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tv   Tonight From Washington  CSPAN  April 30, 2012 8:30pm-11:00pm EDT

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to make that determination on their own and courts are not the country including the court of appeals in california and in chicago are going to be addressing the over the coming years. >> this is an issue that the communicators will continue to monitor. catherine crump attorney of the american civil liberties union thank you for being on the program. josh smith of the national journal was our guest reporter.
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.. it is beginning, we the people, and i am delighted to have my colleague, the former member of the house of representatives, mike castle, to join me and david eisner so accurately
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characterized it, mike and i are members of a 30 year club. it's not too easy to come by. it takes a while to get that kind of seniority. this book, "life among the cannibals," was designed to come out in the midst of this election season to try to appoint the american people with why washington is what it is today, and that is gridlocked and dysfunctional, so that if the electorate is properly motivated, now is the time to do something about it. and the title with the cannibals is by deliberation for motivation and for accuracy.
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because that is what is happening. it is really cannibals be powering senators and representatives. and i will be very specific. starting with bob bennett, the senator from utah, for 18 years, 93% conservative rating, wasn't pure enough to be renominated by the republican party in 2010 for one vote. mike castle in delaware was defeated in a republican primary i ate tea party candidate who had to defend herself on television as not being a witch. and the same applies on the democratic side, where a top
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notch senator like joe lieberman couldn't win a democratic primary. so what has evolved is a great worry on the part of members of congress that if one vote is cast, which calls us the party to -- and a primary where there is a very low turnout, that is the end of the political career, and there are very few who are prepared to put their political careers on the line for a vote notwithstanding what the public interest is. and this book goes into great detail as to my approach to being in public service and the votes that are cast and the one
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critical phot, which was the end of the association between the republican party and me. and i think ronald reagan best put it when he said years ago, when he was a democrat. did you know that ronald reagan was a democrat? he was. and is ronald reagan put it, he did not leave the democratic party. the democratic party left him. but let me assure you that the republican party in 1980, when i was elected to the senate was a vastly different republican party than it was as we moved into the 21st century. win this stimulus vote came up, i was convinced that if we did
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not have an infusion of funding, that we would be heading for a 1930s style depression. and we had seen a few months earlier when george w. bush was the president, that he came up with a 700 billion-dollar package to assist the banking industry and the automotive industry. $700 billion was the twin brother to what president obama came up with a few months later, with $878 billion in the stimulus package. the house of representatives voted down the bush program and the stock market dropped 700
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points in the end of september of 2008. the republican caucus in the senate was organized and the vice president cheney came to talk to us. you know dick cheney, that wild-eyed liberal. well cheney said that if you don't pass this package, you are going to turn george w. bush into a moderate herbert hoover. and a majority of republicans voted for it, including bob bennett. that was the end of bob bennett's career. but when president obama was elected shortly thereafter, it came up as his first legislative initiative to have a stimulus package. suddenly, republican caucus was out for his scalp. jim demint, the senator from south carolina, was heard to say
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we are going to turn this into obama's waterloo. mcconnell, the senate republican leader, said their republican senate agenda is to defeat obama. this was three years and 11 months before the 2012 election. and nobody in the republican caucus except for olympia snowe, susan collins and arlen specter would talk to the democrats about the bill. i had been the child during the 1930s depression, and i didn't want to see another depression. my father, who was a russian immigrant in 1930, found --
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which would was yiddish. we lived in wichita, and my father packed up the family, headed east to philadelphia where he had a sister. in the depression, that is what families did. they moved in with one another to survive, and those were really tough times. and i had been there. it was plain that the vote was going to be highly precarious and it turned out to be just that. and that single vote out of 10,000 turned out to be the problem which i had. and that has created a situation
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where for example, senator collins and senators nau would not cross again the line. we had a case called citizens united, which is pretty well-known, where the supreme court of the united states decided that corporations and unions could make unlimited financial contributions. actually, unlimited anonymous expenditures, independent expenditures, so-called. and they left a narrow opening, that is that congress could legislate to require disclosure so that at least you would know who is putting up the money. if sheldon adelson, from south carolina for newt gingrich for $10 million, you would at least know who is putting up the money. i think adelson overpaid for south carolina. but that was his choice. 59 senators on one side of the
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aisle, myself included, voted for what we called cloture movement, but not one republican senator would stand up to provide the 60th vote. neither collins nor snowe. they had seen what happened to arlen specter and they were wiser and that went down in defeat. so today you see the emergence of the giant super pacs, anonymous contributions. where's the money coming from? where's the chamber of commerce getting that money? foreign? foreign corporations? nobody knows. the law doesn't require disclosure that that sort of paints the picture as to help and shy people are about crossing the party lines, putting their political careers on the line. and you know, seeing the emergence of the tea party, you
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have seen what has happened in the town meetings right here in convention hall in early august of 2009. secretary of health and human services sebelius came to talk about the president's proposal for the affordable health care plan, which was before the supreme court last week and a tea party was out in force. had we been in this room, having this discussion, we wouldn't have been able to hear one of them talk there was so much noise in the adjoining room. and a few days later, i started my august town meetings. every year in august, while i was in the senate, i would make it a point to visit every
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county. usually i had 80 or 90 people. on this day i had 1200 a rather famous town meeting, where they had the replay again and again and again of a rambunctious crowd, highlighted by one fellow who charged up, came within a few inches of my nose, his fist waving. he made the front page of "the new york times" the next day. of course, so did i. [laughter] but he was the star of the show. but he became a major television personality. but the country was up in arms and cancer, i think president obama made a mistake and unloading too much too soon.
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he had 3 trillion-dollar programs, one for cap-and-trade on the environment for global warming and the second billion dollars on health care. it was estimated in fact at one point to be $1.6 trillion almost a trillion dollars on stimulus. it had been more than a trillion until it was pared down just slightly to $878 billion. so where do we go from here? might look provides an idea for the future, and the idea centralizes around the experience of senator lisa murkowski in alaska. senator murkowski was supposed in a primary by tea party candidate and went by senator demanded, and the tea party
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candidate cannibalized lisa and defeated her in the primary. then lisa came back in an extraordinary move to run a right-hand campaign. do you know how hard it is to write in murkowski? if you spell it with a y instead of an i your ballot is thrown out. if you spell it with an all instead of the u, your ballot is thrown out. but she won, and i think senator murkowski's experience shows that if you inform the public sufficiently and motivate the public sufficiently, you can reinforce what is outside this building, we the people. the power is in the people. the power is there, but it has to be exercised. and you know how often you hear
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people say well, one vote doesn't count. but that is replicated billions of times, and the nonvoters control the process, and the extremists on each side control the elections. if you want to win the iowa primaries, you have got to stay up until middle of the night to be able to caucus. a couple of final notes, the book has some lighter sides to it. i tell about an experience with senator kennedy in the senate gym. i was relaxing in the hot tub one day in the whirlpool, a great experience. income senator ted kennedy. who i worked with very closely for a lot of years.
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not this closely. and there is steady, 285 pounds in his birthday suit. he comes to the edge of the hot tub, sort of like a diver, plop. all 285 pounds. you know the old saying, a rising tide lifts all the boats? my head damned near hit the ceiling. [laughter] just one other story of a little different line but that has attracted a lot of attention. when john mccain and sarah palin came to campaign in neighboring delaware county, i was asked to introduce them. before we went on stage, mccain said arlen, give me
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some political advice on what to do in a swing territory with the independent voters. so, john and sarah palin and i went to a little area at a little conference table that were in very close quarters. i started to give him some advice on embryonic stem cells. i knew sarah palin was against embryonic stem cell research, but she didn't say anything unintelligent. because she didn't say anything. [laughter] but, the relevant part is not the substance of the conversation. the relevant part was sitting knee to knee in these close quarters. do you know the length of sarah's skirts? almost everybody does.
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and you know when you sit down, as gertz don't go down, and she is a very beautiful woman, very sensual. i wrote this very discreetly. the general approved of it. [laughter] but it has attracted more attention than my ideas on how to solve the nuclear issue with iran. [laughter] well i'm really delighted to be joined by mike castle because mike castle is a bloody warrior like arlen specter. mike castle served with great distinction in delaware as lieutenant governor and then as governor. five terms in the house of
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representatives, so taking tough positions inside a tough, tough party apparatus. when he was in his caucus, as i, the republican caucus on the senate side -- it's a really rough going. and delaware and america lost a great public servant, and from the point of view of the republican party, the party lost a seed. mike was issue when to win that seat. joe biden had given it up to become vice president and his son was in line to run, but when the younger biden looked at mike castle, he said not me. mike castle is too tough with his record in stature in
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delaware. and a tea party candidate emerged. i don't know which which but very few people voted. she won, and she chained -- the seat changed hands. so i'm really pleased to share the podium and the platform with representative castle and look forward to his comments. >> thank you arlen. i am also very pleased and thank you for your kind comments. i just want to ask you some questions that relate to things that you and i have been involved in. we have both been termed and i think are self-described as moderate and moderate republicans for a long time. clearly there has been a complete taking apart of the
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moderate wings of both the democrats and republicans in the congress of the united states. they differ a little bit state-by-state but in the congress is clearly that way. i am trying to determine the cause of that because when they take polls, the self-description but by most people is that they are moderate liberal or whatever and the majority people are very close to it first as any other description of being extremist or hard line. the parties i met in separate that out because they tend to be a little more extreme if you will towards their views of being either progressive liberal or conservative and it becomes very difficult to get people elected who are going to be in the middle. i am trying to determine the cause of all of this. i think part of it is the political parties who have the ability to take some of the legislation you mentioned and destroy a person's voting record on that basis. but i think part of it also is
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the media that we tend to overlook. there has been a big change in the media in the last 10 or 15 years in this country in that it has become a lot more polarized. i am not just talking about "fox news." there've been answers to that. "msnbc" and others if you will which tend to offset the conservative side of this and a lot of the political pundits who do a lot of the writing on the very ideological basis in this country tend to be the ones who are also on the air doing a lot of this talking. i think that it's been divisive and is part of the demise of the moderate wing because there is not a lot of moderate answer to that. you may or may not comment on your book. i've only the chance to skim the book but i would be curious as to your view of the media's role in terms of the sort of changing of the political balance in this country away from moderates. >> mike, i think you put your
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finger on the critical aspects. i think it is talk radio and talk television, which whips the fringes and activity. i think the money is at the hands of those who are willing to finance people on the outside eagles sense, the wealthy who really have more extreme positions. but i think ultimately, that the moderates lose because so few people come out and the people who come out are those who were most interested or the zealots who were really the enthusiasts to come out. and the generalized population has the attitude, my vote won't
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make any difference. i think that is the principle cause. >> let me ask you a question that i am sure is on all oliver minds right now and that is what is happening in the republican presidential primaries which have been going on apparently for some period of time. you have been in both political parties but what are your thoughts about that, not so much in terms of who the nominee they need. i assume it will probably be romney or at least it certainly seems that way but in terms of the nag activity and again as you mentioned, you have these very wealthy individuals with their super pacs and the citizens united case was allowed to happen in this country. but how is this going to play out with the public? is this something that the republican candidate will be able to rebound from or is the damage which is being done in terms of the very negative advertising which we are seeing so prevailing that it's going to
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be very difficult if not next to impossible for the republican candidate to be able to spring back from that? >> well i believe romney is going to have a lot of ground to make up and it's an open question as to whether he can do it. the republican primary has caused romney to move so far to the right, he is off the board. you have 10 candidates appearing in new hampshire who have a question. the question is, would you agree to 1 dollar in taxes for $10 in cuts? anybody in the civilized world and when i say that maybe that excludes those candidates, which they have course i will give you the 1 dollar in taxes for $10 in cuts but not one hand went up. not huntsman, not anybody.
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it was a well-kept secret but i ran for the republican nomination in 1996 cycle. and i was in new hampshire. there were nine people there. the question was, how many of you promised to abolish the department of education? eight hands sprang up instantaneously. ridiculous question. you can't abolish the department of education. you just can't do it. so here you have herman cain and michele bachmann and one after another pushing and pushing brownies so romney so far to the right. senators and forum, prodigious worker, covered all the counties, played right into his strength with the evangelical
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right, but as soon as the people of america found out about him like the people of pennsylvania, there he went. and romney has changed position so many times, bill maher had it right the other night when he said romney has changed positions more often than a pornographic movie queen. [laughter] and i am asked who am i going to support in november? i say well, i am not senator arlen specter any more. i'm citizen arlen specter and i'm not happy with president obama to be frank. this policy in afghanistan is absurd. i spoke out on the senate floor against 30,000 additional troops there. we have no fight with the taliban. there is no al qaeda there. i was part of the delegation to
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visit president karzai and he is not somebody you can do business with. you have the tax cut. obama extended it and i spoke out against it. should never have extended the tax cuts for the rich in my opinion. then you have a commission cochaired by alan simpson on the deficit and national debt. doesn't pay any attention to that. and how about romney? well, which romney is going to appear? which etch-a-sketch will we now? how will we reset it? the answer to your question in my opinion is that the primary process has moved republicans this romney so far to the right he is going to have to make a sharp u-turn. ..
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>> and if so, what influence that will have even if obama is reelected, regardless of what the supreme court may do. >> my sense is that the supreme court, following conventional wisdom, will strike down the affordable healthcare act.
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my own legal judgment is that it is constitutional under congressional authority, under article one in the comments of us. the way it has been interpreted. there have been many programs, social security and medicare, medicaid and others, which have served as real precedents. but you have a very ideological core, this is the court which elected bush and they came down with citizens divided, and kennedy is a swing vote. i have studied kennedy very closely since i participated in his confirmation in 1980. kennedy has a pension for the name kennedy court. the argument along a mandate, he said a couple of things.
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one was that the mandate certainly goes far toward an incursion on liberty. suggesting that he would strike it down. then later in the argument, he left himself some wiggle room saying, well, if people get their health care at the emergency room, it is just a burden to everyone else. so you can be sure. if they strike it down, well, i think it's going to be a very confusing situation. there are some things that have already gone into effect. some parts of exchanges, for example. covering miners were children on their parents policies. i don't think you can keep the elimination of pre-existing conditions. i don't think you can compel the
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insurance companies to take everybody if you don't have a mandate. what will congress do? i don't think congress will agree to any -- just nothing. you have a supreme court decision, if they strike it down, it will leave an enormous number of unanswered questions. questions to be litigated in the district court systems and the court of appeals, which will take years. meanwhile, people are sick. it will be very deterrable situation for the country. the supreme court of the united states is so far gone on ideology. roberts and alito testified one way about congressional intent, following fact-finding, they disregarded 100 years of
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precedent and citizens united. one thing that has not been emphasized enough that maybe will be in this campaign, but roe versus wade is in jeopardy. ladies and gentlemen come out there in c-span land. when you have a hundred year precedent that corporations and unions can't make political expenditures, and you have a 1990 case, called austin, where the supreme court upholds limitations, and then congress enacted into law, and then the supreme court upholds it in 2003, and then seven years later, you come along and with a flick of a pen, declare it unconstitutional -- there is no precedent that is saved. if ideologically the court disagrees with it. and that is a real problem.
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>> okay, folks. it is returned. there is a microphone here. you have to get in line and come up to the microphone. there is someone here. anyone else would like to query the senator can get into line and we will try to go through this as rapidly as possible. get in as many questions as we can. please keep the questions as brief as you can. the senator can give brief answers, but he is a senator. [laughter] three i like the first two questions because they have books in their hands. [laughter] >> i am a volunteer. i am a member of no labels. i've been to washington four times, including four weeks ago also, the government of affairs committee. we have a bill before congress with no budget, no pay. i'm not sure if you are familiar, but i'm wondering what you think of no labels.
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one portly, one portly, does this country need a third party. with people like you, and somehow coalesced to have a moderate middle. taking control of his country again. >> i am familiar with no labels. i went to new york when they were first announced. i am also familiar with what you referenced, no budget, no pay, which is politically very popular, although i am not sure if it is really feasible. having said that, they did pass budgets and the provisions bills, which they don't seem to do anymore. and by the way, no labels is a movement to say to you should not put labels on politics.
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republicans, democrats, one way or another -- you should be able to get things done together. and i think it is actually a very good movement, which will do positive things in this country. it has raised a considerable sum of money. a lot of people are taking a great deal of interest in it. having said that, there is a third -- i don't want to say it is a political party, but a movement by another group. a group that is actually gotten on the ballot in every state that they tried to, and will, in all 50 states. when you go to vote for the presidency are coming you can be one of several things. you can vote for the democratic candidate, the republican candidate, the candidate of this other particular group was going to be nominated by some sort of an internet nominating process.
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the president and vice president will have to be of opposite parties. senator, if you're running for president, maybe you will be on there, i don't know. [laughter] that is interesting, too. maybe we need to do something different in this country. no labels is a part of that. at least talking to each other and getting things done. it makes sense. >> i think your idea of no budget, no pay, is a good idea. i just don't know how you get congress to pass that. >> good luck. [laughter] >> they would be the ones that would get no pay. i think if you put that on the referendum, you have a pretty good shot at it. >> [inaudible question] >> we had senator heller who is running for reelection in nevada. he has done his own polling, and no labels has done polling. over 85% -- between 85% and 90% of the people are in favor of no budget, no pay. senator lieberman said he won't be surprised to learn that the
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same polling figures don't take place in congress. somehow, if we can get congress to do the same thing as the american people -- maybe something can happen. >> try a referendum. [laughter] >> yes, sir? >> senator, i am proud to work in the public programs partnered here in the constitution center. when you see come lottery in our congress period in 2013? in my lifetime? and my middle aged children's lifetime? in my grandchildren's lifetime? thank you. >> i am hopeful the day after the 2012 elections. if you throw enough of the rascals out and making comments more worried about losing their seats if they don't vote in the public interest instead of voting to preserve their
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offices, you have a chance to say it. it depends on when we the people raise enough hell. >> and your. >> it is all set forth in the book. [laughter] >> i'm getting a little worried about libel and slander. we have to be careful of what we have to say. >> hello, i have a question for both of you, actually. i think part of the problem are kind of politics now is that i don't find that there is enough candidates that i like or that i want to vote for. it's two longtime political leaders, what expression you have for people who want to run for office? i find that young people feel disillusioned and many don't know where to start, especially now. what words of inspiration would be safer people that want to go
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into politics or see leaders today, and what advice would you give them at this point? especially women. there are not a lot in office right now. >> first of all, there are an increasing number of women. that is very important. more so, as we all know, more women are attending college now than men. there are more women becoming leaders in the private sector, and it will spring into the public sector. i think it is very important to understand the significance of represent people. but also the enjoyment of it. i was in government for a long time. i don't like the way it ended, but i enjoyed the experience tremendously. i enjoy helping people. my staff enjoy helping people. that was a part of it. you don't think about it much, but you get those phone calls about the problems with social security or health care, and you are able to help them. that is a feeling you don't get in most of the private sector type of positions, which are out there. i think it is very rewarding.
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i believe that anyone can do it. i can say that i started in the state house of representatives when i was 26 years old. in wilmington, delaware. i knocked on doors. i talked talk to people. they were happy to see somebody. at that point, not many people did anything like that. they supported me, and i was able to get elected. that was the springboard to what i did later on. i think that young people can do it. i would never underestimate a good, enthusiastic young person with good ideas in terms of their ability to do it. the political parties are very receptive to young people doing this. they are generally looking for candidates, maybe in areas where their particular party is not doing that well. the next person can go out and get the job done, as far as getting elected. i think it is a very rewarding career. sony people tell me that i would never do what you do. sony people tell me that i would
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never do what you do. i cannot imagine undertaking that or whatever. but they can, if you could. the opportunities are there. i would hope that our good that young people, whether they be well educated or not, they can contribute a lot to the public discourse in this country. those are the people that we need to get involved. but the young people are going to be the future of america. we cannot discourage that. my hopes are that both parties get more young people. >> i think you get your motivation around the kitchen table.
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tracy spectre is sitting next to joan. she became well known among the republicans. she and i are trying to have enough talk around the kitchen table to produce another senator or president out of the spectre family. i got my motivation at the kitchen table for my father. he lived in russia, and in siberia they wanted to send all the troublemakers they are to avoid a revolution. he wanted to go to kansas instead. it was a close call. [laughter] he emphasized the importance of government. and how important it was in our lives. that motivated me. i became a committeeman, democratic committeeman downtown
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i became an assistant da. i didn't have any money, didn't have any powerful friends. i won some big cases. i was asked to be one of the young members on the warren commission staff. i won an upset victory for the da, one a republican primary, and you can do it. like mike castle says, if you work at it. >> you mentioned in ideological court. you feel that lifetime performance are still relevant for supreme court justices, and would you support a constitutional amendment that sets limits, say terms of eight or 10 years or something like that? >> well, i think it is worth considering. i wouldn't put it at eight or 10 years, but i think you might have a cut off of age.
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what we really have to change is the confirmation process. i invite you to come to washington. we are having a five year retrospective on judge bork. i want to talk too much about it today because that is my next book. [laughter] and i want david eiseman to invite me back. >> thank you, senator. >> i will give you an idea. he goes through my mind, and i'm not advocating this yet, but something to be thinking about is that maybe members of the house of representatives should be elected for four years instead of two years. that business of running every two years makes them extraordinarily sensitive to fund-raising, to the political environment, and then on willingness to be, i think, more open-minded about what they are doing. maybe that would have to be some
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sort of a cap on how often you can run. this is a terminus problem in america today. not just because it influences things, but it takes away time from the workers must be doing in terms of representing the people in congress. i think that that rapid turnover, which we see in the house, you don't see as much in the senate, but we see in the house -- it is pretty germanic. it is very often that somebody defeats someone else in a close election and that opponent says that i will run again next time, and the race is still on, and it never goes away. it is a bit of a problem in america today. something to be thinking about. i think in terms of where the country would go. good luck making that change. just something to put out on the table. >> hello. i am a retired school administrator and a volunteer here at the constitution center. i would like to say first of all how much we appreciate you coming here and sharing your book with us.
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it is an honor to be in the same room with both of you. i look around, and i think about things that have just happened in philadelphia like the [inaudible name] scandal. the delaware port authority, nonsense that is going on with people who are being less than honest and less than moral. i start to wonder when i look at education. education, it feels like we have so much deemphasized civics and social studies in favor of passing tests in math and reading. i wonder, to me it seems like that has a correlation to the lack of a moral compass of so many people. congress seems to have in so many people in the public realm -- serving supposedly as servants of the public.
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i wonder what you think. either of you or both of you. >> i will leave it up to the senator to handle. [laughter] >> well, education would certainly be a big help. there is no doubt that the schools do not emphasize government. they do not emphasize civic responsibility. and they don't really do much to inform the students about what goes on in washington dc. sandra day o'connor, who has spoken at this podium, in the constitution center decries the fact that students don't know anything about government in washington. that is a first step. the moral compass is a big significant factor on education.
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>> so much of it comes back to the kitchen table. what the parents do. i mean, a lot of the blame is placed on no child left behind, which is an existing law with respect to elementary and secondary education, demanding students being able to pass tests and being able to read, write, and do math. other subjects are theoretically being ignored. first of all, i think that is a little bit faulty. i have been in every school in my state -- small state. [laughter] and i have seen the good principles. and i have seen them put together schedules and figure out how to work other things into it. even when you are dealing with certain aspects of learning required, you can work in civics education and et cetera.
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i think that there should be more of that. i think there should be more basic economic education, too, which might have prevented some of the problems with foreclosures and excessive student loans and things which are going on. i think the things that need to be done, this race to the top business is the next generation of no child left behind. perhaps it will try to address some of those issues. but i believe the educators themselves need to look very carefully at how they can manage it. education is or is going to be, ultimately, a local decision. that's what we have to keep in mind. the federal government will put some money into it, but the bottom line is that it is the local educators who will make the decisions. your basic premise is how do we get there, and i'm not certain. i think i am being given the signal that we are done. senator, i will give you 30 seconds to sell your book. [laughter]
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>> i would make one addendum to that question. that is, i would encourage high school students to go up for debate. go out for debate. it will acquaint you with the substantive issues in the public arena and the teachings of research and analysis and public speaking. those are key ingredients to getting someplace in politics. >> very good. let me thank the senator very much. let me thank all of you. let me just say that he is going to be here. [applause] [applause] [applause] [applause] i'm sure you want if you want to purchase a book, he will be happy to sign it or whatever it may be. >> don't forget "life among the cannibals." this book was written to try to influence what happens in america. i don't care about the premiums and the royalties. but i do care about people understanding how tough and
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vicious it is behind the scenes in washington. and how the partisanship has destroyed the public interest. there is an answer, and we are here it in the constitution center and the big letters across the front of the constitution center, don't mention "life among the cannibals", but mention we the people. we the people can eat and devour the cannibals. read the book. [applause] [applause] >> thanks, everybody. >> thank you. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >> the senate on break this week, we are featuring "book tv"'s weekend programs in primetime on c-span 2. tomorrow night, a look at some of the world's outstanding scientific minds.
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starting with kenny ferguson on her book stephen hawking, and unfettered mind. after that, george dyson talks about the radical universal machine in the 1940s and 50s, in turning the cathedral. the origins of the digital universe at 9:00 p.m. eastern. and at 10:30 p.m., and author traces some of the 20th century's most important inventions to one american company. the idea factory. booktv in prime time all week on c-span 2. in a few momentsfrom our special "book tv" programming in primetime continues with author john shaw on the career of richard lugar of indiana. the life of senator l. simpson coming up in an hour. after that from a look behind the scenes of the 112th congress and the 2012 midterm elections. later, another chance to hear
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the comments of arlen specter in his career. tuesday on "washington journal", look at al qaeda and afghanistan and pakistan. one year after the death of osama bin laden. then we will hear from an environment and energy reporter. she will discuss the impact of energy and environmental policies on the economy. later, an examination of an inspector general report on the veterans affairs department on the accessibility of mental health care. mark thompson, national security correspondent for time magazine has an update. "washington journal" takes your calls and e-mails live every morning, starting at 7:00 a.m. eastern on c-span. >> i have seemed to have earned a certain place where people have listened to me, and i have always cared about the country. he gave me a kind of a platform,
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the book did come that was completely unanticipated. i ought to step up not just as a citizen and a journalist, but as a father and husband and grandfather, and if i see this, i ought to write about them and try to start this dialogue, which i'm trying to do this book, about where we need to get to next. >> in his latest book, the time of our lives, tom brokaw urges americans to redefine the american dream and sunday, life, your questions. in his half-dozen books, he has written about many things. sunday at 6:00 p.m. eastern on "book tv." next, john shaw on the career of six term republican senator richard lugar of indiana. mr. shaw is a congressional correspondent and vice president
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of market news international. this is a little more than half an hour. >> good evening, and welcome to indianapolis. my name is brian how we, and i in this capacity, i have the honor and privilege of not only traveling with senator richard lugar, to europe all the way to siberia to albania, but i have also had the opportunity to travel with the author that is going to be speaking tonight, which is john shaw, which has been in congress for market news, and has written his third book featuring senator lugar. i have to tell you, a story that isn't in the book. john and i follow the senator from moscow that to siberia to a chemical weapons destruction facility, and we ended up in the
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renowned town of [inaudible name] russia. then we went out to the facility where the highly enriched uranium is stored, which has come from soviet nuclear warheads. john and i ended up with officials who briefed us on what the senators were going to see. then we boarded a plane and headed to odessa. on the flight to odessa, we had a briefing that senator lugar participated in. we landed in odessa. we were met at the airport with a motorcade, so we course through odessa. with sirens blaring. we ended up at the london sky hotel. after a brief time there, we
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traveled through an area of odessa, a very gritty part of the city through an area down to the black sea, where the senator was shown monitoring equipment that was placed on ships that would pull in ships coming into the harbor, monitoring and look forward highly enriched uranium. that night we went back to the hotel, had dinner with the senator, in which we talked about everything from what he had seen earlier in the day to the united methodist conference of the united methodist church in indiana. it was a wide-ranging discussion. that night, john and i ended up in the london sky bar. it wasn't quite something out of star wars, but i think the motorcade and all the sirens
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that have brought us into town, piqued the interest of the intelligence community that is centered in odessa. in ukraine, it they are only one of seven of eight nations that border the black sea. as we sat in the bar, every time i looked up at him at the smoky figure on the other side of the bar, he seemed to be looking at me. then there was a group of people at a table, and they started us asking questions. who are you? where you going? and the guy said there are no flights from here to london. and i remember john saying, well, we are actually going to albania for us. then it became apparent that maybe these folks were looking for information that we should not be discussing so much. but that is one of the elements that i shared with john shaw is he researched this book. i'm going to turn the show over
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to him so that he can explain the third book that he has written. this one on senator lugar. john? >> brian, thank you for that kind introduction and a little trip down memory lane. the one part of the story that brian did not mention is that when we pointed out that we were going to albania, brian kicked me under the table. i got the idea that that wasn't probably the smartest thing to be saying to some strangers. thank you so much, brian, for cohosting this event tonight. i would also like to thank kathleen angelo who is cohosting. i very much appreciate that. i would also like to thank marge davis for allowing us to use this incredible facility. finally, i would like to thank rebecca poland and mandy clark and their colleagues from the press who have been wonderful to
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work with in this whole project. it has been a pleasure to work with them. what i'm here to talk about tonight is this book, which prime minister called "richard lugar: statesman of the senate." the book is coming out before one of the most eagerly anticipated primaries in indiana in and many decades. the truth is that i could pretend that this was great timing, but it was almost a total accident. i have been working on this book for a number of years. i work full-time, for market news international, between working a full-time job and covering the senator, it was a very full career. this has taken a long time to write. it is coming out at a very interesting time. the senator is involved in a contentious primary. he gives a sense of how charged the atmosphere is here this
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morning -- i went to a coffeeshop and a guy was waiting on me and we started talking about indiana politics. i mentioned that i had written a book on senator lugar. the first thing he said is the book pro lugar or anti-lugar. the first thing i said was i hope it is fair to him. describing about how he goes about his work. i began this book in 2006. i had just finished another book in 2006, a book called "the ambassador." ron was a incredible diplomatic found a way to get into washington. as i was finishing the book i wanted to find someone else who could give me a little insight into how to best into how washington diplomacy and foreign policy works. i thought of, of course, senator lugar. i grew up in illinois.
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as a midwesterner, i followed his career. i have been covering washington since the 1991 year, and i have covered him as well. my thought was to not rock unturned to write a biography, but do a case study on how a senator can shape foreign policy. my idea was to interview him extensively, get a sense of how he approached the job, to travel with him, both in indian and overseas, as brian mentioned, and also to interview some of his colleagues to get a sense of what they thought of senator lugar. his first those interviews go, i have some incredible interviews with vice president biden, senator mcconnell, governor knowles, former congressman lee hamilton. to ask about the senator. one thing that was striking was to talk to them and asked them to tell me about richard lugar. almost everyone of them use the word statement.
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it is interesting because how rarely the word is used now in american politics. in an interview, i try to get a sense of what they actually meant by that the term. a lot of them didn't have real precise definitions. as i thought about their comments and thought on my own, i developed a working definition of what a statesman is. it has four or five elements that i want to briefly present. this may be providing a context about the senator's career. the first one is the sense of working in the national interest. the long-term national interests, and interest goes beyond the next election. i think it also requires a willingness to take some political risk. as we all know, not a lot of people are eager to do that. a third element is a willingness to work with the other party. perhaps that is even rarer now in american politics. another element is the willingness to break from your own party, to disagree with your
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own party when you feel like they are on the wrong side of an issue. another component is the willingness to work on issues that do not have a short-term political payoff. to work on programs and policies, to do good work when no one is really watching, in effect. id., i think that is a rare thing in american politics. the final thing is that there is an ability to actually deliver and get things done. you can have the best intentions in the world, but in the end, you need to be able to deliver and produce. i think that is also a critical element of statesmanship. this book -- i don't argue that richard lugar is the perfect statesman. there are parts of the book that are positive. there are parts that are negative. i am sure that there are things that he disagrees with pretty strongly what i wanted to do in terms of structuring the book, is to start off with a biographical chapter to put his life and career in context.
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the first was to describe his life in indianapolis, a very consequential time. i spent some time trying to understand the nuances, a major experiment in government that he undertook in the 1960s. i tried to give a backdrop of where he comes from politically. i chased his senate career. he was elected as you may know, in 1976 for the first time. his early career was sort of dogged, discipline, no major breakthroughs. but i think that tipping point of his political career occurred in 1984. to the influential in senator, there were two tracks you can take. the first is a leadership track to try to become a republican or democratic senator. the second is to develop policy expertise and become a chairman or high-ranking member of a committee. interestingly, lugar began
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pursuing the leadership track. there was a five person scramble to succeed him -- senator lugar did not make that. due to some twists and turns, he became chairman of the foreign relations committee starting in 1985. that was a strange way -- they redirected his entire career, and he became it has become one of the leading spokesman on american foreign policy. he also worked in agriculture issues. i think that the real one is for policy. the book itself focuses on some areas that the senator has worked on. i describe some of the things he did in his early career. the focus of the book is the product is working on when i was interviewing him, which was 2006 to 2011. the book describes his work on
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energy issues, global issues, arms control, efforts to overhaul the american foreign policy apparatus. a very technical, comforted a nuclear agreement with india, and an international treaty -- the law of the sea treaty. i won't go through all of this, of course, but in almost all of these areas, the senator has worked in a pretty practical, dogged way to get results. he is a conservative republican, but he has not been particularly partisan, and he has tried to work with people from both parties to actually solve problems. probably the signature issue of richard lugar's political career is the lugar act. it is a program to locate comet secure, and dismantle weapons of mass distraction from the former soviet union.
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it includes biological and chemical weapons and also has expanded to other parts of the world. sugar go the senator went to africa and viewed how the program is working there. the nunn-lugar program is a program that has over performed, it is a program with good solid intentions, well-managed, accomplishing things. we only spend about $1 million a year on the nunn-lugar program, and a lot of people think we should be spending more for it. the senator has been nominated a couple times for the nobel peace prize. that will be remembered as sort of the core of his legacy. if not, richard lugar -- one of his greatest accomplishments -- is his involvement on the iraq and afghanistan wars will be remembered in a more complicated
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way. my own view is that the senator has had some very intelligent, even forward-looking things to say about the iraq war. but i don't think he had a lot of influence. and i think there are two reasons for that. i think first, the bush administration was not particularly interested in congressional insight into iraq. if you read read some of the memoirs that are coming out now from the bush administration, it is very clear that the congressional reaction to the impending war was not of a particularly great concern to the administration. i think a second factor is the senator opted to voice his concerns and reservations in a private, quiet way, rather than to force a public confrontation. this is one of the great dilemmas of of a lawmaker. recent history is replete with examples of lawmakers trying to struggle to find the best way to
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shape an administration's view on a controversial issue. in the mid- 60s, william fulbright disagreed with the johnson administration's conduct with the war in vietnam. he tried to persuade them to change course privately. he held public hearings in 1966, which really galvanized the public debate on the subject of vietnam. in the meantime from a marginalized him within jobs and administration. they didn't want to talk to them anymore because he had gone public and broken the administration. at the same time, mike mansfield, who was the senate majority leader, have the same sort of reservations. he opted to keep his concerns quiet. he was very supportive publicly. yet, he also didn't have a lot of impact on the debate. i think the senator faced an acute dilemma about what to do, whether he should stay quiet or make his concerns known in quiet
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talks or whether he should go public. i have talked to him. in the course of this book, many times, about his views. he felt that he would have more impact by taking a quiet approach. it is certainly a legitimate point of view. there are people who disagree and think that he could've gone could have gone and should've gone in a different reaction. one of the best interviews i had in the project was with chuck hagel, a former senator and nebraska, who is a huge lugar fan. he said it is very clear the demonstration was not going to respond to private treaties, and the only way to get action was to go public. lugar disagreed. one should note, that several years in june of 2007, he went to the senate floor and gave a memorable speech in which he basically said the
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administration's policy in iraq is not working. we need to change gears. many took that speech as a tacit admission to try to work with the administration privately. if the experience in iraq, i think, will be remembered as a disappointing chapter in the senator's career. one of the really good chapters will be his work on the arms control treaty with russia. here it was classic lugar. it was a complex, difficult treaty. he viewed it as part of the arms control agreement that the reagan administration had initiated. he did a deep dive, understand it the nuances of the issue, and the decided that he would work with you, administration because it was in the american national interest to do so. candidly, he was not treated well by the senate republican
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leadership. mitch mcconnell said that lugar was a wee person, but he also brought in jon kyl, his deputy. you have an ungainly arrangement in which both lugar and kyle were involved. it seemed like republicans were turning to kylemac on this. even though most people had a much greater understanding of the treaty comedy to be much more balanced approach to the treaty. but it was classic lugar in the sense that he worked hard on it. he was completely a gentleman. he did not react to mcconnell in any adverse way. he was very committed to working hard on the issue. he sent out a number of dear colleague letters. it was a model of a senator and what they can here. it was a remarkable set of letters. it laid out with the treaty was. while proponents believed, what critics believed, in his view.
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it was, i think, extremely fair-minded. the sort of work that we hope that our lawmakers will provide. it happens too rarely. i'd like to end my remarks by talking about his current campaign. obviously, it is a campaign that has grabbed both the national attention and international as well, of course, indiana, which is something un which is something under -- it is being viewed with great interest. something that i had to wrestle it -- because as i was finishing up the book in 2011, the one big question i had to ask myself and to try to answer, which is how can it be that it is a successful senator, very popular at home, respected, respected throughout the world -- he is fighting for his political life. i won't presume to tell people in indiana with about the
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debates and stuff they have going on, but it seems to me that the senator has faced some headway and that you have to understand. the first is that congress is deeply unpopular. opinion polls for congressional approval or in the high single digits. there is a sort of guilt by association but i think a lot of incumbents have to work through. secondly, i think the senator's brand of republicanism, which i was would describe as fiscally conservative, but internationally dedicated to foreign policy, it is being, i think, at least temporarily pushed aside toward a different type of conservatism that is more focused on social issues. these are the issues that the senator really hasn't talked about a lot over his career. i think a third factor that is weighing the senator down or causing his reelection some difficulty -- is that his whole
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term is that of a moderate, civil, gentle person. i think it is a tone that works wonderfully in washington. it is the way you solve problems. but i think it is, in some sense, out of sync with the more confrontational anger, if you will, demands of the senate republican base. i think his whole temperament is a little bit -- it is a little bit out of step. i also think it is the simple fact that the senator has cast some votes that put them in the mainstream of congress, and even republicans in congress that have been identified by some in the republican party as un- sufficiently partisan. the arms control treaty minister spoke about this one. some of his votes on the supreme court nominations is another. lugar view is that if these people are in the judicial mainstream, the president should have the prerogative of putting
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supreme court nominations before the senate. and unless there are disqualifying elements, the senate should confirm them. that, to me, is the backdrop. the senator has known since 2010 he would face a tough reelection this year. he has done, i think, a lot of things i think you would expect them to do. he has raised a lot of money. he has spent a lot of time -- he spends a lot of time in indiana under all circumstances. he spends even more time here. i think he has also shifted his, if not policies, his rhetoric. i think he has become far more artisan and confrontational. i am on the press list and get a number of e-mails on health care or keystone or something, but i think that he is taking -- he
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has moved to the right to be more in step with the tea party movement. my one view is that i'm a little bit surprised that the senator has not run more aggressively on his record. i think he is one of the more significant senators in the last century, certainly in foreign policy. and i think he has this considerable, impressive history and the background, i think, is the people of indiana -- they have been very proud of him. i think he has explained passionately and unabashedly, he is pulling back -- the campaign has become more tactical and negative. as i conclude, i would actually like to recommend that people read a wonderful essay by brian wrote last week about the campaign. in which he basically said that it was time for both candidates,
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both senator lugar and richard murdoch, the state treasurer, to up their game. but they dispense with the bickering and resident issues and taxes and murdoch's attendance at meetings, and just lay out their agenda for the future on things like fiscal policy, and for policy, health care, and et cetera. i think it will be interesting to see in the coming weeks -- the final weeks of the campaign, the senator really does run fully and aggressively as statesmen of the senate. let me just stop there. i would be glad to take any questions. i ask for any confidence comments too, on the campaign. >> thanks very much. [applause] [applause] >> questions from anyone?
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>> if you will go to the microphone, that would be great. thank you. >> when did you actually start on this project specifically? about five years ago, was that? >> i started in the fall 2006. my first trip of with the senator was in the fall 2006 period in which it is running unopposed. to just show you how the political world shifts, at that time, he was running unopposed. he was chairman of the foreign relations committee. he was a republican president. one of the big challenges of this book -- one of the real challenges is that even though you have senator lugar, who has had a steady career, the political landscape around them has been shifting constantly. it has sort of been like trying to hit a moving target. as i said, the senator's career, i think, has been very steady. the political circumstances surrounding him have changed considerably. i think. >> it probably doesn't fit in
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with your statesmen approach, but you mentioned the agriculture committee. back in the 1980s, i know he was -- he did a smoker job on jesse helms and the foreign relations committee. he has been very active there and have the freedom to farm act. when corn and beans went down. others senators got skittish and they repealed it. but the agriculture is another significant contribution. >> i think that is a good point. i mentioned in the book that lugar has worked on the agriculture committee. he was chairman, as you mentioned, in the 1990s. he, as you mentioned, past the freedom to farm. i talked a bit about agriculture but the focus of the book is one foreign policy. i also spent some time writing by the senator's relationship with jesse helms, which has been a difficult one. they have been actually, jesse
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helms -- lugar was the chairman of the committee from 1985 to 1987, when the republicans won control, jesse helms uses seniority to take control of the chairmanship, and effectively, forced lugar into the second raking position. it was at that point that he went back to agriculture. the battle between lugar and jesse helms is an interesting one. it has been something that has shaped lugar career in a very interestingly. >> john, talk about the political vulnerability of foreign relations chairman. you mentioned that other than jesse helms, could you go onto a little detail on that? >> yes. it is a committee that -- that has been politically difficult to be on. in fact, lugar, i remember when i first interviewed him, no one has a thorough grasp of the political vulnerabilities of the
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senate foreign relations committee like dick lugar. from william fulbright, frank church, there is just a whole slew of people on the foreign relations committee. it is something that he is committed to. one of the chapters is goaltending on the homefront. i described how the senator is trying to keep his political strength at home solid to allow him to work on foreign-policy issues. he does a lot of things to try to connect the world of foreign policy to the likes of indiana. specifically he speaks loud and works a lot on trade issues, which is a way that he believes you can connect foreign policy and the need of people in indiana. he's well aware of that history. up to now, he has been able to survive it.
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we will see one march 8 in the the primary comes. >> john, i want to begin by saying what an excellent speaker you are. and that is evident that you know your subject very well. my question is, and maybe was just touched on, but how does a farm boy from indiana get so passionate about foreign-policy? >> well, i think that it is a wonderful question. i think that there are two simple answers, prosaic answers that will sort of point to that. i think what the senator would say, he would say that his time as a rhodes scholar was a real opening experience -- eye opening experience where he traveled extensively to the uk and elsewhere. and he really saw the world through the eyes of others. he cites his work as a rhodes scholar as being hugely important. he also speaks a lot about his time as a young naval officer,
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working for it a man who was a grand strategist and foreign policy. as a young naval officer, it was shaped for his life. he also told me that his mother kept him grounded. that is a small, tangible abdication of what a different place and world captivated him and actually brought the world outside of the united states ally for him. >> another entity that question, there are those of us that were old enough to remember world war ii. when you live with foreign policy were from 1939 to 1945, it becomes a daily habit. >> and it is not an abstraction. it becomes real. that war was so all-encompassing in american life. that is an important comment as well.
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>> one other point i might just mention briefly, one of the things that i have struggled with in writing the book, and i think i gather that it has come up in the campaign -- is the senator's relationship with president obama. it has become a source of some contention and controversy. my own feeling is that well, i've actually talked to the senator about this. he first heard of barack obama when he was a young senator running for the u.s. senate senate in illinois in 2004. he was struck by the fact of someone running for office who is interested in foreign policy. i think mr. obama referred to lugar very positively. when obama jumped into the stratosphere after his speech in 2004, i think senator lugar kept a much more close eye on him, and when he was elected, barack obama in 2004 -- lugar wrote him a letter and -- he was then the
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chairman of the foreign relations committee, and he said that you would be a good asset to this committee. he brought energy and star quality to the committee. obama joined a committee in 2005. they work together. they took a trip together. during the 2008 campaign, senator lugar endorsed john mccain, as you might expect. but he also was careful not to disparage obama. in fact, just weeks before the 2008 presidential election, he gave a very interesting foreign policy speech in which he talked about the obama and mccain approaches to foreign policy. it was a very even minded speech in which he was, praising both for certain things and criticizing for both things -- it's the sort of thing that you hope that public officials will do. you look at something and you call it straight.
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but even then there were criticisms from republicans who felt that he was not sufficiently critical of obama. since barack obama was elected, and came to office in 2009, i think lugar has tried to work with the president when he could. i think, you know, despite campaign rhetoric that we hear in indiana, i think that senator lugar is neither barack obama's best friend or his worst critic. ..
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senator lugar has forgotten about foreign policy, so the bush administration had this incredible resource, and why they did not draw on him more frequently and more often is astonishing and senator hagel is passionate on that subject, too. google was dollying to help the president but no one called a very often and it was frustrating night think. >> can you talk about the relationship and how that has progressed since senator biden has become vice president? >> they were colleagues together on the foreign relations
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committee. they get along well. they have opposite temperaments as you probably know. senator lugar is quiet and soft-spoken and doesn't like to draw a lot of attention to himself. vice president biden is a more flamboyant and talkative person but they have a respect for each other that it's interesting. the of this sort of the ability to decide what issues they can agree on and to focus on those and no they would harp on it. one of the interesting moments occurred during the nomination to the u.s. and u.n. ambassador and the reserve certain moment when the relation was considering its nomination and lead in the game there was a republican defections of it was clear that he was about to go down, and he basically turned
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and i'm not sure if senator lugar at that moment quite caught what was going on but he whispered in his ear you don't want to call the roll call here. you don't want to lose. again, the short term thing would have been for joe biden to let it pass and have the nomination collapse. but they had a sense that when they were colleagues for the long term and thought it was not important to have the senator out on the issue that could have been embarrassing to him. thank you very much everyone for being here. it's been a pleasure to chat with you, and will be very interesting for everyone to see how the next couple of weeks turnout and with the world looks like after the may 8th primary here in vienna. thank you all very much. appreciate it. [applause]
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four years later i met this dinner. four years ago i looked like this. today i look like this. and for years from now i will look like this. [applause] that's not even funny. >> mr. president, remember when the country rallied around you in hopes of a better tomorrow? that was hilarious. that was the best one yet. [laughter] but honestly, it's a thrill for me to be here with the president and he's done his best to guide
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us through difficult times and he paid a heavy price for it. there's a term for guys like president obama. probably not the two terms but -- [laughter] earlier this year but to be attended a party to the publication of shooting from the lip, the life of senator alan simpson. the author is the senator former chief of staff donald hardy. this is about 45 minutes. >> it's good to see you.
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we are here to celebrate your book. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations]
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[inaudible conversations] >> my name is don hardee. >> she is the author of the book. >> the trouble maker in town. >> thanks for being here.
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>> it's got to be about eight volumes. [laughter] you know jimmy. you know jim billington, of course. >> jim, jimmy. [inaudible conversations]
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we love your christmas card. you didn't have to do that. [inaudible conversations]
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>> how are you? good to see you. >> i'm going to go look. that's what david said to me. [inaudible conversations] what you said i didn't know that.
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>> hello. hello. no, no, i never knew that. >> thank you for coming by. this is madness.
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>> anyway, you're doing a good job >> we've got people worried about it now. [inaudible conversations]
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>> ann is in there. >> sam donaldson said he was a. >> i didn't write this book. i don't get any money out of this. the money all goes to the author. i don't get any. it's true. >> thank you so much. >> you are welcome. >> i used to work with senator thurmond's office in the 80's. >> how are you? >> i needed him in my line of work. >> i can't wait to read this. >> i didn't write it [inaudible
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conversations] i signed a whole bunch. >> thank you, senator. >> tears will streamed down. >> you haven't changed a bit. [inaudible conversations] there we go. he's written a couple of letters and recommendations.
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[inaudible conversations] >> i was a press secretary and i got there in 88. he is doing great. he gave me a list and he says you want to know what i think and yours was the first name but there were only a couple names on it. he was the chairman of the board for eight years. it was about six weeks ago. he said eight years was enough. >> it's a pleasure meeting you. >> i am here as your body guard.
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>> who is that over there? my editors have told me to ask you one thing who is going to work with the republican nominee? >> all i can tell you is republicans have a beautiful ability to give each other the security and then they lose. that is exactly what they do. they say how we get this and they say well, 20% vote for ross perot >> you haven't answered my question. [laughter] >> i would have to say i just wrote a check. >> you did? for how much? >> was for a thousand dollars. i haven't earned enough money
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what he said with this conviction. we know that we've succeeded so far and cannot go all over this country with the 500,000 people people were thirsting for somebody to tell them how do you stabilize social security? how do you do something in medicare which is eating a whole -- anyway, keep entertaining. >> good to see you.
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>> a little bit coming to d.c.. >> who are these? [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >> are you kidding me?
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>> to get in here. >> are you kidding me? this man loves you. >> he is a great guy. we used to do a hell of a lot of business >> he doesn't want to go to anything. i have to go to an event. >> i was working my way up but didn't get there. ann is there. right over there. >> how are you doing? >> i am doing so well.
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>> you may forget getting married in the house baker have room. everything is working well. >> who are you with now? >> i am freelancing and working on my own bills could -- my own book. the last time i saw you you were down the street >> ann is over there.
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>> [inaudible conversations] my god, who is this man? i know who is this. it's david. david brinkley had come back from the dead. estimate how much are they? >> i don't know. i didn't write it. >> you didn't? then what are we doing here? [inaudible conversations]
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>> i am here because of you. [inaudible conversations] i'm surprised they finished it in such a quick time the way that you are.
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>> go ahead and tell c-span. these are pals of mine. stick around. your book will get attention. >> i told them i wanted you to write something. >> tomorrow we are doing a different thing. the books received my personal attention -- [inaudible
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conversations] >> i didn't write it. >> that's right. i forgot about that. >> i didn't write it but -- anyway. i want to add a suspenseful notes to this. >> is that my hair peace? [laughter]
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>> when you lost 45 years ago. >> anyway. john dingell became. i love the guy. [inaudible conversations] stomach everyone will think that i was fiddling around with [inaudible conversations] she said don't you think i mean deuce? he said don't you think i know how to count? [laughter] [inaudible conversations] how are you? a good to see you.
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stat how are you? so good to see you. >> are you sure that that's all they want? >> bob [inaudible] best wishes. he loves you. i love you, too.
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>> can i get a picture with you, too? [inaudible conversations] >> okay. to get in here. how are you? >> this is one of my students. this is one of my finest students.
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[inaudible conversations] >> it's me. my daughter is here. the [inaudible conversations] >> his mother was the judge. 13 children. [inaudible conversations] >> i wish i could have been your author. >> he used to take the whole staff over. >> my goodness. >> you remember my wife, right?
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good to see you all. [inaudible conversations] >> we get to every everyone's awhile. [inaudible conversations]
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>> you must be rambling of the earth. >> coming to yellowstone around july 4th. >> let us know. give us notice. it's been a lot of people come and go into the basement and let the doorbell rang. is anybody in their whacks >> i've done that. >> i believe it. >> the car would drive up and i would go out and start loading. >> if you see me do that --
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[inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] steps before. it's great to see you.
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[inaudible conversations] >> we ran the same year. [applause] >> good evening, everyone. i didn't hear you. hello, everyone. i'm thrilled to welcome you to this special evening for a very dear friend of all farmers, and we are here the fabulous hotel the jefferson and i would like to introduce you to peter grossman, one of our coasts. peter, will you come and say hello?
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>> thank you. jury briefly on behalf of connie i hope that's better. we are thrilled to be hosting senator simpson and the former chief of staff and biographer this evening. we are excited to hear from both of them about the low book shooting from the lip, which i guess is fitting. connie was also very proud last year to host a dinner on behalf of the commission and then to support it in its efforts as a free latinos on the deficit-reduction. that is a political lightweight. so, in a different edition, connie noted that it was no surprise to her at that time that based on senator simpson's effort he would be chosen to be a co-chair of that commission,
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and last i just want to say that as we understand he had full access to senator simpson's records, diaries, volumes, for access, and i will say that's -- the senator didn't mention he's been married 57 years, so anybody think full access after 57 years pretty impressive. connie just wanted to welcome everybody and say we are thrilled to be sponsoring this. [applause] >> malae have the pleasure of introducing what i call the bravest man in the world, don hardee the author of the book. i don't know how you could possibly put all of this in one book and decide what to leave and what to take out to be just as someone who's had senator simpson on msnbc, cnn and fox. you have changed the conversation about politics and culture and about what's
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important in the country. don had to put that on how many pages? 460. ladies and gentlemen, john. [applause] >> what a treat this is. thank you. he told me if i ever got in front of a crowd like this instead of standing in the shadows like i normally do that i should be very careful because one day you are the toast of the town and the next day you were just toast. [laughter] so, thank you all, thank you, peter and tammie and can levenson is an amazing guy. he worked with bailey. i met him 18 years ago in china. he was a great guy in and agreed to buy now and i hope he will get to meet him. if it hadn't been for him we wouldn't be here tonight.
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so, and jackie wherever she she. without her the invitation would have been a mess. i've known alan simpson for just over 50 years. i grew up in wyoming and heard all the stories when i was a kid and then i tried to do them myself and he helped me out of that whole. 18 years i worked for l and i was press secretary and then chief of staff responsible for all the sticks and then when he went to retire and went to harvard i went to the smithsonian and was in charge of government there for awhile and my wonderful wife rebecca who is right here. i'm telling you i couldn't have done this book without. she proved and she is amazing.
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so, we were tired and went overseas and did work with charities and people and came back and ended up on a sailboat and one day in 2005 the phone connected for some reason to some violent tower and it rang and it was al simpson and he said these guys want to write the story of my life, and they don't know me as well as you do. would you like to take a shot at it? and i said because a was a good life i said just a second i having trouble getting the cork out of this bottle of chardonnay. [laughter] and i said why would i do that? because i will give you access to everything in my life. everything. and i thought i knew a lot. all of his records, his papers from his speeches on his personal letters from the family members, it was all there. everything i could possibly want. and especially the diaries.
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6,000 pages worth of diaries, 19 binders and people like david mccullough said the reason these are valuable is that they were put down as they happen. a supply was at the white house talking and he took notes into this dhaka you read that in debt up being 2.4 million words. it [laughter] that flows in 2005. [laughter] i said something that's really important, i said people really no work for you and i was loyal to you and you've been my friend for half a century they are going to expect this and it's very important that they not think that after they've read it.
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so i said, you know, this is going to be important that i tell the bad things and the failures in balance along with all of the success. and he said look, you just do the right thing by telling the truth. he said if hair, eyeballs and chiefly on the floor as a result of telling the truth about me, so be it. [laughter] i also said i have to have editorial control. if you write anything in this book, people are going to think that it is a piece, and also come to can't have any money. [laughter] so i called the contract with that with the university of oklahoma press. so, she said say what you want to make it true. so i did. the first three pages describe what it's like to push a car off
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a cliff and burn down the house and shoot mailboxes to end up on federal probation. now the reason that that is important is that -- [laughter] because this is not a story about politics. half of you have probably written books about politics. diggers' here and there, it gets passed, it doesn't come people's luggage off, what ever. this is a book about humanity, about a human being. he happened to be a politician. this is a story about a person that is extremely human, about a person that puts citizenship ahead of partisanship and that's why it was important to tell the story. and it goes back to the days in which republicans and democrats spoke to each other and respected each other. and it doesn't happen as much anymore. but, for cybill, alan simpson was a great friend of ted kennedy.
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they spoke very late into his life, and people didn't know that and they didn't understand it in wyoming especially. [laughter] so, little story that i have to tell you that kind of demonstrate the days of which there was friendship because either one of these guys could get the microphone and tell the same exact story. it involves a town meeting in wyoming. you know people come in and raise their hands and they are upset about something and this raucous meeting is going on yet he is presiding at the end over the door comes ted kennedy. people cannot believe it. they say what is this guy doing in wyoming? and another one stands up and says that ted kennedy, he's here in wyoming. she is a horse's ass. since then jumps up, runs to the back of the room and throws him into a snowbank. when he comes back in kennedy says to him good heavens, that
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was magnificent. i had no idea that this was kennedy country. [laughter] he looked at him and said it's not to read its horse country. [applause] senator alan simpson. [applause] >> firsthand this is beyond repair. well then i will save it for later. [laughter] if i start at around this room there are some wonderful people here, and i am not going to do that, haven't had a drink, i will a little later. but i have to say don took this over and what she forgot to say is that when he was 17 and he
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borrowed a car i think was a rental from the chevrolet and he drove it to seattle. it wasn't a rental it was called astelin. [laughter] he can to me and said i heard you are a master. come in here. i said you are a very salvageable human being. [laughter] so we were linked at the hip way back. that's a true story. [laughter] but anyway, he's done a beautiful job. it's a great book. i read it as a proofreader to times thinking i found this and that and i would dig them up and then i read it as a reader would read a book and a half day -- i had a lump in my throat and laughing throughout, so it is there and it is a beautiful book and i love it. there are things that could have been left out. [laughter]
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i called ann. she's here. would you step up? [applause] i said i need $300 bail. she said i'm working my way through school i don't have 300 bucks. she said it just stayed there. [laughter] and i thought i need to marry her. [laughter] in this room is another great friend dick and lynn cheney and i might tell about their experiences which would make mine pale. [laughter] know, tell you, we've ran together in 1978. he ran for the congress, i ran for the senate, and dick and lynn and ann and i have run every time one of us was running and neither of us ever lost an election so that is a tribute to
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you. [applause] and then back their standing next to him is the little rascal i met behind barbed wire. he was in the japanese war relocation center in heart mountain wyoming as a 12-year-old boy and our scoutmaster said we are going to go to the mountain and meet the boy scouts. no one wanted to go to reid had guard towers, machine guns coming and was one of those of the ten relocation centers and we had a skilled master he said these are guys just like us. boy scouts. i ran into the this guy. we had a bully that would pick on us so we dug a little trench towards his cabin and during the night it rained like hell and he ruined his tent and we were just
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laughing. he said all i laughed more than he did. but that is a friendship. what's that? >> you kept me up. >> i wrote him and i said remember the kid? we started in congress and served on the board of regents in the smithsonian's of these are great memories but that goes back 40 some years. i could go back to nina totenberg. she and i had some spirited words. let me tell you, they became when i was at harvard we had the most wonderful time together. her father still plague. if you can't forgive a person it's like letting them live in your head rent-free. that's not a funny statement. if you can't forgive a person
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it's like letting them live in your head rent-free. you are in the shower thinking that some of the bitch and he is out golfing. [laughter] so what are you gaining from that? and then of course billington is working over here. i can't go through all this. clarence thomas was year. amazing, the things you go through. i say to people why don't you move on? what is the purpose of keeping tabs? there are the seekers and i prefer the seekers. anyway, billington is up for library of congress and there's another guy out there in the staff. so i'm sitting next to ronald reagan and i said i really love the guy. i am in his diary a lot. i said i think you will want to think of this guy billington.
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>> why would that be? i said he hates commies. [laughter] and not only that but he knows russian fluently. he can tell exactly when those sons of bitches are saying and he said really? three days later we're standing at the library of congress, great story. john dingell, where is that rascal? trademark by -- i can't stop. [laughter] we used to meet on the conference committees and he would say look, we are going to get this done and i would say are you going to do before the ten days is over and he named agassi and said why don't you do something with the staff of that committee in the senate? i said i can't they are as tough as i am but then we got together
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and we beat them to bits. they were on the iraq study group. it's important. what the hell has happened. the word compromise now means that you're a wimp. it's madness. and sure is bruce reed, the executive director of the commission cochaired by erskin and bayh. i'm not going to go any further. i see him over their one of my students at harvard. ann has cleared her throat street times now and none of you have heard it, but i have. [laughter] i want to say we are going to stick around and thank to sponsors because the test of an event like this i go out and i say house the wine? better than anything you've ever bought. now that i'm finished on will be having one.
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but look, there's something i want to -- if you have a book and i just don't want to just scribble my name you can get those out there. if you have a bookend you want me to do some personalization just leave it and we will put a slip of paper and eventually i will get them back or they will be here with mike, my dear friend, chief of staff. where is he? [laughter] >> anyway, mike, the finest i've ever known. [applause] you wear your crown. and becky, here to read this is like the picture. [laughter] >> im falling apart and this picture is internal. the picture and he never did. he sold his soul and in that up
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in a pile of bones at a cadaver but that as a beautiful thing. to think i do these things just one reason, this wonderful guy right here and i have never received a penny. [applause] thank you for coming. stick around. [applause]
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>> i seem to have a different place people will listen to me and i've always cared about the country and the greatest generation right in that book and gave me a kind of a platform dhaka was completely unanticipated. so i thought i ought not squander that, so i ought to stand up as not just a citizen and as a journalist but as a father and husband and a grandfather and if i see these
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things i ought to write about them and try to start a dialogue which i tried to do with the book about where we need to get next. >> up next robert draper looks behind the scenes of the 100th of congress and the 2010 midterm elections. from washington journal, this is an hour. who is jeff duncan? >> jeff is a conservative freshmen, tea party freshman from the third congressional district of south carolina, and it's a great question that you are opposing because i think a
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lot of people even in the house republican leadership don't know who jeff duncan is. he is the protagonist of my book and a lot of ways, and on a couple of levels of the keys with considering first because as one of the more conservative t parties he is the straw that stirs the drink in the 112, chris but also he has experiences of a guy that is trying to learn to make himself known in the institution a body of 45 and he's trying to clamor about to be more than just one of the four injured 35 and so i think that tension between being the very powerful as part of a group and exert himself as an individual was present in the book to read estimate how did you hook up? >> bye chance. right after the midterm elections i decided that i wanted to do this book, and once
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i convinced my publisher still at the dewitt i then showed up to the orientation meetings the freshmen were having here in washington the middle of november and i just grabbed him in the hallway he was one of the two or three people walking in and i told them what i was up to. >> did they know who he was at the time? spent he was one of these 8073 freshman but i knew nothing else about him and he was one of the few people like called that they but we sat and talked in the coming days and well liked about him is he's a very forthright by come a very ordinary. so i thought he could be my every man as i sort of -- he is sort of the vehicle through which we learn how the bill is passed, how one tries to exert oneself on that committee. but then the additional dimension of him becoming the heritage action as the most conservative member of the entire body of the four injured 35 members of representative. >> did this surprise you after you got to know him?
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>> not a special become no. he's from a very conservative district and when he ran for congress, he ran on a set of principles. all these guys ran on something called a pledge to america but his was ratcheted up. it was very specific in terms of the right to bear arms, the believe they shouldn't be run out of government but instead should be an enjoyable part of it and so no, his work pretty clear to me. >> what is his view right now about 112 congress and the legislative process and progress? >> i think that he was frustrated by it. he believed that the republicans compromise too much and that in the debt ceiling he didn't invoke for it and the number of continuing resolutions to fund the government because he believe the government was spending too much and needed to be

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