[ inaudible ] >> english or whoever would never get their own bomb. >> i have not -- there is a move afoot subsequent to the war called the barush plan, they want to make nuclear technology free for everybody, everybody gets it, that way nobody will use it against each other. this is a nice plan. no. it gets shut down in 1946 i believe is when that goes away. we're holding on to this stuff. of course the americans don't want to give that and russians want it. but that goes away, sir and americans will hold onto it. as far as doing any kind of p preemptive attack on anybody who has it, i have not come across -- >> as a diplomatic -- >> as a diplomatic tool. i haven't seen anything towards that end. harry truman will rattle his

saber with regard to korea, not because they have an atomic bomb but he wants to get this war over with but it's never -- it wasn't really a real threat but he rattles the saber a little bit. i haven't seen anything in my research that would suggest that. other questions? i've talked enough about one of my favorite topics and i appreciate your patience and letting me indulge myself. thank you very much. [ applause ] >> thank you very much. and the doctor will be out in the hallway with copies of his new book that came out last week -- >> in january. >> a few months behind. and i know he would be happy to chat with you more if you have additional questions. thanks for being us at the national archives. come back and see us again soon.

in just a few minutes we'll bring a live discussion from philadelphia about house and senate races this fall and the possible makeup of the new congress. members of congress pollsters and election specialists will trade views at this atlantic event.

>> i hope everybody had enough coffee and banana bread. i want to thank the underwriters who make this week in philadelphia possible. afc pa sear ra and maker's mark will provide us bourbon -- come back at 4:00 for that. yesterday after this session our friends from lululemon will lead a meditation session. if it sounds like a joke it's actually not. i was a bit of a doubter yesterday but i did it just a couple minutes after the session and i promise you, if you do, it will be worth your while and get your day off to a good start. we are on twitter at #the atlantic. we are live on c-span. and after both of our conversations this morning we'll have time for your questions so

now to this subject at hand. as the democrats gather here in philadelphia, they ultimately have three major goals, first, win the white house, the other two win back the house, win back the senate. so the battle for congress will be talking about this morning. there are 34 senate seats up for grab this year. 24 of those seats are controlled by the gop in the house republicans occupy 247. of the 435 seats on ballot in november. so the democrats have a big job. to talk about their chances, we've got an excellent lineup. please welcome the guests for the first of our two conversations, new york congressman joe crowley, vice chair of the democratic caucus. [ applause ] senator chris coons from delaware and ben ray luhan,

chair of the dccc. david wasserman, also known as analyst on nbc news election night decision desk and for his book, better know a district. and leading the conversation, my colleague, molly ball. thank you, everybody. >> hi, everybody, thank you so much for coming. well, let's jump right in with the big question, starting with the senate, senator coons are democrats go to retake the senate. >> i'm confident they are going to retake the majority this fall. it's not going to be simple or easy. given the numbers mentioned in the introduction, as you look at the candidates we've got and resources we've got as a party, i'm fairly optimistic that we're going to take back control of the senate. if you look at the map for getting to four or five, i think it is relatively at this point straight forward to predict what

that path is going to be. i'll say that evan bayh's decision to jump into the race, which you can applaud, up by 30 points in one poll and 20 points in another poll and $10 million in the bank and terrific name i.d., i'll contribute to making sure we're able to put it over the top. katie mcginty is running a clear strong race after having millions of negative ads against her in the last six weeks, still up by a couple of points. last briefly by the way of introduction, i'm optimistic about the resources coming out of this convention. if i were running in pennsylvania, i would want joe biden next to me every day as i was campaigning in wilkes-barry and scranton and erie. if were campaigning in ohio or illinois or wisconsin, having all of the different resources we have in terms of folks who have a national profile who have deep experience, whether it's president o bam month or my friend tim kaine who will be a

great campaigning on the stump or all engaged in volunteering as senators to help our colleagues, i'm optimistic. coming out of cleveland you saw a divided republican party. they had a very difficult and messy primary process. the governor of ohio didn't bother going to the convention in his own state. we have great folks able to deliver it and run of candidates and i'm happy to get into any of them who have real strong choices and real strong chances for picking up majority this fall. >> before i start arguing with you -- >> start arguing with me. >> congressman luhan, are democrats going to overtake the house. >> i think they'll have a strong year this year. going back in 2015, we launch the an effort to create a battlefield of at least 65 seats across the country with recruited candidates. many people talked to us and said we're not going to find recruits in those 65 districts

across the country. it's going to be challenging. but then as we got closer to january of 2016 and all of a sudden this candidacy with this guy named donald trump started to surge and gop could not stop him, different things started to be said and there were different observations. here's the plain and simple. democrats are an offense, i'm optimistic about what we are 11 front liners have been doing well. we challenged them to win it in the off year to develop strong infrastructures and reach out to their candidates to their constituents to the electorate across the country. senator coons always says you need to make sure you're leading with example and looking like a small town mayor in each in every one of the districts and they have done that. then we have competitive seats across the country. 15 that president obama won and nearly loss. that solidified the base for those districts and now we're working with dga and ds and all

of our allies in those states where we will have battleground that consists of presidential patleground states, our districts that are battleground in those areas, as well as state and house and state senate seats. and then in places like in utah, where it's a state where we may not be playing with the senator presidential but we're digging into utah to make sure we have doug owens and have the resources he has. were recently on expansion of the battlefield, down in florida with stephanie murphy taking on mr. micah as well as you see the battleground grow into indiana and kansas and other areas. i guess i haven't made any predictions going forward with the house, but leader pelosi challenged me to put the house in play. we're working day in and day out with every vote and every district. we want to see what we can do to maximize wins come forward. >> david wasserman, i'm sure you noticed the answer to my question was not yes.

can you provide us with an objective reality check. how do you like the democrats' chances? >> the current outlook is a democratic gain in the house of five to 15 seats. i don't think that would be a bad night. democrats challenge is illustrated by pennsylvania pretty perfectly. in 2012 the last time there was a presidential election, democrats won 83,000 more votes for congress counting house votes in pennsylvania but won five out of pennsylvania's 18 seats. so republicans were not only able to take advantage of the fact that democrats are clustered in cities like philadelphia winning districts with 80 or 90% of the vote but able to draw a map after the 2010 census that packed democrats into only five districts. out of the 13 republican held states, there's only one we currently rate as truly competitive race in the philadelphia suburbs and bucks county which is open. if democrats have a road to majority, it will run through places like the philadelphia suburbs. but in addition to a geography

problem it has been a challenge in terms of timing. if you said last year, well, what's one thing that could really tank republicans majority of the house? how about a crazy whacky nominee like donald trump? the problem in terms of house level attachment to trump is that the filing deadlines had passed in 81% of districts by the time donald trump captured the nomination in early may. so while there have been some democrats i think the dccc has done an admirable job of getting candidates into races while there was time to do so. it was too late in a variety of districts, a gain of 10 to 15 would be a good night for democrats. >> congressman crowley, that suggests that a big part of the democrats' strategy is going to be running against donald trump. do you see that being the biggest theme of your house candidates? >> i think it's one of the big themes. obviously, they would say to themself, what did you call

them? crazy more exciting than that. even though leader pelosi said yesterday he's the gift that keeps on giving. i think you're right in terms of philadelphia and the suburban area being road to capture the house. i also think you can discount new york. you look at the first long island great candidates and syracuse in colleen deacon, running against incumbent republicans, both districts have this history of going back and forth in election -- presidential election years. and when you have i think -- a great candidate at the same time, this turnout that comes out that doesn't speak well or bode well for republicans in states like new york, and then there's a whole bunch of other. nine seats in new york that will be aggressively engaged in. i feel fairly optimistic. it certainly in the realm of the possibility. we have a much higher hurdle than the senate does to reach.

and the playing field is a lot better. they have a lot more republicans in play than democrats this year. but when do you recognize a landslide? it's very unpredictable in terms of what donald trump will do and what he'll say and what impact he'll have on the down part of the ticket. what i can tell you, my colleagues who i see -- did see from time to time, we were in session, they are on the heels, very nervous about themselves, number of my colleagues did not go to the republican convention. they found an excuse, vacation being one of them. they had stubbed toes and things of that nature. so it really was remarkable to not only john kasich in his home state but folks were not coming from around the country. i was there on monday and tuesday last week and i ran into a lot of folks but saw a lot of folks missing. and i think that's also something to keep in mind. they are afraid of their own candidate. >> molly, could i add an observation. with the trump effect and the observation with republican ger

gerrymandering out of 2010, there were trends naturally going our way over time where we saw republicans -- republican districts getting more democrats, families getting started moving from the cities to the suburbs, those trends when you look at registration data, you see districts shift and then the emerging electorate coming our way. those were already coming to democrats. donald trump is accelerating that. that's an important observation as we look at the new battlefield across the country. >> you talk about a landslide right now and this could be a convention bumper right now donald trump is ahead in most of the national polls and nate silver is saying if the election were held today he would win. senator coons how much do you need a strong performance by the top of the ticket? >> we need a strong performance. but if you look at the number of the states that we hoped might be in play, all of the most recent polls show them actually in play. so in arizona, in missouri, in iowa, in north carolina, we've

got candidates who in reecent polls are within 2 to 3 points against fairly strong and mostly incumbent republican candidates. so yes the national head to head is going to be bouncing around. i frankly would ignore all national head to head polls for the next couple of weeks. in our battleground map we have expanded it into several states where we've both got stronger candidates than we might have hoped six months ago. we've got weaker opponents than we might have hoped six months ago and i'm convinced donald trump is making our candidates truly viable in places that would have been a difficult race two or four or six years ago. >> you mentioned arizona, we had greg walden in a discussion like this in cleveland, head of the republican congressional committee. and what he said was it is easier to tie democratic candidates to hillary clinton, who's unpopular than to tie republican candidates to donald trump who's unpopular because hillary clinton is obviously a regular democrat and donald trump is not so obviously a regular republican. it's easier for republicans to

distance themselves in arizona the democratic candidate running against john mccain, there's an ad against her now tieing her to hillary clinton. is the top of your ticket going to be a drag nor your candidates? >> i don't think it will be a drag, particularly as folks get to know tim kaine, some of the capabilities he's going to bring will excite and mobilize and engage voters who might not otherwise have performed at quite the same high level. tim kaine is a progressive catholic and the combination of his service and experience in armed services and foreign relations, time in honduras, fluency in spanish and his ability to work tirelessly and connect in a number of states that might not previously have been in play but where he and hillary will help put them in play makes me optimistic about winning a number of seats that even a month ago a lot of most optimistic predictions didn't say we were going to have genuinely in play. i frankly think she and tim kaine will be a lift for us.

>> do you think it's significant that senator coons wants to talk more about tim kaine than hillary clinton. do you think democrats will look more at the second person on the ticket? >> it's certainly a solid pick for secretary clinton and tim kaine is a happy warrior, i don't think that can hurt the ticket. i think it's hard to find anyone in congress who dislikes tim kaine. but the senate will be decided by the presidential race. the overlap between the presidential battle ground in the senate battleground is profound. only a couple of states where there are competitive senate races that are off the table like indiana perhaps. but you go down a list of illinois and wisconsin as the first best democratic opportunities in the senate followed by new hampshire, pennsylvania, ohio and florida. when you add in north carolina and indiana to that mix, i think those last five are going to decide the fate of the senate. the senate democrats have

advantages that democrats in the house don't have. for example, some of the demographic shifts helping hillary clinton and senate democrats are in places like florida, where wuf puerto ricans moving from the island to the mainland, particularly the orlando area. those new voters who are automatically eligible by vir tour of citizenship are helping hillary clinton win florida. they are also potentially helping democrats in the senate race potentially beat marco rubio. that's a house district the democrats already hold. a lot of trends are taking place in democratic districts. >> but i would add florida '06 and 07 an increased population with puerto rican voters and stephanie murphy jumping into the race and competitive nature, the shift, in those two districts we should see a bump because of that shift. >> let's talk about the other side of the demographic coin.

you are from a diverse place, guys that look and sound like you. do you meet a lot of these white working class trump voters we keep talking -- >> what are you talking about? >> i apologize for stereo typing but do you -- have you seen -- >> are you talking to me? >> constituents or elsewhere evidence that there is a group of previously disenfranchised people being brought into the electorate by trump? >> it's interesting, i came from the same borough as donald trump, i refer him conman don forgive me. he comes from queens and didn't grow up like i did. and he kind of has disavowed his queens citizenship and we don't like to refer him being from queens anyway, it's kind of even. and i think there was a bit -- keep in mind hillary clinton

served as new york state's senator for eight years, u.s. senator. she's incredibly familiar, not only as a political figure but people know her. and i think cummings that, there was a lot bit of that in terms of long island, first and third district some concern about that. you'll have a ground swell of voters that come out every four years, african-americans and latinos and we saw numbers recently in latinos, he gets worse and worse with latino voters, a growing population on the island, for instance, that is not as widely noticed. so i think you would be surprised that a lot of people look and talk like i do and speak like i do are firmly behind hillary clinton. >> senator coons, you talked about the pennsylvania senate race. this is a state that has been touted as potentially being put on the map by trump's kacandidc,

is it going to be more competitive than usual in the presidential? >> i think pennsylvania is a key battleground state because of the math. if he can't win pennsylvania, i don't see a path to the white house for him. we need to hold pennsylvania in order to win the senate. it's going to matter for both sides in a critical way. i think it leans democrat. i think there's developed this muscle memory of voting presidential -- in presidential years nor democrats we built up the machinery of get out of the vote. but it is state that swings back and forth. we have the benefit of a democratic governor chief of staff is katie mcginty, candidate for the senate. having come through a tough primary. we've reunited the pennsylvania democratic party and katie and campaigning very hard and she's also going to have help from a guy named joe biden. i never met anyone who has tireless and engaged effective campaigning at the grass roots level as joe biden and tim kaine a progressive catholic who

speaks to a lot of central pennsylvanians is also going to be someone who's going to be here and be able to be helpful and effective. i think the combination of the two of them working with katie will put the state away on the democratic side of the column relatively early, i think many of us recognize the centrality of pennsylvania to the outcome of this election and are going to be pushing to make sure all of the resources and volunteers and all of the air time we can will get invested in pennsylvania. >> let's talk a little bit about the issue set of this election. again congressman, you're republican counterpart believes this election will turn on national security, crime, the kinds of issues donald trump was talking about last week. do you see those as being the main things besides donald trump that your candidates will be talking about? >> i think clearly as we talk about this upcoming election cycle and the nature of what is on everybody's mind, i was

talking to shawn patrick maloney recently, a congressman out of new york. shawn said look, the assessment i get when i visit with people is they feel unsafe. they feel like things are unaffordable. and that things are unfair. and i agree with shawn patrick's assessment. as we talk about the notion of national security, whether it's foreign or domestic, we have a responsibility to keep people safe. we have to do that by securing our nation. looking forward and making sure that economic security is something that's real that economic security can be built in such a way where families like the one i grew up in, dad was an ironworker and mom worked in the local school district there, that can't be taken away from you overnight. and as we talk about what were the anxiety coming from, not just the economic anxiety that voters are feeling right now but the real anxiety about the frustration with outside secret money pouring into elections as

a result of citizens united coming from 2010. democrats and republicans and independents, it doesn't matter who you talk to, they are tired of this. they have to do everything they can by working to secure or democracy as well. and each and every one of those areas we'll be working to make that contrast and show the difference between democrats and house republicans. and here's what i think is puzzling to me. the republicans who recently set out a series of white papers to share with the american people what they will do if they are in charge in 2017, here's the worst kept secret. they are in charge now. and the american people are asking why aren't you doing this now as congressman crowley spelled out, house republicans left home without doing anything about opioid addiction across america. they left zika on the table and didn't help the poor people suffering from flint michigan and lead poisoning we have around the country and the list goes on.

zika and what not. that's the difference as i say that the people across america want action. they want us to work together but we all know that speaker paul ryan, even when he made a commitment to move a piece of legislation that would address gun violence after the shootings in dallas and orlando, in baton rouge and up in minnesota and events around the world he was going to move a package, got scheduled for a vote tuesday and wednesday and thursday and friday and each day it had to get pulled because the republicans would not allow for that package to move. that's the problem republicans have and the american people are tired of it. i welcome that conversation. >> can i add to that as well, absolutely right, the nuance here, there's one issue house democrats are identifying with now and the senate did a good job in terms of murphy filibuster, a sit-in on the floor. when we go home to constituents people were saying that's incredible. this an issue we have been

identifying with, house members when they go back, democrat and republican are hearing about this. they have been and we're going to continue to keep the drum beat going. an example of not being able to get the most common denominator of issues accomplished. we're not talking about reenactment of the band, assault weapons ban which i would love to have happen but i'm also a realist. i'm talking about common sense measures that republican majority now has been reassigned and they have never -- have been able to get -- accomplish that at all. i think that's one issue that he we identify with the house democrats more than anything else right now. >> senator coons, do you think gun control is a net plus for your senate candidates particularly? i'm old enough to remember that being somewhat of a third rail and working to get the gun issue off the radar so you could elect pro-gun democrats in red states in particular. in purple states and midwestern states, do you think democrats

can run on a platform of -- >> i think closing the terrorism loophole and enacting responsible background checks is something where we've got the overwhelming majority. not just of americans but of republicans and not just of republicans but nra members who say, we may disagree about the assault weapons ban and disagree about the phrase you use gun control but on those two issues making sure people can't get on an airplane because we are concerned they might be terrorists, they can go into a store and buy military grade weapons without restriction. that seems crazy. family members and friends of mine who are gun owners, if i have to get a driver's license and show i've got insurance to drive a car, i'm fine with the idea that i have to go through functioning background check system to purchase a weapon. we really don't have a functional coordinated national background check system. there are loopholes that are too big and too wide. this can be a winning issue, i'm going from here to a rally about

responsible solutions to the challenges facing us because of weapons. i think the congressman is correct, the average american feels unsafe and insecure about a number of issues, you will see donald trump try to emphasize the terrorism. we're the party that has funded state and local law enforcement has funded the department of homeland security and prepared americans to be safe in a way that the other party can't responsibly talk about. they don't have solutions. we do. >> congressman luhan, one of the themes of this convention is the divisions within the democratic party. your own delegation from new hampshire is divided. do you see that having an impact in november. do you think a lot of former bernie supporters would stay home? >> i wouldn't describe it as being divided. i come from a great state of new mexico where we have passionate supporters on all sides and they are here. what's great about a small delegation like ours and state

that only has a population under 2.4 million people, you all know each other. it's not six degrees of separation, it's maybe one or two. and when you come together united especially with the ugliness and divisiveness and racism and bigotry of donald trump, where he went to new mexico like it he did ohio and went after our governor. i never supported governor martinez, wouldn't vote for her going forward but what he did was out of bounds. he went to new mexico and attacked the republican governor, he helped pull away those republican votes as well. not only new mexico but across the country with senator sanders speaking last night and first lady michelle obama's words of encourage. last night. with little anastasia with her mom, talking about that she wants to become an attorney so she can help other people, this is part of the process. we're coming together and we will stand stronger coming out of this convention than the

republicans. the point i'll make to highlight that, last week both president bushes weren't there, governor romney wasn't there and senator mccain wasn't there. someone told me chachi was there but that was it. so this week senator sanders spoke last night, we'll hear from president obama, vice president biden and heard from the first lady. we're going to hear from senator kaine. we're coming together in a strong way. i'm looking forward to the difference in contrast going forward to november. >> i want to take a couple of questions from the audience, while you're thinking of your smart question, what is the one or two bell weathers that you'll be watching as we get closer to the fall to get your finger on the pulse of which way this thing is going? >> sure. two districts that intrigue me are nebraska's second district and maine's second district. what do they have in common? they are the two states thattal

loegt their electoral college votes by congressional districts and they are conceivably in play. now maine's second district is say rural working class white district where donald trump may have appeal and omaha is a white color diversifying district that might be uniquely poor for donald trump and a freshman democrat, the first democrat elected in nebraska since 1992. bruce polyquinn is the first republican to be elected to the house in maine since 1994. there's an interesting sim met tri to these districts. if a party manages to take both of them they'll have a good night. >> brad is way up in his polling if we can takes those -- mccain is an incredible candidate as well. i feel good about both of those seats. >> if you have a question, raise your hand. when the microphone comes to you, please tell us who you are.

keep it snappy and if you can, let us know who you are addressing the question to. >> my name is ross aber heel, this is to whoever wants to answer first. i'm 18 years old and my demographic has really aligned with bernie sanders in the election. how do you think hillary clinton can best get my demographic to get -- help unify the party with all ages? >> great question. where do you see the youth vote? >> i think it's take great question. i want to hear from the senator and as well as the others but the first thing is, i don't think it's a theme we're divided. it's an observation that maybe there's protest at the democratic election. when has there not been a protest? it's something about us we embrace. i think hillary clinton today is a much much better candidate than she was prior to the primary. i think bernie has done a remarkable job.

i don't think anyone here thought -- i don't think anyone here thought bernie would do as well as he did. i give him a lot of credit -- >> bernie definitely didn't know. >> he was stunned. we're hearing fear and fear goes a good distance in terms of motivating people. but without answers, without hope, and i thought -- listen to michelle obama last night and bernie talk about hillary and listen to barack obama and bill clinton, and then the candidate herself, i think at the end of this convention it's going to have a unifying effect that we're looking for. not just for the effect but people will be really believe in the hillary clinton that i know. >> i think if you look at three or four of the issues that millennials have said are central to their future, climate change, not just tolerance but inclusion, lgbt rights and economic opportunity and plan

for addressing college affordable and college debt, those are all issues on platform and delivery and proposals and policy, the democratic party has i think strong and compelling ideas and i expect both secretary clinton and kaine to push for those issues to bring young people into voting for the candidates as well. >> go on. >> when you really drill down on the polls, it's a great question. the main observation different from 2012 is the huge undecided/johnson stein vote being driven by young voters johnson and stein's numbers are double what they are among -- double among young voters than they are among older voters. if there's one theme driving this election and one theme that i think not only appeals to bernie sanders base but wards off donald trump's advancements is rebuilding america's infrastructure at home. the more democrats talk about it, the better they'll do. >> one more question.

let's go back there. >> i'm gail brewer from new york. we learned change versus steady and notion of change but the trump folks don't seem to care what kind of change. and yet steady to them sounds bad. i'm wondering in terms of the candidates you're talking about, how do you address that. as -- i think if you talk about change, we all want to know what change but i guess some voters don't care. they are change because of the all of the issues you raise and concerns and so on. how do you deal with this change versus steady. clinton is tsteady and to me tht makes sense. >> someone called her the secretary of the status quo. is that a burden for your ticket? >> i would say shall i see a difference between good change and bad change. this goes back to the previous question as well with what will it take especially to reach out

to millennials and work together. in the same way that millennials inside of them have a sense of social responsibility to stand up to bullying and racism and bigotry and to injustice wherever they see it, they don't wait for someone else to do something about it, they organize and they stand up to that. donald trump is bringing ba b the wrong change for america. policies most foreign affairs experts have suggested would make us less safe as a country, withdrawing from nato, economic issues withdrawing from the world trade organization and looking at what the cost of his economic policies domestically would have on the american people, burdening working people in america with his economic plans. and that doesn't even begin to talk about making fun of people with disabilities and people of mexican heritage and our mexican brothers and sisters and suggesting that the judge cannot

hold his job as a federal judge because donald trump said he's going to build a wall on the southern border that mexico will pay for, that shift in addition to not disavowing david duke when the question was asked of donald trump what he thinks about white supremacy and david duke, that has no place in american politics. that's not the change that i want to see. i want to see what secretary clinton has been promoting and putting forward as well as aligns with senator sanders, overturning citizens united, peopling the people's voice back in the people's house. and economic security when it comes to more affordable college education, unsaddling students with student loan debt, making us safer with tough and smart policies to achieve that, that's the vision that i have going forward. and there's no one that could have said it any better than our first lady, michelle obama last night. who does she trust over the next eight years, four to eight years

with making sure we're going to be moving in the right direction with an eye on her girls? that captured it for me. >> thank you so much. all right, thank you very much. senator coons, congressman luhan and david wasserman. we'll move onto the next segment of our panel. thank you. [ applause ] now we are turning to demographics, there was a fascinating recent survey from pugh that found that the most common for white americans was 55 and the most common age for hispanics is 8. you can see from that in a snap shot the way things are trending in this counted. country. i welcome to welcome bowman at the american enterprise institute and roy text era. thanks for being here.

demographics, we've been talking about the surface politics of this election, that's the under lying current, right. let's start with the big picture. in your view, how is the electorate this year going to differ from the electorate four years ago or 20 years ago in its makeup? >> thank you to the atlantic for inviting, we've been working on this for about the last ten years ago and our big report on states of change is available on all of our websites if you'd like to look at the work we've done. i think the growing racial and ethnic diversity of electorate is by far the most important long term trend changing electorate over time. >> and what does that mean in practice? what are the numbers. >> if minorities could be as much as 30% the electorate today and groups that voted heavily democratic in recent elections is an enormous plus for the

democrats. >> what was it four years ago eight years ago? >> it was 27% four years ago and it could be as high as 30 this year if you add the total of minority population. >> basically like clock work the share of minority voters tends to go up by a couple percentage points each presidential cycle and white veote goes down by 2% and you tend to have an increase in white college. so the changing mix of the electorate as carlin is alluding to pushes the democrats forward. you have minorities who vote 80% democratic increasing and white noncollege voters who vote 36 or 37% democratic decreasing, it's a recipe for pushing things in the certain direction. demographics is not destiny but matters a lot. >> so you said like clock work, are there any variables that

could change this mix, whether changing turnout expectations, we've heard about maybe many more hispanics eligible for citizenship seeking nationalization so they can vote, what variables do you see affecting this? >> the key variable wore differential turnout trends among different segments of the electorate. but it should be stressed that even if you see some of this -- these differences, it's not likely to effect the basic trend much. in other words, it could be the difference between minority voters by 2.1 percentage points instead of 1.9. what's primarily driving the shift is population change and differences in turnout aren't going to makes much difference as you might think. latinos already vote in 2012 a pretty good democratic year, 16 points under white voters and still see the result that we saw. i would not expect latino

turnout to crash at this election. i expect it to go up. white turnout, we'll see but i think too the extent we see greater white turnout, it's likely to be counter balanced to this case about increased minority turnout. that's a variable but just to stress the key thing driving the changes is not turnout patterns, it's population change. >> but we are looking at key groups and thinking about how they'll turn out in november. will young people who supported bernie sanders stay home? that's an important question. we don't know the answer. will married women who have been solidly republican group over time are they really going to turn out for donald trump? that remains to be seen. will african-american turnout be as high as it was for barack obama? that's obviously going to be enormously important to hillary clinton going forward. so these are also the kinds of things we're looking at but he's right, the issue is differential turnout. >> you famously all orred the emerging democratic majority

back in 2002, the increasing diversity of the electorate and demographic change leading to a democratic advantage in elections. what would you change with that book if you wrote it with hindsight? >> if we were going to write it right now, the thesis turned out to be by and large correct, the groups we were thought growing did grow and they moved in the direction we thought and states we targeted as moving towards the democrats basically did. if we were writing it today we would do a couple of things. one is deal a little bit more with the issue of congress because we do see -- congress is basically a big variable behind changes taking place in the country pushing presidential elections in a certain direction. talk more about that and structural problems democrats may have translating demographic dividends into electorate

payoffs. some of the issues around that, i think we talk about. then there was a few states where we were kind of behind the curve in realizing how fast they would shift in the other direction towards the republicans and appalachian states, at that point in the book we still categorized west virginia, at least for near future as a democratic race. turn out not to be true in presidentials. i have to say the basic thesis seems pretty solid. i stand behind it. >> carlin, would you agree with that? >> i do agree with that. demgrapher favors democrats but i think the republican party needs to wake up to these extraordinary demographic changes in the electorate. >> what would that mean? >> they would probably start with a lot more outreach to minorities and latinos starting with the latino population. the african-american vote is a pretty solid democratic bloc

over all. it would be hard to make inroads there. interestingly young african-americans are less democratic but not more republican, they are moving into the independent camp like so many other young americans but i think reaching out to the latino population is going to be essential for the republicans moving forward. i also think thinking differently about the growing number of single women and growing number of another demographic we've identified in the states of change work overall, that's going to be important over time because that group is growing. >> you mentioned the idea that demographics are not destiny. i would like to drill down on that a little bit. do we ever see sudden shifts in population groups, haven't we seen the asian-american vote become much more democratic than the last couple of cycles? >> that's correct. if you go back to the early 1990s, the asian-american vote was actually republican leaning. but it's changed dramatically since then. partly a result of immigration in the united states partly a result of the cold war

disappearing and the communism no longer an issue, partly a result of these voters have shifted to the left. these have always been fairly pro government voters, asian americans and that's always come out with a vengance to the point where the party idea advantage of democrats among asian-americans is slightly larger than among latinos. you can't have -- the most consequential within group shift in the last 40 or 50 years has been the shift of white noncollege voters from the democrats to the republicans. so what that enabled the republicans -- these demographic changes that are pro-democratic have been unfolding for a long time but they were completely swamped to begin with by the movement of white noncollege voters into the republican camp particularly in presidentials. so i mean there's a lot of moving parts here and you know, we hold everything equal and push forward. we have a big report with different scenarios called america's electoral future. clearly if you push forward with

the basic patterns we have now, it's a big advantage for the democrats especially several cycles down but you can also simulate what the results are for example, if the republicans increase their share of the white vote by their share of the white vote, in the report. if they do that they could win presidentials until 2028 everything holding equal. that runs out of gas. democrat sets playing field but doesn't determine outcomes but i think it tells parties some of what they need to do and not do. >> sometimes discussions about demographics are pessimistic for republicans. do you see encouraging -- any opportunities for optimism in the electorate or is republicans entire coalition staked on parts of the electorate getting smaller and dying out. >> republican coalition is getting smaller. said earlier white vote has been basis of republican party is

shrinking 2 percentage points every four years. i'm not sure i see a lot of positive things in the data for republicans postmortem after the reflection they were aware of challenges going forward. clearly breaking into latino vote over time is going to be very important and they are going to have to do more work in that regard overall. issues matter, elections matter, candidates matter. we're looking at a lot of states that could be in play that we never would have expected before donald trump seems to be doing better in the rust belt and hillary clinton in the sunbelt. i red ron brownstein's 2009 article on the blue wall, the 18 states that had voted in 2009, straight democratic for five presidential elections, longest trend since fdr election. then i looked at those states again after 2012, those same states voted six times for democratic candidates overall. but now some of those states, michigan, in particular, and wisconsin are conceivably in

play at least based on some of the most recent polls. these trends do change. there's some opportunities, perhaps, for republicans that there weren't eight years ago in part because of issues for candidates and the rest. >> do you agree with that? >> i agree with that. i think in a sense you can put a demographic lens on that. where trumps chances seem best are areas where states where the white population is still large, old, minority population and others are quite slow, relatively static states here. wisconsins, michigan, ohios. so i think that it makes sense those would be in the target zone and have chances moving in the other direction. that said i'm a little skeptical of the ability of trump to move an adequate share of white noncollege vote so far in his direction to swamp all the other trends and the general democratic lean of these states.

it really does look like the white college vote is going to swing pretty heavily toward the democra democrats. that means in a lot of states you have to overperform than you previously did among white working class voters you have to overperform. i think it's a tough calculus. >> democrats have this demographic advantage in presidential elections but how do you explain abysmal performance in midterms we've seen for the past couple of cycles. can that really only be explained by turnout of different groups. >> turnout is important, so, too, is the strong federal system, when you think about the different elections, democrats are largely clustered in big cities. density equals democrats, another democratic adage. in that sense republicans have done well down ballot. even after this election they will probably hold majority of governorships, picked up 900

legislative seats since obama took office. there certainly is something else going on and i think it's related to changing demography but also the fact these are more localized elections. >> also the changing dynamics of the parties and reorienting of their coalitions? because i remember 2006 when democrats won a midterm. what do you think? >> yeah, i think certainly the coalitions are different. the coalitions republicans have turn out in these off year elections, bigger drop-off among democratic constituencies. i think two other things are important here. one is the republicans have done a great job focusing on house and state legislative races. i think to some extent it's a product of the fact some of these other changes are not good for them so they want to maximize their impact on governance by mopping up in these off year elections and in these house and lower seats. i think they have done a better job for democrats focusing on that. the second is something david

wasserman said earlier, structural advantage. the way districts are drawn partly for gerrymandering, partly because democrats insist on living next to one another and minimize the effectiveness of their votes. republicans have far more districts basically 55-45 republican. democrats too many 70, 80%. that wastes votes. win a majority of the vote as democrats did in 2012 and still manage to lose in the house. so there's indications now that if democrats want really -- would have to carry the house vote by 54-46 to get a majority of the house seats. that's not fair maybe but that's the way it is and definitely helps republicans at this point. >> i want to take a couple of questions. but first do either of you see any sleeper subgroups among the electorates?

we've heard a lot about, for example, single women. are there other groups or demographics in the electorate that have not gotten as much attention as sort of the big blocks that you think could either come on the radar this year or this you're interested in. >> i think i'm going to be looking at african-american women in part, because the rate of voting by african-americans in the 2012 election was actually higher than the rate of voting by white americans for the first time in our history and african-american women in particular look very enthusiastic about hillary clinton. they have gotten quite a bit of attention. she spent a lot of time courting that vote overall and i think that will be a very important vote in the fall. >> i don't know if they qualify as a group that people haven't been paying attention to, but maybe less so than some of these other groups over time. but white college educated women. i just think they are going to be really big this year and i think they are going to swing very dramatically in the direction of the democrats.

that's going to swing the whole white college educated vote as i indicated earlier. as pointed out the other day democrats haven't carried white college educated vote practically forever since polling has been testing these things. i think that's an interesting thing. >> i'm so excited to be in a key demographic. who has a question? raise your hand, don't be shy. i can't totally see with the light. there's someone right there in front of the blinding light. tell us who you are and who you want to ask a question of. >> my name is miles, question for both of you. i'm california 24th district, both a very young district and white district, both presidential and open house seat, do you think the youth or the fact it's a very white district will play -- it's relatively a purple district. which one do you think will be more important in the vote this

year? >> i'm not enough of a house nerd to know whose district that is. who is your member of congress? >> lois capps, she's retearing this year. >> young voters are not necessarily the most reliable voters. maybe they will be this year. i would probably look at the white population. >> hard to suss out the forces because i don't know that much about the district. i do think the performance of young white, subset of the white vote overall, is going to be quite important. if you look at the difference between whites by generation, quite dramatic white millennials and older generation. so to the extent a presidential election can propel these white millennials into action in a district like that it could be significant and tip the white vote more toward the democrat. you know, my sense is, i think,

youth drop-off off year elections is huge. i think this is an exciting election. we know people are really interested. we know levels of campaign interest are higher than they have been for a long time. i wouldn't be surprised to see a spike in youth turnout relative to last off year but maybe relative to the last presidential. i think people are -- a lot of young people are going to think, well, maybe i like bernie sanders or maybe i'm not crazy about hillary, but at the end of the day this guy trump is insane and i have to go out and vote against him. i think that's something to watch, the white youth vote. >> white millennials did vote for romney, including white millennial women. >> if democrats move that back toward a tie. >> don't we hear about young people, they are increasingly detached from the political

parties? >> they are certainly much more independent than other generations. they seem to be interestingly in the polling data i spend a lot of time on, they seem to be more interested in state and local than national politics where they think everything is broken. >> one more. going to be right up here in the middle. i'm sorry, right back there. you've got the microphone. >> i'm danielle ortiz from austin, texas, and i'm 18 years old. given how many questions circulating whether or not millennials will show up for presidential election do you think key demographic given congressional districts coming up? >> great. we addressed that a little bit. as you mentioned, that's sort of the bernie vote. could be discouraged because young people haven't participated in elections before. could they look at this election and say i'm staying home? >> i think they could. i think at this point i question that.

i don't see evidence for why that's likely to happen. if you look at the vote of people who are consistent sanders supporters, pew just did some analysis about this, a look at who they are going to vote for today, it's like 90% for hillary clinton. i don't think there's that much reluctance to vote for hillary in this context. if they have a reasonable commitment to do that, i think at the end of the day when the campaign ramps up, the choice is clear, they will get out and vote in numbers equivalent to before, maybe higher. we'll see. if they come out to vote for the president, they are going to vote for the house as well. drop off is small between presidential vote and house and senate vote. the key thing is getting them out there for the election in general. once they are in the polling booth they will vote for outlet offices, which will help the democrats. >> we hear splitting tickets is dead. do you think it could come back in this election? >> i think it could come back.

absolutely. >> thank you everyone for coming. thank you. we'll be back with a lunch program on criminal justice reform at noon so please join us back here at the atlantic space. thank you, everyone. and we take you live to u.s. china russia tri-lateral relationship, its consequences for international order and global economic growth. specialists will look at recent developments between china and russia and what that might mean for the future. live coverage on c-span3. >> look forward to taking off my tie and jacket in due course. i also appreciate that even though we're in the dog days of summer, so many of you have come out to join in the discussion with a particular important and

often changing triangle in the geometry of international relations and international security. i'm talking about, of course, the relationship among the united states, soviet union/russia, and china, of course. as so many of you know, back in the first decade of the cold war, the government here in washington, and many other governments around the world, thought about the monolith of the soviet relationship. they thought in terms of a kind of access between moscow and beijing. yet that having all right incentivized the united states

to begin in the 60s its misadventure in china, the relationship between the soviet union and china was already very much changing. in fact, in 1961, really before the buildup of melbourne forces in indochina, the china east communist party denounced its soviet counter-parts as revisionist traitors. and then in 1969, of course, the relationship came to blows, particularly in the form of the border war along the rivers. the nixon administration, of course, saw in this crisis both dang danger and an opportunity.

particularly an opportunity double breakthrough in the form of detente with the soviet union and the opening to china. now, flashing forward to today, which i think has kind of a theme around it as we look toward the world and that theme is "back to the future." on the surface it would seem that russia and assertive china are making common cause to thwart u.s. global security policy and weaken u.s. alliances in parts of the world that they regard to be their spheres of influence. and that's the backdrop for our panel. we have three colleagues who are associated with brookings. chung lee, director of john l. thornton china senator. fiona hill, who is the director of our center on u.s. and

europe, and yon son, alumni of brookings center and still has an affiliate with us. i want to particularly thank our special guest stapleton roy, who i think i met when i was a very, very junior reporter in the moscow bureau of time magazine in 1969. i'm sure he gave me great insight and wisdom on what was going on on the soviet and chinese border. he went on to be one of the most distinguished diplomats of his generation and i would say pretty much any generation. a revered ambassador to prc and also a good friend to brookings over the years. so now i'm going to turn the procedures over to chung lee to

get this conversation going, and i'm sure there will be time to bring you into that conversation your self. >> thank you for those remarks and for taking part in today's session despite the very busy schedule. i understand you are on call for very important calls, so leave if you can. i think the audience, you can continue to share with us your wisdom. it would be hard to find a better person than you to offer an historical account and also future outlook on u.s./china,

russia/china relations. when he was a scholar, "he translate the soviet leader khruschev. during crucial periods of the cold war he wrote several books. u.s./russian relations and also disarmament. he served as deputy secretary of the state and ambassador at large on the new independent states forming. early in his career as "time" magazine correspond nixon and kissing kissinger's open of china, in the wake of tiananmen incident he wrote an article entitled "how not to break china." only a few weeks ago when we were together in china i witnessed the dialogue with chinese leaders and chinese

intellectuals discussing challenges and opportunities presented bionic changes being global did heo political landscape. so expert knowledge and vision truly invaluable at this time in global affairs especially regarding relations. thank you so mump. >> is the united states losing china? the title of the event is not intended to echo american debate over who lost china, individual of the last century.

but remind us the '70s and '80s provide many advantages to the united states as they strive to win the cold war. today the try lateral relationship between the united states, china, and russia has profoundly changed. u.s. relations with china and russia both seem to be. meanwhile china and russia are strengthening their strategic partnership or even something or someone would call closer to an alliance. some thinkers in the united states have begun to worry about what they call an uneasy triang triangle. chinese analyst have a new term called new kingdom. [ speaking foreign language ] in chinese discourse, to characterize the situation of

the day and try to explore implication implications. now, are we entering a new cold war? what are the interests of each of the three powers. is it a risk for the united states to be on footing with both china and russia while confronting other challenges such as isis and north korea. unfortunately these important questions are not adequately debated in the united states even during this heated campaign season part of the rhetoric should not overshadow the need for sound strategic discourse. we have three excellent panelist toss share with us inside and the perspectives to address

these important questions. the professor on my right is not even china born but also specializes in russian affairs and served in the heat of the cold war. he served as ambassador to singapore, indonesia, the people's republic of china and also as a national -- also as assistant secretary of a state for intelligence and research. my colleague, fiona hill is director of center on united states and europe and senior fellow in the foreign policy program here at the brookings. from 2006 to 2009, she served as national intelligence officer for russia and asia in the national intelligence counsel.

co-author bringing putin, most sought-after commentators, russian and eurasian affairs. last and not least, a fellow, initiative here at the brookings. prior to these positions she was china analyst for international crisis group facing beijing. her research really covers a wide range of topics. she's really an expert on the china african relations and african development. also east and southeast asia and finally russian relations. welcome each of you. each will have 10 minute remarks and followed by a discussion i

will moderate. then out of that we will open the floor for q&a. so we go with this order. ambassador. >> thank you. good morning. first the comment, united states never had china to lose. if we did lose it, it was long ago before i joined the foreign service. i think it would be more accurate to ask which country occupies the favored position in the relationship in the sense of having the better relationship with the two. it was the united states for a long time and now it's china. now, some people date the improvement in russian-chinese relations to the collapse of the soviet union. but actually gradual normalization of relations

between the two countries began long before that. in the american embassy, which just opened up in beijing in 1979, after established relations, we detected a warming trend in russian-chinese relations back in 1979 and 1980. it was reflected in the fact that border problems between the two countries that used to take months to resolve all of a sudden could be resolved in a day or two. and also the chinese had been concerned from the very beginning of the relationship dating from president nixon's visit to beijing in 1972 that the united states was trying to stand on chinese shoulders in order to get at the soviet union. even though we had a binding element in the u.s.-china relationship based on the common concern about the soviet threat, china felt that we were using

china against russia and this gave them an incentive to have a better relationship with china and russia. it was the intervention of the russians in afghanistan that held back that. again as soon as russians began their withdrawal from afghanistan. so we need a long-term perspective on this relationship in order to understand the dynamic that was going on. certainly the disintegration of the soviet union in 1991, which was occurring right at the moment when i was presenting my credentials to the president of the china, and we spent -- our discussion was not on u.s. china relations but what was going on in the soviet union and both our information came from cnn, because there were very dramatic developments taking place on the television screen. but the collapse of the soviet

union and the remergence of practicing tic pragmatism had removed rivalry from china and moscow. from china's point collapse of soviet union was a redesirable development. obviously the russians had a somewhat different perspective on that development. regardless of these contributing factors, the reality is that russia and chinese relations are probably the best in modern history. china has -- the two countries have good reasons for strategic cooperation. they are both opposed to a world dominated by a sole superpower that isn't one of them. they both feel threatened by u.s. unilateralism, u.s. interventionism, and u.s. support for color revolutions.

so they always both suspect u.s. out to change political systems in the countries in ways we prefer and they do not appreciate it. their economies are complimentary. russia is a supplier of military goods, energy, and raw materials, and china as a spire of capital, consumer goods, and equipment. they have a common interest in not having central asia become a breeding ground for terrorism. so these common factors are sufficient to hold in check russia's strategic insecurities caused by the rapid rise of china occurring at the very moment when russia was declining as a major power because of the disintegration of the soviet union. and another factor is these common interests hold in check china's latent am bigs to consolidate position of central asia, south asia and the middle east.

neither country sees its interest as served by forming a strategic alliance against the united states. the statistics speak for themselves. low -- although trade reached $100 billion in 2014, the reality is u.s.-china trade is about six times larger. china doesn't forward that. in other words, the economic relationship with the united states is fundamentally more important with china than the one with russia. chinese investment is pouring into russia and there's essentially no reverse investment from russia. so the hundreds of billions of dollars of foreign direct investment in china that speeded along its economic development doesn't come from russia but united states and western

countries and neighbors of ch a china. until ukraine crisis in 2014 i think you could actively characterize russia-chinese relations as strong, healthy and friendly. this is reflected in public opinion polling in both countries, which was very different from the period when i served in moscow, when russians were acutely suspicious of chinese. but the chinese consistently rated russia as the country toward which they had the least suspicions. united states, japan, even south korea ranked lower in chinese perceptions. and you had considerable easing of the public attitudes in russia toward china but not to the degree that was taking place on the chinese side. but after the ukraine side, i would characterize relations as

friendly, close, but unhealthy because russia has been forced uncomfortable close to russia -- to china because of the confrontation with nato over ukraine issue. as a result, russia now has to go along with chinese initiatives that russians are inherently concerned about as suspicious of. this is not a sufficient factor to undermine the strong ties based on their strategic interests and not having a world dominated by interventionist united states. but it means that this is not a relationship in which there is an equal sense of mutual benefit emerging from the relationship. so this ukrainian development is a very important factor in the bilateral relationship.

for example, the russians were very suspicious of china's drive in central asia and most recently reflected in one belt one road initiative. and it was in 2014 that they ended up endorsing the initiative, and that's after the ukraine crisis had emerged. as a russian official commented privately to me, we had no choice but to go along with the initiative. though that reflects the change in the relationship. former deputy foreign minister ying of china had an article in the foreign affairs magazine in january/february of this year. it provides a pretty good description of relations in china and russia noting both positive elements and underlying concerns on each side.

she pointed out, for example, that she called the relationship as -- let me get the right terminology stable relationship, not a marriage of convenience, complex, sturdy and deeply rooted. okay. that sounds pretty good. but she said changes in international relations since the end of the cold war has brought the two countries together. that's a polite way of saying u.s. behavior since the end of the cold war has driven the two countries closer together. at the same time she acknowledged that china has reduced -- china's rise has produced discomfort among some in russia. in discussing that issue, she noted the following points. there's still talk in russia of the china threat.

a 2008 poll by russia's public opinion foundation showed that around 60% of russians were concerned that chinese migration to russia's far eastern border areas would threaten russia's territorial integrity. 41% of russians believe a stronger china would harm russia's interest. russians are worried china is competing for influence in their neighborhood. i've mentioned hesitance in supporting this silk road economic belt initiative. on the chinese side deputy foreign minister noted as well, some continue to nurse historical grievances regarding russia. despite the formal resolution of their border disputes, which have been settled by both sides, with compromises on territorial issues, chinese commentators sometimes make critical references to the nearly 600,000 square miles of chinese territory that czarist russian

ex -- annexed in the late 19th century. there's no question china was unhappy with the behavior in the ukraine. while china stopped short of direct criticism. fu ying in her article noted that the foreign minister ministry spokesperson in beijing spoke up saying ukraine's independent, sovereignty and territorial integrity should be respected. this was after russia had separated off crimea and joined back into the russian federation. this from china's standpoint was a horrible precedent, because when he was president in taiwan, he had come up with ideas of holding referenda on taiwan on u.n. membership for taiwan and other sensitive issues an

beijing was strong ly opposed, back doorway stemming independent minded thinking in taiwan. here is russia using referendum in crimea to separate territory russia formally recognized as part of the ukraine and joining it back together with russia. so this was a bad precedent. secondly, russian armed intervention in eastern parts of the ucareen to prevent kiev from restoring central control over its eastern territories brought to mind the u.s. cia-backed intervention in tibet during the early stage of the cold war and china's nightmare is that foreign powers would try to intervene inside china and exploit separate sentiments in

areas such as tibet. while china didn't formally criticizes russia over its behavior, it clearly had very deep reservations about having these types of international precedents established. so let me conclude just with a brief comment. when i was atrending a tri-lateral conference among u.s., russians and chinese shortly after ukraine intervention and the chinese who had been very circumspect before in commenting before on russian behavior and treating sino-russian relationship as all sweetness and light, at the very opening of the conference one of the chinese looked at the russians and said your actions in the ukraine have implications for east asia. this was a way of reminding the russians that they were behaving in a way that affected chinese

interests in a negative way. having sat in on numerous conversations with both russian leaders, because of my relationship with mr. kissinger, high-level russians adopt meet with me independently but high level officials partly because of my status as former u.s. ambassador or active ambassador and partly because of my relationship with dr. kissinger, i have not been in relation with a russian leader in which they have not expressed concerns about china and i have not heard a single statement since the collapse of the soviet union from any senior chinese official expressing strategic concern about china. that tells you something about the way the relationship that changed. it's a good, close relationship based on very important strategic interests between the

two countries but from china's standpoint it's the result of positive developments that strengthened china's position in the bilateral relationship and from russia's position, china is acting as a good friend in need but they still see china's rise as posing strategic challenges for russia that they are deeply concerned about. thank you. [ applause ] >> thank you for that very comprehensive analytical talk. we'll go back to some of your excellent points. fiona. >> that was so comprehensive, i think we can go out for coffee, actually. >> you don't have to go out. >> i don't have to go out. we are very privileged to have ambassador roy here. as you can hear from this tour de force that takes us back in this relationship we couldn't have a better interlocutory or

opening presentation for this. as i was sitting, listening to him, i also wondered why we didn't call the title 'n' lo "losing russia to china" as you scoped out the relationship back to 1960s and taking us through the various efforts of russia and china to engage with each other, it became very clear we've been on such dramatically different tra jekt rice in these relationships. trajectories in these relationships. u.s. and china having a difficult relationship, a carefully managed one at this juncture, at least we hope so. russia and united states going almost full circle in 30 years. you mentioned efforts of the 1980s of china and the soviet union to work out the relationships. if we think back to the period,

of course gorbachev had back timing with visit to china with tiananmen square in 1989. that juncture in 1989 looked hopeful for u.s. and soviet relationships. we seem to be on a different path than what we expect our selves to be in now. we do have this strong juxtaposition. we could have had this title, united states losing russia to china, already use it. as you mentioned this has become a relationship between russia and china that has strong elements. you've eloquently outlined this. we see china and russia having very few differences in international organizations. very different perspective on united nations. both very careful about the positions they hold in u.n. security council, a great deal of coordination in positions there, might be make differences. both of them have taken

advantage of the bricks organization and seeing themselves as leading players in that, also g-20. there's shanghai corporation organization that china and russia set up together that has aspirations for a larger role in international affairs. you didn't really mention that there but it does come out about relationships the two of them have been trying to forge in central asia. but i think one issue that we should bear in mind here although we focused on strategic triangle of relations we're not in the nixon era anymore. our recent presidential suggested they are, i've been following like everybody else has all the reporting and the convention. we've had nixon raised and many other different perspectives, not just the form of nixon's china that you've raised. but this is a much more complex world that we're in. this is not