member ruppersberger. this is "washington journal." host: good morning. it is friday, february 11. you are looking at pictures from egypt as tens of thousands of people gathering protest the morning after hosni mubarak announced this transition plans. eyewitnesses to history today as we've learned as the army plans to support the transition of the government and what that means for the democracy protesters, we will see in the next several hours. as you watch this morning, our phone lines are open.

we will show you articles from around the country. we will talk to a few reporters about what is next for egypt. and we have a line for arab americans. if you are originally from that part of the globe and would like to add your special perspective. on this friday morning, we also welcome our community that participate by twitter and your e-mail messages to us. we are going to begin learning what is happening right now from a reporter for "the new york times" on scene in cairo. good day to you. we are watching the pictures from thousands of miles away.

what can you tell us about what you see on the ground today? guest: there are a lot of people out today. there are huge protests organized. there are hundreds of thousands of people out protesting. this is the third week of the protests. what happened this morning is that the military issued a communique that basically supports president mubarak's speech last night and the set of amendments that he opined. the military urged the protestors to go home and do their work. they said they would oversee the outline for the constitutional amendments. they also said they would abolish the emergency law once

the protests had ended. they gave further guarantees that the protesters would not be arrested or penalized for having gone out and staged protests. host: this would seem to set the stage for confrontation between the general public and the military. guest: the military did not really issue a warning. it does not appear the military will take any sort of action against the protesters as they chose to stay on the streets. i think there's news that they might issue another communique and i do not know what they could potentially do at this point. it does not seem -- it does not

look like the military is willing to take any action against the egyptian citizens and the people who are out protesting in the streets. host: that is certainly good news, but it begs the question of how long the officials in the government will tolerate the tens of thousands of people on the street. guest: possibly in the same way they have tried to manage the situation over the past two weeks. they are making very little concessions. they are trying to make promises and acknowledge the demands of the protesters. they are hoping that by showing this vote of goodwill by taking the proper steps that they can build some degree of trust and at least be able to shed away at the numbers of the protesters taking to the streets and in a sense end the protests or end

their effectiveness as a form of pressure on the government. so far, this has not worked. it's very hard to predict what will happen now after mubarak's speech last night in the military's release of several communiques. host: are there any expectations that there will be more statements by mr. mubarak or mr. suleiman? guest: not right now. only potentially from the military, another statement. host: thank you very much. it is certainly fascinating to watch the events unfold. thank you very much for giving your background. mona el-naggar, can read her byline in "the new york times" as she is covering the events in egypt. the united states role in all of this and expectations that

mubarak would resign when clearly he had other plans. a number of discussions in the newspaper this morning. "the new york times" front page -- "the u.s. faces a stark choice." we will show you some of those stories as we listen to calls. phil on the line for republicans. caller: we americans tend to think about this in geopolitical terms. the egyptians are thinking in terms of bread and butter issues and freedom issues. i had the opportunity to go to alexandria a couple of years ago. as american, i saw the very best. one day they took us to the alexandrian library. it is an incredible building.

the real showpiece. when we went down the streets, all i could see was garbage strewn all over the streets. we would look and we would see half finished buildings. some of them look like they might have been businesses. there were not completed. i found out later it takes a egyptian years and years to try to buy a home given the normal .ircumstances fee f and then we saw shantytowns. there was a canal that bisected the city. there were dead animals in the water. when we got to the hotel, we were going to have lunch. we went up these marble stairs.

there were these guys saluting us as tourists. host: people are probably interested in your personal observations, but because we have a lot of callers, your point taken in the contrast and the society. what is the take away for you? caller: i do not know how this thing is going to end. i'm afraid it will end violently. i think the people have had enough. at some point, no matter what you do, they're going to have a revolution. host: thank you. some of the things this caller brings up were also echoed by mohammed elbaradei, who has a "the new york times" opinion piece this morning. as you can see from the blown out quote, "after mubarak's speech, the people must act."

he writes -- let me also show you a little bit earlier, another part to hear what he had to say. he writes --

yester day mr. mohammed elbaradei sent out a tweet. here's what he rode. wrote. those are thoughts from mohammed elbaradei, the nobel prize winner. the next call is from a democrat. caller: i have seen some of those terrific sites in egypt as well. you talk about ghettos. it makes american get us look like shiny palaces. the administration solve this coming. you cannot have connected the foreign policy. he is holding onto power. as this thing grows and grows, it's going to turn into a cancerous, inoperable legion.

the bottom line is, i feel for the sectarian violence that could break out, as you remember the bombing of the coptic christians. that really made me angry. bottom line, you are going to get much more instability and unpredictability as you go on. the bottom line is, they need to get something going. he's not going to leave power. one more thing very quickly. someone else can go there and help them. you can write all the op-eds you want. it will not do any good. else could go? jermaine jackson of the jackson five same. host: virginia, an arab- american. you are on the air. caller: i think this event will

attest for how americans value democracy in the -- democracy and the ideal that as americans we are always proud and we like to reiterate. i think president obama is doing a good job, but i think he should start to move toward idealism and supporting the principles of democracy -- a little bit away from the careful pragmatism and walking the fine line between upsetting this and upsetting that. i think president obama should be an inspiration rather than just somebody who is a wait-and- see. the wait-and-see approach is probably going to hurt the united states in the long run. america always calls for democracy in the middle east. now this unfortunately is there. it is for america to take.

if this goes away, i think it will be a huge blow to americans as an advocate for democracy. host: where is your home country? caller: i'm from palestinian parents. i grew up in kuwait. i have been living in the united states for 20 years. host: thank you very much for participating this morning. next is a call from bill, republican. you are on the air. good morning. caller: thank you for c-span. what is next for egypt? i would hope that the egyptians decide and only the egyptians. i would like you to take my comment under consideration. i am an american of irish descent. you are an american of some other kind of dissent. my next-door neighbor is an descend -- is an italian-

american. it should be labeled an american of arab descent. we have too many hyphens in this country. america is a mixture of a bunch of people. they are americans of certain dissent. american should come first, not arab slash american. host: mohammed elbaradei's more recent tweet. let's take a look at the message she is sending out to the world -- message he is sending out to the world today. that is mohammed elbaradei via twitter. next, let me show you "the wall street journal" this morning. the caller said it should be for egypt to decide. whitex syseset

house." they write -- " frustration is giving way to powerlessness." next caller is from ohio. new haven, mike, independent,

you are on the air. caller: this is democracy at its best. the people are fed up with their dictator or czar. how many czars do we have over us? the only reason we're over there is because of corporate america and israel. israel, israel, israel. everybody should help israel. what about america? last week i saw a crisis financial report and i just cannot comprehend why we americans are not out in the street, too. corporate america robbed us blind. everybody knew what was going on. everybody through -- everybody turned a blind eye to it. america bailed out the corporations. how long are we going to stand for this? mubarak or whatever his name is is not going to step out of power. hillary clinton and everybody -- israel is so important.

host: there's a story about israel in "the baltimore sun" this morning. she writes -- next, the soda, texas. abraham, a democrat. good morning. caller: thank you. i agree with the caller before me. the same thing is going on that went on in tunisia and egypt -- the same thing is happening in america. i want to know where are all the republicans and democrats at? democracy -- let me tell you --

the people of egypt has spoken and it's time to listen to them. host: thank you. hamilton, montana. jim, a republican. good morning. your comments about egypt. caller: if i had a few minutes to talk to mr. mubarak, i would point this out. you are in history, ok. 30 years of rule. how you leave is going to show how history is going to perceive you. are they going to perceive you as a tyrant or are you going to step up and show that you are a class act and you are going to do what is best for your country? they could do small things. example -- tell the army, tell the people that tomorrow the army will be out with bottled water, bread, food.

we will have 40 or 50 military tends we're setting up so you can have medical or this and that. this is how he should be leaving. it shows the corruption. host: thank you for your telephone call. we will spend an hour later today with the chairman and the ranking democrat of the house intelligence committee. we will certainly be talking about egypt, but also about global threats and domestic terrorism threats. mike rogers is the republican from michigan, the new chairman of the committee. he will be at the table with dutch ruppersberger of maryland. the associated press story in "the baltimore sun" this morning.

lakeside, california. sandra is a democrat. good morning. caller: good morning. i would like to encourage everybody to read this book called "revenge." is written by a woman who at the time was writing for "the new york times" and she is israeli. her husband is also israeli and a prosecutor in new york city.

this was about eight years ago that i read the book. she toured all over those countries and went in and investigated. the people's culture is just so different. they are so uneducated. when you get away from the main cities and you are just out in the villages and the hills, one story that i think it's perfectly describes how differently we are -- they have a man in each little village that has all the rules written down on how you get revenge. this one man, he heard this other man and -- he hurt this other man, so that man was going to get revenge against him. he stayed home. part of the rule is you cannot kill somebody if your in your own home. he stayed in for 20 years.

then the man that he prwronged died. he walked into town and the man's nephew killed him. that is called sweet revenge because you have to wait so long. they have millions of rules like this. i think it is totally ridiculous to ask the dictators to step down. all these dictators step down and nobody replaces them but the soldiers? host: an arab-american watching in tennessee is next. good morning. you are on the air. caller: good morning. i think the question is very difficult to answer. what is best for egypt should only be decided by the egyptians. democracy is a beautiful thing, but it needs to come from the people.

it cannot come from any outside pressures or anybody looking to take advantage of the situation. the u.s. needs to be very careful on how we tread over there. egypt is the keystone state to the middle east. what ever happens there will probably have a ripple effect to the middle east. host: where are your roots? caller: american palestinian, as your last caller might like. host: when you hear people say that they do not have the structure to support democracy without lots of support from the rest of the world, what do you think about that? do you think a democracy can flourish when it has been under dictatorship for so many years? caller: absolutely. the middle east is ripe and ready. the problem is -- hegemony over there -- it has been for

decades, 100 years. we need to crawl out from underneath that and allow them to crawl out from underneath that. i think they would become better allies. the people, the young people of the middle east -- they are well educated. i have gone over there several times. they want what the west has, what the westerners have. they love everything american. everything we hear on the news is absolute nonsense. all the radicalization and the religious zealotry over there is not true. it is very minimal. they can someone being shut down, you know. once we get democracy over there and once we have freedoms over there and we push for that as americans and they see that, you

are not going to have the kind of radicalization that is always talked about in the news. people just need to be free. host: thank you. photographs this morning from jazeera television. from the front page of "the " and here's as -- little bit of this piece. year is the last paragraph of "the financial times" front-page

story. next is sebring, florida. richard, independent, good morning. caller: good morning. what is coming out of the white house from president obama is not a pretty picture. looks like he has his fingerprints all over this thing. i was listening to secretary clapper, the intelligence director, and he was trying to make hezbollah, hamas, and the muslim brotherhood sound like they were part of the salvation army or something. he did not mention the threat -- how much of a threat is presented by it was going on

over there. all he could talk about was the muslim brotherhood disturbing food and taking care of people. a kind of reminded me of what was going on in 1979 with jimmy carter and iran and how the staff then shot in the back and allow the radicals to move in. the rest is history. i just hope that mubarak stays in power until september, stabilizes the situation some, so cooler heads will prevail and the egyptians will elect their government, their leaders, without all this outside agitation. host: thank you for your call. the house of representatives is on at 9:00 a.m. eastern this morning. we will have just a two-hour program this morning. the house has the looks like it -- house has decided to delay voting on the patriot act.

we are going to spend our last 15 or 20 minutes this morning talking about the republicans and spending. the conservative political action conference continues in washington this week. lots of action about the deficit. we will show you some stories and a few clips from michelle bachmann and talk to you about domestic spending. the next phone call is from orlando, an arab-american. good morning. caller: good morning. host: what are your thoughts about what is happening in egypt? caller: i saw what was going on and it brought up a lot of confrontation. i consider myself a muslim, both being arab -- for example,

pakistan is a muslim country. the very important for muslim society. there are christians, even though they are the minority, considered important. i would also think -- the mubarak speech -- we saw that he approached it from a religious way. he considers the importance of them wanting what they want and also he did not want to take them out of their land, which is something essential. the same thing, i think the problem may be --

psychologically. the country got the name of israel. it would always act upon the value of this name. a lot of military actions is to kill kids and women. also, at the same time, there are other things that can bring a resolution. for example, [inaudible] we see these [inaudible] something we can emulate other solutions that may be the source of how we got here. host: where are your routes from? what country? caller: from morocco.

host: are your hopes for a democracy in egypt? caller: democracy is something very important and it is part of the muslim system. i think establishing a muslim system over there -- i think the best in the united states would do is to keep them. if they were to practice islam as it is, they will not harm anything. there's a part of capitalism in it, also, in islam. it's not like socialism at all. [inaudible] tax goes to the government. the other guys will all pay about the same amount of money, 2.5%. host: need to run because there are so many people.

thank you for your special perspective about the agreement between the muslim society and democracy, making some points about the two being in harmony. in "usa today" -- this story. here is a bit in gary strauss' story. "he says he was systematically tortured and at one point his blindfold fell off and he saw suleiman. he was never charged."

that is the view of one former cia analyst. next is for water del. mary, democrat line. good morning to you. caller: good morning. thank you for c-span. the united states of america to me is doing the same thing. they have taken away all the jobs. the youth, our black children are in children. i do not think martin luther king got his face blown off or all descendants of slaves by a horrible death in this country [inaudible]

america has denied reparations for the descendants of slaves. they have given billions and billions of dollars to other countries. when i was a little girl, i used to run home to my father. we had a fourth grade education. when the white folks would call me -- i would say, where are we? who are we from? my dad would say, you are arabian woman. how would he know that? that suez canal could talk, it would tell you. the pandora's box has been opened. host: this is on twitter this morning. greg, an independent. good morning. caller: what is next for egypt?

first, they need to stop the current leadership. in the united states they are calling on us to solve the problems. there are other countries. we need more input for the future. there's too much argument wasted on war talk. it looks like it's a time for peace. thank you very much. host: thank you. mike freeman tweets this. from "the washington post" this morning -- "mubarak's decision defensive."nsi he offensiv

missouri, ramona, a republican. good morning. caller: good morning. what i have to say, hopefully, will be more of been in churchman as to why this is actually going on. i have been reading a lot in researching this to try to cope with my own life and i just want to share with you some of the things i have read. host: briefly, please. we have a lot of callers.

caller: all the prints about these and domains were created by god and for god. it says the kingdom will rise against kingdom, nation against nation. all of these nations around israel are going to rise up. those from the north will descend. those from the south will descend. america will be right in the middle of it. praise god -- he is going to intervene. there will be earthquakes and things man cannot even imagines before this is over so that every knee bows and everyone confesses that jesus christ is lord. host: thank you for your call. the "the washington post" opinion page -- every article has something to do with egypt. eugene robinson, "the long walk we owe egypt."

"dear president mubarak." right next to that, about the freedom doctrine. he writes, "we are unwillingly against parties." below that, "illusions of decline." he writes -- "a democratic transition, even a messy and parcel one might isolate and investigate the extremists." decide that -- beside that,

"what america can do." "whatever we say to the smiling -- should be private and decisive." next is a call from richmond, virginia. skip, independent. good morning. caller: good morning. if history has not told us anything, it is that we have no business getting involved in other countries. host: i'm going to move on. thank you for your call. philadelphia, john, republican. go ahead. caller: good morning. to get these tyrants out of office is very simple. we have about $100 billion in swiss bank accounts. they should freeze the assets and you would see these guys get out of dodge within 24 hours. freeze the assets and then

you'll see him leave. thank you. host: thank you. next is a call from new orleans. steve, a democrat. caller: our world's greatest enemies -- mubarak, spread the wealth. host: thank you. "usa today" opinion piece, their editorial -- "mubarak's out of such performance creates a chance for the united states to move beyond its behind-the-scenes maneuvering and put its support for women in the protesters' cause."

next phone comment is atlanta. republican. good morning. caller: good morning. i have two comments. first, i'm very offended by the collar and called in this morning talking about saying the n-word. i hate to see african-americans use the n-word. is so disrespectful. why she tried to turn this uprising in egypt in slavery in the united states and reparations. no, we do not agree with reparations for slavery. they need to get over it. obama looks confused. one day he is for the protesters. the other day he is for an

orderly transition. he cannot make up his mind one way or another. he looks very confused about the situation in egypt. i appreciate your time this morning. thank you very much. host: "usa today" prints a number of editorial cartoons about egypt. here is one of them. we are asking you what is next for egypt. next telephone call comes from washington, d.c. good morning to you. what part of the world do you originally hail from? caller: i'm from ethiopia host: what are your thoughts about what is happening in egypt today? caller: what is happening is something that happens pretty much in most countries where you find an island that is ruling the people. it's not just egypt.

look at tunisia did we do not hear about tunisia because there's no interest in tunisia. we are not hearing anything about it. the media kind of turned to the place where people want to hear stuff. what i wanted to say about egypt -- egypt is a country that receives a lot of money. interest in egypt is much more bigger to israel than to america, but we do not hear anything about israel's saying about egypt. that really bothers me. i know president obama is speaking about egypt almost every day. like the lady who spoke earlier, he seems confused. one thing i would really like to say -- on certain issues such as the foreign policy on countries like egypt, i doubt the foreign

policy changes regardless of who is president in office. they always have a firm stance on how they want things to go. the funny thing about it is, i doubt there will be any change. if any change is made, it will be a transitional period. now you have the military heads becoming the vice-president. the president never had a vice president before. it never works. he will be behind closed doors telling him what he wants. if america wants to see democracy, mubarak has to literally leave the country. he can come back after elections. he is an egyptian. he should come back. that is what i think should take place. host: thank you for your call. a pessimistic view from eight arab american living in washington. another call from carrie, an independent.

good morning. caller: good morning. i'm very thankful for this program and i like to see the balance. what i would like to contribute to the discussion is that this is a time for peace. when i say peace, i mean justice. when i say justice, that means we have to create a balance. there's so much still the in favor of mubarak. then you have these millions and millions and thousands of people and it is still not enough to make it a balanced. in order to create the peace, you have to create the balance. he is a 50 million ton problem for the masses of those people. of the last thing i would like to say -- the lady who called in with the insensitivity of what happened to the kidnapped

millions of africans that were brought over against their will into this country -- it was not fair for her to say that they should get over it. it is also unfinished business. look at how the people here, the black people have tried their best to blend into a situation -- they do not have any jobs. they are doing all kinds of things to survive. they're into the underground economy of drugs because they're trying to get food to eat. the system only allows them to be in these. they will pay for these raunchy, nasty videos -- that's very plentiful. or you will see them in a lot of sports activities. these kind of things that would give them dignity and decency -- there's no money available for them. time. we're out of thank you very much. last phone call from dallas. not much time. you are on the line. go ahead. caller: she kind of stole my thunder. i think everybody has got onto

president obama. everyone says he's a muslim and that kind of stuff. america needs to set back and look. like the lady said when they were calling her the n-word. that's true. you can pay the japanese and everyone else in reparations. we need ours, too. we are in the same situation. those people are fighting for their freedom. we had to die for hours. i won my 40 acres and a mule, just like her people still from the indians. -- stole from the indians. put her but in my shoes and see how she does. host: a different direction at the end as we talk about egypt. we will be back in a couple of minutes with the chairman and talk to the democrat on the house intelligence committee after they heard from the intelligence chief about global threats to american security. we will be right back.

>> i think that is not only one of the major challenges facing higher education facing our country. that is, how we maintain a healthy lifestyle and get kids to have the strength and the judgment to say no. >> r. gerald turner will discuss today's college students. his goal is the site of the george w. bush presidential library. >> this weekend on book tv, george friedman offers its protections -- offers his

predictions. donald rumsfeld sits down to talk about his memoir. the director of the iranian studies program at stanford on the shot of iran. find a complete schedule at booktv.org. >> the patriot act passed after the 9/11 attacks made it easier to conduct surveillance on terrorism suspect. with provisions of the bill ending this month, lawmakers are trying to renewal expiring provisions. follow the history of the bill on line with c-span's congressional chronicle, where you can track daily floor action in the house and senate with time minds and transcripts of every session. finding full video archive at c- span.org/congress. >> this weekend on american history tv on c-span3, the kennedy administration's strategy to overcome it and the

beliefs of bartending fathers and the role of christianity in our nation. and daniel inouye and his experience in world war ii. american history tv on c-span3, all weekend every weekend. for a complete schedule, go to c-span.org/history. >> "washington journal" continues. >host: we have that the table this morning the top democrat and republican of the house intelligence committee. the new chairman is mike rogers, republican of michigan and his democratic colleague, dutch ruppersberger of maryland. thank you very much for being with us. i want to learn more about your views of what you heard about global stress, but i also want

to talk to you about how you want to organize this committee. you have been talking very publicly about your collective goals on bipartisanship and oversight. i want to play what you heard from egypt yesterday and use as a jumping off point for your views on the kind of intelligence you think the white house and the congress is getting. >> because of what happened in tunisia, we were in a much better place to look at egypt and what was happening in egypt. we provided a number of reports about what was taking place. as you can see, i got the same information you did. there's a strong likelihood mubarak will step down this evening, which would be significant. >> if you had to give it a great, how would you give a real-time intelligence as is currently unfolding and has unfolded in egypt?

>> i would give it at least a b- plus. host: mike rogers, what grade would you give the intelligence? guest: a-minus. they did a great job early on of saying we know there are problems in egypt. they knew there were problems in tunisia. it could not pick the time that it was going to happen, but intelligence about the problems were there clearly. more importantly, once it happens, once the protests started, the real question was, did we have real-time intelligence? what were people thinking? i thought it was very good in real-time intelligence so that policy makers could keep up with the decision-king matrix -- the decision making matrix. i thought all that was very

good. host: mr. ruppersberger, when you have leon panetta saying that is likely mubarak is stepping down and then it turns out that he does not in fact step down, what does that signal to the public about what washington knows? guest: as far as confidence, i have great confidence in our intelligence community. we have dedicated men and women throughout the world collecting information and analyzing information. it showed that you just cannot predict what is in someone's mind. you look at what happened. the issue started when a person set himself on fire in tunisia. that started an uprising. the dictator of tunisia, who everyone thought would come down strong of any type of protest ended up leaving.

you have the situation with the mubarak and it shows there's no crystal ball. we're looking for the trends and information. end-game is to protect our country from globalized threats. host: we will be opening our phone lines. you can also contact us by twitter and e-mail. we welcome your comments or questions. we hope you had an opportunity to see all or part of the hearings before the committee yesterday where they heard from the intelligence chiefs about the global threats. the headline coming out was the threat from al-qaeda. can you tell us a little bit more about the state as a threat to americans' right now. guest: al-qaeda, over the last 10 years, since 9/11, has changed quite a bit.

they have hathen affiliated with groups who would not have considered themselves al-qaeda members, but were terrorist groups who used violence to complete their goals. they started to get these affiliate's joined together. in northern africa is a great example and al-qaeda in the arabian peninsula and yemen and places like that. they have joined the al-qaeda network. that increases the number of threats that the united states had to defend against. the challenge for us is that they have gotten more sophisticated and they have gotten larger through their affiliates. and it means that their finances have gotten stronger because all of these affiliate's now pay into al-qaeda to sustain the efforts. when they say it places a bigger challenge today than 9/11, that's what they're talking about. host: in a written statement,

mr. clapper suggested that the complexity of the threats and the ubiquity makes the challenge for intelligence community's even greater. what should americans feel about the level of safety or threats overall? guest: we always have to be concerned. 9/11 showed we were not ready for that attack. when you look at terrorism from a global point of view, we have to focus on how al-qaeda recruits individuals. that's why it's so important that we start working with the hearts and minds of different countries. for instance, in pakistan, afghanistan, trying to stop the training and education of extreme right-wing radical groups that are anti united states and anti israel. we have an example in afghanistan. we are trying now to educate

young your children and counter what is going on in a lot of the other areas where these individuals are being trained -- even further, being trained to be suicide bombers. from our point of view, we have to look at the worldwide threat from each country. we have to look at the training and analyze it to protect our country from terrorism. host:. cia director leon panetta once again on the threat of cyber attacks. >> the cyber a green that is this vastly growing area of the information that can be used and abused in a number of ways, but when it comes to national security, i think this represents the battleground for the future. i have often said that i think the potential for the next pearl

harbor could very well be a sniper attack. host: what does he mean by that? what does a cyber attack to the equivalent of pearl harbor mean? guest: think of where we have come. this started with a guy in his mom's basement trying to hack into the local bank and bragging about it to his friends. it has grown from that to all nations states dedicating a huge portion of their budgets to develop an offensive capability on cyber, meaning they can shut down or attack our servers in government or the private sector. what he is talking about -- if it were to be successful, and our folks are getting good and better every day, to be successful to shut down whole portions of our government to attack infrastructure energy grids and shut them down and have a major impact on the economy and on our ability to

defend ourselves, not only from a government perspective, but a commercial perspective, as well. there are tens of thousands of attacks every single day. this problem has grown exponentially in a very short period of time. we only see the number of attacks increasing, not decreasing over time. host: how are we girding ourselves in the public sector and the private sector against the threat? guest: i will give you the long answer. i was chairman of the technical tactical community of the intelligence committee that oversees cyber security. in my opinion, based on that four years serving in that committee, i think the cyber threat is one of the largest we have in our country. we are being attacked every day. other countries are getting information, whether it is military information, intelligence information,

commercial trade secrets, corp. information, because of these cyber attacks. for a while, we were not where we needed to be as a country, but i give credit to admiral mcconnell, the former director of international intelligence, who made this a major issue. what do we need to do? nsa is as good as anybody in the country in developing technology to try to protect us from cyber attacks. .

>> we just had an attack on nasdaq. think when you get your bank records it is based on records. suppose your account was hacked and you had a million dollars and now it is $10,000. cyber attacks and the countries have the ability to wreak havoc with our systems that are run by technology. right now it is a major issue. we need to educate the public. the confidence level is n.s.a. is one of the best and homeland

security needs to be the bridge to coordinate with the public. we will be dealing with this a long time. host: i am getting messages from twitter like this. concern about privacy rights and people's own constitutional rights and growth of surveillance, and also the cost. we will come back to those after we hear from a few callers. baltimore, aaron, republican line. caller: yes. the number two terrorist fox news reported he was eating at the pentagon after 9/11. explain about government involvement and why that is never talked about. just focusing on american people. host: i think it is a concern

about conspiracy. guest: sure. i think there is a lot of misinformation out there about these types of issues. he was in the united states and was trained here, went to school he here, really self-radicalized here and reached a point where he wanted to go overseas and declared himself a non-u.s. citiz citizen. affiliated himself with al qaeda and joined the declaration of war on the united states. so this was a transformation of an individual who had pretty strong beliefs and now presents himself as a dangerous terrorist in the al qaeda network. i say that because his goal is to recruit americans and western europeans who have no visa requirements to come to the

united states, to radicalize and commit acts of violence to kill u.s. citizens. that is the concern of the united states, how do we stop that and educate them to make sure they are not being radicalized here at home to cause what are terrorist events. the great example is the fort hood shooting or times square bomber in new york. both of them were people who were radicalized by external forces and were driven to do and attempt to commit acts of violence. and unfortunately in the case of hassan in texas he did commit an act of violence. host: chairman rodgers was a u.s. army officer and company commander. he became an f.b.i. agent and personal agent investigating public corruption as a member of the chicago bureau's organized crime unit. that was 1988 to 1994 then

michigan senate in that body before coming to congress. dutch ruppersberger is in maryland's second district on the intelligence and armed services committee. he was a baltimore county executive and on the county council but is a lawyer and served as a county prosecutor. so, lots of experience in the justice system and with organized crime, gangs and brings that experience to bear. i will go to the next call from chico, california, steve is a democrat. caller: hello. i understand we are talking about national security, and i have an issue here within the united states i was wondering about as far as national security. being terminally ill and having aids i have to wonder why i face having my door kicked in over medical marijuana when we can't

control the tpfederal borders t make sure immigrants are not growing it to trade for other drugs or weapons. guest: the first thing, let's talk about knocking your door down. we live in a country that has checks and balances. our forefathers created a great system of government. law enforcement is not going to knock down your door unless there is probable cause which means law enforcement has to go to a judge to go into your home. there are many issues we deal with in the united states. you alluded to immigration. i feel strongly we need to deal with the borders and you mentioned marijuana. we need to deal with the issue of mexico. we have put so much money into the middle east and to fight terrorism but we have turned our back on one of the real threats to the world and that is drugs. not only people who sell them, people who use them and the

crime as a result of that. it is a matter of prioritizing what is best for our country. that is what we are elected to do and as far as constitutional civil rights, we are a very strong people on that and if they are violated people will be held accountable. host: back to some of the testimony from the hearing yesterday. this is from the f.b.i. director. following up on testimony earlier about the increasing threat here within our borders of people who wish to do their fellow citizens rarely. >> this is a very bad time. it has gone up and down since september 11. we are in a period which reflects changes from our perspecti perspective. pakistan, afghanistan and out of yemen or right at the top i think mike would agree with that. then we get down to the home grown extremists who have grown over a period of time because of ease of access to the internet,

use of the internet to process will ties and recruit and organize has grown. that provides a substantial challenge to us. host: more about the domestic threat, please. guest: part of that is the radicalization from overseas entities like u.s. citizens, understand the culture, using it against us when he is trying to radicalize individuals like the "new york times" bomber, major hasan from the shooting in texas. they have two streams of threat. they are trying to infiltrate to do a 9/11 event or christmas day bomber where they train somebody, radicalize, train, finance, equip with an explosive device and were unfortunately successful getting it on an

airplane and flying over detroit but for the unlucky operation of the item saved the lives of people. so they have an external threat into the united states and the other is radicalize and recruit at home in the united states. host: mr. ruppersberger, in response i reread the december 20 "washington post" piece that was called "top-secret america." in part two it was really about the infrastructure built since 9/11. it is written the investigation based on 100 interviews found that technology and techniques from the battle fields have migrated into law enforcement agencies in america. the f.b.i. is building a data base with the names and information of employment history of thousands of u.s.

citizens and residents who are believed to be acting suspiciously. increasing concern that it could end,in the public domain. there have been -- i don't know the number but fusion centers they are called that synthesizing the information. what can you tell americans watching this program about the protection of their privacy rights at the time there are concerns about domestic secur y security? one of the jobs of our committee is to oversee the agencies and make sure that they are doing the right thing and they are following the constitution. we always have balance issues when it comes to attacks. when there is an attack and all of a sudden people say you have to be aggressive. we made a mistake. how is our intelligence community doing this.

the intelligence moves on. there are different issues. when it comes to the constitution, we have laws in place and i represent n.s.a. it is in my district. i'm the first person they could talk to because i'm the first person on the committee that represents n.s.a. i can assure you there are checks and balances there to make sure they have not violated the constitution. they have inspector generals. we have set up systems in the process to make sure there is no violation of civil rights. but that is what congress's role is. because if there are mistakes, a violation, we have to make sure we are on top of that. host: your thoughts on this? guest: we regularly review the process of what they do with that information and how they obtain it. there are rules, requirements and laws they have to follow to get that information even in the data base.

our checks and balances are well under way. if there is a data base with someone in it there is some activity that meets the standard of the law to allow them to be placed in the data base. that is what americans need to understand. it notion that where half the story is told makes people wonder is my phone tapped, are they watching me. none of that is true unless you are involved in some criminal activity or a terrorist type of planning event. both of those will get you on a list. that was the way before the technology got here and after the technology got here. now we just have different ways to communicate and talk so the data bases are going to be more robust. but everybody that is on that list got there because they were conducting an activity that rose to the level by law that would get they will there. host: are we talking about the concerns that your fellow

members had about authorization of the patriot act? guest: we should be vigilant in watching agencies to make sure they are not invading someone's privacy, violating civil liberties. mr. ruppersberger and i have lots of conversations about this. we are passionate about making sure that we don't do that. it is important that we don't s subjugate the fourth amendment to anything but following the constitution. that being said, i have never seen a bill more misrepresented than the patriot act. there are two court systems we have in the united states. the fisa court, foreign intelligence surveillance act court that deals with people conducting espionage and foreigners who are here maybe conducting terrorist operations. then you have the criminal court that we are familiar with. the standards for each court are the same. it is just the nature of what they investigate are different. what the patriot act says is if

you are switching phones every five minutes that the government, if we have already proven to a judge that you are doing bad things with the phones, every time you switch we should be able to switch with you. that is what the patriot act does. host: here is the f.b.i. director talking about the patriot act provisions. >> last thing i would say as you and others have mentioned the threat increasingly is of lone wolfs, persons who are radicalized domestically and the tools up for reauthorization are essential for our ability to identify terroristses -- terrorists in general and lone wolves. guest: first, the patriot act is an issue that concerns many americans because they are concerned over the overreefing of the f.b.i. and others. there is the balance that we

need the tools and give the agencies and law enforcement agencies, f.b.i., the ability to do their job. on my side of the aisle there are people that will vote against the extension of the act. they have a legitimate point of view i understand it and we can do better. but usually the way legislation is made you have to get consensus and you move forward. yesterday in which we don't have many open hearings but it is good for the public and applaud the chairman. the public can understand what is going on and how the intelligence community works. i think that i asked the question and the answer that the director said. if the act was not extended and we are voting on whether to extend it, what would be the consequence. you would not have the resources to do the job.

what is the most important for me in the patriot act is the sunset. that means that we should reevaluate the law every two to three years and it shouldn't be political to see whether there are any violations of the law. we have to deal with the facts. if there is an issue of violation of lone wolf then we need to, when we reauthorize, we need to see if there is any violation and do we need to change the law. so, sunset is the key issue and we have to look at the laws. host: for the chairman and top democrat on the house intelligence committee we are pleased to have them here. fayetteville, north carolina. barry. caller: good morning. on the cyber security, i don't really that as an issue. most of the technology is already debugged before it is introduced into the public.

if i wanted to introduce code or program into someone else's computer, nine out of 10 times, i mean, you know, if that person is of importance or has great responsibility they are not going to introduce or have their computer and their information is going to be on a separate sexual. it won't be accessible by the internet. the other thing of technology, when i was growing up i used to hear stories about people, like from the radio stations they used to get broadcasts and they could hear the radio in their head. that is another technology that -- host: i will stop there and stay with the first one because both guests are shaking their heads no at your statement computers were protected. guest: it is scary the capability that nation states --

take china or russia that dedicates some of their smartest individuals to be able to get around fire walls and get into your computer without anybody knowing it, take information and exploit the information and take it back home with them. or they go in and disable your computer or disrupt it or make it do something it doesn't want to do. that is what has happened the last few years. they are exceptional good at breaking down systems on the computers. i would not feel safe for one minute that they couldn't get in and do something on your computer. so we have groups that work to keep it safe and they do a pretty good job. but we need to understand when a nation decides they are going to apply resources to breaking your code and circumventing your fire walls they will be successful

some of the time. that is why we've the n.s.a. and organizations with some of the smartest people you will ever meet making sure we have defenses in place that we can deal with this kind of technology that is very good and dangerous. host: what are lessons learned from the worm that was reportedly intended to get in iran infrastructure and disable some of its nuclear ambitions? guest: i won't talk about that but what i will talk about is the sophistication other countries, hackers and others have to be able to attack us on a regular basis. as we speak our pentagon and our country is being cyber attacked by other countries, by other hackers and what concerns me, countries that are trying to get inside information from intelligence from the defense point of view, what our government leaders are thinking. what concerns me is with al qaeda, who we know is our enemy, could hire some of these hack

ers to do damage. you can look at when russia went to attack georgia the first thing they did is cyber attack. cyber attacks are serious. they are one of the biggest threats to our country and technology keeps evolving and we have to stay on top of it. the good news is that we have some of the best minds dealing with it. but there are other minds that are good also. so, it is a serious issue and we have to take it and prioritize it and team with it. host: houston, don, independent line. caller: yes. first point, i don't remember the guy's name but he was from pakistan and he became radicalize radicalized by drones bombing his villages.

second point, seems to me like 10 years plus after this war on terror run by our military corporate industrial complex and a lot of congressmen and senators that are well funded by these people, it is not going too well. it is going to wind up radicalizing a lot of guys just like the guy from pakistan. host: u.s. foreign policy and its possibility of radicalizing people. guest: we have to understand something. if the enemy has a safe haven anywhere what we -- in afghanistan the reason 9/11 happened is because they had created a safe haven meaning they had freedom to operate, recruit people and train them and gather finances, to sponsor events that they could assemble and put together to conduct an

operation like the 9/11 operation. what the united states policy has been is we will not allow safe havens to exist. wherever they are we are going to find them and act to disrupt the activities. some notion that there is bombing of villages is just not true. there is no -- not the pakistanis wouldn't do it, we don't do it in afghanistan. we target bad guys in afghanistan. the pakistanis have their own effort in pakistan. so, this notion that there is a lot of civilian casualties is not true. one thing we have found is over the last 10 years is as aggressive as they are and as committed as they are to commit an act of violence in the united states and in europe, we have been able to stop or disrupt every single one of them. that is a combination of fortune policy we have when it comes to places like afghanistan and the

intelligence services efforts to disrupt the events before they happen in europe and here in the united states and around the rest of the world. host: this viewer goes back to the discussion about congressional oversight of civil rights under the patriot act and asks have there been claims of civil rights violations and have they opinion successful? >> we had an issue when the f.b.i. was sending out letters or getting information and we felt there was a violation. we worked with the f.b.i. on that. that was an example of sunset. when you have hearings to review what you have done and we dealt with that. so far we have seen mistakes and when you deal with volume -- i will give you an example. you have n.s.a. whose job is to hear millions of conversations and we have the technology not only to collect it but to analyze it so the information that deals with terrorists and

their plans to attack us or dealing in afghanistan or in iraq, this is what they do. so i think we are on top of this. but we have to look at it every day because when there is a violation it can be against the law and people will be held accountable no matter where they work. host: next call is from orchard park, new york, carl, democrat. caller: yes. i hate to rain on your picnic but i'm not sure the american people are getting good bang for the buck with the money we spend on intelligence. i don't think most people realize it runs up around $40 billion a year, more than the rest of the world combined spends for intelligence. host: you may not be happy about the numbers it is more like $80 billion a year. caller: i stand corrected and that makes my point a little better. we hide the appropriations in

various other committees, various other agencies i should say and what have we got for it? for example, on 9/11 the c.i.a. didn't have a clue. shortly after that, just before president bush ordered an invasion of iraq, we had the c.i.a. director say mr. president, it is a slam dunk, saddam hussein has weapons of mass destruction. shortly after that the president awarded that c.i.a. director the presidential medal of freedom. what did the congress do? did they bring back a church committee to find out how and what went wrong with the c.i.a.? no they went on their way funding it just as they always did and say wonderful things like you two gentlemen are doing this morning.

host: he provides a great jumping off point for how you want to run the committee. guest: first of all, let me go back to the church committee got us into trouble in the sense that it scaled down and really canceled a lot of very important programs in the intelligence world that cost us valuable information going into the 9/11 event. in the 1990's they so cut the intelligence agencies and budgets and personnel by tens of thousands of people that we had whole sections of the world that we had no eyes and ears in. we didn't know what was going on. i argue that was a huge, huge mistake for us and it showed going into 9/11. so, what happened after 9/11 is we got back into the human intelligence business. in the 90's we decimated our ability to recruit foreign spies to help us give information to find out what was going on to avoid trouble and wars and other

problems. what happened of the 9/11 is that we decided in a hurry we better rebuild our ability to recruit foreign spice in foreign countries to understand what is going on to avoid trouble. that was a big cost increase. the technology between 9/11 and today in the intelligence business has grown. one, we just got better at using technology to help us find out information and allow us to make good decisions. two, we had to have technology to defeat foreign nation technology that is -- again i want to stress this -- it is tens of thousands of attacks on our cyber infrastructure in the united states every single day. it is an unbelievable amount. people around the world still want to see the united states fail. they spend a lot of money and

effort to do that. it is a combination, and finding the balance of where we go forward. i have been aggressive and i know dutch has about saying we can to longer sustain the growth in the intelligence business and we will have to scale back a little bit. what we don't want to do is go back to the 1990's where you go into an event like 9/11 not having a full scope of information that you could have. so our argument is intelligence isn't a lux ary any more. it is a necessity. good intelligence means you avoid trouble. host: comments? guest: i agree with mike. we were not ready for 9/11. for republicans and democrats, they cut the intelligence committee after the berlin wall came down. we didn't identify or understand the danger of al qaeda. now we have to reevaluate and we have reevaluated. we are spending a tremendous

amount of money and we have to make sure our job is oversight and to make sure that the money we are spending is used the right way. i also sat on the appropriations committee and there are prioriti priorities. one thing of the costs are in the area of technology. i represent n.s.a. there is a lot of technology and we always have to keep,with other countries that are using technology against us. we have to stay ahead of the curve. another issue is space. one of the main reasons we are the most powerful country in the in the world and have freedom and liberty is because we control the skies. when sputnik came out years ago the concern was russia with control the skies. we put a man on the moon and as a result of research that put us on a level that we were experts

in the field and continue to be but we're starting to slip. china is budget money into improve their military and space program. they are going to go to the moon again and talking about partnering with russia. satellites help us take pictures and a lot of what we do. we have to be prepared. i don't know what the gentleman was talking about, we are working with people and continue to spend money. we take this seriously and we have experts who give us information and we make decisions on budgeting and policy. host: this is not the direct purview but in the event of terrorist attack one thing this country has not done is build a first responders system. we have seen the broadband prupl to allow agencies to talk to each other. why are we not further along?

>> i think there was disagreement of who owns it and how we should distribute it. i believe the first responder community should have a first bite at that apple and we have to change on the broadband to give tell the ability to have abscess. they need the bandwidth to do what they have to do. i think there have been disagreements about how we do it and how we get it moving. host: are you happy about that? guest: no. i think it is taking too long and we will have to get better at it. budget constraints in the states and local municipalities is adding to the frustration. it is an investment and that is probably going to take longer than we need. it has gotten been it was. it is not where it needs to be. host: baltimore city, maryland. republican. caller: hello.

one thing i would like to find out is dutch change his mind about the dream act. i know this is a little bit off, but it has to do with maryland. right now in maryland they are trying to bring that back. they don't want to check on the illega illegals. as you can tell, i'm not from this country and i came the legal way. he said something before about the border with mexico and drugs. one of the biggest problems is not just the drugs, it is the illegals coming in. i know, being from that area, some people say there are a lot of people trying to come in through the border and all you have to do is listen to the way they speak. some are very quiet and don't want to say anything because they don't know spanish.

guest: immigration is clearly an issue we have to deal with. we need to protect our borders. we have to deal with the issue of illegal immigration, no question. i feel very strongly we need to use our resources to not only deal with the issues we talked about with mexico but have a plan. with respect to the dream act, you have a situation where you have illegal immigrants and they have children in the united states or come to the united states when they were young. we have to find formulas to start to make a difference as it relates to immigration. this was a situation that would give an incentive for the children to go to college or the military that would be a requirement to have them come to citizenship. we have these individuals that are out there and they could be productive americans paying taxes. but immigration has to be dealt

with. wove it come together and start taking the next step to develop formulas to solve the problem. if you are here illegally you are committing a crime. if we took every police officer in this country and had them deal with the issue of immigration they would not be able to handle the people here illegally but also it with take them away from the jobs they are doing in crime, rape, burglary and whatever. so it is an issue we have not dealt with. host: dennis lane asks on twitter please ask if corporations are collecting information that is turned over to the government that is prohibited for the government to collect on their own? guest: there is no information that is collected anywhere that doesn't have due process attached to it. you have to have due process to get any information. as an f.b.i. agent if i wanted to find out who rented a car and

fill the blank of a car rental corporation i would have to show,with a subpoena. it is no different with any type of information. host: including the telephone companies and phone calls you make? guest: if you are going to collect information you need a subpoena to do it. if the government is compelling somebody to do something they have to have a subpoena or a court order. host: next caller is abdullah watching in minneapolis. independent. caller: thank you so much. my question is about home grown terrorists. and the role islam plays when incidents of terrorism happens. first of all, i would like to state that i'm a muslim and i'm very much embarrassed and

affected by what these evil guys do anywhere around the world, including the united states. however, when you watch tv and incidents of terrorism are discussed, you will find that people are painting all of us with a broad brush and blaming islam on it or -- and when you go to airports, you are easily picked on from the line. when people hear your accent or suspect you of being a muslim you are easily picked on. i would like to know what the chairman and ranking member think of this. host: michigan has a big arab american community so there are concerns about that. guest: we don't have any

concerns about an arab american community in michigan. we are proud of the contributions they make. when we talk about home grown, our biggest concern on home grown terrorism is radicalization. what we hope to do is involve imams from all over the country in starting to speak out and help those muslims who are being radicalized and pull them back to the faith of peace. our problem is that the people who understand american culture is using the things he knows about american culture to get into the heads of the individuals and pull them through a radicalization process that leads them to be willing to commit acts of violence. the way we stop that in the united states is have cooperation from muslims and

communities and arab communities and we have a lot of christian arabs in michigan as well. that community needs to help law enforcement identify individuals who are going through this process and stand up more often than they do to speak against what is this radicalization process. guest: clearly home grown terrorism is a great concern. it is very difficult from and it intelligence point of view when you have an individual, american individual who has been radicalized. how this is occurring and what our information shows is that the internet, the social network, is where a lot of this occurs. the one has been attempted to make this happen. as far as the issue of problems with the muslim community and the fact they have been discriminated against, it is

unfortunate the acts of a few affect everyone. the best way to do this is develop relationships with the communities and individuals and working with the leadership in the muslim community to say that the koran doesn't say you want to kill people. so we have to be aware of the home grown terrorists and that is where the community itself and other people, if they see an individual that looks as if he or she is going the wrong way and could try to be a suicide bomber, we need help from americans also. host: another question of preservation of rights. the person says why did the n.s.a. put fiber y's at every major switching station in the u.s.? guest: if you are compelling

someone to get information you have to have the third-party adjudication. there is no instance where you don't have to have it. host: so the n.s.a. is not spying on all information. guest: they have to do it through a court order or a subpoena. guest: and there are systems of checks and balances. we have systems, we have congress, inspector generals. there is -- we also have the justice department that oversees these. host: i want to show a statement from yesterday. >> i want to welcome dutch ruppersberger as the new ranking member. he has a solid record and he will serve the committee and country well. dutch is also a friend. i look forward to working with him to foster the bipartisan energy to lead the committee to our oversight responsibilities and to keep america safe.

guest: dutch wants us to run that again. host: i wanted to play that because i have seen two interviews where you emphasize this bipartisanship and you don't want the committee to be political. will you talk about those themes and why they are important and how you want to run things? . when the committee was founded in the 1970's it was supposed to be a quiet, thoughtful committee that dealt with the very difficult decisions and policies and over sigsight responsibilit. the 17 agencies that we have that are supposed to collect information to keep america safe. it is a huge responsibility. most of the issues that we deal with should be bipartisan if n nonpa partisan -- in nonpartisan. it has become highly charged and

political and i think it has done a disservice to america's oversight of the intelligence community. if they don't take the committee seriously they are going to do things that they should not be doing. it is our job to make sure they don't do that. by the way, if they need resources to do the job they need to do we are supposed to be there. so we have had a lot of conversations about this. there are going to be times when we disagree and policy issues where we disagree and we will do that in a way that is respectful and civil and we are going to move on to the next set of issues. that is our pledge to even other and our responsibility to be that interface between america and americans to do the business of the intelligence community that they can't see and know about. host: and have concerns about. guest: absolutely. and they should have concerns. host: let me ask you, congress is getting a rap for how

partisan it has become. we see it on a regular basis. do you think members can check those feelings? guest: we better have. the stakes are too high. this is one thing we should have learned the last election. people are sick and tired of the partisan politics that were occurring in congress. this committee is a committee that is very important because we are dealing with national security and people's civil rights and talking about a lot of money. when you talk about space and cyber security and everything. i think that chairman rogers and i both have had experience in law enforcement. we tease about it because i tell him that i was the prosecutor and you were the f.b.i. act and the prosecutor is supposed to control and yet he reminds me he is now the majority so he is going to win most of the votes. notwithstanding that, we have committed to each other we are going to disagree on issues. i know people on my side have

issues with the patriot act. we will debate them and hopefully come to a conclusion in the best interest of our country. if you look at what has happened on the committee and it has gotten way too political, we have not been able to pass a budget in six years. that is inexcusable. we are supposed to be the experts. we are having the hearings. we are supposed to over ssee al the agencies that deal in intelligence. we have not been able to agree on a budget or get one passed. that means the appropriators make the final decision. that is inexcusable. i feel strongly about working together. we will work together. a lot of what we do in life is about relationships and trust. we have committed to make sure this is a bipartisan committee that will do the best we can to protect our country. host: we have a tweet. not only does national security have to be bipartisan it has to listen to opposing voices. do you intend to bring critics

of the agency before the committee? guest: we have. there are a lot of members who are critics of the agencies. both dutch and i have been critical of the agencies when we think they are wrong. our job is not to be shells for the agency. we have done no service to them if we do that. but we've people come in who have problems and concerns with the agencies. as we said over time and as we have said individually to the agency directors, we are going to be critical when we ned to be. we will be supportive where we can be. our job is not to be yes men to the community. if we do that, i think both of us would consider that a failure. they don't do everything right and when they do we will be there. host: our last call is sullivan, missou missouri. mark. caller: i just turned down my

phone. host: go ahead. caller: thanks for c-span. host: we have a bad questiconne. caller: first of all the two leaders you have there, about every other word out of their mouth is 9/11. why don't they bring up the 1993 bombing of the world traede center where the p.b.i. supplied the truck and bomb they switched for a real bomb that blew them up. they killed six u.s. citizens. host: another person concerned about conspiracy. guest: that is almost impossible to answer a question like that. as a former f. pwfplt eufpb.i. e the oath to protect the united states and the constitution. for some thought that the u.s. government will kill its own citizens to promote anything is wrong. there was a trial and conviction in the 1993 bombing of the world

trade center. the blind sheik went to jail and some of his associates. that has been debunk pwued wher somebody went to jail. host: thank you both for being here. i know you will be doing much of your work behind closed doors but i will invite you to come back from time to time. it is an important way to talk to the public. >> to be open as much as we can is important. there are things that are classified but it is very positive we are having the open discussions. host: thank you again. we have about 12 minutes left. we will talk with you about the republicans and budget. the president's budget is coming out monday. there is already lots of skirmishes about spending issues. we would like to hear what you think. we will show you a couple of stories from the newspaper. in town right now is the conservative political action conference through saturday.

lots of messaging to people there about spending. let's listen to one person talking yesterday. >> as important as the spending cuts are and by the way we need a lot more of them than what we are getting served up today such a narrowly based political agenda is nature appropriate to our times nor is it politically conducive to a broad based appeal that determine our future success. we are all about winning in 2012. host: she was speaking to the conservative political action group yesterday. we will be covering the sessions again today and tomorrow and you will see them live and taped on our network. today at 9:00 eastern on c-span 2 is we a begins. we will talk with you about the republican congress and its approach to the budget.

the early skirmishes about levels of spending. here is one article on the washington times". debt ceiling stirs up speculation. fiscal disaster or political theatre. here are the numbers on the screen. host: while we are waiting, jim is on the phone. covering economics for the national journal, the administration is releasing a white pair today on the housing market specifically the recommendations for fannie mae and freddie mac. have you had a chance to learn what is in it yet? >> yes, i have looked through it. it is very interesting in large part because the administration is recommending three choices about what to do about the housing market and all three of them would essentially kill fannie mae and freddie mac.

. host: replace it with what? >> one would be an entirely private market with no government guarantees. the other end a private market which would be basically backed by sort of a government backstop that would say if certain loans are in trouble the government will guarantee them. then a hybrid with guarantee a small personal of loans but it could be ramped up in times of a crisis like the one a couple of years ago. host: does it talk about its concerns about impact on the housing market? >> absolutely. this is all about the impact which is fragile right now. part of what is going on is these recommendations are concurrent with other financial reform regulations that will do things to safeguard lenders and homeowners more money up front from the home buyer. ways to crack down on speculation that caused the

bubble. so it is hoping to safeguard the market. >> how does this affect the congressional state on freddie mac and fannie mae? >> it probably gets it started. it is a little bit of a political punt. the administration is not just saying here is the plan we want. at least one of which is highly palatable to republicans. stkpwr thanks very much. thanks for outlining the recommendations for how to address freddie mac and fannie mae. >> my pleasure. caller: back to the telephone calls on the g.o.p. and spending. i will show you a couple of articles about it. "washington post" here.

that is lori montgomery's piece. on "new york times" g.o.p. leaders yield to push for more cuts. they said they would being a sed to demands of kevin teufrps and dig deeper for billions of savings this year exhibiting the power of the tea party movement and inning changes of the clash. we go to the calls beginning with memphis. caller: hello. host: go ahead. caller: i'm 90 years old and i lived through the great depression and world war ii i was a veteran, recalled into the korean war. in my generation we didn't have what is going on now in regard

to free speech. i remember listen ing ing to fa coughlin. you have to remember my father lost his home, job, and there were millions sitting around that radio. that is what instigated a lot of that irresponsible speech. we have it today. you know the quote we have met the enemy and he is us. today rush limbaugh is way out of line. you have no control over fox tphaonew news. a.o.l. hired this namele tan know who said you can say anything you want on the radio as long as you are under oath. the other day -- host: thank you very much. i'm glad you still watch at 90

and thinking about national issues. we have about seven minutes. hughes county, oklahoma, bill. he is an independent. we are talking about the g.o.p. and spending, bill. caller: i would like to make the comment about our financial troubles in america. we spent billions promoting sob socialism. we tried to give homes to people that couldn't pay for them. then we turn around and evict three or four million people and put them on the street. it is all a big oxymoron. we are fighting wars in foreign country when we have been invaded by foreigners and our government seems to be making war on its own people instead of islam and all the illegal aliens in our country. i know there's got to be a chan

change. host: financial times this morning has a number of stories. obama faces budget balancing act. deficit strategy pushing broadband plan in advance on the white house budget proposal due monday. right below that on the ground shot fired in battle over foreign aid. a battle front has opened between the obama administration and republics about u.s. role in the world with the white house warning plans to cut spending will endanger national security. proposals would allocate 17% less than the $56 billion they seek this year. republicans said they wanted deeper cuts. next is hartford, connecticut. democratic line. stpwhrao good morning. i have one comment. in my view we do not have a spending problem, we have a

revenue problem. we had a surplus in 2000. the republicans should end one entitlement tax cuts for the rich. they should end that. we have a revenue problem and we do not have a spending problem. host: thank you. dealt in hartford. from the "u.s.a. today" tea party flexes muslim at conservative forum. mingle with old guard at conference. there is a photograph of michelle bachman. house republicans lead charge to reduce regulations. house oversight kcommittee chairman gavelled with two posters one saying how do regulations block private sector job growth the other we are listening. next is a call from rochester, talking about the g.o.p. and spending.

this is jamison, independent. caller: how are you doing. host: fine, thanks. caller: this sounds hraoeulike same spirit back in the 1960's. they are just trying to make this president fail. this is the way. they know if they cut the spending they are going to cut spending in african-american communities, spanish communities and poor white rural communities. then you are going to have a big uproar like tunisia and egypt. but the sad part about it, america has more guns than tunisia and egypt. and people are literally going to start shooting and killing each other. so, that tea party and g.o. pfpp. ain't nothing but the same old people that were back in the 1960's who just want america to fail.

host: thank you. please remember callers turn down the tv volume because the fe feedback makes it hard to hear. just got an a.p. news alert. we will show you the scene frommal japanese that is showing picks. saying local government officials say president mubarak has left cairo and is in a red sea resort. we are seeing pictures from the there. it reports that mubarak and his family have left the egyptian capital. just about two minutes left. we will take a call from baltimore. joe, republican. caller: thank you. i'm just learning some of the comments that are being made by fellow americans regarding our financial situation, i just hope and pray the american people stay alert and don't give in to

this spend and spend. the revenues are plenty. it is a spending binge that we are on and if we ran our own households we would declare bankruptcy or we would have to get more jobs to take care of that spending. i just hope the american people stay tuned in and don't allow us to raise the spending pwgt budget and get it under control. host: two points of view difficult on this from the opinion pages. the chair of the council of economic advisors argues in the "wall street journal" that time for spending cut is now. in politico david rogers and his piece ask is the g.o.p. overreaching. next a call from shreveport, louisiana. clifton. a democrat. caller: yes, good morning.

if there had not been president obama's initiative on spending money to bring it country out of the turmoil that it was it, brought on by president bush, this country would be in terrible condition. the g.o. pfpp. continued to ins that the president's policy has failed but it has not. besides that, the g.o.p. is constantly talking about cutting spending. i know most of the spending they are doing is eliminating jobs. even in my state, our government is always talking about cutting jobs -- host: we will have to make that the last word. house of representatives is now in session on this friday morning. thank you for being with us. we will be back 7:00 tomorrow.

you are always attentive to our pleas. we need to be more attentive to your response and your commands. or we are left to ourselves. you are loving with those who love you. with those sincere, you show yourself to be sincere. with the cunning, you can undo their cunning. so shed your light upon the house of representatives, that step by step, in a unified effort, we may build a society where stability and creativity will flourish and we may even glimpse your glory, both now and forever. amen. the speaker pro tempore: the chair has examined the journal of the last day's proceedings and announces to the house his approval thereof. pursuant to clause 1 of rule 1,

the journal stands approved. >> mr. speaker. the speaker: for what purpose does the gentleman from texas rise? >> i ask for a recorded vote. the speaker: the question is on agreeing to the speaker's approval of the journal. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. in the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it. the journal stands approved. for what purpose does the gentleman from texas rise? mr. poe: i ask for a recorded vote, mr. speaker. the speaker: does the gentleman ask for the yeas and nays? mr. poe: yes, sir. the speaker: the yeas and nays are requested. those favoring a vote by the yeas and nays will rise. a sufficient number having risen, the yeas and nays are ordered. pursuant to clause 8 of rule 20, further proceedings on this issue are postponed. the pledge today will be led by the gentleman from pennsylvania, mr. altmire. mr. altmire: i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic

for which it stands, one nation under god, indy visible, with liberty and justice for all. the speaker: the chair will entertain up to five one-minute requests on each side. for what purpose does the gentleman from virginia rise? >> to address the house for one minute and revise and extend. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. >> mr. speaker, when future generations look back at the 112th congress, they should remember us as the congress that made the tough decisions that got our economy back on track and restored america to greatness. that's why i fully support the commitment to cut at least $100 billion of the budget, we are a country that's $ trillion in debt, which is placing every american regardless of political party at serious and increasing risk. we're borrowing more than 40% of

what we're spending. my 2-year-old grandson is $45,000 in debt and to say that our spending is unsustainable that doesn't quite capture in my mind the gravity of our situation. to meet the deep obligations we have to pass on to the future generations, the blessings of liberty and freedom, we must act now and act decisively. that's why i'm here this morning to emphatically ask that this congress and this session works together to find our way to $100 billion in cuts. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentlelady from new york rise? >> to address the house for one minute and revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady is recognized for one minute. mrs. maloney: the new republican proposal to eliminate all funding for the many services provided by organizations such as planned parenthood are not merely anti-choice, they are also anti-health, anti-woman and anti-poor.

the republican proposal would eliminate the title 10 family planning, which gives millions of american women access to primary and preventive health care. these budget cuts would deny crucial health services and cancer screening just to women. their proposal would set up insurmountable cost barriers to family planning, just for the poor. their vision of smaller government would expand the government's power over a woman's choices. it is wrong, it is shortsighted and it is unjust. let's turn to the business of creating jobs and economic opportunity and away from the business of ruling other people's lives. the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentleman from florida rise? >> to address the house for one minute and revise and extend. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. >> madam speaker, i recently

introduced legislation that ensures that foreign terrorists are tried in military courts instead of civilian courts like common criminals. attorney general holder originally wanted some terrorists, including the mastermind of 9/11, to be tried in new york city courtroom. this proposal was solidly rejected on a bipartisan basis. mr. buchanan: my bill solves this problem. the military tribunal act requires terrorists to be prosecuted and sentenced before a military court. this is the appropriate judicial review for terrorists who kill innocent men, women, and children. classified intelligence may be made public if terrorists are given access to trial in public courtrooms. i urge all my colleagues to co-sponsor this important legislation. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentleman from pennsylvania rise? >> to address the house for one minute.

the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. altmire: i rise to fulfill my side of a friendly wager with my friends in the pennsylvania delegation to commem -- in the wisconsin delegation to commemorate the green bay packers' super bowl win. despite playing much of the game without injured stars charles woodson and donald driver, the packers never trailed and ended their season by winning the trophy named after the franchise's most storied coach, vince lombardi. in winning super bowl 45k -- in winning super bowl xlv, their coach led the franchise to its -- to the most nfl playoff wins in the nfl. the speaker pro tempore: for

what purpose does the gentleman from texas rise? mr. poe: request permission to address the house for one minute. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for one minute. mr. poe: the president announced to this congress he would freeze all domestic spending. this week we heard the administration say it wants to spend billions for high speed rail. and that's not all. they want to give wireless to everyone in the country at taxpayer expense. it would be nice for all americans to be able to ride on fast choo-choo's throughout the fruited plan while reading the news on their wireless ipad but the country is out of money. our national debt has risen over $1. trillion since last year. we need to focus on getting ourselves out of this crisis by cutting spending, not more spending. ask the 44 million people living under the poverty level if they want their tacks to go to the administration's polar express. we need to cut borrowing, cut spending and cut the size of

government. we are all overdue to stop subsidizing the government's special projects for special people with money that does not exist. that's just the way it is. the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentleman from connecticut rise? >> to address the house for one minute. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for one minute. >> this past monday marks the one-year anniversary of the disaster in middletown, connecticut, that claimed six lives and injured dozens others. it could have been prevented. unsafe procedures helped ignite natural gas in an explosion that could be heard across the a 30-mile radius in central connecticut. mr. murphy: one of the people who lost their lives that day hailed from my district. as we look back at the events, it's up to honor his memory and those who died alongside him. the cost of powering our homes and businesses should never be

measured in lives. industry and government alike failed peter that cold winter morning and we have much work ahead of us to right that wrong. while those who lost loved ones in middletown a year ago will never be made whole again, we yes them our diligence and best work to make sure it never happens again. i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentleman from virginia rise? >> to address the house for one minute and revise and extend. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. scott: last year, we passed tax reduction on millionaires. when the bill passed, many of us asked how we were going to pay for it. now we know. this week, the republican majority released a list of spending cuts and look how we're going to pay for it. cuts in spending -- cuts in heating assistance for low-income families, job training programs, national

institutes for health, nasa research, community health centers, and women, infant and children's nutrition programs. madam speaker, the worst part is that the savings from the 70 programs slated to be cut only total $23 billion, less than the cost of the bonus estate tax changes for dead multimillionaires a long way from the $100 billion demanded by the tea party, nowhere close to paying the $850 billion tax cut bill and doesn't fix the long-term structural imbans in the federal budget. mals, that's not right. the speaker pr from kale rise? >> to address the house for one minute and revise and extend. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. >> i rise with serious concerns about the -- this house. i was told there was a right way

and wrong dayway to do things. the right way is to look before you leap. reckless cuts are as dangerous as reckless spending. mr. farr: democrats talk about create manager jobs. on the other side they talk about the race to the wot tom in fiscal cuts. think about it. you can't create jobs by removing the foundation that creates an educated work force. cutting access to education won't create more jobs. cutting job training won't create a more competitive work force. cutting social safety nets won't save lives. not having hearings on the impacts of our cuts is not a smart thing to do. that's why my granddaughter reminds me we should stop, look, and listen before we cross the street. but not the new congress. which does not embrace -- which embraces a race to the bottom rather than informed reductions. we should not -- we should look before we leap.

it might save jobs and lives. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to clause c of rule 119, consideration of house resolution 172 will now resume, which the clerk will report by title. the clerk: house calendar number six, house resolution 72,

resolution directing certain standing committees to inventory and review existing, pending and proposed regulations and orders from the federal government particularly with respect to their effect on jobs and economic growth. the speaker pro tempore: when consideration was postponed on thursday, february 10, 2011, four hours of debate remained on the resolution work three hours equally divided and controlled by the chairs and ranking minority members of the committee on the judiciary, agriculture and government reform and one hour equally divided and controlled by the cheer and ranking minority members on education and work force and the majority and minority leader or their designees. the chair recognizes the gentleman from texas, mr. smith. mr. smith: thank you, madam speaker. i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. smith: two years ago and two years into the current administration washington policies have not rescued our

economy from crisis. in fact, they have intredged the crisis. -- entrenched the crisis. american workers pay the price as regulations stifle job creation and slow economic recovery. the judiciary committee doesn't have jurisdiction over sweeping economic changes but it does have jurisdiction over something that sweeps with just as much force, that is the administrative law about how agencies must respond to congress and what agencies must consider before they rule at all. we reassert authority over the most burdensome regulations our agencies churn out. these are major regulations, those that impose a burden of $100 million or more on our economy. . it requires congress not an unelected agency head to decide whether regulations with massive cost become the law of the land. the judiciary committee has

already begun hearings on the act and intended to move quickly to mark up this legislation. small businesses are the heart of job creation. rather than bend to small business's needs, washington too often rigidly demands that small businesses bend to washington. overbearing, one-size-fits all federal regulations have long been the order of the day. small businesses cannot bear their weight. since small businesses are the engine of job creation, it is clear what suffers, that is jobs. this week i introduced a regulatory flexibility improvements act of 2011 to force federal agencies to accommodate the needs of small businesses. yesterday the judiciary committee held a hearing on the bill and it intends to mark up that bill soon. let's reform the administration -- let's reform the administrative procedure act,

the fundamental charter, for all agency ruling making. while it is not time to retire the a.p.a., it is past time to strengthen it with commonsense reforms. we should make permanent cost benefit analysis requirements that presidents have developed through executive orders. practice has proved that cost benefit analysis improves regulatory effectiveness and lowers regulatory costs. but an executive order, no matter how wise, can be revoked by the next resident of the white house. other vital reforms also must take place. agencies' favorite and almost universal course under the a.p.a. is informal notice and comment rule making. this procedure is certainly convenient and it does have its place. but under its shelter, it has long been too easy for big government to impose hard hitting rules without sufficiently vetting them. this should change. we should consider tougher requirements that agencies must

demonstrate and need for regulations. congress and the courts provide daily prove that evidence tested with witnesses at hearings produces the best judgments. why shouldn't agencies use formal rule making hearings to evaluate the need for major regulations that cost hundreds of millions of dollars? we also should make sure the public has earlier opportunities to comment on potential agency actions. public input should come well before agency positions hardened into settled but often underinformed judgments. under traditional one-time notice and procedures, agency decisions are too often made before public comment even happens. president obama has embraced a number of these principles with both spoken and written words. so i hope we will have bipartisan support for our efforts to pass meaningful legislation that will help create jobs. madam speaker, i reserve the balance of my time.

the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from michigan, mr. conyers, is recognized. mr. conyers: top of the morning, madam speaker. i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. conyers: i am curious about the reference and surprised that my friend, the chairman of the judiciary committee would come to the floor in this discussion and lift up the rains act as a way that we may prevent the regulations for inhibitting jobs. -- inhibiting jobs.

under the rains act we would be violating the separation of powers doctrine that i'm sure that members of the judiciary committee, particularly my friend, the chairman and ranking member for many years, would be familiar with. the rain act which we have under consideration in our committee would be the last thing we would want to enact in this congress to create more jobs. the last thing. i am surprised that the separations of powers doctrine is now required for me to explain on the house floor about

a 1988 case entitled morris v. olson, 4le 7 -- 487 u.s. page 654 that the rains case would be actually -- constitutionally -- would be constitutionally infirmed and that the rains act would be a terrible thing for us to do if you're serious about jobs. supporters of the rains act argue that congress and the chairman have said this, the congress has delegated too much authority over the years to what they call un-elected bureaucrats in the executive branch. of course, they are appointed.

creating thereby a lack of accountability among federal agencies and resulting in burdensome regulations. the rains act does not address even the problem that they are arguing about. some might argue that there is a need to strike a balance between protecting the safety and health of all americans and fostering economic growth and job creation. but the president of the united states has already anticipated this need with his issuance, just days ago, on the executive order improving regulation and regulatory review. i intend to put this in the

record at the appropriate time. which directs agencies to consider the concerns and these concerns in promulgating rules, but the bill that the chairman of the committee refers to would not achieve this balance, rather it will distort the rule making process and will hamper implementation of every single law on the books by changing the presumption in the congressional review act and requiring affirmative congressional approval for all major rules. this act will serve as a chokehold and stifle regulatory review which may in act be the real intent of rains legislation. so i must respectfully hope that

all of the members of this house will carefully review the rains act which will be coming up for a vote in the committee. we have had the hearings. and i'd like you to all weigh in on this because nothing could be more seriously destructive to trying to create jobs than doing what is proposed in that bill. madam speaker, i reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman reserves the balance of his time. the gentleman from texas. mr. smith: madam speaker, i yield three minutes to the gentleman from north carolina, mr. coble, who is also chairman of the administrative law subcommittee. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from north carolina is recognized for three minutes. mr. coble: i thank the distinguished chairman from texas for yielding. i appreciate that. i rise in strong support, madam speaker, on this resolution.

it's been far too long since the congress took a comprehensive review of our regulatory policies and procedures. i'm not here today to be a demagogue or accuser, but it appears many of our regulations simply become another cost of doing business in america. my district is no different from many others. we are suffering from the recession and while we once claim many manufacturing and producing stations, a significant number of directly related jobs having disappeared and gone elsewhere. this situation has grown so dire that general feeling in many places in america is that if the government wants to hold you in violation, the chances are trouble is eminent. i support public safety, public health, safe work conditions, and other areas covered by federal regulations, but i simply do not agree with those who feel that the only problem with our regulations is that there are not enough. this mentality, madam speaker,

is exactly what has gone wrong with many of our regulations. i have no doubt that it would clean our regulatory system, new business and investments will be forthcoming in america. i believe we can do this in such a way as to reinforce good, sound regulations. the judiciary committee, madam speaker, has jurisdiction over the administrative procedures act and many other areas on the commerce code -- commercial code which can be improved without compromising consumer interest. a lot is at stake here and this is not a fight between businesses and their regulators. it's a fight, madam speaker, for the american dream that a list and entrepreneur innovator can have an idea perhaps a dream and then fully pursue it. i'm not implying the sky is falling but the reality is disappointing indeed. our country is becoming less

conducive for economic growth and a major contributing factor, in my opinion, is the failure of our regulatory system. i hope we can change this very soon, madam speaker. and i say to the gentleman from texas, i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yield back. the gentleman from michigan. mr. conyers: madam speaker, i'm pleased now to yield to the ranking member of the subcommittee on courts and administration, the distinguished gentleman from tennessee, steve cohen, as much time as he may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from tennessee is recognized for as much time as he may consume. mr. cohen: thank you, madam speaker. i want to thank the ranking member for the time. my committee, courts commercial and administrative law, had hearings on these bills, the rains act as well as the regulatory reform bills that have been proposed. the rains act would require all measures that have a cost of

$100 million or more, before their regulations go into effect, within 70 days of the promulgation of those regulations they have to be approved by a positive vote of this house or equal house, the senate, and signed by the president before they go into effect. the reality, madam speaker, is this would stifle government. and stifle growth. because as we have seen the senate had difficulty doing much of anything within 70 days. in fact, it had difficulty doing much in two years. and to ask the senate where any one senator can put down a slip on a judicial nomination or hold up legislation that they so choose, unless they get what they desire and want, the last vestige in reality that we have in this country of don't-ask, don't-tell, don't ask the senator what they want, don't tell what they got, all of these

regulations would be at the whim of any one individual senator. that's not what the american public wants. the american public wants the government to work. they want the house and senate to work. they don't want the system in the senate to where one senator can kill almost anything. to where senator no can stop the government from actively promoting the general health, welfare, safety of the american public. now, the rains act wasn't needed , apparently, during the time that george bush was president. and yet there were more regulations and rules during that time than there have been during president obama's time as president. it's interesting to note that my colleagues on the other side understood the separation of powers doctrine and the fact that the article 2 allows the

executive to carry out and administer the laws, and they should be able to do so. but once president obama came into office, and there was financial services reform, the financial services reform we needed because without regulations the financial services sector almost took this country into another great depression. they did take us into a great recession, costing us jobs and jobs and jobs and jobs. . those two work together to almost bring down this nation's economy and the world's economy. to where we had a day when president bush brought us the tarp to save our economy.

and in a bipartisan fashion, we passed the tarp that secretary paulsen told us we had to pass because we were on the brink of, president bush also said, of financial collapse. yes, financial collapse because of the lack of regulation. and yet in this congress, the 12th, we're being asked to say that no regulations would take effect unless the house and senate, that body known not for its alacrity but for its quote-unquote deliberateness, would have to pass something within 70 tais. health care legislation, regulations couldn't go into effect to keep young people on their parents' insurance until they're 26. unless the senate acted within 70 days. pre-existing conditions would continue to be an impediment for children to get insurance and to

be treated. lifetime caps would continue to exist because we couldn't get regulations approved within 70 days. the fact is, it's the executive's responsibility to carry out the laws that congress passes that congress is not the executive and because barack obama is president is no reason to change what the founding fathers set up as a great document with three separate and equal branches of government being challenged, now, the reins act would go back on what the founding fathers wanted. it would go back on the constitution, which we spent time reading on this floor, the entire constitution, that included article ii, the powers of the executive and equal branch -- an equal branching of government to the legislature and the reins act would say that the constitution doesn't matter, that the congress, the legislative branch that's

supposed to pass the laws, will also be part of executing the laws. i hold the constitution in high regard. i don't believe we should shred it because we want to have an opportunity to slow up financial regulations passed as part of the dodd-frank bill and health care for the american public. the whole idea of this review of regulations that we've gotten, and this discussion on the floor of this house, has taken this house from a place where the american public doesn't watch the congress make laws and make improvements to create jobs to improve the welfare of the american public but it makes it a debating society because we already have the power to review rules and we do it in judiciary committee and we do it in all committees. now we're going to have reality television and crmbing span, instead of watching us pass laws, is going to watch us discuss what we already have been doing, always do and are

supposed to do, which is review regulations and have oversight but not veto over the executive. so madam speaker, it is with great regret that i participate in this debate because this debate is not a part of a law and an action and a bill to improve the american public but simply a political show. with all due respect to the chairman of the committee and the members who have brought this legislation, it violates the constitution which we read that shouldn't have been a show, that should have been something we held deeply to our hearts. this violates the constitution and the powers of article ii. i yield back and reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from texas. mr. smith: i yield myself 30 seconds. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. smith: i want to point out to my friends on the other side of the aisle and those who are watching this debate that both

supreme court justice breyer and well-known and well-regarded professor larry tribe have written supporting the constitutional basis of the reins act. it is clearly constitutional, it is clearly going to create jobs. by the way, that's oppose -- as opposed to the new health care bill which the c.b.o. said would cost 800,000 jobs. madam speaker, i'll now yield three minutes to my colleague from texas, mr. poe. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for three minutes. mr. poe: i thank the chairman for yielding. madam speaker, the nation is over-regulated. you talk to any business owner, small or big, one of the first things they will talk to you about is the massive amount of federal regulations that are imposed on them, many of them making no sense, but costing them money. of course that cost is always transferred down to the consumer.

the american citizen. i have tried to find out in the last few days how many regulations there are. nobody knows. we can't find anybody in washington that can give us an exact numb of how many. one person that i trust said that there are over 300,000 federal regulations that have punitive fines for failure to abide by this regulation. that's a lot of regulations. it seems to me, and this is just my opinion, that down the street where the bureaucrats work in those offices, and we don't know who those people are, they get up every morning they go into a room they sit around a big conference table, drink coffee and they say, who can we regulate today? and they write out another regulation. and pass it down to the fruited plain and make the american citizen comply with that regulation. some regulations are probably

pretty good. some probably are not so good. and it's our duty as representatives of the people to control and regulate the regulators. that is our job. i believe that is our constitutional requirement, since we allow these agencies to exist in the administration. seems to me the federal government should help business, not get in the way of business. and we should stop and start our job of doing away with burdensome regulations that don't help the country. this law allows congress to review by means of an expedited legislative process federal regulations issued by the government agencies and by passage of a joint resolution toover rule a regulation. we should have oversight over those regulations. the health care bill is probably a pretty good example of this overregulation. regardless of where we are on that issue, it brings about new

massive expensive regulations. section 906 of h.r. 35 0 will require business owners to submit a separate 1099 form for every single business transaction that they have with another business that totals more than $600 a year. now what that means, you've got a business they deal with other businesses, if they deal with them more than $600 a year, which many businesses do, they've got to file a 1099 form. and the legislation also allows for enforcement under the -- mr. smith: i yield the gentleman an additional two minutes. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. poe: it's expensive regulation that makes no sense. why should this paperwork be sent to washington so bureaucrats can review it? i don't understand the logic. it makes no sense. but the bill also required 16,000 new i.r.s. agents so

oversee the individual mandate requirements that every person must comply with. i think that is unconstitutional, the supreme court will eventually decide. but why do we need 16,000 new i.r.s. agents under the health care bill? i think that's overregulation. the con fregsal budget office, as my friend and chairman from texas said, the director, elmendorf, yesterday, testified that the health care bill will cost 00,000 jobs for americans he said that yesterday. the bill is not going to help the economy, it's not going to help get jobs, it's going to cost us 800,000 jobs. these are some reasons why i think congress has the obligation to review the regulatory process and to get our house in order and probably eliminate a few of those 300,000 expensive regulations that are imposed upon businesses and on citizens. with that, i yield back.

the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from michigan is recognized. mr. conyers: i yield myself as much time as i may consume before i recognize the distinguished gentlelady from houston. because judge poe, if he is still here, has raised the first in the time allotted the judiciary committee has raised two specific grievances about overregulation diminishing job opportunity. one was on the 1099 form, which i am going to examine more carefully, and the other was about the fact that the health care reform act frequently rede-rogatoryly referred to to as the obamacare act, but which i call the obamacare act because

i think it's going to go down in history as major accomplishment of the president within the first two years of his office. he said it would cost 800,000 jobs. i would like to ask him, or anyone in the house, for any evidence that there is an 800,000 job expense because the health care bill that both sides refer to as obamacare now creates jobs because we're adding -- we're adding many more people to the health care system which, ladies and gentlemen, are going to require more doctors, more nurses, more clinics, more

hospitals. how on earth can we expand the provisions of health care which, incidentally, should apply to every american in this country, and then say that it's going to reduce the number of jobs? i think that logic defies explanation but i would yield to anybody that would like to explain it to me. i yield to the gentleman from the judiciary committee, the chairman of the committee. mr. smith: i thank my friend for yielding. the source of information i used and judge poe used saying the bill would cost 800,000 jobs was a report released yesterday by the congressional budget office saying the health care bill would cost 800,000 jobs. the c.p.o. is an independent, credible outside agency upon whom we rely for information on

a regular basis. for them to come out and say the health care bill will cost 800,000 jobs is quite frankly believable and the reason why i think we can cite them as a credible source. i thank the gentleman for yielding. mr. conyers: you're welcome. i frequently cite them as a credible source myself. but would my chairman of the committee explain how we ensure millions of more people and then with fewer and fewer people that the -- did the c.b.o. explain anything in their discussion of this job loss of how the health care system would be considerably expanded but yet at the same time lose jobs? they would do it with less people?

can the chairman of the committee assist me in understanding that apparent disconnect? and i yield. mr. smith: would the gentleman yield again? i can't explain the disconnect because i don't think there is a disconnect but we can certainly supply you with the testimony offered by the c.b.o. yesterday in which they said it would cost 800,000 jobs. we'll get you a copy of the testimony or the other judiciary staff members may be able to supply us with a copy as well. i don't think there's a disconnect. i believe the c.b.o., i believe the health care bill will cost 800,000 jobs and i thank the gentleman for yielding. mr. conyers: you're welcome. i'm pleased now to recognize the distinguished gentlelady from houston, texas, sheila jackson lee, a senior member of the committee, for as much time as she may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady is recognized for such time as she may consume. ms. jackson lee: thank you, madam speaker. let me thank mr. conyers for

yielding. i think it's important that we explain to our colleagues what we're doing here. this is part of a seven or nine-hour marathon for committees of jurisdiction to come to the floor to respond to how important it is to, in essence, clog up the government. it sounds pretty and it sounds attractive to be able to suggest that we have not been exercising due diligence as relates to the regulatory process of the executive branch, and my colleague from tennessee was right when we cite the constitution, what we are saying is that the founding fathers recognize the importance of three distinct branches. the legislative writes legislation and has the right to oversight and those who are part of this body are elected to represent certain perspectives. .

the executive is elected by all of the people. electing the president of the united states. and the third branch, judiciary branch, has oversight. what we have taken to the floor to do is to spend nine hours in redundancy talking about what this body should be doing anyhow. we have the responsibility of oversight. we have the ability to question regulations in regular order. but what we will be doing is ignoring the people's business of creating jobs and, frankly, putting ourselves in the role of a clogged toilet. meaning that we are doing nothing. we are stuck up. so i would make the argument that the raines act may be through good intention is a dilatory tactic that keeps us from doing our work. let me give you a few examples

as a member of the house judiciary committee. one of the subcommittees that i have the privilege of sitting on is a committee, and i thank chairman smith for designing this committee again, dealing with competitiveness. what could be more important than assessing whether or not this country is losing its competitiveness to countries around the world or that corporations are doing noncompetitive acts that causes us to lose jobs. i'm not happy with the united continental -- united-continental merger. we just lost jobs in houston, 500 of them. i would prefer us continuing to have oversight over whether these large-type mergers cause us to lose jobs. there are any number of merging industries that believe that's the best way to go.

and therefore i would welcome that opportunity. mr. conyers, i understand that the mayor of new york is suggesting that germany should take over wall street. i'm hurt. not that i have anything against germany. but i know that there is a type of intellectual property that is possessed if nothing else, the pride of wall street as it relates to the body politics of finance in this country and around the world. i would like to have a hearing as to whether or not that is detrimental to the loss of jobs or whether, in fact, it diminishes the competitiveness of this nation. that is what the judiciary committee has powers to do. if you put this bill in place, and might i concede i don't mind conceding that something is going to pass, but i hope that there is a thought process that recognizes that staff has

indicated to us that last year under this rule there are 94 major regulations that this body would have to tend to. so we would have eliminated our work on food safety, we would have had to eliminate our work on wall street reform, we would have had to eliminate our work on ensuring that americans get good health care in order to stop the work of this body to address a regulation that we would have every right in an oversight process to handle. then as a member of the crime subcommittee i want you to be aware of the fact that i have been told by representative of the federal prison bureau that our federal prison now houses more convicted international and domestic terrorists than guantanamo bay. but yet we are alt a hiring -- at a hiring freeze. we don't have enough prison, federal bureau prison

corrections officers in order to ensure as a rising inmate population, nothing that i'm proud of, continues to grow, the ratio of prison -- correction officers, federal, diminishes. you can see it in the state. tragedy in washington state, not enough officers in the state prison, and a prison officer is killed. we need to have hearings on how we can address the crisis in the federal bureau of prisons. i might say it would add jobs. we need more individuals there to protect them who are doing -- serving their country as being part of the federal bureau of prisons systems. creating jobs. why are we not attending to that? when you have to address major regulation and stop the business of this house to either hold a hearing in committee or 15 days discharge to the floor, we have to debate it on the floor, that's what we'll be doing. rather than engaging in the legislative process.

we write the law. and i might say that i have a great deal of respect for the c.b.o. but i also know that they are not without vulnerabilities and they are not without imperfection. if there is 800,000 jobs lost, are they being lost throughout industry because of certain requirements and on the other hand some three million-plus jobs may be created because of the access to health care and the increased -- increase in resources for more doctors and nurses, health technicians, providing scholarship dollars, more community health clinics that will employ people? it doesn't make sense. it's an oxymoron to suggest that you are going to have a finite law of 800,000 but you are not going to be able to increase. let me -- i'm on judiciary and this is what we are here for, i have already cited to you that i'd like the competitive compete to be addressing the questions of whether mergers are still good for america and the working people. whether or not our intellectual property that is being hacked and stolen is diminishing the

ability for american workers to work. whether or not even entertaining, selling wall street is a rational approach to take. and then let me get on a more controversial subject. some would make the argument, this couldn't be a job creator, but we have been frustrated by the immigration system for now the lifetime of my tenure in congress. we have had the pros and cons, we have been mad at the 1996 reform and the 1980's reform. some of us have continued to press one refrain that we must do security, border security and also a comprehensive approach to immigration. some would argue that that absolutely cannot create jobs, but i will tell you, why are we not fully addressing the broken immigration system in this nation? if we pull at the heartstrings of many members of congress who

will proudly speak of the german heritage, irish heritage, hispanic, latino heritage, african-american heritage, asian heritage, heritage from all around the world, they will point to the fact that they came from somewhere. we understand that if we can regularize this broken immigration system, not only do we have individuals, legitimately investing in america through social security and taxes, but imgrants, new immigrants also create jobs for others. and it builds an economy. the agriculture economy for example that is playing hide and seek with workers who they have to hire. hide and seek because they don't have a regularized system. agriculture industry, one of the greatest in the world, the greatest, we can feed the world, i applaud our family farmers and the industry that has grown, i

have always admired being able to do something with the land. we could be addressing an immigration reform system that puts people to work. that allows the agricultural industry to grow and thrive and build jobs. in fact, i was listening to a colleague from the other side of the aisle who indicated he had come out of the agricultural industry as a man that is doing agricultural work, mr. conyers and mr. smith, and he said we have not been hampered by the economy. we are thriving. we could grow. so if we put an immigration system in place, the work of the judiciary committee, we create jobs. isn't that what we are supposed to be doing? so i ask my colleagues as my ranking member has said to thoughtfully think of this particular resolution, the raines act. it is truly that. i would add that it will strangle with the raines the

work of this body and the work of the judiciary committee and it will not create any jobs. we'll be stifled, standing in our tracks, working with one regulation after another. what i'd like to say if you've got a bad regulation, send it to the judiciary committee, we can handle it. but i don't want to see corporations getting away with criminal activity which we can address in the subcommittee on crime, i don't want to see us getting away with food safety problems because we are not addressing it. madam speaker, let me just say this is a lot of great intention and i have a great respect for my colleagues. this institution is one that i love. but i frankly believe we can do better in this house and the president of the united states and the administration don't deserve this. what we do deserve is a hard fight to reduce the deficit and to build on jobs and to serve the people back home who are struggling with their own problems and needs this

government to respond to the need of education, health care, and science, and many other agencies. with that, madam speaker, i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from texas. mr. smith: i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. smith: madam speaker, i just want to say to my texas colleague who just spoke that i know and appreciate how strongly she feels about saving jobs in houston, creating jobs in houston, as i do, too. but we heard yesterday from the c.b.o. that this new health care bill is going to cost america 800,000 jobs. it just so happens if you prorate that out, that would mean that the new health care bill will cost houston, texas, around 600 jobs. of course it will cost other communities around the country jobs as well. so the best way to try to save jobs in houston, the best way to try to prevent jobs from being lost in houston would be to vote to repeal the health care law. ms. jackson lee: would the gentleman yield? mr. smith: not yet.

the gentlewoman from texas also raised the subject of immigration. i wasn't aware that was connected to this bill but i'm also happy to reply to her comments about that subject as well. today in america there are roughly seven million people who are working illegally in this country. they are taking jobs that should go to the 26 million americans who are either unemployed or underemployed. once again if we want to create jobs for americans in this country, one way to do so would be to make sure that only legal workers are employed in this country and we have ways to accomplish that end. madam speaker, i'm now going to -- ms. jackson lee: would the gentleman yield? mr. smith: i'll continue then maybe he'll be able to yield in just a minute. you want to yield three minutes to the gentleman from south carolina, mr. gowdy, the vice chairman of the administrative law subcommittee. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from south carolina is recognized for three minutes. mr. gowdy: thank you, madam

speaker. i rise in support of h.res. 72, but also want to commend the distinguished gentleman from sks, mr. smith, for not only his leadership on this issue but also the judicious way in which he leads our committee on judiciary. the constitution gives congress limited but critical functions. the very same constitution that we all swore an allegiance to when we took the oath, the very same constitution that we read when we started the 112th congress gives important limited critical functions to congress. and one of those functions is to pass laws that are easily understood and reasonably enforced. it is not the function of this body to merely pass broad ideas and leave it up to someone else, an un-elected official in the executive branch, to fill in the details. and make no mistake, i do not blame those in the executive branch. i blame the congress of the united states for abdicating its

responsibility. nature abhors a vacuum and one look at our code of federal regulation, i encourage anyone, anyone who challenges this or doubts it, go to your local library and look at the code of federal regulation and you will see that that vacuum created by this body has been more than filled by the executive branch. the lab rint that has become this nation's regulatory scheme has exported jobs, imported litigation, all the while eroding the very limited amount of public trust that is left in the institutions of government. we had a witness, madam speaker, in judiciary committee yesterday and i asked him a very simple question. when you get a call from a member of the executive branch, who works with a regulatory agency, is your first impression that he or she is there to help or to accuse? and this representative of middle america, a businessman from kentucky, without hesitation said, they are there to accuse. it is an adversarial