is coming -- [laughter] and the tax cuts are the big thing and the budget's the big thing. there's just not room for it between now -- >> not to mention if they can move on don't ask, don't tell which gateses and the president wants him to do. it's only going to get harder if they put that off until later. >> [inaudible] ..

>> but i think he's taking a rather serious look at it. >> david, don't you agree, i don't think any entity besides to do it, he won't do it unless he thinks he can win. >> absolutely. absolutely. it's not a vanity. >> i'm going to go back and forth with the audience, along -- would like to ask each of you if you can think of it, and what it would be, you've got the ultimate booking, i guess probably the ultimate booking would be god or something like that -- [laughter] >> unavailable. >> unavailable. but i presume y'all have requests in and i presume at some point, one of you are all of you will have to -- president obama on the show. what's the question you most want to ask. >> perhaps just off the top of my head, i would ask, you know,

where does he want to go and how does he think he's going to recoup? it's the obvious question that everyone wants to know. is he going to triangulate, whatever it is that bill clinton did -- >> it illegal, triangulate? >> it sounds like strange elation. it's hard, but, you know, what, people are not sure what exactly he stands for. and i think that's a very interesting question. what is it that really motivates him in terms of what he's going to do to regain the upper hand for the next couple of years. and what does that mean to his governance over the next couple of years and how he will stand for the election. >> i think what i would ought to ask them, he seems to feel that all of his problems that he just wasn't a good enough salesman, that is not the product. and i want to talk to a little bit about that. and also about his timing. >> you're skeptical about it sounds like. >> yes, i am. the republicans say it's about

the product, and the democrats say it's about the salesmanship. and i can think it's a little of both. i mean, i think basically what the president did wrong, he asked the country to bite off more than they could swallow in one goal. and i would like to talk to him about that. >> having taken the question, i think it right now, at least if it were to be in the next week or so. i've never met a losing candidate or losing party that didn't say there was a messaging problem. he's not going to come out and say done, i shouldn't have passed that health care reform. he's just not going to do it. he's got to come up with some reason and the reason is a messaging. i think i might move to foreign policy only because there's 50,000 troops still sitting in iraq. whether or not that constitutes a withdrawal, and i would push of a little on the deadline for next june, the time to do that will be after december when the report -- put a report out there. but i think there have been certain signals inside the white

house and certainly from the military that perhaps that whole is beginning to draw down, may not work as well as they thought it would even though they remain publicly -- [inaudible] >> the left the democratic party, and does he risk an antiwar candidate running for the nomination, even if it's a symbolic candidate. >> another question, does he think hillary will run? [laughter] >> i would wonder whether he still believed that the american people want transformational change. i think point you brought up, john, which has to do with what americans really do want. i think a lot of his election was about people want to put a bit of a governor on president bush's eight years. and yet, government has done, you know, things in terms of anything in the economy, started under bush but continued under obama, has been pretty big.

>> in the front row. we'll get you a microphone, just give us a moment. >> i work in immediate in alternative media, to recover critical questions. one, the tea party, are the republican? because have i seen what has been placed on the ballot as a separate party like the green party or the communist party. is the tea party republican? and the question to all of you in the media, that i've not heard mentioned at all, the two largest indices that have been built in the world, in iraq and in haiti, i've not heard any of the media in terms of mainstream media talk about those at all. that's a lot of government and money. >> i mean, you know, if you're concerned about the cost of building the embassy in iraq, you should take on the bigger issue of how much we spend on the worst. that's a huge issue. and, frankly, the money that has been spent on the embassy is

just frankly a symbol of that, and our commitment issue going forward in iraq. and has it has been and will be in afghanistan. if you're concerned about that, i think it goes well beyond building. i think the tea party's goal in life is to rehabilitate the republican party. so yes, they are part of the republican party. >> and they ran as republicans. they ran in the republican primaries. i think one of the things that was a sigh of relief for republicans is that they did not try to run as independents. >> i think it is a pretty valid point, it seems like many of the tea party activist, those people most motivated in this election, care a lot more about their ideological agenda than they do the republican brand. in many cases they seem to me that they were contemptuous, republicans were washington political professional as they were democratic.

>> but they ran as republicans. they ran in the republican primaries and more elected republicans. yes, they want to change -- >> we would rather have people with principled and just any republican. >> thirty-two believers than 60 our inspectors spent we do have a lot of people have their hands up so we will ask questioners and answers to be crisp and we will get more. >> thank you. i do question. in the last term we saw a lot of immigration, statesmen taking action because they have us in congress too much. a limited amount of time in a lame duck but i was just to see what your thoughts are and what might happen in the next term related to immigration. >> anybody want to take a crack at that? seems like it's a -- big problems can washington doesn't seem to respond to it. >> i don't think either party wants to go near it right now. there's a lot of incentives for the democratic party to do, and republicans to do.

that i think they're both a bit afraid of the both right now. >> not major reform. you're not going to see that in the next two years. harry reid has promised he will bring up the dream act which is a portion of the. and i think you will see a brought up. >> it's significant for the economy as well because of parfum all the obvious issues about immigration, america desperately needs a president, the smartest people from abroad, this poor student, the smartest engineers, you know, people that come over here and do what they used to do. a lot of that is caught up in the current sort of impasse, and appearance of being on friendly terms, people -- >> a young man right here. >> good morning. i'm a freshman at george washington university. in 2008 we saw the emergence with the tea party with the republicans losing the

presidency. now we see the democratic party having some sort of division, giving that there's a competition between steny hoyer and jim clyburn. do we expect further division within the democratic party? >> that's a pretty good question, and i'm going to adding moderate prerogative. is largely ideological competition or over specific personalities and who is the better person for the job? >> i think some of it is just practical politics. normally when a party loses, you know, this is the majority, the speaker tends to resign. i mean, denny hastert did dick gephardt it. i think a lot of democrats were surprised that nancy pelosi decided to go ahead and seek reelection. but i think again this reflects, the people who got beat, the democrats who got beat one of the strongest nancy pelosi supported the democrats who

remain, the liberal democrats, she is sort of the leader of the liberal democratdemocrats. so i think in that sense, that part is not surprising. >> if it was a total secret ballot, nobody had to make a commitment, to nancy pelosi and know we have to take a stand, just totally what they want privately, do you think that the democrats would make her their minority leader? >> i think they would be less likely to. >> she's such a powerful inside player in terms of raising money and how she operates internally, but i don't think anybody wants to have it all right of what could be done to them, you know, in a race. and i think the division like bob said, it's practical politics. but i also think the division right now, perhaps the biggest danger for the president is somebody moving on the left because of war policy and the like. >> go ahead, mark. >> how does foreign criticism

this week, there was criticism, germany, china, on the federal reserve policy. >> we've got a debt commission to make recommendations in the center. we just had an election that was, you know, voters made their opinions known on the deficit. what is it going to take to address this deficit? and how does, how does domestic policy play into foreign criticism of our fiscal policies to? well, i mean, i don't know how domestic policy will play into that, but certainly extraordinary things happen just in the last two days. the chinese openly questioning whether america is the leading economic power in the world. that's extraordinary. the germans called the u.s. clueless about its fiscal policy. it's extraordinary language. and it's not incidental. and it's very, very worrying. and people do want to see a u.s. the. and i do think that would be a

big, big challenge, and something certainly i want to keep and i on over the next months and years while i do this. because you cannot underestimate, even though globalization is a dirty word at the moment, and people here, feel that allow the economic woe is because of the globalization, outsourcing and rise of the rest so to speak. it is his day, and i think when america's challenge like that, in huge and important international forum, it doesn't bode well for the strength in the leadership in the united states. >> i thought it was remarkable hearing that foreign criticism. i'm wondering if it matters in a domestic context. does it bother anybody if the united states or president obama seems back on his you on the world stage? mitt romney, wrote a book saying that president obama's is sacrificing the idea of american exceptionalism. is that going to be one of the themes of 2012? >> may be.

i think we see how it plays out. i think in terms of the american people, if it's personal in terms of when president bush was president, and people just hated americans. i mean, you've didn't get this feeling -- i'm not talking about leaders necessary. i'm just talking about in europe there will were all those wild protest and everything. i think americans don't like that. i think another country criticizes u.s. policy, you kind of get americans going, who are you? and i think people don't like that, but i also have to say, that remember that right now, president obama went over there, and i think they see them as they. let's remember, his first summit, economic summit people were questioning whether america -- whether even free markets was the way to go. i think that questioning has gone on as the american economy has been terrible. it will be interesting to me to watch how we watch in britain

and france at this point. because they went after the cuts in spending, kids out in the street in london, et cetera, et cetera. so they really have taken the approach. alan simpson would like to take. >> we've only got a couple -- i think we might be rather get a couple quick questions and. make your point in the context. you're a good politician if you can answer what you say regardless of what the question was. [laughter] >> there's been a lot of attention paid to the amount of money that was been in this years election, especially by outside groups, particularly on the republican side. as people have covered many elections, how do you see this changing how campaigns are shaped images coming forward speak with great question. thank you. >> this was the most expensive $3 million just for television commercials alone. one of the interesting parts, and there was a lot of money coming in on the democratic side, too, also from outside groups. so we shouldn't overlook that.

but one of the interesting things is these groups that were put together by karl rove and the less be, they're going to stay in operation. and they plan to keep going right on up until the 2012 presidential election. >> interesting point here. i think the audience might find interesting, of course karl rove, they always say no, we assure we are supportive of these groups. you guys are described as rogue groups. karl says i gave money to the texas game association or something like that. you don't say i run that. that was at the beginning cycle. the more and more cycle along, the more these groups seem to be doing well. lso that complaint i got. at the end he was referring to the groups as we. [laughter] >> you know, money -- >> this was an effort by the washington establishment of a big effect outside the parties. >> it's almost always about

money now. money doesn't always been the candidate wins that you have examples of that in california. i mean, but money is such an important part. it's just, you know -- >> time. >> you can't do everything else expect quick question. we'll make this the last one because i've got a final question for our panel. >> thanks. politico had a pretty good piece this point about the narrowing of a number of states that will be in play 2012. curious of those of you, do you agree with that premise i do think that the 20 elections are not misrepresent what will happen in 2012 insurance or the democrats and republicans will do will? >> for the c-span obviously didn't see that story, made the point that the 2008 map that president obama had went in

states where democrats particularly don't win, virginia, north carolina, that expanded and results in 2010 look more like a traditional map where republicans had their part of the country, democrats have their part of the country. the playing field is relatively small, ohio, florida. >> i think it is an important story, and i think we keep talking about this notion of relying and karl rove talked about it, and then thought about democratic rely. we didn't see that. our politics is too volatile right now, and voters, independent voters are willing to move en masse back and forth, swing back and forth. win a tumultuous time. and yes, i think this is about the independent voter. you know, in states like virginia or florida, or the rocky mount west, that were with obama. they will be with him and tell that against him. and i think it does narrow it and makes the country more political look at wisconsin with republican party just did in

wisconsin. it was obviously in the obama column. so yeah, i think, i think the map does revert a bit. he will have to play defense to. >> just quickly, john, one thing we haven't talked about, that you had all of these governorships that turned over to republicans this time, and state legislatures. you're going to redistricting. it's going to be harder for democrats in 2012 because of the redistricting. it will be done mostly by these republicans controlled legislatures. >> every week on politico i talk with these folks for turn the table. i was finished up i give us a quick preview of their sunday shows that and that's how i would like to end this session. if you could give us a preview of what you will be serving up for your views this weekend. >> this weekend we'll be doing at debate between senator lindsey graham and madeleine albright, former secretary of state. will also be doing economic debate. with business leaders and also member of the deputy

commissioner and do have our roundtable, and we have a couple of supporters as well as. >> we have rand paul who will give us the perspective from the tea party republican side, and then chuck schumer, democratic senator from new york who has a bit on sunday television in about six months. [laughter] >> no kidding? >> very unusual. >> that's the scoop. >> i haven't the vaguest idea what could happen sunday morning because i'm not judicial. my colleague is going to do it, and i have paid very little attention. >> you had a very big speakers it's all about you expect that's right, exactly. i'm doing an interview with george and jeb bush that will air at night, at 8 p.m. eastern. so i'm doing that. >> the two brothers together. one interview? >> yes, yes. >> very interesting. >> sunday at eight. [laughter] >> my former college. >> i will be talking to david axelrod and presidential

advisers, first interview since the election. also i will talk to senator mccain when he gets back from afghanistan and will do an economic discussion as well, about that commission and the president overseas and turning on the roundtable one of the guests will be greenspan and newt gingrich. >> that's a pretty good lineup this weekend. we will be watching a lot of tv. block out my day because we will all be very newsworthy session. thank you very much both for this session but for joining us every week on politico. we really, really appreciate it. and i know the audience here really appreciates your insights. thank you all to our sunday hosts. [applause] >> and thank you -- thanks to all of you for coming, or for listening in on c-span. thanks once again to our sponsor at the national cable and telecommunications association. please if you're not inhabit,

started, every week politico.com/turn the table. it's a great show. these guys start in it every week. thank you. [applause] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations]

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[inaudible conversations] and. >> as well as to lead this event quick note listen to readers of the sunday talk shows on c-span radio. also on xm satellite radio. coming at the u.s. senate is about to gather in for the last pro forma session. lawmakers have been meeting every three days during this congressional break to prevent the president from making any recess appointment. sessions are usually very short and there's the legislative business conducted. we will have live coverage of the senate here on c-span2 at 9:30, just a couple minutes from the. until then, allen holmes norton joined a panel of scholars and shows yesterday. she talked about how the

political landscape has changed after lessig's midterm election. george town black law students association hosted this event on campus. it's just under 90 minutes. >> all right, well good evening and welcome. on behalf of george town black law students association, we would like to welcome all of you this evening. my name is brittany. i'm attorney general of our chapter. and we are thrilled of a very great panel with us this evening to discuss the election results from this past week.

i want to begin by giving you all a brief overview of the results and then we will proceed to panel statements. the 2010 midterm elections were held on november 2 of this year. they are halfway through president barack obama's first term in office. in the house the election held for all 235 seats, and republicans made a net gain of 64 seats and became the majority party. the highest number of house victories for a single party since 1948. and highest midterm elections since 1938. in the senate, of the total 100 seats, 37 were up for election. 19 held by democrats, and 18 by republicans. republicans defeated incumbent democrats in arkansas and wisconsin, and one open seat in illinois, indiana, north dakota and pennsylvania. this is the largest number of senate gains for the republican party since 1994 election. and also the first time that

they successfully defended all of their own seats. while the party controlling the white house usually loses seats in midterm elections, the losses for this term were above average. this has been attributed to many factors, including high unemployment caused by the global financial crisis that began in 2007. unemployment rates which hovered around 10% this year. and other factors discussed the controversial health care reform bill, lower republican exposure during these crises, and a higher than usual voter turnout for older and more conservative voters. statistically, the turnout was 3% higher than the last midterm election. and the electric cycle was 25 -- 65 years and older. our director will now introduce our panel. >> good evening. i am truly honored to be

introducing this very distinguished panel this evening. it sort of an easy job because i'm sure that it cannot come in with them by face, then you will definitely be familiar with them by name, and the organizations that they're representing this evening. so without further ado, our first panelist is congresswoman eleanor holmes norton number representing the district of columbia. next we have congresswoman donna edwards represent the fourth district of maryland. we have ken, a staff writer from politico, and last but not least marcio johnson block of representing the lawyers committee voting rights project. and we will start before we begin with questions, we'll give our panel is an opportunity to make opening remarks. congresswoman. >> first, let me say i'm used to coming other monday to teach at

georgetown where i taught full-time, and remain a tenured professor like teaching your every other week. not used to being here on thursdays, but i'm pleased to come in this capacity. my students call me, as i says, professor norton. it i guess i really am congresswoman norton. i jotted some cue random notes. let me see what in the world do i think about this election. i'm pleased to talk about, democrats have to look out our adversaries. let me say something about republicans, especially about what most surprises me. as polarized as the country is, and it's just as easily divided as it was, what most surprises me is the opening salvo of the republicans. there is almost unanimous agreement, it's hard to get that come across the line on what was

most important to the electric. indeed we are criticized somehow understand that, not that i disagree with that. but jobs and the economy. we were told. whether you're talking to republicans or democrats,?n?o although republicans will speak about the deficits. it's hard to get away from the fact that, with the unemployment above 9% that that's the driving force of an election like this.

the presiding officer: the senate will come to order. the clerk will read a communication to the senate. the clerk: washington, d.c., november 12, 2010. to the senate: under the provisions of rule 1, paragraph 3, of the standing rules of the senate, i hereby appoint the honorable carl levin, a senator from the state of michigan, to perform the duties of the chair. signed: daniel k. inouye, president pro tempore. the presiding officer: under the previous order, the senate stands adjourned pursuant to the provisions of h. con. res. 221 until >> wrapping up the last of the senate pro forma sessions. congress has been out of session. they'll be back on monday when members return. work is expected on the bush-era tax cuts as well as federal spending for the next budget year.

you can see the senate live here on c-span2 and the house on c-span. in january we'll bring the opening of the 112th congress with republicans in charge of the house. following last week's midterm election results but before that, we'll there will party leadership elections. >> and we return now to that discussion on how the political landscape has changed after last week's midterm elections. it's hosted by georgetown black law students association. this is under 90 minutes. >> and in this midterm. you can begin to see why we didn't do so well in the midterm. but you're going to have a full bodied election. in 2012. and that will almost look as if

it's two different elections all together. for example, clinton and reagan both were more unpopular than the president was and both won a second term. there must be, therefore, really large differences between midterm turnouts and full election, presidential election turnouts. so what is different? republicans -- this is only give us, donna, some -- some -- something to smile about. republicans won by taking back the original seats that we took from them. so that means that this was -- that this was driven by seats that swing from democrats to republicans. and that means they're holding some seats where there are a fair number of democrats.

so they can come talking about -- talking as if they were all right wing republicans if they want to, but at least for those seats -- and their majority is virtually the same as the majority we won in the last two elections plus ten. they are a volatile electorate. more volatile than in the past. we were -- i mean, i've been -- i was in the minority for 12 years. now, four years we were in the majority. the democrats were in the majority for 40 years. before then. what is also new is the degree at which the deficit became an election issue. each election the deficit is discussed very earnestly. but exit polls never show that the deficit was determinative or

the deficit mattered this time at least to those who came out. and i think it's because the country hasn't seen what they thought was so much spending in so short of time. of course, the banks are already paying back and so the auto companies -- it was not as if there was spending that we didn't have to do or that does not have its return. but you really do live in a country where instantaneous relief is expected. and it has not come from the economy in part because there is too little understanding and politicians have done too little to explain the structural change in the economy. for much of the past duration, the economy has lived on bubbles and so it's sliding back pretty quickly well, we've run out of bubbles and that means we're going to be back to the time when, for example, it took 15 or 20% to put down on a house.

and that's how it's going to be all over the world. somebody has got to tell the american people about that so that they don't expect the kind of economy we used to beginning in the 1990s. so we're left with an election that was driven more by turnout than policy proscriptions. the exit polls showed something very interesting about the people who determine elections which turn out to be neither democrats or republicans. for years now, decades, independents have determined elections and the exit polls show that 58% of them have a negative view of democrats and 57% of them had a negative view of republicans. we have real problems to overcome. we lost the middle of the country. we lost the area. we lost the legislatures and,

therefore, are important and important once every 10 years opportunity for redistricting and will be hugely defensive posture. independent expenditures, citizens united. republicans are left with a mandate based on frustration and an election driven entirely by a new fringe element of their party which puts us at a very poor position to win next time when the election will be driven by independents who are likely to be a whole lot less angry than they were this time. >> thank you. >> hi, everybody. congresswoman donna edwards from maryland and i happen to be from a wonderful state and represent a district that's, you know, one of those progressive districts in our country. and so this election cycle was

not necessarily about the fourth congressional district in maryland. but it was very much about the economy. i had the great privilege of being able to travel to a number of congressional districts around the country to try to help people to get the vote turned out. and i can tell you what i saw when i was out in places that were not the fourth congressional district of maryland. when i was traveling to places where the real unemployment in certain pockets and certain areas was hovering around, you know, the high teens to the low 20s in terms of unemployment. traveling to districts where the real unemployment is really solidly throughout a state at about 15% out in nevada. traveling to congressional districts where 1 out of every, you know, 20, 25, 50 homes is in foreclosure. that's what this election was about. people need jobs. they want opportunity. they're losing their homes.

and they're trying to see the light at the end of the tunnel. and so i think when i look at this election cycle i see several things. one, i see that we had volatility in the 2006 cycle. we had volatility in the 2008 cycle. and we had volatility in the 2010 cycle. it just happened democrats happened to hold more seats in 2010 than we did previously. and so then republicans did and so we lost a lot of those seats. i look at some of these districts or districts, you know, in the scheme of things where i think of the first congressional district in maryland, in that district john mccain won that district in a state that went overwhelmingly for barack obama in 2008. that was going to be a tough haul. it didn't matter what was happening in the broader -- in the broader economy. i also look at a state like

virginia where somebody who really strongly supported a large part of the president's agenda and the agenda of democrats in congress lost but also a state where rick boucher lost and what does that tell us? that tell us we have a lot of volatility in the electorate. we have a lot of independents who are deciding things but a lot of the independents there, you know, they are democrat-leaning and they are republican-leaning and they switch back and forth. that's what makes -- it makes them independents. i also think that, you know, you look at something like the auto bailout that was largely portrayed as something that was to benefit only a handful of states and one industry but i think about our state of maryland and look at the number of car dealerships that have been lost as a result of what's happened with the auto industry.

part suppliers that are in my state where jobs have been lost as a result of what's happened with the auto industry. it was really critical for us to do something to revive that. and i actually that we've been able to see in their performance in this economy now and growing and building back that we've been able to preserve what would have been a really lost auto industry and it's good we've done it but a tough pill to swallow. i'm i've not been in congress very long and one of the things i've learned very quickly is that not only does our electorate indulge in very, very short-term thinking, but so do we in congress. and what that means is that it's really tough to see when you're engaged in putting forward really tough economic measures in a tough time you're trying to transform a health care system that has been widely viewed as in need of reform. and all of those things

happening at the same time. and those of us who are experiencing that, people at home, people who are struggling with jobs and taking care of their families go, oh, my gosh, you know, what's going on here? it's a lot to digest. and, you know, and i expect that what's going to happen is that we're going to see a 2012 election cycle that is as volatile as the three previous cycles we will have had experienced. and so is that a safe bet, a safe haven for the new republican majority? i don't think so. i think it means we have a lot to do as democrats to convince the american public that we're out there fighting for working families, for families who look like the people who are voting. for our seniors and our young people. i mean, i knew it was going to be a tough election when my congressional district in my house -- i was having a hard time convincing my 22-year-old that there was something in it for him to go out and vote. let me just assure you, i did it.

but it wasn't easy. and so if i was struggling in my own household, in my congressional district, can you imagine across the country the struggle to convince young people that all of that change that we voted for wasn't going to happen right away but would take some time. it's a really tough pill to swallow to convince seniors forget all the scare tactics out about social security, your health care. it's not going to materialize, you know, just believe us. it's really a tough pill to swallow. you know, that slice of the electorate that showed up for this election cycle that pretty much mirrors other election cycles to be sure. and the fact that there's a 3% bump in turnout from this one to the last one, 3%, that's the margin of error, who knows whether there was any bump in turnout. but what we do know is who didn't show up. and a lot of those folks who showed up in 2008 and who need

to be energized and they will be in 2012 and they will be part of that electoral base will be the one that republicans and democrats will be struggling for in 2012. and so i just say let's look at this over a period of time and look at the volatility and don't draw any conclusions about what this election cycle means because it's been happening for some -- for some period of time and i'd say lastly that i've cautioned my progressive friends across the country, don't read into this that somehow there was this sort of progressive, you know, force out there because a lot of the progressives won our congressional districts. sure we did. we were in a lot of places where we should have won our congressional districts. but if you look at some people -- i think about carol shea-porter up in new hampshire. she's a very solid, strong progressive but she lost in that district. and so this wasn't -- so this

wasn't about some overall feeling within the -- a party in the democratic party base that, you know, there's this wide shift to the left or to the center. what it means we have someplace where is we're always going to struggle with the electorate to try to make sure that we can convince them that we're working in their interest. and i think i take a very pragmatic approach to this as we look to regain a majority and let me tell you something, as soon as election night was over, that's what i was thinking about. let me look at all these races. let me see who won, who lost and what they were and how do we win -- how do we win that electorate back? and i think we do it by being smart about recruitment. we do it by being smart about the issues that are raised. and we do it by being smart and tactical about our -- about our status in the -- as a minority party as we're going forward because i don't think that all

of those people in the middle are going to tolerate the kind of nonsense that is about not creating jobs, not creating opportunity and not looking toward our future. and with that, i'll end. >> thank you. >> hi, i'm ken vogel and i'm a reporter with politico. i'm thrilled to be a part of this very distinguished panel. and i'm thankful for the georgetown blackwell students association for inviting me. i agree with a lot of the conversation -- a lot of what the two congresswomen says about the demographic cycles that we've seen playing them in the electric cycles and playing themselves out again during this election cycle. i do think there are some things that we can learn about it. it's particularly interesting to look forward to the effect of this election on the coming congress. and even more so on the 2012 election because as we've heard a little bit here this coming congress in many ways it's going to be very much about the 2012

election, whether folks pretend it's not and push legislative initiatives that have no chance of passing like the republicans have talked about with the repeal of health care. that's clearly geared toward 2012. and, you know, some republican leaders have forthrightly and probably regrettably from their perspective actually admitted that, in fact, the coming congress is going to be all about 2012 senate minority leader mitch mcconnell the republican from kentucky said that his number one priority was going to be defeating president obama in 2012. so again probably a little bit of candor and there's and there's a lot of revel try on the other sides. it's always exciting when you have a new congress or particularly when you have a change in power in one chamber like we saw in the house. we're going to see a lot of power struggle, frankly, between republicans particularly in the

house republican caucus where you have this sort of new insurgent force, the tea party that, you know, in some ways have a lot to do with republicans retaking the house. arguably maybe had something to do with them failing to retake the senate because two of the -- at least two of the lawmakers who lost their senate bids were sort of tea party favorites who won their primaries over more establishment-backed republican candidates who probably were more viable in general elections but will never chance to find out because the tea party candidates ended up winning the nomination and losing the general election and we saw that in delaware with county politician jeff coons -- chris coons, i'm sorry, defeating christine o'donnell. and additionally in nevada where senate majority leader harry reid was able to hold off a challenge from this tea party-backed candidate sharron angle and we'll see the tea

party try to exert its power and what many tea party activist see as a mandate in the caucus and that's going to be a problem for republicans going forward because they are going to feel a pull from the sort of the right wing of the party, certainly on fiscal issues which are -- some of the issues that the tea partiers really held out at their number one parties but i think across-the-board on social issues and abortion rights, same-sex marriage and gay rights. and issues that republicans probably would rather not talk about headed into 2012. but because the tea party really flexed its muscles and showed itself as a political force by republican lawmakers and candidates who were going to be running for the first time in 2012 or some of these folks who were -- who won in swing districts who defeated incumbent democrats in the house are going

to feel a lot of pressure to sort of cater to the tea party wing of the republican party and that could cause them problems in their 2012 election campaigns because it is, as congresswoman holmes norton talked about, it's going to be these same sort of set of swing districts that are going to determine the election in 2012. both at the congressional level in the house and also potentially at the presidential level where there are, you know, key states or key districts that have swung back and forth over the years and it just so happened that 2010 it was a republican year they swung republican but guess what. the democrats are going to be back making a strong case in 2012 for why those districts are better served by having democratic representation in the house, in the white house, from democrats' perspective i think again they'll talk about their legislative agendas, but there's also going to be a lot of focus

on 2012. and democrats trying to get back in power in the house of representatives, trying to hang on to their majority in the senate, trying to hang on to the white house. one of the things that i write about -- i write about campaigns particularly probably hear from the comments i'm not talking about the policy as it affects the campaigns but one of the things i found most interesting that i think both the congresswoman alluded to was the outside spending in the 2010 midterm election and the way that some of these big groups were able to take advantage of this supreme court decision that came down in january in a case called citizens united versus federal election commission that basically -- the ruling was that government -- that laws that prohibited corporations and unions from spending money on political advertising were unconstitutional. that they violated the free speech rights of corporations and unions by extrapolation.

but this was taken as a sort of license on the right in particular for these large, you know, corporate-funded special interest groups many who do not disclose where they got their contributions and probably by the time we're done counting hundreds of millions of dollars of ads attacking democrats and they will have to try to mount something similar in 2012 and raise money like that from their supporters. or i think they are going to try to change the campaign finance laws to add additional disclosure with the hopes perhaps that this would scare off some donors who wanted to remain anonymous but still wanted to have an impact on the elections. so it will be interesting to watch that play out, this sort of decision, the pull between whether they want to toughen campaign finance rules which,

you know, could help them politically but also -- it's a good government argument there is well that you want -- you want the voice of the voters to be more important than that of large corporations. or whether they want to try to play on the same field as republicans headed into 2012. that will be interesting to watch and from a legislative standpoint i think we can expect quite a bit of gridlock. the repeal of health care being a prime example. that's the number one priority for many republicans. and there's really no way that they can pass it. i mean, there's almost no way that they can defund it which is another argument that you hear but since it seems to be a little bit at odds with one of the arguments that they made during the debate itself which a lot of it was unfunded mandate and it makes it kind of hard to defund one or the other. the tax cuts potentially see a debate over that. i think that's a debate that we're already seeing some

progressive -- expressing some unhappiness over the obama administration what seems to be a unwilling to compromise on extending some of the bush tax cuts for the wealthiest americans and sort of exchange for also permanently perhaps extending the tax cuts for middle class americans. but, you know, other than a few areas where you see some work occurring where the administration is reaching out to republicans i think we're just going to see a lot of gridlock and gridlock that is sort of posturing with an eye towards 2012 which is where i'm focused. >> thank you. >> hello, i'm a voting rights attorney for the civil rights under the law. and i thank george for inviting me on this panel and i'm very honored to be here with very distinguished panelists. and essentially my perspective is going to be from that of a

voting rights lawyer and the work that i do in protecting the franchise of the elections. and some of it, you know, has already been said about the push and pull of elections and what motivates voters. and i see electoral success being driven by opposition rather than support. in 2006 we had opposition to the war and there were gains for the democrats. that in 2008, the economy crashed. there was opposition to the bush presidency again for the democrats and then here in 2010, there's an opposition -- the voters who came out and voted were motivated by opposition to what they see as government playing too large of a role in their lives and that also is inferenced by the messaging that has been prevalent since the obama presidency. so we have here this election

that was decided by less than 40% of voting age population who participated. but i see this as one of the most important elections in recent years because as was mentioned before, the legislators who were elected, particularly on the state level, and during this election are going to be deciding who will be the representatives for the next 10 years. they will be shaping political boundaries and determining who will be the newly elected -- who the voters are going to be choosing and which pool of voters are going to be choosing members who will be in the congress. we have state legislators and the governors. we can't discount the role that governance is going to play also in determining what the congressional districts are going to look like moving forward. and who will be representing the voters of those districts. so right on the federal level you have, you know, the debates

about the role of the federal government, the time of the economic crisis, the jobs, the deficit. and on the state level, we're going to have these legislatures or these commissions who will voters will be choosing in 2012. obviously in redistricting, members, the politicians are trying to protect their voters because that's who got them elected in the first place. but then how do you account for the democratic shift and how there's equal representation. and that added to all that you've heard before tonight is going to shape who the representatives and is going to include that push-pull that we're going to be seeing in coming elections.

there's also -- you know, one of the drivers for citizens and voters in the process, you know, there seems to be this prevalence, dissatisfaction with the status quo which is coupled by an insistence on quick results. you know, we have -- as a country we are facing very broad and deep problems and how do we address those problems. and the electorate seems to want instant results and when they don't get it, they move on to the next party. and the entrenched -- the entrenched voters on the left, the entrenched on the right and then you have that middle of independents who keep going back and forth and looking and trying to determine who is going to provide the best solution. and coupled with that you have this ongoing historical debate that seems to gain resonance, which is the role of the federal government, what the government

needs to do to address problems that voters are facing. so we have an electorate that's very quick to change allegiances and then we have a lack of confidence in our institutional structures and that i think influences and will affect how the elections are going to play out and how the governing process is going to play out during the next two years. and so as we look what the political landscape is going to be over the next two years and looking at who the motivated voters are and who the voters who are going to comprise of the politician need to convince that their agenda is the one that is best suited to the voters, then we also couple that with a time

where we have very polarized messaging. we have now a media infrastructure where i don't have to listen to any opinion that i disagree with. i could -- i need only focus on what i agree with. and to re-enforce my beliefs and was mentioned with the citizens united case and the money that's flooding into the system, we have a lot of money trying to convince me that what i believe is right and what -- and anyone who disagrees with me has a illegitimate position that should be discounted and not given any credence and when you have such a polarizing and -- this highly -- this disparate and very volatile environmental -- the opinion of the others discounted and then

added to that when you have a media that doesn't really focus -- but doesn't focus on nuance and depth but on the horse race aspect and voters are getting their -- are trying to decide, you know, who's telling me what is really happening -- how can i really find out what's going on? and i might -- in the time when i'm trying to keep my job and ensure my kids get a good education do i have time to really get in-depth and determine how the policies affect me, and i'm influenced by what i hear and what i hear is more on the atmospherics of the candidates rather than really getting into depth about the implications of the policies that they are espousing and the push/pull. who has the best message?

who has an appealing frame on what i see as my reality? and that, i think, also plays a significant role in determining how voters are deciding and choosing their political allegiances. so from the voting perspective and the concern we have about cases of the implications of cases like citizens united where there's a lot of money being flooded and a lot of messaging that is focused and not always -- does not always have a lot of depth but is focused on getting on one party elected and vilifying the other, it's how do voters -- how do you motivate the electorate to actively participate with an

understanding of what -- what the policy that best affects their interest? and i think there's been a lot of commentary recently about the democrats fail to get out the messaging about what they were doing or it's wrong for the democrats to say, oh, it wasn't the messaging but it was really -- they need to look at their policies and be aware of where the country is. and there's -- you know, where the country is and then where is the voters that go out and vote and what motivates them to go out and vote. so it's a very complex scenario but i do agree that within the congress for the next two years we're going to have a lot of hearings picking apart the first two years of the president obama presidency and teeing up the position for the 2010 elections.

and i'll leave it there. >> thank you very much. we are going to ask the panel a couple of questions that were submitted beforehand and if anyone has any questions, we'll have a mic and we'll take your questions is well. to start, president obama attributed the outcome of the midterm election to frustration to the pace of the economy. do you think the president should have done more in its area in this first two years of office and how do you believe the republicans will act to create jobs and we'll take whoever will jump in first. >> i'll jump in because i think, you know, frustration with the pace of the economic recovery. you know, we came out of and perhaps we didn't clarify this for the public in the way that we needed to. but when the president came in to office, we all know that we lost 750,000 jobs in january of that month.

and then we began this steady pace which we have undergone over the -- over the last eight, nine months of slow but steady recovery. clearly not fast enough, but if the numbers are any indication in this last -- in our last jobs numbers, in october, that indeed that pace is picking up. now, i think that -- i've always -- i've been saying for a very long time that we have a couple of different kinds of unemployment. some of it is chronic unemployment that has, you know, for some people this recession isn't just one recession. it's the last three recessions. and for other people, we have lost jobs in industry that we may never recover but we haven't had a strategy for two decades but about how we rebuild a

different set of industries for the 21st century. i think if republicans want to seriously move forward on job creation, i will borrow, beg or steal one of their ideas. and it's around the research and development tax credit that the president has said that he supports. i think we have to ramp up our research and development tax credit. i think that we have to couple that with incentives for manufacturing in the united states. and when we do that, both offer additional credit for research and development and credit for domestic manufacturing, that's enough of an incentive for somebody to say, you know, what? we're doing all the technology here in the united states, wow! we can produce those products in the united states, too. that's a good old-fashioned, frankly, republican idea but it's actually one that's about job creation. now, if republicans are serious about creating jobs, then let's find some common ground on something like that. i happen to believe that there

are ideas like that. we saw that in the small business infrastructure measure that we passed where we really didn't get any republican support and yet that was a republican idea. and i think what the president experienced over the course of this last year is reaching out and reaching out and being slam-backed and that's been true on some of these ideas. and so i would like to see the president -- and i think that he's on his way to doing that saying, okay, let's put your money and your ideas where your mouth has been. i'm willing to -- i'm willing to deal and i think one of the first places to deal would be around this idea of incentivizing this manufacturing. >> anyone else? >> i think several people want to talk out there after they've heard so much from us. i just want to say two things. i don't believe that we can make a deal on anything.

with the republicans, not because we don't want to. but because the parties are being driven by the tea party. and it is difficult to imagine if the deficit is the only thing they're concerned about -- it's difficult to imagine some who will stimulate the economy that will get -- get some republican who will be looking over his shoulder to see whether he's going to get a primary opponent if it looks like he's cooperated with democrats. so i regret to say -- and i hope this isn't cynical. but the president on health care spent six months waiting for a gang of four to reach a deal. it set us back tremendously. put us into an election year. and hurt us and hurt him? could the president have done

more? look, every difficulty majority has they have a whole list of things they want to get done. we had a whole list of things when bush came in they had a whole list of things. you remember that list, social security. [laughter] >> when they began to do their things, that they palled up -- they inevitably overreached. did we overreach? we'll never know. we'll never say. but i think that we did the same thing. we had a whole bunch of things that we wanted to get done and we wanted to get them done. health care reform, climate change, the economy, financial reform.

if you had to really ask if he had done nothing but jobs in the economy, would the economy have been any better off? and i think the answer to that is no. because they were inclined to say no from the moment we put the stimulus down. so you can argue that we could have spent all of our time on the economy, and i will tell you that if we had, we would have had no different result on the economy. because of the stance that the republicans took. so if that's the case, why not try to do things that you know will help the economy. like health care reform. tremendous effect on the economy. the most important effect of anything we did, climate change. with all the energy conservation, if you know that a single-minded concentration on the economy alone will not get

you where you want to get and will certainly not get you anything from the republicans, all i can tell you is, i wouldn't think the president -- and since he's the one he's going to be blamed would have fared any better if he had said, all right, i am going to put these three or four things aside. i'm going to do nothing but the economy. come to the table with me, republicans. if anybody sees mitch mcconnell coming to the table and say that's what i really wanted to hear, barack. i wish you would hold up your hand. [laughter] >> if i could take that even a step further -- [laughter] >> you know, if the original question is whether -- if the president had focused more on the economy and done more for the economy, whether democrats would have fared better, i think the answer is a resounding no. because what he did do and what democrats and republicans -- the few republicans were able to work together to do what was the stimulus. i mean, that was the sort of big

economic legislation that took a lot of political capital and a lot of political will and guess what? almost every republican who voted against them, that was most, campaigned against it. and attacked democrats for supporting it and the president for supporting it. the impact of it arguable, i guess. but clearly if democrats came under such fire for supporting the stimulus, the idea that if they had done more along those lines, it had have helped them, you know, stave off this wave in the midterms is probably suspect. and it's also a question about whether it would have actually helped the economy. the economy is in a down period. i'm not an economist but, you know, various measures that have been proposed, you know, the impact of them has been debated ad nauseam and probably will continue to be debated. but i don't think that there's a whole lot that -- i don't think

there's a whole lot more that the president could have put forward to help the economy that would have passed. i think he pretty much got everything that he could. and what he got was roundly attacked by republicans. so it was kind of a no-win situation for him and for democrats and arguably for the country. voters are upset because the economy is bad. and they blamed the folks in power and it happened to be democrats. >> and if i could just add 2 seconds onto that. the phrase on the right from the stimulus that it was an entitlement program that had added significantly to the deficit and i think it would be interesting in the next two years when we're looking at the republican agenda and the focus on cutting the deficit and what is considered an entitlement program and what programs are going to be under the knife and how that would be received by

the voters and how that message will be framed from both parties. >> okay. question from the audience? [inaudible] >> democrats running from everybody legislation during this campaign season but i feel like most frustrating is, i think, seeing good legislation go die. and so i'm wondering should the senate push for reforming the filibuster even though democrats are close to losing their majority for the good of the country on the next two years. >> can you repeat your question so we can have it? correct me to wrong, your question is, why democrats in

the election cycle did not campaign on the legislative victory? and also considering the filibuster, is that correct? >> yes. [laughter] >> but you're right. it is remarkable that -- that we are the party that saved the economy from another great depression. we kept the -- that's what the stimulus did. we did a financial overhaul, a complete and total financial overhaul including a new consumer, a much-needed consumer reform that is part of that overhaul.

an intense rate of job growth. things that people could run on. the small business tax credit when this was clear that the banks would not lend to them. larger student loan and grant changes. in decades. meaning that especially for those in law school, loans will -- there will be a really substantial reduction cost of paying off those loans. new gi bill, thousands of young men and women literally able to go to school. getting paid with their tuition, books, et cetera. it really -- and this is the kind of thing that members look to run on. and my own sense is that with

the first election where a great deal of money had to be spent immediately so shocked the electorate that you could no longer run on things that cost money. i see no other explanation for it. i have never seen any party not run on everything they did. sure, the progressives ran on this. but the people who most needed something to run on could not or felt they could not run on this remarkable agenda. i looked at the -- donna, you must have seen the ads for our colleague gerald connelly. it was just so amazing to see him. he comes from a swing district in northern virginia. and he almost got beat.

and he's the only one of those who came who didn't get beat. and he had to run a negative campaign. he felt from the beginning. he never ran on any of the things that we did. he is himself a moderate. the republican before him, a good friend of mine tom davis was a moderate. i think in a past election, tom davis might even have voted for some of this. but the fact that this guy was president of his class, could not run on anything did tell me that it's not the messaging. he says there's not -- everybody is dumb. can't you see what we've done for you. something that happened that was very different as far as the electorate was concerned.

and when something this new happens that it was impossible apparently for them to absorb and we kept piling on with things that had to be done, they were unwilling to swallow all of it at one time. now, that doesn't leave me saying, well, i guess we shouldn't have done all those things. but it does say that if you are in -- the lesson by the way we overrun the lesson from the last election, that's part of the problem. but it does seem to say that if at least when it comes to spending money -- 'cause i don't think this is going to go away. that if you get signals that people have had it as we did in august when some of our conservative democrats were hammered to death, that you

should at that point begin what to do. shucks, i was gung ho on health care reform but i have to tell you -- and it's interesting to look some of the health care reform some of those who voted for health care reform, some of the conservatives and democrats lost, some of them won, but while i don't have an alternative strategy for you because we live in real time, i cannot at the same time say that i believe we did everything right. that any party benefits by simply -- without debriefing yourself and without self-criticism. and i'm trying to -- as a progressive democrat work up a self-criticism that will satisfy me without pulling me back from the things i believe.

but i think the most dangerous thing you can say well, so much for that. i've explained away how much i think can be explained away. this was not a full bodied electorate. but it was not a totally unrepresentative electorate. so we need a very serious critique of what was at work at this election and the kind of surface analysis we all do, what politicians do is not what we need. we need somebody to look beneath the numbers, to look beneath the trends, to talk to voters, to come back with some data so that we really know what was going on here. >> if i could just say something quick about the senate part of the question. whether reform of the filibuster is necessary or possible, i guess, is more operative. i mean, this is all -- to some extent this is just a way that the dynamics between the two chambers of the u.s. congress has always worked.

proponents of it would say it's in some ways consistent with what founders intended. that the senate was a more deliberative body, where an individual member could, you know, flex more muscle and have more power to hold up legislation or to bring forward legislation. i know that's little comfort progressives such as, you know, you sound like -- when you see legislation going from the house passing in some cases quickly like climate change. my wife works in the senate. and she works for joe lieberman and she worked for a year and a half trying to put together a climate change bill that could pass muster there and all it took was, you know, one republican to say -- i mean, finally they courted republicans and they got lindsey graham on board and once he pulled out, that was it. and, you know, in some ways just a way that the senate works and you could argue, and many have,

that, in fact, a slowing, efficient legislative process. and you could even argue that the filibuster has been abused. but it's sort of always been the case -- i think it probably always will be the case that the senate is going to be the sort of slower-moving body and probably from house democrats perspective that more, you know, foot-dragging obfuscating but i don't see a whole bunch of reform on the filibuster in particular more do i see much change -- >> i think there is going to be some change in the rules actually. and i also think that if we could argue that the filibuster had actually been used for the purposes of deliberation i think that would be one conversation. but that's actually not the way that it's been used. and increasingly that's been true over the last several years and so i think it begs for some

change that allows for a filibuster to be -- to be used when it's appropriate but doesn't allow it to constrain the process. and i fully expect that the remaining democratic majority in the senate is really going to look to it as its rules. let me just say one thing on the politics because i had a conversation of a number of my colleagues. a number of them who have lost their seats. and it's this. that if -- and i think that we passed a very robust, you know, amazing agenda over this last congress. and these were not easy victories, in fact. but at the end of the day, you have a d after your name. you're a democrat. no matter how much -- even in whatever environment, in whatever state you try to pretend otherwise, at the end of the day, there's a d behind your name.

and you are in an environment in which everybody is saying this was the wrong thing to do. this was a bad thing to do, you did it, you voted for it, your party voted for it, and your face is being morphed with nancy pelosi coming through them, you cannot run from the fact that the d is after your name and that was part of your agenda because it was your party's agenda. and the more, in fact -- i would argue the more you run away from that agenda, the greater likelihood it is that people are actually going to believe that you did something wrong. and so i'd like us to take actually a different approach even in some of these most difficult districts, i look at a district in arizona with gabrielle gifford who actually did in her very, very tough district really did stay largely with the democratic agenda and she ran on it in her district

and she won on it in her district even though it was only by a few thousand votes. and we have other places where we see that. and i think, you know, one of the most difficult parts of the election night was actually tom perillo's district and phil heron's district in michigan where they ran on the agenda and it was a much tougher way to go from them. but when it's all said and done it's not as though people are going to believe that somehow you're a closet republican when you have a d after your name and you're running away from the things that your party did. >> it is absolutely not the case that the filibuster has always worked this way. and the question you raise is very important. the filibuster is in danger of paralyzing the political system. when i was a kid growing up in

dc, it was used almost exclusively on racial matters. then it moved gradually to be used more and more and now there is no piece of legislation of any significance. whatever you say about the filibuster, my good friend, nobody of the framers expected that there would be no movement on legislation, whatsoever. and i mean you can get unanimous consent on something trivial but the filibuster has become almost a one-man item. so the whole notion, you know, after the framers intended this is ahistorical, of course it was meant to slow it. it wasn't meant to is to. -- stop.

it wasn't meant to paralyze a complicated country and it's going to be serious that is going to lead to a constitutional crisis and worse and there is no incentive for either party to stop it. just think about it. we found a mechanism that can nullify majority rule all together. so if you're in the minority, you have no incentive to try to reinstate majority rule. of course, if you're in the majority that's what you want. the democratic party isn't going to do it. the republican party isn't going to do it. the only way i think this can be changed two ways. a crisis in the country or grassroots movement from outside of the congress itself. but it is very serious.

it is not the usual kind of thing so get used to it. you will not be able to stand it. you will get nothing done. at least your generation should not buy the notion that that's the way it was meant to be. this is so new that it is not even a decade old. >> thank you. next audience question. >> yes. actually the congresswoman's remarks leads into this perfectly. i feel like where the main problems with the government these days is the political parties. the two-party system. i feel like it's completely tearing what the government is supposed to be doing apart. nationally speaking you look at congress nothing gets done. you mentioned already from the panel from now on everything that happens will be 2012 election. it's not about the country and political power and political process and for the party state. locally, i've worked before i came to law school, i worked in

county and state government in new jersey. and as new jersey -- even though we have a republican governor now, northern jersey in particular, it's a very solidly democratic area and so the party there works as a party boss. it's a very corrupt system. so i think both locally and on a national scheme, the two-party system is failing the american people as a whole. my question to you is this, in looking at the effects of the tea party on this past election, midterm it may have been, do you think there's actually a possibility of legitimate non, you know, main two parties becoming operational? ....

>> do you think there's any realistic possibility of other parties popping up in the next 10 years or so? >> i don't. [laughter] >> basically. and, you know, take a tea party as an example though. there have surely been some talk about, you know, forming a third party either in this election or even more acutely come in the next election if somebody's lawmakers were elected were sort of tea party blessing or support go to congress and end up letting down the folks who saw himself as the tea party activists, the muscle behind their victories.

the system is setup in a way that it is very, very difficult, and probably, to access the ballot to be able to have the type of infrastructure that is necessary to mount, you know, a third party or any real threat to the two main parties. were i think you'll see certain more action is in the respective parties primaries. which you saw with blanche lincoln in arkansas, which is always some of these tea party back to challengers to mainstream establishment republican candidates and republican. we saw it where tea party candidates defeated sitting united states senator is in primaries, and alaska and utah. and so i think that that sort of where we are more likely to see change. and, frankly, the change that we'll see from that perspective is changed that in many ways exacerbates the problem that you

just described. because we will see dissatisfaction with the two main parties, manifesting itself in primary challenges from for the on the right or the left, respectively, in the republican and democratic parties. and if those challenges are successful and say, bill beats blanche lincoln in arkansas and then letzig bill halter wins -- letzig bill halter wins which he didn't do either of those, then you have a senator who is even less inclined moderates in his own party or republicans because he will see his mandate has been from the far left. if the tea party candidates are successful and go into the senate, they will see their mandate is on the far right and they'll be less inclined to work for the centric as for third parties, you know, and lesser some individual or interest that is wealthy enough to provide infrastructure, provide, you

know, the processes and the boots on the ground, whatever you want to call it, necessary to get people on the ballot from that third party, it's just unlikely. and, you know, the interests that are likely to have, that are likely to have the sort of political interest and the financial wealth to be able to do something like that tend to be heavily courted by the two parties so as to prevent the possibility of them throwing their weight behind a third party, whether that's barack obama going in, having breakfast in new york with michael bloomberbloomberg who conceivably has the wealth to run as a third party candidate, or whether that's the republican party going to meet with the coke brothers in kansas or new york to get them onboard with their agenda to prevent them, or to minimize the possibility that they would go ahead and find a third tea party. i'm not sure if that answers your question.

>> we have one more question from the audience. >> yes, i have a question, but i also want to start off with a big thank you, thank you to all of you for showing up tonight and for participating. but a special thank you to congresswoman holmes norton, and congresswoman edwards for sticking to your principles. [applause] >> i think one of the -- i think what the big mistakes we could all make after this, these election returns you to think that there was, that it really was the substance of your policies that was at fault. and i think what we really need to be thinking about is how is it that so many american voters, and not just with this election because we been divided country for a long time, that how is it that they get convinced to vote against their own best interests? now, you've been thinking and working for american working

people, for american students, for americans of all stripes and colors, right clicks but we have to think about the messaging. i think the content is not the problem. i think it is the messaging, and we need to think about it. and not only on the level of individual campaign, but in larger structures of our society. maybe this is just too big to tackle. but, you know, we've got to at least, you know, one television network stations that is completely devoted to campaign against your interest. we ever you stations that do this hours a day. and so the structure of our society has changed in a way that makes the messaging for the our ability to craft the message and get out our message, that there were tax cuts that benefited more americans in the last two years than any number of years. and people did not know that.

so it is the messaging and it is the campaign techniques. and i think we need to think about it on these levels, as much as on the content of the policies. so, may i ask -- [laughter] >> that's a tough one. before i -- spent about 20 years working on progressive policies and politics, and i use to as the question all the time because i just didn't understand, why are these people vote against their interests. and i decided it's the wrong question. because in this last election people were voting in their own interest. and i'll tell you why. because they decided that their interest is in having a job. they decided that their interest wasn't having a home. they decided that their interest was in protecting their families. and the people who were in charge didn't allow them to do that. they were voting for republicans, but they were voting in their interest. they weren't voting -- and so i

think that the question that we have to ask is whether we are doing the kinds of things that enable people to identify themselves as voting in their interest. weather, you know, whether we have shown them that, you know, whatever that standards project on pennsylvania avenue, that that was about a job for somebody in their community and was about creating jobs for them and ensuring that young people can go to school and that their schools have resources. and so i do think that a lot of people want to say that this was, this election was about voting for republicans. i don't agree with that at all. we just happen to have 258 seats. and we lost, i don't know, 60, 63, 64 of them that because some of these are still and decided. we were the party in power. people didn't have a job while

we were the party in power. and they voted their economic interest. they didn't vote for republicans. i think it's important for us to get that in mind, because otherwise, we are going to the mistake in going forward with thinking that somehow we just have to go out there and convince people that we've done things better in the interest and they need to go for it and they're just so wrong. they will not believe that. >> i think you know more than i do about getting voters to come on your site. but it would say because i picked up something also that congresswoman holmes norton said which was in the active pulled out there were more of us voters talking about deficits. and the problem with deficits. i think a lot of what we're seeing is people aren't happy because government but it's not on them. i think that anybody who thinks that cutting the deficit -- i shouldn't be so grand you think i can say this. but my opinion is that cutting the deficit now is actually the

wrong thing to do for the economy. we need to strengthen the middle class. we need to get the engine of the middle class going for economic growth. so in that context, voters who have been hearing this message that democrats are big spenders, when they are not, because we know when the deficits have been rising, or people who think that the best thing we can do for a country that is to cut the deficit. are voting against their interest and some of that message was getting out and getting a fair amount of play last time. so it's in that context and speaking of people voting against their interest. >> when you mentioned about really doing a critique, democrats during their own critiquing, you mentioned about messaging. i give you an example, i will do a critique of democrats on messaging. we had the best messenger in the world. his name was barack obama. but if you wanted to get down

analytically to messaging, one of the things that occurs to me is everyone sees a stimulus as some -- pumping money into the economy. our stimulus was very well-crafted. a third of it went into tax cuts. you see that part of the message. certainly the american people didn't hit that part of the message. they don't think yet that that was the case. part of the reason, and we are very clever, we did it the right way. we saw that bush had just given a lump sum that did no good. remember for the part of the recession that he had to deal with. did nothing. so the way we did was to put it in people's take on pay. so that every time you went home and was a little bit more that you could then spend. did you anybody talk about that? to the american people believe

that they got a tax cut out of the stimulus? that is a critique of our messaging. the people voting in their own interests, lord, ever since southern whites were inclined to go along with the racist democrats who were the party of racism, and the conservative party, who always were the spokespeople for conservative politics, i have understood that people don't vote in their own interest. devoting almost entirely a racial ticket which is why the southern democrats were so long in power, and became chairs of all the committee. it really is important to see history as beyond one election,

to see trends that are occurring. and i see these trends beginning with ronald reagan, when we first -- when the american people first began to believe that government should not be spending money, they should be out of your life. they were in reaction to the post-world war ii period, we're spending money, in fact, we create the economy, the g.i. bill, the home loans that made everybody home owners and the rest. but what come in reaction to that came reagan era and democrats held, found hard to get the presidency because the republicans have spent more than a generation now convincing americans that they should not invest in themselves. they should not invest in the economy. that their infrastructure will be fine if they don't invest any. that they don't need to invest in their schools. that we are going to be on top

of the world, no matter what we do. but above all, don't spend any money. that line began to be pumped into the american people in 1980. it has taken root, and it is going to be very hard to get people to understand that, just as business cannot read the profit without investing, so the american people are not going to be able to benefit if they are unwilling to invest, to invest in their own selves. >> if i could you say something real quick that kind of takes i from the other side of the same thing that congresswoman holmes norton just said, then i have to go to do some media on the network is not the one you refer to any particular party. some people would support i support the other party. you know, you know, you're right that there are certainly people

who are lower income, who have, you know, bought into this republican messaging about cutting spending and cutting government is being somehow beneficial or in their interest him are in the country's interest. and that was a real victory of the tea party. for all the talk about the tea party as being extreme, you know, violent even. there was a move early on and it was partially from the grassroots that it was also arguably from the top down in some of interest, the special interest or corporate interests that saw the tea party is potentially furthering their own interest and is a troll success, to really limit the messaging in a way that focuses on fiscal issues. and on the deficit and on the debt and on government spending and but excluding, to some extent, some of the social

issues and some of the national security issues that many tea party activist and folks became tea party activists, and yes many of the conservative base, really held dear. and instead just focusing on the message that the government spending is out of control, we need to reduce the deficit. there was a simple, straightforward message and it was one that resonated even in some cases, as you posit, and as the congresswoman posited, against the voters who braced self interested but there was no doubt it was successful messaging. and it really tap into the times, which was the standard of the economy, that got so many people feeling vulnerable. so they wanted to hear a simple straightforward message that they thought was one that, you know, pointed to the problems a they saw that got us into thatñ situation. >> and if i could justñ add, i think that the messaging is a victim of our soundbite culture.

because we are dealing with a lot of complex and very serious issues, and it's hard to get into the nuance in a soundbite or slogan. and we've gotten used to having, focusing or turning away from anything that goes over explanations, and that's one of, i think one of the criticisms, or comments that were made about president obama, is that company, yes, he uses effective campaign when he is running for president. but governance and explain the policies, it's getting too much into the weeds. is come out and give it any in three words or for worse, what is it you're doing.ññ and that's very difficult to do ñen you attack on really hardñ messaging. so if you're coming from the opposition, you can have a soundbite or a slogan that captures what it is you up on us to, what you're trying to make

the case in a very nuanced way, is very challenging. and i do believe that voters worried about jobs, we about economy, the poorer class, three, four jobs, just trying to exist and get by. what will capture your attention. the new ones or the slogans tha seem to make senseñ?ñññññ >> all right. we want to thank everyone for your question. and the panel for your participation. [applause] >> before we conclude, just a couple of brief closing remarks. first of all, thank you to the panelists, and we will get to a small presentation and more formal thank you, but also to the audience and to c-span and the other george tenet at let's who are covering this event. this is a really big event, and

one of the tenets of our mission is to inform, instill in our membership a commitment to the black community and as you all know, the midterm elections, you know, very important for all americans, but a lot of issues that we talked about this evening, this disproportionate effect members of the black community and of our community. so it's important that we continue to have this conversation, continue to talk to other people that we know about this conversation who maybe weren't here. and just continue to support balsa in this effort. so thank you all for coming. and now without further ado we would like to formally thank our panelists for all the insight that they instill to us this evening with a small token of our gratitude. [applause] >> so thank you to congresswoman eleanor holmes norton, congresswoman donna edwards, ken vogel who had to leave prematurely, and marci johnson

block all. thank you so much. [applause] >> that concludes our panel. [laughter] >> if you all are interested, we do have a link that it will be lifetime of the georgetown law website. it should be available [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] congress returns on monday when members come back work as expected on the bush era tax cuts as well as federal spending for the next budget year. you can watch the senate live here on c-span2, and the house on our continue network, c-span. january brings the opening of

the 112th congress with republicans in charge of the house following last week's midterm elections.

>> republicans picked up a net gain of five seats with one race still outstanding. and now hold a majority of the state houses in the nation. officials from the public and and democratic governors associations discuss those results thursday at a forum in washington, d.c.. now we will look at some analysis of those races. the international lobbying andd. political strategy firm .co worldwide hosted this hour and 30 minute event. >> really appreciate it.yone a especially on veterans day.ns i guess let's all remember that as veterans day. made my commute fantastic thists morning as the road. but thanks to much to all of you for coming. it's great to see you here. oviously, the lesser give oflue what we're talking about.we'r pretty fascinatinge collectionl i'm craig pattee. i know some of you.

i k i run the state a local practice at dutko worldwide, and i'mworli particularly, i guess, passionate that i don't know if that's the rigathte word when talking about government and politics, but so passionateng a about state and local work. and in particular governors. ar . i'm guessing you are too or you wouldn't be here right now unless somebody told you you had to be. but hopefully that's not the case. it's been so interesting the past six months has been the site of governors races i got started in 1993 when i got kicked out of the bush white house and feels very similar to the way it felt for the past six months. not necessarily a democratic or republican thing, but just a resurgence in the power of governors vis-à-vis you not only in the states, but also here in d.c. and again, if you're here,

chances are that your bread and butter. that's what you'll do. for all very interested in the role that governors play in the states play in terms of impacting federal policy and national policy and the implementation of the policy. and for me, what was really interesting in this election was you had some of the individual races which will talk about in a minute and yes, some of the broader political trends. what does this mean about obama's administration pluck, pluck, pluck. to me the most interesting thing is this resurgence in federalism. the past five to 10 years, governors have been playing third string, but they are definitely back. we have a really active crop of new governors that are going to be very good, both for the national governors association as well as the rga in the tga and on their own. and we have a whole slew of federal policy that are coming back up again, whether it be

rother it be rasterization, no child left behind for transportation funding. you know, exactly how health care reform. that all shakes down to the states now. so it's a very exciting time to see a large group of governors coming in. it will be interesting to see how the new speaker approaches and handles his relationship with governors. i think governors have felt way on the back bench, regardless of what you think about nancy pelosi. even for the next 10 years. what was so great about 1994 is not a speaker and a president and a senate majority leader at that time, bob dole, running for president, all paying attention to governors and that's what he saw such a great partnership. so i'm really excited about it. so the purpose of today is to talk to those governors races in sort of what happened and why. we've got sort of two

discussions. remaking the shorter the way down in the past because everybody has got worn out last year. the first panel for going to be talking about the races themselves. and we're very lucky to have the senior folks for the rga here to talk goes through. and i were going to do some q&a and, probably take a quick five minute i opaque and then chris cillizza will be here later this morning starting at 10:30 to look at some of the political and media aspects of the races. and will be done by 12:00, i promise. i had some other notes, but they're kind of moot now. there is the sole state and legislative aspect to it as well, which maybe we will talk about another day. there were 16 states that had control within the state legislators. i'm not a lot, especially going

into a redistricting year. but there's a whole another conversation to have about that. in any case, let me turn it over to the first panel and get it started. we really enjoyed doing this with the rga and vga. most of you are probably involved in the rga and you probably know that they are two of the most effective organizations in the country and certainly in washington d.c. both in terms of providing opportunities to interact with governors and staff, but providing real funny to those governors and staff as well, going well beyond the dollars they raise for the races. the reason that certain nations are so effective is because they very well run. make eric and nathan daschle run for organizations and they would love to get together. nick had to hop on a plane to go out and get ready for the upcoming rga conference, which i'm sure we'll see many of you. phil cox, political director with the rga, who is here to talk about the races.

horse nathan daschle from the democratic governors association. and we've asked josh kraushaar to come and moderate the panel. josh is a former reporter for politico and now a columnist with national journal.com called against the grain and executive editor of the hot lane. i'd like to turn it over to these folks and the format really is up to the three of you. josh, i guess it's mostly up to you, but you can let it be organic and you know, let's have a half-hour 40 minute discussion and then i would love it if you could help stimulate some q&a from folks, sort of see where it goes. thanks. >> thank you, craig for the introduction and i'm very excited to be here talking about the governors races in the statewide landscape, especially now that it's a week out of the

holidaycome about from time to to digest the results and get some sleep and the partisan bickering and look towards the governing aspect. and to do that i'm really pleased to be joined by two of the sharpest operatives in washington who i've known for quite a while. [inaudible] [laughter] >> nathan daschle, chairman of the democratic governors association -- [inaudible] and republican governors association political dirt, phil who has been here. they've been as many of you know as they connect to director that manages all the dga policy, finance, political efforts, you name it and under name his leadership at dga has played a pivotal role in helping the democratic gubernatorial candidates across the country and the dga really has become a

force in national democratic politics especially over these last few years. so, before joining the rga service as a campaign richard burr current virginia governor donald andy engineered one of the gubernatorial victories of the election cycle. and he's been the campaign manager and consultant to over all the way down to the state legislator and also served as mcdonnell transition direct care. one of the reasons i'm very excited about moderating this panel is nathan and fell for together aggressively on the political battlefield, but this is true for the rga and dga as far as all the political committees that get along with each other outside the office. i've been a part of many panels

and it's not always the case. sometimes you have to really play moderator and kind of separate two sides. a very partisan operation at times. i'm impressed with both the work of nathan and nick they can play aggressively in the political battlefield and get together for drinks and work together and there's not a lot of acrimony, so that's a real testimony to the work these guys do. you know, there's a couple big teams but the governors get lost at times but the senate race of the national attention, but the governors races are among the most important and consequential concepts that we saw this november. and i think will have the most lasting impact on the political scheme in the last few years. and the republicans picked up

the key presidential backgrounds with pennsylvania, ohio, florida, you know, vis-à-vis the races where the presidential race in 2012 and then i'll have an interesting impact on how these play out over the next few years. president obama is preparing for his fall election. there's a lot of very, very top democrat and they're going to have to figure out how to move forward in this day. so i went to kind of delve into how the governors races, how they are affected and affect the presidential races in two years. another big theme that came out of the governors races redistricting. try not, is not necessarily the most thing when it comes to politics, but when you look at the house race map and the state legislative races for years and years to come, these are one of the most consequential governors races because the governor can do the bold work.

if you have a democratic governor in a state with republican legislature, they can make it much for a bipartisan effort and vice versa. a lot of these big states, a lot of states where we seem governors and parties which is, they are going to be a lot of lasting impact and i want to go into that as well. there's also a lot of a lot of proven others, fresh faces, 24, 25, couple dozen. you've got folks that haven't been around before with familiar faces like california judge jerry brown and morgan john kitzhaber and a genuine tea party governor paulo page. you've got a guy who was around washington d.c. in congress they ran for president in 2005. there's a lot of colorful characters and i want to go into some of the more interesting storylines also from 2010. but first i want to take a really big picture look of the night on election night. and kind of close to similar

questions. governors gained five governorships you win some, like son. he said five saves will do better than a lot of the expectations for democrats heading into election. so i want to -- nathan, are you satisfied and how do you think it does for the upcoming governor's races? >> well, thanks. first let me thank dutko for this. they also want to thank all of you for coming. as craig said, normally they give this world races and i used to seem some people interested in governors races. when i want and i assumed i was in the wrong room and almost turned around while checkout. it's great to see so many people here because it's just sad, the governors races that have already taken place are going to be the most significant in our

political landscape for the next decades comes to talking about what they mean is very important and very useful. and also, i want to say to josh's point, to committees have a long history of mutual respect and sincere. and i do respect a great deal of work the rga did over the past cycle. at a phenomenal cycle and you saw the statistics come the money they raised. fill himself ran probably the best campaign of the two years. so really it is an honor to have both of them. they'll talk about the question at hand. the question just asked as i was satisfied with that gain on the republican side of five governorships. the answer to that is yes. we've spent much of this year bracing for much greater republican views. opponents predicted we were going to get annihilated. people were saying that his eight, nine, 10. there was one statistic that within my head every single night went to sleep, which was

that according to the university of minnesota, smart politics bob almond democrats were poised than at any point in 90 years. site by then i had at that, going to spend this? [laughter] maybe i can tell people we had a record-breaking year at dga. fortunately -- [laughter] fortunately, we did not have that outcome. i think phil will admit this point, has said publicly they were expecting it to be in the 30's when all was said and done. we kept them 25. the reason that's a victory for us is we enter the worst political environment since 1994. we were up to spend, outmanned, outgunned by the two to five -- 2.5 to one ratio by the rj -- rga. historical average was 5.5

governorships. the fact this environment we were so that we could keep them to honor historic average, i think is a victory for us. and so, we ended up feeling very good about the fact that we're still in the 20th. but in the twenties i mean 20. [laughter] it sounds better if you say in twenties. and you know, we were able to flip side states from republican leadership to democratic leadership. the reason i think that is significant is the only place in the country were democrats made significant inroads in changing seas from republican to democrat on the state level and will probably get into whether that's true. but being able to flip side states the republican leadership to democratic leadership in this climate not only as a victory in itself, that says something that i think is still a lecture at worth it to democratic electorate. it is looking for commonsense leadership and still wants change and right now when i said the last election as things in a

different government. before the election you talked about the big four states, california, new york, texas. all four of them. how disappointed, excited? >> everyone knows that as vermont and hawaii go -- [inaudible] [laughter] no, we clearly wanted to win florida. we've spent $6 million in florida. does a very, very important race to us. we came within 50,000 votes. think we did everything we could peer the climate and environment just wasn't right then. that one was less of a surprise because ted stroup had been chilling in the polls for the entire year. he did come up strong at the end, but wasn't enough to win. so obviously i'm disappointed in both of those, but those losses would've made it a whole lot

worse had we not then better in new england states are not putting out one important states like minnesota and oregon and of course california as well. thought to ask another corollary to that question. look in all the exit polls, all the surveys before the election. i mean, this is looking like a republican white house. he got every key demographic, republicans for the first time, women in the exit polls, white voters like 20, 25 points. this is one of the most lopsided elections in quite some time. the fact that you didn't quite win some of the big states, california, the 30 seats -- haley barbour set 30 seats. was that disappointing or we are expecting some of the candidates not been strong and get that historic number? >> before i avoid answering your question, let me thank the folks

at dutko. so many of you been so helpful to us over many, many years, especially the western virginia and the cycle, so appreciate you having us. nathan, congratulations on completing your cycle as executive director. i can tell those of you to watch that stuff in d.c. beating the same committee is tremendously difficult challenging thing to do. it just doesn't happen these days and you conduct yourself if i had a great professionalism for actually five and a half years. we look forward to many good things to come. i couldn't be more excited with the results of the election. i mean, we set out at rga really to have an impact on the key presidential battleground states. going into the election, we held

two of 10 key battleground states, walking out was that nine of 10. we invested over $50 million in those races. we were able to raise over 100 million -- than of $100 million this year as nathan mentioned. so i think the story for us is really looking at those presidential battleground state, looking particularly at the midwest, you know, you look at wisconsin, michigan, ohio, pennsylvania. you know, these are states that world democratic-controlled states, democratic governors with key presidential battleground states in 2012. and you know, they'll now have republican governors since many good candidates. we talk about some of our governor? , folks like scott walker, rick

snyder and tom corbett. i think we've got some really exciting people, john k-6 who has got more energy than my 4-year-old niece. it's a lot of fun to watch, john, go to work. so look, i think getting the neck in a five, sometimes we'll give it a six because of florida, nathan. and 29 is great. and i think we need to take a step back. this was a truly historic election cycle. and even what degree i think that governors races really to drive a lot of what happens down ticket. and the fact we were able to deploy $100 million for students taking spend $14 million for example in new england i think helped her candidates throughout down ticket. and we picked up by the levites of 13 right now stands at 13 congressional seats in new england. we made gains on the congressional side and picked up

almost 20 seats in the midwest. so you know, we suffered rue himelfarb 610 to eight and i had to sit on the postelection and they work fine. you look at it and you know for a lot of times the national pundits are saying the republican parties is now a regional party. you know, the south and the midwest. well, i think democrats really have that problem now. but got some bastions of support on the coast and in new england, but they've got a real problem in the midwest and we made gains in places that i think that they just weren't expecting. craig had mentioned something that's critically important, which is state legislative races in the state houses. there were 19 state houses that slipped from democrat to republican. nineteen. talk about an impact on the districting. in 680 seats that went, state

legislative seats to at least a minimum of 680 that republicans gained across the country. i think that's going to have a lasting impact over the next decade. so you know, look, we're very pleased with where we are. i can remember growing up playing hockey new england that we were losing the other team scoreboard. and you know, that's 29 races is something that we're very pleased with and particularly where they are think is going to have a huge impact on redistricting and also 2012 in the presidential cycle. >> i want to talk about some of the names of some of the people that were elected governorships, that the concept that pass for the presidency, the current president excluded, but most of them come from governorships and we're already seeing it in new jersey chris christie being mentioned and touted as a possible 2012 competitor in

2016. but you're going to be seeing a lot of these first-time governors being mentioned as national contenders for the presidential in 2012 and beyond. i want to go to both nathan and phil. who are the rising stars in this freshman class of governors? >> the rising stars would have to be some fresh faces, jerry brown -- [laughter] neil abercrombie -- [laughter] i would say i think that john hickenlooper from colorado will be a star right off the bat. he is a really interesting person. he breaks the political mold. he's socially liberal, fiscally conservative for most of america is quite frankly. he want any part of the country that democrats have not traditionally done well in. in the last decade from really started to taper off.

and most importantly, he's an interesting and fun person to be around. he's real. like so many governors, he's a real person and it's got interesting ideas. what is funny about him is that he ran an ad that showed him on a horse. and it was kind of a parody ad saying if you run for governor of colorado, all your consultants tell you that you have to be right in a horse. and he's the mayor of denver. he's not a cowboy. funny thing about yet is the total six months ago, you know, i'm thinking about this at. and it's me in a horse. and you know, he basically drawn up the whole thing himself. but that's the kind of guy he is. he's very creative. [inaudible] >> that's a retake of the one he did in my own race. the shower ad is excellent for those of you who haven't seen it. but i would say -- [inaudible] >> that may have been one of the

most memorable ads, john hickenlooper, not exactly the most charismatic candidate, but these into that and he puts on his hidden jumps jumps in the shower. >> was at a pivotal point of getting his identity out there? >> yeah, it was. the key point is he was fully clothed. >> alice's first ad in this race. and you know, i think it was an important ad because it wasn't negative. it was funny i don't want to do a negative vibe vibe. i want a positive campaign. he identified himself as somewhat optimistic. i think about how bad voters still respond better to optimism. not the campaign tactic, negative works. but if you can find a way to have an optimistic message, voters will respond to a better and that's why i think hickenlooper was able to set

himself apart soberly on this race. i would say dan lloyd, connecticut will be a rising star. and of course andrew cuomo, everyone knows who he is. he's got a great resume. i can't speak to this, but doherty has been taken on some bigger roles. i agree with your premise but on both sides that will be about his leadership coming out of this. i want to quickly follow up on colorado because of such a key battleground state. immigration is a major issue that democrats were very successful in many cases i think. how do you look at that as kind of a bulwark for democrats starting in 2012. >> yeah, that's very, very competitive territory. no party has ownership of that part of the country. we've proven we can win there. we still have the governor in montana. we do have a governor of

colorado. we had a governor in new mexico and arizona in recent years. we can win in that part of the country. it obviously takes a certain brand of democratic leadership that i think still exists in person or party, but yeah, that's an important part of the country. i think president obama can win that in 2012. and i think having people like john hickenlooper, brian schweitzer will make that happen. >> great question and i could probably talk and answer the question. we have so many new governors first of all. governor donnell was talking this week. he said not one of the senior governors, which is kind of crazy to think about. this was really an historic election for the rga. when you look at the fact we elect the first woman hispanic governor of state and susanna

martinez, india american woman and mickey hayley, for women governors, hispanic and brains sandoval in a key state like nevada, really important election for us, for our party going forward well into the future. i think we're going to have a lot of emerging stars. i look at our current crop of folks that haven't been inaugurated yet and eight think obviously about governor barbour as someone who is a possible candidate for president in 2012. he's been not only an exceptional governor and the state of mississippi, but he's got a great strategic mind and i think you'd be obviously a powerful force in any republican nomination for president. you know, you got folks like governor general who has done an incredible job, especially in the wake of the cold spell, oil spill in the louisiana. he's got folks like chris christie and bob donnell who

have had just incredibly good first years, you know, balancing budgets by cutting spending, not raising taxes. chris christie has taken on the unions and is really turn this state around a new jersey. so i think we've got a lot of potential candidates. i think most of the candidates for 12 already out there. you got governor fulani, governor barbour wang, former governor romney running. but i think you're going to have a number of potential vice presidential that will be interesting on our side. you're going to look at a susanna martinez or a brains sandoval because they're both from swing states. they both have great stories to tell and i think the list is long. i mean, we could probably go on and on, but it's great. i think the other thing that's

interesting is for rga at least, this incoming group of governors is pretty tight knit. they talk to one another a lot. so you're going to see a high degree, i think, of policy cross-pollination. and i'll governors across the country are doing with the same set of issues right now, which is how do you balance budgets and a terrible economy? and you know, they're looking at folks like jindall and barbour and mcdonnell and fulani who have done these things over the years. and also i should mention rick perry who by the way we were doing the back of the envelope sort of assessment of governor perry. he said $285 million in negative advertising spent against him over the course of his career. 285 billion was in incredible amount. the state that dga thought they

had a shot at and invested some money in. >> had i known that 285 number, would probably would have not -- [laughter] >> you know, governor. it's been an incredible leader in taxes and somebody who's going to be very prominent i think on the national scene as well going forward. >> phil, i'm struck that you mentioned a lot of these up and comers in the gubernatorial class, but surely talking -- i remember governor's class where we were already about potential candidates on a presidential ticket. you really think after being in office for two, three years they could be seriously considered? >> you? >> you look at chris christie and what he's accomplished. look at his national profile. look at some of the things mcdonnell has been able to do. it's have to be in for a year, but i do think that our current crop of presidential candidates are probably -- i think they're all white males. correct me if i'm wrong. i think we're going to be

looking for some diversity on the ticket. and i think we've got that and our current crop of governor select. >> do you believe chris christie? >> yeah, i take governor christie's word that i don't think he's going to run. 2016 is another story. >> i was going to say, i think that it's very possible all the candidates he mentions will be possible 2012 candidates were maybe 2016, but sometime in the near future. and the reason i think it is something about makes a governor so compelling, but compelling in this environment. our trust -- are used to users of powerpoint and we talked about how bad the problems are right now and then how will public trust in government is. and that creates a real problem, particularly for folks in d.c. you have to think about washington d.c. because our problems are increasing, but her faith in government to fix them

is decreasing. but think what that is created as the faith in government is probably at an all-time low. that's why i think we're getting so many people identified independents, not democrats or republicans. democrats are slightly different breed in the sense they are closer to people, most importantly outside of washington d.c. they think for a lot of people, type of leadership we've seen is more like what you want to get the federal level to the leadership in congress. you know, while many times you think two years as a governor is not enough experience, i guess it doesn't surprise me so many names to be considered just a big governors to have so much more of what is compelling to people right now. >> i mean, you have a lot of governors coming in, a lot of the governors you mention. it's such a budgetary environment and it's not going to be you cannot benefit from spending a lot of money. a lot of cuts will have to be made. to think they can survive politically? ed rendell, one of the most

popular governors two years ago when he leaves office with approval ratings in the 30's, low 40's. do you think you can survive the subprime? >> absolutely. and i think they can thrive. and i point again to both make donnell, christie, jindall, barbour, governors would've done it to make deep cuts. you know, one of the things that was certainly the wind was at her back. you know, if you look at some of the issue matrix for the selection, two thirds of the likely voters going into election day, jobs and the economy as the number one issue and spending as the number two issue. and we have, you know, democrats in congress and the president to thank for that, but that was the same issue environment we face it in virginia last year in september and october. bumbling governor's race, but experience in virginia, with the most single out on education and the entire election cycle, which if you had told me that in the governors race i would've said

you're drinking too much that day. but you know, the issue was certainly in our favor and voters generically trust the republicans on the economy and on spending. if you look at those governors that have made hard decisions balance budgets by cutting spending, not raising taxes, even, you know, looking at education and health care in areas that traditionally, you know, voters don't like to see us cut, those governors have a lot of support. donald cut $4.2 billion in his first year. he is a $400 million surplus in virginia and he's got a 60% job approval rating. chris christie, same thing. and now, and even worse environment. so i hope and pray and encourage all of our candidates or governor select to really look at what some of these other governors have done and make those cuts, make them now and

hopefully the economy will come around in the next couple of years and mobile to reinvest some key priorities. >> i want to get to audience questions and a little bit, but first i want to do a lightning round of questioning. what were the biggest surprise is? every election you've got some shockers. i was certainly surprised by some of the governors race outcomes. nathan, what was the biggest surprise for you on election night? >> biggest surprise for me probably was illinois. >> you told me he thought it was almost over a few months before. >> yeah, that was between you and me. [laughter] he was trailing for most of the selection, you know. and you know several points behind grady. in fact, julius was out pulling him.

and to close that cat back i was just amazing and a real testament to him. we did have one person on our staff who insisted for months that he was going to go this race. he told me were by and large democrats who had made up their minds yet and they would eventually come home for pat quinn and he was right. and as just enough margin. >> is very larger lesson that phil brady ran back very outspoken conservative candidate in illinois in the key to winning a lot of elections is the suburbs. there are lots of these other states in the future and if their campaign strategy that quinn uses? >> well, yeah. i think with that ratio is that there still is when we have a greater tolerance for mainstream there still a breaking point, particularly in states that have been history of electing moderates. in illinois you have a history of electing moderates from the northern part of the state.

phil brady is not one of those. i think it shows even though it are greater tolerance for kansas we still have a breaking point. >> do you think illinois was an unpleasant surprise. i think i would agree with nathan that we thought we had a really good shot coming down the stretch the last couple of weeks they are. that's a state where the partnership you see in a lot of cases between the dga and the unions really pay off, whereas we literally had been some reports had 4000 paid workers on the ground in cook county leading up to election day. in cook county i think the turnout was higher in cook county over the senate race. and really i think at the end of the day, that was the story but there is a better turnout observation based on union support. i think the other surprise that was a pleasant prize for me personally was one of the states that i was dealing with everyday was florida. we came through just a bruising

nomination contest, where we had over $70 million spent, you know, 95% which is a negative advertisements. and you know, as our nominee, rick scott had a negative image going into the general election until late primary -- and you know, he was upside down. and you know, we sort of thought alex sink had the makings to be a good candidate. didn't turn out that way. i think the skype team ran one of the best campaigns i saw in the country and what is obviously a critically important state. the rga has spent over $98 billion in florida and i know dga was heavily involved. so 50,000 votes will take it. it was, you know, incredibly important to win florida. >> emerged in florida, rick scott tens of billions of dollars of his own fortune in

california. make would've been spent 120, 130 -- the same amount of her own money and lost by eight, nine points. it wasn't even close. do you want self-funded candidates or could that deeply backfire? >> i think it doesn't easily backfire, but it can backfire. if i remake with men, men, this is on hindsight. there are smarter than people come by think in hindsight she should've taken a break. she should've let the election cool off of it. after she won the primary emotion eyebright backup on tv the next day. and so, she had nominated the areas for six months and i think she became her own worst enemy because few of us are tired and they built in this narrative she was trying to buy the election rather than earn it. so i think in that case the smarter thing would be to have her beat the budget, take the summer off and let people pull down and started again on labor day with the new brown was going to win.

>> brown was somewhat conventional in many ways. the book, i think california is an example. at the stay where we ran a number of these races where we had income that democratic governors who were retiring. doyle is a good example, who are in the 30's were the 40's and job approval rating. you know, rendell in pennsylvania. in this case, you know, we at schwarzenegger who i think his job approval rating was literally in the high teens, low twenties. canosa testing. i think the democrats in brown's campaign did a good job linking. there was one ad for they had the same thing. they did a good job sort of linking to schwarzenegger and that was the killer. i also think, you know, the housekeeper issue, kind of when it came up sort of park to celebrate the middle of the last 60 days of the election. certainly did not help. and we paid the price with the hispanics. i think the overall exit polling

showed that we got i think it was 13, 14% hispanics. >> all right. well i wanted to open up the questioning to the audience as i know you all probably have a lot of questions that nathan and so would love to answer. so raise your hand or that they know who wants to ask a question. >> two questions. [inaudible] does having jerry brown and not having the problems or having the problems california is going to have to face, is that a good thing or a bad and for both of you? >> return of the disco era if you will. >> i'm originally from ohio. could you talk more about the downstate because there was a total flip up by think

republicans on all of the state races except senator brown in both houses. thank you. >> i think california for all of us in this room, for everybody across the country is a little scary to think about the problems that state is facing from a physical standpoint. i mean, at some point in the next couple years, they are going to be, you know, asking the feds for significant amount of money and questions whether or not we do it. and i think jerry brown's has got a huge, huge challenge on his hands. the people of california have sort of decided we're not going to win races in states where people want higher taxes and, you know, they sort of decided that's what they want. and so, i'm concerned, you know, as a citizen, you know, looking at the economy and the way things are going. look at all the unfunded liabilities in the state of

california has. i'm just not sure, you know, how jerry brown's and that legislature is going to dig their way out of the hole. as far as ohio goes, i mean, that was obviously a huge success story for us. we invested heavily in that race, heavily and early. you know, one of the lessons from ohio inmate and i'd be interested to hear what you think about this, literally the last couple weeks, the lessons of that campaign. normally have to deliver 1000 gross rating points to deliver a single message. in a state like ohio it's literally probably 2500 or 3000 statewide because there was so much going on on tv. all the outside groups come in and so it's obviously a national election. we saw that any member states of states across the country. to the early money there mattered. we invested heavily at rga and early voting, and the infrastructure and state party and some of our key states and

ohio. that definitely pay dividends down ticket and across the board. and i think that's obviously a key state in 2012 and we're really excited to have john k. fick, you know, who is going to be a great governor, but also somebody who is not going to shy away from building the party infrastructure. i think that's going to be really helpful to her nominee in 2012. >> can anyone hang on for more than one term? >> i think so. i think the story of california is also being told in most other states, probably to a greater deer in california. the fact is most states have to drastically cut their budgets because 49 states have a balanced budget requirement. if you look at the spending fiscal year 2011, overall state spending is 7% less than two dozen eight, which is lester before the recession. all state governments are cutting spending. california has additional

problems because there's so hamstrung hamstrung by the referendum requirement. but look, i will quote our chair, governor jack markel of delaware who left in 2008. in a time like this, why do you want to be governor? his response is that the timely is what you need, more than ever, good people to be governor. if you believe in your candidates, which i do, this is the time that you want them in office. it's a whole lot easier quite frankly eight years ago because you have to say yes to everybody. it was easy to be popular but a political capital. times like this on the right deficits knife to cut budgets and go back in july caddick and, it's a lot harder to be popular. now is when you need real leaders. if you believe in your candidates, this is when you want them there. the final thing i would say phil is right. one of the things they learned is that relatively speaking you can make a bigger impact earlier out a new kid before because i

don't understand, there's some there's some 520 specimens that spent their entire budget the last week of the elections commotions of waste of money. at that point in time, one can be a competing with airtime, everyone of the universe. and to come if voters elect me and all of you, you're not listening to political ads. you're turning them off. i think the smart thing to do, which i think both dj and rj did effectively with start earlier because you get an earlier when people are paying a little more attention. >> question. >> yeah. >> make sure you get some exercise this morning. >> question for both of you. politics in the united states, particularly looking at geography, the southern region, the south of the democrats. basically got wiped out on election night.

democrat operative, republican operative, how do you see that? i've seen enough of this too now i remember when i talked about the republican a lot for president, but there's always resurgence. there's always a way to come back. the kind of looking down the road, you know, how do you deal with that in the coming years? >> well, let me say this. i don't think it's quite as bad as it might look. in the way of elections, you will think it's plus five around the country. so you're already down a couple points. you're not going to win that we fear. so it's very tough to win in the south to share. that doesn't mean in a different year we can win. we already for the country and the way the election on top of that is very tough. consider however alex sink came in with 50,000 votes of winning the largest state in the south. another surprise we didn't mention is jeanne shaheen came very close. roy barnes didn't come quite as

close as i thought he would, but held his own and important state. so we did run three competitive races in the south, but in this way of elections where this is the hear from republicans not only have to log down, but they need to in the purple states, too. the purple states have a 50/50 state. this is when you're the party benefiting us to witness with elections. we feel alright we can hold onto some of those purple states and again as we talked before, all of them to some modest gains. i think it was probably too much to ask. i think were going to start making inroads and was traditionally difficult territory. >> states like georgia and texas, you know, these are competitive states. i mean, we think about them now. they're southern state, republican states. texas is going to be a minority, maturity state within the next few years. and no, i think that's probably one of the reasons why dga took a serious look in the battle of

texas. georgia is a competitive state. and likely would be in good campaigns and have good candidates. but you can't take a think the same thing on both sides. we came within, heck, if you look at new england, you know, you are chewing connecticut and new hampshire and vermont with the three states who came within 20, 30,000 votes of winning all three of the states. so to me the story is more about kindness, you know, what our suburban annex urban voters across the country? how they act in? what are they responding to? and how are you communicating their? i think that is really a critical, you know, swing area. when i woke up everyone in my usher in virginia thinking about how do in prince william and loudoun county and fairfax county? had you in you win those areas? what issues do you communicate on quite exciting for both

parties, you know, we have to caution against thinking yeah, we've got x, y or z in the bag because we have seen things change rapidly. >> any other questions from the audience? >> given the swing towards the republican side, not just in the gubernatorial races, can you speculate about what you think the implications might be for health care, both national policy and actual execution on the ground in the states? >> and were very republican republican governor strike to put sand in the levers of the health care law. it's going to be good at what are the implications? the >> yeah, i don't think so. i think would be more interesting to see what happens in congress now that they've taken over the house. i don't think there's going to be any germanic changes in large part because i think as time goes on, particularly to the benefits of health care become relays, people will come not more accustomed, but more

appreciative of what it is the democrats passed. >> how long does it take for the benefits to become realized? >> you know, i think the jury is out on health care. i was a bit. i mean, we've got 29 republican governors that are going to be speaking with a very loud, probably more unified voice that we've heard in a long time. you've got really strong policy leaders like governor barbour and jindall and donnell and others and perry who are taking the lead in trying to sort of unify that group and speak with one voice. and so, you've seen a lot of -- using the governors consulting with speaker boehner and others in congress. i do think they're going to play, you know, a more forceful role. it's interesting on health care as you've got governors that campaign certainly this year

against, you know, against a health care plan, either repeal or reform. and so, they have to prepare to implement on one track while, you know, also continuing to fight it on another track. and so, you know, that's a challenge that's going to be interesting to see how that plays out and i'm not sure how it will. >> phil, just to follow up, was health care come without a law in any any of the races? >> absolutely. i think, you know, more importantly, you know, someone described the election to me as more of a restraining order on obama's policies. and, you know, i think taken as a whole, you know, health care was an issue certainly in certain states. cap-and-trade was a big issue that maybe was somewhat underreported, especially in a

lot of coal producing areas across the country. it was a big issue in our race flashier in southwest virginia in the rota valley and on down into the ninth district of virginia. but overall, you know, it was the economy and lack of the confidence of the economy. i think the wrong track number going on election day was 67%, which is the highest percentage in the last five years of midterm elections. and then spending. you know, the president's overall approval rating was i think nationally around 43% going into the election were the democrats were able to hold onto governors races, was in those areas for the president's approval rating was five, seven, 10-point, you know, about sort of the national average. >> well, i think were just about

out of time, but i wanted to really give a gracious thank you to nathan, phil, dutko, craig for putting the panel together. i think we learned not just a lot about what happened on election night, but what results will mean. i think were in for a pretty entertaining but newsworthy couple of years. >> it's always entertaining. >> yeah, thank you. >> thank you. [applause] >> gang, we've got about five minutes here is people need to check their crack very and then were going to start the ne half-hour. .. [inaudible conversations]con [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations]

>> thank you, folks. appreciate everybody sticking around here. around we're going to shift the topic a little bit. obviously we were doing some analysis on the race is of the rga, the dga and were now going to focus the debate on really a what worked and didn't work. i was kind of fascinated that you could spend 200 million of your own money and not get a leg to it, proving that the candidates and the message really does count. it's not all money. so hopefully the senate got that message as well. i wanted to introduce our next speaker here, chris cillizza. houston is the number of times it does. i was very entertaining. if you want to be really entertaining you should go to youtube, enter chris cillizza base camp bp debate night on youtube and it's kind of disturbing. but very funny.

he's appealing to the younger audience there. [inaudible] [laughter] >> seriously, it's very funny. chris runs a weblog called the fix for the "washington post." i'm sure many of you have seen it. if you haven't, you need to. and during the campaign season he runs a commentary called the friday light which is looking at the top 10 races at least according to hand and what's interesting about them and why. so you've been deeply involved with all of these races and paying very, very close attention to what worked and what didn't work. and so, in the past were the best thing to do here is to let chris grip on his observations and then use that to stipulate discussion. he's very good at the q&a and very engaging. so let's let them take it from here. thanks, chris. >> thank you, sir. all right. so, i guess i won't talk for long because the president

sitting here anything. does everybody say that? i won't talk for long. they probably do. bill clinton. and finally -- [laughter] anything until i'm sure covered a lot of it. but i would say is this is true at the gubernatorial level and the senate level, too. i think what we saw affirmed last tuesday, which i always think it literally feels like six months ago. i don't know why. it's like time stretches once the election is because it was not very long ago. i think what we saw is candidates in the campaign really do matter in statewide races. .. i did the same thing in colorado with bennett. very, very good campaign from beginning to end. amazing that a guy like that gets elected in a year like that

in a state like that. same thing. i would say probably at the statewide level, governors and senate affirmed that campaigns and candidates do matter when they're close. but ultimately always think about winning the candidate. and i get to meet lots of them. someone told me it's like an old marketing slogan work dog does like the dog food, it doesn't matter how good the marketing campaign around the dog is. i think it's always going to remember that. i put myself in there. it's all metrics, how much money race and you know i'm here can hold inside. and that's all fine. but if there's no there there in the middle, you know, that makes a huge difference and it models in places there. it's not true probably at the house bubble. at the house level, in some waa you are the art want to vote against the that's good enough.t

a guy named rove labrador who got elected inuld idaho. i mean, should not have won then primary general election who did everything he was supposed to do. it matters less in-house candidates or less money is spent than people pay less attention. it's more of a charlie cook said in the house a parliamentary style collection. it has nothing to do with the two candidates. i would say the what the gubernatorial level the candidates do matter. i was thinking about campaign and candidates i thought were good. there's always less i think that our good them are bad. that is a depressing thing about politics but i think sometimes you see a kind of race to the bottom. i don't know if you watch the nv samet debate. i have to. they pay me. the only reason i did watch it

and it was really not good. you were kind of like i can't believe these people are going to serve. harry reid i think is an able politician i think even his biggest allies would say he's not super telegenic or charismatic so i think there were some bad campaigns. i do think there were good campaigns and i was writing them down and it's funny a lot of the good campaigns this may run counter to the point i made i thought one of the best campaigns in the country was ted strickland and ohio. i thought he did a lot of things right. he was in a very difficult situation, 400,000 jobs lost in the first four years as governor. the industrial co midwest, very difficult for democrats to win when as was proven here but i thought he did a lot of very good things i thought they prosecuted the case against john quite well in the long run came

up short think he ran a pretty credible campaign himself. it wasn't a huge disparity like i would say with harry reid a great campaign. other people and trying to remind myself. i thought scott walker was good in wisconsin. he's the republican. he ran a smart outside campaign, good ads. this goes to show conventional wisdom isn't or smartness isn't all contained within the bounds of washington. he had a firm -- immediate firm didn't do political tv, something i don't forget the name of it but it's like red box or something it made me think of those places you get the disease, something like that. his ads were quite good. he ran a campaign the brown bag campaign. he brings his lunch to work

every day, drives like a 19922 leota silica, this whole idea that government spends too much and we need to rein in, really good, smart message. i would say especially, who lost to him ran a pretty good campaign. look, it is an odd campaign, but jerry brown did a pretty good job. he kind of tit -- looker, when you're running as someone who married a multibillionaire in a state like california in which tv -- there's lots of states where there is diminishing returns. it's like how much money can you spend on television i know what? as hillary clinton and barack obama proved the answer to that is lots. but i do think -- look, i will use my home state of connecticut. there's only so much money you can spend. you can buy a lot of new york tv and reached the southern part of the stick and spend billions of dollars. linda mcmahon is going to have spent 50ish million dollars.

but there is no amount you can spend to get diminishing returns in california. talk about $5 million a week, try more than that, to run any significant statewide television , for get and direct mail, a conservative, hispanic radio, which she did. she did everything literally you could possibly do. and i think jerry brown, it's hard to run against that because you are running against somebody you run 10,000 pints of tv, she can run 20,000 points of tv, you run 20,000, she can run 40,000. so i think that he's smart we tried to shrink the campaign and he took a lot of criticism for that. he's not doing anything, she's winning, it's a disaster. he shrank the campaign because he figured i can't match her and money left but we need to have a short campaign so that i can match her as much as i can on television but some help for waiver of their which he needed and i think ultimately meg

whitman didn't turn out to be as good candidate -- -- obviously i am by bias here -- we are not important, everyone ignores us. it is hostility at times toward the press, and there's a great youtube clich if you are at youtube looking at my idiocy you should also search meg whitman, there's a time she does a round table at e-business -- some kind of like green jobs please come and reporters clearly think that when this is over with reporters mostly go to events not because they care deeply about green energy jobs necessarily, but because they want to have a chance to address the candidates especially in california where you don't get as much access. and the meg whitman people didn't want her to ask questions so the shepherd and greet escort out of the room but then somebody, god bless the flipcam,

they are like she has to go to another event. she's just like standing in the other room and then they put up a screen to block her so that they couldn't. so those kind of things i didn't wear well or they don't give her the benefit of the doubt when it comes to the media. you know, i think in california it may matter a little bit less because it is such a television state and you just spend money on tv and it didn't wind up being enough. i think california proved that even in a year like this which is a wonderful year for the republicans nationally and is still very, very hard to get elected as a republican. you know, i would point at arnold schwarzenegger but let's be honest he wasn't elected as a republican he was elected as a celebrity. elected kind of it would be cool to have that guy as governor, not because they believed in the principal he espoused. many republicans say he doesn't espoused republican principles. so i think it's difficult to get elected but i do think jerry brown does deserve to have

credit for the campaign he ran. courts seals i have. i thought blonden was good and nevada. hispanic federal judge that harry reid gave to make sure he never ran for office. do you run for office? i mean i think he is a star and solve a lot of republicans elected. i don't know how much skill and meeting talked about this but the governors level he saw a lot of republicans elected to lie still and will play a prominent role in the national party. susan martinez, the first latino woman ever elected, very good campaign, very steady, very solid rga helped her in the primary, smartly to get to the primary financially, and i think she will be nicky hailey won by a smaller margin than i think a lot of people thought she would