i think you see the voters saying that on their very weary of the enormous plans that they won't, that they don't understand on health care and they are also weary of any health care plans are for they have full confidence that the rest of the country is moving in the right direction. so i don't think health health f it is where it is now or the president comes back with some limited pieces, i think the president will successfully kind of walked us back from becoming a big issue in the election because clearly when you look at the numbers on health care we are showing a similar pattern of people starting out positive and the more they heard the more negative they became. ..

their own interests and flowed from candidate to candidate or do they more likely sort of stick and when do they stick with that decision? >> there is no single model about when independent make up their own but by definition

independents are more of a floating vote because as you can see once people identify themselves with a party there is a 73 colin 90% probability they are going to vote for their party's choice. if not straight down the line in 80% of elections give or take once they don't like the candidate races. so what is happening is if the bigger the eckert but independence the greater the probability or possibility of volatility in the elections because those voters can or are more likely to decide leader, more likely to change their mind once or twice, more likely to see swings and more likely to vote how they think the conditions are of the country, the country at the time the vote. and that means if you think the electorate has been volatile you ain't seen nothing yet because if you've got an electorate dominated by independence then

by definition it will swing more and it means as i say to you initial we think of the swing voter has a small group. i think philosophically a lot of people in the party's push this notion of the swing voter is a small telescope group and a country that essentially had chosen sides and the numbers over the last 70 years show the opposite process has been happening. that is not the country is like. in fact there are these three very distinct groups and if you are a democrat or republican these days you are only going to win almost any election almost anywhere only if you have a majority of independent support. >> i hear you saying folks out there want to move the process forward and see progress and i guess with the republican

minority kind of creating this grid lock do you see any political that vantage in the 2010 election for the congressional democrats to take a hard line, put their bills on the floor and force republicans and to do this filibuster the keep saying they are willing to do? at least creating the image we are trying to move this process forward or believing they are moving the process forward could that help the democrats? >> i think there's one thing you do see its that the president is seen as the one reaching out now to both parties. i think for a while the president pulls seen as perhaps just playing with of the democrats but right now since the state of the union and last couple of weeks going to the republican retreat and pushing forward the commission i think of to-1 they said the president is in fact reaching out to find

more bipartisan solutions and i think that is probably the single biggest movement that i saw in the latest polls in favor of the president. that is not merely seen by the democrats in congress and the democrats in congress could adopt one of two strategies. they can join the bipartisan notion along with the president and seem to be reaching out to try to make compromises on big issues to end the logjam. alternatively they can put through a number of votes that are unpleasant for the republicans' leading up to the congressional elections which is a strategy the republicans always did to the democrats so they would always try to get every democrat on record as voting for tax increase before the elections and and so the democrats are probably the democrats need to do a little of each because you need to show

that you are for progress and you need to show that the republicans in fact don't have any ideas or are clinging to old ideas, they are without a leader and left to their own devices and are not really voting for the kind of solution so i think they are going to need to deploy both of those kinds of strategies coming up here. >> patrick, in the back. >> my name is patrick, a student of the clinton school. i have to say i like your comment about having a president that's to the spread and please out a simple feasible plan we did all identify with. but life in sort of frustrated with watching the events happening in the congress because they're seems to be so much bickering. until i saw a video on youtube of president obama addressing the gop and it was literally can stand in front of the republicans saying what do you

want to know, just talk to me, and i guess i was wondering what is your opinion about his new initiative to televise or make footage available off events like that going on in congress? >> i thought that was an excellent event president obama did. i think it was genuine and it was real. it was interesting because there was a widespread sense that in america we don't get to see real discussions of political figures and issues that in britain question time provides an opportunity to really question everybody. they are just used to kind of the open televised rough-and-tumble between the political figures and in many ways we run a culture of press conferences, staged events, isolated messages and not so much the interaction.

the only interactive and events that we typically have are the presidential debates so i think it is not just a question of transparency but i do think that although the downside would be people would see the bickering the upside would be people would see working and that kind of working across the aisle is not staged but is part of a genuine on going interchange. one of the things president obama ran and won on was the idea being the most transparent president in a modern world everything is online instantly i think delivering on that promise is part of what he needs to do. every president in order to be maximally successful has to be the person people voted for and elected and i think one of the reasons they voted for him is he is going to bring a modern sense of transparency of not listening

to the special-interest into the presidency and i think that he can't do enough such events. >> question right here. >> federal reserve bank. our important in reality is a turnaround of the financial crisis to where the middle class feels they are seeing a turnaround before those numbers change for obama? >> i think there's a very very strong connection between the unemployment numbers and the numbers that you are seeing politically. it's very hard for you to get widespread approval with 10% unemployment so that's why i said throughout this talk there is doing a lot of the right things as president there's been more transparent, there's

creating kind of a sense that you're bringing in both parties for moving forward on progress but there is no substitute for some results and when people see the on employment number down everyone who said this program isn't working well now suddenly say this program is working, and i'm glad that's why we have four year terms precisely because of the problem that if we let people judge everything on every, what happens every day so the importance i always said the unemployment at 10% was like a trip wire. as it went up once it got to 10% that kind of number would just become and plays and in people's mind and i think it has. it was unfortunate that it couldn't be avoided and i think getting it back down to 8% or below will also be a kind of smaller rivers tripwire and show progress is working and we hear

various predictions about what is going to happen but i do think the reality of that is it can change a lot of the political numbers that we've seen. >> you said a few minutes ago about congressional approval disapproval 24, 71 at levels that are and you cite a dustin a factor in senator biden's decision not to run. if you were looking at that today and you were advising or tossing out advice for another incumbent blanche lincoln from arkansas with a congressional leader of 2471 or would you say? what would you do? >> i think it is a tough situation here i think in arkansas. i think that the general sense for most people is to freely i

think come out and pick some issues, some strong issues you think are important to people, run a public campaign on them, try to say okay let's not get caught up in the politics of partisanship. i think that senator bayh did strike a chord in a lot of people where he said look i just think there's too much partisanship and we've got to move to get things done. that means people who want to stay in the senate and be back with happening they have to echo that is where they personally are. i think they have to pick a couple of big common sense issues and drive those home and third i think they have to say the republicans don't have any answers other than no. with the public is saying is don't take a turn and actually if you look at the congressional members under the republicans there were a few points worse so

the problem is white turn to something that you know doesn't work when you haven't given the democrats a fair chance at turning the country around? and i think you have to do those three things as major elements of a strategy in what it's going to be. i think a difficult election. >> time for one more question. right here, yes. >> how much of the country are people going to be and when the campaign, since the campaign contribution limits have been thrown out the window do you think on a daily basis public opinion is quite be swayed by who has the best commercial? >> swayed by? >> whoever has the best commercial or public message of the moment. >> i used to joke that we spent a lot more on advertising a hamburger in america than on our political system. that's changed. [laughter] there's a lot more spent in politics today.

the effort to restrict money in politics has backfired. so far i don't think the supreme court ruling actually will make a lot of difference because already interest groups had a significant number of advertisements on the air through independent groups. it would make a difference in the last 30 to 60 days where more explicit messages but already we have seen tremendous amount of money from all sides coming. that is why i again when i started this i think we have probably not seen a midterm election the way this could shape up. it was interesting of the american public they got obviously involved in the 2008 election almost like never before. then i think a lot of people the way politics for a while. that's over. now i think it's coming back so i think that you are going to see they can contest and

remember what fuelled 2008 was actually a small dollars. there was never a tradition in this country of small political donations. i used to do the dnc polls of political donors. the average age was 80. there were just a few people. i would say was this the whole list. and so for the first time you have a full agenda, full one per cent, 3 million people participating so the real thing that's changed i think in terms of ability to go on the air was the involvement of the 3 million citizens. if you take a 3 million citizens and all the interest your right. the advertising industry could be an for continued success on alternate even years to considerable extent but i guess my point is i don't know if it's going to result in more

volatility of the electorate. but rot believed the electorate has a sense of what they want and particularly as i have written working and middle class voters are better educated, the following issues more, the research things on the internet and they tend to be more serious than people give them credit for so i think we may have historically high levels of political advertising for ever but i do think that we are going to have historically high levels of political involvement in this country for some time to come as well. >> ladies and gentlemen, mark penn. [applause]

now a look at oversight of contractors and iraq and afghanistan. this is one and a series of hearings held by the commission on wartime contacting an independent group created by congress. the commission will send a report to congress later this year. witnesses include state and defense the board officials read this part of the hearing is about an hour and a half. >> thank you, commissioner. mike co-chairs, please. >> thank you. this seems more like a scholarly discussion and i would like and it kind of puts us all to sleep. i'm trying to think of some way to wake us up. one of the things i think of is the lack of coordination cost billions and billions of dollars. a huge waste which means we don't optimize the dollars that we spend.

it also results in the loss of lives in the military, the loss of lives and our diplomatic corps, loss of lives and severally and civil servants and loss of lives and contractors, u.s. contractors, allies, our nato friends, the loss of lives of local nationals both as contractors and as civilians on the street and loss of lives of for third country nationals. that's the bottom line. so it is a huge issue. with any of you deny that the lack of coordination has resulted in a serious cost of money not that it's your fault but lack of coordination and loss of lives because we haven't optimize our military and we haven't succeeded in rebuilding the nation like we want to? i don't need a long answer. i will start with you, ambassador and go right down the line. >> certainly coordination has been problematic in the past.

it's been getting better. >> is a blast. i asked his lack of coordination resulted in wasteful money in the loss of lives. >> i think it is safe to say -- >> it's not a hard question, ambassador. >> coordination could be better and absence of effective coordination has led to the losses. >> loss of lives and waste of money? >> i think it is a -- >> the fact that you have a difficult time seeing a is more concerned than anything. it is a no-brainer. let me interrupt to a second. this is a hearing to which we want to know is this something that registers with you? and if you can't tell me it doesn't cost the loss of lives and loss of money i give to the easy question. the hard questions are to follow. >> there is no question there have been losses and money. have there and losses in lives?

perhaps so. >> perhaps? so it is just a money issue. it's not an issue of using our forces were successfully? don't you think that if we are able to help the iraqis and afghans that this would help bring peace sooner therefore not cost lives? that's kind of like basic it seems to me. >> better coordination would lead to better results including victory faster therefore not the waste of money and loss of lives. correct? >> presumably. >> presumably? is that the way you want the record today? you can't say yes? >> again it's not a hard question. mr. beaver. >> i would say there's a lot of room for improvement. and people work hard but yes,

better coordination would mean more cost-effective delivery of assistance. there are constraints both in terms of what the military can provide for this activity where we have to get the development done and i think pacings are living in the right direction. as for a loss of lives i have to be careful because of potential legal issues that may be out there. but there isn't any of us that have served in this part of the world that regret the loss of lives under the chain of command that we will take with us to our graves. >> i was in congress. we didn't appropriate the money that we needed for coordination. so i don't put you out there as somehow you have cost the loss of lives or have wasted money. i put us all in this together and it seems to me you deal with reality and from reality make good decisions.

and it strikes me again like the ambassador it's hard for you to say what is reality. i'm giving you a chance, doctor. >> i am quite sure looking back over the past eight years yes, they're has been waste associated with lack of coordination and very likely the loss of life of the white cannot verify your assertion with a concrete example. i would however at this point. we have to think about the quality of coordination that you are underlining here. in many cases it is a lack of coordination between those who have good situational awareness or understand the human terrain of where we are operating in a wartime setting and those responsible for actually designing and i underscore a recent article by major general on the issue of intelligence.

i think that level of coordination is key. finally i would have to say in a wartime setting there is the cost of the local loss of life. i don't know how many girls schools in southeastern afghanistan have been hit and how many students have been hurt or killed but that is also a factor i would add three this and if i were a answering the question i would have just said yes. the fact you all had such a struggle seeing the obvious almost didn't ask the question because it is obvious otherwise why are we here? if it isn't costing money and it's not costing lives than you guys are wasting your time trying to have better coordination so it was a no-brainer and if i was a professor, it wouldn't be a good grade. and speaking of professor there is a story of some harvard students who fall to the would be smart and go up to maine to study for the weekend for a final like sam, and they had for

whatever reason they didn't study and they were not prepared to take the exam so they decided to miss it and come back and tell the professor they had a flat tire so that is why they were late. he said no problem. he said i will give you the exam. he put them in four separate rooms, there were four of them and he asked them one question and the question was which tire. i would be tempted to ask each of you to tell me how you coordinate with each other and not have to be in the same room just to see and satisfied myself whether the answer would be the same. i can't do that so we will start with you, ambassador how do you coordinate with mr. beaver and mr. shearer? how do you coordinate with usaid and the dod?

>> with dod i have members on my staff to read one of the deputies is to ensure close coordination to i have several members from the dod whose been detailed to my staff. in every construction stabilization which i share these agencies state jim is my principal and has talked about developing the capacity and we have worked together on a variety of things he's already mentioned. but the integration record mission with inter agency is comprehensive, it is in my office and it is in every work product we produce. we deploy people to those which the doctor spoke about as well as develop the process where the interagency agrees. seeming to have 86 people how many are in iraq and how many in afghanistan? >> we have no one in iraq right now. we believe we have 20 in afghanistan but i can confirm that for you if you like. >> nobody in iraq to coordinate. >> correct. i've already explained why.

>> mr. beaver. >> representatives from the ambassador's group meet with us every week. where we have our own interagency meeting at usaid headquarters and it includes the representatives from department of defense, treasury, health and human services and others, agriculture included. we also meet regularly and weekly along with other assistant secretary level of undersecretary level officers at the state department what is called the meeting. we need at the deputy assistant secretary levels and the deputies committees. that is all here in washington. in the field as well obviously the regional command in in kabul in the case of colleagues from the pentagon, that is an almost daily, hourly coordination effort especially with the pakistan and afghanistan coordination unit that has been

set up the pentagon. we also have military representation at the office of military affairs. the work on my task force and we meet regularly. that's here in washington and in the field that is as i said an ongoing exercise akaka three we have liaison officers in kabul city sitting inside of our offices both with thus and agriculture colleagues are also in our office. >> yes, mr. chairman as the ambassador said, i do sit on the interagency for the reconstruction and stabilization that gives my office and has a good opportunity to interact freely intensively on a wide range of issues. i would also add that there is an nsc role and interagency coordination particularly relevant to that is the point made by several of you about secretary gates proposal on

shared responsibility and pooled resources. there is a larger interagency review on security sector assistance which had an appropriate point will turn its attention to the secretary's proposals so is an ongoing process. i place a high premium on the active involvement in interagency coordination. >> what mr. beaver each give me the names of three people that work in ambassador's office that you work with? >> rob jenkins is one of them at my level that i work with. he's usually the deputy or acting deputy. >> anybody else? >> that's the one idea with. >> do you deal with anybody else? >> there's people that come to the weekly meeting. >> mr. jenkins i believe just rotated output to be replaced

shortly. >> i will just concluded because i hope we of three rounds and not to. mauney view of smart power isn't soft power. my view of smart power is the use of hard and soft power and strikes me one of the challenges of why we deposit to up soon enough is we were not willing to deal with reality and that was that we were into nation-building. if you are into nation-building or state building it means we have to put more resources into usaid and into the state to do the job. the failure to do that has resulted in our being six years behind. it means our troops will be in iraq and afghanistan particularly afghanistan longer than the need to be which means their lives are in danger longer and it means all the contractors who are their, their lives are in danger longer, and so i would

like us to talk in my next round will be about the whole concept of nation building or state building. thank you, gentlemen. >> thank you, commissioner. we will start the second round now. and start with myself. i want to go back to -- i will have my second area of discussion but i would like to calibrate also author of the initial remarks about the importance of the very senior level executives secretary to secretary discussions and i am smiling because it is already now called the gates proposal and secretary gates in his presentation, and i want to read this because it's important on would propose he doesn't care ultimately what is accomplished as long as an improvement is accomplished because in his presentation are statement, he said, and i am pulling sentences out, unlike the existing structure and process these leftover from the cold war, and

he certainly has a history to be able to make that statement which often he's talking about the current process which conspire to hinder true toll of government approaches. we're talking about the whole of government, then he says regardless what approach we take to reform and modernize america's partner capacity apparatus whether it is something like the proposal a just mentioned or some other. so i think he was trying to say that it's time and i think it is clear. i don't think it was one unique proposal and i put that out there. i have a comment on the que dee dee are -- qddr. we're spending billions of dollars a month in iraq and afghanistan. whether it is qdr or qddr i've been involved in them. they recommend a very powerful in a very important study groups and things like that and it

stretches about. there is an immediate need, so i think that's an opportunity someone mentioned before. then the thing i would like to talk about this several of you have reference we are moving in the right direction. i think there's a lot of progress being made by don't think that you can make a statement we are moving in the right direction and have it withstand close scrutiny, and i'd like to talk about one partnership that ongoing that is what the partners about all and that is there is a significant afghan national army and afghan national police action in process involving coordination. both organizations. this commission sat, and there is a transition going on from state department and many of the aspects to the department of defense and this commission said in a briefing by the program executive who had been handed

the contract that he was going to use, and i was the one, it could have been anyone that asked the question so he made a great presentation, straight shooter, new the procurement business we are talking about wartime contract in and i asked what have you done with the state department? the answer was nothing. and i said why not? is in the incumbent state department? and he answered i was told not to. i know everyone now is saying whoa because there's a big protest it will take the course the double take. but they were going to have everybody out of there the first of january, have a program accomplished and now we are into the end of july with the incumbent and i would propose to you lack of initial coordination caused that and then doctor ogle talk of the interpol agency

which is a part of what leads and to the interagency. i again ask the question, $300 million on what the contract was for life support. what is life support from with? and i don't mean to be giving a tutorial but i will do it, it rhymes with logca and dozens of locations. weld the decision was made to the use of contract where the bid would be lockheed, reef young, northrop, a small organization called eric and is he black water and that part of the particular program was initially going and only $300 million soon to grow because you don't of the expansion and cost and the united states army had gone through a exhaustive three-year process to identify part of its logcap program. three exceptional contractors.

the contractors qualified that had done a good job, forget about cost issues and what not. forget about ethics. there had been some of the customers they dealt with said the new life support and those were not any of the five. they were floor, kbr and dyncorp. what's going to happen? the other countries to have to ask the question they're great program innovators from the first 3i mentioned, the of proven track records. what is the history feeding and housing and putting the electronics and putting in little pieces and security and training the people to do that and hiring them? zero. blackwater has a little history on the afghan border police if you know it. that is an immediate case and it's not the only case. my point is, and i'm going to ask the two of you, get a free ride mr. beaver, are we moving

in the right direction and a sense of leaving the impression things are assembly and by building up a head of steam or do we have critical problems that could cost dozens and hundreds of millions of dollars because of a lack of effective coordination? doctor? >> you're absolutely right to put your finger on the interagency coordination within the dod community as you know. there are many stickle verse from the military departments, the office of the secretary defense, the combatant commands so why am not conversing on the particular details that you are siding with respect to logcap. i understand its importance broadly that yes we are only as good as the next screwup. >> i might say i talked to the logcap people and their answer was logcap can't do this and my response was i don't care you've

got great contractors and by great i mean well qualified contractors who can do this work. why wouldn't they want to bid on life support in the same area the have people in camps they are supporting and the answer is that someone else's problem. please. >> i think you made the point very well and what i think it suggests, and there is appreciation and our departments leadership level on the need for bringing all of the stakeholders together. >> thank you. ambassador? >> it has improved but it's far from perfect. the problem that you mentioned, i'm not in position to respond because i don't have responsibility for it but we know that there are problems. >> right. it is the organization that is making that transition. i could care less whether that incumbent gets work or not but that incumbent is doing a great job and that's not even part of

the future because of the interesting we don't have time for it contracting process. it is being debated presently. so i have usurped a little bit of time. i am switching the order a little bit if i might just to give balance. mr. henke, commissioner henke i'm going to ask you to go next and commissioner tiefer, you are after that. >> ambassador, in the 2009 recap publication you provided today he made the case your letter is titled five years of progress. you make the case you are established in 2004 but then your seat bid is coming and i think it's insightful, like most good ideas at birth it was full of visions for the future but will one resources to accomplish them. and then use it later in 2000 by the office began to hit its stride and the 2001 state department budget finally provided scrs with funding for its operations. further you see despite these

limitations scrs as always managed to deploy but never assets were available. my question is on resources. isn't it true that you have all the resources you need in fiscal year tend to do everything you need to do? >> the resources we've gotten the fy and budget is 150 million dollars -- but all designed for the civilian stabilization initiative to build civilian response to support scrs staff operations. that is sufficient to do what is in front of us. >> but the point i want to draw as you were funded -- you told congress last year you would reach your in the state for active response corporation is 250 people? >> it was to 50 but we used money that came to my office as opposed to the civilian response corporation said we are talking about 264 active.

islamic active components fully funded by your office, right? >> that is from our money and usaid because they're paying for the component numbers. >> you have plenty of money in fiscal ten to do that? >> correct. >> when you did it your budget to congress last year did you tell them you would be at 250 plus or minus by the end of calendar year 2000 mine? that is one of the congressional reports indicated. >> we told them we would be close to that number, yes. estimate your actual number is 86, 92? so there's plenty of resources, right? you have plenty of money. >> we have the money to do what we've been asked to do, that's correct. we are not asking for additional money. >> just so people understand the track record in 2,092 at $45 million appropriated and in 2010 at the end of the you had 150 million appropriated. 120 plus 30, correct? so the resources between nine and ten basically tripled, is

that correct? >> let me give you the funding. you are missing one stream. islamic predecessor. >> we got, let's see $55 million from the fy 08 supplemental. that was 30 for scrs and 254 usaid. it's been in the fy 09 budget, we received $75 million. $45 million for scrs and 44 usaid and now and fy ten but we received 150 million so those are the three streams. >> you're in the state for the stand by her response corps, the civilian response courthouse which is the third level but the stand by response is 2,000 people? >> correct. >> and you are funded in fiscal year ten, correct? i just want to work funded to provide 2,000 --

>> stand by members, correct. secure number on board now weighs 558, 600? in all cases or about 25, 30, 35% of your authorized number and funded number. >> correct. >> so resources are not an issue. >> that's correct but can i make one point on the staffing because i think it's important. one, to build the stand by to 2000, we are going to need flexible hiring authorities. right now to be a member of the civilian response corps by legislation you have to be an american active duty in the federal government. we have divided civilians response court by 80 agencies and usaid is supposed to have the large percentage, 37% because the skills are the most appropriate for this of all the agencies. that means we need 740 stand by

members. as you know -- >> those are added hires come eckert? >> stand why isn't additive hires. active are. we base upon the money we have and we are building fast now. on the stand by you go to people currently members of your agency. u.s. aid as everyone knows had had serious drop in the staff over the last 35 years. there are how many foreign officers about 1500? you are not going to get 740 stand by members from an office corps of from 1400. we have asked in open to get legislation this year to get authority to hire foreign service nationals and the retirees. as jim mentioned in the testimony earlier they've done excellent service in iraq and afghanistan. if we get those authorities we will be able to build component to 2000. with that we will be short. we need that.

it's not a question of money is a question of authority. to build the -- >> i'm confused why we are learning that five years into it that we need authority not to do something -- >> we ask from the beginning. we just didn't get it. we wanted this all along. you've got a of producing legislation. >> cubin vbied how many times? >> three times. we finally got it in late 2008 and with that we didn't get everything we wished for. we've been asking for but we did not get it then. a cynic would the gentleman yield? i have trouble sometimes when i hear we have asked. how long is we? spec this case the state department and administration with previous administration and now. >> we are talking about your predecessors or you? >> both my predecessors the first two years and then me since then. >> cubin in the office how long? >> three and a half years.

>> last point on the active component we are at 86 right now. it took several months to get rolling. we had to streamline some hiring procedures. we also had the problem of security clearances for people outside. but now we are adding an active response core members of the rate of a couple of weeks sometimes faster than that actually often faster than that. >> i'm out of time. thank you. >> thank you, commissioner henke. commissioner bever? >> we are both in a way academics or at least we were coming you read the national defense university and me and baltimore high school in your old writings are still their waiting for you. i want to ask about coordination in the field and i'm going to come to a very concrete question and not a general question about coordination but whether you are willing to work for one particular measure. let me get there.

the afghanistan study group which she wore a distinguished member of drew the distinction between the relatively peaceful north and west of afghanistan and the conflict it south and east and last with mark schneider the crisis could do the same distinction and agreed with me that we should be using our tools like what i'm asking about the money differently in the north and west and south and east. in another study where you were a core contributor done by the center for strategic and international studies you were a court contributor and i might note the doctor zakheim was a distinguished member so when he asks questions he knows where he speaks. in that study there are challenges identified included

inadequate input from civilian agencies, the projects have rarely been designed with input from u.s. diplomats and development professionals i would translate that as a -- a.i.d.. this has rarely been designed with input from the u.s. professionals who might place those efforts in a broad political strategy and institution building requirements. i know you can talk about the coordination of serp and having individual professionals from the state or a.i.d. by one to ask congress places elsewhere you said the programs reliance, this is serp on input from professionals from the state usaid and other agencies has been uneven would you be willing to say not nearly input but that

all the herbst project of the threshold give me a number, 500,000, 1 million serp projects are now development and the lead agency if they are supplying personnel should be usaid. are you for the defense department willing to do that or is the defense department excuse me for putting it this way called serp and not be willing to put a.i.d. in the lead? >> i guess i hostage to some of the previous writing that i would be happy to provide you some views on that. i honestly believe that our service personnel downrange at the end of the day or r. dee at bostick about how this gets done. they want this to be done in a smart and effective way as quickly incoherently as possible. i don't think that means that

they would necessarily want to hold anything or offload everything. they would look pragmatically at each funding source and channel and each set of programmatic requirements and come to a judgment. speed it does not always of course yield the best answers. some things do need careful study. and i also would acknowledge that our military commanders at the various levels bring to bear somewhat different set. >> you will say it's different when you're talking to but more expensive projects that a.i.d. should have the larger role when you're talking big projects? >> i'm not sure i can -- the inference in your question is right. serp was never meant to be a very high cost item. it was always initial impact, quick impact, the quips as it were philosophy very much small-scale whether it was microgrants -- >> but you're own studies say it is used at the high levels. you would just say yes, they should have a larger role.

>> i would agree with that. but i would also -- you have time at the end. i appreciate you agreeing. that is a rare thing in this hearing. mr. bever i am not blaming the afghan corruption on you, far from it, 1 million miles from it but in a study of afghan electrical systems done by sigar and i have seen many writings on afghanistan so i want to ask you to be blunt and in an america we but the impact of afghan corruption on the u.s. taxpayer expenditures. i will read a couple of sentences or two to capture the flavor. corruption and the energy, this is sigar, corruption and energy

system affects afghanistan's ability to collect revenue. according to usaid a major point of corruption in afghanistan is the electrical distribution systems process these according to the bank, numerous witnesses in afghanistan's management of the energy sector leavitt susceptible to corruption the bank cites examples of patronage from the ministry jobs, consumer expectations of bribes to pay for utility services and investor expectations of the demand and bribes. it's built in. would you agree we have numbers for what security costs in my back. we used as a 15 to 20% of the development project lead for security. would you be willing to say, and you can't get number four below or four of but if you like what he would reach ten to 20% of our development money goes where a.i.d. says it goes, sigar says it goes into the afghan

corruption? >> i'm not going to give you a percentage. i'm going to leave that to the sigar and accounting office to get a percentage. >> we try our best to minimize corruption problems and i don't recall the exact context of that particular line. there are problems in the collection of tariffs in kabul and kandahar and sharif and others. it's not a problem by the way he can afghanistan. you see the same difficulties in the neighboring countries in that region because of the weak institutions and the inability to actually enforce the tariff collections. >> you don't want to give an answer, would you say it's a lot or a little, the corruption level? >> on a.i.d. programs, i am going to say that its minimum. >> my time is up. >> thank you, commissioner.

commissioner zakheim, please. >> who do you report to? >> i report to the new administrator of a.i.d.. >> that's fine. ambassador herbst reports to the secretary of state and mr. bever to the equivalent of deputy secretary. who do you report to? >> i report to the undersecretary of defense for policy, michelle flournoy trusten secretary michael ticker. >> secure basically reporting to michael. do you think that is sufficient for the department that is often described as the 800-pound gorilla that spends big bucks even on serp which was authority or 50,000-dollar deal but now it gets chopped at correct me if i'm wrong, commissioner, it is over $1 million. >> i think so. >> do you think that is a sufficient level of cord nation?

how often do you speak to the ambassador directly? >> once a week? once every day? >> on a weekly basis we were in europe together a few days ago and we work together. >> if you travel together. to speak to him every day? >> of every day. >> every week? >> probably. >> okay. do you think that is efficient? when i was undersecretary i spoke to my counterparts every day on these sorts of issues. do you think that is sufficient? >> i think it is driven by the need of the moment. i would be happy to talk to him every half hour. >> so there isn't an urgent requirement here? life of this hearing made it pretty clear things are pretty urgent around there. it's not urgent enough? >> our staff are locked and loaded. >> staff locked and loaded is nothing, you heard that from the commissioner. that doesn't work. so you think that is sufficient just to speak to ambassador

herbst lynn sweet? and mr. bever, to speak to him once a week, too i take it? >> how often do you speak to him? >> i speak to many people -- >> how often used daily to jim bever? >> very rarely because i'm not doing contingency oversight i'm doing capabilities at to see, that is a different slice. >> fine. how often do you talk about corruption and once each other to pick up again on the commissioners point? let's just go across. ambassador herbst how much do you discuss with your counterparts? >> where we are engaged corruption is an issue. >> how often do you discuss it? is it on the agenda at every meeting? once a month, once every six months? >> as a distinct issue is not something we discussed, corruption specific operation is something we discuss. >> regularly? >> yes, regularly. >> would you like to hear from

me? >> absolutely. i would just say and i commend the commission for raising the issues we do try to deal with this within the context of what we do at the coordination through the special representative office of the state department and out at the embassy as well as with the argeo and sigar. we are trying to work hard with the institutions, the afghan government and it comes up almost weekly at my level and deily with my own staff and those at the state department that we coordinate with and i would close by saying the london conference just a few weeks ago, this was the key feature of the discussion among all of us a full of the donors that contribute to the afghan reconstruction trust fund. we can talk more if you like. >> i heard something and i'm not sure that i got it right so you can correct me. i understand there are folks in

the civilian response corps who have warrants essentially as contacting experts and a.i.d. doesn't use them. is that wrong? >> we have reached out to both the defense department and state department to see what they had available that we could look at for the various skills. in the case of the defense department i think that we looked at among the list they gave there was a handful of people with contradicting capabilities that met our needs and we pursued them. in the case of afghanistan i believe. in the case of scrs there may have been one or two that had that kind of background and i think we were looking at them. i don't have the specific names. i have to get back on that. but procurement officers are high value commodities and grant's officers. >> that's why i'm asking because i heard something quite different and finally, ambassador herbst, how has

ambassador holbrooke used the cicilline response core? >> we provided names of civilian response court to his office which is responsible for the staffing our people in afghanistan. islamic you provided the names. how many has he used? >> i have to come back but he asked us to do specific things and we provided the election team. i mentioned strategic communications team and the election team was eight people strategic communication was six people. >> out of 86 folks the person in charge of the most critical operations and most critical part of the world has used 10%. and how often? >> its eight plus six? okay. and this is year round or just short term? >> the election team was there for about six or seven months. they are, obviously the strategic communications team

has been on the ground since i don't know october, november. and the embassy now asked to put together another team for the upcoming elections. >> basically eight or nine years. so 10%. thank you. >> thank you, commissioner. commissioner schinasi, please. >> ..

and also with respect to specific functions, particularly those of intelligence analysis. >> actually, commission, that we have seen a growing need for civilians within the od field components and while i can't speak to that particular requirement for intelligence analysis and whether that might be civilian or military, i can tell you that we do have an ongoing initiative that is beginning to take flight. it is called the civilian expeditionary workforce, the cew and it is within the department of defense intended as an instrument for resourcing civilian jobs now and at whatever unit level we can within the field, jobs which generation ago would have been handled by officers are now handled by civilians. the cew is our effort to appropriately resource dod

operations. i am not talking about the largest civilian component but it is very much a work in progress and we will be happy to look at areas where we might complement the crc. thank you. >> ambassador herbst are you aware of that effort and are you looking to see whether or not part of what you can do that the civilian court fits in with one dod is trying to do to decrease its reliance on contractors? >> the cew is i believe two years old then we have kept apprised of it from it's inception and now it is principally as jim just said to provide civilians for strictly dod related activities, where the crc, the responsibility we are building is meant to be involved in the stability operations. we are working with a society of her which we are deploying. >> i guess that raises an interesting.. your description of strictly

this agency's operations or strictly that agency's operations. aren't we talking about here but that that those lines have learned in the way that we work in those spaces and gaps in little better, isn't that. >> the notion of coordination across agencies is a function which has been handled through s/crs and civilians and that is to make sure what each agency does is link one with the other to produce an overall operation which make sense, which will be effective. but it is also true that each agency may have specific tasks which need to do in the case of dod, they have their military organization and these certain specific things. >> let me ask you, turning back to iraq for a minute and your comment that you haven't been there because you haven't been asked in. it seems to me iraq is in transition as much as

afghanistan is in transition. it is just a different way so we are seeing the same kind of overlap or gap or seems that are going to develop in iraq. we are going to take out, a plan to take a 10,000 troops in month until the end of august. we are seeing functions transferred like the police training in this case going from the department of defense to the department of state. again, and i guess mr. ifor was the one that used the term continue on, are we placing strict lines on that continue him that you throw something over the transom or are we trying to work for integration as we move to different points along the continue him and in that sense, i am not sure i understand why we don't go in somewhere unless you are asked. who has to ask you and it seems a very stilted formal process still that we would like to see some more fluidity and flexibility with that. >> the answer is very simple.

your question assumes that we are a full up and running organization but we are not. we are an organization that has been funded for 18 months and is only gradually developing capacity. if we had 1000 people, all 264 active members plus seven or 800 standby members then we would be able to make an impact in a place like afghanistan and perhaps iraq but we had 15 people we would deploy two years ago and we have got 86 today. the numbers are growing by the week but they are not significant in an operation where we are talking about 1000 civilians. >> i appreciate that that is where you are. >> now that we are building numbers as i say i have been approached by one of our single folks and we laid out what we could do and we may well be playing a role there. it is not going to be hundreds of people. we don't have hundreds of people but it could be 15 or 20 in the niche functions we are able to do at the present time that we are soon reaching a stage and by soon i mean within a year per we will be able to do something medium scale to large

large-scale. >> i guess a response to commissioner henke about you are fully resourced but your response. >> what i'm saying is we have the money. we only have a short period of time. we have to build a civilian court. that is what we are doing. >> let me turn back to you dr. shear. is this an issue of people? is an issue of money, functions, the difference when you make a decision as to where to go to get support for a mission that you need? >> it is a combination maam of all of them. the human resources element is eight lead time element. getting the right mix of people with the right skills is something that does not materialize right after the money, so in terms of the ask as it were, the requirements dod is

very i would say liens on the inside of hearing from the field commanders to get their sense of what the requirement is. that doesn't mean we politely accepted. we ask hard questions but we would want to hear from the field to see what they requirement is in terms of this human resource n. been pushed very hard to make sure we can get it downrange within a reasonable timeframe. >> thank you. my time is up. >> commissioner green, please. >> thank you. i think there is pretty universal belief and certainly historically that the only organization with the capability to really rebuild infrastructure and stabilize the situation is dod. that he said, and recognizing ambassador herbst that you are trying to, that is best as best you can certainly within the resources you have to legitimize the role of s/crs in that area

as the organization that manages and coordinates those kinds of efforts. with that in mind, and this follows somewhat to commissioner schinasi's question, looking at the drawdown in iraq and the significant reduction we are going to see in u.s. military and dod capabilities they are, how is the state in usaid planning to fill that void, particularly since you have no one in iraq? who is doing it? >> i will start if you like and then ambassador herbst. >> one i am not responsible for

our iraqi policy at the present time. there is an office that is responsible and they are taking the lead. as i have artie said twice -- max b. can i object? what about this is that? >> it is the office that deals with iraq. >> they are the ones that decide on the people. >> they are involved with in the staffing for iraq. >> who makes the decision? that is all i'm asking. do you mind? >> well, they make recommendations and made by their system secretary but we secretary but we used to have a special envoy, david satterfield. they were involved in those decisions. >> but who decides? barrett numbers than there are people. who decides? >> who was responsible for all for the staffing of the civilians? >> yeah, who makes the decision for iraq? >> i will have to get you that answer because i'm not personally involved. >> but, your office is at least

nominally responsible for the coordination of the activities that we have been talking about today. is that not true? >> we are responsible for doing this going forward, for doing this going forward. >> okay, but going forward we are going to draw down there. that is forward. >> excuse me, going forward in future operations.com operations. mechanisms were established to deal with iraq starting before 2003. and our office created in 2004 because it was recognized by late 2003. >> i understand all that. who in the state usaid latch up is doing the coordination to take over the roles that dod is currently doing in iraq? >> i can get an answer for you. i don't have the answer right now.

>> ambassador herbst, you mentioned in your testimony that the pace of hiring is slow. why is that? what is the long pole in the tent? are you competing with the political mafia, the econ mafia, the management mafia? who was deciding, goes back to dr. zakheim's question, who is making those decisions, whether b. 100 people recruited by the state department, how they are being distributed across the beer owes? >> you are talking about the crc members? when you say the 100 people? >> the crc members. >> first on the hiring basis, it was slow at the start, because we simply followed the opm rules, which led to

inappropriate candidates coming forward. we realize that. we been streamlined the process. so we lost two or three months because of that but if you look at our hiring over the past six months you will see clear and steady improvement. for re: who makes decisions as to where we use the, we have been in discussion with the office for hiring and we have provided the crc members who we have run on wrought on board so they can be considered for jobs in afghanistan. a make good decisions. >> okay but who decides, of the pool of people coming into the department how they are being distributed and are you getting your fair share? >> yes, we have been getting our fair share of resources over the past 18 months. before that, no. since then, yes.

>> mr. bever related to iraq. >> just to comment on that question. obviously we are, we had a idea are normalized in our mission, the size of our mission to one that we normally see in this kind of development situation. it is about 250 million a year and fiscal year requested about 130 employees between our americans and our fsm's. what-- what is going on in the mission, in the u.s. mission, the embassies in interagency coordination effort right now to figure out between military state in a.i.d. which of the various assets and responsibilities of the picked up by home and that is going on right now under general matthews and ambassador munter. so that is an interagency process to pick up come including certain elements of logistics contracts, operation and maintenance activities. i would just.the commission to

one key question, which is something we have always stood for going back a number of years in iraq. we had an asset transfer coordination group within the embassy. one of the things we were always most concerned about was it is one thing to sign the document and transfer it over to the finance ministry. it is a whole other thing to get their agreement that they would build into their recurrent costs budget elements required for operation and maintenance of the assets that are being transferred. we always insisted that they had to agree that they would leave room in their budget for operation and maintenance, so as the commission looks at these questions i would just suggest to you penetrating label get that kind of an issue. >> ambassador herbst, one must question, going back to one of my earlier ones and that is, you feel you are getting your fair share. what is the long pole in the

tent to get more people? >> you mean beyond the numbers we have artie described? i think that we will need to get congressional approval and funding for more people. i think you may know the original concept of this call for 4002 at 50 people, 250 active, 2000 standby in 2000 reserve. congress built active to standby to show you are using it and we will build the reserve. i think that concept is still one we are wedded to it we want to have the 40 to 50 or 40 to 64 because we added 14 to the active members. if we build the court that size we would be able to deploy and maintain as many as 1200 people. that would cover completely our needs in a place like afghanistan right now. but i would call that our medium-term objective. ungar term there may be greater needs but let's build this so we can deal with it. >> okay. >> let me just add to that. i think one of the challenges

for government is how to do what ambassador herbst just mentioned year in and year out with the structure of the way that our officers serve, which our 12 month assignments. you look at afghanistan right now, we are approaching 1000 u.s. government officers. that will even tax the dynamics in the resources of and the resources of all of our-- and that is just for afghanistan. if something else comes up along the way, and i can think of one, then you know, i think we are still struggling to figure out how to recruit, motivate, incentivize, retain these officers who just like our soldiers also would leave their families behind and served in very dangerous places. >> with the gentleman yield for one very quick question? when you say 1000 of the tears, that is usaid employees?

>> now come in the case that can stand that a state department and a.i.d. and a few other department agencies. >> thank you. speak thank you commissioner. >> the reason i asked about the cost of lack of chord nation in terms of dollars and lives, i had two reasons. one i wanted to see how seriously you treat this issue in terms of the lack of chord nation. and secondly, it's in my mind you can't answers to think we the most obvious question and the easiest answer, it makes it difficult for me to appreciate your responses to the questions. i really don't know the answer. it is kind of like the proverbial hammer that costs $400 and the toilet seat that costs $4000 about 20 years ago when they did an investigation. everybody harped on that but what i was an indication of that the wings on the plane really

must have cost a lot but nobody knows how to evaluate the wings. i am having a hard time in this hearing having some takeaways, so i am going to first read a quote and this is secretary gates last wednesday. dr. share i would like you to listen to it, but for all the improvements of recent years america's interagency toolkit is a hodgepodge of jerryrigged arrangements constrained by dated and complex patchwork of authorities, persistent shortfalls and resources mr. herbst, and unwieldy processes. so that is what he says. so this is my take away. i want you to react to it. might take away is the s/crs is providing very few people in iraq based on the contractors. that is absurd. and afghanistan, under the civilian response corps. that is one of my takeaways. mr. shear office is buried to

barnett bureaucracy. that is one of my takeaways. military is doing the work because usaid and the the department of state funding and staff don't have the resources but the military does. another takeaways practically speaking there is much chord nation and state opposes both proposals in the sense that they are silent to the proposal made by the inspector general in iraq and sokoto and silent today on the joints stabilization funds proposed by dod. it strikes me curious in one sense because dod has more funds than they are willing to put it in the same pool and it makes me wonder if they lose control. another takeaways no one has taken the ball and run with it in terms of chord aiding reconstruction and stabilization. mr. herbst notwithstanding i don't feel the energy that i would feel if you thought there was the loss of lives which you don't seem to think.

it is clear nature reforms are needed. at least it is clear to me. that is one of my takeaways so now i want you to respond to the following. these are options. one is the joints stabilization funds by mr. gates. you don't have to tell me whether you like it or dislike it. tell me the pluses and minuses. usoco, an office of contingency operations by the inspector general. another one is multinational funds through world bank or recent development banks and that is the proposal. another is the multinational a pooled funds through nato. another is the national security council level office. we had some support in a previous hearing particularly from seth jones, who talked about that may be a way to move.

and finally, making current construction better through additional resources and that would be for you mr. herbst. i will start with you dr. shear. respond to some of these proposals and tell us what strengths and weaknesses of those are. so, let's talk about the joints stabilization funds. what is the strength in what is the weakness? i'm not asking you whether your department supports it or doesn't support it. >> its basic strings are is that it incentivizes interagency coordination and collaboration. that is the basic incentive than that reflects the fact that those departments have very significant equities in the stabilization area. its principle downside are the principle challenge is congressional oversight quite frankly. if you have eight committees with jurisdiction here that does create a major challenge for us. that is how i would wait. >> that is very helpful in thank you for that.

usoco, strengths and weaknesses? >> it's is strength a systematic focus in this weakness is that it would be a redhaired stepchild. and it would create antibodies within the interagency community, created challenge for chord nation and it would not replace, and would merely add on to existing command relationships both on the defense and on the foreign-policy side so it would complex up by rather than simplify. >> what is the positive part? >> the positive part is that it could be a steward if you will for contingency contracting and all the critical elements that go into that, the human resources peace, the i.t. peace in piece in the contract management piece. >> multinational pooled funds through the world bank? >> i probably don't have an expert enough to give you a good sense of the pluses and minuses.

>> multinational pooled funds for nato? >> same. >> national security level office? >> that plus there is responsiveness to the president, to the national security adviser and the principles. be paramount in chronic question for the nsc is its ability to focus especially on operational issues which ought to be outside. >> and making the current structure work better through additional resources? be i never denied the need for additional resources. we have a list of things that we need to look at very hard within our own agency. >> but, do you think ambassador herbst needs a lot more resources in order to enable him to help the chord nation effort? >> i think he has put his finger on what i see as the principle

which is human capital and that has been the long pole in the tenth. tent. i think state department impact in a positive sense is not simply an issue of size. it is an issue up where the of where the function is located within the level of bureaucracy, something that dr. zakheim has raised barely within the dod context. >> mr. bever, would you run through? let me bring them in order that i the order that i did. s/crs. is your mic on? >> the joints stabilization usoco. >> take the crs-- i am sorry. i apologize. the joints stabilization. >> i think each of these has potentially some merits that they are more careful attention. my own view is my view and the intergovernmental processes that

each of our agencies or government works best when each of our agencies works to its own comparative advantage. and when our authorities are not usurped in such a way that where the authority rests is different from where the accountability and responsibility. >> let me say to my terms and see if you agree. if everybody is in charge, nobody is in charge. in other words you feel you would have more accountability. i am hearing you say you would have more accountability if you were in charge of the funds rather than grouping them into other funds? >> yes, but this is why i like the notion of a continuing and an involvement by national security council. the nsc is one entity that is able in my experience to pull all of the actors of our government together, but i do agree-- operationally that is

not really his forte, sticking with the overall policy is. on usoco, similar to somewhat on the joints stabilization. i am going to differ because they do not want to. >> but is there a strength into weakness that you can point out? tell us the strength and tell us the weakness. >> i think it is an interesting idea but to operationalize it would take an enormous amount of effort by all of our agencies that would divert and distract us from getting our job done. >> the pulling of world bank funds xp multinational trust funds can work very well if they are well-managed and again i would point to the afghan reconstruction trust fund. it is one example where donors to work well together that they have responsible-- and reasonably good accountability on the inside and i think it is a model that can be built upon. frankly, whether it is under world bank come implementation

monitoring or an nato mechanism, i am kind of intrigued with the nato mechanism. >> how about nfc? >> i have just mentioned on nsc my own experience experiences the nsc or other administrations the office of vice president were able to pull together for her actions and elements of our government towards a national priority in ways that nobody else could. as far as making all are current structure is better, i think we could do a lot more in that area and i am frankly, in our case, i am looking for ways and i think dr. 12-- shear mentioned it ultimately gets down to her human capital. and what do we do to recruit our people to retain and promote them, to keep them in theater? we spend so much effort getting our people off to afghanistan for example. what do we do next year? >> we are looking at that issue obviously through the issue of contracting, but we want to know

what is inherently governmental. we want to know do we have an over reliance on contractors who it gets us into that very issue you mentioned and i will go to ambassador herbst. >> the joints stabilization funds, the strengths and weaknesses? >> jim pointed out that those ensure coordination. on the other hand though if you are concerned about militarization you have to wonder. on usoco, it is the point that i argued me. you have a mechanism which can work. if you want to try to create a new mechanism that will take you a couple of years and set back the responsibility. bob zoellick is a very able guy. the good thing about this is that they leverage capital from around the world. the problem of course you put into the fund and you lose control. on nato pooled funds, they are

too if you put the funds in you leverage it. that is a good thing. it is also true we have more influence probably in nato then we do in the world bank also we have a fair amount of the world bank so you reduce the liability bayer, the downside. on nsc level office you certainly need to have an nsc engage in this process to reach coordination and they ought to place in theory where this can be done best but it really depends on the administration. >> and finally, you can and, you get to be the closer in terms of my questions. making the current structure work better. >> i think when you are in a fight you go with the capacity you have or make it better, you empower it. again we have the civilian growing interest at a rate. give us first, let us build it, secondly empower us to use it and you will see what we can do. >> thank you gentleman. >> okay. what we are going to do is a

brief wrapup. we are going to give you the allotment of time we said. we are going to go around one more time for any final comments and if anyone has a burning question, they can deal with it. i really don't. i have an observation, which is we have reference, because this was just an excellent presentation by the secretary and i think it could have been by either secretary, except the initiation came from defense and i am taken away first of all a lot of thank you gentleman, significant need for evaluation but not that they need to you know, you make comments about there is certainly a lot that we can can do immediately. well, that is not what is in my view being done and i think it comes down to a couple of points, which is the statement that we need to incentivize

collaboration versus the existing structure and process that is left over from the cold war. that is are a powerful and we have done a few things that aren't the cold war. i think my second is as they listen to it and not you gentlemen, you seem to be very collegial but all of the examples of the lack of coordination presented here today felt like organizational ego or said another way, different organizations with responsibility, we are kind of protecting their territory with sort of the concept that they never met a good idea that wasn't their own so if you have got it, hey it won't work for the same reason. if i have got guided ifr he presented it and it is a good time so that comes down to when and d-delta default to the status quo. for me it was a great hearing because there is a lot of work

to do but this commission has had, this is the ninth hearing. we have been briefed, pushing 483 things by organizations in the field that we have documented and made available, very substantial data analysis. we have three hearings down in the short-term and we are going to continue to press on workout thank you gentleman. bob? >> nothing further. i thank the witnesses were attending. >> just to reiterate what you just heard, i think you all are trying mightily especially ambassador herbst. i think your organizations are simply not cooperating and i think it has become clear in this hearing. i think they are, i sensed a degree of frustration that you folks were trying very hard to hide. thank you. >> commissioner green? >> mr. bever, not to get an answer but an area that you are

going to have to deal with are somebody is going to have to deal with is spot. you are going to have to figure out a way that is acceptable to usaid to integrate yourself either into that system or some other system. the last point is just to reiterate what i said before. i think we have got a lot of momentum now on this activity and, if you guys don't figure out a way to take advantage of that, i can guarantee you what will happen. it well after three and died. >> commissioner schinasi? >> i'm just going to go back to resources for a minute. mr. bever in your statement you said that your peak pk i.t. spending was $4.8 billion in 200322005. that is less than a week spending and that gives you the

idea of the magnitude of resources and if you look at the fy2011 executive budget summary for state in a.i.d. and any i.d. you see that a foreign military assistance just to pick one is about the fourth largest expenditure in here, and that compares to 2.5 billion for contributions to peacekeeping and peace keeping operation so if we are going to talk about militarizing foreign aid and our foreign policy i think we already see are the numbers where we are now. thank you. >> commissioner tiefer? >> thank you mr. chairman. mr. bever i think i said something earlier that were subject to misunderstanding leading to what was to meet the surprising response that the word minimal and the word corruption could be put in the same sense of but i think i now understand that was unclear. and i am going to do some perl parliament eric but then i'm going to ask whether this is a substantial level of corruption in the afghan political economy

which might affect the united states. this place i was drawing on and i don't mean to surprise you in any way. sigar's report january 15, 2010 on the afghan energy supplies. beheading, which is i think what would have been helpful to you, is simply afghan government lacks the capability to collect revenues to fund fuel costs and operations and maintenance expenses. so this is a section that the afghan government can't get the money from the energy system and it includes what they have had to do instead, like coming to us and saying well you fund our operation maintenance, will you fund our field cost? that is not to say the u.s. government projects themselves are suffering from corruption and if i gave that impression that that was what i was asking,

and i think i did, then i withdraw my question. but with that being the mechanism they then do describe corruption in the energy sector affects afghanistan's ability to collect revenue and they give an example that it takes as many as 25 signatures to get an electricity connection in kabul. though you don't need any signatures if you get it through bribes and as a result, this is a "matt from sigar, the cost to obtain permission to build a connection could well exceed the actual cost to connect to the distribution system. the bribes cost more than the cost to connect. so with that being my background if there is substantial corruption in the afghan economy which may indirectly affect u.s. efforts. speak commissioner, yes, i would say yes.

there is than it has been growing, and you can track it pretty closely with the corruption that came with the drug business. but, if you would like a cute questions for the record we can fill you in on more. >> it is a very serious issue and discount discounts the effectiveness of our $8. no question about that. state by i have other questions for the record and i will stop. thank you. >> commissioner shays mr. chairman. >> no question. as i am sorting this out i'm thinking it was mentioned the cold war. the cold war has ended and it seems to me like the world is more dangerous place particularly for the everyday civilian, and i am struck with the fact that we have smart power in the beginning. it is totally heart. we go in and we use our hard power and the challenge that we are trying to all address is that the combination of hard and soft power, but then eventually

there is a handoff. dod is out and then it is all stake. and, i am struck by the fact as well that you made mr. bever that everyone is exhausted. and, we have got to do with that in a very honest way eco obviously coordination is hugely important, obviously dealing with the waste, fraud and abuse and waste of money and also to ensure that we don't lose people because we haven't coordinated well, so we are going to obviously-- we are looking at all of these issues. we haven't taken a position on how we coordinate. i think you all make arguments well for the different options that are out there and probably it is a combination of the few of them. but, we look forward to working with you to get the right answers. thank you.

>> thank you mr. chairman. now consistent with their prior understanding all three of you can put anything that you need to clarify the record on the record, but now ambassador herbst and and a final comment he would like to share? >> i have to leave for a press conference so i apologize for that. >> i would like to reiterate one point. we have got something that is going. it is relatively new. it has not been tested budget is growing quickly. we are starting to use it. give it a chance. >> mr. bever? >> we have welcomed being here today and thank you very much for them fighting a.i.d.. i would just say on the corruption issues, i welcome the opportunity for us to continue engagement on this important topics as well as performs even in the energy sector which we have been working on. i think we have to wait for a little bit more political evolution related to various appointments in government and i would rather not get into that

here in this setting at this point. commissioner green we had a meeting with the department of state and the congress, congressional staff on friday. i think we have found a way forward there. we are seized with that challenge and we look forward to some more discussions on that. and finally, commissioner shays, i just want to say i am sorry. i may have misunderstood your original assertion about lost lives and lost money. i am a firm believer that it is in they the nagin i's interest to do whatever we can to mitigate conflicts ahead of time and that is why a.i.d. created a small office of conflict mitigation partly out of the spin out of the early afghan issues. but i think those kinds of efforts need more and more attention than i can see a country in the region further southwest of these countries,

where there is problems coming. and it is extremely important to save lives or go soldiers lives, and civilians lives, to get to apply lessons now for their future possible area of conflict finally i would just say i would urge the commission to engage with their agency and the state department and i know my colleague had to leave because the issues you are raising are the ones we are grappling with internally between us on how to structure these kinds of issues for the future between us. thank you. >> thank you. that make sense. dr. shear. >> mr. chairman and members of the commission i have found this engagement very enlightening and i'm taking a lot of homework back to my department. i will keep my leadership closely informed on this. and i do appreciate the opportunity. i just underlines two things, which i think chairman shays and

others have actually mentioned and that is this issue of sustaining the time, tension and energy and the contingency over a persistent long period is really a challenge. as general mcchrystal just said, unfortunately after the taliban are working in policy may be one of the biggest threats we face. we have been trying to debate one eight year war and it looks like a one-year wars. in order to give the time and attention and energy that is required especially in the contract where results have to be sustainable, where there is local ownership, we want to leave things behind at the local communities that the local communities can embrace that are not seizing monument to foreign intervention that something that is used. we have to figure out a better way to work in this persistent environment. we don't have answers yet. we are working on them and i will do my best to engage colleagues on this in a continuing dialogue. thank you so much.

>> thank you doctor and the last item, we always thank the staff is the real reason we are here in terms of our ability to deliver and prepare our sessions. this is the part that i always like too. we are done. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations]

[inaudible conversations]

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briefing on the international micronics trade. we will hear about the drug trafficking problem in specific countries. at the briefer is david johnson assistant secretary of state for international and narcotics of law enforcement. this is 30 minutes. >> good afternoon. it is my pleasure to introduce to you today the secretary david johnson of the bureau of international mark roddick sent law enforcement affairs. he will be briefing on the annual comprehensive assessment of worldwide illegal drug and transnational money-laundering situation known as the international narcotic control strategy report or by the acronym incsr. this report covers calendar year 2009, and its conclusions

reflect the department's analysis of international drug control and money laundering environment during the last calendar year. at the briefings on the record and cd cds of the the two volume report are available at the press office and we will also be bringing them in here to handout and will be posted on the state department web site at the conclusion of the briefing. with that further ado i will let the assistant take over. >> thank you. good afternoon. today we have the opportunity to present the 27th edition of the international narcotics control strategy report to the congress or-- this is this report is a review of foreign governments ever to do with their own narcotics problems that could meet their international responsibilities and set forth a u.n. narcotics and crime treaties. the drugs and chemical control section covers some 130 countries and jurisdictions. the second section on money

laundering and financial crimes describes the efforts of 60 nations implement strong anti-money laundering and counterterrorist financing regime's. this information provides a comprehensive assessment of the worldwide illegal drug and transnational money-laundering terrorist financing situation. this report has been prepared in accordance with section 489 of the foreign assistance act of 1961 which requires us to identify major illicit drug producing countries and major drug transit country's. major sources of chemicals used in the production of illicit narcotics or major money laundering countries. section for anyone of that act defines the major money laundering country by statute as one his financial institutions engage in currency transactions involving significant amounts of proceeds from international micronics trafficking. that means both the states having challenges as well as those simply with very large financial industries. this year's report covers calendar year 2009.

its conclusion reflect the department's analysis of international drug control and finance environment during the past year. a sunny analysis we identified challenges we have face with their partners but more importantly, it points to lessons learned which will help all of us, the united states as well as our partners identify practical ways to address the problems of narcotics and crime. the united states provided significant assistance and resources to our partner states to help develop effective law enforcement, judicial institutions and anti-money laundering regime's. we are judicious in determining how best to provide resources or corporate efforts are central to deter illicit drug and transnational crime from reaching our shores shores as well as from destabilizing our partners. additionally we and our partners are working to reduce or on demand for illicit drugs within our own borders in concert with efforts made by other consumer nations.

has made clear by the secretary in her first visit to mexico we view it as a shared challenge and a shared responsibility. if you will allow me to do one thing slightly off the subject, last week in afghanistan, when the bombing took place, one of our own fine young and dedicated afghan police was seriously injured. on behalf of all of his colleagues here in washington we want to wish him a speedy and full recovery. this condition is stable and he is making progress following surgery for domino,. at was conducted by a u.s. and afghan teen. we look forward to a full recovery. so without i will attempt to answer any questions you might have if you have any. yes sir. >> what is your chief take away on the narcotics report? which countries are cooperating the most and which countries are quite bringing the least? where does the greatest ever need to be made? the i think what i will do is

stick to the script if you will. we divide her efforts here between a september report were where we do exactly what you say and identify those countries which we say in the language of the law are failing demonstrably to corporate and you can look at that. that is something we will come back and do in september again. what i would say the chief take away from this is though to go to the nub of the question you ask, is that this is a very challenging situation. it requires require part of efforts of all the countries involved, those that produce who are ultimately consumers themselves whether they wish to be or not, by virtue of the made sure of drug production and it requires efforts on behalf of a full government. it is not just a u.s. problem or for a producer problem. and it is also, illustrates a

think the consumption of drugs as an international phenomenon. the country regrettably with the highest usages is iran, and that's a substantial effort underway themselves to help deter this but among the fastest-growing cocaine markets is not the united states. they are the ones in europe, so it is a global problem and one that we work on globally with our partners. yes sir. >> you describe the situation in afghanistan as a problem that involved last year. >> i would say that it continues to be a very big challenge. if you look over the recent time , production of poppies has declined by about 30% over the course of the last two years,

from 07209 but that is beginning at a very high plateau if you will. so, it remains a significant challenge. i would also underscore that that measure, the measure i cited there is poppy production, area cultivated and that gets to only one aspect of the problem and that is the production of the raw material. trafficking throughout afghanistan continues to be a big challenge. we with our partners in afghanistan forces through the largess of the american taxpayer and other donors has been developed as well as the actions by international partners and policing area and the drug enforcement administration is having what we believe to be more and more of an impact on the trafficking issue but it reminds of very large problem. one of the things that, where we have reshaped our systems programs over the course of the

last year or so is to move away from a focus on eradication, certainly in the eradication done by outsiders including ourselves and one that is focused more on an interdiction and institution building effort as well as an effort to develop more fully alternative livelihoods with a very strong emphasis on agriculture and on subsistence agriculture. that will only have an impact over time but it is a battleship that is clearly turned over the course of the last year and we would hope and expect that to have more and more of an impact as we look forward. in addition to that i have to point out that some very strong efforts have been taken by the afghans themselves. in particular a program that we and other foreign reported in helmand under the leadership of governor bob gold and a very concentrated area which brought a combination of alternative livelihoods, economic support

for the area, provision of government services and a in a more concentrated way and also the threat of law enforcement action had an impact on the local of poppy production in that area. but i think it goes to, underscores a point which i think everyone understands that this is part and parcel to the insecure situation so where there is greater insecurity regionally in afghanistan there is a greater incidence of narcotics production and trafficking. speak if i could just follow-up when you say it is turned over the last year do you mean the broader situation in afghanistan or that poppy production or the interdiction? >> i would say our policy has performed over the course of the last year moving away from an eradication focus to a focus on interdiction and in terms of the law enforcement and coercive peace if piece if you will, as well as a much stronger focus on alternative livelihoods with an

emphasis on agriculture. in terms of the results of the area under cultivation, that change has taken place between 2007 and 2009, a drop of about 30% from a very high plateau. i wouldn't, view the measurement period we are talking about here, i think at the end of calendar year 2009, are our probe searches coming on stream so they would have some impact but certainly not the impact we would hope they would have over time. yes-man. >> i put into dhs the drug cartel's mexican drug cartels have a presence in the thousands of u.s. communities and also there is reporting on the cultivation of marijuana by drug cartels the they been in national parks. how does the international strategy address things domestically that are connected to international concerns such

as the mexican drug cartels? >> the strategy not so much although it does, i mean they reported you will, the strategy does. the report not so much, but the corporative assistance program we have with mexico is aimed at helping our mexican partners develop a greater capacity to deal with than mexico with these drug cartel organizations. i will leave it to domestic law enforcement agencies to describe just what the level of engagement is in the united states but i suppose illustrative of that was the take takedown under operation to take down under operation coronado by the department of justice i guess months ago now. if i recall correctly it took place in more than 300 locations and so yes, there is a broad impact in the united states of cartel operations that are based or emanating from mexico and

they think that illustrates another.that bears underscoring. when people think about spillover, we tend to think of it as a class and things billing over right at the border. it doesn't tend to be that way. the spillover if you will was more broadly in the united states and some of the border communities can be not nearly as affected as some of the more inland areas are. yes sir. >> continuing on this topic, you have read the reports over the past eight years regarding this specific-- mexico and money laundering continues to be a challenge. can we expect something be done between both countries in the area of money laundering send? >> i think money laundering is one of the areas we are seeking to address, both in terms of domestic operations within mexico and the united states as well as our corporative effort. one of the things that my colleagues and i are responsible

for in terms of the cooperation program is providing equipment and training for mexican border authorities in mexican law-enforcement so they can better detect bulk cash smuggling. we have seen some of that in operation and i have seen some of it personally. the motivation for sequestering this is very strong. you can see it in the bulk cash sequestered in things as bizarre as the axles of industrial equipment, so it is not a simple issue to deal with but this kind of nonintrusive inspected equipment is exactly the type of devices you need in order to deal with that. i think that we still have work that we can do and must do on this. we are dealing with the millions on a problem that is best expressed in billions, and so we need to make further progress i think in the financial institution piece of this as we

move forward. >> hi, i have two questions if i might. first of all on the money laundering. i see obviously iran and united arab emirates and lebanon and the idea money laundering, i know you are dealing with terrorist related to that. do you believe that one of the reasons that these countries and afghanistan even, what are the kind of terrorist concerns about terrorist financing that we should take away from these reports specifically in afghanistan, iran and kind of the countries and proxies iran is using right now and then on venezuela, last week, venezuelan ambassador was quite forceful in defending his country's efforts to combat the problem and he maintains that he gave specific statistics that were quite impressive and i want get into them now but just to say that he

said that your charges in this report are political. ..

toussuire did with venezuela i don't contradict -- the statistics that are in this report are based on the self report of the countries involved so the statistics you see here for 2009 shouldn't differ from what was cited by venezuelan government official. it might but it is their numerals. but i would say is if you look at the evidence on the ground where narcotics are emanating from transiting into the caribbean or to africa and onward into europe you see an extraordinary half of particularly aviation exports out of the venezuelan area next to the border of columbia so that is what we site and he's welcome to his point of view but

that's not a political statement, that is evidence of radar tracking. yes, sir? >> i am aware of the cooperation with russia and about fighting narcotics in afghanistan, but on the russian side there's a major issue for concern that the hour security and in afghanistan and russian officials are saying that it actually helped increase supply of narcotics to the russian federation several times. do you think the united states can address its policy and find some other solutions? >> i am familiar with the issue that has been articulated by the

officials. i would point out to you that the level of production has continued to decline even in the face of our having altered our policies, and it's declined much more than any eradication program that we ever had were ever contemplated. we found the eradication program that we were seeking to make work was not a cost-effective way to deal with this issue and the area that we have ever succeeded in eradicating was extremely modest. it wasn't having material impact on the problem so we have refashioned our program and focused on other areas where we think it might have a greater impact. i don't think the program that we had under way that had eradication as a significant element was changing the threat russia faced. russia does face a significant

threat of exports of opium products from afghanistan as does all of afghanistan's neighbors on into western europe and asia but i don't think and the eradication program this spring to be an effective way to address that certainly not the one that we have underway and we terminated yes, ma'am. >> on the western hemisphere have you seen changes compared to the previous year's on specific countries like bolivia for instance? >> i would say that of the three major producing states in the andes, columbia had a significant decline although it remains by far the largest producer. peru had a modest increase and bolivia has a continuing trend

of a step up per year in the neighborhood of ten to 15%. it's taken place over the course of the last several years in addition the method of production that is now being used by cocaine producers in bolivia has adopted some more effective if he will production methods and has in fact costed double the output quantity of cocoa. so there is a significant increase in the potential output of hydrochloride from bolivia because of that. >> do you attribute this to the government efforts? >> i don't attribute the ladder to the government efforts. i attribute that to the efforts of the producers. but on the former continuing growth area of cultivation it is a disappointment that that

continues to increase and that there are not effective policies the would limit the production over time. >> this is on production but in if you put in venezuela as one of the principles you see this increase or the same for some time? >> i will see a significant course over the last year, no. >> you said -- i didn't understand from the u.n. for each country? >> it's from each country. yes, sir. >> i checked the volume and the country is not included this year. i want to ask the reason he was in the last year and second because i haven't had the chance to check the volume i want to ask whether north area is in the country of the volume one and if so is there in the new findings on the north korea?

>> is not in a finding with respect to north korea. we haven't seen sufficient evidence to say with certainty state-sponsored trafficking had stopped. the last hope -- high-profile incident was in 2003. the cumulative impact of repeated incidents and other publicly acknowledged criminal behavior by north korea points to the likelihood of state corrected trafficking in addition to trafficking by individual spirit >> the reason that they are not in including the falcon? >> i believe it is the absence of a significant financial industry but let me check. i'm giving a nod from one of my colleagues. yes, ma'am. >> thank you. i want to go back to venezuela because the government claims the drop abuse control commission recognized the force of the venezuela.

why your report is so different from in comparison with what they said that he is still fighting the drug trafficking. >> the fact as we observe them in terms of product emanating particularly by air from venezuela remains significant. >> is this supported on efforts made by the country? some of these other countries you kind of wall with their efforts but they are major money laundering. >> i don't see any effort in this particular region to deal with the issue. we've seen efforts in the seaborne cooperation with law enforcement agencies. >> you don't see any efforts? >> in this particular area i talked about, the border area aviation experts, cocaine from the border area between venezuela and colombia on the

venezuelan side i haven't seen any effort, any significant efforts to stop at traffic. yes, ma'am. >> how can they try to improve the cooperation and what do they say? >> we have some cooperation with him. we think particularly in the seaborne area what we have been unable or we haven't found a willing partner if you will mediation initio region. >> yes, sir. >> what can you say about the middle east as mentioned, what can we see but the states and do you have a list of states with special concerns? >> your colleagues earlier asked about that issue and i explained our concentration on listing individual states with special concern in the narcotics area was something we dealt with under a program that comes to

fruition in september so we will address it then. on the question of particular states in the middle east i would refer you to a reported to have a specific question i will address it -- >> [inaudible] >> will it's available now. i'm sorry. yes, sir. >> there is a press report in the root making a fuss calling it a scandal the u.s. embassy in beirut, the asking them to provide a list of the foreign companies with all the debt to the embassy and the newspaper saying that this lebanon internal security. are you aware of this? >> i'm not aware of the report and glad to take a look and see if their something i can be responsive to but i'm not familiar with the issues we don't want to speculate what might be in the press report.

>> just a couple more questions? >> i'm trying to understand on the idea of terrorist financing. he kind of mentioned terrorist financing a lot like the word terrorist financing the tener earlier you said that you don't look at the source of -- >> what i'm suggesting is the programs we have under way for cooperation deal with money laundering across-the-board so an effective antilaundering regime which deals with proceeds of crime as well as terrorism is the same type of programs we are looking at the antimoney laundering program and that is our value to the mechanism but we do recognize that moneys that are laundered could be used for various the various purposes and our focus is both in terms of motivation dealing with the issue of course has to do with

counternarcotics, crime and terrorism. >> the state of the world crisis, the collapse of banks, lack of funds going into the government for all kind of things are you seeing any substantive changes in money laundering linked to the world financial crisis? >> i can't say anything specific, know. the pressures the new site could have an impact probably more of the individual crime level as opposed to the systems in place. >> if i follow up with haiti there's a lot of talk of tv as a transit way for drug trafficking and money laundering in the hemisphere. most of the money that goes to haiti seems to come through the form of remittances which reno has been a sore spot for control of money laundering because such small amounts they come in in cash and go out in cash.

can you address that? is there any elevated concerns or any actions taken? >> it is always to be encouraged remittances or any other form of money transfer goes through recognize financial institutions so that it is both safe for the sender and recipient as well as avoids the taint in the buildup of the situation which could ask the various transfers as well and with respect to haiti. a program on the ground before the earthquake assisting with the building of capacity in the policing of the financial crimes. we intend to start that as soon as we can appropriately with the haitian authorities so that is our effort to address the issue. the source of much of the drug money that would be coming into

he goes back to the question we've beaten up several times concerning venezuela because that is the destinations and in fact the largest one for the flights emanating from the border region and venezuela. >> i'm sorry to keep going on about this issue but even if you look at the report to the criminalize laundering? yes, i mean it seems -- i haven't had the time obviously to go through the report but it seems this country -- >> which country? steno was a lie is taking efforts in other countries that you are sitting in the report as other major countries. if this report is about to give cooperation mabey you see in other areas to make a distinction between results and cooperation whereas with venezuela use ingalls immelt as not having any results but it does seem they are making

efforts because in the report you're talking about all the things they are doing. >> we cite what everyone is doing. this is not as you imbedded in the earlier question on one of your colleagues this is not a political report. estimates with respect it seems in some countries -- >> with respect if you look at the radar tracks and impact it's having on the caribbean i don't think you can make that argument. i wish you could. >> that's just one specific area of all that you're talking about. >> one specific area which is a very destabilizing activities in the caribbean and west africa so it is a great concern. >> regarding mexico, you have during the past months very supportive of mexican efforts and the cooperation with the u.s.. the mexican public is growing more unhappy with of the fight because the level of the violence continuing to increase.

with pressing down in the polls and so on. during the elections in mexico one year and a little bit more than i here are you worried d historic strategies you followed with the mexican government could be in peril? >> we see a broad commitment to building the institutions of an effective policing system in mexico and to reform its judicial institutions, and i think that that has very broad support certainly in our government and we think mexico as well. thank you. >> thank you. [inaudible conversations]

de c-span2 kneal library is a digital archive of c-span programming from barack obama to ronald reagan and everyone in between. over 157,000 hours of c-span video now available to you. it's fast and free. try it out at c-spanvideo.org. now senate debate on republican senator jim bunning's decision to stop a bill to extend unemployment benefits. we will hear from senate majority leader harry reid and center -- senator bunning.

islamic every night people want to work to need to support their families but can't find a job go to bed with at least the comfort of having unemployment insurance and health benefits. but last night more than 1 million of them, people throughout america went to sleep relying and woke up without the comfort they will be there now. early this morning, when they would rather be spending the morning is working mothers and fathers in every state will gup the oman plan edolphus in a long line. news reports today of the lines are long today all over the country from virginia to nevada to kentucky. they are long because these people are worried how they are going to put food on the table and pay the bills. far too many americans those benefits were set to expire last

night. six times last week democrats asked to extend unemployment benefits for short time while we work on a longer extension to read six times republicans said no. they didn't just say no to us, the members of the senate. they said no to the families in all states count on us to act when we need action who count on us to respond in the event of emergency. this is an emergency. the republicans in the senate are standing between these families and help these benefits expire and expired. it might work under the senate rules but it certainly doesn't work for the working families. the need to buy groceries does not expire, the need to heat your home, put gas in your car, make payments for the furniture you bought, the car you bought, your house payment, take

medicine and supports an aging parent and take care of kids, they don't expire. those opposed to helping our fellow citizens at the time of the greatest need want to talk about process. process and republican colleagues can to the floor and talk about process and they had a right to do that. under the rules against it is true mr. president but you can't afford to feed your kids it doesn't mean anything about process. we talk often about the cost of inaction. it's the reason we insist on creating jobs and making health care affordable and strengthening the national security. when we talk about the cost it's more than just rhetoric. it comes with the dire consequences. the americans that will but this one without the benefits the need now know better than anyone else. mr. president, associated press

runs over the country. among other things the article says this morning 2000 federal transportation workers will be without pay today. and mr. president, the reason we are talking about -- this doesn't count the thousands and thousands, of 2 million people are not plan to have jobs as a result not extending the highway bill. that's what we want to do. but these people work because what has happened is even the inspectors can't do the jobs of people are walking away from these jobs. secretary lahood of transportation by the way republican congressman until he was appointed here said construction workers would be sent home from jobsites because federal inspectors must be furloughed. been named a long list of construction sites the would be

halted. george washington parkway, kump beckham for bridge i don't, but it is but it's in virginia, bridge construction in idaho, all over the country this is happening. the transportation inspectors safety inspectors have no pay so they have to leave and nothing is happening. this is when to lead to untold numbers of people, to a million people will be able to work. it's wrong what's taking place mr. president and it's not too late to fix it. i hope republicans will reconsider. think about the constituents standing in the line as we speak. >> just a brief explanation why

we are where we are with this extension bill, the brief extension of 40 days. there was an agreement between the majority leader of the finance committee and the minority leader in the finance committee, senator baucus and grassley on the three month extension of the same provisions. there were more provisions in the bill also. it cost a little more than the $10 billion this asked for because it was three months' extension. senator reid pulled that bill from the floor of the u.s. senate. he did, the leader of the democrats pulled the bill from

the floor. i support extending unemployment benefits, cobra, flood insurance, highway bill fix, small-business loans and a distant network television for satellite viewers. if we can't find $10 billion to pay for something that we all support we will never pay for anything on the floor of the u.s. senate. i've offered several ways to do this including trying to negotiate with the majority leader's staff. mom has been successful. we cannot keep adding to the debt. it's over $14 trillion going up fast. if the budget before us passes

it will add another $1.5 trillion to the debt. last week well it's now a little past last week, we passed paygo for those who don't know what paygo is, it means you have to pay for everything that you bring before the senate and you can't charge at on the debt. you can't charge it, that's what paygo says. so understanding that i hope the american people understand my serious objections. i would like to ask for unanimous consent the senate proceed to the immediate consideration h. r. 4691 but the

amendment at the desk which offers a full offset be agreed to the bill as amended be read a third time and passed and the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table. >> reserving the right to object. >> majority leader, history is something you have to be involved with to understand what transpired. first there was no bill to take off the floor. there were discussions between democrats and republicans and on the thursday before we left for the last week that we took i was

in the back call with senators grassley come bachus and senator mcconnell, friend said they were not ready to agree to anything yet. it's very clear mr. president that if we are going to extend benefits for a lot of tax provisions that are important to business we should at least consider extending benefits for people down and out for the same period of time. so understand the bill that came before the samet included a jobs package that extended the highway benefits for one year saving a million jobs, creating jobs by allowing small businesses were in any business to hire somebody that's been out of work for 60 days and don't to pay withholding tax and they get a thousand dollar tax credit. in addition to that to help small businesses we have a provision to allow small

business to write off and not to appreciate to under $50,000 of purchases in the year. very important to stimulate business and we have also in that bill a provision to stimulate the economy by extending the built america bonds that were so successful in the recovery act and those funds expire so mr. president, you can have all the excuses one wants but the fact is my friends on the other side of the aisle are opposing a extending unemployment benefits for people who are out of work. i would also say this, paygo is interesting. i'm glad my friend brought that up and i got what he brought up the deficit because it is very big. but where was my friend from kentucky when we had to that were on paid for during the bush administration? tax cuts that cost more than a trillion dollars and paid for. where was my friend and republicans objected to that?

mr. president, paygo is important and we passed it, we, the democrats dustin, my friend didn't vote for it. it passed because democrats voted for it. not a single republican voted for it. we had these during the clinton and worked. we paid down debt in the last clinton years. we also understand how important the debt of this country is, build up, start build up so strong during the eight years of the bush administration. we brought to this floor the presiding officer no one worked harder than the presiding officer to come up with something to address the debt. with the chairmen of the budget committee and others. we wanted a debt commission and we brought to this for a debt

commission, a good one mr. president based upon what we did with base closings, military base closings we tried for decades to close bases on necessary in the country after world war ii was gone korea was on, the imam, we didn't need those bases because of what happens trying to close the base because local politics we couldn't do it so we passed the bill that said we are going to have a bit closing commission they will come back with recommendations in the house and senate has a choice either vote no or yes on the recommendations and they will be yes and we close rumors bases all over the country. the commission we established was based on the same thing. and we voted peewee democrats voted. why didn't it pass? because seven republicans who co-sponsored the legislation voted against. so mr. president we don't need

lectures on debt. what we need is to recognize there are poor people of america who are desperate to day and people are working making good money on these projects all over america today better being told to go home because there for mr. president i object. >> the senate will continue debate on extension of unemployment benefits point

over 1,000 middle and high school students entered this year's c-span's studentcam documentary competition with a short video on one of the country's greatest strengths or challenge the country is facing. we will announce the 75 winners on march 10th and showed to the winning videos at studentcam.org. now a discussion on sunday's parliamentary elections iraq. the american enterprise institute heard from election and military analysts on how the outcome of the elections could impact iraq and u.s. policy. this is about one hour and 40 minutes. [inaudible conversations] >> thank you for your patience. good afternoon everybody. welcome to the american enterprise institute. i'm the vice president for foreign defense policy studies here. we are holding an event on iraq

and iraq's elections. it's a little bit amusing to me to be sitting here introducing and even on iraq something when i started here back in 2002 when used to do it on a weekly basis and the truth is good news is no news in iraq and we haven't had as much talk about in recent years since the success of the surge and while i think iraq has had some ups and downs we are here on overall what is a pretty positive occasion to talk about iraq's elections. i'm going to get my number wrong. it's the fourth election in five years. elections are meant to be exciting in and of themselves but only because of the space process and not because of any violence associated with them. while we have certainly seen a step up in violence in iraq and i have no doubt we will see more in the coming weeks at the end of the most of the excitement is in fact coming from the to and

from of the electoral process rather than anything else which is a wonderful story and something perhaps as we look too closely we tend to forget but overall success story and something i know we are very proud of it here at aei and much of that can be attributed to the wonderful work of our troops. i'm not going to say anything more except to quickly introduce the speakers here today who will address the issues and you'll find the full biographies online at aei bald cord. in order of speaking today, we have carina perelli, united nations elections veteran and now executive vice president of the international foundation for the electoral systems. next to her is scott carpenter the custom family fellow and the director of project at the washington institute for the

policy also a veteran of iraq and cpa and even more battle scarred veteran of the department of state. next we have brian katulis at the center for american progress and he does a great deal of work on middle east issues and u.s. national security. michael ruben, were known aei scholar and always get the additional title role calls a senior lecturer at the naval postgraduate school on middle east affairs. finally next to me, sorry everybody i have a cold. i apologize if i smith threw out. it's not a motion. next to me is kathleen ridolfo, now an independent arab affair analyst from to listen to 2008 she worked as an iraqi analyst at radio free europe radio liberty. if we could ask you to start,

thank you. >> thank you, danielle. i have been in the field of elections and transitions in conflict area our high risk environment for the last 40 years of my life studying with leone country in latin america and in many ways at every step of the process you find people that asked you the question why he elections, why basically not go through another type of arrangement, why are you betting on giving voice to the people so early in the process these.

also transition's which have been involved and the latest is the afghanistan from which i'm returning right now and i can say two words about that in a moment. but basically when you choose the path basically you're making several bets. one of them is the fact that elections are going to go from hot to cold therefore they are going to go from identity issues about the past, issues extremely violent and expressed in violence with violence as a political language to issues that have to do with in the delivery of services, governance, art of governing and providing the population the things they require and in many ways this has been a path that has also been followed by the

iraqi process. the other problem people don't understand is that elections are not ebenefits. they are basically process these, long-term process these and many times we have to fight with the privacy is impatience of the media and stakeholders and strong case of add in the international community that basically don't remember from where we started and where we are going. elections are also about building institutions including political parties in many ways. and you have to build them through engineering many times and build them through rules of the game and basically through

negotiations of the will of the game. most people don't realize that the first document that probably is negotiated after a conflict or during a conflict is not necessarily the constitution but that part of the constitution that has to do with provisions from electoral law and how we provide power etc., etc.. and then two things i learned, one that i learned in my own country which is basically that you don't negotiate with democrats, so it is also an education of the elites and education of the political establishment and of the people, and finally something that is present with the spiritual

exercises when the founder was once asked the question but i don't believe in god he had a fantastic answer which is pray as if you believe and one day you will. so it's about creating habits and basically also forcing habits but also the force of habit in terms of not discussing the issues through other mechanisms including violence but discussing it through institution of arrangements and discussion of rules and about box and that is in a sense the best we took when the process of the iraqi transition occurred. i was first called to start

negotiating with jerry brummer at the time. what sort of path and the discussion was interrupted by the demise in the on the bombing of the hotel and i leader returned and was responsible for many of the institutional arrangements in organization of the first elections and was the commissioner in 2005, so that's more or less sort of the plot forward from which i am talking. i also have to say the views i experts here do not represent the current organization, they are my own but in many ways i wanted to extract some lessons from that sort of did that we

took up the time and from afar i can see basically in terms of the glasses it has been acquired in many ways. the political establishment today in iraq discuses rules and in many ways to fight within, contained by the rules of the game is basically the space game, the rules about the electoral politics and in many ways many things that we see our iraqi politicians being politicians and not being more words or tribal leaders. in that sense, that is a good vantage.

the other trend that emerged was a sickly the issue of the vote of the citizenry because in many ways the citizens voted not so much about the message we extracted was the vote was on secretary in but it was also it might have been nonsectarian but it was a very strong anti-incumbent vote because of inability of the politicians of power to basically provide basic services and provide what we can call bread-and-butter issues and that is a very interesting evolution in terms of iraq. the process the pc right now is basically obviously the feeling with rules of the game, a sort

of pro version debaathification that might reopen the wounds of the past and the emergence of the fear mongers but with a certain degree of approaching it. what are the risks in terms of the process many of course. one of the risks, the most important risks is that basically voters grow disillusioned with electoral politics to solve and address the problems and therefore there should be a setback because they are talking about what we were in baghdad in 2004 and 2005 they were talking about the democratic dividend, the provision of the basic services,

electricity. that is still not the case and basically the current process might hamper the government and therefore basically brokers also vote with their feet by not showing up at the polls but also don't buy basically reverting to previous ways of solving the tribalism and so on. of course there's always the risk of the acceptance of the results whatever the results are going to be if the politics become polarized. adel i want to mention one thing which is basically the trend in terms of globally and the am i

will talk to minutes about afghanistan. we have seen the emerging again the ugly face of basically a sort of pseudo sovereignty to fight against timely interventions of international community in many ways and from other actors including national actors every time there are diplomatic intervention or the u.n. intervenes to say you cannot do it because this goes against sound electoral practice and sound international practice. and that is particularly the case when we are discussing fraud and basically observer statements and it's something

that is not only happening in iraq, it happened in afghanistan the last process and it's extremely worrisome because we might have a reversion to the previous ways of thinking. in terms of what lessons can be extracted from iraq to afghanistan because of tennessee and is an open process i have to be careful about what i say because i am still involved but basically one of the biggest problems that we have seen emerge is a feeling with electoral rules as the recent free of president karzai that degree has also the potential of the debaathification commissioned article 12

basically states candidates are going to be that it by the security forces with little or no input from the commission with little or no input from the u.n. and from isaf. everybody else is concentrating on the issue of the commission for me that is a lot more -- the issue is a lot more serious than the one of the complaints commission, and we should be monitoring it a lot more carefully. thank you. >> thank you. >> thank you, aei for organizing the panel. a very privileged to be on with such distinguished people and good friends. i served with speed in baghdad and was thankful when

shea-porter issued in to figure out how it was we would create the selection system working with the iraqis to do so. i want to make three quick points today. first i think these elections in iraq are going to be about the future, not about the past. second, the electoral system we now have will tend to cement emerging local and regional parties within the broad coalitions that exist and three the formation because the first two issues will be extremely complicated after the elections take place. so .1, these elections are about the future, not the past. as corrina mentioned in the january 09 provincial elections, voters had it. they had had it with islamist slogans and the pretences their issues were being addressed and look forward to throwing the

bums out and they threw the bums out. i don't think there was incumbent, very few incumbents were left standing. people did not want to hear religious slogans. they want to hear submissions to the problems, retial politics but at the same time despite the fact these were local elections, people voted for more centralism. they rejected federalism, they added up to here with the kurds. they wanted to have a stronger central government that could take care of issues. they repudiated the federal concept as elaborated by the islamic supreme council for iraq and the notion of a large kurdish regional government like area in the south. they wanted more centralism. in carvel for in fact a baathist governor was the largest vote

getter at the time. he won more votes than any individual in all of iraq during those provincial elections. that was in the heart of iraqi shiites. the islamic council supreme council for iraq was hammered in this provincial elections. it was practically wiped out and had very few places where it had a hold on which to negotiate collisions maliki's state of law and certainly no place where they were particularly powerful year and a place which was particularly powerful. the reason i want to highlight this initially is to see one of the issues we've all been consumed with here in washington and an extant in baghdad as well is the issue of the justice accountability commission. i have written in sharp

criticism and have challenged the legality of it but i also am concerned we not overestimate the impact of this process and its contribution to the the legitimization of the process as some like to paint it and at the same time i like to point out the reason this has become so big is the party is associated with the iraq national alliance were looking for a wedge issue to bring themselves back politically from the debacle of january, 2009, and i think this is a big problem for them. the reason i think it is a big problem for them is there isn't one shia or kurdish party or even sunni party that is pro baathist the points to see the return of the ba'ath party to iraq. therefore in the south especially all of the parties, all of the voters are

antibaathist so first you have to convince them that their return of the baath is the number-one issue. you have to convince them that's the number-one issue and second al-hakim and others they have to convince the voters that even if it is the number-one issue, and i don't think it is but even if it is the number one issue they are the best positioned to deliver on keeping the back office out of government. i don't think that's been to happen. one of the other reasons i think this is about the future and all the past is even as he was banned as a justice of this accountability commission decision, and initially said he was going to boycott the election how to respond to his own constituents who said you can't ban but we are going to run which ultimately forced him to back off and say we are going to run and are enthusiastic

about running and please get out and vote for us and perversely i think for the iraq national alliance is the justice accountability commission rulings have cemented the base of that constituency that now is going to turn out every single vote for it can in order to bring about the change that it's looking for so although there has been house durham drawn about this issue and i know that michael and others will talk you will but more about it, i think as the wage issue it may actually backfire and that the issue while of concern and i understand why people would be concerned about it is not likely to be the definitive issue of this campaign. number two, the elections will serve to seven because i parties and local parties as constituent

members of the national coalitions. now, in the 2005 elections, iraq was one single electoral district and it was also closed list. now the implications of that one single district in the close list is the political party leaders are vastly strengthened. they get to determine who is on the list and we're and it's a national list. there's no connection between the people who are voting and the people they elect so you elect somebody on the list, the person may live in baghdad what is it to you if you live in basra? in this there are multi member constituencies within the governor rents so the political parties and coalitions forming are trying to find powerful attractive local candidates to run than they are creating these collisions.

so the impact especially in places like nineveh province where the party is strong is that they're going to win overwhelmingly. and they are a constituent member of the iraq coalition. but what happens after they are elected if they have a large number of seats from the nineveh province and they go to baghdad those seats don't necessarily have to stay within that particular question. you can move them around and what about in the south where from the polls i've seen 30% of the people are still undecided. who are they voting for? why at this point in polarized iraq with 30% of people and decided i think it's because these are the supporters of muqtada al-sadr air. it's possible any way and if these people vote and they vote for muqtada also all solder it's

difficult to see them cooperate in over the long haul. they tried in the elections in december to fill some five and ultimately of course the united hsien twist split into multiple components and i think it's going to do so again. fair and final point, the colish information process which requires a great deal of consensus building and of compromise is going to take a lot of time. there are constitutional time lines i won't go into the constitutional time lines means the process will take at least four months if they are all mint and i don't think they are going to be met so we are talking five

to six months. why do i think it is great to be so complicated? for a number of reasons but since i have no time going to focus on one and kathleen will talk more about it but the kurdish alliance is bring to be the most coherent block of delegates and in the past the kurds have always been the most sought after partner because they are the kingmaker's. in these elections no coalition will get more than 25 per cent which means at least the to have to come together but when concerned about is the kurds which no the united states will be leaving soon are going to want to strike the best bargain after these elections if they can't read this is their last chance and here's the challenge. if they push too hard, if they hold out too long there will be a temptation to form an