purpose of sex, which gets into what is the purpose of marriage. >> so the fat was in the fire with the sexual revolution that's going to divide the culture? >> absolutely. and that gets into the basic understanding of the human person. >> so there are real deep philosophical and anthrow pological issues and we need to do a better job educating our people over what does it mean to be human and what is the purpose of our sexual difference and complimentarity. >> the whitney clayton, salvador, mayor soloveichik, thank all of you. we will convene again in about ten minutes. so we have sfwlik live today here on c-span3 at 11:45 this

morning, federal communications director commissioner robert mcdowell will discuss an international proposal to give the united nations more control over the internet including cybersecurity and domain names. he opposes the plan saying that economic and political progress everywhere would grind to a halt. this afternoon at 4:00 eastern, a house subcommittee is holding an oversight hearing to examine the department of veterans fairs purchasing practices of prosthetics. according to the inspector general, the supply costs have increased by 80% over the past four years. in large part due to excess supply. again, that's live today at 49 p.m. eastern. all this week in primetime here on c-span3, we're featuring american history tv with a look tonight at america's civil rights policy. starting at 8:00 p.m. eastern, we'll hear from historians, civil rights leaders and former presidential administration

officials as they discuss the changes in policy from fdr to today. american history in primetime all this week on c-span3. last friday, vice president joe biden spoke to survivors of fallen military members. he recounted the difficulty of dealing with the death of his wife and daughter in a car accident in the early 1970s. and said it was the first time he could understand how someone would consciously commit suicide. joe biden and joint chiefs chair martin dempsey joined the vice president at this event hosted by the tragedy assistance program for survivors, an organization known as t.a.p.s. >> a philosopherer once wrote that friendship improves happiness and abates misery by the doubling of our joy -- >> let's see, i bet we have some technical folks that can fix that.

all right. how is that? not yet? i'm glad this is happening with me now. all right. how's that? great. i wanted to share a favorite quote. a philosopher once wrote that friendship improves happiness and baits misery by the doubling of our joy and the dividing of our grief. you are loved. america remembers. and through t.a.p.s., we are now here for each other. i'm bonnie carroll, the president and founder.t.a.p.s., and this is our family, a family

we never wanted to be a part of, but i can't imagine a more patriotic, a more passionate, or a prouder group of americans than to be with this weekend. thank you all for being here. well, we've come together this weekend with a lot of support and a lot of hard work, and i'd like to recognize our amazing partners at the new york life foundation, at prudential, at telos, and at operation hero miles. please stand up. this is our time. and we are so for the nat to have very special guests with us today to honor our loved ones and offer words of comfort.

t.a.p.s. is very proud to be a part of the white house joining forces campaign and to work closely on a rel basis with the first lady and dr. jill biden. we are also blessed to count the chair chairman of the joint chiefs and wife as tireless advocates for the families of the fallen. ladies and gentlemen, t.a.p.s. families, it is with pride that i introduce our dear friends, vice president joe biden, dr. jill biden, accompanied by the chairman of the joint chiefs martin several dempsey.

>> thank you, bonnie, for that kind introduction and good morning, everyone. i want to welcome all of you to washington, d.c., and i hope you feel right at home while you're here. i'm so honored to be with all of you. memorial day is just a few days away, and if i can say one thing to all of you and your families, it is thank you. you are our heroes. i have been truly overwhelmed by the bravery and courage of our pen and women in uniform. and inspired by the dignity and the sense of patriotism that military families like yours exhibit every day. each of you, like our servicemen and women veterans and their families, have dedicated so much to your country, and we are truly honored by your sacrifice. it is our sacred duty to honor

it the service of those who have sacrificed for our country. and america thanks you. our thoughts and prayers are with all of you. this weekend, on memorial day, and every day. and now it is my pleasure and my honorton introduce general dempsey, someone along with his wife denie has done so much to support our military families. general dempsey? >> thank you. >> is thanks. you're very kind but we're here to honor you this weekend as we try to do every day of the year. i want to thank the vice president and dr. biden for being here. we get to share the is taken

with them at on many occasions many events like this for families of the aggrieved, of wounded warriors and i can tell you that their heart is exactly where you'd want it to be on these issues. so it's an honor to share the is taken with the two of you again. i like to always tell folks a little bit about this day in history because it helps us connect to our past. so on this day in history, in 1986, you might recall the phrase "hands across america." because 6.5 million people linked hands from battery park in new york city to long beach, california, and they were doing it in the name of homelessness and hunger. but i think about that in terms of what t.a.p.s. does because what is t.a.p.s. is doing for us is linking hearts across america. and i would like -- i know you have a special place in your heart for t.a.p.s. we have a special place in our heart for the founder of t.a.p.s. who is 18 years ago,

decided to link hearts across america and how about we give a round of applause to bonnie and her team. >> you know, most americans have not had the life altering experience of being handed a folded flag, but those of you in this room have. and it in many ways, you are the face of our two wars over the past decade but even prior to that. so, what we want to tell you today is that your example truly does inspire us, that we understand and honor your sacrifice and what you've done for your nation and promise you that we will never forget it. i just had the privilege to go and spend some time with your children. and by the way, they're unbelievable bunch. they're great looking kids. now i know why they're so good

looking i guess. and they're in there -- i know there's some mentors in the room here and each of them as a soldier, airmen, marine, coast guard or veteran mentor and assists really. it's the highlight of my year. i was here last year and i'm back again. i told bonnie i won't miss another one of these for as long as she continues to invite me. so -- so we're with you. i promise you that. and ladies and gentlemen, i now have the privilege and the honor to introduce a man who epitomizes service, sacrifice and support for our military families. the vice president of the united states, joe biden. >> thank you very much. thank you. thank you. please be seated.

i'm jill biden's husband joe. as i'm known here in washington. and in my household. general dempsey, i've been around washington for a long while. and i was one of those folks they call a chairman of the foreign relations committee for a long time. and i have gotten to meet an awful lot of incredible military personnel. and some remarkable women and men who have worn the uniform. and they all have different qualities. but i want to tell you just for a second about why i like dempsey so much and why i like dee dee even more. and i really mean this. these guys get it.

these guys get it. you're not a number. you're not a soldier or a soldier's family. these guys wear it in their heart. i've been with them when we visited bases where some of your heroes had fallen. i watch, i watch how deenie responds. i watch the general. he's a tough guy. but i watch him. and you can almost hear his heart breaking. and there's something special about both of them. and i guess you know it, too, but when he says he'll be here as long as he's invited, he really means it. this is not -- he's not here because it's his job as the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff.

denie is not here because of that. if you saw his family, by the way, his children serve. they are -- they are in harm's way now. i watch jill and denie talk. we don't have the military history they do, but our sons spent a year in iraq. and -- i don't say that -- when he came home, it's going to sound strange to you, maybe to anybody but this audience, we felt almost a little guilty because he came home whole. because there's so many, so many funerals i've attended, so many bases i visited.

and you know r, not all losses e equal. not all losses are equal. and what used to drive me crazy, i could be wearing one of those red shirts not for the military but when i was a 29-year-old kid, i got elected to the united states senate out of nowhere. on november the 7th. and i got a phone call like you guys got where someone walking up to me on december 18th, i was down in washington, i'm the first united states senator i ever knew and i was down. washington hiring my staff and i got a phone call saying that my family had been in an accident. and just like you guys know, by the tone of the phone call, you just knew, didn't you? you knew when they walked up the path, you knew when the call

came. you knew. you just felt it in your bones. something bad happened. and i knew. i don't know how i knew. but the call said, my wife was dead. my daughter was dead. and they weren't sure how my sons were going to make it. christmas shopping and a tractor-trailer broadsided them in one instant, killed two of them and -- well, i have to tell you, i used to resent -- i knew people meant well. they'd come up to me saying joe, i know how you feel, right? you knew they meant well.

you knew they were genuine but you knew they didn't have any damn idea. right? isn't that true? i mean, that -- that black hole you feel in your chest like you're being sucked back into it. looking at your kids and most of you have kids here, and knowing it was the first time in my career, my life i realized someone could go out and i probably shouldn't say this with the press here, but no, but it's more important, you're more important. for the first time in my life, i understood how someone could consciously decide to commit suicide. not because they were deranged, not because they were nuts. because they had been to the top of the mountain and they just knew in their heat they had never get there again. that there was never going to be that way ever again.

that's how an awful lot of you feel. and by the way, the moms and dad s, no parent should be predeceased by their son or daughter. i unfortunately had that experience, too. but you know what? i was, i don't know but guys, but i was angry. man, i was angry. you all probably handled it better than i did. no, i really mean it. i was angry. i -- not that it's relevant what religion, but i'm a practicing catholic and i was a practicing catholic at the time. but i was mad at god. oh, man. i remember being in the rotunda walking through to get to the plane to get home to get to

identify the -- anyway, and i remember looking up and saying god, as if i was talking to god myself. you can't be good. how can you be good? you probably handled it better than i did. but i was angry. and i have a great family. and this woman literally saved my life five years later, but i have a great family. my mother, my brothers, my sisters, my best friend in the world. and they're all there for me. there's still something gigantic missing. and some of you, the loss occurred two years ago, some of

you maybe two months ago. and just when you think maybe i'm going to make it, you're riding down the road and you pass a field and you see a flower and it reminds you or you hear a tune on the radio or you just look up in the night and -- and you know, you think maybe -- maybe i'm not going to make it, man. because you feel at that moment the way you felt the day you got the news. and out of the blue, i got a phone call one day from a guy who was a much older guy than me, and he was -- i didn't even know it. he was a former governor. that's all right. i'm used to babies. you don't have to take him out. don't worry about it for real. and so what happened was i got this call out of the blue.

from a guy who was a former governor of new jersey. i never knew him, never met him. and he said you know, called to express my sympathies senator, i know what it's like. i felt like saying you know. and he said i know what it's like. he said when i was attorney general i was a young guy and i lived across the green if trenton -- i mean in the state capital from the -- from my office. i was attorney general and i used to go home for lunch every day and one day i'm walking back across the green for lunch, it was only a block away and the woman who came in to help once or twice a week came running across the green and she said attorney general, your wife just dropped dead. he said i remember what it was like. i started listening. and he said you know what helped me? he said, and for what it's worth, i'd recommend it to you. he said, start to keep a calendar. keep a calendar. and every day when you go to

bed, every night when you go to bed, mark in that calendar whether the day was a one, which was as bad as the day you heard the news or a 10. he said you won't have tens for a long time. but measure. just mark it down. and he said after two months, take out that calendar and put it on a graph. and you'll find that your down days are just as bad as the first day. but here's what happens. instead of them being like this, they get further and further apart. he said that's when you know you're going to make it. that's when you know you're going to make it, when you realize the measure of your progress, your mothers, your fathers, you husbands, you wives, you brothers, you sisters, that's when you know, that's when you know i might make it.

and all of you, i don't know all of you. many of you have kids and grandkids in the other rooms. and you know as well as i do that they need you. but you know what most people don't understand, didn't go through what you went through, you need them more than they need you. you need them more than they need you. you're going to find something remarkable has happened. my mother, a sweet old, wonderful irish lady said something at the time the accident happened that i thought was the cruellest thing as i came out identifying -- fae came out. she said joey, she adored my wife and my daughter. she said joey, out of everything terrible something good will happen if you look for it hard enough. i thought what a cruel thing to say. really i did. you know what you're going to find out? your relationship with your son

or daughter which was already close is going to be like a bond of steel that runs through your chest and theirs and wraps you together. you're going to find with their brothers and sisters they're going to be each other's best friends their entire life. everybody's friends with their brothers and sisters. you're going to find there is a degree of difference and depth of a relationship you never ever, ever thought could happen and i'm going to say something outrageous. i was a good and caring father before the accident. in a bizarre way, it's almost harder for the parents of our fallen heroes because parents never expect to have a child predecease them. never. the irony is, when jill -- this is the most incredible woman in

the world -- when jill makes up the wreaths for us on december 18th when we have a special mass and for the gravesite, when jill on mother's day walked me out to the cemetery and brought flowers, i brought for my mom and she brought a favorite flower for my deceased wife and daughter, what happens is that there really is hope. the ache in the back never goes away. but it gets controllable. when i asked jill to marry me, i realize i'm being personal but this is important i hope to you, and i had to ask her, by the way, five times.

by the way, that's not a joke. that's the god's truth, five times. finally, this is five years after the accident five sometimes, the last time i came back and knocked on her apartment door. i had just come back from africa on a trip as a senator and said jill look, you have now engaged my pride. this is the last time i'm going to ask. she's at the door. i didn't walk in. she's holding the door. i said it's the last time. let me say, don't say anything. i'm going to ask you will you marry me? you don't have to tell me when. you just have to tell me if. if you say no, that's it. she looked at me and she said, yes. then she later tells my sister when asked why she finally said yes. she said i fell in love with the boys.

it is too soon. it is not reasonable. it is beyond your expectations. matter of fact you're going to go through periods when after a while you'll see somebody you may have an interest in and you're going to feel guilty as hell. you're going to feel this awful awful awful feeling of guilt. but just remember two things. keep thinking what your husband or wife would want you to do. keep thinking what it is and keep remembering that those kids of yours are him or her the rest of their life. blood of my blood. bone of my bone. because folks, it can and will get better.

there will come a day i promise you and you parents as well, when the thought of your son or daughter or your husband or wife brings a smile to your lips before it brings a tear to your eye. it will happen. my prayer for you is that day will come sooner or later, but the only thing i have more experience than you in is this, i'm telling you it will come. you are not alone. -- you have one overwhelming advantage. say biden, how the hell can you say i have an advantage of anything? you have that incredible thing called the military. you are not alone. just sitting around the table people you didn't know before. being able to share what is it like, how do you put them to bed, how do you say your

prayers, what do you do? what do you do when they ask about. that's why i think that will as i said coming on in, i said to bonnie, that's why what you've done, bonnie, is so, so critical. most of us go through what you're going through totally alone. and after awhile, doesn't make the loss any easier or harder. after awhile, you get tired of you feel like you're relying on your family too much. you feel like i can't say to my mom, i can't say to my sister who moved in to help me raise my kids, i can't say to my brother. i mean it's about time. i've got to get -- and if you have somebody to talk to. for what it's worth and i'm no skols or psychiatrist, but i sought help for how to deal with my kids and you have that

advantage, as well. it became solace for me to talk to people i didn't even know but had called me and said they'd been through it. i'd call. they gave me their phone number and i'd call just basically for someone to say, you can make it. so hang on to each other. hang on to each other. and i can't tell you, i can't tell you how deeply the five of us on this stage feel about the surprises you paid for this country. that doesn't fill the black hole. but you should know, only 1% of you have fought these wars. and much less, thank god, than 1% of those who fought the wars are going through what you'r