then, my dream was to go to the usc medical school, get married, raise a family, and practice medicine in los angeles. growing up in a lower middle class community on the southside of chicago, madison was considered the pinnacle of professions. noble and humane. virtually everyone important in my life, my family, my teachers, my girlfriend wanted me to be a doctor. over time, their dreams became my dreams. they convinced me i should be a doctor. but as hard as i tried i couldn't do it. after a few difficult and unhappy years as a premed student, it became painfully clear to me that i did not like the courses i was taking. i thought my comparative anatomy

class was a perversely pointless form of psychological torture. especially a dissection labs. and i just could not make myself study something that didn't interest me. at the top i thought i'd like to discipline, and that i was selfish, maybe so. but whatever the underlying reasons, i was unable to make myself into the person that i thought he should be. so i decided to stop trying. i was 21 when i dropped out of college. packed everything they own, jeans, t-shirts, letter jacket, guitar come into my car and drove from chicago to berkeley, california. i guess one small part of the university of southern

california dream was mine after all, the california part. berkeley in the 1960s was at the center of everything. the antiwar movement, the free speech movement, the human rights movement. it was the perfect for an undisciplined, selfish twentysomething to begin the search for himself, a righteous cause, and a job that he loved. everyone living in berkeley in the 1960s opposed the vietnam war. i was no different. it was the age of aquarius, but i never had long hair and i never wore love beads. i learned to play popular protest songs on m on the guitat i was never a committed, serious antiwar protester. i did find a cause, however.

once i still feel passionately about today. a few hours east of berkeley are the sierra nevada mountains. i fell in love with those mountains, and the inevitable natural beauty of yosemite valley. i cared about the wilderness and i wanted to help preserve it. i joined the sierra club. i became an environmentalist. [cheers and applause] during my california springs and summers i spent most of my days in the high sierra's in yosemite valley working as a river guide and a rock climbing instructor. i loved doing those jobs, but, unfortunately, they didn't pay that well. i also got a job working couple of days a week as a computer programmer back in berkeley. i had learned to program in college. i didn't love programming but it

was fun and i was good at it. and computer programming gave me the same kind of satisfaction as solving math problems and playing chess. both things i enjoyed before i became a confused teenager. at this point in my life i thought i was making real progress on my journey of self-discovery. i found a cause to write a couple of jobs that i love and one that was fun and paid the bills. i was pretty happy with my life. my wife was not. what she saw was a college dropout who spent too much time in the mountains doing foolish things. she wanted me to work full-time as a computer programmer or go back to college and finish my degree. we compromised. sort of. i started taking classes at uc berkeley. i took several classes, but the

only one i can remember was a sailing class taught at berkeley marina. once again i fell in love and begin a lifelong affair with the limitless omnipotent pacific ocean. when my class was over, i wanted to buy a sailboat. my wife said, this was the single stupidest idea she had ever heard in her entire life. she accused me of being irresponsible, and she told me i lacked ambition. she kicked me out, and then she divorced me. this was a pivotal moment in my life. [laughter] [applause] my family was still mad at me

for not going to medical school, and now my wife was divorced me because i lacked ambition. it looked like a re- occurrence of the same old problem, once again i was unable to live up to the expectations of others. but this time i was not disappointed in myself. for failing to be the person they thought i should be. their dreams and my dreams were different. i would never confuse the two of them again. i discover things that i loved, the sierras, yosemite, the pacific ocean. these natural wonders brought me great joy and happiness, and would for the

that you are crazy, you just might be onto the most important innovation in your life. [cheers and applause] this is one of those times when experts were wrong. arrogance and insanity turned out to be innovation in disguise. the oracle database prove to be a defining technology of the dawn of the information age. the oracle database also totally abandoned my plans to build a small comfortable company, a

perfect place for me and a few of my friends to work. as the information age move from dawn to the full light of day, technology horizons were constantly shifting, revealing a brave and exciting world of new possibilities and new opportunities. oracle doubled in size year after year after year, for 10 years. i'd set out to create the perfect programming job for me. instead, i greater job why had to stop programming altogether. i attempted to create an environment that could completely control. instead, i was when a company with thousands and thousands of people that was growing so fast that it was impossible for anyone to control. >> it was like sitting in a hurricane. and then we went public. oh, my god. maybe i should've been a doctor.

i was constantly learning on the job training i think they call it. everyday i learn something new and interesting, something that i did not know the day before. i like that. my new job was challenging, captivating, consume. i worked all the time, but thinking back i'm very sure i didn't love it. or maybe i was just too tired to even know how i felt. but i have found a place in the world. my family finally forgave me for not going to medical school. and nobody ever accused me of lacking ambition again. now i would like to tell you one last story about my best friend, eye gouge with lots of crazy ideas and taught me an important lesson. my 30 year friendship with steve jobs was made up of a thousand walks. if there was something he wanted to talk about, and there always

was, we would go for a walk. we would climb to the talk of windy hill, hiked around castle rock or through the sands on the beach. over the years, one particular blog stand out. had a lot to talk about that date so we jumped in the car,, put the top down and out to council rock state park in the santa cruz mountains. it was over 20 years ago back in mid-1995. she was finishing up the toy store it at pixar and running the computer company founded after he left apple. apple was in severe distress. it had gone steadily downhill during the 10 years of steve's absence. the problems were now so serious, people were wondering if apple would survive. it was all too painful to watch and stand by and do nothing. for the purpose of that

particular height of the santa cruz mountains on that particular day was to discuss taking over apple computer. my idea was simple, by apple and deon beasley make steve ceo. apple was a worth much back then, about $5 billion. we both had really good credit. and i had already arranged to borrow all the money. all steve had to do was say yes. steve proposed a somewhat more circuitous approach. first, persuade apple to buy next computer, vince cable join the apple board, and over time the board would recognize that steve was the right guy to lead the company. i said okay, that might work but

steve, if we don't buy apple, how are we going to make any money? suddenly he stopped walking and turned towards me. we were facing each other we would does left hand on my right shoulder and his right hand on my left shoulder. staring unblinkingly into my eyes, steve said, larry, this is why it's so important that i am your friend. you don't need any more money. [laughter] i said yeah, i know, i know. then i said but we don't have to keep it if we could give it all away. i was whining. steve just shook his head and said, i'm not doing this for the money. i don't want to get paid. if i do this, i need to do this standing on the moral high

ground. the moral high ground, i said? well, that just might be the most expensive real estate on earth. but i knew i had lost the argument. steve had made up his mind right there and then at council rock in the summer of 1995 to say -- to save apple is way. people get back into the car i said you created apple, it's your company, and it's your call. i will do whatever you want me to do. i went on the apple board and i watched steve bell the most valuable company on earth. [applause] the lesson here is very clear to me. steve was right.

after a certain point, it can't be about the money. after a certain point you can't stanspend no matter how hard you try. i know. i've tried hard. but it's impossible. in the end the only practical option is to give nearly all of it away. so why did steve go back to apple? why did he devote so much of what remained of his life to his job? why do i? i believe the answer is that deep inside of all of us, all of us, there's a primal desire to do something important with our lives. and freud said there are only two things important in life, love and work. he did not say love and work

with the same thing. i'm passionate about my work. it continues to give me great satisfaction and a sense of who i am, but passion and love are different. at least for me they are. i love my family, a few precious friends, for cats, two dogs, cherry blossoms to japan, pacific islands beaches and bays, and the majestic sierra nevada mountains where it all began for me. my feelings about work are very intense, but quite different. there's a tv advertisement for the united states navy vet says it's not just a job, it's an adventure. that's exactly how i feel about my years in silicon valley. and interesting, challenging, all consuming adventure. like any ongoing adventure, i

have no idea how it ends. but i know it will. for me. and a long, long time from now for all of you. but today, graduates, you're beginning your great adventure. your generational change the world as every generation does. you will invent new technologies and create new types of art. impossibilities will be transformed into possibilities, and unexpected opportunities will present themselves. you will change the world, and the world will change you as you learn and grow and discover more about yourself. remember this, graduates. and a constantly changing world, what is possible is a moving target. don't be afraid to experiment

and try lots of different things. and don't let the experts discovered you when you challenge the status quo. like mark twain says, what's an expert anyway? just some guy from out of town. [laughter] each of you has a chance to discover who you are rather than who you should be, a chance to live your dreams, not the dreams of others. each of you has an obligation to commit to a righteous cause, one that elevates you and improves the conditions of humanity and the planet. soon, many of you will begin a new job. i hope it interests you and challenges you and reward you with a sense of purpose and satisfaction. but if it doesn't, keep searching. it's out there. it might take a while, but keep

searching until we find a job that ignites your passions, like i did. even better. you just might find one that you love. thank you and congratulations. [applause] >> this morning on c-span2 former president bill clinton speaks to the graduating class of loyola marymount university in california. than louisiana governor john bel edwards speaks to graduates at southern university in new orleans. live at 9 a.m. eastern, georgetown university law center holds a forum on food and public health. >> former president bill clinton delivered the commencement

address at loyola marymount university in los angeles. he encouraged students to embrace their differences and work towards a more inclusive society. this is 15 minutes. [cheers and applause] >> well, thank you very much. i want to begin by thanking your chair, kathleen, and congratulate her not only on her degree but on the work of many years to enable more young people to go to college. president snyder, thank you for welcoming me here, and for your service, and for doing it with such remarkable energy.

and a good sense of humor. we need more of that today in america. i want to thank congresswoman maxine waters and her husband, ambassador sidney williams. vaccine for service, her devotion to this district, and her longtime friendship to hillary and me which is more than i can say. i think the provost, vice chair of the board and all of the other faculty and staff. a lot of proud parents in this audience but it's people who are in public service at a do want to note that senator john barrasso from wyoming epistemic here because his daughter is also in the graduating class, so i thank him for his presence. [applause] at least two other alumni are very important parts of my administration and i want to acknowledge former deputy

secretary of defense rudy deleon on, and a man who is not your, tony quelled, was a great congressman from california and the primary sponsor for the americans with disabilities act who served on the commission for people with disabilities. [applause] i am here in two capacities, not just as a commencement speaker but hillary and i came as a proud uncle in and of our nephew tyler who is a member of this class. [applause] so i want to congratulate tyler's mom and dad and all the parents and family members and support systems that got all these graduates here today, as well as the graduates themselves. i am well aware that for most of you, the least important part of this ceremony is my talk.

[laughter] look, i graduated from georgetown 40 years ago and i can say with some conviction that most people who've been out of college as long as i have cannot remember either their commencement speaker, much less what he said. however, i remember both, and i learned a lot from it. like you, we had our commencement outside. like you, it started out as a cloudy day. but just as the commencement speaker, the mayor of washington, d.c. got up to speak, his huge thundercloud rolled over. the thunder was incredibly loud and massive lightning bolt came out of the sky. and walter washington looked at us and said, if we don't get out of here, we are all going to drown. [laughter] i wish all the best. if you like to read my speech i will send you a copy. good luck. [laughter] that was it.

and so i learned that the very finest commencement speeches are both breathe and highly relevant. [laughter] -- brief. so here's my only slightly longer attempt. you are graduating in the most interdependent age in human history, interdependent with each other, within your community, your state, your nation, and the world. this campus has seen global imagination, and what you have also today, light the world on fire, both have to be defined. because all interdependence means is that here we are, stuck together. we can't get away from each

other. divorce, borders, you name it. we are still stuck with our interdependence. and so whether we like it or not, for the rest of your lives, what happens to you will in some measure be determined by what happens to other people. i how you react to it, how they treat you, how you treat them, and what larger forces are at work in the world. the global economy, the internet, mobile technology, the explosion of the social media have unleashed both positive and negative forces. the last two years have seen an amazing explosion of economic, social and political empowerment. they have also laid bare the

power of persistent inequalities, political and social instability, and identity politics based on the simple proposition that our differences are all that matter. at the root of it all is a simple profound question. will you define yourselves and your relationship to others in positive or negative terms? because if we are bound to share the future, it seems to me that it is clear that all of us have a responsibility, each in her own way, to build up the positives and to reduce the negative forces of our interdependence. this applies to people on the left, the right, somewhere in the middle, or somewhere out there.

there are so many people who feel that they are losing out in the modern world because people either don't see them owes a pashtun or they see them only as members of groups, that they feel threatened by. the young people pushing for immigration reform, clinging, hoping to make their way in a country where their future is uncertain feel that way. the young people in the black lives matter movement feel that way. but so do the coal miners in communities where there present is bleak, if they think their future is bleaker. i think all of us who want to fight climate change don't give a rip about the wreckage of their lives. it's everywhere.

when we try to drift apart and interdependent age, all we do is build up the negatives and reduce the positive forces of interdependence. what does set the world on fire mean anyway? it means you can set the world on fire, but the power of your imagination, the gift of your passion, by the devotion of your heart and you imagination, the gift of your passion, by the devotion of your heart and your skills to make your life richer and to uplift others. or it means you can set the world on fire. [laughter] you have to decide. but because the world is interdependent, you can't take a pass. i think the future begins by accepting the wonderful instruction of our very first jesuit pope.

pope francis has fostered a culture of encounter. where my foundation works in africa and the hills of central africa, nobody has got any real transportation so everyone needs each other on foot. and when people pass each other on half and one says, good morning, hello, how are you? the response, translated into english is, icu. i encounter you. you are real to me. think about all the people today, yesterday and tomorrow you will pass and nazi. -- and not see. puc everybody in a restaurant who worked in a restaurant where you go after drug is delivered when you? do we see the people that we pass on the street who may have

a smile or a frown or a burden they can barely carry on? when we advocate for the causes we believe in, have we anticipated all the unanticipated consequences for the we can take everybody along, or a ride into the future that we imagine. when pope francis tells us to engage in a culture of encounter, he's thinking about the lmu students in this class who, since they were freshmen, have performed almost 200,000 hours of community service. that's a fancy -- thank you. [applause] that's a fancy elevated way of saying, you saw a need and you stepped in to solve it. you did it at all because it was the morally right thing for other people, but because it made your life more meaningful. that's the way you want to set

the world on fire. the young people that were mentioned in my introduction who have been part of our global initiative community for university students made very specific commitments. they promised to mentor high school girls, to help them overcome any preconceived notions of their own limitations. they promised to help the victims of domestic violence, and violence against the homeless. they promised to provide more capital to small businesspeople and haiti through microcredit loans, something that means a lot to hillary and me personally, because her more than 40 years since we took a honeymoon trip there, we've cared about them and believed in them. they promised an education exchange with the national

university of rwanda. we can work a lot from them because they lost 10% of the people in 90 days to genocide in 1994, and they came back because they refused to be paralyzed by the past. they joined hands across the lines that led to all the bloodshed to create a common future. that's what is at the heart of your restorative justice program here. instead of figuring out who to punish them figure out how to repair the harm. instead of focusing on getting even for the past, focus on how we can share the future. it at the heart of the effort here to improve the juvenile justice system. you, without knowing it, have often embodied the future of positive interdependence we hope to build. you can't have shared prosperity

in an inclusive community unless we believe our common humanity is even more important that are incredibly interesting differences. and so i will say this again. on every continent, think of the struggles in latin america, think of the political and social and economic struggles in america. think of what's going on in asia, in africa. think of how europe is dealing with this influx in the middle east with the largest number of refugees since world war ii, and all the conflicts within these countries and whether they should keep europe together. every single one of these is part of an ongoing battle to define the terms of our interdependence. whether we do in positive or negative terms. are we going to expand the definition of us and shrink the definition of them, or shall we

just hunker down in the face of uncomfortable realities i just did with our own crowd? it will be a bleaker future if you do that. so set the world on fire with your imagination, not with your matches. [laughter] set the world on fire by proving that what we have in common is a million times more important than our admittedly utterly fascinating differences. and finally i just want to -- [applause] -- say that all this is, this great struggle that will go on for so what years now, to define our relationships in an interdependent world is for you, the background of real life, your life. the life in which you will write

your own story, give your own dreams, suffer your own disappointments. it is an empowering gift, this education you have. for most of human history, adults had no choice about what they did with their waking hours. they got up and did what their forebears had done to survive, defeat, to propagate the species, to have children, to raise them, to go on. it's a limited them to them, your job is to set the world on fire, they would've had no clue except maybe to try to put two sticks or stones together, to be worn at night and put food. but you can set the world on fire because of the empowerment of your education and the empowerment of your circumstances.

so here's my last shot. there are no final victories or defeats in this life. you will make mistakes and you will fail. and if you keep trying, you'll be glad you did. the only thing that matters is how quick you get up and how resolutely you go on. it is not given to us to win every battle, but to fight the right fights. mother teresa once said it was far more important that she and her fellow nuns be faithful, then they always be successful. i can tell you after 48 years, it doesn't take long to live a life. that journey can be utterly glorious. and i would give anything to be your age again, just to see what's going to happen. i do believe that this will be

the most prosperous, discovery written, exhilarating period in human history. if we decide how best to set the world on fire. if we keep expanding the definition of us and shrinking the definition of them, if every day we all get a little better in seeking everyone we encounter, physically or virtually. if we remember that a very short life the things we share matter even more than the things about us that our special. so do well, do good, have a good time doing it. and remember, it's the journey that matters. set the world on fire, and then

the right way. god bless you. [cheers and applause] you. thank you. [applause] >> louisiana governor john bel edwards address graduates at southern university in new orleans come a public historically black college. during his remarks he stressed his commitment to the university and the students as it faces the threat of closure. this is 10 minutes.

[applause] >> thank you. thank you members of the class of 2016, chancellor, president, faculty, parents, friends. it's an honor to share this day of celebration with you. and doctor, my friend, thank you for your exemplary service to the southern university of new orleans and to the state of louisiana, under some of the most difficult circumstances imaginable over the last 10 years. donna and i am a state of louisiana wish you well in your future endeavors. and while i'm here, i want to issue an official statement in the name and by the authority of the state of louisiana,

specifically i, john bel edwards, together with the citizens of this great state do hereby given special recognition to the chancellor in acknowledgment of your leadership and dedicated service to southern university new orleans and the southern university system from 2006 2006-2016, ma and in witness whereof i have here and to set my hand officially and caused to be a fixed is great deal of the state of louisiana, the capital, gussied up baton rouge on the seventh day of may, 2016. and i have signed this i want to give this to you, doctor. a sign of appreciation of the great state of louisiana for you. [applause] >> before i go any further, our invitation today mentioned ordering our steps, and so did

that musical selection. and god will order our steps if we ask him to come and he will order our steps in his word. but we still have to move our feet. we all have to move our feet. you are going to get an opportunity here as you leave as graduates to move your feet as you've never done before, so congratulations. it's a great day. i'm happy to be here to celebrate with you. [applause] on may 251980 i graduated west point. it was an outdoor service. we were wearing full dress gray over white, and what i remember, it was raining hard. we smelled like a lot of the dirty sheep, and the speaker spoke way too long. and i'm sure he gave a good speech. and affected with the vice president george bush to seven months later became president. i still don't remember much of

it. i'm not going to keep you long today. and, in fact, i'm told at one time dr. seuss gave the commencement speech. he got up, he said the purpose of education is to determine fluff from stuff. and having said that, i've said enough, and he sat down. [laughter] i'm not going to be that brief, not going to be that eloquent. to all the moms out here, tomorrow is your day, but today is your day, too. [applause] you have supported these graduates through good times and bad times. you have encouraged them to chase their dreams, and today they are catching one of those dream. you watch them grow into the men and women who are receiving their diplomas today, so thank you, moms. while we are at it, thank you dads, aunts and uncles and grandparents because of to take the family. it takes a support structure to

make sure that our children can be successful. i know you are proud, and i am proud as well. most importantly how i want to congratulate the class of 2016. [cheers and applause] your hard work has paid off.3 [cheers and applause] your hard work has paid off. i know some of you faced even more challenges, lots of challenges to get to this day. many of you are not traditional higher education students. maybe you are not full-time student when you started. maybe you were never a full-time student. maybe you've had to work a job, raise children. maybe you were displaced by a storm. maybe you just started later in life for whatever reason. but just look at where you are today. life may have gotten in the way, but it didn't keep you down. so just take a moment because

today is a bit of great celebration that you're going to be busy but just take a moment, think back, contemplate and thank god for the blessings in your life that have allowed you to reach this point. thank him for your family. thank you for your teachers. thank you for the faculty and staff here. most of all just thank him. now, no matter how you got here or how long it took, you will walk out of these doors today following in the footsteps of a long history of trailblazing nights are you represent a new chapter in suno's enduring legacy. it's been 10 years since the university return to new orleans after being displaced to baton rouge in the aftermath of hurricane katrina. doctor has led this university every step of the way. i do know that recovery wasn't

easy, and it certainly wasn't quick. in fact, it's only been two years since the last thing that triggers were moved off of this campus. i've been to this campus about five times now. the progress has been remarkable. but those things are just buildings. the real progress has been with you, the people at southern university of new orleans. and what's most important is you never gave up. you didn't give up on your school. you didn't give up on your education. and i can promise you this. as your governor i'm not going to give up on you. i'm not going to give up on the southern, and i'm not going to give up on suno either. [applause] i have long believed that suno is too important not to fight for. and when they were threats of closures in the southern university system, i stood up to defend this universities important place in this

community and in our state. i know that there is a vital role now and in the future for a public hbcu in new orleans, and that is your role, suno. [applause] suggestions to the contrary are incompetent civil to me. your education is not just your priority. it's my. it's a priority for everybody in the state of louisiana. despite the roadblocks along the way, suno has experienced tremendous growth through new and renovated buildings, steadily climbing enrollment, and one-of-a-kind programs such as the apprentice site site prom and anwar center for undergraduate student achievement. named for a louisiana he wrote and an american hero and a southern university graduate, lieutenant general russel arthur ray. eventually the yuma trailers disappeared and in their place

the small business incubator center was built. if that isn't resilience, i don't know what resilience is. in addition to represent a new chapter for suno, you also represent a new chapter for the great state of louisiana. one i hope that is also resilient. one that i know is resilient as well. and there's no doubt we of challenges to overcome. we are still been with the largest budget deficit in history of our state. we've seen the largest cuts to higher education in the nation over the last eight years, at the same time the highest increases in tuition in the nation over the last eight years. we continue to have the highest incarceration rate in the nation, and we should not. the people in louisiana are not innately more sinister, more criminal than people elsewhere. and we should put them in prison to a greater extent than the rest of the country.

[applause] while i'm very frank about the challenges we face as a state, i want you to know that i am also genuinely optimistic about the future of louisiana, and that is largely because of the bright individuals seated in these seats right in front of me. you know, we can never and should never guaranteed quality of outcomes in our state, but we must guarantee equality of opportunity and access to quality higher education is an opportunity, and your graduation today presents another. i want to focus for a minute on samuel, graduating today, in addition to having the highest grade point average in his class can samuel has been working part-time for the past three years as a research assistant at the louisiana cancer research center. because of his passion for

life-saving research, he has decided to continue this work before starting a joint indeed-ph.d program next year at the lsu health sciences center. [applause] thank you, samuel. i am delighted that you plan on staying here in louisiana because we need you here. in fact, we need all of you here. too many times i've seen the young people of our state think that they might have to leave to get a great education or have a good job or a rewarding career. nothing could be further from the truth. opportunity, great opportunity awaits you right here in louisiana. just look at suno alumnus orlando williams. the same year that suno returned home to new orleans, orlando graduate with her masters after also receiving for undergraduate education in that suno. she went on to be the first woman to serve as chair of the

council at the youngest person ever elected president of the louisiana police jury associations black caucus. so never under estimate the power that you have to make a real difference. your talents and your fresh ideas can forge a new and better path for louisiana. and i determined spirit is one of the greatest gifts you can take away from suno. it's the kind of determination that will give louisiana a better and brighter future, but it will also help you as you enter this new chapter in your own life. and while i am confident that you're leaving your with the tools needed to be successful, i cannot promise you that it's going to be easy. the test of school may be behind you, but there will always be testing life, and many of them will be harder. even when it may seem impossib

impossible, never ever doubt your ability to succeed. and don't let anyone convince you that you cannot be successful. so dream big, chase that dream and catch it. i'm speaking to you today as the 56th governor of the great state of louisiana, and had i listened to the experts, to political pundits, the naysayers, i never would've run for this office because i wasn't supposed to win. so what i tell you, you can do anything, trust me, you can do it. if you can dream it, if you can chase it, you will catch it. [applause] so i hope you leave here today, not only with a quality education, but with determination to make a positive difference, not just in your life and not just in the life of your family, but in your

community, in your state, and in this world in which we live. congratulations, graduates. and god bless each and every one of you. [cheers and applause] >> booktv has 48 hours of nonfiction books and authors every weekend. euros in programs to watch for. on saturday night at 10 eastern on "after words." senate majority leader mitch mcconnell discusses his life in politics and his book. is interviewed by tennessee senator lamar alexander. >> all majorities are fleeting, and depending upon what the american people decide this november, i can be the minority leader next year. the majority leader position does present a real opportunity, even in a body like the senate which is very difficult to make a function. to our advantages to set an agenda and what we call the

right of first recognition, to move the country in the direction you would like to go. >> on sunday in depth live with steve forbes, author and editor-in-chief of "forbes" magazine. you will join us to talk about his life and career and latest book, reviving america come in which he argues for repealing obamacare, replacing the tax code and reforming the fed. of the recent book titles include money, freedom manifesto, how capitalism will save us, join in the conversation. we'll take your phone calls and e-mails live from noon to 3 p.m. eastern. then sunday night at 11:15 p.m. eastern cbs 60 minutes correspondent lesley stahl discusses the science behind grandparenting in her book becoming grandma, the joys and science of the new grandparenting. she interviewed colleagues, friends, doctors and scientists about the changes that occur in

women as they transition to the role of grandparents. go to booktv.org for the complete weekend schedule. >> american history tv on c-span3. saturday night at 10 eastern on real american spent more than 110,000 cubans flee cuba. they come the 140 kilometers to key west, florida, in nearly 2000 votes. why do they come? why are there so many? >> during the spring through fall 1980 across a 125,000 cuban refugees arrived in florida from cuba. here in the years from disney or bibles to america and find out why they left. sunday morning at 10 on go to the white house rewind, the 1992 democratic and republican convention, bill clinton accepts his party's presidential nomination in new york city.

>> in the name of the hard-working americans who make up our forgotten middle class upheld accept the nomination for president of the united states. [cheers and applause] >> add-on, president george h. w. bush accepts his party's nomination in houston. >> and i am proud to receive and i'm honored to accept your nomination for president of the united states. .. washington it's unanimous.

unanimously commander in chief, unanimously president of the united states, unanimously reelected president of the united states, unanimously appointed as for lieutenant general and commander in chief of all the armies, ought to be raised for the as much as in the united states. what a record. >> george washington scholar, peter enríquez, continue to meet with political figures and was often called upon to craft policy. for the complete american history tv weekend schedule go to c-span.org. >> here on c-span2 live from washington bringing you the start of a day-long conference on food policy and public health, attendees will hear from former fda commissioner and former health and human services secretary dana shalella, about

to get underway on c-span2 and news out of washington this morning from the labor department, the monthly report on jobs, u.s. employers adding 38,000 jobs in may the fewest in five years. falling 4.7% in may. [inaudible conversations]

[inaudible conversations] >> good morning. my name is tim westmoreland, senior scholar at the o'neil on health law. i'm sorry to say the dean trainer has just this morning been calling for a family issue and so i'm happy to say that probably makes me dean for the day if there's anything that people want from the law school. [laughter] >> but i'm welcoming you here today for the o'neil institute which was founded about ten years ago because law is and

will be a tool to solve health problems, locally, nationally and globally and for almost a decade o'neil has worked with all parties, private sector to develop law as a means to arrive at innovative answers. o'neil is holding conference on food to help us understand how it can be improved. it is obviously one of the most basic parts of our lives. food is one of the biggest personal expenditures, and biggest parts of the economy and one of the biggest sources of jobs in america and increasingly recognized as one of the biggest components of public and personal health. many americans have food insecurity during the year. the use of antibiotics in

livestock contributes to antibiotic resistance and obesity is one of the pressing concerns for individuals in the nation. we hope today's meeting to creation of bipartisan indeed, nonpartisan attention to these and other problems. as a new president and new congress come to power, it's important to ensure that food problems are on the table. and it's important that we present not only the problems but also the legal and the policy solutions to be considered. fortunately we have a who's who of policy expert. the proceedings from today are to be published and mfer -- moreover potential to be discontinued by policy makers and advocates and consumers as part of the 2017 political agenda. today's event is open to the press and is being live streamed

and televised. for those who are not physically present, i'm told you can join in on twitter also using the #vote food 2016. there are also twitter handles were available for the speakers on the biopages. please help us keep the conversation on social media and don't forget to add #votefood 2016. óscar, cabrera, executive director, sarah roach and allyson and and and alissa.

thank you to them. welcome to georgetown from the o'neil institute and it is my great pleasure to introduce to you as the next speaker david bladik. david. >> thank you very much. [applause] >> good morning, everybody, we have a busy day ahead of us and wonderful potentialists, before we get started, i want to point out that i've been slided, everyone else is the honorable and i'm not. so i wonder what that says. so today we have sort of the all-stars of the all stars in terms of public health and food safety and they need no introduction, so instead of reciting the biographies which are in your handouts, let me

just sort of point out one or two of the key successes each of them had during their tenure as either secretaries of department of agriculture or commissioner of the food and drug administration. so the honorable danesh alella she oversaw the department during one of the most important periods in terms of food and health. this was the time when our nutritional labeling information package was being designed and the theme of her administration was making sure consumers were better informed about the quality and ingredient's of the foods that they were eating, enormously important time, also real up in improvement. incredible gains were made during her tenure. the honorable glen, democrat from kansas, think about that.

secretary of agriculture during just a tremendously transformative time during the department. the department moved away from what it used to be called poke and sniff meat inspection to more modern technique. also during administration, much more robust enforcement in safety laws including closing down meat processing plants that were unsafe. finally last and not at least, margaret, commissioner of fda, she oversaw the implementation of the food modernization act. always a challenge. i can only imagine the battles that were fought and the blood that was shed in order to get those regulations through.

so today what we are going to do is we are going to start out by asking -- by me asking, excuse me, one timely question, we are having election in november. we will have a new president. [laughter] >> i won't say anything about that, but just assume for the moment that the new president in his or her wisdom decides to call on people who actually know what they're doing and calls up secretary shalela, glitman and ask the following question, i have decided as president to create a new office in the white house, the office of the national food. assuming you accept my appointment, there are two issues that i want you to focus on, at the moment we now have 15 federal agencies responsible for

varying parts of food regulation in the united states and as former government officials we all know that the three most dreaded words in the english language for people to work in government is interagency coordination. we all fear that. so the question is what changes, if any, would you recommend to the structure of our food regulation process in the united states and if so, how would you do it? and the next question is what would be your first two or three policy initiatives which suggest i would move forward recognizing that in virtually every administration you have two years of grace before congress is over and you can't get anything done? we will start with that simple question and i would secretary shalela to go first. >> oh, boy.

>> ten minutes. >> number one, i would tell the president it's a bad idea to have a zara for anything. [laughter] >> there are ways of getting done whatever she wants to get done without appointing a food. number two, i would say don't waste your time on reorganization. the politics of this are so dicey and peggy has had a lot more experience about rationalizing the food safety system. number three, i would say to her there's a far more important issue if you insisted on a food that there should not be one american that goes hungry and you want to focus on the goal you want to achieve and then get the government organized in a way that you can achieve that goal.

whether it's snap or wic, i would eliminate food insecurity in the united states by putting some system in place that would do that. >> that's it? we will move in quickly. >> you don't wanting to into our policy substantive. >> you have ten minutes. >> some of you remember the movie the graduate, hoffman was trying to figure out what to do with his life and his father-in-law looks at him and says the secret sauce, remember what the secret sauce was plastic. this was 1968 which is in the heart of my life, my adoll --

adolecence and vietnam. i think to some extent there are a lot of secret sauces today in different words but one of them is food and agriculture which has become much greater highlighted in the minds of the public, people are much more interested in this thing. there's a lot more health going on, mgo private sector relating to food and nutrition and everything else. it's a game-changer in terms of the role of food and agriculture where as where it was 40 or 50 years ago where medical schools didn't give much attention to it. it was all thought to be farm issue and you ate what was put in your plait. there's been interest in issues

and in terms of outside folks that are interested in them as well. i agree with donna that moving boxes around in government is generally not a productive idea. and, you know, for some time i thought if we started food safety by combining all food safety functions in the federal government, poultry along with noneating poultry would make a lot of sense. no way, we are not going to give up our jurisdiction, those things are not likely to happen formally, what happened in recent years under the clinton -- under the obama administration is that, there has been a lot more collaboration and cooperation on issues like the food safety modernization act and food safety enforcement issues and so collaborating and working together is a better way of doing things than moving boxes

around. i would say a couple of things that i would recommend, i still believe, one is that appointing competent able and intelligent leaders in cabinet and subcabinet posts that know something about what they're doing is critical and that is often not the case. often the people who are picked at the top, people notwithstanding or sitting next to me are often picked for political reasons or for relationship reasons and not always the right people to manage the affairs of food safety, food issues down the government bureaucracy and i remember at usda myself, at the time picked not on subject matter, they were not stupid but other lines of work. it's very important that a president, vice president and

cabinet leadership appoint competent able people who know something about what they're doing and have a broad view of the subject of what they're talking about. the second thing i would say is that in the case of usda, we were more than just a regulatory agency, we were a policy agency. i always thought that usda handled not only farm programs but most federal nutrition programs were in the department of agriculture, much of food safety was there, virtually all of the conservation programs affecting private lands were there. snap and school meals and related things. it would be use that the name would be changed, either department of food and agriculture or agriculture nutrition and forestry to represent what it does because the department of agriculture is basically the leading food department in the government

overall and yet it kind of hindered by this languaging that it's the department of agriculture or the department of farmers, when, in fact, it has a far broader role. in my judgment if we gave it the characterization of what it actually did, it would be a lot more helpful in working with the other departments on issues that needed to be done. i think secretary has done an excellent job of working across lines whether it's fda or usda, let me give you one example. when you go out to farm country you mention the three-letter word, the three dirtiest letter words, epa, okay, and people see that as the enemy. they don't see the fda as the enemy. some do, but they see epa as the enemy. you know, a lot of this is political, a lot of this is

style, a lot of this is sometimes not the best political judgments being made at the highest point. a lot of it is people that don't want to listen too out in the country side but if the department were characterized in such a way where it looked like they were -- they had a much more leadership role on the items within their jurisdiction, then i think that you could probably doo a better job politically with some of the other issues, conservation issues that are coming up. so we can talk more about policy judgments, but i don't think that reorganizing sake makes sense, it's leadership the main thing that counts. >> most people would agree with you that agency leadership may make more of a difference than anything else including statutory mandate. commissioner, you are being recruited to be the food czar for the next president, what's your advice?

>> i would agree that this is not a moment of reorganization, if we were starting from scratch, no one would design our current system and the notion of a single strong food agency would have a lot of appeal but at the present time i think there are too many important activities under way that need attention, focus and resources and that reorganization would actually create a terrible scrum where work would not get done and new legislation would offer opportunities for things that were unhelpful rather than helpful to be introduced and i think that this is a moment to really focus on the task ahead and as has been noted, thinking about food very broadly in a comprehensive way that recognizes the importance of food safety but also food security, the issues of quality and nutrition, the linkage of

our food system to other major pressing public health concerns such as antibiotic resistance and the use of antibiotics in animal agriculture and the relationship of food production to broader environmental concerns, food production i understand is the leading cause of environmental degradation today which is no small problem for the country and for the world. it is a complex arena and i think, you know, we need to address it in all its many components. with respect to whether or not there should be a czar, i rarely disagree with my former boss, dona shaleila. czar i don't know but appointed real coordination in the white house is really important. we never knew who to talk to in the white house about our issues.

we assumed often mistakenly that people within the white house were actually talking to each other and we often found ourselves in the situation where important issues were not being taken up because of a failure of a person in the white house who was fully knowledgeable and accountable and frankly an advocate for our issues because of all the competing priorities. sometimes these issues would drop lower on the agenda. i don't know if i should tell one story. would i get in trouble? >> one shocking moment for me -- >> nonpublic stories. >> when we were trying to move forward with the -- the proposed changes to the nutrition facts label which was put out in final form just recently, but we were trying to get a briefing with the white house and it wasn't getting done and it wasn't getting done and i finally called over and said what's

going on, there's time urgency here, we have to get the proposed rule out and then we've got to get a final before the administration closes. and i was told, well, we are having trouble getting on the schedule because the same people that need to be at the briefing are working on syria now. so -- [laughter] >> i resisted saying i hope there are more experts on syria than there are nutrition, in any case, there was this problem of -- of leadership within the white house in terms of who you talked to and who is the accountable for making sure issues move forward and decisions get made. certainly expertise really matters too. and i couldn't agree more with the notion of a new administration needs to really continue with tradition that i think the obama administration brought putting people with expertise into critical roles and then listening to them.

of course, i think it's a critical time, focusing really on food safety for the purposes of this meeting and this panel to make sure that the food safety modernization act gets fully implemented. this is one of the most important historic undertakings in food safety in the history of our country. it's the first major set of new regs and new authorities in about 70 years. and it's really an effort to try to shift our system for food safety from one that's reactive, waiting till a problem occurs and then trying to address it to one that focuses on prevents, which, of course, a core component of public health and this will benefit patients and consumers. it will also reduce preventible cost to our healthcare system and will advance our economy

because it will prevent serious problems that undermine food producers and industry and that undermine public confidence in their products. so shift a focus to prevent is absolutely key and requires, you know, really a lot of work at every level across sectors, across levels of government, agencies of government to make this real. another important component reflects a broader reality which means working across borders as well and the food supplies now increasingly globalized. i was shocked when i got to fda and learned some of the numbers that -- about 50% of fresh fruit and produce is coming from countries outside of the united states. over 85% of seafood is coming from outside of u.s. waters. these are products that are

highly vulnerable to contamination and adultration and product that is are hard to oversee in terms of fda's responsibility for protection of american consumers. the only way to do it is to actually understand and care about and, in fact, invest in strengthening capacity in oversight in countries around the world. we are now talking about food coming in from well over 100 different countries coming in through multiple different ports of entry, several hundred ports of entry and from countries that have very unsophisticated systems in many ways, so you can no longer do what fda wants to do, stop the ship, inspect the barrel of malasis and say this

is sugar water and you can't come in. so really focusing on globalization, the need for new global governance mechanisms to better address the oversight of food safety. also applying better science. this is the time when science advanced so greatly that we have new tools that we can already see are making a difference but we haven't adequately invested in them whether it's using sequencing to enable detection of outbreaks specially important in complex food supply where product that is are contaminated can suddenly appear in multiple countries and multiple parts of the country better pointed use diagnostics so you can quickly detect if there's a problem and also, you know, really much more investment in understanding some of the important aspects of --

of disease surveillance with respect to antimicrobial resistance. eliminate the use of antibiotic but we need to understand the problem of ecosystem and impact on important drugs for human use and human disease. so lots more i could talk about but i think i've probably used up my seven to ten minutes. >> you have, but secretary shalela and secretary glitman have not. >> i want to go back to the reorganization issue because i assume it doesn't surprise you that none of us think that the next president should spend a lot of time on reorganization. though they will because they'll be people in the white house

that think that we ought to have a rational system, there be people in omb in particular that think we ought to rationalize the system. the problem we have is high government officials, is that we have seen the energy wasted and we so the politics as wearing us down on the reorganization. every one of these agencies or responsibilities has their own constituency and to go through that when there are so many more important issues, both my colleagues here have pointed out, it doesn't seem to be worthwhile to us and so we always get recommendations of rationalizing the structure. the briefing book that's now being prepared for the next president will have a recommendation, let me assure you, for rationalizing the structure both in food safety as

well as a whole set of other issues. mostly done by hill people or former omb types that think that that's the first thing that the new secretary or the new president ought to do, but none of us want to take our energy and do that. we are more interested in the outcomes and applying new science in all of this. second, while i don't believe in czar, that doesn't mean i believe in coordination. .. going to be held accountable for decisions made

by that person, and people who coordinate out of the white house have to understand their roles and be sophisticated enough to understand they are not the people who have to testify and therefore they shouldn't have line authority as opposed to convening authority, coordination authority, forcing consensus where consensus has to be forced. there is a big difference between that and someone who thinks of himself as a czar is the only place i would make about this. >> i agree with what donna says as well. if you are coming into this administration, what are the problems, the asteroids that are going to hit the earth if they impact the ability to produce enough healthy produced in a sustainable way to feed the country and the world. once you know what those big items are you try to figure out

how to organize the government and who is going to do what and what is the best way to do it? that needs to be done? i don't think it has been done much by the government in the past, food and agriculture issues have not had high-priority attention unless there is a massive outbreak or the zika virus is hitting, so the first question i would do is have some team, what are those asteroids? we have to double food production in a next 30 years to feed a growing world and do it in a way that doesn't rip up fragile land, rain forests and everything else we need to preserve our environment. that is a challenge. it is global, a gigantic challenge. in the context of climate change, whether very abilities.

health and nutrition. understanding those issues, changing as time goes on and through finding a safeway to do these things. those asteroids will determine what policies we should pursue. what i find most disconcerting is the level of dollars and commitment to the research and development functions of food and agriculture arena. i understand why the health sector, and infectious diseases or big draw, much more directly. the level of funding on food and agriculture.

the private sector picked up some of this but not the most important part to be done in the public sector through the land-grant, india world or anything else. from my perspective what we don't know is going to kill us. we are going to change the ability to produce food to feed hungry people and we need to be focused on that from the top down. one specific issue in this area, you cannot produce food without water. agriculture is responsible for 70% of freshwater used in the world. rural issues and rural people are responsible for 22% of the people living in the world, the rate of urbanization happening dramatically all over the world not so much in the us but globally.

sub-saharan africa, the conflict between water utilization to produce food and water utilization to keep this alive as urban residents, is one of the massive challenges in the future. we neglected that. what energy is to our lives, another issue. if i were president i would want to bring people together to decide not how to regulate the food safety issue or regulate the farm program but i want to know how to meet these challenges in the next 20 or 30 years because those are the ones that will be determining whether we can feed the world safely and environmentally soundly. >> let's drill down a little. commissioner hamburg talked

about attitudes in food, the secretary reminds us that somehow or another we need to double food production in the next we 10 years, quite a challenge. last week the new york times reported the incidents of a superbug that was resistant to antibiotics. that is scary. we have these dystopian futures ahead of us. how do we avoid it? let's focus on antibiotics in the food chain. emission are hamburg spent a lot of time working on this but i want each of your comments how to successfully navigate this. would you like to start off? >> this is a pressing problem, not a new problem. it is one of those issues where many have recognized the growing concern and spoken to some of the possible solutions but we have not moved as quickly as we should have, now we really do find ourselves in a frightening situation that we are starting

to see seriously resistant organisms. at the same time we are not seeing a comparable expansion of new drugs in the timeline to treat critical aspects of human and frankly animal disease as well and new vaccines that could make a difference. this is a problem we need to address in an urgent way. it is one of those things that an incoming administration has to make a priority and it is increasingly a priority on the international stage as well. the linkage of animal agriculture and human health and disease is a real one, we don't fully understand it but there is no question we need to rethink how we support animal husbandry and agriculture in this country to reduce the load of antibiotic

use. the elimination for growth promotion which perhaps secretary goodman understand better than i. i don't know why it works but it does work in allowing healthier, more rapid development of various kinds of animals but it really involve throwing in the feed to animals, and is something that doesn't need to occur has negative consequences and finally in this country we are seeing the elimination for growth promotion and that is happening in other places in the world. the next big challenge for the fda is to create a framework for oversight of appropriate use with the veterinary community which has been disconnected in

many ways from antibiotics in the culture. it is different from human disease and health care providers but also think about the appropriate use for preventive purposes because there is a gray area between growth promotion and prevention. there are some very real and appropriate uses for animal health and agriculture and antibiotic prevention but you don't want it to be an ill-defined zone that can sort of spread into broader and inappropriate use. that is the issue and this is an area we need to work on a global scale. we need to have common ways of addressing this problem across countries because these resistant organisms move around,

we are tracking them and understand we live in a global world and these threats to health are global as well. >> you have done a lot of great work in this area which moved the ball forward in antibiotic resistance. i ordinarily don't read mother jones magazine but i was on a plane yesterday and a big story about purdue farms, one of the larger producers has gone to and antibiotic breed system for growth promotion. they still use antibiotics for disease because if an animal catches disease you got to treat the disease or it can infect everything else but the idea of using massive amounts of antibiotics for growth promotion, the animals would grow faster and fatter when they have these growth promotions but after a period of time

resistance would coming and affected negatively. there are a few others taking this attitude. purdue's attitude, i did it because consumers demanded it and it is a good lesson in agriculture, the power of consumers have grown significantly. part of this has to do with how we raise animals in the industrialized world. they are not raised in little five room hotels. they are raised in 500 room hotels the equivalent of 100,000 animals in one unit whether it is cows or chickens. when you put -- if you put 3 or 4 times the people in this room and kept us in here and we couldn't go to the bathroom and we had to deal with each other all the time we would probably all get sick. so the methodology of what i call mass production of animals leads to diseases and that is why they inoculate them and for

prevention and growth promotion what i do see happening is clearly a movement away from using antibiotic growth promotion. you have done a lot of that at fda and a lot of companies have voluntarily done this on their own because their customers want antibiotics free as much of that means something in the world and frank purdue has done a good job trying to promote this thing. the research of development, how you keep animals well, because we are a protein-based world, people eat protein, they eat meat, lamb, chicken. it is part of the world's diet forever. and how we keep these animals well to feed a large and growing world and do it in sense of agriculture prices as a challenge and that is something the research and development agenda needs to give high

attention to. >> we have been using antibiotics for animals since the 1940s and numerous studies by the institution and others, the world health organization positioned, warning doctors about overuse of antibiotics, we have known the link between antibiotics and animals and human health for a long time. underlying all of it, there is a consumer movement that will move the ball but underlying all of this is how to make it sufficient, whether we have enough faith in science and scientists. every issue we are talking about we have a body of research we ought to be listening to and we have to figure out a way to put together the politics or inform the public the way to drive

these positions. i have been unnerved by selective moving away from the science as we make decisions and we should be concerned about that and this is a perfect example where we have known this for a long time and where consumers are going to drive us in one direction consumers can also drive us in another direction where there isn't clear science and we have seen that in agriculture and food safety as well. i just think government in particular has to make science-based decisions and we have to explain it to the public and get a level of science literacy and comfortableness with our scientists so we can do this. >> let me follow up, consumers moving the needle, antibiotic use. it is easy to see why chicken

producers are sent to the market because their name is on the product so you go to the grocery store you know you are buying chickens from her do. you don't know that with respect to the products and so what is the transmission bill for informing consumers about antibiotic use, and is this an issue where we ought to focus on labeling a product, and letting consumers choose by putting a stamp on herds that have been raised with prophylactic antibiotics? or trump stakes, you remember. >> the interesting issue, i was involved in the motion picture industry for a while. there was a movie called field of dreams. they were building a mythical baseball stadium in iowa and the line was build a stadium and

there was a lot of negative feeling and kevin costner, this famous line, if we build it they will come. it always struck me in agriculture the reverse is almost always true. if we grow it and raise it they will buy it sight unseen. in a sense that is the tradition of agriculture because people always assume the products are safe, and grocery stores reliable, we have a lot of trust in the mend in our food companies and that is the way it was. that is going through, and different types of agriculture products. if you grow it and we know where it is grown and we know what kind of feed is put in and if we know where the giant comes from and we think it is safe and

doesn't have any gm ohs and if it doesn't have antibiotics and if it is sold at whole foods i don't know what all the things are, then we will buy it. the consumer overall has become a much bigger factor than 50 years ago. that is good, that is not bad. it has been driven by the marketing effort, walmart markets 23% of all groceries in the united states. one store. walmart and target and others can effectively set the agenda for what is actually bought. they are smart at figuring out what consumers want in this process. along way of answering your question because i don't know what kind of label ought to go on what kind of product. i suspect some people would like an antibiotic label on meat or

hormone free label on meat and by and large labeling is a good idea. with two provisos. what is there has got to be enough real estate on the food you are buying for the labelmaker, you don't need a microscope to figure out what is in the product and that is why modern barcodeing take that particular thing up and number 2 is because the consumer wants something in their food doesn't necessarily mean it is the scientific thing or the right thing. it may be a cultural thing or an ethical thing, may have nothing to do with food safety whatsoever. more an item of choice. i suspect going back to my original point consumers will want to be more and more educated as to what they are eating and it is the job of the food industry and the regulators to make sure people have the

right, the best scientific basis, education so they can make intelligent choices, not choices based on fear or the latest news story. >> let me ask commissioner hamburg this question, let me add one more factor. there has been enormous controversy over gml labeling and questions about labeling, for example whether the animal was raised with hormones. what do you think is the right balance for consumer labeling of these kinds of products in the united states? do you favor greater -- accepting the point that there is limited real estate and you don't want to fan suspicions that are not science-based where do you come out on labeling things like gm ohs, hormone use,

antibiotics, are these the kinds of things we need to provide modern consumers or do we need to be more restrained? we will start with the commissioner who had to make these decisions recently. >> it is a replicated area and i support consumers desire to have information about the products that they eat. it links into a number of comments that have been made about the complexity of labeling as well as the need to have science-based approaches in terms of what mandatory labeling, the gml is troubling because it is an arena where many people quickly jump to the level of anxiety about an arena of science they don't understand

to adopt the negative stance towards gml despite the fact that there have been lots of scientific studies looking at the safety of these products. you can't know everything. the vast body of science, there was a recent review that i thought reported by the national academy of science, taking a deep dive, the opportunity for gm oh foods in terms of addressing critical issue of food security and how can we produce enough food going forward, how can we produce plants that are drought resistant or disease-resistant so we can respond to growing demands for food, and how can we enhance protein density, this is

the area that worries me the most, the we not interrupt period of what some call science denial is an out of fear, the positives are very compelling especially if we care about food security around the globe and i to worry the calls for mandatory labeling of gml, potentially since the message that these are dangerous and that concerns me going forward, i think if people don't want to consume gm oh containing foods they should be able to access products that meet those needs of voluntary labeling can address that. i worry about government

deciding mandatory labeling in that context. >> gm oh is the exact issue i worry about along with peggy, you have to make science-based decisions, you have to protect the regulatory agency to make science-based decisions, i spent most of my time at hhs over a eight year period from political pressure, from the white house and the hill, from interfering with science-based decisions and with gm oh issues on every with thing we had. and we had the bovine growth hormone issue. i am chancellor of the university. the way it would stop at that time was pediatricians in the

state went and testified before the legislature arguing the milk was safe for kids. that stopped it at least for a while but if we are not willing to tie ourselves to science-based decisions we will be in big trouble in this country and part of the response ability i felt has secretary was to protect the fda which was regulatory agency and on occasion i had to say it is a regulatory agency and neither you nor i should be interfering in their decisions and as long as they are making science-based decisions and they continue to, otherwise we undermine science in general when we selectively pick out these issues and i consider that the most dangerous aspect of government.

>> i do think there is a growing lack of trust by americans in all of their institutions, government, politics, business, regulation. and i think while i agree both of you on the gml issue, i need gm foods and they are perfectly safe, we have to make sure we have a regulatory system that is modern and deals with these issues because the whole field is changing so dramatically there are new ways to manipulate genes we didn't have before, in order to give the public the trust that decisions are made independently and on the level. that doesn't mean excluding industry from the process but it does mean just saying something is safe doesn't make it safe unless you have a regulatory

process people believe fully examines these particular issues. in the house, and implemented the organic standards act and the organic standards act created a whole new industry and agriculture where by and large it is certified organic, doesn't have gm ohs in it with limited circumstances and finding a way to allow people to buy non-gm oh foods without mandatory labeling is a much better way to go. i see some food manufacturers made the decision to go with labeling and mandatory labeling scheme, and some in the farm community have not necessarily done a very good job explaining benefits of gmls. a lot of consumers don't see the things that have happened to benefit themselves.

if we could develop products that have drought resistance, pest resistance growth qualities people can see, they facetiously say if you could have a dmo seed that would grow hair on my head and a tremendous opportunity but that obviously happened like cialis or something like that but in any event what i am saying is these issues do require a regulatory system that the public has trust in, on the level. that system may need to change as time goes on as consumers want to know more about what is in their food. i agree with donna that daniel patrick moynihan said you can have your own opinion but you can't have your own facts. in this debate on food especially gmls and other related things people often let

their ideology and their opinions equate to facts. that can't be helpful either. >> food agencies are vulnerable to pressure from both the public as well as congress and it is reflected in congress. i remember the reauthorization of the fda when we were trying to get it through. we got drug advertising because of a deal on the reauthorization of the fda. i wasn't desperate to get the reauthorization. i left congress at 3:00 in the morning after arguing vehemently with senator frist who admits it was a mistake and he said the administration's petition is if we take drug advertising we will not -- we will not agree to the reauthorization of the fda, we can live without that reauthorization but the senators were so desperate to get it off

there plate that they cut the deal on the reauthorization, i left thinking i had made it clear where the position was. we got the expansion of healthcare costs as a result of the connection with fda reauthorization. that is not acceptable. to give you some sense why the financing of the food safety system is not outside the political realm, it is very much tied into it and we are very vulnerable because of the way we finance safety in this country. because you cut deals as you are going along, and pressing congress on these issues, we continue to be backing up on what we think are good

science-based decisions. >> as long as she was at hhs, breaking the important of fda as not an independent regulatory agency, as a regulatory agency that as such really needs a special role. i also want to wonderscore it drove me crazy the importance of notice and rulemaking to open the regulatory process and make sure consumer and other stakeholder voices are heard and to say the comment period was taken very seriously. off in the process of rulemaking took longer for all kinds of reasons, it is something very important in our system of government that is often underappreciated. ..

we now have the full blueprint for a limitation out there and please. we need to make sure that the opportunities represented this important legislation get implemented. >> the history food and agriculture issues did not get much into a high-tech or the private equity world of the investment community. now you go to these investment meetings all over the country, and food items are a giant part of a small entrepreneurs are investing in. so they're looking for ways to do with photosynthesis and get

crops growing faster india with ways using less water. a lot of them are using new technology and some of them may be using gene those and others are using the kinds of things. so it is really important that we recognize in this whole area of our centers are not just the fda, usda, epa and seed companies. this is becoming a very decentralized issue, food. that other sectors have. the high-tech world and everything else. are regulated system has to cope with a much more diverse group of players. and that's something i hear when you go, these young guys getting out of silicon valley or harvard or mit saying we see food as a dramatic new opportunity. we don't make sure there is a regulatory system that is consistent speed up we are seeing a grain of the boundaries between food and drugs as welcome what our