nye north, women-owned businesses of the available contracts under this particular commission and report to congress. just this morning, before i flew to washington, i had a room full of small, minority and women-owned businesses clamoring to understand how to interact with the federal government. in fact, one particular woman-owned business stood up and said they have been certified for however long and never could get any information how to access opportunities that could be utilized by their small business to create jobs. . this amendment would help to ensure that a small part of the business community is reached. it is imperative they are aware of the existence of contracts and imperative that the process of obtaining a business contract is clear. and along with other appropriate federal agencies have a

campaign. i believe there should be accountability as to which firms are receiving these lucrative contracts and a system of monitoring. everyone has said on the floor of the house, bipartisan, republicans and democrats, we are for small businesses. so am i. i want them thriving, surviving, growing and getting the information. this amendment, which is a sense of congress, i believe, gives them an opportunity to play on an equal playing field. we know what will happen with the commission. that those who have always known to access the system will be in front of the line. let's give these small companies an opportunity to also achieve their dreams and aspirations for the american dream. i reserve my time. and i ask my colleagues to support my amendment. the chair: the gentlelady

reserves. any one claim time in opposition? the gentlelady from texas is recognized. ms. jackson lee: let me just say that the evidence of how important this language is is by way of a group in texas that were able to secure by legislation the gentlelady from the district of columbia excellent -- now this group of veterans are making a productive site and a productive part of our local community. that evidences what we can secure with this knowledge. i yield back my time. the chair: the gentlelady yields back. all time has expired. the question is on the amendment offered by the gentlelady from texas. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. in the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it and the amendment

is agreed to. the chair understands that amendment 5 will not be offered. it is now in order to consider amendment number 6 printed in house report 112-385. for what purpose does the gentleman from missouri radio rise? mr. carnahan: i have an amendment at the desk. the clerk: amendment offered by mr. carnahan of mr. missouri. the chair: the gentleman from missouri, mr. carnahan, and member opposed will each control five minutes. the chair recognizes the gentleman from missouri. mr. carnahan: i add my voice to encouraging our chairman, ranking member to continue to work together to find that common ground. i know they have worked on this, but obviously more work to be done and i want to encourage that. only way we are going to get things done in this house.

so, i want to thank the chairman and ranking member for their work on the committee and on this bill i want to thank the high performance building caucus that i have worked with, that has helped focus on management on our bill's environment. the amendment that i offer tonight will ensure that the federal government makes better decisions in the construction or leasing of federal facilities, decisions that save taxpayer dollars. the u.s. federal government manages a large inventory of 429,000 buildings with a total of 3.34 billion worldwide. as we know, buildings are resource-intensive accounting for 40% of energy use in the u.s., 12% of water consumption and 60% of nonindustrial waste.

federal facilities account for 0.4% of the nation's energy usage. with such a large energy footprint and related cost, it is only common sense that the federal government understand the short and long-term cost. my amendment is ensures that future construction and lease projects reflect the best use of federal dollars and greatest value for taxpayers. my amendment does this by requiring the use of life cycle cost analysis. and the project is receiving at least 50% federal funding. life cycle cost analysis is the most accurate method for assessing the total cost of facility ownership and takes costs of acquiring, owning and disposing of a building or building system. it is an assessment of a project instead of looking at the

immediate up-front cost and will provide encouragement of the facilities that provide the best results for the lowest overall costs. the process of life-cycle analysis makes for sound fiscal analysis while allowing our building planners to account for the full long-term costs of projects. life-cycle budgeting ensures we make the best decisions and get the most value when it comes to our infrastructure. we know that it can be marginally more expensive to construct an energy-efficient facility. but over the long-term, the same facility saves money in energy and water costs that actually make the building a better investment. my amendment will ensure that federal agencies have the complete picture and understand ongoing budgetary obligations when considering construction or

leasing of facilities. agencies should use this tool to consider the total cost of ownership of their buildings, including long-term operating life cycle costs. this amendment requires federal agencies to use life cycle cost analysis of the overall spending on design, destruction and scrks and maintenance to rereflect the best use of agency funds. i thank my colleagues for recognizing the importance of this issue and i resevere the balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman reserves. the gentleman from california. mr. denham: i would like to claim the time in opposition even though i'm not opposed to the amendment. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for five minutes. mr. denham: i thank the gentleman for his work on this amendment. just as we saw the other amendment pass through on a voice vote, making both amendments making language into

the bill. that could have been done a couple of other times tonight. we want to make sure there are a bipartisan bill and get rid of waste and run a more efficient government. but specifically on this amendment, i would like to thank the gentleman from missouri for his work on this and this amendment would ensure the general services administration accounts for the total costs in the design or lease of a building. g.s.a. makes decisions that binds the taxpayer to significant obligations and unfortunately, currently g.s.a. analysis doesn't take into account the total life cycle costs. this amendment would correct this and i support the adoption of this amendment. and i will yield back. the chair: the gentlelady from

texas. ms. jackson lee: i have known the gentlelady from the -- if you would, the district of columbia and i see a lot of come ti and college yalt. and mr. carnahan said something that struck my con sense and that is we are able to master this legislative process that allows us to negotiate into the moment we might get this on the floor which i understand might be tomorrow. i would encourage whatever is possible to do, mr. denham, have gotten to know you and whatever is possible, you mentioned the possibility of language, reconciliation. i cannot speak for the gentlelady from district of columbia, but she keeps her word and loves this capital of what she represents and has a deep

and abiding concern about the homeless and obviously this issue of the use of property. i only entreat you to see what is possible as you have zwated dwighted on the floor of this evening and i would encourage there be further discussions if you can secure that opportunity. i think both would be able to hopefully have dialogue. i want my high respect and leadership for her leadership on this issues. i yield back to the gentleman from california. mr. denham: reclaiming my time. i support the amendment. look forward to a bipartisan support on the bill tomorrow morning. this is something that taxpayers need. this is something that will help us reduce our debt and republicans and democrats can work on something on a bipartisan level and give something back to the president that he is asking for you. i yield back. the chair: the gentleman yields

back the balance of his time. the gentleman from missouri is recognized. mr. carnahan: i want to thank the gentleman for his remarks and the ranking member has asked for the remaining one minute of our time and i yield to our ranking member. ms. norton: i support the carnahan amendment and i want to indicate what i -- what the agreement was in the bill, we would have a bill that democrats and republicans would support. what we have here is a bill that are somehow that republicans are divided on and democrats are expected to carry over the finish line. if in fact this bill had come as a base bill, i think he would have democrats in larger numbers supporting this bill. whatever republicans wanted to do with the fact that the base

bill did not always conform to exactly what they would have wanted would have been made up on my side. and i thank the gentleman for yielding. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. all time has expired. the question is on the amendment offered by the gentleman from missouri. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. in the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it and the amendment is agreed to. >> i ask that the committee do now rise. the chair: the question is on the motion that the committee do now rise. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. in the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it and the motion is adopted, and accordingly, the

committee rises. the speaker pro tempore: mr. chairman. the chair: mr. speaker, the committee of the whole house in the state of the union having had under consideration h.r. 1734 directs me to report that they have come to no resolution thereon. the speaker pro tempore: the committee has had under consideration h.r. 1734 and has come to no resolution thereon. the chair will now entertain requests for one-minute speeches. the chair lays before the house the following personal requests.

the clerk: leaves of absence requested for ms. burkle of new york for today, mr. cly born of south carolina for today, mr. engel of new york for today, mr. linch of massachusetts for today, mr. poe of texas for today, mr. reyes of texas for today, mr. van hollen of maryland for today. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the requests are granted. under the speaker's announced policy of january 5, 2011, the the gentlewoman from virgin islands, ms. christensen is recognized as the designee of the minority leader. mrs. christensen: thank you, mr. speaker. this evening, the congressional black caucus is pleased to have a few minutes of special order time to again come back to the

issue of voter protection. as we know, many states have either passed laws restricting voter participation in elections or are in the process of doing so. and these are attacks as we said last week, have taken many forms. did expanding the ban that prevents felons from voting, cutting election administration budgets, curtailing early voting, eliminating same-day registration and i have to say two members of the congressional black caucus, keith ellison and gwen moore, introduced just in november, a bill that would protect those rights and restore same-day registration and also same-day voter registration and improve the voter access to --

voter access protection act is the name of the legislation and the laws that curtail early voting and eliminate same-day registration. some of these laws intimidate voter registration groups and the states are imposing strict i.d. requirements, creating barriers requiring getting the i.d. and barriers to students voting where they attend school. . tonight i'm going to be joined by several members including sheila jackson lee from texas to again begin to raise the country's awareness of some of the voting restrictions that are being put in place across this country and to let the public know that the congressional black caucus, just as we did last year, go across the country

to raise the country's awareness of the need for jobs and actually having job fairs where we actually put people to work in several cities across this country. we matched people that were out of work with jobs and we're still waiting for this congress to pass job legislation, the american jobs act, and many of the other pieces of legislation that the c.b.c. and other members have put forth. but this time we're going to go across the country and focus on protecting the rights of americans to vote. and at this time i'd yield such time as she might consume to congresswoman sheila jackson lee of texas. ms. jackson lee: let me thank congresswoman christensen for her leadership and as well our chairman, emanuel cleaver. we had the opportunity to host him in houston this past weekend and he raised the issue of the challenges of the issue of voting protection. isn't it interesting in this month, to my colleagues and i

see that we're joined by our colleague from ohio, marcy capture, who has been a champion on these -- kaptur, who has been a champion on these issues as well and has seen her state being in the crosshairs of protecting all citizens' right to vote. the voting rights act is an act that dignyifies all voters. because its premises that one person, one vote. and if the tenants and the premises of the voting rights act is passed, no matter what your background in this nation, you have an opportunity to vote. if we keep with the integrity of the voting rights act, the gist of its message, don't block individuals from voting. that's simply what its message is. and this is more than appropriate to rise to the floor today because this is the month of the birth of barbara jordan,

february 21. last year was her 75th year. we're still commemorating it in houston. but she was, again, part mother of the voting rights act by adding language minorities. by doing that she stred the coverage of the voting -- she spread the coverage of the voting rights act beyond the deep south which was the original core group of states that were signed into law in 1965. so i say thank you to the honorable barbara jordan, one of our colleagues and a member of the congressional black caucus and stand here today to reject any undermining of the legislative intent and the coming together of republicans and democrats that voted for that extension at the time she was in the united states congress. now we come some more than 30 years later when we re-authorize the voting rights act in 2007, there was a lot of rumors that

thought that we were extinguishing the voting rights act. in fact, i want to put on notice all of our colleagues that the voting rights act is always in essence in the crosshairs, in jeopardy, when i say that, for people who believed wrongly about the voting rights act. the voting rights act of protecting voter rights again is to make sure that seniors, to make sure that the disabled, to make sure that those who face hardships -- as we recall there were enormous hardships during hurricane katrina when the citizens of new orleans were literally blocked from voting just because of the infrastructure collapse. in the terrible conditions in alabama and missouri with tornados. i recall the infrastructure of the 2004 election in ohio when a late and dear colleague that

worked so hard along with marcy kaptur, stephanie tubbs jones, to thwart the breakdown of machines. we came to the floor, we took issue with the election because how all of a you is sudden you have breakdown of voting machines interestingly enough in the minority community. so this issue of voter protection is far reaching. it is not necessarily as clear cut as someone would like to say. it's for those people, it's not for those people. in fact, it is for all americans. and right now we have a dilemma. the dilemma is that we have an epidemic, some 40 states have passed what we call voting i.d. -- voter i.d. texas has happens to be one of those states. ohio was one of those states and i'm not going to give mrs. kaptur's comment bus i do want to congratulate ohio for the

work they did and she will tell you, it was in the crosshairs again, i use that frequently, it was conflicted but it has been relieved and she will, i'm sure, address that. but there are other states who now are subjected to the oppressive, depressive voter i.d. law, in the instance of the state of texas, might i say, that state allows you to use your gun license to vote but a student state-issued i.d. cannot be used. elderly people now have to travel miles, many of them born with midwives, missing birth certificates as my mother, who held on to her voting card that she legitimately got to the end of her life, but could not vote today because try as we may, for

ida jackson to find her birth certificate, we went halfway around the world and were still not able to secure a certified copy of her birth certificate. i knew she was born because she lived. then i had seniors in my own district in a wheelchair where they went with their family members to the sites of where they're to get their voter i.d., waiting long hours. right now in the state of texas congresswoman -- state of texas, congresswoman, we don't have an election date. we don't even know what to tell our constituents about getting a voter i.d. because, thank goodness, if i might say, we're now presently being reviewed by the department of justice whether to preclear or not preclear this voter i.d. law. i hope that truth will prevail, that it is depressive oppressive. so i am very grateful that the congressional black caucus will

be traveling to cities in a variety of regions of this nation including our southwest region to argue vigorously for voter protection and for ensuring the protection of all people's right to vote. i hope as we experience in 2010 that the king street patriots who plagued our inner city precincts, many of whom i saw, will not intimidate our voters. i hope that when the selection comes for poll watchers and others that come into our voting areas, minority and poor areas, people who have the right to vote, that we will be there protecting everyone's right to vote. let me be very clear, poor is not a respective color. it impacts all. and poor people who have a difficulty in going somewhere to get a voter i.d. and some states paying $40, a new poll tax, or

can't get off work, that's voter protection, you would imagine that there are people who work who are afraid to ask their bosses for their allotted time off for them to be able to vote. our efforts, the congressional black caucus, joined with our colleagues, is going to stand up for each and every american. i am glad that president johnson, a texan, i was just marveling at him today, and his daughter, lucy banes johnson, joined us when we honored barbara jordan's 75th birthday just a few months ago. we'll continue that with additional commemorations but the key is loving the right to vote, protecting the right to vote, supporting the voting rights act is not irrespective of color. we welcome everyone who will accept the fact that it is our birth right as citizens to be able to not be thwarted and stopped and blocked from going

to a poll and expressing your right to democracy. finally let me say, i had the privilege of working for the southern christian leadership conference and i might say, it wasn't that long ago. it was some years ago. but it wasn't that long ago. and my friends, let me tell you, as i traveled throughout georgia, south carolina, north carolina, alabama, mississippi, the core states, among others, that started out with dr. king's great march and great effort to push this congress and this president toward recognizing how many people were left out of the right to vote, as a worker for the southern christian leadership conference in the 1970's and beyond, i would go into places where people of african-american dissent were -- descent were frightened to vote, were not registered to vote, were sharecroppers on plantations and i venture to say that there are crises in

communities like that even today. and for us to go into those places was almost as if we were creating an overthrow of the government. i remember very distinctly and i state on this floor, going up to a leaning, shanty building, which was the place where these sharecroppers and others who lived in the area were supposed to be voting, the voting booth was a, if you will, a ragged cloth covering an area that you allegedly were going to vote in. sitting on the front porch of this tattered general store was a gentleman sitting with a rifle across his lap. to sioux suggest no one is welcome here -- to suggest no one is welcome here. when i went up with my then rather young self, starry-eyed and trying to ask if this was the voting site, all i could hear my colleague say is, run,

he has a gun, and the next thing i heard as we were bending down behind cars, something i had never heard, that close to me, is shots ringing out. this is not a joke. this is not something we don't take seriously. i'll never forget that day for as long as i live. that someone would block anyone from coming to a place sacred and somber place to cast a vote for a person of their choosing. i want to thank the gentlelady for allowing me to participate and to recognize that this fight is a fight that we should never give up and we should never be categorized, that voting rights is something about those minorities. voting rights are american rights and they're invested in the declaration of independence that starts out by saying, we all are created equal, with certain inalienable rights of life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness. with that i will yield back the

balance of my time, closing in saying, voting rights is part of the pursuit of happiness. i yield back to the gentlelady. mrs. christensen: i thank you for coming and making that very strong presentation and for sharing that story with us that let's us know that not so very long ago people were really blocked from voting and took their lives in their hands to just try to exercise that simple right, the right to vote. i'd like to now yield such time as she might consume to our colleague from ohio, congresswoman marcy kaptur. ms. kaptur: i want to thank dr. christensen for holding this very, very important special order as we begin black history month here in the united states. and say how proud i am to serve with her. her backbreaking work in health care, leading us for coverage for all, to congresswoman sheila jackson lee, i had not heard that story, what she personally has lived and helped push

america forward to a new day. it is nye distinct pleasure and honor to be here with them tonight. i wanted to participate in this special order because of what we are going through in texas and ohio, in florida, around this country, with redistricting. and it's true that ohio, because population hasn't grown, has to lose two seats. but we have seen a redistricting like none other. and i wanted to put some of this on the record because i think scott scolers around the country and young people -- scholars around the country and young people studying could really take a look at what has happened in this recent redistricting that i think has a subtle and very insidious agenda that isn't immediately apparent to the eye. i had a woman come up to me yesterday in a church in ohio and she said to me, congresswoman, she happened to be african-american woman, she said, i want to ask you a question, congresswoman. why is my voting location changed all the time? why is my precinct slipped all

the time? and i said, you know, madam chairman, i said, i know something is going on that isn't good here and ohio was never technically a voting rights state, but there's something strange and i thought i would put on the record some of what's strange about what's happening in ohio. individuals like herself constantly have to go to a different precinct. she never moved her house. she lives in the same place. a lot of people maybe don't realize that their precinct has been changed and some percent of people will not go to the other precinct. it may be a small percent, it may be .02%, but you add that up around a state that votes 50/50 and you begin to see a falloff in voting. i can tell you this and i wish to place this on the nation's record tonight, for every republican congress member from ohio who sits here and they have

the majority, 13 out of 18, their home county was kept whole. . every single one. for every democrat, five of us, their home county was crashed and broken into parts. every urban county, the five of us, there is one that has been split into four parts. lucas is missing its western half. akron, go down to that county, one of the largest cities in ohio, sliced in half. what do those places have all in common? all urban areas. mixed populations. they like people who aren't like themselves. they like the diversity of life. those communities have been hacked apart in ohio. our colleague, congresswoman

sutoven, her 42% of the present simbs in her district are broken. that means booth workers can make mistakes. more than one member of congress is running in that district, so many as three are running in the same precinct. do you realize how much confusion, even if everybody has i. q. of a kazillion. booth workers will make mistakes and just like the woman i mentioned whose precinct keeps changing, there is a certain percentage of error involved in that and happening in the democratic areas. not the republicans. i would ask those who are listening to us tonight, peeling

apart places like texas and ohio and the type of jerry me and deering, communities are being hacked apart. doesn't palmer, ohio have a right to be its own city. it's hard enough to get things done. we have so many people losing their homes. all kinds of problems in this country with unemployment, but we make it harder, we make it harder for communities to hold together. there seems to be something un-american about that and something very ugly and insidious when it pulls people apart. we have a republican from the other side of the oil. do you know how many counties they put in his district? 20 out of 88.

that means 60 county commissioners. can you imagine how many mayors? unbelievable. this makes no sense, but it's what happened. and i'm very concerned, as my colleaguesr about what happens to people who are elderly, who can't travel far, who sometimes have trouble seeing. and as you start switching things around and make it more difficult and they print the absentee ballots, but you need a magnifying glass to see the letters when we know the population in many of these urban areas, we have a high percentage of senior citizens. there is something very un-american and unfriendly about what is going on here and it makes me think about the voting rights act and maybe

strengthening it and looking at urban areas that are being broken up in very, very strange ways. you can't even explain -- the lines don't make any sense. it is like they are shattering communities of interest. something really wrong about that. and i wanted to say to congresswoman christensen, in ohio we have had a lot of great african americans and i had the opportunity to seemb with them here and i would like to say the names. and if you give me an extra minute. one of the individuals i would like to talk about is a great writer, tony more ison, a woman, who was born in ohio in the ninth congressional district and we know how important black history month is because it's a time of the year to reflect and be grateful for the countless contributions of african

americans like ms. morrison who made enduring contributions to world history. this year's theme is black women in american culture in history and i would say this woman is proud to join my colleagues of color and say that i'm glad it's all women down here for the moment because our voices need to be magnified and ms. morrison did that. we, in honoring women, honor her. she is exactly the type of person we should be recognizing given this black history month's theme for her work in american literature. she is a pull itser prize winner and first black woman to win the first prize making her the 90th nobel lawyer yet.

and she didn't come from the places known as the cultural meccas and came from a tough place where people work hard for a living and born during the great depression in that working class city and ms. morrison showed an interest in literature at an early age. and received degrees from howard university here and cornell and taught at texas southern university, howard university, yale and trins ton. her contributions to american history come from her six novels and during her ceremony, the permanent secretary of the college said her depictions of the world of black people, tony marcheson has given the african american people their history back. let us recognize the history of tony morrison during this

month's black history month. while the united states is facing challenges, it is incumbent to make sure that the work of others do not go unnoticed. i just wanted to mention also she pened a story about a girl from her childhood. i happen to have blue eyes. i never thought about that and she said this was the basis of her first novel, "the blew eyes" published in 1970. i always wanted curly hair and i never really had it. we learn from one another and we appreciate from one another and in conclusion, let me say i wish to place on the record from "the cleveland plain dealer," recognizing the great african americans. there are a few of whose names.

langston hughes. stephanie tubbs jones and i miss her until today. i have her picture in my office, halle berry, first african american to win an academy award. mayor stokes, cleveland, ohio. we are so proud of that and i was proud to serve with his brother, louis stokes, who preceded me. i could go on, mr. speaker. but i have to say i'm proud to be from ohio, one of the states that was always a free state, home of the underground railroad and people disembarked and escaped for their lives to places like canada through northern ohio and through the communities i'm privileged to represent now and i'm proud to

stand with dr. christensen in honoring all americans and what they have taught us over our september tries about full representation and the decent and fair treatment of people. what a legacy they have given and continue to create for our country. i thank the gentlelady for yielding this evening. mrs. christensen: we appreciate you pointing out some of the inconsistents that are occurring in ohio and paying tribute to tone -- tony morrison. we have a gentleman joining us and that is congressman al green of texas, a leader in his area in the naacp for many years and leader in the congress and a leader of our country. thank you for joining us. mr. green: thank you very much

for yielding time to me. i greatly appreciate it. and i want to thank all of the members of the c.b.c. for the stellar work that has been done in this area of publishing the history of africans in the americas known as african americans. i would like to tonight address a very simple topic that has a lot of meaning. the whole notion that great people will always rise to the occasion. however, it takes great people to make the occasion. and on occasions such as this, we often mention the great ones, the great thurgood marshal, the great litigator that he was, winning more than 29 cases i believe, before the united states supreme court of america. but in talking about the cases that he won, approximately 29 is what i recall, we also should

remember that there were other persons who helped to make the occasion for the great thurgood marshall who became a justice on the united states supreme court of america. one is charles hamilton houston. he was the person who produced the strategy that the honorable thurgood marshall followed to help the naa crmp p litigate the cases that went before the supreme court, more specifically, brown versus board of education and there is a story about thurgood that people are not aware of. he applied to the university of maryland, law school at the university of maryland and was denied access because of his color. and i'm not angry with the university of maryland.

as a matter of fact, it was because they rejected him that he went to howard university, where he met the honorable charles hamilton houston. and it was there that their friendship blossomed that thurgood acquired intelligence about the strategy to use the constitution and litigation to bring about a more perfect union. the interesting story, however, is not complete unless we go on to talk about how thurgood, who graduated at the top of his class, went on to practice law. and one of his first cases involved a person who was denied access to the university of maryland. he won that lawsuit. so history has a way of causing persons who have been rejected to have the opportunity to make a difference in the lives of other persons who may be similarly situated. i'm so honored that thurgood

marshall became chief litigator for the naacp, but all of this was predicated upon him having a great relationship with another person who made headway and did not necessarily make the same kind of headlines, the charles hamilton houston. we talked billion rosa parks and how she took a seat that ignited a spark of the civil rights movement. and there was another person who took a seat before rosa, handcuffed, took to jail, a 15-year-old girl. her name was claudette covin. she didn't make the headlines. but did make headway that when the honorable rosa parks was arrested, it became a story.

rosa parks was a head of a community and that was no small way to the contribution that she did. and rosa parks wasn't just tired, she was tired in the sense that she was tired of injustice. and she took a stand against injustice because she was tired of injustice. . . the bus boycott didn't end because of the boycott alone. i think that had something to do with it, because it probably helped to shape public been -- opinion. but there were three other females who filed a lawsuit that made its way to the supreme court of the united states of america. rotor, mcdonald and smith. it was that lawsuit that they won, they made headway, they didn't make the lasting headlines, but they made the difference in the montgomery bus boycott. and of course we always talk about dr. king and we should

because he paid the ultimate price, he made the ultimate sacrifice. but we should not forget that before dr. king marched from selma to montgomery there were others who set out to march from selma to montgomery. and they did not make it across -- well, they made it across the bridge, but that was where they met strong resistance from officers who had clubs and they resisted the marchers, they didn't resist them, they actually took them on and they beat them all the way back to the church where they started. i enjoy hearing john lewis tell the story, not because of the suffering but because he tells it in such a way as to cause me to have some degree of appreciation for what they went through on bloody sunday. and how they paid a price. there were many people there on bloody sunday. the honorable john lewis was

among them. they made headway, they med headlines. but their names have not been mentioned and these are the people who made the occasion such that the honorable dr. martin luther king could come to selma and to proceed with the march that eventually took them from selma to montgomery. made headway, didn't always make headlines. but they made a great contribution. and of course we know of the honorable barack obama, first african-american president of the united states of america, who did not get there because of his color. he's president because he's capable, competent and qualified. but before he ran there was a woman who ran, the honorable shirley chisholm. she was the first african-american to run for president from a major political party. she didn't get the nomination of the party but she did run from a major political party. so we should remember that for

every martin king there were persons who were in the shadows, who made a difference. john lewis was one of them. for every thurgood marshall there's a charles hamilton houston who made a difference in the life of a thurgood marshall such that he could go on to do the great things that he did. for every rosa parks there's a person who was in the shadows who made a difference, who helped to make the occasion such that rosa parks could rise to the occasion by taking a seat and igniting a spark that started the civil rights movement. let us remember not only the persons who made the great headlines that we continually recognize but let's remember that there were other persons who made great headway, who don't get the recognition today that they merit but they were a part of this great movement for liberty and justice for african-americans across the length and breadth of this country. and at some point i shall talk

about persons who were of many hues who also participated in this great movement. because we didn't get here by ourselves. there were many persons of many colors who marched and protested, many of them gave their lives to this movement as well. john cherlady comes to mind who was beaten in austin, texas. he lost his life. he was anglo. of course we know about goodman and cheney and shwarner and two of them of course were not african-americans. shwarner and goodman. so i think that on occasions like this we should always celebrate the great and noble african-americans who made great sacrifices, remember those who were in the shadows and also remember that there were others of many hues, of many ethnicities and many religions who were right there with us to help us arrive at this point in our history and i thank you so much for this time, to mention

some of the great ones, and some of those who were great but did not receive the acclaim that they retchly deserved and i -- richly deserved and i thank you again and god bless you and god bless america. mrs. christensen: thank you, thank you, congressman green, and thank you for reminding us of the many unseng heroes and her wins on whose shoulders we also stand today. this is black history month and on many occasions throughout february the congressional black caucus will be here on the floor to talk about some of the ones that we know and those that we don't hear much about. there's a lot of our history that of course we're very proud of, the long march to freedom, the march to the right to vote and today where we now have 43 members of the congressional black caucus. but we also have history that we're not going back to and sheila jackson lee, when she was speaking earlier, reminded us of some of that history. tomorrow the congressional black caucus, going back to the other

topic of our special order, the right to vote and protecting that right to vote, tomorrow the congressional black caucus, led by our chairman, reverend congressman emmanuel cleaver, will be submitted a house resolution condemning the passage of legislation that would unduly burden an american citizen's ability to vote and opposing any state election law or proposed legislation that would have a disproportion impact on vulnerable communities across this country. and when we introduced this, i think this is clearly a resolution that would signify the sense of congress it should be a resolution that every member, republican and democrat, should support, supporting the right of every american citizen to vote freely and to have that vote counted. and we would invite all of the members of the house to join us in that resolution, to become

co-sponsors and to -- we would ask the leadership to bring it to the floor for a vote. again it condemns the passage of legislation that would unduly burden an american citizen's ability to vote and opposes any of those state election laws or proposed laws that would have a disproportion at impact. we know that people of color have been barred from voting. the passage of restriction -- these restrictive voting laws, the resolution reminds us is reminiscent of the jim crow era poll taxes and literacy tests that disenfranchised thousands of african-americans. it also reminds us that these laws do more to suppress the right to vote than to protect our electoral system. there's a lot of talk about these laws being passed and proposed because of fraud in the election system but there's no proof that there is any fraud and so these laws are really about suppressing the right to vote.

with that, mr. speaker, i'm going to -- i'm going to yield back the balance of my time but before i do i'd like to ask unanimous consent that all members may have five legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on this subject of the special order. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, so ordered. mrs. christensen: thank you. thank you, mr. speaker. and thank you, colleagues. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady yields back. thank you.

the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentlelady from the virgin islands rise? ms. norton: mr. speaker, i move -- mrs. christensen: mr. speaker, i move that the house do now adjourn. the speaker pro tempore: the question is on the motion to adjourn. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no.

the ayes have it. the motion is adopted. accordingly the house stands adjourned until 10:00 a.m. tomorrow for morning hour >> a bill making it illegal for members of congress to trade stocks. known as the stock back. it passed with bipartisan support last week. live coverage of the house always here on c-span. republicans have been moving a handful of bills aimed at overhauling the budget process.

first and legislative line-item veto bill. a staff writer for "the hill," on how works. >> line item veto in which the president would be able to strike individual provisions and preparations bills that was ruled unconstitutional by the supreme court in the 1990's. the u.s. constitution has never allowed the president to have that. and instead this bill would create a similar situation where the president could ask congress within 45 days of an appropriations bill that passed to rescind certain items. the request is an up or down vote. it could be filibustered in the senate or blocked. this is a fast-track procedure. that is entitled the line-item

veto back. >> why do supporters say it is necessary? >> that is -- we have a temporary moratorium on earmarks. provenit hasn't impossible to pass a ban on your marks. this came up to ban all your marks and that was defeated. if the president had that ability he could take the earmarks and list them before the senate. with some sunshine on that. and potentially embarrassing members of both houses for putting that in the bill and having those struck. also it would tend to cut down on wasteful spending. you see that a lot in the pentagon. repeatedly, the pentagon asked for certain weapons systems and their preparations to be cancelled or scaled back.

members tend to defend those programs. >> you mentioned the president. he is set to release its annual budget request to congress. how was that expected to be received by lawmakers? >> it will be a political fight. and i and my colleague wrote today's edition, sort of a big rematch of last year's battles between the house republicans and the white house with the budget. basically what we expect is president obama will put more flesh on the bones of his recommendations to the super committee on how to cut $4 billion from the budget. through a combination of new revenue and spending cuts. but it is not going to do much on the long term intimate reform. this is where house republicans will come back with a revised version of their medicare plan which would ultimately offer a type of system for future

seniors. >> a staff writer for the hill. thank you for your time. >> thanks much. colorado holds presidential caucuses tomorrow and there is a prairie in missouri. "road to the white house" coverage continues. a rally for mitt romney in colorado. >> house and senate lawmakers continued negotiation to extend the payroll tax cut for workers. there will continue their work on tuesday. all sides agree it should be extended. >> i do not hear a disagreement in the fiscal -- philosophy that if people get a that enhances

their lives -- a ged that enhances their lives. i hear an excuse for why not to do it. the fundamental philosophy to be young people with an education so when they go into the workforce they have an additional tool. >> the program has functioned to provide financial support when you lose your job. i think it will not work. second, i do not think it contradicts the motion you a suggesting, the more education you have today the better off you will be in the economy. >> watched the rest of this online. all at c-span.org/videolibrary.

>> newt gingrich on energy policy. colorado republicans are holding non-binding caucuses on tuesday. the state's 36 delegates will be decided at district and state conventions and april. from the colorado school of mines, this is about 40 minutes. >> the chance to talk about energy and what has to be done. i think this is a remarkable point in american history. you have an administration whose policies are wrong on national security, on american job creation, and on cost of living. i will explain what i mean. this is the most and the american energy administration we have ever had. -- anti-american energy

administration we have ever had. [applause] you have the highest cost of gasoline we have ever had. if you are a writer at the new york times in the red the subway to work, it may not occur -- and you ride the subway to work, it may not occur to you that the high price of gasoline is a problem. if you are the rest of the country, the high price of gasoline has a lot of effects. it affects the cost of groceries. everything is delivered by truck. it affects the cost of everything made by plastic. it affects the costs structure for people. we had a woman who came to an event in nevada who said to me, she was rationed to two trips a week. i was one of her two trips.

let me start at the most practical level. the obama administration's high- priced, anti-american model is very dangerous and very destructive. let me put it in context. just the last 48 hours. you have an egyptian government which is threatening to try american hostages, almost a repeat of the jimmy carter weakness of 1979 and 1980. you have a pakistani government which has arrested the doctor who helped us find bin laden, instead of praising the person who helped us find the most wanted person, they have arrested him. you have an e runyan -- an iranian government that has been practicing how to close the strait of hormuz.

faced with all of that, irrational, a serious american government would have a program on american energy. they would say, our goal is to become so dependent -- independent that we do not care what they do. [applause] i have a very simple formula for that. you want to measure what our goal is. it is to ensure that no american president ever again does to a saudi king. -- bows to a saudi king. [applause] how do we do that? we replace whole bureaucracies. i am for closing the environment the protection agency and replacing it with a new agency with brand new people. [applause]

the environmental solutions agency would have to have as a first test common sense. [laughter] you can talk to any farmer anywhere in america about the proposed the regulations and you will have an idea about what i neemean. they had this meeting with an executive who was explaining that epa had control over air and that dust was a particular matter and that they were concerned with the fact that in arizona you get dust storms. this is a sign that something is going wrong. they were out there to try to figure it out. you, during part of the year, could you water the areas that produce the dust storms? [laughter] these guys said, arizona is a

desert. it is called a does it because we do not have much water. this was the kind -- it is called aid does it because we do not have much water. -- called a desert because we do not have much water. this was the kind of dialogue. it will encourage entrepreneurs and incentives to solve problems with new and better solutions not with red tape, litigation, and lawsuits. that would be a help. second, we should overhaul the department of the interior. the obama administration said they were going to lift the moratorium on the golf and replace it with a permanent system. they would not issue any permits. there was no moratorium. you just had to apply for a

permit. the permit system was there. i was in new orleans, people were so angry. people say, they are angry at the obama administration. these are $80,000 a year jobs. an economy that has economic problems, these are good jobs. the administration was so of of touch with reality, they did not realize these rigs move. they thought they could put a moratorium out and score political points. the panel had advised against a moratorium. they did this political moratorium. the first rig the movement to egypt. it took 80 dozen dollar a year jobs -- $80,000 a year jobs.

the second move was the best. the guy in charge was a hard- core conservative active -- conservative. he said, because of political instability in the united states, we are going to drill off of the condo. -- congo. [laughter] at a time of high unemployment, at a time when we need more american energy to be safer in the world market, the president vetoes the keystone pipeline. this kills 30,000 construction jobs. kills jobs in houston processing the oil and shipping it. it blocks the u.s. from having a pipeline bringing oil that we could use in a crisis if we had a problem with the middle east.

the canadians are looking at a partnership with china to build the pipeline due west to vancouver. what i have said is, if i am the president of the united states come on the first day, i will sign an executive order allowing the construction of the keystone pipeline so that canada can have an american partner on january 20. [applause] pase] let me make two other points about energy. i am focusing on oil and guess. two more points above oil and guess. -- about oil and gas. we should allow -- i would open up federal land for oil and gas

and for minerals. when you realize the u.s. government operates 85% of nevada and the bureau of land management does not want to allow any development. the reason north dakota has 3.5 percent and unemployment and has had seven straight tax cuts is because the oil is on private land. if north dakota had been public land we would have had no idea how big the formation is. the formation is 25 times bigger than the u.s. geological survey thought it was. the volume of oil available in north dakota is staggering the bigger than anybody thought 10 years ago. we would know none of that if it had not been on private land. i am dedicated to opening up

federal lands, not national parks. we own 69% of alaska. alaska is twice the size of texas. [laughter] perry flinches, but he is a good sport. 69% of alaska's is 1.5 texases. you could give an environmentalist half of texas. you would have an area the size of texas to open up. the largest reserves are in alaska. a base and that is estimated to have as much oil and gas as the in -- basin that is estimated to have as much will and gas as the entire gulf of mexico. we have more energy in the

united states than any other country. we have a government that has for the last 40 years been more and more and more anti-energy. i am for a profoundly changing it. the last point i want to make about oil and gas, this is true of all energy systems. it takes a fair amount of money to explore, develop, build the pipelines. the tax program, if you go to newt.org you can see a program designed to create jobs. first, we have zero capital gains tax so hundreds of millions of dollars will pour into the u.s. second, we have a total of 5% corporate tax rate which is an irish tax rate -- a 12.5% corporate tax rate which is an irish tax rate.

it allows our companies to compete successfully worldwide. it means general electric would actually pay taxes. [applause] maybe the most important thing for the development of oil and gas and minerals is we had 100% expense iing. any new equipment you buy at the right doc in one year. the goal is to make the -- you buy you write off in one year. if you want to draw unemployment compensation, you have to sign up for a training program so you are learning something during the. we are attrit -- up during the period we are paying you.

[applause] let me say finally, i am for a system of energy. i think it is so vital for our economy. you keep $500 billion a year at home, you are going to create new jobs. it is so vital for our national security and our standard of living. this is a country built around an expensive energy. to have the -- inexpensive energy. t have the epa have a proposal that would get 25 cents a gallon? i am for developing every source of energy. the current proposals for electricity would mean we would start having done a lot because of of our own government. this is the kind of -- having brown outs because of our own

government. this is the kind of thing we have to stop. i look forward to your questions. [applause] >> thank you. we do plan to have the moderator's pose some questions to you. i want to applaud the idea of abolishing the epa. i would like for you to consider the endangered species act as part of that problem. one of our concerns is fuel taxes. there is a proposed additional increase to those taxes. that is troubling to agricultural producers and folks in the west who have to travel large distances every day. it is complicating to our life. what would you propose in other ways to bring revenue into the treasury outside of energy

production? >> let me say, i support saving endangered species. i also support common sense. when you are told that the largest bas andin -- basin in the lower 48 may be closed down for development because there may be a lizard that is so endangered it covers thousands of square miles. there are so few of them we are going to close down dozens of square miles? there must be so many of them. what has happened is the environmentalists had infiltrated over the last 40 years the people on leapt to are against business. the use the environment as -- on the left who are against business.

they use the environment as an excuse. i am for endangered species being preserved. there has to be common sense applied to that. i would like to see a substantial amount -- imagine that we had $500 billion a year. the royalty affect of that to the federal government would be remarkable. i would like to see two-thirds go to pay down the deficit. [applause] and managed to have the -- i managed to have the sneezers. i would like to see one third turn towards infrastructure. i would like to see a

displacement of royalties. also displacement of royalties to rebuild our infrastructure. i do not know the case in colorado. in iowa, the number of county and state bridges that are beginning to be inadequate is very significant. part of it is as farm production has improved, and has wee bit more corn, we get bigger yields. we are carrying more tonnage over these bridges. you are going to have a nationwide challenge. i would like to see some break where maybe two-thirds of the royalties go towards the debt and one third would go towards infrastructure. >> thank you. we appreciate your support of energy issues. the united states has ordered

100 years' supply of domestic natural gas. these resources could be transformative, both for economic development and energy security. in the context of free market, what is the proper role of government in guiding the development of energy production? the chemical industry, reducing emissions, or exports? >> is a very good question. two quick things about the supply of natural gas. this is a perfect case study in why liberals are so consistently wrong in their effort. [laughter] the reason you had an explosion

in the volume of natural gas is we have taken a technology that was developed for offshore, which enables them to go down dozens of feet in one hole and go of 4 miles -- go down thousands of feet in one hole and go off for miles in every direction. it was designed offshore where it is expensive to have these big rigs. the more production you get, the bigger your return. somebody to get that model could work on land. -- somebody figured out that model could work on plan. we thought shale was not economically recoverable. they applied an abortion doctor and technology on shell -- an ocean-going technology on shale.

we went to a 100 plus supply. let me give you the side story. we are a dynamic society of constant innovation. there is no peak best. those are terms used by the left to justify telling the rest of us we have to have austerity so they can control our lives. i want to unleash the american people in order to have us produce. i do believe in shaping the market in the sense that alexander hamilton described. for example, we have always allowed depletion on will wells which is a tax break. we have a variety of tax breaks used in a variety of different ways. the difference between that and what obama does is he wants the

bureaucracy to pick winners and losers. it is one thing to say, anyone who wants to go out and find oil gets it right off. i want to allow one her% -- allow a 100% write off of new equipment every year. you are going to have a boom in investment. we are shaping america. i do not want a bureaucrat to decide between company a and company b. if they were good venture capitalists there would not be getting a government salary. [laughter] [applause] i am deeply opposed -- this is why, when i propose that we have a bold new approach in space, i did not oppose any extra money. i propose taking the money nestle wastes and using it as incentive to see what we can get

out of the private sector. not to pick winners and losers. how would we know you got to the moon? you would be on the moon. it would be obvious. [laughter] you would not have to have five of obama of's friends go to the white house and say, can we but -- can we pretend we went to the moon? remember that lindbergh flew to paris by himself for clinton but thousand dollars. there was a prize. -- for $25,000. there was a prize. >> we are looking at recordtheyn higher. starting with keystone is a

great place to try to change policy. what other steps we take to lower prices? >> -- would you take to lower prices? >> there would be a series of executive orders, one is the keystone pipeline. one would that all restrictions in the gulf of mexico and would enable people to start developing the gulf of mexico. there is an interest in lag here. you win the election in november. you want to know when the economy is born to start recovering? 9:00 at night on election day -- when the economy is going to start recovering? 9:00 at night on election day when people realize he is gone. [applause] the mood is going to become a obama is gone, i think i'm going to hide -- going to be, obama is gone, i think i am going to hire somebody.

i will ask congress to stay in session on january 3 to repeal the three bills. i want them to repeal obamacare. [applause] i want them to repeal dodd- frank. [applause] and i want them to repeal sarbanes oxley. [applause] i want all three of those on my desk when i am sworn in so i can sign them my first day. then we will have a series of executive orders. they will begin to open up how the department of the interior deals with federal lands, the gulf of mexico, and my goal would be to send such a powerful signal. everybody who is in the oil and gas industry is going to know on

election night, these things are coming on january 20. it means, they will begin moving. the industry will start moving. people will start moving. people move on the expectation of future behavior. the market response to future predictions. $20 a barrel. my guess is -- this is reagan's birthday, he is 101 years old today. [applause] the first executive order reagan signed deregulated gas. we had rationing on opposite days. if your license plate was odd or even, you had days you designated to buy gas on. reagan signed deregulation. the price of gasoline fell.

i think it is fair to say you will see gasoline prices fall dramatically if we bring supply online. >> thank you. we do have a couple of questions from the audience. we have some microphones here. we will start right here. >> mr. speaker, welcome to colorado. do you believe in human induced climate change? [laughter] >> i saw the porcine -- coors sign. i was happy all the way. i believe we do not know. i am an amateur paleontologist. the planet has changed its

temperature in number of times. we were in the museum in chicago looking at dinosaurs. if you look at the in the arctic, you figure it must have been a lot warmer. i am happy to take prudent measures that are not very expensive. if we can find and expensive safe nuclear power, i am for it. there are a lot of things you can do. what i would not do is turn power over to the bureaucracy to run the entire company -- country. i have always opposed cat and trade. many of you have seen it, the ed i did with nancy pelosi is the dumbest thing i have done -- the advertisement i did with nancy pelosi is the dumbest thing i have done. i never said i was in favor of cap and trade. you can go to newt.org. and see

video of the testimony. the dutch have been faced with the ocean for a long time. they did not adopt and al gore approach of lowering the sea. they built dikes. there are a lot of ways to solve problems. [applause] >> thank you. >> thank you. one more question. thank you. >> speaker gingrich, a little comment. regulation seems to go hand in hand with energy in the high cost of energy. before we get too far, you need to be aware that milk is not a hazard this bill -- hazardous

spill and it took an enormous effort to convince the epa of that. there was a lot of effort to convince them. the other question, it is one develop new energy and create new energy, it is also important to conserve the energies we have. the example being, the trucking industry, two hundred industries have worked with the department of transportation trying to change regulation which would cut the weight limits on some- -- semis. it is 820% increase in the load. -- a 20% increase in load. they decided to table this.

not realizing it had been studied. it is very helpful of here in this part of the country where the majority of a list of troubles by truck. it makes sense. where would -- the majority of our stock travels by truck. it makes sense. where would you stand on this? >> i am conservative. if i were liberal i would be for regulations that do not make sense. [laughter] the milk one was always one of as fascinating moments. -- those fascinating moment. i want to make two points. i am not against all regulation. when i taught environmental studies, the river had caught fire in downtown cleveland. i tell my friends, it is not a

good sign when you have enough pollution that a river is catching fire. we had tennessee with the sulfuric acid had turned off all of the trees for several miles -- had turned off all of the trees for several miles. --burned off all of the trees for several miles. i want to have a new agency. there are certain limits to what we are willing to keep. one of the reasons i am different, one of the reasons i decided to run, knowing how hard it would be, we have had republican presidents. we have had republican presidents with a republican congress. they did not change the epa. they slow down the rate of decay.

they generated the same regulations year after year. after having studied it for a long time, i think there is a virtue to having somebody who knows what they are doing. we have tried two years of an amateur. i think you need to replace the agency if you are going to make it work. the people are committed to a world the which is incompatible with our local freedoms and free enterprise. a gingrich hesitancy it would be very controversial. -- gingrich presidency would be very controversial. we would fight for fundamental change in a way that none of the other candidates have begun to think about. [applause] >> we have one more question we would like to ask. >> i am representing a german

company in the energy field. we have developed some unique systems in the solar field, wind turbines, storage batteries. we can to colada two years ago. we invested millions about dollars. we do have a situation where events like solyndra have put a dent on positive developments. would you have a mandated program for energy. that is what it took in germany to spawn over three dozen companies that did not exist -- over 3000 companies that did not exist. >> no, i would not. [applause]

let me tell you why. a mandate has no cost attached to it. you watch california where they do these things all the time. they are destroying business in california. they are destroying the cost of living. i will create a permanent tax credit so you have the ability of your decisions. it is irrational for the congress to pass a tax credit. you have no long-term stability. i am happy -- i recognize, i am shipping part of the energy environment to favor the growth of new technology. we subsidized air mail in the 1930's. it is a conscious effort to create a new industry. we did not pick one company or another. i would say, i would be happy to talk to you about had to have a

long term, stable tax credit you can count on. i do not want to go to in no cost attached mandate system in which you end up with systems which are incompatible and can be legally opposed because they fit a formula. that is an invitation to go to waste on part of the new technologies and lower the standard of living. [applause] and i done? -- am i done? one brief political commercial. if you decide you want large change in washington and the think having someone who helped ben -- balance the budget for four years and worked with clinton on a program that created a 11 million jobs, if that makes sense for you, i

would ask you, when you go home today, on bass boat, e-mailed, telephone, -- on facebook, e- mail, a telephone, to encourage people to vote for me tomorrow. i am very thrilled to be here today. i hope you have a good afternoon. thank you very much. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> presidential candidate rick santorum also spoke to the colorado and a peace summit. his comments are about 40 minutes. >> thank you.

a great opportunity to be back here in colorado. this is my first time at the colorado school of mines. we look forward to this discussion today, talk about an initiative that is important to me. i have brought a couple of members of my family. i have been married to my wife for 21 years. we have seven children. i would two oldest have taken of semesters from college, a year from college to help osama out on the campaign. that is my daughter elizabeth -- to help us out on the campaign. that is my daughter elizabeth and my son john. [applause] i am anxious to talk about this. i come from pennsylvania. pennsylvania is a great energy state. it is a great mining state. i have a history in the mining industry. not myself personally.

unlike other folks who have run for president, who have owned it will wells, my grandfather was a coal miner. a different end of the spectrum. my grandfather came to western pennsylvania in 1927. he worked in a coal mine in a little comtown. it was a company town. he got paid with coupons. you got paid with coupons. you live in housing with company housing. you had to shop at the company store. i have been to the house. the water was a quarter of a mile away. that was the environment, when my dad came and came to america

, it was an experience that my grandfather ended up working in those mines and a 1958, when he was 72 years old. my grandfather, he would be proud of me, he would not because of the party a represented. he was a union democrat. -- he would not be proud of the party i represented. he was a union democrat. when i was growing up as a kid, there were three pictures on the wall. there was a picture of jesus, the pope, and john f. kennedy. i do have some background in the coal industry. my grandfather lived for the rest of his life at the mouth of the mind. -- mine. there was an orange creek.

i used to play around in the coal fields. when i left, went to school at penn state. also, i worked for a senator who represented the coal industry. i worked closely with that industry for many years. then, when i became interested in running for office, i continued to do a lot and worked in the energy industry. we had a little oil and gas industry. the gas industry was ok. the mining was not what it was. all of the mining has moved appeared to the west. we were dealing with issues. in the recent years, we have had a change in pennsylvania. we have a change based on the fact that hydro-fracking, deep

drilling. we were fighting about where to locate facilities along the east coast. liquiedif -- liquefied natural gas, we were deficient. thanks in part to a lot of funds, fracking and shale, we now have two $60 since -- $2.60 gas. we were trying to find people to get into the industry. if you look at the unemployment rate in pennsylvania, it is lower, why? because of energy. we are excited about that. we are not excited with how the administration is dealing with hydrocracking -- hydro-

fracking. what they have done to the coal industry, delays and the niles for permits. the war on coal-fired power plant. -- plants. we have already seen six shut down. as many as 60 may shut them as a result of these new regulations. the clean air act regulations that are being put on a cold- fired power plant. -- on coal-fired power plants. we have well over 100 years of oil and a couple hundred years -- we do not even know how much gas we have. the president cannot look again that as an asset. he looks at this as a problem. -- the president does not look at that as an asset.

he looked at death as a problem. -- he looks at that as a problem. i see it as one of the greatest assets we have. to create affordable energy to keep the standard of living in this country as high as possible. and sometimes carry a chart with me that shows the cost of energy in the country in the standard of living in that country. you can see, the cheaper the energy in the country, the higher the standard of living. it is a correlation to the abundance and affordability of energy and the quality of life. we have to remind people that we went into a recession in 2008. people forget what. they thought it was a house and bubble. that was because we had a spike

in energy prices. people had to pay so much to air conditioning and heat their homes. this is the reality of how important energy is. we put a plan together that is very big on growing energy. particularly, the energy assets that we have a competitive advantage in. that does not mean we need government-run programs. i believe we need to have an energy policy where we eliminate all subsidies. a love everybody to go out and consume and have a regulatory environment that focuses on reasonable environment of compliance, -- environmental compliance, driven by actual science.

and we have safety policies that are compliance-oriented, not intended to punish and make it too expensive to operate. we have an opportunity in this country to have a read- energizing of america and create an enormous amount of opportunity, whether it is building the keystone pipeline, which would be day one. whether it is the creation of a new epa that will go about the process of appealing regulation on clean air. a whole host of regulations, repealing them or repealing and replacing them with regulations that are cost effective.

these are the rational approaches we need to take to make sure we have affordable energy and we bring down the price of oil in this country, not just for our economy, but for our national security. the name of my economic plan is the maid in the usa planned. the reason it is called that is because i take an emphasis on creating manufacturing jobs in america. we have a country that is uncompetitive with most of our trading partners. our biggest trading partners. the reason it is an competitive is not because of the cost of labor. if you look at the top nine trading partners, we are 20% more expensive to do business with. if we do not trade that cut -- change that, we are going to continue to lose manufacturing

jobs in this country. we are going to have these products which have been engineered in america, manufactured somewhere else. people say, how are we going to get the economy going? certain parts of the economy are going well. not as well as they could. the rest of the economy is lagging behind. unemployment among blue-collar people is three times what it is then college graduates. the innovation that is occurring at the top is not being made in america. people are not reaping the benefits of the transformation of innovation. we need to change that. the wall street journal described my plan as supply-side economics for the working man. i do apply supply-side economic principles. create a plan field that can

compete with china, that can compete with mexico, not on labor costs, but on other costs. if labor costs are the only death for -- differentiation, we will lose those jobs we will keep all the good paying jobs here in america. there is no reason to move out of the country unless you what products delivered to the location. this is the best country in the world to export from. we could be the export market for the world again if we created an environment. one of the key parts is not just a tax policy, we allow things to be brought back to america instead of paying a tax. there is no tax if they invest in equipment here in america. what is one of the key elements to keeping energy costs affordable? manufacturing is one of the highest users of energy.

we need to have a competitive marketplace for power in this country. to allow the power to be moved and manufacturers to be able to get power and bulk quantities. we need to change the market. a lot of that is done by the state. as the president, i would like to see more of a marketplace. we have that in pennsylvania. the more we can see that happen to let the rest of the country, not only can we see rates go down -- happen throughout the rest of the country, not only can we see rates go down, we can build things necessary to build on our infrastructure. i thank you all very much. i look forward to your questions. [applause] >> we do have is moderator's.

we would like to pose some questions to you first. i am the president of the color of the farm bureau -- colorado farm bureau, farmers are frustrated with the environment the protection agency. we do want clean water and clean air. we are very concerned about having a balance between debt and a reasonable and agee policy. as well as balancing the regulatory burdens. had you see that being accomplished between those impacts and costs that come about? there have been conversations about reducing the budget, possibly even eliminating it. you said you would like to reform the epa. hud the balance that as well

as, -- how do you balance that, as well as, the epa is provided to protect air and water. >> thank you very much. to answer your first question, the real key in balance. i know people get very upset. we belive everything in our lives. there is no absolute. you go into the grocery store, you are always balancing your checkbook with what your eyes want. even not go and do anything irrespective of the cost. there is not unlimited resources. the most important thing we need to do, which is what this administration has not done, which is to use them on the science, not politicized science -- which is to use sound

science, not politicized silent. we saw it with global warming. an absolute travesty of a scientific researcher that was mutt -- of scientific research that was motivated by politics. motivated by those who saw this as an opportunity to create a panic and a crisis the government to be able to step in and it greatly control your life. [applause] i never bought a hoax. -- the hoax. i understood there are hundreds of factors that impact the climate. it is the determining ingredient in the sauce that affects the

entire global warming and cooling. it is absurd. and yet, we had politicians running to the ramparts. unfortunately, politicians who were running for president. they bought into global warming. both congressman gingrich and governor romney supported the idea of man-made global warming and cap and trade. i never did. unless the science is better than what we have seen today, i will not. if you look at these things. i come from southwestern pennsylvania. i grew up in a small town. i remember the smells of the mills. i know the quality of life that

can be affected by dirty air. i encourage you to go back 100 years and look of pictures of pittsburgh. you cannot see it. i am not exaggerated. you cannot see it. it is black. but the sky is dark all the time. that is how that the smoke was. we know the dirty air. we know the problems. we also know that science can measure things in the parts per gazillion. the way the laws are written allows for the agency's botched they were written at a time when they did not have the school -- they were written at a time when they did not have these tools. it is the agency's discretion to use science to for the drive up costs based on laws -- to further drive up costs based on

these laws. we need to reread those laws. the issue is not the epa. george bush but also epa was not like barack obama's epa. the question is, what happens afterwards? the to and fro back and forth as a result of having different people that you regret legislations, to interpret regulations. -- people to rewrite regulations, to interpret regulations. we need to rewrite laws. abolishing the epa does not get rid of the laws that the epa has to enforce. someone else is going to enforce them. what makes you think that any other agency is going to do better? we need to agree with the idea that we need to reform in this area. that means we have to go and

look at the laws. that is what i am going to be focused on. i am going to be focused on cleaning up the epa and trying to change the idea of the tenor there. fundamentally, we have to change the underlying laws if we want to see this. that includes imposing things like requiring real science in the coalition of cost-benefit with the government. >> thank you. [applause] >> senator. on behalf of colorado, i welcome you and thank you for your time. you mentioned the abundance of the domestic hydrocarbon resource and in your home state of pennsylvania we have seen the potential of increased natural gas resources, what they can do for economic development. you also discussed your support

a free market. with that as a background, what they see as the proper role of government in getting the development of our energy in guiding the development of our energy resources. what should the government do and what should it stay away from? >> i see this as consistent with the overall philosophy of dealing with a free marketplace. the government is there to create a plainfield -- playing field for businesses to thrive in a way that is a and creates opportunity for different categories of energy. i believe the government has gotten in the way in a lot of resource development. clearly, with offshore in deep

water drilling. -- and a deepwater drilling. i have been an advocate of opening up those. fought to open up the alaska wildlife refuge. her of if we're going to keep a current will flow coming in the years ahead, we have to have more will follow in the pipeline. -- will flow in the pipeline. the oil reserves are depleting. we are talking about a keystone pipeline, we may lose the alaska pipeline. there will be insufficient flows to keep the pipeline going. just to keep existing, we need resources in place, we need to look for other opportunities. i am not an oil man from texas going out to sell and more to the public. i will tell the truth on everything. tell the truth about what is. how it can be safely explored

and grilled. how that can be critical -- how that is critical to us. the same thing -- the same thing with federal land. we do not have a lot of federal land in florida. i can tell you the problems i had with the federal government with timbering on the national forest. we have the most proper wrote -- profitable national forest in the country because we have black cherry, which is pretty valuable wood. we have the endangered species act, which has prevented us from timbering all sorts of anchorage there. it has been corrected school districts and the like because of the government's inability to allow us to care for our resources. a forest, in my opinion is like a garden. and you have got to care for it. if you leave it to nature, the

nature will do what nature does, which is boom and bust. we were put on this earth as creatures of god to store the earth and wisely, but not for our benefit, but for the earth's benefits. [applause] i consider that an article of faith. you may consider that an article of reason. if we cannot be good stewards of the environment, then we should not let the vagaries of nature destroy what we have helped create. i think it is important that we have a policy on federal lands. first, i would like to have a lot less federal land. i think that would be a great opportunity to reduce the budget

deficit, for us to get rid of and turn over to the private sector a lot of federal lands i do not need to be in our inventory. [applause] and for the press, i'm not talking about yellowstone or the grand canyon. go out and look at a lot of federal lands that could be suitable for pastor, could be suitable for oil and gas or other types of uses. they do not need to be in the federal inventory. and they are not necessarily profitable. and in the case that they are, they are not particularly well- managed. blm is understaffed and does not have the ability to provide adequately for the management of these plans. there are all sorts of opportunities for us. and again, i come at it from a bit different perspective. i come at it from the perspective of growing up in a little town in western of solving a. the pretty much do not make any money at it.

i come at it from a common-sense way to make sure we are getting the best utilization of our land, and at the same time, keeping our precious land say from development. [applause] >> president obama has proposed raising sanctions on oil and gas production on several occasions, citing the need to raise revenues to offset renewable tax credits or help reduce the deficit. critics of the president's plan, including the consumer energy alliance, argue that raising taxes would result in diminished -- reduced domestic production and higher prices at the pump. in one study, it has texas said it would increase government revenues. -- reduce government revenues. -- in one study has said that it would reduce government revenues. >> basically, all subsidies to energy should be eliminated. there are not a lot of them, to be honest. but for me, this is a market and

we should not put any taxes, any federal taxes on the development of energy. energy is an important -- as you heard me talk about before, it is very important for the health of the economy. we should be encouraging the free market to develop energy, whether nuclear energy, or whether it is wind or solar, coal or gas, oil, whatever it is -- ethanol. they should be developed based on where the market can be driven. the federal government should be in a position to make a plain field -- a playing field level. i would not encourage any special fees or taxes put on energy production in this country. i think it would be counterproductive. [applause] >> thank you, senator.

we do have microphones for the audience questions. right here in the blue shirt. let's start right there. >> hi, mr. santorum. my name is paul and i'm also from southwestern pennsylvania. i'm very fortunate to be a student here at the colorado school of mines. when i think about the future, i wonder what we can do to increase the number of elementary school students who are interested in math and science. >> that is a great question. here is the rare look at it. -- the way i look at it. one of the principal problems of education is that it is run by the federal government and the state government. [applause] i know we like to use the term "public schools" but they are

not really public schools. they are government schools. [applause] and as a result, we have an education system that is not oriented on you. it is not oriented on the people who are response -- who are the customers of the education system the customer of the education system, in my humble opinion, is the parent. why? because they are paying for the education of their children. they are the ones to pay the taxes. and whose responsibility is it to pay -- to take care of the children? the parents. they are the customer. they're the ones paying the government to do their job. but that is not how the education system in this country functions. except in very rare occasions. some public schools, and charter schools, maybe they actually do try to create an environment.

i believe you can get someone with their god-given talents that is probably oriented toward doing something like this. the way to do it is to make sure those god-given talents are identified encouraged from the earliest possible time. you not need government programs or grants. it will need is to make sure that every child -- i mean, i can think of some myself, people that i knew as kids who i thought, wow, this kid is going to be a great engineer, this guy's going to be a great scientist, and he went off the track and never ended up as anything. why? for a variety of reasons. everything from personal problems to drug use to a bunch of other things. why do we have an environment where parents and children and administrators in schools, and particular, can get together and provide every child

in america with a customized experience? it is not impossible. we are spending hundreds of billions of dollars. the one out of every three children in america will not graduate in high school. 1.2 million kids and you're dropping out of school. if you drop out of school, yet a 75% chance of being in poverty in america. we say, we just accept that. we accept that those kids are dropping out of school. i guarantee you, there's a sufficient number -- i don't know what percentage, but a significant number of those kids have the talent to be here, have the potential to be here. it is just that potential has not been realized. why? maybe a bad family situation, maybe a personal problem, maybe school -- who knows? but we have not, as a society, made a commitment to you. we have made a commitment to the

system. what good is that? if the system is not there for you, which is not. and we all know it, and yet we tolerate it and we continue to pump money into it as if doing that will change it. parents of the united states of america, you need to stand up and say, enough. you need to demand that which is your right. [applause] and the first thing i will do is fall on my sword and say i made a mistake, which i did in voting for no child left behind. we will repeal that and everything else with respect to the government contributing and control of the secondary and primary education system in this country. the only exception to that would be to help schools and school districts that have a disproportionate number of special needs children, which are obviously going to be more expensive to care for.

other than that, we will leave this not to the states. my objective will be not only to change things at the federal level, but to help you as parents organize an effort across this country to tell the states to stay out of the education system in this country, but let parents and local communities design programs that can maximize each child's ability, each child ability to find their way. this hall will be filled because we will save more children, and as a result, more children will end up here. [applause] >> thank you, senator. to keep pace with where we are headed, one more question. i see a couple of hands right in front. >> senator, thank you. we heard from you and speaker gingrich on what you would do if you -- if elected.

>> did you ask me what kind -- are you going to ask me what i will do if i lose? [laughter] >> no, if, god forbid, obama is reelected, what would a lame duck president do that most concerns you? >> if president obama were elected, what would concern me? first off, he would implement obamacare, which in my opinion, will transform america into a second-rate country. why do i say that? because every single american will be dependent upon the federal government or for their basic health and wellness. -- a federal government for their basic of an alumnus. in every other country where that has happened, you create a dependent society and you give government control over people's lives, it will make us a

fundamentally different country than we are today. look at what has happened in the past week with the catholic church. when the government tells you that you have a right that they can give you, that they created a right for you, they can tell you how to exercise that right. because they now control you. because you are now dependent upon them. the only place you can get this health insurance now, unless you are opting out of the system and you pay the fine and you self- insure, in other words, you insure yourself. they will tell you what that system is going to be and they will order your access to care. and you will be dependent upon them for them to read about to get what you need. and you will like it. the catholic church was just told that they have to provide

things in the health care and pay for them that are strictly against the teachings of the church. what did the obama administration say? to bad. -- too bad. it is a right and you will do what we say. not only that, when the bishop objected and wrote a letter, he was not allowed to write a letter. there was a military archbishop. he wrote a letter to be read by chaplains in the military. complaining about obamacare. and what it was imposing on the pack -- the catholic church. and the obama administration stop them from reading that letter in the church, and last week forced them to change the language in order for it to be read. careful what you wish for when you give the government power and authority over you. what am i worried about? i'm worried about more of that. i am worried about cap and trade coming back.

the economy starts doing well, it is coming, rest assured. the only reason it did not pass is because we are in an economic downturn and they knew it would destroy the economy even more if we even talked about it. it will be back, as well as all of the folks who lost two years ago because america will change. america will not be the land that the -- i believe in free people and free enterprise and doing things -- america will not be the land that believes in free people and free enterprise and doing things for themselves. will be like our european friends and allies are. we will be happy with cradle to grave care, and that is what america will end up like. i say this is the most important election in the history of our country. [applause] i would say that without

question, cap and trade will come back. but we will see amnesty -- assuming barack obama wins, and went back the majorities in the house and senate, we will see some sort illegal immigration bill that will grant amnesty to people in this country. and we will see more people come into this country illegally because of the opportunities that will provide. this country will be very different. that is why i'm here. that is why i am running. having said that, incredibly optimistic he is not going to win. -- i am incredibly optimistic he is not going to win. [applause] and i think we have a great opportunity. i think we have a wonderful opportunity to remind america in this election as to what is at stake and who we are and why we need to believe in ourselves again, and believe in the things that made our country great and

believe in solutions to the problems in this country, i believe in us instead of government. we will wait and see where america is. thank you very much. if god bless. -- god bless. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> colorado posing non-binding caucuses are being held tuesday. the state's 36 republican delegates will be joined by a the moderator. >> are bad news is that we had to cancel -- >> the republican presidential candidates ron paul is campaigning in minnesota. non-binding caucuses are being held there tomorrow. the state's 40 republican

delegates will be decided at state and district conventions in april and may. this is a little more than half an hour. [cheers] >> it sounds to me like the cause of liberty is alive and well in minnesota. [cheers] you know, they have a lot of bright lights here. i cannot see you very well, but i do hear you. that is great. [cheers] and somewhere down front, one side or the other, my wife, carol is with me, my wife of 55 years. and we have one of our 18 grandchildren with us, linda, is with us tonight. i want to thank you, everybody, participated in the state

elections. thank you very much for the support. and also, mariann certainly deserves our applause for her hard work. [applause] and walter and the tea party movement deserves applause as well. thank you [applause] ] -- thank you. [applause] but most of all, you all deserve the applause because you are interested in doing something important. and that is, change in this country come and go back to our roots, decide we want to live in a free country and not a company rapidly drifting toward totalitarianism. we need to reverse that. [applause] you know, supporters as well as myself have been criticized. ever notice on tbi to criticize?

[boos] but the one i get the biggest chuckle out of is that we are dangerous. of course we are dangerous. they have been making a slip of the status quo and they have been ripping us off. [applause] we are dangerous to those who abuse the monetary system first, the people in the federal reserve, the people in the military-industrial complex. they do not want it disrupted when they have a crisis. they come begging and pleading. when it is a good time, they read all of the profit. that is going to change. [applause] if we had to summarize it into one word as to what we must do and what is the important issue, to me, the important issue is

liberty. [applause] if we look at all our political action, it should be to protect liberty. we did a pretty good job on this for a while. i would say the last 100 years, things have been slipping. i like to go after the president, but i do not as much as some others because i see this as a problem lasted for some time. if you are looking for something to criticize, it would not be hard to criticize the president. he wants to give you obamacare, which we do not need and it will be expensive. [boos] but also, whether it is the promises made in 2000 or the promises made by the current president, unfortunately, we continue to do the same thing regardless of the election. they keep the same foreign policy, the same monetary policy, the same entitlement system, the same deficits. we need to clean house and say

we want renewal of the spirit of what made this country great, and that means emphasizing your personal liberties. [applause] to defend liberty, we have to know where it comes from. it does not come from our government. sometimes they think they are passing it out, and they are always restricting. if it is their liberty rather than our liberty. but liberty comes to us from our creator, or a very natural way. we should all of our liberty and own our lives. and we should not only have life and liberty, but we ought to be able to keep the fruits of our labor. [applause] one reason why the income-tax is

so detrimental, it is based on the assumption that the government owns everything and they allow us to keep a certain percentage under their conditions. it is a sellout in the sense of liberty. that has been around since 1913. and when true liberty comes to this country once again, government will be what -- will be much smaller. we will not be the policeman of the world. we will not have runaway entitlements. [applause] and to not only will we not have income tax, but we will not have a federal reserve. [applause] [cheers and applause] who would have ever dreamed 10 years ago that we would have the

attention of the federal reserve like we have today? [cheers] but it is important one to come to understand what the monetary system is all about and why inflation is bad, and why it a few people in secret can create money out of thin air. you come to realize how important it is in relationship to the welfare state. none of this would happen if you did not have the federal reserve to my ties and by the debt. how would this happen if members of congress wanted to spend all of this money, and they should not pay for it through taxation if they are going to do it. but that is difficult. people get tired of the taxes. they resort to borrowing money to much. but then that pushed interest rates up. and they've invented the federal

reserve because you can hide the inflation, you can transfer the penalty from one group to another. but ultimately, this catches up with us. in the meantime, what it does is if we do not have to pay the bills up front, it allows governments to grow. this is what happens in collaboration with the federal reserve and the politicians who got reelected by doing exactly what the people were asking for. they did that for a while until we finally consumed all of the wealth of the country. real productivity has gone overseas. the only thing left is a arwin. but that pushes interest rates up. -- the only thing left is arwin. but that pushes interest rates up. then they go to the federal reserve and a print the money. as long as that happens, government will grow. it will land, because many a country has tried this in the past.

it ends up badly. it ends up with the destruction of the currency. [applause] the one characteristic of the destruction of a currency, the depreciation of the currency is the middle class shrinks and the wealthy class gets wealthier. just look at it not in the last few years alone, but over the decades. that has generally been the case. a lot of wealth has left the middle class. we have a freer market and sound government, the middle class in this government -- in this country was the largest and wealthiest in the world. [applause] i think we lost the moral high ground many years ago, probably a little bit before the depression and in the progressive era. we lost the moral high ground because there were those that said that government would always take care of those who are having problems. and if you are a humanitarian,

you want to give free stuff out, free food, free medical care, free education, free housing, and everything will be ok. the trouble is, you can do that for a little while, but then again and people are unhappy. and guess what, the very people who are supposed to be helped with these humanitarian to our intent to transfer the wealth of iran the world and think it comes from printing press money -- wealth of around the world and think it comes from printing press money, they're hurting those they intend to help. in the last four years, the evidence is on the table. it does not work. it leads to endless wars. the economic system is deeply into debt now. that is why we have to restore the basic values of just common sense, sound money, private property, and also, we have to

address this foreign policy that has given us and less wars against enemies that we do not know who they are. we do not know why we go to war and we need to bring our troops home. [cheers and applause] the message of liberty has been around a long time. we talked a little bit about it for years ago, and a lot of people joined the effort. in the last four years, a lot more. even today, this message of liberty is spreading. we get criticized also of the foreign policy of minding our own business -- for the foreign policy of money our own business. those who are serving and have

served in the military understand this the most. guess who they support for president of the united states? [cheers and applause] most people know that i have served in the military. i was in the military for five years. [applause] there is no other candidate who has been in the military. some people say, they just a poor you because you were in the military. that is partial, but not the whole thing. -- they just support you because you were in the military. that is partial, but not a whole thing. i would never send troops into a war that is not declared where i do not know exactly who the enemy is. fight it, we need, and come home. -- to win it, and come home.

[cheers and applause] as well as going into the military, we take an oath of office to defend against all enemies, foreign and domestic. i can reassure you that the foreign enemies are not a threat to us. there is no one on the verge of invading us. we have more weaponry and we spend more on our military than anyone else put together. this whole idea that we are on the verge of being attacked, this was true in the 1960's when the soviets were in power. of course, they erupted themselves and their power ended. -- bay bankrupted themselves and their power ended. we have to realize we do not have to have this fear. we do not have to keep spending more and more. in fact, the more we spend, the more we send our troops overseas, the more bases we have, the more drones we used to kill people, the less safe we are. we are not safer by running out

foreign policy. [applause] not only do i believe it is a detriment to our national security, i believe it is a major part of the devastating budget deficit we have. we spend $4 trillion that was put into our our debt in the last 10 years with our overseas commitments. this bringing troops home, you do not have to pull them out of the military. immediately bringing troops, of the, suddenly that means they would be spending their money in this country, not in germany or japan or south korea. [applause] under conditions of war, whether war overseas or a war against the american people in a war that they call the war on drugs --

[boos] -- i think we should stop all those wars. [applause] is actually a war on our civil liberties. we have seen this systematically, especially since 9/11. 9/11 was a serious, serious matter. i voted to do whatever we can to go after those individuals responsible. i was discouraged rather rapidly after 9/11 because they used it as an excuse to do something they had been planning on doing for six years. in my first speech against the iraq war, it was 1998, because it was clearly evident to me that they were going to do that. [cheers and applause] but after 9/11 occurred, it seemed to take 10 years to get one guy.

with all of the weapons and technology that we have, it takes 10 years to find him. what did we do? we went to iraq and we did nation-building and we invaded these various countries. we have lost close to 9000 americans and 44,000 severe injuries. we have hundreds of thousands of veterans today begging and pleading for help. we have an epidemic of suicide a of people coming from iraq and iran back home. obviously, it would be much better if we have not gotten involved. their real enemy right now in my estimation -- because i do believe we have a powerful, efficient military. we have to defend against all enemies, foreign and domestic. [applause]

once again, shortly after 9/11, within a week or two, there was a bill that was brought to the floor that had been floating around congress for a couple of years and it never had support and they could not get it passed. after 9/11, they said come on now is the time we will print -- we will pass this wonderful bill that will protect the people, the patriot act. [boos] the patriot act is very, very unpatriotic, if you want to know. [applause] that bill was passed rather rapidly. as one member of congress told me, i had to vote for it. i did not have time to read it, but it was called the patriot act. how could i go home and explain it if i voted for it? i tried to explain to him that it was his job.

you have to go home and explain why you voted the right way. [applause] but in the bill, you may have noticed this already, but in washington they name a bill and it always sounds pretty good. just as soon -- maybe not 100%, but just assume that the bill may be opposite of what they are trying to do. [applause] if they have called that the "repeal the fourth amendment act" maybe it would not have passed so readily. [applause] but the undermining of our fourth amendment rights, especially at airports, is olli consequence of the page rybak. as far as i'm concerned, private property should be protected.

and not by the tsa. [applause] if we allow it to stand and look at the pictures we have seen on television and in the newspaper at the poking and prodding of little children to elderly women in wheelchairs and making us think that we are safer because of this, it is impossible. i think it is there to intimidate us and make us compliant and listen to the government. this is what happens when you move from freedom to a tyrannical state. then why you to obey the government instead of your own heart and your own mind and your own property. [boos] the patriot act was certainly a big deal for us, but it is still ongoing. maybe you heard that the defense authorization act was passed. [boos] and i'm very impressed that you

know what i'm talking about [applause] because i'm convinced that you did not hear it on the evening news. you must be getting your news someplace else. it passed in the senate and house of. the president gave it a happy newyear by signing yeait on year's day. but the wicked part of this, it changed our history in many ways because civil laws should always be enforced by civil police and local police. but now, it is institutionalized, codified that the military now can arrest any american citizen, put under arrest with no lawyer, no charges, no trial, and can be put in prison indefinitely. [boos] this needs to be changed. we will not be living in a free

society and a free republic. and it will be used. they do not write the laws in order to not use them. a one year ago, the president announced -- someone came to the senate and he announced that it is now the policy of the united states that we can assassinate united states americans. where does he think he gets his power? we cannot let this stand. but to prove his point from his side, he has already used it three times. he picked a guy that he decided was a bad guy. he may well be a bad guy. he does not live here. he was not american citizen. he lives in yemen. he was not arrested and charged, but he was assassinated because he was associated with bad people. but he was never even convicted of a crime. they kill him and nobody is going to worry too much. but the next week, they decided he had a relative that was an

ally of is. they said, we need to kill him, too. they went over and dropped another drone missile on him and they killed his son. it turns out his son was 16. he was barbecuing out in the backyard. this is not what america is supposed to be about. it is supposed to be about the rule of law, and we should all be protected. [cheers and applause] our economy is not going to be revived until we come to our senses. we got into a mess because we spent too much, too much debt, borrowed too much, printed too much, regulated too much, and then we depend on the federal reserve. but when the crisis hit, it

became obvious. and it was predicted by many that it would come. and a bubble finally burst, and guess what the solution has been. spend more, tax more, and continue to do the same thing. then they wonder why they are not getting results. we have to decide whether we want to have a free-market economy with sound money, a gold backing, restraint on the federal reserve, and restraint on a congress that is spending money. [applause] i want to cut the budget by $1 trillion. [cheers] the first year. now people get nervous saying, the government doesn't spend $1 trillion, one that weaken the economy? no, it will help the economy because to spend it they have to inflate. i met some bureaucrats and they

do not have any idea how best to spend your money. only you have the idea how best to spend your money. [applause] we have to ask a couple of basic questions. the first basic question is what should the role of government be? should government be there as an entitlement system? should we believe this story at entitlements are our rights? do people have a right to medical care? do they have the right to food or to a house? no, they do not. they have a right to their life. have a right to their liberty. they have a right to keep their property. then they would be able to afford it. when government does it, they cannot get anything. [applause] the entitlement system has to be

challenged. the foreign policy has to be challenged. the monetary policy has to be challenged. and quite frankly, the others are not doing that. it is all status quo. both parties, yes, they sound different, but the goal has always been more power. the arguments are real between conservatives and liberals and republicans and democrats, but it is all over power. it is not over whether -- not over what kind of government we want. the founders knew this and they wrote a constitution. they wanted the government to be very restrained. i believe most of the reason we are in this mess is because we have failed to follow the constitution. and i believe the only way we can get of this mess is that we put those in washington who take their oath of office seriously and obey the constitution. [cheers and applause]

samuel adams was very clear, and other founders were worried about if we did not keep our republic. they worry that we would go into a dictatorship of the pure majority, which is called democracy. that means the 51%, if they go along with it, can take away the rights of the minority. if you look at the patriot act, that is what is happening. if the majority endorses it, the minority is undermined. when you get worried about not having enough -- today, we do not have 51% of the people right now that endorse everything we say. but the truth is, you do not have to. but you have to have leadership. you have to let people in the right places. 51% of the people in this state will not be voting tomorrow. you will be voting, and you have more clout than those who do not

vote. [applause] and adams advised in never requires a majority, but a minority, that they would be fed up with it and it would be irate and determined and believe in something, and our goal should be to continue the powers of life and liberty in the hearts of men. and i think that is what has happened in this country. these last four years have been so different than when i started in the 1970's. suddenly, the young people are waking up to those who dreamed all of this and are coming alive again. [applause] and it has been said that you should never doubt the small group of people who has firm

convictions, that they can change the world. never doubt it, because it is the only way it ever happened before. both in the-and in the positive, i am sure. when the communists took over, they did not have a majority vote. no, it was a month -- a determined group. a minority has to have the right viewpoint. my argument is, if you care about people, care about yourself, care about your family, you have to opt for liberty. it is liberty that offers us not only this wonderful opportunity, but also it offers us wealth. i have always been convinced -- i love my freedom. i would be giving -- willing to give up wealth if i could have my freedom. [cheers and applause]

but the wonderful thing about it is that we do not have to make a choice. history shows that the freer a society, the wealthier the society. we do not have to argue that case. the bigger the government, even when it is designed to help the poor, actually, the biggest beneficiaries are the rich. they get the money and the bailout and the benefits of the inflationary system. we should not lose this argument. and for a while, we were consuming wealth and it was more difficult because everybody was simply getting stuff. but most people now know that there's something seriously wrong with social security. all of these programs are bankrupt, and we do not cut anything. we still have another war and we are upset that the world has not

joined us in going to war in syria. soon it will be iran that we have to go into full war. [boos] but now, i think the people are realizing this is not going to last, even those in leadership that are saying we have to continue this. nobody is arguing that case. but the other thing that happens, both negatively and positively, the currency goes down rapidly and you can have chaos anna that is -- chaos politically and economically. the other thing is the ballooning out and joining of a movement sometimes moves rather rapidly. i think we are on the verge of that. we have already seen the opening. and it is not just a few people in think tanks. this is all around. it is getting into our university and into the media. and thank goodness for that. [applause]

talking about the internet, it is a good example of the success that so many of you participated in. the stock online privacy act might stop because of you -- the stop online piracy pact might stop because of you. [applause] when you speak out, politicians listen. they do not have much conviction. you are in charge. that is what this campaign is all about. you have to get out your message. [applause] but there is every reason to look at this optimistically because more people are discovering what happened and young people are coming alive and those who have been waiting for this are willing to join. i had an interview the other day, and i was complemented -- which is rather rare. he said, young people come out

to your functions and they seem really excited. but he said, in the last six months, it is more than just the young people coming out. and i said, yes, that is because we are all thinking very young these days. [applause] liberty is a -- if this liberty was a young idea, it is only tested for a short time frame. tierney is the old idea. we do not need any more tyranny. it started with the magna carta. we do not want our government even undermining the principles of the magna carta. we're not going to let them do that. we're going to continue this movement to which the country up, change our government, and continue to win the elections. thank you very much. [cheers and applause)

[captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> republican presidential candidates mitt romney held a campaign rally in centennial, colorado today. republicans hold a non-binding caucuses tomorrow, with 36 delegates heading straight to conventions in april. this is a little more than 20 minutes. ["born free"] ♪

>> that is quite a welcome. you do not get a better welcome than a colorado welcome. i will tell you that. [cheers and applause] thank you so much. you on army and your honor our cause, our mission, our effort. i know there are a lot of people in this country who feel that our best days are past us. if they are not. at the future is bright. america is back. [applause] we have in the heart of the american people all we need to make sure that america get back on the right track. we get back the white house, get back the senate, if we get a amera contract to create jobs and continue to be -- we get america on track to create jobs and continued to be the shining

city on a hill. [applause] it was three years ago almost to the data and that president obama was on the "today" show and he said, if he could not turn the economy around in three years, we are looking at a one- term proposition. we are here to collect. [cheers] in this country, we have almost 24 million people that are out of work or have stopped looking for work and are just in part- time jobs and need full-time work. do you know what has happened to median incomes of america? over the last four years, they have dropped 10%, the median income, even as the cost of gasoline and food is out. -- are up.

i have had the opportunity to go into various homes and i was surprised. i was getting my hair cut by a guy in his 70's who thought he was going to retire a lot earlier, but could not afford it. i have met retired couples who thought this would be the best time of their life and it tied to take -- and have had to take part-time jobs. in some respects, the president has done everything wrong. just last week he tried to take a dog for the fact that unemployment is down to 8.3%. -- he tried to take a bow for the fact that unemployment is down 8.3%. [boos] remembe remember, he said if we let him borrow $7 billion he would have it below 8%. three years later, it is still above 8%. that is failure.

[cheers] and there is another reason he does not deserve to take it out. -- take a bow. everything he has done has made it harder to put americans back to work. do you think obamacare has made it easier for americans to get back to work? do you think daud-frank has made it easier for banks to make loans to new businesses? do you think the national relations board telling boeing they cannot build a factory in south carolina because it is a right to work state, the you think that put americans back to work? do you think trillion dollar deficit every year -- by the way, the president is on track to put in place almost as much public debt as of the other presidents combined, you think that helps businesses in america? there you have it. his policies did not help put america back to work.

it slow down the economy. he was elected at a critical time when the nation faced a real challenges. -- wasesident wasn't elected to lead. he decided to follow. now it is his time to get out of the way. [cheers] this campaign is more than just about replacing president obama, as important as that is. in my view, this election is going to be a time to decide what america is going to be. what kind of country we are going to have. because there are people in this country who believe that fundamentally, the government ought to be an actor and it should tell us how we live our lives. and their government is far more intrusive than anything we've

had before. i do not want to become a social welfare state. look at the differences between the past that america could follow. president obama, if he is president for four more years, it is trillion dollar deficits every year. it will inevitably hit a wall, like greece or italy did, and there is no one big enough to pull us out. that is the course we are on. if i am president instead, i will slow down -- if i cannot slow down the rate of government spending, i will cut it. [cheers] right now, government consumes -- federal government consumes about 25% of our total economy. i will get that down to 20% within four years. and one more thing, i will finally get on track to have a balanced budget.

[cheers] there are some other differences. president obama seems to have adopted something you see in some countries, just not ours. we call it crony capitalism you use the money of the taxpayers to take care of your friends, our you have bureaucrats decide how the economy ought to work. for instance, when general motors got in trouble, and instead of going through the bankruptcy process where it could come out on its own or perhaps get help from others from time to time, instead, he handed over to uaw, the people who helped in his campaign. and you have the national labor relations board were the right to work states are going to be penalized. and then you have the strangest thing, where the president and his friends are actinolite venture capitalists. they looked at something like

solyndra and decided to give a $500 million. [boos] that is not just a bad idea because we lost $500 million. it is also a bad idea because when the president chooses a winner, when he says his view for the best solar energy company is solyndra, think about all of the other companies that cannot get capital for their idea. and the government has chosen a winner. he did the same thing with a battery company that has now gone bankrupt. there are a couple of electric car companies. and what are all of these things -- what do all of these things have in common? they are all contributors to his campaign. i want to return america to the genius and innovative spirit of american enterprise. [cheers]

this president says a lot of the right things from time to time, but then does not do them. the other day in his state of the union address, he said he was a "for all of the above sources of energy." nuclear, coal, oil, gas, as well as the renewables. but what we have seen over the last three years, a president who does not like kohl, who does not like drilling for oil -- he has used the epa to keep us from both. as a result, america can anticipate spending hundreds of millions of dollars a year buying energy from other people when we can maintain it here ourselves, or from canada with the keystone pipeline.

[cheers] the right course is to build that pipeline, develop our own resources and finally get america to be energy secure. [cheers] on one of the most critical issues that we all care about, our health care, this president has the view that government bureaucrats can take care of your health care betteri will rd return health-care to you and your physician. [applause] the president came to office and said he was going to meet with ahmadinejad, chavez, came jong-

il. how has that worked out? even they did not want to meet with him. the right course is to stand with our restaurants. i will stand with our friends around the world. [applause] by the president's own standards, he has failed. theas on "a today's show -- today show"this morning, and he said he deserves a second term. you believe that? i looked up the record. i look at what has happened. he said in his first year he would propose a comprehensive immigration reform plan.

he did not. he said he would lower unemployment. he has not. he said he would dissuade iran from becoming a nuclear nation. he did not do that either. this is a president who said he was going to work with republicans to craft a bipartisan health care solution. he did not do that either. this is a president who presided over and an economy where their median income has dropped 10%. this administration has failed. that is why we need a new president. [applause] you guys are lucky to live in such a beautiful place. this is a majestic place. i understand a person from massachusetts came out here and

climb to pikes peak, and after she was on the peak, she sat down and wrote a song, "america the beautiful." she was here. this is what inspired her. oh, beautiful, for spacious skies, she saw that here. you are fortunate to have such beauty around you to remind you of this great land. [applause] another verse, she said, so beautiful, for heroes and who more than self their country love and mercy more than life. do we have any veterans in the room? please raise your hand.

thank you. [applause] thank you for your service. the beauty of america who is not just land. the beauty of america is the people. there is one other verse. the idea is the people drafted a concept so we are enduring. what makes us the nation we are is not just our dna. what makes us the richest nation in the world who is the values, the principles that continue to rein in america. when they wrote the declaration

of independence, they tend revolutionary words. the creator gave every human being our rights. i am distressed as i watched our president try to infringe upon those rice. -- our own rights. did you understand this administration argued before the supreme court and a church should not be able to determine who the ministers are but the government decides, and by the way, did you know some members of the court are a pretty liberal? they decided, 9-0, president

obama was wrong. just this last week this same administration said that churches and the administration's they run have to provide for employees free of charge, contraceptives, morning after pills, the like. think about what that does for people who do not share those views. we must have a president willing to protect americans right to worship god according to our own conscience. [applause] the creator endowed us with certain unalienable rights,

among them life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. you guys know that one. any college students here? one. for these students, i hope you do not gloss over the phrase, the pursuit of happiness. what happened with the founding documents is the belief we would not be limited in our pursuit of happiness by the circumstance of our birth, by the place of our birth. we would be free to chart a course in our lives, and by virtue of that being given to us, people all over the world seeking opportunity came here. this is where they wanted to come and created the most powerful nation in the history of the earth. this has driven us to be the most innovative nation.

i do not think the president understands this like you do. i value the founding documents. i value the principles that made us a great nation we are. i do not want to fundamentally transform america. i want to restore the principles of what made us a nation we are. this is a critical time in our nation's history. we will either keep on r.o.a. or live within our means. we will have government tell us what kind of health care we have or we will maintain freedoms we enjoy. we will have a government that protects religious freedom or we will have a government that tells us what kind of conscience and we should have. we will have a nation that now stands with our enemies -- that does not stand up against our

enemies, or we will have a nation that stands up for our friends time and time again. these are critical times. i happen to believe because we are extraordinarily patriotic people, that if we are led by men and women who will tell the truth and lead with -- and live with integrity, who know what makes america america, and who know how to draw upon patriotism, and we will draw upon any challenges we have. i will keep america strong and the shining city upon a hill. thank you so much. thank you. and what a welcome. thank you. ♪

♪

♪ ♪

♪ >> road to the white house coverage continues tomorrow night with the result of caucuses in colorado and minnesota and of primary in missouri. caucuses continue all week in maine, and later contest in arizona and michigan followed by washington's's caucuses at the beginning of march. you concede the latest video of the gop candidates and president obama campaigning online. on our web site you can read what the candidates, political reporters, and others like you are saying about the presidential race. all that and more ad c-span.org

/campaign2012. >> lawmakers extended negotiations on the payroll tax cut. the cuts expire at the end of the month, and all sides agree it should be extended. >> the philosophy that it enhances their lives and enhances the ability to get a job down the road. i do not hear disagreement with that. i hear as an excuse as to why not to do it but rather the fundamental ability to rearm people so they have additional tools. >> to link a social security program to provide financial support when you lose your job, i think first of all will not

work, but second, i do not think it contradicts the notion that the more education you have today, the better off you will be in this economy. >> to watch the rest of this meeting online at the c-span video library. >> in a few moments, steve case and what he sees as an opportunity for congress antiknock president obama to work together -- congress and president obama to work together. ben bernanke is on capitol hill tomorrow morning to talk about the economic outlook. he will testify before the senate budget committee at 10:00 eastern.

america online founder steve case says congress and the president have an opportunity over the next several months to help entrepreneurs and small businesses. he was on a panel hosted by the network founded by a house majority leader eric cantor. this is a little over an hour. >> i am david thompson, moderator, and i would like to introduce our distinguished panel this morning. house leader eric cantor, co- author of the best-selling book "young guns." tim scott represents south carolina, one of two freshmen of the committee. the southern company services president and ceo, jobs creator alliance member.

consumer find the general managing partner, retired ceo and chairman of the staples. finally, steve case, america online co-founder, case foundation chairman. we had a great panel this morning. we talked about growth. the summary of our first panel is that growth -- we view it from our own experience, and we need to find growth -- we define dress as companies that a cheap high sales growth. -- we define growth as companies that have high sales

growth. sales growth is the driver for job creation. it allows them to make a profit to reinvest and hire employees. revenue growth cycles are cyclical. the previous cycle was consumer- driven. this one is more infrastructure- driven. energy. software and services. finally, we need to optimize our regulations and policies to

improve the velocity for allowing companies to grow and create jobs. america used to have a 50% share of sales companies. small business is the heart of america's growth, but some of

those small businesses become large businesses, like apple. we had a 50% share of the company. today we have 14%. we are still the number one nation for sales growth companies, but we're not a leader we used to be. mohrs sales growth companies create more jobs that will get full employment in the next cycle. we have got to get full employment in the next cycle, and the forecast indicates we are not going to get there. our challenge is daunting. we need to restart america's growth engine. let me open up the panel. washington plays a key role in job creation in the economy.

>> first of all, i appreciate the opportunity to be here on such a distinguished panel. and really, the spirit of today's discussion is what this town needs more of. it is about sales growth, growth and innovation. washington can do a lot to inhibit the growth in entrepreneurial activity, it can to elect to inhibit the formation of capital, and can dissuade people from doing what we need them to do, to go about the process of taking risks, because from risks comes growth in sales. we also know that we can do positive things to create an environment where you do have extraordinary stories of sales growth. you mentioned a specific

industries that most economists are looking at in terms of going forward, and whether it be infrastructure, energy, technology, services, this seems to be, as you indicate, where the high growth and the prospects for high growth is place. tohington's role should be try to focus on policies, tax policies, regulatory policy, that can aim in those industries' growth, but it is not washington possible to pick another way and jack up the economy -- not washington's role to pick another way and jack up the economy. when washington is in the business of choosing which industries should win and which should lose, when washington is in the business of saying people should spend their money here or there, it generally does not work.

we have seen policies over the last three years of stimulus spending, we have seen increasingly intrusive government regulation of capital formation in the health-care arena and others that have not worked. that is why i think you will see us in the house of representatives talking about new policies, new ways to accomplish what we are trying to do, which is to get people back to work. as you said, small business is something that i believe most people think is the backbone of america. every business started as a small business. we know that growth and the number of jobs is really about small business growth, and the high sales growth companies feed that more than anyone else. that is what we intend to do, and tim and i will bring policies forward for small business, a triple tax policies, and to cut small business taxes. those are bills we will bring

to the four straight up. that sends a signal that washington really is in the business of trying to encourage entrepreneurial activity. the idea that you are focused on this panel is one that all of us need to spend a lot more time to engage in in a helpful way. >> steve, excited to have you here today. you took a risk in founding aol. you had the velocity to grow. now you're sitting in the interesting position of looking at a situation today with your personal experience of being one of the 4%. what are the top lessons that you think can be applied? >> first of all, it is great to be here. when eric asked me to be here, one of the young guns, because i am an old gun.

i am in my fifties and it is always nice to be included in a young guns forum. it is a nice to have washington focused on the role that entrepreneurship plays in our nation. in tyson's corner, virginia, in 1985 we will a pretty significant company. i've been focused on investment in companies, including livingsocial, another company in massachusetts. i kind of pivoted from being an entrepreneur to backing and helping entrepreneurs and create jobs to it more recently, probably why i was asked to join this, is that in the last year or so i spent a growing amount of time on a policy in washington and get people focused on the role that entrepreneurship has played. we're not the leading economy by

accident. in tire industries were based here. we've kind of lost sight of that. when people think about business, they tend to think of it in overly simplistic contexts -- the fortune 500 companies. it is these tight rope companies that have the potential to create significant jobs. in the last three decades, 40 million jobs have been created by tight rope companies, accounting for all the net job creation. if you want to focus on the economy, you want to focus on jobs, this is the place to focus. the data recently has been

troubling. the number of new start-ups is down 23% since 2007. it gives you a sense of that. meanwhile, ipo's have contracted significantly. when aol went public almost 20 years ago, we raced almost $20 million. now companies, because of sarbanes-oxley, they often get sold and when companies are sold, at they decelerate instead of xl right. -- instead of accelerate. startamericapartnership.org website -- we have launched 18 startup regions around the country because we really believe that while providing an overall umbrella of resources and focus it is important, ultimately the real action is what happens at the regional level. also last year i was asked to join the president's jobs council. we came out with our report, i think in september or october, and met with the president.

this was a bipartisan group. credito the president's to get a gather and understand what is going on here. i was focused on entrepreneurship. what we did was instead of reinvent the wheel, we set a bunch of smart people have been working on this for years and what we get them together and prioritize and figure out which ones can have the most impact and recommend those? that is what we did. many of the things we recommended are the things that

eric and kevin and others in the house have been leading on for some time. there's not a lot of good news these days in washington around people coming together and solving problems. there is a moment in the next couple of months where we do have bipartisan support perhaps for pro-entrepreneurship legislation. the next month there was a bipartisan bill introduced in the senate by senator rubio of florida and senator koons of delaware -- senator coons of delaware. a bill was introduced by senator warner of virginia and senator moran in kansas, again with bipartisan support. last week, --, prison the white house released the start of america -- last week, the white house released the start up america package. things are brewing in the house and senate. there really is an opportunity that we have to capitalize on it and focus less on press releases and more on working together to forge a partnership around and the legislation. sarbanes-oxley is a key one. the aol spirit is less common these days, and that is a problem because much of a a businessuch of aol's

happened after it went public. there are a number of things in the house and senate bills that will deal with raising the cap and having an on-ramp, which is a big deal in terms of job creation. the second, which also has bipartisan support, is called crowd funding, along platforms used to fund projects like a documentary to also fund businesses, with certain precautions. the proposal has some support. if you are raising less than $1 million and the individual investments are less than $10,000, they essentially have

been carved-out. that is a big deal that a lot of companies that have a problem because they rely on their own money and informal friends and family money, from that point to real venture- capital it is quite challenging. third, which i think is the most important, but i recognize we force them to start companies and other companys that compete with us. it's as if we said why don't you move to china, but get an education but once you do that

we're going to kick you back to china. but that's essentially what we're doing right now. bipartisan support. let's encourage for them to stay here. let's stape a green card to your diploma. it was put forth by senator warner, a stem visa and entrepreneur visa. these aren't going to solve tall immigration problems. there are many things around the dream act and comprehensive immigration reform that folks will debate for some time but focusing narrowing that is around immigration. i think there is a moment there, really is the opportunity in the next month or two to work on the house, work on the senat, the work that's been done in at the white house where there is overlap. people essentially agree on 80%, 90% of the solution. how do you make sure that the

policy works. it takes everyone to focus. they're asked a bunch of their previous winners to come to washington later this month. going to march in washington in terms of entrepreneur legislation. so we can do it. we've just got to get it done. >> before i talk about energy. i want to talk about the credibility of electricity to the general economy. the men in the institute said that 20% of the growth domestic product was dependent on our electricity. today it's 60%. so that is reliability, affordability but it's an optimizing of those three things. for our business, when our communities grow, when businesses grow, when our

residential customers grow our business grow. when i talk about energy and electric, it's not being miopic about the industry, it's the impact that it has on our economy. it does drive the economy. you couple that from 2007 to 2010, 23% new businesses have been launched, the lowest in any recession nair -- recessionn are ary period. so if we're not creating them, it's impossible to grow. how do we create jobs? how do we find ways that once their created that they're successful? for us, you know, there are two things. one is the creation of jobs with companys that continue to grow and be successful. and the second piece and steve also mentioned it is the skill issue. i've been very involved in

education. our company is very involved in education. one of the concerning long-term things is, if we need and the mckenzie global institute says we need 21 million new jobs by 2020 to reach 5% unemployment and to reach the growing population that needs to be employed in this country. so if that's true, even if we're able to create those jobs, that only 34% will have college degrees and will be about, you know, $2 million shy. but those degrees might not be in the right field. so business, you know, government has role, yes. but business, we've got to get in there and we've got to develop the kills that we need. three things that you've heard, i think there are key issues like regulation. overreaching regulation. what do we do to make sure that we can start businesses quickly, that foreign, direct investment chooses to come to this country. for example not only do we create jobs internally but that

we're a drawn investment. the world bank recently said that the united states is 27 in the world now in terms of getting construction permits. so if i'm going invest in a manufacturing facility that's an issue. in the southeast, where our company is, we've been successful in awe tracting automotive, steel manufactures. the last steel manufactures, it was a key part of it. the sectors are so tied together that when we make decision on health care or energy or infrastructure that we look at the cascading impact and ensure that they are not unintended consequences and at the same time that we make sure that we're investing in our future workforce, that not only do we have the numbers but the

right skill sets. that's not just college graduates that ensuring we have college technical professionals, physician assistants, nutritionists, that kind. >> it seems to me that there's this real word education happening and that we're trying to get on the same page, the needs of management teams of high growth are unique. you've got have high friction, more velocity, make decisions faster. from your experience from education, how do we do that quickly? because it's easy not to be on the same page and just be focused on risk or growth and conservation of capital. from my time at mckenzie a management team working cross structurally is hard to do. >> from a business standpoint i think some tension is healthy

as long as everybody is moving toward the same goal. you debate, you come out with better answers that way. so there's a healthy tension. what i've seen more successful, i was on the state school board was the integration of business into the kirk la of the school where -- curriculum of the school where superintendents said what type of workers do you need? what type of remediation are you doing? they were spenting $3.5 million trying to get people up to the level of the workforce. we've got to make sure we do that earlier. our company's been involved with career academies. career academies were not the standard. kids went in as sophomores. then by the time they graduated they were able 100% passage rate on our tests. but they were just as qualified to go be engineers and

accountants. what we found out that the graduate was 96% and this included at-risk kids. the school was open to anyone the county or anyone the public schools. i believe to make good decisions for education that we've got to have stronger partnerships between business in the communities and the schools and that businesses in there are not just saying, well, shame on you, you didn't bring this person to us but we're going help you develop and deliver the type of skilled workforce that we need if the future. >> thank you. >> on that topic, one of the things that we've done in charleston county we had force protection for military vehicles. we would have a workforce for the future and we're doing the same thing with boeing. they've partnered with my old school to make sure they create the workforce that they need to

be competitive of global skills in the future. without that integration we seem to lack the necessary tools to be competitive in our country. but from a global perspective we lack it completely. the same thing happens from that standpoint. the overall tax is over 30% of our g.d.p. you add that on top of an unskilled workforce you find yourself being a major competition. you attract more revenue into our country all the way down to your local schools to create a platform for the future. >> first of all, thank you to steve and otherings for working, changing the policies in washington. what's frightening to me is there's a big diver generals between the they're rhettic convergence at the top, against all of it, so we look at the

fed, the treasury. we've got an easy money policy. what's not so easy if you're a small emerging business to get a loan. it has to do with the intense actives with create for the bank examiners and all covering their butts and basically not allowing regional banks to lend money. the risk -- the risk in compensation as part of dodd frank. so every public company has a right to this tremendous tiss, how their senior management is not induced to take rickses by virtue of their stock options or other options they've got. car max is a great fax growing company of the -- fast growing company of the district. they're indicating their approach to the company. they went all the way down to the associate on the sales floor. i don't think this is what the f.c.c. has in mind, guys but we will send it into the letter.

guess what comes back? would you give us a thorough analysis why you included your sales associates on the floor? give me a break. why are you paying people in washington to do this kind of stuff? just to be a pain in the butt? i'm sure there's no immigration that says we should do this. until we get an administration focused on this, no matter what policies we have it's not going matter. >> can you respond to that because you made excellent points? it is almost as if this town wants to micro manage every small, medium, large size business in order to wipe out any risk that may be present in an entity or an industry and if we go back and sort of remember what has built this country, what has built this country is the fact that more people from

different backgrounds have got more opportunity throughout economic freedom. it's not through a government environment that tends to come in and prescribe what kind of risk scenario is going to take place on the floor of a car max show room. again, it goes back to in the very broad sense, we don't want policies that this town determines is, through a certain industry or this is where capital needs to be allocated. the role of government should be that we want to create an environment where the laws are properly and transparently enforced that everyone is operating turned same rules and that we wipe out unlawful behavior. and enforce the law. we don't want this town and its reck lay tors and its policymakers coming in and telling companies like car max,

aol, southern companies we don't want or boeing -- we don't want this because that is a sure way to snuff out the innovation and enji knewity that has given rise to the greatest nation with the greatest prosperity in history. it's unbelievable to hear that. and i know that i go home and talk to people that i represent and it's very difficult for them to access new financing because of the pendulum that has swung so far and that everyone's worried about getting in trouble. so there's nothing going on as far as the access to capital and business formation. you know, that's -- certainly there is some and there are signs that program maybe it will get better but right now we ought to take a thorough look at the things that are standing in the way. and that's why for the last several months the house is referred to has been very aggressive at saying, look, we

need smart regulation we dode don't need them driven by some ideological purr sthute will snuff out the growth that we so desperately need in our economy. and again, maybe there's an intention to want to do good and that washington can wave a magic wand and make everybody better but again the success that america has bred has been built on free market and almost chaotic but incredibly attractive society. it's not a machine that washington creates that we're here that we go and tinker with. we're here to have a set of laws evenly applied to everyone and to ensure that those engaging in unlawful behavior are held to account. >> i bring a certain

perspective. i think of myself as american and my focus is to try to build bridges and try to get something done. >> there's an opportunity to get something done. there are big issues aren't fiscal policy, around regulation, what's the level of that? what's the right level of taxation particularly in a global economy. military issues and foreign policy. those are big issues and they need to be batted around and that's what elections are for and will have that debate this year and the american people will decide which side of those issues they're on. but right now there's an opportunity to get something done around these entrepreneurial policies. it's time to figure out how to come together because everybody agrees it's important. everybody understands how

america was built, everybody understands the role of entrepreneurship. there is interest in the house and the senat, republicans and democrats an there is interest in quite considerable momentum. they may surprise some of you. but if you look at the legislative agenda or the state of the union, there is clearly a recognition that it's an important thing to focus on. >> i'm going to hop in right now because i know tim wants to as well. i glee all of us want growth, all of us want more entrepreneur in terms of high gross sales companies. it's just the words have not met the actions and we're trying to force that. we really are. and all of us want to work together. but again, when you deal with this sort of rhetoric that has been so omnipresent in this town about dividing, you know, the rich and the poor, instead of saying, we're all in this together. we need people like you.

we need people like you. we need all people like this in this together because successful people can help those who are not. and again, the tendency to go want to put second -- sectors of society against one another is very dangerous. this is frustration that we want to do some good. set aside that kind of nonsense. >> he hit the nail on the head very well when he underscores the disconnect that we have in washington. there's a philosophy that says there is a responsibility to divide the buy as equally as possible and to protect the american citizen. the other side of the coin simply says that we have to gross -- growth far more than dividing it equally and the goal is not to protect the individual as it is to unleash the individual and see twha what their maximum potential is. stevie talked about h.r. 2930, an opportunity for small investors to get involved in

the game. the question is as a country, do we want to be a high-growth marketplace. what are the remedys that we can bring to the table? most of the remedys that business owners want have nothing to do with washington. >> i started my small business in 19 9. i thought my 1990, 240 sx was an asset. i didn't realize that 240,000 miles on the car was not an asset. my banker said you can't get a loan on your car. ok. what he did talked to me is forming partnerships with people that would have an investment in my business that would have a long-term return for them. i went to a cup of my friends and we had a long conversation because i had good relationships, i was able to start my combizz. when you look at -- business. when you look at the con strixes. we can destroy jobs. we simply cannot create jobs

but there are some legislation that we've been working on that will actually move the ball ford wand whether it is h.r. 2940 that allows for advertising and marketing that will make your company grow, whether or not it's a simplification and a phasing in of s.e.c. requirements that allows for it to happen faster or looking at the regulatory environment. when i went around my district and did a regulations tour, we found that dodd frank has had a major impact in a negative way on our construction world. so you're talking about 42% of our developers are gone permanently. finding it alone, having 40%, 50% requirement in the game. is the hurdle too high for most folks to get involved in? the department of energy, they want to now regulate your decorative fireplace as a primary heating source, another loss of 10,000 jobs.

and over and over again, not even mention boeing and the effects of big corporation. the fact of the matter is if we restrict the formation of capital and eliminate the incentives alone money, you find yourself in a quoog mire fit that's very difficult to get out of. eric's been saying for the last year and a half, jobs, jobs and jobs. how do we create an environment that's conducive for job creation? >> i really like your point. 90% of job creation comes from the public. there are have been suggests to get the companies to do just that. but from our phone interviews and our panel in similar tom, the execution of regulation so that companies can grow efficiently is paramount right now. they've got to grow. as you come through that inflection point of 50 million,

it's all about velocity. you can't spend more time looking at risks. it's all about you've got to be planning ahead for next year's growth in hiring people. how do we solve the problem of regulation reform so that growth businesses can move faster as tom brought up and susan did? >> i think there are two levels to it. let me first go back to what i was talking about before. it's kinds of the core issue. i recognize coming here that this is a strongly republican audience. i also recognize two weeks ago when i met with the democratic house retreat was a heavily democratic audience. some of the things i told them, they don't want to hear. maybe some things you don't want to hear but i do think there is a moment to come together. i think there is an agreement around the key things that need to get done. so trying to build bridges around there is critical.

it requires us coming together around these issues in the next couple of months an it's got to start in the congress but ultimately there is more support than there was a few months ago from the white house. it wolve solve all the problems but some of the problems. i'd break it into two parts. some is the macro regulations issues and some are access to capital. the funding of the banks are very important to focus on. and then there are regulations that relate to specific industries. there's a big debate the last couple of months against sopa and things like that. one of the great things about the internet thead companies like aol possible is they did it right. they invested in some of the basic research that essentially created the internet. and then at the right point in time figured out a way -- >> >> al gore?

>> it was a little bit before al, although he was a big advocate. they commercialized it in the erbley 199 o's. but then adopted the internet and commerce and that has allowed it to flourish. now it's flourish. it's not surprising there are some of those debates. but they have a pretty good model in terms of launching industries. they aren't playing the kind of role that they were playing 30, 40 years ago. there's a role for university research. we need to do a better job of commercializing it. but there's a role for that. and figure out how to unleash these industries so they can start them in the united states and grow in the united states and just -- but a lot of core points that i want to make sure we don't lose sight of.

you referenced it before. is the big focus around globalization is on manufacturing. that's where a lot of the -- in some extent services. the story less told is over the last decade we've seen a real acceleration and the globalization of entrepreneurship. what is the secret sauce in america is now being replicated in other nations, put in a very aggressive pro-entrepreneur venture. now they have more people in their china office than in their silicon valley office. we need to make sure that we double down on our entrepreneurs and the only way to do that is to pass this pro-entrepreneur legislation. whether it's the start-up act or there there's a varietyy of different things. we need to make sure we don't try to put too many ornaments on the tree but get the core

issue around talent, immigration, funding, regulation against tax policy in terms of the right type of tax incentives, those are the core underpinnings. if we get those in place we can usher the next weaf of entrepreneur and remain the number one entrepreneur nation. >> it's a passionate topic. there's a couple of you ready to jump in. >> why worry about -- i used to be a democrat too. but then i started a business. [laughter] >> and i realized what these policies mean. i think the stuff you're talking about is all good stuff. the problem is we're taking two steps back at the same time. let's talk about venture capital. the business i'm in today. dodd frank is now going to regulate the venture firms.

we have spent $100,000 in redge industry. now we're going to make the taxation an election issue and there's going to be a lot of consensus now. i don't care about that one way or the other personally. having said that, though, if you start taxing a venture capitalism at 40% instead of 15%, his hurdle rate will change. the valuation for start-ups are going the be affected and you have less capital and less attractive terms. when you're making progress at one side, the administration is taking it away on the other side. that's what deeply concerns me. >> when we talk about regulation, the majority leader mentioned smart regulations. >> it's not clues -- choose winners or losers. we believe for a future for electricity.

you need nuclear, you need coal, renewables and efficiency. you do need all of those. just as you would not a financial portfolio with a great stock even though southern is a great stock. you need a diversified portfolio. we're in all sides of those areas. we have to incentivize the risk -- we want to take smart risks, educated risks. we need regulations that help us to be safe and secure but beyond that the market work. and what will find is you will see that the winners will come up. that doesn't mean that you don't need short-term incentives for start-ups. in fact, a lot of the things that have been going on with the department of energy, our clean coal is going to capture 65% of the carbon dioxide. it will look like a natural gas plan. we worked and received money

from d.o.e. but it was our employees and we put for more money than the government did. china own all the new developmentings. we we license that technology in china and while we're building the plant in mississippi, the first one was built in china and we're learning from that. government has a role to provide money. they find who the winners are. and when you find who the winners are, that takes care of it that you don't have to do that forever. >> do you think there's a misperception of growth companys that are doing the right thing? there is always 10% that aren't doing the right thing? >> i don't think it's 10%. i think it's less. >> this goes back to the statement. it's almost like three steps forward, two steps back. an again steve comes with the

right -- in the right spirit. we ought to be looking for ways where we can work together. an when the president unveiled his job agenda back in the fall, my immediate reaction was, look, this all-or-nothing approach is not going to work because no two people are going to agree on everything. so we ought to try and find places where we have vision and let's go execute it. thomas edison said vision without execution is a hallucination. we need to go and execute now. there are -- there are plenty of bills sitting over there. i think we're right up on 30 bills the house has put over into the senat well for them to pick up. and if the president could join us, i mean, steve indicated, you know, there's been at least perceived shift in the rhetoric at least as far as small business is concerned out of the white house, i would like to see some action put behind

that rhetoric. again, there's been too much now for three years, indication that there was some other motive around the policy-making and support coming out of the white house. it wasn't all growth. it wasn't as tim says growing the pie. it has really been much more aboutdividing, not multiplying. we do need to think about multiplication, not division. that is what growth is about. we should be able to agree on that. if we can set aside this rich versus poor stuff and say, we want everybody to be successful. we know that some are not as successful as others. how do we create that environment? you go to growth-oriented companies. that is the way other people can become successful. i hope we can put it into execution.

>> the middle class grows and people reinvest into the community. how do we get everybody on that page, which has a bigger impact, then being divisive? >> i think it is important for the people of the country. if those who are feeling they do not have an adequate job opportunity or are out of work, how do we get them back to work? it goes back to the mention of these industries where we know there is a lot of growth potential. we should go about trying to put a sign up to the world. our governor, and even governors

passed, on both sides of the aisle, have been very effective. we are open for business. we want success. we do not want to punish success. come back to the bed at is that you indicated. we want to punish them. we need to get the job and the wealth in a way that people can believe we have a growing economy again. when washington says, i want to tax you because you are too successful, the buffet tax, that is anti-growth. we need a rule that says we need to stop the government from overly including into the innovative spirit of our country. if we can stop that kind of talk

in say we are about trying to level the playing field and give everybody an opportunity, we can be a lot better off. that goes to the point about finding a sweet spot. >> if you focus on customers, everybody can focus on customer needs. if the customers are the job creators, small business, start- ups, amid market, those creating jobs, how do we get everyone focused on that job creators to rally around what they need? >> ultimately, it is the private sector. the government creates the context. ultimately, the action happens when people take risks and starred companies. many failed. that is the nature of entrepreneurship. there can be huge successes like a facebook, there are also many,

many failures. that is a story of entrepreneurship. not just because the country was built by entrepreneurs, the people who came over in the first place, they were pioneers going to take risks. that is what has made us unique. it is the envy of the world. not to silicon valley, the american eagle system is the envy of the world. -- the american eagle system is the envy of the world. i think we are doing the right thing in terms of what is happening in the house and senate, republicans, democrats, and the white house, trying to focus on this rule -- will of the entrepreneur were. there has been great work that highlight the importance of this issue. if you are concerned about unemployment and want to find people jobs, high-growth companies are the answer. if you are concerned about the

economy, entrepreneurship is the answer. if you are concerned about our competitiveness in the global world, people and getting smarter about this thing, other than your ship is the answer. it was not true a year or two ago. people are focusing on this as a key thing. there is, a bipartisan support to try to get something done. there is reasonable clarity. there is still disagreement. there is clarity of a rumble immigration plays, funding, regulations around capitol, sarbanes oxley. the question is, how do we get things done? in all the conversations i have had, they look at me like, you are so naive. do you really think anything is going to get done? [laughter] i think something has to get done. we have to see this moment.

my focus has been narrowly on this. i say narrowly on this. how do we bridge the divide and bring people together. it is the best way to get our economy moving. >> in the last few minutes, i want to raise the bar. we have to give -- its 5 million more jobs. we are doing great things. that is not enough. to create the millions of jobs we need, we have been a great nation in the past, our share is declining. it is not going up. yes, we are still a leader. quote we are talking about is good. there is a window of opportunity. what do we need to do to raise the bar? our country is in crisis when it comes to jobs. there is not a lot of patience. people are giving up.

what do we have to do to raise the game? we do not have time to keep arguing. we have to improve the velocity. vella ideas have to be bigger and bolder. we are talking another two dozen growth companies, an average revenue growth rate of -- and other 2000 and growth companies. an average growth rate -- a big number. >> i agree. we have to be bold. it has to be above growth for america. all of the things that divide us, whether it is the fiscal issues, we know that elections are there for a reason. some are going to be decided there. we can all agree, you need to create, how many new jobs? >> it would be 3500 in construction and 800 permanent jobs.

it is what we need by 2020. >> when the 21 million new jobs. that is our goal. we ought to put that out there as our goal. we have eight years to get there. what is that, two and a half million jobs a year? how do we do that? it is going to take immigration, we need the smartest and best in the world to come here and help us. look at graduates. there are so many foreign nationals outpacing americans. we want to attract them we have moved in the house toward that end. we have lifted country capps on highly skilled immigrants. we ought to do more of that. we have pieces. we ought to expand that program. we will take human capital. we have to say, what kind of

capital formation, what kind of risk is going to be required to create those new jobs? let's plug that in. this is not rocket science. this is about running a pro- growth agenda so that washington does not inhibit the growth. as i said earlier, this country does it better than anybody else. there are a lot of people trying to copy us. let's set out a plan in the let's do it. it is easier said than done. i have also seen so much effort and attention put on the division rather than the multiplication. we have to come to the fact that if we do not do this, we are not going to have the success story. it is about being old. it is a but green to say, the things we disagree on, let's try to get to that goal.

>> one thing we have to do is, we look at all the jobs here for america. also, in a global economy, our american workers need our share of the global economy. what that says in the southeast is it has been flat for us. industrial has been doing well. a lot of it has been exported. we would like for that to stay. it is great to have these exporters. we have american companies who are selling products all over the world. those are great jobs. they help the economic cycles in this country. when latin america or china is growing. part of what we have to do is, how do we make sure that american companies and workers get our share of the global tide? >> let me throw that in there. if we are going to be serious,

how do american-based multinationals get their piece? how do they get their piece of the global pi? taxing is huge. multinationals operate with both hands tied behind their back. you can see the problems in this town. there is so much rhetoric about saying, if you implement a full tax policies, they are going to create jobs -- implement favorable tax policies, they of going to create jobs overseas. it means success at home. that tax policy needs to be a part of it. we have differences on that. incrementally, we can do things to help pro-growth companies, we ought to be doing it. let's let me close on an optimistic note. -- >> let me close on an optimistic note. it is time to focus on what we can get done.

while i am worried about america's position, and give some of the statistics about globalization and entrepreneurship is accelerating, the reason i am optimistic, if we can get our government to put the right framework in place, my day job, 90% of my time, is meeting with entrepreneurs who are excited about the future. across all sectors, not just technology, but services and manufacturing. i made a lot of entrepreneurs. they believe they are going to change the world. the culture, they were going to go work for wall street. more and more are interested in working for start-ups. there are a lot of great ideas out there.

health care, it is going to be revolutionized by technology. the next decade is going to be the glory years. a lot of things happening around at energy. a lot of things happening in education. those three industries, health care, energy, and education, are huge pillars and have not been constructed in the way that other industries have. there is enormous opportunity. there is a thirst and a hunter and a passion around entrepreneurship. we need to make sure we accelerate that by having the right policies in place. >> time enough for questions. >> looking for opportunity for common ground. we are on two different pages. common ground is used based on what was said and what they're -- eric has said.

the all of the above strategy. the second area,2010, he talked about restructuring of the corporate tax rate. it was huge. it would allow repatriation. talking about bringing capital back to the market. the third is the capital gains tax. we talked about eliminating it. i think those are three areas where we already have common ground. if we can get him to move on those issues, we already have leadership that is moving in that direction. here is an opportunity. >> i want to piggyback on something steve said. this country still has the largest number of patents in the world. the entrepreneurship is alive and well. we have to help it grow.

talking about colleges, i was involved in an effort, i was not part of it, there was the school, courier academies, this young man was a junior in high school. he started his own company. by the time he graduated, he had been certified in microsoft and had his own business with five employees. we have people out there starting very young. let's teach this in our schools. let's get business involved. we have the talent. i believe in innovation and entrepreneurship. hud and the harvest this? i grew up in rural alabama. how do you make this crow to where we continue to be the biggest country on the face of the earth? >> i can see your wheels turning. >> i want to believe but i do

not. [laughter] look at trade, we talk about foreign trade. this administration has not done a single trade deal. it took three years to approve the ones from the bush administration. public companies go to someplace in africa, we cannot compete because your choice is to not go to the business or go to jail. you of fighting with one hand tied behind your back. getting a lower tax rate, it would be great. you can already hear the rhetoric, if you give it away to the big corporations, here we go again. it is not going to happen. >> i understand why there is cynicism.

i understand why people feel like nothing will happen. when we started aol, nobody could figure out what of is doing. entrepreneurs are used to people not believe in something can happen. the quote from last night as a super bowl, there would two great advertisement. one was about entrepreneurship. the patriots did not like it so much. the other one i enjoyed with the clinton eastwood at the tasman. it said, it is halftime. -- advertisement. it said, it is halftime. it was not just about detroit. it is about what we can do more of the. entrepreneurship was the key driver in the first half. we need to make sure it is the key driver in the second half. [applause] >> i can open up for questions.

if you would like. >> thank you. it has been a great discussion. i am with the boston consulting group. a leading competitor has been mentioned a few times, mackenzie. we have great news from a recent study. but it would be useful to share with the. -- i thought it would be useful to share with you. economics and a driving manufacturing back to the u.s. from china. this is driven by an increase in wages in china. they have increased at a consistent rate. when you go from two dollars to $6 it matters. this is beneficial -- beneficial to states like south carolina. it is also driven by increases in the won. we are much more productive than work is in europe and the rest

of the developed world. we think the u.s. can be served better from here. some of the ideas that came up, we have been suggesting. we have been sharing with the house and senate on both sides of the aisle. immigration is critical. your store it -- your point about vocational training are very important in germany, you have college and university mixed with vocational training. the whole idea around supply chain clusters, being able to invest behind an anger. if you get bmw to come to south carolina, build the small businesses that will be there in order to provide the network, the suppliers that drive the huge jobs, a multiplier effect from the plant. those are some things you mentioned. a few others, awareness. you should think about the numbers, not just today, but in

the future. when we first did this, the 2010 numbers said, manufacturing will be in china. 2015 said, manufacturing will be in the united states. you need to look at it going forward. a couple of other thoughts. tax policy has come up. we think depreciation is a wonderful way to encourage investment today. as i mentioned, being able to promote, not just foreign direct investment, but u.s. direct investment. i wanted to thank all of you. >> thank you. >> one other thing, there is the repatriation of a lot of calls and their jobs because of technology. instead of building big call centers, people are able to work from home. we are seeing more repatriation of jobs here. that is a great trend.

>> that is one thing i have seen. we are a leader of information technology. if we can use that, it tends to have a great benefit. >> you will still see the united technologies is bringing back four thousand jobs from china and mexico. they are coming back to south carolina because we have created an environment that is conducive for business in our state. >> i appreciate howard -- your research. it is a cycle. it is not that we are going to create jobs, but how many and how fast. >> would any of the like to comment, we are talking about job creation, would anybody like to comment on the kids don't have a project -- on the

keystone pipeline project? >> i think tim referred to that. it is a great job project. it is something the president has come down on what we believe is the wrong side. if you are for job creation, put your money where your mouth is. job creation belongs in the private sector. that is what this conversation has been about. if we want to grow this economy, get the 21 million jobs, it is a no-brainer. from a natural resources standpoint, a security standpoint, and for job. that is what is about. >> no question in my mind. the question is, are we going to position ourselves to be in a place where jobs are going to come or are we going to allow it to go across the seas?

but we going to be a player or not? the decision has to be made them. it cannot wait until after the election -- the decision has to be made mel. it cannot wait until f. to the election. >> heads the cynicism. -- after if the election. >> hence the cynicism. we can do this. >> it has more to do with what we see as america's future, philosophically. please see it as a place that needs to be insulated -- do you see it as a place that needs to be insulated? >> that is a really good closing. are there any let's questions? we promised to end it. i want to thank you all. one must question. >> there was much controversy over the jobs numbers about

whether it paints an accurate picture. how do you think this is being spun? how does the gop had a plan to confront it? >> any time you agreed in a quarter of a million new jobs, it is a good thing. i welcome that good news. as far as new participants in the market and how that was being interpreted, i do not know enough to tell you yes or no. i did see one thing that indicated it was up until june that he saw a decline in the number of those participating in the job market. since then, there has been a leveling off. perhaps, there is evidence to the contrary. i'd look at the fact that you are creating a quarter of a million jobs. we can do a lot better. this the economy has done a lot better in the past.

in the early '80s, when you saw us coming off of the recession, 300,000 new jobs a month. if we are going to reach that goal of 21 million new jobs by 2020 you are going to do the math. you are going to have a significant number of sustained job growth rut the. . we ought to embrace it but we all -- throughout the period. we ought to embrace it. >> thank you. i would like to thank the panel. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012]

[indistinct chatter] >> colorado and minnesota coast presidential caucuses tomorrow. there is a primary in missouri. our coverage continues in a few moments with newt gingrich and rick santorum at an energy conference today in colorado. followed by rallies for ron paul in minneapolis and mitt romney in colorado. parts of the federal aviation administration temporarily closed last year because the house and senate could not agree on funding. after passing 23 short-term

bills, congress has come to an agreement on long-term funding for the faa. tomorrow, we will talk to house transportation committee chairman john mica about the faa. also, a hearing on president obama's recess appointment. there with four posts at the liberal lesions board. we will talk with that -- will talk about that with raul grijalva. also, melanie sloan. "washington journal" is live every day at 7:00 a.m. eastern. >> this past week, lawmakers continued negotiations to increase the payroll tax cut. they will continue their work on

tuesday with a fourth public meeting. all sides agree it should be extended. the talks are focused on have to pay for it. >> i did not give this agreement in the philosophy that if people get a ged that enhances their lives and their ability to get a job down the road. i did not hear a disagreement with that. i hear an excuse -- the fundamental philosophy of trying to rearm people with an education so and they go into the work force they have an additional tool. >> the program is designed and has functioned to provide financial support when you lose your job to a climate that you have to be in this training, i think, it will not work. i think it contradicts the notion you are suggesting, that the more education you have

today, the better off you'll be. >> what's the rest of this meeting with the two others on line at c-span.org/video library. >> now, from colorado, new gingrich on energy policy. colorado republicans are holding non-binding caucuses on tuesday. the state's gop delegates will be decided at district and state conventions and april. from the colorado school of mines, this is 40 minutes. this is about 40 minutes. >> the chance to talk about energy and what has to be done. i think this is a remarkable point in american history. you have an administration wse policies are wrong on national security, on american job

creation, and on cost of living. i will explain what i mean. this is the most and the american energy administration we havever had. -- anti-american energy administratione have ever had. [applause] you have the highest cost of gasoline we have ever had. if you are a writer at the new york times in the red the subway to work, it may not our -- and you ride the subway to work, it may not occur to you that th high price of gasoline is a problem. if you are the rest of the country, the high price of gasoline has a lot of effects. it affects the cost of groceries. everything is delivered by trk. it affects the cost of everything made by plastic. it affects the costs structure

for people. we had a woman who ce to an event in nevada who said to me, she was rationed to two trips a week. i was one of her two trips. let me start at the most practical level. the obama administration's high- priced, anti-american model is very dangerous and very destructive. let me put it in context. just the last 48 hours. you have an egyptian government which is threatening to try american hostages, almost a repeat of the jimmy carter weakness of 1979 and 1980. you have a pistani government which has arrested the doctor who helped us find bin laden,

instead of praing the person who helped us find the most wanted person, they have arrested him. you have an e runyan -- an iranian government that has been practicing how to close the strait of hormuz. faced with all of that, irrational, a serious american government would have a program on american energy. ey would say, our goal is to become so dependent -- independent that we do not care what they do. [applause] i have a very simple formula for that. you want to measure what our goal is. it is to ensure that no american president ever again does to a saudi king. -- bows to a saudi king.

[applause] how do we do that? we replace whole bureaucracies. i am for closing the environment the protection agency and replacing it with a new agency with brand new people. [applause] the environmental solutions agency would have to have as a first test common sense. [laughter] you can talk to any farmer anywhere in america about the proposed the regulations and you will have an idea about what i neemean. they had this meeting with an executive who was explaining that epa had control over air and that dust was a particular matter and that they were concerd with the fact that in arizona you get dust storms.

this is a sign that something is going wrong. they were out there to try to figure it out. you, during part of the year, could you water the areas that produce the dust storms? [laughter] these guys said, arizona is a desert. it is called does it because we do not have much water. this was the kind -- it is called aid does it because we do not have much water. -- called a desert because we do not have much water. this was the kind of dialogue. it will encourage entrepreurs and incentives to solve problems with new and better solutions not with red tape, ligation, and lawsuits. that would be a help. second, we should overhaul the

department of the interior. the obama administratn said they were going to lift the moratorium on the golf and replace it with a permanent system. they would not issue any permits. there was no moratorium. you just had to apply for a permit. the permit system was there. i was in new orleans, people were so angry. people say, they are angry at the obama administration. these are $80,000 a year jobs. an economy that has economic problems, these are good jobs. the administration was so of of touch with reality, they did not realize these rigs move. they thought they could put a moratorium out and score politicaloints. the panel had advised against a moratorium.

they did this political moratorium. the first rig the movement to egypt. it took 80 dozen dollar a year jobs -- $80,000 a year jobs. the second move was the best. the guy in charge was a hard- core conservative active -- conservative. he said, because of political instability in the united states, we are going to drill off of the condo. -- congo. [laughter] at a time of highnemployment, at a time when we need more american energy to be safer in the world market, the president vetoes the keystone pipeline. this kills 30,000 construction jobs.

kills jobs in houston processing the oil and shipping it. it blocks the u.s. from having a pipeline bringing oil that we could use in a crisis if we had a problem with the middle east. the canadians are looking at a partnership with china to build e pipeline due west to vancouver. what i have said is, if i am the president of the united states come on the first day, i will sign an executive order allowing the construction of the keystone pipeline so that canada can have an amecan partner on january 20. [applause] pase] let me make two other points about energy. i am focusing on oil and guess.

two more points above oil and guess. -- about oil and gas. we should allow -- i would open up federal land for oil and gas and for mirals. when you realize the u.s. government operates 85% of nevada and the bureau of land management does not want to allow any development. the reason north dakota has 3.5 percent and unemployment and has had seven straight tax cuts is because the oil is on private land. if north dakota had been public land we would have had no idea how big the formation is. the formaon is 25 times bigger than the u.s. geogical

survey thought it was. the volume of oil available in north dakota is staggering the bigger than anybody thought 10 years ago. we would know none of that if it had not been on private land. i am dedicated to opening up federal lands, not national parks. we own 69% of alaska. alaska is twice the size of texas. [laughter] perry flinches, but he is a good sport. 69% of alaska's is 1.5 texases. you could give an environmentalist half of texas. you would have an area the size of texas to open up. the largest reserves are in alaska.

a base and that is estimated to have as much oil d gas as the in -- basin that is estimated to have as much will and gas as the entire gulf of mexico. we have more energy in the united states than any other country. we have a government that has for the last 40 years been more and more and more anti-energy. i am for a profoundly changing it. the last point i want to make about oil and gas,his is true of all energy systems. it takes a fair amount of money to explore, develop, build the pipelines. the tax program, if you go to newt.org you can see a program designed to create jobs. first, we have zero capital gains tax so hundreds of millions of dollars will pour

into the u.s. second, we have a total of 5% corporate tax rate which is an irish tax rate -- a 12.5% corporate tax rat which is an irish tax rate. it allows our companies to compete successfully worldwide. it means general electric would actually pay taxes. [applause] maybe the most important thing for the development of oil and gas and minerals is we had 100% expense iing. any new equipmentou buy at the right doc in one year. the goal is to make the -- you buy you write off in e year.

if you want to draw unemployment compensation, you have to sign up for a training program so you are learning something during the. we are attrit -- up during t period we are paying you. [applause] let me say finally, i am for a system of energy. i think it is so vital for our economy. you keep $500 billion a year at home, you are going to create new jobs. it is so vital for our national security and our standard of living. this is a country built around an expensive energy. to have the -- inexpensive energy. t have the epa have a proposal that would get 25 cents a gallon? i am for developing every source

of energy. the current proposals for electricity would mean we would start having done a lot because of of our own government. this is the kind of -- having brown outs because of our own government. this is the kind of thing we have to stop. i look forward to your questions. [applause] >> thank you. we do plan to have the moderator's pose some questions to you. i want to applaud the idea of abolishing the epa. i would like for you to consider the endangered species act as part of that problem. one of our concerns is fuel taxes. there is a proposed additional increase to ose taxes. that is troubling to agricultural producers and folks

in the west who have to travel rge distances every day. it is complicating to our life. what would you propose in other ways to bring revenue into the treasury outside of energy production? >> let me say, i support saving endangered species. i also support common sense. when you are told that the largest bas andin -- basin in the lower 48 may be closed down for development because there may be a lizard that is so endangered it covers thousands of square miles. there are so few of them we a going to close down dozens of square miles? there must be so many of them. what has happened is the

environmentalists had infiltrated over the last 40 years the people on leapt to are against business. the use the environment as -- on the left who are against business. they use the environment as an excuse. i am for endangered species being preserved. there has to be common sense applied to that. i would like to see a substantial amount -- imagine that we had $500 billion a year. the royalty affect of that to the deral government would be remarkable. i would like tsee two-thirds go to pay down the deficit. [applause] and managed to have the -- i

managed to have t sneezers. i would like to see one third turn towards infrastructure. i would like to see a displacement of royalties. also displacement of royalties to rebuild our infrastructure. i do not know the case in colorado. in iowa, the number of county and state bridges that are beginning to be inadequate is very significant. part of it is as farm production has improved, and has wee bit more corn, we get bigger yields. we are carrying more tonnage over these bridges. you are going to have a nationwide challenge. i would like to see some break where maybe two-thirds of the royalties go towards the debt

and one third would go towards infrastructure. >> thank you. we appreciate your support of energy issues. the united state has ordered 100 years' supply of domestic natural gas. these resources could be transformative, both for economic development and energy security. in the context of free market, what is the proper role of government in guiding the development of energy production? the chemical industry, reducing emissions, or exports? >> is a very good question. two quick things about the

supply of natural gas. this is a perfect case study in why liberals are so consistently wrong in their effort. [laughter] the reason you had an explosion in the volume of natural gas is we have taken a technology that was deloped for offshore, which enables them to go down dozens of feet in one hole and go of 4 miles -- go down thousandsf feet in one hole and go off for miles in every direction. it was designed offshore where it is expensive to have these big rigs. the more production you get, the bigger your return. somebody to get that model could work on land. -- somebody figured out that model could work on plan.

we thought shale was not onomically recoverable. they applied an abortion doctor and technology on shl -- an ocean-going technology on shale. we went to a 100 plus supply. let me give you the side story. we are a dynamic society of constant innovation. there is no peak best. those are terms used by the left to justify telling the rest of us we have to he austerity so they can control our lives. i want to unleash the american people in order to have us produce. i do believe in shaping the market in the sense that alexander hamilton described. for example, whave always

allowed depletion on will wells which is a tax break. we have a variety of tax breaks used in a variety of different ways. the difference between that and what obama does is he wants the bureaucracy to pick winners and losers. it is one thing to say, anyone who wants to go out and find oil gets it right off. i want to allow one her% -- allow a 100% write off of new equipment every year. you are going to have a boom in investment we are shaping america. i do not want a bureaucrat to decide between company a and company b. if they were good venture capitalists there would not be getting a government salary. [laughter] [applause] i am deeply opposed -- this is

why, when i propose that we have a bold new approach i space, i did not oppose any extra money. i propose taking the money nestle wastes and using it as incentive to see what we can get out of the private sector. not to pick winners and losers. how would we know you got to the moon? you would be on the moon. it would be obvious. [laughter] you would not have to have five of obama of's friends go to the white house and say, can we but -- can we pretend we went to the moon? remember that lindbergh flew to paris by himself for clinton but thousand dollars. there was a prize. -- for $25,000. there was a prize.

>> we are looking at record high gasoline prices. they are projected to go even higher. starting with keystone is a great place to try to change policy. what other steps we take to lower prices? >> -- would you take toower prices? >> there would be a series of executive orders, one is the keystone pipeline. one would that all restrictions in the gulf of mexico and would enable people to start developing the gulf of mexico. there is an interest in lag here. you win the election in november. you want to know when the economy is born to start recovering? 9:00 at night on election day -- when the economy is going to start recovering?

9:00 at night on election day when people realize he is gone. [applause] the mood is going to become a obama is gone, i think i'm going to hide -- going to be, obama is gone, i think i am going to hire somebody. i will ask congress to stay in session on january 3 to repeal the three bills. i want them to repeal obamacare. [applause] i want them to repeal dodd- frank. [applause] and i want them to repeal sarbanes oxley. [applause] i want all three of those on my desk when i am sworn in so i can sign them my first day. then we will have a series of executive orders. they will begin to open up how the department of the interior

deals with federal lands, the gulf of mexico, and my goal would be to send such a poweul signal. everybody who is in the oil and gas industry is going to know on election night, these things are coming on january 20. it means, they will begin moving. the industry will start moving. people will start moving. people move on the expectation of future behavior. the market response to future predictions. $20 a barrel. my guess is -- this is reagan's birthday, he is 101 years old today. [applause] the first executive order reagan signed deregulated gas. we had rationing on opposite

days. if your license plate was odd or even, you had days you designated to buy gas on. reagan signed deregulation. the price of gasoline fell. i think it is fair to say you will see gasoline prices fall dramatically if we bring supply online. >> thank you. we do have a couple of questions from the audience. we have some microphones here. we will start right here. >> mr. speaker, welcome to colorado. do you believe in human induced climatchange? [laughter] >> i saw the porcine -- coors

sign. i was happy all the way. i believe we do not know. i am a amateur paleontologist. the planet has changed its temperature in number of times. we were in the museum in chicago looking at dinosaurs. if you look at the in the arctic, you figure it must have been a lot warmer. i am happy to take prudent measures that are not very expensive. if we can find and expensive safe nuclear power, i am for it. there are a lot of things you can do. what i would not do is turn power over to the bureaucracy to run the entire company -- country. i have always opposed cat and trade. many of you have seen it, the ed

i did with nancy pelosis the dumbest thing i have done -- the advertisement i did with nancy pelosi is the dumbest thing i have done. i never said i was in favor of cap and trade. you can go to newt.org. and see video of the testimony. the dutch have been faced with the ocean for a long time. they did not adopt and al gore approach of lowering t sea. they built dikes. there are a lot of ways to solve problems. [applause] >> thank you. >> thank you. one more question. thank you. >> speaker gingrich, a little comment.

regulation seems to go hand in handith energy in the high cost of energy. before we get too far, you need to be aware that milk is not a hazard this bill -- hazardous spill and it took an enormous effort to convince the epa of that. there was a lot of effort to convince them. the other question, it is one thing to develop new energy and create new energy, it is also important to conserve the energies we have. the example being, the trucking industry,wo hundred industries have worked with the department of transportation trying to change regulation which would cut the weight limits on some-

-- semis. it is 820% increase in the load. -- a 20% increase in load. they decided to table this. not realizing it had been studied. it is very helpful of here in this part of the country where the majority of a listf trbles by truck. it makes sense. where would -- the majority of our stock travels by truck. it makes sense. where would you stand on this? >> i aconservative. if i were liberal i would be for regulations that do not make sense. [laughte the milk one was always one of as fascinating moments. -- those fascinating moment. -- those fascinating moment. i want to make