tv U.S. House of Representatives CSPAN November 29, 2011 10:00am-1:00pm EST
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>> a look at some of our live coverage on this cspan networks -- the u.s. house is in had to o'clock eastern and members will consider a number of bills including one to increase the number of highly skilled foreign workers allowed in the u.s. you can see live coverage of the senate on c-span 2. they will spend the day on defense department programs and policies. cspan 3 will be live at 5:30 p.m. eastern. we will talk about the failure of the deficit committee and whether new taxes are needed now. book-tv will be live at 11:30. we will have a collection of cartoons from the days of theodore roosevelt. >> within 90 days of my inauguration, every american
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soldier and every american prisoner will be out of the jungle and back home in america where they belong. >> george mcgovern's pledge of the 1972 democratic convention came nearly one decade after being one of the first senators to speak out publicly against the vietnam war. the senator from south dakota featured a landslide defeat against richard nixon but his ground-breaking campaign changed american politics and a democratic polity. he is featured this week on cspan's "the contenders." that is live friday at 8:00 p.m. eastern. >> i will be very clear -- i will neither be a lobbyist for historian. i am both. there is no way i would be a lobbyist. i will miss this job and i will have tinges of regret when the new congress is signed up.
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maybe you will laugh but one of the advantages of not running for office is i don't have to pretend to try to be nice to people i don't like. [laughter] some of you may not think i have been good at it but i have been trying them the notion of being a lobbyist and having to be nice to people i don't like would be ridiculous. i will not in any way practiced law but i may show up pro bono for a gay-rights case. >i will be teaching and lecturing. >> after 16 terms in the house of representatives, barney frank will step down at the end of next year. watch his retirement announcement as well as more than 1000 other appearances on the cspan network online at the cspan video library. it is washington your way. >> coming up, the annual new
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hampshire primary awards banquet and this year the new hampshire institute of politics is honoring john mccain and senator john kerry. from manchester, this is one hour 40 minutes. [applause] [applause] >> the next part of our program is we recognize our spe >> we will have a dialogue that is -- that will take place. dan will moderated and will be like the oprah winfrey of the presidential primary tonight. we are going to hear local the about some of those new hampshire moments and to senator mccain and senator kerry i will share with you what people consid new hampshire moments because there's 1i am aware of and it's bipartisan just like this event. it was 1996 when bob dole won the republican nomination, and
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that summer gephardt came to manchester and needed to pick up some items at a drugstore and in that stopping at the drugstore on daniel webster highway. he walked in and put his purchase down on the counter and the kid at the register looked up and said you or gephardt and he said yeah and the kid said to him i don't believe it. bob dole shops here, too. [laughter] this is a true story. a year later you may remember bob dole did the infamous commercial and i rn into gephardt and he said to me you know in 1996 we didn't know what bob dole was fighting in the drugstore but we sure know now. [laughter] that is a new hampshire moment. if you would direct your attention to the monitors around the room we get a special deal for the folks for revieto see
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at the new hampshire primary. after he was elected i'm sorry, let me start hat again. if you never had the chance to meet david broder, those who have will tell you is your loss. >> it just wasn't him. >> i've been covering politics for a very long time and as a journalist, not as a partisan i have a stake wanting to see this political system of hours worked deeded was without a question eight heightened political reporting much short of an introducti he would never realized they were standing next to a pulitzer prize winner. >> he wasn't the world's best dresser like a flannel shirt with a tiny camera cross in a very easy style and set a very powerful and out come when he
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wrote that column. >> a fixture on the national talk-show often the topics center on something that he had written earlier in the week. estimate the late peter jennings looked to see what he was doing he w doing a story on a voter. he really lked the stage. he really liked the stage and talking to the people on the street, at events he would pick out not to those individuals you think he would pick out >> david broder was drawn to the new hampshire politics and witnessed a lot of itfrom mccarthy in 68 and chastising the publisher of the union leader and 72.
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>> david broder was right there and wrote about that and he was here for a lot of the other significant moments. >> i remember him stressing to me kind of like a student even though he would always make you feel important that what is great about the primary here and when you are doing is you're seeing them become a duty to before they become presidential. you are seeing the real person here because they have to be the political leaders the area and trying to understand what made us take. >> one exhibit came in 2008 when he approached the secretary of state and asked him for a list of the four small new hampshire towns as he wanted to get a feel
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for the voters were thinking. >> he kicked the town because he had never been there. he said i've never been out there. what's it like? he says it's pretty small. it has a general store late in the center of the village so he spent about three hours in the afternoon. >> that night he would write an article predicting that barack obama would easily carry new hampshire in the general election no holes, no tracking just the result of a few conversations. >> it was from his personal context knowing that the town had been very close in the previous election and that it wouldn't be. >> david broder played ball the new hampshire would be his world series and the people he met along the way.
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government association at st. anselm college and an intern for senator shaheen. like all of you, i have a love for politics and the political process, and part of that is the appreciation of an influential journalist, david broder, who covered some of you come interviewed many of you and was friends with most of all of you. although david has passed, his work will continue to impact my generation and generations to come. david's exceptional character should be mirrored by all. although he acquired an impressive resume throughout his long career, he never lost sight of the people and the voters he worked to inform. this made him the perfect
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reporter to walk the streets of nchester, meeting people every day and providing a real view of what was happening in the primary. bye taking an objective approach, david was abe to see individuals and candidates for their accomplishments and credibility. rotterdam the party affiliation. david also stayed true to what he loved, covering the elections, including every presidential race since 1956. numeus elections and even races. to david every race was an important and needed coverage. and as a result, he spent a lot of time in the granite state. david broder is across generational role model because america needs more journalists like him today. the best tribute to david is to follow his example.
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do what you love and dewitt with integri. in commemoration, david broder is given the new hampshire primary award. i'm honored to present this award to his son, john schroeder, with remarks from his colleagues gambles of the washington post. [applause] >> young people like you inspire my faher. we commemorated my father's birtay earlier this week and to mark the day of my brothers and i went out to city field to see them pla my father's lifelong team the chicago cubs. 28 years ago my father and his sons went out to shea stadium to
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see the mets play the cubs, and then as now these were dog teams. at he fighting for last place on the national. by the end of the second inning all those years ago, they were down by eight. as the innings went past the showed no signs of life, but my father never gave up hope. each that came up my father would be cheering on in to that team. when the cubs scored eight marrec to this rally in the ninth in winning and went on to win the game my father was triumphant at this victory on the road to the last place in the national [laughter] and i think that love of the cubs, the lifelong believe supported his lifelong believe in another underperforming and will use institution american electoral politics. and i think my father very much
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felt reassured that this institution he left was interested in such a significant way to the voters of new hampshire through their primary. and it's not too strong to say at my father loved the voters of new hampshire. not st for their kindness to a stranger appearig on a winter doorstep bringing them in sight for a warm cup of coffee and sharing their thoughts about the issue of theday, becuse also like my father the votersad never given up hoping the promise of american electol politics. and for that reason on behalf of my mother, grandmother and my father's name i am honored to accept this award for him. thank you very much. [applause]
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>> josh, there was was terrifi. it is an honor for me to be asked to participate in this dinner and i want to thank the institute for honoring david and having joshua pure. there are so many distinguished members of the audience i don't know where to begin in acknowledging people i would say to paraphrase president kennedy this is probably the biggest assembly to the political talent and bring the power ever gathered in new hampshire exit when david broder dined alone at the way fare. there was a lovely memorial service they have for david at the national press club back in april. the most memorable parts were by jos and his brothers george and matt and mike thy were given the attention today that he would have been immensely proud
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of the sons that they produced. as murderous the said and i think she captured david just right she knew everybody in this room in some way or another or at least everybody in this room knew him by watching he was the cal ripken of reporters on meet the press and was on "meet the press" 401 times over his career many of you know him because he covered rsonally in the state and talk to you because you're an adviser to a campaign. i know that many of you would call him a friend, and probably feel his loss as deeply as us for whom he was both a mentor and a colleague. dave loved new hampshire. he liked the place is that new hampshire was always his favorite whenever we were kind of dividing up assignments at the beginning of a campaign david would always say you go to iowa i will wait for you in new hampshire. [laughter]
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she enjoyed almost everything about his time here. he enjoyed the ritual of the primary, the pace of the primary, the people. one of his favorite things was the quadrennial lunch he did with the reporters of the monitor on the afternoon of the primary. i know that he will always look forward to that year after year. he was called the dean for a reason. he brought to his reporting a seriousness of purpose unmatched integrity and believably keen insight. he was as competitive as anybody i ever knew. he hated when we got beat and occasionally we did, and if i was the person who got beat it was very clear hwas unhappy about it. but he was always -- he carried himself with incredible humility. he was a reporter's reporter. he was thought of as a convent by many people but he never fought himself that way. she never believed he had all the answers. he knew the answersand insight came from doggett reporting.
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in the era of bigfoot journalism he walked very lightly. he made space for other reporters on the "washington post" and he taught by a sample into the young reporters he was unfailingly generous and when he died the e-mails that many of us got from friends and colleagues and young people that we didn't know who were touched by david personally was a tribute to him. .. >> he loved these moments. he loved the night before the primary when the voters were
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about to speak, and as everybody knew, you couldn't predict what the voters here were going to do. one of the young reporters said to him, do you have a words of wisdom or observations? watch ron paul is what he said. [laughter] he was a reporter's reporter, but he was not flawless. i love to tell this story on dave, and i told it while he was still alive, and i'll te i now since he's gone. i was the political editor at the post in 18980. i never had to worry except for the night of the first new hampshire debate, not the national debate, the famous -- i paid for this microphone debate, but the earlier one. i was in the newsroom, and david called just as the debate was starting and said, oh, dan, we have a problem. he and lou misread what was happening. they decided to watch the debate on tv. local tv was carrying on a
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delayed basis. radio was carrying it, but they didn't know what station carried it. david said to me, can someone in the newsroom cover us for a half hour while we get our bearings and figure this out. they joked about it afterwards, but we never trusted them on their own after that. [laughter] there's another funny memory of dave in new hampshire. the 1984 sickle, the first cycle we used laptops. if you knee him, he had a complicated relationship with technology [laughter] so he set off for new hampshire for the first time armed with his laptop proudly, but as insurance, he also carried along his battered old typewriter, and when he got up here, the political editor remembers watching david type his stories on the typewriter and take the copy and put it next to the computer and retype it into the computer. [laughter]
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those are some of the fond memories. there's serious moments as well. i remember the night before the new hampshire primary in 1984 #. we had done tracking with abc, the first time, and the tracking shows gary hart was in a tie as of that night. everybody expected that mondale would win the primary even though hart was making a move. there was confusion in the room, and somebody said what's it mean? dad said it means gary hart is probably going to win the pry marry, and -- primary, and walter will have a long ride to sale the nomination, if he can. he had those instincts always. he understood and could see around corners, and it was also obvious to him at other points in other races how things were moving. he was here for everything, to record jimmy carter's rise for
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reagan's win, for the george hw bush's victory here in 88, bill clinton as come back, pat buchanan, the straight talk express, senator kerry's bounce back, and finally the remarkable events of 2008, which was, of course, his last primary. i think his most famous story was probably the one eluded to in the video, which was the 1972 story about edmund musky, weepy and voice choked with emotion. that was a controversial story. if you never read david'sing's accounting of it that he did in his book behind the front page, i commend it to yo it's a pro's prose example of revisiting someone's own work in the light of new information. it's the kind of person that david was. he never believed he always had it right, and even when he was convinced he had it right, he was prepared to re-examine it.
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i want to close by talking about what david liked best about politics, which was talking and listening to voters as others have uded to. david once said you can learn more about a campaign by talking to voters than you can ever learn by talking to a politician or political strategist. nobody in journalism paid more attention to the concerns of voters or cared more deeply about what they had to say, and i think that's why he liked this state in particular. he admired the independent spirit of voters here. he knew they would not be dictated to by conventional wisdom or herded into supporting this o thatcandidate becae of happenings intates. he admired the responsibilities people here have about putting candidates through their paces. we'll hear about that a little later. he was grateful for their willingness to share their views with him. honoring dave with the award,
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i think you honor yourselves and the rich tradition you have created. thank you very much for remembering our friend. he was veryspecial. thank you. [applause] >> if you direct your attention to the videos, we have one more for you. >> join me in welcoming the man who is going to take back the white house from george bush -- [applause] john kerry! >> 2004, senator john kerry won the primary by a couple of touchdowns. >> i love new hampshire. [cheers and applause] >> then, again, that was how it was supposed to be, even from the early days of his campaig >> your courage, your courage can make sure that we do what's right for our country. >> he started out in that
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campaign as the front runner. everybody thought he was the person to beat. >> he department give up. >> he really seemed like the dominant candidate and the front runner to a lot of people, and he came even out of new hampshire a lot, and campaigned all over the place. >> going and before and after things in the 24 hour fitness gym? >> the funny thing happened on the way to the win, a deep democratic field including the likes of weley clark, and others, and all valued his support, while folks were still not real sure about this senator from massachusetts. >> people always like this, you know, he's got money, he's kind of swift. >> i'm not sure how one's status is and how they believe they
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are, and i think it may have taken him awhile. >> i believe there's better ways to do business here in america. >> if kerry was adjusting to the learning curve, a governor from neighboring vermont, was finding his ing just fine. halloween of 2003, the race shifted. howard deen was the life of the democratic party it seemed, an with the primary months away, the kerry campaign threatened to become fractured. >> there was a real sense of division within the party and within neighborhoods and among friends. >> by this time, republican strategists were gearing up for a bush-deen show down in the general election. >> it would be natural us for look at what a deen-bush race would look like. >> this race would be interesting. >> itas, at that point, that people really began to see who john kerry was and the fact that he was not going to give out,
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that he was going to keep fighting and come back, and he made critical decisions. >> among those decisions, the firing of his campaign manager leading to the departure of two other top aids, but he refused to let his campaign or the media take their eyes off the ball. what the people want to know is what we're going to do to provide health care. this is all inside baseball. nobody's reading this other tn you. >> maybe it's the fire in his belly giving the supporters the idea to put fire in other bellies as well. >> he said, john, listen, we want to bring you in the fire house, introduce you to the folks, and put on chili for you, and we had invitations saying come to the fire house with a candidate and chilly. he's still more chili than the ones he served. >> is it good? >> what's better than a chili
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fest than a bus tour, which also seemed to catch fire. >> we have to turn the country around, and these are not just words. >> the group on board, some supported each others, others di't, but it felt like a new launch, and it began to connect with people. >> we don't need commercials, but we need leadership. >> interaction with real people that make a difference in the primary, and that was the perfecexample. you know, allhe pundits had written him off, everybody at e national level say, oh, he's gone, cant win it. he kept working here, and he came back and won this because he went out and made his case to the people of the state. >> his approach was payg off not only in new hampshire, but also in iowa. the wheels were turning in his campaign while falling off of others. >> then we're going to watch in dc to take back the white house. [cheers and applause] >> by primary night, he took the
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biggest step towards the nomination and a special thanks to those who took him ere. >> unbelievably grateful to the people of the state who kept their hearts, minds open, they were willing to sort of take a look, begin, and i'll never forget that. it's the bond that will be with me for the rest of my life. [cheers and applause] >> he was a believer, and he believed that he made his case which has to happen in the primaries. [cheers and applause] [applause] >> to present the second award tonight, please welcome united states senator jean shaheen. [applause] >> hi, thank you very much,
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everybody. thank you. please be seated. thank you. please, sit down. [applause] i am truly honored to be here with all of you, so many distinguished new hampshire politicians and luminaries to celebrate the new hampshire presidential primary and three of my personal political heros. david broder a legend in american reporter, john mccain, whose service we all know so well, and, of course, i get to give the award to john kerry. you know, you may rember that in 2004, i chaired john kerry's national political campaign for president, and now my husband, billy, was his new hampshire campaign chair, so in our
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household, it was john kerry for president every day all the time 24/7. stephanie can tell you that's true. as you heard in that video, early when he got into the race, everybody thought john kerry was going to be the nominee of the democratic party, but then as the video showed, by this time in 2003 as the new hampshire primary was really heating up, the pundits and the pollsters had pretty much written off john kerry, his lead dropped in the polls, and people thought he didn't have a chance, but they didn't know john kerry. he hung tough, and he decide to take his message directly to the voters of new hampshire, and
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showed not only what he was made of, but wha the voters of new hampshire are made of, and, of course, that's when the new hampshire firefightersame up with their idea of the khili suppers, and as dave lang says, they pointed out they had a candidate as hot as the chili they were serving, and i think john kerry ate 50 pounds of chili in that campaign, but they were a huge success, and they were a success because john kerry took his message and his candidacy directly to the voters. he didn't give up. he showed the courage, tenacity, the intellect, and the commitment that won him the democratic nomination, and i
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remember he fought for every vote. i can see him on granite street at 6 a.m. on election day shaking hands in the blistering cold, and he stayed up there right until the polls closed. he won the new hampshire primary that day, and it was a victory as much for john kerry as it was for the new hampshire voters, and, you know, i sported john kerry because i thought he had the leadership this country needed at a time we really needed it, and i never thought that i would get a chance to serve with him and with senator mccain in the united states senate and to see up close and personal the kind of leadership that he still provides to this country in the united states senate. i've had a chance to servewith him on the foreign relations committee and see the
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commitment and the passion that he brings to everything he does, and when this administration needed a diplomat to go over to pakistan after the davis affair after osama bin laden was taken out, they called on john kerry. when we were trying to pass the new s.t.a.r.t. treaty, a significant piece of nuclear disarmerment, it was john kerry who led that fight and more than anybody else deserves credit for getting that done, and i think one of the things that i like to think about is that throughout his success, that he still remembers those chili feeds, the cold new hampshire days of retail politics, that john kerry brought out the best in the new hampshire primary, just as the new hampshire primary brought
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out the best in john kerry. please join me in awarding this new hampshire primary award to john kerry. [applause] >> that is so beautiful, that is really something. [applause] >> i am really -- thank you, thank you. [applause] thank you very much. [applause] thank you very much, folks. [applause] [applause] >> thank you very much. i think i can come back here and safely again say with equal passion, i love new hampshire. [applause] i really -- this is very, very special. i can't tell you, just being in the presence of so many good friends., people -- one of the things that comes out of that, and i think john feels the same way and tells you, you just do
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make lifelong friends, and you have a sense of the people and the state, the country comes out of it, that is simply unique. i'll never lose that, ever, no matter what i do in life, and i thank new hampshire for that. you made me a hell of a better candidate, forced me to look inside, dig down deep, get at it, and i was with rob portman of ohio the other day who serves on the super committee with me, and we were chatting about it, and he reminded me, you know, you only lost the presidency by half the people inhe ohio state said yum on a saturday -- stadium on a saturday, and i said, thanks, rob, you better make it up for me. i'm counting on you to cut a deal here. we're going to get this done. [laughter] i can't tell you how special it is for me to be here with my pal, john mccain. a few days ago, john sent me a photo with the two of os sitting at the state of the union
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address, and on it he wrote, the two losers, together again. [laughter] it was really sweet. [laughter] so being here in new hampshire is very, very special because here in new hampshire, john mccain and john kerry are 3-and-0. [laughter] so tonight, we're here as winners, and -- [applause] that's very special. [applause] you know, john and i got here this evening, took one of the john huntsman flights -- [laughter] by pass iowa, straight to new hampshire -- [laughter] and i was listening to governor, congratulations to you on an extraordinary -- will be an extraordinary year as you're getting there, and i think everybody is appreciative of your public service -- [applause] but i -- [applause] john was talking about the new media and the social media and
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tweeting and facebook and so on and so forth. i don't tweet a whole lot cause i think it's much more important for senators to make their mistakes and gaps in public i person, which i've been known to do occasionally. it's a pleasure to be here under the -- i was a fan, which means he never would have made it in washington today. [laughter] but this event brings us together to celebrate one of the most important journeys in america, how we choose our leaders. this is a room full of great memories and full of friendships i talked about a moment ago. there's one person not here who i want to thank and single out, and that is a great friend of
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ms. shaheens, judy who is battling a form of leukemia and will have another operation down in boston, but all of us who got to know her love her dearly and send her our passionate hopes and wishes and prayers for a complete cure, and we admire h enormously. [applause] john mccain and i have been through a lot of battles together, and some we were not together, but they were battles. [laughter] both come herewith a special respect for david broder. he really was what dan called him, a reporter's reporter, an i think, you know, represented something that we'd lost in american politics, which is tragic, which is a guy who, you know, didn't get swayed by
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sponsors or interests or the inside game, but really always looked to the people. he was a people's reporter as well as a reporter's reporter, and he was a reporter who hung his hat on the truth for which we are all very, very grateful. i also thing i can say safely he'd be very, very proud i know of what josh said and his sons, but he'd also be very proud of dan balz, and how he carries on the tradition. dan, thank you for this evening with us and for doing what you do. [applause] let me -- [applause] let me just say a few words about new hampshire and where we are today, and then i want to sit down, and john will speak, and then we'll have a chance to talk a little, but, you know, i first heard or sort of sensed new hampshire as something special and different when i was a young naval officer in the
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gulf of tomkin in 1968, and, of course, 1968 was a hell of a year up here. i got all that news, you know, drifting in, and i'll never forget, i had an interest in public policy and life, and i remember listening to the vote counts and getting the sense of what gene mccarthy was doing, and the power of new hampshire when new hampshire told the united states of united states it's over, you can't run anymore. human impact on -- huge impact on our nation and the course of history, and later on in 1999, i was up here, campaigning with billy sheenor al gore, never in my maiming nation rely did -- imagination really did i think that five years later i'd be up here with some of those same people on my own journey because i ought al gore would win, we have eight years, and that would be that, but we all know
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what happened remembering tim russert and florida, florida, florida changed the course for all 6 us and the course of the country, and i'll never forget all the personal parts of campaigning up here, traveling around in a too tight van with nick clemons and nick robinson, tooling around the city and listening to their bravado storieabout their nights at the irish rover, a well-known bar here. [laughter] so that i was left in the morning, you know, driving around. i was struggling with the frost heaves, and they were struggling with the dry heaves -- [laughter] but that's another story, we won't do that one tonight -- [laughter] what stood out to me and still stands out to me as i come out here tonight is the sense of
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loyalty. the loyalty is amazing. when new hampshire makes up their mind, believe me, their your friend for life, and when they make up their mind, they go the distance, and they are tough in the making up of their minds, and that's the beauty of what happens up here in new hampshire. i'll never forget visiting wh the fire house and dave came on board early, and ultimately the firefighters came on board, and we had the incredible chili feeds you heard about which confounds me still to this day, i think wikileaks as happen insight to everything in government, but they don't have dave's recipe to chili yet. i don't know what's going on, dave, but it's a well kept secret. i feel guilty about that now because michelle obama is trying to campaign on good nutrition, and there's kerry serving 25,000 pounds of chili, not a good
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standard, but it got me to where we needed to go. [laughter] the truth is that loyalty was carried on by a fellly by the name of bob banes who after his own campaign kept his promise to me made way back when i was front runner said i'll endorse you, but waiting until my campaign is over, begin every reason in the world, and bob could have taken the duck, but he didn't. he came out and stood up and endorsed me like he said, and he fought like hell to help us turn ings around. similarly, right about the same time, the person who introduced me, your senator shaheen, came on board as the national chairwoman at a time it was tough, helped me make some tough decisions that began to turn things around, and i'll never forget going to the vfw hall in
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dover where bill clintonave his last dog die speech, and it was said, you know, something about and talking about dead dogs, here's the harry campaign, and we have this to say. [laughter] it was about the same time, i remember a supporter said to me r you know, the reason i support you is because you look like the old man on the mountain. [laughter] a week later, the old man on the mountain fel [laughter] i said this is not a good oh men. [laughter] a couple days later, a couple days later, my campaign pollsters said, you know, the only way to win new hampshire is to save a drowning baby in the river. i decided differently. i believed in what you believe in. i will never forget the images people sitting cross legged in houses taking notes, writing down what you said, comparing it to what you had said a month ago, asking the tough follow-up questions, coming after you, an
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extraordinary process, where people really looked inside your gut, your heart, your soul, and made a measurement about you, as individual as a human being and made a different kind of judgment from all the advertisements and prognosticatorand the pundits. that's the value of new hampshire, and that's the value that i think is precious to the entire process of how we choose even a president of the united states in this country. i say that to you at a time when we are troubled. john mccain and i spent a lot of time together trying to get democracy in libya or in egypt or berma and other places, but he'd agree with me we have a challenge to improve our own democracy right here in the united states of america. we have to get rid of this
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shrill, almost desert of dialogue, if you want to call it that. it is shocking to me that the degree to which critical issues facing our time today are lost in a sort of parallel universe so little to do with people's lives and so little to do with the challenges we face as a country. i know we can get there. john mccain knows we can get there. they know we can get there. the question in the next days is whether not we're going to be able to find the critical mass that puts country ahead of party, that gets rid of, you know, looking for the facts and makes common sense decisio. the reason i know we can do that is to end by telling a quick story. late 1980s, early 1990s, john mccain and i decided that we really thought it was time to make peaceinietnam.
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may sound strange to some of you, but it was a time the pow was criss crossing the country and had a sense people were left behind. it was a big question mark, and here was a place where there's many ways in the hearts and minds of people that we were still at war, and john and i understood that, and we thought that our interests, that our nation's interest, that our future lay in trying to get that behind us and in moving on, so john and i banded together, and improbable twosome who had differences over the war, but who found the common path to work for the interest of our country, and for ten years we slugged it out against some people who actually challenged john's senator, laled him the candidate, challenged his patriotism, the man who spent six years in a prison, and that's what we faced.
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ultimately, jo and i found our way back to vietnam together, and i will never forget standing in the prison where john was held for a period of time, standing in the very cell that he had been imprisoned in, alone, just the two of us, as he described to me some o what had happened, and at that moment, i said -- i sort of felt to myself, and i thought about it a lot afterwards. you know, if we two can get over our feelings about the war and get over the difference of an arizona republican and a massachusetts democrat, we can come together to try to do what we're doing here and find commonground, then all the rest of these things ought to be easy because they're in the greater interest of our country. when ben franklin walked down the steps of constitutn hall, a woman walked up to him and said after they'd finish their work, designing our nation, she said, what do we have
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dr. franklin? a monarchy or a republic? he looked at her and said, a republic if you can keep it. that's the work that we face today, and i am very, very proud to be engaged in that work with john mccain, and with others in the senate, people who want to reach across and find not just the commonground, but find the higher ground. that's what builds our nation. the history of the senate is a place where people disagreed and great partisanship. people could have different ideologies and beliefs, but when the nation's interests were at stake, those people found a way to come together and put tho interests ahead of all else. i think that new hampshire is going to contribute humanly to the effort to help us do that once again in this presidential
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race. i think david broder said perhaps in the bible there was a line that said and new hampshire shall lead. [laughter] amen. i believe it will. thank you for the pleasure of being here. [applause] [applause] [applause] >> okay. if you will direct your attention, again, to the video monitors. >> you can want -- cannot buy an election in the state of new hampshire, my friends. >> he invented the town hall style of campaigning. >> working hard for you. >> he just has a way about him. there's something beyond charisma. >> thank you very much.
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>> too many politicians are too scripted all of the time and the sort of fort of new hampshire, how you interact with voters was tailor made for a guy like mccain. >> but before he became new hampshire's mccain, he was gist a senator in arizona, and in the days of 1999, that didn't mean much to primary vote voters. >> a little difficulty getting them to come out. free ice cream, and we had 13 people. >> to jump start things, they turned to veteran, and students, and the latter providing a funny moment in a trip to king state. >> he's doing his five minute speech, topic of the day, opens it up to questions, the very first question from a college student was, will you please tell me your position on hp? john mccain was truly flustered. he's looked around, and he says, you're goin to have to be more
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specific. the only thing i know about hemp is that you make rope out of it, and that's what we usedded in the navy. [laughter] >> well, there's lots of sties. >> another student had the gal to ask him if he had the energy for a cmpaign. >> thanks for the question, you little jerk. [laughter] >> it was that kind of humor that was turning the tide in john mccain's favor. i'm not exaggerating when i tell you a man came and told me he had been to five of my town hall meetings, which i also alleged was a testimo toy inabity to close the deal. [laughter] >> turns out he was closing more deals than he thought, and by late summer of 1999, the momentum was building. >> it was month by month rising of three to four points,. >> i had a small gathering at my house,romised to have at least 20 people, and low and behold, over 150 people came. i'm going, what kind of --
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>> 400 people lined up for arizona senator john mccain's book signing. >> what's surprising and shocking about that is that we had a campaign plan, we followed it, and very little, if anything, took us off our game. [cheers and applause] >> co primary night, 2000, the evening was his. >> thank you very much. thank you and god bless, and welcome to our 115th town hall meeting here in new hampshire. [cheers and applause] >> i don't think too many of us were surprised the next day. we were surprised at the percentage of the votes, but we could feel -- >> it would go down as a textbook primary win, but then came 2007, and this time around, things were different. >> nice to see you, you haven't aged a bit since we did this in
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2000. >> the first half of 2007 was a difficult time for everyone involved in the campaign, especially jn. [inaudible conversations] >> we department have to introduce john now. everybody knew john, and he was probably more under the microscope. the questions were tougher, and the crowds were bigger. >> along with the crowds, the campaign staff grew as well. >> they set up the apparatus of 150-160 people that you needed in washington. we had the offices, geared up for it, and then quite frankly, thefundraising was not there. it became pretty clear that we were spending at one level and we were raising at a lower level. >> a lot of people, more people were hired than should he been hired. you know, had this for all intensive purpose, a big bureaucracy of a campaign. >> at one point, it seemed the mccain campaign would not survive, and the reporters smelled blood in the water. >> one asked under what
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circumstances would you drop out? hn mccain uttered the line only if i succumb to a fatal disease before the primary. >> it was around that time the man known for straight talk wanted some of his own from his pomp advisers including walter peterson. it was a reckoning of sorts that didn't start well. >> everybody's going back and forth saying we should be doing this and that. >> that was a tough meeting because john was looking for very honest advice, although, he had his mind made up, i think, that he was going to stick it out because mccain is not a quitter, but hearing governor peterson and other folks reaffirm he couldn't win was really a very sort of poignant moment. >> he knew how to run in new hampshire, and he knew what he needed to do, and it was just the smartest thing he could have done, just going back to basics. [inaudle conversations] >> thanks very much. >> after focusing on new
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hampshire once again, things stted to shift in the fall of 2007. >> people were starting to listen. they said, hey, he was not dropped out. >> i talk to the people of nemplegz. i reasoned with you. i listened to you. i answered you. sometimes i argued with you. [laughter] >> by primary night, 2008, john mccain would stand tall oe again, and while the bid falls short of the white house, his new hampshire connection was set in granite. >> he's done as much for the primary out here in new hampshire, the first in the nation primary as ever has. >> he's a remarkable person. one of the great honor of my life. he's one of my friends. >> i don't know if this will make the cut or not, but, john, i love you, i hope you have another 75 years, keep smiling and keep shining. ♪ [applause]
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>> to present our third award tonight, please welcome united states senator kelly ayott. [applause] >> it is really an honor and it's overwhelming to be here with all of you tonight, and so many of you have worked so hard to preserve the first-in-the-nation primary, and truely an hop nor to give this -- honor, and my colleag, john kerry, very well deserved, and it's an honor to serve with you in the united states senate. it's very much -- it's surreal actually to be up here tonight to give this award to john
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mccain, someone who i have such great personal admiration for. john has an extraordinary record of service to the people of this country and a long history with the people of new hampshire, and i thought about it, and i don't think you can understand or appreciate that special relationship and wy new hampshir took to john mccain so much without an understanding a little about john's background. he comes from an extraordinary family, a distinguishedded military family -- distinguished military family with four generations of naval academy graduates. his grandfather was an admiral serving commander of a carrier force in world war ii. his father was commander in chief of the pacific forces in the vietnam war. his son, jack, is a naval academy graduate who now flies helicopters in the navy, but breaking ranks is his son, jimmy, who enlisted in the marines and served in iraq.
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finally, someone in the mccain family made something of themselves. [laughter] john's own service as a pilot in the navy and his character is what drew so many in new hampshire to want to meet him. you will also find a veteran as a mccain town hall meeting. we all have come to admire mccain for his bravery, courage, and his integrity. he spent five and a half years imprisoned in vietnam, tortured by his captors, and when he was offered early release becse of who his fatherwas, he refused. john mccn puts principle first. just one example -- based on his own personal experience, john mccain bought members of his own party and spoke out against torture, leading to the effort
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to pass the detainee treatment act to ensure we live within our values. [applause] john mccain never hesitated to do what he thought was right rather than what is politically expedient. a rare individual in politics. new hampshire's the place where his commitment to truth and politics found a name, straight talk. it was traveling across the state on his straight talk express that senator mccain's unique brand of candor and politics caught fire with very discerning new hampshire primary voters, not once, but twice. senator mccain would become a primary legend, and in my view, new hampshire's de facto third senator, was far from certain when he started campaigning home in 1999. with texas governor, george
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bush, wrapping up endorsements, leading early in polls, the arizona senator faced an uphill climb, but true to his character, uphill climbs don't stop john mccain. moving from town hall to town hall, john mccain made the case for reform in washington to anyone who would listen and answered every last question to he was asked. although his early town hall attendees may have shown up just for the ice cream ring they left knowing they just witnessed something rare in politics, an honest, confident, leader with integrity, who republicked their view -- respected their views even if they differed from their own. they alsoaw someone who was firmly committed to changes business in washington and had a record to prove it. during his first new hampshire primary, john mccain disproved
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what the pundits had to say and the insiders thought about the race, and he won our primary by 19 points. while he may not have gone on to win the nomination that year, senator mccain left a lasting mark on new hampshire politics. since 2000, the free flowing meetings have been the hallmark of the new hampshire primary. to be taken seriously by voters here, you have to be completely accessible, can't get away with sound bites or poll driven answers. you have to go voter to voter, house party to house party, town hall to town hall, and mt t people of the state of new hampshire. agent years later the people of new hampshire and john mccain once again proved the pundits wrong when john made one of the greatest come backs in political history. they talk about bill clinton being the come back kid, john
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mccain is the ce back kid in new hampshire. after being the early front runner in 2008, john literally fell to being fifth in a four-person race. he was out of money, carrying his own bags, he was hoping steve would pick him up at the airport so he'd have a ride, and the media declared his candidacy dead, but he came to new hampshire, and he went town to town, voter to voter, and the crowds at the town halls grew from a handful to dozens to hundreds, and the people of new hampshire listened once again to the man that everyone had written off. so many of us have personal memories of our time with john mccain. for me, it was during my own primary. i did myirst town hall meeting with john mccain, and i went home that night and i said to my husband, i said, even if i lose that race, tt was the
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experience of a lifetime, to stand on the stage with jun mccain. i would like to share with you an especially moving story from the campaign in 2008. after a town hall meeting, the mother of corporal matthew stanley who died serving in iraq asked senator mccain to wear a bracelet bearing her son's name. senator mccain promised to everything in his pour to make sure that his death was not in vain, and true to his word, when so many others wanted to give up in iraq, john mccain stood up for the surge in iraq and said we can succeed even when it's not popular to do so, and i know senator mccain still wears corporal stanley's bracelet today. in 2008, the people of new hampshire again saw john mccain's character, his integrity, and when the results were in, senator mccain's
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powerful message of reform beat out money, defied washington's conventional wisdom, and, again, propelled john mccain to victory in our primary. eventually, of course, he became our republican nominee. we were proud to have thatrole here as the first in the nation primary to propel him to that victory. [applause] a new hampshire primary has no greater friend in the republican party than my colleague, john mccain. when our first in the nation status has been threatened by bigger states, john has shown in word and in deed why new hampshire must remain first. for that, and for his decades of distinguished service to our country, i am very honed to award him tonight with the first in the nation primary award, and
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i just want to say on a perm note, i consider john mckane a men -- john mccain, a mentor, someone today still working very hard to reform washington, and it is my privilege tonight to introduce john mccain. [applause] [applause] >> thank you. [inaudible conversations] >> well, thank you very much, kelly, for those kind words and that wonderful introduction, and i'm very pleased and proud to tell you that you have kelly ayotte and jean shaheen both
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serving on the senate arms service committee fighting every day for the men and women serving in our mail tear. they -- military. they make a great team together, and i know new new hampshire can be very proud of them and their service to the country. i thank you, kelly, for your kind words, and thank you, jean, for your wonderful service to the state of new hampshire, thank you. [applause] so i have to begin by asking your sympathy for the families of the state of arizona because barry goldwater from arizona ran for president of the united states, and morris udall, and bruce babbit, and i ran for president all from arizona. this may be the only state that mothers don't tell their children that they can grow up
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and be president of the united states. [laughter] [applae] i'm very honored to be here with my friend, john kerry. i was thinking as he was talking, when he and i first came tohe senate not too far apart, there was a number of senators who had served in the vietnam war, and i guess at the beginning of 2013, they'll just be two of us remaining. i would, again, point out that our effort on behalf of normalization of relations between the united states of america was driven by the fact that back in that time into the 80s, a war was ov in 73, but into the 80s and even into the 1990s, the wounds of that war were still fresh and unfortunately still divided our country and in many respects, prevented a lot of our vietnam veterans from coming all the way
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home. i'm very proud of the work that johnnd i did, and to show you that if you live long enough, most anything can happen. there's a destroyer based in japan named after my father and my grandfather named john mccain, and last september, it paid a port visit to the port of deng that shows if you live long enough, anything can happen, especially if the chinese are behaving the way they are, but any way -- [laughter] barry goldwater said if i was elected and beaten his as, colorful language, you wouldn't have spent all those years in a pris camp. i said, you're right, barry, it would have been a chinese camp. [laughter] he was not amused. [laughter] josh, thank you for your moving
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words about your dad. i'll never forget it being a freshman member of congress one day, and your dad came to my office, and i was literally tongue tied. i was so honored to meet the great david broder, and i think one of the things that you could be very proud of in this day of polarized media of msnbc and fox and back and forth, i could not tell you to this day whether dad broedr was a democrat, republican, libertarian or vegetarian. [laughter] he judged and report on american politics with total and complete objectivity, and i know that you're proud of him, and, dan, you are carrying on in that tradition. i suspect you are a vegetarian, but anyway -- [laughter] and charlie bass and frank, thank you for your continued service, and i cannot come here without mentioning thee lovable
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joe, and thank you for your continued direction, guidance, and insults -- lz as we try to -- [laughter] as we try to win the affection of the voters of new hampshire. thank you for your kind words, and thank you for your years of friendship. governor lynch, you know, he's unique fellow. i had a town haul meeting in hoppington, and he brought his daughter, and i was honored that he would be there. i think that he proved that you can govern with the approval of people of all parts of the ideological spectrum, and john, we appreciate your outstanding service as governor, which moves me then to tell the story of the two inmates in the state prison in the chow line, and one of
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them turned to the other and said the food was a lot better in here when you were governor. [laughter] and you can't tell that joke in illinois, i'll tell you that. [laughter] other several other states. [laughter] bill, thank you for your steadfast advocacy and support of the first-in-the-nation status. a lot of would be candidates for president visit me, and i say if you really want to understand a little bit about new hampshire, you should read that wonderful book that bill has written about first-in-the-nation, and it's said, if you're a united states senator, unless you are under indictment or detoxification, you automatically consider yourself for a candidate for president of the united states,
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and i can't conclude without mentioning that my beloved friend warren redman, we cherish his continued service and hope and pray for his good health as we know he's been having some of those problems lately. hugh greg, an institution here in new hampshire and a great guy. walter peterson, who continued to give me and all of us leadership and guidance throughout the years that we had the wonderful opportunity of being in his presence. i can only say to you from the bottom of my heart that i've been probably the luckiest person that you'll ever have the oppounity of knowing. i've had such great good forchip in m life to be able to be a pa of this great nation and a
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part of the incredible experience of running for president of the united states, but my fondest memories frankly will be of the experiences i've had here in new hampshire because it's such a unique place and the people are so unique. they believe we live free o die. they believe tat they should examine every candidates they not only take it as a privilege, but they take it as responsibility, and it's. my great honor to meet some of the most wonderful acquaint acquaintances in the campaigns with so many wonderful people, and what you have done has contributed enormously to the democracy that people all over the world today in this thing they call the arab spring are looking at and want to emulate
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and want to be like, and i guarantee you that in the next election, there will be people from libya and egypt and hopefully syria and other countries around the world who will be coming here because they were inspired by the example of the united states of america and what you do here in the great state of new hampshire. thank you and god bless. [applause] [applause] >> thank you, senator mccain and senator kerry. for the next 15 minutes, dan balz is going to facilitate a little discussion about those experiences during their presidential primary campaigns. ..
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the remarkable color -- roller- coaster ride, for the record, it was not me that asked the question that elicited more famous response of contracting a fatal disease. i think that with susan page. but i was at that press conference, and i remember that as one of the low moments that you had. at that moment, why did you, or did you have bates in new hampshire as a place that could sustain and bring you back as a can of it, and wade did you begin to sense that that was going to happen or was possible?
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o happen or was possible? >> i thought it was possible because at least in new hampshire i had that relationship i had established with the people of new hampshire in 2000, but also the context i would like to mention our focus now is on jobs in the economy d by understand that and this campaign is going to be about jobs in the economy in the election was about jobs in the election. in 2008 there was a surge, and i believe that we had to support the research and we had to weigh in in iraq and i believe we could win an iraq with that strategy. and so i really did these a lot of my campaign not just here new hampshire but in south carolina as well ad florida on
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the issue of whether we should support the surgeor leave and face the serious consequences of losing a conflict in that part of the world. so i think that matter, too. and i think it helped to galvanize some of the veterans vote which is very significant here in new hampshire as well. >> senator kerry, in your campaign as the video clearly showed the fall was very, very difficult for you. you made a strategic decision that was a little different than senator mccain, senator mccain hundred on the new hampshire you decide that iowa was also important in order to facilitate coming back in a hampshire. why was i was important to you and how did that contribute to how you are able to do here? >> it was important becae it was an event that came before new hampshire, and i thought to get people to listen again it was important that i shake
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things up and change the dynamics. my problem, the problem that occurred for me was i think to fold. one most importantly on the iraq war in the united states senate i did what i believed was a presidential decision. if i had been president of the united states and we were trying to leverage saddam hussein in order to give inspectors in and do what they needed to do to protect the country i would have wanted the power that the president was asking for, and because of colin paul, brent scowcroft and a couple of other people who went very public about ho the power could be used i thought we had elicited om the president of the united states guarantees specifically
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that we would only go to the war as a last resort, we will only go to the war if we built the legitimate coalition, and that we would only go to the war based on the other countries and the sort of an primm utter if you will of the country's, and i thought i was really important to us because john and i learned what happens if you go to war and you don't have the support of your country. i regret to say, and i don't wa to interject the partisan here, but in my judgment evyone the promises made by the president is not kept. we didn't go to war as a last resort. we went in the collision complete and so on and so forth and as is now a record about of the weapons. so, i knew what was going to happen. i had some people on my team who advised me and said senator, if
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you vote for that you were going to have a hell of a hard time winning the nomination of the democratic party. well, i know that and that is probably true, but i am going to do what i think ought to be done as a matter of interest to the country, and you know, i -- howard dean, it's very easy. if you're outside the senate to say i would have voted against it and very easy if you are in the senate you have to vote, actually vote. so i lean tard that from the entire spring and fall and the money started going crazy, and i think frankly i was not as good a candidate. i was still talking senate ps. i hadn't broken out of that as a legislator and it took me awhile to do that. people like jean shaheen and otr folks here tonight and otrs, space bean and others and they beat me up enough. it just changed.
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throughout the campaign i changed. i was a better candidate toward the end and i'm sure you felt the same way. you learn as you go through that and i think as i came into the debates with george bush and so on i felt like i was on top of the game. but my conviction was like could turn it around if i had a chance to meet people and explain my thinking and really talk about what my priorities were. in the and i think that is where i said the people of new hashire listened. did you to the test. they didn't just buy into the story and that is the value of what happens here and it's interesting because john -- you know, it happens in this state in both sides of the nile. that's the interesting thing about w hampshire. it has a capacity to serve a separate and discern acording to the space values, but it also does the same thing with respect to the republican party values and so forth and again and again new hampshire is able to choose
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a winner, not always, but again and again and it's an interesting process. >> what would you say is unique if there is something about campaigning in the state compared to other states? >> very sick simply as possible they expect to see. they expect to see you and the expect to be able to question you. they expect to examine. like the old joke the guy in manchester said to the other guy would you think about him for president? i only met him twice. [laughter] in other states do not expect that. in california and you think thy are going to go to every town and village and city and it's something that people do reserve judgment but it's more important than that is tha people in america believe they should
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vote. people in hampshire believe they have the responsibility to examine the candidates and to make a judgment. and i'm not saying that people in the rest of the country don't feel they have a responsibility to vote. if they don't have a unique responsibility that people when new hampshire have about how important and how what a determining factor what happens here in new hampshire is all about. that's why it is so key that this first in a nation status be preserved. [applause] >> and bob dole one night was at someone's home and after he finished an hour and a half or two hours he said that wa great but people in my neighborhood are mad because you haven't been to my neighborhood and you better get to my neighbor defeating you were going to get their votes. give me your address from your name and address. she lived two blocks away.
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[laughter] what you think would happen to the process of nominating the presidents of there were a change in the calendar? i know neither of you is going to come out in favor of moving the new hampshire primary, but what impact would it have if the hampshire and iowa were not front-end of the process. >> some state has to be first come and i think this proven process has served the country very effectively. i know john will agree with me. there is just way too much money in american politics. we have to get -- i mean this is a state that succeeds in getting the money out of the process. this is advertising and yes deer is still money spent but i don't think the hampshire is as enslaved by that as they are the personal inquiries about the process. bye getting to know people, and if you are going to make real decisions in the country you don't want to empower the money and some other place.
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what state are you going to choose to be first? california where it will be all mauney? new york, florida, some other place? this state has proven its ability to also have a spectacular diversity that i think is marked down in the country. high-tech, low-tech manufacturing, lightning factoring all of these different components, education, and i think it is a terrific balance it is obviously a strong, strong tax and tip of the which reflects an awful lot of the country and it is a good debate to have put new hampshire is historic we also found a way to do the things it thinks it needs to do for its citizens. so i think there are a lot of reasons that there is a virtue to the state and would be hard for somebody to convince me that an unknown state with an unknown sefton genex is somehow when to replace that more effectively. >> i just would comment, and i don't mean this as a criticism of iowa but i think history
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shows the winner of the new hampshire primary more than likely is going to be the nominee of the party or has more than likely it is not in the iowa caucus and don't get me wrong i enjoy the iowa state fair and having the pork chop on a stick. [laughter] and the deep-fried twinkie. don't get me wrong. [laughter] >> [inaudible] [laughter] >> anyway. but it does seem to me when you look at it results over the past modern times in the way the last 30 or 40 years the iowa caucuses arnot the determinant and the greatest ripoff of all are the straw polls which are the worst thing since obably ethanol. [laughter]
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>> i remember being in iowa when you're telling people you felt a great because you had your glass of ethanol that morning. [laughter] >> and chuck grassley. >> senator mccain, you won here twice, both victories were instinctive. which one was more satisfying? >> i think each were satisfying in a different way. the one here in 2000 obviously was a huge upset. the one in 2008 was survival, and so they really are very different and each had their own. after winning here in 2000i knew we had a very tough road to get the nomination. after 2001 was reasonable confident it was pretty well in hand if we didn't screw up which i had never done.
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[laughter] >> in 1999i was up and they said how would you like to eet him? he was 101i believe that the time so i went inside his home as many of you know and i said what was your favorite candidate? evin all of these people. they will come up here and met with you. who is your favorite of all of them who impressed you the most? he said mr. roosevelt. really? fdr was quite impressive. no, it was teddy roosevelt. [laughter] >> not making that up. [laughter] >> is there a particular moment that you remember first from your time of here either in a moment of humor, a poignant moment, a moment you learned
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something you hadn't known or was driven home to you in a different way? >> i will never forget waking up on the 27th of january at the hotel and the water had frozen. we couldn't take a hot shower, couldn't shave. i had to keep my water in a microwave, and there was something i said just doesn't feel right this isn't good. but they came together. there were these great moments. remember visiting the house to get new support and there as a refrigerator covered with all these photographs of every democrat that has ever been there and i was looking for space. i said i'm not going to win this race. [laughter] but there are so many different things. so many different parties where
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something happens. people open their homes the kids are wonderful. there's just so many of them you can't pick between them. but it is a life changing experience. i can't help but sit here and listen to john all might talk about it twice and i only did it once. my juices are flowing. [laughter] >> so many wonderful and amusing and entertaining science. there was a convenience store there was a woman very important -- >> mary hill. >> they said you have to go see mary hill. she's very important. so i went down and she came walking out and she had a hillary clinton button on. [laughter] i said thanks for sending me over there.
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[laughter] spinnaker the author of course was the mother who, you know, asked me to wear this bracelet and i always have. [applause] >> we have a couple minutes left. i want to turn this around a minute and ask you to talk about my side of the business because we spend so much time appear as reporters were trying to get right and very often don't get it right but thanks to the independence of the voters to keep surprising as from time to time i want to direct this first senator mccain with a specific question but i want senator kerry to also talk about it. in 2000 or in the fall of 1999 you launched the street talk expressed and you got on the bus
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and invited all of us to the back of the bus and yousaf for hours answering questions on the cord to the point the dalia occasionally had to get off the bus and get on the other bus to get some work done because you were your stamina was quite remarkable and you were willing to take questions about anything and it was always on the record. we are now in the age of twitter and blogging and i wonder could you do that again in a new hampshire primary environment? how different is it today in the media environment that we are in and how is it changing the presidential politics? >> i regret to say that it would be much more difficult today, and olive regret saying tat. and i have to say that if you remember the people that weren that bus again with all due respect to today's media they were pretty seasoned, pretty experienced, pretty mature judgment members of the media.
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let's face it the top people re assigned to the presidential campaigns, the top individuals. i have tsay i don't think that is the case today. but having said that, i do believe that as opposed to the 2000 campaign or even a 2004 mpaign or even to some degree the 2008 capaign there is now access to information in a way that is like drinking from a fire hose. there is a myriad of opinions. there is a plethora of information. we have as you say twitter and facebook, we have all of these different ways of peple getting information. in 2002 they got theinformation about what the reporters on the boss told them. now it's pretty obvious that they can get -- you can remember and i can remember when we all waited for the evening news.
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does anybody wait for the evening news any more? and could i just finally tell one brief story coming and that is that i tweet and a lot and i get in trouble every once in awhile, but the tweet of the year last year in 2010 was snookie that i'm so mad that president obama for raising tas on tanning beds. she said senator mccain would never do that because he'ss pale. [laughter] so why tweeted back your right, snookie would never raise taxes on tanning beds. it's a situation. that was the tweet of the year. [laughter] but i just want to finally mentioned the air in the spring wouldn't have been possible without the social networking. and there's a tremendous downside to the social networking but there's a tremendous upside also to the flow of information which th gives knowledge and i think
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probably better informed vote at the end of the day. >> senator kerry, what is your vote on that? >> i agree with john, but i also would say that there is no accountability to date. i say this with all due respect you are an exception. there are few reporters who, like david broder, were not impacted by all of this outside. but frankly, you know, you've got seven candidates or eight running for president of the united states to think that planet earth is only 5000-years-old and there is no sense of accountability here. you have a complete discounting of what is absolutely factual. john and i and others have been struggling with this for years. the changes in the climate. the 48 states in the unite states are now currently dealing with disasters because the floods and fires and it's just enormous, but people can assert
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that the earth is flat and it's reported some and so say that it's flat it's got equal footing there is no accountability for the truth or for science or what has been established as a and accepted norm for years and we have a problem in this country as a result of that. you know, you read the paper yesterday and today and the peace corps is down and revenue is the challenge we have in the education system. you go to china and other countries thatspeak our language fluently as kids find out how many kids in america speak the second language. so i think that the lack of accountability in the system for some the six standard of truth allows this chaotic kind of confused non-dialogue to take place which is based on anything but their real needs and concerns of the country so where
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else are we going to find if we don't have the papers of record or the institutions of record with respect to the news getting actually help people discern or hold people accountable the things that are just absurd there isn't any accountability to things that are patently absurd and it's getting harder and harder and in the democracy if people don't get good information or there isn't accountability you can say anything big money has the ability to say what it wants to say. it can buy the message and that is what is happened under the citizens united decision where people can now secretly put unlimited sums into the effort to the contion of comes and as a result the average person's concerns are not as well represented as are those who have the ability to get out there and change it. that is what threatens our
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democracy in my judgment and you guys in the state or what stands between us and neither anarchy or ignorance or bad decisions were so forth and that's where we are today. [applause] seabeck the only caveat that i would get t that coming in by understand exactly what you're saying and there's a polarization and the lik of which we haven't seen before but there's access to information or you have to do is have a couter or a cellphone and i agree with you about the citizens united decision and the thing that scares me most about the decision is a lack of transparency. that is wh is really dangerous about the citizens united. [applause] but i do think that information
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is available to people that in a way it was never available to people in times past. whether that information is distorted or not or whether -- it is out there. one glad to hear your response to that but i do agree with you about the lack of accountability spec senator mccain gets the last word. thank you both very much for all letting me be part of this this has been a really wonderful evening of the for a rarity here we wanted to very and for the senators three posthumously my great friend david and we think you. [applause] >> senator mccain, senator kerry, john jeff broker for all the people here and the people of new hampshire, thank you for being here tonight on the commitment to have made. we will once again in a few
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months prove to the rest of the country a serious hampshire voters are in taking this responsibility that wehave and demonstrate here tonight by bringing democrats and republicans together that we really do cherished the primary and hope we have it forever. thank you. [applause] >> see more videos of the candidates at c-span website. read the latest comments from candidates and political reporters from social media
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sites and cling to seize and partners in the early primary caucus stage. iowa, south carolina, in new hampshire all of c-span.org/ campaign2012. >> within 90 days of my election every american soldier and prisoner will be out of their jungles and cells and back in america where they belong. >> george mcgovern's pledge came nearly a decade after being one of the first governors to speak out publicly against the vietnam war. his groundbreaking campaign changed american politics and the democratic party. george mcgovern is featured this "theon sees fancspan's contenders." of his life friday at 8:00 eastern. >> living at our live coverage
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at c-span networks. we're live at 2:00 eastern as the house doubles in. the house will consider a number of bills, including one on highly-skilled foreign workers in the u.s. the senate -- and at 2:00 eastern. they have been debating language detaineected terr terrorists. grover norquist talks about whether new taxes are needed now. all of that today on the c-span tv networks. next, lessons learned from the japanese nuclear power plant crisis. the fukushima power plant suffered major damage in march of this year that led to radiation leaks. the u.s. nuclear regulatory agency said they have directed the agency's staff to begin immediately implementing safety recommendations. this conversation is about an hour and a half.
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>> it is a pleasure to be here. welcome one and all. it is a dynamic thing. in true tradition of talking to the nation, i am going to monopolize the conversation. then we can -- then we will open it up. welcome one and all. i would like to introduce my guest and a couple of words about being in japan, because i think that will help set the scene for the conversation that follows. to my immediate left is the chairman of the nuclear regulatory commission. and of course played a pivotal
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role in how the united states responded to what was going on in japan. i have questions about how that all unfolded. to his left is jim apple piepin. >> my term was mid-1982-1987. >> right. he is now managing director and senior fixed-income research analyst covering the electric power industry of barclays' capital. he knows about how the money flows in the industry is feeling about nuclear power these days. and i think it will be a very interesting issue to bring up with him. let me very briefly set the scene for my first question. the tsunami happened on friday. obviously the first smell bombs started rather rapidly
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thereafter, and the first word that things were looking that was pretty quick. i hopped on a plan pretty quickly on sunday and was in japan by monday in time for the next major event. i miss the first one, but that showed you how big of an event it was that there were multiple events. it was a cliffhanger. i was there for a couple of weeks watching and tried to sort things out. if you will indulge me in a very brief joke. the way the japanese government was handling this was giving a very limited amount of information and very little analysis. the joke it brings to mind is a pilot in a plane that has lost contact in radar. he has no idea where he is. he sees some guy on the ground in yield out the window, where am i? the guy yelled back, you were in an airplane. >> he says i know i must be over
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the microsoft campus because i'm getting perfectly accurate, but not necessarily useful information. the japanese government had very little interpretation. it was a huge struggle for journalists and the entire world to make sense of what was going on. that is my question to the chairman, which is how much did you feel you were in the situation? did you have more insight did the rest of us? >> i think the agency that i represent is a nuclear engineers and things that can go wrong, so we had a good sense of what kinds of challenges they were dealing with and what the situation was like. i remember getting a lot of reports in the early stages talking about the amount of
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time, and that is key to the safety features. you have a reactor that is very hot and want to keep water on it so it does not melt. there was a lot of discussion about the amount of time that the corps had been uncovered. -- core had been uncovered. everyone knew what that meant in a way, but no one was talking about what was really going on. it was probably uncovered for 18 hours or 24 hours, and those are very long amounts of time. we sent a team to japan to provide assistance to the japanese government very early on after the first day on friday. by the time they got there it was sunday morning.
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they were there to certainly give us a little bit better information, but something like this is a challenge to get reliable and accurate information. this was all a tremendous human tragedy. you have tens of thousands of and people -- people impacted. it was a very difficult situation for everyone, especially in the early page of the incident. to go where you getting good information out of japan? -- >> were you getting good information out of japan. i read there was frustration about how little information you were giving. >> the party was to provide information to the people of japan. i can only imagine if we were ever in a situation like that in the united states, which we work to make sure we are not, but the
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primary responsibility would be to make sure we're communicating internally, not worry about translating the information into french and spanish and the other languages that would make it accessible. there is obviously a degree of information we were not getting, but to the extent we got information, people were doing some of what they could to provide information to the u.s. and regulators around the world. take a part of the frustration is the japanese culture is the government decides what you need to know, and they do not get as much as one would hope would be given out here. that lack of information created a huge uncertainty around the world. they felt their people did not need to know very much, and so the rest of the world did not know as much as we all hunkered to know. >> i look at these situations,
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and it is always difficult to communicate. it is always much harder than you think. for instance, as i look back i think the first public statements i made about what we believe was going on was not until monday after thing started on friday. during that time it went very quickly, and so we probably in a difficult situation like that, probably no one communicates as people like. we all work on it. it is one of the things from the international regulatory perspective, something people want to work on is how can we better communicate and provide more information more quickly to the population and the general public. it will always be a challenge, because part of the real challenge is you want to communicate accurate information. and given the condition of the reactors it was very difficult
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to get accurate information about what was really going on. there were inherent challenges about being able to communicate. in the end as people take a step back and communicate, i am sure there will be more effort to look at how that information can be better communicated, not only to the public that you may be directly responsible to, but the world. these have become global incidents. so there is a lot of interest around the world. >> there are separate lines of communication in the business world. did you have in sites that were not in the public realm? >> i think to a large extent we were also subject to the information that was publicly available. we relied on many of the same
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sources. we listen to what was said. we've listened to what information was coming from the industry and from the media and the united states and japan, but we were limited by the same information, and the information flow was quite limited. to some degree conflicted. >> let me ask you more about the big picture. and can you tell right now what impact this is having on the u.s. industry right now? obviously we did not have all of the facts about the meltdown, but we know things are pretty bad. we know it is a multi-billion dollar thing to resolve. it must make nuclear power -- people who invest in nuclear power a little shy. >> yes. the immediate direct impact in terms of trading levels for
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securities was relatively modest. we did see in debt instruments for utilities, which is the area i tend to focus on, some spread widening. there were incremental cost for the larger nuclear utilities. companies like exxon, which operates the largest generation fleet, the utilities that operate nuclear units in california, obvious focus of attention as well. in we saw some widening of trading levels for their debt instruments, and we also sell a similar impact on the equity side. the move was fairly modest and fairly limited. i think to a certain extent that was driven by the step-by-step approach that was taken by government officials in this
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country, and they gave grieg a fair degree of credit. his colleagues on the commission, secretary chiu as well. in a fairly short order after the accident began you had statements from greg and that in their view there was no reason to shut down operating units in the united states, and there was no imminent threat to safety from those units. that was followed fairly quickly by a detailed briefing by the technical stuff that really went through the technical basis for that judgment, the broad conclusion. all of that was helpful to the investment community, and information flow began to get better over time. i would also say as things have unfolded, the approach that the nrc has taken did a great deal to provide a great deal of
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confidence to the financial community and to investors in the industry. setting up or establishing a near-term task force that would focus very intensively on that the lessons learned from the accident, and it would produce a set of recommendations quickly so we would have a sense for what new requirements would likely come out of the accident was very helpful, and that also served not to disrupt ongoing nrc activities of the time, whether it was the supervision of operating plants or the ongoing activities regarding license extensions or new plant operations. all of those things were very helpful to the financial community. >> do not forget the nuclear power industry has liability protections. the federal government is standing in there. if there were something of this scale in this country, the utilities would not be on the
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hook for the hundreds of billions of dollars. >> that is correct. there were lots of questions from investors in the aftermath of what are the insurance arrangements in terms of liability claims and property insurance protection? how would this all work? and also especially, what are the likely areas people will be focusing on? and most importantly, will they disrupt ongoing operation of the existing plants, and what incremental costs will be utilities likely face as a result of the new requirements? >> the commission obviously went to work rather rapidly, and ask the question how well are we prepared for this. i kept hearing the reassuring statements from your technical staff that there is basically no looming disaster, but they found things that needed fixing. if i understand correctly, you have five years to do this. that is a little puzzling. the five years gives
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us the time we need to make all of the necessary changes. some of the things are to do reviews, and what we call walk down spear yen both from utility and possible nrc to go on and take a look at certain things in the plant. that is not something that will wait five years. some of what we will need to do will take analysis, and that analysis will take a year or two to figure out the white way to address a particular problem that came about from the accident at fukushima. then you have to go on to make modifications or changes to the plan. you might have to change training that the operators have. those things take time, and you want to do it in the right way. i think the commission is moving
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forward, and we recently approved a shut of short-term actions to begin that process. some things will take less time than others, but we think five years is a good way to capture it all. it wraps the issue of some moves beyond it. they're obviously been to see the issues that come up in new things to address and keep focused on. if we are taking more than five years, we will not have resources to deal with new issues as they come up. >> let's take a step back and talk about the condition of the complete right now. and i am still getting confusing information, because the utility seems to be saying there is still radiation being produced in outcast, but the department of energy, which has been doing surveys in the field says there is no new radiation settling down on the ground. you will see this huge spike in
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early march and decays down. is it out costing right now? -- outcasting right now? >> we believe they are at temperatures below the boiling point of water, which is a key milestone, and a key piece of their plan to really ultimately recover the site and decommission the area. there is some poe degree for some amount of steam to develop and that can have some amount of very low levels of radioactivity in it. that would likely be right now the major source of any type of additional releases. those are very small and not anything right now that would be posing any kind of real threat to public health and safety. there may be some degree of that still going on, but as the temperature continues to cool, that will eventually go to -- really disappear altogether.
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>> circling back to some of the history. i think your most famous statement was suggesting there should be a 50-mile evacuation done for u.s. people around the plant. that was based on radiation levels or was that based on your expectations of what might go wrong? >> it was really a combination of a lot of different factors. the prime issues we were -- as i said we have very good experts at the n.r.c. and they were looking at scenarios and looking at the conditions of the plant and trying to postulate what kinds of things could happen from there. so we did some very conservative analyses to get an estimate what we thought could happen and some of those analyses showed there could be releases of radiation that if they happened in the united states would trigger us to take those kind of precautionary measures like evacuations and things like that. it was based on the analyses that we were doing given what we saw as the conditions of the reactors. and potential for it to get worse.
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take us a long time to figure out how accurate those models were. and if the assumptions were accurate and correct. but in general we have seen potential areas of contamination out to fairly large distances. >> in specific swaths, serm not a 50-mile radius. what does that mean for u.s. power plants? gee, if it was 50 miles there, we don't have a 50-mile evacuation zone around indian point or any other nuclear power plants. do you -- have you set a new standards for yourself that you need to replicate for the plants in the us us? >> i don't think we have. i think the standard has always been that we prepare to require all the plants to prepare to evacuate or take other emergency measures. it's not always evacuation that's the best thing to do. all the plants are required to prepare about 10 miles outside the plant for immediate kind of
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emergency response. then beyond that they are required to prepare out to about 50 miles for more longer term activities like dealing with radioactive materials that could get in the food supply and things like that. all of that is about preparation. but there is nothing that says if we ever were to have an accident that would require actions beyond that, that we wouldn't work with the state and local governments with the utilities to take the appropriate actions. so i think if anything what it should tell the public is that the agency will always do what it thinks is in the best interest of public health and safety. in this case in japan when it came to american citizens that were there, we thought it was prudent to advise them to stay a little bit farther away around that 50 miles. this is something we'll be looking at as we go forward is this idea of should we make changes to these evacuation, these emergency planning zones? personally i think it's something that's long overdue. some of the data, analysis that
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goes into these in many cases decades old. there might even be a better way to do it than have these kind of preplanned areas that are based on distances away. there may be a better way to figure it out with modern computer technology, modernalalcies tools. we may even have a better way to do it than that. >> jim, obviously there's someplaces in the world that reacted remarkably differently than the u.s. did. i wonder if you could say a few words about germany which subsequently said we are phasing out nuclear power in germany. and other places around the world that are basically seem to be unperturbed by this like china and india. >> sure, there have been very different reactions as you say in different countries. some countries, particularly in northern europe, have made the decision that over some period of time they want to phase out their existing plants. in other parts of europe, france, united kingdom are good examples, and in most parts of asia, countries still seem to be
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prepared to move forward. japan a little uncertain at the current time in terms of the future direction there. each country obviously needs to make its own decision based upon their situation. the available alternatives, and how uncomfortable they are with the operation, the continued operation of their nuclear plants. some countries have been more concerned and others more confident that their existing regulatory framework and operating performance of the plants and ain't to apply the lessons learned from this accident should enable the plants to continue to operate. i certainly think that's the correct view. that's the view we are taking here in the united states. and i think it's appropriate for our situation. a lot of it also depends upon other decisions that are being made around other available alternatives and the economic competitiveness of those alternatives as well. >> let's talk about china for a second.
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i think they are planning to expand their nuclear fleet fairly significantly. i take it that has not slowed down. do you think they should take some lessons from here? >> i believe that there was a pause shortly after the accident and my sense is that china will look at further steps to strengthen and expand their regulatory framework. i think that's a prudent approach. that seems to be the approach that china is on to support the continued development program that they have in place. >> how do you feel about that? we just witnessed this high-speed train accident. china moving a little too fast in its technological development? >> i'm not an expert on their nuclear program. but my sense is their plants have a good operating record. my sense also is that the plants that are in the early stages of construction, very similar to the one that is are in the pipeline for construction in this country.
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the construction processes have gone very well at the early stages, but have gone quite well. so i don't see any reason why china cannot or should not go forward with their program. i do think that having a very strong and effective regulatory program makes a great deal of sense. i think it's one of the strength that we have in this country in part that strength came about as a result of the three mile island accident. i think the n.r.c. is better and more effective today as a result of some of the steps and changes that were taken then. and quite frankly i think the industry in this country is stronger and better as well. one of the things that was done after the three mile island accident was the establishment of the institute for nuclear power operations, and i think that is a very effective complement to what the n.r.c. does. when the oil spill task force asked me should the energy industry think about something
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like that, my reaction was yes, they should. neither the n.r.c. nor inpo are infallible, but between the two of them not a lot falls through the cracks. i think in part as a result of t.m.i. we have a pretty strong and effective regulatory system in place both within the industry and then also by the government. other countries i think can benefit from that same structure. >> greg, i'm not sure you talked about this question, let me spring it on you. if this accident happened in china instead of japan, how different would it have been in terms of information flow and technical assistance and all the rest of that stuff? i know our relationships are obviously very different. >> that's an interesting question. one area that may be different, and nuclear is different -- i'm not an expert in the railroad industry, nuclear does have a fairly close knit regulatory community.
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i think jim alluded to that a little bit. internationally. there is a lot of communication and discussion among regulators. i have certainly met with many of my counterparts and attended several meetings and conferences over the last six or seven months dedicated to learning lessons from this event and all the major nuclear powers are representative of those meetings. i think there is certainly a sense of communication and cooperation among the regulatory bodies. >> including china? do you know your counterparts in china? >> absolutely. they are very much participants in these kind of international forums. there's also a kearnt part to the institute for nuclear power operations which is the world association of nuclear operators, which is trying to establish that communication among the industry utilities and companies that own these reactors. so i think nuclear power is unique in that regard, maybe not
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unique, maybe similar to the aviation industry to some extent, but it is very much an industry in which there is a lot of communication among the safety experts and safety -- and there is a saying whether right or wrong that an accident anywhere, or accident somewhere is an accident everywhere. >> global industry. >> exactly. i think you saw that with fukushima, there was trem interest everywhere what does this mean? we were getting a lot from people about what does this mean for u.s. reactors? and so i think there's an appreciation among all the safety professionals that there is that need to communicate and coordinate as well as we can. >> the counterexample is sars, which struck china and i covered that one as well. >> we should not go where you go. >> a little after the fact.
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but it was -- china was basically denying it was going on even though i know they have people who participate very much in the world health organization and global health issues. they knew what was going on. they were trying to to stuff and were doing stuff on the ground, but the government was not sharing with the rest of the world until a certain break point, at which point they finally said this is crazy and actually they did open up and all of a sudden there was a dramatic change. but i mean that's also potential scenario. we are looking at -- >> it's interesting in many ways was part of the challenge with chernobyl happened was there was denial. at that time there was the former soviet union, and there was not a lot of information. some of the first indications of problem came from a power plant, i believe it was in sweden, where workers were going in and out and they are monitored to make sure they don't accidentally get contaminated and take contamination out of the site, and it was setting off some of their alarms.
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they determined that the source of that was not coming from the plant. that was one of the first indicators there was something going on and there was denial. the international community after that came together and established treaties and international instruments, binding instruments, to better ensure that communication. one is the convention on nuclear safety, which actually interestingly enough every three years the convention meets and they had their meeting planned for this year. and that took place after the fukushima event, so it gave it a whole new emphasis and opportunity to strengthen that to better enhance that communication. but countries do report to the international agency. when they have accidents they report them. there is a particular scale. all these things that came about after chernobyl. so to some extent while i think jim alluded to the n.r.c. making changes after three mile island, i think the international
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community, regulators and nations, made changes after chernobyl to address those issues of communication. certainly i think there will be lessons to learn and ways to improve what happened in japan, it's a much different situation than it was i think in mid 1980's in terms of the international community recognizing the need to communicate these events. people will find out about them eventually n this day and age it's better to try to communicate that early. >> we got some equipment, the u.s. government rather quickly got equipment in for monitoring radiation. i believe the first i saw of the -- this plume of radioactivity going to the northwest from fukushima was actually u.s. military flights carrying u.s. department of energy hardware, and i wonder to what extent -- how much the technology has changed, how better our monitoring is and obviously by the time it wafted across the
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pacific and people were picking it up in trace amounts on the west coast as well, but how much -- how better equipped are we for understanding and being able to follow how an event like this will unfold? >> i would say we are well equipped now. i'm couldn't say we are better or worse than we have been in the past. it's one of the challenges we dealt with is a lot of people were able to see indications because of reporting, all our nuclear power plants reported if they identified radioactivity material. we have very sensitive instruments to measure and record this kind of material. and one of the challenges we have is communicating the risk of that material. in many cases, all cases here in the united states, it was no real health consequences but it was there and so people had an interest in it. i think in tokyo they are still dealing with some of that. i think people are going out now
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whether it's on the internet or however they are getting it, but people are getting their own personal radiation measuring equipment of one type or another. they are identifying hot spots or areas within tokyo where there may be radioactive material. most of those things, all have come out as being things that have no real health consequences and has nothing to do with the fukushima accident. so some extent the challenges are greater because there is the availability of people to get equipment. and information spreads because of the internet and other kinds of tools almost instantly. so it is a challenge for us in the regulatory community and probably in the government in general to make sure we are communicating effectively and accurately about what's really going on. so i think in this day and age it's very typical anything that's a secret anymore. >> we don't know really what's going on inside of plants. not that's a secret but it's unknown.
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you were watching after three mile island how things unfolded. i wonder if you see parallels. are there lessons, things that are lessons? >> there are a fair number of parallels. information flow was a problem during the t.m.i. accident as well. communication with the operators in the plant. understanding what was actually going on in the plant. getting the right kind of advice and information to the people operating the plant. some of those same problems existed during that accident as well. in the aftermath if you look at the approach that we took after the three mile island accident, and i think look at the approach that the n.r.c. is taking today, i think there are some interesting contrasts and i would say some lessons learned from what happened after t.m.i. after t.m.i. the industry, the n.r.c., and at that time the congress as well put together a
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substantial amount of new requirements for the industry. there was very little done at the time to try to set priorities or decide how those changes should be implemented. rather the approach was to say, these are the things that need to be done. go do them and do them immediately. essentially immediately. all the focus, probably understandably, was on making those changes as a result you had some disruptions of the n.r.c.'s ongoing activities. and i think you also created some operating challenges for the industry. i tend to believe that most all of the post-three mile island changes were needed, but clearly some of those changes were more important than others. and some were clearly more complicated an others. one of the things i like about what the commission is doing and what the n.r.c. staff has done so far is to say, let's try to look at the areas of agreement,
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and there's fairly dramatic consensus between the industry and the n.r.c. about the precise areas that need attention. i think very little disagreement about the areas. and the approach has been to say, let's try to look at the recommendations that came out of the task force and set the priorities. for the things that will have a fairly immediate and positive impact, let's get after those right away. and for the others that need some additional work or analysis, then let's stage or sequence those changes. i think that's exactly the right approach. i wish that we had taken more of that approach after t.m.i. we didn't. we went through a fairly difficult period. and i think that's one of the reasons why i and also i think others in the financial community now are fairly comfortable about the approach we are on. there is an effort to try to make this managible and look at it in a disciplined way what changes are really going to provide the most important benefits to safety, get after those quickly, and then spend a
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bit more time on the changes that may need a little bit more analysis, or that are a little bit more complicated in terms much deciding what the right answer really is. >> one of the issues here of course is i think the public has an exaggerated idea of the hazards of radiation. we saw this run on identify dine tablets on the west coast which was not justified by the science. i think people are surprised to learn that even survivors of her roshea and nagorno-karabakh -- nagasaki, there is cancer but several hundred. radiation -- it is -- it has caught hold of the public imagination. for you to assess public acceptance for finances, must be a difficult issues. for you in terms of how safe is safe. do you just say, forget the american -- forget these misconceptions. we'll do what's technically right. i want to ask both of you how do
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you get into the fact that people don't necessarily come to this with a completely rational and dispassionate set of facts? >> on the financial side you are right. there is that component to the analysis. i think the way that most of us who followed the industry and the way that most investors who invest in the industry look at it is these are -- these assets are very long lived assets and they are valuable assets. what we all want to know is are the plants safe to operate? are they likely to operate over an extended period of time? reliably or not rerye bly -- reliably? is the regulatory framework that governs the rules for operation of those plants relatively stable and predictable and effective? and what is the cost profile of these assets going to be? are they going to be productive
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assets over their expected lifetime? if they are, nuclear plants, if you look at the fleet we have today, those plants represent about 10% of our generation in this country, and about 20% of our actual electricity production because of their high reliability. and when the plants run, they run very well with a very predictable and very stable cost profile that's very competitive with any of the other available alternatives. investors know and understand that, but there is a challenge in looking at nuclear assets and saying is something going to go wrong? how predictable and dependable are these assets going to be? over a very long period of time. since these plants initially were given 40-year operating licenses and typically have received 20-year extensions. you are looking at an asset that has a useful life over a long period of time, 60 years, and has a very important effect in terms of the financial performance of the companies
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that own and operate them. >> sounds like you were looking more at the nuts and bolts. >> that's right. what we do look as well at public acceptance and regulatory acceptance because those are factors that can affect the long-term performance availability of those plants. there are clearly some parts of the country that have a more ambivalent a view of nuclear power. not surprisingly after fukushima we have seen the concern level or degree of opposition increase in those parts of the country. and there are companies that have ongoing license extension challenges under way in precisely those jurisdictions. that's a risk factor that applies to those companies that wouldn't necessarily apply to companies that operate nuclear plants in other parts of the country. >> greg, i want to turn that question to you. obviously there were some issues
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that were identified that were serious technical issues that were -- let's make sure that we are protecting against station blackouts and things like that. a loss of power at fukushima is what led to the meltdown there. so clearly, not trying to say there were not really real problems you guys identified, what about the public perception? how did you deal with that as well in thinking about what needs to happen? >> fundamentally we try and -- we want to hear from the public. we want to hear from the stakeholders and everybody who is involved in this process. so we are getting the best information. but when it comes to our decisionmaking we like to base it on what we think is the best technical recommendations. the best policy. unfortunately there is probably no right answer to any of these difficult questions about what's, i think as you said, what's safe enough, what is really the appropriate level for safety.
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that's a policy question that will probably always be debated as long as we have anything that has a hazard potential. what we try to do is establish our statutory mandate is reasonable assurance of adequate protection, which i think of as the way of congress giving us the heart job trying to figure out what that means because it's not -- doesn't roll off the tongue real easily. that's basically in a way why the agency was created to figure out what does that mean? how do we go about on a day to day basis to implement that? you take a situation like fukushima, which is nonetheless still a very low probability event, something catastrophic happened, still very, very unlikely in this industry, particular here in the united states, but when it does happen, that is something you have to deal with. and you have to go back and re-exam -- re-examine some
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things and you look in the past these are maybe low-risk type of things so it's not the best place to put our resources right now from a regulatory perspective or safety perspective. we may move on to something else. but when they happen, then you have to go back and re-examine them, did we make the right choice? that's what we are doing right now. you touched on station blackout which is this idea when we lose all electrical power to a site, that this is known to be a very significant situation. very difficult situation to deal with because of the way the plants operate. we have always had a requirement for dealing with this so-called loss of all electric power or station blackout. you lost all power, you lose your lights, literally. and -- >> you assume the power would come back pretty quickly. that was one of the lessons, well, maybe not. >> first and foremost if you lose electrical power everybody
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has diesel generators and they generate electric power for the reactors. the station lockdown is a situation which you lose all of your electrical power then your diesel generators can't work. what we have looked at historically is the combination of those factors is probably you are going to get some kind of power back in a couple hours. clearly in japan that didn't happen. the smee had the effect -- tsunami and the earthquake to some degree had the effect of negating those power systems. that's one of the things we need to look at. but in contrast to three mile island, we are starting much farther along in the process. we aren't having to create a station blackout regulation. what we have to do is tweak that regulation a little bit based on new information. the starting point is a lot better for us. and the work we have to do is less than to make those fixes. it's not a wholesale change to our approach. it's incorporating these new
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lessons and making what we have better. >> i will take questions in a minute or two. if you want to line up at the microphones. jim, if i recall correctly after three mile island among the -- not only were there safety improvements but there was also a lot of enhancement and operating time. the plants were limping along. they were not cog well. there was -- doing well. there was a tremendous improvement in the amount of time they were out of play even operating. was that related to or unrelated to the changes around three mile island? >> it was a combination of factors. i think some of the post-t.m.i. changes spli kated matters. you were doing modifications and changes in plants when those plants were operating and inevitably i think that affected operating performance of the plants to some degree. but also i think it's fair to say that the operating performance within the industry has improved fairly substantially from the time that i was on the commission until today. if you look at the plants today
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in terms of reliability performance, average capacity factors are about 90%. and when you factor in averages that's about as good as you can get. you are operating at the upper frontier of reliability performance. in addition regulatory and safety performance i think has improved measurably as well. so the frequency of events that challenge equipment in the plants, the frequency of errors or mistakes has also come down pretty dramatically from the 1980's. to a large extent i think that's due to the industry's credit, improved operating performance and reliability within the industry, to a certain extent it is a result of internal pier pressure, the reviews done by inpo. to a certain extent i think it's the result of the effectiveness of the regulatory system. and then finally getting past some of the changes and new
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requirements that were complicating factor in terms of operating the plants was an element as well. a git of a combination of a number of factors, i think. >> let me ask you, rules for everyone, please introduce yourself and ask a question. no speeches, please. thank you. >> goonk -- good afternoon. the energy task force on lessons learned concluded that u.s. nuclear plants need not be shut down while these lessons are studied and the licensing need not be suspended either for new plants or license renewal reviews. beyond that the n.r.c. staff has agreed with the nuclear power industry in the u.s. that n.r.c. licensing boards, which are holding hearings both on the licensing as a new plants and the license renewals, should re ject saying that the fukushima lessons should be considered during these licensing hearings. why is that? what's the problem with considering the fukushima lessons during these license
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hearings even if you don't have to shut the plants down? >> i can't -- because of the way these hearings work i can't comment specifically, i can talk a little bit in general about the approach that the commission's taken. we do have a process to go through these hearings which the commission kind of serves as kind of a the last review of all the decision that is these independent licensing boards. what the commission has said we think we have a good process in place to address these issues. if somebody can come in and make a good case there is a specific issue, any particular proceeding and which the fukushima events will be relevant, then they are free to make that argument. and that's largely i think what the commission said. so to some extent it's reilly about doing this on a case by case basis.
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and then at the same time we will be going through and doing our -- kind of our follow-up activities which will likely require modifications and changes as the commission is recently agreed with a subset of the recommendations to move forward on quickly. some of those involve orders. that's a fairly strong tool that we use with the plants to get them to make changes right away. that will apply largely to an existing plant as well as it would to a plant that may be going through a license review or plant that may be undergoing a new licensing review. i think there's a way to do it and capture all of it. the crucial piece really comes down to how we view these changes. there's really two ways we can look at changes or modifications we make to plants. one is to say it's basically a bedrock or foundation of safety. what we would call an adequate
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protection issue. if it is one of these bedrock issues for safety, then it's going to apply to every plant. if it's something that is an enhancement or modification that's more in the category things that would be nice to do but may not be justifiable for every plant in this country, then it would potentially apply differently to different facilities. right now the approach the staff has recommended is we look at all of these things as really kind of redefining what we think is the fundamental things that are important for safety. and if that's the case, then it's going to apply pretty much to everybody equally regardless of where you are in your licensing review process. >> my name is christopher. my question is, two questions are would it be accurate to say no one has died as a result of exposure to radiation at fukushima. secondly, can you assure that no
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one will die as a result of exposure to radiation in the future? >> what we know right now there have been no fatalities that were directly related to radiation exposure. i believe there were a few workers who were killed at the plant because they were performing work and when the tsunami hit they lost their life. there are some workers who have received levels of radiation that are higher than we normally allow in this country for normal operations, but in an emergency situation, the kinds of exposures that people could be exposed to, but none of those would present an immediate threat to their life. based on what we know from the indications we have right now. there were a few workers that
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early on were exposed to high levels of radiation through contact with contaminated water, and again nothing that is going to lead to an immediate loss of life because of that radiation exposure. these will be people that will be monitored. it's a very important principle in the nuclear industry that we put an important emphasis on monitoring people's exposure to radiation. whenever i go to a nuclear power plant, for instance, i carry with me instruments that will monitor my radiation exposure. i get a report of that every year and what that is. it's very low. in general most people are going to be exposed to more radiation and medical diagnostic procedures than they will certainly from a nuclear power plant. right now we don't see any evidence of any exposures that would likely lead to immediate
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kinds of loss of life or these kinds of things. but it's something certainly that will be monitored as people go forth to see if there are any specific health effects that can be tied to the exposures people are getting. >> i can add a little. obviously the excess radiation exposure is not of the immediate levels but levels that over a very large population was exposed would raise their risk of cancer probably too small to actually see because cancer is a fairly common disease. i have seen estimates from a couple hundreds, if everyone basically was outside during the time of the accident within that perimeter, there were maybe a couple hundred extra cases. they are highly uncertain. and it's not clear they would ever be mesh shurenl. one more -- measurable. one more thing about the people exposed at the plant.
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there was a period of time where they didn't have enough of these radiation monitors to go around, early days of the accident. some people went in and like their crew chief had a radiation monitor but every person did not. there is some lingering question about we'll never know what those people were exposed to. that's an as terrific. i think -- asterisk. maybe there's more to come on that. thank you for your question. over here. >> i'm with daniel with perdue university. i'm wondering about the storage of on-site nuclear fuel rods, and if the n.r.c. has changed its position at yucca mountain as a result of the accident we have seen there. >> well, right now the n.r.c. is focused fundamentally on making sure however spent fuel exists it can be safe. predominantly plants use a combination of keeping that fuel in pools, pools of water, large
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tanks of water, or in what's called try cap storges. you take them out of the pools and put them into concrete casks. both of those ways of storing spent fuel are things we think can be done safely for a long period of time, and securely. one of the things from fukushima that we are looking at is making sure we are properly monitoring and ensuring the integrity of these spent fuel pools because there was a lot of question in the early aftermath of fukushima of what was really happening with the spent fuel pools. particularly after the hydrogen explosions there was concern the integrity of the pools may have been lost. those are things we are looking at. by and large the agency believes this material can be stored safe for at least 100 years. we are looking at really what
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the finite, if there is kind of a finite lifetime, for these current methodologies, but would have to be moved o to a permanent repository. that's kind of our approach to it. but fundamentally the decision about where nuclear waste goes or what's done with it is really a decision for the industry for the department of energy, for the congress, for others. the n.r.c. has the responsibility, if a particular path is put forward, to do the licensing review and the licensing work that would be associated with a particular facilities. >> you actually raised the public alarm about the possibility with the spent fuel pools and one of the reactors may have lost its cooling fluid. why did you think that was the case? when did you come to reassure yourself it was not true? >> well, we had a lot of information. again some based on engineering
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judgment about what could be going on in the facilities. and some data we were getting that indicated that there was -- we weren't seeing the kinds of things we would expect to be seeing if there was a full pool of water. in terms of the practical impact what that meant was there would be large radiation fields at the site which we were seeing. a combination of material that had been disbursed and potentially some radiation coming from the pools themselves. the practical impact of that was really the challenge that it presented for dealing with the site and getting in and doing the kinds of things that were necessary to continue to get water into the reactor cores to ensure they could stay cool. fairly early on the reference made to put water into the pools because regardless of what was going on we knew water was evap waiting -- evaporating and try to make sure they had sufficient
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watttory prevent anything more serious from happening. in terms of when we first learned that it appeared there was not a challenge to the integrity of the one pool, i think it was unit four's pool, i don't recall exactly when that was, at some pint they did some measurements or some cameras in and looked at the fuel and didn't appear to see -- didn't appear the fuel had been damaged at all which would be indicative of there not having lost all the water in the pool as we had believed early on. >> jim, does this issue about the spent fuel pools affect the way you guys look at the industry? and what needs to be done? does it seem like there is a big chunk of money that needs to be spent? >> fukushima related issues as greg said. instrumentation, better
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instrumentation for the spent fuel pools. and ultimately better ways to ensure that under conditions you can get water in the pools. those are all part of some of the fukushima related issues. there is a broader investor concern, more around the management of spent fuel. and the government's inability to fully its contractual obligations. if you go back to the nuclear waste policy act of 1984, the government took legal spot to come up with a solution for the waste problem. that was supposed to be the construction of a geologic repository. the industry began to pay a charge of one million per kill watt hour for every hour generated to go into a fund. the objective was that repository would be in operation by 1996. obviously that has not happened.
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and at this point we have the president's blue ribbon commission looking at what should be done about the program. how should it be focused going forward. what should be the plan for developing a solution for managing spent fuel on a long-term basis? in the interim the utilities have to deal with the problem both by storing more spent fuel in the reactor pools and also by using dry cask storage. fortunately the industry has been able to recover the incremental cost of spent fuel management from the federal government because the federal government failed to meet its contractual obligations. i think that situation will continue but ultimately i think the financial community and investors all want to see the government be in a position to be able to fulfill its responsibility. and the responsibility of the government was to take title, ownership, and responsibility for the spent fuel.
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so hopefully the president's blue ribbon commission will come out with a final report and set of recommendations that will lead to a progression of steps where the government can fulfill its obligations. i think there's a fair degree of unanimity among the financial community, among the industry, and certainly among state regulators that have been paying the fee and rate payors that we should get on with this and the--ratepayers that we should get on with this and come up with a workable plan for managing spent fuel. >> did the accident in japan affect that discussion? >> i think not too much. obviously we have all heard the statements that greg just made which is spent fuel can be safely managed either in dry cask storage or in spent fuel pools. if there are necessary steps, those steps are likely to be taken and quite frankly those
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costs are also likely to be borne by the federal government should be. >> it seems like -- it would seem like there might be pressure let's get an offset. there is obviously more spent fuel sitting on site than there was in the reactors themselves. you want to mutt it someplace safe and get it out of the way. >> my own personal view is that's exactly right. that we ought to move to some interim storage facilities where the government can start to take title and responsibility for spent fuel and where spent fuel can be stored on a longer term basis in an engineered facility before ultimately moving to a repository. i think that's the right approach. a few of those regional facilities owned and operated by the federal government in my view would be a step forward. and it would begin to move fuel away from the plants which is beneficial for a variety of reasons. >> question over here?
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>> i am a correspondentant with japanese tv network. i report on fukushima in japan. i measured the radio -- radiation level on the fukushima , i can judge the situation more accurately. my neighbor in tokyo is an american man. he has a daughter and he is always concerned about her health. what do you think of the japanese policy which permits children to receive 208 millie seaters per year. is this safe? >> let me point out for people who weren't following the story that closely one thing that happened after the zent was the government actually relaxed its radiation exposure requirements. particularly for children.
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in the area. i believe they ultimately undid that but it created quite a stir at the time. can you give us the back story on that? >> well, these are complicated decisions without a doubt. any time you deal with a significant accident like you have in fukushima when you are dealing with the radiation risk, you are dealing with a statistical risk, if i could say it that way, it's the chance of something happening later. taste not the levels of radiation exposure are not levels we know are going to cause immediate harm to anyone, but they have the potential to increase the risks of other kinds of diseases. it's always a very difficult tradeoff to figure out how to balance those with some of the other risks and challenges that may be involved with any person. evacuating somebody from their home is a difficult thing to do.
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if any of you have ever experienced challenges with the weather and you lose power for a week, it's not easy. imagine being taken out of your home completely and being told you can't go back to your home for an extended period of time. that's a difficult thing for any government to do. when you are dealing with these levels of radiation exposure, there are a lot of different factors that go into the decision. i'm not going to comment specifically on what they did in japan. just to share my perspective. i don't think any of these decisions would be easy. i didn't have all the information and data they were being loog at and knows what the implications were. 20 millieciter, if i do my conversion right is two recommend. after this -- rem. i definitely learned how to convert after this accident. it's on the order of a cat-scan, what you might get on a cat-scan. to give you a sense of what that
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exposure is. that's something that people are exposed to in this country. the international icksperts who look at radiation exposure will tell you that children are more suspectible than adults. two rem is what we allow -- actually even larger than that, in general the international community two rem exposure level is what workers in the nuclear industry are allowed to receive as part of their normal exposures. it's their upper limit. generally the goal is to always have it be as low as possible. but two rem is the level they are allowed to. for a short period of time for a child to be expossed -- exposed to that, there may be factors that would weigh to allow you for a short period of time to say that's accept and. not having been in the position to make that i can't comment on whether that was the right decision or not because there were a lot of factors involved and a lot of factors that go into that. if we were ever to have an incident like that in the united states we would be faced with
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some of those challenges as well. most of those are in the aftermath of the accident. not in the immediate. in the immediate time we generally have very well established standards and know exactly what we would do, but it's in that three, four, five-week period when you have to weigh a lot of different factors. you may have a short-term exposure to a higher radiation level. but as a result you'll be able to stay in your home and if the overall health effect for you may be better to be able to return to your home and spend time in your home living and trying to recover and deal with the kind of emotional impacts of an incident like that. >> do you think we would relax standards under certain circumstances? >> when we get into that -- past that immediate phase we don't have definitive standards on
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what is the acceptable level. it's something we continue to discuss within the federal government. it is something that a lot of different agencies have strong opinions about what the right answer is. when we get into that phase we are no longer talking about having definitive standards. the definitive standards come about in that early phase and what you do immediately to prevent acute exposures. but as you get into the later phases, it really is more of a collaborative process about determining what is the right answer for public health. and that's not going to be easy. it definitely will be a difficult decision. as i said it's never an easy thing to tell somebody that, for instance, you may no longer be able to go back to your home as some people in japan have been told. your area will forever be an area you can never return to. some of those exposure levels are not necessarily very large. very may increase your risk of cancer. that's a very difficult decision for the government to then say
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forever you can never go back to your home and you have to find a new home and new community and new livelihood and life. taste a very, very difficult decision when you get into that phase, because, again, what you are talking about is hypothetical -- not hypothetical, but probabilities of of cancers and probabilities of diseases. there is no definite disease we can say you are going to get. we can say your likelihood increases. but we can definitely tell you are not going to go back in your home and your neighbors, you may never see your neighbors again. it's a difficult decision. >> i can see that cutting both ways. i would like to think the government has established some overall standard that they are not going to -- it's not going to be a situational thing. on the other hand, i guess i'm wondering what happens if somebody has a house that has ray done levels they may get significantly more radiation than that. the government -- it seems
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imappropriate for the government to tell people you must move out of your house because you are being exposed to high levels of ray done gas. >> it's a very active discussion -- radon gas. >> it's a very active discussion. i can't say there is a right answer here. the approach that previously had been established was what we would do -- what -- we establish a process to try to figure out what is the best answer. we were trying to come up with clean up as much as you could. and then see are the levels at a low enough level their risk is reduced enough it would be ok for people to go back. but it's hard to say at the outset that you would -- can you just pinpoint a number and say that's the number and that's where we are. it's really about tradeoffs. and what are the right tradeoffs. >> i remember discussion with dirty bombs. very difficult situation where you may have permanent low-level
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contamination of a downtown area or something. then what do you do? i guess we won't resolve that right now. we'll take another question. >> my name is john. i was recently at the regional v.r.c. meeting, blue ribbon commission meeting here, and like the previous questioner from this microphone, i was concerned about the spent fuel issues. and to follow along to his which really took my first question, it appears to me that at fukushima there were a couple of issues that aren't normal to spent fuel. number one you had i believe at least two reactors that had to be taken out of commission because of the accidental damage that had happened. and that meant that their status for radioactivity and like that was different than what has been planned for the normal lifecycle
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of fuel rods. and that raises for me two scientific questions. one is, how the heck do you get those highly energetic rods out of their original operating positions and safely into a spent fuel pool? and then do you need different spent fuel pool protocols to deal with this different type of fuel rod than what you plant for? >> i'll take the second part of the question first. the easier part. i think the short answer is yes. there will have to be some special way to deal with this fuel and a similar problem occurred with three mile island. the first part about how to do it is something people are looking at right now. the first and most important thing is you have to -- when you are talking about shall--- there are two issues. the fuel in the core itself. that fuel has likely changed its
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form and shape as a result of the lack of water. and then you have the fuel in the pools themselves. so right now there is an effort that the fools will be easier, there is an effort to ultimately to move that fuel out of the pools and into a different -- they have a large pool there. i think that moves some of it into dry cask and some into a much larger pool they have to store fuel. that's a little easier proposition. but the goal is to do that because ultimately the buildings are not ultimately going to be preserved or maintained. you want to get that out. getting the fuel that's been damaged in the reactor cores out is going to be difficult and take some time. it will require a lot of engineers and scientists to come up with very creative ways to do that. because it does present challenges for -- because of the high radiation levels. so at this point i don't think
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anybody has an answer. there is experience with these kinds of things dealing with highly radioactive materials and moving them and doing that. but it will be unique to this site and unique to the reactors. those are things people aren't going to know for some time. it will be a long time. right now nobody really knows what the condition of the fuel is. it's likely that it's melted. but to what extent and what condition it's in right now nobody really knows. we can hypothesis -- hypothesis size and do analysis, until you can get in there, you won't know. it was largely the same case at three mile island. >> take a long time to figure out what had gone on. like five years. did that time help you? i know this fuel remains hot for five years. maybe in five years nobody wants to sit and wait, but if you do, obviously that fuel becomes easier to handle. it loses at least its thermal
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heat if not its radiation. how did that unfold on three mile island? in terms of getting the material out of the core. >> for t.m.i. it did take, as greg said, a considerable amount of time you had to develop fools and equipment to actually -- tools and equipment to actually remove the damaged fuel from the reactor vessel. the same thing i'm sure will be true here as well. >> i have read that the japanese basically decided not to worry about robotics for nuclear power because it was part of their hue russ -- hubris that nothing would go wrong. they didn't have to worry about robots. are there better robots around the world that can be put into action to work on these problems when it finally gets cool enough, and cooled down enough to get close to it? >> there will likely be some type of remote capability and access. and that expertise lies beyond the n.r.c. but our friends at the department of energy have
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experience with that and other places. there is expertise in dealing with these kinds of challenges. it will have to be some type of remote operation. and again right now it's just hard to speculation because we don't have a good sense of what the condition of the fuel is. how will it be accessible. where is all of the fuel? has some of it moved outside of the vessel? we don't know. >> some of the images of the spent fuel pool shows some are messed up. it's not proceeding on. there's debris in it. it's kind of a mess. to answer a little bit of the technical question, the spent fuel pools are are suspended significantly off the ground so that you can essentially pick stuff out of the core and move it all the while leaving it under water. that's one of the issues for earthquake design. these pools were up on concrete stilts but basically they were
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