starting saturday mornings, 48 hours a people and events telling the american story. watch personal interviews about historic events on "oral histories." we visit key figures, battles, and events during a 150th anniversary of the civil war. go behind the scenes and museums and historic sites on american artifacts. and the presidency looks at the policies and legacies of past american presidents. get the complete schedule at c- span.org/history. >> we have more from the third annual redstate gathering. up next, nebraska candidate don standard. he discusses repealing president obama's health care law. later on, remarks from adam

hasner. he is currently running to take on bill nelson in the elections. >> next year, i will replace ben nelson in the u.s. senate. [applause] and then nebraska will be represented by into lifelong conservative in the u.s. senate. has the next nebraska state senator, i will vote to repeal obamacare. [applause] i will vote to secure our borders. [applause] i will vote to cut federal

spending and balance the federal budget. [applause] and i will vote to defend life, the second amendment come and religious freedom. [applause] i am honored to have been endorsed by redstate and by mark levin, honored to have the support of many t partyers across the state of nebraska. i am honored to be here today. you all are the salvation of our nation. nonplus you for all that you do for our nation. [applause] america today is going in the wrong direction. we have a president who apologizes for our nation instead of leading it. we have a president who bows to foreign dictators instead of standing up to them. we need a new direction.

we need a new president, and we need to restore america. [applause] restoring america must begin with defending our freedom. our founding fathers understood that big government threatens our freedom. the source of our freedom is not a benevolent government. no, our freedom is not a gift from our government. as thomas jefferson said, the god who gave us life gave us liberty at the same time. our declaration of independence tells us that the source of our freedom is our creator. the declaration of it -- of independence says this, we hold our troops to be self-evident that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unavailable

rights, and among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. to secure these blessings, govern -- governments are instituted among men driving their powers from the consent of those governed. when any government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it. [applause] ladies and edelman, our own government has become destructive of our liberties. so the time has come to do with the declaration of independence tells us to do. we must alter that government. [applause] we can do that at the elections next year, and with god's help, we will do that at the elections next year. [applause] next year we control the washington politics.

we vote of the people like ben nelson, who voted for a federal takeover of power in health care. next year, we can throw out of washington politicians who want to impose socialism on america. and next year we could throw out those politicians who are leaving our nation on a path to national bankruptcy. next year, we will alter the government of the united states. [applause] there are two competing ideas about the american people. the idea of the elites is that most people are ignorant, uninformed haters that must be controlled by a central government and who are incapable of making good decisions for themselves or their families. because of this belief, and the leads imposed national health care on us and tell us it is for our own good. they want to be able to tell you

what car you can drive, what food you must eat, and even what lightbulbs you must use. and the elites will decide who gets medical care and who does not. and the elites will tell you this is all for your own good. my friends, this is not freedom. this is tyranny. [applause] so let the word go forth from this time and this place, that as a free people, we will decide what is good for us, not the elites in washington. [applause] the other view of the american people is that they are intelligent, capable people who won their freedom to live to

work and raise their families without government interference. for those of us who see the american people in this light, we believe in less government, lower taxes, and more personal freedoms. or as thomas jefferson said, a wise and frugal government which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has turned. this is the sum of good government. that is the way thomas jefferson described good government. that is the government we want for ourselves, our children, and for our children's children. like you here today, i believe in the people. i believe in the greatness of our nation. i believe the united states of america is a nation that all

americans should be proud of. in 1936, the olympic games were held in not to germany. adolf hitler was in power. hitler attended the opening ceremonies of the olympic games. the olympic teams of each nation were told that as they marched past hitler possible viewing stand, they should did their national flag as a sign of respect. so one by one, the nations of the world marched past adolf hitler, each one dipping their national flag. and then came the american team, and the american flag. the american team believed that america and the american flag should never bowed to a foreign dictator. [applause]

and so they marched past adolf hitler with the american flag held high. hitler was furious, as dictators all lawyers are when free men and women will not now down to them. we need to restore the pride in america that our 1936 olympic team had. never again should a president of the united states now to a foreign dictator. -- bow to a foreign dictator. [applause] and never again should a president of the united states apologize for our great country. [applause] we need leaders who will defend our nation, not apologize for it. and what do we need to do to

restore america's greatness? i believe it begins with faith. the bible tells us what is needed to restore a nation. it is written in second chronicle 714. if my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then i will hear from heaven and i will forgive their sins and heal their land. [applause] so restoring our nation must begin with ernest prayer. when you go home tonight, i would urge you to pray for our nation. pray to god that he will heal our land. but it is not enough to pray. every story in the bible accept creation involved men and women

inspired by god who did what they were called to do. so what else, in addition to prayer, do we need to do to restore america? number one is simple. go and vote. number two, talk to your friends and neighbors and get them to vote. number three, help those candidates who are courageous and who share your values, hopes, and dreams for america's future. and what policies should we demand of our politicians to restore america? let's start by adding a balanced budget amendment to the constitution of the united states. [applause] we must repeal obamacare. [applause] ben nelson of nebraska was the

60th vote to impose obamacare on our nation, and i will be very happy and proud to cast the 60th vote to repeal obamacare. [applause] there should be no more bailouts, no more earmarks, and no new taxes. we must develop our domestic energy resources. we cannot continue to allow the radical environmentalists to block energy development in the united states of america. [applause] we must firmly reject socialism in the united states of america. [applause] we must maintain a strong national defense, and we must stand firm in defense of the second amendment, in defense of life, and in defense of religious freedom. [applause]

do these things and more and we will restore america. i am running for the united states senate because our country is going in the wrong direction. senator ben nelson of nebraska is a big part of the reason why. we must defeat him. we will defeat him if we can get the financial help we need for our campaign. ben nelson was the deciding vote to impose obamacare on our nation. he made that note in exchange for the cornhuskers kick back. he voted to waste $780 billion on president obama's wasteful stimulus. he voted to table cut, cap, and balance. then nelson went to washington claiming to be a moderate, but he is clearly a big government democrat right now.

the good news is, i am leaving him in the polls 46% to 40%. [applause] the bad news is that he is leading us by $3 million in campaign funds. thanks to his big government friends. we need some financial help to balance the scales. will you help us? and just in case you want to know, our website is stenbergforsenate.com and we can make it as easy as possible for you to contribute to our campaign. restoring america will take courage on the part of our elected officials. t.a.r.p. was passed because of the threat of an economic depression if it did not pass, but then most of the money was

not used for what they said it would be used for. the debt ceiling was raised as part of an insufficient budget deal because of overblown threats of immediate economic collapse if the debt ceiling was not raised by august 2. we need senators and members of congress who are not afraid to vote against bad deals. we need men and women of courage. i stand in all of the courage of the signers of the declaration of independence. the declaration of independence was in effect a declaration of war against the military superpowers of that day. a military expert at that time would have told you the revolutionary army would be quickly defeated by overwhelming british force. signing the declaration of independence was an act of treason against the british crown. the penalty for treason was

death. despite the enormous risks, their love of freedom was greater than any fear they must have felt, and so they courageously sign their names below these warrants. and for the support of this declaration declaration, with the protection of divine providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, fortunes, and our sacred honor. because of their enormous courage, we are free today. and i thank god that they have that courage. if our founding fathers had that much courage, surely we can fine men and women today who are not afraid to insist on the passage of a balanced budget amendment to the constitution of the united states. [applause] if congress had listened to the tea party, the credit rating of the u.s. would not have been cut

last week. will shi[applause] but it is not too late. we can restore america's aaa credit rating right now. we do not need to wait for the super committee. congress, go back to washington and pass cut, cap, and balance right now. [applause] if we believe in freedom and we believe in america -- and i know that you do -- then let us go forward boldly with courage, asking god's help, love and freedom, remembering those who gave their lives for our freedom loving our country and changing our governments, so that our posterity will save us. when the challenge came, we had a terrific -- courage to defend

our nation and defend our nation and restore our nation. thank you. may god bless you and the united states of america. [applause] >> folks, normally, when i endorse a candidate -- i have got to know them somewhat. i endorsed don sight unseen on his record. it is that good of a record in nebraska. we have got to support a guy like this to get rid of a guy like nelson. we will open it up to questions. >> we have a lot of great young minds in the senate right now. how can we differ from the old

mcconnell system? >> the question was, we've a lot some young lions. i appreciate being puttinput int category. [laughter] how do we overcome some of the good old boys? i had a conversation with senator demint about that. his view, which i share, is that we need to send reinforcements to the rand paul, jim demint, toomey, lee group. it is amazing what 5 seriously committed conservative republicans can do in the senate. if we can send them another five, 10, is going to make a difference. and pretty soon, the good old

boys will have to follow what the young lions are doing, which is cutting spending and restore our freedom. [applause] >> what is your feeling on term limits? >> i am a supporter of them. the attorney general of nebraska is not term limited by law or constitution. i served as the attorney general for the state of nebraska for 12 years. i was reelected twice. i do not think there was any doubt that i could have been reelected a third time, but i thought 12 years was enough and then returned to the private sector for eight years. i was recently voted as the state treasurer last fall. i would support an amendment to the constitution to require term limits. i want to point out, as the attorney general of the state and nebraska, our state passed

term limits for senators and congressmen. the arkansas case went to the supreme court, whether states could term limit their own senators and congressmen. i wrote the friend-of-the-court brief and the right of the states to limit the terms of senators and congress. we were not successful in that effort but we were leading the effort. i would support a constitutional amendment to the constitution of the united states to impose term limits. [applause] >> good afternoon, thank you. it is great to be here with so many like-minded friends. i do have to tell you, charleston has a special place in my heart. this is where i propose to my wife gillian, who i am proud is

here with us today. [applause] eric, thank you for everything you do. i want to thank everyone who is here today, who has taken the time out of their summer schedules to be a part of this incredible event. redstate has truly become a central pillar of the conservative movement, and i am proud to be a part of it. being from palm beach county, fla., i am always asked how it is possible i turned out to be a conservative, let alone a republican. well, i can tell you, it certainly was not my upbringing. i was not raised in a privileged, conservative, or even a republican household. far from it. my parents were liberal jewish democrats who were public school teachers from brooklyn, new york. [crowd groans]

when i was born, they had $31 to their name, and they saved and sacrificed so that we could move to florida. i got my passion from my mom and my love of baseball from my dad, but i got my politics from someone else. that someone else was ronald reagan. [applause] and despite being born in brooklyn, growing up in palm beach county, despite being the son of two jewish democrats, i came of age when it was morning in america. when i turned 18, i registered as a republican. now i am sure you can imagine that conversation. but after the malaise of the carter years, ronald reagan did not just tell us there was a shining city at the top of the hill, he led us there.

i was inspired by his can-do spirit, his unapologetic embrace of america's greatness, his moral clarity and his common sense main street wisdom. and for all that sunny optimism, he was the original tea party insurgent. [applause] when he disagreed with the direction of the republican party, he did not abandon it, he changed it permanently and for the better. and his example still inspires me to this day. and it is a lesson to all of us that are determined to make the reforms needed in washington in order to save our country. ronald reagan did not do anything halfway. he did not manage america's decline. he reversed it. he did not campaign on making inflation a little bit less painful. he stopped it.

and he did not just slow down the soviets. he defeated them. [applause] ronald reagan came on the scene and swept away conventional wisdom of the day. think about his four-word division for the cold war. we win, they lose. it sounds so simple, doesn't it? it brings to mind a great quote: they say the world is too complex for simple answers. they are wrong. and that is even more true today. the establishment is once again telling us that we have to give more of our freedom, our money, and our decisions to people in washington, d.c. we hear talk about changing the debate in washington and how policy that we know are right are not realistic.

our job is not just to slow down obamacare or to simply manage the national debt or just to accept 9% unemployment. our job is to provide a clear alternative to the policies in washington and offer real solutions to turn america around. [applause] because the nature of the challenges we face simply demand that we put principle first and our country's fate ahead of politics. and that is why i believe so strongly in cupp, cap, and balance. i was the first candidate in the country to sign onto it. i did so because it was the only proposal that attacked the real problem. it is the only proposal that may have given us a fighting chance to stop the endless borrowing

and spending, to stop the mountains of foreign debt, and to start us down the path of reigniting america's economy. it was so simple, even the experts in washington complex -- declared it impossible. it defied conventional wisdom and it had turned washington on its head, but isn't that exactly what we need to be doing right now? the recent debt deal is a perfect example of what is wrong in washington today. too much gamesmanship and not enough leadership. [applause] now i have heard all the arguments. some good friends have defended it. that is their call. but it does not change the fact that it is a bad deal. the downgrade and common-sense proves it. the whole process was a

dysfunctional mass. only in washington could they make this kind of stuff up. they tossed cut, cap, and balance the side, and for what? a deal that adds $10 children more to our national debt? a deal that cuts spending less in the next 10 years than government marble road this month? a deal that opens the door for higher taxes and threatens our national security, all courtesy of a not so super committee? if the debt limit fight does not improve, we need more principal conservatives in washington. this is not just about cutting. it is also about growing. growing our economy to provide the jobs and opportunities that our nation is capable of. we need leaders who will speak out for pro-growth policies that will build our economy and create jobs. we need to be aggressive on

sweeping tax reform to flatten and simplify the tax code. we should push to eliminate loopholes, subsidies, and special interest carve-outs, and lower the rates for individuals and businesses. [applause] democrats see tax reform as an excuse to raise taxes, punish job creators, and redistribute wealth. we see tax reform as a matter of fairness and a way of stimulating economic growth in our country. but getting government out of the way does not just mean reforming taxes. it means for reversing a job- killing regulations. president obama wants 4200 new regulations on businesses. the epa alone wants to implement 330 on everything from farm to construction sites. let us to freeze any new

regulation that would have a substantial economic impact, and instead of the cap and trade scheme, we should be pursuing more domestic energy exploration. [applause] and while we are at it, let us shake up the agencies that are killing jobs, and let us begin with the national labor relations board. [applause] we must stop them from advancing big labor's agenda through the back door. what they are doing to companies like boeing is economic extortion, and it is anti- american. [applause] and lastly, if we are going to solve our nation's debt crisis and jobs crisis, we must repeal obamacare. [applause]

obamacare is a trillion dollar nightmare that will make our health care system worse, not better. it will lead to the rationing of care, tax increases on small businesses, and increases on dependency on government. and once it is implemented, it will be impossible to get rid of. the fall of great society's begins when freedom gives way to dependency. but if we act boldly, we can reverse the course that president obama and washington politicians have placed us on. because it is not too late. america's decline is not inevitable. if we place our trust in the power of individuals and not the power of the state, then we will usher in a new era of economic prosperity and security. if we hold president obama

accountable and provide a clear alternative to his failed policies, we can and will take back the white house and the united states senate and achieve the vital reforms necessary to turn america around. [applause] but we have got to be willing to fight, to stand firm, to not blame, to do the hard work to ensure victory, to knock on doors and walk precincts, to blog, tweet, work on phone banks, and it is not easy. it takes a lot of money, sweat, and prayer. but i know it works because it is how i ended up here. in 2002, when i decided to run for the florida house, a lot of people said i did not have a chance. they said i was too young, too conservative. the party establishment told me

to wait my turn. but i knocked on over 10 dozen doors and won a four-way primary. [applause] then people said it would not last, that i could never get reelected in my district with an a rating from the nra. the attack me for being pro-life and standing up against the unions. my local newspapers beat me up for being too ideological and too rigid. despite it all, i won reelection three times. [applause] the eight years i served as a part-time legislator was a tremendous honor. we were proud foot soldiers in jeb bush's conservative revolution, we cut taxes, reform the education, we balance the budget and grew florida's economy.

then in 2007, i was picked by the speaker of the house to serve as the republican majority leader. that speaker was my friend marker rubio. [applause] -- marco rubio. marco once described me as the most part hint -- partisan republican in tallahassee. he meant it as a complement. the media tried to use it as an insult. but i wore it as a badge of honor. [applause] it was also that same year when charlie crist became governor. he had campaigned as a jeb bush conservative, but the day he was sworn into office, he began governing as a barack obama liberal. people have short memories in politics. they forget that before obama, before the tea party, and before the great american awakening,

the establishment in our party was telling conservatives that the way to be democrats was to be more like them. but like you, i stood by marco the partyen establishment stood by charlie crist. when he was on the cover of every magazine and was being referred to as the future of the republican party, we stood up to him and we ignore the establishment and ignored those who declared that conservatism was dead. our beliefs never changed and our principles never wavered. we proved the media and experts wrong and then, and we can do it again today. [applause] we cannot back down now. because if we do not stand and fight, nobody else will. the work of people like you in this room, in rooms like it

across the country, began this revolution in 2010. and we must work even harder now. we must send more people to washington who will do what is right, not just what is popular or easy. we need conservatives who will stand up to the democrats and to the republicans who act like them. [applause] this is even more important now than ever. after the message we sent last year, every politician is trying to reinvent themselves as a conservative, and it is getting so silly right now in florida. former chief of staff, the guy that he calls his maestro, the same guy who himself described himself as a charlie crist republican and was

attacking markhor rubio is now trying to run as a true blue conservative. think about that. that is like rahm emanuel trying to run away from barack obama. now is not the time for reinvention. now is the time for reinforcement. [applause] republicans who will stand alongside jim demint, marco rubio, mark lee, and i would be proud to be one of those leaders who you sent to washington next year. please join our movement. visit adamhasner.com and connect with us on facebook and twitter. we must rise to the generational challenge like those before us rose to their spirit because when we look back at this moment in our nation's

history, i want us all to say that we answered the call. join me to fight the status quo in washington, and together, we will save the united states of america. god bless you all. god bless the united states. [applause] >> but we put them on the spot here at the redstate gathering. not only do they have to pay their own way, but they have to take questions, too. questions? >> [inaudible]

>> let me just share with you that i was one of the first in the country can -- candidate to embrace paul ryan's plan for medicare. i understand the decisions we need to make to preserve social security. in florida, we have 3.3 million that are on medicare. everyone of us knows that the medicare trustees have said medicare is going bankrupt in the next 10 years. if we do not make the tough decisions now and transform the system from one that does not currently work, with health care inflation what it is, 10,000 baby boomers coming onto the rolls every day, if we do not make those tough decisions now,

these programs will collapse on current beneficiaries, and it will burden future generations with crushing taxes, a lower standard of living, an infringement on their personal freedoms. so people ask me all the time. you are running for u.s. senate in florida, where the senior population is so high. i remind them, florida seniors have the most to lose if we do not have this conversation. so what we need to do is go out and our people with the facts. republicans are far too often passive. we need to be aggressive. we need to have the information and the numbers and the statistics. we need to go out and persuade the american people that the way we are going to preserve our greatness is not by increasing taxes and continuing to build on these programs, but by making them work for future

generations, unlike the way they are currently headed with their current path and direction. >> [inaudible] >> i believe the reforms start with -- the ryan plan is a first great step. i embrace and in terms of providing individuals with the payments so that they can go out and purchase their own health insurance. put the decisions back into individual's hands. we trust the individual, not the government. that is the beginning of beginning to reform medicare. when it comes to social security, we need to be more specific about raising the retirement age, more specific about how we calculate benefits. we need to be more specific about giving people the opportunity to have their own accounts and to ultimately be able to opt out. that is what will preserve that social safety net for future generations.

>> [inaudible] over 80% of the crime is drug- related. it is obvious that we are not losing the war on drugs, we have already lost it. i wonder if you would give any thought how we would proceed with the problems? [inaudible] >> we were just in poll county for that political barbeque. while i recognize so much of the crime in the country is drug- related, i do not support efforts for legalization. i am watching what is going on along our southern border. we have a full-fledged war

taking place along the mexican border. when we are seeing with the drug cartels, kidnapping, murdering, human rights abuses, legalizing drugs is not going to make that situation better. we need to be more vigilant to preserve the values in our culture. [applause] >> [inaudible] energy, agriculture, epa, and education. [inaudible] >> that is the beginning, but only the beginning. the question was, despite -- domestic discretionary spending and the elimination of certain agencies. dismantling government. it starts with education,

energy, housing and urban development, department of transportation. we have to go in and we have to win the battle of ideas. this is an ideological battle. we need to be able to demonstrate that job growth and economic prosperity does not come with higher taxes and growth in government. what we have seen in washington over the past few years -- and i do not just blame the democrats. republicans share in the blame of growing the size of the government. but we also have to recognize the portion of the budget -- over 60% -- is on social security, medicare, and medicaid. so while we are working to restore constitutional principle spending, which means devolving power back to the states in the areas of education and elsewhere, we also need to realize we are not going to come close to our fiscal

responsibility promises if we do not address the tougher issues of medicare, social security, and medicaid. that is a great example of how we can block grant funding and give power back to the states. >> [inaudible] >> it is a pleasure to have you here. >> thank you all so much. thank you again. [applause] >> watch more videos of the candidates. see what political reporters are saying, and track the latest political contributions. all at c-span.org/campaign2012. >> libyan rebels say they

control most of the capital city of tripoli. residents are celebrating in the green square and nato is promising to maintain its air security until fighters returned to barracks. a top american diplomat says that the whereabouts of colonel muammar gaddafi are unknown. president obama remained on vacation. he has no public appearances scheduled for the day, but according to politico, he is being constantly briefed on the situation. and off camera briefing of the white house spokesperson is expected, and we will let you know if anything significant comes out of that. on "and the communicators" this evening, a look at the communication industry. they will discuss cyber threats

against the u.s. after that, it is "book tv" primetime. we will check in at the harlem book fair, freedom fest, and roosevelt reading festival. more now from the third annual redstate gathering with current u.s. house candidate mike williams of texas. he speaks on the deficit, tax reform, energy independence, as well as immigration reform. he is the former texas railroad commissioner. his comments are about 35 minutes. [applause] >> thank you. thank you for the introduction. thank you for your friendship, and thank you, my friend, for your support in this particular race. you gave me a special opportunity today to be in this

room, as my friend and colleague for the last 12 years announced his candidacy to be the president of the united states. this is already one of the best days i have had. i wanted to come here and do something special. somebody once asked the great american novelist alex haley, what gave him the inspiration to write "roots?" he said each and every day, you should try to find some good. i am here to find some good. the good folks here that understand that they were created in the likeness of god, and it is from him that our rights come, and it is him who understands that the rights to not come from government. the simple role of government is to preserve, protect, and defend individual liberty. i came here to pray with some

folks who are getting ready to fight with the american dream. who recognize, unlike our president, that america is exceptional that is because of our per capita income, or because of the number of our youngsters that go to college, but we are the only planet whose rights came from our heavenly father. i came here to see if i could get somebody stirred up for the next couple of months, a bit for the campaign. this thing about fighting for american liberty. we understand the linchpin of that is this notion of personal responsibility. so we are fighting in a war that is a conflict of different visions. some folks believe the only way we can prosper is for government to grow. for those of us who know that we prosper by the engines of person kind, each and every single one of us. folks to understand that on the one hand you have a government

that says they can force you to buy certain products, sort of like health care, which means that one day they may force me to buy chocolate even though i do not eat it. wait a minute, and they are going to control your business and families through an epa that is following the fancy of global warming, rather than letting american producers produce energy? somebody like that is going to tell me, he is not going to recognize that i have an inherent right that came to me from someone above, to possess and there and carry my arms. i am a texan, so of course i have a concealed handgun license. i just will not care you -- tell you what i am carrying. we have work to do. among to spend some time today -- everybody in this room, you have listened to folks before me

talk about how we have to cut spending and ending earmarks, stopping this slide towards european socialism. we just saw an exercise in washington where we raised the debt ceiling. i have to admit, i do not know why we call it a ceiling and we keep on raising the roof. $16.50 trillion in debt. $200,000 per capita. so a new child is born today, we get about 600 new babies every day in this country. what do they get? a birth to begin in one hand and a federal debt in the other. we are spending money that we cannot pay back. we know that we have to cut. do not think that any of us can say that we can cut. have you ever done anything

before? when i became a member of the road leading railroad organization in texas, there were 853 employees. when i resigned, we were authorized at less than 705, and we had less than 670 on the payroll. i am a politician that had cut the size of government. in addition to that, it occurred at no small risk or sacrifice. in 2005, the texas legislature gave eight of us statewide officeholders have a $45,000 per year pay raise. and i never took a penny of it. i want you to know that i know how to put the words public and

servant in the same phrase. but as texans, i do have to admit another thing. i am married to a talented and absolutely gorgeous woman. even if i took a pay raise, i would not have been the bread rainier in my family. so i wanted to keep a life that i had become accustomed to. despite the joking, this is serious. i had the chance to be an assistant secretary at the u.s. department of education under president bush. this country did not have a u.s. department of education in 1979. it will not need one in 2013. [applause] for the last 12 years, it was my daily obligation to try to make sure america had abundant supplies of affordable and reliable safe energy. we did not have a department of

energy in 1973, and you will not need one in 2013. [applause] weekend defund npr and planned parenthood. president bush appointed my wife donna to something called the corporation for national and community service. she went to washington for her first board meeting. she had flown through senate confirmation. and do you know what the corporation for national and community service does? it spent $900 million of your money every year beginning people to volunteer in their local community. help a brother understand, has anyone ever volunteered for anything? there has to be a whole lot of cuts like that. we have to be in more than just

an austerity program. we need to create wealth and prosperity and jobs in this country. it seems to me one of the first places we have to look is at our tax code. my dad is a retired high school football coach. he was inducted into the texas football coaches hall of fame. [applause] he would say if your team is winning and other teams -- if your team is not winning and others are, you might want to do what they are doing. if we look around the world, look at some of those former soviet bloc countries. many of them have moved to a flat tax. i recognize there are other options. and national fair tax. but as long as we have a constitutional amendment to limit the 16th amendment, we cannot get there. somebody in washington will try to take money out of both of our pockets. my friends, we can also do

something else in creating jobs. let us create -- take one of the resources that was given to us, to use as a platform for creating jobs in america. we should be explored for every molecule of energy in america. we should be exploring off of the east coast, west coast, gulf of mexico, and in and more. in order to keep the lights on, we recognize we want to rely on american natural gas. whether you look at the estimates that say we have a 100-year supply, or a 300-year supply, we are going to turn the lights on with natural gas. you know the story with nuclear power. the french and the japanese have nuclear power. my goodness, if the french can figure it out, then we can. in order to move our cars,

trucks, and buses, i do not know what some on to the north is going to develop tomorrow, but to get to tomorrow, where we spend $40 million on foreign crude, much of it going to people who do not like us, the way we get from there to there is american natural gas. [applause] as a perspective congressman from a southern state, we have got to recognize that we have to control the border. it is interesting. pope john paul ii said america was the continent of hope. we were created under a divine idea, that all men were created equally. we want people to come to america. part of what makes this country as great as she is is the confluence of all of those different folks that came from

different places. but there is a way to come to america, and it is consistent with the rule of law. some folks have not got the message, so we have to control the border. i think we control it with a wide variety of tools. some places, a physical fence where it works. other places, you might have a technology fence. in other places, you will need boots on the ground. and because that is an international border, some of those boots will be military. [applause] we have got to also say, quite frankly, we have to provide disincentives for people to break our laws. we should say no to amnesty and node to send share for cities. no to benefits to people who came here illegally. and we need to visit -- revisit the question of citizenship. i go back and think about what

was the purpose of the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendment? we need to be clear about that. we also have to say to employers. you have to use our tools. we are going to give you a tool to determine who is there illegally and who is not. but if one persists in hiring folks who are not here legally, i am a prosecutor. [applause] there are a number of things we should and ought be doing. and i want to leave you with why i think we go to a conversation with all of us we would say this notion about the american dream and fighting for the principles of liberty, a part of our family story. i want to share parts of the williams family. my grandfather was a unique man, one of the few men of his generation who earned a high- school degree.

became an entrepreneur, business owner, the patriarch of the black community. he wanted his daughter to have a similar life with similar opportunities. my grandfather put my mother on a train and said my mother to san antonio, texas, 200 miles away where she attended a catholic girls' school. she grant from high school, went on to college, went to graduate school, became a teacher and top for 40 years. when i came along my parents wanted the same thing for me. i went to catholic school. there was no catholic high school. i am old enough to of gone to school during segregation, but i did not go to a segregated school,, even though my parents taught at one. what did my parents do? they found the catholic boys'

school in colorado. it was 602 miles away. when it came time to go to school that was coaching, mom was teaching, so they put me on a bus. they pulled out a map. they put circles by the cities where the bus would stop. by the otherrx's cities. to theid when you get x, call your grandmother and let her know you are all right. you cannot send a 13-year-old child on a bus 602 miles away where there is no one in the community that looks like him and not have imbedded it is the innate the notion of individual liberty and personal responsibility. it is laid out in unique ways. as i go around our state, this country, people are telling me that what you're looking for in

this cycle, the job's description for people you want to send to washington or people who had records as consistent constitutional conservatives who have the courage to go to washington and will not wilt under the washington he will stand up to obama, and even the republican establishment. who will not be seduced by the washington post and the new york times and who can rally america's around the next generation. i was the lawyer assigned to the case of the united states of america versus five members of the carolina knights of the kkk. i invited those individuals for

conspiring to obtain weapons stolen from fort bragg and other military installations across the south. if you go through the records of the united states senate, they will tell you are prosecuted those cases underarrest to myself. individuals who had done harm to others put a death warrant up against me. i put three of my witnesses in the federal witness protection program. i tried to of the cases under heavy protection of federal agents. at the end of the day those five individuals got a tax-payer federal trip to an institute of higher learning. [applause] four years later i was the assistant secretary at the utah department of education under george h. w. bush. i announced a policy statement that said colleges and universities should discontinue

based upon of blood line. the new york times, the washington post, the dallas morning news, the boston herald, other major newspapers across the south said it was a frontal assault on race-based affirmative action. why do i tell you that story? i tell you that story for a reason. we are insignificant times of the moment. you are getting ready to hire folks. i think you have told me what that job description is. i have to think the courage shown by the 33-year-old kid still rest of this 58-year old man as he stands here. i have to think that the fidelity to the notion of individual liberty, the prospect of giving to all americans the opportunity to sit in those

seats, opportunity to educate all and get them willing and prepared to be our next leaders, i have to believe the notion of individual liberty rests here as well. so my friend from texas, by friends from congressional district 25, and my friend from across the -- across the country, if you're looking for someone who has a record of achievement and a vision for a brighter american future, i asked for your support and your help. [applause] made a piece of the lord be with you. may god bless you. may god bless america. if you. -- thank you. [applause] >> i am going to ask you the

first question, because our friend the governor is not here. i need someone to response from texas for this. while the governor of texas was announcing this standing here saying he was running for president, the president of the united states was playing golf and a rain storm by himself. >> we had a working governor. after january 13 we will have a working president. as a matter of fact, gov. kerrey does not play golf. who has a question? way over there. >> [inaudible] >> the district, because of our growth, we are getting four new seats. this is not one of those.

this is a seat that is now projected to be 56% of the vote. senator mccain got 66 percent of the vote in the presidential bid. i look at this as a takeaways seat. it is currently held by one of the more liberal members. won't it be ironic? the difference is that he has here and i do not, but that is ok. this is a fairly long thing. 200 plus miles link. it goes from tarrant county, a small part of terror and county county, all the waynt down to a large part of travis county. 13 counties. it is a kurd in travis county. it is 249,000 of the 698,000

votes -- people in the district. it is about 515,000 voting age population. yes, ma'am. could you describe and tell us exactly how your form of thinking has changed. >> i think there are a couple of different ways. she said you sound to be conservative and you have a conservative record. while my parents were not political when i was younger, they were quite conservative. obviously they were conservative in terms of the base of reading.

in addition to that, i say i am blessed with three things. number one, i have a heavenly father, but never too, i was born in america. i was born in one of the most conservative cities in the country at the time. a city that has given you two american presidents. that was part of it. i also grew up at a time -- obviously i went to college in the early 1970's. when i returned home to mifflin in 1978 after i got out of law school i started to analyze myself in ask myself how to create wealth? how we go about the business of the advancing the african-

american community? i said one team has won plan, and that does not work. then there is another plan. i started investigating that other plan. back in 1982 i went to a cabman -- cabbage and it took with me a bible -- went to a cabin into the bible and nelson friedman's book. when i came out of the mountain, . knew what i was pier y >> [inaudible]

>> one of the things that i heard, one of the questions that was asked prior to be coming up here, you guys do not know how important you are to the movement we are in the midst of, because we are in the movement of not only providing education, but demobilizing new voices and abysmal voices. he said first win the argument, and then when the boat. we win the argument by engaging all kinds of folks, providing them with information and persuading. that is what we have to do. we're in the persuasion business right now. in i think they're telling me my time has ended.

me myhink they're telling time has ended. one more question. way back. >> [inaudible] >> think about -- federal energy policy is affected by a number of thing. number one of global warming. the threat of greenhouse gas deregulation. also, we also have onshore the challenge of dealing with u.s. fishing and wildlife agency, which has now decided they will protect at 3 inch lizard at the risk of hundreds of thousands of barrels of crude on the largest onshore crude oil play in north america. and thousands and thousands of jobs. we have refiners in this country that had on schedule bunch

construction projects. they will tell us today that they have shut down those because they do not know what will happen with obama care. i do. we will repeal and replaced. they do not know what will happen with obama care. if you look at what has happened in the gulf, the bp incident was one of consequence of human error. we produce crude every day and have been doing so every day safely. what we should do is make sure the producers attend to the rules, and when they do not, we should then have them deal with those enforcement agencies. those rigs have left, and most will never come back. if you think about every brick that is running on shore, that is about 12 jobs just on the

rig. then there is another eight to 12 in direct and induced jobs. about 450 get their work on each rig. we put american jobs at rest because someone does not want us to do so in the gulf and elsewhere. someone wants us to go after the energy industry and our ability to produce our own energy. and think about the nature of borrowing money from the chinese so we can loan it to the brazilian so they can go drill for oil. >> [inaudible]

the question is what we do about the black vote? let me mention a couple of things. we have to recognize the of have a conversation with that community and meet the community where it is. we're so impressed with our policy positions we want to run up to people and say here. i tell books all the time that the way we make that change is for them to understand who we are. in getting to understand who we are, we have to have a conversation. we have a responsibility. you guys up what it when i talk about my work at the department of education on individual liberty. but when we see someone acting in a way that is clearly racist, clearly biased and

discriminatory, we need to be the first people in the room to say no. do not get upset if somebody on the left tilsit if we do not like, because you did not fill it first. we have to have that conversation. i am convinced, and this may sound self-serving, but i am convinced that with the election of alan west and tim scott and michael williams, you will start prayer read by. you do not get folks permission to say i am republican. i find it interesting as i go around my state the number of people who come up to me and say

i am a republican. it is all say it out loud. we want them to vote. we want them to vote with us. that will happen as we get more and more of us to get on the national stage, and more of us are seen by the folks in that community. they will say if he can do it, i might be able to do it. the community agrees with us on most issues. they just did not think they like us. >> michael williams, i will make a point at the end that may give me in trouble or not. you and alan west and tim scott, i just got an e-mail from a buddy of mine who says herman cain is in iowa right now.

we are in the second congressional district of south carolina, which is the district of fires the first shot in the civil war. it happens to be represented by a black man who happens to be a republican. it is nice to see michael williams and michael west and tim scott and herman cain and the list goes on. running not based on who they are about what their ideas are. you have been consistently, since 2009 -- i cannot get over the fact that your are railroad commissioner that has nothing to do with real roads, but the power of your ideas and what you say, i appreciate you. you can send michael williams to the united states congress with your careers, money, and your vote. [applause]

>> watch more video of the candidates. see what political reporters are setting a track the latest campaign contributions with c- span is website. easy to use, helps you navigate the political landscape would twitter feeds and facebook updates from the campaign. plus links to c-span media partners in the early primary and caucus states. all at c-span.org/campaign2012. >> libyas opposition leader says rebels have captured another of muammar gaddafi sons, bringing to three the number of leaders in custody. also reporting in remarks we show you a short time ago, the secretary general of the u.n. is urging forces loyal to muammar gaddafi to stop fighting immediately.

he told reporters it is important that the conflict and with no further loss of life and without retribution. the hilt is reporting this afternoon that help intelligence committee chair mike rogers is calling on the u.s. to take a prominent role and libya if muammar gaddafi is removed from power to insure the that the weapons do not fall into the wrong hands. he broke with his colleagues in supporting the u.s. involvement in operation from the beginning. we will have more on the libya uprising and give you the latest on capitol hill as it unfolds. >> dr. martin luther king was not a president of the united states. at no time in his life did he hold public office. he is not a hero of foreign wars. he never had much money. while he lived he was reviled at

least as much as he was celebrated. by his own account he was a man frequently wracked with out, a man not without flaws, a man who like moses before him more than once questioned why he had been chosen. the task of leading people to freedom, the task of healing. >> watch this entire event, the groundbreaking of the martin luther king jr. memorial at the c-span video library. now nearly five years later the memorial will be dedicated washington, d.c., this sunday on c-span. we will have coverage of other even surrounding the dedication on the c-span networks. >> every weekend it is american history tv on c-span3, starting

on saturday mornings. 48 hours of people telling the american story the history bookshelf features some of the best known history riders. is the key figures and events during the 150 anniversary of the civil war. visit college classrooms across the country during lectures in history. go behind-the-scenes of museums and historic sites on american artifacts and a presidency looks at the policies of legacies of past american presidents. get our complete schedule at c- schedule. >> up next, the chief of naval operations spoke at a conference for the association for unmanned vehicle systems earlier this month. the defense department secretary for research also gave a keynote speech on the use of unmanned systems and the impact of current budget environment. this is just over 40 minutes.

the navy sponsor team defeated japan yesterday. i think we are even in that regard. [applause] it really is good to be here. i was so pleased to see the response that the symposium generated and the number of people who have signed up for the week. i think it is indicative of the interest, the passion, and the

promise that unmanned systems of all varieties portend for the future. today i would like to tell you about the approach we have taken and the future on our plate. there is no question for those of you that followed national security issues that were fighting in fiscal realities i believe will drive us more rapidly and in a much more focused way beyond our traditional platforms and to the inclusion of and demand systems. i think clearly in the navy's case, without the work and

commitment that our office of naval research has done over the years and kept the pot stirred up, if you will, we would not be in a position where we are today. clearly, it was the sustainment of o.n.r., and in the last couple of years in the case of the navy where we have reorganize ourselves and look at how we want to use unmanned systems and move to many of those programs and to information dominance. it is also important to acknowledge the contributions come interests, and confidence of the technical communities of academia and how they have been able to bring that intellectual power to bear in the world of unmans.

there is no question that industry deserves great credit for continuing to pursue many of the initiatives that we see operating in the battle space today. in i would like to touch a little bit on how we see an unmanned systems operating and what i have been referring to during my time as the chief of naval operations operating in the way we can provide the nation with the best option or options. a few months ago i was giving some remarks and someone asked me about the maritime strategy that we had issued four years ago. was it still relevant? and did it still a matter in the world in which we live today? that was on the eve of our operations into libya. i knew we were going into libya.

it was not in the public domain. as i tried to formulate the answer, i have this vision of our navy at that moment in time. as some of you may know when we laid out the strategy, we said we would be a force that was forward. we would be a deterrent force. we would project power. we would control the seat and the areas where we needed at that moment in time. we would conduct maritime security operations and we would provide humanitarian assistance and disaster response. on that the ticket evening, or ballistic missile submarines were on patrol as the nation's most survivable deterrent force. two aircraft carriers were in the middle east as changes were sweeping through that area. we work for word in every ocean of the world and on every

continent. those two capabilities were checked. we were moving ships and submarines into position to make the initial attacks into libya the took down the air defense system with our ships and submarines. their ships and submarines were also provided seek control and area. as you went further east, you were able to see the united states navy working with friends and partners in the somali basin. so my answer to the gentleman that asked me the question was yes, it is relevant and active, viable, and it does provide those offshore options that the

nation will lead in the years ahead and is able to be done without any footprint. i am often complimented for our navy, because of how fast we're able to respond, and we are able to respond quickly because of the great skill and confidence and initiative of our sailors who are deployed today. about 65,000 of them parroted the key to the speed of response is also the fact that we're always there. we are present in every ocean and the world. we're standing by in those areas where conflict war disorder is likely to occur, and it is the presence that gives the nation the speed that will become increasingly important. in all of those things that i just talked about, i think it is important to recognize that in

all of the operations that we conducted, our communications were not challenged, the command and control of our forces were not challenged, and there was no real threat to our ability to access those areas. so we in a way were never challenged in how we wanted to operate and what we wanted to do in those particular circumstances. those days are not always going to be the case. there will be challenged, there will be systems that will

i have no idea why it was that event that caused me to be so focused and excited and the enthusiastic. probably because in my mind it truly does portend a significant change in the and the attaches and the power and versatility of naval carrier aviation, because if we can blend the unmanned on an aircraft carrier in demand on an aircraft carrier, we change the invention of carrier vehicle intervention in a way that has not happened in decades. i would also say that as the organization, and i alluded to this earlier, that culturally we are often slow to adapt. we tend not to want to pull these innovative solutions -- solutions into the way we do things. we struggle to answered needs in new ways even though we know there is a compelling argument

to get these systems out there. that is why i believe the approach we have taken to reorganization and a great young leaders, some of who you see here and audience today are the ones that will carry us forward. i would also say we get wrapped up a lot in our defense procurement process. that of an industry does not bring new ideas to us because we do not ask for them, that i think that reveals an acquisition system that does not accept failure and is not eager to learn from its mistakes, which i think it's a huge shortcoming of our system. failure is not bad. not learning from the failure is bad, but failure is not bad. resistance and getting what i called speed to fleet. how quickly can we get systems out there? and the time that it takes thing

-- takes us collectively to get an idea and get it out into the fleet i think represents a risk- averse culture and bold set of process sees that are not geared to the age in which we live it. i believe it is also worthy to note that even though we have had the fires out deployed, the fires out deployed a short in afghanistan -- ashore in afghanistan that the item of note was that of fires that were shot down in combat, and negative. all of the positives were glossed over. all of the lessons we were able to learn by deploying two years early, to shape our thinking for the future, that seems to be minimized. i believe that is indicative of

thinking and policies that are not helpful to our future. i also believe we have a belabored operational test and evaluation regime. that from time to time, more often, tends not to be able to deliver integrated and interoperable systems we will need. again, a stovepipe look at how we're bringing systems into play and not being able early on to determine the inner opera ability issues and solutions and the integration challenges that we know we will face. we know we will have to think differently about how we do that. if we fail, what happens is the systems get put on the back of our sailors, and they are the ones that have to struggle through the process. they are the ones that have to

fight through the inability for systems to work together. i think there are more of us in uniform and those of us that are in the department can do a better job of articulating requirements, stating those requirements and working closely with the research community and with industry to make sure we get those systems delivered quickly and can work our way through rapid fielding. it is so important at this time, because i really do believe that in few times in history have we been presented what technological opportunity in the way that we are today. we have to get our heads around that and make sure we are requesting that in the right

way. i think just to close with a couple of points that remained of great importance to me. you were all there last year when i cast the net widely to continue the pursuit of high density under water power. that clearly is something that will be a game changer for us. i encourage and thank all of those that have been part of bringing options to the navy so that we can look at what the best way ahead is. just in the short time we have been advocating for increased power, we have seen the times rise markedly. we need to continue to do that. i think there should be increased attention paid on the use of open architecture and how we can take advantage of that to increase the rapid fielding of

these systems. as i a voice said from the beginning, there is no such thing as an unmanned system. there will always be people in the loop and in the process in some numbers in some way. the environment in which we're going to be in, whether it is the risk environment, the nature of anti access strategies for the fiscal environment that we're going to be in, we cannot afford to simply take an operator out of the vehicle to declare victory when we put it the additional people in the back room. the cost of people in the future will only continue to rise. we have to make sure the systems we're putting together, the integration, in our offer ability takes advantage of how you bring down the number of people associated with operating

the systems in which we will bet on for the future. i would say with all of the challenges and rubs and shortcomings that i have highlighted, i do believe that we in the navy have we imagine that our future. we have restructured our selves, and we have put the right leadership in place to take us there. again, i appreciate the work that is done in all dimensions of this exciting area that will help us deliver on the promise of technology. the promise of technology that is not an end and to itself, but that technology that must be integrated into how we will take our forces into the future, how we will take our forces anywhere on the planet where we want to go for the good of the nation and operate in an integrated,

safe and affective matter with our friends and partners, wherever they may be. i think you very much for your time. i think you for your efforts. i would now like to open it up on any questions you may have. thank you very much. [applause] thank you. >> sir, at the beginning of this speech you said you think the budget climate will drive the development of some of the systems. i was wondering if you could elaborate on that, particularly for what you said at the end about having to make a business case for reducing. >> i think the budget and are met will drive the development as long as we see them as an integrated force with our manned systems. for example, i will use the

underwater world for where i have put a lot of effort and thought recently. i believe unmanned underwater systems have become extensions to the submarine and can pay come extensions to aviation, manned or unmanned, as far as scenting the bottle here yet so if you were to ask me if you could extend the your sensing their work with unmanned systems, my initial reaction is we can get there more cheaply than if i have to buy many of the more man that system but also reduces the risk to personnel and reduces the cost of the personnel that we may have to have out that of limited duration, and like command systems do that can be more

persistent in the battle space. that is where i think that as we look at how we want to structure the fleet, how do we want to build programs, that i believe we can get more bang for the bout by integrating the unmanned into demand networks. -- more bang for the buck by integrating the unmanned into the manned networks. what do you see the roles of the unmanned underwater vehicles in use for disaster? >> i think you could use the unmanned underwater systems to sample water in the event of a disaster, not unlike what we saw in fukushima where there were concerns about contaminants. there is no question that as you

conduct a major humanitarian assistance operation, whether it was the tsunami off of indonesia. i have recently returned from chile where i spent time in their hydrograph it office with the bottom of the ocean ship did so much, and as you are trying to close and bring in significant amounts of aid and you do not know what the bottom is like any more, what the depths are, i would rather send in unman the systems that can sense the bottom and that the bottom and provide the information that tells us where to go and where not to go. i think that can be huge. i would say those are some of the areas that show great promise. quite frankly, the technology is there today to be able to do that. thank you.

on the back. >> thank you for coming to speak to us. we have developed on thomas rotorcraft. i am interested on your thoughts on shipboard air craft, the trade between the larger and more capable and costlier aircraft verses were plentiful less costly aircraft. >> think you. -- thank you. that was another area where a couple of years ago we made a decision that was reflected in the programs that you see today. there was early on in the explosion of unmanned systems where everyone wanted to get into the game of most active system at the time. as i was looking at our budget and looking at the capabilities

that we had, and i began to look at the future that we would encounter, for me, it became important that we focused on our strengths. so we were investing in airborne systems that required us to be a short period that required us to have additional manpower structure to be a shohore. -- ashore. we're pretty good at living at sea. we have been doing it for a while now and are pretty comfortable there as well. we made the decision that the unmanned assistant we would pursue would come from the sea. because as i mentioned in the beginning of my remarks, that offshore option is going to become increasingly important.

it will become increasingly important for two reasons. the introduction of anti-access area of denial strategies and systems where there will be an effort to keep military forces out of a particular area, and naval forces that offshore option to move. but it is also going to be important politically, because i believe the future will be one where the sensitivities of sovereignty, the nation's desire to control its own land to be able to focus on that which is theirs, that the idea of large footprints ashore, bases ashore, improved facilities may not always be guaranteed as we have

become used to over these past years. the ability to have these mobile you west-sovereign bases, whether you call them aircraft carriers or whether it is a small the street that allows the rotorcraft to use a small spot in the ocean, i think that is going to become increasingly important. the question on the different sizes and the cost relative to those sizes will be one in my mind of trade-offs and payload and indifference. that is how we will look at that future. the fact is we have a lot of air field in the navy that have very small landing areas. that is where the road no aircraft comes into play. aircraft comes into

play. the vertical landing and takeoff will continue to be important to us because of the large number of landing fields that we field in the navy that a sovereign u.s. territory that we do not have to ask for flight rights and do not have too big -- ask for basing rights and access. it is there and then put it where ever we want it. yes, sir. >> i support [inaudible] i have been an operator since the early days of the pioneers. first of all, a complement, sir. over the last 20 years you have by far been the most impressive and motivational when it comes to the employment of unmanned systems entire initiatives.

>> thank you. >> now i will ask a question if i could. in your perspective, how would you like to see the acquisition process and prove to affect the development and fielding of unmanned systems. on a fielding side, could you share your thoughts -- you mentioned the fires doubts. what are your thoughts about how we can expedite more for were deployed forces? ward-deployed r- forces? >> i think we need to take a look at how we can better engage with and collaborate with industry early on. i think we defense ourselves away.

even though our friends and industry say we would like to collaborate more, when i say i will bring these companies into the room, along with companies see, even industry gets a little sensitive because of proprietary information and the like, and i can understand that. i think of the school in a garment we're went to be in, we have to figure out a way to be able to do that. we have to look at the constraints that and have it that from happening. i would also say that we should look at ways to work our way through operational test and evaluation process faster with less cost. i do not for a moment get cavalier about safety issues for our people or effectiveness, but i really do think that we have bureaucratized that process.

we have to think on how we move things more quickly here and i will cite the example of what we wanted to do with the next role of the unmanned carrier aircraft. we put a challenge out to our need the and to the department at large and to industry where we said we would deploy a squadron yet to be defined as far as number goes on an aircraft carrier to operate by 2018. there was a time in our country when we elected to put a man on the moon in 10 years, and it became a passion, it became a matter of national pride. in the case of putting a squadron of unmanned aircraft on

eight years, it became too fast. i think we have to get ourselves out of the mindset of too fast to conform to a process, as opposed to saying we can do this the resourcesize we have the industrial agility we have to do it. instead, we have retreated to a bureaucratic process that in my mind is an inhibitor. i will stop there, because i can feel myself getting a little pumped up. [laughter] >> good morning. washington political science. >> you are right at home here with all of these techies. >> not really, sir. very interesting.

what sorts of efforts have you been engaged in to provide new guidelines for creating legal and ethical framework for integrating unmanned systems into the new bout of space? >> one of the things we have done, and i do not want to inflate this bigger than it is, but when we created our way ahead and what we're calling information dominance, the restructuring of our staff and the navy to the director of information dominance, the reactivation of the 10th week for global cyber operations and the organization of all of our people in the navy who deal in the world of information into an information dominance corp., those are the three things that tended to be the main points of this strategy of our way ahead. obscure thing that

we did that many people are not aware of. that is within the office of facilitator general, we created another element in their that deals with the law and from that wall how we deal with rules of engagement, which really get to the ethics, the escalation and the escalates i. to be able to begin to think our way through that. to think to be able to talk in unmanned systems in terms of the cyber activity, we're putting a lot of effort, a lot of talk, a lot of money into the technical side, and we're not looking enough that the policy side, which gets to your question. so by creating and then educating people in this new

area of warfare and the rules of warfare was how we came at that. i think that? complex of the two clearly is the cyber dimension, simply because of the body of laws that we deal with and how you work your way through that. i think, in many cases, that we're making a bit more out of the ethics of unmanned an icy and i look for -- and then i see and i look forward to looking into that more on my own. i think that we're making a little bit more of that than it probably should be at this point. over on the right -- thank you very much. >> hello, circa i am from sweden. thank you for taking the time to

come here and talk to us. i have a question regarding the arctic. sweden is the chair of the arctic council. maybe you can elaborate on what the navy -- the challenges you see in the arctic and the opportunities for unmanned systems. it is getting a lot of attention, especially for energy right now, and of course it is always a strategic area. thank you. >> thank you very much. i would also say that the arctic is getting a lot of attention and the navy, about three years ago, we established a task force on climate change. not just to address the arctic but the changes that will take place around the planet and how it affects the maritime domain. where will it induce potential sources of conflict? where will it provide potential areas of cooperation? but the arctic is one where we

have had significant focus on these past couple of years, and i think initially as i see it, the first press up in that region will be for fishing, as the fish follow the colder water and go up there. this will then lead to questions of how the monitor and how do nations enforce their rights in the regimes in the arctic areas? there will also likely be increased search and rescue activities, so the question that was posed earlier, can you use unmanned systems to enhance your ability to sense and respond to search and rescue? as a get into the next step, which i think is going to be the exploration in mineral extraction and oil and gas extraction, how do you make sure that you are able to monitor

the environmental issues? and i think unmanned systems can provide great information so that we can better understand what we're doing to the environment, as many of these activities are taking place. and then our estimate is that in about 25 years, you will have a viable and a profitable transportation route across the top of the planet, as i call it the opening of the fifth ocean. and there, what sort of communications schemes do you need, was sort of sensing schemes do you need? i believe that even as we look at an open arctic, the conditions up there are still going to be harsh, challenging, and it is still going to be quite cold, which will challenge the human dimension to be allowed to operate of their for any great length of time. again, i think this is an area

where unmanned systems can play. not necessarily as a system of military capability but one of sensing and information and communication that in that harsh environment, it will be the optimum way to approach the problem. but clearly, a very focused area for us, and i appreciate the leadership and the intellectual effort that is taking place on behalf of your country in what is truly going to be an extraordinary moment in the history of mankind as that ocean opens. it is the first ocean to open since the end of the ice age, which i consider to be a very big deal. well, thank you very much. thank you for the work that you do. i look forward to following the great work of this organization and all who are involved in unmanned systems. thank you. goodbye.

[applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2011] >> throughout the day, we have been bringing you updates about the situation in libya. libyans are celebrating and the streets of tripoli, but the fighting is not over yet. rebels are claiming to control virtually all of the city, but there's still scattered gun battles and fierce resistance. the whereabouts of gaddafi still unknown. three of his sons are under arrest. world leaders are planning meetings to help libya right in the future now that muammar gaddafi is apparently a. american officials have been in frequent touch with rebels and britain as unfreezing libyan assets. france has announced plans for an international meeting next week. president obama has been receiving updates from libya during his vacation in martha's vineyard. he's getting statement on developments at the hour. we're recording the president's remarks and will bring them to you later here on the c-span networks.

[bells ringing] >> notice the color on the bourbon, that pretty amber color that you see is all coming from the char on the inside of the barrel. this char is or bourbon gets all of its color and a lot of its flavor. currently they discovered over from the barrel. this weekend, we highlight frankfort, ky. throughout the weekend, look for the history of the literary life

of the kentucky state capital. on c-span2, life, violence, corruption, and urban renewal. douglas boyd on frankfurt's crushed -- crawfishes bottom. and the life of the ninth calvary supporter. american history tv on c-span3, a visit to buffalo traced distiller, one of only four distiller is in operation during prohibition, for medicinal purposes of course. the first two state houses burned to the ground stop by the third, the old state capital. " and american history tv. this morning, we started a series of discussions looking at medicare. tomorrow, we will look about medicare advantage. wednesday, the medicare prescription drug program. thursday, a look at fiscal challenges to medicare. this morning, a look at the history of the program on

today's "washington journal." ournal" continues. host: this week, we have a series looking at medicare. tomorrow we will look at medicare advantage. on wednesday, the topic is medicare part d. we will wrap up on thursday looking at proposals to bring down medicare costs. today we're looking at the history of the program. marilyn werber joins us now. the law was signed in 1965. was it controversial? the debate went on strong for a continues before it was signed into law. if jfk could not bring it into law, you know it was controversial. when we had to turn over in

1964, we have a democratic sweep. that is when they were really finally able to -- president johnson was able to sign this into law. host: you talk about how it was debated for 10 years before it got through congress successfully. guest: the impetus was poverty. half of seniors in the 1960's were living below poverty. we're talking about the federal poverty guidelines. you have to be pretty poor to qualify. we'reay's standards, talking about $10,000 or $12,000 or less a year in income. you had to be pretty poor to qualify. we're talking about almost half of seniors at that time qualifying as living in poverty. host: president johnson signed

this into law at the truman library in missouri and enrolled president truman as the first in the fishery. -- as the first beneficiary. guest: truman started the debate going. he is the father of medicare. host: what are the big changes that have happened in medicare? guest: it is not that different today. we have added more over the years. when medicare first started, we have two parts. a and b. a was hospitalization and hospital coverage. that program was intended to get at catastrophic health care costs. when it was created, we also have medicare part b.

that is the voluntary parts of is that seniors can often too. that covers physicians' services and a thing that is not in-patient hospital -- anything that is not in-patient hospital. there was an addition of disabled people. medicare covers 47 million americans. only about 40 million of them are seniors over the age of 65. the remaining 7 million or so are disabled people. it is very different. we added them in 1972. then you move on to about 1997 and create a new program called medicare plus choice, the predecessor of the medicare advantage program. that gave seniors an alternative to the traditional

fee-for-service style medicare where you pay a percentage and the government pays a percentage of whatever doctor or hospital you choose. the newer program allows seniors to choose private health care plans. still today, this is mostly managed care. we're talking about hmo's and pco's. that allowed them to make that choice. fast-forward to 2003, the medicare modernization act was the last big change. that created the prescription drug coverage. more than half of all business histories -- beneficiaries and

taken advantage of that to get prescription drug coverage. host: we're talking about the history of medicare. let's look at the dates she highlighted in the monaco -- a moment ago. in 1962, it was expanded -- in 1972, it was expanded to include disabled people under 65. the following year, prescription drug coverage was repealed. guest: medicare does not have limits on out-of-pocket spending. if you are a senior and have a particularly bad year with something that costs a lot of money, there is no limit on what you can spend. the islam was intended to put a cap on spending -- of the law was intended to put a cap on

spending so you would not go broken in health care costs. it's all the people needed prescription drug coverage even then. -- it saw that people needed prescription drug coverage even then. the problem was that there was a group of people very concerned they would have to pay a little bit more to get this extra coverage. it was not that large of a population that oppose the law. nevertheless, it was a very vocal group. of one ofon the car the leading members of the house who pushed for the law.

it was a big deal. within about a year-and-a-half, it was repealed. it never went into effect. look at thetake a meeting with the senior citizens that are angry about the tax that would have raised the cost. >> he raced across the street, still pursued by angry senior citizens. >> he is supposed to represent the people and not himself! >> inside the car, he could go nowhere for a few minutes as the crowd surrounded him. finally, he got out of the car and walked down the block, diverting the crowd away from the car. >> i do not think they understand what the government is trying to do for them. i do not think they understand

what is going on. >> moments later, his driver pulled into a gas station. he jumped in and was gone. >> that was the congressman in 1989 meeting with citizens curious about the catastrophic health care law that would have raised taxes on medicare beneficiaries. guest: i wonder if they knew at the time that they would be getting rid of prescription drug coverage and how long it would be before congress again got the point where it could give seniors some sort of prescription drug coverage. i wonder if they could have seen into the future whether that would happen that day. host: in 1997 medicare advantage was enacted. in 2003, congress added prescription drug benefits. our guest is the special correspondent and special fellow at kaiser health news.

if you would like to join the conversation, here are the numbers to call. let's get to the telephones. paul is on the independents' line. caller: and the medicare should be expanded for everybody. there should be a premium placed on income. no. people would be healthier and pay a higher premium based on their income. it would be solvent. -- younger people who are healthier would pay a higher premium based on income. it would be solvent. the best medical system is the va system. i am a retired veteran. there are no claim forms to file. there is no chance of fraud. $200 billion is wasted you are on medicare fraud and waste. that would be eliminated.

the doctors are paid a good salary. nobody is making false claims. we could have a medicare premium, but there would not be any claim forms. we would have a low-cost system that would be high quality. the va system was rated the best. guest: there are many people who would like nothing better than to see what style system can is what people in washington called single payer. democrats have stopped pushing for this for the most part. they realize that most republicans will not go for this. some democrats will not go for it either. they have bought away from trying to push for the medicare for all style system. the one. y have backed away from trying

to push for the medicare for all stall system. we are seeing a lot of changes in the health care law passed last year. high-income seniors will be paying more for their medicare. we're talking about seniors about $85,000 in income and more. they will be paying more in their premiums. they already are in certain parts of medicare. we are expanding this. we're seeing a lot more of this. this is something we can expect to see more of in the future. the financial system continues to be tough. medicare spending continues to grow. i think we will see more of this. host: today we're focusing on the history of medicare and the

basic fundamentals. people over 65 qualify. people under 65 with certain disabilities qualify. 48 million people are in bold. we're getting those numbers from the 2011 medicare trustees' report. lee in maryland, a republican. caller: i never hear talk about the military-style medical court in this country -- corps in this country. why could we not have that to train doctors and nurses? it would allow us to create a school for doctors. nowadays to be a doctor, you have to pay a billion dollars to become one. everybody says they are paying a lot to be in the medical system. we could create some one to give us medical supplies. it would be just the way our

soldiers take care of our needs. we could profit off of the bottom of it. we could put that money back in the economy. i am unemployed. we could start this country back up. we're being sucked dry by the doctors and nurses. if you go see the doctor, is $200 for one hour. guest: it sounds like you and the first caller agree on quite a bit. the problem is political. it is also an ideological. you have two different viewpoints. this split's fairly closely along party lines. democrats would like to see more of a national plan, something more standardized by the government. on the republican side, if you have a group that is very committed to private insurance and competition.

because of these is the logical differences, i think it is unlikely we could end up with that kind of a system. host: mary writes that there are two different types of medicare. guest: it is very complicated. right now, there are four different parts. a is hospitalization. that has to do with anything in- patient hospital. in the working world, this is what you see taken out of your paycheck. this is the payroll tax. it is up 1.45% of your payroll that goes to pay for medicare benefits trees -- been beneficiaries in this

hospitalization program. your employer matches that in the system. the new health care law will increase that tax for wealthier americans. those workers over about $200,000 in income a year will pay extra, almost 1%. then you have part b. that is physician coverage. that is going to the doctor. it is different from part a. a is what you get when you turn 65 or qualify for disability. b is different. is a volunteer system. you do not have to do it. just about everybody does because it is a good deal.

it is even out-patient hospital services. that is financed differently. it is financed from general revenue. it is financed by a premium. the average premium is a little over $100. it is more for higher income seniors. the higher income level for seniors is of little lower. we're talking about $85,000 for an individual. you could end up paying something closer to $150 a month. it could go up to $350 a month. those are the two original parts of medicare. the writer is talking about medicare part c. that is medicare advantage. that is private insurance. the government has a lot less to do with that.

you opt for the traditional for part -- or part c. that is private insurance. it could be an hmo, ppo, or other program. the program is going to have changes. it was changed in 2003 as part of the same law that created the prescription drug benefit. the republicans at the time wanted to drive people to the program. because it is private insurance, they believe competition would lower costs and gives seniors better care. they decided the government would pay more for seniors that participated in that program than if seniors participated in the traditional fee-for-service

program. it turned out to be about 13% more. as a result, people in the medicare advantage program typically get better benefits. they may get benefits that a and b do not cover like eyeglasses or hearing aids. they typically have lower premiums. in some cases, it is zero. after the health care law from last year, that is changing. the differential between what is paid for the two different programs is going to become more equal. almost 1/4 of all medicare beneficiaries who have medicare advantage could see a reduction in defense, higher premiums. it could see a reduction in benefits and higher premiums. we will definitely see higher premiums in all of medicare.

it will be a little different moving forward. a lot of people in medicare do not know which one they have. it is hard to tell. host: let's look at the spending. a costs $185 billion. this is in 2010. guest: medicare on the whole is heating up almost 15% of the federal budget. it is big. it is expected to grow by almost 6% a year through 2020. that is after you take into

consideration some of the cutbacks and savings that were passed as part of last year's health care law. we're still talking about growing at 6% a year. host: we have a call from new york on the new york -- democrats line. caller: the average life expectancy was 65. it is kind of a joke. race covers other things besides the color of your skin. medicare is meant to appease us like we're stupid. my mother collected it. thank god she has private insurance because she has to pay $100 of her social security. they are saying that you caught up with us. in 1965, you would have been dead by the time you collected. it was a game. now you can collect it and they

are trying to keep us from getting it. they have plenty of money for the military. they are gamin gus. -- they are gaming us. if they're going to do that, they should give us their benefits that we paid for with our taxes. guest: there are discussions about the difficulty congress is having raising the debt ceiling. these are the discussions coming up. it looks like every. is going to get a cup. it is not just health care or military. it looks like it will affect everything. the costs of medicare for a very high -- are very high. democrats and republicans agree that something needs to be done to lower the cost of the program.

you also mentioned the retirement age being 65. you are correct. when medicare was created, life expectancy was much lower. therefore, if you did not have that many people claiming benefits for as long as we do now. that is why one of the options on the table for saving money is raising the eligibility age. there is a lot of talk about raising it to 67. a year ago, we only heard republicans talking about this. right now, we're starting to hear democrats as well. this says to me that is much more of a possibility for the future than it had been even a year ago. host: joe is in pennsylvania. caller: nancy pelosi said the only way we will know what is in

its is if we have to find out what is in it. it is it true that medicare -- obamacare wife out $500 billion in medicare? is that true? guest: that as a whole nother can of worms. that was a claim in the midterm election. republicans did very well with that claim. it is not exactly true. there were some cutbacks in medicare, but to say that $500 billion was cut from medicare is not true. the program is still growing. cutting 5 $1 billion sounds like you sliced the program --

cutting $500 billion cells and you slice the program and it is getting less. that is not true. host: talk to us about the reluctance by some providers to deal with medicare. some will not take medicare patients. guest: this is definitely a problem. traditionally, private insurance pays doctors the most of any paper. then comes to medicare. then comes medicaid. every time we talk about saving money in medicare, we talk about cutting payments to providers -- doctors and hospitals. the health care law does make some straightforward cuts to hospitals. we have had some physicians' cuts. they were supposed to take

affect every year. every year, congress has stopped them from taking effect. we do not have a solution. every year, doctors are worrying that if congress does not step in, they will get cuts. if they let it happen, it could be to 20% of what medicare pays them. many physicians are very concerned cannot make ends meet. the question is whether to take it or not. if you are an internist, you probably want to take it. how are you going to slice that large of the population out of your patient base? it is getting harder and harder. physicians continue to say that if it gets worse, they will not be able to take medicare any longer. the health care law from last year does increase payments for primary care providers. this has more to do with medicaid, but they are trying

really hard to recognize there is a big differential between physician practices. i mean from specialty to specialty. some specialties are doing just fine. others, especially the family practice and internists are having the most trouble. host: is it more about the reimbursement rate? guest: the people work is very difficult. we hear the complaint from providers -- the paper work is very difficult. we hear the complaint from providers for the beneficiaries region or the beneficiaries -- we hear the complaint from the providers and the beneficiaries. ar complaints about the

paperwork. i am not sure it is different from the private sector. host: let's go to john and florida. he is a republican column. caller: in washington cut does not cut anything. it just cuts the rate of increase. the republicans were right if you want to be truthful about the way people talk about cuts in washington. i am glad to. if the projection of what it costs. that projection is 10 times with a projected in 1965. we were supposed to be down around $50 billion. it is the same thing with social security. people do not want to talk about math because there is no way to lie about it. i have had the pleasure of

cleaning out a few houses in my time. i came across some bills for my tonsils in 1965. the co-pay back then was $20. my sisters went into the hospital in the 1960's. there were both charged $10 each for having their tonsils removed. i ran across a couple of bills were if the doctor came to your house, it was $10. if you went to see him, it was $5. it is amazing to see how small those bills were prior to medicare. i think the reason is because once the government gets involved, people do not have to pay the true cost. when people do not have to pay the true cost and you have another party paying your bill, that is driving of the cost of medicine. that is another thing no one else wants to talk about. why is it costing more? what is the real reason?

guest: whether it is medicare or private insurance, democrats and republicans would agree that is a real problem when you have a third-party payer. if you have to go in and pay the whole bill yourself, you will shop. if you are buying a tv, you will compare prices at three different stores. the way things work with insurance, medicare or medicaid, or private insurance, someone else is paying for it. it may be your employer. people do not have a good understanding of what their employer is paying for them. there is widespread agreement that this is very difficult. it causes people to use for health care and not really know what health care is costing them.

just getting what they need and not shopping around. this is the impetus for republicans who have been pushing for health savings accounts. you have a catastrophic insurance plan, but you have an account. you can take that money and do what ever you want with it. you can decide which hospital to go to for your help replacement and which physician -- for your hip replacement and which physician to sea. everybody agrees is better to get consumers involved and get transparency. transparency is a problem right now. we do not have a good enough system to allow people to compare prices. it is better than it was five years ago. if you call around to hospitals to see which one will give you a better price on your hip

replacement, good luck. the doc fix is what i was referring to earlier. we were talking about how congress looks to reduce spending. they look to cut the doctors and hospitals. the doc fix was a cut made years ago. it had an unintended consequence. this is not within meant to do. congress did not mean to cut as this laws much was going to do it. as a result -- this was an ongoing thing. it was a complicated formula that would require these reductions every year going forward. democrats and republicans agree you cannot cut physicians 20% in

a year. every year, sometimes twice a year, they stepped in and fix the problem. they add a little bit more money. it is costly. the problem is they have not fixed the problem permanently. the problem continues to grow. the longer you wait, the more expensive it is to fix. host: mark is in stark -- margaret is in sacramento on the democrats' line. caller: my husband is retired military. when he turned 65, we discovered he had to enroll in medicare part b to qualify for his ri-care -- tri-care.

why is that? it seems like paul ryan wants to give $6,000 vouchers in replacement for medicare part b. i wonder if people go how far that would go. it would go a little towards medical coverage nowadays. you had a republican talking about it. before he realized he was live on tv, he said good luck getting something for that. that is all i have. thank you, c-span. guest: i do not know the answer to the question about the military and party. i apologize for that. paul ryan is the republican house budget committee chairman. he had his own plan for a long

time. then it more if into what was passed by congress -- it morph ed into what was passed by congress as part of the house budget. it is a non-binding resolution. it says we would like to work towards it. that did not become law. nevertheless, it got a lot of discussion. it started a lot of discussions about how medicare might be changed. the part of the plan you are talking about is either his original plan that as vouchers giving seniors a certain amount of money. it was not handing them cash or a check, but it must be used to buy a private insurance plan. i interviewed paul ryan. i asked him if this amount of money would be enough for

seniors to actually buy insurance. his answer was, in some cases yes in some cases no. some people would probably have to put in more money to be able to fight the plan -- buy a plan. he said it would take work. he said they would have to figure out if there was a way to get more money in there. the point was to reduce medicare spending. that is different from what the house of oxley passed as part of its budget. that was a concept that has been talked about since then. it would be a formula whereby medicare would pay a certain percentage of the seniors premium so that the senior could buy private insurance. instead of being a set a chunk

of money, premium support would be support for the premium. they would help with a certain percentage of the premium costs. host: daniel from minnesota is on the independents' line. caller: am i on live tv? i believe medicare starts out with a doctor-patient relationship. the ultimate issues with health care -- i feel everybody has a right to health care. as an independent person, we should own all of the hospitals that is financed through the government. that would build more hospitals,

much more employment, and much better health care services for old and young. it is like fannie mae. you buy a house and retire and then you die. guest: we do have some public hospitals. it is a very different system than if all hospitals republic. currently public hospitals have a tough time of it. they are publicly financed. this is where a lot of the uninsured people will wind up getting their care. the hospital has a lot of uncompensated care so the government steps in. a lot of state spending goes to public hospitals. it is a tough system. these public hospitals find it hard to make ends meet. it would be very different if

all hospitals were public. my guess is we will never see that happen. there would be a lot of opposition to doing that. it's back to ideologies. -- it gets back to ideologies. republicans want to move towards private health plans and hospitals because they want to build competition, lower costs, and improve quality through competition. that is the way they see it all ideologically. i think there's a poor chance of that happening. host: what kind of deductibles and premiums to beneficiaries have to pay? guest: medicare is a complicated program. if you are in it, you probably get it. part a is in-patient hospital services. there is no premium.

it is financed by the workers. i am paying my payroll tax today. when i retire, i will benefit from that. i do not pay a premium when i hit 65 or become disabled before that. but the deductible is significant. it is $1,100. before you can get any benefits from the system, you are paying $1,100 into the system. that is why many people on medicare purchase supplemental coverage. retiree health care coverage may help with the cost. a lot of people see it as too much and would rather buy a supplemental policy to cover some of those costs. for medicare part b, the physician services, you are paying a premium. that is about $110 a month.

if you are a higher income beneficiary, you are probably paying upwards of $150 a month. if you are much higher income, you could be paying $350 a month. that said, the deductible is much lower. i think it is about about zero hundred $50 or something like that. -- i think it is about $150 or something like that. part c is medicare advantage. it is the private health care plans. you are paying a premium. it is typically much less. the average premium is about $44 a month. that is less than half of what you would be paying in part b.

we have wealthier seniors pay more. we could potentially see the premiums rise as the government pays less money into the plans. then we have the fourth part of medicare. that is part d, the prescription drug plan. the premiums for that have been relatively low. they average about $37 a month. remember these plans are all private plans. it depends on which plan you choose. you get in there every year. a lot of seniors do not give in every year. they stick with the same plan. if you were to get in every year during open enrollment and compare your plan, you would find some have zero premiums and some have much higher premiums. if you take a zero printing zero- -- if you have a

premium plan, you will probably have higher deductibles. it is hard to see what it costs. the senior or disabled person is choosing the plan is right for them. >> it tomorrow, the focus will be on medicare advantage and the medicare prescription drug program. and we wrap things up with a look at fiscal challenges and proposals to cut costs on thursday.

we will have the internet security and thailand -- alliance discussing cyber threats against the u.s. after that, "booktv prime time. the focus, book fairs and festivals. we will check in at a harlem book fair. also, the freedom fest and roosevelt reading festival begins at 8:30 p.m. eastern. you'll begin to see that also on c-span2. president obama gave a statement on the situation in libya just a short time ago. the president said it remains fluid and uncertain. moammar gaddafi's nearly 42-year regime is coming to an end after a five-month nato-led bombing campaign. the president says the situation reached a tipping point in recent days. but there are elements that remain a threat.

>> of dr. martin luther king was not a president of the united states. at no time in his life to the hold public office. he is not a hero of foreign wars. he never had much money. while he lived, he was reviled as much as he was celebrated. by his own account, and he was a man of frequently wracked with doubt, a man not without flaws, on a man, who like moses before him, was wondering why he had been chosen.

he had the task of leading people to freedom, the task of healing festering wounds. >> watching the entire event, the groundbreaking of the martin luther king jr. memorial. now, nearly five years later, the memorial will be dedicated this sunday, live on c-span. during the week, coverage of other events surrounding the dedication on the c-span networks. >> fema administrator called neighbors the spurs trailed responders ellman in natural disaster-- the real first responders. the new approach involves in gauging the entire community in coordinating their response to federal disasters. this is about one hour. >> ok.

i will be very brief. we are privileged to have with us administrator craig fugate, who has the plo organization, and has held this position -- the fema organization since 2009. he spent eight years in the florida department of emergency management. during his tenure, there was the first statewide emergency management program to receive full accreditation from the emergency management backwardation program. kudos to administrator fugate. he brings the boats on the ground experience because he began his career as a volunteer firefighter and served as an emergency paramedic.

i think you'll find some quite interesting. [applause] >> good afternoon. for these purposes, we are live or taped which is why i have three microphones on me. i was asked to talk about the whole community. this is something fema is talking about. what do they mean by "hole of a community?" what they doing different? it is not mysterious. my staff got tired of using my talking points so they started calling it whole of community.

when we respond to disasters, who are we serving? who is the team? there are a couple of observations that i started making when i was looking at my job in florida, particularly in the aftermath of hurricane andrew. you still haven't done a katrina, so we're not sure if you guys have fixed anything. that was the situation back in 1997 in florida. we lived in the shadow of hurricane andrew. how to improve, how to deal with those challenges, particularly when you have a state prone to hurricanes. one thing we thought we learned

after hurricane andrew, and this is one of the things that i have learned [no audio] they dodged the bullet because they were not getting any 911 calls. what was interesting was that from about 122nd street south, no calls were coming in, so in the absence of calls, it was not that bad. the reason we were not getting calls for help as because been --the power lines come up phone lines, everything had just been erased. remember the initial reports from downtown was a look like they dodged the bullet because the water had not reached their

ankles yet. we learned in hurricane andrew that the key to knowing is to go in and do a quick assessment. we came up with a new acronym. what we were going to do was get a bunch of subject matter experts, get a quick snapshot of how a community has been affected, so we will get experts in the utilityies the only thing i ever found out was rapid was the amount of time it took us to say we are going to do it. from that point forward, it rapid.'s being

you had to fly in. by the time they landed and we wouldd about systems, it take about 72 hours. the problem was that at 72 hours, you were making decisions about when to send in. so it would be about 5 days too late. maybe if we made the team smaller. i kept finding, no matter what we did, we were getting things out on the ground no earlier than 72 hours with a hurrican you can see coming. it took 72 hours to get to

stabilization. i asked a different question. instead of trying to figure out how bad it is, what do we want to change? i started looking at disaster is a little differently. what exactly are we doing and how much time will it take to get it done? i started to dissected these disasters, international, earthquake response, other types of events. there was a standard kind of process. the first thing is to reestablish communication. if you cannot physically get to the location, then you cannot change the outcome. you have to be able to get in there. you would think in most cases you could just drive in. when you lose the interstate 10

bridge, you have to be able to get to the area. the other thing i found was safety and security. there was a tendency to wait or a reluctance to use the national guard until there was a security issue. i actually found in talking to social scientists that you are doing more good by reassuring people they are not by themselves and showing them that people can get in. this is one of the things that they've coined the presence of mission. you have to make sure it is safe and secure. i have never carried a gun. when shots get fired, what are people going to do if they are not carrying guns? they stop. and does not even take an actual situation, just a perception that it may be dangerous and you could shut down almost all of your non-law-enforcement

disaster. the third thing was search and rescue. the injured do not have time. a lot of them are teams that would get their 24-48-72 hours later. we looked at most earthquakes and other types of events of large-scale structural damage, what is the survivor number of looking like after 24 hours? 48 hours? 72 hours? is it a stable population or does it decrease rapidly? for the injured, the sweet spot as the first 24 hours. if you're going to change the outcome for the injured, you need to get there quick enough. after 24 hours, you are now dealing with a population that it is trapped or they will make it without you. the ones you could have made a difference for, the decision has been made. that is a time factor.

the other thing i observed is that 72 hours it took us to figure out how bad it was was the time frame we needed all of that stuff there. you needed to the assessments to see how bad it is to respond, but the time it takes to do that is eating up the time i could use to change the outcome. away with the assessment. how do i know how bad it is? if i have a major hurricane impacting the population. , why do i not just respond to see with the potential impact will be and adjust downwards if it is not that bad the arts they said there was a lot of risk for waste, but i have never seen a disaster go well if you do not have enough stuff there fast enough. if you can get there, overwhelming, by time, then a lot of times may not use much,

but you can raise it out quicker. getting to the point of stabilization is not better, but you stop the loss. that is a key element in how we are approaching and responding to hurricanes. we had a tropical storm hit before charlie. it hit august 13th. 22 days, hurricane francis. 11 days, hurricane ivan. nine days later, hurricane jane. we were able to stabilize that and free up resources for the next disaster. but we had used a traditional model of it during assessment, ordering resources, we would have had over labs where we could not have moved to the emergency phase while we were maintaining a steady state of recovery.

i thought i had figured this out. we can make this work. then the next year, a series of hurricanes. we started out with hurricane dennis in florida, a category three. that should have been an indicator it would be an early -- a crazy year. it was one of the earliest landfalls in florida history. we responded with great success, got it stabilized, moved into recovery. we thought we had figured this out and here comes katrina. what you do not realize is that not only do you have katrina and read a behind it, but you suck up all the resources out of the system. it was virtually at the point where the hurricane off of the yucatan peninsula, which then got to a bear much pressure lower than katrina, start moving towards florida and we are in a

situation where the country is really focusing on katrina response. i am looking at a fairly substantial hurricane coming to florida which fortunately weekend, but not enough. we at a category two hitting the west coast exiting the east coast. you would assume the worst damage would be on the east coast, but will lead did not read that book. we had greater impact on the east coast because it took out power for 6 million people, the bulk of which romney east coast from miami after palm beach county. again, we responded based upon the potential impacts. we sent in this blind distribution within 24 hours. we had distribution from the west coast, east coast and the lake okeechobee, down to miami.

we did not have the distribution up in the first 24 hours. we were weighted more heavily on the west coast and east coast and we got slammed because of our poor response of not having enough supplies to everyone in the first 24 hours after the wind had exceeded the coast. this is where i learned another part that becomes a building block for the whole community. after hurricane andrew, we learn that the volunteers and volunteer organizations have to be a part of the team. salvation army, red cross, we cannot have our own response. we have to work with a team to figure how to deal with the teams. we learned those lessons pretty good and we had dealt with a good team to do that. we have not built a team with the private sector. based upon previous history,

particularly early 2004, the assumption was that the power was out it was down. this is what i found was, we were being government-centric. we look at how government would solve a problem as if we had total ownership in figuring everything out. we have been responding to hurricanes that were just bad enough that a government- centered approach was getting the job done. when will my hits, it is a much larger area. we put out as much products in three weeks than we did in 2004. it was a much bigger storm even though it did not have the damages you saw, but the impact for much larger. as we are setting up and putting in the distribution with the assumption the private sector is up and running, we are getting reports.

there are stores open. how is that? there is no power. what about generators? when did they start doing that? well, about halfway through the 2004 hurricane season, but we were not paying attention. from miami to palm beach county, we did a quick phone survey and started calling big box ostores. only five were not open. gov. bush, whom i was working for at the time, likes to remind me of this. he was out meeting with constituents complaining about the length of the line for the free water but we had located in areas central to the communities we were serving with good access and good parking. we were in the parking lot

handing out free food and dice. they're eating fast ford and had just bought groceries stores, do think we could do better job coordinating next time darks this through before a low-power it is up until this point, we have been so focused on what the government was going to do. volunteers and organizations like that, government was going to adopt your breathing and take care of everybody, but we were arrogant and made the assumption on that most of the goods and services are down by the private sector, not government. why do we make the assumption that we will suddenly be able to do all this? we started to sit down with the retail sector in particular. our first question was coming

and you may have heard this after katrina, "but we should contract with the people who get it, give them the job. for a small fee, more than my annual budget, to have that much like in their system and excess capacity they would be interested. they operate in a system that does not have slack and they do not have the capacity to of a sort demand beyond which they are doing in their own sperm. unless we respond to invest in that, the reality was they could not do the things we were doing. i thought i was asking the wrong question. "what can i do to keep you opened "/ client competing up with

something they haven't done and protected. i am going to set up and operate in that environment and actually compete with them. maybe i need to change the question to what do i need to do to keep open and where were you not reopen? what does their footprint look like? they are in the same places that most of our local governments have said are the point to distribution for their communities. when you look at where they are not at, you look at things like inner-city is and areas around lake okeechobee that did not have big box stores. if we were working as a team, those would have been the places we would have sent supplies to. they all have the wal-mart, target, home depot, lows. the stepped back and said perhaps this is a model we need to look at.

how do we work as partners? you hear the term "public- private partnerships," but i want to be a part of a team. i want you to know what i am doing and distributing supplies. i want you to tell me when you have stores coming on line so i can shut things down and do my distribution more targeted to those who need it. i brought up the loss the when i came to -- that philosophy when i came to fema. there are a thousand reasons when someone says you cannot do something in government. we have representatives from a consortium of companies and have a position dedicated to the national correspondents

coordination center. sometimes it is asking a more simple question. i do not have control with local and state officials, but i can set the tone, be a bully pulpit, and i can work issues back to the state to help open up lines of communication to get things done. my team started to getting it that it would not be government- centric and we would embrace the ngo's. we tend to call them "victims" and social scientists sent the was a problem. in helping people to deal with a trauma coming and need to

empower them. a loss of control in the ability to make decisions makes the ability to recover more diffeicult. words had power. i adopted the term "survivor" and not "victim." one thing i realized is wen we -- when we took historical events, we think, "what if it happened today?" the great miami hurricane of 1926, what would that look like today? sciencecne -- information looked at it asaid

it would be a $150 billion hurricane affecting the state from miami to tampa and makes landfall again in alabama. housing loss would be larger than katrina in catastrophic planning. we are looking all the way up to dod, the ngo's, and the private secter running it against these timelines. you cannot redefine sucess to meet what you are capable of doing. we have to look at it

differently. what about the people living there? the answer? "they're all victims." this tendency that everyone is shell shocked and sitting around doesn't happen. people will start doing things to help each other. there is a bias that we look at the public is a liability to do bad things. there are worrying about people who were starting to cut, small community setting up kitchens, and the big fear was that they were not licensed. the fear was that you were going to get food borne illness outbreaks i have a read the

mortality reports, and i never heard of anyone buying from food poisoning. i get the concern about sanitation. we're concerned about disease and those types about breaks. would it not make more sense to give them some quick instructions about bleach and sanitation versus saying, "do not do this?" if it is that bad, do you have the luxury of telling the public not to help? there is a real challenge. the person you come up with his liability. the other excuses that they are not trained. we developed this idea that we are all going to have credentials and a real blow who you are. -- and everyone will know who

you are. i am still waiting for that to be solved. every disaster is "come as you are." it will be what it is. i have started to change how we look at the public. we tend to take a parental approach to the public. we tend to think that we will have to tell them what to do, how to do it, and make all these decisions for them. we get really antsy about anything that would suggest the public would go beyond that or take matters into their own hand. we have to get past it because as much as we give credit to the first responder community, who was actually doing the first rescues? the neighbors crawling out of the debris searching for their

neighbors. that happens time and time again. it is pretty much what people do. maybe we ought to change our messaging and add one thing. once you and your family are safe, check on your neighbor. during a heat wave, again, you saw this message going out from the red cross and other officials. check on your neighbors. you may save a life. if you think back three or four years ago, you were really not going to see or hear that. we are recognizing more that we need to engage the public. my evolution has gone full circle from government-centered, doing everything, scaling up, having all the answers to recognizing a finite capability with volunteers and those that

emerged. we have to bring them in and give them a seat at the table. it is an evolving process because you start getting into different sectors and the interdependence sees you see in the ability to focus on things. if you are a subject matter expert, we do not really regulate a lot of private sector people, but they will bring in parent agencies to shut up and they will talk to us. how do we go through and really look at getting critical life services, a critical delivery resources online that are essentially non-governmental, industrial, utility-based, other things up and running in such a way that we can speed up the recovery process? the private sector starting to realize something else. they cannot plan autonomously from the government. they are starting to realize that no matter how good their

business continuity and contingency plans are that the community plan fails, they might not be successful either. we talk to them about things like is your community really going to be able to deal with housing and get schools open? get basic public services up and running backs if they fail, i do not know if your plan will cover that? how will you keep employees of schools will not open for months and your employees have kids? it may be six months before schools reopen and i have marketable skills. will i stay that long? one of law enforcement is not up and running backs which you have debris and people cannot rebuild? this is really this evolution that we have gone through to get to what we call the whole community. that is not to say that government is basically telling everybody your on your own, but it is really recognizing that each part of this team has a role and responsibility.

you need to move away from a government-centered approach to policy solving and recognize there are other models and capabilities out there, and particularly when they do it every day in the community. they oftentimes not as little about us and how we operate and how they do. this has been a part of the effort to bring them together. on the plus side, which goes back to being prepared, this is where we like to get feedback. the reason you're telling us to be prepared is because we are all on our own in a big disaster, no one will get to was, we have to take care of ourselves, it is all smoke and mirrors. well, that would be cynical approach. let me be more pragmatic. if everybody in this room who lived in the d.c. area, if something happened here, like one of these freak storms that is powerful and it hits the

area, power gets knocked out and you lose everything in your refrigerator and you do not have water pressure, and we start setting up supplies and commodities for you to go get them, had ever asked yourself if you're not ready to get the supplies, would you go get them? this is where i really try to focus on the fact that there is a shared responsibility in being prepared. it is not that you're on your own. it is that everyone needs to understand the need to be prepared to the best of your ability because when we do, those of us that can and should have the financial means and resources, when we show up to get artist lies, who did read as cut in line in front of? those in the community that are the most abominable, have the least amount of resources, and are at greatest risk. for lot people, this is not something that is comfortable to hear. they say, "a pay my taxes, so

why can i not get supplies?" we do not respond in a format based upon that. part of that is trying to get people to understand that in disaster, the more that we have prepared ourselves and our family the less resources we have to ship in and the more we can focus on the most vulnerable, but we can get the central services up and start moving back toward their recovery. when we talk about fairness, to walk and it sounds like this. you need a plan, a 72-hour supply, thank you very much. it never really tells people why that is a critical. why there will be members of the community that will not have resources or the ability to get ready just trying to get through day to day. it should not have to compete with the rest of us. the reality is the faster the response in any crisis, it is a neighbor helping neighbor.

again, we have kind of gotten away from it. we talk about what government is going to do, and part of it is being honest. the fastest response in joplin was not the fire department but neighbors helping neighbors. they got there quickly, brought in resources, got to the injured. within 24 hours, the primary search was done. they still found people several days later, but the bulk of the rescues were done in the first 24 hours. a lot of the credit goes to neighbors helping neighbors, people literally just going in and applying the skills that they have. that is that. there is one last piece. in our planning, we have overly identified what we were going to do based upon planning for what i call a generic population. now, if we were doing a good job with that generic

population, then why is it every time we have a big disaster that we identify a group that was marginalized or written not meet their needs and we have to write and an ax? in my time frame of doing this, we have written annexes for the elderly, people with disabilities, people who have pets, and we were about to write annexes for people with children. i started ask myself the question. how much of the population is that iraq's you are up to half of the population with hats come up to 25% with children at home, depending upon your community, 10% and frail elderly except in florida where it is like 80%. wait a minute. we are planning for easy. we are planning for the people that should have been prepared and not need everything we're bringing.

it really hit me. mark from the safety children commissions as we need to address children's is used. we have dryden and next because we need those needs met. infants and children should not have to suffer the indignities. i looked at mark thinking that sounds like a typical response, but let me ask a question. should the children be in the spot for a population -- in the special population. kids are not small adults. there needs a different, other dietary issues are different, but we put them in an anax,

everyone will think it has been done, but trust me it will not be a part of the court process. it will be an afterthought you will think about instead of just doing this on the front end. asset here's the problem. a lot of the anax, infants and children, if i get a request for meals for 1 million people, what will ship them? i will ship them 1 million shelf-stable meals. if i'm really desperate, i will be shipping in mre's. my granddaughter cannot shoot through one of those. unless they specify we're sending these the first responders and they are asking for meals to the general population, i will do what is easy. i will do the resources that we have always done, shelf-stable

meals, meals ready to eat. what will that mean for infants and children? we do not put in baby or infant formula. we have to change the culture. the communities as they need to plan for real and not easy. you have to go from the infant all the way through the frail. what goes in comes out, so you need diapers and adult diapers. and julie bottles and disposable baby goods, right? you'll need bassinets and bathtubs, right? it your sheltering people, people may show up in a wheelchair and may need assistance, right? we wanted to implement a special needs shelter and they could not buttery general special -- shoulder because there were special. the disability community said they did not like the term

"special needs," and the ada frowns upon what they're doing even though they realized we were well intended but clueless. why cannot this be a part of the community in be integrated and you look at our functional needs versus making us special, or limiting access to availability disservice is that under the ada does not have an asterisk that's as does not apply in disasters. this is tough for emergency managers. we're basically writing for people that have access to mass transit, high schooler better education, english primary language, financial resources, insured, and not exactly the most vulnerable people in the room, but that is who we were planning for. in pet everyone else in and an ax. we figured that approach was

failing and it failed every time. we're going to start planning for the community that we live in, not the communities that are planned. we know that we're going back to address these issues in the response, so let's address them in our preparedness exercise is, how we train, how we staffed and equipped. we now maintain infantine baby supplies at are staging areas for logistics'. instead of just having special needs shelters, we're looking have functional access shelters for people are not turned away because they present with a disability and percent summer else. -- with a disability and present themselves a summer house. how the work with this day to day and work as a team?

how many people heard of joplin before the tornado hit it? not exactly disaster central. more non 4 route 66 than anyone else. i wanted joplin pretty quick because the president said he wanted me there. i was there the night after it hit. it is my second day and a move to the red cross shelter. there was no special needs shelter. it was a red cross shelter. people believe there were on oxygen, in wheelchairs', getting medical attention. there were red cross and public health care nurses providing basecoat medical services. have there were supplies that were being cared for by adventists and southern baptist setting up activity areas to

distract the kids. the wireless companies figured out not only did the need to set up sites, but they need chargers. people may have their faults but not their charter, local casino got all of their charters and donated them. you have pets being sheltered on the same campus, but not with people, but on-site, so when people showed up they were not turned away. you have an option for your pet to be housed there. how did this happen? they took all the challenges the people said were too hard to do and they said who does this every day? we will plan and meet. if we ever opened a shelter, how you bring all these resources together? they ought to practice that a couple of weeks after the meeting. when people say it is too hard and a pointer job plan and say,

"they did it." they did this in the worst situation you can. it gave you barely any warning and killed hundreds. it destroyed one of the major medical resources for the region. in spite of all that, they operated a shelter and was a textbook of how we plan for the communities we live in. at fema, we want to embrace the whole community, build speed into our response, trying to lean forward. when something big happens, think big, go big, go fast, be smart about it. by the time you know how bad it is, you lose the ability to change the outcome. i said, "just trust me on this." if you do not planned, respond that way, it to get behind, it will be far more costly.

we do not do this on every disaster, but it is because we cannot get enough confirmation to say it is not bad. we will change the outcome. we have to bring people to the table to get the full team in there. that is kind meant -- kind of the idea of the whole community. it forcues us to realize how governmetn does this. how do you bring in the whole team? we lose fewer lives, get the injured, stabalize, recover, and rebuild. in thteds to be set first few days of the launch. our gotal is to speed up the

response to build a team to solve the probelm. those things that happened in japan with the tsunami could happen here. that is in the realm of possibility. we have had historical events, and they could very well happen again. based upon our infrastructure and population vulnerabilities we have built in. that is the whole community. questions? [applause] >> can you address how you would use the mass me as an enabling supporting function instead of being them in react mode?

i have read books where the media would come into the emergency management system and learn what really took to run a response and help them give instructions to the public and what not. >> there is a double-edged peace here. if you try to get the media to be part of your mouthpiece, they will rebel and you will never get it. if you look at what the media has come with him two things they do. their prime responsibility is to report the good, bad, and ugly. the other part is they can be great communicators to brighton permission to their viewers and listeners about what to do. there is a balance. you need to educate emperor by the british ahead of time. you build relationships, make yourself available come into understand the media's role.

tomorrow, i will be chatting with the weather channel about hurricane preparedness. i will be typing in my answers. you have to do it on the front- end, but you have to understand that if you try, the media's as you were part of the team. we have to remains and separation of and dependent, as we report the good and you're about. the need to see that as impartial. the understand what their job is on the front end, but they can educate and reached of yours which comes back to having the information, making yourself available, providing formats that a useful to them, do you work their schedule? they did the press conference at 5:00.

for the tv guide it is like, " you're killing me. unless you're doing it live, but it during our show. it is stuff like that that savvy people get. i need to get this message job. when would it be best? what is the best format packs -- best format? i'm one-man commission user friendly. the more user-friendly, the greater they would use the information and get out in a manner that reflects the public. if the public for survivors, and we look at them as a part of the team, maybe they are not a liability but every source. this is something that everyone is dipping into, but the guest

intermission i got -- the best of permission i got is from the weather channel or the public themselves. if a look at the public as a resource, and we call this crown source and -- crowd sourcing. trust me. i ran a 911 center. i went to an unknown illness with guns drawn. you have to build relationships with the the media and of time, but they even think your shirt and a co-op or control them, you will lose whatever relationship you had. guess what? if it is bad news commis mind as well get it out there. -- if it is bad manners, you might among get it out there.

d.r. >> recent incident in japan with fukushima, is essential that lessons learned will fly to our country in the event of a similar scenario? >> i just signed m.o.u.'s with japan and new zealand. we have had staff there in the aftermath. not everything that happens is affable to us. we go to the process of what happens, how did you deal? what is interesting about tornadoes, hurricanes, and the tsunami, which is tragic because we did not focus on the real story, the loss of life, but looking at this from a standpoint, but we're actually

released our strategic plan leading up to it. we did not know the tsunami was going to occur, but if you look at the numbers, the tsunami in japan fits in underneath what we were saying were realistic thresholds for maximum maximum events. this are validating some of the things talking in may. you never have something that big. i am not in the business of the things we can handle. when something like that happens, what will we do as a nation. one of the interesting things about our conversation about australia and new zealand, new zealand has a very similar federal government system. their emergency management system is very similar to the u.s.. their territories and local provincial governments have more authority. when we were talking to them at

the big floods and tornadoes, many of the similar issues we all ran into. it is something we invest time in. sometimes it's validating. ve stuff. it's negati >> department of defense. you mention the role of the national guard, an active duty, the role of military. what of the key areas you think that may be able to support you. >> dual status commanders. these are one of the great tools. congress passed a law to form a council of governors, appointed half republicans, have democrats, to look at public

elected officials. one challenge we had is that if we brought in title x forces with a state that had a dual command structures, and from a state perspective, it has always been that many of the national guard commanders had built up title dx forces. when they were in command of title iv forces, they were let go. we let the station of dual status command, giving them the honor to nominate and command state active duty.

this has been a breakthrough. part 2.rt one of bring able to bring in title x forces gives us unity of effort. i am not sure most of you in this business know that we cannot reach out and touch our reserve forces in a disaster that a presidential mobilization which have the time commitment and takes them away from doing any other duties. yet many of our combat support forces in the states of impact could be faster and more responsive if we had congress giving the authority to provide that presidential collops could be lessened the call-up under the preserve act.

piper to a homeland security can do reserve call-up some of the national guard. the next thing for d.o.d., which would require congressional action, is to provide for the ability to bring up their reserves and less than a presidential mobilization in support of the disastrous response. that will be a key issue in getting the rest of the team on board. even though they are out there, they're difficult to bring in to respond. longer-term, again, we have been looking at the tendency pressed over the problems. we recall talking about search and rescue. when my eyes but it you, -- these are designed for the structer.

-- structure. we were overthinking this with northcom. we wanto tell you wanhat you to do instead of letting you know what we want done. the urban search and rescue guys, northcom said that was not what we need. they said we needed to go house by house. we did not need it engineers. it was almost like, "do not tell me have to solve a problem." from katrina, we are micromanaging that we are stepping back and and said it telling you how to do it because this is the outcome we want to give greater flexibility to

understand how to greater meet those needs, because with dod, it is always "just as you are." the ability to not be so focused on a particular unit gives greater flexibility and in providing mission statements and assignments that are broader in scope and gives the commanders were ability. these are the things we're working on. the biggest thing is speeding up the process. getting units on orders, bringing them in, getting them deployed. it still takes a long time to move units. -- i waslly pri's really pleased about what we were working on with northcom. there is a lot of process to speed up to get things going is faster, as we need to change now come in 72 hours, we need to speed that up, probably by

making these more based on outcomes. >> can you speak to the future of the private sector preparedness program and how it integrates with the whole community concept? >> dhs or private sector? if i really want to get the private sector engaged, i need to do something differently and talk about a return on investment. i am taking a different track. people are focusing on access, and that is great. if you want to get to the heart of this, it is about the bottom line. unless they are and non-profit,

what is the return on investment? if you cannot answer that question, do not do some stuff for good will. i have been pushing for a lot of companies that would be better off scrapping their contingency plans and just have enough insurance to pay off everyone, make a nice profit, and close. the plan for what their community is going to do, and if the community is not better, they're better off not opening. they are interested in the government ability to respond. when i started, most people were business continuity planners, focusing on their data and financials. we are now seeing titles more and more in the big companies having to do with the emergency managers. i am way past that and looking at how we integrate the private

sector in part of a team? how'd we tear down the walls worse than the separation of church and state? i am not contract thing, but i just do not want to meet with them the real need to be but the share of media over systems to discuss what we are all doing. we're pretty close to were several of the major retailers will give us live feeds were we can map and see statices in real time in the case of a disaster. there are some good starts there, but we are booking really hard at how we are supporting each other in a situation where you are able to see who the government is committed private sector come into can do what to get some been stabilized. >> there are a lot of people

involved in this total of the-- in this study. are there gray areas in your knowledge? >> we but less importance on the sociology of the importance of how people deal with things. there are a lot of people, the harsh side, engineering, forecasting, we spend more money on a forecast but we never asked if it would change. we issue a warning and people still die. word they step because they did not know what to do? -- where they stopped because

they did not know what to do? we spend so much time on the science and not the people. this is the societal aspect of how populations react. how do you change behavior over the short and long term? how you take things that are not the norm? there are two successful campaigns that changed the norms. not wearing your seat belt and smoking were the norm. but it is the of the way around. we talk about preparedness. those people come at the of a flashlight and basic things, that is as good as it gets. you are an out liar if it really got down to it. how you change that? he tried to do a lot of things coming you end up diluting yourselves. both of these instances of cigarettes and seat belts had a punitive respect but it was

measure ever. it had consequences. what i really think we need is more social scientists. we need to fund social science research which is not hard engineering, but a lot of people think it is soft and not that relevant, but a population where we end up talking at them and they do not hear ross -- hear us, we expect certain things to occur. we do not look at marketing or research. we do not look at the behavior. we do not understand the demographics of community.

these people live in a neighborhood. they do not really identify, yet everything is based on government response structures of relating that to the communities. that is a big area. it is not glamorous, but if you're going to change outcomes and we do not understand and have the ability to protect things like that, it does not matter how good the forecast is or how fast we respond. we do not know why. we do not get it. "washington journal --

>> these people would keep you here for another hour easily. i want to thank you. that was terrific. it is clear that you are a national asset and we are delighted to have you inside the beltway. you may not be glad about that. >> eventually i will get free and go home >> i thought that back in 1995. we are honored to have you come and talk to us today. it was a wonderful presentation and it is very clear why you are where you are. you bring a welcome experience and talent, so thank you. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2011]

>> and join us later tonight for "the communicators," weekly look

at the telecommunications industry. you will hear from mar rotenberg and larry clinton. they will discuss discuss cybers against the united states. this is that 8:00 eastern on c- span to. -- c-span 2. we will check in at the harlem book fair. this gets underway at 8:30 eastern. on c-span 2. obama said gadaffi's rule is over, even though elimentements continue to take over the libyan capitol. this was his first apeparance pearance since the weekend push. >> i just completed a call with

the national security council. i am talking about the extraordinary events taking place there. there are still regime elements, but this much is clear. khadafi's regime is coming to an end, and the future of libya is in the hands of its people. his reign has unraveled. we were inspired by what broke out across libya. longing for human freedom, echoing the voices we have heard all across the region.

the campaign of violence was launched against the libyan people. gaddafi was threatening to hunt them down. his forces advanced across the country and there was a potential for wholesale massacres. in the face of this aggression, the international community took action. there was a un council resolution for the protection of libyan civilians. a coalition was formed including the united states and our partners in nato. we launched a military operation statewide to stop his forces in their tracks. the united states provided the bulk of the firepower, as our friends and allies 14. the united states, together with the european allies

recognize this as the legitimate governing authority. his forces were steadily degraded. in the western mountains, the libyan opposition confronted this regime, and the tide turned in their favor. in the last several days, the opposition increased their coordination from east to west, taking town after town and the people of tripoli claimed their freedom. for several decades, the people of libya had lived under a tyrant. and now the celebrations that we see in the streets of libya show that the force of human dignity is much stronger than any dictator. as this regime collapsed bridge collapses, there is still fighting and we have elements

that threaten to continue fighting. it is clear his rule is over but he still has the opportunity to reduce further bloodshed by calling for those forces that continue to fight to lay down their arms for the safety of libya. as we move forward from this pivotal phase, the opposition should take steps to bring about a peaceful transition, and the leadership has made clear that the rights of all the libyans must be respected. true justice will not come from replied -- reprisals or violence, but from libya that allows their citizens to determine their own future. the united states will be a friend and a partner, joining with allies to continue to fight to safeguard the people of

libya. i have directed my team to be in close contact with nato and the united nations. and we will deal with the humanitarian impact, working to make certain that the critical supplies meet those who have been wounded. secretary hillary clinton spoke with the coalition on all of these matters. and susan wright will use next month's assembly for this transition period we are working to prepare for libya after khadafi. we will make certain that these institutions of libya -- and we will look into -- the assets that were frozen this year.

and we will lead to a democratic libya. as we move forward, we should recognize the work that has been done. has murderedime scores of american citizens in the past. we remember the lives of those who were taken in those acts of terror, and all the men and women in uniform who have saved some lives over the last several months. the pilots executed their mission with skill, and all of this was done without putting a single soldier on the ground. the libyan intervention shows with the international community can do. nato has proven that they are

the most capable alliance in the world, with firepower and the power of our democratic ideals. this shows what can be achieved when we act as equal partners. and we look at the unity of our efforts. finally, the libyan people. your courage has been unbreakable. a notion is dividing us but we are joined in basic human longing for dignity. your revolution is your own. now, the libya you deserve is in your reach. we will stay in close coordination for that outcome. the extraoridinary events show

fear can give way to hope and freedom can bring about a brighter day. thank you very much. >> politico writes that new questions are being raised about how much money gadaffi stole. we will have coverage from today, related to events in libya, and that is all starting eastern.tonight at 8:00 bill adaire was fact-checking the statements made by 2012 candidates. >> he is the editor of

"politifact." >> the four-year anniversary. how did this get started? guest: when i >> this was at the guilt i had for not doing fact checking. i had not done enough to tell what was true and what wasn't. the newspaper was willing -- try and experiment and to let us create a fact checking epiwebsie where we would read them on a truth-o-meter and then collect those ratings for each candidate so that -- one of the innovative things about politifact is that you can go to any of the people we check, hundreds of people

come and see what their record is. how many true, how many false- ratings they have gotten. also, look things up by feature. the whole idea is to do accountability journalism in a more modern way, in a way that takes advantage of the web. now we have an ipad and iphone app that allows us to display our journalism in different ways. the idea is to bring journalism into the modern age, i guess you cod say. host: i want to read from a piece that you have. our guest is bill adair and here is what he writes.

host: how do you go about doing the fact checking? guest: we start off by going to the person who made the claim, weather is -- whether it is the office,u, boehner's or the mayor of cleveland, and we say, "tell us where you got your information." then we try to determine the relative truth of the statement. we always try to find independent experts, when we can come on any particular claim. then we write an article that is presented to something of a court at politifact which is three editors that determine the truth-o-meter rating.

we have done 4000 since we started. more receny, we have grown into the states. we now have politifact in ohio, texas,lorida, oregon -- nine different states. i believe the result is the greatest, largest back checking effort in the history of journalism. host: some might say -- why can't journalists vet themselves? you talked about your own frustration in trying to get some of the real time fact checking. why is it so hard? guest:act checking journalism is not easy and it's not always something you can do easily. i think a lot of journalists do a good job at fact checking. not just politifact, but also a factcheck.org -- collectively, we have spurred a lot of interesting fact checking. what's different about what we

do is that we are solely focused on this. by taking advantage of the web, we have presented it in a way that hold people accountable. we hear anecdotally from many members of congress, from governors, from mayors, that they're very aware of politifact and that they are changing what they say as a result. i find that encouraging. i think journalists should have been doing that all along. i think it will continue to spread. host: why is it important to know about things like the price of slim jims? why is it important to look at the minutia? guest: we try not to take this stuff too seriously. that was a claim made by sarah palin, talking about how food prices had gone up so much. she said her husband was having to pay dramatically more for slim jims these days. like many of the things that we

check by republicans, it was made in the context of blaming the democrats, blaming the white house. we had another one that w similar to that that we checked for michele bachmann when she talked about the price of a memorial day picnic and how it has gone up under president obama. we raised that statement falls. someone once compared politifact to "the onion." i tried to take that as a compliment, because we try to have fun with this. deep down, its solid journalism. host: politifact won the pulitzer prize in 2009. you have the best record and the worst record -- guest: we do not do a best and

worst. i can talk about how different candidates have faired. more recently, we have looked at rick perry, who just announced he was running for president. his record was mixed on the truth-o-meter. host: we are looking at the numbers here. guest: pants on fire, i should explain, is a falsehood that's not just false, but ridiculously false. another presidential candidate who has a record with a lot of falses, who has been asked about it, is michele bachmann. i think about 20 of her radiance out of 30 -- 20 out of 30 have been false. on either side of the spectrum,

ron paul has feared pretty well -- ron paul has done pretty well. one of the challenges for us now is people are urgg for us to come up with some sort of a batting average of you could comparrick perry's record to ron paul's record. we have not done that yet. we are obviously not a fact checking everything they say. we are fact checking things that we think voters would be curious about. politifact is about satisfying people's curiosity. when we check something -- we check something when we think someone would say, "really? is that true? host: bill adair is our guest.

he is the editor of politifact .com. if you would like to in the conversation, here are the numbers to call. you mentioned some of the candidates. let's talk about one we have not yet. mitt romney. here is how the numbers break down. how is he doing compared to others? guest: that is a mixed record. he is building on his record from the 2008 campaign. we did a lot of fact checking on him in 2008. you are sort of constantly building your statistics. everything we've ever raided on mittomney or on any one -- ever rated on mitt romney or on

any one carries forward. this is a good way to hold elected officials and candidates accountable. we recognize that our readers do not always agree with our conclusions. in general, i think they respect our work. i think this is useful information. host: let's hear from a republican colorado and maryland. good morning. caller: good morning. first of all, the statements your guest has made out groceries, the prices going up, obviously he has not been in a grocery store lately. they have increased greatly. i also wondered if the only sources of fact checking they use is internet, or if they do y of legwork, lego through videos or town hall meetings. host: let me first talk about the food prices.

you need to look at the fact check specifically. i did not mean to say that a grocery prices had not gone up. it's just that the claim that congresswoman bachmann made was false. her claim was about the specific percentage increase in memorial day barbecue prices. it was based on some data that was not appropriate in the way that she did that calculation. as for -- i forgot the second question. a comment. host: let me read you something on twitter.

guest: absolutely. probably the one i recall most was the florida democratic party, the spokesman for the florida democratic party was very quick to call us when we gave the party a pants on fire. that is typica in the case of bill o'reilly, we gave him a false, and he acknowledged that on the air. jon stewart, probably our most famous fact check. he went on the next night and apologized. then he turned around and he read a list of statements that we had rated false that he

noted had been made on the fox news channel. get a lot of feedback. some is positive and some as negative. host: how much direct source reporting do you get? guest: it is high. we get requests that you could fact check a debate in real time? it takes a while to do a good fact check. we tried to the two original sources. do we rely on the internet is like asking do we rely on the telephone? of course. the key is what sources use of

the internet. we tried to go to original sources. we ted to go to the original vote to see if the congressman really voted the way somebody said. we look at the original roll- call. we put a lot of emphasis in original sources. >> democrat, missouri. a -- host: democrat, missouri. caller: rick perry real against government spending. -- reeled against government spending. then i did some research. have you ever considered doing a hypocrisy meter? part of the problem in politics is a politician can make a statement that is technically

true -- for example, the government spends too much. if you look at the hypocrisy of the statement of someone who is actually benefiting from the government spending in using it to balance their budget, it really is a lie or hypocrisy. have you ever thought about doing something like that? guest: it is an interesting idea. we are big on meters, as you indicate in your question. we have not gonthat far, because we really want to stay in the realm of fact checking. besides the truce-o-meter we have the - truth-o-meter, we have a another major.

-- we have a flip-o-meter. we do not have a high hop -- a hypocrisy meter. it is on the bounce of commentary. we have our plates full with fact checking. host: us take a look at the candidate rick perry. >> since june of 2009, 40%, as i said earlier, of all the jobs in america, created in texas. it is time to do the same thing in our federal government. those simple principles will work as we in washington d.c. as they do in the state of texas. host: how busy doing talking about the job record in texas? guest: he has been somewhat accurate in describing a lot of

the job situation in texas. the caller had an interesting point, that was madin a washington post story yesterday. many of the jobs created have come from additional federal spending. we did a fact check similar to the one you just had and we raided the that true in looking at the number of jobs created there. it is important to note that we waited a some of the claims of the democrats and the claims of those -- quality of those jobs. they are not -- a fair number of minimum-wage jobs. host: here is what governor rick perry said back in jaary 2009.

7% of jobs created in the u.s. were in texas -- 70% of jobs created in the u.s. were in texas. that was false. in another statement was half true. guest: half-truth is the statement is partially accurate, bu leaves out important details. mostly true, it is correct but the leaves of content. what we tried to do is risk of the relative accuracy of something. the truth is not a black or right, but it has shades of gray. by leaving out context, politicians and pundits can mislead us. our reading something half-true, we can show that there is some

truth to something, but there is important context that you should know about. host: same petersburg times washington bureau chief. a couple of folks are rich -- riding in on twitter. how has all been a fair to so far? guest: no one has been checked more than president obama. we checked him 330 times. his ratings have been more towards the true end of the scale. he has had a 25% of hisatings have been true. he has had a fair number of false as. 49, which account for 15% of his ratings. a 41, mostly false as.

for pants on fire ratings. -- four pants on fire ratings. host: we have the scorecard of president obama right there. you can see how his numbers are adding up. guest: when we tried to collect his campaign pmises, he had made more than 500 campaign promises. he made some early progress through the pure power of executive power and the past ma in the economic stimulus. lately, now that the republicans are in control of the house, congress has stalled on manyf

his promises. >> do you have a comparison point, that if other candidates running for president have made that many promises during their campaign? guest: we do not have the resources to go back and look at other presidents. but is different about barac obama as a candidate is, because he was a relatively new player on the washington scene, he felt he had to be very specific in his promises to individual oups. he made many ecific promises to labor unions, parents of children with autism, many different people. the result is a lot more to ack. host: indiana, independent line. caller: i would like to ask if

-- a question. why have you not focused on some people specifically, what they are promising in terms of the disparity between wealth, the poor, and how can these economic procrastation may be spinning out to show that we really are not having a trickle-down theory. contrast to the voodoo economics of reagan, you are telling a lie. guest: you have to consider that we are in the fact checking business. we have to wai for somebody to

make a factual claim, and then we researched it and read it on our meter. we are not in a commentary business. we are not convinced. we have to wait until somebody makes a claim that we think is inresting, provocative, that we think people would be curious about. we then read it. we have raided many by republicans that identified themselves as the party members. we have raided many claims by democrats. i think we have done a very good job of that. if you go to our site and look under subjects, you can see various subjects, whether it is the economy or deficit, where we have de a lot of of fact checking. host: tennessee. caller: what is the average

percentage between what he fact checked on republicans versus democrats? is it 50-50? what would it be? guest: we do not keep that the data. our goal is to check the most interesting, provocative statements. others have alyzed our work and found that it is rghly 50- 50. it will vary depending on the week. we've beechecking more republicans, because there are a running or whatever the number is. naturally, there is more conversation byhe people running against barack obama. we have been checking more republicans lately. our goal is to help you make sense of politics.

more of what you are hearing is om the democrats, then we will check them more. host: this writer from twitter says i love the pants on fire rating. guest: when we look at our traffic numbers every day, that rating is always on top. it is better for us to gnal that we do not take this stuff too seriously. we want to do journalism in a way that is accessible. some of the political discourse can be downright silly. host: examples of recent pants on fire statements? guest: we gave one to mr. rahm a couple of weeks ago. he said, we are inches away from and no longer having a free economy. this was a claim he made in his

announcement speech. we thought it was interesting and was there a way to show how free the u.s. economy was. one person went to the conservative think tank that it did ranking somehow free economy rkings are. we ranked high for having a pretty free economy. this is a big is saturation on his part, so he got pants on fire. host: washington. caller thanks for taking my call. on the scale of a moderate spending of the truth, i was wondering if this was more

offending to voters and potential voters -- do people find it more offensive about people and get asked a question at a rally, and it plays off the top and he does not have a fact for that particular answer -- or are voters more offended by something that they know is absolutely not true. which do you think our sensibilities more? guest: i think you are right. there are two very different circumstances.

we have falsehoods that we think under the clean lights mistakes. you are being interviewed. he say something wrong and get a number wrong. that slip up -- he may consider it a misdemeanor. the more egregious one, of a prison it would bother people more. i cannot speak for the american people. are they the calculated falsehoods, where somebody goes and says something, knowing it is not true and it is a big a saturation. every year, we award a lie of the year. the last year was a government takeover of health care, describing the health care reform law as a government takeover of health care. there are many ws you can

accurately describe the health- care law and what is a dramatic change in healt care. it is not accurate to call it a government takeover, which conjures images of the european style medicine. that line got repeat over and over again. many that repeated that line probably knew it was not true. host: rhode island, independent. caller: when the federal government says a certain percentage o premiums have to go towards health care costs rather than profit, i would suggest yes, the government is taking over health care. that is not why i cled. i want to find out who you voted for in the last presidential election. the president said the vice-

president did not call the tea party terrorists. and have the fact check to that? host: why is that important to you? caller: when i call in, i hav to say if i am independent or democrat poured republican. everyone comes to the table with pre-conceived notions. i just want to know what his is. it does not mean his immigration is not correct. is to be factored -- factored into the competition. guest: one thing with arican journalism is that we respect the privacy of the voting booth. what is public is public. you would find that i am not affiliated with any party. we do not require a the staff --

we to not disclose who they vo for. we think the privacy of the vote booth is sacred. we did not feel that that was something -- that there was anything to fact check about. the claim that the vice- president made was done by reporters line on unnamed sources. we do not rely, and now and sources. -- unnamed sources. nintelligible] we have rejected stories that reporters have turned in a that relied on unnamed sources. we have made them take this material out. it is important in fact checking

that people be accountable for their wor and we be accountable for the reporting. we will not base it on an anonymous source. host: missouri. caller: koufax checks your people? -- who fact checks your people? i am beginning to have my doubts about you. i am beginning to think you are no different from our mainstream media? host: heavy checked the web site yet? he hung up on us. guest: some say we are too hard on democrats or republica. we are independent.

we look at these claims fm the perspective of the independent journalists. look at our website right now. the first item is a false for president obama's education secretary. a false for the press secretary. there are a couple of false as for rick perry. we did in impended research and call them as we see them. host: patricia, a democratic college in long beach. caller: i would like to discuss with you, there was an article in the new york daily news last week by a political -- he did not write it, but another person did. he was encouraging with everyone to come out with some dirt on

rick perry. the article is very long. it scared me a bit. it turned out to be all false. will this be a really dirty campaign for 2012? will you be very busy doing the false and untrue and pants on fire? guest: this is the nature of modern-day politics. it is rough and tumble. in the old days, there were fiers. everything was seen it through the filter of the union dues or the big newspapers or wire services. now, thanks to the internet, it

is much more bare knuckled. it is a great time to be a fact checker. with all of these claims going around, it is our job to check them out. when people say something, we do not just check claims about policies or issues. if someone makes an attack on someone about their record or things they have done, we check that out. i am not familiar with the article you are referring to, but that is the type of thing that we expected to check a lot of this year. ho: looking at arne duncan here. here is his record. guest: this was a good one and done by our colleagues in texas.

they have nine state sites around the country. it is done by the austin american statesman. they went to the original sources, which are the state's statistics on class size. they found that there have not been massive increases in class. at some great, there had been slightly decry -- decreases. it is not the massive increase that he talked about. that would earn falls on the meter. host: our guest is the editor for politifact. he also is the washington bureau chief for the "st. petersburg times."

let's go to our independent line -- i think we lost that caller. santa monica, calif., republican. caller: and thanks for taking my call. i want to ask the guest about something that is important to me. i think facts can be distorted into twisted a lot. i want to turno education. one says that texas is not doing as well as other states like wisconsin. there was a study done on wisconsin and texas. the comparisons are not valid for equal. 30% of the students in texas are hispanic versus 4% in wisconsin. of the hispanics that are in texas, they are doing better than those in wisconsin. they said of the students in

texas that are white, they are doing better than the ones in wisconsin. you do not look at town demographics were you do not take into account certain ethnic groups and certain groups are beer in other states where they are more popular, but their performance is lower than the national average. the you ever take those kinds of things into account? guest: absolutely. by the way you asked the question, you illustrated our challenge. deciphering these things can be very complicated. there are many different factors. as really get a claim made by a politician or pandit, there are many details that we have to account for. we do r best to do so. i am not familiar with the particular study you are refering to, but we do our best. if we get something wrong, and

somebody points out that we got it wrong, we will go back and look at it again. what we do is so important that these claims about whether it is about education or somebody's background or what ever are the building blocks of people's decisions about whether they will support a policy or not. who or what they will vote for. even a claim -- or complicated claim about education, hispanic and performance -- they are buildi blocks in a decision be. fact checked one of one of our tweeters. guest: i would rate his claim falls.

friedrich false. -- false. host: here is the claim by pawlenty. guest: there is a consensus on global warming. there have been people but have spoken up against it. we looked at that and at the number of them lative to the size of the scientist. we felt thathere is not a lack of consensus on this anymore. it is pretty remarkable that it continues to be this debate on it. thousands of scientists have agreed with the report. what is interesting about the message on twitter is it characterized our work as

saying -- i was joking that he would have earned mostly false. these are what we deal with everyday. we do r best to look at the specific wording of the claims and rate the integrity of what people were saying. host: here is how it was raided. it said a false. anthere is context here. you expln why and he given the rating you have. guest: that is an article that is probably 1500 words that goes into detail about wiry reach that conclusion. one of the concepts is that using the power of the web, it is very laird. you can come to our homepage and see the person, the statement, the rating. you can click for the article. if you want to read more, you

can list -- we list all of our sources. you can come to your own conclusion. host: democratic caller in evanston, illinois. caller: do you have a category knowns almost true? guest: mostly true. caller: i have seen you on msnbc.com. i think they brought you on because you notice something as barely true. in fact, when you look at what was there, 99% of what was done was true. there was something minor that you said, this is why we give it to this rating. that small plane had no significant impact. that was one thing.

here is my room main reason for calling. when you look at president obama and he rate him on the promises kept -- when you have a congress, this is where your categories are inflexible. you have a congress that the people are absolutely entrenched in bringing down this president at all costs, even if it means bringinghe country down. yet you say, and he did not complete his promise. that is no different than if i said bill, i will pick you up and take you to a place. on my way i get held hostage. would you hold me accountable for that? guest: great question. we get to the sell-off. it has to do with our rating system not just on obama but also our pledge meter, where we

rate the promises of the republican congress. one thing we decided to do was to treat a promise that was not fulfilled as a promise broken. that can mean that even if it is beyond the person or the group's powers that it is still a promise broken. president obama made some promises relative to cap and a trade. those are probably not going to be fulfilled. i think we raided them as a stled or promise broken. we consider it to be a broken promise of the over 500 alliterating. we treated the republicans the same way. we decided that you cannot get into a situation where you have to assess each promise and decide, it is not his fault, so we will treat it a little bit

differently. we do the same for our promise features in the state. the one on governor. and gov. scott, gov. walker in wisconsin. we have been consistent about that and aounced it at the start of the meters. we know people will be unhappy about that. we have to have that consiste >> "washington journal" continues this week with medicare advantage and the prescription drug program. we are live every morning, beginning at 7:00 eastern, with a series on medicare at 9:15.

>> watch more on the candidates, and the latest on the campaign contributions. easy to use, and helps you navigate the political landscape, with the latest polling information and links to the c-span media partners. all at c-span.org/campaign 2012. >> dr. martin luther king was not a president of the united states. and at no time in his life he hold public office. he is of a hero of a four more, and he never had much money. and when he lived, he was reviled as much as celebrated. he was a man who frequently

suffered from gout. and the man, who like moses before him, questioned why he had been chosen for this task. the task of leading the people to freedom. and of healing the wounds of the original sin of the nation. >> watched the groundbreaking of the martin luther king jr. memorial. and five years later this will be dedicated on this sunday, live on c-span. we will have coverage of other events surrounding this dedication on the c-span networks. >> the assistant secretary for health and human services, the elimination of racial health disparity. this is part of a two-day summit

held in washington. >> thank you, mr. johnson. i would like to refer you to your note but if i could, to remind you that there are important tasks, if you would like to take a look. this is good information about this organization sponsoring today's summit, with information about the sponsors, and if there are representatives here, we thank you very much for bringing all of these important messages to everyone today. we would appreciate this if, if you could fill this out so we can improve the future summits. and there is a section on the speaker's biographies. we have such a distinguished panel i will not be able to read their entire biography.

i refer you to the speaker's biographies for more information about the vast accomplishments. i would like to invite the next set of speakers. and i would like to remind you have these note cards in your binder so please put your questions on the note cards. and if you wonder how we do a masterful job of keeping on schedule, i would point out that jackie over here is actually holding up pieces of paper to let you know when you have five minutes, one minute, and quite frankly, when you are just out of time. this is like a hug at the academy awards. >> we will go ahead and get started.

very distinguished panel of speakers here as well. and i would like to say a few words. you will hear from dr. howard, the assistant secretary for the u.s. department of health and human services, right down the block. he has published more than 200 articles in the medical and public-health literature, including the health disparity. he served as the commissioner of public health in massachusetts from 1997, to 2003, where he emphasized the power of prevention, to eliminate health disparity. and the binder will have more information about his very impressive background of accomplishments. i would also like to thank dr. david sacha, the director of the sacha mental health institute,

established in 2006 in atlanta. he was sworn in as the 16th surgeon general of the united states and the director of the center for disease control and prevention. he has held top leadership positions, at the charles drew university for medical science, and the morehouse school of medicine. i would like to turn the podium over to him. >> thank you so much. i am honored to be at this historic summit, and let me just thank all of you for your attendance and commitment and your dedication to making our country more healthy. country more healthy.