i think i worked harder than those around me because i didn't have as much talent. throughout my life, you know, as a s.e.a.l. i probably was never the best jumper, or explosive expert, or shooter, or sniper, but i always knew who was. and i always surrounded myself with what i think was the finest talent. and i was -- i've always been honored to lead men and women of unbelievable commitment, sacrifice, and arguably on some of the most complex missions the military faced. >> your parents separated. how old were you? >> i was in third grade. parents separated. the separation was not a friendly separation. so, my daughter, i've always made sure that maintain a very cordial, and a friendly relationship with her father.

and it's been -- it's helpful that way. my relationship with my daughter, both myself and her father, walked her down the aisle at her wedding and that meant a lot. >> when did you first have an interest in politics? >> probably in the third or fourth grade. you know, i always would kid around about being governor of montana. i was always in student council. i was student or class president, you know, multiple years. you know, looking back, i ran some pretty good campaigns. i listened. but i liked the idea of service. i liked the idea of doing things for others and getting -- accomplishing goals. so at a pretty early age, you know, i thought about really service, and i have been on a team most of my life. between a football team in high

school, we were successful state champions, undefeated. went to oregon, had a successful career as a team. and then the s.e.a.l. teams, you're only as strong as your weakest link. politics is very much a team sport, as well, for a higher purpose. but you can't operate independently, or you can but you don't do it well. and if you operate as an individual, more than as a team, then i think the end result is you won't bring the ball to the field. you won't be successful on the battlefield. and you won't be a successful politician and you won't get things done for a higher purpose which is to make america more secure. make sure our future for our children is more secure. to make sure that we protect opportunity and it is about equal opportunity and not equal outcome. and that's an important part of the american value system that's worth fighting for.

>> let's talk about college. you went to oregon. you played football. why there? >> pac-10, you know, as a kid, growing up in whitefish, you know, fairly small town. you go to eugene, oregon. it's in the pac-10. you're playing against the teams that you watch on saturday. good program. some of my best friends today, you know, a result of my college career, rich brooks, neil and the coaching staff that time were as much of a coach, a mentor, and a father and certainly eugene and whitefish being in a forest-type community, outdoors, it was a good fit for me. >> big debate in the nfl about concussions, as somebody who played football. what are your thoughts about that? what should parents be aware of

if their son or daughter plays football and those who move in to professional leagues? >> i think it is a concern. the way you play the sport. the head contacts, i think, can be limited successfully. it kind of evolved certainly where i was playing, the helmet and the head were a lot bigger, and more pronounced part of the game. i think a lot of it is techniques. and make sure at an early age you don't use the head as a battering ram. that you take -- the coaching has to be right. but i think looking forward, the game can evolve where we see less concussions, less head contacts, and bring it back to its origins, which was kind of a rugby type of a game. but when you're wearing a helmet like the one behind me with oregon, that can be used as much

as a weapon as it can for protection and there is a difference. >> any injuries along the way? >> well, i was undersized for a center. i polled as the center, beside me was gary zimmerman, phenomenal player. just amazing athletic ability. scott shepard played left guard. i had some ankle problems going through my last game. and i started four-year letterman, my last college game in football. i was 212 pounds as a center. i used to wear three sweat pants so i'd look like i was, you know, heavier than i was. but it made for some pretty long, long days. and when you face a 320-pound nose guard and you're 212 pounds, it makes for a long day. >> did you ever think about the nfl? >> you know, i -- not really. because i don't think the opportunity was there. you know, early, everyone has aspirations.

and a lot of my friends did play in the nfl. again, i was probably not the best player, but i know who was and i surrounded myself with great, you know, great people, great team. i don't think that my play was the caliber of being successful in the nfl. >> so why the navy? and why navy s.e.a.l.s? >> you know there was a mentor in oregon by the name of admiral dick, who commanded the "enterprise" during the vietnam war, and i graduated with a degree in geology. he asked me what am i going to do? go out to the coast of oregon, become a geologist, specialize in deep sea operations. look, if you're going to dive, have you considered being a navy s.e.a.l.? they dive. but i think it fits your personality. at the time, no one really knew what a s.e.a.l. was. this was before the books, before the movies.

and he brought a recruiter down. i took a number of exams. both physical and written. and he said, well, you know, this is a volunteer program. if you don't like it, you can leave at any time. which he was very truthful about that. he was a pilot. but the program itself was -- he was truthful. you could leave any time. you could ring the bell, but the program was hard, as it should be. because when you wear the trident of a navy s.e.a.l. i think there's an expectation that you're never going to quit. that you're going to complete the mission successfully. >> hard, rigorous, tough training, so what do you remember about the training before you became a s.e.a.l.? and what was the most difficult thing for you personally? >> well, you know, in my life i was both the instructor and a student. and it's a lot more humorous and controlled on the instructor side than it is a student. the basic course lasts about six months.

numbers, we were looking at about 3,000 candidates kind of whittle them down to about 750. start the initial part of training and we'd graduate somewhere between 150 and 200. about 90% or so will leave the program voluntarily. it means they have the skills. the aptitude and attitude and skill set to be a s.e.a.l. but they choose to quit. so a lot of the s.e.a.l. training is mental. never to quit. keep persevering. and i can teach a kid to do push-ups, do pull-ups, to swim, but it's much more difficult to look at the heart within a candidate and make sure he doesn't quit. and that's what the s.e.a.l. training, the toughness part of being a s.e.a.l. is important. >> could you hear your grandmother talking in your ear saying don't give up, stay with it?

>> well, for me, you know, the nights were cold. i was -- certainly the water. i grew up in montana where winters are hard. the swim team as a kid -- and we didn't have a pool in whitefish. we swam in a lake that was fed by glacier waters. so, you know, swimming was pretty cold. but i never was colder than when i was on the s.e.a.l. teams. i actually was never colder in actually doing operations in the s.e.a.l.s, as cold as training was, some of the s.e.a.l. operations i went on, you know, far exceeded the demands that were placed upon me in the training part. which is a testament of why the training has to remain hard. >> you've been on a number of missions, and i'd love to hear some stories, but behind me is something from iraq and saddam

hussein's palace. explain. >> well, that was a panel, a panel from a four-panel door that was saddam hussein's bedroom. it was explosively breached, and that was the small part of it that is still, you know, still intact. so that was -- i was a deputy acting commander in special forces in iraq in 2004. so, i was responsible for, you know, a lot of different missions and what was going on. and that was one of the non-value items that were brought back. >> what was it like to be in iraq? what was going through your mind during that mission and during the early stages of the war? >> well, iraq is a very complicated country. it's sophisticated. but very basic in others. iraq has a sunnis population, which is very proud and has

currently been disenfranchised. it has a majority shia population that for many years was -- was, you know, put to a side as a kurdish population up north. the current crisis of what we face to a degree was a result of creating a vacuum. it's a battle within islam, as much as a battle between east and west. it's not going to go away unless america, you know, leads by example. and this administration acts with resolve, and shows other nations that we're there, we're committed to peace, and we're committed to making sure our allies have everything they need to be successful. >> how do you think the iraqi people view the american people? >> you know, my experience, i fought with the kurds, with the sunnis, with the shias, and almost all parts. i think there was a great deal of respect between the sides. they knew we were not there to

colonize. we spent a lot of effort, you know, looking at how to make their life better. how to make the area stable in the long-term. and a stable middle east is not only good for america, it's good for the world. >> was it the right war? >> i think -- i think it was a difficult call. certainly, you know, i was on record of looking at going into iraq from the point of view of a person who was executing policy and not making policy. my job is to make sure that when we engaged in the mission, we won. my job is to make sure the men and women had all the right equipment, all the right training, and all the right rules of engagement to w win decisively on the field of

battle, and also to eliminate collateral damage. we went on a lot of missions where there was collateral damage and i would sit down with the imams and talk about what happened. the koran is very different than the bible. but ultimately, it's people. and i think as a u.s. commander i think you're obligated to make sure that what you do is the best for your force and the mission. >> what is more difficult, serving as a navy s.e.a.l. or raising money for a political campaign? >> oh, being a navy s.e.a.l. was a great job. i kind of laugh sometimes at being a congressman sometimes is more difficult than being a s.e.a.l. and that you -- as a s.e.a.l., you can watch things get done. you can -- you can engage. you have a terrific team around you. normally, you had the resources to win, and you can watch progress being made. on the hill, under the current,

polarization, there's progress being made. it is fixable. it is absolutely fixable. but progress is not as rapid as what you would like. you've got to make sure you exercise some patience. and some is just political rhetoric. some people don't want the facts. they don't care about the facts. some people don't want the facts. they don't care about the facts. what they care about is an agenda. i never looked at life through a red or blue lens. it's always been red, white and blue for me. as a former s.e.a.l. commander, i never asked the political affiliation of the folks around me. what i cared about is how good they worked. were they skilled, committed, did they have the right training, and did they have the right gut and grit to do what was next. on a political landscape, the freshman group coming in i think has an enormous amount of talent. there's enormous amount of talent on both sides of the

aisle. again, my job is to surround myself with a team and make sure we have the right resources to move the ball forward. >> let me throw out a hypothetical. let's say democrats want to raise taxes slightly. and you want budget cuts in other areas. can ryan ziggy hold firm to principles but also compromise on taxes, spending, or any other matter domestically? >> well, i think there are some values that are nonnegotiable. those values would be faith, family, the constitution. i hold those values. and some of it is my background as a s.e.a.l. commander. i swore an oath to defend against all enemies, foreign and domestic. i was proud to give that same oath in congress. so to me the constitution itself is nonnegotiable.

how we approach making america more secure, how making the economy prosperous so we can afford a strong military, so we can afford to keep the promising we made and infrastructure and social security and elderly programs and medical, it will take a strong economy. so i will sit down, reach across the aisle on how to get there. i don't think you have to ever sacrifice your values. are there places where tax reform should be done? absolutely. but of the three components of our economy, of taxes. you have cutting. spending, and then you have growth. it is much better to grow the economy. you will gain more in a shorter amount of time if you grow the economy. i think the growth is about energy independence. in my experience in the middle

east, think of the change that the world will look at and change in our lives as americans if we are energy independent and weren't held hostage in the middle east about our energy needs. liquid natural gas to europe so they would not be held hostage to aggressive russia. and we have everything in this country to be energy independent. that's part of a vision. you know, and i'm a huge fan of teddy roosevelt. i was when i was a kid. and going forward. what i like is he thought big. montana enjoys a lot of federal lands. for public use. over 100 years ago he had the vision of looking at what

america should be and could be. because we weren't a great power at the turn of the 19th century. we are today. a lot of that foundation was thinking big. and i like the idea that roosevelt thought big. america has to think big again. the problems are real. but we need to think big enough to find solutions to them. and we can. the american spirit is still strong. >> how do you structure your life here in washington, back in montana, and with your family? >> well, i travel a lot. i try to be here. i'll be in a committee and walk out of the committee and say hello. and montana is still eye to eye, which is important. to me it's important that we have a conversation over a cup of coffee or we talk eye to eye.

since my family is spread across montana i straoeu to stay in touch with what's going on. i try to use the internet a little more and skype. cell phone coverage in iraq is better than cell phone coverage in montana. which that needs to be fixed. i spend a lot of time on the road. my family is here in washington, which is important. and to make sure that i'm a father. i spent a lot of deployments away. i want to see my children, grandchildren. my daughter is a navy diver. my son-in-law is a navy s.e.a.l. they're in virginia beach. so it's nice to see the grandkids. it's nice to have them up in a little while. >> is is the skrob what you expected? >> to a degree. i have had to readjust how fast we can get things done. it is bureaucratic. i was surprised at the amount of

bureaucracy in washington, d.c. and the view is different from missouri or yellowstone. and part of the hurdle that we're going to have to get over is decisions are being made in washington by unelected bureaucrats that they're not bad people. but they just don't know the issues on the ground. they couldn't tell where montana is on the map and the difference between butte and bozeman. decisions are being made from people that don't understand what it is to be out in america and see these victims and regulations and how they effect normal people's lives. so the further we can push the decisions down, if you were to make a decision, i think it's a fair request, fair trade. when you make a decision, you should understand what the

consequences are of the decision on the ground. and decisions are made every day. this kind of one size fits all. it doesn't work. what it does is it is stifling what the one value america has done better than any other nation in the history of the world is innovate, think out of the box. and one size fits all top management stifles everything that has made america the shining light of every other country. innovate. think out of the box. the american way. and that we have to protect. >> and finally you talked about your grandmother and some family members. was there somebody in your life that influenced you, that set you on the path to where you are today. >> my high school coach, bob

rathe taught me if you worked hard you could be successful. he gave me an indication that i have some talent. if i work hard. and really it's been a coach relationship. it was in the s.e.a.l. teams. i came in when there was a lot of vietnam instructors there that had been through combat. and they've always been very kind. they have always been a mentor to me. i had some great, great leaders that have gone out of their way. they kind of bring me in and go this is the path we see for you if you want to go in this path. you'll have to earn it like everybody else. but you have a great opportunity. and as a result, i try to stay disciplined in my message. in a football sense, i try to stay between the hash marks. i understand i represent

everyone in montana. i represent not only the republican side, but i represent the democrat side, tea party side, the union side. i represent everyone in montana. and i think if we take that value set forward, congress represents america. truly articulate the values, needs, desires of your district. but the purpose is to make america better. and there's a lot of ways that we can, a lot of pass to attain our goal. we are all sent for one person, to make sure america remains strong, secure, and prosperous. >> could we see you in leadership down the road? is that something you would be interested in? >> yes. i'm always interested in contributing where i can.

leadership certainly. i think if i work hard, that's probably attainable. it's wherever i can fit in and help the team. >> republican from montana, thank you very much for your time today. >> great to be with you. my pleasure. >> the fall of sigh gone happened 40 years ago aurp 30ag. the army and air force reflect on their vietnam war experiences and escape from the country following the fall of saigon. it eventually settled in kentucky. this is hosted by the university of louisville. it's about an hour and a half. >> so you would like to introduce two moderators for