might want to get -- >> okay. i believe that this is jewish and in egypt now that the regime is very tricky. and they are -- i really do not believe that all the sectarian incidents in egypt is carried by the people. i think a lot of it is carried by the regime, and they say that we are protecting the topics. okay. and incidents, there were two it's bush and in the cars while there was a ceremony going. so i think that eventually the

church and the police came and they saved all the church from the radicals, okay? and a major the good guys protecting the cops. and i don't think this goes to the cops even. i think this goes to the muslims because they have not attacked the muslim brothers and i think the people in egypt, they said this is not the direction what we want. we want mubarak to come and save us from radicals. there is a big movement in egypt here to go to mubarak to lead the muslim brothers. and this is something, it's like an indication, everybody in egypt is afraid of them. i tell you. a topic people, they are as of now, they are going for mubarak that i am telling you that. and this is because of what the muslim brotherhood have done in the last 20 years. i was talking to my wife today,

and let's take -- forget about the cops. let's talk about women. the muslim brothers came and said no women can be president. no cop can be president. anyplace now a woman can be a president in egypt? we are not heading for that yet, but they announce a. they said no cops, no women. mubarak came in the other side and he said i'm going to put 65 women in the parliament. what do you expect the women want to vote for? are they going to vote for the muslims or the muslim others? no. they will vote for babar. mubarak put himself on one side and the muslim brothers on the other side to keep it all the other parties, he sidled and don't. the muslim brothers fell in the stricken they were in this radical thinking. no cops, no christians, no women. we are very radical. we have been at this very strict sense in people don't like that so they're going for president mubarak. the regime is very tricky, and

they are professionals. they know what to do and how to do it. [inaudible] >> me? no. i do support a new constitution in egypt. i prefer that, for my personal opinion, demand for what is now the opposition, there is no opposition in egypt. who is going to take the government now. assume that mubarak steps down or he dies. there will be chaos in the country. so the first step for us to do in egypt is to have a constitution, a democratic constitution, and have the liberal -- there was something that went he went for election four years ago, he was not a very strong candidate. mubarak only gave him two weeks to campaign. he took 600,000 votes in this

environment. they were cutting his microphones. people of egypt want democracy. muslim christians. they want freedom. first you need to give them this chance, to be free. and then you can make an election in egypt but you make an election now, who are they going to vote for, people? so we are in put in mubarak we don't know what to do with. >> do you think during this environment we can see civilian resolution for coptic? or the civilian revolution start since or whatever, and start we could see all of the details, or i can see civilian revolution for coptic under?

we can see anything. and even today there is a topic started to talk about making parliament in exile. >> coptic people are peaceful people. we've been there for thousands of years. we are very peaceful. we accept our problem. the nubian people, the same icons that we are peaceful. we don't fight. we don't revolt. we don't, we pray. the coptic people, when they get in a very bad situation, they go to their churches and pray. and this is what our problem, the people -- [inaudible] >> fast and pray. and it works. because we are the biggest minority in the middle east, 15 million people. our praying and fasting worked. we don't fight. we don't carry guns. we don't do any of the. we've fast and pray. >> civilian, not. >> we have to move on. sorry.

>> democratic country and justice on the. what does that mean? >> i'm sorry, could you identify the person you're dragging a question to? >> how many promised country and justice, it and in iraq there was free election and there is a government in power watusi in the first iranian government. how to guarantee that a free election doesn't end with the radicals coming to power who don't understand freedom and free speech? >> my personal opinion that the biggest danger in egypt now is a revolution of the people which would have no -- chaos, chaos revolution. and this is our biggest enemy. because there are no organization and to be radical, could be street people, could be

on the street. what mubarak have left the country that is a very dangerous. and i think, i think it was a chaos revolution what happened. it was organized from outside, but there was no -- it was not within constitution, there were no constitution, anything. we need a modern constitution in egypt. we need to get rid of that constitution. >> i have a question. i just wonder, how would you assess what they are saying that their expression as a civilian or. >> supports. >> it is scary. how can you assist? >> let me say, of course, everybody coming you heard him, worried about chaos. and you heard dr. mansour

worried about the civil war. well, as a social scientist, i go with evidence. what we have seen in egypt in the last 300 years is exponential rise in acts of civil disobedience. acts of civil disobedience. in 2006, there was fewer than 100. in 2007, it jumped 10 times. from 100 to over 1000. last year, 2008, which we have complete statistics, it was over 3000. 3000 acts of civil disobedience. from the nubians in upper egypt, to the cops and bill egypt, in

sinai in sinai. to the fisherman's in the north of egypt, and so on. so acts of civil disobedience went so far as they have remained peaceful. there is no guarantee that will remain peaceful. because we have seen imbeciles when the crowds got out of control, like in 1977 during the food riots, during, when the people were victims of landslides and when the government unable to salvage them. and when the central security forces, the stick with which the regime uses to be the people, that stick, that hand, in the regime in 1980, i think.

87. so we have these episodes of frightened and some of us. rise and civil disobedience. memory of the food riots, the state security rights, and these things show how precarious a situation is. mubarak nevertheless has traded and has promoted himself, and now is trying to promote his son, as the guarding of stability. not only in egypt but the middle east. he is not. he has not advanced the cause of peace. he has not delivered for those hundred billion dollars that they got from the united states and western europe. he has not delivered any development that could have been reflected on all of those indicators of the un report that referred to in passing in my remarks. so they are concerned. they are justified in their

concerns. i cannot think that civil order is imminent, but we should not be relaxed and say it is not imminent and therefore we will leave business as usual. we have to take measures that we have to take steps. we have to pressure mubarak, either through ourselves here, and we have been doing that peacefully, or through friends of egypt, like the united states, to engage, as i said, benchmark, roadmap, show us how we are not going to do this year, next year, three years from now. he has two more years to go, two and a half more years to go as his presidency and in the election of 2011. and that is enough time to amend the constitution to prepare the candidate for fair and free election, to have what

mr. chesley suggested, an interim government to prepare for the transition. >> i had just a question. just another question. i wonder, like the people here are demanding. >> first of all, i am a fugitive. i forgot to say that. i have present sense is pending against me in egypt. six cases presently. [inaudible] >> for everyone i win in court, there are three more. five by members of the undp -- members of the ndp, national democratic party, some of whom have become very proficient about them, every few months he filed a case. and there is another two, three

lawyers, members of the party that had become very proficient as if they have nothing else to do but to file cases. again, this is seven years old. very feeble man. i am here as a fugitive. i am here in exile. and so i am fighting from your buddies are egyptian americans who feel some loyalty and some to the country and they see their country sliding into chaos and into injustice and they are speaking out and they are screaming. yes, sir. >> this is for you, or any of the other panelists. a lot of us are looking at iran and the youth protesting, fraudulent elections on the streets. and as we are talking about what might happen in next year or so in egypt, that is a useful analogy. tell us about youth in egypt and

the numbers of youth, percentage the use of new media technology, and whether they might react to fraudulent elections in the same way. >> very good question, very pertinent. and perhaps a question asked about iran, here is one very interesting development that happened when the contested election took place in iran. and the ayatollah, the clergy that his ruling iran, shutdown the internet in iran. immediately, egyptian bloggers put their blogs and their proxies at their disposal of the young iranian counterpart. no coordination did they did not know them, but this was spontaneous act of solidarity

that shows as some of my panelists, copanelists said, that how hungry the whole region is for democracy, for freedom. and any country that makes some game is cheered by everybody all over the middle east. and this is the also opportunity to thank for the courageous work that they are doing in promoting and in monitoring and in seeing what is happening in the middle east on that front. the democratic front. now, there are three very important events that they can give us a signal of what we could go to, where we can draft. the elections in lebanon, those who are very frightened about the extremists and who have swallowed the bait that was given by the likes of mubarak,

fighting everybody of becoming muslims, in lebanon they were beaten. it was a secular opposition that won the day in lebanon. and then inchoate, again, the islamists who had been in the majority department were beaten by the secular and the liberal in kuwait. not only for that but for the first time for women in the history in kuwait were elected. all of these and then i talked about the acts of civil disobedience, all of these groups of course our coalition. all of these developments, while they are still in their infancy, but they show that there is a promise, a promise that we have

to hold, nurture and work for until it comes to full fruition. >> this question is directed to anyone other panelists who would like to answer. given the political unrest we've seen over the years in egypt, whether it be through the rise of activism on line, the strikes, demonstrations, does it feel as though your efforts here in the united states as well as happening on the ground in egypt is pressuring the babar government to stay on edge and kind of watch your movements more than they had in the past? cynic though, as you said, you know what the mubarak regime is doing even to the young activists and the bloggers, and how they are in circling every autonomist initiative for freedom or for interest. so what we do here is to give voice to the voiceless in egypt. given how controlling the regime

has been with the media, including the so-called independent media, which is increasingly becoming less independent because of all of the efforts and the tricks that the regime is using, especially through advertising, public sector, promotion, and so on. so they can stifle. they can suffocate any independent voice and we have here, i would like to note, salute you who is one of our great writers, journalists. and she probably can't after this session, tell you more of what the media subject to by this regime. >> my question is the egyptian coalition opinion about.

[inaudible] the opinion of the provision about mubarak regime, provision tried to find, the people, treated badly, and there is much human rights violation. what is your position about that? >> the coalition has not taken up this issue. i am being very candid with you, but we have a nubian voice in the coalition. we will welcome him to give us a full presentation on the issue. and the coalition, i promise you, and promise all our nubian brothers and sisters here, that the coalition has no problem taking up any issue that is

brought to its attention. they will deliberate it. they will debate it. and they will take stand on it. so i can promise you that much. so, if there is no other questions. >> i did want to -- >> go ahead. >> caroline, would you? >> does that include? thank you very much. >> nothing more to say. thank you very much for coming today. and actually, i do have two more things to say. i am afraid i may have forgotten to introduce myself. i am dina guirguis and i call upon you, everybody that supports human rights and democracy worldwide to join in a protest tomorrow in front of the white house between madison avenue and 15th street, calling for democracy and human rights in egypt. and that will take place starting 10 a.m. tomorrow. so we hope to see you there and thank you again for coming. [applause]

[inaudible conversations]

>> thanks very much. i'm glad to be here. i had one question when i was sitting at the table that i was going to rebut him. so i am not. i'm going to talk about an analysis that is different than the left right democrat republican conservative analysis. but will address some of the points that david made. i want to start first by saying that david wrote a very night's endorsement of our book which is called voice of the people, the transport in american life. and just very quickly, he said they want us to look at issues from a new perspective, develop new ways of talking about

differences that may be more illusory than real. and come up with some solutions that transcend the political and ideological discussions that so often government people of goodwill -- that they so often keep goodwill from working together. that is a quick summary of what i want to talk about. i want to make a couple of comments about mark introduction. first of all, what i am doing now, which i believe i have been doing since i started working, is comparable, all the way through. it's the concept is that we have a way of thinking about and doing policy and politics in this country that is limited by our tendency to divide into two teams and then treat it as if it is a football game. now secondly, i want to -- and i

want to argue that this is not a persuasive argument. i am not trying to persuade people to behave in a particular way. what i am saying is that people actually already do behave in a trans- partisan way your and our institutions are designed to screen that part of our behavior out of our policymaking process. so for example, and incidentally just for the record, matt has been one of my heroes for long before while i was in college. and he is an amazing guy in terms of his absolute undying commitment to the first amendment. and being a very strong liberal on all kinds of things and being a very strong pro-life person simultaneously. and you mix all together into one person and you have a very unique guy. and you kind of want to watch what's going on in society you can watch his career path and you will see who hires and who fires him. and you will do what's up was down.

one of the things about him that is so fascinating that he was the chief biographer of america's pacifist who trained martinez again in his nonviolent. and it is an interesting set of stories about what goes on in america that most of us don't nobody think about. and that is part of my argument that we actually have a trans-partisan reality under way below the surface of our politics. we are doing in this book, and there are copies out there if anybody am as long as they last you could just grab one and take it. we are making analysis of how the country works. and our analysis begins by saying there is not a great divide in america. there is not a great divide between people on this site and people on that side. and we cite years of election data that show that what we have in the country is a very strong framework of general agreement on every single issue.

with two teams, one at this end and one at that end, arguing with each other. the structural problem is that those two teams happened to have control about 100% of the political apparatus. so for example, in voting, roughly right now as far as democrats voting and republicans voting in elections, probably they account for something in the neighborhood of 30% of the american population. there are more registered independents than that are either republicans or democrats. and there are more unregistered, legally qualified voters than there are democrats and republicans combined. so you get in a situation where you have a small portion, roughly 30% of the population, or 30% of the political world, or 30% of the american society representing the political world. so they get into a room and they

do a bipartisan activity. and they decide this 30%, roughly half democrats and half republicans, you know, give or take a little bit here and there. this small minority of american society decides how all the resources are going to be spent. and the result of that is that the rest of us are sitting around saying what's going on here. a very small number of people have been at these town meetings, yelling and screaming at each other. the interesting idea there, that i didn't think david was quite clear about, and i think there is a better article about it in the post this morning by michael gershon, who is a conservative writer, former chief speechwriter for george bush, who talked about the town meetings and the whole phenomenon that is going on. and his argument is not democrats bad, republicans good, or whatever. his argument is we have a debate going on where both sides are behaving in a rigid manner.

certainly, you can see that when you watch the things on c-span. there is a whole dynamic underway which is that end of the spectrum and this end of the spectrum arguing with each other in public in all kinds of ways and getting more and more invested in arguing. remember, all the people who are fighting in this partisan battle represent a small percentage of the total american society. that is the analysis that we are presenting. so how do we think about things in a new way in order to get around some of the stuff? personal first of all, as a matter of human nature, we believe really strongly that every american has these debates going on inside themselves. do we need more of this kind of health care, do we need less, is it going to be expensive? and they're going on inside themselves. and we need a way for that debate that people are having inside themselves to be express

more into social policy framework. that's what the founders were trying to develop when they created this country. it is quite different than any other political system. the idea was that we all have, by ourselves, individually, families, neighbors, we have a lot of discourse, a lot of discussion. most people don't step up and say this is were i stand, where do you stand? most people say cheat, what do you think about. and that dynamic works on a local level and it begins to develop and move up until it's cut off at the knee by the political process that moves it out over that kind of direction and creates a kind of things we see in our politics. so we identify a range of individual activities that go on around the country. that actually exhibit, already underway a trans-partisan dynamic. in santa barbara, there is a prison program, postprison term program that addresses one of

the most contentious political areas in our society. about a thousand people a year are returned from the california penitentiary system to santa barbara, and people were sitting around saying these people aren't coming back. they are done with the terms. what do we do. and it was a real serious problem. so they got together with the public defenders, the prosecutors, the social workers, the prison reform people, they hit their knuckles with the rumor people, all got together in a group. and they started saying look, these people are coming back to this town. we got to make a way for them to fit into the town or it's just going to be more trouble. now there were a lot of programs that existed for, you know, prisoners after survey. but for example, if you want to get a job you had to wait three to six to nine months or even get an interview in those programs. the local folks set up a system in which they were actually creating, it's a service pack, a

transition back into society program that began before people were left prison. started counseling before they were out there started saying where do you want to live, what you want to live in santa barbara. and the action came out became part of the network of a community. changed the whole framework for those folks that were in that program. there is another example of a school. in the school, it's a san francisco school. it was one of the worst schools in the city. and probably one of the worst in the country. and there were only about four people who were taking the advanced mathematics class in high school and they were all asian girls. . .

people are working to make things different, to improve things. and our cultural system and our social system needs to engage and support that. that is the dynamic. how do we think about that? first of all, the spectrum is a very, very weak tool to think about politics. for example, let's think about a debate that went like this. my team thinks you should walk on your right leg. my team thinks you should walk on your left leg. that's fight about it. we can do all kinds of things.

but when you get all done no matter what the outcome of the debate you're going to have to walk on your right and left legs. otherwise you just stand jumping up and down. our politics is like that. the left leg has control. we jump up and down on the left leg. then it changes. the right has control. we have got to recognize that to integrate left and right. we the way we are proposing is instead of a spectrum, think of a matrix. think of left, right, arbitrary. part of the matrix. and then think order freedom. left, right. this is also in the book. okay. now you look at politics.

what do you have? you have one for the left, one for the right. what is very interesting, a whole raft of debates in this society pit free left and free right on one side. order left and order right on the other side. take campaign reform. mccain pretty conservative center. feingold most liberal center. opposed to that is on one hand the american civil liberties union and on the other hand the national rifle association. again, free left on free right. those teams are fighting. you can find them in the paper on issue after issue, on the internet or newspaper. they usually get clustered under something called odd fellow

coalitions. there are places where people are going around. look at these strange people on the left and right. what does that mean? what is we are saying that is fundamental. there is a tendency towards order. and requires the integration of freedom and order. if you have only order you will eventually have oppression. if you have only freedom you will eventually have chaos. if you can integrate freedom and order you can, in fact, have progress. because the more order you can organize that is not impressive, the more freedom you can have that is not chaos, that is the key to what we call the

transparty imperative. we are saying it is happening all across the country. where is the first point we need to address this politics? the very first point is on districting of legislative districts at the state level and the federal level. and the first successful transpartisan initiative that has gone into politics that we identified. the california reapportioning. it is a reapportioning. the commission is now operating only public hearings. it set up by a commission quite different. most commissions that are established require so many democrats and so many republicans. usually whoever is in power gets the odd one. three or five or whatever.

in this initiative in california it is roughly one-third democrats, one-third republicans, and one-third independents. independents have explicit messages that to roll in this district. that is an extremely important breakthrough. because now the way things would get done, at least there will be forces there. that kind of dynamic is the beginning of the real progress. what we would argue is that kind of an approach with the passion of the term-limit movement behind its has a real chance of a restructuring of the whole framework of american politics and policy. the term-limit movement is a movement that does well in addressing the personalities and politics. it does not actually address the underlying structure politics. in the term-limit movement the same small cut all of democrats

and republicans makes the decision. it is just that instead of see and it it is joe. after six years joe takes over sam's job. it is virtually impossible to move anybody out of office. they control, for example, redistricting. right now of very small percentage, i think 30 or so seats in the house of representatives are actually -- maybe it is a few more than that, 60, are actually a minimal to possible change by virtue of an election. all the others are fixed as a republican or democratic districts. changing that would change the framework for politics. and the objective for that change is to allow the personal american conversation that goes on within each american and around each american dinner table to actually be heard in the political process.

right now it is closed right out. and our analysis of transpartisan imperative is this is the dynamic that madison was talking about when he wrote against fascists. the idea that he was working on was the fact that what goes on in this society actually has an important role to play with what goes on in politics. and we cannot allow a fashion to dominant politician. frankly right now we have a fashion dominating politics. it is the partisan politicians. the opening of the books, i would just like to give you two examples.

the first chapter, although the evidence shows our country does suffer deep divisions the conflicts are not among ordinary people. there between ordinary people and political elites. in our highly stylized political structure everyone played dehumanizing rolls that caused the whole apparatus to resemble a cross between sumo wrestling and kabuki theater. people are playing roles. they are not actually expressing anything real. they are playing roles. that distorts our whole application of resources. now, i wanted to just read one other quote that we borrowed that i find useful in setting the context for what we are doing. in 1990 during a more hopeful time after the end of the cold war a nobel placed the united

states of america at the fulcrum. the idea of the pursuit of happiness is at the heart of the attractiveness of the universal civilization to so many. i don't imagine my father's parents would have been able to understand the idea. so much is contained in the idea of the individual. the idea of achievement and perfectibility. it is immense human ability. it can't be reduced. it cannot generate fanaticism. but it is known to exist. because of that of the more rigid systems in the and blow away. that is the dynamic that we are talking about when we say, if you harness the actual conversations that are going on within and among americans to our political process and begin to have our policies formed by the intelligence, the concern, the commitment of the american people you will end up with a strong, vibrant moving forward society which will raise all of us and the world itself to the

important notion. we are not trying to persuade people to do this. they are already doing it. we are saying let's construct our political apparatus to reflect what the people are already doing. thank you very much. [applauding] >> if anyone has a question there is a microphone. >> can they just ask from the table? >> they can repeat. our c-span audience wouldn't hear them very well. i am going to tell one thing. and let me make this anecdote the first question. one of my mentors many, many years ago the distinguished gentleman by the name of part

livingston he he was a trustee d chairman of the trustees for a while. the legendary story is that he was working with the president of a bank and went in one day to have a conference. he said, boss, pachenski or o'brian? and the president of the bank said, i'm surprised at you. the bank has to be strictly neutral in these things. we don't take sides. we can't back anyone. we have to be neutral. and he said, yeah, boss. i know that. but i really want to know is who are be neutral for. the international platform association is not neutral for anyone. we believe in free speech. we have had a person with a onetime historical progress a background this morning and a onetime -- and the chairman of the american conservative union. but my question has to do with the general loss of civility that my mentor, park livingston,

so championed. he said always reasonable people have reasonable differences of opinion without questioning the motives of other people. is that part of what you and david have been talking about today? >> well, i think the civility issue is crucial. i think that my own feeling about civility is tied directly to the fact that things that people want to say and what to be heard saying are squeezed out in the process. so i think two things are driving people's lack of civility. one of them is not having an option to go somewhere and talk. and not only democrats and republicans. generally the system problems of reasons, some of which are structural. we have a lot more on our agenda then we used to have. not a lot of time and space for people to be heard. more importantly there is a lot of fear in the world. i think there was a lot of fear,

of course, after 9/11. i think that was institutionalized into some of the things that david and i both agree, i would call them egregious abuses of federal power. but also the economics downturn has frightened people enormously. i think people are very, very upset right now generally said that even their own internal debate is probably less civil than it used to be. and the discussions are harder. and that is a very big challenge for the culture. i am curious about these articles in the post this morning. the health care debate. i am curious. there is this very interesting statement. obama has not taken a real position on health care yet. some people are saying that is a bad thing. his strategy clearly was to let the debate take place. everybody that we can to scream

and yell. i don't think anybody really expected the level of civility to be this low. it is enormous. i am, among other things, chairman of the board of an organization called citizens for health. we have a constituency. extreme left, extreme right. it is all mixed together. and we can't -- we are not very happy about mandates. that institution is not happy about any mandate at any time. it is a tricky problem. i think that is doing. and they are fearful that they are going to be told. the fact is right now it is already happening. that is one of the things we battle for. health as of fundamental human right. we don't think that ordering people on how to get their health care is a way of getting at. we are very concerned that there

are many options being pushed off the table that shouldn't be. that is from my constituency that is from the right, left, middle. any more questions? >> our next speaker is here. sorry. [applauding] >> thank you. >> jim, if these are your glasses you're going to miss them later today. our next speaker has arrived. one of the themes of this international platform association meeting is celebrating the advances made over many years in education for african americans, especially higher education. we will be honoring the today. died more than 100 years ago in 1896. a post civil war president of emory university. roughly added to the united

negro college fund and some of the same colleges were beneficiaries. but a friend of mine is here today from the national park service do is an assistant director here in washington d.c historic figure in the advances in civil rights. she was the founder of the national council for negro women. she was also a founder of a school in daytona florida. what was it? [inaudible] >> okay. somebody will correct me. i am very grateful to margaret for coming today to tell us about the life of mary mcleod bethune and to invite you to visit their house. margaret coleman miles, i have to remember your married name.

[applauding] >> hi and good morning to everyone. can you hear me? i wanted thank you for inviting senator rhodes. people refer to him. a state senator from illinois. i still bestow the honor upon him. i want to thank you for inviting me here to talk about a great american woman who had a vision. oh, my god. years ago. her name was mary mcleod bethune. she was as civil-rights activist and if. see also was an educator who founded the college, now a university. mary mcleod bethune, let me give you just a little bit of background about who she was.

she was born in 1875. she was in a place called mayesville, south carolina. in the south carolinians in here? okay. wonderful. so she was the 15th of 17 children. in those days that is what the family size with been. she was born 10 years after the signing of the 13th amendment which meant after the 13th amendment had been signed most southern states were very slow about setting up a public education for negro's here in america. what happens? the churches get themselves together. they would dispatch a pastor and a teacher to a particular rural area. this particular church would have been the presbyterian church. the presbyterians dispatched a pastor and teacher to

mayesville, south carolina. set it up as a school. and this is how mary mcleod bethune was the recipients of school education for the first few years for life. after finishing this school. that school would have only been up to the third or fifth grade. that was it. there was no other educational opportunities for negro's during that time, especially within the rural area. it so happens -- the school would have taught reading, writing, and arithmetic. and then they would have taught moral values. and so after that was over there was nothing. but bethune was fortunate. not only to see this story and tell you about how bethune had the determination. they began to help her the filled the dream and the vision that she had for not only basic education for negress here in america, but a collegiate level of education here in america.

and a around 1883 the school opened by the presbyterian church. bethune did graduate from the basic course that they had there. it's just so happens that a quaker seamstress, very kindly quaker seamsters from denver, colorado wrote her teacher. her name was mary. and mary was trying to exemplify her faith in god. and so as she was pondering how she was pointed to this she got an idea. she wrote a letter to the teacher commented that pastor and teacher in south carolina. and it went like this. my name is mary. i am interested in paying 10% of my income for the continued education of one of your students there at school. she did not know any, and she asked the teacher to choose which one of her students there to receive that seven year scholarship which would have

taken that student to the scotia seminary in concord, north carolina. the teacher chose mary mcleod to be the recipient of the mission school education. she had demonstrated that she was interested in education. not only was he interested in education, she helped her family. during this time how people get money in their household, they grew cotton. captain was so valuable that you could go it. it was a one season crop. you could grow it. you could pick it. you could take it to the weigh station, and you were paid cash money on the spot. by her parents being illiterate they were dependent upon whatever the weigh station said they had. so bethune going to this school,

see new the responsibility of helping her parents get a fair price. so she did help them, not only them. she also helped the others within that community. so when the scholarship was offered she had already demonstrated that she was not only interested in education for herself, but also helping her family as the benefits and the community. the day that she left, there is a book, the biography of mary mcleod bethune. it is out of print, but you can find copies in your local library. on that day when she left, between 11 and 12 years old when she boarded a train by herself bleeding says carolina going to concord, north carolina to the scotia cemetery. the whole community turned out for her because they were so excited for the fact that she had the opportunity to get a larger educational opportunity to graduate. and so she did attend the scotia

seminary. she did graduate in 1893. that's quaker seamstress was so impressed with her performance there at the school and she was the first african american to be able to -- or negro during that time would have been the term. to graduate, to attended and graduate. after graduating the quaker seamstress was so impressed she paid an additional year for her to attend the moody bible institute in chicago. she graduated in 1895. her greatest desire at that time was just to be a missionary. she wanted to be a missionary. she wanted to go to africa. well, she did discover that moody was not sending any negro missionaries to africe. so she she had to think about what she was kind to do. unlike the negro missionaries to

africa as early as 1830 they would have never sent as a woman by herself. this criteria would have been, you send them out to buy two. and that would have been at has been dead wife delegation. well, bethune did not get married until 1898. she did not qualify. she could have also accompanied a husband and wife delegation, but she would have been taking care of their children. so none of that came into play for her. i know on that day when moody's said, i'm sorry, your application is denied, she was disappointed. and so would any of you be disappointed with the fact that you had prepared yourself why you did very well. you were denied. and then she stood there being disappointed. she never dreamed in her wildest dreams that she would be the founder of a college or a college president.

october 4th 1904. mary mcleod bethune started the day telnet normal industrial school for negro girls. she started off with five girls ranging from the ages of 8-robby years old. her son. by that time she had married another fellow teacher. so has she started off she had of very meager amount of money, which would have disappointed a lot of us. i'm not going to even make an attempt because i can't do anything with the small amount of money. believe it or not she started off with $1.50. she convinced the person. she started the school in her home near the railroad tracks, and she convinced the honor, the rent was $11 a month. she convinced him, just let me on the property and i will raise the rest of the rent money for you. sure enough she did. she then began to train and

teacher girls. she had so many. started out with five. but daytona beach during this time had a large economic boom. the railroad was being built. the east coast railroad was being built. most of the railroad workers at children. but in daytona beach there was no educational opportunities for a negro's during this time. so bethune said, i'm going to start this school myself. she get of a large influx of girls. the railroad. she boarded the girls in that tube from home that she had. the railroad workers sent their children to her for her to take care of them and for their safety because they were then boarded. it did not have to worry about it. never going to be taught and academics and how to carry themselves as a lady. in daytona beach people used to identify bethune grows because she did start out with cross. she did not accept boys until

1908. they would identify her girls. they saw a young woman walking in daytona beach and she had on a blue skirt and a white blouse and a straw hat looking quite elegant, they knew that they were students from mary mcleod bethune school because they had never seen negros like this could before. and bethune's model was when people have a negative opinion of you, you put your best foot forward. and you don't play to the negatively. let me tell you she had that task. there was a rumor going around that blacks could not learn. and that was why the florida board of education and a lot of other board of education's in daytona beach and the southern area would not expand the money.

it was $2.75 for every black child's education. a $11.75 for every white child education. but to keep them from issuing the money for the black child education they just simply said blacks can't learn. bethune was infuriated. she came up with one of the smartest ways of how they showed them that blacks could learn. she went to the various hotels within the daytona beach community area after she trader pearls. they were looking very nice with their uniforms. and she said in the book, only one hotel in daytona that refused to allow her to come in. the others she proved her point. she would introduce herself to the hotel proprietors. hello. my name is mary mcleod bethune. abbott like to come to your hotel and would on of the light musical selection with my girls. you know, they said, okay.

music. everybody knows black folks consent. bring them on and. let them come ride on in. we'll have as a nice little soiree in the hotels. and so she would kill in. the girls had their the uniforms on. she would be so bold. bethune had a lot of confidence. she said i believe in god, but i also believe in mary mcleod bethune. and also what was doing the right thing to do. well, she would get to the hotels. people would look in amazement to see these little girls. and of course, she was trained as a missionary. that meant one-on-one a missionary many to play that piano. she would get in that lounge and played that piano. people would go, oh, my goodness. look at this. just thoroughly entertained and overwhelmed by how their presence, how they carried

themselves. and then after the musical selection was over with, i guess what bethune would have the girls to do? read shakespeare. complex literature. and the people were blown away. oh, my god. and this is how, as she was going for getting support for her school she met three of the wealthiest men in the world in those hotels. two of them in the hotel. one of them was john d. rockefeller. he did establish of funds to educate negress here in america, and it still exists to this day. he was so impressed by what he had seen mrs. bethune and those girls to. he came up and said the girl's hands. asked them how much it cost to get to the school. then he proceeded to say test mary mcleod bethune, , i'm goino pay for each one of the girl's education. i'm going to come and visit your

school. now, you can imagine bethune was just come up. come on. and then she met another gentleman by the name of thomas h. white was president of the white sewing machine company. they were so enthralled at mary mcleod bethune. we have to come to your school. when they went they did not see the pristine college campus that you see now in daytona beach. bethune and her girls were still in that to run got its. they were using milk crates as their chairs. bethune shared the same fate as her girls. her desk was a barrel with a board over it. well, wait a minute. you are not going to tell me you did all of this fine teaching in this -- and i know they had to catch themselves. they wanted to say dump.

i'm going to help you. and another gentleman, his name was james gambell. all of these men had summer homes in the area. and so he was so impressed with her direction and drive. he became her first board of director. the school grew quickly in 1908. she began to admit boys. 1923. she merged with another school. that is where the cookman park comes from. who was cookman? well, an all boys school. one of the first of its kind in the south. it does say in the right up that it was one of the first schools after the civil war that was set

up to educate negro boys only. the minister -- the methodist minister that was there decided and name. they would decide a name for the school. it was another methodist minister before him who he thought his whole ambition was to educate negro boys. his name was alfred kirkman. now, the bureau opened the school. the other methodist ministers that have labored and were working on the school says, we can't name the school anything else but after alfred cookeman. his zeal, determination, and interest in wanting to educate negro boys. and so that was the name of the school. in 1923, you know how it goes.

when the government gives you money they expect that you support your own self. the funds get cat. you are wondering how in the world am i going to keep this school solvent without this funding? well, bethune heard about it. the two schools merged. it became a unique talent. the rest is history. also, as the school crew in 1941 it came accreditation to offer of four year liberal arts college. mary mcleod bethune stepped down as president in 1942, and she turned the school over to the united methodist church. and they are the ones who own and operate the college to this day. now, in 2004 another woman comes on 100 years past mary mcleod bethune. takes the helm of the presidency. her name is dr. reid.

dr. reid decides because the alumni association that went to the college was so grateful for the educational opportunities and things that was afforded to them at the college, they brought back millions of dollars. they were very successful. poured millions of dollars into the college. and dr. reed said, okay. it's good that we have money to provide educational opportunities for others that cannot afford it. it is now time to get the accreditation so that we may offer a master's and ph.d. did your 14th 2007. the bethune cookeman college ceased to exist. it is now the bethune cookeman university. not bad for a lady who started out five girls, $1.50. she built the college.

the college campus where it is located now. it was on second avenue. they renamed it to the dr. mary mcleod bethune boulevard in daytona beach, florida. and so it used to be the city dump. bethune taught the honor into selling the lobster for $250. now, that was a lot of money during that time, but it certainly was not the value of that land. the gentleman was so convinced with the talk of mary mcleod bethune and what she wanted to do with the property that they sold the original person of land with the colleges now, which used to be the city dumped her for that amount of money. guess what her down payment was? eleven dollars. that's all she had was $11. and so she then confessed and, if you just let me on the property. they signed an agreement. she would have the money in a couple of years, the whole $250. guess how she raised the money?

she sold sweet potato pie and made homemade ice cream for the railroad workers. she raised that money. so where there is determination and to convince of the people of your dreams and visions, you can really work miracles like mary mcleod bethune did. i would like to share with you one last piece about misses bethune. august -- i think the same year that she died she gave one of the most profound interviews with john johnson who was the president and owner of johnson magazine in chicago and a nine. and it is entitled mary mcleod bethune legacy. and a lot of people gained a lot of inspiration from this, and i hope you do, too. it goes as this -- like this. sometimes i ask myself if i have any of the legacy to leave. now, not only did bethune start this school in daytona beach and

was the first president for the first 40 some years, she also was adviser to four u.s. presidents starting with calvin cooney, president hoover, roosevelt, and , and president y s. truman. appointed to be the head of the department of negro affairs. that made her the first black woman in america to head a u.s. federal agency. when the president truman came along after roosevelt had died, remember president roosevelt has signed the executive order to end discrimination in the federal government in the defense department. and it was a tremendous lot in life to complete that. he appointed mary mcleod bethune and 11 other outstanding african americans to be assistant secretary to the department of defense to ensure that african

american man or negro man at that time were not initially discriminated against to join any branch of the military. they were recruiters. two african american women were not permitted from the initial conception into the army. is my time up? >> just about. >> okay. let me finish reading the article. >> of one-stop the. >> okay. truly my barbie positions are f. my experience has been rich. by have and still principles and policies in which i believe firmly. i need the love. love builds. it is more positive and more helpful than hate. i leave you hope and the challenge of developing confidence in one another. i leave you thirst for education. i need you to respect for the

use of power. i leave you faith. i leave you racial dignity. i leave you a desire to live harmoniously with your fellow man. our young people. they are the futures of america. we need to build and help them as much. and this is how, with the individuals that i talk to you about, the quakers seamstress, the methodist church, the episcopal church, they all work together. she could have never accomplished what she accomplished by yourself. but with such fervor of her spirit and her looking to the future to provide a collegiate level of education for a new address here in america she did just that. thank you so very much. [applauding] >> margaret, thank you for

sharing that inspirational story. i want to say that we did invite today dorothy heit who is the current president and has been president for the last 50 years of the national council for negro women. she unfortunately, well, not unfortunately, she is on a cruise today with the school named after her. she said she would otherwise like to have come to be with the ipa today. we have to leave this wonderful inspirational story and talk about the topic of government waste. we had peter grace here and speak to the ipa in 1990. his successor is here. tom, would you please come forward. tom schatz is the chairman of citizens against government waste. but i ask him to talk about in part was whatever happened to earmarks? we heard a lot about earmarks. they were supposed to have disappeared. i am going to ask tom, did they

disappear? please welcome tom schatz. >> thank you very much, mark. it's a pleasure to be back speaking to the international platform association. the last time i was here taxpayers were up in arms about wasteful spending and earmarks. that was 10 years ago. the deficit was an outrageously high number. not much has changed. one thing that has changed as we know more about which members of congress are asking for in the earmarks, but they still take great pride in the pork. this is something citizens against government waste. at that time that was the terminology. we're redoing earmarks before they're really cool. we did the first congressional

book. this current fiscal year, $19.6 billion in pork. so the record year was 29 billion in 2006. lower than the record, but higher than last year. one of the things, of course, that happened in 2006 was the loss of the majority by republicans. while many thought it might be worth. others bought the other issues to be people were upset about the lack of accountability and transparency. one of the reason that earmarks exploded under the republicans was we take over in 1994. about one year later speaker gingrich, newt gingrich, decided that one way to help republicans get reelected and keep the majority was to encourage the appropriations committees in the house and senate to put earmarks into the legislation, and to the district's of vulnerable republican freshmen.

so this was at that time but the first time really a campaign re-election tactic. many members of congress will say we have to do this. it helps us locally. the real objective in their mind is to get reelected. i don't know how people that don't take earmarks, how do they get reelected without the earmarks? well, they have a principle that says they won't take earmarks. so the members under the speaker's suggestion went really hog wild. the earmarks proliferated throughout congress. the way that it is divided has nothing to do with anything other than who is the majority. 60 percent of the earmarks get to the majority party. 40 percent go to the minority party. there was a discussion between the then chairman of the appropriations committee senator

ted stevens of alaska and hawaii who's now the chairman of the appropriations committee. this is before the 2006 elections. the comment was we really don't care who gets the majority. we will still continue to do business as we have. we will continue. so many often say that there are three parties in washington, the democrats, republicans, and the appropriators. the appropriators do business a lot differently than the rest of congress. it's one of the reasons why spending is not really under control. earmarks are not a large part of the budget. $196 billion. that is less than one-half of 1% of this record $3.5 trillion budget. of course we have $1.8 trillion deficit. but when members of congress refused to give up the pork

regardless of how large or how small it is, it makes it more difficult to address larger issues. the temptation in washington always is to go spend more money. there aren't enough members and say we have to get spending under control or we don't really need this new program or we already have 1205 programs for had rescued. let's find one that works and stick with it. that is not merely the tendency toward the objective as most members of congress. they have a lot of committees and subcommittees. they like to hold hearings, often on the same topic. agencies did called up and may speak to five or six different sub committees within a few days on the same issue. it's not that well organized. if you want efficiency. if you want spending it is incredibly well-organized. but you know when you look at these town halls all over the country this is not just about health care. this is really about the size and scope of government,

something that has been going on forever. and it's something that i think politicians need to pay attention to. because the chains that they wanted apparently was not a lot more government even though many of us thought that is what we would be getting. certainly disappointed as in that regard with the stimulus and the t.a.r.p. and the bailouts. could you imagine in the past thinking that the president could force of the chairman of any company, let alone gm? this is what we have. the earmarking is part of that control and part of that desire in washington to go and spend more money. and the partisanship stops when it comes to the appropriations committee. many members of congress like to say that this is something that has been going on since the beginning of the republic. that is the quote from majority leader harry reid. however, that is not exactly the case. the constitution does grant congress the power to spend.

no money shall be drawn from the treasury but by consequence of appropriations made by law. now the bylaw is of very interesting way to approach it as well. when members of congress and these year marks to the appropriations bill it is not in this statute. they are added in what is called committee reports. so it is really an extra legal way of spending money. the agencies ignored these year marks at their peril because the appropriations committees make it very clear that if they don't fund the earmarks they will cut their budget the following year. that was literally what happened when citizens against government waste back in 1988 and 1989. lifted all of the unauthorized programs and projects that were in the appropriations bills. technically they should not be funded by the administration.

well, he got some phone calls and we even got a letter from the appropriations committee chairman saying if you ever come up with such a list again will cut your budget and a half. so they can't cut our budget. mark remembers a lot of this because he was working. we decided they can't do anything to citizens against government waste. we will take up this effort. a few years later we did issue the first congressional pig book. we give out oinker awards. we will leave some of these books in the back. this year in particular we had a few good oinker awards. we also have what we call pork by capita. here is the pit book itself. it comes out every year. and the oinker awards this year include the logrolling award,

$4.5 million in wood utilization research. that is in ten states. nineteen senators and 10 representatives added this particular project. we knew about wood utilization for years. one would think we would have figured out what to do with this widespread product by now. that government needs to spend $400 million a year. the industry apparently doesn't have enough money to do it itself. we also gave out the narcissist award. a lot of members of congress like to name things after themselves. this went to senator pat roberts of kansas. we can do these all day. members of congress like to name things after themselves. we have on our web site of a section called bird droppings. these are everything we have been able to find in west

virginia named after senator byrd. some 40 or 50 places named after the center basically just a big reelection sign when you want. you go past the robert byrd freeway and the robert byrd center. everything else that you see in the state. in fact and there is a statue. their is a law in west virginia that you can't build any kind of statute until after an individual is deceased. they made an exception for senator byrd. if you stand close enough he appears to be reaching into your pocket. so senator byrd, of course, will be reelected until he can no longer go on. he is unfortunately, quite ill. that is what the members to cut that is what the state apparently lacks. one of the one that we have is the water taxi to know where a word. this is the latest version of the bridge to nowhere. $1.9 million for the beach.

a small beach within a mile of bridgeport. you can walk to it. there was a bridge. burn down 10 years ago. local folks didn't see fit to rebuild the bridge themselves. so they put in $1.9 million last year. this is what we see over time. and as we have noticed they are not disappearing. they are still there. still proliferating. the democrats have done, as i said, more transparency, but not enough. not a matter of what you see. it's a matter of what this band. i encourage you to take a look. in the newsletters, one more quick thing. their is a summary of an article by a professor talks about the non monetary consequences have it interferes with their functioning basically. members of congress called him up and say, spend the money. takes away from much more

important issues related to the defense of our country. when these individuals and contracting officers are faced with the choice of doing their regular business or answering a call from a member of congress but they don't really understand the process and how things work, that is another way that these your marks are not helpful to the country. >> thank you very much. [applauding] >> i apologized to tom for rushing him just a little bit, but we have one of our guests all the way from california here. he is also one of our verbal award winners. jim arnold, will you please come up and introduce pat boon? i have the marine corps flag right here in your honor. >> thank you. thank you, my friend. i didn't know i was going to get the honor to introduce my

friend, pat boone. the 60-plus association. when i ask mr. boone a few years year to be our national spokesman he said well, jim, now that i admit that i am 60-plus i will be your spokesman. it is a real honor to have pat here to receive this award. he needs no real introduction. you guys know that. everybody in this audience knows it. he's one of the top recording stars of all time. they say down in hollywood that you have reached the height of your career if you get a star on the hollywood walk of fame. pat boone does that have a star on the hollywood walk of fame. he has three stars on that walk of fame. one for music, one for movies, and one for his writing career, his singing career. records. all-time record producer. pat boone, would you please come on up? it is an honor.

[applauding] i think they want to give the award later, but they wanted to say a few words. we will give you the award in just a moment. >> well, thank you, jim. i'm sorry? oh. well, actually i am relieved because when i first heard that i was receiving this honor i thought you said silver bull award. i thought i was being awarded for something different. but anyway, but i am a singer. of course i sing words. i have learned the value and the impact of words, particularly the spoken word. of course if you can add some music to it that is also very persuasive. to think that for some reason i have been selected to join this

company of people like margaret thatcher and ronald reagan, of course, going back to daniel webster himself makes me think even more about the impact that words do have in our lives. of course the bible starts in the beginning. god created the heavens and the earth. he said -- spoke let there be light. then there was light. that shows you the immense power of words. of course, tom jefferson said in his declaration of independence we hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal and endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights. among these life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. and these words, they have been singing and campaigning for a couple of words in our pledge of allegiance.

under god. the words that have been in our pledge since 1954 which 99.99% of the american public want to keep in our pledge. but one man does not like those two words. he convinced the 9th circuit court that they might be unconstitutional in our pledge. well, i disagree. i have written a song, recorded, it actually went to number 15 in the billboard hot-100 single chart with those words, under god. [applauding] >> they are powerful. they persuade. they influence. they change history. patrick henry, give me liberty or give me death. words like charlton heston, from these cold dead hands. they bring with authority and truth and to be able to speak those words. sometimes employ them

effectively. it is a great blessing. so i think you if i deserve this in any way. i am very grateful. and of course, i am a spokesman for jim martin and 60-plus having come out of the closet some seven years ago and confessed that i have a senior and have been for some time. i now speak on behalf of seniors. we want to take care of all americans in the latter part of their lives. preserve and use the great experience that they have developed. so thank you for this. i am greatly honored. [applauding] >> pat, before you leave my sister told me a story last night. i would like to tell if you would please. one of the themes today we have been talking about advances in education for african-americans. you had this story about the early days of television when you had your own tv show.

>> well, i am surprised. i didn't know you knew that. you know, i guess most of the public has no idea. i have been a civil-rights activist. i am a kid from nashville, tennessee. but by was raised properly the parents who saw everybody equally. so when i was doing my television show, it was number one in the nielsen rating. i was singing duets. ella fitzgerald. nat king cole, sammy davis, tony bennett, perry como. one day harry belafonte called. he was the biggest entertainer in the world. he said, i like the way you treat your guests on your show. would you like me to come on and sing a couple songs and maybe do something together? i was flabbergasted. and so i said, boy, would die.

i went then to announce this great invitation or opportunity to our sponsor, chevrolet and to abc and the ad agency. and they said we can't do this because he is really russling feathers with his civil-rights stand. so we can't have him. and you mean i have to say no to harry belafonte. yes, sadly. and i said, well, it's not the pat boone show. i appreciate the opportunity, but you will have to give someone else to take over from here. you're going to leave your own show for this? i said, you know it's more than this. it is a bigger issue than that i understand it, but i can't be part of it. thank you for the opportunity. well, of course, they relented and said if you will guarantee the about be some embarrassing statement made. we are going to sing some songs. and so they agreed that i could

have harry belafonte on the show. so that is that story. .. >> for those who have been sitting here all morning, we will take a little break right now. thank you. >> also have some -- a few of pat boone's latest book. i think he has written more than a dozen books. 14 or so books.

he has one about his 50-year journey through the united states of america. as a great entertainer. hires the silver bowl award. >> if mary would bring up one of those books real quickly. and we got the award here. >> we just had to make sure we got the right award. my sister, sheryl, serves with pat on a couple of advisory boards, including the parents television council. will you please present the award to pat, and steve, would you help sheryl present the award. >> hi, pat. wanted to say ten years ago when i joined you and steve allen, i was so thrilled that somebody i admired so much as a child i would get to serve on the same

board, and i'm so glad mark told that story. you're a here to so many people. we present this award to you for your wonderful career and the inspiration you have been to all of us always. [applause] >> through, sheryl. thank you very, very much. i ham -- am honored. >> here is the pat boone book we will have in the back. he will stay a while and autograph a few of those. one more story. a lot of you in this room remember when there was cigarette advertising on television and booze and so forth. when he was 21 or 22, they said to pat, he is going to get a national tv show, and they said, pat boone, we have a sponsor for you, and meyers, they said it's cigarettes. he said he didn't want to do that. they pointed out ronald reagan

hawked chester fields. his was a guy who didn't have two nickels to rub together. then they came later and said anheuser busch in st. louis, and he says, i don't want to do that, either. to the advertisers came back and said, mr. boone, do you have anything against chevrolet automobiles? [laughter] >> no, he didn't. again, thank you. >> thanks, folks. this concludes our morning session. we will be serving lunch a little before 12:30. so thanks to tom for coming, and i want to thank margaret coleman miles who brought it an inspirational story. thank you again, margaret. [applause] >> and bill, yes, sir.

bill, would you put a microphone, please? in front of you. >> i just wanted to introduce pastor kathy morris, the senior pastor at the trinity methodist church in atlanta, georgia. >> please come up to the microphone. we're honored to have you. >> is anybody coming to church these days? >> is anybody coming to church? very few. very few. thank you all so much for having me here. i'm glad to be here. >> we're honored you could join us today. thank you very much. please take a break. thank you. this concludes the morning session.

>> according to the center for immigration studies, one out of three people in the u.s. without health insurance is a legal or illegal immigrant. the organization hosted a discussion this week on immigrants and the health healte bill making its way through congress. this is an hour and 15 minutes. >> good morning. my names marker kerkorian. i'm in a think tank here in washington that critiques the impact of immigration in the united states. we don't have views on things other than immigration. the center has no stance supporting or opposing any kind of reform on health care.

our staff and board almost certainly have a pretty wide variety of views on health care, as well as a variety of other issues. but health care being such a big part of the economy and such an important thing, obviously in people's lives, it's a significant intersection between the work the center does on immigration and something like health care, and there i think we do have a contribution to make. there has been some discussion already of the immigration aspects of the healthcare issue. from our perspective, that's been limited because it's been mainly about the issue of legal status. in other words, will illegal immigrants be subsidized by some taxpayer-funded healthcare program, and that's important,

and our speakers will touch on that. but the important thing i think is to understand that the problem, if you see it as a problem, of immigration as it relates relates to health care, it's not limited to illegal immigration, as important as that is. it's the question of immigration overall and the impact it has on health care, because illegal immigrants are people like anybody else, they come from the same countries at legal immigrants, same families. a lot of time it's the same people, flipping back and forth between legal and illegal status. so to understand, to use a phrase, come mensively the impact of immigration only health care, you need to lock at all immigration north just illegal immigration, as important as that is, and that's what we aim to do here tonight. our first speaker is probably

one of the nation's leading experts on the issue of immigrion, the research director here. the second speaker is james r. edwards, jr. he is a fellow with cik, co-author of the congressional politics of immigration rerear form and has work in both the immigration policy field and the health policy field. so he will have a lot to bring to the discussion. and last but not least is robert rector, the leading scholarship on the issue of immigration and services and cost. so the three speakers will say their piece and then will take q & a from people. steve? >> thanks, mark. as mark said i'm steve, director

of research for here in washington. at congress and the nation debate healthcare reform, the impact of immigration should be an important component of that debate. now, whether illegal immigrants get access to some new government program or public option, has been discussed to some extent, but the overall impact of immigration has not really been discussed. as mark pointed out, we at the center for immigration studies don't have a position on what form healthcare reform should take. i'm personally sympathetic to some of the proposals but that's not the focus of my discussion. i will discussion what the dat tell us about the effect on he healthcare system. i will rely on data collected by the government, and what i think that data is going to show is

that it is very difficult to imagine getting our healthcare house in order without getting our immigration house in order, if you will. in my presentation, i'm going tow to rely primarily on government data, the current population survey from 2008, the most recent data available. it asks about your health insurance coverage in the previous year, the previous calendar year so that would be how much coverage you had in 2007. the survey is collected by the u.s. census bureau and is our primary sores of information on health-insurance coverage in the united states for any population. let me also point out that most of the information i will cover today is also available at our web site, www.cis.org. now, in 2007, 33% of immigrants,

of all immigrants, legal and illegal, did not have health insurance, compared to 13% of native-born americans. immigrants account for, by themselves, 27.1% of all u.s. residents without health insurance. we can see this in figure one, which is to my right, right here. figure one shows that immigrants are 12.5% of the nation's total population, but they are 27.1% of the uninsured. again, this is just the immigrants themselves. if we can keep the camera on fig 1 just a little longer, let me discuss some additional information. the impact of immigration is not just confined to the immigrants themselves. immigrants have children who they are often unable to provide health insurance for.

if the children, who are born here, the u.s.-born children of immigrants who are under the age of 18 are included with their immigrant parent, then together, as figure 1 shows, they comprise 31.9% of all those without health insurance. now to place this figure in context, figure 1 also shows that immigrants and their kids are about 16.8% of the total population. so twice their share of the unshard -- uninsured relative to the share of the population. this means one out of every three people in america without health insurance is either an immigrant, legal or illegal, or the u.s.-born child of an immigrant. the total number of immigrants and their children without health insurance is 14.5 million in 2007. why that is so important is because what it tells us, just obviously, is that when we're talking about the uninsured in

this country, which is a big part of the current debate we're having, immigration is a very large part of that story, but of course it's not the whole story. it's just a large fraction of it that is often not adequately acknowledged. there's another way of thinking about the impact of immigration on the size of the uninsured population. we can look at how much of the growth in the uninsured or increase in the uninsure is from immigration. the government reports that since 1999, the number of uninsured people is up, about 6.4 million. in 2007 there were 5 million immigrants who arrived in the united states since 1999 who didn't happen health insurance. so take the 5 million and divide it bit 6.4 million, it's 78% of the growth in the uninsured is attributable to these enoughly

arrived immigrants, or equals 78% of the growth. if we add in u.s. born uninsured children, it grows to 85%. if we had no immigration after 1999, most of the growth in the uninsured would not have occurred. now, immigration does not only impact the size of the uninsured population. it also plays a role in the medicaid system. medicaid is the primary government program that provides health insurance to people with low incomes. now, it goes by different names. like in california you may have heard of medical, but it's really just medicaid. and when we talk about here medicaid, we're talking about the big program, whatever name we talk about it under. in 2007, 19% of immigrants and

their u.s.-born children were on medicaid. and we can actually combine the share who are on medicaid with the share who are uninsured and figure 2 over to my left has some pie charts that does that. what figure 2 shows is that 47.6% of immigrants and their u.s.-born children were either uninsured or on medicaid. that means that almost half of immigrants and their children have no health insurance or have it provided to them by the government. in comparison, the bottom of fig 2 shows, if you can see it, that about 25%. so 1/4, and they don't have health insurance or have it provided by medicaid. the question you're probably all

wondering, why are should many immigrants in the united states lacking health insurance? the large share of immigrants without health insurance is partly explained be the large share of those without education. one-third of immigrants did not complete high school in their home country. which means they typically work at jobs that don't provide insurance, and their resulting low incomes from their lower levels of education, means they can't afford it on their own. among illegal immigrants we estimate that 55% didn't graduate from high school in their own country. among all immigrants, legal and illegal, it's about a third. we seek the importance of immigration to this question by just looking at some simple statistics. we look at college-educated immigrants, 15% are uninsured. if we look at immigrants who didn't graduate high school? half are uninsured. so a big part of the story is

education. but it's not just education. cultural and oer factors also seem to play a role. if we look at affluent immigrants who have a college degree and compare tome in affluent without college they're half more likely to not have health insurance. so something is going on. i was looking at households of $75,000 a year or more. so these people should be able to afford health insurance. they have a college degree so they should be able to recognize its importance. but again, the immigrants in that position are much less likely to have insurance than natives in that position. >> now, there's some other reasons for this. and that is that immigrants often come from countries where health insurance is not that common. or they often come from countries where it's provided by the government automatically,

and i think these two factors also play some significant role in why immigrants, who would seem very likely to have it given their education and income, still often choose not to. now, one thing that we can also say is lack of health insurance among immigrants is not caused by immigrants unwillingness to work. in 2007, about three-quarters of all immigrants held a job. and that's the exactly the same for adult natives. this is not caused by immigrants sitting home and not being willing to work. again, rather, the reason so many don't have health insurance is their educational attainment. there is no single better predictor of how an immigrant is going to do in the modern american economy than their education level, and this is try where we were to look at welfare use, income, homeownership or

health insurance coverage. so far i eave only talked about all immigrants and their kids. but what about legal status? in an earlier study we estimated that 64% of illegal immigrants are uninsured, and they account for about one out of seven people in the united states without health insurance, and if we were to help their u.sbeen children, it's one out of every six people without health insurance in the united states is an illegal immigrants. so these are some big numbers, but it's not the whole story. again, about 7 million uninsured illegal immigrants. that number is 8 million when we count their u.s. children. what about the costs? that's what a lot of folks are concerned about. we have been in the process of trying to develop some more precise estimates, but right now our best estimate is that we're spending about $4 billion a year providing health care to illegal

immigrants. that is just public expenditures, $4 billion. it's more if you count their u.s.-born children. now, it's also important to note that uninsured illegal immigrants use significantly let in health care than un-native born americans. they're just dramatically more likely to be uninsure in the first place. this is because they tend to be younger than native-born americans, and so health care costs generally rise with age. the illegals are relatively young so they tend to cost less than uninsured natives. just much more likely to be uninsured in the first place. also, although this stereotype is that illegal immigrants go to the emergency rooms often, this is not correct. the problems illegal immigrants create for emergency rooms is not so much that they go more often than the rest of the population; rather, it's when they go, anywhere much more likely not to pay.

and that is why it's a problem. remember, 13% of native-born americans are uninsured, so they pay the vast majority of the time. but more than 60% of illegal immigrants are uninsured and don't pay. when illegal immigrants use emergency health care there's often no cording stream of revenue to offset their costs. this is why emergency rooms get so crowded in areas with lots of illegal immigrants. illegal immigrants are using the system without paying for the system at much higher levels. we can also calculate the cost to taxpayers of the whole thing, of what legal and illegal immigrants cost and if we put in there, u.s.-born children are uninsured as well and that's $11 billion a year from public

coffers. now, charity and illegal immigrants themselves pay on top of that, but the cost, we're estimating at $11 billion a year, and this takes into account that the immigrants tend to be younger and use less care, but much more likely to be uninsured in the first place. what if we tried to provide medicaid to, say, uninsured immigrants? in that case the cost would be very high indeed. with decide to cover just the uninsured illegal immigrants with medicaid, even taking into account their much younger age issue it would still cost $15 billion to 30 bill a year to provide them with medicaid. providing medicaid to all uninsured and their children would be perhaps $60 billion a year. what about amnesty or legalization of illegal immigrants. would that solve our problem?

an interesting question. the president has made statements that suggest that he thinks an amnesty would solve our problem. but the answer is, no, it almost certainly would not. remember, lack of health insurance is very common among legal immigrants. people who are here legally in 2007, more than one-fourth of those wean wean -- with a greend did not have health insurance. if we look at immigrants with legal status, 35% of insured. so we think that more illegal immigrants would have health insurance, but there's a catch. if we look at those less

educated green are cardholder, in addition to 35% been uninsured, another 2% on medicaid, the health insurance program for the poor that is very costly for the gotcha. means we haven't really solved the cost problem because we didn't solve the underlying problem, which is that illegal immigrants are overwhelmingly unexcelled. not -- unskilled. he say a majority -- no education beyond high school, and we think a majority haven't even graduated high school. about 55%. and # 0% are either high school drop -- 80% are dropouts or only a high school education in conclusion, we have to ask the question, can we have healthcare reform without immigration reform? put a different way. can you let illegal immigrants stay and avoid the large costs for taxpayers. the answer is, almost certainly

no if the illegals stay, the costs will stay as well. in short, we either enforce the law and reduce the illegal population over time, or we just accept the cost, which is another alternative. if one still favors an amnesty or legalization, whatever you like to call it, then we have to be honest and make it clear that in areas like health care, the costs are significant for letting illegals stay and may actually get quite a bit bigger if we legalize them. it doesn't solve the cost problem. as for legal immigration, obviously illegal immigrants already here are free to stay, of course. but in the future, we have to decide whether it makes sense to continue to allow in so many legal immigrants who don't have a lot of education. depending on how you calculate it, some research shows a quarter of legal immigrants

haven't graduated high school, and some research shows a third haven't graduated from high school. so a very large fraction of the legal immigrants can be described as quite unskilled. at present, most legal immigrants are in the country because they have a relative here. this means most legal immigrants are selected without regard to their education or impact on taxpayers or the healthcare system. if we want to avoid large costs for taxpayers in healthcare system, we need to significantly reduce the number of legal immigrants who are allowed in in the future who have very little education. now, i think there's still one final point that bears mentioning. the large share of legal immigrants on medicaid or the large share of illegal immigrants without health insurance, should not be seen as some kind of moral defect on the part of immigrants. the vast majority of immigrants, legal oreg