skills in the guard and reserve force. the process inside the department, to actually identify those skills allows them to be tracked inside the department so that the nation needs to drop on that we could no. it would be extremely valuable in the way to increase the skills and capabilities the national guard can bring to the table. >> i think that's a great idea. we identify many of our civilian skill sets for the guard to messieurs but i don't know the dmz but truly pays attention to that and i think we have a lot of wasted talent and ability to be better utilized in the active duty force. do you think the dod will rely heavily upon our guard and reserves as we move into future complex in outlying years as

heavily as they have in the past 14 years? >> there's no question they will play a valuable role. certainly we have asked a lot of guard and reserve members and they have given a lot in the last 14 years so it will be a valuable contribution in to future. >> thank you. i will move on to the different topic and mr. clarke you can assist with this. today i wrote about my colleagues in a letter some of our underwater cable and it's very concerning because the farris iber optic cables and they carry everything from sensitive information, communication. many of these things that are vital to our economic stability and i know that is a very sensitive topic, but i think it's pretty vital that we start talking about our answers and underwater cyberoptic cable. are you concerned at all about the security that either exists

or does not exist out there and if you could expound on that please. >> i'm very concerned about it. those cables carry trillions of dollars in financial transactions every year. about 90% of the world economy runs on undersea cables as a result of that and the russians for a long time it and had an undersea recognizance program with a go under the water and they have taken an interest lately in undersea cables. we can tell by the areas they are operating that they are looking for something down there in the vicinity of the cables. out in the open ocean the undersea cables are fairly hard to find because you have to search a large area but in the areas where they have their landing on the short and the united states or europe or the middle east there are wrote relatively easy to trace back to the water. i think those cables could be easily broken.

there are broken fairly regular today as their result of strollers or anchors that pick them up and today the responsibility for responding or replacing or repairing those cables applies with the industry so they have on call cable -- to fix them. we are talking timeframes from weeks to months to repair a cable that's been damaged as a result of hostile or accidental action. one concern i would have his way to improve the ability to rapidly respond to these kinds of attacks to restore the 2-d unless cables and then we need better monitoring capabilities in the vicinity of landings were a target rich environment for undersea vehicles or a ship that's going to remotely-operated vehicle to attack them. there are technologies out there that can provide the ability to monitor these various pretty well but it will be a key part of it and being able to find something small like doctors

singer and mr. chair -- mr. scharre talked about. we need to come up with capabilities that could be used against undersea cables. >> i agree. thank you very much. i perceived that are not something we need to turn our direction to also. thank you mr. chair. >> thank you mr. chairman into all of you for testifying. the department of defense has used technology basically quality over quantity to stay ahead of the other countries so one of together the other hearings we had said that we are falling behind in our ability to rely on their technical superiority so do you share that view and if so what are some very fundamental steps we should be taking to increase our

capacity, technologic capacity? >> i think one of the main factors, how do we shorten the time. mr. clarke talk about modularity, thinking about payloads and platforms but also thinking about software payloads to the can operate software very rapidly but there are even more fundamental shifts that people are thinking about. this firm i mentioned earlier is thinking about taking a major platform and breaking it apart entirely into a larger number of basically just the payloads that are all interacting together. that's something we are experimenting with and exploring. >> so are you saying that we should spend more money on r&d or is it also the way we are structuring how the money spent? >> the way we spend the money is

absolutely critical. >> how would you change spending our money? >> the r&d spending in the department is decentralized and fragmented and so a more centralized process that focuses on the key areas and the effort is underway under the long-range , something, something acronym. >> center at think its away but we clearly don't spend enough on r&d and we have seen the percentages go down on the government side but also as a nation as was mentioned on the defense undersea side as well. the issue of quantity quality is not just in terms of the weapons systems that simply if you run out of missiles for example in the fight you'll have to ask is that you may survive but do you differ to the enemy in that time. >> i would just add one more thing.

we have a pretty good investment in r&d. it's not well focused as we talked about. in addition to that industry used to do a lot of internal research development with their own money to explore new military capabilities that might be beneficial in the future. they have refused -- review that significantly in the amount of procurement because it's normally a percentage of procurement and there's this disincentivized thing industry from pursuing its own internal research and development. that in the past has given us things like stealth and new radar technology. one thing we want to look at is how do we encourage industry to be independently looking at problems that they had adjusted their new technologies? >> one of the ways we incentivize the private sector is of course to have the potential of technology transfer with the research that they are doing. for mr. scharre what impact do

you indicate our future -- and what is your assessment of the departments can't -- progress in terms of reducing its reliance on fossil fuel sources? >> i think there are a couple of key reasons to do so. one is strategic risk and vulnerability. another one is cost but an important one alternative energy solutions can help increase endurance for many long endurance capabilities particularly robotically but on the battlefield. batteries and fuel cells and solar power can allow us to put persistent surveillance out there to detect enemy. for months or years at a time. there are operational advantages as well. >> it's about not so much fossil fuels is reducing our energy dependence in general. what you see as we have forces

at a long difference because their friends and allies are an ocean away from us so generally transferring those forces are long-distance and they're having to operate at the very tabarre logistics chain. reducing the amount of energy they need in general would be important. taking advantage of technology that don't require fuel would be importance of the idf battery technologies that are able to last for long period of time and eventually recharged by the son are returning to some docking station would be a very good way for us to reduce the tether that we have to maintain. right now we have to have refueling aircraft and ships with the ships they are refueling and refuel a ship every few days while its operating an aircraft obviously have to operate for shorter period of time for that to be refueled. they don't require fuel to be delivered to the platform on a regular basis. >> thank you.

>> thank you mr. chair and sorry senator or run out and i had to step up for a few minutes. we were celebrating the 240 prathea the united states marine corps so we had to welcome the chair and ranking member as members of the navy and the army. >> a dark day. >> gentleman thanks very much for your testimony. chairman nye extender i was actually struck by your testimony in one area or in a couple of areas that were very insightful but one of the things we have been hearing about in terms of cyber is the idea that this notion we are constantly being attacked and you mentioned it some of the dollars and statistics you have in your testimony on cyber crime and what the cost is eye-popping

that there has been this notion of us being on defense, defense, defense. one thing that i like about your testimony as you talked about a little bit in terms of offense. we embedded a lot of this technology. we are the leader in it's still so there are all kinds of opportunities for offense. could you provide some examples of that? the chairman's opening statement about turning technologies into offensive advantages i think he was very illuminating from a historical perspective. what are some opportunities in terms of offense that we have with regards to cyber? >> there are a number of offense at capabilities. first and foremost he had failed to see what the adversary is doing. hence the need for the commercial sector to be part of the solution so what is hitting them can be seen by everyone. when you think about how to computers talk, i want to talk

to you and we go to the accent that takes time and if you think about if you're trying to get in while that's happening the government can stop it. what you have is opportunities to change what is happening in cyberspace with the offensive tools. the issue comes down to what would you authorize for example cyber command to do in order to defend that? you might say i'm going to let you do everything you can to block all the way from words coming from. technically speaking you could destroy computer in cyberspace by getting on it and doing certain things to it. so the technical ability is there. it's public record. now all you need is access and

how you get into that access is where you take the capabilities of an nsa with the cyber command and put those together. so you have tremendous opportunities and i think when we look back at our capability we are the most integrated network society in the world and we look back and we say look at all the opportunities on the offense in the mid-look at our summit defense in the same man we are broke. we have all these glass windows. the first step pitch those. >> let me ask you a related. i know there has been a lot of discussion in the testimony on deterrence are raising the cost of cyber attacks and it seems to me and i would welcome any of your opinions that if you are from an authoritarian regime like russia or iran or china they in some ways have an advantage because they deny and lie. we had nothing to do with that even though they did and they do but you mentioned one example to

me that the iranians were attacking our financial system. but it makes sense for us to say publicly that if you do that again we will crash your entire financial sector. is that the kind of thing that we should be looking at in terms of raising the cost because it seems to me as an authoritarian regime you can lie about who's doing it but the cost is almost minimal because we don't react. should we maybe look at being a little more public and upping the ante in saying if you do this in north korea, iran, china we will respond and some of these countries i'm sure we can crash the whole economy. what would be a problem with that kind of deterrence that makes it a little more transparent that raises the cost of medically? and of course if we announced that we would have to act.

i'm curious, any of the palace what would you think of something a little more transparent from our perspective and do we have the disadvantage when we are the only authoritarian regimes that routinely lies about this issue? >> one thing led to think about is the fact that the turned action might need to be proportional with the action is intended to differ. if we say that because the iranians are attacking our banking sector that we would crush their financial system that might be disproportional and therefore they don't find it to be a credible threat. if we did it it may deter further action but it may be seen by the international community is being highly disproportionate. we might need to come up with a more proportional reaction so the adversary of would say this is something united states could do. maybe the response didn't needs to be not in cyberspace but another domain. for example warfare jamming,

small attacks on oil infrastructure could all be undertaken with relatively small amounts of collateral affects while i'll so demonstrating the resolve of the united states and be able to do something that they would find credible and that we could repeat. that does not cause such a huge damaging reaction that people aren't going to believe we have never used it. >> the challenge is not mutual in terms of the mutual shared destruction. for example we are far more vulnerable to cyberattacks in north korea but that's actually good thing because they're integrated with the global economy. we have freedom and all that other things. we want to be in a position that they are in so recognizing the points about may be looking at the other deterrent angles. more importantly when we are talking about steering cyber command and taking on these roles in the civilian lead it's

moving it and also way from its role in clear warfare itself and the determinant of success or failure will not be thinking about it individually but how it's integrated with other warfighting capacities. the more we focus on the power grid the less integrating the cyber capability in terms of war using it to take down an air defense so it's cohesive with your warplanes going over as for example israel was able to pull off an operation. be careful of steering cybercommand more towards civilian roles. they set us up for a fall in real war. >> i just want to add some 32 that to make sure at least from my perspective you understand. where you can get commercial industry to help is to do their part. that's the wargame in the effort

cyber command and the defense department can work without the energy sector. if that shuts down we have got a problem. her defense needs to defend the nation this area. i'm not proposing we go in and prop up any energy company that helped them build the right cybersecurity so we know they can defend themselves and call for help when they need it and then push that out beyond upon greece. i think our defense department has to think marcaw principally. i agree going after all that dark stuff is part of the but my concern is if i were a bad guy i would invade or infrastructure. i would take it out before you could respond and that's what the chinese approach to warfare is. so i think we have to put all that on the table working. >> thank you mr. chairman. >> i want to thank all of you for being here.

appreciate it. i wanted to follow-up general alexander and something you had in a prepared wrote that russia's intervention in ukraine and the syrian complex were just the start of a potential series of actions that seek to reach the international environment so want to get your assessment based on all your experience of what comes next with moscow and what should we be doing to respond? >> greatest concern is eastern ukraine. i think everything that's going on is for putin to get more closure on eastern ukraine were the weapons platforms that he cares about are created. i think he wants control of that and i think by pushing what he has done he's going to continue to go for that. there is nothing that i see that would indicate he's going to stop doing that and i think he will lie and do everything he can in help make that happen. serious a great way, think of it

as a paint. he can accomplish real objectives between iran, syria and russia and is doing that by helping to shape what he thinks are the best proxies for russia, syria and iran in the region. so he wins twice there. it takes our focus off eastern ukraine. people are still buying their and focus everybody on syria. i would not be said prize took over the next six months we see some more action in eastern ukraine at the same time. with respect to syria what i'm really concerned about is the tension that creates it. we get the point where we have to fire back against russia or iran for their actions in syria. if we do that i think we will see their response in cyber. i really do. think it will come because there is no way iran can come after us. they can launch terrorist attacks and we have been fairly good at stopping those but they can hit us with cyber.

what happens if they change their approach from disruptive attacks against the financial sector to destructive against the financial and energy? >> if anyone wants to comment on this because i hear you discuss this i think if we let him continue to do this without any response as far as i can see doesn't this almost become a fait accompli which we see this heading in our direction which is going to work put us in a more dangerous situation so if you are typing right now the president what would you tell them to do? >> i would say refocus back on ukraine. ceria is obviously a dynamic a difficult situation but ukraine is a situation where we have a friend of the united states, not an ally but a partner that's under threat and attack i russia

in providing ukrainians the capability to better defend themselves in the electronic, electromagnetic spectrum as well as cyberwould be important to give them the capability to defend themselves and disrupt the russian attempts to gain more territory. that will force putin to re-fork is his effort and make a determination as to whether he is going to resolve in ukraine or eventually receive. >> if i could i agree. i think our vital interests in eastern europe and the middle east are at risk. i think we have party had some outcomes of iranian deal. i think cutting a deal with them is important to our perspective but we lost some of our allies doing that. losing those allies is something we cannot afford to have happen. i think we have to step back and say what's your strategy for both?

we will have to deal with both of the same time in and the middle east. we need our allies to know what we are going to stand beside them. it's the same thing in eastern ukraine. everybody's looking at it and they say you have made all these declarations about a dose declarations about nato's what happened? are you going to be there? and at times unintentionally our absence may look like were not. what i'm concerned about when you talk to saudi's and israelis and others, are here with us or are you with iran? what is your objective? i think we have to clarify that. our nation needs to let our allies know we are there for them. i think that's a first and most important thing we should do and we should discuss with them how we are going to solve issues in ukraine with nato and what we are going to do in the middle east to shore up our allies there. >> does anyone want to add to that?

>> the last several decades of u.s. foreign policy defense strategy has been focused on the challenge set of networks of individuals, criminals and insurgents, terrorists and the problems that of failed states and moving forward we are going to have to recognize whether it's russia or china we have too returned to great state competition and what that means is when we look in certain areas we need to look at the ruins of not just the failed state for proxy warfare as well. think we are seeing certain areas of that only will have to learn what does and doesn't work in proxy warfare and reframe our purchase along those lines. on top of this focusing on how you keep -- when a competition but also keep a lid on it from escalating. >> thank you all. appreciate it. >> general just follow-up on your comments to senator ayotte

you say we have to take actions to reassure our allies and the nations in the middle east what actions would those be? >> i think we need to reach out to saudi arabia united arab emirates kuwait jordan and egypt and sit down with them and say we are here. i think some of the things we had to talk about -- >> we say that all the time by the way. >> we look at egypt perhaps some of these best comments i've heard of a strategy for egypt was how do you give them stability? how do you give them security? you've got to have energy. you've got to get these guys jobs. 24% unemployment is really bad for us and with the world. they have enough money to do it. we have the expertise to help them get there. i think we have got to look at the security, the stability, the energy sector and the jobs.

the economic development in the middle east to get them to a place where they can look forward to their future versus fighting all these issues we are seeing with radical islam. i think the conference a program like that lead their country and others in the middle east is a step forward and let them know that we are going to be there not just for a couple of hours but for the next several decades >> right now the egyptian regime is becoming more and more oppressive. 45,000 people in prison, no semblance of any really progress on a number of areas which are in contradiction to our fundamental principles. >> this is a tough area and i have been to egypt several times there is no good solution without economic growth. so i guess the question chairman

is how do we help them get out of this because in my dealings with our counterparts they want to do it. have you get there and there is so much tension at in that region. if we don't help them get economic growth what they are going to have this continued failed states and with those failed states now we have got just another one. so it seems to me at some point we have to come up with a strategy that counters that and i personally believe that is some web developing their economies. >> dr. singer i have your book on my desk admittedly in a pile on my desk but i will move it to the top of the pile the next time i encounter you. i will be able to give you a big risk treat -- critique of the pieces that you espouse in the book. congratulations on its success. mr. chair thank you for your

articulate answers to the questions mr. clarke and general alexander, a special thanks to you for your past service but also it will be the intention and we do work on a bipartisan basis as you know what this committee to start looking at the follow one to this cyber legislation that we just passed in the senate and will be calling on all of you as we move forward with that effort. i think you would agree that additional legislation is necessary. would you agree that general? >> i do, chairman. >> hank. >> mr. chairman this is the an extraordinarily insightful panel and he chose widely a west point graduate who is command company commander. you have an army ranger and a graduate of harvard university's

a good job. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations]

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>> thank you. great crowd. great crowd. good to see everybody. >> thank you for coming out. united technology has sponsored these issues and i was holding out for a helicopter but you sold the company so i have to hold out for an elevator for the house or something. but anyway, and the great people at national journal for putting this together. great crowd. i want to put in a plug quickly. the brand new almanac of american politics just came out. it is an amazing 2084 pages. it is sort of everything you needed to know. i bought my first copy in 1972 when i was a senior in high school in louisiana. i bought everyone -- were you from louisiana? we went to the same high school.

that is right! anyway, so -- wow, see this is a real story. i didn't make it up. just anyway, it is now at bookstores near you and amazon and all kinds of great places. there is an 18-page introduction essay i wrote at the beginning. just remember i wrote it over the summer. cut me some slack there. what i am going to try to do is talk a little bit -- if you feel confused about the 2016 campaign so far join the club. elections are like fingerprints. everyone is unique and they have different dynamics and circumstances. this is obviously about as weird as they come. kind of interesting dynamics on the democratic side and a lot on

the republican side. i am going it try to put sense into what is going on and why and look at the democratic nomination side briefly and spend more time on the republican side and talk about the general election to the extent we can without knowing who the nominees are and then talk about the u.s. senate finally. in terms of why this is a weird election and what is making this a highly combustable and gumbo

of different factors -- that is the southern part of the state. not where we are; the easternmost suburb of dallas. i would argue the factors are ideas, economic anxiety, p populism, the culture wars and pervasive anger at politicians. let's talk about the ideas for a second. i don't think there is any question that the democratic party is a heck of a lot more liberal than it was when bill clinton left office 15 years ago. at the same time, the republican party is a heck of a lot more conservative than it was when george bush left office seven years ago. this is manifesting itself on

congress and party primaries and the like where what we are seeing is that the people who were conservative, moderate democrats are pretty much gone. in terms of the electorate are gone. so the parties are more cohesive. there is a lot of sorting taking place. that means the conservative democrats that were the balance keeping democrats from going off into a ditch, this is your left, they are gone. and the liberal moderate republicans, the ballot sort of kept congressional republicans from going into the a ditch on the right hand side. they are gone as well pretty much. it reflects what happened in the primaries as well. just simply democratic primaries are more liberal than they used

to be and republican primaries more conservative. so the primaries moved to the extreme and the centers of gravity moved to the extreme. the people, members that don't reflect that, have been purged out sort of, in primaries. and then we have a median environment that reinforces all of that whether it is fox and talk radio and the internet on the right or the prime time shows on msnbc and a little talk radio and a lot of internet on the left it is just intensifying this idea to a point that wasn't there 5-10 years ago. there is another dimension. it used to be more when people, when you disagreed with someone, you just have different views. and increasingly, and this is true on the left and right, anybody you disagree with must be evil. they cannot just be wrong. there is something more than that that has taken place. it has taken on a real edge.

and the whole idea of balancing competing values has gone out the way. enough of the essoteric stuff. i would say jeb bush and hillary clinton are caught in time warps. i turned 62 today. today is stew rothenberg's birthday so if you run into him. my birthday is later in the month. jeb bush is 62. just a touch older and hillary clinton just turned 68. if you think about hillary clinton, when her husband was president she was perceived to be at the far left of her husband's administration and she is scrambling like mad to keep up with the party that moved

considerably to the left. and look at jeb bush. he was one of the most conservative governors in america and now the primary difference between jeb bush and clinton is bush demonstrated ideas to moving over with the party. he hasn't moved over to keep up with it as comfortably and having lots of problems. so this ideaology is a big factor. second thing is economic anxiety. you know it is very interesting is while we came out of a recession in 2009, we were seeing polls even earlier this year that were showing a majority of americans but we still were in a recession.

and if you think about the last two years of looking at economic growth it has been a yo-yo. it has been about 3.24 percent. over the last two years, for the quarter, starting 2013, 4th quarter, gdp was at 3.8 -- that is good. then it dropped down to negative .9 for the 1st quarter of 2014. then it jumped up to 4.6 and stayed at 4.3 and dropped to 2.1. so that is below where you want. then it dropped down to sixth tenths of a growth rate and then up to 3.9 and only 1.5 percent

for the 3rd quarter. this is, you know what we have is an economy that is getting buffeted. it is so fragile it is getting buffeted by things like droughts in the west or west coast dock strike or what is going on in china or the euro zone or greece. it is continuing this anxiety that really never ended after the recession is over. when you get down to it, if you look at median, real household income, half the families and half the households have done better/half worse, household income hasn't gone up since 1999 when you consider inflation. we have had two terms of democrat presidents since 1999 and two terms of republican presidents since then. we have had democratic majori majorities in the house and republican majorities.

no matter who was in charge, real median household incomes haven't gone up. that is so that people have this feeling that well the economy may have recovered but my economy hasn't recovered. and that is sort of adding a new degree of angst. all of this led to populism. whether that is the occupy wall street on the left and elizabeth warren and bernie sanders, two of the hottest people and personality in the democratic party. or the tea party movement with trump on the right side this rise is causing tension within each party. the tension in the democratic party between the building construction unions who wanted the keystone xl pipeline and the environmentalist who didn't want the keystone xl pipeline. or look on the republican side. the export/import bank is

creating tension on each side. then you get to the culture wars. where you have one piece of america that is desperately trying to protect what they see as the historic values and culture of this country. and the other side believes the culture that values should move and change with times and should keep up with the change in society. it is manifesting in things like the most recent planned parenthood fetal tissue research issue, same-sex marriage, and it is like one country wants to watch father's knows best and the other wants to watch modern family. it is creating another tension out there. and then finally, think about what conservatives and republicans, but mostly conservatives tend to value. they tend to value freedom and

liberty. liberals and democrats put a higher value on justice and equality. it is like two different value systems. it is like the men are from mars and women are from venus or whatever the book is. different value systems driving wedges through the political process. that leads us finally to the anger at washington and career politicians. there is a recent poll that asks people do you think most people in politics can or cannot be trusted. can be trusted, 23%. cannot be trusted, 72%. wow. do you think the current political system in the united states is basically functional or dysfunctional? functional, 33%. dysfunctional, 64%. these are very, very deeply held views but there is a party

difference. they asked people what is more important to you: someone with experience in how the political system works or someone from outside of the existing political establishment. overall, 56% of americans said they preferred experience. 56%. and 40% preferred an outsider. if you just talk to democratic voters, 69% experience and only 27% outsider. but just republican voters it was 60% outsider and 36% prefer experience. when you think of republicans, and this comes into the presidential a little bit, is that republicans tend not to be early adopters. historically they have been people that like to be comfortable with things.

they want -- you know, they have been small seat conservatives. we started seeing the changing sum in 2012 and 2014 a great deal. so there is a difference within the two parties between the two. i am mad as hell and not taking this anymore. it really is that strong and toxic. these are the five factors i think created this instability we are seeing in the political process. let's talk about the democratic side first. you know there is some precedent to what we are seeing in the terms of the democratic party initially behind the frontrunner and the frontrunner has the lock on the nomination but then a challenger comes out and makes it a little interesting for some

period of time. think of walter man mondale with the challenge from heart. or al gore and the challenge from bradley. each got interesting briefly and then got a little less interesting. in 2000 things were different with the left getting further to the left and to the left of where hillary clinton had been. and then this anger at politicians, career politicians, anger at washington or the established order of things created more edge to it. the real story with hillary clinton is when you think about when she left office as secretary of state she had terrific numbers overall. republicans and conservatives

all hated her but hated her as long as they have known anything about her. but if you look at her numbers along democrats, liberals, moderates, independents, hillary clinton's numbers in january of 2013 were good. the truth is they were probably unsustainably high because there was a period of time where she was not seen as a politician or a presidential candidate. she was above politics. so her numbers among non-conservative and non-republicans road up to an unsustainable level. when she left office, they started picking up her running for president, you saw this slide down in secretary clinton's positive or favorable numbers coming down but it was good. it didn't pick up the steam until 2014 when she became seen in more of a political context.

she didn't help herself with a couple remarks. my two favorites were in january of 2014. down in new orleans speaking to the national automobile dealers associate and she finds the need to sort of volunteer that she hasn't been behind the wheel of a car since 1996. you know, you watch that and go, what in the hell would you say that for? was this your way of sucking up to a room full of car dealers? why would you say that? she talked about my husband and i were dead broke when they left the white house. we know about the legal fees from the white water and the impeachment. yes, of course.

but anybody that can get a seven-figure book deal and six-figure speeches is not what most of us think of as dead broke. it was different. but again, it is still -- hers were still pretty good until this e-mail thing started catching. early on i blew off the e-mail thing. you use work e-mail for work stuff. but you are not paranoid about people being out to get you. i would not have done it and she would not if she could do it again. but then you hear there may have been classified information in

some shape or form flowing over. whether it was classified before or after the fact or marked classified or not and things started getting more complicated. the republicans were as healthy and having the lead to not having a lead or within the margin of error within people like donald trump. when you look at the polls, i

talked at a peter heart who has a new poll coming out last night/this morning, and peter makes the argument that clinton is perceived as smart and competent by most people but they don't have this warmth. a lot of them don't like her or feel any kind of comfort with her. they don't necessarily trust her. it is not a competence thing. it is a personal thing. that comes into play in a general election. but in a nomination environment, you know, it is kind of hard to see how she could possibly lose the nomination to bernie sanders barring some catastrophic event. could sanders win the iowa caucus or new hampshire primary? that could happen. it is observation changes

behavior. you could argue they have been observed a lot and it changed their behavior some or in the primary caucuses out there. but when it gets to primaries, non-new england primaries, the demographics don't map up. if the fbi finds things and decide to pursue it and the decision is up to the public integrity justice department, a group of career politicians, but if they do a recommendation up, that is going to put the attorney general and the obama administration in a really tough

position. you have a huge mess on your hands. if you think of this as getting overplayed, think for once, did sandy berger who was clinton's first advisor expect to be prosecuted for mishandling classified information? what about john doych who stepped down already? or david petreus while director of national intelligence tr not appropriately handling

classified information? this is something where there is a chance they decide to pursue this, directly or indirectly, that could cause her real, real problems. to the point about the public integrity section, tell me about the bush white house. i don't think they wanted to do that. they are faced with a situation of how do you turn it down? it was a garbage case that was discredited after senator stevens lost the election and was dead. or do you think the obama white house wanted david prosecuted? a close advisor to the president. heck no. do youngstown -- do i think this is going to happen?

no, i don't. there is a chance it knows to the dark side. if it did, and i think we are talking about 1-6 chance, if it did, i think you will find democrats again looking on the wall for the in case of fire break the class option. before getting in the nuts and bolts of handicapp handycap p a think of every republican nominee with the exception of goldwater, everyone of them has been a sitting president, former

or current vice president, runner up of the previous nomi nation, related to the probe hazardo -- previous president or a commander in the war. republicans are not early adopters. we started seeing different behavior in 2012. when you saw michelle bachmann win the iowa republican straw poll or herman cain shoot up in the polls, where republicans considered nominating inconceivable people that was totally against their stereotype of doing this. in the end, they nominated mitt

romney who was the runner-up but that was only after pursuing every possible option and they were all discredited. what we saw in the republican nomination fight was a little forshadowing of the situation we have seen since then. one other broad point, if you think back to 2008, what is something you heard a lot of republicans say in the 2008 general election? well, it is a lousy idea to nominate young freshman senators. okay. and there is a sort of feeling among a lot of people in both parties that well you really want someone that maybe somebody who has been a governor of a state, that executive experience is a better skill set than someone who came out of congress. so you have this over here.

but there is another thing that is also important. if you did a national poll and asked people what is the most important facing the country today or what do you want the next president of the united states, what do you want them to focus on, if you ask democrats that question what they will tell you is the economy, jobs, and a certain con dproup of issues. republicans say terrorism, america's place in the world, completely different issues which are not governer oriented. so the republicans have a dichotomy of what they want that is separate from ideas. how should we look at this race?

i am sort of a simple-minded person. i like to hyper-organize because i am adhd i tend to hyper-organize. things. i look at it like ncaa brackets. you have the brackets over here that is the conventional establishment republican party that nominated eisenhower, both bushes, reagan, dole, mccain, romney -- that republican party. and then there is this other republican party that is more of an outsider wing. ronald reagan would have been an outsider by '76 but by '80 the establishment embraced him by then. then you have this other outsider other wing that is unorthodox. it is a malgam of four groups.

you have the tea party, the faith-based conservatives, then you have libertarian, and then you have people that are just really, really, really, really, really -- five really's -- conservative. i would argue what is happening and the weird things happening on the conventional side are different from the weird things happening on the more exotic side. on the more conventional side, i think what we see is if someone told us two years ago, jeb bush is absolutely positively going to run for president, what would most of us assumed? he would lock up the conventional half of the republican party, and it is about half, he would lock that half of the party up almost immediately and have a very good chance of winning the overall republican nomination.

so there is the bush thing. and scott walker would do well with this. what was going on here? first with bush, i think you could say first that the bush brand has been kind of dinged up some. this is not the brand that dad left in 1992 or that w inherited in 2000. i wrote a column a year or so ago where i likened it to jeb bush is the teenager whose older

brother wrecked the car just before homecoming or something. it is not your fault but you have deal with the consequences. there is that. but closely associated with that is the bush brand, that was once terrific in the republican party, but it is also, w not withstanding, it is associated with conventional, historic traditional republican establishment and that has taken on a bad sheen. we talked about the part where the republican party moved over to jeb, dad's right, jeb's right and moved way over. i also think there is one other factor here. i hardly know him. i hardly met him with a couple

times. but jeb bush has always struck me as a smart guy and an honest guy, he is not a chameleon in any shape or form, and he is being asked to take changes in what he feels is important on substance issues and take on a rhetoric i think the guy is uncomfortable doing. conversely, hillary clinton was more than happy to go ahead and move over on keystone xl pipeline, and trade and things like that. but bush is showing a lot of -- you know, a considerable resistant. so it is not only creating a political problem but it is coming across like his heart is not in this. the guy that was sort of an 800 pound gorilla when he was governor of florida who exuted

strength and confidence and great certainty and now we are not seeing that anymore. i had a ceo of a big company that dealt with him a lot when he was governor say that guy, when he walked into a room, you knew someone walked into room. he projected this air. and he said i don't see this happening now. and i think we are seeing that in the debates. in interviews, and on the campaign trail so underperforming is an understatement. but he is in a position where he is going to have to turn it around and needed to the other night even but in the next couple two-four weeks because i don't think he is getting any new donors on board, any now donors, and there are a lot of big bundlers and fundraisers that were fully prepared to go his way but have been sitting back a little bit.

i think bush is facing a very real threat. and you see scott walker whose skill set didn't match the brand. and chris christie, i think with christie, a lot of the momentum was when there was uncertainty about whether jeb bush would one. and people pushing christie in the new york/new jersey area that once it became clear jeb bush was going to run it is like the wind came out of christie's sales. then you had the bridge mess and a little bit of the jersey state

finances but the fourth thing is what is chris christie's stich? the truth teller. the big tough guy that is going to tell the truth. he got out trumped. donald trump stole his act. chris christie and donald trump are different people but that role was stolen. you watch christie in the debate and i think he is pretty good but he has never been able to recover or match up to the expectations. he is looking at the best raw, talent. if we were talking about sports,

you would say that marco rubio is the best all-around athlete in this race. that he has got a very, very good skillset. if you look at his announcement speech, in terms of skill and reach, it was the speech that was not unlike obama, but the thing about it is i had dinner with a democratic strategist the next night who was like, you know, a democrat could have given 80% of rubio's speech because it wasn't partisan. it was a message that could resinate across a lot of lines and particularly to independents and moderate voters.

that is really good. folks are terrified of marco rubio in the beginning because of the obvious latino voters but going after younger voters also where republicans have a hard time. if rb -- obama won the 18 year olds by a 23% margin. romney's best group was 65 and older. if a republican could cut into democratic margins among younger voters that would be huge. but the problem is he is running a general election campaign not unlike bush but while running for republican presidential nomination. he needs to throw red meat to the party base and he hasn't been throwing that which is why

i think rubio is moving up in the polls but not as a pace you might think. it is because he seems to be running for the general election and the nomination. i suspect that needs to change. and then you get to john casich. i knew him back in the house. i liked him a lot. i have not talked to or seen him since he became governor but i would say just as mark rubio has the best skill set i would argue that casich is probably the most qualified person running in either party. 18 years as a member of the house back when it was a functioning institution. the house armed service committee member the entire time he is there checking that national security box. governor of ohio. that is a big deal. then you think it is ohio. no republican ever won the

presidency without winning ohio. and if you look at ideaological where he is, i think of this as a bell curve, where the bell curve is the 40-45 yardline on the right side because the country is a little more conservative than liberal, and kasich is on the 40 yardline. in the same zone as bush and rubio. so it is not optimal to win the election but it is good place to be. but he has one shortcoming and that is, and again i alluded to and said i have adhd which is no surprise to the people that work with me, that adderall or

ritilin would change his life. you have never seen a person that is as successful as him that is as unorganized or undisciplined. contrast his speeches with ted cruz. ted cruz did it at liberty university, he had memorized the speech, it was perfect. what about kasich? there wasn't a teleprompter. i don't think there was a speech written. he got up and went on this stream of conscious thing for close to 50 minutes. you go john, john, this is an important event here. that sort of thing. i am aware of a fundraising

phone call me made within the last month to someone. this big republican donor-type, very wealthy person, it was clear that kasich was having one, or possibly two, other conversations while on the phone with the donor type. and the guy finally said if you want to talk to me on the phone call me when you are not having other conversations. it is like you cannot do that. the point is i think if bush doesn't get stuff together quickly, and i think it may not quite be too late, but you have see rubio take this conventional thing. i mean christie showing signs of life and things but i think it is going to be more rubio. let's go ever to the exotic side. i have to really, really speed up. donald trump is clearly tapping

into the this visceral anger. it is like giving the finger to career politicians and the establishment. or let's say you have people estranged from the establishment. they are looking for the opposite of a politician. that is what they want. but for different people that is different things. for some, and it tends to skew a little bit more blue coller, a little bit more male, a little younger, but not exclusively in any of those, their idea of donald trump is donald trump. he is the opposite of the politician in their mind. he is angry, says what is on his mind, doesn't care what anybody thinks. it is a pretty good act. so one group gravitated to him. then there is a second group,

and these are people that are just as estranged but not as angry. they are gravitating to ben carson. they say him as a kind gentle man. they see him as someone who is a role model focus groups say. this is what politicians ought to be like; who tell the truth and are decent people. so in their mind, and it tends to skew more white collar, deeply religious, a lot is about religion, but in their minds, ben carson is the opposite. and it is carly fiorina in the other group. doesn't fit the mode of a career-politician over here. a lot is social economics,

temperamental, it is what are you looking for. keep in mind, by the way, that you know, we used to this can of the republican party as the p t party of country clubbers. keep in mind that roughly half of the republican party is college-educated. roughly half is not, though. a lot of these are or their parents were conservative democrats who moved into the republican party and completely changed the mix of the republican party. so they moved over. now, the thing is i think, my colleague amy walter wrote a column over the summer where she said summer is for dating and winter is for mating. i thought that -- you know, i

have heard republican voters say, particularly last summer, that this was like walking into a baskin robins with 31 flavors of candidates and they have the wooden spoon and they are tasting all of them having a great time. the establishment is petrified but the voters are having a great time because they never had a selection quite like this. we have seen trump's averages starting to come down and carson has supplanted him in some. let me do a quick rant. you can see people in the press, and non-press, who will gravitate -- whatever is the new poll, and even though they have no earthly idea who the pollster is, and nobody has heard of the

pollster, and it is like polls are a commodity. they have become all of the same. it turned out they were making stuff. i saw people on a morning show going crazy over a couple state polls i never heard of the pollster before. ever! and like, you know, any of you, you could -- what your mother's maiden name? >> tata? >> tata research just came out with a poll that shows -- i mean, the thing is you could get it on television. i should not say this. this is on c-span and somebody will. they give it as much credence as if it were an nbc times poll or

something. i think that as it gets closer to february 1st iowa caucus to february 8th, from the dating around phase, or having a little this or that, and i think we are seeing it with trump. the novelity is wearing off. people are noticing he knows little about very few of these things. they are starting to see it fade. i think carson is going to have some legs and we will last a little longer. the funny thing, the trump and carson vote is not interchangeable. take for the carson-type voters, they see trump as this vain and profane man who brags about being on the cover of "play boy"

magazine, fully clothed, and that is against the deeply faith-based people backing carson. we are talking about different voters here. but when you listen to carson, and i am sure, first of all, as a neuro surgeon, the guy probably has twice the iq points of any of us in this room. but when you listen to him, it is clear he knows very, very, little about any of these things. you heard him being asked about the debt limit and it was clear he didn't know it what it was. the question is once you get into caucuses and primaries and messing around/dating around down to getting to who is going to be the republican nominee? who can beat and win the general election? who do you want to be the

commander and chief to deal with all of these problems? i suspect you will see this start to fade down a little bit. i think it is going to go to someone, this more exotic wing of the nomination. it is going to go to someone who is a vehicle for that anger, that outsider, but knows more and is sort of more -- is not quite as flawed in one way or another. and obviously trump and carson are very different people than some of the others. could it be a carly fiorina? she is a great example, to me, of how someone who never held elective office, and shouldn't necessarily know about the foreign policy issues and things, man she is flat been to school. she has studied this stuff.

she knows these issues inside and out. she is honed in. she is on message. and the thing about it is what carson and trump don't know and understand about public policy clearly fiorina figured it out. she is really good. i think her challenge is this. b besides the fact there is no campaign underneath her which is the deal-breaker in primaries and caucus but the question is what is her narrative? is it going to be a flawed and

failed ceo who was pushed out and has become sort of untouchable in some ways? i mean like where is she -- usually you think about baseball or football. a manager or coach, or whatever, gets fired from what team and what happens? they pop up some place else. ceo's are often like that. they go on corporate boards. you can make a fabulous living going on the boards of big companies, as a former woman ceo of a big company, you would think about boards. other than taiwan conductor i never heard of her being on a board. then we get to ted cruz. i talked about how kasich was

probably the most qualified and rubio probably had the best skill set in terms of skill set but one thing that rubio, that fiorina and cruz share, focus, discipline, i mean they are -- they are absolutely on task and nothing you could say or do will sort of peal them off of what they are trying to say which is a valuable commodity in politics. when i look at cruz, i see someone, and i am a registered independent, middle of the road guy, i don't agree with ted cruz on a lot, but when several of us had dinner with him last year, the backroom of a steak house, and sitting across from him, cruz said things the day before i would have thought were crazy, and the next day i did in fact

think were crazy. but when he said it, it didn't sound crazy. it made a heck of a lot of sense. he is a very, very skilled communicator. you cannot listen to him and say this guy was a championship debater in college. and finally, focused and has a strategy. you notice he has never criticized trump or carson because he wants to inherit. he believes their support is going to start melting off. we are seeing trump start to melt off already. he wants to be there to be the remainder man. to sort of pick up the support, and you don't do it by telling people their first choice was a stupid first choice. that is not how you do it. and so, i am watching cruz as the guy that i think, and i don't have data to support this,

is most likely to be the person that inherits this outside more exotic side of the republican party. that is how i see it. quickly, first of all, this election is about change. and what kind of change do you want? risky or more safe form of change? that is something peter heart was saying the other day. what kind of change do you want? to me you say is this time for change election or about changing american demographics? if time for a change, that is leading towards republicans winning. but more about demographics that can be a really challenge for the republican party. this is going to be, one thing, we are waiting to get the rest of the new wall street nbc journal poll, in september they asked would you whether see a democrat or republican elected. and it was 37-37 or 38-38. just dead even. that is where this thing starts

off. and then candidates, events, circumstances kind of sort of start leaning it one way or the other. sort of watch that. quickly, the senate and then we need to open it up. senate, everybody in this room knows most of the people watching c-span know, senate 54 republican, 46 democrat so democrats need a five-seat gain to hold the house. we have gone into a boom bust cycle in the senate. john edwards talked about two americas. i agree. i have presidential election america, and midterm election america. the turnout is big, broad, and diverse, it looks like the country in the general election. but mid-term, turnout is 60%

high, older, wider, conservative and more republican. it is just a different environment. so what we are having is 2008, democrats have a great year in the house and senate. 2010, republicans have a great year pick up the house and senate seat. 2012 presidential year again, democrats reelected and pick up the house and senate. 2014, boom bust cycle. six-year terms in the senate. if you are a republican and elected on a mid-term election year congrats you won with a 70 mile per hour wind at your back. but six years later you are up during a presidential year. other other way around, democrat elected during the presidential year, six years later, you are up in a mid-term election. in 2014, last year, democrats had a whole bunch of seats up and they were in really, really

red republican states and they just got completely hosed. that is a political science term. 2016, the shoe is on the other foot. republicans have 24 -- these were the seats up in the 2010 republican wave election. republicans have 24 seats and democrats only have 10. but republicans have seven seats up in states that obamaca took 2007. one of those republican state seats in an obama state is in iowa and grassley will not lose. but you have six republican seats that are in real, real danger here. and conversely you only have one on the democratic side and that is in nevada. if you ask each side, what is one more? and republicans would love to

talk about colorado. but that doesn't look that promising against michael bennett. democrats would like to say richard burr and north carolina. but i don't think anything is going to happen there. it is 6-1. you look at kirk in illinois, good guy, but if he got reelected it would be an enormous upset. ron johnson in wisconsin would be an unset, i think. and you look at other republicans that would not be upset but republicans in states that obama took have challenges. portman in ohio, we have pennsylvania, the new hampshire senator and rubio's open seat in florida finally. six republican seats that are a-prime vulnerable versus harry reid's open seat in nevada. ...

like florida, ohio, new hampshire, nevada, so that it is not necessarily true that as it goes presidentially it will also go in the senate, but keep in mind, whatever the turn of dynamics, whatever the issue agenda, whatever is going on. we are looking at a heck of a race for the senate underneath what is obviously one of the weirdest and most fun presidential races we have ever seen. i know we have some microphones here. i'm told there is a way to tweet questions in. questions, comments, accusations, and i think state your name and the

organization your representing are with did i answer -- zero, you have some? these are two good ones. first, how can establishment republicans win in a populist friendly year? and,and, i guess that is a great, great, great question, although to me trump is more populist. carson is less. so populism is going on. and to me i don't really call with carson is doing populism. it is something different and big and meaningful, but i think that it is something that is other than populism. that is a really good question command where

clearly one of two things happened. republicans change their stripes and did something theymay have only done once since 2002 or is more like 2012 with a flair with all of this and want to do this and end up doing that. that is onethat is one course. the other courses they go with someone outside of the box or that is running from the outside. he's a better candidate skills and trump are carson. he knows this stuff in the issues and in a debate he would be very, very, very formidable. that is why i think that you could have a somewhat populist or outsider run and possibly when the republican nomination, but that it is

one that has gotten -- that does not have some of the shortcomings let's face it, the republican establishment is under siege. >> i think he is trying to build -- put kind of an edge back in. i mean,, i have a very high opinion of jeb bush. i give him a b12 shot. i personally like five our energies and just found them away. maybe a little bit more caffeine. and say, you know, and, you know how you kind of -- you

ever seen before a football game or some of the football players paying heads before the game? it is like a pair of rams, just sort of psyching themselves up for a game. and this guy needs to get psyched up. and i mean, if i were -- i would say whatever i needed to say. you want to go to thanksgiving having to look across the table? i would say whatever i needed to say to make him angry, get passionate and get him to show that this is not something. i don't thinki don't think it is his right or that he is inherited it or anything else. but i do think that is a perception out there. and he is a different person that his brother and maybe it is better, maybe it is not. he is a different person, but to, but to be

honest i don't think this is a campaign problem. he has rotten luck about what he is up, when he is up. the whole world might be different, but it is both timing and that he has yet to show that he desperately, desperately wants this and will,we will, you know, as he said the other day not terribly convincingly which you on nails 1st thing in the morning. more questions. yes, sir. there is a mike right there. >> thank you. given the impact of donald trump's campaign turning this into a schoolyard type politics, how do you see that impacting campaigns going forward? less genteel? >> while. well, i don't know. i kind of thing gentility start going out of style a while back. but -- because i think is

trump going to be a role model for some candidacies and the candidates of the future? yes, i think so. there is only one donald trump and that he really is a, something of a performance artist, and where,, you know, for a guy who has never been involved in politics before, he seems to have a very, very real understanding of how the media works for how to manipulate the media them out to take advantage of it, which is interesting for someone who has never run for anything before, but i am tempted to say that trump is part of a trend that we are seeing toward more outsized, more passionate, angry,passionate, angry, it is part of a trend that we had already seen, but i

think that he is a pretty unique character, and so it is not something we will see exactly like manifest itself like that, but we will see a lot of little trumps coming up along the way. hehe is awfully unique. i mean,, he really, really, really is. and the other thing about trump, to me, i don't know that this is a guya guy that could deal well with being in 2nd place for a long time. i don't think his ego can take it.it. keep in mind, he is only into this for 2 million so far. you can look up in the house and senate and find heck of a lot of people up there or that did not make it they're who put in far more than 2 million of there own money he said at one point that he would spend a hundred million if necessary. you know, 1st of all, let's just assume that he is liquid enough and can come over 100 million, do you know what that represents?

obama and romney each spend $1 billion in that election. so hundred million, you know, it is more than pocket change, but i don't think he would see the republican party donor stepping behind him to pick up the tab. i don't think that many people would jump out of pick up the tab for donald trump. but i do think that we are seeing politics go for a time to a very, very different place which is why it is important that while i personally don't think carson and trump will go the distance, that anger that they give voice to, that israel, and i don't underestimate that at all. who will be the jockey that rides that anger through to the finish line?

my hunchhunches it is not trump or carson. right over here. >> do you see any viable scenario in which the republicans lose the house? >> any viable scenario that republicans lose the house. first of all, the most -- it's hard. it is really, really, really, really hard and would take an enormous amount of effort was the house. basically, democrats would have to hold onto 100 percent of their seats and when every single republican seat that is in any danger at all, 100 percent of those, which really, rarely happens and then start knocking off people that are not even vulnerable at all and just given where people live population patterns, where the congressional district boundaries are, this is really hard. if you are going to tell me

republicans have lost the house what happens? i would assume one of two things. trump's name is on the general election ballot. either as a republican nominee or an independent, independent, and i don't think he will run as an independent. i don't know if carson would do that are not. but the thing about it, republicans have kind of, i mean, speaker ryan o speaker weiner a lot because, well, a year or so ago he says something about taking all of the sharp instruments out of the room. and by doing the debt ceiling and the budget deal they did remove the instruments that would be most likely for them to impale themselves. so that it is awfully, awfully, awfully hard.

look, you never want to say never. but it is awfully, awfully, awfully hard. if our republicans i would say, republicans should be worried about the damage they are doing to the franchise internally within the house of representatives when i think of fortysomething members that that that paul ryan not conservative enough, it is like, wow, this is really, really interesting. and i do think that a month or so ago eric cantor who let his district get out from under him but is a really smart guy, but he wrote a peace in the "wall street journal" where he warned conservatives of following leaders who are mr. -- misleading the and have given them -- there is this pervasive view among conservatives that we were

told, and itold command i think the establishment played in the us a little bit. we were told, if we elect of republican majorities of the house and to the senate that we could repeal obama care, turn back the epa regulations, undo everything obama has done and democrats have done and put forth our agenda and get a bunch of things done. in the next day actually the speaker warned of false prophets, you know, the same sort of thing. the thing is, it ignores basic civics that you may have a majority ina majority in the house and you may have a majority in the senate, but until you have vetoproof -- if you don't have the presidency, if you don't have vetoproof filibuster proof majorities you don't have that kind of control. and so these conservative voters feel like they were

misled. we were promised we could get all this done command to them republican leaders obviously could get all these things done and have chosen not to. well, they did not choose not to, they couldn't. look at the rules come out place works. and that is, i think, primary source of all of this vitriol that you are seeing within the republican party as they think they got like to. the thing is, i think that they were exaggerating. hyperbole is part of politics. put us in office and we can do x, y, z, but they took it literally and feel betrayed by their leaders in the leaders exaggerated somewhat. but you could not do that unless you have filibuster vetoproof majority. you cannot do all of these things you guys desperately want to do. so, another question in the

room? >> okay. >> is there a path to victory for the gop and colorado senate? the smart aleck side of me says,says, yes, get him to resign from one seat to run for that one. i think here is the challenge. number one, it is a presidential year as opposed to a midterm year. the electorate in colorado, colorado is one of the closest aides to being 50-yard line state out there, but it is a big difference between presidential year and midterm year mark udall is from a story family, but i don't think he was a natural politician.

and while michael bennet is relatively new to politics,, wow, i think his understanding of politics and of campaigns and how to win is very, very, very highly developed, and, and i don't think he is as beatable as udall was. finally, there is only one cory gardner. you show me another cory gardner that can cut into independents and moderates, cut against the problems that the party is facing in umpteen different groups, and that person could win the general election. so far republicans have not found someone there yet. i am pretty skeptical there command to be perfectly honest i'm fairly skeptical of north carolina. the sanders outreach to might -- white male voters

something with key demographics, do you see from the gop. well, to me yes bernie sanders support is overwhelmingly white and that -- but i think that the white males the bernie sanders voters, swing general election voters. talking about volvos and birkenstocks and soy lattes and things like that because i think that is not fair. but the thing about it is sanders voters and supporters are very, very, very passionate liberals and they are not anybody that whatever contemplate voting republican. what is interesting is, i

don't -- if there is a path to the white house from bernie sanders it is a subtle one and probably requires republicans doing some pretty exotic things themselves and then getting a whole bunch of breaks. it will be a long process. >> it is the revamped primary schedule most favorite your opinion? >> wrote a peace earlier this year, and david wasserman, our house editor has no working on some things. it is interesting. there are -- i am not sure -- well, i don't think he

has released this yet, but there are an enormous number of delegates for the republican convention are not from conservative places. and basically every congressional district, each one has three delegates. now there are also some from states that have voted republican. for example, in the most republican districts, david we will shoot me for doing this. and the most republican district in the country according to wasserman romney got -- there were 85,672 romney votes for each of the three delegates from the congressional district.

and i think it is hosea's toronto's, 1,772 romney votes per republican delegate to the convention. so that there is not very republican places. less ideological republican. even though the people who live there don't even no any republicans. the thing about it, the

delegate selection process does on the republican side tends to put -- does give non- republican performing districts a boatload of delegates, and it is some pretty impressive numbers. >> in particular the nominee be so disliked that it would drive them to the other party rather than being attracted to the other party. >> that's a very good peemack. to me, independence is independence is the best number look at, but i also look at self-described moderates as well.

let me make sure i am looking at the exit poll, the right tab. independent. that's the vertical. i'm looking for the horizontal tab. romney won the independent vote by a five-point margin in 2012. romney won the independent vote by five percentage points, but among self-described moderates obama wanted by 15-point margin. and so i kind of look at both of those groups, independent and moderate. and so is there -- obama one

without winning more independent votes but did it because his party had an advantage in terms of party. a lot of conservatives did not vote for romney and that route press the republican number. at the same time as she had done what it would take to jack up to what extent might he have lost the independent vote. this whole exercise, you haveexercise, you have to be able to walk and chew gum at the same time.

you have to be able to hold your base while reaching in and grabbing as many votes as you possibly can from the middle, whether it is the partisan middle, independent, or ideological middle moderate and keep in mind that a great number. >> in my other notes. the decisive factor. 29 percent as a vision for the future. and romney one that group by nine-point margin. romney one that group by 13 points.

romney one that grew by 23 points. the other group, 21 percent cares about people like me and obama one that group by a 63-point margin. so romney won three out of four, but got clobbered there. and so that is why for a conservative the key is how can i maximize the republican vote, maximize the conservative vote, but not come across as this coldhearted person who does not care about regular people. and, you know, that is why you say how does the republican do that? the answer is, very carefully. it is not something that just happens automatically. okay. i am getting the hook.

last question. emergency candidate for both parties, michael bloomberg. >> well, 1st ofwell, 1st of all, let me state my personal bias. i think he is a smart guy, very good mayor of new york. the republican side, that would be a complete nonstarter. you cannot do what he has done on guns and have any chance on the republican side. and even on the democratic side i think it would be safe to say that elizabeth warren and the occupy people , if they think hillary clinton is a wall street candidate, try somebody that actually did work there. they would get completely out of their minds. i just think that joe biden would be -- to me if there was case of fire break the

glass, if it's early i think you might very well see the party head back toward biden. if it is late in the process , like really like then where it is almost like too late and we get into the world of filing deadlines in this, but i wonder whether -- ii don't think -- i have a hard time seeing any circumstance, sanders actually wins the nomination. so the guy within the existing field. >> and i think.

>> someone who has been a two-term governor of the state, widely considered to be in the mainstream of the party in politics, where bernie sanders has been -- he has his own ue chace it, he has not been the most effective member, liberal democratic senator. really effective democratic senators, ted kennedy, tom harkin. but sanders has chosen to basically be a voice but to actually do stuff, get things done, driving agenda. that had noten