programs. you have to be able to substantiate your in the country legally. you have to be able to substantiate that you have been here over the time limits for eligibility. the health care reform legislation turned up on its back and tramples it to the dust. it says that we will not verify. we will not check. we have a complete open door for every illegal immigrant current and in the future to simply enroll and receiving benefits under this program. when the only will not check them, we will not check them once they begin to receive the benefits. if you are going to do that with respect to health care, why would do not also establish the same precedents with respect to food stamps and public housing and earned income tax credit? i believe that is the direction that the congress want to go to allow all welfare benefits to be fully available to all illegal immigrants.

this seems to me that not only set up a substantial cost -- i believe it is on the tune of close to $200 billion over the next decade. . . >> someone could enter the u.s. illegally in a feature or as a tourist who has a significant medical condition that requires health care. they could declare themselves to be eligible for these programs,

and role in this public auction, begin to receive medical care without ever being checked as to whether or not they are in the united states lawfully or eligible for these programs. i believe under this legislation, will begin to draw the seriously ill from all over the world to begin to come here to receive free medical treatment. once you put these individuals up to the dialysis machine or what ever is, we are unlikely to pull the plug and say, get out of here. it is absolutely mind-boggling, the president that is being established here there -- and the precedent that is being established youhere. a that is targeted to low-income people, medicaid, public housing, food stamps, so forth. over the next decade, the u.s.

will spend $1.50 trillion on means tested welfare for lower skilled immigrants. those are the high school degree or less. half of that, around $750 billion over the next decade will be for medical care for lower skilled immigrants. this is primarily through the medicaid program. it is a massive expenditure in a time which the united states is already going bankrupt as a nation. the health care reform that is pending in the congress would add additional costs on to that, not only by making the illegals eligible for free medical care, but also by extending medical care to all of the legal immigrants who currently do not have it. steve's numbers here are very good, about a third of the uninsured are immigrants. if you look at the lower income

uninsured, where the core of the expenditure will be, that number is probably significantly higher, as much as 50% of the lower income uninsured. we are about to, i believe, going to a system of nationalizing u.s. healthcare, creating a government monopoly, -- in order to provide health coverage to immigrants. in addition to the health care reform, we have the fantastic cost associated with pending amnesty. one of the things that we know about illegal immigrants is that very few of them are eligible. if you are an illegal immigrant, you come here during -- you're going to find some way of becoming legal or you're going to come back home when you are

of retirement age. one of the clear things that any amnesty bill or earned citizenship bill does, at the point of passage, it immediately takes all of the current illegal immigrants and makes them potentially eligible for social security and medicare. an astonishing out your costs. all of which is hidden in the normal budgetary calculations which only calculate the cost of amnesty over a 10-year period. you're going to put as many as 12 million individuals into the social security and medicare systems. the cost of that once they hit retirement age would be around $2.50 trillion. of that, $1 trillion will be for medicare alone.

this is just another aspect of, not only are we spending enormous sums on the current system, the enormous sums on the current low skilled immigrants, but with health care reform, we will pile much more money on top of that. if we add amnesty on top of that, we will be adding another trillion -- another $1 trillion, $2.50 trillion if you count social security as well. we're beginning to look like argentina in terms of the level of public debt that we are racking up here at an unprecedented rate. a substantial portion of this debt is due to the fact that we are bringing in very low skill individuals through both legal and illegal immigration, providing them with a vast array of government services that they do not pay for, and basically piling up the debt on our children in order to pay for those services.

thank you very much. >> thank you, robert. steve, did you have a question? >> i have a point of clarification. what you're saying is, if they have a public option or some new government program, they could have created a situation to verify whether the person is eligible. some legal immigrants are not eligible because they have not been here long enough, but illegal immigrants are not. the issues explicitly to make them eligible in the sense that they took out the enforcement. they also said that they were not supposed to get it, so would it be a speed limit on a highway, that a pronouncement that police will never patrolled highway. it is that kind of what we have done? >> it is difficult to know the motivation for omitting the

verification provisions. i think the one provision that is in their that i mentioned that excludes availability but does not require a way of checking ait, it is like the highway sign, the highway marker you mentioned. but is also similar to -- have you ever seen in no trespassing sign in the middle of the woods , and there is no fence, no former with a shotgun or whatever? it is just there, no enforcement whatsoever. >> i would say the motivation is clear. it could not help but be clear. it is an unprecedented step in the u.s. welfare system to

basically say, you are not eligible, but we will not check. we have never done that. i wonder why that provision is in there. on multiple occasions, they deliberately voted down amendments that said, why don't you apply the traditional checks? by the way, these are over 71 different federal welfare programs. you use this type of check to make sure a person is eligible. that is what you do. it is not only just to check for illegals, it is a check for employment verification. if you come in and have eight specific and come, the government determines whether york and come is, in fact, that low. -- whether your income is, in fact that low. if you proclaim your eligible

for this, we will let you win. if you proclaim that you are a u.s. citizen, you are in and we will never checked you. there is only one reason for doing that. it is because the deliberately intend for all illegal immigrants, both current and future to received free medical care at the expense of the u.s. taxpayer. >> when you referred to the $1.50 trillion in the next decade, are you talking about illegal and legal immigrants? >> it would be much higher if you granted amnesty to the illegals. under the current system, recognizing that lower skilled immigrants take about 15% of total means tested, cash, food,

housing, medical care, that would be at least $1.50 trillion. over the next decade. it is those with a high school degree or less. probably a majority of that is for those who are currently legal. >> speak up and identify yourself. >> to questions. did you find any difference between illegal immigrants and illegal immigrants in terms of their paying back? the use of emergency services? you mentioned they tend not to pay for that. might that potentially change or they legalize? the second question is for mr. edwards. have you looked into the agricultural workers and the provisions, how health-care

reform might affect that segment of the population? >> the statistics i gave for what taxpayers pay, remember, uninsured people pay billions of dollars for their care. they just don't pay for most of it. the total sum of what taxpayers pay is right around $43 billion. at $4 billion of that is going to illegals. some more money might be going to legal immigrants. we don't have a body of research showing that legal immigrants are more likely to pay for services. i don't know of any that says that when they are uninsured. legal immigrants tend to have health insurance than it illegals. the big difference seems to be medicaid. they get insurance, but entirely at the taxpayer expense.

if your concern was that they did not have insurance and now they do -- that is positive. it might improve their health care outcomes. if your concern is the taxpayer, that is bad. being on medicaid is much more expensive than being uninsured. >> one of the bills -- i believe it is the senate bill, but i may be mistaken. states that offer a permanent residence for u.s. citizens, it may be the house bill -- i may have been reversed. it is a permanent immigrant visa holder. the other says that -- it includes anybody who is here under color of law which includes everybody who is legally here on temporary, protected status comment on

immigrant visas, and so forth. -- protected status, non immigrant visas, and so forth. they're finding that on immigrant visa holders, a temporary visa holders would not qualify. it the other that says -- the other one says -- >> it would include foreign students, legal immigrants coming -- and immigrants given temporary status. people who are described as immigrants that are legally here, but temporarily. >> in reading the memorandum, the second bullet points says that immigrants account for 27%

of those in health insurance. obama says that legal immigrants account for 27%. the one before says 64 percent of illegal immigrants -- can you explain it? >> what fraction of immigrants do not have health insurance? the other is trying to measure the impact on the system. if they're only 10 immigrants and half don't have insurance, it would be a trivial fraction of the uninsured. one statistic is how many people, of immigrants are uninsured? one is what fraction total they comprise? in the case of immigrants and their children, the two statistics are somewhat close. about 33% of all immigrants, not their kids, did not have health insurance. they comprise 27% of all people

without health insurance. a third don't have it, and they make up a fourth of the total. you can't just no one without thinking about the other. that is why this to statistics -- they should be a little clearer. making clear the total verses what fraction, but that is how it is. >> a comment for the director as well as a question. i enjoyed your book of charts, the impact of immigration. second of all, when you talked about the impact that happens to be mentioned, $2.50 trillion roughly. in your analysis of the martinas bill in 2006, you estimated that in addition to legalization, there be at least over 60

million people who come into this country through chain sponsorship. is that included in the out years? >> no, the $2.50 trillion would be the cost of providing to the current illegal population. the bill three years ago did have it. it would impose even greater costs. the bottom line to understand this is to recognize that the u.s. has a very large and robust welfare system. we don't recognize it because it is over 71 different programs. in order to calculate the cost of these programs. social security and medicare

appear on two lines -- you have to really dig. when you add all those things together, the cost of aiding the two were -- the tour, is three- quarters the cost of social security and medicare. it has grown as rapidly as social security and medicare over the last three decades. the pieces are never put together. the bottom line in terms of medicare -- immigration is that the system along with other government systems, it constitutes a massive transfer of resources each and every year from the middle class down to the less advantaged. we can barely afford to do that for disadvantaged lower income americans.

huge numbers, both legally and illegally who fall into the criteria of these programs would not work all the more legal -- the more illegal immigrants that we have, the greater the cost to the u.s. taxpayer. he wrote -- it receives $20,000 more in government benefits and then they pay in taxes each and every year that gap . at that moment, we're borrowing it. in the next decade, we will be putting a debt on the future in order to pay for it. >> next question? >> [inaudible]

there is a problem with education people -- with education level, the people coming into the country. have you done any cost-benefit analysis on what benefits the economy, and what the cost would be if he did not have the means to do it? >> yes. as the level of immigration has gone up, one of the most troubling trends in the u.s. labor market is that less educated americans are worth less and less. there are about seven or 8 million of them not in the labour force who are 18-65. if we look at people who only have a high-school degree, especially the young, 18-29- year-old. it has declined by 7 million as well.

all told, america has 25 million. these are people with no education beyond high school, not working. the total work force is 7 million to 8 million. it looks like we have this enormous supply, but the situation has deteriorated dramatically. teenagers used to work at very high rates, 16 and 17-year olds. the last year has seen a massive decline. roughly speaking, if only 1/4 of the less educated not working or native-born, would it work? throw in a few teenagers, you could throw -- he could replace the whole work force. the other thing that is going on in the u.s. labor market that most people think is equally as troubling, wages and benefits at people on the bottom has

deteriorated dramatically. not only are less educated americans working less, they're making less. there are astonishing statistics. let me give you one of my favorites which is very well documented. meat packers, generally done by people without a lot of education. their wages are 45% less today than they were in 1980. for high-school dropouts, wages are about 22%-25% less than they were in 1980. if we have less unskilled immigration and paid workers more, it appears we have a huge -- from an equity point of view, that would make a lot of sense. we have adopted this other policy where we flood the unskilled labor market, keep wages low, and allow non work to become very common among less

educated natives. there are other issues going on there. other factors are affecting less educated people in this country. it is not just immigration. but i think immigration is a part of it and something we can do something about. we can change our immigration policy. the japanese setting up factories in malaysia and displacing u.s. workers is tougher, were as reducing the immigration level or reducing your unskilled immigration level is something that is tangible and we can do something about. >> i happened to work on both the issues of welfare and poverty and immigration. so i get this very paradoxical message that i can go to one group and be told in the morning that there are absolutely no jobs for lower skilled americans in minneapolis or milwaukee. and i can go to another group in the afternoon and be told that we have to have massive low

skilled immigration because americans won't take those jobs. we have to reconcile these things. if you were to go for any discussion on black poverty and a black family structure in the united states, the overwhelming consensus, particularly on the left, is low wages for black male workers and a lack of jobs for black male workers. for 20 years, that is the prevailing factor. that is why we have poverty, welfare, and so forth. at the same time -- that we do not have enough workers to fill these lower skilled jobs -- that have almost been flat for several decades. somehow, we need to have more of

these workers. it is a misnomer to suggest that it makes the economy larger. that somehow the average citizen benefits from it. it is true that makes a larger pie, but the immigrant eats about 90% of that share of a larger pie through his own wages and it does not confer benefits on the rest of us. it does confer cost on the rest of us. >> let's take a couple more questions. >> you mentioned that residents in your own countries do not have knowledge of the systems -- what is the risk of medical tourism to get medical coverage

in the u.s.? >> that is a reasonable question. it can be a lot of people numerically. it can be millions or billions of dollars, whether it be a large fraction of the health care pie. remember that people that engage in health care tourism will be the most affluent to find they can't get insurance in their home country. they are aware of and they can afford the plane ticket. they can navigate the process which millions and millions of people do every year. what you would not expect is a person who is not literate coming from india and trying to do medical, but you expect someone to a college in india that they can't afford to treat and being able to buy a ticket. that would be more of a phenomenon against the most educated -- i amongst the most

educated. that would be another example. there are about 400,000 births comprising about one out of every 10 births in the u.s.. what percentage of people who are women, who arrived pregnant? -- what percentage of people or women who arrived pregnant? it is hard to get a handle on how big that is potentially. as robert pointed out, if you do not verify, which is what this new bill considers, that could grow much larger. >> i would consider the precedents for medical tourism to be quite strong indeed. in the 1980's and 1990's, we allowed elderly immigrants to come and then get on your

program called supplemental security income. in fact, elderly immigrants coming to the u.s. to retire on this welfare program, it was the fastest growing element in u.s. welfare. it was absolutely unprecedented. what we found, and we had testimony on this as part of welfare reform in 1996, across southeast asia, there were publications in the native languages on how come the united states and retire. in chinese. we have testimony to that effect. one of the things that happened in welfare reform was that welfare reform said you had to be a u.s. citizen to get ssi. that sort of checked that massive inflow. the people that are not

attracted to these benefits -- not only are people aware of this, but you have agencies and organizations set up to inform them and to draw that men. -- draw them in. and any illegal immigrants would have the absolute option to bring their parents and their grandparents and, declaring them eligible, and receiving free medical treatment under the system. you could retroactively try to get some of that back, a record of achieving that is absolutely terrible. what you're going to do here at the very least is create a mass which will be exploited and will ultimately have to be cleaned up at some point in the future after we already spent a lot of money. >> one final question. speak up, please.

>> the in your studies, there are very interesting studies, but did you consider the cost of not insuring these people who are already here, especially in light of the h1n1 virus and various other viruses? would not be less costly to the nation to actually cover these people and not expose the citizenry to even more health costs? >> i do have an estimate for illegal immigrants. right now, we're spending about $4 billion on their health care. let's say we give the medicaid. there are about 7 million, but they're relatively young. you're still looking at about $15 billion. it would be more expensive to cut -- to cover them on medicaid. the health care outcomes might improve. when you're talking of

communicable diseases, that would be an advantage. the bottom line is, people who are uninsured to cost taxpayers money, but government insurance costs a lot more. their health care outcomes improve, but there is a balance. we're not going to save any money if we ensure folks. people who do not have insurance put off care, they pay some on their own, and taxpayers spend billions on them as well, but it is not anywhere near like with actual insurance. >> when lyndon johnson launched the war on poverty, welfare spending in 1964 was about $70 billion a year. it is now 10 times higher. it went from 1% to 5% of gross domestic product. the next decade, it will be 6% of gross domestic product. where spending the additional money in order to save money.

boy, is a good thing we saved all that money. the bottom line is, as long as you have to this type of low were skilled immigrant in massive numbers in the united states either legally or illegally, they're going to cost u.s. taxpayers a lot of money in one way or another. it to the extent that youthful inc. -- those costs go up. >> i will make one observation. the congressional joint economic committee just recently came out with a report, and it looked at how well cost estimates had done on several of the programs in the past. the estimates on the front end of medicare and various other programs -- i believe the joint

economic committee's identification of the cost was that it underestimated in most every instance by anywhere from 1.6 all the way to -- all the way from 1 to 16. between that and 16 times underestimating, that is a huge risk of liabilities you are potentially going to take on. that is one element of adding that. >> thanks to all the panelists. all your publications as well as video on this event would be on our site at some point relatively soon, cis.org. thanks to everyone for coming.

[applause] calle[captions copyright nationl cable satellite corp. 2009] >> up next on c-span, three cabinet secretaries issue guidelines to businesses for dealing with an outbreak of a h1n1, swine flu. congressman gene taylor holds a town hall meeting in mississippi. and later, a panel discussion with former white house domestic policy advisers from five presidential administrations.

>> as the health care conversation continues, c-span pose a health care hub is a key resources. go on line and follow the latest tweets, video ads, and links. also keep up with town hall meetings, house and senate debates, and double your opinion with a citizen video. d.c.'s ban health care hub at c- span.org/healthcare. on tomorrow's washington journal, a look at town hall meetings with a usa today reporter. bing west previews tomorrow's presidential elections in afghanistan. washington journal begins at 7:00 a.m. eastern on c-span. secretary kathleen sebilius said

the government is expecting a swine flu outbreak later this year similar to the spring. she was at a briefing on the flip guidelines for employers and businesses. we will also hear from the commerce secretary gary locke and janet napolitano. this is 25 minutes. >> thank you all for joining us. the secretary of common security has spent months at the forefront of this administration's efforts to combat the h1n1 flu virus. i am pleased that they have joined us today to help businesses and employers prepare for what many experts believe to be an active flew season. we're also joined by rather admiral read from the center for

disease control. they will answer questions at the conclusion of our presentations. as all of you know, h1n1 is more than just a significant health issue. it has the potential to affect nearly every aspect of our lives from our economy to national security. it will take americans from every walk of life, all of us pulling together and doing our part to mount an effective response. businesses across the country from mom-and-pop businesses on main street to fortune 500 are counting on the federal government to convey accurate, reasoned information in a timely way. we already face much economic uncertainty. a flu outbreak is a very scary prospect.

the government has to get america prepared. the interagency effort you see is further evidence of that cooperation. but government cannot do it alone. for this effort to be successful, we need the business community to do its part. businesses play a key role in protecting employees health and safety as well as the negative impact of the economy and society. first, they need to set the right tone. if employees exhibit flew like symptoms, they should not come to work.

the cdc recommends that that employee be asked to go home. in america, we love to praise the puritan were affected -- work ethic. this fall, it was serve the country better to praise common sense and responsibility. from top to bottom, businesses need to drive home the point that if an employee stays home sick, it is not only the best thing for that employee's health, but also for the health of his or her co-workers and the productivity of the company. they will be able to develop smarter policies by staying in touch with their local health departments. in the lining their guidelines accordingly. that could mean anything from the basics, covering your mouth when you cough and sneeze.

developing sick leave policies that are flexible and on punitive also makes sense. some businesses require workers to provide doctors notes or other paperwork to prove that they or their loved ones had to miss work because of illness. that's a requirement that employers should consider dropping. it has the potential to overload of the health-care system that will likely be stressed during this year's flu season. the third thing that is absolutely essential for american businesses is thorough preparation. even if precautions are taken, some employees will likely get sick and parents may have to stay home with a sick child or even healthy children if a particular school is closed. that is why companies need to plan for the continuity of operations with a depleted work

force. plans should be put in place now to allow for the working and staggered shifts. employes should be cross trained to cover essential functions. in a flu outbreak become severe, companies may need to reduce face-to-face meetings or curtail non-essential travel to reduce the possibility of h1n1 flu transmission . we hope companies will not have to take these steps. but a little planning now will help insure that our economy withstands what ever the virus throws us this fall. if companies need more information on how to prepare, they can go to the federal website, www.flu.gov. the committee tool kit on how to prepare for and prevent an outbreak of the virus from

drastically affecting your business operations. now we would like to invite the secretary of hhs, kathleen sebilius to come up and talk about the steps that businesses can take to prevent employees from being sick and the first place. -- in the first place. >> is good to have the chance to join you today in league with my colleague in the flue fight, secretary napolitano. welcome to admiral redd, and secretary harass or with us today. i am pleased to be here to talk about the role that the private sector can play in preparation and mitigation of the flu outbreak.

this is a real shared responsibility. the federal government, as secretary locke said, we're looking -- we're working with our state and local partners to get ready for flu season. we really rely on the private sector to also work with us to make sure that americans are as safe and secure as possible. in terms of the steps that employers can take, secretary locke already talked about the employee policie then yous to be reexamined in terms of the flu. -- policies that need to be reexamined. there are a couple of steps that

are critically important. one is encouraging target populations to get their seasonal flu shots. seasonal flu vaccine will be ready, is ready in some places right now. it is certainly going to be widely available in september. encouraging employees to get that shot and get it out of the way is a good first step. as secretary locke has already said, the strategies involve hands and home. frequent hand washing and use of hand sanitizer, but also covering sneezes or coughs with a sleeve or an elbow, not your hand. and cleanliness will help stop transmission of germs. go home or stay held is the critical piece of this puzzle. we know that those are two

important ways to stop the transmission of the virus. the vaccine we know is one of the best strategy is to immunize the population against this brand new flu strain. getting employees prepared to receive the vaccine is important. the target population has been identified, and we hope that employers do some personal out reach to the target population who might be in their employment. pregnant women are particularly susceptible to the virus and should be strongly encouraged to be ready to get a vaccination once it becomes available. adults under 65 that have an underlying health condition, asthma, any kind of respiratory distress are in the target population. we want to make sure they're ready to be vaccinated.

and if employers have younger workers, the target population includes those who are six months up to age 24. i hope no one has children working in the shops on a regular basis, but certainly the 16 to 24 year-old to may be working full-time or part-time are a target population. i think employers can go along way to encourage those folks to get vaccinated. health-care workers are a critical target population. a lot of the private sector employers deal with health care workers either on a full-time or part-time basis. parents or guardians of infants under 6 months old. vaccination is not recommended for babies, but keeping parents or guardians, grandparents, foster parents of those kids vaccinated will help protect the baby.

having the employers assist us in getting the message out to those critical populations so that they are ready to get vaccinated -- we're working closely with scientists at the center for disease control and the fda. we're working actively to make sure that an h1n1 vaccine is as safe and effective as possible. we know that the health departments will be the best information source for regular information, and we anticipate the same kind of outbreak. in some areas, there may be a lot of the flu. staying in touch with the local health department is way too --

is a way to make a surer to monitor the response is very carefully. day-to-day changes are quite dramatic. human-resources and policies need to be as flexible as possible, and hopefully follow public guidance. guidance is 24 hours after the fever seizes -- ceases. that will vary from person to person. others may have a longer series. and also keep the workplace is as clean as possible.

frequent wiping down of surfaces which people are likely to touch, having a protocol in place. hand sanitizers and opportunities will help mitigate the spread of the flu during the flu season. again, the web site www.flu.gov has information, regular updates, so we hope people take a look at it. i would like to turn the podium over to secretary of, and security, janet napolitano. >> thank you, i do not have too much to add to the comments that you have already heard, but i like to emphasize a few themes.

one, protection from the flu is a shared responsibility. in all likelihood, a flu virus will be back on our shores -- it has never really left, but we are now going to see it reenergize with the beginning of the school year. that means, from a business perspective, planning is essential. what is being released is an assistance plan that maybe people and business, they're busy dealing with a very tough economy and may not have taken time to really think through what i have the flu season means. that is why we are issuing the systems for businesses so they don't have to start from scratch. they can take the document that secretary locke held up. think through this. it is not just seasonal flu,

that is why it is called seasonal flu, and those shots are available or will soon be available. encourage your employees to get their seasonal flu vaccine, but preparing for absenteeism for the virus. particularly in this time that we're in now, we are in that loose season foer h1n1 before te vaccine will become available. let's be proactive. we are being proactive at the level we are at, but we are now asking the business communities to be proactive, too. let me emphasize one part. that is businesses that controlled critical infrastructure to make sure that those operations continue, even

if you're absenteeism rate has to be high, either because an employee is sick or because they have to stay home with a sick child, i was down in the gulf coast and a meeting with leaders in the oil and gas industry there. a number of issues, but a key part was to guarantee and really make sure that they thought through. whatever needs to be done so that there is a continuation of operations at a critical business level at the supply chain level. and the department of, and security would continue over the next few weeks with that sort of out reach into the private sector as we have been doing all this summer. again, a few shared themes. this is a shared responsibility.

and encouragement to go ahead and get seasonal vaccine, if you're in the targeted category for that so that stressor on the health-care system is taken care of or is mitigated before the full facts of h1n1 arrives. and have a plan for absenteeism, and be responsible for the absenteeism that needs to occur with this new strain of the flu. and number four, will continue to work with critical infrastructure businesses in particular. the country needs to be prepared, but also needs to be resilient. thank you very much. i think some questions are in

order, but go ahead. any questions? yes, sir. say the war and which one of us who like to grill? >> this is a general growing. if the flu spreads despite these measures, are you prepared to put up more drastic guidelines such as encouraging businesses to close down branches to stop the spread of flu in that area? >> the key is for every business to put in place plans on how they would continue to operate with severely reduced work forces. so that is going to be up to every business on a case by case basis. they will have to decide for themselves what is the most economic, to shut down the

shift, and -- and assembly line, etc. it is impossible to come up with such a blanket statement. the key is to come up with flexible work policies and leave policies to plan for cross training, higher absenteeism, and to develop policies that, for instance, encourage employees to go home upon the first symptoms of flu. and to reduce the impact on the public health system, perhaps waiting policies that require notes and verification from medical personnel, because the medical community will be inundated tending to those who are sick and having to issue notes and verification that someone is sick or that someone else in the home is sick merely compounds -- merely compounds the problem.

>> we know this will change our regular basis. the centers for disease control is prepared and ready to issue up to guidance as situations change. again, we anticipate variants in local outbreaks. what may be happening in atlanta is not likely to be happening in seattle. local health department officials will be the best guide, but the guidance from cdc is based on what we're seeing right now, the recommendations for preparation in getting ready. we anticipate, as the floozies and unfolds and more outbreaks occur, her back guidance will be updated regularly. it will keep you posted as we did this spring as more outbreaks occurred. there were some school posters and areas. -- school closures in areas. it may change as the fall floozies and unfolds.

-- the fall flu season unfolds. >> first, there have been reports on how only a fraction of the doses ordered are actually going to make it here by november. i am wondering how concerned you are about that. how you fill in the gap? yet already put up guidelines related to schools. how does that apply the same the colleges and universities verses primary schools? how do address the difference? >> de school guidance for k-12 has been released. later this week, there'll be school guidance available for higher education. it is somewhat different, so stay tuned. that is in preparation right now in the final stages. i would like to have the admiral redd from the center for disease

control answer the specific vaccine question. my 30,000 foot view is that we are very much on target. we're working with five different manufacturers that are preparing, as we said, for a target date of about mid october for the production lines to begin. we never anticipated that all of the vaccine would be available day one. it would be on a rollout basis. i would like to call me at role to give you a very specific update. >> thank you, madam secretary. our intention with announcing the number of doses was really to reiterate that this was something that is evolving, to be as open as possible with what the actual situation is at this moment. there are efforts under way as we speak to increase the number of doses that are available to address the situation. i think the one thing we ought to expect is that as this

process goes forward, there will be fluctuations in those numbers. in terms of the impact on the date that vaccine will be available, there are only so many people you can vaccinate at once. as you go forward, the total number of doses will be the same. there may not be any difference at all in terms of the actual number that will be vaccinated the first weeks in october. >> any other questions? yes, go ahead. >> i had a question for admiral redd. i wonder if you could address for us the military dimensions of this, whether h1n1 poses any kind of national security threat. and are you aware of any mobilizations by any branches specific to this threat in the

recent days that have passed or that are to come? >> in terms of mobilization, it is that the level of interagency coordination at this point. we're working with the department of defense. there are issues in the military that are not in the civilian population. those are being courted across the departments. in terms of a specific national security threat, i think we are taking measures that -- and taking measures to help the health of the public. we are taking measures to minimize the impact that this illness will cause. >> any other questions? thank you all very much. .

a of a government computer security and how to defend against cyber attacks. >> tomorrow morning, a journal of health policy hosts a conference of the anti- government role and health care. you can watch live coverage on c-span2 beginning at 8:30 a.m. eastern with remarks from former surgeon generals. >> this fall, and to the home to

america's highest court from the grand public places to those only accessible by the nine justices. the supreme court, coming the first sunday in october on c- span. >> how c-span funded? >> in the u.s. government. >> the benefactors. >> i do not know. i think some of it is government raised. >> it is not public funding. >> donations. >> from my tax dollars. >> america's cable companies created c-span as a public service, and private business initiative, no government mandate, no government money. >> mississippi rep gene taylor hosts a town hall meeting to discuss the health care legislation and hurricane katrina. due to technical problems, we joined the meeting in progress.

this is an hour and 10 minutes. >> everyone is entitled to their own opinion. the fact of the matter is the debt has been growing a lot in our lifetime. we have to get a handle on it. is that the debt has been growing belote in my lifetime, and we have to get a handle on it. [inaudible] >> shut up and listen to the man. [applause] >> what i think everybody needs to remember is that a little over eight years ago, we were running annual operating surpluses. they were small. we still had an accumulated debt, but when george bush took office, we had a small annual operating surplus.

president bush, if you recall, when we had an opportunity to start paying the debt down, president bush said it does not make sense to pay down the debt prematurely, and therefore, we have to pay a premium on the debt that to prepay. we have calculated the amount of debt that the nation can pay off over 10 years and that is two trillion dollars. the national debt doubled during those eight years between a combination of katrina, the wars in iraq, but also the first president that i know of to cut taxes during a war. most other generation said let's

pay our bills now, and not stick our kids with our bills. [applause] some people have asked about the fair tax, or the so-called fair tax. back up. one more. a fair tax -- [shouting] >> we will get to your questions. the fair tax is billed as a 23% tax on everything. i would also remind you that there is still going to be a 7% tax for the state of mississippi, because that is how

the state gets over half of its revenue, and how the city gets 1% to help run the city. oh, i hope it came to listen, and i will listen to your questions. [applause] it is really a 30% tax, because if the after-tax cost is $100 and the item, 7 $7, with $23 in taxes, a $23 tax on $77 is a 30% tax. a 30% tax would not raise enough revenue to replace the current system. it would have to be at least 34%, even if there was no tax evasion.

the bush treasury department said the rate may have to be as high as 40% very how would this affect the typical mississippi family? if you are a married couple making $39,000, very modest, the current federal taxes are $5,600. under the fair tax, you would be taxed $14,000. you get a rebate of $6,000, leaving you with a fair tax - 3 date of seven dozen dollars. the $6,000 rebate, the fair tax- entitlement, $18,000. if you make $99,000 -- again,

this came from the bush treasury department. [booing] >> are you still there?

kenya regression more became you hear me? health care expenditures in america, hospital care -- this is total national spending on health care. our nation already spends $746 billion on health care, $508 billion on physician services. that is a lot of money. that is a lot of money.

federal government spends $810 billion on health care for the state and local governments spent 298 billion on health care. these are where your tax dollars physicians, 68 billion. insurance plans, 98 billion. prescription drugs, 490 billion. nursing homes, $24 billion. it illustrated expenses, 60 60

billion. where does this come from? revenues. payroll taxes. interest on the funds, $90 billion. texans are security, $11 billion. -- taxes on security, $11 billion. what is mississippi get all ready? nursing homes, $672 million. inpatient hospital care, $543 million. facilities for the mentally retarded, to wonder 7 $7 million. -- $277 million.

as i mentioned, we have one of the most favorable ratios of federal dollars to stay dollars for medicaid. for every 19 cents the state puts up, the federal government matches it with 81 cents. that means the federal government is putting up $2.5 billion to the takes -- to the state's 508 $5 million. what is the other factor we have to keep in mind? in addition to the cost of existing situation, we as a nation are getting old. when my dad was teenager, there were 20 working people for everyone retiree. right now there are three working people for every retiree. if i live to retirement age, there will be only two working people for every retiree, demographically, it does not any easier to pay these bills, it gets harder. that is why we need to think

wisely right now without running up the tab. in 1960, their only 1 million americans over 85. right now, it is close to 5 million people, and they are projecting a 2030 there will be close to 9 million americans over 85. it is this a simple, sad fact of life, as we get up in age, we will have higher bills. the last thing, again, because these are commonly asked questions, and then will vote your questions. i see my friend pat right now who is trying to build a hurricane proof house. he is probably paying enormous bills on that hurricane proof house. we are still working to have the

federal government let you buy when insurance as an option to your flood insurance. a great many of you came to my town hall meeting shortly after the storm and said i got screwed by my insurance company. they did not give me a dime. the only people that paid me or my federal flood insurance, my home owners -- what did that mean when they denied a claim? it meant that somebody had to pick up the difference, and that somebody was our nation. i did not make the promise. george bush made the promise, i am glad he did. [applause] george bush stood in jackson square and said if you lost your home and you need a place to stay, which are going to get to a fema trailer. the fema trailers cost about $15,000, about the market price to buy, but one of the

president's big contributors@@@v we are already paying that bill. i think that people ought to pay for the bill in the future. minyas discovered that i never could it turned them been paying a quarter of a million dollars. with the bidding for contractors it happen there is only two under the thousand dollars limit on it. we want to get the amount to the purchase up.

if the bill here house trright, you are going to get paid. pager premium, you come back the day after the storm in your house is gone, you will get paid. you do not have to hire an engineer. with that did not happen last time and we want to make sure it happens next time. we have talked about some things that are commonly asked. we will go ahead and let you ask questions, one at a time. let me do one last thing. i have a number of my staffers with me here tonight. going back to what normally happens, should anyone here have a social security problem, a veterans' problem, a medicare or medicaid problem, something that involves you and you want to talk to one of my staffers, i have people here so you can look someone in the face and give

them information. we have ms. peggy r. be in black, bowed jackson -- bo jackson, bob carson, so does anyone have an individual problem they need some help with? raise your hand. ma'am, do you have an individual problem? peggy, can you talk to this lady? bob gerson and billy r. my two veterans experts. bob, we take his information, please? is it an individual problem?

bo, will you talk to that lady in the green t-shirt back there. anybody else? social security. miss harvey is wearing the black coat here. in the black and white jacket, do you have a question, sir? ok, we will start with you, ma'am.

>> we cannot hear. >> george county, mississippi. i did not vote for president obama. i was not real happy with mccain. i am not happy with president bush, the way he spent money. and not happy with obama, the way he is spending money, but i did support gene taylor. the last 25 years, he has cared about mississippi, and he listens about mississippi. there are a lot congressman up there that are shutting the doors. they are not listening to us. they are calling us mobs. we are not mobs in mississippi.

we are not mobs in mississippi. but my question is, as a staff auditor, i have not seen the federal government made one attempt to clean up one messe. [applause] i have not seen them clean up the sec. in run should not have happened. people should not have lost their retirement. -- enron should not have happened. we have enough regulations to stop that, but it is not happening. there is too much going on that is not being checked. if you cannot clean up a little, how can you take away all our health care that we pay for? [applause]

>> we will start in reverse order. number one, i would hope by now that everyone in this room is aware that i am not going to vote for the health-care plan. [applause] we will take them in reverse order. >> i did not mean you. >> quite honestly, it goes back to that 11 trillion dollars of debt, the fact that the medicare trust fund will collect enough money between now and 2017 to continue to make its annual operating expenses. but come 2017, because of that retiring population, because of medical inflation, because of

the prescription drug benefit that i did not vote for and other things, we will no longer be collecting enough to pay the bills. three things we can do that just make perfect, common sense. number one, the insurance industry was given a one-year exemption from antitrust laws in 1946. they are still exempt from antitrust laws. that is crazy. that not only affects your wind and homeowners insurance, it affects your health care. mark has to compete with other shrimp packers. they have to compete as well. on the medicare prescription drug benefit that voted against, there was a provision that actually prohibited our nation from using our huge purchasing power from getting a better deal from the pharmaceutical companies. that is crazy. when home depot and lowe's by step, they get the best price because they buy so much. if one of the vice 10 cars a year, you'll get a better deal

than someone who buys one car. that is just the way it works. it is crazy for nation not to get the best price. that provision was included in the medicare prescription drug benefit by a guy who left congress to go to work for farcical manufacturers. -- for a pharmaceutical manufacturers. something we should do to give you a better deal for your tax dollars, remove the anti-trust exemption, number two, take out that language and let our nation negotiate for better prices. the third thing is generics. i am fortunate to have a chemist/for merck pharmaceutical manufacturer on my staff. -- former pharmaceutical manufacturer. he has explained to me very clearly that generics are just about the exact same thing you would buy if you by the name brand stuff, only it is a lot less money.

for example, many of you have heard of cialis. it has been around for a while, so the patent on it has expired. we checked with the drug store across from my office. right now that are selling cialis for 50 cents a tablet. but the one that they advertise on television, in every one of dad's they say tell your doctor you need this. cialis-cr is $5 a tablet. a thousand pardons -- ambien,

not cialis. just chalk that up to an old man. [laughter] ambien is 50 cents a tablet. ambien-cr is $5 a tablets. for the things we buy with your money, we have to get the best price. if someone absolutely has to have the name brand, let them pay the difference. those are three things that we as a nation can be doing right now, we ought to be doing this fall to stretch your tax dollars. the second thing is, a lot has been made of court reform. the mississippi state legislature has addressed that, and i have not heard many doctors -- i cannot think of the doctors complaining about tort

reform in the past couple of years. it should be done on a state-by- state basis. i voted for tort reform and i was a state legislator. i have voted for it in washington. what we need now is insurance reform to go on top of that. she made some great points. unfortunately, if you remember back in 1999, congress passed something that repealed something that anyone my age would remember which was called glass-steagall. in high school, that only taught me three bills, but they stuck with me. glass-steagall was one those three, because what it said was that the banks cannot take your deposits and go gamble with them on wall street. that law was passed right after the depression because banks were gambling with people's deposits on wall street. they lost that money. those people lost everything, and the banks walked away scot-

free. so in the 1930's congress passed a very good law called glass- steagall, which said banks cannot gamble with your money on wall street. it came up in 1999. they said with all the great accountants out there, with all the great electronics we have out there, we do not need that anymore. i voted against that. i thought glass-steagall made sense for 60 years and i thought it should have stayed on the books. interestingly enough, bill clinton and republican house and senate were all in on it. to his credit, the president of the biggest bank in self mississippi, he has passed on, but he called me up shortly after that and said we wanted you to vote for that. i said mr. leo, you are a

conservative guy. your bank does not need to be gambling on wall street. he thought for a second and said you are right. the bank prides itself on saying on signs out front, bailout, no thanks. waterboard going to do? -- what are we going to do? we need to pass something like glass-steagall this fall, put it back on the books, so that banks get back to their core business of banking, and investment firms do what they do, which is investments. did not mix the two. if you want to gamble, go gamble, but if you one is money to be say, it needs to be safe in the bank. the jeep you want your money to be safe. i am recognizing one at a time. i will get you, james.

-- how will get to you, james. >> i am richard comrade from laurell. i know we have had this discussion before. in the past couple of years or the past six months, we have had the stimulus bill rammed down our throats, cap and trade ramps for congress, spending bills shove down our throats. >> and i guess you know i voted >> and i guess you know i voted against all >> we are going to see who the candidates are. if the two candidates last time, one came to south mississippi and said she would help with our insurance. the other didn't bother to come down here. that is true. let's do this.

i appreciate you coming. i had folks coming to me afterward and saying i'm from a certain time and at a chance to talk. why do not you say something? i travel so people do not have to. were you on the bus? >> i'm a conservative just like you. i am a republican. i appreciate all the things you do for self mississippi. s you do for self mississippi. everybody in here should.

i do not have a question. i have a point i want to make. i have a nephew who lives in new zealand. new zealand is under national health care. he is 16 years old. he had rotator cuff injury on his shoulder. it took him nine months, nine months in a sling to get a doctor's appointment. his family, under national health care, had to pay half the cost of eight $40,000 operation. if you folks want nationalized health care of that nature -- >> again, i am not for the obama health care plan. >> i know you are not. i appreciate that. >> i appreciate your comment.

>> medicare fraud is absolutely outrageous. [applause] we had a local incident of medicare fraud here in moss point. if someone would just take the time to look at all the cheating and fraud that is going on, there is no telling how many trillions of dollars that could be saved. [applause] >> mike, that is the list of all the waste and fraud hot lines. we have a copy of that by each of the doors. we are not a police state, my. we cannot be everywhere. if you are a concerned citizen and you are aware of it and i am

not, then i would ask you as a concerned citizen who knows the circumstances -- >> i know that this lady in moss point was cheating the government [unintelligible] >> that is why we have the waste, fraud, and abuse hot line up there for you. >> i found out about it afterwards. >> again, if you see it happening, that is why they let them. i am not omniscient. if you see something that i don't, please, as a good citizen, take the time to make that call. [unintelligible] [applause]

[shouting] >> sir, i have been a democrat for 28 years since i first ran for city council. i would think of vote as an american. -- i vote as an american. [applause] sir, i would remind you that several people were on the ballot last november, a presidential candidate, to senators and myself, and i am very grateful that i got more votes than them. [unintelligible] >> i am neither a republican nor a democrat. >> i am glad to hear that.

[applause] >> i would like to reiterate what this lady asked just a minute ago. every time we turn around, we are fighting to save some of our freedoms. the government is getting bigger and bigger and bigger, and taking more and more, and frankly, we are done with it. >> can i ask you to be specific? >> ok, health care. i did not want you messing with my health care. i pay $700 a month for my health care, the best in the world. i do not want somebody registering my guns. i know you have taken a good stand on guns, but we are having to fight for it. keep going. i don't want any more government, none. i do not want a noti.d. -- i do not want a national i.d.

[applause] . . >> [inaudible] >> can you step to the hall so i can see you prov? >> to the person that can afford $700 a month for insurance, i can appreciate that you can.

if you would like millions of americans who have lost their jobs and no longer have $700 a month to pay for insurance, these are people that have to be considered also. they are all real americans. [cheers and applause] [boo's] >> folks, out of courtesy to your fellow citizens, if you like what they have to say, clap for them. if you don't like what they have to say, don't clap for them. we are all entitled to our opinions and to wheat -- and we do not have to be doing our fellow americans opinions. are you from here?

>> the first thing that i wanted to know it is when tarp legislation was passed the worst time. it was 3:00 in the morning. i am told that parts of that bill were put in in just before it was voted. did you vote yes? >> i voted no, sir. both of the presidential candidates did vote for it. >> what about cap and trade? >> i voted against cap and trade also, sir. i think it is a ponzi scheme. >> do you accept pac money? >> yes, i do from the local shipyard. >> from local money? >> most all of them have a local

interest. >> read the 10th amendment carefully. >> believe me, as a former state senator and councilman, there probably is not anyone in this room that better anders stands how much i want cities to do their job, states to do their job, and we are here to back them up when they need us. on a day-to-day basis, we need them doing their jobs. man, are you from here? >> [inaudible] >> who else is from moss point? how about the gentleman over here with the polka dots blue tie? >> [inaudible] >> we will get to you.

yes, ma'am. >> gene? i am a resident but and the president of moss point naacp. i realize that the current health care proposal may have some problems, and you are not going to vote for it, but i think there may be alternatives on the table. is there any way that there is an alternative that you would consider the hard-working mississippian do not have proper coverage? there are so many of us who do not have proper coverage. if there is a compromise that is reached, would it provide the service that would provide the coverage that this country should provide. would you consider supporting

that type of measure? [cheers] >> folks, expect york -- respect your fellow citizens. number one, 46 cents out of every health care dollar total. it is either federal money, state money, or local money, so almost half of the bill right now is tax money. medicare is scheduled to quit collecting enough to pay its bills come 2017. i think it is more important right now to keep the promises we have already made by getting congress on things like prescription drugs, taking away the insurance company's antitrust exemption, and finding, the [unintelligible]

i have made new promises. the reason that you are eligible from the day you join the service is because of me. [applause] that was my fight, and we won. if you are retired military, the reason you have health care is because of me. i shut down the house of representatives. i have done quite a bit too expand health care. when you and i were kids, the only americans who were promised health care where our military. when you and i were kids, there were charity hospitals. then around the 1960's, medicare and medicaid. then we expanded military health care to keep the promise that we may to guys like henrico. if he served 20 years, we would pay his health care bills for

the rest of his life. with $11 trillion worth of debt, i just don't know where the money is going to come from. i don't want to get our nation and the further into debt. you asked a great question. [applause] are you from here, sir? >> [inaudible] >> walk through the aisle. then we will get to you, mitch. >> [inaudible] >> i will get to that. i will get to you. >> as a follow-up to carly's question, i am concerned they may make little changes in the

proposed bill and representatives and senators that hav made their mind up not to vote for it currently may change their mind and vote for it with some little changes. one thing i am concerned about is the public option versus the cooperative option. it is my concern that under the public auction, private enterprise cannot compete with big government. it seems lately that any time the government needs more money these days, they just start printing more out of thin air or wherever. >> and not put the chase my boat based on any small questions. i'm not going to vote for it. i told you the three things i am for that i am hoping will do

right now. >> i believe you, but i am afraid -- kathleen sibelius' said that the demonstration was going to drop the public auction and change to the co-op option. i am concerned that it will change some representatives. >> i understand your concern. i do not mean to cut you off. it is not one to change my mind. i told you what i am for. that is what i'm going to do. the question was asked of me, what is the difference between this and wind insurance. there is a huge difference. if we have a plan that allows you to buy wind insurance as a voluntary option, it has to pay for itself. it will not increase the national debt. not increase the national debt.

it has to be done in a way that is balanced. when we collect premiums, we will pay the cost that goes out on its annual basis. you are really spreading the risk. in mississippi, for those who say they do not want the government in the wind insurance, the government is in the wind insurance. the state has 8 $6 billion exposure. the state general fund budget is only $6 billion. if we have a terrible storm, it could bankrupt the state. if you spread it around coastal america, you are spreading the risk. the chance of those coastal communities getting hit is not going to happen. you can ride advertisements saying don't let this happen to you. great question, and that is the difference. >> [inaudible] >> great question.

the health-care bill even with the changes that a couple of guys would be able to get out of would cost the nation $900 in new tax dollars or $900 billion in new debt. we don't have that kind of money. does anyone up here have a question? mayor, would you like to introduce the council? just quickly. >> yes, we are going to start to my left. mr. tommy hightower, ward five. we have our jackson county supervisor milton harris. we have houston cunningham, our at large member. this surely chambers, ward 4.

ms. ruby heel, ward 2. >> thank you. if anyone has a question after the meeting, i would be more than happy to meet with you. >> what is the difference to spending billions of dollars providing health care for everybody, and we are spending billions of dollars on a war that we should not have been in. what is the difference? >> again, i don't know if you heard it, the question is what is the difference between that and the war. it is a very fair question, and they are both expensive. i did vote to send us to war in afghanistan. i voted us -- i voted to send us to war in iraq. [applause]

both of those wars are extremely expensive. both, in terms of your tax dollars, but more importantly in terms of those lives. guys like johnny pope who were buried on saturday. several people, major green from this community. we are in it. at this point, we have to see it through. i do believe we will be out of iraq by august. i just had a high-level meeting with general john kelly, marine corps three-start last week. he is convinced we will be out of their. unfortunately, afghanistan is going to be a mess for a while

to come and it is going to be expensive. i think we need to get there, kill those people that need to be killed, make peace with those that are willing to make peace with us, and come home. [applause] that is a very fair question, sir. are you from here, sir? >> originally i read an article in florida. my name is pat macdonald. there was an article in one of the magazines about an investigation into the medicare problem in florida. they looked at 1700 medical providers, medical equipment, durable equipment. 114 out of 1700 were fraudulent. i talk to my doctor last week before my wife had her back operation. he spent about 30 extra minutes

with us. he has reported to medicare on six occasions in the last six months fraud. nobody ever from medicare ever contacted him back. >> do you see that young lady right there? >> [inaudible] if the congress and the house of representatives would make fraud charges equal to what bernard madoff got, and send them to jail forever, this problem would stop [inaudible] >> his observation was on fraud, and i will remind you that at the doors, we have hot lines for all of the fraud and abuse lines.

if you see it, is your money. if you want to save your money, turn them in. i promised the former state representative behind you. >> congressman, thank you for coming. once this war is over with, veterans like myself in the state of mississippi and across this nation, are you committed to not cut our benefits in support us 100% like we have supported the united states? [applause] [cheers and applause] match, my job right now is to keep the promises that we have already made including our promises to our veterans.

that is why i am not making any new promises. it is expensive. carl, i don't want to dwell on it because i consider this man a friend. it is just a gift of god that he lived. he was in the hospital for years. he can walk and he can talk. when i first saw him, i never dreamt any of this things would happen, b it comes at a price. we are going to have a price to take care of him and his boy until that man is an adult, and we will keep those promises, mitch. [applause] >> i have several questions. >> how about one in fairness to everyone else? >> ok. illegal immigration. back in the 1980's, i lived up

in new jersey. on the way to atlantic city, there were illegal immigrants working at gas stations. they would have people, nine in 10 of them, living in the back of the gas stations. you called up immigration's a customs, did you know what they said? they said you are violating their privacy. >> on immigration, there is a bill that does a couple of things. i am a co-sponsor of that bill. an additional 8000 border patrol agents to secure the borders. secondly, and equally as importantly, if you think about it, they come here to work. americans go to mexico to goof off. [shouts]

>> so if you take away their ability to work, they quit coming. how do you do that? [shouts] so how do you do that? if they can find out can legally buy a gun, we have a system now in place. it is called e-verify, where a potential employer instantaneously can check to see if that potential employees is here legally. number one. no. 2 is if he knowingly hired an illegal alien, we throw the book at him. you take away the incentive to hire illegal aliens. third they, it starts with each and every one of us. like many of you, i lost my house. i had to rebuild my house.

i don't know how many of you, every contractor i dealt with, i said he will have an all american crew on my property. some of them would say that they are all here legally. i don't care. they are going to be american citizens. i paid a third more for my roof to get an all american crew. number one, it starts with each and every one of us. throw the book at those people who knowingly hire illegal aliens. because of some high-profile raids that of already taken place in mississippi, i am noticing a lot less of what i suspect to be illegal aliens right now. [shouting] >> [inaudible]

>> i am not from moss point. i have an observation followed up by a question. you are a conservative and you regularly oppose your party on voting issues. why do you remain the party of nancy pelosi and harry reid and all of these people who continue to make us feel like we have to fight for our american freedoms? [cheers and applause] >> weaken both the stereotype. in the past couple of weeks, there have been three very high- profile republicans that got caught with their mistresses. i am not going to stereotype.

i am in a party with a navy admiral, a navy corporal. my good friend jim marshall is in the ranger hall of fame. it does not make me any of those things, but i am proud to be there with those people. i am pro-life. >> did you say that you work with this bill -- >> i am sorry, one at a time. >> did you say you were working on this bill with schumer on this immigration thing? >> schuler. by the way, heath schuler came in second in the heisman trophy, but that does not make me a great quarterback. >> let's talk about schumer for a minute. >> he is a senator out of new york. >> he is planning to ram through

this health care bill with a vote of 50. can you fight against that for us in mississippi? >> sir, i regret that i am going to have to ask you to repeat your question. i could not hear it. >> he has threatened to ram this >> he has threatened to ram this health care bill with a v is there any way you can bite him from doing this? >> the answer is, yes. he is in the senate. i'm in the house. i do not think this will become law. i'm sorry to have to be so much banks. other representatives are hearing similar things. i do not think they will vote for it come september. i am a representative. he is in the senate. what happens in the senate, you

need to contact our two senators. >> i have been ob/gyn for 20 years. i want to emphasize that health care is not -- when you are a sick patient, health care is not in your interest to be run by a big business with the bottom- line profit. when you look at the demonstrations of government-run programs, medicaid and medicare, as minister costs are about 3 cents on the dollar. others are up 20 cents on the dollar. when you say you are conservative any support being and not in front of your health care run by bureaucrats, you wanted being run by some big corporate board that could care

less. . . . [cheers and applause] >> #1, and thank you for what you do. we lost a lot of doctors after the storm. thank you for being here. you don't hear me that nothing you don't hear me that nothing medi d. we can do a better job. you have heard me say that we need to bring two -- we need to bring true competition. they are exempt from it. one of the reasons why they can charge that much, doctor, and i don't believe you can do this or think you could call the others and say let's charge this much money, or call them up to say -- no, you can't. but they can.

it is perfectly legal for the insurance companies to call each other up and say let's raise prices and cut coverage. you take alabama, you take louisiana, i will take mississippi. that has to change. that is one of the first things i want to get done when we come back. i hope a lot of people will ask the same question that you are asking. the insurance lobby is a powerful lobby. i think it is starting to dawn on people that they should not be exempt from the antitrust laws. when trent and i got together after the hurricane, we started to compare horror stories. quite honestly, he did not know they were exempt from the antitrust laws. he knows it now. it is one of those things that we need to get the word out on.

again, thank you for what you do. [applause] >> we met several times at different town hall meetings. >> folks, give daryl a chance. >> i would like to address my concerns dealing with the waste that you have up here ther. there was a plant -- >> i missed the name of the company. >> it was shut down by the epa a couple of years ago. they promised to clean up the area. all the citizens that lives in moss point were able to apply for some type of compensation benefit plan due to the waste in the cleanup process. a lot of them went out and got attorneys cannot fill out paperwork.

-- attorneys, filled out paper work. i want to know what has become of that plan that was agreed upon with the epa. >> the answer is, i don't know. if you give us your information, we will try to find out for you. you of the first one that has asked me that question in about 10 years. >> [inaudible] >> i think it has been a pretty good while. if you get me that information, we will find out for you. how about this lady over here, billy? >> speaking of medicare -- >> would you say your name? >> there was a bill that was passed that a house foreign

doctors to come in and be educated and become a doctor. medicare pays full amount for their education and their stake here in the united states. that bill should be repealed. it is taking money out of medicare for these foreign doctors to come over here and be educated. most of them don't go home. >> i don't know that to be true. >> i have the bill that was sent to me by another congressman a. i left it at home. >> i don't know if that is true. it does not sound right. to the best of my knowledge, the only people that are getting their medical education paid for our people that agree to serve in the military. i think the rest of them take

out loans. >> there are a lot of foreign doctors here that have been educated in the united states. i think most of them were educated by medicare. >> i don't think that is to but we will look into it. how about the lady in purple? billy, can you get to that lady? >there is five more minutes. we can get into more questions. the mayor has spent a small fortune on police. we are going to honor her request that we are going to wrap this up at 7:30. we want to get many of this police back to their families. yes, ma'am? >> i reside in hurley. just a couple of remarkshat i

would like to make. the people in rural areas of our county recently lost some of our rights. when we feel like we are starting to lose them at the federal level, it is like adding insult to injury. people are a little fired up. >> could you be specific to what you think? >> what i feel like is that we are not having offer input as to what is happening to our health care. many other things, but i will not go into all of them. i would appreciate it if you would take a message back to us. we appreciate what you are doing for us. you have voted in a conservative manner. if you would take the message back to washington for us, that we are not idiots. we are not in the business of

name calling. we would appreciate if our leaders would spend more time paying attention and reading the bills that they are passing instead of calling us names. [cheering and applause] >> ok. thank you. thank you for the way you said it. i very amok -- i very much appreciate what he said. we are going to wrap this up. this gentleman is wearing a united states marine corps hat. >> first and last, i would like to congratulate you for facing all of us. if you want my vote, you will have to do more than voting against. i want you to go back to

washington and tell them how angry our fellow americans are. [cheers and applause] >> ok. come on. last one. ok, one last marine. i promised the police that they could get back to their families. >> most people around here call me buddy. there are a few things i would like to ask. let's talk about veterans. everybody in here, if you were a marine, and i have always been a marine, but when you in the 1960's, 1970's joined, they told you you would have it for life.

if you were not signed up by january 3, 2003, you will not get one penny unless you make less than $16,000 and only less than $3,000 worth of property. >> buddy, i think you are wrong. >> i am not wrong. >> body, we have bob person here tonight. he is going to get your information. >> i am trying to help somebody else. >> we have had the largest expansion of veteran benefits in the nation's history. they turned >> planning on attending a town hall meeting and had a video camera? you can hear your video on c- span. go to the web site for details.

coming up on c-span, former white house policy advisers discussed how presidents formulate domestic policy. then all but a government computer security and defending against cyber attacks. and the center for immigration studies hosted a discussion on the effect of immigrants on health care system. -- on the health care system. tomorrow morning, a conference looking at the government role on health care for you could watch live coverage on c-span2 beginning at 8:30 a.m. eastern with remarks from former surgeons general c. everett coop and others. dollars this fall, into the home

to america's highest court, from the grand public places did those only accessible by the nine justices. "the supreme court," coming the first sunday in october on c- span. >> how is c-span funded? >> the u.s. government. >> i do not know. i think some of that is the government raised. >> it is not public funding. >> probably the nation's. >> i would say from me, from my tax dollars. >> how is c-span funded? america's cable companies created c-span as a public service, a private initiative -- no government mandate, no government money. >> in june, the miller center brought together policy at pfizer's from and nixon, carter, reagan, and george w. bush administrations for this discussion about how policy decisions are made in the white house. this is about an hour and a

half. >> it is my pleasure to welcome here -- welcome you here on the symposium on the white house domestic policy. you had been here before as part of our other projects on individual administrations. we welcome you back. for many of you, this is the first time and we're happy to have you here on this occasion. the presidential history program here at the miller center began doing intensive oral history interviews of administration's and the leadership of my colleague, jim young, in the aftermath of the carter administration. we have had interview projects

on presidents carter, reagan, george h. w. bush, clinton, and we look forward to doing work on george w. bush. we had in past years conducted two similar symposiums to the one we have organized a day. one on the white house congressional relations operation and another on presidential speechwriting. the art two great virtues to this type of forum. the first is that this is an opportunity for those of you who have helped decisions of cross administration's to sit together and reminisce about a lessons and experiences that you came by during your years in the white house. although we feel that there are important things that scholars can learn from individual administrations, it is equally true that there is great virtue

and having great democrats and republicans, the various people from various administrations, having the opportunity to talk about these issues. that is the one great deference, the ability to cross party lines for ideas. the second major difference is that when we do individual interviews as part of our project, those interviews are done under a veil of confidentiality. that is in order to ensure candor in the interview. they're there for inaccessible to scholars or journalist were students of american policy. the second great virtue of doing this kind of work is that we're able to do this in an open forum, the precedents are being simulcast on the miller center's web site, and we also have the good fortune of having c-span television here. this will pass we expand our audience to people interested in the kinds of questions that we will be dealing with here today. so to summarize again, the great

virtues are that we have multiple administration experience and we can do this in a way that allows us to inform public debate now. it is with great pleasure that i turn of the moderation to my colleague, michael nelson. professor nelson told the faculty position at rhodes college, but has -- but is also a non resident senior fellow here at the miller center, has worked with me on notable interviewers, and has proved to be a splendid interviewer as well as teacher and author. i recall having seen on a web site within the last year or so a list of the top 15 academic publications, and if my recollection is right, four of those top 15 volumes were father

authored or edited by you. we're happy to have you at that table and we are also delighted to have you as the moderator for this meeting. thank you all again for being here. >> thank you, russell. we are enormously pleased to have this gathering here in the room and also through the miller centers website and three c-span, the larger audience of people interested in public affairs. this is a gathering similar to one that we have last year that was also broadcast on c-span. it brought together former white house officials, last year speech writers, does your people from domestic policy offices, as well as scholars that study what they do at their institutions. to simply talk about what it is like working on domestic policy in the white house. as russell pointed out, we have people here from the nixon administration through the second bush administration.

there are four sessions altogether. this is one of them. look at c-span and the miller center web site to see when the others will be available. our theme for the next 90 minutes is what happens in the transition from campaigning for president, making a number of promises and pledges, responding to a variety of questions about policy issues, and then actually after winning the election, proceeding to the office or like president four becoming president and having to take into account what you said in the campaign with what you actually can do, need to do, or pressure to do as president. and what a distinguished group of former white house domestic policy people we have here to help us do that. i will introduce first the person who work not only for jimmy carter as deputy assistant

for domestic affairs, but also was legislative counsel for senator walter mondale became vice president in the carter ministration. after years of working in cable television in one important capacity after another, he is currently vice chairman of the firm of williams and jensen. the second person i will introduce is not here yet but who will be joining us on route from london during this 90 minute program. this is stewart eisenstaedt, all part of the carter administration and later part of the clinton administration. he was domestic policy adviser to president carter but the entirety of his service in office. he also served during the clinton administration as u.s. ambassador to the european union, as well as in other capacities. recently he has been working in the area of holocaust issues,

restitution and so on. he has written a very west -- a very well-received book on this subject, "imperfect choices." the third member of our panel will be participating in the discussion during the session. bruce reed. he currently is president of the democratic leadership council, up famously serve al gore as a key speech writer when gore was in the senate, 1985-1989. he became a part of the clinton-bork campaign in 1992, serving as deputy campaign manager for policy. and then for all eight years of clinton's presidency, he served as domestic policy adviser, and is particularly associated with the reforms in the area of

welfare. and finally, a republican in this group, margaret spellings, who in terms of this conference imparted her service that is that great as rollins -- she is bruce reed's successor in the george w. bush white house as domestic policy adviser during the first term. she later went on to be appointed and confirmed as secretary of education. in both jobs, she worked very closely in the development and enactment and implementation of the new child left behind at. at this point, i will turn things over to the gentleman to my immediate right who is going to conduct a discussion. that is my great friend and colleague, andrew busch. andy, this is a homecoming of sorts. he earned his doctorate in government from the university of virginia. he has gone on to do great

things, in the oval things from the standpoint of admiring him. -- enviable things from the standpoint of admiring him. he is at claremont mckenna college, and he is the author of 11 very well received those, most recently "an epic journey -- the elections of 2008 and american politics, a" along with his mentor. it is a wonderful book. it has nothing to do with the subject of this conference but it is a wonderful book. that will cost you $1,000. [laughter] and the bush, is your time to shine. >> thank you all for coming. the theme of this particular panel is moving from campaigning to government in domestic policy.

this could be thought of narrow late, just as the transition period from elections through an operation. it makes much more sense to think about this more broadly, more in terms of the question of how you turn what the campaign talks about into policy after january 28. and more generally, how does the campaign at that domestic policy after january 20. i will ask a few general questions and there could be specific follow-ups to the individuals who are the main participants. and then halfway through, we will open it up to anybody else at the table. that is how we will proceed with this. just by way of a very brief introductory comment, it seems that there are several ways to approach this are several plans to think about. what sort of context is established for domestic policy by the campaign in a general way?

the second is, how does campaign rhetoric about domestic policy translate into the sort of thing that the president talks about as president? or does it? what kind of continuity is are there rhetorically and not when it comes to talking about domestic policy? and the third thing is appointments. how does commitment to the president's campaign agenda translate into appointments in the domestic round, and what other factors come in? and then there is policy-making itself, in terms of executive orders and the legislative agenda, particularly in terms of how you go about targeting the first executive orders, setting the legislative priorities to try to fill the campaign agenda, and what other sorts of things get crowded in debt move some of the campaign agenda may be out of the

picture? starting with the general context, my first question is, during the transition and early stages of presidency, to what extent were policy discussions influenced by the president's domestic policy commitments during the campaign? and what other sorts of factors came into disrupt some of that? and that is just a general question to the people at the head of the table. >> i will jump in. and clinton's experience, we traded the campaign promises -- we treated the campaign promises as gospel. that was the only scripture to guide as. -- to guide us. he loved all aspects of politics but he left the policy part of that bet.

if you that running for president was the ultimate job interview. -- his view was that running for president was the ultimate job interview, and campaign promises were the terms of his contract. when we got to washington, that is not how even some in our party had followed the campaign and listen to what he said but weren't necessarily convinced that everything he had promised was a good idea. there was an enormous amount of back and forth and a lot of pressure from people who were not part of the campaign in our own party to selectively etiquette -- selectively at the campaign promises. -- aedit the campaign promises. i am sure the market had the same experience. that was our strongest weapon in

internal debates within the administration, and in debates with congress, was to be able said, this is what the president promised. we have to keep his promise. that is a hard main for our president's allies to dismiss. >> i absolutely concur. i still travel with my "renewing america's purpose informix at -- i still travel with my "renewing america's purpose." it even inform the second campaign. it was the practice in our party, particularly to the extent that he had talked about things, being a different kind of republican that not everybody on my side of the i was while late tuesday asked about, compassionate conservatism, education, immigration, faith based initiatives, all those

things that were a little bit of aid to it. not only did they inform our work but we knew that we had to get them done quickly. when i see president obama tackling health care right away, i see a lot of the similarities. his popularity is as high as it's ever going to be, and that is probably the case generically. that is the time to do it that things that are most difficult to do. to the extent that there were specifics and that lays out a series of principles or ideas or a core philosophy or orthodoxy, which i believe the president's thinks it had a guiding affect into multiple iterations. said those keystones continue to inform -- so those keystones continue to inform our one and you throughout the administration.

-- our dewpoint -- viewpoint throughout the administration. >> i was the one pick to do an incremental approach and the meeting did not go well. the presidential campaign is a huge effort, a huge labor, but these guys are very much listen to what they say. by that time they have said them for robert two years, they believe them. [laughter] we had a net book that was personally edited by the president, a set of campaign promises, and it was absolutely sacrosanct. at the same time, carter was the kind of -- more even than those

to talk him -- and insurgent candidate. i worked in the senate. we had another candidate in something happened to him. and he ran against washington and he had a very difficult time, i think, making his agenda fit with their agenda. it never really did work out. if i can say one thing, i think he did a tremendous favor to his successors. we lost a ton of senate seats women lost in 1980 that nobody -- george nelson, george mcgovern, they had been there for a long time. members of congress began to realize that if things don't work out for their president, it

just might not work out for them. i think there has been much more of a driven effort to work these things out, because there is a fear factor there that i think was not there until that unpleasant experience. >> it is a given, i think, that to come in and do your best to pursue the plan that is put out in the president's campaign. cases will rise when that is not possible. i do you have to back off or sometimes you have to backtrack and reverse yourself. when those cases came, how much discussion was there about the problems caused by the fact that this was a campaign commitment, as opposed to other policies.

was that a central part of the discussion? >> my experience is that it buried by degree. -- get varied by degree. particularly those that worked in the campaign setting, the worm must haves and things that were nice to have. on the must tabshaves, the worst created around a set of principles, everybody knew what they were. everything else was up for grabs. those -- there are two scorecards. one is what is so integral to the president for one example, no child left behind. all the stuff we stole from the dlc. just kidding. that's how we got 87 votes for it in the senate.

all the things that were less important and ultimately did go by the wayside. they go by the wayside because of various ensuing events like 9/11, because of budget issues, and on and on. but there are only two groups of issues and test type of context. >> and i think, those of us in the white house are not the only ones paying attention, obviously. the day that we took office, the "washington post" ran a full- page list of every major promise that we had made. i put it up on my wall, and as martin suggested, i had a separate list of the ones that i thought were essential. but even in the transition before we had taken office, whenever there was i can that we were going to deviate in any possible way, it was front-page news. and in fact, i can remember

people who had not been on the campaign leaking that we would break a campaign promise long before there was a decision, because i thought it would increase their leverage. we already had all reputation for breaking campaign promises, but that indian we did not break. -- but that in the and we did not break. -- in the end we did not break. we were coming in at the tail end of a recession. it turned out to be a lot larger than he anticipated. that forced him, in order to keep the campaign promises that he made, it forced him to propose a budget painful cuts that he would not otherwise have

done. he was not bombed out by this at all actually. when we tell them, we were all terrified about breaking the bad news. that the country have had half as much money as we anticipated, but he thought it would be an interesting challenge, trying to balance the federal budget and keep his campaign promises at the same time. and it actually was the discipline-forcing mechanism. it made it easier to prioritize which campaign promises came first. >> if i can ask you, during the campaign, to were talking about what you hope to do as president in the present tense. when elected, here is what i

hope to do. once you are elected, if you have four years. is there a process to educate voters that even though we cannot keep every promise the first year, we have a sense of order in which we intend to proceed. and that we will get to everything? you've got to preach patience. how well does it work? >> i think that most presidents are in a big hurry to get the things that they must care about up there. partly because we all believe people have their head in the clouds of the beginning. policy -- i look back on regret on are tenured that we tend had big ideas in campaigns, and we submit them, and when the big idea is not adopted, when the

comprehensive welfare reform is not adopted, we just move past it. there is not a tendency -- there is not that tendency to stay with that thing. if you cannot get the big thing, to put some building blocks together. when things do not work out, we lead the ruins behind. [laughter] discourage other travelers. i do not want to go there. that is one of the bad things because you become so dedicated year campaign idea, and come -- someone else comes up with smaller ideas and new-them. -- and you dash them. it wastes a lot of expertise built up on a life -- congressional committees and administrations.

>> i agree with that part. that was our experience with immigration. one of my great disappointments is how we left the worst place family founded in what threat -- with respect to immigration and that democrats are libel the past president bush's emigration plans. there are places where you think you lose, and then there are places where you say, not a piece of legislation but executive orders, regulatory processes, commissions, various other ways. in his pronouncements in campaigns, we don't say that we will pass a bill that will do this for that. that is part of the game plan that you have to proceed. >> can you give an example of doing that through executive out -- executive order or

commission? >> this is why raise it in this context. i am thinking about postal reform. the post this office was in bad shape. we needed legislation. it was over due for reauthorization. but we needed to build some more ideas and build some consensus, get a bipartisan group and the president appointed a commission. it did its work and ultimately we enacted legislation. but we needed that lead up. for the people who cared most desperately about postal reform, we had to say, wait, we have this commission over there and we will see you later. >> pas hardest thing to do is to take along view. as long as you hold on to the job, if you can accomplish a lot over a long period of time. we were able to double education funding over a eight-year period, even though in any one

year we were making incremental change. particularly for your own supporters who had been waiting a long time for your party to get back in power, saying to them when you come in office, don't worry. it is going to take as four years or eight years. that is a tough message for them. but in washington, yet at -- is as important to preach in patients. you have many people counseling patients on the things that you wanted to come up that may have got you elected, the kind of changes that washington does not like to make. i can remember after clinton took office, the congressional leadership met with him and said, we know that you said that we should cut our staffs but we do not really want to. we know you want a rap form

campaign finance laws and lobbying laws, but you cannot do that. if you do campaign finance reform, that is taking away our current jobs. if you do lobbying reform, that is taking away our next jobs. [laughter] he and the press -- he ended up pressing those reforms anyway. but the country is willing -- the country does not expect that much. the key is for the president and the white house to recognize which issues are better dealt with one step at a time, and which is used to you have to go along on first down or not get another chance. >> this brings up the importance of the talk that goes on about domestic policy.

my next question is, out of all the areas of domestic policy, what were the areas where the president's message or rhetorical content remained more or less the same from the campaign, and were their significant differences between how he had talked about something of governing versus when running for president? >> i can give you an example of presidential rhetoric that was treated as sacrosanct, that led to an enormous debate within the administration over what it meant to. [laughter] one of the central promises of bill clinton was to end welfare as we know it. and he led out in some specific terms what that meant.

everyone had to go to work and so forth. this is going against the grain of his party, not a promise that washington wanted to keep any time soon. so there was a lengthy internal debate about what did it mean. if we did this in a couple of states, would that account? if we let people stay on welfare forever, with the account? what was interesting about it -- in part, because it was so ambitious, it was a very difficult promise to walk back from. it would have been difficult to go halfway.

the welfare commissioner for connecticut actually printed out the acronym and posted it is in every welfare office, and tried to instill in her workers that promise, even before we figured out how to keep it. >> i think that 9/11 introduced a set of circumstances that had the effect of the calibrating our game. in the domestic agenda, there was more that was in the similar sense, with the specs and -- with the exception of social security. we did not get it done as

opposed to changing direction. we had a commission, obviously, but it remains undone. doesn't everybody? >> i think it is part of our problem. i don't really recall a case on a major issue where we really change directions in any respect. >> then let me ask, where their cases where on a particular domestic policy issue, it proved counterproductive for the president to remain in campaign mode when he was talking about issues? >> i do not know that counterproductive to remain in campaign mode? circumstances dictate how you react to particular things and what your point of emphasis in.

it would have been ridiculous for president bush to continue to talk only about education and that faith based initiative in october 2001. that is where the reactive part of this is into it. there doesn't some point get to be, just as we are saying that president obama and the economy, they are playing the cards it paid out -- that they are dealt. >> if there is one word that president carter repeated throughout the primary and election, it was comprehensive. the word on the other side was incremental. washington was a pleasant incrementalism -- was a place of incrementalism and that was what was wrong with washington. he was elected because he believed it. and because washington at that time especially was an

incremental place, he created the conflict that characterized -- it created a conflict that characterize the carter years. rather than comprehensive, i don't know how you move that. >> the tensions of all three of our presidents facined, they cae from outside washington and had an agenda that was somewhat at odds with his own party, and had a mandate to some degree for the changes that he was seeking. answer the question is, when you get to washington, you are faced with a reluctant congress that if it had wanted to do what you

wanted to do, it would have done it already. what compromises are in your interest and in the country's interest, and what are not? bill clinton was certainly influenced by jimmy carter was experience, that if you push congress to hard -- too hard, they would just give up on you. i think he was quickly cured of that approach by the 94 -- a 1994 midterm results, because we found that the only way we could govern effectively was to govern the way we had campaign. through trial and error, we got to that point. it is an important debate that the party has had.

if you do not make any incremental progress on your agenda, then the country will regard you as a failure. the most successful presidents with their domestic agendas have found a way to keep speaking pass the congress, past washington, directly to the country on the items that they want to get done, and eventually congress is more likely to bend to the will of the people and a popular president, and to stick to their guns. >> there is a point to be made here, tending to guide that we work for for four years. carter came into office by after the nixon and ford administrations, which were probably, i think, that this period of time for democratic members of congress in the history of the world. everything that was passed under

lyndon johnson was passed actually under these two guys. and our guys did not have to take responsibility for the things that were not perfect. best we could do. could have been better, but best we could do. [laughter] this is a political secret love fest. and then comes carter, who is saying, no. and i do think that the big electoral defeat, especially in the senate in 1980, made the lives of subsequent presidents easier than it would have been. there was a sense that we will hang separately if we do not

hang together. >> talking about how campaigning translates into governing, there is an entertaining event of the actual election and the size of the victory that the incoming president wins. carter, clinton, bush, they all campaign talking about comprehensive changes that they wanted to bring about or something equally big. they win victories that are not landslides. carter very narrowly elected, no coattails in the form of new democratic members of congress. bush famously a minority president in terms of popular vote. clinton wins a significant victory, but far from the landslide, a 43% of the popular vote. in helping the president make that transition, and do you take into account that they were not elected with a reagan-style or even in obama-style landslide,

and adjust accordingly in terms of what you put on your domestic agenda? >> no. [laughter] to the contrary, even. he redoubled his efforts to educate and talk about the reason for the message. he felt like he had more work to do to get those numbers up. but far from saying, oh my god, i have to turn a different direction? nope. >> ross perot got 19%, said there was a huge groundswell for change, more less, of the same kind. we felt like the country wanted things to change in a hurry. i think it is one of the reasons why ideas have to be central to the campaign, by the domestic policies you make -- domestic

promises you may need to be high profile. the president is claiming a mandate that the country is actually aware of, not one that just happens to be in his campaign literature that reporters might ever read or a few wonks in the campaign 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 wants to get to the fine print. sometimes they just won a new president and they are not going to get to the bottom of the contract. in our case, because the country wanted a lot of change but was skeptical of government's ability to deliver on that change, they had some doubts

about our party and they scrutinized everything that we did and were quite aware of the promises that we had made. >> i think presidents, were certainly president carter felt that he had to implement. as you work your way through that agenda to more or less success, i found that as we moved through the years, it was more possible at the beginning stages, like where we're going to put our priorities are what will this program look like, to howl when actable it was be affected. not how popular it was but how can aenactable it was. did it to agree that he campaigned on it, he was much more interested in how enactable it was.

but if you get past that, to programs designed inside the administration, then you could at least get congressional relations concerns to move up the list of things that were taken into consideration. >> the other thing that is really important. we of all been in development of policy on the campaign trail and how good job you do in bringing in members of congress and local officials and whoever else you can to be a part of that, and have some ownership of those policies. i am thinking about education stuff. judd gregg and john boehner, the only thing they like about the health committee was that pension stuff and maybe some of the health care. education was not their thing. george bush had to do a lot of education with them about what this is about. and they bought into it. and it became their deal as much

as he did. i think how you spread around the equities is really important to and helps predict whether you will be successful or not. >> so you come into office and you have to deal with congress. he met a lot of campaign commitments. congress gets overloaded if you try to do too much at once. at least that is what they claim. [laughter] how do you decide? there have been close to this -- clues to this come about heidi decide what to put on top and say we will wait until the second round, when they come next year? >> it is a series of things. how right is in legislation, is

it up for reauthorization, is that left over? it is something that the president is -- when we put education first, the president was most comfortable with that issue and his facility around that issue was strong, and it was a good strong place to start. one of the prospects for bipartisanship, those sorts of things. it is a series of elements. >> we wanted to flood the circuits. there was no desire -- we figured that congress was going to -- would slow walk and nothing's as it was that we did not have to make it any easier for them. one of the areas of difficulty -- the congressional system is

not well set up necessarily to handle a couple of priorities at the same time. bill clinton wanted to pursue welfare reform and health care at the same time because he felt that they were in transit cleve related as policy, and that they spoke to different anxieties of the electorate. unfortunately they went to the same committees, and even worse, we have house side that wanted to do health care and not welfare, and they senate finance committee wanted to do welfare and not health care reform. at a certain point, at any white house makes the calculation of what they can get done and come back later. i think that white houses are often wrong in assuming that political capital -- you start with a lot of that, it has a

half life, and it goes away. that was not our experience. our experience was you start out with capital, when you spend it well, if you get more of it. if you get a bad bet, you end up with less. >> we had to pick between doing welfare first are doing health care first. i think we felt that you could do the same thing at the same time for two reasons. it was in the same department and it cannot design two." is at the same time. and you had these different committees it would have the dominant role dealing with both of those programs. you cannot possibly do it to them. i think we flipped a coin, and we were good democrats, so we pu