u.n. climate change conference in copenhagen. later, the director of nasa's goddard institute for space to the talks about his research in a new book on climate change. "washington journal"is next. .

host: portion lent to panics actually showing a slight profit according to a new treasury report. the new assessment of the $700 billion bail out program provided by two treasury officials on sunday. ahead of a report to congress on monday, is vastly improved from the obama administrations estimates last summer of of $341

billion. smaller, larger of bail out. republicans? (202) 737-0001. democrats? (202) 737-0002. independents? (202) 628-0205. they write the officials said the government could ultimately lose 100 billion from the bail out program and new loans to banks and trade to homeowners and credit to small business. still it would lower the deficit forecast for this year which began in october to the 1 point 3 trillion from 1.5 trillion. report could camp down some of the both parties over the bail out. congressional leaders are planning to use some of the money for economic stimulus and job creation. of course draw they write the

government's losses extend beyond that program and federal reserve still hold as trillion dollar portfolio of mortgage backed securities who market value is unknown. the times says the improved treasury program is a result of higher than expected returns on loans and as the financial sector recovers from free fall last year, the government had not had to use more of it's 700 billion in lending authority this year. according to treasury officials that don't want to be identified discuss it before it was presented to congress. we'll more but we're getting your thoughts this morning on the question or on the headline. treasury sees smaller loss from bail out. first call here is maurice on the line from democrats from loganville, georgia. what's your reaction? caller: i'm pretty optimistic,

we're going to take losses but it seems like the alternative would have been much worse. i think a top program could have been done - perhaps i think that homeowners and the middle class could have perhaps gotten some of this money because it could have helped people keep they're homes and even some small businesses could have gotten some of this money that could have been of some help. the republicans completely, they would hate - it's a terrible thing to say but it seems as though republicans would hate what president obama and his administration to be successful in anything. healthcare, the war. it's too sad. it's such a sad thing that because of politics and partisanship they're attacking constantly. president bush did no wrong.

but now you hear them saying, well, i didn't like what he was doing, but i just had toed by my time. no, sir. host: part of the "new york times" piece. the bank bail out has been unpopular by former president georgew bush and congress. luis or in candor, new york for independent. tyrone, you there? caller: yes, i am. i think it's great. this is a very smart man. you give him some time and i think he can straighten all this mess out and i'm very proud of him. come on. now we're going to talk about small businesses and get this healthcare thing out of the way. the republicans try to stop everything he does and it's not going to work. have a great day. host: now illinois, bill on the line for democrats. treasury see as smaller loss from the bail out.

what's your reaction? caller: good morning and thanks for having me on. i appreciate it. all along, i've been very disappointed as a democrat because i felt the government should be dealing with the employment and illegal immigration thing. i think it would have e limbed nights a lot of the cost of the bail out. this is just smoking screens and that the future generations are going to have to pay for all this bail out and it's ridiculous and i'm really sad for them. host: thanks for y calling. times says panic of america rus wraz bank of america was became the latest big ban to be say that it was raising private

capital. and would start to payment back. the last bin being bank tester to the state. the estimated $42 billion in losses is annette figure that accounts for some profits to offset the losses and treasury officials about chrysler and others and the american international group. but the latest bail out accounting could have political and legislative ramification. irvine, kentucky now. harvey. independent caller. your thoughts this morning? caller: yeah. several years before the crash actually occurred, i did several spreadsheets and that sort of thing anticipating the economic down attor turn because of the . consumer spending goes down.

i read a lot of things for the house senate and financial services et cetera. exan a profit margins million, if you loan someone $100 at ten percent but then the mortgage value goes down and you want to get rid of that. why not sell it to par to the government that's willing to pay except like three or 4%? so they can pay you full value back. recapitalize use so you can lope the money out and get the economy spurred. it's not a bad thing and we just have to realize now that the government is holding a whole lot of valuable mortgages. it's just at a little lower rate and there's tons of money out there that small businesses and other cans use to revitalize the

economy. we're just looking at this all bad and everybody has bought into all the - sky's falling kind of thing to the point where our confidence in america has gone down. we need to get that back and get rolling and start spending money on revitalizing our communities each and every mayor and county judge throughout america has to create some kind of viable comprehensive play to start creating growth in the north, south, east and west of their communities. host: appreciate your thoughts. want to let other viewers weigh in on thoughts. the "new york times" headline if you are a twitter user follow us at c-spanwj. here's one tweet this monday morning. smaller loss? that means the pressure is off for reform. wall street can party like it's 2004.

dayton, ohio. gary for democrats on the line. what's this story mean to you? caller: i tell you what. this may not have too much to do with what we're talking about. this president is actually ruining our country. that's all i got to say. host: how so. caller: thank you. how so? every way around. he's taking us down the road to socialism and everything else. everybody knows that. host: baltimore. ron? independent caller. caller: my reaction this morning is more of a question. when the obama administration makes the projections on, you know what our deficit is going to be from the bail out, and then months later it comes in lower, that's, you know on the surface it appears to be good

news, but who is it that watches and regulates the people that make these projections. i mean can they make a high projection and then when it comes in lower, appear, make everything appear we're doing well and it's all good news? >> thanks for your thoughts and questions. maybe somebody else can share they're opinion on that. here's the headlines in the "new york times". story on the web. late last night. u.s. forecasts smaller loss from pail out and some other points include the politically the treasury program has been unpopular every since it was created by former president bush and a congress controlled by democrats and has grown more reviled overtime as a symbol of the government's favoritism to wall street that continues to struggle and spread jobs.

it's disturbing both parties as they approach a midterm election year and largely because of their votes last year in favor of the bail out program. it was unclear how that climate might be altered as taxpayers realize they didn't lose $7,000,000. at most the ultimate losses will be 1/5 of that amount and probably less. democrats in congress have decided to divert about 70 billion dollars from what is left in the bail out to the cost of other construction projects, credit to small businesses and aid to state and governments. maryland on the line now. robert. democratic line. caller: morning. remember the tea party complaining about the tarp money being spent to help the economy because george bush, they forgot about him being one of the

people that started this and first they thought it was failing and now ate appears the tarp money is being paid back and having an impact on the economy. it was a great thing and who's going to get all the credit for it. but obama has to put this thing in action and make it work. bailing out the banks was a good idea, i think. just image in you going to the bank with your paycheck and you can't cash it. but now we have to concentrate on the working people and creating jobs and i think the rest of the tarp money should go to creating jobs and helping the working people. host: appreciate your thoughts. more of your calls in a couple of minutes but i wanted to take you up to boston now. in addition to the action in washington this week and denmark with the climate change summit there's a u.s. senate primary tomorrow in massachusetts and matt vicer is a reporter now on the phone with the boston globe.

he of course this is for ted kennedy's seat. remind us who is running and who's leading one day before the primary. caller: we have four democrats running. mark mackk okly and cofounder. alan casey and the boston celtics co-owner. stephen cally uka and republicans have a state senator scott brown and a businessman named jack robinson. leading in the polls. martha coke l.a. ly has led and the first to get in the raise, ahead from the start and republican site scott brown the state senator, has been leading. host: to the democrat, martha,

what does she bring to the table? what do voters seem to like about her? guest: the her favorability rateing is high. part of that is because she's been a prosecutor so every time she's on t.v. she's putting somebody in jail. she's got a strong image as a prosecutor and she's also would be the first female u.s. senator from massachusetts. emily's list has gotten involved. lot of national interest from woman's groups across the country. so i think that's another thing that's energized a certain section of it here for her. host: what's the political mood of the common wealth there following the death of senator kennedy. all that legacy. what are folks looking for in their next senator?

>> i think they want somebody to carry on his legacy with the recognition that none of these four match up to him. at least not right now. obviously so, there was a lot of build up and sort of a lot of um... sadness with kennedy's death and election, in some ways has been anticlimatic. sort of during a strange period between thanksgiving and christmas and people are tuned in. the hard-core political people are tuned in but the general electorate is predicted to be a fairly low turn out tomorrow. so you know, it's kind of an odd time to fill just such a historic and big seat for massachusetts. but i think people are turn together - hoping they can carry-over healthcare. you know opposition to the war and things like that. i think are some of the issues

that have played big here. host: reporter for the boston globe. thanks for the preview for the primary tomorrow at massachusetts. back to your calls. georgia. mark, republican. treasury seeing a smaller loss from the bail out? caller: think this is another lie to the people. so the fed doesn't have to open up your books. mr. ben bernanke open up your books. the feds giving trade to their buddies on wall street. host: caller touching on - ben ben bernanke. he be in washington today and we plan live coverage on c-span three. one of our companion networks at 12:45 eastern. he'll talk about some of the most frequently asked questions of the federal reserve. said chair. 12:45 and from georgia, steve,

democrat, hi. there. caller: yes, i'm calling about the news about the tarp funds coming in. and first of all i just want to say the republicans, they will cut off their noses to spite they're face. there's nothing it does that's good thing for this country and it's kind of a shame to see this. there's nothing he tries to do to help the american people that will be seen by the (202) 737-0001s as something fiv73 republicans. these people want the government to fail. they don't care what good comes out of it. the only objective is that this government fails and i'm so happy to see good news coming out of this and i mean, we would have been in a worse economic

situation if this president had not take ten steps he did to fix this. now they think it was a hoax which is exactly not the case. this country was at the brink of collapse. economic ruin and this president has succeeded in pulling out of that. these republicans will fail to realize that and continue to put down everything this president tries to do to help this nation. host: appreciate your thoughts. tim geithner making news again. money news today. treasury see as lower job rate. he predicts the rate will be lower than ten percent in the year. economic is moving closer to job creation. said this with bloomberg and krit sideed the record management bonuses said to be paid by big banks this year by ir reshops bli high bonuses.

all banks need to restrain the amount they pay their leaders to long-term goals. the house takes up a major financial regulation bill. think about midweek or so. white house coverage and in will it o beach, new york. hi. joe. caller: i hate to break people's heart. this has nothing to do with democrats or republicans but there's a tremendous disconnect here. doesn't anybody notice? the dow was down to 6 thousand points and more statistics came out and more people are losing their jobs and homes. more people have nowhere to come. they're getting part time jobs and looking to scrounge and look for a place to live and all this is going up and stock market went up on the back of misery. more americans are suffering the more cheap labor they can get

and more jobs are disconnected the more profit these guys are making. i was a capitalist rooting and now i'm not sure if i want to root for wall street. they're making billions and people here are trying pay their rent. something is terribly wrong and geithner and ben bernanke, they scare the hell out of me. i think they're crooks without guns. >> we'll talk healthcare and climate change conference. there's a "wall street journal" lead story today that says business fumes over, e.p.a. rules. copenhagen for the summit. business leaders focus in washington where the obama administration is expected to formally declare carbon dioxide a dangerous pollutant. an endanger finding could pave the way to emit carbon dioxide a

dangerous to make costly changes in machinery to reduce emissions. e.p.a. action to regulate it could effect the u.s. economy more directly and quickly than any global deal inc.ed the danish capital. many groups are opposed to curb a gas as ambiguous about carbon dioxide. caller: good morning, c-span. how are you? i want to set the record straight that tarp was actually a bush plan. it was written by henry paulson and everyone and their uncle was against that plan and now we're finding out that it's paying off which is what the plan was supposed to do when it began. obama from that plan and now

he's reaping the benefit for it. people in this party, on this side of the aisle are against obama because he's antifree market. stimulus had nothing to do with stimulating this market. taxing corporations who employ americans and legislation that out-sourcing american workers to say india is not doing the worker of america any favors and owner industries and autoand real estate doesn't help this economy either. he needs to lower taxes on companies. host: thanks for your thoughts and we'll take a look at that photo of president barack obama in roll call this morning met with democrats yesterday on healthcare. we'll talk with the managing director of managing quarterly

about healthcare. senate faces crunch time. he attempted to lend his power of persuasion to the healthcare debate sunday and democrats and liberals scrambled to get on language restricts a borths funding. more coverage on that on c-span two. they're back at it at 10:00 a.m. eastern time. we'll be there government to government. stanley mcchrystal. the "washington post" says afghanistan plan stays mainly in tact, when he finishes testifying the top u.s. nato commander in afghanistan mcchrystal will return to add min straight a largely unchanged war strategy. usa today. general pay try as.

this is usa today and general that commands forces in the middle east doesn't think progress to achieve under the troop surge in iraq in 2007. this will be a step-by-step operational campaign he told usa today. at times increases in violence undaed edly as taliban try to hang on a particular safe haven and sanctuary. next call on the treasury story in the "new york times" today. portland oregon. jeff? hello there. morning jeff. caller: i just wanted to say that benjamin franklin said when he was in office, these banks are going to kind of screw us over and take all of our money and charge us too much on our loans and i think that's what they've done.

host: oakland, california. independent caller. charle? caller: i'm glad that they're getting some taxpayer money out. i'm in california and a furlough employee and i'm missing three days of my salary every month and corporations like pg&e. i'm late on my electrical bill. i've said i'm going to be a little late. they just charged me $350 for being late. these corporations are out of control. i think it's corporations period. not just the ones like that but we need to check all of them. host: thanks. couple of other stories. philadelphia energy guy rer says iraq clear clears way for voting and last minute deal yesterday was reached on renee negotiating parliament seats that clears the way for national elections early

next year. the an elections are seen as crucial to keeping a planned u.s. troop withdrawal. several other papers today this from iran. opposition girds for rally as internet access is kept. and dictator from iran on the eve of students demonstration. internet access were choked off and they warned media to stick to their offices for the next three days to prevent the opposition from mobilizeing the masses. government opponents are seeking to get large numbers of demonstrators to rally today. "wall street journal" piece from iran and detroit on the line now. bill, republican, your reaction this morning caller: smoke and mirrors. i'm here on the street and we saw a whole lot different.

we don't care what the people on wall street make. they work hard and earn their money. what we care about is we watch this administration as our young men and women are diagnose fighting a war. he's played more golf games than george bush did in all years president and nobody wants to say anything to that. that's popular i guess but with this president, how many golf games has this man played while our boys are out there fight sng host: seattle. one last call. republican. caller: good morning. i agree with the last caller. with all due respect. i wish you would be more respectful to the callers. it's like you hold your mouth in that position to get back to please end. please be more respectful. i believe with the federal

reserve they're not a branch of our government. wall street and federal reserve are controlling our government. all three entities have nothing to do with the judicial and legislative branches of our government so they need to be reigned in and the federal reserve needs to be audited. when people like myself have been out of work for 12 months it's the scariest thing and you have the federal reserve loaning money around the world. our boys and girls are fighting iraq to indian troops don't have to be there. that's indian problem. not america's. host: appreciate your calls. seeing a smaller loss from the bail out. we'll talk about healthcare in a couple of minutes but again it was 68 years ago today. 1941 the surprise japanese attack on pearl harbor left many

americans dead. the national park is doing research on that. we'll a brief exert on one survivors words. you can watch these at c-span dot org. here is a look. track announcer: i was a crew member on the luke field side of fort island. that particular sunday i had duty and was actually at the hangar at the time the attack became. we thought a plane has crashed so we ran out of the hangar looking across the runway, we see the smoke coming up from the hangar. we still didn't know what was happening. - and, about that time here's a plane diving from the sun and

dropped two bombs and pulled out of his dive and could see the rising sun under his wings and then new we were being attacked by the japanese. i started looking for a place to hide. we didn't have any bombshell tears and here comes another japanese plane flying from south to north up on the west side of ford island. they were flying slow. i could actually see the goggles on the rear gunners helmet as he begins to machine gunfire. i look out and hear all this splattering on the concrete and i jumped behind this tractor that was parked there and it gave me the protection i needed. host: you can watch for the complete interview december 209th or watch on www dot c-span dot org. healthcare now joining us from

the news room is adriel bettelheim. ma'aming editor of u.s. quarterly. more senate debate? >> never seems to stop, does it? they worked through the weekend and president barack obama gave a pep rally to the senate democrats yesterday telling them this is the most important thing to come before conference since social security was presented. they'll be in all likelihood, taking up an amendment that discusses drug importation whether consumers can bring in drugs from another country where they may sell for less than they do in the united states. tomorrow in all likelihood a very contentious issue, abortion language and how that will play out. remember this was a big issue when the house passed it's issue of early hall in november.

host: see the numbers one more time on healthcare. this is this half hour's topic. we're looking at a piece this morning. mr. adriel bettelheim. he writes the best holiday gifts the senate must pass it by this year's end. here's the deal. if obama sign as healthcare bill before a state of the union address and starts with historic victory to proclaim before the country and can pivot to the issue. jobs and how to create them. how important is the end of this year deadline we've heard so much about? guest: timing is everything. the longer there's not an agreement the more questions about whether or not there's a government. both the congressional and others have staked they're legacy and talked about the need for this change if they can't bring ate cross the finish line

they're in big trouble and closer they get to the midterm elections without an bill or agreement or law the more risk some of the lawmakers will be. i agree with,e j and i think they need a bill out of the senate and then come as rather difficult conference to reconcile the senate and house versions before getting anything to the president's desk so it's almost too optimistic to say he will have something in late to mid january. host: viewers to the piece. senate must pass healthcare this year. what's your opinion? republican, (202) 737-0001. democrat, (202) 737-0002. independent, (202) 628-0205. mr. adriel bettelheim, back to the president's visit yesterday. we have video. symbolic. substantive and a little bit of

both. what's this mean for the party of the president coming up? guest: showing him a little love. they've been working pretty much nonstop on this and his assistant almost said that. it's an empathetic gesture i'm here with you too but it was lacking much in substance. the president has been very reluctant to talk about specifics. he doesn't bring a laundry list of demands of what he wants to see in this bill and that frustrates senators that want to see more leadership. two things the president doesn't want to under mine discussions going on behind closed doors saying i want this when harry reed and others might agree to something else. number two wants to keep congress invested with them emotionally and let them hash out the specifics and doesn't

want them to turn to him and say, okay you tell us what you want. it's this dynamic all year long and i wouldn't expect a change at this point. host: in addition to abortion and public option. adriel bettelheim, we're reading inkq there's closure fights. procedural things that may have to happen pretty darn soon in order for a bill to happen by the end thifs year? can you explain what that's about? guest: senate rules could take a long time to go into but the simple truth is democrats need 60 votes to advance the debate and bring the questions that are dividing they're caucus and the republicans who are almost unanimously opposed to the healthcare overhaul will force harry reed and senate democratic leadership to come up with the 60 votes so.

what we're going to see is reid to push motions limiting debate in senate speak and try to force at least some aspect of the bill. we're not sure really which ones yet. he realizes there's little time left in the legislative year and they're desire is to pass something. anything by the year's end. >> we'll from the leaders. florida first call. bruce. independent caller. hi. there. caller: i was very big watcher of c-span and i appreciate all the work you guys do. but for me, when i see a senator standing up and see all these empty seats behind him if there was such a great concern about the healthcare or any debate in the senate shouldn't all senators be there and listening and partakeing in the discussion? where are they? host: what's the reality there?

guest: well the real stuff is sometimes off the floor. every senator has - there's all sorts of personal privilege rights that can be invoked. everyone can speak sometimes on multiple issues, there's a lot of deal making going on in the rooms and chambers throughout the capital and that's where we are right now. they've been talking about this for six or eight months and most senators have staked their position and everyone knows more of less what they would vote and now they're trying change the language and you do that really by assembling coalition and holding out your vote and that's going on right now. so the real action right now is kind of behind closed doors. host: louisiana, what do you make of his piece, the best holiday gift. he makes the point in his view

the senate must pass the bill by the end of the year. what do you think? caller: well the only thing this is, is just political. they're where i had about being re-elected. they don't give a damn about us people out here. we don't what - want this public option they'll break insurance companies and then it's going to go to single pay and anybody with any common sense or knowledge of anything can see it. except the stupid democrat senators. and what they don't realize is elections could really get rid of all of them. they're all worried about, like i said, about re-election.

host: got the point. adriel bettelheim ofkq. guest: viewer articulates if you have a government run insurance plan pieced against private insurance plan that could squeeze the private insurance out of business. from hospitals and doctors and all other medical providers. how this works out is while we're all here watching what the senator does. the caller, sentiment like this makes it a tough vote for a democrat like marylander who is a tough swing vote in this. said in no uncertain terms she can't support health overhaul with a public plan. that kind of sentiment is making it very difficult for democrats to manage that.

you may have conservative people and liberal. it's a tough balancing act from reid. host: congress dot org is one website associated with cq that you with a interest might want to go to. lots of information on healthcare. harry reed had to say about his disappointment in republicans. this was yesterday. >> if the question were asked. what is your disappointment? it is that we've not had a single public statement from the republicans that they'll do anything to help us with the bill. quite to the contrary, that's bad for the american people.

the american people last year called for change and change is taking place. president did spend time going through the things we've accomplished this year and they have been significant based on where he was when he took office. even before he became president, december, 670 thousand job where is lost. november more than 700 thousand. february. more than 700 thousand. so we have made great progress and will continue to do so. host: adriel bettelheim of cq. what did you here in the majority leader yesterday? guest: would like republicans to join in and they're working hard on at least two moderate republicans from maine. they're generally viewed as the most moderate members.

olympia snow supported the senate finance version of the overhaul. the plan they're currently de bath has deviated from that. she had conversations and went to the white house to talk to president barack obama as well. they're really locking in on her. senator reid the majority leader can't be surprised there's uniform republican opposition to this at this point. it's a big sweeping expensive piece of social engineering that a lot of republicans have serious problems with it and they said yesterday, he went back on his campaign pledge to do his reform the an partisan manner. so these are sort of standing talking points and it shows why things so difficult to bring even one lawmaker across the

aisle. host: from arizona. law remember from democrats do. you think the senate must pass this bill this year? caller: certainly important. it's ridiculous. they need control of things and drug companies are just out of line and there needs to be some regulation. ho host thanks. mr. adriel bettelheim can you take us deeper into the drug purpose amendment coming up this week. >> yeah this is a topic that comes up all the time in healthcare debates. there's a concern about the rising drug costs and the role they play in medical inflation. some people that are policy junkies might remember in 2003 when the bush administration and congress expanded medicare and drug prescription benefit. there was a lot of talk about

allowing consumers bringing drugs from a broad and seniors taking buss to canada and somehow to limit importation that's banned now for safety grounds so this has emerged in the healthcare debate now. what's interesting after president barack obama campaigned on bringing drug cost down. he cut a deal that would insulate them from some drug price cuts that would be mandated in this new system. so this effort to liberalize importation is greatly opposed guy form suit call companies and they point to this deal with the white house. interesting to see how it's debated in all likelihood today and see where administration comes in on this. we can't stipulate drugs coming

under a liberal regime will be safe. host: how about more detail on abortion that we touched on earlier. so much talk about annelle son amendment. what will we see? h guest: ben nelson is working with republican from utah. on tougher abortion restrictions that would essentially prohibit the public plan being discussed from offering elective abortion discussion and it makes it harder for people to buy coverage to have access to abortion services. this language that they're working on mimics the one that was asserted in the house bill. that was a product of amendment offered by congressman stup ac and what they're trying do. nelson and hatch and other

anti-abortion forces in the senate is insert this language so when they go to congress and combine with it the house bill, it'll survive. but there's a lot of abortion right percentages and this nelson act will more than likely fail. host: clyde on the independent line. morning. is it a must pass this year bill you think? al caller: absolutely not. the best thing they can do for healthcare is get government and insurance companies out of the way and let the patient deal with the healthcare providers. this is about redistribution of wealth and controlling 1/6 of the economy. no bill with the type of legislation in this bill that would, for noncompliance example, it has penalties and fines up to $250,000 for

throwing people in jail for five years. why would that be in a health bill? this is a tyrannical bill by a government trying get control of the economy. also it's - we're going to see abortion, illegal immigration put in this health care system and all the negatives that they say they took out. it'll go right back in. this is not a healthcare bill. was it 2000 pages? why you need that much legislation. what this government should be doing is trying create jobs and it won't do that because it wants the nuise around the neck of the public. track announcer: thanks for calling. the caller mentioned jobs and whole topic of the economy. can you take the healthcare debate and lingering issue of jobs and put them together. does one effect the other right now and how much?

guest: your pushing an ambitious overhaul during a serious economic downturn and that makes people very anxious because they're having trouble making they're ends meet and they're worried about their kids having a good future and there probably knowing somebody that's under water. this is risky to talk about tinkering with people's health angle meant but politically it's not a bad time to try. argueing for the status quo when the economy stinks is not a palatable proposition. you don't let a good crisis go to waist. you swing for the fences and push for bold offenses and say the country needs change. take advantage of sort of malleable public opinion and try to rally people around the cost. devil is in the details and we're seeing push back now that the house has passed it's house

care plan and senate maybe weeks away from passing it's plan. the closer you get people get and try to assess out the details. host: heard from majority leader harry reed and mitch o'connell spoke yesterday and gave his particular take on things. especially the president's visit. >> i think the fact that the president of the united states is over meeting with democrats only telling you where this debate has gone. earlier in the year there was talk about producing a bill that 80 of 100 senators could support doing it on a truly bipartisan basis and as you follow this over the weeks and months it's drifted into a completely partisan effort to take a half a trillion dollars cuts out of medicare and produce and effect higher insurance premiums for 85

percent of the country. not surprisingly that's not a bill that generates much enthusiasm on our side of the aisle. here we are a few weeks before christmas with the democrats trying je squeeze every matter swallow a difficult pill for the american people. host: how about more on strategy on the minority side moving forward? guest: well i think they would like to drag out this debate to promote they're ideas. we saw john mccain in the background of the last clip. he already tried to get the bill recommitted the finance committee which is killing the bill. saying you have to restore medicare cuts to help finance the expansion of coverage. i think the other republicans would like to put even more

pressure on democrat colleagues and see if they are willing to make a tough vote. part of this is delay but part of this too is and attack line. trying create the notion that democrats are forcing a bill a lot of people don't support through the process and the poling suggests people are pretty anxious. favorable ratings are dropping and it's eroding into overall support. i think they sense weakness and democrats picked up historically republican leading districts and there's democrats representing red states now and i think they see obviously some benefit in this attack line and drawing out the debate. host: this is adriel

bettelheim. the "washington post" says the best holiday gift that the senate must pass the health bill. getting your reaction to that headline. florida, gary, republican? caller: first thing is we forgot who works for who in this congress. or country. the congress is supposed to be by the people for the people. a lot of people in this country are suffering as a result of the health policies in place throughout the country. i believe if the senate and house of representatives had to have the same coverage they would pass for the people. if they had no coverage like the average person in this country, we see the healthcare problem reconciled fast and there would be some sort of coverage for all people in this country and that's all i have to say. host: new orleans now.

line for democrats. caller: sir, is it still time in the end of the this bill to use the nuclear option. i remember vaguely in the bush administration they never had 60 votes in republicans and i remember, dick cheney taking the seat and casting the vote to let the republicans pass several things. also i'd like to apologize for billy toezan from louisiana that has single-handedly destroyed far farm suitle. guest: nuclear option is come up in a series of debate. most recently on judicial nominees. it's an up simple majority to ram basically a question or

bill, what have you, through. this is considered hard ball tactics in bad form and a chamber that values common ty and tradition. in this case they'd discussed this strategy in terms of passing part of the health overhaul through a process called reconciliation. not sure that's what the caller is talking about but they could have used budget rules to try to get part of this through rather than 60 votes. they have for strategy reasons decided to go with the 60 vote rule and that's calculation harry reed made. host: how about more mr. adriel bettelheim on the evolution of what maybe used to be called the public option. we read this headline in the wall street about a new government run health proposal. they point out democrats are employing the federal reserve

plan as a model. guest: this is one thing going on. we talked about how things going on behind closed doors and there as so-called group often. five moderate and five liberal talking about possible things. one that has occur supply and demand a public option modeled on the plan perhaps administered to the department of human health and services. under one configuration they would have the federal government administering this thing but the actual insurance plans could be offered by non-profits or even for profit companies. what they do is try to thread the needle between those concerned with the government giving too much control and those that don't want an totally elective thing.

where they can pick and choose not to have a plan. it's trying to find out the delicate compromise. how much government control is enough for the 60 votes. host: what would the majority in the house think of this plan? guest: hard - by opposition i assume you mean republicans. i think they would say anything that's federal public option. light or big government plan is unacceptable and i think olympia snow has said the public option in any disguise is unacceptable. the best she would account is to put off the question for a while and determine if there's fair enough pricing in insurance coverage and maybe have a public plan some years down the road. that's called the trigger option. i think that would be their response to such a thing in the

house they passed a much bigger, truer run public option and this is the kind of compromise you would have to see hashed out between the house and senate. hard to tell if they would be willing to stick to principals and risk maybe scuttling the entire effort. it's a little too early in the game. host: one more caller. from virginia. caller: good morning. i have been following this issue off and on for the past year, i guess. what i have found confusing is the fact that the total cost seems to be - you know - different depending on which source i'm referring to. i would like to know what is it that's going to close to a trillion dollars for this healthcare reform bill? thank you.

host: mr. adriel bettelheim, can you help us out? guest: it is a little confusing. first of all you have the senate bill that's very much in play between that are dollar 800 and $900 billion dollars and a house bill that will expand medicaid offer coverage to more people. it probably in access of 1 trillion dollar price tag so as stuff beats pulled in and added. as they talk about covering more people and cutting this and that it's like a moving target. the score card changes and each time they make a policy change they have to go to the nonpartisan congressional budget office which is numbers people that crunch numbers to come up with a new price tag and this is why all the talk about, c.b.o. scoreing is important in all this. it tells them how much this will cost and then think have a sense how to justify it to the voters. that's why there's different

voters out there. host: who are you watching most closely in the next few day? guest: i think senator delegation, these liberal democrats. how with this can they come up with compromises without deflections from either side. host: how about the fourth section? guard guard towards the end of the week you'll see reid out on the cut off for the debate but you should see pretty contentious issues. abortion and drug importation. they'll deal with some pretty hot stuff and i think we're getting into the serious moment now where either deals are cut or people will start walking. host: adriel bettelheim. ma'aming editor of congressional quarterly. thanks to you.

. . envoy stephen bass worth is in seoul, korea, today to talk to officials about a trip to north korea, this to try to talk the north into resuming six-nation nuclear talks. international talks stalled about a year ago. politoco reports senator chuck schumer is objecting to banks that are charging consumers

with a.t.m. fees twice per transaction, a practice he calls double dipping. the new york democrat says 72% of banks charge their customers whenever they use another bank's a.t.m., even though they're already paying a fee to the bank that owns that a.t.m. messages left with banking industry groups were not immediately returned. the white house security breach at a recent state dinner is one of many, according to an internal report obtained by "the washington post." it says that the secret service has had 91 security breaches since 1980. the report has been useded by the service to analyze its vulnerabilities and update procedures. and those are some of the latest headlines on c-span radio. >> part of our live coverage today on the c-span networks includes federal reserve chairman beckbeck speaking to the economic club of washington. that's at 12:45 eastern on c-span3. you can also follow it online at c-span.org and c-span radio. a thaw week the senate

continues debate on the healthcare bill. see it all live on our companion network, c-span, it the only network with the full debate, unedit and had commercial-free, and read the senate bill and the house version and to watch video on demand, go to c-span's healthcare hub. >> "washington journal" continues. host: joining us now is the co-chair of the coalition for the green bank. first, what kind of work does the coalition do? what is it all about? guest: the coalition is obviously supporting a green bank that provides funding to develop renewable generation and infrastructure around that, so we can get financing to the market quickly so we can get these projects in place for the purposes of increasing co2 -- excuse me, decrees co2, increasing renewables to meet the administration's goals of 20% by 2020, and most

importantly, creating significant green jobs for the economy in the short term. host: when we talk about green jobs, give us a definition. what's a green job? guest: well, that's a great question. a green job is a little bit of a misnomer, because if you think about a green job, it goes anywhere from real estate all the way through manufacturing, as well as development of mega watt hours. so if we just use an example of a wind turbine, if we look at a wind turbine, first you have to have the procurement of the land. you have to have the clearing of a specific part of the land. you have to have the manufacturing of the turbine, which includes, you know, pipe fitting, welding, manufacturing of the tubes, the blades, and then the installation of that, and then the development of the transmission lines, poles into the grid, and then the operations, and then operation and maintenance around that facility. so it really includes all the things you think about from

green on the environmental, on the engineering side, but all those jobs that you typically  see basically from soup to nuts. host: our guest will be with us for 25 more minutes to take your questions and comments. he is todd filsinger, co-chair of the coalition for the green bank. green jobs the top inning here, learning ball what that means. republicans can call 202-737-0001. democrats, up 37-0002. and independents, 202-628-0205. mr. filsinger, your organization was represented at that jobs summit last week at the white house. what was that like for the coalition? guest: oh, it was very good. reed hunt, my co-chair, was present and said it was a very good exchange of ideas, a lot of brainstorming of some of the top leaders in the country in energy, the small business, labor, and others. it was a very good exchange, a

lot of great ideas, and the coalition for green bank was very proud to be represented by reed hunt at that event. host: what were some of the ideas? in other words, what are you looking for from washington in terms of green jobs and this green bank? >> well, we believe -- and it was represented at that summit -- is that a green bank is one of the fastest ways to get significant job creation in the united states. and when we look at the amount of green jobs that we can create in getting renewable generation on the grid, we're looking at up to four million jobs in the next several years. and again, when you think about the types of things that would be done, it includes the green generation, includes energy efficiency, retro fitting, and all of that infrastructure around that. so significant job creation for initial capitalization of about $20 billion to $25 bill yofpble

we get significant leverage for that. and we believe one of the most cost-effective, efficient ways to get significant jobs in this economy, and also moving the agenda forward on moving the country towards renewable green generation. host: you mentioned four million jobs potentially. what's out there right now in the area of green jobs? explain more of the evolution of this concept and how far you think you've come. >> well, i believe last year, i believe about 85,000 jobs were created in this area. there's a significant number of jobs -- i don't know the number off the top of my head in the green area, both direct and indirect jobs. but if you think about the big picture and how many mega watts we currently have on the renewable -- from a renewable perspective, we have about 38 to 39 big awatts out of a million gigawatts on the u.s. system. if you look at how far we need

to get to 20%, based on today's generation, we need about 200 gigawatts. so a significant, almost a five-fold increase based on today's generation. plus you have, when the economy picks up, you'll have load growth at about the 20 gigawatt range. so a significant number of additional mega watts that need to be added to the grid, as well as the infrastructure supporting that, the transmission, distribution of getting that into the grid and all thely to the homes. now, we also have, you know, all the energy efficiency and retro fitting bits. if you look at immediate job creation, one of the most effective ways to do that is energy efficiency or retro fitting current residential and commercial homes, resulting in jobs and energy usage reduction. host: calls now for our guest, who spent 21-plus years in the electric utility industry in north carolina. lee on the line for democrats, you're on with todd filsinger.

caller: good morning. host: good morning. caller: my first thing was, isn't most of the technology coming out of china, why can't we build here ourselves? and then, last time you were here -- i don't know if it was you or maybe even if it was someone from your organization -- they started talking about, when are we going to start doing this alternative energy technology, and next thing you know, we hear it's coming from china. why can't we make it here? host: let's hear from our guest. guest: a very good question. i think one of the reasons the coalition for the green bank thinks it's important to get the green bank in place, get the financing in place so we can move forward with the creation of jobs in america is because, if we don't, we're going to get left behind. china is moving very aggressively with renewable generation, renewable jobs, both wind, solar, and the smart

grid and the like. so it's really important for us in america to move forward, get the financing in place so the projects that are unable to get the financing, low-cost financing, can move forward and put america in a leadership position. we think it's -- we think that's absolutely critical. i believe the american wind energy association mentioned that there were 35 -- about 35 manufacturing facilities in the united states. and if we can get this financing going and get the renewables, as i mentioned, almost increased by five-fold, we can do a significant amount of that in the united states. host: you mentioned china. what other countries are leading the way in this area? guest: spain and germany are two of the other countries that are moving forward aggressively. india is also moving very aggressively forward,

particularly in the solar bit. but all across -- when we look at the installation of renewables, europe is moving forward aggressively with wind and solar. they have set goals of 25% by 2025 of renewables installed. and i was in ireland meeting with the irish energy minister, who has set an internal goal of getting to almost 40%. so a lot of countries moving forward with renewables, and part of that intent is to try to get some of that manufacturing. we can take a leadership position in the united states on that if we move forward aggressively, and there's significant job creation that comes from both the installation and the development and manufacturing of those facilities. host: san fernando, california can, matthew is on the independents line for mr. filsinger. what's your question? caller: well, basically i do have a question on the renewable energy. i am seeking a way and information on how to get -- i

have several ideas for renewable, green energy ideas, and i just need some information on basically, where would i submit to get these viewed or funded, etc.? i'm a small business owner. it's a landscaping company, but i'm trying to currently get my small business funded through grants.gov, and that's in motion, but is there any other links or, you know, resources that you can basically guide me to to get important ideas that i have viewed out there? host: thanks. entrepreneur looking for a little bit of help, mr. filsinger. guest: wrblings i think that the department of energy -- well, i think that the department of energy currently has some programs f. we get the green bank in place, obviously that would be one area. i would encourage you to go to the coalition for the green bank website and look at some of the members there that are

part of that coalition that may match up with your ideas and reach out to some of them. also feel free to reach out to me, and i can direct you in that from the website. host: you've touched on financing a couple of times to get this whole idea of green jobs and a green bank going much more quickly. where are your sources, potential sources, of financing, government, banks,? i especially ask because of the climate we're in economically. guest: wrbling the coalition for the green bank would initially be capitalized with anticipated of $20 billion to $25 billion, which would come from the u.s. government. this would be an entity solely owned by the u.s. government, but an independent organization. that amount of money would be used for the financing for guaranteed -- for loan guarantees, for loans, credit

enhancement and the like. the private funds would come in from the equity perspective to do the equity side financing, and that would come from the -- from a lot of the folks you see that are members of the coalition for the green bank, as well as many others that are out there developing projects, moving these forward, manufacturing facilities, power generation, etc. host: how long do you expect it might take to generate $25 billion? guest: well, we would -- we would want that $25 billion funded upfront, and that $25 billion would allow to us get leverage on that of 10 to 20 times due to the nature of the loan guarantees. we would want that as an initial capitalization. host: we go to dayton, ohio. mark on the republican line, good morning. caller: good morning. guest: good morning. caller: hi, todd. mark harris with the builders development group near dayton, ohio. what i'm doing is i found a way to actually proceed in the process of doing 12 megawatt a

ray of solar near dayton. in this program, i've been getting great response from the state of ohio, and i'm also currently working with what we call the dayton development coalition. part of my problems are having on the local aspect. i have a plan and i have a local, state-run solar grid company, which is a provider that is ready to put 12 megawatts of power on a single structure, also a structure that has been abandoned by large companies, and i've got that company willing to go online to do a great project. i'm having a heck of a time getting local officials to buy into the fact that i can bring 1,000 jobs to g.m. and everything else. where do we go?

guest: well, when you go from the local jurisdiction, i think it is important you push the local officials. i assume this is the state or city level -- that the state level, the governor's office, the council and mayor's office, when you have a potential high number of jobs, i would definitely be using that to push that forward and that agenda forward. it's difficult to understand how, you know, in this current economic environment, that we wouldn't be pushing those things forward. you know, there are local issues on permitting and others that are tough to get over, and that's being worked on, too, separate from the coalition for the green bank. host: cran ton, rhode island, matthew, democratic caller. hi, matthew. caller: hi. i was just wondering, you know how pushing for green jobs is not actually showing people how to do, it like, if they have an idea, i was wondering if they

know there's a form of quantum energy that would be cheaper than any green jobs that are out there are. tin there's a cheap quantum energy, but nobody wants to listen to me because they don't really believe me, but it's definitely true. and i was wondering, what do you think about, like, new forms of cheap quantum energy that we can a lot through a unified field? host: let's see what our guest has to say about it. host: i'm not an expert in that particular area, but i think the key is, when you have an idea, make sure that you get an equity participant behind that idea so they can bring it forward for financing. when we move forward with the financing, obviously the private market brings forward those projects, and then those projects are reviewed for feasiblity and to make sure they can get power to the grid and they can be done in an

economically feasible basis to get reasonable, low-cost financing. host: here is a message or a question via twitter. do you expect the u.s. taxpayers to subsidize your green bank? if taxpayers pay for modernizing the power grid, we should own and operate it. what do you think? guest: well, as we look at the green bank, we're looking for a $25 billion initial capital infusion. that money would be paid back to the taxpayer through loan repayment, through fees, etc. this is a nonprofit bank, but it is one where we intend on paying back -- the taxpayer would get paid back, so we think it's a very economic way to get jobs on the grid. you know, in the u.s., there are utilities that are owned by the participants, like the united states co-ops, which are owned by the participants, and they are also involved in this process. host: what parts of the country are we talking about, mr.

filsinger, with green jobs? do they spread all over the country? what's your people in the various regions here know? >> well, you know, i think that's a very critical question, because one of the things we believe is you have to get jobs across the united states. so if we look at, you know, where are those jobs, well, if we look at the part of the country hardest hit by the automotive sector, that is a great part of the country that will be getting to retro fit some of the manufacturing to manufacture the green components for the renewable generation, for example. if we go to the west, you have a lot of solar opportunities in the west, you have a lot of wind opportunities in the west, the south, you have biomass in the southeast. and in the northeast, you have energy efficiency and retro fitting all across the united states. if you look at some of the

different examples, for example, in colorado, you've got the bark beetle. you've got the opportunity there to take all the damage to the forest due to the bark beetle, you have logging jobs, you have creating biomass, all the way through there. you can see all the jobs that go through that process. but then again, you've got microturbines on irrigation in the northwest. we have, you know, every single state would benefit from green jobs. host: are they long-term jobs, do you think? what can you tell us? >> yes. as we move to a green economy, we are looking for long-term green jobs. now, in the short term, you would obviously get immediate jobs from construction and implementation. but as we move forward, i think it's important to know, when we look at the amount of generation in the united states, we're looking at about 1,000 gigawatts in the united

states. if we're going to move to a 20% renewable standard, we have significant generation that will need to be built on an annual basis. so even the construction and implementation will be long-term jobs, as well as the operation, maintenance, and the continuation tv maintaining those facilities as we move forward. -- and continuation and maintaining those facilities as we move forward. and as we cut energy costs through retro fitting, we also have new ideas and new technologies that come to the market. those are also need to be funded into the future and create additional jobs for the longer term. host: one or message before we go back to calls via twitter, one government involvement, we would have no highway system, no hydroelectric, no space program, and no strong military. our next call is from thaddeous who lives in biloxi, mississippi, independent caller. hi there. caller: good morning.

host: good morning. guest: good morning. caller: i have basically four quick questions, and then i'll take the answer off the air. my first question is, initially in your statement you said that in the future these jobs would impact us. my question is, have you approached manufacturers and other people to find out if they are really interested in accepting your product, and how far down the line would it intact us, since right now we are in such a job crisis? my second question would be -- host: caller, let me stop include and get back to the second question. we can keep things more orderly that way. mr. filsinger, anything on the first question? guest: yes. manufacturers, some of them are members of the coalition. so yes, we have spoken to many

manufacturers, and many of them are on our coalition who are seeking funds so they can move forward in getting some of these things done. a few examples of that are -- one is a manufacturer of more efficient components for the transmission system, which can potentially cut electricity consumption by 5%. another manufacturer is making concrete bricks in a more carbon-efficient manner. so many manufacturers are part of the coalition and are very supportive and excited for the potential to get low-cost finance sog they can expand their facilities and get more jobs and more factories in the united states. host: biloxi, one more question. go ahead. biloxi, you there? i think they're gone. we have joan on the line now from washington. what town you calling from? go ahead, please. caller: yes, i'd just like to ask the question, at the

beginning of the program, he mentioned the jobs fair at the white house and that there were top economists and other people there. i was just kind of curious, how many republicans were in that? because i know, just cabinet members, none of them have had outside jobs other than government jobs. also, i was just in upstate new york for thanksgiving, and i sought wind turbines -- and i saw the wind turbine program up there by candaigua lakes. how much of that wind energy is deemed used in that area, and for how many people? i think i counted like 50-some wind turbines just driving along the road. and also, now that -- and i'm sorry that he's passed away --

senator kennedy was against the wind turbines in the cape cod area, when will that go into effect? host: thanks. you can take any or all of that. guest: well, with respect to the wind generation, wind generation, obviously the size of the facility is dependent on the size of the turbines and the number of turbines. generally, how that wind gets into the grid is determined by the transmission and where that transmission brings that generation. you can generally be rest assured that the areas around if the wind turbines are definitely getting the benefit of that generation, but so is the entire market. because as we look at the grid itself, you know, half of the grid currently in the united states is about -- is approximately coal generation. there's about 20% natural gas, 20% nuclear, and then about 7% is hydrogen ration, and then

the next small bit is the renewable, the wind, the solar, the biomass. but as you dispatch through a typical day, tun, at nighttime, a lot of the wind is being used , and then in the daytime you've got a lot of the natural gas units that are producing the electricity. so the benefit of that the wind is accumulating to all the customers. as long as the wind is able to get into the grid so it can be used and useful, and that's a critical component of this as we move forward, to make sure that we have the transmission to make sure the wind isn't stranded, that we're not building wind turbine that is cannot be use and had useful. and then also looking at making sure that we have the right distribution system or smart grid type it can nothing to make sure we get the most efficient use that have wind. but knowing overall, wind is benefiting the entire grid, not just those areas around the turbines. host: when we talk about these green jobs, mr. filsinger, what should folks know about education levels, training,

pay, how does it compare to other types of jobs? guest: well, it's a very good question. if you look at the jobs, it's a broad array of jobs, as i mentioned before. it's all the way from the real estate agent, the pipe fitters, the welders, the construction workers, the operators, the environmental engineers. i was at a clean economy network conference where they were looking at discussing retrofitting with some of the current construction workers that were out of work who were now going move into the retrofitting of residential and commercial property. and one of the attendees was the mayor of las vegas, who said, we are here to create careers, not just jobs. and i think that's a critical component. when we look at this, we're taking all the different jobs that are out there, most all those jobs fit in this -- fit in a green economy. there's the pay scales are varied, but there's some --

these are significant jobs, and i would call them careers. host: next call from florida, tom, democratic caller. go ahead, please. caller: i'd like to ask a question about the flex fuel cars now that we've got these cars that are designed for more efficient with alcohol r. with $180 billion going crude oil, that sounds like it's paying for he was if we just distill the alcohol. we have biomasses, we have nonindigenous plants to start w. i'd just like to see what your opinion is. host: thanks. guest: well, when we look at ethanol overall, there is a significant amount of ethanol across the country, but there's also upcoming technologies that will allow us more flexibility there. clearly the coalition for the green bank and the concept of the green bank is to move us away from foreign sources into domestic sources. i think when you look at what we're looking at, for example,

if you get the $25 million capitalization, up move forward with the investment in the green technology, you have the same effect ads taking 11.5 million off the road per year. or reducing the co2 by 22 to 60 million metric tons. , so you know, moving to these alternative domestic fuels is critical in part behalf we are supporting through the coalition of the green bank. host: as you seek funding, what have you heard so far from congress about your ideas? guest: the green bank was included in the waxman-markey bill and had a significant amount of bipartisan support. we are also seeing that bipartisan support in the senate through the energy and natural resources committee, so we've had, i would say, fairly strong support in both the house and the senate. host: last call, minnesota.

lee on the independent line, hi. caller: yerk i'd like to know, if you manage to get your funding and the dollar continues to fall at the rate that it's been falling in value , say another 70% drop in the value as we had 20% drop in the last six months or so, if you get another 60% or 0% drop in the value of the dollar over the next two years, how will that affect your plan? host: thank you. guest: i don't think it necessary al effects the plan. what it does do, when the dollar drops off, is makes america, in a sense, more competitive with the other providers of the manufacturing of those parts and facilities. so i don't think it hurts -- i don't think it changes the plan, but i don't see a negative effect with respect to the green bank. what we're focusing on is

domestic production, domestic job creation, so it's really, you know, a u.s.-based model. now, as you see shifts in the dollar, you will get more exports, and it could be even more beneficial. host: our guest has been co-chair of the coalition for the green bank. coalitionforthegreenbank.com is their website. we appreciate your time this morning. coming up in a couple can of minutes -- we will talk about the president's afghanistan war strategy. our guest will be the senior writer for the weekly standard, plus your calls. today is the 68th anniversary of the japanese attack on pearl harbor, december 7, 1941. 2,390 americans were left dead, and the national park service has been collecting stories from that day. they're doing an extensive oral history project. we're about to hear a brief excerpt from one survivor's story.

>> pennsylvania was flagship of the pacific fleet, and we were also, i believe at that time, flagship of the navy. it was admirable ken shipp. he just happened to be not on it that day. when we used to go out on patrol, and they would have general quarters, the saying used to be the japs are attacking as we'd run to our battle station, and most of us knew that eventually we were going to have to fight the japanese. now, where that trickled down from, i have no idea. i suppose from the politicians, the officers, the officers to us, but we expected to fight them eventually. we just didn't know when. there was no need for radio communication. it was obvious to all the ships in the harbor that we were under attack, so they had us carrying ammunition out to the 350.

i had just been handed a three-inch shell, and i was getting ready to run it out to the gunee, and the next thing i knew i was flat on my face. something went through my right thigh and out my rear end, and i had a six by inch piece blown out of the left thigh. i had five peefs shrapnel in the left leg. my right hand was shot open. i lost part of the left he will bosme i lost part of the muscle out of the bicep. they finally put me into a bunk, and i was there -- lying there, and i saw one of the third-class radio men go by, and i said, hey, osman, and he looked at me, and he says, who are you? and then i realized that either something's wrong with me or something's wrong with him. so i said, it's hyland, and all he did was go, oh, oh, and walk away from me.

host: you can watch the complete interviews. they're going air on december 19 and 20 on c-span3, or watch them at www c-span.org. our guest now is from the weekly standard, here to talk about afghanistan. and what do you make of the new, the current policy that the president put forth? guest: well, generally i like the policy. i think it was something that is cannot with what the president has been arguing not only when he was campaigning during the 2008 elections, but also going back years when he was in the senate and even before he was in the senate, talked about a need to refocus on afghanistan and to win the war there, because it's crucial to u.s. national security. and indeed, global security. i think he made good on those campaign promises by doing what he's done. i did not like, as a lot of people didn't, the timeline. i thought there was almost a jarring discord effect when he

says literally two times in his speech last week, in consecutive sentence, this is crucial to global security and that we were going to be out in 18 months. seems to member a tension there. if it's crucial to global security, we should be there to win it no matter how long it takes us to win it. host: will the first part that have strategy prior to the timeline work, the addition of troops? guest: certainly, it's a risk. there's no guarantee at this point t. i think the model that you've seen is the surge in iraq. and while there are many important differences between what we're seeing in afghanistan and what we saw in iraq, it's a good model, and i think having general david petraeus looking at sort of above at how the surge is implemented and having someone like general stan mcchrystal be the one to implement it, i think there's a reasonable expectation for success. host: weekly standard writes about general mcchrystal, the bottom line, they write here, a very capable field commander, will have 100,000 american troops by the middle of next year to take the fight to the

enscommee regain the initiative in the war. he has expressed confidence in his ability to execute his strategy with these resources. he and his superior and theth in chain of command, general petraeus, have earned the right of the nation's confidence in their judgment. is the nation confident? guest: i'm sure the nation's confident, although we've already seen a swing in polls that were taken after the president's speech of people who are now at least open to supporting the process. i believe it was a cnn poll last week said 61%. you had seen before that, just in the two months before the speech, a precipitous decline in the number of people who were willing to support such an he is can a haitian or even to support the war itself. i think this is actually sort of a quirky view on this. i think this is actually an area where the president could do himself some good politically if he makes a sustained, consistent, co-county attorney case about the need to be there, which has said for several years, and allows his generals and national security team to make

that case for him, why this war matters, why is it important to win, and what exactly are we doing on the ground to get us to that point where we win it? host: phone numbers on the bottom of the screen for our guest, stephen hayes, weeklystandard.com. we're talking about the president's strategy in afghanistan. separate lines there for republicans and democrats and independents. let's turn to congress then, mr. hayes. what will its reaction to be the strategy? what have you heard so far? guest: i think we've heard a mix. it's very interesting. you don't often see issues like this that have splits in both parties on both sides. you have republicans on the one hand, who are very skeptical this can work, sort of make an argument that george will made, this is not likely to succeed, we shouldn't spend this kind of time and resources. and you have democrats arguing, well, this is yet another war, we are escalating, and it will come -- this escalation will

cost us in terms of what we can do on domestic policies. then you have a group in the middle of republicans and democrats who are supportive broadly of the president's plans, even if they disagree with the timelines or the numbers in terms of the escalation or are concerned about costs in the middle who have said, look, we think the president's basic arguments are right here, and we're supportive of what he's trying to do. host: so here is a shot of general stanley where can crystal. he's greeting members of the afghan particle parliament. he's going to be greeted by members of congress this week, has at least a couple of appearances before committees on either side. what are they going to want to know from him? guest: well, i think you'll see a lot of grand standing, i think. this is what congress does to a certain extent. he will come, and they will all make their own personal cases n. many cases, members of congress will be more interested in making policy statements, establishing their position firmly rather than hearing from him. but i think when you get to the serious question, you're going hear people ask him, what are

the likely prospects of success? what exactly are you going to do to make sure that we get from point a to point b? on the republican side, i think you're going to have some skeptical republicans, particularly in the senate, who are likely to ask him how the mission was pared down. i mean, he came in with the president's previous mission for afghanistan laid out in his march 27 speech, and general mcchrystal thought he had a man darkte a counterinsurgency mandate. one of the things that we read in the ticktock since then is that the president sought to narrow that mission with his national security team. how exactly has that mission been narrowed, if it has been, and what does the timeline mean? host: and there were a bunch of hearings on the hill last week, and many of those same figures out came to the sunday morning shows yesterday. the idea of this deadline, one of the storylines today, is there a deadline, what should it somebody robert gates, the defense, was on "meet the

press," here's today say. >> is this a deadline? >> it's the beginning of a process. in july 2011, our generals are confident that they will know whether our strategy is working, and the plan to is begin transferring areas of responsibility for security over to the afghan security forces with us remaining in a tactical and then strategic overwatch position, sort of the cavalry over the hill. but we will begin to thin our forces and begin to bring them home. but the pace of that, of bringing them home, and where we will bring them home from will depend on the circumstances on the ground and those judgments will be made by our commanders in the field. >> regardless of the circumstances, though, what you're saying is that withdraw will take place at that point. >> it will be begin in july of 2011, but how quickly it goes will very much depend on the conditions on the ground. we will have a significant number of forces in there for

some considerable period of time after that. host: so stephen hayes, do you hear the word deadline in there? >> well, it was a very direct question from david gregory sthrks a deadline? well, really, it's a beginning of a long-term -- so he dent say yes. what's been interesting is the white house has been putting out the story, including going so far as to call reporters in to meet with robert gibbs and say, look, the president meant what he said, this is a firm deadline. and then you have -- yesterday on the sunday shows, hillary clinton and robert gates, i think taking great pains not to call it a deadline, and to build in sort of a softness to this deadline that i think probably should have existed at the time, and i think that's in part a reaction to two things. one, the next particular response. i think even people who are likely supportive overall of the president's policies, as i am, were deeply concerned about this deadline and saw the tension in it between, you know, crucial to our national security and leaving in 18 months. i think you've also seen reaction from the leadership in

pakistan and afghanistan saying, wait a second, you know, if youly? that you are leaving in 18 months, that could cause us real problems and inhibit our ability to do the kinds of things we need to do to enable you to leave. host: first call, albany, new york, chris on the independent line for stephen hayes, hi. caller: hi, yeah, i don't agree with the polls, the 62% that mr. hayes quoted. i can't find anyone really who supports this escalation in war, and the obama foreign policy, i think his electorate figured he mean a different kind of president, instead of adding numbers, osama bin laden, if you remember, he invited us to come. he said, i want to drain your economy, i want to shed your blood over here. and it seems like we're playing into his hands, we're dealing with a faceless enemy. it's an information war. to throw in troops and having machinery and convoys, everything in the mountain terrains and the thousands of

villages where these people scoot around, they're flying around on horseback, you know, with saddle bags full of heroin, and like i said, when the generals sit down, you know, at the table with obama, they say, we can win this thing. but when you don't have a definable enemy, a faceless enemy in effect, there's no winning anything. obama should be talking about nuclear disarmament with yained and pakistan and talking peace instead of continuing this, you know, this same foreign policy that americans are really tired of. host: thanks. stephen hayes? guest: well, i think the president has done plenty of talking peace and has done talking to nuclear disarm am. some may think he's not terribly realistic about both those things. i think there are some on the left who are saying that the president is escalating that he ran as an anti-war president, that eepts being true to his word. couldn't be further from the truth. he was very specific about the

kind of escalation that he was going bring to office if he were elected. and he talked about sort of refocusing attention on afghanistan, and in some peaches, i recall, even got specific with how many brigades he was going to send to afghanistan in order to finish the job there. he's actually been quite consistent. as critical as i am on iran and on north korea and on many of his foreign policy adventures, i think on this one, by and large, with some exceptions, with some caveats, he's got it right. host: south bend, indiana, jonathan, good morning. caller: good morning. president obama is making a mockery of the united states. this man is absolutely the worst possible person we can have as a leader of the free world. host: caller, let me explain why. caller: well, there's three basic reasons. number one, he's been in office for a year, and the man is finally, after listening to his generals saying we need 40,000, he undercuts them and says, we'll, wool give you 30. and then in 18 months he is

we're leaving. can you imagine world war ii, all right, we're fighting this war because it's veelingts that we win the war, but you know in june of next year we're leaving? host: caller, let me ask you, though, the administration did make the point they're trying to try to get some extra troops from nato does. that mean anything to you? caller: not at all. the united states is the one that suffered the world trade towers coming down, not nato f. we're going to do, this we have to do this on our own. the third most important point, is president obama going to issue little cards for miranda rights so when the american soldiers see an enemy combatant, we can turn around and read them their rights? this is a mockery. what you know breaks my heart? me as an ex-military for 13 years in the united states army, this is absolutely a blasphemous thing that this president is doing. host: stephen hayes of the weekly standard. guest: well, i think the caller makes a good point about the deadline. we had a fascinating article back, i believe it was in 2005 by a harvard professor, and he

argued that this was, you know, two years before the surge, he argued in effect, the most important part of a surge is to -- is its psychological effect. you're basically saying to your enemy, we are here, we are going to defeat you, there is no compromise, you know, give us hope in effect. and what i think the president has done, unfortunately, with his announcement of this 18-month deadline zpashe really, we should be specific. i mean, the surge will not -- they've accelerated the deployment of troops, which is a good thing, but it won't be completed until likely the end of august, and then they're going to evaluate it in december so. you're really talking about, in some ways, a four or five-month surge. but in telling i think the people that we're fighting in afghanistan and in pakistan that there is a -- that this is finite, you're essential inviting them to wait us out. and roshte gibbs has sort of dismiss that had argument when

it's been raised by him, but he hasn't actually done it by making any arguments. he's just done it dismissively without countering the claims. and i think the psychological -- the fact that there won't be the psychological advantage of saying to the enemy, we are coming, we are staying, you will not win, i think gives that gives them hope. host: next call, lutherville, good morning gorges frank, democratic line. stephen hayes, good morning. caller: good morning. guest: good morning. caller: i think it's just a waste of time. we got people here in the united states, we can't afford -- we got to change. we got to stay the course, we got to stay the course, we got to win this war. how you going win a war when this war was going since i was a little boy?

in our i'm 65 years old, and people still raising hell and fighting over there. focus on the homeland first? guest: the caller raises points that i think are at the heart of many democratic complaints about what the president has done. i find the talk, particularly from the president, the talk of the costs of the war, $30 billion a year additionally to surge the troops that we're surging, i find that rather distasteful actually. to me, when you add it up, $30 billion is 4%, less than 4% of the $787 billion that he pushed and that democrats in congress passed. winning a war that the president has said is crucial to u.s. national security, on one harningsd you want to spend whatever it takes to win that war if it truly is critical to u.s. national security and global security. but to complain about the cost or to publicly worry about the costs in the face of the spending orgy we've seen in

washington i find distasteful. boy from billions to millions, the lead story in the washington toast talks about millions of dollars of gear left in iraq. it's donating passenger vehicles, generators, other equipment worth tens of millions of dollars to the iraqi government. this is new authority granted bit pentagon, and the commanders in iraq may now donate to the iraqis up to $30 million of equipment from each facility they leave, up from the $2 million cap established back in 2005. what does that mean to you? guest: well, that's a lot. one of the things, with war comes weavepls the extent you can do everything you can to weed out that waste, fine. if we're going to do something with excess equipment, i think handing it over to the iraqis is the best way to solve a bad problem, in effect. host: many callers talk about afghanistan versus pakistan. is it that simple? put the resources and the focus on pakistan versus afghanistan,

or do the two go together? guest: no, i don't think so. by surging into afghanistan, you're also changing the strategy. but by surging into afghanistan, you're providing sort of a backstop in pakistan. you've got to do hard-core al qaeda elements in pakistan. i think most experts believe that that's the case. what you're essentially saying you're not allowing free travel, free flow where they could continue to make common cause with the taliban and afghanistan. so i think, you know, if you flip the formulation, if you take the troops out, then what you provide is essentially a power in which the taliban has much more freedom to operate, which could be even more dangerous to both countries. host: you touched on something called the ticktock earlier. we read stories over the weekend, really long stories, about the president's process in making this decision. did anything that you read surprise you? guest: what surprised me? i guess i thought, frankly,

given how long the president took to make this decision, i guess i thought that i would learn more about where his particular hangups were. you know, some of that talk was in these articles, but given that the plan he's endorsed, it resembles, largely resembles the basics of the mcchrystal plan. i guess i thought there was going to be something more dramatic, adding a timeline, adding a july 2011 drawdown date, to me that wasn't something that would have required taking that much time. host: next call, robinsonville, mississippi, tony, independent caller. thanks for waiting, tony. caller: ok. this strategy is not a strategy at all. what i called about is, you can get this afghanistan, iraq, you can get this all over in a day or two if you wanted. to all you got to do is go back and look in history f. when the

british were trying to get the goods out of india, they built the sexrr had to go through all that territory. and right off the bat, it the islamic people start attacking the cranes and killing people and robbing them. then they put soldiers on the cranes, so what you did was dig up the tracks and crash the trains and robbed them some more. so somebody came up with the idea of arm two guys with buckets, they put it on the tracks, never had any more problem with terrorists or anybody messing with the train, never had another problem. now, it's my thinking if we was able to get some cameras and take pictures of guys dipping their bullets in pig grease or whatever before they load the guns and let the enemy see that, they would drop their guns and run. they will not mess with us. if you don't believe this is true, next time you go to the

convenience store to get some cigarettes or whatever you're going get, ask the guy behind the counter what's i think of this idea, you'll find out real quick, they'll throw their hands up and say it's over, we're not going mess with you, we're not going to take a chance on salvation and, you know, -- they give up. host: thanks. stephen hayes? guest: not sure there's a lot to respond to there. you know, i think the caller encapsulated some obvious stereotypes. i don't think that that is likely to be the solution. host: twitter message for us and stephen hayes, afghanistan has always been the graveyard of he will pires despite their primitive lifestyle and fighting with 15-c arms and techniques. they ask why. guest: well, that's a good question. toing a certain extent, we've seen an arrogance that has accompanied previous attempts to conquer, if you will, afghanistan. i think we have a different goal here at this point.

i think particularly because the president has scaled back his ambitions. i mean, tip point he's not even talking about necessarily defeating the taliban. there's certainly, i don't believe, a strong commitment to the "nation building" in the president's plans. he's now just talking about degrading al qaeda and rendering it incapable of mount ago tax against the united states. host: what will the nato role somebody we know they're being asked to add froops. how will that work? guest: hard to know if they will meet pledges, because pledges are exactly that, pledges. you know, i support obama administration will ton put a lot of pressure nato allies to make good good on what they've said they're going to do. we had a caller earlier say that he's not that confident in nato troops. i have to say, i'm not either. i remember when i was in iraq, interviewed a polish general and asked -- it was a group interview, and we asked, what is the most difficult thing about your mission here in

iraq, and he said most difficult thing is being international. coordinating among all. various groups. i think one of the reasons that, you know, and there are many, but one of the reasons that the surge turned out the way that it did in iraq is because essentially the u.s. government took hold of the operation and americanize it had and said we are going win this thing, it's too important to, you know, to say we're going to let our allies handle things that they might not be able to handle. so i'm much more encouraged by the 30,000 u.s. troops than the 7,000 or so nato troops. host: caller from here in washington, d.c. for stephen hayes, it it's mike on the republican line. hey, mike. caller: hey, how you doing? my question is, do you believe that the whole afghanistan war thing is going -- because obama has said that the war would be like, you know, over by now, that you can be gone, so what's the take on that?

guest: well, i'm not institutor caller is referring to afghanistan or iraq. i think the president wanted to end iraq very quick, but he was very clear in the campaign and has been throughout his presidency, once march 27 in a speech that he gave and again in august in a speech that he gave, i believe before the v.f.w., talked about the need to stay in afghanistan, the need to win in afghanistan. so he's actually been, i think, quite consistent about his commitment to afghanistan. and what we saw over the weekend was a bit of a shift in the rhetoric that we've gotten from the administration, it the president's emphasis on tuesday in his speech and in the briefing that is he gave before the speech was that this would put us on a trajectory for drawdown. what you heard from secretary gates and secretary clinton over the weekend is we elected to be there for years, two to four years, and maybe locker, and that was the emphasis. i think what the administration was trying to do was recalibrate its message a bit in part for domestic consumption, but also, more

importantly, for consumption in afghanistan and pakistan, and to our nato allies. host: and the there's another headline, gates sees slow afghanistan pullout. this is "the washington times." obama's goal for 2011 called a beginning. little rock, arkansas, faye on the line for democrats. you're on with stephen hayes. hi, faye. caller: yes, mr. hayes, when i heard the president give a deadline, i heard it in a different way. i heard it as a ploy, like he gave july 18 so that the afghan people will not lollygag around and training their law enforcement or their troops or whatever, but i think that, you know, if they're crazy enough to think that we're going to be gone on july the 18 and stick their heads out on the 18th, they'll be this for a big surprise. in our, that's the way i looked

at it. i looked at it as a way for the afghan government to take him seriously and for them to not lollygag around and train their police officers or whoever it is that they're training, because july 18 we're gone, and that, you know, if, like i said, if they think that we're going to be gone, they'll stick their head out. guest: i think that's a good point. i mean, i think that's exactly the case the administration would make about the deadline. and as somebody who's critical of the deadline, i actually think that is entirely possible. it's a clear way of sending a message to both governments in afghanistan and pakistan that we're serious and that we need -- you need to do the things that we're asking you to do now, and that there is a sense of urgency. it's the upside of a deadline. i mean, i think it's foolish for those of us who are critical of the deadline to pretend there is no upside. it does communicate urgency, and it does put the president and the administration and general mcchrystal in a

position where they can make demands. the question is the tradeoff. is that worth doing more than the sort of conflicting message you send, the message and intention that you send by calling for a pullout when you're essentially telegraphing it to the enemy? host: stephen hayes, we appreciate your time this morning. thanks a lot. guest: thanks for having me. noip our last hour of the program, we'll talk about climate change, the summit in copenhagen, denmark, has begun. it will last two weeks. president obama is expected there late next week. our guest will be the former chairman of the president's council on environmental quality from the years 2001 to 2009. he'll take your calls. in the meantime, some more news from c-span radio. >> it's 8:59 a.m. eastern time. "the washington post" reports that new authority granted by the pentagon says u.s. commanders in iraq may now donate to the iraqis up to $30

million worth of equipment from each facility they leave. this includes passenger vehicles, generators and other equipment worth tens of millions of dollars. officials say the approach has trigger ited arguments in the pentagon over whether the effort is hurting the buildup in afghanistan. meanwhile, a gnat owe spokesman says the group's military representatives are meeting now in belgium on afghanistan and are depopped confirm last week's pledges made by allied nations for an additional 7,000 troops for the war. the result will be announced tomorrow following the meeting. .

and update on market -- a south carolina governor, mark sanford. a state house committee meets today to give -- to consider whether he should be impeached for being out of office during a five-day trip to argentina and his use of a state aircraft. if full committee could debate the bench -- the measure next week. >> american icons, three original documentaries from c- span now available on tdvd, a unique journey through the tree branches of american government. to the supreme court after the eyes of the justices, go beyond a velvet ropes of public tours into the rarely seen spaces of the white house, america's most famous home, and explore the

history and architecture of the capitol, one of america's most symbolic structures. american icons, 83 disk dvt said, $24.95 shipping and handling -- a three-disc adibi de -- a three--- dvd said. host: our next guest is james connaughton. they are of the climate summit and you can see them talking about saving the rain forest and little cities, healthy kids, and someone jumps up and says, what if it is a big hoax and we create a better world for nothing? guest: the cartoon catches the edge of what is probably correct. there are all kinds of reasons to pursue cleaner energy, climate change being one of them, but good old fashioned

security being another one. there's a lot more going on then just climate change going on. host: what is your focus in copenhagen? guest: am very pleased that the major economies, including the developed economies and the developing ones india and china, have declared but there rendition through 2020 can be. and there is a graph -- and there are aggressive levels through 2015. -- 2050 . >> which come -- countries have you watched -- a host: which countries have you watched most closely? guest: president obama has been set out in -- and ambitious, but reasonably achievable set of goals. i want to see our friends in europe to say we can work with that. then when it comes to china and

india and in the other emerging economies, whose emissions already exceed those of the duo of the world, i want to see them carrying out programs that have enforceability and accountability internationally. if they are committing to more domestic accountability, that can be trained -- translated into an internationally controlled much ring system, then i can see numbers for progress. host: the phone numbers are on the screen. james connaughton is now the executive vice president at constellation energy. we will take your calls in just a couple of minutes. one of the story lines of the last several days was the creation of a special fund to allow certain countries to get on board to make the changes they need with a climate change. can you explain that to us and what your thoughts are? guest: there are a number of countries that say, especially

the emerging developing countries and the smaller countries who say, we can only do so much with what we've got, but we can go further in addressing the climate change if we have international assistance. they're talking about $10 billion annually. when i was in the government, the u.s. had proposed the as doug reshma of such a fund. and i think the obama administration -- the establishment of such a fund. and i think the obama administration is talking about more money. if we can get our counterparts to come up with a signature to portion of the money, that is the jumpstart. one other thing we can do immediately -- right now, we have tariffs and non-tariff restrictions on clean energy technologies, especially countries like china and india. leaders mariko 20 tariffs on energy technologies and that alone -- leaders tomorrow could go to no tariffs on energy technologies and that alone would be a big star.

host: first call is on the democratic line, good morning. caller: my question isn't -- leads to science and i complained about it. i went to school for an engineering degree and i went to professors and i said, look, i want to do experiments, and their specialty was a computer simulation of chemicals. i said, don't you know that the scientific method is experimentation? i do not believe that computer simulations of things that you already know, of things that you are ready are projecting to know is really science. i just want to say that all of this climate change and of corp.'s movie and stuff like that, it is all -- and al gore's

movie and stuff like that, it is of computer simulation. i would like to know your thoughts about that. guest: that is an excellent question. as it happens over the past couple of decades, the world has spent about $40 billion on climate change science. we have got the initial sense that humans are contributing to climate change, but there are a lot of questions about to what degree, over what time for it, and where. where you will get a positive impact and negative impact. fortunately, the scientific communityand a lot of the money today is going into ground-based observations to validate the models. it means that we still need to take this issue seriously and there is more money to do with insurance policy. the more climate change, the more we are cleaning up the air in terms of how it harms people today and also becoming energy

secure. those are all, -- , and benefits. host: the politico.com front page, an ice sculpture of a polar standing in copenhagen. they talk about president obama's decision to participate in the end, rather than the beginning. what does that signify? guest: i think it signifies practicality and impact. originally, there were born to have him go at the beginning and most people are not there yet. he will be going at the end when the other leaders will begin their remarks. it is smart to put him there when the top people are there, to show a sign of common commitment. and i think they're looking at reasonably and bush's goals, which is where we all want to become a couple -- reasonably ambitious goals, which is where we all want to be. host: here is an article from

"wall street journal prempr." can you tell us more of your opinion on this? guest: what is happening is that the epa, based on a series of lawsuits is about to trigger a series of regulations under the clean air act, which is designed to deal with pollutants like so2, which causes acid rain, or ozone which causes smog. the one area on which there is strong bipartisan agreement in washington, that is, if you're

going to address co2, it is better for the congress to set the rules rather than the epa with the clean air act, which was not designed for that purpose. i agree with that. co2 is complicated to do with on the one hand, and the clean air act was reconstructed to do with these pollutants that have immediate effects, not the long- term air pollution affects. i hope the congressional process will rapidly move past the epa regulatory process, because the other thing that you can be assured of with epa regulations is a decade of litigation. i think more people have spent money on lawsuits than cutting to -- cutting emissions. host: we go to oregon, robert, an independent scholar, thanks for waiting. caller: first, thank you for letting me ask you this question. and please bear with me. i am just getting into this

political stuff and that is why i am an independent. when it comes to the environment, i would like to know what it is that is going on in alaska with the conception rio, or whatever it is that is going on -- conception radio, or whatever it is that is going on and it's possible links to send armies out in the ocean -- to the tsunamis out in the ocean. and i would like to hear you speak about the repercussions in this area for a garment, and yet, in this area we have the highest rate of staff infections. could you tell us what is going on up there with harp? guest: i'm not familiar with the specific example you're giving

up in alaska, so let me speak to your -- your question more generally. we did not manage things so well in the past decade or so. but i have to say after doing in our mcguirk for almost 30 years, we have come light years in terms of levels of production -- during environment work for almost 30 years, we have come light years in terms of levels of protection. a lot of companies do not worry about compliance and more because they have set themselves up or do not create them as a risk. what we're talking about now is how we better clean up the mistakes of the past. we have tens of thousands of old industrial sites cleaned up in our cities and redeveloped, and new technologies to do with the legacy of the military activities that you have talked about. i really believe we could actually create a lot more power a lot more affordably with a lot lower emissions, for example.

the company i work for is focused on that, consolation energy. efficiency, as margaret, new nuclear power, -- the company i work force focused on that, consolation energy. efficiency, this margaret, new nuclear power, things like that. host: san antonio, george, republican caller. caller: good morning, i was wanting to know what the government is doing because we all know that us humans have an impact on the environment, rather than climate. that is natural and occurs every tens of thousands of years, like the ice melting and the so accounts breaking off, things like that, we have nothing to do without. what actually is the government doing because the carbon tax betancourt was wanting to put on us is ridiculous -- about gore

was one in to put on us is ridiculous. guest: you are zeroing in on one issue, which is, how we deal with greenhouse gases and how do we do this with out producing a tax would-result? -- without negative results? we strongly support kurram? regulations, but we want to do it -- strongly support cap and trade regulations, but we want to do it the government program. it lets us work in a way that lets us decide how to do it and the government does not touch the money. we spent alternately hundreds of billions of dollars transitioning our plants into lower emission plants, but we will do it in the cheapest possible way. again, something that will, in

fact, increased costs. if we do it right, it is presumed -- proven to work well. we did it with respect to acid rain. there was a program in the 1990's that used this approach. when you do it right, it is not a tax. the only credit a of those companies that reduce emissions. and we're hoping that congress uses this approach but it is for the congress to declare the goals. that is something that only our elected representatives can do. host: james goddard rights in the "new york times" today, "cap sa and fade."

guest: i disagree with the basic conclusion capt. trade has proven to be the single most effective tool we have got. we have cut acid rain air pollution by 50% at much less than the projected cost. now we are about to cut acid rain pollution another 70% of using the same tool. another thing i would note, if, in fact, the program is working and emissions are dropping rapidly, you're supposed to get to very low cost. that is the point of it. you are supposed to reduce costs, rather than keeping pollution going. and pres. obama has committed to an 80% cut in pollution by 2050

and that is something that the industry supports. i do not think anyone can disagree that it is a big cut in seven that we have not been controlling before. i think that with patience, we can get all of the emissions cuts that dr. hansen would like to see. he is the scientist and i and the policy guide. host: back to the phone calls, good morning. caller: i think i have a comment more than a question. one of the reasons i think that, particularly the republicans, are ranting about this being a hoax, i think this is more

spiritually based previn and anti science trading. guest: is zeroing in on the dynamics in washington. -- you are zeroing in on the dynamics in washington. like anything else, there is a bell curve. there is science that supports the view that climate change is going to be dire and happen tomorrow. and there are legitimate the scientists that are questioning whether humans are contributing to global warming. but the weight of the science is significant enough to make expenditure on. i do not know if i would get into characterization's of belief structures because i have dealt with scientists of varying belief structures and i have dealt with non-scientist, a of varying beliefs structures. this requires the kind of political process and debate that we go through.

copenhagen underlines the seriousness of the discussion. science must always be tested and we want to be sure that as we go along we continue to do the right thing. host: we hear from mike now from illinois, independent caller. caller: good morning, with this thing going on in copenhagen and a lot of money on the table for the cap and trade, wired we've been there as an advanced nation -- why aren't we've been there as an advanced nation? why are we sending our scientists and engineers to third world countries or advancing countries to help them -- why aren't we sending our scientists and engineers to third world countries where advancing countries to help them? we have been advancing over the last 30éymkhb years, like we han

edison, -- in medicine, why aren't they in copenhagen taken that information that we know already and sending our engineers and other people to developing countries and help them develop them -- help them develop cleaner energy? guest: there is a lot of that going on. there are processes that the u.s. is leading in terms of partnerships throughout the world. but you are right. we have to help countries lift themselves out of poverty, but to do so in a cleaner way. only about 20 countries are responsible for most of the dirty emissions, if you will. there is not a lot we can do in the next 10 years to really cut emissions, but we can set the stage for it.

we can do more efficiency, more renewable, and use more natural gas, which is becoming much more available in america. but about 10 years from now, hopefully we can have a technology that will capture co2 from coal and chief says and available energy, but with -- and keep that as an available energy, but with no emissions. we could cut a big chunk out of our missions and do it safely. and get our cars electrified. even with plug in hybrids, i can cut a a lot of emissions. give us the right time and hundreds and the billions of dollars can be spent, even here in america to turn our system around from and the meeting went to a non-emitting one. host: loss cruses, new mexico, hello.

caller: global warming is not a hoax. there is a real basis for it. however, it is not a crisis either. the observations are on the low end of viva ipcc projections -- the low end of the ipcc projections. guest: i think where you come out is where a lot of people come out, which is, it sounds like we know all the -- enough and what will the impact be? i think the question is one of insurance. there's some possibility of a big effect, but we do not know what the possibility is. if i can take reasonable cost effective steps to avoid that, of wood to avoid getting cancer in the future, why not do that? the other thing is that i am deeply concerned with energy security. by then we are far too reliant on foreign sources what we do

not have to be. and i really care about air pollution, the stuff that actually puts people in hospitals with respiratory distress and prematurely kills people. we still have some room to move on that and that is benefit cost justified. i can spend hundreds of billions of dollars on clean energy and save much more in terms of lives and injuries to people from air pollution. if you look at the whole package, it is worth being aggressive as long as we're on reasonable time once to make the transition. i cannot build a nuclear power plant tomorrow, but my company can get one before the end of this decade. give us the time, we will retire the old coal plants and replace them with cleaner ones and do that in an effective way for the economy.

host: congress has to say yes to anything the president wants to to? guest: i think that is right. and one of the biggest challenges has been the clean technology fund and also helping developing countries become resilience to any of the negative effects to climate change. i think a direct incentive approach is the best way to go. you get some accountability. your spending and you get to see what you're paying for. i would do a hybrid approach. do the mandate to be sure that we get something for regulatory

policy and then incentivize the rest. if we eliminated trade barriers, terrace anna non-to -- tariffs and non-tariff to energy, we could do that tomorrow and sell goods and services at a much lower price to countries that need it. i think the bears that are making it more -- the barriers that are making it more expensive than we already have are absurd. host: if you copenhagen and the participants, mainly those economists that are based on fossil fuels have nothing positive to offer, according to this article.

host: next call for our guest, san diego, a democrat. caller: my question is about hybrid vehicles. do think that will be the source for change -- and do you think that will be the source for change? also, do you think that global warming is the source for your bald head? guest: [laughter] host: booker raton is our last call, carol, are you on the line? caller: thank you for taking my call. my son graduated from mit and i'm very proud of him. i did read that carbon dioxide is it -- is an odorless gas and

is heavier than air and it passes out of our lungs and then is absorbed by the plants convert it into surrender or hydrogen and release it into the air. how could it possibly be a pollutant? that is my question to you. my son lives in the north pole with eskimos and i wanted to ask you, have you ever lived there? and the polar bears are fine, by the way. they are multiplying like bunnies. host: anything you want to respond to? guest: i have been up to alaska, in your beautiful place on earth. you have beautiful landscape and a lot of development. i think the two can go hand in hand very well. the way that the science shows that there's probably a contribution of humans to an excess amount of co2 -- you are

right, there's a lot of naturally caused co2 -- is getting out of bonds. -- out of balance. we can make real progress in being sure to prevent something that from happening if we do it on a reasonable time lines, and we can be aggressive over a long time for income over 40 or 50 years. i look at this like insurance. the science tells me a lot and it is worth taking action. i think that is what the company in talks are focused on now. at the end of the day, the politicians are going to be very careful that we have reasonable goals that are ambitious, but also that we can keep our economy's sustained. i cannot build a nuclear energy and less i've got a strong economy to pay for it. these things work together. i need a strong economy first in order to pay for the clean energy systems that follow. host: james, 10 -- james

connaughton, thank you so much this morning. our next guest will be james hansen of goddard institute for space studies. he also has a new book coming out tomorrow. we'll be back with some of your calls in a minute. >> the c-span's 2010 studentcam contest is here. the $50,000 in prizes for middle and high school students. top prize, $5,000. just create a 528 minute video on what our country's strengths or a challenge -- craig a five- eight minute video on one of our country's strengths great challenge the country is facing. winning entries will be shown on c-span. grab a camera and get started. go to studentcam.org 4 contest rules and information. >> "washington journal" continues. host: from houston is james

hansen, director of nasa's goddard institute for space studies. dr. hansen, as we look at the issue, you have an op-ed in the "new york times" today and we wanted you to give us your take on things. instead of cash and trade you talk about cap and fayed. -- cap and trade you talk about cap and fade. guest: how i'm getting a big feed back in my ear. i wonder if we could do something about that. but what i actually recommend is not capped and trade, but a fee and dividend. because the fund -- fundamental fact is that as long as fossil fuels are the cheapest form of energy, then we will continue to use them more and more. but the fossil fuels are not made to pay for the damages that they do to human health, the environment, and future climate that our children and

grandchildren will face. what we should do is put a fee on carbon, that means oil, gas, and cold should have a flat feet applied to them -- a flat fee applied to them and that money should not go to the government. it should be distributed to the public on a uniform basis. that way the person that does better than average in reducing their carbon emissions will actually make money. if this be gradually increases, then peoplehood -- then people will buy a more efficient car, and so it their homes, and struck down carbon emissions. host: urban tax -- and drive down carbon emissions host:. ahoy our guest is ahoy joining us -- host: our guest is joining us from houston.

we're talking climate change and as you look toward copenhagen, dr. hansen, what are you most hope for from the son of feddis -- the summit of the starting today? half guest: we're going to have to get on a very different track and what is being talked about by the political leaders because if you look at the problem and see how much carbon and we are getting from oil, gas, and coal, what you quickly realize is that we're going to have to phase out emissions from coal. and we're going to have to prohibit emissions from the on conventional fossil fuels like tarzan'tar sands, hot but if yok at what is happening around the world, the united states just signed an agreement with canada related to the pipeline to carry

tar sands to the united states, so, in fact, the actions that are needed are not being taken. what is being talked about for copenhagen amounts to what were called indulgences in the middle ages, when the singers at the end of the year could purchase from the catholic church -- wendy sinnerswhen the sinnersa f the year could purchase from the catholic church. what they're talking about in copenhagen will bring a small amount of money for the countries and developing countries are calling for as much as they can get, but they are not talking about phasing down the carbon emissions at a rate that would solve the crime problem.

hong host: our guest -- host: our guest is the author of a new book called "storms of my grandchildren" and it gets released tomorrow. but what are you writing about here, dr. hansen? guest: is about the calamities that our children and grandchildren face if we stay on business as usual, but it is also about the actions we could take that have many other advantages in terms of facing off our addiction to fossil fuel. but what i show is that we are not taking that path. the government talks about such a path, but it is green wash. if you look at the actual emissions and how they are changing, if you look at the plant for unconventional fossil fuels, you realize that they are not actually on that path. people are going to have to stand upon if they are interested in the future that

their children and grandchildren will face, and therefore do have to tell the government they will have to be more honest about this. -- and they will have to tell the government they will have to be more honest about this. host: first,, good morning. caller: i would just like to point ..out of that people who deny climate change, for years we polluted our water and look what that did. why do people think doing that to our area will be any different? -- doing that to our air will be any different? guest: people have a hard time seeing the connection between the gases and caught a change because so far, the warming is about 2 degrees fahrenheit, and

that is small compared to weather fluctuations. but that is partly because it takes the climate system quite a substantial time to respond to the changes, so there is more change in the pipeline. and it does not take a very big temperature change globally to see the effects. we can see them occurring in the arctic mountain glaciers melted are around the world, climate zones are beginning to shift. host: you mentioned a 2%. what percentage of a figure of warming would travel you the most and what might we see? look ahead, if you could. guest: our mission is not 2% from about 2 degrees. host: i apologize, two degrees you said, yes. guest: what has become clear in the last two or three years is that the dangerous level in the warming or the dangerous amount

of atmosphere carbon dioxide is a lot less than what we thought several years ago. in fact, at present, we have increased carbon dioxide from 280 to 387 parts per million. we are already in a dangerous zone. if we leave co2 that high and allowed it to go higher, than it is clear, for example, that the ice sheets are not going to be stable in the long run. we already have this remarkable satellite, and gravity satellite, which measures the earth's origin -- gravitational field so accurately that we can see the changes in the mass of the greenland and the arctic ice sheet. that was data that begun -- that we began to take in 2002. initially, it was at a rate of 150 to 200 cubic kilometers per year. it is now losing mass at almost

300 cubic kilometers per year. and a and dr. cut, which had been close to mass balance, -- and antarctica, which had been close to mass balance, is now losing nasmass. if we continue, those eyes she to will become unstable and we will get rapid cboe -- those ice sheet will become unstable and to get rapid sea level rise. it will be a chaotic situation for our children and grandchildren. we will have to decrease of atmospheric co2 back below 350 parts per million. that is possible if we phase out coal emissions and prohibit and conventional fossil fuels like oil shale and tar sands. host: moving on to tennessee. tennessee, are you there?

paul, what is the name of your town? caller: petros. mr. hansen, i have a quick call and a question for you. my comment is, i work in the coal mines. we had some scientists come in and tell us that the water runoff from where we had served mind was running into the water beds polluting. that is a senseless because just as much water was running off the mountain into the water system. but my question is, co2, i understand that as a gimmick -- dangerous chemicals to are out this year. i'm wondering if you would like to have us put on the muzzles of that every time we agreed, we are not -- so that every time we

agreed we are not reading this a of pollutants back out -- every time we breathe we are not in his backyard into the atmosphere. co guest: 25 nominal levels are not harmful to human -- co2 at nominal levels is not harmful to humans. but in excess, it traps in the atmosphere in heat radiation and causes the atmosphere to become warmer. that is the danger, its effect on the climate, its properties in absorbing heat radiation. host: next call, bill, independent line. caller: mr. hansen, i have read your stuff over the years and i appreciate your book and i will go out and get it.

two questions, one is, do you believe in the northwest passage melting that have been a couple of years ago, maybe last year, and should be highlighted as one of the media things that we are getting, result of global warming? and two, i do not see a massive pr campaign to the public. you can tell by the calls that we have been getting over the last few weeks. people do not understand that it is not natural because the amount of co2 is equal to seven mount st. helens and volcanoes. --and co2 is not a pollutant, like you said, but too much and you drowne. guest: co2, the amount of co2 in the atmosphere is affected by

volcanoes. it is one of the -- one of the interesting things is that if you look at the really long history of climate, there were times when volcanoes were particularly active and when they were -- by shrewd say that the amount of co2 in the atmosphere is determined by the source, which is volcanoes, and the sink, which is the weathering process that takes the co2 out of the atmosphere and deposits it on the ocean floor. but there have been times -- and the amount of co2 from volcanoes depends on continental drift. when there are continent moving through ocean regions that have a lot of carbon that on the ocean floor, then we get more co2 in the atmosphere.

there was a time 50 million years ago when india was moving to the indian ocean and spewing carbon dioxide into the atmosphere that there was so much co2 in the atmosphere that it was much warmer than now. -- there was no ice on the planet. natural changes like that can occur, but they changed -- those changes occur very slowly over long time frames. and the rate at which humans are now changing atmospheric co2 is 10,000 times faster than the national -- natural changes. now the humans are determining the future of climate. that is what we have to pay attention to. we are now in charge of atmospheric composition. host: guest is james hansen, the director for nasa's carter institute -- daughter to

institute. the headlines say that businesses are fuming over the epa rule. what does that mean to you? guest: well, it is dangerous in terms of been the principal factor that determines our future climate. it would be great if congress would pass a responsible legislation that would deal with this problem, but the things that they are talking about now, the waxman-markey bill, the bill and the senate -- in the senate are completely ineffectual and they do more harm than good. i think the administration is wisely using the clean air act to put pressure on congress to

come up with more effective legislation. host: houston, our next call commentary on the line for democrats with james hansen. caller: i am one of the few people that have actually developed ap 42 software for emission laws and things like this. they have a storage capacity of over 10 million barris of oil. a lot of these storage plants like to overstate their emissions losses so they will not lose their capacity. they fear that if they understate it there will be a cap on that and they will not be able to build any more storage or production capacity. i have one more question. there is no human activity on

mars. there is no human activity on neptune, and yet, we are observing the ice caps on mars melting and the eyes associated with neptune is reducing. can you -- the ice as you stated with neptune is reducing. can you explain that? guest: with regard to his first comment, indeed, one of the reasons that the fee and dividend makes more sense than cap and trade is that we have with cap and trade is that a lot of countries are encouraged to keep that pollution because they can sell out to the developed countries as one of the offsets which allows the developed countries to continue their pollution. that system just is not make sense. instead, we should put a price on the emissions, on the carbon emissions.

that would encourage both developed and developing countries to reduce their emissions. as far as the planetary temperatures are concerned, there is no inconsistency in any observations of any of the planets and the fact that the earth's temperature is increasing because of carbon dioxide. the amount of ice caps on mars and changes for a number of reasons. there is weather on mars just like there is weather on the earth. host: steven, illinois, you're on the line with james hansen. caller: the main question i want to ask you is, you were talking about different things that could pollute the air. and what is the u.s. going to do -- you know, we have the

nuclear power plants that are operating now. the most of them are on a 40 year contract. these companies are taking bids for more 40-year contracts. what happens if george three of those nuclear plant has an accident -- what happens if two or three of those nuclear plants has an accident in the next 20 or 30 years? nuclear guest: is actually one of these -- guest: nuclear is -- a one of the safest energy producers that we have. the next generation of nuclear power is inherently much safer.

it has the ability to shut down automatically in the event of any anomalies. and there is even a greater potential in the fourth generation nuclear-powered, which would be capable of burning more than 99% of the energy and the nuclear fuel while present nuclear power plants to burn less than 1% of the energy. they end up leaving a large part of the nuclear fuel as a waste product with a very long half- life ended is a big problem. but the fourth generation nuclear power would be capable of burning almost all of that and of leaving a product with a much shorter half life. and even would be capable of burning the waste from the older generation nuclear power plants. it is very unfortunate that the clinton-gore administration in 1994 terminated the fourth generation nuclear research right at a time when they're

ready to make a demonstration plant. it is something that we need to be looking at for the future because it has the potential to produce carbon free energy. host: at a time for a few more calls. dr. hansen, we wanted to get a twitter message sent your way. guest: the carbon feet, we would need to have an agreement with europe and with china to have a carbon fee in these places and if they did not want to have a carbon fee, then place a duty on the products that are imported from those countries in proportion to the amount of carbon that is emitted in the production of those commodities.

in fact, this approach is much easier to get an international agreement, and all countries involved, much easier than what is used for the kyoto protocol and what they're talking about in a copenhagen. host: what countries do you look toward iran the world as well models in the area of dealing with -- are round of the world as models in the area of dealing with climate change? guest: china is getting very aggressive with renewable energies and looking at nuclear power, both third and fourth generation. we're going to get -- we need to get moving or we're going to lose our advantage. we still have the best expertise in the world with nuclear power, but we need to take advantage of that. we should be developing carbon free products but we can sell to the rest of the world.

the way things are going, it looks like we're going to be passed up by china if we do not get off our duffs. host: the next caller is on the independent line. caller: with regard to the summit in copenhagen, how you feel that with the release of these recent 1000 e-mails, what impact you think of all have on the summit? it would seem to indicate intentional of fraudulent scientific data coming from them, which also implicates the doddered institutes -- goddard institute and phil jones, who recently stepped down. can people believe the data coming from them? host: reliability of data, dr. hansen. it did guest: not have any

effect of all -- guest: it does not have any effect at all with our understanding of climate change. in fact, climate changes around the world are very well documented. as far as this specific issue of global temperature is concerned, if there were anything wrong with of those analyses of global warming, that it is completely available, the data from the 5000 weather stations around the continental areas, the ocean temperature data and the polar regions where temperatures are measured by different research stations. all of that data is well available and is available on our website. if any answer -- any other answer could be extracted from that, don't you think that these deniers, the contrarians

would immediately published that result? they are waging a propaganda war. and frankly, those e-mail messages gave them a lot of ammunition. it is unfortunate that east anglia did not want to release aratheir raw data. the way science works, you'll have to release your data so that other people can test whether they agree with your knossos. the data that we use in our institute -- with your analysis. the data that we use in our institute is on our web site so anyone can check that if they want to. host: let's go to seattle, on the line for democrats. caller: my question is about your talk of 2 degrees warming

already. i have followed global warming pretty closely the last few years and something that caught my attention more than anything is the possibility of a self sustaining warming from the source of carbon dioxide matter in the northern part of our hemisphere. i was wondering what degree we would reach, or maybe what your we would reach a degree at the pace we are on now or we would reach the possibility of losing control of this completely. host: thanks for calling. guest: what the caller is referring to is what we call amplifying feedbacks. in particular, the one he is referring to is the fact that there is a lot of methane, frozen methane stored in the tundra and on the continental

shelves beneath the ocean water. there have been times in the earth's history when some warming has occurred and it has caused this methane to melt and release that nothing gas into the atmosphere. it is a very strong greenhouse gas ended amplifies greatly the warming and affects the possibility of the warming becoming a a an -- becoming out of our control. that is one of our our -- one of the things that we talk about in our book. it is very hard to say when that will occur, but what we can say is that if we stay on business as usual, then i expect that this century, within several decades, will begin to see the ice sheets become unstable. when that happens, and they begin to discharge more icebergs in the ocean, that will tend to cool the north atlantic ocean and the southern ocean around antarctica and that will

increase the temperature gradients between low latitudes, which continue to warm from the greenhouse gases, and these high latitude ocean areas. that increased the temperature gradient will drive stronger storms. and the sea level rises and a stronger storms, there will be chaos in cities in towns located along coastlines all around the world. and i think there is a danger that the economies will be in so much trouble that we will not be able to control this problem. we may eventually cause the release of these methane hydrates and then the whole system gets our to our control. that is why we need to get on a different path -- but the whole system gets out of our control. that is why we need to be on a different path soon. host: idaho, on the line for the report -- on the republican line

for james hansen. caller: i just heard from this gentleman the most blatant, ignored propaganda against the catholic church that i have heard from anyone in the long, long time on the public airways. i would just like to say that we are farmers and we have had such a cold fall this year that we cannot even get -- our wheat is not coming up out of the ground and replanted earlier than -- wheat planted earlier than usual. and personally, his information about the so-called global warming and they have changed it to climate change, of course we're going to have climate change. but really -- can we really have to global warming? can it really be measured? i think this man is doing a lot of propaganda. i am dismayed at his comments. host: dr. hansen, one last

comment before we wrap up. go ahead. guest: with regard to religion, and baptized into the latter-day saints church, but i happened to fall in love with a catholic and i married one. and just by coincidence, both of our children married catholics as well. the fact that the catholic church sold indulgences is an historical fact. the catholic church does not deny it, but they realize it is not a good thing to do and did not do it any longer. host: is there anything else you want to add about copenhagen, especially from your book? is there another action that you want to lay out for us before we wrap up? guest: the actions of the government are going to have to take is putting a price on carbon emissions and giving that money, 100% back to the