guest: yes. i am getting a level of care that everyone should be entitled to. i think we can do it. i support -- i think president obama's health care reform will turn out to be a very big plus for this country. host: michael kinsley with us for another 20 minutes. caller: does your guest feel that the supreme court will repeal the obama care legislation? the second question is -- if they do,

next maryland, a democrat. caller: i am with hillary because she is speaking for us wittman that actually have husbands at home and had to go out and work also because we are the 99% of people have to go to work and leave our children with a babysitter and can't afford day care so we had to have a relative take care of our children. i am with hillary and i appreciate and thank her very much, thank you. host: more on hillary. guest: i don't know what to say. it is true that most women work because they have to, not because they wanted. to. i still think women who stay

home if they have five kids especially, deserve respect. host: the headline in this morning's "usa today" -- we are 40 years past the feminist revolution in this country. why are these issues still being discussed? guest: because they have not been settled by any means. your question implies that that is still an issue that inflames people. women who stay at home get terribly resentful and it is hard in washington. people go to dinner parties and

women and even men who don't have some high-powered job are made to feel that. host: next is oregon, independent, good morning. caller: changing the subject a little bit, you mentioned earlier the trayvon martin case. the thing to me that is interesting about it is it seems in that case, we have people demonstrating, trying to get the results of they want rather than waiting for the courts to do what they are supposed to do. it seems to me like a dangerous trend going in that direction. if you are not happy with what is happening in a particular case, just get a bunch of people together and start causing trouble and see if you can force the issue. i would like to know what your guest would say on that

aspect host: let me put a to add lines on. that is really what the caller was referring to. this morning "washington post" - guest: i sort of agree with the caller. there are things that are worth demonstrating about and there are things which are just not. not that they are not equally important but there is -- they are supposed to be settled in different ways. the civil rights movement was an attempt to change block and we succeeded in changing bullet. -- the law - countries succeeded in changing the law.

to demonstrate over a legal issue i think is inappropriate. host: 9 x is a call from norris, tennessee, a republican. caller: that is the reason why we have a republic, not a democracy. a democracy is mob roles. we have not heard the side where there are two independent witnesses who saw the man that is on trial now being beaten by the young black man. morning wake up every with a trial going on and a 70- year-old black man who had killed two british guys who had come over to go to disney world. we have memories. we have opinions. we need to get the people parading up and down the street off the street and we have a

president cut off by the supreme court and his comments. he is not a leader we need at this time. he has divided the races and divided the corporations against the employees and unions against the non-unions. he is just a divider and not a leader and we need someone who can lead this country. host: she talked about the president dividing. he made a comment about the trayvon martin shooting early on the quote was "if i had a son, he would be like jim." should the president be involved in may criminal investigation? guest: i think the president stated his case quite eloquently. i thought his comment was a little bit sneaky but in the end, a very eloquent and lifted

ambiguous. did he mean because his son would be that age or was he specifically saying because his son would have been black? i think he started with the second and eased his way into a more universal point. host: next is fort worth, another female caller, a democrat, you are on. caller: by the way, my father suffered with parkinsons' for years. anyway, i have a couple of different items. nothing would have happened with george zimmerman if this had not -- if the police had not dropped the ball and nobody has been able to explain to me why if martin was on top of him beating him up and he managed to get his gun out and shoot him, white zimmerman was not covered in blood. it does not make sense. ann romney -- this is just

infuriating to me. it was never indicated that being a mother was work. i have been on both sides of the aisle. i was fortunate enough to be able to stay home with my children for a few years and circumstances changed and i had to go to work. i was a working mother outside the home plus a working mother at home. believe me, there was no comparison. the working mother outside the home was very much harder in every respect. on top of that,a nn romney does not claim her home and cook all of their meals. i am not stupid. she said whether she chose to stay home more chose to go out and into the workplace, which

unfortunately, the majority of women in this country don't have that benefit. also on health care -- we have had a problem with health care ever since the 1970's when nixon turned over the choices for health care to kaiser permanente to let them decide who should be in charge of our health care and who could get health care. it has just progressed until all of has been is a for-profit business. host: three different issues -- do you have anything to say? guest: my impression is that kaiser permanente is a great system and they are responsible for doing something terrible in the 1960's. ann romney, i think, did say she had been quite fortunate in having the choice to stay home.

i have to say that i had never have kids but i now have a grandson. inyou see what's involved raising a kid, it is amazing to me that the human race has survived. my hat is off to anyone who does this. host: here is ""the wall street " front page story. getting back to the wealth of candidates -- i am wondering why mitt romney's well as an issue. -- wells is an issue.

guest: how can he emphasized with people and their problems today, especially with the state of the economy. host: he is not the first modern wealthy candidate for president. what is different? guest: what is different is the particular economic times we are going through another thing that is different is his inability to communicate some that they were understanding of other people's problems. he keeps stumbling into these weird callous remarks likely "my wife has a couple of cadillac's ." host: a couple more minutes left baltimore, maryland, independent, go ahead. caller: i remember your previous career expeditions that i want

to thank you and good luck to your health. please comment on these two points. the first point is affordable health care. if you use that term and replace affordable health care with that other pejorative they are using, you see how ignorant some of these callers are when they actually say affordable health care. it is no more difficult to say that then it is to say that other word. i want to ask you to comment on that and please comment on the fact that 50% or more of corporations including general electric pay no taxes. compare that after the tax revenue to the poor people or folks like myself who are contemplating late filing just to pay what little bit i have to peg which is more than they pay. i beg you to comment on those points and continued good health to you. >guest: thank you, the phrase

the man did not want to mention is obama care. the republicans invented that because it sounds derogatory and has now become universal. a famous example was impressionism was considered an .erogatory dissenting was -- as happened with obama care. -- the same thing has happened with obama care. the other question was -- host: i didn't write it down so i apologize. ohio is our last caller, go ahead caller: i have a question. i know that the president wants everybody to pay their fair share but to tax the

millionaires, they are the job creators, and also, when you think about them taxing people we see what thew government is doing with our money? they really need tax reform. i don't understand why our guest here is not bringing across the point that our government has failed us. the senate has not passed a budget in three years. you cannot run a business without a budget. how can you run a country? you see what they are wasting our money on. it is a sad state of affairs. we need a budget and we need tax reform that is fair to everybody. guest: on the point about tax reform, you are absolutely right.

the gentleman's point we could remember was about corporate taxes. host: that's right. guest: the last tax reform in 1986 was kicked up by a report that showed that corporations were paying no tax at all. there certainly should be taxes on them and there should be spending reform. the government does not run efficiently. however, even if you ran the government and all these programs with perfect efficiency, the main thing the government does these days is taking in money and write checks. social security, e medicaresecuritytc and no matter how efficiently you do that, we still made more revenue. host: as we close out, you said at the beginning that we talked about trivial things in the country when there are serious problems particularly the

national debt that mr. be discussed and priorities that come out of the budget. overall, are you in an optimistic state of mind about the nation? guest: i am pretty pessimistic actually. in my career as a journalist, i have seen these issues and i myself have yakked about these issues forever and we have not made much progress. host: where does that leave us? guest: herb stein who was a well-known conservative economist in the nixon administration has stein's law which is anything that can't go on want. won't. he said problems will solve themselves and maybe that will happen. host: michael kinsley on friday the 13th, thank you for being here. our final segment is the weekly

series "america by the numbers" we will look at how the airlines are doing. we will be right back. poe >> for this years studentcam competition, we as decisions to submit a video on what part of the u.s. constitution was physical -- important to them and why. good morning, catherine. >> good morning. >> why did you choose gender discrimination? >> women for started to pick it up, we had narrowed it down to the 14th amendment. after i read a few articles under discrimination, i found similar articles about gender discrimination and how it relates to equal protection of the 14th amendment. i thought it was really interesting and we could build upon it. because of the controversial topic and a different perspectives we could use and how it might affect us in the future while sharing the

knowledge we have learned and presenting a problem that our generation may face in the future. >> the work force of investment act, can you explain that? >> the wia is a law that was passed in 1998. it basically helps create new work force investment for some and helps create job opportunities by educating employees and improved job training programs that are available to both men and women in the united states. >> you also discuss the equality clause of the 14th amendment. can you explain what the debate is? >> there are some many different interpretations on the equality clause. one might be that pentagon scalia does not believe that women are protected by the constitution because there is no mention of it and no one voted for that specific legislation. on the other hand, some people believe it says that no state

shall deny any person of equal protection of law. this may mean that there is equal protection of both men and women under this legislation. >> can you tell me how the supreme court decisions have affected this issue? >> if originally, women were excluded from the bill of rights. however, this was extended to women. this represents the mindset of a particular time. an ex press is how the supreme court justices have voted in the past. >> what is the most important thing you took away from this experience? >> i learned a lot of things report. one thing i learned is that the constitution impacts on me and affects me everyday. there is a commitment you have to make through the course of a project and team work and we learned about the wide scale of the fact, not just on once this of the group, but on every

single citizen in the united states. >> what do you want others to take away after watching your video? >> i guess our purpose was to inform people about gender discrimination. to present a problem in the u.s. today and raise awareness for problems we may face in the future benefactor joining us and congratulations. here is a portion of a documentary "working women" inequity in the nation. >> how with the lives of citizens be affected by discrimination? >> women should not be discriminated against based on their gender. >> the senate has put two laws on the books, title 7 of the civil rights act of 1964 and equaled pay act of 1963. >> although it is uncertain in future legislation regarding

gender discrimination being affected in the future, some people find it comforting to have centers like oed result in discrimination cases. even though congress has put many laws into action, gen discrimination -- the debate is whether the 14th amendment protect women. >> you can watch this video in its entirety and all other winning entries our website, studentcam.org and continue the conversation on our facebook and twitter pages. >> "washington journal" continues -- host: you are likely to find stories in newspapers this morning similar to these. let's show you some airline- related stories today.

the stories come out of studies done -- done by our guest who is the director of bureau of transportation statistics. what job you do for the government on behalf of the american people? guest: as a statistical agency that is designated to compile transportation statistics, we collect information to inform the public will make informed decisions. for this particular effort, we are collecting airline information on time, performance, luggage loss and other things. this is so the department can set rules and the public can be informed. guest: andy is at "aviation week." how the airlines use this

information? guest: this is information they release every month in the aviation consumer reports. it is more for consumers. host: don't check on their competition? guest: they do and it is important that many have rewarded pilots for being on time and there are incentives because they know that consumers look at the report. it is important for their image and performances. it is more economical for them to be on time. host: how long has the government been tracking airline performance? guest: [inaudible] host: how did it get started? guest: there are concerns about the performance of airlines. host: the public wants to know how they were doing? guest: started to collect the data in 1995. we collect four buckets of intermission for airline. the traffic, the volume, the

origin and destination, where you come from and where you are going to handle traffic volumes between pairs of cities and financial information of the airline's and would also collect an operating characteristic of the airline. host: i will start with the first chart we have. before i do that, i need to welcome the audience into this discussion. we will divide the phone lines between eastern and central time zones. if you live in the mountain or pacific time zones -- you are welcome to make a comment or ask a question about the airline industry. there is lots of debate and discussion and the government has been involved in policies. the role of the tea s.a. and on- time flights through the security process is all on the table as we look at the numbers that give you a report on how the airline industry is doing.

you're welcome to send us a tweet. the big number here is that a lot more people are flying. guest: correct, the reason we show you this is because when we talk about on-time performance, there are two contributing factors that drive on-time performance. one is the weather and the other is the demand on travel. this chart shows you that since 1990-2010, the passengers increased by almost 17%. host: there was a dip in the economic downturn? guest: it is around 2007-2008 recession and the dip in 2007 is due to reduced flights. host: the numbers are beginning to come back up. were the causes for the growth of people flying more?

guest: two decades ago, deregulation was a huge factor because that brought the price of the tickets down. host: more people can afford to fly? guest: the economy is more global so people fly to get to their business contacts and that has driven a lot of this because a lot of this is business traffic. people earn more income and are more able to fly and people are looking for more experiences in an interconnected world. host: how does the number of airlines affect the number of flights people take? there has been consolidation in the industry. guest: if you look at the numbers, there have been many airlines that went bankrupt. in thes a lot of churn industry because it is a low- margin industry. the trend line is steadily up all those years. host: there might be fewer choices but people are still flying more. look at the first number which

is on-time performance for the airlines. how do you measure on-time performance? guest: thank you for asking. it is important to define how we measure on-time performance. performance is measured against the scheduled -- the airline scheduled arrival time. there is a 15-minute window to measure that. you have a flight that does not reach its gate within the 15 minutes of its arrival time, then we call it a late arrival. we use the same 50 minutes to define the late departure. host: what happened that there was such a dip in on-time performance in 2007 tax gues? guest: the major driver for on- time performance is the number of flights on the weather. you can see the recession there which is the arons bar

highlighting -- the orange bar where the recession started in the reduced number of flights contribute to the improved on- time performance. host: what brought it down before that? guest: that was because of weather. hosright after 9/11, it is becae the reduced flights and then it started going back to the previous level. host: there has been a passenger bill of rights and a push in congress for better performance from the airlines. when did that happen? guest: this really happened over the last decade. the airlines did some voluntary commitments and congress was not satisfied. the dot has put out passenger

regulations and they are about to do the third round scheduled to come out in august. the last few years have gotten more aggressive host: can we see a change in the results based on the regulations? guest: based on on-time performance, i don't think you will see the change in results. the driver is the weather and the number of flights. there is a debate over the tarmac-delay role and whether that is increasing flight cancellations. there is more congestion at airports. host: when we look at the on- time performance of varying by month, what makes the difference from month to month? guest: again, it is the weather. the height of the bar shows the percentage of on-time flights, rivals. the three months we circled reflect the mild winter in

200011-2012. if you look at the same three month one year ago, you can see the on-time performance is almost 10% over. it was a much milder winter this year. host: let's take our first telephone call from south carolina. caller: hello. i have a comment and maybe a question. it is a political question. i am a disabled got from south carolina. i don't hardly ever fly anymore. if you could comment about this political question about the decision that the president and then made about the south

carolina boeing plant. i'm sure they know about that but do they have a comment about that? can they shed light on what happened there? i can't remember the name of the board but it was a recess host:: i know you can't comment on this but do you have any light to shed on the boeing decision? guest: boeing had move some production to south carolina and the union argued that they were penalizing the union because of some labor action they had taken. they said that was against lot. there is a big huge fight over that and congress got involved and there was some very political -- that got result

because boeing and the union came to an agreement and that dropped as an issue. that was a huge political fight for a long time. host: back to the statistics -- this is essentially a report card for individual companies. airline on-time arrival rankings, the top five and the bottom five. who are the five highest? guest: for 2011, if you look at this chart, the top box shows the top five in 2000 and the top five in 2011. the hawaiian airlines is number one in terms of on-time performance. host: #two alaska, number 3 air trend, number for mesa, number 5 continental. who are the five lowest? guest: the atlantic southeast, american eagle, delta, expressed jets, and jetblue. host: there are changes from

year to year. in the year 2000, continental, northwest, were all in the top five. these are now smaller airlines. guest: this reflects the weather. the weather as a major factor in on-time performance and it is reflected in this on-time performance. host: when consumers get this information, does it have an economic impact on the airlines? guest: no one has ever measured directly whether there is an impact there was a change in the dot testing rules on the website where the airlines have to put the on-time performance for a specific flight. before you had to ask the airline. the airlines argue that no one really asks that question.

i, personally, i host: checked and this is required for the airlines to report this. this week in washington, there is a chamber of commerce annual aviation summit yesterday. guest: i was part of it. host: richard anderson was one of the speakers. he talks about the future of the airline industry. [video clip] >> i think gold will be a natural -- as the industry evolves the way all consumer industries evolves, when was the last time you looked at all the options to buy a personal computer or an automobile? more and more merchandising as this industry evolves into a typical consumer-light industry, there will be this propensity to regulate more. we should avoid that let customers decide whether the light to travel on an airline that charges for overhead space.

it is another product in the market. there are plenty of choice in the market. consumers have more perfect information about buying air transportation than any other industry in the world because the internet and their sights and search engines that they have given every consumer virtual shelf space on every single price option and availability for any ticket virtually anywhere in the world at any time. let the consumer decide. they are host: smarsmart. guest: there are a few things driving that. there was the second airline that charge for carry-on bags and wind spirit airlines started this, there is a big outcry in congress. dot is considering a rule that

would require airlines to give their optional information to travel agencies to book airline so that total price comparisons can be conducted. the airlines say let the consumer decide. they say not to regulate that. host: are fees and satisfaction any part of your measurement? do you measure the fees and customer satisfaction? guest: we don't measure that. we measure the levels of revenues that come in from baggage. host: we might talk about that later on. let's take our next phone call from manhattan as we talk about the airline industry, regulation, and how the government measures performance. go ahead, please. caller: i have two specific questions.

mr. anderson talked about the internet and all the statistics that are published. he said air travel is a product like buying a television. the consumer can state pretty well informed. isn't the bureau of statistics on air flight something that could be very well automated without having a bureau? all of those flights are scheduled on computers already. we could just program than to have that information available. host: guesyou had a second question? guest: i think ms. hu incorrectly addressed a question you asked and just gave up. there was a big drop in on-time performance. she said it is whether or the

volume of people who are flying. then she started to say that the recession was a factor unless people were flying. then she fell back and said maybe because it followed 9/11. i believe when everything was less on time coincided with when we had the world wide volcanoes and all those flights were delayed and rerouted across the atlantic. host: that would be a weather events. if all of the airline data is computerized, his question is why do we need you and your colleagues? why can't be collected by servers? guest: i guess we could but we are also collecting a lot of different data from the airlines. on-time performance may be as

one of the factors that we could consider collected through the web service. host: i guess other services are not so easily collected. guest: finances are not available in the web and other factors. guest: it used to be dot was the only place to get this. this does not include international. host: the airlines themselves have an incentive to report status guest: they are required. there are some private companies that started collecting financial information. host: our phone lines are open and we are talking about airline performance and other statistics gathered by the government measures in your use and satisfaction of the airlines.

the lines are divided by geographical region. next up is a call from pennsylvania, hello caller: i think the problems could be eliminated if we would have just plane flying trans oceanic and transcontinental and try to develop a high-speed rail system for shorter distances. i think that would eliminate a lot of problems. our train system in this country is a disgrace. that is my comment. host: what has happened to the short-haul airline industry? are there more flights between the shorter hauls? are there many options these days? is that -- as that industry disappeared? guest: after 9/11, the short

haul traffic went down as far as the hassle of going through airports. it is still there and the other problem from the smaller cities is that the smaller regional aircraft are not becoming economical because of the higher fuel price. small community trouble might become an issue. host: if the fuel is more expensive, they charge more for the tickets? guest: if you are on a 50-seat jet, you can only charge for 50 people. you cannot distribute the cost is widely and they are not as fuel-efficient. host: you also measure airport on time arrival. let's look at the 2011 statistics. and how airports to do. salt lake city is number one this time around and phoenix is number two. guest: seattle is number 3, portland, oregon and then minneapolis. four out of the top five are in

the west coast. host: are there factors that contribute to that? guest: weather is a major contributor. on the bottom, it is quite a contrast pretty bottom five is jfk, boston, according, san francisco, and new work. most of the airports are in the northeast. host: san francisco is on that list. guest: san francisco is a very popular airport. the number of flights impacts overall performance. host: new hampshire, barrie, good morning. caller: i'm a retired airline pilot and want to comment on the impact on safety that forced retirement has had. we're familiar with the recent novel accident where we had a young inexperienced pilot flying great aviation is one of the few fields where people are forced to retire whether they want to or not. many people would like to retire

early and get out of the business. it is not what it used to be. if you're going in for brain surgery or heart surgery, you would not necessarily what a sharp young guy who just get out of medical school and got good grades. i think we need to do away with mandatory retirement and that would increase safety quebec. -- safety quite a bit. that may be a little bit of subject. guest: they have recently increased their retirement age for pilots and there was a big debate because it brought up the safety issue and what age is too old to be flying. they just increase the retirement age a couple of years ago. from his perspective, i don't think they will bring up that issue again anytime soon. host: these are the busiest airports in the united states? they account for 1/3 of all air passenger travel? number-one guest: atlanta followed by

chicago, los angeles, dallas/fort worth and denver are the top five. in 2011. i would like to point out that the top 10 busiest airports if you look at 2011 from 1990 which is on the right hand side of your chart, almost all the airports have increased traffic. if you look at the number one airport in 2011, that traffic is 60% greater than the top one airports in 1990. every airport is getting busier. host: let's see if we can see the comparison it was in the number 3 spot in 1990 and only serving 23 million

passengers. the increase is huge. how do airports account for that increase in airport traffic? where the money come from from building out? guest: the money comes from the federal government and the passenger facility charge per seat. that they put on every ticket. most of the airlines charge that very big debate on that is whether airports in should be able to increase that beyond the maximum which is $4.50 per segment. the airports want that to be increased as another source of funding for expansion and renovation and the airlines do not because they say that will reduce the demand for tickets. they say it is hard to raise fares. host: we pay $4.50 for each segment of a flight that guest: it is a limit to two segments.

host: so the most would be $9, is that right? guest: yes, the maximum per airport is $4.50 and i believe it is two segments reported host: airports would like to raise that? guest: they say they are underfunded for expansion and the system is congested. the airports that have room to expand want more money for that. it will come from the federal government or money they raise themselves. they want this to be an option. host: texas, hello to steep -- caller: i have two questions. i fly quite a bit and i'm more concerned about on-time arrivals. what about departure times? it is understanding that the departure time means degette pulls away from the gateway makes it onto the tarmac for

several minutes but is considered a departure once it leaves the gate. that is my first question as to how that is measured. i had not heard anything recently about the air traffic controller computer system. i heard they have quite a bit of upgrades coming in is that still on track? host: do you measure on-time departures? >> yes, we do. since the arrival is more important for the passengers, many of us are worried about making our connection so for today's presentation, we are mainly focused on a rival's. host: is there a correlation between the rivals and the departures? guest: yes, a major factor for delay is aircraft arriving late so if i making a connection, my flight came in from some place else was late, and that contributes to the on time. host: the other question was on

the air traffic control of dating. guest: next generation is an ongoing probe longtime bear there have been updates to the system and people say they are still using a 1940 system but that is not correct. there is a big move in next generation to make a satellite- based system rather than a ground-based system. that would have more control over the flight route and decisions that are made. you'll have more direct routes to the airport. he will save fuel and time and the missions which is an environmental issue. the faa had their ducks lined up but they are getting better at this and it is a question of funding and the cystic and a long time. -- and this has taken a long time.

host: next is a call for more than in vermont. caller: good morning. i'm sorry if i digress a little bit. -- would you please get your people to open their lives so they can understand them? host: you are having difficulty following the discussion? caller: when they close their teeth, absolutely, and you don't understand them well. host: do you have a question on the airline industry? caller: not really. host: nice to have you with us. you mentioned earlier that there are regulations regarding tarmac delays. bring us up to speed on that debate. guest:the dot put in a rule that if you are stuck on the tarmac, it is not really the

tarmac, but a few left the gate and you are stuck on the ground and not a signal for three hours, the airline has to bring it back to the gate and give you the option to get off the plane. that got expanded. it used to be just the larger airports and that extended to all airports. it includes a four-hour limit for international flights for the big debate is the airline industry says there is a threat of a fine of up to $27,000 per passenger if you violate the rule. it could amount to millions of dollars of the airline say we're canceling more flights because we are afraid if it is not our fault, will exceed the limit and the penalized. -- and be penalized. host: what is in the public's better interest? a delayed flight? you have been measuring tarmac delays.

what do the numbers tell us? guest: the tarmac role has significantly reduced delays on the tarmac. this chart is showing the last 13 months in terms of the number of tarmac delays. these of the number of flights that sit on the runway far more than three hours. host: this is international and domestic-guest: the red is international and they are required to start reporting next year. the rule took effect in april of 2010. the next chart we will see is the impact. this chart shows you the large delays are almost all related to weather events. host: let's look at the next one before and after the 2000 aid to tarmac role. guest: the rule took effect in 2010 and before and after impact

is clear. before the rule, there were many tarmac delays. the width of the bar is basically the number of tarmac delays para host: this is the more recent times from and are hardly any delays. the discussion is delays vs cancel guest:. the number of flights that are affected that had this for very small percentage-wise. the airlines brought this on themselves because they had a lot of years to voluntarily deal with the problem and they did not that is why the regulations happened. i have a 3-year-old son so i don't want to be stuck on the ground for more than three hours. it would be a nightmare. it is very hard and there are a lot of horror stories. how many more cancellations does it cause and is it worth it to have that many more cancellations to avoid that scenario? can you adjust the rules to make everyone happy? host: does communications

technology have a role to play? people sitting on the tarmac may be using their cell phone score hand-held devices. real-time information going out from the public about how long they are setting on airline runways. guest: that is how the regulation can about. there was a passenger who was stuck on a flight. this was when the internet and facebook was not around. there was social media and blogs and she used that to organize and became a big campaign that eventually forced the dot to implement a rule. she had a hot line set up so people could call in and they send in pictures. airlines -- the public response is more widespread and faster and that is something airlines

have to deal with. host: this next part looks of the number of flights canceled. guest: this is for the last 12 months. each bar represents one month. the blue bar shows the percentage of canceled flights. the red line shows the number of passengers that are impacted by the cancellation. for the last 12 months, 1.7% of flights were canceled. that amounts to 100,000 flights and almost 7.5 million passengers were impacted. host: what was the cause of the spike in august? guest: i do not know. i'm sorry. host: last year there was a spike and it came down dramatically by september of the following year. guest: the weather has significant impact. host: if you took this chart

back farther in time, would you be able to assert the increase of flight cancellations before the tarmac law went to play guest: stacks we have a chart on that. this is how it related to before and after the tarmac delay rule took effect host: what did you learn from that? guest: immediately after the rules had taken effect, we see some correlation. with time, the data is not conclusive and terms of the relationship. host: sarasota, fla., you are on the air. caller: i want to mention a quick thing about the older gentleman that called about speaking clearly.

i have a lot of older clients and that feedback is very important. sometimes they don't have a hearing aid and a read by lips. anyhow, it is not just these guests. host: thank you very much caller: as and listening this morning, i think of my sister and how i have to tell her a half-hour early to arrive on time. sometimes i laughed but most people, at least i think most people, look at times when they are booking flights as the travel time. sometimes those troubled times are four hours or less. they say i will only take one stopped and that the time i will have. do you have any statistics on just selection alone? i think airlines post those times with a higher price because they know the consumer. the consumer does not want to

wait in the airport and they don't want to make three or four stops for a cheaper flight. that was one of my questions. my other question is south west is a wonderful airline. they do not charge baggage fees. years ago, they tag on those fees because they said we had this gas price. southwest is very successful. i had a family fly down from toronto and i cannot tell you the thousands of dollars they spent not only on their fares but also host: their: what is the question? caller: why did the airlines still charge for baggage and do they take the statistics on the total time? host: thanks very much. guest: it helps them make money. that is the short answer.

southwest does not. they get more business out of that but it is not taking a big chunk out of anyone carrier. airlines are moving toward more fees and more ala cards. te. host: i have a bag fee revenue charge. what can learn from that step guest: it shows the back of the revenues are increasing over time. host: quite a bit between 2009- 2010. guest: many of the airline started collect the fees in 2009. host: more and more carriers were adding them on. we're just about out of time. we will say thank you. for people interested in the airline industry, the biggest debate this year in the airline industry is what? is there anything in congress they are facing as an industry? guest: the airline in next gen

funded, more passenger rights rules, regulations is always a big issue. there is a lot of issues. host: next gen is budget- related. were the costs associated with those? guest: billions of dollars, i think $20 billion. it is not all in one year. it is a lot of money to change a whole system over. and also the airlines have to equip their aircraft and who will pay for that? that is a big issue host: thank you for being here. the department transportation and their statistics bureau will continue to measure your satisfaction. hu patricia

>> we appreciate you being with us. thanks for being with us on friday the 13th. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] former secretary of state condoleezza rice speaks on u.s. corn policy at the heritage foundation in washington. she is a political science professor at stanford university in california. last year she released a memoir about her years working in the bush and administration. we are planning live coverage of her remarks starting at 11:00

eastern. republican public and to a candi -- republican presidential candidates romney and gingrich will speak at the national rifle association annual meeting. rick santorum and eric cantor and rick perry as well as scott walker will be expected to speak. that event will be live on c- span radio as well and on c- span.org. >> are specific mission is to work to see that human rights remain an essential component of american foreign policy and that when we are evaluating our foreign policy moves globally, and human-rights has to be part of the dialogue. >> president and ceo of the lantos foundation for human rights and justice. >> talking about torture as it

relates to gone war on terror, the recent policy with russia as well, and the upcoming issue on whether or not the u.s. congress should pass and accountability act. whether or not we will stay on record as saying human-rights matters in russia and in china. >> more on that sunday night at 8:00 on c-span. >> a the 15, 1912, nearly 1500 perished on the ship called unsinkable. >> once the lookout rebels were sounded, the lookout cited an ice berg ahead and they struck the bells. time, which is a warning saying that there is an object ahead. it does not say what kind of object. what the lookout bended after striking the bell, he went to a telephone and 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 do you see? the response was, icebergs straight ahead. the response from the officer was, thank you. >> sunday at 4:00 p.m. eastern, part of american history tv this weekend on c-span 3. >> vice president by then was on the campaign trail yesterday in exeter, new hampshire, to compare president obama's plan to change the tax code with mitt romney's. as was the fourth in a series of campaign speeches the vice president delivered on general election issues. was introduced at the exeter town hall by new hampshire president deirdre reynolds. this is about a half-hour. >> hello, new hampshire. [applause]

i told the drug that i should say hello and then sit down. i used to drive a school bus and now i am sort of an administrative assistant. [laughter] i cannot see a lot of faces because of the lights, but i see a number of familiar faces back here and up there. if it's good to be back with you all. over the past few weeks i have given a series of speeches on behalf of the president and myself about what is at stake for the middle class and why the choice in this election is so fundamental. i have spoken about the rescue of the automobile industry, the

american automobile industry, about retirement security, and having america leads the world again in manufacturing. today i want to speak about a fourth topic that will impact significantly with the other three on the state of the middle class in america. that is the tax system. all these issues tell us the most fundamental issue, how do we rebuild an economy with a strong and growing middle class? that is the challenge. the president said that is the challenge of our time. when all is said and done, this campaign we are on is going to really boil down to a very simple question -- are we going to rebuild an economy where the middle class is growing and not shrinking and are we going to restore the value that says in america if you work hard you can get ahead, that personal

responsibility will be rewarded, that everyone from main street to wall street will play by the same rules? we are as a country going to make a responsible choice to ensure that the kind of future we want for our children is back within reach for our children. " in the neighborhoods we grew up in. so many parents of young children today have doubts that we had when we raised our countries. played by the rules and work hard. they could be certain that they provided an opportunity for their children. that is what this is really all about? . part of the debate is about the tax system we have and the subject on everyone's mind as april 15 approaches. president obama and i believe that it is simply wrong to have a system that is so riddled with loopholes and preferences that

the wealthiest and most successful of all americans often pay at a lower rate of their taxes than the average middle-class people do. warren buffett, who many people in america know, is an extremely successful, generous, and gregarious man who ran a very bright light on this subject when you note that. as a billionaire under the current tax law pays a lower tax rate than his secretary pays. but the thing is,. he is not, there are tens of thousands and several millions of people in that same situation making over $1 million, doing exactly the same. if it happens all the time, because the law allows it? and because we are fortunate to be able to hire good accountants and lawyers who know how to take full advantage of every aspect of the tax code.

as we start, we have to decide how to begin to get this back under control. e begin to right the ship so that middle-class people have a chance. restarted by proposing the buffett rule, to ensure that if no one who makes $1 million or more in any single given year will pay at an effective tax rate that is less than 30%. it is simply a matter of fairness. it is also a matter of common sense. let me read a quotation from someone else. >> just a moment ago i told some people about the letter i just received. is a letter from a man out there in the country, an executive earning six figures, will above $100,000 a year. he wrote me "in my support of the tax plan because i am

legally able to take advantage of the present tax code, nothing dishonest, doing what the law prescribes and will wind up paying a smaller tax than my secretary pays." that letter was not written to warren buffett. that letter was written to and led by president ronald reagan. "ie person went on to say, would like to be a book to come to washington to testify before the congress on why it is wrong." i remember a time ato lo not log ago when president clinton was the president of the united states. left office, he left america with an enormous surplus and an enormous if projected surplus. i was proud to have been in the senate at the time and help them accomplish that goal. but then washington made a series of really bad choices after he left.

two big tax cuts, neither of which are paid for, obscured overwhelmingly to the very wealthiest americans. two wars carried on the books, not a single penny paid for either one of them. and a medicaid drug program worthy but also not pay for. in addition, the bush administration went on and eviscerated the oversight functions of the federal government. as a consequence, too many investors bet on short-term gains and made extremely risky financial schemes. you know the results. the worst economic crisis since the great depression. so when barack obama and i came to office, when we walked in the door, at the peak of this crisis, we were handed a $1 trillion buildup as a production -- projection for

that year which started in september, the budget year. we were handed a $1 trillion bill before we had 10 minutes on the job. and the near certainty that we were going to lose several more million jobs before we even could get started with our program. billions of dollars of lost revenue. as a consequence of the great recession coupled with the steps that had to be taken to prevent that recession from turning into a depression, which added more to the deficit. and now that we have turned the corner, we are faced with another choice. do we pay down the deficit, cutting wherever we can as we have been doing, while at the same time investing in things we know we must invest in in order for the economy to grow and create middle class jobs? we know what they are. it is investing in education,

research and development, new technology, clean energy. or do we continue to spend hundreds of billions of dollars on tax windfalls for millionaires? windfalls they don't need and that they never asked for. i came from a wealthy state. i often point out that wealthy people are just as patriotic as poor people. there are just as patriotic as middle-class people. i think they know that they should be doing more. now governor romney and others argue that if we keep these windfalls and then shot were even more windfalls on the very wealthiest, that is how america grow, andeconomy will not gro that's how we will create jobs, but they say.

they offer this prescription as if it is somehow a new idea. like something we have not seen before. like something we have not actually tried before. we have seen this movie before. [laughter] you have seen the movie. it does not end well. where has he been? [applause] could it be that he is out of touch? i don't know, but i will tell you that he missed the movie. although he benefits from the movie. folks, this is the same argument that was touted out a decade ago by president george bush to justify the unjustifiable tax cuts for the very wealthy then

and look what happened. it actually had the opposite impact. it produced the slowest job growth in half a century. during that time from thatto 2007, middle income people actually lost $2,300 in income. they actually retreated. they did not grow. but it is true that the very top did very, very well. but the impact was that our economy faltered, the middle class shrank, the poor got poo -- poorer and ultimately the economy collapsed. it collapsed on all of you. it collapsed on the middle- class. and it came down with a crash.

$1.7 trillion in lost value, lost income to the american people. you watched the equity in your homes evacuate. you want your 401k plan be eviscerated. that's what it produced. and now mitt romney wants to take us down that same road again. let me state it plainly, the president and i are determined to do all in our power to make sure we never go down that road again. s, it really is a straightforward proposition, nothing complicated about this.

we believe, as i suspect most of you do, democrats and republicans, we believe it is fundamentally unfair to ask a middle-class family to pay more and to lose more opportunities so that a millionaire can pay less. it's that simple. i don't know any person, i don't know any reasonable person, regardless of their political backgrounds, but disagrees with. that with back when we were trying to put more teachers and cops back on the street and we had a very small surtax on the first dollar over $1 million, the polls if show the vast majority of millionaires thought it was the right thing to do. so i don't buy this argument republicans offer. i don't buy this argument. but the very wealthy are not prepared to contribute to the recovery in the same way that everybody else is prepared to. they are not prepared. ronald reagan, warren buffett,

deirdre, the president, no reasonable person that i know feel this is the american way. we are not supposed to have a system that is read. we're not supposed to have a system with one set of rules for the very wealthy and one set of rules for everybody else. -- we are not supposed to have a system that is rigged. we have maintained our position that nobody under $250,000 would have their taxes raised. where i come from, that is wealthy. we are talking about the very wealthy. time and again, ladies and gentlemen, middle-class americans have shown their willingness to stand up and do their part in times of political, economic, or military crisis. time and again. but the one thing in the neighborhoods i come from, and i suspect all of you, the one thing we don't like being played for is a sucker.

the one thing we don't like. [applause] when you all pay your taxes next week, you and every citizen in new hampshire and my home state of delaware ought to be able to know that everyone else is paying their fair share as well. but the truth is you know that there are not. the truth is, when you pay those taxes, you know that not everyone is paying their fair share. and it is not just the buffett rule. the buffett rule will not solve all our problems. if it is just fairness. at the fairness if governor romney has his way, we will have the romney rule. i mean this sincerely spirit it is not just a cute little deal. there's a romney rule that says let's double down on the tax cuts for the wealthy.

this is not about class warfare. this is about math and people's lives. as my dad used to say, don't tell me what you value, show me your budget and i will tell you what you value. [cheeers and applause] so let's take a look at what the romney rule values, but the governor values and his colleagues. he values the bush tax cuts to be made permanent for the wealthy, the ones that are inte -- are intended to expire this december. he wants to extend them permanently. that will cost $1 trillion over

the next 10 years, $800 billion of that going to people who make a minimum of $1 million. to add insult to injury, the rule proposal to give another $250,000 per year tax cut to the average millionaire on top of maintaining the bush tax cuts. i know if you had not want all the debates, you probably think i'm making all of this oup. but seriously that is what he is calling for. that's another trillion dollars in tax cuts over the next 10 years going to the top 1%, of american taxpayers. baby fromame that crying. she will inherit it. [applause]

.he's going to pay for it that's one smart baby. [applause] lks, the bush tax cut for the wealthy and the new proposal of an additional $1 billion, these are tax cuts that the folks in that category did not ask for. they did not ask for this. they don't need them to maintain their standard of living. by that i mean, the only time people really sacrifice is when they lose a tax break or a tax structure that forces them to change their standard of living. that is what changes people. when you have to move out of your house and rent instead of owning. when you cannot send your kids to college and in only send them to trade school and so on. but nobody in the category

designed to benefit from these tax cuts is going to have to change one single aspect of their standard of living. it is a stark choice we have to make. a choice between the romney rule that i think will take the country in a direction that we don't want to go. the buffett rule says no one making more than $1 million will pay a smaller share for their income taxes than middle-class families do. now you hear them come back and say the effective tax rate for middle-class families is lower and so on. a lot of that is true, but the bottom line is, anybody making london million dollars cannot pay 30% in taxes? -- anybody making $1 million cannot pay 30% in taxes? that is lower than the prescribed rate right now for millionaires and people making over $200,000. the romney rule says the very

wealthy should keep every tax breaks and loopholes they have and get additional new tax cuts every year that are worth more than what the average middle- class family makes in an entire year. in the neighborhoods i ask them to look up the average income in this area. a $250,000 a year tax break would be roughly somewhere between four times greater than the average income of a family in this neighborhood. it is just not fair. but beyond being not fair, it is literally a bad economic policy. it is bad economic policy. i understand -- we understand rewarding risk and rewarding innovators, we understand that. we understand some cases that

deserved a different tax treatment to get people to take risks to benefit us all. but let me put this in perspective by giving an illustration. this summer -- and deirdre just in directly reference this -- this summer the interest rate on student loans is supposed to double. it is set to double. we are talking to congress to try to hold it at what it is, 3.8%. it is going to double. with the. with the romney rule, a middle-class family with a couple kids going to college would see their interest rate double. just imagine your car loan doubling, what it would mean out of your pocket. imagine if the interest rate you

are paying on your mortgage doubled tomorrow. maybe these guys don't come from the same place that we come from. that makes a difference. it makes a difference in your standard of living. it makes a difference in what you can do for your family. it matters. it is all about the impact of the romney rule on the middle class or the obama-biden approach. it is about whether or not you will be able to afford to send your kid to college, whether you can live in a safe neighborhood because there is adequate resources to have sufficient police protection and fire protection, is about whether or not your mother can pick up all of her prescription drugs and not leave two of them at the counter. my mom was with me. i did not even know she was doing this until i followed her to the drugstore and watched my mom say to the druggist, i only need four of these, honey.

it's a whether or not working moms such as deidre can afford not just child care but decent child care. in our view, the fair way to do this is also the right way to do this. the economically sound way to do this. that is what the president and i have been talking about this and will continue to talk about it for awhile. let me tell you what we proposed in addition to the buffett rule. if we lay out a plan to reduce the federal deficit by $4 trillion over the next decade. people say how do you do that? we do that by making some very painful cuts. we've already cut over $1 trillion, painful cuts. we also get it by coming up with 1 pound 5 trillion dollars by ending unnecessary tax breaks for the very wealthy. -- $1.5 trillion. that is so our children don't have to carry the burden. we cannot get there without cutting bone marrow, if you

don't include the elimination of the tax breaks for the very wealthiest among us. if we put the buffett rule in place, let the bush tax cuts expire for the very wealthy, and reject mitt romney's additional $1 trillion tax cut for the very well, america will be able to do the things we need to do to build the economy. everybody knows what they are. we cannot be the most competitive nation in the world when we are ranking 16th in the world of percent of college graduates we have in the nation. we have to invest in education. it is self-evident. but to do that, you have to say it is more important to help educate hundreds of children or send hundreds of kids to college than to give one billionaire the romney rule tax cuts, because that is what would replace it. just one. how many new kids can we send to college for $250,000 a year, the

tax break than he once ran an ad for people making over $1 million? look, choices matter. they have consequences. the president and i will make that choice, but mitt romney will make a different choice. we believe we need to provide tax cuts for cutting edge manufacturing enterprises so america can lead the world in the industries of the future. what you are doing here in new hampshire, providing good paying jobs for a growing middle class. but to do that, you have to say that creating jobs in america is more important than another tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires and a tax break for them to go overseas, for that matter. [[cheers and applause]

the american people know the choices we have made and want to make sure that we know what the romney choices. they have a fundamentally different economic philosophy. to put it bluntly, we think it is out of step with basic american values. i'm not calling these guys un- american. i don't want to hear anybody play that game with me but it is out of step with american values, those middle-class values, that most of us are raised with. governor brown calls the president out of touch. -- governor romney calls the president out of touch and anti- women. how many of you have a swiss bank account? [laughter] [applause] how many have somewhere between 20 and $100 million in their

ira. i've got to meet you. out of touch? he calls the president out of touch? the president and i'd value of investment and risk. risk should be rewarded and investment should be encouraged but we also value work. we also value the work of our hands and the work of our head. we value the work of the american people because, guess what? when they work, everything is edit in value. everything has a higher value. this is a basic choice in the election. the president and i are determined to make the economy work for everybody. not just because it is fair, literally not just because it is fair. that is reason enough but we believe and history shows that

when the middle class corots, the wealthy get wealthier, the poor have a better shot, the economy is sound and the economy grows. we believe in a fair shot and a fair shake. governor romney and those who share his philosophy believe in no rules, no risk when you fail taking a risk, and no accountability. folks, by was stated very plainly -- the president and i have absolute confidence in the american people. that is not hyperbole. we have absolute confidence in the american people. they have been and continue to be the most innovative and productive people on the planet. that is a fact. we have absolute faith because we know given the opportunity, they have never, never, never, never failed to step up, never.

we also know one other thing -- we are better positioned as a nation and you should know, we are better positioned as a nation counting every nation, china, every other nation in the world, we are better positioned as a nation at this moment to be the leading economy in the 21st century if we act responsibly. , if we invest in our people, it fully invested education, if we invest in innovation, if we invest in new technology, if we invest in alternative energy. we have absolute confidence in one other thing, that although we have a long way to go, we are on the right track. 25 months of growth is not enough but we are on the right track. let me make it clear to you -- i want to say it as plainly as i can -- this is no time to turn back. god bless you all and may god protect our troops.

thank you also very much. thank you. [cheers and applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> condoleezza rice speaks are in u.s. foreign policy from the heritage foundation this morning. she released a man more last year about for years working in the bush administration. we're planning live coverage of her remarks in about half an hour. republican presidential candidate mitt romney and newt gingrich will address the national rifle association annual meeting gathering in st. louis today at live coverage begins at 2:00 eastern. also, speakers will include presidential candidate wreck santorum, eric cantor, rick perry, and wisconsin governor scott walker and events will be live on cspan radio and online at c-span.org. house budget committee chairman

paul ryan took on president obama's budget in a keynote address at the george w. bush presidential center text converts in new york city tuesday. his comments last about 20 minutes. [applause] share the same aspiration. to play for the green bay packers although we would not be on the team at the same time. [laughter] >> thank you very much, jim, and thank you, ladies and gentlemen. it is so nice to be here with so many friends and contributors to the journal, and my dad, especially -- and might i add, especially sources. we're really grateful to our sources. i'm really glad to introduce our next speaker, congressman paul ryan. the congressman and i share atoh strategy. i was looking at your web site. free-market capitalism is the engine of mobility and highway to the american dream. i could not have said it better myself. that is what we have to focus on. what we do to get back on

prosperity, to get our train on the right tracks? prosperity is what the american dream is all about. limitless opportunities to make the most of your life. your opportunities come from god and nature, not from government, and you can do what you want to be happy, however you define happy for yourself. my own family history is pretty and remarkable. the potatoes stopped growing in ireland. my family was in a class based society. they came over with the turn on their backs. they came to boston, worked the railroads until they had enough money scrape together to buy a farm. that ended up being in wisconsin. they were there in the summer and they thought it looked just like ireland, so they bought the farm. then came winter, and they said oh, crap. and they had to make a go of it

since then. the idea you could leave these class based societies and come to this country because of the idea of this country, we are the country that is formed not based on geography but based on an idea. and we always have to read- realize that idea. now more than ever, that idea is being compromised. that idea is on the line. we have a choice in front of us. do we want to get back for growth and prosperity like the 4% solution you are talking about, or are we going to throw in with the rest of the world and go down this austerity path, which is what europe is going towards? austerity means current cuts to benefits for current retirees. it means cranking up your taxes to try to please the bond market vigilantes' which slows down your economy, makes it harder for younger people to get out

and have a career and make a life for themselves, overburdening regulations were the central government is picking winners and losers in the marketplace, slow growth, pain and austerity. that is what europe is suffering. and get to this -- and guess who gets hurt the first in the worst? the people that need government though most. the poor, the elderly, the sec -- the sec. -- the poor, the elderly, the sick. so, what we are experiencing right now is basically decades of politicians from both political parties making promises to voters that they could not keep, and in europe, those promises are up and now they're in austerity mode. hear, for lots of reasons, the world reserve currency and other

reasons, we still have time. we still have a chance to get this under control, to get back to prosperity, to preempt the debt crisis that will bring us to austerity. but our time is not that much greater. our window is starting to close. the next president and the next congress will make this decision. the reason i say it in such a stark way is, i think we are we are reaching tipping point. the sticking points will be difficult to come back from. the first one is a mathematical one, a debt, after which if the bond market's turn on us than we are in the austerity mode. then we are in the cutting benefits for beneficiaries, at changing the social contract for those who have already retired around these programs. then we are managed decline mode. in our budget is whatever the

they havets tellutell us to be. the tougher tipping point is the moral tipping point. it is the one where we become more of a taker society versus a maker society. where the vast majority of able- bodied americans do not see themselves as a provider, but the government. where we have taking our safety net and instead of working it, give it to people for a live of dependency. the numbers are pretty startling. read steve forbes magazines. listen to them. we are always getting close to the other tipping point. seven% of americans get more benefit from the american government than they pay back in taxes.

you can already argue we are past that. i do not think we are. most americans believe and the dream and a society of growth. we still have that window. what that means is we are at the proverbial fourth in the road. we have the force of two futures in front of us. we owe you the the honor of making this choice. on the one path, we have the president's back. there's a government centered society. there is the society of debt and decline. the other path is what we are proposing. it is a path of getting us back on the grill and pre-empting a debt crisis. this november what we're asking

for is the affirmation of the country to get us the obligation to get this. the choice cannot be clear. you have an opportunity society which is reclaiming the idea. president bush -- president obama, a freudian slip. i would argue that he is bringing us to this government centered society. he is putting our trust in government. i have a lot of problems with the president's budget. go figure. you are elected to represent the people of your district ores date.

we have a debt crisis on the horizon. they decided for over a thousand days not to do anything about it. that is a firing offense. let me talk about the president's budget. there are a lot of problems i have with that. let's focus on growth. it makes our growth situation worse. there are a number of reasons why. i will quote tim geithner. we are not suggesting that we have a solution to long-term fiscal problems. we do not like years. i cannot have said the better. this is what the president is doing. rather than seeing this as very clear present danger, we're waiting for the republicans to offer their than attack it.

this is not called the leadership. certainty, if the but the budget plan in place, this will give us an immediate boost of growth today. the future of the bond markets, they're looking to see of leadership is being placed to get this situation under control so they can take risks so they know that they have a certain feature that is one to be optimistic about. it until you have a plan in place, you have another growth in dividends. cronyism. both parties have been subject to what i call crony capitalism or industrial parts. we got confused. we thought being pro-business was being pro-market. it ended up attracting barriers

against would-be competitors. it is easier for us to go back to our core principles. it is harder for the left to do this. the president subscribes to the notion that they just know better in washington. we have a permanent class for those who can better micromanage society you can do a better job of subsidizing and picking winners and losers whether it is the regulations come accreting too big to fail banks or solyndra and the regulatory state. they believe in the process which put it aside and replaces it with connected capitalism. this replaces the rule of law with the role of bureaucrats.

that is probably one of my biggest criticisms of this budget. taxes. tax reform. this is where i think the present budget is the most anti- growth. in january, he is proposing that the top marginal income tax goes up to 44.8%. where paul and i come from, overseas, which we mean lake superior, led the canadiens struck their business tax to 15 term. nine out of some businesses in wisconsin filed their taxes as individuals. eight out of some businesses are not corporations. what we're saying to them is that if you get successful and buy 4 acres out of the in-a parks and get 25 employees, we

still call this the american dream. you're going to be a with a 45% tax rate. how on earth are they going to be able to compete with the likes of the canadiens are taxing themselves at 15% or the japanese who are lower than us now. we have got to remember we're in a global economy. if we tax these businesses were more than half of americans work today, if we tax them as such higher rates than our foreign competitors are taxing their companies, we lose, if they win. this is a system that is right for austerity. higher tax rates, more complexity, and more loopholes.

we tried this approach. we have tried chasing higher spending with higher taxes. it has not worked. we tried stimulus spending. all they got was a debt hangover and a cloud of more uncertainty. it is just put this on slow growth. -- it put us on slow growth. one of the six americans are in poverty now. the woman in unemployment rate is the highest we have been since we measured it. these policies are not working. there is a better way. some of us are actually putting ideas on the table to show there is a better way. a lot of the political pundits told us we were crazy. the pollsters and the political class said what ever you do, do not do that.

you are going to risk political debt. if you want to be good at these jobs, you have to be willing to lose these jobs. if all you do is worry about getting reelected in doing what they tell you is the right thing for the moment based upon phone calls that took place, you are going to go nowhere. you will be running in circles. we know what works. freedom works. limited government works. if you take a look at our budget, it is a huge contrast. the contrast is this. we action deal with the problem. we actually see the debt crisis coming. we see the drivers of the debt and we deal with it. we have to have those entitlement reforms so that we can preempt austerity. we had proposals at medicare. it does not change things. you wait much longer all bets

are off. the one not be able to do that. let's preempt austerity by getting us on the right path so that those people who retire -- my mom has been on medicare for 12 years. when you turn 65, yet could of florida for the winter. -- you have to go to florida for the winter. it is a promise of $37 trillion. if we reform these programs, we came with the commitment to the current generation. we cut $5.30 trillion in spending. we strengthen did these entitlement programs. we get our debt under control and get the debt completely paid off. we propose the end of cronyism. get rid of all the corporate welfare. get rid of the notion that we

should be subsidizing this company and not that company. get back to the system of free markets and fair play an equal rules apply to everybody. the other big difference is tax reform. we propose to do fundamental tax reform. of all the things you can do in this country to help people get back to work, you have to acknowledge the fact that the income tax system blows of i januarup in january. all tax laws must originate in the house. when and lost the house, it frigid will let the house, it was permanent. it was never meant -- when it left the house, it was

permanent. it was never meant to be temporary. then came the byrd rule in the senate and a filibuster. in order to get that tax reduction in place, which the 2003 law was to speed it up to get out of the mild recession, and he had no choice but to accept the time limit on it because the senate refused to go along with making these things permanent. now we are where we are. we have a cliff coming at the end of the year. it provides a great opportunity. let's reform it. let's take a page out of steve forbes playbook for a better system. there are a lot of democrats that agree with the. at tremendous respect for these

gentlemen. -- there are a lot of democrats that have tremendous respect for these gentlemen. we can help the small businesses succeed. i will not go through a system. it means the we did not keep pushing capital away any make america the place where you want to keep your capital. we make america a place for you was dislocated. we have to make an export more things. we need to have tax laws that

died with that. -- jive with that. we are the honorees of having the highest in the world. we think we should have lower rates and improve the incentives to save, work, and invest. the tax rate do that. you l.l. capital to be deployed where it can do the most -- you allow capital to be deployed were taken to the most good, not where some bureaucrat thinks it ought to go. people in their community decide where it ought to go. you have to keep your eye on competitiveness. you do not mind the fact that this is a whole new story. this is not one where the united states is the undisputed superpower of the world.

the we keep going down this path for we divide each other and try to come up with this idea that we can tax ourself at double the rate, our competitors are taxing there. we will be slow growth. there will be economic stagnation. this helps our budget quite a bit. the cbo acknowledges that we will go down to a one term growth. it could be lower than that. what we are showing is that if you actually get the plan that president obama is talking about and get a grip dividend, you'll balance the budget so much faster. if we do those three things, we can quickly get america back on the path of prosperity. the idea is this.

then you revive the system of up for mobility. here is what it comes down to. we do not like the direction the president is taking the country. we believe he is putting the country on a path that is a government centered society of debt and declining. we believe if we follow this path the will not end well for anybody. then you have a debt crisis. the people who need government the most are the ones that get hurt the first. we believe in prosperity. we believe in equality of opportunity, not outcome. we want to put these kinds of programs policies in place. we have to ask the country for permission. our commitment is this. we cannot simply when an election by default are running against the guy and winning a- war. -- a negative war.

we have to have a positive election. we do not want them fixed in some class. when i was working the drill at mcdonald's, when i was waiting tables, i never thought of myself as fixed in some class. it never occurred to me there is some limit and the government had helped me cope with it. on my ownelf as my journey. that is what we do. this is the choice of to futures we have. do you want to get back to prosperity? do you want to be honest with people? we can keep the commitment to people who have already retired and get back to growth. or are we going to succumb to

the tactics that designs to speak to us now could device of ways, it to distort the truth about what is happening in this country? these are the choices. i hate to be so stark but it is that simple. i want to thank the people who are here you have done so much to put us on the right path only to see the inertia of math and economics come at us. we can do this. we can turn this around. i have no doubt in my mind that we will get this country back on track just like our parents did for us. that is the entire legacy of america. he may the country better for your kids. if we get this right and we turn it around, i have no doubt that for the next generation they will look back at this moment that this is the time america regained its greatness. thank you very much.

[captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> pictures of president obama leaving the white house and a departure for a swing through florida. he will head for the summit of americas in colombia and will make a stop in tampa and will speak about the benefits of trade with latin america and onto three days in cartegena, columbia. and there will be discussions on integrating the economies, increasing trade and combating drug violence. this is the president's fourth trip to the region. he has an upcoming fifth trip in june when he is said to attend a group of 20 session in mexico.

[captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012]

>> the president and first lady released their tax return information said. -- theama aren't $780,000 obama is earned. the filing deadline for this year is this coming tuesday. going to the heritage foundation here in washington where condoleezza rice is about to speak on u.s. foreign policy. >> for this timely and important event. it is atomic because events overseas are raising questions about our national security --

it is timely. the launch of a ballistic missile by north korea. it is important because americans are debating how we should respond to events in north korea and in afghanistan, iran, syria, and other hot spots. there are questions that are raised, actions suggested the president wants to change the engages united states in gaug the world. is to request that certain countries be patient and wait until after the election to see what he will do. foreign policy often takes a backseat to domestic problems that are plaguing this country. problems like jobs, health care, and tdebt.

these issues are vitally important. foreign policy also matters to americans. americans want to know how today's leaders and those we elect in november will protect our nation and safeguard our liberties in an increasingly threatening world. have someone with us today who is qualified to talk about american values and american leadership on the world stage. i have the honor of working for dr. condoleezza rice. she had served as president bush's national security adviser and on the stock of george herbert walker bush's carry council. -- security council. america faced severe threats from the middle east and elsewhere. dr. rice helped shape policies

to help free thousands of people tyranny.orn today she is speaking about american interests. she's a professor at stanford university at the thomas and barbara stephenson at the hoover institution. she was called a woman of many talents, a musician, a scholar, a leader, and a secretary of state, and the best america has to offer. i could not agree more. ladies and gentlemen, to my honor to welcome dr. condoleezza

rice to the heritage foundation to talk about leadership, americas critical role in foreign policy. please welcome dr. rice. >> thank you. thank you very much. thank you. thank you. it is a pleasure to join so many friends and thank you very much for that wonderful introduction and for your service to our country. it has been a while since i left government and there is a question that i'm asked all the time. it is different being outside of government? it is different being outside of government. one of the big differences is that i get up every day and i get my cup of coffee and i go online to read my newspapers. i read them and say, isn't that interesting? i am able to go onto other

things because i no longer have responsibility for what is in the newspapers. i am concerned about the state of our country and the state of our world. it has been quite a decade or so. international system has experienced three great shocks. the shock of september 11, a day that none of us will easily forget. we remember september 11 as the day that every day after became september 12. as we fought to keep the country safe against terrorists who try to do it again, we recognize that it was a fortune and not perhaps scale but fortune that led us -- skill but fortune that led us. people and perhaps our men and

women in uniform who volunteer to defend us at the front lines of freedom and we owe them our guitar gratitude for doing so. [applause] after 9/11, we confronted the fact that it was failed states and uncovered spaces and the potential nexus between -- that threatened every country. it's still this group of terrorists had come from a failed state, one of the poorest countries in the world, afghanistan, it to attack us and to bring down the twin towers and to blow a hole in the pentagon and they paid $300,000 to do it. then of course in 2008, there was another great shock, the

global and economic financial crisis. that it accelerated the underlying tendencies in the international economy and called into question whether or not democratic capitalism which had been at the core of the economic system since the collapse of the soviet ian, was indeed in trouble. it exacerbated the internal contradictions of the european union, which is still try to work its way through those contradictions. it exacerbated the contradictions in russia, demonstrated that it has not made the transition from an oil syndicate to wait real economy based on the potential of its people. it raise the profile of brazil and india and china. brazil and india remind us of something that is very important, the strength that they have.

something that we should not underestimate. they are multi-ethnic democracies that are stable. somehow they made the transition from government to government by peaceful means. remember that these are countries that duet with huge multi-ethnic populations, especially with india. they can still somehow manage the peaceful transfer of power. they remind us of the essence of the third great shock, the arab spring and what is unfolding in the streets of the middle east. that is a reminder that authoritarian just is not stable in the long run. those who for tears looked to stability and not democracy -- those who looked for 60 years

who look to stability and not democracy. and withdictator revolution spreading, he went into a square in bucharest. as he stood there with 250,000 in the square, one woman yelled liar. 100,000 people were yelling liar. decided -- he decided to run. was delivered to the revolution and he and his wife were executed. is what separates an authoritarian from other people -- an old woman yells fire.

or a policeman gives weight at the berlin wall. -- gives way at the berlin wall. nger a terrible way to make political reform. it is replaced by revolution and it will be a rocky ride the middle east. all the shots taken together portend fundamental shifts in the underlying balance of power in the international system. the question i would like us to consider today is, as those shifts taking place, will be an american imprint on that new balance of power? the united states has been

willing to imprints on the international system. we have believed that free markets and free peoples would ultimately result in a more peaceful and prosperous world. we have had a view of how human history should unfold. since world war ii, have promoted that view of human rights, religious freedoms, the rights of dissidents, the rights of women, not just because it is 8 moral case but because there is a practical case for those rights. we have learned the hard way that states that do not respect their own people are indeed dangerous states. that has helped reduce that view of human history. remarkable changes over the last several decades -- eight europe free of soviet power that is

whole and at peace and free. it has produced in asia powerful democratic allies. in japan and south korea and parts of southeast asia. it has helped produce in latin america a turn away from military coups toward free, stable democratic states like ombia. or chile or columbi we have helped to pull back from the brink of state failure. even in africa were sometimes people are so patronizing as to say, africa is too trouble for democracy. we have seen the rise of democratic governance. we have seen in places like botswana a commitment to free

elections so those who would govern have to ask for the people's consent. there have been decades and there have been setbacks. it's been a remarkable stream in favor of those who believe that free markets and free people will ultimately triumph and that indeed the value of freedom is a universal one. an american one or not a western one, a universal one. there are many challenges ahead. there is china. china challenges the concept and the idea that a tartarian -- that authoritarianism is not stable. that forget the stresses are emerging now in china as it makes the greatest social economic leap in human history.

i was first in china in 1988. the streets of beijing or competition with a lot of bicycles. that is not beijing today. they have listed a lot of people out of poverty. the stresses and strains are showing. product safety problems, bullet trains, or baby milk formula that is poisoned and the first impulse was to execute the person in charge of product safety. the stresses and strains that one sees in reported rights of over 180,000. the stresses and strains that one sees in a kind of lack of

confidence in the chinese leadership about where they are going. i'm not suggesting there will be a revolution in china. if you go to the chinese internet, there are three words you would not have seen. it suggests that the information age is indeed a challenge to the chinese leadership and they understand it. some other leaders are beginning to suggest that maybe the genesee based on prosperity -- legitimacy based on prosperity is difficult to maintain. some like the premier seems to suggest that maybe something that looks more like legitimacy based on consent might be necessary. the idea that these leaders -- people could elect their local leaders, they will want to elect their provincial leaders and

their national leaders. authoritarianism is not consistent with the development of human potential. it is true that china is a challenge in terms of geostrategic terms but only if we cede those terms. we are military power unmatched and we should remain so. in cyber, in space, with missile defense, then we will be able to sustain our dominance in the pacific. if we pay attention to the strong alliances that we have with other democratic states, in australia, in japan, then we have a basis for american leadership to dominate for years to come. there's a relationship with

india which is rising as a power in the region. we have ceded the ground in one of port area in asia and that is in trade, where we have been absence. the last three trade agreements that were ratified in the congress and negotiated in the bush administration. has secured nine free trade agreements and five more are in negotiation. trade is the one place that we have not tilted toward asia, latin america, or anyplace else. free trade is america's -- one of america's greatest assets in helping both free markets and free people. asia, then, an infrastructure

for dealing with challenges. the middle east is much more chaotic. it lacks infrastructure. many of the pillars have been robbed by the events of the arab spring. sometimes i wonder if the so- called pivot to asia is because the middle east is to ohard. o hard. cannot afford to pull back -- we cannot afford to pull back. we should do everything that we can to build north american platforms from oil and gas to transportation to new technologies. we should build north american platforms for energy security. but we know that we will not be insulated from the middle east.

one way or another, the malignancies of the middle east will come back to haunt us. so we need to move from a series of tactical responses since 2009 more strategic view of how we want the middle east to unfold. out a strategic view, either at the regional powers will exacerbate already-strong sectarian tensions in the region. when our british friends drew the lines of the middle east, they obliterated any notion of sectarian divide. you have a circumstance in which one has had to dominate the other so that in a rock -- in -- this divide

will be worse without a strategic view of how the middle east might unfold differently. we need to look to build those stability. it begins with a recommitment to our friends in the region and to israel, which still stands as the one strong democratic state in the region. we need to press reforms among our other friends. the mubarak situation did not have to work out the way it did. there were urged to undertake reforms before the people were in the streets. we need to do the same with our might make a move

for greater representation for their people. to knees it is a place that seems to be on the right course -- tunisia. they continue to pressure more in egypt. we need to have a relationship with turkey, a critically important country that we forget once really wanted to be a part of europe and was rebuffed by european union that was more concerned about what turkey would do to it. so the reaffirmation with a democratic turkey is key. also to recommit to iraq. times if feels like the rockies --some times in feels like the iraqs have gone off course.

they have institutions in place that might help to give an answer to the sectarian divide between sunni and shia. you can have majority governments of one sect or another. iraq needs our we-engagements -- re-engagement. we need to challenge iran. iran 8 revisionist power -- is a revisionist power. they have supported the terrorist shia groups in southern iraq. they have stirred up trouble in the eastern provinces of saudi arabia. they use their tentacles to try

to cause problems in the gaza or in lebanon. in this regard, syria is critical. the collapse of the regime would deprive iran its handmaiden in the middle east and its launching pad for hezbollah and for trouble in that region. now, it is a pretty big agenda to react to this changing world that has undergone these shocks. there those who ask, can we handle this challenge and still pursue our values? this is what has made the u.s. exceptional. this belief in free markets and free people, a willingness to try to promote them abroad and a

belief the world would be more stable and more prosperous as freedom wins out. that exceptional as an is critical for another reason. we cannot ask the american people to make sacrifices if we have nothing to say about how the history should unfold. rather than leading a common cause with like-minded states and longtime allies who share our values in europe and asia and latin america and africa and beyond. why should we make the sacrifices of leadership? american exception wasn't an american leadership are l inked. it is reasonable that the american people are tired and i take some responsibility for that. i said

to the president that they are tired. it has been a challenge and there has been vigilance and i think people are tired. i understand that. there are those who say that we sapped our strength to do with our domestic problems at home. i want to suggest that there is coin.er side to that poin perhaps is our lack of confidence at home that is sapping our will to lead abroad. the confusion at home becomes an excuse not to engage the world and that is directly related to our willingness and our abilities to lead. much comes from domestic strains and in thomas but there's something deeper going on.

human potential is so key today and america has been better at tapping human potential than any country ever in human history. it was the resources that you could dig out of the ground the major parable in the 19th century. in the 20th-century, goes resources to make a better widget. when the 21st century, it is human potential and innovation that are at the core of influence and power. i got to travel around the world and got to see what people admired about the united states. the one thing that i always saw as a source of admiration is our great american national myths. a myth is something that is outside linear thinking and ours has always been the log cabin.

you can come from humble circumstances and you can do great things. that has been the key to unleash potential. it comes as a result of opportunity. that belief has led us to be a magnet for people from all over the world, the most ambitious people in the world have want it to come here. for those that came here, the united states has been enriched immigrants and has been made stronger by immigrants at is the cap from this demographics of japan and russia by immigrants. we must reaffirm our self as a country of immigrants and find a way to have a systematic set of

laws and set of practices that allow us to continue to have the human potential come here. it is not enough to let people come here. it has to be true for people who are here. the educational crisis that we face may well be the greatest threat to our national security. the educational crisis threatens to continue to produce weak links. a democracy is only as strong as its weakest link. crisis in k-12 produce people that will be on the bill because they will have nowhere else to go and do -- there will be on the dole. unfit for the on

military or for other jobs. that is indeed the key to understanding another aspect of american exceptionally some. this is the most successful experiment in self-government in human history. it was built on the responsibility of the individual, with an impulse not from government but from civil society and philanthropy and from faith-based people who just wish to be good. that belief that it does not matter where you came from, in matters where you're going has given america a narrative. it is not a narrative of class conflict and entitlement. it is not a destructive

narrative that finds fault for your challenges in someone else's success. it is a narrative that says i may not be able to control by circumstances but i can control my response to my circumstances. that is an empowering narrative of opportunity. that is perhaps more than anything else the key to american exceptional was some. it is perhaps the key that is most under the assaults today hear a home. it may explain in parts why we lack the confidence and optimism and the strength to continue to advocate for free markets and free peoples abroad. without that advocacy, without that leadership, without the willingness to sacrifice and in print, one of two things will

happen. either there will be chaos. chaos not last because history avoids a vacuum. it is will likely that that vacuum would be filled by those who do not believe in a balance of power. we would find ourselves in the worst of circumstances, where we cannot protect our values and cannot protect our interests either. i am optimistic. i have seen the united states lead summit times before. 2006 was a pretty bad year for the bush administration. i read the biographies of the founding fathers. the unitedts,

states should not have come into being. the greatest military power probably should not have come into power. and the years of civil war, brother against brother. we became a more perfect union. a little girl from alabama, the most segregated big city in america, where parents cannot take her to a restaurant or movie theater, but they have convinced that shouldn't be able to have a hamburger at becometh's, cheat can the president and she becomes the secretary of state. america has a way of making the impossible see inevitable. i think we will do it again.

it is critical that the most compassionate and the most generous, this extraordinary place, this exceptional country also continues to be the most powerful. thank you very much. [applause] >> thank you very much. that was truly inspiring. a deep look into history. that is what the country needs to hear. thank you very much for that. we have some time for some

questions from the audience. we have some ground rules. we have two people in the aisles with microphone. if you could wait until they come to you to give the microphone. if you could identify yourself. as a courtesy to our guest, if she could keep your question is short and to the point. so -- >> hi. a lot of respect to you, secretary rice. i thank you for your leadership on nato enlargement given your time as the precarious state. georgia and ukraine were blocked. the upcoming nato summits is in chicago.

this is not an enlargement summit. macedonia has met all the requirements. greece violated their treaty obligations and i wanted to know your properspective. >> i have believe that nato must remain open to any democratic state, european democratic state the wishes to join its ranks. nato was to be a collective security mechanism for democracies. in this regard, we pressed very hard. integrated a number of east european states including the baltic states, at the time was thought to be impossible to do. i worked very hard to try to

resolve the macedonian name issue and perhaps it will be. i favor very much the integration of any european state that is ready and seems that macedonia is ready. as to ukraine and georgia, the nato communique said that these countries will become members of nato. that was an affirmative statement of the rightness of their coming in. the timing -- i am far from this and i do not know all the ins and outs of what is going on with the allies. i help nato recalls what is meant to these states to be in nato. they have managed to make relatively smooth the transition from the collapse of communism

in central europe to the integration of the states into europe. >> thank you so much for coming and speaking today. i want to thank you for your part in this representation documentary that i had the opportunity to view. what advice would you give young women in a time work even though enormous strides have been made that women are some really under representative in the media and the government and high-ranking jobs, the vice you would give to young women and what you think it would take to receive full equality for women in government? >> i believe we are going to achieve full equality. it will happen one person

anytime. glass ceilings will be broken not by some announcement that we wish to break glass ceilings but because people are willing to break them. we have had three of the past four women as secretary of state's. colin powell was in there but that means is been 16 years since we've had a white mal.e e. define yourself in terms of what you want to do and how you'll get good at it to make a case that you are to do it and then go for it. it helps to of mentors and people who have been through the stretches. you don't have to have role models and mentors who look like

you. i was waiting for it black, , soviet mentor, i would still be waiting. find people who take an interest in you and an interest in your career. never, ever let anybody define what you are going to be by how you look. that is something -- if you see somebody trying to do that, you just challenge right back because they have no right to do that and you cannot let them. >> thank you very much. i'm the in this number -- how do approach to things that are

happening in syria? role?ee turkey's there are less countries trying to find the u.s. what do you think? >> thank you. can bef turkey's role, beneficial to have turkey, which is a democratic country that is coming to terms with the relationship between islam and democratic values and democracy and it does not see them as contradicting one another. there are struggles in turkey and in makes people a little rved about some other things going on there. these people will build a new

democratic bases in turkey. i think turkey has begun to advocate for the rights of others to live in freedom as well. it is important to see how strong turkey has been in support of change in syria. change in syria is important because if we were willing to say it would not allow muammar gaddafi to mow down his people but we have watched as thousands mowedple have bebeen down, then we have a problem. i would hope it would be a broad policy because then you'll have something looks like proxy warfare in syria. if we just contemplate the situation in which power was

restored but there were all these challenges, you have to go over into turkey and into lebanon and into iraq. there's a lot at stake in syria and i think it comes to trying to bring the opposition together as a turkey has done. institutional reforms that would be made that would protect rights of all the minorities in syria as well as the majority. that would have as patrons of that, countries like turkey but the united states and the european union. you have to say if we cannot do with to the u.n., will do it as a coalition. i'm not suggesting the united states needs ground forces in that region. quite the opposite.

this is not just a threat to our values. this is a strategic threat and we have to find a way to bring together those who are willing in the terribly, turkey, and others. without american leadership, i am fearful that it will be a set of tactical decisions that are because of the interest of the regional powers and not because of the interest of a different kind of syria. >> back over here. >> thank you. >> good morning. you said the united states needs to challenge iraqn. presenters will be sitting down negotiators. if they're not successful, what should the united states do next? >> i think to take a tactical

decision when one talks to the iranians. what do you say once you're talking to them? i think there are a couple of things that have to be said. the world has to be confident that the iranians have been shut off from a pathway to a nuclear weapon. it is the same process that you can pursue higher percentages later on. once you saw the science problem, it is and engineering problem. "you can enrich to this level and no further." the iranians do have to be told that they will have to shut down the sights that are under clear -- the undeclared sites

that are an open secret as to where they are. we to be careful not just to focus on the nuclear side. the nuclear side is very key. why iran a nuclear weapon would be so destabilizing? n is. because of what iraq it is a state that is the poster child for state sponsorship of terrorism weather in southern iraq or the gaza strip or in lebanon. is state like that with a nuclear weapon would be unacceptable and a grave danger. iran, that regime is under a lot of pressure from sanctions. i do believe it is a regime that

has lost all legitimacy. it is a population that is 7% under the age of 30 -- 70%. it is hard for me to see how in the long want that -- it is stable with that regime in power in iran. the iranians did not agree to what we would like them to agree to? if we do not want to face the president -- to face the hard choice of having to use military force than the iranians have to believe that he will use military force. that's the only thing that will change their view. president obama has said he has a military option and he will use it. he does not bluff. the chatter around him is not helpful. that undermines the message that

there is a useful military option and that we will use it. the nine states where not tolerate an iranian nuclear weapon -- the united states will not tolerate an iranian nuclear weapon. >> thank you so much, secretary rice. if you would like to share your thoughts with us on what is going on in china. the biggest political scandal in decades. >> what is striking to me about the case and i do not think we know what happened there and the depth of it. it raises some questions about the strains of institutions in

the provinces and the strength of rule of law, which i think raises questions about how one achieves the rule of law under authoritarianism. how open the discussion of it has been in china. it is lighting up the blogosphere. at suggest there's a chinese population the craves information about what is going on in this country, that is determined to know what is going on in the country. when people know what is going on and they are interested in what is going on, they start to want to do something about what is going on. that presents a challenge to the chinese leadership, particularly if they prepare the 2012 party congress. we have to say china has achieved legitimacy based on prosperity at this point.

the genesee based on press. -- the genesee. people become concerned about those who drive around in f erraris. the state is supposed to be dedicated to social equality. china has a lot of challenges. if we're in the meeting rooms, people might be asking how the political structures could accommodate some of these, now becoming gorbachev. tried to reform from the top and you wind up collapsing the system. i think the big question is, what does it say about china itself and how politics gets done and the relationship

between provincial leaders and the center and how the chinese people will respond to what is in fact one of the biggest political scandals in their history. >> we have time for one more question. >> hi. i wanted to ask how you think the u.s.-indian relations it is panning out? this was a big success for the bush administration. i wonder how you feel it has gone and where it is going. >> thank you very much. i think the relationship with india is a key two or three related that we need to invest in. have brazil and turkey where we need to invest, and we need to invest in india. it is not easy. for some many years, it defined itself in a sense of a

distinction to american power. movement was that way and the tilt for the soviet union. that will not change overnight. it is changing in the indian business community. when you talk to people from mumbai, they are interested in what can be done to create innovation. there is so much activity back- and-forth between india and the silicon valley that you cannot count how many. underneath the governmental relations, a lot is happening that will change the character of the u.s.-indian engagement. even though there may be some disappointments, the civil nuclear it will stall as people

evaluate nuclear energy, the civil nuclear deal was not just about nuclear energy. it was about high-technology and the ability to share high technology with one of the most innovative and creative states on the globe. we do engage india -- we need to engage india because india list in that neighborhood. i believe if we stay with it and we encourage not just governmental engagement but engagement across the population and across the business community, we will find that those barnacles, you will, to define india will start to

fall away. we will have a good and reliable democratic allyl south asia. india was the first country to contribute to the democratic fund in the u.n. we did relief for the tsunami with india and australia. military to military exchanges are going forward. we have to be patient. this will not promote votes at the u.n. to mark in our favor. this is a relationship that if we stay the course and pushed, we will continue to make way with one of the remarkable democracies in the world.

>> i am sure i am speaking on behalf of everyone here today of how thankful we are that you can get to speak with us. it has been a while since you've been in this hall. the last time you were here you were secretary of state. we hope this is not the last time that you come. you have an open invitation. you have either people here across the nation and across the world. we thank you for your service. i thank you for your time that i work for you. i remember working on the democracy fund issue very well. i take it once again for coming here today and for your future service in your ongoing service to the country. please join me in thanking her once again.

[applause] >> this event comes to a close. secretary rice wrote her memoirs last year, "no higher honor." she was on book tv to talk about it. mitt romney and newt gingrich will address the national rifle association's annual meeting in st. louis today. live coverage begins at 2:00 p.m. today eastern. rick perry and scott walker will also be there.

that event will also be live on c-span radio and c-span.org. sunday, the executive director of the -- a look at the 2012 u.s. senate races. 33 seats are up for election this fall. >> the pope has a specific way to be determined. the pope handpicks this person. this person decides when the pope is deaad. he calls out his baptismal name three times. this is a carryover from the romans. the pope is not dead until he says he is dead.

>> the ever-changing description of death. organ harvesting is blurring the line. arlen specter on the split between old-guard members of his party and those supported by the tea party. but tv -- boook tv on cspan2. >> congress was called on to extend funding. rahm emanuel was chief of staff in the obama administration. the funding runs out in the end of may. this is about 40 minutes.

>> good morning. we are going to get started. we have a very full morning. i hope you had a good night's sleep. to know what the bank was called recently? a sleepy enclave. does this feel like a sleepy enclave? i do not think so. anyway, we had a terrific day yesterday. president clinton spoke. he gave a spectacular speech yesterday -- speech yesterday. i was able to attend a number of the sessions on china. i had a discussion about the economy. we had strong panels on nigeria. i know we have a large delegation from nigeria here.

today we have been equally exciting morning. we will be shortly hearing from secretary john bryson and mere rahm emanuel. we of -- near rahm emanuel. we have sessions decided -- assigned to look at how the world has changed economically, considering the arab spring, and some of the forces we need to think about both from a business point of view, and understanding the global trends that are happening. it will also have a panel on a global infrastructure, which will keep power in our global economy. for many years, the united states and the world relied on the u.s. consumer. those days are largely behind us. we will look at an era of infrastructure that will really power our global economy and our

own economy. speaking of which, yesterday, the commerce department released export numbers. we exported $181 billion in february alone. that was a great height. [applause] >> to put it in perspective, one year ago it was $165 billion. it is a strong increase. we are exporting over $2.1 trillion on an annual rate right now. some quick things i want to announce -- one of the things we have done, those of you that have worked at the bank, had been working hard on this, greater customer focus. we announced greater credit

express, a new small business lending product. we've launched that. when we see you next year, we will have rolled this out in a robust fashion. i'm excited by that. just this week, we have been working for the last week -- year for -- with secretary lahood and his colleagues and the department of transportation, and have come up with a new plan for our larger exporters where we will have greater transparency, and more information on how u.s. exports could be done more economically so we need the goal of doubling exports and creating more jobs in the bed states. all of this is part of what we want to deal, giving our workers a competitive edge, and as we

called the conference last year, moving government at the speed of business. he will now hear from secretary john bryson and i was pleased that within one week of the secretary being confirmed, he and i set down for lunch and map of how to work better together. more importantly, i thought, for ex-im bank, but it is rare to have the commerce secretary that is also a customer of the bank. when john was in the private sector at edison, we financed the project in indonesia. the good news is they paid back the loan, so we like that, and created a lot of jobs. john is a satisfied customer, and we were dissatisfied banker. he recently led a trade mission to india. we saw lot of infrastructure opportunities there. he will introduce rahm emanuel.

rahm emanuel and i have been friends for 19 years. we met just before he was married, and he and his wife had three spectacular children. i will only say that in politics it is often important to have a rabbi, not just the spiritual leader, but someone that is able to guide you through things, did you council and coaching, and rahm emanuel was very helpful in my first appointment with president clinton at the small business administration. i felt fortunate not going to have a rabbi in rahm emanuel, but to have a jewish rabbi, which led to greater credibility. he will be speaking to you this morning. we are working closely with the city of chicago. we have an office there. rahm emanuel is very much

looking at chicago has a point of export, is engaging in the rest of the world. we see that in port cities like new york, seattle, and he is taking in exporting to a hold of our level in chicago. without further ado, let me bring out my good friend and colleague, john bryson, secretary of commerce. [applause] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] >> well, thank you, fred. it is a great pleasure in welcoming all of you to this second day of this critically important, and also wonderful and will conference. i am going to jump right into what i do with the commerce secretary. i will tie it into what we are most focused on here, and that

is ex-im bank and the critical role it plays. it will not surprise you that i think a principal priority of mine is increasing u.s. exports. we want to do everything we can to help american companies do what i say every time, and that is build it here, and sell it everywhere. the national export initiative, and i think most of you know this, that the president launched two years ago which it at the time it was extraordinarily bold red the focus was dublin within five -- bold to do that. the focus was to double within five years. there are plenty of challenges ahead. we are on the road. we have to make ex-im bank possible. if we cannot have ex-im bank to go where we need to go, this

will be in the direction of impossible. let me touch on a few things. fred gave you a few statistics. u.s. exports of goods and services, last year, 2011, hit an all-time record of $2.1 called -- trillion. we announced year-to-date exports for january and february are up 8.5% over 2011 levels. one other key point, from 2009, to 2011, the number of export- supported jobs increased to 1.2 million. that is a really important number in this economy. we know is that those export-

related jobs pay higher than the average -- that those export- related jobs pay higher than the average ex-im bank had a wreck -- average. ex-im bank had a record year. ex-im bank does this at no cost to taxpayers. ex-im bank has generated revenue for the u.s. treasury since the 1990's. that is what you call smart government. re-authorizing the ex-im bank should be straightforward, sound, in a truly simple decision for the congress. i think it is important to put it this way -- losing ex-im bank at a time when america's businesses and workers are just getting back on their feet would be deeply unacceptable. so, as fred said, the commerce

apartment and ex-im bank are close partners. i want to give one example of how we are working together. india's economy has grown at an annual rate of about 8% in recent years. their cities and populations are growing at a rate of unparalleled now among the largest countries. so, india has an ambitious plan to invest $1 trillion in infrastructure over the last five years -- next five years. two years ago, as fred suggested, i led a group of businesses to india on my first trade mission as commerce secretary. my message was simple. american companies have deep experience in building our own complex infrastructure here in the west. we can find a mutually beneficial ways -- in the u.s.

we can find mutually beneficial ways to help our indian partners do the same, creating jobs in both countries. here is an important fact. ex-im bank supported about 3 billion u.s. exports to india just last year. two companies with us included ge energy, who signed a contract for a 2.4 did what project. it is critically needed. very large scale. ex-im bank financed that significant and incredibly important project. looking for, the commerce department and the ex-im bank will work closely with businesses like yours to build

stronger bridges around the world. this is a team effort. leaders throughout the country are playing a key role, in particular, great cities are crucial to driving export. i am very pleased to introduce the extraordinary nature of one of them, come and -- mayor of one of them, a man that needs no introduction. rahm emanuel is remarkably talented, colorful, and in the words of "new york times" columnist david brooks, he is always passionately promoting some policy idea, something he cares deeply about, and cares deeply -- deeply believes in. he was born and raised in chicago, became active in local and state politics, came to the

white house in the clinton white house, served three terms in the congress, and as all of you know he went on to become the white house chief of staff for our president, president obama, where he did clearly remarkable things. during his tenure, he helped orchestrate the passage of key milestones such as the economic recovery act, wall street reform, healthcare reform, increasing access and decrease in cost for millions of americans. he played a crucial role in securing a bipartisan compromise hat saved 140,000 teachers' jobs. in 2011, he was elected to come home, elected the 55th mayor of chicago. if you read about him over the last year, you know he hit the ground running, bringing quick

action in bold ideas to the city. in fact, since rahm emanuel became mayor, more than 25 countries -- companies have announced they will be creating jobs in chicago, ind nearly 15,000 jobs have been created through initiatives he has championed. is the tough choices to restore the city's economic health. he is worked to increase transparency in communication with the people of chicago, and he is helping chicago pro- business, including exporters do what they do best, which is growth and create jobs. so, please, help me welcome to the podium, chicago mayor from emanuel -- rahm emanuel. [applause] >> thank you, mr. secretary. thank you for those kind words.

it is moments like that you wish your parents were here, because you know your mother would be proud and your father would be amazed. i also want to say to spread -- fred, we will go there since we of know each other for 20 years, right now i think there are rabbis across america go pain, seeing if they could raise the standard of -- gulping, see if they could raise the standard. thank you for those kind words, and for the opportunity to speak and address a very important topic. let me say up front one thing. now that i'm no longer part of washington, back home in chicago, and also as a person who helps two presidents on

major trade pacts -- one of my stance with president clinton was helping bill daley see nafta through completion. also, when i ran for congress, i was for free trade agreements, and when i worked with president obama, helping in the early stages to finalize pieces related to south korea, getting that agreement back on track, working with others in the administration. i'm a believer in opening markets to goods made here in america. now, the secretary has his way of saying things, so it would be unacceptable to not reauthorize the ex-im bank. i think it would be foolish not to reauthorize the ex-im bank. he did not open up banks around the world and then not finance

the opportunity to seize market share. the two go hand-in head -- in- in-hand. he would be counter to any business plan to not have the financing in place to seize market share. take south korea as one example. in a time which america did not have that agreement, the eu and others reached the agreement, and south korea became the 10th largest economy in the world. we're coming in late. we had better product, made better, but to get a market share we lost in need of financing arm so our companies are not at a distant -- disadvantage. i was hoping congress will come to an agreement so we do not fumble the ball on the 50-yard line. that makes no sense. as a superpower, you cannot

operate this way. to open up markets in colombia, panama, south korea, each of those countries will have different parts of america's product come there, but the financing is essential. in chicago we are about to launch an initiative as it relates to exports, setting a goal or the next five years to double exports around the world, which will create in the chicago-area 100,000 jobs. to do that without the ex-im bank would not be possible. we are the third largest city in america, yet we are ranked 10th in exports. that means we have a low base. we can improve we will do it, and i will lay out some of the ideas we will do to achieve that goal with the ex-im bank as a

strategic partner. i want to accentuate it. i want to use it to it's full ability. chicago and illinois have benefited from ex-im bank, including companies like boeing, caterpillar, john deere, and that is a good thing. there are other companies in the chicago area that have benefited. to achieve the goal we have set as a city, over the next five years -- and exports, which will help us create over 100,000 jobs, i need to take advantage of three other strategic advantages of the city of chicago. we are the center of flat roofs manufacturing companies. the midwest is. the chicago area is. there has been a focus on those businesses opening up around the world to other markets. basically, we have about 100,000

companies with 500 or less the employees. we are the center for the country of the flat roof manufacturers. for them to gain market share, open up in other countries where they do not have access to day, they need the resources that come with ex-im bank, the capacity and financing that comes with ex-im bank. they cannot get there because they do not have the of the structure to do it otherwise in- house. that will be a central part of our strategy. let me roll back a little and take one step back. about seven months ago, i said what is our plan for the city of chicago over the next 10 years? in my own view, while chicago his huge strategic advantages, and i want to give you one example -- the average four-year

college population in the city is 20%. in chicago it is 34%. we have a skilled workforce with a midwest work ethic. we have another huge advantages. we are losing those of vantage is. our productivity, our educational advantage. what is our business plan? i do not want to experience what happened for the country, another lost decade. we cannot afford it. i pulled together chicago, our nonprofits, a our academic institutions, partnered with the brookings institute and mckenzie, to lay out a plan that says what are our main goals, and how do i make sure that as we make decisions we are marching towards achieving those goals? there were a number of them laid out. we have 10 specific goals of which exports word seemed to

beat -- were seen to be as a low-lying free for the media job growth of -- fruit for immediate job growth. there are things that are not being fully materialized and realize for job growth and economic activity. first, chicago is the england of the -- inland hub of america. if you are in new york, it makes sense why you look to europe. chicago is the inland hub of america. it is a transportation, distribution, and logistic juggernaut in america. if it runs on a rail, roads, or brown rice, chicago has a role to play. 25% of all cargo on rail comes

to chicago. the airport, the second busiest in the country, but the only with both major carriers operating out of. you can get anywhere in the world or anywhere in the country directly. we are also the center where broadband runs. and a host of level we are a juggernaut, -- on a host of levels we are a juggernaut, the best never been extended for an export strategy, gaining more market share. secondly, i already told you about our work force, the education levels that are essential. one of the pieces -- great four- year institutions, higher education institutions. one of the 75,000 people go to our community colleges. -- 175,000 people go to our community colleges.

one of the things we have done is we are changing community colleges, picking six -- six growth fields. malcolm >> will only do healthcare from now on, -- malcolm x college will lead to health care now. dibble develop the curriculum, the professors who will train the students so they will be exports to be in the 85,000 jobs over the next decade that will come on in health care. all scripps is training health care. the other fields will be professional services, culinary and hospitality, i.t., and also the advanced manufacturing. right now, in chicago, we have about 1000 jobs in the chicago

area that are open in the industrial maintenance area and we do not have the skilled work force to six -- to make them. those are the people that fix the problems that get exported from the world. while chicago lost manufacturing jobs come out its own in advance and effective. how do i accentuate that? our committee college will train the workers to the industrial maintenance and have the skill base in that area. one school will be dedicated for that. the industrial manufacturers will develop the curriculum, do the training, so when a worker comes out of one of our community colleges, they will know that the curriculum and the training they did -- and in the same way, i will say this is no different in my view, it is a

false choice to think that only a four-year institution -- you need all skills. dow works with kellogg in developing the curriculum at northwestern so the graduates are the people that can come work at dow. that should not be any different for a person coming out of malcolm x that should give people the same skill base. third, and essential to this in the infrastructure space that i talked about, we are launching about $7.3 billion of infrastructure spending in the city of chicago over the next

three years that will create 30,000 jobs. we are replacing 1,000 miles of water pipe -- everything 100 years or older will be replaced. 750 miles of sewer will be replaced or realigned. they will be totally replaced or rebuilt. we of the two largest water filtration systems. those will be rebuilt. all of that savings, to the will year's worth of water that we lose through leaking pipes will actually be considered, and our savings from water, sewer, the catch basins, will also be creating 18,000 jobs over the next decade -- alone.

we will be rebuilding a new chicago, and that skill base, what other countries are going on and infrastructure build, we will gather that skill base and our companies will have the skill base to compete for what goes on in india, colombia, nigeria, vietnam. as we are rebuilding here in america, not only are we rebuilding america, we are getting a skill sets to compete for infrastructure projects in markets around the world. the architectural, engineering expertise for water. i think water will be important in the next 30 years, as important as energy has been for less 30 years. if we sit on the great lakes. i want the expertise in chicago. in addition to setting a goal, and partnering with ex-im bank to focus on the small manufacturing companies in the city of chicago, to begin to

develop in those markets around the world -- we will be doing a conference with ex-im bank to set goals and market share. a lot of these companies who do exports only export to one country. the reason they came across as was coincidence. when it comes to exporting it should not be a coincidence. it should be a business plan. to win in the 21st century, it cannot be an accident or coincidence. it has to be a business strategy. axiom will use chicago as its test market to develop the small companies, what boeing, john deere, microsoft knows about ex- im. you need them as a partner. they will be partners for the

small manufacturers of chicago with market share in the countries around the world looking for american made products. we will do the conference, the partnership, the financing focused on those mid-level companies. in addition, i am converting our sister city program and asking each one of our sister cities and our -- in our initiative to come up with a plan to expand market share in those cities. as mayors we have a sister city programs. usually the other mayors coming, we exchanged gifts, talk, take a picture, and that is it. i think as you can gather from my speech, i do not find that very exciting. we will turn the sister city program. we have sister city programs with shanghai, in new delhi,

moscow, toronto, and germany put the biggest port city, 28 on five continents, but they have never been organized with a clear business strategy for the city's economy and businesses in the city to accentuate and gain market share. each of them will report back in the next three months with a business time specific. what do we do to maximize opportunities there? not just more flights, not just another photo. they are great. i love taking photos, but if i want to do that, i go to a wedding. we have never used our relationship to maximize as a city our business opportunities around, and the city partnership with ex-im will be a key piece to that.

leslie, let me say this. as we modernized -- modernize our infrastructure and using ex- im as a partner, each of these are part of a strategy that is complementary. using chicago's strength with its workforce, as the only inland city with market share. it is the only city that looks out, with the distribution system that allows it to look out, but into america. the work force as highly skilled, highly motivated. it is the center of flat roof manufacturing. it did not lose in the advanced manufacturing jobs the pace the rest of the manufacturing sector

lost. how to organize those aspects to expand our market share to achieve what i think it is -- i think is an achievable goal -- one that president obama said for the country. there were skeptics three years ago that there was no way america could export itself to growth. use that same metro, five years, double, -- metro, five years, double, one of the thousand jobs will come to the city of chicago. we are marching along to make sure that from the destruction, to job-training, from skill- based development, to export growth. we are not point to have our own export policy, but we will have our own export strategy, and ex- im will be a key partners in helping us achieve that. as i said, we are 10th as it

relates to exports, but we are the third largest city in america. we of great potential. our base is low. our capacity is great. i am honored, and it is not unusual that you would have a mayor come here. it might is something about my life. i checked into my hotel last night, and i got caught watching president clinton on c-span, watching your former boss on c- span, but that said he laid out a vision for the country. today, there are about 50 cities in the world that are the main competitors and economic drivers. chicago is one of them. to seize the next decade for the people of chicago, we, too, has to have the business strategy, and growing our exports as part of our economy is essential.

at making sure that the manufacturers are in chicago can stay there and grow their means i have to give them better infrastructure, better skilled workers to pull from, and greater markets to go seize. we are now putting in place a strategy to move up from 10th to where we belong on that listing of american cities with an export-driven economy. it has worked for boeing. i'm happy, because boeing is based in chicago. it has worked for caterpillar, an illinois-based company. it is worth 4 john deere, another illinois-based company. -- it has worked for john deere, another illinois-based company. we want to make it work for the companies that have 500 or less employees in the chicago area to have an export strategy that is beyond zero or one country,

taking the capabilities of ex- im, the marketing strategy, and have the city function with ex- im so chicago can move on to its proper rank, using all the assets of people, skills, technology, to gain greater market share. thank you very much. [applause] >> a reminder, republican presidential candidates mitt romney and newt gingrich are at the national rifle association annual meeting today. live coverage begins at 2:00 p.m. eastern. also appearing rick santorum and house republican leader eric cantor. it will be live on c-span radio and at c-span.org. >> our specific mission is to work to see to it that human rights remain an essential component of american foreign

policy. and, that when we are evaluating our foreign policy moves globally, human rights can never be the only consideration, but it has to be part of the dialogue. >> the president and ceo of the foundation for some rights and justice -- >> when we abandon our deepest values, and whether we are talking about torture as it relates to the war and terror, or the policy with russia, and the upcoming issue of whether or not the u.s. commerce should pass the accountability act, which we do not need to go to the details of, but whether or not we will stay on record as saying date matter in russia, they matter in china. >> more, sunday night at 8:00 p.m. on c-span's "q&a." >> this year's studentcam

competition as students across the country what part of the constitution was important to them and why. today's third prize winner selected the 14th amendment. >> as husbands, fathers, mothers of working women, i believe we recognize the gross inequity of discrimination in pay-based john deere. >> what is gender discrimination? >> is known as a bias towards a person based on gender. >> it is important that we equalize those disparities, especially when there's so many women working. >> the equal protection clause of the 14th amendment basically states that no citizen should be stripped by any restore process of the law. this can be detected by protection of discrimination of any form. senators are working on passing the work force enforcement act.

the wia helps unemployed women find jobs. although the future is not clear, perhaps there will be more legislation regarding gender discrimination. the legislation tells the lives of the citizens of for -- effected. >> we do not want to see loved ones discriminated against based on their gender. >> congress has put two laws on the block -- title 7 of 1964, and the equal pay act of 1963. >> although it is not certain if future legislation will be effective in the future, some people find it comforting to have cnetere to resolve discrimination cases. >> even though many loss seven put into action, the debate is on -- lots into action, the

debate is whether the constitution because protect women from gender discrimination. supreme court justice antonin scalia does not believe women are protected by the constitution. he shares his viewpoint in an interview. he says "the constitution does not discourage it require discrimination on the basis of sex. the only issue is whether it prohibits it. it does not. nobody ever thought that is what it meant. nobody ever voted for that. >> i want to be protected by the constitution, because i did not want to be discriminated against. >> there are other interpretations on whether women are protected by the constitution from changed -- from gender discrimination. >> it basically says that every man and woman should be equally protected. >> there are over 20,000 gender discrimination cases filed each year.

a few famous cases focused on pay discrimination. walmart vs dukes' started when there was a complaint about gender discrimination. she claims there was a violation to title 7 in the civil rights act of 1964. the debate leads us to one thing in general, the pay gap. >> that would be about the gap and pay, money that men make in relation to what women make for the same work. >> the bureau of labor statistics says itself the do not control for many factors that could be significant in explaining turning differences. if you factor in of severable choices such as part-time work, seniority, and occupational choice, the pay gap stands between 5% and 7%.

>> how much does the average woman make to the average man? >> women still earn 77 cents for every dollar earned by a man appeared >> in 2010, the weekly median earnings was $669, while for men it was $821. so, what is the effect of the pay gap? >> i think that oftentimes workers are in staff roles which do not pay as well in a revenue- generating position. that is the fed the matter. >> sheryl barnes -- de ceo of yahoo!, kraft foods, and pepsi are a few women admitted into the ceo ranks.

>> only 2% of the ceo's are women. not 50%, but to%. only about 10 of them are at the senior level. there has to be barriers somewhere. i do not believe it is nefarious ceo's, board of directors, or senior executives keeping women down. i think some of it is stereotypes, but most of it is that we as women are not putting ourselves in the positions we need to begin to move into those levels. >> while the average earnings for women still lags behind men, in 2009 female ceo's received raises of nearly 30%, while male ceo's took pay cuts. >> one of the great things that has happened over time is the ability of government to make sure that justice is done. i am proud to have supported the proposals that allow women a

fair day's pay for a fair day's work, which will affect both women and men. >> there are still barriers that affect men and women. one of the barriers is the glass ceiling. the glass ceiling is the metaphorical term used to describe the unseen barrier that prevents women from reaching the top of the corporate ladder, and it can describe barriers for but in general. -- women in general. although gender discrimination seems to be a thing of the past, many see it today. >> the findings you are seeing today revealed the glass ceiling exists. >> they're still contrasting viewpoints on the glass ceiling. >> from what i have found is that it truly was just a metaphor, and there is no glass ceiling. you look above you, and you see a ceiling, but it is not made of glass, right?

>> it is not a glass ceiling effected when in. the real glass ceiling is the choices that men and women are socialized to make. >> since the glass ceiling is a metaphor, are there barriers for people of different genders? >> sure, there are. even for white men, there are still barriers. >> there are existing barriers. how can they be prevented? the debate and gender discrimination will still go on, even the laws are enforced to protect women from gender discrimination. no matter what, one thing is for sure. no state shall make or enforce any law that shall abridge or deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of the law.

>> go to some didn't -- studentcam.org to watch all the winning videos. >> coming up, we will go live to tampa, florida, for remarks from president obama on trade policy with latin america. you can see the president live starting at 1:20 p.m. eastern. until then, a discussion on a study that challenges the cost of the health-care bill. host: let me introduce you to our first guest, charles blahous, a public trustee and based in george mason university in the washington area as senior scholar. he spent sop time at the national economic council under president bush and has a career in public policy and exhibition. thank you for being here.

you've made some news about your analysis on the health care law and its ultimate costs. what are your findings? guest: well what i try to do is give something of a before and after picture of the health care law just basically measuring where would the budget be if this law had never been passed and where is it now and how do they compare. and what i found is that the law will add about $340 follow the federal deficits over the next 10 years, about $1.15 trillion in net federal spending over the next 10 years and that's under a optimistic scenario in which all the cost savings work out as planned. host: that number contrasts with the analysis by the congressional budget which found that it would reduce the deficit. how can you be so far apart? thet: it's the crux of paper in some respects because i think my deficit different result is not because i disagree with congressional budget office. i use the congressional budget office as a basis of my own work. what the congressional budget office does is something different from what i did.

they score the effects of legislation relative to a score keeping convention, a hypothetical baseline scenario and that baseline scenario was different from actual law. c.b.o. in their publications is very transparent and explicit about this. they say these are the score keeping conventions we're directed to use. we're differ from the actual law in the following respects and these are the findings. when i was reading through it, i thought this is very interesting in the sense that i had not seen anyone conduct an analysis of the effect on the budget relative to the literal change in law and no one seemed to have done that. so while the c.b.o. analysis, i have no problems with it and i am exemplary with it in my study, they ask a different question than the one i ask. i ask how does this budget fact -- how does the law effect finances relative to previous law. host: the medicare systems have two public trustee, one republican and one republican.

-- one republican and one democrat. the white house was challenged that president obama ok'ed your point and here you are as a major critic of the cost of his big initiative. his response was he doesn't sigh subsidy your intellectual direction and he says however, your numbers with motivated with the timing. guest: i have not entered into a lot of impassioned policy controversy surrounding the law. there's all sorts of controversies surrounding the health care law from the constitutionality of the purchase mandate to whether the new independent payment advisory board is a good thing or a bad thing. will people be able to keep their employer provided insurance under the law?

all these controversies and i don't have not expressed any opinions about the merits of the policy choices in the law. i have calked study on a very narrow fiscal point which is what is the net effect on the law on the federal budget and i try to stay out of everything else. host: i ask you whether or not it would be only to do a simple sort of back of the envelope calculation for people so they could understand how you came to the analysis. can you do that for us? guest: i can try. this is what i've come up with. but basically, the c.b.o. score in 2011, in 2011, found that relative to the score keeping convention, the law would put us $210 billion to the good, basically. now that was before the suspension of this one provision of the law, the class program which has since been suspended. host: which is long-term health care insurance and they were hoping many americans would buy into that and there would be an increased revenue, correct? guest: right. c.b.o. and everyone else agrees we no longer expect these

savings from this program that we're credited this program to arrive during the first 10 years. so if you adjust last year's analyst for that -- analysis -- then we get to what's the difference between the c.b.o. analysis which is relative to a score keeping convening and my analysis which is relative to prior law. and there's about a $475 billion difference between those things. and so that puts us from $123 billion to the bad -- or to the good to about $350 billion to the bad. and i also give credit for about $6 billion of savings beyond what c.b.o. did. host: so from a policy perspective, big issue driving the numbers in the health care law is what? guest: i would say it's the fact that the new cost commitments under the legislation substantially exceed the cost savings under the legislation. there's a lot of parts of this law and many of them costs a lot of money.

there's a very substantial expansion of medicaid and ship that costs hundreds of billons of dollars over the first 10 years. there is the creation of these new health exchanges and the subsidies costs hundreds and billons of dollars. there's an extension of expansion of the spending authority of the medicare program. it would be able to send out full benefit payments for many more years. so that is a new spending commitment or certainly an extended spending commitment that costs real must be so you -- money. and you add all of the savings together and the new costs exceed the cost savings by over $340 billion even in a best case scenario. host: we want to open up our phone lines. the cost on the health care law vs. its benefits. and we would like to involve you in this discussion. our guest is -- we're going to talk policy with him if you'd like. phone lines are open. you can also tweet us @c-spanwj. i described your job. tell people what the public

trusty are responsible for? guest: sure. we finance social security and medicare programs. there radio six trustees. four of them are government trustees. secretary of treasury, secretary of labor, secretary of h.h.s. and the commissioner of social security. in 1983, they were -- two were added. my fellow public trusty, the democrat is robert riceshower who i have a wonderful relationship and i'm very privileged to work with him and with the other trustees. and the public trusty positions were added in the 1983 reforms out of a sense that there needed to be two eyes from the public looking over the shoulder of the government trusties and vouching for the projections, the expression they use was furthering public confidence in the projections. i have been a student of the trustees projects and i've before in support of it and my experience as been so positive and the high opinion i have of

the process prior to becoming a trusty as been more than validated by my experience. host: so trusties in your opinion now looking at the -- from the outside and now being inside do a job for the public? guest: absolutely. and i will say this is a little bit of cheerleading for the trustees process but there are a lot of things in government that have very difficult to project. economic cycles, budgetary consequences but if you look back at the history going back years before i became a trusty, if you look at the social security projections in particular, by the standards of government projections, you've been remarkably accurate. we've had a pretty accurate picture of the unfolding social security financial problem for several decades and that's a great credit to the work of the activists and the objectives of the trustees process. host: i want to get the public involved here. let's begin with a call from

texas. pete, you're on. good morning. caller: good morning. it's a pleasure to talk to you. i started my business in 1969 when i put up my first production plant i turned over the business to my two sons in 1999. and there was about 700 workers and employees we had. what we're facing is all these high taxes. obama's going to raise the tax to 39.6%. and there's a 3.8% surcharge on people like us that are making business. there's also a medicare -- an additional 3.8% on medicare with no ceiling. so that ends up at 47.2% marginal tax bracket. now you have eight to 10% state and local taxes and that's damn near 60%. so what we have decided, we've just about had it with this government and this president so my question to you is have you decided as to how many businesses are going to shut

down because of this health care law? because i told my sons why in the hell should they work for the government when you put it on an hourly basis seven to eight hours a day with these strictly far government? that's my question to you. how many people are going to shut down their business because of their health care law? host: got it, pete. thank you. guest: well, i guess the short answer to the last part of that question is that i have not done that analysis. what i've done is a very narrow analysis of just what is the fiscal effect of the legislation? what i show is the legislation on balance is going to add to the federal deficit of course, no one can say for certain how we're going to finance the mushroom and federal deficits that's out there. that's a very difficult thing to assess the impact of but what i've shown is the net effect of the law is to add to federal thoughts. you made one mention of the

additional 3.8% tax under the legislation that's referred to as the so-called medicare unearned income contribution. if you look ultimately down the line, we would be projecting more of that tax. whether that would be political sustainable, i do not know. it certainly should not be presumed that all of that revenue is going to materialize because we could end up with the alternative minimum tax. there is substantial pressure in congress to relax it from one year to the next. host: a question on twitter.

guest: the answer is no. i cannot explain any of that. i have no insight into health care stocks. host: i think the point of the question is the private sector attempting to bend the cost curve is seeing profits and this is a very good business. guest: yes. there are a lot of policy controversies. this cuts to a point that i want to make. a lot of people supported and opposed this health care law for different reasons that are very important. what i have tried to do is stay out of that policy arguments. there are many reasons why this health care reform law was undertaken. not all of the provisions of the law are necessarily bad. what is it going to do to federal financing?

host: a question here from an op-ed says -- here is the paragraph. i bring this up because the objective that everybody in the system seems to have it is bending the cost curve. guest: exactly. i make a point by saying there are two important arguments. its effects to the federal deficit and the effect on total

costs. this law fails both tests. it would add to costs and exacerbate deficit. obviously, the motivation and goals of health care reform our various. there were multiple objectives for health care reform including humanitarian objectives of trying to accomplish a lot of different things. with respect to the fiscal yardsticks, the effects on spending and deficit spending those are the few things that the left and the right have agreed on. we need to bend the cost curve downward. host: our next phone call is from california. a democrat, you are on the air. caller: good morning. i am sitting here watching the

program and it is scary because i am on dialysis. medicare has done away with everything and i will not be able to live because i will not be able to afford my treatment. it is important to me that health care stay intact as well as social security. i just wish you would rethink it because it helps me when i get dialysis to afford it. thank you. guest: beyond a very compelling story that the caller just gave, this is very important to the point of my paper. medicare finances are in important part of this equation. there is a bipartisan commitment to upholding the solvency of medicare.

one of the effects of the affordable care act is to extend the solvency, the measured solvency of the hospital insurance program from 2016 to 2024. what it means is that the measures that the congress has to take in order to keep medicare solvent are now somewhat relaxed going forward because we are showing medicare to be solvent for eight additional years. that is not in the fact that is accounted for in the scorekeeping convention showing a favorable score for the law. i would say that with respect to the viability of medicare, you have a bipartisan commitment to upholding that. i do think the caller should remain confident that the medicare system will be kept solvent as it has for several

decades. host: sasha asks on twitter -- guest: the way that -- the way i would respond to that is by saying if you were to say what is the net cost of no negotiations for drug prices relative to what we have, i would have to say the answer is 0. what was established was a system of competition between private plans with direct negotiation by the government to hold down costs for medicare part d. it has certainly added to the federal cost commitments.

one cannot fault with what was done with holding down those costs. the cost of medicare part d have come in considerably lower than what was projected. in terms of the net cost relative to alternative choices, i think medicare part d is one of the few places where prices have come under budget. host: this was a big policy initiative. did you support it? guest: i was working on social security at the time. we have wonderful people we worked with at that time. they all were important health care experts. at that time, i was working on social security and retirement policy. host: next is winston-salem. you are on. caller: thank you for taking my call.

my question is for mental health. medicare has a cap of 190 days lifetime. we well know that is discriminatory. is that going to be eliminated with this new health care policy? no one seems to be able to answer this question. maybe this guest can answer this. guest: i think the honest answer is i do not know the answer to the question. i have no knowledge or expectation that this law has changed that but there could be something i am not aware of that speaks to this. host: from an accounting perspective, this question asks -- guest: that is a great question. here is how i would put it. i think cbo would say theirs is

not the best case scenario but their best guess of probabilities, pros and cons. what i would say about my papers -- i have put together three scenarios. they certainly do not span the full spectrum of possibilities. they measure best case and worst case from the standpoint of legislative risk. future congresses uphold all of the cost savings envisioned in this law. the pessimistic scenario is one in which congress acts more like they have in the past. you could have participation by -- for these new health exchanges that go far afield. guest: i would say my numbers do

not contradict cbo's. we are asking and answering different questions. i support and use the methodologies and assumptions that cbo has put forward. they have scored the law relative to a particular scorekeeping convention. i have scored it relative to prior law. there is really no conflict between the two analyses. host: west virginia, good morning. caller: as i recall, medicare was enacted in 1964. i would like to know the difference between the projected cost that medicare was going to be and the actual cost that occurred. i would also like to know what the effect of lawsuits have on

the cost of health care today, especially in the pharmaceutical industry. host: thank you. caller: this is actually a very important question in the sense that costs for new programs like medicare almost always end up being a lot more than envisioned. sometimes the cost of what was previously enacted wind up more than what was previously projected. back in the 1960's, we had one picture of how cost inflation was going to be. health care cost inflation has been much higher than that. that is one reason why costs have come in higher. there is the tendency once government programs are established for congress to expand them. social security is a fantastic example. when it was first created, it did not have cost of living

adjustments, disability, and a lot of things that it has now. it did not have a much more generous formula that social security has today. this is very important for the evaluation of this health care law because it sets up a new program of subsidies for health insurance purchased on exchanges. it is very likely the cost of that will be higher than what we are projecting. host: to give you a sense of our debate, here is "the washington post" -- right below that, the headline from "usa today" -- on twitter, james asks you -- guest: i doubt it is morris and 50%. -- it is more than 50%.

in social security, the potential fraud is limited because you are sending direct payments to people and administrative costs are low. even in medicare, the vast majority of payments are appropriate payments. there is always work undergoing to make sure fraud is tracked down. there have been instances over the years of a fraud being discovered. i have a lot of concerns about the medicare program but it runs relatively well in terms of taxpayers getting value for their money. host: dr. charles blahous works at a think tank. >> we are leaving this segment

and we will go to president obama goins in tampa, florida. is talking about trade relations among u.s. and latin american countries. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ >> thank you. hello, tampa. . [applause] it is good to be here in tampa, good to be in florida. i just got a tour of this magnificent court. port. i was hoping to try one of the cranes. [laughter] the secret service would not let me. they don't let me have fun. there were more concerned about your safety than mine because [laughter]

they did not want me missing anything up. i want to thank david for that introduction. i want to thank mayor bought cor - buckhorn for welcome us to tampa and an outstanding member of congress, kathy castor, for joining us today [applause] if you have chairs, feel free to sit down. some of you do. it is warm in here. i don't want anybody dropping off. i have been talking a lot lately about the fundamental choice we face as a country. we can either settle for a country where a shrinking number of people who really, really well while a growing number are struggling to get by or we can build an economy where everybody gets a fair shot and everybody is doing their fair share and everybody is playing by the same set of rules.

part a building that economy is making sure that we are not a country that is known to us for what we buy and what we consume. after all, our middle-class was built by workers who invented products, made product, and sold products, the best in the world, all round the world. our economy was thriving when shipping containers left ports like this, packed with goods that were stamped with three proud words --"made in america." those exports supported a lot of good paying jobs in america including right here in florida. that is the country i want us to be again and that is why two years ago, i set the goal of doubling american exports by the end of 2014. today, with the trade agreements that i have signed into law, we're on track to meet that goal. soon, there will be millions of new customers for american

goods in south korea, and columbia, in panama. there will be new cars on the streets of seoul that are imported from detroit and toledo and chicago. that is progress. i want to thank two key members of my cabinet who were here today, labor secretary hilda solis is in the house -- [applause] and u.s. trade representative ron kirk because the work really hard to make this happen. [applause] one way we have helped american business sell their products around the world is by calling out our competitors, making sure they are playing by the same rules. for example, we have brought trade cases against china at nearly twice the rate as the last administration. we just brought a new case last month.

we set up a trade enforcement unit that is designed to investigate any questionable trade practices taking place anywhere in the world. we will take action whenever other countries are skirting the rules, breaking the rules, and putting our workers and businesses at an unfair position we will also make sure you have access to more customers. 95% of the world's consumers live outside our borders. we want them buying our products. i am willing to go anywhere in the world to open up new markets for american businesses. that is what i will be doing right after this visit to tampa, i am heading to columbia to take place in the summit of the americas which greece together leaders from the caribbean and from north, south, and central america. everybody here knows how critical this part of the world is to our economy and to creating jobs. a lot of the countries in the region are on the rise.

in latin america alone, over the past decade, tens of millions of people have stepped out of poverty and into the middle class. they are now in a position to start buying american products. that means they've got more money to spend. we want than spending money on american-made goods. that american businesses can put more americans back to work. in car exports in the western hemisphere are up by 46% since 2009 parent [applause] tampa is one of the biggest ports in the country. a lot of the business being done here has to do with trade between us and latin america. the fact that it has gone up 46% since 2009 is a big deal for tampa. florida exports to this region are up nearly 30%.

we now export more to the western hemisphere than to any other region in the world. exports support nearly 4 million u.s. jobs. this is one of the most active trading relationships in the world and you see it up close here at the port of tampa. every year, more than 2.5 million tons of fertilizer go from here to farmers in the caribbean and central and south america. engine oils that are produced not far from this port get shipped to countries throughout the hemisphere. everything from recycled steel to animal feed gets sent from a year to customers all across latin america. while i am in columbia talking with other leaders, i will be thinking about you. i will be thinking about how we can get more businesses like david's access to more markets and more customers in the region because i want to sell stuff but i want to put more americans back to work. [applause]

one of the new things we are doing is launching something called the small business network of the americas. obviously, a lot of exports that leave from america to other places are big businesses and that is great. we want their big corporations successful and selling products around the world because we have a lot of small businesses that are suppliers to them. we also want our small and medium-sized businesses to have access to these markets. this initiative will help our small businesses, latino-owned businesses, women-owned businesses, african american- owned businesses. we want every business to be able to access these new markets and start exporting to these countries. this will make it easier for them to get financing. it will link them up with foreign buyers who are interested in their products.

i have always said that the true engine of job creation in this country is the private-sector, not washington. our job in government is to help businesses grow and to create platforms for their success. that is one of the reasons i have cut taxes 17 times for small business. [applause] that is what i fought to tear down barriers that were preventing a entrepreneurs from getting funding. that is what i have travelled around the world opening new markets so that american businesses can better compete in the global business place. [applause] ultimately, this is what america is about -- we are a nation of doers and a nation of builders and we have never shied away from competition. we thrive on competition.

if the global playing field is level, america will win. so long as i am president, i will keep on doing everything i can to give our workers and our businesses the opportunity to succeed. [applause] that is how we will make this recovery felt by all people. that is how we will make sure we build not just from the top down but, bottom up and in the middle out. that is how we will make sure that everybody has a fair shot. we will make sure that anybody who wants a job can find one and anybody who wants to succeed and live out the american dream has the opportunity to do so. [applause] we've gone through three very tough years with the global financial crisis. it is the worst crisis we have seen in a generation.

as i travel around the country and talk to our workers and their businesses, you cannot help but have confidence. we don't quit. we are resilient. we stay with it. we are the most inventive country in the world. we've got the best on to careers in the world. if we got the best universities in the world. we got the best research in the world. we got the best infrastructure in the world and we will keep at and make sure that the 21st century is the american century just like the 20th century. thank you, everybody. god bless you. [cheers and applause] ♪ [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012]

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♪ ♪ ♪ >> president obama speaking to a crowd of supporters of tampa focused on the trade with latin american nations. he is using this as the jumping off point for the summit of americas in colombia. leaders from 33 countries in the americas are taking part with discussions and integrating the economies, trade, and combating drug violence. ♪ ♪ ♪

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♪ ♪ ♪ >> come inbev shortly, republican presidential candidates mitt romney and newt gingrich. they are at the national rifle association annual meeting in st. louis today and we will have their remarks at 2:00 p.m. and we will hear from rex santorum,

eric cantor, rick perry and scott walker. live coverage is at 2:00 p.m. eastern. until then, a discussion of some of the upcoming races for u.s. senate in this year's elections.

guest: host: new tells about some interesting races? guest: asked which cerase would decide the majority. i think i have the answer. maine. host: why is that? guest: it is fascinating because you have primaries on both sides for republicans and democrats but you have an independent

candidate there, the former governor angus king and what he is telling voters is that he is not going to declare a party until he gets to the senate. he has not decided which party he will colchis with. he would like to colchis with none but that is not terribly realistic. you have to sit with somebody. he has left this up in the air. democrats feel he will caucus with them and republican sort of a great. the reason he is running is that senator olympia snowe decided to retire because she really was tired of the partisanship. he would like to shake things up, in his words. it will be very interesting. he could decide the majority. host: you say that he does not

know who he wil caucus with. guest: i think angus king so committed to shaking things up that, there is a snare that on election night, if the senate is 50 seats-49 seats, there is a possibility he could opt to join the 49 and tied up with power- sharing. host: we will play a clip for you. which is the most vulnerable senator and we will have you comment about their pecs. picks. this is guy cecil. >> [video clip] two months ago the republicans had 100% chance of winning the maine its 8 until the far

right pushed out. i think the chances of the republicans holding onto that cigar probably less than 25%. host: more comments on the maine seat. guest: i don't disagree with that. i think it is true but angus king is the front runner in that race. he was pulling at 56% in a three-way race. at the same time, it is hard to put this one in the bank until angus king says what he will do. host: this clip is talking about the scott brown-elizabeth warren race. [video clip] >> who is the single most vulnerable republican? who is not coming back in 2013? >> scott brown apparel there's a couple of reasons.

scott brown is out of touch with the voters of massachusetts. i understand he will use every photo op possible to go to the white house and talk about the fact that he co-sponsored a bill that got 93 votes in the united states senate, which is not a profile in courage. at every opportunity where he had a chance to stand up against his own party, to really stand up on the votes that matter, he has failed to take that opportunity whether it is tax breaks for the biggest oil companies, whether it is his substance on the buffett r ule, that is out of step with the voters in massachusetts. >> he does not have a believable message. he is one of two republicans that voted for a bill against the republican leadership.

he stood up and said that was the right thing to do for massachusetts. the national journal says he is the second most independent senator. no one believes what elizabeth warren is saying about him. host: what about that race? guest: both of them are right. scott brown is the most vulnerable republican incumbent. where i think he is wrong is his statement that he is out of touch with massachusetts. i think he has done everything he can to be bipartisan. there will always be votes that republicans can pick on. i think that will be a great race. the talents god brown has is over, and that r after his name especially in a presidential year in massachusetts. he is going to have to deal with these voters who are used to ng straight democratic ticket.

if he loses, it will not be because he is out of touch. it will simply be because he is a republican. host: there are some many interesting races to talk about but bankers setting the stage for a discussion with our audience. -- but thank you for setting the stage for discussion with our audience guest: thank you. >> coming up shortly, comments from some of the former and present republican presidential candidates. mitt romney, new gingrich, rick santorum, scott walker and we will have it with cspan radio and c-span.org and it starts at 2:00 p.m. eastern. until then, i look at some of the news and politics and social issues and politics from today's "washington journal."

host: we welcome you back on this friday the 13th -- you are a risk taker. michael kinsley is at the table. he has been commenting on the national scene for most of his adult life from his position at bloomberg. this ties into what i wanted to ask you. one big story this week is the trayvon martin case and the other is the mommy wars about the value of women working at home. what do these stories say about the kind of things we talk about? guest: the trayvon story is a serious one and says our work to eliminate racism in this country is not over. you cannot really say much more than that. the mommy wars story is ridiculous. host: why is that? guest: it is three-quarters of our politics these days. people say someone it says something that obviously they wished they could take back. then someone on the other side says they are terribly outraged

by it, which they aren't. they are actually delighted because they have something to bash the other side with. a couple weeks ago, when that mitt romney aide made a remark about etch-a-sketch. they bashed him for it, saying they were terribly offended, when they were delighted. it is just one long series of episodes like this. the serious things about politics do not even come up. host: are these in fact a substitute for serious discussion or a proxy for serious issues? guest: i think they are a substitute. host: given the vast communications systems, the fact that everyone agrees there are serious problems, how does this nation get to a serious discussion? guest: that is a great question. i guess it depends on politicians willing to discuss the major issues. host: do we have those? guest: well, we don't. the big issue -- the problem is, there are no answers you can give that will not cost you votes somewhere. the big issue is the budget which you were just talking about with your previous guest. no one has a solution to that that is not going to require a good deal of unpleasantness. politicians do not like being unpleasant. host: is there a lack of -- is it exacerbated by modern communications? or do they use them to their advantage? guest: i guess it is exacerbated because it happens so fast. there was a remark on anderson cooper. it took no time whatsoever to become what everyone was talking about. it is a lot more interesting to talk about that then the stuff that the previous guest was talking about. host: we would like to open up the phone lines for michael kinsley. he has been writing recently

about the buffet rule and health care. please join us by phone. we will put the phone numbers on the screen and we will also take your comments on twitter. your dig deeper into thoughts about class warfare. what are you seeing that has resulted in your column? guest: it is namely i had trouble with that column because i had a lot of thoughts about class warfare that did not add up to anything coherent. these are various terms they get used in class warfare and maybe what they mean that are not obvious.

i think -- actually it fits the model i was discussing before. people claimed the main energy of the issue is people blaming other people of committing class warfare. the republicans say the democrats are practicing class warfare anytime someone argues that wealthy people perhaps should pay more income tax. then the democrats say the republicans are practicing class warfare by -- well, by claiming more of the income -- host: a proxy of this debate has been the buffett rule.

this is from "the financial times" -- when you look at the buffett rule, what do you see that debate being about? guest: the interesting thing is i do not think you could argue against it. mitt romney paid 13.9% of his income in taxes when he made $23 million, i believe, last year. that is not right. however, the trouble is if you are going to have tensions between the classes, you have to draw a line somewhere and say these are the people who pay more taxes and these are the people who ought to pay less. that line was $250,000 in

president obama's campaign for election. that in the general culture and in the general discussion of who ought to pay taxes became the line. now because of the buffett rule, that line is $1 million which moves it rather far and reduces the number of people who will have to pay more taxes and essentially eliminates any chance that employing something like the buffett rule will solve our fiscal problems. host: when you think about income taxes or tax revenues in this country. what should they be designed to do? guest: the purpose of the income tax is to raise money to do what the government needs to do.

host: how important is fairness? guest: fairness is very important. then you get into "what is fair?" i think it is fair to expect -- it becomes class warfare and a bad thing when people imply that it is evil to be making more than a million dollars a year. president obama went out of his way to say there is nothing wrong with people making that much money. just that you ought to recognize that it is not hard work and it is not dedication that are primarily responsible for people making that much money. most of them would agree, they are lucky. if you are lucky, and we are all lucky living in this country, it is not a terrible thing to ask you to contribute more when

we have terrible fiscal problems. host: the other side of the argument -- about 50% of the public pays no income taxes. is that fair? guest: there is a school of thought that everybody ought to pay at least $1 to make sure everyone has skin in the game. i do think that the people who do not pay income tax is because they do not have much income. i do not lose any sleep over that. host: the first call comes from new york. richard is the republican. caller: good morning. people have been talking about serious issues all along. ron paul has been talking for 30 years about the dangers of class warfare and the war on drugs and the war on these other

foreign countries, sending troops all around the world. they want everybody fighting. the whites, the blacks, the homosexuals, the jews. our country has been hijacked by these international bankers. for obama to see he does not have authority from congress -- it is ron paul or nobody. real serious issues instead of paris hilton and whether she is wearing panties or not. i thank you for c-span. have a good day. guest: i respect ron paul because he is, i would say, one of the few politicians who is principled and consistent. i give him a lot of credit for that.

host: let me tell you about michael kinsley's background. he is a harvard graduate and studied law. harford has been batted around in the news recently that -- harvard has been batted around in the news recently. guest: that was ridiculous. this makes you wonder about mitt romney. mitt romney made a crack that obama harvard. he has two harvard degrees. if you think no one would point that out -- what does that say to say that? i think this is a good example. if he could do it over again, he would not have said that. to pile on him for having said it is unfair. host: michael kinsley spent six years on cnn as a co-host. as well as a moderator of

debates on pbs. a new ruling from the 9th circuit court that public television stations can accept political advertisements. is that a good thing? guest: they are not supposed to have advertising at all i thought. i missed that. what was the argument that they could not? host: i don't know. postcode they were restricted and now they can take political campaign advertisements. they are expecting to have an appeal. guest: there are charitable contribution rules. i do not know. host: before bloomberg, he has been at many publications. "the new republic," "the

economist," a founding editor of an online magazine, "politico." guest: right now i am just writing a column. i'd like that because you can read something in the paper -- i like that because you can read something in the paper. instead of getting in line to call cspan. it is leverage. i miss editing a little bit. the joy of that as leverage. if you get five ideas, you can assign them all. host: next up is california. go ahead. caller: i think you have a good issue. is michael kinsley the guy to make it? you just pointed out that he was on "crossfire." talk about a program that turned things trivial and

upside-down. you have people like hilary rosen who gets on these programs and she is an operative. they are an operative for these parties. we talk about the word "objective journalism." journalism used to be objective. but there is no definition to things anymore. guys like michael kinsley are really operatives for the democratic party. guest: i am not a shill or an operative for the democratic party. i cannot even remember the last time i met a democratic party official. who was the third person? host: hilary rosen. guest: she is a democrat

certainly and a democratic consultant and also employed by cnn as a commentator. i think cnn tries certainly to balance but they want to have people who they feel are good on television who can represent the various views. they have her and many republicans, too. host: when you were on "crossfire," it was during the early days of political tv. guest: i left years before they took it off the air supposedly because it was too contentious. if you turn on cnn now -- host: what do you think of the state of the three networks with round-the-clock discussion?

guest: i think it is better now with a more or less explicit conservative channel, a more or less liberal channel, and then cnn that tries to play it down the middle. host: jack is a democrat from jacksonville. caller: good morning. i would like this guest to talk about -- i think that people have misconstrued a point. somebody on the democratic side, defend that point. like the american people are stupid and we do not understand

the point that she was making. when it comes to mitt romney, people seem to think that we do not know that he constantly changes things like the american people do not know. i would like him to talk about contraception. the war on women and things of that sort. democrats do not try to pass laws like that. when they went way past he did -- host: thank you very much. the contraceptive discussion.

guest: i think that is an example that most republicans wish they hadn't gotten involved with. host: the first one was on ann romney and he suggested it went too far. guest: criticizing her went too far. yes, of course it did. she should not be criticized at all for staying home and raising her family. host: president obama yesterday said families are off-limits, but the front page in "the wall street journal" says she is actively involved in speaking and being on twitter and other places. michelle obama is a very involved in the president's reelection campaign. does that make them fairer game

or are they off-limits? guest: i think they have to go further before they become fair game. ann romney had a funny quote, saying "they should have come to my house when i had five boys making trouble." i would like to know more about that. if hilary rosen could take that remark back, she would in a flash. to hold it against her and stop campaigning about all of the other issues and discuss this one is really absurd. host: tennessee, a republican there. good morning. caller: good morning. i am calling about this envy thing. the haves and have nots.

i do believe the 99%, and i am one of those because i am retired, and my children -- we have all gone to school and they are better than what we have. how many more things can you get if you can't get to the 1%? why are we envious and not happy? i would say most of us are very happy and satisfied with the lives we lead. this president should stop trying to divide this country. guest: i think the president has been very careful. i believe and i think he believes there is nothing wrong

with being in the 1%. he is in the 1%. if you have been fortunate enough to be in the 1%, it will not kill you to pay a little more when we obviously need to. host: we have quite a few people on twitter who have known your career for some time. one of our viewers on twitter asks if we could take time out of the discussion to hear about your efforts with parkinson's disease and how new medical treatments are fairing. guest: i do have parkinson's and had had it for 20 years. i have had it probably longer than that. i was diagnosed 20 years ago. i am doing pretty well. i feel very fortunate. i take a lot of pills. i had an operation five years

ago which was relatively rare then but is now quite common. i carry two pacemakers in my chest and they send electrical signals to my brain. i do not know what impact they have on my politics. they don't cure but they ameliorate the effect. host: has your experience with the health care system informed your opinions about the health care lobby? guest: yes. i am getting a level of care that everyone should be entitled to. but it would be very expensive. i think we can do it. i support -- i think president obama's health care reform will turn out to be a very big plus for this country. host: michael kinsley with us

for another 20 minutes. go ahead. caller: thank you for taking my call. i have two quick questions. does he feel that the supreme court will repeal the obama care legislation and the second question is, if they do, does he think this country is more than likely headed to a single payer system? host: what do you think should happen? caller: if they strike down the section that says americans cannot be forced to buy insurance, i think the entire law collapses. i would wonder what is next. i think that a large percentage of the democrats in congress would opt for a single payer system. system. we