i know that going back to ancient conservative history might not be the most interesting thing to do especially when washington is the here and the now. i would like what former senator alan simpson used to say. he said washington is the only place where sound travels faster than light and so i know that it is a fast-paced kind of place. i appreciate you taking time to

come to think about this today. we have copy of the book if you like to have it. chapter 5 is the current, most relevant part today. if you want to take a piece of it look at that. thank you for coming and we'll stand adjourned. [applause] >> you're watching booktv, non-fiction authors and books every weekend on c-span2. >> from the 30th an maul miami book fair international on the campus of miami-dade college, congresswoman debbie wasserman-schultz discussing her book, for the next generation, a wake-up call to solving your nation's problems. this is about 45 minutes. >> good afternoon, everyone. please take your seats. we're about to begin.

good afternoon and welcome. my name is malu harrison, pleasure to welcome each and everyone ever you here this afternoon. happy anniversary to miami book fair initter national. 30 years in this community. a round of applause indeed. [applause] our thanks to miami-dade college for all of its leadership and efforts, all of the volunteers, students, faculty and staff who come together every single year and for the past 30 years and we can expect that to continue to bring this cultural enrichment to our community. i would also like to thank our sponsors, adino and american airlines and friends of the fair, many of whom are seated here in the first couple of rose. thank you so much for your support. and those of you who are not yet friend, have the opportunity to also join us as friend of miami

book fair international. please come on in and take your seats as quickly as you can. thank you very much. this year we're asking you to consider making a special donation to the fair. you may have already heard that earlier today. we're asking you to take out your cellular phones and to text mbfi to 41444, if you're so inclined, we would greatly appreciate it. i thank you in advance for your support. without further adieu, let me tell you that after our featured speaker speaks, you will have the opportunity to ask questions. if you would step to the mic in the middle of the room, ask your questions as succinctly as possible and then step away from the mic and have a seat and your question will be answered.

if you like the book autographed, we'll autographing on thisgr floor on the other sie of the elevators immediately following. so without further adieu, i would like to welcome an individual who will be introducing our speaker. he i is a former state senator d leader in the democratic party and his name is mr. dan gelber. mr. gelber? [applause] >> i'm going to raise the microphone. in a few minutes it will be lowered substantially. thank you. listen, i've really had a great honor here to introduce wonderful speakers over the last, almost decade. vice president al gore, caroline kennedy chris hayes. i've been asked to introduce george mcgovern. i'm glad to be here to introdue another right-wing crazy.

so the truth is though someone came to me this morning and said, i love your introduction. and is smiled, i said thank you for that generous comment. they're always so short and they never distract from the speaker. i can't remember a thing you have ever said. so i promise you i will be short, i will not disappoint you but it is very hard for me to speak about debbie wasserman-schultz in a forgettable way. i met debbie in the late '90s and i met her in a place where i think she did almost her business, the superstore, baby love in broward county. debbie spent a lot of time there and few years that followed, she was having little kids as i was i. i joined her in the legislature almost immediately and became closeia friends with her because frankly she led a battle against so many things wrong headed in this state and for me having her

around was a incredible opportunity. i have always viewed debbie as both a younger sister and an older sister. and what ih mean by that is, a younger city, little sister, because, while she is younger and she is littler. but i have viewed her as a big sister because of really the kind ever role model she's been to me and any public servant who wants to fight for progressive causes in this country. this is a person of incredible passion and principles. and that's why i have always looked up to her. i can tell you i watched her in so many battles. i watched her fight jeb bush over the terry schiavo case. watched her fight over education issues. ic watched her struggle with breast cancer. the thing that defined her in each of those battles she had not simply great clarity and

passion but she had a vision that was very unique. i was fortunate to be with her in the legislature and watched her in her career going from the florida house, florida senate, to congress and to chairman of the democratic national committee. it is a incredible story for somebody that started as an aide ino the florida legislature. and she is our debbie wasserman-schultz. she is no one else's. we're fortunate to have her come from this community. let me say this before i bring her up here. i have to ask you to buy this book. why she is here, for the next generation. by the wayt it costs 25.99. unless you're canadian it is 29.99. that is in canada. she will be afterwards signing your copies. i urge you to do that. she is very chat i and will talk to you probably anybody with her longer than she wants them to but she can't help talking to people because she has a lot to talk about. lee t me with this i watched

debbie wasserman-schultz in the last if i have teen years in almost everyone of her battles. thene thing i love about her and why you probably love her she never pick as fight with a weaker foe. she always pick as fight with somebody who is stronger, well-financed, who is fighting for some other cause. if you read this book, you will quickly understand. debbie is about fighting for principles and with passion and my dad and i, a not of -- lot of you know my dad, seymour gelber. we were watching her on the a show. your friend debbie has moxie. my dad is 94. i'm not sure that word moxie is used in the last 90 years. i said to him i think that is a little bit pejorative. moxie is a word you use to describe a woman who has a lot of passion and principles but the truth of the matter is, doesn't matter whether you're a woman or a man. debbie wasserman-schultz is someone who represents and reflex to me the greatest kind of principles you should have in

public service. she stand up and believes it is her job to stand up for people who can not stand for themselves, to speake for people who do not have a voice and fight for principles she believesr represents the best angels in america. that is why i'm proud to present to you today to hear her speak about her new book, the next generation, which you should buy. debbie wasserman-schultz. [applause] >> thankld you. thank you so much. shah. it is great to be home. i have to tell you it's a little sure real to do it in front of a hometown crowd. dan, thank you so much for that really touching, incredibly warm introduction. what dan just did is for me like having my brother introduce me.

we have fought side by side for some years and i actually met dan's father, seymour, before i met dan and to have had any praise from either one of them but especially a public servant and a leader like seymour gelber as dan said, probably many of you know him, is really remarkable. and for me it means that maybe i'm doing something right. but dan is been a great dad and a great leader and someone who has chosen a path of public service in spite of the fact that in our generation when we grew up a lot of our friend in the w '80s, which was the me generation, chose the path making as much money as humanly possible. there is nothing wrong with that. that's a good path. but dan and i both chose a path that allowed to us go to bat

making the world a better place for others every single day. that is really what this book was all about. so,at dan, thank you very much r that really special introduction and this book and writing it, and people have said to me, deb business, you didn't have enough to do? you had to cram a book in to too? the answer is yes, because i realized especially in november of 2010 when this project came to fruition that after the tea party swept far too many elections in that year that they began hurdling us from manufactured crisis to manufactured crisis and every issue, every significant issue, whether it was the economy, education, healths care, civil rights, civil liberties, environment, energy, gun safety, you name it, infrastructure investment, all of those have come to a screeching halt because of the unbelievable

gridlock that their poison has caused. for me as a mom, i'm a mom with twin 14-year-olds and a 10-year-old. i have a lot of balls in the air and you know, i think so often we all hear politicians, and i'm one of then, talk about the importance of any given issue being critical because we have to do what's right for the next generation. only i realized that concept is not an abstract one for me. i have the next generation in the back seat of my car every single day. you know, of course as a mom, thatve makes sense, but when you think about it, and i'm sure don't realize this, i counted, i'mon one of eight women in congress with children younger than 10. now when we ask ourselves why the issues that are important to the next generation don't reach the top of the legislative agenda, there aren't enough moms with young kids might have something to do with it. so i wrote the book so i could

sound an alarm bell. so i could make sure that regular people had an opportunity to read this book and find the issue that they are the most passionate about, even if they don't realize it now. and give them a roadmap to how to make a difference in the lives of others on that issue. and because i am a busy working mom and we all have a lot of balls in the air, and i recognize that our most precious resource is what? time. yes. but some people perceive the most precious resource is money. not when you are trying to balance work and family. when you are trying to make sure that you can make end meet. time is the most precious resourcehe. what i did hear each chapter we lay out theh problem. i lay out my version what i think the best solution is and we give you some guidance how to get involved in that issue and make a difference in an

effective way because too often people end up wasting whatever little time they do have, on a way that isn't going to have enough reach and make a difference and of course at the endgo i made sure and it was really important to make sure there was a list of organizatin that is we talked about in this book and how to contact them. because what will happen someone will feel motivated and excited after they read this book. they take something away they want to do themselves and they close the book and get distracted by their very busy life. there's a list right there for you to go back to follow up so you can get involved and make a difference on the issue that is the most important to you. so i want to read a few excerpts from thea book and i'm excited and looking forward to take your questions because i think having spent three years writing it i really want to share how i shaped my advocacy that this

book represents. so i want to start unusually with the conclusion because the conclusion is at the beginning is a good way to show you what this book meant to me and why it was important for me to write it. the conclusion is called, change what happens next is up to us. over the course of our lives each of us has moments of clarityr when we mow exactly wht matters above all us. that flash of insight gives us a sense of purpose and in that moment we have the capacity to reorganize our lives so that virtually every decision we make from that point forward serves that overarching purpose. in my own life there have been two such moments. giving birth to my children, and being diagnosed with breast cancer. one was exhilarating. the other was devastating but both of these events made me realize i absolutely must make the most of my opportunity to have impact what matters most to me while on this earth, sharing whatever knowledges and skills i have to make it a better place. that was always my mission in

life, but when i had children this mission came into sharper focus becoming more urgent and ever before. my husband and i brought into this world three babies who depended on us completely who we could not imagine living without. we are dependent on them. caring for those children immediately way came the most important thing in our lives. with that became a sense of vulnerability this is why my breast cancer diagnosis gave me a dreadful jolt. even though my doctors were confident that the disease could be stopped with aggressive treatment. there was no guaranty i would survive or no guaranty it would not come back if i beat it. all the things i want to teach them and do for them all of that was in jeopardy. at the same time i learned there was not. i was not alone. there was a sisterhood who felt the same fear about the future. women like nama who was only 32 received her own breast canner diagnosis in 2006. her daughter was three years old at that time.

with her breast cancer at stage two she did not know whether she would live long enough to see her daughter go to kindergarten much less graduate from high school and college. in the midst after grueling chemotherapy regimen, she promised bod if given the strength to outlast the disease she would devote her life to helpg other woman fight breast cancer. she made her promise creating the tiger lilly foundation. even before my own diagnosis was proponent of breast cancer research and awareness. whener i developed breast cancer that became more important. in 2009 after i shared my own breast cancer experience publicly i teamed up with nam and her p foundation to craft legislation that the centers for disease control prevention to launch a national education campaign to raiseal awareness. that bill called the early act was incorporated within the affordable care act, obamacare that passed into law in march 2010 thanks in large part to a diverse coalition of more than 40 organizations who rallied in support of the bill. today the early act task force

at cdc through appropriations passed as part of the early act awarded grants to organizations like share it and force which help younger women deal with the unique challenges they face when diagnosed with breast cancer. the early act task force will create a national education and awareness campaign targeting young woman so they are more likely to catch breast cancer early and survive. taking these actions knowing i had a role in future girls and women prevent breast cancer was incredibly empowering with the help of her and other breast cancer advocates we turned adversity into universal good. for instance, not all of us have children but all of us were children at one time. so we can understand the consequences of the decisions made by adults responsible for children's well-being. we must recognize our responsibility and obligation to make decisions in a way that will improve children's welfare similarly not allon of us will receive a cancer diagnosis but we all have to come to terms with our owniv mortality.

when that day cops we'll face the question whether we did enough during our lives to make a difference in the lives of others of the having considered that questionti myself i can say that there is no room for doubts or regrets. each of us must be able to answer that universal question, by saying that he or she absolutely made a positive impact on the world. we can not fool ourselves. we must truly believe this and we can not afford to postpone the purpose that defines our lives because we do not know how long we have. for the sake of our children, l foriv our fellow human, and for tranquilty of our own individual souls we must begin to take action right now. and that really crystallizes i hope why i thought it was so important to insert a little more work into my own life and try to motivate people to part with a little bit of their precious resource and make a difference in the lives of others because the way that we are going to make sure that this country can thrive is by making sure that we measure our nation's success by how well our

children are doing. and i think if you took a step back and thought about how our children are doing on a host of issues, all the issues that i have run through in the last few minutes, we're not doing that well. whether it is education, health care, environment, investing in nation's infrastructure, protecting our childrenme from guns and other harmful weapons, civil rights and civil liberties, we have a lot of work to do and we have got to stop the my way or the highway politics. that i think is the big part of what the tea party has, how the tea party has dragged us backwards. allowing the tail to wag the dog, allowing the agenda to be controlled more bye the power that people want to hold on to in washington rather than doing the right thing. so i really hope that this book will motivate real people, regular people, to go down to your elected official town hall meeting. spend a few minutes after the

meeting's over talking with that elected official at podium, give being them a sense what is important to you. get involved in an organization that focusing on an issue that really matters, most of all communicate to the people that represent that you wanted gridlock to stop. i can say that even as the chair of thet dnc. obviously i support my party's agenda and i represent a very progressive congressional district. so it is clear to me where my constituents are and that's with where i am also but it is also clear to me it is critical that we reach across the aisle, that we work together to find common ground. that we stop digging in and insisting onpe everything being our way. so in that spirit, i wrote a chapter on civil liberties but i also wrote a chapter on making sure we go focus more on civility and the chapter is called, discourse, not discord. i want to read a brief excerpt

from it for you now. as we consider the consequences of the deterioration in political discourse and how we can reverse that course, it is helpful to ask ourselves how did we get here? my more tenured congressional colleagues tell me there have always been moments of discord ind washington this era is especially vicious. i find a variety of opinions why that is. some blame the media for stoking clashes colorful enough to carry the 24/7 news cycle. other blame millions spent been pacs air during course of campaigns that last longer than they ever before. one of the more interesting here theories came senior member of con gruss, innocuous shift in lifestyle of congressional members. when a representative was elected he or she would move to washington, d.c. with their family living roughly half the year. wasn't uncommon for a democratic member as child on same baseball team as republican member. more likely to run into one another or grocery store or bank out to din.

these past generations were more civil in congress because they had a sense of being part of the same community sharing at least one attribute even if they disagreed about every question. calling rival name on congressional floor would make it awkward to encounter the same rival in the stand at ballgame. more congressional action is condensed, with the house meeting 3 1/2 days a week, alternating monday night through tuesdayer or friday. members spend three evenings in washington before flying home for a four-day weekend. 112th and 113th congresses with republican majority also seen very light schedule with congress in remess many morebl days than recent historyof making it more diffict for members to spend time getting to know each other and building trust. consider the republican members of congress swept into office in 2010 on ua wave of tea party support. this classof of legislators has been widely criticized for using excessively harsh language in course of debating issues. so happens many of these same members are reclusive come to

washington. cbs newscl report in january 20, 19 of the 87 new republicans from that class slept in their congressional office rather than rent a home in washington. as representative joe walsh, republicanin of illinois told te news station, i think it important show we don't live here. we're notli creatures of this town. maybe if representative walsh was more after social creature in washington wouldn't accuse democratic opponents in 2011 exploiting service record m in iraq as way to get votes. that opponent, tammy duckworth flew 120 combat hours in iraq before a black hawk helicopter t by rocket launcher in 2004 blowing off both her legs. she had the poise to help the copilot land helicopter safely before passing out from her injuries. shee narrowly survived and uses two pros at the time sick legs. today tammy duckworth is member of congress, democrat from illinois and she beat joe walsh. [applause]

thiss excerpt goes on to talk about an effort that i have engaged in with a number of my colleagues, dan webster, republican from orlando, one of them to try to make sure that we can build those relationships across the aisle and start to build some trust. when i was in the legislature with dan and other colleagues in tallahassee, you know, we did have opportunities to sit next to each other in committee hearings and spend time together on house floor. if you notice how we conduct business on the house floor today, we're really are just engaged in series of timed speeches. and we take turns back and forth, republican and democrat but we're not hearing each other. we're not, it a is not really a debate. it is an opportunity, no offense to c-span, but it is an opportunity to get in front of c-span cameras and project your message across the country to the hundreds of thousands of people watching at that moment. years ago, when the founding fathers conceived how we would

actually pass a bill into law, the idea was that members would gather and build relationships and trust, would work together, would reach across the aisle, would engage in give-and-take and eventually the product that came out of that process would be one that went into the top of the funnel and came out the very narrow end with the diversity of opinion that represented america. and unfortunately our process has deteriorated to such an extent that we are really not even doing anything of consequence, particularly in tho last couple of cycles. so dan webster and i decided to start a bipartisan dinner, a dinner a that we have no agenda. we just got five republicans and five democrats initially together and we went to dinner and started to get to know each other a little bit better. with every subsequent dinner the requirement that is the previous attendee has to bring a guest from the opposite party, to the

next dinner. and we're up to about 30 or 40 members now. we'vee gotten to know each othe. in fact i have been able to cosponsor legislation with a couple of the republicans who i would never have spoken to otherwise if not for attendance at thatne dinner and really started to make sure that we could find a way to find common ground not necessarily on the big issues but if you, the longest distance starts with the first step. so i'm trying to do my part. some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are as well but we do have a ways to go. another thing thath has been fun and also built collegiality in the congress is after i shared my own breast cancer experience publiclyn i started the bipartisan congressional women's softball team. that might seem trivial but the women members came together and there has been a baseball game played for 50 years that the republicans and the democrats play against each other and this

is t mostly all the men. a couple of women play from time to time but the women decided, you know what? we would be better off playing on the same team, fighting common enemy, the press corps. and we played the female press corps. that is easy to rally members around a single cause. and we raised money for the young survival coalition which is young women's breast cancer organization. we've been playingr this game fr fiven years. sadly the congressional women's team only ones. the quest for that trophy continues. but it has given us a chance to be out are at 7:00 in the morning for three months in the spring every year practicing being women, just being girls and getting to know each other as moms and as girl friend and we don'tn talk about politics in fact i consciously don't wear any of my democratic t-shirts to make sure we keep everything neutral on the field and it has given as you chance to work together. what we alltf said during this last shutdown that if they just

locked a few of the women in the house and senate in a room, left us alone for a few hours we would solve a lot of these problems. just likeo that. [applause] so, so before i get to questions i want to share one more thing with you because i'm sure the affordable care act will come up and i hope it does because i really look forward to talking about it. but i want to share an excerpt from the health care chapter which should give you an idea fully implementing the affordable care act and making sure everybody in america has access to quality, affordable health care is so critical. in october 2009 during the american, excuse me, with so many provisions of obamacare yet to take effect, nope, i'm still, not starting on the right page. here we go. let me start again. in the t introduction i shared with you that before i began my career as legislator iuc was encouraged to sit down and list the policies that matter most to me. near the top wasi making health

care affordable of the in this sense voting for obamacare was the fulfillment of my most deeply held belief the role of government force in positive change for people's lives. before congress passed the medicare part-d prescription drugpe benefit in 2003 traditiol medicare did not provide coverage for prescription drugs. manyna seniors face ad difficult choice between medicine and meals. when congress passed part. did, the republican majority at the time left a gap in coverage known as the doughnut hole. when a senior on medicare spend approximately $2600 on prescription medication they fall into the doughnut hole coverage gap and pay for the drugs 100% out-of-pocket until they reach $5600 in prescription drug spending. some seniors never reach the top amount in calendar year. they pay for 100% of prescriptions for rest of the year until next year. many seniors on fixed income can't afford to pay the way gap through coverage. affordable care act phases out doughnut hole, closing it out in 2020 savings seniors $3,000 a

year of drug cost. i spoke at the west broward democratic club, one of the largest democratic clubs in florida, made up senior citizens who live in my congressional district, when i finished began taking questions, woman i known at 23 years never known struggling to make ends meet rose to make a statement. she said, deb business, thanks to obamacare i don't have to ask the pharmacist to score my miss. i used to do that so they would ask me longer. because the doughnut hole is closing i can afford my prescriptions now. eye-opening moment for me because i used that story generally arguing for affordable care act passage. i stood in line at seniors at pharmacy couldn't afford to pay for prescriptions. they had to decide which to fill and which to leave. this is woman i knew well directly benefited from the closure of the medicare prescription drug coverage gap. more clear to me that obamacare and safety nedp programs like medicare are essential maintainingre minimum quality of life for ouro seniors. of course reforms have improved

lives of americans of all ages. i have friend an constituents who worried about health care coverage for young adult sons and daughters who after graduation sometimes find it hard to find a job with benefits. in years pas dt insurance companies were free to end coverage for dependent children enrolled in their parents plan at age of 19. thanks to obamacare, insurance companies must allow the young people to remain on a the parents insurance plan up to the age 26. the most significant provision of the health care law haw for concern with preexisting condition. children protected from denial of coverage, september 20 third, 2010. that samed coverage takes effect in january 2014 when the individual mandate takes effect. the addition of newly enrolled healthy beneficiary payments will balance cost of covering higher needs patients excluded on basis of need for preexisting conditions. under old system being female was treated as preexisting condition. women were charged higher premium simply because of

gender. this wass a reprehensible practice, since my bought with breast cancer i had a double-whammy. after i shared my experience i heard from so many women diagnosed with breast cancer at a time they were diagnosed with breast cancer. they needed raiddation treatment and chemotherapy but they had to only choose one because they couldn't afford the deductible for both. i can't imagine howrr terrifying it is to make that choice. it is absolutely critical we make sure no one has to choose between medicine and meals. that no one has to worry about whether or not and other shoe is going to drop when facing a serious illness. as someone who at 41 years old after a clean mammogram just two months before was picture of health on one day and was diagnosed as breast cancer patient the next day, knowing that i was one job loss away from being uninsured or uninsurable. on january 1st, the 129 million americans who like me live in this country with

preexisting condition will have that peace of mind we don't have to worry about the other shoe dropping if god forbid that illness ever recurs. and, what's going on right now in washington, and what republicansu who have spent yeas trying to repeal or delay or unwind the affordable care act are trying to do is take away that peace of mind. well i'm hear to tell you, until my last breath i will fight to make sure we will not go backwards. [applause] thank you. i'll conclude, thank you so much. i will love t for living in south florida. i will conclude by just telling you in spite of the fact that i just shared with you my views of the world and what i think we need to do to get back on track, i know that it can't be done alone. i know that it can't be done just exactly the way debbie

wasserman-schultz prescribes. the only way for to us solve these problems, and there are big problems, huge challenges, immigration reform is a significant challenge, why, why, are we not able to take up the legislation that the senate has passed, that clearly a majority of the house of representatives said they support through cosponsorship or republicans who publicly sairtd they would vote forfeit allowed to come to the floor, why can't we take that issue off the table and make sure we make our economy more robust, make sure that we have a humane and just policy for people a who are here who simply want to make a better life for themselves? why can't we work together to solve our nation's problems? if we don't make a commitment to doing that, if we don't get folks like you off the sidelines and each of us commits to just spending a little bit extra time making our impact on the world, then, we are really going to set ourselves backwards, set the

dial backward and in a competitive, global economy like the one that we must acknowledge that we live in , we will lose that competitive race on too many issues. and i know how proud i am as american. that, we are and should continue to strive to be the best nation on earth and every indicator that we care about and we can do thatat if we bond together, if e work together, if we stop the my way or highway politics and stop fingerpointing and just simply work together to solve our nation's problems instead of spending endless hours of pointless fingerpointing that simply sets us backwards. so thank you so much. i hope you enjoy the book. [applause] thank you. okay. so there's one microphone, one line. great. >> my question is the, health

care plan was passed and it was called the obamacare plan now. isn't that the plan that republicans proposed in '93, basically? and yet now, that it was passed they opposed it? i just want you to comment on that? >> the individual mandate concept that is underpinning of the affordable care act, obamacare, yes,an that was actually conceived by the heritage foundation which is obviously a conservative think tank. it was one embraced by republicans in the early '90s and for some reason now that was embraced by president obama, suddenly it is a government takeover of health care by their definition and, you know about the worst thing we could do. look, the affordable care act is not perfect. i could not name a piece of legislation that we've ever passed in more than 200 years that is perfect but the founding fathers set up ais process for deal with the imperfections. it is called working together, to solve problems and if there

are things that come up that need to be ironed out, glitches like fixing website. obviously the website should work. the affordable care act as i have described for you this afternoon is so much more than a website.th it means so much more to millions of people. and so i'm ready. all of my colleagues on my side of the aisle are ready, willing able to sit down and hammer out some of those problems that might crop up. what we're not willing to do is repeal it and go backwards. thank you. [applause] >> is there any chance that congress will work together on anything, but specifically, on eliminating the salary cap on the fica deductions? >> on the federal deductions? >> on fica for social security? >> oh, you know, that concept is part of the broader discussion which i hope we get to in congress on what to do about

making sure that we add to the long-term solvency of social security. it's really, it is really important and there are a variety of different things we can do. if you, for example, and i actually talk about this, there is safety net chapter in, for the next generation i talk about medicare and social security and medicaid and some things i think weme could do, one of which is,f you take off that cap, that income cap onn fica, it adds 75 years of solvency to social security. 75 years. [applause] and doesn't touch benefits. will wealthier people obviously who make above, $107,000 care that now they're paying taxes on all of their income? sure. but, the whole point of last year's election, remember we debated this forethe whole presidential election in 2012, whether everybody should have a fair shot and a fair shake and everybody should pay their fair share. why should wealthier people pay

a smaller percentage of their income in taxes into the safety net programs that are so essential so we have at least a minimum floor through which we're not going to allow our frail seniors to slip through? the answer is that they should and we have to focus on working towards that goal. thank you. [applause] >> hi congresswoman, nice to see you again. >> you too. >> my questionc is about the gridlock. yesterday doris kearns good win was here. we had a discussion about woodrow wilson and theodore roosevelt. specifically wilson. he used to go down somewhere called the president's room in congress. when asked about how gridlock, how things get moving, one of the suggestions from the other speaker was president should using, find that room. another suggestion that has been, i wonder if you come moment on what the president can do to be more engaged with

congress? another idea that has been floated, that was talked about at that panel was the idea that members spending so much of their time raising money and so the, in addition to what you spoke about and how you fly back. >> right. >> not living inou washington which was also discussed is this idea that you know, they go home so the question is, is there some campaign finance solution that we can put in place? >> so the president's room is on the senate side of the capitol. that question i assume is more symbolic of the larger question, what can president obama specifically do to engage congress more? i think the whole notion and criticism of president obama out there that he is not engaging with congress is pretty overwrought. you know, he can have all the beers and barbecue with members of congress that he wants. he h could fill his calendar wih those kinds of interactions but if you don't, if we don't have a

willing dance partner wants to get to common ground and is worried more whether they're going to draw a tea party primary, if they actually work with the president, then they are about doing the right thing, then, you know, the beer and barbecue isn't going to matter, worth a hill of beans. and i will give you an example. just so i can make sure you understand. i practice what i preach and i tell the story in the book as well. in the summer of 2011 when we had the debt ceiling deal, the first time we bumped up against defaulting. cuts-onlyu deal. the deal resulted in the sequester which we're still struggling to replace, but that deal included 1.trillion dollars in spending cuts only. reallyl painful cuts, many of which i spent my career opposing. now i was one of the handful of democrats that combined with some republicans to pass that deal because we were on the brink of default and we could

not jeopardize the full faith credit of the united states. but i knew a lot of people in my district would be opposed to me voting in favor of that deal and those cuts. but i had to decide, okay, have i built enough trust up, i hopefully built enough trust up in this community that i can come heem to my constituents and explain even though they didn't 100% agree with me on my decision, they trust me enough that i'mr willing to spend some political capital with my constituents so they understand that i have really gathered all the information and made the best decision that i thought we could make for the country. yeah, there is some risk to that, but you have to be, when you have significant issues facing the country, your seat can't mean more than doing the right thing. it really can't. and then you know, you stan for -- stand for re-election and hope people think you did the right thing. if they don't, that is the way it goes. [applause] yes. >> i would like your take on what we see as a shift in the

wealth of the country to a very, very tiny percentage that has only gotten worse and worse and worse since reagan, the republican god. and see your example or discussion about social security as an example, where the wealthiest opposed any proposal to eliminate that cap. what could be done when the wealthiest have the power to create a tea party, funded with koch money, that has -- >> let's not -- let's not distract from the myth of the grassroots movement that the tea party professes to be. corporate funded, corporate, question.o >> how can we address those things? because if we don't, we're going to end up some of the countries with, very wealthy and increasingly rebellious and disenfranchiseed majority? >> i think your faith should

have been restored with the re-election of president obama last year. and here's why. because that election, between mitt romney and barack obama presented two very distinct and clear paths, down which americans could choose to go. the path of the republicans and the tea party extremists who really thought the solution to our nation's budgetary problems was, cutting taxes for the wealthy, and cutting spending. and we watched that movie before and we saw the ending and didn't like it. and barack obama and democrats in congresses past, take a balanced approach to deficit reduction. make some difficult choices in spending reductions but don't cut the heart out of our future likesp education and health care research that really would make us less competitive and also make sure that you ask people who can afford to pay a little bit more by closing tax look holes that people