i am started a movement with seven women and a tax machine -- and a fax machine. i am here, of course, because we are focusing on getting women into leadership in america. we would be able to do a lot more of the things we have been talking about if we have women who can work across these labels. that is why they are here. [applause] we have paid a lot of attention to this political area. in the last five years, we have been focused on that. we have been able to get 10,000

women to get into politics. they are out there and ready to go. this is the generation that could change this culture. half of this women are women of -- half of these women are women of different racial groups. the young women of america are out there. they are excited. they want to lead. i want to tell you some other stuff about them. if you want to change the culture, yet to build a culture. if we do not dance at this level, we do not dance. we have been using the film "fair game" to train women about the new s.t.a.r.t. treaty.

where are you out there "no labels" leaders? we want to be able to speak in this movement. we are a nonpartisan organization. this is the way we are going to move our agenda forward. we have lisa burroughs on the board of "no labels." you did not dance as well as i thought you could. this is going to be interesting to see what happens next year

because, as i see it, i was a very fortunate woman. i got into politics at a different time. i got into politics when there was a lot of work across all parties. we went to political caucuses together. we made policy changes together. it was phenomenal. it was a very different kind. i am very lucky because i had a mentor like mary louise smith. she and i lobbied the legislature. why in the world are we joining different parties? i have not heard that question since 1978. now we are in a very different place.

we are now at 17% of congressional leaders and 24% of congressional leaders are women. you saw one of them over here. lisa west has organized across parties. i will tell you the question these women are now asking. am i going to sacrifice my life and my family and it going to be able to make a difference? this is a real question. i take it is something all our sons and daughters want to know about politics right now. that is why we are here with " no labels." when i started doing this work,

i went back and read a little bit of john wesley's work. he said when he looked at the past -- some of you probably remember his book -- the world of business fails. they did not know they were in the transportation business, so their whole business failed. i have thought about that whole thing. i think to myself, even though we are getting the first women into leadership, not to take the place of men, but to leave beside them. what he said has rung true with

me. right now we are not trying to get women in four equity's sake. we are in the transformation business. the business we are in it with " no labels" is the transformation business. i anticipate a great relationship. one where everyone will actually know how to dance. we'll have women in leading side-by-side with men. we thank you for your participation. [applause] >> please welcome the mayor of newark, new jersey, mayor corey

booker. [applause] >> i feel like i need to do a howard dean yell to wake you all up. where are the housewives? let's see each other. we have a choice here if this is going to be a moment or a start of a movement. this is the time to move. i want you to see each other. no one thinks baseball -- a small group of people can change the world. i write history. i studied it going back to the very founding of our nation. we will either hang out together or we will surely hang out together. -- we will either hang together, or we will surely hang together.

we are not hanging together around our common principles and our common ideals. i talk about history. there is a a wonderful moment where the city of jerusalem was under attack by the romans. the romans were told to lessen their seats and they could take the city. inside jerusalem, divisions started breaking out. they started burning different quarters of the city. before you knew it, the roman army came back and took the city with ease, clinging to a historical truth. if there is no enemy within, the enemy without can do you no harm. we as a nation must fess up to

the fact that the enemy we face is our inability of pragmatic people to come together to advance this nation forward. this is the frustration of our day and age. i see it in your all the time. there are simple solutions to many of our complex problems if we could just come together. you heard mayor bloomberg up here on the stage. he gave me the best political allies of all my life. before you become a mayor, become a billionaire. [laughter] brilliant advice. but he actually told a bunch of -- pulled a bunch of neighbors together around the country to talk about violence. we have the virginia tech every day in america.

i remember when the decision came down the said b.c. could not ban handguns. all my friends said, "there will be blood running to the streets of washington, d.c." i found out there was only one in shooting in my first term that was done with someone who shot eight -- who had a gun legally. he was a correctional officer who used his sidearm to shoot himself. i listened to my friends on the other side of the political aisle that think that any kind of gun resolution is an assault on the second amendment. mayor bloomberg and his team of mayors around the country, we pulled to find out about this issue. mayor bloomberg paid for it. [laughter] we found al that over 90% of gun owners support sensible legislation that could curtail illegal guns getting into the

hands of criminals. simple things. we have done shows where a criminal could show up with a temporary restraining orders taken out on them, they may be on a terrorist no-fly list. but they can't walk into a gun show and fill their trot up with -- but they can walk into a gun show and fill their trucnk up with weapons. now we stand in a precarious place in our nation's history. we look around the globe and from brazil to china we see countries outpacing us in education, in economic growth. democracies are born not to fit

in, but to stand at out. we should be a light unto other nations. we are falling behind on so many different measures. that is not the american way. we are a country where impossible dreams are made real. [applause] we have choices to make. we should change our dialogue. compromise is seen as treason. we are reaching across -- reaching across the aisle should be applauded and not denigrated. the future of education in america will be minorities. we as a country have come so far that we haven't healed the racial achievement gap. education retain that can be measured in the church against

of dollars in terms -- in terms of gdp. yet, we fail to do it. i reached out to a republican governor. we could write a dissertation on our disagreements. the man is a meat eater. i am a vegetarian for crying out loud. he loves the jets. i love the giants. thank you very much. we have to find a way to end the war of injustice. we have to find common ground so we can advance ourselves forward. this will be the test. a friend of mine at a party yell at me when i gave a speech last year in new york. now they have become my greatest partner. in newark, we have dropped the recidivism rate.

jack -- dies like jack kemp who either came to admire who thought about enterprise zones that are creating wealth in urban areas all across the world. no political party has a monopoly on great ideas. this nation can only go as far as we are willing to take each other. there is no democratic destiny or republican destiny. there is an american destiny. [applause] we know from all our traditions , christian, muslim, jewish -- the ideal of community. people love their favorite three word phrase, a hallmark of this nation -- e. pluibus unum.

we have a choice to make. we can answer the call of our country. we can claim the truth of our nation. if we can realize that america is a nation, but is also a destination. we as a nation must be willing to make the sacrifice. democracy cannot be a spectator sport. you cannot get joy after sitting at home on our couch looking at msnbc or fox. if we do not get off of that callous every make our nation -- this is the test we have before us. we must realize that we as a people in this nation drank deeply from the wells of freedom. we have an obligation to make a choice to accept reality as it is or take responsibility for change. i visit schools all the time.

that is where our future is. i stopped for a moment and i get chills. i listen to our kids. our children, every single day, up from oakland, calif. to newark, new jersey -- all of our children join in a common course calling to our consciousness, not that we will be a nation of discourse, but we will live up to our means and be the united states. our children say in unison, speaking truth to our resistant years -- they say that we are one nation under god, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. may we claim this truth in our lifetime and make it real once and for all.

thank you. [applause] >> please welcome u.s. representative joe sestak from the seventh congressional district of pennsylvania. >> gracias. [applause] i was asked to say a few words this afternoon. there are two items i would like to talk briefly about. one is accountability. i joined during the vietnam war. i never wanted to be in politics. someone once told me i was a crappy politician. i am. i just want to be a district --

a decent public servant. i got married very late in life. that was my first personal challenge, getting someone to marry me. [laughter] at the age of 47 i did get married. then i had my daughter. she is now going on 22. she suffered with a brain tumor. i got out of the navy and then i did a payback tour. i ran for congress and work on the health care bill that has caused consternation across the nation. i can remember when i got out and i went to the local county where i was born and raised and talk to the local chairman. i said i was going to run for congress.

c.c.c.not know what d. was. i called them and they told me not to get into the race. i called back the next day and they repeated they did not want me to get into the race. this was my first exposure, having changed from being an independent. it park and to john f. kennedy's words. by serendipity we won. two years later we ran again. the first time we spent $3.50 million. the second time it was $28.5000.

somehow we were able to get -- i remember walking out of the pentagon. it was the day 9/11 happened. 20 minutes later, a plane slammed into the building. the men and women i had worked with never came out. the chief of naval operations called and said, "joe, i want you to set up the anti-terrorism command for the navy." that night we call together everybody. we put everything on the table. two months later, i was on the ground in afghanistan. we do not breed liberals or conservatives in the navy. we breed problem solvers. we put all our years on the table and try to come up with a pragmatic solution.

then, as some issues -- as some of you know, i was asked to run against the republican senator in my district. i said i wanted to spend time with my daughter. the republican then became a democrat. the party then said, "no, joe. we do not what you." i was about to go back to my affiliation as an independent. i went around the 67 counties to try to decide whether to get in when the party said they had changed their mind. i was really taken by how angry and how upset everyone was. that was just the democrats. they wanted to hold someone accountable.

i decided to still run as a democrat. the last tory i would like to tell you is about accountability. it is a value our label speaks to. i think there has to be a dose of accountability within the pragmatic leadership. i believe in compromise, principled compromise. that term, accountability, was taught to me on it -- by a 19- year-old kid on an aircraft carrier i commended. there are 5000 sailors on an aircraft carrier. the average age is 19.5. my mother used to come aboard.

she was a high-school math teacher. just like cory said, they are tremendous. on an aircraft carrier when they launch and airplane, it throws you into the air. when the push that button, it is the right of your life. but sometimes as you are just about to launch, they say stop, shut down the engines, and get out. no pilot worth their salt will ever shut down their engines until they know they have been unhooked from the catapult. it is underneath them and they cannot see it. these kids are great, but they can make a mistake. when they push that button, off you go, and you are not coming

out. all the sudden, this young 19- year-old kid watch out to the flight deck under the belly of that plane. the pilot cannot see. he detaches the plane from the catapult. then a young man or woman walks into up -- in front of that plane. that kid does not move. not until the pilot shut of his or her engines and are safely on deck. that kid has done everything, which i would argue, in addition to a possible compromise -- that kid said, "trust me." i am responsible for having unhooked you from the catapult.

but i am also willing to be accountable. if i make a mistake and you start to go overboard to your death, i will go overboard to mind. heaven forbid that men and women in what she did, d.c., are willing to do a principled compromise. be willing to do the right thing again and accountable way. we came pretty close in pennsylvania. our constituents are angry and upset. they want to hold someone accountable. even more than that, they want to believe again. they want to trust again.

i do not care if this is someone with a nra sticker on their car or a student from philadelphia. they are waiting for some very practical leaders who will just do their job for this nation. even more than a principled compromise is part of the dialogue. thank you very much. [applause] >> please welcome, the state treasurer of pennsylvania, robert mccord. >> i am been warned that there is a need for speed. having -- we are at the time

where one more speaker could be 10 more speakers than you need to hear from. i will try to be quick and interesting. i am the highest status speaker of anyone u.s. come before you today. [laughter] let me remind you that many of you are among the smartest people in the country thinking about politics, trying to organize this kind of free- floating sense that something is wrong with america's political conversation. the work you do is invaluable. part of my what to do is urge you to recruit people who are not already famous. this is not just about senators and members of congress is -- congress -- i am a huge bloomberg fan and think what he is doing is invaluable -- but it is important to start

recruiting officers. it is important to talk about issues that seem dull, but are crucial. 15 years from now -- we still listen to rock and roll and call each other brother and so forth. send we will be in our retirement years. the problem will still be there. you can't listen to good talking points out there. -- you can listen to good talking points out there. here is one for you. do not work. the average person has $67,000. i do not think there are many people in this room who want to hit 65 and live on social security.

5% of $67,000 for 30 years. we have a pension program and he will not get all the way there. the lesser branded elected officials will care if you care. i want to give a confession, a brief war story, and a reiteration of bills. when my favorite members of congress in history used to say we have gotten to the time in the evening where everything has been said, but not everybody has had a chance to say it. the confession is i did not think this movement would be this successful at this point. i am one of those characters who said, "if i do not raise my hand to get involved, nobody will."

are really believe in this goal, so i would give it a try. i had no clue it would be a license to meet people like corey booker who has been a hero of mine for decades. that i would have a chance personally to thank these congressmen for decades of public service and for doing the right thing. when you go back out there, say there was this skeptical former venture capitalist turd treasurer who said there was no way this would work, but we will give it a try. i am shot to see how many insightful people there are and how many -- and how much media attention this is getting. this could be a robust and valuable response to all of the name calling out there. give yourself a round of applause. [applause]

on the war stories front, one is about a republican president, one is a republican state senator, and one is from the private sector. i just met with a gentleman who had the third page of find in america. i wonder how old he was. he was 87-years old. the sets aside money to send 400 african americans to college every year. he said there are kids out there who mean well, work hard, but they are not at the top academically. the top tier from the ghettos get scholarships. it is that kind of thought leadership, looking at real problems, and courageously providing real solutions. some of you young people in this room will get that wealthy. i want you to remember this

moment. i want you to do something for other people when you get to that level. [applause] the next story is one involving a senator. we were hanging out a couple of weeks ago. he said, "the every -- the greatest president i have ever had a chance to work with was george bush of the father." 1, he did the right thing by the deficit and did it in the right way and at the right time. he did it in a way that did not cool down the economy. 2, he is the only bidding american that could have put together that alliance to go into iraq the right way and take a lot of political heat for not going in all the way. he said it was exciting for him was to watch him pulling together that consensus and see that he knew these people for 30

years. when they took the phone call around the world, they reminded me that an important piece of this is not just seeing teleprompter as an speeches or showing up and raising a lot of money, it is about doing the work for decades. we are carbon-based life forms. every business i give to says not to forget to invest in relationships of trust. we are building relationships for all four people. we do not need to agree with them on every front to say let's work on something we can work together on. i was giving a speech saturday morning. we were celebrating the greatness of pennsylvania by spending a lot of money in new york. [laughter] i am doing my fiscal do the by saying, please, come spend some

time in pennsylvania hotels or go skiing or go to pittsburgh. we just get a lot of money in this town. we at the pennsylvania manufacturers association. they had arlen specter and governor rendell and so forth. it is 9% -- it is a 9% republican audience. i am all against the taxes. it will cool economic activity. we are the only state in the country that does not tax these resources. i am sitting here biking might bet -- biting my bit.

i was all for the consensus just cut in washington because i think we are moving forward. we have been making hundreds of millions of dollars in pennsylvania because of various moves by the treasury. i am going to mention the tuition account program. it is 92% funded. i have enjoyed working with the young, recently elected republicans. i had no idea he was in that audience. he said, "i am just point to do it. let's hold a press conference. you tell them why it is such a good idea." it is just an example in the last 48 hours of help finding a way of reaching across the aisle

can be invaluable. it reminds us why we are here. we are here to put aside labels more often. it makes it safer to reach across the aisle. let's be dogmatic. if somebody reaches across the aisle and they are not a member of your party, maybe you find a way to fund raise for them in the next election cycle. we are seeking common-sense solutions. we have said that 15 times so far today. we are offering uncommon sense solutions. we talk about enterprise zones. that was not a common-sense solution when it was invented. not everybody was thinking about giving scholarships to african- americans. even more important than and common sense solutions, which have to do with price elasticity

and demands -- taxing cigarettes is a good idea because you want to make people smoke less. taxing so that is a good idea when you have a four-fold increase in the level of diabetes in america. that is an uncommon conversation because people do not understand the notion of externalized cost. we need some uncommon sense. we also need uncommon courage, the kind of courage that the congressman demonstrated when they voted for the stimulus package. the kind of physical courage that corey booker demonstrated when he went on a hunger strike. i will end with this. as we sit in one of the finest and intellectual aestheticians in the world, we need to remind people that evidence, fax, and

ideas matter. they matter. [applause] too often, especially in government, we set our hair on fire and we put it out with a hammer. it is important to focus on deficit, but it is not the right time to shut off unemployment benefits. if you are going to stimulate the economy, it is a hard debate. we say we are going to attack wage. this is an important time to be thinking about how to balance this. nobody i have ever heard of has done better than david walker. you hear him in a couple of minutes. he would tell you about his next initiative.

we have a delicate balance of competing concerns. when we go out there, we have to talk to these people. politics at its worst is about deceit. it is about education and consensus. you will make that possible. i salute all of you for the time you are taking. thank you for your time and attention. [applause] >> please welcome, douglas palmer who served as mayor of trenton, new jersey for two decades. [applause] >> good afternoon. i know you are tired. everybody stand up and stretch your legs for a second. my mama is a teacher. i learned that trip from her. there you go. i listened to a lot of people.

i just want to say a few things. first of all, i have been blessed to be an elected official for 30 years. i know what you are thinking. i was five out when i got elected. i understand that. [laughter] i was fortunate to be known as a "free holder." i was mayor of my hotel for 30 years. as mayors, we do not have the luxury of being partisan as other people in congress and other places. use all my ear bloomberg, my hero -- by the way, you heard what mayor booker said. blumberg told them to become a billionaire first. when mayor booker ask me what to do first, i tell him to shave his head first. it will work for you. [laughter]

as i look at what "no labels" is about, it takes me back home. you do not work on this is what the republican mayors want to do, this is what the democratic mayors want to do. we are in the problem solving business. we work on solutions. this is a very important time in our nation's history. quite frankly, "no labels" could not have happened at a more opportune time. it is more than just an election. it is a movement. it continues to move. it continues to move people. we continue to move people by common sense things. i have a colleague who is a

republican. i am a democrat. we grew up in the city of trenton. he served as a republican on the board. because we wanted to help the city of trenton, even though we talked about different ways, we came together for the good of our community. as a result, we have the trenton devils, a aa hockey franchise. we worked together. it takes courage. i can remember going to the suburban areas in our town and people would tell him, because he became a county executive and i became a mayor, they said they were for building a baseball

stadium, but not in trenton. we would never get out of there alive. here is a republican whose own party was telling them this and he had the courage and conviction to see what it would mean for the economy and businesses. he said, "it is not not in trenton." that is what it is all about. common sense solutions. i understand people are mad. people have lost their jobs and their pensions, they are losing their homes, they need college tuition for their children. people are taking it vantage in very partisan ways. it is time for you and i to sit at the table. if you do not have a seat at the table, you'll be on the menu.

for too long, the things that we want to say and do for this country have been on the menu. it is time to act. i just want to say this last thing. one of the reporter said, "do you think this will make a difference?" you, i, and many other americans can make a difference. one person can make a difference. as a mayor, i know this all well and good. we are at the grass-roots level. we are on the front lines. when you are a mayor, you go to the beauty parlors, the barber shops, the grocery stores, the churches, the bars -- you go everywhere. one day i was going into the supermarkets.

sometimes they feel like i am sticking around when i am buying certain things. heaven forbid i was buying black flag at enrich killer. people will look in your basket and see what you are buying. one day i was ready to jack l. add another beautiful, black, baldheaded i came behind me and looked into my basket and look at the razors i bought. the asked if they were any good. i told them they work for me. he goes back and exchanged his blades and got the kind of place i used. i said, that is really something. obviously, if i can influence what goes on in a man's had, --

what goes on on top of a man's head, i can influence what goes on in it. we have to have a dialogue going. we have to get it into people's heads. that is where it will be successful. dealing with the people on the grass-roots level up. thank you, good luck, and let's be friends. [applause] >> please join me in welcoming the former comptroller general of the university and the founder of the take back america movement, the hon. david walker. >> thank you. it is ashley comptroller general of the united states. it is a pressure to be here with you today. this is a historic moment.

all of us have gathered here today in order to create a new movement for "we the people." our country is at a critical crossroads and our political system is broken. 221 years ago the american republic was founded. our nation was based on a few fundamental and timeless principles and values. these included ones like limited government, individual liberty, opportunity, personal responsibility. at the beginning of the republic, we were governed by citizen legislators to let their occupations for a temporary period of time to do public service and focus on the greater good. they understood and acted to make the concept of the united states, all life. where the art -- where do we stand today? we are the superpower with the

largest economy and most mighty military honors. as a nation and a people, we have strayed from the values that made us great. we also face a range of sustainability challenges that literally threatened our country and our family's future. today we are also increasingly governed by career politicians who may or may not have had a meaningful job in the world before they were elected to office, but once they get to washington, they definitely are not in the real world. too many focus on the short-term interest of their political careers, their party's, or their individual states and communities most of us here today and most of the american people are not pleased with the status quo. we want to help change the

nation's course in order to create a better future. we are the mainstream of america. we represent the sensible center and the majority in the middle. our displeasure is not based on a particular party. there is plenty of blame to pass around. our concern is based upon a system that focuses too much on politics and not enough on progress. what about our nation's finances? the plain and simple truth is that our country's financial condition is worse than advertised. we are headed for a fiscal abyss at breakneck speed. we must change course before we go over a cliff. changing course is also essential if we want to keep america great and the american dream alive. let me briefly review a few fiscal facts. at the old set of our republican 90 -- and 1879, the federal government was less than 2% of

the economy. today, the federal government is 24% of the economy. total debt is rapidly approaching 100% of raw economy. if you look at the true data, and you'll find out that the total debt is already worse than ireland, at the united kingdom, spain, portugal, and we are not that many years away from greece. we are almost -- for almost 200 years, the united states did not accumulate a significant debt burden, as we were at war. today, all too many politicians say that it is ok to run deficits. even that peacetime. even when the economy is strong. this is not a sustainable

philosophy. we have more than double the nation's debt in the past 10 years and we're on the track to double it again in the next 10 years. we have gone to the world's largest debtor nation. we have gone from no foreign debt to half of our debt is owned by foreign lenders. this has literally serve to compromise the future for young people. to their credit, the american people about -- know that we are living beyond our means. they are the leading indicator. the politicians are the lagging indicator. the results of the risk -- of the recent fiscal commission are illustrative. less than one week after we voted for tough choices on spending, taxes, and budget controls, there was a so-called deal done by the leadership in

washington up whereby this so- called compromise involved no tough choices whatsoever with regard to fiscal matters, charging over $900 billion to the credit card, all the tax cuts that people wanted, not a dime of spending cuts, and nothing to do with the structural deficit. people call this a compromise? what kind of compromise is that? what kind of planet are these people on? it is important that the commission's good work of be put to use. it is important that we, the people, make sure that the disparate -- make sure that it is. the people can handle the truth. they deserve the truth. they also do not deserve rhetoric. given the importance of the

fiscal responsibility issue, it needs to receive priority attention. the choices that we make or fail to make in the next three-five years will largely determine whether our future is better than our past. everything must be on the table. budget controls, spending cuts, tax reform with additional revenue is. those rigid be -- they do not have a credible plan to address the deficit. those on the right to say that we can solve our problem without raising taxes are wrong. they, too, did not have a credible plan. it is time for our elected leaders to develop a plan that can be implemented in phases over time where the math works. all of us need to encourage our elected officials to address this issue sooner rather than later.

we want to do it before we have a crisis of confidence in the market. in order to make that happen, we need to encourage people to work together and across the aisle spurted 22 help people understand the difference between elected officials want to solve the problem and the officials who are part of the problem. [applause] as we look to the future, we must not forget her past. america was founded by individuals who pledge their life, liberty, and property to create what has become the greatest country in the history of mankind. they had a dream and they were successful beyond their wildest imagination. however, today, we are mortgaging the future of our

future at record rates. this is immoral. it must not be allowed to continue. [applause] in closing, our future is threatened by a range of unsustainable policies and a broken political system. we are here . -- we must remember the no labels model. not left, not right, for words. we must recognize that the concepts of fiscal responsibility and social justice are not mutually exclusive. we must pursue both. working together, we will make a difference that we will all be proud of. after all, wheat, the people, have the ability to do anything

we set our minds to it. our nation's founders and families deserve no less. not left, not right, forward. thank you. [applause] >> that ladies and gentlemen, please join me in welcoming no labels founding leader. >> you know who is the most popular speaker? the last one. [laughter] i came here today with a lot of really good friends. my best friend, my husband, was here. i'm going home tonight with a whole lot of new friends.

i'm a texan. we like to take credit for some things. most of them we have heard. some of them have not. we would like to say, we on the great victory. but lyndon johnson did not bound by himself. -- did not allow it to buy himself. -- own it by himself. 25 years ago, when i got into politics, i did it because i had an agenda. i still do. i got in it because i was competitive. the reason i do today is for my two kids. our job is to see their future.

after today, i know we will see their future. i know i can count on you to go home and make a difference in a way that is going to help me. we cannot do it alone. it will take all of us. i am so proud to be part of a movement that is going to make a better life for my kids. thank you for being here. it said travels to your homes. -- safe travels to your homes. [applause]

>> one thick we have learn -- thing we have learned over the last 30 years is economists are not good at predicting what will happen. >> robert samuelson has written about politics and the economy for over 30 years. he'll join us sunday night on c-span's "q & a." this morning toby harnden and