about his new book. it is a look at president obama direction with the afghanistan war. then we will discuss recent developments of reports of mortgage irregularities and the use of fraudulent loan this is "washington journal." host: could morning, it is friday, october 8, 2010. wen jiabao is winning the nobel peace prize for fundamental human rights in china we are marking the 30th anniversary of the c-span call-in program. on this day 30 years ago, c-span open up phone lines for the first time in an event at the

national press club and we have made it a mainstay of our programming ever since. we are going to celebrate you this morning by learning about our regular crawlers and reviewers who have not called in the past. -- regular callers and regular viewers who have not called in the past. why do you watch the program? give us a call. the numbers are on the screen. and good morning to you. and we have lots of news and political discussion later on in the program. we hope you will not mind listening for the first part of a program about those corian are a regular audience. would like to -- those in the

regular audience. we're going to go back to the archive ensure you what the very first call looks like 30 years ago here in washington d.c. following a speech at the national press club. >> what's the name? >> we have south dakota. >> this is bob jabr frattini sinton, south dakota. -- bob joffra in yankton, s.d.. it corrects bought from yankton, s.d. it went into -- host: bob up from yankton, s.d. went into the archives as our very first caller. let's begin with our very first caller of the morning from richmond, va., anthony on the

democrats line. good morning. caller: good morning out there. how are you? host: very well. does a bit about yourself and how long you have been watching. caller: i am 51 years old and have been watching since you started. i am one of those junkies that has been reading about events from the world and domestic events since i was about 18 years old. five of the -- i went to school in d.c. and i have a master's in gw. and with regard to why i watch c-span, i think you guys have quite a bit of good information that would inform significantly about topics that we cannot get from mainstream. but most importantly, i watch c- span to get a gauge of how

strong of a command to the -- does the american public have of a subject that is when i get fearful and it is not meeting even if this -- it is not me being elitist, but that many people calling in do not have a command of the topic, whether it is on both sides or partisan or whatever it is. then you do find many people who call in and have quite a good command, whether they be republican, democratic, independent. host: before you go, what are your favorite issues? what most attracts you? caller: one thing that attracts me is international affairs and also, domestic ones as well. i think, just got everything. i am extremely interested in just about everything.

anything that can inform us from a neutral perspective, a non biased perspective. i think, if it is going to inform us on a topic it does not matter what it is as long as it is not propagandized and it allows you to make a decision on your own without being persuaded court to try to politicize an event. host: anthony, thank you so much. 51 years old and been listening for a long time. this is tim calling from michigan. caller: listen, are you guys ever eligible for emmys? host: theoretically, but not practically. caller: well, because about -- i have got to tell you and i'm not

trying to kiss up. host: i appreciate it, but i'm not looking for compliments as much as i am learning about you. caller: basically, i'm a white collar according to joe. i'm a democratic socialist. host: how old are you? caller: 49. host: how long have you been watching? caller: i have been watching every day since october 5, 2018, because that is when i got what -- laid off. host: and what do you do? caller: i am a machinist. host: what issues do you tend to watch most carefully on the wash -- on the "washington journal"? caller: politics. host: how would you vote in elections this year? caller: the last three times i voted for nadir. at this election, and voting

straight democrat. if i may, i told you what i make an hour, but i was looking at numbers kent kurmanbek, his salary, i have heard, at -- , his salary, i have heard is at $32 million per year. i guess he feels he does not need to pay taxes. this year, i've heard they are spending $53 billion on the campaign across the country. they cannot extend unemployment, but they spend $53 billion, which based on a population of $310 million would average out to $170,000 per man, woman, and child in this country. you talk about clause 4 -- class warfare, good lord, and entitlements. host: and going to talk -- to cut you off right there because

there are lots of other mornings to talk about these things. let's talk about the nobel peace prize going to a chinese dissident. we are talking to you this morning and our goal is to hear about who is watching each morning. our next call is at walls from montana. republican line. tell us about yourself.

caller: i'm just waiting for the weather to come in. host: how long have you been watching, how old are you, what are your politics? caller: i have been watching since about 1987, or 88. host: a long time. caller: i am retired, 62 years old. i worked for the federal and retired at 55. host: where are you doing now? caller: i'm busy with the grandkids. host: what do you tend to watch or react to on the "washington journal"? caller: i watch the issues on social security and possibly predetermining the way they do the numbers for social security

and politics in general. and my health care plan, of course. host: ok, issues that most directly affect you and your state in life right now. we welcome the twitter followers to tell us a bit about yourself this morning. tell us about who you are and why you watch. also, those who send their comments in by e-mail, tell us a little bit about you this morning. as i mentioned, the washington -- the "washington journal" has been around since 1985. we average 60 calls per program and that means we take 23,000 phone calls per year. the next call is at the south, democrats line -- the next call

is seth, democrats line. ♪ i have been watching since i was -- caller: i have been watching since i was too young to be watching, since the eighth grade. i have gone to college and law school. but the information i watched as a child was impressive. we grew up in new york city pork, in the projects, single mother. and -- in the new york city fo poor, in the project, single mother. especially i watched the senators. i remember robert byrd, his

language was impressive to me. and i did not know what they did or how they got there because it was not what i experienced every day, but it really inspired me to say, hey, who that guy is pretty impressive. -- of that guy is pretty impressive. even though people get down on him now. but it was a world that i was not exposed to. down in newo his cool york city. i was lucky enough to go to a school in nyc, and then law school and i became an attorney. it has changed my life. i watch because of brain limbs follow-up questions. i watch because of the way the interviews open up questions and allow them to flow.

and now, i have children and they hate me and c-span because it is on so much. but i think there are a lot of good things that you guys do and you have truly been a good service to the country and to me personally, because allowing me to see that little glimpse of a world i did not normally see really changed my life. host: thank you very much for calling and sharing that. that was a call from ithaca, new york, seth, a democrat and lawyer. and let's do this tweet from donna. next is a call from her career,

new york, charlie, republican line. -- from herkimer, new york, charlie, republican line. caller: good morning. and the socialist from michigan is one -- is your typical caller. i'm one of the five original reviewers that and still watch this. host: i have heard that before. but see if we can hear for many of the other five. fromt's see if we can hear any of the other five. caller: this program has degenerated into lies and hatred and anti-semitism. you encourage hatred of the jewish people, hatred of the republicans and that is why the conservatives stopped watching this program. you have limbaugh on if you weeks ago and he was called a

liar and a racist and you allowed it to happen. why do i watch it? i watch for the same reason that we spy on the russians. we need to see what the enemy is up to. let me relate to my favorite guest and my favorite call of all time. host: please do. caller: you have this leftist reporter on to talk about the tea party movement. it was like watching a "saturday night live" nonskid. what do these people know about people who live in middle america? it was laughable. my favorite, call was a guy who called in and he began by talking about the nets in the two-party -- of the nuts in the tea party were running for office this year. and then he went on to say the

isnedy -- that canken lay alive and hiding somewhere. host: i'm glad we amuse you so much. do you want to tell us about yourself? caller: i was a truck driver until 1997. i got rheumatoid arthritis and in 2005 was no longer able to pass the physical. five was forced to retire. i was channel surfing one morning -- by was forced to retire. i was channel surfing one morning and i discovered washington journal. host: i'm glad we make your blood boil enough to come back often. next up is of lydia, independent. good morning. caller: i have been watching since 1996.

i am 55. i live at, lake martin, alabama. i was the emotional mother a soldier and i would try to call every 30 days during the iraq war. you give americans a voice and in vermont -- and information. i watched for years and did not have the courage and i know my voice always trembles, but it was the iraq war and they gave me the courage to call in. i am a progressive liberal. i am 55. in the state of alabama ordaz -- it is a red states. -- in the state of alabama -- it is a red state. my son has been in the army since 1999. he has had several deployments to iraq. i would get the courage to call in about award. host: thank you, lydia.

overall, we have the statistics on the number of males to females that call in. libya says she got the courage to call and we would encourage -- lydia said she got the courage to call and we would encourage more females to call in. you can see the average caller is 70 dozen mailed to 16,000 females. -- 70,000 male callers to 16,000 females. here is another tweet. let's turn to the newspapers before we take another call. the next phone call as we talk

to you on this 30th anniversary of the c-span call-in program is robert, a democrat. >> my name is doane from brookeville, maryland. congratulations to you. in the late 1960's the mouse was being developed in the universities across this great nation. in addition, many of those who complain about the program should be thankful that you have a medium like this. when i think about the nobel peace prize winner that you mentioned this morning in china, god bless him, imagine if they have the same freedoms that we have to have a program like this. c-span should be broadcast in china and other repressive nations around the world. or anyone else who would like to see it. i am 53 years old. i am black. i'm not very well educated. i call in because i've had the

opportunity to speak to people i would never imagine. for example, i spoke to general haden, former cia director. what a thrill. i wanted to tell them what i thought. i did not say anything denigrating, but just to get the opportunity, it was like a kid on christmas. also, i got to talk to mike huckabee during the crisis when the killer had killed four police officers in the midwest. and mike huckabee had pardoned him some time ago and i got on to him about that and also about the statement that he made about the person who talked about shooting barack obama. yesterday, the lady who was the protesters of the funerals, i got to get down with her.

,'m not condoning what she did but that was a seminal moment. and the lady from iran, you were there that day. she was a professor from gw. i used to watch nightline when it first started because the iran hostage crisis. i was a younger man then. the ayatollah from the city of marconi, she really thought i was a nut. let me tell you very quickly, the station and 90.1, i remember when it was jazz. and it used to belong to the university of the district of

columbia. but i was watching c-span before that. however, too, i collect political cartoons and i have heard blocks from the beginning of the reagan administration in a meticulous condition. and i remember there were some of the most prolific political cartoons ever. host: i'm going to jump in. we have a lot of people to get through this morning. senator barbara mikulski on the front page of this newspaper. we have our regular in mailer's writing to us this morning -- e- mailers writing to us this morning.

american hero is one of our regular twitter participants and he writes -- the next phone call is from baltimore. this is stella on the republican line -- so vella, excuse me. caller: i came to this country 45 years ago. i am a latin american citizen and i love this country. i love c-span. i have it on the radio and i listen to you guys all the time. i do not know if you know, but in baltimore cannot we really do not have too much newspaper. -- in baltimore, we really do

not have too much newspaper. aboutally more informed everything. i listen to c-span and the reporters about their point of view. right now, the reporters put what they feel, not what happened. and i like to see it without the filter. i have got my children ready for school. they're all grown and married. before they went to school, c- span early in the morning. we would sit here for half an hour before we walk to school a host: and how much did they enjoy that? caller: you know, they would be surprised. they really liked it because when they got to school, usually, the teacher would ask what they saw yesterday or what is new and they had something.

and you guys helped them. right now, i have all of them very involved in the community. they help. and i have to say, thank you, because you have opened my life. i come from costa rica, where we are pretty free about everything. and when i came here i knew that i had to find someplace where i could learn more about this country and you guys have been id. host: thank you very much. it is a good story and it is good to hear it this morning. the proposal has been here for 28 of our 30 years -- brent bessel has been here for 28 of our 30 years of programming. can you turn around and waved to the audience. at a myra, five and a half

years. johnny st. john, a mere two years. we got a lot of years ahead with you. and my colleague, garecht more. he is the guy that you see changing the lighting jells behind us during the breaks and makes sure we have good pictures from the studio. the next call is from indianapolis. this is a lori, on the independent line. tell us why you watch. caller: good morning, and first of all, happy birthday. congratulations and thank you to all of you for keeping us informed for many, many years. i have been watching the program with a copy -- a cup of coffee. that is the best way i can start in the morning to stay informed. and i love your 30-minute panels when you have one side of an

issue and then 30 minutes later you have someone else speak on the other side of the issue without interruption. as well as when you read the paper to hawes. you have enriched -- to us. you have enriched my life and others. host: laurie, can you tell us about yourself? caller: i have a master's degree and i work in the health-care industry. i speak a couple of languages and i have been here for more than 30 years. i have become a citizen to vote and produce a paid in a democracy of this country. many people do not have the freedoms that we enjoy and sometimes take for granted in the u.s. host: thank you for your call. a few people are not reflective of the overall team, but the exact date, he has been with us for seven months -- zack dqade,

has been with us for seven months. and there is bill. he will take your call when you call in. paul, can we see you this morning? thank you, paul, for being there. our executive producer of the program, michelle, is a relative newcomer. but she has been here about a year. she has been producing talk programs at other networks and we are glad to have her aboard at the helm. next up is bought from pennsylvania. republican line, good morning. caller: hello, 63 years old. i am a laid off machinist and i sort of watching you guys about six years ago. in theory of 2001 i moved to cleveland and during a few months up there, my wife would

come back and forth. she worked in pittsburgh. i started watching cnn during the cold war, the first one, and it was pretty good. i moved up to cleveland and it was right after the election. i was bored and never a political person. one day i happened to turn on msnbc and there was a show called "that was the week that was." thinking, man. then i sort of watching -- started watching a little bit of c-span. i like watching both sides of the argument. but i found -- what i found out about myself is that i am a conservative. i did not realize that until i started watching some of the other channels. it is amazing. you guys are good. i like watching you. i enjoy it and i like seeing both sides. i like some of the people that call in with their remarks.

i appreciate watching you. i've been watching more for the last few months since i was laid off. host: and what did you get laid off from? a caller: i was a machinist. host: what are your prospects for the future? caller: i'm 63. it is pretty uncertain with companies right now. you never know what is coming around the bend next. i have noticed the stock market goes up and then they do something else and it drops. like i said, a conservative, so you will get my spin on things, but it is kind of the way i see things. like i said, when i was up there, i sort of watching msnbc and and thinking, man, this is weird. this guy has just been in office a year. and i voted all my life. then i turned on cnn and it was the same thing. then i sort of watching fox and i sort of watching you guys. and then watching all three

channels, you can tell what side of the fence they are on. that is interesting because you can sit there and debate this guy yourself from one side or the other. it is interesting. i enjoy it. host: mike is owned twitter. -- mike is on twitter. peter worst he is reporting from the "washington post" about tax wrangling in congress.

the next telephone call is from gerald, a democrat, in the crater lake, one tenant. good morning, gerald. caller: thank you for taking my call. my name is gerald and i'm 68 years old this past september 22. well educated at mit for a number of years, bachelor's and master's. i watched c-span because by the beginning of this year, i came across an opportunity to purchase one of those toxic troubled assets properties that had been foreclosed from country but it -- countrywide and bankamerica into fannie mae. but it turns out i uncovered several items that would allow us a decent broad jump out of

the recession. i was waking up very early in the morning and turned on the television and for the very first time came across c-span. after about three or four months, i got a chance to speak with douglas elmendorf, who is the director of the congressional budget office, who offered to review my documentation. bair sent off to him and received letters back -- i sent it off to him and received letters back from chairman bernanke's office, from the secretary of the interior, who was directed to pay attention to what was written. and i'm going to have the chance right now to tell the listening public that they can view this idea that is sitting on the president's desk. and remember, congress has id. and mr. warren buffett has

agreed to review the documentation and he received it about a week ago. aloha, noble house -- along ha noblehouse alongalohanoblehouseinc.com. god bless you and god speed. host: leonard sanders cent cut -- sent us an e-mail saying --

kaibelle is a familiar name to those who watch us regularly. here is what she says this morning. next is a call from kansas, phil, republican. how are you? caller: good morning. host: nice to hear from you. caller: it is a great service you guys provide. i did not start watching "washington journal." we started with book notes, brian lamb's show in the evening. it is interesting because there is so much empty space in the media. some of their will come on a cable outlet and you realize they have never read the book.

i would sit there watching brain and you would look at the book and it was daud eared. dog-ed it was dau ared. it was amazing for me. the master of watching the journal. i am not an economist. my graduate degrees in theology, but i took an interest in economics when i retire. -- retired. and it is interesting. i started reading hayak after a show by brand and someone had written about high-tech. -- by brian and someone had written about hayak.

it is interesting watching you guys and when you get that call that is way out of bounds. the thing to do a great job of being part -- impartial, which is a great thing to do. there are many times that i would want to say, would you just shut up and get off the line? i do not watch cable because it is really not valuable space. host: thank you for your call. hear from the "washington post" losman in --

all this came to light because of those way that the case had been handled. next call is from washington d.c., carmen on the politics line. you have lots of politics here in washington d.c.. where are you on our line? caller: i turned on the tv and eyes are watching about immigration and i look at what is done about the school system.

and i say to myself, one day i'm going to talk about this. i came to this country 43 years ago. i came the right way and i never had my hand out saying, give me, give me. you see a lot of that now. i've walked in the street and i'd go to the airport and i see people eating and throwing trash in there. i do not understand why americans allowed this to happen. if you do not stop this, then your country, this wonderful country, is going to look like my country because over there is dirty, it is filthy and nobody cares. host: carmen, thank you for calling. a new guest on the c-span.

let me tell you about the four people who were the very first call in deaths. over from the screen left is michael kelly, a george mason university professor of shakespearean medieval literature and also the author of something called the capital connection. gushman is next to him, a longtime communications individual. the next -- next to him is tack neil and he has been reporting on the telecommunications for a long time. finally, don west, a longtime friend of c-span. he was the editor for many, many years of broadcasting magazine. he is in the center's green here

of this picture. many of you have studied and communications, he was the bible for a long, long time. here is another tweet. let's listen to katherine on the republican line. good morning. caller: good morning, susan. i am a 78-year-old lady and i was born back in time that you were a democrat if your family was. and when my boys got to be in their 40's, my one son said, mom, -- i did not have cable at the time and he is a republican. he said to me, i'm going to get you cable and you can watch c- span and you can watch the senate and the house and see if you don't change your mind.

and he was right. but when you sit and listen to both sides of this, it is just fascinating. i have called in several times. but anyhow, that is why i watch. host: thank you very much. caller: i have one more question. host: ok. caller: on the senate floor, there is a lady that goes around and keeps things in order. who is she and what does she do? host: i'm not sure who you are talking about on the senate floor. possibly a stenographer who takes notes. is she wearing a box and typing? caller: no, she just carries around these papers and this kind of like how she keeps orders -- is kind of like she keeps order for the senate. host: thank you for your call,

but i'm not sure what position you are talking about. our last call is herb on the democrats line. caller: i am 82 years old and i go back to the days of watching c-span when brian lamb had holes in his shoes. he had the gift of making it a two-way conversation when people would call in. and little by little, he got the other hosts to do the same thing. i think it makes a much better program and i wish brian, maybe a month to once -- i realize he is semi retired. i wish once a month he would come back on the morning journal. i think virtually all the c-span viewers would like to see him. let me offer, if i could come offer a couple of constructorcoe criticisms for c-span that might

make it better. host: we do not have much time. caller: i will make it quick. but when someone calls in and the guest refuses to answer the question, how about the host says, the question was this, ma'am or serve. and back years ago used to allow caller after caller to say that we must attack iraq because of 9/11. they made the connection and is hosted never once, in my opinion, said there is no connection. a wide you label the two together? it may have performed -- why do you label the two together? it may have performed one small step. but overall, c-span is great. host: thanks, herbert.

and we are probably not going to do what you suggested it makes it a very different kind of program. vivian has reportedtweet it sevl times this morning. thanks, vivian. we are so glad that you are all out there. where would we be without you? this conversation will continue on our twitter page if you would like to talk more. it is also on c-span's facebook page today. we will continue the conversation about why you watch and who you are so that the audience can get to know more about each other. we are going to take a break and then we would back to discuss the two-party -- the tea party. neil king will tell us about how

they are changing as it gets closer to election time. contentn's local vehicles are traveling the country as we look at some of the most closely contested houses -- house races as we leave up to the midterm elections. -- as we leave it up to the midterm elections. -- lead up to the midterm elections. >> i will tell you this, we have to look at obama's agenda. what ever their people come out with, nancy pelosi is going to rubber-stamp it. in the end, those so-called -- so-called blue dog democrats are delivering each and every vote her that they need past. >> high have been in congress

because i do not think there were listening -- i have been in congress because i do not think they are really listening. they're going to deliver a crushing debt to the next generation. i voted, again, for these budgets, but i did not agree with some of this fiscal discipline. but you hardly ever get what you want in washington. >> jim marshall as a conservative democrat and the challenger in this rate is boston -- in this race is often scott. -- vaustin scott. the district is a republican leaning district. john mccain picked up 70% of the vote in the district here.

if you look at the numbers, about one in court mccain voters actually voted for marshall in that -- one in four mccain voters actually voted for marshall in that race. he is not terribly reliable when it comes to things like health insurance or schip, which came up two years ago. he is not terribly popular with liberals, but he has maintained a very strong connection to people in the middle. there are two really good assets in this district. one is that he has tied himself very closely to the robins air force base future. he has spent a lot of time with the committee to keep the base open. they were successful and, in fact, it has expanded. there are a lot of people down at the base that see him working very hard on their behalf. secondly, he has done a lot of work with the green things.

you want to -- in bringing things back to the district. if you talk to a lot of county commissioners, and even some republicans, they will say that they do not necessarily like that he is a democrat, but he works very hard for the district. austin scott is about 20 years younger than jim marshall. he is a state representative in the agricultural hub of in the south end of the district. i think it has been for three terms now. he has a lot of confidence. he started out this election cycle running for governor. there is a crowd that wanted him for governor and when it looked like john marshall might be somewhat vulnerable, he is doing really well. he projects a useful guide.

both of them are committed to reducing the federal deficit. jim marshall is the chair of the house caucus for a balanced budget amendment. it is number one on his website. they talk about preserving the base, the robins air force base, and its ability to be a large employer in the state. they talk a lot about community service. i think the major thing will be the fact i jim marshall is a democrat. that might actually be the thing that helps austen's got wind. -- austin scott win. i think this race will be more favorable from the republican perspective, particular because there is a base of republicans. the task is to convince republicans that they want to

vote for republican candidates and not for marshall. i have had several republican friends that say they do not vote for democrats ever, and except for jim marshall. c-span local content of vehicles are traveling the country -- >> c-span local content of vehicles are traveling the country as we leave up to this midterm election. for more information on what the local content vehicles are up to this election season, visit our web site c-span.org/lcv. host: on this friday morning we are pleased to welcome back to our washington -- "washington journal" neil king and his story this week caught our attention. earlier, we had people reporting on the tea party, suggesting that they were proud of their independence and lack of structure. you are suggesting that this is starting to change.

guest: i think that they are realizing that to last, they cannot just be a lot of groups in various cities or counties that are just totally grassroots. because to do that, they have to maintain a certain passion that is just not there. what they're trying to do -- i think virginia is the best example of this. they are building a loose federation across the state that will help them organize and unify and push forward on things that they want to push forward on. and looking toward 2012 on the national front. host: different is virginia from other states? -- howled different is virginia from other state? guest: they are the most mature in terms of inside. i think there are a number of reasons that is the case. they had a big election last year that brought a number of conservatives into office. it did some of the purifying the

of the office that other states are trying to do. they also have a prominent center for election this year. it has caused a lot of strife in a number of other states, like nevada and arizona and delaware. they are ahead of people in some ways and then below the radar in other races. host: i want to put the numbers on the screen and invite you to talk politics 2010 about the two-party movement -- a tea party movement and its alignment with the republican party. jamie radtke, who is she? guest: she is an interesting figure. she is the head of the richmond tea party. she is one of the driving forces behind this federation of virginia tea party patriot.

six or seven folks have come together around the state to create this federation. they're having a big convention starting today. ms. -- host: ms. radtke, thank you for being with us. tellus about your involvement with the tea party. -- tell us about your involvement with the tea party. how long have you been involved in politics in general? caller: i am probably one of the out buyers in the tea party movement -- out fliers in the tea party movement. i have been in politics for about 15 years. when the two-party came along it was very similar -- the tea party came along he was very similar to what i had already

been doing. host: is being a politician your profession? caller: no, being a mom is. host: how old are you, if you do not mind me asking? caller: i'm 36. host: tell us about the tea party there in virginia. caller: we wanted to maintain our sovereignty, but we knew we needed to work together. i invited some groups into richmond to work on that and we brought everybody in their across the state. and i think we have this federation and to be able to coordinate and collaborate on things across the state has been very effective for us. we have the health care freedom act last year here in virginia that our attorney-general is attempting to sue about. it that has emboldened us here in virginia.

at the convention we are expecting 25,000 people here. it will be the largest tea party convention in the country by a least three or four times the size. we are just hoping to activate the tea party going into the midterm and even into next year. host: and you are also doing a straw poll i have heard. caller: we are, we are doing a presidential straw poll. this will be the first straw poll of just a tea party activists. it will be interesting to see who the tea party liko they do not. host: are the tea party movement organizers in other states in communication with you to understand what you are doing in virginia and how to apply that in their own states? caller: we have had that conversation with groups. we have a national tea party that we use just to communicate

through e-mail and phone and share ideas. that is something that we just sort of recently because we found that the interaction that we have in virginia has been very effective and we are trying to get that across the country. host: tell us about, the organizations' focus for the 2010 elections. what are you aiming for and what will be success in your organization? caller: the virginia t. party association is not directly involved in any of the elections. we have focused on conventions, as well as help to support local groups. our focus has been on legislation. but the local tea parties have been involved. there busing people door-to- door, hosting debate. -- they are busing people door- to-door, hosting debates. host: how would you describe --

i know it is a general question, but your relationship with the gop, and in particular, gop- elected officials? caller: i would say our relationship with the gop- elected officials is pretty much manilnil. we do not have a relationship with elected officials. we meet with our congressman, but we do not how many relationships at the federal level. guest: host: -- host: is that intentional? caller: some of the congressman have had a tendency to be involved. they were not sure what we were all about. and then they were focused on the health care bill. some have been more embracing than others. and we have also focused on the state here because we were

having not much effect at the federal level. they were going to pass the health care bill anyway and we started trying to pass legislation in the state to thwart what was going up there. host: mr. king, do you have any of the questions for her? guest: this is a thing that i think is unprecedented, the governor and attorney general, [unintelligible] just tell me about on the local level what your interactions have been with public officials in the state. caller: we have been proactively meeting with legislators -- state legislators and the eternal -- attorney general and religious of that we want to -- relationships that we want to nurture. that has been our focus. in that regard, they have been

very receptive and we are very encouraged by that. host: thank you very much for spending time with us as you get ready to host 2500 to 3000 people in richmond va. we look forward to hearing about your straw poll prepare. i want to get to call, but before we do, i do not know if you watched our last session, but we had a very frustrated conservative caller who does not like the fact that the mainstream media can report about the tea party and not get their arms around the story. how you get to the core of it? guest: it is interesting. in this case i went on to virginia for several days and talked to more people, then i could possibly fit in the story. i also talked to people all over the country, a tea party

leaders, largely trying to figure and of these people were trying to do something below the rate are seen and what kind of corollaries there are out there. . . guest: it's extremely hard. it's an amazingly interesting, very amore fs, very american

uprising in a lot of ways. and it's at heart something that is extremely simple. they just want there to be less of everything, basically. there's been a lot of confusion i think created by the word party in their title. we know this goes back to the so-called party in boston a long time ago that had nothing to do with the political party. and the fact that a lot of these groups have the word party suggests to people that they should be a political party and put their own candidates forward. but they're much more of an advocacy group. and in talking to the fellow in ohio, he said in a lot of ways we're more like the chamber of commerce or like an environmental group that is pushing for certain basic principles and not necessarily expecting to have or wanting to have kind of the whole panoply of platforms and what not that a political party would have. so i think there's still a lot of misunderstanding. i think the evolution of the

movement itself is still under way. but the evolution of reporters understanding and the public's understanding is still a work in progress. host: david, democrat's line. good morning. caller: good morning. thanks for taking my call. in the first place, a party or anything else is just a union because it is a group of people advocating for their benefit. so we could call them a union as well as a party. second of all, i can't understand the candidates that they are putting up are so radical. take, for instance, rand paul. he wants to go ahead and put a $2,000 deductible on senior citizens. he also wants to go back to repeal part of the -- i can't

think of the name. but he -- the things that he wants to do are not in the mainstream, they are radical. second of all, we have a candidate up in alaska that wants to do away with money that's being spent -- sent to alaska that is far more than they send in, and he wants to go ahead and change education and everything else. we have other candidates that are looking at doing away with the school board. host: so what's your bottom line with these observations? caller: i don't think they're anywhere close to being mainstream. they are very, very conservative, and they don't reflect the working man's view

of what should be done. host: ok. guest: i would challenge that they are the same as any group or union going out for their benefit. the thing there is they're really true to their word. they want less government. and a lot of these candidates, even talking about rand paul are talking about adjustments to social security that would in the end deprive people of certain things. including the people that are pushing for this. when it comes to the candidates, inet interesting. there's been this spontaneous eruption of support for certain candidates in certain areas. the tea party movement both locally and nationally, they came in and made a difference. i'm not sure necessarily whether that's the perfect reflection of what this is all about. the various people that have popped up and been supported among this wave of people that

have pushed them forward as the nominees. i think in the end we'll probably be a better judge in the next cycle because in a lot of ways, jamie down in virginia talked about this. in virginia they talked about the candidates that were there that were holding up the banner themselves as the tea party banner. so there's no doubt that there have been some unusual candidates that have stepped forward and ones that may not be elected. that's one of the main things that they're pushing right now is if you all vote for republicans, you're going to be promoting some of these agenda that is you may find scary. the polling, though, on the other hand, has been interesting because we did a poll a week ago that showed that something like 70% of all republicans identified with the tea party movement, not that they were card-carrying tea party people. but that they sympathized and shared a lot of ideals. so to the extent that the republican party is mainstream, and 70% identified with the

movement, it appears it's fairly mainstream. host: we have seen a lot of organizations such as freedom work and the like. but when you dig into the finances of these statewide movements or even more local, where are the dollars coming from? guest: there are these big organizations which have sort of curious roots and in some cases the tea party express is a good example of, which is a big nationwide thing. they moved into alaska, they had a big effect in delaware. it's itself affected with the political advertising group. they make a lot of money out of doing that sort of stuff. freedomworks is doing that nationally. but again, if you look at an organization like the one that jamie has in virginia, they have a tiny budget and are receiving very limited, if any, help from the outside.

what's interesting about these local groups is they're being run by people who almost in all cases have day jobs and are doing all these things in odd hours, well into the night. which is another thing that causes worry in their camp to what extent they can keep these things alive. jamie is not only a stay at home mom but a home schooler who has three children and teachers her kids until 1:00 in the afternoon and while she's trying to organize these huge conventions. and again, there's like the big national groups and then much more grass roots local thing. and they don't necessarily connect or in some ways even have all that much to do with one another in a lot of ways. host: ann, republican line. good morning. caller: i'd like to talk about california a little bit, because we always seem to get labeled as being a democrat state. and a lot of people don't realize that there's like three different californias. northern california, southern

california, and i'm from the central valley. and it's a very conservative area. lots of farmers and families and a lot of people here are conservative. they do believe in family values and think like the tea party does. and we sort of get lost in the shuffle there, that california is not that conservative. but there are a lot of conservative people here. i guess what bothers me is that people who are conservative are busy out there working and doing with their families and so forth so they're not really vocal. they don't make a lot of noise. and unfortunately the people that make a lot of noise and carry plaque ets and on the street corners and so forth tend to be those who are progressive liberals, whatever they call themselves. so sometimes it gets me upset

when i hear people speak for all of california or speak of -- for all the country like your last caller who said that conservatives or tea party people are radical and i see just a whole different view. i see mothers and fathers that are working and have families and are trying to do things in the community and go to soccer games and football games and -- host: let me pick that up and ask to see what you're observing. guest: we are engaged in an endeavor to see whether the country will change. and california is a great example. they've got some big senate races there which could in the end tilt to the republican. that would be a big shift. obviously california has a republican governor at the moment, but both of its senators are democrats. there are other races around the state that could also swing to the other side. and one of the things that we've been picking up in some of our reporting is that both in new england, which is an

area that's been pretty much devoid of republicans, at least in the house for some time, that that could shift a lot in the election coming up in november and similarly in parts of the northwest. so people think of oregon or washington state, california, massachusetts as being overwhelmingly democratic states and they still by and large are. but this election in november could put some red dots in some of those areas to change that. so i think maybe people's perception of california might change a tiny bit. host: susan has this posting in the politics column today.

guest: again, there is a lot of infighting going on out there. some of it kind of pretty humerous. in florida there's a huge fight under way as to who really has the rights to call themselves tea party. in florida there is a tea party that has registered. they are putting forward candidates. up in delaware and new jersey area there's also a fight, there's a candidate who is claiming that he really is the true tea party. in the case of harry reid, sharon engle race in nevada there's a guy running as a tea party candidate. engle's camp is really worried that in the end he may garner just enough votes to tilt the election to reid and deprive her of what she wants to be -- wants to happen. so there's a lot of that in-fighting. some of it is really nothing more than just grudges and there are places where there are actual issues that divide them.

there's the issue of nullification. do the states themselves have the right to prohibit a federal law from being imposed. that is running through a number of states where there is disputes. there's one in virginia, in indiana there's a big dispute about whether the tea party should take that up. a lot of people think they shouldn't because going back some connotations. so it's interesting. it's certainly not harmony out there by any means. host: in virginia at least they're recognizing that they need to find their way through internal differences. foo guest: this dispute that was highlighted there in south dakota is not the kind of thing that one is seeing in virginia. and there are other states, ohio i would put in that category for sure, pennsylvania to some extent, texas is obviously a huge state with a really vibrant kind of tea party movement but a difficult one to put all into one hopper. and a lot of people don't want that to happen in the first

place. host: north carolina, bernard, independent line. caller: good morning. i -- [inaudible] host: we have a really bad phone connection. can you do anything about that? caller: can you hear me now? host: that's better. caller: first, i'm a black person and i'm offended by the whole tea party movement. first of all, [inaudible] every day, tea party every day. the same like the tea party movement seems to be a white movement that whites don't have an understanding for. also, why didn't they talk about this when bush was president? c-span seems to have like a pro-tea party agenda that seems to be counter productive.

no one group owns hate and hate has a tendency to go both ways. i'm not a hateful person. i was in the military and the -- continued to hear the people [inaudible] wonder why i serves f served in the first place. never talk about the nation of islam. that's not fair because they have their opinion about things too. host: thank you for your call. guest: he has a very good point certainly about the bush era driving up of debt, the encroachment of the federal government into private lives on a lot of fronts. you know, and i think that's one of the real weak points of the movement. they claim that a lot of these things started before, their concern started. it only really came together after obama was naugyated. but it's also very clear that the naugation of barack obama and some of the things that were done quickly, the stimulus packages is also just the sheer economic jolt that the country experienced in the year before

was itself a big force. and gave people the sense that something had gone wrong in the country. particularly on the economic front. but, i mean, i also agree with the caller that this whole, we want our country back, has some unfortunate connotations in some ways. i'm not sure really, though -- he used the word hate. i'm not sure it's a hateful movement. some of the earlier impulses that were seen at the early rallies have subsided to some extent. c-span junky tweets. guest: they don't really have too much choice in that regard. there's also been a big debate which we mentioned a little bit earlier about these divisions within certain movements about whether to go the third-party

route in the first place. i think there's a consensus across the board among all these tea party groups that's not the way they want to go. host: going third party? guest: yeah. there's wreckage looking back over the decades of third parties that tried to get movements and fell apart and most had a defining person behind them. if you look at ross perot's attempt to move forward as an independent. one thing that's so striking about this movement, despite the fact that there's people like sara palin and others is it's very much a leaderless movement that wants to remain a leader ls movements. there's strength but also a lot of challenges. host: next, a call florida. caller: good morning. mr. king just answered my question. i was calling to see if he thought that the tea party would be a viable third party.

that's good news for me. i'm a democrat up here and there's a lot of noise in florida this year, a couple of new candidates challenging career politicians like allen boyd, for example. and they've got a lot of funding from these people. i'm just real worried about that. i was watching earlier this morning. i just wanted to say that i've listened and watched for over five years now, i'm a college student and first-time calling so i'm a little bit nervous. but i appreciate what you are doing. i don't think you have a tea party agenda. i think you guys show both sides and i want you to keep up the good work. host: thanks. what are you studying in school? caller: i'm a history major. host: what are you going to do with that? caller: i'm going to be a teacher. i'm looking forward to it. i like kids and i want to help people. host: thanks for your call this morning. caller: thank you. guest: it's funny because he

said he would be worried as a democrat when they went that route, when i think if they went the third-party route it would be bad news for the republican party because it would sap support in a lot of places. the movement, dick army of freedom works, uses the word hostile takeover. a lot of people objected to that even within the tea party movement. others are wanting to sort of purify the republican party, bring it back to what they think is its original origins. and doing that not only in this election but well beyond. the question is there how long will that last if it lasts well into 2012 it will be perhaps an enduring movement. host: talking to kneel king of the "wall street journal." next call, louisiana. ellis. caller: good morning. i simply want to make a

suggestion and object vasion that the party, rather, the movement as you all call it known as the tea party movement , very similar, if i'm not mistaken, to a movement back in fill mor times, during and post civil war time known as the know nothing party in the south. and i would recommend that if you're not involved knowing anything about that, you check a book by a former history professor of mine of a college in louisiana by the name ofo verdyke. very similar to the tea party at this day and time. simply want to make that suggestion to you. host: appreciate the call. guest: i don't know a lot about the know nothing movement. but what's interesting about the tea party movement is it's steeped in all kinds of

nostalgia, which the previous caller before this one brought up the whole aspect of wanting their country back and all that sort of thing. a lot of these ads of the tea party people run, various people fighting during the relutionry war, there's a lot of talk about the founding fathers, all kinds of books that have become mandatory reading, basically, many of these books being decades old about the principles of federalism. so maybe for all i know this know nothing book is among that library. host: this viewer on twitter wants to weigh in. guest: i think really there are several events that really caltpoletted this. just the shock of september 2008, the stock market, going

down the financial crisis the tarp bill that was then passed to give so much money to the banks. i think that particular financial bailout was the biggest single thing a lot of people now believe that that is something that happened under obama. of course it didn't. that was to a lot of people the ultimate symbol of the government stepping in, in a place it didn't really belong. and then of course the inauguration of barack obama moved this along, particularly then the democrats pushing forward so swiftly on the stimulus package which underscored the whole theme of federal bailouts. so i think it had roots definitely that go back further. there's no doubt about the fact that it really came together in the first month after the democrats took washington. host: we're talking about funding earlier. open secrets.org, one of the sites that tracks money has this statistic.

do you have a comment? >> guest: there's no doubt. there's been huge money that's poured in. there's just a lot of people all over the country who, if they all started contributing $50 can make a big difference. there's money like that has poured into a number of these big races that have drawn national attention. chris tin o'donnell in delaware, she won a primary there, whatever it was, a month ago, had very little money in the bank and within two weeks i think she had brought in almost $3 million almost entirely in these kind of donations. host: oklahoma city, democrat's line. caller: good morning. this is ridiculous and i want to say something else.

you mentioned o'donnell. here you have a woman who said that she worshpped the devil. but then you have these tea baggers who say we're christians. but now they're going to back a woman who said that she used to be a devil worshipper all because she claims to be a member of the tea party. and just like the guy said, what it is is a lack of information, because you have these tea baggers trying to blame my president obama when bush is the one that gave us the bank bailouts, bush is the one that had the jobs being outsourced. bush is the one who got us into a war, two wars that we haven't even paid for, $3 trillion. medicare under bush, homeland security. you talk about more government. he gave us homeland security. he gave us the patriot act. and you guys are worried about barack obama. i mean, this is ridiculous.

because if you ask these tea baggers they do not get their information from anybody but fox news. they need to educate themselves. ask -- and this is it. how many get their information from the computer? how -- host: i'm going to stop you. we've got your point. thank you for your call. guest: a loot of these folks are really -- lot of these folks are pretty educated on a lot of things, i agree fox news informs a lot of their thinking, and there's a lot of people who tune into that. when it comes to the religious issue, that's interesting because there's a divide where there are those who are very much libertarians, government off our back, less federal government, that whole thing. and then there are those which are more religious in orientation if you look at the glenn beck rally that he had last month, which was basically a big church pick nick, primarily overwhelmingly a

religious event, these are people i'm sure identified largely with the tea party movement but were themselves kind of standard social consoytist. so that's a whole area of the movement that is yet to kind of figure itself out as to what extent of the tea party movement is going to be religious in context and to what extent it's going to be mainly about limited government. host: as we close here, what will you be watching? how interesting is this straw poll from the virginia meeting this weekend? guest: i think it will be somewhat interesting. i think these straw polls to be kind of indicative of -- but of no particular consequence. no one would have voted for barack obama in a democratic straw poll. he was beyond being an outliar for the race at that time. i think there are a lot of people who could step forward in the republican race, somebody like mitch daniel who

may not even be on their list today or tomorrow when they do their straw poll. still, as jamie was saying, there wasn't anything quite similar to this. so i'm sure people will take note of it. host: you will be out listening to voters between now and election day? guest: i will be out there. host: thank you for being at this desk this morning. guest: i appreciate it. host: we're going to take a break here and learn more about politics 2010 with the focus on the ohio governor's race. and after that, bob woodward will be here to take your telephone calls. >> it's another class of the

titans of two spending millions of dollars in this race. we haven't seen any game changing moments around the country in any of the races that we're taking a look at. john is trying to make the case that ohio needs a new direction, the economy is flat lining and hats been for decades there. republican and democratic governors haven't been able to turn it around. despite the fact that he hasn't really done anything that means that he should be fired, john casic is making the case that ted strickland is the wrong guy to run the state. ted strickland has been making the case that casic has ties to wall street and outside of ohio atmosphere. he's trying to portray him as the other, and that has continued throughout the debate. i think it's interesting, here we are on october 8. last night's debate nearly four weeks out from the election, we've already had our final

debate. the two will not meet again in a debate. host: ted strickland has been trailing in the polls in this race so far, but he's starting to come back a little bit. some attributed that to his ads. let's take a look at the ads.

host: is it working for ted strickland? guest: i think it's interesting. both sides focusing very heavily on the economy. ohio has such a very high unemployment rate, higher than the national average. that's really going to be the way the elections play out around the country. ted strickland is doing his best to focus on the past. as a member of congress and then after his time in congress john casic was somebody who a lot of wall street folks considered friends. he then went and worked on wall street. that has been the main thrust of strickland's message.

and really, i think we've seen in the polls recently that that message has worked a little bit but it's not working enough. that's because a lot of voters, especially independent and moderate voters are tuning out any incumbents right now. they don't believe any politicians. that's why you see strickland calling him congressman. >> host: i know you, the folks at hotline will continue to watch this race. where should folks go? guest: check out hot line on call. host: thank you. guest: thanks a lot. host: if you want to watch last night's debate go to our website, c-span.org/politics. host: and on this friday morning, the washington journal is pleased to welcome bob woodward to talk to you about his latest book called obama's war. thanks for being here. guest: thank you. host: i watched you on charlie

rose the other night, and i wanted to start our conversation with your very last thought on that program. i'm going to play it for our audience and then pick up the conversation from there. >> here, we're on thin ice, and not enough has been done to clarify and set the direction of the war which will not -- it's not just going to define in part the obama presidency, it's going to define where this country is in one year, two years, 50 years. host: pretty big stuff. you're thinking we're at a pretty important crossroads of history. guest: this war has been going on since 2001. longest war ever for this country. right now, it's in trouble. this report released by congress this week shows that it's not -- if you take in the

back of the book, i print the secret orders that president obama issued to the military and his national security team, and he lists four criteria for evaluating progress, and they are four risk factors as they are identified. the first is afghan governance in that war. now, we're dealing with karzai, who i point out in the book, the intelligence shows is a manic depressive, on his meds, off his meds. a couple weeks ago he's crying in public. one day he says he's with us, the next day he's going after the united states. he is an unreliable partner. second risk factor. the afghan security force and how are we training enough to get to the point that we can turn it over to them.

in these secret debates in the white house, which i describe here, the military's pushing for a goal of training 400,000 afghan soldiers and police. they keep bringing this goal back to the president. he just says no, what's the evidence? where does this come from? and finally, at the end he just dismisses it and says your presentation strains creddult. there are in fact attrition rates in the police and army sometimes that are higher than the recruitment rate. third area is pakistan, which is the powder keg of south asia and in many ways the powder keg of the world. weak government, all of these safe havens for al qaeda and the taliban extremists and insurgents. a country that has 100 nuclear weapons.

and the fourth area is international support. and as we know, that's on the wane. in this country, the criticism and doubt about the war is great. so you have a situation where the president has forged some consensus, got everyone to sign up to the strategy he developed. but sometimes you get a compromise where none really will work. and this maybe be point we're at now. host: i pulled the commentary page from the washington times this morning because there's a big piece with the headline, is afghanistan worth winning? you have -- the first question asked was, should we pull out? does anyone around here believe we should leave? everyone was silent. why is afghanistan worth

pursuing fundamentally? guest: this is the question. it's afghanistan-pakistan. as the president says at one of these meetings, the cancer is in pakistan, not afghanistan. vice president biden makes a very compelling series of arguments that we should focus on pakistan, that we have enough force, enough intelligence capability and control of the air over afghanistan that the taliban cannot and will not come back. host: there is a lot of discussion in washington this week about your comments about hillary clinton and joe biden on the next ticket. you've been here a long time. with all this substantive coverage in this book, were you surprised about how much attention there was about the contours of the next presidential race? >> you know, it's reported in the book that one of her advisers told her, look, it may

be in 2012 obama's in trouble and that he needs to put you, hillary clinton, on the vice presidential ticket. it's being kicked around. look, it's politics. and if you look at the numbers, hillary clinton has strength with voter groups, workers, seniors, latinos and women. and obama may need them. now, the white house is right, they're not talking about it now because they're worried about the november elections coming up. but after that, when they get into presidential election mode, as we know, in politics people will do anything that's legitimate to win. and sometimes things that are ill legitimate. host: one of the things we're going to do during this program is show some clips from some prior books. but before we get to that, this

is the list in the front of the current book, obama's war. you seem fascinated, you can attack the presidency as a journalist but you seem to go back to the concept of presidents and the pentagon. and the leadership around the war decision. why does that aspect interest you? guest: because it's so important. if you travel abroad, you discover we're defined by our wars in many ways i think the country is defined to itself by its wars. it is a serious moral choice always. people lose their lives, people are maimed. it is the defining undertaking for a nation state. and if you can look at, as i attempt to do here, exactly what obama decides, how he works, who he listens to, what matters, how he loses his cool

sometimes, even barack obama does, it's a window into who he is and the message control in this white house, like the clinton white house, the george w. bush white house, is phenomenal. they eek out a few sentences, this is what happened, this is what is going on,. because i have 18 years, it's the barack obama you don't know. >> host: this is from september of 2008, the war within, one of your several on president bush and the iraq war talking about the president's relationship with his generals. let's listen in. >> the problem is george bush never really solved the dilemma of how -- what is the interaction between the civilian end and the military end. he never had the generals so

they were close to him so he knew what was going on. so this is all taking place at a distance or over secure video links to baghdad and there's not that moment of, i've got to call it a come to jesus moment, or meeting, where he got everyone together and said, look, this is a mess. host: compare that with president obama and the generals. guest: well, of course one of the themes here is the relationship between the civilian leadership and the uniformed military. and in the obama case, as is laid out in great spreadsheet detail as one reviewer said, you see the military resisting and saying, look, you have to send 40,000 troops. this was last year in the strategy review. you have to have kind of an open-ended commitment. president obama did not buy that and there are some

electric moments where he confronts the generals and the pentagon, and says, look, you promised me three options and you've given me essentially one. secretary gates, defense secretary, finally says yes, mr. president, we owe you that option. but it never comes. the president has to take things from memos and thing that is gates has said to come up with the 30,000 troops and a beginning, a vague beginning of drawdown next july. so it's cobbled together. again, the problem of not having that personal relationship with the generals when mcchrystal was put in last year initially to be the commander in afghanistan, president obama met with him for 10 minutes. i asked the president in the

interview i did for this book, you're picking your eisenhower. how come only 10 minutes? and the president fell off the question by saying, well, that would mean i'm f.d.r. and i'm not and this isn't world war ii. and i just said quite directly, but this is your war. and when i'm picking somebody to work with, i interview them for hours and hours. those are the most important decisions you make. you need to make a human connection. the book at great length shows the distance that the white house kept general petraeus time and time again. general petraeus, who much of the book was central commander of afghanistan and iraq, is now, after mcchrystal was

fired, just the afghan commander. and he says to rahm emanuel, i'll be your lead shred dog -- sled dog on this. emanual says yeah, yeah, yeah, but there's never that team building where the generals are included or some of the generals, some of the military in the inner circle in a way that all the cards get turned up, face up, so everyone knows where everyone stands. this is done at a certain distance now. on the other hand, in terms of president obama on the intellectual level, these strategic reviews are a masterpiece of professor obama considering all of the issues, debating them, hearing people out. mind to mind in terms of

substance, it is a terrific job. on the personal level, which is often more important,s there this curtain that comes down and stays down. host: we've got a call, matt on the democrat's line. go ahead. caller: long-time listener, first-time caller. thank you so much for your insight into helping us say informed. why does the military, the joint chiefs, the leadership seem to have an agenda that is driven to what they want to do and withholding information? and secondly, how did president obama deal with that differently than president bush? and where was he effective and where was he not in that arena? guest: big question. first of all, the military leaders believe what they argue for. their agenda is out of conviction. i'm absolutely convinced that

the theme music in the background here is vietnam. the generals remember vietnam, the famous book dereliction of duty by hr mcmaster showing that, in veem, the -- vietnam the joint chiefs were not assertive enough. it's this theme they didn't have this personal relationship with the civilian leadership and so they didn't tell the leadership exactly what they felt. so admiral mullen, chairman of the joint chiefs, general petraeus, know that they have to be assertive and direct here. and that's what they're doing. but the problem is, i think it's one of the other generals in the white house, general

luke makes the point that the secretary of defense gates is the final window for a president into the world of choice. in other words, the secretary of defense should make sure that the president has a series of real options. in this case, gates went along with the military. he's quoted in the book telling the generals look, i'll give you -- i'll get you as much force as you need or want for as long as you need or want. but remember, you've got your battle space and afghanistan i've got my battle space back in washington. in other words, he closed off that world of choice for the president. and that's a real problem. that's one of the unsettled aspects of this, as i was quoted earlier on the charlie

rose show, we're in a precarious situation here in this war and on thin ice. you've -- the second part of your question. host: it was how does he deal with it differently than past presidents. i think you covered that. guest: i think i did. host: call from mississippi is next, james, independent line. caller: good morning. i wanted to ask mr. woodward, as long as you've been writing books and as long as you've been a person with integrity to a certain point, do you think it's fair for just anchor people like on the news, like cnn and all these other anchor people to come on tv, on the news and speak like they're experts as far as political? and do you think that the tea

partiers are not just people that is looking at the government as far as washington but in the small towns and government in small towns -- in small town with leaders of government and these cities and things where a lot of the corruption is at. guest: ok. first, about the news media. a lot of people do come on and offer their opinions or make judgments. sometimes they're deeply informed and sometimes they're not. it is a mixed bag. the tea party movement, i don't really know much about. i make this observation, though, that there is a tradition in this country of voting people's anger and the resentments. if you go back to the declaration of independence, two thirds of the document is a list of grievances against king

george iii. we tend to be a group of people in this country as diverse as we are who kind of, when we don't like something, when we have objections that run at a high level, to act particularly in the voting booth. so i'm not surprised that there is a tea party movement or any of these movements. there's a tradition that goes back to the beginning. host: i have another clip. this is an old one. and it's from 1994, when you wrote your book the agenda. this is about the relationship between vice president gore and bill clinton. let's listen. >> vice president gore, i think very much to his credit and to clinton's credit, but i was surprised to hear that gore in a moment of frustration, when clinton asked him what do i do about selling and making the

decisions on this economic plan, gore said to him, you get with the dodd damn program. that's -- god damned program. that's frank talk from anyone. i never heard of a vice president speaking that frankly to the president. and as i say, it's frank and direct at the same time. it's to clinton's credit that he will let people talk to him candidly because the president needs somebody who will speak the truth. host: so let's fast forward to this president, because joe biden plays a major role in your book. guest: very much the same. there is an important scene on the eve of obama's strategy and troop decision in afghanistan last year where biden shows up at the white house when he knows president obama's going from the residence down to the

oval office and the situation room and meets him there at the port co and says, you're going to have to limit the mission here. and the president has developed this six-page series of secret orders and joe biden says to him, if you don't, you're locked into vietnam. we're going to get into constant escalation and it will be a quagmire. and he said to him, he said if you -- if this is not working out what you've dobe, you're going to have to make some god damned tough decisions, man. not mr. president, but man. host: next call, south carolina , republican line. caller: thank you. first of all, i want to make a few comments. one was about the -- about

president bush's excoration, if you will, which began basically in 2006 after the democrats controlled congress so heavily. and it was like day in and day out to blame bush for everything. ok? and then which until now they still blame bush. and -- but, anyway, that -- and to my mind, i felt a lot safer with george bush as president. i mean, safer in the war standpoint. i believe he was a guy that was maybe barely qualified to be president. guest: you know, one of the things that is interesting is president obama still blames president bush for setting the conditions particularly the economic conditions, particularly, of these two wars which bush started and obama thinks that the iraq war was a

diversion and they should have stuck to afghanistan and maybe ended it quickly. host: what about president obama's view of the necessity of war? guest: i talked to president obama about this, and he really gets focused when he talks about war and makes it clear he doesn't like war. he quoted some cliches. war is he will. -- he will. that the dogs of war, once they are unleashed, they're hard to control. he sees his job as imposing clarity on the chaos of war. i showed him a quote from one of the great world war ii books written by a friend of mine, rick atkinson, day of war, about the italy, italian campaign. and in it, atkinson, who probably understands the military and military history

better than anyone, just waxed eloquent in a paragraph about how war crupts everyone, and no heart goes unstained. so i handed this to president obama and said, what do you think of this? and he read it and he said, i'm sympathetic to this. go back and read my noble peace prize acceptance speech. i ran home and dug it out, and there obama says sometimes war is necessary but it is never glorious and it is a manifesttation of human followly. this is a man who i don't think george bush liked war but bush was willing to go to war for reasons that he felt were necessary. that will be debated in history. obama wants out of afghanistan. host: next call, des moines,

democrat's line. caller: thanks for c-span. mr. woodward, i would first like to say thank you. you're a true patriot. i appreciate everything you did. you brought down a corrupt president, and i wish that maybe we could do something about this situation. first off, i've got a good friend of mine, he was over in fallujaha and he lost 34 of his fellow marines that were friends of his. guest: this was in the iraq war? caller: yes, sir. and the thing of it is, what i want is an investigation on when we started pumping owl oit of iraq, -- out of iraq, there's $9 billion that is un accounted for and the pentagon was in charge of this. and i think there should be an investigation. i talked to one of our congressmen here from iowa, and i told him there's not one

congressman or one senator has said anything about this $9 billion that disappeared. guest: ok. i'll tell you one thing we find in the iraq war and in the afghanistan war, all kinds of money floating around in the systems for -- and the systems for accounting for it are not very good. i'm not specifically aware of $9 billion of missing money or unaccounted for funds. what happens, one of the very important distinguishing characteristics between iraq and afghanistan is that in iraq they have all this money that goes to the government from their oil. in afghanistan, they do not. afghanistan is a poor country. host: i want to clarify one thing. you talked about how the military was arguing that we needed to train 400,000 police

and afghan military. the president talked about the fact that it would cost about $8 billion to do that. is the intention that the united states will continue add infin itetum paying for the afghan police? guest: hopefully not. this is one of the question marks and this is one of the reasons president obama kept saying i'm not going to spend $1 trillion because his budget director gave him a memo saying ten years more on this war will cost $778 billion. there are all kinds -- $889 billion. there are all kinds of numbers we know from the war in afghanistan and iraq that all of the numbers are low bald, that it always -- balled. that it always costs more. host: this viewer wants a claireication. the president would like out of afghan. he asked, does obama want out of afghanistan but in on pakistan? guest: what the president

realizes in kind of the center of all of this is pakistan -- i don't think he wants -- no, in fact i'm sure he doesn't want a war with pakistan. they're our allies. what he wants to do is win more pakistani cooperation to go after these safe havens where al qaeda resides, bin laden is probably in pakistan, the pal ban insurgency leadership in pakistan. and i recount how the intelligence people have photographs and communications intercepted showing that the taliban insurgents go from afghanistan back into pakistan, get trained, rearmed, r and r weekend, and then they load up trucks with weapons and they're waved through pakistani checkpoints to go into

afghanistan and kill american and other coalition soldiers. i quote leon panetta, the cia director saying we've got to get boots on the ground. these drone attacks o from the air are not enough. and as he quite neatly sums it up, this is a crazy kind of war. host: michigan, this is steve on the republican line. good morning. you're on. caller: good morning. i've got a couple quick questions. one, i would like to find out if you're telling, are you a democrat or a republican? and number two, i'd like to find out how you voted. i think it was in 68 and 72 when nixon was being voted on. guest: a fair and good question. because i live in the district of columbia, which is so predominantly democratic, i am a registered democrat but i am

an avowed neutral. and to put that into practice, i take my young daughter into the voting booth and she votes for me. she is now 14. we've been doing this since she was about age 4. she is now quite informed and they let you bring a child with you in the voting booth and she actually makes the selections. . .

guest: it was republican george bush who started the war with almost unanimous support from the congress. this issue of the draft is out there. i don't think we're going to get to a draft in the future. but i think one of the interesting things is the separation in the society. secretary gates gave a speech about this a couple of weeks ago, which i thought was quite good, that there are a group of people who serve, and then all of us -- there are so rigid, but we are not really aware or

committed to them at the -- there are surrogates, but we're not really aware or committed to them but the level we should. host: brian tweets -- guest: just a little bit. a war, or an open shooting war, with iran at this point. one of the components of this precarious national security picture that the president is dealing with, however. host: talking to bob woodward about his new book, "obama's mohrs." orlando, jennifer on the independent line. caller: mr. woodward, i have a comment regarding hillary clinton and the question. carl bernstein wrote an excellent biography -- guest: i agree. caller: called "a womain in --

woman in charge." i agree with him that she has a problem telling the truth. you made it seem that you are the one who first mentioned that the three wanted to play musical chairs with vice- president biden -- that hillary wanted to play musical chairs with the vice-president biden in 2012. i don't think you are correct. stooges like sally quinn and peggy noonan started flooding that i did a year ago. book, which i have read -- the strength of that book is that it is a very balanced account of hillary clinton, and it has some criticisms, and it also praises her drive and intelligence.

but i have not come and no one i know of, has suggested that she floated this out or that she wants to change jobs with vice- president biden. in the book, when hillary clinton has decided to accept the post as secretary of state, she talks to one of her political advisers who says, look, it is a no-brainer. take the job, you will get foreign policy experience, you will heal the relationship with obama which, as you recall, was quite bitter during the primary season in 2008. if, in 2012, when obama is running for reelection, presumably, he may be in trouble politically and need to put hillary clinton on the ticket because of her strength with

four of voting groups -- seniors, working-class voters, women, and latinos. this is how all of this surface. i mentioned it in an interview a couple of days ago, and it became one of the minor media feeding frenzies. host: speaking of hillary clinton, this e-mail -- guest: well, in a perfect world, we wouldn't need military intervention, and it to be done with -- it could be done through economic relationships, through diplomacy, and so forth. i don't think in our lifetime we are going to live in that world. host: let me move to how much diplomacy was discussed as an option in the military at the meetings you reported on. guest: richard holbrooke, the

special representative, is the one who negotiated the dayton accords back in the clinton administration that really brought peace to the balkans. he has said, and makes the point, you don't fix this war with the military victory. i think everyone agrees. the taliban insurgency in afghanistan is part of the fabric and is always going to be there. you need some sort of diplomatic settlement. that is inevitably how we get out of this war. host: the reports this week that the taliban might be at the table for talks is one that you would have expected from your reporting. guest: yes, i report that there were secret talks through the saudis. but this is all very preliminary. the taliban still thinks they

have the momentum -- host: so why would they negotiate? guest: exactly. host: ed on our republican line. caller: good morning, mr. woodward. the russians pulled out of afghanistan after nine years. if it wasn't for charlie wilson, maybe it would have been longer. between the russians for nine years and we are at nine years, it is 18 years but are we fighting a war or fighting a culture? what are our chances of winning a battle with a culture? guest: that is an interesting question. i don't think it is a battle with culture. i think it is an overhang from 9/11, because the taliban provided sanctuary to al qaeda and bin laden, and the attacks of 9/11, only in part, came from

afghanistan. but al qaeda is not in afghanistan in any significant way. in a way, and this is vice- president biden's argument, why don't we just focus on the cancer, the problem, pakistan? but this is an interesting point, that the intelligence people get into this, and the book, trying to say, what do we know about the enemy? one of the first rules of war is no to the enemy is -- is know how the enemy is, what they care about, how they operate. an intelligence expert who worked for general petraeus, and general petraeus set him up with a special intelligence unit called the center of excellence to actually get on a note around with people in afghanistan --

get on the ground with people in afghanistan to learn about tribes and villages and do the work to answer these questions about who the other side is. as he got in there, he said that general petraeus is the blind leading the blind. we don't know enough. we now note a good deal more -- now know a good deal more. if it is enough to inform what we do on the ground in fighting the insurgency there and protecting the population, which is the hearts and minds strategy of counterinsurgency. host: this is from 2007, on the president bush being in a bubble. >> we were specifically asking if you get outside advice from people like brent scowcroft, national security adviser to bush's father. he said, "no, i am in a bubble.

i don't have outside advisers. i relied on my work cabinet." that is part of the critique of bush, but he did not -- that he did not have a system of considering down sides to decisions. host: how does that compare with this president? guest: the president does not use to many outside advisers. one of its outside advisers is colin powell. at a crucial point, obama calls him in and asks them, and first powell says, "look, don't be guided by the left or the right here. don't be driven by the media. do what you think is right." on the eve of the strategy decision last year, powell comes in and says, "just because the military is unanimous in their advice does not mean they are

right. you are the commander-in-chief and there is only one commander in chief. there are other generals you can get if necessary." host: orlando, joe, democrats' line. caller: good morning. good morning, mr. woodward. i have a nephew in the 101st airborne deploying to afghanistan. me and my family paid a little more attention than most americans to what is going on over there. my first question is, vice president joe biden was put on the ticket supposedly because of his expertise in foreign affairs. however, when it comes to this war in afghanistan, his ideas seems to be ignored, i believe, because he was advocating some kind of a limited outpost type of strategy. to me, that seems like the most logical. we went in there -- what for?

to find bin laden and to eliminate or weaken al qaeda. now it has turned into a nation building ploy. what happened with that? guest: let me just answer that one. a lot of people who have read the book -- because vice- president biden comes into these meetings that i have the notes, and you see exactly what he says, and he makes very strong arguments for a more limited effort here. the president didn't reject it, though. he expected some of it. in the secret orders the issues, he tells the military, look, the goal here -- you are right to call it modified nation- building -- clear, cold, build, and transfer. clear an area of insurgents, hold it with the military and

afghan military, build stores and sewers, protect the population and win hearts and minds, and then transfer. obama is very direct with the military, saying, don't go into any area that you cannot transfer, which means turn this over to the afghan police and the afghan army. host: minnesota, paul, independent line. caller: good morning, c-span, and mr. woodward. quick question -- first, let me say i have about 600 dvds and the greatest eye-opener i have seen is the recent independent film called "why we fight," based mainly on president eisenhower posture prophetic warning to the station about what he called -- president eisenhower's prophetic warning to this nation about what he called the rise of military

power and what he called the military industrial complex. guest: i have not seen it, but it is interesting, as president obama was preparing his speech last year, when he went up to west point and announced he was going to send 30,000 more troops, that we would begin some sort of withdrawal next july. the president, in that speech, quoted eisenhower's famous speech about the military- industrial complex. as part of the speech -- the part of the speech president obama quoted was the part where president eisenhower said the president needs it did not just about national security in mohrs, but there needs to be a balance between national programs, including domestic programs. this is internally in the meetings and at the white house, the president is very

passionate advocate for some sort of refocusing, getting away from these wars, to his domestic agenda. host: here is a photograph this morning of general petraeus -- apologies, it is from "the new york times." you call them two of the most ambitious, driven man of their age. how well their relationship play out? guest: they have not closed the deal that i know of, on a personal level. they look at this differently. president obama wants to limit general petraeus -- general petraeus is quoted in the book saying privately that this the kind of war we will be fighting all of our lives and our kids' lives.

host: last call, kenny, republican line. caller: good morning, mr. woodward, and c-span. i'm a political junkie, an old retired firefighter, and like a lot of firefighters, i hear a conversation in the firehouse. i want to know where the person making the comment is coming from. in the comments i hear on television and read and newspapers, it is always left out what the person that is making the comment or writing the books personal opinion is about the person they are writing about were the situation they are writing about. if you are opposed to war or the war we are in, i would like to know upfront that i am opposed to this and this is a book i have written in regards to this, or i am opposed to or support a particular parpolitical person -- host: kenny, we got it, we are

out of time. guest: a good and fair question. this is a neutral inquiry. i am not for obama, i am not against him. that is why i am able to do this kind of work, i think i am not for or against the war. i am trying to present what carl bernstein and i back in the watergate age called "best obtainable version of the truth." host: the book is called "obama's wars." on at the best-seller lists, so easily available. bob woodward, returning to c- span as he always does when he has these books out to take your questions. thank you. remove from president to politics -- we move from presidential politics to the market situation, as we hear more and more about the mortgages being questioned legally and what that might mean for the overall real estate economy. we will be right back with that.

>> this weekend, c-span3 american history tv takes a trip to west virginia for a civil war antiques show in search of missing a historical documents. also, from the national archives, songs that lifted soldiers' spirits during the time of lincoln, and how harry truman's containment policy resulted in decades of tension between the u.s. and soviet union. american history tv, all weekend, every weekend, on c- span3. >> most generals, they're great this is what they do on the battlefield. arguably, washington's greg is

is what he did between battles, holding the continental army together. >> sunday, part two of our interview with author ron chernow on his biography of george washington, on c-span's "q&a." >> this weekend, and through december, listen to the marked supreme court cases on c-span radio -- landmark supreme court cases on c-span radio. >> what we are arguing is that you may not publicly desecrate the flag regardless of the motivation of your action. >> saturday on c-span radio, nationwide on xm satellite radio channel 132, an online at cspanradio.org. >> "washington journal" continues. host: about 40 more minutes on

washington journal. everybody has been waiting for the jobless numbers. a wave of government layoffs last month outpaced weak hiring in the private sector, pushing down payrolls by a net total of 95,000 jobs. the labor department says the unemployment rate held at 9.6%. the jobless rate has topped 9.5% for 14 straight months, the longest stretch since the 1930's. local governments cut 76,000 jobs last month, most of them in education, the largest cut by governments in 28 years. nearly 14.8 million americans were unemployed last month, almost 100,000 fewer in august." with that, let me introduce you to our final test of the morning -- final test of the morning. mark calabria has developed expertise about the housing

market in the united states. his financial regulation studies director at the cato institute -- he is financial regulation studies director at the cato institute. we are now learning this week about a very big concerns about the foreclosure legalities. help people understand what is going on with this. guest: essentially what has been going on is that lawyers have been working on behalf of people facing foreclosures, have been going through a lot of documents and discovering that a handful of lenders essentially at people sign off on the files who could not have physically sign off on that many files in that amount of time. there are questions about whether proper due diligence was done, where a proper -- whether appropriate decisions were made. host: what are the possible implications of this? guest: one of the biggest

applications is that this is going to drag out the wave of foreclosures for another six months. altman, the number of people who keep the house who would not -- ultimately, the number of people who keep the house who would not have otherwise will be quite small. host: does it have implications for the large banks that are part of this? guest: to agree. they don't actually own a the mortgage most of the time. they just collect the payments. i should say as an aside, this has implications going forward for securitization as a model of mortgages. we are not in the jimmy stewart type model where you make your loan and go down the street, because if you lost your job, and you would see your lender that he would be able to negotiate something because they on it and they hold it.

nowadays they sell off to somebody else and securitize, and is a chain of paper work develops. the more people you have, inevitably, the more mistakes will be made with paperwork. how the securitization of work in the past is certainly not going to be sufficient going forward. host: the mortgage electronic registration systems, as described in "the washington post" this month, is housed in a nondescript office building in reston town center, virginia, helping people avoid the time and expense of filing mortgage documents pay increase each time to change his hands. -- each time a mortgage changes hands. guest: a mortgage broker might originate the loans and they might sell off to another lender

and it might end up in a fanny or freddie -- fannie or freddie. instead of transferring or having to resign the deed at every step, they coordinate the process. host: no guarantor. guest: exactly. they streamline the process, that you don't have to have the paperwork redone every time. many people might not know, although you are supposed to get disclosure every time a mortgage changes hands, most people don't know this, that a lender they got their mortgage with it may or may not hold it and how many people hold it over time. host: let's get to root causes. banks have their properties on the books for a long time. were they, in fact, getting pressured by any sector of government -- governors or investors -- to clean it up quickly?

guest: there has certainly been a tremendous pressure from investors. investors lose if they don't get paid. they don't on the loan. own the loan. it is the incentive of the bank not to foreclose. the housing market has gone down by more than 20%, and for the lender, bank of america, for instance, the more they pay on the mortgage, the more they can continue to collect on the second. the incentive is not to foreclose. the duo, as the servicer, a fiduciary duty to the trust of the more -- they do owe, as the servicer, a fiduciary duty to the trust of the mortgage. the house is likely to sell for more today than it will six months from now.

there is also the issue of whether the house is kept out. -- kept up. i think it is important for us to get to a point where the housing market actually reaches bottom. the importance of that is that for both the lender and the borrower, when it looked at an asset that might be appreciating, there is far more reason to stay in the house. same with the lender, that if i think this is going to be worth 10% less in six months, there is more incentive for me to foreclose today. when we hit the bottom sooner, we will change incentives in the system. host: how is the bottom recognize? you only recognize that after the fact. the rest of overshooting this is less than -- risk of or shooting

this is less than keeping it at market levels. host: our guest has a doctorate in economics from george mason university. he held positions at harvard university's joint center of housing studies, and served as deputy assistant secretary for regulatory affairs at hud and six years as senate staff paddling issues related to mortgage, finance, and economics, all this to bring to bear at his position at the cato institute, where he serves as financial regulation study's director. our focus is the cruelest aspects of the economy and the current -- news -- real estate aspects of the economy and the current state of foreclosures. first call. caller: good morning. my question is -- when i first started noticing that a lot of

the contracts were overpricing houses. i am going to tell you an instance -- i don't know what kind of thing it was, where they put forth hundred thousand dollars on an account to make it appear that i had this money, ok -- but $400,000 in an account to make it appear that i had this money, ok? and now they want it back, ok? it went from countrywide to bank of america. they are trying to foreclose on people so that they will not find out how they got into the house in the beginning. if you notice, all of these houses are up and nobody is in them. all of these buildings are existing and nobody is in them. you tell me now, because -- that was a prime example -- host: i am going to jump in, because we understand the thrust of your question, the whole financing of contractors to put these properties on the market.

guest: this, i think, is important on the rehabilitation side as well as -- there were a lot of inflation of appraisals during the process work homes were overvalued -- where homes were overvalued. there is tremendous pressure to move homes, and this happens in every bubble. there is a degree of fraud, and that is across the spectrum with many players. i cannot remember whether torture is a judicial stay with us foreclosures, -- whether georgia is a judicial state with foreclosures. host: explain the difference between a traditional state with four coaches and one that is not -- judicial state with foreclosures and one that is not. has t: a judicial i

to go through a judge with the foreclosures. it is worth emphasizing that almost all of the moratoriums that we have started to see in the last several weeks art largely just in the judicial states. host: republican line. caller: good morning. my husband and i put a contract on a home, and was a short sale. we had the cash. very clear that we could have purchased a house in two weeks if needed be good but you have to wait and do the contracts, so on and so forth. the bank kicked the appraiser out and was moving forward. we offered $195,000, the asking price. it seems to me that that was ever cut and dried -- that was

very cut and dried, but they were dragging their feet, dragging their feet. when it was time for us to extend her contract, we said, forget it, we're not going to keep waiting. that was 30 days ago. the home is now $20,000 less. i don't understand what is taking so long when people are out there want to buy a house and the banks are dragging their feet like they are. guest: a friend recently tried to buy a house on a short sale and it did not work out and gave up. in a short sale, the borrower has the last minute ability to come to the table and say, i am going to start paying my mortgage now, i want to work out something to the process of short sales, in my opinion, is far too complicated. we need to go away from a one- size-fits-all approach to foreclosures to say that these are a bucket of homes for this

will not be sustainable. how do we get the market moving again, versus when you hit a bump in the road and there is a process to get the person in a sustainable home again. almost all the moratoriums we have seen within the states have been very blanket. all the loans by bank x would be under moratorium until we figure this out. host: looking at the potential for really unlimited numbers of lawsuits, title companies are in the middle of this with the guarantees. if title companies begin to go bankrupt because of so many claims against them, what happens? guest: you set aside the difference between -- there is only a handful of title companies. this is a very real issue, because if ownership is not

resolved, and it was mentioned by the last caller the short sale, the ownership might transfer, but these claims start coming up and you see a lot of claims of the title companies. a couple of them went down, that would be every bit disruption -- that would be of very big disruption to on the other hand, the title companies are generally pretty well preserved. they satisfy these contingencies. to some extent, they are expecting this. of course, they don't like to take losses. no insurance company ever likes to pay claims. to a degree they will find ways to not pay the claims are resolved problems, but this has potential to be significant losses for the title companies. host: "new york times" this morning -- "halt in foreclosures a new blow to home sales." guest: i think we should go through this quicker and sooner

rather than dragging out the pain. fundamentally, what housing prices will be will be reflected by supply and demand, driven essentially by demographics and income. prolonging the process of adjustment and getting homes on the market for sale -- it really is causing a lot of anxiety. you essentially have a million- plus homes in a show inventory that, once they work their way through the foreclosure process, will depress prices even more. host: next call, dallas, independent line. caller: hello. i have two comments. the first is on the back of the previous caller, that you are allowed to engage in his speech for quite some time and never did -- in hate speech for quite some time and never did cut them off. i'm talking about the caller referred to it the number of white people in the tea party

and referred to them as teabaggers. i am sure if that were a white person using the n-word, you cannot allow them to use it more than once without cutting them off. that is very unfair treatment. you are not the only post on c- sp -- not the only post to us that on c-span. but it is very wrong. host: do you have anything to say on this topic? caller: as far as foreclosures, it is painful, but too many houses were overpriced and too many people were in over their head. we will have to allow the market to deal with their foreclosures but i don't think the market can just artificially prevent that from happening. guest: in the latter part of that, i largely agreed. i don't think there is much we can do to change fundamentals of the housing market. host: georgia, democrats' line.

caller: i would like to tap into the broader knowledge of the economy. i see the unemployment rate, at 9.6%, on your screen. the question i have is, local, city, state government, they cannot create jobs. it seems like the private sector cannot sneeze unless the federal government says "sneeze." what is happening with the economy went in and of these municipalities can do anything -- when none of these municipalities can do anything unless the federal government to do what it will do? the private sector cannot do anything unless the federal government says so? thank you. guest: the biggest soft spots in

our economy are housing and the labor market. we lost 3.5 million jobs directly related to housing, whether it was construction or real estate, and those jobs will simply not come back until the housing market hits bottom and work off excess inventory, which will be, at least at a minimum, a year if not longer. housing tends to lead us out of recessions and in the past. i hope we don't have to wait around for the housing market to turn around before the economy gets strong again, but that will be a big component of it. we also see a disconnect between the labor market and the overall economy. over the last year, things like the gdp and consumption starting to actually increase, whereas the labor market has stayed flat and soft. there is a relationship between the housing market and labor market that is not appreciated, which is that a lot of times you see, essentially, people stuck

under water and not able to leave their house, and go to a labor market that might be growing. if you are a carpenter in tampa, it is unlikely your services will be needed there any time soon, given the over- construction. historically, one of the adjusted mechanisms for the labor market is that people move to parts of the country that are growing, and being stuck in a house is a drag on that, as detrimental effects -- and has detrimental effects. host: the president used the tactic of a pocket veto to send a mortgage foreclosure bill back to congress, which, as described by "financial times," passed quietly by both houses of congress. what is this supposed to do, and why do you suspect to be done? gues -- thwhy do you suspect

the veto. guest: the bill solely dealt with notaries and tried to make more uniform electronic signatures, that they were used in one state and state. -- used in one state and not in another state. it is something we see in washington, where you link it to the broader economy. while it is tended to foreclosure crisis, -- tangent to the foreclosure crisis, whether this bill passed not it would not have any effect on what is going on. host: next call. caller: i read on a website that they were planning on using the rico act.

guest: i am an economist, not a lawyer, and that act has traditionally been used to fight organized crime. it has been used in a lot of other instances be organized crime. it has been used quite broadly. it is not surprising that one would try to use it against a lender. again, i am not a lawyer, but the idea of easing is to claim that they are criminal -- using this to come that they are criminal enterprises will be very difficult under the law. host: you are on the air, tim. caller: good morning. i was wondering, the banks that got us into this mess and the first place divided on these mortgages up, the derivatives, and then sold them all over the world. who has got a mortgage? how can they kick you out of your house if they don't have the mortgage? your living room might be in japan, your kitchen might be

over in iceland. another thing is, these banks gambled and the people lost. when the banks went down, the government goes and tells them out, and everything is stacked against people from -- bails them out, and everything is stacked against the people from the get go. since you are an economist, how can 5% of the population get 90% of the cash, and the rest of us make these loans at at the same time the ship jobs overseas -- shift jobs overseas? guest: on securitization, it is not well understood while mortgage-backed securities are sold off to a variety of investors, they are held in trust. a claim on a mortgage-backed security is simply a claim on the trust. they own a piece of the pool, so there is a whole alone in their

-- whole loan in there. pretty much we know who owns the loan, we know the pool who owns the loan. that is not really the problem facing the market today. there are challenges regarding whether the paper work is done sufficiently, but there is really no ambiguity over who owns the loan. the loan is owned by the pool, the trusty, not necessarily by the holders of the mortgage- backed security. i'm sympathetic to problems with the banks did my opinion is that we should have left many of them fail rather than bail them out. there is frustration with having a bailout for banks, and why should we not essentially extend that to everybody else? i would emphasize that my hope is that, despite the bailout, we get most of the money back, and we are getting most of it back at least from the banks, not necessarily from fannie mae and freddie mac or from the autos.

we need to make sure that the loans that underlined these banks are collected. most of these are going to accrue to the investor, not necessarily to the bank. the single largest investor in mortgage assets today is the american taxpayer. via the ownership of fannie and freddie and the ownership of the federal reserve. host: a tweet -- guest: i am not sure it is actually in terms of "pressure to sell." certainly, freddie and fannie being very large investments themselves, they are essentially investors and mortgages, not lenders per se. there has been tremendous pressure from the regulator and from the white house to minimize the losses. so far, we've seen about $150 billion from losses in fannie

and freddie. we will not recovered most of this. there has been some pressure to try to make sure that we minimize these losses. one of the ways we have done that is fannie and freddie have gotten aggressive towards moving to foreclosure quicker. and try to push the loan back to the lender. at and there is pressure on the letter to try to foreclose, too. there are activities fannie and freddie are involved in that i s putting increased pressure to foreclose and get these homes off of the bank's books and off fannie and freddie's books. host: a tweeter of the mindset that this is greeted by the people -- created by the people. guest: i think there is a degree of truth to that id which heard the housing market into a casino. a lot of people figure, "i will

get the loan, and if it turns out well, i will get the up side, and if not, i will walk away." in states like california, mortgages are what are called non-recourse, which means that if you walk away from home, the lender can only go after the home. i do think that is a fundamental question. one of the things i did -- i would two in the judicial states would be that the moratoriums would be solely for people trying to pay their mortgage. over 1/4 of the delinquencies are from homes where the homeowner did not make a payment in over two years. pretty much an indication to me that the person is not going to make a payment anytime soon. i don't think if you attend two years of free rent, you should get another six months of free rent. host: realtytrac looks at homes

in foreclosures. individual states -- nevada, arizona, florida, and california. this ends in 2009. what does this trend look like in the future? guest: it is important to recognize that the state's yupik really are the center of the crisis -- states you picked are really the center of the crisis. they are the states with the biggest bulls. even those of us who live in washington, when we would hear what house prices were over there, we were shocked. the median income was still only about $50,000, and you are really encouraging people to stretch far beyond their means. that was never going to be sustainable. i would say that many cases like california, you still have prices that are far out of reach

for the typical household. there really is no other chores but to come down. -- no other choice but to come down. there are other states with different categories, ohios and detroits, where they had a fundamental economic weakness and they did not see housing bubble and it the same degree they will be in those situations for some time to come. host: baltimore, mary, republican line. caller: mark, my question is about political culpability looking into the history of this, especially related to fannie -- fannie mae and freddie mac. i want to know, what is your take on the political -- everything being politically determined with the money that goes to pay for the not-for- profit -- the high salaries

that the executives get, freddie and fannie mae. what is your comment about political culpability? you talk about a lot of irresponsibility in these different areas of the housing bubble, irresponsibility of different people involved, but, you know, to what extent would you -- what percentage would you put on the responsibility related to political public in that whole scenario? -- political culpability in the whole scenario? guest: full disclosure, in my time on the senate banking committee, i worked on the bills.e and fannie it was very much an uphill fight. one of the reasons against doing any sort of fannie and freddie reform, particularly in 2004 and

2005, was that we would take the steam out of the housing market. looking back, i wish we would have taken steam out of the housing market. we would be in a much better a situation today. they spent a lot of money and had a lot of friends and the housing industry, and it worked -- they work very much to protect the status for fannie and freddie. i hope one of the things, baristas going forward is to finally decide to get rid -- i hope one of the things congress does going forward is finally decide to get rid of fannie and freddie. socialize losses are unsustainable and inherently unfair. host: on the left-hand side, " price index, and you can see the decline has reversed itself and begins to pick up in 2010. the share of distressed houses -- a peak in the beginning of

2010 and now continues to go down. what does this really suggest? it is not necessarily that there are fewer in the pipeline, but people are not buying them or they have not been made available for sale? >> you have seen it track back and forth depending on whether a state like california,. there is a back-and-forth. -- depending on whether a state like california has a moratorium. there is a back-and-forth but because freddie and fannie are essentially political creatures, it changes. to an extent, it is differed by state as to how you are getting this through. we have seen some stability in housing prices now. there is a question about whether it has hit bottom or whether it will fall back again. but that is really one of the drivers there, and a big problem

behind in terms of getting prices. host: what is the current inventory backlog in the united states? guest: a million or more homes than we need as a country. host: how many does the country need? guest: las vegas, for instance, 75% of the sales in a bubble -- close to 30% overall. while you are seeing some of that come back -- recent national association of realtor did it says that 30% of home sales are all cash. people come to the table and try to buy these homes when they hit rock-bottom prices, but you are not seeing the broader investor interest. i don't think we're going to for awhile. to some extent, i hope we never get back to the day when someone buys eight or nine homes with the intention of flipping them

all repeated the pri we've not had that amount speculative activity -- intention of putting them all repeatedly -- flipping them all repeatedly. we have not had that one of speculative activity. host: next call. caller: nobody is going to jail. a congressman can lie and have extramarital affairs and to all these things and do it in the name of democracy and use the constitution. it is like a wolf coming into the henhouse. you let these guys in and let these guys influence congress meant to write laws certain way, and who loses? the poor. it is not only a racial thing, it is a class war. when people use the constitution to basically manipulate laws, no oversight, nobody is going to jail, this is basically what happens.

now you have people at the top are having money coming in from different countries, trying to class this country but the republicans came in. when they were running the show, there was a surplus. they tried to destroy this country. nobody thinks about that. it is all about money. i wish people would start acting like americans and stick up for this country instead of letting people come in with foreign money, and these bureaucratic, so-called christians who believe in religion and demagogue it, they are not really christians. guest: i certainly think there was a lack of oversight in washington, for most of the banking system in general. what we saw was really encouraging of it. i think there is a difficult fundamental question in my mind, that the reality is that most of us like a bubble when it is going on. in my experience working on the banking committees, congress

largely sways to what the american public wants them to do, and if the american public likes the fact that there home prices going up 20% or 30% a year, he will not see a lot to push that act -- you will not see a lot to push that back. how'd you have eight regulatory structure robust enough in the face of a bubble. host: the whole concept behind loan modification. guest: they are very tough. in some cases, it is better than the alternative. for one of the larger lenders, there is a significant sector where they are there for two years. if he remained 8 -- you remain a lender and you lost your job, in most cases the landlord would

have you out in six or seven months. in the harshest state, you can fora homeowner in house six or seven months before the mortgage lender gets you out. many times it is not necessarily a desired situation. in a one driver to find -- the no. 1 driver behind foreclosures and delinquencies is somebody has lost their jobs. there is no requirement for you to use your unemployment insurance to pay your mortgage. for a lot of people, it may be that you don't like the situation you are in, and the reason you keep in it is that it is the least bad of a lot of bad alternatives. host: next call. caller: mark, do you pronounce your last name calabria? guest: calabria. caller: you are the best pitch i

have never heard an economist at -- speak so -- you are the best. i have never heard an economist speaks openly and to the point. -- speak so plainly and to the point. you really are good. it is funny, you are talking about -- in 2006, i sold a house. i am a builder and realtor. i kept asking, how is the lone going -- loan goign? -- loan going? they just kept laughing at me. it was one of these new age loans, and i am looking back now, and i think, i must have seemed like an idiot. in my business meetings, my builder friends -- i think it was about 2007 -- i kept asking them, do you all have anything going? what about buyers? hey, guys, i think we are dead

in the water. nobody believed me, but it turns out i was right. with that in mind, would you defend obama's situation? i think we were already in the bus when he took over -- bust when he took over. guest: i believe that the bureau of national economic research begins -- dates the recession beginning in 2007. at the beginning of the contraction, and the middle of last year, they did not say everybody was happy and find again, -- and fine again, just to stop contracting. a lot of builders have the perspective that no matter how bad the market is, they will sell their homes and a product is better than anybody else's. we had a situation across the board, and it was true at the federal level, and among lenders

where they continue to lower their underwriting standards. there are a number of lenders who did not . many of the ones who are responsible are still standing today. host: will, good morning to you. caller: good morning, c-span. i appreciate your guest, and i appreciate the transparency that comes through. c-span is a window to all three branches of our government, and i appreciate you providing the service. the thing i have a problem with our government, though, it's obama, when he came into office, he pronounced -- he promised the american people accountability and transparency. we have seen quite a bit of that failure to come across for the last two years but i know president obama has made efforts to do something about it, but there is so much greed and corruption that he is up against

the wall. what i would like to bring about the problems we have in all three branches of our government is that legislative reforms are going on but it is not catered to the american people. it is catered to special interests and big business. when you look back when all this started under bush, oil companies started this snowball effect of windfalls. they broke the american people 's back with the gas tanks at $4 a gallon. what happened with the homes in mortgages and stuff, the same thing happened with the one false -- windfalls -- host: we have got to stop there. guest: it is a fundamental guest: it is a fundamental