military community coming home to an american community that does not understand or pay attention to veteran issues. we come home to a lot of handshakes, but we need to understand there are men and women out there who have spent the last decade fighting a war. they need to get an education. they need to be reintegrated back into society. these are the men and i want to thank the american people for everything they have done for us. we still have a long way to go to keep forging this new greatest generation. no serves asranti the administrative director of the veterans of america. join us tomorrow will be linda feldmann and we will be joined

by ralph reed to talk about the goals of the coalition and their key issues in 2012. we will finish our discussion looking at crew's safety and where it comes in as far as regulation and legislation. all that plus information. don't forget, our coverage of the south carolina primary starts at 7:00 p.m. go to the c-span.org web site at c-span.org carry it we will see you tomorrow. thanks for joining us.

"road to the white house" continues tonight with a look at the south carolina republican primary. we will cover the candidate's speeches. primary coverage continues with florida. there will be caucuses in nav and at and may -- nevada and in florida in may. >> sunday on "newsmakers," the republican primaries and what they mean for democrats. and they look at the future of payroll tax cuts and the budget this year in congress. that is at 10:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. eastern on c-span, c-span radio and c-span.org.

>> if you have a saudi arabian prince who is part of the royal family of saudi arabia who has bought one of the largest news franchises in the world, you have to look at what are his motives. >> diana west writes about culture, politics, and the spread of islam in the western world. they should have to register-- r. diana west sunday night at 8:00 p.m. on c-span's "q & a." >> a look at the discussion of raising the budget gap. this is one hour, 10 minutes. sponsor of the subject resolution that is before the desk.

madam speaker, i'd like to start my conversation with a few numbers. 15.2 trillion dollars. that is the size of our national debt. we as a nation are borrowing at the rate of $58,000 per second. that is approximately $45,000 for each man, woman, and child in america. this type of debt is not sustainable. madam speaker, this resolution is offered today to send a message to the nation and to the world -- >> madam speaker, the house is not in order. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is correct. the house is not in order. the house will be in order. members are advised to take their conversations from the floor. the gentleman is recognized. mr. reed: thank you, madam

speaker. this resolution is submitted to send a message to the nation and to the world that this chamber is going to lead and not hide. we are going to deal with the issue of the national debt once and for all because it is time. the path that we are on is not sustainable. it is a path of bankruptcy, it is a path that will destroy the american dream if we do not stand up to the plate and lead us out of this fiscal nightmare that we now find ourselves in. now, many people in this town and in this chamber and in the chamber on the other side of the capitol probably would like this issue to go away until after the election. the problem is is that the issue will not go away. and even though if we don't want to deal with it politically, we need to deal with it

substantively. and my resolution that is before this chamber will send a message that the constant borrowing on the backs of our children, our grandchildren must come to an end. i quote the words of our own president when he was senator in the u.s. senate. the path that we are on is similar to the words he echoed and stated in his u.s. senate chamber when he said this constant borrowing, this national debt is a complete failure of leadership in the white house. we need to lead. and that is what we are going to do. so i ask for support on this resolution from all of my colleagues to stand with us, make the hard decisions, deal with this issue to stop this insanity that is truly a threat

to our very nation. and also it is a threat to any economic recovery that our nation hopes to enjoy in the short term. . because if we do not get this debt under control, small business america, entrepreneurs, the people that will put america back to work, will not have the confidence or the certainty to invest in the american market that are going to lead to real jobs and to deal with the problem of our unemployment once and for all. so with that, madam speaker, i reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from new york reserves the balance of his time. the gentleman from michigan. mr. levin: i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. levin: you know, there's a very basic fact. i've listened to the rhetoric. if house republicans prevailed

on this bill, what would be the result? chaos. chaos. the house republicans have become the party of chaos. six months ago they took us to the brink of default. no one in this country liked what they saw or maybe a very few. not the american public at large. surely not the markets. surely not the markets. but apparently house republicans did and you're at it again. here we are in the first full day in the house when we're in session this year debating a measure that will take us immediately back to the brink of default. house republicans have once

again, relying on the votes of others to save them from themselves and to save this country from them. this is postering, posturing, not legislating. this is rhetoric, not real action, and we've seen this movie before. 174 house republicans voted for the budget control act that set out to keep the government functioning and address our long-term debt, but many decided to turn tail and on september 14, 228 house republicans voted in favor of the disapproval resolution to end the president's authority to pay our bills. that's what's fiscally

responsible, paying bills. basically they were for it before they were against it. it's a rerun of a bad movie. when the american people clearly want us to move forward, and unfortunately house republicans have turned to washington with the same confrontational tone they left when they nearly allowed the payroll tax and the unemployment insurance to expire. and i want to emphasize that. the same confrontation, instead of a spirit of seeking common ground, essentially confrontation. and i think the american people have said to you, enough is more than enough. house republicans act as if we don't already have a deadline looming. one with vast implications for millions of american families, that's what we should be

talking about. in six weeks the payroll tax cut expires for 160 million americans. federal unemployment insurance begins to end for more than three million people searching for work, and access to health care becomes endangered for 46 million seniors and the disabled. well, last month -- while last month's jobs numbers were encouraging, the private sector gained nearly three million since the recovery began. but with 16 million americans looking for work, we need to do more. we should be doing everything possible, everything possible to ensure that our recovery doesn't falter and you're here supporting something if it prevailed that would deeply

impact our economy and economic growth. so here we are in the third week of january, and now we have a conference committee on these issues charged with the payroll tax cut and unemployment insurance that -- but that hasn't yet happened. not for lack of wanting on our part. we've been eager and wanting to begin. families and businesses that have been planning for the year should not wait until the 11th hour for once again uncertainty. brinksmanship has had for republicans i'm afraid as demonstrated today become the rule. so i urge -- we should reject this cynical, this rigidly ideological attempt to take us back to the brink of default. if you prevailed, it wouldn't

take us back to the brink. it would throw us over. the resolution fortunately is going nowhere. its only impact will simply divide and distract from addressing the real needs of the american people. so i assume, as happened once before, a majority and maybe a vast majority of the house republicans will come down here and essentially contradict what they helped to pass. that contradiction isn't even good poll tickets -- politics and it's terrible policy. i reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from michigan reserves the balance of his time. the gentleman from new york. mr. reed: thank you, madam speaker. what i'd like to say is that

time has passed since we passed the balanced budget control act. there has been no action on the debt. we have seen nothing out of the white house as to a plan to deal with this national crisis. and my colleague on the other side, i'll remind as i am a conferee on that conference committee to deal with the payroll tax rate, to deal with the unemployment insurance, to deal with the doc fix, i was here through december, we were here last thursday, friday working on it. and i'm glad to see now the house democrats are here to do the work. we do need the senate to join in that conversation, and i my hope is that -- and my hope is that they will join in that conversation soon. we are capable men and women in this chamber, madam speaker.

i am confident that we can walk and chew gum at the same time. we will deal with the payroll tax rate. we will deal with the issue of unemployment. we will deal with the issue of the doc fix, but we will not take our eye off of what is becoming one of the fundamental issues of our generation and that is our national debt and that's what this resolution speaks to and will constantly remind all of us that we need to be diligent on this issue to get it taken care of once and for all. and with that i would like to yield to my colleague from colorado, mr. lamborn, for three minutes. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from colorado is recognized for three minutes. mr. lamborn: i thank the gentleman for the time and for his work on this vital issue. i'm opposed to raising the debt ceiling limit. how in the world can we raise the debt ceiling if the senate will not work with us to pass a balanced budget. the senate has not passed one

in three years. no one would walk into a bank and ask for a loan without a plan on how to spend that money and pay it back, so why is it ok for the federal government to operate that way? it's not. the latest increase to the debt ceiling limit allows president obama to borrow an additional $1.2 trillion, which brings our national debt to $16.4 trillion, and he will likely be back at the end of the year asking for another increase. to put that into perspective, after the revolutionary war when we became a country in 1776 and after that, many wondered if the young democracy could withstand what many at the time considered a crushing debt. the nation had borrowed heavily to pay for the revolutionary war. the debt when the war was over was about $34 per american which in today's inflation adjusted dollars would be about $653. today's debt, by contrast, is nearly 68 times that size or

$45,000 per american. it's bad enough to borrow money like there is no tomorrow, but to do so without even a budget in place is simply wrong. today, i have introduced a bill to stop this madness, the budget before borrowing act, h.r. 3778, is a straightforward, no gimmicks approach to spending money. it very simply says the nation cannot raise the debt ceiling limit unless the house and senate have agreed on a budget resolution. this could only be waived with a vote of 2/3 of both members of the houses. to conclude, i am opposed to raising the debt ceiling limit, and i urge my colleagues to support this disapproval resolution. with our current debt load and lack of a budget, the president has no business asking to raise our nation's debt at this time. thank you, madam speaker, and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from colorado yields back. the gentleman from michigan. mr. levin: it's now my privilege to yield one minute

to the gentlewoman from florida, ms. wasserman schultz. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady from florida is recognized for one minute. ms. wasserman schultz: thank you, madam speaker. i rise today in firm opposition to this resolution. a political stunt that prevents the increase in the debt limit that this congress has already approved. this is a dangerous distraction from our efforts to move the country forward, support continued economic growth and promote job creation. and it lies in the face of the budget control act which 174 house republicans voted for last summer. in 2011 my colleagues across the aisle caused multiple self-inflicted economic crises. the republican majority simply has not learned that these kinds of empty partisan measures can cause immediate harm to our economy and hurt working families everywhere. this resolution is nothing but a deeply harmful and dangerous charade, dangerous for americans still struggling to find work, dangerous for our

economy that is depending on our robust and focused recovery and dangerous for our responsibility as a legislature, tasked not with these grand charades of brinkmanships. we have already seen our credit downgraded and seen other countries face the worst of default. i urge my colleagues to reject this resolution and protect the full faith and credit of the united states of america. thank you. i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from new york. mr. reed: madam speaker, i am happy to yield three minutes to the gentleman from texas, mr. paul. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from texas is recognized for three minutes. mr. paul: i thank the gentleman for yielding. i ask unanimous consent to revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. the gentleman is recognized. mr. paul: madam chairman, we're here today to try to prevent the national debt from going up another $1.2 trillion. but in a way it's a formality because most everybody knows the national debt is going up

$1.2 trillion. and this is sad because this process is a really very mixed effort to try to curtail spending. and this power to the president to ask for a debt increase and then we have to get 2/3 of the congress to prevent this from going up, this is a creature of congress. it's also a creature of a mental status here in the congress of overspending on just everything. and it would be nice if we could blame everything on the current administration or even the past administration but this crisis has been building for a very long time and it's very bipartisan. there's been way too much cooperation in this congress because those who like spending cooperate and they keep spending it and for a long time we were able to get away with this because we were a very wealthy country. now we're nonproductive. the good jobs are overseas and yet the spending is escalating exponentially. we're really not facing up to the reality that the problem is spending.

yes, we have to deal with the debt, but the debt is a consequence of too much spending. where do we spend too much money? in two places, overseas and domestically. we need to stop the spending. you know, it's really in my mind started about 40 years ago when there was a guarantee that you don't have to worry about debt because we always had somebody there to buy the debt. if we'd had a market rate of interest where you didn't have the federal reserve buying the debt, interest rates would go up and force us to live within our means. as long as you have a federal reserve there with no linkage of anything of soundness, since 1971, the congress has been reckless and the deficits had continueed to grow and the crisis -- continued to grow and the crisis is an inevitable consequence. i believe we are in denial here in congress. if we had the vaguest idea of how serious this crisis is financially not only for us but for the world would cut spending because you can't solve the problem with debt by

accumulating more debt. it's just impossible to do this. and one other thing i think we fail to do on both sides of the aisle is really cut spending overseas. it is considered that if you spend more money overseas you have more defense, and there's no truth to that. just spending over $1 trillion overseas doesn't necessarily give you more defense. and yet nobody's willing to cut. some of these automatically -- automatic cuts is supposed to be in line, they come out of the supercommittee, everybody's squirming already. how are we going to prevent these cuts? and this pretense we might cut $1 trillion over the next 10 years is total pretense. we are in total denial that is cutting something. there is a proposed increase baseline budgeting of $10 trillion. we are going to cut $10 trillion over 10 years? that's over $1 trillion. our debt is going up $100 billion a month. it's a charade. the american people know it's a

charade. they are tired of this. they've known about this. we need to make up our minds, are we going to live within the confines of the constitution, get out of this mess. . >> another 30 seconds. mr. paul: thank you. the crisis we face as i said is not just domestic because it is a worldwide crisis. and if we don't do something, we will be forced under very dire circumstances because we cannot bail out the world. we are prepared now through our federal reserve to bail out all of europe. we have been downgraded. france is downgraded. greece is downgraded. we believe that all we have to do is spend more money and inflate the currency. believe me, we ought to face up to reality and live within our limits. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from michigan. mr. levin: it's now my privilege to yield three minutes to the very distinguished senior member of our committee, mr. charles rangel of new york. mr. rangel: i ask unanimous consent to revise and extend my

remarks. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from new york is recognized for three minutes. mr. rangel: i was awed in listening to my friend, congressman paul, he usually comes up with some far-fetched ideas that i have no idea what he's talking about, but the truth of the matter is that he is right. america is walking down a very serious economic path that could not only jeopardize what's left to our fiscal system, but good or bad the whole world depends on our system. and i cannot believe that a group of americans, especially members of the congress, would say that the president of the united states is not authorized to pay off the debts that we already had. we certainly can find a lot of agreement as to how we got there .

whether it's president obama or bush's tax cuts, or two wars that the congress never declared. hey, all you need is a mathematician to add it up, but we got it there. we owe them money. who is so less patriotic, who cares so little about our country that you would have in addition to the falsehoods they tell about us, saying and we don't pay our debts, either? it's a question if you want to talk about what we do in the future as relates to spending, but i know the debate has to deal with people who don't pay taxes. i know the debate has to say that people are taking unfair advantage of a tax code with so many loopholes in it that the most conservative republican has to agree it's time for a reform. there's a broad area we can talk about and what we are going to do about wild, reckless spending. but you just don't do it by saying that i am so angry with

the president. i am so politically involved in opposing him, that i will deny him the opportunity to do what every president has always done and that is to be able to tell the world that you can count on us to pay the money that we have borrowed. now, being a politician myself i know there's extreme things that we go through, but love of our country has to be something that we believe in. and i don't know what republicans feel such a strong commitment to the tea party or whatever other people having parties on the other side, that they would say that they would stop america from paying its debts. i don't believe it. you don't believe it. you know this is not going to pass. but my god, i don't think we should be dictated about

connection with what foreigners think about us. but they should be some pride in saying if we make mistakes, they are our mistakes not european mistakes, not foreign mistakes. if we borrow money and we don't like how much we borrow, that's our domestic problem. but for god's sake don't let us fall in such partisan position that we are going to say that the united states of america, the leader of the free world, we know how to borrow. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from new york. mr. reed: thank you, madam speaker. i'm now privileged and happy to yield to the gentleman from florida, mr. rooney, two minutes. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from florida is recognized for two minutes. mr. rooney: thank you, madam speaker. our national debt now stands at more than $15.2 trillion. that amount exceeds the entire u.s. economy. washington's reckless spending

now burdens every child born in the u.s. with a $50,000 share of the national debt. if we don't do something about it now, we'll be the first generation in american history to leave our children worse -- a nation worse than we inherited. and our skyrocketing debt doesn't just affect our children and their future, it damages our economy and our unemployment rate today. it's a drag on the economy that fuels uncertainty. it hurts our credit rating. it slows economic growth, and it prevents job creation. when president obama took office, he pledged to cut the deficit in half by 2012. after three years in office, has he yet to introduce a credible plan to get our deverses under control? no. -- deficits under control? no. instead under his watch the country has hit three of the highest deficits on record, and that's unacceptable. the national debt has grown by more than $4.6 trillion in his

three years in office. we can't solve our debt problems until we address the root cause of this issue and that's overspending here in washington, d.c. in house we pass a budget that would put our country on the path to a balanced budget. the senate didn't pass a budget. they dew point take up our own -- our budget, they did nothing. we passed nearly $1 trillion in spending cuts and we are planning to do more this year. the senate, as i said, has not written a budget in nearly 1,000 days. if your family was trying to get out of the red, you would sit down at the table, figure out how much you are making, how much you're spending, and where you should cut back. the senate refuses to do that. think about that for a second. how on earth are we supposed to get our fiscal house in order if the senate won't even write a budget? and why won't the senate do their job? one word. politics. it's no wonder we have a 12% approval rating.

madam speaker, it's time to cut out the credit cards here in washington and stop spending money we don't have. the longer we wait the harder it will be to fix the mess that we are in. putting our country on a responsible fiscal path is the only way to restart the economy and ensure our children a prosperous future. thank you. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from michigan. mr. levin: it's now my privilege to yield three minutes to another distinguished member of our committee, mr. pascrell, from the state of new jersey. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from new jersey is recognized for three minutes. mr. pascrell: thank you, madam speaker. the gentleman from michigan. listening to the debate you're not hearing the same thing you heard seven months ago, i'm told. but when you look away then you say, gee, didn't i hear this before? maybe that's true on both sides. but you know bruce bartlett, who is a former advisor to president reagan, and a treasury official

in george bush's administration, wrote about the five myths of the debt. the five myths of not paying the debt. or not increasing the debt. and one of them i think bears witness today of what i have heard. the myth that it's worth risking default on the debt to prevent a tax increase given the weak economy. this is a republican saying this. i'm just repeating the words. he says, while republicans' concerns about higher taxes are not unreasonable and they are not, most economists believe that any fiscal contraction at this time would be dangerous. in fact, they note that a large cut in spending in 1937 brought in another sharp recession. it's very easy to say that the president is the -- the purpose,

is the reason why we had the plague and the tremendous deficit, but if the private sector wasn't spending money, then we would have had five million more people out of work. the government has the responsibility when folks can't do for themselves what we expect. that undermines the recovery of the country and that's what happened in the great depression. republicans respond that tax increases are especially harmful to growth. however, they made the same argument in 1982 when president reagan requested the largest peacetime tax increase in american history, and again in 1993 when president bill clinton asked for a large tax increase for deficit reduction. in both cases conservative economists' predictions of economic disaster were completely wrong. and strong economic growth followed. i wasn't here in 1993, many of you were here in 1993.

you remember what the dire consequences of those -- the clinton plan was. and what happened. we had the greatest boom in 50 years. just like the economists who told us we were heading to nirvana since 2001. and i don't want any part of nirvana if that's it. and none of us do. so, we are not talking here about helping the middle class, that's for sure. we got bailouts for them, for the other side. we know what the results are. all of us know that. it's not a partisan issue, really. you're trying to say you want to protect people's taxes, and we want to say we got to pay our debts. but we are really not 180 degrees apart. i think we need to do both. and if we don't sit down together, we are not going to do both. i yield back, madam speaker. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from new jersey yields back. the gentleman from new york. mr. reed: madam speaker, i yield

one minute to the gentleman from illinois, mr. manzullo. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from illinois is recognized for one minute. mr. manzullo: thank you. madam speaker, any vote to raise the debt ceiling should be tied to restraints on spending. this is the voting card. america's most expensive credit card. during my time in congress i voted nine times against raising the debt limit because it was not tied to spending controls. this is another time to say no. last august we were hopeful that we could have gone beyond the $4 trillion mandate in the budget control act, but it did not happen. unfortunately the supercommittee can could not come to a consensus and we have been drifting ever since. we are now projected to add $2.1 trillion to the national debt since august with the president's most recent request. i voted over 700 times against $2.6 trillion in spending over the past five years. that's a good place to start to find the savings that we need to get serious on debt reduction.

we need to vote yes on digs approving to raise the debt limit yet again so we can get to work to cut the spending. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from michigan. mr. levin: i was looking over the vote from the first of august and it's interesting to see -- hear people coming forth who voted aye on august 1 and now essentially want to repudiate that. i now yield three minutes to another very distinguished active member of our committee, james mcdermott, dr. mcdermott, from the state of washington, from the snowy state of washington. mr. mcdermott: i ask unanimous consent to revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from washington is recognized for three minutes. mr. mcdermott: madam speaker, it's been more than a year since

the tea party took over the house. 375 days, and all that time the republicans have not brought one bill to the floor to help the economy. not a single bill. today after a long vacation and on the only day of legislative business in the month of january, the republicans are yet again wasting the american people's time putting out press releases. we aren't voting to help americans get jobs or make education better or investing in roads or bridges. no. instead the republicans have us voting on their top priority. to default on our country's debts. ain't that something? priority? today's vote is exactly why the public is disgusted with the congress. the hypocrisy of this vote boggles your mind. republicans wage unnecessary wars on our credit card? they cut taxes on the very rich.

and blow up the deficit. and now they don't want to pay for the spending binge. . i got the republican study committee's email outlining their agenda for next year. i admit. i subscribed. we have 14 million people unemployed. we have huge competitive challenges with our other countries. there's lots of investing we need to do at home. but what's the republican program as they put it out over the email? nothing. they didn't have one, not one new idea in that agenda. all the republicans want is more war, more deregulation on wall street, and more dirty air and no help of any kind whatsoever for the middle class. madam speaker, the republicans are wasting the americans' time. we need investment, not a republican default. they're spending their time in south carolina now selecting

their next leader to lead into the same congress of no. this is the congress of no we're watching. they don't pay their debts, they don't have any ideas, they don't provide any jobs. it is simply the no congress. i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from washington yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from new york. mr. reed: thank you, madam speaker. i'd just like to remind my colleagues on the other side of the aisle the last time we took a vote on this issue back on the budget control act in august is a much different time than today. since august we've been waiting for a plan from the other side dealing with our national debt. we've been waiting for a plan from the white house to deal with our national debt. nothing has occurred. so, madam speaker, there is no repeediation of our vote from august. this this consistent with what the american people are telling us, that we need to get our act

together in washington and i join my colleagues on the other side. my hand is open to work hand in hand to dole with these problems once and for all. i'm willing to sacrifice my political life to do what needs to be done for the american people. i just hope my friends and colleagues on the other side of the aisle will join in that same sentiment. let's put politics aside. let's deal with the substance of the day. let's deal with this underlying national crisis that is represented in our national debt. you have many friends over here that are looking to reach out, hand to hand, join arm in arm to deal with this problem and deal with the economy of our nation once and for all. i just ask you to jump and join us rather than fight us. and with that i'm happy to yield to my colleague, mr. flake, for two minutes, i believe. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from arizona is recognized for two minutes.

mr. flake: i thank the gentleman for yielding. this vote has been called a charade. that is true, it is. let's face it. the president will veto it. the senate will sustain the veto. having said that, for years and years we raised the debt limit without a discussion. let alone a vote sometimes. it would just happen procedurally. that's wrong. at least this time we've had a discussion back in august. i didn't favor the budget agreement that we had there. i did not vote for it because i think if we're going to raise the debt ceiling then, boy, we ought to have a plan to pay down the debt or actually deal with the deficit. but i think we have to admit that even if the senate had passed the house-passed budget, the so-called ryan budget, we would still have to raise the debt ceiling. i don't think anybody really disputes that. we are going to have to raise the debt ceiling again and again, but at least put together a plan to deal with our deficit and we haven't done that. now, in our candid moments on our side of the aisle, we were headed toward this fiscal cliff

long before the present president took control of the wheel. he stand on the accelerator to get us here faster. the congress only decide to take action when we stand on the edge of the cliff. it could happen when we have a treasury auction and no one wants to buy our debt. it could happen sooner than when we want to realize. it behooves us now to put together a plan to deal with our debt and deficit. that plan does not exist today. i think for that reason we should vote for this resolution and then put a plan to deal with it rather than just letting future generations inherit this debt. with that i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from michigan. mr. levin: i yield myself 15 seconds. mr. flake, the problem is if you prevail you'd create an abyss. you'd create an abyss. i now yield two minutes to a

very distinguished gentleman from georgia, another active member of our committee, mr. lewis. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from georgia is recognized for two minutes. mr. lewis: madam speaker, i want to thank mr. levin for yielding. here we go again, madam speaker . instead of working on legislation to help create jobs , house republicans have gathered us here for political gains. this bill is not constructive. mr. speaker -- madam speaker, it is destructive. it is disruptive to the most important task we face, helping struggling america get back to work, get our economy moving again. we've been down this road before. we fought this so-called battle

last year. the debt limit is america's credit card bill. and just because we don't like the banners doesn't mean we don't have to pay it. it's just that simple. when you get a balance on your credit card you pay it. we all do it. this exercises a waste of time and taxpayers' dollars. i urge all of my colleagues to vote no on this bill. let's come together and work for the good of this nation and not partisan -- the time is always right to do right. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from new york. mr. reed: i'd like to remind my colleague on the other side of the aisle, when you get a credit card bill that you can no longer afford, you do pay it but you cut it up and you stop

the spending so you don't exacerbate the problem. and with that i'd like to yield two minutes to the gentleman from georgia, mr. gingrey. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from georgia is recognized for two minutes. goip madam speaker, i thank -- mr. gingrey: madam speaker, i thank the gentleman for yielding and i rise in support of this resolution of disapproval of increasing the debt ceiling another $1.2 trillion. you heard colleagues on both sides of the aisle, members of the ways and means committee, the distinguished former chairman, mr. rangel, and others speak about why we have to raise the debt ceiling and that it's something that's been done over the years and certainly that's true and the nine years that i've been a member, this being my 10th year, i've seen it happen many times. a lot of times it's passed, as mr. flake said, procedurally and the public doesn't even know it. now, i rarely disagree with my friend from arizona, but i take a little bit of exception with what he said.

he said the president has just stepped on the accelerator a bit. i would say $4.5 trillion in 3 1/2 years is not stepping on the accelerator just a bit, madam speaker. that's putting the pedal to the metal. and this has gotten so totally out of hand that it's got to stop. so this is not on our side a waste of time, as the gentleman from washington said. we are not just pandering to the tea party. listen, we're paying attention to the conservatives in this country that first got my attention in 1964 and the conscience of a conservative and quit all this spending and get our fiscal house in order and we need to do that by cooperating on each side of the aisle. this resolution will fail. we understand that. the american people need to

know there are members of this congress that are going to stand with them, whether you call them tea party or whatever, and try to den grade them. but questioner -- denigrate them. but we are going to stand here with them. we are going to take the time today. it may be the most important thing we do, to say we are not going to overspend and just automatically -- and then we're going to say we are going to cut over the next 10 years but we are going to borrow over the next year $1.2 trillion. my colleague has yielded me a little bit of additional time. i am ready to wrap up. this is what we need to do. this is what the american public needs us to do. it's time for us to get together in a bipartisan way, solve this, solve medicare, solve social security. as former speaker newt gingrich said on the campaign trail just yesterday, it's time to take social security off budget and have it stand alone, not let the cock raise the trust fund

-- not let congress raise the trust fund. we now owe $2.-- if we don't increase the debt ceiling then seniors won't get the social security checks, that's baloney, and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from michigan. mr. levin: it's now my privilege to yield to another distinguished member of our committee, mr. neal, three minutes. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for three minutes. mr. neal: let me call attention to some of the statements that have been offered here. mr. reed, the reason you were invited to this floor to manage the time as a freshman member of congress is very simple -- you weren't here for the reckless ride that the republican party took during the eight years of the bush administration. that's why you're here and the other freshmen have come to the floor, you weren't here for this tirade of spending. when you said you cut up the credit card, so we're going to cut up the credit card for the v.a. hospitals? after 35,000 men and women have

been wounded, serving us honorably in iraq and afghanistan? now, look, i voted against the war in iraq and i voted against the bush tax cuts in 2001 and 2003. fact. not opinion. bill clinton says goodbye and there's a $5.7 trillion surplus. balanced budgets four times in five years. it's only happened five times since the end of world war ii. mr. flake is one of the few republicans that will come to the house with a straight face and say -- let me tell you how we got here. he knows how we got here and mr. gingrey is a friend and he knows how we got here. you can't cut taxes by $2.3 trillion and fight two wars and honor the commitment we have to those men and women who have served us honorably in iraq and afghanistan. and while i was against the tax cuts and while i was against the war in iraq, i'm going to vote for those appropriations

to take care of those veterans' hospitals. you don't cut up the credit cards when they come back. you use good judgment before you send them off. what happened here during those eight years with the prescription drug benefit? what happened during those eight years with weapons of mass destruction? what happened with tax cuts? and by the way, the corresponding argument on those tax cuts -- tax cuts pay for themselves. well, guess what, we're staring at a $15 trillion deficit and debt because of those reckless fiscal practices that took place. for the republican party to make these arguments today about this issue, which, by the way, mr. flake is correct about again, it's but a charade. you meet your obligations, you pay your bill. that's what the credit card is about and not to pontificate in front of this chamber today about reckless spending when for eight years nobody had the

courage on that side to stand up and say, enough is enough. and i thank the gentleman for yielding the time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from new york. mr. reed: madam speaker, i'm pleased to yield two minutes to the gentlewoman from tennessee, mrs. blackburn. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady from tennessee is recognized for two minutes. mrs. blackburn: i thank the gentleman for the time. every time i go back home to tennessee and as i hold town hall meetings, i do hear from my constituents enough is enough, stop the madness, let's get the nation's fiscal house in order. that is what the american people are demanding that we do. and just so we all realize what the debt is -- you're talking $15.2 trillion. nearly $5 trillion or 1/3 of that debt has come onto the books in the past 3 1/2 years. that is the rate of acceleration by which this

administration is pushing this nation to the brink. and that is why our constituents are saying stop it. it's the reason for this vote today. to pass a resolution of disapproval, to send our message to the president that, look, time is long past for you to bring forward a plan to deal with this debt. it is your responsibility to do so for this country, and it is your responsibility to do so for future generations, to make certain that children and our grandchildren, like my two grandchildren, tonight have an increasing -- don't have an increasing share of this. this past year, our family's share of our national debt grew by $30,000. $30,000. it is time for us to realize that we have to stop the out of

control spending, we have to freeze the spending, then we have to begin to cut and remove and eliminate items that are unnecessary to the budget. let's reiterate our commitment to getting back on the right track, getting our fiscal house in order. let's reiterate this commitment to the american people, that we have hit the high water mark in spending and we are going to join together in a bipartisan fashion to make certain that we get the federal government's fiscal house in order. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from michigan. >> i now yield three minutes to another -- mr. levin: i now yield three minutes to the gentleman from the great state of oregon, mr. blumnary. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized.

mr. blumenauer: i appreciate the gentleman's courtesy in letting me speak on this measure. what we are dealing with today is a smoke screen to ensure the self-inflaketted crisis of confidence that's been unfolding with our friends on the other side of the aisle over the course of this last year. everybody knew that we would honor our debts that had already been incurred. but they fogged the issue, created doubt, pushed to the brink, and this charade today is a result of what was required to help them get off the ledge onto which they had climbed that risked damaging the credibility and credit worthiness of the united states. the issue should be how we spend money. we need to change how we do business.

and i think with all due respect, there are things that we could be working on now to make some progress. there is an opportunity to reform our tax system that is complex and unfair. we're just finding out that mr. romney, with hundreds of millions of dollars, pays less in tax than probably the undocumented workers who worked in his yard. there are opportunities to deal with carried interest, with unnecessary tax breaks that are permanent for oil and gas, while important emerging technologies like wind are in a state of limbo. and the public agrees that the most fortunate among us should be paying a little more. it's only fair. they can do it. it makes a difference. we could be working together on

agricultural form to spend less money but target on farmers and ranchers, rather than large agribusiness. we should accelerate the health care reforms that started out bipartisan and relatively noncontroversial that actually would help us no longer spend almost twice as much as other developed countries for results that aren't as good. instead of getting down to brass tacks, my republican friends are playing games like this measure. luckily, the game that they are playing today won't crash the global economy, but it will further erode confidence in congress and it delays the day that we work together on the elements that i just described, where we could get bipartisan

support, change how we do business, redeuce the deficit and give the taxpayer more value for their dollars. thank you and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from new york. >> thank you, madam speaker. i yield two minutes to the gentleman from louisiana, mr. scalise. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for two minutes. mr. scalise: thank you, madam chair, i thank the gentleman from new york for yielding. let's look at president obama's record after three years. he's left a record of debt, despair and downgrades and here we are debating whether or not president obama is able to grab another $1.2 trillion that he adds to the debt of our nation that our children and grandchildren will have to pay. the reason we were downgraded is because president obama himself has still refused to put a plan forward to balance the federal budget. his budget that he pushed forth doubles the national debt in its first five years. then he becomes the first

president in the history of our nation to have our debt rating, the debt rating of the united states, downgraded. you look at the despair. as americans are trying to get jobs. we're get regular ports today that president obama is going to reject the keystone pipeline. turning his pack on 20,000 american families who were looking for those good jobs. here in america. making us more dependent on middle eastern countries who don't like us. the canadians, who are good friends of ours, wanted to send oil to america. that's oil we don't have to be buying from middle eastern countries. instead the president is going torque as we're hearing reports of today is going to turn his back on those 20,000 jobs. he's going to send that oil and those jobs to china. now how propost-rouse is that. as the president is trying to rack up more debt on the nation's credit card, at the same time, he's turning his back and running 20,000 more jobs out of this country. that's the record of this administration.

that's what president obama has given us. you wonder why we've had over 8% up employment for almost every single month he's been president. we can't afford the obama economy. we need to reject this increase in the debt ceiling, stop spending money we don't have and i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from michigan. mr. levin: i yield three minutes to the gentleman from kentucky, mr. yarmuth. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for three minutes. mr. yarmuth: i thank my good friend. madam speaker, i understand that the republican majority will vote today against the president's request to raise the debt limit. to borrow a phrase from a former speaker of the house, can we please drop the pious baloney? less than six months ago, republicans voted for precisely what they are voting against today.

this republican leadership created a national crisis and walked us to the brink of default. then they voted far bill to end the crisis, but slipped in a provision to allow them to attack the president for a decision they don't have the guts to stand by. this is not leadership and it certainly is not governing. it's an ideological game that's ventured well beyond the absurd. mr. flake, i think in a very important moment of candor, talked about the fact that the very budget that the republicans passed this last year would in fact raise the national debt by more than $6 trillion over the next 10 years. you cannot square logically an opposition to raising the debt ceiling when you have voted for a budget that does exactly that. it raises the national debt. with all due respect to the gentleman from new york, when he says nothing has changed in the last seven months, nothing has

changed in the last seven months. we agreed on something, we knew what the debt was going to be, the deficit, we agreed to accommodate it in this way. the only thing that's changed in the last seven months is that the republicans are now trying to renege on the agreement they made seven months ago. that's the only things that's -- thing that's changed. the american people have been loud and clear on what they need from this congress. responsible investments in infrastructure, education, and job creation. they want everyone share in the sacrifice for our economic recovery, including billionaires and big oil companies. madam speaker, it's time to do the work the american people have asked us to do. they don't have time for more pious baloney. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from kentucky yields back. the gentleman from new york. mr. reed: thank you, madam speaker. i remind the gentleman that what we have done on our side of the aisle is at least we've put a

plan in writing by adopting an aprove -- approving the budget. we're scrust looking, in the last seven months, we have been waiting for a plan from the white house of how are we going to get out of this national debt crisis in black and white? not political speeches. but in black and white. so we can take it back to the american people and have an open and honest debate as to where we're going to prioritize our spending and how we're going to get out of this hole. that's what we're looking for. that's what my colleague from arizona, mr. flake, is talking about. we are at the point on this side of the aisle, ladies and gentlemen, to say we don't care who is at fault. i'm at the point, democrat, republican, we're at 15.-- we're at $15.2 trillion, whoever is responsible for it, i could care less. what i care about are my kids, my grandkids who aren't even born, aren't even on the face of this earth, of getting our act together in washington and getting a national plan put together that we can join arm in

arm and stand with each other to deal with this issue. with that, madam speaker, i yield two minutes to the gentleman from kansas, mr. huelskamp. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for two minutes. mr. huelskamp: thank you, madam chairman. i rise today in opposition to raising the debt limit again and again and again. last week i traveled across the first district of kansas to host seven town hall meetings and kansans reit vated -- reiterated the same thing i heard on town halls last year. overspending, overregulation and yes, overtaxing must end now. kansans are not concerned about the next election like most in washington seem to be. they are worried about the next generation. between the first day this president took office and today, debt has grown by $4.6 trillion. in comparison, it took from

george washington to bill clinton to build up that much debt. now the president wants another $1.2 trillion. unfortunately, the real battle to prohibit this $1.2 trillion mortgage on our children's future was lost five months ago when the house passed the budget control act. since the budget control act passed, the congress has failed to produce any cuts from the supercommittee. we failed to pass a balanced budget amendment. senator reid not only refuses to pass but refuses to consider a budget. that doesn't paint the picture of the -- the culture of overspending in washington for the past half century has led us to where we are today. every president has refused to balance the budget. every member of congress who advocated for their special interest, every special interest who came to us, they are all to blame for where we stand today. when this debt limit is reached,

every man, woman, and child in america will have their own debt to pay to washington of $50,000. this doesn't take into account the mountains of debt we face for future entitlement programs. this is not about us. this is about our children and grandchildren who will have to pay this back. unless and until washington can get its grip on reckless spending and borrowing, the future of our country will remain online. i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from kansas yields back the balance of his time. the chair will advise the gentleman from new york he has 34 minutes remaining on his side, the gentleman from michigan has 35 1/2 minutes. the gentleman from michigan is recognized. mr. levin: it is my pleasure to yield five minutes to our distinguished whip, mr. hoyer from the great state of maryland. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for five minutes. mr. hoyer: i thank the gentleman for yielding. madam speaker, according to a new poll by "the washington

post" and abc news, 84% of americans disapprove of the way congress is doing its job. i don't know that the other 16% are paying attention pause we're not doing our job well. and this certainly is not doing our job well. the reason it's not doing our job well is because it is a pretense. a sham. this legislation is to pay bills that we've already incurred. whether as the gentleman said it was incurred with your jotes -- your votes or our votes, we have incurred those expensesful 69 -- those exes. this is about -- those expenses. this is about whether america will pay its bills. the previous gentleman said nobody has done anything about the debt new york point of fact, we did something about the debt. we put revenue at levels commensurate with our spending. and as a result, in 1997, 1998,

1999, 2000, and 2001, in 1997, we brought the debt -- the deficit down to $25 billion and for the next four years western had a surplus. now, a couple of those years were not real surpluses because we counted on social security revenue but two of those years were real surpluses. this is about whether we pay our bills that we had incurred. not doing this would be irresponsible and would lead, i think, to further disrespect by the public and properly so. one of the reasons for this feeling by the public is that americans are tired of political games. this is a political game. this is a game that will say, see, i voted against debt. now, let me tell you how to vote

against debt. when you cut taxes in 2001 and 2003, i agree with my friend, it's not about blame, it is about learning, however. when we cut tacks in 2001 and 2003, 2001 under george bush, we didn't pay for them. we pretended they would pay for themselves. they didn't. alan greenspan says they won't. we ought to learn from that. learning from that, we ought to say, yes, we'll pay our debts, the president doesn't want this money. it's not for the president. it's for bills that we incurred in fighting two wars, in giving tax cuts, primarily to the wealthiest in america, to passing a scription drug program that frankly all of us now support, but we didn't pay for it. as a result, we got deeply into debt. we have to show courage, wisdom and hopefully intellectual

honesty in getting to that. the american public are tired of seeing republicans spending time because of electoral positioning and they would be tired of us doing the same thing. that's what all-what this is. this is not our debt. we voted against it. but that's not responsible. it's not honest. and i think most of you know that. the resolution before us today is simply another waste of time. more than that, it undermines competence here and around the world. some of that debt, of course, we owe to people around the world. it is the essence of political gamesmanship and does nothing to reduce the debt or create jobs, and we spent the whole day on it. this is the only full day we will spend in january debating any issue. americans know that we ought to pay our bills. they know we reached a deal in

august that said both parties would work together to reduce our deficits in order to provide certainty to our businesses, certainty -- families around the dinner table. this would only provide more uncertainty at a time when our people need to see us working together on a big balanced deal to meet our fiscal challenges. my friend and i are both for that effort. i am very much for that effort. but i don't pretend that not paying the bills that we incurred are going to solve that problem. the only thing that's going to solve that problem is we are going to ask everybody to contribute their fair share. yes, we are going to have to make some cuts and make some cuts that neither side will like and raise revenues that neither side will like. but i will tell my friend, who is waiting for his grandchildren, i have three grandchildren now and i have two great grandchildren, and he's right. they're the ones who are going

to have to pay this bill. and i saw my young friend and new member from south carolina -- i can't call his name right this second -- can i have two minutes. mr. levin: i yield three minutes. mr. hoyer: i saw my young friend passionate about not passing this to his children. i could have given that speech. i voted against the a.m.t. without paying for it. we paid for it when we set the a.m.t. i think it needs to be fixed and we'd pay for it. i would vote no on this resolution, and i strongly encourage my colleagues to do the same. why? america is disheartened because they do not believe we are honest in dealing with them. they believe we play political games. they believe that we are not addressing the issues they know are of importance and know do not have easy, simplistic

answers. i hope that democrats who vote no will vote no joined by a large number of republicans, not because you like debt, not because any of us like that. and very frankly i voted for the clinton revenue increases in 1993. the prediction on your side of the aisle was it would destroy the economy, unemployment would spike and the deficit would explode. none of that happened. you were wrong. all of us are wrong from time to time. dead wrong. as a matter of fact, we enjoyed the best economy i have seen in my adult life in the 1990's. and we have seen the worst recession in my life after pursuing the bush policies for eight years. yes, we were in charge for the last two but we couldn't change policies because the president had the veto and the majority votes to sustain that veto on this floor. so, ladies and gentlemen, let's

be honest with the american people. we've all incurred a debt. we all spent the money. we drove on the roads. we were defended abroad. we invested in health care. research. we all incurred these debts. we know we need to solve it. we know that will be tough but honesty will make it easier. honesty between ourselves, honesty with the american people and honesty, integrity and courage. i say around this country talk about, you know, greece has a real problem. they are 128%. i think we are at 100%. the problem with greece is they don't have the resources to solve their problem. america, the good news for us is we have the resources to solve our problems. if we have the courage and political will to do so.

this vote is a small token of showing that we have the courage, the wisdom and the political will to do so. we need to pay our bills. vote no on this resolution. show the american people that we have courage, that we have wisdom and we can have the political will to make america the continuing strongest country on the face of the earth, and i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from new york. mr. reed: thank you, madam speaker. i would like to say to mr. hoyer that i have a tremendous amount of respect for him as a member of this body, and i have joined him to support the go big effort. and what i would say is by this resolution, look at what we have done on our side of the aisle. we have brought this conversation out of the back rooms.

we have brought the ideas and proposals that we heard from mr. blumenauer from oregon, i believe, who talked about comprehensive tax reform, agricultural reform on the floor of this house in front of the american people in an open and honest manner. and what we have done on our side of the aisle is to stress that these conversations will no longer happen besed doors, but they will happen on the floor of this chamber. and i'm confident, i am confident that when we come together, like we are, like the foundation that we are setting in our conversations that we are going to solve this problem. but until that solution is enacted, i will get up every day as a member of this house to champion the cause of getting the fiscal house of washington, d.c., in order, to get our reckless spending under control and get this economy going. and with that -- mr. hoyer: will my friend yield? mr. reed: i'd yield.

mr. hoyer: i want to thank him for his participation in addressing this issue and frankly in my opinion he was one of the 100 signatories saying, let's say get a big deal. we have to get a handle on this debt. i want to thank him. but i want to assure him as well -- i have been here just a little longer than he has -- this debate has been going on for some period of time. this is no new debate. with all due respect, it's been on this floor, i've been raising this issue for some 20 years, very frankly. others have as well on both sides of the aisle. the debate has been going on, but as i said, we need to summon the courage and political will to not just debate it but to address it and

>> live coverage of the u.s. house is always on c-span. c-span's road to the white house coverage continues tonight with a look at the south carolina republican presidential primary. we'll give you the latest primary results, take your phone calls, tweets, and emails and cover the candidates' speeches. the primary schedule continues with florida, and in early february, caucuses in nevada and week-long caucuses in maine. you can follow the road to the white house at our website, c-span.org/campaign2012. >> sunday on "news spickers" -- assistant minority leader, representative james clyburn, talks about the republican primaries and what they mean for democrats. also, a look at the future of payroll tax cuts and budget this year in congress. that's at 10:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. eastern on c-span, c-span radio, and c-span.org.

>> mr. speaker, the president of the united states. >> tuesday night, president obama delivers his state of the union address. live coverage begins at 8:00 p.m. eastern, including the president's speech, republican response by indiana governor mitch daniels, and your phone calls, live on c-span and c-span radio, on c-span2 watch the president's speech along with tweets from members of congress. and after the address, more reaction from house members and senators. throughout the night, go online for live video and to add your comments using facebook and twitter at c-span.org. >> on wednesday, house speaker john boehner and other republican leaders held a press conference reacting to president obama's decision to reject the keystone pipeline project. the speaker said president obama is selling out american jobs for politics. this is about 20 minutes.

>> the president was depiven the authority to block this project only and only if he believes it's not in the national interest of the united states. is it not in the national interest or create tens of thousands of jobs here in america with private investment? is it not in the national interest to get energy resources from an outline like canada and supposed to some countries in the middle east? the president has said he'll do anything that he can to create jobs. today, that promise was broken. the president expedited the approval of the so will i

understand radio loan project, but won't approve a project that's been under review for over three years. yesterday the president's own jobs council said the energy pipeline project like this one can create hundreds of thousands of american jobs. the unions support it. the states along the proposed route support it. and it has bipartisan support here in the congress of the united states. the yet the president decided to reject it anyway. the president will stand up to his political base, even in the name of creating american jobs. and now canada is going to have to look to other nations like china to sell its oil reserves. the president's policies are making the american economy worse rather than better. and this latest decision is just the latest example. i'll just say this -- this is not the end of the fight.

republicans in congress will continue to push this because it's good for our country and is good for our economy and good for the american people, especially those who are looking for work. >> thank you, mr. speaker. tim griffin, arkansas. today president obama has decided to create jobs in china instead of the united states. why do i say that? i went to the canadian embassy weeks ago, met with officials there. they said they want to do business in the united states. but if they can't do business here, they have to take those oil sands somewhere to have them refined. they said they would do that in china. now, this decision impacts not only the country, but specifically my district, the second congressional district in arkansas. we have a company wealth fund. it makes the pipe for the keystone pipeline.

and they laid off some workers right after the president said that this decision would be after the next election. the folks at wealth fund were hoping for the opposite decision today, approving the pipeline. i spoke with them a little bit ago. they said that their concerns are, number one, that now they have all this pipe, hundreds of miles of pipe sitting around that's going to flood the market, reduce the cost of pipe , and they may have to lay off more workers because of that. and also, this is an indian company that came to the united states and invested in little rock, and now they fear that this is going to deter companies around the world from making investments because of

decisions like this. so i'm going to work with the speaker and do everything i can to get this reversed. >> good afternoon. a few weeks ago -- in fact, january 7, in the president's weekly address -- he vowed to "do whatever it takes to get the economy moving and create jobs." and so, today, what we see is the president has showed through his actions that those actions do not match that rhetoric. and by deciding to block the development of the keystone pipeline, he has essentially decided to block the creation of 20,000 new jobs. as has been said by our speaker before, this was a bipartisan pipeline project. bipartisan support in the house that will put people back to work right away and will boost our domestic energy security. examples have been shown.

now that energy supply will go elsewhere. the jobs connected with this project will go elsewhere. either we're going to get serious about the number one issue, which is the creation of jobs or not, and clearly the president has decided that he is not serious if this is the decision that he's going to make on this particular project. there's no question that our belief is the president's policies have consistently failed to create jobs. this decision is another wrong move for america, and it's small businesses we need so desperately to start creating jobs again. three years ago this month, barack obama was inaugurated as our president. we were told that if we passed his stimulus plan, his healthcare plan, dodd-frank, it would help our economy.

instead we have the worst serial unemployment since the great depression, millions more have lost their jobs in the three years since he's become president. his policies have failed. it's a new year. it was an opportunity to try new policies, and after studying keystone for three years, 20,000 shovel-ready projects just got buried. canada has energy and jobs that could be destined for the united states of america, and this administration has just decided that instead perhaps they should be destined for china. it's a sad day for struggling american families who want jobs. >> as we know, it's been morn three years since this administration has been studying the keystone pipeline. i will remind you that in october of 2010, secretary clinton was -- indicated that she was inclined to support

this project. in august, this last august, 2011, the state department completed their analysis, and they agreed that the proposed route was, in fact, the preferred route. the payroll tax legislation that we passed in the senate as well, we had a provision that the president should decide based on whether the keystone pipeline should move forward. president obama took office, the national gas price was $1.83. in my district this last weekend, it was $3.69, more than twice as high. this is a pipeline that will bring as much as a million barrels a day. so, where do we go from here? we have asked already secretary clinton to come testify before our committee next week. the president won't say yes. we want to let the american people know that we will.

no option is going to be off the table. we can't wait, and as a sponsor of legislation relating to keystone, a member of the energy and commerce committee. >> thank you, mr. chairman. as a supporter of the pipeline and author of two of the bills in support of the pipeline, i'm deeply, deeply disappointed that our president decided to put his politics above the nation in job creation and energy independence. the two things that keystone pipeline brings to the united states. this isn't over. the president's statement did not mention in any specifics why denying the permit is in the national interests of this country. as the governor of nebraska said yesterday in a published article, the keystone x.l. pipeline, at a time with 8.5%

unemployment is in the national interest, it's a no-brainer. i agree with the governor. now, they say they need more time, but as fred mentioned, this is the same state department that was telling us all summer that they had all of the information to make their decisions, two press releases by the state department, that secretary clinton made public statements that all was in order, and, in fact, they had in essence already chosen the route by telling transcanada where the pipeline should go and said they don't see any reasons to deny this. now, seven months later, they've changed their mind. to me, it's pretty obvious it's all about election year

politics. also, july 25, the white house, through o.m.b., issued a statement that says they have all the information that they are working diligently, the state department, and that they will have a decision by december 31, 201, is but yet here in the middle of january, they're now saying something completely different. at this time, who's next? >> what this decision says to me is a repeating pattern from the president of delay, obstruct, delay, obstruct, lost opportunities, lost jobs, lost ability to have more energy security, but to also move us

in the direction that we need to go. the administration is now delayed and turned down the keystone pipeline permit. they are repeatedly holding up our permits to mine couple in southern west virginia and across the appalachian region. and they've also delayed and obstructed the ability to get permits on the outer continental shelf. you know, three's a pattern. this is a pattern that we've seen from this administration, that they will -- they are willing to sacrifice -- they talk a lot about infrastructure jobs and how great infrastructure jobs are. what are more prolific infrastructure jobs than building a major pipeline through the center of our country? for the life of me, i can't understand it. and so, as the speaker said, we join with him. this is not the end of the fight. we're going to continue to fight this, because this means that much to the american people.

thank you. and next, marshall blackburn from tennessee. >> thank you. even though i represent tennessee, i grew up in south mississippi with a dad that worked in the oil industry. and i remember as a child, from time to time i would have classmates at school or friends from church whose dad went away to work on the pipeline. and there was always a sense of pride that was tied to those jobs. yeah, the pay was good. the work was hard. but the work was consistent. but it was doing something that was mighty important for our country, and that was making certain that we had energy. and i kind of liked that. i kind of liked that feeling that we were all in on this team together. working to make this country great. now, as was said, how in the world is has the president arrived at this decision?

and i think many americans that are looking for work are out there thinking, how could he look at the facts, as mr. terry said, they told us this summer they had all the information they needed, all the information points to the fact that we need this project, we need these jobs, we need this energy, our country needs the energy independence. so, it leads us to believe that the president chose to make an anti-jobs, political decision that does not support what the american people are wanting to see done. to grow jobs in this country. >> the president said he forced his hands, said this is the end of the game, but what is the end of the game? >> all options are on the table

, but understand something. while the president may say we forced his hand, the facts are indisputable that the state department has had this under review for three years. all the reviews have been finished. and under the agreement that was in the legislation, the president had to make a decision and it had to be what was in the national interest of our country. and for the president to say that the keystone pipeline does not in the interest of our country, i think most americans are scratching their heads wondering why. >> do you think this should affect the negotiations to extend the payroll tax? >> all options are on the table. >> what coulding the options be? i know you say all options are on the table, but the american people are watching this. >> this fight is not going to go away. you can count on it.

>> but what are the options? the american people get a statement from the white house that say they're rejecting this permit. what can congress do that congress couldn't do before until they had to wait to hear from the president? >> there are legislative vehicles that will be moving in the next -- in the weeks and months ahead, and republicans on capitol hill will continue to do everything we can to make this decision a positive decision for our country. the nern people are still asking the question -- where are the jobs? here the president's got an opportunity to create 20,000 direct jobs and over 100,000 indirect jobs, and he says no. we're not going to give up. >> is it worth it considering now there's an extension of the payroll on the east and we're

17 1/2 days in and he's already said no. >> this pipeline is important to our country. it's important to what the president says. and that's creating jobs. he said he'd do everything he could to create jobs in america, but yet he didn't. >> you've been talking about energy. there's another very important national security issue. the president has written a letter to the supreme leader of iran calling for direct talks. do you agree with that, or do you think that that makes the united states look weak, sitting down with the leader? >> i think it's very difficult to have talks with a country around the world who's vowed to do everything but wipe us off the face of the earth. this is not the kind of environment that i believe can lead to a constructive decision. and in fact, i do think it makes america look weak. thanks. >> thank you, sir. >> we continue our coverage on

the reaction to the obama administration's keystone oil pipeline decision. here's a look at some speeches from the house floor. r what pur gentleman from pennsylvania seek recognition? >> to address the house for one minute and revise and extend. >> before congress left washington in december, we asked the president a simple question, will he stop blocking the keystone x.l. peline. coress established laws to govern pipeline approval, the state department published regulations and typically aplufle -- approval takes 18 to 20 months. mr. pitts: however, keystone has been on the shelf for 40 months now heordered duplicative environmental reviews to extend the approval process to 52 months. is this because keystone is unprecedented? no. transcanada has already built

pipelines that extend from canada through the united states. it's time to stop letting  seek recognition? >> to address the house for one minute and revise and extend my remarks. . >> a few minutes ago the white house announced it was going to rejeck the keystone x.l. pipeline. the white house did this among a backdrop with record high gas prices in january. a major factor in these high gas prices is the continued political upaval in the middle east and impact it's having on economic uncertainty around the world. keystone would bring nearly a million barrels of oil from our friendly neighbor, canada, to the north and also up to 100,000 barrels of oil from the discoveries in montana and north dakota. mr. flores: it would also put more americans to work while improving our energy security. the department of energy ha stated the gasoline markets --

prices and all markets served by the gulf coast and east coast refiners would decrease as a result of the pipeline's construction. the white house would be well advised to consider a poll i took in a recrept teletown hall of our constituents where 87% of the constituents said that they strongly supported the keystone x.l. pipeline. we cannot wait for more jobs and for better economic uncertainty for all generations. thank you. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. for what purpose does the gentleman from pennsylvania seek recognition? >> i ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman from pennsylvania is recognized for one minute. mr. altmire: mr. speaker, i rise today in support of the construction of the keystone x.l. pipeline. i ask that the president reconsider his reported rejection of this project. this project willncrease employment while reducing our dependence on overseas oil. canada has already made its decision. the pipeline is going to be built. the question is whether it lands on the gulf coast of the united

states or the west coast of canada. and make no mistake, if it ends up on canada's coast, that oil will only continue westward to china and their markets. the jobs an the economic benefit of the pipeline would then be lost here in the united states. mr. speaker, this pipeline is a foregone conclusion. who will benefit is not. this is a chance to employ americans and help protect them in a volatile oil market. i ask the president to reconsider his reported rejectioof this project. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yield back. for what purpose does the gentleman from texas seek recognition? mr. poe: request permission to address the house for one minute. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman from texas is recognized for one minute. mr. poe: mr. speaker, there is disturbing news today regarding our national security and economic security. politico reports that the administration will say no to the keystone x.l. pipeline today. so no to thousands of union and nonunion jobs to build the pipeline and no to refinery jobs in southeast texas.

no to obtaining oil from a reliable nation and ally like canada, but yes to more oil from dictators like chavez from venezuela. yes to being hd hostage to middle eastern oil and dictators like ahmadinejad who now threatens to stop oil tankers from going through the straits of who are muth -- hormuth. and yes to insulting can in a dasm the prime minister of canada says he will build the pipeline and go to his west coast and that crude oil will be loaded on chinese tankers. china, our national enemy regarding -- and competitor regarding economy. isn't th a lovely decision? if the administration chooses to say no to keystone x.l., the ministration chooses poorly. that's jo arizona seek recognition? without objection, the gentleman from arizona is recognized for one minute. >> thank you, mr. speaker. mr. speaker, it's not too often that a president of the united states has the opportunity with one swipe of his pen to increase private sector jobs by thousands of employees while at the same

time increasing our energy independence and energy security. mr. quayle: that's what will happen with the keystone x.l. pipeline. unfortunately the president punted it on that decision and past 2013 even though the state department said there would not be a significant impact op the environment. we gave him another chance. unfortunately there are reports that he will reject the permit for the keystone x.l. pipeline. and the thing is what's confusing, mr. speaker, is he's been saying that we can't wait for job creation. but with this decision he's saying that we can wait for thousands and thousands of private sector jobs here in the united states. and that we can wait for energy security. mr. speaker, this is the wrong decision at the wrong time. we need better decisions from t gentleman from colorado seek recognition? without objection, the gentleman from colorado is recognized for one minute. >> mr. speaker, according to the canadian government over 143,000

jobs in colorado defe on our trade relationship with canada. further, crude petroleum is our top import, and colorado is not unique, many of the jobs and energy around the country come as a rlt result of -- as a result of our relationship with canada. it been three years since e application was filed which would create a pipeline that extends from the oil sands in alberta to the gulf coast bringing significant oil supplies intthe united states. mr. gardner: the united ates as a whole both economically and from a nation security standpoint will benefit immensely from the approval of this pipeline. in my mind it's a very simple question. why import oil from countries that seek to do us harm? when we can get it from our neighbor to the nort i'm continuously awed at how much energy potential we have in north america and how simple it would be to advance policies that would make us more energy independent. snt that what we are trying to accomplish -- isn't that what we are trying to accomplish? apparently there is an as terrific when it comes to jobs

for this administration. not these jobs, perhaps some others. this administration has done everything it can to stand in the y of a project that will help 100,000 americans get back to work. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. mr. gardner: mr. president, don'tminute. mr. olson: mr. speaker, while the president campaigns on his we can't wait slogan, american workers are still asking, where are the jobs? the president knows that 20,000 american jobs can be created by approving construction of the keystone x.l. pipeline. why is he rejecting 20,000 american jobs? why is he not reducing our dependence upon middle eastern sources of oil? why is he not increasing our security which increases our national security. why isn't he taking our debt crisis seriously by increasing

revenue from taxpayers with american jobs? why is he not listening to the american people? mr. speaker, the american people deserve better from their president. he should focus on the 20,000 new jobs he could helpt . >> thank you, mr. speaker, i appreciate following my colleague from colorado who recognizes the importance of jobs. unfortunately, the president of the united states has turned a blind eye to the american people. in my state of colorado, we have 17 counties. according to the colorado department -- we have 17 county, according to the colorado department of labor, that have unemployment in excess of 20%. we havan opportunity to create jobs in this country. the keystone pipeline will help provide energy certainty for this country in a responsible way. create american jobs on american soil, to be able to put amican

people back to work. today, we hear the president is throwing his hands up, turning his back on the ameran people. people deserve better. we must get this economy moving. we must create those opportunities for jobs for the american people. this is our time, this is our opportunity, and we call upon the president to enjoy -- to join us in >> voters are at the polls in south carolina today for the state's republican presidential pry practitioner. this is woodland park community center in columbia, south carolina, one of the state's polling places. voters here will see nine names on their ballots, even though some of the candidates have withdrawn from the primary. the south carolina election commission says none of the nine certified candidates had officially withdrawn in time to remove those names from the ballots. we'll be keeping tabs on polling places in and around

columbia all day today leading up to our live coverage tonight of the primary results. after south carolina, it's on to florida for that state's primary 10 days later. and in february, the caucuses in nevada and maine. you can follow c-span's coverage online at c-span.org/campaign2012, and join the conversation via facebook and twitter. tomorrow on "washington journal," we'll discuss the results of the south carolina primary with linda feldman of the christian science monitor and charles bierbauer. and ralph reed joined us to talk about some of the key issues evangelical voters want addressed in the 2012 raceful and then a look at the impact of the cruise ship accident with bud darr of cruise lines international association. and that's all live starting at 7:00 a.m. eastern here on c-span. >> for more resources in the presidential race, use c-span's campaign 2012 website to watch

videos of the candidates on the campaign trail, see what the candidates have said on issues important to you, and read the latest from candidates, political reporters, and people like you from social media sites at c-span.org/campaign2012. >> now a look at the debate over the stop online piracy act and the protect i.p. act. leaders from net coalition and the consumer electronics association gathered thursday to talk about the potential impact of the two bills if they were approved by congress and signed into law. both bills are aimed at sites that commit or facilitate online piracy. >> good morning, everyone.

i serve as the executive director of net coalition.com. net coalition is made up of a number of big internet brands that have been engaged in the pippa and sopa debates. we've been engaged in every piece of legislation that has to do with the intersection of intellectual property since the beginning of the commercial and internet, including the copyright act. i'll ask the panelists to introduce themselves and go down the line and have them spend a couple of minutes talking about their different perspectives on this issue, if that's ok. we have casey ray hunter. casey, want to raise your hand? what will be talking about the impact of these bills on artists in the creative community. michael from the consumer electronics association will

talk about how this impacts the innovation economy. christian dawson, who will provide a perspective from small businesses and web hosters. and mike masnick, who is going to provide us a view from the valley on all of this. i think we've had a pretty amazing couple of weeks on this. i think four months ago, i would say that the hollywood community thought that this piece of legislation, both pipa and sopa, were cooked, fully baked and were going to be rammed through the legislative process. we had tried to engage policy makers for about two years to give them a very serious concerns that we thought that what was being proposed was quite revolutionary and remarkable and would really fundamentally change the way the internetworks and how users interact with the internet. the basic reason for that is since the beginning of the commercial internet, congress has very intentionally passed laws that have allowed for this innovation without permission atmosphere, where a venture capitalist or two people in a garage can design a compelling

technology and get it to market with very few barriers to entry, and they don't have to team up a set of lawyers to make sure that they're going to be -- not going to be sued out of existence. and the reason they don't have to do that is that our laws in the united states basically say that internet platforms, internet companies that are serving as conduits for the communications of third parties aren't responsible or liable for the content of those communications. they're not treated like publishers. they're not liable for defamation. they're not liable for copyright infringement or a host of issues. they simply serve as conduits and platforms. that policy decision that was made in the mid 1990's is the reason that the u.s. and technology industries lead the world. most of the rest of the world regulates speech. they don't have first amendment. they have government censorship of certain kinds of speech. the fact that the united states

doesn't do those things is why the u.s. internet industry has dominated the world in exporting those kind of technologies and why the internet has become ubiquitous and fundamental in our lives, because of the very fact that we can use it in every aspect of our lives. these bills change those federal policies by requiring for the first time internet companies to be responsible for the content of third parties that are using their systems. it imposes a lie ability on those companies and subjects those companies to potential technology mandates from judges who would be given the authority to redesign internet technologies, to require them to develop some sort of system to filter and block content that is being directed to a site that has been determined to be illegal. parts of the bill, especially in the house, also allow for allegation that internet sites

can be removed from the internet without any notice to the internet site that's being accused and without any ability to defend itself and confront its accuser. the other portion of the bill that is very problematic for us is that it imposes for the first time in the u.s. code a private right of action whereby one industry gets to sue another industry who's not doing anything unlawful and no one's alleges our companies are doing it. they're simply service providers, but it would authorize a private right of action to allow the industry to sue our industry torque get them to take action, to help the industry that's suing us. there's no other place in the federal code that allows one industry to sue an innocent set of companies to get them to take action on their behalf. finally, we have very serious concerns with the expressed technology mandates in the bill. you've all heard about the d.n.s. blocking provision, and we can get into that if people have questions about that. but the bills continue to have

a search engine remedy that would require search engines based on a government action to "disappear" a website from the internet. aside from the very serious impact of having a government in the -- our government impose censorship type of requirements on search engines the way china does, these remedies won't work. you cannot literally disappear an internet site from the internet unless you go to the server and take down the site. so that just encourages people to use foreign-based search engines that aren't subject to these orders, or, if you delete the primary link to a site, a secondary link simply moves up to the top spot. so, from a technology standpoint, these solutions don't work. in any kind of legislative proposal to regulate an

industry, you have to balance the effectiveness of the remedy , and against the scope of the problem, and what's really curious here is when congress began this debate, they jumped over an analysis of what the scope of the problem is. we have not been able to get any answer from the motion picture association or their allies about how many websites we're talking about. the m.p.a.'s website says there's 19 sites that they're concerned about. i've heard some people say there's tens or hundreds of sites we're talking about. the m.p. also says that nine out of 10 pirated movies happen because they're being stolen from a camcorder in a movie theater. if nine of the 10 movies on being stolen out of a movie theater, why aren't we talking about how to bulk up the security in movie theaters? i think they may have a legitimate response to that, but we've never had a debate about what the scope of the

problem is, where the problem is occurring, and how we can work with them as partners to address illegal activity on the internet. so i hope we've had the chance based on what's happened this week to reset the debate. harry reid still has a vote on this as a first order of business when the senate returns. we think that's very unfortunate. we have a clear sense from our meetings here in the senate that offices do not understand these bills. they're very complex. the majority of leaders ask them to take a controversial vote at the first thing that they do when they come back. we hope that changes. so i'm going to now move on. shall we just go down the line? i give a brief introduction, but if you want to just introduce yourself, give a bit of your background, and then we'll spend a couple of minutes for each person and then open you are for questions. feel free to come up here. >> oh, doesn't matter. >> i'll go up, all right. >> not as tall as you there.

>> i'm from the internet i guess is my role here. and also silicon valley. but i think actually a sad point that refment -- representing the view of the users is important, it's user focused and it's very much about actually providing services to users that they like. and i think that there's been a lot of talk in this debate how this is a debate about hollywood versus silicon valley, and i think that's unfair in a lot of ways. as we saw yesterday, many millions of people, most of whom have no connection to the technology industry, spoke up and complained about this bill. and i think that that point is very important to recognize. that is because what the internet is is much bigger than

just a bunch of companies in silicon valley. however, one of the things that i think has been very interesting about this situation is the fact that the startup community and silicon valley has a sort of wider ecosystem has actually gotten involved in this debate and this discussion. silicon valley is sort of notoriously nonpolitical on any issue. for the most part, it's because we are heads down working, hopefully innovating, hopefully doing stuff, and generally hoping that government stays out of the way. but i think that there is a recognition, a very wide spread recognition that on this particular issue, it was something that the startup community and wider ecosystem could stay on. and so very, very quickly and very organically, a very large portion of silicon valley was

able to come together, speak out, and make their users aware of the issue, which i think was an important part of this, because, again, it's not just a sort of silicon valley company issue, but very much an issue that we think would impact our users in terms of how we grow and how we build new innovations. so at that point, i'm going to make three other quick points and then move on to christian. we all recognize, again, that piracy and infringement is certainly an issue. it's an issue that impacts all of us, many of the companies in silicon valley obviously are producer intellectual property in all different ways, whether it is content itself, software, physical products that have trademarks. so all of these things definitely impact us as well. but what i think is very important to recognize and to

understand is that as -- to understand what kind of problem it is, and as markham was saying, this is something that we sort of jumped into or that congress jumped into perhaps rule taking the time to understand what kind of problem and what kind of solutions are necessary. what we have seen, if you look throughout history, is that law enforcement and regulation tends not to work. infringement is generally a service issue. it comes about when companies are not providing the kind of service that users really want. the things that do work against infringement tend to be new innovations, new services that provide exactly what people want. we see this every day now with services like netflix that provide a better service and better features. what we fear from the sort of silicon valley standpoint is that laws like this actually work against that kind of solution, because we need that kind of innovation, because we need new services in order to

really take on this issue. any regulation that creates overbearing regulatory issues and the idea that the two founders in a garage will suddenly need six or a dozen lawyers sitting with them becomes a really serious issue that actually holds back and prevents the ability to create these new innovations and services we need. the second point, in talking about different, the size of the problem and the different sort of estimates that have been put out there, part of the issue is that this bill is so broad, or both of these bills are so broad and, in some cases, very ill-define that had it tries to tackle a few different problems and lump them together. in particular, we're concerned about the fact that it lumps together both trademark issues and copyright issues, despite them being very, very different. the challenge to tackle each of those problems we think

involves very different solutions. so the idea that you try to mix them together becomes pretty dangerous. and then the third very big concern is certainly how this impacts overall innovation and jobs in particular. as i mentioned, just the idea of having to think about the legal issues and how much -- how much extra cost that would be means that a lot of new startups probably never get started. .

countries are already reaching out to entrepreneurs to say that they have better regulatory environments for things like that. so those are sort of the big concerns and i think that because the connection between this technology startup community and their users and the fact that this became such a serious issue culminated in yesterday's very widespread actions on line. >> my name is crition dawson i'm the cheap operating officer of a company. and i want to talk about the perspective of the web hosting. the authors afthese bills say

that our fears are unfounded and that reading the text should make that clear. but we've read the text many times. and after rereading the latest version of these bills and considering the still secret manager's amendment, our problems with these bills are still to be found. let me take a few moments to discuss our specific kshes. first, it's hard to start and run a small business in this economy. my company is a 17-year-old business that uses its internet know how to make it as easy as possible for people to launch and manage their own business on line. we've been there at the startup and helped companies grow. but at the end of the day the reason these companies grew to collectively employ thousands of americans is not because of my company's hosting services. it's because the internet itself is a dynamic constantly evolving environment that allows businesses to provide

access to goods and levels of services that consumers never thought possible. the internet has allowed a doctors 2 trillion online economy to grow and thrive and enable our industry to create thousands of high-paying jobs. and it's no exaggeration to say that it's the internet itself that's in danger because of these bills. how? law suftse. lots and lots of lawsuits. baseless lawsuits, predatory lawsuits. anti-competitive lawsuits. lawsuits that will stop speech and commerce dead in their tracks. the authors say that's not the intention of the bills. that they merely want to get at foreign rogue websites. they need to put in private right to action because sometimes the courts aren't fast enough. they need anti-circumstance vention to and they say that they need to make their definitions loose and open to give law enforcement the right tools to catch pirates because those guys are slippery. the problem is that once their words become law, these words

are set free from the world of good intentions and cast into the world of enforcement. and that's where they stop working. companies like mine are responsible for enforcement today. we know how this stuff works. these bills will open up a new world of copyright lawsuit profit tiering just like we've seen in the patent industry. businesses will allege copyright infringement just to intimidate. law firms will spring up just as they've done in the patent industry. our broken system has cost innovators $500 billion. do we really want to be responsible for smothering innovation? supporters of these bills have repeatedly asked us to point to provisions that make this happen. i will. under this, hosts may be considered operators of web sites. section 4 a 1 allows injured parties to bring suits against operators of web sites. let me be clear.

the entities to support pippa have used these same terns to bring suits against web hosts. they will again. we have read the bill, we know what's in it and it will expose us and our customers to untold litigation. i represent domestic web host companies. we are allies in a fight against piracy. we fight this every day. we enforce the copyright act. give us real tools and we'll use them. if we thought these bills would do the job. we wouldn't be standing here. but they're not even close. we know these bills won't work because we've read them. and maybe because we understand the internet at a nuts and bolts level, we understand the damage these bills will do. we strongly urgently appeal congress to congress to simply start over. and when they are ready we hope they'll call on companies like mine and others, companies who understand how the internet works to help. we are your allies in the fight against piracy and we'll be happy to help craft a bill that

effectively fights piracy while keeping the internet safe for american businesses. thanks. >> that's a lot of exercise i just got walking to the podium. i'm the deputy director for future of music coalition. we are an education research and advocacy organization for musicians. more importantly, we're musicians, we're label owners, we're entrepreneurs. over the past decade plus we've worked with thousands of musicians, music managers, song writers, independent labels, and many more on a range of issues that impact musicians and other artists. we exist simply to give musicians a voice in the policy debates that affect their livelihood. future music cares about a couple of other things. access and compensation to artists. access to reach audiences

without gate keepers. in the digital realm we're talking about letting artists participate directly so that new models can arise that reflect their contributions. i have four basic points that i want to make about the proposed legislation. number one, and perhaps the most important, the trade organizations representing the content industry do not represent all creators. every day, we hear from musicians and music managers who have questions about what this legislation means and who are expressing concerns. then there's the broader arts and cultural sector. just yesterday, a number of organizations representing tens of thousands of arts groups and individuals in disciplines ranging from music to film and dance and more, sent a letter to congress outlining their concerns. these are major groups, and they're all copyright holders. talking about the association of performing arts presenters, dance u.s.a., fractrd outlists, the national alliance for media

and culture. national performance network. opera america. and theater communications group. even the writers of america guilders west, the folks who write your shows, expressed concern. all of these groups are huge contribute tors the cultural sector and the american economy, yet they felt compelled to weigh in. why? because they know that these bills have real problems. individual artists are also weighing in. i think that the character ron swansen would probably be against the bill too but that's because he hates all government regulation. trent rezz anywhere, neil, author, one of my personal heroes, musicians, one of our favorite and a board member, mgmt, ok go, amanda palmer, adam savage, and maybe he'll do a special episode busting some

of the myths about these bills. hank, a legendary music producer prom public enemy's bomb squad. artists have every right to be wary when conglomerates push for policies that can undermine their free expression all the while claiming to speak for creators. my second point is about the marketplace which is still evolving. digital sales are up, 1,000% increase. that only tells part of the story. we're only starting to see what the legitimate marketplace looks like because of the innovations that have scom from the open internet. increased consumer interest in legal license services is something to be enormously proud of in an industry that's had a difficult time transitioning to digital. but it is this very eco system that could be threatened by poorly crafted legislation. the original definitions in soapa were so broad as to

include sites and services that artists and millions use every day. we're glad that some of the most egregious aspects of the house bill have been toned down in a manager's amendment. but there are still tremendous problems. and we need to remember that, despite the trial balloons that we've been seeing, the senate bill has not been amend in any significant way. like i said, we hear from musicians and managers about these issues every single day. many are ok with the fan tweeting a link to a song and some of them get pretty mad when they see foreign sites selling their music without paying them a cent. if we can agree the latter is impossible, we need to hit pause without compromising all that's great about the internet. and if congress really wants to do something positive, they should look at how artists are using technology and pay a bit more attention how the companies can tilt the

marketplace. now, chris just this morning commented in a "new york times" article about how the massive outcry to these bills is changing washington. i agree with that. but he thinks is for the worse. i disagree for that. many of the thousands are copyright holders and they're entering the marketplace and selling music on sites that need to be heard, too. my last point is that some would say that we're simply giving the attorney general powers to do thing that is are already happening under u.s. law enforcement. well, it's true that the u.s. is already seizing web properties through the department of homeland security immigrations and customs enforcement division but it's not exactly a smashing success. when ice removed one particular hip-hop blog, it turned out that they returned it after holding it for a year, admitting that it was improperly seized. but the infringing material that was being hosted on that

site was coming from major labels. even though the raaa was the organization that issued the initial takedown request. now, lawmakers may be trying to solve a problem without a perfect understanding of how today's music marketplace functions. our worry is that these bills could codify this lack of process and lack of transparency, expand the scope, and potentially allow these abuses to become even more systemic and congressmen place. we want to stop piracy. we want a legitimate digital marketplace that rewards creators and fans alike. we just need to hit pause and take the time to figure out how to do it the right way. and currently, sopa and pippa are not the solution. >> good morning. michael of the consumer electronic association. when casey mentioned the various artists and celebrities

that came out who came out, he forgot to mention kim kardashian. i believe that will be the tipping point. >> that was selected. >> i represent the company representing 2,000 technology companies, we put on the show which ended last week, big success in las vegas. let me make a couple of points including a couple take aways. you used to walk around and see stand alone products. now, you see netbooks and smart phones and tablets and smart tvs, all of which derive their value from the ability of consumers to get information anywhere. all of this derive their value from an open and vibrant and innovative internet. so basically even hardware manufacturers now rely on the internet and on the power of the internet. and that's why this issue with these bills is so very important to us and it's key to

us. number two, the other thing you see when you walk the halls of ces, of the world's top 1,000 brand names you're probably seeing about 500 of them. so protecting trademarks, intellectual property is important to us. i remember the huge issues with infringement and counter fitting and how do you deal with it, how do you go after it. there are targeted ways of going after these foreign sites. so often it's those on the other side of the issue say you have two choices. you can either have these overbroad damaging laws or let the pirates run amuck. and that's really a fause choice, not that way at all. there's the open act introduced in the senate and the house which provides a smart strategic targeted way of going after these foreign pirates without doing cladgeral damage or the internet eco system. i think it is very clear now that these extreme solutions to

this issue are not politically viable. i think we have seen that. so now it's time to start looking at reasonable solutions. and the open act is certainly a good place to start. number three, yesterday was an extraordinary day in terms of citizen engagement. and i think it will change the way intellectual property policies is made going into the future. it used to be that you would kind of gather a few people in a back room someplace, a few stakeholders, not all, mostly big companies, and cut some kind of a deal. and it was nontransparent and the issue was complicated and nobody noticed. but on the internet, there are no longer any backrooms. and i think what people were protesting yesterday was not just the content of these bills but also the process and the fact of the matter is that all of these people, the hundreds of thousands of people who contacted congress yesterday were stakeholders and not just

stakeholders because they love and use the internet but also because they are also creators, intellectual property holders. and we are now, because of the internet and technology we are now a population of creators. so we all have a major stake in it. and i think that as this issue goes forward, those stake holders are going to want to make sure that their interests are being taken into account. and that again is one of the virtues of the open act which was developed and commented on publicly. so with that, i would like to introduce one more guest. michael, a late guest to our panel, who is a sillcon valley venture capitalist with a group called hatry labs and also part of a new advocacy group called engine advocacy. if you haven't checked out their website, do. it's extraordinary. they're doing great stuff. and their presence in their stake makes an important point because some on the other side of the issue have tried to

frame this as an issue pertaining to maybe one or two big companies, and these companies are like ginning up all this stuff, which is a bizarre interpretation given what we've seen. but the fact of the matter is that big companies, they're big. and they have a lot of money and they have resources and can hire a lot of lawyers. and no matter what type it is, they'll be fine. they'll do ok because they have the resources. who really gets hit when you put these new regulatory burdens on business are the small businesses and the startups, because instead of the two guys in a garage, now you need them and ten lawyers and new companies don't have the resources for that. and michael is going to speak about how the startup community is impacted by these laws. so come on up. >> thank you for that warm welcome.

i'm michael, strategist with hatry labs in san francisco. i'm also the cofounders and director of engine advocacy. the reason that we're here in washington instead of out in san francisco spending our time creating the companies that create jobs that fuel the american economy this week is because these bills are dangerous to the long term health of our sector. a sector which i will remind o all of you has created all of the net job growth in america since 19980. and this bills will do grave harm to that community. people in my field and venture capital and in startups through out silicon valley and austin and new york are worried about this because of the chilling effect that these bills will have. there's no way to calculate what will happen to innovation if they pass. we are worried about the companies that may not survive and takedowns and whatever else

may come after this, but what about the companies that haven't started yet? what about the companies we haven't dreamed up? the companies that will never be because, as a couple of people who have said more learned and esteemed than myself, two guys in a garage can make their dream come true. but with their ten lawyer friends, it becomes a little harder. and from a venture capital angle, if i'm going to give, and the people in my company, are going to give a company to get started we want to know it's not going to go down another legal sess pool to be fought out in court and dragged out to maybe one day come to fruition. they will cause grave damage to this sector. we need to facilitate the ability for small businesses to thrive and flourish in america because talent is going overseas. we have seen programs in countries like chile, in the netherlands where they're starting a program which mike has told me about and sounds interesting. but i would rather people stay in america. and at a time when job growth

comes at a premium and we're fighting in washington every day and saying where are the jobs, why are we fighting about a bill that will kill innovation, stunt job growth, and the creation of wealth in this country? we would welcome the opportunity to sit down and find a better way forward on online piracy. no one on this panel, no one i think in this room or even in this town supports online piracy as an idea. i think we all agree on that. but this is the wrong way to try to fight this because in fact they don't solve the problem and they cause, as i keep saying, grave damage to the startup community that fuels the economy. we're waiting to see a manager's amendment. i think we all think it might be today on the senate side with the bill. they're talking about some modifications to a bill. but the fact of the matter is the underpinnings of the bill are the problem.

we can take out the filtering and we can take out search engines and just about anything. but the focus is wrong. i've said a couple of times in meetings with these guys, it's a little like we're trying to kill a flea. but we're trying to do it with a tank division instead of a fly swatter. and then we're sending the tank division to kansas city instead of miami. it doesn't make any sense. it doesn't solve the problem. and these bills are toxic to the point of destruction. we would welcome the opportunity to find a better way forward. we would love to sit down with the mpaa, and the recording industry, and talk about how startups can innovate to solve this problem. we haven't been given that opportunity. this bill is going through way too fast and way too soon. this is something that needs thoughtful reasoned debate with interjections from all sides and all parties with a stake in the fight. we would welcome that opportunity. and i hope that the mpaa, the

riaa, the other members of the entertainment industry who are backing this bill and their proponents in the united states senate and the house of representatives give us a call, come to our web site, engine advocacy.org. make a phone call. find us on there. read our artist letter that casey and mike pointed out. find some of our resources. we want to talk to you. we're not just sitting here and saying we don't like this, and trying to walk away. we would work for a better way forward. we wait for the call. i think with that we're open for questions. >> thanks. >> mike was a last-minute addition. he did that off the cuff. so well-done, mike. for those of you waiting, it's michael, with engine advocacy.

so let's open it to questions. please identify yourself first. i don't think we need a microphone. it's a small enough room. >> i love when we have tech events, we have tech problems. >> perhaps we can innovate out of this problem. >> hi. assuming you don't get harry reid not to hold the clotur vote, how confident are you that you can get 41 votes to block clotur? >> it's not over. and yesterday was the beginning of i think a pretty remarkable grassroots phenomenon. i don't know exactly how many members of congress pulled off their support yesterday. i think it was in the tens.

it's a big number. so i'm -- but i will say this. i think that senator leahy is committed to this and my guess is he is going to introduce a last minute managers' amendment that he drops on everybody. i think at this point he would drop a ham sandwich into the process and try to pass that if he thought it could pass just to restart the momentum and get to a conference with the house where a conference is a backroom deal, closed-door process to pass something. so i would be very suspicious of any efforts to week to try to launch or introduce upon the community some sort of, quote, deal. >> one comment i have is yesterday was the beginning of something, it wasn't the end of something or the culmination of something. we have seen new activists come to us and say, what can we do? so between now and the cloture vote there's going to be lots of stuff going ofpblet not just the blackout. the blackout doesn't end the things. it's the beginning of a whole

series of pushes to try to make a difference. >> if i could just add. clearly this is very complex stuff. and clearly there is a will i think on both sides to come to some kind of solution that works. when we testified before the house judiciary committee, they said that 80% of their problems come from ten sites, as i recall. so it should be possible to get reasonable people together -- 80% from 20 sites. but that's a fairly small universe. but the way to do it is we need to have a process. we need to have discussions. we need to have hearings like has been done pretty much with every other large intellectual property bill. so a situation where a bill is dropped and then it's brought to the floor 4 hours or 72 hours later is kind of puts us right back in the situation where we were that the startup

of this whole problem. so what i would suggest is everybody step back and we bring the stake holders together and we have a reasoned, rational deliberate process so this time we can get it right. >> just two quick things in addition to that. first is the -- a lot of the protests yesterday and a lot of what happened on line, it was really about two things. it wasn't about the content of this bill but very much about the process by which all of this happened and the fact that the sense was that this was very much a backroom deal. so i think that anything that somebody pops out today or tomorrow with this idea that suddenly all the problems are fixed or some new backroom deal has been struck to deal with this, you know, it's not going to appease or calm the folks on line. this was not just about this

bill. this was about the way that a lot of things happen in this town. and i think that people speaking up about that are not going to -- they're not going to trust or appreciate a bill that comes out of that same process. you know, i think they really want something that is a much more open and involved process that involves everyone. the second comment on that is if they do go forward with the vote next week, there is the cloture process itself, i think that there's some talk about whether or not that is a vote on process or substance. and i think it's important to recognize that that vote very much will be a vote about the substance of what is in the bill. and if it is a bill that suddenly pops up today that people have very little time to

read or understand on such a big issue, that is going to be a huge problem as well, because it's moving forward on something that people just simply have not had enough time to understand on something that will have such a large impact. >> i had you had a question. >> you keep referring to things moving too fast. but the senate judiciary committee marked up the bill last may. senator widen has taken credit for having opposed this concept for a year and a half. what took you so long to get here and to be protesting and making your points? >> well, i think just speaking for our industry, when this bill was introduced, we raised very serious concerns and we were told that there would be a process to work out a process to try to get to some sort of understanding and work out the

problems. in the senate -- and this starts getting very inside washington. but the manager's amendment was introduced and ten days later was marked up not in a public forum but off the floor where there was no public view. that manager's amendment for the first time included a private right of action and a search blocking provision. when we expressed our concerns at that point the managers said don't worry, the house is going to fix all the issues. and then we tried to engage in the house and we saw that process unfold where it became very difficult to work out any sort of issues. and i think that the chairman of that house decided that he could ram it through his committee. and when that failed, it moved back over here to the senate when the majority leader reid decided to schedule the clotur vote. so we never had an opportunity at any point to actually sit down with stake holders and see if we could actually work out issues and look at what the scope of the problem was.

so that's all very inside washington thing and it's hard to make that understandable to people. but we didn't want to have to raise the volume on this like we did. or -- but because, as mike said, the process was so flawed, it really left us with very little opportunity but to try to reach outside of washington to get people to pay attention. >> i think also, a lot of people certainly in the startup community raised issues with the bill that came out in may. it certainly wasn't as loud but there were a group of about 40 or 50 venture capitalists who sent a letter, a group of over 200 entrepreneurs, a group of over 100 law professors who sent a letter all related to the original bill. and many of us expressed interest in engaging with congress and being involved in the process. and we were assured repeatedly on the house side that the house bill would address these

problems. boob glat came out to silicon valley over the summer and there was a meeting where this issue was raised and he promised that he had heard the concerns of the community and that the bill would address those problems. and then when the bill actually did drop in october, it was -- it appeared to not hear any of those concerns and actually went very much in the other direction. so i think that kind of accelerated it. >> i've got a different perspective because i have no political background whatsoever and i represent small to medium business that is just happen to make up the backbone of the internet nuts and bolts as we know it. the vast majority of the companies in that space are companies that make between -- that generate between 1 and $100 million a year in revenue, small to medium bists. we don't have lobbyists. we aren't out there on the hill advocating. and up to this point we've been so focused on our business that we haven't had time to get

engaged politically. this is actually been a bit of a water shed moment for us. we're here now and we're not going away. but i've got to say that we'd rather be focused on innovation, and driving our businesses forward. what took us so long? we've been trying to build up this economy and we would rather get back to it. >> i have maybe something to add to this about the process as well. we are in washington. we're not a lobbying group by any means. we're in education group largely. we've been tracking these issues since pipa was called coica. and when it was first issued we went through it and tried to kick the tires and talked about what seemed unworkable and what might be possibly not the worst thing in the world as an educational benefit to artists. keep in mind that artists want to believe that their congressional representatives have their best interests at heart when they're talking about intellectual property and copyrights.

it takes a long time for people to realize that maybe it's not the greatest idea in the world to let them drive this train. we would like to think that we have productive relationships with all kinds of offices on the hill because who doesn't like music. right? but the idea is that the process was flawed from the outset. i can definitely concur with mike's assessment about the introduction of sopa. we were under the impression that maybe sopa would represent kind of a more sane approach to some of the issues that protect ip was trying to solve. that turned out to absolutely not be the case. keep in mind again we're talking about a stake holder community that is much broader than anyone in washington has probably ever considered before. i mentioned tune corps in my initial remarks. it's a platform that allows artists to distribute their music to digital music stores.

their executive just told me that they distribute more music in one month than all the major record labels do combined in 100 years. these are all copyright holders. the fact that these folks have to understand that they have rights as well and that those may not be reflected perfectly in proposed legislation is something that's not going to happen overnight. and when you have a very small nonprofit like future of music coalition versus -- and i don't want to necessarily use the word versus. but for our intents and purposes -- a well established, law beyond a reasonable doubt up big money trade industry, then you can see how the deck is stacked. >> one other point on that process. we provided three red line drafts to the committees of jurisdiction over these last two years and if they weren't totally ignored, they were substantially ignored in the process. the house and the senate judiciary committees. >> grant.

>> a couple of you have alluded to this already but can you talk about the importance of the protest yesterday and was that a tipping point do you see in this debate? >> i'll say that i don't want to call it like the great awakening of the internet because i think that a lot of us here and most of our friends and people we know on line and off line have been involved in these issues for a long time. but what we saw yesterday was concentrated mass action that had immediate results. we had -- we couldn't keep up with twitter yesterday because so many united states senators were taking to the service to announce that they were no longer supportive of the bill. we're running around town trying to figure out what's up and down as this is all going on. you saw the people gather in new york, san francisco, and i

think even in seattle. and wherever else. and it was heartening to see people coming out. aint was a great day. but it was not the first day and not the last day. we're here for the duration and we're here to make sure that we find that better way forward. and i think all of us here and all the people that came out yesterday would echo those comments. >> i think that what's really interesting about what happened yesterday is that like most things you're going to see 95, 98% of the people that took in the information that day, they're going to end up doing nothing with it. a lot of people aren't going to fully understand this is an extremely nuanced subject. the people that are pro and against are all providing arguments that are sometimes too simplistic. but we reached such a wide audience yesterday with what was going on and an audience of all ages that there is going to be a core group.

and we're already seeing it. that comes out and says i get this. this is important to me. the internet does wonderful great good things in this world and we want to do what we can to protect it and we created advocates yesterday, we created activists yesterday. and that's going to mean great things for this movement and the next one and the next one. >> i think that's an important point. as much as yesterday was tactically against sopa and pipa, yesterday in a much broader and lasting way was for the internet. >> i think think that we have an opportunity for the mpaa to learn something here. and chris yesterday said he has a steep learning curve in this industry. and i think their approach to this bill demonstrates that. but the mpa and their studios tried to outlaw cable television, they tried to outlaw the vcr, the ipod, the dvr.

the common theme, they failed but they are also technology is better now the biggest revenue sources for hollywood. in some sense they're trying to outlaw the internet and they're scared of the internet and we understand that. but i think they have an opportunity to reset on their side to embrace the internet's potential where the internet can actually become their largest revenue source, too. i think that's inevitable. but they're going to have to go through that cycle. and i'm hoping that this last couple of weeks will accelerate the timetable for the studios and they think through their business models and their legislative and regulatory plans. >> i would love to think that we're true mark hum but judging from the original can airy in the coal mine, the music industry, waiting to be conturemed appropriately to a behavior, i don't have a lot of high hopes that the motion picture is going to wake up to that understanding any time soon. >> let's take some other questions. >> hi.

you all were talking about this isn't the last push. it seems, when, from your comments that you sort of think that that amendment and that bill is going to zip through the floor on the senate. so my question is, what does that mean? does that mean that you continue your advertising campaign that you all talked about this week? you know, what are you all going to do other than walk the halls of congress? >> i don't think the bill will zip through on the senate. i think they will try to by trying to introduce some sort of ham sandwich that they think will pass. but i think what you've seen yesterday with members jumping off, i don't think that tactic is going to work. and if they try to move forward and have a debate on the floor, i think members will step up and have a protracted debit on the floor. i hope it doesn't get to that point. >> i think it's important to recognize that even if, let's

just say in some bizarre world that the senate comes up with some bill that say everyone at this table actually even agrees with, i'm not sure that would even work given the process and what's happened and what happened on line yesterday. you know, that was the internet speaking out. and that was not a group of people represented directly by us, that is a very large group of people extremely concerned about the overall process that we certainly don't control in any way shape or form. and i think that it's not even so much about what we do even if everyone at this table said wow this is a wonderful bill that magically comes out of nowhere, i obviously don't think that's likely. but you know there's a larger concern about the overall process and how this was done, and i don't think that the internet is just going to go away quietly and accept the

bill. >> i ools think that while some proponents may try to tweak the existing bill and try to get it through, the fact is that for a whole lot of members, they're largely toxic at this point. i think they're radioactive. you have a situation where congress' approval rating is very low. i think there is a perception among the left and the right, among tea partiers and occupiers that somehow there are a few large, well-connected interests that are trying to game the system to the detriment of everybody else. and number three, people love the internet and use it and think they own it. and when people get the sense that congress is about to harm the internet at the behest of a handful of well-connected interests, they get very angrifment and i think what we've seen is extraordinary. there are 1500 people protesting in the streets of new york yesterday on a copyright issue. this issue is coming up in primaries and congressional

races, a caller: right issue. it's coming up in town halls and in new hampshire and south carolina. and this is extraordinary. and i don't think it's going away. so i think the notion that somehow you can kind of make a few mibor tweaks and kind of it's business as usual and nobody will notice is unrealistic. and i think there are a lot of members at this point who will want nothing to do with the sopa and pipa approach going forward. i think it's time to step back and reset. >> i was actually, yesterday, the first drap of the open act was released and i was actually up until midnight reading through that bill with a couple of representatives from two of the larger companies in our industry. we were -- so we were up until around midnight talking and one of the largest companies in our industry said, we've got one of the largest clients came to us

today, they're a foreign company, and they said if sopa or pipa past we've got to go host offshorse. these bills are toxic enough that if it happens, the companies won't wait to see whether the laws apply to them. they're just going to leave our shores. and they're going to take american jobs with them as our industry declines and offshore industries increase. it's going to happen. >> i think a simple, a different way to answer that question is not what we're going to do. but what is congress going to do? after yesterday, the internet has spoken. what are you going to do about it? >> i think also interesting to know, with all of the statements from people in congress yesterday, how most of those statements came out and how they communicated with the public, which is they used the very tools that people -- that people are using to speak out as well.

you know, it was twitter and facebook, and you tube with some of them. that's how they got the message out. and i think that that was very much a statement as well, that some members of congress are recognizing that engaging via the internet is a really important part of being an elected officials and representing constituents. and so i think that we need more of that and i think that going back to the previous question as well, what happened yesterday was definitely the beginning of something important not just in this particular process but in getting congress much more engaged with the people that they actually represent. >> over on the end. >> what percentage of your business do you feel is international and how many jobs, how much revenue have you lost? >> actually, i represent a company that we see about 60% of our business is

international. what's interesting about 20% of the world's band withgoes through the united states. but when it comes to the actual infrastructure, the nuts and bolts of the internet, we still lead the industry, we still lead the world when it comes to our infrastructure. and people from all over the world gravitate towards the united states because our band width access and reliability and grids are the best in the world. but boy is that changing every day. and the more we give people chances -- the reasons to go offshore with their infrastructure to buy pass the united states, there's a huge economy out there. so i can only speak for myself in saying that actually 60% of ours is foreign business that has a real possibility of leaving and affecting u.s. jobs in my particular company.

but as a whole, we're seeing the internet infrastructure economy representing about 4.2 billion as i think the number that we represent in overall revenue, and a lot of that could easily just move offshore. >> i think the 60% number is consistent with what the larger internet companies do for some of the big internet brands. i think they've gone over the 50% mark where revenue from offshore is exceeding domestic revenue. the internet represents 23% of net growth gpped worldwide and much of that is driven by u.s. internet companies promoting their services overseas. i think the bigger consider for many companies is not the revenue loss, it's the global retaliation of a precedent that starts to allow governments to sensor and determine what speech will be allowed on the internet. and we know that these aren't just countries like china or

iran. they're liberal european democracies that would love to see an excuse to begin regulating speech on the internet because they don't have a first amendment and that they will use this precedent as an excuse to begin doing that. and our companies, as they try to promote their services worldwide, are very much concerned about the international rethat willation from foreign countries. >> and i think that i'll just add the venture piece here as well. those numbers i think definitely bear out and it is about the companies that are happening and being created now. but it's the ones in the future, and i keep going back to this point. that the companies, the next wave of innovation won't happen in america. you'll see more of that money going offshore. and companies like ours and firms like ours will not want to just subsidize litigation. we're looking to give you venture money to start a business and create jobs and grow wealth.

so we'll be looking for more international investment. that being the case. it's a simple fact of the matter. and i agree as well with mark's point about we don't want to be on the list of the countries that do this and we don't want to add to it. we don't want to align ourselves with china and iran and then allow, like he says, liberal western democracies to line up and do the same thing. it would -- paul dixie, an internet innovator said a while back, it's not that the internet won't survive this debate. it's like that we won't like what it will become. and that i think is the larger point here about moving offshore and revenue growth and all of those things is that we just don't know what it will be. but we know we won't like it. >> other questions. >> two questions. the first one tonight hit on,

i'm still getting press releases from different members in both the house and the senate saying that they're coming out against the bills. first, i think about six cosponsors of protect ip who say they no longer support it plan to pull their names and you also have the speaker saying that he wasn't going to move forward unless there was a compromise. so given that, you still think that they'll go for it or is the turkey dead? the second thing i wanted to ask about was is the intention to just kill the bills and start from scratch? or are there areas of compromise where you guys would be open to possibly supporting something if things were tweaked? >> i think the answer to the first question is, it was reportsed today that senator

kyl has proposed a deal with senator leahy to try to get this bill off life support. and i think that there are members, perhaps senator leahy, that would try to introduce a ham sandwich into this situation if they thought it could pass. and i think we have to be careful to look at those statements that may occur. i think the bigger point is there are solutions but we need to step back and reset. and really have a data-driven process, to look at what the scope of the problem is when we don't even know how many websites we're talking about from the other side, that's kind aff problem. we don't know what the scope of the privacy is, that's kind of an issue. and we don't know how burdensome some of these would be and the impact they would have on the internet. most has been generated just by grassroots advocates who aren't lobbyist whose said here's the real data about how much traffic is going to these sites

or the cyber security effects. so i think the issue is that instead of having to negotiate with a gun to our head, so to speak, let's sit down and have a data driven process with a wide array of stake holders, engineers, small businesses, large businesses, copyright holders of all stripes, and try to figure out a more intelligent solution. >> and also to have that process be public. i think i can't emphasize that enough. again, no matter what comes out, you know, if sort of a bill comes out and even if everyone agreed with it, the people protesting yesterday are not going to accept that process. i think that was very clear from the statements and you saw being said yesterday. so it's not so much what we would accept even. i think it's really what the public needs to see at this point. and that is a much more open and involved process. >> our coalition is looking for something to support. we are fierce advocates against piracy and we want to be able

to support something. we think that these bills have the complete wrong focus and it's going to be tough to get there. we've had less than 24 hours to delve into the open act but it's looking promising. so we are looking for something. >> i would add that i can definitely agree with pretty much everything mark has said and even double down on the aspect because what's been very interesting for us is to figure out how musicians are making a living and whether we can bring constructive information about that into the policy making process. and we actually are finishing a research project on artist revenue streams that hopefully will have that impact on these kinds of conversations. the other thing to remember is that if the folks who introduced sopa and pipa are so keen to bring in stakeholders now and the supporters of those bills, where were they when alternative approaches were described over the last six

months? is it possible that we could get a situation where we could figure out who the bad actors are, craft legislation that's appropriately tailored, and avoid the collateral harms? sure. but the fact of the matter is doing it 11th hour in a backroom deal like mike said is probably not going to be the way forward. >> a couple of points. first question, is it dead? no. it's -- despite the american people speaking as loudly as they could yesterday, the majority leader as we speak is still scheduled to bring this bill to the floor of the senate on tuesday. so it's not dead at all. number two, what is really extraordinary to me is this manufactured urgency. you know, you have all kinds of very substantive, very smart interests who are bringing up very substantive potential problems with this bill and saying it would harm innovation and harm our standing overseas, and raising very real issues. why can't we step back and get

it right? the country isn't going to blow up if we don't enact it this week. >> are you sure? >> um. >> and number three, what we are interested in as a goal is coming up with some solution that addresses these rogue pirate websites while preserving innovation. we believe the open act is a narrow targeted and strategic way to do that. look, everybody agree that is piratey is a problem. and from there, you've got a fill solvecal bifurcation. some people believe the way to address that is to hobble the internet. others believe the open act approach that the way to do it is to cut off the money to these sites to do business. so you cut off the money. and that is what the open act does. that's worked in other context, that's worked with the offshore gambling bills and it has the added advantage of not doing

collateral damage to innovation or creating windful for trial lawyers. so to the extent that you're going to do something and something needs to be done, that seems to be the reasonable way to approach the issue. >> i want to echo michael's comments, the bill is not dead, it is very much alive. we're leaving our call tool up. we want people to make phone calls and keep the pressure on. but more than that, intellectual property law is some might say a little boring but it is also very complicated and it's not the kind of thing that you want rushed through. it's not the kind of thing you don't want to go through with a fine tooth comb and find every little minute detail so that it's not being fought out in courts for decades. we want to get it right the first time. help us help you. we want to sit down, we want to talk to you. the open act as everybody has said is a great counterproposal. we would love to see both of these judged on their merits.

we would love to talk about any and all avenues to combat piratey and we're sitting and waiting. but the bill is very much alive. there's still a vote scheduled. keep calling. >> not just entrepreneur property law but when combined with the changing structure of the internet. we've got to have foreseat and see where are we going to be in 10, 20 years. that takes a lot. >> and on top of that, in terms of building on all of what was just said, you know, copyright law in particular over the last 35 years has been adjusted, there have been new copyright laws or changing to copyright laws 16 times in the process of 35 years, and it feels like every two years or so there's a complaint and there's a rush, and none of those changes haven't necessarily addressed the problem which is why they keep coming back. but none of the potential problems that have been caused by some of the earlier changes

ever -- there's never a process to go back and look at the problems with existing law to potentially fix them. so i think the idea that maybe we should sit down and think through what the impact of these particular changes are before they go into effect is kind of ap important idea. >> we have one or two more questions. >> you've emphasized that a lot of this opposition is not necessarily from organized groups. it's diss pratt people on the internet. and you've also emphasized the process as seen as ill legitimate the way that these bills have been made. is it possible that the whole process and the whole issue has become so tainted to a large group of people that even something that if you decided you all did like the open act and that it seemed to people that it was a good approach, that even that could not get

passed because not everyone necessarily would understand that? they would just see, here's another way that backroom is trying to push forward something that will do harm to the internet and we're not going to listen to what it is, we're just going to oppose it? >> i really think if the process becomes more open, that people on the internet will throw support behind something that works. we talked about the backroom deals and i love your line markham about dropping in a ham sandwich. but we talk about all these inside washington things. and in the community, the reason we haven't gotten involved to this point isn't because we don't care about the issues. we look and say two things. just let me do my job. and i don't understand that process and i don't want to be part of it because it's not open and not honest. the more open and honest, the better the proposal, the more support you'll find. the same people yesterday, tomorrow, the next day, they'll come out and support something that works.

>> transparency matters tremmed'sly. the open act has been transparent from the beginning. they reached out to the public and criticize and attempt to meamed the bill. and i think from what i've just looked at, it's very preliminary stages, it's a bill that if pipa and sopa did not exist, the media industries would be thrilled to have. and we don't see major public outcry about it yet. i think it's because of the transparency and the approach that's been taken to it. >> i think that the setup with that particular bill, whether or not people agree with it, was really an important step that i think even people who don't necessarily like that particular bill, they were very impressed and liked the fact that it was presented not just in an open fashion in which the original text of the bill before -- months before it was introduced actually introduced in the house and senate, was

put up and people had -- could comment. it was put up on a platform that let people actually make suggestions and comment on it and give their thoughts, and that the bills that actually were introduced from that are very different than what came out first. and so whether or not those bills are acceptable, i don't know. i can't say. but the process itself was a lot more open and i think that people definitely recognize that and really appreciate that. and i think that there is definitely a sense that if more or all legislation kind of worked with that kind of process, people would be a lot more engaged and a lot more comfortable with what's coming out of congress. . .

i think that as they have become, as they have filled the issues of becoming a new generation of an internet caucus, they will build up some good will and credibility with a constituency that when they say, cast and we are trying to move in a constructive way to balance the interests of the internet community with the interests of the copyright community," i think that will certainly help. there is a distrust with members

of congress and what their intentions are, but i think that is beginning to change. >> even if you want to give leadership the benefit of the doubt, and i have no problem doing that because we have been a consistent with our message about how folks in the creative communities can interact productively with lawmakers, it is that the lawmakers need to hear from this community. it is a question of how the argument is weighted. if it is just npaa and riaa that the leadership is hearing from, then that is a problem. it even underscores the need to hit pause right now. it is becoming increasingly clear that it is the technology community whose interests need to be represented. the entrepreneurial community whose interests need to be represented. now more than ever, it is a coterie of copyright owners who have never even had the opportunity to introduce their side of the story to this debate, so all the more reason to hit pause and see if we can

bring more stakeholders. >> of ike and also add, there was a time not long ago when it was considered to be somehow charming that members of congress did not know much about technology. now, i think we have come to the point where it is no longer funny. to the extent that you are going to be making rules that govern the internet, you have to have some familiarity with how it works. i know most of you are working the markup on sopa. in some ways, it was frustrating because there were a lot of members who clearly did not have anything close to that level of familiarity. on the other hand, and it was also exciting because there were a lot of members who were clearly tech people and were quite familiar with how technology works, how the internet work, with the innovation community needed. i think those members are in the assembly. in terms of how congress deals

with these issues, i think it will get better because there are a lot of very young, very articulate members who are engaged in this issue and had a deep understanding of how it works and what smart policy is. from that side, i think i am very optimistic. >> let's end there. take your question of line before they never let us leave this room again. this is great. the panelists -- i am going to speak for them -- will stay. we just have to get out of the room. if you have additional questions, we will just chat out in the hall. thank you for coming. >> thank you. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> lawmakers stopped the anti- piracy legislation from moving forward on friday, which is seen as a victory for internet companies that staged an online protest this week.

the leader of the democrats in the senate said he would postpone the critical vote that had been scuttled for january 24, in light of recent events. -- that had been scheduled for january 24. voters are going to the polls in south carolina. our coverage continues throughout the day with coverage of candidates' speeches and updates on primary results after the polls close tonight. you will also be able to join in the conversation with your phone calls, e-mails, and tweets. tomorrow, we will discuss the results of the primary with linda feldman of the "christian science monitor" and monitorbierbauer -- and charles bierbauer from the university of south carolina. then, a list of the impact -- >> for more resources on the presidential race, used c-span's campaign 2012 website, to watch videos of the candidates on the campaign trail, see what the

candidates have said on issues important to you, and read the latest from candidates, political reporters, and people like you from social media sites. >> if you have a saudi prince, who is part of the royal family of saudi arabia, who has effectively bought one of the largest news franchises in the world, bought into it, you have to look at his motives. >> diana west writes about culture, politics, and the spread of islam in the western world. >> i think there is an argument that should be made that fox should have to register as a foreign agent. >> more with former "washington times" writer diana west on c- span's "q&a." >> now, a discussion on the 2012 presidential race with chicago mayor rahm emanuel.

he shared his thoughts thursday on president obama's reelection campaign and the republican presidential nomination. joining him was rachel malcolm and new york times columnist david books, and gop strategist alex katz seattle. the event was monitored by george stephanopoulos. it is from the university of chicago's institute of politics. runs about an hour and 10 minutes. >> we a preview of attractions to come. it happens at a most propitious time in our political calendar this year. we have a panel that is second to none, i think, in their insights and their contributions to this discussion. let me introduce them one by one. first of all, i am great will to our moderator, george stephanopoulos. i have known george for 20 years.

i met him when he was made. governor bill clinton was running for president. he became an essential person in that campaign and ultimately in the white house, became a best- selling author, and made the transition to journalism and has become one of america's most respected journalists. his sunday show is a must see for people in washington for years, so much so that it has not been reprieved, and he is back, even as he anchors "good morning america." understanding what his schedule is, i am particularly grateful that he is here today cash. let me introduce george stephanopoulos. [applause] >> i have known our next speaker since he was 22 years old. communications director, and i was a political writer.

he would come only with calls -- he would pummel the with calls every day, and he has been ever since. we have had a chance to work together over the years, and he is truly a force of nature. does not really need an introduction. let me introduce the great mayor of the city of chicago, rahm emanuel. [applause] i mentioned in my remarks that i grew up 100 yards from our next panelist. we have actually led parallel lives. he began his career in chicago journalism. i began my career in chicago journalism. he went to the university of chicago. i went to the university of chicago. the only difference is he apparently attended class. let me introduce one of the

great public thinkers in america today, david brooks. [applause] when i was at the white house, you may remember we had a little bit of a problem with an oil leak in the gulf of mexico. in the midst of that, we had a small luncheon for a few journalists. these things go on from time to time. our next panelist was there and was quizzing the president on how we were capturing the oil and whether we were doing it properly and said, "i have read two books on this." ofse who are aficionados' her television program and before that, her radio program, know that she drill down very

deep -- [laughter] on these issues. let me introduce rachel maddow. [applause] finally, let me introduce someone who is kind of my opposite number on the republican side. he has been doing campaigns for as long as i have, only on the other side of the ballot. i have deep admiration for him as a person and as a professional, and for his passion for politics and for this country. he is exactly the kind of person we want to include on this panel today. let me introduce alex casiano.

[applause] >> thank you for bringing us all here. congratulations on your new upcoming position. what a day to be here. this is one of the great things about politics. we -- had we had this discussion last thursday, it probably would have started in a completely different way. i want to start with alex for that reason. last thursday, mitt romney looking like he is headed for three in a row, winning the first three primaries and caucuses on the republican side, unprecedented. you wake up this morning. turns out he lost iowa. newt gingrich is surging in south carolina. saturday night, we do not know what will happen, but instead of being 3 for 3, still a chance he could end up being 143. what difference does that make? can he be stopped? i should add, you did work for mitt romney last time. >> i was hoping he would

overcome that this time. [laughter] pleasure to be here, david. i am glad there was an opening in my schedule and an open schedule. as a republican, i want to point out that my marriage is not as open -- [laughter] never seen a year like this one. i do not think any of us have. the republican field, let's say -- i do not think at this point has entirely distinguished itself. ronnie, i think, is still the only candidate who can win the republican nomination. i do not think anything has changed. i think he may get crushed in south carolina saturday. he has run a very defensive campaign so far. he has run a campaign that, i

think, the four corners like chapel hill used to run. when you have a lead, you sit on it. but there really has not been much beyond jobs. "i am the job skype. i am mr. fix it." that will be tested here. nevertheless, newt gingrich has a ceiling. he is one of the least popular candidates i think republicans could put forward. he is unacceptable to a huge amount of the party. personal flaws, political flaws. and he is the only guy left on the field who could possibly compete with money. every time he stands up, he hits his head on the ceiling. this is the old newt we are seeing. every time he gets to the front of the pack, he blows himself up. i think he will collapse either before saturday or after saturday. and then, the game should be runny's. >> but why does somebody always

pop up? it has been the story of the last seven or eight months. >> i want to publicly congratulate david on this. when i was here, there were two things that were lacking. one was any hint of sexual activity. [laughter] the second was a route out -- >> it is a sex joke. [laughter] >> i am actually late for something. then the issue is running -- romney. i think he is a much better candidate, but he is not like anybody you sort of know. i tell the story -- i followed him campaigning, and he was in the hampshire, campaigning with his five perfect sons -- bip,

chip, rip -- [laughter] he goes into a diner and asks what village in new hampshire they are from, and he describes the home that is in their village. those around the room, and on the way up, he first names almost everybody he has met, and that is impressive as a steady political skill, but it is not an actual political skill. the guy you guys work for, bill clinton, had it. there is always a cold wind between him and voters. >> yet, at the same time, he has been the candidate pretty much all along the white house most expected to get the nomination the hallway, and consistently, even in the republican primary, the candidate seemed most likely to be able to win in november. >> i sort of feel like he is the tallest midget. there's not any difference

between money 2008 and 2012 as a candidate. -- between romney 2008 and 2012. >> he is more skilled as a candidate, don't you think? >> is this a quiet enough room to discuss that? i think his skills look great because they are being measured against newt gingrich, right? and rick santorum, who, i mean, it is a tragedy for rick santorum that he is un- googleable, but it matters. if rick santorum were invented today, he might have a chance, but he comes from someplace. i think that is why mitt romney looks good. but today, he got into an angry screaming match with a boulder on a rope line saying, "america is right, and you are wrong. thank you." who are you thanking? the quiet room thing that no one

can discuss income inequality unless it is away from the riffraff. when a child asked him on the stuff in hampshire why he wanted to run for president, he went into a long, emotional with about how it has been difficult to work out with his estate planning attorney which of his children and grandchildren get which millions of his fortune. yes, it has seemed like he is going to win. >> trying to figure out how to get adopted. >> i think that mitt romney is running to win, and i think it is likely he will win, and i think it is largely by virtue of the fact that his competition really sucks. >> the candidate would be most able to make this election about barack obama in november on the republican side. >> right now? >> [inaudible]

>> that is all. ok, hold on. most likely is mitch daniels in my view. hold on. it is ok. no, do not do that. do not worry about it. you got your chance. then mr. mayor, do i take it that your election was not unanimous? >> no, i do not think so. >> ok, you have had your say. can we -- okay, just -- >> another undecided voter. >> i don't think so.

then he has fired 353 library employees -- >> he has fired 353 library employees. >> here is the deal -- you got your chance to say. let me just turn now -- you got your chance. let me just try to answer that question. about sex. [laughter] first of all, when you say who is the best candidate, in my own view, the best candidate is not on the field, versus the president. i think they had a lot of good candidates -- chris christie, mitch daniels. second, i do not think on south carolina, to your question earlier, the first question about mitt romney -- i would just say this, and that is that people forget -- you will remember this. when bill clinton basically had the nomination wrapped up, he lost connecticut and lost it big. i do not even read anymore the newspaper and follows the ups and downs.

because mitt romney is going to be the nominee. >> every nominee is tested. that there is always a buyer's remorse process. eprom before it -- a problem for mitt romney is that happened before he was nominated. he has a problem connecting to voters, and that is in eight. unlike running for congress or senate that this legislative, that is not insignificant for a chief executive. you have to create a relationship between the public and the candidate. that is essential. that is a very important thing. that will be a big problem for him. i do want to say this, though, or my dear friend david axelrod, while everyone else is going to make a joke at your expense, as your friend, i will defend you because i know how important this was, and you are going to enrich a lot of kids' lives in the process, letting know how to do negative ads. [applause]

i just feel we are a little down on romney as a panel. the impression we had just given a emphasizes the -, which is there, obviously, but i think the reasons he is weak is the reasons he will be strong in the general. he is against a republican electorate and he is the organization man. but he'll be the organization man for moderates in the general. i think he will be really strong. i go back and forth week to week about whether he is a slight favorite or slight underdog, but he will be a relentless, pretty good campaigner. it is funny to watch. i do not know how he was four years ago, but he spends as much time after the speech shaking hands with people. he seems to just work like a dog. while everyone else is on the bus, he is still out there working, sweating, and he is not an impressive as a candidate. >> i agree with you. yes, he definitely makes

mistakes. has basically been through 16 debates with two, maybe three mistakes overall. did not really get touched until the last debate on monday night. and those served as something as it -- something of a primary, but assuming he does get the nomination, for the sake of argument, right now, it is clear he will have to figure out how to deal with this whole constellation of issues around his business background. the campaign will say that they are happy to be debating that rather than his record in massachusetts, but it is still an open question whether it will end up being a net plus or net -. how would you deal with it? >> i think watching the campaign deal with it right now, one of the surprising thing seems to be had difficulty funds to handle it. not so much the issue itself as, i think, he has come across at times as someone who is slightly embarrassed about being successful and making money.

immediately starts off on the defense of. if you can go out there as a republican candidate and make the case that money in may, money i earn, money and vested, money and pay taxes on -- now let's talk about your money. many current administration is spending, driving in debt, taxes, you and your kids are going to pay -- usually, people do not really care that much about other people's money. certainly not as much as their own. but there is a certain distance to romney, from connecting with people in their daily lives, and that is a challenge for him, but i agree with david. in the general, it may end up being a positive. the election i think david once and would love to have, as we all know, is a choice between a hot republican and a very polarizing democrat. the election you would not want is a referendum on the incumbent. romney is hard to love. he is hard to hate. there's a lot of styrofoam in him. he is resistant to temperature

change. [laughter] he does help with the spotlight on obama in a general, i think. >> one of the things that struck me -- this is a real open question about the republican establishment's vehement response, telling people to shut up, almost literally telling newt gingrich to shut up and carry as well. it was articulated as, "we do not really want the country to be treated to criticism of capitalism. leave that to the democrats. we think it looks bad. to me, it was sort of an open question about whether or not they were trying to shut down those attacks because those attacks hurt. if that is the case, it's those attacks her money, are you protecting his last job, which will then just be exposed in october? that is what rick perry has been saying all along, although nobody has cared much about what he has had to say recently. he has said he would rather have this decided now than in october. >> the feeling in south carolina

is those attacks really have not heard him. what hurt him is everybody is still looking for the anti- romney, and newt gingrich had a big alpha dog moment in the debate and seized control of the agenda for about 10 seconds. >> the issue, though, is, look, everybody knows about his wealth. it did not need to be a surprise that this was coming. the way they handled it has been the surprise. this is about the most telegraph past coming across, which is, "we are going to talk about your money and how you did it. the fact that he has been, as i always say, sometimes like, "watergate was a crime in search of a cover-up." i had my own view about whitewater, which was a crime -- a cover-up in search of a crime. they have reinforced everybody's negative perception of what is hidden behind it. they have made it bigger than what it could have been. the answer -- we have all done

this -- every question has been reversed in either a senate race, governor's race, or congressional base about wealth. it is out there. we could talk about my money or we could talk about yours. >> except there's a difference. the reason i think they wanted to shut down the tax now is not so much the substance but the fact that they were coming from newt gingrich, and when it comes from a democrat, you just say it is class warfare, but from newt gingrich and rick perry, it changes the character. that it came from john mccain 2008 as well. john mccain be mitt romney in 2008. it is not new. they just seem very afraid of it this time around. i think the country is in a very different place. >> there is no question about that, but how does obama respond? let me bring this to you, first. the state of the union coming up. we saw a little bit of a preview in the speech the president gave in kansas about a month ago, where he laid out his

lines of argument, looking at this, but what -- if he were -- and this is his campaign document coming out on tuesday -- if he were to try to get back that middle of the country that he has lost over the last four years, what would you say he needs to do? >> the first thing i would say is this economy is about national decline, fear of national decline. 70% of americans think the country is in long-term decline. if you go to a room and ask people how many think their kids will have worse life prospects than them, every hand goes up. that is the subject. i guess the first thing i would say is do not give that speech he gave in kansas. >> really? >> yes, i think that strategy, the populist, anything at going of occupy movement -- i think that is a giant mistake. people do not want to talk about

equality. they want to talk about opportunity. >> but inequality is a serious problem right now. >> i think if you frame them, you do think that. i think it is a serious problem. i do not think the american people necessarily the ad is a problem that really plagues them, with the top 1% are doing. i think the problem that plagues them first is obviously jobs. second is family breakdown. 40% of american kids are born out of wedlock. their life prospects are permanently worst -- are automatically worse. in some ways, the swing elected as mortar fear from divorce then from unemployment. somehow, getting at the mixture of social anxiety and economic anxiety and giving an opportunity talk is a lot better than basing your entire policy on taxing the top 1%. the final thing -- i just think he has to be big. if it is about national decline, he has to have big policies, has to have tax reform, which he is not going to do.

i think he should have done since then-bowles. -- simpson-bowles. my fear is that in the state of the union, the policies will be like this for a problem that is like this. >> i agree and disagree, if i can. ofgree that people's sense the banks is not of the moment but is larger. politics, and you know this, is about choice. mr. fix the -- mr. fix it, the moment the question, is not exactly a resounding call. i also think this election is in many ways for the president. romney is a possibility only based on what does not -- does and does not happen in the realm of presidency. not because of mitt romney. people know instinctively we are at an inflection point as a

country. i do think that being big, which is why i think the campaign lends itself -- the president is more inspirational. he can give a vision which mitt romney cannot do. he comes in and says, "we are going to do this and that and move this piece over your." it does not address what the people want and need and think the country needs. and i think that the president is. the state of the union is the one last time to put up the blueprint and the architecture of what i will do in a second term. the first term is, "i inherited a mess. i did what i could to stabilize it. here's what we're going to do the get put the first term back and make it all about the future because elections are about tomorrow. if you are going forward, looking to the rearview mirror, they will catch you on that and you will have an accident.

and number of us have worked for candidates. they want credit for what they have done. everybody's eyes focused on the future. otherwise, it goes to a debate that slightly tilts the other way. if he does that, which i do believe people have and thanks about -- an angst about this moment as a precursor to the future, if he goes to his inspiration as a leader, i think it plays to his strength. >> let's go to david, who does not want to see kansas again, but i take it that will probably excite you, right? >> i do not know that i get excited. i do not know that i get excited about speeches. that is why i disagree a little bit arahm about -- a little bit with rahm about if i were advising the white house. i feel like we are a little bit inspirationed out. i feel like there's a little but

a conservative backlash in the country, which is, cassette and i do not actually believe in anything or anybody who says they can make things better. i realize a lot is wrong, but i do not have much hope for big vision for making things better." i sense that among my friends on the left and in the electorate broadly. i do not think that is necessarily cause for despair among those of us who are involved in and comment on politics because we like the inspirational side of it, but i do think people need to have their faith restored a little bit that government can do something useful. i think this is probably a time to talk about small, doable things that people can identify with that they have not heard before. a pretty vision about what the future could be like that we could all agree on, but we do not know how we're going to get there or believe we can get there. sort of feel like we have done that. i am sort of ready to hear, like, a cash for clunkers speech. >> the question is -- what is

doable? i agree partly with what you're saying. you think of the state of the union as the president's big chance, the one time he has people that. the degree of difficulty this time around seems to be so much higher because he is in the chamber that everybody hates and that no one believes is going to come together in any way to get something done. >> he knew the job was dangerous when he took it. his job is to be president and lead. i find myself here advising with barack obama and agreeing with the mayor of chicago -- [laughter] >> [inaudible] >[laughter] >> whenever the mayor says, i am with. i am going to draw you a map of the next election. this is a country that always thought tomorrow would be better than today. as david just said, now we feel we are slightly over the hump

and staring down this perilous decline. it is a big-time, a big election about big things. you have the candidate, the secretariat of hope and vision. this is the guy who does it better than anybody. he was elected on that. any campaign that is not the strips his greatest gift but more important misses the huge prevailing dynamic, which i think people are hungry for, "with my eyes over the horizon again. tell me that this country is not headed over the press of this, but that there is a new global economic front tear out their." there is a threat from mars. when there is a threat from mars, it is not hard to unite the people of earth. we have a new global frontier, a new economic frontier, and we have got to compete out there. everybody sign up. we will have to do this. that is as good an excuse as you can have for bipartisanship and all kinds of things.

has he gone too far left in his campaign? has he polarized enough? have republicans gone too far right? that option is not available. that is a political calculation that i think the obama campaign has to way or already has made. >> if the republicans have gone a represented 20% of the country, then you should represent 80% of the country, and what i see is him represent the opposite 20%. i think he needs to understand what moment we are in. we are in a moment where entrepreneurship is in decline. china has got its mojo. americans overwhelmingly feel we had something we are losing. there is a vague sense of that. we do not quite know what it is. they have a complete this trust that government can get anything done. they want somebody to shake that. i think you run a campaign where you take some from colorado a and colorado -- column a and colum b and jam it altogether.

that is absolute teddy roosevelt would have done. >> but talking about those individual ideas i think is part of it. you want to show that you are not a polarizing president. you do not want to say you are not a polarizing president. we have heard, cassette and let's bring the country together. we have heard it is not read states and blue states, it is united states. we have heard that. show it. the way you do that is by concrete, granular ideas that do not make people hate each other. you have to be specific in order to do that. >> i think we are, as i said, at an inflection point. you need an inspirational -- you are the president, you are the leader. i am not buying a ticket to the cash for clunkers speech. i am not doing that. the pieces, which is interesting -- you are giving the governing strategy, not the campaign

strategy. the government is the pieces that fill in the mosaic and make it accomplish of all. the problem the president has is that in running against congress, the checkmate were nothing else gets done, it undermines his inspirational, "here is what we're going to do. that is the problem. what he has to do governing-wise -- >> do you think there is any option but to run against congress? >> they are playing the role, which at the state of the union, you will get 57 million people. i would not make it a cash for clunkers speech. i would make it about the agenda for the next four years because people need that. they have to know what your vision is. it is your one last opportunity unbuilded, the sites your speech at the convention. you will not get that again. i would not make it a walk away checklist. the governing part is -- it runs

against the grain undermining what i think will be the rhetoric and the need of the campaign. the campaign is going to have to figure out, between the white house and the campaign, how to make the congress do a few things to illustrate this vision of the second term so it will not look like, feel like the first term. that is going to be difficult. [inaudible] >> i have a dear friend who you know at the "washington post." we both really admire barack obama, but we admire entirely different people. ej likes the liberal party. i like the transcendent

university of chicago barack obama. >> [unintelligible] >> [unintelligible] [laughter] [applause] so who is -- i have come to the conclusion that ej is right. i was sort of snookered. >> i think your analysis is more about you and ej then it is about the president. i mean that seriously. i think that's -- look, the president is -- i think he is exactly who you thought he was and exactly ej's, and i do not think they are at odds the way you guys see it. i used to say this about president clinton.

moderate voters locked in on him because they saw nafta, balanced budget, welfare reform. the base locked in on bill clinton because they saw a guy raised by a single mom on the other side of the tracks, and they all came at him for different reasons. that is not differ about ronald reagan, who put a very interesting coalition together that never sat together at the table. every president has people of different takes come to them and lock in on different things. i do not see that at all contradictory. if anything, i see it as a success of a good public servant, from a political standpoint. >> debased came back to bill clinton, in large measure, because of his enemy. will that be enough to get the democrat party excited again about barack obama in november? simply running against mitt romney? >> i think campaigns do matter. i think it depends on how mitt romney runs.

if he runs the way he has been, that will excite people. it is interesting -- i talk to people will consider themselves to be based obama voters, and i hear from them a lack of excitement, but i talk to professional democrats, and they say they are not worried at all about the base or about the excitement. that is not my anecdotal experience. just from my life moving through the circles that i move through. it is that i do here some depression in terms of the level of enthusiasm, but i do not know whether it translates into whether or not these people will stay home. all of these things are intangible until the ec with the turnout numbers are like, but it is also relative. it does not matter if there is not much democratic enthusiasm if there is no republican enthusiasm, either, and we're not seeing that yet. >> i do not know that i agree with that. on occasion, political professionals are the last to know. [laughter] the excitement that the last campaign, that barack obama intended in this country -- let's face fact -- that is

unique. that does not happen all the time. the first black president of the united states. it is not nearly as exciting when you lose your virginity the second time. [laughter] that is, i think, "ok, we have done that. it is going to be very hard to duplicate it, especially with a transcendent die not taking you anywhere. when the ship is dead in the water and he is saying, "we are running out of supplies. i have to take from you to get for me." de kansas speech. as opposed to, "we are going to go over here. there is a better place, and it will be better for everyone." he is just not running an exciting campaign. it is a pessimistic campaign. >> can i go out of turn and talk again? then i will shut up for a long time. i think one thing we are not appreciating is how little liberal politics plays in most

people's lives. politics is not something that most people do as a hobby. it is something that exists as sort of a civic obligation or maybe a little bit of entertainment alongside everything else going on in their lives. part i think what has happened and that we need to understand about how people your political messages now is that the republicans and, more specifically, the conservatives, have won the framing and messaging battle on whether or not politicians are scumbags and whether or not government is worth anything and whether or not policy can do anything and whether or not you can expect anything from the work of public servants to make your life any better. there is a deep cynicism that government can do anything, and the framing affects everything they hear from politicians on both sides. that is why i want granular, can do it was a work, believe in it, again. i think that creates it plans on which inspiration can give its next speech. we have sort of given in to the idea that there is nothing good

to get out of government, and that needs to be contested by any democrat running, but particularly by the president. >> that is why i think republicans think this is a threat from mars election because it is actually about what kind of government we are going to have. here we are at a perilous. running out of money. government is not working well. are we moving from the industrial age of government where it is a machine to the communications age where we have to reinvent this thing bottom- up, get power out of three smart guys in a room in washington? does government 20 years from now need to look more like this book and less like the army? that is, i think, the opportunity that obama is missing. that is why i think government is in disrepute. because it is broken. it does not work. it is old. it obama loses, i think it will be because he covered all. >> the guy getting 20% in every primary is the guy who says we

ought not have government at all. that is the state of respect for governance. >> i think the case republicans have not made well is there is a better way. it cannot look like this. i think you are right about that. we have to push power and money out -- it cannot be ford motor company 50 years ago. we have to reinvent this thing. >> the problem is we have -- and part of this has now gone to the governing. i think the world has changed and conventional wisdom has not caught up on this. it used to be divided government would produce stuff here the most productive part of government was actually government by one party, first of all your years of george bush. i do not agree with it, but getting things done, doing what they said they would do, most productive time for president obama, first two years. the notion that people said divided government was what you needed, that has changed.

we are now -- you want something to happen, actually the markets want something to happen, you need a party in power. what happens is the public reacts against it as you saw in 2006, 2008, 2010. parties overshoot the runway. the public recoils from what they have done. but the time in which you get action is not from divided government, but from government made up of one party. that is why when you think about what you can do, when you have divided government, you are getting really short -- >> there is no question that has been true, but i wonder if we are actually heading into a new phase. if you look at the fact that you are hitting three deadlines next december and january, another debt limit, tax cuts expire, automatic spending cuts go into effect, and there is no choice -- whoever is in power, republican, democrat, president -- congress will have to deal

with all three at exactly the same time. >> that is why i am happened to be mayor. [laughter] >> i wonder if you almost will need divided government in order to make it work because the decisions have to be made. >> i think in general, in academic sense, the decisions have to be made by two from each party in the room cutting a deal and imposing it on everyone else. that is the only way the big spending and deficit decisions will be made. no party is going to do it on their own. in essence, you are right. the reason i am pessimistic and why i think we will have a big fiscal crisis is we do not have parties capable of doing that. american history over the last half century as we had an era of democratic dominance and an era of republican dominance and then a tide era in the 1990's where it was basically 50/50, and this political scientist at this theory that the sun party and

the moon party, there is always one party that is the son, and the moon party just reflects its light. now, we had two moon parties. each party represents 30%, and having that minority mindset gives them a very different psychology and the party hoping to become a majority party. internal cohesion is much more important. the ability to compromise is much harder. the intellectual information flows are much more insular. so all those things mitigate against the idea that you will have the sort of grand compromise. >> i think we really came close to it with boehner and obama, but it is precisely because the republican party in general -- >> you said early on that you wished the president would have pushed both senses, but is that not essentially what he did when trying to get a deal? >> i guess in a secret room, he did. i spent a lot of time on the phone with people trying to understand what was being

offered. it is a you have two minority parties, i have this other party representing 20% or 30% of the country and i will be 80%, that means i have to be out there with a plan. i am president of united states. i am publicly embracing them, saying they do not agree with everything, but traveling around the country hammering out something like this together as americans. this is what i ran on. we all know this is a problem. we all know growing debt is a moral shame on the country. and that they're dealing with it. i think that is a 60% decision rigid position. >> come december, to add a complication to the brew of the limits is what if the voters in the decision in november give a mixed decision? >> i think that is most likely. >> we can at this at the presidential, but i think you can for sure assume you are

getting a mixed decision in the house and senate. i think the presidential will be close, and i think it has been mixed. i happen to think the problem will get stalled because situations like that lend themselves in a moment for focusing the mine because you have to. i think in a bizarre way, if boehner is still speaker, they are losing seats because in 2010, they had too much real estate, and the public is recoiling. he will be liberated in a way that he was not eight months ago. >> the image of him liberated. >> to the point about losing your virginity twice -- still trying to figure out how you can do that. i am trying to get my head around it. >> the first time was hard enough. lafayette -- [laughter]

>> you went to the university of chicago? >> we are all here trying to help the university. >> i want to ask each of you a quick -- not quite yes or no, but i will start with you, alex. your particular expertise, hispanic vote for mitt romney, probably one of his biggest problems, assuming he gets the nomination, hard for him to win unless he gets above 40% of the hispanic vote. has run a primary campaign where it seems to have turned off a good portion of the hispanic electorate. how does he fix that? >> for a party that as a whole has a huge problem with hispanics, we have rubio, sandoval, martinez -- we seem to be doing well for a party doing so poorly. how do we fix it? a lot of it is tone.

but monday, illegal immigration is a problem. we have laws for a reason. this is a country with strong hands but big hearts. in 20 years, we will not have an immigration problem in this country. we will need to be hanging help wanted signs on the border. as soon as you start talking about what this country needs to produce to support social security -- i have never been able to deal with the immigration problem in a box. when you get into a box and say, a cassette in those people are ,", you cannotb litigate your way out of that year the only way to solve the problem is the way george bush did it, you knock the walls of the box down. that is what i think republicans need to do. we are missing and obama. we're missing that optimistic vision. that is why immigrants come here. then a different question -- should the president fear or welcome a third-party

challenger, and will he get one? >> on the right or left? >> that is my question. >> he will not get one from the left. i think the left would be alive anyone who challenged obama. it would be somebody from the right or somebody from space, like dr. paul. [laughter] i mean, metaphorically speaking. when you talk about where ron paul's politics are in our existing policy, they are something from space, something that defies left/right, and therefore, confounds all traditional political analysis right now. i think it is absolutely not impossible that ron paul will run third party. i do not know which side he will take the most votes from. it is not a ross perot-style candidacy. >> i agree with what you said, that the left will beat anybody and bit them from limb to limb that they challenge the president, which is why earlier

when you said i think the left is disenchanted with the president is not right. they will rise to the battle cry of the president. i think his problem is in a poll of voters, but i think you drill down from battle but states, it is not the same as national. the left is going to be with the president because they know the consequences and the price of the selection. your statement that if someone tried to challenge him from the left, it would rid him from them to them, that is correct. >> i think they will defend him, but i do not think that is enough to get people who otherwise would not vote to get up and vote for him. >> another problem is ballot access in all 50 states. they are like me, middlebrow, what bowles-simpson. i would get younger versions of ralph nader and pat buchanan.

i think it is a huge market for chicago -- no, for a down market. pull everybody home abroad, and then just rock, social conservatism and economic populism. i think there is a market for that. >> the perfect third-party candidate is we should take americans elect and give this country what it really needs -- experienced leadership that will add to the phone at 3:00 a.m. -- hillary clinton. "just trying to help began laughing -- just trying to help." [laughter] i think this is less about it more rigid mitt romney and more about the president. in his three years -- just take last year -- there has been 1.7 million private-sector jobs created, the most since 2006. you would not know it, though,

based on feeling. he has never had a long run. it has come in spurts. you get four months, you get the surprise on the 200,000 -- we have this panel right now, four months from now, after the heel of four months of consistent, above average, above expectations, 190,000, 200,000, 220,000 -- the fever will be broken. they will have a consistency that gives a dynamic to the race that is totally different. i think mr. fix it as a message will fall totally flat, and what he has missed since day one is a level of consistency of good news on the economy. the big trouble he has got, in my view, is iran and how that could play out. he has a right here on jobs, on job creation, less about unemployment, and i think if we

had this panel four months from now with that played out, we would have an absolutely differ discussion about the president. >> do you think the conflict is an automatic - in an election? it does nothat's mean it has to be. it has the biggest impact on the economy and foreign policy. it brings foreign policy into a campaign. >> $5 gas in the summer. >> you are somewhat -- but not want to say baked into the assumption, but europe is what it is and we had dealt with it. iran is a different situation. europeans feel differ about the united states and this president, so different motivations. >> i want to get questions from the audience. one from the balcony that does not have a name on it. do you believe audiences in a

precedent -- televised president to debate deter from the overall effectiveness of the debate and distort the candidates' views by clapping, boeing, etc., and create better ratings for partisan networks -- by , etc.?g, boeinoing >> i think audiences are good and we should have larger audiences. i decide to have a good fight in the roman coliseum without an audience. this democracy thing is a little messy and ugly at times on both sides, but it would be hard to do it without people. true on both sides, the people who move primaries and caucuses on both sides are, of course, the extremes on both ends. so you get intense passion from those folks. i think overall, the debates, though they have ground most of our candidates into dust, except for perhaps newt gingrich, who is harder