>> that is contested. >> let me say that it is a debatable proposition. it is not clear cut. i want our listeners to understand there can beach instances where you do not go with a prosecution if you cannot make the case. this is a specific crime. all crimes require specific intent, but this is a specifically in attentive crime. -- intentive crime. we're spending all this time talking about water reporting. instead of looking at the -- waterboarding, instead of looking at it italic the of our conduct. no other people has been this restraint in dealing with this problem. >> let's push this further.

in this case in terms of what happened with waterboarding, you had people like khalid sheikh mohammad who was working on what -- waterboarded over 180 times. you have and that -- he was 100 times a. another person was waterboarded 83 times. that is not true. sheikh mohammad khatami was waterboarded 183 times in one -- khalid shaikh mohammed was waterboarded 183 times in one month. this is some of the information we have confirmed. given the fact that you have sessions going over 40 minutes, 183 sessions in one month, would you consider that the evidence to support a formal investigation of torture? >> with respect, there were at least two investigations i am aware of, and as careful

lawyers, we know something now, including evidence you describe. we had career lawyers who would love to prosecute people who they believe bristol all and would like to make -- who they believe broke the law. they decided not to go forward. we believe in the role all. we have to accord a considerable level of credibility to those results. >> de you believe right now that waterboarding 100 to the -- 183 times in 30 days would be enough to you to say we need to investigate this new information? >> presented this way, and these are troubling facts, but what we are missing here, we are a civilized people. if calling it 180-plus waterboarding sections describes

a few applications of a few drops of water, if that is what it means, is a difficult question is if you take a person and shove their head under water. seems tog everybody t forget, we have waterboarded thousands of people. you cannot consent to torture, to slavery, to prosecution. -- to prostitution. some things are not subject to be kent scented. -- to being consented to. >> i know it is not easy, in 2003 george w. bush told the public before the iraq war that war crimes will be prosecuted, war criminals will be punished, and there will be no defense to say i was just following orders.

as you know, just following orders defense was rejected at nuremberg, and we helped create that precedent. president obama went to the cia and said i understand you were following orders, and i am not going to allow employees of the cia to be investigated and prosecuted. do you believe president obama was correct in his view, or is he in violation? >> let me defend president obama. i think you and a lot of other people are misconstruing what he said. he did not say i am convinced law was broken, but for some crass political reasons or because you were just following orders, i was not want to prosecute. that would be trouble. after the campaign, having come into office, having gotten access all information, including previous investigations, he must have been advised.

that there was no credible basis to proceed and he went forward and reassured the cia about it. the other interpretation is highly consultant -- insulting to the president. >> thank you very much. i will now go to colonel shaffer. you have a unique position as someone who has been boots on the ground. as i am sure you are aware, after war war ii, this country prosecuted a japanese officer accused of an incident in which a u.s. citizen was tied to a stretcher with his hands -- his feet in the air and his head toward the floor, water poured over his face, caused him to gas for air until he agreed to talk. do you see any distinction between our case against -- cases you have read about

involving the united states program? >> we could go to the bathroom downstairs and set up our own little waterboarding thing to tested out. i do not think it was a few drops of water. i do not think there is any legality within the context of the law. i have to do things. i did not want to get into anything classified, but there was a program which allowed for this to exist. i have done a lot of classified black operations were, and a lot of us understood that this is probably illegal by the fact that international law says you cannot torture people. some of us may not have known of some of the specifics of the japanese outcomes of waterboarding. most of us understand that torture it does not get you

anything except information that people are going to tell you to make you go away. a special operations unit gave up the technique after being authorized to do it. they had to sort through everything everybody would give them, because more than half of what they would be given was false. the practical application of the reality of the amount of authority which not matching up with the outcome. talking about the jurisdiction and the proportionality. b, c, ld go over a eighth, principal. -- principle. >> i would like to turn to lee casey. when you were speaking you

talked about how in your view the military target anyone anywhere in the world where you are found. we're talking about any combatants. there are rules. if the president is saying he has the right to take out a list and write the name of the u.s. citizen on it, and that citizen will be killed, and you have said you can kill that citizen anywhere in the war, just outside the stores. the president has discretion to do that. what are the rules limiting that? >> there are the roles of distinction of proportionality, which is a distinction would not be an issue because he is an enemy combatants. proportionality would be. the question is how much collateral damage there would be. >> who enforces the rules? >> the courts, the congress, and

the president. that me finish -- before we move along, in addition, with respect s, you have to respect neutral rights. in addition, it is also true that you cannot attack someone who is an enemy combatants if they are not capable of resisting, which is to say one of the early cases the individual called the dirty bomber was surrounded by fbi agents in chicago when he arrived in this country. you could not just shoot him because he was not capable of resisting, and in such cases, you cannot go ahead and just kill someone. and so it those rules would also have to be be taken into

account. >> said it could be enforced by the courts. efforts to give the alaki business and the other people on the hit list had been rejected, bush obama administration's say the court does not have jurisdiction. >> with respect to the question of who the president decides to target, the d.c. district court was correct, it is a political question. the fact that in that instance courts would have to decide and say i am not want to review whether this individual can or cannot be attacked does not mean there are not legal in rules and it does not mean those legal rules are not applicable and can be enforced, perhaps in this case by contrast, if it believes the president is incorrect. >> the court can review the

names on the list, then who would have standing and say i would like to have the policy review, because the courts have rejected that. with alaki, they said he would have to come even if he would, we would have to kill him. would anybody who has standing would not be on the list? >> the judge said he was not showing up at the courthouse or at the u.s. embassy and saying i would like to surrender, please accept my surrender, which in case his surrender would have had to have been accepted. with respect to the enforcement, it may well be in this instance that the policy -- again, your remedy may be -- as opposed to the courts on that particular issue. >> my last question, you mentioned you cannot kill someone if they cannot resist.

does that include vaporizeing them with a drone? in the case of bin laden, all reports are that he was shot immediately. were those of unlawful killings the seals could have captured him? >> no, they were not unlawful killings. in determining whether someone was capable or not capable of resisting, you do not have to accept danger to yourself, which is to say in the case of bin laden, he could well have been capable of resisting. he was not surrounded by fbi agents. the fact that the individuals who went on that operation chose

to shoot him as opposed to trying to take him prisoner was perfectly legitimate since they were not -- unless he actually began came out and was actually not only willing to surrender, but not capable of resisting, and that was obvious. with respect to vaporization, the predator drones, that goes back to whether you have to give someone noticed before you attack them. that is simply not what the law requires. under the laws of war, there be no particular reason why that rule not apply to anyone. >> thank you very much for that. we want to keep us on time, we will turn to the q and a. we will now start a short period where each of the debaters can have enough debater question

them, but there is a limit of two minutes. we will start with bruce fein. >> do you believe in the detainee held at the prison in afghanistan is entitled to have any judicial review even when they are -- even under habeas corpus, or are they just outside the universe of fell law? >> what matters is article 3 court, and the court rejected this view. i want to emphasize this is the first time in american history where it this level of unprecedented judicial engagement. there is not any judicial engagement in battlefield decisions. hundreds of cases now arising out of the detention at

guantanamo, rejection of the proposition that individuals held in custody overseas, outside of guantanamo, have access to habeas. we believe in the rule of law, and we have to accept the outcome of the courts whether we like it or not. >> is it your view that any detainee held at guantanamo could be circumvented with his right to habeau by shipping them to afghanistan? >> that point was pressed home in oral argument. i remember it before the panel of judges in the d.c. circuit. you did not carry the day, because again, we have a unique constitutional regime, and we're talking about a gentle

proposition as the constitution applies globally with regard to u.s. citizens. it regards to aliens only when they are on u.s. soil. post 9/11, we put guantanamo in a different basket. action by the u.s. government, seizing those who are not u.s. citizens are not enforced by the district 3 courts. >> citizens are detained at guantanamo bay. >> you can stay here because you have your two minutes. >> i would like to pose a question to tony. question is this -- under your logic about bringing people to justice, can you conceive of any war where in all instances you would be able to go and arrest without putting undue risk to the seal team or any other team, the obligation to bring somebody back, but you can never use

deadly force even against a person like bin laden, under your logic of the scope of operations of the cannot use deadly force against him, not as a matter of the rules of engagement, whether he was renting, -- the western during -- he was surrendering? >> you are absolutely correct. if you're able to do that, apparently if they can do that, you are going to put yourself in danger. from here on, if you are put in danger if you're going after by guys who might resist, you did not have to go. think about that. we have to understand the capability to resist and what you're asking me relating to the individual who was the target of villages operation, but a combat and, however, within the

context eight guys at you at guns, coming out of sleeping, the question becomes not a practical one. there was no time. i understand from the raid, and this would hold up in court, that any seal ever felt he was threatened in that event. the idea here that we should apply deadly force standards like we would apply to any law enforcement officer on the streets of america -- at the time of an event, the first thing you do, you take them off the street, you do an evaluation of standards, and was it a legitimate killed. i do not believe in in the military setting this would have been a legitimate killed. >> you are suggesting a bunch of our best soldiers just committed a war crime. do you believe there are operational judgment, situation awareness on the battlefield at that time, is better than yours? do you believe that?

>> i am told to hold the line here rigidly. we are going to have to go to your question. >> my question is for mr. rivkin. it has to do with the idea of blacksites. i am going to put it in a framework where you know i'm coming from. rico statutes. endicott text of -- in the context of black side, we used u.s. taxpayer dollars and we set up the sites, we use taxpayer dollars to have cia or special operation forces capture someone, they use contracted aircraft, you give them to a third country and say here is the guy, go torture him. are we culpable for that torture?

>> what you are doing is respect to spending backs. there is nothing illegal about running black sites. there's nothing illegal about using taxpayer resources. only in this situation where you ordered someone or direct somebody to engage in acts of torture, you may have a problem, and i have no basis to believe that occurred. rico is not apply to governmental activities. rico is irrelevant here. >> rico was the example of a culpability example. we spend congressionally mandated money to conduct things that would be held up in international law as illegal,

and if we do not direct it, we know it is going on. >> congress was in full compliance. this is an instance where the executive fully complied with the relevant statute. >> was the executive telling the truth information to congress? >> i believe there is a likely to speak about the scope and completeness of those briefings. >> thank you very much. now we will turn to lee casey, and he can take is affected. >> forked bruce -- my question is for brees. what level of violence to you think is necessary for an act of war, and do you think that congress can authorize the use of military force short of a declaration? >> yes, the second question is

congress can authorize the use of military force. military force does not indicate more necessarily. the law is generally silent. what level of violence justifies war? there are close in the constitutional language with regard to habeas corpus in times of invasion or rebellion. that level of threat. that was what was not met when u.s. supreme court held habeas corpus had been illegally suspended by the military commission house ax and the actions of the text of branch. this is not a question of euclidean geometry where you cut the number of soldiers. my judgment, if you look at

9/11, what we know now, 50 al qaeda by their own task force in afghanistan, 50 alone, you can fit them in this auditorium and have a lot of space left over, that is not a level of violence that justifies throw away all the due process, the precious liberty that exists in the united states. >> 20 seconds. >> what lot do you think applied to the tripoli war, to that operation? >> international conflicts, yes, and that is what was conducted by thomas jefferson. >> the barbary states had their existence in north africa. they were operating as state actors. >> status of the barbary pirates

-- stay tuned for next month. i will not turn it over. >> thank you, i have 15 minutes to relay audience questions, and i would like to apologize. there are more than 30 questions. i do not think i am gone to get to 30. the first question might be appropriate for you, bruce. is the fact that the justice department tells the president waterboarding is legal mean the president cannot be prosecuted for waterboarding and related that the united states has a right to find torture in ways that do not comport with international law? >> the first question is whether the president relies on that legal advice of the justice department. there is a good faith ruled built into both now the statute

as well as implied in the common law, and it was applied in watergate. as long as there was a good faith interpretation of the law, the answer would be he would be shielded. that oftentimes is very fact specific. hitler often relied upon information. regarding defined torture, the united states can define torture under --president cannot redefined torture. that is quite specific. with regard to international interpretation, it is in the treaty. there was no effort to try to differentiate between the treaty definition of torture. i do not see there is lee way. it is true when of the more blurry elements of torture as defined in the statute is

whether or not what was done with calculated an imminent fear of death ought to cause protracted mental trauma. that time can become a matter of difficulty in application. >> a question i will direct to david. if the u.s. is free to take out by assassination anyone it feels is a so-called combatant anywhere, what is stopping other countries from assassinating their enemies on u.s. soil, such as iran wanting to kill the saudi ambassador in d.c.? >> assassination is more than just a killing. it and the applies to internationally protected persons. killing an ambassador come of an enemy country, is an assassination. other actions are not. he asked me if a given country believes there any state of war

with us and they are attacking on our soil or somewhere else in the world and american official who is within the chain of command, an american military officer or the secretary of defense, to the extent they believe that, they are not committing -- be an act of war. on the other hand, iran has been engaged in a low-grade activity engaging numerous operations against american soldiers, including kobar towers. those things happened in the international green. we choose not to take that up on invitation and engage in acts of war against us. the fact that we in good faith belief that we are in a state of war and we carry out military operations against enemy combatants come the fact the somebody can do it us does not

diminish the legitimacy of what we're doing. >> the question i will direct to tony, what you propose is the next that given political realities and congressional reluctance to address these violations? >> which violations? >> all the violations that you think have occurred of any law. >> there are two primary violations. the scope and premise of the authority for military force has to be her defiant. if you are a carpenter and had a hammer, everything looks like a nail. if you leave it to the commander to determine what their actions are regarding combatants, they will set up an arbitrary standard which has no relevance to the original authority. i do not think that is a viable course for this country to continue on.

we're now considering sheepherders as potential terrorists because there is some link or some way to link them to al qaeda. we have to standardize what that authority means. we cannot kill 20 million pashtuns. regarding detainee operations, there are two factors we have to clarify, habeas corpus. whenever somebody is captured, even if they do not have geneva protections, you have to figure out what you are going to do with them. indefinite detention is not viable. we have to clarify that. what is torture? i say in my book, we talked about operation dark heart, there may be a moment in time when i would do something like jack bauer. a general took a gun and shot it over someone's head and got tactical information. should we systematically

tortured people or allow that through our own hands? that is what we have to define. >> a question i will direct to lee, what are the criteria for determining a person to be combatants? where is -- where does the burden of proof lie? the d.c. circuit decided in a case that there would be a perception of regularity for all the government's evidence. is there history that shows all the government's evidence is all the way unreliable? >> in terms of the criteria, traditionally the criteria are are you associated with an enemy force, and what is the nature of that association? you do not need to carry a gun. you could be a cook and still be a legitimate target. there are all sorts of different jobs. with respect to this conflict,

all of that i think applies, but it is true the d.c. circuit has been in the process of and lightning us to some extent. it has been the elucidating those rules. it has concluded a number of cases that you have to look at it holistic play on a case by case basis. with respect to the perception of regular a, keep in mind but the perception of regularity means is that the evidence that the government brings in is accepted as having been regularly gathered and put together. you do not have to prove that the agent who wrote the report actually did interview three individuals in afghanistan. there was a perception it was regularly taken. it is not a presumption of the truth of what those three people in afghanistan said.

the court can still reviewed that and consider them to be inherently incredible and in deed the detainee can also challenged it. >> bruce, if one accepts the argument that the wars are illegal, what are the obligations of u.s. citizens? >> to petition congress for impeaching the president for high crimes and misdemeanors, subject to a trial. i have crafted an article of impeachment against president obama for an illegal war in libya. it has not gone very far. declaration of independence says at some point in time it every act of a government reduce its us to vassalage, we have the right to establish a new

dispensation. we're not there by a long shot. the founding fathers said the impeachment process would be a surrogate for a coup de tock. -- coup d'etate. >> this is a question directed to lee. proportionality -- estimated it did in iraq range from 150,000 to 1 million. you accept this is an acceptable amount of collateral damage for civilian casualties? >> you need to look at it with respect to the unique operations. the concept of proportionality

is applied military act by military act. you are asking whether the war itself was worth it, whether the amount of damage that was done to the civilian population of iraq, the amount of injury and damage done to our people who fought the war, was worth it. with respect to that, only time i think will tell. was it worth it to establish a democratic government in the middle east, and as weak and imperfect as it may be, and will in the future that lead to positive change there? i do not know. >> thank you. i will direct this to tony. how should the united states defend against war waged by non nation's and are drawn attacks everett waffle? >> the latter question first.

drone attacks are lawful. they are a tactic is all about the legal application of that as the capability. that is something we have within our arsenal. technology has developed where that is a viable technique for taking out leaders in remotely patients. with that said, it has become an overreliance at technology as a metaphor for progress, saying we must be making progress if we are killing people. that goes to our second answer, targeting individuals in third countries. the tactic should be the last resort, speaking both as an operator and having lived within legal constructs of our defense committee for the past 25 years. the default position should always be an was during the times that i have come up from the service capture rather than

kill. the cia shooter who killed officers and outside langley, the captured him. that is the position we should do. that should be our standard. only to be good to a third country and do something if we can do reasonably well in bringing them to justice. otherwise i think no matter how you define combat, combatant, we do not have sufficient understanding of what a combatant is, and if you're waiting for commanders to determine that, they will go to whoever they will go to. you got to get the default of capture rather than kill whenever possible. >> to david, the question asks, and there are three or four questions of the same nature. you cite 9/11 as the legal foundation of wars of aggression

for iraq and afghanistan. if he becomes obvious by side of the challenges that 9/11 was not the event described its so- called conspiracy theorist are right? >> there will be conspiracy theories as long as mankind exists, but we should not pay much attention to it. like the kennedy assassination, 9/11 has been extensively looked on. all theories about 9/11 not being an attack have been proven to be rubbish. it is not a position of the united states government. it is the position of every normal government in the world, including russia and china. it is also the position of al qaeda. if that is a conspiracy, we have a super conspiracy where

everybody is conspiring to bring this about. coon >> thank you. bruce, i will interpret this question a little bit, and you may have touched on it already. the citizens placed on assassination lists, who are targeted, let's say, have the same right prior to the killing as they would prior to a trial if they were captured? i suppose the question is, with the drone attack ever be legal, if it was clear that he not be captured? >> i think you are examining the parallel in the criminal justice system, you would first expect there could be a warrant issued for the arrest of mr. alaki for crime, and it was said he was consistent in all sorts of crimes, including the fort hood killings, perhaps in inciting

crimes against americans. the fact was he was not subject to any indictment, any charge whatsoever about unlike osama bin laden who was under indictment. at least you would have by requiring a warrant some judicial check on supply having a president arbitrarily identify anybody in the war, including us, i will kill you, and then after rightists -- and then afterwards we will let congress decide if they want to impeach me. i would say you can end up with a system of warrants that authorize that kind of force what it was shown in the warrant process that an attempt to capture would be futile. i would amplify on this idea that has been incinerated on the other side that anytime we can avoid a risk ourselves we can use lethal force to prevent that risk from occurring. that would suggest if we are at war with iraq, and we did not want to risk any danger to

soldiers, we just launched icbm 's with nuclear warheads into iraq and in separate -- and in separate debt. -- and incinerate them. would mean version but and not a psychic become a staple of how we would fight wars. -- that would mean hiroshima and nagasaki would become a staple of how we would fight wars. >> we are beyond local here, ladies and gentlemen. on balance, the entire record and prosecuting those wars makes me proud. we spent too much time to deal with the most difficult and jarring questions, about

enhanced interrogation. this is the small part of the overall spector. in no other part of human history has had this unprecedented level of legal attention on how to do things right. even the torture memos, i do not know of any country that would bother to ask difficult questions and try to reconcile dictates of law. serious debates within the justice department, within the exhibit branch, an enormous level of judicial engagement. debates during the campaigns. prosecutions of people who violated laws of war, numerous prosecutions, of people who did not commit crimes themselves, but failed to report crimes. we should look at the unprecedented level of attention to minimizing collateral damage, not using force. was concerned, and this is the

enemy that bites out of civilian areas, that pretends to be civilians caught levels of collateral damage are going to be high. have mistakes occurred? of course. the most difficult environment in which to always be right. there's no other war i can think about where any other country has done better in putting out the danger. this is a different debate. it is a debate about nature, a military threat. live in a world where a small group of people can in fact unprecedented levels of destruction and mayhem. unless we understand that, and the job of any military establishment is first and foremost to protect the american people. if we're not going to appreciate the proposition, we are part to pretend because we do not have tanks, driving, planes flying, thousands of troops marching in lockstep on the other side, that that is not a danger. where forfeiting any basis upon

which the government has come into being. again, that is the threat we face. i am very proud of everybody who has been involved in this war. i am proud of the fact that we continue to debate these issues, including many democracies donot issue.bate these >> these wars have an unprecedented, and we have established a set of principles, that will lie around like loaded weapons ready to be used when in the caligula comes into the presidency and decides to take the principle and extended here at home. all liberties at present rest upon the benevolence of the president of the united states. under the principles we have established, a president could

go on television today and announced that he has got secret evidence suggesting there is going to be an even worse devastation than 9/11 unless we suspend the constitution. he is empowered to detain anyone try, because his first duty and only duty is save us from danger. that would be lawful authority according to the prevailing legal principles that have been announced during that state of war. to me, that is frightening. we need to remember that we are -- we adhere to certain principles because what it says about us. the perspective of what its b says about the enemy. as abraham said so he would not be a slave, so he would not be a

master. as we would not want to torture, we will never stoop to committing torture or flopping to rule of law. that is basing lee -- that is basically what this is about. if you want to stick to the level of the enemy, where we are seed major and they are de-flat, that is not what the united states is of about. it is to be americans, where the rule of law is king. [applause] >> i want to thank all the participants. i think they met the standard of elevating the debate in this country, and they will not be help to that comparison to the political debates we've been seeing on tv recently. i think they have whetted our

taste for more. it is supposed to be the first sensible for the rule of law, and when it does violate, and also among the citizenry across the country, wherever concerned citizens want to reflect on what is meant by the preamble to the constitution, which is at "we the people." secondly, one of the questions that are on some of our minds have come out of this debate is the balance of power. the fundamental question i took from many of the comments of the participants is yet unanswered, and that is, who decides? one view is the inherent power of the president to conduct foreign and military affairs has a much wider latitude than their critics would allow. i think we do not need to engage

in back and forth to realize that the judiciary has limited itself in deciding that questions that are raised by the citizens are political and therefore outside the judiciary. it has limited also members of congress have abdicated their role under the constitution. we do not have hearings like the fulbright's hearings on the vietnam war. it seems congress is willing to delegate its authority to the president, which is something that some viewpoints would say is appropriate, and the present has those powers as commander in chief.

whenever ehud we take, the question will always remain, who decides within the formal framework of the three branches of government, and when and of what issues and what kind of counter checks there are, at second, what about the people? what is their role in generating process these of decision making that affect these great issues. these issues regard how the world treats us. the cia has a word for that, and that is an excessive use of wrongheaded force needs to blow back, and the stage a blow back is not ending. it is very much an issue of the safety of the world and whether the law will disciplined power

and the its of force throughout the world or whether the use of indisciplinee of power will prevail. i hope this will expand the attention of tavis in our society which have no place in a society that had given in the first amendment the preferred freedom in our constitution, that have no place in giving everybody a role, however remote and preliminary, in trying to make this a better country and a better world. those of you who are interested in more information about the taboo project, the debate is available for your visitation at

taboo.org. i want to thank everyone of these participants who have elevated this debate with a level of precision, not ordinarily be viewed on television, and in this case we're talking about c-span coverage of this debate. of what to think david rifkin and want to thank the casey and stuart taylor. i want to thank tony schaffer and bruce fein and jonathan turley for a sterling performance that invites us to want more. thank you very much. [applause] >> coming up, the chairman of the nuclear regulatory commission on lessons learned from japan's nuclear crisis. then a look at the impact of the holiday shopping season on the overall economy. at 8:00 eastern, presidential

contenders who have changed history. this week, george wallace. >> this past july 4 simon winchester uk pan-american citizen. >> i decided i would take all the necessary steps. i got one of the questions wrong. i rang a friend, and asked -- it was what is the american national anthem. the immigration officer said it

should be, but it is not. >> the latest book is now in paperback. watch the rest of our interview with simon winchester sunday night. >> now discussion on lessons learned from the japanese nuclear plant crisis. the fukushima nuclear plant suffered major damage from an earthquake and tsunami in march that led to nuclear radiation leaks. the nuclear regulatory commission directed their staffs to become immediately implementing seven recommendations from me nrc's task force. you will hear from that chairman during this 90-minute event. >> it is a pleasure to be here. let me give you a flavor for how this is going to go. the format that works best is -- ising from combination

borrowing from "talk of the nation." it is a dynamic thing. in the tradition of "top of the nation," i will monopolize the conversation a little bit. i would like to introduce my guest and say a few words about being in japan, because that will help set the scene for the conversation that follows. to my left is the chairman of the nuclear regulatory commission. he has been since 2009 and played a pivotal role in how the united states responded to what was going on in japan. i have questions about how that unfolded. to his left is a person who was also on the commission, but after three mile island,

starting in -- >> my term was mid 1982 through 1987. he is now an analyst at barclays. knows how the money flows and how industry feels about nuclear power and these days. these will be interesting issues to bring up. that we bring up and set the scene for my first question, and i got to japan on -- this in any -- the tsunami happen on friday. the first meltdown happen rapidly thereafter. i hopped on a plane on sunday and was in japan by monday in time for the next events at the

nuclear plant. that shows you how big an event it was, that there were multiple events. as try to sort things out, and if you will indulge me, it brought to mind the way the government was handling this was giving limited amount of information and little analysis. the joke that it brings to mind is there's a pilot on a plane who has lost radio contract, radar, he knows he is over the state of washington picked he sees somebody on the ground and yells, where am i? he says, you are in an airplanee. not so i knew i must have been over the microsoft campus. very little interpretation.

it was a huge struggle for the entire world to make sense of what was going on there. that is a prelim to my first question. to the chairman, how much did you feel you were in that same situation? did you have more insight than us at the time? >> the agency that represents is filled with nuclear engineers and a lot of experts in things that can go wrong. we had a good sense of what kinds of challenges they were dealing with and what the situation was like. i remember getting a lot of reports in the early stages talking about the amount of time the corps had been uncovered, and that is really the key 60 feature. the reactor closure is very hot and you want to keep water on it so it does not melt. that is basically the idea.

there was discussion about the amount of time it had been uncovered. if everybody knew what that meant, but nobody was really talking about what really was going on and what state the core was likely in after an extended period of time. we heard it was probably uncover 418-24 hours, and that is a very long period of time. that could lead to some very serious incidents. we sent the team to japan to provide help to the government very early on after the first day, really, on friday. by the time they got there, it was sunday morning in tokyo. they were there to give us a bowl better information. this is just a challenge to get accurate and reliable information. it was all in the midst of a tremendous human tragedy.

you have tens of thousands of people impacted, tens of thousands dead, so it was a very difficult situation, i think, for everyone, especially in the early days. >> were you getting good information out of japan? i have read that there was a lot frustration about how little information you were getting. >> first and foremost, the responsibility was to provide information there and work through their long process. lichen only imagine if we were in a situation like that in the united states, my priority would be to communicate internally and not worry about having to translate all the information we have into french, spanish, to make excess of will. there's obviously a degree of information we were not getting

and we would just hope that we would get. to the extent that we got information, i felt there were doing what they could to provide an permission to other regulators throughout the world. >> part of the frustration is the japanese government decides what you need to know in their culture. that is not necessarily what you hope would be given now here. that lack of information created a huge amount of uncertainty around the world. they were really telling the people. they told them they did not need to know very much of the rest of the world did not know as we are hunkered to know. >> i look at these situations, and is always difficult to communicate. it is always much harder than you think at the time. for instance, i look back in the first public statements i made about what we believed was going on was not until next monday

after things have started on friday. it went very quickly. in a difficult situation, no one ever commutnicates as much. as i meet with my counterparts, it is something that people really want to work on. how can we better communicating and provide more information more quickly to the population and to the general public? it will always be a challenge. again, part of a real challenge is that you want to communicate accurate information and given the condition of the reactors, it was very difficult to have a lot of accurate information about what was really going on. there were just inherent challenges about being able to communicate. in the and, as people take a step back to review what happened, there will be more of

an effort to look at how that information can be better communicated not only to the public you may be directly responsible to, but really the world bank of these kinds of actions have become international or global incidence. there is a lot of interest around the world. >> there are separate lines of communication for the business world. of dollarsomillions out in interest here. >> to a large extent, we were also subject to the information that was publicly available. we relied on many of the same sources. we listened to what gregg said and what secretary chu said. we listen to what information was coming from the industry and the media in the united states and in japan, but we worried

about the same information in the information flow was, as you said, quite limited. it was coming to some degree, conflicting. let me ask you a little bit more about the big picture stuff. >> can you tell right now, one of the bottom-line questions. what impact is this having on the u.s. industry right now? obviously we do not have all the facts about the meltdown, but we do know that things are pretty bad and is a multi billion dollar, $10 billion or more combusting to resolve. people who invest in nuclear power are a little shocked. >> yes. the immediate direct impact in terms of trading levels for securities was a relatively modest. we did see, for example, in the area that i tend to focus on, there was some spread widening, incremental costs for the larger

nuclear utilities, companies like exxon which operates the largest unregulated nuclear generation fleet -- companies like exelon. those companies that operate nuclear facilities in california saw some action as well. we saw the widening of trading levels for their instruments and we size similar impact on equities. the move was fairly modest and fairly limited. i think come to a certain extent, that was driven by the step-by-step approach that was taken by government officials in this country. i give greg credit, the nrc, secretary chu. in fairly short order, we had

statements from greg and secretary chu that they said there was no reason to shut down the units in the united states and that there was not imminent threat to safety from those units. that was followed fairly quickly by a detailed briefing from the nrc technical staff that really went through the technical basis for that judgment for the broad conclusion. it was all helpful to the investment community in the information flow began to get better over time. i would also say, as things have unfolded, the approach of the nrc has taken, in my view, did a great deal to provide a degree of confidence to the financial community and to investors in the industry. they set up for established a near term task force that would focus very intensively on the lessons learned from the accident and it would produce a

set of recommendations quickly so that we would have a sense for what their requirements would likely come out of the accident, which was very helpful. it also served not to disrupt the ongoing nrc activities at the time, whether it was the oversight and supervision of operating plants or the ongoing activities regarding license extensions or new plant license applications. these were all very helpful to the financial community. >> the nuclear power community also has liability protections. if there were something of a fukushima-scale in this country, the utilities would not be on the hook for the hundreds of billions of dollars. >> that is correct. there were lots of questions from investors in the aftermath about the insurance arrangements in terms of public liability and property insurance protection. how would it all work?

and also, especially, what are the likely areas people would be focusing on docks would likely be the new requirements? will it disrupted the ongoing operation? what ongoing costs would utilities likely face as a result of the new requirements? >> the commission obviously went to work rather rapidly. how well are we prepared for this? i kept hearing reassuring statements from your technical staff that there was no looming disaster, but they did find a bunch of things that needed fixing. if i understand correctly, you have a five years to do this. how did that come about? that is puzzling. >> if you think about it, that five years gives us an opportunity to make all the changes that will need to be made. it is not mean we will start making changes right away, but some of the recommendations are to do a review and what we call

a walled-down. you put inspectors from the utility and from the nrc to take a look at certain things in the plant. that will not wait five years. some of what we need to do will take some analysis. that analysis will maybe take one year or two to figure out the right way to address the problems that came about from the accident at fukushima. once you know we need to do, then you need to go and make modifications to changes to the plans. for instance, you may need to change training for operators. that takes time, and we want to do it in the right way. five years is a good goal to get finished. the commission is moving forward and we recently approved a set of short-term actions to begin the process. some things will really take less time than others, but five years is a good window to capture a doll to move beyond

this. there will always be safety issues that come up and things we need to address and focus on. if we take more than five years, then we will not have the resources to deal with them as they come up. >> let's take a step back for a moment and talk about the condition of the plant right now. i am still getting confusing information. the japanese utilities are saying there is still radiation being produced, but the department of energy, the u.s. department, which has been doing surveys says there's no radiation selling down on the ground. to look up occurrence, there is a huge bite in late march and then basically moving data to a low level. is it out casting right now? >> we believe all reactors are at a temperature below the boiling point of water, which is a key milestone. that is a key piece of their

plan to really ultimately recover this site and decommision the area. there is a potential degree for some amount of steam to develop and that steam can come in principle, have some amount to very low levels of radioactivity in it. that would likely become are right now, the major source of any type of additional releases, but those are very small and are not doing anything that would pose a kind of real threat to public health and safety. there may be some degree of that still going on, but as the temperature continues to cool, that will eventually disappear altogether. >> circling back to some of the history, your most famous statement suggested there should be a 50-mile evacuation zone for the u.s. around the plants. was that based on radiation levels were your expectations

about what might go wrong? >> was a combination of different factors. as we said, we have very good experts at the nrc looking at scenarios and looking at the conditions of the plant and trying to define possibly what could happen from there. we did some very conservative analysis to get an estimate of what we thought could happen. some of the analysis showed there could be release of radiation, if it happened in the u.s., would force us to take those cautionary measures, like evaluate -- like evacuation's. that was based on the analysis based on what we saw the conditions of the reactor. there would be a potential for it to get worse. it would take us a long time to figure are exactly margaret those models were. -- how accurate those models were. in general, we have seen

potential areas of contamination at a fairly large distances. >> certainly not a 50-mile radius, but what does that mean for u.s. power plants? we certainly do not have a 50- mile evacuation zone around indian point or many of these other plants. heavyset a standard for yourself that you need now to replace -- replicate? >> the standard has been that we prepared to require them to evacuate or take other emergency measures. sometimes evacuation is not the best thing to do. all plants are required to prepare 10 miles outside of the plant for immediate emergency response. beyond that, they're required to prepare 50 miles for a longer term activity like dealing with radioactive materials that could get into the food supply and things like that.

all that is about preparation. there's nothing that says we were to ever have a an accident that we would not work but is still local governments, the utilities, to take the appropriate action. if anything, what they should tell the public is that the agency will always do what the best interest is in public health and safety. winning can to american citizens in japan come on we advise them to stay a little further away than the 15 miles. this is something we will be looking at as we go forward. should we make changes to these emergency planning zones? personally, i think it is something that is long overdue. the data and analysis that goes into this, there may even be a better way to do it, to have these kinds of pre-planned areas based on distances, but there may be a modern analysis tool

and we may even have a better way to do it than that. >> there are some places in the world there are marked -- react differently. germany said they will phase out nuclear power. other places around the world basically seem to be unperturbed by this, like china and india. >> there are very different reactions. some countries, particularly in northern europe, have made the decision that over a period of time they do want to phase out their existing plan. but in other parts of europe, france, the u.k., and in most parts of asia, countries still seem to be prepared to move forward. japan is a little on certain that the current time in terms of the future direction there. each country obviously needs to make their decision based upon

their situation, the available alternatives, and how comfortable they are with the continued operation of their nuclear plants. some have been more concerned and others more confident that their existing regulatory framework and the operating conformance of the plants, and their ability to apply the lessons learned from this accident, should enable them to continue operating. i personally feel that is the correct view. that is the view we are taking here and in the united states, and it is appropriate for our situation. sometimes of the decisions are being made around other available alternatives and the economic competitiveness of those alternatives, as well. >> let's talk about china. they are planning to expand their nuclear fleet fairly significantly. i take it that has not slowed down. the think they should take some lessons from here? >> i believe there was a pause

shortly after the accident. my sense is that china will look at further steps to strengthen and expand their regulatory framework. i think that is a prudent approach. it seems to be the approach that china is on to support the continued development program that they had in place. >> how you feel about that? we just witnessed this high- speed train accident moving maybe a little too fast. how does it make it feel? >> i'm not an expert on their nuclear program, but my sense is that their plants have a good operating record. my sense is that the ones in the early stages of construction, very similar to the ones in the pipeline for this country, the construction processes have gone very well. in the early stages, they have gone quite well. i do not see any reason might china cannot or should not go forward with their program.

i do think that having a very strong and effective regulatory program makes a great deal of sense. i think it is one of the strengths that we have in this country. in part, it came about as a result of the three mile accident. the nrc is better and more effective today in as a result of the steps and changes that were taken then. quite frankly, the industry in this country is stronger and better, as well. one thing that was done was the establishment of the institute for nuclear power operations. that is a very effective complement to what the nrc does. when the oil spill task force asked me if the energy industry should think about something like that, my reaction was yes. neither the nrc and more of that organization are infallible, but between the two, not a lot really falls through the cracks. in part, as a result of the

three mile, we have a good regulatory system in place. other countries, i think, can benefit from the same structure. >> i am not sure if we talked about this, but if this had happened in china instead of japan, how different would it have been in terms of information flow, technical assistance, and the rest? our relationships are very different. >> that is an interesting question. one area that may be different -- and i am not an expert, but we do have a very close knit community internationally. there's a lot of communication and discussion among regulators. i have certainly met with many of my counterparts and have attended several meetings and conferences over the last six or seven months dedicated to

learning lessons from this event and all major nuclear powers are represented in those meetings. i think there is certainly a sense of communication and cooperation among the regulatory bodies. >> including china? do you know your counterparts in china? >> absolutely. they are very much participating in these international forums. ,here's also the counterpart the world association of nuclear operators, trying to establish that communication among the that own andhose run these reactors. nuclear power is unique in that regard. maybe not unique, but may be similar to the aviation industry to some extent. it is very much an industry in which there's a lot of communication among the safety experts.

that is not saying whether right or wrong that an accident somewhere is an accident everywhere. >> it is a global industry. >> you saw that with fukushima. there is a tremendous interest everywhere about what this means. we're getting a lot of requests about what this means four u.s. reactors, and so i think there is an appreciation among safety professionals that there is a need to communicate and coordinate as well as mccann. >> the other example that comes to mind, unfortunately, is sars. i covered that want as well. i guess i drew the short straw. china was basically denying it was going on even though they had people who participated very much in the world health organization and the global health issues that they knew what was going on. they were doing stuff on the

ground, but the government was not sharing with the rest of the world until a certain breaking point when they finally said it was crazy and it opened up. all the sudden, it was a dramatic change. that is another potential scenario when looking at this. >> it is interesting, what was part of the challenge when chernobyl happened was that there was denial. the former soviet union was not letting out information. one of the first indications came from a power plant, i believe, in sweden where workers were going in and out and they are monitored to make sure they did not take contamination offsite and they were setting off some alarms. they determined that the source of that was not coming from within the plant. that was one of the first indicators that there was something going the international community after that came together to establish some treaties and international

binding instruments to better ensure that communication. that is one of the rules of the convention on nuclear safety which, interestingly enough, and they meet every three years and they have their meeting planned for this year. but it that took place after the fukushima dai-ichi event, give it a home in emphasis and give them an opportunity to better strengthen that communication. countries to report to the international standard agencies when they have accidents and their report them on a particular scale that is designed. these things all came about after trouble. jim alluded to the nrc making changes after three mile island. i think the international community and a regulators and nations made changes after chernobyl to address those issues of communication. this will definitely have lessons to learn and ways to improve what happened in japan,

but it is a much different situation than it was in the mid 1980's in terms of the international community recognizing the need to communicate. people will find out about them eventually. in this day and age, it is better to try to communicate early. >> the u.s. government rather quickly got equipment in to monitor. the first i saw about the plume of radioactivity going up in the northwest from fukushima dai- ichi was u.s. military carrying the department of energy hardware. i'm wondering to what extent the technology has changed. how much better is are monitoring? by the time it blasted across the pacific and people were picking it up in trace amounts on the west coast, how better equipped are we for understanding and being able to follow on event like this is likely to unfold?

>> we are well-equipped now. i cannot say if we are better or worse than we have been in the past, but it is one challenge we deal with. a lot of people were able to see indications because of reporting. on nuclear power plants report if they find a radioactive material, so we have very effective instruments to measure and the core of this type of material. one of the challenges, i think, we have is communicating the risk of that material. one of the cases here in the u.s. was that there was no real health consequence, but it was there so people had an interest. they're still dealing with some of that in tokyo. people are going out now, whether on the internet or wherever, but people are getting their own personal radiation measuring equipment of one type or another and they are identifying hot spots or areas within tokyo where there may be

radioactive material. most of these things have no real health consequences and have nothing to do with fukushima dai-ichi. to some extent, the challenges are greater because there is the availability of people to get equipment and information spreading because of the internet and other kinds of schools -- kinds of tools. it is a challenge to help the government to make sure we are communicating effectively about what is really going on. i think, in this day and age, it is very difficult to keep anything secret anymore >> we do not know what is really going on inside the plant, not that it is a secret, but just on noun. i'm not to bring jim -- is just on noun. whatyou're watching after happened with three mile island. >> information flow was a

problem during the three mile accident as well. communication with the operators and the plant, understanding what was actually going on, getting the right kind of devices and information to the people operating the some of the same problems existed during that accident as well. if you look at the precautions we took during the three mile iceman and look at the approach that the nrc is taking today, there are some interesting contrasts and lessons learned from what happened after gm my -- after tmi. the industry, the nrc, and congress put together a substantial amount of limits for the industry. there was little time to try to set priorities or decide how those changes should be implemented.

the approach was to said, these are the things that need to be done. i am going to do them immediately. also, the focus was on making those changes. as a result, u.s. and disruptions to the nrc activities and created operating challenges for the industry. i tend to believe that all of the post-three mile island changes were needed. some were more important than others. some were more complicated than others. one of the things i like about what the commission is doing and what the nrc staff has done so far is to say, let's try to look at the areas of agreement in which there is a fairly dramatic consensus between the industry and the nrc about the precise areas that need attention. there is very little disagreement about the areas. the approach has been to say,

let's try to look at the recommendations that came out of the task force and set some priorities. four things will have a fairly immediate impact, let's get after those right away. for the others that need some additional work for analysis, let's stage or sequence those changes. that is exactly the right approach. i wish we had taken more of that after tmi. we did not. we went through a difficult period. that is one of the reasons why i and others in the financial community are fairly comfortable about the approach that we are on a. there is an effort to make is manageable -- to make this manageable. to provide benefits to safety, get after those quickly, and spend a bit more time on changes that may need a little bit more analysis or are more complicated in terms of deciding what the right answer is. >> one of the issues is that the

public has an exaggerated idea about the hazards of radiation. we saw a run on iodine tablets on the east coast, which was not backed up by science at all. people are surprised to learn that even the survivors of hiroshima and nagasaki, there was an exodus and some cancer, but it was 10% or less of excess cancers. radiation has caught hold of the public imagination. for you to accept -- for you to assess public acceptance for finances, how safe is safe? do you say, for that the misconceptions, we will do what is technically right? how you get into the fact that people do not necessarily come to this with a completely rational and dispassionate set of facts and approaches? >> on the financial side, you are right. there is that componentry

analysis. -- there is that component to the analysis. most investors look at it as these assets are very long-lived assets. they are valuable assets. what we all want to know is, our plants safe to operate? are they likely to operate over an extended period of time reliably or not reliably? is regulatory framework that governs the rules for operation of those plants relatively stable and predictable and effective? and what is the cost profile of these assets going to be? are they going to be productive assets over their expected life time? if they are, nuclear plants, you look at the fleet that we have today. those represent about 10% of our generation in this country and about 20% of our actual

electricity production because of their high reliability. when the plants run, they run very well with a very predictable and stable cost profile that is very competitive with any of the other available alternatives. investors understand that. there is a challenge at looking at nuclear assets and saying, is something going to go wrong? how dependable are these assets going to be over a very long period of time, since these initially were given 40-year operating licenses and typically receive 20-year extensions. you are looking at an asset that has a useful life over a long period of time and an important effect in terms of the financial performance of the kind -- financial performance of the countries that own and operate them. we do look, as well, at public acceptance and regulatory acceptance because those are

factors that can affect long- term performance and availability of those plants. there are some parts of the country that have a more ambivalent view of nuclear power. not surprisingly, after fukushima, we have seen the concern level or degree of opposition increase in those parts of the country. there are countries that have ongoing license extension challenges under way in precisely those jurisdictions. that is a risk factor that applies to those companies that would not necessarily apply to companies that operate nuclear plants in other parts of the country. >> greg, i want to give that question to you. there were some serious technical issues that were identified. let's make sure that we are protected against blackouts and things like that. a loss of power for fukushima is what led to the meltdowns.

clearly, i am not trying to say these are not real problems that you have not identified, but what about the public perception? how did you deal with that in terms of what needs to happen at the power plant? >> fundamentally, we want to hear from the public, the stakeholders, everybody who is involved in this process. we are getting that information. when it comes to decision making, we base it on what we think is the best technical recommendation for policy. unfortunately, there is probably no right answer to any of these difficult questions about what is it safe enough and what is an appropriate level for safety. that is a policy question that will always be debated as long as we have anything that has potential to it. what we tried to do is establish our statutory mandate,

which is the way of congress and giving us the hard job of trying to figure out what that means. it does not roll off the tongue really easily. that is why the agency was created, to figure out what that means. how do we go on a day-by-day basis and implement that? it is still a very low probability event, to have something that catastrophic happened. it is still very unlikely in this industry, particularly in the united states. when it does happen, it is something you have to deal with. you have to go back and reexamine some things in the past that you looked at and thought, these are low-risk type of things. maybe it is not the best place to put our resources right now from a regulatory perspective or safety perspective. we may have moved on to something else.

when that happened, you have to go back and reexamined. that is a lot of what you are doing right now. the idea that when we lose all electrical power to a site, this is known to be a significant situation. it is a very difficult situation to deal with because of the way the plants operate. we have always had a requirement for dealing with the so-called walls of all electric power, which is visual. you lose all power, you lose all your lights. >> you also assume the power would come back quickly. that was one of the lessons. well, maybe not. >> if you lose electrical power, everybody has generators that generate electric power for the reactors. the station lockdown is a situation in which to lose all your electrical power and then your generators cannot work. what we have looked at his shortly is the culmination of

those factors. you're going to get some kind of power back in a couple of hours. in japan, that did not happen. the tsunami had the effect of disabling all of those electric power systems. that is one thing we need to go back and look at. in contrast, at three mile island, we are starting much farther along in the process. we do not have to create black regulations. what we really have to do is tweak that regulation a little bit. the starting point is a lot better for us and the work we have to do is a lot less to make those fixes. it is not a wholesale change to our approach. it is incorporating the new lessons and making what we have even better. >> i will start taking some questions. if you want to line up on the microphones, that would be great. if i remember correctly, after three mile island, not only were their safety improvements, but a

lot of enhancements in operating time. the plants were limping along and not doing so well. there was a tremendous improvement in the amount of time there were up and operating. was that related to the changes around three mile island, the safety-related changes? >> it was a combination of factors. some of the post-tmi changes complicated matters in. you were doing a lot of changes in plans while there were operating. the affected operating performance of the plants to some degree. it is fair to give -- it is fair to say that the operating performance in the industry has improved substantially from the time that i was on the commission until today. if you look at the plants today in terms of reliability performance, average capacity factors are about 90%. when you factor in refueling outages, that is about as good as you can get. you are operating at the upper

frontier of reliability performance. in addition, regulatory and safety performance has improved immeasurably as well. the frigate's the of the events that challenge equipment in the plants, the frequency of errors and mistakes, has come down dramatically from the 1980's. to a large extent, that is due ,o the industry's credit improved operating performance within the industry. it is a result of internal peer pressure, and the reviews that are done by inpo. it is a result of the effectiveness of the regulatory system. and finally getting past some of the changes and new requirements that were a complicating factor in terms of operating the plants. a bit of a combination of a number of factors. >> i will start taking questions. the rules for everyone -- please introduce yourself and ask a

assessing a question -- ask a succinct question. >> he task force concluded that nuclear plants need not be shut down what these lessons are studied and licensing may not be suspended for renewal reviews. beyond that, the nrc staff has agreed with the nuclear power industry in the nine states -- in the united states about the license renewals in rejecting contentions saying that the crucial lessons should be considered during these licensing hearings. why is that what is the problem with considering the ferguson lessons during the licensing hearings even if you do not have to shut the plants down while you are studying the lessons? >> because of the way these hearings were, i cannot comment specifically. i can talk in general about the

approach the commission has taken. we do have a process to go through these hearings were the commission serves as a last review of all of the decisions of these independent licensing boards. what the commission has said is that we think we have a good process in place to address these issues. if somebody can come in and make a good case that there is a specific issue in a particular proceeding in which the fukushima events will be relevant, they are free to make that argument. that is largely what the commission said. to some extent, it is about doing this on a case-by-case basis. at the same time, which will be going through and doing our follow up activities, which will likely require modifications and changes.

the commission has recently agreed with a subset of negotiations to move forward on quickly. that is a strong tool that we use with the plants to get them to make changes right away. that will apply largely to an existing plant as it would to a plan going for a license review or a plant that may be undergoing a new licensing review. there is a way to do it and atoll for all of it. the crucial piece comes down to how we view these changes. there are two ways we can look at changes and modifications to plants. one is a bedrock or foundation of safety, what we would call an adequate protection issue. if it is one of these issues for safety, it is going to apply to every plant. if it is an enhancement or modification, that is in the

category of things that would be nice to do, but may not be justifiable for every plant in this country. then it would potentially applied differently to different facilities carry it right now, the approach the staff has recommended is we look at all of these things as a kind of redefining what we think are the fundamental things that are important for safety. if that is the case, it will apply to everybody equally regardless of where you are in your licensing review process. >> my question is, would it be accurate to say that no one has died as a result of explosions -- of radiation in fukushima? can you assure that no one will die as a result to exposure to radiation in the future? >> the one to take out one? -- do you want to take that one?

[laughter] >> we know of few fatalities due to radiation exposure. a few workers were killed at the plans because they were performing work and when a tsunami hit, they lost their lives. there are some workers who have received levels of radiation that are higher than we normally allow in this country for normal operations. in an emergency situation, the kind of exposure people could be exposed to. none of those would present an immediate threat to their life. based on what we know from the indications that we have right now. there were a few workers that, early on, were exposed to high levels of radiation through contact with contaminated water. nothing that is going to lead to an immediate loss of life

because of that radiation exposure. these will be people that will be monitored and it is a very important principle in the nuclear industry that we put an important emphasis on monitoring people's exposure to radiation. whenever i go into a power play, i carry with me instruments that will monitor my radiation exposure. i get a report of that every year. in general, most people are going to be exposed to more radiation and medical diagnostic procedures than they would from a nuclear power plant. right now, we do not see any evidence of exposures that will likely lead to immediate kinds of loss of life for these kinds of things. it is something that will be monitored as people go forth to see if there are any specific

health effects that can be tied to exposure that people are getting. >> i can add a little bit to that. there has obviously been in excess -- there has obviously been excess radiation exposure. it would raise their risk of cancer too small to even see. cancer is a common disease in. i have seen a study that says if everyone was outside during the time of the accident, within the perimeter, there may be a couple of hundred extra cancer cases. had they are highly uncertain. it is not clear if it would ever be measurable. one more thing about the people who were exposed at the plant. there was a period of time where they did not have enough of these radiation monitors to go around during the early days of the accident. some of the people went and and their crew chief had a radiation monitor but every person did not. there is some lingering question about, we will never know what

those people were exposed to. that is an asterisk at this point. maybe there's more to come on that. thank you for your question. >> i am wondering about the storage on site of nuclear fuel rods. if the nrc has changed position as a result of the accident we have seen there. >> right now, the nrc is focused on making sure that however spent fuel exists, it can be safe and secure. plants use a combination of keeping that fueling in pools of water, large tanks of water, or in the dry storage. meaning you take them out of the pools and put them in concrete casks. both of those ways of storing

spent fuel are things that will be safety -- that will be safe for a long period of time. one of the things we're looking at with fukushima is making sure we are properly monitoring and ensuring the integrity of these spent fuel pools. there was a lot of questions in the aftermath of fukushima of what was really happening with the spent fuel pools, particularly after the hydrogen explosions. there was concern that the integrity of the polls might have been lost. those are some of the things we have been living at. by a large, the industry -- the agency believes it can be secured securely for at least 100 years. we are looking out what the finite lifetime for these current methodologies is. that is our approach to it. fundamentally, the decision

about where nuclear waste goes or what is done with it is a decision for the industry, for the department of energy, for congress, and others. the nrc has the responsibility, if a particular path is put forward, to the licensing review and the licensing work that would be associated with a particular facility. >> there is a backs or their that we will skip over for the time being. you raised the public alarm that one of the reactors may have lost its cooling fluid. why did you think that was the case and when did you reassert -- when did you reassure yourself that that was not the case? >> we had an indication of what could be going on in the facilities. some data and we were getting indicated -- we were not seeing the kind of things we would expect to be seeing if there was a pool full of cold water.

in terms of the practical impact, what that meant is there would be large radiation deals at the site. which we were seeing. a combination of material that had been dispersed and potentially some radiation coming from the polls themselves. the practical impact of that was -- the challenge that it presented for dealing with the site and dealing with the kinds of things that were necessary to continue to the water into the reactor cores to ensure that would stay cool. fairly early on, there were efforts made to the water into the polls because, regardless of what was going on, we knew what was evaporated. to try to reach those and ensure that they had sufficient water to prevent anything more serious from happening. in terms of -- there was not a challenge to the integrity of

the one cool. i think it was the fourth pool. i do not recall exactly when that was. they did some measurements or got some cameras in and look at the fuel ed did not -- and it did not appear that the fuel had been damaged at all. >> does this issue about the fuel pools affect the way you look at the industry and what needs to be done? is there a big chunk of money that need to be spent on putting things in dry casks? >> yes. better instrumentation for the spent fuel pools and ultimately, better ways to make sure that you can get water into the pools. those are all fukushima-related issues. there is a broader investor

concern around the management of spent fuel. and the government's inability to fulfill its contractual obligations. if you go back for the nuclear waste policy act of 1984, the government took legal responsibility to come up with a solution for the waste problem that was supposed to be the construction of a geologically repository. the industry began to pay a charge of 1 million per kilowatt hour of electricity generated by nuclear plants to fund the development of the repository. the objective was that repository would be in operation by 1996. obviously, that has not happened. at this point, we have the president's commission looking at what should be done about the program, how should it be focused going forward, what should be plan for developing a solution for managing spent fuel

on a long-term basis? on the interim, utilities deal with the problem by storing fuel in the reactor polls and using dry cask storage. the industry has been able to recover the incremental cost of spent fuel management from the federal government because the federal government failed to meet its contractual obligation. that situation will continue. ultimately, the financial community and investors all want to see the government be in a position to be able to fulfil its responsibility. the responsibility of the government was to take title ownership and responsibility for the spent fuel. hopefully, the president's blue ribbon commission will come out with a final report and a set of recommendations that will lead to a progression of steps where the government can fulfil its obligations. there is a fair degree of

unanimity among the financial community, the industry, and the state regulators to have been paying the fee that we should get on with this and the government should come up with a workable plan for managing spent fuel. >> did the accident in japan affect that discussion? >> not too much. we have heard the statements that greg just made. few can be managed in a dry cask storage or in spent fuel schools. if there are additional steps that are necessary to ensure that is the case, those steps are likely to be taken and, quite frankly, those costs are likely to be borne by the federal government. >> it would seem like there might be a little pressure to get it all site. -- off-site.

you want to put it someplace safe and get it out of the way. >> my personal view is that is exactly right. we ought to move to some interim storage facilities where the government can start to take title and responsibility for spent fuel and where spent fuel can be stored on a longer-term basis, in an engineered facility, before ultimately moving to a repository. i think that is the right approach. a few of those regional facilities owned and operated by the federal government would be a step forward. it would begin to move fuel away from the platts, which is beneficial for a variety of reasons. >> i am a course on the with a japanese -- i am a correspondent with a japanese tv network.

i measured radiation around fukushima in april. my neighbor in tokyo is an american man. she has a daughter and she is always concerned about her child. what you think of the japanese approach to receive radiation each year? is this safe? >> two people were not following the story of the closely, one thing that happened after the accident was the government relaxed its exposure requirements, particularly for children in the area. i believe that ultimately on did that. it created quite a stir at the time. can you give us the back story on that? >> these are complicated

decisions, without a doubt. anytime you do with a significant accident like you have with fukushima, when you're dealing with radiation risks, you are dealing with a statistical risk. it is a chance of something happening later. the levels of radiation exposure we are talking about are not radiation levels we know are one to cause immediate harm to anyone. they have the potential to increase the risks of other kinds of diseases. it is always a difficult tradeoff to figure out how to balance those with some of the other risks and challenges that may be involved with any person. the vacuity someone from their home is a difficult thing to do. -- evaluating someone from their home is a difficult thing to do. there are challenges with the weather and you lose power for a week. it is not easy. imagine being taken out of your home completely and being told

you cannot go back for an extended period of time. that is a difficult thing for any government to do. when you're dealing with these levels of radiation exposure, there are different factors that go into the decision. i've not want to comment specifically on what they did in japan. just to check my perspective -- just to share my perspective that none of these decisions are easy. i do not know the data they're looking at. if i did my conversion right, it is 2 rem. that is on the order of what you might get for a cat scan. to give you a sense of what that exposure is. that is something that people are exposed to in this country. the international experts who look at radiation exposure will tie the children are more susceptible than adults.

2 rem is what we allow -- what workers in the nuclear industry are allowed to receive as part of their offer exposure. the goal is to have it as low as possible. but that is a level that they are allowed. for a short period of time for a child to be exposed to that, there may be factors that would weigh to allow for a short period of time that that is acceptable. not having been in the position to make that, i cannot comment on whether that was the right decision or not. there were a lot of factors involved, a lot that goes into that. if we were ever to have an incident in the united states, we would be faced with those challenges as well. most are in the aftermath of the accident. in the immediate time, we have been very well-established standards and know exactly what we would do. it is in the three, four, five-

week period, when you have to weigh a lot of different factors. you may have a short-term exposure to a higher radiation levels. as a result, you will be able to stay in your home and the overall health effects of being in your home, living and trying to recover and dealing with the emotional impact of an incident like that. these decisions would be very difficult in the united states, for short. >> do you think we would relax standards, health and safety standards, under certain circumstances? >> when we get past that immediate phase, we do not have definitive standards on what is acceptable levels. it is something that a lot of different agencies have strong opinions about what the right answer is. when we get to that phase, we are no longer talking about

having definitive standards. the definitive standards come about in that early phase of what you do immediately to prevent acute exposures. as you get into the later phases, it really is more of a collaborative process of determining what is the right answer for public health. that is not going to be easy. it will be a difficult decision. it is never an easy thing to sell somebody that you may no longer be able to go back to your home. some people in japan have been told that your area will be an area that you can never return to. some of those exposure levels are not necessarily very large. they may increase your risk of cancer. that is a difficult decision for the government to say, you can never go back to your home. you have to find a new home, new community, noon livelihood, new life. it is a very difficult decision when you get into that phase.

you are talking about hypothetical -- not hypothetical, but probabilities of cancers. and probabilities of diseases. there is no definite disease that we can set your one to get. we can set your likelihood increases. but we can definitely tell you you will not go back to your home and you never see your neighbors again. things like that. it is a difficult decision. >> i would like to think that the government has established some overall standards that they are not going to -- it is not want to be a situation of thing. on the other hand, what happens if someone has a house that has high radon levels and they may get significantly more radiation from that. the government tells them if you have to move out of your house because you have to -- you're being exposed to high levels of radon gas.

>> i cannot say there is a right answer here. the approach that had been established is what we would do to establish a process to find out that answer. we would try and clean up as much as we could. and then see if the levels are at a low enough level that the risk is reduced enough that it would be ok for people to go back. it is hard to say, at the outset, that you would -- that you can pinpoint a number and say that is the number and that is where we are. it is about trade-offs and what are the right trade offs. >> i remember the discussion with 30 bombs, were you may have permanent low-level of contamination of a downtown area or something. then what do you do? we will take another question. >> i was recently at the brc meeting here.

like the previous questioner from this microphone, i was concerned about spent fuel issues. to follow on to his question, which really took my first question, it appears to me that at fukushima, there were a couple of issues that are not normal to the spent fuel. you had at least it two reactors that had to be taken out of commission because of the accidental damage that had happened. that meant that their status for radioactivity was different than what has been planned for the normal life cycle of fuel rods. that raises two scientific questions. how you get those highly energetic rods out of there are

original operating positions and safely into a spent fuel pool? and you need different protocol to deal with this different type of fuel rod than what you planned for? >> i will take the second part of the question first. that is the easier part. the short answer is yes. there is going to have to be some special way to deal with this fuel. a similar problem occurred with three mile island. the first part about how to do it is what people are looking at right now. the first thing is -- when you're talking about it, there are a few issues. the first is the fuel that is in the court itself. that you as likely change its form and shape as a result of the lack of water. and then you have the fuel in the polls themselves. right now there is an effort to move the fuel out of the pools

and into a difference -- they have a large pool their. they will move some of it into dry casks and some of it into a pool that have to store fuel. that is an easier proposition. the goal is to do that because ultimately, the buildings are not going to be preserved or maintained. you want to get that out. getting the fuel that has been damaged in the reactor cores out is going to be a difficult activity that will take some time. it will require a lot of engineers and scientists to come up with creative ways to do that. it does present challenges because of the high radiation levels. at this point, i do not think anybody as an answer. there are -- there is experience with these types of things dealing with highly radioactive materials. it will be unique to this site

and to the reactors. those are things people will not know for some time. nobody knows what the condition of the fuel is. it is likely that it is melted. but to what extent or condition is in right now, nobody really knows. we can hypothesize and do analyses, but until you get into the court itself, you will not know. it was largely the same at three mile island. >> it took a long time to figure out what had gone on at three mile island. it was about five years. did that time help you? what is in the spent fuel pools may be five years. nobody wants to sit and wait. if you do, obviously, that you'll becomes easier to handle. a loses its thermal heat -- it loses its thermal heat. >> for tmi, it took a

considerable amount of time. you had to remove the damaged fuel from the reactor vessel. the same thing will be true here as well. >> i have read that the japanese decided not to worry about robotics because it was part of their hubris that they thought nothing would go wrong. they did not have to worry about robots. are there better robots around the world that can be put into action to work on these problems when it finally gets cool enough for them to get close to it? >> there will likely be some sort of remote capability. that expertise lies beyond the nrc. our friends at the department of energy have experience with that and other places in the u.s. and the world. there is expertise in dealing with these types of challenges. it will happen with some kind of remote operation. right now, it is hard to speculate. we do not have a good sense of

what condition the fuel is, how it would be accessible, where it is, have some moved outside of the vessel? we do not know. >> some of them are kind of messed up. it is not typically a matter of -- it is not simply a matter of proceeding. debris has fallen on it and it is kind of a mess. some are suspended significantly off the ground so you can fix up up off the floor and move it across while leaving it under water. that is for earthquake design. basically, these schools war on concrete stilts. -- these pools were up on conc rete stilts.

>> the tools are designed to withstand seismic events and be able to maintain their integrity. that appears to be the case in fukushima. the damage to the pools appears to have come more from the hydrogen disclosures, which collect in the building that is more readily accessible. if you can better deal with that hydrogen, you can reduce the likelihood of the pool is losing their integrity. but they are very robust structures. >> you are still worried about them. >> absolutely. again, looking forward, it is something we will look at. some of the things the task force has recommended is making sure we have -- making sure we get water in there and have good instrumentation. we are also like to look at

whether we should require more fuel to be moved from the polls into dry casks. it can only be done after the fuel has thermal and cooled. it is physically hot from a temperature perspective. after that, it is possible there will be more of a benefit to move into dry casks. we do not know. the data cannot really decide. it is almost like a photo finish. you have to look very closely to figure out which of these is safer. when they learn something from fukushima that tell us that it is much better to move into dry cask storage than keep it in pools. and we would put in place the regulations to do that if we need to. >> some people do not think it is a photo finish. let's take a question from over here. >> i would like to ask a few questions. the first question is, i have

read in the media that if they would have been more speedy incoming sea water on the reactors, the scope might have been mitigated. is this the case? if that means that we do know how to deal with a long station blackout with confidence, we could mitigate the disaster. my second question is, i understand there is controversy about whether low levels of radiation actually increase once susceptibility to cancer. i'm wondering if the aftermath of fukushima has the possibility to settle that question? >> in terms of -- remind me the first question. >> the first question was, is it true that -- >> the seawater, right.

we will have to analyze the situation. there was discussion, and i have not seen all of the interactions that the japanese utilities had with the government about the time it took for the sea water injection to happen, but i am not in a position to say if we had done that earlier, would things have been different? the most important thing in situations like this is getting water into the reactor core. when you lose power, you lose the ability to circulate water and move it around. the conditions of the site were very difficult and challenging. it was difficult to know exactly what was going on and what was happening. it is hard to say right now if that had happened earlier, would this have happened. i do not know. people will spend a lot of time and money trying to figure it

out. we have sophisticated modeling tools that can model how these reactor cores behave in certain scenarios. one of the first scenario is people will run is see water injection. when you take all of the salt water, you are putting this water in and it evaporates. you are going to have to release some amount of radiation eventually. otherwise, you build up too much pressure and have the kind of failures that appears to happen. with some of these pressure boundaries being failed. new experiences phenomenon that if you boil water, you can blow up stuff. if you have attar -- if you have had a humidifier, that is what happens. all of the salt that is being put in is still in there.

before they are able to use the process that they have now, all of that water that is being pumped in with salt and the water was evaporation and leaving that's all behind, it is not clear what impact that would have. there was a possibility that the assault would -- that salt could block the ability of water to flow into the corps and get to the places where it is needed to cool. it is hard to speculate whether or not that would have made things better. it is something that people will look at. the second part of the question -- question whether this will give us information about the ability to say anything about health risks all low levels of radiation. >> i do not think so. people who are in these communities, we do not have good data on what their actual exposures were.

we have good indications of what the ground deposition was and how much radiation was there. we do not know that if you were inside your home, did you go outside? it is very hard to say what the doses were to the individuals. richard mentioned, in the early days, there were challenges might -- there were judges getting radiation monitoring equipment to all of the workers. it may not be difficult for those workers. more than likely the workers will provide information. the best source of information for low levels of exposure is in really in the united states and it is the radiation workers, the professionals who work in the industry. i believe there are efforts right now -- no one has mind this data and done at systematic studies of health impact. it has been done with workers,

radiation workers, nuclear energy workers in other countries. never, to my knowledge, in the united states. there is going to be an effort to do a study like that. that is a study that can give us information. we have very active records of people exposures. as richard said, when you're dealing with these exposure levels, there are so many levels that can affect instances of cancer. in some cases, we do not even know what causes those things. if we do not have accurate records of the doses, it is unlikely that you have any reasonable statistics come out of it. but the u.s. data is actually very comprehensive and very large samples of individuals. >> one last question. make it short because we need a short answer. >> about one month ago, the

japanese ambassador in washington presented the fukushima revenge. he showed discussed without a were recovering from head. i asked him, out in the scenario in fukushima compared to when the united states dropped two nuclear bombs in hiroshima and nagasaki. that was a bigger disaster. i understand that it is good to discuss with waste, and but what happens with the war's still going on and the way we see the military focus in on facilities, there could be nuclear plant impacted and destroyed. we had a tsunami, and that was far more, that could break the nuclear core. we have solutions in that case?

>> these structures are robust structures. while there was damage to a lot of the of similar equipment and some of the diesel generators were lost by the tsunami, the basic structures did survive the tsunami. and the earthquake. again, this is the limited knowledge we have to. there may be some failures that we identify later, but they stood, so to speak. i'm sure you have seen some of the pictures of this massive wave coming and hitting the structure. it is a very challenging force on those buildings. for the most part, the basic structures were able to withstand that. there are robust in designed. you cannot design every facility to deal with every kind of weapon or structure that is out there. ultimately, we are a civilian agency. we make sure we do what we can to ensure that the right kind of

steps are taken to protect people and we will get those things that we think are most effective to do that. >> thank you very much. let's give a warm thank you to our guests. [applause] >> and less like our moderator, to carry it he did a great job -- and let's think our moderator, too. he did a great job. [applause] and we have another coming up. josh rosenthal will be joining us, as is our moderator. there will be other speakers joining us. if you find that interesting, please join us. i would like to close by thanking our sponsors. exxon-mobil, a georgetown

university, and aaas for letting us use their facilities. thank you very much. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2011] journal" continues. host: we are back with ylan mui from "the washington post" to talk about consumer confidence and holiday spending. the national retail federation has this chart, the percentage of people plan to shark -- shot a black friday did you see it going up in 2011 from 2010 and

from 2009. it has continued to go up since 2008. what do black friday weekend, cyber mony, what does it do for the overall economy? guest: the holiday season is very important because consumers account for 70% of total gdp in one way or another. so, a holiday season but the biggest time for consumer spending, and therefore it is really important for the economy. mastercard estimating that this weekend will top20 billion in retail sales. that could be a big boost to the economy and certainly big numbers we are seeing for the holiday season. host: consumer confidence in november 2011, it rose to 64%, the highest since june, and 60.9% was the number in october. what does that say heading into the holiday shopping season? guest: a little bit of mixed messages.

the 64 number forhe index is a little better than it has been but certainly -- it is still sort of a depressed number overall. what we are findg is consumers are sort of cautious, but that they are waiting for the other shoe to drop in the economy. they have seen things not appreciably worse, but we are waiting to see what happens with the super committee, the payroll tax, unemployment benefits. on the one hand we are being sort of cautious but on the other hand we are managing to eke out gains in sales, retail sales increase in the past 16 months in a row. people are still spending money but in the back of the mind they are thinking we need to hold on to a little savings in case something goes wrong. host: according to the national retail federation, this is what consumers are planning to spend. what types of this -- give spared consumers planning to buy this season? the red is 2011. food and candy, a little more than 30%.

personal care and beauty, between 20-1/3. a gift cards and six tickets, only -- almost 60%. the big-ticket items, books, c. d.'s, video, video games, toys, clothing and or accessories. consumer electronics, consumer- related, kind of a low number, 30% to 40%. what do you ke? guest: there are some blockbuster items. certainly people were lining outside of best buy this morning for $200.42-inch flat screen tv but at the se me you are seeing gift cards. there are a number of items that have become increasingly pular. host: what does itean that people by -- what sort of items are today, have they been buying leading up to the holiday season, versus what they would buy if we were not just coming out of recession? guest: i think what you are seeing is folks are buying more with a plan.

we had many reporters out in the we hours of the morning talking to folks who were in line waiting for those blockbuster items. and they've got a strategy. they are not out there just looking to browse. they are out there with a plan, with a budget, and also making sure that they are not going to break the bank. so, i think you're seeing people shop with a plan, within a pre- orined budget rather than the impulse shopping. host: how do they plan to pay for these kids? if you look at the national retail federation, debit card, check card, is in red and it looks like it is on the rise reverses a check and credit card. here is the blue line, credit card. so, people plan to pay for it right away. guest: with cash. we have seen it through while the recovery, that folks are de- leveraging, shying away from creditards, both because it is more difficult in order to alify and also because people

are wary of adding extra credit. we find a total revolving credit, credit card debt, declined throughout the past -- i believe it is the past two or three years -- and finding debit card use is on the rise. people are paying with cash and may have to dig into their savings a little bit today with cash. but they would rather do that. host: what do peoples savings look like compared to years in the past? guest: compared to the 1970's and 1980's, a very low level. but compared to where we were right before the recession and financial crisis hit, we are at elevated levels. right now the personal savings rate is 3.5%. a little bit better than it was the previous month, but it is not at a 5% level we had been at immediately following the recession. what it is telling me is that folks are having to spend a little more money may be unnecessary items, maybe some pent-up demand at that people are willing to dig into their savings in order to purchase,

but that ty are still trying to maintain the buffer, again, if something goes wrong. host: ylan mui is here to talk about consumer confidence and holiday spending. we divided theine below the differently because we want to know your plans. let us know what you plan to do this holiday season and what you think it does for the economy. a piece in "the new york times" op ed pages.

guest: there is something called the paradox of thrift. that means for the economy as a whole, it is encouraging for consumers to people put their wallets away, that means the economy slows, it means -- you saw after the 2008 holiday season when hundreds of thousands were laid off. there is real world impacts. however, t paradox on a personal level, it is a very irresponsible thing to do. certainly, the level of debt we were carrying during the economic boom was not sustainable and it is something we are paying for now. so, balancing those two things

is very difficult. one thing that has been promoted and we might be seen in the future is that the american consumer may no longer be the driver for the global economy. we are seeing consumers and asia increased their spending, the rise of the middle-class is in somef these emerging markets li brazil, india, and china. those countries may be able to sort of pick up some of the purchasing power we have left off and wheat could begin creating products to sell overseas. host: you touched on this and little bit but temporary workers in holiday season. according to careerbuilder.com, 30% plan to hire extra seasonal help, one-third plan to permanently higher after the holidays and 53% plan to pay more than $10 an houand 14% plan to pay more than $14 an ho and the big retailers are posting nine out of 10 jobs. how does this compare to past years?

guest: retail hiring was a little better this year than it was in previous -- well, i will say last year because it was really bad in 2008 and in 2009. it is a little better. i think the key thing is retell often is a job safety net for many people. it can be a second job, it may be a job they turned to if they lost a different type of job. so it is an important industry for folks for many different reasons. i think the big question would be how many of those stay on after the holiday season because temporary employment is an issue. host: will we see a change in the unemployment rate based on temporary hiri? guest: i think not just an retell but overall. a lot of companies are hedging their bets and maybe taking on extra workers to meet current demand but are cautious on making a long-term permanent commitment to workers. so, one thing you are seeing is company's overall may be transitioning to a hiring temporary workers, contract

workers, instead of hiring people full time. that can lower the unemployment rate temporarily, but it remas to be seen how long those workers remain employed? host: black friday, cyber monday, and then small business saturday with to the obama administration endorsed with a statement put out november 23, saying "my administration is committed to helping small businesses drive the economy toward recovery and long term growth." can you compare those three different efforts and what the expectations are for them? guest: small business saturday has grown a lot but it is still very new. it was created last year by american express to highlight local businesses. there are saying we will leave black friday to the big box guys, we know we can not compete with their flat screen tvs, but we will take a separate day for ourselves. we have seen it grow.

it is anticipated 89 million people will small -- shot at small business saturday at the smaller retailers. and for businesses over designated last year, sales were up 28%. that are seeing a big response. it is something growing but ill relatively new. host: what about cyber monday? guest: it is no longer just monday. it is cyber week now. retailers are rolling out deals from sunday through friday. somelready started things getting day rolling out deals. many more online retailers participating in cer monday. but really we are seeing it extended for the entire weekend -- week after thanksgiving. caller: i'm going to be spending less. my income isbout 75% less than what was a couple of years ago. host: you have taken a real

hit. caller: yes. in the statistics come they are not including self-employed people. host: let's take that point. guest: it is a variable. that is part of the challenge of being self-employed. you don't always have that kind of security. about two. % this holiday season -- about 2.8% -- tt is not a big number. 2.8% is a number that is cautiously optimistic. there will make that number not a blockbuster. host we have a tweet.

matt in washington, c.cpland.c., plans to spend the same. caller: i have no money, same as last year. i almost went out to get the $200 tv. i spoke with my cousins. they said you should buy it online. i decideto be more of it planning spender this year. small business a center but i'm going to be at small siness saturday tomorrow. host: you might be interested in the business section of "the new york times." decemberuntil early

that prices are likely to be the lowest for electronics. stores offer t steepest discounts on the weeks after thanksgiving to unload inventory. that is according to some who tracks deals. guest: the blockbuster deals are very limited. there are 50 of those 42-inch $200 tv's at best buy. their work00 people online -- there were 200 people want hoping to get that deal. so you buy other things to make up for that. host: are those other things on

sale? guest: they may be or they may not be. host: seattle, washington, mike. do you plan to spend less? caller: yes. withy current occupation in sales, we do not necessarily know how long our commissions is going to go on with the industry. it sounds like when you take the pulse across the country that there are so many people that are unemployed, not working that well like to be spending and they will be spending less. it is better for us to be more conservative without spending, spending less. we may in a sense get the

children and high ticket item, one or two, as opposed to what we have done in the past where we would stock up and give them a gift for being good in school but what also stocked up inside the house for christmas. think about black friday, go out and buy christmas gifts. but those gives away -- put those givefts away. we have decided to cut down on the number of guests and focus on those electronic gifts. heart goes out to those that were in a position where maybe they hav fat a house where they

were foreclosed on and they're looking for -- or maybe they was had a house that foreclosed on. we will talk with our children about, let's go out and shop for some of the other children that may not have what they should. i look at this country. we are all in one big melting pot. it will take all of us to stick together. i have held back from doing the major shopping -- our income is pretty good. with the occupy wall street movement, they are suffering. it will take all of cost to look out for each other and to move this country forward. host: that was mike in seattle,

washington. we have eight tweet from li -- we have a tweet from liz. guest: tt does happen. it is a pain for consumers. the popularity of gift cards has cut down on the number of returns. and one of the most giving gifts. host: there is a speech today in "the washington post." companies like groupon offer black friday and cyber monday sales. you omamay buy something for $25 that has a $50 value.

guest: the shopper gets plenty of gift to go around. some of the other retailers are mimicking this. safeway has daily deals on different food products. the success of groupon has influenced the way retailers are offering their deals on line as well. host: marty is next and plans to spend more. caller: i think christmas is for the kids. i remember growing up, we would always look forward to it. i want to pass that down to my children. you're one of my favorite hostesses. host: people are saying we will spend the same or less.

marty was in the minority. guest: they may end up spending more than they had planned. host: don planto spend the same. caller: good morning. happy thanksgiving. i will spend about the same. i found out that moderation is kind of a key factor, with everything -- spending, economics. sometimes we spend a little ittle less. a l host: if don and other spend the same, then what are the expectations for the holay season? guest: 2.8% increase.

host: is that enough to help retails for the rest of the year? guest: the holiday season accounts for about 20% of total retail sales. there'll except that because it it is a positive increase. is it a number that will scare away all thoughts of a double- dip recession? host: "the baltimore sun" reporting prices at low point for lcd tv's. any thoughts on this? guest: lcd tv prices are important. retailers relied on them for extra margin. now prices have gone so low that retailers cannot make money

off of them. the margins are quite small. this has been a concern for best buy and circuit city, when it was still around. next.laue is caller: good morning. i plan on spending next. the last couple of years, i have made my christmas presents. i even madmy own wrapping paper by using a can of gold spray paint and newspaper. i was frugal. host: adam plans to spend the same. caller: good morning. we are both retired. we are elderly.

we are the only ones who have been hurt by the administration. we got no increase in our income at all er the past two years. we'll have to spend less. i did not understand this administration. we are the only ones who w have been put at zero increase. host: what sort of things are you holding off spending your money on compared to the past? caller: it is all different things. we have granhildren and we spent a lot of money on them and lovily to that. our income has been frozen for the past two years.

we are the ones that the administration said they are trying to helphe elderly. host: i asked the question because there is a piece on holding off on a hair cut to buy a new car. caller: that is a kind of ridiculous. host: the spending habits will be scrutinized for clues into one of the most important drivers of the u.s. economy. caller: i understand all that. how can we spend more to try to help the economy when we have less?

have to live within our income. host: i understand your point. i wonder if you're holding back on things like hair cuts. guest: we pay people to pick up the dog poop in our backyard and to fix our clothes. sales of basic sewing kits either doubled and tripled because people were trying to mend their own clothes or often. caller: good morning. i was laid off in june. so this year we're spending less. we're shopping online. you cannot pay me to go in a store. my 14-year-old is a techie.

we have a budget. he made a purchase last night. .hat's it for the holiday i'm thankful we are able to keep our home and my car intact. it's the longest i have been laid-off. i know my father and mother and sister and brother in the military -- we are just ateful to be in good health, smiling, and i'm doing well. guest: one thing we've been tracking is a tale of two christmases. the recovery has not been even across the economic spectrum. the wealthier consumers have recovered and have returned to spding mh more quickly than

shoppers at the lower end of the spectrum. walmart brought back layaway. they eliminated the program and brought back because they found their customers were asking for a it. so they brought the program back and planning for to be successful. they have stolen toy share from target. host: we have an e-mail fro joe. guest: the money being spent -- we spend it on one thing or another. the issue is whether we spend it at all or just hold onto it. if we spend it, that keeps stores open longer.

they hire more people. that is how thchain works. host: you said consumer spending is about 70% of our economy. compare that to other countries. guest: it is becoming a growing part of the economy in emerging markets like brazil and china. the american consumer has been the driver of the american economy and of the global economy, as well, throug the dement increase for addional services. it is paying for it truckdrivers who brings the merchandise to and from the store and the gasoline that fuels the truck. host: as more people go to online to shop, does that mean overall less jobs?

guest: i think that is on clear. you have folks in warehouses of packing all those boxes to ship them out. online sales are an important part. they look at them as all working together to increase sales. online sales expected to grow 15% this year. overall sales are a bit moderate. host: scott is next any plans to spend less. you are on the air. caller: i plan to spend less because i do not have it. hello? i just don't have it. i do not have the money. you in worker -- union worker.

i like the walmart layaway plan. lower grade of food. to do just what it is -- it is just what it is. host: when diyou go to walmart? we go on to ohio. do you plan to spend the same? caller: i'm saving more money by spending the same. you'll have more. if you spend a lot of money, you will be broke. host: there was a story between the gap and the middle class and affluent has become apparent on the shopping weekends because the target, walmart is targeting their consumers that have limited dollars, but

nordstrom, my's open up but very little sales to target their more affluent shoppers. guest: nor sherm's says there will not celebrate christmas before thanksgiving -- nordstrom's says they will not celebrate christmas before thanksgiving. they will celebrate christmas after thanksgiving and give a thanksgiving its due. neiman-marcus has the holiday wish catalog that has extreme guesifts that can cost millions of dollars. you're having a real division in the economy right now. part of a problem ishat incomes have remained stagnant. there's not been wage growth.

they are getting the same paycheck as before. that is something that weighs down on consumers. host: have we seen the benefit of the payroll tax reduce? has it shown up in consumer spending? guest: yes or no. if we do not have a,hings would be worse. arrived, we had higher commodity prices. part of that benit was cleaneaten up. now, if we don't have the payroll tax cut, would thatave made it much more difficult? obably so. next year's peril tax

>> tomorrow, a look at the super committee possibility to reach a deal. later, a look at a wall street journal op-ed on whether the u.s. education system is to blame for the lack of skilled workers for companies to hire. that is live at 7:00 a.m. eastern here on c-span. the official white house christmas tree are arrived at the white house today. first lady michelle obama and her children got a look as it arrived. the tree from wisconsin will be decorated to honor military families.

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>> take care, happy holidays. bring her in. hold are up. -- hold her up.