the government will take care of it. they do not exercise caution at home or at work. we need to return that sense of responsibility. host: j.p. morgan's case announcing the firm lost $4.4 million in the case led by the london operation. guest: it is not putting anybody at risk except some shareholders. the point i am trying to make is j.p. morgan has several hundred through cracks -- bureaucrats and could not touch this. more regulation on top of the regulation we have is not the solution. the solution is public accountability. now we see the accountability j.p. morgan is chasing. that will do more to shape up

that entity in london than in the regulation -- than any regulation. transparency, publicity. that is what will do it. not several hundred imbedded regulators who missed the whole thing. host: gary is on the line for republicans. caller: this is an example of government reaction to a problem like during the savings- and-loan crisis with all the bankruptcy's when the government had to take it over. when you write a bill for 2000 pages and the bill for 2400 pages, you will find out there are a lot of things in those bills that do not have anything to do with what happened during the 2008 crisis. guest: that is true. the consumer perot -- bureau is

given the right to regulate student loans. does anyone think the student loan problem, which is not an insignificant problem with the burden it puts on graduates, does anyone think that had to do with the crisis? i do not think anyone thinks so. the banks have had a long relationship with his -- its customers in that part of texas. its customers now have to read 20 pages. the bank is concerned no consumer will way through 23 pages. -- weed through 23 pages. i understand what the rules require. they just put out new rules to their days ago for the rich nation -- origination of mortgages. the rules are 1000 pages long.

the bank says to us, who is going to -- what customer of ours in west texas is going to wade through 100 or even 20 pages? host: this is from one of our viewers. dodd-frank is typical of what happens when the private sector misbehaves. guest: that is true. regulation is reactive. it is like you are fighting the last war. whitneys' to happen is set of incentives so financial institutions and other entities have been sentenced to be responsive to customers rather than to bureaucrats that they know they can charm. host: you can send us a, on our twitter page, join the conversation. you can also email's. good morning come independent line.

caller: i think he explained it good. this is relative to the corruption between wall street and washington. this has been all over the internet about things happening, nothing being done about it. you have all of these corruption scenarios going on. congress says, we did not see it. they do not see it until the taxpayers have to pay for it. host: thank you for the call. tony says, is it true dodd-frank has generated a fourth of 13,000 pages of regulation? -- of boards of 13,000 pages of regulation? guest: and know there are rule making is that have to be completed. -- i do know that there are rule makings of have to be completed.

there will be many thousands of pages, many forests cut down before this is done. it does not help. if we're getting away from simplicity and responsibility, we will be lost in the forest of detail no one can decide for or enforced. host: do you want to take this all the way to the supreme court? guest: we want to get the structure fixed. it cuit takes going to the supreme court, we're happy to pursue it. there are several steps that congress is aware of that would fix this. they would give congress a budget control, change the rules of judicial review, and give the white house some oversight authority over the agency. those are three things that would make a big difference. it would make the agency more

like the fcc. organizations like this have multiple members from both parties so you do not have a dictator going off on a toot by himself. there are clear changes to be made. republicans have passed for them. democrats have said no. here we are. host: lynn is calling from new york. caller: i have a question about the dodd-frank bill. i understand the issue is there are things that will not be under the control the congress. tell me how many bills and departments have been created by this president that have no control by congress. they are not being seen by -- overseen by congress and are outside the scope. how many bills have been passed

that we do not know about that have no oversight by congress? guest: there are several. the consumer bureau is one of them. there is the resolution referred to as the too big to fail authority. is the provision mechanism for dealing with the big banks that get into trouble. that is kind of secret to. it was done in secret. no one has any say in what they do. it is all done over the weekend. that is kind of scary provision. it is not in our lawsuit, but it is there. in the health care bill, there is the independent payment advisory board, which has completely unreviewable authority to dictate or tell people like me getting on medicare exactly what we are allowed to have and cannot have.

it is 15 people who are unreviewable by congress, the courts, or the white house. if congress wants to change the rules this ipab has issued, it takes a 2/3 vote of congress to change it. it is very hard to get that. nothing else in our live -- in our government life is subject to that kind of restrictive oversight except the consumer bureau, ipab, and others less important. host: how big is the state national bank in texas? guest: it is 275 million in deposits. it is small. host: some of the banks would be exempt from the tougher provisions of dodd-frank. they are pursue this? guest: they are not exempt from

the ultimate enforcement authority. they have already heard from their examiner from the office of comptroller. they are subject to oversight and enforcement, even though certain provisions do not automatically apply to them. host: a comment on our twitter page. it did not go far enough in some areas and too far in others. gainesville, fla., is on the republican line. caller: it sounds like it is not that you are against any type of regulation. what you are fighting for is to not have somebody have the ultimate authority with the checks and balances. if i am hearing you correctly,

that is what the lawsuit is about. you are right in saying a small community bank that cannot support in infrastructure to comply with federal regulations coming down, like you say, this is a trend. it is dangerous because it goes against what makes our government great. host: 80, david. thank you for listening on c- span review. guest: he summarized it. we're not against regulations. want to make sure it is subject to oversight by institutions set up by constitution. dake the case of the bank an -- in texas. is in the district of a republican congressman who sits on the oversight committee in congress.

if the agency did something to this bank this bank thought it ought to get the right to appeal or question, there is nothing the congressman the way it is set up to do about this. there's nothing he or the whole committee can do about it because congress has been cut out of any oversight function for these regulations. host: they bring up "too big to fail." the j.p. morgan official statement was basically "oops." do you oppose the too big to fail rules? guest: we do not deal with it directly in the lawsuit. you are asking my personal opinion. i am opposed to laws which tend to perpetuate too big to fail. it gives the public the

impression there are some big banks on wall street that the government would bail out one more time. that we are opposed to. but that is not in the lawsuit at this time. host: steve, good morning, indianapolis, independent line. are you with us? we go next to connie from maryland on the line for democrats. caller: on want to say to mr. gray that he is putting it all on fannie mae and freddie mac. i watched the oversight hearing. they said they were just one part of it. they were not the cause of the meltdown. one part was because the securities and exchange commission chairman did not do his job. he was supposed to be watching out.

he had been warned something was going on. he did not do anything about it. greenspan, when he was the chairman, he said he believed the banks with police themselves. they did not need anybody to watch them. he said if he knew they were not, he would have been something. -- he would have did something. republicans do not ever want any regulation. host: thank you. guest: it is not regulations we are opposed to in the lawsuit. is the fact the regulator has no accountability. if it were accountable to congress, the white house, the courts, we would have a different view. it is not that we're opposed to the agency itself. it is that the functions they're trying to perform, we do not think the public needs

protection by an autocrat that does not have to respond to checks and balances that are a central pillar of our form of government. host: let me conclude on that point. richard cordray is the current head of the cfpb. what specific checks and balances are you looking for? guest: we think the courts ought to have more to say about what he does. congress ought to have the right to shape the budgets of the agency in response to things they do or do not do. we think the white house and fed should have some oversight authority as well. we're not going to try to dictate the terms of how you would provide this oversight, but there is no entity in the federal government that does not have to make any effort to respond to any criticism by any branch of government. host: c. boyden gray is filing the lawsuit and one of the lead attorneys in the case.

thank you for being with us. when we come back, we're going to continue our series of " america by the numbers." we will be talking about being when well- "washington journal continues. it is friday 13. we are back in a moment. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] >> this weekend, growing up in the shadows and secrets of the nuclear weapon tests of the --

nuclear weapons facility. she looks at the effect on the environment and people. on sunday, peter collier on the life of jean kirkpatrick. >> in your opinion, carter governed with a mentally accent. she saw the governors -- dominoes start to fall. by 1979, she was a full-fledged opposition to carter and what she saw as carterism appeasement. crucial in this respect in 1979, she saw the fall of the shaw and another, a couple of lacerating experiences for her and people like her. >> sunday night at 9:00. at 10:00, the marine sniper and author on life since leaving the military. all parts of boat tv this weekend on c-span2.

>> he had no plan. the remnants of the armies were not coming to his aid but trying to escape to the west. that is when he collapsed and realized it was going to come to an end and it was a question of suicide. >> a new look at the second world war from hitler's rise to power to his chaotic final days. >> his main objective was not to be captured alive by the russians. he was afraid of being exposed in a cage in being ridiculed. he was determined to die. eva brown was determined to die with him. >> "washington journal" continues. host: is a new report looking at the well-being of children.

key national indicators for 2012. joining us to look at the numbers, edward sondik and kristen moore. thank you for being with us. what did you learn from the numbers? guest: the numbers are put together by 22 federal agencies that deal with statistics. it is a consortium aimed at giving a comprehensive picture of the well-being of kids. we learned this year many of the trends are very positive. preterm births are down. infant mortality is down. low birth weight is down. there are a couple of education measures which are up. it shows scores have improved as well as a number of others. kids taking science courses. i was particularly impressed

with some of the figures on violence perpetrated by kids and against kids. both of those are down dramatically from the high points in the mid-1990s. host: you point out preterm births are down for four years in a row. drug present -- it -- drug use has risen since the 1990's. more children living in poverty worldwide. guest: the recession has changed things for children. there is increasing poverty. that matters for kids. the stress and turbulence their families feel is reflected in the lives of the kids. we want to keep monitoring this over time to see what happens in the next few years and how that plays out. host: what about single parent families and the issue of

poverty? guest: that is one of the most startling figures. if you look at a single female households, 47% of those households are in party. those children live in poverty. it is a dramatic figure. about 1/4 of children live in single female households. nearly half of those are in poverty. host: this is what the chart looks like. you can see primarily female household families, far fewer single male head of household. guest: the figures do not show up on their. host: teen birthrates is one of the trends, clearly it has gone down over the last 10 to 15 years. what do you attribute that to? guest: kristin is probably in a better place to talk about causality. we feel you look to the change

in the economic situation. if you look to the campaign against tenn birth, i would say it shows real success. this is an all-time low figure for the united states. the implications of this go further than that. low birth weight is tied to teen birth. that it is down probably has to do with that. infant mortality as well. guest: a few things to notice is that it is in every group. young teens, older teens, whites, blacks. it is happening in every state. it is a major positive change. it affects not only the well- being of the adolescence of the children she might have. since the peak in 1991, 3.4 million births that might have been born to teenagers have not occurred. that has major implications for

the well-being of the current generation and the next. host: we want to hear from you. we are dividing the phone lines for timelines. you can send us an e-mail. you can join the conversation on our twitter page. the birthrate has come down. the level of obesity among children has gone up significantly. from the early mid-1970s to where we are today, you can see a significant increase. up to 20% of those under age 17. guest: that is not the full story. it is 20% if we look at it overall. if we look at the figure for black girls come is 27%. we do not have all hispanics from the survey. if a look at the figure for mexican boys, it is 28%.

the disparity is significant. one could argue there is good news in this in that the curve is sloping off. it is either going down or level. if we look at the rate of change to what it was, we are doing much better than we were. i would not look at the last couple of points which show the figure going down at this point, the percentage of kids with obesity, and say we're winning the race against this. even though i am from a statistical agency, i applaud the widespread effort underway to address this. it just cannot be handled alone

by the health sector. we have many domains in the report. housing, criminal-justice, you need to look across all of those domains when you see an issue and understand how to address it. that is one of our purposes, to put the facts in from the decision makers and researchers. host: kristin, you look at this figure, 5% in the 1970's and 20% today. the question is why? is it because of diet, lack of exercise, society and technology? are there other factors? guest: it is diet and exercise. american kids are not eating the best diet they could. more fruits and vegetables would be a very good thing. it is also exercise. kids are driven places. they may not get enough physical education.

there are programs that work. it is difficult to sustain the effects because there are a lot of influences in society that encourage overeating. it is changing how kids eat and exercise. host: springfield, mass., good morning. caller: i am calling because i want to talk about my experience with children in poverty. yesterday i was in housing court in springfield, mass. i am a volunteer working with tenants to keep them in their apartments. yesterday, we could not help several families with children because they lost their jobs and could not pay their rent. congress has made it a point to cut all the services for children. that is not in your report.

also, these people, if they are lucky, the springfield housing authority has no money. they are putting these children in hotels. think of a family with three children in a one-room hotel. that is doing good. they are lucky. when i walk down the street in springfield, i see children from the time i go to the court until the time i leave in the afternoon. they are still out there. they have no place to go. host: edward sondik? guest: i started off by saying there are a lot of positive trends, but underlying those trends, one of the key disparities is poverty. income. another is education. there is no question this is something, a key factor when we

look at the well-being of kids. we cannot just look at the overall trends. we have to break it down in this way. clearly policies, local, national, economic policies, education policies, a variety issues play into this. host: our phone lines for the eastern and central time zones, for the mountain and pacific time zones. we focus on "america by the numbers," children in america. this one looks at the percentage of children growing up in the home where someone smokes regularly, also looking at the poverty status as a comparison. what does this tell you? guest: it tells us we have a lot of progress. the percentage of kids has

declined tremendously. on the other hand, when we look at this by party status, -- by poverty status, for people under the poverty level, the figure is much higher. this competes with what we know about smoking. people with lower incomes tend to smoke more. we can see it here. this is very important, second- hand smoke. it affects the kids when they are children. it can also have affects later on. there is a chart we do not show. data for it are on the website. it shows not only exposures in the home but exposures outside the home in the environment. there is a chemical test that can be done on the blood that looks for a product of cigarette smoking and nicotine.

it is a very sensitive test as to whether or not people are exposed to smoking or smoke. that shows over the last 15 years, the percentage of kids exposed to second-hand smoke in and out of the home has gone from 88% to about half of that. as i recall, is 42%. there has been progress overall. the figures we have on reported smoking in the home are less than when we do this careful test. it gives us another picture of exposure. it is still an issue. host: this is what the hard cover looks like. you can also check it out on line at the cdc website, centers for disease control. one of our viewers is saying in florida, you have to be 25%

below the poverty level before you are considered for any assistance. shows the benchmarking are facing. guest: i think the numbers reflect something we need to think about with children. we think about the economy, we don't just track the stock market but the employment rate and the economy. we want to look at kids health, education, behavior, mental health and emotional well-being. it is reflected in some of these questions. the things that affect kids' health and well-being more broadly are both private and public. whether someone smokes in a home is something a family can do. we see enormous progress. families are also being buffeted by large social forces where there are reductions in services. that is illustrated by the housing concern. that is a source of great stress. what happens of parents and

families makes a difference for kids. host: another chart, children born with low birth weight. you can see the numbers relatively stable the last 20 years. guest: they are higher than they are in other countries and the united states. so, we have some work to do. we have a very high rate of unintended pregnancies. parents are becoming parents when they have not planned on it and they get prenatal care late and they may not be as invested in the pregnancy. it is a concern because children born at low birth weight are less likely to be as healthy. host: karen from milton, georgia. good morning. caller: good morning. i have a question. i work with kids who have to go to a school buses independent of the public school because they were not able to make it in the public school. in that school, they are considered -- in order to be in

the program they have to be considered homeless, which means not living with a parent but living on a friend's snowfall or an uncle. my question for you, there are so many policies out there, has there been any research done on which policies that we have had over all of these years that have actually worked and which ones have not and get rid of those policies? because it is very difficult to work with these children within a framework you are given because you have to follow the guidelines. you can't get out of the box of the system. host: kristin moore. go ahead, caller. caller: it would be helpful. guest: there is a movement in that direction. is not as true as a researcher i would have liked to have been but the public health field has had made dramatic improvements in health -- obesity being the

exception -- over the past decade because they monitored progress and it is evidence- based. it is happening more and more in the field of education and social intervention. the idea that programs have been shown to work or the evidence- based or in form. it is increasingly happening for policies as well as programs and i think it is a very important positive trend for kids. host: phone lines added for those in the eastern half of the country-western have -- another chart i want to share with the audience. race, origen -- hispanic origin, what does it show you? guest: where we are today and it projects out to 2050. a significant change. the percentage of all kids who are white has been going down.

percentage of children who are hispanic are going up and in 2015 the percentage of children who are hispanic will be one. high -- one point higher than those who are white. it shows a significant change and that has implications and terms of culture, perhaps language, and all of this needs to be looked at in the context of policies. i was struck by the last caller's question about policy and our people going research or should they do research. one of the research -- reasons the consortium puts out the report is to provide things to stimulate research. in a sense, all of the measures are the outcomes. we don't talk about specific policies here. but something that undergirds all of these is policy, culture, a variety of different changes. and the sorting that out is a

really -- it is a research issue and a policy issue. and we hope that these figures guide that. host: mike miller has this point -- and kristin moore, if you could address it. guest: day care is another one of the two-generational issues. helps parents become self- sufficient and high quality health care helps children as well. we do know that quality is important. weather and not out there is helpful for kids -- good, quality child care could help them get ready for school. i think that is a decision policymakers will have to address at the national level and the state level and the community level. the extent they are able and willing to support quality. host: larry is on the phone from illinois. caller: good morning. my question is -- the chart that

was referenced a few moments ago on the reduction in teen birth. i did not hear what possibly contributing factor the abortion provision was of that and to the extent it was factored in or percentage contributed to that, do you see that as a plu so rnot -- + or not and was a contributor -- did it contribute to the effect of mortality rates in infants? guest: what is going down as the pregnancy rate -- sober, abortion, pregnancy all going down. there seemed to be some decline in sexual activity among adolescents and increases in contraceptive use so there seemed to be changes going on on all of those levels. host: this may surprise some people, but it's plain from the bureau of labor statistics, children living with one parent

employed full time year round and above that, two married parents, the trend from 1980 through 2010. guest: bureau of labor statistics tells us here, overall, second line from the top, right hand side, 70% live with at least one parent employed full time. 30% don't. their parents are not employed full-time. we go further down and say the figure for single parents families -- see the figure for single-parent families is about 40%. this relates to poverty. we could parse this out and look at it as a function of poverty. each one of these lines in a sense, that is a specter, a percentage of two working parents but even though they are working they are at the poverty level or bring your body. we already talked about the figure for the bottom line, 47%

of single mother households -- single-family households led by a female, 47% of those families are in private. host: another note on day care from kathleen, who points out -- guest: you then do the math on that and it is a tough situation. host: paul is on the phone -- paula is on the phone. stamford, connecticut. caller: this is my first time. i am very excited. i have been a social worker for the school system for 17 years. my main concern and does point, because it has become a huge all over the country, is bridging the achievement gap between minority students and majority students and at least hitting

the proficient line. i think it is very unfair to expect teachers to do it singlehandedly, and yet that is exactly what our governor once. no one is addressing the fact that a lot of these minority children don't go to preschool or if they do go to preschool, a lot of them go to a head start program where it is staffed by mostly spanish speaking staff and so the children continue to speak spanish and come to kindergarten knowing very little english, let alone their numbers, letters, shapes, colors. as i said, a lot of the parents cannot speak english so the parents cannot help their children with homework and study

for tests. i understand, i get it, they are working two and three jobs. i work with children whose -- where both parents are incarcerated and they are living with elderly relatives like grandparents and aunts and uncles. i guess my question is, what can we expect from parents to help us help them and to help us the u.k. their children? guest: you are certainly right in the achievement gap does start before children enter school and it starts in infancy. again, when we are talking about the whole child it reflects the kids nutrition and how much television they are exposed to, and the quality of the john kerry your comment reflects -- quality of the child-care.

your comment -- it really matters the rest of their life. they get into school if they start out behind it is hard for them to catch up and the research is very clear. but they can catch up with high quality schools and high quality after-school programs. again, quality is a valid keyword. one of the things i take away from this report is about prevention. it is easier to help kids acquire the skills and knowledge that they need at a time that it is to pick of the piece of later on. guest: one of the purposes of this report, it cannot be comprehensive but it does provide a relatively easy way to go to more information and more statistics. for example, we have some statistics on education that shows some trends.

is a said earlier, math and science and how kids are doing in the fourth grade and eighth grade. but there is a link bus takes you to the national center of education statistics and there you can find much more information that expanse of of these lines is so they can be looked at by race, poverty status, a variety of other -- by region. a variety of other ways that can help, again, fuel the research and the development of policies and the evaluation of policies. host: edward sondik are adopted from stanford university and director of the national center of health statistics and kristin moore, a graduate of university of michigan and senior scholar at child trend. you get the intimation that came out that cdc.gov.nchs. duncan from ohio.

welcome to the program. >> i never liked the phrase "it takes a village" because i do not believe it takes a village to raise a child, i believe it only takes parents. i think the phrase "it takes a village" is a lie. do you agree? -- i would certainly agree as a researcher that the role of parents is extremely important -- guest: i would certainly agree as a research that the role of parents is extremely poor and, and extended family, it is clear. there are also community institutions and neighborhood characteristics like crime and economic opportunities that the research is very clear also matter for kids. guest: the village certainly has an influence. i am not in a position to say whether the caller is right or wrong on that, but the report i think emphasize is just what kristen says and there are multiple domains in you need to look at all of the means, like

criminal-justice, health, and housing. host: this is from the u.s. census bureau, health insurance for those newborn through a to 17. public health insurance, private health insurance or any type. from 1987 until 2010. what do these numbers tell you? guest: the percentage of children who are in short with any health insurance, the top line, 90%, has been pretty much of their for the entire period of the chart. it means that 10% of children were not insured and any point during the year. there is another factor here that the report mentions. has to do with the usual source of care. insured children have a much higher percentage of them have a usual source of care. i think a figure is on the order of 7% don't.

the figure for uninsured children, those who do not have a usual source of care, is almost 30%. that is crucial because there is no usual place to go for prevention, no usual place to go for what -- for what you have on the screen in terms of immunizations -- i guess it is not on the screen yet. but for immunizations. it is really quite important and it is a difference you don't see in those curves. another thing you don't see in the curves is the care of kids with pre-existing conditions, which, of course, relates to the health reform and the fact that it is covered. host: kristin moore, you look at these numbers. respond to this one comment -- the number one cause of poverty for women, childbirth. if you are a single woman, what are the chances you live in poverty versus raising a child

with two parents? guest: it may change her woman's income if she cut her out was at work, but what it really does is it increases expenses. that is where it is very important for child support to be paid and certainly to have two incomes -- better than having just one income economically. host: some good news and these statistics. young people as victims of serious violent crimes have been down pretty steadily over the last 20-30 years. guest: very much so. this is very impressive. and there is no single factor. i checked with my colleague at the bureau of justice statistics on this, and there is no single factor that actually explains what appears to be a rise and then this decline. a number of different things coming on that range from the first part of it, a change, believe it or not, in the age distribution. interesting it would have an

effect on the statistics, but it does. there was a change in the age distribution where as we move to the 90's, distribution with what -- was more on the side of the younger teens then the older teens, and there is a correlation with that and serious violent crimes. less for the younger and more for the older. so, we see it is kind of level. then it starts to pique because of drug issues. then it starts to fall also because of drug issues. and the fact that according to my colleagues, the use of guns and the organization in the drug trade, there was more organization in it that led to less violence. then it reaches the point where it is starting to trail off and

it is still not clear what that is exactly due to. the bottom line is, in terms of the impact on children, this trend has really been very positive. again, we need to look at research and we need to look at the data we have and others in this system, the federal statistical system and researchers have that can help explain it. host: on friday as we look at america by the numbers, a new report out today looking at children in america. mary as on the phone. louisville, ky. caller: good morning. i very interesting discussion. i think there is something very basic being lost and all the numbers, which is some of the negative consequences -- lost in all of the numbers, which is some of the negative consequences of government intervention. we have had forced busing in our community for over 30 years. we were the subject of a supreme

court ruling over the past 10 years saying that we had to adjust our rules for forced busing. but the bigger issue is here -- some of our children are bussed 45 minutes away from their home in order to diversify. the impact has been not only had school stores not improved -- scores not improve, but declined. the children are far from home and the parents have difficulty participating in their school life, the social life, attending parent-teacher conferences. this intervention has alienated people from their and student's school life. they are further away from the schools. there could be much better improvement if we had nabal preschools and families would feel more a part of the school -- if we had neighborhood

schools and families would feel more a part of it. guest: there have been policies and programs implemented based on hunches, their own best guess of what would be good and then they are not really study. i think that is why it is really important to the value with the implications of what is happening on the ground. sometimes programs have unintended or unexpected positive consequences and sometimes they have unintended or unexpected negative consequences. we need to develop better evidence than-based policies. guest: this provides some of the evidence to drive the research. and that want to drive the to the web site, cdc.gov.nchs. but a quick snapshot, estimated 74 million young people in america between infant and age 17 accounting for about one- quarter of the u.s. pasta -- quarter of the population.

i am from illinois -- diane from illinois. caller: i want to know in this discussion where personal responsibility comes into play to only have as many children you cannot afford to support, rather than to blame society as a whole? when i was growing up, i came from a family that was not well to do. we had six children. i mean, when we went to take our lunch to school it was peanut butter and jelly and stuff, but it was my parents' responsibility to feed the children that they created to gather. -- together. now when someone has a child, to be the taxpayers that are supposed to pay for their preschool, their breakfast in school, their lunch in school, .unch for the summer's

how can this country survive when there are no guidelines that people give free things for behavior when i was growing up in the 1950's and 1960's -- they were frowned upon and not celebrated with vince. host: thank you for the call. guest: our job is to provide the fact -- facts and the caller is raising some very important issues in terms of policies and politics and in terms of culture. we could use these figures to give us an idea of where we are, but clearly the issues raised need a public discussion and an understanding of where we go in the future. this is why some of the projections we have -- you showed one before -- children,

as a function of race into the future, why it is important. host: these are children between the ages 4-17 from 2001 to 2010, dealing with serious emotional and behavioral difficulties. i am assuming we have been able to keep better track of this in more recent years. guest: i think dave emotional and mental well-being has become more what people are willing to talk about, something recognize. it is an issue for children, sometimes very young people -- children. addressing it and intervening early, and best and in children as opposed to solving problems. guest: one of the purposes of the forum is to identify areas of deficit where we need more data. one of the areas the form identified in the 10-plus years of existence is mental health of

children. the system has moved to try to fill that. between different agencies -- might agency and the health resources and services administration and others have sponsored surveys that hone in on the mental health side. that information is couple on the slide on the screen on the national health survey to give a more complete issue of -- a picture of the issues and the trend. host: our next caller is from peoria, illinois. caller: i am glad you should the graph on emotional distress and children. during the 1980's i was doing transfers to prisons -- if somebody wants to know what's hell is like, spent some time

and there. what people do not want to see, until their own children are affected -- affected, they do not have much of a cure. not religious morality but human decency -- something starts to happen, especially with young people, anybody -- when you see 10 or 11-year-old kids looking right through you, they don't care. but when they go to the big house, you are not going to scare these folks. i say be where -- where, connecticut, the family home invasion. those things can happen if you do not get a grip on this. guest: it is how to present data that is very dry anyway you understands what it is saying. you just give us figures of 74

million children in this category. we can translate this figure into numbers. so it probably represents, i would say, back of the envelope estimate of around 13 million children. it may be 5% or 6% but it translates into millions, the number of children with the problem. host: has anything been done comparing those children raised in a fatherless home compared to two-parent home regarding violence? guest: there has been many children -- studies. on average they find children raised in single-parent homes have about twice as many problems on average. however, the majority do not have problems. the majority develop just fine.

host: i will pick up in 1990. from 1990 through 2011, an uptick, it went down and now back on its way up. children in eighth grade, -- some even younger than that, using drugs and middle schools. we had an uptick in the teen birthrate in 2005 and in 2006. it is not something where you can just feel good and relax. they go up again. host: let's go to missouri. good morning. caller: i worked my way through college selling books door-to- door. i was 40 years old before i ever had a job with a regular salary.

i am starting three small businesses. i think that the problems that these people are talking about our problems that come from the lack of caring. not by parents, but by society as a whole. guest: i wish we had a measure of caring. we don't have that. but i can tell you that the people who put these statistics together care a tremendous amount and that is why we try to put them out there, to stimulate this kind of discussion. to try to identify issues that perhaps are below the surface. and to get them out so that

society can address them. host: the way to summarize -- kristin moore, i will start with you. the state of american children in 2012 is what? guest: i will say mixed. there are many children in the united states doing very well, they are some of the most privileged children in the history of the world. there are other children in the united states whose lives are extremely difficult. they are born into very difficult situate -- circumstances, poverty and disorganization and the future is very much at risk and bacon tell at a young age that they will face enormous challenges. but very diverse. guest: many of the trends are positive. telling something about policy and impact. some of the quicker it -- figures are quite astounding. a percentage of children have

asthma, quite a series began. obesity figures -- can go up to 40% for some groups. we got significant disparities we need to address. host: thank you both for being with us. more information online at the cdc web site. appreciate your time. we will take you to the floor of the house on what will be a brief pro forma session. a lot on the agenda before the august recess and the party conventions. a couple of reminders, we will be live with the national governors' association annual summer meeting taking place not too far from washington, d.c., williamsburg, virginia. also keeping an eye on the green party convention happening north of us and baltimore, and the nominee will be among our guest this sunday. and also a chance on "washington journal" both tomorrow and

sunday. thank you for being with us this friday. now live coverage from the floor of the house of representatives. a very brief, pro forma session. [captioning made possible by the national captioning institute, inc., in cooperation with the united states house of representatives. any use of the closed-captioned coverage of the house proceedings for political or commercial purposes is expressly prohibited by the u.s. house of representatives.] the speaker pro tempore: the chair lays before the house a communication from the speaker. the clerk: speaker's room washington, d.c.,, july 13, 2012, i appoint the honorable latourette to act as speaker pro tempore on this day, signed john a. boehner, speaker of the house of representatives. the speaker pro tempore: the player will be offered by our chaplain, father conroy. chaplain conroy: let us pray, we give you thanks for giving us another day. how shall we be measured in your sight and the culture of achieving we can carry over competitive attitudes to our relationship with you and to those we love and serve. but once we realize there is

nothing we can do to make us love us more than you already do, we can be set free to simply love as you love and serve others with abandonment. help us to give ourselves in love and service, for this is enough. in a culture of success, the worst thing that can happen is to fail, but all you ask of us, lord, is to do what is right, speak what is true and give ourselves in service to others without counting the cost. bless the members of this people's house and bless us all with the grace to love as you love. and may all we do be done for our greater honor and glory. amen the speaker pro tempore: the chair has examined the journal of the prior day's proceedings. pursuant to clause 1, rule 1, the journal stands approved. the chair will lead the house in the pledge of allegiance.

i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. the speaker pro tempore: the chair lays before the house a communication. the clerk: the honorable, the speaker, house of representatives, sir, pursuant to the permission granted in clause 2-h of rule 2 of the u.s. house of representatives, the clerk received the following message from the secretary of the senate on july 12, 2012. that the senate passed without amendment, h.r. 3902. with best wishes i am signed sincerely, karen l. haas the speaker pro tempore: without objection the house stands adjourned until noon, >> the house in and out for a

pro forma session and they are back tuesday noon eastern for morning hour, 12:00 or legislative -- 2:00 the legislative work. the telling the automatic spending cuts in the sequestered -- detailing the automatic spending cuts and the sequestered. the house is expected to spend the remainder of the week on the 2013 spending bill and then monday at 2:00 p.m. eastern -- the senate will move to a deal for campaign finance disclosure rules that requires super pacs, nonprofits and other special interest groups to do to disclose any time they donate $10,000 or more to a political campaign. follow the house here on c-span monday and tuesday and the senate on c-span2. coming up in about half an hour we will hear a discussion with amnesty international's syria

adviser who just returned from the country where an estimated 17,000 syrians have died in the 17-month conflict. we will be live at the center for strategic and international studies in washington. underway at 10:30 a.m. eastern. also, the nation's governors are gathering in williamsburg, virginia, for the weekend-long national governors' association weekend meeting. live coverage starts at 1:15 p.m. eastern with the opening session and a discussion entitled "the finding great leadership." then at 3:00, the panel on education and workforce with current vegetation secretary and the bush administration education secretary. coverage throughout the weekend here on c-span that well -- as well. again, at 10:30 a.m., live here at the center for strategic and international studies and the association press reports the head of the u.n. delegation and syria that the teams have confirmation government forces

launched attacks from the ground and air yesterday in a poor farming village where there are reports coming -- reports of a mass killing, it could be 200 were massacred. in the meantime, discussion from this morning's "washington journal." and look at the role of the middle class and the presidential election. host: we want to welcome you gentlemen. thank you for being with us. let's begin first with some of the news and then we will talk about the book. speculation that began yesterday with the drudge report saying condoleezza rise on the short list for mr. romney. guest: the most ridiculous thing. romney is getting hammered all da because of the bank and the romney campaign calls the drudge report and says we will change the issue, we will put condi rice up.

guest: that party can not nominate a pro-choice vice presidential candidate. i did not know what the alternative is three we would nominate a segregationist. it will not happen. guest: one of the people associated with the iraq war. not what the republican party wants to hold the election around -- the widely popular iraq war. the whole thing was a head fake to distract attention from bi ain. guest: if i were him, i think he needs some authenticity's i would do either ryan or christie, someone the core of the party would find motivating. guest: a smart guy, he has done a good job. ed rollins, the party -- he said

the party is too wide, too old, and too fat. host: let us talk about the book because you write "it is the middle class, student." -- stupid." guest: we are writing about a three-decade decline of the middle-class, what is the heart of the country. at the heart of what enabled us to be where we are. just two important -- too important not to scream about and not to make the election about. host: you point out an interesting statistic, the bottom 10% have gained about 10% in real wages the last -- years and the bottom -- top 1% has

gained more than 250% guest: if you look at the middle 60 or so, guys are 21% or 27%. this book is less about inequality and more about the lagging income growth in the 20%, 40% time, 60% quintile. and they lost 40% of their net worth between 2007-2009. and in the book we have two of the most interesting charts -- hours worked have gone up exponentially. the number of hours people have been having to work. if you think of 100 million hamsters just churning every way they can to keep the wheel going, that is a portrait of the american middle class, not going

anywhere. yuko part of what we do is try to listen to people and it drives our analysis. wells in a corner -- inequality is probably the most important thing to address. but if you listen to people, with a focus on -- they just go right to the line in the middle, the median family. flat for three decades. that is what they are looking at. if you look of the period from world war ii until 1980, it grew by a lot. so we are looking for a difference kind of country. host: james carville, the title -- how did it come about? why did you put that aside in the campaign headquarters and what is the genesis? guest: the genesis was this -- we had a lot of smart people working there, people coming in there with a lot of smart ideas.

what i was trying to do is get the campaign more focused, get the people in the campaign more focused, and it was like, it is the economy, stupid. why do we need more park space in the ninth stage -- all good, were the things but not what we should be focused on. the reason why we went to the middle-class is because in 1992 we thought the economy was the focus of everything we did went and then this instance it should actually be the restoration of the middle class. host: from "the new york post" this morning -- here is a portion of what he told cbs news. [video clip] >> the mistake my first couple of years is thinking about this job was just about getting the policy right.

that is important. but the nature of this office is also to tell a story to the american people that gives them a sense of unity and purpose and companies and, especially during tough times. when i ran everybody said, he give a great speech but can he actually manage the job. my first two years i think the notion was, well, he has been juggling and managing a lot of stuff but where is the story that tells us where he is going? i think that was a legitimate criticism. so, getting out of this town and spending more time with the american people, listening to them and also being in a conversation with them about where we go together in the country, i need to do a better

job in my second term. explaining but also inspiring. host: your reaction question of guest: that is really, really important. thes the president's -- president, a great speaker and a charismatic but did not tell people where we are going. did not do a story on the economy and health care. people want to know where this thing ends up. people are kind of desperate to know your direction because they want america to succeed, the president to succeed. i think the recognition of telling the story, the journey of what you're doing and where you are going now -- people will give you a lot of space. they know how tough it is out there. they are very responsible. they are not looking for you to throw goodies at them but they want to know where you are going. host: you said you will read about the president's message on the economy and middle-class.

guest: i was. in the book i said -- we heard the president said right here i have not driven the narrative. if you do not put something in the context of a story and never to, people cannot understand in the context of a larger plan. this is exactly the kinds of things sam and i have been talking about for a long time and we offer the narrative and the narrative is what is happening to the middle-class, how we rebuild. i thought that was one of the most encouraging interviews i have seen the president did in a long time. guest: putting in the context of the $250,000 threshold for cutting taxes for the middle class. this president's economic policy -- the recovery act was 40% tax cuts and each year after that he was doing. taxes, tax cuts. each year. his main economic philosophy,

tax cuts. we have now gotten beat $250,000, it would be in the context of a person every year in this presidency trying to make sure the middle class and the working people had a break. trying to keep the taxes low. that is the story. host: in the book, james carville, you talk about specific policy items, including congressman paul ryan and his budget. "caught the many goofball -- it could yet we have a $16 billion debt, how we bring it down question of guest: not only is it immoral but it is dishonest and everybody knows it is dishonest. it is dishonest because it said we will cut everything for poor people, give rich people a tax break but we will not tell you how we give that tax break. if that is not immoral, i did not know what it is. if we are going to say --

according to cbo, at a time we have escalating health costs the action was to increase over all health care costs. to the people getting medicare that can save it and give it to more tax cuts. it is the essence of immorality. and, plus that, he is a dedicated follower of ayn rand, he may distaffers read it might be one of the most immoral persons of the 20th centuries. he said i am not an atheist. even if he took her atheism away, and i went and i talked to jesuits and other people like that, the level of the morality. she bought the gold and will itself was immoral which is the basis of morality -- she bought the golden rule was samaras. host: how long have you known each other? guest: we met along the way but it was beginning of the clinton campaign.

guest: 20 is a good enough number. host: the book is titled "it's the middle class, stupid." betty is on the phone from illinois. eleano caller: my first comment is about alan greenspan. as far as the stimulus, he was not told the truth of the economy was so he did not put money in the stimulus. at least when the president made a mistake -- president bush was asked the same question and he said he did he saidno mystics. as far as the book, thank you, mr. carville, for the book, i know you were a of a supporter but i think the book put it that icing on the cake.

i know your wife is a republican and you are a democrat. have a good day. host: the president did save the -- guest: the previous caller raised an important question about what happened committed to the presidency. he had a mess. people know that. actually pretty amazing how the voters themselves, for about the crisis, they understand they have a responsibility, wall street had a responsibility, banks, politicians. ordinary voters thought it was a shared responsibility. and they want everybody to play a part in bringing us back. they do resent the 2%, the wall street ceo's the win their part in the process.

host:tom from fort lauderdale. independent line. caller: keyboard to take my call. two questions -- one on taxes and one on clinton. i would like to get on the clinton question. romney's taxes -- where are his taxes? he makes $20 million last year and cannot employ someone to get his taxes gun -- done? we had a secret to president nixon and we cannot need another guy. release your taxes. the question with clinton is -- when is your buddy clinton move the unity of the base to the mainstream media. he is participating in these debates. there are so afraid of the military. tell him to move the debate to the mainstream media immediately. guest: let me go to the first one. romney is a guy who clearly feels like, look, rules that

apply to everybody else does not apply to me. his father released taxes for 14 years and everybody who has run for president has done that. he says he is not going to do it. he says he has an immigration plan but i will not tell you what it is until after the election. romney, most people did not realize, is not just for the bush task -- tax cuts for the rich but once to go 20% more. he asked -- was asked to pay for it. he said getting rid of tax breaks. he said i would not tell you before the election. then he said he would cut federal programs. yes, he says i will not tell you before the election. the rules for the other candidate is you have to tell people before the election what you will do. that is the idea. so -- guest: the whole issue about addressing the inequality in the country, his response was, let's discuss that in quiet.

the big issues can be done after the election and quality -- quietly. host: this is how "the new york post was " puts it. he refers to the 1992 campaign and your former boss, bill clinton. he was somebody young and slick and needed to seem a mature and substantive, which is why he needed to but more details. mr. romney does not have the issues. guest: i think he is ignorant. he is not in a demand that he is making an absurd argument. -- he is not an ignorant man but he is making an upsurge argument. bill clinton had a thousand times more experience in government. saying somebody is more mature so they did not have to tell us what he is going to do. get out of here. he is a nice enough, smart and tough guy. it is just an idiotic argument.

>> a serious argument is, look, listening to these people, you look at the debate about the past -- did a mock -- did obama get the economy moving. that is not what the voters are. they believe he was handed a difficult thing. it was complex. look at the piece today from "the national journal" on the issue. they want to know what you are going to do. they think the middle class is in trouble, the country is in trouble and they want to know what is coming. what is in the next term or by what is in the future? guest: i hope the romney camp follows that advice. everything we see, every focus group and poll, everybody says they want to know what your idea, what your plan to get the middle-class moving again. and by and large, this election more about the next four than the last four. guest: talking about the bailout

for auto makers, the only thing the president save with the unions, one of the arguments the presidents are -- host: talking about the bill of auto makers, the only thing the president save it was the unions, one of the arguments. guest: you have this crisis, we had a lot of people in trouble, people losing their houses, small business in trouble. but even before the election, mccain and obama, democrats and republicans rallied on how to save the big banks. right thing to do, i am sure. rallied to rescue the auto companies. i am sure the right thing to do. but they believe that this president at the same kind of world view, we rescue the people who were rouse -- are responsible and not rescue -- who were irresponsible. the president had to overcome that and 2010. guest: there are a lot of people and also industry that are not gm, ford, or chrysler. it inherently save these people

also. the supply chain. it is an enormous industry with ramifications and not everybody that is in this industry is in a union, by far. host: the book is titled "it's the middle class, stupid!" republican -- good morning. caller: i would like to ask mr. james carville is there really a middle-class? looks like we have the rich and poor. i don't remember the middle class being in existence for some time now. so i am not really clear. does he go i will say a few words and turn it over to -- guest: i will say a few words and turn it over to my colleague. we do, but it is not what it used to be. explain to our caller how we define middle-class and what we say it means. guest: we go through in this

book defining it. you ask every question. and and we think it is an aspiration, and an identity, people believe in hard work being rewarded. but hard work is not being rewarded. people are building up -- if you talk to people now, not just talk to people in our focus groups, and the poles and -- 10 years ago, 75% thought there was a decent chance for you to do well given hard work. a major drop in confidence. people do believe they are on the edge and slipping. we ask the question, are you middle-class? they will say, i used to be, or my parents are, but there is a sense of slipping them. you are right. they talk about just the rich and poor, talking about america looking like a third world country. but they also think it is unacceptable. even though they get to that

conclusion they are not willing to say let's stop here. that is why people want to know what you are going to do. host: i want to read stan greenberg's words but i want to bring this looking at congressional districts and the lack of bipartisanship on the big issues -- social security, taxes, medicaid. you write in the book -- how can that happen? guest: i think one of the things that is very difficult -- and i think it has backed up by political scientists this -- the way we do all these congressional districts. the cluster of of one party in one district. i would ask people out there, look at the congressional districts in your state and is the biggest fear of a congressman is he will get beat by somebody in his own party,

supposed to get beat by somebody -- as opposed to get beat by somebody and another party, you are in trouble. as long as you don't fear losing the general election you will say i will not let somebody did in who is more hyper deaf person -- i will keep my business as close as i am to the base. if you look over a period of time, this is not the sole thing but it is a huge contributor to what we have here in the united states. i think the word for it is gerrymandering, but not quite gerrymandering the way you would learn in civics class to protect people. you do draw weird lines to have the district 80% republican or 80% democratic. more of these kinds of districts. host: what is different? if you look at the big pieces of legislation -- civil rights act of 1960, president reagan working with congressional democrats in social security, even the 1990's with bill clinton and welfare reform. guest: i know this will look like a partisan comment but this

is based in data. if you take republicans and say what is your ideology, 80% so identify as conservative. very homogeneous. if you say democrats, what is your ideology, only one-third are liberal. two-thirds of democrats are moderates and conservatives. you have a very the first party. hard to be very effective as a governing party because we are so the verse as a party, racially and ideologically. so, i think the problem is mainly on the republican side where you have this uniformity within the party. you don't have that kind of diversity across the party. you've got to break that. somehow -- maybe reapportionment, somehow you have to change the dynamic. guest: some observation that i think conservatives make -- and make them, too. if you are married, a better chance you will be in the middle class than you are not.

if you go to church, a better chance you will be in middle- class. guest: conversely, single- parent. guest: more of a chance you have a difficult time. i don't want to get into this, but a lot of economists say if you drove the value of the male worker down, you drove the value of them as a prospective spouse down with it. maybe with some of the things i really like -- the child care credit, you know, eitc -- but that is mostly for single parent. how we do what governmentally -- the value of having strong families. i think it fits in very well. guest: let me jump in -- host: let me jump in because rick had a point. stan greenberg, does the president made a big initiative to energize the base and excite moderates? guest: the big initiative is

what he caller: he is out there and expressing the understanding of how much -- how pivotal this moment is for people and saying this is about the future. guest: this is something that people are fascinated with. we need a big idea. in recent america, every stupid idea has been a big idea. we're going to cut taxes for rich people and that will stimulate the economy and the government will have more wealth. that didn't work out. "let's deregulate the banks and they will think of things to j uice up the economy."

it blew up in our face. going against the whole convention and maybe as opposed to one big dumb idea, should come up with three smart ideas. every time we get a big idea, it in our face.ck in our faw up on james carville and stan greenberg. their new book, "it's the middle class, stupid!" guest: and the point i tried to contrast is the point of the reagan democrats.

it was very focused on race. they look at the middle class squeeze. igging the is rea game." it was very much a racial discussion. we're losing jobs and incomes. we have to change that. host: debbie is on the phone. caller: good morning. i am 41 years old and i work full time every day every week and i cannot support myself. i work a 40-hour workweek and i cannot support myself. i have been retraining to get a better job.

i have a job, a salary, and benefits. i am one of the people you're talking about. it is demoralizing to go to work every day to get a paycheck and to realize i cannot take care of myself. host: what do you do for a living? caller: i worked as a production artist and i make about $30,000 every year. i didn't ask for much. it is impossible. my ill be paying off light daughters students loans until i' die. they want to cut my mother's what little she has

coming in. >> all this available on our video library and c-span.org. anthony cordesman will be introducing donatella rovera. she has just returned from syria word estimated 17,000 syrians have died. this is just getting under way i live on c-span. >> i think it is obvious how urgent this issue has become. we have announcements now not only of what may be a new major incident but the possible movement of syrian chemical weapons and we face a coming deadline and a confrontation potentially between the west, china, and russia over whether the u.n. mandate should be

continued. we have something like nine days in which to find out whether we can move forward on this incident. so let me -- that the speakers speak. we begin with donatella rovera and let her make her remarks and then aram will open things up for questions. thank you very much. >> i have spent several weeks in syria in the north of the country investigating human rights abuses, many of which have crossed the threshold of crimes against humanity and war crimes. i was in syria without the approval of the syrian government because the syrian authorities have not allowed human-rights organizations to access syria. i crossed the border i think the

y."m ms. "illegall i worked in 23 different towns and villages and in three areas of the country in the north, the area just north of the city of hamas. i like to start talking about the biggest city, the wealthiest, the economic capital of syria. the last place in syria i am aware there is --where there is no armed confrontation between the citizens and the government forces. this city has been late in joining the protest movement. it did not start as early as 70

months ago as in other parts of the country. -- as early as 17 months ago as in other parts of the country. the protests has been exactly like other parts in the country. every day i saw small demonstrations varying from a few hundred or maybe a few thousand people. within 15 minutes, the security forces would intervene. they're working alongside security forces and would fire live rounds assault, weapons but also hunting rifles. in a single day on may 25, 10 10ople were killed, tendentio demonstrators and bystanders.

not only they fire on the crowds of administrations where there is no use of violence. people were sort of clapping with their hands raised above their heads to show they have nothing in their hands. then they go after those who have been injured. this has been very much throughout the country from the beginning. cannot go to hospitals because they will be arrested. you have mostly young medical students, doctors, nurses, people who perform very important task which is providing life-saving emergency treatments. those people have been targeted by the regime. three weeks ago, three young man, medical students and an

english students, were a part of a medical team who were providing treatment to injured demonstrators on the floor of apartments where they were at risk and the owners of the apartments were at risk. the three were arrested and after a week their bodies were found with clear marks of torture. they had been shot in the heads and their bodies had been set on fire to give a clear message that it is not a good idea in in this type of humanitarian tasks. elsewhere in the other towns and villages, it was a different story. i was there in april and may and through the beginning of june, it was an open armed conflict

with the armed opposition, which is present throughout the country in different strengths and government forces fighting it out and in rural areas. but more importantly i went to the specific area to investigate a string of very brutal military incursions that have been carried out by syrian government forces and militia from late february through to early april. in all of the areas i found similar patterns. i will give you a couple of examples. security forces in one city into a house where three brothers were sleeping with their mother and their sister. they took the boys out.

there were 822, 24, and 26. they were construction workers -- there were 22, 24, and 26. they had participated in demonstrations. they did not flee their village because they figured they had not done anything and they were not worried about the army. the army went into town the day before. they knew the army was coming to town. they were asleep when they were dragged off from their beds. there were shot in their heads outside their home and their bodies were set on fire. the mother and sister were not allowed to collect the bodies until 7:00 p.m. that night. in another place, the army swept

in. a young man who was with the opposition ran up the hill to get his little cousins who were aged 8, 11, and 13, to get them back home. the army caught up with them, made the four of them kneel on the ground and shot them dead. the little one was shot in the head and in the palm of the hand. other people were up in the hills looking after the sheep. other children in the area told me that he was kneeling on the ground with his hands up when he was shot. these are really individual examples of cases that i found

by the dozens and for a period of five weeks that i spent in syria. in every single town and village that i visited, big or small, houses had been burned down to the ground. in some villages, half of the houses, hundreds of homes as well as other property, medical facilities, pharmacists, field hospitals and also ordinary clinics were burned down. it wasn't just a question of some soldiers lighting amuck because the burning was a thorough from wall-to-wall. some it incendiary devices were used which indicates a level of premeditation. does it do not carry hundreds of incendiary devices with them.

that is not what patrols carry. they would have to carry those with a specific intent. we cannot talk about possibly the actions of some rogue elements or acting on personal initiative -- that cannot be the case because the patterns are similar. brutal execution, burning down of large numbers of home and property by different units who were operating in different parts of the country at different times. this is a state policy quite clearly. they also in every village took away mostly young men. those who were killed or mostly

young men and also elderly people and children. it was the same for those who were arrested. the ones i could speak to were the lucky few who have been released. they bore her rent is marks of torture and open wounds -- thety horrendous marks of torture and open wounds. those released were people the security forces no longer had any interest in or whose families paid a lot of money to get them out. a small number of cases. there are hundreds that we know about but many more who have disappeared and have been detained, some up to a year ago and they have never come back and the families have had no way

of knowing where they are detained. when they contact the different intelligence agencies that are responsible for the detention, they are told that they are not there. sometimes families manage to get some news because they hear from people who have been released and tell them, "i was detained with your son." in most cases they have no idea. they have no idea that their relatives have disappeared. we have to be mindful of the behavior of the armed opposition. the armed opposition was formed after several months of peaceful demonstrations being shot at and demonstrators being killed and injured and anybody suspected of

being involved with protests or demonstrations being rounded up and tortured and in some cases disappeared and in some cases killed. an armed opposition was formed and it is becoming stronger and more organized. it is engaging in a more efficient way in recent weeks with government forces and gaining more ground in recent weeks. they, too, have begun to commit human-rights abuses. it is for now at the level of individual cases. we all know that in the situation of armed conflicts things can escalate very quickly. i would like to have a small digression on the issue of the term "civil war," which is being

used in the media quite a bit when talking about the issue in syria. i do not think we are in the situation of civil war. as a kind of private initiative. the monopoly of violence has been firmly in the hands of government forces. syria has a certain ethnic composition. sick. issue has not started with the uprising and goes back many decades. because some of the development that we have seen since the first large-scale massacre that was reported on the 25th of may and in which has not completely been clarified until this day right up to the massacre that was reported last night.

the reports in these cases which remain to be very -- they are all militias from villages going into sunni alleges with the support of the armed forces that area with artillery and then the militias going in and finishing the jobs, so the speech, killing people. -- so to speak, killing people. government forces targeting their opponents because they are at their opponents and because they protest. the danger as the conflict continues is that it could

acquire a greater sort of sectarian element, which would be very dangerous. to end with aan few words of the role of the international community. everybody i met, if there was one question that everybody was asking was, why is the world doing nothing? why is the world watching? the syrian uprising took place during the arab spring and people in syria saw that in tunisia and egypt. people brought about change without it becoming armed conflict. in libya, it was a different story. there was intervention by the

international community. in syria, the world has watched and has done nothing. the international community is paralyzed in a way that it was not in libya. looking at this from the perspective of a human rights organization whose interest is first and foremost the protection of the civilian population. it is striking first of all if one goes back and looks at the kind of debate that was being had in the spring of 2011 at the syrian uprising. very quickly, the only option that was being discussed by the international committee of was, should be a -- should there be a military intervention or not?

but there was no discussion of any other initiative and there could have been a number of initiatives. the situation in libya was referred to the international criminal court within two weeks of the first demonstration taking place. we are 17 months into what has been a brutal assaults on civilians. the leaders of the free world are still discussing whether it would be suitable to refer the case to the international criminal court. we have seen the international community agreed last april to the setting up of the united nations mission in syria. it was a case of too littlte and too late. the un supervision mission in syria was there with the wrong

mandate. to observe the cease-fire. there was no cease-fire, not even for a single day. it was clear there was not going to be a cease-fire. things had moved too far for a cease-fire to be a realistic option. two useful things that should have been done that would still be useful now would be for the situation in syria to be referred to the international court and for the mandate of the u.n. mission to be renewed not in its current form but to be expanded, to be given the authority and the necessary human skills and capacity to carry out investigation into war crimes that continue to be

committed. the use of that would be that it would be sending a signal to the perpetrators of these abuses. is over.for in punitivpunity it is regrettable that that message was not delivered to the concerned parties right at the beginning. it is not too late to do so now and i'll stop there and be available for questions. >> thank you very much, donatella rovera. thank you for your comments. the challenge in syria from the operational ground level all the way up to the strategic picture, you have levels of complexity and a kind of challenge that the region has not seen in decades.

my comments will focus on taking us from the internal to mention and the popsicles therein -- and the obstacles therein. the roots of the crisis are tied to social economic disparity. the mismanaged distribution of natural resources. the crisis has evolved at a pace and scale that has metastasized the internal politics of the opposition and the responses of the assad regime. one thing can be said about the assad response. every authoritarian system about

what to do to maintain power does very little to translate into a path forward for a future for syrians and for a way out for the assad regime. it can only prolong the crisis. you have by far more polarized environment, no communication between assad and the opposition. this has now bolona into a struggle for power in syria -- this has now ballooned into a struggle for power in syria. you have on both sides in message -- an effort to shape a message in what is happening in syria.

you have a battle for what the course is in terms of the right ad regimet the assd thinks they can take. it doesn't change the fact the both sides have been battling to craft a message. this has been happening in the context where you have an environment that is far more divisive than at any point in the last few decades. syria now sits on a broader regional fault line, not necessarily by design but by default. the competition and the polarization along the rhetoric of -- the struggle is

between the regime and a predominately suni opposition. is fault line impact the crisis -- this fall line impacts the ault line this fualt lin impacts the future. kind of longevity in the access to lebanon and supports the has a lot and try to shape some of the outcomes in syria first is the gulf states lethat are trying to reshape the balance. you do have a difficulty in reaching any kind of consensus at the regional level over what to do about syria. everybody wants to negotiate as long as they get exactly what

they want which is not exactly the definition for negotiation. beyond all this, the gulf states find themselves at a crucial crossroads in politics. this is the first time that they can shape regional outcomes at a time when the three traditional pillars of the arab state system are either silent or unable to change events and that is shaped the tactical choices, this idea that whatever emerges locally will most likely be predominately sunni to be supported. all these things complicate the struggle that 16 months ago was essentially a grassroots efforts to shift the debate about what

syria's future to look like, what economics should look like . a lot of instability. there is no international community on syria. there is not likely to be one in the near future. you've of actors like the united states that are struggling with the lessons from past experiences in places like lebanon and iraq. these are countries with deep communal divisions that the u.s. could not and cannot fix decisively in and a short-term effort. here in the context of a country like syria, there is -- that is close to the epinter of an arab-israeli politics, it is critical to the stability of

neighboring states like jordan, lebanon, iraq, and turkey. it affects the stability of israel as well. the reality of the view from washington is that there must be a strategic outcome in syria, one that maps out some kind of stability at a time when states like egypt remained unstable, jordan has seen a shift in leadership over time, and all of this is critical in light of iraqi concerns about its own internal stability. none of these paid positive scenarios for the syrian future. you have a regime that will continue to repress and will continue to adopt the lessons learned from other cases of authoritarian failure. but will not be able to chart a path forward. you have continued support from external actors which will make the kind of scenarios and on the ground experiences that the syrian people are suffering all

the more intractable overtime. this will be a long-term crisis and even have assad were removed or left, it would not change the reality that whoever runs syria will have to face the socio- economic, political and economic ramifications for the next decade if not longer. we can talk about the other points during the question and answer period. >> ladies and gentlemen, let me throw things open for questions but before i do so, let me ask a favor of you. if you look around, you can see how many people are in the audience. a lot of them are going to want to ask questions. i'm going to ask you the favor of actually asking a question, not making a statement or a speech, having the question of simple enough so the panel has a chance of actually answering it,

and before you actually ask that question, could you please indicate to you are and the organization you are a member of if it is an organization you're speaking for. with that, let me ask you as the first question? forgive me if i don't identify those of you i know by name. i will just point but the lady and the front row -- please, >> barbara slavin from the atlantic council. the question is -- we read that the opposition forces within the country are getting stronger and they have a defect of control over large swaths of the countryside. is that the case and, if so, what are you so pessimistic route -- about their ability to defeat the assad forces?

>> in the whole of the north which is where is i was and is no different in other parts of the country, it is kind of a shared management of the land, if you will. the government forces are present. have checkpoints on the main roads and sometimes they put up flying checkpoints at intersections with smaller roads and the smaller roads you can move if you are careful and always check ahead that there is not a sudit's that kind of divif labor -- also on the main roads at night, the government forces tend to kind of lock themselves up in the tanks and not stay very visible. i would not say there is total control that the opposition has anywhere but they certainly

have operational ability. to move around. >> thanks for your question. you have to understand a static snapshot of what is happening along the frontier with turkey is something that is not going to capture the scale of what is happening between the regime forces and these units that are operating as part of the opposition. there have been reports, none of them completely accurate, about command and control by opposition forces in places. the mapping we have seen suggests over a significant portion of the promise, they are reporting and i am suspect about that. there are indicators that there are strong pockets of control along the turkish frontier. there is a reluctance now by the

syrian military to send the kind of messages that could aggravate further an already difficult dynamic with turkey. that being said, the assad regime still has enormous repressive capability. they have always expected as far back as the early 1980's that the next battle the security apparatus would have to face is not unlike what they saw in the 1970's and 1980's. you have an ideological military and far too many desertions as opposed to defections and you still have a fair amount of command control but the challenge this patrician battle really poses to the regime is that they are engaged in a struggle that always shifts, it is like a game of whack-a-mole and does not -- has learned not to stay and fight to the and it

will drag things out further. that is partly why i am a pessimist. neither side is able or willing to make the kinds of decisions that slow the pace of violence. i would not be surprised if we're talking about this kind of cycle well into the end of the year if not into next year. spreadgoing to try to things around the room. the gentleman next to the gentleman with the microphone. >> thank you. i have been listening for months on this thing and have been waiting for someone to give a percentage of population of syria. >> to ask a question please? >> i would like to find out what is the percentage of opposition as opposed to assad forces. >> why we take a couple of other questions at the same time? the gentlemen and the second row

there. -- in the second row there. >> i appreciate and things are more horrific than they thought. i was surprised that the role of sectarianism is not bigger. could you draw more of the sectarian roles and how they play in this? >> one more question? the gentlemen in the front row. >> thank you. my question is for the entire parent. when you look from lebant to the bay of bengal, what does the panel think the chances for all this violence in syria to spill

over to jordan, turkey, and elsewhere and become a catalyst for a larger regional conflict? >> i think we would all love to know the percentage but the situation in syria just does not make it possible to conduct that kind of research. there is either people and journalists in syria with government approval and their movements and their actions are tightly controlled and observe and monitor. then there is others who go in illegally and have other challenges in terms of how much they can move about and what they can do and so on. it is very difficult to know with any degree of certainty either what is the percentage of support amongst the population for one side or the other on the one hand as well as a exactly

-- the numbers in terms of what is in the syrian army, that is reasonably well known. what is less well known is how many people have actually defected. the figure is very -- the figures vary greatly. i have not seen a figure of the exact number of members of the armed forces that have deserted that i consider to be reliable. i think there are various figures. it is still a small percentage. spill over potential -- i would like to rewind back to libya. that was one place where the international community acted or reacted with lightning speed. everybody was united pretty much on what to do. there was a small group of people who named them sells the national transitional council

that essentially represented themselves, not anybody else but they had good contacts mostly in the western capitals in america and europe. all whole world fell in love with them, completely forgot any of the people. i was in ban gauzy and -- benghazi and everybody thought libya was going to be so easy because there are not the sectarian issues you have in syria with different communities. it is very homogeneous. and they forgot about tribal differences. the regime in libya fell and now you have 100 nations in a single city and many hundreds more and when there are disagreements, people don't sell that and more

by punching it out but they fire rockets at each other from across the street. the situation is very messy, indeed. in terms of when you talk about spill over, the parameters of analysis that have existed for a long time in the middle east have been sort of thrown up in the air in the last year. it is because those who brought about change have not been the traditional oppositions. in any of these countries, they are trying to play a role now to a larger or smaller degree of success but certainly, the opposition played no role from tunisia to syria. it has been young people who have just come out and got us to where we are in the different countries. i see too many of the parameters

of the old analysis that have been used for decades. to predict what may or may not happen and i don't see not taking into account analyzing the situation today of a new reality that the actors have changed, at least the change that is deeply chicken the country. -- shaken the country. you still have the older guys trying to find a place in the new egypt or the new tunisia when they were really not very present during the uprising and they did not play a decisive role, if any at all, in bringing about the downfall of the regimes. i think that is something to really bear in mind. the second thing i would say is that after the french revolutions, they got napoleon. it took many decades before

democracy. what has happened in the middle east is the beginning of a process. it does not matter -- in each country there are challenges. in none of the countries, it is going to be great. even in the best case scenario, there will be internal conflict, internal strife at different levels. because people who have been denied the possibility to have a free press or free expression or free assembly for decades are going to need to find their own way to create spaces for debate, for resolving their differences. while applying the old

parameters of analysis is worth bearing in mind, there are rather new elements. >> on the question if you can reliable man about the percentage that supports the opposition or supports the regime, it is hard enough to map out the players involved in politics as it stands. you will not get a reliable picture in terms of accurate numbers. what is clear is that you do have a large cross-section of the syrian population that has to deal with the reality, the myth of a unified syria under some language of arab nationalism which has been pulled out of the equation. you now have communalism. you have communities like christian minorities and some heterodocs.

they can be critical of assad but they don't know what the alternative is in terms of social economics and politics and security "is still a sizable popular support and even with the in the sunni co community. have a significant portion within the armed forces that are hanging in there because of the real threat that they face should there be some kind of debasqification. you have these kinds of defections are people being sidelined. on the question of sectarianism, the assad regime has widened the communal told -- the communal to mention the of largely -- largely lost control of that message. it has polarized society and you

have the lot of mob politics that impacts this. the communal dimension and the potential divorce between communities could be a source of instability and require true leadership in that something as increasingly scarce in syria. in terms of the chances of spillover effects, with libya as a country that imploded and syria will exploit of things continue, we already have instability in the northern provinces. they are launch platts -- bear launch pads for opposition activities and in syria, you have a sunni community in lebanon bettis in the same politics of the shiites before the and the 1970's. they feel they have no leaders and they have, because with their brethren in syria. lebanon has become increasingly unstable and subject to the

effects of a potential tsunami of instability from syria. jordan has already seen a number of prime ministers come and go and it is not a good sign for stability in jordan and there are pressures there in a country that has fewer sources of revenue and is relying on external support for stability. even turkey has to face the reality that it has an 800 + kilometre with syria and its own source of instability and iraq tested deal with its own sunni-shiite problems. in none of the countries where we have seen regime change or changes in the distribution of power do we have any sense of certainty that the players who are shaping events today will either be relevant or able to shape outcomes in the future.

this is not the kind of cycle that one can assess in 2013 or 2012 alone. we will have to assess this overtime and who ultimately in harris the centers of power is deeply uncertain. -- inherits the centers of powers is deeply uncertain. >> i think that both panelists race an issue which needs far more attention. these are changes taking place in the region which, for decades, as seen economic and demographic pressures build on a largely national level. there is varied little regional integration or regional economics accept for a local security arrangements. the pressures that are outlined will be extraordinarily difficult for any government to solve. that report to the conclusion that many of them could not be adjusted by a company and

government on -- in less than a decade simply because of the u.s. pressure, economic pressure, the disparities in income on the problems of governance. there's a warning that i think needs to be drawn particularly by americans, a confusion that there is an easy route to elections and elections produce legitimate governments. historically, elections do not produce legitimate governments. virtually every election held in the post-colonial period did not produce a legitimate government or one that could survive for half a decade. the president historical even in europe is one that we might bear in mind. i remember a senior arab official making this point -- it was in st. for westerners to talk about an hour of spring when westerners have their own experience. they had a spring in 1848. last

it arguably until 1914 and did not end well. i think this is prospectively what we want to keep in mind over time. the gentlemen in the second row over there and we will take another series of questions. >> good morning. while it is clear to me who is supporting the regime, i would like to know in your opinion if it's true that in the opposition there are also minorities or is it just the sunni uprising?

>> the gentle man in the far back over there. >> thank you. i'm a former prisoner from syria. you mentioned the icc. when need a resolution. on not sure if i understood this but you describe the mission of the un observers as useless because there is nothing to see there. what you expected from expanding a useless group? there is lots of weapons and nobody will collect those and how you deal with those steps anybody picking up arms is in a position. >> thank you. the gentle man in the front row here.

please -- >> good morning, i'm from the leadership academy in from the building. what is the position of the international community on syria and today have any plans or actions to take on stabilizing the community and stopping the violence of syria? >> who supports the armed opposition was the first question. that is a good question and i think it is one where the answer is likely to possibly keep changing as the situation develops further. some of the armed groups that i

saw operating in syria had one kalashnikov between four people. they were poorly armed. that has changed a little bit in recent weeks. the last week that i was there at the end of may, i saw some more and they have light weapons and a arms -- in the hands of armed groups. they have been able to capture more weapons from a temporary military camps that they have been able to overrun. obviously, there are different players outside mostly who seem to be offering help. none of it is done very much in the open. i don't like to work with

speculation but with facts. for now, i think there will not say anymore because i have no certainty and i don't like to speculate but certainly what i think is clear to all is that there are different players as in any other conflict who might have an interest and influence in things and may choose to do so by providing support of different kinds. to the question over there, icc russia - it has not been tried. we have seen that russia and china agreed to the un mission to the kofi annan plan. it is regrettable that the international community did not think outside the box and did not try to address and look at

options which were options outside the military intervention. that is what i think it's regrettable that from the very beginning, the debate that was had was should there be military intervention and not look at other options. there has been no serious attempt. it is quite clear that russia has been playing an obstructive role but it is too easy to just blame russia because even the government's were talking tough today, only four weeks ago, there was an initiative by the swiss government precisely to rally support for going to the security council and tabling a resolution on referring syria to the icc and countries in the northern hemisphere were still saying that maybe we should give the kofi and non plan a chance. they have not tried and that is regrettable. with regard to the role and

mandate of the u.n. mission, i did not say they were useless i said by the time they got there, the mandate that they were given was inadequate. there were there to observe a ceasefire and that was the mandate and there wasn't a ceasefire to observe and there will not be one to observe any time soon. but what we would like to see is the mandate to be renewed but expanded -- for them to be given a mandate to investigate human rights abuses, crimes against humanity, war crime and if they're given the mandate, they will also be given the human resources necessary. in terms of the question on the role of the international community, as i said earlier, the international community has very much focused only on looking at the possibility for

military information and -- intervention and decided that was not a good route to go down and it has not done very much. else until now. >> in terms of the question on minority representation within the opposition, the reality is that by a factor as opposed to by design, it has been difficult to build an opposition that has minorities and meaningful -- in meaningful leadership positions. there has certainly been syrians who belong to minority groups who have distanced themselves from assad but that does not change the fact that the opposition groups remain largely sunni ted by senate demo demographics. you have to be careful about pigeonholing anyone group.

many minority groups are cautious. on the question of the u.n. mission, and whether it should be renewed, you have to look at the alternate scenarios. includes a protracted civil war not unlike what you saw in algeria or lebanon which would go on unabated and with metastasize further and no one will have a sense of what the outcome will be. beyond that, you have the prospects of deepening instability and communal division. the annan plan was the right idea at the wrong time and not supported by a mob of the players that mattered locally to say anything of international. is only now the people are starting to come around to the reality that this will become a very messy and long-term crisis. in any form, there needs to be some prospect of diplomatic effort.

a lot of what we are seeing is deeply depressing and-on syria. that does not mean one has to completely close of the diplomatic channels. on the question of whether or not, what is the position of the international community -- again, there is no international community. on syria. you have a very divided political sphere. have disunity in the security council. you have russia that is deeply suspicious of any western efforts in syria. it is based on what they view as the erosion of their interests in the region to say nothing of their own internal pressures tied to the expansion of nato and all of these things make it very difficult to chart and a meaningful course when it comes to syria. it is not very good answer but it is as close to the truth as i can find and it is not clear what any player at the international level can do in the short term to stymie the violence.

>> ladies and gentlemen, i've been instructed to end this discussion formally at 11:30. i would like to thank dontat ella very much of giving us a human rights picture o. i would like to thank aram for providing perspective encourage you think and in the usual manner? [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012]

>> united nations is meeting today about syria and the voice of america reports that syrian opposition activists and government forces with tanks and helicopters on thursday killed more than 150 people mostly

civilians in a village. the activists and witnesses say troops shelled the village before storming the area. estimates of the number of debts are as high as too moderate 20. if you want to see this program again, it will be available later in our video library at c- span.org. we will have the national governors' association meeting today at 1:15 and a discussion of defining great leadership and at 3:00, a panel of education and the work force with arne duncan and former secretary margaret spelling both live here on c-span. we are asking the question today on facebook -- what makes a great political leader? log onto facebook.com/cspan and we may read those later today.

our road to the white house coverage continues today with president obama in virginia. we're covering his stops all live, one at green run high school in virginia beach and a high school in hampton, virginia and later on, the president will be speaking at the roanoke historic fire station number one and will be joined by mark warner and former virginia governor tim kaine this evening at 7:25 eastern. no events for mitt romney today but is reported that former candidate rick santorum is hitting the campaign trail for governor romney and is expected to campaign for him tomorrow in pennsylvania. >> when you think about cyber actors, let's put it into five groups -- nation states, cyber criminals, hackers and hactivist and terrorists. they're not all mission states a

when you think about deterrence, you'll not talking about nation on nation, you have other non- nation state actors you now have to consider. in one of these attacks, you may not know who is doing it, who is attacking your systems. either way, the outcome could be a same. you lose the financial sector or the power grid for your systems capabilities for a period of time. does not matter who did it, you still lose that. you've got to come up with a defensive strategy that solves that. >> watch the national security adviser general keith alexander on the cspan video library. >> hitler had no alternate plan. when these remnants of armies were not coming to his aid, that is when he collapsed and

realized it would come to an end. >> in new look at the second world war from adolf hitler's rise to power to his dark, chaotic final days than it is an objective was simply not to be captured alive by the russians. he was afraid of being paraded through moscow in a cage and being spat at and ridiculed. he was determined to die. eva braun was determined to die within them a more sunday at 8:00 on >> this weekend, the campaign collection is about 100,000 objects and goes from the very beginning of the nation and goes right to the present. that is important for us because we are trying to keep this large addition fall and documented and reflect the largest part of american democracy. >> a look at the smithsonian

presidential campaign memorabilia collection, sunday at 7:00 p.m. eastern and also sunday, more from "the contenders." this week, wendell willkie who never ran for political office before winning the 1940 republican presidential nomination. he would never hold office but he would become an unlikely ally to fdr. that is of 7:30 p.m. sunday on cspan 3. >> tampa, fla. khmer and the charlotte north carolina mayor recently set up for discussion about their city's preparations for hosting the 2012 republican and democratic national conventions. it was posted at the newseum in washington.

[applause] >> thank you. good morning and thank you for being the early morning crowd. i am mike allen and this is the pre-convention edition of the playbook breakfast. we are excited to have the mayor's of both hostess' cities, mayor box form of tampa, mayor fox of charlotte, republicans will go first in 48 days is the republican convention. at each of the conventions, we will be hosting political hug where we will do live shows daily and three events. we have playbook breakfast every day of both conventions. we hope to see some of you all bethere. in the evening is a lounge where we will have soft drinks.

and not so soft drinks. we will of lots to talk about and look forward to seeing some of your guys there. before the mayor's come on stage, we have a pregame with reid epstein who has been in they romney and obama bubbles. we hope you are following along with us on twitter. reid came to us from "newsday "before that. he has also interned at "the washington journal." he went to emory and columbia school of journalism. you will be reading his byline and thank you for coming. [applause] thank you so much for coming

out. take the hot seat. you are our first romney bus reporter in the cycle and you have been out with president obama. power the baubles difference? >> the runyan organization as a whole does not mind hiding what they think about reporters. they are more aggressive person without pushing back to people on the bus, on the phone, at events where is the obama campaign bends over backward to have this aura of being nice to people. >> this suggestion is that they actually feel the same way. >> of course they feel the same way about us. at the end of the day, no matter how the romney folks treated you, you can talk to them and you could get them to go off the talking points. the obama folks to me seemed more disciplined in the

traveling bubble. they sort of have the specifics of 6-8 sentences no matter what the question is. >> i did not warn you that i would ask you this. what do the baubles think of their minders? what did the two press corps is think of the campaigns? >> it is a little bit different. i'm not sure i have been in the obama bubble long enough to have a formed answer to that question. i would tell you that the romney bubble as far as the reporters have been together for going on one year now. anytime you're in close proximity with people for so long, it is almost like being at summer camp for at the end of the session, you know what will irritate every other person there and you know the things they do that will irritate you. you have all these different personality disputes and long-

simmering issues that are often stupid personality issues where people sit on the bus or things that someone says. the obama campaign is not on the road every day in the way the romney campaign has been, you don't seem to have the dynamic. >> what irritates you? >[laughter] >> these microphones on? i just want to get information and i want to know what is going on. i would much rather have people be not nice to me and be able to have something for a story. and to have information that other people don't have and to be treated and have the food be better and still might have done a thing. >> there is an odd paradox that

in a way we have more information than ever. i started out on the campaign trail. you talk about what they say and the policy papers they hand out and the reaction of people in the crowd but now, everyone in this room gets all of that because we can watch the events live and see the reaction on twitter and post the policy papers. so what do you do? >> what i figure that my job is when i'm on the road is to come back with something that you cannot get by watching the event on tv. the obama events for all on tv. the romney events are almost all streamed on the internet somewhere. my job is to add something for our stories -- that somebody

pushingsitting in the office in can get. whether it is talking with the advisers who are milling about in the back of the events, whether it is for word what the candidate is trying to accomplish for the message or what advertisements that will run next -- things you can get because you know these people and because you are there and because you see them in bars and you're not getting by watching the exact same event 1,000 miles away. >> take us behind the scenes a little bit. you mentioned the advisers milling about and that is amazingly viable to have -- karl rove will drop into a center in the last campaign, tell us about that. >> early in the campaign in october and november in iowa, there was one hotel in i with everybody stays at which is a marriott. i was watching one of the big

faith and family events that was that saturday in the early afternoon. i had filed and i went to the bar at the hotel to have dinner. it was the -- i was the only one in the bar and newt gingrich came down incident -- sat next to me. >> is this a bar stool? >> this was at the end of the bar. wisconsin was undefeated and the loss to michigan state in overtime. i was the fourth quarter with newt because he came to the same thing i did. he came to this event and finished of schmoozing with whoever he was the schmoozing with annie came to the bar to have a drink at the end of the night and the only other person there was a reporter so we chatted that we want both went to the same college and we talked about the race and we talked about the football game that was on. you see that happening more

often early in the campaigns when there is less everything. there is less minders, there is less media so it is a much more intimate session so you get to know the candidates and the staff better. it,if you're covering you're not can get anywhere close to the candidates at this stage. >even the advisers, the president's advisers are staying in a different hotel the most of the press. you will not see them but the romney people you will see them having a drink late and you cominco with them and get information out of room that you would not get normally. >> follow him on twitter. he is @rediepstein. thank you for your great

coverage. [applause] we would like to thank the bank of america for their continued partnership in these playbook breakfasts which are important for the issues that matter most in washington and we appreciate bank of america's partnership in this amazing year which is about to get more amazing in the year ahead. thank you in live stream land for being there and we would like to join our conversation. we will be getting your questions for both of the mares. -- both of the may orders. - mayors. it is 48 days until the republican convention in tampa. mayor bob blockhorn is with us.

-- mayor bob buckhorn is with us. thank you for joining us. the mayor is from falls church high school, the jaguars' them in 1976. that tells you how old i am. >> you have family here? >> my brother as a photojournalist on the white house detail for cnn. if you have somebody who looks like me with less care, that is my byounger brother. >> dad was upi? >> in its heyday. i remembered as a kid that we only had one car growing up so we would take my dad to work in the morning and the company afternoon. we parked and 14th street and i looked at the national press club that he would be sitting there typing away with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth and a bottle of whiskey in the drawer. >> we are about to invade your

city. >> i can't wait. >> what do you hope we will remember about tampa? >> for most people coming to tampa, it is an untapped market. some of you in this room have never been to temple before so it is a mid-sized american city hosting an international event and other the olympics will be the most watched television this year. tampa is a place where i hope people walk away with a sense of a city i did not know anything about. it is a city i would like to potentially come and visit again and invest in. it is a really neat place. >> the convention itself will be in the tampa bay form. someone said you could throw a baseball out there and throw the river and would go to the gulf of mexico. will there be a beach field to the pregame? >> in late august in tampa, everything feels beach-y.

the temperature is a little warm. some of our friends don't realize how hot it is there at that time. many of the delegations will be spending time at the beaches and many of the hotels will be at the beaches and many people use this as an opportunity to visit disney world or stay at the beaches and bring their families. i think you'll get thelavor of a very ethnically diverse community and it will very much have a florida feel to it. >> you are a democrat hosting a republican convention. >> i am indeed. i hope they will let me end. in. i really don't care what goes on inside the building. for me, this is an economic development opportunity and for my city. of a look at this as a political event. i look at this as a chance to showcase tampa. yes, i am a democrat but i intend to be the best host the

republicans have ever had. my job is to replace ed rendell as their favorite democrat. >> why do say that? >> he was chairman of the dnc at the time was very transactional. philly got it. mayor rendell did everything they could to make sure their experience for the republicans was a good one. i don't care with the politics are. i may disagree with some of it but my job is to be the host at my job is to provide a safe environment but i want to showcase tampa, florida for the entire world. >> are you expecting demonstrators? you had a team to go to chicago to watch with a big demonstration was like? >> we have been training for this for a year-and-a-half. the republican organizers have done 10 or 12 these events have told us that at this point in the preparations, tampa is well- positioned that well prepared as any city they have ever been in.

we are expecting demonstrations. the dynamic in the country and the emotions around this election and the emotions around this economy will lend itself to very fervent expressions of alternative views. we will be prepared for that. we have tried to accommodate everybody and their first amendment rights while expecting the people will be paid. we're training for those who choose not to. if they choose not to, it will be a small minority, we will deal with them and deal with them respectfully. we will extract them from that environment and we will be happy to house them at the local jail. we are hoping that they won't. we will be prepared if they do. >> are you worried? >> i worry about a lot of things as mayor like hurricanes. i think we are as well positioned and well-trained as anybody could be for this event. we will deal with it and deal with it well. there will be incidents, i'm

sure. we expect that we will do it in a way in a form and in a fashion that will make tampanians and americans proud. >> how real is the hurricane threat? >> we calculated this and we have not had a direct hit in 90 years. >> congratulations. >> thanks, mike. i think we have calculated in at less than 1%. in florida, you can train for hurricanes every year. we are ready if that happens and ultimately the decision to evacuate his mind. we think we will be fine and it will be hot. it is a tropical environment and we understand that but we are ready and deal with her kids on a daily basis in terms of preparation. i think we will be okay. >> both of the mayor's we're talking with today we called new urban nests, they are trying to get people to live in the city.

in florida, they don't live in cities, they live on golf courses. what do you do to try to get more people downtown? >> our downtown has seen more growth in the last year than it has seen in the last 10 years. >> you have river walk. >> the obama administration came through recently to allow us to finish our river walk. tampa is a dynamic place on the waterfront. we have not taken the band is of the waterfront like we should have but you are seeing a huge explosion in young professionals moving back downtown. that phenomenon is occurring around the country but is typically in tampa. i think tampa is leading the way out of this recession in florida and is being driven by young professionals who enjoy the urban environment. we have triple the level of attendance and some of our downtown parks in the last year because we drive so much activity down there. once people get exposed to the waterfront, they walk away elected delegates and convention visitors saying wow, i never

knew this city existed and this is a cool place. >> we know it drives employment in charlotte light bank of america. what to the unprofessional in tampa do? >> it is a diverse economy. part of it is back up as wall street operations. >> who is the largest? >> in downtown tampa, it is probably one of the banks. we're still regional headquarters for many banking institutions but we have a big technology sector, the university of south florida which drives technology and incubation. we have moffitt cancer center and we just built a facility which is the center for applied medical learning and simulation that will do probiotics and simulation unparalleled across the world. that will drive about surgeons from all over the world to train on robotics and simulation. it is an emerging southern city

and a city trying to change its economic dna from real-estate and tourism to a more technology and value added the economy. i look at this recession and i've only been there for the past year and have so for me coming out of this recession and repositioning tampa to change its dna and make it a place where we can attract the best and brightest and keep our young people, is my mission. i have a 6-year-old and 11-year- old both girls. that's how i know god is a woman. if i want them to come home someday, and not go to austin, texas or san diego, i've got to create an environment that allows them to come home to a job that warrants the education that my wife and i will give them. i have skin in this game and i am passionate about them the main hall is the tampa bay * forum. the main meeting will be in the convention center so what is

nearby? >> they will be on the water. the convention center and the tampa bay * center is on the water. the two major hotels that will post delegations are right there with in the perimeter. you have harbor island across the channel which is where 7000 residents live as well as some of the delegates staying there. you have the inner city which is our historic district which is half a mile away connected by a streetcar. i think it is a pedestrian- oriented friendly environment. many delegations will stay at the beaches. >> some of them are distant beach as. >> they are and here is the challenge for tampa and charlotte -- where both mid- sized american cities hosting major international events. tampa has hosted four super bowls. we do this as well as anybody in the country but hosting a major international event like the republican or democratic convention is a different challenge for us as it is for

mayor fox. the logistics and transportation will be different than if it was chicago or new york or l.a. we cannot observe that the same way and the host committee has least over 400 buses that will move the delegations back and forth. tampa's release spread out. that is the nature of florida. a lot of people want to stay at the beach as the one to bring their families and make a vacation out of this. almost from orlando to sarasota, delegations will be housed. >> how far is orlando? >> it is probably 90 miles and sarasota is about the same theme so they will be coming downtown every day. >> most of the delegates, if they're not in downtown tampa will be at the beaches which is about a 25-minute bus ride. >> one of the surprises has been

trying to get the federal funding that you needed for security. there are not earmarks any more. >> both mayor fox and i spent a good talk bit of time in washington, d.c. to free up the $50 million that has been committed to both cities, charlotte and tampa. for security. that was not something we thought was an earmark, that was a necessity. we could not have posted that event without the security money. i will be able to throw 1000 officers at this and i have to hire from all over the state of florida, 3000 more law enforcement personnel, troopers, deputies, police of a service in addition to the national guard. $23 million will go to feed, clothe, and equip those 4000 law enforcement personnel and the remaining 20 million goes to security-related purchase light

cameras and equipment. that $50 million will go and it is not a christmas list for the city. it is a serious use of money for security-related purposes to keep thethankfully the congresse through and we're spending that money as we speak. >> how was fundraising going? >> it is going well. i am not as involved in it. our committee has raised money necessary. they estimate they will raise $50 million. you talk about a direct capital infusion. you have $50 billion on security-related things, you have $59 of the host committee put it on the party, and then another $50 million of

convention bill were spending. you at the multiplier on that you are looking at close to $300 million invested in the local economy. that creates jobs, opportunities. small businesses have an opportunity to participate. >> there are local skeptics. >> ask me in september. actually, i do. in spite of all the sleepless nights, the preparation, i think when this is said and done, the world will how to a different view of tampa, florida. we will be dancing on the international stage. anytime we get in front of anybody as a city, we come away, and there will be criticisms. we come away with folks impressed with what we have to offer. >> the conventions used to figure out who the nominee is, the horse trading who will get

the nomination. conventions do not get so much trauma around them, and it is possible that romney will make his running mate sen. should conventions be modernized? >> the last contested convention was the democrats in 1960. actually, in 1956. i do not know. have they become archaic? some would make that argument. and both these cases we know who the nominees will be. the question of the vice- presidential pick, we know on the democratic side. i imagine romney will announce to get the ball going into the convention. what this does is energized activists and that is important, because the folks that come to both conventions are the true believers, the folks who will not on doors, make the phone

calls, who will raise the small dollars, that get energized for the election. it serves a purpose. is it a purpose that is worth $100 million in federal tax money? good question. >> what if it were two days. >> it is worth it to us. >> a shorter convention would be worth it? >> i think so. certainly for my city. for us to have the opportunity to tell our story, i am all in. it is our coming out party. we'll tell our story to the world. we will tell tampa's store. >> how is it different from e super bowl? , everybody comes to have fun. some will choose to do otherwise.

super bowls -- we can do super bowls in our sleep, we have got so at that. >> this is 50,000 people, 5000 press. >> we estimate 15,000 press. >> by miss polk. -- misspoke. it is potentially a combustible mix. we expect that, we know who they are. we know what their tactics are. for the most part it is going to be a good event. >> you gave occupy the heisman. >> we did not give much to them. they had this big bed sheet hung from the tree across the street

from me, and i live in a place that would not be typically occupy friendly. they're not a lot of democrats where i began -- where i live it. it is not a gated community, but he hung the biggest bet she'd say me -- bed sheet. i saw the picture in the newspaper. i would not let them occupy anything. the public parks belong to everybody and anybody, and i will not let somebody take over the park for whatever purpose. we would not let them occupy a part in downtown, and most mayors run the country who did found themselves having to extract them later on at great political cost and trauma. >> what intelligence are you getting about what the protests

will be like? >> the 99.9% people good, law- abiding america. the less than 1% that will come that have been defined as anarchists are there to cause mayhem. what we saw in minneapolis, paul, what we sell we in chicago, a group of people with no ideology, just intent on destroying what of the system is. we anticipate they will be here, some of the singh folks you saw at the united nations event in chicago. we have been monitoring their activities and we steady their tactics and we will be ready for them. you can assume they will be here. >> that could be -- >> we hope not.

>> tell us about the burns stakeouts. >> it is a world-renowned steak house. house, withak the best wine collection. the wine list is this big, and folks used to steal it. they haven't changed it to the tables. for those of you who are coming, if you're lucky enough to get a reservation, it is well worth it. i would do it if i were you, and then i would go down to the historic district where some of the old cigar factories are, like the latin quarter in tampa, but burns is well worth the visit. >> what else? >> i have heard that politico is

picking up the tab. >> for you, sure. >> we have got great restaurants, and what you will find out about tax -- the you know what a -- is proof it is a spanish dish. if you laid out the ingredients of the dish on a table before you cook it, you would say none of this work sprit if you put it in the dish, it makes a spectacular meal. we are hispanic, latino, italian, cuba. we are a metaphor for america. it is a different place than most other cities. we speak three languages, spanish, italian, and english. there are some words in 10 but that did not exist anywhere

else. >> an example? isthe spelling of sp7 septima. that is what they call it in the historic district. some would say is an incorrect spelling. it is an exciting place. you will enjoy it. >> i would like to bring others into the conversation. a question for the mayors? >> the 1% have been a big presence at conventions. given that caps are off and

billionaires' are spending as much as a figures on a single contribution, had you seen any upsurge in the huge spending by that fat cats who financed our elections? >> in terms of contributions in terms of hosting the convention? not a huge upsurge. i am not as involved on the fund-raising side as the committee is. what they have seen, some of our partners who have made contributions to the convention doing significant legacy projects that will stay behind after the convention. is building a playground and when a buyer neighborhoods. we are seeing a lot of things like that take place where there will be significant positive effects for our committee, along

with the nation's they made to the convention. i would say it is not out of line with spending on other conventions. >> i am the founder of the prey at the pump movement, and we're so happy that the gas prices have come down. i guess we will have to get out there again because the prices are going back up. i wanted to ask you, what the you think we can do -- what do you think we can do to alleviate racial tensions that seem to be getting into this campaign? what advice would you give to democrats and republicans as week mirrored this, what is probably one of the most divisive and racially charged political presidential campaigns in our history?

i love politico. >> thank you. >> you may be asking a question that is about my pay grade. race in america is a serious problem. i think it is one of the most serious problems we face. president obama postelection four years ago was its star. it was a positive thing for america. it set a tone for many people an ideal for what america could and should be. interjecting race into a presidential campaign is an abomination to me as an american, and for most of us, democrat or republican, interjecting race to is a trees like this, there's no place for it. to divide americans on ethnicity or gender or race is unamerican.

we should celebrate that diversity, and any candidate that drives to that list, denominator is to be unqualified to be president. >> i am one of your constituents. how do you plan on -- mpa?egistered in tapro >> yes. out the address gridlock, and how will you address disruption to business out of the tourism industry that will occur in downtown tampa? >> those buses will be coming from the beaches, north of us. people devise dedicated lanes on the interstate just to move

those delegations back and forth. the businesses downtown -- we will be open for business, but it will not be business as usual. if you look at other conventions, there have been occurrences, where some of the downtown businesses suffer because the we challenges getting downtown, having to deal with protests. regular customers did not come. we'll have a lot of workers who will choose to take vacations. there will be some impact, but in the larger scheme, if you look at the positive impact of this event on the bay area and on tabla, far outweigh the short-term challenges that some of our residents will face. we have been pressing them for that. we have been telling them this will not be your normal week. we need to be understanding. when you think about the

residents that live on harbor island, across from where the convention held, across the channel, the ingress and egress will be challenging. i told them did not come out on your balcony, because you may find a red laser spot on your forehead because it overlooks the forum. secret service will be monitoring what takes place out there. there will be challenges but we're excited about them. >> tell us the secret about how to get around. >> call mike allen. [laughter] don't call me. i cannot get you can, cannot take care of their parking tickets. we are an open, friendly -- >> tell us something that we do not know. something we should see, something we should do. >> the florida aquarium on the

outside of the perimeter, a great place to go visit. we have 3 brand-new museums. we have a beautiful children's in on the water. there are a lot of things in downtown that the convention guests will enjoy. >> you have a birthday between now and then? >> i do, july 29. i will be 54. >> the republican convention gets control of the debate times form around july 15, and so what happens around that time? >> our convention center will house the media. the forum will house the event. they will take over that area for the next month, and in terms

of upgrading infrastructure, getting it ready for the press corps and the visiting dignitaries, we will spend the next month preparing this environment. the secret service will control the environment. the perimeter will be outside this. the closer you get, the more security will be enhanced. it is a lot of work, the biggest lift, and i can speak for the mayor foxx, too, it is the biggest undertaking ever. >> the president's chances to win florida? >> it is going to be a tight race, i would say 52-48. >> that would be a landslide. >> in florida, it is. he was down a week ago, and as he sharpens rhetoric and makes his case, and bear in mind the

county board template is is the ultimate swing county. it was one of the few in the country that voted for clinton in 1996, and i ran the campaign in 1996, i voted for bush twice, and then voted for president obama in 2008. as i for go, so does florida, and as florida goes, so does the nation. >> last question. you have been in for more than a year. when you were running, there was a profile in a newspaper that said buckhorn acknowledges some see him as too ambitious and too slick. >> you would not say that, wouldn't you? >> what are the chances that you will be back as congressman?

>> none. for those of you who do not know my history, it took me a long time to get this job. i got beat that in 2003, and they said my career was over. i was lucky to win the, and i will tell you that i love going to work every day. my only regret -- i tell people, being a big-city mayor is the toughest job. i regret is every day that goes by is one day less that i am the mayor. i got the job of a lifetime. i get up every day inside it to go to work appeared to come up here and -- no. >> mr. mayor, good luck. >> thank you very much. >> thanks to our friends at bank

of america for making this possible. we have a surprise before mayor foxx comes on. lester.you know beth she has a birthday in two days. where celebrate by adding beth lester. happy birthday. you can enjoy cupcakes for protest with politico. happy birthday. congratulations. take a sprinkles cuff kate and that will bring on -- cupcake and that will bring on mayor foxx. welcome.

you were on the house judiciary committee staff. yes in washington from different ways. -- what ismy comeba it like to come back? >> easier on my conscience that have an impact on my local community. in washington you get stuck in a bubble. he did not see what happens on the ground. it feels a lot better. >> anthony foxx, you are a democratic rising star, charlotte is a rising city that has survived very well, with strong financial services. what are we going to learn during a convention that we do not know? >> we will learn a lot about the city that has a real heart to it, that is much different than an lot of parts of the country.

i will give you a couple examples. the first one is that my grandmother turned 95 about two weeks ago. she can remember -- i did not often eat cupcakes for breakfast. not bad. appreciate that. i will eat it after the interview. my grandmother can remember talking to her grandmother who was sold on an auction block in north carolina in the 1860's. her grandmother had enough sense to make sure that her children went to school. they got a fifth-grade education, and the next generation went to college and the next generation went to graduate school, and five generations later, this family that had someone sold on an

auction block five generations ago and now represents the largest city in north carolina. there is an american story built into that. i grew up on the west side of charlotte, which is largely african-american. single mom. when to a public high school. under a desegregation order that required bussing. when many cities were struggling with the effects of busing, we had kids come from boston to charlotte to learn out integration worked there, because charlotte was known as the city that made integration work. there are a lot of cities -- stories about how charlotte as reconcile opposites over time, and that is one of the stories that need to be told. >> what is the feel going to be like? we're talking about mayor buckhorn. >> i was thinking about bringing

some sand and some volleyball nets. charlotte has a little relaxed feel to it. it is not all stiffed business suits. it is a city that is -- the restaurants have improved dramatically in the last 10 years with the welcoming of a great culinary school. we have night life that has gotten a lot better over the last 25 years with new arts and cultural facilities. some great performance art and entertainment that happens. we have lots of outdoor activities for those who like to do that. we have the national whitewater center which is a man-made rapids facility. you can renew or to rafts out there. there is a lot of stuff to do. we like to have fun, too. food.re big on what should we eat there? >> well, barbecue is something

that you should try, but you have to decide -- and this is a serious issue -- you have three choices. you can go with a bigger base, matocan go with it to me bu base, or you could go with the mustard base. i am telling you, you cannot -- >> if you can only have one, which would it be? >> it will be the one you pick. >> are a number of unique things about this convention. one of them is the venues are divided. it could be in one hall for the first two days, and then the president will get his acceptance speech in a larger venue. tell us about that. >> we are excited about the opportunity to display the city in multiple ways and to invite

as many people to the convention as possible. we were delighted when the decision was made back in january to use we will bring in as many people on this convention as possible. our goal is to make this convention but the most open and accessible to mention in history. to involve as many people as we can. adding that capacity allows us to do that. >> i understand people from all around the country, a few locauy people have been selected to come. >> there will be lots of people, whether they are delegates or

folks that have been involved in the campaign some way in a volunteer capacity. we want as many people to be part of this convention as we can. >> tell us about the first two days. >> the first activities will start on tuesday. the gavel will go down on tuesday, and the shortened our convention to three days. to your point about modernization of nventions. our goal is to compress as much of the official activities as possible. the first two days will be in our basketball a rematch, which will be full, which is sometimes a challenge for that arena. we will involve the traditional activities that happened in the convention. speeches, the roll call of states, and so forth. it will be a lot of fun. >> something that is unique is you have been involved in the fund-raising and you have been

doing a little bit with one arm tied behind your back. the campaign said no corporate contributions. how firm a line at the been taking on that? >> the rules have not changed. the decision was made early on not to accept corporate lobbyists or pac money to support this contention. we're under a contractual requirement with dnc to observe that protocol. we have been moving through that process. the interesting thing is we have gotten an amazing response from people. we have 48 times more donors to this convention and denver had already. the opportunity to involve some many people in the process bringing this convention together not only from the standpoint of funding, but from the standpoint of format and expanding opportunity for people to be engaged is exciting, historic, and we're looking for

ticket. >> it is been a real pain, much more difficult. do you feel this is done to be feasible way to raise money for conventions and the future? >> yes, it is a different model that says every day people can play a role in supporting an activity like this and that matters. conventions really matter. i'm old-fashioned, but i believe that conventions still have a purpose, and one of the main purposes is casting the mayor does that become part of the conversation as you turn the corner into the fall. we do not have another vehicle to do that. i think my experience has been people are interested, engaged, and willing to support it. >> unions have been unhappy about the choice of north carolina. >> we are moving from four days to 3, but what would have been the fourth day is labor day,

which is monday. we have had an overwhelmingly positive response from labor to our plans on monday, which will be to create an uptown -- downtown streets festival. >> this is the monday, which is usually the first day. it was going to be an event at charlotte motor speedway. now it is in downtown. >> we traditionally have a labor day parade, and the labor day parade usually draws a couple thousand people. this is going to be the biggest parade charlotte has ever had. it is an opportunity to celebrate working people across the country. our response from labor has been incredibly positive to that. we never had a convention that takes a day at the bridge working people, and that is what we will do. >> a fantastic spread in "fortune" said charlotte is

fine. it says charlotte, nascar king -- there are a lot of play bookers who do not know nascar. >> it is started by people running moonshine around the south. it ended up becoming a sport. the actual first nascar-type race was run in charlotte. we are home to about 90% of the race teams. it gets back to the point earlier, charlotte is a lot more wearing suits and sitting at white tablecloths. >> 55 days until game day. what has to happen between now and then? >> we are locking in at this

point on our transportation and security logistics'. we're still working to train our volunteers, and mike meier buckhorn mentioned, we are stepping up our police department with folks from all over the country. we have a 1600-member police force today. we will double the size of that force by the time the convention rolls are round. there is a lot of activity associated with that. at this point i feel good about where we are. >> is the history that there is more demonstrations, or alternative opinions, at republican conventions or democratic? >> i think it is about the same. i have not done an analysis. >> do you think is gone to happen? >> we sent a team to chicago and

tampa, and we are tracking that type of activity. if chicago is an indication, there will be a lot of one-upped it and speculation going into both conventions as to how much of a presence the demonstration activity will actually have. at least in chicago is an indication, we may see less than what people and expect going into it. we will be ready for what ever is there. >> how worried are you about actual damage? >> you're always worried about making sure you can do everything you can make sure this is a safe environment, but only for people attending, but demonstrators themselves. our security protocols are all aligned around trying to make sure we strike the right balance between protecting first amendment rights, but also making sure everyone is safe. >> meier anthony foxx, one thing

you're known for his bring more people downtown. you have done that with light rail, making charlotte more transit friendly. >> charlotte is a student of what has happened in a lot of southeastern cities, where you are starting to see an inward migration from other places around the country. population growth even during the recession. one of the challenges that happens in an auto-dependent area is used to get this sprawl in fact, about 20 years ago charlotte undertook to be progressive and trying to adopt transportation strategies that also had land-use strategies attached. light rail is a part of that. we have a nine-mile line of light rail that runs into the south. we hope to extend it later this year. we are aligning residential development alongside those lines by free-zoning the property so that piece of business can be dealt with and

developers can do what they do best, which is to put up units. we have seen $1.4 billion of investment along the south corridor line. we will do everything we can to advance our transportation strategies. that is part of the way we try to reverse the effects of spore all. >> you are the proud pop out of this piece. he used it in a way as an excuse to the price you would like to do anyway. what have you done? >> i have lost 15 pounds, so i'm trying to lose a little bit more to be a living example of the first lady's initiative on let's move. childhood obesity is one of the areas we're focusing on. we're trying to make a real dent in that issue before the convention so we can talk about what we have done at the convention. we're working on engaging youth

in this convention more than has been done. i made a promise to engage 1000 youth in this convention in a meaningful way, so that there will be a thousand kids who can say for the rest of their lives they had an opportunity to be engaged in helping states this event. >> what can they do? >> there are in turn ships, where they have the chance to do mock interviews. they did not get cupcakes. so, we have done that. economic inclusion is another legacy of this convention. charlotte is it for the first time a majority-minority city, and the economics of the city not correlated as rapidly as the democratic changes. we have implemented that head of

the current effort to involve minority women and other businesses in this connection, and this is the first dimension of either party to have a stated minority women participation goal, which is incredible. it is that a third given to those diverse businesses. >> women and minorities together? >> and folks with disabilities and lgbt businesses as well. i will talk about my legacy. finally, we are also working very hard on this issue of sustainability. charlotte is the first city in the country to take its central business district and aspire to reducing carbon footprint of that central business district. 20% overreduce it by 2

the next five years by proving the business model of what those reductions mean in terms of cost. >> first, i will ask you the one thing that everyone will remember from the breakfast today is how did you lose 15 pounds? >> oh, man, it has been a challenge because people give me cupcakes. [laughter] i get up and swim, i run, you're a variety of things, and diet is the biggest thing i've been working at, just trying to avoid stuff like that. but i will eat that one. >> tell us what you eat more of, what eat less of. , i am eating a lot more vegetables and a lot less meat. meet, maybe two days or three days a week, but tried to stay away from that, and carbohydrates are a big source

of wait for me. stay away from bread, flour, sugar, that kind of thing. kind of like that. >> questions for mayor anthony foxx a shot? >> we heard about the other mirror about assets he is bringing to tell about. can you give us an example of what you're doing in charlotte to help prepare? are you bringing in taxicabs from other cities or other employees from other areas? >> we will use about 250 buses to bring our delegates in and out of the central business district for the convention activities. some of those buses will be local, some will be coming from other places. we went and got dispensation from the general assembly to allow us to use black cars and

that sort of thing from other states to come in and be part of helping us with that piece of the logistics. we have a lot of assets already in charlotte, and we are looking forward to the ability to show those assets off from a travel standpoint. >> yes, sir. >> mayor box, you spoke eloquently about your downtown and the like a prayrail. predecessor did the same. meier buckhorn expressed the idea showing off tampa's renaissance might get a bunch of republicans excited about cities. nevertheless, this whole thing is it viewed as a largely partisan issue, as the transportation out come shows. how might you and near buckhorn -- and mayor buckhorn highlight

your cities to actually make those issues even less partisan? is that possible? >> yes, i do think it is possible to make them less partisan, and historically they have been less partisan. of the folks i most admire on transportation issues is the current u.s. secretary of transportation, ray lahood, he is a republican, and he talks about the way these infrastructure investments pay off for our country. they pay off indirect jobs in terms of getting construction workers and engineers and architects and others employed. when you look at the ability of cities to manage congestion and air quality, but also to create more mobility choices for people, it is important. charlotte is growing by 30,000

new people every single year. >> 1/3 of the people in the county are from elsewhere? >> from elsewhere, and the largest employer is the health care system. it is becoming an increasingly larger part of our economy, and we have energy companies and others who are planning a big role. people are coming for all kinds of reasons. i will tell you that from the standpoint of this question, our challenge as a city is integrating to thousands of new people every year without raising our air quality, without adding to the commute times and the digestion, and transit infrastructure is so critical for a going places like charlotte. >> tell us about your lapel pin approved ballot this is the

official lapel pin for the convention. it shows lots of people. raising their hands in support of president obama, which is going to happen in north carolina this year. >> what are the chances of president obama repeating in north carolina? >> i think they are very good. >> you are alone? >> the president wins, it is because of what? >> for several reasons. one, people get the president walks into a bus stop. they know we were using 750,000 jobs on a monthly basis before he took office. and that to happen to go from fat to 28 months of private- sector job growth in a row is a huge accomplishment. they also note this president is focusing on building the country

back up from the middle-class out as opposed from the top down. i think people are going to get that when they have the choice. >> diaz think the convention will have helped if he wins -- do you think the convention will have helped if he wins? >> or carolina has never posted a convention. the last one in the carolinas was in the 1860's. there is a lot pent up energy for this type of activity. there is a lot of energy on the ground and the president will do just fine. >> how are you? on fund-raising there has been reports that have been raised, the goal is $10 million well below the goal.

the host committee said that fund raising is on track they have not given specifics. in the spirit of an open and accessible to mention, can you tell us how much have you actually raised? >> i can reassert and reaffirm that we are right on track. i feel very good about where we are. remember we are doing something that is different than in the convention in history, to not take money from the corporations and lobbyists, and with all due respect to my friend and colleague meier buckhorn, the convention in tampa is doing just that. that is the way these things have gone. we are building a different type of model. i think it is working and we're going to have a great convention. >> can you say percentage, of

the 37 men dollar goal -- of the $37 million oil, can you say 50%? 70%? , where right on track. there is a track there and we're right on it. >> in the back. >> we have seen three north carolina democrats can it's saying they will not be attending the convention, one of which the district is nine blocks from the bank of america stadium. can you talk about the inner- party politics, how that is affecting the morale and fund- raising? >> my strong guess is if you look at convinced of both sides there are people who choose not to attend conventions who are elected officials or candidates for office, and largely by what

you will find is those folks are not attending because they are out working in the fields to get reelected or to get elected in the first place. i do not begrudge anyone for that. we are going to have a great convention. for those who come, it will be exciting. the will be plenty of people seeking elected office and great democrats who will be part of this convention. it is not a concern. >> do you think this three-day convention will be a model for the future? >> i think it will be the model. 2008 was such an aberration in the sense there was so much intrigue about the nomination process all the way up to almost the end. even there, but the time the convention came around, you knew who the candidate was going to be. i think conventions will become

increasingly more about storytelling, about the narratives that both parties want to cast on major issues confronting the country. that is still a viable part of conventions. to the extent that there are not floor fights over who the nominee is, i do not think that is all the reason to have a convention. part of the reason to have the convention is to tell your story, and we do that in courtrooms every day in this country as part of our process, and that is a great part of our democratic process. >> you decided not to run for governor this year. you're one of the best-known rising democrats in the country. your for erie -- you are 41. what do you see as next for you? >> i have more than i can say grace over in north carolina with what i have on my plate. we have two months until this convention, and we have got some major projects that i want to

see get done in charlotte. i have got two young kids. they have never known me to be anything other than an elected in official. over the last week i took some time over july for the sit down and have dinner at home for a little while. the tug at home is always there. >> what will they do during the convention? >> one boy, one girl. they will be with us a lot during the convention. we will try to put them down relatively close to their bad times, but we want them to have a good experience with this convention. my daughter really wants to meet malia and sasha. i do not know if that will happen. >> i think that can be arranged. where should be good to eat? >> those of you who are not worried about your weight, we

have lots of really good places. as mayor, i cannot tell you one, but i can tell you where to go. the main strip, go down to the south park area. we have some in university city, but i will not pick one because i will get in trouble. what i can tell you is we have some great farm-to-forck restaurants in charlotte. >> maybe the first lady will be there? thank you all for coming out so early this morning. thank you for our college books for making this possible. or fox, they differ a

great conversation. i will carry your cupcake. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] >> the national governors' association holds its annual meeting today in williamsburg, virginia, and coverage will get under way like that in about 20 minutes. the opening session talking about strategies to foster business growth and to talk about the finding great leadership. that is coming up at 1:15. at 3:00 they will focus on education and the work force. we will have both of those live

for you. at 1:15, they are talking about leadership, and we have posted a question about the finding great political leadership on our facebook page. if you have a comment, you can log on to our facebook page and post that comment. sharon thomas post that leading by example and execute changes in situations, allow feedback from those of you keep you are leading. that is from facebook. more coming up later on. we will go live to the conference center at the williamsburg lots, 1:15 eastern. until then, the governor's of nebraska and that by stash chairman opened the meeting with a news conference this morning highlighting the agenda and the challenges facing state governments. we will also hear from bob mcdonnell. inside the old capitol building

in williamsburg. we will show you as much as we can until the live session gets under way. >> good morning, and thank you for coming, and welcome to the commonwealth of virginia. the old dominion, the mother of presidents, the cradle of democracies, and other accolades that have been stood -- been bestowed on our great state. i am delighted to be the host governor for this national governors' association conference, and i am delighted to be joined by the chairman of the national governors' association. you will hear from him shortly. this place where you are sitting is the old house of burgesses of

virginia, where literally history has been made. since 16 07, may 13, when the 144 brave men and women that ended in jamestown, they began the greatest experiment in human freedom the world has ever known, and we are excited about that history still being alive in virginia. in 1619, settlers first started what would become the oldest continuous legislative body in the entire free world, and that is the general assembly of virginia, where they convened in a small church which we will be able to see tonight, and we are excited about governors being able to see that. the old port of kingstowne was just discovered after 380 years in -- the old port of jamestown

was just discovered after 380 years. they are being able to do digging and removing artifacts as we speak. it is exciting that the governors are here. this place where you are today is a place that was built in 17 05, after the colonial capital in jamestown was burned several times. others felt it was necessary to move inland. the capitol building here was built. the edifice here you are in today was rebuilt after several fires. this would have been the place where the house of burgesses and some of the great names of american history would have sat in this room and participated in democracy. george washington, thomas

jefferson, george mason and others would have been in this building in this room. the first to governors of virginia, the only to that work governor when this what was the capital of virginia until 1779, where patrick henry and thomas jefferson. no doubt would have been in this place with the speaker sitting right behind us addressing those assembled purchases, including washington and others, that would have sat in their place creek is a place where patrick henry in 1765 railed against the stamp act in his famous speech. this place and this entire premises is which it history, from williamsburg to jamestown. this also happens to be the place where i was inaugurated in 2005 as internal -- as attorney general. it was a treat in honor of the

400 anniversary of the state to be inaugurated. i could not think of a better place like the governors who love the country, love the rich history of america, whether state they are from, i knowed they join me in believing this is the greatest and most prosperous country on our earth, and we want to do everything we can as governors doing things that are positive in our respective states to keep this great land of liberty alive and well. being inspired by the founders is something will be a great source of inspiration to all the governors. we have a lot of important business to talk about that i will love the leaders talked about, from health care, energy,

to see crustacean to other issues that we're on to discuss , so peopleng we have pic can begin to think outside the box. we will start with mr. collins it can inspire us with how we can manage our state's well, and we have major activities that will take place in jamestown, tonight, and in williamsburg, the old governor's palace tomorrow, and it will be great for our governors. i look forward to talking to about the issues of today, the system of federalism we have in america, the states being the laboratories of democracy is that our founders designed it to be. we will talk about ways we can work together to work with or stand up to the federal government if they overreach or

do not give us the flexibility to govern well and have positive things that republican and democrat governors and joined in. regardless of what party we are in, we have this belief that this long and storied history of our country and our long history of experiment in freedom in the american republic, 236 years old, born in this place is one that we all share a great love for. of what to turn it over to the chairman of the national governors' association to make his remarks. >> thank you very much. as you were giving those remarks, in particular, virginia, if you had given that in high school, i might have gotten a better grade in the class. i think for the update. welcome to the 2012 national

governors' association annual meeting. i want to thank bob mcdonnell and his wife for such and or welcome to williamsburg. last night we had a we are looking forward to all the events occurring this week and we're appreciative of all you done. i know your wife and my wife have done more work than you when i combine and we appreciate what they have done. i am delighted to be here with a good friend, the delaware governor jack markell. jack and i have known each other for more than a decade and research together as state treasurers. i want to thank him for the support he is giving me this year as the vice chair. we have worked together on a variety of issues in different

capacities. i have great respect for jack and the work he does as the governor of delaware. working with jack and all the governors is one of the things that makes the nga unique organization. provides governors a platform to have a bipartisan candid conversation about developing innovative and a group approach to governing. it has been a privilege to serve as the chair of the mta and i'm proud of our successes and out like to share a couple of those with you. during the last year, we were able to streamline the nga policy process and change the way we do business of the governor's priorities are at the forefront of everything we do including our lobbying efforts on capitol hill. for example, governors worked together on the issue of d-block and urged congress to establish a nationwide conditions effort for our first response is providing them with a reliable access to the most modern

communications technology was and remains a good approach for all governors for the next as implementation. nga recently held meetings with teams from 50 states and territories to help keep policy- makers examine and understand the challenges and opportunities related to implementing the public safety broadband. nga continue to support additional opportunities to force state leadership on broadband build out and governments. following our winter meeting in february, the governor's continued to work together to preserve our air national guard and protected from disproportionate and damaging reductions. we fought hard to be part of the process and to provide a path to meet fiscal responsibilities while protecting the aircraft and personnel list -- necessary to fill the guard bus critical mission at home and abroad.

we're also bringing together a group of states in a prescription drug abuse policy academy. the abuse of prescription drugs is the fastest growing drug problem in the united states. alabama governor robert bentley and the color of governor -- and the color of a governor are leading this exercise in strategic planning aimed at reducing the abuse. the recent supreme court ruling regarding the new federal health care law remains at the top of governor's mind. even though governors have different opinions on this issue, we will be having many conversations about this issue to throughout the conference. finally, states continue to face fiscal challenges which is why i chose a growing state economies as my chair policy initiative. economic growth and job creation is fundamental to our success

and our future and it is the most important issue facing governors. we want to help the private sector grow and create new job opportunities for our citizens. this past year, we held four regional summit attended by 10 governors and staff for more than 35 states and territories. we heard from the business community and education leaders at each summit. the goal of growing state economies is to provide governors of the policy -- and other policymakers to assess the economic environment in their state and strategies to foster business growth. high-growth businesses are one of the driving forces of the modern global economy and a primary source of job creation, prosperity, and economic competitiveness. a key component of growing state economies focused on how governors can foster an environment where small business

and -- and neutrons can transform into high-growth businesses. today, governors will receive several deliverable from my initiative. the first is a report entitled "a policy framework" which highlights six issues which can be refined to improve the conditions for job creation. the second is a report and accompanying pocket card that i brought with me that provides governors and other state policy makers with better policy directions and strategies to foster business growth. it emphasizes understanding the path away through which a small business becomes a fast-growing firm and the policies that support the transformation. finally, each governor will receive an individual state profile that provides a set of measures and information to help them understand where their jobs are coming from, of who they're

entrepreneurs and business owners are, and what they're likely sources of business groups are. we will continue to cover this topic throughout the weekend when we hear from author and management educator jim collins and author and professor steven blank. of like to ask a very good friend of mine and someone who has been supportive of our efforts this past year, governor year markell, our vice chair to say a few words. >> good morning, everybody. i want to start by thanking governor heineman for being a tremendous leader and his tremendous focus on state economies. he has, but a number of strategies that i think are helpful to states across the country. we appreciate your leadership. to governor mcdonald, thank you for hosting this. we love virginia, it is a beautiful state. for a state that came relatively late to the union, this is not bad. [laughter]

in case you're wondering, delaware is the first state. thank you so much for your hospitality. one of the things that is so great about being a governor is that the people of very clear expectations about us. it is not about the speeches we give or the rhetoric, it is about whether we're improving the economic climate in our states and whether we're improving schools and whether we are being good stewards of the taxpayers' money. that is what our people expect of us. that does not mean we don't have disagreements. some of them can be strong disagreements and i think that can be very healthy thing. i am thinking specifically, as an example, the affordable care act. regardless of the governor's decision aut whether to accept the federal offer to cover millions of additional people for medicare expansion, medicaid does have a state chair and different governors have been

looking for different ways to try to find greater efficiencies including reforming delivery systems, expanding managed care, and handsome program integrity efforts. all that cannot stop the growth of medicaid so we will be talking about innovative strategies to lower medicaid costs during our health and human services committee meeting tomorrow. in addition to that, later this month, the national governors' association will bring together our whole policy advisers, medicaid directors, insurance commissioners, the people who are taking the lead in our states to develop the exchanges and bring in all those folks together to talk about next steps with respect to the implementation of the affordable care act. the affordable care act is really just one part of what will happen to hear this weekend. while it may generate some heat, there is so many other areas of agreement that we want to bring to light including results from our center for best practices,

sessions focused on finding the common threads that bring us together as states and we can be heard by congress. example, governors continue to feel the squeeze on their budgets because of constraints revenues, increased expenditure, pressures from reductions in federal funding, the need to replenish reserves and to provide resources for critical areas that had to be cut during the recession. the education and work force committee will discuss the reauthorization of the elementary and secondary education act, the economic development and commerce committee will focus on agricultural trade. the natural resources committee will talk about the role of states creating a modern electrical grid. the special committee on homeland security and public safety will discuss veterans issues followed by a discussion on by a surveillance. the people in washington tell us

the worst day in our states is better than the best day in washington. i think there's probably a lot of truth to that. washington may be caught in the grips of partisan paralysis but in the state capitals, we really don't have that choice. we've got to figure out ways to keep people working together so we can put our people to work. this weekend is a great platform for us as governors to work together across party lines to create new efforts to push our core priorities for word of better jobs and stronger schools. is a chance to get past the partisan gridlock that is so much defining our nation's capital and work together on solutions that will help drive each of our state's forward. it is great to be here and i'm looking forward to the meeting and i will let governor heineman take the podium and i will be happy to answer some of youruestions. >> there is one final comment about delaware and virginia.

in the mid 1860's, there were experiencing difficulties and needed a state to join a union to help them move forward so 1967, neb. join the union to help these two states out. [laughter] we will be glad to try and answer your questions to the best of our ability. yes, sir? >> this morning, several of us in the room join you in a partisan political event as you gave your opening remarks here, you talked about the founding fathers and this hallowed hall and i wonder what you would think and your fellow governors would think that this is more of a bipartisan event but what do think they would think about the state of our politics in this modern age? and is it and evolution of what they practice years ago? >> >markell well that while we have similar challenges as ceo's and leaders of our states, we

also have some broad disagreements. we discuss those openly and some of our governors only meetings. the fact that we have similar jobs is not mean we don't have very different approaches. a lot of it is with respect to policies coming out of washington. and how affects all of our state's on health care, energy, taxes, jobs, and regulation. i have been very clear that i think a lot of the policies that have come out of washington have been devastating to virginia on energy, jobs and health care. i have a different approach than governor markell has sent some of the maybe philosophical and some of them may be how the medicaid expansion would be good for his state but i don't think it is good for my state without reform. the debates that took place in this building 236 years or so ago were pretty vibrant. mr. henry stood up and started

talking about the crown in 1765 and his rebellion against the stamp act. he certainly did not mince words with that. my guess is the burgesses, when they were debating, whether we should have revolution, there are strong divisions between the likes of henry and washington on one side and some on the other side that took a modest approach. that is one of the biggest decisions everaken in the history of the united states. having this discussion here, while we have differences of opinion between republicans and democrats, we also know that the buck stops and the governor's desk. we don't have the luxury of being able to borrow money in the way washington does. we have to balance our budget, 49 of us have that in our constitution. we cannot print money. we have various significant constraints that are put on everything from bar weighing to other things where we have to make very specific practical

decisions. we now have a different approach and philosophy, the specific and pragmatic decisions that every governor has to make on a host of issues are important. we have empirical measures on jobs, on surplus or deficit, on medicaid population, on any number of things we are held directly accountable for by the people of our state. there is a lot of common ground that we will discuss today -- everything from sequestration to energy to some of these wonderful joint initiatives that date and jack have put together in the center for best practices to say what is working in some states that are getting best results and we can tap into that and a state of virginia might not be doing things as well as nebraska or delaware. of course there are differences and we will discuss openly as we always do. there's an awful lot we learn from each other and i look

forward to this. >> in my state, my focus the entire time, nearly eight years that i've been governor, is on education and jobs. the people in my state expect me to get things done. the biggest frustration i have with the federal government is they never make a decision. they never act. we are forced to do it and want to do it every single day. we make those tough calls. we may differ on some of the outcomes or the decisions we make but i know jack and bob and i are willing to make those tough decisions and so are other governors and we would like the federal government to make decisions about the budget. we won't agree with every single one but we need to know that in order to move forward with our own budgets and other decisions. >> can you expand on how the

affordable health care act is good for delaware? what would be like as a governor to potentially be getting money from taxpayers in another state? >> math is matt. we spent a lot of time looking at the map and we also understand that there is a significant cost to do nothing. the way it has been for a long time is that people are not covered, they will get sick and eventually end up in the emergency room and they will get care in the most expensive place possible and that will cost all the rest of us who have insurance. it is called uncompensated care and the cost of that is really quite high. as we look at the expansion and run the spreadsheets -- this is not political. this is a financial analysis of what it means to cover an additional 30,000 people, in our case. what kinds of resources will be available to us from the federal government and what will it take from delaware tax payers?

my view is that we understand it all properly. this could absolutely be a good deal for delaware taxpayers. i understand the other states will make different determinations based on their own reading of the math. for us, as we understand it to this point, this looks to be a good decision. >> can you give us your position on that? if you had to make a decision today to opt in or not, what would you say? greg i would say that medicare expansion without reform is irresponsible. president obama said exactly the same thing in 2009. when he spoke to the senate democratic caucus in d.c. putting more money into a system that already is somewhat broken does not make sense. i think we have all talked to secretary sibelius and others of the need to do things in

maintenance of effort and waivers in certain areas and the lack of flexibility that the states have an more abilities to have managed care and be creative and entrepreneurialism our states to save money and set the program the way it works for us. we have been denied that so i don't think that i can make a decision right now. i wrote a letter that went wednesday to the president and secretary and ask about 30 questions on exchanges and medicaid expansion. it is a 3000-page bill and people are still trying to figure it out. until we get more information from washington on some of these bags, it is hard to make a decision. there were two things that came out of the court's decision that were not fully expected. one was that the decision would be made on the fact that it was a tax. we thought it would be on the side of the commerce clause. secondly, the 7-2 ruling that

the court would say that it is not proper to penalize states to refuse to expand the medicaid program, not only deprive them of that additional money, but to penalize them with their existing medicate based, that creates new options. the original act was very punitive for stays that did not expand medicaid. this now gives some options which a don't think a lot of us expected to be part of that decision. it is about 10 days past than and the secretary has announced new time lines and has given us two years to apply for level one or level two for exchanges and their host of issues about medicaid expansions. the nga just until letter of with five or six questions that we want to have answered. i have a number of other ones i propose. i don't think is responsible from -- for my state to make a decision now because there's more to be done. >> one place where want to

comment -- i agree with governor mcdonnell that the additional reforms are important but i also don't believe those additional reforms have to come from the federal government. we have to face the fact that in our state and in the country, we've got to move away from what has become a sick care system where providers and facilities are basically paid based on how many procedures they do and we've got to move toward a health care system where providers are rewarded basin whether or not they keep people healthy. that is not something that has to happen at the federal level. each state can come up with their own plan to do that. there is legislation now in massachusetts the governor patrick is working on to get away from the fee-for-service system and we're looking at that carefully and we have a couple pilots in delaware. in my view based on our understanding so far, the medicaid expansion is the right thing to do for delaware. we will have to continue to work

to move away from the sick care system toward a health care system. >> let me just add to that a little bit -- you are hearing a great discussion and what it means ultimately is there will be 50 different states solutions. i respect the fact that jack is going one way and bob is going another way and we will probably go slightly different late in the sense that in nebraska, we believe is on funded medicaid expansion will result in cuts to public school funding, to higher education and increased taxes and i am opposed to that. i agree with jack that we need to focus, for example, on prevention, will miss, and out comes. i hope everybody in this room got one, a pedometer to keep track of your steps every single day. as part of nebraska, we started well as program three years ago and the people, all of us are part of the wellness program have to do this every single day. our premiums have gone up less

than 2% per year for the last three years. we need electronic medical system in this country like we have an electronic financial system. we need greater hospital transparency. let's put out the cost of routine operations on the internet for every hospital in the country so consumers can compare. good, i can step out. >> it is interesting to hear you talk and a clinical sense about how you will discuss all these issues. nothing is as compelling this year as the aca and it is timely and it occurs not only after the supreme court ruling but in the middle of a presidential campaign that certain people on this stage could be front-line players in. [laughter] talk a little -- >> from this morning, the nga

news conference. we'll take you live to the williamsburg lodge or they're about to get under way with the annual meeting and they will start this afternoon with a focus on leadership. jim collins will be speaking to the group. he is the chairman of the nga. they're just getting started live here on cspan. >> former secretary margaret spellings and all governors are encouraged to attend and it will be in this room. saturday's business agenda begins with the concurrent meetings of the economic development commerce committee and the health and human services committee. we will then have a governor's- only luncheon business session followed by the meetings of the natural resources committee and the special committee on all my security and public safety. sunday morning, we will begin with the governors-only breakfast and business session and the annual meeting will conclude on sunday with a session about growing the next

big idea. steven leblanc will join us for that session i know we're looking forward to all of these. let me start today by saying that we're very honored to be joined by several distinguished guests from the canadian parliament and a delegation of arab ambassadors. would you please stand so we can recognize you? [applause] thank you for being here. now like a motion for the adoption of the roles of the procedure for this meeting and i would note that as you know, we have streamlined our policy process and we do not anticipate any new policies at this meeting. it governors to have questions or want to make changes, please submit them to the nga staff by 5:00 p.m. tomorrow. >> is there a motion?

>> cino discussion, all say aye, all opposed? thank you very much. i would like to announce the appointment of the following governors to the nominating committee for the 2012-2013 mta executive committee. governor branstad, walker, malloy, and the chair will be governor bucheer. as most of you know, we are here in colonial williamsburg and we owe a debt of gratitude and thanks to governor bob mcdonnell and his wife maureen. we had a great event last night and they're more to come. i learned this morning when bob davis a history lesson about the state of virginia. i said at a news conference, it would have been nice to be taught that to me in high school i would god made better grade. he has some remarks for us and a very distinguished veteran

governor who will join us. [applause] >> thank you. my fellow governors, what a tremendous honor it is to have you here in the commonwealth of virginia, the cradle of democracy, the mother of presidents, the old dominion and we are thrilled that nearly half the nation's governors would choose to travel here to be part of this. thank you for according us this privilege two years ago. i want to thank the step that has been working so hard in this for over two years led by jean marie davis who is here and your first lady who are out drinking williamsburg wine and having a great time editor difficult yacht cruise on the york river this morning. we're delighted that the spouses of also chosen to come.

i cannot think of a better place for governors to convene. whether we are republican or democrat, no matter what state or territory you come from, we all agree on one thing and that is that the united states is america and it is a marvelous country, perhaps the greatest country on earth, the place where more great ideas about human liberty and free enterprise and democracy have sprung and those things that happened in jamestown and williamsburg or written 230 years ago that are now still alive and well and spreading these ideas about human freedom around the world. for us and virginia, is a source of pride that that happened here. and that you all are here. may 14, 16 07 is when those brave 144 men and boys landed after 144 days at sea leaving england and arriving at jamestown, virginia.

tonight, you will be literally right on that spot where the settlers landed. despite 380 years of trying to figure out where that ford was, it was not until 1996 when using sophisticated technology, they found the footings of the original jamestown fort you will see tonight and we will have dinner literally on those hallowed grounds. it is literally living history. the archaeology there, they are still digging and finding artifacts and you will be able to see the museum where everything from remnants from the well that was just found to the well-preserved body of who they believe was captain r. solomon of gosnall. it is a marvelous piece of history and i hope you will be able to attend that even tonight. tomorrow night, in colonial williamsburg, we will be at the governor's palace, the place that not only colonial governors ruled for many years but also

the first two governors of virginia, patrick henry, and thomas jefferson. you'll also be able see the house of burgesses where we had a press conference this morning where people like george mason and george with and george washington and others actually sat as elected members of the house of burgesses. this is where patrick henry gave his great speech in opposition to stamping. we are proud we were selected to be here because governors love the histories of their state but they also cherished these marvelous foundations of united states of america and much of that rich history going back 236 years to the founding of our country right here in williamsburg in jamestown. thank you very much for coming. i think it will be a terrific time. you get the great music of carbon leaf, a great richmond ban that will play tonight. there will be fireworks tomorrow

night at the governor's palace i hope there'll be good fun and good fellowship and we can talk about the compelling issues of the day dealing with health care and energy and budgets and so forth as we renew friendships with one another and learn from one another and take the best ideas from the states and important to our states and continued those traditions of jefferson and henry that have endured for many centuries. while i am merely the 71st governor of virginia, i have a special guest and that is the first governor of virginia law happens to be with us. will you please welcome, my good friend, patrick henruy? 1 thank you, your excellency. gentlemen and ladies, as i was accorded the high and very unmerited honor to be appointed as the first governor of the commonwealth of virginia, it thus falls by happy duty and my very great privilege to bid you

each and everyone welcome to this, truly the birthplace of american liberty, as his excellency has correctly stated. the seat of government, after all, of the largest, oldest, wealthiest, and most populous of its majesties colonies. it was here that good men and good women gathered together to lead the charge toward the direction of a new and very bold experiment, a new nation of united sovereign states conceived in liberty with the honest intention of justice under law for all men. it was a very radical notion which guided their feet. it was that all men are by nature equally free and independent and have certain inherent rights namely, the enjoyment of life, liberty, and the means of acquiring and possession repossessing property and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety. it is our most earnest wish that during your endeavors while here that you agree with

success towards the advancement of american happiness and i can assure you it is our sincerest wish that we will put forth every effort to provide for you the warm and gracious hospitality and reception for which the old dominion has long been famous. on my own personal note, it is my wish that you may be guided while you are here with those fundamental principles without which i believe no free government can be preserved to many people. justice, moderation, temperance, regality, and virtue. good luck, godspeed and welcome to williamsburg. i am your servant. [applause] >> thank you very much. i want you to know that governor mcdonald was concerned that you might stay around for ever and resume your role as governor of

the commonwealth. he wishes you the best of luck in your continued retirement. [laughter] at this opening session along with our discussion about defining great leadership, we will hear from jim collins in a moment. we will also honor our outgoing governors and recognize our 15 and 20-year corporate fellows. i want to talk about the initiative 5 lead over the past year which will set this up for jim collins. for all the tough issues we face today, economic growth and job creation is fundamental to our nation's future and to each of our state's futures. - 2, growing state economies, is about providing u.s. governors and state policy makers with better policy options to assess the economic environment in our states and foster business growth. we understand how a new small business becomes a fast-growing

firm and the policies that support the transformation. the growing number of policy makers here and abroad recognize the need to understand the effects of public policy on the entrepreneurial pathway. from startup venture to a high- growth company to a global corporation. during this past year, we held four regional economic development summits in hartford, nashville, seattle, and omaha. i want to personally thank governor malloy, a governor has long, and governor gregg or for hosting these summits in their respective states and i was honored to do it in my home state. there were 10 governors, 35 states represented, we heard from a variety of speakers from those in the private sector to academic researchers to other experts who shared with us the keys to promoting and supporting innovation and entrepreneurship. i appreciate the fact that so

many governors sent their teams to reach one of these regional meetings. you will see in the reports that are at your desk two different reports that we are sharing with you. one is 12 lashes for growing state economies and the pocket car that goes with that to determine which of those two actions may be appropriate for your individual states. the other report is entitled "a policy framework"is now to be a resource for you to be considered for your own policies or priorities in your individual states. finally, nga is providing each of you with an individual state profile that provides a set of measures and information to give you insights about where the jobs are coming from in your state, though are the entrepreneurs and business owners and what are the likely future resources of business growth in each of your states. as governor, there's no question that all this want to strengthen our state's economic performance. we hope these two reports will

be helpful to you. i want to say a special thank you to the staff and to my co- chair or vice chair jack markell in assisting me in this effort. this leads us to our keynote speaker jim collins. he is a student and teacher about great companies about how they grow and how they obtained superior performance and how good companies become great companies. having invested and nearly a quarter of a century of research into the topic, jim has author or co-author of six books that have sold more than 10 million copies worldwide. they include the classic "built to last." the international best seller," good to great." "how the mighty fall"examines how great companies can self- destruct. his most recent book is "great by choice, on certainty, chaos,

and look and why some thrive despite them." based on nine years of research, it answers the question -- why do some companies pride in uncertainty and chaos and others do not. fortunately, we will not only have a presentation from him but he will answer every single question for us and by the end of the day, we will all know what we need to do to go from good to great -- jim collins. [applause] >> thank you, governor. good afternoon. it is a great privilege and honor to be here with the governor's. i thank governor mcdonnell for being such a gracious host in his home state. i think governor heineman for leading the initiative in growing state economies. in his letter about initiatives,

he focused on the role of new growing and strong companies. as a core engine of economic growth. i would support that. we need in every state new entrepreneurial enterprises that become great growth companies who need -- we need good companies to make a leap to become great companies and we need great companies that can endure through wave after wave after wave of creative destruction. after years of studying corporations, i have come to the conclusion that we need more than that. i have come to see that if we only have great companies, and it is important we do, that would not be quite enough. we also must have great k-12 education, great colleges and universities, great police department, a great military units, great cause-driven

nonprofits, and great government performance, local, state, and federal. good is the enemy of great. good is the enemy of great. i have been privileged to be able to spend a quarter of a century of my leg on one question -- what systematically distinguishes a great enterprise from a good one? a great company from a good one? what marks the leaders who lead them? what makes them different? it is a data driven approach. we have more than 6000 years of combined corporate history and our research data base now. it is like christmas. i love data. it is like opening up packages and seeing patterns and it is like christmas. across the four major studies the governor mentioned, "built to last"looks at and drink

companies and "good to great" acid the conduct overcome mediocrity and that translated into the monograph in the social sector is and how those ideas extent world outside of business. "great by choice"is all about thriving in chaos and many of you in your world wrestle with every single day. this study put special emphasis on our entrepreneurs and small- business people which goes right back to what we were talking about in the growing state enterprises and growing state economies initiative that can navigate an uncertain landscape and that uncertainty will not go away. to build some of the greatest companies of all time, how do they go from little tiny start- ups into the greatest companies of all time? if you get more of those in your state as pistons of economic

growth, they will create jobs, they will create economic results. how do we get more of them? finally, my own personal favorite because i have a dark side -- "how the mighty fall," a forensic examination of train wrecks and how companies brought about their own self destruction. it is not inspiring but it is fascinating. i come to you here today in the spirit of service. service to you at this table and in full recognition that i'm not an expert on the unique challenges of being a governor. i don't want to pretend to have that. i hope to share with you a bit of what we have learned about what makes these great companies to take so you can think about how to cultivate having more of them in your state. also to share with you some of what we have learned about how

the executive leaders and governorship is executive leadership, how these executive leaders who built the great companies led differently. them less than great leaders who did not create great companies. i would ask you to consider what might be helpful at what might not be helpful. in your own quest to lead as a truly great executive in the role of government. or. as we think about this, i might ask you to consider a question -- think about this as a governor -- if you have to allocate 100 points in terms of what will most define your governorship as to whether it will go down as a truly great governorship into two buckets -- bucket a is executing with tremendous discipline the plans

and goals and agenda that you bring with you and bucket b is successfully responding too big, unexpected events that hit you and your state as governor hickenlooper and i have just experienced in colorado. how many points you allocate to execute your plan with discipline and how much of it is determined by how you respond to the unexpected things that will inevitably hit you along the way? i will return to this later about what we learned about how our leaders wrestle with these questions. it is very dangerous to study success. .o we don't we study the contrast between success and failure. between endurance and collapse,

between great and good and that brings us to one of the biggest lessons from all of our work which is if you rewind the tape of history, we find enterprises that were in the same spot and same potential facing the same landscape and yet one becomes greater and the other does not. the driving factor of greatness was not their circumstance. they faced the same circumstance. that is how we do our research. we look at those who are at the same starting point that had different outcomes at least inevitably to a key lesson -- all of our research, to one point -- greatness is not primarily a function of circumstance. it is first and foremost a matter of conscious choice and the discipline. what did we learn? what might be helpful to you? first, we learned through the lens of our research -- i don't

know what is the same for you -- it all begins with people. when we did the good to great research, we expected that the way a good company would become a great company is you would have some kind of charismatic visionary leader who would set a new direction and motivate everybody. actually, what we found was they walked in and said i am not going to figure out where to drive this bus until i have first figured out who should be on the bus. and who should be off the bus and who should be in the key seats. once i got the right people on the bus and the wrong people off the bus and the right people in the key seats, i will figure out where to drive the bus. as we zoom back from all the years of research data in the business sector and your world may be a little different, if i were to step back and say out of the 6000 years of data what is the most important executives killed these three leaders had -- it was the ability to make

very rigorous people decisions and to make sure that all of their key seats were filled with the right people. it is an interesting question. don't know the answer to this but i will post to you to reflect on. how would a great governor actualize the idea of the right people in key seats? how would a great governor do that different than a good governor and held a great governor do that different than a business person? when faced with an ok person in a key seat, what a great governor spend more time trying to develop that person into the right person or act more decisively to replace that person with the right person. perhaps later we might chat about that but everyone of you around this table at this moment have at least one question of whether you have the right

person in this absolute key seat. and my right? what to do about that? dwight developed or replace? how patient semi and as a different and how patient can you be in the role of governor as distinct from business? i don't know the answer to that i oppose it to you as a question. we spent a lot of time thinking about leadership. it is a challenge to speak to great leaders about what we have learned in data about great leadership. we puzzle on the question of what is the x factor great leadership? for the lens of our research, we found it is not personality. we confuse personality and leadership all the time. some of the greatest leaders we ever studied, near as we can tell, have no personality.

they had a charisma bypass. people like darwin smith who took over kimberly-clark committed to a great company was reserved and shy and almost nerdy. he said was just trying to become qualified for the job at the end of his tenure. we find some leaders are very charismatic and were great leaders our research like ann mulcahey who saved xerox. she had a very measured view of herself. i never expected to be ceo, she said. she had the burden of responsibility. like all the great leaders we study, she was constitutionally down to the deaths of her court constitutionally incapable of capitulation. what did we find? what did our data show?

we found it is not so start as leadership or not but we saw it as a level of hierarchy. level one is individual capabilities and level two is good team skills, level 3 is effective punishment, leader foot -- level for is leadership. what we found of our greatest leaders, the ones to produce the results over time, they went to a different level. we can't call this level 5 leadership. -- we came to call this level 5 leadership. the difference between four and five is the true x factor of great leadership. that x factor surprised us. it was humility. humility combined with an utterly ferocious will and not humility necessarily in a self- deprecating way.

these leaders did have a strong ego and they had confidence and they had ambition and they had drive and they had that relentless everybody around them exhausting and would you let us sleep energy. they have all this. the difference between them and those who did not build great companies is all the ambition and drive and energy and motivation was channeled into being service to something bigger than them. it was a channeling of that energy into something out word, not to what they would get, but to what they would contribute to some cause or gold or purpose or ambition or set of values. that was bigger to them and in which they were in service. when we turn to look into the lines of the social sectors, we find something quite interesting. i always find it interesting when people suggest that we

should simply import business thinking to the social sectors. they are very different environments. government is different than business and certain ways. those of you who have been in business and are now government recognize that. i personally think that leading in government and leading in the social sectors is an order of magnitude more difficult than leading a business. why is this? it is in part because the power map is different. if you are sam walton, in 1986, and you drew a power map of wal- mart a said let's allocate one other points to a bubble of power, there is one big bubble named sam. if one -- of sam wanted wal-mart to write it would go right and of the one it to go left, it would go left. if you step out of that unusual case of concentrated executive power of the business executive, we get what a friend

of mine who ran a university said -- i have to deal with tenured faculty and that is leading with 8000 points of no. in a diffused power map and armond very rarely does one executive have enough power of to make things happen. a lot of people have not-power to stop things. therefore, the leadership becomes true leadership. it was some doubt that leadership only exists that people follow when they have the freedom not to follow. in that sense, a step up requirement from business to government might be a very big step. "mcdonnell and i have wrestled with an interesting question which is -- does humility and will apply to elected office? i don't know the answer but i

posed to u.s. a question. -- i pose it to you as a question. when they came in, what did they do different than their comparisons. how did they lead differently? what actions did they take? one is getting the right people in the first task was to say what are my key seats and do i have been filled with the right person. there is another interesting thing -- you would think the great leaders we study it would sort of start with a broad inspiring vision. that would eventually have that but where they really began was picking up the rocks, looking at the squiggly things underneath, fatcts andbrutal f saying our first job is to confront the brutal facts. churchillline from

-- the greatest mistake and public leadership is to hold out false hopes soon to be dashed by events. our leaders never wanted to have that happen to them. when we were writing, we coined the stockdale paradox. with all our challenges, i would like to share that with two because all of our leaders have it. it was taught to be by admiral jim stockdale. he was the highest ranking military officer in hanoi hilton and shot down in 1967 and have the burden of command inside to 1974. he was studying philosophy at stanford when i was teaching in the business school. i had the privilege to get to know him. in preparation for my first conversation with him, i read

his book, "in love and war," which is alternating chapters of his life and were when he was captured in camp. i found myself getting depressed because we can endure anything but we know it is going to come to an end but it began to dawn on me that when he was there, he did not know if it would ever come to an end. how on earth did he deal with that? i asked him. how did he not get depressed? he said he never got depressed because he never wavered in my faith not only that i would get out but that i would turn my years in the camp into the defining event of my life. in retrospect it made me what i am. we were walking to the faculty club to have lunch and his leg did not quite work right. there was a comfortable silence

now walk for a long time and never said anything. finally i said, who did not make it out as strong as you? it was thet's easy, officers. he sounded early optimistic. he said i was not optimistic, i just never lost faith. what is the difference? the optimists are the ones that say we will be out by christmas. christmas would come and it would go and they would say we're roby out by the next christmas are things getting and it would come and go on when it happened enough time, they died of a broken heart. that is when the admiral grant and by the shoulders and said you must never confused danita on one hand for absolute unwavering faith that we can and will prevail in the end with the

other discipline on the other hand to confront the most brutal facts. we're not going to be out of here by christmas. everyone of our leaders had this duality, faith and facts, the ability to put those together and be able to wrestle with both of them at the same time. in learning about your states and asking nga folks, almost every state has tremendous fax and a long road and the only way we can deal with that is with the stockdale paradox, confront the brutal facts and not capitulate. i used the word discipline. being rigorous about people, having humility and will, living

the stock dale paradox. these are all forms of discipline. when we look at the best performers, discipline ruses for the data. i want to be very clear that the motion of the culture of discipline is not a business idea. actually, disciplined people who engage in disciplines thought and to take disciplined action, this is a great loss idea, not a business idea. you'll find a culture of discipline if you look at a great symphony orchestra and puts together a perfect symphony and you feel the notes go in your years and down your spine and you could goosebumps. that is discipline. we define discipline in the day in the carter institute waging war on cancer. we find a culture of discipline in any great school. that produces outstanding educational results for every kid.

you find a culture of discipline in the best of our armed forces ended the expired young cadets that i see of west point and and all of our military academies. you'll find a culture of discipline and the most successful companies and you will not find it in the mediocre. the critical distinction is not between business and government, between great and good, between the discipline the and the undisciplined. in the second chaka want to share with you, want to turn to the question of uncertainty in dealing with forces out of our control. my colleague morton hansen spent nine years asking why some of their leaders tried and uncertainty and others don't. we studied these companies that we studied these companies that were young and