so this is correct. i believe chairman goodlatte is discussing an important issue. and what about the testimony of the witnesses at that hearing? it was really stunning. one witness, professor jonathan turley, well-known throughout the country, writes a lot in publications and legal journals, who is the professor of public interest law at george washington university law school and nationally recognized constitutional scholar, said he is a supporter of president obama's policies and voted for him. i want you to hear this, colleagues. professor turley at the hearing said this -- quote -- "i believe the president has exceeded his brief. the president is required to

faithfully execute the laws. he is not required to enforce all laws equally or commit the same resources to them, but i believe the president has crossed the constitutional line in some of these areas." he goes on, this is a direct quote -- "this goes to the very heart of what is the madisonian system. if a president can unilaterally change the meaning of laws in a substantial way and refuse to enforce them, it takes offline that very thing that stabilizes our system." he goes on -- quote -- "i believe the members will loathe the day they allow that to happen. he is talking about members of congress. i believe the members of congress will loathe the day they allow that to happen. he goes on -- quote -- "this will not be our last president. there will be more presides

who will claim the same authority." quote -- "when i teach constitutional law, i often ask my students what is the limiting principle of your argument. when that question is presented to this white house, too often it's answered in the first person that the president is the limiting principle or at least the limiting person. we can't rely on that type of assurance in our system." close quote. that's what professor turley said who voted for president obama, a well-known legal scholar. that is dramatic testimony. we need to listen to it, and i'm hearing it from my constituents daily. they think this administration is not telling the truth on a regular basis. they can't imagine how we can pass a health care law and the president just go in and pick and choose what parts of it he wants to go forward, what parts he wants to delay. how can this happen?

is this a legal system or not? mr. turley goes on -- quote -- "the problem of what the president is doing is that he is not simply posing a danger to the constitutional system. he is becoming the very danger the constitution was designed to avoid. that is the consultation of power in any single branch. this newtonian orbit that the three branches exist in is a delicate one, but it is designed to prevent this type of concentration." close quote. wow. this is very strong. then when professor turley was asked whether the president had acted contrary to the constitution, professor turley answered in the affirmative. he said further -- quote -- "i

really have great trepidation over where we are headed because we are creating a new system here, something that is not what was designed. we have this rising forth branch in a system that's triapartheid. the center of gravity is shifting, and that makes it unstable, and within that system you have the rise of an uber presence. there could be no greater danger with individual liberty, and i really think that the framers would be horrified by that shift because everything they have dedicated themselves to was creating this orbital balance, and we have lost it." close quote. that makes the hair stand on the back of my neck. this goes to the core of our government. are we a legal system or not? and if we start eroding these

classical principles of law, duty and responsibility, appropriate balance between the three branches of government, we have done something that's important, and professor turley said we are undermining the orbital balance. indeed, he says we have lost professor turley, not me, professor turley goes on to say -- quote -- "it's not prosecutorial discretion to go into a law and say an entire category of people no longer -- will no longer be subject to the law." that's a legislative decision." close quote. it's a legislative decision, not the president's decision. the legislature represents the people over a period of years people are elected to this body in the house. the -- he goes on -- quote --

"prosecutorial discretion, professor turley says, is a case-by-case decision that is made by the department of justice. when the department of justice starts to say we are going to extend that to whole sections of law, then they are engaging in a legislative act, not an act of prosecutorial discretion. wherever the line is drawn has got to be drawn somewhere from here. it can't include categorical rejections of the application of law to millions of people." close quote. great scott, he is so correct. prosecutors have discretion. they don't have to prosecute every case that comes before them. there are factors that enter into that, but the president doesn't have power just to

eviscerate whole sections of law that affect millions of people. professor turley hit that exactly correct. he goes on to say -- quote -- "many of these questions are not close, in my view. the president is outside the line. that's where we have the most serious constitutional crisis i view in my lifetime, and that is this body is becoming less and less really vonetta." close quote. he's talking to the house, house of representatives. you are becoming less and less relevant, and he considers this to be the most serious constitutional crisis in my lifetime. and we sit here oblivious to what has been happening. i have talked about this an awful lot. i guess i have not been very effective. really take professor turley's arguments and remarks and just

hammer home how serious it is, this question we're dealing with. so he goes on to say this -- quote -- "i believe that congress is facing a critical crossroads in terms of its continued relevancy in this process. what this body cannot become is a debating society where it can issue rules and laws that are either complied with or not complied with by the president. i think that's where we are. a president cannot ignore an express statement on policy grounds." close quote. he said the president cannot ignore an express act, statement of law because he is -- he has a different policy view. now, does anybody contend that he does? i'd like to see him send me a note on it. any member of this body that

thinks the president of the united states can ignore an express statement of law base he disagrees with it on policy grounds, i'd like to hear him defend that issue or explain their position on it. he goes on to say -- "in terms of the institutional issue, look around you. is this truly the body that existed when it was formed?" he's talking to the house now. "does it have the same gravitational pull and authority that was given to it by the framers? you're the keepers of this authority. you took an oath to uphold it, and the framers assume that you would have the institutional wherewithal and frankly ambition to defend the turf that is the legislative branch." close quote. isn't that true? the framers assumed that you would have the institutional wherewithal and frankly ambition

to defend the turf that is the legislative branch. we're sitting here, we have had the majority leader stand up right before the presiding officer and break the rules of the senate to amend the senate rules. just a few weeks ago, just a stunning development. this is third world stuff. this is not the united states of america, a constitutional republic that i serve as a prosecutor year after year. we took so much pride, my staff and i, in trying to make sure that nobody was given an advantage or disadvantage based on status or wealth or race or intelligence or background or whatever advantage they had, equal justice under the law, and we enforced the law whether

anybody would have voted for it or not had we been in tongue. it was passed by congress. we enforced the law. at that same marrying, nicholas rosenkrantz, a professor at georgetown university law center, and author of the single most downloaded article about constitutional interpretation in the history of the social science network, also testified before the house judiciary committee. he stated that the president's constitutional duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed -- quote -- "is not optional, it is mandatory." close quote. and that president obama's -- quote -- "wholesale suspension of law is a paradigm case of a take care clause violation." close quote. he further testified -- quote - "what's striking about this is

the president's decision to enforce the immigration laws as though the dream act had been enacted, when in fact it has not. rather than declining to comply with the law duly -- with a duly enacted statute, the president is complying meticulously, but with a bill that never became law. so they offered a bill, it was rejected by the congress, and the president is almost to the letter enforcing it, a bill rejected by the people's representatives. professor rosen krantz goes on to say congress has repeatedly considered the dream act. the president favors this act. congress has repeatedly declined to pass it, so the president simply announced that he would enforce the immigration and nationality act as though it had

been, as though the dream act had been enacted. to put the point another way, the president's duty is to take care that the laws be faithfully executed. laws with a capital l, not those bills that fail to become law like the dream act." close quote. i think this is a serious matter, and i think the professor hits it directly. professor rosencrantz was in agreement with professor turley that wholesale suspension of law is quite something else, and that is -- that is what has happened under obamacare. likewise, in the immigration context, a kind of case-by-case prosecutorial discretion is one thing, but a blanket policy that the immigration act will not

apply to 1.8 million people. that's quite something different. this is a scale of decisionmaking that is not within the traditional conception of prosecutorial discretion." close quote. well, that is certainly true. it just really is. it's hard to believe we're here. i think we're here because in the great law schools of america and the top levels of our academic world, in our news media and so forth, we've moved in sort of a post-modern world in which words don't have meaning. they all -- they're subject to being altered whenever they choose to fit the mood of the moment. the president said, when he nominated people for the supreme court, he wanted nominees who would show empathy.

well, what is empathy? it's not law. is it politics? is it bias? is it personal opinion? our system is based on law not empathy, not bias, not politics, not ideology. this is a serious matter. chairman goodlatte then interjected -- quote -- "in fact, the president has taken it a step further. he wrapped up the meeting and has actually given legal documents to the people in that circumstance, well beyond simply deciding not to leave them there and not prosecute them but to actually enable their violation of the law by giving them documents to help them evade the problems that ensue from living in a country that they're not lawfully present in." professor rosenkranz replied, "quite right." this matter's not going away.

we're going to deal with it. i truly believe the american people expect this government of theirs, that works for them to produce an immigration system, a legal system that involves obamacare and other policies that is committed to law and not to the feelings of the chief executive and not to his policy preferences. we avoid that, then we've got a serious, serious matter in this country that goes to the heart of the strength of this republ republic. you could sap that strength, erode the power of our legal system and the legal system, in my opinion, is the greatest strength this nation has. i thank the chair and would yield the floor. i will yield the floor. the presiding officer: under the previous order, the senate stands adjourned until 9:00

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social media websites. >> coming up, the communicators examines the government's role in supporting health care technology. and then a look at the 2014 energy outlook. and later we will mark the hundredth anniversary of the federal reserve. >> >> we are on site in washington, d.c. this week. it is the site of the first ever expo.

joining us on the communicators is the director of the fcc. welcome. >> thank you. >> why is the fcc involved in these matters? >> one of the ways we are involved is we had an m-health task force saying here are ways that the fcc can provide leadership in the area. we allocate spectrum and that is the oxygen on which mobile devices run whether it is for health or other areas. in a more important sense, we have to collaborate and cord nature with other federal agencies and the private sector and helping people get to

market. >> let's take the three points. spectrum, how do these devices depend on it? >> in the case of apps that is part of that. but there is a medical body area and the fcc provided the first in the world. this allows monitoring of vital signs without having to have an intrusive monitor. it can be a game-changing in tracking people's health and health care and that required allocated spectrum. another way we support this process with spectrum is something called medical micropower networks. there is a potential for

interference with other things moving through the area so this is necessarily. >> is there something special for devices? >> blue tooth and wireless mikes are in an area called unlicensed spectrums so there is no guarantee against interference so you can under how in health care settings this can be a problem. >> let's turn to the device and app makers. what kind of general technology are we seeing? >> nearly 20,000 health related apps are n o -- on the market place -- and that is one angle to this. you see in this room diversity.

wireless networks and gateways to collect medical devices and solutions to collect people to networks and the world of remote monitoring. even text apps that are used for text for baby. >> they depend on the spectrum. if an app or medical device maker depends on spectrum do they have to get approval from the fcc for the use? >> yes. there is an fcc key in your cellphone. every thing that transmits spectrums requires fcc approval. we have a lab that runs that and a number of certification bodies. >> does that fall directly under your jurisdiction?

>> the office of engineering and technology is in charge of that important function. >> anybody who uses or develops an app and uses spectrum they fall under the fcc regulation and what is the balance between how much they provide and not wanting to stop private companies from inventing? >> this was the focus last summer to this day. we worked with the fda and the office of national coo al coord and a diverse group of people to say what is the good balance between patient safety and spectrum. and invasinovation and how do t regulators and other involved

work together. the fcc's focus is to reduce interference. not a very funny joke i made earlier, but the fda is focused on patient safety. we have equipment authorization programs for products that use spectrum. the fcc put out technical guideiance on medical equipment and we worked with them. or folks bringing them to market have to go through both processes. every app doesn't have to come through us. it may or may not have to go through fda and they put out guidance rules on those. but any platform that is a transmitter needs to come through fcc. >> matt quinn, what is the fcc

roles in privacy is security? >> we are not the lead enforcement in enforcing hippa. we work on the requirements for electronic health records. we have not staked out a specific rule. >> hipa is? >> the health insurance portability act which the law of the land for privacy and security and expediting transactions. >> you talked about working with partners. talk about the partnership and how you keep from getting in each other's way? >> we understand what we do. a lot of my first few months has been explaining and how we are

involved in health care. the most commonly misunderstood part where we are involved is we subsidize broadband for rural organizations. we are trying to make broadband affordable for rural and urban providers and everybody in between. this aligns with efforts by medicare and other folks to connect people. explaining that to them and how the health care connect fund can support their effort is a real eyeopener. i spend every thursday afternoon at the fda talking through thing and we have meetings with engineering and technology.

we did a workshop with them and will do more in the future. it is a technical conversation but getting to know people individually and personally as well. >> give us a status on rural areas and how equipped they are to handle new technology. >> health care organizations themselves is one side of this. and we are getting a lot of progress on broadband for those folks. there are still gaps as the commissioner talked about earlier in getting broadband to people individually. the fcc took exciting actions in that regard through the other programs. the other is getting phones in people's hands that need them. and that is other parts of the universal service line like life line. and we have seen exciting

partnerships from the phone companies that provide the service and medicare manage aids and text for baby as well. the power of health and broadband and getting it into individual's hands and hospital's hands are goals that are related but operate in different ways. the health care connect fund subsidizing broadband to health care organizations. other programs are aimed at connecting people. and also bringing broadband service to rural areas and others and that is less. >> so you said about meeting with the fda and being at the fcc, how often does your job involve telling people what is happening in this world to the commissioner itself? >> the chairwomen was the

commissioner until recently. i share the information with the folks. it is a new role. it was the role of the director of health care initiative was recommended by the task force. they said they needed somebody to work externally and cord nature and internally as well.