l. i am here to introduce this esteemed team here. gaithersburg is a terrific place and they are so wonderful in how they support their arts and humanities. we're really pleased to bring you this fabulous event. thanks in large part to the generous support of our sponsors and volunteers. please when you see them, say thanks would you? we got a few housekeeping items. of course, turn off your cell phones and devices. we'd presenter that. if you're tweeting, which we encourage you to do, especially with a picture of the book cover maybe, please use the hash tag gbf15, and we need your feedback. surveys are available at your tent and on the web site and on the mobile app for this operation, by submitting a survey you'll be entered into a drawing for free ipad. so it's worth your while to do that. martin frost and richard cohen will be signing books

immediately after this presentation and there are numerous copies of the books on sale in the politics and prose tent. buy your books early buy them often. no doubt you have friends who want these books. please buy a bunch. our writers would appreciate. i. this race free event. we want to keep it that way. it really does help the book festival if you'll be buying some books. the more books we sell, the more publishers will send their writers their speak with us, and purchasing books from our partner, politics and prose will help our local economy. it supports local jobs, supports the book festival, and supports independent book stores. that's really important. they need your support. so if you enjoy this program please buy some books. martin frost is here with us today. he spent 26 years as a member of congress representing dale

dallas-fort worth. he swept four years of the democratic congressional campaign and four years as chair of the house democratic caucus. richard cohen is not our "washington post" rich cohen. i'm told he's the good richard co handbut has been write about politics for many years he started covering the north hampton city council. is that right? >> yes. >> a couple years ago. this book by martin frost richard cohen and tom davis who couldn't be here today -- have written "the partisan divide." a concept relatively unknown here in all democratic montgomery county, maryland. we know we have republicans here but they have not elected anybody recently. current count and state elects individuals are divided on

scales of progressivism but not party scales. it makes our lives less contentious. we do have that in the state of maryland and we have plenty of conversations going on right now about party issues and the like. i personally feel very related to these authors here, and nat the one republican i have served with who served on the montgomery county council howie dennis actually worked for tom davis. a great guy and this is important. i cast my first vote for president, george mcgovern in the town of north hampton massachusetts. when i was in college and that is mr. cohen's home town. so like we're practically related. >> he was the president of massachusetts. >> he was -- he got massachusetts, that was it. oh well. at least my vote counted that year. and in addition, my strict, which represents -- includes all

million plus members of -- residents of montgomery county is -- i'm not sure we're proud of this or not -- we're proud home to a portion of what has been called the united states least compact read most jerrymandered, congressional district. district 3 which covers a portion of the eastern part of montgomery county and was referred to in that book -- looks like a -- no one can come up with an animal that describes -- >> have to get in line to be the most gerrymandered. >> we're right up there and we're proud of it. the authors will be glad to know we're ahead of you on 0 couple of these issues. we just enacted a public campaign finance program for local elections some this week, we funded it to a tune of a million dollars. so we have much in common with the world of politics and action. i'm sure we can do better and we'll learn more from these

great leaders today. so this brings us to the main event, martin frost richard co hand, and "the partisan divide." >> our co are authorize tom davis couldn't be here because he its a commencement ceremony so he has good excuse. let me tell you how this book came about. and then we'll give you time to answer questions itch was chairman over the democratic congressional cam pine committee in 1996 and 1998. that's the committee that raises money for candidates and recruits candidates and plans strategy. tom was chairman of the republican congressional campaign committee in 2000 and 2002. so we didn't good head-to-head, and that way we're friends. tom and i beth have been out of congress for a while. i've been out for ten years. my term ended in 2004.

tom has been out for a little bit less time. i served 26 years tom served 14 years. so that between us we served 40 years in congress, and we also saw, when things were different in congress, where -- i'm not saying everyone got along all the time but it was possible to get things done, and it was possible -- more possible than it is today to work across party lines. when i was first eelectricity to congress there was a congressman from miami florida bill layman. bill had been a used car dealer before he was elected to congress and used to the all of us he didn't think he could fall any lower in public esteem and then he was elected to congress. that is at a time when congressional approval rates were in the 40s and 50s. there was a poll last year that showed only eight percent of the public approved of the job congress is doing. that's family and friends and paid staff.

and it's not really good for our country, quite frankly that congress is held in such low esteem. we're a great country. we hope we have a legislative branch that can respond to the desires of the public, and it can work together and to that -- and that has not been the case in recent years. tom and i after we both left congress we would appear on cable television sometimes in kind of a point-counterpoint. we were first put together by chuck todd on msnbc on his show "the daily rundown." and after that we were on cnn and bloomberg variety of cable shows, and we realized that even though we were partisans -- he was a partisan republican and i'm a partisan democrat weapon didn't agree on a lot of issues but we didier on the fundamental problems that faced the institution of congress and why congress doesn't function very well today. so we decided we would write a book. i will tell you for those in the audience who have ever

written a book, this is hard. i'd never done this before. and in writing books it is better sometimes just like it is in life, it's better to be lucky than smart. and tom's college roommate amherst was an executive aft a book publishing company and i used to be a journalist. a journalism degree from the university of missouri, i covered congress for congressional quarterly before i went to law school and got in politics. so i write pretty fast, and tom had been thinking about this for three or four years and had published of the book in his head. -- had part of the book in his head. so it took us a little less than a year from the time we started working to when it was published. that's pretty fast. time and i did an outline of 16 chapters and made a decision. some of you have read books where there are cao authors and and the book is written in a

blend voice youch don't to who said what. tom and i decided we would each take half the chapters. rich would work with us. in fact rich was the co-author on a couple of chapters but he would be clear who wrote which chapter in the book, and then we would put our names on the beginning of the chapter and then we each were given the tub to comment on each other's chop at thes to make opinion wes thought the other one may not have done fully or we might have a slightly different opinion. not a bad way to write a book. once the oak appeared, we started can do book events at presidential libraries. we have done five libraries so far. the reagan library the nixon library on the best coast, the clinton library in arkansas, lbj in austin, and we did the george w. bush presidential center in dallas and we were on the west coast, we did stanford and usc

we did rice while we were in texas. we have done some on the east coast. we did one at tufteds. we're going to am hurt at the end of the month and politics and prose the cosponsor of this book fair, had a very nice event for us at their store after the book came out. so this has been interesting. an interesting experience. i share that because it's not something i'd ever done before, and i found that people are interested, they come and ask good questions. and this is not like one of those raucous town hall meetings you see sometimes. people actually come and want to know. they have things on their mind and want to know why this place doesn't work better, and we try to respond to that the best we can. let me tell you some of the thing wes cover in the book. i want to give you that background. we really looked at this from three different perspectives. there's 16 chapters and they deal with pieces of this. there are three fundamental reasons why there is so much

partisan divide in congress today. and again this may not be the nice montgomery county but this is the case in the country and you see that every day on television and the newspapers, when congress can't get its act together can't do things that people want done. one is the role of redistricting. this is just a house issue. there are three factors in redistricting. the first factor is that in recent years the political parties have made a real effort to take over state legislatures in the the two years right before an election so the republicans in 2010 -- they didn't do anything illegal. it was within the rules. they absolutely put a lot of money into elected people in state legislatures and electing governors particularfully states that had gone democratic for president. they took over michigan, they took over ohio, they took over pennsylvania. so obama carried those states for president but the republican party controlled those states when the district lines were

redrawn in 2011. so you now have a situation in those three states alone where the majority of the vote for congress and for president is democratic but 70% of the congressional districts are republican. now, democrats have done the same thing in previous years. don't get me wrong. the republicans are not the only ones that have done this. but republicans have done it to a fair the well, so now in the 2012 election, republicans won control of the hoe house by 17 votes. so you have to ask how did his happen? computers are wonderful thing youch them what you want and they'll draw a terrific jerrymandered district for you. it will give you the result you want. so most congressional redistricting is done by partisan legislatures. i'll talk about some alternatives to that. and that's how you got the kind

of districts you got. and the result of that is that these are one-party districts. whoever wins the primary is the congress person, and the general election is almost irrelevant in 80 parts of the districtness the country. and so what that means is that the whole contest is in the primary, and that the congress person the man or woman who represents that district, has to be always looking over his or her shoulder as a well-organized small group because primaries are small turnout elections that can take control of a primary. republican congressmen are looking over their right shoulder to see if some far right winger is going to run against them in the primary and this influences their votes. democrats likewise look over their left shoulder, worried that someone from the left might run against them in the primary low turnot, so there's no incentive to cooperate with the other side. in fact it's exactly the opposite you don't want to be seen in public with somebody from the other side. certainly don't walk to have

your name on legislation with someone from the other side. now, one of the other things that's contributed to this is something called residential sorting. my co-author tom davis puts a lot more weight on this than i do but he makes a legitimate case that in many cases, people who live together think the same way. people move to montgomery county want to be in a democratic county, and so people in center cities, people are democrats. out in some of she suburban counties in thing midwest and southwest, those people are runs. that's where the republicans live. so that influences the way districts turn out. a third thing is the voting rights act. tom and i have a difference of opinion on this. tom thinks it was inevitable that when the vote rights passed that the result would be african-american districts heavily african-american districts in the south would be represent bid black democrats

and everything else would be represent bid white republicans itch think the republicans filed a careful strategy trying to make friend, trying to go to some black elected officials particularly early on and say look the democrats have discriminated against you. they haven't drawn african-american districts in the past. we'll make a deal. we'll put as many blacks as possible into certain number of districts to guarantee that a black can be elected and it just so coincidentally all the surrounding districts will be bleached almost all white. so i didn't think that had to be the inevitable result and some key people in the african-american community john lewis, who said don't do that. let's put enough african-americans in the districtness the south where an african-american can be elected but let's have african-americans in some of the surrounding districts where they can influence the outcome. that was not the case in many instances and now all you have in the deep south are black democrats and white republicans

there are no more white republicans, with limited exception. some in florida and those politics say the farther south you go, the farther north you get in florida so they're not a typical southern state. there's one in anyway a couple of anglo white congressmen in texas but they represent hispanic districts. that's another matter. the hispanic turnout is lower so you have to have a higher forge guarantee a hispanic women bell elected. so the voting rights act aren'tal shorting and intentional gerrymandering has led to safe districts where people don't talk to the other side and they're worried they may lose the primary if they do talk to the other side. another factor is what has gone on with campaign finance. tom and i both were harsh critics of the mccain feingold law when it was passed about 15 years ago. our view was that under -- prior

to mccain-feingold, outside groups labor and corporations and wealthy individuals could contribute to political parties. that had to be disclosed. when i was children of the dccc we disclosed every money. mccain fine gold took that away from political parties and we argued with the people who were authoring mccain feingold. the inevitable result the money will about to ideological groups on either frame won't go to the parties. we were right and they were wrong. and that's exactly what has happened. and now with the supreme court taking the position that money is a free speech issue and you can't put limits on what anybody can spend in politics. you can put limits on what they can give directly to a candidate but you can't put limits on -- and what they can give to a party but no limits on their

able to have independent expenditures or give to groups on c-4s, and the problem i the c4 groups don't have to report their contributors so large amounts of unreported money being dropped into races in the last minute and an incumbent congressman alives in mortal fear somebody will spend three or four million dollars against him in the last couple weeks of a race so you have this odd combination of safe districts where the challenge could be in the primary and unlimited money from the outside. we have some suggestions about that. and i'll talk about that in a minute too. the other thing -- i don't mean to be overly critical of the media. i used to be a reporter. but we now have highly polarized media. when i was first elected there were no all news cable stations. somebody figured out, some very smart people figured out roger ailes figured out for fox that there was money to be made by having a conservative talk

channel, and that is exactly what they did. so the people on the right could know where to go to get their evening fix on what was going on and most of that's very partisan. and then msnbc figured out their making money on the right. let's make money on the left so they started msnbc. it's not as extreme as fox is, but it's pretty partisan. they don't cut much slack for the other side. poor old cnn tried to go down the middle and they've lagged in the polls so they've lagged in the rate examination the other two have been more successful. also the internet, of course, is a source of enormous amount of information. some of which is not true. and the internet does nose have editors in many cases. so the public is being bombarded with all kinds of partisan -- highly partisan information and i'm not as a reporter, former reporter i'm not for censorship

or putting restrictions on what people can say on the media or the internet but i think we have to understand the effect of all that on our political process. how can we solve this problem? the recommendation champ at the in our book makes several specific recommendations. one is that congress pass a law which it could do -- it's empowered to do this, whether it would do it is another matter -- requiring states to have nonpartisan commissions to draw congressional districts. not a bad idea. five states decided to do that on their own. california arizona wisconsin. washington and new jersey, and in many cases these are much less gerrymandered districts and fair-fight districts either side can win. so that's worked, not perfect litsch but it has worked. the problem is legislatures aren't going to do that on their own unless directed by come, and the question is, will congress directly to do that?

well the people in charge right now don't want to change the rules of the game. they don't necessarily want to have a fairer system. democrats were in controlled we might take the same position and say, we like the system the way it is. so unless the public rises up and the public says, look, enough of this, let's have some more competitive districts in this country it may well not happen. another recommendation we make, and again, this is as a result of the supreme court. the united states supreme court has taken the position that money is a free speech issue and so you can't put limits, you can't pass a law putting limits on how much people can spend in a federal election. maybe you can do that in the county election for local government but you can't do that, supreme court will not let you do that in a federal election, so i have to explain to people you don't like citizens united? you can't override that with an act of congress. the only way you can override a supreme court decision is to have a constitutional amendment.

and it is real hard to amend the constitution in this country. it takes a two-thirds vote of each house and has to be peace bid three-quarters of the states so the best is have disclosure. we suggested that congress out to possess a law requiring every organization of any kind that mentions a federal candidate by name anytime during a two-year election cycle be required to disclose all their contributors to the federal election commission so at least we know where this money is coming from. that would be legal the courts would permit disclosure but won't permit limits on the total amount of spending. now, we have also made in other recommendations, some of which are a little controversial. some years ago congress permitted earmarks. that's a -- where a member of congress or member of the senate could designate how money would be spent in an appropriations bill in their particular district of their particular state. unfortunately, this was abused. one of my college classmates

from the university of missouri, whom i did not know, randy duke cunningham actually sold ear marks to defense contractors and took bribes, and he was sent to jail. spent a little time as a guest of the government, as he should have. that should never happen. other people used ear marks to fund some somewhat questionable projects. what we have suggested is that earmarks be returned but with the requirement that the members' name has to be put on it in so in the committee report you know which house member or which senator ear marked the spending and it could only be spent in the senator's district or state. the reason for this is, one this would give members of congress some skin in the game. they would have a reason to support appropriation bills. right now -- the government operates on a continuing

resolution. this is a crazy way to fund the government. you could never fund a business this way. you wouldn't know how much money to have for staff until half of the year was gone but bates the way congress rated. so re recommend going back to earmarks. not everybody agrees with that. we understand that. this was a considered to be a reform but i think that going back to that system would be helpful. also we have recommended having a national primary day for all elections for the house and the senate. not for presidency. states can do their presidential primaries and their caucuses whenever they wanted to, and but all primaries for the house and senate would be on the same day. the reason for this is that would hopefully have a larger turnout. the news media would pay typings what was going on focus attention on the fact this is primary day in the united states and that maybe we'd get more people voting. one problem we have with prim marys is in some states you

register by party and you can -- some states you can register as an independent but you can't vote if you're an independent you can't vote in the party primary of either party. you're frozen out of the process. even though in many cases the whole election is in the primary. now in other cases independents choose not to involvement they don't want to be afailated with one party or the other but then they are conceding the outcome to a relatively small group of voters in many cases ideologically extreme to pick the candidates in their parties. california has an interesting wrinkle. i'm not suggesting this be done in every state. it has met with some controversy in digs to going to a nonpartisan commission, california has an open primary where everybody can file regardless of party. so you can have multiple democrats and multipep republicans republicans and the top two are in a runoff, and the result of that in some cases you had two democrats in a runoff or two

republicans in a runoff. the effect of that is, for example, if you have two democrats in a runoff, then they have to talk to the republicans in their strict. they have to get votes from the other side and conversely, if you have two republicans they have to talk to the democrats. not every state is going to do that but it's an interesting experiment and ought ought to be looked at. we i believe in ore country and we believe in our system of government. we just want it to work better, and we are -- our government is constantly renewing sit. it's not the same government set up by the found fathers. african-americans can vote now. women can vote now. that wasn't what the founding fathers originally had in mind. so that we can improve our system. we can be better, and hopefully we can produce some results that people want and desire. let me -- rich really did yeoman's service on the book.

rich had covered us -- he was a reporter and had covered both tom and me so we knew each other. he asked tough questions and he was a reporter, and he asked us tough questions as we were working on the book, too rich. >> thank you very much good to be here. i will just speak for a few minutes and then we'll invite your questions. i really -- i've written books in the past, actually get back to that in a second. this was a unique experience for me as martin just said. i had as a reporter martin frost was a very good and helpful source for me. tom davis was the same. but this was a great opportunity for me to work directly with them and i think they -- the two of them -- i was glad to assist them. they were kind to help bring me along as co-author but the two of them provided, with this book a real public service. most members of congress, once they retire, they just disappear

and they do various things, which is fine, but relatively this is a book i think is pretty unique in that these two former members who were real players at the time, each of them served in a leadership capacity, a respected legislator, they told the stories. they explained what the place was like, and they did it from -- as martin said, they each wrote separate chapters and separate pieces of chapters but there are common themes from the book. that they're expressing. so i think they have done a great public service and i would add to that, not so much as a matter of age or number of years but the two of them -- maybe i would include myself as well -- were dinosaurs. we come from another era. martin and -- in particular with martin and tom.

they're dinosaurs because they were centrists in their parties. martin a centrist democrat, tom a centrist republican. and they would each be able to work across the aisle. there just isn't very much of that anymore and that's unfortunate for the country and the book explains why. and i'll take now -- follow up on the introduction, tom does refer in the book, tells the story about connie morella who many of you recall was -- there was a tame when republicans were elected in significant positions in montgomery county, and as tom describes in -- at one point in the book, connie had -- in the late '90s and and was defeated in 2002, best chris van allen doing well for himself since then -- but as tom describes in the book, he talked to connie

and basically said to her at one point connie, this district montgomery county, is changes and there's not much you can do about it. obviously redistricting did become a factor but it was changing even apart from redistricting. so there are -- this book -- that's one brief example. tom is talking about coby morella as one example of dozens or scores of cases kind of explanations of how politics were changing, including here in montgomery county, quite frankly. my experience -- i enjoy -- i had more than 30 years of writing for a magazine, a couple magazines, but one in particular, national journal covering congress and it was a great experience for me. i continue to write as a free lancer but it's a different pace and that's fine for me at this point. but as a reporter covering congress what i particularly

enjoyed -- what i tried to kind of capture for our readers is that congress always is changing. it changes from obviously from one congress to the next. it can change from one month to the next, one week to the next the schedule will change. and the challenge is for reporters and even for members in their own way to try to understand and to kind of keep on top of these cyclical changes. sometimes members lose touch with the changes. i'm thinking again real briefly -- won't give the details but tom describes here, both martin and tom talk about how their states, texas and virginia changed while they were here, and tom tells in particular the story of what happened to eric cantor in the form are majority leader, now out of congress because he

didn't stay on top of the change. having said that, yes there is change and it's constant, and we can say right now in 2015, congress may be working a little bit better. than it was last year. but i would submit to you -- this will be me main point for this discussion -- i would submit to you that the book that we wrote remains apt and relevant and timely, even though there may be -- congress may be working a little bit better now. there's various -- a group called a bipartisan policy center a first rate organization, and has members former members of congress from both parties. bipartisan policy center has been issuing statements lately saying -- pointing out some of their facts are correct and relevant -- that congress is getting more done.

to which i would say okay, but i would also then add that all the themes in this book, all the point that martin described for you in this presentation, they all remain valid. namely there's problems in the country with polarization in our politics. there's problems with the media. changes in technology. there's changes in demography. these -- there's changes about the role of money in politics. these are factors that, as a group, and kind of in terms of the interaction of these factors, helps to explain why it has become more and more difficult for congress to get anything done. even if maybe on occasion now in may or the spring of 2015, perhaps they are passing a budget. they may pass a defense bill.

they passed something on iran. but i would submit to you that the real problems that have led to the dysfunction remain in place. and it's going to require again as the book describes, it's going to require not only members of congress but really it's going to require the public to demand change. to tell the members -- members of congress can kind of wring their hands and say that the place isn't working very well, but they have shown one skill all 535 members of congress have been able to get elected under this system. so they may not like the system but it works for them. if there's going to be change, i would submit to you it's going to have to come from the grassroots. >> i'm going to give you a couple of examples before we take questiones no one should

get too cared we were with the fact there are one or two things that peaced in congress the last couple of months because there's some very, very tough decisions yet to be made and which congress may find itself back in the ditch fairly soon. i'll give you some examples. one is renewal of the export-import bank. this is a financing facility that has been very important for american businesses to be able to sell their products abroad. and you now have the tea party element of the republican party who thinks it's terrible that we're helping big business, and terrible that the government is in any way helping businesses in the country sell their own products it ought to be just a free market process. that may not be renewed. that may fail. another example is the highway trust fund. our roadded and bridges are in terrible shape and congress cannot figure out how to come up with enough money to fund the highway trust fund and still

happen done it. it runs out thened of the month and they're talk about maybe they'll fund enough money for two months. the problem is that some people, most mostly republicans but some democrats -- don't want to raise taxes in order to build better roads in this country and better bridges, and we may wind up with not being able to pass anything to fund the highway trust fund because of the antitax movement. we have used -- had user fees in the past. we have had a gasoline tax. people don't want to raise the glen tax. actually the price of gasoline is down now and so maybe if you could add a few peppies to the gasoline tax figure out how to rebuild our infrastructure, that would be good for the country. but people won't even consider that. the ice the trade vote. something called fast-track you. read but the the paper, has to do with the pacific trade agreement with countries in the pacific rim. there are lot of people who feel like our country has been giving

away our jobs, past trade agreements made it easier for american business to move outside of the united states, and so even though that finally passed the senate, it is not at all clear that will pass the house, and the president may not have the authority to enter into negotiations just as past presidents republican and democratic presidents, have had this fast track authority in the past. they've given us the ten minute sign do we need to give you a chance do ask questions. i'm saying, don't get misled by the fact congress passed one or two things in the last couple of months. they have a lot of difficult issues yet to resolve particularly if the supreme court strikes down part of the funding mechanism for obamacare and congress doesn't have any idea how they're going to take care of that. so be glad to take questions. please go to the mic when you ask questions. >> one of the serious questions with respect to the trade bill,

one of the implications for employment and i think there are lot of unanswered questions. the president has been proceeding somewhat -- and so i think that has to be revealed so that the act would be measured in a proper light. the other thing with respect to infrastructure seem like an article of faith. god for bid we be identified with the tax increase. the are very few politicians in my experience who have been prepared to say and i think one governor way back, of illinois said i'd rather be elect for one term and get something done, and but that is not typically the indicate with elected officials and i don't know what the answer to that is other than electing politicians who do not want to make it their career. >> well, it's an interesting point. in the past, congress of both parties has figured out how to

fund the highway trust fund. that is an area where they've been -- whether they call it a tax or a user fund, there has been bipartisan agreement that we have to do something about the infrastructure in this country. now, because the parties are so split and because of the influence of these outside forces who will scream bloody murder if you do anything with additional revenue congress can't even do that even though past congresses have done that. let me speak to term limits. the u.s. supreme court some years ago -- interesting -- held that term limits for federal office are unconstitutional. what was the reasoning? this is a republican court. their reasoning was that the constitution requires that you have to be 25 years old and a result of the state to run for the house and 30 years old and a resident of the state run for the senate and you cannot add to those requirements for office. so the only way you could have term limits would be to amend

the constitution. could happen but it's not easy to do and some people think term limits don't make a lot of sense because they empower the permanent class in washington who are there all the time and if members are rookies all the time they won't be very good at getting their job done. but you can make an argument. richard? >> let me talk just real briefly, somewhat personal way about presidents. i won't talk directly about our current president but i will talk about some past presidents -- i'll mention the fact that i did -- i've done a couple of books in years past, and one of them was a book about how congress passed the 1990 clean air act. it was passed unanimously virtually unanimously the leadership -- wouldn't have happened unless the first president bush took the lead and did a very good job and worked with the democratic congress, and i -- and the legislation was passed and i wrote the book

about how that happened. i wrote it's year later. and seemed like -- bus the publisher asked me if i would. it never occurred to me that when i wrote that book in 1991, that 20 years later, it would be a piece of ancient history. that we simply have lost -- just a very few cases like that when now where a president takes the lead and the members of congress respond. and then i've also wrote another book about a guy named -- charm of the ways and means committee and he end up in jail. wrote about what he did in congress. he enjoyed legislating but he -- the way he did it -- he was chairman for 13 years, 12 of those years was the presidencies of reagan and bush, and he wanted them to take the lead and then he would follow.

we -- again that is the book, that's a story. ross ten cow ski. doesn't exist anymore. >> credit you for reflecting on what chief executives or the legislators did that was profitable. with respect to first president bush unfortunately the apples fell far from the tree. >> two other people who want to ask a question. thank you. >> i want to address this question to mr. cohen. address it to him because mr. davis is not here, and at least mr. cohen -- i'd like you present what you think would be mr. davis' argument if he were here. >> well, i think you heard much of it -- a lot of it from martin frost. >> well, what i have -- i have some very specific questions. >> go ahead.

>> the republicans in congress, in the house have made 50 attempts or more to take away health care from the 12 million new people who have it. the republicans in the house have voted against extending unemployment benefits. the republicans have voted against food stamps. they'd like to cut that down. politico has a big article even though mr. barren said -- mr. boehner said it's stupid to ask if theirs relation between congress and amtrak's troubles. a big article how republicans delayed for seven years fixing the very thing that would have avoided that, and mr. toomey tells us, has very strongly voted against it, a republican senator from pennsylvania -- >> i can -- >> and no. we could go on. i could list a thousand things

that republicans have done that are against ordinary people and against the public interest. >> that's not the purpose of the discussion but i can -- i've heard tom speak enough and i know that tom would say is that he is an economic conservative. he believes in the free enter prize system but he dunce agree dismiss things the republicans have done recently. if he were here, that's what he would say. other questions. >> what is your prediction for what is going to happen with the highway trust fund in the next week? >> i don't know. it's an extraordinary situation. my wife and i were driving over here from virginia, and part of the road that we drove on had a lot of potholes and we were commenting on, when i they going to get tat that fixed? i don't know the answer to that. i hope that there are some options that congress is looking at. i was on the budget committee when i was in congress, and the chairman of the budget committee, bill gray, always had something in this back pocket he

could pull out at the last minute to solve some of these really tough problems. i'm not convinces the anymore charge right now have anything in their back pocket to solve the issue and they may just kind of do it one month at a time. there is something that's being looked at and that's letting american corporations repatriate some of the money they held out of the united states, let them bring that back and they would have to pay tax on it and there would be some revenue from that and that could be used for the highway trust fund. that makes sense. the problem is the chairman of the ways and means committee wants to pull that back and use that money when there's tax reform. so they're a turf fight between the people on the infrastructure committee and the ways and means committee, as well as that pot of money could the used use for the highway trust fund. >> to be clear most members of congress both partyes want to have a highway program. the problem is that there's less and less money coming into the

trust fund for various reasons having to do, for example with the fact that fewer people are driving fewer miles -- >> but richard the problem is they're not willing to take courageous votes. i buy cars, me wife and i have car with good mileage now. one of the reasons we bought the car so wouldn't use as much gasoline but that alone is not the sole problem for the states. it's the highway trust fund. >> so they can extend the program for a month or two at a time but they're not willings, as we're saying here to simply not willing to deal with the reality that continuing with the program as it is, need additional sources of revenue. >> you have somebody behind you that wants to ask a question. >> thank you. no doubt about it, the big kahuna in partisan divide are the primaries and the

gerrymandering and commuters awe you mentioned. but what do you think having been there about the work schedule of congress? >> well -- >> in the sense it used to be congress would stay in town, the representatives would socialize with each other they would know each other -- >> the argument was that -- >> and they would have a relationship. now they fly out on thursdays -- >> when i was elected in 1978 i moved my family to virginia. three small children. so the only time i'd get to see my kid's would about in the evenings after work because when i was in texas i had to meet with voters all the time. but people are concerned they will be accused of having gone to washington if they move their families to d.c. let's hope that we can find a way to have a little longer work week and be more productive. anyway, thank you very much. we have enjoyed it. we'll be available in the book signing line.

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