foreclosure and printer -- foreclosure prevention efforts being taken and it has complicated things further for people who are dealing with issues with a waterfall of information coming from different sources. attorney general mostly in charge of the settlement if permission. now here we come with comprehensive rules address to the whole market which are badly needed. it is incumbent on us and will be a measure of success to work together with one another to try to put that information together and bring it together for people and make it accessible to them. .

>> a lot of if involves close corporation. >> okay. one more question. >> to me, i have a mortgage, i don't work, i can pay the mortgage out of my monthly check. if we let the lenders know that they will going to take the house away from us because there's nobody to -- >> refinance.

modify. reform the loan? >> i can't pay out of my disability check. it's quite a bit. but i can make it. if they find out that my mother has passed away, will they take the home from us because there's nobody working that can -- when they try to refinance the home. >> here's what i would say, two things. number one, you shouldn't bury your head in the sand and assume the mortgage owner won't know. they will know if payments are not being made, they are going to know soon enough. okay. if you are able to make the payments, obviously that eases the situation. if you find there's a point where you can no longer make the payments, there's no point in pretending they won't find it out. they will know that. if you have trouble and you are not able to make the payments, you can contact the consumer bureau. we have a help line now for

mortgage problems including people who might be behind or facing foreclosure. we can help try to navigate this with you with your servicer. john's operation hope does the same thing as well. if you find you are no longer making the payments, can't keep up, you can come to us and we'll try to work with you. >> now that he's passed, will they ask someone else to refinance? >> this is actually a great question to end on. the director said if you get in trouble, and if there's a problem, contact the agencies. they will have the protections in place that didn't exist before and resources that didn't exist before. what's being announced today, you have a level playing field for rights with borrowers, but you are not even there yet.

you are actually in a very good position, you making your payment. you can afford to make your payment. they can look at the eyes and see you have the dig dignity and respect. operation hope to stand behind you and make sure the lender respects the fact you can make the payments and having doing that. i can't imagine they will throw you out of the house because your mother has passed. there is a great example of partnership, there are many resources. you don't need to go very far. >> thank you so much. >> this concludes our announcement this morning. thank you all for joining us. [applause]

[captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> rick santorum announced today he's ending his presidential campaign. that's next on c-span. his formal rival, mitt romney was on the campaign trail and president obama head a rally pushing for changing in the tax code. >> martin luther king is a man of all of the people that i met and talked with and spent time over the years is the man that the most -- the american individual that i admire most of all. of all of them. for me, he is my personal hero. why? because martin luther king put

his money where his mouth was. [applause] >> his career spanned over 60 years. cbs mike wallace died this weekend at age 89. watch his interviews with iranian presidents and the c-span video library, every c-span program since 1987. >> republican presidential candidate, rick santorum, is ending his campaign. he made the announcement in pennsylvania. he was joined by his family and supporters. [applause] >> thank you very much. it's always an honor to be here in this beautiful town of gettysberg, such a historic town. first and foremost, i want to thank everybody for the outpouring of prayers over the

past weekend. we had a difficult weekend. good friday was a little bit of a passion for us with passion play for us with our daughter, bella, who is the joy of our lives. getting, unfortunately very sick. ended up in the hospital this weekend. but i'm here to report to start out things she is a fighter and she is doing exceptionally well and is back with us and the family. we're looking forward to spending a lot of great time with her. but it caused us to think. as the road that we have as parents in her life and in the rest of our family. this is a time for prayer and thought over the past weekend. just like it was, frankly, when we decided to get into this race. karen and i and the kids sat at the kitchen table and talked about our hopes and fears and our concerns.

we were very concerned about our role as being the best parents that we possibly could to our children and making sure they had a country that was -- well, the american dream was still possible. i think a lot of concerns that we had for our family with what was going on in washington, d.c. and all of the problems that you've heard me talk about on the campaign trial that american dream was slipping not just from the hands of average americans, but for all americans. that dream was slipping away. we had to, as parents, go out to do what we could to take on that responsibility for our children and for children across this country. and so we started out almost a year ago now in summerset, pennsylvania, and i told -- well, my our -- our story of our

family and my grandfather that came to this country and worked in the coal mines and my father who served our country in world war ii. as you hear throughout the course of this campaign talked about my stories and the stories of our families. after a while, it became less about my stories and more about what kept us going were your stories. so as the people across america that we had the privilege of getting a chance to know and interact with. you know, when you travel around and one such story was a guy named chuck. who had a pickup truck and joined our team. he drove us around on his dodge pickup truck for months on end as a volunteer because he believed. he believed we provided the best opportunity to turn this country around. i met a lot of folks in iowa that i'll never forget. folks like sam clovus who is a

talk show host. i'll never forget the fighter pilot. man of very strong convictions welling up on what was going on with our country and particularly with our national security. and the not three legs but four legs stool with the constitution being one of those important legs that we forget about. people like wendy jenson who was our best volunteer. 5,000 phone calls and just a few days before the primary because she was someone who was dealing with a disability and illness. she passed away shortly before the caucus. but was a -- someone that i remembered her passion for the least of us. those who are on the margins of society as many who looked at her. folks -- even today as -- because of our daughter, bella, who come to -- came to our

rallies one after another in wheelchairs, bringing their special needs children and holding signs up of children saying i'm for bella's dad. just a beautiful idea of again not my story, but their stories. it was what really fueled our campaign and gave us the energy, at a time when over and over again we were told forget it. you can't win. we were winning in a different way. we were touching hearts and raises issues that frankly a lot of people didn't want to have raised. our best phone call after iowa was a young man who came to our first event in oklahoma in a wheelchair, named nathaniel. he had spinabifida.

people that were overlooked by society and don't seem to be as involvable. folks like the duggers, the dugger family that traveled around with us in their bus and gave their time and energy because they believed in the basic importance of having strong families as part of a strong country that we can't have a strong economy. as we've heard me say over and over again without strong families and strong moral fiber that makes us the moral enterprise that is america. even fun things like the sweater vest. amazing thing. it happened on a night i was doing an event for mike huckabee in des moines. everybody was in suits and ties. i showed up in a sweater vest. turns out i gave a good speech. then twitter said it must be the

sweater vest. from that point on, the sweater vest became the official ward robe of the santorum campaign. the big part of the campaign is a manufacturing base of the economy. we saw the sweater vest in a company that was making them here in the united states. we ended going to that little company in minnesota in the middle of winter, it was a beautiful day, and got a chance to see that little plant that had been around for almost 100 years. turned out, we are the best customer that they have ever had in their entire history. so it's been a wonder story after story of people who have come forward. two girls who put together a song in tulsa, oklahoma, called game on. who have traveled and followed

us around. over a million hits on youtube of the catchy little tune they were inspired to give. even today we have folks in texas working to make it a winner take all primary to make sure we have the best opportunity for texans and conservatives to have a voice. it has been inspiring to me story after story that we've been engaged with. and it turns out that it really wasn't my voice that i was out communicating, it was your voice. the voice that you gave me from the stories and experience i had. and that's what people say how did this happen? how were we able to come from nowhere? it's because i was smart enough to figure out if i understood and felt at a deep level what you were experiencing and tried to be a witness and interpreter in a sense of that, that your voice would be heard and

miracles could happen. so it did. miracle after miracle, the race was improbable as any race you'll ever see for president. i want to thank god for that, and i want to thank all of you. thank all of you across this country for what i have given -- well, hopefully not just me and our family, but what you've given which is a voice for those who are in many cases voiceless. we have tried to be a witness, not just for your stories and for your voice, but to provide a positive and hopeful vision. not a negative campaign. we traveled around and did 385 town hall meetings in iowa. we weren't out there trashing anybody. we went out in the campaign from that point on and painted a hopeful positive vision for our country. one that was based on how to get the country turn the around, not just economically. not just economically, but reflecting the hopes and -- the hopes of americans. not just the fears of americans. the hopes of americans as what we could do to confront that

violent radical islam and particularly the scourge of iran and what we could do to take on the problems of a sluggish economy and a washington has grown so big. we put forth concrete solid plans that many of which came from the people that i had an opportunity to interact with throughout the course and time of this campaign. we did focus a lot on the families, on the dignity of human life, and on the moral enterprise that is america. and i know joe klein will be upset about this. one of my favorite articles was one that he wrote, his headline "rick santorum's inconvenient truth." and talked about things we should talk about more, but get shoved aside in the public. we talked about how to build a great country from the bottom up and carried around the copy of the constitution. it was the constitution that got the tea party folks excited,

which we saw about the operators manual of america being disguarded by those in washington. i tried to bring to the battle was what abraham lincoln brought to the battlefield when he talked about the country being conceived in liberty and dedicated to all men are created equal. he was quoting, of course, the declaration of independence, conceived in the declaration. we talked about that declaration as the heart of american exceptionalism. we will never be a country that can go forward as a great and powerful country unless we remember who we are and what makes us americans. that's what our campaign was about. about what made our americans. how we built this country from the bottom up and how if we are going to be successful in the future, how we must believe in ourselves and believe in the ability to go forward and do the same thing. against all odds, we won 11 states.

millions of voters, millions of votes, we won more counties than all of the other people in this race combined. we were able to spread that message far and wide across this country. and what we found is that -- well, we found that support, and i found a deeper love for this country. every state that i went to and those of you that followed me around, i said i really love this state. it was a love affair for me going from state to state and seeing the differences and seeing the wonderful, wonderful people of this country who care deeply about where this country is going in the future. we care deeply about those who are out there paddling alone who are certainly left behind and in some respects feeling hopeless. and let's do something. ladies and gentlemen, we made a decision at our kitchen table to get into this race, against all of the odds.

and we made a decision over the weekend that well this presidential race for us is over. for me. and we will suspend our campaign effective today. we are not done fighting. we are going to continue to fight for those voices, we are going to continue to the fight for the americans who stood up and gave us that air under our wings that allowed us to accomplish things that no political expert would have ever expected. there's a lot of greatness. a lot of greatness in this country. we just need leaders who believe in that, who are willing to give voice to that. who are willing to raise us up instead of trying to provide for us and do for us what we can better do for ourselves. that's the message that came to me. and it's one that i feel very, very good about continuing to talk to americans about. i walked out after the iowa caucus victory and said game

on. i know a lot of folks are going to write. maybe those even at the white house, game over. but this game is a long, long, long way from over. we are going to continue to go out there and fight to make sure we defeat president barack obama that we win the house back, and that we take the united states senate and stand for the values that make us americans, that make us the greatest country in the history of the world, that shining city on the hill. to make us a shining beacon around the world. thank you very much. god bless you. [applause] [applause] >> thank you, everybody for coming.

>> before his official announcement, rick santorum called mitt romney to let him now about the decision to get out of the presidential race. later mr. romney held a campaign event in wilmington, delaware at a steel company. delaware's primary is april 24th. [applause] [applause] [applause] [applause]

>> hi, i'm susie. i'm the ceo. i wanted to thank all of you for coming today. [applause] [applause] >> and i'm pleased to introduce lorie greyson, also a woman business owner and executive board member of abc. she will introduce the governor. >> thank you. thank you. >> thank you, becky. first of all, i want to thank r.c. fabrics for inviting us to be here. the past half hour, he's been meeting with 12 of us women business owners. i want to say thank you. as a business owner, i'm very interested injobs.

jobs for the people that work for me and jobs for my children, as a mother. you know in the future, i'd like them to have jobs too. i don't want to be supporting them forever. i hope they are not here. boys. mitt told us he's really interested in the business climate and making it better for us, you know, as business owners, especially small business owners. really to survive the economy. mitt, i want to thank you for that. as a woman-owned business, i want to encourage other women that this is our president. ladies and gentlemen, mitt romney. [applause] [applause] >> thank you. wow. [applause] [applause] >> thank you. thank you. this has been quite the -- wow. [applause] [applause]

>> thank you. the only time i typically get a standing ovation is when there are no chairs. so i appreciate the fact that you gave me such a welcome. it's an honor to be here, becky, in your facility. this has been here a while. there's some heavy equipment here. this is a fabrication plant. they make steel beams for various buildings. business has been not as hot as it was in the early part of the last decade, but it's coming back slowly, but surely. thank you, becky, for hoping your shop. lorie, thank you for introducing me, and for the business owners who spent time with me before we came together. this has been a good day for me. [applause]

[applause] senator santorum has decided not to proceed with his campaign. i had the chance to speak with him this morning. we exchanged our thoughts about going forward. we both have a great deal of interest in seeing the country taken at a very different path. he has made an important contribution to the political process, and has brought forward issues that he cares very deeply about and has been able to gather public support and interest in those issues and in himself. he will continue to have a major role in the republican party. i look forward to his work in helping assure victories for republicans across the country in november. we got to get that job done. [applause] [applause] >> now the reason that i wanted to meet with these business leaders was to ask them about their enterprises, what the

prospects are for them, what they are seeing in the marketplace, but also to get a sense of the administration's policies and the government's policies as they relate to small business. and as you might expect, those policies have by and large been devastating to small business. and so we spoke about the president's failure to actually encourage small business. and also i would note to be able to encourage enterprises that are owned by women and to encourage job creation for women more generally. there's been some talk about a war on women. the real war on women has been waged by the obama administration's failure on the economy. [applause] [applause] >> do you know what percent of

the job losses in the obama years have been casualties of women losing jobs as opposed to men? do you know what percent of the job losses for women? 92.3% of the job losses during the obama years have been women who have lost those jobs. the real war on women has been the job losses as a result of the obama economy. and if we're going to get women back to work and help women with the real issues that women care about, good jobs, good wages, a bright future for themselves, their families, and for their kids, we're going to have to elect a president who understands how the economy works. and i do. [applause] [applause]

>> i see one of my supporters over here, christine o'donnell. didn't know you were going to be here. thanks, christine. good to see you. the president is so out of touch, i don't think he knew that number. if he did, he probably wouldn't have said that his administration has been a great success. he says he's not only done a good job, he says he's done a great job. even with 92.3% of the job losses being women. he thinks he's done a great job. an historically great job. he did not say that on "saturday night live" we said that in the mainstream media. you look at the experience of this administration in the last three and a half years and you can see that something is seriously wrong with his perspective. not only have 92% of the job losses been among women, he's also seen 800,000 people overall lose jobs, home values decline,

the median income of americans in the last four years has dropped by 10%. these have been tough years. 2.7 million homes foreclosured upon. the president's policies have not worked. he says that was my stimulus. yeah, that was three and a half years ago. he borrowed $287 billion, said he'd hold unemployment below 8%. he said by now we'd be below 6%. we are not. you have failed, mr. president. we've seen it. we're going to change it. [applause] [applause] >> there's one place the president has delivered. he said his energy policies would cause energy prices to skyrocket. that you've seen. now the other day he said

something i agree with. he was speaking to a group of newspaper owners, publishers, and editors. he said this is going to be a defining election. this is going to be a critical election that will determine the course of the nation. not just for a year or two, but indefinitely. that is not an election in my view about a person or a party. it is an election about the direction of america. [applause] >> we're going to have to -- [applause] [applause] >> we're going to have to ask ourselves what it means to be american. today and in the future. we're going to have a choice between two paths. one which is outlined by our president which is the government-centered society. where government calls the shots, where business is the bad

guy, we pick other scapegoats to attack, but a government-centered society. then there's the other view. the view that was laid out by the founders. america is a land of freedom and opportunity. now i'm going to ask you some questions here in a moment or ask you for questions. if you've got questions you want to ask me, i'm going to turn to you and do that and let you do for best to answer them. just a couple of thoughts about the government-centered society in contrast with a nation that's free and filled with opportunity. one of the entrepreneurs was talking about how she and her husband began a business some years ago. i won't describe exactly who it was, i presume it was a result of a job loss or sitting on the kitchen table and said wouldn't it be interesting to learn something more about apull

industry. now they employ dozens of people. it's amazing the entrepreneurial, innovative spirit of americans. their success does not make us poorer. it is time for us to have a president who not apologize for success at home, and will never apologize for success for america overseas. [applause] [applause] >> between these two visions of a government-centered society and a free and opportunity-based nations, you have these differences. you have a president that will continue to amass trillion-dollar deficits, enough

debt to ultimately sink our economy in the future. if i'm president, i'll cut federal spending, not just slow the rate of growth, i'll cut it, cap it, and finally get us to a balanced budget. [applause] [applause] >> on to this president, we will have a health care setting where the government tells you what kind of health insurance he must have. i'm convinced he will tell you which treatments he can receive and which treatments you cannot receive. if i'm the president, i will get rid of obamacare and return the responsibility of health care to you. [applause] [applause] >> this is the president who the other day said he is for all of the above when it comes to energy. i tried to figure that out.

because it's clear he doesn't like coal, or oil, or natural gas. and then i figured it out, he's for all of the things which are above the ground. solar and wind, but the stuff beneath the ground, he's not for. i am for all above and all below. i will get energy secure in the country and build the pipeline from canada. in this president, the government-centered society, we'd love to talk about the economy. they want the economy to do well. they just don't like business very much. what they don't understand is that the economy is nothing but the edition of all of the businesses of america together. that's what makes the economy. saying you don't like business is like saying that you like only -- omlets, but not eggs.

if i'm the president, more and more inclusion, higher and higher taxes. you know the president wants to take the tax on small business from 35% to 40%. if you say i don't understand what you are talking about, mitt, let me point this out. the number or the percentage of american workers who work in businesses that are taxed at the individual tax rate is 54%. 54% of american workers work in businesses taxed as individuals. that means when the president wants to raise the individual tax rate, he's raises taxes on small business. if he does so, he will kill jobs. then, of course, there was another tax idea photoed up by vice president biden. some of us call him the gift that keeps on giving. [laughter] >> you know him well. [applause] >> he's proprosing a global tax

for businesses. i'm not quite sure what he has in mind, but i'm sure it will kill jobs. if you raise taxes on working people, you hurt families. when you raise taxes on small business, you kill jobs. that's what they are doing. in the name of fairness, they are killing the opportunity for americans to have a fair shot at getting a good job with a rising wage. we'll put people back to work and good jobs by stopping the tax madness. i see a member of our armed forces. i appreciate your service, young man. [applause] [applause]

>> you know the state of our military readiness right now. our navy is smaller than any time since was founded. in 1917 our air force is smaller and older than any time since it was founded in 1947. by the way, the 1917 number, was not when the navy was founded, our navy hasn't been smaller since 1917, and the air force since the founder in '47 is smaller and older. our troops is stretched to the breaking point going over to afghanistan and iraq, he wants to cut the number of ships, and active personnel. i will add our ships, add to our air force, and add to our personnel and give our veterans

the care they deserve. this is a defining election as to what course america can take. will it remain strong militarily? will we be committed to low taxes, low growth, higher incomes, will we protect freedom and opportunity, will we encourage small business or crush it through more and more legislation like obamacare and dodd-frank, and one thing after the other that makes it harder and harder for businesses to grow and provide good jobs. that's the choice that we have. i'm convinced that the american people are going to do something that we should have been three and a half year ago. which is let a conservative president be elected to the united states. i intend to be that person, your

help. [applause] [applause] >> let me turn to you for any questions that you may have. those of you that are in the sun are going to have a hard time making it out over here. but i'll -- this is just a test. you know, the detectives always put you in the sun to get the truth out of you. yes, sir. hi there. >> i just wanted to ask, there's a lot of discussion on individual tax rates in the election. less about corporate tax rates. i know your plan talks about taking it down to 25%. what additional steps to you take to get competitive and bring the revenues back home when you have countries in all sorts of other places jocking? >> yeah, those who are not familiar with this, some countries have figured out business is a good thing, not a bad thing. if they have tax rates that are lower than it might over time encourage businesses to grow

there. and we with the highest tax rate in the world on any developed nation, we're scaring away encouraging businesses to leave. we've got to become more competitive. one way is to bring the tax rate more down forwards the european level. can you believe that? get our tax rate down to 25%, and then by the way help pay for that by getting rid of some of the special breaks and exemptions that have been worked into the code over the years. there are other things we can do. this is a strange one. only the government can come up with this idea. let's say you are a business that manufactures construction equipment like caterpillar. and you decide you are going to build a factory in china to build equipment there. you are not going to ship it back to the u.s. too heavy. you are going to keep it there and try to compete in china. and the engineers here in america that design the products will be able to design them and

ship the designs. you are over there, you have a factory there, and it makes money. now you pay chinese taxes, of course, but as you are going to be competing with the chinese construction equipment company. if you make a bunch of money other the year, and you want to bring it home to america, we'll tax you for bringing it home. if you want to keep it in china, you don't get taxed by america. so think what companies do. they keep the money outside of the u.s. it's estimated that over $1 trillion in profit is held outside of the u.s. because they don't want to bring it back and get hit with what's known as the repatriation tax. bring the money home. thank you. [applause] [applause] >> i really have more of a comment. to beat this president, you are going to have to nose to nose

and toes to toes with all of the untruths. and you are going to have to do it with the data that's out there. i hope you are willing to do that and your campaign will do it. [applause] [applause] >> right there i heard -- i heard a shout out of harley -- harry truman, give them hell. he understands that he can't just blow things by people. it's a strange thing. the truth came out when he spoke with president medvedev, wait until after the election. i can be more up front. you don't say that without making clear that you have plans after your re-election than you are willing to tell those of the american people. he's going to hide. it's my job to seek and our job to seek. it's going to be a hide and seek

campaign. we're going to find out what he's going to do. i think we have some idea because of what we've seen. thank you, yes, ma'am? >> for those that couldn't hear the question, what could we do to get more refineries build in the u.s.? refineries will build refineries if there's oil to refine, but if we continue to make it harder to get oil from here and canada, why build from here, there's no need. so the marketplace and competitors will build refineries if they are needed. if there's a raw material, namely oil, crude oil, that's here that then it can be processed. we have a president who's administration has reduced the number of licenses that have gone on federal land to drill by half. and he's reduced the number of permits to drill on federal land to 1/3 of what they used to be.

and so we are not drilling today for the production we're going to have tomorrow. therefore, people who are planners and build things like refineries and pipelines they look and say we won't need these down the road because we are not drilling now. the president has an ad out. you may not have seen it. he has an ad out talking about how oil production has risen during the presidency. not thanks to him, thanks to him of the prior president. then he blames someone for the high price of gasoline. guess who he blames? he's very good at blaming. it's a characteristic of this administration. he blames me for the high price of gasoline. because i don't want to raise taxes on oil companies. i don't like raising taxes on anybody. this president goes around and tries to find some group of americans that other americans may not like a lot or may not trust a lot. then he says let's tax them. it's their fault. this blame, this populism of

going to trend to divide america is not only wrong, it's dangerous. we are one nation under god. and united we will stand and lead. [applause] [applause] >> how many czars do you plan to have? or do you plan to return back to three branches? >> the question was asked how many czars? i can't imagine using that term even if i had someone that i wanted to help me with in government. the obama administration is out 35,000 government workers. that's a lot of people. these entrepreneurs here, they don't begin to employ 135,000 people. that's a huge number of people. the problem with 135,000 more government workers is not just they have to be paid and have to get retirement benefits and pensions and so forth, it's they have to do something.

they do. they intrude in your life. they audit you, they inspect you, they regulate you, and there's too many government workers. [applause] [applause] >> i look forward to eliminating government programs. not just cutting them, getting rid of them. we have people that find themselves out of work and need new skills. we have to have job training. we have 49 different job training programs at the federal level. and these these -- they report to eight different agencies. think of all of the administrators, the bureaucrats, the salaries, the pensions, the health care, it's just outrageous. i'd take all of that money and i'd give delaware their fair share and say hey, you take this money and use this to train your own people and the way that you and delaware think best. [applause] [applause] >> hi.

my name is roxy wagner. i came up from bethany beach today. i hope this isn't inappropriate, but have you chosen a vp? >> i'm here to announce today that i do not even have a list. [laughter] > you know, this decision by senator santorum is unexpected. we'll begin thinking about that as some point. i can't tell you when, and i can't tell you who because we haven't made the decisions yet. a lot of the decisions about the campaign going forward, we'll be thinking about that this week and making a number of decisions. when i say thinking about, process. not individual names. i don't want to get things started too quickly. are you available? you bet. there you go. yes, sir. [laughter] >> here's a microphone behind you. there you go. >> as a 19-year-old american,

i'm sure everybody knows about gasoline and everything. as the president, hopefully, what are you going to do by opec, there's obviously something happening in the part of the world that they decide to raise the gasoline, you know, the amounts of it go crazy. as president, and also donald trump has also stated in a lot of his comments about how opec is ripping us off. it's become more clear they are. as president, what would you do? >> well, what i would do is take advantage of the oil resources that we have here and allow additional drilling and provide licenses for additional drilling on federal lands here. i would also build a pipe lynn -- pipeline from canada to get more supply of oil here. i would take advantage of natural gas. natural gas has really come out in a big way. sounds like you already know

about this. [applause] >> we've always been able to drill vertically into the ground. now we can go vertically and horizontally. as they go horizontally, they can tap into pockets of natural gas or oil and by pushing fluid into the pipe, they are able to push the gas and oil out. that's called fracking. this technology has allowed us to get 100 years of natural gas. it can be liquefied or piped to our transportation networks along the interstate highway for long haul trucks, fleets inside cities, we can take advantage of the oil resources, gas resources, coal resources. a lot of folks are interested in electric cars. guess what? the electricity has to come from somewhere. we always say this is great. we'll have electric cars that won't require oil. yeah, it requires coal. because half of the electric energy comes from coal. we're doing to have clean coal.

hopefully the technology becomes increasingly available. these are the things i can do to get the price of gasoline to be affordable again. one of the women said they have a fleet of 70 trucks. you know, you got a fleet of 70 trucks, when gasoline prices go up by 25 and 30 cents, that makes a difference. trucks don't get 30 miles to the gallon. we're going to have to get serious about taking advantage of our energy resources. by the way, in case you didn't know, i spent my life doing what these women were doing. i spent my life in business. i understand why jobs leave. i understand why it is government is such a burden in various types of businesses. why it is that government kills jobs. my objective is to make government the the ally of jobs

and small business and growth. [applause] >> mr. romney, if the supreme court uploads obamacare, when you are elected president, what are you going to do? >> well, one we won't be very happy with them. i actually believe they are going to do the right thing and overturn obamacare. i certainly hope so. i don't see how -- [applause] >> i agree with the justices that ask the questions. justice breyer asked the question about who could read this thing. 2700 pages. how in the world could the court be asked to read something like that? my view it will be overturned. if it's not, on the first day i

will use something president obama has been doing, he's been giving waivers for president obamacare to various unions. i'm going to take that idea and give a waiver to all 50 states, so they don't have to follow obamacare. [applause] [applause] >> now because some states won't except that waiver, i will also have to get it repealed. let me tell you, i'm not going to replace it with nothing. we're going to work piece by piece to bring the cost of health care down so it's more affordable. small business is getting crushed by higher and higher insurance prices, and families are having a harder and harder time. particularly if someone in the family is ill. the premiums for the enterprise that hires them, or if they own their own policy, they go crazy. there's things we can do to get the cost down. we can do that. i'd like individuals to be able

to own their own policy on the same tax advantage that businesses can buy policies for you. there's some things i'd like to do. that's something we'll do piece by piece. the first job is stop obamacare where it is, because we simply can't afford trillions of more federal dollars. this kind of deficit spending must be stopped. i'm going to get a young lady behind you. [applause] [applause] >> i've got to take. >> if you are elected president, besides obamacare, have you combined a list of priorities of the first five or ten things you'll do in the first 100 days of your administration? >> thank you, and it's a long, long list. and so i won't take you through all of it. let me tell you some of the things i will do by executive order on day one. one, i will make sure they grant a waiver from obamacare. not that i have described. number two all of the obama era

regulations, i will put a waiver on and remove those that hold jobs. [applause] >> that's number two. three, i will move to get the tax rates competitive. four, i will make sure we label china the currency manipulator. [applause] >> which allows the president to be able to crack down on any place where they have stolen intellectual property or executed unfair trade policies that kill american jobs. for me this is about getting the economy going again. short term and long term. with good wages. those are some of the things that i do right off of the bat. then i got other things to do. we got to repeal sarbane-doxley. [applause] >> i want to take the marginal

tax rate and reduce that for every american by about 20% from where it is now. you might think how are you going to do that? how are you going to pay for it? i'm going to limit reductions and exemptions for high income folks so they pay the same share they pay now. i'm not looking to lower taxes on the wealthy as the democrats charge. the wealthy will pay the same. by lowering the marginal tax rates, that helps small business. because instead of paying 35% tax rate, they would pay 28%. that means they have more money going out of their balance sheet that they can use to hire more people to pay down the receivables. these are the kinds of things small businesses need to do to grow and add jobs. we have to understand that we're in competition. i'm told your time is up and my time is up. i want to say this, we're in

competition. we're in competition for jobs. we're in competition for the best jobs. we want rising incomes here. we want our economy to be so strong. by the way, economy. that means all of the businesses to be so strong that they can afford the strongest military in the world. we want to have the best schools in the world. we don't. we want to care for our veterans and seniors in the best way imaginable. we want these things to be once again the american experience. and so we're going to have to work hard to encourage enterprises to get them to grow again, to get them to hire here, to get them to focus on america, everything we do from immigration policy to education o job training to labor policies and tax policies, they have to encourage enterprise. get them going better. so that we can are better jobs and rising income. this is not hard. the president is looking for someone to blame for his own failures. he's looking for some group to

blame. let's tax these people. let's rip these people. that's not what america is. we want to lift all americans. that's the right course for america's future. [applause] [applause] >> i love this country. i love america. don't you love america? i love this country. [applause] [applause] >> the founders were either brilliant or inspired. and probably both. they said that the creator had given us their rights. not government. and among those rights were life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness. we would be free in america to pursue happiness as we choose. this freedom, this opportunity, to find america as a nation,

government-centered society is changing that. these guys in washington don't understand that. they think that government bureaucrats, smart as they are, can live a life for ourselves and we can't fool ourselves. they are wrong. individuals, free people, choosing free enterprises have built the strongest economy in the world and the greatest nation in the history of the earth. it is not time for government. this is time for free people. i want to restore america's freedom and get america strong again. thank you so much. glad to be with you. thank you. [applause] [applause] [cheers and applause] [cheers and applause]

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>> associated press economics writer derek kravitz. sean spicer and brad woodhouse

discuss rick santorum pose a withdrawal from the presidential race. after that, our magazine series continues with bing west looking at his recent article on afghanistan. washington journal live tomorrow at 7:00 eastern on c-span. >> president obama was an florida pushing for changes to the united states tax code. he spoke about the buffett role which would require americans are the more than $1 million annually to pay at least 30% of their income in taxes. the president spoke for about 40 minutes at florida atlantic university.

[cheers and applause] thank you. [cheers and applause] how is everybody doing today? welcome it is great to be back in florida. it is great to be back in boca. it is great to be here at the home of the fighting owls. i want to, first of all, thank a denver not only leading us in the pledge of allegiance but also giving a great details about burrowing owls. explain it all to me and then told me he wants my job. i explained to him that the

constitution required for him to be 35 years old. i will keep the seat warm for him. for a few more years. i want to thank for back out for that extraordinary performance. -- thank rebecca for that. she wants to be a teacher. she is an english major. we need great teachers out there, so we are very proud of her. i want to thank your president, m.j. saunders, the mayor of boca raton for hosting us here today. we also have your outstanding senator and former astronaut, which is really cool, bill nelson in the house. [applause]

a wonderful congressman, ted george, is here. and my great friend, congressman dan wasserman shultz's here. -- debbig wasserman shultz. and you are here, which is exciting. >> we love you! >> i love you back. [cheers and applause] i know this is a busy time of year. some of you are one month away from graduation. we have some seniors in the house. pretty soon you will be closing the books for the last time. maybe you will be making that one last trip to the beach.

or coyote jack's. you will be picking up that diploma that you worked so hard for. your parents will be there, they will be beaming and full of pride. and then comes what people call "the real world." i actually think colleges part of the real world. i think there's a transition that will take place. some of the will go on to post- graduate degrees but some of the will be out there looking for work. colleges the think the most important investment you can make in your future. -- college is the single most of gordon investment. i'm proud that you have seen this through. i know that the future can be uncertain. we have gone through the three toughest years in our lifetime economically.

the worst financial crisis, the worst economic crisis. our economy is now recovering, but it is not yet where it needs to be. to many of your friends and neighbors are still hurting, still looking for work. too many are still searching for that sense of security that started slipping away long for the recession hit. -- long away before the recession hit. i have the "amen" corner over here. we'd ask ourselves is central fundamental question. what we have to do to make sure that america is a place where, if you work hard, if you are responsible, that the hard work and responsibility pays off? the reason it is important to

ask this question right now is because there are alternative theories. there is a debate going on in the country right now. can we succeed as a nation where a shrinking number of people are doing really, really well but a growing number are struggling to get by? or are we better off when everybody gets a fair shot? [cheers and applause] everybody does their fair share. everybody plays by the same set of rules. that is what the debate in america is about right now. this is not just another run- of-the-mill gab fest in washington. this is the defining issue of our times come a make or break moment for the middle-class. everybody here is aspiring to get in the middle class.

we have two very different visions of our future. the choice between them could not be more clear. keep in mind, i start from the belief that government cannot and should not try to solve every single problem we've got. government is not the answer to everything. my first job in chicago when i was not much older than all of you was working with a group of catholic churches on the south side of chicago in low-income neighborhoods to try and figure and how we could improve the schools, strengthen neighborhoods, strengthen families. i saw the work that some of these churches did doing more

good for people and their communities than any other government program could. in those same communities, at the matter with how well crafted the educational opportunities were to take the place of a parent's love and affection. i also believe that since government is funded by you that it has an obligation to be efficient and effective. that is why we have eliminated dozens of programs that were not working, announced hundreds of regulatory reforms to save businesses and taxpayers billions of dollars. we have put annual domestic spending on a path to become the smallest share of our economy since eisenhower was in the white house, which was before i was born much less you. i believe the free market is the greatest force for economic progress in human history. but here is the thing. i also agree with our first republican president, a guy

from my home state, a guy with a beard named abraham lincoln. [applause] what he said was that through our government we should do together what we cannot do as well for ourselves. that is the definition of our government. that is the reason we have a strong military to keep us safe. i suppose each of us just could grab what ever is around the house and try to defend our country, but we do better when we do it together. we have the best military in the history of the world with the greatest men and women in uniform. we pay for that. [applause]

that is why we have public schools to educate our children. you know, if we did not have public schools, there would still be some families who would do very well and could afford private schools or home school, but there would be a lot of kids who would fall through the cracks, so we do that together. it is one of the reason we have laid down real roads and highways. we need to get our neighbors and friends to say we should go build a road. that is why we imported the research and technology to save lives and create entire embassies, the internet, gps. all of those things were created by us together, not by ourselves. it is the reason why we contribute to programs like medicare and medicaid, social security, and unemployment insurance. [applause]

because we understand that the matter how responsibly we live our lives, eventually we will get older. we know that at any 0.1 of us may face hard times, bad luck, a crippling illness, or a layoff. together rebuild this safety net, this basis of support that allows all of us to take risks, try new things, maybe try to get a new job because we know that there is a base for us to rely on. but these investments in things like education, research, health care, they have not been made as a grand scheme to redistribute wealth from one group to another. this is not some socialist dream. the have been made by democrats

and republicans for generations because they benefit all of us and they lead to strong and durable economic growth. that is why we have made these investments. [applause] if you are here at florida atlantic because you have a financial aid -- [cheers] a student loan, a scholarship, which was how i finance my college education and how michele did. that just does not benefit you, it benefits whenever company may end up hiring in and profiting from your skills. it's one of you goes on to become the next steve jobs or

mark zuckerberg, or when you discover the next medical breakthrough, a think about all the people whose lives will be changed for the better. we made an investment in you and we will get a return on the investment. [applause] when we guarantee basic security for the elderly, the sick, or those actually looking for work, it does not make us week. what makes us week is when cuban-americans can afford to buy the products for businesses themselves, when your people are willing to take risks because it does not work out and they worry about feeding their families. what drags our entire economy down is when the benefits of economic growth and productivity go only to the tube, which is what has been happening for over a decade now, and the gap between those at the very top and everyone else keeps growing wider and wider and wider. in this country, prosperity has

never trickled down from the prosperous you. it has always come from the bottom up, up from a strong and growing middle-class. [applause] that is how i generation who went to college on the gi bill, including my grandfather, helped build the most prosperous economies of the world has ever known. that is why a ceo like henry ford made a point as workers enough money so that they can buy the cars they were building. there is no point in me having all of this and then nobody can buy my cars. i need to pay my workers enough so that they buy the cars and that, in turn, create more

business and prosperity for everybody. this is not about a few people doing well. we want people to do well. that's great. it's about giving everybody a chance to do well. that is the essence of america. that is what the american dream is about. that is why immigrants have come to our shores, because the idea is it does not matter what your name is, what you look like -- you could be named obama. you could still make it a try. -- you could still make it if you try. [applause] yet, we keep on having the same argument with people who do not seem to understand how it is america got built. the people we have political arguments with, they are americans who love their

country. democrats, republicans, independents, we all love this country, but there is a fundamental difference in how we think we move this country forward. these books keep telling us that if we just weaken the regulations to keep our air or water clean, protect our consumers, if we would just convert these investments that we are making to education, research, and health care, if we turned them into tax cuts for the wealthy and somehow the economy would grow stronger. here is the news. we tried this for eight years before i took office. we tried it. [cheers and applause] it is not like we did not try it. at the beginning of the last

decade, the wealthiest americans got two huge tax cuts, in 2001 and 2003. meanwhile, insurance companies, financial institutions were all allowed to write their own rules, find their way around the rules. we were told the same thing we're being told now -- it will lead to faster job growth, greater prosperity for everybody. guess what? it did not. yes, the rich got much richer. corporations made big profits. we also had the slowest growth -- slowest job growth in half a century. it the typical american family saw their income fall by about 6% even though the economy was growing. the average middle-class american was not seeing more of their paycheck. health-care premiums

skyrocketed. financial institutions started making bets with other people's money that was reckless. and then the entire financial system almost collapsed. do you remember that? it was pretty recent. some of these science majors in here at -- i like that. we need more scientists and engineers. i enjoyed science when i was young, and if i recall correctly, it is it -- if an experiment feels badly you learn from that. right? sometimes you can learn from failure. that is part of the data that teaches you stuff, it expands our knowledge, but you do not then just keep doing the same thing over and over again. you go back to the drawing

board. you try something different. that is not what is happening with these folks in washington. they are peddling the same triple-down theories, including members of congress and some people running for a certain office right now who shall not be named. [applause] thesee doubling down on broken down theories. it really did not work and we almost had a second great depression, so maybe we should try something different. they have doubled down and proposed a budget that showers

the wealthiest americans with even more tax cuts and pays for these tax cuts by cutting investments in education, medical research, clean energy, health care. audience: boo. >> of the cuts they're proposing are spread out evenly across the budget then at 10 million college students, including some of you, wednesday or financial aid cut by an average of more than $1,000 -- would see your financial aid cut by an average of more than $1,000 each. thousands of medical research grants for things like alzheimer's, cancer, aids would be eliminated. tens of thousands of researchers, students, teachers, all lose their jobs. our investments in clean energy that are making us less dependent on imported oil have been cut by nearly one-fifth.

by the time you retire, instead of being enrolled in medicare, you would get a voucher to play for your health care plan -- to pay for healthcare, but if health care costs rise faster, like a house, the rest will come out of your pocket. if the doctor is not enough to buy a plan with the specific doctors and care you need, you are out of luck. by the middle of the next century -- by the middle of this century, by 2050 come at a time when most of you will have families of your own, funding for most of the investments i talked about today would have been almost completely eliminated altogether. now, this is not a in exaggeration. this is math. the republicans objected.

they said, "we did not specify all of these cuts." welcome you did not because you knew that people would not accept them. you just gave a big number. what we did is do the math. this is what it would mean. they say they did not the typical propose to cut student loans. ok. if you do not cut student loans, then that means you have to cut even more. the money has to come from somewhere. you cannot give over $4 trillion in additional tax cuts, including the people like me to do not need them and are not asking for them, and it comes from a magic tree somewhere. it you hear them saying, "the president is making this stuff up," no. we are doing the math. the want to dispute what i'm saying, you should show specifically where you could

make the cuts. [applause] they should show us. they should show us because, by the way, they are not proposing to cut defense spending, so it is not coming out of there. seoul -- show me. america has always been a place where anybody who is willing to work and play by the rules can make it come a place where prosperity does not trickle-down from the top but it grows from the bottom, growing outward from the hearts of a vibrant middle class. [applause] and i believe that we cannot stop investing in things that helped create that middle- class, that create real come a long lasting come along-term growth. should not be doing it just so

the richest americans can get another tax cut. we should be strengthening those investments. we should be making college more affordable. [cheers and applause] we should be expanding our investment in clean energy. the republicans will tell you they need to make these drastic cuts because the deficit is too high. our deficit is too high. there are arguments may have a shred of credibility if you did not find out that they wanted to spend $4.60 trillion on lower tax rates. i do not know how many of you are math or business majors, but you cannot pay down a deficit by taking in $4.60 trillion in less money. that is denying that you will be making all of these cuts.

it does not add up. it does not make sense. keep in mind, more than $1 trillion in tax cuts they propose would be going to people who make more than $350,000 per year, an average of $150,000 -- again, just taking the numbers with the details they have given us and you spread it out. that is at least $150,000 for every millionaire and billionaire. each, on average, would get at least $150,000 and some would get much more. we added up all the investments that could take four. -- could pay for. i really do not need this tax break. i have been treated well in this

life. i will be ok. malia and sasha will be able to go to college. michelle is doing fine. [applause] understand what this means. here is what $150,000 means. this is what beach millionaire and billionaire would get, on average. this could pay for a tax credit that would make a one year of college more affordable for students like you.

plus one year's worth of financial aid for students like you. plus one year's worth the prescription drug savings for one of your grandparents. [applause] was a new computer lab for this school. plus a year of medical care for a veteran in your family who went to war and risked their lives fighting for this country. [applause] plus a medical research grant for a chronic disease. plus one year's salary for a firefighter or police officer. $150 and dollars to pay for all of these things. keep about that. -- $150,000 could pay for that. what is the better. to make our economy stronger? do we give $150,000 in tax breaks to every millionaire and billionaire in the country? or should we make investments in education, research, health care come and our veterans? -- health care, and our veterans? [applause] i just want to emphasize again that i want people to get rich. i think it is wonderful.

that is part of the american dream. it is great that you make a product, create a service, do it better than anyone else, and that is what the system is all about. understand the share of our national income going to the top 1% has climbed to levels we have not seen since the 1920's. the people benefiting from this are paying taxes at one of the lowest rates in 50 years. you may have heard of this, but warren buffett is paying a lower tax rate than his secretary. now, that's wrong. that is not fair. we have to choose which

direction we want this country to go. do we want to keep beating the tax breaks to people like me who do not need them? are given to warren buffett? he definitely does not need them. bill gates has already said he does not need it. or do want to keep investing in that things to keep our economy growing and keep us secured? that is the choice. [applause] boardwalk, i have told you where i stand. -- florida, i have told you were i stand. it is time for the members of congress to tell you where they stand. we will be voting on the buffet rule. if you make more than $1 million per year -- i'm not saying you have that, you have made smart investment, and you have your nest egg prepared for retirement, but you are bringing in more than $1 million per year, the rule says you should pay a percentage of your income in taxes just like the middle-class families to. [applause]

you should not get special tax breaks. you should not be able to get special loopholes. [applause] if we do that, then it makes affordable for us to be able to say for those people who make under $250,000 per year that your taxes do not grow up. we can still make those investments to things like student loans, college, science and all the things that make this country great. this is where you come in.

this is why i came to see you. the weather is nice. the guys have been a wonderful audience. [applause] i have learned about the growing -- burrowing owl. one of the reasons i came down here, i want you to write your members of congress, send them an email, tweet them. tell them not to give tax breaks to people like me who do not need them but tell them to invest in the things that will help the economy. we need to bring down the deficit in the balanced way that is fair for everybody. remind them who they work for. tell them to do the right thing. [applause] as i look out across this gymnasium, everybody here, from all different backgrounds, all different parts of the country, each of us is here because somebody somewhere felt the

responsibility for other people. our parents, our grandparents, our great-grandparent than the sacrifices they make. some of this to the enormous risk to come to this country with nothing for a better life for their kids and grandkids. [applause] a lot of them did without so that you would benefit. they're not just thinking about their families, but they were thinking about their communities, their country. that is what responsibility means. as if you have greater and greater opportunity, the scope of you being able to help more people and think about the future expands.

about not just thinking yourself, but you are thinking about your kids, spouse, family, grandkids, neighborhood, state, and your nation. you think about the future. now, it is our turn to be responsible. it is our turn to preserve the american dream for future generations. it is our turn to rebuild. it is our turn to make the investments that will ensure our future, to make sure that we have the most competitive work force on earth. to make sure they have clean energy that can help clean the planet and help fuel our economy. it is our turn. [applause] it is our turn to rebuild the roads and bridges, our airports, ports. it is our turn to make sure that everybody here, every child

born in what ever neighborhood that they're able to dream big dreams and put blood, sweat and tears behind it that they can make it. i know we can do it. i know we can do it because of you. you are here because you believe in your future. you are working hard. some of you are balancing a job or a family on this side. it you have a faith in america. you know it will not be easy, but you did not give up. that is the spirit we need right now because here in america, we do not give up. in america, we look out for one another. in america, we help each other get ahead. in america, and i have a sense of common purpose. in america, we can meet any challenge.

in america, we can seize any moment. we can make this century another great american century. thank you. god bless you. god bless the united states of america. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] ♪

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>> up next, a discussion on afghanistan's security and the transition the country is going through. rick santorum announced he is getting out of the presidential race. we will have that later. mitt romney was on the campaign trail in wilmington, delaware. baseball players and owners reached a labor agreement last november. a conversation on collective bargaining in baseball. michael wiener will be at the national press club. later in the day also on c-span 2, supreme court justices paid tribute to former justice sandra

day o'connor who was the first woman appointed to the court. she was nominated by ronald reagan in 1981. live coverage starts says 6:30 eastern. >> april 15 1912, nearly 1500 perish on a ship called unsinkable. >> this struck the bells three times which is a warning. it is not say what kind of object. he called down to the officer on the bridge to tell them what it is that they saw. when the phone was finally answered, the entire conversation was, what the sea?

i spurred right ahead. the response from the officer was, thank you. >> this weekend on c-span 3. >> the united states will continue to be involved in securing afghanistan after the 2014 withdraw. he is the representative to afghanistan and pakistan and was part of a discussion hosted by the -- >> good morning. my name is george moose, i'm the vice chair of the board of directors here at the u.s. institute of peace.

i'm pleased to welcome you here this morning. before we begin i would like to ask all of you to turn off your cell phones and your pagers. because they interfere with our own electronic systems, including those that are streaming today's session live over the internet to our many listeners in our virtual audience out there. this morning i have the honor to introduce today's session on prospects for peace in afghanistan. as the size of today's audience is evidence enough of the interest in this topic. my dubious claim to this particular honor lies in the fact that i recently returned from a three-week visit to pakistan on behalf of the state department, which of course naturally qualifies me as an instant expert on the subject. usip as an institution, however, has a much longer and much deeper involvement in afghanistan going back to two -- 2002 with the institute was asked to apply its special expertise in the areas of peace building to the task of promoting peace and stability in

afghanistan. for the past two years usip has focused its attentions on the development of a strategy for the country's political transition and transformation. one built around constitution of development, credible elections, and a durable and inclusive peace process. in 2008, usip hosted minister as a jennings randolph resident fellow here. we regret he was not able to join us for this session but we look forward to his participation in future sessions. his research helped inform the afghan peace and reintegration program which in turn has become the blueprint for usip's own reconciliation and reintegration work. as is abundantly evidence to all concern pakistan is also a critical element in any calculation of the prospects for peace in afghanistan.

which is why usip also has a presence and a program there. some would question whether dick holbrook's original rand vision of a strategic partnership between u.s. and pakistan was ever realistic and viable, but i think there is widespread agreement whatever hopes there might have been for such a partnership have been shattered by the multiple shocks of 2011, the most significant of which was the raid almost a year ago on osama bin laden's compound. just when one thought the u.s.- pakistan relationship couldn't get any rockier, we have the announcement by the u.s. government last week regarding lakshar leader, said, which was made on the eve of a long awaited visit by the pars to india and the eve of pakistan's parliament debate of a long awaited report on the future of

the pakistan-u.s. relationship. and if that were not enough, we have the op-ed piece over the weekend by representative dana rohrabacher vigorously defending the resolution he had introduced in february calling for self-determination. which seems certain to reignite the passionate reactions of pakistani officials. now, these developments and others inevitably give rise to a series of questions. among them, how to respond to those here in this country who are increasingly calling for an end to u.s. military engagement in afghanistan, how to ensure a credible political transition in afghanistan, one requiring both credible presidential elections in 2014 and an inclusive peace process. whether the u.s. can succeed in its efforts to bring about negotiated into pakistan civil

war, in the absence of pakistan's -- afghanistan civil war and absence of pakistan's engagement and cooperation. in short, what are the prospects for peace in afghanistan? to provide answers to these questions, we are privileged to have a very distinguished panel of experts, true experts. i will not read their biographies since you have them, but i would offer the following highlights. marc grossman has held just about every major post one can hold in the department of state. ambassador to turkey, assistant secretary of state for european affairs, director general of the foreign service, and undersecretary of state for political affairs, the department's third highest position. since february, 2011, he has served as special representative of afghanistan -- for afghanistan and pakistan

with all of the challenges pertaining. and i think it's important to note that marc's diplomatic career was launched in pakistan. that was his first posting. in essence he has come full circle in his career. nilofer sakhi has written extensively. she is founder and chairperson of women's and activities of women's service association where she established the association for peace building and conflict resolution. she served as a country director at the open foundations, afghanistan program, where she also worked as a senior consultant on rule of law, transitional justice, and human rights. pre- rashid is pakistan's eminent journalist and author. his writings are required reading for anyone seeking to understand the realities of afghanistan and pakistan. his publications which include "taliban, jihad, and descent

into chaos" has sold millions of copies. his newly published work, pakistan on the brink is already being described by viewers as a must-read. where and how that rand design went awry. i will add living as he does in lapur and writing as he does with unrestrained honesty and candor also qualifies him as a man of considerable personal courage. last but not least, we are privileged to have with us, ambassador omar samad, who is afghanistan senior expert here at the u.s. institute of peace. prior to joining usip he served as afghanistan's ambassador to france and previously as afghanistan's ambassador to canada and prior to that spokesman in the afghan foreign

ministry. a graduate of american university and the fletcher school, he's widely own and respected for his determined efforts to promote the cause of freedom and democracy in afghanistan. now, given that extraordinarily qualified group of panelists, wenow, given that extraordinariy qualified group of panelists, we knew that we needed someone with equally extraordinary credentials to serve as our moderator. we could not have found anyone better qualified than former assistant to the president for national security, stephen hadley. as a top advisor to president george w. bush for eight years, steve has left his mark on every major foreign policy issue the united states has confronted. he has continued to do so since leaving office through his involvement in a host of policy study groups and his extensive travels, including his own visit to pakistan of last october. importantly for us here at

usip, he's a former member of the usip board and we continue to benefit from his support and his sage advice. so it is with great pleasure that i turn the microphone over to steve hadley. >> thank you very much. i want to thank the panelists for being with us this morning. and thank all of you. i think we should have a very interesting hour and a half on this most important question. i want to outline how we are going to try to proceed this morning. i'm going to begin by asking each panelist what may look like a bit of a softball question,

but it's kind of a framing question so each of them can take three or four minutes in turn to sort of set out sort of a general approach to the problem. what we'll then do after that first round is i will then ask questions to the various panelists and i will try to see if i can broker a bit of a conversation between and among the panelists on the various issues of the day. i suspect when all that is done we will be basically an hour into this hour and a half which we have. and we will then go to questions and answers from the audience. you should have received as you came in or once you got seated a card. we would ask you to write your question on that card. if you don't have a card you can raise your hand and people will come and get you one. and we would ask that you would pass those cards then to the aisles and someone from usip will come down each aisle and collect them and they will then be passed to me. and that last 30 minutes i will ask your questions to the members of the panel. we will try to end promptly at 12:00 noon, and ask you then to

let the panelists have a moment to depart the hall before the rest of us exit. that's what we'll try to do this morning. and i think we could not have a better panel here to debate this important question about how to get to peace and stability in afghanistan and pakistan. so, without further ado, let me begin, ambassador grossman, i'd like to begin with you if i might. ambassador moose talked about political strategy. i think if you read the press on afghanistan there is a lot of talk about security, security situation in afghanistan, the transition to afghanistan lead security responsibility in 2014. but under the constitution president karzai's term expires in 2014, which means there will be a presidential election. and one question is, will that presidential election result in a president with authority and support throughout the country, or could it be a repeat of the last couple elections which were contested and a source of division?

accompanying the security transition strategy, could you say a little word about the political transition strategy and how the administration sees on the political side getting between where we are now and 2014 and beyond? >> thank you very much. let me just add my thanks to all of you and if i could add my thanks to usip and all the people who organized this wonderful event. it's an honor to be on this panel. i might if i could say a special word of thanks to steve hadley, who in the year i have been the special representative for afghanistan and pakistan has been particularly well in his counsel of others. i appreciate it very much. i think the question, steve asked a great question, which is to say we spend a very large amount of time thinking about the security transition. security transition very important. laid out in lisbon in 2010, the

transition and geographies which has already taken place. the military activity, the civilian development activity, all these areas we have been working hard on to promote the list done transition and then get through to a success at the end of 2014. i think i'll talk a little bit about the other transition. it's very important that we not lose sight of the success in list done. one other thing about list done, i had spent a couple weeks ago around europe talking about support for the afghan national security forces. stay focused on the lisbon transition is because for a public in the united states and also publics in europe it's a very important part of explaining the story of how we are going to go forward in afghanistan to get to 2014. security transition a very important thing. steve's right, i think we ought to be spending a considerable more time thinking about what is the other transition that's happening in 2014. there are two transitions we ought to be considering. lisbon, then obviously the political transition as called for by the constitution of

afghanistan. an election, change in leadership, and they very importantly getting to the transformational decade which was called for at the very important conference in bonn. i'll say three things about that. first, there is obviously a huge amount of work for afghans to do to get ready for 2014. because this election, how they want to run their own country, what their life will be like in that transformational decade 2014 to 2024 i think fundamentally is a question for afghans. we can talk about this and encourage and work with the election commission and consider questions going forward for 2014, this is first and foremost i believe an afghan question. i know that they will focus on it and focus on it successfully. second, as steve said, there are two or three other pieces of getting ready for that transition that are extremely important. one, i believe, is the regional context in which that second transition will take place. i take you back if i could to

the very important meeting in istanbul last november, the very important international conference in bonn last december which set a framework for secure, stable and pros fuss afghanistan inside of a secure, stable, and prosperous region. regional component of this, support of this transition in afghanistan is extremely important. second, let's not forget also the economic aspects of this. here steve and others have been particularly helpful to me which is to say that going forward to 2014 and after 2014 there's also got to be a even economic provision in connecting the economies with afghanistan and pakistan in the center. i believe that will also play a very important role and access for these two transitions in 2014. finally, as george said and also steve repeated, there is the question of peace and reconciliation.

george talked i think very rightly about the efforts the minister is making that we are trying to produce also for one and one reason only, which is to see if we can get afghans talking to other afghans about the future of afghanistan. but i believe the peace process, the question of this conference, prospects for peace, reconciliation, reintegration, all of these will play a very important role in whether we are successful in the dual transitions in 2014. >> thank you, marc. i'd like if i could to ask ambassador samad to pick up on that and particularly picking up on this -- the political strategy. there's been a lot of discussion about outreach to the taliban as an element of a political strategy between now and 2014. i'd like you, if you could, to talk a little bit about the rest of a political transition in 2014.

you have written, for example, in a recent article, you had a quote that said, much of afghanistan's loyal political opposition, women's rights groups, and civil society not only feel marginalized but are also increasingly concerned about a re-talibanation of the country because of misplaced priorities. that's a serious statement. could you talk a little bit about what you mean by feeling marginalized and what ought to be the approach of the afghan authorities and the united states to address those issues and that feeling? >> thank you. thank you for the easy question. good morning to everyone here. i thought the ambassador would get all the tough questions. that's the advantage of being an ex-diplomat. by what i had written i'm trying to reflect, i think, what the afghan people are feeling in terms of the political transition that is about to take

place, if and when it takes place and how it will take place, and what to feel first of all i think connected to a transition. you want to feel inclusive and included in the process that not only takes into account their aspirations, but also deals and offers them certain solutions and answers to questions that are really tough in terms of what are we doing with the taliban? which taliban? where and what context? these are questions that i think are on the minds of many people not only in afghanistan but also across the world, especially the main contributors and main stakeholders as to what exactly are we going to get out of a reconciliation. a political process is the way to end the conflict and we hope that that will be the case for afghanistan. but there are many questions as

to what kind of reconciliation. is it going to be narrow? is it going to be one where we bargain over certain gains that we have had, afghans have had over the past decade? what are we going to give up? what are we getting in return for it? if we are going to end up with a political sentiment, which is a bad word being used, what does it mean? what does a political settlement mean in terms of incorporating certain elements within the after began rooting structures, giving away certain positions. does it mean that this will guarantee the end of conflict. that everyone who is on today will actually sign on to this? so there are many questions lingering in people's minds. i think that that's what's caused a certain amount of uncertainty and angst within the afghan population. and especially within political circles. civil society, and especially

the parliament. i think we keep ignoring this body called the legislature or parliament, whether we like it or not, an elected body in afghanistan, elections are not perfect. but we cannot ignore their views and their input. so i think that it's important that as we move forward with the political process, we keep in mind that afghans have certain questions. they would like to have some transparency as part of this process. and they are really also worried about the regional context. as mr. grossman said, afghans see their immediate problems as originating not within afghanistan but originating within the regional context. and they see a lot of supporters outside of

afghanistan as well as inside afghanistan. but the supporters inside afghanistan are our own supporters, we need to deal with them ourselves in our own way. but supporters outside of afghanistan are very difficult for us to handle. in the past 30 years of our history has shown that we need to find better ways of handling this aspect of supporting coming outside afghanistan. >> thank you. one of the things that i think may inform the conversation here in the work that the u.s. institute of peace and the center for american progress have been doing, we have tried to distinguish between reconciliation, which is thought of as an outreach to the taliban, and a broader political settlement, which is making the afghan political structure more inclusive of both the opposition, women's groups, a sense that many view the afghan government now is narrow

with a sense of entitlement, fair amount of corruption, so we have talked about outreach to the taliban or reconciliation with the taliban and political sell settlement in terms of broadening and opening up the afghan political structure. we might have that distinction in mind. i would like to ask, how do women in afghanistan, you have been an advocate of women's empowerment in afghanistan, and how are women in afghanistan seeing the outreach to the taliban, what is their perspective. >> events with afghanistan to talk about these issues and the peace prospects. there was a level of optimism

that existed, in 2010. this was on the issue of the conditions -- this is not because they had good memories of the taliban regime, people were tired of instability in the country and wanted to have a solution everyone to have a stake in this. then they started working with different stakeholders and groups. with all the bad memories that they had from the taliban regime, they wanted this to be in the past.

in the last two years, unfortunately the level of optimism does not exist anymore they are afraid of -- there's been a lack of transparency in the process. there has been a lack of -- the private sectors, education and many other sectors. there were all part of a society and they were not consulted initially. it worked at the level that the international community just had been at the table to discuss the substance. the presentation of women's groups has been very symbolic in the process. it does not contain any substantive talks. women are concerned that the taliban has not released a

document or published anything that would except the constitution of afghanistan. has undermined the last 10 years of achievement. the support of the international committee has been focusing on this. now there is the level of pessimism that exists. there is no solution to the sentiment and reconciliation is not a solution. wait for more -- we think there's more need for a division in neighboring countries. let's talk about their interest because their interest matters a lot. otherwise the foreign countries will not cooperate in the process. there will not discuss their interests at the negotiating table. the solution doesn't rely will talking to the taliban alone.

>> thank you. you have indicated some reservations about where the reconciliation and the political settlement process are now. i want to come back to you in a moment and ask you to be prescriptive. how do you get this process back on track? i would like to turn to mr. rashid. the importance of the regional players and the role they can have in terms of a stable peaceful afghanistan over the long term. there's no more important neighbor than pakistan.

our objective is for a stable afghanistan and a stable peace for pakistan and they are related. i will start very basically. there's a lot of discussion about what does pakistan want for afghanistan? do they want the return of the taliban? let's begin -- what are pakistan pasquale's in afghanistan -- what are pakistan's goals in afghanistan? what are they willing to do to bring that about? >> i wish i knew. i wish more people in this room new and i do not think they do. i think marc outlined a very

comprehensive vision. i think part of the vision that must emerge in the chicago summit has to be the fact that the aim has to be an end to the war before you leave. if the nato forces will leave afghanistan in a state of civil war, then i think we're looking at total failure at the end of the day. we're looking at the collapse of the entire political system as it has evolved over the past 10 years. i would like to see eight u.s. vision articulated. our aim is to end the war before we leave. i think that will carry weight

in the international community. we can talk about each of these things individually but i think that has to be an overarching policy. maybe we do not get that but i think the aim has to be expressed. if we look at the areas, the international situation is in a crisis. a lot of the europeans want to pull out early. the law long-term funding of afghanistan and the funding of the military. the regional situation -- the tensions with iran and the tensions with pakistan. the domestic situation inside afghanistan with these recent incidents we have had is also very precarious.

i think an enormous amount needs to be done and we need diplomatic efforts on all three fronts in order to get this process going. i've always believed that the military has essentially always had a maximalist position and a minimalist position. it has moved from one to another. it has for a long time a strong maximist position where there is no compromise with india on afghanistan. micromanagement of any kind of political deal between the palestine -- and the taliban and eastern afghanistan. and then a minimalist position

which is geared more around compromise of talks, and with india and not rejected it completely. given the crisis with the u.s. and pakistan, both are taking center stage at the moment. there is an element of anti- u.s. defiance, which is being propagated in the media. this makes -- this takes on a hard line on afghanistan. how dare the u.s. talk to the taliban. how dare the u.s. talk about this strategy without sharing it with afghanistan. because of all the other crises, the military is weak.

i think it would also be willing and ready to accept this minimalist kind of set of demands for itself. t a question of how the u.s. and the international community is going to play with pakistan. is it going to be aggressive or is it going to be a little more patient? i think that is important. two things pakistan has to do. the time has long passed that pakistan can continue giving physical support for extremist and fundamentalists. i think this is going to require -- there has to be a deadline given to the outgoing taliban and to the fellow groups to move out of pakistan in order

to speed up its reconciliation. pakistan has to play a more positive role then it is done so far. it is critical for the international community to know that pakistan is given a certain time period. i think that is very important. there has to be a major effort at de radicalization. this does not mean confrontation in a military way.

this is the kind of thing the international committee would give money to if pakistan did not have the resources itself. we have reached a certain stage improving relations with india but they cannot go any further. there's a limit to how far you can go in afghanistan with karzai. we can knock move forward -- we cannot move forward on last pakistan is prepared to offer a program for d radicalization -- de-radicalization. >> the notion that the game needs to be to end the war before the united states leaves. i was there in october. if the goal is a peaceful

afghanistan, it will take a long time and that is not something that can be accomplished between now and 2014. i would like your comment on the suggestion that that is a goal. there has been an announcement in the last weekend that there is now an agreement on the issue of night raids, which has been standing in the way of a strategic partnership agreement between the united states and pakistan. is that agreement liable to be concluded? what will it say about a post- 2014 presence of the united

states in the event we cannot get it all done? will it say about a u.s. commitment in afghanistan post- 2014? >> thank you very much. when i heard it had to be done by 2014 -- the bars are high but it cannot be that high. on the question of special military operations, at night raids. it does open the door for the strategic partnership documents. i think that is something important to get signed an hopefully it will be done soon. i do not know how long it will take but we would like to have a good document. i think it is important because it starts to answer some of the questions.

it also starts to answer some of the other questions that we have heard. let me just say to both of you and to everyone in this room, i think the idea that reconciliation and the process of reconciliation has to be done with any more inclusive manner around in afghanistan with the united states of america is right. reconciliation is not an issue between the government of afghanistan and the insurgents. it is about afghan society. when you think about the questions that you asked -- what does it mean? one evanish i have had is that -- one advantage i have is that we set out in 2011 -- they

answer some of your questions. people have to break with al qaeda. they have to live inside of the constitution in afghanistan with the rights of women and minorities and other groups. i want to repeat the point i made in my opening. the role of the united states i want to make the point i made in my opening, which is to say that the role in the united states with the taliban is to try to open the door among afghans for conversation the questions you ask or questions that afghans have to enter. and the point you make about the region is extremely important it

has got to go forward a successful way. i would like to tie my interest, if you will, in this whole place of economic development and the empowerment of women in afghanistan. among the most interesting people that you meet in afghanistan are female entrepreneurs. i think there is a power to them there. women in business have a standing in society. were you face those questions of how far, how much, what changes? women can help stand for themselves and i think that is extremely important. before we leave, i think we should not get trapped here in the proposition that by 2041 -- by 2014 we are gone. if that were the goal, we would

not accomplish any of the tasks that we set out to do. this is just one part of the message that after 2014, there will be a mass engagement in afghanistan of economics, political. it will have to do with democracy, all of the things that are in the spd. it is not possible to say we will end this war before december 2015. it is not possible. we have the international debt trade that is laid down in bonds. and secondly, we have [unintelligible] when i think about a chicago, you have these lines of operation now. you have the military, which is important to continue. u.s. civilian efforts and development in government. all these things where people are investing in afghanistan. the of the question of transition and reconciliation.

this is so people can say this of the policy of the international community in afghanistan. then if we are successful with that, then you take as dental and chicago and tokyo and bonn -- istanbul, chicago, tokyo and bonn any follow-up. >> i want to go back to the issue of the june race. i'm concerned about the reconciliation process. it began to give the u.s. government a framework for dealing with that. i want to ask each of you the same two questions. my thoughts about the broader conversation, reconciliation needs to be an opportunity for the broader conversation among all of the elements in afghanistan. i would like to ask each of you

to talk a little bit about what kinds of conversation should be within with an asset -- afghan society. how is this structure? and secondly, making 2014 the vehicle for having that kind of conversation, and advancing the prospects for a broader reconciliation. i want you to put your policymaker hats on and talk a little bit about how to structure this conversation, how the 2014 election can be used to do that. >> as far as the achievement that exist in afghanistan.

>> i want to make sure that the images that we get from the media, the country is going to fail, i do not believe in that. i see the changes happening in the private sector. we have dealt with these changes and we do not want to show the cause. we are more structured and systematic with a system in place. these are great major opportunities for the connectivity of the world. thank you very much, ambassador grossman.

there is a different picture from the media of what we have in afghanistan. with the reconciliation of afghanistan, i think there was a lack of structure from the beginning in the process. for more structure, it has to be more transparent. there are issues that we cannot disclose. if the issues remain closed and transparency does not exist, how do we know as a nation that what are the discussions happening -- between countries and regions -- even the afghan government is not in the picture.

they are complaining about the process. that is damaging the sovereignty of the country. inclusiveness is not only to include women's groups. that is very important. i know the taliban does not recognize the afghanistan government. how do we see the future? it is hard to predict a successful outcome. the taliban are not legitimizing or considering the government.

this is a huge talk line. inclusive is not just about women's group. it is about the pakistan -- afghanistan government also. a broader process. we were expecting the peace process -- they were not able to reach the distant elements of the society which is education, which we did not name at the beginning and we have had several talks. you have to have outreach and a member of them. they should at least -- i know that time is limited.

we have to have outreach. they have started that. to have outreach. civil society was only -- they are not just society only. you want them to be included in the process. if we do not include them, you will not be able to legitimize the peace process. they have to legitimize it at the end of the day. as we give structure to the entire process. the media should cover the hope. there is an extreme level of pessimism right now. we have to show the people that something is happening in the positive.

otherwise, people think negatively about the entire process. if you don't have the support, it will affect the legitimacy of the process. need a negotiator -- we need a negotiator. we have not started the process yet. there has not been talk about the substance. we've done the logistics. that according to peace building procedure -- this process has shortcomings. the process has not started yet. how are we sure that in another two years we will be able to create another outcome?

work should be a little bit out of the logistical efforts and should be focused more on the process, to bring -- talk about the substance. sepsis is where the interests of pakistan -- absence means what are the interests of pakistan? not only pakistan is involved. iran is another player. there are other stakeholders. they have to come to the table. and the third thing, mediator role is an important part of the process.

right now the process is under question. the united states initiated and it is run and only happening, the taliban and the united states, the process. this has to be moved out of the mind of the people. international partners are a strong supporter for afghanistan. there are good points and bad points. the bad point is thatthis will undermine the neutrality of the process. >> interesting. what i would like to do is i would like to turn to ambassador samad and heavy focus on the -- have you focus on the

2014 election. we have a good description of the kind of process to be seen. if you could talk about the 2014 election and what afghans need to do to make sure that gives a free and fair election. i will ask mr. rashid to talk about what more should be done with the regional players and give you a chance to respond to the comments we made here and then we will go to the questions from the audience. >> i just wanted to say that what needs to be done is to consolidate these gains. afghanistan is a much better place than it used to be. mightdiscussing what happen if the taliban returns or what might happen if afghanistan collapses.

nobody 10 years ago thought we would have been at this point in afghanistan, -- this level of fertility -- fragililty. there's a certain level of fragilility. it needs to be fixed. we just sort of agreed that there is a component that needs to be brought back into the process. weare putting our house in order in afghanistan. elements are coming under this big tend to -- elements are coming under this big tent. there's a taliban that is radicalized. that is something that is missing. it was not going to judge -- budge or change.

we think this taliban is willing to come under the tent. we're trying to push him and encourage him and inside him to come under the tent. know that cousin is outside of the borders and that pakistan can have probably the definitive --provide the help that is needed in order to push the cousin back into afghanistan. then we can enter into talks with them.

this is the picture we're facing right now. the international committee can create a role. there needs to be assurances. we had the kabul process. we had istanbul and bantu. chicago is important and tokyo will give us the financial commitment that is required. what is the missing is the messaging to the afghan people and to the region. the international committee means business. they are serious about ending the war and continued the work that began in 2001. afghan will be in the driving seat. as you drawdown the troops -- i am grateful for the

international committee has done. the blood that has been shed on all sides. we need to end this but any one not just be saying that war will end in 2014. we need to be able to say we will now enter into a political sentiment face -- a political settlement phase. we do consolidate the peace and moving forward to rebuild afghanistan. this will be critical in trying to determine which path we are going to take. we have had 10 years of experience with a democracy that is young and is learning

the way forward. don't expect afghanistan to become the model of democracy within a generation or two. it will take much longer. but what choice do they have? what we have is a choice between an imperfect democracy but one that will be nurtured and helped along, and forces of radicalism. so we have to make that choice. the election will be a critical testing ground. we need to make sure we stay within the bounds of the constitution. if the constitution needs to be reformed, there will be a discussion and debate in the

country to reform it. that has to be inclusive. democracy has to stay within the bounds of the constitution in afghanistan. human rights and gender rights falls within that. the taliban have to fall within the bounds of the constitution. they need to become something. they need to be shown they have a voice and that their voice counts. and they are going to become political actors in afghanistan, like everybody else. not more, butnot more, not less than anybody -- else. they will have equal rights under the constitution. how do we do this? how do we convince the taliban? that is the trick that needs to

be answered. >> does pakistan have the will ability to pressure these cousins that are outside of pakistan to return and take part -- of afghanistan to return and take part of this process? what else needs to be done on a regional basis to support this process? >> there is hardly any discussion in washington about elections. how are you going to withdraw these troops and also have elections? who will stand by? who will protect these elections? one idea is if president karzai sees it within himself to brings

the elections forward so that the international presence can be there and can play a role in protecting the elections. bringing the elections for would -- forward to next year or even into 2013 would be an enormous help to the international community. you would like to include the taliban in this process, too. that is a big question mark. will it progress and to such a stage where you allow them to stand in the elections? would they take a decision to stand in the elections or not? it is probably vital that the transition to the next president should take place well before the final -- large-scale withdrawal takes place in 2014. on this reconciliation, i think president karzai has made

enormous mistakes. he is not put forth a comprehensive team talk with the taliban. they are reenergize the ethnic issue. they're creating enormous in net -- ethnic division. there is open talk of civil war in afghanistan. let's be realistic. between the north and the south. amongst the south itself between the taliban. -- the taliban and the pashtun. whether the army or military can stand those kinds of strains -- the war -- if there is disbelief -- there's a belief that somehow the americans will get up and say goodbye and leave and the afghans will come into the trench and hold that tranche and -- the trench and hold the

entire country against the taliban. if we will be in a state of war in 2014 when the troops start leaving, there will be a wave of attacks by the taliban if there is no peace process. one of the most important needs for americans and for nato is how to reduce the violence so the burden does not fall on this afghan army which is completely untested -- illiterate drug -- which you all know what dogs there are, it's literate, drug taking, etc. we do not know how it will perform. i want to say there have been divisions in this administration in washington and i do not think we can ignore them. that's been a major cause for

problems in this peace negotiation. the taliban has suspended the talks. partly because, it seems, because of the u.s. military getting forensics checks. the u.s. has to talk from one page also. the more divisions that there are in pakistan and kabul, it -- and iran, etc., it creates problems for the u.s. and for these negotiations. these other countries have an angle on which to build their own defense on. there will need to be a massive diplomatic effort. did the state department is -- maybe the state department is

unable to do on their own. they have no relationship with iran. you need someone else to talk with the iranians about the settlements. it is tragic to with the u.n. has been run down. they cannot take up a position in negotiation leadership, unless it is from outside. i think the americans can resolve this for themselves. they can designate a european to talk to the iranians. it is a critical part of any kind of regional settlement. in pakistan, the problem is, is a huge domestic crisis. you have a military trying to get rid of the government.

read the judiciary lining up with the military -- you have the judiciary lining up with the military. this could escalate again. you have an economic crisis. now, it has been unfortunate that there has been so little pressure from the government on the military in a more comprehensive way to change pakistan's armed policy, because that is what is needed. the military controls it, butthere can be pressures to change it. other groups are trying to pressure the military to change. the military is deeply confused, deeply aware thatthings cannot continue. take that step to turn the ship around is something that nobody has the courage to do all right now in pakistan. the more aggravating measures there are like -- people see

this as tit for tat thing that americans are doing. if it needed to be done, it's true have been done for years ago after mumbai took place. there were accusations about mumbai. to do this for years later, -- and i caughti can understand the -- frustrations in the united states. people have seen this more less as a tit for tat thing. not as a strategic or a policy issue. there's a huge domestic crisis which is dominating everything at the moment. as long as that is not resolved, we are not going to see a reconciliation with the united states. the military, the government, the parliament are all held hostage at the moment to the kind of rhetoric that's coming

out of the media and these extremist groups. i hope they can come out of it sooner than later. but pakistan will continue down this road. i hope it can come out of it. certainly this year. but, turning the chip around -- ship around, nobody seems to have the will to do it. not the military, not the politicians, nor the government. perhaps the next election should be brought forward in pakistan, too, so we could have a new government which could tackle some of these issues that need to be looked at. >> thank you. marc, you have the last word. you have a broad canvas to paint on. i will ask for questions to be brought up. >> i felt that the stage is

tilting in these last few minutes. that is all right. i want to make sure there's a lot of room for questions. i would like to go back to the question of reconciliation. it is important to emphasize this reconciliation process is about society in afghanistan. nor is it about the united states of america talking to the insurgents. there is one purpose and one purpose only and that is the point that you made. the taliban does not want to talk to the government of afghanistan. somebody has to break through and open that door. our goal is to open that door. i do not know if we will succeed.

our porpoises to open that door -- our purpose is to open that door. the peace council has an important role to play here. i make a point to go and visit with the high peace council. it has to be more inclusive. talk to the people around the country. do not forget the accomplishments. i take one lesson. for the taliban, it is not for afghan society to accommodate the taliban. it is the reverse. it is the job of the taliban to recognize what is happening in

afghanistan over these past 10 years. how did the president --how did the president's make their own decisions? we have talked about reconciliation. reintegration is an important part of this as well. one point about tokyo. tokyo will be the place where the international community will make some commitments to the government of afghanistan. bonn called upon the government of afghanistan to make commitments to the international community. i know people will be looking for that plan, as well. this room is full of former

colleagues. i have many faults. not keeping the government fully informed on what we were doing is not one of them. i recognize that is what people say. i worked very hard so that people are not in the dark or excluded. pakistan is the place to start. they need to work on this issue. when you say nobody is thinking of how to structure our forces in afghanistan for an election in 2014, that is part of the importance of an event like this and started to talk about these transitions.

i was in europe a few weeks ago and this was very much on people's minds. two transitions are happening and they need to happen successfully. i go back to the question of, "we are leaving." the afghan national security forces are going to grow to 350,000 people and that number will stay consistent till the end of 2015. then it will slope down. they can fight and do the kinds of jobs that are important. i come back to the point that this panel is all about. teat not just a peace process -- it is not just a peace process, it is and afghan peace

process. if they will not take ownership of peace, it will be lowered. i believe the prospects are good. >> i have six questions which i've turned into four questions. we will go through them and see how much time we have at the end. do you think the taliban have moderate any of their views on women, or do they want to go back to the policies of the 1990's? for those taliban that come into the practice, where it be think their views are on women today? >> that is a good question. we do not know if they have

moderated their views. they are -- they want women's roles. there's interpretation about the law, whether they want to name that as a perfect model. i do not think we have reformed. the other think they are saying -- there are many issues relevant to women's participation in public, women praying outside, a traveling with someone else. these are issues that show us

that they have not modified anything about their take on women's issues, especially if they're focusing very much on the women's role. if it is islamic, we do not say women's right. it is good. we respect that. >> mr. rashid. >> look, why this is so important is that the tell about have been locked up in safe houses in pakistan for the last 10 years -- the taliban has been locked up in safe houses in pakistan. they need exposure to these people.

i would hope that the first thing that would happen is you take delegations from all walks of life and meet with the taliban. and the taliban working with people, all sorts of members of the afghan elite. this would give the taliban the kind of exposure to moderate afghan society that has come up since 9/11, more than ever before. >> the burden is on the taliban for this reconciliation process. that would be an opportunity for the taliban to reassure women on this point. next question. how you assess the ability of the loyal opposition to mobilize afghans to participate in the country's politics?

how'd you addressed the issue between the split between the north and the south, in the direction of democracy and development? >> these are very good questions. i think it would be good for the position to create their political platforms. whether it translates to political parties, that is up to them. the afghan people, offer them a set of policies dealing with different viewpoints in a more coherent manner.

so far their activities and behavior is somewhat ad hoc and not fully integrated within the parties as well as intra- movement. i think there are issues that need to be raised amongst the opposition groups that they share in terms of the interest, to move forward to credible elections, legitimate elections. how to deal with certain constitutional questions. how to make sure we don't go off track with elections overall and the process that it needs. in terms of north-south, i believe the 2010 elections did demonstrate one of positive

change. the ability of the top candidates to cross values and boundaries that existed in afghanistan prior to 2009. there they were an ethnic or regional boundaries. the main candidates were able to tap into committees that were seen as a possible to tap into prior to these elections. society is maturing and seeing beyond the committal interests and this goes beyond that. this is a good outcome of what has been going on over the years. i think 2014 will offer an opportunity to expand on this achievement. the media in afghanistan has played an incredible role along

people to express themselves about all of the issues. every time i turned to the media and listen to these discussions, i am amazed at what we had in 2001 and will we have today. -- and what we have today. this is an educational process for the afghans. whether you have access to tv and media or whether you're in the city, you are bound to be impacted by all of these changes and i think this is good news for the political process. this will become less of an issue. >> interesting. during recent interviews, you have stated perhaps the biggest failure of the u.s. coalition effort has been the inability to establish a viable economy

in afghanistan. what can be done to fix this? what are the priorities between now and 2014? we are talking about an economic transition. >> i think this administration has tried very hard to improve the economic situation right from the start. the war has intensified. it is difficult to get out and to improve the economy and the agriculture. this should have been the main focus from 2001. this was the intention of this administration but they were not able to fulfil it. tens of thousands of afghans

are going to -- this is a generation in favor of democracy and reform and change. this generation will be left out when they leave. no one is talking about setting up a computer chip factory in kabul. we're talking about having a self sustaining -- investment in agriculture. i think the only way that that can be effected in the long term is if the world wants to subside or their wants to -- or there has to be a regional reduction in violence.

surely, there are very good ideas for the next 18 months or so. what should be done now by the ambassador and others as i open of the tokyo conference is the theme should be played as to how you will develop the outside economy. down the road, there is the prospect of minerals, oil, gas. the chinese are already taking up options there. of course, it is going to be hugely beneficial. are they going to be capable of looking after the wealth? and there is going to be a need for national -- for international help on that. we do not have copper or i and or warlords like we have drug warlords now.

we are at a crossroads of asia that has been talked about a lot. this is a huge money earner. south asia desperately needs pipelines to provide oil, gas, electricity to pakistan. there are all these possibilities. it is going to be very dangerous and precarious. putting tens of thousands of jobs into the job market where there are no jobs. >> in addition, specialization. for that new generation, to focus on youth is an important thing. it provides more education facilities, scholarships.

that is, to have a long-term impact. right now, we have a scholarship on political issues but not on the economy. that is why we have few people that can get into the country and government also. investing in youth is one of the important things to support the economy. and the private sector has done a marvelous job in the last 10 years. the technicality and professionalism that exists. >> last question. the first part of it is something you may not want to answer. but i will give you a half of its. you can avoid answering it if you so choose.

what would be the optimum u.s. military presence in afghanistan post-2014? how do you balance what is needed to meet u.s. and afghan interests from a force standpoint against off-putting afghans, waivers, and the demand of the television -- of the caliban -- the taliban? how you balance and weigh those factors on what the u.s. presence should be? >> i'm going to go to the economic question. the regional aspect is right. the private sector aspect is right. the foreign investment to support the afghan private sector -- two points. there are opportunities in the extracting industries that are available now.

i have the economic vision. there are opportunities to be taken advantage of today. the other thing that is really important is we talked about the company's that are interested. what is the rule all structure in afghanistan for commercial law? how do i resolve why disputes? how do i work through it? afghanistan has got to set a legal framework to encourage foreign investments. finally, in 2011, we had the afghan-pakistan issue. that number has gone up because people see what you see, center -- central asian economies connected to south asian economies.

to the question you gave me, nobody can answer that question for you. on the second question, you could consider this not leave. -- naive. the last of the spd's are causing anxiety in the region. nobody knows what is going to happen. people will connect their economy to it and realize that there is going to be an american presence in afghanistan for some time. the region will say, how do i react to that? i think a decision will take some steps for an afghanistan

sable -- stable and secure process. >> i want to thank the audience for your participation, the good questions, coming and attending this session. let me thank the panelists for their participation as well. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> rick santorum announced today he is ending his presidential campaign. that is coming up next on c- span. his former rival, mitt romney, was on the campaign trail in wilmington, delaware. and president obama held a rally in florida pushing for changes to the tax code.

>> tomorrow, a discussion on the u.s. criminal justice system. the attorney general speak at the national conference joined by reverend al sharpton. coverage at 9:00 a.m. eastern on c-span2. and a conversation on proposed changes to the tax code and the warren buffett ruled. >> republican presidential candidate rick santorum is ending his campaign. he made the announcement at a news conference in gettysburg in his home state of pennsylvania. he was joined by his family and supporters. [applause] >> thank you very much. it is always an honor to be here. it is a beautiful town, gettysburg, such a historic town. first and foremost, i want to

thank everybody for the outpouring of paris over the past weekend -- of prayers over the past weekend. we had a difficult weekend. good friday was a little bit of a passion play for us with our daughter, bella, who is the joy of our lives, getting unfortunately -- getting, unfortunately, very sick. she is a fighter. she is doing exceptionally well. she is back with us and the family. we look forward to spending a lot of great time with her. but it did pause -- cause us to think. as the role that we have as parents in her life and with the rest of our family, this was a time for prayer and bought over the past weekend. just like it was, frankly, when we decided to get into this race. my wife and i and the kids sat at the kitchen table and talk

about our hopes and fears and concerns. we were very concerned about our role as being the best parents we possibly could be to our children and making sure that they have a country where the american dream was still possible. i think a lot of concern that we had for our family was that, what was going on in washington, d.c., and all the problems that you've heard me talk about on the campaign trail, that the american dream was slipping, not just from the hands of average americans, but for all americans, that that dream was slipping away. as the parents, that we ought to go out and do what we could take and that responsibility for our children and for children across this country. we started out almost a year ago now. i told my story, our story of

our family, my grandfather, who came to this country and worked in the coal mine. my father, who served our country in world war ii. we have talked throughout the campaign about my stories and the stories of our family. after a while, it became less about my stories and more about what -- what kept us going were your stories, the stories of people across america that we had the privilege of getting the chance to know and to interact with. when you travel around -- one such story was a guy named jack who had a pickup truck -- chuck who had a pickup truck, who joined our team. drove around for months in his dodge ram truck because he believed that we had the best opportunity to turn this country around. i met a lot of folks in iowa but i will never forget. -- in iowa that i will never

forget. a man of strong convictions welling up with tears, about what is going on with our country, particularly national security. the constitution is one of the vitally important legs we have forgotten. alike -- people like wendy, our best volunteers. 5000 phone calls. she passed away shortly before the caucus. she is someone i remember, her passion for the least of us. those of us on the margins of society, as many would have looked at her. even today, it is because of our daughter, bella, folks into our rally one after another --

folks came to our rally one after another. children in wheelchairs saying, "i'm for bella's dad." just a beautiful idea of a not- story, but their stories. -- of not my story, but their stories. told to forget it, we were still winning, touching issues and raising issues -- touching hearts and raising issues that people did not want to have raised. a young man came to our first event in oklahoma. he had spina bifida. he wanted someone who spoke about people who are overlooked

by society or do not seem to be as valuable as others in society. folks like the duggars, the duggar family who traveled with us in their bus and gave us their time and energy because they believe in the importance of having strong families as part of a strong country. we cannot have a strong economy, as you have heard me say over and over, without strong families and a strong moral fiber that makes us the moral enterprise that is america. even on things like a sweater vest -- [laughter] amazing thing, that sweater vest. it happened on a night i was doing in a bent for mike huckabee -- doing an event for mike huckabee. i gave a pretty good speech that night. all of a sudden, the

twitterverse went wild, saying "it must be the sweater vest." from then on, the sweater vests became the uniform of the campaign. we sourced it to a company making them in united states. we went to that little company in minnesota in the middle of winter. it was a beautiful day. we got a chance to see that little plant that had been around for almost 100 years. it turned out where the best customer that the mills there have ever had in their history. it has been a wonderful story after story of people who have come forward. those who put together a song in tulsa called "game on."

over 1 million hits on youtube 4 that catchy little tune -- for that catchy little tune. even those who want to make it a winner-take-all primary. it has been inspiring to me, the stories that we have been engaged with. it turns out that it really was not my voice i was out communicating. it was your voice, the voice that you gave me from the stories and experience i had. people say, how did this happen? how were we able to come from nowhere? it was because i was smart enough to figure out that if i understood and felt at a very deep level what you were experiencing across america and try to be a witness to that, tried to beat an interpreter of that -- be an interpreter of

that from your voice be heard and miracles could happen. mircale after -- miracle after miracle happened. i want to thank god and thank you for everything you have given. a voice to those who, in many cases, are voiceless. have tried to be a witness not just for your stories and your voice, but to provide a positive vision, not an negative campaign. we did hundreds of town hall meetings. we were not trashing anybody. we painted a hopeful and positive vision for our country, one that was based on how we could get this country turned around, not just economically, not just economically, but reflecting the hopes of americans, not just the fears of americans.

the hopes of americans confronting the violent, radical islam, the surge of iran, what we could do to take on the problems of a sluggish economy as washington has grown so big. we put forth a solid and concrete plans, many of which came from the people i had an opportunity to interact with throughout the campaign. we did focus a lot on the families, and the dignity of human life and a moral enterprise that is america. one of my favorite articles was one that joe klein wrote. "rick santorum was inconvenienced -- "rick santorum's inconvenient truths." we talked about how we would build a copy -- a country from the bottom up and we carry around our copy of the constitution. that got the tea party folks excited.

we talked about the operator's manual of america being discarded by those in washington. i tried to bring to the battle what abraham lincoln brought to this battlefield back in 1863, november 19. he talked about this country being conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. he was quoting the declaration of independence. we talked about the declaration as the heart of american exceptionalism. we will never be a country that can go forward as a great and our book country unless we remember who we are -- great and powerful country unless we remember who we are. that is what our campaign was about -- what made as americans, how we built the country from the bottom up, how we could be successful in the future, how we must believe in ourselves and leave in the ability to go forward and do the same thing. against all odds, we won 11

states, millions of voters, millions of votes. more counties than all the other people in this race combined. we spread the message far and wide across the country. what we found is support and a deeper love for this country. every state that i went to -- everyone who follows as around would hear me say, i love this state. it was a love affair for me, seeing the differences. seeing the wonderful people of this country who care deeply about where this country is going, who care deeply about those who are out there feeling left behind and, in some respects, feeling hopeless. ladies and gentlemen, we made a decision to get into this race and our kitchen table, against all the odds -- at their kitchen

table, against all the odds. over the weekend, we made the decision that this presidential race is over for me and we will suspend our campaign effective today. we are not done fighting. we will continue to fight for those voices. we will continue to fight for the americans who stood up and gave us that air under our wing that allowed us to accomplish things that no political expert would have ever expected. there is a lot of greatness in this country. we needed leaders who believe in that. who are willing to give voice to that. who are willing to raise us up instead of trying to provide for us and do for us what we can better do for ourselves. that is the message that came to me. it is one that i feel very good about continuing to talk to americans about. i walked out after the iowa

caucus victory and said game on. i know a lot of folks will now write game over. but this game is a long way from over. we will continue to fight and make sure we defeat president barack obama, that we when the house back, and that we take the united states senate, and we stand for the values that make us americans, that make us the greatest country in the history of the world, that shining city on the hill, to be a beacon for everybody for freedom around the world. thank you very much. god bless you. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> thank you, everybody, for coming. appreciate it very much.

>> mr. romney held a campaign event in wilmington, delaware. delaware'presidents primary is april 24. [applause]

>> i'm the ceo. i want to thank all of you for coming today. i'm pleased to introduce a lori greyson, also a woman business owner, an executive board member of abc. and she will introduce the governor. >> thank you, thank you. >> thank you, becky. i want to thank you. it's awesome they invited all of us to be here today. the past half hour, mitt romney has been meeting with women business owners. and i just want to say thank

you. because as a business owner i am very interested in jobs, jobs for the people that work for me in my business and i am interested in jobs for my children as a mother. in the future, and with like to have them have jobs, too. i want them to support me. i have them out here. mitt told us he is interested in the business climate. making it better for us as business owners, especially small business owners to survive this economy. mitt, i want to thank you for that. as a woman owned business, i want to encourage other women that this is our president. ladies and gentlemen, mitt romney. [applause] >> thank you, wow. thank you.

your very kind. this has been quite -- wow, thank you. [cheers and applause] thank you. the only time i typically get a standing ovation as when there are no chairs. [laughter] i appreciate the fact you gave me such a welcome. it is an honor to be here in this facility. this has been here a while and there is some heavy equipment here. this is a fabrication plant and they make steel beams and girders for building various buildings. business has not been as hot as it was in the past decade, but it is coming back slowly but surely. becky, thank you for opening your shot, and also laurie for opening -- for introducing me to the women business owners as we came together. this has been a good day for me.

[cheers and applause] senator santorum has decided not to proceed with his campaign and i had the chance to speak with him this morning. we exchanged our thoughts about going forward, and we both have a great deal of interest in seeing the country taking on a different path. he has made an important contribution to the political process, has brought forward issues that he cares very deeply about, and has been able to gather a great deal of public support and interest to those issues. i look forward to his work in helping assure victory for republicans across the country in november. if we have got to get that job done. [applause] the reason that i wanted to meet with these business leaders was to ask them about their

enterprises, what the prospects are for them, what they are seeing in the marketplace. but also to get a sense of the administration's policies and the government's policies as they relate to small business. as you might expect, those policies have by and large been devastating to small business. we spoke about the president's failure to encourage small business. i would also note, to be able to encourage enterprises that are owned by women, and to call create job creation more generally. the other day there was a talk about the war on women. the real war on women has been waged by the obama administration's failure on the economy. [applause]

do you know what percentage of the job losses in the obama years have been casualties of would been losing jobs as -- women losing jobs as opposed to men? what percentage of the job losses were women? 92.3% of the job losses during the obama years have been women who lost those jobs. the real war on women has been the job losses as a result of the obama economy. and if we're going to put women back to work and help women with the real issues that women care about, good jobs, good wages, a bright future for themselves and their families and their kids, we will have to elect a president that understands how the economy works, and i do. [applause]

i see one of my supporters over here, christine o'donnell. good to see you. [applause] the president is so out of touch. i do not think he knew that number. and if he did, he probably would not have said his administration has been a great success. he says he has not only done a good job, but a great job. even with a 92.3% of the job losses being within, -- being women, he thinks he's done a great job. and he said that on saturday night live. [laughter] he said that to the main street -- mainstream media. and if you look at the administration and the last three and a half years and you can see that something is wrong with his perspective. not only have 92% of the job losses been among women, but you have seen 800,000 people overall lose jobs, and values --

home of the lawyers have declined. -- home values declined. the median income for the average american has struck by 10%. homes of been foreclosed upon. the president's policies have not worked. he said his stimulus work. that was three and a half years ago. he barred $787 billion and said he would hold unemployment under 30%. -- below 8%. he said by now we would be below 6%. you have failed. we have seen it. you cannot hide it. we are going to change it. [applause] there is one place the president has delivered. he said his energy policies would cause energy prices to skyrocket. he was speaking to a group of

newspapers the other day, publishers and owners, and he said that this is going to be a defining election. this is going to be a critical election that will determine the course of the nation. not just for a year or two, but indefinitely. this is not an election, in my view, about a person or a party. it is an election about the direction of america. we are going to have to -- [applause] we're going to have to ask ourselves what it means to be american today and in the future. we will have a choice between two paths, one which is outlined by our president, which

is a government centered society, where government calls the shots, where business is the bad guy, we pick up these scapegoats to attack. but a government centered society. then there is the other view, the view that is laid out by this -- by the founders that i subscribe to. america is the land of freedom and opportunity. [applause] i will ask you four questions in a moment. if you have questions that you want to ask, i will do that and do my best to answer them. but a couple of thoughts about government-centered society in contrast with a nation that is free and filled with opportunity for entrepreneurs. one of the onta and doors was

talking about how she and -- one of them was talking about how she and her husband started a business some years ago. just sitting around the kitchen table they took out a piece of paper and said, wouldn't be something to learn more about upholstery? and her husband took an upholstery class. and decided to start a business upholstery and goats. -- upholstering goods. now they decide -- now they employ dozens of people in a business that makes upholstery. it is amazing, the entrepreneurial, innovative spirit of america. and their success does not make us poorer. it is time for us to have a president who will not apologize for success at home and will never apologize for america overseas. [applause] between these two visions of a government-center study and a free society, you have these two things. you have a government and with a trillion dollar deficit

ultimately sink our economy in the future. i will cut the rate of spending. i will capet and i will finally get us to a balanced budget. [applause] under this president, will have a health-care setting where the government tells you what kind of health insurance company you must have, and i am convinced, which treatments you can receive and which ones you cannot. if i am president, i will get rid of obamacare and return the responsibility of health care to you. [applause] this is a president who said that it comes to energy. it is clearly does not like coal or oil or natural gas.

he is for all the things that are above the ground, solar and wind. but the stuff beneath the ground he is not for. i am for all of it, above and below. i will get the energy security for this country and i will build that pipeline from canada. [applause] and this president's government-centered society, they love to talk about the economy and they want the economy to do well. they just do not like business very much. what they do not understand is that the economy is nothing but the addition of all of the businesses of america together. that is what makes the economy. saying you do not like business is like saying you like, that -- like armlets, but you do not like eggs. -- like you like, but do not like eggs.

you know the president wants to take the tax on small business from 35% to 40%. you may say, i don't understand what you are talking about. let me point this out. the percentage of american workers who work in businesses that are taxed at the individual tax rate is 54%. a 54% of american workers work in businesses? as individuals. when the president wants to raise the individual tax rate, he is raising taxes on small business. and as he does so, he will kill jobs. and then there is another tax idea floated out by vice president biden. some of us call him the gift that keeps on giving. [laughter] you know him well.

[applause] he is proposing a global tax for businesses. i'm not sure what he has in mind, but i'm sure it will kill jobs. if you raise taxes on working people, you hurt families. when you raise taxes on small business, you kill jobs. that is what they are doing. in the name of fairness, they are killing the opportunity for americans to have a fair shot of a good job at a rising wage. we will put americans back into good jobs by stopping the attacks madness. -- the tax [applause] -- this tax madness. [applause] and i see a member our armed forces. i appreciate your service. [applause] thank you.

the you know the state of our military readiness right now? our navy is smaller than any time since it was founded in 1917. our air force is smaller and older than any time it was founded in 1947. by the way, the 1917 number is not when the navy was founded. it is any time since 1917. and the air force, since its founding in 1947, is smaller and older. our troops are stretched to their breaking point. going back to iraq and afghanistan and multiple the point is, our president wants to cut the number of ships, aircraft, and personnel. my view is that the strong america is the best for an allied peace. i will add to our military and give our veterans the care that

they deserve. [applause] this is a defining election as to what course of america will take. will it remain strong militarily? will we be committed to low taxes and to growth, jobs, higher incomes, will we preserve a americans' freedom and opportunity? will we encourage small business or crush it through more regulation of like obamacare and dodd-frank and sarbanes oxley and one thing after another? i'm convinced that we will need to do something we should have done three and half years ago, and that is, to elect a conservative president for the united states. i intend to be the president with your help.

[applause] let me turn to you for any questions you may have. those of you that are in the sun are going to have a hard time. this is just a test. the detectives always put you in the sun to get the real truth out of you. yes, sir? there is a german right back there. hi, there. -- a gentleman right back there. hi, there. >> there's a lot of discussion on individual tax rates in this discussion, less about corporate tax rates. i know your plan would take it down 25%, but what additional steps would you take to get competitive and bring some of those companies back home from other countries? >> those that are not familiar with this, some countries have figured out that business is a good thing, not a bad thing. and if they have tax rates that

are lower, it might come out over time, -- it might over time, encourage businesses to grow there. with the highest tax rate in the world, we are encouraging businesses to leave. we have to be more competitive. we have to bring our tax rate down toward the european level. can you believe that? get our tax rate down 25% -- down to 25% and then have some of the deductions and so forth that have been worked into the code over the years. there are other things we can do. this is a strange one. only government could come up with this idea.

let's say, you have a business with construction equipment, like caterpillar. and you decide you are going to build a factory in china to build equipment there. the will not ship it back to the u.s.. it is too heavy. you'll try to keep it there and compete in china. you will ship the designs are there. and you are over there in a factory and it makes money. you pay chinese taxes, of course, because you'll be competing with the chinese construction equipment company. but if you want to bring money home to america, we will tax you for bringing it home. up to that 35% rate. if you want to keep it in china, you do not get tax by america. think what companies do. they keep it outside the u.s. it is estimated that over a trillion dollars in profit is held outside the u.s. because they do not want to bring it back and get hit with what is known as the repatriation tax. that makes no sense. bring money home. let it come back to create jobs here. make the businesses grow here. [applause]

that is one more change. thank you. yes, ma'am? >> i really have more of a comment appeared to be this, and you're going to have to go nose to nose and toaster toes with all of the untruths. it has to do with the data that is out there. i hope you're willing to do it, and that your campaign will do it. [applause] >> i heard a shout over there, harry truman's "give 'em hell." the truth came out as he spoke of pres. medvedev in russia. he said, i can be more flexible. you do not say that to the head of russia without making it clear to anyone listening that you have planned after your reelection that are different

than those you are telling people during election. it will be a hide and seek campaign. we will find out what he is going to do. i think we have some idea because of what we have seen in the last three years. [applause] thank you. yes, ma'am? >> [inaudible] >> for those who could not hear the question, what can we do to get more refineries in the u.s.? we will build refineries if there is oil to refine here. but if we continue to make it harder to get oil from here or from canada, why build a refinery? there is no particular need for it. the marketplace and competitors will build refineries if they are needed. and if there is raw material, namely crude oil that can be processed. we have a president whose administration has reduced the number of licenses that have gone on federal land to drill by half. and he has reduced the number of permits to drill on federal land to one-third of what they need to be.

we are not drilling for the production we are going to need tomorrow. therefore, people are not building -- people who build refineries and pipelines and things like this look at it and say, we will not need these because we are not ruling out. and this president has an have out -- and add out talking about how oil production has risen during his presidency. that is thanks to the prior president. and then he blames someone for higher oil prices. guess who he claims? he blames me for the high price of gasoline because i do not want to raise taxes on all oil companies. i do not like raising taxes on anybody. this president goes around and tries to find some group of americans that other americans

may not like a lot or trust a lot. then he says, let's tax them. it is their fault. this plane, this trying to divide america is not only wrong, it is dangerous. we are one nation under god and united we will stand and lead. [applause] >> how many czars do you plan to have, or do you plan to return to the good -- return the government to only three branches? >> i cannot imagine using that term. it is just amazing. the obama administration has added about 135,000 government workers. that is a lot people. it these entrepreneurs here, they do not begin to employ that many.

it is a huge number of people. and the problem with 135,000 more government workers is not just that they have to be paid and have to get retirement benefits and pensions and so forth, but they have to do something. and they do. they intrude in your life. they audit you, inspect you, regulate you. there are too many government workers. [applause] i look forward to eliminating government programs, not just cutting them, getting rid of some of them. do you know how many job training programs we have? we need job training programs for people who find themselves out of work and need new skills and get new kinds of jobs. but we have 49 different job training programs at the federal level.

and a report to eight different agencies. think of the administrators, the bureaucrats, the salaries, pensions, the health-care cut. it is just outrageous. i would take all of that money and i would give delaware their fair share and say, you use this to train your own people in the way you and delaware think best. [applause] >> my name is roxene wagner. it is a pleasure. i hope this is not inappropriate, but have you chosen a vice president? [laughter] >> i'm here to announce today -- [laughter] -- that i do not even have a list. this decision by senator santorum is unexpected. we will begin thinking about that at some point, but i cannot tell you when or who because we have not made those decisions yet. a lot of these decisions about the campaign going forward, we will be thinking about that this week and making a number of decisions. i have been thinking about

process, not individual names. i do not want to get started too quickly, but are you available? [laughter] yes, sir? >> as a 19-year-old american, i'm sure everybody knows about gasoline. as the president, hopefully, what are you going to do -- opec, if there is something happening in part of the world, they decide to make announcements to make it go crazy. also, donald trump has made comments about how opec is ripping us off. it has become more clear. as president, what would you do? >> i would take advantage of the oil resources we have here and allow additional drilling and provide licenses for additional drilling on federal lands. i would also build a pipeline from canada so we get more supply of oil here. i would take advantage of natural gas.

natural gas has come into its own in a big way. [applause] it sounds like you already know about this. we have always been able to grow vertically into the ground. but now we can go vertically and horizontally. as they go horizontal lee, they can tap into pockets of natural gas, or oil. and by pushing fluid into the pie, they are able to push the oil out. that is called fragging. this technology has allowed us to get 100 years of additional natural gas. it can be piped to our transportation networks on the interstate highway for long-haul trucks or fleet inside cities. it weakened the event of our oil resources, gas resources, coal resources -- we can take advantage of our oil resources, gas resources, coal resources. we always say, this is great that we will not have cars that require oil. yes, it requires coal. half of our electric energy comes from coal. these are the things i can do to get the price of gasoline where people can afford it again. one of these women here describe to me her business and the fact that they have a fleet of 70

trucks. when gasoline prices go up by 25 cents or 30 cents a gallon, that makes a big difference. because trucks do not get 30 miles to the gallon. we will have to get serious about taking advantage of our energy resources. and by the way, in case you did not know, i spent my life doing what these women are doing. i spent my life in business. i understand why jobs leave. i understand why it is government is such a burden in various types of businesses. why is that government kills jobs. my objective is to make government the ally of jobs, the ally of small business, and

encourage job growth. [applause] >> mr. romney, if the supreme court upholds obamacare, when you are elected president, what are you going to do? >> well, one, we will not be very happy with them. but i actually believe they will do the right thing and overturned a obamacare. i certainly hope so. [applause] i agree with those justices that ask the questions. even justice prior ask a -- breyer asked the question about who could read this thing back to thousand 700 pages, how could the court piaster read such a thing? -- who could read this thing? 2007 hundred pages, who could read such a thing? he has been giving waivers to

obamacare to various unions. i will take that idea and give a waiver to all 50 states, so they do not have to follow obamacare. [applause] because some states will not accept that waiver, i will also have to get it repealed. let me tell you, i will not replace it with nothing. we will work piece by piece to find ways to bring the cost of health care down so it is more affordable. families are having a harder and harder time, particularly if someone in the family is ill. there are things we can do to get the cost of health care down, and they must be done.

there are some things i would like to do, but piece by piece. we cannot afford trillions of more federal dollars. this kind of deficit spending must be stopped. [applause] you got a young lady behind you. >> if you are elected president, besides obamacare, have you compiled a list of priorities that you will do in the first days of your administration? >> thank you, and it is a long, long list. i will not take you through all of it. let me tell you some of the things i would do by executive order on day one. one, i will grant a waiver for obamacare.

number two, all of the obama era of regulations i will put a hold on and remove those that killed jobs. [applause] 3, i will remove corporate tax rates. four, i will label china a currency manipulator, which allows the president to be able to crack down on where they have stolen intellectual property or have had a unfair trade that kill jobs. to me, this is about getting our economy going again, short-term and long-term. those are some of the things i would do right off the bat. then other things. we've got to repeal sarbanes oxley, dodd-frank, obamacare. we have a long list. [applause] i want to take the top tax rate

that americans pay and i want that about 20% of where it is now. how will i pay for it? i will limit the deductions, particularly for high income folks so that the high-income folks pay the same share they now appeared on not looking to lower taxes on the wealthy, as the democrats always charge. they will share the -- pay the same burden a share now. but by lowering the marginal tax rates, that helps small business. instead of paying 35% tax rate, they will pay more. -- they would pay 28% tax rate. that means they have more money. these are the kinds of things small businesses need to do to grow and add jobs. we have to understand that we

are in competition. i am told that your time is up and my time is up. we are in competition for jobs. we are in competition for the best jobs. we want to rising incomes. we want our economy to be so strong. and by the way, that means all of our businesses, to be so strong that they will form the strongest military in the world. we want to have the best schools in the world. we do not. we want to care for veterans and seniors in the best way imaginable. we want these things to be once again the american experience. we will have to work hard to encourage enterprises to get them to grow again, to get them to hire here. everything we are doing from education policies to labor policies to tax policies, we got to encourage enterprise. this is not hard. the we have this dichotomy. the president is looking for

someone to blame for his own failures. he is looking for some group to blame tuesday, let's tax the people, let's regulate these people. we want to lift all americans. that is the right course for america's future. [applause] i love this country. i love america. don't you love this country? i love this country. [applause] the founders were eager brilliance -- either a brilliant or inspired, and probably both. they said the creator gave us our rights, not government. and among those rights were life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. we will be free in america to pursue happiness as we choose. this freedom, this opportunity to bind -- to define america as

a nation, these guys in washington do not understand that. they think that government bureaucrats, smart as they are, can live our lives better than we can for ourselves. they are wrong. free people choosing free enterprises have built the strongest economy in the world and the greatest nation on earth. this is not time for government. this is time for free people. i will restore america's freedom and get america strong again. thank you so much. [applause]

>> tomorrow morning, associated press economics writer derek

kravitz. then sean spicer of the republican national committee and brad one house of the democratic national committee santorum.rex santorum'ick after that, a spotlight on magazine series continues with military analyst bing west. plus, your e-mails, phone calls and tweets. "washington journal", live tomorrow at 7:00 a.m. eastern on c-span. >> president obama was in florida pushing for changes to the u.s. tax code. the president talked about the buffet rule named after warren buffett which would require americans earning more than $1 million annually to pay 30% of their income and taxes. next week, the senate will vote

on legislation regarding the proposal. he spoke at 40 minutes at florida atlantic university. [applause] >> thank you! how is everybody doing today? well, it is great to be back in florida. it is great to be back in boca. great to be here at the home of the fighting owls. i want to, first of all, thank ayden not only for leading us in the pledge of allegiance, but also giving me great details about the burrowing owls. he explained it all to me.

and then he told me he wants my job. and i explained to him that the constitution requires you are 35 years old. so i will keep the seat warm for him -- for a few more years. i want to thank rebecca for that extraordinary performance. in addition to having an unbelievable singing voice, she wants to be a teacher -- she is an english major -- and we need great teachers out there, so we're very proud of her. i want to thank your president, m.j. saunders -- the mayor of boca raton, susan whelchel, for hosting us here today. outstandingot our senator and former astronaut, which is very cool -- bill nelson in the house.

a wonderful congressman, ted deutch is here. and my great friend, congresswoman debbie wasserman schultz is here. and you are here, which is very exciting. i am glad you guys came out. now -- >> we love you! >> i love you back. now, look, guys, i know this is a busy time of year. some of you are less than a month away from graduation. some seniors in the house. closingoon, you'll be the books at wimberly for the

last time. maybe you'll be making that one last trip to the beach or coyote jack's. you'll be picking up that diploma that you worked so hard for. your parents will be there -- they'll be beaming, full of pride. and then comes what folks call the real world. now, i actually think college is part of the real world. but obviously there's a transition that will take place as you leave college. and some of you may go on to post-graduate degrees, but some of you are going to be out there looking for work. college is the single-most important investment you can make in your future. so i'm proud that you've made it and you've seen it through. but i also know that the future can be uncertain. now, we've gone through the

three toughest years in our lifetimes, economically -- worst financial crisis, worst economic crisis. our economy is now recovering but it's not yet where it needs to be. too many of your friends and too many of your neighbors are still hurting out there. they're still looking for work. too many of your families are still searching for that sense of security that started slipping away long before this recession hit. >> amen! >> got the "amen" corner here. so at a time like this, we've got to ask ourselves a central, fundamental question as a nation -- what do we have to do to make sure that america is a place where, if you work hard, if you're responsible, that that hard work and that

responsibility pays off? and the reason it's important to ask this question right now is because there are alternative theories. there's a debate going on in this country right now -- could we succeed as a nation where a shrinking number of people are doing really, really well, but a growing number are struggling to get by? >> no! >> or are we better off when everybody gets a fair shot -- and everybody does a fair share, and everybody plays by the same set of rules? that's what the debate in america is about right now. this is not just another run-of- the-mill gabfest in washington. this is the defining issue of our time. this is a make-or-break moment

for the middle class and everybody who's aspiring to get into the middle class. and we've got two very different visions of our future. and the choice between them could not be clearer. now keep in mind, i start from the belief that government cannot and should not try to solve every single problem that we've got. government is not the answer to everything. my first job in chicago, when i wasn't much older than most of you, was working with a group of catholic churches on the south side of chicago in low-income neighborhoods to try to figure out how could we improve the schools, and how could we strengthen neighborhoods and strengthen families. and i saw that the work that some of these churches did did more good for people in their communities than any government program could. in those same communities, i saw that no education policy, no matter how well crafted it is,

no matter how well funded it is, can take the place of a parent's love and attention. and i also believe that since government is funded by you that it has an obligation to be efficient and effective. and that's why we've eliminated dozens of programs that weren't working, announced hundreds of regulatory reforms to save businesses and taxpayers billions of dollars. we've put annual domestic spending on a path to become the smallest share of our economy since eisenhower was in the white house, which is before i was born much less you being born. i believe the free market is the greatest force for economic progress in human history. but here's the thing. i also agree with our first

republican president -- a guy from my home state, a guy with a beard, named abraham lincoln. and what lincoln said was that through our government, we should do together what we cannot do as well for ourselves. smart the definition of a government. we that's the reason why have a strong military, to keep us safe -- because i suppose each of us could just grab whatever is around the house and try to defend our country, but we do better when we do it together. and we've got the best military in the history of the world, with the greatest men and women in uniform. we pay for that.

publicwhy we have schools to educate our children. if we didn't have public schools, there would still be some families who would do very well. they could afford private schools or some would home- school. but there would be a lot of kids who would fall through the cracks. so we do that together. it's one of the reasons that we've laid down railroads and highways. we can't build a highway for ourselves. we got to get our neighbors and our friends to say let's go build a road. that's why we supported the research and the technology that saved lives and created entire industries. the internet, gps -- all those things were created by us together, not by ourselves. it's the reason why we contribute to programs like medicare and medicaid and social security and unemployment insurance.

because we understand that no matter how responsibly we live our lives, we know that eventually we're going to get older. we know that at any point, one of us might face hard times, or bad luck, or a crippling illness, or a layoff. and the idea that together we build this safety net, this base of support, that allows all of us to take risks and to try new things, and maybe try -- get a new job -- because we know that there's this base that we can draw on. so these investments -- in things like education and research and health care -- they haven't been made as some grand scheme to redistribute wealth from one group to another. this is not some socialist dream. they have been made by

democrats and republicans for generations, because they benefit all of us and they lead to strong and durable economic growth. that's why we've made these investments. if you're here at fau because you got financial aid -- or a student loan, a scholarship -- which, by the way, was how i was able to help finance my college education. that's how michelle got her college education. that doesn't just benefit you. it benefits whatever company might end up hiring you and profiting from your skills. if one of you goes on to become the next steve jobs or mark zuckerberg, or one of you

discovers the next medical breakthrough, think about all the people whose lives will be changed for the better. we made an investment in you; we'll get a return on the investment. when we guarantee basic security for the elderly or the sick or those who are actively looking for work, that doesn't make us weak. what makes us weak is when fewer americans can afford to buy the products that businesses are selling, when fewer people are willing to take risks and start their new business, because if it doesn't work out they worry about feeding their families. what drags our entire economy down is when the benefits of economic growth and productivity go only to the few, which is what's been happening for over a decade now, and gap between those at the very, very top and everybody else keeps growing wider and wider and wider and wider.

in this country, prosperity has never trickled down from the wealthy few. prosperity has always come from the bottom up, from a strong and growing middle class. that's how a generation who went to college on the gi bill -- including my grandfather -- helped build the most prosperous economy that the world has ever known. that's why a ceo like henry ford made a point to pay his workers enough money so that they could buy the cars that they were building. because he understood, look, there's no point in me having all this and then nobody can buy my cars. i've got to pay my workers enough so that they buy the cars, and that in turn creates more business and more prosperity for everybody.

this is not about a few people doing well. we want people to do well. that's great. but it's about giving everybody the chance to do well. that's the essence of america. that's what the american dream is about. that's why immigrants have come to our shores, because the idea was, you know what, it doesn't matter what your name is, what you look like -- you can be named obama -- you can still make it if you try. and yet, we keep on having the same argument with folks who don't seem to understand how it is that america got built. and let me just say, the folks that we have political arguments with, they're americans who love their country.

democrats, republicans, independents, everybody -- we all love this country. but there is a fundamental difference in how we think we move this country forward. these folks, they keep telling us that if we just weaken regulations that keep our air or our water clean or protect our consumers, if we would just convert these investments that we're making through our government in education and research and health care -- if we just turned those into tax cuts, especially for the wealthy, then somehow the economy is going to grow stronger. that's the theory. and here's the news -- we tried this for eight years before i took office. we tried it. it's not like we didn't try it. at the beginning of the last

decade, the wealthiest americans got two huge tax cuts -- 2001, 2003. meanwhile, insurance companies, financial institutions -- they were all allowed to write their own rules, or find their way around rules. we were told the same thing we're being told now -- this is going to lead to faster job growth. this is going to lead to greater prosperity for everybody. guess what -- it didn't. yes, the rich got much richer. corporations made big profits. but we also had the slowest job growth in half a century. the typical american family actually saw their incomes fall by about 6% even though the economy was growing, because more and more of that growth was just going to a few, and the average middle-class american wasn't seeing it in their paychecks.

health care premiums skyrocketed. financial institutions started making bets with other people's money that were reckless. and then our entire financial system almost collapsed. you remember that? >> yes! >> it wasn't that long ago. i know you guys are young, but it was pretty recent. now, some of you may be science majors in here. i like that. we need more scientists, need more engineers. now, i was not a science major myself, but i enjoyed science when i was young. and if i recall correctly, if an experiment fails badly -- you learn from that, right? sometimes you can learn from failure. that's part of the data that teaches you stuff, that expands our knowledge. but you don't then just keep on

doing the same thing over and over again. >> no! >> you go back to the drawing board. you try something different. but that's not what's been happening with these folks in washington. >> no! >> a lot of the folks who were peddling these same trickle-down theories -- including members of congress and some people who are running for a certain office right now, who shall not be named -- they're doubling down on these old broken-down theories. instead of moderating their views even slightly, instead of saying, you know what, what we did really didn't work and we almost had a second great depression, and maybe we should try something different, they have doubled down. they proposed a budget that

showers the wealthiest americans with even more tax cuts, and then pays for these tax cuts by gutting investments in education and medical research and clean energy, in health care. >> boo -- >> now, these are the facts. if the cuts they're proposing are spread out evenly across the budget, then 10 million college students -- including some of you -- would see your financial aid cut by an average of more than $1,000 each. >> boo! >> now, thousands of medical research grants for things like alzheimer's and cancer and aids would be eliminated. tens of thousands of researchers and students and teachers could lose their jobs.

our investments in clean energy that are making us less dependent on imported oil would be cut by nearly a fifth. >> that's wrong! >> by the time you retire, instead of being enrolled in medicare like today's seniors are, you'd get a voucher to pay for your health care plan. but here's the problem. if health care costs rise faster than the amount of the voucher, like they have been for decades, the rest of it comes out of your pockets. if the voucher isn't enough to buy a plan with the specific doctors and care that you need, you're out of luck. and by the middle of the next century -- by the middle of this century -- excuse me -- by about 2050, at a time when most of you will have families of your own, funding for most of the investments i've talked about today would have been almost completely eliminated altogether. now, this is not an exaggeration. this is math. and when i said this about a

week ago, the republicans objected. they said, we didn't specify all these cuts. well, right, you didn't because you knew that people wouldn't accept them. so you just gave a big number and so what we've done is we've just done the math. this is what it would it mean. they say, well, we didn't specifically propose to cut student loans. ok, if you don't cut student loans, then that means you've got to cut basic research even more. the money has got to come from somewhere. you can't give over $4 trillion worth of additional tax cuts, including to folks like me who don't need them and weren't asking for them, and it just comes from some magic tree somewhere. so if you hear them saying, well, the president is making this stuff up -- no, we're doing the math. if they want to dispute anything that i've said right now, they should show us

specifically where they would make those cuts. they should show us. they should show us. because, by the way, they're not proposing to cut defense, they're actually proposing to increase defense spending, so it's not coming out of there. so show me. look, america has always been a place where anybody who's willing to work and play by the rules can make it. a place where prosperity doesn't trickle down from the top, it grows from the bottom; it grows outward from the heart of a vibrant middle class. and i believe that we cannot stop investing in the things that help create that middle class; that create real, long- lasting, broad-based growth in this country. and we certainly shouldn't be

doing it just so the richest americans can get another tax cut. we should be strengthening those investments. we should be making college more affordable. we should be expanding our investment in clean energy. now, here's the other thing that the republicans will tell you. they'll say, well, we've got to make all these drastic cuts because our deficit is too high. our deficit is too high. and their argument might actually have a shred of credibility to it if you didn't find out that they wanted to spend $4.6 trillion on lower tax rates. aren't know how many of you math majors, business majors -- you can't pay down a deficit by taking in $4.6 trillion of less money, especially when you're

denying that you're going to be making all these cuts. it doesn't add up. it doesn't make sense. and keep in mind, more than a trillion dollars of the tax cuts they propose would be going to people who make more than $250,000 a year. that is an average of at least $150,000 -- again, we're just taking the numbers with the details they've given us and you spread it out -- that averages to at least $150,000 for every millionaire, billionaire in the country. each millionaire and billionaire, on average, would get $150,000. some folks would get a lot more. so we did some math of our own. we added up all the investments $150,000 could pay for. all right? so let's say a tax break that i might get that i really don't need -- i've got -- treated

pretty well in this life. so right now, i'm going to be ok. malia, sasha, they're going to be able to go to college. michelle is doing fine. so understand what this means. here's what $150,000 means -- $150,000, this is what each millionaire and billionaire would get, on average. this could pay for a tax credit that would make a year of college more affordable for students like you. plus a year's worth of financial aid for students like you. ofs a year's worth prescription drug savings for one of your grandparents. plus a new computer lab for this school. plus a year of medical care for a veteran in your family who

went to war and risked their lives fighting for this country. plus a medical research grant for a chronic disease. aus a year's salary for firefighter or police officer -- $150,000 could pay for all of these things combined. think about that. so let me ask you what's the better way to make our economy stronger? do we give another $50,000 in tax breaks to every millionaire and billionaire in the country? >> no! >> or should we make investments in education and research and health care and our veterans? and i just want to emphasize again -- look, i want folks to get rich in this country.

i think it's wonderful when people are successful. that's part of the american dream. it is great that you make a product, you create a service, you do it better than anybody else -- that's what our system is all about. but understand, the share of our national income going to the top 1% has climbed to levels we haven't seen since the 1920's. the folks who are benefitting from this are paying taxes at one of the lowest rates in 50 years. you might have heard of this, but warren buffett is paying a lower tax rate than his secretary. now, that's wrong. that's not fair. and so we've got to choose which direction we want this country

to go in. do we want to keep giving those tax breaks to folks like me who don't need them, or give them to warren buffet -- he definitely doesn't need them -- or bill gates -- he's already said, i don't need them. or do we want to keep investing in those things that keep our economy growing and keep us secure? that's the choice. and, florida, i've told you where i stand. so now it's time for members of congress to tell you where they stand. in the next few weeks, we're going to vote on something called the buffett rule -- very simple -- if you make more than $1 million a year -- now, i'm not saying you have a million dollars -- right? i'm not saying you saved up all your money and you made smart

investments and now you've got your nest egg and you're preparing for retirement. i'm saying, you're bringing in a million bucks or more a year. then, what the rule says is you should pay the same percentage of your income in taxes as middle-class families do. you shouldn't get special tax breaks. you shouldn't be able to get special loopholes. and if we do that, then it makes it affordable for us to be able to say for those people who make under $250,000 a year -- like 98% of american families do -- then your taxes don't go up. and we can still make those investments in things like student loans and college and science and infrastructure and all the things that make this country great. and this is where you come in. this is why i came to see you. i mean, it's nice to see you.

the weather is nice. you guys have been a wonderful audience. i learned about the burrowing owl. so there were all kinds of reasons for me to want to come down here. but one of the reasons i came was i want you to call your members of congress. i want you to write them an e- mail. i want you to tweet them. breaksem don't give tax to folks like me who don't need them. tell them to start investing in the things that will help the economy grow. tell them if we want to bring down our deficit sensibly, then we've got to do it in a balanced way that's fair for everybody. remind them who they work for. tell them to do the right thing. as i look out across this gymnasium, everybody here -- from all different backgrounds, from all different parts of the country -- each of us is here because somebody, somewhere,

felt responsibility for other people. our parents, obviously, our grandparents, great grandparents, the sacrifices they made -- some of them took enormous risks coming to this country with nothing because they wanted to give a better life to their kids and their grandkids. a lot of them did without so that you could benefit. but they weren't just thinking about their families. they were thinking about their communities. they were thinking about their country. that's what responsibility means. it means that as you have greater and greater opportunity, then the scope of you being able to help more people and think about the future expands. and so you're not just thinking about yourself, you're thinking about your kids, your spouse,

your family, your grandkids, your neighborhood, your state, your nation. you're thinking about the future. and now it's our turn to be responsible. now it's our turn to preserve the american dream for future generations. now it's our turn to rebuild, to make the investments that will assure our future, to make sure that we've got the most competitive workforce on earth, to make sure that we've got clean energy that can help clean the planet and help fuel our economy. it's our turn. it's our turn to rebuild our roads and our bridges and our

airports and our ports. it's our turn to make sure that everybody here, every child born in whatever neighborhood in this country it is, that if they're willing to dream big dreams and put some blood, sweat and tears behind it, they can make it. i know we can do that. i know we can do it because of you. you're here because you believe in your future. you're working hard. some of you are balancing a job or a family on the side. >> four more years! four more years! >> you have faith in america. you know it's not going to be easy, but you don't give up. that's the spirit we need right now, because here in america we don't give up. here in america, we look out for one another. here in america, we help each other get ahead.

here in america, we have a sense of common purpose. here in america, we can meet any challenge. here in america, we can seize any moment. we can make this century another great american century. thank you. god bless you. god bless the united states of america. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] ["stars and stripes forever" playing]

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