do you want to comment on that? a lot of those drugs, even though they are coming out of columbia, they go into venezuela. then from venezuela, they either go straight to west africa or they're going to the island of hispaniola >> they are coming into west africa. they are using that as a transshipment point to get into other places primarily europe. do you want to comment about that? >> it is a very real concern. it is certainly not exclusively a military challenge but i think africa command in its uniquely interagency composition is in a

posture to contribute to countering that effort for the illicit trafficking of narcotics and other illicit trafficking destabilizes nations and regions all of which are not helpful in trying to provide security. i think this is a challenge for the whole of government and if confirmed, i will look at africacoms role in that regard. >> have you had any thoughts about what we should do about that as commander of africa? >> senator, i think the way in which africcom could bring assets to bear is a maritime the domain awareness. in this regard, i would like to partner with the u.s. southern command that participate in this type of efforts on a routine basis. i suspect but don't know the africa command has already done

so to learn from the experience of southern command and find out how we might best leverage that experience and africa. >> mr. chairman, this is a great example, general hsm just mentioned southern command. southern command in africa command is a great example were all the agencies of government are coming together to address a particular problem. it has certainly been true with regard to drugs in south america but it is also being true with regard to drugs with regard to western africa and through that command. it is the dea, the fbi, the cia, as well as the military components that are all working together. so often, we are giving deference and kudos to our young

men and women in uniform which is most appropriate. they are held in such high esteem. then, we don't realize changing nature of protecting the interest of the united states in the free world is a common bond of all of these agencies, sometimes led by the u.s. military but other times working directly in a partnership. i think it is fascinating. west africa is clearly a place where we have that going on right now as well as the u.s. southern command. thank you, mr. chairman bennett thank you for that comment. >> that is an important point made that is not often enough. you pointed out that i want to

ask one question about the start treaty and there are other questions during the hearing. you have pointed out when you're asked about their russian unilateral statement that it is not part of a treaty, it is not binding on us. it is their point of view and we made our own unilateral statement at the same time we will proceed with missile defense. our statement -- our unilateral statement made at the same time as there is, april 7, says that u.s. mitchell of fence systems would be deployed to defend the united states against limited missile launches and allies and partners against regional threats. the united states noted its intent to continue improving and deploying its missile defense systems in order to defend itself against attack as part of our collaborative approach to strengthen our ability in key

regions. thank you for pointing that out our unilateral statement was made this day -- same time as there is part of their unilateral statement was not binding on us and is not part of the treaty. was not pointed out enough, it seems to me, that the exact same thing happened at the time of start i. there were unilateral statements made by the russians. that had to do with the abm, that if we pull of that treaty, they said that this was a unilateral statement and at that time on the soviet side when there was a soviet union, this tree may be effective and viable under only conditions of trade between the u.s. and the ussr and the limitation andabm's. this was in 1972. that was the statement they

made and we made a unilateral statement at the same time saying sorry, we're not bound by that statement and we could make changes in the treaty or pull out of it. it is our -- it is in our supreme national interest to do so and in fact, we pulled out of the abm treaty and they did not as a result terminate the start treaty. despite their unilateral statement read is that correct, general? >> yes, sir, that is the way i understand it. iswhat i don't understand why when our witnesses are asked about the unilateral statement, why after they point out it is not binding on us and we made our own unilateral statement, it is not binding on us and we intend to proceed and it will not threaten you in any way, why don't our witnesses

pointed out that we have been there before? we just went through that exact same unilateral verses unilateral back in 1991. i am just curious. you are aware of this? why is that not something which is used to address this constant reain we hear about the unilateral russian statement in this particular treaty? why isn't that part of the response? the history. >> probably a deficiency on my part. >> no, no most witnesses don't get there. is it not as important as i think it is that we have been there and done that listen to that before and had no effect? i am not critical of you. i am just curious person witnesses don't seem to focus on what seems to me to be obvious that their unilateral -- unilateral statement is not

binding and we made our own and we intend to proceed with their missile offensive, we have been for this exact same unilateral /unilateral before. it did not have any impact. rightly or wrongly, we pulled out of the abm treaty. they did not a lot of the start 1 treaty. and i am really curious but i am not critical. you are not making reference to that history and that is typical of our wnesses is it not as important as i think it is? you can be totally blunder diplomatic as you wish them no, sir, i just think that >> and no, sir, to define the full context of the debate, you capted a better than i did and i don't know why i did not

capture it that way. >> again, it is kindf a pattern, frankly. maybe people don't want to sound offensive. it is not the offensive to make reference to this unilateral history, in my judgment. that is my opinion i want to thank both of you who have served our country well and your family support, we know how critical that is and we thank our families again and appreciate your ming reference to your families the way you do. unless there are further questions by may which there are gone and there are no one -- there is no one here to make any we will stand adjourned i want to thank you both i also want to thank senator webb for the step he is taken to let our nominations to proceed.

he had a legitimate interest in getting information and he has obtained that information and as indicated -- and has indicated the release of all denominations and up not only will that pulsatile said a number of other nominations which had been pending but also will speed up your nominations and confirmation as well. we will try to get a quorum as quickly as we can of this committee so that we can address your nominations. i don't know if there is any -- [inaudible] thank you both -- we will stand

adjourned. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] >> and at two o'clock 30, the american constitution society host a review of the arizona immigration law. we will have you the -- we will have that live at 12:30 eastern. congress is out for the thanksgiving break. when they return, they will focus on the ethics inquiry -- inquiry of congressman charles rangel. censure was recommended last week and the full house needs to approve that. the senate is also out for the holiday and when they return, work is expected of a food safety bill. both chambers are set to return on monday, november 29 and you can see the house live here on c-span and the senate on c-span 2. january marks the beginning of the 112 congress. the midterm elections will bring

several new senators into the mix and among them are former congressman and u.s. trade representative and head of the office of management and budget rob portman. he will be joine by new connecticut senator richard blumenthal, form -- former state attorney general. he will replace christopher dodd. the fcc reports that with the growing popularity of wireless devices, demand for wireless spectrum will be over 30 times higher just a few years from now occurred assistant commerce secretary talks about his department's plan to free up wireless spectrum and what happens if they fail. that is tonight on c-span 2. the national governors' association posted a seminar this past weekend for the 29 incoming governors to aise them and their transition teams on a variety of issues. this is a news conference that was held to talk about the event.

speaking first is governor bill ritter from colorado springs. wheelchair you as much of this as we can until the start of the american constitution be -- society of and. >> -- e. event. >> we know there are people on the phone and media folks ask your question loud and we will probably repeat the questions. we are really delighted myself and my wife jeanie are delighted to host the national governors' association for the new governor this seminar. to my right is the chair of the national governors' association who will stick in a moment and to my left is the nebraska governor who will be the incoming vice chair and they will both make remarks. this is an historic time. in memory, there has never been more new governors in the united states than there are this year.

this tradition of bringing governor-elects with governors who have served and some who are retiring and some going on and doing all we can to talk about experiences we have had and hopefully mentor those governors in this transition. we know in this country, we are at a place where there is still a very, very difficult time. the governors in this country will face enormous challenges and it is accord until to was to all that did -- to do all we can as an association to prepare those governors for the kinds of challenges they will face from budget perspective, politics, and many things that involve the daily life of being governor that may be apart from strict policy or strict budget thing. that is our hope. we do it without regard for party or partisan issues. it is our hope that this

national governors' association can actually represent a bridge in partisan politics that helps us bridge those places that sometimes can become a little bit more expensive during campaigns and that weome back to get a permit how we work on the issues that make such a tremendous difference to the people of this country? we have a lot of experience and we hope to continue to do that. one way of making that stronger likelihood is certainly our being with these governors and the governor elect to give us our experience and this is what we hope to take away from this and so far, it has been a great meeting in that respect. i let would like to introduce the chair for three days. our outgoing chair was governor mansion, now senator and chris has done a fabulous chair in the

72 hours. >> thank you. thank you, bill. on behalf of the association, first and foremost, thank you to you and your wife for hosting the event. candidly and even more importantly, take you for your wonderful service to the great state of colorado. you had been of great service to the country. we thank you for your leadership of the last four years. we have been joined by some of our other governors, some newly elected. if you please introduce yourself. >> i was born in colorado springs. >> there you go. >> welcome back. [laughter] >> we will have governor-in just

a moment. >> i had been chosen by my colleagues to serve as the chair of the national governor's association. our governors or facing an unprecedented economic crisis in their respective states. i can tell you, when we come here, we do not come here as republicans or democrats. we but the elephants and the donkeys aside. we come here as governors of our respective states. i will continue the effort that was begun by my% assessor -- that was begun by my predecessor. to me, our nation is falling behind in regard to our competitiveness. our children, who today are dropping out of high school, or a lost resource to all of us.

those who make think it is impossible to get a degree, we want to open up the doors and say not only can you, we need you to. we need more majors in science, technology, engineering, and math. we need to have the best and brightest as our employees and we beat companies to hire our students to have the experience and education necessary. one of the issues we will be talking about over the course of this year is how do we restore the rightful place of our students in the competition globally to be number one again. that will be what unites us. that will keep us going forward. we also will know that we have budgets to balance. we have health care issues. we have public safety issues. i had been a governor for six years. the role of the governor has changed dramatically in america. six years ago you may have had a national disaster and paid

attention to it on the day it happened. today demonere set to stand ready. in the case -- today we have to stand ready. these governors are called upon to do that which their predecessors did not have to pay much attention to. i cannot be more happy to have these 29 new governor in lex joins the national governor's association. this is the largest class in history. the closest was 1920 when there were 27 new governor-elect. they will give us a new energy and some great new perspective, but they will join some colleagues who really do have the priority of what is right for america. it is a great opportunity to for us to get to know our new colleagues so we can unite around the issues that are important to the people in our

respective states and our nation. i am blessed to have a wonderful partner. he is a great leader of the state. he is going to be a great partner for me in leading the association. i would like to introduce to you, governor david hyneman. >> i want to start by thanking governor richard for hosting us. we cannot be more pleased. we know that they are a tremendous couple. we appreciate their service to the state of colorado. i want to the knowledge that publicly. secondly, i am looking forward to my partnership with the chairwoman. we worked together across partisan lines. we all understand what the job is as governor and, in our respective states, we work with

legislators, both republicans, democrats, and independents. i just want to share with you, governor nixon of misery is a democrat. just two weeks ago, missouri came to nebraska to play football. i invited govern nixon [laughter] he wants to forget about the first quarter. i invited governor nixon to come to nebraska and he came. the citizens of our state were very impressed that he did the zero governors could be walking around the governor's residence in lincoln nebraska, chatting with the residents of nebraska. every time we host a tailgate we have friends from other states. that is how we develop these

personal relatnships that are so important. we are trying to share that now with the governors-elect. they should be thinking about budgeting, scheduling, how they will work with their staff, how you can utilize the nga, which is a great resource. they can answer all sorts of questions for you. they give you the research and knowledge you need on any individual issue. what i want to emphasize is that governors or leaders. we balance our budgets every year. we resolve our challenges. we take them head on. we make tough decisions. if you talk to any governor in the country right now, we are focused on jobs, the economy, and education. i cannot agree more with what the chairman said about education. it is one of the most important issues facing our states and our country. i think it is very critical.

i think the states can be a model for the federal government. i would hope they can learn from us that working together does pay off. it is important. that is what the american people what. they want us to work together. yes, we had a competitive races for the governorship, for the presidency of the united states, or the congress. but at the end of the day we are all americans and we should be working together. thank you. [laughter] [applause] >> are there any questions? >> you have alluded to this somewhat, but if you look at popularity ratings for governors they are close to all- time lows a nationwide. what does that like, sort of being -- >> on popular? [laughter]

we have a relationship where i can finish his questions. governors have to make very difficult decisions. we do balance our budgets. we lived to the worst recession since the great depression. there is a lot about the economy that tends to lag. because of tha there are unenviable choices. that can tend to alienate interest groups that is part of serving now in a time of difficulty. one of the things we are doing is talking about that. what the seminars today is about budgeting. part of that will be if you are in a state where you must balance the budget, you'll have to make some difficult decisions. how'd he do that? how do you ensure there are shared sacrifices? part of that is going to be that when you alienate people, they

are going to say, "governor, this inot something i amatin favor of." it will come a time when this economy will pickup and it will be better. the governor of wyoming used to say that his popularity went up and down with the amount of rainfall in wyoming. things are did did people in public life of benefit from that. when they are difficult, we experience downfalls in popularity. i think everybody in this life understands that. it is time to govern. you have to govern without regard to the polling or favorability. you just have to do the things that are necessary to move your state along. >> perhaps we could hear from some of the new governors about the shifting policy or the

shifting policies. there has been a major political shift here. >> one of the objectives of the n.g.a. is to take the politics out of our policy discussions. we found we could do that. we were able to find a way to do that when there were more democrats than republicans did it has shifted the other way. there are a lot of things about the political landscape nationally. i do not think it is in the last incumbent on those serving as governor in these times. our association is about bipartisanship. >> i would just make one comment, i do not believe it is

about politics this year. i think it is people ahead of politics. those of us who are campaigning on getting the people of our state ahead of politics is why you are seeing a shift. it is not just governors. it is legislators, senators, congressmen, and even the white house is having a rough few months. it is all about getting the american people ahead of the politics. >> i think the more important number is the 29 new governors, not just republican or democrat governors. this is what does to get things done. they did not elect us to be popular, they elected us to get things done. if we did that, they will be happy. it boils down to jobs, the economy, at our budgets.

we appreciate being here to help prepare for creating jobs in balancing our budgets. >> i would like to hear a couple of different governors respond to this. from the governor's perspective, what are the things that you learned in which she would have that, ahead of time looking back, i wish somebody would have told me this. for the governors-elect, what are you finding more difficult from transitioning to -- more difficult transitioning from campaigning to governing? >> it is important in this transition period -- everything that is coming to your

legislator. -- to your legislature. what you do not what is a surprise in the first 100 days that can derail you. that is one of the things i learned the hard way. other governors? >> one day we talked about yesterday was in the last six years i have had more emergency declarations banned in any time in history from natural disasters. drum while ours, -- from wildfires, up to droughts, to floods. i do not think i was ready for all of that. what it entails any partnership that is called for on the local level and the federal level, the one thing i share with my new colleagues is there are a lot of things that are going to happen you cannot be prepared for. this is one you cannot predict,

but you can be prepared for by making sure you appoint the right people. yet to make sure emergency management is ready to go. you have to make sure the structure is in place. situational awareness is key at that point. that is the lesson that i learned the hard way, if you will. i pass that on to my new colleagues. quite the thing i would share with you, we did not have an authority to go to governor- elect orientation because she was going to a recount. the way i became governor in nebraska, my predecessor was asked to be the secretary of agriculture. on january 20, he got confirmed. on january 21, i took over. he included me on everything. what i would like to share with the governors, know >> we will leave this event to

go live. on december 8, the u.s. supreme court will hear arguments in the case of the 2007 arizona law that penalizes employers for illegally employing illegal immigrants. this is a different arizona law than the controversial 2010 statute that requires local law enforcement to check the immigration status of suspected illegal immigrants. now a panel discussion on the 2007 hours on a measure from the american constitution society which is alive. >> as such, the case is a privilege of a possible review of the court of another controversial hours on emigration law, the recently enacted fb 1070 which criminalizes the failure of non- citizens to carry documentation and is currently before the ninth circuit court of appeals for it is inappropriate to

mentioned that acs issued a brief on the constitutionality of this a lot by three law professors at the university of arizona. to start us off today, it is my pleasure to introduce the moderator of our program. neil teaches constitutional law and procedure at georgia state university college of law where it also directed the center on state legislation and policy. served as counselor to senate democrats during the impeachment trial of president clinton. his practice focused on issues of presidential power. we are pleased if he cochairs the acs group on federalism. that makes him a good moderator for the discussion. please welcome the end -- please join me in welcoming neil. [applause] >> what makes men aft moderator for the panel today is that i

love pre-emption. i love teaching -- it make me a lot of other things -- [laughter] when i teach constitutional law, i love to teach pre-emption. in some measure because it is a really hot issue in constitutional law. in some measure and this is why when i teach it, i teach it last, it scrambles up all of the settled rooting interest in constitutional law. by the end of the class, the liberal-conservative to buy this for the well settled in the classroom on issues of division of power between the federal and state governments. with the hot issues that have been coming up recently and have been a real stable of the court's docket over the last few years, those rooting interest it will upset. what is very often been happening is that states have more aggressive rules with respect to consumer protection,

business interests, and business interests seek to have federal law pre-empts state law and conservatives in those instances attend to like the federal law and liberals tend to like the state laws. everybody is all confused and that is a great way to leave a constitutional law class, i have found. to further scrambled a batter and scramble the rooting interest, we have chamber of commerce verses whiting which will be argued in a few weeks. this involves federal law which is expressly exclusive. being expressly exclusive, that would settle the matter. federal law, if valid, pre-empts state law. the problem is that the federal law includes a savings clause that allows states to maintain licensing in similar loss for the arizona has said that

articles of incorporation are eight license and so if you violate federal law and arizona, a day -- there licenng law is that you lose artics of incorporation. that is ultimately the business death penalty. the governor mentioned this when he signed a below. the question is whether the federal law pre-empts that pretty state law also includes a requirement that businesses use this federal e-verify data base to verify workers' status. federal law makes the e-verify lot voluntary. the resolution of those issues can have important for applications in two areas. one is in the area of federal pre-emption of business law. it is the area that has been hot and for the next few years that list will remain hot on the supreme court docket. the other is states immigration

laws. over the last five or six years, the states have enacted thousands of laws relating to immigration. the overall tenor of those laws has been to make immigration law stricter, tighter, more draconian on immigrants and people whose citizenship status might be in question or to impose more exacting enforcement regimes. whether or not those laws are pre-empted and preeminently with my the of the arizona law as the 1070 that was issued today. this case may have important ramifications in that area as well we have assembled a terrific panel to discuss these and more questions. i am not going to go through all of their qualifications because if i did, it would make my list quite pale i will leave that out there.

we will begin with professor anil kahan from drexel university who will address these pre-emption issues and we will then turn to jennifer chang newell from the aclu followed by sri vinishasu. he will talk about the business interests that are at issue in these cases. finally, we have david rickers from the cato institute who will talk about the state interest. >> i would like to thank the acs for inviting me to participate in this forum. let me give an overview of the federal backdrop against which this issue is arising. the federal law has extensively regulated immigration for a very long time going back to the 18

80's and increase in over the course of the 20th century, developing a comprehensive fame regulating compensation. until adoption of the immigration reform and control act or irca, there was no prohibition on hiring a federal -- of illegal immigrants. irca came after a decade of public and congressional debates over the issue of illegal immigration. it marked a major policy shift by extending federal immigration regulation into the interior of the country and specifically into the private workplace. one reason the debate took so long is that in setting up this employer sanctions regime which we will talk about a minute, congress sought to balance a number of different and competing policy objectives. congress obviously sought to

prevent employers from hiring unauthorized emigrants but on the other hand, congress sought to minimize the potential burdens and disruptions for employers who are now being enlisted at least by the federal government for the first time essentially as immigration enforcement agents. congress also sought to address another set of concerns that an overly severe or employer sanctions regime might lead to discrimination by employers against employees who appeared for and in some sense if that were easier for employers to do. instead of going through verifying employment in a more careful way. irca requires employers to inspect certain documents and complete an i-9 form for employees.

many of you are probably personally familiar with this. e employer may not collect and inspect additional or different documents than those that are specified by law. as long as the documents reasonably appear to be genuine, the employer must accept them as proof of identity and eligibility to work and have discharge their responsibility under the law. it is a ratively limited burden placed upon employers in terms of examining documents buried if an employer complies and is faced with that process, they cannot be sanctioned. to deal with discrimination concerns, irca prohibits discrimination on the basis of nationality and citizenship and to make sure the balance is being implemented properly establishes ongoing monitoring and reporting to oversee the effectiveness of the system in advancing these various objectives.

in recent years, congress has also set up an experimental pilot program called e-verify which set with six double -- supplements the i-9 form but it has not replaced the i-9 process. there are concerns about the reliability of e-verify. the error rates for foreign-born employees which is the population and ends up being a concern in this kind of scene is 20 times higher than that for u.s.-born employees. some have proposed making e- verify mandatory, the predecessor was in 1996, congress has continued to authorize e-verify as a temporary voluntary pilot program. congress has presented the

federal government from requiring employers to use it. in view of these different policy objectives, irca subjects by letters of the employer sanctions regime to a carefully calibrated series of criminal and civil sanctions ranging from civil monetary penalties and injunctions to criminal fines and up to six months in prison and in some cases these sanctions are federally administeredirca expressly preempt any state or local law imposing criminal or civil sanctions against those who would employ a illegal aliens. in the years leading up to this, roughly a dozen or so states had adopted their old employer nctions laws which the supreme court said could be held permissible given the lack of any clear federal policy concerning employment of

authorized immigrants. in response to that decision, in 1976, congress wanted the federal uniformity. once this story exception is for licensing or similar laws which are exempted from pre-emption by a savings clause. the scope of these preemptions and savings clauses in irca is a central issue in a whiting case. what does this encompass? the arizona law purports to be a federal licensing -- a licensing law but the label -- but what hours and -- but what arizona calls it is something different.

those provisions would nevertheless be displaced whatever they are chosen to be called. even if they're not printed, they might be implied because they conflict with federal employees sanctions regime. what does it require? there are two sets of provisions. the law creates an independent state law offense of knowingly or intentionally employing an unauthorized alien. this purports to khmer both a substantive definition of illegal alien which is not the same as an individual who is all lawfully present and the elements of the existing prohibition against on authorized aliens. the various ways in which the arizona law operates independently of federal law and diverges from the balance is what raised the pre-emption issues.

i will talk about a couple of them. procedurally, the law creates through state and local institutions without requiring a federal determination of whether an employer has knowingly employed an authorized alien. in terms of the penalties, law authorizes suspension and revocation of business licenses to fit within the savings clause but what constitutes a license under hours on a lot? there is a broad definition which is different from other parts of arizona uses the term. this includes articles of incorporation. bill law defines those as licenses. it arguably operat as a regulatory system rather than a licensing law. the lower courts have upheld

this law against the pre-emption challenge. a couple visit to think about is how do we characterize the arizona law? is it in immigration law? does it regulate the workplace? is it a licensing law? they may overlap in the differences might be subtle but in terms of how the pre-emption arguments turn out in court, those characterization's might end up being irrelevant. i will leave the other thoughts for the moment we can hear from the rest of the panel. >> thank-you. >> i want to thank all acs for inviting is here to talk about these important issues. i was asked to address the immigrants' rights perspective on this issue and why the ninth circuit got wrong when they upheld available as of the arizona law. as you have heard, there are essentially two ads that are relevant here -- the first half

of the arizona law establishes a state employer sanctions regime and the second half of the law mandates that all employers in the state of arizona and roll in the electronic employment verification program notes -- now known as e-verify. let me talk about that first. that is less complicated. the essential question is whether a state can mandate e- verify when federal law makes participation in that program voluntary. we argued that that conflicts -- the mandate seems self-evident and conflicts with federal law. the ninth circuit did not think so. we think the ninth circuit was wrong for many reasons including

the fact that the statute, the relevant statutory provision says multiple times that employers have to have a choice and whether they want to enroll and apply as a voluntary program. this is repeated throughout the relevant provisions. in taking away that choice, ariz. is negating what congress is trying to do. in addition, it is relevant to think about the secretary of department of all my insecurity who is expressly prohibited for mandating participation. there have been several proposals in congress to mandate e-verify and none of the proposals have yet passed. congress has repeatedly declined to make it mandatory.

if you think about it, it is obvious. every state or locality did what arizona was trying to do, congress' intent of making this program voluntary would be entirely negated. that is basically what our argument is. there are numerous problems with the e-verify system. non-citizens who are authorized to work in the united states are many, many more times likely to get erroneous results from this system saying that they are not actually authorized. one of the main concerns is discrimination against non- citizens. it has already been documented even under the federal employee sanctions regime that employers have 10 to have the opportunity

to discriminate against non- citizens in the employment process. there have been studies that have well-documented this issue. moving to the other half of the case which is about whether the employer sanctions regime that arizona has established is either expressly or m + said late compliance. that would be quite simple if there were not the seven were parenthetical. this would prevent states from imposing more civil precautions. the parentheses says that except for licensing or similar laws. that has been the cause of a lot of consternation and that is the big question varian.

what did congress really mean? what we think congress was thinking about at the time is the following, at that time the irca was enacted, it was enacted in 1986 and there were numerous states that have farm labor contract in laws and there were licensing laws for the licensed farm labor contractors. they regulated the fitness of a farm labour contractor to do business. they imposed various requirements that farm labor had to meet. these laws included other kinds of agricultural workers including forestry workers. there were several state laws at the time that expressly required that farm labor contractors refrain from hiring

undocumented workers. if they did do so, their licenses could be sanctioned. that was the state of law at the time when irca it was enacted. as the audience probably knows, at the time and today, farm labour is a context in which on document of employment is of special concern what we think congress was thinking of when they said licensing or similar laws, they were thinking of these farm labour contractor licensing laws but were not always called that. sometimes they're called registration laws and sometimes they involve forestry. that is what we think they were talking about. getting back to what the statute says, it says licensing or similar laws. we are still thinking about what does that mean for us?

the arizona law basically defines licensing in an extremely broad way. it does not amend it pre- existing licensing scheme or establish a licensing scheme. it basically says all of these things that traditionally are not licenses we will call licenses. the major existence as a business and the state of arizona, we are calling that a permission and a license. we can sanction you if you do certain things under this law and we can end of the existence of your business if we find you employed on authorized workers a certain number of times. our argument is that you cannot just take things that are not licenses and deem them to be

licenses and caught a licensing scheme. that is clearly not what congress intended. at minimum, it has to be a bonafide licensing scheme. that is a scheme that regulates the fitness of a business to do a particular thing. i say i am running out of time here. i guess i will say a couple of things quickly. stepping back all little bit, the bottom line is that if arizona created a licensing scheme, does it fit within a parenthetical? that's walls all role as any state can take it and call it a license and then they can say daikon sanction that.

to illustrate that quickly, the state of south carolina actually passed l lot in which -- a law in which they decided they would impute licenses. they decided they would improve licenses to every employer in this state. even though employers and south carolina don't actually have an implied license, they decided that we will include a license to you and based on that, we will send to you if you employ all unauthorized workers. that fits within the exception, there's basically no limit to this principle. i was asked to talk about the implications of this case and i think i have run out of time. maybe i will leave that -- >> j,enny.

>> fact acs for putting on this panel. it is a privilege to be here. banks to whoever made these brownies. they are really taste [laughter] i am a partner and we filed a brief on behalf of a consortium of business organizations. the chamber of commerce was a named party in this case. we know the business interests have a strong stake and what happens in this case. one thing that is interesting about this case is that it is one of the rare cases in which you get a call option -- a collision on one side coupled with organizations that jennifer represents.

i argued and immigration case last term and it was on behalf of an individual who had been deported and want to get back into the country. the chamber of commerce was nowhere to be found understandably because they did not have an interest. we have been involved where immigration groups have not been involved because they don't have an interest. it is rare that you see this kind of coalition of forces come together and maybe the justices who find themselves sympathetic to different perspectives along the spectrum and they might come together in this case whether or not -- instance wouldn't ordinarily bring them together. why did businesses care about this issue? let me give you a few statistics from our brief. this is based on a report that

was put together by the national conference of state legislators. businesses like uniformity and regulation because this uniformity and complication leads to burdens of compliance. a central concern and what caused many of these businesses to come together on this brief was the problem of a patchwork of conflicting regulatory burdens that are m -- are imposed on businesses. the other states can have an incentive to do the same thing. what you have seen is a real explosion in state and local efforts to wait in in the immigration arena. the employment are reyna is at stake but in the immigration arena more generally. it is the sort of a patchwork that results from that that gives the impetus for groups to file and come together and to put some meat on that bond.

immigration laws generally, in 2005 there were over 100 cases introduced and activity doubled to over 500 and then it tripled. in 2008, another 1300 bills and in 2009, more than 1500. these are bills that were introduced, not bills that were enacted. you see the kind of activity we're talking about in this arena. many were enacted. 38, 84, 206, and a 222 in the same years. you are seeing a great deal of legislative activity here. it extends to the employment fear which is particularly at stake here. 244 in the employment-related bills in 2007.

in 2008, 19 more. in 2009, 12 states enacted 21 employment-related laws and six other laws or vetoed. these are the concerns that give rise to this brief. these issues have been raised so far. with respect to the first half of the case which deals with the e-verify that the sanctions imposed on employers who hire unauthorized workers. the concern is really then the uniformity that is evidenced by the federal scheme is compromised his states and localities can come together and oppose requirements. that is self-evident and does not require great collaboration. that is one set of important considerations at stake. another set of considerations deals with e-verify which has

thus far been a voluntary system. if you propose a mandate on businesses to use the system, it has its own set of birds because there are ongoing monitoring costs associated with that system. it is on like the paper burden process mandated by federal law under the by-nine process. the burden is minimal and there are standards that come into play that make it much more easier for owners and it puts the onus on the government to enforce it. this puts a greater strain on businesses to come up with computer systems that are necessary to monitor compliance. especially i would say those burdens are pronounced with respect to nationwide businesses. we have information in our brief about the burdens that would be imposed on a nationwide business like wal-mart given the

number of employment applications they see every year and the number of workers that determine if they are authorized or not. one thing i think we can talk about, if time is permitting, is how this case fits into what neil identified earlier which is the broader scheme of business pre-emptive cases. two terms ago, we saw three very important decisions. last term there were none in the pre-emption arena. this time we will see another three or four, depending on how you count them. it will be interesting to see how this will set a lead to that. >> thank you, sri. >> they give for having me and i would like to think those of the speaking here today. i am here to present a minority report of sorts. it is a very half-hearted one. in this particular case, i think that the state is within

its powers. i think the policy of concerns pushing this in the other direction. i summarize my views as follows. the mandatory e-verify is not pre-empted either by field or other pre-emptive the doctor earns by the federal immigration provisions. the arizona law does get policy wrong, however. it is not about arizona immigration policy but our national policy that is in dire need of an update. i will sort of talk about some of the unexpected consequences and what i think are some of the things we do not talk about that we should. first, this clause saves the arizona statute. as previously mentioned, it allows licensing for similar statutes which is a very broad

category. this is in. traditionally occupied by the state. i think that language from the lock decision in 2000 basically gives the tied to the states. we have the assumption that the historic police cars of the states will never superseded by the act unless the was a clear and manifest purpose of congress. we have a mixed record in this is a big part of the statute and it is mixed on what exactly congress intended. i think the tie will go to arizona. use of the federal system as opposed to raise state and local immigration minister would clearly be pre-empted and it helps arizonas case as well as their explicit in corp. of the good-faith compliance provision from the federal law. i think the broad reading of the licensing statute is as opposed to a narrow one our dealings the

brief is an essential reading for what has established as congress's intent. that is a fault of the historical record than anything else. i did the resumption toward the state in this case carries over to whether they are pre-empted in making this mandatory or not. they could have been states for making this mandatory but they did not do so. that is all the time i wanted to spend in defending arizonas case. i think the law in arizona gives us the wrong policy outcome. i think that is true not just with arizonas case but the national level. we need an update. a larger temporary worker visa program is really where we need to be moving the public debate toward. a lot of this is found on false assumptions. first, we're not economically weakened by having workers in the country.

one of my colleagues has written a book, "mad about trade," and makes the case that the u.s. economy is strengthened, not weekend by for exchange and not just of goods but of labor. you probably have some business statistics that will make that case more effectively. the social rules of driving the conservative fuehrer is based on myths, particularly about the claim that immigrants equal violent crime. while there have been some incidents, a rancher killed by an illegal immigrants in march, it served as a rallying cry for the passing of state bill 1070. statistics do not show that this is a dangerous bunch of people who want to do anything besides come and get a job. the people of arizona are less likely to be convicted of crimes, violent and non- violent, then have in the past

four decades. a vote -- according to doj figures, the conviction rate had been the lowest since 1971. program was the lowest since 1966. immigrants have been made more law-abiding citizens regarding those types of crimes. i would say, yes, the next does have a crime rate to mr. with an urban center, but it is not out of proportion from similarly sized cities across the country. and the detroit, a city not known for being a magnet of illegal immigrants, the have a crime rate three times that of a phoenix. other social factors are would drive crime and not immigration. third, i would like to touch on some of the unexpected consequences of our current immigration policies and litigation over the constitutionality. the best thing that can come out of this litigation is that enough people are unhappy with

the results of litigation that we actually have a real comprehensive move towards immigration reform that the federal level. i think that includes as the 1070. -- state bill 1070. arizona is understandably frustrated and they have passed laws that in some respects went too far. the should be an impetus for us to make this a legislative priority is set of the electoral weapon. i did not take seriously the claim that we just need to secure the borders. that is like saying we would consider it a rising our drug laws after we won the drug war. that is crazy. the drug war clearly has many negative consequences for what people effected by it and the rule of law that it is time to rethink our drove policy. on this from the obama administration has been a disappointment. everything i just said about drug laws, copy this and say that again about immigration. our drug laws may also help

emigration to the extent that it will cut the legs out from under the cartel legs of mexico. the national security. , and they bring this up because this is what i were gone, but here talking about vectors for foreign terrorism, infiltration, and the incentive we have greeted for the market to facilitate this, the route to a network is maintained by both the drug and immigration policies are in and of themselves a significant threat in a terrorism aspect. my task is made easier by the market's, either over land, or by many-celled marine. the economic incentives are now so strongly encouraging that the mini-submarines are considered disposable. you can just drive them, deliver cargo, and leave them. this is what happens when markets are driven underground

by making a class of contraband and in the context of immigration, human contraband. the u.s. policy of ignoring the basic economics at work at our borders has made us less save, not more. with that, i will close and answer questions. >> thank you, david. do any of you want to respond to comments of the others? anything anyone said give you heartburn? the good. i have a question before turning it over to the audience. my question is, the heavy jenna very nice job of doing when you were supposed to do. as moderator, i am very pleased. you represented a, sort of coming your own perspective on the case and the merits of the case. i'm curious why the supreme court has taken it. it is not an obvious circuits blood. the ninth circuit opinion did not strike the statue down.

it upheld the statute. the panel of the ninth circuit has democratic appointees and it is not the kind of ninth circuit panel we expect the supreme court to be watching very closely. the supreme court to the case and it may be that it thinks the ninth circuit is obviously wrong. having read it, it is not obviously wrong and there are arguments to be made. is there a trap door somewhere? if so, what is it. what is the court's thinking? why the support they've granted this case? anybody? sri? >> one thing to keep in mind in terms of procedure is that this case was granted after solicitor general. the one tried and true strategy for getting a court interested in a case is to try and pitch the case in such a way that they will ask the government. these statistics are quite clear that in cases in which the

government asked -- the court asks the government to take the case, the court ordinarily takes the case. this was one where i think the battle was largely one by persuading the cords to ask the government for their views. when the government weighed in and they said to take the case, at that point the court is hard pressed to deny it. i thought one thing that was interesting about what the government did in terms of recommendation was that the government recommendation arose around the same time, and i can remember the exact sequence of events, but around the same time that the litigation on the other arizona immigration laws came in. there were three questions presented in this case, and i think it is important for the pre-emption to keep distends express pre-emption and implied pre-emption. this law pre-empts and that it

defines its own subject matter as they sat gramm. we do not care what these pre- emption clause say, but as an inherent manor, allowing the underlying state regulation to derive conflicts with the scheme and therefore it is granted even though it tells us it has to be so. what is interesting about these two cases before the court now and the broader immigration cases before the ninth circuit is that in this when there is an express pre-emption claim and an implied pre-emption claim. the government, run the same time they filed suit against 1070, which is clearly an implied pre-emption claim, the recommended the supreme court take the case but only on pre- emption. it recommended the court not take the case and i do not know why that happened. nobody does. it is interesting that the same time that litigating implied pre-emption on 1070, they recommended the court not take this case but the court wellhead

and did it and took the case of these issues including preemption. one thing that will be interesting to see in terms of gauging the implications of what this case will be for the other implication debates going on is whether the court even touches the implied pre-emption issue. the more touches it, the more they spend on consequences and debate over 1070. it depends on the way the government initially recommends the court takes the case which is expressed preemption, and will take lesser implications for other litigation. that is not to say that it will not have many, but i think the overlap will be less significant than it otherwise maybe. >> one thing to add to that, i may be recalling correctly, but i think the solicitor general, in terms of implied pre-emption, either implied pre-emption issues on the two different halves of the statue, and i recall that at least part of what they were opposing was the e-verify issue.

on the court, unless they decide that it was improperly granted on that issue, there is no express pre-emption issue of e- verify so the court will at least have to address implied pre-emption with respect to that part of the arizona law. i do not like to speculate, but i think the federal government may have had a slightly different competing considerations with respect to e-verify and that could have driven by they recommended against that particular issue. >> thank you. questions from the audience? yes? >> thank you very much. i have a few questions. one for ms. newell and one for mr. rittgers. for ms. newell, on the e-verify and arizona making it mandatory.

this may be wrong, but there is not a clear enforcement mechanism for e-verify. it is not the business that is penalized, but even if there is a clear enforcement issue, a lot of employers are not use e- verify and they're not being prosecuted. in this sense, does that make e- verify mandatory in name only? the logic is to tell employers that it is mandatory. if so, does that concern you about licensing and other mechanisms? it may mean mandatory in name only and not remain mandatory. mr. rivers, i appreciate your comments about perceptions about illegal immigrants and the criminal heinz. i think there are similar speculation on both sides about health-care costs, higher education costs and i'm curious to read your theories as to why there's so much speculation on what seemed like an empirical

question that could be easily resolved and why there are seven camps that say the causes cited money, violent crimes, when all these answers could be gathered the justice statistics. >> on the question on e-verify, i think there have been a lack of clarity. i am not aware that there has been any actual prosecution and then the employer at this point. my understanding is that there has been at some enforcement activity in the form of investigations and i do not know if "raid" is the proper term, but there have been some employers to have had their promises investigated. let's use the term investigated. even that kind of enforcement

activity presumably can create an incentive for employers to comply, but there is no dispute that on the face of the law that every employer in the state of arizona is required to enroll in e-verify in. >> with regard to statistics and where the bad numbers come from in the public debate, i guess the motivation is political gain. there are people who get into office running on campaigns that sort of have this as their bread and butter. with regard to the costs, i know this gets tossed around, how much illegal immigrants cost, or do not cost aside. i think a lot of that is driven not in meriden but in facts and our tax policies are structured within the states. you have the underground labor market, it is property-tax- prevent state tax bases deal with this better than

progressive income taxes. it gets passed on via the landlord whereas income taxes do not deal with that very well. taxes -- taxes does a better than california. >> yes. right here. >> i i am from the press association news service. first of all, can you talk a little bit more of the wide- ranging coalition that is siding with the chamber of commerce against the arizona law. it has brought from the chamber of commerce on one hand to the aclu on the other hand to service employees to illegal immigrant rights project and you name it. how did they all come together? what points do they agree on? this was running to my mind as

you were giving your presentations, but does the 1986 act expressly have a prohibition against states in going beyond their boundaries? there are other labor laws, and we can call this a labor law cents employers are barred from hiring undocumented workers. that allows states to use the federal l, things like the earlier standards act. does this say that this is a floor and theoretically states could go beyond it or not? on the question on how all these different groups came together, we have a knowledge there are some pretty strange bedfellows here. my recollection is what initially had thinned was the immigrants' rights groups, civil rights groups, including the aclu, national immigration law center, but the groups that

originally sued like the civil- rights, immigrants' rights, and labor groups, they originally sued it together in one lawsuit, and i hope our remember this correctly, but the chamber of commerce, i believe, sued in a separate lawsuit and they were consolidated. when you really have before the court now are two or possibly more consolidated lawsuits and the chamber of commerce and carter philips is now the council of record for all. they are arguing the case and we wrote our brief together and submitted a single brief for each briefing.

that is sort of how this all happened. i do not know if that answers your question >> two about the points of conference? -- can you talk about the points of that conference? >> i think everyone is in agreement that this law is bad and that it is pre-emptive. there is a huge problem with having a patchwork of the 50,000-100,000 different laws across the city, states, and that is a problem that immigrants rights groups and business groups are equally concerned about. one area of tension from the human rights perspective is a we talk about immigrants, authorized workers who are non- citizens facing discrimination. the people causing that discrimination in this context businesses and employers. that is always a little bit

tricky to talk about because the business perspective is that we do not discriminate and the immigrants' rights perspective is that our constituency does face discrimination. that is one area. >> this context is going back to the 1986 law. even at that time, the business community and employers' groups were concerned about the burdens that employer sanctions would have. immigrants rights groups were concerned about potential discriminations in particular. at that point, organized labor in some community groups were on the other side of the employer sanctions debate and they were concerned about the fact that unauthorized the immigrant workers would have on wages for u.s.-based workers. those groups have now, in fact, shifted. one interesting thing to see coming out of this case in

congress is that the constituencies in favor of employer sanctions are much more limited than they were in the 1980's. yet, at the same time in the comprehensive immigration reform debate, there really is not any significant proposal to repeal employer sanctions even though there are questions about how well they work. on questions of pre-emption clause is, the questions of the statute say that the federal law preempts any state or local law imposing civil or criminal sanctions on those who employ or workroom unauthorized aliens except for the parenthetical text of which jennifer has already given which says licensing or similar laws. there is not a whole lot of room, and the argument here and that arizona is making is that this is essentially mirroring federal law.

a requirement of a federal definition is a mirror provision. how strong this pre-emption clause is, whether it leaves room for tougher -- tougher penalties is one of the questions here. there's also a question of how much room does the savings clause leave. >> quickly, i want to mention another of dean key council of representing on the immigrants rights and civil rights are mauled of -- malda. >> there and possessing the fact that the government comes in on one side and that usually matters a great deal, especially when talking about and crime -- and quite friends of principals. the question is what sort of impact as the challenges can have on federal law enforcement? when the government comes in and says one thing that cares a lot of weight, you have all the groups of the questions referred to plus the united states on one

side, which seems significant. >> just a couple of things to added to that, because the federal government was involved, obviously just as kagan has recused herself from this case. and the other really quick thing that i was going to mention is now leaving my mind. i will not mention the other thing. >> right here? >> i am just wondering how you think met things may turn out is states go in the other direction now. they are going in the anti emigrant direction now, but one of thetage for a pass a law saying that employers may not use of e-verify or what if they were to pass a law saying we would offer free food to people who came here illegally knowing that they came here illegally. what would happen then? >> when the nation's say in the

response is that a state has passed a law saying that -- one thing i should say is that the cannot participate e-verify until the error rate falls below a certain level. that was in illinois. what happened in that situation is the law is no longer in effect because it has been invalidated under the exact same pre-emption argument. their clothes laid similar pre- emption arguments that have been issued in this case. the bush administration actually sued the state of illinois in that case. i think in general there are pro-immigration laws that really depends on what the context is. i think your question really highlights the preemption, at least from civil-rights is really a normative lee neutral. legal doctrine, whether it helps or hurts really depends on whether federal law is good on the issues were concerned about

whether state law is good or better on the issues you're concerned about. there is a very, very fine line that we want here at the aclu between pro-immigrant policies that we do not think our agreement said and anti- immigrant policies that we are in the court every day saying they are pre-empted. if you examples of that, for example, municipal aideed. there has been a couple of various cities in the country who have enacted municipal identification was that are available to residents of the city regardless of immigration status and groups like immigration reform law ends june who has sued over laws like that. the aclu has helped to defend those laws in court. >> in the back?

>> hello. i was just wondering what do you think that congress had in mind when they drafted because of licensing? is this firm legislative history, case law, what types of situations would fall under that category? >> i think they mentioned earlier that what we think congress really had in mind was a quite narrow situation involving farm labor contractors. the legislative history there, there is not a lot of legislative history on this issue, unfortunately, but the little that there is, does support our view. the express pre-emption provision, this was a debated

for over a decade. there were a number of hearings. the express pre-emption provision was in their for quite some time before the parenthetical ever appeared. the appearance that turned that ago, i want to say it was in 1985 or something like that. it was really late in the game. there is really not a lot of information out there about why that parenthetical was there. there is just a little tiny bit in the reports. would there is it does support our position. i do not know of others went to comment on that. >> it is like a three ascensions child of the parenthetical jennifer is talking about. it is unclear the way the sentence is structured whether the forestry and foreign laws

are supposed to be the proper scope of what that applies to or whether they are just the examples of whether they're supposed to do business more broadly within the state. it is hard to discern exactly what they were trying to get that. >> right. at most, we think you have to be talking about a genuine bonafide licensing scheme. that means a law that regulates the fitness of a business to conduct a certain kind of activity. >> several of you have touched on this and i would like to go back on this and hear what you think this will have on the ordaz and 70 litigation and would correlation there is between the two of them -- will have on the 1070 litigation.

>> one thing i should mention before directly answer a question is that there is another case to keep your eyes on and it is called lozano verses hazleton in the third circuit it involves an employment provision that is very similar to the one at issue in this case. it also involves a housing provision that prohibits landlords from renting to undocumented immigrants, essentially. the third circuit invalidated both halves of that law, housing and employment, so they reached the direct opposite conclusion that the ninth circuit reached. i believe the deadline on that case is that it may be the day of arguments in this case. it will be really interesting to see what happens when people expect that the defendants in hazleton will file a petition and then what happens after that, no one knows. the employment issue will really be controlled by what happens in

this case. there are numerous other laws in the country at the state and local level but mostly the local levels that are similar to the housing peace. that is another type of what i would, in an anti-american law that is out there. then there is state bill 1070 which is another kind of these laws, but it deals more with the question of whether and to what extent state and local law- enforcement authorities can directly enforce immigration laws independently of or specific programs for cooperation with the federal government. that is the big picture question in state the 1070. i think the lawyer answer is the legal questions in this case are very different than the legal questions in the state build 1070 -- state bill 1070.

they could stage of the about doctrine that would impact 1070. it is currently pending in the ninth circuit. they just had opening arguments a little bit ago in the case pending is actually a suit followed -- filed by the united states. the court could says of the about the doctrine which could impact 1070. the court could say something that could serve as a great deterrent for states or an incentive for states to enact these kinds of laws in general. that would be the closest thing that would really impact 1070 other than anything that has to do it pre-emption doctrine. is entirely possible that the court may been [inaudible]

that would not am tired 1070 that much. the question of 1070 is not about the immigration reform and control act. and as -- a welcome it generally has nothing to do with employment of authorized workers. the questions there are what can the arizona state and local police do when they interact with immigrants. can they enforce immigration laws. there is a distinction about express pre-emption and implied pre-emption. if this is an express pre- emption decision based on this clause, then its reach will be somewhat limited because it will focus on the employment-based laws. if the courts resolve this case on the grounds of implied pre- emption, then it could have other implications for these other areas in a more significant way. >> that will determine which way they rule. the parties have focused first and foremost about with the expressed branch because means

and what licensing means. if they strike and the slot down under express pre-emption, there's no reason to go on to implied pre-emption. then we have to address, presumably, the implied pre- emption, in that case from your still talking about consequences. >> other questions? oh, i am sorry. one more. >> and greg gtohr, bloomberg news. i know the implied pre-emption law is different. are you suggesting that if the court gets to implied pre- emption on employer sanctions that it is where it is really big, but implied pre-emption on e-verify, that is likely to have

the less impact on 1070 and otherwise? >> it bears real emphasis that there are two implied pre- emption issues in the case. there is the employer sanctions issue which only becomes a distinct about implied pre- emption jaundice. the point, i think, that we are making is that the implied pre- emption argument is the one that could have salience for the 1070 debate. 1070 is not an implied pre- emption challenge. the nature of the issue is such that it is about the particularities of e-verify it is likely that will have consequences for 1070 than an implied resolution on employer sanctions. >> even there does depend a little bit. the nature of the year verify claim is essentially that congress set up a voluntary

program in the state makes it mandatory. that could happen, and but if it comes out the way the ninth circuit did, it will depend, i think, about how the court regards the policy objectives underlying federal law. at the court wants to say that the congress's objectives are to expand enforcement's in a dramatic way, then that could have says builder consequence. not in the same extent of the claim. >> ok, great. please join me in thanking our panel [applause] . >> class is dismissed. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010]

>> congress is out for the thanksgiving break. when they return, they will focus on the ethics issue for representative charles rangel. the tollhouse needs to approve the recommendation of censure. the return work on the food safety bill. both are scheduled to return on monday, november 20th have. you can see the house live on c- span and the senate on c-span2. lots of new faces in the 112th congress. he was exceed 9 term incumbent my castle. another new face is colorado's

got -- scott tipton. for more information on all of the new members, visit our web site, c-span.org. several of the nation's incoming republican governors gathered for their annual conference in san diego to talk about their approach to governing in the fiscal challenges they will face once sworn in. you will hear from governor alexi of ohio and tom corbett of pennsylvania. this one-hour form starts with ryan's and evolve, governor- elect of nevada. ryan sandoval. >> i give up my lifetime appointment to run for governor for the state of nevada. that was the number one question i got asked on the campaign trail. the first person to ask that question was my father. >> i heard you made your

decision. i guess you know when you are doing. i called him back and said that is not quite the endorsement was looking for from my father. in any event, i was very blessed to be the first person in the history of my state to defeat a sitting incumbent governor in a primary. i was very fortunate to defeat my democratic opponent by 11 points. that came because of all of your support here in the audience. my state faces significant challenges. we lead the country in the unemployment. we lead the country in the dropout rates. we leave the country in foreclosures. the second question was, why would you run now? the answer is i think it is the greatest opportunity and the greatest moment in the history of my state to have the privilege and honor as serving for governor. i made a specific message when i announce my candidacy that we would balance our budget without raising taxes because that would be the worst possible thing you could do in the worst recession

of my state. i talked about the fact that i was going to reform education and change the dynamic. i talked about the fact that we're going to diversify our economy and make our state a better state for businesses to come to and work in. again, i want to leave a lot of time for the governor governor- elect to speak. it is a privilege to be here. i cannot express my thanks and gratitude enough to the support of the republican governors association and the governors came to my aid during the course of my campaign. i look for to everyone else's remarks. thank you. [applause] >> the next presenter is susanna martinez, also a former prosecutor. she is someone who will be the governor in a state that has been trending blue in recent years and election cycles. she really captivated the

imagination and vision for her state after some very difficult years under the previous administration. she is someone who i think will be incredibly influential for the party, the republican governors association. she is someone we worked with and i think they sent to mexico approximately $2 million to help her and held her race in mexico. we look forward to her comments. >> thank you. first and foremost, i want to thank all of you for your support. i could never have been elected in the state of new mexico and gotten my message across without the financial support of those behind rga and gov. barbour. it has allowed me as district attorney in the county were republicans are outnumbered nearly 31 to take the challenge

statewide where we are still outnumbered nearly 31 and it has allowed me to win at this race with eight points. the way we did this is weekend on the message that we wanted to make sure to close the deficit that mexico is experiencing. but this point is about a $500 million deficit. we have a 5 ft. $6 billion budget. we're for the ninth in the nation in education. we are the bottom of every good list and the top of every bad. we're not competitive and wherever governor. is, we continue to have a very friendly challenge amongst each other that i intend to bring back from all the jobs lost to your state. we hope we will clean environment in the mexican that is competitive for small businesses to win as a small businesses have a level playing field that they have not had in a very long time.

art admistration right now, they take the winners and the losers. the small businesses, 80% of the jobs created in mexico are leaving by leaps and bounds. we have an energy-rich state. we have oil and gas. we have a uranium, potash, copper, coal. we have many positive things that can turn our state around, but our foremost issue is to close the deficit in a long- lasting way creating a positive environment for businesses to grow and making sure that we are producing students that are graduating. right now 50 percent senator kids go on to college and they need remedial studies. that is unacceptable. a 40% of our kids did not graduate and offer my school. with a lot of work in front of us. we are determined to produce results.

we're determined to make sure the safety of the -- the face of the republican party is the face of those who deliver results and that those who elected them and earned their respect, and their vote in the future of those who have been elected this time, but will this so in the years to come. thank you. [applause] >> he is no stranger to solving problems and has been a great leader to our country where he served in the u.s. congress. there was a moment in time in the late 1990's were the budget was actually balanced. he was one of the key leaders, if not the key leader, in making that happen in the congress. he was a driving force for that balanced budget. he is someone who understands the importance of fiscal discipline, not just giving certain -- giving great speeches, but getting it done. one of the great stories is that the great lakes states are mostly returning from blue back

to read. you see republican governors in places like iowa, wisconsin, ohio, pennsylvania, and so many other places. john is coming out of a huge battle in ohio. it was a fire wall for president obama and the democrats. president obama was there 12 times. the rga sent $11 million there and played a significant role in this election. regardless of mechanics, ohio will benefit from the strong, clear, disciplined leadership and we're very grateful for you. we look forward to your comments. [applause] >> thank you, tampa. first of all, it is important to note that i'm the father of two 10-year-old twin daughters. i think about susanna hodges spoke to all of you, jan brewer,

mary fallon, the republican party has got some women that are just awesome. [applause] as the father of two 10-year- old, one of my daughter wants to be president. the other ones to be president. we are enthusiastically supporting the doctor. i received a phone call a couple of days after the election from the big time assistant to president obama. she said, "are you rested"? -- a sense in the president, the vice-president, and every left- wing group in america. it took me a couple of more hours to wrap that up. it was a heckuva race. i want to thank everybody that was able to jump in and

participate. i think it was the firewall for barack obama. joe biden told me the other day that we threw everything at you. >> and i said, "joe, and we won. i want to think bolivia. there are a lot of people in here that represents special interest groups. sometimes we can look at that from a negative point of view, and other times i believe we can see moments in time where you had the experience and the knowledge to help transform the government taking the private sector experience and the views of innovation to make things much better. i really believe that the business community looked over the cliff after these last two years. there have been a lot of times people say this is the most important election of my lifetime, but frankly, i think

we will look back and say to dozen 10 was an election about buyer's remorse. nothing personal against barack obama, but this is a values issue. the value is that if you work hard and you are successful that somehow you did something wrong, or that somehow we can take on massive amounts of debt and at times reckless spending and not realize that it puts our children and their children born to children at risk. but somehow letting the federal government's micromanage your businesses, then you take a look at the crazy provision in the health-care bill and you just shake your head and say, "where the heck are we going to"? the business community, the ceo's you represent, the board of directors that you represent, they have awakened a sleeping giant in america, these people who believe in free

enterprise, government as a last resort not as a first resort. i think we should all be part of ourselves. you were willing to stand up take the heat, take some hits, let haley barbour become a leader to say that we need your help, we need to join the fight, and stand for the principles we believe in. give us an opportunity to prosper, but i think a lot of your inspiration that you want your children and grandchildren to have the same kind of opportunities that we got from our parents. that was my motivation, frankly. the state of ohio has not been open for business. we are open for business now. i want to encourage all of you

to go to a website. i do not know if it is live quite yet, but fixohio.com. if you have a ways in which you think the location, the skills of our workers, great universal there's generally be of benefit to your company, we want you to come see us. this will really be the message to every governor because every governor is struggling and fighting to create jobs in an economy that has just been devastating to our families. john kennedy was right when he said a rising tide can lift all boats. i hope this curve of governors will have their voices heard in washington and will let our people go so we can design programs to meet our problems, so we can not just a balance the budget in ohio, but i will cause the budget and cut taxes. a high has to become more competitive.

we have to take down the regulatory barriers, but every state is trying to do this. it is good for our country. we would like you to participate. if you have ways in which you think you can allow us to operate the government of ohio and serve the customer, the people of ohio better, we want your ideas. we want you to raise yourself out of the whole the find yourself in where you are really concerned about taking care of what you have and think a bigger than that. dierdre be great. dare to be different. dierdre create a legacy. we are there to except you. i know so many of the other people here today feel exactly the same way. i do not look at it so much as a competition with rick perry. i think ohio state be the last time. i look at this as a -- i do not look at this as a competition, but this is an opportunity for all of us to work together and rise the tide so that we can all be successful and the families

inside of our states can prosper. i want to leave you with one final thing. the bottom line for me is incredible. we raised a lot of money for the r.j.. we would not have been able to win without their help. at the end of the day we are in the strong to do one thing, restore the legacy of my great state and be a good role model for other people, for young people. that is what i am all about. we welcome you to the bugeyes state and we hope you will help us. thank you for your help. [applause] -- welcome to the buckeye state and we hope you will help us.

>> there is a reason he has gotten so many votes, he is a strong leader with a strong record. he also just finished a strong campaign. the themes included reducing government spending and holding the government accountable for results. that message in strong contrast to his opponent. it was a referendum on those values and more in the state which is one of the most important swing or better brown states in the country. we're very fortunate that he will be one of the next great governors of the united states of america. the governor-elect from pennsylvania. [applause] >> thank you. thank you, governor. we use the term "keystone state ." one of the things i spoke about during the campaign was not only to be a keystone, but to be competitive.

gov. kasich, i will argue because i think competition is important. the more -- among ourselves, and we cannot just driven computing among ourselves, but we are competing with the nation's -- we cannot juste competing among ourselves but we are competing with nations around the world. i am convinced we will change this country. last year when we were in austin i sat on the same stage with gov. jindal, gov. perry, gov. pawlenty. i wanted in on the competition. that is exactly what we talked about throughout the entire campaign. we could not continue, i said, to increase our spending and increase the sentence of our budget in pennsylvania which increased by 40%.

we could not continue to increase the debt at a time when people are losing their houses, at a time when the economy is going further and further south. we could not continue to balance our budget using stimulus money, which i always refer to as a long-term debt, and applied to short-term asset of causing the budget for one year. that was the message received by the people of pennsylvania. i would not have been able to deliver that message as luck -- as well as i could without the help of the rga. to the membership of rga thank you. i want to thank you what you have bought -- what you have done. we are going to make a difference. i think one of the most important things that a governor can bring back into the state governments, and maybe they can take to washington, too, is common sense.

we start taking a look at the effect of over-regulation, take a look at the effect of not having a lawsuit reform, as we do not have in pennsylvania. a promise the people that we're going to get it, and hopefully this year. and we will make pennsylvania open for business so that we can compete with texas and ohio and my good friends and the east -- as disney, to the west -- excuse me, to the west -- and my good friend to the east, governor christie. i believe it is going to make this country stronger. thank you very much. [applause] >> i should mention that the rga invested $8 million in the pennsylvania governor's race. nikki haley is our next and last presenter before we get to the q&a part of the presentation.

she has a compelling life story. she is somebody who was in entrepreneur. she worked in her family business and understands what the policies mean from the standpoint of a family that ran a small business and provide jobs and economic activity in her state. surely has lived the american dream and served with distinction as one of the most dynamic and effective legislators in the south carolina legislature. there were a lot of folks and a very tough competition for this governor's race in south carolina. she rose to the top. i think you'll see in eminent and in the coming years, sheet will be one of the most dynamic leaders of our country. we're grateful to your service to south carolina that is coming up, and to the whole country. [applause] >> thank you very much. i will tell you a lot about what happened with me and what happened with south carolina. i have a daughter of indian parents who reminded us every day how blessed -- i am the daughter of indian parents

reminded us every day how blessed we were to be in this country. my parents started in the living room of their home and years later it was a multimillion- dollar company. one thing we knew is that there was never a day when it was easy. i started doing the counting on the books for them when i was 13. it was at that point that i learned the value of the dollar. it was at that point that i saw how hard government was on businesses, i saw how hard it was for businesses to make a doll andow easy it was for government to take it. i did what my parents always said. instead of complaining about it, i got involved in the legislature. what i saw as we came into the governor's race was, yes, south carolina had a republican house, senate, and republican governor, but that wasn't good enough to we needed to have a conservative house, conservative senate, conservative governor, and we

needed to have it in every state in the country. we hadn't. state house legislature -- we had an arrogant state has legislature, we had a conservative governor in mark sanford, but we needed to see more of that. i had a very little name id, very little money. but what i did was i went across the state and said that if you think government should understand the value of a dollar, if you think elected officials need to remember who it is they work for, and if you think jobs and the economy should come first, join our movement. i always said that if you like what i have to say, but tell people. and they did. before we knew it, there was this amazing grass roots movement that went across south carolina. i always finish by saying that if you join our movement, don't ever let it be about a person, don't ever let it be about an election. make sure it is about what we need to do going forward.

make sure this is about how we're going to change the face of our country going forward. look at our country now. we are celebrating some wins, what does that really mean? it means that we saw people get involved in government that had never been involved in elections before. this is not about being a republican, democratic, independent. it is about the fact that we have had enough. we have seen an awakening across the country where i've never seen people more spirited about the government and elected officials are more scared. it is a beautiful thing. we need to keep it that way. but it is not the wins we need to celebrate, it is about what we're going to do in january we have to show the value of the dollar, we have to look at unfunded mandates, we have got to look at health care, we've got to look at immigration reforms, we have got to make sure that we're going back to smaller government, but we've got to make sure we are strengthening our businesses. that is when we proved to the

people of the state that we are fighting for them again. while we need to celebrate the fact we have a great republican governors, we really need to celebrate is the fact that people on the power of their voice. i can tell you that what happened in south carolina can happen across the country. they elect the person they thought should win. we have a great responsibility with that, especially as we go into the election of 2012. i think we're going to see people wake up and we will see them fight back and we will see a government that is stronger and better than we have ever seen before. as we are facing congress, it will be up to our commanders to fight the good fight, to show washington what will the policy -- what real good policy looks like. i want to thank the rga, because they were one of the organizations that, instead of looking at who could win, they looked at who should win.

we want to thank you for everything you did, for your support of the rga, and now we want to roll up our sleeves and get to work. thank you very much. [applause] >> ok, we're going to have a little discussion between panelists for a little bit, and in a little while we will open it up to all of the governors, governors-elect, governor-does in its -- gov.-designates. the theme for this panel is the future of the republican party. one of the issues is the need for the nation at the federal level and all levels of government reduce and control of spending. each of these candidates and governors-elect have got to campaign for that was one of their main themes, but, due to reduce spending and reforming government -- what can we do to

reduce spending and reform government? so what are two ideas that you have for lessons learned, in your case, from congress? >> the press has tried to get specifics out of me for six months and i'm i've -- i am not -- [laughter] i think the key is that you have to make changes and shrink government. we know that all of the country, we know that in states and the federal level if the first thing we cannot is play favors fifth you have to look for friends and see whether they work. of if it'll work -- you have to look at programs and see whether they work. fiddle work, you off -- if it'll work, you have fifth of the thrift -- you have to get rid of them. i look around and my folks take a look round the country and we

often think of the fees for a number of years -- thinking of these for a number of years to defraud a snitch and a few things federal thrift off of the office 52 if -- how this vicious daniels -- how does mitch daniels do things better half of this 52 if half of this bob mcdonnell few things w? fearful of the half an impossible situation in minnesota or the -- tim pawlenty half an impossible situation in minnesota for the legislativ -- for the legislature wants to raise a rates. we will get dollars in the classroom. the most important thing is to not be revealed, the fear of your selford -- not be broken,

that take care of yourself or any of your friendsville the other thing is that you cannot have a fear i. if you were elected to get reelected, though rou -- don't run. there is nothing wrong with getting hammered over the head for something you believe in, because in the end will help the people. the half of great for me when i was leaving because they -- wanted they -- they had a parade when i was leaving because they wanted to make sure i was sitting at a foundry -- that i was getting out of town. of one other thing 5 ft. over the course of my campaign was -- i did over the course of my campaign was a picture of life is a default businesses -- was make sure i visited small businesses 50. we had to reduce benefits and let people go, and they turned

to me and said, would vote wife and i -- "flight can fit the government do the same -- why can't state government to the san?" i don't think if t should be a novel conference that usenet would you have, of love with life -- fell victim to the novel, fifth and have -- i don't think it should be a novel concept that you spend what you have. i have taken a meticulous approach to that and i think the state of nevada will be better for it. >> i think what all of the states will face is a terrible budget crisis. but when we do that, it is a perfect time to go back and say,

what is the role of government? it is intended to secure the rights of the people. it was never intended to be all things to all people. we have to go to each agency and figure out what the commission is, and figure out what we have and how can we work our way out? on the federal level, we have to understand we have mandates coming down that are unhealthy. we need to get this coalition of republican governors together and have a conversation with d.c. and fled them know that rather than mandating health use on our states, let incentivize small businesses to offer health care and reform medicaid -- that would take 10% off our budget -- let us do tort reform, as gov perry did in texas and it is phenomenal. we need to allow insurance companies to cross state lines so that it is competitive. i do think that while we are all

facing these challenges, there is incredible opportunity for us to look with the core missions of government are and redefine our states again. >> there is nothing worse than a strong -- for a strong and robust economy that you have eight thick and corrupt government. in new mexico, our current administration for government by 54%, handing out exempt positions to those who were donors and friends. eight years ago, we had a republican governor. his exempt positions were 183 this current administration grew to almost 600. one was the director of a museum that did not even exist. and in recent months -- there

were fighting it some folks and putting them in -- they were hiding exempt folks and putting them in classified positions. we have a big and corrupt government. what is happened to the state of new mexico is that it has become extremely unpredictable. i propose to our state, the citizens of new mexico, that we will cut back on the exempt positions, closeo the number of 180, which will save us $10 million. a proposed a 5% attrition rate for state employees, because it grew by 5400 state employees in just eight years. we need to reduce the, and by the attrition rate of 5%, we can save $40 million. if we paid universities for credits students receive and instead of just because they

enroll, and wait until they complete the course, we can save $52 million, and that is looking from the outside in. the administration is not being forthcoming not only with the legislature, but certainly not with the transition team. from the outside looking in, we are asking $100 million, and a week after the election, the deficit went from $252 million to $452 million, just a week's time. the projection of -- the realistic projection that growth will be at a 6% rate has allowed the current administration not to make cuts, not to make tough decisions, but to continue to grow because there is expectations that are realistic that we will have a 6% growth. no one believes that. we're going to make tough decisions. i believe we can find waste and

fraud, and any government that grew by 54% is obviously not in touch with the population growth and inflation, and therefore there is waste within state government. to make it more predictable, when you grew out corruption, it will bring back the ability to be competitive with the neighbors and bring back revenue and jobs that are necessary for us to grow the economy. i'm committed to not raise more taxes proof that is not the wife we get out of the mess we found ourselves in. -- i am committed to not raise more taxes. that is not the way we get out of the mess we found ourselves in fifth off the intended to have a very reputable environment, we intend to make sure it is a fair playing field across the board, and we intend to prepare future with us with children and to fit them in the way that the work force within in mexico stays within mexico -- within in new mexico, because we have three jobs to offer. -- great jobs to offered.

>> the unfunded mandates coming out from washington are often passed down to state and county and local governments from pennsylvania and ohio, with many local governments. we pass much of it along, and we do to them what the federal government is doing to us. we have to get that under control. it is a great deal of spending that nobody has to pay attention to the federal level. they just go ahead and do it and don't think about it. somebody is going to pay for it. the complaint i heard throughout the entire campaign is "view in government cost too much -- you in government cost too much, you make me pay too much in taxes."

i think it is a tremendous problem in pennsylvania and probably in many states, that we have to get the kind of spending based upon -- nikki, you said "the all things -- be all things to all people," i add, "at all times." because the economic challenges we have right now, we have some of the greatest opportunities since the 1980's to get this under control and say that we have to stop acting this way. we have to be responsible for anything that we send down to the next level of government. we have to make sure they have the ability to function. therefore, are we going to pay for this at the federal level or the state level? i think that is number one. no. 2 is, i agree with the

inchon on not just cutting for the sake of cutting -- with jo hn on not just cutting for the sake of cutting. you have to be smart about for cutting. the number one goal of all government, i don't care what level, is public safety. you're to make sure that people are safe within streets and work places and homes. the same thing happens on the federal level. we have to be safe from foreign nations that would do us harm. we will get that under control. but then we will look at where we're spending money. education is important, but how are we spending it there? if it is not making it to the classroom, more money is not going to get you more education or better education. we have to assess how the spending is going on. i look at pennsylvania, and the average cost of a cluster of his $244,000.

in philadelphia, we have a dropout rate that is somewhere around 60,000 -- 50%. across pennsylvania, we have 30,000 students drop out every year. that is acceptable to me. we need to be smart. one of the things i campaigned on is -- you cannot do it to all government at all time. taking certain agencies and start out with what i call 0- based budget. why do you exist? what is its core mission, what is its purpose? what do you really need? not our budget was x last year and inflation has caused it to be y. will need to get away from that kind of thinking. we need to do that the federal level, also. >> i would customize the questions to maybe one panelist,

and we will go through a couple quickly and we will open up to the upper governors. -- other governors. gov.-elect cent of al -- sandoval, we will not be a successful mission if our children are dropping out of our schools. it is not a formula that is going to work. they not only become economically detached, but they become wards of the state and frustrated in other ways. we have to make sure strategically that we are to getting at the highest level possible as many people as possible -- that we are educating at the highest level possible as many people as possible. why don't you share with the audience your vision of education in nevada? >> thank you, governor. i made a commitment during the first part of a campaign to visit 100 businesses. i also visited 100 schools throughout nevada.

i visited elementary schools, middle schools, i schools, charter schools, private schools. i wanted to go into the classrooms myself and see what was going on and talk to principals, teachers, parents. i came out with a bold education plan. i had the benefit of working with the former gov. bush from the state of florida. one of the hallmarks of my education plan was choice, something that had never happen in the state of nevada. i believe that every parent and child should have the ability to choose the school where they want to attend. you mentioned accountability. i think it is very, very important that schools be accountable so that parents throughout the great state of nevada should know how the school's performance, and if it is not performing, there will be a change with regard to administration. another thing in nevada is we have is tenure, and in nevada you can get tenure after one

year. >> oh, my. >> i knew that would draw out a gasp. that is something that needs to be taken head on, and when i talk about all these things, i think there should be merit pay for teachers. i think we should reward great teachers. there should be the ones given the benefit showing increases in test scores. i talked about their fact that nevada -- the education statistics from other states and we are not performing up to par when it comes to graduation rates for students. that is one of the commitments i made during the course of my campaign, to improve systemically the delivery of education in our state so that we start to move those numbers up and provide children at several different paths. not every child is meant to go to college. they should have a career path and opportunity in that regard. i will be a strong champion of the charter schools and korea

and technical schools. those are all things that will -- career and technical schools. those are altering some will change the dynamic in nevada so that i will not be talking about the statistics in two years. we will approve every measure of education in the great state. thank you. >> in the future, we see if states increasingly addressing the immigration issue. we saw that in the action and debate in arizona recently. gov.-elect martinez is from the border state, new mexico, has deep familiarity with these issues and spoke strongly and clearly during her campaign. share with us how the republican party and republican governors can address the immigration issue going forward. >> i live in a county that is the second-largest in the state of mexico. we border mexico. we border juarez, mexico, the murder capital of the world. it has been the responsibility

of all local law enforcement partnering with the federal government and border patrol to make sure that we are keeping that violence on the other side of the border and not allowing it to come across. however, it does. we are experiencing higher numbers of trafficking in narcotics, trafficking in humans. we have a law in new mexico passed by the current administration that allows for the issuance of driver's licenses to illegal immigrants. it is a driver's license that does not look any different from what i carry. therefore, they are able to travel the country. they are also under a executive order from the current administration that provides sanctuary, which means that when an individual is a vested by the -- stapled -- one individual is arrested by the state police, they're not able to determine whether the person is in the country legally or not. you cannot find them to hold

them accountable for the criminal activity. i have been a prosecutor since 1986 and elected district attorney since 1996. law enforcement has always made sure that we place people in jail, we determined that they accurately glee or not, regardless of the color of their skin. -- whether they are here legally are not, regardless of the color of their skin. it is not about the mexican population. it is merely about the mexican border, which has been weak, because people have been coming across that border because it is easier to do so. they are coming from across the border from all over the world. we have arrested individuals in recent history, the last six months, from jamaica, china, poland, because they are coming to mexico because it is an attractive state where they can get illegal ids that allow them to travel the country without production. they are provided sanctuary. we find out where you are, we

are rescue, sent you to prison, punish, whatever it may be, and you are deported because you have proven yourself and save to be in the country -- proven yourself unsafe to be in the country. in new mexico, 40% of the population is hispanic, but it is amazing how well the message is received that we have to secure our borders. we cannot have comprehensive immigration reform without first securing the borders, and we have done many things in our state. [applause] we have done many things in our state to try to do so, from a fence in some places to barriers to prevent vehicles from crossing with loads of narcotics. keep in mind, the arrests are people from all over the world, and some of them are to to cause us direct harm. we understand it from a law enforcement point of view, and

we understand that it is important that we secure the border -- a partner with texas, arizona, california, to make sure that we do that first before we take the second steps and the man that the federal government do what they are -- and demand that the federal government to what they're supposed to do to have put immigration reform. >> competitiveness depends on access to affordable and competitively priced energy grid a lot of what we thought about the energy debate, as recently as five years ago, has changed dramatically because of massive new fines and availability of natural gas and in north america and within the territorial jurisdiction of the united states. it is a game changer. many experts believe we have enough natural gas to supply the entire caseload of energy for the country for hundreds of years to come. pennsylvania is one of those states that has one of those large deposits. talk to us about the kinds of

policies the federal government needs to enact or the states to enact to unlock that massive, game changing potential of a natural gas deposit. >> the potential for this country and for a state like pennsylvania, particularly with a find in pennsylvania, it's almost difficult to get your head around. depending on who you talk to. i look at it from a number of different perspectives. it has already meant about it thousand jobs in pennsylvania -- 8000 jobs in pennsylvania. it will mean hundreds of thousands of jobs both direct and indirect, in building the gas suppl delivery system, but also the markets for technology, in addition to the technology and resources we have already.

it has made pennsylvania literally the second largest energy field in the world, in my opinion, if you add all the different types of energy. what that allows the united states to do, if we develop it properly and safely and protect the environment while we're developing it, is make ourselves independent of the middle east carried over the course of the next 30 years, as we take that technology and put it into clean-burning fuel in various areas, including a vehicle fleet in pennsylvania, helping michigan -- i would like to get michigan to come down to pennsylvania. we have trucks built on here that are gas-burning trucks. a whole new market will be distributed across not only the country, but we will become a net exporter. we have to start looking at energy in this country, and we do in certain parts of the country, as really a commodity

that we can be exporting. but we have to develop it properly and safely. to me, one of the blessings of what happened in pennsylvania -- one of the best things that will happen in pennsylvania -- this is an industry that is at its beginning. this the beginning of the steel industry. what is going to mean for hundreds of thousands of jobs in pennsylvania -- but we have to develop it properly and safely and keep the environment in mind. that is something that pennsylvanians and americans acro the board will be able to arrive on that kind of energy. i know governor perry as it in texas and we have it in other parts, we have it in louisiana -- we have to get better control of energy policy. we know that talking about having an energy policy for the united states -- it is almost 2011, and still have one.

i told the people of pennsylvania that we will develop one for pennsylvania. >> john kasich, if you could tell the federal government that they have to get out of, get out of your life, get out of your face, in ohio, with the one thing the -- what with that one thing be? >> to debut of things -- how what two things -- two things -- how about medicaid and job training? let our people go. [laughter] >> nikki haley, with your entrepreneurial background, most of those jobs will come from those states and small and medium-sized businesses. if you could highlight the things it will be most impactful in starting new ventures in your state. >> i think we have to create a small business environment. the way to do that in every

state is to understand that when you give businesses cash flow and profit margins, what is the first thing they do? they hire people. it comes down to tort reform, tax reform, understanding that when you give them profits, they hire people. the smaller you can make government, the more you can create jobs, the more you can improve economic development, the more you can strengthen small businesses. >> let's ask our other governors, governors-elect, to join the discussion. but unfortunately, we're having microphone issues. let's see if governors on the panel would like to jump in and ask questions on these topics or any other is of interest to you. rick, are you awake? [laughter] stay with us, man. inda, you look like to have something on your mind. >> i'm not sure why you are picking on me today.

let me take opportunity to thank everyone who is here today. i'm sure what everyone is thinking right now, what an impressive group you are. phenomenal, intelligent people. [applause] i think for the first time in perhaps our member it, the focus is going to be on the nation's governors as opposed to washington, d.c. in many of your states, you will have the opportunity to get these issues dealt with and get your solutions implemented more quickly than they would be at the federal level. i would pose a question to you -- what is going to be the biggest challenge to each of you in getting these common sense solutions implemented right away? what are you going to face? what is your biggest obstacle going to be? >> i think a microphone may be

working again. biggest barrier to whatever the reforms are. >> i think it is getting the mindset of many in the media at the beacon actually do this -- that we can actually do this. the question they ask is how would you be able to do this, nobody has been able to do it in the past. they have to understand, and we have to understand as governors, that we have a mandate for the people of pennsylvania and the people of the united states. they want this done. it is going to be building consensus, building coalitions with the legislature, to make these changes. what if you said earlier today that we cannot blank -- one of you said earlier today that we cannot blink. >> media -- other barriers or hurdles? >> what we're all going to face very tough budgets.

we need to say to the people of our state that this is going to hurt and we're going to struggle, but we have to make sure that don't make political decisions the first year, we make the right decisions. if we do that, we will come out stronger and more competitive than we first started. but we have to be honest that we're headed into a terrible budget year and be honest and let people know what we're going into pre but we will bring this country back to the weight is supposed to be. -- to the weight is supposed to be. >> the biggest challenge is to get people to reflect people -- the people to reflect on the chilean miners. if we put together and have a good, strong team, nothing will be in the way. if people want to break down and just take care of themselves -- this is not a time to do that in my state or any state in the

country. it is incumbent upon us to raise the bar and get other people to join in. if that happens, i have no doubt we will be successful. >> luis from puerto rico took over with a lot of challenge, and the political tradition at least in recent years was the other way. he came in as a reform-minded governor and leader and was able to enact significant changes in the face of a lot of opposition, current and past. give us a couple of lessons learned that these governors might benefit from with your experience in puerto rico. >> thank you, and i congratulate everyone here for the tremendous success this november. indeed, we will be facing tremendous challenges. from my own experience, what i can tell you is what you're going to do, do it quickly. commit a kid immediately with

all stakeholders -- communicate immediately with all stakeholders. go as far as you need to go in year one. and then, once you are done, for example, reducing expenses, because many of you have tremendous budget gaps, and immediately start reducing taxes, because that will bring business to your state. the country is looking for leadership. i am sure he will lead. that is what we need to hear from you. >> thank you, appreciate it. i see you law in the corner by yourself. -- lonely in the corner by yourself. you got done extremely well with a lot of momentum. you have a lot of experience under your belt. give us lessons learned and what you see going forward for the

state of nebraska at these governors may benefit from. >> i share what you just heard. you have to communicate what you believe in frequently, often, until people start coming back to you and say, "i am tired of hearing that speech." people all know that. we have been on the campaign trail. but it is true from that regard. secondly, when i took over, state spending was averaging 7% a year. we slowed to 4%, past the largest tax relief package in the history of the state. when i started as governor, where in the top 10 of places we did not want to become the top 10 highest-tax states. we are not done yet. you ca make a difference. the only thing i would share with you, and we have learned as governors -- when you stand up and lead, your state will follow. if you can set those markers out there, you can really challenge

your legislature. the other challenge for me is, in spite of the fact of how important taxes and spending are, what counts most in the breast is went university of nebraska wins a football game. >> what counts most in our state -- what counts most in our state is when university of nebraska with a football game. i want to thank rick perry in advance. when you do that, at nebraska will continue to grow, and i want to thank in advance for that. [laughter] >> let me ask governor is fresh off the campaign, off the trail, their competito -- very competitive experiences -- what is one thing that surprised you during the campaign that you wish you a note earlier, or that you now know that will serve you going forward that perhaps

you did not fully appreciate what you first got into it? >> the biggest surprise to me was the intensity of it, for a moment 1. what i jumped in the race, i announce my resignation from the federal bench. i did a sentencing at the p.m. at 5:00 p.m., there was a reporter on my doorstep ready to interview me. the next day, i had several interviews and meeting with different groups. you have to be on at every moment. i learned about trackers. i never knew about trackers before. just thinking sure you were on your game at every moment. i hate to be redundant, but going to those businesses, going to those schools on learning things first answer that you have your finger on the pulse of your state, you realize the degree of how people are hurting at how, when you say something,

you say what you were going to do and now it is time to do what i said i was going to do. i have gotten to work in that regard. i made statements in the course of my campaign, put together a team, interviewing each of the respect of persons at the head of my respect of positions within state government. i hit the ground running. as i said, there was never a day when there was an awful thing going on. i think a -- was a good -- there was never a day when there was not something going on. i think that was a good boot camp. >> nikki, a surprise you learned along the way? >> ignorance is bliss, and it is good that there are certain things you don't know when you are governor. the biggest surprise was watching people find the power of their voice, understanding that when you let people know that you are working for them

and fighting for them,he fact that they are getting involved, sometimes for the first time, i have never voted i and -- and have never voted in an election, we are seeing this groundswell across the country. everybody wants to analyze the tea party, and i have a huge fan of the tea party, but it is not a party at all. as republicans and democrats -- it is republicans and democrats and independents who said that they've had enough. that is a great push and motivation for governors in the country. >> i want to come to you, rick scott come in and of for a health care question. you and thinking about the -- you happen to think about that. -- you have been thinking about that. >> i was thinking about this as we met the great group of new

governors coming in. i think our country is in very good hands. i was also thinking about the fact there is a reality that we sometimes walk away from. in south dakota, and we are one of the smallest state in terms of the total overall budget, but when you look at the general fund, the part that the the display of prejudice the opportunity to impact, 49 cents of every dollar in our state goes to education, i the k-12 or higher education. 35 cents goes to taking care of people. the leaves you with 11 for all of your corrections and courts and protecting the public. if you add it all up, up 5 cents left from every general fund dollar, to what we'd like to be up on, bureaucracy, the legislature, the economic development efforts. at the same time, if you look at them out in south dakota, the

amount that goes into the bureaucracy is $58 million per year. this year, our federal medical matching rate, because of our income average over the last few years, was up to no. 3 in the nation. that means we get to put in another 483 basis points up at to funds -- 483 basis points of matching funds. compare that with the operation of the bureaucracy of government, everything had about $57 million, $50 million, and it brings and the reality that the federal government, policies and mandates, are going to be a player in how all of us are going to be able to fix our but its long-term. the reason i bring this up, and the reason i talk about it today, is that i think there has to be a commitment among the governors that are here in the future that they have to be actively involved in sharing policy and what the impact are at the patrol and what it does

to the people -- at the federal level and what it does to the people. at the local level, you get in annual your sleeves and so forth, but i don't think this group of governors can walk away from the responsibility of telling it like it is to the federal government and getting actively involved in the policy side. if you don't, nobody else will. i think we truly need this new group of governors to step forward and play an active role at the federal level. >> well said, mike. thank you. rick scott is the new governor of the state of florida, one of the foremost policy leaders in experienced hands in the health- care debate, led a leading health-care company and has been involved for a long time. you see places like minnesota, adding up k-12 education, health and human services, you have 3/4 of the budget. compared to health and human

services, theigrowth is not anywhere close to health and human services. we have to find a way to slow down the health care costs at the local, state, federal level. give us the best ways to control costs from your perspective. >> there is no reason health care should cost what it costs. we have to be very active and make sure that all the policy we are involved in. we of to make sure everyone knows exactly how it will impact our citizens and state budget. it is going to bankrupt us. obamacare will be the biggest job killer ever in this country. we have to do everything we can to stop the implementation of it. we have to repeal it. but we have to educate everybody in our state and nationwide about the problems with it, and do everything we can to get government out of our health care decisions. if government gets out of the way, health-care costs can come down, but the more we have

government involvement, that is what is causing most of the health care inflation. >> this panel is just a representative sample of the quality, death, experience, and integrity a -- this great depth -- depth, experience, and integrity of this crop of governors. it will be a transformative moment for the country when the country gets back on track mostly because of the leadership of these men and women. there are a few others who have not heard from yet, but i hope you take the time to get to know them in the coming days. you will see the work of the rga reflected not just in their personalities and leadership abilities, but what they will bring forward over the next couple of years. that you for attending this session, the rga annual meeting, and we hope you'll stay engaged for the next couple of days. our mc will give us instructions for the next event. [applause] >> congress is on recess for the

thanksgiving break. when they return, the house will focus on the ethics inquiry of congressman charles rangel. a committee panel recommended center for the new york democrat last week, and the full house will need to approve that. the senate is also out for the holiday parade when lawmakers return, work is expected on a food safety bill. you can see the house live on c- span, the senate on c-span2. this january, we will see the opening of the water 12th congress, with lots of new cases. among them, republican jeff denham, and all of -- an almond farmer. also new to congress, democrat karen bass, who defeated the republican 86-14%. for more on all of the new house

and senate members, visit our home page, c-span.org. the fcc reports that with the growing popularity of wireless devices, demand for wireless spectrum will be 30 times higher just a few years from now. the assistant commerce secretary talks about his department's plan to free up wireless spectrum, and what happens if they fail. "the communicators," tonight on c-span2. for barack obama to george washington, learn more about the nation's presidents on the c- span at the library. biographies, it is to be is, historical perspectives, and more. searchable and free. it is washington your way. a discussion with the author who has written a book about the inner workings of the obama white house, from today's "washington journal." joins us, the author of "survival."

you set up a dynamic between the people that you call revivalists and rvivalists. who is in each camper? -- camp? host: -- guest: lking at it now, particularly at thetart of the year, i wanted to look at the messes that they were in and how they got out. campaigns are a means to an end. you make a list of promises, you get to washington, then you kind of undo them. in this case it is a 21 monthlong journey. it was not just the process, it was where they forgetheir identity. transitioning from campaigning to governing was much more of a

challenge than it has been four previous presidents and white houses -- more a challenge than previousen four previouor presidents and white house's. this idea of being a transformer, that c-span pledge, televising of debates. it became emblematic of how they wanted a transparent approach. revivalists are on that side of it. survivalists are on the washington side, saying do what it takes to get washington done. make the deals you have to make, grease the wheels, that is how it works inashington. that battle between the ideas has been happening in the white house for the last two years. host: does it happen in the

mind of the president as well? guest: exactly. how pragmatic and realistic he is, but revivalists call him an mp sir. -- appeaser. a few weeks befe the former clinton chief of staff had this dispute with campaign folks, that they talked about getting lobbyists out of the administration, but then they said they wanted to work around it. then they said that the candidate meant it. that it was tru what happened? they held the line but there were a couple of exceptions. host: we are talking about rohm emmanuel, survivalist. how many of them will carry

over? guest: it is important that the replacement for rohm emmanuel is the leader of the survivalists. a congressional liaison, with people like larry summers on the economic team. some of them have left or are on their way out. the most interesting character that was not part of the coming in white house, getting other people involved in communication, like dan piper or david axelrod, shifting from campaigning to governing. what they did not understand was that technically the other side have a soft campaign. they were transitioning into this washington mode. they expected republicans to come with it? but it never happened. host: what about this notion of

getting through the campaign and then having a couple of years instituting legislation and changing the culture? what does it tell you? guest: they thought they would have a window, maybe a few months, maybe a yr. but there was no window. not in washington. every administration, it seems to actually get much worse and more exaggerated. the culture, especially with the technology and the media and the influence of cable, the influence of all of these things together means that people on capitol hill making it much harder for a long-term policy.

ho: the numbers to call, for democrats, 202-737-0002. for republicans, 202-737-0001. for independents, 202-628-0205. you talk about how emotional president obama was in the health-care bill, something that many journalists did not really pickup on. he was viewed as a stomach president. how emotional was he? did you get a glimpse of that? photographers have a strange sense of what is going on. what i noticed was that there were very few moments when this president as a candidate showed emotions that he could not control. i have always been very aware of them.

even after his grandmother died , he actually spoke about her and gave a stump speech and started to cry than. -- then. this is a moment, as the vice president was introducing him, where the vice-president was his normal and hyperbolic self. everything was literally the greatest ever. it was all very eessive. i think that people were very focused on him. next to him, the president was released groveling. his face was all contorted. it was extremely striking. just in case i did not get it

right, but would check with his senior staff. he was released troubling to hold it together. he has such a polished performance, it makes you wonder that when the mask comes off, what is really going on? that is what took me to the critical nature of health care and why he had risked so much. it was the memory of his mother and her experience with terminal cancer, struggling with insurance, almost every single case besides that campaigning for health care, almost every piece of this legislature was campaign -- tailored for people in her situation. that was a focal point for him precisely because of the experience of his mother. host: you wrote in your book that "obama it is giving up his

most emotional moments in his political career into his personal life." guest: right. that. asked him about it is striking as well, but his senior aides were trying to tell him not to do a thing because it would ct him politically, he would talk about his mother. which is why he wanted to risk so much. revivalists really refers to him digging themselves out of a whole 10 months ago when people said that health care was dead. host: you are talking about one year into his presidency.

guest: we are all showing pictures of 1 million people on the mall in saying that he had 78% approval, now look at him. having lost the senate race, the start of my time line here, it ended up as two months. starting out as the ted kennedy's seat. that shock and surprise of the republican victory where everyone said that the president was doomed and finished. it reminded me of several points through the primary where people declared him to be over, finished, and dead. two months later, he gets health care done. a dramatic turnaround. ianted to see how he did it. how they responded to that kind of pressure in failure. what do they talk about now? everyone says that the president is finished, that he is gone and

that there is nothing else that he can do. we will see. at some point, you do not know. he will cling to the edge of the cliff. hillary clinton thought that he was finished. when sarah palin was nominated, democrats said that he was finished. . journalist and msnbc commentator, we're talking about his new book. he is also the author of "renegade," which profiles the 2010 election and was a new york times bestseller next year. let's get to the phones.

caller: i watch you all the time. i wonder how you feel about all the sacrifices that have been made, especially with health care. i am grateful myself. i have a 20-year-old son who will be getting health care again thanks to the reform. but you thi we will end up getting some kind of of public option and be able to rein in the high costs of health care? and also, i was wondering what you think of the election and what it really meant. i mean, does it really people -- does it really mean people want less government or was there a different message? host: let's get to the answer. guest: when it comes down to the election, the interpretation is

important. if you look at what changed between 2008 and 2010, it is independent voters. that is the group the president sorely needs to get back. they voted for him heavily in 2008, and they voted for republicans heavily in 2010. the parties on both sides are not particularly happy here. independent voters want to see a change. they want to see a change in the way washington works. the compromises that really mattered, that nancy maybe was referring to, are the things like transparency, the kind of back room deals, signing 9000 earmarks into law, which the president did in the first in appropriations bill. those are the things is said to, but especially independent voters, that maybe this guy was

not straight to you. it goes to the bed compromises they made. they were unnecessary. they undermined the brand. when it comes down to the public option, it is worth addressing. i hear it from progressives all over. this president never as a candidate talked about the public option. he did not even agree with the individual mandate as sunday he is going to support, and that is actually now law. no serious democrat suggested there should be a public plan. there were ever in the early 1990's. as i describe in the book, the with the public option took on a life of its own was a real barrier to getting health care done. chuck grassley was the republican that had a final confrontation with the president. or the president confronts him inside the oval office. they say that this is your plan. this is essentially the policy that you have advocated all of

these years. if we give you everything you want to mccann is still supported? and he said in know. he asked for something in return. he said, mr. president, if you go out publicly and say no public option, then i am with you. and the president could not do it. even though there was never going to be a public option. you cannot say that because he would disappoint people like nancy. taking it off the table and that everyone's political options would have been constructed. the public option was a distortion. no one seriously advocated it. i would argue that it actually cost the white house politically. maybe chuck grassley whenever have been there, but it certainly distorted the debate. let's hear from patty in minneapolis. republicaline. caller: good morning. i'm one of the few people that watch msnbc. you know, it sounds like the same thing here. that they do all day long on msnbc, praising president

obama, making excuses. oh, he's got the two camps, and one's telling him to do this and the other is telling him to do that. the guy can't make a decision for one thing. he's never won anything. and you folks didn't do your job when he was running to back him. and all his communist, socialist friends, terrorists, got a who wrote the bk about wish they had done more even in the light of 9/11. the other thing i want to say is, why don't you talk about all the czar van jones, wh don't you talk about that? your first clue with premeditate ople have when he said he wasn't going to take public donations, whene reneged onhat. he says, no, no, he's not going to go with the government funding for the election. that was your first clue he was a big phony. host: you have a lot of pints. let's get a response. guest: i'm surprised she can be

that uninformed after watching msnbc all day. you need to check the dictionary. if you ever have known a communist or socialist or even a terrorist, you'd know that that's just ridiculous. so you made a lot of points -- you suggest that i'm making excuses. i can tell you there are plenty of people in the white house who have not been happy about what's been in the book. we just talked right now about how the president awas conflicted. the interesting thing, there's no question that he had this different decision making procs from president bush. however, if you look at what has motivated people in this last election, it's not a lack of doing things. it's that he's done so much. so can you challenge whether or not he makes decisions quickly enough, but -- weird for a

terrorist, patty, he has this health care legislation through . and credit card reform, financial regulatory reform, $800 billion of recovery money. that's not someone who doesn't make decisions. you may think he's done too much. you may think he has taken too throng get to his policy positions. but the question about whether he has had any experience, we've used lots of different models for presidents over the years. prident bush was a managing director of a baseball team. does that make him a great executive? that wasn't the model people were looking for then either. host: during the campaign -- of course all sides in political campaigns use rhetoric. but sarah palin, the v.p. take on the republican side, talked with the president paling around with terrorists after the president won the elections, sarah palin criticized him as having death panels as part of the health

care bill. was the obama team surprised by how much traction buzz phrases have gotten even if they have not actually been legitimate parts of the obama campaign? >> right. and they shouldn't have been. because in the campaign this was not unusual. remember, there was all of the rumors that he was a muslim, and they spet an extraordinary amount of effort and time thinking about how to deal with that, putting up websites, doing targeted ads online to try and marginalize this kind of stuff to say we know we can't stop it, but we can at least make seem to the extreme because that's what it is so they put up the birth certificate and everything else. in terms of now, their attitude was, well this stuff will take ca of itself. isn't it obvious? and it wasn't obvious. and in the current media, technological environment, things can go viral extremely quickly. so death panel talk goes from a facebook posting to something that pops out of the mouth of a senator or congressman.

and it's played all day long on cable. a different environment, would they had been far less nimble dealing with than during the campaign. host: our line from missouri. hi, brent. caller: good morning. thank you for not -- rihard, i've not read your most recent book, but i can't wait to based on the subject matter you've been talk about today. guest: thank you. caller: pretty much a long check list, i'm sure. i'll throw out as many as i can. the primary thing is the debate between the revivalists guest: survivalists. caller: whatever you want to call them. and now with so manpeople like rahm and others leaving and others coming in, do you see that maybe him coming back

and getting exclusively a little more on the revivalist point of now that he's lost the house, etc.? and if could you also address -- as someone that voted for him, first democratic president i've ever voted for, and still supporting vigorously to this day, i was utterly befuddled leading up to four months before the mid-term elections as to why did he not -- you made an excellent point just a moment ago about how it wasn't that he hasn't done anything, it's that he's done an astonishing amount in two years or less compared to as many presidents as i can remember back to 1980, perhaps earlier.

the places that a million jobs are saved just by not legislate g.m. go under -- host: talking about that p.r. campaign. guest: yes. it's interesting. he's done a huge amount. the basic assumption is the people would understand this stuff. they came to see how a lot of these things got mench the together. -- merged together. people thought that the recovery act was confused with the top bailouts, the wall streets. and that it self, was also confused with the carmakers' bailout. they've got to spend the next two years unpacking all of this stuff. because they have done this huge amount. and it didn't tell its own story. one of the problems they've had with the recovery act is that it did so much, they said politically -- and, again, -- politically it would have been much more sense dwroible break it up. you had tax cuts,

infrastructure pieces oft. then you deal with the state budgets and teexers' jobs and everything else. -- teachers' jobs and everything else. they couldn't do it like that because it woul have taken too much time, or at least that's what their economic and political advice was at the time. in retrospect, it's hard to tell a single story when you've got everything lumped in there. now that the g.m. has had its successful public offering, part of the money has been -- tarp money has been substantially paid back. the carmakers aren track, at least in terms of obama, they're on track. there is a story. but they have to go out and do that. campaigning, revivalalist spirit, it's something that would naturally happen as ey gear up for election time. but campaign does force them to tell the story about what they've done in a way that you just don't when you're governing, when you're trying to do deals with members of congress. if you are worri about how

each vote will play -- if you are trying to get a small circle of republicans instead of a broad setion ofment in -- independent voters on your side, then you're vercautious about what you say. you don't want to exclude any options. i don't want to say something in case that triggers a bad response in the vote you're trying to get. that's the essential dynamic they've had. and moving into campaigning, talking to a broader base, especially independent voters, not just republican members of congress that allows them to tell the story much more vigorously in the revivalist sort of spirit. host: richard wolffe. let's go to faye in chicago, democratic caller. welcome. caller: thank you so much. i'm so glad to be on c-span. i've been trying forever. i'm so pleased that richard is on. i'm a little bit nervous. i can't believe that the

survivalists -- revivalists -- i'm not a revivalist. think -- i'm now a revivalist i think it was a natural progression because over the summer i wanted the health cre debate to be over because i got so sick of hearing susan collins, chuck grassley, olympia snowe just keep going over and over and over. i just wanted to get it done. want it to be so over. and now at this juncture, i'm more of a revivalist in the regards that i want to see more of the essence of what the president campaigns on. as a support ofer and tremdous supporter of -- as a support of the president, i want to see if he can get back to those principles and put that out there. i think we'll be better off. guest: that's a great point. think everyone wand health care over.

it was sort of like the pennsylvania primary. if they just did one more thing and just gave one more compromise, they'd reach their goal. but along the way every single compromise made it that much harder for them to cling ton what they stood for in the first place. it was one more deal after another deal with ben nelson in nebrka and louisiana with senator dran drew. -- landrieu. so it was a sort of desperate letterch to the finish line. en that killed people terms behalf it stood for about what they could talk about. you know, it's interesting, people wanting him toget back to the reform, changed spirit of 2008. i don't think it's just a question for democrats wanting to be more popular here. here's a guy who campaigned saying that he wasoing to approach these problems, these massive problems the country faces, in an honest and

grown-up way. when you come to tax cuts and the deficit, he's got an opportunity there to say if we're going to have an honest discussion for people on the left and the right, then we've goto deal withverythi. that's a real opportunity. one thing we all know, congress cannot actually deal with is a big debate in a grown-up way. look at how people reacted to the deficit pro polesals. social security, we can't touch that. he has an opportuny to say, come on, we've got to be real, honest and serious here. host: are there lessons learned that trying to work across party lines does not work for this white house? when you talk about their effort to try to bring some republans onboard, getting shut down, things not quite work out, what is the takeaway? does that still leave room for compromise in rking across the aisle? guest: it depends where you draw the line. they have worked extensively on the recovery act across party lines with republican governors. many of whom the vice president

pointed in and out my book, many of whom are going to be rung for president. -- rning for president. so when you see governor barber out there against the president's economic plans and policies, you've got to remember that they've also been very happy to take recovery act, the administration's money, the people's money through the administration -- they've been taking that money to prop up their own budget. which republicans are you reaching out for? and what do independents think out of all of this? there's some interesting polling that show independents and democrats in general want to see compromise, want to see people reaching out across party lines. republicans in general don't. that's a very interesting dynamic. so see where the president comes out. if he's just trying to reach out to republicans and congress, i think we've got ple evidence to say he's not going to get anywhere in the next couple of years. but if he's saying to independent voters, i'd like some republican ideas, i embrace them, can i work with republicans when they work with me, that's a very different

proposition. host: we'll cover the 2008 campaigns from the obama camp's perspective. he's with "newsweek" and an msnbc commentator. we're talkinabout his new book, "revival." let's hear from jeff, republican in florida. good morning. caller: good morning. please allow know make a few points here with this gentleman. first and foremost, sir, the hope and change that obama talked about was never really clearly defined. during that time it was all about just get rid of bush. many republicans felt the same way. so he really did not define specifically what it is that hope and change was. it was pretty much a fixation of individuals' imagination. the main issue dealing with this country at that time was the economy. it was almost like having a car that neded a paint job, maybe new tires and all of a sudden the motor falls out and blows up on the car. that's what folks wanted him to deal with motor that blew up which was the economy and the housing market at the time. now, the tarp and the bailout and all of those different

things were something that they did that does not impact the people. the stock market could be at 15,000, the average person that's not -- does not partake in that. yeah, maybe perhaps retirement. so the president has done a lot of different things. but all the things did he was not things that needed to be done at the time. thank you. host: a response? guest: it's an interesting point. the economy was the central point in the general election. that's true. but this president talked about a number of different things. health care, foreign policy. it was a very long campaign. you uldn't get by 21 months by just talking about hope and change. how does it affect real people that the financial market didn't, in fact, continue its collapse? well, you know, a lot of banks collapsing even more than they had then would he affected e real economy much, much more than we even thought. so you take the stock market the stock market doesn't direcy affect jobs, but it does affect everyone's 401k's,

everyone's employers because employers largely in the market in one way or another,whether they are listed themselves or e tradi listed kches. and the stock market has gone from a low of, what, 6,000, 7,000 in march of 2009 to about 11,000 now. that's a huge change. and it's a signal that confidence has come back at least in the financial market. if you don't have the financial market, if you don't have a financial sector, we don't have a functioning economy. so the expectations, quite rightly, are high in terms of where unemployment should come down. but in dealing with the economy, number one, he spent $800 billion on the recovery act that as i point out in "revival" is as much as president bush spent in iraq and afghanistan combined. fact that people think that it had no impact is it self, curious. it tells you how badly this white house, this president, this administration has spoken about its own record.

but you can't spend $800 billion and have nothing to show for it. there are teachers who have jobs. there's money that's gone into people's paychecks. again, come back to vice president biden who told me he's the guy who passed with selling the recovery act and managing it. he said people didn't know they were getting a tax cut. they thought they were getting a pay raise from their employer. if the vice president, the man tasked with selling this stuff says we did a terrible job of telling people what happened to this money, a third of that $800 billion was that tax cut that people didn't know where it was coming from, that's a giant mistake. host: can it be corrected? est: they've got two years. host: as far as p.r. is it too late to rewrite the public perception of the stimulus? guest: it is extremely hard. can you tell a story through repetition is in the clearest model for them is george bush in 2004. there were no weapons of mass destruction in iraq.

iraq was spiraling into a civil war. the economy was actually slowing down. and yet they won a big victory in 2004. as an incumbent president, admittedly they had a weak opponent. who knows what opponent the president will face in 2012. but through discipline, through repetitions, through comingp -- even in a disastrous situation that iraq was in 2004, a sitting president managed to barrel through it. not easy. not easy at all. but can it be done? he's got two years to talk about health care and the economy. it's not going to be any different. host: let's goto ty in kentucky, independent caller. good morning. caller: good morning. thanks for taking my call. the part that i have to make and a question that i have is what i see what happened with this election in 2010, was that it seemed to me the political ross yes, sir now is fought and won over the television now. and a lot of people are getting their information or misinformation from the shows,

the people who do not support the president or support the president whether he's right or wrong. and me as an independent voter, that's where i got turned off. i'm not someone who gets my information from the television. i believe in the old-fashioned political process of nonging on my door, how is i affecting my local neighborhood? i live very close to cincinnati, ohio, so that major city's policies breed right over to my city. so i'm very active in both states' elections. but wt i saw in the grassroots was what people needed and wanted. that's not what was presented through the media. so people who get their information solely from the media, they're not being informed properly. guest: that's why c-span's important. one thing again, back to 2004, people found that vorte contact, face-to-face contact, at the grassroots was really important.

that was the skill of the 2010 campaign. in 2010 they found that in states where they had a machine, democrats could actually help themselves. and many people in many districts didn't have that. so the dr-to-door direct information is a very effective way for campaigns to operate. host: ty was just talking about the power of the media, these new shows, cable shows. you're a commentator on msnbc. how much do you think about that as you go in to work at msnbc and talk on the shows? there is this idea that a couple of callers have brought up now that it's a very powerful medium. and the message really affects people's view points. guest: it is powerful. there's no question. i try and deal with it by rooting my analysis on what i say in reporting. so that's one way you deal with it, to try and ground things. rather than saying, u know what, we're just going to have a competition to sort of enrage and inflame people if it's a

race to the extremes, it's not helpful for anyone. it's not in keeping with what i want to do as a journalist or what i think these cable networks should be doing either. having said that, i think the real influence is what goes over your shoulder here. what happens there in terms of what they're watching. that has been the big shift. they are focusing much more on these cable shows, and those debate, rather than a sort of broader audience. rather than even newspapers or anything else. things people congress used to care about has shifted over time so if their competition is to appear on those shows, i think you see the whole public debate shifting to the extreme that are more sensation over the approach. that's what's shocking. the people that get on cable tv over there now are of the most extreme voices. they used to be the least flngsal. but because of that projection on tv, they're becoming more influential. so i don't know that that's helpful to anyone to debate.

host: let's hear from nelson, democratic caller in st. louis, missouri. caller: good morning. thanks for taking my call. host: you're welcome. caller: first, let me ask you, who really does create jobs in america? when you have a national election, they blamehe president. i've notice -- i've noticed in missouri people blame the democrats all the way down to the local politicianget blamed. another thing, john mccain had 58 million people vote for him where obama had 66 million i think the republicans did a better job of keeping their people engaged. i didn't hear a lot of people like yourself coming out over the last two years talking about some of the successes of the obama administration where you would see john mccain out almost every other month on those sunday tv shows. guest: i've been criticized for

a lot but being quiet is not one of them. you make a serious point. who creates jobs? it's clear, private employers create jobs. and one of the extraordinary things about this recovery is the big corporations are sitting on giant piles of cash. they're very cautious, still, about spending that money. i think this is a classic point in a recovery where there needs to be some extra confidence. that's why the stock market numbers are important, because there is a sign of confidence, of investors' confidence, and what these corporations are likely to do. if they see investors putting money in, the numbers going um, then they tend to feel freer about spending their own money. and how do they spend snn they buy equient and they hire people. this is not unusual given the scale of the collapse, the receion, and the length of a expected recovery. but presidents do get blamed for unemployment just as they

get disproportionate credit for low unemployment. that's just a fact of life. you can't vote out c.e.o. you can vote out politicians. it's very interesting looking at this mid-term election because, yes, people voted out democrats, but the republican standing has also been extremely low. people are unhappy with politics across the board. they're also unhappy with employers across the board. but they can't do much about that. hoststicking with the economy for a moment, the director of the white house economic council, you paint him as a very divisive figure in the white house. guest: yeah. byhe way, this is -- among my reporting of people in the economic team, the team that he was supposed to run. a very interesting dynamic there. he told the president, at least in his wn account when i interviewed him for "revival," he said i'm not a good manager, if you're lookinging for a good manager i'm not your guy. but i can run an honest policy process. well, he turned out to be a bad

manager. it's true. but he also, in the view of the people working with him, turned out not to run an honest policy process. he wanted the job as treasury secretary. but, again, according to rahm emanuel, who i interviewed several times for this book -- tim gehner, the current treasury secretary, played hardball. geithner said i've got a good job as the head of the new york federal reserve. if i don't get treasury serget, i'm staying in new york. -- secretary, i'm staying in new york. and they felt at that time at they really needed both of these guys, that it would be reassuring for the markets, send a good signal to have people with experience. remember, whatever the debate now, at the time nobody knew where the bottom was, how many banks would collapse. so having confidence in these two people was very important. so geithner gets the job that smors wants. smors has a job that's ill suited for. and the tensions between the

people on his steam extraordinary. the turf wars got so petty, so intense, that people couldn't function anymore. that did directly impact -- we talked about the communications, what stories they could tell. how can you tell people what your combheck policy is -- economic policy is if your economic team doesn't agree? they couldn't agree on the volcker rule to limit the activity of the wall seet firms because larry somers blocked it for one reason or another. he was deeply skeptical about lending to small businesses. he's been a roadblock along the way. and the fackshussness of that -- fractiousness of that debate has been remarkable it really does come down to the president, too. this was not a secret inside the white house it may have been a secret to the rest of us, but that's why i tell the

story in "revival." host: let's hear from the republican in san diego. caller: hello mr. wolffe. guest: hello. caller: how are you today? guest: i'm good, thankou. caller: i used to watch the fox news, but now i watch msnbc because fox news -- guest: congratulations. it's a good choice. caller: they distort the truth. guest: i agree. caller: my question is, why isn't the republican party getting onboard? they want -- [inaudible] the problem as i see, they say we're going to do this, that, this but when you come down to the last two years, they didn't do nothing. they're worrying about the election in 2012. people need jobs now. it's just like the three young guns. get in office and say we're

gointo do this, do this. all they want to do is say, no. no, no. guest: you know, it's going to be an interesting dynamic watching that play out. expectations are vee high -- very high, especially for the grassroots, the republican level, that they can stop the spending, stop tax raises, you know, bring down the president. and, of course, in the broader election, especially independent voters, are looking to them to do something about the economy. if it gets, as we all expect to gridlock position very quickly, we'll e how the enthusiasm shapes up. they're going to have to make compromises. one of the first votes they're going to have to take is on raising the debt ceiling. there are a lot of grassroots, tea party folks who want a no vote on that. a no vote on that would send this country into a tailspin in terms of the financial market because it would suggest this country will debate on its debt. you know that really would make the last crisis meltdown look

like the tea party. host: one last quick question. as you mentioned, you chronicle a pert in the whide between when scott brown won election, through the signing of the health care bill so -- and then the diss, as you call it, the moment of victory with the health care bill. rht now you've mentioned we're in another dip here. we're seeing the white house in another trying time. would what would be a sign t you that they are once again having a revival that the obama team is pulling back up? will it be getting legislation through congress, will it be polls among the american public? guest: polls don't mean a whole lot two years out from an election what really matters is can they reclaim that reformist spirit? and at this moment can the president do one of his signature moves, which is to call out the sort of political gimmicks? one of the ways he signaled he was a different kind of politician was to say to people through the election, you know, they want to talk about a gas

tax holiday, it's a gimmick. it's not really going to affect the cost 6 gasoline -- of gasoline very much. ople are not being honest with you or straight with you. i'm the kind of the grown-up in the room here. i'm the one in the middle against these extremes. he has an opportunity to do that now so let's see how well he positions himself, how well he tells his own stoy. if he's just another washington politician, i'm frayed we're going to have four -- after 2006, 2008, and 2009, 2012 looks like it's going to be the same kind of thing. people are going to want more change. if he is the incumbent president s >> the fcc reports with the growing popularity of wireless devices, demand for wireless spectrum will be over 30 times higher a few years from now. the assistant commerce secretary talks about his department's

plan to free up wireless spectrum and what happens if they fail. that is tonight on c-span2. here are some programs c-span is airing thursday starting at 10:00 a.m. eastern. jeff bridges talks about his work to reduce youth hundred. jane goodall on her love of nature and animals. chief justice john roberts in the role of the supreme court. later, lawyers discuss the impact of john paul stevens. former president bill clinton presents the liberty award metal to tony blair. thanksgiving day on c-span. the c-span networks. they provide coverage of politics, public affairs, nonfiction books, and american history. it is all available to you on television, radio, online, and on social media networking sites. find our common duty time to the c-span video library. we take sees been on the road with our digital bus and local content the vehicle. is washing your way, this c-span networks, now available in more

than 100 million homes. created by cable, provided as a public service. a look now at the faa's next generation program and how the new technologies keeping up with the increase in airline travel. also, advice to the flying public as we enter the busy holiday travel season. this is from today's "washington journal." host: michael huerta is the deputy administrator with the federal aviation a ministration. thank you for being with us. guest: thank you for having me. host: we want to hear about the next gen system. what is that? guest: it is the next generation of a system that will guide airplanes through the country. but we have been working on a radar system that was developed in the middle of the last century. what the next gen provides is satellite based, and that gives

us a much more precise pture of what is going on in the air space. that will greatly increase the efficiency of the system and reduce delays for travelers. host: is it already been put in place around the country? guest: yes it is. host: let's talk about where and how that has been in your judgment. guest: for the last 16 years we have had automatic dependent broadcast. this giv pilots and controllers a very precise vie of the area. there was first deployed in alaska where mountainous terrain did not lend itself well to radar coverage. also in new mexico. it has given us a very clear view of airspace. it has also been deployed in louisville and philadelphia and by 2013 it will be deployed nationwide. host: you talk about the technology and how just 15 years

ago gps was considered to be revolutionary an hour this, and for everyone to have them. has the faa kept up with technology? does it go in leaps? is it a study in incremental transition? or does it have to go in these big bounce? guest: it does have to go in these big bounce to a certain extent. we have a very high standard with respect to safety. it is not a system whe wcan try out new technology as it is coming into maturity. we need to be convinced that whatever we deployed in our system is mature technology and can maintain the high safety standard we have. in addition, it is a large and complex system. we need to consider not only how to deploy a given area, but howard interfacesith the existing systems that might be in place to ensure that w have

a seamless transition and we maintain high levels of safety. host: how old are these systems in place now? guest: it is a system of systems and it has been deployed over time. the radar technology has been around since theiddle of the last century. systems have been refreshed and they have been developed, but it is bas on an old technology platform. this is a quantum leap for us as we applied satellite technology. host: and as you said, b2013 we expect 1.4 billion gallons a fuel will be saved by increasing efficiency. guest: there are twondex -- imct of that. the cost to the system, but if you are earning less fuel,ou

are gripping reducing the garden for open trade -- greatly reducing the carn footprint. host: what is your advice to travelers this holiday season? guest: thanksgiving weekend is always the busiest of the entire year and is concentrated over a short period of time. my advic would be to get to the airport early and make sure you have familiarize yourself with the tsa web site and new screening guidelines. make sure that you pack appropriately and be a bit patient. it is a concent time but we want everyone to have a safe on thanksgiving. host: a boycott fdot ordaz -- a boycott of the imaging machines

is called for at 68 airports. guest: tsa has a very tough job, which is, how they balance the very real concerns we have in this country about security against the desire to allow travelers to move freely throughout the system? they're doing a great job in trying to find the appropriate balance. i would encourage a everyone to recognize that the screening methods they have put in place are designed to address the threatthat they have. we heard from president obama over the weekend. he is challenging everyone to look at ways that we can do it better. that we can make it less interested and that we can ensure the public in trouble to read -- freely throughout the system. -- can travel freely throughout the system. host: let's go to the phone lines. you are on with michael korda.

-- michael huerta. caller: obama has been trying very hard and he is doing great. i'm wondering, do the republicans have a plan? i'm not sure what is going on with that. host: are you speaking about faa issues in particular? caller: exactly, yes. host: is your question about what republicans would do differently than the president? caller: yes. guest: in both houses there is a great deal of concern and a great deal of interest in modernizing our traffic control stem. and at the same time, ensuring what we need to ensure a safe aviation system. host: jim, independent caller in maryland. could morning. caller: was an air traffic

controller for 36 years. i have been retired for 22. it was a long time ago. but i have two questions. one, i do not do much traveling, so all of this bruhaha about inspection really does not affect me. i think it is difficult to address. but this other thing about this new system with the satellite being the primary acquisition source of positioning and, probably, communication, but what is the redundancy factor? how do you back up the possible failure of a satellite, or

something like a tremendous solar flare incident? host: let's leave it there. guest: that is a really good question and one of the reasons we have been moving at this at a very deliberate pace. as i talked about earlier, we have a very high standard of safety that we need to hit. as we migrate to new technology, we need to make sure that we have the redundancies in place to make sure that the system can operate under any of a wide variety of things that could go wrong. we have all had experience with technology failures and what we need to ensure is that as we transition to any new technology platform, that it is appropriately backed up and redundant. host: michael in baltimore, md., the morning. caller: i have tw questions as well, but they are not very complex questions.

one, -- you might have answered this already. when you see us using cell phones on airplanes, if you see us using cell phones on airplanes it? and yet the thing is, you know how you have to have all of your ttle bottles of lotionn a astic bag and recently i did not have them in a plastic bag and it was rejected. they went through them and found that they were lotions and stuff and they took them and threw them away. but my question is, if i had them in a bag, what i have been able to keep it? help me understand how hiding it in a bag or not having it in a bag -- how having it in a bag or not having it in a bag made the flight safer. guest: you just need to check the tsa web site and see what the requirement is.

there may have been said that about the size of the bottles by you had. there are strict limits on liquids and gels that you can carry with you on a flight. just double check with the tsa web site and make sure that you handle it in the appropriate way. i have bad bottles thrown out as well. i know how truck -- how frustrating that is, particularly when you get to the other hand and you have to turnaround. just make sure that you follow all of the of corporate guidelines as defined by the tsa. on t question of the flight, there are concerns about -- by a lot of travelers that they would like to stay in touch. we have no plans to change any of that right now. in fact, a lot of the flyers enjoy the solitude the can be used on an airplane.

but in the near future, i would not plan on using your cell phone on a fght. st: let's go to a comment from twitter. guest: i think tsa does a good job of trying to keep their passengers with their baggage. something that is going on with screening might take something away from that. again, it is just a matter and when an and knowing what the tsa guidelines are and making sure that you are packing in a way that can insure efficient screening. host: michael kordhuerta

oversees the next gen traffic control modernization program, which is our topic today. let's go to pittsburgh, pa., keith on the independent line. caller: i have more of a statement that i have a question. ielieve travel is not a first amendment rightnd if people do not want to go through the scanners than they should not fly. guest: thank you. host: when you talk about the faa, what is the relationship between air-traffic control? what is the dynamic and hierarchy there? guest: the faa is unique among federal agencies because it has such a large operating unit to it. the largest partf our operation is air traffic

control, the network as well as the controllers that work day in and day out to ensure the skies are safe. it is a big part of what we do, but not the only thing we do. we are also a regulator of safety and we provide support around the country to ensure that airports have the resources they need to serve the flying public. it is a complex mission. i love being at the faa because it is so operationally focused. " day in and day out is different. host: john is calling from washington on the republicans line. caller: good morning. i have a question about the naked picture machine. i know that supposedly not what it is. the fourth amendment of the constitution supposedly protects us againstnreasonabl search and seizure without a warrant sworn under oath. no one has ever sworn in ward

underwrote about me for anything and i'm trying to figure out -- sworn a warrant under oath about me for anything and i'm trying to figure of why they are either taking pictures or groping all over my body. it is an unreasonable siege and server -- , search and seizure. host: it is the tsa making these roles, but what is the faa's relationship with the tsa? guest: tsa does have exclusive jurisdiction in deciding how security measures will be implemented across the aviation system. we are aware of what tsa decisions are and what our sponsors need to implement them throughout the country.

as the president said over the weekend, we understand that a lot of people are extremely frustrated and he has challenged the tsa and the department of homeland security to continue to find ways that would improve this screening experience for customers. host: let's hearrom his seat, democratic caller in ohio. good morning. caller: good morning. i think the president is doing a good job and he is trying hard. he has all lot on his plate. my question i what plans do republicans have to make a change? it is confusing for me. guest: we have had a great deal of bipartisan support for the aviation system and we will continue to work closely with

the democrats and repubcans. the president has been a great champion for transportation and the faa host: i thi messi manage to get on twice there this morning. honlet's go on to frank. caller: the searches and pat downs at the airport are unnecessary, at best. statistically, the chance of becoming a victim of a terrorist attack is equal to winning the lottery twice in a row. more people die from falling down stairs and then they do from terrorist attacks. their grievance -- the reasons given for

were they had to release film from 9/11, all of which it tears the government officials story apart. caller: we're talking about the faa and not so much the tsa. guest: they are both working hard to try to find the right balance between security. i know it has raised a lot of concern with people. we are hopeful that tsa will continue to evaluate and ensure we can keep the system safe and secure. let's go to scott in florida, republican, welcome.

caller: my question is with the nextran system. i'm actually a pilot and i think the next gen system is great. when are you going to have the ather aspect and the traffic activated with t system? or will that just go along of the same time. -- at the sameime. another question is, with the smaller airports, it seems that there is pressure to close them or reduce them, like in venice, fla., where they are trying to shut it down. what is the faa trying to do to prevent that? guest: first, in talking about the deployment of the next gen, but we are looking at a time table that goes through -- from now through 2025 and beyond. we were looking at a whole list

of recommendations working with the faa that identified a number of near-term improvements that can be made to the system between now and 2018. we have been working hard to try to -- is a balance of technologies across the whole system. earlier, i tked about the automatic independent surveillance system. our goal is to have that deployed by 2013. that will provide greater coverage across the entire system. as it relates to the weather, we are they have some ascts of the weather that we are taking advantage of that has provided pilots with much improved capacity throughout the entire system. there will be data, activities -- the ravi datacom activities. turning to general aviation,

general aviation is of great interest to the faand we want to do more to make sure that the general flier has the access to the system. the vast majority of the individual operations in our ertraffic system day in and day out are general aviation flyers. we need to make sure that the system can accommodate not only the needs of the commercial pilot but the general aviation community. we are trying to find ways to work with and a, a general aviation. it plays out in different ways -- to accommodate general aviation. it plays out in different ways and many of the decisions are local. host: what does next gen actually look like when it comes to parliament in pockets and what air traffic controllers see on their control boards? is there any change?

guest: there is. pilots in the cockpits, there are a couple of things they would see. adsb give tm a clear view in the cockpit and what is around them. the datacoms are also interesting. today, when profits and controllers exchange data, it is done by a voice. it is read out to a pilot and the private reads back. that takes time and that introduces the possibility of error. when y have it running through the system it remains the same and you have much more consistent and precise information. when you think about radar, what you are seeing is a system that is refreshing about every 10 to 12 seconds. you are seeing points of time through the system.

in the next gen world, what you are seeing is a real time look at the system. it is much more precise. it is a much sharper view of what is going on and that enables us to make the sysm more efficient. host: next call on the democrats line. hi, there. caller: my question is involving unmanned aerial vehicles. i was wondering if the next gen had anprivate uses for that or for business use, or if there are and the faa restrictions on its use. the will those be lifted or changed? guest: the whole idea of a manned aircraft -- an unmanned aircraft is something of intest to the faa. it is not specifically a nextran proposal, but the thing about --

a next gen proposal, but the concern about unmanned aircraft in the system is that when you are in a mixed environment of a manned and unmanned aircraft, that you continue to operate it safely. when you are in an unmanned aircraft, where you do not have is the ability to see and avoid from the cockpit. the pilot is at a moment -- a remote station. and there are concerns that have shown up throughout the system about latency, the delay between in putting commands and .he aircraft respondeing and also, if there is a loss of link. if you lose the aircraft, what will it be designed to do? we're working with the department of homelandecurity on the whole with the aircraft industry because we recognize that these are part of the aviation system in the future. we need to ensure that when they operate within the national

airspace system that they do so safely. host: tom in virginia beach, good morning. caller: you might be a political appointee, or did you come up through the ranks? and the second question, your comment about the tsa, i appreciate the fact that the tsa is involved in security. is there any time when the tsa says, wait a minute, you are coming out with an idea that is not practical for the general aviation side. what kindf input does the faa have regarding their inp -- their interaction with the tsa that way? guest: i have spent my entire career in transportation. i am a presidential appointee and was confirmed by the senate. but i worked with the department of transportation in the 1990's and ve been around the

transportation industry and aviation is a street for all of my career. as it relates to the tsa, yes, we have a close working relationship with the transportation of administration and we do talk about what is being planned. but again, it is their call as to what is necessary for the aviation system pose a safety and security. and we work with them carrying out that system. host: do they ever say that something is not going to be realistic for the pilots or the fleet? guest: we do talk with them about how all this plays itself out in a real-world situation. i think is a very good and very professional relationship that we he with them. host: monte writes on twitter --

guest: the icao is a an international organization that focuses on global aviation. we are very active members of icao and they just completed their assembly that takes place every three years in montreal. we talk about things like, what -- where is the industry going? and we talk about concerns that affect the global aviation industry, and what are the longer-term issues that we need to be concerned about, such as environment and continued erations othe system. it is a very close relationship that we have with icao. host: we are talking aut a news article that deals with holiday travel. does the faa work with the military to free up aspace?

guest: we do. host: how does that work? guest: human recognize it, but there are blocks of air space that are used for military training and so that the defense department can do their job. we have had an agreement with the defense department to open some of the airspace during peak travel times. there will be large segments of the military aerospace made available to the commercial system so that we can take more flights through the military airspace during the busy holiday period. that just gives us more options. at this time of year you can have whether that will develop in the aviation system. there are a lot more flights and people moving through the system. that gives -- it gives pilots more options and sohat delays are minimized and so that people

can get home and see their loved ones. host: this is carl from washington d.c. caller: you have been talking with the department of homeland curity and the department of defense on next gen. i'm wondering, how much are you working with the industry itself, like the airlines on this kind of work? guest: is very close work. i think earlier, i mentioned that we work with an industry task force last year to intify the industry's perspective on, as we roll out next gen, what are the things that we can do to ensure that industry is able to take advantage of the benefits of it. more rectly, we have formed a nextran advisory committee made up of industry stakeholders to advise the faa on what we call the business of next gen. what are the things that weeed to think about as we roll it out

nationwide? and how does the industry, the airlines, the other users of the system, how do they need to react, or what are they concerned about and would like to see us do as we move to this system? it is a close working relationship and sometimes, when you are in this consultative procses, it seems like they take longer, but you have a much better results at the end. host: in this article is written at the concept of nextran is sometimes like putting a man on the moon. is this fact -- that big of a moment for aviation in this country? guest: i think it is. it does not have the wowereit value -- it does not have the wow value of walter cronkite and the first man on the moon.

if you think about hamas we started with bonfires and then it moved to flights andur radar. now we are going to satellite navigation. it just opens up so much more in the way of the efficiency, ensuring that a safe system becomes even safer. there are so many benefits for improving the environment of footprint of aviation. there's a lot wrap up in next gen. we probably will not have one day when we flipped a switch and everything is wonderful. five, 10,5 years from now the aviation system is going t be very different from what you see today. host: do you see the future being overly dependent on technology and there is a risk that some of the aviators will lose their skill as far as the ability to judge and feel and guide the aircraft?

guest: some people talk about whether we are to technology dependent. the technology is a way of life for us. we are very dependent on technology in the average home. he have more computer technology in the average home than the early space missions probably to the advantage of. at the same time, we are ensuring that the aviators are well trained and have the skills necessary to operate within the system. we want to make sure that aviator not become so dependent upon the technology that the plane flies itself. ey still need to know how to fly the aircraft. we want to make sure that the training mechanisms are in place to make sure that they maintain those skills. host: the next question is from twitter. guest: the air traffic

controllers are the lion's share of our work force. i would not characterize it as a who has power. from our standpoint, maintaining a good cooperative relationship with the air traffic work force is extremely important. when you have highly motivated work force that work well with the agency, we work much better at ensuring a safe air traffic control system. in terms of the people that we hire, we coatroom a pretty rigorous selection process -- we go through a pretty rigorous selection process. we want to make sure that we have the very be peopleto carry out an extremely important function. host: the next caller is from boston, joseph. caller: what type of hardware will we be relying on for the next 30, 40, 100 years with the

system? guest: in terms of hardware and software, a lot of it is highly specialized for the traffic control system. a lot of the stuff that we use is very specific to the aviation system. we have a wide variety of vendors across the old technology spectrum. we want to insure that we are not completely dependent on any single vendor or any single technological platform, if you will. but we are using industry best practices and as much as possible, whenever the standard procedures are for the deployment of the system. we want to be sure that we have competition and a robust platform that can grow over the years. host: issues come up from human rights groups about being stuck on runways or a backup of flights.

you mention in ur recent speech that you have collaborated on projects and delays on the runway -- collaborated on push backs and delays on the runway. our target is to have six to 10 aircraft waiting on the runway for takeoff. when we have to fly a -- a flight in the other direction, there are fewer aircraft to move. is this part of the next gen project? guest: that was a project at kennedy airport in new york. the impetus for the project was that kennedy needed to do in -- a major construction on the so- called pay runway, one of the major runways in the airport. one of the challenges we have been working with the port authority and the airlines that operate from kennedy airport, as well as with our workforce was,

how do we manage this loss of capacity in the system? the combination of technogy and operational procedures where we put in place a reservation system, where airlines can manage in a real time, collaborative fashion, when they expect to push back, and if a specific slot can be assned. rather than taxing back -- taxiing back and waiting, peoe were able to know what time of their window was for the runway. you would expect a decrease in -- you would not expect a decrease in delays, but actually, delays were increased -- decreased. it was highly successful in canada has made it a standard of

operations there. host: is something you're likely to see with nextran? guest: oh, yes. the principles are not just technology, not just the black box, but what you can do on the technology -- on the example side. host: next call, go ahead. caller: why in the world aren't we take in more advantage -- taking morof vantage of the highly trained ex military that have basically been in this business? and the second question that i have is, when did the tsa become the transportation safety administration from the transportation security administration?

guest: the tsa was created following 9/11 by the department of homelandecurity. their function is the security of the aviation system. in terms of hiring at its military, a lot of the controllers that come into the aviation system are, in fact, the ex-military. i think there is a great relationshiphat we have. it is a place that they can to and you -- can continue to use their skill at that they obtained. it is fair to say that the faa looks to a pool of retiring military as a great place, to wire. host: when we talk about -- as a great place to hire. host: when we talk about next gen, what are we talking about as far as getting money to meet these goals?

guest: genscher, let's talk about authorization first. the faa, like any federal program, needs to be authorized by the congress every few years. we have been without a permanent authorization for quite awhile. we're on our 16th extension right now. that is a bit of a challenge because it does not provide a longer-term view of where the program is going ithe future. everyone is concerned about that, not only the faa, but industry and a lot of members of congress are concerned about what can be done. there is some talk about what might be able to be done during the lame-duck session. but we certainly hope so, but that remains to be seen. congress recognizes that making this investment now is a way to enter the system can operate more efficiently -- as a way to

ensure the system can operate more efficiently downward. -- down the road. we have had a lot of support. in our current fiscal year budget, something over a billion dollars is dedicated to the next gen program. but it is something that is very much needed and i think is a very good investment for the american taxpayer. host: you mentioned that the busiest travel days are coming up. guest: yes. host: what are the busiest days and how does the faa deal with that huge of a bump up in the travelling public? guest: the good news is the thanksgiving falls on the same day every year. it is always on the last

thursday of november. christmases on december 25 and new year's -- christmas is on december 25 and years is on the 31st. you can probably expect that thanksgiving day will be the busiest day of the year. itill pick up tomorrow and wednesday. wednesday will be a very busy day. thursday and friday, you should expect better airports will be crowded. people will be heading on to see family. make sure that you check the tsa web site to know that -- what the security procedures are. check with the faa.gov to see what any delays are. be patient and have a great time. thgs will slow down a little bit in december and then ramp up again for the second half of

december for the big holiday rush and the end of the year. the same rules apply. lets everyone show a little patience, but do what you need to do to ensure that you have a safe holiday with your family and friends. host: finally, what changes do you need to implement to deal with a bump up in holiday traffic? guest: we talked about the military airspace that gives us more flexibility throughout the system. but we are an operation 365 days a year. this is something that we plan for. we have all of the people in place to >> congress is out now for the thanksgiving break. when they return, they will deal with the ethics report on

the charles frankel. the ethics committee recommended censure. the senate is also well for the holiday. they are eected to continue on make it safety bill. both chambers scheduled to return next monday, november 29. you could watch the house live here on c-span, the senate on c- span2. this january marks the start of the 112th congress. many new faces in the freshman class, including john carney, from delaware. colorado republican scott tipton representing the third district of colorado. >> the fcc reports with a growing possibility of wireless

devices, the demand for wireless spectrum will be 30 times higher a few years from now. lawrence strickling talks about his department's rigid attempt to free up wireless spectrum and what will happen if they fail. hear the program ceased and is airing thursday starting at 10:00 a.m. eastern, jeff bridges talking about his work to reduce youth hunger, chief justice john roberts and the role of the supreme court, and lawyers discussing the retirement of john paul stevens. bill clinton presents the liberty award metal to tony blair. they skipping day on c-span. >> now british secretary kenneth clarke talked about the guantanamo bay civil litigation settlement involving british citizens. he also took questions from members of parliament. this is about 40 minutes. >> the statement from the

justice secretary. mr kenneth clarke. >> i like to make a statement. on the sixth of july, the prime minister tell the house that the legacy issues the government had inherited around the treatment of detainees held by other countries needed to be addressed. our reputation as a country that believes in human rights, justice, fairness, and the role of law otherwise risked being tarnished. there was also the risk of public confidence being eroded, with people doubting the ability of our security and intelligence agencies to protect us and questioning their rules under which they operate. the government is absolutely clear that national security and the protection of the rule of law go hand in hand. the prime minister has repeatedly made clear that this coalition government is unswerving in its opposition to torture or the ill treatment of prisoners or detainees. we do not condone it.

nor do we ask others to do it on our behalf. we recognize that our longer- term security interests require that we defend our values and the rule of law, and that any allegations that threaten those must be treated seriously. in tackling the challenges posed by those serious allegations, the government's overriding objective is to ensure that the security and intelligence agencies are able to focus on their vital task of protecting security and interests of the united kingdom, and that the serious allegations that threaten their reputation and that of our country are examined properly. the security of this nation is the first concern of any government. the security and intelligence agencies play an indictable part in ensuring our security, and the government is determined that they are free to do the vital job that we need them to do. in his statement, the prime minister so that a single authoritative inquiry was

required to investigate the serious allegations of the government's complicity in the treatment of detainees held by other countries. the right honorable sir peter gibson was appointed to head that independent inquiry. the prime minister also made clear that the inquiry could not begin while related police investigations were ongoing, and while so many of the guantanamo civil law suits brought against the government remained unsolved -- unresolved. to help to pave the way for the inquiry to begin, the government committed to entering into a process of mediation with those held by the united states in determination -- in detention in guantanamo bay who had brought civil actions against the government. i can today inform the house that the government has now agreed a mediated settlement of the civil damages claims brought by detainees held at guantanamo bay. the details of that settlement

have been made subject to a legally binding confidentiality agreement. they have been reported in confidence to the chairman of the intelligence and security committee of this house, and to the national audit office, and, i think, to the chair of the public accounts committee. no admissions of culpability have been made in settling those cases and nor have any of the claimants withdrawn their allegations. this is a mediated settlement. confidentiality is a very common feature of mediation processes, as in this case. confidentiality was agreed by both parties, subject to the necessary parliamentary accountability and legal requirements. i hope the house will understand that i am unable to comment further on the details of the settlement without breaching that confidentiality with the claimants. the alternative to any payments made was protracted and

extremely expensive litigation in an uncertain legal environment in which the government could not be certain that it would be able to defend apartments and the security and intelligence the agencies without compromising national security. the cost was estimated at approximately 30 million pounds to 50 million pounds over three to five years of litigation. in our view, there could of been no gibson inquiry until that litigation had been resolved. the government will become further statement to the house when the relevant police processes have been completing and the inquiry is in a position to begin its work. the mediated settlement actually represents a significant step forward in delivering the government's plan for resolution of these issues in the interest of both justice and national security. the settlement has the support of the head of the security service, the secret intelligence service, and the whitehall

departments involved. the security service and the s i s are issuing a public statement to that effect today. in his statement, the prime minister also announced plans for a green paper on the use of intelligence in judicial proceedings, which we hope to publish in the summer of 2011. it will examine mechanisms for the protection and disclosure of sensitive information in the full range of civil proceedings, inquests, and inquiries. we will also consider complementary options to modernize and reform existing standing intelligence oversight mechanisms. the government is engaging with relevant parliamentary bodies, key stakeholders, and our international partners in developing these proposals further. mr. speaker, today's announcement is a very important step forward, and we are getting closer to be able to get the important gibson inquiry into

all these allegations finally under way. >> thank you, mr. speaker. i thank the justice secretary for the advance sight of his statement and for our meeting earlier today. i welcome his decision this morning to make this oral statement to the house, rather their written statement originally planned. i would like to put on the record that at the outset, that up until november 20 to up to 2004, i was a senior partner at a law firm that acted for a number of the guantanamo bay detainees. does he agree that the statements as significant as this should be made first to the house before they appear in the media? willie therefore join me in raising concerns -- will he therefore join me in raising concerns that this extremely and up -- extremely important announcement was leaked to

television last night? on the substance of the statement, the house is united in its complete rejection of torture and mistreatment. the cause for the practice, collusion, or complicity in torture. torture is illegal, it is internationally banned, and no government will have anything to do with it. on this side of the house, we remain completely opposed to guantanamo bay. we took action in government to remove all of the british citizens and all but one resident from guantanamo, and my right honorable friend the member from south shields ensured that britain's government was the first to get all of her citizens out of guantanamo. what steps is the government taking to secure the release of the one remaining resident still in guantanamo, shaker aamer? i notice the member represents his family is in her place.

british security system -- britain's security systems are required to live up to the high standards while protecting our national security. they do an incredible job. their work is rarely ever recognized. they save lives and we should always remind us of that. we should also firmly on the cuban rights policy of our security services and be proud of their stance. at john sawyer -- as the head of the secret intelligence service said last month, if we know or believe action by us will lead to torture taking place, we're required by united kingdom and international law to avoid that action. it makes us strive all the harder to find different ways consistent with human rights, to get the outcome we want. to sustain the exact -- the excellent work of the intelligence agencies, and to ensure that the standards are met in practice, it is vital that whenever allegations are made, they're fully investigated. you will note the previous government began the process of

publishing the consolidated guidance given to our intelligence officers, which was finished earlier this year. it remains our view that all measures possible should be taken to satisfy ourselves, the public, and our allies that if any wrongdoing is alec -- is alleged, it is fully investigated, that any evidence is gathered and passed on, and that it is dealt with to conclusion. that is why the previous attorney-general referred two cases where concerns had been raised to the police for investigation, and that is why we look forward to the judge-led inquiry into allegations of complicity in torture now that the civil cases are settled. can the gentleman confirm that the police will be of a conclude their investigations before the judge-led inquiry begins? obviously the house is not been privy to the details of the settlements and the negotiations, but the honorable gentleman would know that there are legitimate questions about the settlements that the government has come to, that

means that these 16 cases will no longer be resolved individually in the courts. we understand that the government has had to consider this in the light of the ruling by the court of appeal in may. can the secretary of state confirm to the house that the settlement reached will not prejudge the inquiry or pass judgement on the actions of our security services in advance of a full investigation? could he tell the house whether the confidentially agreements prevent the secretary of state from telling the house and the public the sums of money involved in these settlements? if so, will he reconsider and agree with us that there is a public interest in knowing the total sum involved in this settlement? and will he commit to scrutiny of the settlements from the intelligence and security committee and the public accounts committee? he said, mr. speaker, that the claimants would be able to give evidence to the gibson inquiry. can he tell the house what investigations within the scope

of the inquiry will take place into the allegations in the specific cases? will the inquiry pass judgment on each individual case? can he say whether the scope of that inquiry has changed since the prime minister's statement to the house in july? finally, can he also tell the house whether any other cases remain unsettled, and if what decisions has been taken on their effect on the inquiry? it is important that the inquiry can be thorough and have full access as a court with had to the documents. can he confirm that the gibson inquiry will have access to all the same impression that has been or would be available to the courts? everyone will appreciate the need to ensure that britain's security is not compromised and of course that will be reflected in the way that this inquiry operates. however, it is important, as the allegations are comprehensively

addressed, that the public have confidence in the process and its outcome. there is no place for the torture or the mistreatment of detainees. >> mr. speaker, i, too, regret the leak. i am having a bad week for leaks. i said this -- i made a statement yesterday that had been leaked by someone at the weekend, and last i was at dinner when i was told that television had the details of the statement. i'll do my best to ensure that there are no leaks of this kind in the future. we are continuing to press the americans for his release. we're trying to ensure his release and we are in constant contact with them. so far as the other questions are concerned, the determination of this government, as soon as we took office, has been to draw a line under these cases and move on in the light of the policy which he supported, and which all parts of the house agreed. this country is against torture. this country has a high-quality

security and intelligence service. we wish to make it quite clear that it is not complacent and must not be complacent in the torture or ill treatment of detainees, so the sooner we resolve these doubts and enable it to get on to its proper job of intelligence, the better. we were bogged down in litigation and complaints which were slowly going not know where they could have taken years to resolve, because of all the difficulties about the admissibility of the evidence and the hearing of evidence in public. for that reason, we of sought to put a line under this. we published the guidance on treatment of detainees. as he said, that is the first- ever pick taken. we have now resolved these issues in a way which enables us to move on. we still have to wait for the police inquiry, to which he referred to. no minister or anyone else can intervene and start instructing the police on how to conduct these inquiries.

we cannot get the gibson inquiry under way until the police inquiries have been resolved. i do not know how will take -- i do not know how long it will take, i hope it will not take too long, but that is a matter for the police. if those inquiries lead to prosecutions, we will have to wait for the resolutions of those prosecutions. if they lead to no prosecutions, we really will be clear to get on to the inquiry that lies beyond. the settlement, which involves no concession of liability or withdrawal of allegations, does not prejudge the gibson inquiry in any way. it will be entirely for sir peter and his colleagues to decide on the inquiry once its terms of reference have finally been settled. we see it looking at the problem in general, of course looking at the history, and deciding whether there were problems are not and whether there lessons to learn, as well as making inquiries about how we might ensure that the standards that the whole house would want to a

halt -- uphold are put beyond doubt for the future. we and not altered the scope of the inquiry since the prime minister made his statement, and we expect it to have access to a very wide range of information -- indeed, all the information that it could reasonably expect. the problem with the courts is either they cannot have access to a lot of information because of all the security problems, or they cannot share it with the complete tents and the public. as far as i'm aware, the settlements cover all the british citizens and residents making complaints from guantanamo bay. we are not aware of any other cases that could be raised on all fours with this. with the actual settlement that we reach, it saved us money and more importantly time. it stopped the intelligence service spending man-hours on sifting through evidence and coping with litigation, and make it able to move on, but it is

absolutely confidential. it is legally confidential and could be reopened if either side broke that confidentiality, so i am afraid i am not able to tell the precise sums of money involved. but the gain that has been achieved by managing to mediate these claims is very considerable and in the national interest. >> order. there is much interest in the subject, and immediately afterwards we have a 10 minute rule motion followed by the first day in committee of a very important constitutional bill. therefore there is a premium on brevity from backbench and front bench of life. >> having been a member of the intelligence and security committee for the past five years, i reached the uncomfortable conclusion that if there is to not to be a total breakdown in the intelligence- sharing relationship with united states, he has reached the right conclusion. however, does he agree that he must now find a way of conducting such litigation without compromising national security? has it considered expanding the

scope of the green paper from civil cases to criminal cases? >> i am grateful to my honorable friend for his sensible proposition. the same issues arise, and i will certainly bear his secession of. the problem crops up over and over again. we currently have an inquest into the highly important matter of the explosions on july 7, to extend itself into an inquiry into the activities of the intelligence services in informing themselves about possible risks to security throughout the country. holy forcibly, it has run crash into the problem of exactly what evidence is supposed to be adduced about that in public. i have no idea -- it is for lady justice hallett to resolve -- how we move on that particular case. the green paper will be difficult.

it will be difficult to reach clear conclusions, but we wish to do so as quickly as possible and the purpose of the green paper is to address the problem so that we can be sure that justice is done without compromising a social security. at the moment there is a tendency for claimants, the security service, and everyone else to get bogged down in interminable litigation and judicial review. that has to be resolved. >> jack straw. >> i welcome the statement and, of my right honorable friend. picking up on the remarks from the chairman of the foreign affairs committee, may and has the right honorable gentleman whether it is possible for sir peter gibson, who has great judicial experience, to feed into the important work on the green paper on the use of intelligence in judicial proceedings? >> sir peter gibson has indeed been the intelligence services commissioner, and still is, although he will probably have to give that up when he takes on this inquiry. he wishes to give his views, i am sure they would be welcome,

because as the right honorable gentleman knows, is a very considerable expert on the subject. >> is a reasonable assumption that the uk government would not agree to a mediated settlement if there was no evidence what up -- whatsoever of uk involvement in any illegal act? >> the settlement is not to be taken in any admission of liability, as it were. it wasot in the interest of either party to get them stuck into civil litigation with a wholly unforeseeable outcome. as i have already said, it could have taken years and could have cost tens of millions of pounds. its resolution was holding up the wish of the prime minister and the government to get on with sorting out these allegations and having a proper inquiry into them. it has cost us quite a bit of money to mediate them, because the complainants were pressing

their claims. obviously it is a very difficult and unusual situation, but it was right to do in the public interest to pay the money. the idea that we should carry on arguing for the next five or six years -- it could have taken that long -- and find ourselves in a pale reflection of the south of -- saville inquiry running on and on would not done anyone any good at all, so we paid the money so that we can move on. i think we have saved public money by not continuing to contest the claims. >> david miliband. >> i think they will be natural concern on both sides of the house about government payments of compensation when culpability has not been admitted. it is important to welcome the statement today. i also welcome his repetition, word for word of my memory serves me right, of the previous government's position on torture and other cruel and inhuman treatment. may i bring it back to the

subject of the police inquiry in the gibson inquiry? like him, i hope for a speedy conclusion to these inquiries so that -- to the police inquiries so that the gibson inquiry can get on with its work and bring some facts to a debate that often sadly lacks them. would it be possible for sir peter gibson and his team to start work now, even if their public and other work cannot get going yet? it would be a pity if the police inquiries were to drag on for many more months, delaying bringing clarity to this area. >> i share the right honorable gentleman's statement of his country's by uses far as torture and i share his impatience to see the impact -- the gibson inquiry get under way. but we cannot have the inquiry proceeding in parallel with either civil or criminal proceedings on part of the same subject. for that reason, we must make it clear that both will have to be resolved before we can proceed. for sir peter to start, and if

there were a prosecution arising from the police inquiries, a criminal trial might be running in parallel to the inquiry. that would not be possible. we shall wait to see what the police decide, and the moment it is resolved, sir peter will be able to begin his work. >> without protesting -- without prejudicing any of the backs of this case, can my right honorable friend confirm that any act of torture, or conspiracy to commit acts of torture by uk citizen anywhere in the world will be a criminal offense, and that, as a matter of public policy, any evidence obtained by torture will always be inadmissible in uk courts? >> yes, i can give a straightforward, positive answer to both those questions. yes, that is undoubtedly the case. my honorable friend has accurately stated the position. >> i thank the justice secretary for the advance notice of the

statement. given the need to preserve confidentiality in relation to the settlement, how long does he think that that confidentiality would be preserved, bearing in mind the two serious leaks from his department this week? >> exactly the same thoughts have crossed my mind, but i am bound by the confidentiality agreement and i must hope that everyone will abide by their legal obligations. however i share his uncertainty. >> might ask the secretary of state, might it be appropriate for us to recover the cost of compensations from those individuals who are responsible, in particular the former labour prime minister, tony blair, who is made tens of millions of pounds since leaving this house? >> the cost of been incurred in civil litigation between the detainees and the government's, and we have settled it. i do not think that would be proper. i do not agree with his

suggestion, and i do not think there is the slightest claim against the previous prime minister. will the secretary of state accept that many people will find this a very difficult and bitter pill to swallow? will the confirm, if our intelligence relationship with united states were to break down, which was a real possibility, that would imperil the lives of many, many citizens of this country? >> i agree, mr. speaker, that the government's relationship with the united states and the close relationship between our intelligence services with the united states make a very vital part -- contribution to our protection of the security of this country and the lives of individuals here. it must not be jeopardized. >> dr. judy -- julian lewis. >> does the secretary of state agree that it would be wrong to infer from the fact that there is a confidential the agreement

-- confidentiality agreements about the substantial sums paid to these individuals rules that the confidential it to you agreement was imposed at the behest of one side rather than the other? >> the other side. confidentiality, i am assured. it is not at all unusual, when mediating an action of this kind, for both sides to agree that they wish to have confidentiality. my honorable friend is quite right. there is no point in trying to read into this that either side has recital. -- resiled. anyone who has been involved in any kind of civil litigation on a less serious matter will know that a party that has been busily protesting its side of the argument can be a qualified to stop running up costs, to stop wasting management time, to make a reasonable offer and to get out of it.

>> leaving aside the cheap political point made by the honorable member a moment ago, let me tell the secretary that i find it difficult to understand, as will many people, how compensation could be paid unless there was substantial substance to the allegations made by those who claim that they were transferred illegally and tortured abroad. is it not the lesson quite clear that a state like ours, based on the rule of law, must ensure that all its officials observe the rule of law, and not -- and not be complicity in any way with agents abroad who carry out torture? >> is not unusual in many walks of life for settlement to be reached with neither party making any concessions on their arguments, both people agreeing that the settlements is a

sensible way of reaching a compromise in the dispute without going further. having said that, i agree with statement of principle in the second part of the question. this government is opposed to torture. torture is a serious criminal offense. we are opposed to the ill treatment of detainees and prisoners in any circumstances. we will not condone it, and we will not be complicity in it. does the essential values that we have to depend even when we face such dangers as we do now from terrorism in the world. >> jane ellison. >> i welcome my right honorable friend statement. further to his comments about shaker aamer, does he agree that if we rhetorically -- achieve closure of the next few years, it is important that a murder is released to this country so that he can give evidence to the torture inquiry in person? -- that aamer is released to this country so that he can give evidence to the torture inquiry in person? >> yes, i do agree.

i know that there are many people who feel very strongly about his release. we continue to be in contact with in other states and we hope that he will be released and returned to this country. i agree with her and we're doing our best. >> is the secretary of state comfortable that in the weeks that he is announcing big cuts in the legal aid budget, millions of pounds are being paid out. should we not be making sure that if those who receive the money themselves breach the confidentiality agreement, or their lawyers do, that that money is taken back from them? >> that might involve reopening the settlement which i would not be willing to do. what has to be careful about confidentiality because in principle, the settlement could be reopened. there are quite a lot of aspects to this, with which everyone is uncomfortable. and some people will strongly dislike. we have to keep our eye on the ball and decide what is truly in the national interest. what is truly in the national

interest is allowing the intelligence services to get on with their job, allowing us to put the reputation of this country beyond doubt, and learned any lessons that have to be learned -- we do not know yet -- from anything that sir peter gibson puts forward. as for the legal aid proposals, we so that legal aid would still be available on a means-based -- means-tested basis, to anyone who still wish to challenge the state by way of judicial review. other claims would have to involve exceptional public interest. >> can i welcome the statement of the speaker and signs are that we did not do more to speak out against guantanamo bay and everything it stands for. the creation of the term "enemy combatants" allowed the nation, indeed the world, to ignore the geneva conventions. my i ask him to turn to the issue of compensation for british victims of terrorism overseas? those caught up in the 7-7 bombings were adequately supported and compensated, but as soon as such an event takes

of place abroad,. as for whatever wetherbee and buy or other places. that is simply wrong and it needs to be changed. >> i know my honorable friends continuing interest in the subject. we are as part of our policy considerations in the light of public spending reviews, having a look at the criminal injuries compensation system and the proposed terrorist injury compensation system and deciding how we should judge the government's responsibilities for compensating those who have been injured by crime, either at home -- we have always -- either a home or abroad. i know my honorable friend has been campaigning for that. >> a google i wrote on behalf of the home affairs committee to the previous attorney-general, asking about the police inquiries, and i see that he is surrounded by law officers today. paul not seeking to influence or instruct the police, which would

be totally improper, surely it is in everyone's interest that we know that there is a timetable. what is holding up this inquiry which has gone on for several years? >> am sure if the police follow these exchanges, they will note the impatience of the honorable member that we move on in their resolution to inquiries which have been going on for about 15 to 18 months. he knows because he is as good a lawyer as anyone else involved in these discussions, that it would be quite improper for anyone to approach the police and put pressure on them to put in a timetable or press them one way or the other. >> henry smith. >> i very much welcome the gibson inquiry, and i also that this is announced -- that this is necessary for the sake of our national security, but will he not acknowledge the concern expressed by many that those non-prison citizens, the

settlement has been paid using british taxpayer money for foreign nationals detained in a foreign country by a foreign government? >> the cases involve british nationals or british residents. although there is one where that is a slightly doubtful statement, but it already got under way before we came into office, and the jurisdiction had been accepted. 12 cases are already before the kick court, and four would come before the court if we not proceeded. we've not started compensating people at large for what happened in guantanamo bay. we've only dealt with british residents and british citizens. >> dennis skinner. >> have i got this right? is he paying out large sums of money, and not telling us how much, to people who are giving no guarantees about breaking confidentiality? can it be true that he cannot

say to the house at all that this matter has ended? is nt buying time? it sounds like money for old rope. the other week, they were giving prisoners votes. now they are giving them lottery millions. i think we have found the up soft underbelly of this government already. >> in answer to the honorable gentleman's question, he is not right. the confidentiality is binding on both sides. and the people who brought the claims have bound themselves by confidentiality, and so has the government. it is a perfectly usual term of a mediated settlement the well was born to be a hugely expensive problem for the british taxpayer if it had not been resolved. >> el welcome the statement. the mediation is designed to address the potential cost of litigation arising from the guantanamo cases and an estimated to be around 30

million pounds and 50 million pounds. the inquiry is wider than that and will deal with non- guantanamo cases where individuals have been detained in other countries. what is the estimated cost of the potential litigation in those cases? >> the gibson inquiry does have wide terms of reference, i agree, although that has to be settled. it is looking at the whole question of the ill treatment of detainees generally, though of course, usually in cases where there is british involvement, such as where our allies have been involved or where we have been engaged. friend takes a great interest in these allegations in his age is that rendition be excluded. i cannot give an estimate of the cost. we're ages that there should be a reasonable time scale, and so is sir peter. we do not want this to go on forever. it will take such evidence as it feels fit and go as wide as necessary to guide future

british policy. beyond that i cannot go, because in the end this will be a matter for sir peter and his two colleagues on the panel. >> we know that the settlement was under 30 million pounds because doubt was the minimum cost of the alternative. i do not understand and i'm not all lawyer, most british people are not, why the government took the view in making this settlement that it wanted to keep the sum of money involved a secret from the british people. why was that the government's position in this case? >> it was negotiated and the other side wanted confidentiality, and it was settled on the basis of confidentiality, subject to parliamentary accountability. i understand the honorable gentleman and with great respect i anticipated his questions, as they will incur to quite a lot of people. we could settle this on the basis of confidential elegy and we have done so. we have notified the national audit office, we of offered a

briefing to the chairman of the public accounts committee, and we have briefed the chairman of the intelligence select committee, but we would be folly to break the legal confidentiality, part of the settlement, if the result is to jeopardize the settlement and put us back where we started. >> i am sorry to strike a discordant note, but ordinary decent people out there are quick to think that the world is gone mad. we've got people making wild, unsubstantiated, and baseless allegations of torture getting more money than victims of terrorism here in london. what people want to hear from the secretary of state, if it is the law that forced it to do this, they want reassurances that he will accelerate proposals to change a lot and ensure that we never have the of -- any of this nonsense ever again. >> it is the rule of law, i'm afraid, mr. speaker. the honorable judge -- the honorable gentleman is

prejudging the claims that were being fought out before the courts. the claims were for compensation for serious problems that these detainees had suffered -- i met them. the argument was about the complicity of the british security sisler -- british security services, which was not and is not admitted. they were bringing a legal action. it might be that had this been fought to a conclusion, the court had come -- might have come to the honorable gentleman's conclusion that these claims were baseless -- baseless, but we are never going to discover that now because we have settled this. we did so as it was not worth discovering, because the bigger public interest was to make sure that we could put a line under all this, getting back to having the reputation of our intelligence services restored and getting sir peter gibson to it buys on how to make sure that the reputation remains impact -- remains intact in future. >> will my friend assure me that

if these allegations were wild and unsubstantiated, as has just been suggested, the government would not have been keen to settle these cases? >> i think that in all forms of litigation it is wrong to start reading whether a settlement made with no admissions on one side and no withdrawal of allegations on the other indicates which side was winning -- it does not necessarily. these t sides were locked in litigation which was going nowhere fast because of the very difficult legal problem of what evidence can be admitted and whether that evidence should be admitted publicly. if you want, you can read into that one side was admitting it or that the other side was producing frivolous statements and got away with murder. the court was entertaining these claims. 12 civil actions were under way. but think everyone understands from the most extraordinary circumstances of this case that it was better to settle it than just let it go on to see who eventually won.

no one should read into this admissions of liability and no one should read into this that one side packed up their claims. we just agreed to come to a very sensible mediated settlement. >> can we demonstrate that we of learnt the lessons of the damage done to our reputation by the protracted nature of these investigations by guaranteeing that when fresh allegations are made of bad behavior, such as the 21 cases cited by the garden following freedom of information requests, but those present and future allegations will be investigated swiftly and thoroughly? >> that is why we need the green paper, to try to establish some rules on the admissibility of intelligence evidence or evidence that may be of relevance to national security. and i said, in answer to an earlier question, it is cropping up with ever more frequency and we just need to resolve i