get an update on the budget deal. we will speak with the house budget committee member and a republican congresswoman. then a discussion on changes to the national security team of president obama. we'll be joined by mac destler. ♪ ♪ ont: the president's speech attention to health budget -- 2012 budget is discussed in the "washington post" today. there is news this morning about finalize legislation on the 2011 spending plan. you can find that on c-span.org and read it for yourself.

the president is considering a compromise when it comes to raising the nation's debt limit. the deadline is said to come as late as july. it will be the topic for the first 45 minutes this morning. your thoughts on raising it. if you want to weigh in this morning, here is how you can do so this morning. you can call in numbers at the bottom of your screen. if you want to send us your thoughts by e-mail, you can do so at this address. and you can also comment on twitter. "the wall street journal" has the story this morning. the president is open to a deal.

here is what the authors write.

possibilities of some type of negotiation over the debt limit according to the "the wall street journal", and if you want to weigh in, the lines will be on the screen. you can also send us an e-mail or a tweaet. eugene, ore., you are up first. it morning. caller: -- good morning. caller: thanks for taking my call. al qaeda is leading us to spend ourselves into oblivion in variation as to how we let the soviet union spent themselves into oblivion. we cannot afford our empire.

global trade has declined due to piracy -- if we withdraw our troops. global trade has not been that good to the american public. host: is that -- what about raising the debt level? caller: i do not think the republicans want to cut down the military. i think in bargaining for the debt limit increase, we should try to withdraw our troops. host:maine, independent line. our previous caller -- what do you think about the process and

point he made? caller: i agree with him. i think our president and the political parties should tell the american people the truth about that. that the debt is what we both the social security trust fund. between medicare and the highway trust fund, $6 trillion of national debt. why not just forget it. it is government money. they have already spent the money years ago when they borrow from them. i think it is the big deal with medicare right now. they will have to start cashing in those u.s. treasuries they are sitting on. host: new york, republican line. go ahead. caller: president obama is doing

such a good job selling of america. host: turn down the tv on your set. what do you think about raising el limit?leva caller: it is a good idea. they have to raise the limit. this is the government of the united states, so we have the power to do it. a clean bill up and down. host: what about definite reductions in spending? caller: it should be higher interest and higher income.

someone has to put more money into the treasury. host: here is something from "the wall street journal" as we take calls. please continue the calls. you can do that on the phone line or send us an e-mail. we will look at economic news. as far as last week's effort on the continuing resolution, you can find out the details as far as the cuts and some increase is as far as budget is concerned on our web site, c-span.org. joining us to walk it -- to walk us through it is brian friel.

there was a decrease from last year's level. that was in the epa. fill us in on that. >> policy riders would have said that the epa could not issue rules related to the regulation of greenhouse gas emissions. those provisions are not in the bill. you have significanct cuts in te epa. they have received substantial increases over the last few years. >> as far as with the proposed cuts, in spite of the increases before, was this an economic move or was there politics behind it?

caller: democrats have been pushing for more regulatory authority. republicans have been pushing back. they say those kinds of regulations [unintelligible] host: we saw cuts under housing, transportation, and urban development. and 18% reduction from last year. it goes after one of the subheadings, the high-speed rail. guest: that was one thing that president obama pushed for. everyone had to make sacrifices. president obama's education program raced to the top to improve elementary and secondary

education. he was willing to give up some money in the high-speed rail program. host: where were some of the other cuts that were most significant ta? guest: many cuts came from political projects proposed by members. the bill does not have the earmarks in any programs. there are billions of dollars in reductions for earmarked. defense, labor, education as well. pell grants was an area that was a bone of contention. democrats perfected the current award level for students. republicans say there is change that prevent people from getting more than what the pell grant

want. host: or the other areas under commerce, justice, in science. it talks about nasa funding as well. can you speak about that? guest: under science, there was a bipartisan push a few years ago to try to double the funding for research and development programs. it was to keep the united states competitive with other countries. with this push towards a cuts, people hoped they would be able to double that. even some of the public -- programs that of the level funding, [unintelligible]

host: funding for more than 55 programs was terminated. this falls under the effort of the president under his health care law. guest: some of the provisions that help for republicans to push for implementation of the health-care law, those provisions were kept out of the bill. there were significant portions of the bill eliminated in this deal. one was a pilot program that would have allowed some people to opt out of their employer provided health insurance and a seek individual coverage in the markets that is still paid for by the employer. one is known as cooperatives. those provisions were put in the senate to get to the bill for a

period now in the negotiations, they were eliminated. >> what is the prospect publicly as far as the vote this week? what is expected? guest: the house is expected to vote on wednesday. then a vote on thursday in the senate. it would prevent the government from shutting down on friday when current funding runs out. both will have to keep their people on with the backing of the speaker of the house, republican, and the democrats. host: d.c. many people following one person's -- do you see many people following the vote of one person? guest: some say the cuts were

not deep enough. maybe as many as 70 house republicans will vote snow. -- no. enough will go along. you never know if people are going through the details of it today. there could be things they do not like and perhaps more members than expected will say it is too difficult to swallow. host: there is a story today in the paper over the debt ceiling. there are calls for some type of compromise as far as calling the debt ceiling to spending. can you speak about the importance of it isn't what it means politically on capitol hill? guest: if the government is not able to pay the money that it

has borrowed, the consequences in the financial markets -- the treasury secretary says the debt limit will be reached sometime in may. they can do several things to extend the government's borrowing authority. we are looking at a late june or early july as the deadline. senate republicans are trying to get a balanced budget amendment as part of the agreement to increase the debt limit. bipartisan senators are trying to come up with a broad deficit- reduction program that would affect tax revenues and spending. that could be wrapped into the debt limit. wednesday, president obama will release his own deficit

reduction plan. we will learn all of these things and then have the bargaining to figure out what everyone can agree to, so they can signal some signs for further debt reduction. host:brian friel, thanks for joining us today. he is the congressional quarterly staff writer. you can go to our web site to get the information that bryan spoke about. c-span.org. you heard him talk about the debt ceiling. that information will be made available to you as well when you go to our web site. you have heard some of the political aspects that is going on regarding compromise if the debt ceiling is raised. we want to get your thoughts on

the remainder of our time. if you want to give us a call, use the numbers at the bottom of the screen. you can e-mail us and comment on twitter. they are cutting by 15%, which means it is 2008 all over again. democrat line, go ahead. caller: the debt ceiling does have to be increased. we do not want people calling in the markers just yet. deficit reduction looks like a

good idea, although it depends on what gets reduced. host: what do you mean by that? caller: where do you reduce the deficit reduction? medicare and medicaid? we have to pay that out by law. military spending? or do you reduce it in the 20%, which is giving money into jobs to people that are not necessarily part of the military industrial complex. host: independent line, lynchburg, virginia. caller: hello. host: turn down your tv. caller: ok. i am calling from fayetteville, north carolina.

i had a question i wanted to ask about -- most of the people you see talking this come on tv act as the this large debt just started when obama went into office. i think the people need to know that this debt has been rising for several presidential terms. it is not just something that came about in the last two years. host: as far as raising the debt ceiling? caller: taking care of the debt we already have in raising the debt ceiling -- we have to raise it, because it has been raised so many times before that -- that is why there is no money now. the spending has been going on for years. host: here is this, and from

twitter. van buren, ark., republican line. caller: raising the debt limit is a horrible idea. this has gotten us nothing but trouble. cutting the spending by far is the best means of getting the debt under control. a couple of billion dollars, i do not think it will handle that. we could see really bad debt with inflation. the american people need to learn the mechanics of our money. do it online or get a book. understand how they are doing this. host: clinton, conn., a democrat

line. caller: it is time to do away with corporate welfare. the oil subsidies for the richest companies in the world, the farming subsidies for mass of industrial firms, and other corporate welfare items like that. it is time they stood on their own legs and only need taxpayer support. host: 1 percent says the debt ceiling has to be raised. president obama -- one person says the debt ceiling has to be raised. we are talking about the raising of the debt limit. caller: thanks for taking my call this morning.

if you look at the funding levels in 2008 versus what it is now, a lot of these areas are not cut. a lot of the rhetoric from both sides failed to take notice of this. thanks for taking my call. raising the debt limit is a bad idea. host: republican line. caller: i am on the independent line. i think the redundancy and inefficiency in government is so mpid.d -- rapi we would be ok.

i am on social security. a couple of years ago, they decided to send everyone who was a senior, $250. we did not ask for it, but we got a two letters. one letter said we would get the money. a follow-up letter said they were going to send us another letter with our check. they did exactly that. also in a lot of the agricultural departments, they allow their people to put in lots of overtime. that is during the winter if they want. in the summer, they can take off. it has weeks of not going to work. there is not a business in the world that can work like that. host: that was diane in north dakota.

a spokesperson address the issue of the debt ceiling. here is what he had to say. >> the president said he regrets that vote and says it was a mistake. he realizes that raising the debt ceiling is so important to the health of this economy and the global economy, that it is not a vote that even when you are protesting the administration policy, you can play around with. you need to take very seriously the need to raise the debt limit so that the full faith and credit of the united states government is maintained around the globe. host: kansas city, missouri, robert, a democrat line. caller: thanks for taking my call. everything has been blamed on medicare and social security,

but no one has said anything about the cost of the war that has been going on around here. we have to continue to raise the ceiling. another thing we have is with the ship in libya. the cost of shooting those rockets in the airplanes, they keep saying that is because of the country and no one wants to stop that cost. but they keep talking about so security. i think it will continue to raise the ceiling to get the country out of debt. host: according to several sources, -- this is the

baltimore sun this morning. the "washington post" talks about the behind the scenes and goings on.

there was a poll. one of the questions asked during the survey is if you had to use one single word, what word would that be? the word with the most response was to attack ridiculous." -- was the word "ridiculous." caller: there are some costs that nobody is looking at. if someone is in a real catastrophe like japan with the earthquake and a tsunami, of course, america wants to help. spending money to help with the army in the palestinian area and is sending money for u.n.

relief and a training little children to hate and terrorize, i think we need to look at crimes like this that are not serving in a national purpose. host: mitt romney has announced that he is forming an exploratory presidential committee. jonathan weisman made his twitter.s known by a twittevia the story in "the wall street journal" says the announcement that he can formally begin running money for the presidential campaign.

jackson, mississippi, you are next. caller: it seems like everybody is asking the wrong question. what principle are we using when we say america is the richest country in the world and we are broke. how much is america worth? how can we be broke? we are the richest country in the world. how can we be broke? what kind of accounting practices are we using? it seems like nobody tells the truth anymore. we are a country that is on the brink. everything is great. you ask a person a question, and they do not answer the question you asked. they tell you something totally different. nobody tells the truth. how much is america worth?

host: oceanside, california, republican line. caller: i have two things to say. the first comment is i was not -- i would not raise the debt ceiling, because it would force the government to work with the money they have. i would not raise the debt limit. the second creative idea is i never hear anybody say there is a contingency plan where we allow money to flow into the system. for example, sells a security money should never -- money should never have been taken out of social security.

they should put it before the people to joke -- vote and if they are going to do something like that. host: comparisons have been made between the fukushima .risis, a level 7 it is a major incident. it compares to the type used. it cites chernobyl. this is how they put it in the wall street journal this mornin.

rome, georgia. caller: republicans have taken taxpayer money. they are giving it to subsidies to these monster corporations and billionaires with tax breaks. the revenue must be made up somewhere. we have had -- it is not a spending problem but a revenue problem. one more thing before you cut me off. [unintelligible] once the budget is passed, they have nothing else that they can hold you hostage with. host: oklahoma, independent

line. caller: thank you. i have heard that we borrow 40 cents of every dollar that the federal government spends. is that correct? host: i have heard that as well. caller: in that case, we have to raise the debt ceiling, but it seems like we would have to cut the spending. i would suggest some of the overseas bases that we have. i think we have about 120 overseas. before we cut anything, i would like to see congress pass a law that any congressman or congresswoman that is convicted on a felony gets their pension cut off and have no medical benefits. that is my input. host: florida, you are next.

our republican line. caller: i imagine we would have to raise the debt ceiling. our country needs to pray and repent. our country in is andn obama nation right now. host: what does that have to do with the debt ceiling? caller: people have a hard time finding a low-paying job. host: democrat line. caller: my comment is on the debt ceiling. it should not be raised. the ceiling on taxes for the rich should be raised. that would be significant in

terms of helping this economy as well as cutting a lot of military spending that is wasteful every day. host: for those calling in for the remainder of the program, turn down your television. in the financial times this morning, some talk about the proposal by the u.k. banks and rules for those. it is closer to u.s. rules.

colorado, david, independent line. caller: one of the reasons that we have the debt that we have is because of the debt we have already accumulated and are paying interest on. one other thain about taxation. we have more of an income problem than an expenditure problem.

host: should we raise the debt ceiling? caller: which cannot help it. we have to -- we cannot help it. we have to. we have to manage the difference between taxation and expenditure. host: here is the lead story on the "washington times."

illinois, talking about raising the debt limit. republican line. caller: good morning. we do not have to raise the debt limits. it is like driving the titanic faster into the night. they are the icebergs in the ocean. driving the titanic faster, raising the debt limit, -- right now the common man and does not have a lifeboat to save himself. we need to use patience,

slowdown, and remember that just because i do not have a harvard degree does not mean i am stupid. i can go to the supermarkets and by only so much that is within a month wallet. i cannot charge what i cannot pay for. we are counting on our leaders to be at least in grade school smart, not to outsmart us with their degrees. host: a comment off of twitter. valdosta, ga., a democrat line. caller: we have to raise the debt ceiling. otherwise, we will default on

our loans. compare it to people not paying their credit cards. a lot of money that is being wasted -- i watched c-span all of the time. i watched the senate. there is nobody out there. everybody is being paid. what i believe the senators are doing is they are fundraising for the next election. and we are paying them to do that. if we knew the hours they spend on fundraising, we would be freaking out. we have to raise the debt ceiling. we must. no doubt about it. host: is the u.s.debt clock dot

org. it keeps a running tally as to how the debt is accumulating. georgia. caller: we have to raise the debt ceiling. we have to get a revenues up. what has happened is that we have taken so much money and sent it overseas. these trade agreements have to change. if i take trillions of dollars and put it in your right pocket and borrow against it out of your left pocket, what is the effective? it is a losing deal. host: do you think there is

consideration not to raise the debt ceiling? caller: we have to see what the republicans and democrats are going to do. it is foolish how they cannot come to any sort of an agreement. i have never seen this country split like it is split right now. we have our children overseas fighting these wars. i hear people calling saying we need to bring them home. i worked with veterans. how can you bring them home when they have no jobs? host: house speaker john boehner on fox news talking about the implications of the debt ceiling. >> the president has asked us to increase the debt limit. to increase the limit on the credit card.

that is without doing anything about the source of the problem. we have to deal with the source of the problem. >> will you settle for less than trillions of dollars in spending, whether it is two trillion or 6 trillion as paul ryan has proposed? >> we will work with our colleagues in the house, senate, and white house to make sure we take meaningful steps to pull our country back on a path of a fiscal sanity. today, we do not have that. it is too early to predict what could or could not happen. my members want serious steps in the right direction. host: we have a few minutes on this topic for you to weigh in. the "washington post" talks about pakistan's government and

it discusses the use of drones. one more call on the topic of the debt limit, mich., a democrat line. caller: good morning america.

instead of constantly putting blame here, there, and every where [unintelligible] can you hear me? instead of us putting the blame here, there, and everywhere, we all claim we love america. we all live here. the problem is there. what we need to do is -- host: we will leave it there. thank you for your thoughts. there are many economic issues today. later on in the program, the oversight in government reform committee and will join us to talk about these issues. we will first hear from this representative, earl blumenauer, a member of the budget

committee. we will have his thoughts when we come right back. ♪ ♪ >> on april 12, 1861, confederate forces attacked fort sumter in carolina starting the civil war. next weekend, american history tv on c-span3 brings you the sights and sounds from fort

substance region fort sumter. there will be interviews into reactors from the north and south. it the complete weekend schedule on c-span.org or click hour alert button and have the schedules e-mail to you. >> a few months ago i was able to schedule a tax cut for american families. now, the same cooperation has made it possible for us to move forward with the biggest annual spending cuts in history. >> watch of the events from capitol hill and the house and senate floor to the white house and around washington, online with the c-span video library. search, watch, click, and share with everything we had covered since 1987. what you want, when you want. >> may 1, your questions for a

professor. his books include private rights and public illusions. he will take your calls, e-mail , atw andeets, live sunday, may 1 on "book tv." >> washington journal continues. host: earl blumenauer joins us. welcome. what are your thoughts moving -- regarding the budget? guest: people are peeling away the layers of the onion. what was once a bold revolutionary idea -- is will have a larger deficit in 10

years and if congress just went home and did not do anything. there is nothing revolutionary or bold about little money for poor people. now it is a voucher for health care to the insurance companies instead of to the insured. a voucher none the same. it will raise health-care costs in this country. the most fascinating piece is after a hearing, republicans campaigned against slashes to medicare. they take all of those savings to pay for the tax cuts. they go far beyond anything here fortuitous 30 americans --

for millions of americans. i hope people will see what is inside of it. host: how do they treat entitlement? guest: the main entitlement that has been changed deals with the entitlement for senior citizens to be guaranteed health care in old age. now they are not entitled to the benefits that they have in medicare, unless they are already within the 55 or older -- the younger people will not have an entitlement. the private insurance market did not want to ensure both people, because they were not employable in most cases. they were older and sicker. now they rely on the private market to care for older americans. they admit that they will reduce the value of this culture overtime. it shatters that entitlement.

the partnership that the federal government has had -- elderly, disabled -- by eliminating that partnership and turning it into a block grant that will be ratcheted down. the states are basically on their own. when they look at what is happening in the states around the country, the elderly, poor, disabled, will soon be on their own. host: what will the president proposed this week on his thoughts of how to handle the budget? guest: he has made clear that his approach would be more balanced like the deficit reduction committee and virtually all independent experts. he agrees that it needs to be a balance of revenue and reductions and some spending. his administration has proposed some cuts in defense. they have been open to change

agricultural programs. bear in mind that the president and the democrats in the last congress already engineered a massive change in reducing entitlement costs with the affordable care act, which is going to have savings in excess of $1 trillion. both parties in congress, if they have the courage to accelerate real reforms embedded in the bill, we can save far more. host: this is what one person has to say.

guest: that is nonsense. the ryan budget is. to reduce revenues dramatically , cutting taxes for the most well off. independent analysts agree any way you of one to slap it, it will shift taxes on to middle class americans. the notion somehow that given what we have done already to deal with the reform of health care and now the republicans are complaining about, because they are not generous enough for special interests. they cannot have it both ways.

we are still in a situation where there are opportunities for us. i come from a low cost high value state. they spend about half on medicare. that is people in miami. there are ways that we can bend the curve and improve the quality of health care. adjusting revenue, continuing these efforts. lots of money can be taken out of the department of defense. not moving away from reforming agriculture. we are shipping $147 million a year to brazil and coffee farmers, because we are not willing to reform our own coffee farming facilities. that is silly. host: the first call is on the

republican line from georgia. caller: you guys were in charge. you had the president, the senate. you were in charge and you did not get rid of all of those things. 1% of americans have a perfect credit score. i know how to handle money. not even following simple eighth grade math. you are only pulling in enough money to feed a gopher. guest: bear in mind that what we saw in the last congress was a complete collapse of an irresponsible legislation from

our republican friends in the senate. they did everything to have a super majority of 60 votes. we had over 300 bills that passed through the house that stopped in the senate. there are more things that could of been done in health care in defense and a whole range of things. people were not willing, whether it was simple judicial confirmations or dealing with moving forward of environmental protection, did not want to do it. this is unprecedented in terms of grinding the senate to a halt. unlike what my republican friends said on april fool's day in the house, it still takes both chambers. we would have liked to pass one thing from the house to the

other. article one section 7 still applies. there is a dynamic beer. there is not anybody who is pretending that we should be making some changes. we will advance the budget out of ever budget committee that will be something that could be enacted into law that will not strip away health care from our elderly and most vulnerable and move in directions that i think the american people want to. it does not have to be that hard. we will probably have it this wednesday. it will be available online. i think it will be the website of the house democratic budget committee. host: pa., thanks for waiting.

caller: this thing about the deficit, any business cannot stay in business unless there is enough revenue. and non-profit cannot remain without having enough revenue. the tax cut from president reagan was going from 70% down to 35% at the time. now president obama wants to take it back up where it was before. to do that would bring in 8 million over 10 years the top two% when reagan did what he did, to 1000 for couples the

top 2% put $14 trillion into their pockets. 14 trillion. all he is asking for is to go up 800 billion. that is not enough. guest: the caller makes an important point. historically, tax breaks have been higher than what today are now. they are just pulling back to what the tax rates were for eight years under bill clinton. that is where we created something like 17 million jobs. with the reduced tax rate under george bush, we had a net loss of private-sector jobs. there is an opportunity without being punitive to be able to restore some revenue that comes

into the federal government. there are other areas that republicans turn their backs on. a federal aviation has passed twice. there were some 80which sounds , with their plans, you are able to look through the roof because the top of the airplane has ripped open. these are things that are acceptable to the industry, would take billions of dollars to do with airline safety and necessary improvements to the system, turning their back on it. these are things that are not rocket science, are not going to bring the economy to a halt. we have been there before and a lot of people and that we should

be there now. host: we have heard reference to the bowls-simpson commission. most of those reckitt -- recommendation were ignored. guest: that is not my approach. they lay out a reasonable path. the numbers add up. my point, at that juncture, was, let's move on the things that we agree on and debate where we are not. instead, we are having a very unrealistic effort. it is not going to pass the senate, and would fundamentally change the partnership that americans have relied upon, and would increase health care costs for all americans while reducing what the federal government invests. and we know who is going to pick up the tab for that. host: end on the independent

line. pennsylvania. -- ed on the independent line. caller: there is a myth that the rich are creating all sorts of jobs in this country. they are creating jobs in china. when bush introduced the tax cuts, where were they building? they were tripping over themselves to start building in china. ronald reagan would be rolled over in his grave today. as far as feeding the beast, we are making the debt so big by giving tax cuts to the rich. defense spending, most of the money goes to the industry. maybe the workers should get some. bush tax cuts, $2 trillion.

two wars where most of the money went to defense and private contractors. prescription drugs. almost $1 trillion went to the prescription drug companies. people do not realize that with the bush tax cuts, they put off -- they cut off billions of dollars to the states. guest: your caller has a very important point. we are seeing record profits and corporate america, a few trillion dollars, at last check, that people are sitting on. and they have been able to achieve those profits actually with employment being down. they have delayed hiring. and we are seeing, just because of the bizarre set of circumstances we have now, in

some cases, corporations farm borrowing money to pay dividends. there is another stealth tax that is being inflicted on middle america, particularly, the elderly americans. record low interest rates. when someone gets $0.10 for every $1,000 in their savings account, people who relied on that, are being decimated. this is a tax that falls disproportionately on the elderly, middle america. i would hope that we have a more comprehensive approach, going forward, and we not put the burden on folks who have really not done anything wrong. they have played by the rules all their lives, save, and have

been dealt, i think, an unfortunate hand. host: what do you make of the continuing resolution? what were you surprised with most? guest: it is depressing that we focus on things like -- i expected it republicans to go after public broadcasting even though it is widely acceptable by most americans. i expected them to go after the epa as well. but cutting money for the pregnant women with infants child program -- that was surprising. going into the agricultural system, which has lots of opportunities for savings, but instead, cuts the conservation payments that goes to farmers

which provide the environmental benefits for everyone. that was extremely shortsighted. these are commitments we have made to local communities to give back a small amount of the oil will tay's -- royalties, but instead, we are seeing people having to shut down state parks. frankly, if the public really knew about these things, they would be unpopular. host: do you expect back -- passage on the vote? guest: the issue is no longer the money. that is clear when the negotiators, more than a week ago, were a couple billion apart. actually, democrats have been willing to give republicans what they originally wanted.

but is this really about ideology? they are imposing their will on the residents of the district of columbia, treating it like a colony, on things that have no impact on the federal deficit at all. the bottom line here is, if the ideologues want to push for more, anything can happen, but it is clearly something we are going to see with the debt ceiling, which is a much more consequential discussion. host: should it be raised? guest: it will be. americans will be paying their debt. right now, despite the loose talk about america becoming , actually, investors are

investing tens of billions of dollars every week in the united states. our interest rates are the lowest they have been since 1971. people messed around with the debt ceiling, even hinting that we may not go good on our obligations, it will strangle the economic recovery and add to the deficit for more than they are talking about extracting through some of these unfortunate budget cuts. host: should a decision on the debt limit the kaptur itself, or tied to spending reforms? guest: i will support a clean increase in the debt ceiling, even though i am in the minority. historically, you try to put the onus on the people in charge. but this is looking at the delicate balance of our recovery, because there is

uncertainty and run the world. there is arm wrestling going on about the future of the budget. i make clear, even though i am in the minority, i will vote for a clear debt ceiling increase because america will pay its debts, and we need to retain that confidence. host: charles from bella vista, arkansas. caller: you are just proving to me that you would say and do anything for a vote. we borrow $0.40 on every dollar that we spend. $16 trillion in debt. out of that, we owe $400 billion in interest alone. you people were upset about trying to save $37 billion. 1% pace 44% of the taxes.

10% pay 9%. 40% of people pay no taxes. we are almost to the point where the gimme-gimmes exceed the people that do not pay a tax. it is going to be worse than greece. earl, there is no way we get out of this debt, unless we do it immediately and soon. guest: it is interesting, i hope the caller takes a hard look at paul ryan's budget. this is taking away the guarantee for seniors for medicare. it slashes all sorts of programs, but because it is not a balanced approach, because it

slashes taxes further, it does not come into balance until 2040. as i said at the beginning of the show, will actually have more of a deficit that if we did nothing. it is not true that the majority of americans do not share in supporting government programs. as a practical matter, a typical american household actually pays more than hedge fund managers on wall street. it is true that some people do not have a federal tax liability but they are paying huge amounts in social security and medicare tax. 70% of the people that i represent a more for social

security and medicare than they do for income tax. but as a percentage of their income, to say middle americans are not paying their fair share is a mistake. kovach in time and look at the money that was -- go back in time and look at the money that was paid by corporations 30 years ago. the percentage was much higher. now it is down to about 6%. i welcome a conversation about what america's revenues system should look like. i think this is one area where there is bipartisan interest. host: tax code? guest: diving into the tax code. all sorts of provisions that no longer make sense or are unfair. the "alternative minimum tax"

that was a tax on millionaires who did not pay their taxes, has now morphed into a tax on millions of american families because they pay property taxes, income taxes, they do with retirement. no billionaire pays the alternative minimum tax because capital gains, a carried interest, is not covered. your caller raises an interest that i want to explore. the tax code is unfair, counterproductive, it leaks money, and it is expensive to administer. host: it makes money how? guest: what are called tax expenditures whether it is for special interests or the deduction that some of us get for our homes. credits, deductions, exemptions in the tax code now cost over $1

trillion a year, and they are going up. one of the things that was mentioned in the bowles-simpson reports included tax expenditures. including defense, medicare, tax expenditures. those are the largest areas and they are increasing more rapidly. host: does that mean modification or elimination of tax expenditures? guest: there are a number of items there that are deeply ingrained to how we do business, not only popular. there are probably some that no longer need to be in the code. there are some that need to be streamlined. why should a corporate ceo, for

personal use, use a corporate jet and pay less than someone working in his company to be in a middle seat in coach? our tax code, faa regulations, create this bizarre regulation, which invites people to be skeptical. host: would you keep the tax code at 35%? guest: we could increase that rate, broaden the base, deal with other things. there were proposals that came out of the bush treasury that moved toward a lower rate and broader base. i think this will be a productive conversation with the administration

. host: alaska, wisconsin. caller: i am calling about the debt ceiling. if you get all the democrats together, run a bill clear up to the president. the republicans will not let the country default. they will not let the world economy fall apart. this baloney of them tacking on this bill and all of these other bills on the debt ceiling -- it is a bunch of baloney. it is just too scared the democrats -- it is just to scare the democrats and color down to them. -- collar down to them.

it is nothing but a mess in wisconsin. we are going to end up paying more taxes. guest: i would hope no member of congress would reached the point where, in exchange for some ideological or personal political hostage-taking, they would take down dealing responsibly with our obligations for our international debt. but i will tell you, having talked to some of these people, having listened to them, having watched what they have brought to the floor of the house of representatives and amended in the continuing resolution, i think it is safe to say, some

have a very different view of reality from where many different americans are. do not watched this -- i and i quite know how to describe the drama that we have gone through the past couple of months. you would not think that anyone would put this amount of pain, inefficiency, putting the federal operation on a string and yanking it back and forth. it is not just a few billion dollars that is at risk for the cost of a shutdown. the cost of putting the government in this limbo has been billions of lost productivity. i have contracts in my district where people were going to do

work for the navy, could not execute the contract. we do not know what these people would do. i hope the majority would not play this game, but it is not clear. host: mike freeman asks -- guest: this is one of the things that has disappointed many of us. we have been in session three and a half months and there has not been an effort to actually boost employment. there have been ideologically- driven things 4 km, big bird, public broadcasting. but there are opportunities for us to move forward, to be able to rebuild and to renew the country. we have proposals that would

improve employment that we have offered up. but we have not seen that from the other side. the president has a number of things that he sketched out in the state of the union. there ought to be more focus on making sure we do not stray strangle the recovery. we should be investing in our future, not cutting fell grants, making it more expensive for young people to go to college. host: 1 the story in "the wall street journal" -- how does that factor into discussions that representatives have been happening -- having on capitol hill? guest: it has been interesting.

we had been getting advice from the federal reserve, from independent economists. we have been getting information from cdo. people here who are driving the house agenda are sweeping that aside. they are not so concerned that the proposed cuts that they advance would have, according to independent economists, would cost hundreds of thousands of jobs. even the fed, cautious to step into this, indicated it could be a couple hundred thousand jobs. you would think that people would be sensitive to that. but there is no indication that people are taking the information from the independent authorities seriously. host: mansfield, texas. summer. caller: you mentioned the airlines.

one reason there are so many problems with the airlines, people do not realize almost all of the maintenance is done in mexico and other south american countries. it has been contracted out. it used to be the republicans were all good christians, but now they are also the only patriots. they do not want any government, they want to contract out everything, whether it is the government or for business. that way there is no pension, health insurance. if people want to get the facts, go to politicalfact to see what the people are saying. i was caught up

in that a few years ago. believe me, i am far from being a millionaire. the problem there, it was never set up to adjust for inflation. guest: great point. in fact, we attempted to get some attention to this when the tax cuts that were being pushed through by the bush of ministration by my republican colleagues -- we said, you are going to structure it so that we have more people in the amt. let's have that instead of having more tax cuts. i think it is a great idea for people to go to politifact. they are the people that get in behind the story to find out if the facts are actually true.

this is kind of personal for me. the 2009 lie of the year was death panels. there was end of life legislation that was bipartisan, something that i had put into the last health care reform. politifact judged it the lie of the year. that is a lovely window for people to see politics. this is a deep area of concern. we have airline maintenance being done around the world, but it is not clear that there are careful standards both for the work and security. there have been efforts to make sure, under faa reauthorization for instance -- there was an amendment to make sure this work that was contracted out,

wherever it was, that it would be done according to american standards, and that there would be careful scrutiny from a security point of view so that we do not have somebody said the time an airplane. we have seen stranger things. anyone that puts a bomb in his underwear makes you wonder how they might infiltrate a work crew offshore. if we are going to contract this out, americans need to have confidence that the standard for security and the quality of work are met. host: in terms of funding, the cr, high-speed rail often comes up.

why is that? guest: it is a tug of war for resources available. i had been working with florida. i know and number of people there were just heartsick that the government decided to turn back. we will have higher speed rail in the u.s. all-around world, countries -- he did not need to go to japan someday, we are going to have high speed rail. the question is whether it is sooner or later, or whether it is americans building it. host: riverside, california. on the republican line. leslie.

caller: good morning. the democrats always seem like they are on the defense. about those contracts in wisconsin, how come you are not screaming about that? why aren't you doing anything about the voting machines? these people in power, they will be shutting out people that i know and love. this is america. guest: it illustrated this losing track of precincts from a whole city. is it in confidence, willful manipulation? it is probably just incompetence, but it represents

a weakness that we have right now, an election system that is fractured, in thousands of different hands, many are partisan operatives. we do not have a standard for voter registration, standards that are high enough for the operation of the equipment this is one of our dirty little secrets about the inaccuracies and potential for manipulation. i hope that we can have a bipartisan consensus that we need to fix it. it is embarrassing when results in india, a country of 1.3 billion people, many of them illiterate, can be produced faster than we can figure out who was the senator in illinois. host: how would you define your week ahead with the work on the cr to do? guest: it will be very busy,

entertaining for political junkies, but we need to clarify this. americans deserve it. host: earl blumenauer, thank you for your time. we are going to take a look at the president's national security team. mac destler serves at the university of maryland at the center for international security studies. in our next program, we will hear another perspective as far as economics are concerned. our guest is ann marie buerkle. she is from new york, and member of the oversight and government reform committee. by the way, if you want to check out more what was released last night in terms of the continuing resolution, the latest on the budget as well, we invite you to go to our website, c-span.org.

there is a special link to take a look at the budget discussions happening this week in the house and senate. that will give you all the information you need to know. again, c-span.org. coming up, more discussion on the economy with representative ann marie buerkle. >> let us meet another winner in the studentcam competition. we asked students to produce a video on a topic that helps them better understand the role of the federal government. today we are going to minnesota where sam is a senior. why did you pick a homelessness as the topic of your video? >> there were a few different topics that i was considering. one was federal funding for public schools, which directly affects me. with homelessness, i thought that was a more interesting

topic because there is a bit of a mystery to it. i know that i was, myself, not sure of the causes, and what was being done to help them. i was interested to learn about homelessness. i thought it would be interesting for others to watch as well. host: how is your community affected by homelessness? >> i live in the suburbs, so the homelessness that i see is different from than in the big cities. around here, there are only a few homeless individuals, so they kind of have a reputation. a lot of people have come up to me and said, i saw brad -- the homeless individual that i interviewed. in a smaller area, it is more

about people's generosity. in the cities, there are more shelters and soup kitchens to help people out. >> what did you learn when you help at the food shelf? >> they told me about a federally funded program called 211, meant to try to avoid homelessness. if someone felt like they could be on the verge of becoming homeless, they could call and there are resources available to them to try to help them avoid the outcome. >> beyond 211, what is the government doing to address homelessness? >> 211 provides for soup kitchens and shelters around the nation. i also did some research in the department of housing and urban

development, a temporary housing development for people who need time to get back on their feet. they also had permanent programs for low-income families, people who are not able to work. >> what should people come away with after watching your video? >> i think if people see brad's life, others in the documentary, they will have more respect. not all people are homeless because of bad choices. when i was interviewing brad, i had a shot of him just standing on the corner of the street with his sign. as i was doing that, someone drove by and literally threw a handful of change at him. you can see him in the documentary picking up the change out of the snow. the person was yelling at him to get a real job. it is not that easy, especially

if you are homeless and struggling. i hope that people can see, homeless people are still nice people. they just need a bit of help. >> let's take a look at the video. >> each day i drive by the community mall, i see him wake up and trudge to the same corner and stand there all day. he is a a stranger to everyone and known to no one. is nothing being done to help the homeless? >> nearly 6 million low-income households pay more than half their monthly income for rent or live in severely substandard housing. our recently released annual homeless assessment report found that on any given night in america, more than 640,000

individuals are without housing. >> you can see the rest of this video and the rest of the winning documentary's at studentcam.org. host: our guest is a member of the oversight and government reform committee. ann marie buerkle it is from the 25th district in new york. regarding the debate on the 2012 budget, we heard from our previous guest, concerns about the way that it lays out the map. how would you respond to those concerns? guest: the budget is an excellent effort in terms of what we need to do to get back onto fiscal sanity course. we need to stop spending. the last congress did not pass a budget so we are in this cr situation, which is untenable for the american people. we need a fiscally responsible plan.

i believe paul ryan has put that fourth and i am looking forward to the debate. host: where do you get the most optimism, in terms of specifics? guest: the amount of money it will save the country, the fiscal responsibility of the plan. he will save the nation, over a 10-year period, trillions. it is what we need to do when we are staring at a $14 trillion debt. host: there is a column in "the washington post" about this. guest: obviously, i disagree. i think the nation has gone off

course. we have gotten involved in giving money to agencies, getting involved in things that do not make sense for this nation. right now this nation is borrowing $0.42 on every dollar it spends. it is time to rethink the way we're doing business. paul ryan's budget changes the paradigm somewhat from a large central government to giving more rides back to the state and reducing spending. he has had the courage and has worked extremely hard to get this budget in place. we are at a crossroads right now. if we do not do something about controlling the spending, we are going to lose this nation. i have six kids, all of and grand kids. my parents were first-generation americans. my grandparents came here from italy because of the opportunity that the united states of

america has always offered. work hard and you will be successful. if we do not do something about this deficit, we are going to lose the nation, we are going to lose the american dream. paul ryan's budget is the responsible thing to do. host: if you have questions for our guest you can call, republicans, 202-737-0001. democrats, 202-737-0002. independents, 202-628-0205. journal@c-span.org is our e- mail. twitter.com/cspanwj, if you want thisnd us a tweet morning. the president will be speaking on budget issues. as far as what he could say, could it work alongside republicans, regarding results in the 2012 budget? guest: i hope he listens to his

own debt commission, i hope he realizes the urgency of the situation. unfortunatly, -- unfortunately, the budget that he released increased spending. this cr, this debate that we are coming through now, has changed the debate. we have gone from not getting any spending to cutting $35 billion. host: is that good enough for you? guest: as a matter of fact, it was just released this morning, so we are only going on here say. i am a little bit disappointed, but i think john boehner did a fabulous job negotiating. we are only one piece of three. he worked very hard to get a good deal for the american people. i am proud of the republicans and what they put forth and what they did to get to this point.

host: where are republicans in voting for this legislation? guest: time will tell. because the legislation was not released until after 11:00, we will not vote on it until there's day, the role that was imposed on us by the speaker. -- thursday, the rule that was imposed on us by the speaker. host: are you concerned about any efforts to slow down, hinder the process, as far as getting cr passed? guest: in 2010, our discretionary spending increased. this year, it is going to decrease. that is a huge difference. just in this small piece, we are changing the tone of the debate.

we are going to decrease spending, stop spending, we are going to get on a course of fiscal responsibility. we have accomplished a lot in this cr. yes, we all would have liked more, speaker john boehner would have liked more, but in order to prevent the government from shutting down, to make sure that our military got paid, we had to compromise. that is part of good governing. host: jane on the democrat's line. good morning. caller: i really want to talk about medicare, cuts to medicare. i go to the doctor now. i am lucky that he takes medicare. medicare pays $49 for the visit. most doctors do not take medicare in our area because it pays so little. my father died at 83. we could not get insurance for

my mother. since he never paid social security, she had to pay full price for medicare, and then get a supplemental, and then she still went broke at 89 with the large drug costs. the ceo of united healthcare common two years ago, got $1.2 billion -- a package. there was a discrepancy in the paperwork. he got $800 million for a retirement package. how do you justify that and my rates keep on going up? tell me how you can justify that. if i spent $200 for my supplemental insurance, medicare

should be insolvent. guest: thank you for the question. it is very important to let seniors know -- first of all, the current health care bill that the president passed in the last congress. that bill is why your decisions -- and i have heard from my constituents, doctors do not want to take medicare. there is nothing in health care bill that injures our doctors will be paid a good rate so that they can take medicare. the issue with my united healthcare is paying their executives, i agree, is outrageous, but we do not have control over that. we have to make sure our seniors get what they need, make sure medicare is a viable option, that physicians are paid a good rate, so that they will take medicare patients. paul ryan's budget for tax and

preserves medicare, which is what we owe to our seniors. seniors should know that paul ryan's budget does not touch any of your benefits. it only addresses those who are 55 and younger. those about to receive medicare, you are good. we need to address the dr.'s reimbursement for medicare. unfortunately, as a result, many doctors do not want to take medicare people. host: "the wall street journal" takes a look at the president's budget. what do you think about the approach? guest: it is an approach that we have to figure out. how are we going to preserve medicare, social security? many folks in those programs.

some do not. if not, they should be able to opt out. for folks who have planned on social security and medicare, it is incumbent upon us to preserve that so that they get what they need. host: when talking about medicaid, some have suggested block grants? why is that an important provision? guest: because it gives back to the states. let the states control their programs, what benefits their patients, subscribers can get through medicaid. it eliminates this a big federal government, all of this spending that goes to administrative costs. let the states decide what is best. host: dann in ohio. independent line. caller: with all due respect, ma'am, you are not being honest. the ryan plan does cut medicare.

we know how we got in this mess, it is called republicans. two wars, you expanded homeland security, you messed up prescription drugs, and now you want to preserve medicare? i do not believe you. you want to get it back by cutting planned parenthood. women and children want juice and milk. why not go after the real money? you are just not being honest, ma'am. guest: i agree with you, the republicans are just as much to blame as the democrats, that george bush, with all due respect to george bush, he spent money, increased the department of education. 9/11 was outside of his control, but the discussion of the wars -- we are now involved in three arenas where we have military deployed. i agree, the spending did not begin in this administration.

both parties are guilty of it. this administration, the stimulus plan, $1 trillion, the health care plan, t.a.r.p., the bailout, the amount of spending increase dramatically. but we, as a nation, not democrats and republicans, have to figure out what we are going to do. paul ryan put forth this plan. it is not the final plan, but it is a place for us to start having a discussion. host: ollie, pennsylvania. the beat on the democrat's line. caller: hello, grandma. i am a friend, -- grandma, too.

i finally made $100,000 in one year, but they are going to tax me, and they are not going to stretch it out over three years. so i will be screwed that way. you said something that i want to respond to. you said you want to give everything to the states with medicare. the states are broke, so that is going to work out fine. why did the insurance companies raise their rates right before this obama's health care comes in? my daughter and her family are struggling. they have to pay $115 a month for insurance. how can you live when you only make -- it is stupid. there is real money to be had. we are talking about ceo compensation and you say that you cannot control it. well, maybe that is true, but

you could tax them. you are sure taxing me. everything else, the security, at the airport, all of these wars are over done. and people are not mentioning all of these young people that are going from crafty high schools right to jail. guest: thank you for the call. many legitimate concerns, things that need to be looked at. the one point that you mentioned about insurance rates. i think insurance companies have raised their rates in answer to, in preparation for the new health care bill. the increased taxes, all of the additional expenses, because of this health care bill, they have begun to raise their rates. the fact there is no tort reform -- also, they are factoring in their risks, preconditions. that is why the american people -- and your complaint is a

legitimate one. why are my rates going up? in washington, we have to do something about health care. i agree with you. thank you for your call. host: on twitter -- guest: when we first began the discussion on the cr, the debate was we are not going to cut anything. now we have to consider $30 billion. it is a place to begin the discussion. everything is on the table. paul ryan deserves the credit. he has taken the heat for medicare, social security, the positions for how he handles the issue. but if we do not debate how we can handle what he provided us, it will be dead in the water. i have kudos for him.

host: our guest serves the 25th district. what does that cover? guest: basically from syracuse to rochester. a beautiful part of the country. host: our next phone call is from syracuse. randy on the republican line. go ahead. caller: good morning, representative buerkle, how are you? i live in your congressional district, i voted you. you have convinced me with every vote you have taken that i voted correctly. as a friend of mine said recently, you have reinforced our belief in the american form of government. at a recent town hall meeting, you were talking about the deficit. you said that you were not quite there yet. i wonder what your thoughts are and if you are there yet.

guest: the debt ceiling will be an informed discussion. as the american people know, we are about to reach the debt ceiling. so the question becomes, do we raise it? unless we get significant statutory reform, unless we make some real changes so that we do not get into this situation again, i am reluctant to raise it. it sends the wrong message. it is like giving an awful hall like a bottle of whiskey and then saying, we will deal with your drinking problem tomorrow. this nation has $14 trillion, a deficit of 1.6 trillion. . now is the time. this is a good time for us to have that discussion and make changes that we need to make, so that we preserve the united states of america.

host: as far as people who know about the speech say about the president's cr discussion -- what would you say to those? guest: i have a problem taxing the rich because they make a certain amount of money. they need to pay their fair share of taxes, and they do, in most cases. the extremely wealthy maneuver through the system. we heard from david camp this morning. he is going to simplify the tax code. that is important, so that everyone pays their fair share. but it is the wrong approach if we are going to tax the wealthy or the successful. that is not the american way. the reason the american dream exists, you work hard, you are successful, we are not going to penalize you. we want you to succeed. the message that there is going to be class warfare, that we are

going to tax the wealthy and punish them for success, i do not agree with that. the answer is to stop spending. our country does not have a taxing problem, we have a spending problem. host: you talked about the well is maneuvering through the system. could you talk about that? guest: when you talk about the estate tax and all of that, they have the wherewithal, the attorneys, accountants, and they know how to avoid these things. it is the people affected in the middle, that are affected by this tax rate, they do not have the wherewithal as the rest in the world, the donald trump and warren buffett's of the world. they have figured out the system. i just think class warfare is not the right way to go for this country. host: the defense spending? guest: i agree with the defense

spending. we always must give the military what they need. we have them engaged in three fronts, and several others as well. when we deploy them, when we make that decision as a nation, we have an obligation to give them what they need. having said that, the department of defense is fat. there are places where they could be cut. we know that most government agencies, there is room to trim, including dod. host: programs, people? guest: we have always talked about the procurement issue. staffing. it would require a good close look, but we have to. whether it is dod, department of education, epa. it is time to pull in our belts. host: the president addresses

the deficit to march in a speech tomorrow. largo, florida. caller: i would like to talk about taxation and health care. as far as taxation, the republicans are for taxes -- zero for the rich. they fought over the christmas shutdown over a tax break for the rich the turn around and raise taxes on the poor. how did they do that? by taking the $800 per couple tax break that president obama had put in, and replaced it with a 2% payroll tax. if you make $9 an hour, you just got a tax increase of about $30 a year. so that is a tax increase, whether you would like to admit it or not. and the rich people got more money.

as far as taxation, the constitution says that you can make money, you can spend the money. there is no reason to have a deficit other than republicans refusing to tax, which is what the constitution says we should do to pay our bills. we should not have a deficit. we should pay as we go. guest: i agree, we should pay as we go. unfortunately, several administrations, this one and before, did not do that. we had a surplus, then george bush came into office. not only did he spend that surplus, but he created deficit. that increased the debt and we are where we are today. i agree with you. we should only spend what we have, just like you do in your family. host: on twitter --

guest: great point, donna. i think cutting spending is stepped number one. all the things we talked but with the debt ceiling, entitlement reform -- but beyond that, we need a pro-growth economic plan. we need to send a message to businesses, the government is going to get out of the way so that you can be successful. we need to reduce regulations. i sit on the committee of oversight and reform. the regulations we put on businesses, to the point where we had a hearing last week -- there were several people on the panel from business. when they were asked, would you do this again? they answered no. the onus on business owners is too much. we have the second highest corporate tax rate, second to japan. we do not send a message to

businesses, we want you to be successful. small businesses are the backbone of this country. our message to them if you wanted to succeed. they are the job creators. the federal torgovernment cannot create jobs. if we had a pro-growth business plan, we will see the nation's economy get back on track. host: should there be an evaluation of dodd-frank? guest: i believe so. one of the things that thecr accomplishes -- that the cr accomplishes, it allows oversight of elisabeth warren's committee. there was concern over her being approved. she is going to have a lot of regulatory control with dodd- frank. that is one of the things that the cr does, oversight of her committee. host:

caller: and legislators are serious, should do not all be in favor in programs that would cut 15% as well as a closing 1000 basis we have around the world and stop paying for other countries national defence like ron paul suggested? guest: i agree with you, sir. i am also on the foreign affairs committee. i want to tell you that we have had several hearings as to how the american people are spending their money, eight we are giving to home, and how they're spending that money. that will absolutely be on the table to discuss. as i mentioned earlier, it does not make sense for us to be giving money to countries and we are baring 42 cents on every $1 give them. we can no longer afford to operate every have -- as we have

done in the past. we need to do what is right for the american people into the priorities of the united states first. host: austin, texas, on the democratic line. caller: my aunt lives in syracuse and either should be interested to see ron program -- you on the program. what got us in this was the derivatives program when we were creating products based on covering of student loans, crating baskets of securities that were supposed to spread around the risk and therefore be a wonderful thing. at the height of the derivatives crisis, the value of all derivatives was about $700 trillion. when those things collapsed and the people all over the world were holding paper on products that were worthless.

i have a worthless piece of paper. you have the money. that is money. it is like the lottery. it does not disappear. and has simply followed from people all over the world into the hands of people right here in america that legally it stolen. you say we cannot go after the people from the health insurance company that makes $800 million bonus? we cannot go after the people from mostar that have stolen this from the economy? that is what you are sent to washington to do, not to be making money on small business owners and on the backs of a $500 million from planned parenthood. please. that is not the problem. guest: i have three children live in austin, texas. it is a great city. to your point, i think that is what dodd-frank is trying to

address, the derivatives issue. it will be a good balance between doing the oversight it needs to do but also not in beating the market and protecting, as you say, to keep derivatives and the market safe. host: next to perry, fla., but on the republican line. -- bud. caller: my concern is congressional deadlines on the budget. i am a past federal budget officer. we have deadlines to get the budget completed. and it seems to me that congress and the elected officials do not worry about the countries than they did their political careers. they need to do the job for our country and quit arguing. compromise is the name of the game and it needs to be done in a timely fashion. thank you. guest: thank you for your call.

i agree. it was irresponsible for the last congress to not pass a budget. and is why we are where we have with this continuing resolution. this is not the way for this country to operate. it creates uncertainty and put their military in a position where they worry if the government will shut down. i can assure you that speaker boehner, paul ryan, and republicans want to get a budget passed by september 1st, our fiscal year. host: when it comes to non- security discretionary spending, this calls for getting the levels below 2008 and freezing those for five years. how do you achieve that? guest: by doing what we have achieved and hopefully will vote for in this cr. as we put budgets forth from here on in in, the budget should not have an automatic increase

and we keep it at the spending level for that year and we were calling that rather than an automatic increase, which is what we have done in the past. host: gainesville, fla., on our independent line. caller: think year. good morning, ma'am. you agree with everyone who calls in, but i wonder if you will agree with me that the $55 billion that we give the corporations for orioles drilling should be removed -- for oil drilling should be removed. i have worked in my life and i see the removal of the amount of money for social security and medicare. with my age, i felt that have

paid into the system and i deserve what i paid for. if you want to privatize it, i want my money back. thank you for taking my call. guest: you say that i agree with the callers, but that is because callers on both sides of the aisle have good points. while i may not agree with the solution, i agree that they are identifying a problem. you say you have paid into medicare and you deserve to expect medicare coverage. that is exactly right, sir. you have worked hard and you should not have to worry about your medicare. that is what paul ryan's budget is about, preserving medicare as we go forward. again, i want to repeat that his plan does not affect anyone 55 or older. if you are already receiving medicare or will in the next 10 years, it does not affected at all. that is something very important for the american people to understand so that we do not have this fear.

it was the same with the budget shot down. the american people deserve better whether it is the seniors with the military. they deserve certainty from their washington -- from their government. host: if it is wrong to dismantle medicare for those over 55, why is a right to do suffer under a 55? medicare's overhead is 3%. private insurance is a 20%-30% over the top. guest: medicare as it exists right now is unsustainable. we have to take the steps to make its sustainable. one of the steps taken is that if you can afford to pay more and you can afford not to rely on the government, then so be it. you have a choice to opt out. that preserves the system for those, like the gentleman who just called, of so they do not

have to worry about it being gone. if we continue on the course we are on right now, medicare is unsustainable and we will not have medicare in 10 years. the paradigm has to be changed in the 1960's and 1970's, a large central government was the way to go. given the population shift and the baby boomers to know we have to change the way we think. if we do not, we will not have medicare or social security. host: louisville, ky. caller: i love the fear tactics again like we had during the bush administration. i think the republicans have scared the population so greatly when it is not that dire. how you can sit and look people in the eye saying that this will not destroy medicare is unbelievable. also, i would like to know that if you are so concerned about the budget, why did you and

every republican in congress give a $40 billion tax cuts to the oil companies? it is just unbelievable what you are doing by striking this year when we all know that it should not be there. guest: thank you for your call. i agree in terms of a fear. this should not be about fear, but i do disagree whether or not the situation is dire. this situation is dire. the nation faces a $1.60 trillion deficit this year, a $14.50 trillion debt. we are spending billions of dollars every day just to pay the interest on that debt and it is unsustainable. this is dire. we need to change the way we do business for the american people. host: from indiana, david on the independent line.

caller: good morning. guest: good morning, david. thank you for your call. caller: i am 54 and i remember the social security law change. i will be 55 in july. it is a curious thing to me that my taxes were raised from 1983 to cover for my retirement and social security, and now due to the current financial system or situation, that was not caused by mean that by people that we have bailed out, and lack of lending standards, you know, it seems odd that you and others in the republican party can make the rest of us pay it when i have been paying all along.

the current budget right now, maybe i am not exactly accurate, but the 2011 budget, the one you continue the resolution was obama's first budget. 2010 was bush's budget with his last congress. do you remember that? review in congress? can you define what was in the 2005 budget? i do. my son was going to go to college that year. my son and i both have student loans and now medicare has changed. host: we will leave it there. guest: i was not in the congress. this was my first term. i discarded in january. 2010 was president -- it was a lack of budget and congress failed to pass the budget.

i do not think the issue is about blaming but solutions. how will we solve these problems for the american people? that is what we need to be focused on. it does not do us any good to be partisan. it does not do us any good to be fighting. we need to figure out what is best for the american people and best for this country. host: pa., mike on the republican line. caller: i imagine that your head is a swimming being a freshman. i do not what the politically correct answer, i just want your opinion. how do you think the founding fathers would think about these officials making decisions about all of our lives? guest: this nation has gotten so far from the constitution that it is not funny. i mentioned earlier about the crossroads. when i ran, one reason was to

not only protect the american dream for my kids but to get this country back on course to our constitutional principles. so many of the agencies, the functions common -- their functions and czars. if we get back to what the role of the federal government should be, we will find many of these problems will be solved. host: from syracuse, add on the democratic line. go ahead with representative merkel. -- buerkle. caller: he made a statement earlier that the private sector has to create jobs. -- you made a statement earlier that the private sector needs to create jobs. there are too many jobs in the government sector and that is one of the problems that we have. paying pensions, these high

wages. more states have more government employees than you do it in the private sector. the private sector is not creating jobs. banks are not lending money. i just feel that is what the major problems right there. i will listen to your answer. guest: thank you for your call, ed. you are right on that the government has grown to the point where, again, it will become unsustainable with the tensions and the health care plans. it is the private sector. until the government creates uncertainty for the private sector, uncertainty whether it is from the health-care bill, cap and trade, uncertainty for businesses have them hunkered down. they do not know what taxes are regulation will be put on them next. they will not hire, buy more equipment, grow their business. the best thing this government can do is to get out of the way and let these businesses have a

freedom and let them understand we will not tax them to death. we will not regulate them, change the regulations in place, give them certainty so that banks will lend the money. banks and businesses are sitting on a lot of money because they are uncertain as to what will happen next. that is the first thing that this congress can do is to give certainty to businesses so that they will grow, higher, and expand because they know they will not be regulated or overtaxed. host: when will the vote before the c.r.? guest: this will cut federal spending by $38.50 billion. that is a start. but it will give certainty to the military and begins to dismantle the health-care bill, which is not a good thing for this country, and it begins to

take the steps, as i mentioned earlier with elizabeth warren and dodd frank. it does a lot of other things other than the $38 billion. we had a president who said he would have a freeze on spending but no cuts. we have reversed that discussion and we have cut $30.50 billion and we will go from an increase in 2010 of 14% in domestic spending, and we are cutting 4%. that is a big swing. host: kansas on the republican line. good morning. caller: good morning. how are you at? i am and 85 year-old retired accountant. i was a teacher for many years. i have been retired since 2000 and i have two grandsons in the

u.s. navy and i am so proud of our military. i am proud of you, dear. you are doing a great job. as i said, i am retired so i watched c-span some much. even though i was a teacher, i learned so much from watching the house of representatives and the senate on television, you know? we have the idea that you guys just sit up there and do fluff. so many callers call an early -- call in and there are so many things that are being thrown out and they believe there is money floating around. the oil guys are terrible. i am telling you. everyone works hard and no one is trying to cheat the government except for people like madoff or whatever his name was. guest: think you for your call. my mother is 89 and still at

home. it is nice to hear from you and thank you for your grandson's service. if you extend to them that we are a great fall nation for the service and sacrifice of our military. thank them. host: what will determine if you vote for the cr or not? guest: a close look in addition to the $30.50 billion in cuts, what else is in there? whether or not this accomplishes what we hope to accomplish and i look forward to reviewing and later today. host: as it stands today, would you vote for increase in the debt limit? guest: not unless there were reforms to keep us from getting there again. the budget is planned with an automatic increase and that would be the basis.

we need to pay attention to spending. we have to have cuts. it needs to be an entire look at how we spend money and it needs to be careful look with spending cuts, significant cuts, otherwise we cannot just raise the debt ceiling. we have to address the problem. host: representative dan maryborough from new york. thank you for being here. -- representative anna marie buerkle. next up, mac destler or from the university of maryland and a look at security issues. we will have that after this update from c-span radio. >> 19 past the hour. u.s. companies sold your products overseas in february. the trade deficit fell to nearly $46 billion which reflects a decline in oil imports. exports had hit an all-time high in january.

an update on the nuclear crisis in japan. the science ministry reporting today that slight amounts of a heavy radioactive metal have been detected in the soil and plants near the fukushima plant. other elements that had already been found include radioactive iodine and plutonium. this metal can lead to the kenya. meanwhile, japan has raised the nuclear crisis alert level to seven of which is equal to trouble. -- to chernobyl. as congress focuses on the budget for this year and next, the anchorage daily news reported today that the bridge to nowhere is back. legislators have approved another $1.50 million in federal money for the bridge that would connect anchorage to an

undeveloped area. they estimate the total cost to be $700 million for that bridge. those are some of the latest headlines on c-span radio. >> policies ban on twitter. the fastest way to get programming updates as well as links to events -- followed c- span on twitter. during the viewers who already follow our twitter feed. from a "book to be close "to american history and c-span radio -- from "booktv" to american history. get started at twitter.com/cspan. >> i was able to sign this because both parties found common ground. the same cooperation has made it possible for us to move forward with the biggest annual spending cut in history. >> watch the debate about next year's budget from capitol hill and the house and senate floor, to the white house and around

washington on line with the c- span video library. a search, watch, click, and share. everythign since 1987. host: our final segment takes a look at national security interests. mac destler looks at those things for the university of maryland. we run the program because of reports stemming from potential changes coming from the team. one person on top of that list is defense secretary gates. what is his role in national security? guest: think you for having me on, pedro. a pleasure to be with you. secretary gates, as you know, has been secretary of defense for more than four years. he has been the longest secretary more than three of his predecessors. he has been kept on which speaks

to a major strikes and that he has bipartisan support and appeal. he is regarded as a centrist, a balance arr. he stated that he did not want to be obama as secretary of defense but he would if asked. he seems to be reaching the point where he really, really is going to leave sometime this summer. that puts before the president the question of choosing a successor. it is unlikely he will be able to replace gates in the sense of finding someone with his range of strength and credibility, but he has good candidates. host: such as? guest: the most interesting and considered to be a front-runner is leon panetta, the current cia director. he was white house chief of staff under bill clinton. he was a member of congress for

a number of terms. he was the director of the omb. he is known as a very effective a no-nonsense manager and a good political year -- ear. when he was appointed to the cia, there was a lot of skepticism about his qualifications and his intelligence background. those questions will be raised also were he to be named secretary of defense. he has, by most accounts, done quite a strong effective job that the cia in both managing it well and getting the support and confidence of the staff there, which is critical. host: skills and abilities transferable between the two positions? guest: there not the same. gates was the director of the cia in earlier times under bush

41 and four gates and has it turned out that it is transferable. host: another name mentioned recently in is -- guest: former governor of mississippi and a moderate democrat. they have confidence in him. he has less high level management than panetta. but as secretary of the navy, more hands-on experience with leadership of the military. host: as far as the president's choice to come this summer when secretary gates might leave, does he name as someone before the transition takes place? how does that usually work? guest: it works differently in different times.

often as in the case when president bush replaced secretary rums feld, it was a big surprise because he had not been told in advance. more than often, the secretary is known to be leaving and the appointment is coordinated and a successor is named more or less at the same time. we would be surprised if that was not true this time. obama has had oodles of time to plan for this with gates. another person that is talked about is a democratic senator from rhode island, jack reed. he is regarded as a solid, credible center of left defense expert who is a possibility as well. he likes the senate just fine. panetta says he likes the cia.

quite possibly come either the administration has not been talking to people yet or they have been sworn to secrecy. host: how important is it that whoever assumes the position has the ability to give the president honest and frank discussions and at least analysis? guest: that is absolutely critical, of course. this is a confluence of a number of forces. the primary loyalty is to the president. the defense secretary is in the direct chain of command. the use of military of force goes from the president to the defense secretary to the military theater commander. the commanders and leadership of the joint chiefs of staff is different. they have a responsibility to oversee any deployment of armed forces, the report to the

congress, both of the armed services committees defense appropriations subcommittees in each chamber of congress. he also has to have good relationships with the three military services and yet not simply rubber-stamp when they give him. it is a very demanding job. host: when you look at the president's national security team for the remainder of this program, about 30 minutes. if you want to ask questions, you can call us at -- journal@cspan.org and twitter is

#cspanwj. you mentioned to the joint chiefs of thstaff. guest: admiral mullen is the chief which means he is the senior military officer. he will complete this fall his second two-year term. only one chairman since the joint chiefs of staff were greeted in the national security act in 1947 has served more than two terms. that was under lyndon johnson during the vietnam war. it would normally be unlikely that mullen will continue. there are reports that obama has been somewhat frustrated with the admiral during the famous bob woodward argument about troop levels and certain levels in afghanistan in 2009 when mullen did not provide

alternatives in the way the president seemed to want and it stuck to the single proposal of the military under general petraeus moving forward. host: their discussions asked about the secretary of state and her future. talk a little bit about her role with the national security team and what happens if a change would take place. guest: there were two positive surprises involving hillary clinton and the obama administration. the first surprise is that her relationship with the president has been pretty good, pretty strong. most of us who look at history and when the president appoints someone with an independent political base who is prominent as secretary of state that it is asking for trouble. without going back to harry truman and jimmy burns for another example, or powell's most recent example, he was a

threat to bush people and did not get on with george w. bush and was not as effective as he could have been. we said, "we hope it works, but we are skeptical." hillary clinton has accepted the fact that the president is deciding the policy. she has been assertive and aggressive in carrying it out with issues like libyan military action. she has been assertive. the second surprise, maybe not a great surprise, but has been her close relationship with secretary gates. she indicates consult a lot and often come to, in positions. -- she and gates consult a lot. in this case, because obama himself is so determined to run things and because he has several senior advisers in the white house including his national security adviser, tom donelan, is a good balance to have those two together.

one of the interesting questions when we have a new secretary of defense is and how that person will relate to the secretary of state. concerning your future, she has stated, as i understand, that she does not plan to stay around past the end of the first term and she has also said she has no ambitions to run for any further political office. host: our guest is mac destler from the university of maryland. our first caller is from boston, mass., on the independent line. caller: the morning and think for your comments. youood mornign anng and thank for your comments. i believe you know and what about national security issues. i am a smart person. i was wondering if you would submit to a creative idea about getting out of afghanistan which

no one can find a solution to. i know two afghan students and they both independently claim that every single insurgents in afghanistan believes that the reason we are there is a total set up. please do not cut me off. please do not cut me off. when you go home tonight, would you look into the crash of worth everyonecenter 7 so can understand the u.s. is investigating the issue? do not smile. please investigate the issue. guest: a lot of people around the world to not believe 9/11 was an attack by an organization called al qaeda.

some believe the united states attacked themself to provide an excuse for military operations. i personally think that is unlikely. i do not know of a time when the country has done that to itself. i do not think that is a plausible argument. there are those who believe it and certainly to the degree that taliban sympathizers or guerrillas believe that this no doubt feels their energy. host: abilene, texas, on the republican line. caller: i do not know how anyone can speak of security for our country without our southern border being addressed right now. people are screaming for some help. arizona tried it and they got sued. we are facing a third-world country right across our border. it is totally unsafe. there are traveling visors for

texans. drug wars are spilling across and we are demanding something be done. how can a civilized country tolerate this situation coming across our borders? the government does not keep andtistics on the o.t.m.'s how many citizens in america are killed by illegals. host: to the larger issue, if i may, as far as domestic and international issues, over the last couple of fronts there have been so many hot spots. guest: let me briefly in respond to the question. it is a continuing problem. she is right. the number of illegal immigrants has actually dropped in recent years for two reasons. one is the recession and the second is harsher enforcement that began under george w. bush

and has continued under barack obama. there has been some progress on the issue. on the board general drop, -- on the more general job, they have done a competent job. there have not been any huge mistakes, no bay of pigs, no catastrophic decision like the invasion of iraq. on the other hand, there have not been a lot of great successes. the middle east has been an area of priority for president obama and there has not been a breakthrough in middle eastern negotiations despite serious efforts on the part of hillary clinton, barack obama, george mitchell, the special envoy, and so forth. the president made a very difficult decision to engage in libya but without going all out and saying that our goal is to win a civil war and oust the general gaddafi.

they want to prevent atrocities to civilians. for the time being, that has led to a divided, unstable, uncertain situation in libya. if that continues indefinitely, this will certainly aware of the president politically and maybe the fact his international credibility. he is not alone. he was careful to engage nato and now the french in particular are taking a lead. host: hasting, fla., on the independent line. caller: i have a question. i worked in the oil fields as a young man. i understand that we have more oil than we could use in the next 100 years. how much blood and treasure would we be able to save if we did not have to go over to foreign countries and protect the oil that we have plenty of

here? would that not save us all in blood and treasure but secure us as a nation? why is not anyone in your group they're demanding -- there demanding we get rid of the epa regulations that stifle the oil industry? we would not even have to be over there to fight all of this stuff. host: you can answer if you wish. guest: just quickly. the problem is price. there is a lot of oil in the united states, oil, shale, but they are all very expensive. do we want to pay more than the $100 per barrel of oil to make those sources viable? that is a lot of the problem. epa regulations do have some

impact, but they are not, i do not think, decisive in this matter. host: this morning talking about the use of drones and their place in late national security efforts. guest: the administration has accelerated the use of drones to kill leaders in pakistan. so far they have not come close to find bin laden in that regards. host: who makes the decision? guest: the cia runs the drone operations, but i presume the cia director makes some specific calls and people on the ground respond to reports. the pakistanis have a problem and an interest. the problem is that we are making decisions that are interested in their territory

and any country would be sensitive to this. on the other hand, pakistanis do coordinate with us and the sand -- same things we complain about is helping us spot people to attack. there is the ethical question of drones that we are executing without trials. advocates say that is no different than military operations where someone is a declared adversary and you shoot at them. others have taken a different stance. host: we have seen more of susan rice from the united nations. tell us about her role and her performance. guest: she has an impressive role in winning approval of the libyan resolution, which was quite a strong resolution, and

which survived because neither the russians nor the chinese be toted. dave, the germans, and the indians come and brazil have all abstained. she has proven to be a good negotiator and a diplomat. she was a primary obama national security adviser and there was talk she made -- he may be the second president to have a female national security adviser named rice. it may not happen now, but nevertheless she has been a good member of the team. the fact that she is african- american is helpful in dealing with a range of countries, but it is basically your confidence and capabilities that makes her useful. host: sacramento, calif., on the democratic line. david, go ahead. caller: are g.d.p. right now is

at 42. % -- 42.8% of gdp on the wars in iraq. we are spending $9 billion in the last 10 years on tax refunds for the rich. host: your point on national security? caller: we should be pulling out of iran and iraq and especially building the country to get out. host: michigan on our republican line. pittsburgh, pa., on the democratic line. caller: yes, sir. and do you think our military is a strong enough? do they depend too much on the

guard and the reserve? when i returned from the guard in the 2005 -- retired in 2005, the guard was doing 52% to 54% of all refueling. do you think our military needs to be bigger? is that a national security issue? guest: that is certainly a national-security issue. there is no question, particularly during the height of our involvement in iraq, that the military was badly stretched. tours were being extended. the national guard was being used for a wide range of duties. there was a movement taken late in the bush administration which continued for a while under obama to add it to the number of

troops in the army. long term, i do not think the military is weak. as we step back from these engagements, and i do not anticipate our being involved in compare herbivores in the near future, that there will be pressure on the defensive budget-- involved in to parable wars in the near future. there is a need to cut spending and balance the budget. i think the pentagon is a large share of the budget and will have to take a hit. it did not take enough of one in the agreement reached this round, but this will be highly visible when we talk about long term spending. host: talk about the world loved

general david petraeus in national security. -- talk about the role of general petraeus. guest: he has been a big figure when they decided on a surge and replaced military leadership team and put him in charge. they proved to be successful for rescuing us from absolute disaster and has given general petraeus enormous prestige. more recently, he was promoted to the overall command, including iraq and afghanistan, and when general mcchrystal made some extraordinarily on wise comments to a reporter and had to be removed, petraeus agreed to obama's decision to replace mcchrystal so obama could have a credible leader.

petraeus has tremendous credibility and is a strong figure with strong views about how these wars should be pursued, particularly abroad, counterinsurgency approaches. he is not an easy person for a president who wants to make specific decisions. it is a potentially difficult relationship, but i think it has been a difficult that sometimes between obama and petraeus. when the interesting stories that has been coming out is that if panetta knows from the cia to the pentagon, perhaps petraeus would be named a director of central intelligence. that is a very interesting appointment. he is very smart, a very intellectual general. he has clearly been using intelligence a lot and it would be interesting to see what he would do with an organization

like the cia. one caveat is that most of the military intelligence actually comes from institutions within the pentagon so in terms of his current role, he relies a lot on defense intelligence. host: tyler, texas. caller: i would like to have your guests explain something about the christmas day under were bomber, if he would -- underwear bomber. he was probably number three on the list at the time. how was he able to dine at the white house? the underwear bomber was escorted to the plan by state department officials. guest: i do not know enough of

the facts on that to common. i am skeptical, but i do not know. host: back to your point on general petraeus, you said there was talk of him going to the cia. would he be a better canada to go to the department of defense if that position is open? guest: there was a strong desire not to have a general or a military man as head of the defense department because of a question of the separation of civilian control the military. when the general marshall, the most prestigious military officer perhaps in american history, was asked by harry truman was to take over the department of defense during the korean war, congress had to pass a special exception. i believe, though i am not certain, that the loss still exists that a general would not head the department of defense and that it needs to be a

civilian. for that reason, it is unlikely that you would have an effort to make petraeus secretary of defense. host: on the democratic side from arizona. good morning. caller: with this one world government that the powers that be are turning out, we seem to in doing the yeoman's work security. these countries benefit a great deal from our bases of being their and our people spending money. i am wondering, why can we not charge them for providing security? guest: we do charge a number of countries. they are renegotiating for japan in which they provide a substantial amount of money to us in support of our deployments there. they are for them as well as for us. in the terms of advanced

industrial countries, that is a general pattern with germany, etc. host: is there a sense of how other countries have responded to this team in place? guest: obama is very popular. there was a great unhappiness with president bush among most of the leaders of the world and therefore people were delighted he was no longer there. in that sense, it was a positive response. secretary clinton and secretary gates have been well respected. that has not meant that they would suddenly do what we want them to do on a number of the shares. it has been hard to get more contributions of nato troops to afghanistan although we have made progress in that and i can get a plug for my friend who is a u.s. ambassador to nato and is very much involved in that effort.

it is always hard to get started. getting the joint action in libya was an example of the successful coalition diplomacy. now the problem is to make it work in the real world. host: in south carolina with 10 minutes left with our guest. good morning. caller: good morning. i would like to ask about the airplanes being serviced overseas in different countries. why do we do that? the government can get involved and regulate the amount of water in my washing machine and now i have to do two loads instead of one, but why can they not get involved to let them be serviced right here? as far as the military and what not, why not give the cars and trucks back to the motor pool

and bring those people home? it would save a lot of money. host: hollywood, fla., on the democratic line. caller: if the dock because a cease-fire, how do we get him out? -- if gaddafi calls a cease fire, how do we get him out? guest: there is a report that the african union has organized a ceasefire, but the problem is that what does gaddafi did in this situation? the best hope right now, and it is not clear that it is a strong hope, is that he could be negotiated out in terms with some assurances for his personal survival, protection of his family, a refuge. i think the problem of beating

him at militarily would be very difficult. lead and then accept a victory by gaddafi is very unlikely during the current circumstances. a stalemate that is a bloody is possible. host: providence, rhode island, next on our independent line. caller: good morning. i have a question for mr. gessler. in response to the defense budget, -- mr. destler. where does the money come from to pay these corrupt officials in these countries to buy their allegiance to us? it is just that the officials that run those governments. secondly, as far as the arizona border with mexico, why would

our own government sue the state when they are trying to do a job that the federal government will not do? guest: on the second question, the basic answer, whether you like it or not, is that immigration is a federal and not a state responsibility. it is true that the federal government has been in a stalemate in terms of passing new immigration legislation. that is a big problem and a reason for the lawsuit, a belief that the state government asserted authorities that belong properly to the federal government. host: rialto, california. you are on. caller: i want to know if we could probably get general powell to go in, got a victory,

and he clearly knows the situation in the middle east. that would be a check made for the whole country. i will take your comments off air. guest: he was on my list of long-shot candidates for secretary of defense. it is an interesting policy -- possibility. as a former general, there may have to be special legislative action taken. he has been secretary of state since then, so he is more than one decade away from service as chairman of the joint chiefs. he left that office in 1993. he is a person that is very widely well-regarded. he is getting on in years. he probably would not wanted and therefore whether it is a viable option, i do not know. host: would there be concerned because of his involvement in

the iraq war? guest: there could be. it is known that he was a skeptic about the iraq war. he went the extra mile for the administration and gave a speech about weapons of mass destruction which has not stood up very well in terms of what we found, or more properly did not find, after we invaded. host: springfield, missouri, your next for our guest, mac adust lurked -- mac destler, from the university of maryland. caller: first, in remarks on the comments about how foreign powers were thankful to come in after george bush. at least bush stood up for us. in the national defense security team, if an american citizen

goes to mexico, we have all heard on tv what we have to put up with a good to mexico. you are allowed so many days. if you do not leave, you go to jail. yet we cater to all of the people coming over here better than we do our own american citizens. i am not proud of the way that the republicans acted in the past few days, but you guys are all about security. host: what is your question? caller: what is it -- when is the national security defense team going to stand up for our security and defense and not other people's ? guest: i never had a time limit when i went to mexico. no one told me i needed to leave in a certain number of days. host: santa rosa, california.

caller: hi. congratulations. host: next caller on the independent line. caller: your guest there has got a nice way of handling everyone that has been talking to you. i came from mexico. i served in the u.s. navy. i have seen it be deferred changes in the way the military is treated here and overseas. i was in the service in the 1970's after the vietnam war ended. i am really proud to be here in the united states. you know what? of these people who put down our

country, this is my country. i inherited it. i love it. i would do anything for it. we have to be proud of our servicemen and not let anyone take away from the respect that we needed to give our servicemen. guest: thank you. thank you for your service. it is my country, too. host: as far as individual members of the national security team, how do greater performance? guest: it has been pretty good. we have not talked about the national security adviser, and i think he has been able to put a policy progress together in the way the first national security adviser, general jones, was not. the national security adviser has to be close to the president. i think he is, therefore, able to make things move in a more coordinated way. coordinated way.