and i will sit down with you the minute we tell you you're available, but i want more than a meeting. >> i agree. >> i believe is senator shelby on his way? >> i understand senator shelby is on his way. we have a second vote and i would appreciate your patience and i would put the committee into recess until senator shelby. >> you want to meet now, mr. secretary? thank you very much. the committee is in recess until senator shelby arrives. thank you very much.

the committee is taking a quick break as you just heard. you can watch that on c-span2. earlier leon panetta said that a balanced approach for tax cuts is feeded in order to meet the $5 billion level mandated by the

budget control act.

come quick programming updates while we wait for in committee to come back. this afternoon on c-span3 we'll have remarks from tim geithner. he's a featured speak or the council on foreign relations event where he's expected to talk about u.s. economic recovery efforts and preview next week's g-20 summit in mexico where world leaders are gathering to discuss issues surrounding europe's debt crisis. again, that's live here on c-span3 beginning at 4:30 eastern. and in about 25 minutes over on c-span, starting at 1:00 eastern we'll have live coverage at the u.s. chamber of commerce. they're having their 2012 job summit. the chamber is releasing their third annual enterprising state study that looks at how specific states are doing in today's

economy. a number of governors are also going to be on hand to discuss the findings.

it turns the committee did wrap up and they did adjourn. defense secretary leon panetta again saying a balanced approach saying the defense cut is needed to have the $5 billion level and he urged members to find a solution to stop the sequester and half a trillion dollars in cuts saying such decisions would force them to hollow out the force and inflict severe damage on the national defense. j.p. morgan ceo jamie dimon was testifying about his bank's multibillion trading loss and the implications that it may have with financial regulations within the dodd frank law. we'll show you some of that hearing coming up in just under

an hour here on c-span3, but you can also go to our website and watch it any time on c-span.org. also this afternoon c-span3 will have live coverage of remarks from treasury secretary tim geithner. he's the featured speak or the council on foreign relations, vent where he's expected to talk about u.s. economic recovery efforts and preview next week's g-20 summit in mexico where world leaders are gathering to discuss issues surrounding europe's debt crisis. again, that's live here on c-span3 at 4:30 eastern this afternoon. >> and another programming note, starting in 20 minutes at 9:00 we'll have live coverage of the u.s. chamber of commerce and they're having their 2012 job summit here in washington, d.c., and the chamber is releasing their third annual enterprising state study looking at how specific states are doing in today's economy. a number of governors are on

hand to discuss the findings. kenya, indonesia, hawaii, kansas, chicago and washington, this weekend on book tv, join david maraniss for "barack obama, the story." a video record of his travels and he takes your calls and questions. also this weekend on afterwards, conservative commentator jonah goldberg blames liberals for an ongoing war on ideas. >> american politics has disported for the last century or so by this idea that by the further you move away from the left is away from bad things and another word is fohomophobic an sexist and they're winning an argument. >> that's sunday night at 9:00 on book tv this weekend on

c-span2. >> the story behind "the star-spangled banner," the invasion and burning of washington, d.c. mark the bicentennial of the start of the war of 1812, from fort mchenry that was seen through the rocket's red glare. historian authors recall on this little-known war. more this weekend and more from the key political figures who ran for president and lost, but changed political history "the contenders." this time, three-time presidential candidate, jennings brian this weekend on c-span3. secretary of state hellry clinton said the attack helicopters russia is sending to syria may dramatically escalate the couviolence in that country. shimon peres, and hosted by the brookings institution in

washington, d.c. the two leaders discussed israeli-palestinian negotiations and the nuclear program. later today mr. peres will be at the white house to receive the presidential medal of freedom and c-span will have coverage of that event. >> thank you very much for joining us. it's a great pleasure to have you here on this occasion to have the ten years of support for brookings. at one time i had something to do with the saban center and we're especially appreciative that so many of you have been involved in the work of the saban center over these ten years are here to join us today. i especially want to welcome senator

senator inweigh inoue and the united arab emirates for inviting us for their presence today. >> when i asked how he would like to be honored, he, of course, refused and then when i said that no was not an option he said that we should do it in the brookings saban center tradition in the exchange of ideas about the middle east and who would he like us to invite to conduct thatten change, i asked him and he answered in a flesh, shimon and hillary. it's a great testament to their friendship for cheryl that they both agree to join us today and it's a great testament to their high reputation and fame that i can say the words shimon and hillary and everyone will

immediately know to whom i am referring and the president of israel and the secretary of the united states. thank you very much for joining us today for this conversation. i'm not going to time -- our precious time on introductions since you know them both so well but instead i thought we should go straight to the conversation. i'm not sure what the protocol is. i suspect the president outranks the secretary, but since shimon is such a chivalrous gentleman, he's known among the good characteristics that i'm sure he would agree that it should be ladies first. so madam secretary, i wanted to

start by asking you about syria, just to go to the heart of the matter. you've done an incredible job dealing with the world's problems, but i suspect the one for the time being is the most vexing one for you is syria. so tell us, please, what's your approach and the u.s. strategy for trying to deal with this tremendous brutality that we seem to be witnessing going there from day to day? >> martin, first, let me thank you and brookings and particular tee the saban center for inviting us to be here. i'm the one who is especially delighted and honored to be with a longtime friend and someone who i don't think i'm alone in saying that i admire so greatly, and i appreciate the chance to talk about some of the issues

that we are addressing together. certainly what happens to syria matters greatly to the united states and it matters drastically to israel and how we work through the many difficulties that are posed by this unrelenting, brutal crackdown carried out by the assad regime and their military loyalists will have far-reaching consequences for the region and beyond. let me just make three quick points. first, we continue to support kofi annan's efforts and we do so because he represents both the united nations and the arab league and to have the joint special envoy who is speaking to two organizations that have seen

their common interests in trying to bring an end to the violence and help to precipitate and then shepherd through a political transition and the six-point plan that former secretary-general annan laid out is a good plan and of course, it's not being implemented and of course, the contempt and the rejection of the first principle of that plan, namely the cessation of violence by the assad regime has certainly been a grave assault, not only on the lives of the syrian people, but on the international effort intended to bring an end to this

ongoing conflict. kofi annan is now trying to put together a group of countries that would include russia that we agree should be included to work on a said that it was not defending assad but it worried about what came after assad. and that it would work on political transition, but there are always a lot of caveats that they then interpose. so i met with kofi annan on friday. we talked through what his strategy would be. and he is working very hard to try to implement it. the redline for us was the inclusion of iran. we thought that would be a grave error. since we know that iran is not only supporting the assad regime, but actively mentoring, leading, encouraging not merely

the regular army but the militias that are springing up, engaging in sectarian conflict. so we have a timeline in mind, to see whether or not this effort of kofi's can be successful. the outer limit of that is mid july when the security council has to decide whether or not to extend the mission. and certainly if there is no discernible movement by then, it will be very difficult to extend a mission. that is increasingly dangerous for the observers on the ground. secondly, i think that the challenge faced by so many from the near neighbors in the area to those further out is -- what

one can realistically do to try to bring an end to the violence without seeing an increase in the activities of certain elements of the opposition that could lead to even greater violence and the likelihood of the civil war that we're all trying to avoid. so you hear from time to time that they're meeting with certain elements. the saudis, others are trying to figure out how to support people under the assault of the syrian regime, and it's quite challenging to actually deliver on that. there are lots of weapons on the black market. there's money that's available. there seems to be an increasing capacity in the opposition.

both to defend themselves and to take the fight to the syrian military in an irregular way. but there's no doubt that the onslaught continues. the use of heavy artillery and the like. we have con fronted the russians about stopping their continued arms shipments to syria. they have from time to time said that we shouldn't worry, everything they're shipping is unrelated to their actions internally. that's untrue and we are concerned about the latest information we have that there are attack helicopters on the way from russia to syria, which will escalate the conflict quite dramatically. there seems to be a massing of syrian forces around allepo that we've gotten information about over the last 24, 48 hours. that could very well be a red

line for the turks in terms of their strategic and national interests. so we're watching this very carefully. finally, i would say that part of the reason why this is complicated in the face of a clear rejection of what the assad regime is doing, is because there is such a fear among many elements of the syrian society and in the region about what would come next. you haven't had a wholesale departure support or even into exile of a lot of major players in the syrian society. we are approached on a regular basis by representatives of different groups within syria who are terrified of what comes

next. i don't know how else to say it. so how we manage a political transition, assumining we could manage a political transition, how we provide reassurance and some level of protection to christians, kurds, sunni business leaders and the like, how we prevent a massive inflow of refugees across the jordanian and turkish borders, how we protect lebanon from getting caught up in the sectarian divides that afflict them as well as syria. if these questions had self-apparent and actualizing answers, i would certainly share them with you, but as things stand, this is our constant, painful analysis as to how we can push the assad regime out. there's no doubt it needs to go,

but create a transition that gives at least some possible reassurance to those who fear what comes next. so i think with that, i'll end. >> thank you. mr. president, syria is your northern neighbor. the israeli army is 40 kilometers from damascus. your deputy chiefs of staff is in the papers in the last two days warning about the danger that syria's chemical weapons could get into the wrong hands. how do you see this, and what do you think can be todone about i? >> i want to thank you very much. with them i feel at home. peace and social justice. not because only my personal

emulation which is tremendous, but by the uniqueness. never before did anybody in history, men or women, travel thousands and thousands of miles from place to place, day and night, not because traveling is such a great pleasure, but because she has an unprecedented responsibility. all the previous secretary of states, because of them, while dealing with international relations which is one thing, hillary's dealing with global responsibility which is a totally different thing. you've had international relations, capital, and that's it. no more. she has to face people all around the world with unbelievable differences. occasionally the people are

leading the government or the government is leading the people. and we live in a world where governments became weak. because the main instruments were taken away from them. the control of economy and the control of security. since economy became -- it affects every country. so the global economy without global government. it's global. it's wild. it doesn't have a -- again, there's no government that's come close. so hillary is trying really to fill the gap by creating alliances, by trying to have common bases. and if the administration wasn't built to handle it, so we have

to create an entirely new experience. saying it, i believe in the middle east, we have to think about two facts. number one. and the future. the new age. but in between, we have a transitional situation which is not the same for all countries but different for every country. doctors came in the hospital and told the nurses, so much in a hurry. the sick people.