news and policy issues that impact too. coming up friday morning, usa today white house reporter gregory will discuss president obama's use of executive orders. we'll talk about how the obama record compares to previous presidents on how president-elect donald trump could reverse or modify obama executive orders after being inaugurated. then david strickland, council for safer streets. he talks about the future of self driving cars and how technology companies, automakers and regulators are working to safely bring the technology on the market. and we'll talk about the serious civil war. the latest on the battle for aleppo in the conflict that's been raging for almost six years. watch c-span's washington journal, five at 7:00 a.m. eastern on friday morning.

join the discussion. >> every weekend book tv brings you 48 hours of nonfiction books and authors. here's some of the programs this weekend. saturday night at 10:00 p.m. eastern on afterwards, georgetown university professor jason brennan that the failure of democratic political systems to provide the best outcome. calls for a change in how governments are run. in his book, against democracy. he's interviewed by the vice president of the cato institute. >> why is it that people reject that system is because they think it won't work very well. they think it will lead to bad outcome. the probably right. so once you say that why care about not just fairness but bad outcomes than you're my side and have start asking, well are you going to weigh fairness versus the quality of the outcomes. >> on sunday at 1:00 p.m. eastern the before columbus foundation presents the 37th

annual book award which recognizes outstanding literary achievement from the entire spectrum of america's diverse literary community. the awards are presented in san francisco. a5:00 p.m. eastern jonathan zimmerman professor of history of education at the history of pennsylvania who argues that free speech is under threat on college campuses across the country and his book, campus politics, politics, whatever needs to know. >> it doesn't taboo words which had nothing tort discussion but taboos ideas. 40% were not human hearing from them. that means there's a serious pc problem. >> go to booktv.org for the complete we can schedule. defense secretary recently spoke at the reagan library in california where he outlined the defense achievements. this is 45 minutes.

[applause] thank you. thank you all. good afternoon. john, thank you for that kind introduction. it's very good to be back here at the reagan forum. i'm pleased to join so many longtime friends. in the defense department, among, among the dedicated and patriotic americans here. including two of my predecessors former secretary of defense dick cheney, and leon panetta. as well as so many dedicated public servants like chairman max or barry. in the congressional congressional delegation here today, current colleagues like my deputy bob

work. our chairman of the gene chiefs of staff joe dunford. and many others who contribute to our defense enterprise such as lockheed martin ce, all part of the team. america. thanks all for your continued support for servicemembers and their families. and for all your own contributions to our national security. each of you knows well that america's defense is so vital that to we whom it is entrusted must ensure its excellence across the years and across the domains for conflict, not just in air, sea, sea, land but also in space, cyberspace. from strategic error to presidential administration, cross our government and across

parties. ensuring that continuity is important at a time of change of administration. i'm proud of the way the men and women conducted themselves during the last presidential campaign. standing apart from politics same focused on the mission. committed to overseeing the orderly transfer to the next commander-in-chief. that's something dod takes a lot of pride in and has done for a long time. we are carrying out this year's changeover with the excellence that is expected of us. let me congratulate general jim mattis for being chosen to take my place. i've worked with jim for many years. he is is a friend, and i hold him in the highest regard. of course the excellence the

american people expect of our department is to impart to the continuity and leadership defense secretary's a both parties have provided over the last seven decades. each one of them has strengthened dod to meet the challenges of their strategic errors. in the future challenges as they sell them. with bold action such as unify the our forces at the dawn of a nuclear age, moving to an all volunteer force after the vietnam war. leveraging leap ahead technologies like stealth and precision guided munitions and battle networks to fortune on unmatched military edge against the soviet bloc. winning the cold war and defining u.s. leadership in the air that followed in waging 21st century counterterrorism and counterinsurgency campaigns.

i myself have lived through, witness, and served in all but the earliest of those eras. in the strategic transition between them. contributing to programs involving missile defense and space in nuclear triad during the cold war, overseeing the project to prevent the stockpile of soviet nuclear chemical and biological weapons from falling into the wrong hands after the cold war ended. in a more recent recent years helping develop and field capabilities like the mine resistant protected vehicles for the fights in afghanistan and iraq among other places. in this strategic transition. we're in right now we must widen the spectrum of our current and future capabilities to account for this great change in the great change economic, political, social and technological underway in the

greater and fiercer competition we face. i say this because today dudes he no fewer than five immediate but also distinct and evolving challenges. we are counting the prospect of russian aggression and coercion. especially in europe. something we haven't had to your worry about for 25 years but now we do. for managing historic change in the asia-pacific, the single most consequential region for america's future. were strengthening our deterrence and defense forces in the face of north korea's continued missile provocations. were checking iranian aggression in the gulf. on helping defends her friends and allies in the east. were counterterrorism and accelerating the certain and lasting defeat of isil. the course were preparing to contend

with an uncertain future. ensuring our military is ready for challenges we may not anticipate today. defending our our country and this strategic transition requires our military deters the most advanced adversaries while continuing to fight terrorist groups. to be clear, the u.s. military will be ready to fight very differently than iraq and afghanistan or the rest of the world. we will, as we must be prepared for a high end enemy which we call full-spectrum. our budget, planes, training capabilities and actions we must demonstrate the potential that if they start a war, we will win it. because of force meant to deter conflict can only succeed if it can show that it will dominate conflict. that is the the kind of force i have been determined to build my successors.

that's why amid this strategic transition it's been necessary and will be necessary dod to change, adapt, innovate, not only to meet today's challenges but also ensure defenses continued excellence well into an uncertain future. want to speak today about the changes underway to respond to the challenges focusing on the military campaign to accelerate the lasting defeat of isil, are stronger ballots strategy on russia on the rebalance to the vital and dynamic asia-pacific. also to describe the actions were taking and pioneering innovations underway to ensure dod has the technology, the operational plan, the organization and the people to continue to defend our country and make a better world for decades to come. i will start in the middle east.

the region of great turbulence and confusion but where we are not confused views. were clear about our pursuit of america's national interest. among that is dealing isil the lasting defeat that it deserves all certainly received. we've reached reached a critical milestone in the military campaign plan as we meet here today the valley american forces are engaged in intense effort to isolate and collapse the control over most of in iraq and in syria. bringing the great weight of our entire range of capabilities to bear in the enabling of capable a motivated local forces. the seizure of these two cities is necessary to ensure the destruction of isil's parent tumor in iraq and syria. the primary objective of the military campaign, and put isil on it irresistible irreversible

path to defeat. reaching this is the result of deliberate actions taken last year. going back to last summer i consolidated the work for iraq and syria under a single unified command. streamlining our command-and-control for the fight against isil. the last october president obama approved the first in a series of recommendations that i and joe dunford made to accelerate the campaign against isil introducing every tool of our military to the fight from airpower to special operation forces, to trained advice and assist capabilities to our intelligence and cyber tools. i should tell you that since then president obama has approved every single recommendation the chairman and i have have taken to him for additional forces and capabilities as we saw

additional opportunities to accelerate the campaign. the overall coalition military campaign plan we devise last year has three objectives. the first is to destroy isil's parent tumor in iraq and syria. the sooner we crush but the fact and the idea of an islamic state based on isil's body are barrick ideology, the safer we will be. that is necessary but not sufficient so the second objective is to come back everywhere they emerge everywhere around the world. in afghanistan, libya and elsewhere. in the third objective is to work with the intelligence homeland security and horseman partners to help protect our homeland some people from attack. that's ultimately our most important mission. this strategic approach of our

campaign is to leverage all the tools the dod's disposal to enable capable and motivated local forces to apply pressure to deal them out defeat. we recommended this strategic approach because the only way to ensure once defeated isil stays defeated is to enable local forces to seize and hold territory rather than substitute for them. we have been squeezing isil from all sides and across domains through series of deliberate place to continue to build momentum. what are special operators conduct raids, free hostages and gather intelligence it creates a virtuous cycle cycle a better intelligence generates more targets and rates and more opportunities we can seize. to gain even more momentum. as a result since last year,

play-by-play, accelerant after accelerate, the campaign has delivered significant results. in iraq, we been helping iraqi security forces and passion are good to dislodge isil from city after city, ramadi, falluja, kiara, mark moore. our coalition is now doing the same in mosul, having isolated the city the iraqis with her helper taking back easter most of them moving west. there is a complex mission will take time to accomplish but i'm confident that isil stays in most all are numbered. in syria on local partners put in and to isil's expansion and then began to systematically roll it back towards raqqa, an important objective since the so-called capital of the

caliphate and the hub for external attack. after helping capable and series forces we enabled them another forces to retake shiitake, denying isil control over those areas and cutting off their primary lines of communication into turkey and iraq. we are now helping our local partners isolate raqqa from which there's only 15 miles away. isolation face continues according to our plan where generating additional local forces necessary to seize and hold raqqa. in addition to taking back territory were yielding results and if denying isil the finances, supplies, freedom of movement command