i say, chris, we are in deep shit. we are looking in the problems and the flight control business. whatever problems were occurring here. we have come to the conclusion that we had an issue on board the spacecraft. our job now is to start the evacuation from.

at the same time, i am faced with a series of decisions that are all irreversible. at the time the explosion occurs, we are about 60,000 miles from the surface of the moon. .

and of the other option was to go around the moon. it would take about five days. they were now at the point of making the decision -- which passed are we going to take? i got the feeling that said do not use the main engine. do not jettison the lunar module. that was all i had was a gut feeling. in the flight control business, you develop some street smarts. i think every controller has felt this at one time or another. lundy had the same feeling. by trajectory people are scared out of their wits that we're going to execute this, because it is very late in the trajectory to make this kind of competition. swing this mission around the front side of the moon is very risky. mai systems guide -- my systems guys want to get home as soon as they can because they know are

-- they know they are in deep trouble. it was nothing more than a gut feeling. we spent -- we spun the mission around the moon, rather than come around the front. this then puts us on the trajectory path that we have to start rapidly coming around for. we talked briefly to the group. i do not have much time to say why we are doing this. they were willing to follow whatever direction we were giving them. in the meantime, we now have the crew moving over to the lunar module, starting the power-up process. glynn lunney's team has come up to the speed, to the point where we can hand it over to them. my job is to get off shift and come up with the game plan from here on out. as soon as he hits the consul, he is immediately challenged. the final fuel cell is now dying

purity have to get over and -- the final fuel cell is now dying. he has to get it over to the lunar module computer. it is all pencil and paper. we would have killed for a pocket out later. the data transfer have to be absolutely perfect. as he was doing that, i was walking down stairs, trying to figure out which direction to go. whenever we came up with had to be -- we had to come all with an answer in hours and days. it would be outside designing and we had to come up with the answers. we walked into the room. my team is down there. it is loaded with my controllers and backroom people. this is the data room. it is a room that is used only when there is trouble. you can sense trouble in this room. there are two overhead television monitors, one small

coms unit. it was filled with great government desk's -- gray government desks. we were in the data room where the records from the analog recorders were used. one of the very difficult problems that we faced was that there was no instantaneous data retrieval. it was literally hours from the time we would request a printout of the preliminary data until we would see it. the only records we had to work with were the ones that were in the recorders themselves and a few hard copies we could take to copy and make copies of. we had these pieces of paper. these controllers had been watching the life blood drain out of the spacecraft. we knew there had been some type of explosion. that was about all there was. our job was basically to try to figure out what on board the spacecraft was still usable and

to come up with the game plan to get them home. by now, we had made a decision that we're going to go around the moon. i made a brief opening speech because i have a lot of new players who were starting to show up from the engineering community. we have astronauts who were reporting. it was obvious that the team was much larger than we really need at this stage in the game. i needed to focus on the most immediate problems. throughout all of this, it was emerging -- we kept hearing one voice as we were going through the evacuation in the lunar module cerna. they had started telling us about the problems we would have been accomplishing an alignment using the lunar module optics of the spacecraft's were still docked -- while the

spacecraft were still dr. together. it was a principal concern of myself and lunney. with this background information, can we afford to power down the space shuttle? can we get to the point where it could very easily stretch this? the game plan broke down now into three distinct phases. one is, come up with a set of master checklist's that we could use to get the spacecraft from where we were, around the moon, and then back to earth. i assigned one of my more trusted controllers who had been with us since very early in the mercury program. he became the model for the systems engineers that we used in mission control. he was given the job to be the

individual who would maintain the master set of checklists for the remainder of the entire mission. a new controller had joined us and he was given the responsibility to sit on top of all consumables and resources available on both spacecraft. he had absolutely veto authority over any checklist entry. they were almost welded at the hip. the third one was a guide to figure out how to turn the lifeboat into a survival vehicle. one of my other controllers got that. these were the three key individuals. i told these three people to look around the room and anybody that they did not think they needed for the next few hours,

to send them back to the consoles and get them out of there so that we could focus the smaller team. we did a black or exercise that listed quickly -- a black board exercise that quickly listed the issues that needed to be worked and who would work them. the power guy came and said, gene, we have to get powered down immediately. i said, i will work on this. we have to figure out -- we have to expect the navigation system to continue drifting and we have to find some way to realign it. we gave phil the responsibility to come up with ways to use it. i started getting ahead of myself. one thing that was giving as problems was that this explosion that had occurred had set a cloud of debris around the spacecraft and black -- and

froze particles of oxygen. we normally navigated with stars and we could not see them anymore. we could just see the sun, the earth, and the moon. phil was given the responsibility to come up with techniques to check our spacecraft attitudes or maneuvers and those kinds of things, using only the sun, earth, and moon, and to continue to refine the techniques of aligning the navigation system on board the lunar module once we did have that. i took my team offline and tried to bear out ways to cut down the return trip time -- tried to figure out ways to cut down the return trip time. there was no way we would make five days. we needed to cut it down to five days or -- for days or three days. we started moving in several different directions. one team worked a power profile. another group worked on navigation techniques. a third group was integrating

all of the pieces. my team picked up responsibility to figure out data -- a way to cut a day off the return trip time. we set up a formal ties. we set up working areas down in the control room proper. it was amazing how presidents of corporations would respond to these 26 or 27-year-old i have been charged. that was one of the real miracles oof mission control. the relationship between program manager, designer, flight controller, it all warranted absolute and pure trust. once a person was given responsibility, everyone back to them. once decisions were made, you never second-guessed those decisions. this process continued for the first 24 hours. my team came back on console to

execute a maneuver. it goes back to apollo 9 when we did a lot of testing of lunar module when two spacecraft or doctors together. as soon as we recognized we had to perform the maneuver to speed up the journey, that was the set of procedures we called back to. we updated the procedure is based on the situation at hand. my team came back on console. we executed these procedures. we increased our velocity of return by almost 1,000 feet per second. we change the landing point from the indian ocean to the south pacific. we said the aircraft character -- carrier iwo jima to the landing location. with the maneuver behind us, we could power down for the first time. the power level -- you can explain it very simply. it was the equivalent of 200 watt light bulbs in your house, about one-quarter of what

today's light bulbs used. that is what we had to do to get the crew back to earth. once we started this and got into this power down process, we had only one major management flap. he needed to get his crew to sleep. he was very forceful about one in get his crew to sleep. i said, we're going to keep them up and wait until we get the spacecraft into thermal control mode. they wanted to power down even more. i had to tell them that we're not want power down completely. what we have to do was -- what we had to do was rotisserie-type maneuver. the only light we had was the son. it took quite a while to do this. the first attempt was unsuccessful. they were crossing -- grousing that we could solve the problem

later. i have the same no, that is not the way we're going to do business. -- i had to say no, that is not the way we're going to do business. there were emergencies all the way through the process of returning to earth. our trajectory was flattening out. we did not know why. we had to correct that. the crew was suffocating that. we had techniques of using chemical scrubbers for the air. from the standpoint of the command module, and the lunar module, as we were approaching the final phase of entry, the procedures were not coming together quite as nicely as we would have liked. the crew wanted to see how we intended to accomplish this final landing. the basic problem was a command module, are reentry vessel, that only had about 2.5 hours of live

line. we had the service module, where the explosion occurred, that was basically useless. we had the lunar module with the patches through the small tunnel. that was our lifeboat. we had to come up with the game plan to move this entire stack into an attitude where because that -- separate all three pieces of it would not collide upon entry. the crew had to evacuate from the lunar module at the very last moment. they had the power of the command module, get its computer initialized, separate the pieces, and this was the game plan. we did not really get all the pieces put together and get and verified by the simulators until about 10 hours prior to the time we needed to execute this plan. the crew was quite concerned that they could see that earth continuing to grow and the windscreen on the spacecraft. they still did not have the game plan in hand. we kept reassuring them. this is not -- this was about

the time that dick came in and said, you're going to have a plan. cool down. he had the magic of being able to work with the crew. they worked with us. those were the real pioneers of space flight operations. they set the mold for everybody else from that day on. we got the procedures up to the group. jack swigert have a command model procedures. fred haise have a lunar module. -- jack swigert had the command module procedures. fred haise had the lunar module. there were caught and coveralls. it was very moist. -- there were cau andotton coveralls. fred haise had a very high body to a richer and the shakespeare he had all urinary tract infection -- fred haise had a

very high body temperature and a urinary tract infection. ken mattingl andyy had been instrumental in looking at troubleshooting. the voice of mission and troll -- joseph kerwin during the final hour -- joseph kerwin was the voice of mission control during the final hour. his control was absolutely superb. he was a mentor, a teacher, a tutor, disciplinarian -- the whole 9 yards. at times, i almost felt he was on board the spacecraft, placing their hands on the switches and keeping them going. the bottom line was, we continue to have many surprises. we had to do another emergency maneuver. one of our three command module batteries failed at about the time the parachutes were due to come out. at that time that we landed,

this issue was still in doubt. the final thing remember about this mission was the reentry period. the mood in this room was becoming very mellow. when we got ready to jettison the lunar module, we started speaking sentimentally to the lunar module. thank you, you were a hell of a good spaceship. you did not even know the world was out there at the time. we were so focused. it came time to express our feelings. again, the entire world is listening. mission control is going to admit we are emotional. jack swigert finally says, all of us up here want to thank you guys down there for the fine job you did.

that broke the ice. we got a few attaboy s from lovell and haise. then we went to black out. that is the time when communications to the spacecraft -- we could nail when it started and when it would finish to the second. each controller, during blackout, it is a very lonely period. the crew is on their own. they are left with the data that you gave them. each controller is going back through everything they did during the mission. was i right? that is the only question in their mind. you hear the electronics, the home of the air-conditioner. you smoke a lot. somebody lights up a cigarette. you drink the final cold coffee and still soda that has been there -- stale soda that has

been there. every eye has been on the clock on the wall. when it counts down to zero, i tell kerwin to call. wef@ call again and again. we are a minute from when we should have heard from them. there is a little bit of doubt coming into the room that something happened and the crew did not make it. in our business, hope is eternal and trust in the spacecraft and each other is eternal. we keep going. every time we called the crew, we are one minute and 27 seconds from when we should have heard from the crew before we finally get the call back. a down range aircraft has heard from the crew. almost instantaneously from the aircraft carrier, we get a sonic boom and radar contact from you agena. -- from iwo jima.

uc the spacecraft under these three red and white parachutes. the motion is so great that every controller is giant may crying. -- is silent plea crying -- silently crying. you can never express an emotion until well after it is over. you get the whoop. you can hear the emotion in of voices. you have to work to get everyone. the guys are in the warm air of the south pacific. the spacecraft -- you see them come out of the spacecraft. iwo jima is circling it. mission control -- our job is not done until we can over responsibility to the carrier task force command. it is only when that is accomplished that we can start the internal celebration.

our celebration always started with cigars. i do not know what the young controllers will do today, because you cannot smoke in mission control. maybe someone will change that. the day the shuttle team for cover -- teams recovered their crew members against long odds. start with the cigars. nobody in mission control was going to speak. we had some darn fine cigars. we went through mission control to the back room and the offices and laboratories. everybody had their mission cigar to light up at the same time that we did >> bob fully provided by the cigar institute of america. -- thoughtfully provided by the cigar institute of america. >> then he unlocked the doors because they have been locked. the real heroes start pouring in

at this time. the faults in the back room who gave us at hand when we needed them. the final phase of every mission, the final celebration, is to pass out an american flag. we had the flag that we passed. we started this tradition when we set our first american -- second record. it was the record when we rounded the two spacecraft the first time. since then, there has been an american flag in hand of every controller at the time of touchdown. this is just spectacular time for us. i do not think anyone will ever forget those final moments. these are always something. while we wait for the crew to recover -- the backup crews and the capcoms always develop some

kind of parity on what happened during the course of the mission. and this was a parity that was taken off after a very short set of comments i made during the misison. -- th emission -- the mission. he said, i think it is an instrument -- instrumentation flight. he said, we have to do something about that. they took these three segments of words and intersperse them with spike jonze. we had some gospel singing. we had president nixon. interspersed these on a tape. we had to listen to this thing over and over again as we drank the beer and smoke is a more cigar's -- smoked some more cigars. that was the kind of system in

those days. i do not think any more people in peacetime has ever come together in a similar fashion. >> did that old gang ever get together for reunions. >> we have one coming up. we get together every five years for some type of reunion. i think they're all together into frequent -- too infrequent. two or three things have done a lot to help us in the most recent years. the apollo 15 -- the apollo 13 movie has done a lot to bring back some recognition to really great people -- people who stood tall when times were short and odds for long. i think john glenn's flight help us bring to gather some of the -- bring together some of the joy of living and working as we did. that has helped.

now that the coming celebrations for the anniversary -- we will have a lot of 30th anniversaries. we have flown here. i think that is bringing it back together. let's -- it is good to get people back together. >> we have stopped with apollo 13. the apollo program was cut short. nonetheless, there were others that were pretty important. what was your role during the 14, 15, 16, in 17? but it changed. we were at the point of having to move -- >> it change. we were at the point of having to move engineers. i had this during my teams out more and more. we literally had our feet in between apollo and skylights. at the same time, the flight directors had become a very valuable commodity. many people who caused the

mercury, gemini, apollo programs to come into being or retiring in been the programs. cliff charlesworth was one of the first to go. we were looking at how we could apply some of the technology to other problems. glynn lunney left. he picked up another program at the time. it is now the next generation of our involvement, trying to involve the russians as our space partners. all of a sudden, i found myself short of flight directors and having to bring new people on board. it was a mentor, a teacher, a tutor, the same as kraft had done in early days pretty stretched our assets, -- in early days. we stretched our assets. we standardized.

i would launch the apollo 15, 16, 17 for both the earth and the moon. the other flight director still remaining work gerry griffin who handled eva's. then we handed it over to be frank and britain would do the landings -- to pete frank and griffin would do the landings. we wanted to use the diminished resources but keep the quality as high as we could. 14 stands out because it was probably one of the most famous things that's griffin -- it is one of the things that i remember him in. as we were getting ready to go down to the surface of the moon, he had -- we had recognized the indication. when my other controllers came up with a software patch -- one of my other controllers came up with a software patch.

we executed a software patch with no more than two-hour shelf life from the time we recognize the problem and the time we started down to the surface of the moon. we executed a very complex procedure onboard the spacecraft to pass the software to ignore the aborts which during the startup phase. once it was properly settled back at the switch, then we re- unable to -- we re-enabled. the mission control team knew the limits. they could do no wrong. there was no problem to scoot up -- too tough or too difficult. i remember apollo 15 because of a heavy penalty the crew paid. with the rover extending the service operations and the

surface time, their fingers were hemorrhaged. they became dehydrated. by the time they finished their eva's and we lifted them off, they got into the lunar orbit and glynn lunney was on control at that time. he had the darndest time trying to get the spacecraft -- it had been getting ready for the separation of two grew spacecraft. in the equipment transferred over into the command module, getting the integrity checks, i was sitting next to him very we were getting ready to take over the shift. the crew was having mental lapses and blackouts. we would clarify the instructions about the different checks. the separation maneuver did not get off on time. it was like we had lived in a time warp. after the mission, we found that, due to the crew's dehydration, we ended up with

the severe past -- with severe passion -- with severe potassium deficiencies. this was characteristic. to prevent this in future missions, we spiked orange juice with potassium, because we tried to find ways to back off on the timeline. this added to the famous orange juice rebellion on board the spacecraft. we had some problems with the thrust control mattingly was to execute it pretty came around the back side of the moon and it did not get -- mattingly was to execute it. we came around the backside of the moon and it did not get executed. approaching mission 17, it was a series of go for broke things

that we and the crew would do to keep the missions going to accomplish our objectives. the missions were becoming more and more difficult. it was a super bowl class, elite, world-class team in crisis management. to put it bluntly, we were at the top of our form. we moved into a 17. it was with a degree of melancholy -- i do not think there is any person alive who led worked with the loaner program and these missions -- any person alive who had worked with bill lunar program and these missions -- it was the end of the era as like control. i needed to find a way to inspire the next generation to go on. it is equally as exciting as it was going to the moon. i had to convince them of that.

it was a traumatic period of great change as an organization and personally. the final thing that gerry griffin and i decided to do -- all previous flight directors -- they were in the console one day and the next mission they were not there anymore. lunney, charlesworth 0-- they had gone out this way. it was determined that we would not go out this way. a spectacular based artist was sitting in front of me at the console, sketching the crew. he would look at the pictures on the television screen and in 6 d seconds -- 60 seconds, he would have a sketch of them.

we went to the coffee shop. i was interested in the legacy. i wanted to leave a different legacy than the one my predecessor had established, the legacy of the flight director. i wanted to leave a legacy in the broader sense -- a mission control itself. i asked bob to design us and insignia for mission control -- an insignia for mission control. i said i wanted to talk about the commitment that led to the flight controller's pin, which will seat several places in mission control today. it represents the commitment and team work of the programs. the discipline, because once we failed in july 4, we got into -- failed in chairman 94, we got into a series of arguments about the mission -- failed in gemini 4, we got into a series of

arguments about the mission. we basically were not tough enough. we did not step of our responsibilities. we have to remember that we're always accountable for what we do. we failed. we can never stop learning. i sketched out the elements that i wanted to be represented in the emblem for mission control. he agreed to go do this. i then came back in, launched the crew off the surface, and into lunar orbit where we would continue for some time. griffin and myself handed over to the next generation of light directors. -- of flight directors. i handed it over to my assistant flight director, my face ballwin man -- faithful wingman.

griffin handed it over. we sat in the viewing room for the remainder of the mission to watch our new flight directors carry over the skylight program. it was very important for us. >> it was not really the end of the program for you. you had moved on into management. it was the end of your flight direction. there were still flights to be flown and spacecraft to be worked with. you mentioned a couple of them, skylab for one. >> skylab was -- people say -- gene kranz, you really cannot believe what you are saying. skylab was as exciting to me as apollo ever was. skylab was a different type of focus as a leader and team.

we had -- the apollo missions were all short, around 10 days or so. it is one thing -- a team together and do all the rent -- it is one thing to keep a team together and do all the right things or just 10 days. it is another thing to do it for the better part of a year and to hand over hundreds of problems every shift without a glitch. to have these people all respond to loss of control because the moment is holding the attitude freezes up and a whole stack system starts tumbling. to recover from a massive short in one of the power distributors that is scattering solder balls inside the spacecraft. to learn to repair and replace things in flight. to go back to brute force mechanics to fix the space systems.

skylab started off in a top fashion. flight control teams literally fought, took over ground command, and fluid by ground command -- flew it by ground command. we were manually firing the jets and thrusters. i was one of the plotters. the flight directors called me into action. i sat in mission control for a year every day. we would plot external skin temperatures. we would deduced the location of the sun and figure out where to maneuver so we could find the proper balance between keeping sun to generate power versus the minimum temperature to keep everything on the inside from frying. we flew the spacecraft using simple blocks that way for the time until -- plots that way

until the spectacular engineering team could, with ways to replace -- could come up with ways to replace the thermal shield we have lost. they took pete conrad, paul weitz, and joe kerwin to install this stuff on the eva's -- i think they were the most wild we had done since the jim and i program -- since the gemini program. we sat 12-hour shifts every day for a year. we were absolutely delighted when the flight director would call for us to sit down and console and take a shift. there was one time that was really funny. it was anecdotal. at the end of the first skylab mission, several flight directors went over to receive

awards. they flew them over. myself and pete frank carey the time frame while they were off getting their awards -- carried the timeframe all they were getting their awards. they took a look at what we had done and threw it out. they started from scratch. the other thing that was neat, was chuck lewis had been suffering from stomach problems through the final mission, until the required emergency surgery. two weeks prior to the end of the mission, i was recalled back to my flight director duties. i sat his shift from the time he had the surgery until the mission was over. i covered the jim and i -- the gemini, apollo, and skylab.

>> could not keep the old war horse off. >> once you get into this business, i was a figher pilot. when you left the cockpit, you realize that you had lost the one thing in life you treasured the most. you also recognize there is a thing in life called progress. you have to move forward. it was the same thing with leaving the console of the flight director. any flight director says it is the happiest time of his life. my job now was to continue building the team and the championship practices that developed the count -- that developed that caliber of the team for the skylab and the soil yuz. that became my job. >> what do you remember about astp?

>> it was the enigma of the entire program. i found it very difficult to believe that we were abandoning skylab, a very functional and usable space station to commit resources, a launch vehicle and spacecraft, to go after a purely political objective. been made a big deal about working with the russians and -- they made a big deal about working with the russians. we had done that as early as upon gemini program. i could not believe we were giving up an extended mission in the skylab for purely political objectives. i have never been a politician. i did not focus as well as i should upon the broader set of political objectives. there are many constituencies. what i would say is -- there is

a variety. the one that is most important is getting young people -- giving young people a place to go, a dream to have and hold onto, and to move into the future. that is the most important legacy of space. if it takes political objectives to do it, so be it. >> you were not happy with the decision to send our first space station -- that introduced a whole new plausibly, did it not? you're looking at the difference between a mission and nothing that stands up their day in and day out. >> skylab was probably the most productive era of space flight in the history of the program. we had four major causes of science -- astronomy, astronomers were on board the space station. we had marvelous relationships with major laboratories and

observatories that were interacting with the group in real time. -- the creew in -- the crew in real time. we always continued the scientific process in an unmanned fashion with ground control. we had medical experimentation where we continue to learn about man in space. we continued to probe the very unknowns about how long and how people will man would be over an extended time. we continue to press the envelope from a standpoint of crew performance. we found a lot about the psychology of having a crew in space. we found out about the ability to communicate with themselves and their families, developing camaraderie between the control team and the ground -- and the ground. the earth resources was one of the most magnificent experiments that with our reform

to -- that we had ever performed. we had a pubes passes to a second-by-second basis -- we had to compute these passes to a second-by-second basis. the motions seem to be doing things we did not understand. we had a series of corollary experiments. we ran furnaces. everybody kids about making ball bearings in space. there was a reason also appeared we were trying to develop manufacturing processes. we needed to find out what happened when metals melted together in an zero-g environment, in a perfect vacuum. i considered the abrupt termination of skylab, after only three transmissionsmanned

almost heretical. we give a very rapid process of learning for a mission that was purely political. it made no sense to me. >> do you see a relationship between the fact that the russians and the united states are together and their objective is to build a space station? a modernized version of what skylab once was? >> i believe that the process of working together internationally is incredibly important. i guess i am an american. i believe in america for americans. i do not believe that we have a businesslike relationship that is going to allow us to continue to work in space. you have to have a set of ground rules of an operational nature, technologically -- you cannot set a game plan that is totally

political in nature. it is not going to make sense to the participating countries. i believe the problem that we have with the international space station is that nobody in america is really understanding what is going on there. why are we doing this? we of the very poor job of selling this program? -- we have done of very poor job of selling his program. it will go the way of skylab and a lunar program. you cannot just walk out after the mission is over. you have this massive device up and earth's orbit that has to be brought down in a controlled fashion. again, it is a horrible waste of financial resources within the united states, russia, the participating countries. the fact is that we have to come to a business like a set of agreements with the russians, as we did with the other purses many countries in europe, japan,

and canada -- and we have not yet established that kind of relationship. we continue to make excuses for the financial problems. we continue to make excuses for the lack of delivery. these were recognized in the early days of the program. financial problems are not going to go away. technological problems are not going away. but we still want russia as a partner. we have to set up a game plan that is going to work for the next five, 10, 15 years. >> is it possible to establish such a game plan? >> there is enough in space for all participants that yes, we can establish such a game plan. we have to move beyond what i would say of the national -- almost ethnic relationships for building a relationship in russians versus americans -- we have to look into what is good for our nation in the broader sense. what is good for our industry and our scientists? we have to move beyond the

boundaries. we have to have a better framework and we have now. >> one thing we do have today is the work forkhorse. the space shuttles have flown an immense number of flights very successfully. >> i love the shuttle. it is magnificent. i look at the shuttle as glass hurrah of the mercury, gemini, and apollo generation. it is a device that was founded on the principles and carries forward the characteristics of very strong leadership. basically, if you take a look at how this device came into being, it is probably the most advanced, technologicalsystem

that has ever been built -- technological space system that has ever been built. people do not receive the second -- the recognition that they should have for the commitment they made to americans and the world's space capability. >> do you believe that the shuttle was an instrument that was built by the most gifted technologists, leaders, and managers that ever existed within the space program? i think this get that aid to the american people, the american public, the space business -- this gift that they gave to the american people, the american public, this is business, is never fully realized and recognized. it is the space system that has a broad range of missions. it has demonstrated itself to be applicable to accomplish every

one of its objectives. unfortunately, it has not achieved the economy that was intended. the economies are not being achieved principally because of political limitations put on the program. at the time of the challenger accident, we were one of the world's premier launchers of satellites from the shuttle. we had carried a majority of the department of defense satellites. we had done payload operations for laboratories for many countries in the world and provided a research laboratory for people in the united states wit. with the stroke of a pen, it was decided that we were unwilling to risk human life to deploy satellites that could be as well deployed on an unmanned spacecraft. we lost sight of our objectives. we were after continuing the operations of the premier launcher within all space

systems of the world. we were also trying to make the launch your economically -- to launcher -- the launcher economically feasible. we accepted a placebo for the loss of the challenger crew. would say we went the wrong way. >> do you think that -- it was originally conceived as something that would be all things to all programs. perhaps that was asking too much. >> i would say yes and it prepared i would not equivocate. -- i would say yes and no. i would not equivocate. it could deploy. it could retrieve. it was a platform for eva's. it launched satellite systems. you name it.

the one thing it did not become was the economic workhorse we had expected it to be. that was part of the process within the nation that we were using to sell programs to congress. i do not think any operator ever looked and said we will launch one of these guys every week. no matter how good your space system is, really, it was not that way. the technology was not quite there. it is maybe a generation earlier in these things where some of the early transport prototypes. you have to put this in the context of today in the future. -- and the future. it is essential to maintain these technologies so that we're capable of protecting and providing for our own people before we start worrying about

the peoples of the world. in order to take care of the peoples of the world, we need a strong economic base ourselves. we can see that today. as the economy sinks and rises, we have a stabilizing influence. we provide the funds. to do this, we need a stable and robust economy ourselves. to do this, we need to continue to develop very new and very advanced technologies. to do this, we have to find difficult objectives to go after. this is that forcing function for tough technologies. space is through the last frontier for the development of very new and advanced technology. we have been living, basically, on the technologies of the 1960's and 1970's and the shuttle that were developed through star wars. there was a tremendous communications revolution.

we ought to figure out where research and development is going to come from. i have concern that we're not investing well in our nation. >> you may have answered my final question. it is one for you. you have been responding wonderfully well to everything i have asked you for the last few hours. it could be that i have not asked the one question that the illicit what gene kranz wants to say. with that in mind, it is all yours. >> i wish that, as a nation, we could set our sights much higher. i believe it is essential to have a national purpose. it is essential to maintain the pioneering spirit that made this country great, the spirit that he past century, that got us through world wars, and allow us to move into a leadership role.

it was an passionate leadership role throughout the world -- it was a compassionate leadership role throughout the world. it allowed us to step up to the challenges of the cold war. it is a challenge that took the country to the moon. it took us into space. it is a preeminent force in space. in the process of doing this, we've rekindled the pioneer spirit of the people who grew up in the depression and came to adulthood in the 1960's, carrying space through the 1960 through the early 1990's. i would like to find a way to sufficiently challenged a new generation of people to get them out of the i mode into the we mode, to make them want to do something rather than be something. i would like to give young people the same dream that we had. i would like to find our nation unified -- the world's unified in achieving common goals. i believe that space provides us

-- difficult programs like mars provides us with those things. unfortunately, we do not have the national leadership we need. we do not have a united states congress that really recognizes the need for this country to continue to grow and invest in our needs. we cannot have leaders capable of stepping up and taking a difficult position and articulating why we must do something. i am not interested in something for gene kranz. i am interested in funding for my children. i am interested in something for my children's children. we are the only nation in the entire probe that is blessed with the types of freedoms that we have -- in the entire earth that is blessed with the types of freedoms that we have. with so many different ethnic groups and types of people. we're capable of doing these kinds of things. we must continue to force our leadership to grow. i was privileged and proud to be

part of the years when the leadership flourished of mission control. there is not one flight director who ever left year was not inspired to do something else, to do better. that is important for us to communicate, not only to people here at johnson. people will look at these tapes. the people of the nation, this very magnificent world that we live in, they need to look closely enough to find its true meaning. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] >> you are watching c-span, created for you as a public service by america's cable company. up next, remarks from for president bill clinton on the anniversary of the oklahoma city bombing. then, officials remark on the comment -- a remark on the impact of the bombing. after that, gene kranz, from the

apollo 13 mission. today marks the 40th anniversary of the astronauts's returned to earth after that near disaster. -- astronauts' return to earth after that near disaster. >> all of this month, see the winners of our studentcam, -- studentcam competition. watch the winning videos every morning on c-span at 6:50 eastern, just before "washington journal." you can meet the students who made them. for a preview of all the winners, visit studentcam.org. >> as the congressional we can get under way for the senate on monday, and the house on tuesday, said that members will bring -- senate members will bring a bill to the week about

financial regulation. to begin the week, senators will turn to several administration nominations. monday, a vote on debate about the treasury department undersecretary. that takes place at 5:30 eastern, after members dabble in at 2:00. see that live on at c-span2. the house returns on tuesday for legislative business. . earlier this week, former president, bill clinton, talked about the oklahoma city bombing on americans, it's been 15 years and president clinton talks

and president clinton talks about this ent, this is about 45 minutes. >> thank you, michael, for your remarks and for your service to our country. i want to thank john podesta and al from for hosting this forum 15 years after oklahoma city. i'd like to thank the panelists, ron brownstein, congressman kendrick meek, former congressman mickey edwards, bradley buckles, mark potok and mike waldman and jamie gorelick. i must tell you, that's the first time i've seen that film and i have, as has been said, continuously gone back to oklahoma city. continuously going back to oklahoma city. i am going back in a few days,

they are having a week-long observation for the 15th anniversar anniversary. even now it seems real as if it happened yesterday. there was a story in "the new york times" by a reporter who has been positively, and i say that in a positive way, positively interested in this. drawing parallels to the time running up to oklahoma city, and a lot of the political discord that exists in our country today. that's a legitimate thing to do. and it's important before we overdo that, to put this in the context of what happened and to try to understand what it meant for america and what it means for all of us in the way we

exercise our citizenship. before the bombing occurred there was a sort of fever in america. in the early 1990's. first it was a time like now of dramatic upheaval. a lot of old arrangements had changed, things that anchored people's lives and gave certainty to them had been unravelling. some of them by then 20 years. median family income began to stagnate and inequality in our country went back to the 70's, and before the global system and before we had an adequate response to it. and there were huge numbers of americans who were working

longer hours for lower incomes. more and more families under enormous economic stress. meanwhile the fabric of american life had been unravelling. there was a lot of violence in our cities. there was a rise of gang violence, in particular, there were people putting political spins on some things that the gangs were doing. and the structure of the world where we lived in, where we knew where our enemies were in the polar world, itself was coming to an end. oklahoma city was a few years after the fall of the berlin wall. and there was no simple bipolar world anymore. there were a lot of fist fights around the world based on ethnic, religious and

cultural and long-standing geographicical regions. it was a hard time to get a stable position, we moved from an economy that built the bigge biggest infrastructure and to one that built new systems and new problems. there were more people trying to figure out where they fit in. more people that lived in confidence and optimism in the face of change. it's true that we see some of that today. since this country was born in reaction to abusive power by

government, if you remember, that's what the boston tea party was about. it was about no taxation without representation. it was not about representation by people you didn't vote for and don't agree with but can vote out in the next election. and so a part of being an american has always been banging away at the government. you know when i was a young man in politics in arkansas, any time federal government did something we didn't agree with, we would have a standard saying, it was the only institution in america that could mess up a two-car parade. everyone said stuff like that. in the decade of the 90's and beginning in the 80's, there was a run-up of more seriousness of

the government and its employees and an effort to legitimize violence. it was something in my lifetime i had experienced first as a young southern growing up when people saying it was ok to use violence against government people that were trying to promote equal opportunity and racial integration. and for a brief period in my lifetime, in the late 60's early 70's, the idea of violence against the government and the weather men. a few of you are old enough will remember that. but by the 80's we began to have the rise of violence from a branch you could call

right-wing, but it was political ring that believed that all taxes were illegitimate. in the 80's two of my personal friends were murdered in arkansas. one of a sheriff that was my rural coordinator that was charged to work with the federal officials to lead the effort to catch a tax collector, gordon kault, that was well armed and in the shoot-out he killed my friend. there was a young african-american state trooper that just by accident, doing his job, stopped a man in a big van who had an entire arsenal in the van. and he did not want to be apprehended. so he killed this young man, who

i knew. then as we moved into a new decade not long before i took office, the incidents at ruby ridge. and then we had in '93 after i took office. the first world trade center bombing, from people from other countries and illegal immigrants and the first incident of international terror on our soil. and then we had waco. where people can argue back and forth about what the right thing to do was. i wrote about this rather extensively in my auto birography, but there was no question that david kerschner believed he could use violence

against the government and doo things in that encampment, to children, that were illegal and unconsciousable. and the sense was that waco and ruby ridge were not the fault of those advocating violence, but the government attempting to enforce the law. so it became symbolic. so this was all going on. a great uprooting in america. people feeling disoriented. i will never forget a young woman who helped me understand that she was a 17-year-old high school senior in new hampshire, when i ran for president, at that time new hampshire was one of the worse economies in the

country. and she introduced me to her parents, and her father said i can't look in the face of my wife and children at dinner anymore, because i feel like a failure. this sense of loss of incapacity of impotence makes people v vulne vulnearable. to the song of simple explanations, wanting the world to make sense again. there was a rising music in the 90's that was basically not just a carefully orchestrated plot but one that fell in the soil for so many people of a world that no longer made sense. they wanted a simple, clear

explanation of a complex mixed picture full of challenges that required not only changes in public policy but personal conduct and imagination about the world we were living in. and so demonizing the government and the people that worked for it sort of fit that. and there were a lot of people who were in the business back then of saying, that the biggest threat to our liberty and the cause of our domestic economic problems the federal government itself. and we have to realize that there were others who fuelled this, both because they agreed with it, and because it was in their advantage to do so. when i became president, it's hard to remember this, there were only 50 site on the worldwide web. there are more added than that

since i have been talking. but it exploded in my first term and has continued to explode ever since. and among those who first saw its potential and made use of it, are those who used the internet to even share information on how to make bombs. we didn't have blog sites back then. so the instrument of carrying this forward were the white-ring radio talk show hosts. and they understood that emotion was powerful than reason and they got more listenship and more advertis advertisers if they kept people in the white heat. it was just that, turn on the radio, listen to something you

didn't agree with, vent your anger and go on. but it shaped the environment in which we were in. and another thing that needs to be reconciled or stated here, that was different from the current situation. is that when i took office, americans were literally still divided over the issues that divided us in the 1960's and 1970's, we were still divide over the race movement and vietnam war and still divided over the women's movement. we were still fighting about abortion and all the other issues that flow out of it. and into that combustible mix came in the late 80's and 90's is a fresh debate over gay

rights and what that meant. and a lot of these battles that were spoken about by me and speaker gingrich, was an attempt to finally reconcile where we were going forward on all of these issues. i got a very moving letter from robert mac mcnamara that was a member of the 7@ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ >> battle model of vietnam

veterans and given to me. they said that day would support me. the war did not end with my election. it entered a new phase. a lot of this me. but entered a new phase. a lot of this current uprooting was overlaid by the unresolved issues of the 60's and 70's. and aggravated by the new ways people had of communicating both through the radio/talk shows and the insipient internet networks. so, in the two years after the world trade center bombing and before oklahoma city, we had worked hard and largely on a bipartisan basis, to begin

america's effort to protect ourselves against terrorism better. and there were a number of things done, and one thing that i thought had been done, that we learned on 9/11 wasn't, and i issued anr/y executive order requiring the f.b.i. and c.i.a. to share information. and i didn't know before 9/11 that the president was not supposed to know what was going in the f.b.i. and stay 90 miles away from that. both agencies had honored that order in the breach. they had nominally transferred people but not much cooperation. all which is reported in the

9/11 commission. but some had happened with tunnels and planes flying to the philippines and west coast. and in an attempt i had sent legislation to congress to ask them to further strengthen our encounter against terrorist attacks. and it was making its way through. and meanwhile timothy mcveigh had made up his mind to take a different course. and on the anniversary of waco, which is symbolic of the people that see government as the problem. he drove or fertilizer truck up next to the murrah building and

down. people had just come to work that day. and it's worth knowing that 168 innocent people were killed. people that were mothers and fathers and sons and daughters and good neighbors and citizens. one was a secret service agent, named al wikfer, he wanted to take his family to oklahoma city because he thought it would be a wonderful place to raise his children, a safe haven, idyllic upbring in america. 300 buildings were damaged, 19 children themselves were killed with many others. and in the immediate response there was an amazing set of acts

andáf$fj humanity and heroism. a man i later recognized, a 49-year-old veteran and he was there and got out and then went back in. where people were falling, and i think you fell several floors and richard dean went back in to save the lives of several women. there were fire rescues to pull out survivors for days. i sent a crisis to the f.b.i. and sent fema to assist, you saw that in the film. and then firefighters from all

over america showed up to help. people came from new york to help. i will never forget after 9/11 and we lost firefighters and at a memorial service, a guy came from oklahoma city. and said, i came here because they were there for us. america stood with the people of oklahoma city and maybe the most important letter i got out of all the letters i got. was the one that you quoted. because the whole issue was is how will the city, how will the state, how will the victims and their families respond? a heart-broken nation was looking at them and pulling for them and wondering what they would do. and essentially the pan am 103

widow told them, it was ok to keep on living. the only way7$ honor their lost loved ones was to reclaim life. and do with life what their lost loved ones would have done. it was better than anything i could have said, and she had more credibility saying it. and i think it helped not only the victims and their families, it also helped everyone else. so after oklahoma city what happened. well, at one level we did rational things, i went back to congress and asked for the legislation i sent them. bob doyle was great, we had

bipartisan mission, we disagreed about fertilizer and regarding a mission, and scientifically it's hard to do. but there was a sense that this is something that we had to do together. and that's exactly what happened. i proposed measured to increase law enforcement officials dedicated solely to fighting terror. and domesticallied terror efforts. i asked for the approval ofb2sz military exerts that were not permitted to involve nuclear weapons. we wanted law enforcement to have greater access to financial records and track money trails, and two, to have the same rules

apply to organized crime figures and for those selling explosives used in a terrorist incident. congress passed this bill in seven weeks with strong bipartisan support. and i tell you since we have had 9/11 and since, that legislation helped in my administration and in president bush's administration, it's worked several serious terrorist . .

i think its also important to note that oklahoma city changed the country in other ways. we didnt stop our political fights. you remember, i kept fighting when newt gingrich and the"x republicans shut the government down twice at the end of 1995. you know, everything didnt turn into sweetness and light. but as tough as it was, it was different. ill tell you an interesting, entirely personal story. you saw gov. keating and his wife talking there. frank keating is a very conservative republican who, by coincidence of history, was the president of the college of arts and sciences student body at georgetown when i was a student there, in student government.

and believe it or not, we had the school of foreign service and the language school and the business school had an entirely separate student government. we had been fighting for 30 years -- over issues when that oklahoma bombing happened. i know mayor norrick and had a great relationship with him. but i always liked frank keating because i always knew that he was honest, straightforward and believed in his positions just as strongly as i did in mine. but i thought it was -- its just something you should know. we had been involved in political conflict literally since the early 1960s -- when oklahoma city happened -- since we were college students. and i cannot say enough about the way he and his wife handled themselves, the way the mayor of oklahoma city did, the way the people in the community and the state did. they were great. it changed something in us. we sort of got over the idea that our differences justified our demonization of one

another. and i think thats really important. a couple of weeks after the legislation passed, i went to give a commencement speech at michigan state. and i thought it was very important, because michigan had been the site of the rise of a lot of the militia groups -- people who were drilling with weapons and who had various strategies about what it is they were supposed to do. some of them, plainly, were sanctioning terror with their words -- or violence, illegal violence -- but to be fair, a lot of the militia group leaders also condemned what was done at oklahoma city and said they wanted no part of that; it was wrong; it was illegal; the perpetrators should be punished. so i went to michigan state and

spoke to both the students and the militia members. i thanked those who had opposed the bombing. and then i took on those who hadnt, and explained that hadnt, and explained that their actions and their words had consequences for people like timothy mcveigh had consequences for people it had come out that he had a very troubled life. he was an alienated person. hed had a very troubled life, that he was a profoundly alienated person, and that he was highly vulnerable to the suggestions and implications of the most militant rhetoric at the time. lots of other things happened after oklahoma city. we had to put more barriers around federal buildings. against my strong desires, i gave in to the unassailable

logic that we had to close pennsylvania avenue, because the white house is a very old building and i saw the schematics of what would happen if timothy mcveighs fertilizer bomb in a pickup truck were just parked in front of the white house, which is much -- you know, and that street, pennsylvania avenue, is farther away from the white house by a good stretch than his bomb was from the murrah building. and still, because of the construction, they said it would blast out the windows in the old building and collapse the west wing, with potentially calamitous consequences for the government. and so we restricted access to pennsylvania avenue. but most of the consequences of this, i think we cannot fully appreciate. i think, first of all, oklahoma city impacted young people profoundly.

hillary and i actually did our weekly radio address together one day, and we had young people who were profoundly@@@@@g >> we ask what they should do with it. there were questions about what their responsibility was to one another. these young people are now young adults. it is very interesting. it is interesting how they have turned out, this generation. first of all, theyre remarkable for their commitment across all party and philosophical lines to community service -- to

non-governmental service. they also vote in higher percentages than people just a little older than them did at their age. they work in elections in higher percentages than people just a little older than them did at their age. theyre more likely to volunteer for americorps, teach for america, their local religious institution, the united way or for some other purpose. its just part of their dna. and i think that is also extremely, extremely interesting. i know that what happened at oklahoma city and how it affected them when they were young in their conversations with their mentors and parents, is part of the reason why. most of them are probably not at all conscious of it. but it changed their psychology, their orientation

to the rest of the world. so what are we supposed to make of this? what are the lessons of this for today? first, we know that living with confidence in a time of change and adversity is difficult. and we are living in a time of change and adversity. so we have to be more sensitive. before the economic crisis, which began on september the 15th, 2008, with the failure of lehman brothers, after inflation, median income in america was -- for families -- was $2,000 a year lower than it was when i left office. ninety percent of the gains of the last decade went to only 10 percent of us, 43 percent to 1 percent of us. thats profoundly disorienting. once again, where more people

were working harder for less. and now, we have the highest percentage of americans whove been out of work for six months or more weve had in decades. this is disorienting. and people are looking for anchors to make life simple and understandable, and adjustable again, and sometimes with the idea that they need to go back to an idyllic time that never existed. thats a big part of the explanation for this anti-immigration law that arizona just passed; or the idea that we ought to bring back confederate month in virginia without talking anything about slavery; or the idea that you ought to be able to pack a loaded six-gun into a starbucks and order a cowboy latte. all of this is really about, where do you feel oriented walking through the day -- how to feel secure in the face of insecurity; how to feel ordered

in the face of chaos. im not defending the specifics of any of these; im just telling you thats whats going on. there is an enormous psychological disorientation today. and that is also the way it was in the early 90s. and we must not forget that when that happens, we have to pay special care both to have a raging debate, because we need to figure out what to do about this, and to do it in a way that nurtures the best in us, not the worst. the second lesson we have to learn is that we cant let the debate veer so far into hatred that we lose focus of our common humanity. its really important. we cant ever fudge the fact that there is a basic line dividing criticism from

violence or its advocacy. and the closer you get to the line, and the more responsibility you have, the more you have to think about the echo chamber in which your words resonate. look, criticism is part of the lifeblood of democracy. nobodys right all the time. but oklahoma city proved once again that, beyond the law, there is no freedom. and there is a difference between criticizing a policy or a politician and demonizing the government that guarantees our freedom and the public servants who implement them. and the more prominence you have in politics or media or

some other pillar of life, the more you have to keep that in mind. i acknowledged that in my political career, i had, on more than one occasion, in the face of a government policy i disagreed with or a practice i thought was insensitive, referred in a disparaging way generally to federal bureaucrats, as if all of them were arrogant or insensitive or unresponsive. and i have never done it again. you could not read the stories of the lives of the people who perished at oklahoma city and not respond in that way. do some people still abuse their power? yes. do some of them treat their customers and the people that pay their way in an inappropriate way? yes. does congress sometimes do

things that dont work and dont make sense, or the president? absolutely. but our criticism should be aimed with a rifle, or preferably, with a b.b. gun, in a way designed not to demonize the institution of the government or the people who work for it. and i, too, learned that from oklahoma city. and i think its worth repeating again today. as we live in another highly contentious, partisan and uncertain time. now, i have to tell you that i had a great time fighting with newt gingrich and tom delay and dick armey. i loved seeing that picture of him in the post today -- the outline -- armey with his cowboy hat on. i remember when he called hillary a socialist. i remember when newt gingrich, shortly after becoming speaker-elect, said that hillary and i were the enemies of normal americans. it didnt bother me a bit. i was glad to get in and mix it

up. but what we learned from oklahoma city is not that we should gag each other or that we should reduce our passion for the positions we hold, but that the words we use really do matter because there are -- theres this vast echo chamber. and they go across space and they fall on the serious and the delirious, alike; they fall on the connected and the unhinged, alike. and i am not trying to muzzle anybody. but one of the things that the conservatives have always brought to the table in america is a reminder that no law can replace personal responsibility. and the more power you have, and the more influence you

have, the more responsibility you have. look, im glad theyre fighting over health care and everything else; let them have at it. but i think that all you have to do is read the paper every day to see how many people there are who are deeply, deeply troubled. we know, now, that there are people involved in groups -- these hatriot groups, the oath keepers, the three percenters, the others -- 99 percent of them will never do anything they shouldnt do. but there are people who advocate violence and anticipate violence. one of these guys the other day said that all politics is just a prelude to the ultimate and inevitable civil war. you know, im a southerner. i know what happened. we were still paying for that 100 years later when i was a kid growing up, in ways large and small. it doesnt take many people to

take something like that seriously. so i dont want the whole story of this retrospective just to be about this, and trying to turn everything into politics. and i guess thats naïve, me being in washington and all. i still have some memory of it. but i think that the point im trying to make is, i like the debate. this tea party" movement can be a healthy thing if theyre making us justify every penny of taxes we raised and every dollar of public money we spend. and they say theyre for limited government and a balanced budget; when i left office, we had the smallest workforce since eisenhower and we had four surpluses for the first time in 70 years. and if the people they say should be elected had not gotten elected, we would be out of debt in just a couple of years for the first time since the 1830s. but when you get mad, sometimes

you wind up producing exactly the reverse result of what you say you are for. think about your own life; forget about politics. every time youve made an important decision in some non-political -- totally personal -- way, when you were angry or frustrated or afraid, theres about a 75 percent chance you made a mistake. isnt that right? you know -- and the older you get, the more youll see that. its about a -- you know, doing things when you are mad is, by and large, a prescription for error. so the only thing im saying is, have at it, go fight, go do whatever you want. and you dont have to be nice, and you can be harsh. but youve got to be very careful not to advocate violence or cross the line. yes, the boston tea party

involved the seizure of tea in a ship because it was taxation without representation, because even the massachusetts bay colony, which had been largely self-governing, had it stripped from them. this is about -- this fight is about taxation by duly, honestly elected representatives that you dont happen to agree with, that you can vote out at the next election, and two years after that, and two years after that, and two years after that. thats very different. this whole thing goes right back to our countrys beginnings. when george washington served his two terms and went home to mount vernon to retire and john adams became president, he was called out of retirement one time. you know what it was? he was called out of retirement to command the armed forces sent to pennsylvania to put down the whiskey rebellion,

because good americans who had fought for this country crossed the line from advocating a different policy and opposing the current one to taking the law into their own hands in a violent manner. once in a while, over the last 200 years, weve crossed the line again. but by and large, that bright line has held, and thats why this is the longest-lasting democracy in human history. thats why there is so much free speech. thats why people can organize their groups. it may seem like fringe groups that advocate whatever the livin sam hill they want to advocate. thats why. but we have to keep the bright line alive. so thats the second lesson.

the third lesson is, its always a mistake to bet against america. what happened at oklahoma city -- something that horrible, which could have just made all those people so full of anger and hatred. and you saw that monument on that gentle slope and that beautiful pool, with those 168 empty chairs, and how they responded and how we did. and you heard the former governor, george nigh, saying nobody remembered who was a republican, who was a democrat. its always a mistake to bet against america. we tend to figure this stuff out. and we zig and we zag, and we go up and we go down, but look, we still have a growing population with a very healthy fertility rate, which is a good thing in the 21st century. we can accommodate more. immigrants still want to come here, notwithstanding the

legislation in arizona. its more true today than it was when president kennedy said at the berlin wall, freedom has many difficulties and our democracy is far from perfect, but we never had to put up a wall to keep our people in. and we can put up all the walls we want to try to keep them out, but as long as we are free and open and full of promise, people will want to come. so by all means, keep fighting; by all means, keep arguing. but remember, words have consequences as much as actions do, and what we advocate, commensurate with our position and responsibility, we have to take responsibility for. we owe that to oklahoma city. we owe it to keep on fighting, keep on arguing. they didnt vote for me in

oklahoma in 1996. it was still a republican state. but i loved them anyway, and i will till the day i die, because when this country was flat on its back mourning their loss, they rallied around the employees of the national government and they rallied around the human beings who had lost everything, and they rallied around the elemental principle that what we have in common is more important than our differences. and that's why our constitution makes our freedoms last because of that bright line. thank you very much.

after bill clinton concluded his remarks, a former administration officials and members of congress took part in a discussion on the impact of the oklahoma city bombing this is one hour 15 minutes. >> we have our closing act, our panel discussion. i am one brown. -- ron brown. john gave you an introduction, so i will quickly run through our panel. on my right, your stage left, we have the executive director of the school law. he was director of speech

writing for president clinton until 1999. on the other side of him, mark is the director of the intelligence project at the southern poverty law center. at the southern poverty law center in new york. at the southern poverty law center, one of the premiere group tracking extremist groups. before that i spent almost 20 years as a journalist, a reformed journalist, who publications from "usa today," the dallas times herald, "the "miami herald" and covered the siege in waco, the oklahoma bombing and the trial of timothy mcveigh. next to him, congressman kendrick meek from florida. currently a candidate for the u.s. senate, member of the house ways and means committee. formerly on the homeland security committee and served before any of this as a captain

in the florida highway patrol. so he had direct experience. mickey edwards, representative of oklahoma city in congress for 16 years, serving on the house budget and appropriations committees and is a member of the house republican leadership in another era. after leaving congress, he taught of course for many years at the kennedy school of government at harvard and has been affiliated as well with the program on law and public affairs at princeton university. on his other side, jamie gorell, former general counsel, deputy attorney general under president clinton and now a partner at bloomer hail where she shares the defense, national security and government contracts practice group. finally, brad buckles was the director of the a.t.f. for alcohol, tobacco and firearms, 1999-2004. earlier served as chief counsel and then deputy director,

currently executive vice president at the reporting industry association of america working on issues relating to intellectual property. so with those introductions, let me start, if i could, jamie, with you and bradley, if you don't mind, also, tackling this first question, i want to talk a little bit, obviously, with the book we're going to talk about the implications of those events to what's going on today but let's start by trying to understand the issues themselves. president clinton said tim mcveigh was a troubled individual, but there was also a very contentious crime, if you sort out the positives of something you like in this magnitude, is it fundamentally rooted in a deeply alienated individual, or is there a social content, a political context that sets it in motion and how you kind of portion between the two in determining

this kind of -- >> i think the president said quite aptly, you take a troubled individual and you put him in the context of a movement that is disparaging of and dehumanizing of other people, and it becomes permissible, indeed in the mind of such a person, to kill those people. the notion that you could so demonize federal workers and their children that it would -- you would be unremorseful in blowing them up requires both. we had at the time a really rabid movement that demonized federal employees that viewed waco in particular as a -- an assault by the federal government on freedom and

acertain ideology and you take an unhinged person like tim mcveigh and you get oklahoma city. i mean, you could not have sat at the justice department -- and i came in to the justice department in 1994, so after waco. but you could not have sat there and read the letters just that janet reno got and not have been worried about what was out there in the water, and tim mcveigh drank that water. >> one of the things we'd seen even moving into this period is there have always been unhinged individual with different motives for taking this action and before there was timothy mcveigh we had the unabomber, we had mr. moody who sent a pipe bomb to a federal circuit court judge because he was mad at the government and the court

system. but what we saw developing during this period was really moving beyond some kind of personal motive and personal agenda to latching on to something that was a bit more frightening and providing kind of a premade agenda for people who were otherwise searching for a way to assert power and control over their lives, and there was a frightening number of people who were moving into this area, both in the rhetoric of talking about committing violence and sometimes not doing it, but talking it and then those around them, like a timothy mcveigh that took it the one step further. >> so you're saying that really the distinction here was not just the lone individual with the kind of grievance but attaching something larger pulling them in this direction. >> there was a -- what we call sort of gun show culture, there

was a culture the kind of literature tim mcveigh read and carried around with him, was passed around, discussed and erased. >> mark, any thoughts on that, that kind of -- do you agree that that is a kind of distinction and to what extent is it perhaps relevant now? >> i think it's very relevant now. i think it's absolutely true that many of these people are mentally ill or really disturbed by something that laces their personal life. you look at a guy like joseph stack who flew the airplane in the i.r.s. building in austin. i think if you read his final testament, his last document, he's mentally ill. he was angry at a lot of things, he was angry at unions and corporations and executives who got bonuses. he was angry at his ex-wives. but you know, this guy was out there, he came into contact early on, about 1987 with the radical tax protest and was part of the patriot movement

and started to focus his ideas, so i think ultimately, it's impossible to say, would he have killed somebody else? but ultimately his anger was focused on the government and very specifically the i.r.s., and as a result people died. . >> we find whether it's the degree of partisanship that now exists in our political environment or it's the absolute

conviction, whether you're on the left or the right. that you're correct and the other people have lost their minds, that leads to things like this. people can't calibrate the way they need to. >> i think one difference between now and 1995, which is president alluded to, is that the distribution channels for what were fringe or extreme ideas or organizing have exploded. in the sense that there's always been the turner diaries or the john burke society or the militia movement. but now, as was said, the internet has exploded. there are more radio channels. shouted opinions nonstop on cable tv. so the distinction between having -- being disaffected and alienated, having the institution be part of that that's dangerous and being in a

wider soup of overheated talk is much harder to see. and that seems to me to be something that is new and scary and we haven't really come to grips with it. >> it seems to me also that it's absolutely true that back in the 1990's, you had talk radio, you had the beginnings of the internet, and i absolutely agree that those have had their importance. but now wu see it leaking into a much larger kind of stage, so that we have politicians who are willing to say the president is setting up death panels, we have politicians who are willing to say criminally illegal aliens, murder or drunkenly run over and kill 25 people. we have people willing to say fema, on fox news or wherever it may be, that fema may be running secret concentration camps. we didn't have people who had audiences of three million people saying those kinds of things with absolutely no justification whatsoever, and they do exactly what the

president talked about. they demonize particular groups of individuals. i.r.s. workers, federal workers, mexican immigrants, and it all seems to add up. >> the relationship between political discourse and this extremist behavior. congressman, let me bring you in. the president said, and maybe what mark just said is relevant to this discussion. president clinton said that oklahoma city did change the political climate in the sense of getting people more of a sense of the limits of how far they should go. if that was true, has that evaporated? has that worn off over time? do you feel that people still feel a restraint? or do you feel that there is simply kind of this sense of almost anything goes and making charges against the other side? >> i think now with social networking and individuals being able to sit in their private homes and get their views out to the world i think is even now

more open than it's ever been before. i think 15 years ago, did not have the effect that 9/11 had, as it relates to the politics of the way policing that kind of activity and identifying it early on. it's so much of it. you know, you can find it on a google search in a matter of seconds. seconds. i want to agree with mark by -- when you have people of influence and power, especially political power, that validates something that could be counterproductive to a and firemen for all of us, for instance, the reason health care debate. there was a distraught look on his face. i asked one of the gentleman that was working with ken in his

office if the sergeant was ok. he said that the sergeant was trying to keep them from bringing people into the capital that did not belong in the capital. it is ok to take it to the next notch. it could very well bring about a political environment that could be quite unsafe. i could tell you that with the upcoming elections, more of that is becoming more evident that someone needs to act out from the left or the right to show the movement that it is worth the fight. >> let's go directly to the question that is looming over this. we have certainly seen our own share of unsettling incidents. . . militia. in pittsburgh, there were some reports in the early administration of a spike in threats against the president. president clinton alluded to the

battle over starbucks and so forth. when you look across the landscape, how does the threat of domestic terrorism now compared to what you saw in the 1990's -- you want to start? >> well, let me first say this. i think that what the president observed, which is that words matter, is in part an answer to matter, is in part an answer to your question of did oklahoma city change our body of politic? this is what you see in movements. after oklahoma city, we asked the f.b.i. to approach the different militias that were operating all over the country. we saiding look, you can speak, you can exercise with your guns in the woods, but you can't kill people.

>> seems reasonable. >> well, you know, when the montana freemen hole themselves up and the f.b.i. surrounded their compound, they called out to the militias to come, and no one showed up. after a spate of abortion clinic bombings, there was one outside of boston, and we went to the church and we said, you're preaching against abortion, which is fine. but could you also say that it is not proper to take a life in advancing that position? and they did. and there was never another one in that time period. i say these things as waves. i think we are having another wave right now. it feels that way to me. and i am hoping that there is something short of a catharsis, which in the case of oklahoma city and the abortion clinic

bombings and others, that will stop that sway. >> maybe starting with mike and coming this way, everybody respond to what jamie gorelick just said. are we in the midst of another wave? another threat? >> i don't feel i have the law enforcement expertise to know in a really concrete sense the v. menace toward government as an entity is strong as i've seen it since the early 1990's. i think that there are dislocations, even greater than the ones the president talked about, that are rumbling and rattling through the political system that people in washington, people in new york haven't even focused on. the president mentioned september 15 as the day the lehman brothers fell. i think for tens of millions of americans, what happened then and the response, tarp, which

may have been very necessary, was utterly startling, called into question their faith in the government, and gave fuel and legitimacy to things that seemed extreme and irrational. i think that until we understand how the economic crisis is being felt in people's lives, we can't understand how people are talking about government and politics. it certainly feels very troubling. >> mark? >> i would say the same thing. i don't think there's any doubt that we're in another period very much like the run up to oklahoma city. you know, i agree very much with what you said, jamie, about the idea of these things come in waves. we're in the middle of a kind of backlash. we've done a recent study that shows an absolutely enormous growth in the anti-government and patriot groups and militias and so on. on one level, maybe they're trying to be a little bit more

modern. the plot in michigan, planning to murder several hundred police officers and so on, a lot of the other militias rushed to say, that's not us, we're not like them. the reality is that most of these groups do have a set of beliefs that lead to small minority divides. they really believe the government is getting ready to impose martial law, that those who resist will be thrown into concentration camps, which may or may not be run by fema, and ultimately, the united states will be forced into a sort of hell, one-world government and so on. i think the president was absolutely right in what he said about the causes and dislocations of the time back in the 1990's. well, now we're going through a very similar period. i think the big driver's mentioned already, but one of the big things that's not much spoken about is the racially changing demographics of our country. i mean, most of the people i cover, as a matter of day to

today, have imprinted on their brains the year 2050, the year white is no longer the majority. there's a lot of trouble, a lot of feeling about that. i think jimmy carter was pretty much right on when he said behind a lot of this angst and anger and fear and frustration lies race. the economy seems to have become to me just as big a driver. i don't think there's any question about it. there's a fury out there. and it's connected to the ideas not only of i'm unemployed, my family's in trouble, but sose sons of bitches in the banking industry, the auto industry. executives walk off with bankrolls in their pocket and we get nothing. and the third piece of it. just a second longer. the role of commentators who are essentially in my view pandering for votes and ratings.

it just stokes the fire and i don't see anything that's moving us towards any kind of calming down. it's a difficult jeannie to get back in the bottom. >> another wave? >> we also have to understand that this is america and individuals have the right to free speech and access. and it's a very difficult thing to deal with. but the warning signs started very early on in the last couple of years after the last election. there was some intensity in the country, especially online and also verbally. and you watch 24-hour news cycle and you see individuals that are very, very -- going over the top as it relates to their views, versus the average american. you can see something there that is not just, "i'm upset because there was a bill that passed," or that i got a letter reminding

me to pay my taxes. it's something else. i do believe leadership is going to have a lot to do with how we avoid future incidents. i think responsibility -- i always say leadership brings about responsibility. and you have to be more responsibility. so i call on leaders. need to be local leaders. need to be religious leaders. local or federally or state-elected leaders or religious leaders getting out in front of what they may believe. may be a movement that may be counterproductive to us all as americans and saying it's wrong. and we have that, and a lot of that, when we created the homeland security committee in congress, came out of the 9/11 recommendations. it was a bipartisan commission, but it did talk about the country and the government being focused on homeland. it was easy. oklahoma, home grown terrorism. 9/11, them versus us.

so it gave the political "ok" to start looking at these issues and having debates about patriot act, privacy, how far we go, how much we protect it. so we're still having that discourse. and i do believe that when we get out of the business of reacting to incidents and trying to prevent it from happening in the first place, i think we'll see a more safer society here in our own country, that everyone should be safe, but everyone believes that individuals should have their right of free speech. >> we're obviously in the midst of intense, passionate political debate. but do you also think that this is bleeding over into something more dangerous? >> oh, i'm sorry. >> i don't see this as a new wave in the same sense, because i see it as something very different. something very different has

come into the process. there was a time when had i been fortunate enough to serve in the house at the same time kendrick was there, i would have certainly disagreed with him on some things and i would have respectfully disagreed with the gentleman from florida and then we probably would have gone to lunch together and had a friendship. but things changed dramatically not just on the outside, but on the inside. large part of it, during the gingrich years and the idea that -- when i first ran for congress, i advocated my points of view, ied a ro -- advocated my party, and then i was sworn in and i stepped across this magic line and i became a member of the government. i became a congressman with real serious obligations and responsibilities.

and then later in the gingrich years, it became you ran for office to be anti-government. you ran for office to be anti-congress. and so we see now not just the people out in the community exercising their -- upset about whatever policies are being promoted, but you see members of congress on the balconies egging on demonstrators outside. you see the rhetoric on the house floor. joe wilson, "you lie." or alan grayson, republicans just want people to die. it has become an advocation of responsibility by the people on the inside that is helping to fuel and to stir up this anger on the outside. and that's something very different. >> and for what you're saying, even more ominous than what was the case in the early 1990's? >> yeah, i think it's very, very ominous, because the people --

the tim mcveighs of the world, they were dangerous, but they were unusual. they were not part of the real mainstream. now you have prominent members of the united states congress stiring up all this kind of thing. and that's a different dimension altogether, and the danger that it can pose could be to create a lot of timothy mcveighs. that's what worries me. >> do you see parallels? >> i do see parallels. the troubling thing is it is not the political rhetoric and the speech so much as it only has to touch one person. timothy mcveigh was one person. he had a few people around him who assisted him on this, but it was really his driving force. the most difficult thing from a law enforcement point of view is trying to find that lone wolf, whether it's timothy mcveigh or eric rudolph a few years later with the series of bombings that

he perpetrated. not as deadly, but nonetheless terrifying to people. and this kind of rhetoric. all it has to do is touch one or two people who are unhinged and we can see this same kind of thing blow up again. as i said, we've had people who have had bombs before and other agendas, but the frightening thing is to give people a platform that seems to legitimize what they're doing, and they can feel they are patriots in causing disasters and killing people. and not criminals. >> you know, all a sobering kind of assessment. i just want to dot the i here. are all of you, or any of you or all of you concerned that we are heading toward a serious act of violence in the next few years? or serious attempts, large-scale domestic terrorism as a result of the climate that you're

describing? >> well, i might just start. i think there are a few things going in our favor these days. timothy mcveigh's weapon was a massive 5,000-pound truck bomb made from fertilizer and racing fuel that he used to concoct this. this. a lot of these thi a lot of these things are much more difficult to acquire these days without raising the suspicion of law enforcement. there are systems in place for learning about unusual purchases of this kind of material. there are more controls on the purchase and safe storage of legitimate explosives, so that they are less likely to be sold than they were before. -- stolen van they were before. it would be much more difficult today for timothy mcveigh to pull it off.

what remains relatively simple is that we know here in d.c., from the d.c. sniper incident, that to people in a beat-up car and a rifle can cause a great deal of terror in our cities as well. whether it is in oklahoma city, the bombing, or something less catastrophic, but just as terrorizing, i think those potentials are certainly there. >> i am not in a position to know whether we are likely to have an attack. i was merely saying that i did not like the sound that i was hearing in the atmosphere. as brad points out, the tools back they have are many -- the tools of mayhem and destruction are many.

either real damage or fear. >> how about the tools of law enforcement? are we better positioned today? >> yes. there's no question about it. no question about it. president clinton proposed in 1994, and it was anti-terrorism tools were provided by congress in 1995, again in 1996. then the patriot act after 9/11. and more importantly, leaning into it by government, i can say as a former 9/11 commissioner, we looked at this, and even as of 9/11 felt that we were better prepared and certainly since then. the resources that have gone into this, the tools that are available are much greater than they ever were. so i actually, from that point of view, feel much more comfortable. >> congressman meek?

>> i can tell you that on the committee on homeland security, law enforcement is -- they're just as good as the human intelligence that they receive, from family members, from neighbors, from individuals who say, hey, i didn't seen up for this, i need to go tell somebody what's going on, and to be taken seriously. unfortunately, that kind of thinking failed on christmas day kind of thing, when a man's father came forth and said, hey, i'm concerned. so i think that the attitudes of americans have changed quite a bit to say that i will even turn flesh and blood in if he or she is going to carry out an act against the republic. i think you're going to see more of that. i think law enforcement is taking it more seriously. because as a former person that wore the badge and carried the gun, i know many times individuals come up and say, hey, i see something, i think something, they just think it's just a barking dog.

now it has to be taken serious because law enforcement could very well -- that individual who doesn't take it seriously could be making a career decision. i think that's good for the country, at the same time, putting the responsibility on everyday americans and those that live here need to be a resident or something, saying it's your responsibility to keep all of us safe. that's the reason we have amber alert and all of those things. law enforcement can only work as good as the individuals that work in the country allow it to. >> mark, are we stronger on the other side? >> i agree completely with what jamie said and others. i think absolutely that law enforcement has more tools and they are using those tools in an effective way. i also think that oklahoma city was obviously a huge wake-up call for law enforcement. there was a lot of reluctance to describe fellow americans as terrorists for a long time. the f.b.i. didn't consider abortion clinic bombers to be terrorists or the murderers of doctors and their escorts and so on.

and that changed. there was a bit of a shift of focus after 9/11, when once again, the enemy seemed to be foreign and didn't look like us, wore a turban on his head, that kind of thing. i think especially, on the street, mihm and women who work -- men and women who work at law enforcement are a very big part of this. i think there's a very high awareness out there. at the same time, we should remember. there were -- since barack obama became a candidate, we've seen a man found in maine before he was even inaugurated found to be building a dirty bomb packed with radio active material, can he intended to set off at the inauguration. the day after obama was inaugurated, a man in the boston suburbs walked out of his house and started to murder black people.

why? because he had been reading on white supremacist sites for six months that the white race was being subjected to a genocide in the united states. on and on and on. june 10, the holocaust museum shooter. my point is, i think it's certainly true that i think it's harder to build a huge bomb like the bomb that mcveigh built. nevertheless, it only takes one to get through and i think that's really the lesson of timothy mcveigh. >> you mentioned earlier the role of demographic change. obviously we are living through an enormous ongoing demographic change. 2008, the first election in our history where more than a quarter of the vote was cast by non-whites. about a third of the population is now non-white. there was a poll in "the new york times" yesterday about the tea party movement. and it said that more than half of his policies of president

obama's administration favors the poor. 25% think his administration favors blacks over whites. i just feel he's getting away from what america is, one respondent said. he's a socialist. to tell you the truth, i think he's a muslim and trying to head us in that direction. i don't care what he says. he's been in office over a year and can't find a church to go to. that doesn't say much for him. just interested in thoughts. obviously this is a different country than many americans grew up in. not only is it more diverse, but the diversity is spreading. we did a piece in the "national journal" a couple months ago. in the 1990's, one quarter of congressional districts were at least 30% non-white. now it's about half. so places that had never seen diversity are seeing non-white faces on the street and in the stores. is that part of what we're talking about here? terms of creating these sentiments among some elements of the population? >> well, it probably is among

some elements. but, you know, i used to be a journalist, and it's easy to pick out a quote. you interview thousands of people and you have an interesting quote. i think that was a very interesting study. surprised me a lot. for example, finding that the tea partiers were apparently both more affluent and better educated than the public at large. so it was really a very shocking kind of study. i think that we don't want to try to paint too big -- i actually think president clinton was very, very good at putting all of this in perspective. there are racists out there and there are people who dislike president obama because of the color of his skin. but that doesn't mean that that's where most of the anger is coming from. it might be coming from a lot of things that the president talks

about in terms of the sense of people feeling disconnected. you know, they're losing their homes, they don't know what's going to happen next from al qaeda, we're engaged in two wars and they lose family members, and i think there's just a lot of angst out there in the country. what has to happen is not just race. i think jimmy caferter was certain -- carter was certainly wrong about that. i think what has to happen is just like what president clinton just did, we have to start pushing back. we have to start pushing back against the idea of demonization of the people with contrary views. i think that's the bigger problem. i think more people were worried not about death -- debt panelings, but about the cost. the governor of tennessee, a democrat made this comment yesterday, about what the effect is financially in his state. there is real, legitimate debate and disagreement.

and what we have to do is all of us collectively make sure that we do what president clinton said, draw that line beyond which the debate cannot go. that's what we have to do. >> mike, you're nodding. >> well, i think that after oklahoma city, after the bombing, there was perhaps temporarily a coming together among the country about what was a permissible line and what was permissible in the demonization of government. in the immediate aftermath at that point, the congressional republicans in the house missed that home. they were still playing the record from two years before saying we're going to shut the government down and everyone's going to be very happy. you heard, you saw president clinton and those of us who worked in the white house at that time saw it repeatedly, the affection and respect he had for senator dole. you could see it in the way he talked about him. senator dole was noteworthy in being courageous on drawing those lines within his own

party, just as democrats drew lines against the weathermen in their party. the real challenge is what lines will be drawn now by people who have strong conservative views but want to make sure that those who follow those views stay within legal bounds. . but not getting heckled on talk radio. the challenge is who will stand up who has the authority and power to stand up and say we're going to fight the election. let's not go farther than this. this is the missing ingredient. those kind of leadership -- that kind of leadership makes a

difference. we're in the midst of an intense political debate. there are people who are genuinely activated and energized in the opposition to many of the things that obama wants to do. there is a backlash, particularly among white donors. not all of that, whatever portion of it is -- goes beyond the pale. president clinton was wrestling with this issue himself. how do you kind of isolate the sentiment that is separatist and dangerous from legitimate expression of the political debate? it is not an easy thing to do, is it? or is it? >> i feel like i should say something. let me just say for someone who is out in the field and has talked to individuals that have

-- that agree and disagree strongly. when you walk away from the conversation, like a said before, you know it is something else that is their that is not a public policy question, but cannot actually service -- a surplus or the cannot say it in sunlight. i have a great deal of respect for those that petition their government to do the right thing -- what they believe is right. petition their government to do the right thing, what they believe is right. i have walked through parades' in my own state had the end, i went over to those who had an issue with my presence and i had some very good conversations on public policy questions.

there are those that have found refuge in these groups. that is a problem. i had conversations with those that were out there. the majority just disagree with that policy and then you had those that did agree and then you had those that could not stop calling me a tyrant and feeling that they need to make a statement about how tall i was. i did not painted them with broad brush's. i believe that this is good. when you look at the politics, i think that there is a question on who is going to vote in november when it you think about it? you have to feed that kind of thinking. that is why the leadership side of things are not really standing up. you are seeing candidates like john mccain who are having a

hard time. you see mr. lieberman say that he is concerned. is the volume higher than it was before? absolutely. he is concerned about the left's extremists that might those that are on the right feel that he or she need to make an name for themselves, even though it may not be a lot to stand on. the responsibility side, i hope it can rise up and that we will have leaders. i hope we do not need an incident for that leadership to prevail and come out with those voices to say, stop, let's start the job here. let's be americans. let's know where to stop. that is where it is. where do we yield? where do we stop? in my next six or seven months, i am not going to get false all riled up and say, anyone that is

-- folks all riled up and say, anyone -- shot them down. no. let's let america be america. let's understand that we have responsibilities. we're not like other countries. >> i will bring in the audience for questions in a moment. we talk about the responsibilities of leadership. the assumption is that we're largely talking about republican and conservative leaders. the habit of europe -- an obligation to draw boundaries between the more ardent members of the coalitions. president clinton noted that he went in 1995 to michigan state and spoke directly to the most disaffected elements of society. is there a place for the president himself now to do something like that before we run through the stop sign as >> i think so. it is harder to demonize someone who is real and right in front

of you. although, it was a long time ago, our experience with dealing directly with ms. -- with the melissa groups at -- dealing with the militia groups -- it was pretty powerful. those troops, they went right in and they asked him to engage. it worked. i would recommend to president obama that he would do something like that. icing to the hardest challenge in the splintering of the media is that the mechanisms for the antidote of truth are less.

you can say to 8 country, you are a leader, we need you to do what they said it and you're going to do. if people because of the narrow casting of our means of communication only hear that someone is the devil, they can be as reasonable as they can be in person but he is fighting an uphill battle which is not helped by the color of his can or the size of his person. -- by the color of his skin or the size of his person. i am worried that the normative the size of the media, the norms

we had are pretty much gone. >> what is important to remember, but the president is the head of state and government. prior to oklahoma city, president clinton was also a partisan figure, he was seen -- the house minority leader called him your president. in response to the tragedy, it enabled him to be seen by a much larger group of people by fusing with their patriarchate aspects. -- patriotic aspects. right now, there are not the unifying media.

was sorry if there was a tragedy, would there be a rallying around. obama has dealt with some very serious issues. i don't think that we should be under illusions that he would be heard. corks i think that a collapse >> basrah line >> -- >> i think that there is the concern of trying to name and shame people. at some point, something has to

stop. if the leaders of the party are going to do that work, there are other players. i meet people like lou dobbs, like a plague of leprosy came and some how immigrants are responsible. that is not even true. that is benign these days. i am talking about all so the industry. there is 8 resurgent patriot group out there. right before all of those bricks were thrown to a congressman windows, there was a furious item that said to blakbreak to r windows. it went on and on like that. 48 hours later, the windows

get destroyed. this is something beyond vandalism. >> i think that the seeds of animosity pear fruit only if they fall on fertile ground. our society has made some evolutionary changes that allow a lot of fertile ground. we as a people have stopped talking to and exposing ourselves to people have different opinions than our own. liberals hang out with liberals, conservatives hang out with

conservative. people live in neighborhoods made up of people who think the weight that they do. we live in a big echo chamber and dumpe. the melting pot is not melting. we are becoming congealed. we all hang together and we all watch fox or we all watch msnbc and we worship at the altar of either rush limbaugh or keith olbermann. we have got to break that down to make a collective community in the way that we once were even though it will be fertile ground. >> it is rare to find a hybrid parked next to a pickup.

>> the point was brought up that someone needs to push back and someone with a lot of authority. who has that kind of authority? could be the authority to lead the backlash against extremism? how do we combat this and be heard? >> it has to be collectors.

i don't think that any one person has that authority. president obama should speak out that he is one of the people in who is controversial. on you have pelosi and in john boehner and read it together, this is the time for a large number of americans to stand up. this is one of the few people but has credibility. >> extremism might be a source of partisan contention. you have a number of republicans who say that democrats are trying to whip up

a frenzy as a way to discredit what is a legitimate disagreement. there is not even a consensus on the funny if there is a problem. there are competing partisan definitions. >> it will be an increasingly partisan time. in broadcast television, there were a few programs that everyone watched. when they presented a fact, people who saw this more or less have thought it was true. my kids think that it is on msnbc more than it is on fox.

i see that as a change of pace. they see that as a norm. you are seeing a whole generation grow up without a concept of an objective reality or a consensus. that is challenging. >> when you have seen that kind people that commit violent acts, can they be reached by john boehner and nancy pelosi? >> some of this crosses in my current job in the music industry. you have these little echo chambers. if someone wants to hear a certain thing, they can find a certain thing that looks

legitimate. a lot of people want to read what they want to believe. i see that in all sorts of areas. people are violating copyright laws in some ways that they want to think about the government. they go to places where people want to hear what they want to hear and they all talk and forth at each other saying the same thing. >> i don't think the right question is whether they can reach potential terrorists. the question is whether leadership, this affects the

larger community. this takes away the sanction of violence. it changes the way if someone is disconnected thinks that he or she will be received if they do something fast. they are now free not to listen to the participants. you will see this kind of thing with some senators. moth>> i have a question for

congressman edwards about earlier this week there was an issue that took place in the state legislature where they almost legitimized a different almost legitimized a different militia group not aligned it actually got some not from the state legislature in in oklahoma about -- some nods from the state legislature in oklahoma about legitimizing this movement. where does that had? -- head? are we legitimizing yet another level here? >> that is happening in a lot of places, oklahoma, arizona. as the president mentioned.

we have, inside the institutions, not only in congress, but inside the state legislatures, people who have lost all sense of responsibility. they are carrying on the most extreme kind of rhetoric and policies. it bothers me deeply. it bothers me that it is happening in oklahoma. i showed this to john podesta. this is my oklahoma sooners cell phone bid to be from oklahoma is to be from oklahoma forever. oklahoma city is so deeply in my heart. it bothers me when i see these things happening in my city and your city. i do not know how to route that out. it would be wonderful. i have many good friends in the oklahoma legislature. it would be wonderful if they came together and said, -- if

they shot that idea down and said that is not acceptable. i do not know how we make that happen. it is a good question and a very disturbing question. >> any other questions? no? let me ask one final thing and we will let you get back to your day. i want to ask about another way of looking at the spikes in this kind of activity. on the one hand, we're going through demographic change. on the other hand, along the same line, we do have economic strains on average families. income has been strained since the 1970's. under george bush -- president bush, the median income actually declined after rising under president clinton. we did not see this kind of wave, as we did in the early 1990's with president clinton and unified democratic control

of congress, as we do today with president obama and unified control of congress. to what extent is this not a long-term change in america kind of phenomenon? when you have a democratic control of government and they are seeking to advance the kind of programs that democrats want to advance which typically involve a more assertive role for the federal government. there are some that rockwell from this, is this more was a political or demographic phenomenon? >> i think it's that the debate for the role of the government is at the heart of this. if you look at a gallop poll which asks people if the government is trusted to do the

right thing. in 1994, 24% trusted them. now, 19% trust them. we made an effort to try to push that number up, to get people to once again have faith in government. in fact, that peaked after 2001 and it declined pretty precipitously. you always see this debate over government and over conservatives being mad about liberal policies being enacted. the challenge is of the line beyond that. to me, the litmus test is, if political leaders are not willing to shoot down, if in fact the president is not a secret foreigner, which millions

of people believe, but this is a legitimate as asian of his authority -- this legitimizes his authority. >> is this a political time bomb or political or demographic? -- is this a political demographic or does it have another cost? >> i ran for office to help people in the community and to help make the cities and counties better that i represent. we get kind caught up in this ideological battle. spheri am sitting here as a candidate in a possible three

bomb or four way race. i think is important that everyone understands that politics has trumped public policy throughout the country and it will take a real coming together of leadership after november 2nd, november 4th, january, on trying to reclaim the middle in all of this. i see in my future as a republican as we look at the first scenario and me as one of the 60 moderates in the house. it will be about who goes out to vote. it should be about who should leave the country and who

should stay in the country. those that are pushing those opinions have crossed this politically. it is counterproductive. this might be against my political progress. i just want to say that i think florida and states like it will have this change we are talking about. i think that florida is a place of good will. it is something else now and i am hoping that it does not go there but it will probably be a battle royale for all of the state races. and you have a number of people. pray for the country. we hope that americans are able to come together and to know the safety and support and things

can go over the top and we need to report this. >> to what extent are we seeing a political phenomenon? what are we seeing? >> i remember after the oklahoma city, there was a poll that asked whether or not you thought that the federal government was imminent threat. 39% believed that. the number is now 54%. that says something about what is going on. there is a fear and frustration

out there. i would go quickly back to another point which is your idea about politicians speaking out. even mentally ill people want the justification. they want to feel like what they're doing is saving the world. it is important what people say in positions of power. people like lou dobbs and people who spent years demonizing latino immigrants. is it any surprise that during the time of 2003-2000 for crimes against latinos went up 40%? no. the i don't think that all people who commit hate crimes are all mad man.

they feel that they are standing up for the standards and morals and integrity of the community. the bid if they grew up in a household that said that latino immigrants are coming to destroy the culture or the president is a fascist, they are being given a kind of justification and it gives them justification to feel crimes. they are the young men standing up and raise enough to do what their parents don't have to go to. >> remember, the health-care debate which polarized a lot of people in some very nasty ways was not beginning. before that there was the stimulus package.

people get very concerned about what they saw happening economically in terms of the finances of the country, the national debt. the majority of americans prefer a limited role of government. that is the legitimate grounds for debate. what is really happening is the loss of civility. right now use see a lot of it coming from the right. i am a republican conservatives. this is not the state police set the political puzzle. -- this is not just a piece of

the political puzzle. we have lost the ability to talk to someone we disagree with. i would like to say that this is just a matter of how we can track down the people who can pull a stunt like timothy mcveigh. we have bigger problems with our ability to form a cohesive and collective society of people who interact in a reasonable way. >> i would agree with that completely and just at two points -- i don't think the that the undercurrent of extremism and potential riots will go away. we have had episodes of this throughout our history. the way i would answer your question is that i think that

economic pessimism fuels that. if we can turn the corner in our economy and become more optimistic as a people we cannot be counted out as a country. hougsome of that righteousness s well meaning. they want to make sure this country is great. it is misdirected. if that can be channeled into a job building something in a community being on the right track, i think a lot of the

steam and anger goes out. it is replaced by something more positive. i would look for that as a partial answer to the problem we are observing today. >> in some ways it does not matter. it is clear that the rhetoric that is used is similar to the rhetoric that timothy mcveigh or and eric rudolph attached to it. it is something that allows them to feel like they are doing the right thing and justifies some aberrant behavior because they think they are being patriotic or attacking a tyrant. our concern is not which it is, but that it is out there and that there are people who will attach to that and use that as their motive for carrying out

criminal acts. >> you have been a terrific panel. i would like the audience to join me in thanking you. are there any last words? if not, you are free to get back to your day. thank you for joining us. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] >> monday marks the 15th anniversary of the oklahoma city bombing. we will show you a live memorial ceremony from the oklahoma city national memorial and museum. we will hear remarks from survivors, witnesses, and the keynote address from janet napolitano. see that live on monday starting at 9:55 eastern here on c-span.