one point he raised was that the cost estimates, the first cost estimate was in fact taken from a study that was done, and the person who made the estimate said, well, no, it will not really cost that because we are going to give all the money back, and he made some other assumptions that i do not think were valid, -- that he made that i think were valid, so many republicans use that. the individual was questioned i think by "the wall street journal." obviously this commentator would not agree with that. the wall street journal won back to the individual 88 knowledge that the cost would be greater than that. one of the things people should understand is just about the process. this bill was 900 pages long, and the added 300 between then and last night.

they added 300 more last night. . first, a news update from c-span radio. >> president obama welcomes german chancellor angela merkel to the white house at 11:30 a.m. eastern time, the two leaders hold a press conference. later the president and first lady holds an evening picnic for white house staff. omb released a statement

outlining but the veto threat of the war spending bill, this after yesterday's decision and congress to include funding for more f-22 fighter jets. on wall street, stock futures moving lower ahead of data on personal spending and consumer sentiment. china national radio says the state planning agency is likely to reject a chinese company's bid to acquire bankrupt general motors hummer unit. -- hummer unit, saying it conflicts with goals. u.s. district judge sam can't turn over a letter of resignation to a senate official serving a subpoena at the prison where he is serving a 33-month sentence. those are some of the latest headlines on c-span radio. >> conservation and the beginning of 20th-century, there were two sides -- just like now. >> teddy roosevelt and his

leading role in the early days of the conservation movement. >> he was not what we would call by modern terms a kind of holistic -- he believed in hunting, but he did not believe in hunting so you would make a species extinct. so, yes, he cared about snail darter, butterflies, wild flowers. he wanted to make sure we had a place for that in modern society. >> sunday, part two with douglas brinkley on "the wilderness warrior." federer roosevelt and the crusade for america. sunday night at 8:00 p.m., or listen on satellite radio, down lied that c-span podcast and watch part one c-span.org. >> "washington journal" continues. host: joining us is congressman jay ainsley, a democrat from

washington and one of the strongest proponents of the legislation moving on the house floor. we want to go to a clip of president barack obama talking about the importance of congress coming together to pass this legislation. >> now i urge every member of congress -- democrat and republican -- to come together to support this legislation. i can't stress enough the importance of this vote. i know this will be a close vote in part because of the misinformation that is out there that suggests there is somehow a contradiction between investing in clean energy and our economic growth. but my call to those members of congress who are still on the fence, as well as to the american people is this -- we cannot be afraid of the future. we can't be prisoners of the past. we have been talking about this issue for decades. and now is the time to finally act. host: i also want to refer to a recent editorial you wrote in

your hometown paper, where you like and what is going on in congress to the apollo project. my colleagues not have recalled the first apollo project as they set a cap on carbon and set national goals, but having called for a new apollo energy project seven years ago, i saw the similarities. last time we went to the moon. this time our technological genius an entrepreneurial zeal returned to the task of saving the planet. guest: we have the same source of energy as we did have and the apollo project, the american spirit of innovation, entrepreneurship, a can-do spirit. although we are in a recession and difficult economic times, we ought to have confidence in ourselves that we can't innovate to really be the arsenal of clean energy for the world. what i see this as an enormous economic opportunity because we know the world will be

demanding this clean energy technology sources. so when i think of this bill, i think of the people will have -- who will have new, clean energy careers, doing concentrated solar energy. the people at clipper win the company in iowa who will be building and installing wind turbines and people out of a company in washington showing companies out to save energy on computer networks. so when i think of this, i see this as an economic opportunity that we need to seize. and i listen to some my colleagues, and really think this is a little bit of a debate between the optimists and pessimists. the pessimists think we sort of lost our edge, that we can't beat china in a race to build lithium ion batteries, can't be germany in a race for solar technology. we are the people who went to the moon. i still believe we have a right -- the right stuff. also a debate between those who are satisfied with the status quo and those who believe we have a brighter future if we in

fact adopt aggressive, proactive, american solutions to this problem. this bill, i think, is an american solution because it is based, number one, and innovation, number two, on optimism, and a system invented and perfected in america, the system of limiting pollution and charging polluters for the right to pollute. we did this with acid rain and cut pollution in half and it cost us have as much as the people who are now squalling about this saying that this would cost, and the reason that it costs half as much because genuses were starting businesses sometimes in their garages around we speak, developing technologies who can do this at a reasonable cost for us. and this is a very reasonable cost of a process -- a base -- of a postage stamp today and i need to ask my republican colleagues to take a deep breath, look at the evidence, look at what we have done in the bill to ameliorate costs for

americans and the congressional budget office which is really the referee who concluded this would cost americans 47 cents a day. and if we can in fact get rid of 5 million barrels of gasoline, which this bill would do, which we are now importing from opec companies, and free ourselves from -- from that addiction, if we can restrain global warming gases that are melting glaciers and threatening our coastline and killing our forest, and the trees are dying by the thousands of acres. we can do something about that. third, most importantly, we can get in the global race for these green collar clean energy jobs and that is what this bill will do. status quo is not good enough. host: we are talking to congressman jay inslee. on the republican line, you can call land --

host: congressman, you are member of the energy and commerce committee. you authored a lot of amendments that affected this legislation. we heard about cat and trade. what are some of the key components that are lesser known that you think are important? >guest: we tried to design a bill to take care of all the regions and industries and a military costs associated with going forward, and i think we were successful. number one, mike doyle and i added an amendment that would prevent job leakage. we do not want to see jobs go to china if china does not adopt a vigorous climate control system. we built into the bill a provision to help steel workers and aluminum workers and pulp and paper workers, that they would receive 15 percent of all of the allocations and that would prove it -- prevent any job loss going overseas associate with the program. also a spur to other nations to follow our lead.

we are the leader of the world still, and we ought to leave. it acts as a spirit of them to act. second, a provision that would essentially recycle the money. basically this is a system where we limit pollution, which we have been very successful in doing, and we make polluting industries pay for permits, and then we recycle that money back to consumers in several ways. the first 35% of all the value will go back to consumers through the utilities, the regulated utilities. they will be required to get the money back to consumers and a variety of ways. rate reductions to help consumers insulate their homes, and energy efficient refrigerators and washers. second, a provision for the bottom 20% of the americans, lower quintile, they will receive assistance directly in tax credits and help to insulate them from any cost whatsoever at all. so they will be totally insulated. we also have a provision that is

very important, renewable electrical standard, which would basically guarantee americans that we will have 15% of electricity from clean, renewable sources, by 2020. and that we will have helped -- help retaining 5% efficiency in how we use energy. we always know the cheapest energy is always the energy that we don't waste. we know there are boatloads of energy's, if we get installation, cocking the windows and have energy efficient appliances. third, we have a robust and i hope even more robust, research and development component so we can help businesses to develop. by the way, this is going to be driven by the private sector of the united states. there is some governmental research and development but 95% of the innovation and 95% of resources and the great ideas

will be developed by businessmen and women in this country. i've gotten to know these people over the years, wrote a book about energy and i got to know all of these people. you cannot turn over a rock in this country without finding a business person with a great idea. and they are out there today. so we put in a green bank -- we are calling it a green bank that will finance the business people in the first commercial project. they have a great idea, build a prototype in a garage, then they need financing to get it into commercial applications. so we have a bank to help them across that the valley of death. so there is a comprehensive bill and it is regionally balanced. we are a diverse country. i come from a hydro-dependent state in washington, others depend on coal fire for electricity. we have a whole host of mechanisms to insulate those in

the coal-dependent areas of country from price shocks. people can put permits to prevent the price from swinging too rapidly. we have the most aggressive regulatory system in the market. we finally are regulating derivatives. about time, isn't it, not to let wall street run amok again. so we have put a lot of fail- safe mechanisms. but the bottom line is this -- we just got to get to the bottom line -- i know people concerned with cost. none of us want to pay a penny if we don't have to. but i think in that looking at it with economic sense, as the congressional budget office did, they concluded it would cost americans 47 cents a day. it is a little bit more than a postage stamp. and i have yet to find anyone who believes that if we can solve the problem of a loss of

jobs with -- which we are experiencing today, if we can free ourselves from dependence on middle eastern wheels so that we did not even have to worry about fighting wars over will come if we can give our grandkids a fighting chance to have salmon in the rivers and glaciers and coastline in florida, that is worth 47 cents a day. now, i think democrats believe that. i believe republicans believe that. i believe independence believe that. the question is, will it on the? all that no -- all i know, following the economic people who look of the model. the reason we have been able to keep the costs down is we have adopted some measures in the bill to insulate consumers. that is why i am happy with its results. host: our first call is on the democratic line from wisconsin.

vonnegut west virginia. host: sorry. caller: please be patient with me, i am very hill -- ill. it takes me a lot of time to get my thoughts. guest: take your time. caller: it does have to do with environmental problems. i do live in west virginia where we do value our ability to mine coal because of the need for jobs, good paying jobs. wal-mart is basically our biggest employer. but i am very much concerned with the environment. i was hearing a year or two years ago, about the incandescent and fluorescent light bulbs and how that would save us energy. however, because of the nature

of my illness, i am very allergic to fluorescent bulbs. i need the incandescent. when i watched the hearing, i called several members of congress and ask them -- asked them if some kind of provision be made that would give people like me to choice to choose whether i want incandescent or fluorescent. guest: i think i have good news for you. number one, science is rapidly developing new types of lighting. elie the lighting -- a recently went to dupont lab -- led lighting, that could be commercially viable next few years. we will encourage that, and that is one of the things in the bill, appliance standards, so we will receive more efficient lighting and heating systems and

save us money. by the way, this bill could save us enormous amounts of one our household energy bills, 20% to 30% easily are available. this bill will help americans. $9 billion a year of this bill will go to americans through states and cities to help get these kind of lighting to help them save energy. let me just note on coal, we will help the continuation of coal -- we have $1 billion a year to help the industry affect sequestration techniques , 25 sent word for putting it in the ground and keeping it in the ground so as not going to the atmosphere and destroy the climate. the coal industry could have a future long term if we perfect this technology. so we built in systems to help coal-based regions to keep their jobs going. i may add, this bill is very

eclectic in the energy sources that is allowed. nuclear could be part of this mix. and a cap and trade system bug -- does help development by making all lozi of two systems cost competitive. sir you feel badly. one of the reasons we do this bill is that more people will not have the ellises associate with climate change, and people are interested there was a very disturbing report issued by the national oceanographic and atmospheric administration last week at the white house. of the new head of it released it. there are some things about our health -- this is not just about polar bears. polar bears are great, but this is about us and our neighbors and our kids, whether they will have respiratory diseases associated with the problems, whether they will have heat- related health issues. this over the long term is a health issue. for a postage stamp today, i think your help is worth it. host: on the republican line,

charles from bella vista, ark. -- arkansas. caller: china is building a coal-fired plant one a week, and russia -- and europe is a mess. and we are going to loan that money so they can clean up? we are 40 times cleaner than we were the last 35 years. we are doing a damn good job right now without spending all this money. the gentleman who wrote the computer program for global warming, he is the one that says his program is flawed. he does not believe in it anymore. but yet we are spending money on something that is still not proven, regardless of what you say or your other people who started this. now, have you read all 1500 pages of a program that you are going to vote on today? did you read 1500 pages of the

program? guest: i did not just read it. wrote the bill -- parts of it. i wrote a book and the subject and spent a week in china two weeks ago talking to the chinese about how we will no longer give them the excuse for inaction by our inaction. china, essentially we will not allow them any more or any country for the matter, but the excuse out that we are not going to act when america, one of the two largest polluters on the planet, has not acted. i believe we are by destiny and by the system the leaders of the world. we did -- and value system, the leaders of the world. we did not wait for china to adopt the of rights, freedom of speech and religion until we did. we did not wait for the chinese to go to the moon. we lead the world and we went. what we need to do is remove an excuse the chinese or the indians were the russians have for inaction in this regard.

i'm hopeful in october we will have a bilateral agreement with china will make agreements to us about what they are going to do to solve this problem. you are entirely right, they are building one coal-fired plant in week and if they did not restrain that, the world is going to be cooked. so we have to do what we can do to compel their action. here are the two things -- #one, we can act, which we will do today in congress. two, our business community can build technologies that we are going to sell to them. ramgen company may be selling them clean coal technology. the bright source concentrated solar energy, we will sell them product and ship money back here and products to the west. i am getting tired of seeing ships coming in low in the water in seattle full of chinese products and when they go back,

they are high in the water and empty. i want to start putting american products on ships and shipping them to china. there will be a giant market for clean energy technology. here is the question -- we saw in china two weeks ago and electric power plants are building, a solar cell the element system the building, the wind turbines system they are building. we are in a race determining whether the products be made in china or in the united states. this bill will enhance the prospect that those jobs will be in america. i am proud to tell you that one of the investments i was irresponsible for getting in the last bill was a $2 billion investment in lithium ion batteries. this is key to the future of the car. we are going to be billed -- increased building and driving partially electric cars. i want them to the end mass., in

washington state. i have learned one thing, if you do not want to believe in the science of global warming, nothing is going to convince you but having read the ipcc report and seen tens of thousands of acres of forest 100 miles from my house dead because the beatles are killing them because the weather is too warm down to kill the beatles in the winter, having seen the ugly sherds essentially disappeared during my lifetime of 58 years, we don't have a choice and we have to act. host: larry from missouri. on independent line. caller: good morning. i do not know how you can sit there and of the american people in the face and tell them this is not the biggest tax increase that we have ever had. you can say no tactics -- who is going to get the money from cap and tax? because you have put us in so

much debt with all of these idiotic things that you keep putting forward to the american people. the people who are going to hurt the worst of the poor people in the united states who cannot afford to pay the bills. they can't even afford to pay the bills they have now. and i have been working on this for several months with my electricity company in clinton, missouri, which is a coal-fired plant, who spent $8 million in the last year to bring whenever you're talking about down, ok? as an older person and the united states who is 70 years old, i would hope to heck i would never live long enough to save the american government, which is us, not you, but us, we pay the bills so you can have a job, your job is paid for by us -- not this time for you to step up to the plate and say, no,

this is time for the american people to step up to the plate and say we are tired of being taxed, tax, tax. that is all you guys know how to do. spend, and tax. it is not just democrats, it is republicans, it is all of you guys. you come up with this idea -- this idea have been hanging around for awhile. guest: fans for your call, and congratulations on 70 years. you have seen a lot of change in your lifetime. and a lot of good things developed. and a lot of things because we got together at the country and decided to do them. we went to the moon, we developed jet aircraft, we developed software, and we did it because we made some investments in our future and we did it during your lifetime because we were confident in our ability to do those things. i am very confident that we can do these things to keep any rate increases very, very low in this regard, and i will tell you why.

one of the things you said, the good news, i can tell you, will not come to pass. people who are low income -- people who are high income in this country might have to pay a postage stamp a day, according to the nonpartisan congressional budget office, which is frequently cited by my republican colleagues. it posted stamp today. some might have my income level will have to pay postage stamp a day to save the planet from research we're dealing with and to grow jobs. the people who are earning in the bottom quintile, the low income folks of this country, we have assured them -- and i can assure you they will not pay a penny for this in the long run because we are recycling money back to those low income folks. i may also want to add that this money, up to 15% of this essentially is not going into

the general treasury. 15% of this is going into the treasury and going right back out to the low income people we are talking about. the rest of the value of this program is going to york utility, going to your utility, and that utility by law would be required to recycle the value of that back to you in ways to keep your rates low, in ways to insulate your home and to help you get an energy efficient washer or dryer. that is going to be recycled back to you. we could go through the list of where else that goes. but this money basically is required to go back to the u.s. economy. it is not going to be subject to appropriations of congress. one other thing frankly that i think a very good in this bill -- this money is not subject to congress appropriating it. it is all designate where it is going to go back to the american people. that means congress men and

women cannot go there and redirect this money to any particular project or purpose. we have assured ourselves and our constituents that it would be used for these specific purposes. i think it is a real wholesome thing. host: our last call, christine on the democrat line from halifax, pennsylvania. caller: i am an american voter who strongly believes in the science of global warming and i truly hope you can get this passed. i'm calling because of a conversation i had with a staffer at my representatives office, tim holden, and he is a democrat and apparently is against this and i called to find out why. i was told the cap and trade would devastate the agriculture and coal industry of his district. i said, well, how would that happen?

is it because they are such huge polluters? he said, yes, frankly that's it -- that's it. i also asked how the representative considers himself a democrat when he was going to go against in this bill, and i said had he lived in it any other -- had listened to any other voices other than his campaign fund there, and a staffer told me that the people he is protecting are not even supporters of him, they are mostly republicans. so it is very frustrating that my representatives might be holding this up. guest: well, tim is a great guy and a great democrat and congressman. do not hold what the staffers or in terms told you against him. there will be some democrats voting against this bill. and there are concerns in some of these regions. i can tell you that the efforts to make sure that coal