from the colonial era, prohibition to today, drinking

for better or worse has always been a part of the american landscape. saturday night live on american history tv, a history of alcohol in america. watch our siem um cast of "back story -- simulcast of "back guys."

"backstory" with the american history guys. host ed ayers, peter onoff and edward gallo regale with tales of spirits in america. part of american history tv this weekend on c-span 3. actor alec baldwin is in washington, d.c. this week promoting federal funding for arts and education programs. he spoke at the national press club monday and took questions from the audience. this program is an hour. >> good afternoon and welcome to the national press club. my name is theresa warner and i'm the 105th president of the national press club. we are the world's leading professional organizations for journalists, committed to our profession's future through our programming while fostering a free press worldwide. for more information about the national press club please visit our website at www.press.org. to donate to our programs offered to the public through our national press club journalism institute please visit www.press.org/institute. on behalf of our members worldwide i'd like to welcome our speaker and those of you attending today's event. our head table includes guests of our speaker as well as working journalists who are club members. and if you hear applause from our audience, we'd note that members of the general public are attending. so it isn't necessarily a lack of journalistic objectivity. i'd also like to welcome our c-span audience and our public radio audiences.

our luncheons are also featured on our member-produced weekly podcast from the national press club available on itunes. you can follow the action on twitter using #npclunch. after our guest's speech concludes we'll have a question and answer segment and i will answer -- i will ask as many questions as time permits. now it's time to introduce our head table guest. and i'd ask each one of you to stand up briefly as your name is announced. from your right, kate michael, k street kate. naya hawkins, associated press. todd purdham, "vanity fair." mary miliken, reuters. monica hopkins, el dorado pictures. nora halpern, americans for the arts. allison fitzgerald, freelance journal and speaker committee chair. i'm going to skip our speaker for just a moment. robert cardon, cardon communications and speakers committee member who organized this luncheon.

nina ozlu tunceli, american for the arts. mark winow, kiplinger's. nicki schwab, washington examiner, yeas and nays columnist. bob madigan, wtop. pam stevens, msnbc. [ applause ] our guest today is an award-winning actor, producer, director, and author. he has starred on the big screen, on television, and on broadway. alec baldwin has won two emmy awards and a number of screen actor guild awards for playing the self-absorbed jack donaghy on the hit television show "30 rock." he has hosted "saturday night live" a record 16 times and is a well-known frequent flyer and american airlines fan. a native of long island, mr. baldwin began his career in soap

operas in the early 1980s before moving on to broadway and films. his most notable films include "the hunt for red october," "the aviator," "pearl harbor," and "it's complicated." mr. baldwin is a member of the americans for the arts artists committee and serves as the 25th annual nancy hanks lecturer on arts and public policy. he is in washington this week working with the committee. he is also a board member of the people for the american way and a strong supporter of the animal rights group peta. mr. baldwin lives in new york city, has one daughter, and is recently engaged. mr. baldwin can now add national press club luncheon speaker to that weighty list of accomplishments. mr. baldwin is also a well-known political activist. perhaps that comes from spending some of his college years right here at george washington university. mr. baldwin has been mentioned as a candidate for public office. this might be the right place to make that announcement.

mr. baldwin? [ applause ] >> how are you? thank you very much to theresa werner and to everyone from the national press club and to all of you for having me here as your guest. and also to thank bob lynch and nina ozlu and everyone on the staff of americans for the arts because i am here once again as their guest for the arts advocacy day work that's being done on capitol hill. and tonight is the lecture, the nancy hanks lecture. and the dinner to follow. i started coming -- before we get to that, actually, let's talk about american airlines and words with friends. because i know that's precisely what you want to talk about. because it's not lost on me that while i was being admonished for using my phone while we were parked at the gate i think

someone -- i think some dear friend of mine, some colleague of yours from fox news who i'm deeply, deeply, boundlessly admiring of, mentioned that i was using my phone while we were actually on the runway about to take off and they had to taxi back, which is not true. but while was in the plane and we were parked at the gate and i was using my phone, and then i was asked to leave the plane, i want to just tell you this. it was this amazing moment because it seemed like a scene from a really smart movie, like a michael mann movie where you'd expect really smart writing and great acting, but not like some crazy hyped-up tv show. it was a really wonderful moment where there were -- i had said -- i registered a very loud complaint about this woman who i thought had singled me out. and then a very young asian-american woman who was actually this breathtakingly beautiful woman and very serene, i'm sitting on the plane and she

snz walked up to me and said, "mr. baldwin, would you gather your things and come with me, please?" and i just had this kind of narcotic effect on me. she just spoke very quietly and very calmly. and they threw me off the plane. mr. baldwin, would you kindly collect your things, please, and come with me? but as all this is happening, there were probably about seven or eight people who had their cell phones out and they were tweeting about it at the time that it was happening. i want to thank all the people out there on twitter who happened to make note of the fact that there were a lot of people in the first-class cabin of the plane who were on twitter at that very moment that i was being kicked off for using my phone. they were tweeting about it. not my -- not my day. bad luck for me that day. but that's okay. i'm here as the guest of americans for the arts. and you know, i've been coming down here since 1990. the origin of this work for me was with the creative coalition that was formed by michael

fuchs, the former head of hbo. fuchs, who wanted to bring together a bunch of entertainment industry professionals, producers, writers, directors, and actors to kind of focus their work and their advocacy on public policy. comped for them their office space there at the hbo building across from bryant park back then. hbo is still there, but i don't think tcc is anymore. and fuchs gave them office space and gave them a budget, a modest budget of staff. a person from hbo got them started. then they went out and raised money. and the name of the game back then was for us to learn more about how to effectively advocate for our issue, whether it be in albany or here in washington. and ron silver -- it's sad when i look at the photograph. and nina can confirm this. there's a photograph of us together in one of our early trips.

steve collins and i, susan sarandon, chris, michael benehum, and ron silver. half the people in the photograph are gone, they passed away, very tragically. but silver was someone who was a great mentor for me in the advocacy world. i remember sitting me down on a train coming down here and talked very, very succinctly and very effectively about cover and you're going to say this and they're going to say this and anticipating their answer and here's your battery of answers you're going to have and facts and statements to help substantiate what we want to do, the issues were gun control, reproductive rights, the environment, federal funding for the arts, and so forth. and we would come down here, and i've come down here intermittently since then, to speak to members of congress, a, to thank our supporters, both republican and democrat, in both the house and the senate who've worked to gain federal funding for the arts, and to not admonish -- i mean, that's

something i might have done five or ten years ago now, but to -- or shame, if you will. it's more to encourage, to try to cajole some of our opponents who still don't believe that there's a role for the federal government in funding the arts. and i don't mean that in terms of individual grants. as many of you know, the n.e.a. is out of the individual grant business as a result of some of the -- i would imagine as a result of some of the controversies in the past. when i first started doing this kind of work, it was the days of karen finley and serrano and piss christ and mapplethorpe and a lot of people jumping up and down and screaming during the early clinton years. we wound up getting an appropriation in '94 i guess when gingrich and that crowd took over. my dear friend liz robbins helped us to -- to term what they called the corn for porn swap.

some deal was made with conservative republicans in the house to get some kind of an agricultural subsidy which allowed them to back off and support federal funding of the arts at a certain price. and that back room deal between the n.e.a. and the agriculture subsidy became known as the corn for porn swap in the days of mapplethorpe. since then a tremendous amount has changed on a variety of levels. the government is out of the individual grant business, the amount of money dropped precipitously for a while and has come back up.

however, i think the numbers are still problematic as far as i'm concerned. you have an appropriation for the nea now at about $147 million. the appropriation when i first started coming down here, the statistics i had available online were for 1992 which was $175 million. the internet which never ceases to amaze me. took me quickly to a site where you could do the -- the index to adjust for inflation. so i programmed it $175 million, which today would be like $248 million. if $175 million in '92 would actually be $248 million today and we're at $147 million, we're just around between $90 million and $100 million less. make no mistake, we are right now $90 million to $100 million less in federal subsidies for the arts in a country that has grown to 320 million people, let's say roughly. at least the ones we can count these days. at least the ones we bother counting in the country these days. and the -- i'm someone who has said on the record that i think

the arts are beyond essential. everywhere i go, i just got back from rome, and everywhere i go, i see that dichotomy. i see that strange dissidence. and you go there and you see that we have what they don't have, the american economy is still a strong economy. when we balance our debts and pay our bills. the american economy is still a great economy and still a strong economy. when we falter, it's because we don't get it right in terms of balancing our budgets and our priorities and that's a different conversation. but the -- when you go to italy and they have -- they have a weak economy, but they have an artistic heritage that puts us to shame. you go to paris, you go to london, even when you're in new york and this city, as well. tonight when i give these remarks, i talk about the

artistic heritage of the country being embodied in this city like no other city in this country. i included in the remarks i make today, i say, nothing makes you love this country more, which kind of chokes me up actually. nothing makes you love this country more than when you come to washington. and it has nothing to do with the rhetoric of any one of these people that exists on the hill today, none of them, republican or democrat. the rhetoric of political leadership in this country is irrelevant in terms of creating real love for this country. it only creates disgust and disdain and disappointment and heart break. and if you walk around washington, d.c., the great, great architectural, the great, great artistic heritage of our country of our country is embodied in this town, in this town, in this great, great city where i went to college for three years. and my comments i say that. i say it's so funny i live in new york. and years ago i used to live in washington and i'd go to new york. and in washington, took the course of d.c. politics and culture, learned kennedy's great

line. about d.c., the city of southern efficiency and northern hospitality. jfk's great quote about washington. and i remember -- i lived in the old d.c., 1976 i came down here, back when they were burning in effigy. now, if you lit a match in lafayette park, you'd get shot by probably six or seven different snipers in different aspects all over that area in different areas of the white house. they've shut down pennsylvania avenue since i was here. i remember it was odd to me to be in union station. i remember when i went to school here, you would -- i didn't have the money to fly and it wasn't convenient. and they used to have a train you could take. the last train was at 9:30, and it was a local. it stopped in delaware, stopped in new jersey. you'd swear it was stopping in st. louis too it took so long.

this train was the slowest train you've ever been on in your entire lifetime. and we would go to new york, it was like $18, it was 36 bucks round trip to go on this train. and you'd leave union station and sometimes i'd get a ride there, whatever i wanted to get there early. if i missed that train, i was dead. i get there early, you'd sit at union station, the great, great union station at washington, d.c. and then go on from there to new york. sophisticated, glamorous, wealthy, cosmopolitan new york and go to that godforsaken sink hole penn station. one of the great train stations to probably the worst train station in this country. to the worst. the worst. that was erected on the grounds, once been a great train station as many people here know. the old mckim, meade, and white

structure, the old penn station torn down. controversy around the world. from all corners of the world. which gives birth to the historical preservation law of new york. but you're in new york, there's a lot of great architecture in new york, not like washington. a lot of great architecture. and art in new york. much of the art, of course, that's not in public spaces and architecture. behind a door that you've got to pay a fee to access, you know. great art in london, spain, all over europe, rome is singular to me. i just got back from rome. the city itself is a work of art. you are inside a work of art that is the expanse of an entire city. you know, and i think that in this country, when you're over there, you see they've got the -- i only have glib words for you today, but they have the art thing down.

they're spending a lot of money over there. and they're getting a lot of tourists over there. they're getting a lot of our money over there over the last many years because they have preserved that heritage and they've made art count. they've raised their children to believe that art counts. it's part of their culture and part of their heritage. and coming over here and we have what they don't have. we have the potential and typically -- we have a great humming, hissing, steaming, 12-cylinder economy here. and we don't get the art thing right all the time. i think we send the wrong signal here. we say art isn't important enough for the government to spend money on. you don't need to spend on what i'd spend on. i'd spend $1 billion on each. i'd spend a lot of money on art, more than most people would possibly imagine on art, government money, arts education and so forth. but i think my host here this year, bob lynch, said he would settle for $1 per u.s. citizen he'd be happy with. bob said just ask them to wrap around $1.

it'd still be more than double what the appropriation is now. i want to finish by just -- because i could go on and on and on. i do want to finish by just saying, we have heroes, friends, comrades whatever you want to call them here in the house and senate. republican and democrat in terms of our seemingly never ending journey. and keeping america focused on the arts and arts education. i would like to take a moment to thank louise slaugter, you all know louise, and congressman norm dicks who is the democrat from washington in the tacoma area. both stallwarts on the democratic side. both -- and i came to testify with kevin before the congress, and the testimony was canceled. and we didn't wind up doing that. but representative richard hanna

who has been a good friend to the arts and our movement, the republican from the utica area of new york. and representative chris gibson also from new york from central new york and the saratoga springs area. these are -- those are two what we would call freshmen moderates. i'm sorry, did i have -- yes, hanna from utica and gibson from saratoga springs. two -- those are two moderate freshmen with us. the two stalwarts we have are republicans in the house are, of course, mike simpson who i met with last year from the boise area of idaho and representative aaron schock. both have been long -time friends of ours.

people who are not as we say in new york -- are the republican study group. the study group, which i think the -- you had mentioned to me, nina, who was the founder of the -- phil crane. the former member, the founder of the republican study group and congressman tim wahlberg, we're hoping somehow we'll be able to get a game of words with friends going with tim. i'd like to try to pitch that. we're going to find some beachhead there with him and try to get him over on our side. on the senate side, we have senator tom udahl from new mexico who is good with us on this issue. he's a first-term senator, but he has been spearheading efforts

to recruit other senators to support funding increases for the nea. and tom harkin. who was chairman of the help committee on health education, labor, and pensions has been placing a spotlight on the decline in arts education programs in grades k-12. the republicans we have that are our heroes and our friends are tom cochran, the republican from mississippi. i met with him last year. he's been great for us on the arts, and susan collins from maine, long-time moderate republican and supporter of public funding for the arts. and tom coburn is the one we were going to mention today as being not as wonderful as we would like him to be on the issue of the arts. and i wanted to mention that we have a couple -- is this the one? we have a list. all oklahoma, yeah. in the state of oklahoma, we've got -- in march of 2001, the oklahoma visual arts coalition

received a grant of $15,000. in march -- that was in march of 2001. in may of 2001, the theater of oklahoma in oklahoma city, all five of these are in oklahoma city by the way received -- i'm sorry, 2011 rather. oklahoma visual arts coalition was march of 2011 in may of 2011 was lyric theater of oklahoma, they got $45,000. the oklahoma council of the arts which is more of an umbrella organization of that community in june of 2011 got $773,000 from the national endowment of the arts in oklahoma. in july of 2011, the oklahoma visual arts, again, got $25,000. and then the oklahoma historical society in july got $20,000. so i just want to mention that we -- we always find it -- not

enjoyable, but ultimately necessary to point out to some of these folks that there are constituents of theirs in their own congressional districts or statewide in the senate who the nea is bringing some wonderful, wonderful arts-related programming and events, shows, what have you. and educational opportunities for young people there under the umbrella of the national endowment for the arts. i want to finish by saying that i -- in my own life, my path with art -- i mean sometimes people think when you do what i do for a living, you were kind of living the art lounge. you're in the art tent. and, you know, you're behind the velvet rope with the art people. and that's not necessarily true. i work in a business where the longer i'm in the business, the purely artistic aspects of my business intrigue me much more than the glitz and the glamour

and what is often the purview of the stars and actors. design, directing, cinemamatography. editing. musical composition. everything that comes into play in great film making are far more interesting to me now and draw my attention now than they do. but the artistic -- the artistic experience in my life comes to me the same way it comes to you. i go out my door and i try to identify some experience artistically that is attractive to me. then i've got to go get a ticket for it and i've got to buy a ticket for it. and i can afford to buy a ticket for it. i can go see whatever i want whenever i want. i've been very blessed that way. but a lot of people can't. and i've been working my foundation that i set up a few years ago to funnel, you know, some tributaries of my own income to the arts. and funding.

right now i made this agreement with capital one bank. i had this relationship with capital one bank. becoming a spokesperson for a bank at the time of the banking collapse. and at the -- at the genesis moment of the occupy wall street movement was not a goal of mine in my career. i want to assure you of that. however, capital one came to me along with a couple of other bankers and were talking about on camera promotional opportunities, which i decided to avail myself of for two reasons. one, i was on a television show every week, so i thought now is the time. you know, when i'm off tv, i'm going to be off tv for a while. but when i'm on tv every week and we went into syndication, it became clearer that audiences are probably plenty sick of me now so they can't get any sicker of me. maybe i'm wrong about that, by the way. they can't get any sicker of me than they are now. so i thought, well, i'll do this campaign for them and i funneled

all the proceeds toward arts funding. my foundation, we earned a specific amount of money from a two-tier contract with them last year for 18 months and gave all that money to arts-related organizations and i'm doing another round with them now. no -- no -- i only -- i only mention that because it might not have been the smartest move in my life to go do a commercial for a bank. they've been great partners. they've helped shape the commercials and they've been wonderful, wonderful partners for me and helped to publicize and promote the fact we're giving the money to arts-related organizations and i say this because what i've discovered is i've gotten older. because i am older now. i just turned 54. and as i've gotten older, there's a thing i did that satisfied me and there's a thing i did with my life and what's coming more into focus are not a

lot of them, but the three or four other things i did that i could have been very happy doing that i'm not at all doing now. i got a great opportunity to be the on-air announcer for the new york philharmonic in new york and i've been doing that for the last three seasons with them. and my relationship with them has led me to this place of when you're with them, you are in the art lounge. you know, when you're hanging out with these people who are like alan gilbert, and a bunch of people -- a bunch of people ha