about the issues they are facing. guest: i encourage all of videos -- all viewers to go to studentcam.org. we have a list of all 75 winners. we will be airing all of them and having a short interview starting april 1 through april 27. tune in to seize and starting on april 1, or you can watch them on our website, to watch all the top ent

next, chief justice john roberts on the history of the supreme court. he spoke at the university of alabama law school in tuscaloosa. following his speech the chief justice roberts to qstions from students including one on president obama's comment about a supreme court decision during the state of the union address. >> welcome to the lecture. there are moments in the nation's history when we are compelled to reflect upon and marvel at the brilliance of our founding documents. the united states constitution is no less than a miracle of language, structure and stability. governments resemble their citizens in that crisis often reveals their greatest strengths and weaknesses. today in 2010 when our nation has faced a string of critical

moments of lawyers can maintain our faith in the resilience of our constitutional system. our citizens and society, our very way of life are protected by a constitutional architecture that has survived every challenge and withstands every threat. within our system of governing our courts are often the branch of last resort. the ultimate guardians of our constitutionalism was all attorneys vowing to serve the branch which alexander hamilton said will always be the least dangerous to the political rights of the constitution. infil i united states when there are disputes over the election results the scope of individual rights are the parameters of corporate governance we still settle our disputes in the courts and not in the streets. during these times in particular our law school come manatee is especially honored and inspired

by the presence of the honorable john roberts, jr.. we appreciate, we admire and respect the chief justice stewart ship of the judicial power of the united states and our beloved constitution. chief justice roberts on behalf of the faculty, staff, student body, alumni and other friends think you for visiting today tuscaloosa alabama. [applause] >> thank you. thank you. [applause] >> phill law school is grateful to the family. it's now my privilege to call upon judge to introduce the speaker. >> it is a pleasure for my family and welcome to tuscaloosa

and to introduce to you the honorable john roberts jr.. if anybody was ever destined to be chief justice of the united states is he. he started out shopping his future when he was in high school in indiana and he graduated at the top of his class but also was a rustler and kept them of the football team. he then went to harvard university graduate school where he earned his tuition working in the summer and the steel mill. he graduated summa cum laude from the credulous school and onto the law school at harvard where he was the managing editor of the review and graduated magna cum laude. he then went on to clerk the circuit court level for judge friendly and then justice rehnquist before he became chief

justice. from there to the administration of president reagan where he was assisted justice to the president, he was then deputy solicitor general to president george h. w. bush. he then went to private practice where he had been two or three years earlier than back out but he went back into the private practice in b.c. and practiced there where he argued 39 cases before the supreme court of the united states. he specialized in that. president george w. bush appointed him first to the d.c. circuit's and then to the supreme court. chief justice roberts was the youngest chief justice to assume that position since chief justice marshall over 200 years

before. and when he was confirmed, he received the most votes, affirmative votes to confirm him of any chief justice in the history of the united states. he is married, his wife is a lawyer, he has two children and some of us got to know them on television years ago. josina and jack. he's a perfect chief justice for the times and it's my great pleasure and my honor to present to you the chief justice of the united states. [applause] >> thank you very much. i appreciate that. thank you very much. [applause] thank you. thank you. i'm delighted to be here. thank you for the generous introduction. i do have to qualify a couple of

the points though as far as my high school career you do need to know there was a very small high school and as far as getting the most affirmative votes you need to know there were many more states when i was confirmed than there were for some of the other justices. dean randall, thank you very much for your kind remarks. i have been very impressed by the students and faculty here and enjoy the opportunity to meet with them earlier today. i feel very privileged to deliver the 2010 fletcher that has attracted so many of my colleagues as well as international terrorists over the years. collectors are a fitting tribute to an individual who has provided distinguished service to the federal judiciary for nearly two decades. the judge follows in the tradition of other great alabama edger arrests including hugo black who served on the supreme court with such distinction for more than 33 years. justice black has such high

stature that he is easy to forget that he was not the only to serve on the supreme court. a justice with alabama ties was john mckinley born in virginia but practiced law in alabama before serving on the court from 1838 to 1852. he served as a circuit justice for the ninth circuit which at that time consisted of alabama, mississippi, louisiana and arkansas. things were different back then. justice mckinley was though most traveled of the justices of his era logging about 10,000 miles a year writing the southern circuit at a time travel was of course far more arduous than today people it now when trust is mckinley left the bench another took his place. justice john campbell was born in russia practiced law in montgomery and developed a national reputation as a superb and took it. one of his biographers noted

that when justice mckinley left the bench of the members of the supreme court unanimously urged president franklin pierce to appoint campbell. the president, we followed the and vice. as i said earlier, things were different back then. justice campbell served on the court from 1853 until the civil war when he returned to alabama and a leader to louisiana to practice law. after the war year and a plea and as a highly respected supreme court advocate are doing before some of his former colleagues. among other things he served as the lead counsel in the famous slaughterhouse cases. now alabama has the distinction of not only providing the court with great jurists and advocates but also contributing in a more concrete way to the supreme court physical structure. most every citizen has seen photos of the truly magnificent supreme court building as pictured above. as many of you already know and

we will surely be reminded to take the supreme court tour, alabama is the source of the stunningly beautiful white marble that increases much of our supreme court building's interior many visitors to the court assume that it has resided in this timeless beautiful building since the court came into being in 1789. not so. for nearly a century and a half, the court, they were separate and coequal branch of the government under the constitution, did not have a home of its own. the court moved into the supreme court building in 1935. it this year march to the eckert marks the 75th anniversary of the opening of the building. with the anniversary of mind, i would like to make a few observations about the symbolic importance of this structure built in part of alabama stone. at time of the ratification of the constitution, the federal government had no buildings of

its own. the government temporarily convened in new york city. president washington named six supreme court justices who were promptly confirmed again things were different back then and they made a plan to join the president and congress in new york. congress already occupied new york city federal hall so the court selected temper recorders on the second floor of the merchants' exchange building above a bustling marketplace. it's not actually far from the truth to say the courts first meeting place was a shopping mall. february 1st, 79, the supreme court moly lacked the permanent home, it lacked a quorum because of illness and poor travel conditions only three of the six justices showed up. even aer the court made a big war among its second day it suint adjourned for the simple reason that they had no cases. the court met again briefly in the merchants' exchange building

later that year when it had cases holding court in the exchange building for a total of 12 days. now as you know the constitution authorizes congress to determine the location of a district to serve as the permanency of the federal government. during the spring of 1790, and number of states fight for the honor of establishing the district from their territory. pennsylvania proposed philadelphia, other candidates included in nablus, baltimore and frederick maryland, trenton new jersey, new york and cities yet to be named along the potomac river's. it was over the course of the dinner in new york that thomas jefferson brokered a bargain in which james madison agreed to support alexander hamilton's plan for the federal government to assume state war debt to restore the nation's public credit we'll in return hamilton would support madisons preference for the capitol to be established along the potomac to

persons compromise was formalized in the act of 79 d and the also provided for philadelphia to serve as the nation's capital for ten years to placate some of the pennsylvania delegation, but also to give the new government time to build a capital city. the supreme court accordingly moved to philadelphia and occupied temporary homes from seven to 91 until 1800. the court convened twice in the pennsylvania state house now known as independence hall and then regularly at the city hall now known as the old city hall. by 1800 largely through george washington's leadership, a capital city along the potomac emerged. the planners of the era led by pierre provided congress at feist congress the landscape provided three premier locations for important public buildings. this was a happy coincidence since the government had three

branches. on the first site congress and evicted the white house for the president's use. on the second site congress laid off a building for itself the famed capitol building. on the third side congress and its wisdom build a permanent home for the patent office. [laughter] one of these very little known side jobs of the cheese to become chief justice is to serve as the chancellor of the smithsonian institution. as the chancellor i'm very proud to say the patent office now serves as the home to the national gallery in the smithsonian american art museum. but as chief justice i have to know congress left the court without a home of its own. the absence of a permanent home perhaps seemed less odd in the early 19th century when the justices left outside washington and spent much of the year hearing cases as the general

circuit justice is a practice known as writing circuit. the justices journeyed to washington only twice a year to hear cases as the supreme court. but the supreme court still had to hear the case is somewhere and starting in 1801 the court met in several temporary quarters within the capitol building. when john marshall became chief justice he promoted, artery by encouraging the justices to launch at the same boardinghouse when they came to washington. he also saw much of the case discussion took place over dinner. his younger colleague recounted the courts refrain from drinking the favorite beverage of the era except on rainy days to relieve the chill. but he also noted that when faced with a particularly vexing case on a clear night chief justice marshall but sometimes look out the window and observed

the court's jurisdiction was national so it must be raining somewhere. [laughter] the justices of john marshall's year i did not seem deeply bothered by the absence of the court building devoted to their use. indeed chief justice marshall delivered his opinion in marbury versus madison in the parlor room of the seals hotel where the justices for lodging so that justice samuel chase who was debilitated walk by delta would not need to travel to the capitol building. the justices still needed a courtroom and in 18 tandy eventually settled into a room on the ground floor of the capitol north wing. but that did not last long. when the british invaded washington during the war of 1812, they torched the capitol and destroyed the justices workroom. after the repairs that took five years the court resumed meeting in the basement chamber shown above.

the court used this room known as the old supreme court chamber as its courtroom from 1819 until 1860. this is the courtroom where john mckinley and john campbell said alice justices. the court chamber designed by benjamin was very attractive but cramped. the court had no room since justices had to put their robes on when they ascended the bench. the windowless space was quite dark. people joked the statue of leedy justice needed no blindfold because it was too dark to see anything any way. apart from the practical problems with this space the courts residence in the capitol was not consistent with the framers conception of the supreme court rule under our constitution. the founding generation conceived of the court as a separate and coequal branch of government. as hamilton stated in federalist number 78, there is no liberty of the power of judging be not

separated from the legislative and executive power. the image of the court hearing cases in the lower recess of the capitol building surely did not capture the role of the court that the framers had conceived or the chief justice marshall had established through decisions such as marbury. the court's presence in the capitol perhaps have more subtle consequences. the justices walked the same holes as members of congress and naturally developed personal familiarity with the political figures and pressing issues of the day. it wasn't uncommon for the sitting senators such as daniel webster and henry clay to walk down to the supreme court chamber and argue cases. there are virtues to familiarity that there are fyces as well. when judges are surrounded by politicians it may be too easy for a judge to forget his distinct and limited role in our constitutional system.

as you know chief justice taney presided over the court during the era it sat in the capitol. the courts physical location during his tenure placed him literally in the midst of strident congressional debate over the expansion of slavery in the new territories. it is i admit ranks surmised but perhaps the close proximity to congress and the participants in the political process skewed his perspective about the court's proper function so bound by the elected representatives struggling to find a solution to the slavery question, he came to believe that he and the court could conclusively settled the matter. the result was the catastrophic decision in dred scott which brought lee declared slaves had no legal rights under the constitution and what congress from forbidding slavery in the new territories. that decision placed the court in the middle of the public policy debate tarnished the

court's reputation and only deepened the national decline. near the end of cheese to become chief justice pawnee tenure of the senate that had grown with admission of new states moved into a larger and more ornate chamber. chief justice seized upon this opportunity to move the court into the senate chambers where it remained from the 1860's until 1935. this is the court room where louis brandeis and oliver wendell holmes served as associate justice is and where john campbell appeared frequently as an advocate. the courtroom had several practical advantages over the old supreme court chamber. it was larger accommodating when hundred members of the audience and had a high ceiling and natural light. it also had a separate robing room so the justices were scared having to put their rope on when they came on to the bench. but the symbolic problem remained that the justices were

tenants in the home of another branch of government. as in the case of the old supreme court chambers there was no room for the justices to have separate offices. the justices were relieved of the circuit riding responsibilities during the period so they now all resided in the washington hearing. but without office space in the capitol they worked from home and generally came to the court only on argument and conference days. when william howard taft joined the supreme court as the tenth chief justice in 1921, he didn't like this arrangement. taft had of course served as president before he became chief justice. but before his presidency he served as both a state and federal judge and he had a very clear conception of the importance of the judiciary. shortly after his appointment as the chief justice, she traveled to philadelphia, the early home of the court.

in researching this talk i came upon a newspaper report of his visit which noted the chief justice was, quote, acclaimed by cheering crowds. naturally i felt compelled to read further. [laughter] the press story told how chief justice taft sat in the chair the chief justice had once occupied the challenge for the chair. [laughter] and heard stories about the court's early sessions. taft spoke and made comments that still ring true today. he pointed out the character of a nation's judiciary reflects the character of its people and the capacity for self-government. taft speaking directly from his experience as a former president observed a judiciary made subordinate to the chief executive were obliged to follow suggestions from the throne reveals subjection two carpenteria 40 inconsistent with the love of individual liberty.

a judiciary whose judgment must be made to follow popular clamor in the inconsistency of a mall with indicates people lacking that self restraint without which popular government is doomed to failure. he continued beneficial role by the people cannot be obtained by the asking were through high sounding constitutions. it takes training and self control and appreciation of intelligent and patriotic leadership and perception of the great importance of the welfare of the whole greater than that of self or faction. people must trust those of high character qualified by experience and learning but must not trust them too much. i think chief justice taft's words rightly earned him some cheers. but i am also intrigued by what he did not mention that must have been thinking.

biden taft had already undertaken steps to secure the supreme court a home of its own. chief justice taft skilled politician who knew the way of congress began to circulate in the hallways of the capitol relentlessly lobbying senators and representatives for separate supreme court building. his efforts paid off and in 1925 congress enacted a bill that provided that the court would have its own building. taft also weighed in on the exact location of the building pressing for a site directly east of the capitol. the site had a rich history. it had been the site of the brick capital which congress temporarily occupied after the war of 1812 and a military prison that captured soldiers house under deplorable conditions during the civil war. it also may have been the location of this deals hotel, historians are not sure chief

justice marshall announced the marbury decision. at the time congress acquired it for the courts use it was the headquarters of the national women's party. taft not only can't handle the location of the building but he took a direct hand in its design. he saw to it that he was appointed the chair of the supreme court building commission. he also chose the great architect whom he already enlisted to begin planning the building. he was famous for his creations. he was a champion of the neoclassical school of design before his appointment he had already sketched an exterior design that drew heavily on the classical symmetry of greek and roman temples. gilbert presented detailed plans for the new supreme court in the summer of 1929 shortly before the collapse of the stock market and the beginning of the great depression. congress nevertheless voted in december of 1929 to appropriate

$9.7 million to fund the construction. chief justice taft's persistence but plans and money in place. he sadly died a few months later and did not see the completion of the building. but the project moved forward under the leadership of the new chief justice charles evans hughes. the side was prepared, the cornerstone was laid in december, 1932 and construction began in earnest. gilbert was able to import the nation's finest sculptures in the process including james frazier, adolf wegmann and robert afton and he insisted on using the finest materials. the building was completed in april 4th, 1935 only a few months later than the targeted completion date and importantly under budget. the court returned $95 of $532.2

of the original appropriation to the treasury. the building that emerged from this process is one of the most striking structures in washington state fleet and circassian get rich with subtle symbolism. gilbert personally selected several design elements that made the building truly distinctive. he chose as the exterior construction material and pure real marble from vermont which has a high content and makes the building stunningly luminous in some light. but for the interior she chose marble from alabama which is warmly fein and deeply textured. he then played high ceilings and the decorative detail in the public spaces to convey the gravity of the court's work. for some of the court was simply to grand harlan fiske stone likened it to the temple of karnak and suggested the justices should ride into it on

the backs of elephants. [laughter] a number of justice is remained in their home offices and came to the courtroom for arguments and conferences. as a result when hugo black joined the court in 1937 he was able to select a choice corner office suite even though he was the most junior justice. william howard taft's vision executed by gilbert was not to create a building for the comfort of its occupants. rather he sought to establish a home for the court that would convey to the nation and the world the important and distinct role of the supreme court under our system of separated powers. while the white house serves as the residence for the president and the capitol is primarily assembly house for the which the youth of the the supreme court is fundamentally a tribunal where issues of in the wording importance are decided through the in partially application of the law. the court, in its architecture

as well as its administration, expresses somber studious and thoughtful deliberation. that process is a separate and apart from the more free-wheeling and sometimes quite raucous political one activity that takes place across the street in the capitol. you can sense a palpable difference when you cross first street from the capitol to the supreme court. ..

carved by adolf weinman and spanish marble portraying the progress of the law. defreeze is depicted progression of bloggers judging from the ancient such as moses and confucius through more recent historic figures including blackstone and john marshall. those freezes remind us that an exercise in judgment we are not simply deciding disputes between

litigants. we must take the long view and articulate legal rules that will sustain future generations. as judges with a special privilege of life tenure, we must be faithful to the constitutions enduring principles and not to what is currently popular or politically expedient. to reinforce that reminder, gilbert installed on the west wall, directly facing us, a frieze depicting an allegorical battle between good and evil with justice flanked by wisdom and truth standing between the combatants. that frieze reminds us that we cannot take the benefits that we enjoy as americans for granted. rather, we are securing our freedoms only because we are vigilant in maintaining the framers vision of the nation founded on the rule of law. we are now in the process of completing a renovation of the supreme court building which will preserve its timeless design while updating its

timeworn electrical and mechanical systems. we expect to complete the renovation by the time the court convenes in october of 2010 for that term. now i am happy to report that we are following past precedent and expect to complete the project under budget. we are justly proud of the magnificent building that we are privileged to occupy. it helps remind the nation and the world of the importance of the rule of law and upholding justice. in that sense, i think it is very significant that our mother country, the united kingdom, recently chose to follow the example of its rebellious american colonies in reorganizing its judicial system. it has reconstituted its highest judicial authority, which had been the judicial committee of the house of lords, part of parliament, as a separate judicial entity known as the supreme court of the united kingdom.

our notions of separation of powers have taken firmer root across the seat. perhaps not surprisingly, the united kingdom also took the step of relocating its new court, moving it out of the parliament to a building of its own. we should be proud that the united states success in implementing the rule of law to an independent judiciary helped inspire that change. to mark the occasion, i presented to the lord chief justice of the united kingdom a symbolic gift, a piece about them a marble taken from the interior of our building. let me read the inscriptions on the gift we gave him. i need a little help to read. on one side, the topside comets is presented on the occasion of the opening of the supreme court of the united kingdom are the supreme court of the united

states. united states. october 16, 2009. on the other side, it says marble. this marble was quarried in alabama and installed within the supreme court of the united states as part of the original interior construction of the building which opened in 1935. the marble was presented as a symbol of the shared heritage and enduring bonds of neutral friendship between the supreme court of the the mac and the supreme court of the united kingdom. that little bit of alabama speaks eloquently to the spread of american ideals around the world. thank you very much for your kind attention and your gracious hospitality. thank you. [applause] [applause]

>> chief justice roberts that was a wonderful lecture. we learned a lot and appreciate your presence. the chief justice has agreed to take questions. ess me to call on those of you who have a question. he especially would like questions from students. he took some questions from 11 a clock today so particularly from the upperclassman he is ready to hear your questions. >> we have been ordered to use these. spew whatever it is, make sure it is not a question on architecture. everything i know, you know. >> i wanted to ask you about what led you to study law? >> to study law? to be honest it was not an abiding interest from the beginning. i did not know i wanted to study law until i was in law school. [laughter] in college, i was a history major, and i wanted to teach

history. there were no jobs for people to teach history when i came out of college, so i thought maybe i would go to law school and perhaps teach legal history while also being a lawyer but when i found myself in the first year of law school i found i enyed it so much that i dropped the history as a career choice, and focused on law. >> justice roberts, i kind of have a follow-up. i also have a degree, an undergraduate degree in history and i'm wondering how if you founder your legal career did that prepare you for the practice of law? >> i think it is great. there are a lot of different disciplines, undergraduate disciplines that i think are excellent preparation for law. history works good for me because first of all that is what we do. the first thing that happens when we get a case as we look at the precedence, the history. what if we done before? i also think on a more

fundamental level it is critically important to understand what the people who drop our original documents, the framers of the constitution, what they were thinking of, what their experience was when they did that. the same with respect to the civil war generation in drafting the civil war amendments, what was driving them. it is not always determinative. they wrote certain texan that was what guides us but in understanding what that means you do have to understand the history behind it. spew what are your views on how friend versus davis, circa 1937? >> you must have ambitions for the senate. that is the kind of questions they ask. [laughter] during confirmation hearings. i will give you the same answer i gave them is that i can't comment on particular cases that will have pertinent to my ongoing work.

>> when justice thomas was here he had him pretty strong opinions about the confirmation process which i tend to agree with, contentious confirmation process doesn't necessarily make for a better court. i have seen some of your confirmation hearings on the internet at some point and i just wanted to hear what your thoughts were. >> the first year students who i talked to this morning heard me expound on that a little bit. i agree with justice thomas' views. i think the process is broken down. the senators ask questions and they know we can't answer. we tell them we can't answer and they ask more questions we can't answer. i think frankly they'd be the process as a vehicle for them to make statements about what is important to them and perhaps important to their constituents, but not about matters that we can opine. they want to know how we are going to rule in certain cases. we obviously can't tell them that. then they say well maybe i will get him to reveal something if i

ask what he thinks about these cases. we can't tell you how we view the ongoing significance of those cases. we can figure out that they are trying to get us to say something about how we are going to decide case and they know that is inappropriate. i am very happy that recent nominees from both presidents of both political parties have adhered to the view that it is improper for nominees to tell senators how they are going to vote in particular cases. i think that is important. i think, the senators are the only ones that can change how they conduct a process and if their process and if they are interested in finding out information that is pertinent, they should change the way they do it. there are a lot of good questions they can ask that would reveal something about a nominee. what is your theory of the constitution? how are you approaching, how are you going to approach judging? when you write your opinions who are you going to write them for? are you going to write them for

the public? the decision in brown versus board of education was about 20 pages long. earl warren one of the public to be able to read it. he did didn't want to be filtered through the newspapers of the day or excerpts. you are going to write it for your colleagues, exchange with the dissent about what this means at several levels of footnoted bait, that would be a good question. as i said earlier, as the nominee with the latest book she read his. that will tell you something. what is her interest? what did she think? you don't have to give me a list of the books you are bred but something to give me a better sense about how a nominee would approach the important job. asking them how they are going to rule on the hot button issue of the day make snow sense. it is also counterproductive. you go back amok at the hearings for example of the judges who participated in roe versus wade, you don't see many questions about abortion. whatever the hot button issue is

going to be in 10 or 15 years from now, the senators don't know in the justice don't know so it is kind of a backward looking process. i think the process is not very fruitful. i think the only people who can change it are the senators who run it and i hope they do. speak thank you for coming to alabama and since you have argued many cases before the supreme court, could you comment on the process of bringing circe you or he to a case? >> we get about 9000 petitions for cert a year. we don't decide those cases. we are not a court-- we are not saying that decision was right. in fact it is often because it is very wrong and we don't think it is so wrong it is going to have an impact on the development of the law. our job is to resolve conflicts among the circuits of federal

law develops uniformly. that is one reason by the way our docket is actually not that very interesting once you get past the handful of cases that are going to be of general popular interest. if you have the court in new york deciding a bankruptcy court one way in the and the court in california deciding the same issue another way, we will grant cert and resolve that no matter how uninteresting it might be. resolving conflict and ensuring the uniformity of federal law and addressing important constitutional issues obviously if the a federal court strikes federal court strikes down an act of congress we are going to review that even if there is not a conflict on the question. so those are the main criteria. it is vitally important. there are supreme court around the world that have similar caseloads and they are required to act as a court whatever the court of opposite of there is, a court of air and decide those cases, and the chief justices of

those courts tell me it is a deliberate means of the other branches to keep them from being a significant part in the political and legal process. if you have to decide 9000 cases a year you don't have any time to sit back and say this is an important issue about our government functions for the civil liberties of our people, so the legal reforms that gave us the right to choose which cases we hear role as a coordinate branch of government. >> chief justice roberts, earlier in the season the supreme court had a 5-for decision to remove corporate and emits on presidential elections. some critics have said that provides opportunity to corrupt democracy. i was wondering what your rebuttal to that would be. >> i did vote on that, and i have to let my opinion in that case speak for itself. >> i was wondering if he you

could speak a little about how your private practice experience helped your-- helped you perform better as a justice? >> i think it has a little bit in the sense that i know what many of my friends-- i was about to say former friends, but friends. i don't always get to see them when we are arguing. i get a sense of what they are trying to do and how they are trying to make their points, what they are holding back that might be worth exploring with them. i like to think i have learned a little bit about the process in general, about how i could be helpful to the court that in turn allows me to get as much from the lawyers as i can. you do a lot of writing in the briefs you are trying to right. it is somewhat unlike writing a decision that you are dealing with the same precedence, dealing with the same statutory language. i like to think that was good practice and i obviously have the chance to engage in a

dialogue with the justices on the best days, and so that gave me some experience in trying to do that, which is what i spent some of my time doing now so i think it was good preparation. my colleagues come from a different background, some with a great deal of experience as a court of appeals judge. that gives them a different type of experience. with experience as an attack-- academic which allows them to take a different respect of on some of the issues. justice thomas with his experience running a government agency also benefits him a great deal. i thought for the longest time when of the great gaps we had in the court was somebody with experience as a trial court judge. justice sotomayor fills that gap so i think it is very good. people talk about diversity and there are some areas where we are lacking but in terms of background if we are going on the court we actually have a great deal of diversity.

>> justice roberts, during the state of the union address the president made some adverse comments toward your decision regarding mccain-feingold. i want to ask you about the opinion of the case, but i will ask, is the state of the union union address the proper venue to chide the supreme court for its decisions that it makes? >> first of all, i think anybody can criticize the supreme court without any qualms. we do it enough in our 2 cents, right? [laughter] i think people should feel perfectly free to criticize what we do. some people i think have an obligation to criticize what we do, given their office, if they think we have done something wrong so i have no problems with that. on the other hand as you said there is the issue of setting the circumstances and the decorum. the image of having the members of one branch of government standing up literally

surrounding the supreme court, cheering and hollering while the court, according to the requirements of protocol, has to sit there expressionless, i think is very troubling. and it does cause me to think whether or not it makes sense for us to be there. to the extent the state of the union has degenerated into a political pep rally thomas i am not sure why we are there. >> thank you very much for coming to see us mr. chief justice. earlier you mentioned how the decision was written relatively briefly so the average person could read it. i was wondering what other virtues you think a well written decision as a work of writing has? >> well, that is sort of a good question i think a senator could ask, and my answer-- [laughter] my answer would be first of all i think it should be accessible

to intelligent laypeople. who don't have to be lawyers. if they want to find out, this is an important decision, what do the supreme court say they should be up to pick it up and understand it. they are not going to care for it is the case that talked about earlier where there is a contract on the interpretation of the bankruptcy code but in a case like brown and the other big important public interest cases we have i think you should be accessible to them at least at some level. maybe they don't have to follow the nuances but understand the reasoning. it should give an adequate explanation. we are doing something. that is what we have to do. congress does not have to explain why they are doing something. the president doesn't have to explain why he is taking certain actions. you can throw them out of office the next time they are up if you don't like what they are doing. you can do that to us if you don't like what we are doing so we have to explain to you why we are doing it. it shouldn't be 80 page opinion densely written with 180

footnotes that is just impossible for people to understand other than lawyers and not even most lawyers in a particularly specialized area. it should be something the public understands, concisely, explain what you are doing and let them make a judgment about whether or not you are living up to your oath and decide these questions according to the rule of law rather than personal policy preferences. that is what i think an and opinion is. >> justice roberts, what is your best personal advice for someone holding a judicial position? >> in a judicial position, being a judge? well, that is kind of hard. you have to do the work. there is a lot of breeding involves. there is a lot of thinking about. i guess that would be my advice. you have to read a lot and write a lot but you have to think a lot. actually that would be might buy to law students as well. i think you are too quick to say

here is a problem and now i have to find out the cases. now i have to read all the legislative history. i have got to make notes about this. what you have to do is stop and think a lot. you have to think, here is the problem, here is some legal material. and just sit and think about it for a while. judges have to do the same thing. and don't be too quick to start drafting an opinion if you are a judge. think about things a little bit more. people tend to bring to bear, typically law students who are very bright in work hard, you tend to think i have got to work hard. i've got to find something to do to solve this problem. you have to sit back and think about it. i think both judges and lawyers don't do that enough. >> when justice thomas was here,

he suggested oftentimes when he enters into oral arguments his mind to a large degree is already made up that i was wondering for you, after you have done here screening in the case and convening one way or the other, what impact do such things as oral arguments are conversations with your colleagues have on playing your indecision and if that is a diminished role, what is the significance of oral arguments? >> my take on it i guess would be a little different than justice thomas'. that process, the oral argument process is very important for me. maybe it is because i participated a lot as a lawyer and i would hate to think it didn't matter. [laughter] but, it is a continuing process of narrowing your view of the case. you start out and you get a case and here's the question. russian person that. you have to put that right away on the first page, question presented and you have to explain what it is. then you read the opening brief.

it sounds pretty good. good arguments. your view of the case scenario somewhat. then you read the other sites brief and all of a sudden the opening arguments don't sound so good. there is another side to the story. then your view of the case, the notion of how you should vote is kind of crystallizing gradually. then you go back and read the cases that they are citing, read the statutes that they are citing, the language and again you get a little more firm in one direction or the other. you read the cases. your perspective is narrow. i sit down with my law clerks and talk to them about the case, play devils advocate and get the different views. the process crystallizes. then you come up with the argument. people i i say that the argument ever change your vote? if you took a vote before the argument would it be different? the answer is i don't know because we don't take votes before or after. the argument may force her decision along the same path you

have anticipated or might cause you to change your view just like reading the respondent's brief cause you to change your view a little bit. it is also interesting, it is the first time i learned what my colleagues think about a case. we generally follow the protocol not talking about a case beforehand. we come to the argument with our own views. if i hear one of my colleagues thinks a particular issue is important that i have kind of dismissed, it may change the way i look at the case altogether. we may have different rationales that could support the decision and maybe i am focused on one but it seems like the other is gaining more credibility and i might want to focus on that. the lawyers if they do good job i turned this one way or another so i think the oral argument plays a very important role, just like the various other steps leading up to it do and beyond. obviously the conference with my colleagues place an important role. people don't ask, how often has your boat changed in conference? sometimes, but it is not carved

in stone until we reach that point and even that is not done. the opinion process helps explain what we are doing and sometimes some talk about what the opinion should do. you have to explain it and sometimes you find that he can you can explain it. it just doesn't work. it is easier to write it coming out the other way -- until you something. we change sometimes even at that late stage. >> when you are looking and choosing new clerks, what are the things you are looking for? >> they have to have a good academic record. i have to become triple that they can read a lot, get a lot out of it quickly, they can write well. i like them to be able to talk well. i don't have my clerks do bench memos but i sit down with them and discuss things. some people are a lot better writing stuff than they are talking about it. i want somebody who is going to be good at talking about it and that is how i like to prepare,

bounce ideas off of someone. and they have got to seem like nice people. you spend a lot of time with them over the course of a year. they not only have to get along with me, but they have to get along with their other clerks as well. i like people with a fair amount of self-confidence who are going to feel comfortable expressing their views and defending those views without wilting. once when i chose my clerks, i had a great idea for assessing their degree of self-confidence. this was at a time, when at least court of appeals clerk said to be, if you are choosing them on one day so we had 13 or 14 interview scheduled for that one day. i brought in a dozen krispy kreme donuts. that is not a commercial endorsement. it could've been any kind of donuts. but they were powdered sugar and place. and put them out there and my

secretary is going to say help yourself. i figured anybody who had enough self-confidence to pick up a donut that is glazed or with powdered sugar would be the sort of person i was looking, was interested in. [laughter] i even remember saying, anybody who has a donut i will hire. [laughter] not making this up. there were a dozen donuts left at the end of the day. so i had to go back and look at their resumes. [laughter] so basically, ability, ability to get along with people and a high degree of confidence. >> assuming i get to do some leisure reading in the future what is a book that you have read that you recommend? i have heard the twilight books are good. [laughter] >> legal books, edward white as a biography of john marshall.

it has been around for a while. it is called john marshall, the finder finer finder of finish in. i really recommend it. i read it after it became chief justice. very well written, sort of gives you a nice introduction of the major cases of the founding and also teaches you a lot about tom marshall that people don't know. a remarkable figure that is largely responsible for shaping the supreme court in its current role and through that, the initial decisions shaping the country, the finder of the nation as he put it. a lot of us don't know enough about john marshall. i didn't know he was a war hero. george washington's favorite lieutenant with washington at valley forge. he said valley forge is where he began to think of himself as a citizen of the united states rather than a united states rather than a citizen of virginia. a remarkable man. i think that is a good book to

pick up if you haven't and it is very readable. you will enjoy it. i don't get a share of the royalties by the way. [laughter] >> mr. chief justice were you more nervous the first time you gave an oral argument or the first time you heard oral arguments? >> the first time i gave them. it is lot easier to ask questions and answer them. and, i was certainly nervous the first day i presided. it was an emotional day among other things, the day began with justice stevens reading the court message on the death of my old boss, chief justice rehnquist, and then i took over and presided, so that was an emotional day. but, when you where are there arguing the case, that is intimidating bench. you do have to have the same degree of self-confidence i was talking about, and the issues are always tough.

it is an exhilarating arguing a case in you have the added stimulation of the competition or go on the bench we never win or lose, even when we are debating among ourselves, the majority are going to been being the dissent you never think of yourself as winning or losing. you are arguing and you win or you lose. of course it doesn't append on all that you do but it can depend on a lot of what you do, so it is an exciting process and i would say more nerve-racking. ..

so you have a lot more flexibility in doing things with your family. i will tell you one thing. my old boss, chief justice rehnquist, once said which is very rehnquistian, he said if you want to do things with your young children you have to do it when you're young. [laughter] which means don't fall into the trap of thinking okay i'm going to work this week but i will be able to do something with them next week because that becomes next month and it becomes next year. then you wake up and, you know, they are 16. it's like anything else. i mean, you have to -- the work

presumably you find intellectually stimulating. you do have to balance it with other things and it's not easy. but you do have to remember if you are a good lawyer and everybody here is going to be a good lawyer, you can make that compromise. don't listen to the partner who tells you look, you've got to do this or it's not going to get done. you tell them i've got other things to do that more important. you have professional responsibilities to your calling it but if you get yourself into a position that doesn't leave you the time to fulfill your responsibilities as a husband or a father, then you've got to reassess your priorities. >> sir, first of 51 to express alabamas collective quietness at the rumors of your resignation were greatly exaggerated. [laughter] >> before we get started on that, i do have to announce something to you. apparently the professor who said that has been so overwhelmed he's decided to

leave teaching. [laughter] i feel sorry about it but what can you do. [laughter] >> well, i have a question about essentially the other branches of government role in interpreting the constitution, which it seems like they've pretty much just given up and the best example of this comes from the last president bush's decision to sign the bcra into law while singing this is unconstitutional but the courts will she get out. i wanted your opinion on what the results of that is if you think that's a bad thing and if so when you would like to see happen. >> i think it's a bad thing. congress as well has a date will this be constitutional or not. but they take the same old we'd take to uphold the constitution of the united states. they have the same obligation. it is wrong for them to think that's not part of their job and they will figure it out.

congress that passes the law if they think it is unconstitutional they shouldn't sign it. if the president thinks it is unconstitutional he shouldn't sign it. they have the same obligation we have and it is a high obligation and they should take it seriously. >> mr. chief justice, would you comment on the role you believe international law should play in the constitution or whatever? >> sure. without any reference to any particular case. that's a discussion that i fink each side is almost deliberately missing the the point of the other side. nobody doubts for a minute we can gain a great deal from looking at international law, the decisions of other courts. if another court has dealt with an issue of a relationship of a particular type of national security question with individual liberties of course we should look at it and benefit from i don't think there's any dispute about that.

the question comes up when the issue is whether international decisions should directly inform our interpretation of our constitution. in other words, most frequently in the eighth amendment we are looking at contemporary norms if you look at that kind of thing and look to decisions of other courts around the world to inform that. there i think it's a little more difficult in an number of respects. one, which decisions do you look at. you might like with the german high court says, you might not like what the indonesian high court said. if you decide which ones you like what are you doing other than as someone said you're looking over a crowd and picking out your friends it doesn't help narrow your discretion in any way. i do think there is serious legitimacy issues if you are going to follow the french high court. you're letting somebody none of us have an opportunity to vote for and any way even as a confirmation or appointment process inform the substance of american law and i think that's

also somewhat problematic. it's an issue is the justices debate among themselves but it's important to keep those aspects in mind. sometimes people say they don't believe those justices don't believe an international think we are not willing to do the former. of course we are. we will benefit from looking at that and we do. the other question i think is a more difficult one. >> mr. chief justice when justice thomas was here he inform the same conference chief justice rehnquist had a signature clear that he would employ to move the discussion along. i think he said most often it was on justice breyer. [laughter] he told us that you haven't developed that signature blair so i was wondering what tactics you might use to respect your colleagues time on the bench but at the same time also move along the discussion. [laughter]

>> as a clerk i think i know what blair he's talking about. i certainly saw that long enough when i was working for justice rehnquist. there is a discussion in conference as a very important part of our process. i think i let it go on longer than the predecessor did because because i'm still getting used to it. when you're there 25 years as he was he may be made a judgment he knows what so and so is going to make and let's move along. i'm not at that point yet. it is a difficult part of the job to kind of not control the discussion but make sure it moves along in a profitable way and i think i will get better at it as i go along and i will look to justice thomas for it fights on how to do it. [laughter] >> yes, what are your views on the ninth and tenth amendments. >> are you the same guy who

asked the other question about -- [laughter] >> yes. >> you know why can't ask a question like that. >> i have a question. you mentioned this past year you had 9,000 petitions and i know earlier we talked about the problems that the discovery is causing with the massive number of electronic documents and possibly arbitration. do you think that our methods of dispute resolution are the most effective or how could we adjust to account for this year increasing litigation and the problems they are in? >> i think the way the federal judiciary is developing they are very serious problems. it is an extraordinarily expensive process so that only the very wealthy are people with, a lot of resources can look to them to resolve the disputes were people that have no resources and are being represented in a way that takes that into account.

if you are a medium-sized business with an important dispute, the last place you want to look is the federal judiciary to be i think that's very bad because the federal judiciary needs to have a certain element represent the basic economic life of the nation. i think reforms are seriously needed in the discovery process. the discovery is an example for those who don't follow you have a dispute over a particular question, you file a request saying give us all of your e-mails about this literally millions if you are a big company about how did you design something. then you've got to go through those to make sure they are not privileged materials. it becomes the determining factor in a case whoever can position the discovery request the right wing is going to win because the other side has to throw up its arms. we need very serious reforms in how litigation is conducted. discovery, the we it was developed was an innovation at the time and movement away from forms of pleading and all that,

but it's kind of grown in a way i don't think people anticipated. we need to figure out a way to make that more accessible. >> mr. chief justice did you have any reservations on hearing of your nomination for chief justice about being the chief justice of this country? >> well, of course. it is a tremendously important office. i feel very privileged to occupy it. i will tell you it was quite a week. i was preparing i remember it was saturday night and the hearings were supposed to start the next tuesday and when i get nervous i don't get a lot of sleep so i was going to bed early and my wife came up and told me chief justice rehnquist had died and at that point i was nominated to replace justice o'connor and went to the white house next day and president

bush asked me if i would accept the nomination to be the chief justice and that happened the next morning so in a short period of time a mentor who was a respected and admired died. my nomination had been changed and all of a sudden as you say it was to be the chief justice, so of course. but i had felt my own inadequacy when i was nominated to replace justice o'connor as well. but now all of these additional responsibilities for in the office suggests, by that i felt it's not quite nervous but i was aware of the significance of th opportunity. i felt very privileged to have the opportunity and to serve a country that has been so good to me and my family in an area in the discipline of the law which i enjoyed very much. so, yes i see anybody who is given that sort of opportunity appreciates the significance of

it. when you go around we have the two conference rooms and the pictures on the wall of the prior 16 chief justices. there isn't room for another one so i don't know. [laughter] the first aid in one room and the second eight in the other and you go in and sort of look at them in a quiet evening and see john marshall in all that he's done and right next to him you see roger each of them serving about three decades. each of them when a huge success and the other a huge failure. you know, you go to the other room and see charles evans hughes, the chief justice during roosevelt's koret packing plant and the way that he handled that crisis was critical to maintain the independence of the judicial branch. you wonder if you are going to

be john marshall or roger and the answer is of course you are certainly not to be john marshall which you want to avoid the danger of being roger taney and to study them to figure out how they approach the shop differently so yes of course. and the consequences can be enormous. marshall established the judiciary as an independent branch of government in the framers vision protecting our liberties and ensuring the supreme court would be able to do that. tawny with a simple decision marshall verses marbury decision on todd scott almost ruined the court. its reputation and statute was tarnished for two generations before it recovered from that. so you do that and you know there's a lot at stake. on the other hand i tell you something justice rehnquist taught me early on and how he approaches things. yes it's an important responsibility. on which so much rides but it's also a job. you've got to do the best you

can with limited ability that you are given and then move on to the next case. i am comforted every day by the fact that it's not my decision but it's the court's decision and i have eight wonderful, talented, hard-working colleagues and i can't do a thing until four of them agree with me. so that spreads what would otherwise be an almost unbearable burden of responsibility. >> i was wondering if you felt the court was at all in ansel were institution given that mostly justices and clerks are graduates from a handful of the most elite institutions in the united states. >> i think they would all benefit from a broad representation. i know justice rehnquist always tried to broaden the scope of schools for which she took clerks. i've tried to do the same.

i think would be better. as far as the justices go i don't know. i think presidents should pick people they think are the most talented and accomplished and best suited men or women and i don't know the should be terribly concerned about where they went to law school. >> mr. chief justice, in reference to the war crimes, depue lipitor cui for around the world in the last few years that perhaps in their opinion if a federal court hadn't enough to look into certain allegations that american citizens should be subject to international court jurisdiction? >> that is the kind of question i can't answer. you will enjoy life in the senate. 64. i don't qualify nor do i look like a student. but i do all of the students here i was a student in this

very room in this wonderful schools of think you for recognizing me to get mr. chief justice, as chief justice of the supreme court i want to thank you on behalf of the two injured 49 state judges we have an alabama for coming to alabama and i want to say to the students that i want you to truly appreciate jew to the generosity of all britain's you of this rare opportunity that i promise you as one of the great trial judges here would love to exchange places with you today to have this privilege to be here to hear you and so think you for being here. i do want to ask a question. as someone on the board of directors for the conference of the chief justice's and being involved in the chief justice association the chief justice's heading increasing concern about the amounts of money that are being required to collect judges in the state trial courts. this is a significant issue for

the justices and chief justice across the state and as one of the former justices of the supreme court sandra day o'connor, since her stepping down from the supreme court certainly she has spent a significant amount of time on the issue of how to ever-increasing amount of money and judicial elections are impacting could possibly be impacting the impartiality and the independence of the state trial courts both trial courts and appellate courts. do you share justice o'connor's concerns? >> i do share her concern. the question becomes what to do about it. the subject is more open to the date. these days if you're going to have elections there's plenty the issue would roll money is going to play and is going to be a difficult and important one.

i obviously can't talk too much about what to do about it in the judicial forum since it does implicate broader issues of funding in the elections in general. but also issues of whether you should have an elected judiciary in the first place. and those are broad public policy questions that i have to use on but i'm not sure it makes sense to share them. even though i did this morning. [laughter] >> mr. chief justice, there is an excellent article in the most recent journal former chief justice rehnquist and this speaks of his frugality and i wonder if you could share some stories about the character trait. [laughter] >> yes. i certainly can. there's a famous story. it wasn't my year but back then

he had three clerks only. he could have had for but he had three because he liked to play tennis and that made good for doubles. [laughter] even though it meant a lot more work he didn't care and one of the clerks would drive from the court to the tennis courts, a very short ride less than half a mile or something. one time the chief leaned over and took a dollar out of his wallet and said i am giving david a dollar to help pay for gas. i think you should all do the same. of [laughter] she was quite concerned about the gas money that was being spent in a very short ride. >> last question. >> mr. chief justice do you enjoy what you're doing? >> every day. i really do and i was talking to the faculty earlier. i'd given some thought about why

that's the case and the thing that's great about the jobless you've got a limited number of things you've got to do. you've got to do a lot of reading and writing, a lot of thinking about cases and you have the flexibility if you're sitting there reading researching and are now getting a lot of the reading you can put it aside and say no, i'm going to write one of the opinions and if you're sitting their writing in the the words are not coming you can put that aside and say i'm going to talk to my clerks about these upcoming cases and in my case if that's not working i can say i'm going to focus on some of the administrative obligations. you shouldn't have a that isn't productive that you aren't enjoying something that you like to do, and i feel extraordinarily privileged to have that opportunity and as i said i just enjoy every day and feel that i'm very lucky >> one announcement to make for those of you an overflow rooms

we regret that the chief justice if he will stay where you are we will come to each of the rooms so you can see him in person. mr. chief justice, it's been a wonderful afternoon. thank you for spending time with us. >> thank you. appreciate it. [applause]

now, and even with former military interrogator matthew alexander. he was part of the team that helped locate zarqawi the former leader of al qaeda in iraq. the new america's foundation and national interest magazine hosts this hour and a half event.

>> thank you for coming to the new american nation. i am peter, a senior fellow here. we've got a very interesting program for today. we are going to first start with justine, the address the national interest to will talk a little bit about why she commissioned this story and then matthew alexander will precede and basically tell you about the major findings of his story. matthew alexander is a pseudonym. he's a former senior military interrogator in iraq to raise instrumental in the capture of abu zarqawi and has written a book on that, how to pick a terrorist i believe, and his e-mail is how to break a

terrorist .com if you want to get in touch with him. this is the cover story in the national interest, a very good issue of the national interest not only was not to alexander's story but a great discussion of the various accounts of the great recession that we just had and also great and debate between afghanistan. with that, justine, do you want to start? >> thank you for having both of us. this is one of those times where i was lucky enough to hit on a terrific story and in author who was a pleasure to work with in a topic that just felt so right because this detainee issue is not going away unfortunately and we have someone with us who you have supervised over a thousand interrogations' and 300 yourself

and was also wise enough to go out looking for better ways to do interrogations' and that was held this story came to be. it is a story of how in the nation's, a country not necessarily known for their should we say moderate interrogation techniques learned a new way of doing things through funding from the u.s. government and when matthew came to me about this story there was no resisting it and it was clearly also the cover and i have heard from matthew people are saying they've really learned a lot about how we might be able to do interrogation better and gain more information and most importantly what turned them away from radicalization over the long term and i think with that you will do your subject matter for better justice banaa i will. thank you. >> i will stand up. thank you for that. but mr. love by saying thing to everybody for coming and peter,

for putting this together and steve cole, who isn't here the new american foundation for hosting me and to the organization which i am a fellow for right now the open society institute which has given me the time and resources to go out and do the research and to justine for printing my story. europe at ease the great greek playwright wrote a force of words can do whatever is done by conquering sorts. i believe firmly that we as americans are more than capable of outwitting our opponents, terrorists and interrogation both without using the enhanced interrogation techniques. i have to expand a little bit on my back from before i begin because there's an important piece of the puzzle which is a criminal investigator for the air force before i was an interrogator went to the army. i was school in law enforcement techniques and i grew up in those techniques in my

professional career as an agent for the air force and i had a mentor very good at teaching me how to use long course of techniques in law enforcement setting when i went to the rma i had a very unique back from having the law enforcement officer and it reveals in my group from the air force and one in to interrogate the army. and i am fifer not the most experienced interrogator. i have done about 300 traditions. i supervised over a thousand pairs people in the army of some 5,000 interrogations'. what i bring this kind of a different background, a different set of eyes on this puzzle of how can we improve interrogators and interrogation techniques. , with me for a moment to iraq, 2006. it is the summer, the height of the violence. this is a few months after the golden dome mosque bombing and iraq is engulfed in flames. the body count every day is in the hundreds. for anybody there, it certainly feels like a civil war is erupting around us.

i am in northern iraq and a member of the special forces read team. myself and interrogation partner, mike, our job is to interrogate a point capture whether it be house, car, on the street, and get information in a matter of minutes. where before this of the center getting in a prison i had a worse, days, weeks to get information. now have ten or 15 minutes. every single day we go out on a mission to read a house. a couple of weeks after arriving a couple of dozen missions under my belt, we get a lead on the house of al qaeda weapons dealer and the guy who provides all the weapons for al qaeda, northern iraq. weeks through on our gear and resell the gate in strikers and come to the house, soldiers disembarked, below the front door of comer racing to the house and clear the rooms and captured an iraqi sleeping in bed next to his wife in his pajamas. bickel the interrogators. we come up to the room.

i walk inside and find a bookish accounting looking iraqi man in his 40's standing against his dresser with his arms flexed cuffed behind his back in his pajamas and i approached him and go through the questions. how're you doing? i'm trying to read what is your job? i work at a bank. who lives in this house? me and my family. his wife and his young son and daughter are in a separate room being interviewed by my interrogation partner, mike. has anybody visited the house? no. the soldier behind me is going through the room at the same time looking through drawers under the bed through the hamper, dirty clothes, no weapons. he walks by me and says it's clean and carries on. the lieutenant comes from outside who is in charge of the mission approached me and says there's no weapons in the house. about that time i look around the room and see something on

the wall. it is a wooden cross. i look the other way and in the hallway i see an oil painting with the face of jesus. i look at akram and say are you christian? he says yes, i am cerium. i look to my interpreter, an iraqi from the south as a shia and he nods at me. iraqi snow these things intuitively. he didn't need to see the cross on the wall. i instantly realized we were in the wrong house. in iraq, believe it or not, there's no numbers on the houses. it happens quite often. and so i say to akram i'm sorry. it appears we are in the wrong house. [laughter] it's a little bit in their sing. and i know it's quite scary to have your house read it at night, to be separated from your wife and your children. and he says is my family okay? i suggest, you can be assured we are not going to harm them. we are not wait to harm you.

i will pay you for the door we blew off and damage to your house. the biggest thing i can offer you is an apology. i said but the problem is i'm looking for someone. she said i know. but you have to understand i have a family. and i have to protect them. i don't want to be involved. i said i understand that. but how long can you afford not to be involved? everyday al qaeda is clearing neighborhoods of syrians, christians and she us -- shias three how long until you were the target of attack? i'm asking you to work with me, and american, to try to make iraq saved. he nodded at me and looks at the ground and exhales and he says well, it's too late. ebal become in my house so everybody's already going to assume i am working with you. and he thinks about it for a second and he says to me three doors down the street on the left. we race out of the house down

the street. within two minutes a soldier kicks down the door of the house down the street, runs into the room and captures the weapons dealer asleep on his living-room floor. within minutes we pulled out every type of weapon and ammunition and armament that al qaeda is using in iraq and we just discovered a super wal-mart of al qaeda weaponry. what did i learn from this experience? what i learned is what you do in the wrong house is always more important than what you do in the right house. you go into the right house and capture terrorists. you take down a guy in the street, shot down one week maybe two weeks. but the end of the date of violence will return. you going to the wrong house and do the wrong thing you make the enemy of a family perhaps an entire tried median entire province. fast forward now to indonesia,

september, 2009. attachment 88 which is the counterterrorism unit set up after line 11 by the u.s. trained and funded has been searching for several years for a man named mohammed. he is the body behind the bombings, he is a leader of the al qaeda affiliated terrorist organization in indonesia and southeast asia. he's also behind several hotel bombings in jakarta and he's been on the run for years. he's the number one most wanted terrorist in southeast asia. the police get a tip. an associate lives in central java instead of the russian house and reading a decent policemen and they do undercover surveillance for a week gathering evidence. after that they captured the man, bring him in for interrogation and who they've bring in to advise on the interrogation? none of the van and an produce to be the number three guy. after he was captured by the

police he became an advocate against violence and now works for the police and advises them on interrogation strategies. he wrote a best-seller about why violent extremism is wrong. they analyze this young man and determine the most important thing to him and his family. and supporting his family and that's why he joined ji. so they offer him money to support his family and his captivity. treat him with respect, never criticize him or his affiliation with j.i.. never use hearths to death this orrin techniques through the prism the collections over a week basic law enforcement approach of the army and will they call it we know all. he tells the policeman the location. they run to the house and after a six hour gunfight they kill

him. on highlight these stories so that i can talk about three things and those are who are interrogators, how to go about improving interrogators and the techniques and how can we maximize interrogation to achieve the strategic attractive -- objective which is capturing extremists. who are interrogator's? 80%, maybe more, of the interrogators on a daily basis who are interrogating al qaeda members or other terrorist suspects are in the army. the average age of the interrogators is about 22 or 23. they come in at a basic -- out of high school to basic training then they go perhaps a year of language school maybe not. then threw a five month interrogations' course. when they get to iraq or afghanistan or guantanamo bay for many of them it's the first time they've ever been outside the u.s.. the first time they ever talk to a muslim or an arab.

is that a bad thing? i would argue no. our young people today this next generation are the perfect raw material from which to craft an interrogator. why? let's look at the three major mistakes we made early on conducting interrogations' after 9/11. interrogator's didn't understand how our enemies organized which is more like the mafia or criminal gang, not like rank-and-file soldiers. we didn't understand the culture and how that affects interrogation methods. we were not prepared for the fact past conflicts direct questioning of logical reasoning approaches worked 90% of the time. and that the sell-off dramatically. yet the next generation of americans are suited to address these three issues. first of all this is the facebook generation. anybody here on facebook? i know most people won't admit it. [laughter]

al qaeda is organized like facebook. it's not -- you get recruited and signed up and signed a contract and you get progress up through the ranks. it's organized around social networking. i have a friend and have a cousin. i know a guy who can get money and weapons maybe it's the same guy. maybe he has a relative, maybe you run into an old friend on the street you haven't seen in ten years like with that person contacts you on fees' but you haven't seen since high school. our young interrogator's understand al qaeda organization entrance ackley because they grew up in the social networking culture. they are also more globally aware and culturally curious i believe that older americans. because of the internet and because of our global community are more likely to know about the tenants of islam were cultural differences holidays and festivals. and last, you're going to love this one, i suggest there are

better interrogations' because they grew up with reality tv. how many people here watch reality tv? that gets less hands every time than facebook. [laughter] what is it about this young generation in reality tv and their obsession with drama and emotions? i don't know what it is but i know that it's perfect training for interrogations' because in the interrogation room emotions range like wild fire. an interrogator has to understand the ability to use he motions and emotional approach is to appeal especially to the enemies in this war who were recruited based on emotional approach is. the younger generation gets that. secondly, how can we go about improving interrogations' or interrogators and interrogation techniques? three things. training, resources and research. we have improved training i can

tell you. there is now for instance briefings on islam, culture in the middle east, history of countries. but those courses are typically taught by american soldiers were contractors who were former soldiers, not by natives. if we want to expose people to the cultures they can have what i call cultural acumen, the ability to use culture and not just to know it, those classes should be taught by people who grew up in them. the other thing important is the educational culture world eradicate what is the root cause of why we turned to torture and abuse as a method of interrogation and that is we have to eradicate prejudice. and stereotypes about our enemies which are deterrents to conducting effective interrogations' to be the most popular people were reading when i got to iraq to understand our

enemy was the politically incorrect guide to islam. this would be the equivalent of reading the mind, to understand western christianity. i was the only interrogator i ever met one of them had read the kuran. this is the religion in the stereotypes propagated to can tell you within the training not by all but by some that islam is a religion of violence. i can open up the kuran. this is the translated version might have since college and read the first sentence this is in the name of all of the compassionate and merciful and that is the phrase that begins every chapter in the koran. perhaps this is a religion of compassion and mercy and perhaps we can use that in an interrogation if we understand the culture and quit believing stereotypes. this is what we should be teaching our interrogators. the other thing we can improve upon as teaching them law enforcement techniques. we could bring in detectives

from nypd or l.a.p.d. and teach them how to use things like prisoner's dilemma. i was surprised when i arrived in iraq interrogators' didn't understand it to catch to people you can put them in separate rooms and use their statements to play off each other. anybody ever seen the movie l.a. confidential? a great scene where he uses this technique. you can watch it every night on wall in order. contributors are not exposed to these techniques. they are capable of learning them and using them. the last thing i would say is we need to put resources into interrogations'. if you go to almost any -- i went to three different, four different locations in iraq where we interrogated every single one was the same, the interrogation booths were rooms made of plywood, cheap plastic chairs would barely support your weight and in most cases you could hear through the walls the interrogation going on next to you. we will spend a million dollars to give soldiers the right

weapons to go out and kill people but we can't find them because we won't spend the resources to get the information that would leave them to the targets. we should put in a place of certain incentives recruitment bonuses for instance that would retain and recruit the best possible people from which to mold interrogators. instead they recently lowered the standard of testing to enter the field of interrogation. and we should give senior interrogators the people who supervise interrogators the power and ability to apply incentives. the best i could give somebody an iraq was a pillow or a blanket. we should give them the funds to be about to prevent -- present incentives to convince people to cooperate. can we learn something from indonesian's in the last area which is research? what other countries doing with interrogation methods or analysis of detainees and terrorists that we are not doing? i present this figure which is

-- i think you're all right -- the model of dealing with islamic extremists win antar getting them from the indonesian's which is a medical model. study the target, but a dose level of difficulty and then use therapy. [phone ringing] maybe that is a doctor like getting a call. we preach something similar in our training which is to analyze the dtv but we don't go into detail how to analyze that person. the next -- is this one for the slide? this one? >> yeah. >> look at the indonesian model. jss the level of radicalism. this is something i was never exposed to in our training. both what is removed and what is the role in the network. it is an excellent model for crafting an approach strategy by analyzing the detainee not based on stereotypes but based on each individual and why they joined a violent group. and then look at this last model they use. it's very specific.

it addresses all the different reasons somebody may have joined and what role they have. i especially like this one down here, which in my experience was the most important personal problems. most people, i found in iraq -- i can tell you i never met the die-hard jihadists who had joined out of ideology. maybe one, a 12-year-old boy who had been brainwashed by his father. i met a lot of people who joined al qaeda because they needed protection from the shia militias and reprisal killings. people who killed because sunni access to the oil wealth in the future and a lot of reasons, but none of them or religious through co-pays and that's not to say there are not hardcourt jihadists members of al qaeda who did join for the ideology. but i also argue they are the easiest to interrogate because they are the most emotional. interrogators are an underutilized back in an accounting violent extremism.

we are used together tactical intelligence, stop the next terrorist attack. in comparison, indonesia turned interrogations' into a strategic weapon. not about stopping terrorist attacks although they will do that if they get that information but into stopping their recruitment of future terrorists by turning detainees and to adkins against violence and they've done this successfully with numerous need and high level islamic leaders pretty we should learn from their experience. but to do that we have to put the right resources, the right training and the right research into interrogations'. we have to quit seeing interrogations' as a skill and see interrogators as a profession. we have no professional organization of interrogators. there is no american bar association or american medical association for interrogators. why can't we get those resources when everybody argues that this is a very important weapon in

this conflict. mohammed was felt for winter additions and zarqawi was killed in interrogations'. numerous success to prove our worth but we can't get the resources. is it because we don't build anything? we don't have the lobbying muscle to produce jobs? i'm not sure but i think it's an issue that needs to be addressed. i am completely confident that if we gave interrogators the right resources and trained them properly they will win the battle of wits and they will return exponentially on the dividend this week paid to them, not just stopping terrorist attacks but choking off the terrorist life blood which is new recruits. thank you. [applause] >> great. we are going to open to questions. you've got to wait for the microphone because we have a

c-span camera and you also have to identify yourself and affiliation and interest questions of statements. but let me, as the chair take a prerogative to ask a question which is at the end of the model what is interesting clearly they've had great success and sort of turning people to become advocates of the radicalization, but in terms of supplying these to the west it seems to be pretty difficult because a western policeman or the equivalent of the indonesian detachment, they don't know about islam -- they may be educated about half don't have the same tactile understanding of the environment and i mean what are the lessons that can be applied in the west or is it more this is very interesting these guys are doing something that is quite successful but doesn't really have much applicability to the western

police effort? >> one of the things i discovered in iraq is that first of all, and this is well known by interrogators is that even radical muslims tickly consider christians people of the book, and even jews to the people of the book. and so there is a fundamental level of respect. as long as you respect the religion. i've been asked a lot in a similar notes can females be good interrogator's especially against highly radical or ideological duties and my answer is yes it's not about the fact she's a female is about how she respects the religion and culture of the detainee and we had several interrogators' very successful. that doesn't mean 100% it's going to work. i think there are some difficulties because we are western because of the way that we think about things. there is all types of research

that's been done on cultural differences. one very basic one is people talk about is that westerners tend to be very chronological. when we ask somebody about an event we typically want to hear about it in terms of time. but in the middle east, those events are usually described in terms of relationships. and those types of things -- that's why i say we can do this as well as indonesians' but we have to have cultural acumen and not cultural knowledge. it has to go beyond being able to recite facts. the indonesians to have some inherent advantages. the colonel now general who's the head of the attachment and random and traditions and explained to me these methods, he told me their interrogators will pray that the detainees before the interrogation. it's a great way to show respect and emphasize the common bond. i will tell you one of the

methods are used to bridge the gap actually comes from sports psychology. you know the practice of an athlete rehearsing in his mind taking a basket before he goes out to the court. i would use this technique called the van gogh technique which is van gogh in terms of the paynter. i would paint a picture in the words of the detainee of was cooperating know what the benefits of that would be. i would tell them close your eyes and imagine an iraq where my family visits to come see babylon in the future which is now the disneyland of iraq and his son and my son are walking down the street hand-in-hand without fear of violence. i can tell you images like that often move detainee's to tears because it was such an emotional pull to them to think about iraq that could be secure and we could get there by cooperating because they came in the interrogation both a lot of stereotypes about us especially see the picture of abu ghraib

and knowing what happened at guantanamo bay. >> how would you assess the weakness or strength now? >> i don't claim to be an expert, but i think the trend is showing they are having more difficulty recruiting. i'm a big proponent to say the end of this conflict which we don't talk about often what does the end of this conflict look-alike let's take models of other conflicts, take for instance the battle against the insurgency and philippines against communism. it took place from the 1950's to the late 1980's and was sold through the law enforcement techniques government incentives come economic incentives, amnesty program for fighters and we consider that success. the government philippines now control the problem because there's still 8,000 members of the communist organization in

the philippines. it's not a zero sum game so what i would say is for -- they are on a downward trend a that is what i consider to be winning the war to get down to a number that is managed by law enforcement. >> eric goldstein, human rights watch. can you address the factor of time discussing various techniques because the approach that you described which seems admirable and seems appropriate for the situations where you have a little bit of time to play with in order to get the information that you want, how often is it the case that you need information in ten minutes and how often is it the case that you need it in ten days or how often is it you want information over the course of the week or two and how does that affect the techniques that you described? >> one of my favorite questions,

the ticking time bomb scenario. what do american detective is to win the you're dealing with gangs and catch somebody knowing if they don't get information very quickly that person's dealer or supplier is going to move the way they are captured? we dealt with this every day in iraq especially when we were hunting down zarqawi and the leaders behind this was side bombings but the guy i describe in my book that we interrogator, abu mali had been captured literally 15 minutes after busing suicide bombers to go out and kill people. if we had gotten there 15 minutes earlier we could have saved hundreds of lives. we dealt with that every single day in iraq. we consistently captured guys who knew when future attacks were going to take place you could argue enhanced interrogation techniques work and are effective would we have used them? my answer is no. if i knew torture was effective 100% of the time i wouldn't have used it.

why? because every one of us in that prison where we handle foreign fighters listened day in and day out for insiders said the reason they can to fight was pictures of abu ghraib and knowing what happened at guantanamo bay. some people say well what about the fact that we have been attacked before that happened? it's not a matter of are there people that will attack? they're always are. the last presidency's we have endured terrorist attacks. it is a matter of levels. numerous additional fighters were recruited because of torture and abuse of muslim prisoners. so everyone in my prison really steven of torture did work 100% of time even if it worked half the time, we would never use it. one because we would be recruiting for the enemy and that is not some amazing discovery we came across. it's been in the army field band will since at least 1949, that if you use torture and abuse everyone is giving to use that

to recruit new fighters. that is not revelation but we also realize that is what we are fighting against this war is in just stopping terrorist attacks it is about preserving american principles. so, but let me say this also about the ticking time bomb scenario. if my mother was on the bus with the bomb that was going to go off and i had 15 minutes to get the information i wouldn't turn to torture. i would actually be the last technique because every technique works on somebody. we are talking about is the probability of the technique working. torture as we know from 100 -- if you have to use a technique 183 times, it's not working and is not efficient. i would refer what i did in the field when we had to get information through quickly i went to the law enforcement techniques. i went to the prisoner's dilemma. i went to those techniques police have been using for decades in the same scenario because they give the best probability of success.

>> what are the limits of what you can do with the army field mandible? what is the most you can do? >> the army field manual which i believe is actually very valid and a great document for interrogation techniques but it's never been scientifically studied, we are just now starting that. colonel steve klein and whose one of our most experienced interrogators is working with researchers to evaluate techniques as they are being used. but the field manual will allow you and there is a line that says you can't use psychological tricks rouses and pleased that allow you to use that line allows you to use law enforcement techniques. people say the army field manual out lost techniques. that isn't true at all. you can use law enforcement techniques under the army field and you will. and they are non-coercive and we've been using them. the problem is the only people who are using them are people who have law enforcement

experience back crounse. there are grey areas of interrogation and i will give you a perfect example. in fact this just came up recently. you can't threaten a detainee. we all know that. but can you make a statement of fact is a dtv -- if you catch a dtv making suicide bombs can you show them the iraqi penal code which states that the punishment for participating in suicide bombing operations is def? that is a statement of fact, that is all. you can do that in a u.s. criminal interrogation. i heard a proponent of waterboarding last night on live television say we can't tell somebody that the punishment for a crime is deaf and intelligence interrogation. that's wrong. i had detainee's ask me what is the punishment for my crime? that isn't a threat that is a statement of fact that's

different than a scenario where utility dtv if you don't cooperate i'm going to put your face on a poster that sissy cooperate with u.s. forces and on going to posted in your village and you can guess what is great to happen after that. that's a threat to him and his family the my al qaeda will conduct reprisal killings. so what is my standard for these gray areas? the golden rule. if i would consider reporter or abuse or what is actually the minimum standard which is cruel and inhumane and degrading treatment, what i use it if it was being used against my own troops and that's my bottom line. >> matthew, how much do you think this is still going on, enhance interrogation techniques? what do you think is the bottom line? >> we've learned from our mistakes but there is still resistance within the intelligence and interrogations' community over what the law says and what people should be

allowed to do. the army field manual still allows us to separate people indefinitely insult to become final, still allows us to put people through sleep deprivation. it doesn't even prohibit stress positions. so, i would say that we can say now that we don't torture people but i'm not confident we can say that we are meeting the minimum standard which is in a humane treatment. let me add one more thing to that is you have to replace the large majority of interrogators who never torture or abuse somebody even if they're left alone in a room with a teeny and there were no rules and nobody was watching and then there's a very small amount let's cut 5% of people who would do it with the rules, with supervision, because there's a criminal element to every population. you know that. it's that little group of people, that middle 30%, 20% of interrogators who would do it if there wasn't a role or correct

supervision and that is what we are trying to target. ..

how do we then recognize them as being muslim? i think it is beyond the pale of what a true muslim would be. and the wider question is, it takes you a little bit beyond your own realm, but how can religion in any way be an asset in conflict resolution instead of a divider? most of the time we spend talking about how judaism, islam and christianity are different instead of talking about the common ground that they have, as all people of the book, as children of abraham. >> on your first question, i think yes, we should differentiate. we are smart enough to differentiate between the different terms of violent extremism. we have white supremists and extremist in the united states united states who conduct terrorist attacks. as tom parker from amnesty

points out the ever person who came close to building a dirty bomb was white. and maybe then set it off had it not been for the fact that his wife shot him. i am not suggesting should we should recruit a bunch of whites and arun them. but i do think that language is important. extremely important. from somebody who has been in the field and supervise interrogators i can tell you that the words that are used at the top are interpreted literally at the bottom. and impressions can make a very significant change in people's behavior in the field. the last commander i worked for in iraq who took over the team right before he left walked in, gathered everybody in the room the first day in set i came here with two things and i'm leaving with both, my father's last name and by integrity. no one ever questioned the fact that we would treat everybody humanely.

it was never an issue. i do think language is important i am not opposed to your idea, that maybe we should just call terrorist what they are, which is violent extremists who happen to be misusing the title of islam, but at the same time i do understand the reality which is that the people 9/11 were muslim and that does define some of our enemies, the majority of the tears that are fighting this current conflict and to ignore that fact we would do ourselves a disservice because we do need to identify who are the people and why did they join these violent groups. as far as religion being an asset, one of the stories i tell in my book is about how one of the detainees who was actually religious imam that were created from a mosque, a very religious man and the way i built a bond that encouraged him to corporate

was by trading stories from the bible and the koran. he told me a story in the koran, his view of how the immaculate conception, which was different from the story i had learned growing up, and we traded the differences in the stories and sounded to be found it to be a point of common interest and bonding. so, i do think we can leverage that, but i would be a little careful of that in here is why. what about soldiers that are atheist or that or buddhist or humanist or fall outside of the three religions? i think we should be able to bond on our common humanity as well as our religion and maybe that should be the floor that we use to come together and not just religion. >> i am from executive

intelligence review. if polls are to be believed the majority or a good percentage of the american people today believe that torture works and that we should use it. and i have seen polls saying that something like 60% of people questioned thought that abdulmutalab in the detroit christmas day bombing so-called, should not have been waterboarded. this is really a dramatic departure from our traditions as a nation, even our military traditions. what do you attribute this to and how would you explain this? >> i feel like it is a little bit of a loaded question which i recognize as an interrogator. [laughter] is it that people who support enhanced irrigation techniques have effectively argued that those techniques kept us safe? i think it is the real question. and i would say they have made a very loud arguments. i would say that they haven't

made an effective arguments. anytime you hear anybody talking about supporting enhanced irrigation techniques, keeping america safe, there is never a reference to the long-term. it is always about stopping the next attack tomorrow. there has never been any addressing of a longer-term issue which is terrorist recruitment. which we can stop terrorist attacks in the next 300 years. we can play that game of cat and mouse forever. that is not going to end the conflict. what i think is, there is a misperception in the public about two things. first of all, the competency of our interrogators. imagine if you went to infantry troops and you said, i am sorry, i know you guys are trained to take hills, but we just think that al qaeda is better fighters than you guys aren't so we are going to allow you to use chemical weapons. now, i don't know if

professional soldier that wouldn't be offended by that type of offer. and i can tell you all interrogators, every professional interrogator i know is offended by the fact that we need to be offered enhanced interrogation techniques. they are not enhanced. we can do our job just fine without being, without an exception to be able to break the law and it is a lack of confidence in our ability that i think is driving this partially. and the other part is that it is not static art. you know, we don't have to successfully interrogate every single person that walks in the interrogation room. a soldier doesn't shoot every person with every bullet. interrogations, some of them will fail. we accept that. there is more than one way to get information. no single person holds the information. as we learned on the route to

her cowley there were several guys who we never got to talk. we went around them. we made our methods better and we improve them and we applied good old american ingenuity within the law to come up with better methods and achieve our objectives. >> just curious there are 19 approved methods in the army field manual and you have alluded to some law-enforcement techniques. could you give us a sample of specifically what techniques you would like to add to the manual and what, the example of the thread first a statement of fact, some clarifications that need to be made? >> what law-enforcement techniques? part of my fellowship is that of an author to interrogations manual and in which and which i list out techniques and i share

that shared that with army interrogators. i can tell you almost everybody in the investigations world recognizes those techniques but we have different names for them. for instance there is something called the reid technique, which is taught to many law-enforcement officers. it is a method of detecting deception and overcoming objections, a resistance to objections but basically what i call the ship to blame technique, which is to give the suspect in a criminal interrogation the ability to blame something other than himself for why he committed the acts while confessing. it is extremely effective and intelligence derogation you try to get a confession. you can shift the blame which provides a guilt-free way to provide intelligence information. that as an example. but we don't have shifted blame technique in the army field manual. there is a line in there that does talk about not pointing out

the faults are the crimes of the detainee, but that we don't describe that technique and how to leverage it. risner's dilemma is another one that i talked about. and there is others. how do we clarify what is a threat in an indirect threat? i am not sure we can ever specifically put that into writing other than to say the golden rule, which the manual already says. it already tells us to consider that, to consider the methods we are going to use if they were used against our own troops, how would we believe if it was a threat or an indirect threat. the jags, the lawyer lawyers that advice as in theater, when we go to them what they technique can we say is this legal or not legal, they would use this phrase which is you can't put the dagger on the table. i don't want to criticize that but i would say you can't put the dagger under the table

either. an indirect threat is the same as a threat. because it is coercive. you are trying to intimidate a detainee to give information through threatening their physical security. that doesn't mean you can't as they said therefore make statements of fact and explain the judicial process to people. i think you can do that. that is part of the process and they should know what it is. that i think ultimately we have to trust what is already in the manual which is the right way is the golden rule. >> i am rebecca would be committee on national legislation. could be use bk bit about what it would take to put safeguards in place and ensure a cultural shift to promote humane treatment of all detainees? would it be something like revising the appendix of the army field manual or codifying the golden rule or creating a commission of inquiry for past abuse or another alternative? thank you.

>> three things i would say we can do. how does any organization change its culture? the first thing i i'll argue is that we don't need to change our culture. what we need to do is uphold the culture we are to have in the military. it is our tradition to treat detainees humanely. george washington leading the continental army prohibited the use of detainees. abraham lincoln in no conflict that i know of have we ever authorized the abuse of detainees. and, like i said before for at least 50 years we put that into doctrine with the exact wording explaining that negative consequences of doing so so i don't think we need to shift our culture. i think we need to return to it and reinforce it. i do support a commission to think of think for a. because i don't think we have

had one and i am not at all confident that we even know about all the incidence. the best we can approximate i believe is an fbi inspector general report that came out in may of 2008 that found fbi agents witnessed what could be considered torture abuse, certainly not humane treatment, incidence over 300 incidents between iraq, guantánamo and afghanistan and if you extrapolate that fbi agents are only present in 3% of voluntary patients. it points to the fact that this was a very widespread problem, and we don't have a full accounting i don't believe. and i do think there's a difference between there is a difference between accounting and accountability. now, i have to explain my bias in this matter which is i am a criminal investigator. that is what i have done for the air force since the week after 9/11. and, i was never told to

selectively apply the law when iran cases. when there was evidence of a crime, we investigated it and we apply applied that to everybody. it didn't matter of rank and it didn't matter of location. one thing that is often neglected i would say, almost rarely ever talked about in this debate, is the uniform code of military justice which specifically prohibits any enhanced irrigation-- interrogation. consider the fact we have tried people and convicted them for assault for laying a fingertip fingertip on somebody. the very least, those techniques are prohibited per the army field manual so you would be disobeying a direct order which is one of the articles of ucmj. i think we should have an accounting in terms of having an angry to find out exactly what happened and i think everybody supports accountability. i think one of the most

interesting arguments are or ways to look at this is to go back to look at president clinton's impeachment and look at the quotes for who called for accountability and the rule of law then, and what they said about how important it was to society. the last thing i will say is that this is also a leadership issue for the military. i do believe we will be doomed to repeat mistakes if we don't hold people accountable but i also think we owe ourselves within the military an and accounting of leadership and what it means. there is very few instances of officers or senior enlisted people standing up and saying no to techniques that were clearly in violation of their training and in their ethics and their code in their regulations. very few instances. i think we need to go back and adopt-- i don't want to say new

training because it is in the training. maybe we need to emphasize that from a leadership perspective, how important is to say no it is to say no to unlawful orders. >> i am kyle from national interest security company. unlike the air force the army has a strong love between law enforcement and intelligence functions but most of what you are saying is you might need to break down some of that law or soften it perhaps. >> the air force and then maybe we combined counterintelligence and criminal investigations where is in the army army into separate. at their criminal investigators don't do intelligence. there is a lot of issues that have been discussed many times whether one server as its which do the others model, but maybe i think culturally because the army, because of its mission it makes more sense to have it separate.

but certainly they still abide by the same regulations whether they are together were different. the one place were the things merges espionage. when you have an espionage case it is both counterintelligence and intelligence case and a criminal and criminal mitigation and there is other pieces that are criminal desiccation's, where these things merge and then you get into issues about intelligence oversight of bread that overlaps with criminal investigations. but the services are well-prepared to deal with that. i wouldn't say i am in a position where i could recommend that one service takes the other's approach. i do think that we would benefit when we share information, and that happens in law enforcement between the military and the civilians. we run joint cases with the fbi and military together all the time or with nypd and one of the military investigative branches. that investigative sharing happens all the time that but doesn't happen between army and the civilian community.

>> my name is elizabeth and i am retired from television as a producer. we hear criticism in this country about her lack of language sophistication and ability. there was a story not long ago about the fact that the 63 arabic-speaking man had to leave the service because of their sexual orientation. is the lack of our language sophistication a severe detriment or is it overrated in the immunity presently? >> i'm going to the minority opinion on this one, but let a explain it. if you gave me a choice and i had a limited amount of resources, what i choose to train all my interrogators an and arabic or would i choose what i choose to train them and recruit better interpreters? i would choose interpreters. i had a team of a dozen interrogators, some of whom had been for a year of arabic training and dialects

of arabic. interrogation is a nuance subject. i have a friend who was trained in arabic and it took them quite a bit of time in the country before he could interrogate by himself in arabic, so some people have the capability to do it. but i would choose the interpreter because the interpreter is a cultural encyclopedia that is an additional resource. there are so many times i could give you examples of where interpreters saved my because they realized some cultural nuance and even i have been in the middle east before and i understand the culture but i didn't understand some very fine details that were very important where the interpreter was able to pick it out. in the example i gave him the story i told about the syrian, my interpreter probably knew that when we walked in the house and first started talking to him and just held his tongue. there was another point in time

where he was interrogating a gentleman, and my by my interpreter stopped me and looked at a clock on the wall and said that guy is shia or go he can't be part of al qaeda. i said how do you know that from the clock on the wall? he said, just the picture. the interpreters bring something to the equation that is an additional asset. given time and resources with a train all interrogators in the language? yeah. if you are fluent that is in a bandage because detainees due do respect the fact that you have learned the language. if i asked anybody in here, do you know who francisco briski is , world war ii ace? jimmy doolittle, billy mitchell? i could ask a famous names of pilots from world war ii and you would recognize them probably. but i could name off famous interrogators from world war ii and you would not know who they were. these people, one of them wrote

a guide for interrogations after he successfully interrogated japanese p.o.w.'s and he should -- said everybody should be a trained linguist. i don't think that is a requirement but certainly it is a help. >> i am from voice in america,, and the nation's service and i have done a lot of translation for the state department program my question is, the way they described the-- is like they have already adopted all these new techniques, but i am a bit skeptical about it. isn't this one of the tools are they also retain all their old methods? i think it has big invocations particularly since indonesia is

going into more depth into democracy, because with obama's visit coming up this next week and then also there is our ready talk about resumption of military aid to the special forces, though, can you explain to me is it really busy and it that used its more friendly methods and have set aside all torturers, or is it still 88% of the methods they are using and that has led them to the capture of--? i am not so sure. i am a bit skeptic about this. >> i feel like this is another loaded question. i will be a skeptic with you. just as i would be skeptical of my own interrogation force and whether we have adopted good methods.

because we have a checkered past now and i think it is good to be a skeptic but i don't think being a skeptic toward mending some people use bad methods, that there are bad actors within an organization, that we shouldn't go on and praise when they act in a good manner. the coast, as i was taught very early on as an officer in the military, you don't fix a broken wheel by complaining about it. you fix it by coming up with a solution. and so, in my book i made a conscious decision not to write about the times when i witnessed people bend or break the rules. because they knew that if i did that, everybody would read my book to read about torture and it would be talked about like an abu ghraib scandal. what i wanted people to focus on is how do we improve the methods , how do we do things right, what are the success stories?

that is why it wrote about it. i am aware that people have concerns that in other instances they have and how he sees those techniques. i don't know. i can tell you that i have any knowledge of them doing that are not doing that. what i can say is i want to highlight when they did something well and if we put the positive incentive on the effectiveness of doing things the right way, i am convinced it will help change. men like tito who came up with this method and who are explaining it and helping us to advance the methods really are the leaders and i think we have to concentrate on the positive attributions to the field of interrogation, to promote good behavior. yeah. >> you talk in the article about afghanistan and that afghanistan is going to be entirely different in terms of interrogations and the kinds of

enemies we are facing there. that is clearly the designated next battlefield, so why is it that you think it is so different? >> i have not been to afghanistan so i'm going off other peoples expertise, people's expertise, which is just that there is more diversity and the reasons why people join the taliban or al qaeda. and that diversity can vary by valley quite significantly so the incentives you apply have to be much more buried, whereas in iraq the sunni awakening and the anbar awakening was facilitated by reaching out to several very prominent sunni shakes. that might not be as easy and afghanistan are you would have to reach out to a significant larger number of players to make the same type of advances. and so that is why i think when we talk about applying incentives in in the indignation

model it is not a one-size-fits-all. but i can't tell you there is something universal about interrogations and that is people have motivations his people have motivations for why they join a group. and you have to understand those motivations and apply the proper incentives if you are going to get them to change behaviors and that is universal. >> my question actually touches exactly on that point. i think one of the main reasons you see ongoing support for enhanced interrogation is the belief, wrong or right, that there is a limit to the effectiveness of standard interrogation. in other words if you are interrogating a hard-core al qaeda operative, he is loyal and will be harder to sway through normal techniques, correct me if that is wrong or i have a wrong assumption or whatever but that leads to a two-part question. are there limits to standard interrogation, and if so, can

those limits be overcome by enhanced interrogation, or is that just, our enhanced interrogation techniques just as limited in their goals as standard interrogation techniques? >> the problem first of all semantically, they are not enhanced interrogation techniques. there is nothing that is better about them than regular interrogation techniques. coercive. it is not like you used all the traditional methods and than that we have better methods that we have to apply. it is like i said before, every technique is the has a probability of success. and that success at the pendant upon the interrogators skill in the applicable at the two that detainee. you can have the best interrogator and the best technique and it might not work. just like a soldier can have the best gun and be the best trained and missed a target. so i don't think we can say that

the traditional approaches get to a certain level and they don't work and then you would-- i'm sure there are numerous examples and i know this because it basically and up being a default that cop, good cop where they used course of techniques, they didn't work and this is how we found zarqawi. maybe we should call the relationship building approaches the enhanced interrogation techniques. >> can you tell the audience in capsule form what did work to find abu musab al-zarqawi? >> the way we found zarqawi is beef found a group of men and a farmhouse who were equipped suicide bombers and they brought them back to the prison and there was one guy in particular we focused on, who was basically anybody here seen silence of the lambs and hannibal movies? this guy was the hannibal lecter of al qaeda, in demeanor.

he spoke with the british accent. he sat back casually and he was very manipulative and very intelligent. he even studied calm as he told me, the art of logical reasoning and argument persuasion. and, the original interrogators tried controlled methods and by control methods i mean that their basic approach was priding ego down, stripped down his ego, make him feel like he is not able to resist their methods. they can dominate him and then force them to cooperate. they tried that for almost three weeks and it didn't work. in fact he maintained the whole time that he was told to bring a video camera to this farmhouse and he didn't know why he was showing up there. he thought it was a wedding. right before he was supposed to be transferred after they had given up on him i interrogated him and i had six hours until his trans

>> staples center. l.a. live, downtown los angeles, if sports entertainment capital of the world. this year, once again, the site for the pac-10 tournament. tonight, the quest begins. who will step up? meet the challenge and exceed their expectations? which team will rise together to show the spirit that is unbreakable. caption funding provided by fox sports net ♪

the pacificlight pac-10 tournament begins. washington state, oregon, the winner stays alive! from the great northwest down the pacific coast and into the desert, some of the best basketball talent in the country will be here at pacific light pac-10 tournament. it all gets under way with our first game between washington state and oregon, the ducks swept the season series against the cougars going 2-0. and welcome inside staples center, michael along with miles simon, the most outstanding player from the 1997 final four when he led the arizona wildcats to the national championship and

we can talk about the ncaa tournament and the road to the final four starting next weekend. but march madness starts now? >> absolutely. this is my favorite time of the year. i love being in the staples center. i wish i could have played here in my playing days at the university of arizona. >> it was a shame they didn't have the tournament back then. we look at teams and players and what are you most looking forward to? >> the great matchups like ucla, arizona and that four-five matchup tomorrow. that will a great game, the first game of the series. ucla getting reeves nellson back this week to battle down low against freshman of the action here for the pac-10 tournament. it starts tonight and then on thursday, we have two double headers starting at 12:00 pacific. that's four-five matchup miles talked about. ucla versus arizona. cal gets the winner of tonight's game. and then stanford taking on arizona state.

followed by oregon state. they were flipped from the first brackets. so stanford/arizona, the first game and oregon state and washington. let's talk about the game tonight. oregon taking over washington state. to get you ready we'll go down courtside to the gentlemen who will call the action. don mcclain and barry thompson. >> thanks a lot. i think it's fair to say every year we're talking about who might win a tournament and how wide opened it is. i confess, sometimes, anybody can win the tournament. >> what's great is the unexpected. it always seems to happen. we're coming off a regular season in the pac-10 season where the unexpected seemingly happened every night. what's going to happen in the tournament? i don't know. but it will be unbelievable. >> washington state started the season off ten up and two down. klay thompson was a leading scorer not only of the pac-10 but in the country. the team got a little bit sideways and so did klay thompson.

>> what happens, barry, when you average 25 a night in the preseason, once the conference seasons starts you get the other team's best defense night in and night out. he's had growing pains. he has a lot of ability. the coach he continues to be aggressive, he will hit shots. he's proven that during the season. he definitely went through a difficult time the last weekend. it was a very uplifting moment for him. >> i think it's fair to say every college basketball team that's successful has a guy who really wants the ball at crunch time. i saw you play in ucla. that's the way you were and that's the way porter is for oregon. >> how many times have we seen him change? he's dangerous in pick-and-roll and dangerous in transition. unlimited range and he gets it away quickly. he's been a tough guard.

porter was one of those guys, barry, if he gets it going he can tame the team deep into the tournament. >> the oregon coach has been under siege under the eugene area and in fact northwest. if confidence wins games and pac-10 tournaments then oregon has a chance to win. right now, we've got our own, rebecca harlow. >> at the end of the season, you promised your team would win this tourney. i'm seeing a lot of swagger from your guys. what gives you so much confidence? >> i think the guys have a lot of basketball left. when they're on their game they're good and i think they have something to prove to themselves and the rest of the conference. >> last time you played washington state i was impressed with the floor balance. how important is it to establish that? >> very important. it's important to not only have

floor balance but score the basketball. they can get on a roll on you. >> and defensively, you held this team to 36%. how do you get that same effort in? >> hopefully, they'll help us with 36% again. they didn't shoot the ball very well the first time. it wasn't all us. there are some things we need to do better this time around. >> thanks, coach. michael, miles, back to you. >> thanks a lot. you want to know how strong the pac-10 has been? the last three years in a row, six teams have made the ncaa tournament. >> absolutely. it's a tradition-rich pac-10 conference with arizona 25 straight ncaa tournament bids. ucla going to the final four. three of the last four years. and then we've had 21 draft picks in the last two years. >> not just great players but great coaches. we'll talk about mike montgomery when we return. can oregon continue their dominance over washington state? this pac-10 season? we're about to find out. you're watching the pacific light pac-10 tournament. ght,d soon t e tolantrsey

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team. and quincy pondexter. and when you talk about some of the best coaches in the pac-10, you have to mention mike montgomery. tremendous success at stanford going to the final four. a four-time pac-10 coach of the year and this season in his second year at cal, he won his

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welcome back to the stap ms center for the pacific life pac-10 tournament. since he emerged on the

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shood tee-p li my ble at oraset6 an y i33 poin i mt threters e thst pet t mesly shy my a i liko t g fo the ett each every practice and to win as many games as we can to get the post-season play. >> oregon has been very successful in the past and in this tournament, miles, one thing we know about porter is he's not shy on the basketball court and he loves the big spotlight. >> he may be the smallest guy on the court but he has the biggest heart. he's played in biggest game and he went to the elite eight. he definitely can lead his team to four straight victory this is week in the pac-10 tournament. >> if he has to play a great

game each and every night for oregon to win. >> he doesn't have to play a great game but it has to be a good floor game. get the ball to michael. >> coming up a little bit later, how many teams from the pac-10 will make the ncaa tournament? that's coming up next. you're watching the pacific wlooimpb pac-10 tournament. boston lager

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welcome back. the pacific life pac-10 tournament. getting you set for oregon and washington state. the third time they've met. the captains getting the instructions from the officials. we'll have opening tip coming up shortly. for tomorrow's doubleheader action, the nightcap is a reminder to the fans the games have been flip-flopped from the original schedule. stanford and arizona state is the first game followed by oregon state and washington in the 6-3 matchup. here's other tournaments under way. madison square garden, the big east. seton hall taking on notre dame. the second half, the fighting irish start to pull away and they're up by 12. they drive in for 2 of 14 and the irish go on with a 68-56 win over seton hall.

syracuse will probably be a number-one seed in the ncaa tournament but this bracket is up for grabs. big-12, oklahoma state taking on oklahoma. the first half is all about the cowboys. matt pilgrim on the alley-oop in the second half. they pull away with a double-digit lead. and the defense keeps on pace. keeping it with 24 and they win, 81-67. kansas the number one team in the country. can kansas state possibly earn a number-one seed in the ncaa tournament? our game coming up, oregon/washington state, the third straight year oregon faced the cougars in the pacific life pac-10 tournament. what do you think about the game? what do you think about the pac-10 getting to the ncaa tournament? >> it will be an exciting game. these teams have played tooth and nail. klay thompson is one of the best players in the conference. tajuan porter. we know what he can do. the oregon ducks have a lot to

play for with ernie kent saying he won't be back so it's an important game and definitely, we can try to get thee teams into the tournament this year. >> you think three from the pac-10 deserve to the to go tournament? >> i think if it holds true to form and washington and arizona state play each other on friday night in that semifinal, the winner of the game definitely gets in and the other one can sneak in because most of the mid major and low major conference tournaments have played true to form. >> washington with a preseason favorite to win the pac-10. they've got a lot to play for. also, cal and arizona state, they want a better seed in the ncaa tournament. they make their case here this week. our first game, oregon taking on washington state. the ducks have within 3 of 4. can they make it three in a row against the cougars? we're counting you down to tipoff here at the staples center. action coming up in a few moments. this is the pacific life pac-10 tournament. i beli re slive

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