>> to answer your first question, i simply received the direction to work with cstc-a on this from the deputy secretary of defense for countermarkets, that's who i respond to on a day-to-day basis. they asked that i work with cstc-a to make this a reality. as it relates to your question on open competition that goes back to the acquisition strategy. >> we'll skip that. >> ok, sir. >> ambassador johnson, i'm trying to find the highest level in the two departments that made the decision, this major decision to shift the training program from i.n.l. over to the defense department. by the way, the answer is you are the highest official in state who dealt with it, i mean no disrespect, but this was a high-level decision. this is not the kind of thing

that is decided at the ground level, right? >> i should know the answer to that, but i don't. i may in fact be the highest level official who quote-unquote decided, but senior levels of the department were made aware of discussions going on. i tried to make clear both by written testimony and in a reresponse to previous questions, we're working in an active supporting role to our partners at cstc-a. this is not the kind of thing we push back against, it's something we try to find out if we can play a helpful role to respond to their desires for perhaps a more adroit way of accomplishing this task. >> were you aware of the participation of higher levels in the defense department? >> i was not personally, no. >> would there have been a decision document of some kind

making its way that would that the justifications for the decision? >> the documents that i can recall now were in the form of memoranda and cables coming from embassy kabul that were making known to us the desires of our colleagues in the mill and how they wished to shape -- in the military and how they wished to shape this from kabul. >> i may have questions for the record on that subject and for the entire panel, we're admonished to note that. mr. strain, in the attempt to meet the current target of 160,000 that comes over to you, you will have -- there will be decisions on the program of

instruction, the current eight-week program of instruction. as the matter goes forward, would you expect there to be modifications in that program of instruction? expect there would be modifications in that program of instruction? >> thank you. from a personal perspective, i would expect there to be modifications. based on my own history in the military, i cannot envision we would continue without going over and lessons learned. one of the requirements provided to us as we began the development was the flexibility of the contractor to execute changes into the poi. >> so they have left room for

lengthening or shortening the program in the requirements it gave you for the program? >> as far as lengthening, all i ask is that we have flexibility with change. >> they could change it to the same thing. that is true. are you familiar with the issue that -- of what would happen if the program instruction would be shortened, considering everyone has said in order to meet the fact there is a high level of casualties they have to receive more weapons training than they have in the past, which eats up some of the eight weeks. what would have to happen if it was shortened it? -- if it will shortened?

>> that is a question for them because i just provide them the ability to execute whatever requirement they come out with. i am aware that a high level of the various discussions, but i don't engage in conversations or the decision process. >> i will go to them in a second. embassador johnson, i will ask a question about blackwater because it is one of the five competitors. i realize you are in inl, so i might be asking the wrong person. will stay be passing over to dod information about the past performance of blackwater on the

major contract it has performed for the state department, which would be the personal security contract? >> i will ask if i could take that because i want to give you an accurate answer rather than anything speculating. inl has never had a contractual relationship with whitewater. the way that our colleagues -- relationship with the black water. i should consult with them on this rather than speculating about what that would be. >> that is very inappropriate you would not handle it. i do not note the significance that blackwater currently runs the border police training program, so it is not just drifting through the competition. it is a significant competitor.

general formica, you were fingered as the person to ask on this. you have said the goal is 160,000 afghan national police. suppose trying to reach that goal affected the quality of the police? one of the ways to attempt this would be to shorten the program of instruction while dividing time to weapons -- while devoting time to weapons. what you think about the target of 160,000 in that bind? >> i would say that that was our proposal. that has not been accepted by the dod and by afghanistan, so it is not yet a goal.

we have reviewed the program of instruction for all of the training we do on a regular basis. there is no doubt the current training for police was eight weeks. we have looked at whether it six weeks was achievable. it was done in a committee -- a civilian police professional. they are looking at the program of instruction to see if we could not reduce the amount of training but compressed into six weeks the amount of training required to turn and a police of the same quality. one of that is will were training days, -- one of that is warmer training days.

-- one of that is longer training days. there was some compression in the time required to train. we also referred to the balance between counterinsurgency training. in the eight week poi, it is about 45% of the kind of training that will best prepare a policeman for higher end activity for police enforcement training. the rest was more in administration of general train. >> thank you, and i am done. >> thank you, sir.

general formica, i realize you left command on november 21. this is framed in the context of the day you left. did they have the appropriate resources necessary to handle taking on the management of the afghan national police training through the use of contractors? it you have what you needed to do that job? -- did you have what you need it? >> we had the responsibility from the day that i took command. we were never afforded the resources that were required to provide police mentors when the decision was made before that, so once they adequately resource the afghan security

force, the answer is no current i think general mcchrystal transition to the line of operation [unintelligible] it was transferred and the training teams that go with it to the [unintelligible] that responsibility given to the regional commanders so that he was going to take full advantage of the capability but those combat teams brought not only to the concept of combat operations, but their ability to role model and train the afghan national police. in that regard, things were getting better. i would submit 30,000 additional shoulders only improves that. -- 30,000 additional soldiers.

>> had a properly lined up resources necessary to manage the contract peace? >> as i indicated, we have not matured that capability as contracts group. that was something we identified, it was clear the observation and we appreciate their recommendations and help. it was something noted in the report. we've reorganized them to create a contract management cell and changed our document to increase that capacity. we took some soldiers out and

realigned them against that task. when i left they had not been filled because we only recently changed the document, and that takes time. >> thank you. >> we talked about the transition plan and mr. strain was the head of this requirement for the handoff from state to dod. sometimes we get numb to numbers because we talk about $16 billion spent on training afghan national security forces from the beginning of hostilities. even in that window, if we were to go to the rate of $34 million a month, that is $100 million worth of activity that needs to be coordinated between state and

defense. how effectively they stand up brings into question the potential of waste as we transition with the handoff, will the plans you talked about ensure that the resources are effectively managed and we don't have waste? >> the activities executing the plan will be accomplishing just that. while 90 days is the right numeral, we have sought to make that as effective as we can buy front loading things we can already start to do. in order to make this as smooth as me can and have neither of burlap or overlap. -- neither underlap or overlap.

so we don't drop the baton. so we don't drop the baton. >> there is the potential@@@@@@v >> you stated a very ambitious goal in my view of awarding a contract in a matter of a few weeks, really, absent this current legal process that's going on. take that out of the equation and get back to some point in time where you're able to proceed. are you sure that you have all of the obstacles and impediments out of the way that would enable you to effectively award a

contract task order and meet the time lines that you have identified? >> thank you, sir. i would never sit in any quorum and -- forum and suggest i have taken into account every aspect of every obstacle. what i would suggest is that we have multiple people who have been continuously reviewing, looking at, engaged in and trying to identify where the risk points are and how we mitigate those risks. while the initial risk that we have, in my previous discussions with the commission was the risk of the time frame that we were initially looking at with respect with trying to make this thing occur, one of the risk mitigation factors was increasing the time frame of the current contract so that we would have additional time in order to conduct a more thorough, reasonable and accurate turnover as well as ensuring we had fully and completely understood all the requirements from cstika and were able to ensure that contractors who will be

ultimately awarded that task have a complete and full understanding and are able to in fact accomplish the task that cstika requires. >> one of the things that we've observed in or visits to afghanistan and our additional research is just how tough it is to do things sometimes in afghanistan. and you mentioned earlier having a presence of about 25 personnel that are going to be in country to overto ensure accountability and to basically ensure that contractor delivers, ok? and yet the question is, will they have adequate facilities, a place to live, the communications, the ability to travel effectively to do their jobs in the time frames that you're contemplating? live, the ability to travel to do their jobs in the timeframe you are contemplating? >> yes, sir. i commented on respect to

establishing a full-time presence in kabul. we have access to our own vehicles and a wide amount of capabilities to get out. that was done purposely because of the oversight i have in that region. we established a capability that allows us to move independently and do the oversight required. the types of support they will provide in terms of building for personnel. the transportation involved to ensure we can move personnel back and forth. establishing a rotation so they don't become too embedded in a camp, so there are fresh eyes and an ability for lessons

learned. we spent a lot of time to make sure we can operate in the environment. >> thank you very much. >> there is an irony in this hearing. we are on thin ice not for significant reasons. the life and death issues we should be talking about are ignored while we tread so carefully on the contract issue and the fact there is a protest. i will tell you what my observation is. you have come to our office and made us feel this transfer can happen like that. you had made us feel it will be an easy process. we hear comments from dod and

state and see body language could not see if we were communicating via e-mail that says this has been an awkward transfer. it does not give me a warm feeling to think you have only had one contact with state and you are in charge of the program. as a matter of public record we know the existing contractor has done a good job. that is not alleged one way or the other. in transferring this in order to move quickly, five contractors can do it and the existing one cannot. what we can address this

understanding during a time of war, does this process makes sense? do we risked the lives of our troops because we have a process that doesn't work properly? in a special report we may say this is crazy. a protest season -- the protest needs to be looked at differently. you cannot tell me your knowledge of the protest because it impacts what you do. if it takes longer it will impact you. if it is a 100-day process. it could be waived. i would like to thank you would know the other parts to it. i would like to think he would make a recommendation. the ball game is whether we can train enough afghans in their

army so that we can leave. ben the irony is, if we can leave it goes back to state. i it would love to hear the logic of giving it to dod. what is also troubling is that we know right well -- we know right now we will have 140,000 if we can train them on time. we are transferring a contract over. we are at 94,000 and at the end of the year will be at 96,000. i would like to know more, like a request of 160,000 has been

acted on. we are sending our troops in but we don't know if we will train more afghan police. all of this is troubling. when we were in afghanistan it was emphasized how corrupt every part of the system is. one part i think we would want to make sure is not correct was that the soldiers and police get paid. that impacts our contractors. we had an incredible conversation speaking to people who have been there five years and we are learning some of these people are not getting paid. i would like to think that we

could have covered more territory with this panel. i think it would have been helpful to understand the protest process. are you willing to give me any concept of what you think about the protest and whether it should be different during war, and if we have the regulations to make it different, whether we should utilize it. >> i have a couple of comments if we have time. from my perspective, as the former commander that felt responsibility for developing the national army. we would want to be able to continue existing contracts or

transition from one to another. the imperative is to do that without interruption of the quality of that training. how that process supports that are the two objectives. i don't know if that answers your question, but we would not want to seek an interruption in the conduct of training. i would like to make a point. we spent a lot of time talking about transmission of the contract. the observation i made -- this is one facet of the approach to improve the strategy to develop the afghan national police. the first element was to create a police training command,

something that the minister of interior has some level of responsibility for. we are there to provide him resources to do that. just like the national army, it is commanded by a two-star general. that has been established and is effective. we don't have anything like that in the afghan police. their training is done by the minister of interior. to create a training command, it has that responsibility for the conduct of training -- >> what is the second one? >> to establish a training group inside the needle training mission to take advantage of the trainers that will come who

are responsible for training training command, which includes trainers at the regional site. the third was to transition the responsibility for managing the contract to the organization that was responsible for developing the police so that we would eliminate going to the department of state associated with that contract. you've had one organization responsible for training the afghan police and is responsible for oversight of the contract so that you have a unity of command. >> do you want to jump in on this as it relates to the issue of being able to do a protest? >> i am not familiar of the protest process, so why will

approach this from the point of view of the citizen. -- so i will approach this. apropos of everything from the truman commissioned to it today, we need a process so that if there are things that need to be dealt with through a protest, that there is a way to do that. >> i will let each of you make a closing comment. one of the things that was revealing to me -- to hear contractors -- this is why we will interact with contractors and will not tolerate someone attempting to suggest that we

are interfering with the process, but we will learn. what we learn from contractors was for the folks running it -- every one of them said we are professionals. if we work for someone else, the irony is 80% of folks doing training under different contracts maybe the same people. that is one of the ironies to this. it was impressive to see the amount of dedication to a cause that superseded a company. there was a sense that we are doing something important and would like to continue to do it

>> i'd invite you to comment on any questions that we didn't ask or comment on anything that we didn't comment on. i'll start with you, mr. train. >> i wouldlike to first of all thank you for allowing me to be here and have this discussion with you. a comment you made with respect to making it sound easy as a snap, if that came across i apologize because i'm fully apair of the complexities and the importance of and the many land mines that exist in going through this transition process. we've put a lot of people and a lot of time and effort into this. and we'll continue to do so. you asked a previous question of me with respect to the challenge

process or the protest process. and with respect to that, from my personal perspective in wartime environment having served in a wartime environment, i believe that as ambassador johnson said, the ability to expedite, the ability to move quickly beyond the protest itself and to address the issues is absolutely critical to what we do on a day-to-day basis. the service of the war fight is absolutely paramount to anything that we do here. there are a lot of contracting rules and regulations. but at the end of the day our focus is on serving the war fighters and the people in afghanistan and elsewhere in the world where we have work to do. to that end we will continue to move forward with what we are doing here, plow through the processes that exist, some of the issues that we will have to overcome is the length of time it aches in order to address the issues and that and how that will impact on our ability to conduct the transition.

what that might potentially mean in terms of extensions of contracts or in terms of our ability to move quickly with the changeover. those are questions that at this juncture we can't answer until we continue to pursue down this road, but i will be happy at some point in time in the future if necessary to tack to you about that. again thank you for the opportunity to be here. we look forward to continuing this process and we look forward to spending a lot of time in afghanistan supporting this effort. and spending time in afghanistan supporting this effort. >> we also would concur. thank you. >> i also appreciate the opportunity to participate in this discussion with you. i hope i have been responsive to your questions. with regard to what is said about your engagement with

individuals who are working on the ground, i also have that respect that you outlined. i have engaged in a not successful effort to have this who have given the ultimate sacrifice to be part of the peace officers memorial here. i think they deserve that recognition. with respect to the question you asked about whether we should employ contractors, he moves us who are working on that issue. -- it behooves us. whether it is the department of state for justice who are providing this assistance because of the flexibility that they have and the reach we need into law enforcement, we will

need to rely on these mechanisms to provide the support as far into the future as i can say. >> thank you, ambassador. general? >> i will that to my colleagues my thanks to be able to appear before this commission and thank you for the work that you do in helping us to better align the role of contractors with this work. i share your notion and have a passion that nothing is more important than the development of the afghan national security forces so that they can provide for the stability of the afghan people. we want to enable them to do so. i think you appreciate from your

it visits the complex environment. it is something the development of this forces that will continue to require the efforts of our military and partners, and contractors if the decisions are made to increase the size of the security forces. the transition of the responsibilities was not about changing contractors, it was about unity of command. and have responsibility for developing the afghan police and providing the advisory group would be the same organization that would manage the contract. you talked about pay. we are concerned about several challenges with the security

forces. hay is one of them. -- pay is one of them. we have tried to increase the ability of soldiers to get paid directly through electronic funds transfer. they get their money to their bank account directly. that is in increasing numbers. when i left it was around 70% four army soldiers and 80% for police. that does not eliminate corruption and challenges with being able to take their pay, but it produces it. we thank you for your service and we look forward to working with new, so thank you very much.

we will get to our final panel. fred, and nick, program manager of the afghan national security sector. you can stay standing. is there anyone else who may respond to questions? if so, have them stand up.

we may need to ask a question and if you turn to someone else we would like them to stand. do you swear the testimony you will give before this commission will be the truth? thank you very much. before i start , let me ask for your cooperation. we don't want anyone to game the system. this is not an opportunity for you to make some protest. we realize there is a contract that has to be settled. we had a debate on whether we should invite the of -- whether we should invite you to the panel. you are the most important to answer questions of, what are the challenges of deciding whether to seek work with the

government? what kind of people do you look for? what are the difficulties in training afghans verses are iraqis? the differences between those [unintelligible] fill us in on the generic stuff that will help us understand what it is like in your shoes. and what it is like four other contractors. if we can proceed i think we can learn a lot and we will not have created a circumstance that we regret. am i pronouncing your name properly? you have the floor. >> thank you. on behalf of our employees,

thank-you for the opportunity to participate today. since 2003, we have partnered with the government to build the professionalism of the afghan national police. working closely with the state and afghan minister of interior and the police, our training programs have received high marks for performance. as the program manager, i am proud of the bravery and competency of our team. the team continues to make progress in challenging times and move forward and never quit when it was hard. unfortunately the work is also dangerous.

37 courageous employees, including six and afghanistan have paid the ultimate sacrifice. the police training program faces many challenges. low literacy rates, drug use, issues of corruption, low pay and high casualties. this is difficult work, but it is essential. you know the importance of building an afghan security force in terms of meeting goals and afghanistan. the taliban understands as well. they see the police as a serious threat to taliban control abilities. it is reflected in the vicious and successful attacks on the police. four times the number of afghan police have last their lives as much as soldiers. -- have lost their lives.

as i said earlier, we have faced many lessons over the six years. we have learned and incorporated them into our training curriculum. drawing on my experience as program manager, i am included eight recommendations and would like to highlight five. -- i have included eight recommendations. the numbers train is an ineffective metric for determining capability of the afghan national police. increased the capacity of the regional training centers and expand afghan instructors and advisers. afghanistan needs more police recruits and to provide it danced law-enforcement training to police officers.

we have transition the training of the training centers to the afghan police instructor. we need to develop field training officers to replace mentors in the field. transfer of responsibility should be based on meeting certain metrics. increase the number of police mentored teams and the lengthening period they oversee. this increases law-enforcement skills while reducing the possibility of corrupt activity. as our ceo has discussed with the commission, this should be strengthened to support the wounded and families of deceased. contractors are a reality of

modern warfare. those injured on the job deserve better than they get. we recognize this >> i am please today have with me today mike warren who heads up this effort. mike was a police officer in dallas-fort worth and was an advisor in iraq. we encourage the commission to study the program and see if it might be an effective model for the government to use. finally i would like to extend my appreciation and thanks to the courageous men and women who worked in remote and inhot pittable conditions in afghanistan. increasingly we only hear bad news when it comes to overseas contractors. but it's my belief you would be hard-pressed to find a more dedicated, focused and qualified work force than the one we have supporting the program today. they serve every day for a safe tomorrow. side pie side the military of both the united states and allied forces and our diplomatic

counterparts. they do it because they make a difference. they do it because it's a meaningful contribution to the long-term peace and stability in afghanistan. i for one think they do it very well. i thank you for the opportunity to appeared to. and i look forward to address any questions you may have of me. thank you. >> mr. ryder, that was a very help 238 statement and very touching. thank you. mr. nickerson. >> chairman shays and members of the commission, i'm richard dickson, -- for our -- and fielding program head quartered in kabul, afghanistan. it's a pleasure to be with you today to discuss this contract and the role -- we play in supporting october. i've been part of this contract for more than six years. and and over the course of my

time on the ground i have seen growth in capabilities within the afghan national security sector and i have firsthand knowledge of what npr brings to october's training and -- national -- cstika training. first about the sons learned from our six plus years on the ground supporting cstika's mission. [inaudible] >> yes, sir. consistent with our contract and statement of work, mpra must assist cstika at the basic functions, the defense end and interior. systems development and mentoring on senior ministers and general officers. within the ministry of defense, mpia assists cstika with the implement and development of 23 level systems. within the ministry of interior we assist cstika with 16

ministerial systems with regard to mentoring at the national level mpri will either be the primary mentor or be backup to an assigned military mentor. in addition, npri provides training teams for the afghan international army -- along with these core advisory teams mpri provides for deployed mentors and trainers supporting implementation of functional systems such as inspector general, regional hospital mentors and property book officer trainers to name but a few. general, hospital mentors and trainers. we are involved with the development of the training system within the afghan national army. mentor in programs such as the development of the trainee -- [unintelligible]

i second point is we have learned the value of continuity. they have long jetty -- they have longevity. we understand the value of being integrated because it allows us to better understand the commanders intent, which allows for us to anticipate new requirements and ensure implementation. this allows for effective oversight. we have learned the importance of sensitivity and treating afghans with dignity. cultural awareness shapes our instruction in the expectation. respect for the afghan shapes the tenor of how we mentor. we are proud of our ongoing support in afghanistan and

contributions to training and systems development of the afghan forces. i appreciate the invitation to participate in this hearing and look forward to questions. >> thank you. >> distinguished members of the commission, i am the executive boyce president for xe services. i was an army acquisition officer she previously -- acquisition officer previously. i appreciate the opportunity to be here today on behalf of the team. joseph joined the company last march. the new leadership team is committed to making sure its

work performed for the government is performed with the highest standards of honesty and reliability at all levels. xe has a commitment to conduct business operations in full compliance with regulations of the country in which we do business. transparency must underline our relationships with customers and communities in which we do business. our company's involvement in training afghanistan forces make us qualified to assist the commission. we have more than 2000 professionals worldwide. xe provides mentors should to officers of the border police.

the afghan narcotics units also. these are afghan organizations tasked with combating terrorism in afghanistan. we train these units to interrupt narcotics. the training course lasts six weeks and includes special weapons and maintenance. the basic course lasts six weeks and focuses on rifles skills. xe has applied the lessons to improve these programs. the trainee must respect afghan culture. the relationship between individual instructor and trainee is critical. this relationship must be built

on trust and strong sense of mutual goals. building this relationship requires maintaining a consistent presence of instructors during that time. the training schedule must coincide with the afghan work week and haul the these which do not match ours. -- workweek and holidays that don't match ours. we emphasize the importance of leading by example, including participation along afghan supporters. we have learned that afghans do not like to be outperformed by their colleagues. this has been a motivational tool. these instructors have spent three years in afghanistan. the average age of instructors

is just over 40. that is the equivalent of a field grade officer in the tiller -- field grade officer in the military. i would like to thank you for providing us the opportunity to discuss our successful efforts in training. we are proud our company's expertise can assist our nations mission in afghanistan. i will be happy to answer any questions. >> you have the floor. >> you mentioned in your opening statement several ways to improve the training process. if you have to prioritize the top three, what would they be?

>> thank you. as i looked at my experience over the past 18 months, for a successful law enforcement program the first thing i would do is embed more law enforcement experts at the grass-roots level. we provide a basic training and that is all we are providing. when they go back into the district's what they need are the field training officers. they need someone to continue to provide training for them to improve on the skills they may forget, that is with them 24/7. the other piece that is important is you provide and start to get after this issue we

have heard today of corruption. what you have is a conscience, in looking over a police officer that they have someone to keep them moving forward. i think we need to continue to focus on quality. we talked a lot about short in programs of instructions. the quality that we provide we should not walk away from. the third piece to prioritize this is their needs to be a focus from the grass roots level that goes to the province and back to the moi. the complete chain of command and mentor scheck is very important. -- andmentor -- and mentorship

is very important. >> i welcome your thoughts in a different training environment. what are the top three things that you feel trainers could do to improve the process? >> thank you for the question. it was mentioned on culture. the reason why we list this as number one is it gets at the notion of how we adjust our training. we look at the performance of training. we first show how the task is done through repetition so we see the afghans have that scaled-down, and then we observe. so we get them to

[unintelligible] the second is touched on, our responsibility to bring the right trainer in. that goes to the heart of working with them, we understand what the requirement is they want us to do. then we find that person with that skill set. that is our responsibility. that gets into the standards. the last is the respect for the culture. we have our personnel understand what the training is and the culture so that a factor that in, and observed national holidays that they have. >> thank you. border police, what three things would you do that you are doing

today or would do differently? >> the number one thing is the mentor problem broke -- the men. if you don't have follow up in the field, the skills that they've learned will disappear. . >> mr. roitz we'll start with you on the second question and this will be my last one. just give me your thoughts on the benefits or the limitations of contractors performing in the current mission that you're involved in and the same question for the other two. >> i think the biggest benefit

is we bring law enforcement personnel to be the instructors. for the felt mentors we try to get a balance of people that have law enforcement backgrounds as well as military backgrounds because it's a much more rigorous environment. but i think that's -- compared to the military instructors that's a critical component. >> no limitations? >> the limitations i think really come down to the laws dealing with the international traffic and arms regulations as we want to modify the curriculum at a fairly rapid pace that the are much more restrictive than they are for the military. >> mr. nickerson? >> the continuity factor. many of our personnel have been on the ground for quite a bit of time. it does assist the military as they rotate units and personnel

in and out of the theater. therefore, we need to smooth out that bump if you will. we also provide shortage of skills if they happen to have any. we can fill basically the gaps if you will, that type of term, lea flexible. if they need to change out skill sets we can work with our contracting and technical representatives to do that. >> so you're one that doesn't necessarily believe that military can train military better than contractors? you don't have to answer that. >> i'd love to know his answer. he smiled. >> ok. answer it. >> whether or not the military can train better than -- >> whether the military -- not talking about police now -- whether the military can train military forces, the ana, better

than contractor. >> i think the military does a fantastic job. i do think that contractors do have something to of ever also because of our length of time in many cases experienced and whatnot. >> that's a very diplomatic answer. mr. rydeer? basic police training? >> yes, sir. my personal opinion is, our arm yes, it's not a -- army, it's not a core competency to train police or law enforcement officials so when you have a contractor that is a professional dedicated law enforcement officer from around our united states that's in countries to provide that training, i think it's a plus. our army's just not trained, organized or equipped to do police training. i think the benefits that we've also heard is continuity tim we've also heard the word relationships at the lowest level. when you have our law enforcement experts that are down at the district level and regional level dealing with

police chiefs and police officials and they establish those relationships i think the benefits are -- we just can't weigh them what that really means. so i think those are the two most important things. i'm trying to think of a limitation right now sir but i can't come up with one. >> i'm sure you couldn't on the limitation. thank you very much. >> mr. chief, you have the floor. >> thank you, mr. chairman. your statement has a generic, about the -- not about this specific situation. when developing training and mentoring programs excluding industry experts will not provide best practices or best values. i took a look at the top 10 contractors this year in afghanistan. this is my own data not from an

agency or from the commission. your contract, your civpol contract, is no. is no. 6 -- is no. 6. what interested me is that the same type of vehicle you are on and that the next contract will be on is out of the 10, five are also using that. there is not full and open competition but among all limited competition, idiq. 3 i would have to put a question mark next to. the data given to me was not telling. with you explain what you meantr

that contract vehicles excluding the industry experts will not provide best practice or best value? to some extent, that goes against the we have been hearing for a number years -- a number of years about how going towards limited competition, idiq, is the way of the future. >> let me try to address this for the specific contract and situation we are currently in. currently, -- >> why can't you may get generic? what is after we've specifically? >> i thought that was the question, sir. the question was about the contract. my statement was about the contract. >> i am going to be uneasy if we start getting into this specific contract. i am not going to allow us to have that discussion. we will not have it.

you can talk generically about the issue. >> commissioner, my opinion based on the performance of the employees that we have had on the ground, we have demonstrated our subject matter expertise and the performance we have had with training been afghan national police. by not permitting those that have the work to date and are performing to continue that work, why you see my statement that you just read. >> if a different vehicle were used, the previous panel was asked and another of the competitors on the civilian police vehicle witches cpi, would you agree that would be beneficial, too? >> in generic terms, i think the

taxpayer is better served when there is full and open competition for the value of a contract. >> ok. again, in generic terms, i am a government contract professor so i think i can keep this incomprehensible if nothing else. when there is a protest, although it is possible for the military to save there are urgent and compelling reasons not to stay but to go ahead, in general, will it not be open to the incumbent? this is a chess game. there are only a limited number of moves. isn't it a frequent move for the incumbent to say that you could just extend the time a couple of

months that we continue performing opera -- on the contracts. that is why there is not encouraged in the compelling situation. isn't that standard? assuming the incumbent has not been told you have shortcomings. which is usually not the case. >> commissioner, i am not sure if i understand the question you are asking. >> i can ask a different way. >> i think you are asking me if the incumbent can make the case. >> yes. >> my answer to that is that the incumbent could make the case. >> we have a two month extension of your contract in this situation, yes? that is a fact. what's right now, the task order ends 31 january. i just submitted a de-mob

ilization transition that extends to 31 and march which gives as a two month transition period -- gives us a two month transition. >> would you normally provide performance information if you had it? do you have -- and you would know if you have because the black water is in the nature that the contractor is given an opportunity to put in a response, on the most important contract had in iraq, the personal security contract, the vehicle is on is the wpps -- do you have performance information on that contract? >> yes, we do.

it is generally good on that contract. we have transmissions from years ago, but the performance under the contract in iraq, on a whole, we have a performed, i believe, admirably and effectively. that was in accordance with the scope of the work on the contract. >> when the information was developed, did this cover the incidents which is so alienated the iraqi government that they were unwilling to license you to stay? it took awhile to be able to do that, but when they could they refuse to license you to continue. didn't the past performance information include the incident where the 17 civilians were killed and five or six

employees of -- >> past performance of what? >> it to what? in other words, what are you asking me? the past performance in what contract? >> the contract on the wpps vehicle which was the task order in iraq. >> i believe that information, between us and the government, is a protected items. if it is not we will provided to the commission. i think the report that was done after the incident, it was found that the company was not responsible, as a company. there were individual actions being looked at. i think the report is well looked at from the perspective of having personal, department of state personnel, in the

convoy. >> let me follow it up. i am not asking what you submitted in the current contract in process. i am asking when you filled out the exchange with the contract and officer concerning what they would give you for the future past performance information. it is put into a computer system, but the state does not. i would appreciate you -- i am not asking you to provide when you have given on the sitting process. i am asking if you have received and dealt with this in the past. was it in the best interest of the united states to continue your contract? that was left as a question by the report. i do not know what the state department's view is and i do not know it from the report. if you would provide that, i would take my time. >> it gentleman, i want some

short answers. -- gentleman, i want some short answers. i would like to know the difference between being a contractor in iraq and afghanistan. if you could cite some differences, i would appreciate it. what is the difference? is there any? does the government treat you differently? number two, is the challenge of being in afghanistan different than being in iraq in a noticeable way for providing the same service needed? could you start us out? >> there are differences. the security situation in iraq for a while was different than this it -- the security situation in afghanistan. we are seeing some of that in iraq, but that was the difference. the traders, the trainees, the literacy rate was obviously different and in afghanistan.

we have a 12 week program in iraq. we have an 8 week program in afghanistan. >> you have a 12 week program and those individuals tend to be literate verses aliterate. they tended to have a the but more and come -- more income. they were not in this deep poverty you saw in afghanistan. you are saying it was 12 obverses eight. interesting. -- 12 versus 8. >> the same officer oversees both. we have a number of those who oversee the contract. beyond that -- >> i am sorry. i am trying to move quick here. >> i can only speak to afghanistan.

>> we do not have training contracts in iraq. >> you are in both theaters, correct? >> yes. the developing government after the invasion took a while to take place so the process and procedures you would normally see in the government, even just customs clearances and the like, were much more different. in afghanistan they were more structured, at least in our view. that assisted greatly in the process. the other thing is the licensing process. there was an established structure. the have changed over time and allowed a more orderly process for licensing. r a

>> given that you have information that should be able to influence policy, i'd like to know that it's different in iraq versus afghanistan. if i were a trainer, i would be saying to the afghan policymakers, you know, you've got corruption in a lot of places but the one place you can't have corruption is with police and military because your police and military are your first line of defense, your second line of defensors and i would be saying to the policymakers wouldn't it be nice to have loyal police and army? make sure they get paid. so mr. ryder, you have been in -- what's your capability of influencing that in afghanistan?

who would you talk to? can you talk to the afghan government or is that primitive? can you talk to the american government? because to me that's like a key issue. and it makes whatever else you do succeed or fail. you'll fail if they don't get paid even if you're terrific at training. >> mr. chairman, our points of contact or entry back into our customer is purely through the state department. i can't talk about how i can influence or how we can influence the policy. i can say that we do provide information whether our trainers think the training is going well if we need to make changes to the training, if we think -- whatever we think is going on with the program, we can provide that information and we do provide that information both to our customer which is i.n.l. and to the end user in both countries which is department of defense. but sir i can't comment about what happens with that information with regard to developing policy.

>> mr. dickerson or mr. roitz can you respond to that question? >> i can talk about afghanistan. once again since we're embed the with the cstika organization, when we -- are influencing policy. our influence is working together with them. it is not an individual basis where we would walk in and influence. we work with the military on influencing. >> i think an example would be at the adp and our interaction with the senior officers. we do not have a formal mentoring world. in discussions with them, and you can get feedback on how we see their forces working, and then instituting policy down there chain of command, things

like holding their personnel to a greater accountabilityxd, thee push for better accountability and not having the corruption they have today. i think that involvement, our company's involvement, has helped. >> what i am saying is this. you are taking the place of government employees who might have the capability to have ñiaccess. if you are in the government and charged with doing something, you go to your boss and say i cannot get the job done because we can retain police because they are not getting paid. their morale is down and they are not listening. i am wondering if you inherit in -- if you do not have the capability, i am wondering as a commission member if they're not to be certain rights or opportunities or obligations that enable you to pass on information.

çói am absolutely convinced if e could get rid of the corruption's that we would have a lot more loyal police and army that would be much more willing to sign on. some police did not even know they had a pay raise. ñrlet me ask you about the appes process in general. you have been on both sides. do you believe that we can speed up the process? first off, let me ask you this. have you been in any instances where the process was speeded up by the government where they move forward and said they needed to move? have you had any cases? either you or another contractor could resolve the is you sooner.

>> in my former role we were responsible for been a large procurements for guard at military bases. we had multipleñr protests and e did multiple process overrides. the process -- the process override process is very structured in this service dependent. it goes to a pretty high and level. a pretty high level. might it allows, and there are a@ @ sr @ @ @ @ "ab@ @ @ @ ar@

what are the issues is who the -- associated with the business of government oversight of your activities in theater? i will go down the line. >> we do and currently have -- do not hold me to the numbers.

i think there are four in iraq. right now, i think it is four or five boeing 27 or 8 in afghanistan. from myxd viewpoint, we have the oversight -- going to 7 or 8 in afghanistan. >> we have one in the country. i mean the interface with that individual. in the past six months, there was a system into place to observe and reportçó back to thr staff and captor evaluation of our performance. ñr-- to capture each evaluation. there is formal oversight that goes on consistently.

>> thinking. >> i think there are two aspects of oversight, formal contract oversight, and i think in our case that putting -- they are putting more people in place. ñiçóthe more informal and less structuredñr is adequate. xd>> thank you. let me ask in terms of, and we have had some discussion about contractors having the rule to identify better practices and finding ways toñi streamline, improved, save costs, avoid duplication, etc. in your experiences, the you have examples where you have offered up and contributed new and better ways to do things to save money and improve operations? >> sir, i do not have that

information with me to provide examples. as i mentioned earlier, we have the capability when it comes to the day-to-day training in how we do things and how we can do things better. we provide that information to the inl and end users. >> a position or function cut -- when a position becomes no longer needed, they can go back to a contract official in aberdeen and eliminate the position. if the decision is just listed as not being filled because there is a request for a new requirement at the same skill level, they can then reactivate that. >> if you fell one was not needed, you would indicate?

>> we have had discussions on that. when they come to me with the a@ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @

>> i think we have that capability of being able to ramp up with the military if they choose to take positions of that force to get to the afghan national police. so i think it is possible over time. >> we are finding on the ground right now as forces flow into is a redundancy to make sure there is no redundancy out in the fielded areas, fielded forces. and if that is seen as something that we look at with the kotadkotar -- i think there's two large issues, one is the choke points of getting the personnel into theater, the c.r.c. requirements as well as the receiving staging and moving them to their various locations. but i think there's a sufficient number of personnel available to

do this based on the folks that we she that apply. the second point would be the people that we see that express our interest in going downrange if you will. the second piece would be life support down range. the capacity to maintain that larger group. that's a charge because if you have a short-term requirement and depending upon how much investment you want to make long-term mr. chairman, that'sed the end of my time. >> mr. green. >> i just have one for the record. mr. ryder would you provide us a breakout of what train something being provided in iraq that is not being provided in afghanistan to basically -- >> sir i'll take that for the record. thank you. >> yes, sir. >> mr. kiefer has the floor. i'm going to be wanting to ask a

question to have you think about how you respond to those contractors who are wounded and those that have been killed and what benefits they receive from your companies. mr. kiefer you have the floor. >> thank you. i want to pick up from the questions about under the existing statute, which would be the competition contracting act, if roitz you described well your serious significant experience when you were in the the government doing these things. and then there were nods immediately about the importance of that from everybody on the panel. i think what you were talk about and what they were nodding yes to, under the contracting act for the last 25 years in a re-award situation if sufficiently high level u.s. official says there are urging and compelling reasons to override the stay, the stay is

overridden and the contracting process goes forward. and i think you were asked whether you thought that was very important to have. that is that what you thought you were being asked and that's what's very important to have? >> i think the government needs the right to override -- to do a protest override to continue especially in wartime to meet the requirements and the mission. >> and you're talk about at the existing statute that's been there for 25 years, yeah? >> i don't know how long the statute has been in place. >> speak of 1984 as -- ok. however long it's been there. is that, mr. nickerson will, ryder, what you two were nodding yes to. the exiting statutory system? >> well, i misspoke. this is both my responsibility. i'm not familiar with the act. >> ok. >> but let's be clear. whether it's existing or past, you believe government should have the right to short circuit a system.

and you're not telling us when you think they should have the right, correct? >> [inaudible] >> i'm not familiar with the statute. i'm not a contracts expert. but i stay with what i said earlier. i think the government in emergencies ought to have that capability. >> are you asking for a change in the law, sir, is what i'm asking you? >> no. what i am saying is i think they ought to have the right to in fact override that capability. >> yeah. override the stay. ok. that is a -- ok.

>> -- is in my view basic training that we should not and we cannot walk away from if we're going to leave the afghan -- the afghanis with a law enforcement capability.

so that's my comments to the quality is exactly that. we shouldn't move away from that. that is in my view the minimum law enforcement training that needs to be provided every single day. that's my point on quality. the issues of we have with issues of corruptions and issues of literacy we have worked very hard. we have worked very hard to take a program of instruction and take that program of instruction to make it to hand-on training where in fact we're viewing that they've received the training hands-on. so that piece, the literacy piece is, not going to go away. >> ok. let me ask you from the other side. you've heard that the goal is reaching 160,000 an afghan national police. >> we go live now to the senate radio tv gallery. senate republican leaders are holding a news briefing now on the debate over healthcare. tomorrow morning they'll hold a key test vote on the amended

bill. this is live coverage on c-span. >> good afternoon. everyone. i'm sure you're happy to be here in the capitol on a sunday afternoon. we're about 10 hours away from one of the most important votes we've had in many decades. and that will be the first vote on this now 2700-page monstroussy that seeks to restructure one sixth of our economy. been a couple of new developments. one of the reasons the bill, the manager's amendment needed to be read yesterday was so we could begin to figure out what was in it and what kind of special deals had been cut. we also know, as a result of a report from the director of the c.b.o. that's just out, that the

estimate they made yesterday has now been corrected 24 hours later, which is another reason why we shouldn't be trying to jam through legislation this rapidly. the director's blog came out today and it said correction regarding the long-term effects of the management of the patient and protection affordable care about, c.b.o. has discovered an error in the cost estimate released just yesterday. related to the longer term budgetary effects of the man!iñ amendment to the patient care and affordable care about. what they're saying is that if you look at the second ten years, they could be off by as much as a half a trillion dollars. a half a trillion dollars. now, this is a c.b.o. correction 24 hours after the first c.b.o. estimate. so that's an important new development today. and of course we're still learning more and more about the

sweetheart deals that have been made. and i'm -- i'm going to ask my colleagues to come on. that let me just say that taxpayers of kentucky are not excited, not at all excited about having to underwrite the special deal that is were apparently made for nebraska, vermont, and we now learn maybe massachusetts. so i'm going to remind the taxpayers of our state if they're subsidizing these other three states because their senators apparently extracted a price for passing this bill. let me say finally before turning to senator kyle and senator coburn, thinks just another good reason why a bill like this should not be done on a narrowly partisan basis. when you decide to do something one party only and you've got 60 votes, you're open for business. and it creates the kind of smelly proposition that we've seen on full display that my colleagues will go into further. because it empowers every single

one of those 60 to extract some special deal for them at the extension of everybody else in the country. after all, thinks supposed to be all of our healthcare and not just special deals from people who are in the healthcare system in three states. with that let me call on senator kyl. >> thank you. i was born in the state a nebraska. and a lot of nebraskaens have moved down to my now state of arizona. they're great people. they're very principled people. and i suspect that when they told ben nelson that they didn't like this bill, that they had hoped that he would work to correct the flaws in the bill. instead, what we find after reading the new amendment is that he simply exempted the state of nebraska from some of the obligations in the bill. so as the leaders saiders all of the other states are going to be paying $26 billion over the next ten years to cover the cost of adding all the new medicaid patients to the legislation.

the nebraska governor had writ ton senator nelson saying this is going to be very hard for the state of nebraska to pay for. by the way, my governor had sent a similar letter and other governors had done the same. so instead of trying to correct the problem which is adding all of these new medicaid patients to the legislation, and then having an obligation for both the federal government and the states to have to pick up that cost, senator nelson simply said, well, i'll just exempt my state from having to pay it so that all the rest of us end up having to pay the share for nebraska. my guess is that nebraska very principled people are going to say wait a minute, senator nelson. that isn't what we wanted you to do. we didn't want special treatment. if it's not good for us it's not good for our friends in iowa or missouri or kansas or colorado or south dakota, either. and so if you had that kind of leverage, you should have used it to fix the bill, not just get a special sweetheart deal for us here in nebraska. that isn't what we want. i don't know this for sure

because i haven't talk today friends in nebraska. but i'll bet you that's what they're saying and will say over the course of the next several weeks. final points. if you look at the dow jones news wire of yesterday you'll also find there were a couple of other sweetheart deals. the one i refer to specifically mentions the name "nebraska" on page. but apparently there are other references to insurance companies who meet certain qualifications and it just happens that three insurance companies that qualify are blue cross-blue shield of nebraska and michigan and mutual of omaha. in other words, satisfying the special interests in his state and going against what i think the vast majority of nebraskaens were telling him what to do which was don't support this legislation. >> well, i'd just like to follow up on it. i think you got a half nelson, a three quarter nelson, a full nelson and then the double triple nelson going on here. the half nelson is exempting 1 million floridians from any cuts in medicare advantage. the three quarter nelson is that

senator nelson has excluded the position on hospitals under construction in his state by changing the date but left 80 other investors throughout the country hanging out to dry in terms of billions of dollars of investment that will never come to fruition. but he protected the ones in his state. he also, as noted by the leader, wrote a permanent into infinity funding for the federal taxpayer -- that's all of us that aren't in nebraska -- for any new costs in medicaid that this bill would bring forward. how can that be the america that we're from? we're going to take one group and because you want to get a vote for a bill, we're going to totally treat you different than everybody else. now, we have 90,000 oklahomaens on medicare advantage. we have hundreds of thousands of oklahomaens on medicaid. this bill's going to be a big

cost for the state of oklahoma. why is it that nebraska is more important than oklahoma or arizona or kentucky? it's not. we're dividing up the country on the baits is of program yal preferences -- on the basis of parochial preferences rather than doing the best things for the country. i think it's also interesting to note that in this bill -- and nobody will come forward and claim it -- is $100 million for hospitals. we can't find out where it is. the leader won't tell us who -- who did they buy for $100 million? what state is that? is that connecticut is, that nebraska? what ore state has bought a dole that gets 100 member that nobody else gets?

this process is corruption that's obvious to the average american in this country. and it's a shame that's the only way we can come to a consensus in this country is to buy votes. >> the only other issue i would mention that we didn't touch on that's here is the abortion language. senator nelson also indicated that he had been trying to ensure that tax money was not used to fund for elective abortions. and apparently argued yesterday to all of you that he had done. that it is clear now in the last 24 hours that that's not the opinion of congressman stew pack and it's not the opinion of the catholic bishops. with that let me throw it open for any questions of any of us.

>> at this point is there anything that you think you can do to stop the democrats from having a christmas eve vote on final passage. >> well we're going to have the first vote tonight. people have to show up, vote, take responsibility for their votes. a number of senators i understand have not sent out any statements yet. and we will have two more votes which will give people to take full ownership of this now 2700-page monstrosity. in addition to that, it's pretty clear from the statement that the congressman stew pack put out yesterday that they still have a big dilemma in trying it resolve the issue of funding of elective abortions with tax dollars between the house position and the senate position. so this isn't over. >> sir, you mentioned the 26 billion to cover the medicaid for nebraska. i was wondering how you arrived at that figure. >> the 26 billion is the amount of money for ten years that all of the other states will have to pay to cover the additional

people covered under this legislation. part of which goes to cover the people in nebraska. >> i'd make one other note. the leader talked about the c.b.o. numbers. if you read the foot notes for c.b.o., they said number one that this doesn't include the doctor fix. that's a quarter of a trillion dollars. we're going to vote on that in january. we're going to steal that from our grandkids. so we're going to exclude that as a cost. we've already done. that another footnote that they said, given the history, is is unlikely that these savings will be materialized if in fact they don't do the cuts that they said they were going to do in medicare. but they also stated that that's highly unlikely as well. and then the third point they made is if in fact they do make the cuts, it's highly likely that care will decline for medicare patients. so go read the foot notes on the c.b.o. report and you will find some pretty big caveats which

this congress and congress before have never demonstrated that they have the intestinal for the attitude to do what they said they were going to do in terms of trimming the amount of money coming into medicare -- fortitude. >> [inaudible] >> i think it is. >> that's a pretty serious charge. and it's something, no offense to senator mcconnell, but senator mcconnell has for a long time, member of the appropriations committee -- [inaudible] -- what's the difference between being in a hospital and on a bill? >> there's plenty of difference in this. let me tell you the first difference. senator mcconnell has never voted on a bill that's one sixth of our economy. it's going to affect 300 -- every person in this country. it's going to change healthcare in this country. it's going to change the quality of care in this country. and we're buying votes to move

this country from a patient-centered healthcare system to a government-centered healthcare system? it's day and night as far as i'm concerned. and i would send you back to what olympia snow said. you don't do things like this unless you have the majority of the middle of the country behind you. and so we see this process unfolding behind you that we have to use a mechanism of buying votes by making an ine quallity. first of allers there's going to be constitutional challenges in this bill like you can't believe. i can't wait to see the attorney generals on the states that aren't getting a fair cut on medicaid based on specific benefits in this bill that they won't have a constitutional basis with which to challenge this. >> let me make one more point, sir. here's a tale of two different senators. senator liberman all along said,

"i think the public option, the so-called government-run insurance program, is wrong for america. and i can't support it as long as that's in there." that was a matter of principle with him. and they took it out. and he therefore said that he would cast his vote in support of it. senator nelson has come out with several matters of principle to him as well. he said, "i can't support this legislation as long as it has the class act in it. that's a matter of principle with me. as long as it has the public option in. it as long as it doesn't have the stupac abortion language in it." those were matters of principle that he laid out. so how did they get his vote? did they get his vote by adopting the stupac language? no. they got his vote -- i won't say because of but it's a strange coincidence indeed not as a matter of principle that the medicaid expansion should be taken out of the bill.

no. just that nebraskaens should should be except from it. not that specialty hospital provisions were wrong all across the country but that a hospital in nebraska could be exempted from it. not that burdens on the insurance companies throughout the country would be very difficult for them to satisfy but that a couple of companies in nebraska would be exempted from them. that's not a matter of principle. that's just a matter of trying to do something just for your state and to heck with the rest of the people of the united states of america. >> senator mcconnell, senator mccain said today he doesn't see much more that you guy can do to block this bill under that if the votes don't come together for democrats once they're held. do you agree with that? >> people have to show up and people have to vote. and we're going to do that. at least three more times. and then you've got relatively -- not relatively, substantial

differences between the house version of the bill and the senate version of the bill. i think the american people can be assured that this will not become law before christmas. that's good. secondly, there is more time for the public to weigh in, evaluate and learn more as we have learned within the first 24 hours from the congressional budget office itself about its own estimates. so thinks not everyone by any stretch. thank you, everyone. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2009] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] >> senate republican leaders on the healthcare debate this afternoon. senator mitch mcconnell, jon kyl and tomko burn. we heard minority leader mcconnell refer to a change in the congressional budget office's estimate of the healthcare bill. and this from roll called to, the c.b.o. sent a letter to senate leaders informing them

that an error in its analysis of the healthcare reform bill has resulted in less estimated deficit savings projected for the decade after 2019. quote correcting that error has no impact on the estimated effects of legislation during the 2010-2019 period. the letter continues, however, the correction reduces the degree to which the legislation would lower federal deficits in the decade after 2019. again that's a roll called to. >> look live now at the senate floor debate continue fog the 17th day on healthcare. republicans and democrats alternating time debating in one-hour blocks. this will lead up to a key test vote that will happen at 1:00 a.m. monday. it will be the first of three votes leading up to a vote on final passage which could happen on christmas eve. you can see the senate debate live on c-span 2.

>> and as the senate continues working on healthcare, this is how you can follow debate. you can watch live gavel to gavel unedited and commercial free again only on c-span 2 or listen to highlights on c-span radio and review the debate at our healthcare hubris with live streaming video from the senate floor, complete video archive including the debate on the bill and amendments, briefings from leadership and other key senators and the latest from the reporters and editors at c.q. roll call group. for iphone yearses follow the healthcare rebate with the free iphone associated press. it's free and with it you can listen to c-span, c-span 2 and c-span radio. >> last thursday the senate banking committee voted on the nomination of fed chair ben bernanke for a second term. vermont independent senator berny sanders announced his plan to place a hold on chairman bernanke's nomination when it leaves committee. this is about a hour 45 minutes.

>> u.s. department of housing and urban development. we have a quorum present. let me ask the advice of m >> in order to move things along i was going to suggest and i raised this briefly with the senator shelby after taking the other three nominations.

>> i would ask unanimous consent to consider the following three nominations in block. the three other nominations. the is there any objection to consider them in block? if not let me ask all those in favor of reporting out these nominees signify by answering aye. >> aye. >> opposed nay. the ayes have it and nom neated are reported. i would like everybody to have a chance to be heard on this. and some i know are going to want a little more time than others to talk about this. and i appreciate. that and the committee ought to cooperate in a way that helps the members in these marts.

we need a quorum present and the majority of the quorum present have to vote in the affirmative. you can't have a majority vote by proxy votes of the nominees. he'd like to be able to get to the nomination but i want to give people a chance obviously to have a full opportunity to discuss the nomination in full. with that let me -- what i'll try and do is i'll going to put a five minute time on it but not restrain anybody to exactly that because i know people have maybe more time than others to be heard on the matter. and that we come to a point where i'm going to lose a quorum or senate time to come back i would stay around however long people would like after we have a vote to listen to the comments people have as to why they voted for or against the nominee. so i'm not going to do that now. but at some point today i've got to move this nomination. i don't want to spend all day at it. but again i don't want to have a restrained and jam this thing through without having people who want to be heard on the matter have a chance to do so.

so that is how i'll proceed. i've got some very brief comments to make because during the confirmation hearing i expressed myself about this nomination. but others i said have probably longer comments to make on the nom northeast. i'll be happy to accommodate. that when we have a quorum present i'll move the other three nominations. accommodate that. a quorum is present and i appreciate my colleagues' understanding on that. today we vote to meet on the nomination of ben bernanke. as i've said, my intention is to pass this nomination out of this committee to the full senate. some of the criticisms of the fed chairman, have been voiced during this confirmation process. have merit. and i'd be remiss if i didn't acknowledge that. as i said in our last meeting on this topic, the fed failed in my view in its oversight in consumer protection responsibilities, allowing some of the largest holding companies to engage in dangerous risk-taking and to allow the damage to fall on ordinary

americans. reflected in lost jobs, lost homes, lost retirement and lost sense of hope that many have felt. that you can't put a dollar sign on. it obviously affects this country and affects our citizenry very profoundly. however, i believe that chairman bernanke must receive credit for the critical role he played in the events of last fall. while the judgment of many is still out on that, i happen to believe that he had and others not acted, some of whom sit on this committee, at a time of critical importance to our country, we'd be looking at a very, very different and far more dire situation in our nation that is otherwise the case. and i believe that ben bernanke deserves substantial credit as chairman of the federal reserve for helping us navigate those waters. certainly without not with perfection, but certainly i think, stepping up at a critical time in our nation's history with some very wise leadership that benefitted our nation. the federal reserve took extraordinary actions to arrest this crisis and prevent utter economic catastrophe. and i believe nothing short of that was at risk in the absence of those actionings.

because he did what he did, i believe there's reason to believe that better days do lie ahead for our country as well. therefore, i strongly support this nomination. i want to be clear, that with my support comes my insistence that we carefully examine the role of the institution that runs the risk of becoming too complicated to succeed. and we're deeply involved in that debate and discussion among ourselves and this this committee as we prepare to move forward on a financial modernization effort. i want to thank my colleagues for the tremendous effort being made to go through these waters in a very careful, deliberate fashion, to allow us to come to conclusions that i think will strengthen our nation substantial substantially. it's been proposed that the fed assume a role in identifying threats to the overall financial stability. the fed is also charged with determining monetary policy. supervising some state banks and all bank holding companies and serving as the principal architect of consumer regulation protections. and i fear that more responsibilities that we pile on the fed's plate, the more

hamstrung the fed will be in taking the very kinds of actions that help to save our economy from catastrophe. i have outlined my proposals to maintain the fed's oversight responsibilities, its access to critical information and most importantly, its independence. and i can't stress that last point strongly enough. and although chairman bernanke and i disagree on many particulars of the plan that we proposed and we're working on, i know that we share a common commitment to a strong central bank and a strong obviously american economy. i look forward to working with him in the months ahead and i thank him for his service to our nation. with that, let me turn to senator shelby and we'll move on down the line for comments and proceed in the manner that i've described at the outset of these comments. >> thank you, mr. chairman, mr. chairman, i have a lengthy statement and it will take me a few minutes to give. and i hope you'll indulge me. today the committee meets on the nomination of ben bernanke to serve a second term as chairman

of the board of governors of the federal reserve system. our vote today will not only be an expression of our confidence in his ability to lead the fed out of the crisis, but also a judgment on his performance in the years preceding the crisis. after the recession that ended in 2001, which was precipitated by the bursting of the dot-com bubble, the fed was concerned about a sluggish economy and the specter of inflation, the fed chose to hold interest rates remarkably low. the effect of federal funds rate was below 2% between december 2001 and november 2004. during most of that period, now-chairman bernanke served as a member of the boar of governors of the federal reserve and supported the low interest rate policies. in 2002, then-governor bernanke expressed concerns about the possibility of deflation, and the potential for future financial crisis. his warning was clear --

deflation, he said, basically, is a potential danger which would, which could ignite a financial wildfire. the policy prescription seemed equally clear -- keep interest rates low, keep liquidity flows high and lean hard against deflation pressures. however, while keeping interest rates low for a protracted period of time to a void an inflation-induced crisis, the fed seemed remarkably unconcerned about the possibility of .. dr. bernanke represents a sin of omission. as housing prices soared and risk-taking escalated, wall street investors pressed on as if a fed put was insured. the notion was that in adverse market conditions, the fed would

absorb faltering assets and flood markets with liquidity. governor bernanke at that time assured markets that the fed stood ready to use the discount window and other tools to protect the financial system. protect the financial system. an ndication that the fed put was indeed in place. promoting the existence of a fed put was i believe, an invitation for unreasonable risk-taking and moral hazard. in 2004 and 2005, chairman bernanke and other members of the board of governors spoke of the emergence of a great moderation, a potential permanent reduction in macroeconomic volatility, and risk which they argued were a result of vigilant and adept monetary policy. in retrospect, this misperception left market participants believing that large risks had been mitigated, opening the door for even greater risk-taking. dr. schwartz argues that

chairman bernanke committed a sin of omission by neglecting the growing risk. according to the inflation-adjusted home price index, constructed by economist robert shiller, home prices rose by an astounding 85% between 1996 and 2006. chairman bernanke was a member of the board of governors during those last four years of that period, when home prices then rose 43%. this is remarkable contrast to a 10% rise in real home prices during the entire period from 1890 to 1996. i'd like to repeat those figures. in the 106-year period beginning 1890, home prices rose only 10% in real terms. with that in mind, i do not believe that there can be any disagreements that housing prices were becoming irrationally high over the following decade. as early as 2005, yale economist robert shiller warned about the

outsized gains in home prices. commenting on what he saw as a bubble in real estate markets, shiller said and i quote, significant further rises in these markets could lead eventually to even worse significant declines. the bad outcome to be that eventual declines could result in a substantial increase in the rate of personal bankruptcies, which could lead to a secondary string of bankruptcies, of fnlt institutions as well. another long run consequence could be the consumer and business confidence and another possibly worldwide recession. think about it. chairman bernanke was indeed aware of the growing dangers. however, the fed ignored risk identified by professor shiller and instead, forecasted that the housing market would eventually bounce back from what was viewed as a slowdown and that problems in the subprime market could be contained. in june 2007, speech, chairman bernanke said and i quote, fundamental factors, including

solid growth in incomes and relative low mortgage rates should ultimately support the demand for housing and at this point, the troubles in the subprime sector seem unlikely to seriously spill over to the broader economy of the financial system. he followed in a speech in october 2007 by saying -- the banking system is healthy. goodness. in october of 2007, the banking system was decidedly as we all know, not healthy. by many accounts, the system was months into the kind of post-bubble fallout that typically follows deleveraging of investments tied to massive price appreciation like that which had just occurred in the housing markets. in making the fundamental misdiagnosis, the chairman missed the clear signals -- a housing bubble, a weakened economy, instability in the credit markets, and most important -- he missed a clear chance to take action when it

would not have required a massive commitment of taxpayer resources. in considering chairman bernanke's reappointment, i think we need to be mindful of the fact that the crisis of the 2008 was not days or weeks in the making. it took years. and many of those years chairman bernanke supported the actions that contributed to the ultimate scale of the problems we encountered. a scale we have not seen since the great depression. in my view, many of the fed's responses greatly amplified the problem of moral hazard, stemming from too big to fail treatment of large financial institutions and activities. because the fed also made other major forecasting errors, it was slow to identify possible spillovers from the housing market into the general economy. and the financial system. consequently, the fed took actions that often appeared to be ad hoc and piecemeal. the to quote dr.

scwharts, owe yet failed to arctic late its own goals. the market was thus bewildered when the fed rescued certain firms and not others. mr. bernanke ultimately failed to convince the market the fed had a plan and was not performing in an ad hoc fashion. under chairman bernanke, the federal reserve also vastly expanded use of its discount window including the provision of funds to institutions over which the fed had no oversight. the fed, as you know, also created new lending facilities to channel liquidity and credit to markets that were deemed most stressed and systemically important. the fed's balance sheet ballooned from a pre-crisis level of around $8 lunz billion to more than $2.2 trillion through credit extensions and purchases of risky private assets, gse debt and, of course tresh dee debt. some fed actions in the recent crisis were innovative ways to provide liquidity to a wide variety of financial

institutions and market participants. some actions, however, amounted to bailouts. when handling failing individual institutions deemed systematically important by the fed, shareholders were wiped out and management was replaced. however, in many instances bondsholders were made hold even though they were not legally entitled to such favorable treatment. using powers granted under section 13-3 of the federal reserve act, the federal reserve made it clear that certain institutions and activities would not be allowed to fail. the result was moral hazard on an unprecedented scale in the united states. for many years, i've held that the federal -- i held the federal reserve right here in this committee in very high regard. i had a great deal of respect for not only its critical role in the u.s. monetary policy but, also, for its role as a prudential regulator. i believed to be this nation's fings repository of financial

expertise and excellence but over the years we've enacted a number of laws which demonstrated our confidence in this institution and our expectation they would use the authority we gave them to avoid financial crises. we trusted the fed to execute those laws when deemed prudent and necessary. i fear now, however, that our trust and confidence were misplaced. i believe in accountability. the senate's constitutional authority to advise and consent can be a highly effective means by which this body can hold individuals accountable. it is a process through which we can express our disapproval of past deeds or our lack of confidence in future performance. i strongly disapprove of some of the past deeds of the federal reserve while ben bernanke was a member and its chairman and i feel -- and i lack confidence in what little planning for the future he has articulated. once again, i agree with dr. schwartz and i'll quote him, chairman bernanke advocated monetary policies that contributed to excessive risk taking, ignored or downplayed

serious emerging risks, failed to use regulatory authority available to the fed to prevent housing speculation and unsound lending practices, often misjudged the nature of problems in the markets and contributed to market turbulence by appearing to act increasesly without plans and, of course in an ad hoc manner. these shortcomings stand in stark contrast to some of chairman bernanke's stated objecti objectives given right here in this committee during his nomination hearing before the committee in 2005. during that hearing, dr. bernanke said, monetary policy is most effective when it is as -- it as coherent, consistent and predictable and possible. i do not believe that monetary policy during the recent crisis in which, in some instances, was effectively fiscal policy was coherent, consistent or predictable n. 2005, dr. bernanke said that a monetary policy -- that monetary policy

is becoming increasingly transparent to the public and financial markets, a trend that i strongly support. as i mentioned earlier, i do not believe there was any transparency in some of the actions taken during the crisis by the fed. in 2005, dr. bernanke said and i'll quote the fed works closely with other regulators to ensure the safety and soundness of the u.s. banking system and, over the years, has played a constructive role in managing and mitigating diverse types of financial crises. if i'm confirmed, he said, i will work to enhance the stability of the financial system and to ensure that the resources, procedures and expertise are in places needed to respond to any threats to stability that may emerge. now, not only were there evident threats to the stability of our financial system prior to 2006, but, also a complete lack of regulatory response by the fed. and finally, in 2005, dr.

bernanke said, the federal reserve, along with other regulators, is, also, engaged in trying to ensure that consumers are treated fairly in their financial dealings, that their privacy is protected, and that they receive clear and understandable information about the terms of financial agreements and that they are not subject to discriminatory or abusive lending practice. is there any doubt at this point that we were experiencing a system-wide breakdown in mortgage underwriting and the fed did virtually nothing until it was too late? chairman bernanke is a distinguished scholar, we know that and he's a student of monetary policy and financial markets. under his leadership the fed engineered some innovative ways to inject liquidity in distressed markets during the recent financial crisis and while there may be some agreement on his handling of the crisis, we must, also, take into account his role leading up to the crisis. many have said that changing horses in the middle of the stream will introduce an unacceptable level of

uncertainty into the markets. on the other hand, i would argue that it can be equally damaging to our economy and our form of government if we, the united states senate, fail to use our constitutional authority to disapprove and a nomination when a particular nominee has not executed his responsibilities in a manner consistent with his own claims and our expectation. we talk a good game when it comes to accountability but we rarely match our own rhetoric with actions. in this instance, i believe we must not only express our disapproval of this particular nominee but we should, also, signal future nominees that we have expectations and that those expectations should be met. for this reason and others, i have articulated here, i will be opposing a second term for dr. bernanke as chairman of the board of governors of the federal reserve. >> thank you, nart. senator johnson. >>

>> we are tasked to determine if ben bernanke will continue to be the chairman of the board of governors. we must restore financial stability and find solutions that insure that an economic crisis like the one we had last year never happens again. while there has been criticism of the federal reserve for not doing enough to protect consumers and for unprecedented actions it took during last year's financial crisis, there is also a consensus that mr. bernanke's response to the economic crisis kept our nation out of depression. going forward, there is no doubt that the fed can do better. it can be more proactive and

better communicate with congress. we must not forget what mr. bernanke and the fed did write during the last month. as our nation continues on the path to economic recovery, there is no doubt that having one of the world's foremost experts on the great depression at the helm of the federal reserve is a benefit to our nation. the fed has economic and financial expertise that is unrivaled i believe that mr. bernanke has been rightly nominated for the post. i will support his confirmation today. rnanke's renomination as chairman of the board of governors of the federal reserve today. i'm confident he can assist our nation in finding solutions to

be a stronger and more fiscally civil nation. >> thank you very much, senator. senator bennett? >> thank you, mr. chairman. we deal in alternatives around here. and initial reports of whom president obama might have nominated to be the chairman of the fed had me quite concerned. so, by comparison, i was relieved when he decided to stay with ben bernanke. i've spoken with chairman bernanke, made clear in no uncertain terms that my continued support is contingent on his fulfilling the commitments he made to me that he will, one, implement a plan to pull government support back from the private sector and allow companies to fail or succeed on their own, two, fight inflation aggressively and protect the value of the dollar through monetary policy decisions and, three, work with the congress in a meaningful way

to enhance the transparency of the fed. given the large size of the fed's balance sheet, i think taxpayers should expect nothing less. he's made those commitments to me. in anticipation of what might happen if we defeated his nomination, i have told him i will support him in this committee and on the floor. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you, senator, very much. senator tester. >> thanks, but this is one of those days where i'll forego my opening statement. >> this is a corker, the corker rule here. >> fine. let me then turn to senator bunting. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i am not going to forego mine. >> i thought maybe a trend might be setting in here. >> two weeks ago at this hearing of ben bernanke's nomination, i explained the case for opposing his nomination for a second term. i'm not going to repeat that entire statement today but i want to talk a little bit about

those reasons and a few more that have come up since the hearing. first i must take this opportunity to comments on chairman bernanke being named "time" magazine person of the year yesterday. one financial blogger wrote yesterday that this was like rewarding the captain of the "titanic" for getting everyone off the sinking ship after he rammed it into the iceberg. and chairman bernanke may wonder if he really wants to be honored by an organization that has previously named people like joseph stalin twice, yasser arafat, adolf hitler, the ayatollah khomeini, vlad mire putin, richard nixon twice as their person of the year. but, i congratulate him and hope he at least turns out better than most of those people.

four years ago when chairman bernanke was first nominated to be chairman of the federal reserve, i was the only senator to vote against him. in fact, i was the only senator even to raise serious concerns about his nomination. i opposed him because i knew he would continue the legacy of alan greenspan and i was right. but, i did not know how right i would be and could not imagine how wrong he would be in the following four years. from monetary policy to regulation, consumer protection, transparency, and independence, chairman bernanke's time has fed chair has been a failure. we must put an end to his and the federal reserve's failures and there is no better time than now. as i said two weeks ago, the greenspan legacy on monetary policy was breaking from the

tailor rule to provide easy money and, thus, inflate bubbles. not only did chairman bernanke continue that policy when he took control of the fed, but he supported every greenspan rate decision when he was a fed governor before he became chairman. sometime, if you read the minutes of the fed, he wanted to go even further and provide easier money than chairman greenspan. yet, at recent -- as recently as last month chairman bernanke continued to deny that fed action played any role in inflating the housing bubble. as recently as one month ago. on consumer protection, chairman bernanke went along with greenspan policy before he was chair and continued it after he was promoted. most glaring example is that it took him two years to finally

regulate subprime mortgages after the fed had already done nothing for 12 years. in other words, 14 years, after this body, the congress, had given the fed the power to do that. even though he acted only after pressure from the congress. well, as proof that there is justice in the world, it turns out chairman bernanke himself would have benefited if the fed had acted sooner on consumer protection. in an interview in the "time" magazine issue where he got his award, chairman bernanke said he recently had to refinance his adjustable rate mortgage because, in his words, it exploded. if that doesn't give you confidence in the man in charge of our financial system, i don't know what will. as the economy started to slide in and the housing bubble peaked

and then popped chairman bernanke failed to notice the problems or do anything about them until it was tomb late. during that time, he made many statements showing just how he did not understand what was really going on in the economy or how severe the crash would be. i want to read a few of those statements so that everyone understands just how wrong he has been. on march 28th, 2007, he said, the impact on broader economy and financial markets of the problem in the subprime market seems likely to be contained. on may 17th, 2007, he said, we do not expect significant spillover from the subprime market to the rest of the economy or to the financial system. on february 28th, 2008, he said, among the largest banks, the capital ratios remain good and i

don't expect any serious problems of that sort among the large internationally active banks that make up a very substantial part of our banking system. on june 9th, 2008, he said, the risks that the economy has entered a substantial downturn appears to have diminished over the past month or so. on july 16th, 2008, he said this -- fannie mae and freddie mac are adequately capitalized. and in no danger of failing. and just a few months ago, may 5th, 2009, speaking about the unemployment rate, he said, currently, we don't think it will get to 10%. well, we all wish he had been

right on that one. i could read many more quotes, but these are enough to show how wrong he has been about the major economic issues facing our country. of course, everyone makes mistakes. everyone up here has made mistakes. so, i asked chairman bernanke about these errors in a written question i gave him after his hearing. his answer did not make me feel any better. he said, the fed did not understand the relationship between financial firms, how the problems in the financial sec ter would move to the real economy or how severe the financial crisis would be. that was his answer to me. in those -- i thought those were the kind of things regulators, or the fed in particular, were paid to understand and address. we shouldn't be paying fed

chairmen to get it wrong or to learn on the job. just like the consumer protection, chairman bernanke did not take the job of regulating the banks under the fed's authority seriously. instead of close supervision of the biggest and most dangerous banks, he allowed them to grow their balance sheets and increase risk. the same is true about derivatives. after taking over the fed, he did not see any need for serious regulation of derivatives until it was clear that they were headed to a financial meltdown, thanks, in part, to those very products. even worse than those failures and flawed policies i just mentioned, chairman bernanke destroyed the independence of the federal reserve. he bowed to the political pressures of the bush and the obama administrations and turned

the fed into an arm of the treasury. walking arm in arm with treasury, chairman bernanke bailed out all the large financial institutions, including many foreign banks. and, he put the printing presses into overdrive funding the government spending and out of cheap money to the wall street firms. instead of taking money and lending to consumers and cleaning up their balance sheets, the banks started to pocket record profits and pay out billions of dollars in bonuses. after the hearing we held two weeks ago, i submitted a long list of questions to chairman bernanke. i, also, mentioned his disturbing answer to one of those questions. and now, i want to talk about an answer and more accurately the

non-answer chairman bernanke gave to some other questions. i apologize to the chairman, but this is very important. >> senator, i know your strong interests and i'm not going to put any clock on you. >> thank you. >> but i also hope you'll respect other members here. >> i'll try my best. i'm picking up for the people who passed. [ laughter ] >> the price of the price of gold has doubled. it has set several high your records this year. this has been matched by the slide of the value of the dollar. i oust chairman bernanke what he thought that men, particularly about the dollar and inflation. -- i asked chairman bernanke what he thought that meant, particularly about the dollar in inflation. he said it meant nothing. ask senior citizens who are on the fixed income if the dollar they had a the time that ben

bernanke took over as chairman is now worth 76 cents means nothing to them. the reduction in the buying power from $1 to 76 cents -- i do not see how he can make such an observation. i asked chairman bernanke what he thought the fed's legal authority was to purchase freddie mac and fannie mae securities is since they are not government securities as required by section 14 of the federal reserve act. his answer was that the fed determined by regulation that they are government securities. in other words "because i say so." in response to a question about the fed's decision to pay par on

the aig credit default swaps, chairman bernanke stated that the foreign banks were prohibited by the regulators and some foreign laws from taking his cuts. that is just not true. european banks have indeed taken here cuaircuts on derivatives wh other trading partners. i asked him about secretary paulson's claim that the first nine banks that the park money were healthy. citigroup and bank america needed more bailout money. as the tarp inspector general said later, paulson and bernanke should not have lied to the public about the health of the banks. chairman bernanke's response was

that by healthy, they meant that the banks were viable and not in imminent danger of failure. based on the new definition of "healthy," i hope my doctor never tells me that i am healthy again. i also followed up on the question asked at the hearing by chairman dodd about the fed'claims that the supervision job helps with monetary policy. i asked for specifics about how that has helped in monetary policy. i received only general talking points. the only specific example provided about the bailout lending facility was not about monetary lending policy. not monetary policy. and those facilities, as was pointed out by a financial blogger yesterday, were not

designed by the bank supervisor at the fed but by the market division in new york. i will stop going through the individual questions, because most of them his answers just ignored the question or repeated fed talking points. for this committee and the senate to do our jobs, evaluating his performance, we need real answers, not talking points. we have all heard chairman bernanke talk a lot about transparency. he brags about it. but, his actions speak a lot louder than his words. he promised congress more transparency when he first became chairman and he promised us transparency when he came begging to us for t.a.r.p. money. while he has published some more information than before, those efforts fall short and he still

refuses to provide details on the fed's bailout last year. it has become clear chairman bernanke is not going to open up the fed's action to review by the taxpayers. but, i thought he might at least provide more information to this committee as we considered his nomination. so, i asked for a list of documents for us to review, all of which i think are reasonable for congress to see. here is what i asked for. a transcript of all fmoc meetings, chairman bernanke has participated in. transcripts of all board meetings he has participated in. transcripts of meetings of the board of the new york fed while he was chairman. details of any exemptions granted to federal reserve act section 23 a and 23 b while he has been chairman. details of all discount window

transactions while he has been chairman. details of all transactions at facilities created under section 13-3 of the federal reserve act and legal opinions on the facilities. copies of any swap agreements with foreign central banks, legal opinions related to those agreements and any economic analysis about those agreements. economic analysis regarding the need for and effectiveness of any federal reserve facility created under the federal reserve act section 13-3. economic analysis regarding the need for and effectiveness of unconventional monetary policy facilities or actions. and finally, other relative documents, the bailout of aig, bank of america, citigroup, bear

stearns, lehman brothers, general motors, chrysler, cit and gmac. instead of those documents, what i got in return was a folder full of paper that printed off the fed web page. just in case anybody was wondering, those documents did not provide any new or useful information. that kind of response is not only disrespectful to the senate, but it raises the question of what they are trying to hide. i think we should know the answers to that question before we move forward on this nomination and every member of this committee should demand the same. while it turns out we actually may have an opportunity to find out some is of the information.

i hope every member of the committee listens to this. earlier this week i was informed that despite the fed's refusal to provide individual senators or the public with the information i requested, they have let committee staff of this very kesse some documents related to the aig bailout. when my staff asked what was in the documents, we were informed that we cannot be told because it was protected. since when does staff have higher clearance than members of the u.s. senate? members. that is a tremendous insult to senators on this committee and to the people who elected us. mr. chairman, this committee should not move forward.

chairman bernanke's nomination until he provides us with the documents i requested. and we certainly should not move forward until every member of this committee has been given the opportunity to review the documents your staff has seen. we must know what the committee staff knows but refuses to tell the senators. we must know what other documents they have seen but we have been denied. we should bring them before this committee today to tell us what they know. what they are trying to find out. and what the fed has refused to tell them. i hope and ask every member of the committee will join me in demanding that we begiven this information without moving forward. we know -- we must know what the fed is hiding from us and from the american people. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you, senator. let me just say to members here

it's 10:20 and i know members are leaving because of other obligations. and i won't be rigid about this but i would like to at least tentatively schedule a vote for around 11:00, 11:15 if we could. we'll let officess know. obviously if that slips for some reason we'll let them know as well but give people an indication when we'd like to get to a vote, if we could. >> mr. chairman, i would object to setting a time certain. >> i appreciate that. >> thank you. >> is there a -- senator reed was out. is he going to come in? not going to come in. excuse me, senator merkley. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman and i appreciate the opportunity to say a few words regarding the confirmation of dr. ben bernanke as chairman of the federal reserve system board of governors. i will be voting against this nomination and the reason is short -- in short, is that as chairman dr. bernanke failed to recognize orem dee the factors that paved the road to this dark

and difficult recession. following the collapse of our economy, it apparent that dr. bernanke has not changed his overall approach of prioritizing wall street over american families. my decision is based on my belief that our economy cannot recover if we do not put main street first. our nation is just beginning to emerge from the greatest financial crisis since the great depression. and there is no guarantee we will continue on the road to recovery offer the long term or the short term. unemployment remains far too high. credit is unavailable to far too many businesses. families are plagued by falling home prices and high foreclosure rates. even as we move forward with our efforts to get our economy back on track, it is critical that we examine what led us to this

point. for too many years, federal regulators turned a blind eye to the signs of an impending financial crisis. tricks and traps proliferated in the credit card and consumer lending businesses, predatory mortgage loans exploded, fueling unsustainable housing bubble. regulators lifted rules requiring banks to keep adequate capital and a lay say fair approach to security taigs, derivatives and proprietary trading encouraged excessive risk taking on wall street. as a member of the board of governors, a chair of the council of economic advisers then as chairman of the board of governors dr. bernanke supported each of these decisions. failing to take the precautionary steps that could have averted or mitigated financial collapse. these failures are relevant to the future. we need economic leaders who understand that the ultimate goal of economic policies and

the key to meaningful economic recovery should be financially successful families, not oversized wall street profits. indeed, it should be recognized that while wall street prospered in the short term from the reduced leverage requirements, securitization of faulty mortgages, the explosion of derivatives, americans did not prosecute per. the expansion that occurred between 2002 and 2007 became the first expansion in which working families were worse off at the end of the expansion than they were at the beginning. that is not a path we can afford to travel again. dr. bernanke is a dedicated and honorable public servant. i appreciate his willingness to serve. i appreciate his scholarship and, quite frankly, i appreciate his humble and engaged style in

responding to the dialogue about economic policy. however, those factors, in my mind, do not outweigh my concerns on fundamental issues of regulation and rebuilding the economy. let me put this more succinctly. dr. bernanke's approach helped set our economic house on fire. that fire has destroyed the jobs, the health care, the retirement savings of millions of americans, working families. since then, dr. bernanke has shown himself to be quite adroit with the firehose, helping to put that fire out. but as we look to the future and we look beyond the stage of putting the fire out, i think we need to look for leadership that will be e department at

rebuilding our economic house. for this reason, i will be voting no on dr. bernanke's confirmation for a second term as federal reserve chairman. thank you. >> thank you, senator. snark corker. >> mr. chairman, thank you. i'll be fairly brief. i think this may be our last meeting of the year and i want to begin by thanking you, as chairman, and senator shelby as ranking member for the effort that's under way right now to have a bipartisan bill. i want to thank you both for the way your staffs are working with each other and the tone that's this is an important vote for regarding the chairman of the fed. note is always a safe vote. when there is controversy, no is a good vote. he did not get all of the calls right. he did make many mistakes.

did the titan of our financial world make a lot of mistakes? absolutely. other any major ceos in the financial industry that did not make some large mistakes? inno. lot of mistakes have been made. there are a lot of conspiracy theories floating away. i do reserve the right to extento change my vote. so far, i have not been able to find any fact as it relates to those theories or discussions that taken place regarding intended mistakes. i will sum up and say that i will vote for chairman bernanke for a second term today. i plan to do that on the floor

unless something changes. i will do it for couple of reasons. i think each of the second experiences in our own lives. i started when i was 25 and started a company that grew at 80% for 12 years. some people talk about my business success during those days. it was modest compared to a lot of people in this room. i went through a tough time in 1990. i laid in bed for about a year- and-a-half trying to calculate my net worth at night to see if i could pay everybody back. i did. i paid everyone back on time and made it through. but was i a better business person before the event or after? i can tell you that after going through some incredibly difficult experiences, i was by far better equipped to deal with business after the event them before. my guess is that everybody could

say the same thing. it is not what occurs during good times that makes you strong. it is those things that occur during bad times. if there is anybody in this country that has been tested more and has the ability to be chairman of the fed right now than chairman bernanke, i do not think so. i know there have been comments about mistakes leading up to this. there were huge mistakes by many people. if we were to fire all regulators that made mistakes, we would have to start with a clean slate. i do not think there was any regulator that did not make mistakes leading up to this. i think his experience over the last year-and-a-half makes him by far the most well-equipped person to lead the fed over the next several years. equipped person to lead the fed over the next several years, i

do. i don't know of anybody i could think of that would be better after what has occurred. did he make mistakes? absolutely. the second thing, we've all watched what happened in this presidential race and i don't say this to be partisan t. doesn't matter which side of the aisle it happened on, it would have happened but what we've seen is a president, as you might expect, divorcing himself from the economic crisis that occurred. it's only natural. i think anybody elected would do that, if they came in and faced the ib kind of economic climate we had. i think the last thing we need right now is a fed chairman coming in and divorcing themselves from the balance sheet that the fed has. i want -- i want somebody dealing with this expanded balance sheet that has the capabilities, if dealt with incorrectly, to create huge inflation in this country and create all kinds of other problems throughout our country and in relationship to other countries. so, have there been mistakes made? yes. is the fed balance sheet huge?

yes. do we need to get it back to normal state? yes. but, i'd rather someone who owns that balance sheet and put us in that particular place manage that balance sheet back down than having another person come in who has no ownership of that and has the ability to maybe do some things and divorce them self from the results that i think might not be good for our country. so, look, i think chairman bernanke gets up every morning, i think he tries to do those things that he believes are best for this country, i believe that. i don't think he has a political cell in his body. has he turned me off some trying to build an empire for the fed? yes. and does he need to stop that? absolutely yes and i've talked to him specifically about that. and i know that -- i know that this committee is going to going to through some reg reform that may clip back some of the responsibilities of the fed. and would i ask him, assume he

is listening to this, my guess is he is, does he need to quit trying to expand the empire of the fed, absolutely. but i do think based on where we are today with the balance sheet issues, with what has been learned through this last crisis, i do think he is he is in a good position to make prudent decisions for our country as we move ahead, i do, i plan to vote for him and, mr. chairman, i thank you for the time. >> i thank the senator very much. senator mendez? >> thank you, mr. chairman. mr. chairman, let me thank you for your leadership of the committee during -- throughout this year but particularly in this confirmation process. i think everybody's had the opportunity to make their views very well known in an unfettered way and that process should be reassuring to the american people so i thank you for your leadership. let me also say i don't envy chairman bernanke's difficult position. he's served in what can only be referred to as one of the hottest seats in american government for the last year, make something of the toughest

decisions that have come before the country in probably well over a generation. shielding himself from what has become a populace attack from both sides of the aisle. faced with an economic that was -- economy that was headed into the abyss, chairman bernanke and the fed had what appeared to be a series of hops and choices, take it or leave it, do something or do nothing. and i think we hopefully can all agree that doing nothing was not an option. whatever other disagreements we may have had, chairman bernanke took forceful action at a pivotal moment when the economy could have fallen off a cliff. there may be some legitimate debate about changing the tools the fed has, as well as debate about the choices chairman bernanke made. we could debate both of those issues and i know, mr. chairman in the coming months, we will continue to do so but i believe in the end what we should not do is change leadership at the fed at what appears to be the very

beginning of an economic recovery. having said that, i do believe there's more the fed could have done to mitigate the housing bubble, supervise the banks, enact consumer protections, and provide credit to small businesses. i believe in chairman bernanke admitted himself, he could have done more to mitigate risk and require higher capital standards. but, at the same time, i do believe, at this point, we are better served by someone who has learned from those experiences, someone who did bring us back from the brink of a depression. i remember mr. chairman, november of 2008, after having been told that everything was fine in the economy and then that fateful meeting with the chairman and then secretary paulson saying -- painting a pretty dire picture and saying that, if we did not act between three and four weeks that we would have a global economic

meltdown. a global economic meltdown. and you know, we constantly say now that we have the worst economy since the great depression. there are some who have short-term memory as to how that all came about but the reality is we've also undermined it what that means. i don't think the american people know how much -- how close we were to the brink of a major economic collapse in this country. that's what this president inherited. that's what chairman bernanke was dealing with. and so, as someone who made decisions that we can equivocate with, maybe, but he did bring us back from the brink of a depression and with these experiences, i think he can steer us to fiscal policy that not only is safe harbor but sails towards economic growth. having said that, in the future, i hope the fed will be more responsive to the needs of main street in america, where there is small businesses developing

something, selling something, innovating, creating the new products and jobs of the 21st century. i expect it will be more vigilant to prevent a repeat of the economic crisis we've experienced and we'll get ahead of the next problems we will face such as commercial mortgage market and credit card defaults. so, it is with that expectation, mr. chairman, they will vote for confirmation. i think he did what we needed at a time of crisis. i think he has learned from those experiences. and the final point i'll make, mr. chairman, which you have done and which needs to be a constant effort of this committee, is that whenever we have a regulator, whether it be the fed or anyone else, it needs the oversight of congress to make sure that the laws we pass and that they are enforced to regulate that ultimately that we are at their heels making sure that that enforcement takes place. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you, senator very much. senator hutchinson?

>> well, thank you, mr. chairman. i left to go make a quorum at commerce where we're having a markup, but i did want to make a few remarks. i won't read my entire statement, but i am appreciative of many of the things that the chairman has done and i think that he has tried very hard to steer this ship in a very tough time. however, i am going to vote no today, for two major reasons. number one is the handling of t.a.r.p. and, of course, he was very much involved in that. we were told that there would be one plan for t.a.r.p. and that was basically to buy the bad assets of financial institutions so that they would have the ability to lend with their good assets unfettered.

before the end of the year last year, the plan had changed twice. and i cannot, in good conscience, condone that kind of behavior with so much trust that congress put in the group that put forward the t.a.r.p. and then, of course, we know that since this administration has started, it has changed yet again. and secondly, i am as concerned about the debt ceiling, where we are today, as any of our financial problems. and i think the chairman spoke too positively about needing big stimulus without raising the spectre of a debt that is insupportable. and i think that if he were going to speak for the big stimulus, that there should have

been a huge warning signal about the amount of debt that this country was incurring. and it is for those reasons that i will vote no. however, i will say that i respect chairman bernanke in many ways. i think he's very bright and i think he has worked tire lessly in every way that he saw fit to try to shore up our financial system. and i will say that he has been most accessible to members of congress, for which i am, also, appreciative. but, weighing all the factors, i will vote no today. thank you. >> thank the senator very much. senator brown? >> thank you, mr. chairman. i -- anything that this committee does and anything that this senate does should -- should all be about jobs and i -- i -- and i think that we are in -- mann of you in this committee have heard me perhaps

ad nauseam talk about the importance of manufacturing and that manufacturing jobs, of course, have a multiplier effect, 100 manufacturing jobs in a community results in hundreds of other good jobs created in addition to what it does for local tax base, for police and fire, all that. and i appreciate the comments of senator menendez about main street and my -- my my concern about chairman bernanke is that he is not focused on job creation the way i would hope that he would. this past week, i had breakfast with the president of the cleveland fed. i urged her to use her influence representing the cleveland fed. it is clearly the fed most focused on manufacturing.

i talked to her about using her influence particularly for the problem with credit, giving credit to small business, especially to manufacturing and the supply chain for of a manufacturing. -- for auto manufacturing. the companies that make glass for automobiles to make glass for solar panels. the companies that make y gears for trucks to make them for wind turbines. the banking system has not done well in opening up the credit and giving it to manufacturers. i hope that chairman bernanke understands that. i hope that he understands the urgency of using the powers of the fed to encourage member banks to do what they can to unfreeze credit to provided to local small businesses

especially. i am going to vote for chairman bernanke today. i think he does understand the urgency. it is a tough vote for me because i share some of the concerns. i do plan to vote for him today. i am not at all certain yet what i will do on the senate floor. my concern is that chairman bernanke -- my hope and belief is that he is beginning to understand that his job for all of us is really about job creation and what he needs to do to focus on that. >> csenator crapo. >> i will help us get back on track and yield my time. >> i have given my staff a list of when people arrive. it is not an arbitrary decision. >> before we get to the question

of the actual nomination, i want to suggest that we should not be moving forward with a vote and a nomination today. i strongly oppose moving forward today for two compelling reasons. the first is something i think is really important for every committee member with our rules regarding the document request and how that has been handled with regard to aig and other bailouts. there are a lot of questions yet to be answered about the loans the federal reserve made to aig. some firmly believe the loans were made in clear violation of the federal reserve act. these loans were not adequately collateralized, resulting in the federal reserve bank of new york having to exchange debt claims on aig for equity stakes in two

insolvent insurance underwriting units. center bombisenator bunning metf document requests of important things like transcripts, minutes, legal opinions, economic analysis regarding these specific loans and specifically federal reserve action 13-3 and actions with regard to aig and other firms. the chairman declined to provide senator bunning any new information in response to the request. he basically provided the defense of further secrecy for the decision making process and links to their website. it is my understanding that

chairman bernanke has now agreed to allow certain committee staff in his office to review some of the material related to aig. some committee staff has reviewed that and will not share it with all committee members and our staff. . all committee members staff. now, i think that's clearly just untennable. completely untennable, as we are asked to vote on this nomination. the staff isn't voting on the nomination. the staff that's gotten to see at least certain documents doesn't have a vote and doesn't have to vote one way or the other. we do. we do. and i believe every member of this committee needs an opportunity to first, at a minimum, see whatever the staff has seen for ourselves with the help of our staff and then be

open to requesting access to additional documents and additional information because, certainly, even the committee staff has not been given access to everything that senator bunning and others have asked for. so, mr. chairman, i would specifically ask that we postpone this vote today and come up with some reasonable bipartisan way to give all members and our immediate banking staff access to, number one, the documents that the committee staff has had access to, and then possibly additional information and documents which we would request coming out of that. again, i think it's just completely untenable that committee staff has seen certain things that the senators on the committee, who are being asked to vote yes or no on the nomination have no access to. and i -- i trust and look

forward to discussing this and hopefully resolving it in a reasonable way before the vote -- any vote on a nomination today. the second broader reason i would like this particular committee vote delayed is that this committee, under your leadership, is looking at major regulatory reform legislation hopefully in a truly bipartisan way and, as lots of different drafts, including your draft released suggest, that discussion involves possibly fundamentally restructuring the role and the responsibility of the federal reserve in terms of the regulatory rejeechl. i think it's really putting the cart before the horse if we're confirming the chairman of the federal reserve before we're deciding the role of the federal reserve. and clearly, that role of the federal reserve is very much up

for discussion and debate in terms of regulatory reform. and i think we need to come to a consensus and hopefully we are moving in a bipartisan way toward that first and understand what the federal reserve is first, or will be first, before we confirm a chairman of the federal reserve. moving on to the chairman himself and this nomination, i have strong concerns that have been expressed by other members. one which has been expressed is that chairman bernanke was simply wrong on many, many different occasions on a number of key points under his authority leading up to the crisis. now, as has been said, nobody's been right throughout this. nobody's been perfect in predicting or resolving these issues. and certainly, i'm not

suggesting we use that standard. but, some of the statements he's made, in terms of issues under his direct authority, really are pretty startling and worry some and i'll just repeat a few of the ones that have been mentioned. july 2008, fannie mae and freddie mac are adequately capitalized and in no danger of failing. june 2008, the risk that the economy has entered a stngs downturn appears to have diminished over the past month or so. may hey 2007, we do not expect significant spillovers from the subprime market to the rest of the economy or to the financial system. and on and on. the second specific reason if have so many concerns about the nomination is what senator hutchison mentioned, which is the whole rollout and presentation of the t.a.r.p. program, which the chairman was clearly a main architect and

advocate of. and how that program was never used as it was sold, never executed as it was sold to the congress from day one. and i have major, major concerns about how t.a.r.p. was first presented to us and then used in several substantially different ways to really become a slush fund for bailouts, too big to fail without -- without end. so, mr. chairman, those are my two big concerns about proceeding today and my two biggest concerns about the actual nomination. i look forward to hearing from our other colleagues and then i look forward to a discussion and some, hopefully, proper resolution of the issues i've brought up before any vote. thank you, mr. mr. chairman.

>> thank you, mr. chairman. i cannot support the confirmation of mr. bernanke and i agree with some of my colleagues. i believe that it is irresponsible for us to proceed with a vote today. this is not a partisan move. we often dismiseach others' opinion here because of partisanship. but mr. bernanke was nominated by a republicanment. i supported mr. bernanke. i have every reason to try to justify that support by trying to find good that he has accomplished. he is from my home state of south carolina and i like him personally. there is no reason for me to oppose his nomination except the failure to achieve the goals at

the federal reserve and his own personal goals for his time in office. we can't overlook the fact that he has presided over one of the biggest economic ka tast if is that we have had as a country. certainly we cannot blame everything that has happened in our country on mr. bernanke. perhaps it has something to do with three years of democratic control of both houses of congress, but we will discuss that at another time. it has to be about performance. to promote employment in our country. there is nowhere we can look to find that he has achieved the goals that we have delegated to

him or his stated goals when he took office. we have expressed many concerns on this committee. many who are supporting him, including the chairman have expressed these concerns. but frankly there has been no commitment to actually make changes to increase accountability or transparency. i have met with mr. bernanke personally because i am one of the ones promoting a general accounting office audit so that members of congress and the american public can at least have a general idea of what this agency is doing. i offered him to come up with his own prescription for what that audit should be so that he could protect the independence of the agency, yet i haven't heard back from him.

that we are required constitutionally to do. because it is our job here in the congress to protect the value of our currency and we dell kated that to the federal reserve. we know that the world is losing confidence in our dollar, our ability to pay our debts, yet we are not hearing any changes from the federal reserve. we need to be clear here, we are not talking about another regulator. we are not talking about another appointment. our economic system rests on our currency. the whole world economy in many ways, rests on that currency. our wealth, our prosperity as a

nation, our savings, everything, rides on what they do at the federal reserve, yet we have very little idea about what hthy are doing. we know their mission has expanded well beyond what congress delegated to them. how can we provide the accou accountability and oversight and how can we find ourselves in a situation where we request documents that we, as a congress, should legitimately have the right to see. we are in a situation today where we know that some of the staff has read part but we don't know what part and we don't know what it says. how can we wave this nomination by when it is such an important.

we ignored it with fannie mae. we were encouraged and assured that it was well capitalized yet we now know they were the primary player in creating these toxic assets and telling them around the world. we now know that loose monetary policy contributed to the creation of the housing bubble and other problems that we had in our economy. yet as we consider the confirmation of mr. bernanke we have not heard from him one commitment to change those policies. one new idea. we have heard some say he has learned from the mistakes. he will be better for it. but folks in the hearing we did not hear mr. bernanke say we will ease the loose monetary policy we have had, there is going be more accountability. we did not hear that yet he agreed he did not reach his

goals. the constitution gives us the responsibility. we have delegated it to him. for us to wave the nomination by. i think we have had mixed respon response. we are told by many that we have been saved by a great depression. that is impossible to prove. had told us that if we did not buy a trillion dollars of these toxic assets that the whole worldwide economy was going

collapse. and we had to do it immediately. how can we say that he saved the economy when we allocated this money but we never bought one of these assets. forcing a lot of banks to take this money who didn't need it, didn't want it and didn't use it. that somehow that has saved oush country. what saved us is a very resilient free market system. mr. chairman and my colleagues, this is far too serious to take as another confirmation. we have yet to get to the bottom of what the problems are and how we're going to change them. we may be on the verge of changing how the fed operates

within the system you, yet we want to move ahead with the nomination as quickly as we can before we consider it. we cannot have a federal reserve that the majority of americans no longer trusts. and that is where we are today. we cannot have a federal reserve that rating agencies are beginning to say that they no longer trust and we are on the verge of losing our good credit rating as the world's reserve currency. we cannot rush through this when the rest of the world is looking at us and now a doubting that we will continue to be the reserve currency. i hope that we can look past our normal partisan bickering and look at this as people who are responsible for the well-being of our own country. millions of people have entrusted us with their economic well-being and they are counting on the value of the dollar to be sound so that their work and their sacrifice over their lifetimes will mean something.

we have seen that explode in front of their face, yet we have not made one change. we have talked about financial regulation, but at the bottom of all of this, what holds it all up, is the federal reserve and are currency itself. we have literally filled to get to the bottom of the problem and we have not heard the chairman said that we are going to make any changes and we are hearing today that, despite the concerns, stay the course. ke any changes and we are hearing today despite the concerns, stay the course. it makes no sense. i think we are irresponsible in moving ahead. let's make a better decision at a later time. i have a whole lot more i would like to say but i don't want to abuse my time or my colleagues so thank you for the opportunity to speak.

>> thank you. i am -- as a new member of this committee, i was not here when this it is extraordinary to me to hear finger pointing and blaming as if one person or one political party is responsibility for the 20 year plus over-leveraging of our economy. somehow to say that this was all down to partisanship is an extraordinary comment.

i think there are no clean hands. i think we do need to get it right. i think working together to try to refocus the fed on its most important aspect, monetary policy, and that we make sure we create a 21st century regulatory system that never ever allows the whole notion of too big to fail. and the implications that allows the americans to take place again. i commend you who are diligent in trying to get that done in a by partisan fashion. looking at this as somebody who spent 20 years around the markets there are a lot of things that you all did and the fed did that were extraordinary. most of them very politically unpopular. but i absolutely believe and

basically every reasonable economist believes that without those actions we could have faced economic ka tast if i. monday morning quarter backing is, i guess, part of the job. i look forward to supporting the chairman in terms of his second term. >> thank you, mr. chairman. are we ready to vote? >> i thought you had comments. >> oh, okay.

that caused us to take a second look at what we do. we need to take a second look at whether we even need a fed. there are a number of people that believe that the fed is a mistake and should not have monetary policy managed outside of the congress. the monetary policy should be tied to some basket of goods whether it is gold or silver or soybeans or i don't know. i think we have to understand that the fed was developed for a very distinct purpose as the result of the nation having been through a time when our currency was set arbitrarily and tied to commodities. when the bank after the united states charter was repealed and

president jackson sent the money back to state banks. until the fed was formed there was no central banking in the item and we went through massive periods of disruption. we were on a tremendous roller coaster relative to the value of currency. then with the fed being created, we went to the gold standard and stayed on the gold standard. that worked for a fair amount of time. except for the fact that we had a great recession.

to have the fed be abolished or significantly influenced in determination of the monetary policy by the congress. we are political people here. you know? we live for the next election. we are moved by the intensity of the moment. maybe not so much in the senate but certainly not in the house. you don't want monetary policy being set by somebody who is living by the intensity of the moment or the politics of the day or the moment or the next election.

you want that independence. i think it is absolutely critical to the strength of our currency and the strength of our economy and it would be a huge mistake if we were to move away from that position. are there things that need to be improved in the fed? absolutely. the strong statements in this area, even a lot of what the house talked about is pretty darn good. but we still need a strong independent fed. this is important moving forward because we are confronting a time when our debt is so large that our capacity to fiscal

policy will be significantly prescribed. and an independent fed will be critical to us as we move through this period of trying to straighten out the debt situation or our nation. on the specifics of chairman bernanke, it is obvious that mistakes were made. monomoved out into congress

needs to take a fair amount of responsibility for this problem. we encourage people to buy homes and set up structure to allow people to buy homes who couldn't afford homes. and we had a banking system which basically abandoned the concept of sound underwriting when it came to lending. obviously there were mistakes made. i don't see them as being the primary drivers of what happened. when i hear the challenge to mr. bernanke, he basically made the mistakes to cause this downturn, i don't accept that and i don't think history will accept it. no analysis will find that was the essence of the problem. how did he react in the middle of the crisis? he pushed the envelope.

significantly. he took their balance sheet from 800 billion up to over $2 trillion. and he used those moneys to float thely k ll lillyl lly liq. this market had -- it would have had a much more who terrific economic event as a result of that. would it be a depression? i don't know. the chairman has already set up the procedures and protocols for

how they will do it and they have been fairly public about it and they made sense. can it be done? i don't know. certainly i hope it can be done. we certainly don't want the inflation if it is not done correctly. that is the issue going forward. i think on that issue that this chairman is out in front, taking leadership and that is the key issue for us as a nation. whether or not we see this economy suffer mass ive ive.

having spent some time over the last couple of days, going back and talking to senator sarbane staff as to how these things have worked in the past. they go to the -- they will not provide them unless the chairman of the ranking member, generally the chairman but it helps to have the ranking member sign on. in this case we did. what they did not understand at the time and i just want to say that i strongly disagree with and that is the idea that staff would have access and any member who wants to back this would not. my point is to those of you who

would be interested, there are rules. otherwise it would become chaotic. the process information is available. those kind of requests can go forward. and we also state the problem that i face here. come january 30th, if we do not complete this process then chairman bernanke cannot serve as chairman. he can be a member, not a chairman. a member of the board. we are under somewhat of a tight schedule as well in terms of how we move this. while i appreciate the concerns of those who disagree with the nomination, it is important having had a confirmation

hearing. i want to go forward with the vote this morning and members will have opportunity over the next month before we come back. we do not come back until the 19th of january. it will be sometime after that, depending upon the leadership scheduling a floor debate on the nomination. there will be plenty of opportunity between now and then. >> i understand your comment to be a commitment to adjourn for the holiday? [laughter] >> we will be sitting around the fireplace in the marble room singing "general mills." -- "the jingle belljing;ele bel"

[laughter] >> i thank all of my members. if anyone wants to be heard on the matter, the record open for a couple of days for people to submit comments on the nomination. i am deeply grateful to all of you for your participation. >> since i was one of the members have brought it up, again, the bottom line and i appreciate that we will have access to documents and i am certainly going to take advantage of it -- again. >> we can go on. there is always a request and i

would go on indefinitely. this committee doesn't have such a rule. >> i would just offer one obvious alternative which doesn't delay the ultimate consideration on the floor one minute as far as i can see, which is simply we schedule a committee hearing for this vote, january 19th, so we can look at the documents before a vote and have discussion among members that could affect votes before and not after. and if we do that january 19th, which is when we are coming back anyway, how does that change anyway what any floor schedule might be. >> i appreciate the recommendation but i will move ahead with the vote. >> can i ask the chairman how that would change the schedule, any schedule on the floor? >> i don't control the floor time.

>> we have to move on. the clerk will call the roll. >> chairman? >> aye. >> mr. johnson? >> aye. >> mr. reid. >> aye. >> aye by proxy. >> mr. me nen dez? >> aye. >> mr. brown? mr. tester? mr. khol? mr. warner. mr. bennett? >> eye >> aye by proxy.

>> mr. bennett? mr. corker? >> aye. >> aye by proxy? >> ms. hutchison?

>> mr. chairman, could i be recorded aye in person? thank you. senator hutchison voted nay. 16 voting yay, 7 voting no, the nomination passed. >> let me thank my colleagues. the committee will report this accordingly and i will let members know when we can talk with leadership about scheduling the vote on the floor. and again the invitation, obviously on these documents and so forth, the members and or staff, i would urge both the

minorities to get in touch with senator açcçcñcçcçcçcñcñcçcñcñc industry? one is >> the u.s. senate continues debate on health care. max baucus of montana is the chairman of the finance committee. they are alternating debate.

according to congressional quarterly, the amendment help democrats secure enough votes to avoid a filibuster. right now, barring an agreement with republicans, the final vote on passing a bill could happen on christmas eve. here's how you can follow the debate. you can watch it live, unedited and commercial free only on c- span 2. you can listen to highlights on c-span radio. go to our health care of on c- span.org. there's a complete video archive. for iphone users, follow the health care debate with the new c-span radio iphone app. now, for more on the health-care debate in the senate, and

afghanistan and the recent copenhagen summit on climate change, this is a discussion from "washington journal." it is about an hour. join by joe law wednesday and thank you to both of you for being with us. talking about the action of the past week in washington and beyond. we saw news out of copenhangen and other things. joe lawrence has a piece today. you write never under estimate the power of a deadlineç6q

>> if anyone is going to be happy, it's not going to be for a very long time. it's almost impossible to satisfy people. ñi i think there's definitely some truth in that. for the republican caucus, the

moment is, step aside and let the democrats run off the and that of the cliff by their way of thinking. if they want to do this and build the latest wall street journal, the poll says that 32% of americans think that it is a good idea. the upside of this legislation takes time to come into being. this is a long process. we are really into 2014 before we see the full implementation of this legislation. by then, you will have had two consequential elections and the republicans have to take this into very vantage.

guest: the preexisting conditions exclusion will disappear for children and grown-ups. there are things that will appeal. in terms of the polling, you can read polls any which way. there are numbers you can cherry pit. for instance, the latest kaiser poll says that 40% of people say it is important for congress to deal with health-care and that they should keep trying. that is a lot more than before appeared >> 54% said that congress should get a bill. that is different from the 32% who say that this bill is not a good idea. >> polling issues is very hard. people have real lives. they don't spend all of their timewaying senate regulation.

this is getting excited if you were able to hold up the longest, people get a again win sense that something is very long. the way that this process has worked has shown all sorts of red flags to the american people. this is plawed legislation that's been created in a happen as ard way. looking at some of the liberal wing of the democratic party. you write about how howard dean has urged democrats to start over. how powerful do you think the counter swell will be?

>> we are starting to see a softening of leg isslation. we know that the senate is the senate if you have a senator that doesn't want to play ball, there's nothing you can do about it. some of these people are having second thoughts about how bad this bill is. there is some concern that you are making people buy insurance and the only entities people can get it from is insurance companies that don't have a very good regulation there's so

much to see if it works. if it doesn't, they can come back. for the left, there has been some heart break in this. in the end, people point out this is about establishing the government's responsibility for healthcare. this says the federal government has a responsibility for healthcare. for the west, i liken it to the bill if americans had a flat tax. i think six months from now, the left is going to say it really isn't what we wanted and we got this one thing

>> there are these concrete things. d%@#e@oáe >> let me just say in the beginning that, if they were proud of this bill, they would not be doing it this way. there would not be jimmy threw in the middle of the night, on the elastic in before christmas. that really sums up what we have seen in full display. they tried to bob and weave and hide from the american people who have made it abundantly clear that they do not support what they know about this bill. as you know, we have an expanded version of it now.

it's important that we are having it read. we have to figure out what's in it. i'm here with a message for the american people this morning democratic leaders sprung a new piece of legislation on the american people that will have a profound i am pact on this nation. this is not renaming a post office. >> clearly the republicans see the process. the deals being traded at the end was a pretty wredged

process. in the end, they got to give away what they wanted. it's a whole change of how we operate. republicans are taking the deep except six about this leg the thought that there was no pain's yaded of this gain. this was nothing. it was interesting to see mitch mcconl to complain about the

christmas even vote. >> the doe lay to this point as democrats try to get their caucus together. they start running a 30 hour clock. fáu$e republicans obstruct, then they are delaying. to this point, this has mostly been three attics. host: i want to get some phones. john on the republican line from florida. caller: i got three different things here. all the sections and stuff, you would have a hard time. they have put people in jail

here if you buy votes. that's what obama has done. they want to destroy our medicare by giving half a trillion dollars to give illegal aliens health insurance. we seniors are going to be dying in the hospital or in our homes. every time you all have somebody say something about the illegals, you cut them off. host: my apologizes. that is not a policy here. guest: in terms of medicare. , the only thing that will be cut is the spending growth.

some of the extras are like gym memberships and eyeglasses in terms of the rest of the question. guest: about buying votes. guest: it's not pretty. it happens on both sides of the aisle. sometimes this is what have you to do to get where you are going. it's possible some of these things will be mitigated over time. like states with special favors will be pulled back or other states will get the same treatment so it won't seem like such a blatant buy.

>> i think senator nelson has done something different by come rhymizing on the question of abortion. it's a difficult question to raise the issue of abortion, politics you raise the issue and you can't walk away from it. the larger issue is that the cuts won't take place.

the idea that somehow congress is going to become budget hawks not likely. for this congress to lob it off on somebody else is the height of the issue. >> there are so many people at the bottom end of the income scale who are not getting care because they are younger. they just don't happen to be old enough for medicare. medicare is a stall water. that's a problem they'll have to face. host: nashville on the democrat line. caller: good morning.

the republicans plan scare tactics and are big liars, and under no circumstances do they want to support the healthcare the second comment. i keep hearing everyone speak of that 32% of americans don't want this healthcare. i have never been polled in my life. how can they say that i know people are not being polled. i know just like yesterday,

they had to send the clerk you note bill for seven hours that was delaying the time from the democrats. it's all about breaking barack obama. they do not want him to have a victory. they want him to fail because he is a black man because they figure if he fails as a black man, there will never again be an opportunity for another black person to be?÷ the president of the united states. host: let's get a response from our guest. guest: i think republicans do object. they don't like this legislation. this isn't some bill where you say, i agree in principal but i have minute objections. this is a make or break

question whether or not federal government is involved in healthcare is the issue. healthcare isn't something they talk about. they don't have people they can set up on healthcare and say this is our guy on healthcare in terms of a policy, they have lost messaging points because they haven't had people who can say this is how we think it should work. that was the first time really a republican candidate talked about healthcare.

separating them from employment. it didn't work for him. he brutalized john mccain on that issue. the message to republicans. don't talk about healthcare. talk about taxes. guest: i don't think this has anything to do with president obama being a black president. to republicans, elections have consequences. people voted for this guy. he proposed this during the came pain. i understand why they are putting up a huge battle but they are going to lose. host: looking at some other news of the week. copenhangen. what are your impressions of what happened there. we saw the deal breaker going on at the end climate change con frention.

a lot of other countries are saying not much really has moved forward. contributing money hoping emissions would stop their development to the senate which has yet to pass a climate change bill. there does seem to be some hope. it gets the signal to the world that we are becoming active on this.

>> i think it was a perfect obama solution. a lot of talk, some artificial drama. walk away. nothing is that different. people feel better. there'sçó5.br dpt+tñi photoñr the pressure comesñ- senate. it's not on the senate on this. you couldn't pass a cap and trade bill through this senate in 2010. 2011, we'll see what happens in the election. in a recession with a bad political climate, that's a non-starter. host: let's look at comments president obama made yesterday about copenhangen. >> i want to briefly mentioned comments we made yesterday. all of the world's major economy accept their action.

this breakthrough lays the foundation in years to come. guest: i would make two points. there are some republicans working on this. whatever happens, if anything happens, it is going to have people from both parties. the obama administration is

proceeding with regulating carbon emissions. this is supposed to be another spurt in the senate. but there are things he can do. guest: i would point out that the first and strongest thing to the president about not entering anything into thintoat copenhage early on. the problem with the president's plan, which is not a bad plan, for the senate to take action, is that the litigation on this will take years. it will last longer than the president's first term. . this will take years.

now subject to greater except six than ever. >> i wanted to get back to the medical decision. caller: isn't it true that this is phase two? is phase two? phase one happened in the recovery investment act. signed into law that they intend on obtaining every person's medical records in fact that grants have already been put out for to force them on the system.

the only way they can make sure of the funding is to pass. they can go through these. for obtaining these, the doctor actually said -- he's one of these harvard professor, said the best way to get nationalized healthcare is through medical records. his plan was first you have to get medical records and the sharing.

they changed the use. meaningful use. in its on health it .g everyone v. you will see the number of boards over our medical records. now they need our insurance to force the people to live the style that they need to bring the cost down so supposedly we live healthier. it's all government run. >> in fact, yes. obviously, this creates a

different relationship and anter action between the federal government. we are talking about one of the things thattk created such an uproar was wornte doctors would be obligated to say that people seemed emotionally unstable that they should own a gun. they have created these shock waves this is an either or question. >> good morning.

we need to get rid of the republicans and democrats on both sides. put good citizens in there where in the constitution do they have the right to make this? why this insurance? they don't. this cap and tax and healthcare are both front loaded. i just saw on the news that china stated that the american dollars could fall. we owe them $2.3 trillion. they said the united states is not going to be able force

these bonds. all this stuff going on is going to wake up. >> we'll leave it there. >> i would say the country elected barack obama. he's saying exactly what he said he would do. the hole is to out perform them pride and incentives to move in the direction of new energy a whole new energy. china is way ahead on all that. the industry is much higher than ours.

the plan and the facility in illinois getting a lot of response this week i have us your impressions. one of the things the president is doing to keep a liberal base in check is the qut know issue there have been several issues left over. bad filings in the area. the war still fighting. 100,000 troops. the healthcare bill, they don't get government insurance option.

but guantanamo, they can close and bring the prisoners to the united states. the problem for the president is that to americans, they think it's a bad idea. they think if you have these badies somewhere, keep them there. it does appeal to the left for the people in illinois, it's an economic development.

they have this huge prison sitting there. it is isolated, secure. it already has dangerous prisoners in it. it seems like the best way of dealing with something he's going to have to deal with.xd it's amazing that citizens would think they are going to detour on other people's soil that we cannot keep them on ours. other countries are less than us so is that we can keep those folks from. that's my first point. ñi

with regards to the copen haguing and what chris called the age of obama. the republicans are more like parents that do preventive spanking where as the democrats use the naughty chair. >> exactly. that's quite right. i think the president does think things take a longer time. the president is willing to engage in this long-term diplomacy.

it's good to think in those terms. the premier of china doesn't face those concerns. president obama does. if his party gets a preventative spanking in 2010, he's not going to be able to act out on these long term things he talks about going from shok to transas gas prices go up and down this is probably good for the country. i'm not sure it is good for the. >> i'm 72 years old and i'm one

of those who haveñr paid into medicare all my life and now i'm going to loose it. are you still there? >> i sure am. i'm listening to you. >> we get the first flight of that when they tried to change the mammogram thing with the younger women. why would you take that away? >> if you put in what you have 4sqjyrññi it is all in place. by the time it gets to court to say hey, it's unconstitutional but we have all the funding in place. we have the agency set up. we are going to go back and tax it forward with public option.

host: let's get açó response fr jill lawrence. guest: you are required to buy automobile insurance in those states. it might surprise people to realize that people insisting on the mandate are insurance companies they want the additional customers it's going to make it possible for them to abide by a new regulation where they won't have to exclude the chronic regulabáit will all be spread out among a different group of people some of whom are younger and more healthy this is an insurance company to schmidt to the regulation for 35 million, it's well worth the exchange you are not goes to

loose medicare. it's a trade off. on the question of constitution nalt an enumerated power. states do require you to carry insurance. this will, however be the very first time in american history that we have said that the federal government thast has obligated you under penalty of law to pump a product. that's a huge change. i don't think we should under estimate the federal government acting as an insurance agent for the american health insurance agency that could come along and say you must buy

this product. it is something that's never happened before. it's unlikely the courts want something in place is going to ter it down once it has@@$"a,$á our next caller is calling from florida. mary is on republicans line. caller: i am on medicare. they get rid of my advantage plan, who is going to pay the 20% out of pocket? i mean, to finish paying it off. plus the fact, if it passes and they collect all this money, is it going to be there when it goes in effect, or is it going to be like so security?

>> it has been expensive. something expensive. we should remember. estimates vary for how much medicare is in debt because the numbers are so huge. we know it is 10s of trillions of dollars that medicare is under funded. it doesn't have the money. part of the fiscal nightmare in washington. the baby boomers are getting ready to start turning 65. it's a fiscal storm that will make this blizzard look small scale. >> i should point out that

taxpayers are paying for medicare advantage i think it was florida, pennsylvania and michigan. so those plans are not going to disappear at least right now. guest: yemin is sort of the back water of the peninsula. it's a neighbor to saudi that has struggled to have a functioning government.

we have 47% or 47% of all detainees in guantanamo are solving the problem is significant one. if they really expect to close, having a functional government. >> when americans hear stories like that? >> i don't know americans think we should get involved with trying to stabilize yet another

government. they are not too happeny it's a question without answer. people could revise their terrorism. not going to play well. we are committing new resources this. >> another caller from florida on the democrat line.r jim, are you with us?

>> i'm calling about the healthcare issue and wondered why nobody every shows on any television program a clip of 1965 when the republicans were fighting this issue in the same way in medicare and just seeing the comments on people. i haven't talked to one person who doesn't like medicare. a lot of the problem is coming from issues like no taxation coming back from all of our exportering to china. no one takes the time to investigate any of it. scows me.

there is so much time back and forth focusing on the history which couldn't redicts. they've been fighting the attempts on growth it's considering more than we can afford at this point. it's been noted but probably in all the noise maybe not enough

or people haven't noticed it. >> the medicare cuts has been big on all of this. in 1965, republicans were opposed to it. once something becomes imbeded in the record of entitlements, it is not pried out. the reason is that democrats in talking about making medicare better is too rich a target. it's such a juicey plum. it's impossible for any politician to look back at it. the other thing is that when you make it part of this whole lash up where we are going to cut medicare and grow other health insurance, you are taking away from me to give to

someone else. when we sold medicare in 1965. it was sold as you earned this. you worked hard and we are paying our debt to you. now it is you are just one of millions entitled to healthcare just for being alive. host: lee on the ind line. caller: thank you. i'd like to refer to your female guest there and remind her while you may be in most states mandated to have insurance, you are not mandated to own a car. which begs the constitution nam question again. there's no way this would pass

any constitutional case in court. i am a disabled man. i am go tong medicare in march. that makes things great for me. as 209 caller before that said something about what the republicans were doing in the 1950's and 1960's concerning medicare. >> it's worry some that they all worried. i point out that massachusetts has a mandate to buy insurance. i'm not sure there are any

challenges but so far the plan of this mandate. one of the reasons why this is so bignd complicated. you can't do one thing without doing something else. if you have insurance company abuses you want to fix, you can fix them but then you have insurance companies saying that helps sfare the risk. many people wouldn't be able to afford that. it then leads to how are we going to raise this money. it's one thing after another. that's why it is so big and so hard to under and why republicans are trying to do let's do one thing at a time and democrats are saying no. you could fix medicare.

but, if you don't have a trade off on the other side as we have seen, if you don't have a sweetener on the other side to say we have cut medicare spending but -- keep your team together. med i care is getting a lot of benefits too. they are going toñr have preventative square and won't have to pay anything for it. the doughnut hole on pry scrippings drugs. the aarp like this is bill. >> the aarp is is in a very interesting situation right now. they made a big shift to back a democratic plan that i can't imagine if you were to take a poll of their members would cut

the medicare spending. they would become a key lobbying group on all of this. the aarp has found itself in a comprimised position and lost a lot of members. you get the drug companies and health insurance on board. then really what you are doing is laying the wait on until you can findly get it through in the end. host: susan on the republican line florida. caller: i'm a senior. i'm concerned about the healthcare bill and i'm concerned with the way the congress is acting and the people who have to vote without reading the bill. i don't like it that ben nelson and the another senator from .

i don't like how the two sflarts had to be bribed for their vote. we have to find the money. the last issue is the abortion issue. i have to tell you, i don't know what is going on with it. i am willing i am willing to go to jail. that's how i feel about it. that's how a lot of americans feel about it. this country is fired up about

it. people are disgusted with washington and other parties. it's something we kind of saw in 1972 where people said we are sick and tired. we are revisiting with tremendous furor. people on the left are angry because they have not gotten everything they want from the president. that will fade over time. people who are getting engaged in this process for the first time are mad at how washington time are mad at how washington works. in terms of protest, you could not have found people more upset than democrats, liberals, about the iraq war, which their tax dollars going to fund.

it is just part of the price of living in democracy. sometimes your money is going to be used for things you do not want it to be used for. host: roseanne is calling us from nashville. >> mitch mcconnell is deadlocked. he does not speak for the majority of americans. the health care it is delivering the appropriate law of coal to the senator's right on time for christmas. it is the perfect gift for them and it is long overdue. the abortion issue is really about control. they cannot themselves give birth, so they have to control women's wombs. we still have separation of church and state in the united states, and roe vs. wade is still standing as law.

number three, i would really like to encourage every american to go to google right now and i've been trans afghanistan pipeline, which will not be finished until 2010. every dollar that is used as a dollar that is lost to for health care. we are sending our sons and daughters of to be killed to finish a pipeline. we do not need to be invading other countries to obtain their resources. thank you very much for taking my call. bortion as i said before with senator nelson, this is not an issue that invites come rhymize. it invites strong, hard feelings. i think senator nelson has taken a risk on invoking the issue and then traded away on it. senator leeberman is going to

take heat. he campaigned with john mccain for president. his attitude is -- what are you going to do to me. on the question of abortion with senator nelson. this strikes me as something out of the norm to raise abortion as an issue and then drop it. that's something i think he'll probably pay a price for. >> i've been impressed with the creativity people have shown. first the opt out for the public option and now for theñf abortion issue. he comprimised. it's true. they strengthen the fire wall between federal money and private money on premium payments. they do everything they request to make sure no federal money is going to abortion. states are different. you can't say that the faff

rite republican argument is that one size does not fit all. for this case, that's completely true. new york and california will probably never outlaw abortion or abortion coverage. to my mind, it's the best that could be done. i think it will probably peel off, it has probably divided proponents of abortion to the fact that it will get to the house where it is good enough. host: john on the ind line. caller: just -- the whole thing of being forced to buy insurance from a united states government. this is totally out rage youse. i was raising this issue six

weeks ago. i know what you are going to do. you are going to take this bill and shove it down our throat. i was for a single payer which was never represented at the table in this discussion. $84 billion on the interest alone on the money that's being collected for premiums. this was never on the table. this is a ridiculous bill and way to solve this problem. i hope both parties get thrown out of this congress in the next election. i'm not voting for another democrat or representative on this. host: do you get the sense that after the holidays we still have more healthcare work to be worked on. do you have the feeling that passions on all side also slow

down a little bit? ? ? some kind of trigger. let's have a trigger based on data. people still are not getting covered, premiums are still going up too much, etc.. i think there may be a last stand to come. no one wants to think about it right now.

i think christmas will do everyone some good. guest: you can tell when the speaker left for copenhagen, she was angry. in terms of filling the parties mandates, upholding the platform, getting the job done, she had marched her people off, passing and popular bills in some districts that will jeopardize her position potentially next year. i think she will remain as speaker, but will have a different caucus, but she enforced it and did a terrific job of being speaker of the house. in terms of this one year. now there are risks down the line, but she got the job done. i think she looks over pennsylvania avenue çand sayinç this is the best i can qçdo, w

can deliver this to my caucus, and i believe once they get in the conference, the speaker will have her pound of flesh. >> the u.s. senate is still working this afternoon on health care legislation. right now it is live on c-span2. on your screen is senator jon kyl of arizona who is the republican whip. republicans and democrats are alternating debates. the next vote is scheduled for 1:00 a.m. eastern, early monday morning. according to congressional quarterly, it was that a minute that help democrats secure enough votes to avoid a filibuster. right now, barring an agreement

with robins, the final vote on passing the bill could happen on christmas eve. here is taken all the debate. you can watch it live on c- span2 an edited and commercial free. you can listen to highlights on c-span radio. go to our health care ohub with live streaming video from the senate floor, a complete archive, briefings from leadership and other key senators, and the latest from the reporters and editors fromcq and roll call. there is a new free iphone app. coming up in a little less than a half-hour on "newsmakers," center kent conrad talks about the national debt and his proposal to create a national

commission to make recommendations to congress. that is today at 6:00 p.m. eastern here on c-span. >> c-span christmas day, a look ahead to 2010 politics, including republican congressman eric cantor, david gregory, buzz aldrin, and nasa astronauts. laced -- letter, a former c.i.a. intelligence officer on former -- on strategy against al qaedaf abraham lincoln, great american historians on our 16th president. from lincoln's earliest years to his life in the white house and his relevance today. in hardcover at your favorite

bookseller, and now and digital audio, available were digital audio downloads are sold. learn more at c-span.org /lincolnbook. >> they will come up alongside. we will take whatever security measures we have to take to get in.

>> the last thing they have to do, they have to make sure that when they leave the aircraft, they get all the weapons and ammunition out of the aircraft after the people are out. we don't want to leave anything behind for the enemy. >> did you want to be in here? >> no, i am going to walk from here. we want to come in from behind the aircraft. [unintelligible] >> you come up the side.

>> you might have to climb up there to get it loose. there you go. start the process. >> the afghan military is still pretty small, even eight years into this war. there are like 80,000 afghan soldiers. it is like a couple hundred thousand guys, most of them grounds of this, but in the interest of building up a self sustaining, self supporting afghan military, nato has encouraging the development of an air force. in afghanistan, most of the time

you want to deliver things by air, so you try to support your afghan army battalion hundreds of miles from some population center. they need helicopters to bring them their supplies, and they will not always be able to rely on u.s. and nato helicopters. they have to be able to do this on their own. so they have cobble together a team of helicopter pilots and experts and maintainers and it -- administrative officers to try to help grow and afghan helicopter force. there are two wings, one in kabul in the north and one in canada are in the south. -- one in kandahar in this out. they are trying to grow and air force from the ground up. but they either by them with u.s. money or the afghans have bought them themselves. you try to recruit some old afghan pilots who were probably

trained by the russians 20 years ago, bring them back in, get the summer fresher training, and then try to get them working by a u.s. model of air power, where they are serving the ground troops. they have a process for calling in and making a request to deliver some water. all that may seem simple in theory, but in working practiced every day is really complicated. the americans just work hand-in- hand with the afghans and try to show them, this is how we do things in the u.s. air force. you can do it like us, and you will be able to supply your own troops. there is an afghan infantry battalion and need some water, so the americans help process the request, and they get on the helicopter with the afghans and fly with them. every step along the way, taking off, flying, landing, offloading, reloading things, the americans just field advice.

you could do it better if you did it this way. i recommend at this point you use your map. they did not like to fly by map, they like to use their eyes. how about trying gps in this particular valley? it is all these little things, little tidbits of advice to the afghans. and just do that day in and day out and hope they will pick up on that and do it on their own.

[gunfire]

>> it got much better toward the end of the flight. for the beginning, a think the problem, you are angling a little too far to the left. always remember to return to your position.

[speaking foreign language] >> always remember when you are taking up power, to use your pedals. i think it just requires a little more than what your doing. >> i work with the 438, the air mentoring group here in afghanistan. we discussed and pleaded a flight that took about 50

minutes. -- just completed a flight. we did some maneuvering and test fired the weapons. we also did some high level flight, so we did some climbing and descending. finally we came in here and got to work on some radios and as well as some turning approaches into the wind. will pick up some cargo and basically do the whole thing in reverse back to kandahar. >> what is the biggest lesson you try to impart to your mentees? >> good question. i would say the biggest lesson is being conservative but also thinking outside the training that we have. right now, they have all been trained in the russian style, in the sense that this is the way that you will do this, so you will always do it this way.

we are getting them to think about maybe trying a different type of approach or 4 formation. but at the same time, if you are going to do something different, realize that you also need to be safe and doing it.

>> tell me about the language barrier. how does that affect the pilot mentoring? >> it slows it down. it makes it a lot more difficult even to get across some of the simple concepts. as far as technical terms and aviation and getting those translated properly and getting them across in a timely manner, especially when you were in flight trying to do it, is a huge challenge. i tried to learn a little bit of their language in order to take away some of that stress and confusion, but when you are trying to deal with some more complicated processes in technical terms on the aircraft, flying terms, we are not talking the same language. because they have not large enough english, we have to rely on interpreters, even during the

flight and after the flight. it makes things take about three times as long, getting things across. we also have to break it down into the basic level of the terms, just so that the interpreter knows what your saying so he can try to explain it. even then, you really don't know if they understood exactly what you said, because you have to trust that the interpreter says the right thing. it just brings a whole new dynamic to the training process. it is difficult to gauge how effective you are immediately. it just takes time after time of doing similar things to figure out whether there really grasp what you said. >> we have 15 u.s. mentor's here that are experts in each of their fields.

that team is working with the newest wing here at the airfield with the maintenance technicians thito maintain the aircraft. we are dealing with maintainers we are dealing with maintainers =ñthat sometimes 40 andno carri0 challenges, getting a team of people that can perform the required level of maintenance that needs to be accomplished. we still depend on kabul, the other wing it to provide specialists when we are short on the team that we have ourselves. we focus on may6, on the

foundational principles -- we focus on maintenance. it is quite a challenge. by culture, they rely on just what they have learned through their training and not referring to a book, because they feel like that is weakness. they need to remember what it is they have learned. we have a challenge because of that cultural issue and trying to overcome that. it is a significant challenge, but we are working with themñr over the last month, the 40 maintainers theithat are here, working with each one. we are focusing on the maintenance basics and things that will allow them to assist the operations when we leave. >> the organization seems to exist in a complex bureaucracy,

where you have the afghan military, nato, and the u.s., and not always talking clearly to each other. is it a challenge being stuck in the middle of these organizations? >> a good example of that is, about a month @eo, we had a large bit of coordination with many different nations to move into a new hangar where operating out of. we had to deal with the czech ñrmentors, in dealing with them and trying to move the hangar with slovakia and guards and the bulgarians, and combined with that we had the afghans that we are dealing with, just to make that whole effort work. ñrfor all the support agencies, there are a lot of different agencies we have to deal with. specifically, since we are a new

wing here, there are still some challenges with some battles of will with the established organization of been kabul and this new organization here. some of the afghans really do not want to comeñi notkandahar. there are some issues with this being a new wing. ñithey are connected to their families and want to live where their family is located. we have some challenges dealing with them in that regard with their families, and actually getting people to come here and worked as a challenge at times. just the way that they deal with the daily operations, sometimes it may take them to work three daysçó to talk throuh a maintenance discrepancy and repair actions they expect that will take. the planning process, in the states we would do that same three day process within four or

five hours. we would determine very quickly what parts we need, what skill level sweeney, and how can we uçmk expeditiously -- what skill levels do we need. takes them a lot longer, so there is a lot of patients we have to show, and the frustration level that comes out, i usually get with my team quite frequently and let them know, that we suspect the afghans to be able to perform as we do. the small things that we do back home, sometimes we overlook that allow us to do things as effectively as we do, to get that training and have the ability to generate things that we do.

we have to be patient and just continue to focus on small, incremental improvements, basically a sustained effort over time, and they will get it. >> it is attitude among afghan security forces, the ability -- the inability to see more than a couple of days in the future. it isn't lack of foresight and planning. it is a cultural thing. when life is as hard as it is, you do not look too far into the future. getting the afghan security çóforces planned for enough in advance to move things around and deliver things, keep the aircraft line, all this is really complicated.

it requires planning, and is very hard to do. >> freelance video journalist david axe was embedded with the u.s. air force in october and november. it was his second trip to afghanistan. to watch this program again or other programs produced with this material, you can go to our website, c-span.org in the search box in the upper right- hand corner, type "axe". >> the u.s. senate continues its work this afternoon on health care, now in its 17th day of debate. it is live on c-span2. senator chuck grassley is the ranking republican on the finance committee. republicans and democrats are alternating debate time in one hour blocks until about 11:30 p.m. tonight. the next scheduled vote is at 1:00 a.m. eastern, early monday morning, on the majority