jeopardy today because the united states of america through its leaders have made a mistake. made a big mistake. we have decided to give our people more than we can afford to pay for. i regret telling you, that is another way of telling you how our problem became a reality. we've come to the conclusion that we cannot pay for this debt through growth alone, and we will start with that and dispose of that rather early in our deliberations because the numbers do not add up. you cannot say we're just going to change taxes. it will not work. and last observation is to say everything is on the table. if you are not yet a member, we have two or three vacancies we want to fill. . .

i want to be on this is an american citizen. i hope you think that we can. we're willing to walk -- answer questions after my good friend, dr. alice, speaks. i want to say to the board and task force members, we have -- is wonderful the to found time to come. we will have a meeting. it is my privilege to introduce

my partner in this effort, dr. alice -- dr. alice rivlin. [applause] >> i share it senator pete obvious fervor. i think the biggest threat to to the united states economy as we look ahead is this trajectory that we are on, this unsustainable trajectory of rising debt. i also think the greatest threat to our political system is the strident partisanship which has developed in the last few years, both parties thinking they had the only answer, and less and less communication between them. so we are here to do our bit to bring people from both sides of

the spectrum together to face this issue. we do not have any illusions that it is easy. if it was easy, it would have been done all long time ago. the problems to be solved are very difficult and will cause real pain, raising taxes causes real pain, cutting spending, especially in time -- and talk -- entitlement benefits, will cause real pain. it is nothing to what would happen if we pretend that we can go on this trajectory. we actually cannot. the top end of that line is just silly. we could not borrow that much money. no one would lend it to us. the interest rates we would have to pay would sink our economy and mean that we're putting most of our tax dollars into debt service.

why am i confident that we might succeed in this endeavor? it is partly because actually if you look at what needs to be changed, rather small changes in the number of things -- spending programs, tax programs -- they stand over time can solve this problem -- phased in over time can solve this problem. this is not unique to us. we have an aging population and the rising cost of medical care. our medical commitments and our pension commitments will grow faster than the economy and faster than taxes at any feasible rate of taxation. we have to do something about this, but the japanese have a worse problem.

they are raging faster than we are. the europeans are aging faster than we are, and many of them have taken drastic steps. we have not had to face this problem because we were lucky. we could borrow in the world's currencies. people were willing to lend to a seeming less -- when to us seemingly without limit. but we have reached the limit and i am hopeful that the deliberations that this group will engage and over the next few months, while not easy, will lead us to a package of changes in policy that will not be perfect. not everybody will agree with all of it. but actually illustrate that the problem can be solved. and dad, i think, is the main hope of this group. there have been other groups,

some of which -- on which so we will build. one shows alternative paths to a sustainable but did. i was a member of another group sponsored by the pew foundation recently that advocated stabilizing the debt at 60% of gdp. we did not say how to do it, though. this group is going to say, here is an illustration that it can be done. and i think that is our main function. if we can illustrate this problem -- it is not insoluble. real changes that will not sink anybody can be put together and we can come out the other side with a much stronger economy. now we're going to take questions.

will you please identify yourself? >> andy sullivan with reuters news. they're similar proposals on the hill right now and the white house is looking at putting together a task force. both of those efforts plan to put out a report by the end of the year. the levy time frame when you would do it, and is there any guarantee that these recommendations that you come up with, they will actually be acted on? thank you. >> yes, we have a timeframe. we want our report by the end of this year, sometime in that window. it is not clear what will happen to these various commissions that are being discussed.

if an official commission moves ahead, we will be very happy to be the stalking horse, one group that illustrates that their work can be done. if it does not happen, we will do it anyway. that is where we are. >> i would like to say one other thing that i did not say. you know, i believe that we're going ask the american people to sacrifice. we do not ask them that very often. we do not ask our leaders to ask the american people to sacrifice. that is because if we do not, we are going to lose that which we love dearly. we're going to lose the strength of america, the future of america. so sacrifice will be built into this. it will not be an easy one. we will offer our budget to

leaders of like mind and what purpose. if they are moving ahead with something, we're going to show them what our people think as we went through it. we feel it is going to be worthwhile. who was going to handle that? the head. >> i am with eir. i wanted ask you about the approach of the organizer of your project, peter peterson. cissy was part of the team -- since he was part of the team under nixon that broke up the fdr system, and many got a speculative fortune, he has advocated -- >> he is not part of this project. >> he has advocated this as a way to prop up the speculation. how does he fit into your commission? everybody here is part of that.

he is on the coalition sponsored by that. both of you are. >> to my knowledge, i am not part of it. that does not make any difference. some people were with him on month ago and they left their organizations and were hired by hours. mr. peterson has an agenda. he thinks it is a worthwhile agenda. he is not part of our plans for the future. we think he is a good citizen and we do not know what specific things he has done that we are for or against. it seems like some of the things that you could go, -- that you know, you could share with our group as we meet. next question. right behind you, ma'am. >> i'm from politics daily.

i am wondering what you think about the health-care bill, the senate health care bill, and should it be passed as a way to help resolve the deficit, lessen the deficit, or is this counter- productive in your view? >> i will go first. it is not going to matter anyway. [laughter] from my standpoint, i thought the bill that was contemplated by the house and senate, that both of them failed to restrain growth in government. i think that that should have been set aside and waited until we had a budget put together. that is how i feel. we're going have to look at health care in our budget to see how we can attempt to recommend saving money, because that is the issue. if you're going to try to bend

the curb, they all say, i do not think the bills did that. but that is a debate for another time. >> we do differ on that. i hope and still hope that the houses going to put something together are round and health care bill. the bill is being contemplated, it would not add to the long- term deficit, and slightly ameliorate it. but it is not really an important part of the long run future problem. >> thank you. wtop, good to see you again, senator dementia. what enforcement mechanism -- what makes us think that this is going to be -- is it going to be moral suasion, persuading people?

congress is talking about an upper down vote by congress? what makes this thing work? >> first of all, i think we have about as powerful a commission as you can put to take up this issue and coming out with something that can be done. i think just getting it done is an accomplishment worthwhile. it will then be pushed through any groups, any powerful groups, any legislative groups doing something like this -- we will push our approach on them into any technical matter. which one was done as a study and adopted? 9/11. there were good ideas, great ideas. we're going to put hours before

them. if we do not have one that we can meld hours with, we will put ours there. >> "usa today." many of us are old enough to remember the deficit reduction deals in the 1990's that the congress did in conjunction with the white house. what is different today that you cannot count on the congress and the white house to do it themselves, and therefore you have to assemble a lot of former members? >> i think what is different is that we have lost the bipartisan consensus that it must be done and that it can be done. we have that at the end of the 1980's. people were really worried about deficits, which now were not all that big. there was a bipartisan consensus reflected in the budget

enforcement act of 1990 which was worked out by the president and congress of opposite parties. it put in place the budget tolls, pay go, and the other roles, caps on discretionary spending, that carried us through to balance the budgets worked out by the clinton administration and most of the time by republican congress, and carrying us through to substantial surpluses. we of loss that bipartisan consensus that it can be done -- we have lost that bipartisan consensus that it can be done and must be done. >> i think it is obvious that the debt is bad enough that it ought to have been addressed by congress by now. it should not be on the back burner but addressed now. it is not. i am not there so i do not know

why, but i do believe we have to start as a citizen group and we have to put it together and say that it can be done, and to do it bipartisan. i think maybe we will rekindle something among the leaders, that they have to get on with this. frankly i don't think we can go through another full legislative session and not do something significant about the deficit. it does not mean that we will go down the tubes in that period but we have got to have some indication to the world that we're going to start doing something about this. and not have our interest rates go through the sky. we're going to take this to my right here. ok, let's go. >> bloomberg radio. in the reagan years, they put out potential budget cuts, tax

increases, along with multi page documents. is it your realistic goal that you can come up with a combination that will be politically palatable? what happens at the political calculus changes in november? and what happened to "don't let the government put its hands on my medicare tax code -- medicare?" >> we are hoping to point out that that crisis is sufficiently imminent so that we have to move ahead, and we think that is likely to be persuasive. it is not that the leadership of the congress and the administration do not know about

this problem. it is not that they do not know what some of the options are. but so far partisanship has prevailed, and we hope we can turn that around. >> i think it is obvious that the leadership in both houses know the problems are big and know it is bad. if we can just add to the trepidation, to the fear that this is something really big, and we'd better think big an act big and try to pull ourselves together so that we can politically we're doing something we would not otherwise do, we cannot do that if we're not addressing the problem in that way. one more. >> "new york times", senator dementia. one of the biggest things --

senator demomenciici. could you explain why you think that taxes have to be on the table? senator mitch mcconnell said the he would accept a cut spending commission but not one that had taxes on the table. >> i have told you in a lengthy conference, which i appreciate, and early story debt we talked about, thank you, it is clear to this senator that the problem is so big that you can measure the amount of deficit reduction. if you wanted to be bipartisan,

since it is an american dead. it does not belong to the republicans or the democrats, but americans, incurred by americans for americans. you want that, you've got to put entitlements on the table, and if you do, you have to put taxes on the table. i am sorry that the republicans -- some republicans think otherwise. but i do not believe, i was there a long time, i do not think you can do spending alone and then later come back and bill and what you did not do. it's got to be a package. to my way of thinking, if you have got to have taxes on the table so you can look at it and see how it fits. >> i think that is the answer. and this spending commission, it existed, would not have gotten the support of democrats. you have to have both pieces on the table. >> there is one more.

>> [inaudible] >> how was the head a task force on the clinton tax bill, a lot to do with the prosperity that we enjoyed for the next few years. this is not about non- partisanship. we did not get one republican vote on this. a large part of the democrats who voted for it lost their seats. how are you going to do with this? i want to help. when you start talking about nonpartisanship, i have not seen anything that indicates to me that it is going to work. >> i have not seen anything that

tells me we can fix the budget -- fix this problem right here. i have not seen anything that says that we can fix this and leave taxes off the table. if there is -- i have not seen that there is enough growth possible. we pray to god that we get back on the growth side, but you cannot get enough growth to take care of this problem. so what are you going to do? are you going to leave it had solved? i do not think so. -- are you going to leave it half salt? i do not think so. we will surely bring people on board. >> the american people have not been inconvenienced over the years. if you can inconvenience them and not -- them in now, than

their elected representatives will do something about them. >> the danger is that if this goes on the way it is projected to go, we may not just an inconvenience. we may have disaster. it would be good if the american people showed that they were sufficiently aware of this impending disaster, that they could take steps before it happened. thank you. >> thank you, everybody. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] >> february marks and one year since the economic stimulus was signed in the law. congress approved $787 billion. not all the money has been committed yet. the amounts of project approved in a record last week. there was a $14 billion approval

over the previous week. to find out more, go to c- span.org/stimulus. tonight, corn smith talking about efforts by the fcc for more broadband spectrum and what it may mean for broadcasters. "the communicator's" tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span2. >> wednesday, president obama delivered his first date of the union address to congress, laying out the future of the country and his issues of unemployment and the wars in iraq and afghanistan. the state of the union address, wednesday night. our coverage starts at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span for you can also listen to the address live on your iphone with the c-span radio app. >> in this c-span -- in the

nation's capital and across the country, listen to c-span radio in washington on 90.1 fm, 1 xm satellite radio. c-span radio, covering washington like no other. >> of reaping now on counterterrorism efforts in yemen. secretary clinton will be meeting with arab leaders. daniel benjamin speaks with reporters, followed by a spokesman p.j. crowley. this is about 45 minutes. >> good afternoon and welcome to the department of state. this week secretary clinton will travel to london. she will leave tomorrow night and will participate on wednesday in an international meeting on yemen, and then thursday at the international conference on afghanistan. but i thought to kind of put our

current relationship with yemen into context and the ongoing efforts to work with yemen on security, we thought it would be a good time to bring to the briefing room ambassador at large and coordinator for counter-terrorism here at the state department dan benjamin, just to get a little background on this. and i am sure you might have some questions on activities over the weekend as well. so with that, we will start off with dan benjamin. >> thanks very much, p.j. i will be brief. there is been a great deal of discussion about yemen since december 25. the secretary will be discussing yemen all along with leaders from 21 other countries later this week at that conference in london. obviously she views this as being an enormously important matter and is missing the state of the union for that reason.

there was a lot of yemen-related activity last week. assistant secretary jeff feltman and i both testified on matters in yemen. in fact i testified multiple times. the yemeni foreign minister was here last week and had a very good meeting with the secretary. i think it is important to underscore a few points about what is going on in our relationship with yemen. first of all, it is very much a two-prong strategy we have. there has been a lot of attention paid to the work we are doing with the yemeni government to increase its ability to take care of its own security threats and to take on, in particular, al qaeda in the arabian peninsula. that is vitally important. but we also know that if we are going to have a sustainable long-term engagement with yemen, if we are going to deal with the threats that it faces and that we face as well, it is going to require a sustained engagement to deal with that country's very

serious economic problems, particularly the depletion of natural resources. it has got serious demographic challenges -- water, a depleting water table, and also its governance problems and social issues. and so our assistance is very much aimed at doing that as well. we can talk about it a little more in detail if you like. i should say that we are very pleased by the strong stance that president saw looked -- salih and his government have taken in terms of confronting al qaeda, particularly since december 17, operations that have continued through until this month but i should also note that this is not -- it may appear on the surface to be a suddenly new involvement in things yemeni for the united states. but in fact, this administration

has been engaged on yemen really since the very beginning. the new administration came in and recognized early on that al qaeda in the arabian peninsula was gaining strength and was going to pose a significant terrorist threat and ordered up a comprehensive policy review to ensure that we were using all the tools at our power to deal with the terrorist threat there. that review was completed in the fall. we have been talking to the yemenis consistently. as you know, deputy national security advisor john brennan has visited twice and has been a regular interlocutor with the leadership there. general petreaus has been there, secretary feltman, and so on. al qaeda in yemen is certainly not a new phenomenon in itself. in fact, al qaeda in the region really appeared before we even

used the term al qaeda. probably the first attack ever carried out by people inspired by osama bin laden happened in december of 1992. that is what the first president bush was still in office and involved a hotel in aden which u.s. troops were staying as they were going and coming from somalia. fortunately no americans were killed in that attack although i believe two other individuals were. i should just -- returning to the state department, the secretaries designation of al qaeda as of foreign terrorist organization became official last week. the ball was actually rolling on that long before december 20 fed. it is a very -- i am sorry? >> you mean aqap? >> yes. al qaeda in the arabian

peninsula. she actually signed the notifications and that we use as a basis to go to the un to make this a designation under un security council resolution 1267, well before the 25th. and we are pleased that this group and its top two leaders had been designated there as well. so with that, why don't i stop? as p.j. mentioned, there have been a lot of other activity in the terrorism areas, and so i am happy to answer your question. >> when he was here last week, the yemeni foreign minister pretty much put the blame on everyone but him and his government for things that are going wrong there. he complained about aid not getting through from the previous pledging conference. and i am wondering, do you agree with that assessment?

>> i am not sure i agree with your assessment of his remarks. a weaker two before that, i was actually on cnn with him, he from sanaa and i from washington. he acknowledged his own government's blame for not always keeping al qaeda front and center as it dealt with a number of different security challenges. but i would say that the 2006 donors conference at the time seemed quite successful, but it is true that a lot of that money has not been delivered. so there is a real issue there. and it is probably also true that with a lot of other things going on in the international community and a lot of other countries in need of assistance, yemen may not have gotten all the attention from the international community that it deserved at various points. >> so you would agree with his assessment and you -- >> no, i would say that there

was certainly some truth in what was saying. >> his words were pretty strong. if you go back and look at the transcript, he said that the president had made courageous decisions on reform and were basically getting screwed by the international community. >> that was not the sense that i had of it but i am not going to quibble with you over that. i would say that the international community has made a number of commitments to yemen and they have not always been delivered, and yemenis have also sometimes made commitments and have not always followed through on those. the important thing is that the government is doing the right thing now and we want to use that as a basis for going forward. >> can you flesh out more about the conference itself and what the division of dealing -- helping yemen deal with its counterterrorism problem versus helping build the kind of long- term, stable state that would -- you know, with social and

economic development? what is going to be the division of labor at the conference? and then also, as you see what is going on in yemen -- not that you have not been paying attention to it before, but there are other kinds of states in the region and elsewhere that are considered failed states or weak states, and could have an opportunity for al qaeda to flourish. i was wondering if there was many or -- any more consideration being given in the department about how you -- how you have to do more preventative counterterrorism than reactive? >> let me take the second question first. one of the problems that you face in -- when fighting terrorism is that terrorists are not usually defending a lot of territory and are quite mobile. part of the reason that aqap has become a more potent threat in recent years is that saudi arabia did such a superb job in ramping up its counterterrorism

efforts in the wake of the may 2003 attacks there. and as a result, really, al qaeda within saudi arabia was put out of business for quite a while and has not really been heard from in some time. but the number of the most dangerous operatives did move from saudi arabia to yemen and sort of swelled their ranks of the aqap core there. so we are always going to face that problem of mobility, and yemen had some attractions for the terrorists because of its geography and also because the multiplicity of different actors in their domestic politics -- the power of tribes, the fact that some areas are more governed than others -- that was one of the things that was attractive. now the one country that we're really concerned about in this when it comes to weak governance

or non-governance is somalia. that obviously is an enormous challenge for us, and it has been since the government collapsed there decades ago. and we continue to work to strengthen the tfg, the transitional federal government, and to work with somalia's neighbors there to ensure that any terrorism does not bleed out from there. if you look at the other countries right around there, certainly on the arabian peninsula, there are not any weak states of note. at least none are coming to my mind. but we always have to worry about the possibility of ungoverned or under governed areas becoming safe haven, and i think prevention is very much what this administration is about. if you go back to the secretary

development speech, john brennan speech on counterterrorism in which he talked about the upstream factors that contribute to the terrorist phenomenon, one of them is weak governance. it is absolutely true that we are focusing on that quite seriously. there are a number of different programs going on. border security is a big issue for us in my particular office, but also in other offices in the state department and in dod and elsewhere around the government. we are looking at that. on your first question, as i understand it, and i am standing ready to be corrected by p.j., the meeting itself will be two hours. this is going to be of the nature of a kickoff in an effort to consolidate a lot of the different concerns that have been voiced and the initiatives that are beyond taking -- being taken right now, and then the

real brass tacks work will continue in a number of working groups that will be created there in the next month or so. because of the quickness with which -- the rapidity with which this came up and the fact that we have the afghanistan conference as well, is not really the place where there is going to be a lot of detail work done. but this very important for marshaling international support and making sure that this effort gets off to a good start. >> the secretary, when she has talked about yemen, said that in the past the yemeni government would be held to -- there would be requirements imposed upon it, that we're not just looking to hand over aid without looking for something in return. can you talk a little bit about what specifically we are looking for them to do that they are not doing now? and if you can go back to the 2006 conference, this $5 billion or whatever it was that was pledged, what in fact was holding it up? was it that the government simply did not produce the government that they promised?

or was it the concern that the yemeni government was somehow going to misuse that money is what sit back to the ground? and if that is the latter, are those concerns gone now? >> i was not in government in 2006 or in the immediate aftermath, but my understanding is that a lot of that had to do with a certain amount of donor fatigue, the concurrent claims of iraq, afghanistan, and a number of other places, and clearly december 20 that had an electrifying impact -- december 25 had an electrifying impact and made the international community think that this was a time to get past the excuses and get back to work. there have been questions at times about the government of yemen's absorptive capacity. that is something that we monitor carefully and that the other donors will be monitoring

carefully, and one of the key things we hope will come out of this is the kind of coordination that leads to non-duplication, and to ensuring that resources are being targeted where they can be productively used. now the secretary's remarks -- it is important to note, first of all, that virtually all of our assistance to yemen outside the security sector goes straight to ngos and other actors in the country who are on the ground and who can put this to good work. i am sure that what the secretary meant was a continued engagement on the threats that we're very concerned about, aqap, but also that these resources go towards the kind of development goals that we know that will produce stability in yemen and a basis for a stronger government that can deal with the critical problems it faces.

i think it would be premature to lay out a grid of benchmarks or anything like that, but obviously as with all of our assistance we will be watching carefully how it will be used. >> can i ask another one? we a part of a little bit about it but can you talk about -- the saudis are claiming that iran has a big hand in what is going on in some of these conflicts in yemen not only with the houthis, but perhaps supporting al qaeda? is there any evidence to support those claims? >> we do not have independent confirmation of iranian engagement in yemen, and the houthi conflict or, as far as i know, anywhere else. but i know that most of the attention has been to the contention that the iranians were supporting the houthis. >> so you think it is black market kind of -- yemen is a

kind of bazaar of weapons. but who is arming these people? where are they getting their support if not from country like iran? is it just the black market bazaar in yemen? >> yemen has been for a long time one of the most heavily armed countries in the world. and if there are additional weapons making their way into the country, i do not know that we have identified a single state backing them. frankly i don't have anything on that. there are a lot of weapons in yemen. >> can i ask a non-yemen question? >> shura. >> back in september of last year, there were threats reported in south africa, the embassies and consulates closed down. was there anything resolved on that? are there any concerns about the world cup? >> i remember it and i remember the outcome, and i know that the

issues were sufficiently resolved that after the embassy closed, it was reopened because the security concerns had been dealt with. what precisely happened -- it is something that if you want to follow up with me afterward, we can find out exactly what happened. as for the world cup, we know that all -- >> was set at all related? world cup and what was -- >> no, it was not directly related to the world cup. it was well in advance of the world cup. all large-scale sporting events are -- because they bring so much of the international community gathered, because they are high profile, because there is an enormous amount of press attention -- they get extra concern as possible targets. i know that the south africans are taking this very seriously. there have been discussions between many different security

institutions and the south africans, and another if they are working hard to ensure that there will be a safe tournament. >> you're not aware of any outstanding threats? >> i am not aware of anything of a very serious nature. >> what about the threat to the embassy in yemen? i know that it is a very high risk area, but the huge threats surrounding u.s. interests in yemen that we saw at christmas, are you little bit less -- >> it remains a pretty challenging security environment for the embassy. there is no question about that. and the insecurity in yemen was not built up -- it was not created in a day or a week, and we know that it will not be resolved overnight. but if you recall, i think the government of yemen put out an explanation at the time of

either the operation on the 17th or the 24th suggesting that it was dealing directly with some of the threats that were at hand and that it had disrupted that operation. the oilers banks. >> one broad question. if you could bring us up to speed on your understanding of the situation in yemen with regard to aqap, and specifically with reports over the past year of it becoming an increasing safe haven, as opposed to the af-pak border region, and people making that transition over to all lawless areas of yemen? >> i am not aware of a lot of people going from -- that is to say, a migration from the fata to yemen. what is true is that there are a number of areas of yemen that are, shall we say, under- govern, and they have been attractiveñi regions to militans

for a long long time. and as i mentioned before, we have seen a migration of extremists from saudi arabia. undoubtedly, there have been others but this is predominantly a yemeni saudi group. aqap. and it has managed to do a pretty good job at recruiting from within as well, and as a result, the threat has grown. that is really the core of it. >> if you could give us your sense of the coordination between al-shabaab and its activities inside yemen, especially in the aden region al-shabaab and -- what is your sense and how that is progressing? >> we've seen connections between al-shabaab and allocate at and east africa. we have not seen an enormous amount of al-shabaab activity in

yemen. there are a lot of somali refugees in yemen, to be sure. most of those refugees are fleeing the kind of chaos that al-shabaab creates. so obviously it is of great concern when you have thriving al qaeda or al qaeda affiliate's on both sides of the red sea, but we have not releasing a lot of evidence of that hookup yet. >> and on the other way, with arms going back across to the horn, are you seeing that increasing? >> again, somalia is a country that has so many weapons. i am not sure that what is going across the straits there is making a big difference. >> speaking of somalia, the last administration had spoken about putting eritrea on the list of state sponsors. is that going anywhere? >> we are not at the moment

working on that. i believe that eritrea is listed as non cooperating. not fully cooperating on some ct issues. but we have not taken it beyond that, and we feel that is the right place in terms of working with the eritreans to resolve some of our issues. >> are you actually working with the eritreans? my understanding is that they pretty much were not interested. >> they are not the most communicative people on earth. [laughter] >> where does that leave it right now? >> we have not stopped communicating to them. >> 1 osama bin laden's claim on the state -- >> i was wondering when that was going to come up. >> that he was responsible and that he masterminded the christmas day attack. the belief that to be true? you see a lot of coordination between al qaeda -- aqap and the

kind of al qaeda proper, or do you think it is a kind of jealousy or posturing for power? >> if you look at the text, he does that actually say that he was behind it. and he is doing what, for bin laden, is the tried and true strategy of associating himself with it, and in that way, sort of trying to get some of the reflected glory of the moment, if you can call it that. but in terms of the relationship between aqap and the fata, it is probably tighter than it is between al qaeda senior leadership and any of the other affiliates, but that does not mean that there was command and control by any means. and i think that we would characterize the role of the senior leadership in this context as being mostly about broad guidelines, general targeting priorities, things

like that, and generally pushing out an exhortation to do something, particularly because the pressure on the group in the fata is so great. so i think that is really what it is about. you know bin laden has been trying to put his fingerprints on just about everything that has happened for years, and in that regard i think we're kind of used to it. the boilers thanks. >> thank you. >> sure, my pleasure. >> >continuing on, they discuss the international response to the crisis in haiti as well as an array of other issues of

mutual interest including afghanistan, iran, the diversity of energy supplies within europe. and as she sat in her press availability, they are a key partner and ally and we continued consultation and cooperation with our italian partners. the secretary is currently in montreal participating in the planning meeting that will eventually lead in the coming weeks to aid donors conference on reconstruction of haiti. in this meeting today, that will focus on the completion of a joint needs assessment that will guide downers as they formulate long-term assistance planning for ap. -- for haiti. on behalf of the american people, the american people extends its deepest sympathies and condolences to those lost a vote -- aboard 49.

we've been in contact -- ethiopian airlines 409. the u.s. will continue to do all it can to support the government in the face of this tragedy. i am sorry. lebanon, my apologies. and finally before taking your questions, george mitchell is on his way back from the region. over the weekend he met with prime minister netanyahu and president abbas and also met with king abdallah of jordan, and last night with the foreign minister and intelligence chief and cairo. but he is on its way back to the united states as we speak >> on lebanon, can you be more specific about what the u.s. role will be in this?

who is going, if anyone? >> i think normally we would provide assistance to the ntsb. most of our focus right now is what ever we can do. >> what have they asked for? >> i will take the question. the uss rampage has been redeployed to assist in the search and recovery. it has been in the mediterranean at the time. i think we will be involved to the ntsb in helping to investigate the loss of this particular flight. >> did the particular case come up? >> it did not. >> 6 press the willingness to

bring it up with senator campbell. cantwell,. >> it is a matter of ongoing legislation. the state department has been contact with the senator. i do not know whether it was the secretary directly, but in the immediate days after the verdict, she was in touch with center for cantwell. >> both seem to go out of their way to talk about haiti and what a wonderful job the italians think the united states is doing. given the comments he made guest today and earlier today by whoever this italian official is, did the foreign minister of that on prompted praise -- all are that on prompted praise and a private meeting? >> yes, it might of been a private meeting.

>> did he apologize? >> he did not. he said that it did not reflect the view of the italian government. >> the delay of the afghan elections. >> this was an afghan decision. i think we support that decision. we want to make sure that the election was held -- it results in an electionñi process and an outcome that the afghan people will support. so the fact that it takes a little more time gives us time to make sure that security will be appropriate for the and that the electoral board can make sure that there's an affective elections. >> on haiti, the orphans being adopted in haiti, do we have any idea about how many children can

come here, how many are already here? >> i can do it the second part of that first. it is our estimate that 363 haitian orphans have been evacuated to date. and there are still some additional orphans in the pipeline, perhaps 100 more. we have provided 459 haitians with humanitarian -- medicare and other regions. -- medication and other re asons. we want to make sure that we identify and work with the haitian government, who is eligible for adoptions, where they stand in the process, to make sure that we have received permission from the government of haiti for the transport of

these orphans. on the broader effort, as of 8:00 this morning, more than 11,500 americans and family members have departed haiti. we have 59 confirmed american fatalities, 55 private citizens and four u.s. government official deaths. that includes in addition to the state department employee that we previous sale now, three dependents of u.s. government employees, we have confirmed their tragic deaths in the past couple of days. today we still have operations continuing with the teams from fairfax and loss angeles county, but there have been to order 34 people rescued, -- 234 people

rescued. >> four officials? three dependents? >> 3 were dependents. public today account as official? >> they were there in an official status. they were accompanying family members in haiti. but they are not u.s. employees. >> ok. >> children and spouses. >> how many cases were resolved versus how many were still open? >> we have grounds on 17,000, and is still moving number. i think we have probably resolved 67% of those. there are 4000 or so still open.

4000 are so -- of the 17,000 files that we of open and our crisis data base, about 67% of those had been resolved. we still have roughly 4000, give or take, that we still have yet to resolve. >> the "washington post" this morning talk about the number of -- i think it was 55,004 visa status. can you flesh out the numbers for us on the number of haitians allowed to come in? >> i would defer to the department of homeland security for that. we are not currently processing pieces -- visas for additional haitian citizens to come to the united states.

but there is a limit on the number that can travel to the states from haiti, and that is something that we will be working with a variety of interest groups on as we move toward. >> the secretary mentioned that there was perhaps a change coming. >> obviously this is an issue that has surfaced. this is something that we will look at, as we go forward, but we've made no judgment at this point. .

they are saying that they will not follow your instructions. they said they will be doing what they feel is right in terms of putting kids in foster care. has the federal government -- the litany of agencies -- set forth a policy for all states to comment? >> some very specific criteria have been outlined. our main concern is that any child that comes in has been cleared for adoption. that remains an issue of great importance to us.

chill -- that will be important as we work through additional children. they may have other family members that can support them. we have a clearer criteria laid out. , our broad interest is the welfare of these children. >> some of the parents are not being reunited with the children because state agencies are now saying that they agreed to that. >> we will follow the clear

guidance of the cases. >> any response to the chinese ministry of information? >> he called on me. >> i have two questions. >> can i get a breakdown of the search and rescue results? >> 134 people have been rescued. >> how many americans? how many haitians? >> i do not have that number. >> there has been a vocal complaint from both sides that those who have been rescued were from wealthy hotels and university student parents are saying that not enough money is going to rescue their children. >> as we said, first and foremost, when we put the teams on the ground they started to assess where the greatest potential was to save lives. we were not simply focus on

saving american lives or international lives. we were focused on saving all lives. as the teenagers got an array of commitment, including listening devices, we focused on human beings, trapped under the rubble. and where was the evidence that told us that this would be the appropriate place to do the search. their success speaks for itself. the fact is that the majority of the people rescued, the perspective outlets have cover the use with the amazing pictures being pulled out. this is a vitally important initial stage of the operation. these operations continue as we speak. there will be a point at which we will practically be able to recognize that there may not be other opportunities, but even

now in the last 48 hours there are people that have been able to survive in various places. other teams continue to work. one of the reasons they went to the hotel, montana and christopher, it was because they knew that there was a substantial number of u.n. personnel there. at the hotel montana we had clear reports of an array of individuals there. of all backgrounds. american, international, and haitian. the teams that have responded over the course of the last few days in their particular fields as they have been doing their work, it is that combination. i am sure that the teams are gratified that the number that they have been able to rescue is remarkable, but when you put it together with the tens aíd hundreds of thousands of people that we know have and will perish, the loss of life is

staggering. >> how is the call made to stop the search and rescue efforts when these people seem to be so resilience? >> this is a decision for the government of haiti to make. we think it has been wise that these operations have continued long past the kind of goal or window where you might normally expect people to survive. we are twice past the window of 90 hours. >> the internet. the chinese military said they are transparent when a comes to the internet, this after the secretary called for an investigation into cyber crimes. they say the statements like the one that the secretary made last thursday are designed to

diminish china. do you have a view on that? >> the secretary " forward a vision that we think is broadly shared around the world. -- the secretary put forward a vision that we think is broadly shared around the world. i will submit that being able to surf the internet without restrictions, have access to information, is empowering to people, empowering of societies. obviously she outlined that there are countries around the world that have restrictive policies regarding the internet. over time, this will inhibit the free flow of information, the creativity that might be resting

within those societies and the innovation that results when people have the ability to normally seek information, interacting through the internet,, we think that the free flow of information is something that is a right that all citizens have under the declaration of human rights. >> do you think that this spat could become the first frontúof a kind of war on the free flow of information? >> we are aware that china has a different position with respect to restricting information. we saw that china was restricting information around particular anniversaries. we think that this is inconsistent with the information environment.

not in line with the 21st century. we will continue to promote -- promote unfettered access to information and the ability to have a virtual free association. these are all, we believe, fundamental tenants of the environment but that we live in. we will not back away from advocating that there should be something that all countries should promote. >> thank you very much. >> [inaudible] i would like to hear your point of view on the struggle between the government. in venezuela. >> clearly we think that a free and independent media is a vital element of any democracy. any time that day government

shuts down an independent network that is an area of concern and we will continue to voice those concerns to any government, including the government of venezuela. >> do you mean a multilateral frame? what you mean by that? >> in the steps we have taken around the world, we value that in our own society and we certainly promote that as we evaluate what role the media plays in other countries. we have raised this issue in venezuela. i am not aware of us raising it today, but over the weekend our embassy in venezuela issued a

statement. >> [unintelligible] >> at the present time i am not aware that we have any plans to take this to a higher level. but that always remains an option. >> these six party talks, they have been called the most corrupt. >> nothing has changed. we continue nothing has changed from the trip last month and indications from north korea, the position is that they return to the six party process. >> the normal process? >> this other negotiator for the

six party talks, they had concentration with u.s. officials. going back to the officers hall yesterday, they told reporters that the nuclear process in treaty negotiations could be achieved simultaneously for synergy, which will help mutually. >> there is nothing new in that. we have said that if north korea comes back from the six party process with a demonstration of taking affirmative steps, we would be prepared to have a wide range of bilateral or multilateral dialogue on other issues. they could proceed within the six party process. that remains available to them. the first step is committing to come back to the first party talks.

>> how would you characterize it? >> i would want not to at this point. >> the process between tokyo and armenia and the constitutional court's, between turkey and armenia they are calling for an atmosphere between the countries. last friday the turkish foreign ministers had a phone call with the secretary of agricultural, raising concerns over the verdict. what is the response to this? can you give us details? in terms of the assistant secretary of state talking about the ruling, can you confirm his comments and say that this is

provisional of the state department? >> there was a phone call between secretary clinton and the foreign minister on friday. they did talk about this, and other issues. our position in private remains our position in public. stemming from the agreement between turkey and armenia late last year, it is important that both sides take steps to fill the commitments they made. we obviously understand that this involves actions where the executive branch of each country works with their respective legislatures. we will continue our conversations with turkey and armenia to encourage them to ratify the agreement. >> what about the field remarks that the u.s. welcomes the verdict of the armenian constitutional government?

>> i am not familiar with it. >> a couple of things. ambassador michel coming back, sounds have been made in the press about what happened. do you in the department feel that anything has changed following this trip? starting talks with lower-level officials, could this be a way to get the door open? the latest on the noriega extradition, is that something that must be signed off on? >> i will take that question, there was a development today. regarding the state department responsibility as a part of that, regarding the meeting with senator mitchell, it focused on launching negotiations as soon as possible. for quite some time we have advocated that there be a mix of

reproaches. you could have high level, direct talks establishing a framework for negotiations, and we might have parallel talks where the united states is engaged with both sides severally. -- separately. obviously these issues are complex. these low-level talks with details can be worked out. any or all of these approaches will have to be a part of a successful negotiation. we continue to work with both parties on how we can take steps, a variety of steps to work crews issues. fundamentally we still want to see both sides. >> there was an election yesterday in japan.

today's issue was quite in focus. does the u.s. desire for speed change? based on this? >> it does not. the prime minister publicly affirmed earlier today that his government would make the decision by the end of may based on the options that are now available. >> it does not what? >> it does not change anything. the prime minister of japan said that the central government will be the one that makes the decisions. >> you have no concerns about the results of this election? >> that is a matter for the people of japan and their government. >> on a separate matter, there was an announcement regarding beijing, if i am not mistaken?

>> i will take it. >> the u.s. government special inspector for reconstruction at the state department exercising weak oversight of international contracts with iraqi police training programs. as a result, 2.5 billion are vulnerable to waste and fraud. what is your reaction to that? >> the bureau of national narcotics and law enforcement have made improvements on the report, which has been recognized in previous reports by the special inspector general. we do take note of the recommendation for additional in country contracts. we have been actively seeking additional staffing. from my standpoint, we have an

intensive process of reviewing invoices, making only provisional payments to the contractor after initially certifying. from our standpoint we are doing due diligence. >> you are saying that the audit is unfounded? is there merit to the audit? >> i do not think it we agree with the characterization in that report, but we will continue to work on it. one more. >> [unintelligible]

>> the u.s. senate is in session, recommending a commission on ways to cut the debt and the deficit. later this week senators are expected to take up ben bernanke's nomination for another term. the u.s. house meets tomorrow to consider a bill to provide emergency aid to u.s. survivors of the earthquake in haiti. >> this week, gordon smith on what the expansion of broadband might need for broadcasters, tonight on c-span 2.

>> wednesday the president delivers his first state of the union address to congress, including the issues of the war of iraq and afghanistan. wednesday night, our coverage starts at 8:00 eastern on c- span. you can listen to the president's address live on your iphone. >> the health and human services secretary, kathleen sebelius, spoke at a symposium today. she discussed various programs that assist homeless youth administration initiatives for curbing the problem. this is about 50 minutes. >> thank you, vicki, for that nice introduction. thank you all for your hard work. i know that you have been

celebrating your 35 years. i think that you should be enormously proud of the work you have done. i want to be the first to acknowledge that i know how challenging the work is day in and day out, particularly in a year like this, where the economic downturn produces more needs on the service and and all of you are dealing with budgets being step -- slashed and people being laid off. you have the worst of all worlds, the most challenging of all times, and yet you are hanging in there. also, please do have a chance for a family visit. my sister is here. she is a board member of one of your terrific programs. in cincinnati. it is run by your outgoing share. i have been getting an in-depth look at some of these organizational functions while she has been here visiting with

me. i do not think that there's any question that it has been important to communities across america, but also important to this country, that we make sure the young men and women who your program serves get the support that they need to be productive , responsible adults. it is good for them, and it is good for america. we cannot afford to waste talented youth. i wanted to thank you on behalf of the president and the entire administration, because we are committed at the federal level to working with those of you that are doing the heavy lifting on the ground, making sure that every youth has an opportunity to live up to his or her potential, to have a safe and loving home, which is what your work is all about. before i tell you some of the steps that we are taking to achieve that vision, i want to

follow up on what jane has said, giving you a bed of an update from our perspective, on this situation in haiti. i know that you are getting 24/7 news coverage of the devastation, the department of health and human services has a responsibility. this has been a very challenging effort. the good news is that work on the ground is continuing with not only a variety of foreign governments, dozens of ngos, really supporting the people and government of haiti. getting both food, water, medical supplies, and essential health and services to people as quickly as possible that needed the most. we are dealing with a country

where one out of two people is under the age of 18. they are a very young nation. most of the strategy has fallen on young people. their situation is going to be even more challenging. every day there are more medical staff and support staff on the ground. supplies, food and water, not only on the ground, but being transported throughout the city, more importantly to surrounding areas. hospitals are set up. the u.s.s. comfort has arrived and is operating full steam ahead. our staff on the ground, we have five medical teams, surgical teams, mortuary teams that are helping to identify and hold on to remains of victims so that matches can be made. thousands of patients have been

seen so far. in the middle of all of this tragedy and the destruction, our staff has helped to delivered 25 babies. there is a resilience and a life goes on among the neighbors and friends. this will be a commitment that we may tell them aground in the short term, but also the long term, as the haitians will need that kind of help and support. it is not difficult, when you watch what has transpired in that country, to realize how fortunate we are to live in a country that is more stable and prosperous. while the scale of the crisis might be foreign, the specifics are not. particularly to those of you in this room. while you know that it does not

get covered 24/7 in this country, millions of our own citizens go without the medical care that they need every year. millions of people are hungry every day in america. millions sleep on park benches or under railroad bridges, on a cot in a shelter because they have nowhere else to go. the best estimate that we have is that 1.6 million young americans, between the ages of 12 and 17, slept on the street last year. some of them ran away. some of them were kicked out by parents. all of them had to worry about finding a place to sleep. we know that about half of the school-age homemade -- school- age homeless children have witnessed domestic violence. we know that runaway youth are

three times as likely to have all kinds of difficult times, from major depression -- [somewhatphone rings] as calling someone and it is not me. [laughter] as you know, the home is not the place to go at the end of the day. there -- with no roof to protect you from the weather, no bad for rest, no shower for good hygiene, no refrigerator for healthy food, no door to keep away creditors, and most of all no family or caring adults to help to look after these kids. it is no surprise that young people who are homeless suffer from everything from lack of sleep to skin infections and malnutrition. recent surveys of runaways in

hollywood found that they were 100 times more likely than their peers to trade sex for food, money, and protection. sexual activity than has its own serious consequences. 16 times more likely to be diagnosed with hiv and aids. half of the homeless reported becoming pregnant while on the street. all of those situations, you know well. the challenge is that we need to not let that familiarity become acceptable. these are kids that should be going to sports practices and school dances. they should be thinking about where they might, a college or what kind of job that might get, not where they will find a safe place to sleep tonight. so, helping those young people reach their full potential is a goal that stretches across our

entire department of health and human services. i know that some of our talented staff are here and will be with you throughout this program. many of you know our work. last year we provided street out reach, center and transitional living grants. 750 programs throughout america, together serving 1 million kids last year. we also operates the national run away switchboard, which received 125,000 calls last year from youth in crisis and the adults and friends that care about them. these programs, more than 40,000 young people enter the basic centers and receive preventive services. more than 80% of them returned to a private residence. that is a pretty good success rate. of the 4000 young people that entered transitional living

programs, 45% entered into a safe living situation. we also recognize that young men and women's needs go beyond housing. housing is not merely satisfy what is going on. which is why we are funding neighborhood mentoring programs through our substance abuse and mental health services administration. they service homeless youth struggling with behavioral health disorders. young men and women, the programs that we sponsor help give them a start to the rest of their lives. does is why we support groups like the national network for youth. we're working hard to implement the new $110 million teen pregnancy initiative. [applause]

it is important. sign space programs, evidence based, medically accurate programs that have been shown to reduce teen pregnancy. we want to partner with you on those efforts. we know that we can help young women choose other opportunities. this is why we are making sure that every american child, adolescent, gets the health care that they need. one of the first bills signed into law by president obama was a reauthorization of the children's health insurance program. it expanded coverage to an additional 4 million young americans who are now eligible for the program. one of the challenges is that we know that there are about 5 million kids in america that are eligible for medicaid and are not signed up. part of the effort that is under

way, $100 million national and local outreach programs to try and find the already eligible but not enrolled children. we need your help to do that. and there are kids, right now, who are eligible for preventive care and our reach care, and they are simply not enrolled in a program. so, that effort, we are going to take it seriously. the out reach frankly needs to be done at the national and local level. we would really appreciate your help with that out of reach. two principles are the leading principles of the work that we do in this area. the importance of involving families and the importance of involving young people themselves. i know that the families that we deal with are often challenged.

they're not often the ideal presented on some television talk-show. but the best evidence that we have said that any information -- intervention that is successful with children is much more successful when families are involved. we share the belief that people that have the best ideas to deal with young americans are young americans. peers and friends. we have a program called youth moves, short for motivating others through voices of experience. we've bring together young people that have real life experience dealing with the child welfare system and mental health system, having successfully navigated the systems themselves they serve as role models for other young people and advocates for incorporating youth input into

the public policy that we make. we think that it has been an effective strategy and we really want to accelerate those pipelines. part of the reason i was so glad to have a chance to join you all this morning is that i knew that there would be a lot of young leaders here in the audience. i would like you all to stand up and let us recognize you and all of the youths that are here today. [applause] c'mon, those of you who are young or think of yourselves as young, you get to stand up. i just want to encourage you to keep doing what you are doing. you like a frustrated, thinking that your voices are not being heard, but i can tell you, even in a large apartment like ours, the input is absolutely critical, meaningful, and essential.

it helps us to do a better job with our work. so, there are a lot of meetings that you are going to. not all of them are necessarily fun. maybe not all of them are even interesting, but they are important, and you make a huge difference. so, i have talked today about the range of needs that runway is in young people face. as well as the range of services provided by our department. i know that a lot of you in this audience where multiple hats. advocates of caretakers, real- estate agents, counselors. but just because all of those services are available does not mean that young people automatically get connected with the services that they need. so, if there's one thing that we can think about doing even better is making sure that the departments and agencies and programs work together so that

we all serve the full needs of these young men and women that come to was for help. i can tell you, it is an effort that the president is very focused on. he has made it clear to those of us in the cabinet that he not only wants us to do the best job that we can do running our own agencies, but feels it is a wasted opportunity if we are not leveraging our assets with our allies. so, there is a lot of very exciting interagency work going on. i work on a very regular basis with everyone from the attorney general to the secretary of education. the secretary of housing and urban development, in ways that never happened before.

we have interdepartmental partnerships to our agency and are familiar with. the juvenile deficit coordinating council, which meets later today, through various interagency working groups on youth, they meet on a regular basis. we are doing what we can to make sure that we are not just sitting around the room, chatting about what everyone is doing, amazed that we can leverage assets. let me give you one small example. john donovan, the housing and development director, recognizes that he has the housing she said the cause of, but he does not

have the leverage. we do. we can have that as a criteria. one of the things we're doing, working together, is organizing at the local level, insisting that anyone who applies for funding in our mental health programs and outreach programs must be in a collaborative program at a housing bubble, it is the one way that we can make sure that our service will be connected with that. giving us a much better success chance. those kinds of conversations are going out right now throughout the government. again, we would love your input and ideas. you are on the ground with the heavy lifting off, knowing where the gaps are and where we might be able to leverage those services.

we are committed to working as good partners, this holistic notion that wherever a child or young adult might enter the system, wherever they arrive for health, whoever they see knows what is available. they are asking the right question. any time that we see someone, we should ask them if they are signed up for health insurance and if they are not, assisting them in that process. do they need drug counseling? can they benefit from a mentor? looking at the various pieces, bringing it all together to provide the proper range of support. that is the plan, not only to continue running the programs in the agency, but to run the leveraged programs across the government's, reaching down in close partnership and

collaboration with those of you in the community. again and, i want to thank you for the incredible work did you do in these challenging times. we will have a chance to highlight the work of one young person that is here today. he started his own nonprofit foundation and is equally well known in washington power brokers and in communities across the country, talking about is that here at the head table. -- talking about zack bonner here at the head table. i have been inspired by his story and i know that one of his latest effort is walking across the country to draw attention to homelessness and runaway youths.

i am disappointed that you are taking the southern route, by passing my home state of kansas. but we wish you luck anyways. we wanted to give you some supplies. i have here a little supply kit for you, we have a water bottle, it could, under, and a few things to help you in your journey. is from the office of the secretary. -- its is from the office of the secretary. [applause] i know that he is also a prolific tweeter and blogger. i do not tweet myself, which is probably a good idea. [laughter] but if you had the chance to periodically posted log on our

website, zack, we could emphasize your good average. we wish you luck and hope to see you back here soon. part of what makes them work is his message, the other part is his example, reminding us that all of our young people are capable of doing extraordinary things if they have a loving home and get the right support from caring adults. not everyone is going to walk across the country. but all of our children have extraordinary talents. some of them understand that the talents to not disappear just because they have no home. it just takes additional steps to get them help and support to reach their dreams and goals. thank you, again, for your hard work, for figuring out better

strategies to reach these use. as the secretary of health and human services, i look forward to lending our assets to the work going on around the country. thank you so much. [applause] >> good morning, everyone. how are you this morning? >> good. >> i wanted to thank secretary subereous for her time this

morning when there is so much going on in this world, and in her world, spending time with us to work with disadvantaged and run away homeless people. we appreciate her time and everything that she has to say to us. my name is laurie jackson. i am one of the cochairs of this symposium. i want to welcome you here. 35 years, who would of thought? whether we are meeting at a four h camp or here at this hotel, it is always a joy to be here and get together, networking with other professionals to do the work that we do, hanging out with a nominal young people. give yourselves a round of applause for being here. i know that it is a tough time, economically. i also wanted to take this opportunity to thank the doctor

and his staff, who were instrumental in helping us. thank you so much. this symposium promises to be fabulous. have we not already had a great start? people are asking -- how did they get her? we think is pretty cool as well. there will be many opportunities for all of you in the next few days to learn and grow. who is here for the first time? excellent. [applause] or opportunities whether you are a diehard symposium a tender, who has been here many times. opportunities to learn from workshops, speakers, and presenters, opportunities to learn from each other. we want you to make sure that

you take the time to get to know the people that you do not know, as well as reconnect with people you have met before. >> i have too many papers. i want to take this opportunity to share with you the importance of sharing the message, why we are here and why we do what we do. it is important that you share this message, because we are the people to do with the best. we need to tell the story. tell the stories of the agency and the young people that we work with. if we do not, we could beat very well left with nothing. it is important to not only let congress hear our stories, but to let them know that we need additional funding and resources. if we do not do it, no one else is going to. make sure that you take the

opportunity to make your connection, go to the hill and be heard, as it is invaluable. speaking of sharing the message, i would like to introduce you to someone who is a great supporter of our work here in washington. the act of commissioner for the family and youth services bureau, debbie pell. formerly the director of the office of family assistance, she provided leadership to a natural -- net -- network of staff to provide services targeted to the needs of state, territory, and tribal the administrators. as a former director of france, she provided leadership for

grant programs with economic support through the individuals and community economic programs, job opportunities for low-income programs, the national institute for sports program, and the rural activities integration program. fet director and special assistant to the commissioner of alcs, she served as the principal advisor. she was the principal responsible for the planning and management of a $170 million budget for discretionary grant programs to develop and provide comprehensive programs to support the needs of individuals with developmental disabilities and their families. she also held leadership positions at the food and drug administration and the center for medicaid services. that is a lot. [laughter] please join me in welcoming debbie pell.

[applause] >> thank you very much for that warm introduction. i am not really that old, i have only work for short times everywhere. i would like to think the network for inviting me for -- inviting me to participate in the program this year. it is such a pleasure to meet many of you. we know that you are the people that keep the trains running. without the excellent services that you provide, our program would merely be legislation. i accepted the opportunity to introduce myself today because i wanted you to see my face, publicly the director of the run away homeless youth program, for

the wonderful year -- leadership he has provided for several years. curtis, a standout. [applause] i have to say that because i have been here for about one year, hired as the deputy associate commissioner, curtis was the acting associate commissioner. he has been so supportive of me all year. when i took the time to learn the staff and the programs, understanding the needs, i had to openly tell him thank-you from the bottom of my heart for being the support of manager that you were. i also want to take this opportunity so that you can meet some of the staff that have participated today. could you please stand? these are the people that you probably speak too often, but

may not see their faces. this is our staff. i will not stay here long, as i know that the star is zack and you want to hear his presentation and get going into your sessions. i also am looking forward to participating in the sessions, listening to the emerging issues in your program and the innovative strategies being used on the ground to administer your community-based programs. i am excited to be here and learn as much as you. i would like to commend our young people today. as the secretary has often said, while it might not be the most exciting, you might not even want to be there, but you have no idea how important it is for you to be a part of our

programs. your ideas are what galvanize the staff to continue to do what they do. i will not stay here in keep talking, you are going to hear that for the next three days, but i wanted to thank you for the excellent work that you do. never doubt that we appreciate your work. i wanted to ask you, take an opportunity to look at the web site, look of the mentors on the web site. as the secretary said, we are getting it. we get it. you have to leverage services. we have dwindling federal resources in the way of money, but if you look across the program and see where you have natural collaboration opportunities, you can leverage them. look to see if you have a grant in your community and connect

young people with those programs. we would really appreciate you helping us to get it. we are now asking you for your help with the federal army. thank you for being here for the symposium. [applause] >> it is my true pleasure to introduce someone you have already heard a lot about. zachary bombier. for someone in the sixth grade, he has quite to resonate. born in all -- arkansas, now living in the tampa bay area. a student of the floor of virtual academy, he started community service in 2004 after hurricane charley. in 2005 he formed the little red

wagon foundation, a nonprofit designed to help underprivileged children. he makes backpacks for homeless and street children, packing them with food and supplies. he has so far distributed 2000 across the country. he also helps kids in title one schools by providing books and can be to give as streets. the products are distributed by the teaching tools of the county school system. for the past three years he has been helping children at the gatt -- renaissance village fema trailer park in louisiana. he has donated $8,000 in toys, equipment, and books. he held a holiday party in 2006 and 2007 for children, providing each with a toy and a gift bag, providing each family with a ham. the last four years, zack,

wanting to give children involved, starting an event called 24 hours of, bringing kids together across florida for 24 hours to simulate being homeless, raising funds, supplies, and awareness. in november, 2007, he walked from tampa bay, florida, to tallahassee, to bring awareness during the first ever home was weak awareness month. he once again drew attention to the homeless and build a home for the habitat for humanity. in the summer of 2009 he completed his walked from his house to the white house, with the belief that we all have the ability to make changes in this world if we try. as was mentioned earlier in 2010 he is planning a coast-to-coast

walked by and which he will involve other youth and help to fund their ideas to help homeless young people. he is just an amazing and dedicated youth. zack? [applause] >> i would like to start by saying thank you. when they asked me to speak to you all, i was honored. one of the things that inspired me the most for the past five and half years are the people i have met and the french ships and partnerships i have developed with other organizations. in august of 2005, hurricane katrina hit and in a few months

i was at renaissance village, their largest trailer park. i have seen the conditions that the kids were living in. i've played with them. brought them toys, books, and food. at the end of the day i could walk away and they could not. they were stuck in a compound, men standing at the gates with automatic rifles. drugs and prostitution all around them. a situation that most of the general public would never see. this left a mark on me. whenever i feel frustrated, i think back to those children cannot walk away from the position they were in. those children, and all of the children since then, they inspired me to do my first walk from tampa to tallahassee.

during the what i brought much awareness, not only to homeless youth, but to individual organizations along the way. use homeless advocates -- youth homeless advocates would embrace my cause and use me to bring awareness to not only the problems of homeless in the community but the work that they were doing as well. in april i will continue my walk from tampa to los angeles. to continue to bring awareness. i want to invite all of you to review my routhe and see and sem walking through your community

and, if i am, a partner with us to work together. i must believe in self preservation, and the only reason that this problem exists is a lack of knowledge. if everyone understood why these children were homeless. it is not because they want to be, but because the situation is out of their control. . i live in constant fear of my

mom seeing my room, and because the senate she does, she will make me clean it. [laughter] toys taken out and not put out, so i closed the door and hope it will go away. but it never does, and eventually i have to face my room and clean it. and it is the same -- i stand and stare for the longest and say to myself how can i ever get this claim? but i started one spot and go up for a spot by spot, and eventually i looked up and my room is clean. i you could -- i look at you homelessness the same way. -- and use -- at youth homeless is the same way. we can solve this crisis. thank you all for the work that

you're doing. i know sometimes it gets frustrating and you want to shut the door. but the work that you're doing is making a difference. together we will keep this crisis solved. we have to. there are 1.3 million youth depending on us. thank you. [applause] >> zach has agreed to take some questions.

any questions, that would be great. step on over to that mic, if you would. >> i don't have a question but i want you to know that you are really awesome. [laughter] i am really inspired by what you're doing. thank you. [applause] >> do we have contact information for people who want the log-on? a lot of people are using the electronic media -- any of that that we can post during symposiums so we can spread the word about what that you're doing. >> contact information, and yes. we do have a web site. if you want to continue -- to get in touch with us, we can get

that to you. >> i would be happy to come down and help clean your room anytime. [laughter] >> the website is li ttleredwagons.org. >> i am an adult -- worker and i just wanted to say that what you're doing is fantastic. >> anybody else? thank you. [applause] where does this go? zach and i have a different height thing going on. [laughter]

you are truly a amazing and an inspiration to all of us. we're very excited about your journey and we wish you luck on your journey, and we are anxious to hear about how it goes. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] >> this week toward smith on the sec planned to expand the broad bands back from and what it might mean for broadcasters, tonight on c-span2. >> the senate continues debate today to raise the federal debt limit. there will vote tomorrow on an amendment on recommendations to cut the debt. senators are expected to take up ben bernanke's nomination for another term. the house meets tomorrow and will consider a bill this week to provide emergency aid to u.s. survivors of the earthquake in

haiti. we talked to a capitol hill reporter about this. david clarke, what would be conrad-greg amendment do? >> it would create a commission whose job would be to come up with policy proposals for reining in the long term growth of the debt. it would have the authority to look about the tax code and all the spending programs in the budget. >> why are they considering the amendment? >> it is part of their legislation that raises the debt limit, the amount of money that the government can borrow, and a number of moderate senators said that they do not want to vote for an increase in the debt limit without getting of vote on the commission of some special

commission dedicated to controlling the growth of debt. as part of the agreement, but conrad-gregg amendment is being offered in the hopes that it will get the support of this group to support the growth of the debt limit to support next year. the vote threshold is 60 0, so everyone on the democratic side to vote on it. right now what is not clear that there's enough support to a pass the conrad-gregg amendment. the administration has been negotiating with senator conrad, and his allies, trying to work out a compromise. the president could created that commission by executive order

and that commission would report by the end of the year on its proposals. the moderates that -- senators are skeptical because there would be nothing forcing congress to vote on the proposal. they ask the administration to first get behind the amendment and then move on from there. >> on the larger legislation, what are the white house and congressional leaders looking for increasing the debt limit? >> they want to increase it by $1.20 trillion, before the midterm elections. any time congress has to raise the debt limit, it is a tough political vote with a lot of criticism. the democratic leadership wants to get it done and take off the table for the year. >> david clarke of "congressional quarterly," thank

you. one of google washington journal," we visit the detroit auto show. policies with economic issues including the federal debt ceiling and the confirmation of federal reserve chairman ben bernanke. and later, we discussed policy decisions within the auto industry. jim campbell, general motors' general manager. "washington journal" takes your calls and e-mails live every morning starting at 7:00 a.m. eastern here on c-span. >> wednesday president obama delivered his first day of the union address to congress, laying out his prison for the future of the country and his plan to deal with issues like unemployment, health care, and the wars in iraq and afghanistan. the state of the union address on wednesday night.

our coverage starts at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span 3 you can also listen to the address live on your iphone with the c-span radio app. >> booktv wellcome's paul johnson, author of over 40 books. the latest, "churchill." sunday february 7 at noon eastern on "in depth." >> the president's upcoming state of the union speech was one of the main topics at today's white house briefing. press secretary robert gibbs also answers questions about support for federal reserve chairman ben bernanke. this is almost 50 minutes.

>> let me read just one quick statement before we get started. we are deeply saddened by the loss of the passengers on ethiopian airlines flight 409 in beirut, lebanon last night. our thoughts and prayers go out to the families and friends of those who lost loved ones. the united states commends the government of lebanon and the united nations rescue workers and their immediate response and recovery effort. >> the middle class initiatives that the president and vice president outlined today, would you expect that to be essentially the laundry list of new initiatives that we might see in the state of the union? or will there be more announcements and proposals that he plans to put forward on wednesday? >> as is my desire, i do not want to get too far ahead of the man who will make a speech on that and a couple of days. i think you'll see a series of ideas that the president will

outline that fall into a few different categories. how to get our economy back on a firmer foundation, and how do we create an atmosphere in the private sector that lends itself to more hiring. what do we do to put our government back on firmer footing with the middle class. and along with that, what ideas do we have for changing the way washington works so that people in this country feel like the middle class is getting as fair a shake as the special interests. >> when he talks about jobs creation, at getting the private sector to hire -- are those likely to be ideas that we have not heard yet? is he going to give more detail or a push to the green jobs? >> i think that there is a series of things that the president will talk about, jennifer. i don't want to get too far ahead of where the president --

what the president will do and say on a number of things, including, to finish my list, the actions that will begin to recognize what many middle class families are having to do each and every day, and that is makes basic -- spending decisions based on their income, not on -- and ensuring that the government is doing the same thing in getting ourselves back on a path to fiscal responsibility in the medium and long term. the president will also spend some time talking about our efforts to combat terrorism and efforts that have been ongoing for the first year on foreign policy. >> and can you say definitively that the addition of david plouffe to the sort of broader team is the last change or the only change you guys plan to make in the near future? >> i am not aware of others. i will say this. i think david's -- the president

asking him to give some extra time, i think, might have been a tad overwritten in the sense of, this is not him taking over every campaign in 2010, meaning david plouffe. this is about him working internally on strategy with the folks that are already here. i think you heard david axelrod say this yesterday, that there is a game that gets played a lot in this town that calls for the ritual sacrifice of someone or some of the people. >> well maybe not sacrifice, but bringing in other people. >> i know of no other personnel changes. yes, sir.

>> the administration and made it clear over recent years that in -- that despite the increasingly rancorous debate over bernanke's confirmation for a second term as fed chairman, that they expect that he will be reconfirmed. but given that the jobless rate has risen to 10%, does the president think bernanke has done a good job in meeting the mandate on jobs? >> the president took into account a lot of tasks that the the fed does. obviously the tools that it has on monetary policy, given interest rates, are not -- their options are not great. but the president had to make a series of -- went through a series of decisions last year in

appointing ben bernanke to serve in a second term. obviously, as we talked about last week, there are a number of -- there's still a great of anxiety in our economy, but chairman bernanke helped the president and the economic team steer through some very turbulent times and rough waters. as i said yesterday, i believe that it sends a signal to greater and overall stability to have his nomination approved without political games, and that is what we expect will happen later this week. >> but is the white house worried that an unexpectedly difficult debate over his confirmation could damage confidence in the fed and the financial markets, both domestically and internationally, and that this could further weaken the dollar? >> again, our position is that

it should not. as we all know, this is an extremely important appointment. i think that senators are making up their minds and announcing their decisions, hopefully based on going through an important set of criteria. and i think, again, this is an important opportunity to demonstrate greater stability in our overall system by approving his renomination for another term at the fed. >> i want to follow up on jobs. one of the themes that scott brown ran on was that the obama administration was spending too much money and not doing enough to create jobs. whether that was true or not, why would your first initiative -- since that election -- spend more government money but things that may not really create more jobs? >> well, ed, the initiatives that the president is focused on are not necessarily married up

to a special election's political timeline. >> but will they create jobs? >> i think that there are a series of proposals that the president has made that will continue to create an atmosphere that allows the private sector to hire more, that addresses the anxiety that middle class families in this country feel each and every day their anger and frustration about a safe and secure retirement that with having to work harder and longer, that there -- a tax cut that will help on their child care expenses. i think all of that goes to the type of economic anxiety that people felt in this country last week, last year. but, ed, as i have described

here, this is something that they have felt for many years, feeling like their jobs were not secure. feeling like they were working longer and harder for less money, feeling like they did not have that type of security that they needed. health care fits into that. energy prices fits into that. i think there is a tendency to silo different things -- or put issues in different silos when in fact the anxiety that is felt in this country are around a weak economy manifests itself in many, many ways. >> so was the president's role now partly to deal with the anxiety of the middle class but not necessarily create jobs? because child care, student loan relief, it could be helpful to people but how does that lead a small business to hire somebody for some marc >> polls that the president outlined in december lead small businesses to be in a

position to hire more people. the president -- what the president outlined today was if you are trying to figure out how you're going back to school so you can get that next job, we don't want you to be crushed by the burden of skyrocketing tuition payments. right? if you are having to work longer to pay the bills, we want to make sure that if you are in the middle class, if you're getting help on your child care expenses. i can assure you there are people in massachusetts and across the 50 states that struggle with those problems each and every day. that is part of that anxiety. but, ed, this is not a rule -- a new role for the president. addressing that anxiety has been there since the day he walked into office. >> can i just ask on the stimulus, republicans have already jumped on the fact that yesterday you went to other officials gave what appeared to be three different answers on

how many jobs were created or saved by the stimulus last year. david axelrod said over 2 million jobs saved or created reduce said 1.5 million, and valerie jarrett was more careful in saying, thousands and thousands. does that add to the confusion for people try to figure out did this stimulus work or not, if you got three different answers? >> the report that came out two weeks ago from the council of economic advisers gave the number of 1.5 million jobs to 2 million jobs saved or created. maybe i am guilty of being less of a glass half full kind of guy than david axelrod. but i think that the answers were given consistent with the range that cea -- >> but did you also say a week ago that you would not used "sadr created" anymore because christina romer was saying it

was not the best way to present it? >> the answers that we gave on sunday were based on a report that came out i would point you to the report. >> a lot democrats are drawing parallels between what happened in 1994 and what might be happening in 2010. and marion barry is quoted in an article saying that the president said to one group behind the scenes that the difference here and 1980 -- 1994 was that "you have got me the key to the president as to say that and what does that mean? >> i have not talked to the president about that. >> is that a message that the president is broadcasting on the hill that he can somehow mitigate some of those losses? >> i don't think it is newsworthy to think that the president hopes and expects to be an effective campaigner in the midterm elections. >> do you think that the president did not say that? >> i have not talked to him so i

do not know the answer to that. >> moving on to a gallup poll that says that the president is the most polarizing -- his approval ratings are the most polarizing of any president in their first year, 88% of democrats approve but 23% of republicans agree. why would you agree -- why he think the president is received so differently? >> i think that we live in a very divided country. he has worked hard to change that. but you cannot change the way that washington works if some people do not want to change the way that this place works. >> are you blaming washington for that kind of public perception? >> i am saying that washington has been a polarizing place for quite some time. i think that this is a deeply divided country and it has been for quite some time as well. helen. >> does the president think his bonanza bank bonuses contributed to this political downfall? >and also the middle class, the

poor feeling left behind? >> i think that there are a number of things that over the course of the past year or two years has led to a greater anger and frustration in the american public about the direction of our economy you. there is no doubt that long before bonuses i would -- i think that the president has said and would say again that looking simply at the point at which we got to having to bail out a series of huge banks that took excessive risk, gambled away our money, and then expected us to prevent them from taking the economy over the clip caused an enormous amount of anxiety in this country.

the president said that nobody but wanted to be -- nobody wanted to be in the position of doing that, understanding that the flipside of that was watching the economy go over the cliff. it was not a popular decision but one that regrettably had to be done. i do think that we are now in an environment, though, and we talked little bit about this last week in terms of financial reform in the president's proposal on thursday about certain activities the banks could or could not be involved in -- we have to create an environment through financial reform that never puts the taxpayer in the position again of, in essence, being held hostage to or held hostage by a bank like that. that is why we need rules of the road that are different from what we had in september 2008 and before that that created

that environment. that is why we need different roles moving forward. and what of the things the president will spend quite a bit of time talking about in the state of the union are those new rules, what he would find acceptable on that. now, ed, to build off of what you said, you may look at financial reform is not something that necessarily does or does not create jobs, but i think creating a framework of certainty on what the rules of the road are goes directly to both economic anxiety as well as that new foundation that the president has always spoken about, that creates an atmosphere for hiring in this country. >> can the banks be trusted to become more aware? >> i think that some people have taken steps to limit compensation varied somewhat taken steps to change the way bonuses are awarded in terms of different types of compensation, helen. but i do not think anybody here would say that all of their

actions meet with a commonsense test of what you -- would match that commonsense test that most of us would give them each day about whether they understand what is going on in this country, and understand the level of anxiety around their actions, based on what the taxpayers had to do in ensuring that they did not go over the edge with our economy >> can you shake them? >> through financial regulatory reform, we created an environment in which they are unable to -- they are unable to , through their excessive risk- taking, which, again, we would hope to move backwards, but also not allowing them to be able to once and for all take us over that cliff. chip. >> following up on that poll, it

is pretty remarkable that a president would talk so much about reaching across the aisle and now was the president to presides over the most polarized washington and a very long time. are you suggesting that he does not share in the blame for that? >> i think everybody in washington shares the blame. but i think we've discussed this here. how many times has the filibuster been used in 2009 grew to more >> i cannot give you a number. no, no, no, i am sorry, it was more rhetorical question. >> it was used a lot by democrats, too. >> right, but what i am saying -- not to give credence to when it was used in the past, but understand i think we have found it remarkable, and most people would find it remarkable level that it has been used on things that ultimately ended up being, that the ultimate approval of the legislation, non-

controversial. when you filibuster something that is ultimately approved with 88 or 90 votes, what were you filibustering? >> the standard that anything remotely controversial needs 60 votes has been around for a while. it was not invented by republicans last year. >> no, but it has been employed with great regularity in a sense i think unseen before. dullard they would argue that the reason is that this president has not been willing to -- other than to talk to them, he has not been willing to reach across the aisle and compromise with them. >> we can go back and forth on this. what would you think it would say on something they ultimately voted for 88-10? i think that it is -- you know, i think that in and of itself -- >> is that not a diversion of because they were not really tried to block it out with just -- the 60 votes has just become standardized. it is pretty much becomes

standardized under democrats, too. >> i think that goes to the gamesmanship played in this town that people throughout this country are simply tired of watching. >> on the middle class proposals, president clinton was famous for small-bore or modest proposals that did not do a tremendous amount, they did not change in any big way but they were politically popular. is that what this is modeled after? >> no, increasing the child and dependent tax care credit was something the president talked about in the campaign, a system of automatic iras's, increasing the saber's credit for retirement savings, are all things that the president talked about in his campaign. the first bill he ever introduced in the united states senate had to do with college affordability -- in that case, increasing pell grants. in this case, ensuring that somebody doesn't -- somebody is not prevented from going to

college because they simply cannot afford it. and if they have to borrow money, as millions and millions of people do, but they do not find themselves on the other end of that, particularly in an economy where jobs are hard to come by, crushed by the overwhelming pavement that have to come in paying that loan back. it has been awhile since i was in college, but i think you have -- i think there is a six-month period once you get out of college to when you start paying that loan back, at least that is my memory from my college days. i think a proposal that does not find a recent college graduate trying desperately to find a job crushed by those payments, you know -- >> it is certainly not on the order of magnitude of a health care reform bill that just completely changes 1/6 of the

economy. these are very modest steps here. what not long ago he was talking about dramatic change, and now he is talking about these little modest proposals. >> chip, i think you'll hear the president talk about health care reform in the state of the union. but i don't think someone struggling with high college costs and capping what they have to pay as part of their income so that they do not drowned in those repayments -- or, god forbid, decide on the front end, you know what, i cannot afford this, i cannot afford to borrow the money. if i borrow the money, i will be crushed when i get out of the college. why don't i not just go? i think there are thousands of studies -- and someone just to answer that?

a number -- [phone ringing] it will go a voice mail in just a minute. take a picture of that. how many thousands of studies do we have over a lifetime what a college graduate makes versus someone that did not go to college? and if somebody makes that decision not to go to college because of the cost that they think they are born to struggle with both while they are in college and when they get out, they may be making a very short- term decision with very, very long-term ramifications for where they are going to end up. not everybody can go to europe and play basketball and go to the nba. some people are going to have to -- a lot of us are going to have to go to college to get a better job. and i think whether it is struggling with child care because you have to work longer, whether it is capping the payments that you have to make

when you borrow money to go to college, or providing a genuine sense of security in retirement is important for the american people. >> on health care last week, and i am paraphrasing, but i believe it is accurate to say that you said that the president still wants to pass and believes he can pass something on the level with, something as comprehensive as the bill that is now pending before the house and the senate. does he still feel that way? >> yes. >> he is not backing off one iota? >> no, you can refer to what a number of us said yesterday on the shows. the problems that surrounded health care, the reason the president endeavored to reform a system that was not working for a lot of americans, was because crushing health care costs, skyrocketing premiums for small businesses, getting crushed and the federal government with the budget, those problems have

created -- existed for quite some time, and even after massachusetts they exist today. >> but the president himself said that what he wants to do is coalesce around the most popular elements. in the city also wants to pass this massive comprehensive reform just seem to be direct contradictions. which does he want to do? >> no, i believe the president believes that the circumstances that led him to undertake greater security for people in their health-care costs existed last year, last week, and this week. >> i have a few unrelated questions this morning. on bernanke, this morning senator gregg said on msnbc that he thought bernanke was being scapegoated by colleagues on both sides of the aisle but that the president has fed that with his populist fervor. i was wondering what the president takes any responsibility or if there is a concern that he is playing with fire when he whips up this kind of populist fervor and and -- >> populist fervor based on?

>> just anchoret wall street, you know, they are paying themselves big fat bonuses, we want to tax them, everyone is angry. >> i don't think any of what you just said the president would believe is not true, and i did not think that he would -- i don't think many of the american people would believe that. take what the president has outlined. one, a fee on banks, reporting -- many of them reporting big profits, paying back in full the money lent to them by the american people. >> the by stirring up anger at wall street, is there a downside to that? >> no, because i think that in many ways, as we discussed and as i told helen, i think that anger exists. that anger -- i doubt many proposals that the present has made over the course of the pat year have brought together "the

new york times" and the "wall street journal," but each talked about the notion that the relationships in what banks are able to do if they are getting money at a discount rate of virtually nothing -- going back to your question about rates from the fed -- using that money to do proprietary trading not for their clients but only for themselves, is a proposal that many on the left and the right agreed is the right step 4. and again, all of this is built around, as i talked about last week and again today, the notion that we have to change those rules so that the american people never find themselves in a position of having to do in september and october of 2008 and other times in 2009 in preventing excessive risk-taking from threatening the entire economy, something that the

american taxpayers were not involved in but are footing the bill for. i think the proposals that the president outlined last week and in the weeks before that are very commonsense proposals. >> on the state of the union, do you view it as a reset of his message? >> no, look, i think that if you go back and look at what the president talked about in ohio on friday and you look at a lot of what the president talked about throughout the first year and throughout the campaign, you will find a remarkable amount of similarity. quite frankly, in all honesty, go back to 2004 at the convention and you'll see a lot of that there as well. >> will he be downplaying health care? >> no. >> i have one more but i forgot. >> i am sure they will yield you time. >> i just remembered it now. we got a lot of first row time here today.

>> i did not say that. >> going back to republican tactics comments. does the president said the state of the union as an opportunity to extend an olive branch in any way or to ask them to change their tactics? >> i think it can predict the president will talk about how we change the way of washington works and also talk about the fact that there is no doubt we all have to work together. >> what you mean by "change" however works? >> i am not going to get ahead of where the president is, but i think the president will talk about that. >> easygoing to explain it? >> he will in some detail. >> de know how many press had gone to congress and made speeches with the theme "we have to change the way washington works"? >> 43, i guess. and i am including this presidency because i am sending that george washington felt that they got it pretty darn right,

and so we're going to stay pat. i'm obviously being facetious. but my sense is that a lot of the reason that that happens is because of the way this town tends to work. so i think it will bear mention again. >> one more on the job numbers. it is a moving target on how many jobs have been saved it created. is it possible to just flat out say how many jobs have been created? >> appointee to the report. >> would you be able to say how many jobs have been created, period? >> i would simply point you to the reports that are gotten in by grant recipients -- they have to file paperwork about the employment impact of the money that they get. look, we're going to get new gdp numbers on friday. and i think we saw, as a result

of the recovery act, at the end of last quarter, the first positive economic growth in four quarters. i hope is that you'll see another strong number on friday. we have never in this country -- let me just not say that, because the economists might come back with a month for me. but there is no doubt that it is hard to create jobs in this country without positive economic growth, that without strong economic growth, strong job growth is next to impossible. i think on friday we will hopefully get a report card on particularly how the recovery act has helped create economic growth that will lead to job

growth. >> what is your reaction to reports that the new york fed wanted national security status for some aig details, and what does that say about transparency? >> i have not seen that and i would point you to treasury if you have specific question three or, quite frankly, the new york fed. i have not seen those reports. >> senator bayh said the president may support a freeze in most federal discretionary spending in the state of the union. can you say anything about that? >> as i said earlier to jennifer's question, the president will talk about ensuring that we big event -- begin to get our fiscal house in order, that we have to start making decisions like american families are making decisions about whether or not we can afford to spend as we have over the past many years. i do not want to get into the details of the right now from here, but suffice to say that

will be part of the standing in -- state of the union -- discussing fiscal responsibility. >> has he reached out to senator kaufman at all now that we know that beau biden is not going to be running? >> i have not seen a call. >> is there a new deadline for health care? >> not that i know of, in no. >> is there -- is there a way forward? >> the president has continued to talk to leaders in congress about the best path toward, i guess. >> will recommend one wednesday? >> i will encourage you to tune in on wednesday. >> a couple of things that were discussed with you on the sunday shows yesterday about abdulmutallab. there was an ap report yesterday that said that he was only interrogated for 50 minutes. you said that you thought it was much longer than that. it within characterized to some of our people it was up to 30 hours. can you reconcile that discrepancy and describe what you know about that sequence of

events and the degree to which adequate interrogation was undertaken? 50 minutes and 30 hours is an enormously different time sequence. >> i think a timeline -- i think some of that information is something we're trying to gather. i would say this, major, that as i have said before and as i said, i think, the first time i had a chance to answer questions on this topic coming back from the holidays, the fbi did have an opportunity to interrogate mr. abdulmutallab. they got intelligence, useful and actionable intelligence, that was then transmitted back to officials about the government. this was done by experienced fbi

interrogators. and that is all i have on that. >> is 50 minutes just wrong? >> that is one of the questions that i have, that i've asked somebody to pull out. >> in this justice to our release talking about this timeline, it said, "the national security staff and the president's national security team were revised up the decision to try a abdulmutallab as a civilian, not as an enemy combatant." de know who that went through and did that go all the way to the president? >> let me check with ben on that. i did not see that part of what you're talking about. >> on the student loan, i may be very ignorant about this but if you reduce the rate of payment, doesn't that make the loan over time more expensive for the student loan applicant? >> i think they're doing a briefing. they're doing a briefing call with this -- on this with jared

in a few minutes that i would point you to barry >> said that is not a problem? >> asked jarrett, and it will go to the details of that. >> back on the question of changing the way washington works, given how central that was to the campaign, why is he having three argue the case now? is he going to do it in some different kind of way or is this going back to the original argument he made during the campaign? this is not a new idea for him. >> right, i would posit that not all of those ideas have been heard and implemented. i think that is one of the -- you'll hear him talking about reforming washington. he talked about it as a state senator, he worked on it as a u.s. senator, talked about it as a candidate, and will talk about it again as president. >> in the themes you described, health care was not one of the main ones. is it going to just be tucked in

with some of the others? >> i think that we hear the speech, you will not have to lean forward to hear a discussion about health care. i was giving -- i was giving broader themes, not a litany of issues. >> an easy going to do events around the state of the union? what other are around the country stuff might he do? >> i know that we will be traveling to florida the day after the state of the union on thursday. and i think the president speaks to the republican house caucus, i believe, and baltimore on friday. then there is travel, i think, the next week as well. i am not trying to get ahead of what we have already announced. and i've tried to go through my head what we have already announced. if any of that seems new, then i would like to be a senior administration official. [laughter] yes, sir. >> back to deficit. harry reid proposed some new pay go rules on the hill today,

tougher rules that would be part of the debt limit raising. does the president support that stuff? >> i would have felt look at exactly, not having seen exactly what he proposed, but i think that is part of what the senate will vote on in the next few days and the president supports. >> one thing that did strike me about those rules is that they would apply to extensions of unemployment benefits. >> without having seen senator reid's proposal, i'm happy to have somebody look at it and it to an answer. >> can you enlighten us a little bit about how this president goes about the state of the union address? is he sitting down today, tomorrow with speechwriters, how much does he write, it is c- span -- does he practice with the teleprompter? >> they spent time over the weekend working on it. i'm sorry, the president and the speechwriters, primarily with jon and ben, but the tone were

back in the oval office this morning, both with the president and with a larger group of advisors going through the speech. again, i do not have tomorrow's schedule in front of me, but i believe that he will do some of the practicing that you talk about, as well as continuing to write and work through different sections of the speech. >> is it more -- is it less of a laundry list of specifics that he wants to get and more thematic? is it looking forward weeks ahead, months ahead, years ahead? >> well, and, i think he will do -- i think you will certainly see aspects of it that he will discuss the themes, some of which i outlined here from a broader perspective. there will be mention of -- we will go from themes to issues when we discuss creating jobs, some of the task force, middle

class task force recommendations on things like that. i think he will provide people with an update on what -- where we have come from but how much we have yet to do to get our economy back on track, to restore our image in the world -- a host of the things that he talked about last year. >> guests and the gallery? >> i did not have a final list but we can certainly get that. >> he will have some. >> yes. >> the legislative deficit commission the president endorsed on saturday, does he see that as interchangeable with the executive commission or is a superior to anything? >> i think many of the characteristics might well overlap. a legislative commission was the preference of many on capitol hill. if that fails, then obviously

other steps might be looked at in order to address what the president -- again, what the president will discuss in terms of the medium and long term problems that we have with our debts and our deficits. >> you said medium and long term. you mean after the recession? >> right, obviously there is -- economically to pull greatly back at a time of enormous economic uncertainty and recession, i think almost any economist will tell you, would have -- could possibly have a very negative impact on the continuing recovery, yes. yes, ma'am. >> on the deficit commission, this proposal, certainly the larger issue has been around for awhile. why did the president choose now to come out and support this idea? and second quick question, the

proposal we see going through congress or something you might implement through executive order? these types of commissions in the past have ruled out at times certain solutions group also security, president bush said no tax cuts. is there anything at this point you are willing to rule out -- excuse me, tax increases -- via tax increases, entitlement benefit cuts, raise the retirement age, or is everything on the table? >> i did not want to prejudge either a legislative or an executive one. obviously the president's statement comes prior to the senate voting on a proposal, again, that democrats and republicans have outlined as a way forward in dealing with some larger and sometimes intractable budget debates. again, i don't think it makes a lot of sense for me, before the legislative vote or even before the existence of a possible executive commission, to get

into talking about what would and would not be on the table. whether it is a legislative commission or some other commission, i think that is what that commission has to work through. those are the debates. >> and as far as when he came out now -- >> i think because this is something that will come to a vote sometime this week. peter. >> is the president prepared talk in specific terms about what needs to happen to change washington and what specific ways it can be done? you know, entertain republican ideas on tort reform or reaching out and a more bipartisan way? >> i did not know if tort reform would fall under the rubric of the way alleges what it -- legislative process works.

obviously the secretary of health and human services has set up a series of demonstration projects that deal with both health care costs and the legal system. but i think the president will spend some time talking directly about ideas for reforming washington, yes. >> specific ways it can be accomplished? >> yes. yes, sir. >> president karzai is headed to the afghan conference in london this week, and he is saying that he is when asked for that names of some taliban people to be taken off the u.n. sanctions list in return for them laying down their arms and countenancing talks. is this something the white house would be prepared to look at? >> i would simply say that you have heard general petreaus, added his efforts in iraq, discuss similar type efforts in

afghanistan at political reconciliation. you have heard general mcchrystal discuss the same thing. so obviously a similar path to what happened in a rack each of those two individuals have talked through. again, provided that whoever this is accepts the afghan constitution, renounces violence, and publicly breaks with groups that advocate violence. that is what people except -- expect under the notion of reconciliation. >> first on afghanistan as well. last week the u.n. put out a report saying that the amount of graft and kickbacks in afghanistan is about $2.3 billion a year, about 25% of their gross domestic product.

who in the administration is really riding point on dealing with issues of corruption in afghanistan? >> there is obviously a group of people that are working on our afghan policy, david. let me figure out where that -- where some of that information -- i had not seen that report but i can certainly check on who that is. >> on another subject, bernanke, it's just been reported that mccain has declared that he will vote against that. the boiler to be honest with you, i thought that he had said that all while ago, so i do not know -- >> he has made it official. but when you have conservative republicans and liberal democrats who are announcing opposition, presumably from a populist perspective, at the same time that the white house is raising questions about wall street, do you fear that you're getting sort of -- putting out a mixed message or its mark and

less like you're defending bernanke while also trying to talk tough on these other issues, banking issues and as such. is it muddy? >> i do not believe that it is. again, as i said to savannah, i think that the proposal that the president outlined over the past couple of weeks enjoy great support among the american people because they are very commonsense policies in ensuring that taxpayers get their money back and that banks are not allowed to engage in the type of behavior that we've seen contribute to an atmosphere of excessive risk. look, david, i do not -- i obviously have not seen why senator mccain said what he said. but i think the coalition that you mentioned, i think you probably could cobble together

some type of message around a coalition of those also supporting him. so i would not necessarily read into a ton of those. >> what you take from the opposition? is there a lesson that the white house is taking? >> as you have heard me talk about certainly last week, and i think even -- i think you have seen this from people that both support and oppose chairman bernanke. there's still a frustration about where we are in this economy. the president, even in renominating him, believes -- shares some of that frustration as well. we saw in the back end of 2008 and we saw again manifested in the jobs numbers and the growth numbers that we saw both in the first quarter of 2009 -- well, throughout the first quarter of 2009, both in monthly jobs numbers and in terms of economic growth, the sheer size of the

economic hole that we were in. that is not to say that chairman bernanke did not do a superb job in navigating those waters in 2009 and what the president believed was important to -- >> but their criticism is that he did not adequately or properly see the hole to begin with. >> i think the president believes that chairman bernanke has done an extraordinary job in navigating a very different -- difficult situation and deserves both -- deserved to be built in renominated, approved for the renomination, and the white house believes that that indeed will be the case. thanks, guys. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] >> on tuesday, "washington journal"