have to let them make the decisions and give them financial incentives for making the right decisions. when you do this, it works. minnesota has the highest cumbersome -- concentration of health savings accounts in the country. they work. we said to our state employees, the system is going out of control on price. we are going to do this. you can go anywhere you want but if you go somewhere that is really high in quality and efficient, you will pay less. if you go somewhere that is not high in quality and is inefficient, you are going to pay more. guess where they go? 90% have migrated to higher quality, low-cost providers and the premium increases had been almost 0% for five years. it works. [applause] one last thing, i learned this playing hockey when i was

younger. i am sure you learned along the way, as well. when you are dealing with bowleys, whether it is in the hockey rink, understand that unh said the game tomorrow night, the minnesota gophers are not doing too well. bowleys respect strength, not weakness. . . >> president bush went to the czech republic and poland. you and i are polish brothers here, right?

anyhow, a poll -- they asked the czech republic to host this a defense systems. they did it at great peril to themselves. the former prime minister of the czech republic would say that he lost his job because he extended his neck so far politically at the request of the united states. there was a big controversy when he said he would oppose the radar systems for missile defense. poland was going to host the actual missiles. president obama comes into office and says never mind. we're placing -- we are changing our plans. the to the point where he was quoted as saying in the newspaper "you cannot trust the united states of america anymore. these are two of our best allies in the world. president obama needs to be less concerned about how popular he is in europe and in the middle east and focus on whether we are

respected around the world and whether the united states of america is secure. [applause] i will close with a quote from the rev. martin luther king. he said that the measure of a person is not where they stand in times of comfort and privilege, but where they stand in times of challenge and controversy. the question comes for each of us in this room -- as the country faces one of its greatest challenges in modern history, where do we stand and what do we stand for? where do we stand and what do we stand for? we live in challenging and controversial times. we have a constitution that is the framing, and glorious document for this nation, that is under assault. our freedoms are under assault. our common sense is under

assault. our financial responsibility to our children and our grandchildren is under assault. the question comes -- are you ready? are you ready to fight back? are you ready to take this country back? by your presence here tonight, you have answered this question. your presence says enough is enough. we're going to take this country back. we're going to give our children and grandchildren the right to the american dream. we're going to rise up, fight back, elect republicans all across this country. we're going to get control of the congress and once again set this nation on a promising, positive course that features a secure, free, and prosperous united states. god bless you. big you very much and have a great rest of the evening. [applause]

[captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] >> up next on c-span, an update on the u.s. census count with census bureau director robert groves. president obama announces a new treaty on nuclear weapons with russia. following that, former state department spokesman james rubin and discusses u.s. foreign policy. tomorrow on "washington journal ." the white house correspondents for the christian science monitor discusses enter and exit aggression as a result of the passage of health care legislation. melissa broom up from the job opportunities task force in the

maryland society for human resource management talk about the proposed law that would ban employers from using a credit check as a reason to deny employment. the american legion executive director looks at the impact the health-care bill will have on veterans. "washington journal," live at 7:00 a.m. eastern on c-span. >> saturday, supreme court justices antonin and scalia on the constitution. is it a living document? >> do not pretend that this is producing a flexible system. to the contrary, it is producing what the constitution will produce. that is rigidity. we have to deal with an organization that is capable of passing laws in accordance with the powers given them by the constitution of the united states, which is the whole point

of the constitution. "america and the courts" -- 7:00 p.m. eastern on c-span. >> the latest on the census count. this is about 45 minutes. host: robert groves is director of the census bureau. this is the forum -- everybody in the united states receives this format. guest: the vast majority have. about 13 million households receive the bilingual form, spanish on one side english on the other. because of the two languages, it is a little longer because it is double in the questions. the vast majority of households should have received these by now. there are pockets here and there, deep in the mountains of the west. there are roads that are still closed because of snow. we have not gotten back there

yet. there are glitches here and there, but the majority of people should have this. host: is this the only form that has been sent out? is there a long form? guest: there is only a short form this decade. this is good news for the vast majority of people, although have gotten e-mails of some people saying, "it was so short. shouldn't you be asking more questions? " that is the majority, -- that is the minority, i think. a friend of mine called. he lives with his wife. he said "you guys are lying. it is 10 questions in 10 minutes. it only took us three minutes." it is pretty short. host: is required by law to fill this form out? guest: it is. this is not a new idea. go way back.

in march 1, 1790, the very first congress -- a lot of the founding fathers were members of congress. they passed the census act. they said we are going to count everybody. we are going to count them where they usually live. that is how we are going to do it. we have to make this mandatory. if we are going to reapportion the house of representatives based on this count, we have to make sure everybody participate. in 1790, they levied a $20 fine. $20 in 1790 was a fair sum of money. away at the roots of the founding of this country, the founding fathers clearly wanted everybody to be part of this. host: what happens if you do not fill out this form? guest: there is a fine specified in law. we have learned over the decades that emphasizing the prosecution

of not doing this does not make for a successful census. what we are trying to do in everything we are doing in the outreach is emphasizing the benefits of participation. that is your right to share of political influence through your representative and the financial benefits that derive to your community based on proper accounts. host: is the fine? guest: the fine is dependent on whether you refuse or give misleading and permission. it could be as much as $5,000. host: $5,000? was anybody find 10 years ago? guest: no. host: would you bet somebody will be find this year? guest: if i were a betting man, i would say no. host: what happens to somebody who does not fill out this form?

guest: this is a great question. here is this form. we gave you a prepaid envelope to return it. host: this is like a christmas card. you are well prepared. guest: if you fill out this form and drop it in the envelope, it is costing the taxpayers 42 cents. all of us are going to pay 42 cents for you to do that. if you do not do that, by law, since we have to count everybody, we are obliged to hire somebody to go up to your house and interview you in person. compared to the 42 cents, that is going to cost taxpayers roughly $60 per household. $60 vs 42 cents -- if you bring that to the aggregate, for every one percentage of the household the returns it, we save $85 million nationally. the neat thing about the census

is -- if we do not need the money because people return the forms, we are obliged, and i would be overjoyed, to return that money to the treasury. host: what is the budget this year? guest: the budget is roughly $7.20 billion. a lot of that money is spent for follow-up. we have contingency plans for follow-up. if everyone returned the form, we would save $1.50 billion that would go back to the treasury. as you know, all of us are worried about federal deficits. this is one thing you can do, individually, to attack the deficit. host: can i fill this out and handed to you and save the 42 cents? guest: put it in the mail. i believe the postal service is more reliable than i am. host: our guest is the director

of the census bureau. it is your chance to talk to him. democrat in san diego, you are on the line. please go ahead. caller: i did receive my census form in the mail. i have completed it and returned it. i returned it the same day we received it. i want to say thank you for making this form so easy to complete. it did not take 10 minutes. it took maybe five minutes. or less. i have only to people in our household, so it was very easy. it was not complex. i encourage everyone to please complete the census. i want to thank you so much for being so throw in your explanation of how all you fiscal conservatives out there should complete it. you heard the gentleman say how many billion dollars this is going to save for the government. host: why do you care so much

about the census? caller: i care about the census because of the federal dollars being spent and also because of how it encourages us to be a participant in politics. it saves a lot of money that goes to help us as individual citizens. guest: first of all, thank you for sending it back. it is great. you're sending it back early is something worth talking about. i have gotten e-mails of people who say you have asked us to report who lives in my household on april 1. in the same breath you're saying fill it out immediately. isn't that out of sync? it is a good thing to say why we do that. the vast majority of the households will stay with the same membership between now and april 1. for those people, it makes sense to fill it in early. if you are like me, you put

things aside on the desk or the table and forget to do it entirely. for those households who are anticipating a new baby to be born and the baby has not come yet, or on the other side of life there is someone who may not be with us on april 1, we ask you to wait. if you are planning to move, do not fill it out. you will get one at your new address. the majority of people can do exactly as you did. fill it out, mail it back, we appreciate it. host: is it important to know ethnicity? guest: have to questions that are linked on this questionnaire -- ethnicity and race. we think of those as combined. as you know, we have a set of laws -- the voting rights act and similar legislation -- that are pertinent to the redistricting process.

after we finish our nonpartisan counting, we give to the country, to a variety of groups, things for political uses. we are not a partisan organization. we are a statistical agency. but starting next year, after we determine how many representatives each state has, states are given the responsibility for drawing the new congressional district boundaries. as you know, those districts are reviewed to make sure that they do not -- they have not been formed in a way to be unfairly treating certain minority groups. we need those measures to implement those. host: randi in oklahoma, a republican. good morning. caller: do we need the census bureau for? we have the irs. guest: great question.

as it turns out, the irs has their own -- i guess we need to know not everyone files an income tax return. we need to count everyone. for that reason -- if we relied only on tax returns, we would underestimate how many people are in the country. ever since 1790, every 10 years we have hounded everybody in the country. -- we have counted everybody in the country. in years where we are not doing the census, we have other responsibilities. we do thousands of service. we provide estimates of retail sales every month, of housing starts, of a lot of consumer information that is important for economic planning for the country. i would say, although i must admit i have a conflict of

interest, we need a census bureau to produce other statistical information the country needs to see how well we are doing. host: the next call is from on our independent line. caller: i have a question based on my wife and myself. we are full time rv'ers. we are registered in sioux falls, south dakota. currently, we are in florida. my wife picked up the census form, but they are bar coded. we want to make sure we are counted as people in south dakota. are you familiar with the rv lifestyle and how would you answer my question? guest: great question. thanks for calling in. it is a great way to educate us all the effort we go through to

do this. starting on march 19 and going through april 12, we are visiting rv parks. hopefully you have gotten a visitor. we actually provide forms. you are counted in that park. let me tell you why. also in your mind you are a sioux falls resident -- following the guidance of the founding fathers, which account people where they usually live or where they are around the april 1. for those living this life style, and there are a lot of them, we will actually go out and attempt enumeration right there. the fact that your wife reached out and got a form is great. having you counted in sioux falls is problematic, the way we do the census.

host: i never thought of our be as a lifestyle. guest: it is amazing. i looked at a lot of complicated living situations. this is fascinating. if you look at google earth of a certain area on the texas border, you see a lot of empty places. when i went out there, they were filled with rv's from minnesota, michigan -- host: they get counted down there because they are there on april 1? caller: here is the rule we use. we want to count you where you usually live. that means for a college student living away from home they are usually living in the dormitory. there are certain people who truly are living in multiple places all the time. the usual residents thing does not make any sense.

for them, we say we will call you where you are on april 1. in a simple world, if you have someone who has two houses and exactly six months of the year they live in one and six months in the other, the notion of usual residence does not work. we sickout yourself or you were on april 1. host: what about overseas residence? cguest: we do not count american citizens who have retired abroad. there are a lot of people who retired in italy. they have no intention to come back. they are expatriates'. we do not attempt to measure them at all. if you think about this for a minute, attempting to measure all american citizens worldwide is probably not only a world census, which is an awesome

thing to get your mind around -- we do measure some americans. military personnel stationed abroad are counted through a wonderful partnership we have with the department of defense. they use their personnel records to enumerate them and assign those people to a state based on their home of record. we also do that for the state department and a couple of other federal agencies. host: from michigan, a republican. thank you for holding. you are on air. caller: i sent my out yesterday, family of five. i have a question about two topics. i am a genealogy buff. this last year, i noticed i can access old censuses on line. it is pretty interesting stuff. caller: me to. caller: how many years have to

go by before you make the census available online? will this census at some point be available on-line for my great-grandchildren to look at my handwriting? guest: that is a great question. i am a genealogist, too. the current regulation is that 72 years from now your descendants will be able to look at your form. this will be 2082. hopefully, you are alive and can do it. let me tell you how the 72 was chosen. it was chosen decades ago. it was chosen as a number to try to make sure, basically, that at the moment your census form is revealed you have probably passed on to another state. it would not surprise me, although as a genealogist i have mixed emotions -- it would not surprise me that over the number we are going to change that to a bigger number because all of us are living a little longer.

we did make a decision -- you will like this. this form that you mailed and will be captured electronically -- an image of this forme captured. your descendants will be able to look at your handwriting on this form. it will not be just a bunch of numbers. they will be able to see your writing. if you are like me, it is getting that personal insight about your ancestors that is so rewarding as a genealogist. we will do that for them. host: why is it necessary to know if phone number, especially as people are getting away from land lines? they might say it is none of your business. guest: let me tell you why we do this. i will give you an example to explain why we do this. let us say that in question 1 it says how many people live in your household. you write three.

you fill out the form describing the characteristics of only two people. it is an innocent mistake. you might have gotten distracted. you mail in the form. in our processing system, we catch that. it looks like there is a discrepancy. either there are only two people there or someone forgot. we will call you and say "for data quality purposes, can we tell you what we are finding and is this right? what do you want us to record? " after the process, we literally destroy these phone numbers. we are only using them for that follow-up. there is another use. on question 10, it says does this person sometimes live somewhere else. will we discovered in the 2000 census is that we had double counted a lot of people innocently. that discovery made us very concerned about being able to

follow up people that might have been double counted. that is another case -- we will do some follow-up on those. host: a democrat from atlanta. good morning. caller: i was going to ask the college student question -- whether i turn my family address or my dorm address. but you already answered that. caller: did you get one in your dorm? caller: actually, my mom got it back at her house. i am on a leave of absence from college. i am supposed to be back in the fall. but my college and my home are in two different states. i will just ask a question about u.s. house redistricting. is there any indication of which states are going to gain house seats and which are going to lose house seats? could you go over the process of that in general?

once the forms come in, does the federal government say how many seats each state is going to get and then it is up to the state legislatures to write the boundaries? caller: great questions. let me say a bit about college. i cannot resist. i have to college sons. this is a big source of confusion. anything all of us can do to remind college students that for the first time they have to step up to the plate and take care of themselves. if you live in a dorm, this operation starts next week. we're going to pass out individual census reports to students in dorms. off-campus apartments are treated like regular households. this is a great opportunity for the younger generation, for the first time, to enumerate themselves. parents need to know -- do not count the kid in the dorm at home. even though you are paying tuition and doing all the other stuff for this kid, this is the

first time we need to count them there. your questions on redistricting -- let me tell you something i feel quite passionate about. the census bureau is a non- partisan, independent statistical agency, independent of regulation and independent of enforcement. there is one thing that i sort of deliberately do not follow as a census bureau director. that is the speculation on what states are going to gain representatives and which do not. my job and the job of my colleagues is to count everyone and to do that counting in a way that is completely non-partisan. we will deliver to the president and to the full society in late december the counts by state. that will indeed reveal at that moment the gainers and losers of representatives. at the end of march 2011, we

will deliver to the states counts down at the block level to allow them to exercise their legal responsibility, which is redistricting. we are not involved with that at all. we provide the information. they do the work. host: we were asked -- how much taxpayer money was wasted in the mailings prior to the forms? i receive at least four. guest: i am surprised she received for, but let me tell you what we have done. we sent to almost all households and advance letter. we then send the package with the questionnaire just like the one you have here today. just this week, we sent a reminder postcard. why do we do this? we do this because research has

shown that the advance letter kind of jobs the mind of all of us. we anticipate the receipt of this questionnaire package. the tests that were run over the decades show that about 5% of the household population return the form when you do an advance letter above the rate you would get without an advance letter. it is a 5% gain. let us translate that into money. we did indeed spend money on those mailings. but we have shown that they increase the percentage of people who respond. for every 1% of folks who respond, we save $85 million. 5% is about $500 million that we save on that package of mailing.

it is even more than that. that is a conservative estimate. we did not spend anywhere near $500 million to send those notices. for those who are annoyed by it, i apologize. another effect of this is that we save taxpayer money by spending that amount of money for those mailings. host: if you think you have heard of the census bureau director is probably because you read one of his seven books, the most recent being "surveying errors and survey costs in non responsive by household surveys." chicago, you are on the air. caller: my question has been partially answered. i am one of those people with at least two places of residence. i did receive the form at each place, filled it out at our main home. we have a second in the city because we enjoy chicago. what we do on both of them -- how would you check that column

on duplication? caller: we recommend that for people second house where they do not usually live but sometimes live -- mark 0 on the number of people and send it back. we're going to follow up a sample of houses for these kind of checks. we will do checks for duplicates in various ways. we're concerned about this duplication problem. that, as i said earlier, was one of the findings -- the findings of 2000 that we can do better on. innocent mistakes can be made. will try to check on them. we do checks around the area. hopefully, on question 10, when you filled out the form in your usual residence, you noted that sometimes you live elsewhere, in that other house. that will be a flag up for us to make sure we check. great question.

host: from south carolina, good morning. caller: i just wanted to say that if you do your history like this is indicating, the only right you have is to know how many people live in a home. you have no legal right to know ethnicity, phone numbers, or anything else. i think when you come to my door i will invoke my miranda rights. guest: why would you do that? what is your hesitation about sharing information? caller: i get all my news -- i know what the government is up to. guest: it is a viewpoint i have heard before. let me tell you the answers on why these questions are asked and what is the constitutional basis. we should all go back to article 1, section 2 of the constitution. there is a line that says there

will be an enumeration of the population every 10 years. then there is a, and a very important clause. it says "in a matter that congress shall by law direct." the constitutional rights of the census -- the responsibility is given to the congress to direct. how do we know what the congress has directed? let us go back to the very roots of the country, when there were only four departments. it was justice, state, treasury, and war -- the smallest federal government we ever had. it was the constitutional minimum. there was a census and the very first congress said, "we will direct how the census will be done. the get it on march 1, 1790.

in the 1790 census will collect name, age, race, and sex." that is way beyond the number of people who live in the household. it is crystal clear that the intent of the founding fathers -- and many of them were members of the first congress -- it is clear that they viewed this as more than just a count of people in the household. they did those other attributes. if you examine the 2010 census form, it is the closest to the 1790 census form in our lifetimes. we are way back to the constitution. host: which missing piece of information will trigger a visit? name, phone number, ethnicity, any of the above? guest: this is a complicated and algorithm. i will say that if you only report the number of people in the household we must under law go to your household and visit

you and collect the information. that is what congress has specified. we delivered to congress in 2007, as under current regulation, the topics that were going to be included in the census. in 2008, we delivered the exact wording of the questions. we are following in the footsteps of the constitution, how congress has directed us to do that. we will go back on this just answering number of people. host: what is the situation with the census workers? guest: this was a man who was working on one of our sample surveys. this was a human tragedy, and thereby a tragedy for our institution. the final judgment of the state police working along with the fbi -- this was a man who was

found hanging in a forest, dead -- a census worker. it is pretty clear, i think, that he was that day working on census activities. the judgment of the state police is that this was a suicide and that the appearance that this was an act of hostility toward the federal government was part of an act of deception on his part. their interpretation was that this was his final act of good will toward his family, in an attempt to make sure they had life insurance benefits. it is a horrible tragedy, no matter how you think about it. host: palm beach, florida. good morning. caller: [unintelligible]

can you hear me now? two quick questions. social security numbers -- should i give you the last four digits? what the agencies have access to the information? guest: we do not ask for a social security number. we do not know your social security number. more fundamentally, we do not know whether anyone lives at your address. we do not know anything about you except your address. if you check -- when we mail you something, we mail to the address. we do not know you are there. to make sure people feel comfortable about this and feel safe -- if you notice what we ask, we are asking for each person's name, age, sex, race, ethnicity, and whether they live somewhere else. we do not ask social security

number. we do not ask in come. we do not ask citizenship or documentation status. all of the things that may make some people uncomfortable are gone from this form. host: you talk about citizenship. someone has treated in -- you do not count americans in mexico but do count mexicans in america. isn't that backwards? guest: let me speak to that. as i have said, i think already, the job of the census bureau is to execute the laws specified by congress's over past years in how the census was to be done. we must follow the law. what is the law with regard to this? it was clear, way back in 1790, that everyone was counted, citizens or not.

the 14th amendment make this absolutely explicit, that reapportionment will be done based on accounts of all persons. in practice, in 1790, everyone who lived in the county was counted. this, as it turns out, has been a source of discussion in the country every 10 years. i do it as a healthy discussion. the fact that we have different viewpoints on this is a good thing to talk about. the law is absolutely clear on what we as a census bureau must do. there is nothing new here. we have done it this way 22 times. this is the 23rd census we have come together to do. host: california -- you are on with the director of the census bureau. caller: this is the first time in my 72 years on the earth

where i have seen the census bureau being that large. in question 9 -- i am black. i did not appreciate the black, african-american, and negro. i used to live in nashville tennessee when people were called negro. i do not like that. it really hurt my feelings. i did call and talk to the lady about that. that, to me, is racist. guest: first of all, let me apologize to you on behalf of all my colleagues. i want to tell you what that word is there. it takes a couple of minutes. before the 2000 census, there was a lot of research done about how to ask race. some of research was set up to not give categories at all. we would ask someone to think about race and then tell us what

word they would call themselves, in racial terms. the results of that research were that there was an older cohort of african americans who, in that research, freely said "i would think of myself as a negro." that research produced the 2000 words of the questionnaire, which is exactly what you see here. there is one other thing we need to know. about 56,000 people in the 2000 census, in addition to checking the box, went below and wrote in the word "negro." they checked black and african american, and then added in the word negro. about half of them were less than 45 years of age.

that was a surprise. i have noted this already. i think, in retrospect, which of done that same research this decade. it was not done. there was a focus on other attributes. the intent of every word on the race and ethnicity questions is to be as inclusive as possible so that all of us could see a word here that rings a bell for us -- that is how i think of myself. it was not to be offensive. again, i apologize on that. my speculation is that in 2020 that were will disappear and there will be other words that change. our language about race and ethnicity is under constant flux. it is a challenge for us to keep in tune with that dynamic nature, but we need to do it. host: why is question 8

specifically about hispanic origin? guest: what we have one question on ethnicity and one on race? people around the country have been doing this research. if you in bed hispanic as a racial category, which was one way of doing it in past years, there are a set of hispanics who say -- who have a problem in answering that question because there are white hispanic and black hispanics. the separation of ethnicity from race was an attempt to get better measurements on that so that both white hispanics and black hispanics saw a place for themselves. host: pennsylvania -- robert. caller: i am a conservative republican, and the only question i am answering on the census is how many people live in this household. the rest of the questions are unconstitutional and i will not answer them.

host: robert we just heard that if that is the only question you answer you will get a visit to your house. is that correct? guest: by law, we have to do that. host: i read the miranda rights. these questions on race and ethnicity are clearly a move for the current congress -- i believe in no sense that the census right now -- the census is a lapdog. it is intended to show how many people are here illegally, how many latinos are here illegally. they're going to redistrict in that manner. it is not right. guest: for everyone who feels that, i urge you -- a lot of my friends -- we had discussions about this. i urge you to take a minute to go back to the constitutional

roots. read the first census act. you can get this online. re- the discussions of the clause in the constitution. you have to somehow deal with the fact that the very first congress said we're going to measure name, age, race, and sex. we have to admit that that is indeed the will of congress at the very moment that this wonderful nation was founded. you have to think about what that implies about your behavior on this question. host: from connecticut, independent line. caller: my question is concerning, basically, the granular to you have for ages. if you bring up the graph that had the census and the breakdowns for different categories of asians, be they

from india or china, and compare that to the selection for whites -- the whites have a far greater regularity based on immigration trends and from russia, even among religions, where a lot of jewish people who are considered as white would be considered among themselves as a different group. why are you not going to that kind of bring clarity -- kind of granularity? guest: if you are a student of the history of censuses, and it is hard not to become a student if you have my job, this discussion has gone on in this country about race and ethnicity measurement in the census every decade. it is something that is uniquely american. i think it is partly because we are constantly dynamically

changing racial and ethnic composition is that we talk about this. let me get your questions exactly. the process by which these questions are constructed is one that is renewed every decade. indeed, there is a process by which we post the census -- we're going to be paying a lot of attention to the right ins. we will pay attention to what people wrote in for race and ethnicity that is not part of the check box categories. there is an attempt to have as check boxes those groups that are most prevalent in the country. there is a premium in space on this little form. you could imagine thousands of check boxes for every subgroup. we cannot do that. this is an attempt to make a compromise. race, as you think about it, we

separate conceptually from country of origin. there are other measurements where you ask where are you from -- where were you born or where did your ancestors come from. that is a little different than race. u.s. made the observation there is a lot of breakdown of asian categories. that was the result of this review process and what people were writing in. host: time for one or two more calls. please go ahead. it helps to push the button. michigan, please go ahead. caller: i am from your guests home state. the question i have for you is this. the office that they chose to do their census from in traverse city was a very fine piece of property. it used to belong to a member of the new york stock exchange. they came into that building.

the ripped out all of the old furniture and carpeting and doors and windows. in fact, i was one of the people that we get down by the dumpster every day and tried to get carpeting. it was brand new stuff. they chose to use this prime piece of property. they tore up the concrete floor because they could not decide what the slump was. the report the floor. host: what is your -- caller: he is telling us how we are going to save money with the stamp and they're taking a short-term lease and doing all this work to satisfy -- callerguest: i think i get the . i do not know this particular case. i will tell you how we do this.

we acquire space, especially rental space, through the services of another federal agency, called the general services administration, who are nationally clued in to the markets. they act as our agent in seeking bids for space and having the specifications. i do not know this case. i have visited a lot of our offices around the country. i can tell you that they are not the plush, in my personal opinion. we have to have chairs for people to sit on while they work and we have to have computer systems, but most of these spaces are fairly modest. i do not know this particular one. host: robert groves is director of the u.s. census bureau. please go ahead. caller: a lot of people view

the census data with suspicion. why are there some questions about hispanics? guest: the first question -- let me express my view of the history of this. americans are a feisty lot. there are controversies over the census that go back forever. i have all the newspaper stories from the 1800's where people were worried about this. i think it is part of our nature to be a little suspicious of government. to those people suspicions, i remind you that this is a constitutional thing. i have actually forgotten your second question. host: the hispanic -- >> guest: it is an attempt to separate ethnic origin from the race question. >> tomorrow on "washington

journal," a discussion of anger and acts of aggression as a result of the passage of health- care legislation. a member of the job opportunities task force and a member of the maryland society for human resource management truck about a proposed law that would ban employers from using a credit check as a reason to deny employment. american legion is executive director looks at the impact the health-care bill will have on veterans. that is live at 7:00 a.m. eastern on c-span. coming up next on c-span, president obama announces a new treaty with russia on nuclear weapons. former state department spokesman james rubin and former homeland security adviser francis townsend talk about

foreign policy. following that, nancy pelosi signs the health-care reconciliation bill. arizona senator john mccain is running for his fifth term. he holds a campaign rally at a high school in arizona. with him is alaska's governor sarah palin, who was his running mate in the 2007 campaign. you can see that event tomorrow, here on c-span. >> the renovation of the pentagon has made it much harder for reporters to walk down. more and more spaces are behind doors were i cannot go unless i am exhorted -- escorted. >> and national security correspondent on covering the military here in the u.s. and in iraq and afghanistan.

>> now, president obama announces a new treaty on nuclear weapons with russia. calls for both countries to reduce their arsenals by a third. following the president's statement we hear from hillary clinton, robert gates, and admiral mike mullen. it lasts about 35 minutes. >> good morning, everybody. i just concluded a productive phone call with the russian president and am pleased to announce that after a year of intense negotiations the united states and russia have agreed to the most comprehensive arms control agreement in nearly two decades. since taking office, one of my highest priorities has been

addressing the threat posed by nuclear-weapons for the american people. that is why last april in prague i stated america's intention to pursue the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons, a goal that has been embraced by presidents like john kennedy and ronald reagan. this aspiration will not be reached in the near future. i put forward a comprehensive agenda to pursue it, to stop the spread of these weapons, to secure vulnerable nuclear material from terrorists, and to reduce nuclear arsenals. a fundamental part of that effort was a negotiation of a new arms reduction treaty with russia. furthermore, since i took office, and it's been committed to a reassessment of our relationship with russia. where the united states and russia can cooperate, it advances the mutual interests of our nations and the prosperity of the wider world.

with so far worked together on afghanistan. we of coordinated our economic efforts through the g 20. we're working together to pressure iran to meet its international obligations. today, we have reached agreements on one of my top national security priorities, a new arms control agreement. in many ways, nuclear weapons represent both the darkest day of the cold war and the most troubling threats of our time. we've taken a step forward in leaving behind the legacy of the 20th century walled building a more secure future for our children. we turn words into action. we made progress that is clear and concrete. we demonstrated the importance of american leadership and american partnership on behalf of our own security and the world. broadly speaking, the new start treaty makes progress in several areas. it cuts by a third the nuclear weapons the united states and russia will deploy.

it significantly reduces missiles and launchers. it puts in place a strong and effective verification regime. it maintains the flexibility we need to protect and advance our national security and to guarantee our unwavering commitment to the security of our allies. with this agreement, the united states and russia, the largest nuclear powers in the world, also send a signal that we intend to lead by holding our own commitments under the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. we strengthen our global efforts to stop the spread of these weapons and to ensure that other nations meet their own responsibilities. i am pleased that almost one year to the day after my last trip to the czech republic, a close friend and ally of the united states, which agreed to hostess on april 8 as we signed this historic treaty. the following week, i look forward to hosting leaders from over 40 nations here in

washington as we convene a summit to address how we can secure vulnerable nuclear materials so they never fallen to the hands of terrorists. later this spring, the world will come together in new york to discuss how we can build on this progress and continue to strengthen the global nonproliferation regime. through all these efforts, cooperation between the united states and russia will be essential. i want to thank president medvedev for his leadership as we worked through this league -- as we work through this agreement. but both agreed we can serve the interests of our people to close cooperation. i also want to thank my national security team, who did so much work to make this possible. that includes the leaders with me today -- secretary clinton, secretary gates, and admiral mullen. it also includes a tireless negotiating team. it took patience and perseverance but we never gave up. as a result, the united states will be more secure and the

american people will be safe. finally, i look forward to continuing to work closely with congress in the months ahead. there is a long tradition of bipartisan leadership on arms control. presidents of both parties have recognized the necessities of securing and reducing these weapons. statement like henry kissinger have been outspoken in their support of more assertive action. earlier this week, i met with john kerry and dick lugar to discuss this treaty. threat the morning, my administration will be consulting senators from both parties as we prepare for what i hope will be a strong bipartisan support to rectify the new treaty. . . .

>> thank you very much. has president obama reiterated, that is one of the highest per these of the obama administration to pursue an agenda to reduce the threats posed by the deadliest weapons the world has ever known. president obama said the fourth in his speech in prague last year and today he and president medvedev reached an agreement to make significant and verifiable reductions in our nuclear arsenal. long after the end of the cold war, the u.s. and russia still possess more than 90% of the world's nuclear weapons. we do not need such a large arsenals to protect our nation

and our allies against the two greatest dangers we face today. nuclear proliferation and terrorism. this treaty represents a significant step forward . reset our relationship because we saw this as essential to making progress on counter-terrorism, nuclear security and non-proliferation. we will continue to have disagreements with our russian friends but this treaty is an example of the deep operation on a matter of vital importance. it shows that patient diplomacy can advance our national interests by producing real results. in this case, results that are good for us, russia, and global stability. this shows the world that one of

our top priorities is to strengthen the global non- proliferation regime and keep nuclear materials out of the wrong hands. the new treaty demonstrates our commitment to commit to this -- to strengthen our efforts. we can hold other accountable to do the same. i know that secretary gates and admiral mullin will have more details but i want to make clear that we have adhered to the russian proverb that ronald reagan frequently employed --, "trust and verification." we will reduce the chance for misunderstandings and miscalculations. president obama insisted on a whole government effort and this is exactly what it was. he and president medvedev met several times and spoke often by

phone. the chairman of the joint chiefs' staff and secretary gates worked closely with their foreign counterparts. i met with my counterpart many times and spoke with him on the phone too many times to count. and the under secretary was here with us to help us complete the agreement. she was assisted by our state department expert team. teams of people at the white house, the defense department, the state department worked to make this happen. why look forward to working with my former colleagues in the senate. they will be our partners in this enterprise. i know that president obama had an excellent meeting with senator kerrey and senator lugar. general sounds and others of us

have a brief members along the way. -- general jones and others have worked to to brief members. it is my pleasure and honor to turn the podium over to my friend, secretary robert gates. >> this treaty strengthens nuclear stability. it will reduce the number of nuclear weapons that both russia and the u.s. are permitted to deploy by 1/3 and maintains a verification regime. our arsenal remains an important pillar to our defense posture. it is to reassure allies and partners who rely upon our umbrella for their security. we can accomplish these goals with less nuclear-weapons. the reductions in this treaty will not affect the strength of our nuclear triad or does it

limit plans to protect the u.s. and allies by improving and a plane and defense systems. of our negotiating position was provided by the defense department's nuclear posture review. as the number of weapons decline, we will have to invest more heavily in our infrastructure in order to keep our weapons -- our weapons safe, secure, and it effective. we want to make sure the departments of defense and energy have the funding necessary to accomplish this mission. this treaty carries a personal meeting for me. my professional career began as a junior officer in the strategic air command. one of my first assignments was home to 150 icbm's.

i have been involved in different to negotiations in my professional capacity. president reagan signed the intermediate range treaty which marked the transition from arms control to the disarmament. that accelerated a start and reaches another important milestone with this treaty. the journey we have taken from being one step away from mutually assured destruction to the substantial reductions of this treaty is testament to how much this world has changed and the opportunities to make our planet safer and more secure. >> good morning, everyone. i would like to add that i, the vice chairman, the joint chiefs, our combat commanders stand

solidly behind this treaty. we have made our recommendations and we helped to shape the final agreements. we appreciate the trust and confidence placed in us by the president and vice secretary gates throughout this process. we recognize the trust and confidence this house to foster and our relationship with the russian military. -- this helps to foster in our relationship with the russian military. i met with my russian counterpart no less than three times during the negotiations. each time we met wheen grew closer towards our portion of the result and a better understanding of the common challenges and opportunities our troops face every day. the new start deals directly with us some of the most common challenges. our stockpiles of weapons are dramatically reducing the

stockpiles. this treaty achieves a proper balance, more keeping in today's security in burma. reducing tensions even as the pollsters non-proliferation efforts. -- keeping in today's security in the environment. it protects our ability to have a global strike capability if that is required. it allows us to deploy and maintain strategic nuclear forces -- and bombers, submarines, missiles. through the trust it engenders, the cuts it requires, and the flexibility it preserves, this treaty enhances our ability to do that would -- which we have

been charged to do, to defend the citizens of the u.s. i'm confident in its success and safeguards. >> we will take three or four questions. >> , how confident are you of any ratification in the senate? you mentioned no limits on a missile defense. do you see in the future in gauging with russia in any kind of limitations on missile defense? >> we are focused on ratification. we are working hard we will engage deeply and broccoli with all of the members of the senate -- and broadly with all the members of the senate. i will not send any timetables but we are confident we will make a case for ratification.

if you look at the last three major arms treaty, the treaty of 1993, 95-0, the second treaty, 93-6. in 1988, 93-5. when it comes to the goals of this treaty as were outlined by bob and mike, the great balance that it strikes, there should be very broad bipartisan support. >> will continue to try to engage the russians as partners in this process. one of the technical benefits of the adaptive approach that the president announced is that it actually makes it easier to connect the russian radars and capabilities to those in europe. we think that there is a broad opportunity to not only engage to the russians but also make

them a participant. >> do you believe that these reductions are enough? >> i think that this is a major achievement in our relationship. equally importantly it fills the foundation of the trust we are accomplishing between the u.s. and russia this is a very complex relationship and it is one that we have given a great deal of attention to from the president all the way through the national security team. we believe there are other areas of cooperation we can pursue.

we continue to look for ways to engage with russia on missile defense in a way that is mutually beneficial and which secures us against these new threats. the relationship coming out of the by national commission that president obama and president medvedev announced have covered some much ground and we'd would be glad to give you an in-depth briefing on that. it demonstrates that we are not just talking about the big- ticket items like european security, iran sanctions, missile defense. we are looking to create more people to people contacts and more business investment. we are committed and we will work together.

>> you are facing a difficult task to convince the u.s. congress and the russians will face the same task. please tell me how the russian interests will take this into account >> the russian leadership will be in the best position to speak to the russian interests and how those are met. what we both believe as we went through the negotiations was that cutting our arsenal by 30% was in the best interest of both of our country'ies. more confidence between us.

the concessions made were clearly in the interests of russia. we have to go to the congress, but president medvedev has to go to his legislative body. we all immediately endorsed that offer so if, you know, if president medvedev wants to take us up on it, we're ready. >> madam secretary, congratulations. obviously a couple of deadlines were missed on the way to today's announcement. what were the sticking points and how were they ultimately resolved and what is your message to europeans who are still concerned about the nuclear missiles aimed at them from russia? >> you know, jake, in any complex negotiation, there are

going to be points along the way where negotiator os have to go back to their capitals where the negotiators need to delegate in depth conversation. -- i had to talk to my counterpart many times because president obama and president medvedev were very clear. we want to do this and get it done in a timely manner. it took quite a bit. we needed to make it clear that this was a priority of the highest level of our government. the russians responded to that very positively. we began to work out the last details. we made a decision that we wanted to have not the treaty

agreed to only, we wanted the protocols. sometimes they have been submitted and the work of the protocol goes on what we wanted to go through all of the technical work in the protocols so that when we went to the senate, it was that we can look at the treaty and the protocols. that was some of the time taken to be able to get to the point where we felt like we had the package necessary to go to our legislative bodies. we have consistently conveyed it to our friends and allies our commitment to our partners and to their defense. the adaptive approach that the president concluded with the best way forward on missile defense makes europe's a for.

-- europe safer. there is the ability to build confidence in our central and eastern european partners with russia. everyone aware that this is something on going. one of the reason that the presidents will meet in prague is that we want to send the signal that this is good for europe, the u.s., and russia. >> when people are listening to this, their eyes glaze over. can you explain how this paves the way for progress on preventing terrorists from getting these weapons? >> we have a long-term vision of moving towards a world without nuclear weapons. we are realistic about how long

that will take to convince everyone that this is in the world's interests. the steps we are taking will make a statement of intent. the start treaty says that the cold war is behind us and the is a massive nuclear arsenals that these countries maintain no longer have to be so big it. this is in our security interests and his towards -- and is towards the goal of a world without nuclear weapons. the largest gathering as leader since the end of world war two in the u.s. will happen and is devoted to the idea of how we keep nuclear materials out of the hands of terrorist and row

regimes. russia and ourselves come with more credibility having negotiated this than the non proliferation treaty which takes it further in how we can bring this regime into the 21st century. iran and north korea are pursuing nuclear weapons. you have to look at this whole approach on proliferation. >> it was a fairly brief conversation finalizing the treaty. the president mentioned it to president obama that he wanted to speak with him next in the czech republic.

>> you mentioned the overwhelming majority -- is anything that concerns you about this political environment? is the pentagon uncomfortable about the campaign? >> national security has always produced large bipartisan majorities and i see no reason why this should be any different. we have had a very dynamic political debate in our country over health care which was brought to a successful conclusion this week to the betterment of the american people going forward. i do not believe that this

ratification effort will be effected by anything other than individual senators assessment of whether this is in the best interest of american security. what you will hear over the weeks ahead as we testified and make the case to the press and the public, we are absolutely united in our belief that this is in america's interest. it puts us in a very strong leadership position. i believe the vast majority of the senate will see that this is in america's interest and it

goes beyond policy. >> let me say a word about this from my perspective. there has been a very intense continuing consultation on the hill as the negotiations have proceeded. two of the areas that have been in the concern is are we protecting our ability to go forward with missile defense and we make the investment in our nuclear infrastructure so that the stockpile will remain a reliable and safe. missile defense is not constrained by this treaty. we have in our budget, the president's budget almost $5,000 for investment in the nuclear infrastructure and maintaining the stockpiles. we have addressed the concerns that there may have been on the

hill. i echo the sentiments of secretary clinton. i think the prospects are quite good. the president has been very realistic in terms -- the president discussed that there might not be able to have zero nuclear weapons in his lifetime. others are attempting to develop them. we will do this in a realistic way some of the other steps of trying to get control of fissile material, these are concrete steps to move in that direction that i don't think anyone expects us to come close to. >> to what degree will missile offensive be addressed?

is there some kind of linkage on future plans with the u.s.? is any concerns you have about russia? >> can i ask the undersecretary to address this? >> president obama and president medvedev of discussed this agreement. this is a strategic offensive weapons treaty and there is a relationship. that is where this discussion ended. when you see the treaty and the protocol, they are -- on missile defense. when it comes to romania, the approach is in phases.

we have gone too extensive lengths to brief the russians. frankly, most of the status review has been on the web 4 weeks and months. we don't clear every conversation that we have with allies and friends before we do anything. we talked to the russians and they knew about the romanian invitation in 2015. >> i would like to follow up with the secretary of state. what does the russian cooperation portend and what you had with iran in the sanctions? >> we have had very constructive talks with all of our partners

and in depth consultations with the russians, most recently last thursday and friday. we are pursuing the plan that we set forth in the very beginning of this administration. this is an 80 stracke process. the first track was engagement. the president has reached out to the iranians. the other track of pressure in the event that the iranians would not engage or refuse to comply with their international obligations. there are many questions that raise concerns about the behavior is. i think that this would be

widely viewed in the authoritative source in coming to the united states. this summarizes why the international community needs to move on this second track. i believe you will see increasing activity in the very near future as we work to bring to fruition a resolution that can muster the votes that are necessary in the security council. president medvedev and president obama talked about this continuously. honwhen they are together, they talk about this.

we were out on the new yankee stadium field for the n.y.u. commencement. she was at the center of activities. one of our goals is to try to move the world towards a recognition that nuclear- weapons should be phased out. from our perspective, that is our goal. it is what we are dealing with the nuclear security summit. a number of the region's in the area will be represented. it remains one of our highest priorities.

i'm going to reaffirm our commitment to convincing countries that the path of non proliferation is the path they want to be on. >> verification is an important part >> varyification is such an important part of this whole process and for the american people when they hear you talking about the treaty. what can you say about your level of confidence in the verification process. >> the varyification measures for this treaty have been designed to monitor compliance with the provisions of this treaty. so, for example, because there are -- throwaway of missiles was on an issue, for example. or this treaty was in the past.

we don't need telemetry to monitor compliance. znevertheless, there is a bilateral agreement to exchange bilateral agreement to exchange telemetry informationno carrier0 [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010]

>> coming up next on c-span, former state department spokesman jamentse james ruben and former homeland security adviser frances townshend. and after that house speaker nancy pelosi signs the bill and after that governor tim pawlenty. >> this weekend on c-span 2's become tv. bill bennett examines america at the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st. he is interviewed by walter isaacson. throughout the weekend, look for highlights from the virginia festival of the book. find entire schedule online at booktv.org. which president was buried

wrapped in an american flag and a copy of the constitution under his head? andrew johnson. find these and other presidential facts in c-span's newly updated book who's buried in grant's tomb? >> it is a guide book. it is a travel log if you will but also kind of a mini history biography of each of these presidents. you can tell a lot about people at the end of their lives. >> a resource to every presidential gravesite. the story of their final moments and insights about their lives. who is buried in grant's tomb? now available at your favorite book seller or publicaffairsbooks.com. type in grant's tomb at check out. now some of the foreign policy challenges facing the united states.

frances townshend and james ruben talk about issues, chinese policy and the process of using preemptive military strategy against iran. this is hosted by the panetta institute for public policy. [applause] >> good evening, ladies and gentlemen. thank you for joining me once again at the monterey conference center in historic downtown monterey for the second event and this year's 13th annual panetta institute lecture series. loring the second decade, 2010-2020. we are asking what is next for america. earlier this month, we heard candid analysis about the state of our economy.

our speakers told us that the road to recovery would be a bumpy one and everyone from government to thanks to government need to make responsible decisions about how we spend and how we say if. tonight, we turn our attention to foreign policy and national security, both challenging areas for america. our community is particularly in need for global perspective. we are very proud of the institutions that we have here like the defense language institute, the naval post graduate school and the monterey institute for international studies. we thought that the awareness of the international community is essential.

today, with multinational corporations, shared currencies and the tremendous increase in technology, we lived in a global world. as new powers emerge, how can we balance economic, political, or humanitarian concerns. our financial institutions become more interconnected, how can we promote a global stability. as we look to bring a successful conclusion to the words in iraq and afghanistan, are we paying enough attention to the failed states and emerging nuclear

powers? which of the americas will be in the new world order? who will lead the world? we will ask these questions of two foreign policy experts from diplomacy to national security. our guests have firsthand knowledge of the complexity, the current global issues and the challenges facing america and today's world. our first guest works as the chief spokesman for the state department during the clinton administration. he was a top policy advisor to madeleine albright and a special negotiator during the coast of low war. currently, he is a professor at the columbia school of international and public affairs. please join me in welcoming her

james rubin. [applause] our second guest served as special assistant to george w. bush for homeland security and counter-terrorism and is chair of the homeland security council from 2004 until 2008. she spent 13 years focusing on international law enforcement. she appears regularly on network and cable terrorism has a homeland security expert. please welcome francis townsend. [applause]

guiding the discussion is an emmy award winning journalist and has covered major international events ranging from watergate to september 11th. he currently serves as the anchor of "wide angle," and is the walter cronkite professor of journalism at arizona university pl. please join me in welcoming aaron brown. >> it is great to be here. i wish the weather had been better. i think in a time when public discourse is about the loudest

voices not necessarily the most intelligent. the work of the institute is putting that notion on its head. thank you for allowing us to be here and also for your participation. looking out 10 years, who will lead the world? it seems to me that governments operate in their own self- interest. the chinese work with sudan and are for. the israelis do. they build settlements and announce it in the vice president is there. is this whole notion of leading the world is a bit like herding

cats? >> i don't think so. the u.s. is going through a debate. it is time to look to our own infrastructure and economy and our own problems and put aside a little bit of the extreme focus on the rest of the world that occurs and as evidenced by the wars in iraq and afghanistan. there are some who believe that the u.s. has the largest military power and they can make decisions by itself and force them on others. and i tend to be in the middle. i think that there is an international system. i think that we build our own economy and our own

infrastructure. when things need to be done in the world and making sure that afghanistan will never again be a home for a terrorist organizations. there is the slaughter of bosnians in sarajevo. there is only one country which is indispensable and that is the united states. we don't need to ram things down other's throats but as the only truly global power, we have an interest in an international system functioning. the hard part is enforcing those rules and the difficult cases. in those cases, countries like china, brazil, others step aside and let other people take care of it and worry about their narrow interests. we have a global interests. we have helped to create global

institutions. we were smart enough to know that if they work well, they will help the world to function. that means international agreements on human rights. those are good things for the united states. that is why we are unique. that is why we have an interest in the system. as strong as china may become economically, i don't think that they will have a global role militarily to. >> what does that mean to lead the world? >> he said that we are indispensable. it is important that we not believe our own press in that

sense. >> if we act in a way that we believe that we are indispensable, we don't put forth the critical work. i learned everything that i needed to know about it, see in the third grade. do you remember the overlapping circles? every country acts in its own self interest. i was asked to go to saudi arabia in a very difficult time in our relationship on counter- terrorism. there had been a bombing on a compound on saudi arabian soil. you can imagine i was a little reticent being a sign with this

important task. what you realize that i was not going to ask them to take this issue seriously. the trick was to und the trick was to understand how to convince them it was important to them and to convince them to act in their own self-interest. we're back to the day gram. i used to tell young diplomats, you need to find that overlap, the shaded part where the circles meet. in terms of leading the world in those partnerships is finding that space where your self-interests align and then growing that space. >> i don't want to spend much time although i can't promise i'll spend no time looking backwards. i truly think -- i and everyone else wants to look forward here but how successful do you think administration you last served was in defining leadership in

that way of sort of explaining to people, no, actually, it is in your self-interest. were you successful at it? >> well, there are a number of instances where we are. inconsistent partner. there was times we were able to convince the government. afghanistan might be the best example. look at all the nations represented, whether they are supported by military assets or economic assistance. that really is an international effort. we need an international partnership and that was the government. >> you talked about afghanistan briefly. someone has to make sure that al qaeda is taken care of. don't you think we would -- do you think that we would be there if it was not for the

attack on 911? >> absolutely not. there was a time that the muslim which had been that we supported and they threw the russians out. we ignored afghanistan. that was a mistake. that turned out to be a bigger mistake than anyone imagined. most if not all of the major terrorist acts we have seen in the western world over the past several years, some way or another can be brought back to that area where afghanistan and pakistan meet. there have been attacks in bali and in east africa. there have been attacks in madrid and london it is not any longer a question of the united states.

she did not mention iraq. there's a good reason she did not mention iraq. when i listed the three groups, i was talking politely but i guess i don't have to do that anymore. when the united states declared its right to attack other countries preemptively and when the united states removed itself from participation of any number of treaties and refused to engage on climate change around the world. then they alienated a number of countries in europe have to the point where our closest allies. the prime minister of spain said that if we are going to get support around the world, we need more power and last rumsfeld. is it is very unusual for our

friends to start picking and choosing officials. they came into the office at a time where the u.s. finding partnerships was at an all-time low. we can be partners, we have to return to partnership. let's not get to the point where we don't remember that the u.s. is unique and have in global interest economically and politically in asia, in the middle east. yes, we will be partnered. at the end of the day, there is one partner, whatever you want to call it, whatever it is, it comes back to us. i hope that we don't forget that as we switch from ramming

everything down everyone's throats to becoming partners. >> what is the best we can hope for in iraq? it 10 years out, where will we be? what is the best that we can hope for? >> a government that can help its people. remember where we started in terms of women's rights under the taliban. it has to be a government that can deliver services, competent, not corrupt, transparent. it has to be a functioning government internally and

externally. that is a tall order. the president articulated our first and most important objective in terms of our interest in afghanistan is to insure that that territory is not used to launch attacks of the united states. when you say tang years out, what should be the goal in terms of what we leave of mind? a country that can govern its own people. >> the country has been at war since 911. do you think that the country will sustain the kind of cost that the afghanistan that uc

would lead to? >> this is a tall order. the current governor of afghanistan -- government of afghanistan, it andy card to look beyond general mccrystal has put the emphasis on the counter insurgency. and did i think it is possible. this takes an investment. we have to become basrah have to be careful not to become the victims of our own success. is easy to match and thus losing the will to complete what we have begun. the importance of it cannot be lost. when you think about losing 3000 americans, the cost is so

devastating that we lose our well that the balance of the american people will lose their will. >> it seems to me that you're talking about two different solutions. there is a near-term solution which is to take out al qaeda as best you can, take out the taliban or draw them into the government so they aren't killing people. then there is the functioning of the terrific government that is not corrupt, not dealing drugs and seems almost too serious. hey, crazier things have happened in the world. what is the best that you think we can expect for afghanistan? >> we can have expectations in

the realm of hope or we can have what we would predict. i think that they are different things. having invested thousands of soldiers and hundreds of billions of dollars and the time that a few more years takes place in afghanistan. . . brothers who operate in the opium trade and to expect them at a minimum to never put their women in that society, the horror that the taliban did a few short years ago but at the same time we have to be realistic and i think we have to

remember that the democratic government that we want them to develop needs an infrastructure and that they don't have an infrastructure and they haven't had an infrastructure in that country for decades because long before we were involved in the war, they were fighting others themselves and they have been engaged in this for roughly 30-40 years. but i do think we should set high standards. high expectations. i think it is important if we're going to participate and get nato countries to participate to say that we don't want to see the government that's left abusing the human rights of its citizens or half its population of wearing a burqa and never going to school. i think that is right to aspire to but at the same time, the government decision making from the president on down has to be marrying these principles with prague ma timent. how long pragmatism.

both of us probably want it to be a little longer than the current polling data would shugget the american people will tolerate. that is going to require reminding the world and the united states and the american people of why we're there and it is going to require some big-time leadership from our president and congress to remind people we have short memories in this society, the 24-hour news media. n it is going to require a determined and persistent educational path to remind people of what fred was talking about. -- of which fran was talking about. otherwise, we will leave sooner than we should and we could have provided something that we could be more proud of.

>> i am not sure that i did agree that it is fair to put the attack of 9/11 in the same sentence. haiti is a tragedy. 9/11 is an act of war. are you really concerned that people have forgotten what happened that day, the loss of life that day, everything that has led to that day? or is that just fear speaking? >> no, i do not believe that people have forgotten that day. but here's my concern. to the can -- stick to the extent that we have our -- to the extent that we have convinced ourselves that the threat is no longer present,

that it is not a real threat to our homeland security and our national security, that is not the case. we have had this conversation of. that is a day that i think lives in memory. i believe -- i think my children were sitting in front of the tv. it happened to the people in that building and it happened to all of us as a nation. we also -- we all suffer in that wound. but to the extent that they think that the threat is less because of the passage of time, that does concern me. that is not what our intelligence and national security officials say. we know from the successful destruction we have seen in this country in the last year. all those, in one way or another, you will find have ties

back to this region between afghanistan and pakistan. it was true in the disruptions we saw in the bush's mission when i was there. the seriousness that this region poses -- >> the director of the cia, mr. panetta, where have i heard that name before? >> i have heard of him. [laughter] >> last year, he said, "we have al qaeda on the run." at the risk of sounding both and grateful for my presence here and unduly cynical, ici thoughtf a president who still on an aircraft carrier with a banner behind them. [laughter]

as there been a gagne change in that region, anin pakistan? >> absolutely. that is different than saying that that's different than saying well, you can denigrate the central leadership and still have pockets and cells of affiliates and cells inspired by them and pose a threat. the drone attacks have been absolutely incredibly effective in degrading their central core leadership. >> is there a downside we're not considering to the drone attack, which if the press -- well, let me start there but i actually want to go some place else, pakistan. is there a downside? >> i think there is. the upside has been clearly stated. let me share the upside. the downside is the ease, the lack of sacrifice associated

with what is essentially a war-fighting tool, a drone is a war-fighting tool. there is a congressman who i won't mention, who tended to take what i regarded over the years as the easiest position on every issue. . [laughter] >> we were talking during the afghanistan debate. he was thinking that maybe we could solve afghanistan with drones and we would not need to have the large increase of forces that general mcchrystal wanted to see and that somehow the drones could do it in afghanistan itself. but the rest from drowns is kind of -- but the risk from jones -- but the risk from drones has the assumption that it is easy

to do. it is just a tool. you have to know who the target is. you do not usually find the target from the air. you have people on the ground. i worry when people make policy when they are choosing the easy to fool. it makes me a little nervous. that is what the downside of the drones are. >> what about the effective the "no american dies?" >> would you feel better if we were losing blood? of course not. >> i hope that is not what people heard. i am talking about when we were in a debate on afghanistan. there was discussion that we could solve the problem in afghanistan with the drones. george will suggested that all of our troops should be of short and we should use drones to attack the taliban in

afghanistan. i suggested that that would not be sufficient. obviously, i am not saying that it is a good thing when americans died. to even do about it is not very funny. what i am saying is that, if we are going to choose to make war in the world and we're going to choose this decision, it should be a solemn decision. it should be a decision where we all understand the consequences. sometimes, when people talk about brown's, they talk about it has -- about brodrones, they talk about it as though they can just use automated machinery and all of the realities go away on the ground, where people are, where decisions are made, were the targets are selected. drones are a very real thing. >> he is very right.

by the way, having been there, it is by no means an easy tool to use when you have to make a decision on when to take the shot. >> it is not an easy decision because it does not kill just one person. civilians will die. >> that is right. yes. they are burdensome and difficult decisions. we are asking very senior government officials to make life-and-death decisions that are not always clear and are not always easy because intelligence is imperfect. >> washington being washington, there will be criticism of that. pakistan is central to the work you did. it is confounding, in many ways,

diplomatically. the government of pakistan, depending on the day of the week, it is reliable or not. there is the intelligence service, which makes me really nervous. but they are kind of with us this week. are we making progress? we cannot win this thing without pakistan, correct? >> i do not think so. we were talking about let's look at the movie rather than the snapshot. if we go back 18 months or two years and think about what was going on in that part of the world, there was a major offensive generated by islamic extremists, pakistani taliban inside pakistan. there were enormous numbers of

attacks inside pakistan. the pakistani military was attacked. if for no other reason, that seems to have gotten their attention. in the last 18 months, in general, the direction has been positive. the civilian government was elected on the premise -- benazir bhutto's husband ran on the idea that they needed to lead against terrorism. that gave political power to the pakistani military that had not existed under musharraf. then the pakistani military had been under attack and they responded. as far as the intelligence service is concerned, i do not think there is anyone view in that intelligence service because it is a complex organization with different people from different time periods.

let's call it two and a third out of three are moving in the right direction. we can see the direction and the progress in the last 18 months if you have pakistan on side. the ministration made the point of saying that, -- the administration made the point of saying that, if we are going to commit these trips, we have to get pakistan as part of the equation. that way, the region is thought of as a whole. when we do leave, it will not just fall back into the old patterns. so things are definitely better than they were. >> let me move to war no. 2. that is iraq. i was talking today with an old friend who is a reporter who was covering iraq since the days of saigon.

-- the days of sosaddam. a lot of blood has been shed. a lot of money has been spent. a lot of the people has been created. created. trust her journalism. is that a view you could share? >> iraq has gone through periods of extraordinary violence and brief respites, followed by more extraordinary violence. one of the cornerstones of democracy is a peaceful transfer of power. they're going through their second election. we do not understand the results of that.

part of us want to be there in terms of our frustration in terms of their civilian governance. it has been a proxy battle field for their regional neighbors. there is a shia-cine struggle of the neighbors that vote on inside -- the she-hia-sunni struggle of the neighbors inside iraq. again, i really think the test is can an iraqi government that is democratically elected both competently provide services and protect its people as well as protect its borders from its neighbors? we should not under the estimate the size of the challenge given to the neighbors are and the proxy struggle that goes on

within the neighbors inside iraq. >> take the afghanistan concern you expressed, which is that we will get out before the job is done, and overlay that now on iraq. we have a sense of a plan. we are pulling people out. there is very little willingness to expand much more capital will bear. are we -- capital of thethre. -- capital there. in this room, iraq was more divisive in our own country. those divisions have affected decision making over iraq, whether it was the 2004 election or the 2008 election.

politics have come into play in a way that, in a pure and perfect work, -- in a pure and perfect world, it would not. a president would look at the cost and benefits of staying and act accordingly. but the truth is that he will have pressure from the leaders of the democratic party who supported him and helped him get elected, who went along with him on afghanistan, despite some reservations, and supported a large increase in forces in afghanistan. it is going to be tougher if a judgment is made that a few more months or six months to nine months longer with the 10,000 more troops would make a difference in the transfer of power. it will be a tougher decision. but, again, in complex

situations, you can always look at the glass from both sides. we have to be honest with ourselves. three years ago, we're talking about iraq as another institute. we would be thrilled if things were as good as they are today. it was in the midst of a civil war. hundreds of thousands of people were dying every day. in the past, beirut was a microcosm of the middle east, where all the different players of the middle east came into play. in iraq, there is some of that there today. iran, the persian threat, saudi arabia perhaps supporting sunni arabs, those who would use terrorism to achieve their directive -- all of this is the

unfolding. so far, we can be amused that the guy in leading the elections said that the motion stand and the guy behind in said that there should be a recant. this week, they switched. [laughter] let's hope that, over time, through these different elections and these transfers of power, that it is not an all or nothing gain in that part of the world, where, if you give up power, you lose your livelihood of your lives. i think president obama may well face a difficult decision six months to nine months from now where some problem emergence in iraq that was unexpected. i think he has been careful to say that he will act responsibly leaving then we were

responsible going in. i hope he does not have to make that decision. but he very milk -- but he very well might. >> if that decision is made and the withdrawal is too soon and iraq deteriorates to a degree that it is uncomfortable where people are dying in greater numbers than they are now, that is a bad thing. fundamentally, we need to go back to your portfolio, really, which is what do we need to do to defend, in an appropriately, the homeland? the homeland? i am not an isolationist in

this, i am concerned about the world my children live in. does this make your children less safe? >> probably the most recent example in answering your question is a group called al qaeda in the arabian peninsula. they are believed to have nocome only regional aspirations. we have seen that this over time have changed in a failed bombing. we had warning signs of it. the group that had a regional aspirations actually launch to themselves and were behind the attempted attack. i use that example to say to you is who is operating -- in order to understand if you need to be

fearful in terms of u.s. homeland security, what is the ability for terrorist groups to use that territory to plan or launch an attack against the united states? question, is there a central -- as you look at that question, is there a central government capable of taking care of that territory? if the answer is no, then yes, you have to be worried. that means that it is fertile ground for an attack into the u.s.. >> i want to get to our audience's questions. hold on a second. i was thinking about this the of the day. none of the things that we have been talking about we would have talked about 10 years ago. but 9/11 had not happened. the iraq war had not happened. we had not gone into afghanistan. we're not talking about the iranians building a nuclear

weapon. we were worried about the north koreans. i will give you that. but 10 years seems to be a really long time in days when you talk about the state of the world. 10 years from now, what will we be talking about that we are not even thinking about now? >> there are some people thinking about it, but probably not enough. i know the administration is working on this problem i started out my professional career working on nuclear arms control. the time was the height of the cold war. we have improved the situation massively. we are down to 5000 or 6000 apiece.

what we will face some time, five years or 10 years, i do not know of that is some use of a nuclear weapon somewhere. i do not know where. i am not saying that it is going to necessarily be any major city or cause a complete catastrophe. but the technology is improved. the number of loose nuclear weapons charged -- is still out there. it does not give high priority, despite speeches made by presidents in both administrations. it is done by lower officials and some outsiders. this is a small fein, but has such massive consequences -- this is a small thing, but has such massive consequences. something is going to happen catastrophically in the area of nuclear weapons. it is not necessarily going to

be a terrorist organization. it may be something we have not even thought of. it may be a crazy person. it may be a crazy general in the former soviet states. but something's got to happen in the area of tens of thousands of nuclear weapons and materials that have yet to be accounted for, controlled, and dismantled, and put in the maximum protective lockdown situation. >> when we gathered 10 years from now -- >> hopefully, i will be wrong. >> hopefully, yes. unlike other -- when we get there 10 years from now, what will we be talking about? >> this is a different version of what jamie said. i absolutely think that we have a tremendous public debate about iran's very clear intentions to acquire nuclear weapons.

it may not be a terrorist organization. when we talk about iran's nuclear ambitions, it is the single state sponsor of hezbollah. it is military capable and highly organized, more so than al qaeda has been. it is worldwide. the notion of iran's acquisition of a nuclear weapon, coupled with it being a state sponsor of terror, should scare everybody. secretary clinton made a speech today to aipac and said that, if iran obtain a nuclear weapon, we are likely to seek a nuclear arms race in the middle east.

i took issue with it. make no mistake about it. in the press, you know that that nuclear arms race is on to date and we are not talking about it. we need to be talking about it. there is a nuclear arms race in progress in the middle east and we need to be honest and we need to talk about it. if we do not talk about it, it will not just be iran with nuclear weapons. you have a potentially unstable region with lots of nuclear weapons which makes jamie's. all the more likely. look at what we know. -- jamie's point all the more likely. look at what we know. we know about iran's facility at koontz. we need to be concerned about the nuclear arms race that is currently going on. >> let me see where our audience

takes us. let me introduce the interview team who has helped us select the questions we will talk about. i would appreciate 8 if you would hold your applause -- if you're going to applaud. [laughter] until we hear them all. these are both question veteran -- veteran question vetter's. don miller is editor in chief of the "santa cruz sentinel." they are standing. [applause]

>> how quickly i figured out they were standing. [laughter] >> they did a good job. >> i have not lost a step, have i? [laughter] >> we had a wonderful event this afternoon. a bunch of students are in town. a handful or so of them are here. how like to ask them to stand. i do not know where they are. please stand up and be recognized. [applause] >> thank you. they are from carmel high, marion ojai, monterey home charter school, -- marina high, monterey home charter school. the lecture series of the institute's work and all of us

are grateful for the sponsorship that allows students from high schools and universities from this part of california to participate. we think the sponsors and we ask you to thank them, too. [applause] >> this is all new to me. here we go. how does the partisanship and the turmoil within the country affect our foreign policy? >> this is a subject that i have been thinking a lot about. i am working on a long-term project on it. i have studied and been a participant going back 15 years or so in watching how the other party behaves when is out of power and watching it switch positions when it is in power.

oppositions have the duty to oppose. they raise questions and ask the hard questions to make sure that policies are thoughtfully thought through. i think, too often, in the current era -- partially due to your old position, cable media, radio, for better or for worse -- people's motivations are attacked. people's patriotisms are attacked. the debates that should be had agreeably are had this agreeably. -- are had disagreeably. they used to hit each other with canes and spittoons. that is true. but the cuban missile crisis occurred two weeks or three

weeks before that a midterm election. it involved not a small problem, but the fate of the entire planet. it was u.s.-soviet nuclea0 thermonuclear war, basically. it was the closest election in history at that time. it was kennedy-nixon in 1960. the country had been divided. now is the chance for the election. imagine, today, if we had a global crisis where the parties had slightly different views and it was three weeks before -- >> d. you think that kennedy and doberman would be in? >> i do not know what they would do. it is frightening to think of the next time we face a world shattering, a world historical decision in the current environment.

after 9/11, the country did come together. >i think all of us have watched americans play out at some level and you go, "shut up." i heard someone the other day criticizing the administration for killing too many terrorists in afghanistan. if we had enough detention policies, we would not kill so many. we could water board them and [unintelligible] [laughter] and i thought, whoa, you are too stupid to be on television. [laughter] [applause] that is a standard that had never been reached before. >> if the stakes are high enough, people come together.

>> i do not know. 9/11 is a good example. it has been since 9/11 when the competition between the three cable networks and the rise of the blogosphere have occurred. vicki for me is very simple. it is for -- the key for me is very simple. it is for people to recognize the legitimacy of the other person's argument, that they are just as interested in protecting the security of our country and promoting america and having us be strong, but they just might have a different way of going about it. it predicated agree on that, starting on the house floor, on the senate, and on cable tv -- witobviously, there would not -- but that is where we have to start. it is a simple thing. but it would be profound. >> did you ever worry or cringe

when you were in government not only about the things that were said about your side, but other things your side said about the of a guy? did you ever think, "man, this is dangerous?" >> in the lead to the 2004 election, jamie was working for senator kerry and i was in the white house. it was clear enemy, for the first time how political the terrorism issue had become. bin laden and an american al qaeda member were releasing videotapes.

the threats were very real. we were very concerned about it. there were internal debates about what should be done. at one. there was a decision taken about having the secretary of homeland security raised the threat alert level. i worried that it would be misunderstood as to why we were doing that. i also thought it was incredibly important that to the extent we could pull the teeth on this appearing political, we should do it. senator kerrey was on the campaign bus. he was going to get to the stopped just after tom ridge had gone public with raising the threat of large.

what we did not want was for the president to be blindsided. how does the bush white house get a call through to the kerrey campaign? the answer is that in an incredibly polarizing environment, two people who had worked in the clinton administration, i knew that i could get him to the phone. we laughed about it. r kerrey was not surprised by it. he may not have agreed. in terms of the good of the nation and the security of the country, we were able, by virtue of a personal relationship, to get past the politics. that did not stop howard dean from casting aspersions and the rnc pushing back. by chris about that.

but what gets you through is that there -- i cringe about that. but what gets you through it is that there are people for that. too often, these important issues get reduced to these silly sound bites that to really do not tell you anything and do not really advance the public debate. i think that is dangerous. it happens on both sides of the aisle. both are equally wrong. i think there has to be a free zone where we can really debate substantive issues and divorce them from some of the top. >> both senate -- both president bush and senator kerry made a very smart comments about what a reasonable expectation of terror

over the long term is. senator kerrey said we need to reduce it to an almost nuisance level. they were both creamed. cable cream to them. -- cable cream died them. and i thought, whow, we cannot have a conversation about the most serious issue. the decisions they take, at some level, they do get influenced by that. the financial independence -- the financial dependence we have on china and our foreign policy, do we exaggerated? >> i think we do exaggerate it.

there's too much and assumptions that, because china owns so much of the american dead -- there's too much an assumption that because china on so much of the american debt, that' that is a problem when you owe a big debt nor a small that, when you owe a big bank, you're in trouble. you do not pay it, they take your house. but if you are a corporation and you owe billions of dollars, they give you more money to make you succeed so that they can get their money back. in a sense, the chinese want america's economy to succeed. they want the dollar to succeed. otherwise this $1 trillion worth of treasury bills that they have spent so much money on will not

be worth as much. where i think they own yard that has an impact is that we want to get them to do things to be a responsible mannemember of the l community, such as supporting the appropriate sanction on iran for violating its restrictions. our talking points get screwed up when they get to this day to less than you are not behaving like a responsible country because you are in debt. that hurts our ability to influence china like that. but in terms of sitting back and having some control over what we do in iraq or afghanistan or our relationship with israel or our partnership an alliance with south korea and japan or equally

with any of the nato countries, no, i do not think that china can deploy that leverage. if we ever want china to be a responsible member of the international community, we will need to develop a better financial footing so that we can harangue them with full force. we need to be able to harangue them. one of the things that people do not talk about is that china is not a responsible member of the international community. they do not actually spend a lot of time caring about anything that is not related with anything within china or their ability to get resources for china. when it comes to the world's operations, things that western countries but dissipate in, in peacekeeping operations, human rights abuses around the world, they abstain from those issues

or go along with the majority after it a decision has been taken. they do not have an affirmative form policy. >> what about the freedom of the internet? [laughter] >> they should just back off on their own folks for a bit. [laughter] >> can diplomacy work with countries that the u.s. considers a terrorist countries? can we diplomatically work our way out of this mess with iran? >> there has been no indication, based on iranian behavior, that that is possible. i was saying this to someone earlier. i traveled with secretary jim baker makes the point. you cannot resolve anything if you do not talk to the people you disagree with.

the problem right now is that iran has not done anything to events a willingness to a evince -- to evince a willingness to deal with us in a reasonable way. the military options are not good. i do not think that the current administration is inclined in that direction and. but let me hasten to add that the primary mission was not inclined in that direction either. israel mayor may not choose to go in that direction. people will ask you what you can expect from that, given what you know and what your understanding is. that is a delay tactic.

you're not going to destroy iran's capability. you will delay their acquisition of a nuclear capability. we do not have much choice other than to critical mission that will continue to put pressure on iran. >> is there one thing that is missing there? what are two things that, if we could only convince the czechs -- [laughter] >> it would change? >> china could be much stronger. they are acting in their own self-interest as opposed to the interest of the international community. to the extent that engagement

and diplomacy sanctions are not working, our allies in china and russia bear some responsibility. >> should the doctrine of preemptive military action remain on the table when it comes to iran? >> pre-emptive military doctrine -- this came into the public discussion in 2002 when it was made of the strategy document of the united states to say openly what has always been true, that countries can act in their own self- defense if they are about to be attacked. this was one of the reasons why iraq diplomacy was so hard.

it was seen as a first test of a new thing. if we did iraq, then we could do iran and then syria. that is the way the rest of the world looked at it because it was hyped as some new plan. it has always been true that the u.s. has been able to act preemptively in some situation if they thought it would be in our national self-defense. the issue was not preemption. it was the other word in the doctrine -- "prevention." there and is knockenot -- iran t going to have a missile with which to attack the united states.

but knowing that iran may soon have a nuclear weapons capable program, do we act before they get to that point? that would be preventive war, to prevent something from happening. for all the reasons that she stated, i think we will end up in a very similar situation to the way things work in the cold war. there was a phrase in the cold war that was called "adequate verification." it was a term invented by the nixon administration. it meant that we could have an agreement with the soviet union, who we know are lying and cheating and stealing rations -- [laughter] >> it is not like they cannot help it or something there were born with. [laughter] >> right.

but we could do this in time to respond. i think that is where we will end up with iran. we will develop some analogous phrase. >> we will let them back of their nuclear weapons. >> we would -- >> know. we would attack -- >> no. we would get tax if they throw the inspectors out. we would detect that and then we would make this decision to use force and prevent iran from ever having this capability. to get into a diplomatic discussion with other countries, if they were about to brandish an actual weapon or put the final pieces together or

throw the inspectors out who currently monitor this material, that would yield a different response. i think that is where this debate is going to go. >> may i respond? >> i feel like a lowly college professor. why wait? why do we not blow them up? >> it worries me that the soviet contract gives me comfort in this context. russia was not a state sponsor of terror. when you add that into the mix, the notion that we will be able to know that they have cheated and be able to take time to make a decision to act or that we will + +

i don't think that is realistic. for the movement of materials and for the use of those improvised devices by a terrorist organization. ration -- russia was a state on state threat. >> the alternative is what has already been dismissed which is to use military force. i am not talking about preferences but where we are likely to end up. the reason why president bush did not choose to attack iran and why president obama seems disinclined because the attack would not achieved the objective of preventing them from getting weapons and it would have all of these costs. >> the terrorist capability would be used against perhaps

our ally in israel, perhaps against american embassies around the world, perhaps ourselves. we would be initiating a war in the middle east for a gain that has been described as questionable. that is why president bush did not do it and why this is not preferable. weapon capability. we do not have good options. >> you may use the military option. you can get to the point where the use of the military option for delaying it is a better alternative than the acceptance of them acquiring a nuclear weapon. >> but we are not there yet.

>> no. that is right. i think we may find ourselves there. certainly, our is really friends may find themselves there. -- our is really -- our isreali friends may find themselves there. >> here is the next question. why are americans so despised around the world? [laughter] >> i don't think that that promise is true. during the clinton administration, a relatively popular present around the world, there was a lot of anger and frustration at the united states. the french foreign minister said that we were the hyper power and that european countries did not like being told what to do when it came to sanctions on iran and libya. we were criticized for things

like be telling the secretary- general of the u.n.. in all candor, president bush took that to a new level. even after president obama had come in and fixed theucñ major differences that existed between the two parties, like climate change and change in the practices with respect to the treatment of prisoners and supporting international control agreements, we did something that nobody had ever heard of before. we unsigned a treaty. i guess they had an eraser or pen and the race did. [laughter] -- and you raised it. [laughter] -- and erased it. [laughter]

>> too often, other countries are willing to put their head in the sand and hope the problem will go away or live in the knowledge that somebody else will take care of it, whether it is the united states or the israelis. this is a good example. you talk to moderately arab countries and you get this funny moment where moderately arab countries basically admitte that they would like the israelis to block the iranian nuclear reactor. -- to blow up the iranian nuclear reactor. in the recent case went israel attacked the hezbollah operations in lebanon because they had attacked israelis in the north, for the first time ever, you had egypt, jordan,

saudi arabia issuing a statement blaming hezbollah for initiating the war. it is rare that you have dishonesty. with all the difficulties that we go through, america is the strongest military power and the world. we have a system that is admired. americans themselves are admired, probably less than it ought to be, if we could fix immigration officers being mean to all of those foreigners. it is hard to come to this country if you're not american canal. it is tough to go through immigration. -- if you're not american now. it is that to go through immigration. it is not anybody's fault.

>> so we are not despised. but we could do things to be more admired than we already are. >> did the administration worry -- not that americans were despised -- that the attitude toward the american government was causing problems that we're serious and needed to be resolved because it was dangerous to us? >> yes. one of the things is that, when you read the question, my first reaction is that there is a difference between this agreements by people around the world with american policy versus americans being despised. i have travelled throughout the persian gulf, including to saudi arabia many times.

i have never had the experience where anyone in any part of the world, including the arab world, hated americans. they may have disagreed with policy. they may have locally been disagreeing with american foreign policy. but they did not despise americans. when condoleezza rice went to become the secretary of state, she and i talked about this issue. we had met with a group of american university presidents who were concerned about the drop in student visas from around the world. we were clamping down and issuing fewer student visas. our allies in canada and great britain and australia were easing restrictions on students and were attracting them.

the university officials said that, once we losezo!t them, a percentage of them we will not get back. teaching the customs and immigration officials at airports how to behave in a way that does not unduly offend people who were visiting this country, i can remember a great story. a man who had gone to harvard and said that his wife would not let him go. i said, i will meet him at boston's logan airport if you send him. he said, that is fine, but my wife will let him go because you will not be there every time. it is by no means perfect. it is better.

it was the group of university presidents who said that, by and large, we have gotten students back to this country. they are not at the level that it was before 9/11. people admired the ingenuity and the capability of this country and they wanted to come here. the important thing was to get past the government-to- government relations around the world and reach out to people and let them come here and let them be comfortable and take advantage of the many blessings we have in this country. we worked very hard. that was one of the things we thought we could do to ease some of that. .

>> a number of dramatic decisions, the moniker of fighting as hard as we should for democratic values around the world. i think the decision to not see the dalai lama before the

president went to china, the decision to downplay human- rights and our relationship with china, the decision to put aside some of the democracy programs in countries like egypt, each one of these decisions had good practical value and good pragmatic rationale but the net effect of all these decisions, it is a shame that democracy promotion, the great idea that the rest of the world should have more and more infrastructure of democracy and ultimately democratic governments, i would say became hyper-partisan the day that president bush give a speech to the state of the union and every republican legislator put purple ink on their finger and whenever

iraq was discussed, they waved the finger to try to beat the democrats in the room feels like because they have legitimate questions about the iraq war, they were not for democracy, as if those two were the same. unfortunately, the results is the democratic party during those years and began to associate promotion of democracy with the iraq war and president bush's doctor in and remember this day when the attempt was made to embarrass them. the democratic party has stepped back from being as much of a promoter of democratic dollars around abroad despite president kennedy, president carter, president clinton paused historical support for democracy. >> in your area, nobody seems

very happy. do you think the president has handled it ok? >> i think the president, it is interesting. when you look at the press coverage with the health care debate, the president has not really spoken about the terrorism threat and the issues facing this country in terms of homeland security since the christmas day attempt. i think that leaves open the ability for partisans to criticize him. there is no question that we are going to be attacked again. we can quibble whether it is enhanced derogation or did interrogation techniques are guantanamo bay or the federal trials, all of those are legitimate public policy debates. regrettably, it denigrates into a partisan debate.

i will say to you that i think it is really important and my concern at the moment is the president must find his voice on this issue. i fear, given the christmas day attempt and his concern that the system did not work as it should have, that is -- that we failed to detect the threat before it manifested itself, he had gotten remarkably quiet on this issue. i did not think that serves him or the country well. i think we need to talk about the issue. we need to be off -- honest about the threat we are facing. your national security officials every day they are in office must strike a balance between

security and civil liberties. they do it on your behalf