now. and finally on my far right, dan hemalfavre spent time as clerk to the justices. we invite each of the speakers to shir 20 minutes or so. . .

the level of participation in cases that the court is tremendous. more than a dozen merits cases. it is really almost unparalleled. they are focused on cases that have won consistent principle that goes through a lot of the supreme court's docket. many of the folks watching the program on the web and through c-span, it is tremendous to get to talk to you in this form. i have three things to talk about. the term "by the numbers." what it tells us about the court. the second is what i think is going on. what do we see about what the supreme court is up to and what

i recall -- and what i call the conservative judicial purchase an actuarial ism. a jurisprudence that pays attention to how the justices are. i want to talk about a couple of cases that might otherwise seem like dole points of procedure rather than substantive law. preemption and things that my colleagues will talk about. the more dull sounding stuff of what it is that you have put enough detail in your complaint, or whether the burden of proof shifts and a case, and what that tells us about the supreme court's jurisprudence. the supreme court for many years seemed to have a going out of business' sign up. the court pose a number of cases that was argued and decided was at 714 terms ago. that led to 68, then 67. it went from 82 to 72 to 71.

the dockets seemed to be dwindling. in this term, the number turned around. they decided 75 cases out of argument and 79 cases overall. that is a lot less than 1986,. all of the justices that all of the sir petitions himself. the court had decided in 1986 hundred 56 cases. -- in 1986, 156 cases. the court has a much stronger footing for a stop to it than any time in the last five or 10 years. the court has already granted some 45 cases for next term. it has already filled up its argument calendar for october, november, december, and january. they will hold afternoon arguments a few times in

october. it sounds kind of silly, like does filling the document really matter? it does in terms of being able to have a steady calendar and getting cases in the door that the justices want to resolve. the court reversed a 75% of the time. that puts in context the number that gets -- judge sotomayor and reversed a 75% of the time. whether it is a very significant circuit conflict, it sees a real problem in the ruling below. 1/5 of the dog it was from the ninth circuit. they do a good job of providing the justices plenty to do. seven of the courts of appeals had a 100% reversal rate.

that is pretty remarkable. that includes the somewhat relatively conservative fourth circuit court of appeals. the eleventh circuit had 100% affirmance rate. 23 cases were decided 5-for this term. that is incredibly high as a historical matter. the court to terms ago had 33% of its cases decided. it was an incredibly better term between the left and right on the supreme court. that number has kicked back up again. the supreme court is more divided now than at any time in its modern history. the average number of to cents per case this term broke the to barriers so that in any given case, you expected to be at least 72 for the first time since as long as i've been keeping statistics.

you're much less likely to see brought anonymity across the court. sometimes people confuse the goal of bringing greater coherence to the supreme court pose a decision making with the idea that they once every case to be -- what the chief justice tries to do is to make sure that the court is deciding cases clearly so that you know what the answer is. it might be 5-4100 to% of the time -- five-four, 100% of the time. three judges and other and three judges and number, justice x joins part two-day -- they are down materially. there was only one plurality decision this term down from 34 in the last several terms. while the lines between the

justices are going not -- and growing more start, they are able to decide the cases and you know what it is a you are allowed to do and what it is that you are not allowed to do. 23 cases -- the second highest number in the last 15 years. of the 23 cases, 16 of them were decided along the classic ideological lines. justice kennedy decides what the law means. he is the judge that is in the center. there are four justices to his left and four to his right. 11 joined the right, and five toward the left. it is a two to one ratio. i think it is fair to say he joined the right. the cases that will have a really lasting significance is

probably the caperton case about whether you have a case decided against you if one side bought one of the judges by contributing $3 million to their electoral campaign. whatever you think of the decision and the jurisprudence there of whether there is really a constitutional right here, the court system should be handling themselves -- and is regarded as a case that will not have a huge effect on litigation and the courts. there really will make a real difference in a lot of different areas of the law. i was a that the conservative members of this court had a tremendously successful term, and justice kennedy was willing to go along with them the number that i gave, 70% of the five- four cases -- what is tremendous with justice kennedy

dif -- finds himself evenly divided as he did last term, or have tilted towards the more conservative side. justice kennedy was in the majority in 18 of the 235-4 cases. -- 23 5-4 cases. he was a majority 92% of the cases, significantly higher than anybody else. the next highest was justice scalia at 85%. if you're really want to know where the supreme court is that in any given case is justice kennedy that can be your marker. in terms of what justice was the most interesting, it was justice scalia and justice thomas who remain absolutely fascinating. they are the most principled of the justices. i happen to disagree with the principles a lot, but that is

neither here nor there. when you can see is that when they do believe in principle of law, they go where it takes them whether it is favoring criminal defendants a lot, but they stick to their principles. justice scalia and thomas r. much more likely to vote with the members on the left whereas on the left ever joined any of the more conservative members of the court to create 5-4 majority. justice thomas is by far the most in -- by far the most interesting justice. they take precedence and thrown overboard because he thinks it is completely wrong and introduces a lot of new ideas into the law. and he will have a tremendous influence over time, maybe he won't. he does have a lot of very

independent ideas. the last few statistics i will mention are when justices agreed to gather a lot. the chief justice and justice aledo agreed the most this term. on the left, justice stevens and justice souter has left the court ended at midnight last night that is the term "by the numbers. the statistics that i find most interesting. directionally, let me make a couple of points and turn to the cases i wanted a highlight. i mentioned the jurisprudence of actuarial as some -- actuarialism. under chief justice roberts, it has taken a quite patient approach so that in areas where the conservatives take the view in the warren court area and a subsequent era, there really overstepped the judicial role. it is much more patients and how it is overruling decisions. a couple of examples from this

term, we had the big case about the voting rights act which was civil -- which was celebrated as rejecting the constitutional voting rights act. it is page after page of why section 5 is probably unconstitutional. i think that decision if congress does not amend the voting rights act will later be cited as precedent for the fact that eight members of the court recognize that there are real problems with the voting rights act. there is a term about the exclusion area role that says if the police violate your rights in an illegal search or seizure, the evidence will be used against you in court. that opinion has a lot of language and in suggesting that there should be a good brought

faith exception when the police make an innocent mistake. you can go through case after case after case that doesn't seem to change the law that much. it doesn't change the law all except in respect dealing -- bailing out the civil voting rights act. in area after area, the court is laying down decisions that will later result in significant changes of the law. he later changes won't look as dramatic, because they will point the case after case after case that decided steps along the trail. the court this term did not decide the citizens united case about hillary, the movie. it was not very complimentary. it was revealing to me to put find out that she was, in fact, the antichrist. it wanted to distributed and to ask for it and run up to an electoral cycle. the question is, should we treat that as a campaign advertisement? we usually think of films as getting full first amendment protection.

and so, i think that the court will decide the case from a couple of terms ago where john roberts very nearly decided to campaign finance question and set the table for more aggressive steps. there are about five or six highly charged ideological questions where the court will continue the move to the right. why do i call it the jurisprudence of actuarialism? the court can be quite patient on when it is moving the law because it will be unlikely that they can give it the court's position to the left. justice souter was replaced by sotomayor. the next judge is still doing

great, but in the next couple of years, he is likely to retire. after that, justice ginsburg is committed to staying on the court, but it is likely that if barack obama were to get a second term, he would replace. eight years from now, you have absent some unfortunate turn of health, the prospect of justice kennedy who is 73 or justice scalia who is about to turn 73 are within a few months of each other. the court is not going to change for eight years ideologically on the left, and the chief justice can afford to be quite patient in laying down these markers and is changing the law over the course of eight years

without having to radically do anything because they will get there eventually. i think you'll continue to see substantial changes. the two cases i wanted to mention our procedural ones. the one that will be decided a thousand times in the next six months is a lot. the reason i want to highlight two cases -- they were unexpected. the case is a pleading case which is kind of dull and dry, but assess the rules for what it is that you have to put in your complaint to start a lawsuit in court. the case has significantly raised the bar. these to be a case that i could write a complaint that said these folks violated the antitrust laws and file it. because of like at a little more detail to that, it was

plausible. walter is capable of anything, i could accuse him and people would say, that is probably true. the supreme court has become increasingly frustrated with changing policy and of the burdens of litigation through lawsuits that the level of detail that has to be put in a complaint has been ratcheted up. you have to show the court that it is much more likely that you're going to be kicked out of court at the outset. by the way, the reason it was so unexpected because it was a case about terrorism detainee's. it has nothing to do with free enterprise. it was an allegation that attorney general ashcroft had participated in setting up a system for detaining people on the basis of their race and had proceeded to set up a system of

detaining muslims. the supreme court said there is nothing in your allegation that suggests there really isn't to believe that this is done with the racial motivation. you need more proof before you can start your lawsuit. another case was about how it is you approve a particular age discrimination case. it is a mildly important area of the law. the supreme court instead decided much more profound question. lots of times in a civil rights lawsuit, you have a mixed motive case. yet there are motivated by my age, but also by other things. it is not so clear why somebody was fired, demoted, or didn't get a raise. in a ruling that will also apply any disability context, the plaintiff has the burden of proof so that you can't shift the burden to the defendant by proving that age had something

to do with it and make the defendant prove that we would have done the same thing if it were not for the plaintiff's age. we really thought there were a bad performer. instead, they said turning back the doctrine from a more liberal era of the supreme court that it is always the plaintiff but that has to be proving the case. those are cases that think will be significant or unexpected and will give them some greater assurance that they will not be subjected to pretty wide-ranging litigation. >> change in the lineup. thank you, tom. our cleanup hitter is no longer our cleanup hitter. dan, i will pass off to you. >> thanks very much. i have been asked to talk about a subset of the core's business decisions from this term, those

involving tele-communications, antitrust, and environmental law. by my count, there were a total of seven cases in those three areas. the seven cases collectively make up somewhere between a quarter and a third of the core's business docket for this last term. there was only one telecom decision, and even that was more of an administrative law decision that a telecom decision as such. i will say more about that in a few minutes. there was also one antitrust decision. by the time that case was decided, everyone including the parties were in basic agreement on how the case was going to be decided. the only real question was

whether not it was going to be decided. the court was far more active in the environmental areas. they decided five cases. only three of them were strictly speaking business cases, and i will talk about them a little bit more before i do that, i wanted to make a few general observations about these cases as a group. of the seven, five were from the ninth circuit and two were from the second circuit. in one of the second circuit decisions, the opinion was written by judge sotomayor. in all cases, the court of appeals was reversed. that is not so unusual for the ninth circuit. historically, it is a little

more unusual for the second circuit. this term was not a particularly good term for the second circuit that the court either. although the judgment below has reversed all seven of the cases, the court was fairly closely divided. four of them were decided by a 5-4 vote. tommy mentioned that in some of the cases, you had some unusual lineups. for example, and the last week, you had to business cases which were decided 5-4 against the business, and the five were the four liberals. added two cases, thomas and scalia wrote the majority. there were no such unusual lineups in seven cases i am talking about. the five were the five you would expect and the for the four you would expect. in the other case, the united states -- the party supported one. the united states was six and

one in antitrust environmental cases which is a high success rate, even for the united states which enjoys more success in the supreme court than any other litigant. the business parties had a record of 3, 1, and one. the one at the end reflects that u.s. businesses on both sides, one of them the defendant 1s -- at the defendant's 1 and the plaintiffs lost. if you take the view that a loss is a win for business, even though there was no business party in the case, you could say that businesses were 5-1-1. and if you take the view that any antitrust case business generally was aligned with the defendant in the case, you to take the view that businesses were 6-1 this term.

however you do the arithmetic, it is fair to say that businesses did pretty well this past term in the three areas i am talking about. let me make one more observation. as most of you know, the supreme court rarely takes cases to engage in what is called error correction. there is not enough room on the docket to do that. it is not the way the court sees its role. the court is concerned with

ensuring that federal law is applied uniformly in the lower courts, not in ensuring that is applied correctly, much less that any particular case, several legal principles are applied correctly to a unique set of facts. and yet in three of the seven cases i'm talking about, i think it is fair to say that the case ultimately involved not a whole lot more than the fact of settled law. that is an unusually high proportion. on the other hand, and by way of possible explanation for this, in those three cases, it was the solicitor general representing the united states. the court more often than not will defer to the views of the solicitor general on what constitutes a suit were the case which accounts for the fact that the petitions filed by the united states granted at a rate well above 50 percent sign -- 50%. if the solicitor general asked the court to take a case and represents the court that it is

important to the government, even if it is really little more than a fact known case, there is a good chance that the court will take it, and that is essentially what happened in three of the cases i will talk about. with those preliminary observations, let me turn to the specific cases. this is the fcc against fox television. as i mentioned, this is really more of an administrative law case than a telecom case as such. this is the fleeting expletives case. it came from the second circuit, although this is not the case in which judge sotomayor was on the panel. the main reason for its high- profile was the fact. it involves celebrities cursing on television which a lot of people find interesting. it was not a first amendment case, and it wasn't even really a telecom case. the issue is whether the fcc

posy of holding the funds on fox -- to the fcc's holding fox -- the court held that it upheld the order. so the government one and the business lost. this is the only case in the three areas i am discussing where the business lost. this is also one of the three cases i mentioned that really doesn't involve a whole lot more than the application of settled law, but in case there are any administrative law gurus out there, i should mention that on the way to upholding the fcc's order, the court managed to establish or confirm some principles of administrative law and most of them had to do with house searching arbor

terry reviews his a deferential standard. the court made clear that it is deferential even when as in the fox case, the agency has changed its policy. even when the agency duplicates constitutional rights. and even in the fox case, the actions taken by so-called independent agencies as opposed to a purely executive branch agency, and a lot of the dispute between the majority and the dissent concerned those three obscure principles of administrative law. the antitrust cases -- the issue in this case was a rather technical 1 on whether a plaintiff can bring a so-called price squeeze under the antitrust laws when the defendant has no antitrust duty to deal with a plaintiff their

terms of art and antitrust jargon. this issue arises would have a vertically integrated firm that sells inputs at wholesale, a finished good or service at retail. if the firm raises the wholesale price and lowers the retail price, a competitor in the retail market that has to buy the inputs at the wholesale level will have to pay more for the inputs and it will have to lower its retail price in order to compete. the competitor will have higher costs, lower prices, hence the term "price squeeze." really, the only suspense remained was whether the court would decide the case at all. there was no real suspense over what the result would be if it did decide the case.

that is because, by the time of the merits briefing, the plaintiffs who had won in the non circuit essentially conceded that the theory on which that had prevailed was not a viable one. in light of the concession in arose whether the case should be dismissed as moot. the court decided that it should not be. to no one's surprise, it reversed the ninth circuit saying that a price squeeze -- it was a decision by chief justice roberts. it was 9-0. they're joined by the more liberal justices that made the point that they would not rule out a price squeeze claim this was the one case where the united states was not a party. it supported the defendant's. the case was argued before inauguration day.

it was the position of the antitrust division that was presented to the court. it will be interesting to see over the next four years or eight years or 12 or 16 or whatever it is going to be, what position the united states takes. in many areas of the law, criminal law must notably, but there are others, the positions of the solicitor general -- in most cases, it does not matter whether it -- it does not matter whether there is a democrat or republican in the white house. there are significant areas where the position of the united states would vary depending on who was in the

white house. antitrust is one of those areas. you can probably expect to see something starting next term. if there are any antitrust cases, i do not think there are any on the docket yet. you'd see the united states supporting the plaintiff or an antitrust case in which the united states itself is the plaintiff. whether that will make any difference to the with the court decides these cases is another matter. the first consists of two cases that were not strictly speaking business cases because businesses weren't parties. these cases have the names of seasons. there's the winters case and the summers case. they were both cases where

environmental groups sued to prevent a government from taking certain actions. in winter, it was naval training exercises in the ocean, and summers was the sale of timber in national park. in both cases, the court held that the plaintiffs could not obtain relief and reversed the decision to the contrary. in winter, the court held that the plaintiffs could not satisfy the standards for preliminary injunction. in somers, they ruled that the plaintiffs lacked standing to sue. it more lesson balls the application of settled law. -- and more established principles. no businesses were parties to either case. so no businesses were direct

beneficiaries of the decisions. businesses are likely to be in direct beneficiaries. environmental groups sometimes sue businesses directly. they often challenge government action as insufficiently restrictive of business activities of these decisions make it harder for environmental groups to obtain relief through the judicial process. other things being the same, i think that is a net plus for businesses. the second group of environmental cases have groups in which businesses were parties. two of these were entergy and core alaska where environmental groups sued the government because they took positions that the government's actions were restrictive of business

activities. entergy, they prevented cost- benefit analysis under statutory provision requiring the use of the best technology available for minimizing adverse environmental impact. and the alaska case, they challenged the permit that had been issued by the army corps of engineers for the discharge of waste material. in both cases, the court rejected the challenge. in entergy, they found that the interpretation of the statute was reasonable. in the alaska case, the epa's interpretation of its own regulations were reasonable. both were administrative law cases and environmental cases addressing the recurring question of what level of deference courts should afford agency action. the lineup of the court was similar in both cases. you had the four most

conservative justices and justice kennedy in the majority. you had the three most liberal justices dissented and had just as brier somewhere in the middle. now, because the court held in both cases only that the epa had reasonably interpreted the law, in one case the clean water act itself, and the other case the regulations issued under the clean water act, the administration could use the results in both cases simply by showing the regulations -- showing new regulations. congress could enact legislation as not constitutional case. the result could be changed by congress or by the agency. finally, i should mention that

the entergy case, the cost- benefit case, is the case where judge sotomayor wrote this decision, and the decision was reversed. the last environmental case was the burlington northern case. unlike the to i just mentioned, the government and business were on opposite sides. burlington northern is the only one of the seven cases i am discussing in which the government lost. this was a case in which the government clean up hazardous sites and sought to recover costs from businesses, the cost of the cleanup. the main issue was the proper test for what is known as a ranger liability. they can be liable when it arranged for the disposal of hazardous substances. the court adopted a fairly restrictive test for it liability requiring that the

business take additional steps to dispose of the hazardous material. it found that the defendant in the case, shell oil co. was not a ranger under that standard. the business -- to the decision was 8-1. those are the seven cases in telecom, antitrust, environmental law. if you want a one sentence summary, i guess it is this. business and government were more often than not on the same side, and business and government more often than not won. at least in these three areas of the law, there was an alignment of business, the executive branch of the federal government, and the court itself. thank you very much. >> thank you, dan.

now our cleanup hitter, walter, if you would shan't -- if you would come up to the microphone and share your thoughts. >> let me begin with a general observation that this court continues to have as its central theme. a group of judges to really are impressed with judges and not very impressed with other governmental actors like legislators or executives. and that this confidence in the capacity of the judiciary to make its own decisions is rather extensive across the entire court. this is not a preserve of any one branch of the court. it comes up in little ways. let me start with yesterday pose a decision about the national banking act. most americans haven't heard of section 484-8.

is very close to the heart of anyone in banking, those of us that work and one-fourth of banks that are chartered by the federal government. section 484 traces its lineage back to the civil war, and gives exclusive visit to real -- visitoria powerl is over the comptroller of the currency. -- visitorial powers over the comptroller of the currency. they're free from the hamstringing effects of being regulated by 50 different jurisdictions. it was certainly hamiltonian in vision at the outset that there needed to be a national bank so that the country's business of banking, given the fluid deal of money, which uniquely seen as something that lends itself

to a national rather than separate state regulation. john marshall, of course. he wrote eloquently of the reasons why congress might find the creation of a national bank essential to the welfare of the country to whom it had been entrusted. when the national bank last, -- congress thought it essential to have a system of national banking. it has been thought that the national banking act's provision makes the comptroller the excuse of regulator of banks, at least in respect to matters in which we would call the business of banking. that is to say, everyone concedes that banks chartered by the national governments are

with respect to the regulation in banking, but is thought to be a visit choral power of the comptroller. state attorneys general and protection officers have bristled at this and sought to impose their own revelatory of 40 on banks. so it was in this case in 2005 when the attorney general's office of new york sent letters to a number of banks requesting that those banks provide certain nonpublic information to the attorney general's office about their lending practices -->> we ask that they provide information about their lending practices in order to ascertain whether or not they were complying with the fair lending laws of new york. we said, stop, we are supervised by the national

currency, and the attorney general's office has no authority to exercise supervisory power and to seek this information from us. and this teed up the case is the 20 state attorneys general and the advocates, who believe that the washington enforcement's has not been sufficiently attuned to the needs of the citizens, and the multinational corporations based on the united states and the other that says that regulation is one thing, but 51 different systems is another, for enterprises that are national in scope, and are placed at a competitive disadvantage with the common market. date -- the common market has

the same system of regulation. what was interesting is that this is what they thought would be a very close case, and i have long thought that if you watch the court, you can always tell by the opening words offered by the opinion summarizing the results, how this case is going to come out, even though they save the punch line for last. if this is a criminal case and the person writing the opinion says that, up from the time -- this will be let go. but if the opinion of the author begins, it was a dark and stormy night when mary jones was returning from the prom, you

know that this man will be in the penitentiary. what was unusual yesterday is that justice scalia says that in 2005, eliot spitzer brought this action and he has been succeeded by attorney general cuomo. but several people had their heads spending as to why he was mentioning the person who was not the attorney general and it seemed to invoke an attorney general in this way, to mean that the attorney general was going to lose. but that is not what happened. what the court held was that, with the justice joining the

courts, for the traditional members. congress could not free of them from regulating the business of banking. if they bring the action in court to enforce the fair lending law, they cannot utilize the independent authority with the attorney general and the authority over the corporations to act on this, even with the court looking for a subpoena. new york judges, or actions by the state officials, against national banks, are fine. this is really summing up the court, if they look for the

enforcement of the court, they must survive a lawsuit to risk -- to persist for risk sanctions so the judges are prevented from having fishing expeditions or looking through the books, protective orders and unsupervised discovery. they may do this at any time for no reason. the banks are free from having the attorney general showing up, the currency is already they're going through the pages. but this shows the power of state regulation. in the future. what is interesting to me is that you looked at the

preemption in general, is whether the attitudes are going to change, and when the party that has been more associated with aggressive regulation on environmental matters, discrimination, and consumer protection, takes over the executive branch, so that the people on the side of looking to avoid preemption, they were active on the environmental consumer related issues, have thought that the national government is engaged in serious regulation. those people are now in the government, running the regulatory agency. and once you put in someone who is coming from the environmental community in a

national position, in one of the federal agencies, you are looking less desirable, and to some justices over time, less necessary to have competing state regulations so that, the attitudes have not shifted, and this is a somewhat more aggressive regulatory authority in washington. this may change the dynamic under which we have these statutes, and in a way that may be less favorable to the state

attorney general enforcement. and those who now have a friendly officer with the environmental protection agency, really what competing regulations, from the new environment. the second area that i want to mention is a very interesting split, on the discussion about judges and principles, and that is a case which produced a 5-4 split, that is unusual. we see this every few terms. in a very predictable way. this is scalia and thomas, stevens, justice souter and ginsberg. they can call the technician to the stand when there is a scientific report against the defendant. and the defendant, roberts,

alito kennedy, and prior -- alito, kennedy and justice prior -- just as briar -- justice breyer, this won't work. to which thomas and scalia say, what part don't you understand? you have five people talking about 1791, talking about the crawford case and what was the semblance when the bill of rights was adopted, and the others who are talking about

what makes sense in the administration of justice. this is the fourth time i have had this unusual split. you have the littlest verses the -- you have the literal legalist vs. the liberal legalist, who make up the majority who decide to cut back on the authority. and the most pragmatic justices was made of justice rehnquist, o'connor, kennedy and breyer.

this is roberts, alito, breyer and kennedy in the pragmatist group. it is unclear where justice sotomayor will be. this may be an area where the court is shifting to the right, in favor of law enforcement, she was a prosecutor in the manhattan district attorney's office and this kind of grounding may make her less of the philosophical group, we do not know and she does not know. but the departure of justice souter, or the ideological lines are set up, leaves the court open at that point.

his departure, i think, on matters of business and other areas where this will make a difference is that in some areas of business, with these damages, in the important cases he is siding with business in a way that is not as predictable for the justice. -- justice sotomayor. with the nine -- 9 circuit having awarded two and a half million dollars, what will any of the justices -- it will be hard to get them to overturn this, david souter voted to say that this was too much money and say that this was too much

money. the idea was that the new york yankee -- to david souter in cases like this, where the court is no longer clear. we have not mentioned, sotomayor. we have not mention this, and this is an interesting split. i do think that this case has hardly any thing to do with her nomination, having looked at this over the last couple of weeks, it seems to be clear,

that the president was clear on this matter. the decision was determined by this, and the reason that the opinion is short is because this is controlled by the precedent. the judges saw this is exactly the same way and decided this 3-0 in favor of not second- guessing the test results, and they chose not to publish this so that the results and the fact of the shortness of the opinion, this is a 100 page opinion. there was a review where the law would have been tossed out, and every member of the court wrote like they were making a change adopting a new standard.

one thing that is clear is that you are not to anticipate changing the law, you will apply this as this exists at the time. there is an interesting aspect of this, just for the enterprise community, that is worth noting. the court suggests clearly, that some kind of constitutional entitlement, takes place at some point in the

process of running a promotion, and promotion decision. so at least for the government employers, there is a feeling that what a state or city could do in advance of initiating the process, they cannot do this when the process has taken hold. some people say the governments are struck by the fact that they may now be answerable to some kind of due process way, apart from the race, in cases where they have chosen a selection criteria and initiated a process and changed their minds, they have to carry a burden of proof to say that where they were intending to go was unlawful. this was quite striking. i think that we will have a lot more to say about this in

response to the questions. i will begin to talk about this -- and some as a rebuff in a couple of minutes. a pair of cases that are quite interesting when considered it together involved a question of when the courts should take and knowledge problem, where something has gone wrong in a particular instance and respond to the problem by the recognition of the federal due process right. you take tw of cases. alaska, for reasons i cannot understand, will not let them pay to have the dna evidence tested, and he said would prove his innocence or confirm his guilt. is there a due process right, of access to dna evidence. most every other state would have decided this differently,

and most sensible people think, one not let him pay for the test? the question is, is this a federal right? and the majority says that this is not. . .

commanders, one at norad and the northern command and as you all know, he would not be here otherwise, he is the commander of the pacific command. it is a real pleasure to have the opportunity to hear his insights into the military and the larger american strategic role in a critical part of the world. ann rule keating. welcome to the atlantic council, and thank you for doing this. [applause]

>> thank you all for this great opportunity. a couple of words by a preamble -- i had the distinction of working for then undersecretary of the sense of policy, walter slocombe, for a while. and a few officials, in my experience, have had more consequential impact on with the department of defense and does, did, and is doing then walter slocombe. he was there for a long time. i think he did a magnificent -- magnificent job. it is my honor and privilege been standing here in front of you having been introduced by -- who would have thought back then we would be standing here today? to fred, thank you. oh, in fairness, at the point

out that was great introduction, out that was great introduction, and i@@@@@@@@@ @ @ @ @ r@ @ @ @ acronym's down to a minimum. we have the north pole, south pole, alaska, california, and of the east coast of africa. that is the pacific command area of responsibility. it is 50% of the surface of the

earth. about 51% of the world's population. we have a number pretty large armies. china. when a responsibility for the eastern part of russia. so china's army, russia's army, north korea's army, india's army, our army, our armed forces. pretty consequential. there is significant economic initiative under way of here. about $1 trillion of our trade comes from countries in our area of responsibility. 20 of the largest ports in the world, 15 of those 20 are in aor. nine of the largest ports and the world are now in the people's republic of china and the busiest port, shanghai, is in our area of responsibility. it is a vibrant, dynamic, living, breathing place in which we have the privilege of working and conducting our business.

about a year ago we decided to rewrite our strategy. we've been in the pacific command for decades. the guns have largely been silent in our area of responsibility. for that, we're grateful. it is due to the efforts of several in the room including walter slocombe and the general. we wanted to take what got us where we are and try and catapulted five, 10, 20 years in the future. it is a dynamic aor, as we described. the economic engine is turning. their opportunities and challenges of plenty other. everything about the countries in our area of responsibility, if you think about them and realize how much room there is for growth, how much opportunity there is for, in some cases, a adventurism in korea or in some cases, that behavior. in many more cases than not, cooperating in of collaborating to ensure more peace and stability in the region that is

why we chose to undertake the process of writing a new strategy for the u.s. is a big way. based a lot on what we saw in the rearview mirror but try to look up to 20 years down the road. it is this is undertaking to be sure. we ended up coming down to three basic tenets of our new strategy. partnership, readiness, and presence. pretty simple, complex, simple to explain but not so easy to execute the partnership, we're convinced the building upon the very strong bilateral relationships and alliances we have in our aor, we have five treaties, australia, thailand, the philippines, south korea, and japan. a majority of trees in all countries in our aor. some are decades-old and our bilateral relationships to weave

the fabric that has included as its threads, multilateral engagement and not just milk to mill. increasingly, we see opportunities including elements across the dime, if you will, diplomatic and intelligence, military, and energy and environment. we're looking to cobble all this together in an increasingly tightly woven fabric that emphasizes multilateralism. i will try to cite some examples in a minute. and of the ability we have as the predominant military power in the region to provide some guidance and in some cases leadership to all of these countries that are in response -- that are in our responsibility. india, once upon a time, prior to my work with walter, i was the flag lt. to then admiral william j. chorale in the mid-

1980s. for year and a half, i carried my bad shots, so there's hope for all of us who are younger. but those caring the admirals' bags around. we made a visit to india. he was pretty high expectations, and there were largely unfulfilled. the reception we got was a little chilly. the engagement on a policy level were not very forthcoming. the hospitality was cordial but not overflowing, and the old man left less happy than we would have liked him to be. we just went in for the second time a couple weeks ago, much different from a much different country. we got there on the last of their elections. it is an amazing process. some of you may have had the good fortune of watching india's national elections. folks were flocking to their televisions in manner and numbers that were somewhat unusual to us, glued to the big

screen televisions the other government today is more willing to talk about engagement and a partnership with the united states than they were in the mid-1980's. they are exercising with us on a much more robust bases. we just concluded a trilateral exercise, unthinkable in the 1980's, japan, u.s., india, in the sea of japan, and it was a fairly sprawled sit -- spirited, a technical exercise where we did division tactics. we were exercising weapons and techniques and procedures that are pretty high in. two years ago, india participated in a five-way it says including u.s., japan, singapore, and australia. unthinkable in the mid-1980's, and it is now a matter of course within yet. we think this is a great example of partnership and of the benefits will derive from increased dialogue, increased cooperation, and increased understanding of what we are all about are in the aor. readiness -- does not do is any

good to have all matter -- manner forces that cannot get out there and exercise, cannot respond to military operational directives come to provide assistance to countries to do not quite have all these capabilities, and to get out there and exercise it. as an example, some may have participated in an exercise in thailand held every year. this year, five countries involved. 10 countries, india and prc included send observers to large ships, soldiers, airmen, marines, coastguardsman operating in a real-life a field exercise and a dynamic, vibrant way. and it included with shifting from more fighting, if you will, for exercising the capability of a shifting over to humanitarian assistance, disaster relief, and u.n. peacekeeping operations.

it started out aggressive and ended up not just peacemaking and peacekeeping. never has participation been more vigorous and the more spirited. that is the readiness. it is essential for us to be able to field forces that can move out and answer says across the full spectrum of military operational committee said you would expect for of -- from us. >the third part of our strategy is presence. the officers, a junior officers in our headquarters say it this way. virtual presence equals actual absence. we're all used to the wonders of video teleconferences and multiple secure telephone calls and all that. you've got to get out there. if you have got to get real bird and honest to goodness and grime underneath your fingernails and work with the people in this

very large area of responsibility so that they can develop and enhance understanding of what we, the united states, offer. 36 countries in our area responsibility. we have been 22829 of them. some, like japan, we have been 10 times. when we went to burma, myanmar, we do not think we would get there, but we did. when to offer humanitarian aid since its rigid insistence, and they essentially turned us down. the tragedy. we visited 27 countries. unmistakable, unrelenting been in discussions, not just with them but with senior officials of fruit -- senior officials in the commercial partners in the commercial interests, everywhere we go, unmistakable thing. you, the u.s., are the indispensable partner. we deny necessarily want you with us every minute everyday in our country, on our soil, in our

water, or in the air overhead, but we would like you nearby. we want you to be able to come when we need you. we want our young men and women to go to school with you, preferably in the united states. and we like our young men and women to go to school there. there is the indian military academy, and no one person and sets up for the great reasons of the success he enjoyed with our responsibility as a partnership, absolutely essential to their readiness, we have got to be out there. presence, you cannot could virtually. you've got to be about to deploy, like thomas steen, sell, did their however you can and operate with these people so they develop the understanding of what we, the u.s., offer them. through all of this, in the strategy we hope builds an easy -- a simple but not easy way to ensure peace and stability in the region. we remain the indispensable partner, the reliable partner, the country upon which all of these people can depend to

respond in times good and bad, without a lot of the motion so as to ensure economic stability throughout the region. thank you for your attention this evening. i would be delighted to try and answer any questions you might have. [applause] >> thank you. >> admiral, i think that is a terrific overview of what you are trying to do. and i am sure is stimulated a lot of questions and interests. so let's start. admiral. >> from the institute of foreign policy analysis. would you comment on the china and psi, and then maybe the of the other end of the spectrum, humanitarian system vote -- assistance to china? >> thank you. a couple examples to take it in

reverse order. china had a cold snap in january 2008. you may remember the pictures in the paper where there were 400,000 people stranded at a real yard. a staggering number of people. we get on the telephone to call our chinese counterparts, if you will, and said we would be happy to help, and they said we're grateful for the offer. we're loading up two c-17's. this is several tons of stuff, actually, out of an air force base in hawaii. this is response to a cold weather disaster or challenge. two c-17's launched inside of 40 hours. there were unloading gear with the chinese two-star to stay

thank you very much for the assistance. at the same time, china mobilized their army in a manner that is a little unusual for them, i think, but very helpful to the people there. this example was the year earthquake several months thereafter. same phone call comes same guy on china's in saying we're grateful for the offer and thankful for the help. two more c-17's go in. unless you've dealt with earthquakes, you do not think of what you need. chainsaws, water, food, and plastic sheeting. plastic sheeting was in short supply. a plastic sheeting shortage -- but again, the chinese were grateful for the assistance. we landed, a bloated, and took off. those to the cases come -- we landed, unloaded, and took off. in those cases, offers for assistance were warmly received.

at the same time, right now, is successor to walter has just returned from a visit to china where we have every indication she has been able to get military to military talks back on track. they were suspended in the wake of the time on arms sales announcement in october 2008. i think we're back on track. there's a schedule for the dialogue she has arranged with their japanese colleague. we hope that will lead to an increase in the dialogue and an improvement in the relationship between pacific command and our counterparts in the people's liberation army and air force some narrowly and increased understanding of cooperation on a much larger scale. that is a long answer to a short question. we have provided disaster relief and hope for more fruitful relations with chinese military and the near future. proliferation security initiative.

we are prepared when directed to >> i'm with the liberty time in taiwan. during your tenure, i think you have been trying to help taiwan and china do dialogue or build

confidence among military confidence-building measure. have you been able to accomplish anything? the uc the recent reduction of attention permanent -- do you see the recent reduction permanent? >> we certainly hope that the reduction is permanent. profound hope. as a suspect so, too, for prc and taiwan. we have contributed some instructors for taiwan's annual exercise. as you may know, we have sent some well qualified military instructors. the fact that tension has been defused, if not eliminated, is very encouraging. the steps taken by prc and taiwan, while summer pedestrian

in a way with sending exotic animals, pandas, to zoos, increased commercial traffic, making it easier to send mail back and forth across the street. each of these are not watershed decisions but all contribute to a sense of cooperation and collaboration that we find encouraging. >> i am from the world journal. not too long ago, it chinese sub hit a u.s. -- [unintelligible] can you comment on the capabilities against conventional submarines, especially with those capabilities? >> is that all you want to know? let me take the mccain peace first. john mccain, operating international water, the way we operate around the world with

our navy all the time. it was damaged. investigation is ongoing. i do not know precisely why that was damaged. we will find out perhaps in time. as for the u.s. asw policy, i've got to keep remembering that the tapes are rolling -- we would like to have more than less submarines and the pacific command area of responsibility. the u.s. navy and the department of defense have to make decisions as to how the portion those assets. we have what i think is a 60/40 split with the pacific command and everybody else. we regard to maritime -- freedom of access to the mayor tandem in as absolutely is central to everything we want to get done. .

there are 250-some submarines in our responsibility. not very many of the more hours, but a good number. we continue to pursue asw technology. we want to make sure other countries understand what we can offer them in terms of defense and right of access of maritime command, and countries who develop technologies that we

will uncounted to that policy, we will work to overcome those developments. thanks. yes, ma'am. >> thank you so much for your succinct remarks. my question is regard to a remark he made previously. you have 36 member states covering 3.9 billion population. my question is do you have measures to effectively measure the programs, and do you have any joint lessons learned process to measure those programs? >> is a great question, two great questions. the first one, very tough. in a way you end up trying to

argue the negative. if we do not exercise on a bilateral or multilateral basis, how do you know what might happen in what might not happen? i do not need to get cute with semantics, but we work hard to make sure that we are an invited guest everywhere we go. it is not just my luxury, pleasure, but we have not intend down yet, except in myanmar -- we have not been turned down yet, except in myanmar. we had 36-some helicopters, part of a coalition effort in the bay of bengal. we were able to fly into and arrington, but we could have done so much more. that is the one example i can

think of where we were told no thanks. in every other situation, countries -- we remain the indispensable partner. we want to be humble about this. we want to be invited to the best. in invitation tendered is an invitation received, and that works both ways. the second part of your question was -- oh, yeah. thank you. joint lessons learned. you bet. lessons observed are not necessarily lessons learned. so when we do have these exercises and we have cultural and language opportunities, shall we say, we want to try to get down to a couple of really big hidden items that countries in young men and young women and old men and women can

understand, embrace, and six is necessary or pursue its desirable. so lessons learned is a great big ticket item. lessons observed -- volumes and volumes -- all of us have seen them on the shelves. we are interested. we are not persuaded by this. we are interested and persuaded by lessons learned. we are working very hard with all the nations with whom we engaged to make them concrete, simple, and fixable. yes, sir. >> thank you, sir. i would like to ask a question on north korea. the u.s. government has been watching several north korean vessels right now, which are possibly carrying weapons. are you going to keep watching the vessel continuously? until when?

second, do we have any expectation when the north korean launch will be, and what we are -- what we should be ready for? thank you. >> sure. our response is and is it 6:00? -- are we not supposed to finish at 6:00? [laughter] north korea as activities are disturbing and unsettling for all of us. as far as shipment of proscribed cargo, i cannot comment on operational matters like that with intelligence matters. our president has said he is satisfied that the pacific command and the military of the united states is well prepared to execute whatever did mention he gives us. you can read whatever or not you choose to read into that. as far as the launch from north

korea, the recent launch following by a couple of years the july of 2006 launched, the secretary of defense just said a couple of weeks ago -- i think he said it very well, we are prepared to protect americans and american property and american citizens and american territories. we do not want to tip our hand too much. we want to indicate specific areas of readiness for operational patterns, but we are prepared to execute whatever direction the president and secretary give us. yes, sir. >> thank you for your time today and sharing your wisdom with us. one to get your assessment of the joint special operation task force operating in the philippines.

what have been a positive takeaways? do you think those forces should be sustained in the philippines, even grow, what is it time for them to go home and let the filipinos take over? thank you. >> thanks for the question. joint special operations task force philippines -- we were directed to provide forces in conjunction with the united states special operations command to help the armed forces in the philippines in their struggle against violent extremism, principally in the southern regions of the philippine country. we have been there for about six years now in some number. we have got -- i will just say several hundred special operators there right now, as you probably know. been there for awhile. incredible mission. helping significantly on force

of the philippines in our view of it to the metrics question. while there are still kidnappings, we are not entirely sure that they are terrorists. it little bit of a borderline in some areas between criminal activity and terrorist activity. i was able to go with a real dynamo and a great ambassador for our country. on a trip to visit our personnel about a year ago. we flew down, helicoptered down, drove over -- it was not interstate '95. a little bit bumpy. in about it for your 05 convoy. escorted and followed by armed forces of the philippine marines. so we take this trip in the true heart of darkness philippine jungle. as we leave, visible elements of civilization and get into less

opulent villages and isolated realms, young kids are running out, waving and applauding and jumping up and down and hollering in their native tongue what i'm told this "is good to see you." with their mothers and fathers nodding approvingly. i saw this with my own eyes. i thought this was wonderful, terrific. ambassador said that two years ago, the mother and father would have pulled the kids back and stayed well away from the street. have there been any demonstration, it would have been unfavorable. i saw with my own eyes enthusiastic support from the citizens who had been previously terrorists are violent extremists. i believe we have made significant progress. it is a tough match. but to her question -- we have

the guys there that we have now here we are going to keep them there for the foreseeable future. it is a situation we analyze constantly. we are there for the foreseeable future, and i think that the benefits we came in spite of significant attention and special operations forces are important enough that we maintain our posture and presence in the philippines. serve. >> i want to know, sir, have you personally learn. do you read a lot? do you have smart guys who brief you and up, or do you just go and see it with your own eyes? >> i have the great luxury and a privilege of being surrounded by smart, brilliant dyes --

brilliant guys. this is going to@@@@@@@ @ @ @ - we have astounding support. personnel, logistics. we have pretty good funding. >> i learn by listening.ing. i try to keep my mouth closed and my ears open. my wife would not necessarily agree that that's what i do all

the time. would not necessarily agree. -- i tried to keep my mouth closed and my years -- might years -- my ears open. the spend more time in our embassies. we are spending more time as we can with commercial partners and commercial interest. we spent a full day in india not in the district of foreign affairs, but at luncheons and gatherings, so there is a pretty good exchange of ideas on those terms and on those issues, so i tried to listen more, talk less, and generally, what the staff recommends is almost always spot on, and on those rare occasions when is just need to give orders, studying the

feet of masters. it has been my privilege. >> as the defense department does its review, what priorities are you advocating? >> we were just in town two weeks ago, talking about this. it is a singularly important effort, as many of you know. i am pleased to report that, commanders have a larger say so then my experience in the past, a reformulation of this review. it is a huge challenge for the apartment, as you would anticipate.

we are more active in the formulation of the review. we submit an integrated priority list, and this will be mind- numbing for a lot of you, but we have 10 items on our list, and these are issues where we would prefer a little more funding, a little more emphasis, little more input -- we're more of from the department of defense on those priority issues of hours. of our 10, all of them, tend to attend, are being addressed in the review. we think that is beneficial for us. you might as what those issues are, and again, i cannot go into them, but if you were to think of areas where we might like because of the size, because of the various countries with whom we are exercising, that we might like intelligence,

surveillance, and reconnaissance capabilities, for example, it is being addressed in the review. we are very happy with the role that we have. we have an active voice in the formulation, and it is a singularly important document for us, and we are cautiously optimistic that it will be not just a heavy tome that goes across the street to congress, but that it will have an impact with congress and that the american people will be persuaded by the analysis that goes into it. i am optimistic. >> great pleasure to see you again. question -- i will just use the framework of our strategic relationship with japan and japan looking into theuture. two parts list. first off, the policy realignment initiative, a series

of 19 different plans that basically restructured and some what dispersed our forces further in the pacific, although it did move some army command to the big island. number one, how do you see that change in our laydown posture and how that affects our relationship with japan? and as a subset of that, bomb -- guarm. it is -- as a subset of that, guam. it is a little bit further ease at a lot further south. it will be a challenge to move the marines around. can you talk about both of those? >> it is a great question, and one on which we are spending not an insignificant amount of time and effort. as you state, dpri is not just

guam. there are a number of other subsets, all of which are in some process of execution. we are going to take a navy air went out, move it down. the japanese have built an entirely new runway down there. we are shuffling around some army flags, and i do not mean to sound trivial. it is very important to us in the japanese. we are combining with the air force in japan to have a combined operation center, which will be very important. all through those 18 other parts, on track, generally well funded, and very beneficial to us across the board.

the previous administration, president bush, the current and ministration, president obama, secretaries of state in secretaries of defense from both administration have reaffirmed our national commitment to get aip done. got it. loud and clear. it is going to take some money. it is going to take some time. there is an understanding that working inside the defense line will not get a defense line. properties just will fidget working of the properties will not get it done. there have to be improvements on the infrastructure. those of us who have had a pleasure of going there understand. it is 10% growth almost overnight. you cannot do that anywhere in america without some infrastructure considerations and improvement. that means money, and that takes time. there are labor cost. you have to go back to the marine corps. there are training issues attend

to the transfer. the marines in okinawa still not get all the training they need to get them right there. we have to move some of them around. aip is not without challenges. previous of the stations have expressed their commitment to get it done. there is a new group working inside the pentagon that is at a little more senior level to those who are working very hard to get this done in years past. we are doing all that we can to support the department of defense and increasingly in interagency look at the opportunities and send it to moving moments of fear you could raise the point where of warm -- where guam is l little bit off the beaten path. yes and no. once we get through the environmental assessments, i think we will 5 -- i have deployed a bunch. then on the carrier once it twice. i have been flown a whole lot in that part of the southern pacific. perhaps you have been down there

as well. great training opportunities. it is going to take a little while to get there. we have the flag of the united states flying over guam. as we develop it, we will have more forces down there. it will be a training center for us, and we can move folks. granted, there will have to get on a ship or an airplane to get where they are going. we have a few of those. i think it is a strategic imperative for us, and i believe in time, we will find the money, and get the infrastructure upgrades, improved to the point where we will be happy once we are down there. our marine corps has said he will walk every marine goes there to say when they are done with the to to not want to leave, and guys who are outside to want to go. we are hopeful. yes, sir.

>> thanks for coming, admiral. i have a question. you mentioned the nuclear posture of view a little bit earlier, and i was curious about how you see that playing out in your area of responsibility, the defeat given the call of the president for a world free of nuclear weapons. in particular, dealing with japan and the question of launch cruise missiles and how you see that playing out over the coming years, carrying out this vision. >> thanks. this is my personal -- you might ask the difference between my personal and professional, and there really isn't any. this is a great big deal for us in the united states of america to review our nuclear posture. i mentioned we have been 27 or

28 countries out there. sooner or later, many of the folks with whom we have discussions will get around to asking -- is your nuclear deterrent umbrella going to continue to extend over [still in the blank] country? our abilities on a taken for granted. sooner or later, the conversation comes up, and i said that it is not mine to determine policy, but it is my hope that our nuclear deterrent umbrella will continue to be effective, and that probably means it will continue to extend over wherever in the world i happen to be. the nuclear posture will be aggressive. our president has made clear certain aspects that he hopes to be addressed in the nuclear posture review, and i'm sure the guys doing it understand.

part of that was japan, and what was the second part? i am unaware of specific japanese interests in that particular system that you described. i am aware of japanese interest in the nuclear umbrella, continuing to expand. >> just as a follow-on to the question earlier about submarines as being critical to maintaining freedom of the seas, what about surface vessels? would you like to see more of them -- >> yes. >> ok, but also as part of that, not just more, but i'm curious what types for capabilities in

particular -- what types or capabilities in particular. >> let me go back to our strategy -- presence. i can make a case -- we have made the case -- quantity has a quality all its own. for us, in the s

>> one of the things one learns at at pentagon is that meetings are supposed to start and stop on time. i hope this question doesn't disappoint. hello. jo we traditionally think of warm places when we think of your alor. to the north of your aor, the bering strait, bering sea, and thinking presence and not talking submarines.

how much did the arctic feature in your thinking in your formulation strategy? >> it is a terrific question. the shortest answer is it did not figure much, but we did not ignore it. there are all manner of the interesting aspects to the global warming, if that is what is really happening. as there is an unmistakable evidence of increased access to be number passage. it you come up here, what military command is responsible? visit northern command? i could have made a pretty compelling case two and a half or three years ago. is it pacific command? you bet. is it european command? and what about canada?

is it their water? how do we work through the policy challenges attended to military operations of here, as is certain will be more than less involved in the out years in operations, or at least guaranteeing freedom of access in the maritime domain, so it is an issue that we are studying more closely. the classics that responses we will take that lesson, but we are working on with european command, through the joint staff. it is complicated. it is challenging. it is important. we talk about the trade, that $1 trillion of trade that our countries do with the united states. the decrease in transit time is startling between the far eastern countries and the u.k. and our nato allies. we can cut a for your 05 steaming days off.

an issue of significant strategic and economic importance. we are working in concert with -- not been contest to northern command from a european command, our friends and allies, and the department of state. >> the menil, have complicated, challenging, and important, it

>> coming up, an fcc meeting on broadband and digital tv. then at 7:00 a.m., live your calls and comments on washington journal.

check our website at c-span .org for the latest on the president's trip and coverage of the president's stop. jo now, a federal communications meeting on a plan for national access to high speed internet. we will get a transition on internet tv. this is 90 minutes. >> good morning. welcome to the july 2009 meeting

of the federal communications commission. this is the first commission meeting that i have been 2 cents 1997. i am very happy about that. -- that i have been two since 1997. i am very happy about that. i look forward to becoming more acquainted with colleagues and meeting new ones. before beginning the meeting, i have the distinct honor and privilege to swear in commissioner robert mcdowell. his first term ended yesterday, the day before. i have lost track. the day before. i am very pleased to do this. mr. mcdowell's wife jennifer is here, and you're beautiful children who i will let you introduce. -- and your beautiful children who i will let you introduce.

if you will indulgence for a minute, joining us at the front. this is the swearing in of commissioner mcdowell. pal>> excellent. if you would raise your right hand and repeat after me. i, robert mcdowell, do solemnly swear -- >> bayh, robert dole do solemnly swear -- >> that i will support, defend the constitution of the united states against all enemies foreign and domestic, that i will bear true faith and allegiance to the same.

that i take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation. and i will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office i am about to enter. so help me god. >> well done. [applause] [unintelligible]

that was, as i said, a distinct honor and privilege. the first time i have sworn anyone in in say -- it is an awesome responsibility and a great pleasure to welcome you for your next term. do either of my colleagues have opening remarks to begin the meeting? please? >> very briefly, mr. chairman, thank you very much. i could not think of a better way to launch the genachowski era. i think you have done a great job so far, sir. [laughter] there are four groups of thank yous right here. a will be as brief as possible. i think many folks for my

renomination and reconfirmation -- certainly, my parents, got himself -- god himself. my parents are no longer with us, but i think about them often. to jennifer and my kids. these public service jobs are very demanding and frequently the burdens and stresses fall on their shoulders, and i thank them for everything, all their love and support for the past two years and the time going forward as well. i would like to think the president for appointing me and the senate for confirming the. my fellow commissioners -- commissioner cox -- commissioner copps, and to julius genachowski. more about him in a said. to the team in my office. the office team i have had for years. you try hard to make me look good. i know that can be difficult.

i appreciate that. also, the great women and men of the federal communications commission who worked so hard in the public interest. it has been an extreme honor, as i said during at my confirmation hearings, working with each and every one of you. i am excited to go forward and work with you some more. the second category of thanks is i want to say spots to but to my friend and colleague michael copps for his tenure as acting chairman. thank you for your astute leadership for the last few months. i firmly enjoyed working with you through the era of the 3 a migos. soon you'll have the second era of the 3 amigos. your openness and sense of collaboration and execution of the dtv transition was exemplary.

i wanted you to know how much i and my whole team in my office appreciate your and your staffs time and help. thank you very much. today we are missing our friends and colleague. he is back on his way to his home state of south dakota for must -- for much deserved vacation. hopefully he will catch this in reruns later. johnson worked tirelessly for the public interest. he had an open mind along with an open door. he had sharp insight. his character, his ability to forge a sensible compromise, his sense of humor, and of course, his harmonica playing. i will especially miss the fun of disagreeing with him, because he never took disagreements

personally and he could take it as well as he could dish it out. i am confident he will serve with excellence in his new position. i look forward to seeing his new digs three blocks away. finally, i want to congratulate and thank our new chairman, julius genachowski. we were confirmation partners. for me, being tied to his confirmation was a bit like being waterskiing behind a naval ship. being so -- being confirmed so quickly with him, and as we started to get to know each other, he has been gracious and thoughtful drop. we have gotten off to a fine start. i am very much looking forward to working with you in the coming months and years. congratulations. thank you. >> thank you, commissioner

mcdowell. [applause] commissioner copps? >> thank you. it was a real pleasure to be here when you wield the gavel for the first time as you did with real authority there. i look forward to your chairmanship. this is a wonderful moment. we have the man and the hour. we have a lot to do, a full agenda here. you bring exactly the combination of vision and practicality and experience of having been here and knowing what needs to be done. onlooking for an altogether historic era -- i am looking for an altogether historic era and your leadership. you have gotten off to a great start. i commend your wonderful team. thank you. it is wonderful to watch my friend rob.

congratulations to rob, @@@@@@@ he got here, but it was his cooperative spirit and cordiality and sense of good humor that made him enjoyable to work with. we do work in a bipartisan fashion.

i was a democrat appointed by president bush and he is a republican appointed by president obama. i do miss my friend jonathan for the partnership we enjoyed for seven years. our thoughts went down the same trial. the mission was diversity, broadband, open enough for rural america, disabilities, reaching out to what i called non- traditional stakeholders and upholding his share. he served his country and the commission well. i am please he is going to be returning home from public service and i wish him and karen and they're wonderful kids nothing but the best for the road ahead. finally, if i may go for just a

minute more, but i want to say a formal thank you to be fcc team, a team that is 200 plus strong. they have been working alongside us just tremendously. you could not find a more dedicated group of public service. when given the environment to do their best, the country week's huge, enormous benefits. they stepped up to the plate with s

>> the second presentation will describe the decision for developing a national broadband plan. >> thank you, madam secretary. at what point i do invite representatives to come up. if i may -- while our presenters are taking

the table. i'd like to take a moment to recognize and congratulation the former commissioner as well as their personal staffs and the staffs of the entire agencies. we are ready? mike capman, if i could ask you to start? i would note that bill lake who has worked around the clock as the dtv coordinator could not be with us here today. i do want to thank him in absentia for his great work and public service. rick? >> thank you, mr. chairman. i would first like to express my thanks to commissioner copps as well as commissioner mcdowell, and the former commissioner who is not here today. thank you.

with me here at the table are three members of the policy board and they will provide a brief overview of the transition and where we stand today. first, we will hear from the chief information officer who was responsible for our call center calldtv.gov. he will give -- our call center dtv.gov. we have been in close contact with the broadcasters during the transition, and our communication has been essential to ensuring they maintain a high level of service to their communities. . . ññññ

>> the commerce department authorized the transfer of approximately $10 million to maintain a robust call center for as long as necessary. on june 11, the initial transfer of $3 million was made. that permitted the call center to step 4000 agents during the week of june 12. the call center received approximately 17,000 calls, since june 12, over 1 million calls. calls have declined precipitously. during the week following the transition, the help line averaged 43,000 calls per day. the week of june 22, we averaged

21,000 calls per day. we're also trending downward. the call center is open between 8:00 a.m. and midnight. we have dedicated about 40 agents to serve on a team to answer calls in specific markets where we are ironing out remaining issues. the percentage of consumers to require -- to inquire about reception loss has been steadily decreasing. the number was 31%, it is now less than 20%. a lot of the calls involve coupon requests. those coupons should be issued shortly. despite the high volume of coupon requests around june 12, they can adhere to the nine business days for refills.

i want to thank the commissioner and the former commissioner for the support for our operation. i would like to offer my personal thanks to many who work with our agents and support staff to answer all questions and to do so in a courteous manner. we will continue to monitor the call volume over the next couple of weeks. thank you for this opportunity and i look forward to answering any questions you may have. >> thank you. >> good afternoon, mr. chairman and welcome back. on june 12, after four months of intense outrage and preparation, some 970 volt power television stations serving major markets in the united states switched exclusively to digital transmission for it the completed the national full- power digital transmission for a total of seven of the 39 previously analog stations now provide only digital service.

-- 1739 previously analog stations now provide only digital service. close coordination with broadcasters and providers and short of the transition went smoothly for consumers watching broadcast programming over cable and satellite. thousands of sites had to be ready to switch to digital feet. this part of the transmit -- transition went smoothly. the transition has not been without its residual talent desperate most notably, we have worked closely with about two dozen stations, primarily >> most notablely, we have been working closely with primarily 2,000 stations to ire out recenting issues they currently face. our approach has been with the

sister stations to return to the consumers as quickly as possible. the temporary improvement is available. we have pursued. in the meantime, in the year, a small number of markets to work and determine the nature and extent of their challenges. this work should better help us under the challenges. fortunately for the vast majority, the transition hasn't been successful. we will continue to launch to ensure the continued success. in closing, i would be row miss if i did not acknowledge the efforts of the staff and the work of the video data in particular. >> maybe we will hear from roger bold black --goldblatt.

>> as we discussed, the commission built up to the june 12 transition by ensuring presence in every media market across the country. if i had a map, we would have pinpointed probably every city, every reservation you could find. we had more than 200 people put on an average of 1,500 miles on our rented cars. we were everywhere. they went to local communities, big cities, everywhere people would be affected by a transition period -- transition. the work of local governments and groups to prepare the population. seniors, minorities, low income, non-english speaking people, people with disabilities, and people live in rural or tribal

areas. we have been everywhere. the difference in our teams may was palpable. our aim was to go anywhere we believed we would reach consumers who needed and wanted to make the transition but needed a helping hand. you could have them in our staff in libraries in los angeles and a variety of other places. we also went to ball games, county fairs, barbecues and picnics. we went to any place where normal population would be and wanted to see an fcc person for it we went to help people. we did not just go for the food. our people serve as a line of communication to those to help understand what was going on out there. we not only continued to get the word out about the assistance

available, we also reported back to headquarters what kind of calls we were receiving. people were working at the call centers everywhere. we were getting updates on converter boxes and we are concerned whether people could find these boxes. we would go to the stores. we would give weather reports that might affect the transition. we had some cities that might have a tornado warning. the media bureau responded immediately. we had a great system. our field team worked around the clock to resolve any problems. our teams of more than 200 people put a name to the fcc. as commissioner, said so eloquently," we're no longer a bureaucratic agency in d.c."

we employed extra help in the bigger cities where we were still dealing with certain issues. we have been visiting consumers to help them troubleshoot and let them know that we have not packed up and left. we have been appreciated. we have continued to rely on our dtv vendors. they performed over 100,000 successful digital converter box installations. we have had walk-in centers that have assisted tens of thousands more people. we withamericorp volunteers -- we have partnered with americorp volunteer spirit -- volunteers. i would be totally remiss if i did not think commissioner cop,

mcdowell, commissioner abel state. --adelstein. i have been exhausted and they have done all the work. they have been remarkable i would like to thank you all, very much. >> thank you. commissioner copps? >> thank you all for your presentations. i can sum up my feelings in a single word -- whew! [laughter] this has been quite a ride. long before i begin actor and chair, i knew we were no we're ready for a transition on january 17. in january, we inherited a problem rather than a quarter of effort to deal with an impending crisis.

i want to think congress and the president for the dtv delight act and for making the resources available to the recovery act to use the extra time to try to make a real difference. while it was not possible to compress into four short months all that should of been done the previous four or more years, we tried to do everything we could to make up for lost time. with the tireless efforts of my colleagues and the amazing fcc team, in the private and public sector partners, we were able to make a lot of progress. we cut the number of completely unprepared households by over 65%. this is the call center, in home assistance, and other measures and that meant that we're destruction did occur, and i had warned that consumer disruption would occur, we were able to respond more quickly and comprehensively than would have been possible a few months

sooner. this was the most extensive and finest ever i have been a part of in my 30 + years of service. if anyone asks if public/private part should can work, point them to dtv. if and when asked whether the government can work quickly and efficiently or if it can conduct effective consumer outreach, point them to dtv. if anyone needs an example of what true public service looks like, tell them to look no further than that the hundreds of commission staffers here and around the country who have been devoting themselves up until today to making this transition work. in fact, this transition is such a singular event that we should not let the opportunity slip by to learn what we can from it. as acting chairman, i told people that we needed to develop a comprehensive -- a

comprehensive report to dick -- to document what happened. i have often wished that someone had greeted the report after y2k. the traditions were different from this. it required different things. it would have been a tremendous help to us in the dtv transition if we had had that record of how they went about it. i was part of that effort of trying to educate and support consumers leading up to the year 2000 and have government and the private sector court made it to prepare the country in that case. there is so much to be mined from the dtv experience. setting up a call center, consumer outrage, the close coordination of the commerce department and other agencies from the federal level to the

hyper-local. the in the partnerships with groups like americorp and the international association of fire chiefs. these lessons seem so the media now. -- seem so immediate now. they will receive in the forgotten area that is why we need to compile them and write them down and preserve them now. i think future commissions and future transitions will thank us. by creating a lessons learned report, i do that imply that the transition is over, far from it. these transition did not end on june 12 for it is a continuing process that will take place over coming weeks and months. for low-powered tv service, the coming years. the full power stations made it

through june 12 without lingering problems. as with any transition of this magnitude, there are issues still to be worked for zero. technology changes are seldom if ever painless and when they don't get the attention they deserve until the last minute, some level of destruction is inevitable. as you heard today, our team, working with affected consumers and the stations serving those consumers, will stay with this until these problems are resolved. this may be one of the final dtv updates at our monthly meetings, it is time to say thank you to our fcc team and everyone involved for the amazing an awesome work they did. first and foremost, our wonderful and dedicated fcc staff, from across every bureau and office, from the top down. folks gave their talents and their energy and a commitment to succeed like i have never seen before.

it was not just a job for them. it was a mission. the enduring memory i will take away from this exercise is that determination that i saw when we were out there on the road and in this building here, too, not just to get through the day and do the job but to connect with that senior citizen out there or the person who was technologically-challenged like i often am or people with disabilities. i want to help these people. i want to get this job done. that is the most inspiring thing you can see in public service. everybody in this room who had any role in dtv, i wish you would stand up. there is a few. [applause]

my colleagues i thank for their tireless leadership and work. they help folks get prepared with our call center operations. without rob or jonathan, it would've been far less effective than it was. i think my new colleagues and chairman for his tireless dtv out -- situations yet to counter this transition is not over. i know that under his leadership, we will stay on the job until it is done. i intend to participate in that every step of the way. our colleagues of the commerce department, other government agencies, and the white house, with whom we worked closely over the past five months are owed a huge thank-you. our industry partners, the stepped-up impressively, in preparing themselves and preparing consumers for the

switch, hundreds of broadcasters around the country, much as broadcasters, cable, satellite, and consumer electronics manufacturers and retailers, all of them. also, all of the community churches, a civil rights groups, local governments and many others who reached out to friends, relatives, and neighbors to make this transition happen as smoothly as it could. the country owes all of these folks a huge debt of gratitude and from the bottom of my heart, i thank them all. thank you. >> thank you, commisioner copps. commissioner mcdowell? >> i do not have any prepared remarks. i would like to incorporate the eloquent remarks of commisioner copps and thank him for his leadership on this issue i also want to thank you all for the dedicated leaders and every person who worked on dtv.

thank you for making it a situation that was not nearly as bad as feared. that was only through hard work. that result was not inevitable, by any means. it was only through hard work. organization helped in the final weeks and months. i was especially grateful because our confirmation hearing came four days after the dtv transition. i was delighted that did not become an oversight hearing on dtv, the dtv disaster that could have been. that was fantastic, thank you. we're not done, yet. we are in the midst of the jo we're not done yet with this transition. we are in the midst of the long tail. the folks are satisfied. there's still a number of folks that are not satisfied.