this week for these drafted regulations on products from cloned animals. can you tell us to what extent that issue will find its way to the trade agreements into the trade negotiations and can you elaborate more on the food safety issues that you discussed? >> well, on a specific proposal at the commission has presented that no, there's not an issue which we are discussing in these negotiations. of course we were always ready to answer questions about our initiatives. but it's not an issue we are discussing in these negotiations. food safety are good discussions between the two teams. we are looking into what could be the elements of an vicious

chapter. reseller looking at these at the conceptual level despite explaining to each other whether the object is that we should achieve within this chapter and also conversations about how to facilitate and solve specific issues on each side of regulation and regulatory framework. there are discussions on this topic. specifically i referred to not an issue that has been discussed. >> maybe i will just elaborate a bit. we did undertaken a high-level working group to address the sanitary or sps measures mostly related to food safety. what we said we would do to explore ways in which we could explore or sps class aspects for

disciplines that go beyond and elaborate on the current wto requirement that food safety requirements be based on science, risk assessments. so what we are discussing during these grounds is the various ways we can focus on some of these requirements, focused on sun consulted mechanisms that we can put in place to have our regulators work together to achieve the sps plus disciplines on the food safety measures. the united states and europe have two of the best food safety regimes in the world and by cooperating together and a green uncooperative measures where we

can both achieve on the appropriate level of connection, using appropriate risk assessment. i think we can both gain on the food safety area. ideal not >> i just want to follow up on the united states consent with the issue. why is it so important for the trade agreement. and the last question with the european negotiating ways. i am wondering who the good guys have plans -- [inaudible] with china?

>> well, certainly i think that the negotiations that we would do with china on investment, one of the issues that would be discussed there is the settlement. we certainly will be discussing also this issue besides chinese colleagues. >> press, as i said, it is extremely important to maintain the right of governments to regulate the public interest. at the same time, it's a strong objective to make sure we have in the international system strong investor protections that do include, as i mentioned comest a two state settlement as well as the investor state history settlement. >> that's it. thank you, everyone. >> thank you. [inaudible conversations]

>> why did she write this book? frankly, you're busy, right? >> as you are. >> i wrote "lean in" because you matter how much progress women have made, the world, get ready for the blunt truth, the world is so overwhelmingly run by men.

>> i'm shocked. [laughter] a >> i'm not sure how well that's going. [laughter] >> about washington. >> women have great progress from generation to another resident, my grandmother was in. it's still true men ran every government in every country in the world. that means that when decisions are made that most impact our world, women's voices aren't equally hurt and that's true in the corporate boardroom. district pta meeting, true at the town hall. so i wrote "lean in" to talk openly about stagnation women are facing at the top and to give practical advice to both women and men who want to do their part to change it.

>> i think radio is the longest and best form of media that/. what we do right now is have him

on conversations. only c-span this one from conversation anymore. you read books the way i read books in order to talk to the author seriously. it's tremendously revealing when an author has read their books these days because they don't get many people who've read their books webpage notes. so rewarding to them. i get a great deal of satisfaction when an author says to me a nice complement is that is the best interview i've had on this book tour. loved the interview on things that matter it's an abundant of time and i can do something differently. >> senators return to washington for legislative business on monday, january 6. that will vote on confirmation

for gina gallant, the president's nominee to be the federal reserve. "washington journal" continues. host: >> well, we want to introduce you to someone who's read a new book called "the gop civil war." before we get into the body of your book, give us the backgrounds of people know where you're coming from. >> guest: i started on the hill working for senator bill nelson. as a national national security adviser, stopping for his armed services subcommittee on strategic forces. less from there, went to a pretty well-known think tank in washington. the center for strategic and international studies, where i was director working closely with numbers of congress, both sides of the aisle, educating

them on a number of foreign-policy issues were working on at csis and the issues involved. a lot of work around china as well. moved on from there doing work for a university, leading a project called the 3-d security initiative. working on peacebuilding issues and how to incorporate peacebuilding measures into u.s. foreign policy. but still, working very closely with members of congress and members of the administration and staff as well on a number of different issues. >> how did she get into that line of work? with your education? >> acerbic university via the sheik and where he studied the political science course and moved on to the university of chicago and got a masters from the public policy program there and came to washington and found a spot right here internation's capital and it moved on from there. >> some people are going to say

you worked for a democrat, bill nelson. >> a centrist democrat. but now you read about the gop civil war. >> guest: this is not it was a controversial book, although the title might indicate that. it is a book that looks at the party has a comprehensive analysis of what is going on in the party. also keep in mind we are in a two-party system and no one can deny the fact party is going through an internal struggle right now. so what we are doing is basically highlighting what many pundits, what many writers around town have been talking about. >> host: so who is in a civil war? what are the sides? >> guest: there are the moderates her what she called the political establishment and of course a tea party activist taken place. we are seeing this battle drawnout. we are seeing it come through tuition during the government shutdown just a few weeks ago.

when that whole situation and it, you had i would consider one of the key party mainstays commissary paling, come come out and say that they are going to be looking at key races in 2014, where they are looking to take on many established conservatives, and namely mitch mcconnell and i think this is only ratcheting up the way i really going to see some major damage within the party in 2014. >> host: our topic this morning is based on someone's book "the gop civil war." we want to talk to republicans only during the segment. (202)585-3880 and eastern central time zone zone and you are republican. 585-3881 if you're republican and live west of the mississippi are further out west, not meant pacific time zones in hawaii time zones of course.

republicans only during the segment. we want to talk to you about how you view the future of your party. mr. hamm, with what do ann coulter and john boehner have? >> guest: they care about the gop in the direction of the party. but i think that is where their similarities and. they have very different ideas on how to move forward. john boehner has a difficult task of actually having to govern. he has to appeal to i think of you activist base within his party. he also has to think about the direction of the country real large in terms of how the country is moving toward. we are dealing with some very major issues right now. we are still grappling with high unemployment. they're a number of issues that are coming to fruition, namely

the debt ceiling debate that's going to be taking place in about six or seven weeks. users can issues he has to think about. whereas someone like an ann coulter, she resides firmly in the act that some within the party and kind of like selling red meat to tea party types. >> host: is there common ground? today share ideas, ideals? >> guest: i think they want to see the party become more successful than it has, but particularly in winning elections. how they actually get there at inc. is a very -- i think is open to discussion between them. >> host: the government shutdown. was that harmful to the republican brand? >> guest: absolutely. that was usually -- that was

usually detrimental to the party. the majority of americans believe that the shut down was the fault of the republican party. it didn't help that leading up to the shut down you had a filibuster by senator ted cruz, which i think are many americans, gave the impression this was owned by the tea party and that i think what it did was demand for many americans that the gop has a very difficult time trying to govern. and then, when you had the actual shut down and you had many americans particularly working in government, checks not going out, veterans having difficulty receiving benefits. that just didn't play very well for the republican party. now on the flipside, when the shut down ended, of course there was this immediate. it to obamacare.

and so, many of the losses that we saw a band was inflicted the republican party, those immediately seemed to go away and there was this huge transfers to what happened to the democratic party in the midst of this obamacare rollout that was completely bundled. but still, many americans thought that shut down as firmly in the category of the gop. >> host: what is on the positive side on the ledger in your view of republicans right now? >> guest: that's a good question. actually, republicans are in a really good shape and that they do have controlled the majority of the government ships and regulators throughout the country. additionally, i talk about this in the book, there is no shortage a tank of great

potential candidates in 2016. in fact, i would say that they have a much deeper bench than the democratic party, and begin with of course chris christie who we saw went in a huge land by in a blue state. of course, his issue is going to be, can he bring the party together, the act of assembling and the establishment wing of the party. but winning the way he did in a blue state anything goes a long way in securing his bonus going forward in 2016. of course you have potential candidates like governor bobby jindal, former governor jeb bush, possibly a dark horse like susanna martinez and new mexico of course. she hasn't talked about running. she hasn't avoided the limelight. i think you have a number of candidates with gubernatorial

experience who i'd anchored by 12016. >> host: in your book, "the gop civil war," you write it is fraught with challenges of the party that has become more tone intransigence since the election the first president of color. the other seemingly insurmountable hurdle to climb for the gop is young voters. >> guest: the republican party lost young voters among a number of demographics they will need to win going forward. in 2012 young voters, not just young voters but by men, color. if the republican party wants to be seen as a national force going over, they are going to need to find a way to promote policies, promote ideas that resonate not only with young voters, but with women, with

minorities. many republicans thought that barack obama was running a campaign geared towards 2020 and maybe 2016. deweese the race that he ran and the demographics that he was able to bring alone. i think she's that we are much further along today in 2013 and 2012 finley would he in 2016, 2020. i see going forward the republican party needs to create a big tent mantra of bringing all people into the party. the first thing they need to do is figure out how do we speak to these voters and what are the issues they care about? you look at one demographic that i think was largely overlooked in 2012. that is the asian-american population, which barack obama won handedly. the 2008 race they were 1% of the electorate.

in 2012, there were 3%. some people may say 3%, that's not a big jump. that's a 128% difference between 2008 and 2012. barack obama won that group overwhelmingly. one other point about the asian-american population, they're now beginning to move out of democratic states like new jersey, new york, hawaii. we are seeing the asian-american population of into areas like the carolina, alabama. so those are places where democrats may be at one point weren't able to compete, but because you have this demographic moving into these red states, possibly turning the blue may be purple, i think it makes it more competitive for democrats to be able to compete. i think the gop needs to figure out how do we begin to speak to

these voters. >> host: another trend to happen your your book here. hispanic voting trends. we talk a lot about this during the election. spirit you put this chart in your book. percentage of voters who are hispanic and 2000 was 6% that grew to 10% in 2012 and the democrats percentage of that vote has increased except for the outline year of 2004 it has been increasing the hispanic vote for a democrat while the republicans has been decreasing. >> guest: i think this has been discussed quite a bit after the 2012 race. i don't think we can talk about this and the importance of the latino population because it is

a rapidly growing population. i think what is important if you look at issues, particularly that this population cares about, namely the immigration issue. i would argue, this is actually room for the republican party to make gains because president obama hasn't really moved the ball forward on this immigration debate. readers will not see movement to of course, we're not seeing much take place in the house or the senate. this is an issue that the latino population really cares about. we just haven't seen movements from the president. there's a headline that i saw it a few days ago that talked about the historic rate of deportation under this administration. i think that is room for the gop to really begin to make and

roads in terms of how they address a policy that will move this debate forward and possibly bring the latino population in tuesday's gop tent. of course, the issue is something that they can actually talk about. this is where i think some of the candidates in 2016 i think play a role, namely susanna martinez, maybe possibly a marco rubio. but i think they have the candidate. now what they need to do is try to develop a pilot the two then begin to move the latino population into this tent. >> host: what percentage of the electorate are african-american? why have democrats been able to capture over 90% of their vote

consistently? >> guest: well, i think you just have to look no further than president obama and what he means symbolically to the african-american population. there are many african-americans who thought they would never see an african-american president in their lifetime. and i think while democrats have historically been able to boot the african-american vote, i think seeing the game that this president has made has been unprecedented by previous democratic president. the last democratic president was very popular among african-americans as we both know as bill clinton and tony morrison who called in the first african-american president. seeing this president take inc. is the symbolism of it for african-americans is huge. as long as he's able to project

that, i think african-americans will always be supportive of this president. even if perhaps his policies don't necessarily meet with their need policy wise. >> host: how do they make inroads? >> guest: that's a very interesting question. i think what they need to do is begin to speak to the issues. we saw it and i talk about this in the bud, the autopsy that the republican national committee put together by ranch prevails, $10 million platform, suggesting that we need to begin having a more aggressive dialogue and debate about reaching a to various communities, namely the african-american community. they recently opened an office in the republican national committee. they've recently opened an

office in detroit, a largely african-american city. that is one avenue of trying to begin to reach out and meet voters where they are. i think that is a first step for the party. now what we need to see us both rhetoric and policy matching the senate reject committees. >> host: "the gop civil war: inside the battle for the soul of the republican party" is the name of the book. eric ham is the author. it can for this segment, gop only, republicans only. the next segment will be democrats only. charles krauthammer had an opinion about a so-called civil war. we want to show you back, take a response to that. >> my argument is there's much less division and when people pretend the left-wing media, the liberal media would like us to believe. they love running stories on the great civil war.

the great civil war break now is happening the democratic side. there's this massive rebellion at democrat and obama and obamacare and they shove it down their throat. i refuse to play along with mainstream media and overplay and overemphasize and dramatize the difference is they are mostly over type x on the conservatives. >> guest: i don't disagree with him that there is a looming crisis within the democratic party. i'm sure that'll be a discussion you will have later. but i do believe that is coming. however, i completely disagree with him on his analysis of the civil war within the republican party. it is real. it is happening and we are seeing a tape place. we've seen it take place prior to 2012. we've seen people like mainstays

dick lugar, senator dick lugar from indiana. we've seen him give primary and was such an extremist candidate, richard murdoch. we are seeing senate minority leader mitch mcconnell now grappling with a challenge from his right wing. senator lindsey graham is now being challenged on the right. and in many more races to come, i was actually just before i came on, i was reading in the "washington times" were now senator pat roberts from kansas is actually being challenged from the right. i mean, this is a huge fight within the party. and in the book, we talk about what's going on within the site within the party and it is real.

and i think until the party can grapple with its direction, they are going to struggle to win the white house for quite some time to come. there are a number of issues where the party is fighting. there is a chapter in the book called going out of power, where i talk about the national security implications of the civil war within the party for the first time in 2012 there was no discussion on national security as we would normally expect to see from the republican party. and this has been an issue that the party has owned since vietnam. this is one of the mainstays of the republican party. it's surprising that barack obama has successfully been able to move this issue from the gop

camp into the democratic camp. now that's not to say that it will remain there because i do believe that the american public, while they trust barack obama more than they trusted mitt romney on national security, that's not necessarily a permanent fixture for the democratic party. it's an issue where i'd been the gop has room to grow. but i think that's actually one of the casualties of the civil war within the party. >> host: let's take some calls for eric ham on his book, "the gop civil war." ..karen. caller: i'm a little nervous. there is a big difference between conservative republicans .nd republicans i am a conservative and i happened to be black. is a republican

but not a conservative. host: whose ideas do you like? like me a lot of, -- ve, ted cruz, allen west. host: why? caller: and i think what she does a is she helps advance what the book. there is a huge battle going on between conservatives and republicans what. but when we talk about republicans, i think people typically think that of the establishment candidates. people who are currently running washington. and if you look at the budget battle that is taking place right now, the conservatives would as she pointed out were

very unhappy with this budget deal. and i think he will see this play out more when we have this budget his standoff that's going to take place in congress and i think many republicans particularly in the house and senate are going to be looking over their shoulder in terms of how they should vote because the conservative as she puts it will be looking for them to not advance the debt ceiling debate and i can't what we are going to see is a long her protracted fight in the gop as a result. >> in "the wall street journal" this morning the gop business recast message republican leaders and their corporate allies have launched an array of efforts aimed at diminishing the clout of the party's most conservative activists and promoting legislation instead of

confrontation. >> guest: that is a great point because i wrote an article for the hill newspaper in washington it ended after the consequences and that it only exposes the rift in the party and the use of a largely conservative organizations like the u.s. chamber of commerce actually begin to enter into this for a and now what they are doing is standing with the establishment candidates in the states like michigan and idaho with that he party activists now saying we want our party back. we want to take our country back and for the first part we are beginning to see the establishment fight back against

many of these activist candidates triet >> host: there is a little bit of a conversation going on about your credentials and whether or not you should be allowed to comment on the gop civil war given your background and credentials. >> guest: what i would say to that he is i.e. me not to be a republican or a conservative, but i have been in washington and - a part of these fights that have taken place and these policy will debates on a number of these issues and i write about them and of course people are welcome to reject them or accept them as they should. >> guest: >> host: could you see yourself supporting chris kristin gore mitch mcconnell if you lived in kentucky? >> guest: absolutely i think what he's doing in the state of

new jersey is fantastic. he is reining in the budget and let me say that i think there are no shortages of candidates who i think what the great for this country and who i think are doing a phenomenal job with across the country. i think what susanna martinez is doing in the state of new mexico is fantastic i thought she was a great congressional candidate and is one of the rising stars in the party. and i do believe at this point that crisscross the is the candidate to be and i think that he could give hillary clinton a tough run if he can get out of the primary. >> host: still an individual says i'm a ron paul fall were that entered the gop at the grassroots. we've elected a 28-year-old accounting chair scary

non-interventionist. ron paul, what was his affect over the years and ran the paul? >> guest: i was in iowa during the 2012 iowa caucuses and i was in a little town called van meter for the caucuses, and i was in a gymnasium in the high school and there was so much fervor and excitement for ron paul and i was actually surprised at where he came out because there was so much excitement and energy for ron paul and was and just older people but there were a lot of younger people that were excited about ron paul and i think that ron paul -- it will be interesting if that excitement could translate well to his son and kentuckians and i do believe

that he will be running in 2016 and i think that will be interesting to see if we that fervor and that excitement is displayed for him. what will what he played in 2016? what he tried to be a kingmaker in going forward? those are some of the questions that are out there and. >> host: the next call comes from ryan in pennsylvania. >> caller: i just wanted to say that i was disappointed and republicans and democrats because once they get into office it is all the same. >> host: what you mean by that? could you give an example?

>> caller: you have obama saying that he would start with this surveillance stuff. when he was wrong to but i just don't trust democrats or republicans anymore. >> host: you think it's something once they get to washington? >> caller: its the banker selwa to be cut to the crusco that is ryan in pennsylvania. >> guest: that is a good question. thank you for that. in my book there is a chapter the wind out of power and i discuss a section called the ghosts of iraq and in that section i discuss republicans will have a difficult time moving forward on the national security until wednesday can move away from the debacle of

iraq and afghanistan. and until there is a new phase is in the party and new ideas generated that get beyond iraq and afghanistan i think particularly on national security the party will have a difficult time being able to regain the trust of americans and i think that is just one extent of a larger issue. what does the party due to begin to get the voters to see them as trustworthy and effectively being able to govern. we have seen the government shut down and the rating diminish and i think largely americans believe that is the result of republican and competence. and until from the gop can begin to address those i think that americans will largely be

disappointed in the republican party and not see the gop brand as an effective tool for leading the country forward. >> host: republicans only on this segment. go ahead. >> caller: we do not care what color you are. i am really tired of the race issue being the problem. and next, i would agree. the media is stirring the pot because they know obamacare is in trouble and likely to lose a lot of seats in 2014. so, to me it is stirring the pot because of problems within the

party to divide with so they don't lose seats. >> host: who weighs eight republican that you would like to see stay in office? >> caller: i like a lot of them in the house. dawa tray gowdy is a brave soul from south carolina and there's people from georgia. i can't recall their names. i wish i could. >> host: do you support that he party efforts? >> caller: i am not in the tea party, but i support what they do because one of a are after is for both parties to get back to the constitution and stop tearing it down. >> host: neil cno, thanks for your time this morning.

>> guest: let me address the media stirring the pot as you said about obamacare because i think that is going to be a huge issue in the midterm elections this year and she talked about south carolina as well and so i just want to tackle all of this. i do believe that given that you've got democrats who have 23 seats that they would have to defend, i do think that will be a competitive race and i do believe that republicans have a great chance of taking control of the senate in and they are going to be able to use this obamacare issue as a huge block to hit and democrats over the head with and i can't you have a number of democrats now who are running scared and are a riding in the polls as a result of the problems with obamacare.

so she makes a very good point about that. regarding south carolina i think there is no shortage of fireworks that are going to fly in south carolina. it's very interesting because you have both senators up for reelection and interesting enough senator scott hasn't come out and endorsed his colleague senator lindsey graham. so that is going to be i think a very intriguing and of course niki haley who why did you list as a potential 2016 candidate if she could win the free election in south carolina. so i think south carolina has a number of different issues that i think will provide additional fodder for what might be to come in 2016. >> host: the next call comes from rose hill. the author of the gop civil war. >> caller: hello?

this is rose in new york. >> host: we are listening. >> caller: i've been disconnected three times. you should stop having phone lines. if you disconnect who wish to identify themselves as conservative republicans and wished to make comments because i have been on hold and disconnected for two hours. would you like to know what i think or to hang up on me again? >> host: we are all years. >> caller: well i'm a physician and the first thing i was hung up on is the police state. i will ignore that. i'm a physician and i am concerned about health care. i am concerned about the constitution. i believe there is no dissension among the conservatives. there is no among health care to

providers. i believe there is no dissension among the patients. i may adviser of the patient, the handicap physician. my favorite book is the wounded healer. you should read it. mine dead son who was a war ended hero. >> host: what initio would you like eric to talk to? we are talking about the gop civil war pitting it >> caller: i think he is completely and totally unqualified to speak on this subject. if he would like to -- >> host: is their anything that you would like to add to what she had to say? >> guest: i agree with her on the issue of health care. i think that was a huge debate in the election in and i think it is going to be in the 2014 midterm as well as the 2016 presidential reelection.

regardless of what the president is able to do to get obamacare working and running effectively i think it is going to be an interpol part of the discussion going forward and i completely agree on that. >> host: ron paul attracted young independent and disaffected democrats to the republican party for the gop establishment shunned them. big mistake. >> guest: as i said i thought ron paul -- and i was on the ground and i witnessed the fervor of the ron paul crowd and i thought that he really had something there and was able to tap into people that felt disaffected by their government and was given similar to what we saw in 2008 with then senator barack obama. and i thought if there was a week for him to take that fervor

and actually turned into votes this could be something. we were all waiting for the moment when we would see ron paul eventually win the primary but it never came to fruition. so that is a big question for him going forward and how does that translate into votes for what i think will get behind this in the 2016 presidential race. >> host: steve from jacksonville mississippi. >> caller: this is steve from jackson mississippi but i'm in mobile visiting my brother for christmas and i want you to comment on the race where bradley byrne, the reasonable conservative won the republican primary and then this week he was elected to congress for the special congressional race about 70% of the vote. brusquely verney state legislature, had the business community. he is a reasonable smart

republicans -- >> host: did this happen in mississippi? >> caller: this happened in alabama. he was elected a congressman in mobile alabama area. he beat that he party candidate in the primary and the liberal democrats -- >> host: what do you think about that? >> caller: they need to nominate brusquely burns, haley barbour, bobby jindal and i would like for this writer to comment on bradley burns winning in a conservative primary in alabama -- >> host: we got the idea. are you familiar with this race? >> guest: i am actually and it was part of the article that i wrote for the film a newspaper talking about this race in alabama. i believe it was in district one. it put a tea party conservatives against the establishment candidate and i think that we are going to see a slew of these

races in 2014 where i think the organizations like the chamber of commerce which is considered an establishment organization will begin to stand up to some of these i think more activist far right candidates. and this was a huge test for the tea party in 2013. and i think that it is what is to come in 2014. and i think what this race does is i think it solidifies this thesis that there is a civil war within the party. and when you mention haley barbour, i speak extensively about haley barbour, and i actually call him one of the grown-ups in the republican party. and so i think we are going to see people like haley barbour and some of the older grown-ups or statesman in the party began to stand up and speak out and become more forceful in

supporting and backing of the establishment candidates in 2014 and going forward. >> host: the gop civil war and the soul of the republican party is just and e-book. why? >> guest: it was an issue of the time and this is something i thought i could put together given that i've been traveling the country during the race and looking at some of these issues and i could get it out there to the masses and to get a vintage of the new technologies and push it out there and people could quickly download it to their tablets and their readers. i wanted something people could read and easily follow while on the train or, you know, going for sitting in a waiting room and something that they can't read very quickly and kind of get a pulse on what is going on within the political system particularly in one party, and how that relates to -- >> host: what was that process like for you?

>> guest: it is the first book that was ever written and it took a lot of time. it was all over a year. but of course there were no shortages of storylines to write about namely given that there was written in the backdrop of the 2012 presidential reelection. but it was a very stimulating exercise. i do -- i would like to eat eventually write another book examining the party. i think that there is going to be a major change in the party and voters in the american party would like to see how this process plays out and the level to provide this type of information. >> host: available of amazon. here are some more statistics you have in the book on the 2012 general polls. when it comes to gender 52% for romney and 55% four obama.

59%, romney african-american latino all went to obama by big numbers and the only income group that met romney won was 50 to 100,000 income group, but i want to go back to the daddy verses the mauney party. adel is the tagline that we heard. but what about the women in the gop? >> guest: restart the buck off talking about the demographics because i think that is a huge issue, and there was no shortage of information provided on the impact of women in the 2012 election. and not only do i talk about the importance as a demographic, but also looking at when the candidates are looking at what is taking place in the congress and the role of women if you look at a state like new hampshire as an all women delegation. so i think 2012 could be

considered the year of the woman. i think 2016 will be the year. we are seeing women flexing their political power in terms of voting and women overwhelmingly outnumbered by men going to the polls, and barack obama was able to take advantage of that to the and i do think there were some missteps by the republican party from a number of the candidates. it appears that they still haven't been able to kind of write that down on how to talk about women's issues going forward, and i think unless and until they can do that it is going to be a problem for them. i think one of the bright spots that of the republican party has is that there are a number of well qualified women who could possibly be run in 2016, and i think telehealth immensely the party going forward and people

like susanna martinez and potentially nicky haley, possibly the senator from new hampshire and so i think there are a number of the women candidates, but of course between now and 26 team or when these women may or may not be clear, i think the party still needs to figure out how to be address these issues or how do we talk to women? >> host: next call comes from david, st to joseph missouri. you are on the washington journal. >> caller: thank you for having me. listen, we have a socialist democrat that's claiming how we are there to propose to the socialist police state because we didn't send over like that he party does that we are the loud

screaming beebee -- >> host: david -- when you say you stand up for the constitution, can you give an example of what you mean by that? >> caller: i hate having their rights being curtailed by people that are allowed to commit voting fraud and then when you try to correct with the proper law which is the same people scream that if you are discriminating against who needs picture ids to vote also have to have the same to get their social security benefits and other benefits from the government and the state, but that's all right. you have to identify yourself who you say you are to vote to come out of this fraud that's been going on. that's bad. the complete assault and out to

destroy the second amendment that has been launched for many years which i fought for over 40 years >> host: i think we got the point you get a response for the call? >> guest: thanks for your comments this morning. i don't think that we either party is in trying in any way to infringe on the constitution and regarding the issue of voter i.d. from iowa -- roi fraud it has been studied the that there is so little fur i.t. fraud to not even make a dent in any state or in any election and not

even in the bush v. gore election was that an issue so that wasn't an issue going forward and i think it's something about not only democrats, but i think independent said actively looking at this issue because we are seeing more people coming into the political process which i think is what we want to see happen and so any way that we can continue to get more people engaged in the process is a good thing and we want to do whatever we can to ensure that takes place. >> host: dirty water with tweets 20 or 30 times a show. folks smart enough to earn more than 100,000 gave a majority to romney. he is correct. 54% of the 100,000 plus went to mitt romney come and 54% voted

for barack obama. chase and in greenbrier arkansas. you are on. we are listening >> caller: he is nothing but a tactician and that is what the democrats do. the day and people together so they can get the votes. here is the same role for the people that vote for them. they get all of these rights and freedom and vote democratic. but those that vote for republicans vote for the same services by the government. it scares me because democrats owe the government and they have an advantage with the statistics to the bigger force than the

working people that crop up the dollar. >> host: thank you for calling in. no thanks for that comment. i think the government is there to work for you whether you are a republican, democrat or independent and i need don't think that there is a cut all of immigrants or democrats that are seeking to infringe upon any one particular section of the voters, and i think it's here to try to work for everyone within this country. he says you are showing yourself to be a reasonable man. i could work with you over policy.

jerry is calling from maryland. please go ahead with your comment or question for the author of the gop civil war >> caller: i call to describe whether the conservative republicans and i think that both of these democrats would be conservative and if they allow the question to interfere but i think that our country is based on legal immigrants and i don't think we need to let the democratic party despise the fields were for what we are and another thing is with all that is in the world economy if we had the top of the world of this time, our only way the industry is going out of the country and

democratic jobs are gone and i think we are all going to have to bite the bullet with the economy through the entitlement group we need to get our jobs back in this country that the has the balance over part of the class that we don't have any more. >> guest: he actually makes a really good point and at what about this in the book because -- and i don't want people to think that the book is just a book where i am bashing republicans or the gop. that is not the case at all because there are a number of solutions i offer for the gop going forward and a number of candidates who i think would be great and one of the issues that i do address in the book is this

issue of the global economy, and a space where i think that the republicans can begin to advance the date going forward. and if you look at the president had been wanting for while to make the perfect words asia and i think that we are seeing a lot of growth in the emerging markets in places like indonesia were with korea and this is a place they can be seen as a party that is willing and able to govern if they can begin to look at some of these big picture issues and advance the policy ideas on how the country should begin to address a number of these emerging markets. >> host: and we have been talking with eric ham here is the cover of the book the gop civil war inside the battle for

the republican party is the ebook and it's available at amazon.com. mr. ham, thank you. >> guest: thank you so much for having me. when i went to prison, i didn't take my family with me to ring and as dramatic and emotional as it was. i took one of my current staffers and one that just quit and went on to in operations media firm. they went with me actually and then they dropped me off at present day and i went in and i walked into the little kiosk and i said i am here to report. the guard came up and he said i knew one of your campaign managers and ohio. he said okay. he got down in there and the guard said here to have some hate mail. this is from california he said you have some mail waiting on you.

they gave me the mail to go through the most embarrassing part of the stripped-down and then i got into the intake, walked in to present and down into the courtyard and the warden and won't use the language i do in the book, but the warden told the men they are supposed to take me around and get away from him and he confined his own way. i'm sitting there not knowing where to go, where i'm staying, but clothing to get the are like pajama pants, and some of the -- one of the other prisoners said where is your s-corp that is supposed to take you out and i said i don't know someone in a suit yelled foul language and he took me in that act play of the laundry room. i walked in and a man sitting there and he said are you the congressman and i said i used to be. he said are you a republican, aren't you? and i said well, republicans put me in here, you know, i had to have some humor in the situation. he said i was the mayor of east cleveland. welcome. i will get you some clothing.

we now have the secular forms that govern our acceptance or their rejection of the ways in which the god or gods speak to people and what impact that has. so you have david saying that he has a special insight into the bible and that there were these insights that held the other members of the community to understand particularly the book of revelations better and allowed them to understand that they are living in the end times in a way that most americans do not accept. that by itself doesn't seem to be a problem, but when it leads

to other elements, then that would trigger all law enforcement concerns as well as the popular press, then suddenly this idea of of somebody listening to god and having to follow a few things that seem to be a moderate in the national norms that's dangerous. and that needs to be policed in the controlled senators return to washington for legislative business monday, january 6th.

the brookings institution released a study finding private entities are finding most groups in the civil war and that private funding risks if lighting sectarian conflict in the region according to the report. the author of the study spoke about that last week welcome, everyone, to today's panel on the private donors and extremist rebels. i directed the brookings project on u.s. relations with the islamic world to that i will be moderating today's panel of. to my left is elizabeth dickinson who is a correspondent for the national newspaper based in abu dhabi.

she is the author of the new paper playing with fire light a risk igniting the conflict at home. to her left is kristen who is an assistant professor of comparative and regional studies at the american university school of international service and she's also a non-resident senior fellow at the atlantic council center. to her left is a former managing director for jpmorgan and an itinerant scholar that counterterrorism financing. i want to start with you. when i began to look at this issue back in 2012, i didn't start looking at the foreign financing for extremist groups and syria i was mainly focused on the group's one of the larger groups. it was one of the more vocal groups online and they put

material out on facebook and plater and i noticed several times that they would get very public shouts to the individuals in the gulf and thanking them for the money and material that they were sending to the group and syria. so i began to look around trying to find more information. there was not a lot in the english-language press and you really have to follow this stuff in arabic on the social media. yours was the only article i found and this was back in early 20131 of the first men jennings of this kind of fund raising going on in the gulf. and for that reason that is why we collaborated to send you over to do some on the ground honest to goodness field work to find out what these funding networks are like. hal did the fund-raising network first get on their radar and why

did you pursue it? >> we had a similar experience. watching them surround the conflict you would see occasionally particularly beginning in the summer of 2012 as mentioned, there was no connection and no one had put the pieces together. so i started hearing this more and more and decided that if someone that would have to go forward it would be worth following up so it took about the first six months. and then as it was said we were really able to say that kuwait emerged as the funding hub for this ury in rebels. and i had a very particularly striking first interaction with one of the donors who i met with that gave me an insight into the sort of mentality and how this all began. the first time i sat down with one of them myself i was of course very concerned he wasn't going to admit what he was doing

so i concocted a very elaborate strategy to extract the information and i had my interviews set and these were the questions i'm going to ask that the organ to be very broad in the year that you are interested in syria and he says come over here. she goes through and he says last week i was giving these arms -- you have seen this picture this is the attitude that you very quickly uncovered when you begin to start digging into these networks these are individuals that believe in what they are doing and have really gone all in and supporting these opposition groups. >> host: why did the fund raising get started in the other gulf countries but in particular in kuwait why did they get started? >> this is an important story. you've been able now -- when they were going to go backwards

in time and figure out how late did began, and like the syrian of pricing itself, the involvement began out of the hope that something positive could have been in syria. so beginning in the summer of 2011 right before it was militarize and they were living in kuwait and elsewhere in the gulf where there is a story in diaspora they began raising their own personal funds to send back into syria. at some point, these syrian donors began to formulate with people who would then go around and pull their money and their efforts and at some plaintive the decision was made to reach out to those who had access to the far larger amounts of money and far more important businessmen in kuwait they had a network of people who had been getting to the cause is in the past. so they tapped into this network and at the expatriate involvement and donors is was

started the movement forward into funding of the rebels on the large scale. >> and that was 2012? >> this began and very early. during the meetings a decision was made to begin partitioning the money between the humanitarian relief and the armed lethal aid. at this point something very critical happened, and the with kuwaiti the donors themselves said we want an uprising and the way they described it to me is we want to shorten the duration of your suffering. to do that we need to have armed groups. so i am certainly not trying to suggest the reason the conflict is armed is because it is kuwait but i do think it was a very significant factor in forming some of the early brigades. so some of the donors would bring the groups together an arm

them in a very particular way. >> and what is the is the logical slavery of the people doing the fund raising is a mix of secularists and ultraconservative fallacies? >> we have seen an interesting way of in the ideology of those people involved. so, at the beginning, syria was the call that really integrated peoples and use all the donors from the secular smiled islamist all the way it through the fallacies are involved and the popularity of the funding then as it became more complicated you had a huge dropoff in the sort of public support, the broad base and it whittled down to the true believer types of extremes of the spectrum that were interested in the ideological agenda for the conflict. >> and why was it kuwait in

particular that emerged for the hub of the fund-raising? >> is the perfect and storm for the gulf and the obvious way that it's different from the rest of the gulf is that it's sort of the most space country in the gulf which is something very beautiful about kuwait. to go to kuwait and talk about politics any way you can't in saudi arabia or the uae. political parties and groups, freedom of association, all sorts of political like devotees we would recognize of all in a way that is not in the gulf. so that is the sort of financial condition. the second component of that is very weak and counterterrorism financing law passed in 2002 that failed to criminalize the finance which was caught sending some of the most extreme case is still sending a thousand dollars

to al qaeda. they had no tools in their toolbox to go after that. so given that, they emerged as a sort of place in the gulf where people knew that this could happen in an easy way. i think something that i have grown to understand is i have become more deeply involved in researching it is that the networks that exist for the financing of syria have likely existed for a decade or longer before syria. we now have access to them because a lot of these people have chosen to broadcast in a very public way that allows us to literally map out the social networks of these groups but it's very clear that they've been operating for a long time so i will give you a very brief example of one of the early days of the conflict one of the reasons that a particular the syrian told me he approached a

particular donor was that he had a reputation of being a very effective thunder and she knew that this man had been involved in the past and that his reputation was very widely known among a particular ideological circle. >> i notice when i look on twitter and follow the hash tag for the funding that a lot of the people were responding to the pleas for funding were not necessarily in kuwait. a lot of them are from the surrounding countries. why is it the case that a lot of them say from qatar or saudi arabia find it necessary rather than a local fund raiser. >> it is just a place you can operate and sort of not get caught. for example in saudi arabia it

is a proactive campaign to discourage raising money from the syrian conflict and deaf and if you in particular that have been in the interior light stop doing what you're doing, sort of cheesing them and being stopped. but what doesn't leave the same red flag is the transfer. so at the beginning of the financing in 2012, it was to the extent that there were accounts of what regularly wire let's say on a weekly basis to an account that was the sort of clearinghouse and the money would then be moved into syria because given the business and the ties between the other gulf countries and kuwait it simply didn't raise a red flag. >> how much money are we talking about? a couple hundred dollars, thousands of dollars, hundreds of thousands of dollars? >> i had another sort of surprise moment in researching when i was talking to another donor that had gathered like

republican gathering where people can come in and out on the week might evenings to talk about politicians and we're discussing the fund-raisers. was it a couple thousand. i remember perfectly it was $300,000. that is a huge amount of money where did the money go? i have no idea. to answer the question how much money is being raised? i don't have bank statements to show you because despite the fact that kuwait has a very legal regime people are hiding their transactions and one of the main reasons is fear of the syrian regime who is thought to have for a good contact and a lot of the exchange houses in

nasiriyah. so a lot of these transfers from kuwait would be partitioned into, and you know, hundreds or more parts and moved through syria and very strange ways to try to avoid the regime contact. but based on a number of the individual defense that i know have taken place and people who told me how much money was raised, i would estimate that is hundreds of millions of dollars that has gone. >> host: there is an article that says he and talked to a an intelligence official anonymously and he also had quoted the same kind of figure. can you give us the sense of the mechanics of how this is raised like is somebody going door-to-door asking for donations, our folks just writing a check to an anonymous address? how is the money being gathered? >> the way that i like to think

about it is the solicitation for the money is public but the way that the money is collected is often very, very private and very close and so sometimes even in person in cash or very specific sort of controlled ways. so the way the campaigns are solicited is very similar to something that all of us would recognize as a good ngo campaign. so let's say that you want to support one mujahideen that costs you $700,000. so the earmarks are an effective way to get an idea of what exactly where donation is. there is another example within 800-dollar rpg. so these benchmarks would be on posters, twitter accounts from very well known and have hundreds of thousands if not more than a million followers. there are signs posted specifically in kuwait so you can go to some of the

neighborhoods that are known to be more sympathetic to the groups and they will have huge banners that say come to the event and give for these reasons. that is the solicitation. at the collection level it's happened in a number of ways. at the beginning there were bank to bank transfers and those have become less common now. but at the beginning you receive a much wetter accounts, the plater account would say give the syrian people here is the bank information. it would be a screen shot right there of the account information and the routing number and the amount of currency that were accepted. was like really transparent. now they would say here's an instant message account. they would send back the information. so then a final number.

if you are in kuwait to that's easy if you could help to hold an even and put a box in the middle. there are lots of examples i've heard from individuals in the gulf getting on an airplane with a suitcase and shoving that and visiting the donors themselves. and this is fairly easy to do. i don't think anyone will stop you with a suitcase full of cash. it just won't happen. so this is i think increasingly frequent as people are becoming nervous. >> host: are there distinction is being made about the aid that they have and do they make appeals for the humanitarian aid and gets repurchased or is it in just a call for the donation and the person raising the money will do it as they see fit?

>> this is one of the competitions in tackling the questions of whether this is an issue is a lot of the advertising use is all of the forms of what is considered so charity basically. it's for the orphans, for the widows. to separate these things as free complicated so for example he spends a lot of time building hospitals that he does that specifically working with one particular brigade. so is a humanitarian, is it a partisan? but you know it is not lethal. if the work with armed fighters where does that put him in terms of, you know, lethal assistance? i don't know how to answer that question that the answer is that it's very much intertwined. >> so many people giving

contributions to like it is a contribution that they are allowing them to do what they think. >> absolutely. i should put the final caveat that there are some of the registered charities are some of the more competent and extremely effective charities in the world, so these registered charities are not what i am talking about and there is another distinction because it is the single largest humanitarian donor in the world and without their contribution, it would be -- the u.n. would be in trouble. so why do want to make that distinction there are individuals in the makeshift foundation that isn't sort of the officially registered ngo with one exception that i know of, but otherwise i don't know the crossover. >> so the flavor of the current fund-raising seems to be for the private donors seems to be pretty much the altar the

conservative. was there ever a time and 2,012th where you had the more moderate elements of the society that were raising money in kuwait to send to the moderate elements and syria? >> absolutely. at the peak of the funding there were eight number of people what has really been alarming to watch over the last year as i have followed this is those people who were involved in the more moderate elements have backed away partly because of their dissolution because they haven't been able to sort of effect the change. but also because they are scared of what is happening in terms of the more extreme elements and they are very nervous some of the more extremist elements targeting them. so this is sort of a mirror to what is happening on the ground in syria where you now have the fighting between the groups and the more moderate forces. so this is pretty much happening

in the community where there's a lot of concern that the more moderate and donors are going to be targeted or sort of isolated socially. >> host: you talk about how the money is gathered. how has the money moved into syria because i get the sense that it is not quite often not quite as simple as just making a wire transfer. >> this part is a little bit harder to pin down. but we do have some qualms about how it's happening. some of it is meeting through exchange houses. so the place he would go to change your dollars and the currency if you can make a deposit there and then in syria this is one way to do it and it's going to be partitioned into lots of different accounts so you would have maybe 100 recipients.

sometime in early 2013 turkey added an additional steps of the money could no longer go directly from kuwait to syria. it had to sort of stops in turkey where it could go over the border. the final way that we think it is moving is through the traditional money lenders that are free, and across the gulf. these are basically -- i am hoping that my colleague can give you a more coherent explanation, but it is basically a western union where no cash actually changes were crosses the border physically. so i run up the tab in guinn dubai and they will run up how much the it received from the same agents and then based on the transfers back and forth with a witty clout. if there's ever a lack of

funding on the side, then the cash moves across the border. but that is the basic system. >> i want to talk about the fact that this has had on the insurgency in syria. it seems to me having watched the conflict began in a much more, and much more pluralistic tone in the beginning and has become much more sectarian now. what seems to have been driving that is the perception that the world had abandoned the sunni muslim community to the whims of the al-assad regime and that this really fuelled a lot of the sunni activism in the gulf to raise this money. would you agree with that, and what effect has it had on the insurgency? >> i agree with that completely. one of the motivating prizes for

the funds that you hear is everyone else has abandoned you bush to wage and so these sorts of appeals to the forgotten conflict. but they have also exacerbated the rebels and other ways and i will give you another specific example where of the feuding between the two donors actually contributed to the fracturing of the rebels on the ground, so a dispute between the men outside of syria one of them was a donor in and the other was a donor in a cleric and syria so they had a very high-profile argument on a twitter about whether the rebel groups should join the military councils to be sort of western backed groups that were being tried, that the official opposition was trying to create and 2012.

.. and that is sort of become a self-fulfilling prophesy. at the beginning it was like, you know, if the guy in kuwait wants me to act a certain way to get money, fine, i'll do it. exactly.

we'll make the video. fine, but i think as exactly as you mentioned, as the conflict has gotten so much more difficult -- the humanitarian tools have gotten so much worse some of the ideologies have begin to sort of take hold and really stick in a sense that it's so hard to grapple with what is happening to my community. if i can reach out -- if i had the explanation that define fight i'm fighting it makes it a little bit easier to sort of settle. and of course, going along with that there's been affective aid lodge indication prop all gracious from syria and within each brigade. a lot of the -- brigade have particular units that are intended to codify their particular beliefs. >> yeah. and it is, also, the case that money can be quite attractive;

right. there's not a lot of strings attached to the money. there's a congress breathing down the neck of the private donors. the money is being delivered in suitcases or in garbage bag, and it's very attractive, particularly when the same kind of money is not coming from other allies of the syrian opposition. >> not only attractive. it's the only game in town. for a long time, it was the only way to get funding. you know, there are lots of rumors about which gold states are backing which gold militaries. we know it's happening among private donors. and, you know, everything from i know about the gold states themselves, it's been an on-off. the tap is on, the tap is off. the private donors have not stopped. when you're billing a military force, what you need is consistency. these guys have listen elemental in building these groups. >> right.

so your paper that you wrote is very much about the sunni fundraisers in kuwait and sunni money. primarily because they're the most public about it. but the shia private citizens in the gulf of mexico -- gulf are raising money too. i know, it wasn't the subject of your paper. i wonder if you caught a glimpse. >> it's something that needs to be further investigated. i would like to, in the future, i kept hearing when i would go to kuwait, you know, you know, it's not just the sunnies it's shias rating money. i couldn't find any evidence of it. on the last trip, i found evidence. i found a number of videos, which i believe that it is going on. i believe it could be a significant amount of money. basically the shia community in kuwait is fairly small, and it is -- i don't want to say it's

particularly insular. but it's an extremely strong community. i believe the way the fundraising is probably happening in the shia -- one businessman will call his friends and say hey, brother we need to do to this to support our brothers in syria. a much sort of quieter. it's notable that a number of the most prominent businessmen in kuwait who are shia also have very significant foreign investment in syria. so they have both the personal stake and a business stake in the maintenance of the status quo. which is, you know, goes a long way to explaining some of the cash froes -- flows i believe are moving. this funding, at least what i have so far sort of tapped in to, like the sunni side, i want to stress this, is equally

sectarian in nature in the rhetoric. i don't think that either side is an angel here. both sides are employing rhetorics that is truly despicable, and it's really demeaning to other people that live in their own countries. >> right. and then that's the final question i want to ask you before i turn to kristin. what risk is there to gulf societies, and particularly to kuwait of allowing this kind of sectarian activism. even though it's aimed abroad. what risk is there at home? >> i think it's a great risk. i think it would be naive to think that something that is happening so close to home that people are so actively involved in can really be kept out of kuwait's borders. i don't think it will come in, you know, ways that, you know, we would recognize as armed conflict, certainly. but i think there is a growing tension between the communities in kuwait, and so, you know, people i will speak to from the

shy ya community say we are scared. we are scared of retribution. people on the sunni side will say similar things. the shias are supporting hezbollah against us. they're going attack us. this kind of rhetoric is change to hear in kuwait in the extremely dis-- diverse and messy society. essential like every society is. you didn't hear the direct conflicts in the past. i think they have been exacerbated by people's involvement. >> thank you very much. kristin, can you help give us a sense of the political and the social context for this kind of fundraising? why is it happening now? is it different than the kind of sectarian activism you might have seen in the '90s or '00s? >> sure. first, i would like to say, i mean, i really enjoyed reading

elizabeth's book. i enjoy reading automatic -- all of her work. a lot of thing i'll be doing is providing context. she covered a lot of ground in her report. and one thing, i think, is worth to emphasize on what he said. kuwait is historically served as a main center for fundraising for islamist movement. i mean, that's been there for a long time. the reason it's been there -- a couple of things. one, kuwait is really rich. not only it's rich but it's been rich for a long time. so that kuwaitis have a lot of wealth. and the fundraising, you go where the money is. in addition to being really wealthy, kuwait has -- start talked about this long history of civic activism, definitely the political space to do that. it goes way back to the 1930s which kuwait was the first state in the gulf to have an elected parliament. matter when --

later when the state achieved the independence they were able to work with the family to put forth a constituent assembly that created a constitution that allowed for a strong parliament. i mean, a parliament i think has an impact. it can really affect things. all of it means there's a lot of space then for organizations. and you've had islamic movements then organizing in kuwait for a long time. i mean, the muslim brotherhood came back in kuwait in the '50s creating. salafi early to kuwait. and started forming charities very early. and extensive network of charities. i was really impressed when i was in kuwait in the late 1990s just the pervasiveness of collecting money at that time. i mean, any store you went in to would have a little area where nay would collect money. they were collecting money for different causes.

i'll never forget things. one, salafi really important salafi society having this huge sign written in blood across the top of it. they were collecting at the time money for chechnya. not only they had the charities they've had charities that are extremely networked internationally that are have been collecting money for charitable purposes, humanitarian purposes, and the experience both in afghanistan and chech knee ya and bosnia collecting money as well for more militant causes. i think what struck me i thought about it more was when you look at who is giving money and she kind of hit on this. especially the ones funding the jihadist in syria, it isn't so much the main presence the ones you think of initially. i know, the names of the muslim

brotherhood charities in kuwait. they're not the ones giving the money. i think they are giving maybe some humanitarian aid. even some of the main sill if southbound salafi one of the big changes we see here is the change happening across the region that i think comes a lot from new media really, and the empowerment individuals get from things like twitter. so you have basically individuals that are just able -- that are well-respected that maybe have a presence that have been talking about international causes. a lot of this goes back the sectarian goes back to iraq as well. starting with iraq, i think, a lot of the sectarian language came in with the satisfaction and how things change in iraq and the sunni community, of course. now the ability of those individuals to reach out and collect money on their own that way. i think it would be the main thing i see that is really different. it's not actually coming from the big constitutions so much. but from private individuals

that have been able to find their own audience and to find support through the new mechanisms. >> so elizabeth mentioned in her report that a lot of the fundraising right now is taking place in one of the salafi community. and i wonder if you might take a few minutes to just talk about the shape of the salafi community in kuwait, and the fact that a number of the members are in parliament and have a particularly strong voice in the opposition to the royal family. and how it might complicate the government's efforts to reign in this sort of fundraising. >> right. well the salafi movement is very strong in kuwait. it's very deep and very internationally connected. there's also been a position between the salafi movement in kuwait and in saudi arabia. i mean, so if you had, in fact, certain times very influential sheikhs in saudi arabia that had trawbl with the -- they set up in kuwait.

you have a long flow of both people and of ideas flowing across the gulf, particularly kuwait being very strong as a center for that. again, because it was more open and providing kind of a place of refuge for people having political trouble elsewhere. what it means is that, i mean, cue -- kuwait has the different versions salafiism you would find anywhere throughout. you have salafi movements that would be sort of pro-monarchy. very close to the monarchy and related to movements like that. you have oppositional movements. you have new movements that are trying to fuse salafiism with some idea of democracy. all of these different elements are presence. at the same time, because of the presence of the parliament, you do have salafi movements that have been able to enter the parliament and get a strong presence there. you also have a lot of sympathy for salafi movements among sort

of the more triable areas of kuwait, which have been growing in influence. they are able to use their presence in the parliament for putting pressure on the ruling family. again, what i thought was interesting, if you look at the names of the people that are have been most significant in the fed federation for syria. these are not people i run across looking in politics for kuwait. they are not showing up in the kuwait parliament and are even speaking a lot. i have been watching the oppositional politics in the arab spring. these are not people that come up. i think there's also a little bit of a difference between some of the salafi movements that are much more active or movements that are very engaged on international issues or kind of independent religious sheikhs. and also that are maybe more working on the sectarian issues, actually, and looking at iran and these kinds of things and looking at that -- those sorts of issues rather than playing the domestic

kuwaiti politics. >> can you talk about beth's point she made in the paper and why she tighted it playing "playing with fire." the risk stirring up a lot of sectarian tension at home. do you think that's true? and do you think it is happening or will happen soon as a result of it? it's certainly happening. it started happening. a lot of language coming concerns started happening after the iraq war, and you had actually a lot of sunnies that came to qaw tar and kuwait at the time that were displaced in the sectarian conflict that happened in iraq. i think they had a lot of influence, actually, in importing the more sectarian view. as you said, kuwait has a open politic. there's been tension

communities. but at the same time you had even political blocks in the parliament that were made of actually broke down in the middle of the issues over the role of what was happening in iraq and also in lebanon and hezbollah when some of the parliamenttarian showed their support for them. and bloc couldn't hold together anymore. i think tells you something how the sectarian policy of the region are becoming more prominent. syria takes that to a higher level. now you actually have a conflict hezbollah entering to the conflict where everyone has their own players in there. and a lot were built up from the iraq war, from the other things about shia looking at the rise

of salafi rhetoric. what it means as a minority. but from the sunni side you have a stronger power. they have their own actors. look at hezbollah how they are act to able to another foreign setting. it's talked about. the fears on both sides are really coming together, and i think the problem in kuwait, it's that, you know, it's one thing a lot of people like about kuwait the politics are much more open. but at the same time it allows the space for that much more sectarian rhetoric and competitive politics to come out in the open. >> okay. thank you. >> tom, i want to turn you now and talk about kuwait's counterthreat financing laws. one of the points that beth makes up -- points out in her paper is that kuwait became attractive as a hub for this kind of private fundraising because its laws are particularly lax. can you talk about that?

can you put kuwait laws in the context of the gulf and in the region? are they particularly lax? >> i would like to start by adding my congratulations to beth on the paper. so i think the question needs to go back to 1989, i won't take too long to the present day. in 1989, the financial action task force that is referred to set up and initially set up to counter money-laundering as a function of the trade -- from latin america. go forward to 9/11, and in fact, one of the things that is often overlooked is the first shot in the global terrorism by the administration was a financial shock executive order 13224. which basically put in place the option for the u.s. to sanction organizations that were deemed to be financing terrorist organizations.

the at the same time the board was -- they were told you need to come up with an addition to your money-laundering regulations and guidelines that addresses terrorist financing. so from that moment on, the countries around the world were monitored and audited by fatf and other organizations. to determine extent to which the implementation of the recommendations, so called nine special recommendations were appropriate. they were doing their most to counter terrorist financing. and these mutual evaluations are conducted on a regular basis. the most recent is done in 2010. and in the context of a peer analysis, it's fair to say that kuwait was not doing a good job. if you look at the wikileaks cable from around the time, you can see the u.s. administration was clearly frustrated by the lack of progress that kuwait was making, and the report of that

time highlighted what they called many shortcomings with the legal and lower enforcement framework for countering terrorist finance. poor level of presentive measures, et. cetera, et. cetera. and from a quantititive perspective at that time 49 different elements that fatf reviewed countries on, and they fall in to four categories. and 37 of the 49 categories were rated noncompliant or partially compliant by fatf. that's the 75% failure rate. >> by the way, compare with the other gulf countries? >> so during the period between 9/11 and 2010, other gulf countries made a terrific effort to make up the ground that was felt should be made up. if you look at the noncompliance and high-risk jurisdictions which fatf published in october this year, kuwait is notable for

serving on the left and the company which probably wouldn't want to be in with cambodia, and places like that. in 2012, kuwait made a concerted effort to try to make up for the de-- deficiencies. there's a law that refers to setting up a financial intelligence union, but this is all stuff that other countries did many, many years ago. and i think there is still some frustration that these issues haven't yet been addressed. even if -- rules put in place and announce things will happen. whether there's enforcement and whether the rules and laws are used to deal with illicit finance and any way you can use them. it's what is being conducted. in kuwait -- it's terrorist finance. a lot of these are used in an entirely different matter. we have talked about the way in which politics worked in kuwait, which you may not favor

implementing and enforcing the regulations. >> yeah. that was my question is that a law it seems to me a lot of fundraising that talks about -- beth talks about her in paper, you can't properly construe it as financing for terrorist organizations because a lot of groups in syria have not been designated. most of this money is not going, say, the -- , for example, -- and kuwait has for curving some of the funding if they feel it needs to be curbed for one reason or another. is it possible to curb it under the rubric of countering threat financing? what that is so focused on terrorist organizations. >> i think it's very difficult. there is a hard way and there's a soft way. the hard way is clearly if one can prove that money is going to

organizations that are designatedded and the steps can be taken which as mostly as yesterday by the u.s. treasury were taken by designating individuals. not from kuwait but to providing finance to designated organizations. there is an alternative way. that is that financial institutions are very concerned about their reputation and about being tainted by anything which would damage their reputation. so while you may not be able to directly target individuals who transferring money and rather they didn't transfer money, you can threat be known that these individuals are perhaps not doing what you would like to be done. and you are very quickly find that the serves they received from banks, et. cetera, will start to be withdrawn. they will cut the funds, per se, but potentially inject a fear factor, which might make them think twice before continuing to

do what they're doing. >> has that worked anywhere? >> it certainly has. if you look at the period after 9/11 they effectively curtailed a lot of donations that were going on. combined with the fact that a lot of those kinds of donors felt that the course which they were donating money wasn't going so well in afghanistan and 2003 period. but then something might happen which turns the tide of sympathy or puts forward a cleb to donate money to. you saw the situation in iraq where the documents were found where core al qaeda writing saying, you know, we're having a bit of trouble with money. would you mind sending $100,000. he was effectively raising money for the cause in iraq at that time. so i think it is possible to use soft pressure to curtail donors, but it will require the kuwaitis

to perhaps be more aggressive than they might want to be with the individuals. >> thank you very much. we're going open it up for questions now. i think we have mics around the room. so if you can just raise your hand and wait for the microphone to come to you. we have one kind of over there. >> thank you. good afternoon. [inaudible] thank you very much for the paper. i think it's interesting. i'm curious whether you or any of the panel lists have looked at how the creation of the islamic front and the sort of the eye tempt to kind -- attempt to bring the groups under one operating banner. given the military -- basically don't work anymore. do you think it's going, in some ways, stem this kind of competing competition from private donors.

obviously there's a kind of open question in the minds of the government as to the behavior of the citizens and how it may come back to bite them. i'm wondering what your thoughts are on that. i wonder -- i know it's not the fop -- sort of the core focus of your research, but is there any reflection on how this kind of proliferation of arms and -- effects what happens in the long-term. we have seen in the world has seen. what kind of impact it has elsewhere. is there any kind of consideration it might ultimately come to do more harm than good? because there's no clear way of understanding where the money flows go. i mean, the most -- destructive groups certainly aren't getting, you know, tons of gulf money. they are getting where they can do a lot of damage. just curious if you can reflect on some of those points. beth? >> on the islamic front, i was looking a the this a last few days. at lough promise innocent kuwaiti backers have come out in

support of the islamic front. i suspect what we'll see is sort of a -- everyone is equal but some rebel brigade are more equal than other situations. so for example, i think altogether they are under the same umbrella i think groups will continue to receive better funding particularly from some of these individuals than other brigade until the if. so i wouldn't expect, i mean, i don't know i can't predict the future. i wouldn't expect the donors to change their financing, you know, in any way. i would expect them to continue in the networks they have already established and just, you know, work with -- and those rebel groups continue to work together. >> do any of them react to the formation? >> yes. they have. actually one of the most prominent donors, one of the backers has come out in support publicly of the islamic front. yeah, i mean, we have seen the sort 58 licenses in the past.

it seems to be different because it's bigger and seems it has a bit more coherence. for example, there's some evidence he was involved in brokering arrangement between other individual rebel groups at different point in time. so, i mean, the big question is whether, you know, this alliance is different from other alliances. it has any sort of holding pattern. but yeah, i wouldn't expect the funding pattern to change. in terms of sort regret about what it can do to syria in the future. yes, i think it's one of the main reasons the broad scale funding in kuwait has sort of dropped off and really just hard core elements that remain. so for example, if you look those who have a copy of the report. there's a quote on the first page from someone who raised money for moderate brigade. he was basically lamenting the fact that basically his and other support has gone in other directions it's destroyed the

opposition by making them totally incoherent and enable to work together. >> thinking of a question in the back. >> hi. [inaudible] i'm a syrian -- [inaudible] i recently came back. [inaudible] talking about most of these funding really not sort of -- [inaudible] because i seen the kuwaiti and the -- [inaudible] , youyou know, arrive in syria mostly [inaudible] clothes or there's nothing about weapons. most of the weapon, at least my experience between aleppo and -- [inaudible] really from the syrian army. most of these sophisticated -- [inaudible] they capture them. so really you cannot talk about,

you know, favoring this group or that. because one example that been asking, you know, the headquarter -- we need weapons. we need weapons. they refuse to give them. suddenly they overtook the headquarters. one thing that always -- refuse to give them even weapon from maybe -- [inaudible] we have other propaganda from the other side saying the gulf country is giving the head of intelligence and stories and -- [inaudible] you know, none of the weapon is from the syrian army. >> yeah. no, i really appreciate your making this point. and i think i would emphasize, again, just how much humanitarian aid the kuwaitis