host: one last call, independent, from springfield, ohio. caller: i heard a couple of -- a couple of callers asking how they can afford $30,000 cars. i want to remind people that, especially those in management and business in this country, henry ford, in the last century said, when he doubled the wages of his employees, he intended to pay his workers enough to buy what it is the make for me every day. something will happen in our country to build the middle class. all the factories and all the imports, people cannot buy them and when wal-mart races to the bottom of paying people a living wage, people will not be able to shop at wal-mart.

hopefully, the capitalist system will turn itself around a little bit and say we need to pay people what they are worth. host: thank-you to everybody who called. we will continue to hang around the little but at the washington auto show. the ceo of ford is making a speech. we will show that to you later. that is ford motor co. president and ceo alan mulally. we appreciate your calls this morning. we'll take it to capitol hill for a hearing on aviation security and like to order 53. the chairman will be joe lieberman of connecticut. the two featured speakers, witnesses, tom kaine, and lee hamilton, former chairman and vice-chairman of the national commission on terrorist attacks upon the u.s., the 9/11 commission. that will run a couple of hours and we will be live until the

house cavils and tha. enjoy your day. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] .

ç>> the hearing will come to order. this is the second in a series of hearings will examine where the intelligence reforms in the wake of the attack of 9/11 are

working. toefor in the light of recent terrorist attacks and the ongoing threat in what we have done earlier may need further reform so that we cannot fulfill our responsibility to protect the homeland security of the american people. i want to go back to last week's first before we focus on this one. i very much appreciated the fact all of the witnesses in last week's hearings, and dennis blair, janet napolitano, all acknowledge that mistakes were made with regard to the christmas day attack on the plane over detroit. all three offered to work with each other and with this

committee to make our existing terrorist -- counter terrorist quicker and harder to penetrate. i thought animal blair -- i thought admiral blair was forthright and it brought him some criticism. it made him the target of some displeasure. it was the right thing to do because it was the way he felt and he spoke in what he believed to be the national interest. it is self evident that our homeland security intelligence did not work as we on this committee, congressman hamilton, post -11 with of wanted those agencies to work. -- post 9/11 would have wanted

those agencies to work. when they do deal with the shortcomings, we have some hope the problems will be fixed and obviously whatever mistakes will make one not occur again. one of the most troubling revelations last week was that none of the witnesses was consulted before the christmas day bombing was turned over to our criminal courts rather than the military, where i believe he should have been held. he was a trains to attack america by al qaeda. since our hearing, osama bin laden has boasted of al qaeda sponsorship of the christmas day attack on america. and so while al qaeda claims credit for this attack, umar farouk abdulmutallab, who i think we can describe it as a

soldier in al qaeda, and not an american citizen, now enjoys the constitutional protections of an american citizen, including a lawyer, who counseled him to remain silent even though he may have information that could protect the american people from another terrorist attack. to meet this is outrageous, a kind of alice in wonderland in turning the world on a sense -- in turning common sense on its head. i urge the authorities to turn abdulmutallab where he can be held as a prisoner of war, which he is, acknowledging with some certainty and gratitude that this means he will be held and given rights far in excess of what the geneva convention requires enemy combatants or

prisoners of war be given. we will stay on top of this to make sure this mistake, the failure to consult with -- to decide how to handle abdulmutallab and the decision to turn him over to the civilian courts is ever made again. i do believe our intelligence gathering analysis remarkably improved since the attack of 9/11. the sharing of intelligence is vastly improved. this is due in part to the judgment with us today. shares of the -- shares of thcsf the 9/11 commission.

driving the changes that make the american people more secure today than they were during 9/11. that leads us in part to refer to the act i just referred to as the 9/11 commission act. it sounds a lot better above saying the acronym. the fact is it implemented most of the bipartisan recommendations of the commission. governor kean and congressman hamilton have been unique on the commission and continue to track the implementation of their recommendations persistently over the last five years. they are testifying before us today as cochairs of the national security preparedness group. i welcome both of you and a thank you for your service. your recommendations were

comprehensive in terms of long term actions we can and should take to blunt the terrorists' appeal and to stop their ability to recruit and also to defend our nation against further attack. one of the challenges revealed in our hearings last week was the overwhelming amount of information that is collected by our intelligence and law enforcement agencies for analysis. it's been estimated that the national security agency alone collects on a daily basis four times more information than is stored in the library of congress. that is how much is being collected. i know governor kean and congressman hamilton have been considering this challenge and i would be interested to hear how

we can better organized our analysis efforts so information can be mined more quickly. after 9/11 we were saying the dots were collecting did not come together on the same board. i think now, things to your recommendations and the legislation that followed, the dots are coming together, but there are so many billions of dots, the question is, how do we seek the patterns to help us act preemptively to stop attacks against our country? another question relates to the authorities that we provide in the national counterterrorism center in the commission act. bottom line question, do we need to give the dni additional authorities or do we need to

push them harder to use the authorities they already have it? i know you have done some preliminary work on this and i look forward to the guidance that you can offer our committee as we go forward with this series of hearings. there will be a status report and perhaps recommendations for legislation or further executive action. i cannot think you enough for your efforts to secure our nation against terrorism, particularly islamist terrorism. there is no sense of morality or respect to life. that is the challenge of our lifetime. because of your service, we're doing a lot better than we otherwise would have done in beating that challenge. senator collins.

>> thank you. i do join you in welcoming our distinguished witnesses back to our committee. but for their efforts, many who are here today, we would not have accomplished as much as we were able to. nevertheless, we are hearing these words today -- intelligence failures, calls for reform, lack of accountability, failure to connect the dots, testimony by governor kean and congressman hamilton. it sounds like deja vu all over again. but in fact, there are significant differences between now and then. when our nation was attacked on the morning of september 11,

2001, our intelligence community was hampered by an organizational structure that undermined unity of effort. it was led by director who had little authority over its various elements and of little incentive to put focus beyond the mission of the cia. it was burdened with the culture that promoted parochial agency interest over the intelligence needs of a nation. the intelligence reform act of 2004 fundamentally change our intelligence community. working with the families of the victims and with our distinguished witnesses as well as the rest of the members of the 9/11 commission, this committee was able to pass the most substantial reforms of our intelligence agencies in more than 50 years.

my favorite named for the bill is the collins-lieberman intelligence reform act. in the five years since this act became walaw, information dramatically. in 2009 alone, the intelligence community working with law enforcement and homeland security agencies has have to detect and disrupt numerous terrorist plot targeting our nation. two of the successes were the arrest of david headley in separate conspiracies. other successes were made possible by the reforms this committee spearheaded in 2004. but standing alone, the law cannot accomplish

transformation. at the end of the day, even the most powerful laws are just words on paper. they relied on the president and leaders to produce reform, to aggressively carry out the authority that they have been given, and to fight the war on terrorism, president, the secretary of state, and other leaders must use the laws we pass to their fullest extent. unfortunately, the terrorist attack at fort hood and the failed christmas day plot are stark reminders of what can happen when those authorities are not used effectively. let's just look at some of the authorities given under the 2004 law. the dna has the clear authority to determine requirements and priorities for the management and passingç analysis on

dissemination of national intelligence. the initial analysis shows the dni failed to respond to the growing threat that al qaeda posed to the united states and apparently failed to target sufficient resources at this threat. the intelligence reform act provides ample authority to insure the maximum availability to intelligence information within the intelligence community. intelligence regarding the threat posed by major hasan remains stovepipe at the fbi joint terrorism task force instead of being provided to the the fdepartment of defense o

prevent that attack. the law directs the dni to disseminate the information that include intelligence integration capabilities. here again, the intelligence that may have allowed us to identify abdulmutallab as a terrorist remained undiscovered in many databases. disseminated, those dots were out there. there were not disseminated, but they were not connected. the law provides the secretary of state with clear authority to revoke a visa at any time at her discretion. yet abdulmutallab's these that remained valid one aborted flight 253. the state department had already

decided to question him about his ties to extremists. i would asked, how could he have been a threat to the united states in the future based on these extremist ties, but not a sufficient current threat to caused his visa to be revoked? that defies logic and common sense. finally, despite the president's authority to hold abdulmutallab as an enemy belligerent and subject him to a thorough interrogation for intelligence purposes, the department of justice as we learned in our last hearing unilaterally decided to treat him as a common criminal, as an american citizen, advise him of his right to remain silent, and grant him

a lawyer at taxpayers' expense. it is outrageous carnations top intelligence officials were never even consulted on this vital decision. senator lieberman and i introduced a bill last week to try to prevent that from ever happening again. my point is that the president's must empower his senior officials to use every authority available to them to defeat the terrorist threat. doing so does not require action by congress. that is not to say that further reforms are not needed. correcting those problems is possible under the crime law. it is a matter of using the authority. they do not require a 60-day

review or more studies. they should be implemented now. nothing less than the security of our nation hangs in the balance. thank you. >> thank you very much. i want to note members of the families of some of those we lost on 9/11 whose persistence has not just matched those of kean of and hamilton and members of congress but surpassed it. it's just great that you are here. you're in the front row. we thank you and we will stick with it. if it wasn't for these folks, we never would have had the commission. if not for the commission, we never would have had the legislation. do you guys toss a coin as to who goes first? congressman hamilton, it is great to see you.

welcome. >> thank you very much for inviting governor kean and myself to be with you. we are cognizant of the fact that were not for this committee, many of the recommendations of export 9/11 commission would never have been enacted. the committee has shown extraordinary leadership on these questions over a period of years. i know that the country is safer and the country should be very grateful because of the work of this committee. we thank you for it. senator lieberman, i want to say you're exactly right about the families. this law would never come into effect if it had not been for them. governor kean and i have had a wonderful relationship and support from them. we are appearing today because of a bipartisan groups and our

written testimony gives the membership of that group the name. i know their names. they are familiar to you. it is an extraordinary group of professionals that join tom and me in this review of the 9/11 commission recommendations. at the national security prepared this group, we have been studying the implementation of the recommendations. we are still pretty early on in that review. but we do have at least some tentative conclusions to present to you today. the christmas event and at fort hood, as well, give us the opportunity to make two important points. one is an obvious one and that is the threat from al qaeda and radical islam remains very

strong. one of the members of our group, you know him by name, bruce hoffman, has observed that al qaeda it is on the march. all of us agree with that. we have expressed over and over our sense that the urgency on terrorism has been too low and we have to reject complacency and recognize that we still can see a serious threat. it is not a reason for panic but a reason for a concerted effort. the second observation would make is that we see the determination of the terrorist who would attack the homeland unabated and it reminds us the need for establishing the national counterterrorism center in the first place. we need to support these entities and build them into strong and enduring

institutions. it is imperative in our view of the dni be successful in its vital mission it has been asked to undertake for the country. we have been pleased that your committee has initiated this series of hearings on how well intelligence reform has been implemented, and that is exactly the kind of congressional oversight that we call for in the report. there has been a debate within the intelligence community on the state of intelligence reform and the effectiveness of the dni. the dni has been hobbled over enlist disputes. we're concerned over the criticism that is sometimes made over the bureaucracy of the dni and we support, as i am sure this committee does, an ongoing re-evaluation of its functions to ensure its leanness.

the congress and president gave the dni a massive to-do list, a great deal of authority in the wake of the intelligence failures of 9/11 and weapons of mass destruction. it is not enough to say the dni bureaucracy should be reduced. we need to take a freshç look t the essential tasks and then seek to adjust accordingly. in recent months, we have come to some preliminary conclusions. we have a lot more work to do. we believe they dni has achieved a meaningful measure of success in its first year. it has been worth the inevitable turmoil. it is a work in progress. -- it is a

they have repeatedly connected the dots and shared the information necessary to defeat the terrorist attacks. improvements have been made on this point of sharing the information. we continue to believe that sharing is not as prompt and as seamless as it should be. many of the successes ofing dni have been -- of the dni have been dependent under the bush administration and the obama administration. we want to continue to look closely to make sure it has the authority to do its work. it is our sense of the success of the dni in the short term it will not rise or fall on whether we make additional adjustments to the intelligence reform and prevention act. that was a difficult piece of

legislation to get enacted. it is on the books now. it will be the governing statute for a good long time. so you have to work with it. i think there probably are some ambiguities in the law. you could argue that is more a failure of exercising the authority than ambiguity. for example, section 1018, capacity designed to ensure the chain of command will not be abrogated. raises some question of authority. there have been some problems resulting from that section. we hope those have been cleared or at least improved by the executive order 12333 put into effect in the final weeks of the bush administration.

qthe greatest challenge facing dni relates to the authority and the role. from my point of view, i think from tom's as well, the burden is clearly on thew3 president to be very specific as to who is in charge of the intelligence community, where final authority lies on certain matters. you need a strong dni as a leader. the person has to drive integration, which we all know is a massive task. at the same time, the dni's authorities must be exercised with discretio a in in

consideration of the other intelligence agencies. you really do need eight discipline. the president's leadership is the key. it is crucial and it must be continuing. or we run the risk of mission confusion and decrease the prospect of long and lasting reform that was recommended after 9/11. the ability to lead the intelligence community depends on the president defining his or her role and giving them the power and the authority to act. >> thank you very much for a strong and thoughtful statement. governor kean, welcome back. >> thank you, mr. chairman. we're all blogging are best to get this massive bill passed.

-- we were all lobbying our best to get this massive bill passed. leadership has taken control in the senate. this bill will pass. so thank you. thank you very much for your leadership in that area and the incredible families of 9/11. they were the wind in our sa ils of the commission. they are lobbying to make this country safer. every time i come here and see them, i just echoed leak and the committee in saying thank you so very much. -- i just accokeeecho lee and te committee in saying thank you. the greatest single challenge that rises is the urgent need to

strengthen the analytic process. the president said there was a felony to connect the dots. we might have been able to connect disparate pieces of information. we are pleased the president asked the dni to look at this information. the dni is properly situated to assume a leadership role in applying the most rigorous standards to the analytical tradecraft. congress gave the dni the resources it needs and the ability to recruit and to keep the very best people available. judging the sources of potential tax problems. the president's review has shown, we had a strategic sense

that al qaeda was becoming a threat. we did not know it progressed to the point of launching individuals. we collect and of enormous amount of intelligence. we need the very best people to sort it through but taking it and making a decision as to, where is the next attack likely to come from? what is happening out there? you have talked about more information coming in the library of congress. it is incredible what comes in every day. in this age, we are collecting more information than ever before. how'd we understand it? how do we integrated? the dni needs to deal with information overload.

they can do a better job of pushing information to the right people. welcome president obama's order to distribute reports more quickly and more widely. we can better sort through massive amounts of information to make sure the right people are seeing it and seeing it in time to make a difference. the technology we use must be constantly upgraded. it must be properly placed so better analysis can occur. we have heard a number of times back five years ago before the commission that the analysts were sometimes treated as second-class citizens. hopefully that is not happening today. but these people are probably if not the most important, one of the very most important people in the whole community. we do everything we can to support them, too shy of their

professionalism, and to get the best of them to stay in government. a second lesson from the christmas attacks reminds us of the importance of eliminating terrorist centuries. we found that the attackers from 9/11 benefited from the command structure that existed in afghanistan, but commission placed great emphasis in prioritizing actual potential terrorist sanctuaries. we recommended strategic strategies employed all elements of national power. the more we can keep terrorists insecure and on the run, the better off we are. we are fortunate that the attack on christmas day did not succeed. they remind us, let's look.

or are they developing centaurus? bruce hoffman observed al qaeda it is seeking out exploiting failed states in any other area of lawlessness. they have increased their activities in pakistan, nigeria, and yemen. the u.s. could take a fresh look at these areas, and deepen our commitment to make sure that they cannot exploit those territories it to launch attacks on our homeland. there are a couple of left over matters from our report. we have talked a number of times about balancing the need between civil liberties and national security. we have to get that balance right. it is absolutely important. we recommend a civil liberties and board located in the white house which would look at the implications, whatever laws are passed come from a civil

liberties. of view. the board was staffed in 2006. congress further strengthen it in 2007. we have an independent agency outside the white house. the board held numerous sessions with the fbi director among others, on terror surveillance, and other topics. çbut the board has disappeared. it has been dormant since that time. we have now a massive capacity in this country to develop data on individuals. the board should be the champion of seeing that it does not intrude on the privacy and civil liberties. we continue to believe that that board is critical to the overall functioning, and we urged president obama to reconstitute its come up to.

its members, and to allow them full access to the information to perform will reconsider an essential function. let me give you one more leftover from the 9/11 report. when those of us who are citizens come down to washington and want to find out about transportation or about lavar mental protection or education, we can go and we can hear from the various committees and participate as much as we can as part of our democracy. we can do so with intelligence. it is secret. and yet as we know, the functioning of the intelligence agencies is absolutely essential to this fight we now have. it will be essential in the future. the public cannot really get involved because of the nature

of the information. in this area, which have congressional oversight. that is why we made such a point in our report of saying how thoughimportant with thought congressional oversight was. we use the word "dysfunctional." that was not our word. it came from members of both parties on the intelligence committees. we have not seen -- we made some recommendations. congress decided not to pursue those recommendations. it is too important that congress' oversight be as good as it possibly can be. when we interviewed this director of homeland security, she made the same. better predecessors have made.

they spent almost 1/3 overtimed testifying in this complex system rather than working to actually improve our overall security in this country. we also suggested that perhaps the intelligence committees have more authority so that they can do a better job and command that from the intelligence communities. we point this out because we think it is so very important that congressional oversight insurers they are working effectively. and also to help resolve disputes of conflicting missions. we would urge the congress to look at this issue and take action to strengthen the that. thank you very much. >> thank you, governor kean. let me say amen to what you

just said. congress was quite effective at taking on some of the status quo, and notwithstanding the resistance of the department of defense, existing agencies would push through in the national interest to achieve the reforms, the one existing institution that congress approved to reform it was congress itself. you're absolutely right. we try to adopt reforms that you've gone back to this morning in an uncharacteristic experience, we lost miserably. but i want to challenge you and i accept this challenge myself. let's figure out if we can make

another run at this because it really is important and it does hamper the conduct of our homeland security and intelligence community by those involved. there's no excuse for it except turf protection, frankly. i thank you for bringing that up and let's come back to it. i think we'll do seven-minute rounds of question. someone has been kind enough to not run the clock. thank you. let me say that last winter, we noted five years of the post- 9/11 act. we decided in oversight review. it came after both the fort hood and the christmas day bombing spree we begin this in the context of that.

the fact is as we try to pull back from those events, the reforms -- the experience we had worked to protect us. maybe we had some good fortune and some good luck. the truth is that there was not a successful terrorist attacks since 9/11. but then in 2009, it seemed to was the pace of the attempted attacks against the nine states pick up. there were at least 12 better publicly known. there are others that have not been discussed in public. most troubling, up three attempted attacks actually successfully breached our homeland defenses. there was one in arkansas. the man walked into an army recruiting office and killed an army recruiter.

major hasan at fort hood, and then the attempt on christmas day. i wanted to ask either or both of you to step back a little bit and give us your best judgment about what is going on out there? what happened to increase the pace of attacks? is it just a loss of the sense of urgency? it's something different going on that we need -- is something different going on the way to respond to? >> senator, the immediate thought i have in response to your question is that al qaeda has changed. the 9/11 attack, as we all know, was a highly sophisticated effort. it took a lot of planning and a

lot of people. it did not take a lot of money. it really was impressive from the standpoint of planning and execution. i think the attacks you referred to in 2009 have been kind of solo performances. in some respects, that probably indicates progress, and it means that our aggressive actions with regard to al qaeda have been çsuccessful, at least in part. and is more difficult for al qaeda to organize the complicated attacks. but their intent remains. perhaps their capabilities have been diminished. i do not have any doubt at all that they are sitting there somewhere plotting how to get at

us. they're going to do it anyway they can, with any capability they have. if they cannot organize an effort to fly airplanes into the world trade towers, they can get one person to get on an airplane and try to blow it apart. so our guard has to stay up. i think secondly that our defenses and our offenses with regard to the terrorist threat have improved. we are a lot better than we were. that is no reason for patting ourselves on the back or complacency. but it is a fact. a lot of people in the government are very talented and they're working very hard to block these attacks. not just the federal government but in city and state governments, as well.

we all know the efforts going forward in new york city. i think both factors are present. >> governor kean? >> traditionally, al qaeda used to talk about big things. after 9/11, they talked about doing something. bin laden talked about a nuclear attack. there was one in britain where there were going to blow up the airlines. it does say something that they have been able to pull them off. now they are saying in a sense, let's try these smaller stuff. fort bin laden, if that was him on thatç tape, -- 4 bin ladefon to take credit, it chose they don't have anything else to talk about. now they will lose whatever they

can because they want to show some success. >> i appreciate that response. it gives us something to think about. let's focus in on the dni. i think a lot of us would have guessed the toughest battles that the dni would have with the defense intelligence community. if there have been battles, it would of been within the defense community. i think you raise reasonable questions about whether the dni has become too large. we give them a lot to do. bottom line, i want to draw from you what i assume from your statements is your position, that you have no second thoughts about creating dni. at my right about that? >> absolutely right. we believe they dni is exactly

what we need right now. >> you raised questions about efficiency of spending money. i take it that when you talk about clarifying the mission, you're not talking about weakening dni. >> that is exactly right. we want to strengthen dni. we're not talking about weakening it in any way. i must say i saw a chart to of thinking dni's office the other day. i was quite surprised at things they have taken on kirk is worth a quick glance. is this really necessary to be done by the dni? deliquescence can be raised by some of those efforts. they have a university. i do not know what that is.

in this context, i do not know what is. i am not sure that is the job of the dni. i think all of that needs to be explored. we have no second thoughts. this is a great big, massive, it usually funded enterprises, the intelligence community. you have to have somebody at the top of it with authority, or just is not going to work. that authority has to be accountable. somebody has to knock heads together to get over this mind set of, i can have the information, you cannot. and get outside the stovepipe and to force the integration of the intelligence community.

that authority should be given in the dni. he cannot exercise it, no matter what the statute says, without very strong presidential backing. >> i agree. is it too early to evaluate president obama's relationship with the dni? >> my impression is that the intelligence community is relatively new to the president. i think he began to receive intelligence somewhere along the campaign. senator mccain can tell you when that happened. my impression is that his instincts were probably good but he is still feeling his way. his preference may be -- he said i have appointed good people here. he has done some good

appointments, i think. i do not think he has a firm grasp yet of the intelligence community and therefore i am pretty strong in my thought that he has to step been pretty hard here. or some of these tensions which have surfaced will have exacerbated. >> ok, thank you. my time is up. >> mr. chairman, let me follow up on the. you just raised. the law is clear on who is in charge of the intelligence community. i remember the debates we had and how difficult they were in establishing the quarterback, the one person who was going to be accountable. and yet, in spite of what appears to be a clear legal mandate, the dni and the

director of the cia still seem to be in gaged insignificant turf battles. in just the past year, reports indicate that fit white house has had to intervene in disputes over the cia's role in afghanistan, the chain of command over covert action, and the designation of the chief u.s. intelligence officer in overseas posts. those conflicts undermine the unity of the effort that was the gold that we shared and the very reason we created the dni. i am concerned by reports that the president may have inadvertently undermined the dni by sliding with the cia in these disputes. i have two questions for you.

does the president need to more clearly indicated to the intelligence community that they dni is in charge and has his full support? second, do you believe that relationship needs to be further clarified in law, or is this a matter of the law being adequate for the most part and the president needing to assert, to lay down the law, if you will? will start with you. >> we have always fought -- lee has been very articulate. the success of keeping dni will depend totally on the leadership of the president. in a way, this christmas day bombing did us a favor. i think we were not paying close attention to this area. that is understandable.

we were talking about health care and cap and trade. we got distracted a bit. everybody got distracted and we were not paying full attention to this area. cracks were allowed to form. things got a little off track. now we have a wake-up call. the president has been clear. i assume the actions will follow the statements and that he will pay strict attention to this problem. his leadership is going to be directed to this area. it is not going to happen without that. he passed to make clear what he believes the authorities are and he has to step in on any kind of dispute. >> my answer to your first

question is yes. i try to make that clear. the president does need to make it crystal clear to everybody in the intelligence community that the dni is in charge. as i have said, the exercise of that authority requires a lot of diplomacy and sensitivity. it is a real challenge in how you exercise that leadership. he should be in charge. do you need a change in the law? that is still little tougher. you're not going to change this whoplaw. of the flaws -- the flaws have been revealed. in the longer-term, this is not the first whatever passed by the

congress the may have had some ambiguity in it. it might very well be that you can refine it down the line. i do not have specific language to offer it to you today. i guess my central feeling is this is the lot and it will be that way for a while and you have to make it work. >> last week i question the dni, the head of the national counterterrorism center, and our secretary of homeland security about whether they were consulted in the decision to charge abdulmutallab as a criminal and give him his miranda rights and give him a lawyer, which caused him to stop cooperating and answering questions. i was shocked to hear from each of these top officials that they

were not consulted about a decision that had such implications for our nation's ability to better understand what may be further plots emanating from yemen. governor, what was your reaction to learning that our nation's top intelligence officials had not been consulted about the decision? >> i was shocked and i was upset. it made no sense whatsoever to may. here is a man who may have trained with other people who are trying to get into this country in one way or another, who may have worked with some of the top leadership in yemen and we do not know the details of that. he may know about other plots that are pending. we have not found out about them. this is not just about prosecuting an individual. it is protecting the american

people. things of -- decisions of this kind should not be made without the full import of the full intelligence community. the fact this was done without this kind of consultation was upsetting and shocking. i come from new york. regardless of how we feel about whether the trial should be going on in new york, again, i gather the attorney general did not consult any member of the intelligence community before making that decision. we have to get our act together. .

and that has to be clarified. i am not surprised the fbi stepped in. they weren't there. they go in. but there has to be a policy that has to be clarified. the legislation, or your proposed bill, which mandates consultation and of the dni makes all kinds of sense to me. the intelligence director should be consulted. but importantly, there must be a policy. one of the things we learned on the 9/11 commission is we got into this interrogation, and this is a difficult business,

interrogating people. and you better give very sure that you have got the right people asking the questions. we can have differences of opinion as to what kind of pressure ought to be put on a suspect. but interrogating people takes patience, and it takes skill, and you have to train an interrogator very carefully. i am attracted to the idea of a high-value interrogation group. i do not think we have paid enough attention to the professionalism, if you would, of the interrogator. i am not acquainted with the details of that, but i hope it is developing highly skilled people who know how to interrogate. an awful lot is at stake in finding out all you possibly can. >> thank you. >> thank you, senator. briefly, one of the surprising

things i have learned afterward is that there was a recommendation, and i thought an announcement of the beginning of the high value interrogation group. one of the witnesses last week referred to by the initials hig. as far as i can determine now, the group was never fully operational, never set up. so it was not in the position to be called on to do exactly what we would have wanted it to do, as you have both said, after abdulmutallab was apprehended. thank you. the remaining senators will be called by an order of appearance in the hearing room. >> thank you. again, gentlemen, welcome. it is great to see you again. to for the wonderful work you continue to do for our country. i am going to ask the question later in my allocated time that

will draw upon the great success and extraordinary leadership you provided for the 9/11 commission to see what we can garner from that experience. and as we prepared to move forward this week on legislation on a different commission, either statutory commission focusing on deficit reduction or perhaps on a commission set up by executive order, but i want to bring out some ideas and ask for your thoughts and given the extraordinary success that we realize under your leadership. i would like to say that the road to improvement is always under construction. that is certainly true when it comes to finding ways to stop the bad guys from doing bad things to our country. when you're commission -- when you're commission completed its work and made recommendations to us, i know you made a large number of recommendations,

dozens, the number is 46 in my mind. do you recall how many recommendations we made to us? it think they were all pretty much bipartisan. >> 70. >> do you recall how many we adopted? >> we have calculated that 80% of the commission recommendations have been adopted in whole or in part. and i think in part covers a lot of ground, but most of those, and about 20% -- a little less than 20% out right rejected -- some may still be pending in one way or another. >> ok. one of you said earlier in the response to senator lieberman's questions call me mentioned it has been eight years since 9/11. every day terrorists are targeting us here and around the world, trying to create mayhem.

and they have not had a whole lot of luck so far. it has been close. but they have missed opportunities as well. something that you have recommended and that we had adopted and that has been implemented by the executive branch is being pursued by our men and women all over the world, something is working. it does not mean we sit back and rest. but when you look what we have done, including the things it you have recommended, that really seem to be working, what stands out for you? when you look good with you have recommended that we have passed and implemented fed does not meet last year, maybe it is incomplete, what might that be? what did you think is working well and is important? what are some areas that maybe we did not follow up and did not

implement well? >> obviously, the creation of the dni and the congressional legislation of the nctc was the heart of our recommendation and was to force information sharing. black of information sharing was one of the things we found that probably lead to 911 as much as anything else. -- lack of information sharing was one of the things we found the probably lead to 9/11 as much as anything else. that was key. i mentioned two areas before were recommendations have not been implemented. one is the civil liberties commission. we think it is very important and basically does not exist because the president never appointed its members. secondly, congressional oversight. we still do not believe, and we hear again from bipartisan people on both sides of the aisle that they are not satisfied in the intelligence

committee that they have the ability to do the kind of oversight this country needs, and that is deeply disturbing. if they are not doing oversight, nobody is doing any oversight. it cannot continue to exist with this kind of problem. i could mention a number of others, but those are the most important. >> thank you. >> he is on the mark. on the plus side, i would think the recommendations we made with regard to the intelligence community, including the dni and the nctc and other aspects, i would judge them broadly successful. not completely, but broadly successful. i think a lot of the recommendations we made in the transportation sector, watch lists can certainly be improved. we recommended that. better detection equipment, we recommended that. i have been a little disappointed in the slowness of

the adoption of some of the detection of improvements of detection mechanisms. cargo screening and all those kinds of things i think are under way, taking a little more time probably than we want it to. but they have basically been approved. we had a whole chapter in the book on the 9/11 commission on foreign policy recommendations on the question of how to deal with the islamic world. that was not so much legislative recommendations as foreign policy, and i think we have got a ways to go in implementing those because our relationship with the islamic world is a huge foreign policy challenge and will be for decades to come in all likelihood. i want to emphasize the civil liberties and privacy board. look, you have the capability to day of surveillance and

intrusion into the lives of people that is incredible. with the government can learn about you today and all of these fancy technological devices we have got to intrude into private lives, and kate, we all support it. we think it is necessary. but if you have an argument today in the bureaucracy between the security people and civil liberties people, i will tell you who's going to win the argument. it will be the security people every time. we picked up the paper the of the day and none of the fbi had been violating the law for five or six years. and it was not ever called to the intention of the inspector general. he finally found it up. the fbi, which is supposed to be sensitive to these matters. the point is here that you need somebody out here in the government that is checking everything that is done with

regard to security and asking themselves, can it be done better with a little more respect for privacy and civil liberties? we all know the privacy and civil liberties are going to be invaded. we understand that. you cannot walk through an airport without understanding that. but i think we have to get stronger and have a group with robust powers to be a counterbalance to the argument for security. tom and i, i think all of our commissioners, are very strong on that. >> it is a very bipartisan sense. >> i have one more. then i will go back to the question. when i look at commissions that have been extraordinarily successful, i go back to 1982 with social security. congressman hamilton and senator mccain of voted for that.

we have before us this week the idea of a statutory commission that sort of gives us recommendations that are binding. there must be some kind of override that exists. most commissioners would be sitting members of congress. others say could be people like you who have a world of experience to bring to it. given the success of this commission, give us a little bit of advice is to go forward this week. >> well, pick a german like tom kane -- pick eight chairmen like tom kean. he was chairman. i was vice chairman. we knew each other by reputation bed did not know each other well. tom walks into the room. we're going to make these joint decisions. we will not hire anybody and will not fire anybody.

we will not make any decision unless we do it together. >> it was said that one of the unfortunate things we have going for us was -- a think he's to put it, reform politicians. >> i describe myself as a recovering governor. >> there's nobody in the commission, i do not think, with any interest in running for anything. and do not think anybody was looking for appointment of any kind. so our minds were clear. our agenda was trying to protect the country. that probably enabled us -- that fact probably enabled us to get over the kind of partisan -- it was a terrible time, and this is going into one of the most divisive presidential elections in our history. we started off with the

republicans sitting here and a democrat sitting over here. the first, walked in, i remembered democrats in one corner. we walked into the room and basically said to break it up. after that, i said republicans will sit next to democrats and the other way around and will not meet again unless we have the kind of the seating arrangement. but it helps to have your mind clear of any of the problems, so it can concentrate on whatever the task is, and not to care very much personally and tried to do the right thing. as a commission, we tried to do the right thing, and that was our mantra. we would argue about these things, but we would look for what the facts show and what the right thing is. >> thank you. that was very helpful. >> thank you for being so generous with the time. thank you.

>> senator mccain. >> i want to thank our witnesses for their continued service for the country. especially, i would like to welcome the 9/11 families, without whom the 9/11 commission would never have come into being and these much needed reforms being infected. i was struck that you said 80% of the recommendations probably had been enacted into law. on page 419 of the commission report, it says, strict and congressional oversight of intelligence and homeland security. of all our recommendations, strengthening congressional oversight may be among the most of gold and important. so long as oversight is covered by current congressional rules and resolutions, we believe the american people will not get the security they want and need. it seems to me we have not

implemented that very strong language that is contained in your report. is that accurate? >> unfortunately, you're totally correct. >> ines seems to me, mr. chairman, that we ought to go back at this. -- and then it seems to me that we ought to go back at this. we should do it until such time as we shame our colleagues and to be more concerned about national security than they are about turf. i hope that the next opportunity, we will join in and try to push the changes that have been recommended by the administration. would you say it is probably the most important of failure of all the recommendations that you made? >> yes, i would. and members of the congress were on our commission and they all said and we proposed this that it was the most of the cold organization to be implemented. we said that it was the right

thing to do, and everybody agreed, so we went ahead. >> i will ask the 9/11 families to go into battle again. if anybody can get it done, you all can, and i thank you. i was disturbed by the events in some things revealed in the hearing that the chairman and the co-chairmen held a short time ago. a 50-minute interrogation, a decision made to give the christmas bomber the miranda rights and a civil trial. i only know press accounts. i do not have classified information on this individual. he was talking. there had to be a pause, and when he woke up, get a lawyer. understandably, the lawyer did what lawyers do. that is their job. i am not blaming the lawyers,

but how we could have made a decision the way we did brings me to a larger issue. and that is the whole issue of the disposition of detainees. guantanamo bay, the trials, under what circumstances -- and it seems to me that the overall policy is so -- the word may be incoherent, but certainly not coordinated. i guess there is a more kind description. we now have kind of an ad hoc decision making as far as the treatment of detainees. we still have not resolve the issue of enemy combatants who we cannot bring to trial because of insufficient evidence, but yet, we know we cannot release them. we have learned that there is a certain percentage -- of various 10% to 20%, of detainees better back in the fight.

including some in leadership roles. so dozens this argue for not -- so does this not argue for congress to develop legislation that addresses all these amorphous area as a of trials, of detention, of treatment of this issue of any combat -- of enemy combatants that you cannot bring to trial but at the same time can not release? for example, an annual review of these cases. but so far, none of that has been translated, at least to a policy that members of congress understand. so senator lieberman and senator gramm and i are working on legislation to try to address this issue, and we want to work with the administration to

prevent another situation has evolved with the christmas ballomber but also to resolve te -- resolve the existing issue. some will be tried in new york. some will be tried in guantanamo. some may be tried in other places. does this not -- does this christmas bomber issue not focus the absolute requirement that we address this issue in the policy-making and perhaps a legislative way? >> i very much agree with your conclusion. these people present a real challenge for us within our constitutional system. the problem is you have got a detainee, you cannot prove a criminal charge against him, let us say. at the same time, he could kill

you. it does not fit in the american constitutional system. and we have not figured it out yet. i think the most important thing you said was that you and senator lieberman and senator gramm are working on it. i am delighted to hear that. i did not know it. i think we hear a lot about how government does not work very well today, how dysfunctional it is. this is been an area where the legislative branch and the executive branch have failed, flat out failed. we have had this challenge now for a good part of a decade or maybe more. neither president, bush nor obama, has dealt with it, and the congress is not dealt with it. i am delighted to know that you're doing this. i think it is a very tough bill draft. the important characteristic

that is needed in the bill, however the details are any of got to look to lawyers who know a lot more about it than i do for the details, but the law has to be perceived as being fair. perceived by americans is being fair, whatever that may mean, perceived by the foreign and international community as being fair. i think that is what you have to strive for. that does not mean you give them all the rights of the american citizen. i am not arguing that. but senator, i applaud the initiative. i think this is been a failure of the u.s. government as a whole to deal with this very, very tough problem. and i certainly wish you well on it. >> once again, thank you for your leadership. i cannot agree with lee more. >> thank you. >> too much, senator mccain. i appreciate your leadership on this. it has been very good to work with you and senator gramm.

the choice for our country in deciding how to deal with terrorism suspects we take into incarceration is not a choice between applying the rule of law and not applying the rule of law. we are a country of laws. it is a question of which rule of law. is it the rule of domestic criminal law or is it the rule of the laws of war? of course, i believe it is the second. but that was a very important exchange. thank you. senator bennett, your next. >> to add very much, mr. chairman. i it -- thank you very much. i appreciate the dialogue and appreciate the witnesses and the important subject to have discussed. rather than go back over some of those, because i think the record is now clear, congressman hamilton, let me pick up on a

comment he made. it may appear to some to be a somewhat smaller issue, but you raised it, and i have an interest in it. when you talk about the necessity for better detection equipment -- i spent a lot of time going through airports, as do we all, but i have personally experienced the morhigher technology with respect to body imaging. we have one of those on a trial basis that the salt lake airport. i went through it without any bodily harm or any psychological embarrassment. no displays of any embarrassing fashion anywhere.

i am drafting language and i plan to introduce it shortly, and it is legislation that would require tsa to adopt and employ technology like the body imaging technology at an accelerated pace. as you pointed out, it has been eight years, and we're still using the old mag and bag technology, the magnetometer and searching the bags, which is not very effective and quite interested and very slow. -- quite interested in very slow. i think we should get tsa to employ technology with the capability to detect plastic and liquid explosives, non-metallic threads, and so on. now -- by the way, i very much support what tsa has done with respect to privacy in these

technologies, and we need to make sure that we go as far as we can to see to it that that is balanced as well. ok, we do that in the united states. now somebody gets on an airplane in yemen and transfers in amsterdam. what kind of threat to do we have in the world of transportation that says it is fine for tsa to be doing this, but it will not have any impact on the kind of thing that we saw with the christmas pa bomber? give me your reaction on how technology can be used and how we can get other countries to use it. >> do not know anything that has frustrated me personall more than the inability over a period of years to develop adequate detection equipment.

the most serious thing, in my mind, is the inability to detect nuclear materials. and knowing and spend a lot of money at that. this is a problem that goes back well before 9/11. but we still have not come up with it. so i think there has to be a crash effort, if you will, in the search and development in the scientific community to develop better technology here. the hijackers got on those airplanes in at 911 with four- inch blade knives. they knew you could not get on with eight-inch blades. these people are very sophisticated about our vulnerabilities. and whenever we make a change, they begin to adopt -- they begin to adapt to it. so the technology has to try to keep out in front.

i personally do not have any problem with the body images. i think they ought to be used. i am not that sure ey would have caught our december -- stopped that incident. in other words, people have said to me that even with body imaging, he might have gone through. but in any case, there clearly better than the metal detectors. our adversaries figured out a long time ago they have got to do something other than metal in order to cause problems. now the international problem is a very difficult one, exceedingly difficult. and i know our people have spent a lot of time talking to other countries about strengthening their procedures. i think we have to get to the place where we do not let

people into this country unless they have gone through a security process that is rigorous, however defined. >> governor mccain -- kean. >> our biggest defense is not technology in that area. it is technology in identifying bad people that should not get visas and get into this country. as you know, when you go to these centers, you can see that every person is getting on an airplane at that time heading toward the united states. that is probably the moment the best -- that is probably the best defense we have. the christmas day brombomber should have been on the no-fly list.

i am for any technology we can have to recognize this. our enemies will be trying to get through our technology, and at the same time we have to upgrade our technologies. i think we should do that. it is the best defense we have. do not let the bad people get on the airplane to begin with. did not let them get visas. do not let them get to the airport. do not let them even approach getting on the airplane to the united states. >> thank you. >> thank you very much. next we have senator kirk. i might try to go vote early and come back. if i am not back when center kirk finishes, then senator burris can go next. thank you. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you for your leadership and continuing oversight in this important matter. let me thank our witnesses for

their selfless and patriotic service throughout your public careers. it has been inspirational to all who know and follow it. i also want to salute the families for their valor and persistence. some have worked closely with senator kennedy on help for the victims. you deserve enormous praise and gratitude for your courage. my question basically goes to the impression of almost information overload. we have talked about it and you have recognized the need to recruit and retain analysts of the highest talent and caliber and to recognize their prominence in this whole dilemma. do you have an impression that, given the amounts of

information, that there are sufficient or adequate numbers of analysts of that caliber that are dealing with this? >> my information, frankly, is not recent enough to make that conclusion. i know last time i was deeply involved in this, there was certainly not enough analysts and not good ones. they were not promoted and recognized in the same way, and we were not attracting the best people. i hope that has changed. >> well, i agree with that. this is one of the things that the national security prepared in this group needs to look at. tom said in his testimony that it drove home the importance of the analysts, and that is correct. i do not know whether we have enough. i do not know whether the ones we never sufficiently trained i think it takes several years to

produce an analyst. it is tough work. i mean, you're sitting there watching millions and millions of the banks of data coming across the screen, and 99.9% of it is useless. and then there is the knighted in there. so you have to have not only -- and then there is the nugget in there. you have to build into the system redundancy. i am not worried that if you have two different agencies of the government doing similar work with regard to analyzing intelligence. but i think the question you have raised is a very critical and needs to be followed up carefully. we need, congress needs, to give full support to whatever the intelligence community needs to get topline analysts. >> thank you. thank you both. the other aspect of this analysis of our intelligence,

the vast volume that we have, is -- this is apart from detection technology. this is about the technology that helps analysts said the size, and a great, and read a pattern, if you will -- synthesize, integrate, and read a pattern, if you will. do you know if we really have the kind of state of the art technology that allows us to do that and share it with the various agencies, foreign responsibilities, domestic responsibilities? because it seems to me that grid, if you will, or that state of the art technology combined with the kind of human resources you both talk about is really the key to this whole puzzle. >> absolutely.

i very much agree with that. i do not know the answer to the question, do we have the state of the art technology? i have a suspicion we do not. what i do know is that we've got to find the best people in this country on the question of data management. i mean, you are handling data, and it has been cited several times that it is massive amounts, and you have to sort through that. i do not know whether those people are in the government or in the private sector today. but wherever they are, we better find them, and we better put them to use. >> that is correct. i remember when i was talking to president clinton when we were doing the investigation, and he pointed out that our data management was so inferior in government compared to the data management in the private- sector. he mentioned credit card

companies and some other of its the had in arkansas that he said could have identified these people right away. and we just did not have that technology at that time. i hope we're better at it. i just do not know. >> thank you very much. thank you, senator. >> thank you. i echo the comments of my colleagues in reference to your work. i am retired public official, but duty called, and i am back in it. you all indicated that you're not going back in it, and you are able to do great work for the country, which we appreciate. and to the 9/11 family members, i extend my heartfelt thanks to you for your persistence. i have not been able to read your report. as a new center here, in some general sort of questions. did you all take into consideration -- as a new center here, i have some general for

the questions. did you all take into consideration information about homegrown terrorists? we hear about al qaeda and foreign services. did you take into consideration about homegrown actions? >> the 9/11 commission did not because it really was not within our mandate. but since the 9/11 commission and the development of the the phenomenon of terrorism, it is quite clear that the home grown or the lone wolf terrorist has become a major threat and concern to the country. so yes, the national security preparing this group, we will be looking at that threats and seeing how we can improve our defenses against it. not all of the bad guys, unfortunately, are from abroad. we got a few year. >> you are right. >> i would simply agree with

him. >> gentlemen, i just wonder, when you go back to the al qaeda situation now, what i tend to pick up through my basic information is that they are going to the chatter out through the various pipelines and to all our security agencies that is misleading and misdirected. you would never be able to tell what is really in fact a possible threat. that is number one. number two, i understand that they're going to try to spend us into oblivion with costs. they will have a stretch to come up with every contingency to try to protect ourselves. the civil liberties will be coming. you have these actions that have taken place.

the chatter is misleading. and the attempts to spend as into oblivion, all these various ideas, they will come up with something. they're going to tap as out eventually financially. do you have any comments on that? >> i think it has become quite clear that that approach that you're mentioning, trying to make us spend more and more and more by way of defense, is part of their strategy. and maybe it is even a successful part of the reair strategy. maybe it is one of the reasons they think they are winning in some areas. a dramatic example is 9/11 itself. what did we figure the cost? a huge amount of money. >> very modest amount of money. >> think of all the changes that

have occurred in america since 9/11. what your question raises for me, senator, is one that does not ordinarily come into the debate on terrorism, and that is the question of cost effectiveness. the security people can come up with than in was number of ideas as to what you should do, and you find it very difficult to argue against any of them. because they have truth to them. i think, as we move along and as our costs continue to rise, the question you raised will become much more part of the debate. is it cost-effective? now, obviously, you want to go

on the set of security. and you clearly have. i do not know what this country spends to fight terrorism today. i am not sure anybody has made a calculation of it. if they have, i have not seen it. but it is a huge amount of money. so the cost effectiveness question comes to the front. >> and gentlemen, i have about five minutes to go and vote. so what we're going to do is to call a recess until the chairman returns, and we will recess homeland security committee. -- we will recess the home and security committee until chairman lieberman returns. thank you.

>> the homeland security committee is in a break. they are -- the senate is weighing on legislation about the debt limit. this hearing will continue. we will get back to live with it continues. you can follow the senate debate over on c-span2. the house comes in today. general speeches and 12:30 p.m. that will be live here on c- span.

>> again, the homeland security committee holding a hearing on aviation security and the flight 253 bomb plot. they are going to resume after votes in the senate wraps up. and the meantime, we will bring

you a briefing from this morning, a pentagon briefing on haiti relief efforts with the head of u.s. southern command. > >> if you're ready, we will go ahead and kick it off. >> i am ready. >> ok, good morning. we're privileged to have with us today, from haiti, the lieutenant general. he is the deputy commander of u.s. southern command and currently the commander of joint task force unit a response. i will kick it to you for opening remarks.

then we will start the questions. >> ok, thank you very much. good morning, ladies and gentlemen. thank you for the opportunity to join you today. and i will update you on the efforts underway. >> the senate homeland security committee is back in more quickly than we thought. we're going to take you back live. by the way, this briefing on haiti is online com c-span.org, and we will have a later in our program schedule, too. >> i had a thought. i will come back to it. i want to talk briefly with you about the national counter- terrorism center, which we focused more on the dni and the general problem in some of the effects of the christmas day bombing. obviously, the 9/11 commission that created thenctc to serve as a primary organization for analyzing and interpreting all intelligence possessed or required by the government

pertaining to terrorism and counterterrorism. and the intelligence community directives made nctc the mission manager, a liberal terms. however, the president's report -- the report made to the president about this christmas day bombings states that there is analytic redundancy between the national counter-terrorism center and the cia. we referred to this a little bit earlier. the responsibility was not designated to tracking threat streams from yemen. analytical roles and responsibilities across the intelligence community need to be clarified. in your testimony, you reinforce these points and note that we need to do a better job of insuring that someone within the intelligence community is designated as in charge of running down all leads with a

particular threat stream. let me ask you first generally, what is your assessment of why counter-terrorism analytic roles and responsibilities are unclear five years after the 9/11 commission act was adopted into law? >> i am not sure i understand the question. >> i guess it is a general question about looking back five years. the law really put a charter are in place. why do you think of the analytic roles and responsibilities still seem to be unclear five years afterward? >> i think we simply do not yet realize the importance of the analysts in the system. it terrorism is the threat, and if he had massive amounts of

information coming to you, collection and is one part of intelligence. analysis is the other part of the collection site, we're very good at. the analyst cited, last good at. i think the reason for it is because we simply have not given it the priority it deserves. i am on a group that works with the director of the fbi, and he has certainly given greater priority to counter- terrorism. but in the fbi culture, the top man is the agent in charge. if you are an fbi person, that is the job that you have an ambition to achieve. it is only in very recent years that they have begun to elevate the analyst to a comparable

position as the agent in charge. when you really think about it, the analyst drives with the fbi does. if their principal function is counter-terrorism, the analyst has to drive the activity of the fbi. i do not think you have in the federal civil service the incentives that you need. maybe we do not have the pay that we need to elevate the job of the analyst. i think it is a very, very tough job. and it takes awhile for the federal bureaucracy to respond to the need. >> would you like to add anything? >> also remember that with the exception of the fbi, you had rotating people in every one of those positions. when you passed the act, we do

not have its staying for a while. we need that. we need somebody to focus on these problems, and some of them are because a change in leadership. >> is that something we should think of attempting to do by way of statutory amendment? to give the dni a longer term? >> well, the dni left voluntarily at first. i think maybe the way to do it is to have it through legislation or otherwise. and the understanding that was somebody gets the job, you know, providing that they're not doing their job well, other than that, we expect you to stay. >> it appears that you have a 10-year term for the fbi director. and the intelligence director seems to be in a comparable position. intelligence should be as removed from politics as possible. so it makes sense to me. >> i am glad to hear that.

add not thought about going in, but there may be something to strengthen the dni. it has worked pretty well overall with the fbi director. we see it in this case with this seamless transition between the administration's. let me go back to the nctc. will you talk a little bit about what you think its role should be in relationship to other analysis organizations and to the so-called operators or intelligence collectors in the community? so if i can borrow from what we were discussing earlier about the dni, is the nctc, or should the nownational counter- terrorism center, should they be the leader or just a coordinator? >> well, it is a good question.

i think the analyst is the person who has to spot the problem and to spot the threat. then there has to be an assignment of responsibility to someone to pursue vigorously that threat. i do not think that is likely to be the analyst, but somebody has to be in charge. in other words, the analyst says we have got five strands of information here that. to -- that point to x as a threat. you cannot stop there. somebody has to do it. somebody has to response orespoy of assigning someone to go after

x. i do not think that is the role of the nctc. i am not sure that responsibility lies, but the assignment of the responsibility to investigate and to pursue a suspect has to be very clear. you mentioned the word redundancy. i answered in response to senator kirk, i think it was, redundancy does not bother me. if you have got the cia doing analytical work on the the threat and the nctc, it is ok. the thing that impresses me about the analyst is the work can be boring. i mean, really boring. sorting through massive amounts of data and trying to figure out what is right or what is significant.

and somebody is going to be asleep at the switch. cents -- so some redundancy does not bother me. >> i agree. it is the military concept, of course, for personnel and four systems. >> it is not a bad word to say you have a redundant system. is there to protect the life of a military person. >> one thing we should check on -- and do not know the answer to this. with these various agencies, who is attending nctc? what kind of priority are these agencies giving it? the the people come back with something? -- are the people coming back with something? does anybody pay attention? one of the problems with the legislation is that these agencies have to give top priority and send their top people to the nctc to be effective. i do not know whether that is happening or not. >> it is a very good question.

we're going to follow up these two introductory hearings with a series of subject matter hearings. we're going to do one on the nctc. that is a question i will ask. when we first went over to the nctc after it was established at its new quarters, i remember that it was the then director of the said, look at this. this is where the cia people sit. this is where the fbi people said. end notes, they're no walls between them. that was a big breakthrough -- and note, there are no walls between them. that was a big breakthrough. are they sending over top-notch people? we all wanted to make sure that, just as the military does, we would encourage joint nesness ad

reward it i interior paths -- reward it in career paths. the last question. the 9/11 commission act also gay nctc the authority to pick -- also gave him nctc the authority to conduct a strategic operational planning for counter-terrorism activities. the memories and of the arguments over that particular provision and the fear could fill a book. we're going to focus on this in one of our hearings. what is your assessment of how the is authorities have been used by nctc up until this time? >> my assessment is that intelligence community of overwhelmed by the tactical

needs. in other words, you have a large number of military commanders who want intelligence on the enemy. we're pretty good at getting that information. you have a diplomat who wants to sit down and talk with their counterpart in another country on whatever. we're pretty good in giving that diplomat, our double that, information. where we are less good, it seems to be, in the intelligence community is the question you are raising. longer-term thinking. there is a good example of it. we were behind the curve on yemen. we did not realize how convinced they were in terms of striking the united states. but we need to have a significant element of the intelligence community thinking five years, at 10 years ahead as to where the threats will come from. that is even a tougher job, i

guess, than the imminent threat, but it is very important that the u.s. not be surprised by these developments to the extent that you can possibly avoid it. i look upon our intelligence community is being very, very good. but if there is a weak spot, i think it tends to be longer term. >> well said. that is it. i thank you very much for your time. what i was going to say before was that a former secretary of state said america is the indispensable nation of the world. i say by way, and warning that the fear the two of you have made yourself indispensable. it is quite an extraordinary act of a service you have performed. all the more important in this particular moment in our political and governmental

history that you formed such a collaboration, and it is not just bipartisan. it is non-partisans. i do not think either one of you think about your party label when you do the work you're doing because it is in the national interest. as a result, it continues to make you a very important and influential. your testimony has been very substantive. i do not want to make you feel to mature, but i felt it was actually whise and very helpful to the committee -- it was a verywise. we want a swissair is the subject matter hearings. i would like to invite you and your staff of the national security prepare and this group that we consult with you about the direction in which we're going, and we would welcome your device. i cannot thank you enough. it has been very constructive for us. we will keep the record of the hearing opened for 15 days for

additional questions and statements. with that, i thank you. the hearing is adjourned. .

>> wednesday, president obama delivers his first state of the union address to congress. laying out his vision for the future of the country and his plan to deal with issues such as unemployed, health care, 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. you can also listen to the president's address live on your iphone with the c-span radio app. >> u.s. house gavels in for morning hour at 12:30, until then a briefing on the earthquake haiti relief. the speaker will be the head of u.s. southern command. we'll show you as much as we can until the house gavels in at 12:30. >> i hear you fine. how are you hearing me? >> loud and clear. if you are ready we'll kick it off. >> i'm ready. >> ok. good morning. we are privileged to have with us today from haiti, lieutenant general ken keen. general keen is the deputy commander of u.s. southern command and currently the commander of joint task force unified response. general keen, take it to you for

any opening remarks you would like to make. then we'll start the questions. >> ok. thank you very much. good morning, ladies and gentlemen. thank you for the opportunity to join you today and update you on the efforts underway by the international community here in haiti. i know you join me in extending our condolences to the haitian people. our hearts and prayers continue to be with haiti citizens during this tragic time. all of us here in haiti and across the globe partnered in this recovery effort share and uncommon passion and commitment to do all we can to help the government of haiti and the haitian people recover from this tragedy. we are employing all our resources as fast as we can, and we continue to make progress here every day. every day is better than the previous day and i expect tomorrow to be better than today. we are working in partnership with the united nations and international community. we are enjoying incredible teamwork with and for all

contributing partners and the people of haiti. in fact, early on the morning of 23 january, we operated a joint food distribution joint. this was done in conjunction with the brazilian battalion assigned to the united nations. it was and still is in dire need of relief. it was one of the toughest neighborhoods in this city for years. our soldiers assigned to the 82nd airborne division handed out over 14,400 meals ready to eat and over 19,700 bottles of water. all done in about a six-hour period to a peaceful yet anxious crowd. other developments include the 22nd marine expeditionary unit from lamp lejeune, north carolina, continue its operations west of port-au-prince. the communities include the towns of petite guab, which last week you recall were in dire need of support. it is estimated that 10,000

people in these areas have been killed and 400,000 have been displaced. i was there yesterday visiting our marines who are working jointly with the sri lankan soldiers assigned to the united nations supporting the united states agency for international development and other international organizations so much needed relief supplies are provided to these areas. the second brigade combat team from the 82nd airborne division is now over 3,000 strong and continues its operations here in port-au-prince. yesterdayed medics prepared 22 haitians for air medevac. the naval ship comfort is offshore providing fantastic medical support. to date the comfort has taken aboard 387 patients. it's important to note that all of the haitian patients were screened and selected by the haitian ministry of health. 101 surgery vs. been performed aboard the ship. the pharmacy onboard this

amazing floating hospital has filled over 11,800 prescriptions. histry was made onboard the comfort when her staff delivered its first baby. the 24th marine expeditionary unit from camp lejeune arrived last saturday and immediately went into operation off the coast. we currently have over 4,700 boots on the ground and over 10,700ç afloat. for an aggregate strength of over 15,400 soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines, and coast guard. our airmen number 550 and continue to run the airport operations controlling both helicopters and airplanes over the last 24 hours, they have landed over 200 aircraft. our navy and coast guard have 20 ships operating off the coast of haiti in support of relief operations. as of this morning in support of humanitarian aciesance efforts, we have delivered over one point

millions bottleles of water since the operation started. that's only what the joint task force has delivered. the security situation here in haiti remains relatively calm. distribution points remain relatively orderly. throughout our efforts both here in the city and outlying areas. we have had extremely positive feedback from all those that we reach out and touch. the united nations security forces continue to address the emerging security requirements with great agillity 8 and responsiveness. the brazilian commander in charge of the 14 nation united nations forces here is aggressively employing his forces to maintain the secure environment that neighbors us to continue our primary focus on humantarian aid distribution. medical relief capacity has grown since last week with at-rifle of several international field hospitals

and surgical teams. currently portable hospitals from nine nations including the united states are involved in medical support. these countries are argentina, israel, russia, portugal, turkey, colombia, france, and brazil. we have doctors working in these hospitals from around the world to include mexico and japan. thank you very much. at this time i'll take any of your questions. >> associated press. i wanted to ask you, you said in the past that troops will stay as long as they are needed. how long do you think that might be? you have you started the plan for the inevitable reemployment of these troops? >> thank you for the question. our response here both from the international community but particularly from the united states military is in reaction to the emergency needs to save lives and focus on humanitarian

assistance. we are working with the united states agent for international development, international community. if they build up their capacity to provide that much needed assistance, the need for our military forces will decrease. we are talking to them as they build the capacity to do just that. obviously along with usaid, united nations, and other nongovernment organizations such as the world food program, if they look at building their capacity to deliver much needed humanitarian aid, we will be able to scaleback our assistance. right now our focus is on providing this emergency relief that is so desperately needed. >> this is courtney from nbc news. just following up on that. yesterday at a conference in montreal the haitian representative said that it

would take five to 10 years before haiti could be rebuilt to where it was before the earthquake. just to be clear, you don't see an actual u.s. military presence there for that five to 10 years, you think that would be more n.g.o.'s and state department organizations? >> i think it has been said that the government of haiti in conjunction with the international community are developing a recovery plan, reconstruction plan that will take, as you mentioned, a number of years. but i think as the -- our role here is providing this immediate need for this emergency assistance and supporting usaid as they go forward and develop that plan and transitioning these tasks that we are currently doing over to them. we are all focused on that. but we have to see as we develop the situation and as they build their capacity. we are already seeing much of

that capacity being looked at. whether it be in the area of delivering water or even in the area of medical assistance. for example hospital that we are looking at building and creating in order to address the medical needs is a 5,000-man bed hospital that is needed desperately to take patients off of the comfort and from other hospitals for postsurgical care. they are not -- in order to allow the hospitals that are currently addressing the needs to treat these critical care patients, we need a place to put those that need care before they are obviously released. we need to build that capacity. we are working with n.g.o.'s both within the united nations to staff that hospital and we obviously can enable that process by helping them get it started. but it's scroord -- across the board whether it's deliver riff

food, billing the water, medical capacity. and as the ngo's develop these plans, the requirements just for not just the united states military but other military such as canada, france, and others who are here providing much needed assistance will no longer be needed. >> can i ask one other, when you mention the number of u.s. forces afloat and ashore, it seems like the numbers are lower than the briefing that we had with general frazier last week indicated. we were told they would be closer to about 20,000 by the end of the weekend. can you explain where's the discrepancy there? seems like there's 5,000 fewer troops than anticipated? >> we still have troops coming. in our support round, for example, we have the third expeditionary sustainment command of the u.s. army coming here.

they have less than 10% of their forces on the ground here right now. but it's growing rapidly. we expect over the next 48 hours to 72 hours to see upwards of over 20 companies from the sustainment area arriving with much needed equipment. that's the logistical pieces to be put in place. our capability on the ground is still growing. as we are able to continue to do what we are doing. so we will see the number of troops rise and fall based upon the conditions on the ground and as we determine what capabilities that we no longer need or capabilities that we need that maybe were not initially forecasted. but we very much remain flexible and agile to work with the international community to determine who can provide what critical needs in order to continue providing much needed rewleef to the people of haiti. -- relief to the people of

haiti. >> general, "stars and stripes." you mention add 5,000-bed hospital is needed to start transferring patients off the comfort. how long will it take to build this hospital? >> that's a very good question. we are looking at that. we are anticipating to at least get the seeds of that hospital up within the next week or so. but that will begin small and grow from there. we are hoping to be able to at least start with a 250-man centerpiece of that, and we have the equipment that is either has arrived within the last 12 to 24 hours or will be arriving shortly. again, the manning of that hospital we are turning the n.g.o.'s and they are responding in terms of being able to manage the hospital and be able to staff the hospital. we are enabling that by working with the international community to procure all the things you

can imagine you need in order to build a hospital of that magnitude. we have our best surgeons and medical personnel looking at this. again, planning it along with the minister of health and united nations. the government immediately gave us access to a large piece of the land that could be used effectively to not just take patients off to comfort, but that is a principlal source we want to use. we want to continue to see a flow of patients that need to critical care that the comfort offers and then take patients off of her that do not need that any longer in order to maximize the utility of the comfort. but also from these other hospitals that i mentioned that have patients that could be cared for before they are released, that's what this particular hospital would provide us.

to get her to 5,000-bed capacity i don't have the analysis yet provided by everyone to determine that, nor all the resources. i expect to see the seeds of that hospital up and operating within the next several weeks. >> a quick follow-up. south com was saying there are about 13,000 troops afloat for a total number of 17,800. when you gave your numbers this morning, were you including the 24th? >> yes. my numbers again are included in the 24. there are discrepanciescies between my numbers and southcom's i'll take that back. it could be based upon the reporting dates that we report numbers. as you know we track these very closely, but we have cutoff dates for certain -- cutoff times each day for certain numbers.

the discrepancy could be based upon when we selected our data. yes, my numbers certainly include the 24th. >> voice of america, going in were you concerned about the impact of sending in so many armed troops with all their vehicles and their camouflage uniforms and so on, was there any actual impact of that? what steps did you take to ameliorate what could be the impact of that? and to what do you attribute the relative lack of violence of any kind, especially in those conditions with still scarce resources being distributed? >> i attribute the lack of violence as you mentioned, one, to the great resilience of the haitian people, their patience, and understanding that the world

is coming to help them. statement i also certainly give credit -- at the same time i also certainty give credit to all the 17 nation that is make up the united nations. they have been out there every day and you have to remember when this earthquake hit, it struck everyone. and it struck the united nations headquarters and the staff as well. the general lost a number of soldiers. but they immediately went into action. i met with his deputy commander within hours after first light after the earthquake. he had troops out on -- doing patrolling. obviously they were trying to account for their personnel like everyone else, but he has done everything, i think, necessary to ensure we have a safe and secure environment which enables all of us, all the nations who have military here, as well as the n.g.o.'s to go about and do their best job we can to focus

on providing humanitarian assistance. with respect to your question about concern for the presence of our military personnel, all i can say is we have been welcomed with open arms wherever we go. every day i go out and visit our soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines. i walk among the haitians and they are very welcoming. we have had no security incidents with our particular forces. we obviously take great precaution and we have translators down to platoon level. if at all possible. in most cases we have sufficient translators to get them to platoon level if not lower. both french and creole so we can communicate effectively with the civic leaders, explain to them what we are doing so they understand what we are there for and what we are trying to accomplish. in many cases it is specific leaders organizing the

distribution point and we are simply enabling the n.g.o.'s and leaders to provide this. it's a partnership and really going about doing our job. as we go around the city and we travel in our humvees and other vehicles, we do it as cautiously as possible and least intrusive as possible. but obviously with the mission in mind. obviously helicopters, helicopter operations have to be of great concern. where we are operating to ensure the safety of not only our crew but certainly the people on the ground. and that is a key component about where we land the helicopters ensuring that it's safe and doesn't provide a disturbance on the ground and explain -- those are the type of measures we are taking here. >> general, mike. just returning to the hospital question again, i just wanted to

be clear. who is actually going to build that hospital? is that a u.s. military project? or was that a contractor project? if so where's the money coming from? and how long do you anticipate the comfort to be taking patients as you start this hospital project? >> your second question sirs, we are going to be here as long as we are needed. i go back to how long we are going to be needed is based upon how soon we are able to build up the capacity of the u.s., -- united nations, usaid compapibility to get means in here to -- capability to get means in here to take care of the people, food, those types of things. plans are in place to put mechanisms to sustain, providing water, food, and medical assistance. it's going to take time,

obviously to get those things in place. with respect to your second question -- first question on the hospital, this is truly a joint venture. obviously we are taking the lead of the minister of health who has been very aggressive in working with us. and the united nations, again, working alongside the united nations, a medical cluster that really determines the needs and requirements along with the government of haiti. we have some capabilities such as a core of a hospital capability, principally equipment, we can put on the ground to start the seed of that. then working with the united nations and usaid to contract, to build the structures that are needed to build the hospital. so we are very much in an advisory and assist role in that, providing what we can to

get it started. we are talk along with united nations and medical clusters to get volunteer n.g.o.'s that have access to doctors. i have met with several that are very anxious to provide the management and the core of the medical staff because all of them recognize that having this capability is essential to normalizing as best that you can normalize the medical situation. it's very much a team effort. we are taking the direction, the minister of health along with the united nations medical leads. >> abc news. there seems to be a kiss parity between some neighborhoods having access to food and water and others that don't. those that don't are being prioritize right now. how do you transition to more

formal food and water delivery system? is there any consideration to field kitches being set up? how soon do you anticipate a transition like that? >> thank you for that question because i think that is key to sustaining what is desperately needed and that is the basic needs of the people. i'll talk about food because that's the one that is being worked on very aggressively with the world food program. a number of days ago along with the director of the world food program that came here and we met with the united nations and we worked together with all of the planners, both from the united nations, the government, minister of agriculture, world food program, and laid out the elements of the plan, particularly for the port-au-prince, with the significance of the number of people that have to be fed here,

what would be a plan that would be sufficient to do that. basically in concert with the government of haiti they selected 15 distribution points throughout the city. and they have experience all around the world in doing this. we are simply enabling this to happen by delivering supplies and working alongside the united nations forces because we will be running these distribute points with them, but most of them will be joint. 12 of the 15 sites will be jointly secured and run with u.s. military alongside united nations military. the other three will be run strictly by the united nations forces. each of these sites are set up to feed 15,000 people a day. it will take over one million rations a day to sustain these 15 distribution points. we need to have over five

million rations ready to go in order to kick this off. basically what we are doing, and i think the director of the world food program has laid this out in previous discussions, is we are flooding the city with food. food is being delivered right now, but it's being delivered pretty much in terms of where we can get to and where we can distribute it. it's not being -- there's no distribution points that are set up that are being sustained where every day a family member can depend upon a particular location providing food and water. so these 15 points will be set up. every day we'll feed 15,000 people. if a family member, it would be a female family member comes in, she will get sufficient supplies for her and five members of her family to last two weeks. and therefore if you do the math and calculate it, as they come through over two weeks you are able to sustain and feed the --

those that are in need within the port-au-prince area. we need to sustain that. that's sort of the -- that phase of it. the next phase, the world food program working with usaid and other n.g.o.'s is to move to how do you get off of the m.r.e.'s or these humanitarian rations and get them on dry food or set up some type of sustainable kitchen. that is being looked at as well. how do you move beyond this for sustainable mechanism and plan to feed the population. we are also working with them to look at other areas outside port-au-prince that have been affected that need the same -- you can take the same thing, each water is a little different, water clearly is another basic necessity and just sanitation issues. so the united nations cluster, whether it be the food cluster or medical cluster or the water

and sanitation cluster, all are working feverishly, hard to put in place these long-term sustainment. as those come up and operate, and we are able to turn over the operation of those to n.g.o.'s who fill the capacity to transport the food, efforts -- earth, that's when our forces -- etc., that's when our force also no longer be needed and we'll look at where we go from there. >> we'll leave the remainder of this recorded program as the u.s. house will gavel in. they'll consider a bill to help the survivors of the haiti earthquake. they'll start morning hour. tomorrow the senate joins the house to hear from president obama as he outlines his goal for the next year. media reports say the president is expected to ask for a three-year freeze on part of the federal budget. the house won't be in session at the end of the week so republicans can attend their yearly policy meeting. this year in baltimore. the president is scheduled to

attend on friday. the senate's also meeting today as they continue work on raising the federal debt limit. live coverage of the senate on c-span2. and now to the floor of the house here on c-span. [captioning made possible by the national captioning institute, inc., in cooperation with the united states house of representatives. any use of the closed-captioned coverage of the house proceedings for political or commercial purposes is expressly prohibited by the u.s. house of representatives.] the speaker pro tempore: the

house will be in order. the chair lays before the house a communication from the speaker. the clerk: the speaker's room, january 26, 2010. i hereby appoint the honorable rick larsen to act as speaker pro tempore on this day. signed, nancy pelosi, speaker of the house of representatives. the speaker pro tempore: the chair will receive a message. the messenger: mr. speaker, a message from the senate. the secretary: mr. speaker. the speaker pro tempore: madam secretary. the secretary: i have been directed by the senate to inform the house that the senate has passed s. 2949, cited as the emergency aid to american survivors of the haiti earthquake act in which the concurrence of the house is requested. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to the order of the house of january 6, 2009, the chair will now recognize members from lists submitted by the majority and minority leaders for morning hour debate. the chair will alternate recognition between the parties with each party limited to 30 minutes and each member other

than the majority and minority leaders and the minority whip limited to five minutes. the chair recognizes the gentleman from massachusetts, mr. mcgovern, for five minutes. mr. mcgovern: i ask unanimous consent to revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. mcgovern: mr. speaker, it has now been two weeks since the 7.0 earthquake that struck haiti on the afternoon of january 12. over these past 14 days we have seen pictures of the devastation of port-au-prince and the surrounding communities. estimates of the number of dead continue to rise, and the injured in the capital alone is already in the tens of thousands. many needing sophisticated medical care. people live in the streets and open spaces, fearful of the daily aftershocks. the very basics of life, water, food and shelter are absent or in short supply.

we watch in anguish as we watch the newly orphaned children in which they already had 400,000 orphans. the newspaper said the deaths of so many teachers and students have occurred. nearly every haitian family in the affected areas have suffered a loss of at least one loved one. and while our own u.s. embassy staff and aid agencies worked around the clock to respond to the crisis, each and every one of them are also dealing with their own shock and grief over lost family members and haitian and u.s. colleagues. in my congressional district, mr. speaker, brittany gangel from rutland, massachusetts, remains missing. she's among the approximately 200 haitian and foreign nationals who were in the hotel

montana when the earthquake struck. she was part of a student team from florida's lindh university in haiti working for the food for the poor. she already emailed her parents that she felt she found her life's calling. hundreds of search and rescue workers have been active day and night at the hotel montana, including u.s. teams from fairfax, virginia, and miami-dade and los angeles counties. one rescue worker talking with brittany's father spoke movingly how this was one of the worst sites he had ever worked on and if his daughter were trapped here he wouldn't give up on finding her either. the compassion and empathy of the rescue workers are palpable and their commitment to our victims' families is total. we read in the papers and online of the generosity and resilience of the human spirit. people helping people, sacrificing for the well-being of another.

we often forget how much the haitian people are helping one another as struggle to provide support and get aid to them. governments, international agencies, n.g.o.'s, corporations and individuals have responded and mobilized as never before. on friday evening i was in my hometown of worcester, massachusetts, at an event entitled worcester cares for haiti, to mobilize donations from our local community. and i'm sure that many members of this house have been at similar events in their own districts. aid is pouring into haiti to reach the more than three million people directly affected by the earthquake. it is flying into santo domingo in the dominican republic and being trucked overland in vast convoys, it's landing at the port-au-prince airport which now receives 100 daily flights day and night. and the port-au-prince are now operational. i want to thank the nations of the world that have responded so jen rossley.

i want to thank our hemispheric neighbors who still struggle to overcome centuries of poverty. they have been particularly generous, from argentina, chile, brazil, cuba and mexico. and a very special thank you to the people of the dough minnick republic. to my own government, secretary clinton, secretary gates, administer shaw, secretary napolitano, and all of the agencies, officers and staff here in washington and on the ground in haiti who when faced with a herculean task have more than risen to the occasion. i want to say how grateful i am for all that you have done, are doing and will be doing in the days, weeks and months to come. i have seen firsthand your commitment, compassion, expertise and professionalism. i'm sure that mistakes have been made, but no one wants the aid to arrive more quickly and get to those who need it more than the u.s. personnel on the ground in haiti. for myself, i have never been

more proud of my government or more proud to the people who serve it in it. i ask unanimous consent to submit an article into the record. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. mcgovern: and with that i yeebyeeb. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the chair now recognizes the gentleman from florida, mr. stearns. mr. stearns: i ask unanimous consent to revise and extend. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. stearns: good afternoon, mr. speaker. i rise today in the hopes of appealing to the common sense of my colleagues in the united states senate. in a few days, they will vote on whether or not ben bernanke will serve a secretary term as federal reserve chairman. for the good of american taxpayers and the greater economy, his nomination should be rejected. as chairman of the federal reserve, he has intervened in the financial market in an unprecedented way. he has instituted un-american policies that have deported our free market economy such as

picking winners and losers and the creation of too big to fail. both republicans and democrats alike have argued that the fed itself was a significant factor in creating the worst economic and financial crisis our nation has faced in a generation. where is the justification in reconfirming ben bernanke? interest rates were kept too low for too long as they increased the money supply and economic bubbles were created. in 2006, financial experts throughout the nation pointed out that the housing bubble was collapsing. yet, the fed took no action until it was too late and tens of thousands of families found themselves in foreclosure. another major factor in the economic meltdown were the questionable financial transaction by the holding companies of the largest banks and wall street firms. it is clear now that the fed advocated its role as a regulator of these enters its. just last month, mr. bernanke

admitted in front of the senate banking committee that in the area where we had opportunity the bank holdings companies we should have done more, end quote. the irony of his comments are that the fed has plenty of power and authority to deal with this kind of abuses. we have seen in the financial industry and within the housing market this ability for him to act, but he refused to use it. under the leadership of mr. bernanke, the fed chose to ignore the abuses going on in the mortgage industry. particularly with subprime loans. the fed also chose to ignore wall street's risky off balance sheets transaction that created a domino effect, that rippled through our economy. bloomberg reported that the fed itself entered into trillions in off balance sheet transactions last year, but the fed's own inspector general has not even attempted to audit or to investigate these transactions. astoundingly, mr. bernanke is now advocating that congress grant the fed even greater

regulatory power. we need to audit the federal reserve now. in discussing mr. bernanke's failing as fed chairman is important to point out that he served on the board of governors of the federal reserve from 2002 to 2005 before coming -- becoming chairman. he is no novice, yet he ignored distress from our imminent financial meltdown. and mr. bernanke has not been forthcoming in explain to congress and the american people who in the private sector the fed has chosen to subsidize with american taxpayers' dollars and for what reason and what amount. mr. bernanke has also been unable to fully explain and account for $500 billion the fed has lent to central banks in europe and asia. instead, he continues to hide behind the longstanding premise, the monetary policies should be free from political pressure, coupled with the convenience of the fed not being a public agency and thus not being obligated to publicly account for its actions.

mr. speaker, it is not his money. it belongs to the american taxpayers. under mr. bernanke's leadership, the fed even tried to keep the details of a.i.g.'s payments to its counterparts secret. the emails clearly demonstrate the kind of culture that bernanke oversaw at the fed, one of secrecy to stifle important public disclosure. again, it is not his money. after the difficult financial year we've had, common sense dictates a change in leadership at the federal reserve. reconfirming mr. bernanke to a second term is like putting a stamp of approval on the health of our unstable economy while guaranteeing more of the same failed policies. more of the same is not the solution to our economic downturn and crisis in our financial markets. we need a complete departure from the failed policies of the past. mr. bernanke steered our financial system directly into

the rocks. should we really put him at the helm again? no. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the speaker recognizes the gentlewoman from arizona, mrs. kirkpatrick, for five minutes. mrs. kirkpatrick: i ask unanimous consent to revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mrs. kirkpatrick: mr. speaker, i rise today to express outrage , outrage at the information that has recently come to light about the a.i.g. bailout. though it may not be clear yet who should be held accountable, one thing is clear. the american people will not tolerate the use of taxpayer dollars for use in back door bailouts where the details are treated as classified, using methods typically reserved for

matters of national security. though some financial matters may require protection as a matter of national security. it does not appear that the a.i.g. bailout rises to that standard. at a time when our nation is actively engaged in wars on two fronts and terrorists and traffickers are always looking for means to breech our defenses, such treatment should be reserved for documents pertaining to actual security threats. i oppose the troubled asset relief program from the beginning because it focused too much on wall street and its executives and not enough on the problems that face working arizona families. it does too little to hold accountable the banks and corporations that has benefited from billions in taxpayer

dollars. the house oversight committee and the g.a.o. are now investigating the entire a.i.g. bailout. they should complete their work as quickly as possible so the results can be released to the american taxpayers. i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman yields back. the speaker recognizes the gentlewoman from florida, ms. ros-lehtinen, for five minutes. ms. ros-lehtinen: thank you very much, mr. speaker. thank you, mr. speaker. i rise today to ask how we can break the national 10% unemployment barrier which has now hit my home state of florida hard with a totally unacceptable 11.8 unemployment rate. the congressional leadership has created a cloud of uncertainty over the economy with support of more oppressive regulations, skyrocketing deficits, tax increases and

trade barriers. the administration's spending policies, including the nearly $1 trillion stimulus bill, has drastically increased the national debt by 23% while unemployment has increased by more than three million. and today, the c.b.o. announced that the u.s. deficit for the current fiscal year will come at $1.3 trillion which means that in the one year in which the party controlling the white house and congress has been entrenched, the annual deficit has increased by over 300%. we need to do everything we can to encourage entrepreneurs and small businesses to once again create jobs through sensible regulation, through reduced government spending, lower taxes and greater investment in education. i'm looking forward to the president's state of the union message to see what course he has set for this year and will

look forward to working with members in a bipartisan manner to help bring our economy to full employment as soon as possible. and later on, mr. speaker, we will be discussing an important resolution which designates this week as the national school counseling week on behalf of each and every child that these counselors have helped. as a mother, as a grandmother and as a former florida certified teacher, i recognize just how important it is to fully support our children at every turn. school counselors across the nation share the same commendable goal to meet the needs of every child. they work each and every day to offer our children their expert guidance and compassionate care. whether at home or in school, every child will face new and sometimes difficult situations as they develop into young

adults. through a strong family, many children are able to navigate potentially difficult situations, emotions and decisions from a positive base. but even with the most cohesive and supportive of families, there are times when a growing child needs outside counseling. our school counselors can offer children this vital resource, trust and impartial guide in times of uncertainty as well as thoughtful friends for uncomfortable questions. and they willingly work with all children, regardless of their background or history and are often the last lifeline for our troubled children. we all recognize that children go through tremendous social, personal and emotional development all while being tasked with achieving academic success. ensuring that our children are prepared to be tomorrow's adults requires that each of these components come together

seamlessly. our children are being forced to grow up faster than any generation before them. today's children live in an interconnected world that is vastly different from the ones that our parents or even we knew. in this sea of rapid and radical change, it is reassuring to know that our school counselors will be there to support those children that we need and they need this help the most. they often each child an indense pencible link between the classroom and the real world. school counselors are without a doubt a vital link in our children's emotional and academic education. without -- always willing to lend their sympathetic ear and advice, school counselors are never far at hand when a child needs to express his or her fears, hopes and aspirations. school counselors are helping our children to develop into wonderful young adults each and

every day. we should all welcome the opportunity to say congratulations to these unsung protectors of our children. so, mr. speaker, i encourage all of my colleagues later on today as we take up this bill to honor school counselors across the united states by voting in favor of this resolution for it is a fine tribute to people whose life's mission is to turn today's children into tomorrow's leaders. thank you very much for the time, mr. speaker. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman yields back the balance of her time. pursuant to clause 12-a of rule 1, the chair declares the house in recess until 2:00 p.m. >> the u.s. meese at 2:00 eastern to begin legislative work for the week. today, eight bills and resolutions including one approved by the senate yesterday to aid an estimated 45,000 u.s. citizens who got caught in the

haiti earthquake. live house coverage when they gavel back in here on c-span. next month marks one year since congress passed the economic stimulus money bill. the $787 billion approved just under $330 billion has been committed. with $172 billion actually paid out so far. if you would like to learn more about the projects funded by the stimulus and the spending so far, go to our website, c-span.org/stimulus. wednesday, president obama delivers his first state of the union address to congress, laying out his vision for the future of his country and his plan to deal with issues such as unemployment, health care h. 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. you can also listen to the president's address live on your iphone with the c-span radio app. today on capitol hill senate

rejected a plan backed by president barack obama to create a bipartisan task force to tackle the deficit this year. that was part of the debate on the extending the federal debt limit. also today some political news, republican indiana congressman mike pence says he won't be running for the u.s. senate later this year. the seat now held by evan by in indiana. he had been considering a showdown with the senator who won election twice in that state. about 10 minutes away we'll take you to bowling air force base in maryland. first lady michelle obama is set to announce an increase of $8.8 billion in the president's 2011 proposed budget for programs supporting military families. again that's coming up at 1:00 p.m. and that will be live here on c-span. in the meantime, to montreal yesterday. 14 nations met to discuss aid for haiti. and the prime ministers of canada hainty spoke for about 20

minutes. we'll show you some of that as we wait for the first lady.

>> good morning. i want to bring you up to date with the events that are happening this week. these are important days and this afternoon i'll be meeting with brian cohen and as events unfold this week will i believe be a critical week of decision for northern ireland. on thursday, the world comes together in london to unite against the global terrorist threat. our conference on afghanistan, the london conference, will be attended by president karzai, the u.n. secretary-general, 60 nations will be represented. we will be announcing new figures for nato forces and for afghan forces in the time to come. we will be focusing on how the political and civilian surge we plan in afghanistan can match and complement the military

surge that is taking place. on wednesday, the day before, the first international meeting will be held to agree how we can strengthen support for yemen in its efforts against al qaeda and how we can help the government of yemen with development and governance. as i said last week in the commons statement i made on security, we note that there are terrorist groups with plans to inflict damage on our country and we are always on alert. we will be vigilant against those who seek to destroy and undermine our democracy and our way of life. let me add one thing also this morning. i sent my condolences to president hariri and the prime minister after the crash of the ethiopian airways flight off the coast of lebanon. we are working urgently to establish whether any of our citizens were onboard. this morning i want to say

something about the economy and the next stages for britain. i'm confident that the u.k. economy is emerging from recession. but there are dangerous global forces, volume tile oil prices, financial market uncertainties, imbalances, protectionist threats, risk to growth in every continent which means that the world and u.k. economy remain fragile and policymakers around the world and in the united kingdom must remain vigilant. that is why we are all agreed around the world that we must reduce our deficits steadily according to a plan, but that we must do nothing this year which would put recovery, growth, and jobs at risk here in britain and in every other country. this is the view of all major leaders and it is the view of the international monetary fund. just as we were right to intervene to stop collapsing banks destroying the financial

economy, and just as we were right to agree global fiscal support to avoid recession turning into depression, so it is right now we do what is necessary to ensure we lock in recovery over the course of 2010. the biggest mistake the world could make would be to turn at a time of stress to protectionism. the biggest mistake we in britain and individual conindustries could make would be to withdraw now from the supported actions we need for growth and jobs. that is why today we are not reducing but stepping up our action against unemployment. from today, there need be no young person left on unemployment benefit for the long term in britain. 100,000 young people are today eligible for the new offer we are making of a job workplacement or training and each one has a choice to take what is on offer or ultimately lose their financial benefits. and today i'm urging every

unbloid person to take up this ue -- unemployed person to take up this unique opportunity that is available from today to prove themselves and improve themselves. this morning i have been meeting business leaders signed up to the campaign to avoid any repetition of the 80's lost generation when too many young people were written off. i think it's fair to say that there will be few countries who have done more at any time to prevent youth unemployment rising. and already in addition to today's announcements we have secured more than 100,000 opportunities for young people to show what they can do. over the next 15 months under the new young persons guarantee, there will be a further 470,000 jobs and training opportunities for young people. and these employment measures for young people are in part financed by the revenue from the bank -- >> we'll leave this recorded program and take you live to bowling air force base -- bolling air force base just outside washington with michelle

obama speaking about military families. live coverage on c-span. >> thank you, everyone. thank you so much. everyone, take a seat and have a glass of wine. because i'm going to sell you guys out. they were passing around a little glass, i was like what's that? so, please, feel free. don't wait until i leave when the desserts come out to get the wine. i am really thrilled to be here. thank you, holly, for your kind introduction and support of our air force families and foru! al the work that you have done to put together this luncheon as well as the entire committee. i know that it's hard enough to pull off something like this, but then you invite the first lady and all my stuff. and it becomes a little bit harder but this is absolutely wonderful. i have had a great time. and i'm just thrilled to be

here. again let's give holly and the entire committee a big round of applause for all the work that they have done. and i'm going to be especially nice to holly because her husband commands the air force district of washington. so he not only keeps the skies of washington safe, but he's responsible for when my husband comes back on air force one. so, holly, you and me, we got to get together get this thing worked out. but it's really an honor to be here with all of you. i also want to thank elizabeth biddle for the invitation as well as the beautiful rendition of the national anthem. i want to thank all of you at the committee for this wonderful invitation and bringing us all together. as we saw earlier doing the medley which you got fired up medley which you got fired up about, i like that, we see that