the of structural reforms and a transition to a consumer driven system, medicare as we know it is simply not sustainable. some democrats including the white house press secretary a couple of days ago, and senator chuck schumer, have noted that i gave democrats within the super committee credit for putting in, reforms on the table. i did. and i think it is good to put entitlements on the table, because the american future depends on republicans and democrats coming together to address the issue. what senator schumer and the white house press secretary failed to mention congenially -- congenially is that i talked about $1 trillion over the next decade, but it is critical for us to come together to address the entitlement crisis, and part of the reason we have a crisis is that congress long ago chose

to put these programs on autopilot. in other words, the united states chose, and it is the only country in the world that i can find, not to read the budget for these entitlement programs, so when you look around the world, other countries, even countries that have very generous programs have a budget for health care, for instance. the united states does not. we said eligibility and benefits guidelines and then write a check. social security is budgeted similarly. so we should not be surprised when the autopilot costs -- costs grow so rapidly. this is subject to forced annual appropriations, and that means that there is a debate, a spirited discussion as to what our priorities are, then at the end of the day our votes, and along with that is accountability. entitlements, the fastest- growing part of our budget, the

costs or to make trade-offs among competing priorities -- a bipartisan coalition has endorsed putting social security, medicare, and medicaid on a long-term budget and then having congress keep those programs under budget ordered to face the consequences, which would be certain reforms put into the system. this would provide much-needed oversight for these programs, and i intend to introduce legislation along those lines. in an era of $1 trillion deficits, they cannot afford this. as my time of the a and b, i believed it was important to

have a balanced budget, just as the vast majority of our states do. until a budget can be enacted, my view is that congress must attack waste, duplication, and obsolete spending if it is to earn the trust of the american people it will need in order to reform those important ton amid programs we talked about. no federal spending should go unexamined. clearly, washington is not working. the nation's mounting debt and deficits are holding that job creation and keeping millions out of work. in my view, another round of stimulus spending is not the answer. we have tried that. we need entrepreneurs to come off the sidelines and invest. including deficit-neutral corporate tax reform that brings some hundreds of billions of dollars back to the shores, and budget reform that forces washington to strengthen

important programs. having reductions in non entwinement spending, and a balanced approach to deficit reduction and job creation. the super committee work can benefit because of the abbasid reduction. thrilling the discussions, republicans and democrats alike need a better discussion of the frameworks, and we have proposed the things to help provide a framework, a basis for an eventual solution. we have the structure, as i said, for tax reform. we have generated serious proposals for retirement programs and also for areas like the government pay and benefits, agricultural programs. they may have disbanded, but the profound issues we face have not gone away. in fact, they'll only become more pressing. we have always come together as americans to solve tough problems. we can solve this problem, too. but only if we work together.

as republicans, democrats, independents to roll up our sleeves and -- consensus to meet the twin challenges of our time. thanks for letting me be with you today, and a look forward to your questions. costs -- >> senator, about 10 minutes for q&a, and do you want to call on your own? >> i can do that. yes? >> thank you very much. i would like to ask you if you believe there is any validity in some of the criticisms that have been promoted by the occupy wall street and d.c. movements? >> one of the things i have

heard not just from the washington folks a lot of critics of corporate system is that there are many corporations that do not pay any taxes. they often say we tax the individual side, but as i said earlier, i think part the answer is to of the fundamental reform of the tax code and broaden the base. the reason some corporations do not pay taxes is they take advantage of incredible complexity of our tax code, and ordered to do this on revenue neutral basis, you end up getting rid of almost all of those complexities, so companies that currently pay little or no taxes would be paying a higher effective rate. other companies that do not take it vantage of all of these preferences in the code, the tax breaks in the code, would be paying fewer taxes. it also leads to, of course, a more efficient tax code, where

resources are allocated in a way that helps create economic growth and jobs, said to me, it is a classic job about what we can do across party lines addressing those concerns, and again, this supercarrier process was frustrating. we did not achieve what we wanted to. i had high hopes, but we did achieve coming together in putting together a least a framework for dealing with this issue of corporate taxes, so i am hopeful that one of the products of the committee is that congress will now have the ability to move forward on this. there has not been a revenue neutral proposal ever in the history of the u.s. congress like this, so this is something i believe we will be able to help move the conversation for, not just on the seduction but also with growth.

yes? heather? >> is a belt from goodyear with the great state of ohio. we were very lucky to have you in the senate and on the super committee, even if it did not work out, and that is a little bit that i wanted to ask. i know you wanted to get into next opportunities to address these issues, and if you could tell us -- and you also said, and i think we all totally agree, we cannot wait until the elections for this kind of thing, so what do you see a possibility of moving some of these issues along into a final package that can be passed? thank you. >> as i said earlier, it would have been a great opportunity to move forward because of the procedures, particularly in the united states senate. that was talked about a little while ago, but it is difficult to read a controversial issue in

the senate because it requires 60 votes, with some exceptions, like reconciliation, and also being subject to amendment is sometimes difficult to move the process, so this was an opportunity that was missed in my view. having said that, i still think there is that opportunity over the next year to make significant progress. i say that for three reasons. one, i do think that the committee has put forward a lot of good ideas that can now be picked up by members on both sides of the aisle and in both houses. i mentioned the corporate tax reform idea and the entitlement ideas and some of the non entitlement mandatory spending. what we spent an enormous amount of time, as did the biden and simpson-bowles and another. some of you in this room have been involved in this.

second, we have to address a lot of tough issues in the next year. immediately, the issue of unemployment insurance extension and the payroll tax extension and other extenders, tax extenders, at year end. there are about 87 of them at my last count, and then next year of course, at the end of next year, 30 months from now, we will once again be dealing with this issue of the 2001 and 2003 tax issues and also the alternative minimum tax, and without addressing them, i think we are talking about a $3 trillion tax increase on the 2001 and 2003 rates, and i think it is $4 trillion or more when you look at other extenders, this will force the conversation, and the conversation in my view on to be about both economic growth and deficit reduction, not just that you deal with a specific issue

that is expiring and has to be addressed, and third, although as i said earlier, i think the committee represented unfortunately a lot of where the american people are. i do think that folks are looking for some answers here on the spending side. when i am home, as i was the past several days, a lot of people talk to me, as they always do, about the direction the country is heading in. they want to make some tough choices, so i think the environment is actually conducive to making some of these tough decisions. maybe not at all level that some have called for, going big, which would be something i would support with the right balance. in fact, i supported two budget proposals that do go big, one being the rhine and budget that passed the house, did not pass

the senate, but it did pass the house, it reduces this in the coming years. i think that environment is here. there are more proposals now to build a foundation for some specific legislative action because of the decisions that congress is going to have to make inevitably and because of the environment. i think over the next year, there is a good possibility for reform, and that is what i am going to continue to work on. i am disappointed with the super committee but more determined than ever to address these issues. yes? >> good to see you again, senator. leon. >> good to see you. >> do you envision that they're ready for their limitation on the homeowner's mortgage deduction? >> well, as i said earlier, i

think the framework that some of us supported in the committee process has promised, and that framework would require big changes in the way the individual tax could treat not just mortgages deduction but other tax preferences. i mentioned marty feldstein, who gave a speech at the aei annual dinner several months ago about this very topic, and his point is that there is about $1 trillion in expenditures on the individual side, and his view is that much of that should be considered more like spending then tax policy, and i think there is some truth to that, so when you look at individual tax reform, there seems to be a consensus building around loring the marginal rates, and in the base, but either eliminating or limiting some of the tax preferences, tax breaks, tax

loopholes, depending on how you want to call them, or tax expenditures. i think there are a lot of promising ideas out there. the candidates and it republicans each seem to have their own idea. i am not going to get into 9-9-9 or 20 in 20, but i think all of the expenditures in the code will be subject to close examination, and at the end of the day, i do believe as they said, i am a supporter of tax reform and lower rates for better economic growth, and i think that is part of the solution to not just our economic problems but also our deficit problems, because more growth will lead to more revenues through more economic activity. yes? >> hello, senator.

i am with "the washington post." i am wondering if they called for a vote on the plan, it does not seem that there any other efforts underway to restructure the negotiation for a broad reaching a deficit-reduction plan. is that boat something you would support, or is there some other way where there might be another shot at big deficit-reduction, a plan? >> it is an interesting idea. there is no legislative proposal, and as we found out, getting scores from the congressional budget side on the spending side and from another on the tax side, going to the process, the discipline of that sometimes alters the way your proposal looks. i would be supportive of any proposal coming to the floor and having a vote, but i think there is a challenge, obviously, taking some great ideas and reducing them to legislative

language that is vetted and scored. we had a number of ideas i said that were sent as committee members. i listed some of them earlier. some of them serious, some not as serious. many of them are not good ideas, but frankly, we could not get a score on them, so one example would be selling federal property, something i heard from my constituents about, and there is excess federal property, and the congressional budget office has a hard time getting a score on that. we tried to set specific recommendations for that, and there was a certain amount of property sold, but that was one of the ideas in the gang of 6 and simpson-bowles, but, again, better said than done. scoring it and make sure that it can meet the revenue proposal,

the tax committee estimates of deficit-reduction, so it is a little more complicated than taking a proposal and pretty on the floor because there is not legislative language that has been attached to it yet, and it has not been scored through the process. it will take awhile. i am not sure what the numbers would look like in the end, but i think it is an effort worthy of trying. >> thank you very much, senator. elizabeth sinclair, tea party patriot from washington, d.c. i was wondering whether you and your republican colleagues would get together on the steps of the capital and have a little newt gingrich style press conference, a fiscal contract for america, since we're in a catastrophe at this point. we do not have another year to wait, as you said. if you can get your word and

those of your colleagues out to the american people who are angry, upset, very concerned, and as a wonderful and measured as you are, we feel that we are in serious trouble, and we need to get the word out to the masses. thank you. a fiscal contract for america, could you get it out to us, please? >> as you may know, i worked a lot on an economic platform for america through the united states senate republican caucus. i took the lead in putting together a jobs plan, and the first element of it was the school issues. they are connected. we cannot get the economy moving until there is more certainty as to what is happening on the fiscal side, so my only addendum to what you are saying is i think it ought to be about the fiscal issues and about to give the economy moving. i talked about tax reform today because that is something i am

now going to try to promote, but this includes lower health-care costs, some sensible proposals. it has to include more energy development, exploration, in use in this country, which will create a lot of jobs in states like ohio and elsewhere, and it has to include in my view greater trade. 95% of the consumers do not live in our country, and they feel more of it than we do, and we would create enormous potential for more jobs here, so i think we need to do a better job communicating on all of these issues, but i do not believe we can solve one without the other. maybe 12 points. ours was 7, which seemed like a lot, but it is critical. we got ourselves into such a deep fiscal hole, as i said earlier, it is not possible for us in my view to get out of that without doing both spending reductions and smart, pro-growth

policies to grow the economy and through those growth revenues to be able to work our way out. the overhang is now too heavy. i would hope that we as republicans, and for that matter, republicans and democrats alike would do a better job of explaining these challenges to the american people, and understanding these challenges and coming up with smart solutions is not easy, as we found out. there are some very strong feelings on both sides about the aisle, on our side about revenue, on their side about revenue. the reason i went out of the way to say that they put things on the table, and i will also make the point today talking about republicans putting revenue on the table in the context a pro- growth reforms, is that there were some very difficult political challenges we face in committee, but there were also some lines that were crossed,

and i think that is the basis for an eventual solution. >> senator, we would like you to state all afternoon. >> i will take one more. >> two things. one -- i am assuming that the democrats he mentioned working with corporate tax reformers, at least senator baucus, i was wondering if he and other democrats, if you bring your bill forward in the full senate, and secondly, why do you think that democrats in the committee would not agree to a smaller deal of around $600 billion, like we heard mentioned earlier? i am dan freedmen, and i am with "national journal." thanks. >> i avoided talking about some of our members, much to the dismay of some critics. i do not want to start now by saying what happened behind

closed doors, the chairman baca is, he is very interested in tax reform. he has made this known. he has done a lot of work in that area, as has senator hatch on the republican side. we have board for the past several months on this issue. i do think that both of them are very interested, and i think in this case, there is a common approach to not just loitering the raid but putting this out as a priority, and with regard to my colleagues, could you restate that second question? yes. i talked about this publicly already, so i will again, but is too bad, because at the end of the day, there was a proposal to lease to make significant

progress, not to hit the 1.2 mark but to come close, about halfway there. alex said earlier that he felt that was likely where the committee would end up. i was more optimistic, thinking we would have our goal of 1.2 to avoid the sequester altogether. this included some slight changes on the entitlement side, but there was also a proposal for 550, to take that out, so without any help or for that matter any entitlement changes, there was not for us to move forward. you'll have to ask democrats why that was not acceptable, and they said even that would require significant new tax revenues, so the effort was abandoned, but that is too bad, because that would have taken as in the right direction in terms of dealing with mandatory spending, and as i said the biggest part of the budget and also the fastest-growing part of

the budget, it would not have made some of the structural changes, but it would have taken as down the road, as opposed to the sequester, which focuses almost exclusively -- exclusively on the discretionary side, so you'll have to ask the democrats about that. thank you. >> thanks very much. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2011] ok, we will move now quickly to our panel, as our fellow

panelists and move on. i am kevin, the director of the economic policy studies here, and reassembled this panel to discuss where next for the super committee, in part because the failure of the super committing has been a very frustrating thing for a lot of people in the think tank community in washington in the sense that there was this moment where folks, there may finally be a chance with the right thing would happen, and then the super committee failed, and is almost impossible to ascertain why the super committee failed, and alex mentioned that there is a lot of finger-pointing, but it is kind of like if you had a buddy who had a breakup, and you asked him what, and he said, "we just decided to be friends." there is a lot more to it than that. thinking about the politics on how to construct a committee so it can be successful and the economics on how to structure

the plan so that people would want to vote for it, we decided to follow up this discussion with a discussion of our own, and i turned to my colleague, who we want to go for is only because he is the only panelist who knows any jokes. >> i must say the i am tempted to start with a story that i had used in this room before but that it's even more where we are now, which is a story that takes plans -- takes place in first year anatomies school and medical school, where a professor using the socratic method says, "the question today is what organ when stimulated grows to eight times its normal size, and he looks around the room, and she turns be read and says i will not answer the question, and another

says it is the people of an eye when it enters a darkened room. the professor says to the woman that she did not do her homework, she had a dirty live, and she had a life filled with unsuccessful expectations, and to those who deal with these issues, we are dealing with lifetimes of unfulfilled expectation, and in this case, i would say the i was not where alex was, but i was optimistic we would get somewhere with the super committee, and part of the reason was that rob was on it. rob has an unparalleled experience in his professional lifetime. that includes starting working as either an intern or a lowly assistant to alan simpson on the immigration issue but moving forward, of course, to being a member of the house, known for his efforts and being a director

before moving to the senate, so he understands as well as anybody that given the shakiness in europe, the troubles in the global economy, we are no longer just playing with fire or even live ammunition. we may be playing with atomic weapons been in terms of the economic future, so there would be action. something that makes us uneasy, these actions are not really the way you would ideally like to go, but having the ability to take what ever you produce, brought forward for an up or down expedited vote, no filibusters, no delay tactics, no amendments was an unparalleled opportunity to get

somewhere. why? i offer a couple of reasons, one that droppo alluded to ride at the end, and i must admit that i was optimistic in part because the template was there. we know the bipartisan template is, and i wasn't looking at $1.20 trillion or $560 billion. i was looking at the $4 trillion, which i think is much easier to do than a smaller number. you put everything on the table, and we know from other areas that it basically is due $4 trillion in debt reduction was somewhere between $1 trillion and $1.50 trillion of it coming from revenues, tied to a tax reform that broadens the base, and then a substantial slice of what is left from where the real budget areas will be, which is from the big entwinement programs. the template was there, but one reason it did not happen is because they are templates, and

for all the enormous amount of work that the commission's did and that the commissioners and staff did and that six senators and their staffs did on the gang of 6, all of those are templates. they offer ideas. they are not concrete, and it turned out in the four months, turning that into something concrete was really a heavy airlift then it might have been. now, i am disappointed because i do not think they started very long looking at that before moving beyond it, for the second reason, which as we do have a deeper level of dysfunction, a sharper division into trouble politics than i have seen in my years in washington, and that played out on the inside much more than these efforts did on the outside, and it is baffling actually in some ways that we could not move beyond it, but when i looked at the dueling op-

one written by one and another from a super committee, from what i know of the deliberations inside, you really did have democrats willing to go an extra mile or more on the entitlement front, and when you look objectively at their proposals, they were somewhat to the right in terms of what they were willing to do, and you just could not get there on the tax front on the republican side. there is an imbalance there. now, with the op-ed on the part of the republican members of the committee, they said it "we could not do anything because the democrats would not get off of the $1 trillion on the tax increase front." well, if it is -- if it is $1 trillion for an overall $4 trillion of a deficit-reduction, that is a little less than where the other committees would be, so if that is off of the table

from the beginning, you are not going to get very far, and if you start to move from the $4 trillion which requires very significant movement, especially on medicare, but you have to include social security and medicaid in the package, and you take the tax issue off of the table, and then you start to look at what you can do on the $1.20 trillion front, which means most of it is going to have to come from discretionary spending, which had already taken hits over and over again, including the $900 billion that were a part of the deal that led to the creation of the super committee, you are just not going to find it possible to do so, and if you start to move down towards $550 billion, which is going to be seen by the public, rating agencies, and others as not much better than complete failure, a baggage you are taking just another tiny baby step, but you are taking off of the table some of the things you could agree on,

eliminating or reducing significantly the possibility down the road of coming to that grand bargain. i think i would have been resistant to going in that direction, as well. once we go past the notion of going for gold, going for the grand bargain, which in this case was not $4 trillion in what they would do but $3 trillion, because the already had $9 billion, and which could have been easier by consensus, even if it is somewhat phony, and assumption of some of the savings from troop withdrawals from afghanistan and iraq to grease the skids a little bit more. it seems to me it was doable, and it is tribal politics keeping us from getting there, and while we will see some movement forward, there are some possibilities. i am a little uneasy that you're going to move forward with corporate tax reform. if you do this in individual

pieces, you take away from the table pieces that make it possible to fit all of the pieces together. it is harder than to do an overall deal, but i think we do of the possibility of a broader tax reform and reducing rates, if you can make adding revenues part of that package, and you do have the ability then to reach into the entitlement areas, and let me just make one last comment, which portman did allude to a little bit. we have a different dynamic as we move towards 2012. on the one hand, the next month is going to be an affirmation of tal afar politics are, because we have not just all of these tax issues on the table right now that have to be dealt with one way or another without creating more deleterious consequences. from the payroll tax cut on forward. you also have, if we do not deal

once again with the payments to doctors under medicare, they are going to drop by a substantial percentage, which would cause havoc among medicare recipients and across the board. doing that requires offsets which are going to be very tough in this environment, post failure by the super committee, but then next year, we get to sequesters, which will be very uncomfortable for everybody, and the expiration of the tax cuts, some to some degree, the dynamic of this ships, and if obama holds to his firm commitment, to eliminate at least a sizable portion of those tax cuts, if you are talking about getting a hundred dollars billion in tax increases in 2013, coming from the over $250,000 with nothing in return, as compared to

reaching a grand bargain where you get tax reform entitlement changes, i think you're going to see recalculation on the part of the participants here about whether they want to come to the table and actually do something. >> before i could to andrew, suppose the next president or the current president, the start of the next administration, the president called you up and said, "i really believe, might economists have been convinced main" -- and i will ask others if this would happen, it "i have to move, should i have another super committee? should i not?" and m i a political -- and am i to do that?ifool >> if i were a candid, it would

be to move closer towards legislative language some amalgam of the best ideas of simpson-bowls, the gang of 6, and others. tom coburn has his own set of ideas on how to reduce spending in certain areas, some of which i think could reach a bipartisan agreement, as well. i would want to have something ready to go, and i would propose another process something like the super committees to make it happen. i would remind you that we actually had that when the president created the simpson- bowles committee. he did not do that on his own. there was a fast track process that came up in the senate, again reflecting tribal politics. seven sponsors of the congressionally appointed

committee voted against their own plan because they did not want to give the president a political victory. that would have been much more effective, and it would have been brought up for a vote on the floor, but if i were the president, i would want a package in operational terms like those three, ready to go, and then the process to make it happen. >> thinking about the current registry -- administration if it repeats, or the next. is it true that the president can take a leadership position on this because he has got a huge staff? he has bad guys and gals of the treasury you know how to sort things. and has not sort of be a minister in the staff been more or less out of the game completely in the last couple of years? is that not may be part of the problem? >> the area where i fault obama

the most here is a failure, especially with a message 1.5 years ago, one year ago, to embrace simpson-bowles and then move forward to a vote and then use some other resources. it would have been nice. having said that, part of the reason i have a cautious optimism about the super committee is you have the tax staff ready to roll their, and i actually think you can do tax reform rather quickly if what you're doing is adopting some version of marty feldstein putting a cap on overall reductions -- deductions instead of going in and doing it piecemeal. all you have to do, you could do that, and the congressional budget office was ready to go if they had been able to come up with something fairly quickly, but we have operated with if not a whole hand behind our backs

but at least several fingers of one hand in terms of pushing a lot of this forward. a lot of this also represents what we have been a toxic political environment, and sadly, i do not think the next election is going to some of cause all of that to go away. i think it becomes harder. i would much rather see something done in 2012, because i think it becomes much harder to do in 2013. >> thank you, and i now turn it over to our resident scholar. >> thanks. i share the disappointment in terms of how the super committee turned out, because i thought it was a structure -- i thought for a long time it was a structure that would most likely lead to success, and the failure of it and the failure of other efforts over the past year have kind of made me reassess some of the ways of thinking about all of this, and one context is

liberals and conservatives, democrats and republicans, have means of doing this because they could deficit's been. liberals could have big government, and conservatives could pretend they did not have big government virtually by the fact they were not paying for it, so the ability to borrow helps you smoothbore kind of ideological differences between the two parties. now, we're coming to a day of reckoning, where you cannot do that anymore, where the money is running out, so they have to face reality and look each other in the eye and say, "where are we?" they have very different views about the proper role of the federal government, the size and the scope and the activity of the federal government in terms of the economy and in terms of people's lives. there is always a perception that this is a failure to communicate and that people need to get down in the room together.

people just disagree. there was the staff of the present bush social security commission in 2001, and at that time, there was an effort to reach out to a rp and say, "can we cut a deal" and other things, and you do know they disagree. it is not a question of right or wrong. they just have a different opinion. there is no right or wrong to it. if you are a congressional democrat, wanting a more active role, lots of people around the world feel that way. there is nothing in the judgment about it. republicans look at the history of the united states and the size of the government of the united states and say they want something more consistent with that, and i think that is their right, as well. the conventional wisdom is we just split the difference, go 50/50 down the middle, and that is how we should do it, but if you are a democrat who really

believes in the entitlement programs, the things these are really, really important contributions to society, even splitting it down the middle means a significant reining back of the programs and your vision you have of government. likewise, if you are a typical republican, you think the government is already spending too much. you want well below 18% of gdp. if he won a 50/50 reform, you are essentially locking yourself into government that is significantly larger and is likely to go. it is not likely that the super committee was going to address the entire situation we face, so there is a readjusting of the base line that i think would be tricky to do. on a substantive basis, one of the reason i worry about the conventional splitting the difference approach is that i am not sure it would work that well. kevin and i am one of our

colleagues did some work over the past year or so where we looked at different countries around the world and their efforts to balance their budget and reduce their debt, and we said which countries succeeded, and which failed, and what was the difference between the two? and what we found is a successful attempt to get on top of your budget was not 50% and spending cuts, the 2% tax increases. it was more like 85% spending cuts. the spending share of those success of this consolidation's rose the bigger the fiscal gap was that you had to solve, so the question i think it raises if you are somebody to say i want to have what i think is good policy, any conceivable approach on the super committee that would fit into what we think would be good policies, this is likely to succeed and me to get out comes down the road, it would be likely to actually get support from a majority of

the committee. and i am just not sure if that really existed. if you what your government to be able to walk and chew gum at the same time but also be able to do good policy and that something is actually going to be successful in addressing the problems we face in terms of the budget, something that is not going to be an deleterious effect on the economy, i am not sure your diagram had an intersection in this case, so the question i guess is where you go from here. the other conventional wisdom answer is we need an election to decide this, and if an election would decide it, then i think that would be great, as long it decided in a way of life, obviously, but the way our political structures work is that even if president obama is defeated and the republicans take back the senate, then you

should the democrats in the senate, now in a mistress -- mischief making role the republicans have been in, and they will enjoy that role. we are more or less back where we started, so i think we have a bigger problem, and i think we have a structural problem in terms of how politics allows us to get on top of these things. it is easy to say that the town in congress is back, we need to get better people to run for congress. if people react to structures and incentives, the structures we have which people have learned to exploit more fully now make it harder to get things done. taking a quick look on the data of other countries on the size of the fiscal gap and the size of a long-term budgets they face, a look at other anglo countries, a similar cultures to us with a different political structures, and with the exception of the u.k., which is a very difficult situation right now, others like canada,

australia, new zealand have much smaller fiscal gaps than we do. does this mean they are better people than us? probably not. it is the guess is a structure that has enabled them to get on top of things. part of the problem we have with the increase to division in congress between the parties which comes from a congressional district setup, where you have increased use of the filibuster, which makes it harder to pass things, i think those things make it really hard to get on top of these, and an example, i started working over 10 years ago in social security. about 20 years ago, we knew that was a problem that needed to be fixed. we all know and amid the longer you wait, the harder it gets, in here we are today, and it is exactly the same point where we were before except we have lost 20 years and a chance to make progress on things, so there is

something uniquely dysfunctional about the process is working. it makes it very, very difficult to get on top of. i think structural changes that make it easier for a majority to give policies through, we are going to meander along on things. part of what we need to do is to focus discussion and bogus ideas and say we have some big choices to make going forward, but it is not just a question about doing everything we were doing up until today but do a little less of it. we're going to tax the same way as before but we're going to raise rates a little bit. i think we need to have a bigger more fundamental question about the sort of thing the government is going to do, the sort of benefits is going to give, who is going to give it to, how we are going to collect revenue and from home. politicians, much like teenagers

with, do not focus on the task until the night before it is due. it would be nice to think that your elected officials were more responsible for getting on top of these problems, but eventually, they will have to focus. we do not have the opportunity to portion of any longer, and that is when it has to be made. elected officials, constituents, people in think tanks, talking to the people and said, "these are the choices you face, and you have to think about where we are not just today but what kind of government and role of government you want going forward," but in the next year or so, that is the challenge we may face. thank you. >> thank you, andrew. putting on my next president have, and i am not running, some do not worry. let's suppose i made the following argument. president obama tried to do it, and it did not work for him. one thing he passed was the

health care bill, and that was a political disaster. we have a $1.50 trillion deficit, and we seem to be muddling along. why should i bother even try? i have got a three-year horizon. three years from now, i'm going to start running for reelection, and i think i can put it off for three years without causing a calamity, so what should i do it now? what would you say? >> there is always going to be some president or some congress where you cannot put it off, but the reason these things do not get addressed is the tissue can. i was not a big fan of the health-care reform, but i certainly will give the congressional democrats who backed it the credit. people willing to go on a kamikaze mission. did they we are going to pass" whenever you think it is and recognize that you're going to take a political hit for it,

that you may miss your job or whatever. i really did give democrats a credit on health-care reform. a lot of them were willing to bite the bullet and just to do it. the way things restructured. but lacking people who have that sort of political death wish, it is hard to get something done today rather than putting off until tomorrow. >> the democrats, presumably, they had some things that they could put in their mind that they believe they accomplished that were worth the risk, so maybe it was getting uninsured people insured, so if you wanted to convince the president to do it, what would you tell him he gets? what is the benefit that he should be willing to bank his career on? >> the house and senate republicans have largely gone on record saying they support the ryan road map for taxes and fixing at least medicare and medicaid. there is not the social security

component. my guess is, if that were passed, and i do not know the mechanics to find out how easy it is to do it, through reconciliation or whenever, but if it were passed, you would have some blowback. a big majority of it would probably remain in place over the long term for the reason that it would be difficult to change, but people recognize that a lot of things in there needed to be done but were politically difficult to do. so i suspect that the incentive is do you want to have a lasting political legacy of not just four years but 10 years or 20 years, and you say does go for it, and four years later, you go back to the private sector, so be it. >> thank you. we now turn it over to bill. >> thank you very much for having me. it is a pleasure to follow them.

for some reason, ms. folklorization reminds me of the definition between an optimist and a pessimist. the optimist believes we live in the best of all possible worlds, and the pessimist fears that that is the case. i go back and forth between optimism and pessimism as i hear people talk. i have tried to organize my comments into six super comments, and i will try to go through them quickly. the super committee not reaching agreement, i thought it was a consensus when they were form that they had a tough, upward, uphill effort, and i was not surprised at all that they did not reach an agreement, for several reasons. course, they did not have to. as was said, teenagers do not start their homework until the night it is due, there was nothing to do. therefore, they did not have to reach an agreement, said they did not. second of all, there were cuts

that were already supposed to happen, even in the absence of an agreement. i never understood why they agreed to $1.20 trillion in specific cuts that they would then have to take heat for when there's already $1.20 trillion in general sequestered cuts that they could say, "i am sorry, but we did not vote for that specifically. and third, the $1.20 trillion sequestered, that was not the right composition at least to give the republicans to the table. i said this in august when the debt deal was struck. the triggers that had tax increases and then, you would have gone republicans to the table, but be administration caved on the 1.2, what it should look like, it just as they caved on the overall package, so there was no real bargaining power to get republicans to talk about tax increases, and you heard

that in the commons. having said it is not supportable, my second comment, it is nonetheless remarkable that they did not reach an agreement, and one reason is the issue that norm mentioned. they had a direct line to an up or down vote with no amendment, no funny business, and i would have expected them to have attempted to retain the option some now, even if they could not agree on something right now, and the fact that they just let that go down the drain i think is kind of remarkable. but the other thing is, and this has not been commented on yeah, yes, they needed to cut $1.20 trillion, but they could determine their base line. you could cut from whatever base line. they could do whatever they wanted to do. they could have a base line that

had no tax revenues and it or 50% of gdp in tax revenues and then cut that by $1.20 trillion, and they would have succeeded, and the fact that they could choose their own base line was remarkable. the differences in current policy and current law for example are about $5 trillion. $1 trillion on the defense drawdown and $4 trillion in tax cuts. a kind of felt like if you let me choose the baseline, i will give you whatever $1.20 million cut you want from the baseline, but even being able to choose their own base line, $5 trillion, they could not come up with $1.20 trillion in cuts. i do not want to spend a lot of time on whose fault it is. i am just going to skip that comment. >> we are going to blame you, bill. >> i will take my share of the blame.

the fourth comment is sort of a lot of questions about what happened. i am a economists, not a political scientist, and there is a lot of stuff i do understand. first, why did they set the committee up if they were not going to work hard to reach a solution? second, why did they let pass an opportunity to have this up or down vote with no amendments or up or down orders? third, why did they give up so publicly and quickly and easily. even in the nba, the desire of the union and filed a lawsuit, and then they all come back to the table one last time it reached an agreement. there was no dog and pony show about how they are working with the hard and trying to reach an agreement. they just shut down and said "we are not going to make it." that is a bill baffling to me. fourth comment, hatoyama buenos aires discussion with this policy going big win the white house is not involved? fifth, what does this mean for

the gang of 6? are they back in a leadership position now? if they are not, who is? and lastly, on the optimistic side, maybe this is what progress looks like. it was only one year ago, less than one year ago that the simpson-bowles report was released. in some ways, they have, a long way. they did not reach an agreement, but this is a hard issue, and maybe this is what success looks like. it is ugly and messy for a long time, but maybe it is on necessary to eventually reach a solution. the fifth point is the economics of all of this. how does this change the economic picture that they did not reach an agreement? the answer is far as i can tell is basically not along -- not at all." "economist" magazine said that with their failure, american

fiscal policy is drifting in a dangerous direction. i thought that headline was about 10 years too late. we have been drifting in a dangerous direction easily since 2001. in an exquisite sense in terms of cutting taxes and raising spending and before that in terms of the implicit liabilities we had been setting up, so we have been drifting in a dangerous way for a long time. as far as i can tell, this really does not change all of that. the real issue, as senator portman mentioned earlier, it has to do with getting the economy going. as long as the economy is sticking around 9% unemployment or $1 trillion output gap, it is going to be very, very difficult to balance the budget or to even come close to balancing the budget. ok, last point, what do we do

going forward? if we do another committee, and other people have suggested this. i had this idea in august, but every -- lots of people beat me to it. other delegates to the committee, rather than having each party pick their own. the idea would be that might get you people more in the middle on both sides. particularly liking the idea of letting each party be to a particular members of the other party. some people arethe second thingt issue is not like buying a new pc or a new ipad. if you are not sure if you want to buy one, you wait six months or a year, and it becomes a better and less expensive. the quality of solutions are not going to get better over time.

all of the major ideas were out there. they have been tossed around. the menu is not going to get any more attractive, and waiting is not going to help us, and the longer we wait, the harder the options become, because we have a larger problem to solve in a shorter time. ultimately, the solutions are not going to change the people's feelings are. i have a lot more to say, but i will stop. >> the first question to follow up on the suggestion that got me introspecting, but you think the

leadership at the think tank's has failed a little bit because it could have done a better job to put stuff in legislative language, or is it beyond our means? >> i am not pointing fingers at .ll of you it goes from the idea of attending something down to the legislative alain jewish and -- new legislative language. -- lack think alike rov of resources is holding things back. i find a legislative language on

necessary. you have to be a lawyer to understand a lot of it. i do not know about an -- i think the tanks have been out there putting out a lot of ideas, suggesting reforms. >> it did seem the the hermel was said they could not get everything written up in time -- it seems like the problem was they could not get everything written up in time. >> the problem with each of these reports is that their ideas have not been operational lives down to a specific new level. i think they can take some of the best of those reports

and/the amount to a point where the legislative council could turn them and richard -- could flesh them out. let's vote on it. you cannot do the vetoes there is no bones -- do this because ill.e is no bel it is too bad debt a year later we have not moved in that direction and your you. >> let me follow up to emphasize how big an issue that is. they do not have a tax plan that says if you eliminated tax expenditures you could do this raid.

-- could do this rate. i do not know how you legislate that. it is not in the legislative language. it was an accomplishment they got that far. there is a long way to go to legislative language. at some point legislators have to take responsibilities. >> there is a tax issue. you are not allowed to formulate way and on legislation. -- to formally weigh in on legislation.

this is an easier area than taxes, but it is still very labor intensive. you can get generalities, but relate narrowing it down is tough. >> we have a few minutes for questions. if you can try to make it in the form of a question. >> this whole deal was ridiculous. most people agree it was 25%. his main talking point was one for one. it sounds like a good compromise. over a few days we learned the cuts was over a few years, so i

know he was not trying to lie, but it turned from a dollar to spending cuts. we knew this los going way off 0 cents, and it did. they should have started with if you have a trillion dollar deficit, you should offer cut severely erode -- you could offer cuts. a police you get 250 in cuts rather than 20 -- at least you get 250 in cuts rather than 25 billion.

--foxonservative message i news is not doing its job. effective rates are 40%. they are 28% for federal, and they are 12% for state and local. tax foundation has 9.8 of the state and local level, so it is at least 12 for the top 2%. you have another 22% according to the cost of government data, and the top 10% are aggressively a incurring those costs as well.

you really have a 67% cost for the top 2%. >> what do you think about the conservative messaging on tv? do you think the message gets out of voters need to make an intelligent decision the month >> i think i touched about this in my comments. both sides have to come to terms with what their ideologies implied. i think something like the ryan plans to believe significant things out, but if you want to

address the gap without raising taxes, here are the things you have to do. people are not going to get the same kinds of benefits they have been promised. people say, this is what it looks like it, and it is not going to be particularly pretty. folks on the left have to get to the stage as well. there is a reason why a few european countries do about. it is not just your top 1%, but the average people are going to have to pay more. president obama says we have to raise taxes on millionaires and billionaires. in reality he wants to raise

taxes on households making more than 250,000. a more forthcoming and democrats say we should let the bush tax cuts. both sides need to come to the reality. >> i cannot kicks past fox news not cure it -- cannot get past fox news not doing its job, and what is its job hama? rob portman, i would almost ask a question, but i decided not on the balance. it actually caps spending as a share of gdp.

it is actually 16.7% of gdp. if you look at where we are heading in terms of demographics, and we should have taxes at the historical level of 18%. the fundamental reality isla whatever we do, we are not going to have spending at 18% of gdp. liberals can agree we do not want it to go to 35% or 40%. maybe we should try to stabilize it at 24%, but that is probably the best we are going to be able to do, given our demographics. and we need a very different

kind of conversation. how you come to a better match about spending, and what robb said, almost all of it is consequence of economic collapse, and if you look at discretionary domestic spending over the last 10 or 15 years, it is not rising to a considerable degree. we are going to worry about things like food safety.

we are not having a real estate conversation. you could ideally combined with a much better tax system, and fundamental programs take into account and demographics but also understand you are going to have to change the growth pattern. >> i write the mitchell report, and i want to come back to two things you said. the first is that there is this fundamental difference between republicans and democrats on

what the role of government ought to be, and i am struck by the fire set -- the fact the real issue is not between republicans and democrats. is between incumbents and democrats. the republicans gave us two on funded wars region u-- unfunded wars. ronald reagan talked a lot about reducing the size of government but never gave it a thought during his administration. the second thing is i believe you said we need new structures to be able to get on top of these issues, and i am wondering if you could articulate and what kinds of structures.

>> there is a self-selection problem where anyone who runs for office often thinks there are good things government can do, so you get a little bit of that going on. i personally think the filibuster in the senate should be gotten rid of. i tend to think of the state level the industry things done for members of congress, but the joke is in a democracy choose their voters and in the u.s.

they choose. it pushes them to either side. i should have prepared more, but i tend to think the party that can generate a majority has a lot of power for a certain time. at the end of the time they have done what they want to do, and they are responsible for it. you can differentiate between different branches of government. it is very hard to accomplish something. you can always blame somebody else, so the voter is not clear about who is responsible for what happened, and it leads to difficulties. i feel like i am saying something bad about the founding fathers, but i tend to think more power to congress to get done what they need to do.

the thing that makes me depressed is that congress cannot do what congress. the commission is designed the way i would have design something. when you have in the ability to get a vote and you have some ticking clock that gives them an incentive to do something, and still it did not work, so that is what is troubling. it is a little bit worrying. >> non-defense discretionary spending drop in the first couple years and then started to

grow for the, and i just did a retrospective on the bush legacy, and i looked down to is the fire was riding in the early 2000's, and bush's first three budget years were the biggest increases in u.s. history. they had now the farm bill from haiti. i think part of the problem is the first -- is that he did what steve forbes accused him of doing. he says he talks like a republican but governs like a democrat. i think part of the problem we

have gotten here, and this gets back to the first question, is there is almost of the nile about how much spending has gone up -- almost denial about how much spending has gone up. are there any more questions? thank you for coming. >> i want to recognize the great american hero. we have got somebody here to do this job. >> thank you for coming. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national

cable satellite corp. 2011] >> according to the group americans for tax reform, 238 members of the house of representatives and 48 senators have signed a pledge to not increase taxes. norquist will debate about whether this is good for the economy orleans to gridlock. that is live at 5:30 eastern on c-span 3. up next, a discussion on u.s. security with a former director of national intelligence. and president obama meets with european union leaders. leader harry reid and mitch mcconnell talk about the senate's agenda. >> the new web site has choices

making it easy to watch the day's events. it is also easy to get our schedule with new features. you can even receive an e-mail alert. there is a section to access our most popular programs. a handy channel finder so you can quickly find where to watch our networks across the country. >> next a former national security director dennis blair talks about cyber security. he spoke with david singer of "the new york times." this is an hour 20 minutes.

>> welcome to the institute. this is sponsored by the roundtable serious, and our program features a former director of national intelligence. just one quick administrative whirred. they will go about an hour with conversation between them. when we are ready for questions, you can turn this microphone. the series is made possible with the generous support of michelle smith and the smith family association. we will begin our program. david served as the white house

correspondent from 1999 until late 2006. he has covered a wide variety of issues involving foreign policy and asian affairs. of he serves chief policy correspondent. twice in his career he has been a member of teams that won the pulitzer prize. his documentary won the dupont award, and his first boat was a bestseller. -- book was a bestseller. >> let me briefly introduce an admiral applera, who are first met -- let me briefly introduce who are first met,

in tokyo. he led 16 national intelligence agencies, some of whom played better with each other than others, but have to leave them all. he held a number of positions in the security council. we are here to talk about u.s. readiness. i want to talk about homeland security issues and how things have changed since 9-11, but most importantly during the obama administration.

i thought we could talk about what is going on in pakistan. i want to doggo little bit about the round and the arab spring and how it could remake region, so let's dive in. you have often heard people ask, today than 10r minutes ago? when me turn at 10 degrees and i ask the question, if somebody had said to the morning after 9- 11 that we would go more than a decade without a major terror attack but have several close calls, and would you have talked about was possible common and and have the reforms and would

you have thought about was possible, and to the reforms have anything to do with that? the would say the witway situation has changed our would characterize like this. and we had to be lucky in 2003 to stop a terrorist attack. it is really a set of her sentences -- of percentages. a number of things have to go completely right for a terrorist attack to successfully take place, and each of those house different degrees of risk. you have to make explosives, recruit your friends, and so on,

and at each point common and there are risks. the happened back in 2001. we know there was almost no risk. the united states and other countries were almost oblivious to what might be occurring. due to a lot of work about setting of offices, talking to people, sending people to other countries, of putting people in the airport, and we have made it difficult for the terrorists to hit all of those chances just right. airplanes that can interrupt a plot -- there are points that can interrupt the plot.

one of them islam citizenry. in times square, our guard sought our car in a place where it should not have been, so that is one factor. i would say bonds have shifted strongly -- odds have shifted strongly in favor of the united states. i think as you implied, the system is not 100% and never will be. we have just about knocked back for a threat to the level but attacksrms of terrorist have been for longer than we would like to remember whether

they be various disenchanted groups that think it is a good idea to kill innocent people with a bomb. >> when you ask her net the -- ask panetta, he says he believes all kinda -- hawkeye the -- al qaeda is on the brink of defeat. how would you define it, and would you agree with it? i would take it with your comment that if you got to that level you were close zero strategic defeat your your reader close to strategic you

were close to a strategic defeat. good >> i st. they are still able to put out inspirational literature, which puts ideas in the heads of twisted people. they still have connections with people who share their goals, and as we learned about two years ago, one person who a visa thathave of lis would get him into the united states with a twisted idea of doing something to this country can come close to killing a lot

of americans, so i would say we are down to a level where the organize attacks like 9-11 are very low probability. we are able to detect those and stop those in a way we were not able to do before. to take it down to complete strategic defeat, which is complete disorganization of the movement so truly it is individuals who take their own action, we are always yet, and i do not think that is going to come until the idea of this ideology is discredited within the muslim world, and although it is largely discredited,

approval ratings have been rocketed very low and moderate muslims. -- low among muslims. as a we are definitely in a different phase of this campaign. >> as we mentioned the ideological element of this, one of the eight arguments the obama administration has been making is that because al qaeda had nothing to do with the arab spring and all of those movies did not seem to replicate any of the ideology, that indicates they have lost their momentum and arab and world, and they have lost it permanently.

if you look up the political movement across the region, the you believe it would be extraordinarily different for an outcry -- richard - an al qaeda like organization to have an appeal. >> i think it will be if it's a trend of events is ultimately successful. i do not mean a perfect success, but i mean the replacement of repressive regimes which forms of government that encouraged people to change the system rather than feel compelled to and to pakistan or sudan wh

attack their western protectors with bombs and mayhem, so i do think that is an enormous promise of arab spring, and i would say the dissatisfaction of people in egypt, syria, tunisia elsewhere is taking a much more healthy turn. and they try to cause as much mayhem as you could, so the promise is there, but it is not

inevitable. it takes primarily the efforts 0 people who are dissatisfied. it takes smart wisdom and intelligence. >> let me take you back to a homeland security issues. the department of homeland security 5 the koran. -- the department of a homeland security had it wrong.

>> they are putting something on top, and they are doing pretty well on their own. . they would rather cooperate with each other than putting children in orphanages. the wisdom is it so zero of these organizations -- it so all

of those organizations as a unifying idea. the coast guard does more than protect the united states from threats coming in by sea. that idea of stopping physical threats to the country ought to be at the top of the list, and they did provide a unifying of sect, which was given reality by connective. additional resources have been added. the other chores they have to do are still being done, but this

is a mission that appeals. you are a patriot of wants to protect your country, and if you feel good about that you will put effort into it. the hard part has been overcoming all of those obstacles that always happen when you throw organizations together. >> when i asked what is the one area where they do not believe coordination has worked as well as it should, they will say that because the defense mission is in the homeland security, then the defense department stood for

a cyber command. you only have milliseconds to figure out if your threat is coming domestically or from abroad. it is unfortunately a short enough amount of time you cannot have an argument over who is handling it. tell me how you assess how the obama administration has handled its. >> i said what we have done has been a step in the right direction. i think the steps are pretty small, and i have said openly my

understanding is that you have to centralize in order to be affective. that is partly because of the talent to deal with it. the government has a limited number of people who are really good at this stuff, and there is so little difference between an intraday and networks to steal secrets and penetrating and now a network to steal secrets. they are such intertwined skills, but to try to break them into separate pieces is almost impossible, and what is really impossible is trying to

separate the united states from the rest of the world. that is what all of our approaches are founded upon. all of them are built on this is laid out in the constitution and worked out over the years. if they are friends, you work with them. what i saw was the game of twister being played continually by people and lawyers trying to get around these restrictions, and we were constantly running

back to the justice department. we went to the justice department to achieve a success, and after six months they came back and said, you ought to do what makes sense to you, and we will tell you. >> six months of the billable hours, and that is what they give you. >> i do not fault them. lawyers are in rowboats. they determine if the direction you are going is where the wait .aid they were concepts are exploding. there are some incredibly old

legal precedents they were trained to use. there are some timeless rules but apply a. you do not try to recruit people who are innocent. these were violated by the bush administration in a way that sets us back, so there are timeless principles that apply.

homeland security is responsible for server security -- cyber securities and the domain in which the department of defense is in charge of protection. about one has not gone well. >> when you were in office, it was just the beginning of the obama administration coming to grips with the fact the u.s. now has a significant offensive capability. they did not talk about it much, but they cannot help but be in discussion during your -- doug

be in discussion. talk to me about the for the soviets got their nuclear weapons. are we getting to the point where we have rules about how we develop in the cyber rome? >> i think we should try to develop rules on the government to government basis. with china and particular and many of our allies, i get a lot of resonance with friends and allies who realize the degree of

dependence on cyber. the harm that can be done if you put a nation stayed behind what we see, the chinese in general think they can take the advantage of the internet to try to steal information they can use for their own purposes, and although they complain about people who have them, they think they are giving more than they give away, so they are not ready to talk about it, but i think they are beginning to approach the point, but where we do see some is in a criminal enforcement.

law-enforcement sources have --ken of the rings of at&t's of atm thieves. at a recent conference i told the chinese we do not do industrial espionage. you do. eventually this is going to hurt you, and let's figure out ways to enforce that. that leaves the remaining area of national security in which intelligence gathering and

national governments tried to get in the networks of other national governments, and if it comes to conflict, they will look at ways to use that access to their advantage. that will be the final frontier. it may be possible to reach agreements such as confining action to military or security matters, not going off and trying to bring down power grids in other countries, so i think that is their area we can go and eventually assess -- an

area we can go a eventually. it is hard to tell how vulnerable we are. i saw analyses of what could have been done had we persisted. some of them looked pretty bad. on the other hand, we are dealing with a lot of things on our networks of the term -- all the time. some of them are inadvertent t.rios i tend to think we are not as vulnerable as doomsday sears.

i think the sooner we can find an agreement, the better. >> you will have a few questions, so let's move on. if queen elizabeth was here, she would say this began with the cia officer who got into a firefight. it moved on through the bin laden raid, something that did enormous damage to the relationship with pakistan. there have been several efforts to write that relationship, and this incident in which at least 24 pakistani border guards were

killed. the pakistanis have responded in the usual way. they cut off supply lines to a afghanistan. is there anything we can do to break the cycle? how does it affect our ability to deal with terrorism issues democrats when i was operating within its and when i was thinking about it, i just had an idea of how the formed the american relationship was swiss -- how the form -- deformed the relationship was with pakistan, how much each side would

disregard the other side and look to bring about our relationship, so when you take a step back, it is probably going to be short-term for a pretty specific things. if you believe pakistan requires a fundamental change is to be a member of the community, i think you have to think in terms of trying to establish a more normal relationship between us

and pakistan, and we have to give up the short-term goal we have with pakistan, which was that it would take actions on its side of the border. but was the idea in 2009. they have moved into south and waziristan. they were providing boots on the ground. it seemed we could meet our goal, and it would be to both of our advantages.

in makes the job much more difficult. for a short-term goal it was not being achieved, so we have to go dark and -- go back to a relationship and makes more sense in the long term. we cannot reinforce their position within pakistan to the detriment of the pakistani people. we have to put our army barracks where they belong -- put the army back where we belong. we have to focus on long-term things like trying to change education so it is not know much rasas -- it is not madrassas.

we have to have a careful set of penalties as well as inducements to pakistan in order to reach the right goals over the long term, so i think we have to except pakistan is not going to be a big help in the near term and go back to try to build a long-term relationship that will make pakistan a more responsible member of the international community. >> when you were at the forum this summer you made headlines by suggesting we need to end creditors strikes into pakistan, that there was no way we could continue this kind of relationship. at the same time, we cannot rely on pakistanis to deal with their

side of the border. when you ask about it, they said it was the only way they have to get inside of the border. tell me what you think it has evolved into you. >> this arrangement we have with pakistan in which it does not acknowledge it had given permission to the united states to conduct attacks within its own country is part of this the ofrm of relationship, -- av this deformed relationship is somewhat of a cop out, which i

think will hurt in the long term, so what i was getting out with my proposal, and my proposal was not to stop attacks. pakistan has enemies in the northwest territory it is trying to root out. there are others, so i was looking for ways that would be supported by the governments of both countries openly. i still think finding those things is what we need to do to get this relationship back. >> the u.s. would have to acknowledge credit for a tax

exist, and the pakistanis would have to acknowledge under some circumstances they welcome. what are the chances and they could agree to the outside of the bargain -- to the side of the bargain? >> it depends on what the alternative is. if you are heading towards a waterfall everyone can see, you ought to try something else. >> use of the report that came out a few weeks ago -- you saw the report that came up a few weeks ago.

it did confirm what has been circulating for a long time. it tells you there was a program but was very active, and it puts together a fair bit of evidence that those resumed but not at the level and they have been prior to 2003. when you look of the things the obama administration has done to slow these, is there any way to declare them a success and?

at 5:30 there will be a vote on that nomination. mr. president, i trust that you and all our staff, everyone in this great capitol complex had a safe and happy holiday. i hope everyone is well rested because we have a difficult work period ahead of us. we have much to do over the next few weeks. hanukkah and the christmas holiday are quickly moving ahead. this week we need to finish the work on the defense authorization bill and even more. this month we'll also handle a number of nominations, extend unemployment insurance for americans struggling to find work during these difficult times, and we have more appropriations work to do. the continuing resolution to fund the government expires on december 16. we must not neglect the responsibility to continue our work to put americans back to work. so we'll take up additional pieces of president obama's american jobs act.

this week we'll introduce legislation that would give the economy a boost by putting money back in the pockets of middle-class workers and small businesses by extending and expand ago popular payroll tax cut. more than 120 million families took home an extra $120 billion this year, mr. president, thanks to this payroll tax cut that we championed. the average family held on to more than $935 of their hard-earned dollars this year. we need to assure those families that they can rely on that tax cut next year as well. but this legislation does not -- does more than just protect the tax cuts americans already count on. it deepens and expands that tax relief as well. next year 120 million american families will keep an average of $1,500 because of this legislation. that means they'll have more money to spend on necessities like gas and food and will buy things that help spur economic growth in their communities.

businesses will also benefit from this tax cut. 98% of american firms will see their payroll taxes cut in half when their wages they pay out. in nevada 50,000 businesses will benefit from this tax cut and many businesses will save tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars. this legislation will help families and businesses while spurring hiring and giving the economy a boost and it will be fully paid for with a small 3.25% surtax on income over $1 million. a person who makes $1 million a year, they won't pay an extra penny. someone who earns $1.1 million will pay $3,250 more than they would have originally. at a time when many working families are still struggling, we can't afford not to extend and expand this important payroll tax cut. so i was disappointed to hear

from some of my republican colleagues specifically the junior senator from arizona, who has already come out in opposition to this tax cut. i think it's fair to say that all republicans have not. but my friend from arizona did. mr. president, this is wrong. those who claim they care about keeping taxes low but too often it seems thoepbl care about keeping -- they only care about keeping taxes low for the richest of the rich. the same republicans who oppose a payroll tax cut for hundreds and millions of businesses and families last week jettisoned the hope of a large-scale deficit-reduction deal in the super committee because they insist on a massive permanent taxgiveaways for the very rich. cutting taxes for middle-class families and businesses should be an area where republicans and democrats can find common ground as we have in the past. opposition by republicans is

because this tax cut has president obama's finger prints on it. republicans won't support it even though they know it is good policy for american families and businesses. let's hope that is not the case for all my friends. let's examine the effects of their purely political opposition to a commonsense tax cut. if republicans block passage of this legislation, they will be taking money out of the pockets of american families. that is clear. a family making $50,000 a year, this proposal that we've talked about would not only preserve an $565 ag $935 taxak, year in the family coffers. if republicans get their way, that family will actually see its tax increase by about $1,000. if republicans block this legislation, 120 american families and 98% of american businesses will not get the tax cut next year. instead 120 million families and

millions of businesses will be hit with a tax increase. those numbers are startling. they're shocking. but the potential impact on the larger economy is down right scary. economist mark zandi of moody's said the economy will likely aunge back into recession erasing economic progress we've made if we don't extend this tax cut. clearly our fragile middle class and economy can't afford the setback failure to extend and expand these tax cuts would bring. kweubz say we can't -- republicans say we can't afford to raise these taxes. if they choose to oppose this payroll tax cut, we'll know what they meant to say was we can't afford to raise taxes on the rich. in fact, more clearly, we cannot afford to raise taxes on the rich, but we're happyre we in a quorum call? the presiding officer: we are not. mr. mcconnell: well, first, i would like to welcome everybody back. i hope everyone had a nice thanksgiving. shortly before we all left last

week, we got some disappointing news when the yoipt committee on deficit reduction announced it was -- joint committee on deficit reduction announced it was unable to reach the kind of bipartisan agreement that much of us -- many of us had been hoping for. it was a major disappointment to those of us who hoped that the joint committee would ultimately age to the kind of serious entitlement reforms and job-creating tax reforms that all of us know would have been a big, big help in getting our fiscal house in order and jolting this economy back to life. such an agreement would have also sent a clear message to the american people and to the world that despite our many differences, lawmakers here are capablef coming together and making the kinds of very tough decisions about our nation's economic future that continue to elude lawmakers in europe. i know for a ft that republicans wanted this committee to deliver, and the good news is we'll still see

$1.2 trillion in deficit reduction. but frankly, it's hard toscape the conclusion that some in the white house and even some democrats here in the senate were rooting for failurend doing what they could to ensure that that failure occurred. i mean, what else are we supposed to think when the democrats' top political strategist here in the senate goes out on national television and predicts flure two weeks ahead of the deadline and then comes right out and says yesterday that he thinks the ouome he predicted is good politically for the president. this stuff isn't rocket science, but it's a big mistake. it might seem like a good political strategy to some but it's bad for the country. and that's why i am continuing my call today for the democrats who control the senate to work with us on jobs legislation that can actually pass here in the senate, that can get us beyond the permanent campaign by actually getting something done by working together. for the past several weeks, i have implored the democratic

majority here in the senate to work with us on a number of job-creating bills that have already attracted strong bipartisan support over in the house. it seems to me that if the two parties share control of power in washington, we should spend our time and our energies identifying job-creating measures the two parties do agree on and make them law. it's no secret that many people at the white house and a number of democrats here in the senate would still rather spend their time designing legislation to fail in the hopes of trying to frame-up next year's election. but with all due respect to the political strategists over at the white house, i think most americans would rather we took an entirely different approach, and that's why i think we should put aside the massive stimulus bill along with the permanent tax hikes that democrats are calling for in order to pay for it. in fact, i think it's safe to say that any attempt to pass another temporary stimulus funded by a permanent tax hike on the very people we're counting on to create the private sector jobs we need in this country is purely political

and not intended to do a thing to help the enomy since we already know it's likely to fail with bipartisan opposition. so let's focus sneddon the kind of targete bipartisan bills that the president quietly agreed to last month. 3% withholding bill championed by senator brown and the veterans' hiring bill. as pointed out again and again, the house has been busy all year passing bipartisan jobs bills st like these that we could rally around in a sign of unity and common concern for the millions of americans who are looking for jobs. there's no reason we shouldn't fos on passing these bills rather than using the senate floor as the stage for symbolic showboats that we know won't lead to anything exception more tension and political acrimony. we should do what we were sent here to do, and that means more bill signings and fewer bus tours.

at the moment, the senate business is the defense authorization bill, and there is a lot of work thateeds to be done. we have got a lot of amendments pending on this important legislation. members of both sides would like to see these amendments taken up and voted on. so let's stay on this legislation and focus on doing it right. let's show that we can actually legislate around here. once we're finished, i'm hoping we will be able to find a bipartisan path to resolve the other issues before us before the end of the year. americans are growing tired of the same old political shouting matches and political brinkmanship thas marked this democratic-led senate over the past few years. they are tired of careening from one crisis to another, holding their breath in the hopes that the two parties will put their differences aside and work something out at the 11th hour. only to be disappointed when democrats decide they would prefer to have a political issue to run on rather than pliewgz to to -- solutions to vote on. at last count, the house

republicans have passed 22 job bills that were designed not only to incentivize the private sector to create jobs but which were also designed to attract strong bipartisan support. in other words, they have been designing legislation to actually pass. they have been legislating with an eye toward making a difference instead of simply making a point. what i'm saying is let's follow their lead. let's come together and pass more bipartisan jobs bills and show the american people that we're not going to settle for the easy way out. the economic crisis we have faced is much too serious for faced is much too serious for

honor of hearing from someone before. if you want to know about the history of the terrorism museum it is perhaps best to listen to the man who was the first homeland security secretary for our country after 9/11. tom ridge former tiffin of pennsylvania has distinguished himself and service to our nation and can speak more eloquently than almost anybody else on whether this is a terrorist organization or whether the true terrorists are the people who are terrorizing the people of the camp.

governor tom ridge. [applause] >> thank you. first call, thank you very much for that warm and gracious greeting. thank you very much. i don't know who's responsible for the cameras in the back, but i'm going to make a simple request of one of two or all of you when you get done filming all of this send a copy over to the white house and to the department state, it might help them better understand what we are all about today. [applause] i would appreciate very much. >> it has been a great honor and privilege to be associated with many of my colleagues to all of those who gather and frankly have gathered and continue to gather in many places around the

world this is significant, and around the world we gather from time to time to beg and plead what ever is necessary to make sure that of the human rights, the lives of the men and women, the residents of the camp to protect it that they would be ultimately free to enjoy the freedom and the dignity and the opportunity so consistent with not only their ambitions but the tradition of a great culture and a great country. it's become very personal to me i spent a lot of time looking over the shoulders of mothers have shown me pictures of husbands and sons and daughters that have been killed in iran or tragically the two versions from the maliki government in to camp ashraf. they've received many letters of

thanks and deserving letters of course things because i've tried so many of my colleagues and the delisting of the pmi and return to safety and freedom in the residence of camp ashraf. it's become very personal to me. i have on my desk in my office the first volume called fallen for freedom, 20,000, 20,000 pmi murders. so the opportunity that has been afforded me this morning i thought i would just share with you through a couple of different prisons my strong support of you and your family come extended family you care about and love at camp ashraf. the first is through the prism of a way that is not personal

tall if you think about it. it's cold, it's calculating, it's probably as in personal as you can get. but there's an exhibition in that part of the world that speaks to that and says the enemy of my enemy is my friend. iran is the enemy not of the united states but the modern civilized world so if you are an enemy of iran, you must be considered a friend of the western world and certainly a friend of the united states. yet we don't quite seem to understand that. so, with the hope you will send the documentary to the white house and the department of state let's run through the lessons we've learned of the past couple of years with regard to iran. they are, have been and continue to be the number one terrorist state in the world.

if you are looking for this instability in lebanon particularly southern lebanon and hesla you can chase the line back to iran if you are looking for the instability in israel, the west bank, hamas might work. the bottom line goes right back to iran. if you're looking for individuals in the country responsible for killing american soldiers in iraq and afghanistan , the line goes back to iran. it is an absolutely amazing to me that after perhaps a well intentioned, perhaps appropriated but 97 several administrations ago of harvey mek as a terrorist organization we look at the history as what transpired thinking that may have improved

diplomatic relations and open the door a little but to reconciliation to change. so, if this effort has led to the international atomic energy report concluded it has shown sanctions haven't stopped iran from maintaining a secret well structured nuclear weapons program since 2004 from establishing eye quote a hidden weapons program disguised with social programs the nuclear arms capability than they have ever been, they continue to killian are responsible for the death of american soldiers, continue at the heart of the instability death in the middle east and continue to be the number one

terrorist state and all we've asked this administration to do and frankly the previous administration failed to do this as well is delist the mek, the enemy of my enemy is my friend. the second prez on i think that we should and can look at the challenges confronting us is to do with iraq. many of you know i was a soldier in a different war in a different place and a different time. there's a wall that has 50,000 names and over 50,000 gold star mothers and goldstar dad's. we have at least 4400 who serve their country, have lost their lives in iraq. we had thousands and thousands more coming home with a visible

and invisible wounds we spend half a trillion to a trillion dollars with the hope of the aspiration, with the goal that once we rid ourselves is what these qassam hussain the emerging leadership in its own unique way consistent with their culture but in its own unique way embrace the notion of self-government, human rights, tolerance, free-speech, all of those values associated with the american brand. think about that sacrifice. and think about the notion that having made that sacrifice of both blood and treasure we elevate to leadership a group of individuals in the maliki administration that turned a deaf ear to the european union, european parliament, hundreds of european legislatures who have denied or rather yet unwilling to accept the ad adjudication of

the european union and the u.k. that they are not a terrorist organization. have repeatedly used and i am glad that my friend, patrick kennedy brought it up continue to use this is the irony, the tragic irony, continue to use americans, our designation of the mek as justification for murder and innocent men and women on two occasions and 09 and in 11. fascinating. in the hopes you are going to send this tape over to the white house and the department of state they are going to look at the letter the government sends. to the european commission. in this very letter at the top

organization has already been classified by the international community as a terrorist organization. there's only one reason it's there. we held this government put it there. such a certain extent i will defer to my id distinguished colleagues on the diocese it seems to me there might be the conspiracy here and intended perhaps it does look like we're inclusion and as long as we continue to designated as a terrorist organization they can send these documents around a little just to find a gradual rise and explain the murder of innocent people on the two locations in camp ashraf. i had the occasion to be talking to the u.n. high commissioner for refugees about two weeks ago

, expressed grave disappointment and frustration in the maliki government, but i'm going to get this through the third lens expressed frustration, perhaps even surprise with the united states to act because the continue designation has frustrated their limited efforts because they know even if the excess ins for the iraqi government has denied them access we pointed out today if patrick kennedy pointed out to you even today martin was told you've got to move by the iraqi government you must move these men and women to another location in iraq beginning to wonder why we are so docile, why we are so submissive, why we are

of lives and that's far more important of the treasure but significant treasury to tell us what to do with consistent to our broader obligation to support humanitarian human rights and to keep our promise which we gave individuals to every member of the camp ashraf when we also guarantee them under the geneva convention that is the other interesting piece of revelation over the past several days not only is the iraqi government say they are not going to continue to do and treat them as a terrorist organization that they are not protected by the geneva convention, a rather remarkable statement for someone who wants to be accepted in the broader world community. it's remarkable be influenced that the iranian government

seems to have in iraq. let's remind ourselves ladies and gentlemen that the maliki government didn't win an overwhelming victory and yet to form a coalition government, and we all know who he turned to in order to form a coalition the same individual our military and social forces had sought when he was leading the militias of all solder to of course when he left iraq of peace and comfort and support in iran. only to bring himself back, but he brought a disproportionate amount of influence back. every single day when i was privileged to serve my country and the president as the first few assistance to the president homeland security and secretary of homeland security we called it a threat matrix. sometimes a was a couple dozen pages long, and to a variety of

those of the agencies to get intelligence from a variety of different sources the list of threats against the united states of course you don't take them all seriously. many of them are not credible but you look at them, some more serious come samore acted upon and we waited to see if something would happen and if we could get more information and some were discounted but the bottom line in my time both in the white house and as the first secretary for the department of homeland security not one single time that i ever see a threat directed to the united states and any resident of for a supporter of the mek but we for whatever reason for whatever reason continue. so i've got an idea, i've got an

idea. maliki is coming to this country on december 12th and i really hope this tickets to the white house this the department issues visas and the department of homeland security, although the visa has been issued, has the right to deny you access in this country and it's an interesting position one issues the visa and the other opens the door and lets you in. i've got an idea. a cyclical conditions before we open the door how about delisting the m ek? [applause]

i appreciate that, but there's a lot more. we are going to the list and insist they cooperate with the commission on refugees. we are going to insist that the initial interviews take place in can't ashraf. [applause] we are going to insist the united states provide security for both the commissioner and his team as well as the residence of can't ashraf and insist the united states taking a leading role model the in the form of the united nations but with our friends around the world to see to it that these men and women by the we have given us as much information

about iraq's nuclear capability than our own intelligence organization we must think about that and recognize it as well. those ought to be the conditions the list, to operate with the u.n., keep them at camp ashraf come support the men and women with blue helmets as the u.s. high commissioner and a leadership role in getting these men and women resettled in companies who will raise them, their families and their belief in the non-nuclear peaceful tolerant iran. [applause] one final thought. you know, there's been a lot of discussion about the term used

describing president obama's leadership with regard to libya. some say it was effective means the broader humanitarian interest and building a coalition. of assault as supportive but you talking about the expression was the president was able to leave from behind to mr. president, this is a time you must leave from the front. [applause] he can ask any soldier and marine one of the most difficult tasks as a walking point because sometimes the individual walking point to the initial hit, they

take the flak they are the ones that encountered the enemy but right now on this issue mr. president, you have to. delist mek and provide them the protection and all the rest of the world can welcome them with open arms to promote a free and independent non-nuclear iran. we need a regime change in the first place to start is to delist the mek. [applause] >> thank you, mr. secretary. governor, former member of the house but also veteran of the united states of america thank you for your service to the country. now i have the honor to introduce another individual who has a distinguished record not

only as the chairman of the democratic national committee as a governor, as a presidential candidate, but i wanted to highlight another thing, another title that he has won and that is physician, medical doctor because all of those that are familiar with the service of medicine know the hipaa craddock both -- to the oath. i think it's appropriate today that he speak to us as he has eloquently on occasions before about how we take the hit the credit growth in medicine and apply it to public policy. first, let's do no harm that's not allow another assault and massacre at the camp, let's hear from a real human rights leader howard dean.

[applause] >> thank you. thank you very much. patrick, tom, thank you for your long help on this issue. i started this in january of this year never imagining that we would be here 41 days from the exploration of the guarantee from prime minister maliki has given us. 41 days from the potential execution of the 3500 unarmed people the united states has promised to defend. 41 days. we've wasted nearly 300 days that the government of the united states of america could not get off its butt and figure out what the stood for as a country, and that is

fundamentally wrong. i want to talk first about the united nations. the united nations made in my view a courageous and ionesco at met the palestinians as a member nation. for that, the lobby in the united states demand that they be prevented from any contributions. there's about 20% of their budget. i think the united states as an institution that is important in the world and i think it is a mistake to defund them. but yesterday the president of the united nations made the ridiculous suggestion that the people be redistributed in side of iraq and that somehow without any guarantee of protection either from the united states or the united nations they would be fined. how could i go to the congress

of the united states and ask them to restore the money for the united nations if this kind toward the policy is what we get in return for the united nations and i ask the representatives in the united nations to think about what they are doing. [applause] we expect in return for our investment in the united nations we expect courage, and we've seen virtually none of it from the u.n. and protecting these 3500 individuals in ashraf who have written guarantees every single one of them from the united states government that we would protect them and who have been screened by the federal bureau of investigation of anti-terrorist squad and not in either of them has been found to have terrorist connections. explain to me, martin, what rationale you gave for what you have done which is essentially to sign the execution okay for

3500 unarmed civilians. that is not with the united nations is supposed to be doing. now, both representative kennedy and ridge talked about the visit of the prime minister maliki to occur in the white house. i understood white house visits were a status symbol something important to the people getting them a sign of recognition these were important countries with and mentioned the prime minister is under investigation by the spanish judiciary for a war crime which occurred in ashraf in april of 2011. how is it that the president of the united states is now inviting a person who is being invested in investigated for war crimes to sit in the oval office that oval office does not belong to the president of the united

states it belongs to every one of those americans and we need to be proud of the people that sit in that. [applause] i don't believe we create verdicts with people before they get tried and the prime minister has not been tried for the war crimes but there is not any question the prime minister sent the iraqi troops into ashraf in april 11 -- of 2011 and that 46 actually 38 because two of them white leader medical care was withheld those people were murdered in cold blood by the troops that were sent by prime minister maliki. that means is that evidence turns out to be true, and i believe it is true that he will

in fact be convicted in the spanish courts of the war crime i believe foot nouri al-maliki tecum the man that we enabled to be elected prime minister of iraq is a war criminal, and i believe that we do not as an american people or as an american government consort with war criminals. we may have to talk from time to time we should be talking about how we are going to save lives and we have an obligation to save those lives. the united states government needs to pay attention. we get reassured that they are paying attention. it is not enough to say that you are paying attention. we have 41 days left and when we started we had 341 days left. 300 days have gone by people have been paying attention. 3500 unarmed people in the desert and iraq charged told by

the american people they are going to be protected in writing. we have an obligation. i understand the ambassador has said we want to be helpful but we don't have a responsibility. mr. ambassador and mr. president, we do have a responsibility. we gave our word and gave our riding we have a responsibility i do not want my country to become possessed in the carrying out of war crimes. as the dutch found out people who turn the other way our complicity, which brings me to the planned i don't know why it is still in the terrorist list. there are lawyers here who i don't think it should be but i'm not a lawyer, you can debate or

not whether i'm smart, but i do know that there is not much evidence that i can see. no one has presented evidence to the congress, no one has presented evidence to the intelligence committees behind closed doors. no one has presented any evidence in the public or private as understand from members of the intelligence committee that the terrorist justification is either justified or legal so there is one explanation which is that somehow the administration believes if we keep them on the terrorist list that the law will be nice to us. first of all this is a field apart. the state department has a long history of defending their mistakes, there 15-years-old and this is another example of it. somehow in 1997 we thought they might not send them and blow up

our troops and create atomic weapons subsidize terrorism in the middle east and all for the rest of the world somehow we thought if only we will designate these folks to put them on the list, maybe they will be nice. it is 14 years later i don't detect any of niceness and in fact we've seen the creation of our foreign policy toward the nation of iran to those who run the iran instead of the people who want to be designing the state department which is the president or the state policy, foreign policy which is the president of the state department. the glove appear to be running the foreign policy of the united states of america. now, i in this for two reasons, and in this because i think a terrible injustice is being done to people who we promised to

keep safe and i believe the united states is a great nation and that we have to keep our word. but i did this for a bigger reason than that. the real reason i'm in this does not have much to do or as much to do with the mek. it has to do with the united states of america. this country was founded on the notion that we are raising the bar on the expectations of what human beings were all about 235 years ago. if you look at the i'm not a big fan of this american exceptional was some stuff i don't think americans are better than or asians or south americans or africans or anybody else, but i do think we are an exceptional nation because of the content of our founding documents, the declaration of independence and the constitution because those documents set forth something that had never been done at that

time and there are still some things in the constitution that protect people that aren't in any other constitution of the world of the political minorities so that is in a lot of other constitutions. what that means is the united states of america has stood as a beacon for the rest of the world. we don't even always look to our own standards, but we have a high standard of what our obligation is to our fellow man. the reason people have even amidst our feelings admired the united states is because we were willing to expect more of ourselves as a nation. that is is what stake here. how we are willing to act on what we can expect for ourselves. i'm sure when the 41 days past if harm comes to the people of ashraf, you will get people in political places that will say

well, we didn't have enough time. we started this 341 days ago at least when i got involved and you started long before that. we had enough time but we have allowed the time to trickle to our figures and it is not acceptable. mr. president, we need to act now not just for the people in ashraf, not just because we are to stand up and have regime change in iran, we need to act now because we are standing up for our own country when we stand up for the people in ashraf and if we fail to do that are not just the opposite in the murder of the people we promised to defend, but we are complicity and basing our own country, and i do not believe that any american president ever should be part of that. [applause]

>> malae of the great honor of introducing somebody who can address not only the legal elements and the underpinnings of the situation, but the moral underpinnings of the situation because the professor has spent his career making sure that we stay true to the truth whether it's reflected in bill law or in our conscience that is why he has become known as the top lawyer for civil liberties and human rights and and here to֖ talk to us today is professor alan dershowitz. [applause] >> thank you, con gutzman. thank you.

thank you. >> what a personal honor it is for me to be addressing you here today, not only because of the distinguished company i am in on this podium, but because all of you out there but for another very personal reason as well. mauney religious tradition as well as the islamic religious tradition says he who saves and a human life whether she is saved the entire world. we are here today to say they were old, and what an honor that is for all of us. [applause] now with the regime has collapsed and the syrian regime is under fire the most repressive regime in the middle east and perhaps in the entire world as mahmoud amana sean's iran. they run over the terrorist theocracy and the disfigurement

and murder to suppress dissent. they threaten genocide against their enemies and seek to develop genocidal weapons capable of wiping out entire nations of the face of the earth. they blow of embassies and community centers with massive casualties including women and children. the target people including ambassadors based on religion and ethnicity and national affiliation. the finance and facilitate terrorism and attacks against both civilians and soldiers including so many of our own. they commit war crimes against humanity and incitement to genocide. they are international criminals and like other organized criminal groups, they tell the witnesses to their crimes in order to prevent them from giving testimony against their leaders. now they are planning the killing of the largest concentration of witnesses to their crimes in the world today.

those who are living in the camps ashraf and iraq. 3400 of armed dissidents many of them on witnesses to the worst abuse of the regime over many years, many of them but mrs. to the merger of their own family members. these are people who can give testimony or the international criminal court to invite all the ahmadinejad and others who've committed international crimes, and they should and they may well do that to read some of the most important -- [applause] i can tell you that issue is actively under consideration today. some of the most important witnesses might come from the 3400 residents of camp ashraf. that is one important reason why the potential war criminals who run the regime are so anxious to

secant ashraf shut down and the weaknesses exposed as one human rights lawyer put it to quote the iranian executioners. it's the current intention of the government to close down the camp the day that the american soldiers leave which is at the end of the year you know that the iraqi government reiterated that in a memorandum to the european union. the residents now as we all know have very, very little time to figure out a way to keep themselves out of the clutches of the iranian killers who will surely be hunting for them. all for the dozens have been killed, hundreds wounded by the iraqi soldiers who are unsympathetic. the united states military and its dissidents protect the person's status under the fourth geneva convention and the high commissioner of the refugee has declared them asylum seekers who are entitled to international

protections the there will be no one to actually protect if the campus closed down and arrangements are not earlier made to provide safe travel and safe haven. there are movements to bring the case against the leaders in the international criminal court as i mentioned. efforts are underway to try to persuade several nations that are signatories to the treaty to fight the charges including incitement to genocide and the murder of dissidents. if this were to happen the witnesses who currently reside in the camps the seven would secure the additional status of the protected witnesses and the prestige and the international criminal court might weigh in heavily on the for assuring that they were not harmed by ev calpers assigned to keep them from giving relevant testimony. i intend to communicate directly to the chief prosecutor, the international criminal court and urge him to grant witness

protected status to the potential witnesses who today are in that camp. [applause] and it is an international crime to tamper with witnesses or to murder witnesses. that is what the mafia does. it's not what civilized societies do. in any event these deserve protection on humanitarian grounds. the action of the government and those in iraq up to the law make it clear that these dissidents are potential targets of the mischief. the united states government which was responsible for disarming them as the responsibility to protect them. we've heard from so many now about the impending visit of the

iranian leader, the iraqi leader to the presidency of the united states. there was an interesting freudian slip. if the president of the united states does not demand a change in the iraqi government's commitment to close the camp, his silence will be taken as acquiescence, and that is so dangerous, silent acquiescence. one excuse as we know offered by those who wouldn't protect the inmates is that they are members of the mek, which was once a decade and a half ago designated mistakenly in my view by our government as a terrorist group. this was the first legal point listed by the iraqi government in its recent paper to the european community, the organization has already been classified by the international community is a terrorist organization but also refers to relations with neighboring countries which of course means

iran, purchased relief terrorist nation and so regarded by all reasonable people. there are several legal moral and practical reasons why this excuse of the mek being listed just doesn't work. first of all even if it were true, and it's not, that the mek as a terrorist group that designation would not deny the residence at the camp protection under international law. certainly not all the residents if any can currently be deemed. they are disarmed, they are not engaged in any activities which meet any legal definition of terrorism of them are combatants under international law either lawful or unlawful combatants. second, the designation of the terrorist groups is questionable and more so today even if an organization has once been deemed a terrorist group it does not mean that maintains that status forever.

law is clear. the status must be completely revisited, and there is no current evidence the would justify continuing the status of the terrorist group. consider and compare. [applause] consider and compare the palestinian liberation was certainly a terrorist group for many years growing up civilian buses, murdering athletes, hijacking commercial airlines to murdering students, people what prayer and diplomats. but it no longer retains that formal status. though the leaders, some of them at least skilling qtr best's by naming public squares after terrorists by paying money to the families of tourists and allowing incitement to terrorism and the government responsive media and many other ways to get the authority no longer bear the stigma of terrorism. it follows that mek shouldn't be

considered a terrorist group now even if the designation was legally and factually warranted at some point in time which is highly doubtful and was almost certainly wrong. it is undoubtedly wrong now when the former head of the fdic and the former secretary of homeland security who have seen documents that none of us have available to us can certify that there is no current threat from this organization that ought to cover an enormous amount of ground and carry an enormous amount of weight. and the president of the united states and the secretary of state must consider the current evidence and must be list this organization. in any even to -- [applause] in any even to the thousands of women and the many children and

the elderly and others who were among the 3400 residents of camp ashraf are entitled protection regardless of this anachronistic false designation still accorded to the mek. even if the iraqi government seems to concede this point and ury claiming to be dealing with the camp residents, quote, in accordance with of the human rights principles of international law enshrined in the universal declaration of human rights and the international convent on civil and political rights, but in practice the current plan to close the camp are a death warrant directed against the residence because the mek was once designated as a terrorist group by the united states government. now this stigma of a predict is going to be removed and it is going to be removed -- [applause]

as soon as all the evidence is objectively considered. but it will be a victory if the residents are attacked and killed in the meantime despite the claims to be compliant with lot the government is hindering actively hindering u.n. agencies from trying to help the residents relocate to save places and now they are trying a new ploy to get some u.n. agencies and some u.n. leaders to support the policies that they are trying to implement. that is cynicism at its worst and cannot be allowed to succeed. the international community has often failed in preventing the mass murder of dissidents and perceived enemies of genocidal regime. just remember and consider the horrible tragedies of cambodia,

of rwanda, darfur, the former yugoslavia, armenia many decades ago and of eastern europe 60 years ago. we said after the second world war never again but you know what happened to never again? it has become again and again and again and again. this time we must keep our collective humanitarian promise. the world is now on notice. it has no excuse and the holocaust happened every but he said we didn't know then the genocide we didn't know. when the cambodian genocide was occurring people are telling us it was propaganda. we didn't know. rwanda, darfur, we didn't know. we know.

we have been told. we had been warned. [applause] the conscience of, we know we are on notice. we must act now to protect these 3400 vulnerable individuals. if we fail to do so, the blood of innocents will be on our collective hands and there are specific life-saving steps our government can take immediately. you've heard some of them from our distinguished speakers. we should appoint a special envoy to lead the efforts to the peace resolve to matter. we should call publicly on the iraqi government to remove the december 31st deadline coming and we should do that before maliki comes to the united

states. we should take the matter to the u.n. security council for binding decision to prevent a human catastrophe coming and we should do it immediately the state department should act immediately to eliminate this horrible excuse that's been used by the iraqi regime, buy removing the mek from its list of the foreign terrorist organizations, and the united states, we, with our beautiful statue of liberty standing in the harbor, the statue of liberty that welcomed my grandparents and my great grandparents. we must be prepared to accept a number of residents of the campus on the humanitarian grounds. bring this to your poor, those to be freed, who fits the definition better than the people today for under the shadow of the sentence of death. so there is no time to wait. the clock of death is ticking.

if not now, when? my friend who i know has been also active in this cause, once said of the lesson he learned from the holocaust is always believed the threat of your enemies more than the promises of your friends. we must make that untrue. we, the american people for all the reasons we've heard today must finally keep our promise. we must do it and we must do it now. thank you very much. [applause] >> i don't think that ambassador robert joseph wants to follow

that, but he's going to have to. professor dershowitz, what a transparent argument for all of those of both legal mind but good conscience as can follow. what a fantastic outline of what we are facing and bringing get back to the most essential element, and then she once again for the was very powerful remarks. we have with us a distinguished diplomat and ambassador who has led the cause of protecting the world from the terror of nuclear weapons. he has been united states special envoy for the nuclear proliferation under secretary for arms control and international security and has worked his whole life to

coordinate the prevention and deterrence and defending the united states and the rest of the world from weapons of mass destruction. he is here today to talk to us about the fact that not only have the mek committee pmi bin an indispensable help to his effort in intelligence gathering on the nuclear program in iran, but he's here to talk about why he is in solidarity with the threat of terrorism posed by iran not only on the camp ashraf, but on all people of the world. let's give a great round of applause to the investor ronald joseph. [applause] >> thank you very much, and good afternoon. i tell you it is a hard act to follow. it would be hard act to follow

any of the speakers today, but that is my task. so first i would like to death our sponsors for the opportunity to present to you today my thoughts on a fee iranian nuclear program. the american community of northern california and association with other groups that help to promote a space and secular republic in iran has on a believe a very important role to play and ultimately determining the outcome of the nuclear issue. having worked for the past ten years on trying to stop kuran's committed quest for a nuclear weapons capability at the white house, at the state department, and now other government, i am convinced that until the current repressive regime in tehran is replaced through the resistance of the iranian people, we will not permanently succeed in ending the nuclear program. there are of course a number of

approaches that the united states and other countries are pursuing. economic sanctions through the united nations come even more sweeping financial measures under our own international law and covert activities such as the reported attack on the computers that operate iran's nuclear complex. in the future, and i will talk about this as well, there's also the possibility of the use of military force against the known nuclear facilities. but at the end of today, while all of these measures have and will likely continue to slow down the nuclear program, and while bodying time can be strategically important, they will not in the program. they will not persuade or compel the current leaders in iran to reverse course. only true internal political change can we achieve that outcome. so having already given you my bottom line, let me back up and try to explain how i've come to this conclusion.

i will start with an overview of iran's nuclear program, highlighting what are the most disturbing aspects of the latest on aiea report which received worldwide attention from the media after its release last week. following that, i will try to put the nuclear program in context. what does it mean for u.s. security? what does it mean for the security of the gulf region? why does iran want nuclear weapons, and how would such weapons effective regime's policies and ambitions? finally, i would like to talk about alternative policy options including the use of force. for each of these i will try to identify the strengths and weaknesses, the benefits cut costs and risks. so to begin, let me briefly summarize the iaea report, which is based on what the agency says is credible evidence gathered on the ground in iran as well as information from ten other states. the report is rather technical, so i will translate the findings

and to lay terms on here on's and richmond activity, the report can emphasize its continued progress in the key areas including operating more centrifuges than ever before and nearing the start of production the previously secret facility producing low-enriched uranium twice as fast as before in 2010, and 2 million now a stockpile of enriched uranium which could provide enough fissile material for the nuclear weapons, and to plan the production of enriched uranium for the 20% level that would shorten the time to reach weapons-grade level with additional processing. while these assessments of enrichment are of concern, the most alarming judgments contained in the report deal with what the agency describes as research development and testing activities the would be useful in designing a nuclear

weapon. in other words, iran is working on the building blocks for making atomic bombs. the report does not complain that iran or claim that iran has constructed a nuclear weapon or even that it has overcome all of the technological hurdles the would be required. it does not speculate on how long it will take iran to build a nuclear weapon is but what it does do is for the very first time lay out what it calls strong indicators of possible weapons development. for an agency as cautious as the iaea is. that is a major step forward. these indicators include creating computer models of nuclear explosions and work involving the neutron initiation, triggering systems and implosion exclusions the iaea also states that it has acquired documentation suggesting that iran has been provided presumably through the

a.q. khan at work with nuclear explosive design information and that its work on experiments with conventional explosives to compress metal into a mass suitable to initiate chain reaction. finally, the report points to evidence that indicates a bond has been pursuing a number of weapons for a warhead to deliver a nuclear weapon hitting such a war had on its longer range. unlike the 2007 u.s. intelligence estimate, that iran stopped work on a nuclear weapon in 2003 the iaea found that significant work of the military dimension has been conducted since that time including some work recently. ..

>> iran moved forward in a way to achieve a nuclear weapons capability. whether or not a final decision cannot proved or disproved, but they will in the near future have the option available to it if it so chooses. why do we care, or why should we care both the development? both president obama and president bush said the united states can want and will not

permit iran to acquire nuclear weapons. there's many reasons for this. let me mention just a few. a nuclear armed iran could promote ambitions in and outside the region more aggressively whether in afghanistan, iraq, or in the gulf or beyond. this could take the form of support of terrorism or fermenting political unrest to overthrow leaders supportive of the united states. this would threaten stability and the security of u.s. friends and allies in a vital region of interest. a nuclear armed iran is a direct threat to u.s. forces and allies in the gulf as well as the greatest middle east, europe, and eventually to the united states itself. the likelihood of iran using military and other means of force would, i believe, increase if teheran believed its nuclear capability protected it from retaliation. iran would seek to use the possession of nuclear weapons as

a powerful tool of intimidation and blackmail. a nuclear armed iran could lead to the end of the nuclear non proliferation views as we know it because countries responding to what they see as a great threat that must be detoured by their own possession of nuclear weapons and that include saudi arabia, turkey, egypt, and others. along a with a nuclear armed israel, this is a reason for a global disaster. nuclear armed iran is at the nexus of weapons of mass destruction and terrorism. pursuing nuclear weapons and supporting terrorism. if iran has these weapons and fits all material, the likelihood of their transfer to third parties would increase by design or diversion. finally, a nuclear armed iran would feel more secure from foreign, outside interference

and more confident that it could act without concern of repercussions to repress its own people, those who are, in fact, the greatest threat to the regime's survival. in other words, if iran achieves its goal of nuclear weapons, it's a true game changer. just imagine if it seems difficult today to deal with the current iranian regime. what would it be like if those leaders had nuclear weapons? what do we do to stop it? as i mentioned, and as all of you know, we sought to apply economic and financial sanctions against the regime, especially individuals associated with the nuclear program and entities like the revolutionary guards. since twx, there have been four u.n. security solutions imposing cost penalties on iran for its activities, but these penalties have always been less than what

the u.s. sought. they've always been negotiated down by russia and china who have been reluctant to impose harsh measures for political and commercial regions. the united states working with other willing countries in europe and in asia have also added sanctions through national laws. our congress has been and remains very supportive of these measures, and together, international and national sanctions have reportedly had a significant impact on iran's government and on its economy. president obama recently stated that the sanctions were taking a severe toll on iran. the problem is causing economic pain through sanctions has not stopped the process or the march to acquire a nuclear weapon. what do we do? one course is to impose more sanctions, something we're trying to do on the international level as we speak. however, as before, russia and china say no even now as the

release of the iaea report last week. that leaves us with additional national sanctions, but that seems a self-imposed limit as recent discussions regard possible sanctions against the bank of iran. after raising prospects of sanctions on the central bank on the oil sales globally, u.s. officials seem to move away from such action out of fear it could be too disruptive economically if it rose energy prices at home. there's apparently a price we're not willing to pay economically. as for covert action, there have been press reports of u.s. and israeli efforts to disrupt want program through computer attacks and other means of sabotage, but while the attempts have likely caused operational disruption like sanctions, they have not accomplished their goal, and the

iaea report makes that clear. we can do more sanctions and presumably more coverse actions, and we should, but given our experiences over the past five years we should not, i believe, expect them to work to end the program. time is running out. whether we have one year or two years, we can't be confident an incremental policy of more of the same would be successful. one has to conclude based on our experience to date that we will fail in our task if we don't take an alternative path. put bluntly, we're at a critical juncture faced with very hard choices and huge risks. because we are now at the cross roads, we have to consider the benefits, cost, and risks of using force. not an invasion or large scale bombing of cities and plants, but attacks to destroy known facilities or at least the main

known facilities of the program. no unwants to have to use force, but it's a challenge in which there's no easy policy choices. this is a very sensitive issue, and it should be. i can already hear the chorus that we need to give time for sanctions and covert activities. my reading of the iaea report is that we're out of time. this is no longer a viable option. we can decide not to use force and stick with the current policy, but if we do, we have to face up to the fact we're likely accepting a nuclear armed iran, and this may be acceptable to some, and we're already from a number of quarters in and out of government that instead of using force, we have to adopt a policy of detouring and containing a nuclear armed iran, a policy i argue is fraught with risks. while the obama administration has stated that all options are on the table, it is also made clear that it does not want to

use force. former secretary of defense, bob gates said the use of force against iran would be, in his word, insane, and i'm confident that almost other every country would prefer a diplomatic peaceful outcome. the problem is there's no reason to believe that the regime would ever abandon the nuclear program with one possible exception -- that it believed that force would be used against it. this was the case with libya, and this is the case with iran. for those who might be willing to use force, it would, as it should be, an act of last resort. in this context, consider the likely costs and benefits if cost is used, most likely not by the united states, but by ease real, a country that perceives weapons of mass corruption as an existential threat to its very existence, but have no doubt, if israel used force, the united states would be blamed and also be a target of retaliation.

the cost could be substantial. iran has many avenues to strike back through ballistic missiles or the use of terrorism worldwide oh there are its proxies in iraq and afghanistan and can create economic or political disruptions an unrest, but there's limits to what iran can do and what it's willing to risk. if we were to accelerate further in response to their actions. moreover, the program would not likely will ended by the use of force, as we saw after the 1982 strike against the reactor in iraq. instead, the program would almost surely go further underground, but minute use of force would likely by time. one year, perhaps up to three years. the key question is whether and how that time could be used strategically to fundamentally change the political conditions in iran. some argue that if force is used, all iranians will rally around the regime as a

nationalistic impulse. others challenge that wisdom noting the limited use of force would not alter the deep am -- animosity towards any or all of the regime. i don't know the answer, so let me leave you with that question for you to answer. allow me to make just two concluding thoughts. the first briefly as i said at the outset is the only sustainable solution to the iranian nuclear threat the is emergence of the free and democratic iran. second, and this is more of a personal note, i was asked here today to talk to you about iran's nuclear program, and i hope my remarks have been informative, but i want to say over the past few days as i prepared my comments, and today, as i have listened to the other speakers, i have learned a great deal about the mek, which i had known before only as a source, perhaps the best source of information on iran's nuclear

program, and i can now say une qif click i'm not only a supporter of delistening, but also of the other steps that governor ridge and others on the panel put forth. thank you very much. [applause] >> fantastic. [applause] thank you. [applause] >> thank you, ambassador joseph. [applause] we are very grateful to you and your leadership and not only for our country, but for all the world as these nuclear weapons pose a threat to all humanity, and it's so -- we're all so grateful for your service and also today to make such a transparent outline doesn't is sound familiar? all of these denials by the iranian regime on weapons of

mass destruction, doesn't it sound familiar? violating international law over and over again with respect to weapons of mass destruction, and at the same time, violating international law with respect to human rights. this is not a good group that's running iran. they threaten international security with weapons of mass destruction and the creation of a nuclear bomb. at the same time, they threat our very principles and human rights with their attacks against innocent, unarmed people. you said it over and over again that we do not need more of the same policies of acquiescence and appeasement.

that's what's gotten us this far with very few results of the this regime whether it's their suspension of pursuing nuclear weapons or suspension on their own people. this is a pattern. we've seen it over and over again as alan said, so perhaps now it is a good segue to introduce an individual who spent his career uncovering patterns of corruption and immorality, not only as richard has been on the commission to investigate one of the greatest crimes against the united states, the 9/11 attacks, but he distinguished himself as the lead period of time on the watergate task force

investigating corruption at the highest levels of government in our own country, and he has been tasked with the job of investigating the historic record in world war ii towards germany and japan and war crimes of that era, so this is a gentleman who has seen patterns of behavior whether it was the holocaust or whether it was japan with the imperialist regime or our own country or the 9/11 commission. we have someone who can speak to patterns of behavior of those who are corrupt throughout not only american history, but history of the world. it's my honor to introduce to

you richard ben-venesi. [applause] >> good afternoon, and thank you very much for that introduction, patrick kennedy. the bipartisan national commission on terrorist acts against the united states, better known as the 9/11 commission made a number of recommendations to congress and to the president as part of our final report. among the most significant from a security standpoint was the recognition to maximize counter proliferation efforts targeting weapons of mass destruction, expanding the proliferation

security initiative and supporting the cooperative threat reduction program. in another important recommendation, the commission called upon america to stand up for its values aggressively and define itself in the islamic world. both of those recommendations are central to my remarks today. the arab spring movement provided america with the opportunity to allow our values to define us in the middle east. for two long, we have followed a simple short sided goal of expediency in dealing with autocratic repressive regimes rather than trusting that the principles upon which our nation was founded and on which it has flourished as a beacon for all

freedom loving people to see. could this replace the demagogues and dictators and regimes that have long ruled those countries? let no one jurpt estimate the long slog ahead. debt pias our natural enthusiasm for those in the world who through off the yolk of oppression, there's little reason to believe that democracy or even stability will take root, much less flourish in the short term. this will be a discouraging period in my view fraught with a variety of challenges to security as various factions vow for power or vie for power rather in countries where tyrants rule for decades.

armed conflict, riots, and civil unrest will be fueled by political, civil, tribal, religious, and criminal elements while jihaddists of various stripes attempt to exploit the chaos for their own benefit. by the way, i commend to those who have not seen it, the cogent testimony on this subject by brian jacobs. rand corporation earlier this month before the house armed services subcommittee on emerging threats and capabilities. al-qaeda quickly attempted to align itself in uprising suiting events to its own narrative as defeats of u.s.-backed tyrants like mubarak, gadhafi, and salah.

at least they will be deprived of that argument when they fall in syria, and the mulahs are eventually turned down in iran which brings us to the second topic of my remarks, the far more vexing state of affairs that iran's bo -- belligerent actions brought into sharp focus. two events form my view of strong coalition action of the united states and our allies must be applied to condemn the reckless and reprehenceble activities of the iranian regime. the first, obviously, is the report released on november 8, 20 #11 -- 2011 by the iaea to the board of governors and u.n. security counsel. the report plainly puts to the

lie to the consistent denials by the regime of any interest, much less action in developing nuclear weapons. to the contrary. the report details a well structured and carefully organized nuclear weapons programs specifying there's indications that iran is preparing to produce weapons grade material some point in the future, that iran has the technology to prepare such material to use in a weapon, that iran also is acquiring or has already acquired the specialized detonators and technology needed for a weapon, that iran may now be able to fully integrate those technologies into a bomb, that iran may be conducting simultaneous simulations of key

aspects of nuclear weapons development, that new data indicate that iran is moving towards modeling weapons designs, that there now is further evidence that iran is developing neutron initiators needed to sustain a fissle reactions and form a high yield, that iran seems to be actively developing nuclear missile warheads, and that in a new development the iaea reports that iran may be reporting for future testing. the second recent development regarding and warranting reassessment of the situation is the alleged plot to assassinate

the saudi saudi arabia ambassador here in the united states under circumstances that would also involve the loss of american lives. obviously, i'm not privy to classified intelligence on the subject, but it appears the plot was real begging the question of how high up in the iranian regime planning, support, and authority was provided. was this a rogue operation sanctioned by the faction of the revolutionary guard, or was this is a plot authorized by higher ups in the regime? either way, a very disquieting indication of criminal activity by a would be be nuclear power. there is no disputing the

regimes long history of profound disrespect for the norms of international law and human rights. it's president ahmadinejad, half crown, half thug, denies the holocaust from one side of his mouth while pledging to wipe israel off the map from the other. at the same time, iranians, including ahmadinejad, have engaged in apock littic end of times rhetoric making reference to the return of the 12th emaum and the like. what should we ask of our staunch ally the state of israel? for a nation founded in part on the very painful lesson learned

never again, how much fore bear can we reasonably ask as iran moves towards the development of nuclear weapons and overtly threatens the very existence of israel? the prospect of a nuclear bully in the middle east willing to engage in criminal and reckless behavior is reflected in the saudi ambassador assassination plot, talking up apocalypse and suicidal end of times rhetoric resets the level of bellicosity on all sides. it may well be in ahmadinejad's short term parochial interest to spew the kind of rhetoric for which he has become infamous, but he, and those who truly make

the decisions in iran today, such as iatola, must be made to understand the danger of playing a half court game in a full court world. in my view, the only kind of sanctions that truly jeopardize the regime will have a chance of success in curbing iran's nuclear weapons ambitions. no option, including a military option should be off the table. our allies must understand that iran should not be allowed to delay and barricade until it's achieved its quest for a fissle device.

while iran now does not provide a threat to america, it could one day provide such to a small neighboring nation like israel, and there is no doubt that israel would respond to such an attack with a countervalue attack against iran, not just against its military and nuclear facilities, but essentially destroying the country and its entirety. it is in our interest, in the interest of our planet, to avoid such a horrendous scenario, by taking strong purposeful action to curb the bellicosity and tamp down the ambitions of the iranian regime. sanctions and boycotts of refined gasoline sold in europe accounting for significant hard cirn sigh should be employed --

currency should be employed. certainly french satellite transmissions relied upon by iran can be denied given president car cozy's view that an iranian nuclear bomb is the single greatest threat to world security certainly the covert campaign of sabotage against iran's nuclear weapon development program like targeted violence can and should be rached up. finally, the iranian banking system and iran's i believe to conduct international business can be targeted at our disposal. the key in the use of harsh sanctions is to project to the iranian people who are not our enemies, that there's clear

reasons for these sanctions, reasons entirely the result of the leaders' threatening activities. they must guard against resuscitating a failed resolution by inspiring a call to national unity. this will require skill and strong determination. failure here is not an option. the obama administration has welcomed the iaea findings and has declined the hypocrisy and outright lies of the regimes continuing denials. in my view, we must support the continuing efforts to ratchet up sanctions and building consensus

while walking the difficult line created by the harsh economic circumstances that confront us all today and how those circumstances may be exacerbated by new sanctions. this process will require great skill and judgment, but in the end, we must not waiver from using the great power that we possess to achieve the just ends we seek. thank you very much. [applause] [applause] >> general john kean is someone who, throughout his life, has worn the uniform of the american

soldier. when it comes to implementing policy, whether that policy, as richard said, is the policy of expediency or the policy of principle, we've always been fortunate in our country to have people who richard talked about in the 9/11 commission to have people willing to stand up for american values, aggressively. jack kean, as a retired four-star general and vice chief of staff to the united states army, among his many duties and litany of accomplishments, i think we only need to name two. the recipient of the silver star and the bronze star for heroism

under fire. this is a man who doesn't just talk the talk, but he walks the walk, and that's why it's so appropriate that we have him here today. please give him a great round of applause and welcome him to the podium. [applause] >> thank you. [applause] thank you very much, for that warm reception. i know you are probably getting weary and want to jump around a little bit. my sympathies to you. i'll be brief as i can, but let me associate my remarks with my distinguished colleagues here in terms of your issue, the challenges that you face, and also how well they outline the solutions. my contribution today is an attempt -- in attempt to be brief is to focus on iran and

united states policy because if we can resolve that issue, many of the other problems in the middle east can be resolved to include the mek. the iranian bungled operation to use proxies to assassinate the saudi arabia ambassador to the united states and to purposely plan the operation in the united states is a stopping rebuke to the obama administration's policy of negotiation and isolation with the iranians. i provided the remarks you're about to here to congress two weeks ago in a combined committee dealing with our issues with iran. indeed, republican and democratic administrations, since 1980, have failed to deal effectively with the harsh reality that iran is our number one strategic enemy in the world m frankly, the iranian stated as

much in 1980 that the united states was the enemy of the islamic revolution, and there intent was to drive the united states out of the region. therefore, they have been the systematically killing us for over 30 years. in 1983, their proxies, the hezbollah, blew up the u.s. embassy and the annex a following year with a total of almost 500 lives lost. we only had no response to this tramming di, but we -- tragedy, but we pulled our troops out of lebanon. in 1983, the iranian backed extremist group blew up the united states embassy in kuwait and attacked a residential area killing and wounding over 80. in 1984, the station chief in lebanon wastured and eventually killed, which was the beginning

of an iranian backed campaign to take high profile hostages over a ten year period that led to the poorly conceived and ill-fated operation by the reagan administration to exchange arms for hostages with the iranians. in 1985, twa flight 847 was seized on a route to rome, forced to land in beirut, leading to the killing of a u.s. navy diver and dumping his body, and eventually the hostages taming -- were released. in 1996, the u.s. air force towers and barracks in saudi saudi arabia was blown up by hezbollah killing 19 and wounding almost 400. again, although our intelligence apparatus identified the culprits as iranian backed hezbollah, we had no response, and we eventually shut down the united states military bases in

saudi arabia. since 2003, in iraq, the iranians have provided rockets, mortars, improved explosive devices and money to the shia militia directly involved in killing u.s. troops in iraq. moreover, the iraq sheer militia were trained by the iranian special operation force the quds force, and while they were defeated in 2009, the president's recent decide to withdraw all troops from iraq puts our hard fought gains in iraq at risk and plays into the hands of the iranians. malawki as we speak is underminding his political opponents driving key sunni leaders out of the military, and

he's consolidating his power base. the attack on camp is part of the strategy, and with the iranian finger prints all over it. several iranians are supporting the taliban in afghanistan with money and am knew in addition. the action arm for iran state sponsorship of terrorism outside their border is led by general kasime who's been in charge for over 15 years. general has no military or political boss. he answers to only one perp, the supreme -- person, the supreme leader in iran. we must conclude that for this general, the plan and operation inside the united states that would result in americans being killed, surely the supreme leader at a minimum approves that and may have erected it.

why did they want to do such a thing? well, simply because they can. not only that, but they believe we are weak and they would frankly get away with it moreover, we must ask ourselves has the united states policy with respect to iran been working? we appear to have a policy of rhetorical condemnation when iran behaves in behavior adverse to the united states interest and we engage in efforts that are on again and off again while iran can continues to pursue nuclear weapons. we have some isolations on them in the world which has best as we can tell also has had no impalgt on their pursuit of nuclear weapons or sponsorship of terrorism. we also must admit that the iranians are not without their

own challenges. having two fledging democracies on their border in iraq and afghanistan is a huge geothreat to the preservation of the regime. the arab spring is a repudiation of radical islam. indeed the people in the streets are seeking political reform, social justice, and economic opportunities which are the pain stream of western democracies. suddenly, iranians are taking advantage of the opportunities, the social unrest that the arab spring provides, but no one demonstrated on behalf of their flawed values. losing a state sponsored terrorist like gadhafi is a set back as is the upheaval in syria, the thurm one al -- number one ally in the region. all that said, it is time to review our strategy for iran against the harsh reality despite res rick, attempts to

negotiate, isolate, and sanction, the fact is the iranians continue to use their proxy against the united states interest and continue to pursue nuclear weapons. therefore, one must conclude the obvious, that our policy has failed, and it has failed miserably. what can we do? first and foremost, begin to treat iran as the stray teemingic enemy they truly are, and that our strategic objective is regime change. therefore, use all elements of national power against them and as such, develop a stray strategic competitive frame work that counters every major interest the iranian regem engages in, and, yes, of course, seek international support and cooperation, but regardless of the amount of support we receive from the ic, we must act.

for example, just to name a few -- seize the financial interest that are outside of iran. as many of you know, when the mullas took over in iran, they seized the shah's interests and are now operating thm and are multibillionaires now as a result of it. we know where the interests are, and we can seize them as we have successfully done with the al-qaeda's financial interest around the world. limit their ability to trade by denying their ships entry to ports around the world. stop the refining operation that others in the world are assisting the iranians with, limit the ability of the central bank to operate effectively. we have the number of one cyberattack capability in the world, and nobody's close to

it. conduct cyber campaign, conduct covert operations led by the central intelligence agency in cooperation with other agencies to target the quds force and frox sighs and -- proxies and certainly to pursue nuclear weapons and to provide encouragement that leaders in iran use the population to put pressure on the regime. one lost opportunity we had in the summer of 2009, the persian spring, when we did not speak up and support what the people of iran were doing. in my view, these measures have some chance to compel a behavior change or possibly even the regime to fall because you want these sanctions and targeted operations to have a major impact on the people.

this much i do know -- if we continue the half measures of the past, the iranians will continue to kill us, will continue to sponsor terrorism, and use their proxies against our interest and will continue to pursue nuclear weapons. the next nightmare for the world is around the corner, an unchecked iran with nuclear weapons. this will lead to a nuclear arms race in the middle east, and as my fellow defense policy board member, henry kissinger stated publicly, it is inevitable there will be a nuclear exchange in the middle east, and the world will change forever. this is unacceptable. if all of the measures that i mentioned and they are just a few of what can be done, if all of those measures fail to stop the iranian pursuit of nuclear

weapons, then we must attack that capability militarily, to shut is down, and delay the program and buy time for the iranian people. what other choice do we have? what other choice do we have? to attempt to contain a nuclear iran? i think not. that risk is far too great for the world. thank you very much. [applause] >> thank you, general. [applause] >> thank you very much k -- thank you very much, general. as we conclude today, as i introduce our final speaker, what should we do, the general says? when we listen to our final speaker, we have someone who was worked to develop u.s. policy with respect to another per rye ya internationally, and that's

north korea, so christian is somebody at the u.s. department of state who led the efforts to develop a strategic review of u.s. foreign policy as it related to north korea, also who was pursuing nuclear weaponed and so today, he gives us a very unique perspective in how and what lessons we can take from the way we treated north creigh, ya whether we pursue policies from negotiation which was done, isolation or sanction, and how the policies shall be pursued with a number of one strategic eenmy of the united states -- enemy of the united states as the regime said, iran, and now to give us this commentary is christian wyden, former u.s.

director on u.s. policy at the department of state. [applause] >> thank you, thank you. , well thank you, congressman kennedy, for that introduction, and it's an honor to be here with distinguished company to talk about really one of the most severe and serious threats facing the united states which, of course, is the government iran and its proxies and the work they do throughout the world. it's certainly by a busy couple of months for the tyrants who govern iran. as we heard from a number of people, and as you are all too familiar, you know, we see what iran's doing with the mek. you also know, and we heard from ambassador joseph and others that last week the iaea reported that iran continued to work on a nuclear weapons program, and their findings are unambiguous and reflected a dramatic turn for the iaea of which no one can credibly say teheran is not pursuing a nuclear weaponing

capability, and we were reminded a month earlier, the u.s. exposed a plot by iranian agents to kill an ambassador, a credit to the united states, right here in the washington, d.c., a plot involving hiring operatives of mexican drug cartels to strike us here, and a plot that would have possibly included the collateral death of congressmen and other notables. there was a litany of other egregious offenses against americans by this government. these activities probably come as no surprise to those who gathered here. more than 30 years after the past power, the teheran regime uses terrorists as instruments of national policy. than spend tireless and seeking to expand influence around the world and continues to be the primary adversary of freedom in the middle east. teheran is also been particularly effective at