some of the experiences that i had dealing with communications in the bush white house, but it's also a privilege to share the stage with friends. i've known governor dean for several years. we actually agree on issues more often than not, believe it or not, and we always joke about that. julie mason, who, of course, now is at siriusxm, and i actually had the privilege to host a show on the same potus channel, 124, with former governor jon huntsman on saturday mornings which is a thrill. and i particularly want to give a shoutout to ed rollins, someone i've known for a long time and i'm honored to call both a friend and a mentor to of mine. i was in dallas last friday to get a chance to sit down with president bush for a little while, and i can tell you that he is very happy, he is very healthy, and he's in great spirits following his administration. the president was at the bush presidential center to unveil something called america's pastime, america's presidents. and if you know anything about george w. bush, he is a huge

baseball buff, and so what better opportunity to find the former president in good spirits to talk about his favorite as time. now, how do you turn from dallas, where the president was in good spirits last week, to a conference here at hofstra on long island to talk about the george w. bush administration in general, and more particularly, to talk about how we communicated in the white house? and so i think, of course, the best place for me to start is the beginning. i started on day one in the george w. bush white house as the deputy domestic policy adviser to vice president cheney before moving over to be a special assistant to president george w. bush in 2002. and from day one, what we tried to do was we tried to define how the president would communicate his policies to the american people who had elected him as well as our friends and allies around the world. and in the way that we sought to do this this the opening days, karl rove -- who was the

president's senior adviser -- he had a organization that he brought together on a fairly regular basis of all of the senior staff in the white house. and he nicknamed the group or he dubbed the group the blair house group. and if you have to ask why, yes, they did actually meet in the blair house. and what they did was they sat down, and they looked at the president's policies, they looked at his messaging, they looked at all sorts of things of how are we positioning president bush for success, and how do we make sure that we keep him there and keep him on message? again, these were the most senior folks, the folks with the title of assistant to the president which in a white house, the folks who are at the most senior level, the national security adviser, the press secretary, all those folks would gather around. but karl rove is pretty smart. he recognized that those who sit around the senior staff table at the white house every morning might not necessarily give him the most candid advice. so he dubbed and brought together a second group of which

i was a part of called the conspiracy of deputies. and he figured, well, the deputies have nothing to prove except, of course, giving their candid counsel to rove, and they might be a little more forthcoming about really where are we? is the president really messing up, or is the president doing a good job? now, i bring this up because in one of the earliest meetings we had in the conspiracy of deputies, we sat down and we thought what does a george w. bush presidency look like. this was early, of course, in 2001. how are we going the make our mark, how are we going to communicate to the world who we are. the first thing that we sought to do and we talked about is we wanted to be a different kind of republican, wanted to position the president as a different kind of republican and communicate that as such. and to do this, we wanted to look at new ways to communicate our policies, we wanted to offer new solutions and, of course, we wanted to look to try to find different coalitions that we could build upon beyond our traditional base that had

elected him to office. and second, one of the things we wanted to do was to make sure president bush could try to change the tone this washington and to communicate that he sought to change the tone this washington. here we argued over things like how do we stress personal responsibility, how do we share credit for success with our allies and, of course, how can we treat others with dignity and respect rather than attacking one another. and concurrent to these efforts that i just mentioned, we also sought to deliver on what we promised. and for president bush that meant, of course, number one, reforming public education, number two, finding ways to have institutions of faith to work together, to modernize social security and, of course, to find a prescription drug benefit as part of the medicare program. now, i'll let the historians assess our specific track record of success, but i think if you look at many of the domestic accomplishments that we sought out to do, i think this that we did a fairly good job. be before i close, i want to really give you a sense very briefly on how we communicated

internally to make sure that our message was being articulated properly to the country and to the world. twice a week karl rove and karen hughes would bring together a group called the message meeting, and in case you're wondering, yes, we talked about the message. but what was the message? we would talk about president bush's calendar the day following the day we were sitting in a meeting, and we'd go three months out. and we'd talk about everything from who he would meet, where he would travel, what he would visit and what he would say and to make sure that we were on message. did we have a strong theme? did we have a purpose? and, of course, with the president of the united states, the most valuable commodity that they have, is their time. were we properly utilizing his time? now, beyond this we would sit and we would say we need to make sure that his policy time, the policies that he's articulated when you look at no child left behind, when you look at modernizing social security, that that time was well spent as

well. and if message meetings were those to sort of take it beyond the walls of the white house, i think the most difficult meeting that i had to be a part of was something called the policy deputies. and josh bolton, who was then our white house chief of staff, would bring together every single policy deputy in the white house policy council, the homeland security council, folks at the national security council, and we'd say i need time on the president's calendar next week. and we had these big easels that were on josh's back wall, and it would say monday there's 20 minutes available, tuesday there are 10 minutes available, and literally josh would let the policy deputies fight it out. i need five minutes of the president's time because x. and then another deputy might say, well, ron, that doesn't make sense because the theme of the message we have this week, that's off message. that's not what the president is seeking to talk about. and from an internal perspective of making sure that we really zealously guarded his time so that he could prepare for his

speeches and prepare to go out and to interact with the american people as well as our internal discussion cans of dealing with folks if you're going to get to the oval office, you've got to make sure you're utilizing that time properly, we felt in the first term of the bush administration this was the best way for us to move forward beyond the podium, beyond the press secretary. and it's a shame that scott mcclellan is not with us this morning, because there's so much more complex apparatus at play in a white house and particularly this george w. bush white house of are we on message, are we communicating and are those communications resonating? and i'll leave you with a funny story. so it's not all seriousness, and it's not all, you know, is it all about poll numbers and, you know, where's the president coming up, coming down. so after 9/11 the vice president of the united states was often in secure and undisclosed locations that we euphemistically dubbed as the cave. i'm a big fan of saturday night live, and on one particular saturday night they had daryl

hammond, the comedian,i] who had been tapped to play dick cheney. and they had him in this little cave in afghanistan, and he had a little -- where his heart was supposed to be, he had a little coffee maker, and it said i'm invincible, i'm invisible and, oh, this is sanka, tastes great. and i went to our policy heating with cheney where, of course, we're supposed to focus on policy, and i said, hey, boss, did you see that saturday night live skit they did about you with daryl hammond? he said, no, i didn't. i said, oh, i happened to bring a copy. [laughter] this was vhs, for you students who don't have vhs machines. and we put it in the machine, and scooter libby looked like he was going to kill me, and the vice president was laughing. we paid very close attention not only to the way that we sought to communicate with the public, but what the public wanted to communicate back to us both through satire as well as through serious discussions. thank all very much, and i really look forward to our discussion. will[applause]

>> so thank you, ron. that was -- i've never been inside a white house press operation, and certainly not the bush white house press operation. so i'm going to take a slightly differentçç tact. i think that most people here know that i have extremely strong views about this particular president's administration and his successes or lack of same both on foreign and domestic, which i don't see a lot of point reiterating. but i do want to make some observations that i think are fair and will be surprising to most of you. first of all, i knew president bush for six years while he was governor and i was governor, and he's a good guy. and i liked him a lot. and he was quite a stand-up guy. he kept his word on some business dealings between vermont and texas that he didn't have to do, refunded us some money that we felt we were owed, and he was probably within his legal rights not to take. so i like him as a human being. i had some personal interactions

withw3 my family that caused meo do that. and the other thing was he was a very good politician, and he doesn't get a lot of credit for being a great politician because he followed, in my view, the greatest politician in terms of his political skills which was bill clinton. you won't see another bill clinton in your lifetime, and i'm talking to the students here. the last one with his talent was not jack kennedy, it was franklin roosevelt, and we don't see people like that very often. bush was a very good politician. he was good with people. he related to people well, and i tell you these things in context because i think the relationship between the media and george w. bush was not a great one, although it often isn't with presidents. it's not a particularly good one now. and it's probably because of the character of the media, which i want to spend the bulk of my time on. i divide the bush presidency from a pr point of view into four. the first is the postelection phase. he really, you know, the election was a disputed

election. in fact, i would argue that al gore actually won, but the supreme court decided to do something different. and i actually say that not to be a smart ass and antagonize ron who's clearing his throat and taking his blood pressure madly. [laughter] i say that because there is a mechanism to elect the president when the election is in dispute, and it has nothing to do with the supreme court. it's congress. gore was partially responsible because he could have just said, well, we appreciate the supreme court's views, but the congress has the ultimate say. and we might have lost that anyway. but that -- so i think his numbers after he got to the president were not as good as most presidents would be because there wasn't this sort of coronation, it was a really ugly process. then there was the post-9/11, and his numbers were in the 90s for the same reason that every president who takes, who presides over a country which has been attacked or a president who presides over a country where troops are sent in

america's interests, their numbers are great, and everybody wants to support the president regardless of how far away they may be in their political views. then came the iraq war, and initially, of course, there was a huge surge of support for the president because these were our troops, and everybody conflates supporting the troops and supporting the president. that began to be a liability after it had been there for a while. and finally, and i think this was in some ways he never recovered from this, was katrina. and i'd love to know from ron, because i have no idea whose idea it was to send him over looking out of a jet down on a thousand people or whoever that had drowned. and, you know, but again, i want to reiterate this by saying i like george w. bush as a human being, and i don't think that he meant any of the things that people accused him of meaning. i think it was a pr blunder, and it probably wasn't his fault. let me just say one last thing

since i'm about to hand it off to a member of the fourth estate -- [laughter] i think the press has been a failed institution in this country for at least three presidencies. and i think, i mean it in this way. the relationships between the chief executive have, of necessity, been somewhat hostile for a long time. and i think that's a good thing. i teach a foreign policy course, and one of the things it's amazing to me to look at the old -- even back to eisenhower and even kennedy where people would be, press members would be herded into the oval office, they'd have a conversation with the president of the united states maybe four or five or six people, almost always men in those days, of course, and then on the way out the press secretary would say, by the way, boys, that was all off the record. and it would be off the record, and it would never appear in print. now, that's an incredibly cozy relationship which really is not in the best interests of democracy, to have that kind of

relationship. since that time we're at the opposite pole. and it leads to all kinds of problems. and we're at the opposite pole not because reporters are evil people, although there is a few like there are in every profession, we're at the opposite pole because of the corporation of the media. with the exception of one channel, ed, where the owner whispers in the ear about what not to say, it's because of the corporatization of the media every news show is now a profit center. walter cronkite used to lose money for cbs every year. bill paley didn't care because he had the host viewers, and he could make it all up feeding into, you know, beat the clock or whatever was next after the news. today if you're not making money, you're getting your staff cut, you're getting your salaries cut, you can't send foreign operations. even the best news organizations in america don't have nearly the foreign cover orage they once

had. ap is a shadow of its former self in terms of its employees and where it covers. so it's -- and this is because the news has become a profit center, and it is driving down the quality of news. the pressure in newsrooms is enormous. it's not get it right anymore, it's get it first, and then we can fix it later in subsequent editions, and it is murderous. you used to work for politico, and you -- i know people, of course, this is washington. the pressure is so great, you may do four, five, six stories in a day. in the old days you used to do two stories in a week and get your byline out there, and that was a big deal. it's a very different industry. and it's not -- i think it's not a different industry simply because there are terrible people who are reporters. i don't believe that. you know, that's not true. reporters are interesting, and they're fun, and they want to do the right thing, and they're usually in it for the right reasons. but the pressure on them to do things for the wrong reasons is enormous. and it affected president bush, it's affected president obama,

president clinton, and it may have started with nixon. i don't know. i mean, i'm not sure when the magical time was that it suddenly went south on us, but it's an enormous, enormous problem. and all these three presidents, certainly clinton, bush and obama, have created walls where they don't talk to the media, they manipulate the media, they give certain people favorable interviews, essentially on the unspoken deal that if they get a bad article, they'll never get another interview like this. it's a very, very tough environment, and i think it didn't serve president bush well, it hasn't served president obama well, and it didn't serve president clinton well. i think it's a big problem, and i think we're going to have to have a debate not just about what happened in the bush administration, we're going to have to have a big debate about where the future of the media is and what the social media means and there's no referee and no editor anymore. i would argue there hasn't been an editor for a long time because i know a lot of reporters who basically say the

editor writes the story before you get the quotes and then comes back and remassages the story once you get back to the newsroom. that's not a good model, and we need the fourth estate. you can talk about wall street and congress failing. they can fail. but what you cannot have a is a press that doesn't exert its freedom and its judgment, because that's the only reason that a democracy works. the only reason a democracy works is somebody independently has to hold us accountable for what we do in the political stream, and that's been a very, very difficult task in the last three presidencies. [applause] >> thanks, governor. [laughter] no, i don't disagree with anything you said. i would add on top of that that people expect their news for free now. they don't want to pay for it. >> absolutely true. >> and it's a big problem. and maybe some, at some point today we can talk about why your friend george bush never made it to vermont, the only state in

the united states where he never went. >> only four electoral votes. three, three -- >> there were warrants out for him. [laughter] >> we also had a crazy governor up there. >> yeah. [laughter] >> there was a lot going on with vermont. for me, obviously, the major story on coverage of the bush administration when we talk about the bush administration is what i think many of us can agree is the stunning failure of the news media to provide a critical bulwark against the administration's highly effective propaganda campaign to sell the war in iraq. scott mcclellan's term, a propaganda campaign. but it's wrong to say no one in the media asked questions at this time. the questions were asked, the answers were terrible that we got from this administration. freedom is on the march was a regular answer. also the strategy is victory and the evil ones. there are also a number of factors i think that we forget sort of atmospherics around this

time that must be considered in context when we talk about press coverage of the bush administration. as the golf mentioned, bush's approval ratings were very strong. the average for his first term was 62. can you -- barack obama would kill a man to get to 62% right now. overall it fluctuated in his first term from 90% down to about 52%. still incredibly good for a first-term president. people were terrified after 9/11, they were willing to believe anything. after a strong effort by the administration to conflate 9/11 and iraq, 70% of americans in one poll agreed that iraq was responsible for 9/11. of course, even the administration was kind of saying in the side of their mouth iraq had nothing to do with it, but we were attacked, and saddam must go. [laughter] so at the same time while all this was happening, the news industry was in a crisis. it's leveled off now, but as the governor mentioned, still in

terrible shape. by the end of the bush administration, more than 17,000 journalists had lost their jobs. because of the recession, not because of president bush. [laughter] these included hundreds in washington, d.c. including me. i got laid off in the very last days of the bush administration from a newspaper where are i had covered news for 20 years. and i was the white house reporter. so everyone was losing their jobs. it was terrible. it was, it was a scary, depressing, miserable time in the industry, and i think what a lot of us forget when we want and hope journalists to occupy the church of truth that it is a business, and these businesses don't make money anymore. and it's really, really tough. even when you look at the washington post right now, which is a wonderful paper with a terrific history, a lot of their headlines are clique-based. written on the fly, very fast by kids sitting at desks that don't make a lot of phone calls that don't get out of the office very much. but back to the first bush term.

democrats in congress, many democrats in congress were echoing what the administration was saying about iraq, making the very same statements. there was not -- naysayers were sidelined and marginalized and sort of made fun of. and there wasn't much of a robust opposition for journalists to cover. shortly after 9/11, of course, we had the anthrax attacks targeting washington leaders and journalists. in the meantime, the fbi director said another terrorist attack was inevitable, and all night long over washington, d.c. fighter jets patrolled the skies, and meanwhile, the d.c. sniper attacks began. so all this was going on all at once. and we talk about, like, going from crisis to crisis now. that's what it was like back then. and it's hard to remember now, but these were the days of love ya, w., and get'er done, norman green balm was proud to be an american, and we heard it over and over. and it seems like so long ago.

of course, bush left office with two unpopular wars, a 35% job approval rating. it's very chic to complain about the media, why didn't the media do its job, and i stipulate much of that, it was not -- there was some critical reporting. a lot of people didn't want to hear it. when a president has a 90% approval rating, they don't want to hear gripey stories from the press. but i just wanted to put some of that in interspective -- perspective to describe what it was like to cover bush at the time. there are so many other stories, and i hope we get to them, including katrina, the president's trip to graceland with the japanese prime minister, of course, why bush never went to vermont and jenna's wedding. [laughter] that was a highlight. [laughter] thank you. [applause] >> can you imagine every day you

get up and you go to work at 6 or 7:00 in the morning every single day, you've got world crisis to deal with, you have economic crisis to deal with, you basically start a day -- most of the white house staff comes in at 7, 8:00. you have a senior staff meeting, president starts the meetings all day long and spend 60, 70% of your time dealing with international events, probably higher today. you do a very effective job, you keep making decisions all day long, and the people who are going to interpret what you've done are the press corps. and so it's not that we try and manipulate you, and -- and if you look around this room, this is about the size of what a press corps is every day. and a press secretary steps out front, stands up and says here's what the president did today, and here's why we did it and what have you. and then you try and coordinate the message. i think president bush, i'm a big fan of, and i think,

obviously, his troubled presidency as any man in the sense that he inherited things that came into the environment. i think he learned a lot from his dad, and he didn't want to duplicate his dad, he wanted to duplicate a lot of what the reagan administration did, and i was a part of the reagan administration. and we stepped in in our premise, and it was a much different environment, we were going to control our story. we weren't going to let the national media -- you had a job to do, and you were not going to write our press releases, and you were oi not going to -- so how could we basically drive our message, our story and do it in a very coordinated way? now, unfortunately for president, first president bush, 41, when he got elected and he thought, okay, i'm going to do it differently than president reagan did. i'm not going to have the coordinated effort, i'm not going to have a story of the week, i'm not going to have everybody talking on the same page. i'm going to meet the press. throw anything you want to allow at me, and he did. unfortunately, when you do that, if each and every one of you are

writing a story and it's not a controlled story, you ask questions, then basically you go 25 different directions. and i think to a certain extent even though 41's presidency is being re-examined and given much higher marks than it was when he left office, but to the bush people, the bush w., 43, the father had lost. a very good man had lost and why did he lose. when they went back and looked at things, part of it was they weren't able to tell their stories effectively. when they came into office -- and i wasn't a part of the administration, i was just an observer, and you were, christie, and i think you'll agree with me. they had karen hughes, and karen had been one of president bush's closest advisers. she'd been a newsroom anchor in texas. she came up with him. and she was clearly one of the real strengths of his administration initially. ari fleischer, the first press secretary, had not been a bush person. he'd been elizabeth dole's person. but karen had a great

relationship with the president and could put real discipline into it and budget afraid of karl rove. and karl rove, obviously, had to tread carefully around her. unfortunately, she left after two years in the administration to go back home. she had a young family, and there were pressures for her to go back. she came back in the administration later as deputy secretary of state, but i think when she was there, there was a real discipline. obviously, when you've got stories like the bombings of the trade centers and the pentagon, what have you, all variety of things, you sort of lose track of whatever it is that you want -- >> you want to talk about education, everybody else wants to talk about something else. i don't think you can underestimate the difference in the media today. we take it all for granted. you young people don't know any difference. but when we were in the reagan white house which was sort of the beginning of the modern how do you control television, your story, others had tried it before, but i think we did it pretty effectively. we had cbs, nbc, abc, pbs.

cnn first came into existence, and the white house did not credit them. they had to go to federal court, and the four networks said they weren't a legitimate news agency, and a federal judge said they are. the world changed dramatically. by the time you got to bush 43, you had fox, you had cnbc, msnbc, you had the main news, and it was the beginning of the blog area. so it used to be you could control your story. whatever "the new york times," "the washington post" published that morning, your job all day long was to make sure your story didn't get complicated by what they were covering, and your battle was to make sure on the network news that night going for a million people reading it in the washington times and the new "the new york post" to the 30 or 40 million people watching on tv. so you had an entire day to basically manipulate, manage -- i don't like manipulate, but manage your story. today since today something breaks, 15 seconds later it's on

being, 30 seconds later it's on one of the networks, it's on one of the cable news networks, and i think when the bush people came in particularly after the feeding frenzy, i agree with howard, bill clinton's the most difficulted politician i've seen in my lifetime, and i've worked for pretty good ones, but he understood politics very well. didn't control his message all the time very well -- [laughter] i think to a certain extent a lot of what the bush people wanted to do was really control the message, make sure what we thought was important -- again, not writing your press release or your stories, but we thought was important to try to get out there. the other had a very important, and i think you can never underestimate this, george w. bush was, would go nuts about leaks. and so they really had a no-leak policy. and i mean, there was a great discipline in that white house about not leaking stories. and every time there was a leak -- and i tell reagan

stories, one time bill casey came into the senior staff of the white house which is about 12-14 people to complain about cia stuff getting leaked, and 15 minutes after he left the white house correspondent for "the washington post" said that eight people in that meeting had called to say bill casey was briefing about leaks, they had leaked the story. [laughter] we had a pretty leaky ship in our administration, and i think, obviously, the other administrations had. so i think the discipline was there. i think the team was good. i think a lot of the problem was the press had changed dramatically, and it's there today. it's now forever, even though we've lost a lot of the great editors and entities that used to be we considered mainstream media, today you've got so many fundamental differences out there today, and those 17,000 journalists that got displaced, unfortunately not all writing blogs or doing whatever without an editor trying to make sure the stories weren't there. so i think the bush administration was affected more by the events and the lack of an

ability to control that environment. you don't control wars, you don't control terrorism, you don't control the economic breakdown. and as much as they attempted to do all that -- and i think they were pretty darn good at it -- it just, the stories were just overwhelming. ..

a thoughtful hard to sell good stories on the economic razors but he had a different environment with a different economy would have been sitting here praising the president who understood the media and country for every one of them. [applause] >> the first thing i would like to do is give the panelists the opportunity to respond to anything they would like to weigh in on before i ask a question or two. >> i appreciate remarks from all the other panelists about what a likable guy george w. bush was good we has to joke he was smarter and meaner than he got credit for but he also respected the role of the press would have us to our ranch for dinner.

president obama could name 10 people who spent the last six years covering him. bush knew all of them and their cameramen and wives and he was really personable and fun to cover. >> i have a question about that. before he had a press conference, they would decide ahead of time who would be called on and in what order. i think bush was the first one to do that. >> clinton didn't come out with a list? [inaudible] >> there was an order so people got called on in press conferences prior to basically the networks and then he went to

the press. what happened is you couldn't distinguish anymore who was important. anybody could wear a red dress, ways must aggressively pa i think again, i am sure that was part of the discipline. let's not call in someone who will make the common dairy which so many of them did. you would see the fox person want to make a statement and basically by the way mr. president, do you want to comment on my state? if i was therapeutic same thing. >> it's annoying but i don't think it's regarded as terribly sinister. if the president wanted to question the automaker bailout, i don't think anyone would begrudge the detroit news getting a question in that one

expects tv to get a question in which newspapers are called on. they spread it out over time. >> "new york times" is the end from the plane which i have to say i might've done to if i wanted it. >> i think it's important to underscore the bushes are known for their discipline. you show to the offices 630 in the morning and stay until 8:00 or 9:00 at night and he would work an eight hour day on saturday. it was the one thing andy carter chief of staff taught us is you never get out before the president. that is you don't talk to the press about his policies until the president has announced them. you them. you'd also them. you'd also been sure to your friends and talk about this is what the president will do next week. when the white house press secretary has an announcement to make about scheduler policies, that is when it will be made. we were extraordinarily disciplined from the first term

i was there from 2001 2,122,004 and that is particularly the early years of the enforcer but also a brilliant strategic communications strategist and a lot goes with the passage of time forgotten how we approached it at discipline first and foremost is the president had not been in possession about your ego of getting out of front of the president. >> in that administration, some of the powerful women became players not just in the white house, but he really had -- the women in the press corps of communications were very strong and obviously had great influence. >> one of the things i like to ask you about we haven't talked a lot about the bush

administration, the george w. bush an assertion was happening at a time of unbelievable change in the media. i went to laos and things like that. to me, one of the landmark moment came in 1998 when the starr report into various allegations was published including its entirety online. a week before that in california a company called google was incorporated. there's not even in the water yet, but by 2004, you have actually howard dean's campaign been a pioneer in the use of the web as the fund-raising mechanism. you also have the beginning of internet and various web and also the year the 60 minutes to

dan rather investigation into bush's texas air national guard service is exploded by bloggers who have a greater knowledge of typography and the producers at cbs seem to have. in 2006, twitter can underway. a lot of them that is the first place they will turn when news breaks. this is a nontrivial change and my question is how well do you think the bush administration managed that change and were they leaders or followers or not even figuring it out. >> let me take a first step but that aired the way we have technology and the bush administration, we were literally at a crossroads in the crossroads came into play september 112,001.

all the cell phone towers in d.c. for a network went down and that was the name user mechanism for a lot of us to communicate and after 9/11, the novel times said we would now carry a blackberry which most of us had never heard us before an order to communicate with each other. we had heard of it, but we did have it. if you look at the way we also used digital media, the white house photographer was taking still photos in 2001, 2002, 2003. we didn't digitize until 2004. when you look at the way the students communicate today, hash type it and i still don't understand facebook. i think the challenge was recognizing the technology without they are and how can we not only put the president into the new technology, but how can

we utilize the staff. he noticed president obama carries the black berry. president bush did not. president obama used his e-mail. by the time you get in the 2006, 2007, the white house staff was more sophisticated dealing with the emerging technology for four cousins in the obama administration, night in a technological capabilities and the tools they have to get their message out versus what we have. >> mike hayden which was one of russia's cia director is giving talk earlier today about the crossroads of china and should go in on in terms of security and it strikes me who is really at the crossroads of an environment generational change in the world, not just america.

you have warfare and nation states for 300 or 400 years suddenly becoming individual groups who would use disruption and even al qaeda which i thought was a terrific talk is now sort of an institution and iss is the non-institution. it is really at doomsday cult which is incredibly in fact they've using methods no one could dream up other than people like charlie manson who didn't have the reach of rollins. the bush administration was at a crossroads of a lot of things that were happening in the world, not just american generation and young people looking at institutions in a completely different way. george w. bush happened to be presiding which i don't think i've made presidency easier. one of the fundamental misunderstandings that we base going into iraq on his iraq was

a country. while it was in a country. iraq was a creation of an agreement between european powers a hundred years ago that made no sense of what the president did in the iraq war was still on roof all of that and the forces nobody had any idea were as powerful as they were. the same thing is true of technology. the revolution going on around the world and led in the united states and the bush people have been to be there at the time. to say that the bush people don't understand technology he is not really fair. that is like singing william shakespeare didn't understand literature 300 years later. you just got caught in the enormous historical change that affected everything. not just technology, not just

the media but the existence of the nationstate itself began to change in the fundamental beliefs of the people trained in the past 40 or 50 years became onboard during the bush administration which had nothing to do with george w. bush himself for the people he hired. there was not a whole lot they can do about it except play catch up. >> i go back to the point about discipline. you always want in the campaign or white house. you can't tell 100 stories. i'm sure the administration this week want to tell a story of the nuclear iran negotiations going on. a massive plane crash yesterday, you obviously have the bombing that tape place last night. all of a sudden whenever the original game plan was a different track. the hardest part is you see everybody sitting here with iphone like this and there's a

temptation to go respond and as a press person or strategist, what have you, to have the discipline to say i got this text from julie who wants an answer right now. i sent a text answering her question and i would totally move away from my agenda to her agenda. the way to maintain in the future is extraordinarily harder. i was mike huckabee's chairman and we were doing and 19 iowa with some momentum there. when you get to iowa, all of a sudden by the end you have 10 people. by the end you've got every major press person in the world with press conferences like this. we had probably 150 bloggers with 500 on the phone. we had the mainstream media off behind the cameras. i said this is the future control in that message is very

hard. i think it is not outside a thousand times what it used to be. i could walk into -- i used to have an office in times square. you walk into times square and you are bombarded by billboards, lights and the whole bit. everyone of those filberts cuts five, 10, $20 million plus the rental fees. i defy anyone to walk into times square and come up with a message. if you put those in des moines, iowa, people would drive 50 miles to see the billboard. today we live in a world of clutter. whether it's your network, trying to find how you get your message told inconsistency will be a mixture of air challenge for campaigns and white house even more so. >> and it's going to get much

worse. the number of americans who watch the evening news on the three major networks is not only a fraction of before but the average age is well over 50. the average cable viewer is 62 years old. and the reason the numbers are so high is because there's the bell curve and it stops at 35. nobody watches any of this death. -- this stuff. >> it's going to age out last. >> the truth of the matter is all of this stuff, the evening news which is still the biggest way of getting the news out is disappearing. we are not at the end of the transition. we are in the first quarter. for this problem with controlling message will only get more and more difficult as

there becomes hundreds of thousands of ways people get their news. if something is on the front page of "the new york times," "washington post," "l.a. times" on the three networks it is still a big story. in 15 years that may not be true anymore. >> at those institutions still exists. >> one of the fascinating things to track over time at the white house correspondents association came out with a new seating chart. and if you look at the bush administration we saw media. we had been seated and yahoo!. >> i'll ask one other question and turn it over to the audience. we started talking about the conspiracy of deputies and how

to communicate internally and externally the message. is one of the things that people sometimes don't understand that it not as if the word manipulation has. you would be irresponsible as a public figure if you were spending a lot of time trying to figure out how to get out the message you were trying to get out. if you are lying or deceiving you conceal evidence. trying to get your message out one thing i remember discovering when i worked in city hall in new york in the 80s as if you were the press secretary you had to be in policy meetings because it's a very good thing for the public is somebody in the meeting is asking how are we going to feel the decision is on the front page of the daily news. we could talk about the way in which the pr people are not implementers of the strategy, but they are guiding policies.

>> it's an interesting question because one of the offices you've never heard of nor should you as the office of the staff secretary in the white house. largely out of public view and the secretary deals with all the paper flow that comes to warfare the president. suppose the president you briefed in the oval office said they had articulated to get there in 2001. look at governor dean's not know and say this looks good to me or say paragraph 3 i don't agree with this. before something gets to the president, every major department head has to sign off on that.he made say the

president and senior staff is the myth of the unaccounted agencies if necessary. this articulates what your policy is. how that relates to the oval office and then the press apparatus has worked his entire policy briefings for the last three years, i can't think of a time in the oval office we didn't have regarding fleischer or someone from the communications office sitting there and their presence was not as a policy role, but if they couldn't communicate with the policy was, what the message was, going back to as pointed out about this appointment and the same page. and "the communicators" in policy gigs for lack of a better word had to find a way to work together. here is exactly what the

president's policies are in "the communicators" want to find a sexier way of putting it out there. so we really had a strong relationship for "the communicators." they couldn't articulate what the president was trying to convey. public policy and no administration that ran in and night than in for, you don't make decisions to good pr. you have to sell your public policy decisions. it is a complex process and they do what they think is in the best interest of the country. and it's always a counterpoint. one of the difficulties and the

messages you want, they want to do their own thing. and they'd be more interesting and transportation in the homeland security on the crash and the alps as it is something else. you were always fighting to make sure that you can go out. the key thing we have to understand and one of the things that's never occurred before is isis and all the rest among american pr and they are out there telling their story very effectively, chopping off a man's patter crucifying a manner setting them on fire. that's outrageous. that is the terrorism about. they do that to create terrorism. all of a sudden the guy is beheaded on network television that night and whatever the message of the day is probably diminished and they want you to

respond to whatever that may be. back to the point about discipline, maybe that not the best thing to do or the best argument. so it's very hard and a lot of conflicts in the white house and bond the messaging side of it. >> bush called the press the filter. he wanted to speak directly because they distorted his words and put it through a sieve of darkness and he didn't feel like it held up well under that skirt knee. he started as president obama has perfect game. he was terrible, no accountability. bush was like the most open, giving, sharing person you can imagine and it's much more responsive of the current

administration. it's naturally relationship at odds. they want to tell their positive that this story. and that's not what we want to do. and bush was grade at taking questions to the judgment of the day. he was buried till you're done and take whatever questions you had on your mind. in that way the administration is able to move first or as quickly. agassi president obama holding back and we won't hear from him until months and when you finally get access, reporters are asking the 12 car questions and no one can remember what question three was in the long soliloquy but there's so much to ask of you so much with never had a chance to ask them because the cycle goes on and on. when i talk about a state run media and talking about photo

releases. instead of photographers in the oval office for a routine bill signing a significant or something of note which president bush would do an newest disadvantage to do so, now we don't get that. now to get a photo taken by white house photographer which is no different than a press release expect you not without any sort of scrutiny or accountability. the president doesn't like the press. bush didn't like what the press did. he understood and respected the role the press played. he was much more accessible in a casual way like his oval office encounters which reporters were standing there in modern questions. president obama doesn't like that. he doesn't do it. throughout both administrations, the best information came from outside the administration so you report around it. people on the hill, now value

everything. so those people are gold. and the diplomatic corps and sometimes in the agencies. you don't go to the briefing and get your news. that is not what it is about. >> i will share the tricks of the trade. when i was governor and on the campaign we would avoid the big papers. when i got tired i would go on the road and do small paper interviews. they never got a chance to interview the governor. usually write the way i wanted to read it. when i was on the campaign trail, in defense of the big papers, they will not write the same story every day, but you have to get the same speech every day, five times a day because that is what you do on campaigns. i give a speech for the 25th time on a friday and they will find something else. they will delve into some

opposition some researcher gave them. of course it is in my interest to limit that and that is why you have these tactics people use. one of the reasons he doesn't do many bill signing if congress doesn't pass any bills. >> he met with hillary clinton to hillary clinton this week and i wasn't on the schedule. >> it's a newsworthy event. you're just setting up a system for the next president ted cruz will bring it to the next level. [inaudible] >> you heard it here first. [laughter] will start with questions and then a couple people here with microphones. i would like to go to student questions first if we can. once again, please do the

question right there. we will come to you next. >> this question is for mr. christie. i was wondering, what was the message communicated after the week of 9/11? >> it was a tough day for the country. it was a tough day to be in the white house and a tough day to advise the vice resident of the united state. our entire focus went from over called the domestic priorities with no child left behind to working on a tax cut to domestic consequences. how do we reopen new york city than 814th st.? we grounded all civil aviation and close most of the maritime courts in the country and the

president a few days later at the national prayer celebration and in the days after 9/11, our focus went to prayer and remembrance for those who lost their lives as well as the opportunity to heal a sick country. when you look at what our message was, president bush tried to reassure the country at every agency and entity was doing everything they could to prevent an attack again and we also needed to move forward and heal and the terrorists would win if we sit calmed and sat around and felt hard for ourselves. is a very difficult period for us as a country and it is difficult in the white house but ultimately in julie mentioned this earlier that you noticed the ratings to go up in the 90s because the early

messaging people felt he was doing everything he could to protect the country. >> two important things he did as an observer, there was a memorial at the national cathedral and there've been lots of stories about the president, the white house and young kids and what have you and no one was sure who would be charged and we have this extraordinary service televised and the time of television and billy graham gave an extraordinary speech with one of the great religious leaders and matthew was walking up i said to myself, is there every time you you had a home run is now. he did. he basically got up and following billy graham which is not easy to gave an extraordinary speech. he went right straight from their two new york and they came

on the stage and those two events, the visual was it was more powerful and the message was that the time coming together. sometimes the activity, someone mentioned earlier the fly by on katrina. that was a foolish after to show the president was not in charge and the white house picture was not a deliberate effort. the president that dignity is sometimes more powerful than anywhere else and that was the message back in charge. they wouldn't let us get to the president at his finest because it was hand and he is a man of real integrity and a man who is always underestimated and basically rows and grew in a job in a very difficult time. >> can they do the person to

rose in front. >> i was wondering if you could talk about the effects of new technology or modern media >> i don't think it's over. >> one is the president has a role in everybody looks to the president at a time of great crisis. at that time, everybody's going to focus on that and anybody who doesn't focus will not be paid. if you write a blog about recipes on a day where something like that is going on, fine, good luck. that is what people are focusing on. something had been in passing

which is incredibly important to remember for communications remembers and it's more important than what you say. when i find out how effect do it is i turn the sound off. if someone has done well in a debate or not, i turned the sound off. if you look like a leader or a president, then you've done well and it almost doesn't matter thus he said something absolutely outrageous which some of us on the stage had done from time to time. [laughter] but there is always the role for a central performance in a time of crisis and that is when you have to hit it out of the park. the visual of george bush standing up with a bull's horn could've said i'm having spaghetti for dinner. he would've still gotten great

credit. >> one thing is important about speeches in the future for any of you who want to beast be traitors to ronald reagan and i traveled every day for six years. how long do you think i can hold an audience? one of the greatest speech makers ever. he said watch the audience. personality president gets up, the first five minutes as an adulation and it doesn't matter what you say. he was 200 sprinters and set up to 20 meters. he would get out fast, coast in the middle. you could hold an audience, watch the audience. for 23 minutes, why do you think television shows are 23 minutes and he said -- my point as that they have speeches for an hour

and a half. you really have to think in terms of the future getting your message across and 20, 25 minute and make it count and make it memorable and have some line in their. and richard nixon was the guy who was a great speechmaker although there were great writers and people around them. what was the soundbite in the news that night and you had to gas. nine times out of 10 once you do the drill you know where it is going to be and that is all the soundbite is going to be. you now have to put together a string of eight or 10 soundbite, but you have to weave that together. it's more difficult to write speeches today. sometimes for reagan and bush and others is peggy noonan.

many speechwriters ray for the history books. they write this extraordinary read the document and say it's pretty interesting. peggy had been dan rather's writer on cbs news and understood the spoken word. in both movies and commentary and what have you, he understood the spoken word is different than the written word. basically writing for the written word, which as you hear it differently than you do visually is very in this day and age. >> other questions? >> thank you. building on the previous question that was asked, i want to ask the panel the innovation technology will affect policymaking in the future. >> directly about technology or

policy in the broadest sense. >> it's about technology as well from a military standpoint relatively speaking. that needs to be in terms of the bush administration. we have seen leaps and bounds and the type of technolog available all around does. i was wondering how developing and managed policymaking as technology advances, what are the changes we will be seeing? >> in terms of technology itself is a huge battles over at things most americans don't understand like net neutrality. go down the subway this afternoon and ask about net neutrality, anybody over 40 will have no idea what you're talking about chances are. they are not well understood by people making the policies

because most of them are over 40. the long-term implications and the people who use the net. a second piece is about security. policy will change dramatically and there is a terrific talk about the balance between listening in and how many people you have to listen in on. in the old days you could find out all the things to do than 300 people can pick out the likely thing. clearly you can't do it any other way because you don't have a nationstate that the danger to us as much as they diffused movement any one of whom in any location could get an arm or a weapon and harm people. you have to have this huge attachment. the nature of security policy will change dramatically and is

already changing dramatically. finally what we've been talking about is the nature of technology changing the way in which you talk about policy and it has to change and probably the way to formulate policy as a result of more inking about that but the most complex interaction. >> laws and regulations are keeping up with technology. the patriot act in nsa's surveillance can't keep up with how fast technology grows and members of congress are not always that tech savvy. lindsey graham saying he doesn't do his own twitter feed and never sent an e-mail. these are u.s. senators. >> the requirements putting up one of the things that i am concerned about as communicators is i was not a grace didn't and

basically my daughter harasses me all the time. i graduated in the upper two thirds, but i was always a reader have always read x newspapers a day and i knew every point of view and i evolved from a liberal democrat to the right of most people in this room probably. but at the end of the day, one of the things that bothers me but the technology question is people are very narrow. so you have the capacity to say i'm not going to read any conservative chunk. i will greet these everyday so i know what is happening. my sense is that is a dangerous long term because it reinforces your point of view and you don't see -- there's no flexibility.

what i've said repeatedly to people around the country, and all of the issues we deal with today, all the policy issues are complex. there's no easy answers. if there was easy answers, it would be done. fixing education in new york city with the dedication, if it was easy, it not easy. he did a great job but he doesn't want another run at it. at the end of the day, i hope when you think in terms of policy, you have to have a broader scope and the thing that scares me the most about technology and i have my ipod and i do everything i can for an old man. appearing on fox news that the other 4 million people a day but that's okay. this 200,000 people and he brags about that all the time. so i just think it's important

and the most telling thing to me is the statistic of 96 million jobs are eliminated in the next 10 years by technology. that's a very significant number. we've got to think in terms of the policy question. technology is great. how do we create 96 million jobs in other areas. the difference in 1900 was a blacksmith in a medical dirt graduated harvard and the most educated man in america come extremely valuable. the blacksmith was every bit as valuable. today the difference between the most educated people which as many of you here and those who aren't educated and those who can't do it knowledge and what have you is the ability to deal in the next new world that scares me and frightens me and we need to do with it.

>> let me take a quick minute to address your question about policymaking as it relates to the bush white house. we were prepared. you will remember when president bush had left sarasota, florida float across the country that the technology wasn't sufficient enough to communicate and lifetime. he had spotty communication. sometimes signals would go well. if you read his book decision points, the president note often times they had to tune in to local news stations on air force one because they didn't have technology to communicate and look at more secure communications. for ask him what the vice president often gone, we have to deal with him and communicate within via secure satellite feeds. sometimes those would go. the white house situation room had to be dramatically upgraded to the president had the ability to talk to foreign leaders at the same time.

from a technological standpoint, the obama administration has benefited advances in technology. september 11, 2001 showed you how inadequate the president's communications were so he could form policy is to work with policy staff and try to get a hold of the situation he was dealing with. >> rack of the room. -- back of the room. >> you are saying the message should be controlled. over the last 50 or so people don't want control. it didn't work for nixon. he had to resign. had to work with a country and reagan. what you're basically saying is you should work through the clutter. but should we stay in the same position and try to find within the clutter? >> you are talking about two

different things. you're talking about specific policies. when i say controlled and talking about president of the united states and i want to talk about the things that are important to the country because i need support from the country to get them in past in the congress or what have you. the president needed to control the agenda is to get people across the country to support his program. if i stood up and said let's talk about 50 other things, i'm not talking about manipulation. i'm talking about the element of how you do your messaging. any of you in communication has to understand and it's not a negative thing. if you want a conversation with someone and you have a point of view and you want to express her point of view, you do want to talk about 55,000 in. i said i love sports.

so this guy says i walked out of the restaurant and i'm bored to death. my wife says how is the conversation. i said it was terrible. he's got a last the second question. you like football, sports, baseball. my point is that they president it doesn't do any good with 500 people in the room i will not be able to articulate my message. my message is this. obama carries the important thing this week. iran-contra deal is the important thing this week. i have to use the media as my vehicle to get to the country. it is not manipulated. obviously they would much rather have a lot of other things that occurred. that is nothing to do with messaging. monica lewinsky is something the president would not have wanted to debate. at the end of the day, my point is how you communicate in the

country wants to know what the government is doing and what the leader is doing. >> more questions at the very back. >> thank you. i would like to complement your panelists were living history. you were part of this great american story. now i have a futuristic question. where are president bush's seminar will like to ask all of you, do you see the president as the next president for his good friend bill clinton's wife hillary? thank you. >> may be. [laughter] jeb bush is an extraordinary man and he was always the bush those assumed to be the president. we've got a very crowded field on our side. were the best field of candidates since 1980.

with several confident governors governors come as several senators, some extremely articulate men in the race at this point. we probably have 20 candidates. he's got -- is not going to get it handed to him. he's got a an effective campaign and he has to overcome some of the negativity that unfortunately is what over as we discovered in the last several days and people really want a third. in the case of hillary as different. if her name was bill clinton junior, she's not being challenged at this point in time. you're the expert on democrats. i think she will be the nominee. i think we will have a robust race. it could easily be a bush clinton campaign at this point in time on my side is too

difficult to predict what's going to come out. >> there's been a lot of focus groups and polls and stuff they showed jeb bush has been serious robber was an early stage. voters are hostile to him, his name, his positions on common core and immigration. i don't think it's a lot to get the republican nomination at all. it is folly to predict. hillary clinton but her numbers are already coming down for his approval ratings are coming up the issue gets more partisan. she benefited from high job approval numbers but she was secretary of state. i think even democratic voters wish they had more choices. >> i think hillary is likely to be the nominee because i don't think anybody else is likely to run and who knows what happens a lot of politics for every race

and i think the most formidable candidate would be jeb bush. he's closer to the senator and the republicans died. i agree that jeb bush may not win. scott walker was basically intent these two, but it's a good politician and would fit the conservatives if the vote crystallizes around him, they could dispossess the nomination. ted cruz harmed scott walker because he is going to pull off 10% or 15% of people willing to vote for anybody except i hate everything and government is at the top. it's an interesting race. i don't think this is the most formidable field if you've ever been raised in the republic --

the areas -- there are candidates but i agree john kasich is well qualified to be president. he's the real deal and there's a few other people that are the real deal and most of them held up much better than a last group and that was a lot of fun for us. >> this is partisanship. one major qualified as governor of vermont that you could run for president and other governors of other states are not qualified. >> you may remember i got a kick. but it's well known -- the interesting thing about american politics is you take sarah palin who never talked to more than 300 people, the next day she had 100% name i.d. i am just saying that a nation

that we have governors that will run and i like case that every bed and i think the field -- it is a big important field would have a formidable candidate to run against mrs. clinton. >> i think we can only say to be continued and thanks to our panelists. thanks to you for comi [applause] there are many more panels over the course of the day and i encourage everyone who can to attend as many as possible. thank you. [inaudible conversations]

[inaudible conversations] >> lawmakers back on capitol hill today. one of the first items of the resolution of disapproval on the every nuclear agreement. this morning, it democratic senator joe minchin announced he will oppose the new year deal with iran. he said iran has shown no signs of changing behavior and the agreement is nothing to do guarantee changes. breaking out as nbc's frank thorp, democratic senator ron wyden of oregon and gary peters of michigan have come out in support of the harebrained deal as well given that the 41 votes needed senators decide to filibuster the resolution of disapproval. bedard has the necessary votes to sustain president obama's

theater with 30 democratic and independent inventors back in it, senator manchin is the fourth democrat to oppose the accord with chuck schumer of new york, bob menendez of new jersey and ben cardin of ireland. the senate returns to work at 2:00 eastern in the harebrained deal is the first order of business. you can watch live coverage on c-span2.

>> it is now my push to invite to this stage three leaders have certainly stepped into the arena on a global scale. three leaders whom i had the most was wrecked and admiration for her. first, margaret spellings, president of the george w. bush presidential center and she will be moderating the conversation. and then two leaders i've had the privilege of serving under uzbek commanders in chief, two

leaders are you with all learned valuable lessons of valuable leadership and life. it is my honor to introduce you today the 42nd and 43rd president of the united states. president william jay clinton and president george w. bush. [applause] [applause] >> i know two people are glad he is not running for president. [laughter] >> hey, that was my line. >> i know two who were glad he didn't run earlier.

>> exactly. >> thank you for being here. it's debatable at this point. >> he was great. thank you for being here. really appreciate it. >> president clinton, welcome back to the bush stunner. just a quick personal privilege. it has been a delight to get to work with your team, especially verse wednesday, alexander lindsay and my counsel. we love each other, have had a lot of work together. [applause] >> i think everybody knows that you were the spark plug that made this happen. >> that's not what i said it. >> thank you very much are giving us a chance to do some pain that is of lasting importance. >> we all echoed jake sentiments. without further ado, it seems like yesterday josh bolten was

sitting in my place in washington watching this program 10 months ago. here we are graduating this awesome class. let me start by asking the importance of the two of you working together. that has meant a lot to the scholars if you thought had the opportunity to spend some time with the scholars. whatever you thought of them? what is impressive, what a surprise due price you of this generation of leaders? >> you know, mark sent them and interesting that he runs into pessimistic people in the country and i understand that. i do too. when you meet the scholars come you can't be pessimistic about the future of the country. these are really fine people just inspire hope. clinton and i are getting a little loan ladies days.

[laughter] >> this is the one month of the year when he is older then me. so speak for yourself. >> i am a month longer. i guess that society moves on, there's some pessimistic in my biases hang out with the scholars. >> president clinton. >> the one thing i found particularly interesting about this group that i like it when they were admitted, but when i read are about their specific projects, when we were preparing to come here is that they are diverse in every way. they don't just look different and think different. they have different skills and to think we have this much

innovation going into so many different aspects of our national life, i am like you. i don't see people down on our future. i'd rather be america looking ahead and let the world would look like in 20 or 30 years, i like our chances. we are younger than every big country. we don't then younger than china in 20 years. if we get a good immigration reform, which you tried to do and which i hope we will get, we will stay young. either that or we have to encourage the young of an works for you to keep having more babies. [laughter] ..

>> don't tell me that we can't get together across the lines that divide. we just have to keep working at it. >> yeah. so as you know, these scholars have had an opportunity to study your decisions through this case study approach as well as those of president h.w. bush and lbj. and so take a minute and talk about your decision making process, president clinton. how do you know when it's time toç decide? these are questions our school lahrs want to know -- scholars want to know, and how do you

move on and, you know, not get totally tied in knots over your decisions? >> first of all, i think knowing when it's time to decide is a big deal. you have to know, to answer that question, what all is going on and what kind of decision you're making. that is, if you make a mistake, is it irrevocable? if so, then you maybe ought to take a little more time. but there are a lot of decisions where decision is on a scale of 1-100, 70% right today is better than a decision that's 100% right six months from now when the train has left the station. and so that's what i always asked myself, are the consequences irrevocable? i'll give you one example. when, whenever we were getting ready to bomb somebody, sometimes hi advisers would say

if you don't do this today, you'll look weak. we'll look so weak. and i always said can i kill 'em tomorrow? [laughter] pleasure -- you're laughing, but think about this. because i can't bring them back to life tomorrow. if the answer is, yes, i can kill them tomorrow, then we're not weak. so let's debate if we should do it today. on the other hand, there are those decisions that you literally will paralyze yourself if you don't just go in and make. because waiting for six months so you can get it 100% right is foolish. and i think to make the best decisions, you have to have people who know the things you don't know, who will tell you what you don't want to hear and who aren't afraid to debate. and you have to have a sense when the time has come to decide. >> president bush? >> well, i -- he's, a lot of wisdom there. but sometimes the circumstances, at least in my presidency, the

circumstance made it really imperative you decide and decide decisively. i guess the thing that dominated my administration was an enemy that wanted to kill again and, therefore, i had to make decisions that protected the homeland. i mean, there was -- that was my goal. and some of the decisions that i had to make needed to be made fairly quickly. because the enemy, it sadly still exists, is -- doesn't really care about whether a president agonizes over a decision or not. and anyway, i think the host important point for the -- the most important point for the scholars, bill said this, is to know what you don't though and find people who do. in other words, sometimes when you get to be real powerful, the tendency is to say i must know

everything. otherwise i wouldn't be so powerful. [laughter] and you don't. and it's essential that you know yourself first and find people who are capable of fighting through all the trappings of power, and i'll give you good advice. i've got a couple here in this room; you, josh. people that i don't think would have served in my administration if they felt their primary job was to make me look good, which was an impossible task to begin with. [laughter] and so jake's talk about strategy and principle are really important that everybody on the team knows and that the environment is such that the sycophants aren't allowed in. i don't know if that makes any sense, but -- >> president bush. >> they told me to use some big

words. [laughter] >> used properly. >> yeah. [laughter] >> so president bush -- [laughter] >> this is the point where i reach in my back pocket to make sure my billfold's still there. [laughter] [applause] i don't know any big words. [laughter] itinerant. >> right, all right. [laughter] >> president bush -- >> yes. >> okay. [laughter] so the scholars read your father's book about relationships and building relationships. >> yeah. my only question is why didn't they read mine? [laughter] >> they did. >> thank you. >> but it talked about, obviously, his letter writing and his development of relationships over many years. not just when you need something, but -- >> right. >> -- you know, over time. so talk about what they should learn from your dad and how you all have developed

relationships -- >> well, one of the most remarkable relationships that i described in the book called "41," which there are a lot of copies in the store over here -- [laughter] was the relationship that bill had with my dad. so losing the an election isn't fun. i've lost one, you've lost one. he lost one to him. and yet they ended up having a friendship. you've got to ask the question, how does it happen? how does what people think are bitter enemies in the political arena able to put aside victory and defeat? i think this dad's case -- in dad's case that winning and losing elections was not the most central thing in his life. the most central things in his life turned out to be his faith and his family. and, therefore, it makes it much easier to deal with disappointments on the daily

occurrences of life. secondly, it helped a lot that bill was so gracious. in other words, it's important to be a humble winner, and i find that relationship to be very instructive. that's why i spent a fair amount of time in chapter seven on it. [laughter] so one of my favorite stories, for those of you who haven't heard this and didn't read the first book i wrote -- [laughter] was when i introduced putin to barney. barney was our scottish terrier, and he dissed him. basically the body language was you call that a dog? [laughter] it really, frankly, it -- to the extent that it hurt my feelings, i didn't let him know. [laughter] anyway, so a year later putin says you want to meet my dog? and i say, sure. out bounds this giant russian hound. and putin looks at me and says bigger, stronger and faster than

barney. [laughter] now, you could take hum barrage at something like that -- umbrage at something like that, but the point of the story is i learned a lot about putin then. hi dog is bigger than your -- my dog is bigger than your dog. it's instructive. the lesson is listen carefully to what others say. don't prejudge their sentiments, and let 'em speak. and 41 was a great personal diplomat because he listened to the other person a lot. >> president clinton, when you were with the scholars in little rock, you had a great discussion with them, and you said that if you don't have respect for your adversary, if you don't believe that the other guy is well intended, means to do right, then you're not going to get very far with them. what are some of the ways that you've worked to understand the other guy's point of view, the other person's point of view? >> well, i think i said this when we had the opening of the

presidential -- all these folks. [laughter] i can't remember the launch. anyway, my family raised me to believe in a storytelling culture, and i couldn't tell one til i could listen to one and reiterate. and one of the most enduring stories of my childhood was my eighth grade science teacher who was not an attractive man telling he that none of us would ever remember anything we had in eighth grade science. we should remember this, he said every day i get up, and i start the day in the bathroom throwing water on my face, putting shaving cream on, they'ving, then washing -- shaving, then washing my face off, and i look in the mirror and say, vern, you're beautiful. [laughter] and he said, you just remember this. everybody wants to believe they're beautiful. if you remember that, it'll take you a long way. [laughter] and i have tried to remember

that. and i remember -- [laughter] one other quick example. the loss of trust is paralyzing this country and this world. twenty years ago this fall prime minister yitzhak rabin was murdered by a fellow israeli because he presided over the first big handover of land in the west bank to the palestinians. now, the whole thing was nearly screwed up because one of the maps they were signing said a road belonged to israel that arafat thought was his. i told 'em, go in and fix it, figure out what the truth was, but we were late, and the world press corps was waiting. so they walked out, rabin said, he's right, that road should be his. it was the road to jericho around the christian monument, i

said, what are we going to do? arafat said, we're going to sign the maps. i said, do you realize we sign these maps, they belong to israel as a matter of international law, and arafat, for all of his faults and he had a lot of them, looked at me and said, oh, rabin's word is worth more than any contract. and he did. you cannot imagine somebody doing that today over there, can you? i'm telling you, if people trust each other, everything else is possible. and if they don't, i don't care how good an argument they make, how many people they listen to, it's very hard to get anything done. >> so for both of you, in austin the lbj library did a terrific job of hosting them, and the scholars had the opportunity to learn about communication. of course, lbj is well known for his physical presence and his relentless style and so forth.

and they listened to the tapes of him talking in realtime to martin luther king and dirkson, that's who negotiated the voting rights act. so talk about your persuasive style and how you adapt it to a particular situation, when to push, when to cajole, when to hold, when to fold. president clinton? >> well, sometimes, first of all, you've got to know who you're trying to persuade. it, when i was working with other world leaders, i never consciously at least made an argument for what was in america's interests. i always told 'em why what i thought was right for america was in their interest. in other words, these other people didn't hire on to help you or this country. they're hired on to help their people and their perception of it. so i think whenever you're arguing with someone else,

first, it proves you listen to them. you have to listen very carefully to other people. but you should always make the argument in terms of their interest. when i was trying to persuade in congress, i tried to figure out if there was anything they wanted that i could in good conscience give 'em. and if there was, i did it. sometimes we were right at the border of the definition of "in good conscience." [laughter] there's a reason mark twain said the two things people should never watch being made are sausage and laws. [laughter] and i think it was a mistake to get rid of these earmarks, because it's harder for the president to argue, and i think sometimes congress knows better than federal employees what the best way to spend money is in their districts. so anyway, i think it's different for different conditions. but, first, you've got to be able to listen to who it is you're trying to persuade and see if you can respond on the merits or changing the subject.

>> president bush, i've watched you do in this for years -- >> yeah. >> -- and you're real good at it. >> thank you. >> talk about -- >> why? >> -- how you persuade people. [laughter] well, you tell me why you think so. [laughter] >> i think, i think that it is important to earn capital to spend capital. in other words, i can remember on the tax cut plan trying to get out of the recession that i would go to a state where i had done well politically -- and, well, wen nelson. he was a -- ben nelson. he was a democrat senator in nebraska. frankly, an endangered species. i went to his state -- i flew him down on air force one, as i recall, and did a tax cut event with him there. and, trying to get his vote. and we got it. i think that -- so my only point

is you can earn capital all kinds of ways in the political process. there are some people that are just not going to vote with you at all, and so it's, frankly, important not to waste your time. on the other hand, i do think it's important to create an environment amongst even those who are less likely to vote for you to -- of cordiality. one of the most unique relationships i had was with ted kennedy. a lot of it had to do with you. and there were some issues we could agree on, a lot of issues we didn't agree on, but i knew when to -- i'd try to convince him on what issues. in other words, you're got to know the people you're dealing with. republicans were generally easier for me to work with, particularly when i was riding high. [laughter] a little more of a challenge after '06.

but it turns out that if you're polite, kind, considerate to people, they're a lot more likely to listen to you. >> give an example of that on the international stage, that sort of persuasive -- while we're watching the debate, the negotiations on the deal right thousand. talk right now. talk about use of that persuasive style in an international setting. >> well, by the time the issues get up to the president, there's been a lot of persuasiveness going on. it's what you have a secretary of state for and a national security council for. and generally, the issues are pretty cooked by the time you geti] there. and always, well, just a lesson. i know cuba knowszv this. never negotiate principal to adviser unless you're the one providing the adviser. in otherç words, you always wat

somebody playing theirv: hand, d the personñr has to go back and say, well, i've got to make sure bush okays it. so i never got myself in a position where the person said, well, i've got to get back to my principal. so always go principal to principal if you're negotiating. never go you're the principal with a nonprincipal. i don't know if i've confused that or not. >> yeah. >> you understand it? >> yeah. >> well, then they can understand it. [laughter] i'm kind of avoiding your question. [laughter] >> okay. i'll move on then, if you invite me to. [laughter] >> i got to know these -- look, i had 26 meetings with putin one-on-one more or less, i think, i'm not exactly sure. and every one of 'em started with how's your family? so laura and i went to his house, met his little girls and, you know, a dad loves to the talk about his kids and his

daughters. so i started off, how's your daughters doing? no matter how difficult the subject would be, the whole purpose was to try to create, you know, a huge bridge, a connection. and then we'd get to the issues at hand. >> so one of our scholars observes that, obviously, y'all have an authentic friendship. you spend time together and really enjoy it, and i know you know some of the folks that are running for president. [laughter] and so the question is -- [laughter] what are your thoughts on the way today the candidates can elevate the discourse so that it's foundational for governing, and then tell us these stories from the campaign trail. you've been on it for many years, both of you. >> yeah. >> president bush, you want to start? >> well, you know, i think the discourse generally is lowered by surrogates, and the internet

is a brutal place these days for political figures because there's a high degree of anonymity. there's no personal responsibility whatsoever. people can say whatever they want to say, and it kind of becomes currency. i suspect -- i know jeb and i'm confident secretary hillary will, you know, elevate the discourse. i can't attest to their surrogates. i can attest to this surrogate. i'm not going to be a surrogate. [laughter] it's -- but i, you know, look, i really, i think the american people expect to be, you know, some sharp elbows in a campaign. i think what really discourages them postcampaign, the inability to govern in a way that is, you know, is congenial. and, hopefully, that'll change.

presidencies go in cycles, by the way. >> president clinton, then we'll get to some funny stories. >> i may be naive, they say you get naive when you get long in the tooth. [laughter] but, you know, i think they ought to have these debates both in the republican primary and the democratic primary, and i think that i expect it to be very vigorous in the primaries, and then whoever wins the two primaries will have a hard debate. but they need to keep in mind that what we are trying to do is to take the advantages america has -- and as mark cuban said, we talked about it, we're well positioned. but we haven't proved yet that we can solve the problem that's bedeviling the world; that is, that we can create so many jobs that we have a large percentage of our work force in, and we can have shared prosperity.

and we ought to show respect for the debate by trying to be as specific and clear as we can about the policy choices before us. and we can trust the american people and the process by saying, look, it's not that simple. if it were simple, we'd have already done it, but these are the five things we think are most important, and this is what i'll do about 'em. i think the more we can keep it on that and the less -- so much in the media today is this sort of culture of anger and resentment. we've got to rise above anger to answers. to rise above resentment to a real response. because if you get this job, i can tell you the next day it doesn't matter what was wrong with your opponent in the election. the next day you're on your own. you walk in there, and you don't have somebody to debate you sitting behind the oval office

desk with you, whichever desk you pick. you've got to show up for work and make decisions. so that's all i hope. i hope we clarify for the american people that this is a big bunch of choices, they are not simple, but we are, we can do it. look, the quality of these young people and the inherent assets in the system of freedom of choice we have proves it, but we've got a lot of tough decisions to make. that's all i really care about besides i know who i'd like to win. [laughter] but the more important thing for america is that we know what the heck we're deciding on, and we make a pretty good decision. >> so this is -- we're about to graduate these scholars. what advice do you have for them as they return to their communities and, you know, obviously you heard jake's call to action. what's your advice for 'em? >> don't watch a lot of tv. [laughter] >> read, like mark cuban. >> that.

actually, act. do things. and don't be afraid of failure. i'm not worried about this crowd. >> president clinton? >> i agree with that. you know, the other thing i'd say is if it -- whatever it is doesn't work out, get up. i lost two elections. i was the youngest former governor in american history. [laughter] after the reagan landslide. i had one guy appointed to the cabinet walk across main street in little rock to avoid being seen shaking hands with me for fear that the guy that beat me would fire him. that was a humbling experience. [laughter] and i think you've got to realize there's no personal ambition you have which can be extinguished by anybody else. only you, by giving up your dreams, can extinguish them. and if it doesn't work out

exactly like you intended, it'll still take you someplace interesting, and you'll make a difference. so my advice is what george said, don't be afraid to fail. but you probably will whether you're afraid to or not. and it's scary. you just gotta get up. the world belongs to tomorrow, not yesterday. don't give anybody else permission to take your life away. just keep living and keep giving. and never make the perfect the enemy of the good. never think what i'm doing is too little to make a difference. that's not true. that's not true. do something every day. someday for all of us it'll be our last day. and what will matter with all the steps we took along the way and what they amounted to. not the home run we hit on day x. i wish you well. >> president -- [applause]

>> do you want to add to that? i said do you want to add to that? >> i was stuck on that someday may be your last day line. [laughter] i thought that was pretty damn profound. [laughter] >> so this is maybe a good set-up for this question. our scholars have said that they were surprised by both of you, that you were not what they expected because they thought, you know, what they -- >> they probably thought i couldn't read. [laughter] >> no one thought i could, they -- [laughter] >> so how do you react to that with respect to the filter of the media and how to, what that means to them as they try to present their true selves and have people understand who they are, know their heart and so forth? >> you know, i don't know. i mean, i think we're both

pretty confident people, and if people don't get us, what we're all about, then, you know, you've just got to keep moving on. i try not to worry about it. i can't tell you the number of people who have told me that meet me say you're a lot taller than i thought you were. [laughter] >> i'm not sure that's exactly what they meant. [laughter] >> 5-11 since i was 18. i don't know. i mean, image is image, and you've just got to be confident in what you believe in. if you have a set of beliefs that you're willing to defend, image doesn't matter. and, yeah, you get -- people say things about you all the time, but if that's a criteria for success for you, then go into the fetal. [laughter] >> i would also say, you know, if you cover political news, you

have to realize that it's sort of in the nature of things conflict is better news than concord. even though cooperation works better than conflict. if that's all you put on the evening news at night, you'd go broke. so the nature of evening news will be to make people into two-dimensional cartoons instead of three-dimensional people. it's just the nature of the beast. and i think -- so you just need to always keep your little caution light burning in the back of your head on that. i also think the nature is like let's suppose we were in a campaign against each other. he would have his narrative and i would have mine, and we would try to convince you, each of us, that our narrative was better than the other's. that's okay. but the people covering the campaign, they develop a

narrative too, a storyline. and when -- it's almost impossible for the real story to be the same as the storyline. and it's very hard for the american people to be well informed if the storylines swamp the real story. so you just have to keep all that in mind as you try to be good citizens and still show up. most important thing is showing up. >> so we want some people to show up for the second class of scholars, and we're launching the recruitment today, and people can apply, those who are watching live stream, at presidentialleadershipscholars .o rg. so for those who are pondering application to this awesome program, what advice do you have for those seeking a spot? on how to -- >> yes. mail those that have just gone through it -- e-mail those that have just gone through it, see whether it's worth your time. i mean, there's no better testimony to what's happened than people getting ready to

walk across this stage. my advice is i'm sure they'd be more than willing to share their stories with you. or go to our web sites. don't you think that's a good idea? >> i think that's an excellent idea, president bush. [laughter] president clinton, what do you think? what advice would you have -- >> running out of -- >> no. [laughter] how should people distinguish -- >> i thought you were going to have more stories. >> we're at the bottom of the barrel for the questions. my god, you know? [laughter] >> okay. >> why not just get the graduation going. >> okay. well, but first i have to ask you about being a grandparent. and you're about to have a second grandchild. >> yeah. >> when we did in the first time, when we started this program, he said to me that when you become a grandfather, you fall in love all over again. and that's what happened. we got -- hillary and i have our granddaughter for three days,

and i came down here and left -- it like to have killed me today, but hillary was ecstatic. [laughter] and she wasn't a candidate for anything, she was grandmother of the year. and last night my granddaughter, nine and a half months old, for the first time when i walked into the room, she said, oh, there's your granddad, and she turned around and pointed at me. that was worth more than anything anybody has said or done for me or paid to me or anything else in, i don't know, a month of sundays. everything you said about it is true. >> yeah. last night my granddaughter spoke to me in mandarin. [laughter] ..