[captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] host: good morning, and welcome to "washington journal" this monday morning, december 6, 2010. congress continues hashing out a deal over extending the bush era tax cuts. this week may show just how much work accomplished on the lame- duck session. in addition to deciding what to do about the tax cut, expired unemployment benefits. and issues including the start treaty, don't ask, don't tell, and a dream after it yesterday republicans said they are willing to extend the fix for the long-term unemployed as part of a deal to also extend the tax cuts temporarily. our question for you this morning is whether or not that would be a good compromise. unemployment benefits extended for a temporary tax cut extensions. the numbers to call --

we will read also some your comments later on. but this look at "the wall street journal" reporting on this proposed deal.

our question for you this morning, do you think this would make a good compromise? something being considered here during the lame-duck. it would not extend a tax cut permanently. it would be a temporary move, perhaps two years. continuing on to the discussions and deliberations that are going on, "the wall street journal" says --

what do you think about this proposal? let's hear from mike on the democrats' line from apple valley. caller: i think john boehner said when he signed the bill years ago that it was going to end december 31, 2010. now he is reneging on it and blaming the democrats for anything. i don't like that. but, that is how they are any way. they are multimillionaires. they don't care. agee -- host: compromise, or do you say no? caller: i don't think it should be. the rich have made the most in the last 50 or 20 years and the middle-class and poor and the working people are losing money

constantly. taxes, taxes. all they are doing is making more money. just like barrel -- $303 million and now he is saying, no? host: let's take a look at a story coming to us from "the new york post." mitch mcconnell saying it is pretty clear that taxes are not going up on anybody in the middle of this recession. with a different point of view, senator dick durbin spoke yesterday on one of the sunday talk shows. let us take a listen. >> if you get the unemployment benefits, will you be willing to go along with extended these tax breaks for the upper income people, because it sounds like that is what is going to take. >> we are moving in that direction, only against my judgment and my own particular view of things. it appears that the republican position is -- and it has been consistent, i will say it for

them -- we saw yesterday in the senate, we have to continue the bush economic policies and the bush economic policies of tax cuts for the wealthiest individuals have led us into this recession, cost us 15 million jobs, have utterly failed. you can't point to those policies as successful. h. deede >> the you sound like you will vote for it because there is no other way to get this done. it would these tax cuts be temporary for everybody or would it be something permanent? >> i am not voting for any permanent tax cut for people in the highest income tax -- categories. i don't speak for anyone else, but when it comes to the president's position and democrats in congress, we are laser focus on the jobs issue. host: democratic senator dick durbin is speaking on "face the nation." let us take a look at paul krugman's take on some of the negotiating going on in washington right now. his story is called -- "let's not make a deal."

as far as the deal goes, he

writes -- let's go to cleveland, ohio, where herald joins us. do you think this is a good proposal? caller: i think it is a great idea. compromise is great because we have 9.6, 9.8 unemployment rate and you don't want to raise taxes, especially on businesses, at this point in time because they will not have incentive to expand or hire new people. but the last caller, you always hear liberals talk about the rich or people moving jobs overseas. there is nothing wrong with being rich, nothing wrong with being successful in this country. they are essentially hypocritical because they are the first one who complained

about jobs going overseas, but they are leaving wal-mart and k mart with a shopping cart full of stuff from taiwan and china and then they call c-span and complain. it makes no sense. we have a $40 trillion gdp but close to $14 trillion debt -- 14 trillion dollar gdp. how much is it enough for the people of washington? it makes no sense. host: let's go to jail in san diego, independent line. caller: when they started this, but promised they were going to stop it in 10 years. what is the deal? now that it is time to stop it, they don't want to stop it. they said know that -- for everything barack obama wanted to go. people out here need the money. not the reach money. they don't need the money. they have extra houses. i knew beryl issa when i was a kid and he was a car thief and sandia, a smart one.

he did not do it to make money but he did it for thrills. then he invented lo jack, smart guy. now you can still guide -- cars without getting caught. i think all the people who have millions and millions of dollars to represent us have not got a clue what is going on with us on the streets. host: paul krugman writes that america cannot afford to make these tax cut permanent. on to joe on the democrats' line in louisiana. caller: good morning. how are you today? a couple of comments to make. as far as the tax cuts. i would say absolutely not. and the president needs to

understand that every time he sticks his hand out, all of branch, they have it off and now the only thing that is wrong in this country is no one wants to pay taxes. let us go to a flat tax and then we could get something done. on top of that is if we really wanted to be a common sense -- a deal, let's make a deal with the republicans that they will permanently finance unemployment and put all of those millions of dollars from iraq and afghanistan into social security to get those two things solvent. it would take care of two things. the people unemployed will always have an income coming in so they can find jobs, and, two, the money that is going out of the country will go into social security for the people in that age where they really need that money. not talking about a whole lot of money to start with. let's go to a flat tax, everybody will pay a flat tax

and i guarantee the budget will disappear as far as your deficit and the budget will be a big fat treasury. host: let's take a listen to comments that senator mitch mcconnell, leader of the republican minority, made over the weekend on "meet the press." >> we had more conversations among last two weeks than in the last two years. i think it is a good sign, route 1 awareness -- that the power will be more symmetrical in the next congress and i am optimistic. >> what might the deal look like? >> i am not going to negotiate it here this morning, but at the you are familiar with all of the issues. the big issues on the public mind is whether or not we are going to raise taxes on anybody in the middle of a recession. it is almost laughable that we were in the session yesterday. it reminded me of the movie "brown hold de" where we do the same thing over and --

"groundhog day" where we did the same thing over and over again. here we are at the end of the year. i think it is pretty clear taxes are not going up on anybody in the middle of this recession. we are discussing how long we should maintain the current tax rates. and there are other issues that many people feel are important to address. >> how long of an extension could you agree to? there is a lot of talk of it being temporary. >> i don't want to frustrate new but i am not going to negotiate it here on the show this morning. >> temporary is something you could live with? >> i would prefer to do it permanently. you and i have discussed that on earlier shows. i think the current tax rate is appropriate for our country. it has been in place for 10 years. obviously the president will not sign a permanent extension of . e current tax rate i would like one as long as possible. host: republican minority leader

senator mitch mcconnell speaking yesterday on "meet the press." let's go to gettysburg, pennsylvania. phil on the independent line. do you think this is a good potential compromise? caller: our country is being hijacked by the new religion, political party. people referred this a bush tax cut to attach and all presidents name to it to demonize and another saying it is class warfare. nobody is talking about what is really happening. to the country and caring about the people but they are caring about the big political power shift that just occurs in congress and we are all pawns in this game of who will be the next president. host: chris writes to us on twitter. it is it --

republican color from alabama. caller: how are you today? host: what is your name? caller: victor. i think it is a decent compromise. as some callers stated before it is the definition of the wealthy. you define over and over again that these tax cuts are for the millionaires and billionaires yet $250,000 in certain parts of the country actually would be that of two professional college professors, for example. i am a physician. i went to school for about 14 years. after school i worked 80-plus hours a week. i are in the high -- i am in the higher income bracket. i am pleased to pay taxes and support the country but at what point do you would respond to the loading for the people spending the money rather than the people who are working hard and making the money and pay their taxes and trying to be fair about it? host: you mentioned your

concerns about bumping back up the tax rate for families making more than $250,000. democrats proposed on saturday to only raise it, let the tax cut expire for those making more than a million dollars. that was shot down by republicans. what do you think about that? caller: again, at some point it is dependent upon where you are in the rank-and-file. part of the problem is that i did not really think anybody should be taxed beyond what we are taxed at the rate currently. for example, for me to make $250,000 it theoretically, and then say it is ok to attack somebody who makes a million just because i am in the lower income level than they on, is somewhat hypocritical. i think at some point we have to get to the bottom of the problem and that is the spending. i don't need somebody else to spend my money and more and more of it every year. i and one of those guys who has four children. i chose to have a large family, i have my own retirement plan, i

pay my own insurance, a pay for my kids college funds. i am putting forth a lot of money. fortunately god has blessed me to make a fair amount of money. but again, at what point do you beat on the maine and other people like me who have chosen to go the courts or who have been blessed to have had the opportunity to go the course of many years of education and a decent income level to tax, tax, tax, and again beat on me because i am a wealthy, hard- working guy. at some point we have to get to the spending and do it in a manner that is fair. the gentleman who talked about a flat tax, not a bad idea. however, again, we need not to encourage people not to work by the handouts that we tend to feel free to give but encourage people to go to work and encourage people who can hire people to pay for those things. host: thank you for your call. let's talk a little bit more about what is actually in a potential compromise being

negotiated right now, from "the wall street journal."

the delay could also delay other goals of the senate does not have time to debate them -- allentown, pennsylvania, tony, democratic caller. caller: i am opposed to the temporary -- i am a little bit nervous. i have not been to active on calling. i believe that the people who have the means to pay more taxes should. i think they have gotten many benefits over the last 10 years, and it was supposed to help with increasing jobs so that people could become employed.

this has not happened. so, to give an additional tax increase -- tax decrease, or, you know, to give them more money, how much does one person need? how many homes and other possessions does one family meet? host: victor called early and mentioned that people " are better educated, in his opinion, invested their time and effort and earn more money should be able to hang on to that. here is an article jiggly -- "jobless rate rises among educated." atlantic beach, new york, joe is on our independent line. caller: so many things here.

i thought this was supposed to be about jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs. nobody is talking about jobs. taxes go up each and every day, each and every week, school tax, property tax, water tax, cigarette, liquor, sugar tax. they are taxing everything. it just never goes down. it is a permanent increase, it always goes up. my fear is that if you gave this government overnight we found $100 trillion and handed it to them, and three months they would be in a deficit. they know nothing but spend, spend, spend, take, take, take, waste, waste, and we have to find a way to rein this government in and have less control of our lives and our money. let's get back to jobs. host: are question for you this morning is the potential tax cut deal, extension of the bush era tax cuts across all brackets for a couple of years and as another

part of that, the flip side, extension of the unemployment benefit. you think it was a potentially good compromise? on twitter, dennis rights -- writes -- christine rights by e-mail -- writes by e-mail -- cristi does not want to see either extended, either that tax cuts for those making over a million dollars or the long term unemployment benefits. maryland, john on our republican line. caller: how are you? the last time republicans compromise they took a shellacking two years ago and learned a lesson. you have a caller who had it backwards when he said some big about extending the olive branch.

this is what the republicans did -- it used as a tool against us to say, oh, look, we are extending the deficit. here's the thing with the deficit. apparently they have taking -- taken the talking points for bush reneging on the promise of ending it. but nancy pelosi, when she took office, what did she say? no more deficit spending. $5 trillion since she took office. it is all about spending. it is all about class warfare. they led us into this mess and now they want to kill the private sector by taking money from the rich. assuming they can get the money from the uber wealthy. it is not going to happen. it is their plan to destroy the economy of the usa. thank you very much. host: from "the wall street journal," looking at how long the extension of the tax cuts could last in the negotiating process. a senior republican aide close

to the negotiations saying it 1- year extension of tax cut is unlikely. the comments from twitter -- let's hear from cookie who is a democratic caller from indiana. good morning. caller: thanks, again, for your service. we love you out here. i learned so much. host: what do you think about this potential deal? caller: i hate to see the democrats blackmailed.

it is just a same that the poor and middle-class over and over again vote against the their own interest. it is just a shame. i hate to see the democrats blackmailed. i am still an obama fan. i walked on hot coals for him at least one time. i think it is pure blackmail. host: all right. let us take a listen to comments that senator kerry made yesterday. >> david, i think there will be an agreement because yesterday's vote made it very, very clear this enormous divide between the republicans and democrats. the republicans are fighting to keep in place a tax policy that has failed over the last eight years. it has failed. we have had a net loss of jobs. what we have seen is a republican party that is absolutely prepared to deny

unemployment insurance to people will have been laid off who can't pay their bills, who want to put food on the table for their families, they have said no. what -- we are willing to hold that hostage so we can give the wealthiest people in the country a bonus tax cut. what i mean by that is, people are not focused on the fact that under the democratic proposal, everybody in america got a tax cut. the wealthiest people in america got a tax cut, up to the $250,000 of income. what they are fighting for is to give those people who own more and million dollars a year a bonus tax cut above that even though it is the least effective way of creating jobs and putting it back in the economy. >> isn't it true that the president's own economic advisers said, look, you may feel like you have drawn a line on the sand, no extension for tax-cut on wealthy americans but uncertainty right now in the economy means that you could lose more jobs, you could have a

worsening jobs a tuition if you don't extend these tax cuts for now, for a temporary period. >> we want to expend tax cuts for every single american, but up to a level that makes sense in terms of our economy. host: senator john kerry talked about a potential tax-cut deal and his take on it. robert writes to us -- let's hear what dennis has to say from independent line calling from new york. caller: good morning. thank you very much. please give me a little bit of time. i was -- retired engineer. i work for three fortune 500 companies over the years and

three small businesses. my answer to your question is, i think there ought to be a compromise along the lines of, say, three years for people up to a million dollars and not cut it for people over $1 million for three years and see what happens after the president's election. or after the next, which would obeyed -- host: the 2012 election. caller: before it. give them three years to see what happens. just to give you an idea how some of these small business people were, i actually lost my job from a fortune 500 companies because of the outsourcing and i joined a very small business and actually saved them from going out of business with the technology i brought in. five years later, the owner, an

older couple, who all they ever did was keep the books, they sold it and profited two million to $3 million. as they were leaving the company and selling off, me and the other fellow who pretty much ran the place had to ask for some type of bonus. he gave as $500. and you could imagine what party they are affiliated with. thank you. host: looking at "the washington times" talking about -- talking about the potential for compromise. senator richard lugar, indiana republican, credited the president for reaching out to republicans. certainly an element of reaching out, he said sunday, and i think that has been appreciated.

let's go to new york state, edward, republican line. good morning. caller: good morning, how are you? host: do you think this is a potentially good compromise? caller: i am a conservative republican. i have been unemployed for over 99 weeks, and employment just got cut off on november 8. there is not many jobs here at all in rochester. my problem is backed -- that people are saying it is a tax cut and i am looking at it as being a tax increase.

i believe you need to leave the rates the same. the united states has the highest corporate tax rate in the entire world. 27%. the democrats are saying that the u.s. economy, you have the highest tax rate in the world, now we want to raise taxes on you, and not only do we want to raise taxes on you, we want you to hire people. that just doesn't make any sense at all. now, john boehner, mitch mcconnell, scott brown of massachusetts, have always had a plan to extend unemployment. i am on unemployment. but they want it to be paid for. there is over $40 billion in the tarp that barack obama has had that is unspent. i am not hearing a lot of people saying that this is a tax increase. this is not a tax cut.

everybody's tax is either going to go up or remained the same -- a tax increase. what happened to the $997 billion economic stimulus package that the democrats passed and promised that unemployment would not exceed 8%? host: let's get a comment from twitter -- 9 "usa today" has a front-page piece. bush tax cuts, how they affect you? it visits one community in michigan to gauge the effects of a much debated policy.

a look at the history of when some of these cuts actually started. percy, democrats' line, new york city. good morning pity caller: i would like to say that people should listen to their hearts and not the john banners -- john boehners and mitch mcconnells. there are so many lies. the stimulus package did not start with obama. it ended with obama. everything that is being said that is now obama. obama was not here at the past eight years prior to his not quite two years in office. i would like you to say to the people, it is not obama's, this mess started before him. two years of democratic

congress, yes. but not obama. and they need to work together. and this money -- the rich, it is the coach brothers. yes, there are jobs. in new york we can't get jobs if you are 60 or over. and i am almost two years on unemployment. host: if you have been on unemployment for almost two years how eager you to see the benefits extended? caller: i am very eager because at 60, it is very hard to get a job. host: ok. charlotte, north carolina. independent line. caller: i just want to comment -- the rich, i just don't understand. i have the three slices of pizza and i have to give two of them up for taxes and you have a

whole pizza pie and all you have to give up is two for taxes also you are telling me that is fair? where is the humanity, people? i am unemployed. i am a dislocated worker. i look for a job every day despite what people might say. i am getting unemployment -- first of all, you pay into unemployment -- it is your money that you work for, your employer, paid insurance on you for you for. everybody is talking about -- it is your money that you worked for. first of all. the second, it is just crazy. it is inhumane. i don't understand it. host: did take a look at this

headline from "the new york times." comments coming to us by judith -- alaska, cindy, republican line. caller: i am just wondering how taxing the rich will affect their giving to charity? it's good you think it will affect it? caller: a giving heart is much more successful than they resent the heart would be.

that is just the way i feel about it. and i am from arkansas. host: arkansas, excuse me. do you think this is a potential good compromise? caller: yes, i do. host: ok. thank you for your call. orlando, florida, mary on our democrats' line. caller: if you want more jobs, tax cut -- tax cuts for the rich don't work. the bush tax cut in 2001 and 2003 for the corporations and rich did not generate more jobs. there were reports and articles showing that employers and corporate owners did not use their tax cuts to reinvest into the workplace. in fact, i was one of those who suffered. workers were made by their employers -- one worker was made to do the job of two or three people. overtime pay was cut back under bush's secretary of labor and job tide will and security was eliminated.

so, tax cuts to the rich and corporate employers was and is a joke. they pocket the money and they make workers work harder or they outsource. host: texas, james, independent line. caller: good morning. first of all, what i think -- a quick four-point deal. when it comes to the tax hikes for the rich -- the rich create the jobs. i absolutely believe that. you don't raise your taxes in the middle of a recession to create jobs. that is ludicrous. the second point is, on the unemployment situation, in 99 weeks, it is more than adequate to find a job. i am 66 years old now. i can go find a job within three days. it may not be doing what i like to do. it may not pay what i want to do. but i can find a job.

the other point it is on the corporate -- when a guy makes $450 million a year salary and then gets another 400 or $500 million in bonuses, that money would be better spent put back into the hands of the stockholders and put into or reinvesting into the company to create more jobs. so, i am on both sides of the spectrum on this. therenitely believe that' is another facet in their -- iin there, the reason why a lot of jobs or outsourced in the first place is because too many left- wing ideas came into play -- environmentalist and stuff -- and so much taxes is put on the company that, of course, they

are going to take them off shore. it's collected back to your calls in a moment -- in -- host: lets get back to your calls in a moment but first let us look at some more headlines. this story from "the wall street journal." c-span will be carrying it live at 1:00 eastern time. you can find more information on our home page, c-span.org. this from "the new york times" international section. iran claimed for the first time to use domestically mined uranium.

this comes on the eve of meetings to discuss what is happening in iran. let's go back to your calls. susan, republican line, north carolina. good morning. caller: i am 56 and i think i have been in a recession for about 30 years because i make about $8 an hour. but i would never expect to get unemployment.

and i went back to college just in the recent years to reinvent myself two times so that i would have a job, so i could go out and get a job. i don't understand, because these people will get unemployment, at to make more money than i did. if we are equal across the board -- we don't deserve to take money from other people who have successfully made money. we don't deserve to take that. host: the use a do not extended unemployment benefits? chemical know, i did not think we should at all. -- line chemical know, i do not think we should at all. i was unemployed, i did the best i could. i think people need to encourage themselves to do that. host: let us take a look at some other political news happening, in "the washington times."

this is the house panel on global warming about to go away. some of the politics news. senator chuck schumer, democrat of new york, wants to make it illegal for anyone to distribute or record images produced by full body scanners on airports. this is from "the washington post." and on the front page, they took -- take a look at how house rookies are coming into office. it talks about how they are going to get to do what politicians long have had to do -- fundraiser and meet the

pavement -- beat the payment even if they come from a tea party philosophy. how dozens have held a reception at bistros and town houses, taking money from k street lobbyists and other power brokers within days of their victories. newly elected house members have raised about $2 million since their election. that coming to us from "the washington post." let us get back to mary, democrats' line. at little rock, arkansas. do you think this potential deal, extending the bush era tax cut all across the board for a couple of years temporarily and also extending unemployment benefits is a good deal? caller: no, it's not a good deal. the wealthy has -- have been getting plenty of money from the poor and middle-class for decades.

and reagan started this class warfare and it is still going on. and it just don't make sense. the republicans, they are all were right -- always talk about revolution did it might be a revolution but not the kind they want. it might be revolution of the millions of unemployed people against the republicans and a ball like that. you know what -- why haven't you guys talked about dick cheney's arrest warrant that was in the wikileaks document? you guys have not talked about it. keith coleman talked about -- olbermann. just report what you want to report. you don't report anything bad about republicans. they need to arrest dick cheney. it's got another store in the news from "the washington times." -- host: another story in the news from "the washington times."

columbus, ohio, bob, independent line. caller: good morning. as far as the tax cuts, let's get a couple of things straight. first of all, in the 1950's up through about 1987, taxes were considerably higher and the 1950's looking at 91% rate. it wasn't until about 1987 that we got down to the 50% rate. taxes have been much higher over the years. there haven't been any permanent tax cuts. you can go through federal tax information on the web and you can't find federal sources -- can find a tax cuts have been changed multiple times over the years so permanent is a misnomer. in 2000 we entered with a surplus in the budget.

that surplus was being used to pay down but then current deficit. so, we were in the process of putting down the deficit. in to about the mud and in it 2003, tax cuts -- in 2001 and 2003 tax cuts were passed that reduce the ability to pay down the deficit. it was identified at the time that these tax cuts would have that effect. and we passed a senior prescription plan. that was not paid for. we had several things that have not been paid for. we also had two wars that have been paid -- have not been paid for. now we have people saying, okay, let's deal with the deficit. it seems disingenuous that people were talking about dealing with the it deficit and yet -- with the deficit and we ended up the last 10 years avoiding the surplus that we had that would of been used to pay down the deficit and wheat

incurred expenses -- expenses that increase the deficit. we've got people and they're now saying, okay, we have to deal with the deficit. but where were they when those other things were incurred? host: we will leave it there. one to mention last night was the 33rd annual kennedy center honors. honorees include oprah winfrey. also -- and i am reading this from "usa today" -- paul mccartney, dancer and choreographer, country singer merle haggard and broadway composer jerry herman. the peace starts off by saying the president was reunited with his chicago pal and campaign and deede and/or certification oprah winfrey. but there was no political purpose behind these black-tie bonanza. the talk-show host was among five stars being celebrated. kennedy center honors last night here in washington. coming up next, we will talk about the housing market, how much of a recovery it is making.

we will be right back. >> join us for "the communicators" featuring the people shaping the digital future. we will have a discussion of neutrality proposals by fcc chairman genachowski. and limited broadband spectrum. we are joined by representative marsha blackburn of the house communications subcommittee and a member of the open internet coalition. that is "the communicators" tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span2. >> without the new start treaty

be ratified by the senate, we do not have a verification mechanism to ensure that we know what the russians are doing and they don't know what we're doing. and when you have uncertainty in the area of nuclear weapons, that is a much more dangerous world to live in. >> find out more about the expired start nuclear arms treaty with russia, what it might accomplish, where the treaty stands now, as well as its history. online at the c-span video library. search, watch, a share, all free. it is washington your way. >> middle and high school students, as you work on a documentary for c-span's studentcam co. -- competition, a few tips. one of the things i look for when watching a video is you, the student. i want to see you and your personality, and that makes your video stand out from all of the rest. >> what i'd like to see most in the studentcam entries are a

real investment and care in the topic that you will be telling us about. be sure to be interested in what you are telling us. if you are not interested in what you are presenting, a chance of our, we probably won't be, either. >> 1 tie-breaker a lot for me last year was the requirements for using c-span video. i am looking for videos where people look at a c-span content and said what elements of c-span video makes the most sense for telling the compelling story i am trying to tell? >> for all of the rules, including deadlines, price information, and how to applaud your video, go to studentcam.org. >> "washington journal" continues. host: lawrence yun is chief economist and senior vice president of the national association of realtors. are you seeing any signs for optimism? guest: let's remember, we had a home buyer tax credit stimulus throughout last year and the first half of this year, so the home sale activity has been

respectable. i will not see great and good. respectable during the period we have the tax credits and once the tax credit and we saw a sharp drop off. in a couple months we have seen the natural revival given the job creation, very high affordability conditions, meaning that the mortgage rates are very low. so, we have seen buyers returning to the marketplace. host: you are looking at numbers, the state of the u.s. housing market, international association of realtors. existing home sales in october down 2.2%, pending home sales and october up 10.4% and medium sales price about $170,000, down nearly 1% from last year. what do those numbers mean to you? guest: existing home sales measures act of the closings. signing at the closing tables, getting the keys. the pending contract refers to contract signing that is not yet closed.

given that it rose 10% implies that months of november and december could be a little that -- a little better than people anticipated. of course, with the normal seasonal downturn in the winter months but perhaps of this winter when not be as bad as what we encountered in the past. host: have you seen a number like that in the past year, pending home sales rising so much? guest: that would be a very sizable jump so i was quite surprised and welcoming the figures. remember, coming off a very depressed level. obviously there is additional 10% increase that needs to occur to say that we are back to more normal, sustainable, market conditions. host: you mentioned the tax credit went away. what sort of effect has that had? did it play out like you expected? guest: i think it did its intended impact. the intended impact was to stabilize home values. right before the tax credit went

into effect -- it was falling in a double-digit pace. a sense of the tax credit became available last year, home values largely stabilize and have to remember last year there were 5 million job losses, but despite the five non in job losses home sales actually rose. so, that was a stimulus measure of bringing the buyers back into the market, stays up -- stabilizing home values. now the tax credit went away -- it should not be extended, should be short-term measure -- now we are seeing the natural market forces -- job creation, affordability. people are becoming more comfortable buying a home. host: was a precipitous drop off after it ran out? because the incentive may have given more people that normally would have a move forward on first-time home buying? was there a backlash or pendulum swing? and how severe is that? how lasting?

guest: compared to june -- june was the last month the tax credit was available. then we went over to july and there was a huge tumble, about 30% climb in sales. that is naturally expected because we have to remember that consumers are smart and they see the money on the table, a thousand dollar tax credit to close in june, no money available in july, therefore people rushed and so there were fewer people on the pipeline in july and august but we had the big drop in july and august. but now that we are about six months after the tax credit and as we are beginning to see some healing process. the skull -- host: our guest is from the national association of realtors, talking about housing trends, guesses on home sales and mortgage foreclosure price is going on. at the numbers to call --

we got this from your web site -- realtors say mortgage interest deduction vital to homeownership and the economy. talking about the mortgage interest deduction being on the table out as something to negotiate over at a place to maybe rain in some of the tax cuts that americans get. tell us your opinion? guest: we have to remember the mortgage interest deduction has been in place for about 100 years. it is not a new tax break that suddenly occurred in the past 10 years. it has been around for 100 years. americans are accustomed to it. bass middle-class homeowners have benefited from it -- vast middle-class homeowners have benefit. great for the middle-class who want to move up in their career, their family life, to have the access to buying a home because of the mortgage interest deduction. if that is taken away, natalie, that will hurt the middle class from becoming property owners in the u.s.. so, something that is in place

for 100 years, i would say it is a issue in the tax code. host: dallas, texas, where catherine johnson is on the democrats' line. caller: how are you doing today? $8,000 tax credit. what happens with that is that it expires -- you have to pay it back eventually after the third year. host: talking about the first- time homebuyer credit? caller: the tax credit with $8,000 offered last year? host: that is now off the table. caller: after three years, that is what i have been told because people i know in my job have gotten it. but in housing, it does not matter about giving any time -- kind of tax credit. any kind of tax credit because if people don't have jobs they are not going to be able to keep their houses. in my neighborhood, i work hard to pay for my house but i have

so many foreclosures. i am not sure how the housing market is booming when people don't have jobs. guest: the intent of the tax credit was to stabilize the housing market. there was a steep downturn in the marketplace and we have to remember with 5 million job losses last year, that is a severe economic stress. but nonetheless, there are 129 million americans with jobs. and some of the people with the financial capacity may have been holding back, sitting on the fence. but the idea of the tax credit was to say here is money on the table, let's change some of the psychology about the housing market conditions. if people enter the market, it will help stabilize the prices. stabilizing the prices will help limit some of the foreclosures. if the prices have somehow declined 10% or 20% additional rather than stabilizing, we

would be at much larger foreclosure prices than the much higher level we are currently encountering. host: catherine mentioned homes in her neighborhood being foreclosed upon. what is that doing to the optimism that americans have about buying a home and be able to stretch to afford it? guest: at the beginning stage when foreclosures were rising, we saw much hesitancy with buyers. they did not want to buy distressed buyers. then over time the buyers became more comfortable buying distressed properties because that is where the deep discount of prices were occurring. buyers entered the market. hours -- our sales data and lied that one-third home personages today are distressed -- our sales data implied that one third home purchases today are distressed. all bad loans are made during good times. the defaults that are occurring ramon's originating back in 2005 and in 2006. recent of origination, they are

performing super well with very low default rates. that -- but because of the past mistakes unfortunately we have to go through the process of distressed sales. host: let us go to stefan, independent line. caller: i basically have a comment on your conversation earlier about the benefits, tax cut negotiations. it really shows how out of touch the republicans are with mainstream society when they want to give tax cuts for people who have more than enough money and there are millions of people with no money, they are hungry with no place to live and you really have to negotiate with them whether to get unemployment benefits and you have corporations and thousands of other people who are just living free and they don't really have any income issues. host: to pull you into this conversation we are having, what do you think about the brakes

and a tax code for home buyers, for those paying mortgages? caller: i think it is fantastic. anything you can to help regular or people out there who are just having a hard time. it is a good idea to help people don't have any financial issues, it shows how out of touch the republicans are because a lot of the people who did not have monetary issues bid, there are people who cannot feed themselves and we have to negotiate whether we should give them type of help. host: let us go to tyrone who is a republican in louisiana. caller: how are you what -- are you doing this morning? i want to ask you a question concerning the federal reserve in all of this. it seems to me that if we follow the constitution and let the congress printed currency and regulate the value, then -- it is fine for the people having trouble with the housing. we could get a handle on it if

the congress would -- what they are doing with our money, they are supposed to be the government of the people, for the book, by the people. they are supposed to be working for us. host: the federal reserve is an independent agency here in washington. they are supposed to be immune from any political pressure or pressure from the administration or congress and they determine how much money to print or set the short-term interest rate policy. right now they announced something called qeii, quantitative easing two, printing the money, because they perceive the number one priority of the current economic times is to stimulate the economy and create jobs. that is the intent. in other countries where you have the legislature in control of printing the money, you often see that they tried to balance

the budget by printing of the money but there is no free lunch. what generally occurs is there is high inflation which at sometimes turns to hyperinflation. so, the lessons of the past is, if the political players control the money supply it may lead to short-term benefits but there is always a long-term harm resulting. the u.s. is in a very unique position having an independent federer reserve. europeans also adopted the u.s. method having the european central bank being independent of political pressure. host: let us take a listen to comments federal reserve chairman ben bernanke made last night on "60 minutes." >> it doesn't seem likely we will have a double dip recession. it is because, among other things, one of the most cyclical parts of the economy, like housing, are already very weak and they cannot get much weaker. host: federer reserve chairman ben bernanke. what is your reaction?

guest: right now holding market is trying to stabilize under its own powers. i did some calculations about the people who want to buy a typical home in the u.s. back in 2005 versus today. what one finds is that if a person was to buy it's a book home today, their monthly mortgage payment would be lower by about $500 compared to five years ago. and that $500 saving is not a one-time saving but it is occurring every single month. it is a great affordability conditions. and this will steadily induce buyers back into the market. we are in a job-creating environment. we have a long way to go but we created about 1 million jobs since the beginning of the year. the combination of job market, affordability condition, i think this will steadily help stabilize the market. host: senior vice president of

research and chief economist of the national association of realtors is our guest. france is on the democrats' line from indiana. caller: good morning. have i got something to tell you? we just got back from florida. we went to cocoa beach to see my mother in law. and we went to mcdonald's and while i was standing in line and there was guys from massachusetts standing behind us and my husband is from " -- massachusetts and got to talking and you will not believe what he told us. he says he was all in massachusetts and he could have been in a on a property -- $5,000, because of a short sale. then he went to the next one, 17,000. these are bids he is making. $200,000 condo, they sold it to him for 20,000.

i am going to buy another one because i have a 21 year old son -- he bought one for 58,000. but he's got two condos worth $400,000 in cocoa beach. water on both sides. bought for less than $80,000. all have to do is go online and by these properties, selling short through the banks. this gentleman that you have as a guest, i wish he would talk about these short sales and how people with money, cash, can buy property right now for 10 cents on the dollar. guest: particularly in very distressed markets like florida, las vegas, nevada, where we have seen a buyer is russian for the exact reasons you mention -- home values have fallen so

much, the cost of construction is much greater than buying the existing standing already in place at a much lower value. people are recognizing the value so they are coming into the market. one hurdle people has -- have faced was trying to obtain a mortgage because mortgage, i would say the underwriting standards, the pendulum has probably swung too much -- have been very lax in during the boom years and we don't want to have that condition ever again. but the underwriting standard may be too strict, which is the reason why we are seeing greater percentage of all cash purchases occurring in the market. but the caller is absolutely mark. in some markets of their total bargains out there. but even with the multiple bids, they are getting a great bargain. host: susan writes on twitter -- tell us about the tax credit.

guest: in the very early phase of the tax credit back in 2008, it was something people had to pay back. in 2009, they changed the code to say you did not have to pay back. the people who made the purchase -- i forget the exact date, february of 2009 all the way through june of 2010, this is a pure $8,000 tax credit and you did not have to pay back. host: jack on independent line from illinois. caller: i have a couple of questions for the german who hopefully who is in line to answer. -- gentleman who hopefully is in line to answer. sent to the backbone of capitalism is kind of supply and demand, i did not understand what the people -- corporations will get humongous tax cuts, and there is no one to purchase their products, i can't think of one intelligent business person who will create one single job if there are no

consumers with money. i believe in the long run consumerist should pay -- pay all taxes and the end. no one has a tax money tree where they will pick up and send it to washington. i don't understand how middle- class and especially low income are not getting a tax cuts because they will spend the money. guest: regarding the overall tax code, reasonable debate on both sides. but the home buyer tax credit is directly aimed at middle-class home buyer. first-time tax credit or the young family starting their careers. our data shows that about 45% of the purchases of first-time buyers. first-time buyers typically have

income lower than national median, talk about people right in the middle, low or middle class. but underwriting standard has been very tight and therefore people are getting into the market, having financial capacity. another trend we are seeing in recent market conditions is homebuyers to not want to overstretch. they want to stay well in their budget which is another reason why i think the rate originated are very low. host: talk about the idea of stretching to afford a mortgage or not stretching. what impact does it have on the market? our buyers looking at a different kind of property? guest: you have to remember that this decade, the housing market boom and bust, unprecedented. we have never seen such activity in u.s. history. why did the housing market bubble occur? essentially a credit market bubble, the money was available for anybody who wants to buy a home.

it was the credit market bubble that led to the housing market bubble. the old-fashioned way is to go to the bank and say i want to buy a home and the banks would say show me documentation. that was the old-fashioned tent -- checks and balances. now we are back to old-fashioned underwriting standards -- banks are saying, no, you cannot overstretch. independent of the banks we are getting a consumer survey report showing people what to buy smaller homes, want to stay well within their budget. rather than buying a home -- line host: from "the new york times." a report that during the great housing bubble --

guest: absolutely, the case of people who may not have under normal circumstances able to buy a home, given the mortgages and as a result there was additional excess of demand that skewed the prices. now recognize that people overstretch the their budget and in some cases banks coming out with a very, very long documents, very difficult for the consumers to understand what they are signing. the payback period -- very unfortunate the housing market crash. host: have you visited any neighborhoods in the u.s. yourself that have had the foreclosure epidemic happening, where there are blocks and blocks of homes dotted throughout the neighborhood that are being foreclosed upon or which are now vacant or in hands of banks rather than in the hands of a homeowners?

guest: i would say i go out in the field about 50 times a year in very different places -- st. louis, las vegas, all different parts of the country. in just about every place, and countering economic difficulties, job losses. foreclosures are high. in some neighborhoods, very high. one sees a subdivision being built, but halfway through a completely stopped. now you have a situation where there is a line of vacant homes. but the previous caller mentioned the discount prices. .

prices to all these contracts to businesses, saturday morning contractors. you just get bringing up places. anybody who says by 2007, they did not see this crash coming around a corner should not be in it. i am hoping on a double dip recessionç because the housing market should be capped at 2% for the next 30 years. host: let's hear from lawrence yun to hear his response. guest: just on the data question, there is monthly data produced by the processes from

the federal reserve,ç except on the credibility. new-home sales released by the senses. both are released on a monthly date -- basis. you can look through the website for that data. regarding the housing market bubble, as mentioned, prior to this decade, there was always a natural checks and balances. some young couples wanted to buy a million-dollar home. they did not have the necessary income and they had to do the old fashioned way, stay within their budgetç limit, and in orr to trade up, demonstrate credit history, equity built up. then we have on the housing market bubble which was fueled by the credit market bubble. wall street came up with complex mortgage securities, collateralized debt obligations, charges, many people did not

understand the concept, but the money flowed into wall street, and wall street subsequently lend money to bank of america, çciticorp, and because of the loose credit writing standards, people should have waited a few more years to get their down payment, develop their credit history, but they got their loan right away, and we had this unfortunate situation where the prices were rising 50% while the income was rising only 4%, off of a percent sign. -- 5%. i would suggest, i would think thatç the normal average of 3%o 5% annual return is something likely to take place once housing normalizes. we are not there yet in terms of normalizing but we are

approaching. middle of next year, we may get there. host: loretta in cleveland, ohio. caller: how are you this morning? çhost: we are fine. go ahead please. caller: i was really finished when president bush came out with his ownership society program. the ownership society program was his effort to reach out to the low and middle class consumers, first-time home owners. host: why do you say you were finished? caller:ç republican do not do anything they do not expect a return on. look at what we got. it fattened up america for

slaughter. it was a factory. they passed all the people through there. they did not care whether any of the information was correct. most of those applications for mortgageç loans, it was the agency that added and tweaked it to get it through. it is sad, when you look at how the system is set up, all we have is a pool of consumers. the way bush ran the past eight years, his billionaire buddy is, you were just passed from one to another. then wall street came. they are still making their money off of us. çguest: home ownership rates

historically has been about 65%. there was a continuing upward trend from 65% through the clinton years and halfway through the bush years, reaching zero most close to 70%, now it is closer to 66%. so we are returning to the home ownership rates that were historical. we need to keep in mind, not çeveryone can own a home in tht particular stage of their life. if property can be sustained, within their budget, it is good for them, owning a piece of america, but it has to be sustainable. people who own a home should be able to stay in their home, not where they are overstretched and subsequently foreclosed upon. host: critics say it is

creating an unrealistic goal, theç potential for everyone toe a homeowner. it can lead to a problem of people not prepared to take that risk, taking it nonetheless. guest: we need more responsible home ownership. there is a habitat for humanity's program, for example. you have families who cannot get a home through the traditional channels, and you see the joy that they have when they are given a home, soç we want to do things to extend this feeling of home ownership. these types of things are showing that, yes, people can stay in their homes. however, these complex wall street products that say, let's lend to them, as long as housing

prices go up, housing prices will cover the cost. of course, the price of houses went down. mqi lawrence yun is the senior vice president of research, chief economist for the national association of realtors. james on twitter says -- do you agree? host: in a normal stable market, there is -- housing on to the north, they buy distressed property and they fix it up. that has always been the norm. what was unusualç in the housig market, people were buying property without seeing it, without putting 1 foot of equity, hoping to flip it within

six months. so we had huge amounts of buying activity with the intention to fix it, hoping that market forces would naturally push up the price. many people lost money just trying to flip a property. the old fashioned way of raising values, that is still working today. host: james in chicago, illinois. it independent line. çcaller: please do not cut me off. i have three statements i want to make. inflated mind power and led to inflated cost. why don't we talk about the inflation of cost, instead of talking about how the value of the house is going up and down. it is a sad thing. it is something for someone to live in or something for someone to sell off later.

çbecause i can get a loan for $100,000, the person selling the house wants it for $100,000. this goes back to the tax breaks. if i pay less taxes, i pay more money into the economy. we have had lower taxes for the upper echelon of the economy for, nine years now? the economy has been going down. when taxes were higher, the economy was getting better and we were saving more money because we were responsible. çguest: the caller is right in terms of the value of the home. historically, it was the cost of

construction. he looked at the material and the cost of constructing a home, a margin for homebuilder profit, and that was the value of the home. historically, over time, it rose 3% to 5%. what happened in the boom was lenders were giving excessive loan amounts, so home bodies were being put above the normal correlation between cost of construction and home value, so you had allç of this artificial inflation. that has now come down. home values have come down to their historical level now. host: story from upi.com --

çguest: 91 third of home sales activity has been distressed loans. we were encountering a paperwork problem from the banks, and it was the bank's mistake. they need to correct it. we have to recognize, many of çthe distressed properties, homeowners who have not been paying the mortgages for 12 months, unfortunately, has to go

through the foreclosure process. we need help the buyers coming in, and we have seen that. the interruption coming in, maybe for about three months, maybe we have a residual impact of that process, but in large part, foreclosures are being started. many of them are vacant homes or homes where the owner has not been making a payment for a period of time. it has to go through the legal process. people who said i have a property, understanding that i would make payments, but if they're not making the payments, the foreclosure process has toç go through. host: monday in new jersey. caller: i am listening to all of this and i remember, he did not have to be an economic genius to see what was going on.

it all comes down to grade. everyone stop there and in the pot. everyone was happy to take the money out, but nobody wants to stand up to the plate and say, i made a mistake, i was wrong. host: since lawrence yun isç wh the national association of realtors, do you feel like they are partially responsible, too? caller: the value of a home is what it is. if it is $100,000, then in ballooned up to $600,000. if you knew he did not have the money -- absolutely knew it, and they still sold in the home.

they walked off with a profit and said -- they cannot afford it. and then they were off to the next guy on theç street to buid him. host: what is your response to that? guest: in the home buying process, there are many players involved. there is the mortgage underwriter. historically, there was a checks and balances to say that you cannot overstretch your budget. that was broken during the housing market bubble. also, some of the people involved in the transactions, realtors who were pushing their clients to overstretch was unfortunate. one thing we find with successful realtors compared to non-successfulç realtors, the successful ones are the ones that get their clients through referrals. they have served their clients

well, so they are getting friends and others referred over to them. they have to serve the client's interest over the long term, not about that single transaction. from a consumer's point of view, they need to talk to people. which real-estate professional has treated them well? host: olney, maryland. chuck. caller: i get so tired of the bush bashing, the partisanship, but if you look back, the community reinvestment act, that is the start of where this happened. you look back at the last çcaller, which is true. when you buy a house, real estates in the bubble were going way beyond the parameters of finding comps.

they were going out six, 10 miles to find a home that they could comp. then a home appraiser says that it can sell for $840,000. they put their stamp on it, then they go to the banks and lenders. çthe people cannot afford this process. they raised their levels of income, they go back to look at their assets nurses in come to say that they can put more or less down. a great big circle where everyone was trying to make money. if you look at the guarantees from a.i.g., fannie mae, freddie mac, from buying all the mortgages, and you have these creative people in the investment world that said, if we can do this, we can find a way to sell these and make

money. the whole thing mushrooms. the government got what they !wm'>u(uy home ownership, but a lot of people cannot afford a home. guest: very good analysis. the one thingç i would disagree with is the community reinvestment act. that has been in place since the 1970's. to suddenly say that only during this decade it caused a problem , and more of the study is coming from think tanks, academics, say that the community reinvestment act was not necessarily because of the bubble. i will sympathize with your view that some government policies -- there was a mandate to buy mortgages from low income neighborhoods. therefore, fannie and freddie were chasing mortgages where buyers were not necessarily apply credit quality. another reason whyç is because

fannie and freddie became arrogant, created this hedge fund portfolio, having good times while the home owner can suffer. that cannot continue. there needs to be a fundamental restructuring of what the future of housing finance needs to be, going forward. host: lawrence yun, senior vice president of the national association of realtors. thank you for being here. coming up next, we will talk about the legal issues surrounding wikileaks. >> as south korean troops begin able firing drills, president obama places a call to the chinese president to talk about pensions on the peninsula. presidents huç is calling for l sides to exercise restraint.

china has been pressured by the u.s. and others to use its influence to rein in pyongyang, following its shelling of a caribbean island. general petraeus, in remarks earlier, said he was surprised by president hamid karzai's discovery of military operations in this country. he told the "washington post" it was time to reduce the intrusiveness into dailyç afghn life. more on charlie rangel. the federal election commission is investigating a complaint that congressman rangel improperly used his nationally leadership pact to fund his case against ethics charges. the commission is acting on a complaint that mr. frankel paid nearly $400,000 from his back to. lawmakers are only allowed to use money in their individual

campaign funds for legal fees or can set up legal defense funds for such costs. >> and join us for "and the communicators -- "the communicators." large internet service providers and limited internet spectrum. we are joined by marsha blackburn of theç house subcommittee. tonight at 8:00 eastern on c- span2. >> every weekend, experience american history tv, starting saturday at 8:00 eastern. 48 hours of people and events telling the american story. visit museums, historical

sites, and college campuses, as america's top historians delve into the past. ç>> without the new start treay being ratified by the senate, we do not have a verification method to ensure we know what the russians are doing, and they do not know what we are doing. when you have uncertainty in the area of nuclear weapons, that is a much more dangerous world to live in. >> find out more about the expired start treaty with russia, what it might accomplish, where it is now, and what can be done. host: first amendment lawyer he represented "the new york

times" during the pentagon papers case. thank you for being here. similarities to the pentagon papers case? how do you compare the wikileaks case to that? guest: there are some similarities, in the sense of classified documents leaking to individuals not authorized to have them and then becoming public. çi would say the biggest difference is, the pentagon papers was an historical study of how the u.s. became involved in the war on vietnam. it became public in 1971 when "the new york times" obtained a copy of most of the volumes of the secret study prepared for the secretary of defense, but the material was all

historical, nothing more recent from three years before, and the source had not given it the negotiation body -- volumes of the study, the most sensitive, which dealt with ending the war. here, the wikileaks lakes are much more sensitive, certainly much more current. çby way of an example, you have an american diplomat quoted the king of saudi arabia, saying he wished israel would bomb iran and cut the serpent's head off. there was nothing like that. nothing as alive, perhaps dangerous to publish, probably

not as newsworthy as well. the pentagon papers as well showed a lot of lying to rot the çyears from the american government to the american people about our increasing involvement in vietnam, how we became involved, and the like. i do not think these wikileaks leaks and all that at all. the government comes out pretty well. certainly, it does not show a pattern of misbehavior by the u.s. or its diplomats. host: a recent story in "the wall street journal" says -- we are talking about julian

çassange. they say bringing to justice is another matter. what vehicle could be used to prosecute him? how far does the espionage act go? guest: we have an espionage act. it is very old, passed in 1917. it is archaic in a lot of ways. it is phrased very broadly. it only you read it, you would think articles everyç day that you read in the newspapers violate the espionage law. that is a problem if a law seems to cover too much, it ends up covering nothing. is it possible that the justice could mount a criminal prosecution? it is possible. it would be a hard case, but a

possible one. one element they would have to prove, which is ordinarily difficult, is bad faith on the part of the personç that has documents, revealing information, not returning document which are secret, in one way or another. i think they may be able to prove that bad faith, although mr. assange would argue that he offered to share the intermission with the state department, get the benefit of their views on what he should publish and what not. but taken as a whole, yes, the espionage act could allow prosecution, but it would be çdifficult. the other thing is, we would have to find him. host: let's talk about that. you mentioned in an interview

that mr. assange has gone a long way into talking himself into violations of the espionage act. how would that add weight to a charge? guest: some of the statements he has made, are on their face, saying, i want to frustrate america possibility to carry out foreign policy, i want to frustrateç government's efforto do things around the world. the espionage act is couched in terms of people having unauthorized documents with reason to believe that they can be used to the harm of the u.s. or to the advantage of another country. now he is seeming to celebrate every time a document seemed to put the u.s. in a bad light.

this is what he didç to the initial dumping of documents regarding afghanistan, in which he, in a terribly reckless way, included in the documents, ones which disclosed the identity of afghan individuals helping the united states. when confronted with that, he said anyone helping the u.s. ought to be exposed. that sort of statement is the sort of statement, that if the government were to prosecute, would use against him. to beç fair, he would say, i wrote a letter, i said to the state department, tell me what is so terrible of what i have here, and i will think about it. it is not so easy. host: floyd abrams, first

amendment lawyer, is with us from new york city. we are talking about the legal issues surrounding the wikileaks documents. next phone call. caller: thank you for taking my call. the lastç person talking about home foreclosure, we citizens have a right to know far more of the information that is being hidden away. the last person from alaska, homeowners, not everyone can afford to, we need help the buyers, there is no free lunch -- host: get us back on track here. caller: if we had a wikileaks thing going on to show what is going on behind the scenes, which people, they can go buy these homes any time. çthe thing is, we have a need o

know in this world. host: floyd abrams, can you make that case? guest: i think he will try to. i think the theme of the caller is correct. that is to say, there is the need for more information made available to more people, more often by their governments. çone of the problems here, a problem that we have had for significant over classification of documents in washington, that too many secrets are not secret, too much that is classified has no business being classified. one of the direction we should be moving to in the future is

making more information available. that does not mean the sort of thing that i referred to earlier. the identification of individuals in aç position to e armed in afghanistan ought to be made public, but it does mean that it is a matter of policy and we should be aiming at making more information available, trying to do things to avoid the over classification which has plagued our government for many years. host: error, democratic caller. good morning. -- eric, ñia democratic caller. caller: in many respects, it is hard to make the u.s. look worse than how it has responded to this event. we have seen in recent years, china using drastic measures to

block websites, the internet. i hear there are attempts by some groups to do that to wikileaks. we have also seen the assassination attempts in russia. now there are right-wing pundits who are advocating murderç to e head of wikileaks. guest: i certainly agree with you, the call for the assassination -- and there has been some of mr. assange -- are out bridges, unacceptable. that said, -- and outrageous, unacceptable. that said, there is romm@for criticism for what he has done.

fire want to move our law in a juror attritioa direction wheref thing is more difficult to do. so much information is now available, so easily,qu in a mr rest form -- a miniaturized form. it is not so hard for a pfc.ç n the army to get information about discussions with general petraeus and afghan leaders. that is madness. one reason is the technology that we have to deal with which makes everything so compressed, so available, and available to too many people. at the same time that we should

make more information available, we need common sense on what information is genuinely secret. we need some secrets. we need to protect some secrets. we have to try to find a way to çdo that at the same time as we make more information more candidly and more vigorously available to the american public. host: do you think wikileaks is comparable to a news organization that would be deserving of free-speech protection? guest: it is not just journalists who have free-speech protection. çwikileaks has played i hybrid role here, a quasi-journalistic role in one way, by providing

information, sometimes, as i say, dangerous information, but providing information publicly. at the same time, it is almost acting as if it is a source. it makes informationç availabl, 1st to certain newspapers that they will not reveal it until a fixed date, almost as if it is the internal source. wikileaks has a first amendment argument, and it is a serious one, if ever charged. at the same time, the government'sç has a genuine and serious national-security argument to be made, with respect to the behavior --

often misbehavior -- of wikileaks. host: jack in providence, rhode island. good morning. caller: good morning. the reason for the call is the wikileaks leak of this information concerning iraq, fghanistan, etc. could probably parallel some things that occurred in world war ii. definitely, the public did not have access to information in the same way. back in november of 1941, the secretary of war stemson stated -- this can be downloaded nowç as public information. we have to maneuver the japanese

into firing the first shot without doing too much damage to ourselves. this is on admiral kimball's grandson's website. that is pretty damning evidence, as far as i'm concerned, that jjájjt to get into a war with japan. guest: i have to say, i am not an expert on the circumstances of the united states being attacked by the japanese, but there was a lengthy period at that time of the negotiations with the japanese and of demand by both sides, which obviously lead everyone involved to think my impression was, all thatç ws

meant by that statement was, if there was going to be a war, not that the u.s. wanted one, we ought not be the one to provoke it. host: an ap story -- çwikileaks is facing a varietyf attacks. paypal, amzaon have cut their ties to them. there are all sorts of other ways that the service is being damaged. wikileaks said that paypalç had surrendered to government u.s. pressure. what is the role of government

to conflict some sort of pressure on private companies to play ball with what they want? guest: that is a strictly legal matter. the u.s. can urge but not require companies to behave in some particular wayç. once it becomes a requirement, a ;m it, the first amendment comes into play. i think the issue of whether private companies that disapproved of wikileaks' behavior should demonstrate will love all of their disapproval by taking a sort of action that you advertç to.

it is an important one, a difficult one. these companies have the legal right -- indeed, the moral right -- to behave as they wish and take steps they believe in the interest of the country and themselves. on the other hand, we would be veryç concerned in other circumstances if private companies to disapprove of what a newspaper was printing refused to sell newsprint or refused to make paper available, or took other steps to keep this event information from coming out. -- dissident çinformation from coming out. host: let's hear from an

independent caller in connecticut. good morning, peggy. caller: i am surprised at my own reaction to all of this. i thought we were sort of shooting the messenger. i do not know if he exposed other secrets in other countries, like he is doing with the u.s. m to some important people. i cannot wait to hear what the financial revelations will be, if there ever exposed. are you surprised that this has such coverage, compared to the dollar plan case? i thought that was pretty serious. -- valerie plame case? the commutation by president

bush -- scooter libby's sentence -- it was dealt with, as you say, with the stroke of a pen. the conviction stands, but there was no sentence to jail. i am interested in your comment about assange, in the sense about some contribution he may have made. one of the reasons i find this all very difficult is, as one can see, by reading our newspapers, some of the material that had been made available -- even though it does not show misconduct from the united states -- does permit a better understanding of certain things going on in the world. at the same time, that the understanding can proper --

compromise our ability to accomplish whatwp want in the world. when wikileaks reports about yemen, for example, the about -- about the yemenis leaders saying to an ambassador, you, the u.s., can continue to bomb al qaeda, and we will say we did it. and that, in general,ç is something that the u.s., its people, believe is a good thing. we want to combat al qaeda, but at the same time, we learn something of significance, in reading that conversation. are we better off, on balance, knowing that, or letting it happen without knowing?

as a general matter, those of us who toil in the first amendment, you usually say more the more you get into deep national security areas, the closer that question becomes. not as a legal matter, but the closer the question becomes, what we should warn, if we could will it. host: do you see sort of a 50/50 moment, where some of the things that he has brought to light could be in this moment of free speech, adding to pubdib but do you sees well potentially breaking laws? what is the balance you see here? how do the scales tip? guest: first of all, what he has done would violate just about

every -- violate the law in just about every country of the world. first of all, first amendment, we really mean it and we want to protect freedom of speech, even in situations where the speech may do us harm, unless wedi c13 really persuaded as a general matter that the speech is sure to do so. that is one difference between the u.s. and abroad. second, we happen to have legislation which is so old, so badly drafted, so hard to parse in terms of when it could be applied, that we never knowç wn the government code or might, or even sometimes should take action. for example, i am concerned if

the government were to start an espionage prosecution, that one of the consequences, and unintended consequences, could be significantly to threaten the ability of the american press, at its very best, the report about serious matters relating to national security, which all of us would say, the public ought to know about. . . ç

what in that but says to you this could be prosecutable? this could be a breach? and how much credence do you give to the effect that it had hide? guest: i think they are both right. by then there has been a vast overstatement of the degree of harm -- i think there has been a vast overstatement of the degree of harm. but i agree there are a number of conclusions in the material made public which i think do harm and have done harm and are likely to do more harm.

we need to determine how much harm has actually been done. it has been suggested that the first witness in the defense would be secretary gates. that is to say, mr. assange would try to get the material that you have just shown or for secretary gates to say it again as a way of ameliorating any concerns on the part of the majority or the judge to try to get the case dismissed. but i think the level of harm, and we on the outside can of really know about it. the true level of harm is one factor which the department of justice is likely to take into account. the other one is whether we can

succeed in a prosecution. the last thing we want, i think, is to go in and indict mr. assange and have some european country refuse to extradite him to the united states. host: tracy joins us in annapolis, md., good morning. caller: i have a couple of quick comment and a question. the first, and, i wonder what mr. assange's reaction would be to having his criminal file released throughout the globe. he is accused of two rapes and interval considers it serious enough to go after him. i wonder if that should be considered public information. you mentioned that assange wrote a letter to the department of defense giving them a chance to score of the documents. let's take that a little bit further. assange feels he is in a

position to say and released things that others should not. if there was a discussion between assange and the department of defense, the department of defense might say this cannot be released. he will say, you have to convince me and i will decide if you have convinced me. assange, a non-citizen, put himself at the level of judgment exercised only by the president of the united states. guest: i think you made two interesting points. the first, and it has not been talked enough about, there are significant privacy issues here with respect to what has been released here and elsewhere by mr. assange. senator kerry referred to social security numbers, for example, being released. in other circumstances, wikileaks has provided valuable

information and the identities of members are far right wing political organization. there are serious privacy issues with the will still revelation of certain types of information which wikileaks, invite -- in my view, has taken no account of whaat all. and putting aside whether there should be a criminal prosecution, that would be one of the reasons that i believe mr. assange has behaved in a generally reckless manner. beyond that, i think you make a good point that there are areas here in which material has been released that he would not want released about himself.

but alsoirony nein that, a reason to at least sort of throw up our hands and say there is a very significant inconsistency in what he does, and as you point out, what he surely would like or not like. host: and in finding him, extraditing him as a serious challenge. he has not been seen since november 5. he is believed to be staying somewhere in southwestern england. are other countries interested, perhaps, in filing charges or prosecuting him for the wikileaks issued specifically? guest: i do not think we will find other countries seeking to find him. i am most concerned with the finding issue. we have indicted a lot of people through the years to we have

then had to try to find. we sometimes have found them later on. general noriega. sometimes we have not been able to find them, robert vesco in cuba, for example. as a general matter of american interest and as a diplomatic matter, if the conclusion of the department of justice is that in,n if he is apprehended an say, sweden or switzerland, that they would not extradite him because they would consider this "political" rather than pure law enforcement and european countries do not extradite people for political crimes. i do not have a view. i do not know what the answer to that is. but if i ran the department of

justice and i thought there was a very good chance that even if he were apprehended abroad, what we would litigated over there and there is a very good chance that we would lose, i would way that very heavily. i do not think we want to be on the losing side of this case. host: boca raton, fla., john, democratic collar. welcome. caller: good morning, c-span. i have listened to most of what you have been saying and i am pretty much in need -- in agreement, but i think you got off on the wrong tack initially when you started to describe the difference between the wikileaks and the pentagon papers. i think that is normally not germane. i think that is like deciding the difference between robbing a bank in new jersey and new york.

i would like to ask you on a different tack, if you feel corporations should be defined as people and would you feel the impact of the united citizens case will be down the road. guest: first, i have to sit with candor i was one of the lawyers arguing in that case before the supreme court that the mccain /fine gold law was unconstitutional. i think that and significant parts of the law, in limiting speech and corporate union was on constitution -- unconstitutional. is far as the impact, it did not have much -- as far as the impact, it did not have much of one in the last election.

democrats and republicans each spend about the same amount of money in all of the congressional races and gubernatorial races added up together. in fact, 63 races that the democrats lost in the house, the reason for the republicans taking over the house, democrats outspent republicans in two- thirds of them. so far, it has not had much of an impact. we will have to wait and see if it does. if it is bad impact. there is still the possibility that congress may pass legislation requiring more in the way of disclosure by corporations and unions if they do or when they do spend money on the elections. i think more disclosure is not only allowed, from the citizens united ruling, but i think it is

a good idea. host: end of this wikileaks -- and this wiki-leaks is considered to be the biggest and that is the comparison. it talks about how the defense department is reminding federal employees is not to read secret cables because they are classified documents. let's go to st. petersburg, florida. caller: the sundering of people that come out with truth and the

whistle-blowers and the fact that mr. assange himself has had the charges of rape dropped and then picked up again, or molestation. and if you go on the web site see that the charges themselves and have to do with consentual sex, but that id had to do with getting std tests for these ladies. it seems like the courts themselves are really geared against these things. guest: i really have no knowledge of mr. assange's sexual behavior or ms. behavior. nor about -- or misbehavior,

nor whether he is being mistreated by the legal system in sweden. there is a role in free society for criticizing even whistle blowers, even people who think they are whistle blowers if we think they have missed behaved -- that they have misbehaved. if i, for example, use the word "reckless" about him, i mean it. i think that may even be a soft word to use. that does not mean that i do not think some of the material released is newsworthy or even important, but i do think that he has behaved in a way that warrant criticism. host: david, republican.

caller: i have two quick points. at thest, i'm outraged difference between the u.s. government prosecuting the messenger verses postured -- prosecuting the murder that was revealed by wiki-leaks. the murder of the helicopter civilian by the u.s. military and the two reuter's newspaper people. the u.s. government is aggressively going after assange, but ignoring murder that took place by the military. secondly, i disagree with mr. abrams. he just wants to change the law a little bit. i think the laws are backwards. the burden should be on those making things classified, not on the public to correct things

that have been improperly classified. i do not think the public should bear the burden of trying to figure out what is "proper" in the public domain. and the earlier phrase that the caller said, that we are criminalizing the truth. i agree with that. guest: me respond to your second point. under president clinton, the classification rules were changed so there was a presumption against classification. that was repealed under president bush. i think it would be important to reinstate those standards. i agree with your second point, that it is important to put the burden on the classifiers to

justify their classification decisions. and i think that we should move in that direction as much as possible. host: a quick response to this question from twitter -- guest: first, there are all of the problems that i've identified in terms of the current law, but i'd want to take the question and in the way that i'm sure it was meant, putting aside the language of the law, why shouldn't we be able to prosecute the new york times? the real answer is that is very important. the first protections that -- the protections that the first amendment affords us is to learn of the information such as the "new york times" has learned, to comment on it, to

discuss it as a general matter to reveal it. the pentagon papers are one example. but here with the new york times -- the "new york times" day after day that has been commenting on material made public by mr. assange. the "new york times" did not make it public. the information is out there and i do think that once it is out there and available to it is useful and significant and important to discuss it and protect the process and the entities that are engaged in that discussion. finally, as i said before, too much is classified. if we start prosecuting entities assemble because material is classified, in the

nixon administration the white house menu was classified. we live in a world where individuals with the power to classify routinely over- classified. that makes it -- the fact that someone in the executive branch has said this ought to be classified as a basis for prosecution. host: thank you for joining us. coming up next, we will talk about offshore drilling and a recent obama administration decision to ban offshore drilling in some locations in the u.s. we will be joined by erik milito from the american petroleum institute. >> it is 9:22 a.m. eastern time. the president will reiterate today that if tax cuts for the highest earners are going to be extended, he wants to see unemployment benefits extended

as well. this comes as negotiators continue work on the bush era tax cuts for all income brackets. secretary of state clinton welcomes the foreign ministers of japan and south korea to the state department today to talk about last month all -- artillery attack in north korea's -- and north korea's nuclear activity. they say that to sit down with p'yongyang at this point would reward it for bad behavior. you can hear secretary clinton's remarks later on c-span radio. and defense secretary robert gates is visiting the uss abraham lincoln, which is deployed off the coast of ahman. this visit is coinciding with

the troops surge of about 30,000 troops ordered by the president. aircraft dropped 1000 bomb missiles into october, one of the highest totals and the war. those are some headlines on c- span radio. >> join us for the communicators, c-span's weekly series featuring digital future. this week we will have net neutrality proposals by julius genachowski. we are joined by rep marshal blackburn of the house communications at committee and mark m. ericsson -- markham erickson. that is tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span2. >> without the new start treaty being ratified by the senate, we do not have a verification mechanism to ensure we know what the russians are doing. and they do not know what we are

doing. if you have uncertainty in the area of nuclear weapons, that is a much more dangerous world to live in. >> find out more about the expired start nuclear arms treaty with russia, what it might accomplish, where it stands now as well as the history. >> the c-span networks, we provide coverage of politics, public affairs, nonfiction books and american history. it is available to you on television, radio, online and social networking sites. and find our content any time with the c-span digital -- video library. it is washington your way. the c-span networks, now available in more than 100 million homes, created by cable and provided as ia public

service. host: eric alito from the american petroleum institute is the director -- erik milito from the american petroleum institute is the director. welcome. guest: thank you. host: this story from the "washington post" -- the obama administration will not allow drilling in the gulf until 2017. this was a bit of a surprise, but to industry and to analysts. guest: is was a situation that we did not see coming. we were hopeful to expand access. and if you look at the news on friday with unemployment going up and the other issue of deficit reduction, expanding offshore drilling will help both of those.

expanding offshore access will create tens of thousands of jobs and bring billions of dollars to the economy. host: this is a reversal of what the obama administration had put out in march. people have said that the deep water accident that led to huge amounts of oil spilling for five months, how does your industry account for the being in game changer? guest: over 16.5 billion barrels of oil were produced and no incidents like these occurred. and then in response to this incident at the media focus on our operations to be sure that we are improving them. and we have done that. we have created task forces and the government has adopted a lot of it and we're putting together new standards for the rebels to

perform at in offshore. it ranges from safety management to the equipment that we use. host: "washington post" guest: we would support looking at all of the areas that have been off-limits. if you get the some studies, -- if you look at some studies, they show that by leaving these areas off limits you are sacrificing tons of thousands of jobs and tremendous revenues for the government. when companies get the rights to

these plants to use, it gives them billions of dollars to explore. we have seen studies that say this is a good idea. we have not even seen the administration to come out with the necessary environmental studies to show why or why not we should remove -- we should move forward. host: michael joins us from tennessee on the independent line. caller: good morning. but what i used -- i used to work in the oilfields and what i saw him do, i just could not believe it. we in the oil industry are being punished and bonn preeg -- we in the oil industry are being punished for what happened on a rig owned by a foreign entity. guest: we have to keep in mind

that we should not base a decision like this on just one incident. we do not shut the whole airline down -- airline industry down because of one accident. otherwise we will have to import and increase our reliance on foreign sources. host: let's hear comments from the commissioner of this oil- field commission that was created in the wake of the bp disaster. >> oil is a strategic resource and is important to the security of the economy of the u.s. my only experience with the industry leaves no doubt about the industry's technical savvy of and its ability to manage risk and fuel the economy. we are not dealing here with a

sick or failing or unsuccessful industry, but a complete one. host: what is your reaction? guest: i do not believe that the industry has been complacent. if you look back at the history going back 100 years, when we started out developing in the early 1900's, when of the first things the industry started doing was putting together best practices and standards. we have been provided -- revising and improving our procedures on blowout preventers and on safety and management programs. we have been continually raising the bar. this was an isolated incident and we need to increase the level of safety as we need to, but we need to get back to work. host: quarter reaction to the

proposal of -- guest: we are not so concerned with the structure. we need people out there who are looking at the permits and approving and so we can have the oil and gas flowing. we need people to do inspections. we need enforcement folks. we want to be sure that we have a respectable regime in place. we need certainty and predictability so companies can make investments. host: mary is calling from a plant up. good morning. -- from atlanta up. good morning. caller: i was just appalled that president obama decided to shut off the drilling for seven years

after he made a tremendous loan to the people of brazil for drilling. i do not understand how he can hold the economy hostage. as you said, there have been a couple of bad incidences' with oil, but we have a lot more care than most countries do. host: let's just clarify. it is not that the whole gulf of mexico is off limits. is the eastern coast of florida and also the atlantic ocean. parts of alaska are slated to be developed as well as other parts of the gulf of mexico. guest: yes, we are hopeful of that. there have been signs of movement, but we need the permits to be approved so our companies can get back to work out there. we also think there are significant opportunities in the pacific coast. all of these areas combined create tremendous job potential.

host: lillian is on the line. go ahead. you are on the erik milito. caller: instead of blaming the president for jobs in brazil and all of the, we need to focus on the truth. an earlier caller, you even said they were off subject when they were not. host: how uc the using of the -- how do you see the using of the resources? caller: 20 to focus on jobs and that is all. -- we need to focus on jobs and that is all. guest: the department of energy states that we are going to need

more oil, more natural gas in 2035 then we are using now. we have the opportunity to get that right here. it does not matter whether you are democrat or republican. everybody wants to see jobs created and the economy back up and running as it should be. host: here is a tweet. guest: when you look at the plans for alaska you will see very robust plants in place. -- robust plans in place. the companies that are working there are putting together strong plans and strong a quick and and vessels and personnel in place to be sure that nothing does happen. the alaskan areas have tremendous natural gas resources that we need to bring to the consumer. host: and you mentioned a

cautious approach to offshore drilling in alaska. it is not off the table. there could be leasing after 2012, but there is a process in place. guest: it is correct. any time the government does and approval, they go through several layers first. if you want to have a least- sale, and provide an opportunity, and even in alaska when you go through the program, the response mechanisms and all of these things have to be in place. all of that has to be approved. and we have not seen that moving forward to bring those resources to the u.s. consumer. host: here is another portion of the article.

guest: the government does extensive studies on all of these programs. if you look at the city's that i've been done for what is relied upon in alaska, there have been volumes. at some point you have to make a decision that the environmental and national security interests are weighed into account to put those issues to rest, too. host: secretary salazar mentioned it to reporters last week that one of the challenges is because it is so remote and also because of ice. there has not been proven way to remove oil from icy waters. guest: you have to look at also when you are allowed to drill in the arctic. it is pretty much only in july.

you are dribbling there when -- drilling there when you have better ice conditions. the main point, whether it is in the gulf or alaska, is that companies have focused on one part of the three legged stool, prevention. the other parts are so that you can shut the well down and clean it up. prevention is key. we in the industry have created strong management the safety systems to be sure this does not happen again. host: next caller is michael. hi, michael. caller: mr. milito, i think you would agree we have kind of a schizophrenic approach in this

country. the one of the problems is that our political system, we have congressmen and senators take a bribe from different parties, both parties. i worked in nuclear weapons back in my submarine days. we had backed up after backup after backup to ensure that we would never have -- we never had this kind of nonsense. host: we will leave it there because we are losing michael. but back up after backup after backup? guest: that is a key point. and it is something that the industry has already recommended to the government, that you have players in place when it is in the designing area. you put barriers in place to block any kind of hydrocarbon

from entering into the environment. host: why weren't these ideas, a backup, backup, backup philosophy take into account prior to this? guest: a lot of parties have done this, but the problem is there is no regulatory system in place required across the board. we have not had these kinds of incidences. it puts us in the position of requiring that we have these mechanisms in place to prevent this from happening again, and we have done that. host: next caller is a republican, hi, there. caller: my question is, as we ban offshore drilling, what is

the implication for people coming into our international waters, let's say foreign companies extracting all of these benefits from what we are saying we cannot do? guest: the way our offshore works, we have jurisdiction, the united states does, at least 200 miles out. the outer continental shelf exceeds that. but we are ok. when you look at studies that have been done that show our production will be decreased by 10%, we will then have to import that oil from those who will increase their production. we are out of both of the positive benefits that we need to grasp onto, jobs and income.

host: next caller. speak to'm calling to your guest statement that the oil and gas industry is concerned about safety. i have been watching evidence here in pennsylvania where they are exporting -- exploiting the shale deposits that contradict what he is claiming. i think there are some of the industry players who are taking advantage of the high unemployment and the need for jobs and the need for gas and the proximity of the big markets to do some really unsafe practices here. they fought extraction taxes, which would be used to hire the

things -- the people your guest is referring to. not long ago there was a blowout end the fire burned for more than 24 hours. i do not know how you can expect local volunteer fire companies to come and be responsible for these things. guest: the oil and natural gas industry is committed to best practices, whether offshore or these new shale places. and the fbi has documents and standards that directly relate to put in jail in place. -- putting in a shale place. it is something we have been doing for decades and will continue to do. we do not take lightly in the incident. the gulf incident was tragic. we have to learn from that.

and we lost 11 workers. we have to do everything to be sure that we do not lose workers in the future. host: explain what this term upstream means. guest: that means finding the resources, producing them, and then shipping them by tank line or truck or rail to the distribution side, which is actually taking it and pumping it and putting it into your car. this is finding and producing the resources. host: joan writes to us from vermont and says guest: i do not have that information. i'm not a lobbyist by trade. but i can tell you that when you

look at the investments that this industry makes outside of natural oil and gas, they are very high. the oil and gas industry is a leading investor between -- and between 2000-2008, there was about $130 billion invested in these technologies and the orland gas -- the oil and gas industry contributed at about $50 billion of those.

$1.2 7 million in one quarter. guest: we have to lead people on both sides of the aisle know that these are critical for our nation's economic and job creation issues. from that side, we have to let them know that we are blocking tens of thousands of jobs if we are making this decision on offshore. we are blocking billions of dollars in revenue for the federal government. let's be careful when you use the term lobby, because we need to educate and let lawmakers know these decisions are critical for this country. host: a big surprise when president obama announced this. what went wrong?

guest: i do not know. we will go back and take a look at that decision and realize the consequences this will have for job creation. and we will work with congress to be sure that they are overseeing what is happening in the department of the interior and making sure that the american consumer is being represented as best as possible. if you look at the last poll conducted on offshore drilling, a poll of likely voters, over 60% of likely voters support offshore drilling. you also see a high level of support for increased regulation. we need to have the policy decisions to allow it to start drilling and get jobs back in the economy. host: we are talking about the interior department's announcement last week that drilling -- the drilling ban on

the gulf will be extended. all the way up to 2017. let's go to bring in, an independent scholar in palm beach, florida. -- raymond. caller: i would like to ask this gentleman a question and then i will take the answer off. yes, you are talking about drilling in the gulf and i always hear from people that want to drill their that production down there would always take care of the people here in this country, but you never tell anybody that most of the drillers are from outside of the country and once the oil comes upon it is on the public market and i understand those jobs and i understand all of that.

but you keep saying that by drawing down their it will increase oil to this country and gas to this country and it does in part. but it also goes to other countries. and you people are always telling us that if we grow more it will be better for us. it is in one way, jobs. but oil is always going to be high because it is sent to other countries. guest: i would disagree with that. if you look at the infrastructure in the gulf of mexico, that brings the industry into the united states. if you have another katrina or rita, you have the significant potential to shut down pipelines and the ability to bring that crew to those facilities. and so what you have is a higher price volatility. it is better if you spread it

out. the crude in the gulf of mexico is primarily coming to the benefit of the u.s. consumer. host: comment on twitter -- guest: we have a lot of companies operating in alaska and the gulf of mexico. for the most part we have seen pretty strong performance from all the companies. i would respond by saying, these are companies are hiring. host: when the oil was spilling, bp was up the table trying to figure out how to make it stop. it took five months, but the commission pointed out that a big company can bring a lot to the table. what does that mean for small companies? guest: but the government is

they put together their own panel of experts to kind of peer review the operations going on. in that instance, the industry really truly does come together. we saw over 30,000 personnel involved. millions of feet of boone, skimmers, all of these resources were put in place. i think we have learned a lot and will be able to apply the lessons we have learned and will be able to shut down a well and heckuva lot sooner if it ever happens again. host: next caller is at jeremy. caller: i was calling because i'm not understanding how having global warming -- and i do not believe it is real, but they say this because of the oil and the missions that come off of the fumes.

-- a d e missions that come off of the fumes. we can spend $30 billion on drilling and still worry about where we can cut carbon emissions and i just do not see that we should be spending money on oil and gas. i think we should be focusing on renewable resources, like maybe you could put a turbine in the water and create electricity by the waves flowing over this turbine, or wind or solar. can we spend $132 billion on these other types of technologies.

guest: if you look at where the department of energy sees as having 42035, we will have a significant increase in renewables. at the same time, we will need more oil and gas because of population growth and demand. the best place is to get it here for we can create jobs and revenues for the u.s. economy. these are energy companies the focus on oil and natural gas because we will need that for a long time, but they are also dedicated to creating solutions for these carbon emissions issues. host: next caller is robert. caller: since the beginning of the show have been listening to your comments beginning --

regarding this being an isolated incident in the gulf, regarding this environmental catastrophe, but if you look back through history through the last 50 years you will find there have been many environmental catastrophes. i have also been listening to your comments regarding funding and lobbyists and political action data and it appears to me it is a disproportionate amount of money. we do not even know about this being contributed to the oil and gas lobbies in washington. the majority of the american public does not know about it. also, something a bit closer to my home in pennsylvania, there has been a lot of discussion about natural gas in the shale region of pennsylvania.

and its resources are more in demand in the country, but apparently we are learning more over time about how to do it. when you learn how to do with and not contaminate water supplies by fragging, there has been a lot of concern about water supplies and environmental issues. guest: i wrote down the last two questions. i missed the first. host: start from the end and we will work our way back words. guest: natural gas, fragging has been in place for over 60 years in this country. it is utilize to get maximum results from the oil reserves. it has been proven to be in this -- helpful in these areas.

we have had these corporations around for a long time. we also have been treating the best practices and standards and we believe that if you follow these, then you will be in a position to lessen the risk and not have these types of incidents. anytime there is an incident, the operator needs to be held accountable for any type of incident. the lobby laws gru who is spending what money and where it is going. -- the lobby laws showed you who is spending what money and where it is going. we need to be able to go to capitol hill and educated these lawmakers on issues that impact the american people. in addition, these companies are not just owned by wealthy shareholders.

the majority of the investments are made by retirement funds, police officers, firefighters, teachers. the impacts of these policies could impact people across the board. and the other point i dropped. caller: the caller was talking about lobbying. i went to opensecrets.org. you can see here, this chart shows the total millions of dollars, how much money is imported into that effort. let's go to joanne in colorado. caller: i live in part of

gaslamp. i've got the six wells off my back -- six wells off my back deck. and i have to say, this guy is so speeches. his comments -- he glosses over everything. those companies come in and they run right over the people who are living there. and thosel and a fridathey -- and they drilled and they frag and those chemicals are toxic. if we destroy our world, if we destroy our water, what difference does it make if you do not have a job? if you cannot live in your environment, who cares if you

have a job. if you cannot grow crops or raise livestock, if you have polluted it so badly that you cannot live on it, who cares? guest: i'm basing my comments today on the facts. the we have seen studies done by the epa on the water table but showed no contamination of groundwater wells. we are working with regulators, letting them know that there are best practices in place when companies are acting out there. it is making sure that they move forward in a responsible manner, but while there are a minute concentrations of chemical constituents is primarily water and stanstand. host: tellus what you hope api will do over the next year. will do over the next year.