encryption. or they won't be able to read it. >> how good is the united states on breaking encrypted code? >> it's hard to say. again, one of the nsa's biggest secrets. in world war ii the germans thought they had the most secure communication system and the british with american help was able to break it. same with the japanese purple code. the sophisticated code, the nsa or predecessor was able to break that during world war ii. so, it's very, very difficult to break codes but that's what nsa's job is so obviously they do it. >> that's what jkl wants to know. the nsa is the largest user of storage server companies are making bank. is that true? >> you know, i can't say that accurately.

i would think that they certainly are up there in the top few. google probably stores a lot. there's probably a lot for facebook or whatever. but nsa probably pulls in more -- obviously nsa intercepts more communications and it's got to have a place to store it. i'd say it's probably accurate. >> the wire magazine story inside james bamford's piece, in secret listening rooms nsa software examines every e-mail, phone call and tweet as they zip by. >> caller: thanks for taking my call and thanks for c-span. i find it really interesting, mr. bamford, you do really good work. >> thank you. >> focus so much in the early part of the article on the history of the area where this center is. and you focus a lot on the polygamy that was originally there. i wonder if you are implying

there is an alien mind-set different from most americans that allows these people to trample our civil rights and basically as that man said, basically the term you said using his fingers this par apart that tollitarian state. >> it was interesting when i was looking at where they were building this data center, is they built it in this little town of bluffdale, utah. and the only other thing that i found of note in bluffdale was the fact that it was also home to the second largest set of polygamists in the country. i thought it was very interesting. i had two paragraph there is sort of looking at this combination of the secretive nsa people coming in and listening for these encrypted messages from space, then you have the

polygamists in there also who were listening for messages from space to some degree or from the heavens. and they are both fairly secretive groups. polygamy is illegal in the united states so it was interesting that you had this secretive group of eavesdroppers sharing the same little town with this second largest sect of polygamists in the country. it was the town even had to expand its boundaries to incorporate the entire facility t million square foot facility. it is a very interesting little note that the two groups there could habiting in the same town. >> phillip, independent caller. >> talking about polygamy. let me say this, the two party system is married to the military industrial complex games, and i recommend to all of those listening that the best book you wrote was "body of

secrets." it's one of the greatest books i've read. i'm an activist, i've been out there working with the 25%, it's 25 cent solution and our goal was to get the military spending cut by 25% and send the money back to the cities and states to help save jobs and rebuild the economy. what the people don't realize is that 56 cents out of every federal tax dollar that you and i and the young lady send to the federal government goes to military spending which i'm sure part of is for this whole complex that you're talking about. 56 cents out of every dollar, it's outrageous. >> do we know what the nsa's budget is and how many employees they have? >> it's all secret. the budget is enormous, nsa is about three times the size of the cia and -- in terms of

personnel probably about three times the size also. it's hard to say. somewhere 30, 40,000 people, something like that. but it is an extremely expensive agency because it has so much hardware and satellites and people all over the world. in the article, the wired magazine article, i show all of this new building that nsa has been going on in the last ten years. new listening posts in georgia, in texas, in colorado, in hawaii, putting new satellites up. putting new dishes and listening posts in england. so, it's -- their headquarters are spending another 2 to $3 billion, expanding its headquarters. then you've got the new super computer facilities down in tennessee, so it's an enormous

building program and i agree with the caller that there's far too much military spending. it's -- eisenhower warned of those are industrial complex, now it's the intelligence security and military industrial complex that is gobbling up so much money when we could be spending it for things much more useful in the united states. one other point, it would be good if all of this money was usefully spent but nsa missed the first world trade center attack. it missed the attack on the "uss cole," it missed the attack on the east african embassies, on 9/11, it missed the attacks or missed the underwear bomber who flew into detroit on christmas day and they missed the times square bomber. so if you got something to draw that money it might be a different story. but the point is they spend,

spend, spend and they collect so much information, it's not a lack of information they have, it's too much. >> supporters of nsa might say we don't know how many they have caught. you're pointing out what they haven't been able to catch but perhaps we have no idea because it's top secret how many other times they are catching. >> including bill, i think i would have found out if there were some massive terrorist operation they stopped. i never heard of one yet. >> nsa's infringing on freedom of speech and association. what constitutional authority grants this power? >> nsa is a very unusual agency. it's extremely unusual. every other agency in the u.s. government was formed in congress. there were bills, there were hearings whether this should

happen, when the cia was created. there was a bill before congress, they debated it. it was created in law. nsa was never created in law. it was created by a top secret memorandum signed by harry truman. congress wasn't allowed to know about it. even its name was supposed to be secret for years until it began leaking out. nsa was created in a secret method unlike any other agency. since then it has lived in this unique world where very few people are allowed to ask questions about it. the director hardly ever speaks in public before congress so the agency has little accountability. an act watered down the original

law which was foreign intelligence surveillance act created in 1978. and that put this court, it was a secret court, a foreign intelligence surveillance court, between the nsa and the public. so if nsa wanted to eavesdrop on a citizen it had to go to the court. that's what the bush administration bypassed and broke the law by doing that. after that the law was watered down to -- water down the effectiveness and the role of the foreign intelligence surveillance court. >> john, a republican, st. louis, missouri. john, you're on the air. >> caller: i have a member of my not immediate family, just more or less distant relative who is a high ranking officer in air force intelligence. and he has to be vetted every year and they ask him repeatedly

why my two sons married foreign nationals, one from germany and the other from spain which are our allies. i was told. and then the other questions get even more interesting. my hobby is paint ball war games. i'm active on the internet forums, and i frequently use terms like rpg, law, tank, silencer, et cetera. and they asked him about my political leanings and great detail my attitudes toward the government in great detail. if you want to connect the dots it's because big brother is listening. >> mr. bamford. >> that's the problem is you're an innocent citizen, never done anything wrong and your comments could be taken completely out of context. that's how you get so many

innocent people. it's not a problem of just being thrown off an airplane. you may not each be on the list that is a no-fly list but could be on the black list, if you secretly or if you had, say, a relative or a son that wants to go to the -- one of the service academy, he might not get in because they see that you from these mistaken intercepts they are getting, indicate that you're not a loyal american citizen or applying for a small business loan and you don't get it. may not know why but may be because you're on this secret watch list that nsa has. those are some of the dangerings. people say i never do anything wrong, that's why you should care because there are a million people. who knows how many never did anything wrong. they aren't going to send you a letter saying you're on the watch list.

you're not going to get that loan you applied for as this gentleman mentioned going to be questioned because they think that the person is involved in terrorism or something. >> how is it that the nsa is getting this information out of -- how is it that they are getting it, what is the role of companies at&t, google, are they allowing nsa to tap? >> they have been doing it since 1952. actually you go back to the predecessor at nsa, in 1946. the telecommunications have always known it was illegal to help these agencies do it. they have gone along and done it. this last time was the warrantless eavesdropping. again at&t and the other companies saluted and did what nsa asked them regardless of the fact it was a violation of the law.

and they suffered no penalties because congress passed a law saying they can't be prosecuted and cannot be suited. they gave him total immunity. there is no incentive to obey the law f. you get a president like bush or nixon comes in and lixen used it largely a lot of times for political reasons. that's the problem. if you have immunity to these companies the next president can use it to subvert his political opponent or use it for that sarious plays. >> gracie on twitter. what would happen if we got rid of the nsa, defund them? >> i don't know. it would be an interesting question. i'm not a supporter of doing away with the nsa but i am in favor of putting the nsa on a

leash so they can't get away with doing what they did during the push administration. i would like to see some compromise where nsa gets the funding it needs but doesn't get the funding that is so excessive that it's getting now. and with no questions asked. the congress asks no questions of nsa. i wrote about nsa. i said who is listening to the listeners. nobody is paying attention to the people doing the seevs dropping. >> do they have oversight of nsa? >> they did but the problem with the house intelligence committee do but the role has shifted. when these committees were created around mid-70s under senator frank car itchitch, he was aggressive taking on his

role protecting the public from these agencyings. he did -- that's how they found out that nsa was illegally eavesdropping for 30 years. since that time congress has shifted its role pretty much. now it's basically a cheering squad for the nsa. administration isn't giving the intelligence community enough money, they are lobbying for more money going to the nsa. so, it's a complete switch from this hard oversight to lackadaisical well, we can't say anything about nsa and they can do whatever they want attitude. >> james bamford writes about the nsa, wrote the wired cover piece, inside of the piece he writes once it's operational this utah data center which comes with a price tag of 2 billion for construction will become the nsa's cloud. the center will be fed data by the satellites, listening poerss

and secret monitoring rooms throughout the u.s. all of that data will be accessible to the nsa's code breakers, data minors, analysts, specialists and others at its headquarters and around the world. georgie, democratic caller in california. good morning. >> caller: good morning. i've always found this interesting and with my age i've always known that they have been doing this. but now they are doing it where people are actually getting arrested for things they have done five years ago. and it's been things that's been on their cell phone. so that's going to be interesting to see how that plays out in california. in los angeles, it's going to set a precedence. if it hasn't been set. i don't know if it's been set or not. anything you say on your cell phone, you get red flagged.

and people know they are red flagged but then there are so many that don't, and they find themselves behind bars five years later for something they said five years ago. to me it's absolutely insane. we lost this country, the citizens of this country need to take this country back, and make it a democracy. >> all right. chris a republican in las vegas. >> caller: thank you for your work, mr. bamford. >> appreciate it. thank you. >> as one who also connected the dots out here i have found that this utah center seems to be the crowning jewel of what was originally inspired unter 10 usc 1053 t strom thurman act of 1961, and i find it likely that there is that interfaces with it the smart meters through the smart grid system that enables

the two-way transmitters on your home to create that virtual wire prism, the wires in your home you can't see and possibly the introduction of mind altering psycho electronic waves in your home via the tower on the ac frequency. >> that was chris in las vegas. we'll hear from korine. >> caller: mr. bamford, my question to you is that you mentioned that congress needs to launch an investigation into the illegal tactics of what the nsa are doing but how is that possible when congress are pretty much allowing and you know, passing legislation to allow the nsa to do what they are able to do? >> all of those questions are very good.

and the question that the gentleman just asked, that's the problem. congress doesn't have an incentive to look into nsa because the problem with the congress right now is that no congress person ever wants to look weak on terrorism. because they know that their opponent is going to say well, you voted against this new bill to put the data center in utah which actually isn't even a bill, nsa just does it. that's the problem. the problem is that there are too many congress people not willing to go out on a limb and say we've got too much surveillance going on, because they are so afraid of being accused of being weak on terrorism so anything that the administration suggests or proposes or anything that nsa comes up with is okay because it's going to fight this war on terror. and to be opposed to it is to open yourself up to criticism

from the future opponent who is going to say you're weak on terrorism. i think that's a serious problem how you get around it you have to have congressmen or congress people that have a lot of moral fiber to stand up against these agencies. >> how has the obama administration responded to the nsa? >> well, it's done the same as i was saying, they are very weak on the whole issue of privacy. president obama when he was running for office said he was totally against what nsa was doing, illegal warrantless eavesdropping and that he would vote against any expansion of nsa's power. he would even filibuster against it and would vote against immunity to the telecom companies that illegally assisted nsa. and then when push came to shove and it came up for a vote he voted in favor of expanding

nsa's surveillance capability and voted in favor of immunity to the telecom companies. since then the u.s. surveillance under obama has increased enormously from the bush years. now they are talking about drones flying over the united states collecting pictures and eavesdropping. as a few people have mentioned general petraeus, the new head of the cia came out a few days ago, a couple weeks ago maybe, saying there's all of these connections now to people's electronics in their houses, dishwashers, their electronic components and that the cia feels it has a responsibility to monitor these things. nobody's saying stop. everybody is saying uh-oh, war on terror, better let them do what they want to do. >> cape cod, massachusetts, clay, democratic caller.

>> caller: thank you very much. mr. bamford i thoroughly enjoy your books. i have a question for you. in 2008, i had attend add conference where admiral gary spoke about the tessfleet i think from anti-submarine by american forces. i believe it was about 50 at the time. as i understand it the fleet is now going to incorporate 44,000 employees on top of i believe 13,000 employees for intelligence gathering specifically electronic eavesdropping. i'd like to know if you heard of this about this program and by the way, some of these directors, the present was a former nsa director. some of these programs what their budget is, and what they are tasked for. i would like to hear your comments on this. thank you very much. >> well, it's a good question.

it's expanded enormously. there is this entire fleet now of cyber warriors. that's the new war. p we're creating an enormous -- always looking for new wars throughout and now they are latching on to cyber wars is the latest thing. these contractors, these contractors need some place to make money and they are making lots of money on these cyber wars. as you mentioned, there is a new fleet, the fleet is going to be made up of eavesdroppers and cyber warriors. >> james bamford, we have to leave it there. thank you for your time. >> appreciate it, greta. >> coming up at 2:00 this afternoon the senate budget committee will meet to discuss and markup the democrats' budget proposal, a alternative to the by paul ryan. ahead of budget commit the mark

up, senator jeff sessions will hold a briefing. that will get under way at 1:45 eastern. we plan to carry that live here also. remarks from the senate budget committee chair, from a briefing yesterday where he previewed what the committee planned to do during today's markup. >> thank you all for being here. i appreciate people's participation. tomorrow we'll begin a budget committee markup of a long term budget for the nation. as my chairman's mark i will present the bipartisan fiscal commission plan also known as the bowles-simpson plan, a plan i think best represents an opportunity and a blueprint from which to build a bipartisan deficit reduction agreement. what i am proposing is not partisan, i'm trying to break the business as usual cycle that has been followed for so long

here in budget matters. to be clear, we already have a budget in place for 2012 and 2013. the spending limits are in place, they are contained in the budget control act, passed last summer, that provided those spending limits and the enforcement measures for the budget for 2012 and 2013. the law states very clearly that the budget control act, and i quote, shall apply in the senate in the same manner as for a concurrent resolution on the budget. that's about as clear as it can be. the budget control act stands in the same way, in the same manner as for a concurrent resolution on the budget for fiscal years 2012 and 2013.

so we have a budget for this year and next. it's the law of the land. what we do not have is a long-term plan. that is what we must now work on, and that is what i will be proposing tomorrow. the fiscal commission budget plan provides a comprehensive and balanced deficit reduction framework. it's not perfect, but it does represent middle ground. it brings the deficit down, and it does so in a fair and balanced way. it protects the most vulnerable. it phases in changes to avoid harming the economy, and it includes savings from across the budget, including from entitlement reform and from tax reform that raises revenues while lowering rates. i know that taking this route will disappoint some. certainly some on both sides of the aisle, some democrats will

be disappointed that there's not another plan to rally around, and some republicans will be disappointed that there's not another plan to attack, but i am not interested in furthering the political divide. i am focused on trying to get a positive result for the country because i believe it is critically important that we do, and i believe the best way to do that is to start in the middle with a plan that already has bipartisan support, both in congress and across the country. so tomorrow i will lay out the fiscal commission budget plan in the budget committee. it is clear, i believe, that we have to act. we're borrowing almost 40 cents of every dollar that we spend, and we are on what is clearly an unsustainable track. gross federal debt is expected to reach 104% of our gross domestic product this year and then continue rising to 119% of

gdp by 2022. many economists regard anything above the 90% level as the danger zone, and the long-term debt outlook is even more dire. we face both a spending and a revenue problem. let me be clear. spending is at or near a 60-year high as a share of the national income. revenue is at or near a 60 year low as a share of national income. so i believe both sides of the ledger contribute to the problem, and both have to be part of the solution. we also know that the american people support a balanced approach to deficit reduction. in a recent poll by pew research conducted in november, people were asked what's the best way to reduce the federal budget deficit? 17% supported cutting major programs only. 8% supported increasing taxes

only. 62% said we should do a combination of both, and that's what this plan does. the fiscal commission budget plan cuts spending, and it raises revenue through tax reform. it does exactly what the american people are asking us to do. i believe it is the kind of plan that the american people will support. here is a brief overview of what is in the fiscal commission plan that i will outline tomorrow in the budget committee. it includes $5.4 trillion of deficit reduction over ten years, including savings from last year's budget control act and the final continuing resolution. it lowers the deficit from 7.6% of gdp in 2012 to 2.5% in 2015 and 1.4% in 2022. so it takes the deficit down well below the 3% level that