under current law that prevents them. it is just not the sort of system that could really scale up. so, is every state or city in the country going to have a male clinic? that is just not going to be as effective and efficient to change our health-care system than one we are talking about health insurance -- held insurance exchange, private market with one public option in it. host: you can continue to read about this aspect of the public option the bay at prospect.org. our guest has been dana goldsstein associate editor. thanks to all of you who participated in this morning's edition of "washington journal." we will be back tomorrow morning at 7:00 a.m. eastern. . [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2009] .

>> a conference is under way in washington, d.c., about what to do with the swine flu. they are in a break right now. you can see live coverage on c- span 2 when they resume. the next panel, influenza outbreak. tonight, robert frank, gretchen peters, and eduardo galleano, rode"mirrors."

this fall, enter the home to america's highest court. to those only accessible by the nine justices. the supreme court, coming first sunday in no. >> domestic policy of buzzers gathered to talk about how the administration's make the transition from running for office to governing, hosted by the university of virginia. this is about 90 minutes. >> ok. i think we are about ready to get started. it is my pleasure to waukegan you here this afternoon to this

symposium. many of you have been here before as a part of our other projects. we welcome you back. we're happy to welcome you here for this location. the program here at the miller center began with intensive -- this was under the leadership of jim young in the early 1980's. we have done authoritative interview projects on president carter, reagan, george h. bush, and we look forward to begin work on george h. w. bush. in past years, we have conducted a similar symposiums. one on the white house congressional operations and another on presidential speech

writers. there are virtues to this kind of history beyond what we typically do on individual administrations. this is an opportunity to sit together at a table and reminisce about the lessons and experiences that you came by it during your years in the white house. there are important things that scholars can learn. it is equally true that there is great virtue in having democrats and republicans in various administrations having the opportunity to talk about these issues. the ability to cross fertilize ideas. when we do individual interviews, those interviews are done under a veil of confidentiality.

many of these interviews are held on for a long time and are inaccessible to scholars or students of american politics. the second virtue is that we're able to do this in an open forum. the proceedings are being simulcast on the miller center website. we have c-span television. this will vastly expand our audience. we have multiple administrative experience is and we can do this in a way to inform public debate now. i was one of the principals responsible for organizing the event. i turn over the moderation of most of the activities to my

colleague, professor nelson. he holds a faculty position and has worked with me on multiple interviewers and has proven to be a splendid interviewer as well as author. i have seen on a website a list of the top 15 academic publications used on presidencies. four of those top 15 volumes were either authored or edited by you. we're happy to have your experience at the table. i'm happy to have you as the moderator. thank you. >> thank you, russell. we're pleased to have this gathering here in the room and in the miller center web site

and through c-span. this is a gathering similar to one we had last year which was also broadcast on c-span. the speech writers work last year. this year, scholars who of studied what they do and what their institutions have done over the years to talk about what it is like working on domestic policy in the white house. we have people here from the nixon administration through the second bush administration. there are four sessions altogether. this is one of them. you can see when the others will be available. our theme will be what happens in the transition from campaigning for president, making a number of promises and pledges, responding to domestic

policy issues, and then after winning the election, or succeeding to the office, becoming president and taking into account what you've said during the campaign with what you can do it and need to do as president. what a distinguished group of people which have here to help us do that. i will introduce first someone who was worked for jimmy carter as a deputy assistant of domestic affairs but also as legislative counsel prior to that with senator walter mondale. after years of working in cable television in one important capacity or another is vice chairman of the firm of billions and jensen.

the second person i will introduce is not here yet. he is on route from london during this program. that is stuart. he was also part of the carter administration. he was a domestic policy adviser to president carter for the entirety of his service in office. he also served during the clinton administration as well as in other capacities. he has been working in the area of holocaust issues, restitution and so on. he has written a well-received book on that issue. third member of our panel who will be participating in the discussion during this session is bruce reed. he is currently president --

democratic leadership council. he famously served al gore as chief speech writer when gore was in the senate, became part of the clint-core campaign in 1992. and then for all eight years of clinton presidency serve as domestic policy adviser. he is associated with the clinton reforms in the area of welfare reforms. finally in this group today, margaret spellings, who, in terms of this conference, has the greatest relevance is that she was bruce reed's successor in the george bush white house as policy adviser during the

first term and was later confirmed as secretary of education. she worked closely in the development and implementation of the no child left behind act. i will turn things over to the telamon to my immediate right who will conduct the discussion and that is my great friend and colleague andrew busch. this is a homecoming of sorts because he got here -- he got his doctorate in government from the university of virginia. he has done great things from the standpoint of an admiring a year. associate dean of faculty. he is at claremont mckenna college and author of 11 well- received books.

along with his university of virginia mentor and claremont mckannenna college. it is a wonderful book. that will cost you $1,000. [laughter] is your time. >> thank you all for coming. it is a real pleasure to be here. the theme is moving from campaigning to government. this could be thought of narrowly. not just the transition time. it makes more sense to think about this more broadly, more in terms of how you talk about the policy after january 25. and how does the campaign worked

domestic policy after january 25. i have some general questions. there may be some follow-ups. and then halfway through, we will open it up to anybody else at the table. that is how we will proceed. by way of brief introductory comments, there are several ways to approach this. one of them is what type of context is established by the campaign in a general way. the second is how does campaign rhetoric about domestic policy translate into the sorts of things as president? when it comes to talking about domestic policy, there is appointments. how does it commitments to the

agenda translate into appointments in the domestic realm? then there is the policy making itself. particularly in terms of how you go about targeting setting the legislative priorities to fulfill the agenda and other things that may be going. so starting with the general context, i guess my first question is, during the transition in the early stages of the presidency, to what extent to policy discussions influenced the commitments during the campaign? what other sorts of factors came

man? that is just a general question for people at the head of the table. >> i will jump been. in clinton's experience, we traded the campaign promises as gospel. that was the only scripture that guided us. he had -- he loved all aspects of politics. he loved the policy part of it best. he thought running for president was the ultimate job interview and the agenda he laid out represented the terms of his contract. when we got to washington, it is not how the congress regarded it. some in our party followed the campaign closely and listened to what he said.

so there was an enormous amount of back and forth and a lot of pressure to selectively edit the campaign promises. from his standpoint, he felt that was the way he should keep score. for those of us who been in the campaign and have the same experience, that was our strongest weapon with debates with congress to be able to say this is what the president promised. that is a hard thing for a president possible allies to dismiss. >> i concur. i still travel with my renewing america's purpose.

it informed the second campaign, as well. i think bush really had a dance policy agenda with lots of specifics, more so than had been the practice, at least in our party, particularly to the extent that he talked about being a different kind of republican. not everyone on my side of the child was wildly irresponsible to that. education, immigration, faith- based initiatives. all things that had a bit of an edge to it. they inform our first work and we knew we had to get them done quickly. when i see president obama tackling health care, i see a lot of similarities, that his popularity is as high as it will ever be.

that is the time to do things that may be the most difficult to do. we live by absolutely to the extent that there were spited -- there were specifics. it lays out some ideas or a philosophy which i believe the president's did. it had a guiding effect until multiple iterations. the keystones continue to inform our point of view throughout the administration. >> i will never forget the transition's by someone who is clearly an enemy to present to president carter the place for an approach to welfare. this meeting did not go well.

the presidential campaign is a huge labor. nobody else may be listening, but they are listening to what is said. but the time they have said them for over two years, they believe them. we had something that was personally edited by the president of the united states. their campaign promises. they were sacrosanct. carter was -- more than those who found them, a kind of an insurgent candidate. i worked in the senate. something happened. he ran against washington and he had a difficult time, i think,

making his agenda fit with their agenda. it didn't work out. i think he did a tremendous favor to his successors. there was a failure of leadership to some extent. we lost a ton of senate seats woman lost and nobody thought there were titans in the senate, some who were thought not to be in trouble. they had been there for a long time. if things didn't work out for the president, they might not work out for them. there has been much more of a driven effort to work facings out because there is a fear factor there that i think was not there until that unpleasant experience. >> ok. it is a given that you come in,

you do your best and the plant is put out. cases will arise from time to time when it is not possible. either you have to back off or even backtrack or reverse yourself. when those cases came, how much discussion was there about problems caused by the fact that there were other problems that might arise from policy? is that -- was that a central part of the discussion? >> it varied by degree. as those who worked in on the campaign, i thought about things that work must have some and other things that were nice to have. on the must have, i knew and

the president knew. they were created around a set of ideas on what they were and what was up for grabs. those are the things -- they are actually two scorecards. what is so integral to the president. no child left behind. all of the stuff we saw earlier. just kidding. that is how we got 87 votes for it in the senate. and if the things that were less important and difficult by the wayside. those fall but the wayside because of various events like 9/11 or budget issues. there are really two groups of issues in this context. >> and those of us in the white house are not the only ones

paying attention. to date we took office, "the washington post" made a list of every promise we had made. i put it up on my wall and i had a separate list of the ones i thought were essential. even in the transition, whenever there was a hint we were going to deviate in any possible way, it was front-page news. in fact, i can remember people would not announce a campaign thinking -- they thought it would increase our leverage. we had a reputation for breaking some of these campaign promises. we did not break them in the yen.

the biggest new piece of information bill clinton inherited was a dramatic downturn in the revenues coming in. we were coming in at the tail end of a recession. it turned out to pay a lot larger than had been anticipated. it forced him in order to keep the campaign promises and forced him to propose a bunch of painful cuts he would not otherwise have done. he was actually not bummed out by this at all. will refer said we were more terrified about breaking the bad news, that the country have half

as much money that had been anticipated, he thought it would be an interesting challenge to balance the federal budget. it actually was a discipline forcing mechanism and minute easy to prioritize which campaign promises were looked at. >> during the campaign, we're talking about what you hoped to do as president in the present tense. once you take office, you have four years. mr. process you try to educate voters? -- is there a process where you try to educate voters? >> having not preached patience, you have to preach patience.

how do you do that? how well does it work? >> i think most presidents are in a big hurry to get the things the most care about out there. people have more cloudt. i certainly look back with some regret on our tenure. we submit big ideas. when they are not adopted, like the comprehensive welfare reform is not adopted, we just move past it. there is not that tendency back to stay with the thing if you cannot get the big thing, to put some building blocks together. when these things do not worked out, but we tend to leave these

ruins behind and discourage other travelers. "i do not want to go there." you become so dedicated and someone else probably has other ideas. you get elected. i think that is too bad and it wastes expertise among people and administrations and you just saddle up and ride down the hill. >> i agree with that in part. that was our experience with integration. one of my disappointments is that we have left the place worse than we found it with respect to immigration and the democrats will wind up pushing the democrat -- pushing the

immigration plan. there are places where you say, not a piece of legislation but executive orders and process issues, commissions, various other ways. in these pronouncements we lay out, it does not always say it -- we will pass a bill that -- that is part of the game plan you have to consider. >> can you think of an example of doing that? a commission? >> i think with the extent of the patientce. i'm thinking about postal reform. the post office was in bad shape. we needed legislation. we needed to build some more ideas. we needed to build consensus.

their presence -- the president appointed a commission. he enacted legislation. for those who cared most desperately about postal reform, we said we have this commission over here. >> one of the hardest things get used to -- you can accomplish a lot over a long period of time. we had funding over an eight- year issue even though we were just making incremental change. for your own supporters, you go into office and do not worry. it will take us for years or eight years. it's a tough message for them.

but in washington, it is important to preached impatience. they are counseling patience about things you want to do that may have gotten you elected. i can remember after clinton took office the congressional leadership met with him and said we know you want to reform that into law, but you cannot do that because if you do campaign finance reform, it is taking away our current jobs. [laughter] clint deferred to them on their staff. i do think the country does not

expect that much. i think the key is for the president to recognize which issues are better dealt with one step at a time and which issues do you have to go along and realize you're not getting another chance. >> this brings up the importance of the messages, the talks they go on about domestic policy. my next question is, were there -- out of all of the areas of domestic policy, what were the areas that the president's's message or is rhetorical content remains more or less the same from the campaign? whether significant differences

to how he had a talk about something when he was running for president? >> i can give you an example of presidential rhetoric that was treated as sacrosanct that led to an enormous debate over what it meant. [laughter] one of the central problems was to end welfare. he laid out in some specific terms that everyone had to work if they could work. this was going against the grain of his party, not a party washington wanted to give any time soon. so there was a lengthy internal debate about that.

if we just did this in some states, would it count? if we let people stay on welfare forever, would that count? was interesting about it was that the phrase itself was so ambitious. it was difficult to walk back from that promise. it would have been difficult to go halfway. there were welfare commissioner from connecticut's that printed out the acronym in welfare as we know it and posted it in every welfare office and try to instill in her workers that promised even before we figured out how to keep it.

>> well, i think, you know, 9/11 introduced a set of circumstances that obviously had the effect of pre calibrating our game. in the domestic agenda there were more than it got done with may be the exception of social security. maybe the way we handled it, is maybe we did not get it done or we could have changed directions. we had a commission. it remains undone. >> i do not really recall a case on a major issue where we changed directions in any respect.

>> let me ask this. whether examples of cases on a particular policy issue that proved counterproductive for the president to remain in campaign mode? >> i do not know if it is counterproductive to remain in campaign mode. it depends on what your point of emphasis is. for president bush to talk about education in october of 2001 -- that is where -- is not like you abandoned your agenda. there does get to be, as we're seeing, you are playing the

cards you tell. everybody had a lot of that. >> if there's one word president carter repeated in the campaign, it was " comprehensive." the word on the other side was "incremental." that was what was wrong with washington. he was elected because he believed it. washington had thought -- it was an incremental place. it created the conflict characterized the carter in years. i do not know how you move from blair house or the white house and turn to incremental. >> all three of our residents --

out of our presidents faced. in each case, they were reelected from outside of washington. there was an agenda that was somewhat at odds with their own party. to some degree, there was a mandate that he was seeking. the question is, when you get to washington, you're faced with a reluctant congress that if it had wanted to do what you wanted to do, would have done it already. what compromises are in your interest and what ones aren't? i think bill clinton was influenced by jimmy carter's experience. he pushed congress to heart -- if you pushed congress to heart, they will give up.

you. -- if you push congress to hard, they will give up on you. he was approached by the 1994 midterm results. we found that the only way we could govern effectively was to govern the way we campaigned. we got to that point. it is an important debate that the party has to have. if you do not make any incremental progress on your agenda, the country will regard you as a failure. i think the most successful presidents with their domestic agendas have found a way to keep speaking past the congress directly to the country on items

they want to get done it and eventually congress is more likely to bend to the will of people then a popular presidents then stick to their guns. >> there is a point to be made from the guy who only got four years. carter came into office right after the nixon and ford administrations. that was probably the best time for democrats in office. everything was passed under lyndon johnson was passed under these guys. our guys did not take responsibility. it was the best epa, best we could do. it would have been better. best we could do. the parties were in different situation. this was a political secret love

fest. and then comes carter who was a guy who was saying, whoa. and i do think the big electoral defeat in 1980 made the lives of subsequent presidents easier than it would have been if congress was still -- they're supposed to be antagonists. we may all hang separately, therefore we do not hang together. >> you are talking about how campaigning translates a. there is the intervening in event of the actual election and the size of the victory that the incoming president wins. carter, clinton, bush -- they all campaigned talking about comprehensive changes or

something equally big. they win victories that are not landslides. carter was narrowly elected with no coattails. bush famously minority president in terms of the minority vote. clinton wins a significant victory. in helping the president make that transition, but you take into account that they were not elected with a reagan-style or and obama's style landslide, just according to what you put on your domestic agenda? >> no. [laughter] >> to the contrary. she redoubled his efforts to reeducate or talk about the reason for the message and felt like maybe he had more work to

do to get those numbers up. but apart from saying have to face a different direction, no. >> ross perot got 19%. there was a huge groundswell for change. we felt the country wanted things to change in a hurry. i do think it is one of the reasons why ideas need to be central to campaigns, while the domestic promises you make me to have a high profile in the campaign. you want to beat in a situation when the president is elected -- you want to be in a situation when the president is elected. there was some campaign literature that some may have read or some are familiar with. the more the country is aware of

the fine print, the better off they are. i think it varies from time to time how much the country want to get to the fine print. sometimes they just want a new president and they are not going to get to the bottom line. in our case, because the country wanted a lot of change but was skeptical on the government possibility to do that, they scrutinized everything they did and were quite aware of the promises that we had made. >> i think presidents -- or as president carter felt that he had to implement these. as you work your way through that from more success to last

success, as we moved through the years, it was more possible at the beginning stages, like where are we going to put our priorities and what will look like, to have -- how intractable the was to be a factor. -- how enactable it was. if you can move past that stuff. he was much interested in how enactable it was. if you can get past that, then you could at least get congressional relationships sort of move up the list of things better taken into consideration. >> the other thing that is really important is, we have been involved in development of

policy and how good of a job you do in bringing in congress and local officials and whomever else and you could fill some ownership of those policies. i am thinking about the education stuff. the only think they like about the health committee was the pension stuff and maybe a little of the health care. education was not fair thing. george bush had to do a lot of education with them about what it is about. they bought into it. how you spread around the equities is a real important. it helps predict whether you will be a success or not. >> ok. so, you come into office and you have to deal with congress. you make a lot of campaign commitments. congress gets overloaded to a

certain extent if you try to do too much at once. how did you decide -- there have been clues to this. harry d. decide which of the campaign commitments to put on top and which ones to say we will wait to the second round or next year? >> ladies first. >> it is a series of things. how right it is legislatively. it is up for -- is it up for reauthorization? is there an appetite for moving forward on that issue? is it something deep president is -- we put education first. the president was most comfortable with that issue in his facility and it was a good strong place to start.

what are prospects for bipartisanship? it is a series of elements on how you decide. >> we wanted to flood the circuits. there was no desire -- we figured congress would slow walk enough things. we did not want to make it easier for them. where we ran into the most difficulty -- the congressional system is not well set up to handle a couple of priorities at the same time. bill clinton wanted to pursue health care at the same time because he thought they were related as policy and that they spoke to different anxieties of the electorate.

they went through the same committees. even worse, we had the house side that wanted to do health care and not welfare record form. -- and not welfare reform. at a certain point, anyway house makes the calculations that this is what we can get done and we will have to pursue that. i do think white houses are often wrong in assuming that political capital -- you start with a lot of it and it has a half life and it goes away. that was not our experience. you start out with capital. when you spend it well, you get more of it. if you make a bad bet, you end up with less. >> we had to pick between doing

welfare first or doing health care first. i think we felt it is good to do the same thing. we had one department of health, education, and welfare. we could not designed two major programs at the same time. there were these two committees who had the time in dealing with both of these programs. we could not possibly do with it to them. i think we should have flipped a coin. we picked the poor people first. we were good democrats. it could have come out the other way. this administration does not seem to have that problem. they have different cabinets departments. they're involved in their big initiatives. it will be -- it never would

have occurred to us and i do not think anybody spent 10 minutes spending a proposal up there at the same time to these committees. that is exactly what this administration is doing. maybe we will learn something. >> i think we will open it up. >> we have been talking about this transition in grand terms of public policy. how did you get your job cutbacks [laughter] -- how did you get your job? what did you think your job was going to be? " the policy fights were transposed on who gets the jobs, both in the white house and in the cabinet. >> i want to know how the campaign resulted in you people

in the offices? >> two things. first, we were in an unusual situation. a democrat had not been in the white house in 12 years. almost no one on the campaign even knew anyone in the white house. we had very little idea what these jobs were. we knew still worked. he told us a little bit about how the place work. -- we knew stewart. people more senior than i did not know how the weiss house worked. you can see yes -- you can see -- they did not know how the white house worked. they have people who had done it before.

i imagine most campaign workers feel the same anxiety the moment that their candidate wins. they realize that now you have to share this think that you helped big -- you helped build with everyone else with a party of people that were helpful or did not route 4 your guy or opposed what you're going to do. now you are in as good of a position to get an influential role even though you had given up your life for a couple of years. you believed in the guy you just elected. it is difficult and important for a white house to figure out how to integrate the rest of the world that is going to have to live with and make sure that

people from the campaign are in a position to fight for their promises that they helped make. one of the roles that we played in the first clinton term were keepers of the flame. we reminded the more senior people or the older people that we did promise this and the american people signed off on this. this is really what the president believes and what he wants to do. bill clinton empowered us to do that. he wanted us to make good on those promises. he did not want to have to sacrifice them. i think it is just all part of the moving to washington aspect of governing.

people on the hill thought because they have been doing domestic policy for the last 10 or 50 years that they work as natural a candidate to do the jobs that we were. >> we have not a dissimilar experience. i think republicans were pretty united because we had been in the wilderness. the president wanted a combination of d.c. people -- into cards, -- andrew card's. they knew us better. i grew up around the state legislature. there was a lot of alignment between that and domestic

agenda. this is kind of personal. i was called. "the president wants you to be a domestic policy adviser." are you kidding me? i had just been in texas. so i thought, my god, come and do that? karen hughes and i talked about this and how we were going to manage. andy went through the whole thing that you'll never see your children. it is held and really hard work and people are evil and mean. -- it is hell. karen hughes and i talked about that. i said i cannot go under those circumstances. the president called me. milledge to say, neither of

these mothers -- needless to say, neither of the mothers were run off. >> i went down to atlanta for the campaign. i worked on speechwriting and try to make sure the policy stuff was coordinated. i did some things on the transition. i did not have the job. there was a christmas party. mondale walked up and ask me how i was doing. i said i was doing pretty good for someone without a job. next day, i had a job. >> we have a chance to shoot on quite a few things and think we should open things upper to the other participants. >> there is a folk wisdom on whether it makes sense during a

campaign and identifies what voters are talking about about a mandate. there is a competitive environment. they may not understand the trade-offs or decide not to give them air raid. you can see that in the current administration with iraq. is the campaign a good place to develop policy? does that make sense to look to the campaign to reform policy? >> i felt pretty strongly that anybody who runs for president needs to know before they get in the race why they are doing that. as a practical matter, once the campaign gets going, you can still make policy and you should. you can still searching for ideas and new ideas,.

if you do not know why you're doing it and the most important things you want to accomplish before you seek the job, you probably will not get it. you'll be at the whim of your political operation. we're all wonks and we speaker hack, we are not hacks. both of those personnel in types are necessary in a campaign. the country will get a much better results if a presidential candidate has an agenda that here she has a thought about, it is serious about, has thought through, has all of the different aspects of it so that

it makes some intellectual sense. and for that matter, i think that the best candidates are ones who run on something as opposed to just run on the phrase or a theme or a mood. our system was designed to be a job interview that negotiates the terms of the job contract and what you ought to do for the country should be on that list. >> i completely agree with that. all of that string of reasons that bruce was talking about -- i would add experience that substantiates that philosophy and that agenda. >> yes. >> one of the things that they

do when they get into office is reality. campaign promises are very valuable in setting a path and a course. ultimately, you have to deal with this situation with which you find yourself. bruce and margaret and bert all worked for presidents who came into office with their party in control of both houses of congress. i worked for three presidents. .

>> the second thing is what is the reality that i face in terms of [unintelligible] when ronald reagan came in, we had to give you zero years back- to-back of double-digit inflation -- we had two years of back-to-back double digit inflation. federal spending the previous year had increased 17%.

we have rising unemployment. every taxpayer, because we have a graduated income tax with the lowest bracket at 14 and the highest at 70 had been pushed into a higher tax bracket. we had bracket creep because we had not indexed the tax code. when he came in, he had no alternative but to focus his attention on the economy. this was a source of intense irritation to many of his supporters who were very interested in a set of social issues they thought were important and that have animated their support for him during the campaign. i remember being in a number of meetings where they excoriated him for ignoring their issues. he discovered what all

presidents discover which is i cannot focus on multiple things simultaneously. i have to decide what are the priorities now and those priorities are in part driven by what you have said, but they are also driven by what is the context you face with respect to congress and the reality of what is happening -- happening in the country. we went through a campaign recently in which the number one issue is going to be iraq. if you have looked at the primary in the democratic party, the thing that was dividing candidates was not what happened in iraq. the reality is we now have a president who is facing a very challenging economic environment that did not receive a lot of attention during the early part of the campaign, but now of necessity has to consume an enormous amount of his time,

attention, energy, and political capital because you cannot ignore the economic realities of what we face now. i am interested in what other people's experiences are with respect to the extent which campaign promises can assist you. i think reagan's campaign promises on the economy did assist him in pushing through tax incentive initiatives that he did it. and the extent to which it can prove to be an albatross around your neck because you have made a promise in good faith, partially because you believe in it, partially because it's going to generous support of groups who are important to you. then reality changes and you get into office and now have to decide what are you going to do?

the george h. w. bush faces with respect to a promising made with respect to taxes and how he was going to be able to produce a balanced budget through what he called a flexible freeze. when that did not work, because congress would not go along with it and deficits were rising, he was faced with a campaign promise that proved to be very difficult to keep. likewise, most presidents have come into office with one or more commitments to the steel industry which tends to be enormously successful in using section 201 of the trade act to present presidents with an escape clause case in their first six months in office that they have to deal with.

i know this caused an enormous amount of consternation in the most recent president bush's administration. how are going to deal with a campaign promise when internally, large numbers of administration officials thought this is not the direction we want to take policy. i would be interested in other people's experiences as to how you deal with a situation where you made a promise that is now effectively overtaken by events. >> why do i have to start? [laughter] comeback to me. >> in the albatrosses department, we had don't ask don't tell right out of the box in the clinton and ministration. i traveled with bill clinton for the better part of two years and i don't think i ever even heard the promise made. it was there, it came from

somewhere, he did make it but it was one of those things that nobody thought through how you're going to convince the joint chiefs of staff to go along with it. there was just not any way to get it done. it was an example of the have to be careful of making campaign promises and you don't promising your have no possibility of delivering. if you make this kind of provinces come -- you make is that promises county have to level with people on how hard it will be to do that. the hardest thing to decide is and whether to accept reality or whether to transform it. the best example of a promise we made that opened doors that would not have opened otherwise was clinton made and audacious promise on welfare reform. it never would have happened

otherwise. our own side would have watered down to nothing if they could. because he promised some much, we had to make good. if bill clinton had not made a big promise, it would not have come out of congress on its own. the luxury of a campaign or a possibility of a campaign is that it's not entirely bound by existing reality in washington. it's important for campaigns not to promise what is mathematically impossible. or to pander in ways that are fundamentally dishonest. it is important to try to raise the sights of american politics because the presidential campaign is the one chance you have to do that. >> that is why it is so important he is doing what he is

doing. to enlarge degree, presidential campaigns will be with their going to be. the speech writers will write speeches. the intellectual content behind that, they are not thinktank presidents. our parties go through various cycles in terms of how intellectually prepared we are. these cycles you think would correspond with to get selected. [laughter] but they don't always. i think on both sides of the aisle, having made vibrant, intellectual back pending is critical and there are times when each of these groups have bought into trouble because that part of it was not up to the speeches. >> you mention the gap mountain.

my observation was when you try to inventory those things, they were things that were very important to a subset of folks. to the extent even that maneuvering toward this -- on some of these issues, they are not so macro and immigration is my personal biggest disappointment domestically. it overtakes everything. you make a lot of people mad, school vouchers was another one. people are still writing about why we capitulated so early. >> why did you? [laughter] >> because we couldn't pass it. >> there probably are no

generalizations about american politics that hold true of all cases to the same degree without exception. but there are some broad tendencies. this question of campaigning as opposed to governing in the transition from one to the other does bring to the surface a structural difference between campaigns and governing. to a first approximation, campaigning is about addition and government is about selection. it's no accident that people often say that to govern is to choose. it must -- it's much less frequently said that to campaign is to choose. [laughter] there's a reason for that. what that means this in the transition, you are going from something broader and more capacious to something that is in the nature of events is going

to be more narrow. that carries with it to imperatives that are very difficult inside a white house. one is a struggle, and frequently is a struggle, for the control of the sequence of major initiatives. i remember the first 12 months when healthcare, welfare reform, a major change direction on economic policy, the very controversial decision to proceed with votes on trade issues that were quite divisive within the democratic party. so the question of what comes before what, because you can't do everything at once with any hope of success, it's very important. but secondly, circumstances can

highlight the tensions or even contradictions between or among equally serious presidential campaigns. -- presidential campaign promises. it is no accident that during the transition of the clinton presidency there was the famous battle of the bobs. bob rubin authentically represented a promise bill clinton had made. bob rush represented a different set of genuine important promises bill clinton had made. the president, as president, decided he had to decide. as history recorded, he made a clean decision. it was a brave, faithful, all the lead decision that paved the way for a subsequent partial redemption of the original promise of putting people first.

it certainly was not manifest during the campaign that there would be some tension between these two pieces of putting people first. the circumstances forced the president's hand in a very difficult way. i think virtually every administration by the end of the day could probably record instances in which there is a tension between two equally important, equally intended promises that has to be a choice. >> campaigning is something like falling in love and governing is something like marriage. [laughter] during the campaign it's all willing and and marriage is a lot of argument. -- governing there is a lot of argument.

it's ultimately more satisfying, but more difficult. the difficult things about the early days of administration is there is a lot of willful disbelief that goes on during campaigns. a new president's supporters see in him or her what they want to see. attended nor the other parts. there were plenty battle of the bobs that went on where people who fundamentally disagreed with a major promise bill clinton had paid -- had made, just ignored it. he just kept saying that on the campaign trail. for the president himself, keeping all of these people happy to have fallen love with

him for the reasons is a challenge. >> richard nixon in 1968 ran on a long border. one of his main point was whether to cut the crime in the district to the crime capital of the world. during the transition, we are trying to figure out what that means. my first meeting -- [laughter] he said that crime has gotten very high in the district and catherine crime has been to see me. we have to cut crime. [laughter] so i wrote down and cut crime. i call the mayor and i said i just came from a meeting with the press and he would like to cut the crime in the district,

so if you go ahead and cut it and call me back. [laughter] there was a long pause on the phone. there were about 168 index crimes per day. i will check into it three months later, there was up to 202 per day which was not progress. then i had to figure out what we really do to cut crime. with a campaign promise that the president repeated several times. we had a brilliant man, robert dupont, from the district of columbia. i remember him. he had been a steady-eddie correlation between her addiction and the crimes we were -- he had shown a correlation between heroin addiction and the crimes we were trying to bring down. i brought a note to the president about drug treatment programs. the nixon/ford white house for

the democrats' best years. we let that drug treatments and there weren't any republicans that did it. [laughter] so we had to look at you address this problem. we found a brilliant doctor in chicago and we brought him to washington and we set up drug treatment programs all around the district of columbia. methadone meighen's was huge for us. can we possibly support making an opiate available to addicts? -- methadone programs were huge for us. that was our scorecard. how are we doing? when we get to the point we were able to reduce the rate of increase, that led to a metaphysical discussions of if you reduce the rate of increase, are you reducing crime? it's very difficult to come up with an answer. after four years, to show you

how broad minded we were, we hired dr. peter bourne, who was part of president carter pause drug treatment program. he came up and did yeoman service for us. do you know about this, because we need to learn? the campaign in 1968 was a very important part in rejecting to see how we were doing not just in the district. >> there's an aspect about campaigning and governing has not come up that i would be interested in hearing about. that is the idea of the permanent campaign. this is the idea that campaigning doesn't stop when it ought to, but the attitude and activities of the campaign have to much influence over what goes on in government. i would be interested in what other people think about whether there was too much campaigning

in the white house's or whether it's something that just has to be done. >> the romance never ends. [laughter] >> permanent campaign is a pejorative, but the truth of the matter is the person with the biggest microphone in the country needs to take it and advance legislative and other policy agenda. if that is a permanent campaign, we are all guilty as sin. how the president uses the most volleyball commodity he has and how you use that to -- the most valuable commodity has and how you use that, this one is just like the last one and one of four. >> as long as it is a permanent campaign for ideas. if the next election is what is driving everything and it's just the politics of it, that can be

destructive. margaret is exactly right. the president got elected on ideas, he should spend his time fighting for them. if he doesn't, they will not happen. >> i think it is eight to edged sword. you cannot -- i think it is a two edged sword. you cannot deal with congress unless you demonstrate an ability to go over their heads to some degree. there is nothing worse than going over their heads. and not making the connection. they all go out there and hold their town hall meetings. you don't need a pole. congress is the most sophisticated poll we have in this country. the president to have been the most effective are the ones who have managed that the best and

not gone out there to many times and proven they could not deliver. as soon as that happens, the romance is up. you're not going to make it. >> i want to pursue something roger brought up about parties. it's not only significant whether you have a unified are divided government, but how sharp the line is between the parties. we have moved from a situation in the country where party politics was fairly flexible and pragmatic to a situation where it is much less so and it's much more polarized and rancorous. each of you had different experience with party politics, but i would like to hear the late party politics operated and

how that affected your life in the white house. >> i think this is it fairly simple phenomenon. when i first came to washington in the early '70s as an elementary school in turn, the south had still not gotten over lincoln. what that meant was you had democratic party, in national democratic party that govern on a coalition that went from the deep south to wisconsin and minnesota. but these people disagree about most things except the identity of the speaker and majority leader. in order to legislate, whether you are from mississippi or wisconsin, you had to find friends and the other party. so it's no wonder everyone was nice to everybody. what three or democrat or republican, he were running and legislating with another set people.

we had a golden age of stability. but the south did get over lincoln and we had an ideological line now. that magic moment is over and i believe this is the new reality. i don't think there's any point in bemoaning the old days. we're just not going to have real liberal people in the republican party and real conservative people in the democratic party. that may be a good thing or bad thing, but it's just something that has happened. >> i have a little bit of a variation on that. i think that party, obviously the president has a strong degree of influence over to the national chairman is, whether the rnc or the dnc, it's not

problematical. it is the subset issue identity groups that are more problematical and less affiliated with you or anyone you are connected to. i don't and in disagree -- i don't fundamentally disagree that it has changed and it will have an effect on our country and it will be a vexing thing for president obama as it was for bush. >> i don't think it's insurmountable. in spite of the efforts of all of our respective bosses to change the tone and washington, it has gotten progressively worse. but it is possible to make progress where there are areas of common trust. we found, or nixon had found in

the other party, that when there were general goals that both parties were interested in working on, even if they did not start from the same spot, it was possible to find common ground. we had a pretty productive time of a couple of years before the other side went off the deep end. we worked on balancing the budget and reforming welfare and areas where there were things they wanted to do and we wanted to do and was the question of working out details we could agree on. where we ran into trouble is where we got into the end of the list of common things on our to do list. when we got around to proposing a big expansion of child-care, the republicans look at us and said we don't have any interest

in that. we can negotiate forever, but we are not going to do it. so they decided to launch impeachment hearings. [laughter] the challenge is not that partisanship in and of itself, it's whether there are people in either party who are willing to go out on a limb and break with the orthodoxy in their own ranks to make it possible to reach agreement across party lines. i think there are plenty of areas. it happens in state government all the time. it's the expected model and a state capitals. in washington, is frowned on because there are all kinds of interests that raise a red flag any time you move toward progress. i think that members of congress run in districts on the house

side that are very narrow. there accurately reflecting their constituencies by being more ideological than the country is as a whole. >> the thing that is critical if there is nobody in congress that feel accountable for passing legislation and they're not going to go home and suffer the consequences if the health care bill does not get enacted. president obama is. president fill in the blank is. when i think about ted kennedy who is a legislator and wants to do some things, that is at least as important going on in the interest groups. nobody on the hill feels accountable to execute a play. >> their three presidents represented at this table and probably the three most vice-

presidential -- three most influential vice-president in history. during campaign and -- to what extent was the vice-presidential candidate steering it toward certain promises and holding your feet to the fire to try to achieve those promises? you work for mondale before he came vice-president. >> the guy that we have hired had studied his career and tried to cut every single program. [laughter] [inaudible] >> the vice-president of primary interest or not in the domestic agenda -- the vice president's

primary interests were not in the domestic agenda. when he would weigh and from time to time, he had other interests. >> seriously, if there was a frustration the carter white house staff had with the vice- president it was that we could only to engage a lot less than he wanted to. he was certainly the most effective staff lobbyist, but he did not like people knowing what he was doing. you just cannot dial up. sometimes on things we thought were important. there were other issues like [inaudible] he might have helped to build

this bottle because he was it was -- because he was a protege and had studied the vice- president see as a hobby of long time before he was a net. -- before he was in it. but he was the hardest to smoke out. you knew that he was doing something, but you didn't necessarily know what was. [laughter] >> al gore was a big advocate thought -- before the campaign. before bill clinton picked him, he had consulted them on policies. so he helped to write the speech president clinton gave on and our mental policies. clinton and gore have different interests they were especially passionate about. clinton had not spent that much

time on environment policy as governor, so he was happy to give advice president gore and running room on that issue. that was true on science and technology policy. it may have been more difficult if you had to dip below guys who had worked all the same issues -- if you had to guys and it worked on all the same issues and had a different promises over the course of their career that were odds with each other, but it worked out quite well for them. >> [inaudible] the early months, when you go into office and you work on translating campaign promises into initiatives or reality. one thing we have not mentioned but i think is worth noting since we all came out of the mill you of the white house and

executive office of the president, when the president first comes into office, he has a large number of people, at least positions in departments and agencies that require sat confirmation. people cannot act in those positions until they have been confirmed. there are lots of good reasons not to be involved in the making of decisions beforehand. said the initiative, inevitably, swings to the white house. the office of management and budget, because of the director, has to be confirmed that he will always get confirmed along with the rest of the cabinet, but the assess the directors don't have to go through senate confirmation. so when you are putting together the first program that the president is going to deliver at a joint session of congress.

it's usually in february, and it's very shortly after you come into office. that's the first opportunity the president really has to address the congress and the country as to what my priorities are going to be now and what specific proposals on going to advance. there is a huge event is to the white house staff because they're the ones who are there, it is heavy with people live down the campaign and keepers of the campaign flame, and that's a very powerful argument. we promised this during the campaign and we want been known as an administration keep its promises. there's a huge event it sickos to people in the white house staff, particularly during the

first six months, arguably the first year before you begin filling out with people, departments, and agencies and their thin and a position to be a little more effective in countering with the white house is doing. the initiative and drive is always coming from out of the white house. >> time is our great foe and i have to call an end to this really intriguing and particulate discussion of how transition is made from campaign to governance. i would just what this is one of four sessions in this miller center of public affairs symposium on white house domestic policy making. go to the miller center web site or go to c-span.org and find out when the others will be made. thank you for leading this discussion. >> thank you all.

>> i understand it want to get a picture of the group outside. there is coffee -- [inaudible] >> president obama participate today in a conference call with these leaders. they will talk about health insurance reform. reporters are being allowed to listen in. c-span arabia will late -- will air the conference call live at 5:30 eastern. -- c-span radio will air the

conference call live at 5:30 eastern. >> this fall, after the public court, from the public places to those accessible only by the nine justices. the supreme court, coming the first sunday in october on c- span. >> secretary of state hillary clinton says u.s. policy toward north korea remains unchanged and pressed the case for keeping the lockerbie bomb or in jail. those comments came during this news conference with foreign minister of columbia. this is just over 20 minutes. >> good afternoon. it is a great pleasure for me to be able to welcome the foreign minister of columbia to the state department. i have had the opportunity of

meeting with him before on several different occasions, but it is always an important time when we are able to discuss the many issues between us. colombia is an important ally of the united states and our partnership is based on mutual respect and mutual interests. it is a partnership that enhances the security and prosperity of both our countries. today, the foreign minister and i had a very productive discussion about how we will strengthen and deepen that partnership. we discussed a wide range of common concerns. i asked that we have a chance to really explore our many different agenda items and i think the foreign minister for columbia's leadership on both regional and global issues including their contribution in afghanistan, where colombian troops will soon be helping the people of afghanistan build a more peaceful and stable

country. we are very grateful for their service and sacrifice. we also greatly appreciate the role the colombian police are playing in haiti. their efforts to train security forces in the region, particularly in the dominican republic and what all. we discussed the ongoing situation in honduras. the united states supports the peaceful restoration of democratic and constitutional order in honduras with the president's return as president to finish his term. we continue to believe in the need for a negotiated solution and feel the president's plan was an excellent one for resolving this crisis. once again, we call on the parties to avoid steps that increase division and polarization in honduras and needlessly place people at risk. the foreign minister and i also discussed the bilateral

cooperation agreements that our governments hope to sign in the near future. this agreement ensures appropriate protections are in place for our service members and will allow us to continue working together to make the challenges posed by narco traffickers, terrorists, and other illegal armed groups in colombia. these threats are real and the united states is committed to supporting the government of colombia to provide security for all its citizens. i want to be clear about what this agreement does and does not do. first, the agreement does not create u.s. bases in colombia. it does provide the united states access to colombian basis, but command-and-control, administration, and security will be columbia's responsibility. any u.s. activity will have to be mutually agreed upon in advance.

the united states does not have and does not seek bases inside colombia. second, there will be no significant permanent increase in the u.s. military presence in colombia. the congressionally-mandated cap on the number of u.s. service members and contractors will remain and will be respected. third, this agreement does not pertain to other countries. this is about the bilateral cooperation between the united states and colombia. it is regarding security matters within columbia. our hemisphere faces a number of pressing challenges from the economic crisis, the climate crisis, to public health concerns like the h1n1 virus, narcotics trafficking, and other crimes. these all demand our attention and cooperation. the united states at columbia

are committed to working together and making it possible for us to deliver results for the people are two countries. once again, i would like to thank the foreign minister for his visit and invite him to say a few words. >> [speaking spanish]

>> [speaking spanish, no translation] >> [speaking spanish, the translation] -- no translation

>> [speaking spanish, no translation] >> [speaking spanish, the translation] -- no translation

>> [speaking spanish, no translation] >> i want to say good afternoon to everyone and i would like to thank the secretary of state for hosting the year today along with my delegation. i think her, as always, for the generosity she shows when we come to visit and for the good will in our meetings. the united states and colombia enjoy a very close relationship just as our personal relationship is a close one and we hope and pray this continue in the future for the benefit of both our people. we have discussed a very broad and far reaching agenda, one

that includes all kinds of topics like clean energy, the fight against terrorism, the fight against narcotics trafficking, technology, and as you know, columbia has suffered greatly because of narco trafficking and terrorism, to issues that go hand-in-hand and have to assert degree become synonymous. this is a serious threat we are all facing and we and columbia know this full well unfortunately. also unfortunately, many times in different parts of the world, countries speak out against atrocities committed or assassinations of people as a result of terrorism or no. a trafficking. unfortunately, not all of them are willing to lend the same hand when it comes to cooperation. in the united states, we have found a partner that provides us with cooperation and provides as with barry effective friendship and leadership in this area. -- very affective french and

leadership in this area. drug-trafficking is something we will make sure will stop. only when everyone is cooperating, we will be able to achieve this. columbia wants is completely and we note the united states will help us toward this goal. -- columbia once at this completely and we know the united states will help us to this call. it will be a benefit to all this regionally and on the continent and eventually the entire globe. columbia does not just ask for cooperation, we also opera cooperation whenever we can. as i said -- we also offered cooperation whenever we can. as i said, we want to be able to help all of those through global programs and anywhere it is possible to provide our experience. we are doing this in haiti, with mexico, guatemala, and panama. we are delighted we will soon be signing agreements with the united states on this very topic and we hope we will be able to embrace such agreements

in the future. once columbia is a free of the courage we are now suffering, everyone will benefit of the results. -- of the scourges we are now suffering. thank you for helping us work on are very broad agenda. [inaudible] >> would be learned since rabin's return about north korea and the state of that regime? kim jong il and the state of his health? the possibility of a succession? could this possibly become an icebreaker and adores four -- this -- renewed negotiations. >> the briefing that my husband and those who traveled with them have provided to us is extremely helpful because it gives us a

window into what is going on in north korea. but our policy remains the same. our policy is consistent. we continue to offer to the north koreans the opportunity to have a dialogue with in the six party talks frameworks within the united states that we think could offer many benefits to the people of north korea, but the tories is that to the north koreans. -- the choice is up to the north koreans. we are committed to the goal of full and at verifiable denuclearization of the north korean danceable -- the north korean peninsula. we are exploring with our other partners and international partners what additional steps can be taken to begin the framework discussions once more. but it will be up to the north

koreans to determine. >> [inaudible] >> that is up to us to determine. whether there are opportunities and insights that can be used to try to create a positive atmosphere, it is truly up to the north koreans. >> [inaudible] [inaudible] >> i think i very clearly describe what is and what it is

not. i certainly hope anyone speaking out about the agreement will take the time to understand that this is built on years of agreement between the united states and colombia. there's a commitment the ad states made -- the united states made it going back three administrations if i am not mistaken to assist columbia in its courageous struggle against narco traffickers. what the foreign minister said is very important. we all should be cooperating with one another. we should all be supporting each other. in the fight against terrorism and five against criminal cartels and drug-traffickers, because they are so destructive and damaging to the fabric of society, the assassinations, the intimidation that goes on is not

just a threat to the country in which it occurs, but it's a threat to everyone. i believe any fair reading of what it is we are discussing is about our continued commitment to assist columbia. it has nothing to do with other countries. i only hope people will take the time to understand that. >> [speaking spanish]

>> [speaking spanish] >> i just wanted to point out, i want to reiterate, that what colombia needs is more effective mechanisms of cooperation. this mechanism in particular what the united states is one we have had for a very long time already and is building on a number of mechanisms we have been working on. the principles contained therein are very clear. the principle of sovereign equality of states, the principle of non-intervention, and the principle of the territorial integrity of states. these are very important and

it's and i think it would be extremely good to have more agreements, not just for the united states but with other states in the same vein. >> [inaudible] i was wondering how concerned he were about the man who was convicted for killing more than 180 americans over lockerbie may be released and how much pressure are you putting on the scottish authorities to convince them to not release them? briefly, on afghanistan, there is an upsurge in violence ahead of the election. reports of fraud. where does that leave the legitimacy of the results of the election? >> as to the first question, the united states has made its views known over a number of months, and we continue to make the same.

that's we think is -- to make the same point, that is we think is very much against the wishes of the family members of the victims who suffered such grievous losses from the actions that led to the bombing of the airline. we have made our views known to the libyan government as well. i take this very personally because i knew a lot of the family members of those who are lost because there was a large contingent from syracuse, university. during the time i have a great honor of representing n.y., i knew all of these families, i talked with them about what a horror they experienced. i think it's absolutely wrong to release someone who has been

imprisoned based on the evidence about his involvement in such a horrendous crime. we are still encouraging the scottish authorities not to do so. we hope they will not. with respect to afghanistan, we have made a number of statements over the last several days supporting the electoral process. speaking out against the uptick in violence, i think one way you can view the violence is an effort by the taliban to intimidate people from actually voting and create an atmosphere of violence and fear that will keep people away from the polls. there are problems with this election, as there are with any other election. but we still believe it is the right of the people of

afghanistan to pick their own leaders, and we are encouraging them to come out and vote. we worked very hard a last month to provide security with the help of a lot of our partners who are present in afghanistan and we hope the election goes well. >> good afternoon. madam secretary, the state department has said on different occasions that venezuela has not done enough to cooperate in the fight against drugs in the region. some experts believe that is the reason why hugo chavez has criticized some much the agreement your countries are going to sign. i wonder if you agree with that opinion and why governments like the brazilian government, for example, has had concerned about this agreement. >> i cannot want to speak for

any other government. they can express their own views. but i do want each person who speaks out about this agreement to understand what is and recognize what it is not. it is certainly a bilateral agreement with very clear recognition of territorial integrity and sovereignty and all the other key principles the foreign minister mentioned. i hope that as more is learned, there is not just an awareness of the relationship the united states and colombia have had for many, many years and are continuing cooperation on what we view as not just a threat to the two of us, but a threat to the whole region. i would also ask that more countries actually help us in this fight. don't just stand on the sidelines and don't just contribute to the problems by

doing and saying things that undermined the efforts our governments are taking to try to protect the entire region from this perch of narco traffickers. -- the scourge of narco traffickers. people are free -- people are free to say what they will, but the facts are very clear. this is a continuation of a partnership that we believe and the colombians believe have helped to make life better for the people of colombia. it has nothing -- there is nothing more than that. we want to make it possible as it now is for people to be free from intimidation and violence in colombia when not so long ago, you could not say that. i applaud the colombian government and the president paused leadership for what they have done against a ruthless enemy.

thank you, all. what happened? i can't take you anywhere. [laughter] . .

>> we will take you to the state department for a briefing on refugee issues. it is held on world humanitarian day. the briefer will be the assistant secretary of state for population refugees. that should be getting underway in a few moments. we will have it for you live on c-span. while we wait, an item in the news, cbs reported that don hewitt, the creator of"60 minutes," has died. he stepped down in 2004. his career in journalism spans 60 years, vergie all of it with the cbs. -- virtually all of it with cbs.

he directed people like walter cronkite and edward r. murrow. don hewitt has died at the age of 86. the state department briefing is coming up in a moment on c-span. until it begins, a portion of today's "washington journa;." -- -- headline -- all of the execution of a death row inmate to proceed. the inmate was executed tuesday morning by lethal injection in ohio. maryland on the phone line. caller: good morning. thanks for taking my call. sorry that i missed mr.

napolitano. i can appreciate the book very much. at least he is telling the truth. most of us who have studied history, we do the research and find these things out, but our history books, we were not told the truth. but my other feelings are that there are other races other than blacks, but the united states has gone only to the black and white. but there is another race of people called the american indians that were here, the indigenous people but nothing is ever told the truth about them. we have been discriminated and enslaved since the first white person to step foot on the north american and south american continents. we were not recognized as citizens.

we could not bring any cases before the courts. we were not recognized as human beings or american citizens and given the right to vote until 1924. everyone else, women, other minorities all had the right to vote, but not the american indians. we are the original people here, but even today we have the highest poverty rates. we have the highest infant mortality rates, highest alcoholic problems, but the american indian has been completely forgotten. we have been pushed onto these reservations and little islands probably because the whites and federal government wanted to get rid of us and put us there and forgot about us. host: on the front page of the "philadelphia inquirer," the

cervical cancer vaccine is facing new questions. some are questioning whether this can cut the toll of cancer. federal researchers analyzed 12,424 voluntary reports of post-vaccination adverse effects ranging from headaches to death. they conclude only two complaints, fainting and blood clots, are more common than expected. you can read more about this test in the report and "ama." back to the phones now from ohio. caller: good morning. i just have three comments i would like to make. maybe there are questions.

on the aarp, with all these people casting their memberships because of the health care association with obama, it was a year ago with the bush should ministration when i found out that they were supporting moveon.org. i told them they never sent me an e-mail again. i did not want them to do with anything that donated to that organization, so this is not the first time. the other point was governor, lane -- governor connors was in the process of investigating the acorn, and all of the sudden he decided that it was not

necessary. when questioned by a fox reporter as to why he had decided that, he said because of the powers to be. i would like to know why isn't the media looking into this? one last question. what is the working families association? that sounds to me like the people's party. host: this headline reports sees lag in jobs recovery. a new report predicts more losses and no growth, even as the national economy sellers -- national economy shows signs of improvement. no job growth before 2011. in the latest quarterly report, the connecticut center for economic analysis says they could lose an additional 35,000

jobs, leaving it with 1.6 2 million fewer than in 1990. north carolina on the democratic line. thanks for waiting. hello? let's move on to florida on our independent line. caller: good morning. thank you for c-span. two quick comments. one i could not avoid in reference to the previous guess you had. happening to read [unintelligible] he talked about hubert harrison, one of the founders of harlem radicalism, mentioning one person who wrote in -- wrote a

book called "the letters and addresses of abraham lincoln." one of the most telling quotes of lincoln says might object in this struggle is to save the union and is not either to save or destroy slavery. if i could save the union without freeing any slaves, i would do it. that is lankan. -- that is lincoln. i think with the health care situation is when people start ebbing away from ebbing awayoption, and obama will support what the industry wants, once it is exposed at the republicans are so partisan that they will oppose anything obama will support , then i think we will start to see support beginning to rally around the public auction.

-- rally around o around option. host:"the miami herald" has this i am talking about the economy. prices signaled inflation in check. falling prices gave us hope inflation is not likely in the short term and the fed would keep interest rates low. wholesale prices tumbled 6.8% over the past year. some economists said the drop shows that worries about inflation are groundless. road island on our line for republicans. caller: his thank you for taking my call. -- thank you for taking my call. it is good that the judge wrote a book and i would love to read it. i only have one question.

my grandparents never were in this country when all this was supposed to have happened, so there must have been people somewhere probably still wealthy debra the head of this stuff, but you never hear about that. -- that were wealthy and still the head of this stuff. let the people who did this to other people stand up on time. i am sorry, we were not here in this country, so a is hard to hear people say things. host: where your parents from? caller: my parents are from italy. host: were you born here? caller: i was here but they were born in italy. we had a neighborhood that was

totally mixed. we never had a problem. why is all this stuff coming up? he i think the top media -- i think the top media -- host: our next call comes from florida on our democratic line. caller: this is jill. i just -- this is joe. i wanted to make observations about our health insurance. the reform that is going on, i am nervous because i have not been on in about a year, but health insurance -- we pay for all the research. if france and germany are allies, they cannot cough up some money, france and germany

were bailed out by us twice. we got them out of two wars. we did not have to get him into that, they owe us war reparations. we had a marshall plan and if we cannot strike a deal with them, they owe us a lot of money because those war reparations they promised to pay were never paid. >> we leave this to take you live to the state department for a briefing on refugee issues. >> mr. schwartz has had a long career working on some of the issues that he has taken the lead for us at the state department on. he has served at the un office of the high commissioner for human rights. he has also worked as senior director at the national

security council in the clinton in ministration. -- in the clinton administration. let's turn it over to mr. schwartz. then we will be pleased to take your questions. >> thank you. i thought i would talk for about 10 minutes and maybe take questions, if that works. it is a pleasure for me to be here on what is world humanitarian day. the general assembly at the end of last year adopted this day first to underscore the importance of international humanitarian assistance, including protection of the most vulnerable populations around the world.

but also to note the contributions of the individuals and organizations engaged in the provision of international relief, and also to honor the memories and victims of those who have lost their lives in the effort to provide humanitarian assistance. on this day it also commemorates the lives of the 22 people who were killed in the canal bombing in baghdad in 2003. the group included seriod, -- sergio, one of the great humanitarian spirit it also happens to have personal meaning for me. i had just gone to work for him.

he was sent to baghdad because of his position, and he asked me to serve as his chief of staff. i had just begun that job when this tragic event occurred. ours is a growth industry, unfortunately. the indicators that we use to determine the challenge show that international humanitarian crises are sustaining or even increasing the level of severity. 42 million people around the world have been uprooted by conflict and persecution. 16 million of whom are refugees, and that number is probably increasing by 25% over the past

seven years. it also includes such -- 26 million internally displaced people. in this year, we have seen substantial displacements in somalia, sri lanka and pakistan. we seek similar translating to disasters that are caused by natural hazards. last year more than 235,000 people were killed, some 214 million people were affected and economic costs were estimated at $190 billion. the death toll in the costs were far higher than the average 47 years before. in his new job, i guess the starting point are the words of

the secretary of state. secretary clinton said at her confirmation hearing before the senate foreign relations committee that she would do her best to elevate the attention of the u.s. government to refugee issues and develop comprehensive strategies to address humanitarian crises. there are many reasons why p rotection 0of the -- protection of the most vulnerable population should be at the center of policy-making. there is the moral imperative of saving lives. it is remarkable how consistent and generous has been the support of the american people and the u.s. congress for a very large levels of assistance. that imposes upon us a very

profound responsibility to do the job right. it is critical we sustain u.s. leadership on these issues, the policy benefits are enabling us to drive the development of principles and policy. it is essential that we strengthen partnerships with key friends and allies and populations of our adversaries, where our efforts not only helped to break down negative images and stereotypes, but also communicate to the world our commitment to principles of responsible u.s. engagement overseas. we also have the goal of promoting conditions of reconciliation, security, and circumstances where despair,

desperation and misery not only impact prospects for stability, but also can affect the interests of the u.s. we have a special role to play as the breadth of our humanitarian engagement is quite remarkable. if there is an international crisis anywhere in the world, the resources of the u.s. of the department of state and u.s. agency for international development, and one way or another it is likely to be there in support of protection of victims. this year we estimate that in terms of magnitude of support will be about $4.5 billion. today, on world humanitarian

day, it is my honor to tell you that we are planning to provide an additional $160 million in support of critical international and non- governmental efforts to provide humanitarian assistance and help create the conditions for sustainable recovery. the money will include some $58 million for assistance in africa with a particular focus on somalia, thee -- the congo and chad. and $71 million to address critical crises in many of the other major refugee-producing regions of the world. before i close and open up for questions, let me turn to some of the areas to which these funds in the prior commitments

are going. i suppose i should start with south asia, because in my first week in the job i traveled to south asia, first with ambassador holbrooke to pakistan and then on my own to sri lanka. the encouraging news with pakistan is perhaps 1.3 million of the 2.2 million who had been displaced have returned to their homes. that is encouraging news but it is still a work in progress. the u.s. has provided assistance of about $320 million. about half of -- about half of what the world has provided. we are pressing others to do more. now we're turning our attention

to promoting and encouraging the process of return through assistance efforts that will make it easier for people in the areas which they had fled. in sri lanka, where our efforts have amounted to $50 million in assistance, i visited layer -- i visited there last month. some 280,000 people were remaining in camps, the vast majority were in the farming complex which i visited. >> [inaudible] >> m-i-n-i-k. we learned the government report told us that 75,000

people would be leaving the camps during the month of august. on some level it was encouraging news, but the basic principle of freedom of movement is at play. everywhere around the world displaced persons make their own judgments about when is right to go back. people are pretty good judges of their own best interests. in sri lanka, the continued confinement against -- involuntary confinement is a source of concern, given the recent rain in the coming of the monsoon season. it makes it all the more important that released from confinement will be an issue that friends continue to race. i told my counterparts there

that i would be returning to continue our engagement with the government and others on these issues. i very much welcome the fact that they welcome mike coming back, and i attempt to do that in the near future. -- they welcome my coming back. while millions of refugees remain in crisis, we have played an important role in promoting critical processes of this celebration -- processes of reconciliation. there been locally integrated into tanzania and to the return of 300,000 refugees to sedan -- to sudan. the refugee crisis in africa remains an important issue for

us. in iraq, we are working to assist the government to more effectively manage the integration of a displaced population, which is probably around 2 million people. we have augmented our efforts at resettlement, which will not a the answer but can play a role. in helping to assist those in greatest need. by the end of this fiscal year we will probably have resettled over 30,000 iraqis. let me emphasize one other thing. we don't only deal with the headline crisis. that is not what humanitarian are supposed to do. we try to keep our attention focused anywhere in the world

where large numbers of people are suffering and the dimensions of the crisis require some degree of international engagement. we have been concerned by recent reports of large-scale displacement, perhaps as many as 10,000 civilians, although we are still running reports, as a result of increased military activity in northeastern burma. it follows reports in june of displacement of 5000 civilians and the ongoing flight of another state from burma. the government is assisting these unfortunate victims and providing aid up to 150,000 residents in thailand and communities in bangladesh.

that is one example of a place that at least the press here has not focused on in great depth, but where the work of the bureau goes on. i very much welcome your questions. i think we will do that. >> just about a couple of euphemisms. the freedom of movement is at play in sri lanka and can you speak more about your trip? there was some confusing reporting as to what you have or had not said tuesday sri lankans in terms of people's confinement. >> i don't think there is anything ambiguous about the word confinement against their will. i am not sure what other meaning you can draw from the phrase

confinement against their will. that is what i said. i spoke about three minutes ago and used the phrase release from confinement. i spoke of freedom of movement and i said that displaced persons everywhere make their own decisions about when they feel they want to go home. so i think all of those sentences are pretty unambiguous. our position is that people who are displaced should be agents of their own destiny. if i could think of another way to say it i would. >> how many people are you talking about? our people -- did you go to that

area and see what the conditions of people being confined in? >> yes, i did. i went to this very large facility in one town, and it is a very large displaced persons camp. it looks like displaced persons camps in many other parts of the world, and conditions were not great. people were getting basic services. the camp administrators and non- governmental organizational partners and the ones on the ground were doing everything within their power. to make life as livable for these people as possible. but nobody wants to be in such a

place. and there were a number of issues which could make the conditions of those situations better. those included providing more access to information for people. in my limited encounters with people i was struck by the fact that they had no sense of what was going to happen to them, what the plans were for them. i think people who are in difficult circumstances can deal with those circumstances more effectively if they have some sense of what the future brings. while there are some international organizations that are present in these camps and doing great work, i felt that

access to these camps should be easier for international providers of the assistance and protection. the government should make it easier for people to get in and i made those points very clearly. >> when you said conditions were not great, were their diseases, did people have enough food? can you explain by disease -- can you explain? >> number one, there has been some surveying of the camp population which had indicated higher than -- high levels of malnutrition.

there was some believe that some of that may have been caused by the conflict itself and surveying that took place after people got into the camps. that is a source of concern. there is concern about communicable diseases, especially when you are in a temporary facility. on one level, we want those facilities to be temporary because we don't want them to be permanent, but when things like rain happen, they get washed away and the potential for diseases gets much greater, which is all the more reason to give people choices about what they should be doing. >> the 30,000 figured you mentioned for iraq, that is since the war began, correct? >> no, the numbers for 2008 and

2009 probably get us around 30,000, but the numbers to have come in will have done so during that time. if you look at since the war began we will be over 30,000. how much higher, i cannot tell you. i think i may answer your next question. the numbers for 2008 are about 13,000. the numbers for 2009 will get us around 20,000. you do the math. that is for those two years. the numbers are much lower in prior years but i don't have the specifics. if what i have told you --

>> last year they were looking at 17 for the fiscal year that ends on september 30. >> we don't have a final number but we will be around 17,000. >> just to follow up on iraq. one of the complaints about refugee advocates and groups is that there has not been enough done. there is still up words of hundreds of thousands of displaced. i am wondering when you give this extra $160 million in support, why there is no extra assistance for iraq. if you could talk about the scope of your programs. >> i will have to get back to

you to see whether this announcement includes iraq, but we will have done over $350 million of support. i will have to double check those numbers. if they are different than what i told you, we will get back to you. that is a huge amount of support both on the vast majority of that is not directed to resettlement, but assistance in place. resettlement in a large-scale displacement crisis will never be the answer for the majority of those who are suffering. it has to be focused on assistance. what we have done about a week ago is we announced the appointment of cement that power -- appointment powersmantha power, -- samantha

power. part of the reason that was made was because of the communication to iraq how important this issue is to ask. >> to resettlement -- resettle in their country? >> there were three choices that a refugee has. it is either a third country settlement, integration in place or return. we hope that the answer for the majority of iraqis who are outside their country of origin will be returned, but the numbers in terms of these populations are much greater with respect to internally displaced iraqis. there are probably around 2 million. our assistance is directed for

programs of support of iraqis who can return to their homes from within iraq. >> can i ask you about pakistan and the 2 million people that have been displaced by the fighting? can you tell us, a few months ago people were raising a red flags about the social structures that could break down as these people were made in their displaced areas. are there any red flags being raised as they continue to stay there? >> for all the reasons that were identified many months ago, those reasons still exist. people don't want to stay in displaced camps. long-term residence creates feelings of despair and

desperation and distrust of the authorities. it is just not a good situation under any circumstances. of the 2.2 million who were displaced as of mid july come up right now our best estimates are probably 1.3 have returned. displaced as of mid july, about 1.3 have returned. as important as it is to get people home so that they can restart their lives, it is more important to ensure that they are not going home in circumstances where they will quickly be displaced secondarily. we believe that there will be a continuing responsibility to assist people who remain

displaced for some amount of time and are not able to go back. but the signs are there has been some progress. if 1.3 million people are going back and you have to also appreciate that the vast majority of going back for going back from -- not from camps, but from homes where they were hosted by families. >> a couple more questions because he has a meeting. >> i in from the center of american progress. you touched on a situation in somalia. could you talk specifically about one camp? the chief said on international refugee day that this was the

area in the world he was most concerned about. there were reports that they are transferring people to northwestern kenya. could you talk about how your office is engaged on that? since you are announcing the $50 million for africa. >> we are very engaged. this is an extremely important issue for all kinds of reasons. the humanitarian dimension is critical. the moral issue of making life livable region i was thinking 280,004 sri lanka, but i think the other number is also 280,000. >> i read that this morning. >> but i don't think -- first of

all, the secretary of state discussed this issue with her counterparts in kenya, which was a reflection of the importance of this issue to us. the following the secretary of state's visit, the un high commissioner visited kenya to discuss this issue. i am hopeful that we wil work with the international community to create conditions to make that facility much more livable, even as this transfer you refer to has taken place. i expect to be transferring -- traveling to africa in the next month, and this issue would be high on my agenda. >> could i ask a follow-up?

what effect will this have on the other camp? i know the idea is to transfer into other existing refugee camps? >> i don't know the answer to that. >> last question. >> some have gone recently to thailand, addressing the issue with [unintelligible] there are some reports that there are still some repatriations. is that a concern for the administration? hal is the issue going to be raised? >> -- how is the issue going to be raised? >> let me say that it must have been nearly 20 years ago when i traveled to the broad area of -- i it traveled with the congressman from pennsylvania. we actually issued a report, so

is an issue i have known for many years. -- it is an issue i have known for many years. we want to do everything -- what do we want to achieve? then i will talk about the kinds of things we have been doing. what we want to achieve is that people who do go bad to laos can go with -- their return will be with the expectation that they will not have any problems. better yet, if the international organizations that do this work and monitor this process, that would be great. our discussions with the authorities have been useful on these issues. legally people who are outside their country of origin -- we

believe people who are outside their country of origin, while they don't have a right to resettlement, if they had fears of persecution they should not be subjected to involuntary return. those are our principles. they're the ones that we express. but we also are confident that the return process for people who are not refugees is workable and is one that should be encouraged. we have made all these points in discussions with the government of thailand and the government of laos. the points have been made by levels higher in the senior government. but the recent trip was extremely valuable and encouraging discussion with both the authorities.

>> do you think there are forced repatriation is taking place? >> i am searching in my memory right now. our effort has been to encourage -- to make very clear that those who have fears of persecution should not be forced back. because i don't have all of the details in my head to give you a definitive answer, i will not give the one. what i will say is that the officials in thailand understand and appreciate our concerns very well. our discussions with them have

been encouraging. >> thanks very much. >> thank you. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2009] >> welcome to part two. we appreciate mr. schwartz taking the time to brief us on the activities about the population of refugees. i want to open my part of the

briefing with a statement on events in baghdad. he will see ambassador hill issued a statement -- you will see the ambassador issued a statement closely to mine. we strongly condemn this morning's attack against the institutions of government, resulting in the deaths of dozens of people. we understand the foreign ministry sustained serious damage with multiple deaths and injuries. the attack on the diplomatic facility and those working for peaceful relations through dialogue and diplomacy is an attack on the entire international community. we extend condolences to the families and to the government of iraq. these attacks are an attempt to

undermine progress iraqi institutions have worked hard to achieve. we believe they will not deter the iraqis from continuing their efforts to build a prosperous society. >> do you have any idea who might be responsible? >> know, we don't have that information. >> iraqis are saying is al qaeda. -- no, we don't know. we know that these attacks are coordinated. judging on past experience, this kind of coordinated attack has been the hallmark of al qaeda but i don't have any hard information. >> does this indicate iraqis might not be up to providing adequate security? and the fact that the foreign ministry was hit? >> i would not draw that conclusion. that is the conclusion they want

you to draw. the fact that they hit his government institutions, but i would not draw that conclusion. >> isn't it the fact that they were able to hit these institutions that is of concern? >> unfortunately, these kinds of attacks are difficult to counter. these were a vehicle-born explosive devices. i would not necessarily draw the conclusion they are not up to the job. >> if this continues with you need to evaluate the security arrangement you agree to less here? >> we are there to support the government of iraq. we have an agreement with them that we are abiding by. we want to make sure that iraq succeeds and becomes a peaceful

and prosperous country. at this point, that is the stance that we are in. >> that doesn't really answer the question. >> it is up to the iraqis. it is up to them to decide what kind of support we can give them. >> i don't know if i missed in your statement about american casualties. >> there are no deaths or serious injuries among u.s. personnel or american citizens. >> when you say it is up to iraq is to decide, are you having discussions with them about in the wake of this violence whether you need to rethink the agreement? >> no, i am not aware of those discussions. we are in constant discussions with them in general about the security situation, but we are not opening any official

discussions. >> do you know if u.s. forces were asked to respond? >> i am not sure about that. if i can find that out, i will. we would be prepared to extend assistance. >> how has this latest violence affected the diplomatic work you are doing in iraq? previously your work was curtailed. they could not get out and about because of the personal risks. what is the situation in terms of would you -- were you able to do your business? >> i think you know if it is a challenging environment to conduct business. i am not aware that we have adjusted our security stance. at this point we are trying to

assess the damage. the safety of our own personnel is paramount, but i don't have any specific information about how this has affected how we do our business. i will say that our main interlocutor is the ministry of foreign affairs. that place was very hard hit today. with dozens of people injured and severe damage. at a logistical level, that would affect our ability to deal on a bilateral basis. >> two months ago ambassador hill was the target of an attack, so are you sensing that

there are more risks you are facing? >> it is a very risky environment. i have the utmost respect for my colleagues serving out there under extremely challenging conditions. >> do you think you are -- you were too optimistic a few months ago that iraq was on the right road? do you feel like you spoke to us soon? >> no, as i suggested in the statement, we have faith and political will of the iraqi people to develop into a strong and prosperous society. we have faith that these kinds of attacks will not deter them from that path. you all remember -- i forget

which election, but there was one conducted in an environment where we had multiple attacks on a daily basis. there were a lot of predictions that this would hold down the turndown, but it was a tremendous turnout. there is a desire of the iraqi people to have a normally functioning system. these kinds of attacks are horrific but we do have faith it will not deter iraq east. >> there is a difference is between having faith in their political will and their capability. you have faith in their capability to ward off attacks? -- do you have faith in their capability to more of a tax? the horrific nature is only increasing. -- their capability of more attacks? >> i think that the important

thing here is that the iraqis want to be responsible for their own security, and we are there to support them to try to deal with these kinds of situations. i think that we're all impressed at how restrained the response has been. some of these attacks are designed to try to provoke a sectarian response. so i think that the iraqis -- i think we should all be pleased

at the refusal to be drawn into sectarian divisions. move on? >> what can you tell us about the visit to new mexico of the north korean diplomats? >> not much, but i can tell you that our role in this was to review and approve the request for travel of two north korean diplomats from their mission to the un. as you probably know, any time a north korean diplomat wants to travel outside a 25-mile radius of new york, they have to file an itinerary which has to be reviewed by the state department. in this case, it was approved.

i understand they did go out to mexico, but for details of that i would have to refer you to the north korean mission. >> that is a pretty significant approval. >> i don't think it is. you would be surprised how often we reviewed these kinds of things. >> but given the political sensitivity of north korea. who signed off on this? >> normally it is the east asian pacific bureau. this are the offices that approve it. it is clean. i know this from being on the russia desk. we have the same kind of reciprocal arrangements with the russians with this 25-mile radius. >> i understand that but north korea is a special case. >> it has been lately. i will grant you that, but these

kinds of requests for travel are fairly regular. they do go outside of new york city. >> did anyone from the state department talk to governor richards and's office? >> i am not aware of any specific conversation. -- did they talk to governor richardson's of this? >> i am not asking if they carried any messages, but the north koreans have used them to send messages in the past. i am wondering if when they asked you for permission, if you touch base with him. >> i don't think we did. i will not say nobody in the state department talked to him in the last few weeks, but for this instance i am not aware of any contact with his office. >> can you say for the record whether you are passing any message to