those requests received helpful and friendly customer service. this is not by any means to impugn the folks who have to do this day to day. but i think the fact is that in not all cases the customer service message is getting out. and it's despite the 2007 amendments where congress clearly -- >> you can watch the rest of this online at the c-span video library, as we join a simulcast of c-span radio's "washington today." here in dixon, illinois. let the voice of reagan be heard across this land. thank you very much. and god bless you. >> with the backdrop of a statue of ronald reagan in dixon, illinois, rick santorum on the campaign trail in illinois one day before the primary there. mitt romney at the university t

and the u.s. economy. mitt romney winning in puerto rico over the weekend with its 20 delegates. now all roads lead to illinois tomorrow. a key primary battle in the road to the white house. welcome to hour one of "washington today" here on c-span radio. i'm steve scully. in france a massive man hunt is under way and the terrorism alert has been raised to a higher level across much of the southern part of the country. a man on a motorcycle this morning opening fire with two handguns today in front of a jewish school, killing a rabbi, his two young sons and a girl. news on politics today as president obama picking up the pace of his fund raising for his re-election bid. his campaign collecting $45 million in february. nearly twice as much as the $23 million per month he averaged during the final three months of 2011. the president has $75 million in the bank through the end of january. we're going to be hearing a lot about the budget and the economy in the coming days. tomorrow congressman paul ryan will be unveiling his house republican proposal.

in advance of that the hill newspaper reporting two senate democratic chairman saying that house republicans will risk a government shutdown if they cut spending deeper than the cap's relisted in last summer's debt ceiling deal. kent conrad of north dakota an the chair of the senate appropriations committee daniel inowe of hawaii. they sent a house leader urging them not to lower the $1.47 trillion spending cap. news on the economy. during the 2000s "the washington post" writes u.s. manufacturing was transformed by devastating job losses according to some prominent economists. a new report out indicating that manufacturing jobs may not have been coming back as fast as some have indicated. in fact, "the washington post" writes the job losses in the view of some economists were caused more by the declining global competitiveness of u.s. manufacturers than by more efficient factories. you can read the story online at

washingtonpost.com. from the "chicago tribune," the countdown to the illinois primary. mitt romney and rick santorum over the weekend crisscrossing the state in a final push for voting before tomorrow's presidential election primary with a handful of delegates at stake. mitt romney hoping to carry out the momentum he had in puerto rico over the weekend. let's begin with the comments of the former massachusetts governor as he spoke to business executives at the university of chicago on the issue of job creation and job growth. >> but now, of course, after spending three years attacking business, president obama hopes to erase his record with a speech. in a recent address, he said that we're all inventors. we're builders. we're makers of things. we're thomas edison. we're the wright brothers. we're bill gates. we're steve jobs. the reality is, that under president obama's administration, these pioneers would have found it much, much more difficult if not impossible

to innovate and invent and create. under dodd/frank, they'd have struggled to get a loan from their community bank. a regulator would have shut down the wright brothers for their dust pollution. and the government would have banned thomas edison's lightbulb. oh, yeah, they just did. [ applause ] every great innovation, every world changing business breakthrough, begins with a dream. and nothing is more fragile than a dream. it's essential to the genius of america that we've developed a culture that nurtures these dreams and dreamers, that honors them. and, yes, that rewards them. there's always been something uniquely brilliant about america. i don't believe the president understands this fundamental secret of america. and day by day, job killing

regulation by regulation, bureaucrat by bureaucrat, he's crushing the dream and the dreamers. if we continue along this path, our lives will be ruled by bureaucrats and boards and commissions and czars. that path erodes freedom. it deadens the entrepreneurial spirit that's so unique. freedom is becoming the victim of unbounded government appetite. and so is economic growth, job growth and wage growth. as the government takes more and more, there's less and less of an incentive to take risk, to invest, to innovate, to hire. and the proof is in the weakness of this recovery. this administration thinks our economy is struggling because the stimulus was too small. the truth is, this economy's struggling because our government is too big. too intrusive. too invasive of our economic freedoms. now, i'm running for president

in part because i have the experience and the vision to get us out of this mess. i'm offering a real choice and a very different beginning. i have a conservative economic plan that will deliver more jobs, less debt and smaller government. my agenda takes america in the right direction. it preserves freedom. it encourages risk and innovation. it fosters competition. it allows americans to pursue happiness as they choose and will lead to greater opportunity. and instead of expanding government, i'm going to shrink it. instead of raising taxes, i'm going to cut them. and instead of adding more regulations, i'm going to reduce them. with an overriding concern. do they help or do they hurt jobs? of course, that's just the beginning. there's still more we've got to do. before we can create enduring prosperity, we have to restore our economic freedom. to build a strong america, we have to empower americans to

pursue happiness as they choose, not as government directs. >> republican presidential candidate mitt romney at the university of chicago earlier in the day. we carry it live on the c-span network. it's available on our website at c-span.org. and the "chicago tribune" indicating that the former massachusetts governor did acknowledge that there is an economic recovery, but blaming barack obama for taking so long. rick pearson is following all of this as the chief political writer for the "chicago tribune," joining us from the windy city. thanks as always for being with us. >> thank you, steve. >> we're going to hear from rick santorum in just a moment. that acknowledgment from the romney campaign, an indication that things are turning around in some sectors of the economy and they have to face that. >> yeah. i think what you heard in his speech today was kind of a trying to find a way to recalibrate that economic message that has really been the basis of his campaign. we've seen it in days earlier in his campaigning in illinois where he, like newt gingrich, kind of started, was going after

the increase in gas prices and trying to fuel some voter reaction towards their candidacy through that. but i think -- i think here, again, when he starts talking about regulation, being overregulated, too big government, everything like that, he's trying to find that right balance of saying, yeah, the economy might be getting better, but it could be better if i were president. >> you can tell a lot about a campaign by where the candidate is spending time. mitt romney in chicago. he'll be in schaumburg, illinois, which is a suburb of chicago tomorrow. rick santorum spending a lot of his time in the southern part of the state. in efingham, illinois, over the weekend. peoria, rockford. this event in dixon, illinois, with the shadow of a ronald reagan statue behind him. >> remember, when ronald reagan took the helm back in 1980 he had fought some battles. he'd been fighting battles for a couple of decades to revive conservatism in this country. he fought and insurgent campaign

against no less a sitting incumbent republican. now, we don't have a sitting republican incumbent running for office this time. but we have someone that is certainly the -- the choice of the establishment republican. someone whose turn it was. we see that so often in republican politics for president. it's almost -- almost inevitable whose ever the next in line, that's who the republicans tend to put forward. and ronald reagan said, no, we don't need the next in line. we need something very different. what's going on and was going on in 1976 and, of course, even worse in 1980 was something that was corrosive of the american spirit. we were in a time in the '60s and the '70s that we stopped believing in what made america great. we started believing that government and control of aspects of our lives was what

make americans stronger. back in the late 1970s, the word "liberal" wasn't a dirty word. now even liberals don't like being called liberals in america. but there's one man who changed that. he changed it not by going out and tearing down his opponents. he went out and painted a vision of who we are, where we came from, and what we can be in the future. that was the greatness of reagan. it wasn't his rhetoric. as always, he was just a great ret ror tigs. he was someone who could coin a phrase. reagan would tell you it wasn't his rhetoric. he said it in his farewell address. it was his policies. his policies that were rooted in the greatness of our country. and, of course, what that means, it was rooted in the american

people. not a big and powerful government. [ applause ] and reagan ran that insurgent campaign in 1976, and people were saying, why don't you get out of the race? you have no chance of winning. and he fought. he won 11 states in 1976. i might add, just parenthetically, that if we happen to win illinois, that would be the 11th state that i've won in this election. >> rick santorum in dixon, illinois, with an eye on tomorrow's primary in that state. we're back again with rick pearson who's following all of this for the "chicago tribune." so who do the polling numbers indicate, because they've been all over the place the last 48 hours? >> frankly, go back to mississippi and alabama where the polling numbers were kind of all over the place, too. you know, we're starting to see a little bit of separation

between romney and santorum. but, again, traditionally santorum seems to underpoll. sometimes romney overpolls. a lot depends on the turnout. and the big question has always been up in the chicago metropolitan area where suburben republicans tend to be more moderate, just as we've seen in the past, support romney, but there is a high level of apathy out here which is somewhat surprising given illinois's rare role for republicans to have a say. >> let me ask you about the party establishment. bob edgar, your former governor of the state -- >> jim edgar. >> jim edgar. i apologize. has not endorsed anyone yet in the race. says he's going to stand on the sidelines. politico has a story there's lack of enthusiasm for mitt romney yet a lot of questions whether or not rick santorum has already peaked. >> indeed, as we heard in the clip from santorum about the choice of the establishment republicans, truly if there are such a thing in illinois as establishment republicans and they've been the minority party

for a decade now, the establishment republicans are with mitt romney. now, having said that, though, yeah, there is a, as we've heard elsewhere in other places, you know, the enthusiasm gap exists for romney. now, down state which tends to be more conservative, that's the 96 counties outside the chicago metropolitan area. that's the more rural, more conservative areas. and that's frankly where santorum, the bulk of his support comes from. the bulk of the votes cast in the chicago metropolitan area. but if you've got low turnout there, you've got some enthusiasm that turns out down state it could be a long night. >> let's talk about what is most important in this primary process, delegates. you need 1,144 to get the nomination on the first ballot. illinois has 54 delegates up for grabs tomorrow. but even if he wins the state, the most that rick santorum could get -- the maximum is 44. why? >> well, illinois had a very early filing deadline for presidential candidates and their delegate slates came

shortly after the iowa caucuses. and, truly, the santorum effort in illinois for filing was very much a pure volunteer effort. so just to get him on the ballot, in fact, most of these delegates, you know, could have been challenged because they didn't make enough signatures to appear on the ballot. but eventually a gentlemen's agreement was struck that none of the republicans would challenge each other's slates of delegates. still, he's missing delegates in four congressional districts unlike the states that have proportional representation for delegates. ours are direct ll lly elected. they run as candidates. it's nonbinding on the delegates. the voter has to take the next step, go down to the next level of the ballot and vote for delegate candidates for them to zblount we're talking with rick pearson of the "chicago tribune." chief political writer. let me ask you about the politics of your state. you ind catted the vast majority

of the votes coming from cook county and the greater chicago area. rick santorum spending a lot of his time down state. >> yeah. in fact, over the weekend romney spent a lot of time down state. it almost seemed to be an effort to try to, perhaps, tamp down on the down state support for santorum. yeah. he came to chicago and he gave this economic speech. but it was fully directed, truly, as he's done in the past, looking over his most immediate rival, santorum, and looking ahead to barack obama. of course, this speech coming at the university of chicago where obama served as a senior law lecturer before his tenure in the state legislature, the senate and then as president. >> the headline from the "chicago tribune" website at this hour, romney santorum making the final push for illinois republican votes. what are the story lines that you expect tomorrow going into these results? >> well, one i think is to look at the vote among suburban

women. and given some of the social conservative issues that santorum has brought out, you know, issues like contraception, those kinds of things, suburban moderate women, they tend to vote. santorum's comments about education and whether, you know, kids should seek to go to college, i think that created a bit of a controversy among suburban women who, you know, they're in the suburbs. they value education. they have kids. they want them to succeed. our polling that we did ten days ago had romney with a big lead among suburban women. it's a matter of do they turn out. i think also, too, you know, this has been a state that romney had long considered to be in the win column. you know, back when he was supposed to be that candidate moving on to inevident blt, the mere fact that he's been forced to spend as much time here, that was not on the schedule. he had originally only planned on being in illinois today and tomorrow. one other thing, too, is romney's going to have his

victory party in schaumburg, illinois, northwest chicago suburb, tomorrow night. santorum trying to play off the land of lincoln theme and still revert to his roots is going to gettysburg, pennsylvania, tomorrow night for his illinois party. >> with an eye on the pennsylvania primary in april. well, let me take one hoip thet cal story line. that is that rick santorum ekes out a win in illinois. what does this do to the romney campaign? >> oh, i think it would be very, very damaging. i mean, even -- even if romney were to pick up more delegates, which, of course, is entirely possible because he filed more than santorum, you know, this was kind of -- this was supposed to follow kind of an ohio, a michigan, you know, basically draw this kind of firewall against the rivals. and certainly a santorum victory, i think, would force romney to have to recalibrate the whole campaign. >> rick pearson whob is following all of this for the "chicago tribune." chief political reporter. his work available online at

chicagotribune.com joining us from chicago. thanks very much for being with us. >> thank you, steve. this is "washington today" on c-span radio. the economy and presidential politics coming up at today's daily briefing. abc's ann compton with this question to press secretary jay carney. >> governor romney says today the economy is coming back. something i don't think you'd disagree with. does the president think that the economy recovery has now reached a level where it's kind of inevitable, it's on a path where it's only going to get better? does that make it less of an argument for him during the election year? >> the president absolutely does not believe that recovery is inevitable. we need to do everything we can here in washington to ensure that the recovery continues. it is only within the capacity of washington, as we have seen in the past, most recently last summer, to take action that can harm the recovery.

we can't let that happen. so, no. the recovery is not so far along now that it can continue without leaders in washington making the right decisions and taking the right actions to ensure that we can continue to grow. the transportation bill is a perfect example of that. you know, failure to advance a bipartisan transportation bill, the kind of bipartisan transportation bill that, as you know, ann, because you've covered this, that has been passed frequently over the years, would result in the halting of numerous construction projects around the country. would result in job loss instead of job creation. we can't let that happen. so, no. washington needs to continue to focus on doing what it can to help the recovery continue. as we've seen in the last three

years, there are choices you make in the face of a recession like the one we encountered in 2009 that can either double down on the policies that got you into the mess to begin with or chart a course towards recovery. the president made a lot of hard choices in his first couple of years in office that have led us to where we are today. which is a period of sustained economic growth that needs to continue and needs to expand. a period of 24 months or 23 months of private sector job creation that needs to continue. because, as you know, even though we've in these past 24 months seen the creation of nearly 4 million private sector jobs, the hole dug by that great recession was something like 8 million jobs. there's more work to be done. >> white house press secretary jay carney earlier in the day. one key part of getting a good

job is getting a good education. wisconsin and vermont have a high school graduation rate of 90%. nationwide it is 75.5%. that's an increase of about 3.5% from 2001 to 2009. improving in states like tennessee and in new york. today at&t announcing that it is providing money to make sure that kids stay in school. chairman and chief executive officer randall stevenson announcing today that at&t will provide $250 million to reduce the high school drop-out rate over the next five years. that is on top of the $100 million the company had spent since 2008 to fund similar initiatives through an effort called at&t aspire. today arnie duncan, education secretary, announcing new details to make sure that these grants can improve the high school graduation rate and improve schools overall. part of the america's promise alliance, a forum that took place here in washington, d.c. >> what are the ingredients? what are the secrets to this

success? in the program we're seeing schools that boost student achievement tend to share at least two common elements. first, they have a new dynamic leader who is deeply committed to the students and to the surrounding community. i'm talking about extraordinary principals like roy sandoval who works on a high school on an induation reservation 200 miles northeast of arizona. every monday morning he gets up early and driving 2 1/2 hours to his school. all week long he living on the reservation before driving 2 1/2 hours back to his family for the weekend. the second thing that turnaround schools have in common is that they have teachers and adults who share relentless focus on improving instruction, both through collaboration and through the use of data. all four of the sig models give professionals in the schools the resources they need to be ambitious teachers. they all provide for imbedded professional development, greater use of data to inform

instruction, and increased learning time including more time for collaboration among teachers. and they all provide for improved teacher evaluation systems. but for the first time provide meaningful feedback to support instruction and rigorous instructional programs aligned with state standards. but the road to success is not the program itself. it's the focus, it's the passion, it's the commitment of practitioners that drive success. contrary to a lot of the predictions that were made about sig, the program has helped to spur innovation in the field instead of somehow stifling it. max field magnet elementary school in st. paul, minnesota, has adopted a peer to peer observation system and now requires all teachers to be observed in their classrooms and also to serve as observers in other teachers' classrooms three times a year. an ontario high school in ontario, oregon, teachers are making better and smarter use of technology to improve instruction in realtime. in las vegas, the principal of

pit carson elementary cynthia marlow used cig funds to institute a learning program. the result of an additional hour, reading and math proficiency both improved by more than 20 percentage points. down the road in reno, smith ridge elementary hired a new stem coach and beta specialist to give teachers meaningful feedback and daily coaching. students themselves have a big role in tracking and analyzing their own progress. in empowering students to take ownership of their own learning is so important. weekly assessments monitor how students are learning state standards. all data is tracked for each student in a dated journal. at the heart of all these suck eszs are teachers and school leaders who are excited about the prospect for change. it's what motivates them. it's what gets them up every morning and keeping them working late into the night. this is absolutely a labor of love. these teachers recognize how

demanding this work is, but they also see the potential for fundamentally transforming the life chances of their students. they know that school culture is a difficult, difficult thing to change. but they also believe that all children, all children must be given an opportunity to fulfill their academic and social potential. as one study of turnaround schools in philadelphia put it, teachers at successful turnaround schools feel like they are part of something big. let me give you an example of being part of something big. one of our panelists you'll hear from in a few minutes, carol smith, fantastic superintendent in portland, oregon, will talk in a moment about how the sig program has worked in her district at roosevelt high school. two years ago, roosevelt was named one of the worst schools in the state. but its first year in the sig program roosevelt has had a 14% jump in its four-year graduation rate. attendance is up. test scores are up. and discipline issues are down. but just as telling, just as

important, roosevelt's educators have fostered a new belief among students about what's possible for them. the arts, for example, are thriving. so is the school's drama program. last summer, the students performed a play at the international thesbian festival in nebraska. that was a first for a public school from portland. to make sure all the students could make the trip, drama director joe lane took out a second mortgage on her home. that's a remarkable, remarkable commitment. but we have to give her some help. and i'm going to figure out how to do that. in cities like st. louis and portland, maine, local unions are looking to improve and to strengthen school turnaround efforts. they're collaborating with management to design turnaround customized supports for teachers and new professional development for staff in turnaround schools. a final barrier to turning around schools is that parents are supposed to fight change in neighborhood schools. sometimes parents do cling to the familiar. but we're finding that parents

and community organizations are in many cases actually helping to drive change and to enhance learning opportunities. community engagement is crucial to successful turnarounds. as dennis van ror kl points out, you can't spell partners without parents. >> here in washington, d.c., education secretary arne duncan participating in a forum sponsored by america's promise alliance. it's calmed the grad nation campaign. this by the way was launched two years ago in 2010 by america's promise alliance working towards two key goals by 2020. a national graduation rate of 90% and a college graduation rate of 60%. that would be up from 30% today. by the way, how are the states doing? as we said earlier, tennessee and new york with some double digit gains in the overall high school graduation rate. joined by alabama, florida, georgia, kentucky, massachusetts, missouri, north carolina, south carolina, texas and wisconsin. the ten states whose graduation rates have worsened over the last eight to ten years,

arizona, arkansas, california, connecticut, nebraska, nevada, new jersey, new mexico, rhode island and utah. this is "washington today" on c-span radio. in some other news today, on wall street the dow closed up six. the final numbers, 13,239. nasdaq was up 23. s&p was up five. apple saying today it has no plans to bring its more than $60 billion in overseas cash back to the u.s. until congress changes tax laws. the company announced today it's going to begin paying a dividend to its shareholders and will buy back some stocks. moves that will require about $45 billion in cash over three years. but the company said it will rely exclusively on its domestic cash reserves. apple chief operating officer peter oppenheimer said in a conference call repay treeuating the cash from offshore would result in significant tax consequences under current u.s. law. a new study by the center for public integrity ranking the

states on the least most corruptible puts new jersey at the top. this is a state where in 2009 three mayors, two assembly men and five rabbis were among 44 charged in a money laundering scheme. yet the center says it's analyzed 16,000 data points during a year-long study of public ethics laws in all 50 states. it hired reporters to support its findings and new jersey merited a b plus. the highest grade ahead of connecticut, which had a b. washington state, california and nebraska all had b minuses. georgia, one of eight states graded f, came in last. still in new jersey, the son of former congressman donald paine, the late donald paine, plans to run for his father's seat in the house. donald paine jr. is the president of the newark, new jersey, city council. telling the associated press he felt an obligation to continue the legacy