why? one raise your hand when you get the microphone tell us who you are amply is actually put a question at the end. we will start with this gentleman right here. >> the microphone is coming to you. >> right here.

>> question for jonathan. can you talk about sharing with countries of the region to reduce tension can you give what the incentive would be and theater what do you think would be the new approach or the balance look like in the new year and obviously there is a criticism about too much emphasis, and the book you wrote about is very optimistic about the rebalancing strategy received, that after your competing organizations, 37% if i remember correctly, said it is up so very different. and to look to them to be concluded as somewhat expected especially in the congress.

what is your thoughts? >> i think it is fair to say that in retrospect in the early years of the rebalancing policy, it was significantly over sold by some of the proponents that advocated it. that said, the essence, i think as jeff and i tried to argue in our paper makes sense. it makes sense because it is a framework political economic and security that the united states would wish to operate in this most dynamic region. the problems of course our number one of the dynamics in the region that have undermined the overall context with which the states interact and many of the u.s. problems in terms of the dysfunction of our own government process and preoccupations here that among other things could prevent president obama from traveling to the region also now he has

rescheduled a trip for asia so the issue at the end of the day is whether the policy can be based on of broad principles or whether you need a sense of ongoing engagement and movement to get where you want to go to and i think it's not all bad here if you take the transpacific partnership, your right probably the targets that were laid out for over the ambitious in terms of the fulfilling of the agreement. on the other hand, i think that china's government looks at this in a different way now. the instinct was antichina but i don't think that is what it was intended to do. so really will not be a one-shot deal. it has to be more fundamental

rather than some kind of a bold dramatic gesture because what is the alternative for the united states or anyone else? either you find a framework that states can both compete and cooperate or you have a messy region with all kinds of risks that i don't think anyone seriously would wish to contemplate. this puts the united states obviously in a very complicated positioned as it tries to move ahead with all relevant actors but we can see a lot of the practical changes are much more manifest now and that it has to be demonstrated not for words and speeches but a capacity to solve the critical problems and that i think the verdict is still out. >> the gentleman back here was

>> roi i'm the correspondent. no chapter about europe and i was wondering if that's because [inaudible] will >> we could have for the first time the right-wing and left-wing members of parliament which could turn it into an organization will for any trade negotiations bois one and more generally speaking, why did the president lose the big opportunity to be engaged with europe and she is very unpopular now in europe. >> who wants to handle --

>> i think when you look at the big question the sort of issues that you talked about are not. i can use these numbers to impact bat. even if you said yes i want to try to influence the allied or partner state. so there really was nothing you could write what fix the context. and i think it does appear in a number of cases, for example when we talked about how you deal with russia as a partner in some cases acknowledging that the success is great to be greatly increased and you can't be on the same page web. >> let me build on that question when we he answer here and then maybe turn it. you instructed me that the

biggest outflow of was the ninth maloney revelations have been more economic and diplomatic. as they were unhappy with the bush administration just as they were unhappy with the bush administration for very different reasons. but it strikes me that all of this discussion of segmenting the internet, watching the products because that could have a longer-term impact on whatever the diplomatic outcomes are. >> i think the snoden snowden

affairs and they found in the second term has been to a certain degree hijacked by a very young contract employee who decided to spaldeens on the american espionage activities are around the world, and there's not much the president can do to pull fatback. it's all out there and more of it is coming out all the time. he can try to present his point of view of who edward snowden is, but he's going to push back and be on tv again tomorrow. it's an illustration of the fundamental point made at the beginning about the limits of power not just in the united states but in the american presidency in general. we may come back and look at the second undermined by any event under his control which reminded us in the second bush administration which was in many

ways destroyed by a hurricane. the president had no control over it. his response to the hurricane, but he certainly didn't control the hurricane. on the relation being damaged by this, you're absolutely right is in the economic field. it's the perception in europe that the national security agency is listening to every phone conversation, is watching every tweet and a free text message. all of that is ridiculous. the nsa would have to have two or 3 million employees to be able to read all of that stuff and that would be a monumental waste of american tax dollars, but that's the perception that's out there and it's hard to put the perception back and create the dynamic in the politics that is now working against us in a very serious way about things like the u.s. economic trade agreement.

>> briefly i think there's also the perception that the american companies cooperate in the last several years it's potentially usually damaging to overseas countries who now say maybe we don't want to deal with those companies. >> as some of them have. >> one of the big things was can the president get out in front of this in a way that would push them both to manage the damage from one snowden and worked to preserve what i think has been very successful for american economic interest. >> and steve, could you imagine in the next year the situation in which president putin comes to the conclusion hosting mr. snowden is no longer in his interest and he's gotten what he wants out of this and somebody comes up to mr. snowden's door and tells him that his plane is ready? >> i don't think so. remember mr. putin spent his

formative years in the intelligence service and for whatever reason the russians turn mr. snowden back to the u.s. or sort of boo him out what message does that send that the russians might hope to welcome in the future? if they gave snowden back maybe they would give lee and for mr. putin that would be the measure that would not want to take to make life more complicated for intelligence folks. >> the question related to afghanistan and metastasizing about america. i think it is very complex because d.c. al qaeda and iraq and syria and yemen. they see the concentration in pakistan. what is our real interest in gaining a large force in afghanistan with respect to

these other problems? >> i think we touched on this a little bit before. >> well, first of all, the last portion you're talking about on this plan is something like intelligence. we are not talking about maintaining a force in afghanistan anywhere at the level that is sustained coming and we can d -- debate this. if afghanistan in terms of security and political prophecies and the chances are substantial, this will enable the return of terrorist activity to afghanistan in two ways. one, first of the physical possibility of safe havens for the jihad groups in the ambitions. you asked me, david, and i didn't answer about negotiations with the taliban and one of the key questions is to what extent the taliban separate from al

qaeda? is it domestic oriented or is it inevitably linked to al qaeda in ways that cannot bring the change. my view as if it is domestically oriented, nonetheless it owes a lot of debt including survival debt to support from external jihad groups and so to complete the relationship with al qaeda would be difficult. at the same time, the taliban leadership clearly realizes that it was booted out of afghanistan because of al qaeda and they have said that al qaeda was to blame and so they would try to play the game providing support for al qaeda but it will really limit all engagement. so the one issue of physical security, but the other issue is the imagery, the psychological boost that this would give to

other terrorist groups around the world. this would be the second time when the great power would certainly portrayed. they might have given physical cooperation but there still might be the sense that sufficient violence and cruelty towards people pays off. neither of which is desirable but that doesn't mean that we should fight every terrorist group all over the world. it doesn't mean that we should deploy drones all for the world, but it does mean we need to calculate very carefully they are dangerous and liquidating commitments that we have. because at the end, it will be critically about us being very selective about taking of the commitments, but also delivering on the commitment. and holding the promises that we have made.

>> [inaudible] >> to expand on the question because i think some of the issues with respect to al qaeda and the taliban in afghanistan have parallels in the broad middle east. in your question coming you noted that we see al qaeda popping out in yemen and syria, and certainly there are al qaeda affiliate's present any number of spots around the middle east. there are also a lot of localized violent extremist who for one reason or another may see an advantage in embracing the al qaeda brand, but whose concerns and sources of support and whose targets aren't primarily localized. and it's very important that the united states, has it purses' these rights, continues to carefully make the distinctions and the differentiation. as i look at where the

trajectory u.s. policy is headed in the middle east across north africa, egypt, syria and iraq and down in to yemen, where we don't have an orientation towards the broad transformation that is occurring in the arab middle east, but we have a lot of worries about specific things that we see including the violent extremism. there is a danger that in responding day-by-day to the urgent security imperatives, we in that recreating precisely the paradigm that president obama came into office wanting to dismantle the sort of a broad scale war on terrorism that the drive is our policy and drives the way that we are perceived in the region and the way that we structure the relationships

undergoing tremendous change. so while there is a threat, it is important for us to be civil to distinguish what our local, what are transnational, what's targeting us and what's not. and i would love to hear your views on that as well. >> i want to come back to the metamorphosis of al qaeda. we have seen as a result of the arab awakening and what has gone on in the arab world that al qaeda got a rebirth. ironically it can at the moment that the obama administration policy produced the death of osama bin laden. i'm fully in agreement with everything that she said about the importance of keeping an american presence in afghanistan for afghan reasons. if the administration is unable to make the case to the american people, which is the reason we need 10,000 american troops in afghanistan is continue the war

in pakistan. that's the vital national security interest in the united states. we don't want to see al qaeda in pakistan rebuild likely salles al qaeda rebuild in iraq. the drones are not the answer to the problem in al qaeda, but they are a very good weapon to have in your hand when you deal with al qaeda. my concern is of the united states gives up that within in afghanistan by having no basis for the operation after 2014, we will see al qaeda and pakistan rebuild and regenerate as fast as we saw it regenerate in iraq. >> is there an alternative? let's say we did lose the main base in afghanistan. is there an alternative from the ship or elsewhere in the region and given the extent of the reach now you wouldn't necessarily need to launch them from afghanistan?

>> the short answer is no the technology isn't there. the geography doesn't change. you can watch the operations in the northern part of pakistan where al qaeda operates from afghanistan, iran, india. if you launch them from the sea they are likely to be as unsuccessful. the irony is that it is a covert operation that everyone talks about that you can go to web sites and sea every attack lead out but because it is a covert operation, the administration has their hands tied that it doesn't come out in public and say the reason we want 10,000 is to whack al qaeda and pakistan. >> okay. right here. up front.

>> charlie from brookings. since we have our middle east and asia experts here, the following question relates to the geopolitical posture in the gulf and elsewhere. do you feel that the states or the oil-producing states in the gulf, for the middle east specialists, have dealt with what is implied by the fact that increasingly, the overwhelming demand for oil and gas in the gulf is going to be in asia and not in europe and have they begun to think about how that's going to change their strategic posture with the asian nations that will be the bulk of their revenue? and likewise, for those of you that our asian experts, do you think that south korea, for example, japan, india and others have come to terms that as they become more independent from the gulf, that they have to assume a strategic posture to protect

their access and that they cannot count on americans to do it? and i would just add this is why i do not necessarily agree with that kind of a continuation of american policy in the region because our strategic interests are going somewhere else. >> i will pick it up briefly because i just came back from the gulf and so i've had a chance to hear from folks about this directly. i guess i would say a couple things. number one is some of the disputes over the talks with iran and so on that bruce was talking about in his piece in the relationship, there is an underlying anxiety in the gulf which is about exactly the point you're making. what are the u.s. interests in our region where we are used to having the security guarantor in that area and you do not meet our energy anymore.

and the rest of the world is free riding on the american investment in the gulf security. so, that underlining anxiety is coming from their recognition of the broad shift, and in their most honest moment they don't actually have a mechanism for maintaining the regional order themselves without an external power. they've never done it. they don't have the capacity themselves. we've tried in various ways to help build but it's nowhere near where yet. and they acknowledge also that from their perspective, the chinese or the indians or other rising powers are at least a couple decades away from having the capability to take on any kind of role like that even if they are interested in doing so. so they feel deep seated anxiety that maybe the u.s. is turning away and there is no

alternative. my own view is i don't think we are turning away. i think in many ways because of the crisis in the region and because of our interests, we are kind of mailed to the ground in the middle east right now. but the broad trends that you are describing is one that i think is going to continue to raise questions in these relationships and disputes. >> one of the concerns you here in the region is if there is a deal, then iran is free to go off and become the kind of power in the region that it imagines itself to be. >> let me try to make a couple points quickly because i know there are lots of folks that want to jump on this. first on the posture, the gulf states are secure and reflect their sort of capacity but also reflects the sort of world view that is just engrained from centuries of relationships with

outside power has suggested. so i think this sort of this course is always listed and the free riders always existed. we've never been more dependent on gulf oil than most of our primary allies. we've had a major security commitment and made our investment to the gulf security at the time that europe was far more dependent than we were. i believe that it is in trouble to the american vision of itself as a superpower to maintain an investment in a free and reliable flow of energy from the major producers of energy around the world and i think that will as long as we maintain our commitment to being a world superpower. in terms of the question i think it is a.m. important issue because iran negotiations - all of these securities in the gulf states but ultimately, there is no doubt come to the nuclear

negotiations the would lead to the revival was either regional or strategic power or a regional economic power because the nuclear negotiations are unlikely. i think it is almost impossible to continue any scenario under which the nuclear negotiations need the lifting of a comprehensive u.s. embargo on iran, which is the major hit on investment, particularly for the energy sector and for technology in the energy sector. the fact iran hasn't been able to act is why iran today is almost a net importer of gas despite having some of the largest gas reserves in the world and despite being one of the early adopters to the gas trade back in the 1960's and 70's. so you have a situation in which iran has the result of the constraints that iran is under today will remain in place for the foreseeable future despite some prospect if there is a

final deal on the nuclear issue the rest of the world will begin to come back to iran. >> let me offer a few thoughts on the excellent question that it does seem to me in varying ways, charlie, all the states are mindful of how to use a mixed metaphor the ground shifting that very fact of diminishing the west independence raises questions about whether the united states over the long haul despite its interest in having that sense of a global order and the state the u.s. has in the comments that over time we would see some kind of dimunation and american involvement or that others would have to in some measure take up the slack. the problem is i don't think even among those who are most aware of their energy security, and i would put china very high on the list, recognize that it's going to be a very long-term process before they can be ready

to take on this roll. but that is very, very likely where we are headed. the chinese are now making a commitment to a carrier program. it's not going to be massive necessarily that any carrier program entails huge commitments of money and the devotee to conceptualize a larger sense of the strategy and of involvement that of not only chinese interest but others involved with as well. the other side of course are looking for alternatives to our land-based. you see this in northeast asia of the russians to find some kind of means by which with japan, korea and china they can be a supplier to some extent they are already. so if i were sitting in the shoes of the regional leader, i would be looking for as many alternatives as i could, but i

certainly would not be promising my policy on the expectation that over the long run, the united states would be prepared or able to do this on its own. >> we have time for one quick question and one answer. the microphone is coming to you. >> thank you for giving me the opportunity. i would like to focus on ukraine once more. how can we avoid the nightmare scenario in ukraine and many say that their response has been negligent. what should this administration do? >> this is going to be resolved first and foremost by the ukrainians in ukraine. i think the thing that the united states and europe could be doing now and should be doing is to provide some levels of pressure and should they avoid

use of force. but to go beyond that, yesterday the u.s. government said that the use of those that the identified as having been connected but i would recommend going beyond that and saying also that they have to potential sanctions to encourage the government to get into a good-faith negotiation that includes compromise to address the concerns here. you have seen them say several times he is prepared to have a dialogue and until yesterday not much came out of that as we speak again. so the question is are there ways that they can claim the pressure to read and i think that by targeting with visa and the sanctions people are saying look i want to be able to travel in europe. i have money in the bank in blonden and unless we do that we are going to lose access. and i think the united states

can have some impact to it any time it is talked about here by congress, it gets a lot of play in ukraine but it's going to be important that the europeans are going to have leverage that the united states doesn't and so far it doesn't appear that they have been able within the european union to come up with a stance on this question. >> i want to thank all of you for coming and the panel for their excellent statements if you haven't had a chance to read it is distributed yesterday and today and you can take home with you. and i look forward to seeing at the end of the year how many of these turnout and reminding you all each. thanks again. [applause]

amol conversations [inaudible conversations] >> earlier this month the house oversight government reform committee looked at reducing -- [inaudible conversations]

a quick reminder for 2014 again anytime online at c-span.org. c-span's programming will continue later today with the republican national committee annual winter meeting this is taking place on washington, d.c. posted a forum discussing the findings of the latest shriver report. this ongoing project led by maria shriver aims to raise awareness on key issues facing women. the report looks at the economic status of women in the u.s. and concludes an estimated

42 million marrec risk of falling into poverty. we will show you this event over the next two nights beginning tonight. here is a preview. >> what united both of these teams and everybody that wrote for this report and who has been working what i call on the front lines of humanity is the belief that these women given the chance to not only lift up themselves, but their entire families and putting women at the center of the economy is not just good for women but it's a good for boys and girls and most importantly it is good for the country and that is the mission of this report is to change a lot of the old stereotype, put a new face on this issue and talk about it in ways that people could understand and see themselves and what we have seen and what we have heard what all of the coverage on television

and with thanks and appreciation to beyonce who has pushed this out in two spheres that i didn't even know i existed, and from what we have heard from all of the responses to the ftc is this is my story. this is my story. it's not about the glass ceiling, it's about the foundation. and how do why shore that up? it's a story about including that. it's a story about what is good for the blaze and girls and what's good for women in particular about the incredible struggles that they face to be breadwinners and caretakers and caregivers and to be good daughters and mothers, sisters, citizens and workers. >> a clich portion of the putin event available each of the next two nights beginning on c-span could get on this morning's washington journal we asked whether the media coverage of new jersey governor chris christie has been fair.

some of you have responded to the face the question. jeff says the fine fare, did the expos it? but what about benghazi, the fraud of conservatives, fast and furious, nsa and all the rest, and this is from jose. the media is reporting the facts and he's being held accountable. meanwhile your comments and participation on the social media, go to facebook.com/c-span to offer your thoughts >> many americans some because of their poverty and some because of their color, and all too many because of hope. we hope to replace their despair

what opportunity, and this administration today here and now declares unconventional war on poverty in america. >> looking back at the notable state of the union addresses from lbj to george w. bush sunday at 3 p.m. eastern, part of american history tv this weekend on c-span3 leading up to the seat of the union address life tuesday on c-span radio and c-span.org the house oversight and government reform committee looked at reducing government waste with a long list of ideas and putting greater transparency of the pentagon, privatizing the postal service and overhauling the government information technology purchasing system. this hearing is just about three

hours. [inaudible conversations]

[inaudible conversations] the committee will come to order. the oversight committee access to secure to fundamental principles first americans have a right to know the money washington takes from them as well spent and second, americans deserve an efficient and effective government that works for them. our solemn responsibility is to

hold the government accountable to the taxpayers, because taxpayers have a right to know what they get from their government. it's our job to work tirelessly in partnership with citizen watchdogs to deliver the facts to the american people and bring genuine reform to the federal bureaucracy today's hearing strikes at the heart of the committee's mission, finding and rooting out waste in the federal government. at the beginning of every session, the congress holds a hearing to learn from experts about the status of wasteful spending and reconnect ourselves to be eliminating at, much like the fiscal outlook in the past, the hearing today will be grim because of organizational waste. president obama has overseen the highest deficit on record, and

last year, we had, in spite of tax increases that continue to pile up, 680 billion-dollar deficits. the american people have a burden on top of their mortgage on their home of $140,000 per home. the real perspective is that this is unsustainable. if your home was going further in debt every year, you would ask how long can i tolerate it and yet in just a few years your home will be a quarter of a million dollars in debt if you do not reefers the waste and unnecessary growth in government to permit the committee does not appropriate or tax credit of the committee's responsibility is to find within the authorized missions of the government the kind of waste and inefficiency that can be either eliminated to be delivered to the american people of the better value.

a reasonable estimate for the better value could save $200 million of the stockholders hard earned money. in other words, we could eliminate one-third of the deficit simply by eliminating the known and recognized waste. our first panel today are our partners in the senate, senator carper and senator coburn. no to people have been willing to speak out more against the organizational waste and misspending vanities two senate terse. the second panel will be for individuals who represent organizations that are heavily contributed to the spending reform discussion. first, we will hear from our senators. it's my great pleasure to welcome my colleagues, dr. colburn who releases the waste a book every year and recently released this year's chronicles the kind of waste that can be eliminated, and

chairman senator carper has been a good partner in this discussion. i look forward to their hearings and i would remind my colleagues that any questioning or any further comments after their opening statements will be at the discretion of the senators, and i take pleasure in introducing the ranking member for his opening statement. >> thank you mr. chairman. i'm very pleased the youth called the hearing today. this is the bread and butter of what our committee does, and i hope today's hearing on this important discussion which we have been regularly in similar hearings over the past several years. i think all the witnesses for taking time out of their busy schedules to come here today to be here to participate in this hearing. i'm delighted that the ranking member colburn has joined us in the first hearing to help set the tone for rooting out the

government waste. senator, i want to say i have seen the reports and i agree with many issues that you've identified. it may be one of our last opportunities to work together before your retirement. i look forward to an effective collaboration and sent you for not only your service to your constituents that your service to the nation. i also appreciate that you've agreed to my request to invite the chairman carper to share his thoughts with us as well. chairman carper has been tireless in his efforts to make the federal agencies work more effectively and efficiently. senators carper and coburn have millions and i repeat billions of dollars of savings for the federal government.

today we have a unique opportunity. we have the chairman and the ranking member of the senate homeland security governmental affairs committee and we also have the chairman, ranking member and a traditional members of the oversight government reform. these are the two key committees responsible for reducing waste, fraud and abuse in the government. i propose that we use some of our times today to set up a bicameral agenda for the upcoming year. also we have relatively little time remaining in the congress i propose that we try to identify some of this reform proposal that we might be able to achieve on a bipartisan basis. let's begin with a process today to identify issues on which we have common ground in saving taxpayers billions of dollars going forward. the government accountability office high risk and programs

report gives a political tool for focusing our oversight efforts and the general recommendations are another key that we can examine. and then, of course, we have proposals from groups like those here today. one the agency that comes up repeatedly every single year and virtually in every single report is the department of defense. this makes sense because it is the largest federal agency with the biggest budget. the department's financial management as a whole continues to be designated as high risk. because the gao determined that dod has not been able to fulfil a basic accountability measure of performance, prepare ogle financial statements and detect waste, fraud and abuse. would be a big step in the direction for the dod to produce

for the first time a financial statement. the dot has also experienced problems with management and oversight of three of $65 billion obligated for the contract's last year alone. the research shows the dod have experienced poor performance with background in war in afghanistan, following the contract cost and the crime in the defense acquisition work force. dod leads the government with wasteful i.t. investments and i know this is something the chairman is mostly interested in. in testimony before the committee last year, the gao warned that several dod investments experienced significant performance problems and were indeed high risk. one specific example the gao highlight it was a contract the air force canceled in december, 2012, after spending $1 billion

on expeditionary combat support. despite these and other examples of waste, some progress is being made that we should be proud of. finally, president obama made a priority to reduce the proper payments when he took office. in proper payments had been reduced from $125 million in 2010 to $106 billion in 2013. but that is still not good enough. chairman carper and ranking member schatz team has been active with legislation on the topic and i hope chairman issa and i can do this going forward. there's also improved on the financial management agencies for example the department of homeland security that has obtained a clean audit of its financial statement for the first time in the history. this committee has been in several parts of improving the financial management at the dhs and it's good to see from the

oversight. moving forward we have continued progress in the efforts in the sustained, dedicated and a bipartisan matter. it is not enough to convene hearings and hope for the best. we need to work cooperatively and diligently to find solutions to minimize government waste and maximize efficiency. after all, government reform is a part of this committee. i look forward to the testimony and thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you particularly for deluding to something that we worked on in a bipartisan basis. all members will have seven days to submit their opening statements, and we now welcome the first panel of witnesses. senator carper and senator coburn, you need no introduction and more importantly, i will not be labour the time necessary to get to your important statements

by suggesting more. chairman carper comments you are recognized. >> mr. chairman, to do, the ranking member, to the colleagues with whom dr. schatz -- dr. coburn and i have worked on properties. i have a prepared statement i'm going to ask very quickly to be included in the record. >> without objection, both of your statements will be placed in the record. we are not running the clock but it is the senate, so bear that in mind. [laughter] >> thank you. i like to think -- first of all, thank you for this hearing and giving us the chance to participate. when dr. coburn and i were new in our positions as the ranking member in the chair in the committee we invited both you and the representative cummings to come and lead off on the

hearing on the post reform. i encourage the report today that i think dr. coburn and i have been working on bipartisan legislation and i think we are close to hammering out the last final details to move up the markup on the committee. and we hope to be able to report on a bipartisan bill and to have -- i think we are having some discussions with you all ready, but to have more. in terms of deficit reduction, part of what they are doing in the postal service is right sizing on how to spend less money and get better results and we need to take that kind of lesson across the way in our government. i like to think that there are three ways on deficit reduction. one of those is entitlement reform. the largest part of our spending is entitlement to the and they are important. but in -- if we are going to make progress on deficit reduction, we cannot ignore them and i suggest we deutsch readings. i think the president agrees

with this. , one, save money. if we save the programs for our children and grandchildren and then we do so in a way that does not savage old people and young people. the second thing to do for is a deficit reduction is balanced budgets for four years between 97 to 2,000. and the revenue percentage of gdp by 20% for four years. spending as a percentage of gdp was about 20% for four years. we had four years of balanced budgets, and i think we need a tax reform on the finance committee. we are trying to do that, working with david over here. but we need tax reform that i think will reduce corporate rates so that we are competitive in the rest of the world and generate revenue for the deficit reduction. the third thing we need to do is look at the government, everything to ask this question. how do we get a better results for less money, the same amount of money. it's almost like a cultural change. like a culture of spending towards the culture and that is

what dr. coburn and i do. i know that is a lot of what you do. most of you know mike enzi, the senator from utah. he has the eda-20 rule that has enabled him to work with ted kennedy when he was alive and they were both leaders of the pension committee. and they got a lot done. and i asked him how do you get so much done and he said that we subscribe to the 80-20 rule, we agree on 80% of the stuff and 20% of the issues we don't agree on and what we decide to do is focus on the 80% we do agree and the 20%, we set that aside for another day and they make great progress, a democrat and republican. dr. coburn and by making great progress and set a great example of some of the same re. i want to take a couple minutes and focus on the third of the three's that i talked about, which is deficit reduction and how we get a better result on

everything we do. representative cummings mengin the improper payments. dr. coburn and i have gone back to that well again and again. the legislation passed in 2010 and again in 2012 we introduced a legislation today so that we don't continue to waste money. a lot of comments since. back when i was new in the senate we knew we were spending a lot of money let's do something about it and we report that pity and i think it was back to 2010 dr. coburn and i updated that so that not only the agencies could be required to identify and report improper

payments, but we want them to stop making them. we try to recover the money so we said we want the managers of the agencies to be evaluated in part on how well they are complying and as the representative cummings said the payments have dropped since then and. we enhanced that bill last year. we have put legislation in the senate called the prime act which enabled us to waste less money in medicare and medicaid. people say we can't. well, we can and there's a lot of things we can do on the act. it's been made a part of the sgr legislation that's come out of the finance committee coming and we think it is something that you can brace on the house to enable us to save money in these programs and not savage old people or poor people. the other thing that i want to mengin if i can is -- to of

mention is we have property some of them are defense related and some of them are not. some of the properties we release. we released billions of dollars every year and maintaining these properties we don't use at all we maintain the properties, heating them and cooling them, securing them and it is to try to figure out how to be deal with it involves not just the, that all kind of folks including homeless groups and communities across the country. we have to deal with this. dr. coburn and i are committed to giving it this year and we welcome the opportunity to work with republicans and democrats on this committee. that is just one of the areas we can get a better result. i would just say again that

80-20 will, there's a lot to it. let's focus on the 80%. we can't do it ourselves. obviously you can't do it yourselves but if we work together with omb and jao, every two years we can get a lot of this done and a lot like the improper payments. property reforms realized and we want to get something done so let's just do it. thank you mr. chairman. >> they agree with us on the five days and the six day delivery, too. we will get there. dr. coburn. >> thank you for the opportunity and i think every member of the committee that is here. you know, the problem isn't that , don't get along. we have a 680 billion-dollar deficit that we all agreed to. my take is that we all get along so well. we have presidents that come and

go and compresses that come and go, the wasteful spending continues -- congress that come and go and wasteful spending continues. we forced through the legislation to make the gao show where the duplication is. there has been one piece of legislation that has come out of the congress in four years. it didn't even come out of the congress, it came out of the house, that consolidated one of the things the gao said it needed to be consolidated and it's called the skills act. it's the only team that's happened in four years. so the problem is that we don't know what the problem is. the problem is that we don't act on the problem. and it's hard. there is no question if you talk to the members of the work force committee it's hard when they consolidated the 36 programs into six. that is not easy work. but that bill hasn't even been taken up by the senator bayh

health committee in the senate. so the problem is us. sequestration couldn't even force converse. the sequestration didn't force them to eat eliminate or consolidate any of the government hundreds of duplicated or outdated and effective programs. the problem is us. we are not acting on the information that we have but we agreed to undo the spending reductions without the eliminating a single unnecessary program. not one. we have 60 billion back in spending over the next two years but we didn't see eliminate any of the weakest. if you can't find waste in any part of the program whether it is defense spending, which is right with waste or the tax code, it's only one reason. we have not looked.

the government has grown so massive that there is only one department in the entire federal government that actually knows all of its programs. and that is the department of education. they put out a list every year. they are the only one. there have been attempts to push that through through the senate and the house to make sure every department at least has a list of the programs. we haven't moved it. before you can fix anything, you've got to know what's there. you have to look at it and we haven't looked. the pentagon cannot pass. they were mandated to pass the audit for the first time in 1984. we have a bill to audit the pentagon and it has real teeth if the pentagon doesn't perform. when they came through, they took the teeth out but they cut the audit in. we've been telling them to do the audit for 30 years. if you think they are going to do the audit without any teeth or fret or consequences of not

doing it? and yet it was pulled out. so we are not going to do it until we get serious about doing it. if you think about it, even the sequestration, you don't have to agree with everything that i listed in the book. i could have cut 3 billion there and $60 billion worth of wasteful spending, but the one thing you cannot disagree with is one we are borrowing $680 billion a year from our kids are these things we listed in the waste book priority for the government of the united states? they are not. ..

they paid to close out the. here's the consequences that didn't happen. whoever was managing the contract didn't get fired, and the contractor wasn't sued by the federal government for nonperformance. so the same thing will continue to happen until we start demanding accountability. that accountability is to start with us first. we can't ask the air force to be accountable if we are not accountable. the waste details 100 projects, $30 billion. you can pick with the weather not it's accurate, whether not it's right. through 50% of it away. $15 billion. the question is, is in a time

when we are borrowing from our future, should we be spending that money now? and i would contend that we shouldn't. and so if we are, why is it happening? it's happening because we are not doing our jobs. i'm talking collectively the senate and the house, the committee's. if you think about the gao reports, that account over last three years, another one will come this march, what has happened based on the commission that they have given us? one bill out of the house, nothing out of the senate. the president to his credit has taken a lot of that and put it in his budgets saying, these are right thing to do, we should do. we haven't acted on it. he hasn't acted on it because he can't because we won't do it. i would close just by giving you a little rundown of what's out there. most people don't realize, we

have 679 renewable energy programs from 23 different agencies costing $15 million a year. can anybody logically explain why we would need 679 programs? for renewable energy. nobody can. each one of those can each one of those 679 has a management team, has associated costs with it. if 253 different department of justice crime prevention programs, $4.5 billion, why do we have that many? why can't we consolidate those? finally i'll and come and i've a list, i would be happy to supply a summary of what the the gao hs given us so far in terms of duplicative programs. i met with congressman collins before this and he says how do you do it? it is hard work.

you have to win over the heart of the committee chairman of jurisdiction and say, won't you oversight on this? won't you look at it? won't you try to consolidate? if that doesn't work what you have to do is embarrass the members of congress into doing their job. i'm embarrassed that we as members of congress have allowed this list with the multitude of programs that are on there, with the duplicity that's in it, that we have been fixed. we don't have an excuse. we are guilty of not doing our jobs. and the way to not -- to turn that around is to start. i understand this committee has jurisdiction to look at it, but you can't change it unless the committee of jurisdiction ask. so what we need to all be his ambassadors to separate committees that they will, in fact, do the hard work, you oversight, streamline, eliminate, combine and consolidate so that, in fact, we

can actually get some savings to spend on things that maybe much more important. and what i feel is we are not meeting our of the. because we failed to do the very, very hard work of having to committee hearings, pulling the people in and saying, what is the problem, how do we address the problem? most agencies, by the way, don't know they are a problem either because nobody in the agency knows all the programs. it starts with us, and my message would be, is we need to redouble our efforts on both sides of the aisle, with sides of the capitol to say that we're going to be good stewards. it's not that the program ideas are bad, but when you have 679, there'there so we can justify to anybody. so i would leave you with that. first thing you want to do is consolidate 679 renewable energy programs aim to maybe two or

three. and get rid of the overhead. if you did that throughout the federal government on all these programs, we could actually get to a balanced budget without raising taxes, without making hard choices in things that really hurt people. and could actually do our jobs. thank you, and i'm happy to energy questions you might have. >> thank you. if it's all right with the two senators, for humans will go through an informal questions but i'm not going to yield five minutes back and forth. i know you don't have the time for it. i'm not going to recognize myself except to say that dr. coburn, your waste book will be inserted into a record today as essentially a collateral material for your opening statement without objection. mr. chaffetz, you had a brief comment? >> i thank the chairman. i thank the gentleman here, both senators, for the passionate inspiration what you're doing and knowing there are people who truly care. i particularly want to highlight my interaction with senator

carper. we had a bill here in the house last year, h.r. 328 that last term we passed unanimously, passed unanimously in this body and out of the house to deal with real proper disposal, and working together to get that done with senator carper, there's something like gao estimates nearly 78,000 properties that are either not utilize or underutilized. additionally, the gao estimates that we spend about $1.5 billion a year to operate and maintain these properties, that we don't need. my state of utah, we have an operating budget 12-$13 billion. everything we do for the entire year, yet the federal government has 70,000 excess federal properties, spend $1.5 billion. we have to solve the. that's the low-hanging fruit. it does have to happen in a bipartisan, bicameral images

want to thank senator carper in particular for his working across the aisle in a bicameral way and optimistic we can actually help solve this. >> mr. chairman? just a brief comment. a real pleasure for us to work with you. first things that tom coburn and i ever did together when he was new in the senate, chairman of the republicans majority of the what is now department of homeland security and governmental affairs. we went to chicago together and revisited an old postal facility that was in the. huge facility, dignity forever. it's still empty. there are tens of thousands of buildings like that and we can do something about it. we are determined to get legislation through. it's out of our committee, determined to get the legislation we co-authored to get done. i want to take a moment. it's in my prepared statement but you have done great work on what we call the data act, try to focus on disclosure and data standards for some of the spending that we do. dr. coburn and i have worked to

get that legislation -- mark warner who has been the lead as you note in the senate, but we reported legislation out of my committee and hope we can get that done. that's one of the 80% of the things we agree on. >> i will not go to the ranking member. >> just one quick question. you know, first of all, think of you, both you, for your testimony. one thing i learned after the one with this excuse is that a lot of times people don't do things because they can't do everything that they want to do. so they end up doing nothing. maybe they don't have time, they find excuses or whatever. i guess where i'm going with this, what did you will see, you talk about low-hanging fruit, senator. i mean, what can we -- what can we reasonably do in, particularly in light of senator

coburn's is comments, to get something done? it may not be everything but at least get something done so that this time next year we will say, we were able to chip away at this. what -- >> it's not hard, it's not hard. you get rid of a $680 billion deficit $1 billion at the time. you've got $5.6 billion being collected by people who are on disability or unemployment insurance. you've got $100 million going in unemployment insurance to people who have met incomes of greater than $1 million a year. those aren't hard things to do. i mean, if you're disabled, the very fact that you're disabled, you're not working. that's one of the requirements other than a short period of time that you might be in a trial period. so it doesn't make sense. low-hanging fruit is all over. but it requires work.

it means we have to move it through the process. but unless you start at billion dollars at a pop, or $100 million to get to a billion, you are never going to get there, and what's happened is nobody started. the whole reason i pass the legislation forcing the gao to outline all the duplication was i thought it would embarrass us in the acting. boy, was i wrong. it has not embarrass us at all. we have not acted. we haven't done anything. except what came out of the skills act. so you do it by a billion at a time, and once you start doing it what you find out is, it really feels good to be inefficient stuart of the taxpayers money. it doesn't have to be -- these aren't necessarily controversial issues. these don't have to be partisan issue. do you really think we would

disagree in limiting the 679 green programs? couldn't we all agree that you will agree what the green program but could we do with 10 or 15 instead of 679? those aren't controversial issues but the fact is nobody has the initiative to go and do it. we are not seeing initiative by members of congress to say, i'm taking this on, i'm taking this on, let's get it done. and everything we don't do it, every year we don't reform contracting at the pentagon, every year the pentagon can't need an audit, that means they have no idea. you realize the constitution requires them to give us a report of how they spend the money, and they can't. and yet we don't want to put any teeth on the pentagon to force them to do that? that's too hard? when he compares our colleagues are protecting the pentagon from becoming responsible.

>> thank you. >> if i could -- >> of course, senator. >> when dr. coburn and i were the cheers and the ranking member on a subcommittee of homeland security and governmental affairs, federal financial management, it took me a while but i realized as much as we want to do something about some of these wasteful spending issues, we were going to get much done. maybe if with a partner with the full committee we could get something done. so we started working with joe lieberman and susan collins. we realize maybe if we work with the house on a bunch of this legislation, we could increase the leverage of a little subcommittee. then we said, over at gao every two years they come up with her high risk list. it's a to-do list for us, ways to reduce wasteful spending. we started meeting with jean ichiro, partner with this folks, and that was hopeful. we got ourselves a new -- the president nominated a wonderful woman last year to be omb

director. they put together a good management team that includes beth colbert is now the deputy for management. they have a management initiative agenda for the administration. why don't we partner with them as well? you've of the people who will follow dr. coburn and i at the witness table, citizens against government waste who really care about this, our passion about how do we eliminate wasteful spending. they key is to find that 80% of stuff we agree on, all of us and then we increased the leverage of the subcommittee or committee and get real things done to make the kind of progress. the stuff we put in the legislation, that dr. coburn and i, authored with input from you, hope for new and a bunch of folks, but the prime act. nextstep we think in wasteful spending. put it in the sgr reform legislation. the doc fix legislation but most of it is there. it's great stuff. it doesn't savage old people or poor people. it helps saves those programs,

save them and save money. >> thank you. mr. duncan, i extend you a quick question. >> i want to express our appreciation to both senator carper and senator coburn. both are great members of the house and they're doing great work in the senate. it's sad that every week, sometimes almost everyday we read terrible examples of waste. i read recently about the military building, $36 million headquarters in afghanistan that nobody wants and there's nobody there to use. it's just going to be a brand-new empty building. i remember "usa today" writing about the billion dollar air marshal program where they're spending $250 million per a rest and they've had more air marshals arrested and harassed by a marshal. so many examples. before congressman chaffetz carter, we did another property disposal build years ago. these are properties that the federal government doesn't even

want, and i know senator carper has been working on that for years, and we passed it. here in the house. and i don't know, we need to keep drawing. but mayor -- governor rendell when he was mayor of philadelphia, he was having problems with some government unions and he said before the ways and means committee, he said the problem with government is, he said, there's no incentive for people to save money. so much of it is squandered. there's no incentive for people to work hard. they do not. that's the problem. we need to give more incentives or rewards. all of us have heard about how agencies spend 60% of the budget the first 11 months and scramble around and spend the last 40% in the last month. we need to give more incentives to government employees when they save money. but i appreciate the work that both of you have done and are continue to do, thank you. >> thank you.

ms. maloney. >> thank you for calling this hearing, you and the ranking member, and i welcome our senators and former colleagues in the house and congratulate you on your work, senator carper, your oversight on the consensus was very helpful and i appreciate working with the. dr. coburn, i think the report is terrific. i'm just glancing through it. i'd like to hear a little bit of history of the. when did you start a? have you ever been successful in getting anything out of government that you identified in the wasteful report? why can't we -- i understand your market of an appropriations bill this week in the senate. senate rules allow you to connect things to it. why can't you connect a wasteful spending in a bipartisan way to this bill that's moving? take some action. i would like both the you to respond. i was astonished at the reports i've been reading through, i think ms. woo had this report on a plane and even the pentagon doesn't want. the f-35 joint strike fighter,

the dod chief acquisition undersecretary called it and acquisition malpractice. it's going to cost 1 trillion to maintain it and they've already, the cost of that 400 billion addressing it can't fly at night, can't land on aircraft, isn't useful in today's type of military operations that are more like the navy seals and big plays but can't find a place to land and can't fly at night and can't blog, land. how would you get this out of the budget works how to get something that even the pentagon says they don't want out of the budget? i'm addressing the question to both of you but dr. coburn, could you start first with their history of this study? have you gotten anything out of the budget that you identified as extremely wasteful? how do we get this f-35 that even the pentagon is saying it's wasteful, can do what we want, is not responding to the type of military that we have in america today, which is more of a single swift strike like osama bin

laden type operation. >> addressing the f-35, if you look at the history of that, when you're building planes before you finish your design, you are going to constant rollover. in those you do procurement reform within the pentagon and have dolts in the room when you're buying something -- >> excuse me, let me ask you one question. how would you do that? everyone has cost overruns. you can't outlaw cost overruns. indictment who is doing it. >> only the government has those kind of cost overruns. in the private sector you have a contract and you have a fixed price contract, if you have a cost overrun it's on the provider. it's not on the buyer. what we've done is create a culture where you do cost-plus on development. that's why the nunn mccurdy laws were put in. i would dispute some of parts of

the f-35 are very applicable to what the military wants. there's some questionable taste of it and there's no question it's way too expensive. i agree with you. we started the way spoke about four years ago again with all-purpose to try to answer some of the agents into thinking about some of the decisions they make. just remember, homeland security, for example, we give billions and billions of dollars worth of grants every year. but they don't follow them up. they don't see if they were met. there's only one agency in the federal government that is effective at grant writing, and it's the department of library and museum sciences. let me tell you what they do. it is well known throughout the country that if you mess with them and you are not compliant with your grant, and you spend the money other than, you are never going to get another grant. in other words, they create the proper expectation that when you do wit within you with the woulu said you're going to do, you meet the requirements of the great and you will ascertain.

do you realize most of the grant programs we have, people get grants for the same thing from two or three different agencies and none of them even know it? agencies don't have any idea. so we need grant reform. we need a mandate on how do you write a grant them what the requirements are, what the consequences are. home ec ticket has no idea where their grant money is going. or how effective it is. and whether or not it's risk-based. where's the risk, is the money going to? so it's just lost. we throw money at things and we haven't done the oversight. when was the last time the committee of congress said we would an oversight on the department of justice crime prevention? how well are they working? what are their metrics? what have they accomplished? that's how we found out on job training. we actually did -- i went to oakland and looked at every federal job turning program in the state.

every one of them. we have come in the city of 17,000, with an unemployment rate of less than 5%, we have 13 federal job training programs working. now, it's great about employing people in a job training. they don't need a job training program. the other thing we found is the state run job training programs are actually effective at giving somebody a skill. most of the federal job training programs are highly ineffective at giving somebody a skill to make it a lifetime wage. and so when was the last time we had an oversight hearing on that speak was i hope we have some oversight hearings on that. it in your report have implemented any of the suggestions? >> we've done something to we got a lot of squawk back. we actually don't think that political science grants to study congress right now are a priority. i put that any piece of legislation. they are squawking like crazy, the people who like to earn

their money, for doing studies of congress and political science. couldn't that wait until we are in a better financial condition? it's about perspective. and what would you do if it was your money rather than somebody else's money? and that's the real problem. we don't treat it like it's our money and we should be. >> thank you. the gentleman from oklahoma spent mr. chairman? one minute if i could in response. what am i doing with these water bottles and this cup? this is an aircraft. it looks like a water -- this is a c-5 aircraft. one of the largest airplanes in the world. we started building it in the late '60s, relate about the 1980s. they care huge amount of cargo, troops, personnel and all. this is c-17. it's a radar plane, carries about half as much as a c-5, flies about how this far without refueling. this is c-17. about 12, 13 years ago the

department of defense and pentagon and president bush said, we need c-17s, but what we really need are c-5s that have been modernize. have engines that don't need to be changed out every thousand five hours. to have hydraulic system that enables to fly in the 21st century. they called for modernizing c-5s -- >> the b model. >> mostly. what we start doing about eight years ago was modernizing. as it turned out for the price of buying one new c-17, we can modernize two or three of these. they fly twice as far, carry twice as much. we are not getting andover air force base with c-17 and also c-5. one of those aircraft a year ago said 42 world records for carrying cargo flying literally from here to turkey nonstop, no

refueling. fly them over the north pole to afghanistan. for three of these, modernize, the last another 30, 40 years. cost as much as one of these. we have plenty of c-17. we don't need to lease aircraft from the russians. we need to modernize what we have. that is what we are doing. we are saving money, better results for less money. a lot of times we get ourselves up and mission because the wasteful spending that we do. this is an example of something that would make sense and actually does save money and gives us a better result in terms of our airlift capability. the work we're doing on improper payments, we are down to 106 billion. we will keep moving in the same direction. the work that dr. coburn and i are doing will help us further in that regard. >> i'm going to go into lightning round very, very quickly because i'm getting more questions, not less so i will ask the going to stay within a minute. mr. lankford, you were next to ask. >> thank you, mr. chairman.

thank you for being here. senator carper, you made the comment about the 80/20 will. i found out to be somewhat of a problem as we try to function between house and senate. because in my short time here most of bills that come up with messaging bills rather than bills to fix problems. they come with 80% of the things we agree on and we stick on 20% of things are pure politics that we know will kill the bill. a good idea gets quote unquote voted on but we know goes nowhere and that happened to both directions. both parties are doing it. my question for you is how do we move past that? how do we do with the actual issues and resolve the 80% thing that we do agree on and we can identify as waste and say why can't we at least get an amendment on this innocent, why can we vote it out of the house without adding a poison pill and get them moving? the comment i want to make is tom dr. coburn mentioned, i did find different programs. that is my bill, the taxpayer right to know.

this committee has passed, passed with a person support and we're trying to get that to the floor. it's one of those aspects i would like to see move through the senate as well. it forces every agency to benefit every program that they have, what the cost is for that program, how many people are served in the program, how many staff that they have for the program, the statutory authorization for the program, and a strange thing in common life, and that is the matrix. how do you evaluate this program? i've seen a communism of programs that have no devaluation. -- a tremendous amount of programs that have no evaluation but i'm hoping with the broad support in this committee they can pass with broad support announced and would love to have your help in the senate to be able to get it through the senate. that is a reasonable next step after the gao reports. your response on the 80/20. >> dr. coburn and i had breakfast this one with b.j. johnson. dr. coburn mentioned, the

founders, people wrote our constitution had in mind a system that was hard to get stuff done but they did make it easy. part of the job of the senate is to slow down but it doesn't stop it. back to what i said before, what we have to do stick out how to use the leverage of a subcommittee or a committee or to commence working together with all these good government groups. and double in the same direction, work with the administration to especially we have a team at omb. they want to do this. to the challenge for us is to to get to the people are and figure out how to work together. we can do that. we've got a couple of great examples. we can set an example. your committee, our committee, we can set an example of why partisan cooperation. people don't want us to waste their money. i don't mind paying for more in taxes, i don't want to waste my money. i don't want to waste my money or theirs. there's much we can do on a common agenda. let's do it, and we are doing it

spent as a good mr. tierney i'm going to make a commitment, a pleasure, consistent with mr. lankford. mr. coburn, dr. coburn, take anything out of your way spoke that falls within our mutual jurisdiction. if you'll make a vote on it to your chairman, i will make sure our committee brings the same bill and goes out to the full house. and let's start trying to figure out whether it's 109, a billion over 10 years or a billion, 10 billion over 10 years, you take something out of the book or something that's not in the book, and if the two of you are prepared to hold a committee vote on it, i'll guarantee you a vote here on the same bill. hopefully if we can suggest once the we can come to the same agreement and i'll begin today, scheduling that every week if we have a bill that we are -- we agree on, no matter how small, if it falls within our jurisdiction either completely or partially, i will guarantee

you a vote in this committee on a. hopefully they'll give you an opportunity to go to the book and see if we can't find it, whether it's district of columbia, you may become let's find something and do something every week if necessary. >> i have a question. i'm very glad to hear you say what you just said. because there is an old song that says you've got me going in circles, and you never -- you can go in circles and never get off the merry-go-round. merry-go-round. >> doesn't ago, i'm dizzy? >> i'm not taking it that far. just a circle. but no, my point is i think it's a good that we have the four of us here right now and what you just said is so very, very important. it just goes back to what both of the senators have said. we've got to move forward, and i appreciate your comment and i'm going to work with you. thank you both.

>> thank you very much. just a comment about a year and half ago, two years ago we did a bill identifying 250 tax expenditures and recommended just 28 of them be eliminated as low-hanging fruit, which was over $60 billion a year. and then suggested gao take a look at the others and recommend which wants to be kept, which ones should be changed and which once to be eliminated. i don't think that's a bad way to go, at least to start. the other part look at defense. it's shameful, the defense department input to the financial statements together that could be used as a basis for audits. do you have any comments, recommendations on what teeth to put into some sort of legislation that would tell the department of defense that unless they produce financial statements that are auditable and then conduct an audit, something will happen? and second, if you read mr. stimson report, last year on the military, recommendations

between 200 billion-800 billion over the course of 10 years but one recommendation in one of the subsidy opinions written was that maybe rather than fight over the particular will be cut in the pentagon, we don't do a sequestration type of cut but we say to the pentagon your budget will be be reduced by x amount of dollars, you find that where you will save it, report back to us how you've done. you have any comments? >> i was the member of the bowles-simpson commission voted four. most of those ideas came out of the work that we did in terms of anything. the audit of the pentagon act has teeth into. the pentagon is the only agency that pays their bills themselves. all the rest of them are paid by the treasury. and a teeth that we put in audit to pentagon is if you can't get a statement. by 2017, we will have the treasury start paying your bills. which means, and by the way, a lot of the bills the pentagon

pay are due and a lot of bills that should be paid by the pentagon part page. it's a mess. and when you go to look at anything, there's all this fake accounting to be able to justify to make a payment. so the teeth, were it was, is to move the payment from the pentagon. more importantly, you cannot manage what you cannot measure. the pentagon can't measure hardly anything. and so the whole drive to get an audit of the pentagon is not to get in audit. it's to get into the place where they can get management numbers that they can actually make decisions on. and the raising of 20% waste in the pentagon at a minimum, is because they have no idea what they're doing because their numbers are any good. so it's a fixable problem but remember, we had that in the

ndaa and when incorporated it they took all the teeth out. so you think we're going to get an audit in 2017? know, because there's no consequences if there's no audit. so we're going to continue the same practice. >> thank you. mr. mica. >> i take this as a great way to kick off a new year. congratulate you, mr. chairman, members of the senate with responsibility for doing this stuff. listening to it it's kind of interesting to hear the efforts of folks, mr. duncan and others, for example, disposal of public buildings are vacant and hear you talk about your early efforts. we've all pass legislation. i passed some with mr. denham on that subject. but i come to the conclusion you can only eat an elephant a bite at a time. they will have to focus. we haul folks down to empty building, i think the first

thing i did was then the vacant post office building, two blocks from the white house. that was in february of two years ago. then went back a year later because they hadn't done anything. and hauled a bureaucrat down there to get into building. the first time it was 32 degrees outside, 38 degrees inside. that tends to get their attention but it still takes time. that is a success. we've had successes but you have to target. without a lot of failures. amtrak and we're going to celebrate a billion dollars this year in a dozen years in food-service losses, for which we passed a law that you cannot spend money and lose money. tsa, tom, we were here when we created it, start out with 16,500. we have 15,000 administrators

and 66,000 employees, totally out of control. another example set up to target high intensity drug trafficking areas. some of those are still going on and it's a game that's been played. i think it's constant oversight. i think they just released we did 1600 innings in the house. you've got to keep going after the bastards until you're successful. i don't know anything else you can do. >> senator carper. >> i spent a lot of years as a naval flight officer. when we're going to do something hard in a we seize it is like training and air flight carrier. takes a long time. if you keep at it you can turn them. it's like change in aircraft engine when the aircraft is in play. that's really hard. last night i was invited to speak to budget university delaware students who were down here for part of the semester. they're doing internships across the government.

i asked them, did you all know which one to do with your life when your sixers old? everybody raised their hands. i said, how many of you know what you want to do now? only just a few of them raised their hand. i said i don't care which wanted if you keep in mind for both. to these four rules and your life and you b be successful. number one, figure out the right thing to do and just do it. naturally for us as well. figure out the right thing to do. we don't want to waste money. there's something we can agree on. there's plenty of targets to go after. number two is the of the people who we want to be treated. that applies to entire programs. i want to see these programs for kids and grandchildren. we've got to treat these folks the way we want to be treated. third is to focus on excellence in everything we do the if it is a perfect make it better. the last thing is just don't give a. we know we are right, just don't give a. we are right on a lot of the

stuff, we just can't give them. i'm not going to do. i know this guy's not going to. i sense the same spirit here today. >> mr. jordan. >> thank you, mr. chairman. syndicate, picking up where the chairman's comments and the ranking member, have you looked at the annual savings, wasteful spending that you see, that you agree on, and to be done the analysis that you both agree this is wasteful? if you done that analysis what is that number? it seems to me that's a starting point. happy to done that? looked at all -- looked at mr. coburn's book on whatever you identified, we agree on, these several programs totaled so many dollars, let's start there. have you done that speak waste we have not done that jointly. our analysis of the recommendations just a gao is at a minimum, if you just follow their recommendations to

eliminate duplication you would save 150-$200 billion a year. that's what offices and houses of what the savings are. just eliminate duplication. but that is nothing to do with $80 billion of fraud in medicare and medicaid. it has nothing to do with the cost overruns and i.t. and the federal government which is four to going to do. 50% everything we spent in i.t. >> there's is 77 different means test in social welfare programs. if you have a handful made it would help poor people get i get all that but to get something moving, to get off the dime it seems that you guys testifying, if you two can say we agree with this, there's our starting point, get fat legislation in front of the chairman the city want to do that. the ranking member said he's willing to do that and now it's a place to start. mr. mica said one elephant by at a time spent one of the spartans but he is with a dialogue with

gao, with their comptroller general and also not every year, but so many of every month with gao present at the thing. they put out this high risk list as you know every other year, beginning of the congress and point out any number of ways we can save money. that high risk list for years has been an improper payments. when we first started clicking improper payments and saying what are they, it was like $30 billion, 40 going to find it be that at about 125 billion. we have authored with your support and involvement one after the other after the other legislation going after improper payments. we're down to about 125 billion, 120, 114, 106. we have more room to improve. another area, the property stuff we talked about, the postal service to make sure the postal service is in a position to repay the money that they borrowed from the federal government. there's a lot that gao brings to us and it's a common agenda. that's what we work at.

>> that's all great but we've got to move quickly here. what i'm asking is can you two get together and come up with -- >> we have to take a look at the prime acted as part of the sgr legislation i talked about, that's our bill. >> mr. coburn is on that don't speak with yes. we do a lot of a person bills. >> thank you, mr. chairman. >> we now go -- go ahead. dr. coburn. >> last but definitely not least the gentleman from missouri. mr. clay. >> thank you, senators, for being here today. could you quickly tell us what you think the challenges are of the federal government when it comes to the purchasing and procurement of information technology. is it that the federal government doesn't have the expertise to purchase it? when you look at agencies like dod and hhs, and all of the

others, and do we have the expertise in those agencies do know what we are purchasing, to be able to identify the products that we should be securing from vendors? and just how -- how do we approach that? >> the answer is this is difficult. is not just difficult in government. i have a son-in-law that works for one of the large firms that does this. and his reports as ge, big companies, have the same difficulty. the difference is, is they have stops. they have stop losses. we don't have any. we spend $82 billion a year on i.t., and at least 50% of it is wasted every year. the problem is we don't know what we want when they go to buy it. and we are games a lot. the second problem is, as mentioned with the air force

contracts, there's no consequences for nonperformance on the contractors. there's no consequences to the procurers within the government as a penalty of losing their jobs or losing their position in fact they screw up. so it's about accountability. it's a difficult area. my estimate as private sector waste 25% of them and they spent on i.t. that's my estimate. we waste 50% so we can certainly get better but it's a difficult area. we need to be able to compete. one of the bills senator carper and i have is to elevate this salary scale that homeland security can utilize to bring the proper people in insurance i.t. in other words, we've got to build to compete with the private sector. we need to do that and we probably need that's an area where we can't compete. to get the quality of people to make those decisions we have to raise the level of salaries were willing to do that. we have a bipartisan bill you that. >> and we also have a

responsibility, too, as far as oversight over these agencies, and maybe stop the train from leaving the station. >> well, i'll just give you one other point. too often, government tries to buy something off the shelf and make the off the shelf product fit their system, rather than buy something off the shelf and make the system fit the off the shelf. especially with the army. it's been a big waste of money in terms of their i.t., because they are trying to change programs, things we know worked perfectly ever else doe doesn'tk in the army because they are actually undermining the integrity of what they bought. we have a meeting that we have -- >> i want to thank the senator for -- >> one minute, if i may. >> thank you, tom. >> on this point, states are

allowed to democracy, 50 of them, how can we learn from them. i'm a recovering governor. we used to do a poor job in terms of i.t. management. one of the things that was long and convoluted to come is we were hiring people to work in our i.t. shop, train them, get them to become skillful and they get hired a way for more money. either in other governments or most likely the private sector. the same is true here. we need to be able to attract and retain people once they are trained. we need a set of incentives that do that. the second thing, old rolling stones song, you can't always get what you want, if you try sometimes you can get what you need. we have a hard time picking out not just what we want but what we actually need. we actually need. to know for sure this is what we need, and to stick with that, not to change it, not to keep changing it. we need folks in those agencies who can manage these projects that can manage and not be managed by the folks that are

providing the i.t. system. and the last thing we have to stick with, just got to stick with it from start to finish. those are some of things that would help us. >> i like sender carper liking it to mick jagger. thank you. >> there's probably a song that goes all good things must end, but i'm not going to quote it. senator, chairman, tom, my friend, you've been very, extraordinary generous with your time in questions and i appreciate the. just to recap, i think we've agreed that there's a lot more we need to do, and i did mean it, and elijah mentioned it as i was offering it, we will, in fact, move what you move if you two can agree to it because that's the beginning of chipping away at billion dollars at the time. lastly i think we talked around all day. it sounds like you have some

ideas of some items either as a companion bill or to include with it that we need to do. the president has, talking about needing to are better people to prevent something like healthcare.gov from happening again. we believe that is part of an organizational change, but we're certainly receptive with that organizational change, budget responsibly or chief information officer and the like we may have to look at how we recruit and retain those people who have those large budgets and huge responsibility. so i look forward to this being the start of a great your together. i flew in those old c-5s. they had a reputation for landing, more often than taking off easily. i appreciate the work you've done to try to modernize a portion of that fleet. i refueled a lot of times with is in the air because it felt better if you refueled in the air because you knew you were still flying. you have made a difference and i think the c-5 as a portion of

the fleet certainly is an era you leadership on and appreciate you mentioning to a very old soldier. and with it will take a very short recess and reset. thanks again, tom. >> thank you all. thank you. >> could you all please take your seats? and mr. chairman? >> the committee will come to order. what is the purpose of the john purpose of the jobseeking job se commission? >> i ask unanimous consent to insert in the record at this point a copy of a report that my staff and i completed during the recess that shows that we saved somewhere about come in the neighborhood of half a billion dollars as a result of the committee's work on looking at

conferences penny, wasteful conference spending. nearly a half billion dollars, it'is very significant. maybe you saw some reports about gsa savings that we estimate i think again based on hearings that we did, and expanding that governmentwide -- >> the entire report will be placed in the record with objection to now go to our second panel of witnesses who have been patiently -- sat through the short no question period with the senators. mr. thomas a. schatz as president of citizens against government waste. mr. kris edwards is director of tax policy studies at a cato institute. mr. brandon arnold is vice president of government affairs at the national taxpayers union. and ms. jaimie woo his tax and budget associate with the u.s. public interest research group. i want to thank you all for being here. you are the main attraction,

notwithstanding the previous period to and i think for all of us, the helpful this is a you know you have partners on the senate side who are equally interested in what you have to say. pursuant to the committee rules i would ask that you all these rise to take the oath. raise your right hands. [witnesses were sworn in] >> is the city. let the record indicate that all witnesses answered in the affirmative. this will be a little shorter perhaps in some ways. not like the first round your entire statements will be placed in the record. without objection. and we would ask that you stay as close to the five minute guideline as possible. with that, mr. schatz, you're recognized. >> thank you very much mr. jim and thank you for the opportunity to testify today. my name is thomas schatz, president of citizens against government waste, a nonprofit

organization with more than 1.3 million members and supporters nationwide. it is no secret that wasteful spending pervades the federal government and every agency who performs the function more effectively and efficiently. recommendations to limit waste, fraud, and abuse are rightly provided by the gao, cbo, congressional committees, president's budget and groups like citizens against government waste and others at the table today. for example, since 1993, citizens against government waste has released a compilation of this years recommendations, 587 that would save taxpayers 580 point580-point six-point ane and $1.8 trillion over five years. despite the best intentions of the president and legislators to address wasteful spending and improve government efficiency, the size and scope of government continues to grow. one of the main impediments to reducing the mismanagement of the taxpayers money is congress' tendency to great a program to

solve problems rather than spending a time to determine whether or not the existing program can address the same subject matter. until the beginning of the one of 13 congress there was no formal requirement that committees even specify whether a reporter bill that establishes or reauthorizes a federal program duplicates another federal program. the rules of the house were admitted to require both in israel and provide committee chairman the authority to request a gao review of any legislation referred to the committee to determine if there was duplication. this should help improve transparency but it's not a requirement that congress not approved a new program simply to list that they might have a duplication in this legislation. proposals by senator coburn to change the rules of the senate in a similar manner have twice failed to receive the necessary 67 votes. in addition to preventing more duplication, congress should act to consolidate or eliminate the program identified ngos three

annual reports which senator coburn has estimated cost taxpayers about $295 billion annually. one prominent example of that is the 209 science, technology, engineering and math programs costing $3.1 billion spread across 13 agencies in fiscal year 2010. more than one-third of the programs were first funded between fiscal years 2005-2010. the u.s. does not have enough workers in the s.t.e.m. fields, houston's remain behind students in other nations in math and science education and the new programs created by congress were a major factor in creating such complex and inefficient system that has failed to achieve the intended objective. the other high priorities in addition to the foregoing recommendations such as the armies distributed common ground system. a meeting extended air defense system, stolen identity refund

fraud, also known as tax refund fraud, and mismanagement of information technology. but causes of wasteful i.t. spending include inadequate guidance and program management, unclear goals, and last minute project modification. as a result systems are often subject to significant delays, failed to meet agency needs, failed to launch at all or launch without being fully tested. in other words, for observers of federal i.t. expenditures it was no surprise when healthcare.gov do not launch as planned on october 1, 2013. on the positive side the government is starting to save money through the increased use of cloud computing. even more money could be said for the use of software asset management tools which would prevent the misuse of existing software licenses and the purchase of unnecessary software. in regard to governmentwide procurement we have supported and urge congress to act on it is sugar is pleased to see it mentioned this morning. we will continue to support these efforts because it is the first major procurement reform

bill since the cleanup act of 1996. unfortunate in some cases where a limiting waste and inefficiency has been published, stymied or lease questions, particularly through the suspension by the centers for medicare and medicaid services of some of the recovery audits to help correct for the $4.2 billion of improper medicare payment. regardless of whether the government is in surplus or deficit there is no excuse for mismanaging the taxpayers money. the american people would be well served if everything elected representatives and senators came to work thinking first and foremost about how they can better manage the taxpayers money and solve problems effectively with the resources that are already allocated to the treasury and existing programs. in other words, each senator to ask questions first and spend money much later, if at all. thank you for the opportunity to testify. i look forward to answering any questions. >> thank you. at this time i'm going to ask him and his consent that the 2012 congressional ratings for

citizens against government waste be placed in the record and that favorite 2013 publication of prime cuts summary be placed in the record. that objection so ordered. we now go to mr. edwards. >> thank you very much. i'm chris edwards, editor of downsizing -- the federal government faces a dismal fiscal future with rising spending and debt. you look at the long range projection, long range bass line that looks bad enough but for reasons i go through in my written testimony our fiscal future is much worse than the cbo baseline shows. the upshot to me is we need to look at every federal agency and cat and terminate waste and will party programs. what is waste? its government spending where the cost is higher than the benefits created for citizens. in my view it's also federal activities that the federal government does a poor job at

that could be much better carried out by state and local governments and the private sector. as i think congressman duncan mention their stories in immediate, gao reports adweek about wasting the federal government. my research for downsizing government.org shows there was waste and cost overruns and fraud and abuse although effective beginning of back to the beginning of the republic in the 19 century, full of examples of wasteful spending. what i take out of that is there's a basic structural problem with the federal government and how it operates. waste is endemic and chronic. there's a lot of reasons for the. the federal government has become so huge. federal auditors and committees can keep track of all the spending. the art 2200 separate subsidy and benefit programs in the federal government today. they are all susceptible to a strong and abuse but unlike the private sector, agencies never been to prevent not subject to takeover bids. there is no built-in mechanism to provide for efficiency in the federal government likes it is

in the private sector. federal managers face no profit incentive giving them little reason to proactively reduce waste and fraud. the only real solution then from my point of view is we need to downsize the federal government. how do we do that? one thing is we need to -- we spend five under 60 billion a year on federal aid to the states. in my research of the aids system is rife with waste and inefficiency. senator coburn swift boat had many, many examples and many of examples where a two state programs. why is that? there's really bad incentives built into the federal aid system, state and local governments simply cannot spend federal money as efficiently as they spend federal money. coburn's report, for example, goes into a goldplated million dollar bus stop in arlington, virginia, knew where i live. 80% of the money for the bus stop came from higher levels of government. so arlington county has no incentive to spend the money

efficiently. that happens throughout the federal aid system. i think the three layers of government of the united states should be sort of like a tidy layer cake with each layer funding its own program. the citizens would know who's responsible for those programs. the aid system makes american government sort of like a giant confused marble cake. citizens have no idea who is responsible for programs like bus stops that go over costs. so i think cutting aid programs would be a good way to reduce waste. by other recommendations i go into, privatization. private sector companies have built-in incentives to minimize waste. many governments around the world have figured that out. there's been a privatization revolution that is going on around the world in recent decades, over $2 trillion of electric utilities and railroads and airports and post offices have been privatize all of them the world. that revolution has bypassed the federal government of the united states for some reason. many things the federal government does today have been privatize in other countries.

germany, the netherlands and britain have privatized their post offices, candid and britain have privatized their air traffic control systems. most european countries use private airport screening as i think august and mike it is certainly for me with. passenger rail's and privatized in britain but if you look at a system like air traffic control, our system is falling behind. it's got massive cost overruns. it can't handle technology. we are running our air traffic control which is a high-tech business, we are running it like a bureaucracy. it makes no sense but the solution is privatization like britain and canada have done. the canadian system set up as a nonprofit corporation, non-subsidized works extremely well. it's one of the safest systems in the world. it is a leader in i.t. that's where the united states needs to go with air traffic control. similarly with postal service as i'm sure you're all familiar with, the royal