she will be blind justice ginsberg, the only qualification is -- that because she is a former district judge, she probably have -- probably has more appreciation for practical consequences of legal rulings than many colleagues well, there is no simple justice who was a drive court judge, so this may temper what i think is a formalistic approach to the law, but if i had to guess, i will say that she will be where justice ginsberg has been for the last decade and a half. >> given the unpredictability of some of the appointments, i believe the high court will preserve your comments on tape,

about a justice sotomayor for a future time. now is your turn. you have been very patient and i only ask that you identify yourselves, and if you desire to address one or more of the panelists, please indicate this. >> if i can ask walter a question about this to make this business oriented. where does this happen, if your employer, can you imagine how this would apply? if you were using some test for a promotion, but beyond that. >> this is a very good question, it is very hard to

know the place where you have to make the decision. wherever you would do this in the course of litigation, to demonstrate that you will use this criteria as necessary -- and also to eliminate the use of an alternative. unless you are changing the law, i am not understanding how this works. let me tell you why this was controlled by -- precedence with the judge. there was a case in the 1980's, to decide a civil service promotion test with a racially disparate impact. those affected by this filed a lawsuit. but the first issue, that was decided was, was this enough for

the civil service board to not use the results of the test, when they saw the racial results? or did they have to go further, and disproved the fact they ss to this in the absence of a workable alternative. they say it is enough to voluntarily choose not to use the criteria. there were a couple of developments, in the supreme court decision that occurred between this decision -- what is interesting is that, the civil service board was going ahead, constructing a remedy. an alternative for the promotion process. what they chose was clearly an unacceptable.

they decided to race normally, to adjust these by race, says -- adding points based on what your race was, and the justice said they are not certain that this would pass. one thing that was unfortunate about this, was the fact that -- the process was not over. we did not know what they were going to do. they may have come up with something that made everyone very happy. but it seemed to me that this will be a hard test to defend, the promotion criteria taken as a whole. they used this for 60% of what goes into determining who gets promoted. the national is 40%.

they were giving double way to this. instead of using this for minimum confidence, they are using the bar exam to determine the top three for this school. they are not designed for this. all of those things together will be very hard to defend if other jurisdictions do not have this impact when they use these assessments centers, and this does not account for more than one-third. it will be very hard to defend that, and they did not know that at the time. it is hard to figure this out because we do not know if the test was already taken, if there was some kind of entitlement, there was certainly a lot of sympathy. how critical was this for the test?

the important thing is to take a lawsuit now. i do not know how you can be certain one way or another. the court false them for having set aside, i think they would have had a tough time here, it looked like they would have had a very tough time if they were given a lawsuit. there is a long history of race here. >> the signal here is, if there is a test, and you do not do a good job creating this, and this has -- this gets results that are going to one race, you have to go back and make certain that you knew what you were doing when you were designing the test. when you were deciding who would be the best employees. they make it clear that if you go with this, they will not face

a lawsuit for accidental discrimination. the supreme court does not like to employers deciding things on the basis of race, and they think that throwing out the test results, is against the law and the supreme court -- what is almost as important as any of this, they say that they will protect these people and if you go with this test, even if you do not like this, if you do not throw out the results -- this may be unfortunate. there was a lot of discussion about how these would discriminate on the basis of race. it will take a little while to work out but i think that they will be ok. >> do you think they will have problems if [unintelligible]

>> i think this was a bad situation in new haven. there is a set of rules, giving this and the result was not a wise idea, the entitlement issue is another matter. this looks like for the correction and there is another question about richie. are these discriminations in title 7, are they on a collision course? are they, as the civil rights experts say, completely complementary? they were completely complementary, in ending the exclusion of minorities and from the workforce by region by

prohibiting direct discrimination. this held back a number of minorities. we were fully confident of this until the court, most dramatically in the louisville decisions, until they opted for symmetry. when you ask if this would be an acceptable if this was reversed, they come into conflict because so much of what they agreed everyone should do, is involved in [unintelligible] if you have too few minorities, why do you put such a way to on the s.a.t.? why not go to a different admissions system. that is fine if you want to increase the number of

minorities. but would anyone -- would anyone be accepting this if you reversed this. what if they try to change the admissions standards, to make certain to hold down the number of african-americans so this is not up 5%. this would not have been acceptable. the idea is never that you can trade these efforts made to increase the number of minorities, to hold down the number of minorities, is if they were a equivalent. once you do that this comes in conflict with the other provision of title 7. then you have a problem. that is why we are where we are. >> does anyone think that there

is a possibility as part of the roman catholic church, if they decided to get more serious about their teaching, this could be in a way that may affect the standing of the justice. is this going to be affecting any of you? >> any thoughts? >> this is out of the realm of possibility. anything that may influence the court. let me give you the response to that question. there was a case involving whether the campaign expenditures required the refusal of a judge.

i represented the defendants in the case, responding to the supreme court. we were on the losing end. one thing that we said in a brief, i do not know if this is one of his questions, but this is the and workability of the standard that was adopted by the court, i will know this when i see this. one thing that was said is if the test is biased, what about judges who have an affiliation with the political group or a religious group? if you are a serious catholic, and something important to the church comes before the court, is there a probability of bias where you have to disqualify yourself? it would not be the craziest thing in the world, maybe not in

the supreme court but a court with a catholic judge. they may seek disqualification on the grounds that there is a possibility of bias, which seems to be the constitutional standard. >> we have reached the magic moment here, and i know that some of you have other questions which i invite you to raise with the panelists, when we are through here today. i want to thank you for being with us this morning, giving us valued insights into the court and it's history, and the prospects coming up. thank you for being here with us once again. and as i usually say, stay tuned and we will see what comes to the case. thank you. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2009] >> coming up tonight, president

obama and gen. odierno talk about the u.s. troops leaving cities in iraq. there is a winner declared in the minnesota senate race, we will hear from al franken and norm coleman. and the recently deposed president of honduras speaks to united nations general assembly. >> on washington journal, a look at the minnesota senate race with eric mcpike, peter brown on american health care opinion, randel johnson from the chamber of commerce and lawrence yun.

on thursday, martha raddatz and edward montgomery. saturday, ken silverstein and richard miniter. on monday, rep. henry waxman. "washington journal" is live every day at 7:00am eastern. >> how is c-span funded? >> public funding. >> donations. >> the government. >> they get their funding from the taxes. >> maybe this is public funding? >> 30 years ago, america's cable companies created c-span as a public service, a private business initiatives. no government mandate and no government money. >> the military of iraq assumed

responsibility in cities in iraq. president obama spoke about this at the white house. >> today, american troops have transferred control of all of the cities in iraq and towns to the government of iraq and the security forces. [applause] this transition was agreed to last year as part of the transition with the sovereign iraq government. this is part of the strategy to end the war by moving all of the american combat brigades out of iraq by next september. the people of iraq are treating this staying as a cause for celebration. this is an important step

forward as they continue to take control of their own destiny. with his progress comes responsibility. the future of the rack is in the hands of their own people and the leaders must make hard choices to resolve political questions. they must provide security for these towns and cities. in this effort, america will be a strong partner in the security and prosperity. there will be difficult days still ahead. we know that the violence will continue in iraq and we see this in the senseless bombing earlier today. there are those who will test the security forces and the resolve of the people of iraq with more sectarian bombings and the murder of innocent civilians. but i am confident that these forces will fail. the future belongs to the people

who build, not the people who destroyed. and the people who have tried to pull iraq into the abyss of civil war are on the wrong side of history. finally, the very fact that the people of the iraq are celebrating is a testament to the courage and the capabilities and the commitment of every single american who has served in iraq. that is who we are applauding. [applause] >> our soldiers have overcome every obstacle to give this opportunity to the people of the rack. these women and men are not always in the headlines, but they are in our hearts and we will honor their selfless service and the east coast --

the sacrifice of their families. we have made a great sacrifice in creating a sovereign iraq and everyone who has served there, deserves our thanks. >> now, the commander of the forces in iraq. he spoke to reporters from baghdad. this is 45 minutes. >> can you hear me ok? >> i can hear you. >> good afternoon. we are privileged to have general odierno is joining us this morning. as you will recall, he took command in september of last year. he was a multinational corps commander in iraq previously. he was a frequent participant in

this format. this marks his 12th appearance in this format. we certainly appreciate you for giving us some time today on this important occasion. it is a historic day in iraq. it is a real milestone in iraqi progress. to give us a brief overview, and then to take your questions, general odierno, welcome. >> thank you. good morning. i want to make a quick statement. then i will get on to your questions. as brien said, today is a very important today. we are continuing to move toward our objective of a sovereign and stable iraq. 2009 march is the big milestone for iraq, as security forces assume responsibility for security within the cities

across the country. it is a day when the rockies -- when iraq's practice their sovereignty. in accordance with the security agreement between u.s. and iraq, forces have completed the withdrawal of iraqi cities. a small number of u.s. forces will remain in cities to train, and buys, coordinate with iraqi security forces and enable them to move forward. we will also support civil capacity efforts led by the embassy, baghdad, and the united nascent -- united nations assistance mission. outside the cities, u.s. forces will continue to conduct a full spectrum operations by and through our iraqi force partners. our efforts will establish a layer of defense as iraqis secure the cities. we will secure the belts and

borders in an attempt to eliminate safe havens and sanctuaries and to limit freedom of movement of insurgents and prevent the facilitation of foreign fighters through the borders. the u.s. is committed to full transparent, and continued implementation of the security agreement in the spirit of partnership with the sovereign nation of iraq. the iraqi people should be very proud of the dedication, progress, and sacrifice of the iraqi security forces and the government of iraq. their accomplishments are commendable. the american people should also with very proud as well of the shoulders, sailors, airmen, marines, and coast guard, and civilians who have worked so hard over the past years tiresomely to sacrifice so much in helping the people of iraq progress toward a peaceful and democratic society. with that, i am happy to take

your questions. >> you talked about a small number of u.s. forces remaining in the area. can you put a figure of how many u.s. forces will remain there? >> people have been trying to get me say figure for about a month. the reason i will not do it is because it is going to be different every single day. it will be based on how much training, advising, how much coordination is required. that will change every day. i will put the i will not put a number on it. it is a smaller number than what we have had in the cities now. it has very specific missions. it has trained security iraqi forces to enable them to come if they need help with aviation, coordinate and help us continue our situational awareness of all

situations within iraq. that will help us to better support the iraqi security forces. >> just to follow up. i am disappointed he did not give us [unintelligible] can you of these give us -- it is a few thousand? can give is a ballpark? are we talking about several thousand? is that reasonable? >> again, there are hundreds of cities around. we have hundreds of, you know, for me to give a number -- it would be inaccurate. i do not want to do it. there will be trainers helping throughout all of the iraqi cities where we continue to support and advised iraqi citizens. >> whatever the number is, how are you going to convince them

not to jump in and be helpful where perhaps you would prefer them to have the rockies -- have the iraqis take the lead? would in their first and sing be, we can do that better? >> we are working on changing their mind set. i equated to when we first started the search. we had to change your mind said to pushing our soldiers back out in getting into the communities, really parting with the security forces. today it is the same kind. we have detained a mindset. we are in the cities, there are specific things we can do. we have been out to the cities now for the last eight months. it is really only modal and the last remnants in bad debts that have been helping out over the last few weeks. we have been -- and baghdad that

have been helping out over the last few weeks. they understand their mission. they understand what we expect them to do. we have more to this very closely with all the leaders in iraq. i have worked very closely with the minister of defense, and the operation's commanders, the operational commanders, in order to work this out. i feel very comfortable with where we are at. >> you are reluctant to talk about how many trainers and mentors are in the city. it raises the question of whether or not this is just a show or not, whether this is just semantic. you want shoulders with guns in the cities. you call them what you want. how different is what we sell to two or three years ago -- weeks ago? what is this? is this a show for the american people? >> i would say you did not listen to what i said.

what i just said was, having the italians and a great inside of cities is different than having trainer, and valiantadvisers. we are offering run the belts in baghdad. i have been very clear about this. we had to search forces. we had to the people in the city. we had to live in a safe haven center where. it is the same thing. the iraqis will take responsibility in the cities. we will do full spectrum operations outside the cities to work the safe haven and sanctuaries around the cities. we will continue to do that. it is legitimate operations that we will continue to conduct. in baghdad, you would know there is a significant change. there are thousands of soldiers that have pulled out of baghdad.

there have not been any soldiers in the cities in southern iraq, rahm body, there have not been any soldiers in fallujah . we have been executing this very well. you would see for yourself. there is a significant change. >> if you are going to be so transparent, why cannot tell tommy trainers or mentors are in the city? >> it would be inaccurate. i do not know exactly how many are in the city. it varies day today based on the mission. >> you must have a ballpark. >> how many times you want me to say that? i do not know. what i'm telling you is training and advising teams that we made in baghdad. it will be different every single day. we have worked three closely locally with the commanders to figure this out. it'll be different tomorrow than it is today. that is why i do not want to say no..

it will be inaccurate. if i say no. today, it will be different tomorrow and the next day. it is significantly lower than it has been so far. >> all right, general. right now there are 101 u.s. people in iraq. in august, it is going to be between 15 and 35,000. can you talk about how is this going to work, a time line, from 131? >> what i would say first is it has gone down. vader nine months ago, we were at about 165,000. we have with john about 35,000 soldiers in the past eight months. we will do this through the end of the year. itl