that, and then look for others. and including getting some other 10-year-olds in it. because -- no, i mean, that was an important thing. like, back in the day there were the panther cubs and different things like that, youth organizations that were active, an active part of the revolutionary movement, and i think that would be important. >> that's a very profound question. i got an 11-year-old daughter myself, and we have deep dialogues. she raises questions that i oftentimes cannot answer. ..

>> you can get that, read the children's book. you can get that from music. you can get them from learning how to love your mother and father better, listen to your grandparents. you can learn about in your synagogue or temple or church or trade union. but we live in a society where there is a systematic attempt to marginalize, if not render it impotent and rusty, compassion, love and service to others. you can always ask a psychologist. 18-year-olds dressed site hundred hypersensitivity to

paint others their abnormal because we are producing narcissism. that's what they get on television every day. someone loving everybody, something must be run within. know know, society has a sickness. it's not the young folk who is trying to love the sickness. of course, they can't do that on their own. so that's not an answer. that's an attempt, a gesture at an answer but that's something that i would push -- is a 10 year-old your? who has that question? where? give our sister a hand. [applause] our dear sister raises that profound question. from the mouth of david at uc berkeley shall we learn. >> we want to remind you develop a questionnaire that was on your seat in your program. we really, really need the questionnaires, and ask you, we

also want to encourage you to donate, if you have not come in terms of supporting our efforts to this program. so now we are going to a concise question on this end. >> well, first off i want to say thank you for giving us instructions for a better society. we really appreciate that. [applause] but my question is, the theme of an that has been focused around you being, education and also revolutionary activism. i know you spoke about being -- me, myself, i'm a hip-hop listed. i was listening to an artist and he said, he said his faith is inevitable, talked about basically when the 1% sees that a revolution is there, their vision is to knock them down. my question to you, you to come

is why aren't we as a community building schools, elementary schools and high schools, and keeping our youth in there and instilling methodologies and the real truth? we said we don't learn the real truth. why don't we have educators and people who know the real truth and who really can spread the seed and keeping schools together, and pumping our kids out to the ivy leagues, things of that nature? so, why aren't we on that track? people like us, college goers, that we can do? [cheers and applause] >> yeah, definitely. is there any type of initiative we can do to try to get that ball rolling? >> do you want to say a word on the? >> i can start on it. i mean, one thing that everybody can do, it's important college students, they can reach the younger youth. and you don't have to start, you don't have to have a school to do that. you could actually figure out how to connect with high school

students, and take to them some of what you have learned. and not just what you learned in college, but what you appear to have learned living life, you know. you can bring to them some of what they are not getting in terms of what, where the situation they are up against comes from and how they can begin to do with it. and out of those discussions, this can spread because i remember back when i was young, if folks from college, you know, came to talk with us about stuff, we wanted to hear that. because we knew that they'd gone, they had gone through this before us and never coming back with some knowledge, you know, we wanted to grapple with it and that was an important role that college students who started getting into the revolutionary movement played by bringing stuff back to the younger youth who were in high school, and like that. and they seated us with some ideas and some challenges,

because when we saw them doing things like, you know, getting with the student nonviolent court meeting committee, getting involved in that, knowing this it is, opposing the war in vietnam, that is kind of like damn, could we do that? i think we could. unit, and that kind of spurred some of us. i know my brother, he did his first action when i got sent to jail for refusing to go to vietnam. he organized students there, not directly in relation to my case, but he said i've got to do something. my brother is doing that, i've got to do something to. so they get a walkout at his high school. so i would say that in relation to that, that are definitely steps that could be taken, including right now to reach back to other youth, not only organizing at your college but reaching back to other youth in the many and the high school's. >> one thing to keep in mind,

there's always people who care. it's just oftentimes they don't have power resources to be visible so we have to hunt them down. freedom schools across the country. doesn't have the money as the charter students have. but she has freedom schools. we need more young people part of those kinds of schools, same as too as you say with our musicians. your brother jay-z, musical genius. kanye west, near genius. [laughter] both on the throne right now, right? they were more influenced by mortal technique -- [applause] a different atmosphere. see what i mean? i want him to be themselves but i don't want them to be a moral technique. but if they were influenced by all of that attention, all of the influence, all of that visibility, all of that publicity and celebrity would be put to use to something grander than a little narrow effect that

it has when it comes to justice. when it comes to courage. see what i mean? we are talking about courageous artists who affect young people who, when you listen to the great artistry, he also speak to sell and generate the kind of courage that is required. that's what we had in the '60s. that's what young folks do not have today. if i were going up right now, i would be more, there's a brother named rudy ray moore when i was going up, talked about dolomite. i loved rudy ray moore, don't get me wrong. but if he is a dominant fade to black culture, i would've been a very different kind of person. because what he was talking about was that stand stuff. you know what i mean? that send stuff, body simulation, sexual conquest. that's what the fellow was talking the.

he got a right to do that. that's fine. it's not the most spiritually healthy way of being in the world but that's fine. but that's what young people are bombarded with every minute of the day. and you see what happens to the deeper hip-hop artist? you've got to go underground because you can't get it do. they are not visible because the recording industry and the radio industry and the video industry wants to keep that bubblegum stuff visible so that people won't wake up. [applause] so it's a better priority, a priority. and keep listening to that hip-hop because hip-hop was one of the great cultural breakthroughs the last 45 years, but we don't -- where we are now. oh, yeah, this is what we're talking about tonight. we are coming back. oh, yes, absolutely. it's so good to see you though.

>> time is not on our side so we will only have time for one question in each side come and then we'll put closure. so the next person to the mic. concise question, please. >> so, i don't know if you know of this room, 2010 there was a debate about that testing this universities funds from israel for its occupation, the racism. [applause] >> and i appreciated a lot of the remarks tonight and also including the ones on palestine. and i'm wondering question about tactics. a lot of people say it's wrong, occupation, but we don't want to touch the pictures look in and the south african case, the '80s or whatnot, but now we're not so sure that someone if you personally would support divestment and if not, what distinction is that investment efforts against israeli racism and what lessons can we learn as much on university campuses from the '80s efforts to apartheid.

>> okay. what i would say is, i would support an effort at divestment from israel. one thing though that you have to remember about the south african divestment is that the movement around that started well before it was successful. you know, because the african liberation coordination committee started in 1972. i happen to have been at the founding conference where they did that. that's why i know when it was formed. and it was really in the '80s that it took old. so some people had to work at bat for about a decade to bring it out. and while is very important in relation to that was the exposure of exactly what was happening to people in south africa, and the connections between the united states and all that going down. and it was through that that a

movement was brought forward where there were young people in this country who felt like they had to take a stand on it. but there was at least a decade that went on before it really took old, and you have to, you got to work with the. you actually have to bring out to people, here's the reality. you have to understand you're going up against some stuff because they are not going to get this in the media, the mainstream media. they're not going to get this more broadly in society, so you have to figure out to bring it out in ways that it touches people and moves them to want to act. >> i would want to salute you, brother, for being part of such a movement. talk about israeli-palestinian issues in america. one of the most difficult and delicate issues you can do, takes courage to do that, but we have to do it. there's no doubt that u.s. foreign policy has been predicated on the notion that a palestinian life does not have

the same value as an israeli life. that's wrong. [applause] that's wrong. they are all human. they have the same value, same dignity. same sanctity as christians. the question then becomes, how does one proceed in such a way that you make it very clear our universal principles so people don't think that somehow you are just highlighting the state of israel, given the long history of anti-jewish hatred that we know, a whole host of other religious formations. so that for example, you said to you said this would be my view. the end is, or the aim is, the end of occupation. any occupation, any people, any people. if palestinians were dominating

jews, it's immoral. it's wrong. it's unjust. you say the aim is the end of occupation, per se, want to do all we can to end that occupation, making a clear. then i think we begin to muster a very strong case for divestment. but it's a very treacherous terrain, as you can imagine. and one has to be very, very clear about the universal of the principles on the one hand, and at the same time just a difficult it is the history of anti-jewish hatred. and what is a easily accepted in this country, which is not valuing the lives of palestinians the way we value other lives, especially in america. [applause] >> and our last question.

>> earlier was said something about what can we do to awaken our brothers and sisters who are still sleepwalking, and so i would like to ask, what would you say to those people of color or anyone who hesitates to fully engage in the occupy movement? >> oh, well one, my dear brother, participation in the occupy movement is not the only criteria of people who are awake. honey, the occupy movement is a beautiful thing but it has no monopoly on the struggle for justice. it has no monopoly on the subject of freedom and so forth. there's a lot of other context, and you can do magnificent things, and then just, say prayers for the occupied folks. i'm praying for you, i have other things i'm doing. do you know what i mean? you're dealing with domestic violence over here, cowardly brothers of all colors who are dealing with the vines of them. this'll be my my contact the occupy movement, you're not making a priority so i will see you once every two weeks but i'm

focused on this issue. that's beautiful. seek him in the movement is like a jazz orchestra. we are lifting all these voices but everybody can't be a duke ellington's been. count has a band, too. [applause] >> fletcher henderson got a band. at a natural for god a group. and the whistle got a crew. everybody can't sing in the same group. see what i mean? the occupy movement can't just suck the air out of the whole room just because they are visible. they just doing magnificent things and some of us spending a lot of time, but there's a lot of different other context, see what i mean? but we should always know, the point my dear brother raymond ross reminds me that people wake up at different times. brother carl dix made the same point. people wake up at different times. malcolm little, took them a while to wake up, didn't it? but when that negro woke up,

became a free black man, he woke up, is that right quick dinner and the time you hadn't woken up? oh, you've, you fully alert now. a beautiful thing. so the process, you know what a mean? little wayne might end up being on the cover for struggle for justice to give him time. get that brother time. you don't know. 50-cent might be on, might be on the cover. you don't know. you got to love him, no matter what. >> we want to, first of all, show our speakers extra love for all of their energy. [applause] >> and professor taylor, professor taylor, professor taylor. to make. >> we love you, professor taylor. professor clark, the late

professor barbara christin. we will never forgive you, barbara, never, never. how you doing, my brother? >> brother carl dix has dared us to help your brother cornel west has encouraged us to understand that justice is what love looks like. on behalf of the department of african-american studies, and a host of other people, thank you for coming out tonight. make sure you turn in the questionnaire, along with financial support for this evening. we appreciate it. >> do you have some paper? i will write it down for you. absolutely. i didn't bring my card but i will bring down -- ♪ ♪ ♪

>> a number of groups >> now, remarks from alberto gonzales who served in the bush

administration as both attorney general and white house counsel. he discusses his white house experience and gives his thoughts on some of the current legal issues. from the birmingham, alabama, chapter of the federalist society, this is 40 minutes. >> today, justice comes also be speak and to us. the general umbrella here is, i hope you have come loaded for bear with questions for the judge. thank you very much. judge gonzales, thank you very much. [applause] >> thank you, and good afternoon. i'm often asked what's it like? what's it like to go to work everyday at the white house? what's it like to walk into the

oval office and get the president of the united states advice on terrorism policy. what's it like to be in the situation room in 2003 and witnessed the president give general tommy franks the order to command operation iraqi freedom lacks what's it like to be on the south lawn, on the evening of september 11, 2001, and greet the president when marine one lands on that historic day? what's it like? you know, for a lawyer, for an american citizen, for the son of a poor construction worker, it's a privilege, it's a duty, it's a source of pride and excitement. people come from all over the world to see the white house, the most recognizable 18 acres in the world. and i've yet to meet an american who is not in awe the first time they step foot into the west

wing. it takes your breath away because history is made their everyday. i served during a notable period in our nation's history. following the 9/11 attacks, the lawyers worked side-by-side with policymakers in washington, and we tried our best to defend this country in a manner consistent with the constitution. advising the president of the united states it's more difficult than advising a normal client. president bush looked to me for legal advice, but i wasn't his lawyer. i represent the white house and the office of the presidency, not the individual. for some come in a criminal investigation, president bush had to hire private counsel. because i couldn't represent him in his personal capacity. if the president giving evidence relating to a crime or criminal investigation, i would be required to report it to the department of justice. the president and i are morning

people. we did our best work in quiet conversations early in the morning in the oval office, before many of the other people in the white house had come to work, before the presidents scheduled meetings for the day. we spoke often about the scope and his commander-in-chief power and time of war. exercising executive power in a system of checks and balances fuels a constant struggle between executive, legislative and judicial branches of our government to define the limits at a time of armed conflict. and i used the term limit intentionally because i want to emphasize that even in a time of war, and a time of crisis, there are legal and constitutional constraints on the presidency that has to be respected and has to be defended. determining limits, that is a subject of great debate today. most often it's resolve in the political arenas and not in the

courts but in reality the limits of the presidents of authority is often a function of his political popularity and his courage to do what he believes is necessary, irrespective of public opinion. however, however we choose to define his limbs i think boundaries are desirable, even necessary in our system of government. it's true that americans sleep easier when they believe they are safer because the actions of the president. but even more important to americans is knowing that the presidential action that keeps us safe is within the limits of the constitution. where the measures taken in response to 9/11 attacks controversial? yes. where they tough? they had to be. did they save american lives? without question. which is why many of those policies continue today under current administration. the world has changed so much in just the past 10 years. now more than ever americans

yearn for leadership. we want men and women who value courage and commitment over popularity, who are not focus on the next election, rather on a next generation. leaders who say this is who i am, and this is where i stand. in less than a year, americans will choose the next occupant in the white house for the next four years, and during the 2008 presidential campaign we heard a lot about the promise for change. in truth, every election represents an opportunity for change, new beginnings, the next chapter in the american story. a prominent newspaper in d.c. correctly acknowledged that talking about change is not new. people talk about change even before there was america. this is why the framers of the constitution came to this land. but we continue to talk about change, to want change. why is that? it is because our nature as

americans is to strive for something more, for ourselves and for those who we love. every time i cast a vote, it is a reflection of hope. a tangible act which makes my dreams come true. a poor single mom who can afford to take her child to hospital. and unemployed father can get his job back at the fact that a better -- fighting overseas. a college student votes for her future. our lives are about to be about choice. the person we choose to work in the oval office will have to work with congress to resolve a staggering array of challenges. how do we stop iran from becoming a nuclear power? what should we do to get more americans back to work? how do we sustain the hard-fought gains in afghanistan and iraq to continue the momentum of the arab spring? how will we resolve our deficit

problem? what role shall we play in dealing with europe's debt crisis? will we as a country find the courage, to pass comprehensive federal immigration legislation that sustains our economy, and complements our mastery of objectives? when and how will our military be deployed and used around the world? the president will also have to make another set of important decisions that gets far too little attention from the public and media, the appointment of federal judges. many decisions i just spoke of, when they are ultimately made, are going to be challenged in our courts. and whether you like it or not, the judiciary will have an say in whether the elected grandkids can move forward with policy. i'm reminded of a dinner speech i gave to a very, very conservative group in d.c. shortly after i was named white house counsel. i was just this guy from texas but they did know who i was. here i was from austin, and when

discussing the u.s. supreme court, i told that audience that the role of the courts was to interpret the constitution and that judges tell us what the constitution requires and allows. well, i've was booed. it was a vicious. and i went back to the white house and i was puzzled over the reaction, because evidently the audience didn't understand that while i believe the constitution means what it says, and that to go outside the words and try to discern involvement of societal norms and international trends, places too much power of the hands of unelected, accountable judges. i also know, and they knew back then the reality that judges can't and to affect policy in the way that they decide cases. this is why presidential elections or consequential. other than sending young men and women into battle, no decision by president is more important than who he or she in the future

will place on the u.s. supreme court. they represent the president's most lasting legacy. in april 2005 i invited d.c. circuit judge john roberts to my office on the fifth floor of the department of justice. i've been attorney general for just two must do it was early evening and judge robert and i sat down alone in my office, and bush had been reelected a few months earlier, and we anticipated, finally, after four years in office the president would get the opportunity to appoint a justice to the u.s. supreme court. judge roberts was on our so-called short list, developed after multiple conversations i had with president. and as white house counsel i said and recommended to the president, in 2001 much like i in bed and recommended judge prior to the president. however, before i could be comfortable recommend judge roberts for lifetime appointment on the court, i wanted to

question him about his ideology and philosophy. we talked for about an hour. we export is used on stare decisis and debated when it be appropriate for judge to override precedence. we discussed whether and how personal views and biases of the judge, should play a role in judging. i asked him to explain how he would interpret the constitution and the laws passed by congress, how do the constitution allocate power between the three branches. we debate the appropriate ways that a judge, and signing statements, and whether it was ever appropriate to consider decisions by foreign courts. i was impressed with his intellect and quite competent, and easy-going manner of adjectives than it would serve him well in a tough confirmation hearing, and in conference with the other justices. and months later i was proud to stand before the justices of the supreme court, and that majestic courtroom got a present him as

our nation's new chief justice of the united states. each president places a different emphasis on judicial appointments, and everyone in the white house approaches these nominations in their own way. and during the presidential transition 2000, president-elect bush and i agreed on the importance of judicial appointment. this was important stuff for our country but it was important for president bush, and we agreed that recommendations on district and appellate court judges been made by the white house, judicial selection committee which i chaired as white house counsel. the supreme court recommendation would be made by a small group that includes the vice president, the chief of staff, a senior advisor, carl rove, and the attorney general. and in making my recommendation, let me tell you what i looked at when i made the recommendations for john roberts and for sam alito to go on the supreme court. first i looked at

qualifications, wasn't as a person of professional excellence and high achievement, was this person capable of handling the job by virtue of education, skills and experience? how would the nominee be rated by the bar association? is this someone that i would be proud to have standing by the president at a rose garden or east room announcement? second, i look at character, courage and discipline. does this person of the character to stand up to the unimaginable scrutiny of the nomination process, and the difficult questioning in a confirmation hearing? does he or she have the courage to do the right thing in applying the law no matter how unpopular or contrary to the nominee's personal biases? if the nominee have discipline to apply a consistent set of principles in deciding cases over a period of 10, 20, 30 years, and not be seduced by the sovereign call of the legal elites and the bar and academia?

third, i looked at and for mobility. did we have 50 votes? did the president's party controls the senate? who was the senate judiciary chairman? was the president trying to fill a seat considered a swing vote? for example, was this, appointed by conservative or liberal president might tip the balance of the court? was this a nominee who had executive branch experience and was the author of the executive branch members? with his nomination produce an institutional fight between the senate and the white house over these documents? and was the president strong enough to win despite? and was this nominee worth the fight? fourth, i looked at intangibles and political considerations. president bush cared about gender and racial diversity in our courts. for example, he wanted to go to o'connor vacancy in 2005 with a woman. thus, the harriet miers

nomination. i also attended the nominee, i look for some old enough to have the wisdom and maturity that comes to life experiences, but young enough to be on the court for 30 to 40 years and, in fact, the jurisprudence of this country. and for the same reasons of longevity, i took into consideration the health of the nominee. fifth, and most important, although i am talking about it last, was the judicial philosophy of the potential nominee. my views about judicial philosophy i matter of public record that judges should apply the law, not impose their own policy preferences. when courts appoint an activist philosophy that stretches the law, to suit their policy preferences they reduce the credibility of the authority of the judiciary. in so doing they undermine the rule of law that strengthens our democracy. but in contrast, a judge who humbly understands the role of the court and our system of government decide cases based

upon totally neutral principles. he or she generally defers the judgment of the political branches and respects precedents, the collective wisdom of those who have gone before. in so doing, that judge strengthens respect to the judiciary, uphold the rule of law, and permits the people through their elected representatives to make choices about the issues of the day. whether by appointment or by election, it's not easy to anticipate how a person will decide cases once they are a judge. as white house counsel i interviewed hundreds of men and women interested in serving on the federal bench, including judge pryor, judges beaudry, kugler from hopkins, proctor and others in alabama. when i became attorney general, my interest in judiciary became more personal, because it was my voters making the arguments in the courts and defending the law

passed by congress. in summary what we looked for was the general philosophy of restraint and our judges. and i believe a judge understands the importance of these principles is going to take the right approach in every case. this was a type of judge that i tried to be, and i tried to help the president appointed and i believe most of you here in this room agree this is a type of judge we need in our judiciary. let me close by saying a few thoughts and then happy to take some questions. i talked about the many challenges this country faces. but let's remember that no matter how bad we think things are in our lives, or a business, no matter how frustrated we become in our elected officials, america still the greatest country on the face of the earth. and i fear that too many of us forget how privileged we are just to be citizens of the united states. as attorney general i had the opportunity visit many countries and another many great things beyond our shores. but if i had to choose one

country as my home, i would choose a country that provides all of its people with opportunity. i which is a country that its people are generous and strong, willing to sacrifice, to preserve freedom at home and defend it abroad. i would choose the united states. do we have problems here? i just told you many of them that exist. but name a country that doesn't have to own set of problems to do we have poverty? yeah, we do, but in a country that provides more around the world to feed the hungry. do we have racism here? unfortunately yes. but name a country more tolerant of different cultures and religions. name one country who have sacrificed more of its sons and dollars to protect others and to preserve freedom. this past veterans day i spoke at a dinner for families who had lost family members in afghanistan and iraq. bothers spoke in tears about their sons and children.

in the way they died as heroes. america remains a beacon of democracy in the world's best hope for freedom and safety. i am the son of a mexican carpet or and cotton pick up my father did not go to school beyond the second grade. and yet i begin the attorney general of the united states. we live in a country where dreams still come true. and for that reason, and many others, america is worth fighting for, and she is worth dying for. notable physicist albert einstein said there are only two ways to live collected one as though nothing is a miracle, the other is as though everything is america. i choose the latter. my mother and father met working in the west texas field as young migrant workers. i look back on the days when i was a void and i played in the field next to the lot where my father and uncles built a small house and i grew up there with my seven brothers and sisters. we had no hot running water the entire time i lived at home. no telephone until i was a junior in high school. by mother would wake me up

before dawn so i could eat breakfast of eggs with my father, as she prepared a modest lunch of beans for him and placed them in a brown lunch sack and i can still picture my father walking down the street to catch a ride because we couldn't afford a car. and i would run outside and wave goodbye. several years ago when i was working in the white house, my mother came to visit me in washington and we toured the monuments, you see them like all the other touristy but i also took her to the oval office. this shy little woman about four feet nothing, i wanted to take her in and see the president in the oval office. i wanted to show her what i have accomplished because of her sacrifices and the sacrifices of my father. and on the last day of her visit she was up to make breakfast for me, just as she had done every morning for my father. only i wasn't going to the construction site when a hardhat. i had my suit on and off according to work at the white

house alongside the president of united states i think of the wonder that must have filled her heart but she never dreamed of this miracle that i would take her from the cotton fields to the oval office. now come you've honored me by your invitation to be with you today. i believe in god -- god's goodness that everyday i see his grace in my life, and in my country. in your work in any home i pray that god shows you the miracle that he has provided. may he bless this committee and he continue to bless the united states of america. thank you very much. [applause] >> as i said, if our question, please feel free to ask them. c-span has asked us if you will, please walked to the microphone to ask a question so it will be picked up. >> are you also --

[inaudible] it absolutely. >> the question i had is earlier this year, with respect to the administration will continue to enforce the laws but no longer defend it. could you comment on the executive branch's ability to engage on interpretation and ultimately decide to enforce laws or not enforce laws, i'm not as concerned as underwriting policies -- [inaudible] we will no longer defend this law because we are constitutional. >> of course every administration takes possession of every department of justice, every attorney general takes position that they have the authority to make that decision. we began with the perception that the laws passed by congress are, in fact, constitutional. and if there's a basis which

that law can be debated in the department of justice will defend that law. at the end of the day, let's be candid, we have to realize that all the while the attorney general runs and partner just a makes most of decisions in consultation with the solicitor general he reports the president of the united states. and the present united states takes a few on a, within the department of justice will justice will follow that view. and so, you know, i have disagreement on some issue with the general holder that i always remind myself, he works for president obama, and oftentimes the decisions that are reflected are made at a particular department reflects the decision, the wishes of the president of the united states. that's just the way it is. >> your comments about judicial philosophy, certainly resonate.

my question to you is, how do you think the legal academy has, what role over the last 20 years or so in this understanding of what proper provision philosophy out to be in the role of judiciary? do you think law schools are promoting a correct understanding of the role of the judiciary, or have they caused the problem? >> i don't know whether not unqualified to say categorically law schools have done a good job, not been a good job. interest of presenting both sides. i suspect, depending on, by professor hugh have different opinions in terms of what students are taught. quite frankly i think it's important for students to be

exposed to both sides, both sides of the argument, to understand. when i talk to students about my experience been with the supreme court, for example, i tell them it's not enough to be right or wrong. you may have the best argument, but -- because you are paid by a client to win the case in court. and you can represent the client that you the best legal argument. the present support you, but unless you can count the five vote, that's what the client is going to care most about. ultimately, is winning that case. one of the hardest things that for me as counsel to the present was walking into the oval office and telling the president of the united states, mr. president, we didn't do well in the hobby? no, we didn't do well in the rubble case, the court disagreed. that's hard to do. because what the client expects is to windows cases in the supreme court. i think that more needs to be

done in terms of education. i had a professor asking just the other day, do you think it's still relevant today teaching constitutional law to talk about original intent of the constitution, which i was astounded by that question. you know, to me that was an alarming signal about the state of legal education in this country. of course, it's important it absolutely it's important. i emphasize, i wouldn't stop there. i mean, to me you go, the original founders intent, you look at the constitution. project understand there are many people in the judiciary who don't agree with that philosophy. and if you're a lawyer, presenting cases before a court, you need to understand that. you need to understand, try to get an understanding and feel about what does this judge we believe in? how does this judge approach cases? because that's going to make a big difference in your success or failure in your arguments

before the court. >> one of your considerations when you're going through -- [inaudible] i wonder if you could comment on that a bit more, something of a controversial point also. what goes in -- [inaudible] >> personally, i had a great ill suspicion about rating by the american bar association. but as counsel to the present one of things i would've a is gonna get this person in? and for certain members of the geisha committee and members of the senate, a just a gorgeous for example, gorgeous for example, cobectomy all the difference in the war.

so that's when i say that i look at the, i tried to insist that where the aba would make someone. it's because for some senators it could mean the difference in a positive or negative vote. but i do have some concerns about the ratings of the american bar association, and for that reason. that i came in what year was, i guess it was 2002-2003. we made the decision we would not have the aba involved in rating someone before the nomination process which was a change of long-standing practice. but we have to be realistic. again, in terms of getting someone confirmed to the federal bench, that rating by the aba and other bar association's could make a big difference. that's why we love that whether or not, how is the aba going to rate this person but it wouldn't necessary reflect how i felt about that person or whether i felt a person should or should that be a judge, but would it make a difference in the confirmation somewhat that might be viewed as controversial.

>> you mention that passing what happened on 9/11, you sort of fell in caching can you sort of filling the holes with us what really happened behind the scenes in the white house that day and what happened in the immediate aftermath in terms of your participation, the decisions you are faced with making and it kind of eyes you are having to get the presents because we all have a story that from that day, right? everyone knows what you're doing on 9/11. i was at the airport at about 737:30. the same airport the terrorists hijacked the 747 the crashed into the pentagon but i often wondered, did my paths cross with any of the tears that morning. because they were in the terminal that morning. but i've landed in norfolk, virginia, us to give a speech. it was about 9:00 and i got to

the hotel, the white house had contacted me. the first tower had been hit. gave my speech, and it was over. the second half had been hit. we knew we had a major problem. they rushed me to the airport. by the time i got there, here i was stuck in my deputy, tim flanigan, examined the situation room. we were, we could committee with each other by cell phone, but he's in a situation where. my lawyers were it that griffin white house, and i'm stuck. i'm trying to get back. i need a navy officer at the airport. she takes into the naval air station. they take me to the base commander i tell him who i am. he said will try to get you back. they are transitioning to the highest alert at the base and he is washington person in the way. they started off and around somewhere and i was with one of my lawyers, and finally about 12:30 they gave me a navy helicopter, and one story that i doubt is that they ask of what

you want me to take a? i said getting us closer you get to the whitest and they said we will land on the south lawn. and i said, oh. i said no, nobody but the president of the united states lands on the south lawn. plus i would if we got too close to the white house -- [laughter] that that might be a products we agreed it would take me to andrews. they flew me to andrews, and when i landed at andrews, white house van took me to the underground bunker where dick cheney was out and the other senior officials. about this time that's when they had this secure videoconference with the president. he was frustrated he was now ready to come home. we waited. we waited for the president. all my letters have been relocated to commercial buildings in downtown d.c., tim flanagan and i were the only learned in the white house from my staff but and finally about 7:00, i ran into karen hughes, communicate and director, and we went down to the oval office and waited for the president to land on the south lawn.

and afterwards he went back into his private stay with me, karen, condi rice and andy, chief of staff with the president. we worked on his speech for the nation that night we talked about what happened that day. we felt we all had a different story from that day. went home about 1:00 in the morning. my car had been impounded at does because the tears had parked their car in the same i couldn't get my car a. my deputy took me home. we're back in office to and from then on i was in meetings all the time to unseat in meetings with lawyers i was in a meeting with a policymaker in the situation room talking about policy that i would then take back to the lawyers, back and forth, back and forth. that we can we have all hands on deck meeting at camp david. that's when we started talking about things like okay comment we can't, not only can we not connect the dots, we can't collect about. we can't gather information. that was the genesis for the patriot act. john asked -- john ashcroft was

asked, start drafting the patriot act. was north korea involved, was korea involved, was iraq involved? all these things started bubbling up very, very quickly. i remember a couple days, probably the day after 9/11 i was in meeting in the oval office, and edwin kept talking about we are at work and we got to this. and a lawyer in the said, we've got to be careful about what we call this. so after the meeting everyone left the oval office and i was with the present. i said, you know, we need to be careful about saying we are at war because saying we are at war means will trigger a bunch of international treaty obligations. we will trigger a bunch of domestic statutes. it may affect private contracts if we're in a state of war for any kind of looked at me and he said, you boys can call whatever you want to come but we are at war. so i get the message very, very quickly. that was a very important

fundamental decision in deciding that this is not just a criminal act. this was an act of war. and it was used to pull all leaders of executive power, economic and military, intelligence, everything we could to defend this country. and i don't, it's hard for me not remember what my life was like in the white house before. because afterwards all of my personal attention was on terrorism. and terrorism related issues, working with john ashcroft and the department of justice. and the rest of the stuff, like judges can which is very important of course, you know. i had to head up to the other lose all my team to me just say this about my team. the president, not surprising, is going to get the best lawyers in america. and a team that i had when president bush became president was unbelievable. i think i'd 12 or 14 lawyers, eight of them are so was from the u.s. supreme court. several partners at major firms. these are all superstars. it was such a joy as elected

them to work with that kind of talent and to be able to do, to go into the white house on these tremendous issues of such great consequence. it really reminded me of why i wanted to be a lawyer in the first place. to live a life, to do something where you would really make a fundamental difference in the lives of others. and, unfortunately, we were given an opportunity by what happened on 9/11. i could go on and on about what we did and how it was like. you know, it was hard, but at the same time it was exciting because we felt like we're doing some good stuff as a lawyer. and that's a great place to be. >> when are you going to write your books because i am writing my book. and i've written action most of the. i've been waiting for an going to tell their story. [laughter] [inaudible] >> it's always good to have the last word. it what is your opinion on the

health care bill? >> well, as i said, one of my lunch partners, i quit trying to predict a long time ago how the court is going to come out on a case. it's just so unpredictable. there's so many variables in my judgment to go into a decision by the supreme court justice on a particular case. so, i don't know. and i don't mean to dodge this question, but i just haven't studied the issue close enough. i mean, you read things in the newspaper, you hear things on television, but that doesn't really tell anything you a far as i'm concerned. i would have to sit down, read the briefs and talk to the list. i could do that.

[inaudible] >> judge, would you give your take on the fast and furious? >> well, this is another where i don't know all the facts but i do have some comments, some observations. i do know when you're the attorney general of the united states, you have 105,000 people that work for you. they're all doing all manners of things. hopefully all of them or most of them are okay, and make good sense. of whether or not, oftentimes from the department, the

department is engaged in operation or an agency of the department or branch is engaged in operation at as attorney general you may or may not have knowledge of. there may be a memo that comes up that says quite rightly doesn't get you on the chief of staff because there's nothing in that memo that alerts the chief of staff, army times the deputy attorney general is the chief operating officer for the department justice and oftentimes things do not go beyond the deputy attorney general but he doesn't believe there's anything here that be, that the attorney general should know about. so, you know, when general holder testifies before congress had no knowledge of this, first of all it would be silly, crazy to lie to congress, to testify untruthfully to congress. but the notion that there might have been a member the went to the attorney general's office and that he therefore is charged with knowledge of it, there are many things go i think that would be unfair based upon what

i know. in terms of the actual mechanics of the program, president bush is very concerned about the level of guns going from the united states into mexico, and because he was concerned, then i was concerned about it. and we didn't look at what could be done to try to mexico with its drug problems, the violence in mexico, by limiting the flow of guns from the united states into mexico. now, i have seen reports that this program our predecessor to this program began during the bush administration. i have no recollection of that. that doesn't mean it's not true. was i ever briefed on it? i might have been. i just have no recollection of it. obviously, if a similar program was in place, it obviously, assuming, was executed in an effective way. and i'm assuming because it was effective that's why it continued under the obama administration. but i don't know enough about this.

i'm asked often whether should general holder resigned over this. i see no evidence that general holder has done anything wrong in this. on the other hand, i do understand this notion that when it is wrongdoing in an agency, like c. e. all of the company go sometimes you have to take responsibility for what happens in the agency. i think that general holder is harmed by it anyway by the fact that president obama has an election in a year. and i think that may make a difference in terms of what happens in the future. but based on what i know of the man, he is an honorable man, a public servant has worked hard to serve our country. but i don't know enough of the facts about exactly what happened in this particular case. >> judge, i have to ask this question.

a follow-up. from your perspective, particularly in your service, your perspective on a former executive branch lawyer who may not have been counsel of record in a case before the court, but provided advice to counselor citing executive branch, constitutionality of that law, executive branch lawyer now is on the court, and may be called on to decide, decide constitutionality. i don't mean to pick on justice kagan -- [laughter] >> o.? got but more generally, someone at the department of justice advising the president on constitutionality of a bill and helping to craft it, being called on by the court or below

the court, been called on to decide whether that is constitutional. >> so, are you ask me whether i would have recused myself? to make sure. [laughter] >> you know, i say, when people ask me before she was nominated whether or not she would be nominated, i said no, no way. for that reason. but i just felt that, she would have to recuse herself on so many important issues. i also thought, as i said in my remarks, that she was privy to executive branch decision-making. and all that would be put in to play it and i just felt that would be to dangers for any president, quite frankly. so i was a little surprised at her nomination. you know, i'm not going to have judgment on justice kagan. >> we will break way from alaska couple of minutes of this event, letting you know you can watch it all online individual vibrant at c-span.org.

wisconsin governor scott walker is in washington today and is the featured speaker at the american enterprise institute and a discussion on budget reform. governor walker signed controversial legislation aimed at balancing the state budget. in today's discussion is expected to talk about why wisconsin's model could help other states address fiscal health. live coverage here on c-span2. ..

but that's not all he did in 2011. the milwaukee journal sentinel which i should note opposed his governing reforms and criticized him for it recently wrote, quote, the governor did balance the budget. he did reduce the structural deficit significantly. he did put a lid on property tax increases, he did get schools and municipalities more control over their budgets than they had in years and his efforts at economic it of met through corporate tax breaks and a revamped commerce department was promising. so that is a lot of accomplishments in a single year. the conversation today with governor walker is designed to shed light on what's happened in the past year and what's happening now. and also what it might mean for other states who face similar issues and the country as a whole. joining governor walker as my colleague andrew biggs, who is a resident scholar here at aei, and prior to joining aei as the

principal deputy commissioner of the social security administration. over the last few years, andrew has been doing in extraordinary amount of research and public employee compensation, benefits and pensions and revealing many of the what can only i think be described as unsustainable practices and trends of work in states across the country. so gentlemen, thanks for being here. governor, thank you. >> it's great to be here. >> media would be useful to just take time and tell us what the conference was when you came into office and go into some detail about the reforms that you propose and were ultimately able to advance and why you decided to do this. >> sure. well i will start with that. it's interesting when you think about it a year ago nearly every governor in america faced a budget deficit. covers republican, governors democrat, independent, you name it. every one of us faced a deficit to beat in my mind there's only five ways you can balance a budget using all or a

combination of those different ideas. one is you can raise taxes. my neighbors to the south and illinois have shown how they do that they raise taxes on individuals 67% and businesses 46%. six months later they still had a big budget problem. so that doesn't necessarily work very well in these terms. another option is the public employees which they are talking about know which is what connecticut talked about earlier this year and what other states talked about. that option doesn't make a lot since. i don't want any numbers in my seat the day in the public or the private sector. your option is to cut the core services like medicare. in my state a lot of people would be surprised. i actually added $1.2 billion to my medicaid program in wisconsin one of the largest in the country because i saw the growing needs of seniors, these families and children in my state of the lighted with a reform so that it wasn't a

permanent entitlement in the way of providing a safety net it was one of the large per capita increases in any state out there so i obviously didn't make that choice of cutting that either. and for adoption is you can use the budget trends. my state that had been done previous times the past was part of the reason why we had such a large deficit to begin with. in fact we went back and restored some of those, restocked the reason the patient compensation fund and repaid the state of minnesota with a tax reciprocity payments delayed. we put money back in the transportation fund that had been raised in the past, because we knew that was not a good long-term strategy. so you look at the first four options, none of those in my opinion were good options. the states chose those to balance the budget. instead we took the fifth option long-term structural reform. i like to see we picked an option that thought more about the next generation than about the next election. i have two sons, a junior and

senior in high school and i wanted to make sure the state i passed on to them was greater than i inherited from the past. and for us that is the key. because in our case, not every state is like this, but in wisconsin's caisse the biggest portion of the budget overwhelmingly is local committee and having been a county executive for eight years served people of my county and if you had a cut to the local government that would force either higher property taxes, which i didn't want, or devastate cuts there as well. so the only way to offset that to give local governments the tools as well as the state government was reform one of the biggest portions of our government which was compensation. and so what we did is eliminate collective bargaining for both state and local government employees for everything they sell. and that was capped at the cpi so that if times are tough like now we shared in the sacrifice. if times are good, or public employees got the benefit the we the taxpayers did. so the respect for the taxpayers in wisconsin.

in doing so, we in power not only local governments as well as their state to ask for things simply like a match to the contribution which nearly everybody in america does for the retirement, and make a very modest contribution for our health insurance premium. in our case it is 12.6%. the average taxpayer in my state pays about 20 to 25% outside of government. so we did all those things but more of importantly, we allowed the local governments and school districts to do things like a bit of their health insurance which has saved tens of millions of dollars. it used to be the past school districts in particular to buy their health insurance from a company owned by the teachers' union. by bidding that out, by opening the process up through the reforms come school district have saved millions and millions of dollars just by changing where they bought their health insurance from. we are able to rein in abuses of things like overtime and other excesses out there by no longer having opportunities where in

lowercase some of our state employees could literally call in sick on their shift and then come back to work the next shift of overtime to lead or bus drivers in places like madison that made $150,000 or more on overtime. those have changed and now the power is back and neck and hands of local officials and the taxpayers of our state. so that is ultimately what we did. it seemed pretty reasonable. when you hear us talk about it. probably the biggest reason why i think i'm a target is in addition to all that, we allowed the nearly 300 public servants we have in our state. and i really mean that, despite what the others have said, i've repeatedly talked about my respect for the men and women who took the kid did their lives to the public service but state government, local government or schools. both my kids go to public schools, so i love the tradition as well. but what we allow them to do was ultimately to choose. they have the right to choose. they can choose whether or not they want to be part of the public employees union or not and no longer can their dues be

forcibly taken from the payroll. i think in the end that is what all the focus in washington in terms of the national unions are focused on is it all comes down to i took away the grief he train, the free money i had before and gave that right back to the workers to make that decision. not something i was mandatory and that is what the focus is. >> thanks. i want to come back and talk to -- that's understandable. [laughter] i want to come back and talk about some of the specifics but i want to bring andrew biggs in for a minute. maybe you can give us -- talk about some of your research and some of the broad trends that are going on largest wisconsin but other states, too. >> thanks for a much, governor. since i have things with a bit of background and social security and federal programs, in a way i see this as critics state and local budgets without

looking at public sector employee compensation is like trying to fix the budget without thinking about entitlements. it's technically possible to do it very difficult. what strikes me about wisconsin, i've done a lot of work looking at different states around the country. what strikes me about wisconsin is how remarkable it is in the sense that it is not an illinois, not a california, not a rhode island. so it is not in the case of the egregious problems or a egregious over parador compensation public employees. at the same time though, and i spent with little time before, just running a few numbers to show how the compensation for an employee he and wisconsin would compare to what a private sector worker there might get. wisconsin state and local employees receive salaries. there is a little bit below with the private sector workers with similar education experience. maybe 5% lower from that. what the difference in the benefits in terms of pension

benefits, in terms of the health care benefits where you just mentioned they pay less for them. at the local level they often can be very generous. i went to the annual financial report for the wisconsin retirement system and there's specifics in there and says a wisconsin state employees retiring today after a full career of 30 years which is like is considered a full career in public service would receive a pension for a $32 a year from the wisconsin system paulson and $13,000 per year from social security. so that's about a $45,000 a year retirement income based on an average final turning around $54,000. that's a jury solid place that read the final earnings. a private sector workers would receive the same social security obviously but typical 401k plan. they would only get maybe $8,000 a year in guaranteed benefits out of that.

so you'd have a typical private sector worker with the same salary would end up with a retirement income may be a turnaround $21,000. if they want the same kind of guaranteed stable retirement incomes that employees in the wisconsin retirement system get. so you are getting the same contribution one of the reforms that you made was requiring that all the public employees ought to contribute to the pension system even after that though the benefits of the public employees are more generous than what people in the private sector could get. so there is a comparable with the issue that is very tough to get that because the benefits are very difficult to figure out. salaries are easy to look at, benefits are tough to figure out. an additional benefit that many public employees get is the retiring health benefits. and this is a big difference between letting state and local governments and wisconsin where the state level retiring health benefits are not all that generous compared to places like

california or ohio. the local level though some of the benefits are the retirement system, the health coverage to get under these is one of the most generous in the country, its work force care, accounting reports of getting an extra 17% of the peach year. that's something the private sector workers initially almost never gets these days. >> these benefits we really have to account for even if the salaries are a little bit lower and confident that the benefits more than make up that difference. what that tells you is that there is an issue of fairness. if you want public-sector employees to be compensated comparably to the private sector workers you want to account for how much experience and how much education. but you want things to be roughly comparable between the private sector employees who are getting paid the compensation and the taxpayers who are

providing it. in a lot of cases that is done a little bit out of whack. i think one of the points that has come up in terms of selective bargaining is, you have the backroom of local government and this disparity between the benefits of the retired health benefits to the state and local level is really kind of interesting and i think part of it comes to the bargaining power and experience of the local government relative to the larger sector union is difficult than state government is bigger even in many states they have difficulty bargaining effectively. local government had a hard time because the public sector and we unions are large and well-organized. the school district might go at this every couple of years. they are not as well prepared. so i think giving them more tools to negotiate more effectively can help bring these things back in line and give a more stable and fair level of compensation from something that is going to keep the budget

sustainable and allow for expenditures on things other than an employee cost. if you think about my schools are being squeezed in the materials and things like that partly that can come because compensation costs are rising. if you to greater comfortable with it and the public and private sector compensation the collective bargaining in particular would give tools so you don't know what the outcome is going to be. it allows a process to produce that over time. >> the interesting thing just a couple of thoughts want on your analysis on the public and private sector one of the interesting points, and i preface this today and i will say it again now is i've said throughout this process my respect for people who go into public service in the senate last year and i will say it again and they understand people want for different reasons and its 99 out of 100 times of because of the benefits or other components of their but there is

a disparity. but what we did really wasn't even about trying to invest, even between the public and private sector. what we did was really about addressing the long-term budget, not just the short term but looking out to the future of both the states and in particular the local government. my experience as a county executive was that if i tried to come in and i came in after there was a big finishing scandal and i tried to fix that, i would try to look at either making modest adjustments to employee payroll contributions to the benefits to the contributions of the retirement system or things like health care that even one year we threw out an option of saying instead of that looks to for four months, one week a month were quick to lay of layoffs and at the same time protecting services of those jobs ultimately provide. in nearly every instance a large

list unions said forget it. we would rather have four or 500 people laid off because essentially the message was you will be gone in a couple of years. our employees will come back and we won't have given up anything in terms of our benefits. and what we did was not take benefits away. it was to make real to be realistic opportunities for the contributions to be made to pay for those and the irony is they are matching the pension contribution. the state and please is 100% on that we are not proposing any meeting benefits is revealed they were not coming to make those reforms the of a system that is about half funded and they talked to lagat even the speaker of the democrat down there in the past has been talking about reducing the pension benefit itself for the retirees. if you don't make the structural changes in the front and you are faced with those portable decisions on the tail end and by doing this we got ahead of the

curve so we are better off certainly but ultimately those individuals who spent their career in the public service and didn't have a certain expectation to be retired that there would be some benefits their in the states that don't make these changes that is going to be a problem. one other interesting thing is, just to put this in comparison with the public versus the private sector i have a younger brother, two years younger than i, when this debate was happening last year he pointed out to think about this he and his wife and their family or typical middle class families and wisconsin. my brother is a bankrupt manager works part-time as a bartender, wife works in the department store. they've got two beautiful daughters. they are the epitome of a middle class family. he said to me shaking his head ip more than $800 a month on my health insurance premium and the little bit i can set aside for the 401k because you are

asking for a fraction of that and people are upset about it. to me there was just the disconnecting lot of times folks have who haven't worked of sight of government that what we ask for is not radical. it's actually still pretty generous compared to where most people are not outside of government. it is a very reasonable expectation to make sure that we can pay for the benefits that we are offered. >> i did a quick calculation, where i show that to match the pension benefit that a full career of wisconsin steel employees would get and to get a guaranteed benefit in retirement as they do a private sector worker with the same salary would be somewhere close to a third of their summary and the 401k. so one of the things to focus on getting the contribution of this when one of the differences of the benefit pensions it isn't based on the contribution it is based on a formula in the background and that formula is pretty generous. there is almost nobody who can put a third of their income into the 401k.

so there is really a disparity there and we need to do more retirement savings for the private sector. there is no question about that but i think getting that comparability really does make sense. these things are just very, very difficult on people because around the country particularly when we look at pensions, the contribution is to the state pensions and local pensions has gone up because the assets have dropped, and that is the cost borne by the budget and borne by taxpayers and so i think it makes sense trying to smooth and then out going forward. it is going to be a tricky situation certainly wisconsin is a much better situation than a place like illinois or rhode island. >> with husbandry vv could affect not of the are in place, but across the state or of the local level on the budgets are you seeing the dynamic effect that you anticipated, can you give us some -- >> tremendous. we did early on throughout this process a website in my official

office wi.gov we have a map of all the different counties from all the different jurisdictions about school districts that pass budgets, where the attacks didn't go out and where they pointed out that because the forms they were able to -- the great example is the for hundred thousand dollar deficit turned into about $1.5 million plus the use that money to hire more teachers and the ultimate price of about $300,000 a site. pete seen one of the great examples i have gotten a kick out the mayor of milwaukee in march we were debating this he said what we are proposing would devastate the city of washington. on august 8 the comptroller of the city of washington afforded to the city council that our reforms will save net savings in the city of washington somewhere between 11 to $17 million. of course he was asked by

reporters of the time if he thought it was to the detriment of the city back then because the governor deserves some credit response to the general signal is the false question. i don't know how false that is. [laughter] spinets pretty simply the facts. i think the facts are clear. if you repeat the truth over and over and over again, no matter how many attack ads were how many distortions are out there, sooner or later i believe people gravitate towards the truth and for us and wisconsin there were two benchmarks. i think they define the truth in our state. one was september 1st when my sons matt and alexandria other kid in the state of the public-school went back to school. and then nearly every school district across the street, families saw that their schools were the same or better. they saw that in many cases the reforms not only didn't cause damage, the actually in power to local school districts only to

make good financial decisions to allow them to balance the budget in some cases like theater district's lawyer more teachers but also the reforms remember this aren't just about finances. by freeing up the other changes no schools and local governments and state governments get hired and fired based on merit, the lead to pay based on performance. begin to the best and brightest in the class rooms across the state. i was doing a q&a in wisconsin a couple weeks back into the end one of the superintendents in one of the smallest school districts got up and asked me or make a statement for the question talked about how the reforms save them money and it was good to keep their staff in place and said and he went to sit down a curse he repeated it he said the best part about this is just the francis. the best part is i get to go back to my office and spend my time worrying about curriculum and not just about grievances. for us that is the great

question. it changes the dynamic in our state. a year-and-a-half ago when my predecessor was the governor even back then he was told of the democratic control hundreds of millions of dollars in public education the difference was the did respond to that. in milwaukee it was interesting there was a situation where a young woman was named the outstanding teacher of english teachers council wisconsin she got this great award in a week later because of these cuts she was laid off. why is that? because the collective bargaining contracts lasting and first out to was named one of the best teachers in wisconsin was one of the first lead off to read that changed now. that process has changed other than a handful of school districts who still ran out to put in contracts before the reforms were in effect. it's wide open. so the schools and the state government are going to do better. in indiana we saw mitch daniels when he did the state employees state government and the of the difference was a couple of weeks

ago we got our tax bills and for the first time in six years the average school went down in wisconsin pre-tax is arbiter for most people wisconsin, they are better, the reforms are working. >> one of the points i have seen you make is you have argued this publicly that the reforms will be better for the public employees, will be better for teachers. now you've been in politics a long time to know that it's very difficult to convince somebody that you know their best interest better than they do themselves. so you make these arguments say to the teachers and you have some good examples but they're still opposed to it and they still don't like the reforms. how do you break through that and convince them that it actually is in your best interest? >> again this is true if you keep pushing it over and over again. i went out and i got a reading initiative that did some details yesterday on the public construction but i went around and i like to read at the elementary schools and meet with teachers afterwards.

you can imagine there was a wide spectrum of the people who actually hit me and the people that were open-minded and somewhere in between. and i pointed out that if you look at other states around the country where they didn't do the reforms that we did the had to cut back on the aid to the school and higher education and other things and then force layoffs. so in other places there's a lot less including a lot less teachers working. we were able to avoid that and a handful of areas that have layoffs when those districts that ran through the contracts before the reforms were in effect. in total there is about 1200 more net new hires in wisconsin than layoffs over all statewide and like i said they themselves are concentrated in the districts that don't to get the edge of the reforms in the state contracts. long-term one of the great things was in august do was start coming back and getting classrooms ready and was amazing to me how many teachers would come up to me and say i'm really excited about what you did because i went back to school

and now everybody is here because the one to be here. they are pumped up, they are introduced. i can work directly with my principal. i don't have to worry about grievances or other issues. i can talk directly to the superintendent or principals or others out there. i think there's a whole different dynamic in place. and so long term we are going to be able to report the best and the brightest and be able to keep those great teachers in the classroom and we are ultimately going to be able to have a system set up only statewide but each of our school districts that works only with dollars but in other ways the competency that the have and the actions to provide for the students and i think the biggest winner in that our students. students will win because most people i know a letter schoolteacher's the people living over the years in teaching including those that teach my two kids at high school went into teaching for all the right reasons. love kids, want to inspire kids, want to help them and most of

the still want to do that but along the way too many got tied up in the bureaucracy of and only the union and collective bargaining but even the fear of receiving education itself. when we get ultimately allows the breakthrough of that and in howlers teachers to do it they got in the profession for in the first place. inspire kids. >> one of the things that is frustrated at how the wisconsin story is portrayed it portrayed as your administration on the one hand and the union on the other but they are stakeholders involved in the interest of the parties. there's been positive feedback. what's been the feedback from other stakeholders in the business community or other -- >> you'll get our reforms of collective bargaining as well as the other things we did we pass tax relief, major tort reform, regulatory reform, repealed the state's tax. all sorts of things to create a better business plan. in 2010 the last year my

predecessor was in office the statewide chamber does a survey each year and asks employers in my state whether they thought wisconsin was headed in the right direction or not. 2010, 10% of our employers wisconsin was in the right direction. a couple weeks ago they did that wisconsin survey and it is now up to 94%. and a majority of those employers say they are going to hire more people the next 12 months. now, we want -- we understand that the confidence and the certainty in the marketplace is key to the economic growth and job creation. so we need to do more of that but for the years prior to my taking office we lost 150,000 jobs in the private sector. in the first 11 months of last year the numbers left by about a month and we have seen just over 16,000 net new jobs in the private sector. we still have a long way to go. there's a lot more we want to do in the future but i think that is a tremendous turnaround from having lost 150,000 jobs in the past and a turnaround in terms of the feelings not only within the state, but even nationally.

there must be the small business survival index and the chief executive magazine which annually puts a ranking from one to 50. two years ago we ranked 43 in the year ago we ranked 41. after taking office about six months and after the forum started to take effect we went from 41 of 24 and jumped up 17 spots. fastest increase in any state in the country and all because people realize the only did we create a better business, but when you tackle your structural problems, when you tackle the fiscal problems not just for the onetime federal stimulus to the structural reforms a local level you may get a better state to invest in. you may get a better statement she just for big investors that small-business owners. we are thinking about adding those five or six or seven more employees who are worried that that is what the future legal. everything you can do to provide more certainty and stability makes it easier for them to have jobs and i think in the coming years in 2012 you are going to

see tremendous job growth in wisconsin because of that stability to disconnect andrew demint you see the new look in different states? obviously we are hearing about it in wisconsin but what is the effect when states have the reforms as opposed to those that have it? >> one of the interesting things you've got is the states in the laboratories of democracy you have a lot of different things happening in the states across the country it's interesting to see how things are planning out. you have seen in california governor brown who's hardly seen as a conservative has proposed, you know, significant changes to the pension system for public employees. where is it of having a whole state run defined benefit traditional pension they would have a mix of social security for the 401k and a smaller plan. you have changes going on in rhode island, even in new york where i'm from the governor has proposed changes. so it's just interesting to see how this has played out. a place like illinois which is in pretty dire straits i think is having trouble getting on top of this and i think the real

advantage to doing it. one thing during your comments earlier in terms of the changes in the conversation is the, theoretical standpoint on this the test of whether these cuts were too large increased contributions to pensions or health care were if workers and state employees are quitting or if you are unable to hire ra still able to attract and retain employees? select particularly in a separate economy we were at 27% unlimited strong primm 7.6% a year ago in certainly better than 10% unemployment in illinois and better than the national average. we had to weave a retirement but that was in large part driven by some of the scare tactics to some of the public employee unions to claim that we were going to take benefits away. i still get that today. i get questions about all the time. people who think you're taking away pensions and things on that

regard we are making a payroll match contribution to match that, but it is interesting not only the employment side but illinois is a great example because the of our states and it's why i think i'm going to be under such a tremendous pressure in the coming days in this election is because it's not just republicans or even conservatives. you mentioned cuomo and new york and deval patrick signing legislation in massachusetts largely driven with the speaker and will legislature there but would collect the bargaining reform for health insurance for local governments. you think about rahm emanuel and what he's doing in the city of chicago trying to tackle post-religious. who would have thought a year ago that when occupied chicago protesters came in the would mention my name and rahm emanuel in the same breath. but that's largely because once you are in an executive position if you are honest, if you look at the facts. now come from the republican or democrat or conservative standpoint from savings might choose to spend in different ways. i like to see that money and put

it back in the hands of entrepreneurs who i think fuel the economy through renovation and spirit. liberals may want to put it in the hands of more government spending. but in either case i think there is increasingly at least among the object of this you don't have the option either way if you don't tackle the virus which is legacy costs' growing out of control. illinois is a prime example of the status. in california but think about it, illinois has a pension system that's only about half. the heavy bond rating that one of their fiscal agents earlier this year talked essentially advised not to buy the bond and raises the question what is the lowest in california at the bottom when it comes to the bond rating out there. and it has an impact i mentioned that rank and chief executive. we went up 17 spots. illinois in the last five years because they failed to tackle this challenge has dropped. in five years they dropped 40

spots. on wall street journal editorial it earlier this year or earlier last year they called it a death spiral. if it wasn't for chicago being one of the 12 or 13 megacities of the world, the failure to act on things in springfield would be devastating. for all the tax increases the did earlier pump their chest wisconsin saying they didn't need to do what we did, now you're back carving of companies like sears and caterpillar and others because those companies are threatening to leave because of excessive high tax burdens and the failure of the burdens, so they push more of that off to other taxpayers in the state. to me i think tackling the reform even though it is tough, even though it's brought i didn't seek the national attention. i just looked at this like a small business owner. i saw a problem, i saw a solution based on eight years of being a local government and i went out to fix it. in retrospect it would have been nice to spend more time talking about the details of january. in february building a better foundation for that.

for talked about the tens of millions of dollars that are wasted by the school districts not be known to build up their health insurance were excesses that the state and local governments have i'm talking about that now for my standpoint i said i was elected to fix things. i spent 18 months in a job interview talking about the fiscal and economic challenges my state faced. once i got elected which is essentially hired a supply not going to wait. you can't wait a year or six months you have to tackle it right away. so we may have been one of the first. we will certainly not be one of the last states or just republican governors. it's going to be a lot of space executives that recognize if they are honest with the public you've got to fix it. >> want to talk about the recall for just a minute but i want to mention one thing that struck me in doing some reading before this event. breaking the union, the union

bust. one question i think is interesting to a lot of people looking at these problems in the states is of how to think about collective bargaining and i want to reach a couple of quotes i can across. here's one. meticulous attention should be paid to the special relations and obligations of the public servants to the public itself into the government. the process of collective bargaining is usually understood cannot be transplanted into the public service and i was surprised that was franklin roosevelt saying that in 1937. how should the sort of fair minded citizens think about collective bargaining? he talked about collective bargaining taking a right away which most fair minded people say there's something along with that you can't take these rights away. how should the average citizen be thinking about collective bargaining? >> in that latter point i think some of the national unions that poured millions of dollars early in in february and march of last year were largely successful in

buying it at the time. collective bargaining in the public sector is not right. it is an expensive entitlement. the reality is fdr and others have pointed out last february i remember the president when i was still in medicine because i didn't figure i could safely travel to washington when i was asking 14 state senators to come back home and do their job so i stayed put and i remember chris kristen called me because the annual luncheon that the president has with all the governors the president took a shot at chris and i say we were attacking public employees. so that night i had a 5:00 press conference so i could talk unfiltered with the people of my state and i got asked about that and i remembered kind of the i was strong in the public service by president ronald reagan so i honored office even if i don't always agree with first amendment so they ask about the president's comment in bicycle and sure -- i'm sure the president of the united states knows that federal employees do not have collective bargaining for wages and benefits.

i'm sure he must know that, and i assure the president of the united states knows federal employees pay 28% of their health insurance premiums which is about double by masking the state and local law employees of wisconsin because i'm sure the president of the united states isn't getting talking points from the national union. well, the reality is that is what it was. it was a political push to try to claim our right which is not inherently there. the difference between the public and private sector is there is no one standing up on behalf of the taxpayers. you ultimately to the cycle that puts the taxpayers at a disadvantage and so what we did is say taxpayers should be paramount. i respect the hard working people of my state and i respect them at the local jurisdiction as well. if the liked people to underscore the county boards and other state offices, those individuals should be able to make those decisions. it's quite unlike the private sector we're in a legitimate case if there is a union of labor arrangement there is an

ability the union could strike the employer could move. there's all sorts of different options you don't have in the private sector. people with dr. the unionize of the private sector union is largely in wisconsin are my partners in the economic development. they've been great allies. you look at the rate my predecessor put on the transportation fund week restored that and people like the operating engineers and others to build things in my state love what we are doing because they are people that are back to work again. we stopped the raise and shifting funds. we use them for what they meant to be used for some people who work in the private sector are benefit. the other interesting thing he didn't ask this but it's kind of an aside, this mantra only about the right about the middle class. let's be clear. who pays for the expense of government? who historically in this country and state by state pays for the excess of extensive government it is fundamentally the middle

class taxpayers and our state in the country about standing up and respecting those middle class taxpayers and say once and for all we are going to let you be the ones that think about it first and of some union leader in washington and in medicine but instead we will make decisions that ultimately protect them. that's why most taxpayers to the property tax bills and wisconsin were pleased particularly in these tough economic times to see their tax bills either go down or be under control this year. it's why we made decisions that ultimately were about protecting them and that is what the government is to beat the of the weaker doing is because of the reforms that go beyond just the fiscal policy, because we can now make hiring and firing decisions and pay on performance and change the work rules to really in power and engage our employees will only are we saving money, but in a lot of times as conservatives we get things falsely charged just being focused and cut and some

conservatives just do. my view is we should manage our budgets and then in the areas where the government belongs we should demand a better services. so our reform has not only help us balance the budget and do that long term the of the benefits i believe and which has done a good job in this in indiana is we get the reward excellence, and power given police to make better decisions that is ultimately good for the public and as you do in the private sector we demand excellence there as well. there's a false choice in the government between raising taxes or cutting services. no one would accept that in the private sector. you wouldn't double the price for people who would run your competitor and yet for the generations that's been acceptable in the government. it's no longer acceptable and wisconsin. so one of the things we're interested in is the extent to which what's going on in wisconsin for the reforms may be a model for other states. one of the things that is extraordinary about the wisconsin history is that may be

more than any other states have the tradition of being ahead of the curve in all sorts of reforms need a progressive or conservative you have the whole wisconsin idea coax like bob but folks like tommy thompson on welfare, paul ryan obviously your friend but from this process how you mentioned you talked to chris christi and the battle of the success that you have how applicable is this to other states and the situation they are facing as you talk to other governors? >> first on the history, a year ago on january 3rd when i took the oath of office i did it in front of the state's constitution. the reason i did is because i wanted to develop a part of the constitution that's never been altered, never been amended to read talks about spending and talks about how moderation and

spending that can for more than 163 years ago. over our time in our state i think it is a similar tradition or than 200 years ago during this country is that their sense of a limited government, certainly a government that put the power back in the hands of the state's but in terms of the states in the hands of the people was that a limited government, one that excels in certain key areas but one that shouldn't be extensive. and so our tradition -- we have had a glut of midwestern states folks that it stands on the left and right and everywhere in between certainly tommy thompson with welfare reform and school choice and other reforms like that we didn't look to do this. i didn't set out my mind and say i'm going to chart out a way to lead the country. i said fix the problems and meet your state great again. but i think other states can do that. we took a page out of what mitch

daniels did in 2005 and indiana when he threw in the exit of order a lot easier than a statutory change but an executive order it was to change collective bargaining and turn his state and employees of the government got more efficient, more each active, more responsive to the taxpayers i think that's payoff over time. we've looked at what other governors did and the others can appoint. chris was here before we talking about this but was really this year to his credit with a legislature that was controlled by democrats convinced enough folks in both parties this had to be done. i think other states can and should do that because if they don't come again whether you're liberal or conservative is great to be less and less resources to get back to the story for which it came and it's been on the program out there in the degette can be done elsewhere. >> that is precisely why we are

going to see the tens of millions of dollars coming from outside the state into wisconsin because there are some interests here in washington they don't want it to happen again but whether it is the treasurer of in rhode island or some of the other states the mengin are now in the way they want people to think twice about that because they want people to think they will be retribution if they even consider those changes. i think the more imperative. i did what happens now or a few years down the road is going to happen. >> we are going to open a questions to the audience a little bit but i just want to ask about the recall and what's going on in the audience would like to know all this got off the ground and where things stand, where you see it going in your take on a generally. spoon against artificially november 15th also talked about before the state democrats and the unions supporting, talked about before that november 15th date kick off the recall efforts and have 60 days by the

wisconsin law to collect 540,208 signatures. for while they were talking about collecting a million. i don't know that they will get to that but i assume they will get well into the five injured 40,000. in our states that is equivalent to 25% of the votes cast for governor. in november of 2010 and is the equivalent because you dhaka we have to be voter to sign the recall petition. all you have to do is be eligible to vote, which means 18 years or older, not a felon on paper and lived in the state of least 28 days so it's not an extremely high standard but it is what it is and the burden to ensure that people always sided ones in this president's falls not on the state but ultimately on the incumbent's campaign to challenge. so we will look for those and if there is the examples in the multiple signatures and things of that nature will challenge that in the and i wouldn't

imagine they would probably get that and in all likelihood after the review would force an election sometime i would imagine now in june, early in june and it becomes a new election unlike some states up or down on the incumbent is it forces a new election so the minority of people under the law can ultimately force the new election i think for most of our state even those that are political one way or the other most folks are tired of all of the elections, collectively there was more than $40 million spent by our groups and candidates in the summer on the state senate week to put it in perspective i spent $13 million running for governor over 18 months. they spent more than 40 million in the summer on those senate recall elections. i think most people are just tired of the attack ads and we have all been positive teachers, school board members, small-business owners, talking

out how the reforms are working for them and their communities and we will continue down that path people and ask me who my opponents are going to be. it doesn't matter it will be the big government bosses herein washington who will pull limitless amounts of money into our state and we are trying to influence and have to be ready to get the truth out and counter that and that is what we've done but also i think elections are always about the future not just about the past. we have to lay off a stark contrast. do we want to go back to the days of the record job loss double-digit tax increases and huge deficits or to we want to move our state forward? i think we've taken our state forward and i think we can move aggressively or even more so together in our state but we have to get past the recall. >> are there any reforms that were passed in ohio last year and then they were to repeal the referendum are there any lessons you take from the failure of the

reforms in ohio do you think that you avoided through the way that he went out or carry into the repeal? >> the biggest fundamental difference between ohio and wisconsin as much as we have the work with the recall what we have a with the recall. ohio's case once they got enough signatures to get passed on the ballot in the referendum question the law in ohio says it no longer goes in effect. so it ohio's case the voters never got to see the benefits of those reforms. if i had a vote last march, i think would be much more difficult to win because all people would have heard is the scare stories the would have heard the attacks and they would have nothing to counter that. in my case i mentioned earlier devin benchmarks september 1st in the second week of december those two things alone have a tremendous counter to any attack ads they will run against.

the kids went back to school in the schools are in good shape. my school had a teacher that sounds pretty good and they say i got my property tax bill another good shape. one of my biggest hits on twitter and facebook in the past few weeks is people responding to me asking how many of you saw your property tax is going down or at least stay the same and people are responding to that. in ohio they never got to see that. so i think the biggest challenge that the head there is all that people heard were the negatives and spent by ten or even-1. we will be outspent just as our centers for but i think we can win as long as we have enough to get our message out. >> one more question before we open up to the audience. if i am a reform minded governor and i say well scott did a great job but does this backlash and is their anything in after going

through this you would do differently -- i know you could push for the reform because the structural reforms would have you learned from the nature of how this was unfolded? >> we would lay the groundwork early in january and february. and i mean that not just me speaking about i think we would have run an aggressive ad campaign because that is the biggest mistake i need. i just viewed this as a fixing. elected to fix things, go in and do it. i had no idea the national that would come in to attack early on a really distorting the facts and the truth out there. again i cities before but if people had known how many tens of millions of dollars the school district suite in the past by being forced by their health insurance from the provider if they saw the millions of dollars wasted on the abuses of overtime, if the of seen the examples of officials like myself before i

was the winner across the state who were trying to do innovative things not just for the balance of the budget toward better if they had heard those stories that for a lot of people were not involved in the local environment prior to this coming up a lot of people came out of the blue. one of the things i hear from people and i think it is legitimate, they say you know what, the more i look at your reforms make sense and i'm glad the way that it's worked out, but i really still frustrated because if you could have done a better job explaining it up front. and i don't shy away from that. i say in retrospect hindsight is 2020 but if i can change it for any other governor, for he or she i would say have some respect of communications, built or planned early, don't drag it out, early up front. make the case for whether it is needed and not just do it but to then repeat it. once we got engaged we got caught up to speed on the communications, but you have a fine way to talk directly to your constituents, not just

through press conferences. we have town hall meetings and listening sessions and other things like that. you know, we have crisscrossed the state it's also in beijing for all the talk you often see in the national media and the attacks on this and that the protesters, for every protester like it, there's five or six people that quietly come up to you in a listening session or in a factory you go to the small business to come up and slap you a note and tell you persevere and tell you their family is praying for you, these people give you a thumbs-up. they are people that are not holding a sign of and don't have enough time left on their vacation schedule to take off from work a couple of weeks at a time but they are passionate, just as passionate, they're just not angry about it. so the past that as well and that is the other thing i tell the governors of you were going to do it, don't go halfway. people say could have done this? no. in the and i knew from being a

local elective officials for all those years that if we had gone have way we would have fixed the problem for a year or two it would have only gotten bigger a couple of years on the road. to me that would have been completely unacceptable. and i have to say i don't plan on losing but i'm not afraid of losing because in the end if you do something for the right reasons, i always say in this town paul ryan and i like to point out is to kind of people they are not liberal or conservative or republican or democrat in this town, people get elected to be somebody great or do something great. we try to mentor do the water run for office because you want to do something real and that is what we try to do we try to fix the problem in a way that made sure we were not just fixing it with a band-aid we were fixing it so that the next generation that all first fix it is not to get too nostalgic here but i remember back in september i was at a governors' association conference, and i got up early and ran over to the constitution

hall. constitution hall is about as big as the room that we are in right now. i remember i love history and thinking of our founders as kind of super heroes, sort of super natural. you get a hole like that and remind you will get shares in the back and there's the rising sun and you look at the chairs and remember these were ordinary people. who just did something extraordinary. and as much as it took political courage and her case it took even more than if we don't hang together we will hang separately. >> he wasn't joking. >> literally, in their political lives and yet for 200 years what has made our country great and the times of crisis where there was economic, fiscal, spiritual, whenever, we have had leaders, men and women encouraged in this country in those moments willing to stand up and think more about their children and grandchildren and their fatah but their own political futures and that is really what is at stake italy in

wisconsin but across the state, state by state and certainly here in washington. my hope is that as we have these ongoing discussions there will be more people willing to think about the next generation and with a will do with the next election. >> and we want to open it up to folks in the audience for questions. just a couple of ground rules. we have a microphone now will be going around, so please wait for the microphone. identify yourself and please, make your question in the form of a question. we would appreciate that. >> maxwell from the huffingtonpost.com did you spoke about the national money that came in over the recall process. and you've been critical of the unions and the money sources coming from out of state but obviously a significant chunk of your money almost half has come from sources outside of wisconsin. why are you comfortable with taking out of state money not when it comes from the other side and are you concerned about what will play in the oncoming

election? >> the outside groups that come in and forced the recall when the first place. people from around the country are helping us of the grassroots level are trying to match the amazing levels of money coming in from the unions from washington and throughout the country. so i think it's a legitimate question that for me i wouldn't be raising a penny right now if it were not for the recalls that were largely driven by the national union and just so it's clear you are right in terms of total balance but of all of my contributions this last report we had nearly 47,000, 79% of the donors were people who gave me $50 or less. so even money that's coming from our side wisconsin in many cases it is coming from people giving 15, $20 saying we want to help to counter the money coming from washington and elsewhere. legitimate question that we are just countering the amounts coming in from wisconsin.

>> hello, governor walker. andrew which dow jones. there was a shilling in this wisconsin private sector jobs each month since june including 12,000 in november. does that suggest that maybe your reforms aren't working especially when the rest of the country is stressing jobs. >> ..

>> one other quick question. when you're talking about fairness to taxpayers, concerning reforms, one of the things i've never quite understood is why emergency responders were excluded from the pension reforms. >> great question. and that's one of the things that was in a pile, politically part of the reason the referendum went down. we didn't have that because -- it was simply practical. i had, as january and february when you look at this, the budget, what our options were, we wanted to make sure we didn't do this in a vacuum, we had a strategic plan should there be work shortages or walk off. anywhere at the state or the federal level. soviet contingency plans that could cover my correction facilities in the state, mental

health facilities, other 24/7 five operations. i have about 1700, a little over 1700 is now the and 72 counties. my concern, i did have a way to cover all those jurisdictions should there be a work shortage, fire or police officers in the state of wisconsin. they are professionals. i would imagine the vast majority would consider a work action. but even if one jurisdiction to that end someone's life was risk, i thought i had a high responsibility to do that. april when madison, the teachers in the madison school district walked off the job for three days and left parents kind of out in the cold, that didn't cause anyone's life -- made a lot of parents upset you did have provisions for child care. after a couple days teachers went back because parents were acting passionate reacting very negatively. but in that case, in the case of

public safety, the fact that someone's life could be endangered because that was too high of a risk, so that's why we did it. simple practical consideration but it's a very legitimate question. >> tom with nbc politics.com. governor, you said earlier in the coming years you expect him and his job growth and wisconsin. if good times and prosperity returned to the state, what's the likelihood that the legislature or perhaps you will be the governor, future governor, what's the likelihood that the reforms that you have enacted, collective bargaining, will be rescinded? because after all, it was the session that created passionat d remember, the reasoning was we had to balance the budget. those five choices i gave at the beginning. reforms which i thought were the best of all the other options of

other states and others governors to back if we were to rescind that would have a devastating impact on local governments. conservative or liberal alike you'd be hard-pressed to find many local officials who would be after even right now arguing to rescind the collective bargaining. why? because they benefit. the gentleman who ran for me for governor balanced his men. if that doesn't make the case i don't know what does. and so long-term, while i think some of the recall movement make the false pretense, or presents this as a choice between yes or no on these issues. the reality is if somebody is going to campaign, nobody who ran for none of the people of the candid to ran into recall election against state centers ran on the platform of repeating collective bargaining. they ran a just but everything else got a couple of races they actually ran on medicare.

you all know has nothing to do with the stake him everything to do with the federal level. they ran at anything but that issue. that's clear to me that people like the reforms. whether they like the process, more debatable. but local governments certainly like a. the public has largely benefited from it. if they're going to repeal it, i think politically that is a pretty negative outcome because people think about it. that mentioned this huge budget hole and jeff huge, structural holes for local governments as well. that would have to be filled either by having massive layoffs, cutting things like medicaid, are raising taxes at a time when they'll be crippling in the state of wisconsin. >> governor, josh. on your inauguration before

you're sworn in their unions organizing at the swearing-in talking about a recall before you had even signed a bill or even then governor. how much of this recall is about public policy and how much of it is just a foregone kind of political conclusion? >> taking a step back, the name for one of the recall websites was registered november 2, 2010. they didn't go up with the end of february. you don't register a domain on november 2 because, you know, the tonight show with johnny carson would have the gavel-to-gavel up to his head and predict things. it was because somebody knew in advance that this was likely to happen. a lot of these left of center groups were looking for an opportunity. the unions in particular jumped at the chance. i find it interesting because if you fundamentally this is the case, why aren't they going on a recall against deval patrick,

speaker of the legislature in massachusetts, who are doing similar things. well, it's because there's a political alliance there. i remember, i think was "the boston globe" that wrote a column months ago with a look at some documents or something that connected the white house with a kind of told folks in massachusetts to quiet it down a little bit so they can more aggressively go after hasek and not make the public realize this wasn't just a republican issue, that a lot of elected officials. but i think it's about power. i think it's unfortunate for the people in my state because people in my state are probably going to have to go through tens of millions of dollars more worth of negative ads largely funded by groups from outside of our state. ongoing seemly in this election. there'll be a june election, wisconsin is a swing state that has two key house seats up in an open u.s. senate seat. so my voters in wisconsin won't get much of a reprieve after the

recall election. i think most people in the state no matter they are into politics are tight and. with a handful of people, for them it's about power. it's ultimately about power. about the fact they don't like the fact that we gave public workers in our state a choice. you know, for a schoolteacher in milwaukee who pays almost $1400 when the contract is up now, he or she has to choices to was not they want the $1400 roughly to go to union dues or whether they want to keep that for the fan or health insurance premium or whatever they might want to use the four. that's really what's at stake if you give them the choice i think there's a fear that the public employees will choose to keep that money. that's ultimately what this is about. the voters i think it's simple. it is about as clear of a contrast as you can get. terrific candidate, it would be somewhat hand-picked by the union, they will want someone to go back to what we had in the past, someone who'd go down that same path that i believe illinois is going backwards on,

where the lap record job losses we had in the past, massive deficits and double-digit tax increases which we so years ago. or we can go forward with it much more optimistic better approach that we're headed on and we'll expand on in the future. >> governor, sean sullivan with "national journal." i wanted to ask about your read of the mood of the electrical. what we saw in the 2011 recalls of incredibly divided electorate, almost nobody was sort of in the middle or with no opinion either with you all the way are really against you. do you see a similar divide, if there is a recall election triggered, this year, and secondly, you have spoken about the effect of negative ads on the mood of voters in wisconsin. are you willing to say that if and when a recall is triggered, that your campaign will not be running any negative ads against a potential democratic opponent? >> two parts on the.

put this in context. you guys about not only wisconsin but other states. in 2002004 wisconsin was supposed to be a blue state. is not happen unless you suddenly made wisconsin have different political views in different parts of the state. that's our tradition. we have great debates for generations. anybody who comes and looks at the state before 2011, overwhelmingly democrat, overwhelmingly republican, fox valley, linked above and the rest of the state. that's why normally close competitive races whether ron johnson lesher or others out there, there's kind of a 40-40-20 split. 40 that lean or aggressive a republican, 40 that we are more or less leaned aggressively democrat, and about 20% that is kind of up for grabs in the middle. that number shrinks a little bit just because so much debate, discussion. i think the more the facts get

out, we really haven't run a concentrated campaign getting our side of the story out. throughout all those debates become optimistic that the more the facts get out the more people hear the truth, the more it benefits the local governments, not only financially but long-term. i think you will see a shift but i don't think it will be a tremendous shift. i think you see a shift in our direction. and i think there will be battles just like in 2012, the u.s. senate race, presidential race in our state. it will be very close competitive race because wisconsin, like a lot of other midwestern states are evenly balanced the interests of the ads, we have run positive ads up until now. i can tell you we will run ads that define the differences. we will not take cheap shots. i think people don't want that but i also think people want to know what the difference is. and if i point out my record versus whomever the unions decide to put up to run against me, we will clearly define the differences. i don't think that's negative. i think that's legitimate

comparison the voters one. but that would be our expectation as well. we'll talk about our vision for the future. will talk about how that contrast has people putting their money behind. i should stress the public, there a number of private-sector unions that endorsed in the past. >> john peel with state tax magazine. i know a lot of this recall effort is about the collective bargaining agreement, legislation that was put in place, but some democrats have been critical. but then the state also reduce the income tax credit and that's something they said wisconsin republicans have increased taxes on working quarter of 21st of which response to that? do you think it's also going to be an issue in the recall elections, it might spread out to tax issues and other parts of the economy? and since the senate is so close and it could possibly shift

towards democrats depend on how these races go, how do you think your administration welfare with policies the democrats gain control of the senate in the future speakers couple good couple good questions there. on the tax part, i think all it elections more or less are about the future, not just about the past. there will be some discussion, but you look at the earned income tax credit. but we did was even things out so not as much money is going to offset people who don't pay taxes and give them more of other taxpayers money. that's just a matter of how much of a subsidy. and on the other side on the tax reductions we did, they're all tied into jobs. in fact, many other things we proposed, in fact, out of all the bills that i've signed into law, more than 90% of them have had bipartisan votes. worth repeating. out of all the legislation i passed in the past year, more than 90% of them have had those from both republicans and democrats. i've been putting some of the

tax once. why? because we didn't give blanket tax cuts. our tax cuts are tied into job creation. you create more jobs in wisconsin, whether you're a small business on the other side, if you ultimately capital gains and we exempted all capital gains, 100% exemption for investments made in wisconsin-based companies. why? because i want people to take their earnings and dump them into companies that are in wisconsin that will create more jobs. i mean, i was elected -- those were things that we believe we have it commits impact on putting more people to work. two of the biggest things we pass in the budget were credits, direct tax relief manufacturing and agriculture base industries in our state. those are two largest industry. those are things that grow over time and our tremendous incentive so anybody watching

who is manufactured our agriculture should come to wisconsin because you have one of the best tax person in the country. when it gets better over time, because the tax that is built into this budget. we didn't get out to corporations. we didn't give it out to individuals. we targeted areas that would have a direct impact on economic growth and prosperity, and i think that's part of the debate is someone wants to run against me and say, they will make it harder for manufacturers and others to create jobs, that's a debate i would love to have because i think the people understand that for the small businesses and others in our state that creates jobs, we need every ability to create more jobs and move in that direction. the other part, one of the question? >> yes. if the recall elections in to bring the senate back in democratic control, how do you see that affecting fiscal policy

debate? >> even taking, like i said, more than 90% of the bills passed the house with bipartisan that i put into law. i still think, somehow i think republicans retain the majority. that we think there's enough discerning democrats, including a number who voted for almost all of our major jobs initiatives at we continue to work with us on the same issues. i would imagine even coming up next month or two we've got some issues to further create incentives for venture capitalist investment in our state, to look at reasonable and state money opportunities in our state. i've talked a number of democrat senators who want to vote for each of those measures as well as plenty of republicans. those are things that long-term we can get done no matter what the layout is of the legislature. i think it's better for us long-term if the majority continues but we can get things done either way.

>> i'm a reporter for the "congressional quarterly" here. i wanted to ask you about health care law, which major issue for states and other. both in terms of budget policy coming a. i understand you recently said that you going to put off implementation of the state exchange is until after this been court cases are involved in was not the law is constitutional. i'm curious about your thinking on that and if you're concerned that the state is going to have problems catching up if the law is found constitutional? secondly, i'm wondering if you plan to return any of the money for the health law implementation? >> well, on the first day i took office, january 3, i authorize our attorney general to join the federal lawsuit. i believe that the federal government should not have a role, does not have a role as

defined by the constitution in health care mandated, not only the state but ultimately, i don't particularly care if the state government mandating it on families because i think that's a decision to individuals, families and employers should be making, not dictated by the government. but i particularly be with the tenth amendment that's a right inherent in the hands of not only the state, of the state, but other people. something with a very connected? in that argument. you know, the supreme court is going to take an unprecedented amount of oral arguments in that regard. i think for any state either before passionate not know what impact will become probably sometime next year, is particularly any state that is involved in the lawsuit is a poor decision. and no, i don't think long-term, i think, certainly i suppose the mandate. we have testified before that the president a mandate in

wisconsin? will cause a majority of people to pay more than last for health care. in our state, that's a negative for the vast majority of people. we are one of the highest percentage of the people, or states that cover people's interest. we about 96% of people are covered it so for us to fix the problem for 4% is completely upside down the current health care system, even though it needs some improvements. just seems like a poor decision for the vast majority of people in our state. we prefer better alternatives than what the federal health mandate dictates. and so porous we're going to push both legally and politically any and all alternatives to that. in the and after exhausting all legal and all political alternatives, we will re-examine that. but until that time we are still holding out hope that the power can also rest in the hands of the people.

in the terms of dallas, funny that the state had acquired under my predecessor is not in their hands to begin with. it's a drawdown so we're just not drawing any of that money down. >> thanks a lot, governor. i'm from the hill newspaper. i was one of which are seen as far as the enthusiasm for fiscal reform nationally? it seems the a narrative emerging here in the tea party, for example, may be. do you see it getting more difficult to push for reforms, and do you think your boldness played a role at all in this sort of backlash we may be seeing? >> on that latter part, i don't know. i will leave that to the abundance to decide. i do think, and it's not, you know, it's not a popular discussion to have ongoing. people like to move on, both immediate and the public, move on from one hot topic to the next. but anyone looks at what

happened in august when a bond rating was dropped, for all of us governors, executives at the local level, we know how incredibly important it is for us to guard our bond ratings. that needs not just the bond investors but to investors in general. so for the federal government to have that dropped, i think is a really, it's a warning sign we should not take lightly. and we have a limited amount of time to deal with that. whether or not that has continued or not, i mean, anybody who looks at that, i go back to thinking not so much because the hot topic of the day, but when i think about my two sons in a couple years heading to college and covers after that are going to be in the workforce. it scares the dickens out of me that they will come into a world where state-by-state, particularly in this country, where we are not just generation or even a decade away, we are years away from a major crisis.

and we need to look just across the ocean to greece, greece and the others in the e.u. to see exactly what happened and tackle most of issue. it may not be a fun topic to talk about, but long-term, a lot of times in politics people like to shy away from these issues, and understanding because as long as you are confident, one of us as a you see as lawmakers after i was in office, i remember personalized differences. your opponent today may be your ally tomorrow. so as long as, you know, personalize disagreements on this, but really keep repeating things over and over and over conduct of the great fiscal challenges we face at the state level and severa similar ones ae federal level. it will be in a few years if we fail to act in time for one more question.

>> hi, governor. i'm from the economist. i was just wondering about the element of the reforms that capped base pay increase at cpi that you mentioned. it strikes me that, you know, that's an element that isn't mimicking the private sector, it would be kind of dispiriting to know that your salary was never increase in returns ever by law. and that seems to me to be the effects of that. can you just talk through the logic gonna? >> it's the basis, a group that priest was a collective bargaining unit can automatically have their full base salary for that entire group go up in a wave beyond the cpi. but state government, local government, local governments already the past week or two have given up bonuses, for example, putting performance

incentive. they can do all sorts of things that can build into that. but the idea being we want to empower local governments to make those decisions to tie in performance, not just dividing a wave change once without regard to merit or performance. [inaudible] >> it's still tied to cpi. as the economy improves that could go up. but it will allow distinction between those who get performance benchmarks and those who may not. that certainly has an effective that made one of the issues we come back and examine. that was one of those debated even with the change that entirely or not, and that which is one of those remnants left that we felt was still a basis to have some role, but over time we may find that our employees say just change all that and let's have a wide open debate about salaries as well. >> the final question i want to

ask you, elections about the future. audit of the reforms that you're hoping to pursue? possibly very busy for the first half of the year with some political fights you hadn't anticipated. or are you done, had he done what you wanted to do to get the structural reforms or are there other things because on the structural financial side, one of the things i stress to my cabinet and a reference before is now it's performance time. we have been given these tools, is our charge to make sure that we are logically to be involved with this and do well. and so, a member of our agencies have been taking on principles like the manufacturing and other techniques that have been used. ironically, amazingly many other agencies hadn't had any real training of managers for years, if at all. and to anyone running a business knows it's not too sure top people, but your whole

management structure has got to have measurements and guidelines. we like to say you can't measure it, you can't manage it. so we tried to become much more effective. while we don't have a profit margin as those in the private sector do, we do have a performance measure. so those aren't legislative reforms but those are reforms we're going to internally pick the other part is for us to grow, one of our biggest challenges, many parts of the state we have employers, particularly manufacturing, that have jobs available now. we've got a 7.3% unemployment rate and yet i have a website, portal of when my state agencies, job centers wisconsin.com that has more than 3000 job vacancies right now. in many cases, particularly in manufacturing, they tell us they don't have enough people with the skill sets they need to fill those job openings. part of what we're going to do is put a greater emphasis on helping the private sector partner with the public sector,

find more skilled job position. part of a long-term, education reform. yesterday we came out with a initiative that would give the state superintendent, a position that is independent elected and traditionally elected with help of the teachers union. he and i have our differences on some issues but i miss we are on. and the other big one is we may end up, we will see out all works out, we may end up being part of a national discussion in wisconsin case, as well as an alternative to no child left behind, that it was a big design team of greece different interests of school and school districts accountability. we went to a much more competent way of measuring success of our individual schools, and our districts, and the providing that knowledge battling to educators but parents, business leaders and others. we think we can do it better than the federal mandate under no child left behind.

we think it's imperative not just for our schools and our parents but ultimately for our employers to know that the skill sets we're providing in our k-12 system are matching the job openings that we have in the state of wisconsin. >> that's all we have time for. i want to thank you all for coming today, and ask you to thank andrew biggs and governor scott walker. [applause] >> thank you. >> thanks for coming. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations]

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[inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >> this evening on c-span2 we turn our attention to new hampshire when the first in the nation primary contest will be held on tuesday.

>> though the house will not be back for legislative business for another 12 days or so, house minority leader nancy pelosi and other democratic leaders are set to speak shortly about the republican jobs agenda over the past year. i should get underway shortly live here on c-span2. news from congress, the "washington post" reporting joe kennedy the third might run for

congress to enact years after the death of ted kennedy, and a year after his son patrick kennedy retired from congress. the kennedy clan looks as though it may attempt to run a return to national office. 31 euros grandson of robert kennedy and the son of former representative joe kennedy is forming an exploratory committee for the seat of retiring representative army frank of massachusetts. been discovered should should give way shortly. a briefing with defense secretary leon panetta laying out the administration's approach to defense spending and defense cuts over the next couple of years. president obama spoke earlier at that briefing. we will show it to you later in our schedule as we'll. you will be able to see it in a video library at c-span.org. also, the new head of the consumer financial protection bureau, richard cordray, speaking out at the brookings institution. he was appointed and sworn in

yesterday, and he is at brookings now. that is live on c-span3. also on c-span.org. again, live here at the visitors center on capitol hill, in the press gallery waiting to hear from democratic leaders. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations]

[inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >> waiting to hear from nancy pelosi, democratic leader and other democratic leaders, probably the minority whip as well, steny hoyer, and perhaps a preview to the comments at the briefing here, steny hoyer tweeting a short while ago that president putting aside partisanship and focusing on

getting americans back to work. gop has led the least productive congress in recent years. you can follow what members of congress are saying and what reporters are reporting on twitter.com/c-span. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations]

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>> here on c-span2 waiting to hear from democratic leaders to talk about the republican jobs agenda over the past year. just some information about our political coverage this evening here on c-span2, 7:15 p.m. eastern tonight, former speaker -- excuse me, c-span at 7:00. here on c-span2 we'll be live in new hampshire. hearing from republican candidate supporters, tonight at 7:00, 7:15 p.m. eastern. part of our coverage today, head of the new hampshire primary. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations]

[inaudible conversations] >> good morning, everyone. as you know, one year ago the republican majority was sworn into office. since that time we have seen no major jobs agenda go forward. we have seen a budget that wants to break the medicare guarantee. this is just in opposition to everything this country needs. we have important work to do, as

the president said eric we can't wait. we have work to do. the american people want jobs, and we are not on the job. this congress is out of session for two more weeks, and only a few days into session in the month of january. we have important work to do with our conference, on cutting payroll taxes for the middle-class, with extending unemployment benefits for those who lost their jobs through no fault of their own. and for ensuring that our seniors can see the doctor of their choice under medicare. our countries are here and present and ready to work. our chairman, ranking member of the ways and means committee, mr. levin, xavier becerra, congressman chris van hollen, congresswoman and henry waxman of california. they're here, ready to work. we wish the conference would get

to work, and not take us to a point of brakeman chip pushing it to the last minute again, narrowing the choices adding to the uncertainty for the american people. we have important work to do, to do just that, extend those benefits, and that tax cut because they create jobs. they injecting it into the economy, create jobs that's what the american people need and want. they want jobs. they want us to work together. they want to know why we are not on the job now when they are so in need of jobs. in addition to that, we are here to talk about reigniting american dreams to bring, build ladders of opportunity for all who want to work hard, play by the rules, and to take responsibility. and reigniting the american dream, we want to rebuild the great middle class of our country. we think that's best done by rebuilding the infrastructure of

america. again, we can't wait. we have important work to do. one year in office, no significant jobs bill. i know they are saying welcome we passed one piece of the presidents jobs bill, the veterans peace. of course, they did. of course, they did. the president offered america's job act very popular among the public, they passed one piece of it. much of the rest of it just going by the by. where are they? i don't know. where should they be? right here in this capitol getting to work on this conference committee addressing the concerns of the american people to create jobs, to strengthen the middle class. with that i am pleased he'll tour distinguished assistant leader. >> thank you very much, madam leader. as the leader indicated, today

marks one year since the tea party republicans have taken control of the house of representatives. they came into power and laid it out for the american people their vision of how we should move forward. the centerpiece of that vision was the ryan budget. that budget, as we studied it, did some significant things. above all things, it created additional options for the wealthy, and eliminated opportunities for the middle class. we saw in that budget an attempt to do away with the medicare guarantee. and replace it with a plan that would cost seniors over $6000

annually in additional costs. we saw in their plan an attempt, that budget, and attempt to make college education less attainable for low and middle income americans. we saw in that budget and a salt on seniors -- in that budget an assault on seniors to make this health care much more expensive and in many instances impossible to attain. we are now celebrating a new calendar year. and it is now time for our republican friends to join us and initiate for the american people a new beginning.

recent studies have indicated that we have seen all of the studies, that there's tremendous growing web gap in our country. the wealthy are getting wealthier, and the middle income are seeing their opportunities shrink. that's why if you look at the budget, you will see all kinds of additional options for the wealthy or the one or 2%, and the elimination of opportunities for middle and low income americans. i would hope that our republican friends will hurry back to washington, and help us create opportunities, help us reignite the american dream, help us get

the american people back to work. and with that, i would like to yield to the chair of the house democratic caucus, john lawson. in thank you very much, and echoing jim's sediment, this caucus has reiterated a mantra throughout, which is that job creation equals deficit reduction. and we are here today with our sleeves rolled up prepared to work, as our members have during this break, and we will continue to do so. because we know that our task is to rebuild the middle class. we know that we have to reignite the american dream. and we know how to do that. we know how to do that by investing in our infrastructure, and by making things here in

america again. in my district, just yesterday i met with a greater harbor building trades council, we are at a school building, and at that school building we see what america faces, the need to be able to compete in the global economy by having the best educated students and work force in the world. and also the need to put people back to work, one school built in 1922, in desperate need of repair. and more than 40% of the building trades unemployed in greater harbor for the last two years. there is a great opportunity here, all we have to do is seize on the president's plan and put this country back to work. some have said that our colleagues are just pure obstructionist, that they want to see this economy continue at a slow pace so that it will impact the race of the president

of united states. it's a new year. we are going to get our colleagues the benefit of the doubt. that's why we are here with our sleeves rolled up and prepared to work. it has been suggested to me and confirmed by "the new york times" just last week in the science section, that what may, in fact, be impacting our colleagues on the other side of the aisle is that they have prosopagnosia. [laughter] >> now, that for you out there in the audience means this, it is a blindness that they have. it's a blindness that also works in a way that you don't recognize people's voices. how else can you not hear the play of 14 million americans that are out of work who need to be put back to work? we are here, prepared to work, ready to go to reignite the american dream, make things in america and continue to have the greatest country on the face of the earth, led by a great leader, rosa delauro.

>> thank you very much, chairman larson. i am happy new utah. thank you for being here. i want to say how pleased i am to join with our leader and my colleagues who are all a simple tier. and what we are about to today, my colleagues have pointed out, is that we are trying to look at and direct our discussions and to work on creating jobs and creating a growing economy in this nation. and while the house majority is continuing their extended vacation, we have millions of middle-class and working families, they have been waiting, they've been waiting for this institution to respond meaningful and meaningfully to a jobs crisis. it's time that the majority walked in the shoes of the families who are suffering because of this economic crisis. all of last year this

institution was quite frankly dysfunctional. for partisan political reasons, house republicans majority refused to consider any legislation that would create jobs and get america moving again. 2012, our nation can no longer afford this type of an action so we are here to get back to work, hit the ground running, on an agenda of job creation and economic growth. the thing is, we know what we have to do to create jobs and get this economy on an upward path that enriches all of us. we have to make smart investment in infrastructure, small businesses, workers, education, innovative research and families that will restore the foundation of prosperity, and help us to compete in the global economy. we need to think outside of the box. we have to pass job creating legislation, like an infrastructure bank, that i have

fought for for two decades. this is a nation today that it only consumes, we do not build anything. and we need to get back to rebuilding and look at jobs that cannot be outsourced overseas. we have to provide incentives for corporations to create good american jobs, particularly in manufacturing at home rather than shipping those jobs overseas. we need to pursue a balanced approach to deficit reduction that ask all americans, including the wealthiest 1%, to contribute their full share. all of these initiatives are a precondition for a growing economy. all have been proposed by the president and by the democrats. and many of them have until recently long enjoyed bipartisan support. it is time to get to work. to get them past. and 2012, the american people need congress to work for them again. and we need to reignite

anti-american dreams by fostering innovation and opportunity, and ensuring that all americans have access to jobs. we need to ensure that this institution is responding to the needs of ordinary americans, not just the wealthy special interest. we have a lot of work to do. we are prepared to do it, and i'm confident that we democrats are going to hit the ground running and move america forward. thank you very much. >> thank you very much, chairwoman delauro. congresswoman delauro, chairwoman delauro and george miller, co-chairs under their auspices, members came back, many more than are here now who had been working on our reignite the american dream, whether the rungs whether the rungs of the ladder, we put those ladders on building ladders of success, keeping them there for others to climb up even after some of may have succeeded. we can't wait.

we can't wait because the american people can't wait. before taking questions from you, and my colleagues are available to do so, especially our countries, i want to say that this morning we had very extensive and productive meetings in the zimmerman room downstairs. had conversation with mark kelly, the hudson of -- the husband of gabby giffords agenda to extend good wishes of our caucus to gabby, to hear her plans for the weekend as we observe the one year anniversary of the tragedy. we look forward to welcoming her back and hopefully that will be soon, but we didn't want the one year anniversary to go by without our own conversations internally. and without acknowledging publishing -- publicly, and how

her idealism is an inspiration to all of us. with that, i would like to take some questions you may have first for our conferees, because they are getting to work and they need to leave the syndicate any questions? or are you guys going to bring out the tax on millionaires? >> well, as you see, we are all here ready to get to work, and the clock is ticking, the payroll tax cut which benefits 160 million americans and it's very important to the economy. in terms of how we pay for things and to what extent the cost need to be covered, that's going to be discussion that we all have. we have the ranking member of the ways and means committee, and others who are here as part of the conference. but from our perspective we

think that we should look at all those possibilities but i do want to emphasize this, despite because it goes directly to your question. we have a majority of republican house members on this committee you're on record of as having opposed a payroll tax cut for 160 million americans. at the same time, they are all on record with the republican colleagues trying to make sure that we keep open special interest tax loopholes and protect tax hikes for the various wealthy in this country. we take a different perspective. we think the way to grow the economy is to empower the middle class and middle income americans, and part of that is to make sure 160 million americans have, on average, $1500 in their pockets to go out and purchase goods and services so that small businesses can sell goods and services.

>> there was a sharp takedown in the unemployed rate in november and there was a polish private sector estimate on job creation in december. how much leeway is there to come off the 99 piece of unemployment benefits, especially if there is a improving job picture in the next couple weeks? >> first, let me emphasize the democratic house conferees have been meeting. we are ready to work. the senate democratic conferees have met earlier this week, already to work. and no conference meeting has been called yet, and we hope one will be called very, very soon. i want to emphasize that we need to avoid a return to brinksmanship. the republicans have been dealing with that approach, and

it has really hurt this country. and we have less than two months, and we are here to say we don't want this to go down to the last hour once again. there are important issues before this conference. we want this to be a real conference, a real conference where we sit down and thrash out all the issues. chris van hollen has discussed one of them, to the extent that these major programs need to be financed, we want to look at a wide variety of financing them, and we do not want health provisions to pay for non-health provisions. as to unemployment, let me just emphasize, there's a record number of long-term unemployed in this country.

beyond any level on record. almost half of the unemployed have been unemployed for at least 26 weeks. and so, while there has been some improvement for the vast majority who are unemployed, they are looking for work. and the fact remains that for every job, there are three to four people who are looking for work. and so, we will sit down with republicans. we urge that -- we can't sit down with empty chairs. we're willing to talk about these issues, but we should not be sacrificing the needs of unemployed people who are looking for work, and we should not do so in the name of what some republicans have called

reforms, but really would undermine the basic program. so, you will not get specific answers today to each question, because we want to sit down and confer. but i want to say that the house republican failed to pass when it comes to unemployment was totally unacceptable to democrats in the house, and i think in the senate. and i think they need to face up to this issue and they need to face up to the other two legs, three-legged stool, plus i think we need to look at jobs. >> how open to expect these to be? ..