we will do it. when the company started, people were willing to pay for the fuel in the trucks because there's not enough money to go around. there is something that a leader has, and i think we're missing that. it is not opera obama, for sure. i we need leadership desperately and we don't have it. if you look at the democrats, there's something in their eyes telling me that they are like a deer in the headlights. we don't need that now. we need someone to step out front. guest: you spent quite a bit of time on c-span talking about whether brown may or obama is a more effective leader. -- whether romney or obama is a more effective leader.

i teach a course in southern california in leadership. one of the things we try to get across to our students is we tell them leadership is a team sport. the chief executives of both parties in the white house and statehouses around the country face is when they do try to lead, they are dealing with a political system that is so polarized. is impossible to get anything done. i'm not defending president obama but he faced the challenges of this ongoing knee- jerk hyper-partisanship. we cannot invent leaders. we cannot pass a bill and introduce a bill that will create an effective leader.

we can create an environment where men and women who truly want to lead and bring their strong principals to washington and want to work with together with other people, we want to make it easier rather than harder for them to do it and create the kind of leaders that we're talking about in both parties. host: why haven't you mentioned other parties like the green party? >> the writer is exactly right because we tend to talk about the democratic and republican party because they represent the overwhelming majority of congressional seats in washington, d.c. no labels does not have a plan for the encouragement or discouraged and of certain party sophistication. if you are a strong advocate for a third party whether it is the green party or the constitution party or the freedom party, you share the need of bringing leaders to washington who are willing to work across the lines.

>> this conversation is available on line in our video library. we will take you live next to the national press club to hear from sister mary hughes at the leadership conference of women's religion and she will talk about the relationship between american nuns and the vatican. that is to erisa warner, the national press club president giving the introduction. >> the leadership conference of women which we are about to learn more about today involves the directors of many orders of sisters representing about 80% of the 56,000 nuns in the u.s.. its members are involved in teaching, nursing, caring for the poor, and spreading the gospel. in april, however, the vatican released a surprisingly critical report that said nuns are involved in radical salmon as an and theology at odds with the formal catholic doctrine. the vatican says bishops would

be appointed to assume control of the group and reform it for the leadership conference directors did not seem to welcome such reform. the vatican move provoked outrage among many lay catholics as well as priests to support the sisters. many conservative catholics and church leaders say the leadership conference should be reined in. the vatican said the leadership conference should focus more on opposing abortion and gay marriage. many members of the leadership conference publicly supported president obama's health care bill. long before congressman paul ryan was the vice presidential contender, the leadership conference said they opposed congressman ryan's budget because they have heard it before, a position that bishop's council has taken. a group of sister is allied with the leadership conference began called "nuns on

the bus." a tug-of-war between the traditional power center of the church in rome and a religious or renegade in the new world is taking place. it could be another temporary britain the church which could subside. with us is the past president of the leadership conference, sister mary hughes based in new york. she received her bachelor's degree in elementary education in english, earned a master's of science from hunter college, a master's and doctorate from columbia university, and a certificate in public administration from st. john's university. she began her work as a teacher in brooklyn and by the mid- 1990s, she was a chair person of the education department of iona college in new york. in 1995, for congregational elected her and she later

returned to iona by was reelected in 2007. she has served as the north american representative of the dominican sisters international and was invited member of the university of saint thomas aquinas in rome. in 2009, she began a three-year term and the presidency of the leadership conference of women religious, a term that ended last week at the end of the group's annual assembly in st. louis. that assembly announced it wants a dialogue with the bishops over the issues in the vatican report but will not sacrifice its integrity. sister mary was one of the nuns working on that statement. give a warm press club welcome to sister mary pews. [applause] hughes. [applause] >> thank you so much for that warm introduction and welcome. it is a privilege for me to be here. in all of my time in religious

life, when i first entered and began teaching, i really never had an aspiration to teach and went over the age of seven. [laughter] i am always surprised to find myself and apply such as this and it is truly an honor to be here. i would like to maybe start off with a little background on what the leadership conference of women religious leaders is and is not for the leadership conference of women religious is often referred to as the ltwr established in 1956 and formally recognized in 1959. this happened at the rst xii wht the sisters for organization. they did not want to do it. they have the national education association and the catholic health association. that was enough for them. because the vatican requested it, they did it. to see voluntary membership

organization. the members are the elected and or appointed leaders of apostolic women's community. when i use the term 'apostolic' it is those countries that engage an active work and our world as opposed to contemplative were cloistered orders and their primary work is prayer and they do not interact with society and the same way. it has a threefold purpose -- it tries to assist its members personally and communally to carry out more collaborative lay their service of leadership and their congregations in order that we might better refer to the mission of christ in today's world. it tries to foster dialogue and collaboration among religious congregations in the church and in the larger society. it also starts to develop models for initiating and strengthening relationships with groups

concerned with the needs of society so as to maximize the potential of the conference to affect change. the fundamental stance is one of being a full ecclesiastical community and the church. what we are not is a theological society. we are not a biblical society. we're not a formation conference. there are separate entities and the church that cover all those thingsnor are the teachings of the church necessarily the primary focus of our assemblies. it is a leadership conference. the primary function is to support the leaders in the complex roles ahold in today's world. for instance, one of the most profound meetings i experienced was some years ago.

the focal point of the conference was a panel of women religious leaders, each of whom have experienced having kids murdered, some in africa or else salvador or here. they talked about how they handled the crisis and the media. each of us sat there. we would never find ourselves in the same role. it was incredibly moving. even barbara marx hubbard talked about the role that she feels women religious could play in bringing a cripple -- a greater onus to the world that has become so polarized. one thing that has evolved in the discussion and -- we hear talk about love and the sisters but it is just the lcwr. but they are [laughter] sisters] the sisters who are the members are elected by their own

sisters. we don't hold positions for life. i was a member of the lcwr from 1995-2001 and now i'm a member from 2007-2013. then we go back into the ranks and our sisters again. it is hard to separate the criticism of the lcwr from sisters in general because our leaders -- as leaders we are elected by our community. whether they like custer didn't like us, they would stand behind us and they do. there has been a tremendous amount of support and involvement among the membership of all the women's religious congregations in this country. a typical assembly, to give you a taste of it, we might have a speaker or two. there is the business of the organization. each year, we elect a president elected and if there is

directional statements that we are proving, they come before the whole body for approval the leaders are standing in the place of the members. we don't -- we do not act independently of them. one of the things we often do is have resolutions often in areas of social justice. more often than not, the same resolutions coincide with resolutions that are cast by the u.s. conference of catholic bishops. for instance, the u.s. conference of bishops has a stance against nuclear proliferation of weapons. we have a similar kind of stance. we have a resolution calling for immigration reform. there is a similar resolution. we have a resolution that the uccsb has come out against the

paul ryan budget setting the provisions are unduly cruel to persons who are poor. we would stand in union with the usccb in this particular relationship. although we are situated in the united states, we have sought to keep the lines of communication between ourselves and the vatican open. it has long been the practice of the leadership conference to support its presidency and executive director so that they might travel to rome each year to visit a number of the vatican offices and communicate about the work that is going on there and we in turn can talk about what is happening here. such offices would include the office on consecrated life, the justice office, the office and

into religious dialogue, the office on the pastoral care of migrants and so on. we usually stop to see the un ambassador to the united states. we visit the leaders of other religious congregations. so often, when we were in various vatican offices, particularly the work on immigration and migrants, they would be talking about their trust and we would be able to augment the conversation by speaking about the work of the sisters here in the united states. we found so often that our work coincided with the efforts of the various vatican offices to go on. in 2001, the president of the lcwr requested a meeting with the office of the congregation of the doctrine of the states. they just have not met with them in some time.

we don't primarily work with doctrine issues. they had not seen a need. they replied that would like to meet with the president but they wanted them to be prepared to speak about three issues -- or the nation as being reserves to man, the next was on the primacy of homosexuality. we went and the subject was never brought up. each year since then, we go to the office of the congregation for doctor and fate and we sat there and we asked if they had any questions. it is usually very cordial. we were surprised when in march, 2009, a letter announcing the doctrine assessment was addressed to the current

president. we took it to the franciscan sisters. another way in which we fought to keep our ties with the vatican is we meet annually with the states. we have always had fruitful, positive discussions. one of my last conversations with the last archbishop was if he had any questions. this was after we had the letter announcing the doctrine assessment. he said in his very charming way, i only wish i could duplicate his italian accent, he said i receive many questions about many things and many letters but i have not about you. that is the best news anyone could really want to hear. when we had the information on

the doctrine assessment, we responded candidly and as fully and as completely as we could. in some areas, we found the erroneous attributions. sometimes, it might have been a comment that someone had answered on the floor but it was not the substance of the talk and i got reported that way. we corrected some of that information. quite honestly, the lcwr does not seek to have a much roster, persons who speak against the church. this is not the case of sisters over and against the church. we are a part of the church. the lcwr is recognized by the vatican and we are very aware of that relationship and very grateful for it and very respectful of it. and in between us submitting the record format, we were back

in the office the next year. i specifically asked if there are any new questions. is there anything else they need collaboration on. no new questions. we know now that the report was already written. it was not yet revealed to us until april 18 when we were issued the assessment and the mandate. when the presidency spoke, we were truly stunned. we thought things were going well. we met then in assembly last week from august 7-10 in st. louis, missouri. more than 900 of us were gathered in that room. it's typical assembly might have 650 or 700 during the apostolic visitation is there are more. i don't remember the last time we had this many women come

together. it was really at great sacrifice to the contras -- congregation. many congregations look at their own resources. one congregation usually sends two but fate -- but this year they sent all of their membership. the way the assembly body went about making decisions about how to move forward, i think is as important and historic as the decision itself. there were no fiery speeches. there was no denigration of the vatican or anyone else. we spent significant time in contemplative silence, contemplative listening, and contemplative prayer. we had also placed a priority upon being able to listen to minority voices in the room and honoring that perspective.

in the end, on the last day, when the press release was crafted and it was read to the assembly body, that was the only time that people got up and stood up and cheered. i often say if you put five of us in a room and ask us to decide a room color, we might not achieve consensus but here we have more than nine bird people in a short space of time -- 900 people in a short space of time going in one direction. i was wishing some of the members of congress could be in the room to see another way to do things. [laughter] you also need to know how grateful we are for the media attention that has surrounded this. we did not plan for this. it was the convocation to the doctrine of the states that put this public. it made the assessment and the mandate public.

the press and the media coverage i believe has been thoughtful, probing, and insightful. in so many ways, the press coverage has encouraged and challenged have the sisters to be more articulate about who we are and what we do. we just did hour before and we did not think it was important to do advertising and this caused us to step up to the plate. in the past, we have often lamented the usage nun jokes and the caricatures that were far too prevalent. the level of conversation has been significantly raised and we are very grateful to you for helping us do that. we also hold in our hearts deep gratitude for the thousands of women and men who have been in support of the work of the sisters. there were thousands of letters and e-mails that poured into

the national office and hundreds that or sent to each of these presidents separately. women gathered for our assembly, more than 1500 letters were delivered right to the hotel. they distributed the letters and it was really the centerpiece. each table had a sense of the level of imports. the letters of support were not just cheerleading. it was people pouring out their own fate stories and in some instances, their own struggles and saying it we could help them find a way to speak. we're not talking about changing tour -- church doctrine. we're talking about a place to speak or raise questions. there is support evidenced in so many ways and that was

profoundly encouraging to us. there are certain things that are clear in our response. it is the deep desire of the membership to stay within the church and not move away from it. you may have heard speculation that the sisters will move out of the church or the leadership conference will become a non- canonical entity. only run can confer that. we could not ourselves decide to change the lcwr that way. we could all withdraw and form something else but that was clearly not the desire of the membership. we derive our strength from the sacramento life of the church. we love the gospels, we follow the example of christ, and we believe our essential and

necessary get should be offered to the church. a charism is a gift that each leader of congregation brought. in my congregation, the dominican, we have a love for truth and preaching is very much what we do. the sisters of mercy have a preeminent focus on the mercy of christ that they mfs. each congregation brings its gift, it is a gift to the total church. at the same time, because we work with those who are not -- underserved, we bring challenges to the church and that is the key. there was a document of the second vatican council that challenged religious congregations to renewal and reform in 1965. the teachings of the vatican council are the highest

teachings of the church. religious women took these seriously and were obedient to the will of all holy sed. seed. we need to find the ways to engage in honest, respectful, and loving dialogue. pope paul vi issued an encyclical in 1964 that outlined principles of the affected dialogue. this would seem to be a moment to reclaim those principles. for the sake of the church and for all belong to call this church their home. it seems manifestly clear that our annual visits to rome and the committee participation l ofcwr members on the committees

are insufficient . there are diocese in which there are wonderful and honest communications between the bishops and their religious congregations, that is not present in every place. there has to be a way get better communication. as we look at the assessment, it went back to something in 1997 where we said that it was disturbing to them in 1997, why did it take so long to say it? it might better have been resolved in 1997 when the current leaders lcwr could have responded to it in person. it was also clear from the membership that they did not desire that we allow the mandate and the assessment to consume all of our time going forward.

immediately following the assembly, the presidency and the executive director met with the archbishop and he met with the board of the leadership conference. dialogue and the listening has already begun. that we continue to do. in terms of going forward in addition to that direction, pa sistert farrell, the outgoing president, offered six guidelines by which we might navigate these rough waters. to dogoing to continue this in a contemplative fashion. if the prayer and a respectful ness could bring 900 women in a common direction, we have to believe that prayer will continue to bring a feeling a --

healing and change of corporate real wedding is not about winners and losers. we believe strongly that acharisms of our congregations operate prophetic voice to the church. that is not what my will or intention is. it is honed by a deep asceticism and deep listening. we work so much on the margins. we fall of love with the people we work with. many of those people feel excluded from the church. women go back to the center, we raised those questions. that is not to finance. it is one the church to be all it can be and so that we can hopefully find a greater place that those who are on the margins might also feel at home in the church.

that prophetic voice will continue. we have solidarity with the marginalized. when you were the people who are very poor work -- or lived under oppression, they don't have a need to keep up appearances. through their eyes, they often see what needs to be unmatched. - unmasked. we try to look at our world through their eyes because they inform us. it will be through community with carousels and community with persons like yourselves long to find a place to solve things differently and the examples of the very polarized world in which we live now to is so difficult sometimes to have a discussion on any thing. already the campaignads are hyped up.

you are red, you're white, you are black and white -- where is the avenue where people can sit and work together? we believe very strongly that the church is the body of christ and that all parts of that body have to find a way to be at home in it and be able to talk with one another and be able to work with one another. we will do this in a way that is not violent. it will not be by yelling or screaming or defamation. it will be from a deeply peaceful place. in order to do that, that relates back to the contemplation -- it is allowing the time to listen so the voices we might offer is not necessarily our own voice that comes from my place where we believe the spirit of god as speaking. we will move forward in joyful hope. there are many who have asked

that this is possible. as people of the gospel, we always live with hope. we believe if we introduce -- maybe this is our gift to the church -- to bring a different stance, to invite into dialogue with those who might differ with us so that together we might come to a greater truth. thank you very much and the look forward to the opportunity to respond to your questions. [applause] >> if the vatican decides not to have a dialogue with your group, what is your next move? to all the nuns get to vote on what you do? >> first of all, the dialogue has already begun with the archbishop. that is very promising. i have met him.

he is very cordial. he certainly seemed to demonstrate the capacity to listen. as i understand, the board meeting had an honest exchange of a dialogue has begun. in terms of voting as to what to do, it is the leadership at the congregation's that have the vote on what will come next. they also placed a vote confidence in the presidency that as they move forward, the use their best judgment. we have confidence that they will. as far as our members, we did the best we can to keep the members of our congregations in formed. i think most of us have had separate meetings with our own congregation to say what has been going on to allow this sisters to have their own voice on this. in my own congregation, because i was the one to receive this,

they have been incredibly supportive. as a matter of living in joy and hope as we move forward. >> how parthenons orders leaders appointed, by the bishops or the vatican? >> by neither, in my own congregation, they elect the leaders. there's a whole process by which delegates who have a status of the congregation agree to a level of education and they are involved in an election or a discernment process where the congregation might ask what needs they have and who might be the best women in our congregation to do this. there are some congregations who is head organization is in rome. in a few instances, the

congregation itself nominates people and the affirmation would come from their own leadership headquarters but not from the bishop and not from the vatican. >> have there been similar tensions between the nuns in rome or u.s. bishops previously? >> the one that occurs to me was in south america at the conference of latin america religions. there was a doctrine assessment some years back and there were about to publish a book and it had to be withdrawn. their leadership was withdrawn and the vatican appointed leadership for that organization. we have been conversations with of those leaders who were present at that time. they have given some helpful direction, most of it similar to what we came out with ourselves. we want to stay centered and

keep the dialogue open and that is where the understanding grows. >> if the dialogue fails, what does it mean for lcwr becoming independent? >> i think it is too premature to answer something like that. we are hopeful the dialogue will continue. if it doesn't, the members have to come back. given our love for the church, we don't do anything that will split the conference. you could goal of to any conference and there is another one in the country. they follow a more traditional -- i would have to look different to join the conference. there is different ways and they are all valid. as part of the diversity that

are within the church. it would be too premature right now to venture a guess on the eventual outcome. >> what authority does the vatican or -- vatican or the bishops have a overlcwr? >> it is the vatican that has the ultimate authority. i don't know the ins and outs by they look for feedback from the bishops. in many dioceses in the country, there are wonderful relationship physicians who have been supportive of us. there is a member of the conference last of this was a matter of doctrine or duality? she may have hit the nail on the head. it does not mean we should not be a great deal more prudent and respectful as we go forward. >> what are you willing to compromise and what you willing

not to compromise on t? >> the body of women religious agreed upon certain principles that were important to us. one is that we would stand and our integrity and i believe they should stand on bears but we have to find ways. it would be resistance if there was anyway to reshape this. we don't see ourselves as our role to discuss church documents that are assemblies. a number of our women are theologians. we have a wonderful university in this country. throughout the country, when religious avail themselves to ongoing education and wonderful lectures at various universities. to us, it seemed repetitive to try to set up a way to do that

at our assembly. we're focused on leadership skills and how do we prepare our members to live in this complex society. i think that resistance would come up there was an effort to change the nature of the conference. >> your group as one of several including catholic bishops conferences that expressed deep concerns earlier this spring about the paul ryan budget saying is a failure from a moral standpoint. willie continue to speak out about this now that he is a vice presidential candidate? >> just a word of clarity t,he the did not sponsor'nuns on bus." the information was communicated to us and we did not supported montero -- monetarily.

is important to separate that. it is the network that have spoken so much on paul ryan's budget. i believe it made an effort to meet with them as they went to wisconsin. we don't normally speak out against any candidate. we have tried to give pop -- to politics separately. as we go forward, it is error consensus that by the practices that are detrimental to the poor, it would not be something we could support. >> as your group asked to talk to mr. ryan about his budget plan? >> we have not. >> how many members are there in your leadership conference and how many do they represent?

there are 1500 women with leaders in this conference. there are 56,000 in the united states. >> as your group and cursed the church to ordain women as priests? >> no, we have not. we don't have a speaker to talk about ordaining women. people have viewpoints on this but we are very aware of what our canonical status is so we have never had an assembly where we invited speakers to speak publicly on the ordinance of women. >> do you think the vatican crackdown is a payback for many

of the sisters supported health care reform? >> there is a lot of speculation as to the reason why and that is one of them. some have drawn the inference that because so many sisters support of health care reform that meant we are against the church on abortion and that is not at all the case. the difference between the bishops conference and the women's conference as we differ in our interpretation of the reading of the bill. several important cases have already upheld and none of that money has been used for abortions. >> our young women expected to answer the call to the old order when they're most reform -- reason reference in the case they will be violent or not acting in conjunction with their souls. >> when i come to us, they present themselves for rowley order.

that is reserved for those who have studied for the priesthood. there is a concern about that. some collectors we received, i happen to run 1 -- read one in particular they said this is why i terminated my discernment. on the other hand, if women are looking and interested in joining an intelligent, well- educated, articulate group of women who can speak on behalf of the port and will not compromise. we await you with open arms at our door. >> how do you reconcile your boughs of obedience and light of what is being demanded by the vatican? >> obedience as a very decent sense is listening. it is listening carefully. in the principles of dialogue

that pope paul's roman 6 outlined "talks about how board met this that each person makes every effort to understand the perspective of the other. i think we're not there yet. when we are sure that the dialogue is taking place, i think we will both be changed by the capacity of the dialogue. i think some folks have a kind of conduct of obedience that if you are a superior or you feel you are, that is what is often called lying about obedience. in the religious community, i would not do that with my own sisters. the once on this is something we said and the talk about it. we will sit there and talk about the reasons why she should or should not and we take all that into account.

that is the kind of obedience that we will follow, one that incorporates the listening and agrees that were should be. >> why have we not heard from your organization about the accusations of sexual abuse of children? >> the accusations of sexual abuse are awful scandal in our church. it has been a very painful moment for priests and bishops and cardinals. many are helpful and minister without question and great generosity and integrity. many of our sisters have written letters when one of their man was indicted offering prayer and support. we would never use the

sinfulness of some members to denigrate reputation of ball. o --f the whole. we work with survivors and victims and to try to support them. we were the ones who went and reported things we were uncomfortable with. our loyalty is split and a number of directions. it is split with very good people who desire to govern the church well. it is also for the sake of those who have been abused and the ongoing feeling. i don't know if everyone anyone ever heal from all of those scars. >> some argue that had there been greater conversations with women earlier, maybe this would not have gone for so long.

that is speculation but i think is helpful to have women's voices in the mix as well as men's. >> do you think the attack on the sisters is an attempt to change the subject of abuse by priests on children? >> this is such a speculative issue. there was a wonderful article rison -- written in "the national catholic reporter." in all truth, there are multiple facets that are here. this is so complex, it is hard to say it would be any one thing. it could be a factor for some >>. in 1979, the head the l ofcwr ask the pope about women and ministries. has that caused the vatican to

watch the minister more closely? >> that is all speculative. she did not ask for the ordination of women. she s of the church was going to be open to having more women involved. we all have different degrees of culpability in responding to questions. i think that was a question that was very forward thinking and it's time and it was a challenge. i really cannot say whether it focus of attention and leadership conference or women who were disenfranchised. do you believe that nuns should devote more of their focus to approve -- to approving of abortion and gay marriage? >> on the abortion question, i think it is not a matter -- we oppose abortion but we do it in

a different way than the bishop. the bishop has operated politically and their republican their demonstrations that take place. very much -- they very much supported that and they do that really well. there are sisters inseminator our congregations who work and are pro-life clinics. there are usually no salaries in those places so we are supporting our women as they do that work. i cannot tell you how many of our sisters have counseled young women in our high schools or in our colleges against abortions and it has helped them get the necessary support they need. every time we open a clinic or a place where homeless mothers and their children can now come to get the test tech support they need, all that is supporting the right to life, even our literacy programs helps mothers to be

better mothers for their children. they say now they can lead to their children and talk to their child. all that is pro-life for. w --ork. i think it is a matter of enlarging the conversation a bit and many sisters do go to washington for the demonstrations. as sisters aids, it will be less likely that they have the stamina to endure. in terms of gay marriage, we have not really been asked to speak about it. we have not had a discussion on it and we don't usually speak out on those doctrine issues. i mail surprised when they ask us to talk about these things. you don't want to get in the way of what they're saying.

it is unlikely we will speak on gay marriage. >> pope benedict changed catholic doctrine said that the use of condoms need not always be a violation of catholic law. should we believe that a similar evolution policy will be made for contraception? >> that is hard to speculate at the beginning of july, there was a wonderful article called sin is not simple. it went into defining what is involved in death -- in commiting. we look at the end result. the really important question is what was the motivation? the example that the author used when someone might go in

and said they missed met on sunday. if the prius test why, they rebelled -- they would get a little unanswered. -- they would get a legitimate answer. the issue of freedom of conscience on any issue outlined by the church would always be guided by the largest natural principles which are the motivations. it might be violent not to use the contraception. those are things that require a lot of discussion before when comes to a conclusion. >> what does this statement mean to keep our integrity in the face of vatican reforms?

>> that is mentally variety of ways. it is our integrity as a leadership conference, we want to be able to offer leaders the kinds of opportunities and the kind of skills and exposure that might better enable them to lead in this complex time. if there weren't effort to turn us into something that only discusses church teaching, that is not as useful. there are other ways they can do that. i read the document on my own and discuss them with people locally. i don't really go to leadership conferences to discuss church doctrine. i come out of a college background. in colleges, you put out any number of ideas and you discuss them and you don't necessarily agree with them. it stimulates thought bennett refines thinking. that is the value of financial

leadership conference. can catholicism survive the rift between the patriarchy and the female membership? >> i would certainly hope so. i would believe that it could. back in 1986, there was a reflection on religious life by the court monday talked about -- he had an insight to finding where the gaps were. he talked about the tension between the ecclesial reality a and thecharism of religious life. he said alan porteous to find ways for those -- he said how important it is to find ways for those to work together. it should not be torn apart by detention -- by dissension. that is what our hope would be. >> the bishops' conference has

said that the paul ryan budget fails the test. does the lcwr agreed? >> we have not discussed it. many of its members might feel the same way but as a conference, we have not come out with having a discussion on this. >> when you talk about dialogue with the vatican, who will be speaking on your behalf? >> persons authorized to speak on behalf of lcwr are the president and director together. it is the presidency and executive director together. we are a membership organization. in terms of accepting the conditions or agreed to a condition halladay, but to the membership of the board.

i realize that structure can appear cumbersome. some look for easier after is but is merely a face card and a model of the collaborative ways in which women can really be brought together. >> do you have any message for those who have left the fate because of their disgust of leadership issues? >> my advice would be personal. as a person who was in the office on april 18 to receive this mandate, i felt humiliated personally by the experience. i know how hard women religious have worked dialogue, at communicating about their lives,

and so on. when i came home, as i sat with my own bishop and cried. sometimes we just have to pray to give our hearts back to the church. and for people who have been hurt by our church, i guess it is a prayer "ask them to offer themselves that if they can, to pray that they can find the place to give their hearts back to the church. as was said around the time of the vatican council, the church is wholly in spite of those who want to have it otherwise. we look for ways to give their hearts to the holy. >> what is the status of catholic women today? are your number is growing? how would you characterize the future? >> mike: into began with four

cable or from germany to work with german immigrants in philadelphia. we wound up in new york. some many religious congregations have a comparable kind of her rope beginning. the anomaly was that we grew very large. some of that anomaly i think was probably due to the fact -- one of the teachers said the nuns i had in school were great teachers. her mother was home watching the floors. -- watching the floors. we began to get concerned more about what constituted a call into religious life. someone came for other reasons discerned maybe this is not where there were called to spend

their lives. they left and they remained friends. they do wonderful work in places that we cannot begin to. we are smaller but we have always had a steady three people or so talking to us about coming in. they tend to be more educated. we had a final vote at the end of april and the floor was originally an immigrant from el salvador. the folks loved her because of her sense of humor. the next final bows will be next spring and will be in the province of puerto rico. it is a new immigrant population. religious life is a gift to the church and i don't think god will take to get away. >> we're almost out of time

before asking the last questions, i have a couple of housekeeping matters. i want to remind you of our upcoming luncheon speakers -- we have general james amos and we will discuss the role of marines. on september 6, kathleen turner will discuss reproductive rights and on september 13, james t. hoffa will discuss defining patriotism and the american worker. i would like to present our guest with our famous national press mu clubg. [laughter] the last question is how you think the perception of nuns of change in the u.s.? >> we probably should write a thank-you note to the vatican for shedding of a different light on this. with every challenge, there is

always a blessing on the other side. there have been so many blessings already associated with this particular crisis. one of them has been to draw greater attention to the work and where we have come from cents bavaria's beginnings. it is also how well -- how far u.s. women have come and we are grateful for that. as i said in my opening remarks, we're grateful to the media for that and grateful to the thousands and thousands of great people men and women have written to is to support us. per not perfect but we are challenged by your example. we're challenge the big more. there are blessings.

i don't know if i answered the question. i want to thank you for this opportunity to be with you today. thank you very much. [laughter] [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] you can find out more information about the press club at our website to get a copy of today's program we are adjourned.

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

>> coming up, they look at personal liberties and gun rights. here is a brief look. >> basic liberties barbouare crg all around us. first, he went after restaurants. there are also people whose blood pressure does not spike if they eat too much sodium. people who are allowed to have access to a salt shaker without supervision. who is bloomberg to tell us what to put on our feet anyway? if you are on a major dose of hypertension drug and you make at margarita classes, you are a moron. but being a more honest with a modicum of freedom beats the hell out of letting some know at all to create interest plan act,

which is what they're trying to do. >> that was some of the event looking at personal liberties and cut in rates. all that tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span. >> which is more important, wealth or honor? >> honor. >> it is the kind of nation we are. whether we possess the wit and determination to deal with the questions, including economic questions, but not limited to them. all things do not flow from wealth or poverty. i know this firsthand and so do you. all things flow from doing what is right. >> look at what has happened. we have the lowest combined rates of unemployment,

inflation, and home mortgages in 28 years. look at what happened. 10 million new jobs, over half of them highway jobs, 10 million workers getting the raise they deserve with a minimum-wage law. >> now we are on the countdown to this year's conventions. you can watch our coverage, every minute of the conventions live on c-span, c-span radio, and streamed online at c- span.org, starting monday, august 27. >> earlier this week, the heritage foundation held a hearing on the impact of cuts on the national guard. sequestration will trigger an automatic hundred billion dollars in defense spending cuts over the next decade. this is an hour and a half.

everyone, to the heritage foundation. we welcome those joining us on our web site at on all these occasions and those joining us on the c-span network? we appreciate their attendance with us today. we remind everyone in how to make sure cell phone is have been turned off as we proceed. it will be appreciated if. will post a program on our website within 24 hours. our viewers are always welcome to send their comments and questions for the panel by e- mail. hosting our discussion this morning is steven bucci. is senior research fellow for defense and homeland security at our center for foreign policy studies. he looks at special operations and cybersecurity as well as defense support to civilian authority keith. he served america three decades

as an army special forces officer. in july, 2001, he assumed the duties of military assistant to defense secretary donald rumsfeld and worked daily with the secretary for five and a half years if. when he retired, the continued at the pentagon as deputy assistant secretary of defense, homeland defense, and american security affairs. immediately prior to joining us and heritage, he served as a lead consultant to ibm on cybersecurity policy. join me in welcoming my colleague steven bucci. [applause] >> good morning. we hope to have a lively discussion this morning. i have a couple quick plug before my introduction of our esteemed speakers. first, today is national emp awareness day. electromagnetic pulse.

it came up in our discussion yesterday and is kind of nice that this is part of our homeland security week discussion. electromagnetic pulse is something we need to worry about, because in a country like ours where everyone is connected electronically on a continuous basis, it would affect us. any of you who remember the blackberry outage we had last year for six hours and everybody in washington was in a panic, you can imagine what would happen if if we had an event where we lost all our capabilities in a city or maybe all over the east coast for a while. the other thing is today is the official rollout of this document. these are are two speakers in the suits. [applause] this paper, critical mismatch, the dangerous gap between rhetoric and readiness in dod

civil support missions. this is a critical issue. there is a problem with our capability to do our job, the job of the nation. this does not deal exclusively with the national guard, but the national guard is a huge part of this and need to be. hopefully, our speakers will touch on that a a bit this morning. this is available outside and we hope everyone will share it. it is an issue that affects each of you. if you are at ground zero when something happens, you will want this nation to have the capability to respond properly and expeditiously. right now there is some debate as to whether we have that capability or not. our subject for this morning is the price every state will have to pay: the effect of sequestration on the national

guard. i never served in the national guard. i spent 28 years in active duty in the united states army. but i had the opportunity numerous times to work with the national guard. as i became the deputy assistant secretary of defense for homeland defense i got to work with them pretty much every day. i have to tell you, if you don't understand what the national guard, army, and air guard, what they do for this country, you are missing something, because those men and women are heroes for this country. they are the lineal descendants of the minutemen. that is in their simple and it's very appropriate, because they are regular citizens. are not just weekend warriors. they are people who have real jobs in our communities. and then when the call is given, they put down that plow or whatever they do and then

pick up a musket and they are ready to help their fellow citizens and most of the time at great personal sacrifice. these folks are important. i cannot think of canada better people to discuss this with you than are two speakers. the first is paul mchale, president of civil support international, a consulting firm in washington. paul was my boss at the department of defense. >> can you say that again? >> my boss. only two people are still referred to as boss. that is secretary mckale and secretary donald rumsfeld. they are two gentlemen that i hold in high esteem, not just because of what they have done and who they are, but because i have seen them at work and i have seen their dedication to this nation.

secretary paul mchale is a former congressman from the state of pennsylvania. he served on numerous positions and the most relevant to this is the was the co-founder of the national guard and reserve components caucus in the house. he came to work at the pentagon. i will be honest, i was the military assistance to the secretary of defense at the time and i said, a former congressman, this could be painful. as it turns out, he is an incredible gentleman, easy to work with. easy to work for. he wants you to perform properly. the happiest i ever saw him was when he recruited me to come work for him and then shook hands and said i will see you in about six months, i'm going off to put on my marine uniform and he went back to afghanistan. already retired from the marine

corps reserve, recalled to duty so he could serve as an adviser to the minister in the afghan regime. he was so happy to be a marine again. they never stop being marines. he served there with great distinction and then came back and continued being my boss. his dedication to the national guard is not just professional. he also found a beautiful woman who is a national guard general, who he then married. where is martha? that's his lovely bride. from vermont. next to him as the gentleman that he was joined at the hip with the whole time we were there in the building, lieutenant general retired h. steven blum. the whole time i knew steve, he was the director of the national guard bureau, not a

very glamorous, but a very critical job. he later became the deputy commander of u.s. northern command, the first national guard officer ever to serve in that position. steve is also a special forces officer, which i kind of like, because i was too. he has served pretty much in every position you can have in the national guard. he is a man of infinite imagination, infinite energy, and vision. even before the rest of the department of defense started getting ahold of the issue of chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and high yield explosives response, he was the one who picked up the gauntlet and said the guard can contribute to this and the guards will contribute to this. he made to the guard a critical cog in that responsibility.

these two gentlemen fought that battle against a lot of naysayers and achieves quite a bit during their tenure. i will let you read paul's paper to get the status of it now, which is not quite as good as it was when they left office, but these two gentlemen i am proud to call both of them friends. they are personal heroes for me, because i have seen the work they have done for this nation, not for self aggrandizement and definitely not for money but for the sake of this nation. i would ask you to join me in welcoming paul and steve. i will give each about 10 or 15 minutes to make opening remarks. and then we will go into question and answer. i will tell you, as i call on you to ask a question, if by the end of the second sentence, if i

don't hear a question mark, i will ask you to stop. we will start with paul. [applause] >> steve, thank you very much for your kind words. i truly don't think of myself as your boss. i think of you as my friend and colleague. i was honored to serve by your side during 3 or four years of pentagon service. general blum, my good friend, and my wife, the general as well. and the colonel just back from afghanistan, sir, thank you for your service. [applause]

ladies and gentlemen, there was a very fine article in "politico" yesterday in which secretary of defense leon panetta was quoted. "i realize there are a lot of other things going on in this country that can draw our attention, from the olympics to political campaigns to drought to some tragedies we have seen in communities around the country. i thought it was important to remind the american people that there is a war going on." the only thing worse than the fog legislative strategy of sequestration would be its actual implementation. with military men and women in daily combat, 41 were killed last month, says secretary panetta. it is a deep breach of trust to put the department of defense on automatic pilot. across-the-board cuts in d.o.t. funding would severely jeopardize the operational

capabilities of our active forces, sent a message of u.s. defense vulnerability to our adversaries, and irresponsibly weaken the national guard in its ability to protect the u.s. homeland." because the sequestration cuts, totaling approximately $500 billion over 10 years are across the board, it's difficult to determine precise with the impact. but a substantial reduction in military personnel is a near certainty. recently it was reported by the chairman of the house armed services committee and secretary leon panetta on july 25 when buck said, "we have 100,000 leaving the military."

it's expected there will be a reduction of 100,000 personnel coming aboard donnelly from the army is what he's saying, as a result of cuts that have already been approved. then he went on to address sequestration. he said, "if we will have another 100,000 if sequestration takes effect." in response, secretary panetta said, "it would obviously add another 100,000 that would have to be reduced." there is uncertainty as to what the impact of that reduction of an additional 100,000 would have on the structure and strength of the national guard. some insight into that was provided on may 17. that was when ray odierno, once the special assistant to the

chairman on homeland defense issues. he and i worked together on a daily basis. i have extremely high regard for him and his professionalism. he provided some insight into how that 100,000 production in end strength would impact the national guard when he said, "if we have sequestration, it will affect the reserve component and the active. it depends on what the balance we picked. what i talk about a lot is 70,000 out of the active component, 30,000 out of the reserve. the army could be reduced anywhere be 400,000 to 425,000 soldiers. the national guard might lose an additional 20,000 soldiers. the army reserve might lose an additional 10,000. the net effect of all that is

if we have sequestration beginning in january, it's very likely the army national guard would lose an additional 20,000 men and women. in addition to the yen's strength productions, it's reasonable to assume sequestration goes into effect in january, national guard title 32 funding account would also be reduced. the negative impact of such title 32 reductions on homeland defense and defense board of civil authorities would be immediate, both in terms of training and operational missions. over the last decade, some of which was described by steve a few moments ago, there's been a shift in dod policy. steve and i were intimately involved in that shift in policy, police in a far greater reliance on the national guard for the execution of domestic military missions. while that policy shift has correctly emphasize the role of

the national guard here and home, it has also tied the domestic mission of the national guard more directly to the variables of d.o.t. dod funding, including sequestration. let me take a moment to explore some history now, if i may, to give perhaps a more practical understanding of that shift in policy. if my memory serves me correctly, and i believe it does, in 1992 during hurricane andrew, when it was necessary for the military to provide support to civil authorities because of the magnitude of the destruction that occurred and the aftermath, the majority of the force that responded to provide assistance to civilian authorities came out of our active component. a great deal of that came out of the 82nd airborne. a smaller portion of that force came out of the national guard. if i remember the ratios correctly, and i believe i do, roughly 70% or slightly less of the force that responded to

hurricane andrew in 1992 came out of the active component with slightly more than 30% coming out of the reserve component. but the benchmark was roughly with an emphasis on the active component participation in the defense support of civil authorities discommission. that policy of using primarily active component forces changed radically in the aftermath of september 11 and in response to the requirements associated with domestic preparedness. i was nominated to become the first assistant secretary of defense in 2003. i met with the senate armed services commission in his office, senator john warner, distinguished gentleman. he wished me well in my new job and we talked about a few other things of a personal nature.

he reminded me that we should not use the dod funding to support discommissions executed entitled 32 status. he said use our war-fighting money and use it for civil support missions domestically executed. i thought that was probably a pretty good advice. my view of the subject changed considerably once we experienced the operational requirements of hurricane katrina. the national guard can function increase statuses. -- in three statuses. it can be in 10 states status. that is traditional. the national guard forces and states tennis are under the authority of state law. they're under the command and

control of the governor of that individual state. they are funded by the state to execute those missions. state's status. federal status is kind of the opposite end of the spectrum. when the army guard or the air guard are brought into the title 10 federal status, the army guard becomes part of the department of the army and air guard becomes a part of the department of the air force. they are fully integrated into the active component of and are subject to federal law and are under command-and-control of the president of the united states. the funding comes from the department of defense. groundre's a middle between those two and has become important middle ground, title 32 status. in title 32, the funding for title 32 status comes from the department of defense. the law that applies is generally not federal law, but command and control remains vested in the hands of the governor of that individual state. so it really is the best of both worlds from the vantage point of the state. the training, equipment, the funding comes from the

department of defense of command-and-control. is not with the president. title 32 status, national guard forces are not covered by 1878 statute that forbids the use of military personnel for law enforcement-related activities. under command-and-control of the governor in title 32, the national guard may be used for law enforcement-related functions. during operation liberty shield, which was the term we had in 2003 in the federal interagency to describe are prepared this domestically for any repercussions associated with a possible war that we thought might take place with iraq. surely prior to the commencement of ground operations in iraz, -- in iraq, operation liberty shield provided for certain enhanced protections here at home because we were uncertain as to what action iraq might take or could

take within the u.s. in response to a combat action in iraq itself. just before we went to war in iraq my very good friend and former colleague in the house, pennsylvania, tom ridge, initiated operation liberty shield. he called upon the governors of the individual states to provide protection for their critical infrastructure, utilize in the national guard. i got a phone call from the governor of the state of arizona, who is today the secretary of the department of homeland security. governor janet napolitano was very creative. she had the distinction of being prematurely right. she wanted to use the national guard to protect critical infrastructure within her state and she argued persuasively that because this was a terrorist threats from outside the united states if it was a threat really to the nation and not to the state of arizona and the funding for that title 32

mission should in fact the federal in character and that the state and state funds and state status should not be protecting infrastructure against our international adversaries. that was not policy at that time. i had to tell her, to my regret, but she cannot do that. she was not happy about it and i was not happy as the messenger and a couple had to communicate that guidance, but that was the policy. that has since changed. let me tell you how it has changed and then we move to steve for his comments. hurricane katrina occurred in august of 2005. two months before hurricane katrina, the new strategy for a homeland defense and civil support was written. when i began my talk a few minutes ago i mentioned the ratio, 70-30 in terms of the military assistance provided during hurricane andrew in 1992. we changed that in the strategy. it made no sense to us in a post 9/11 world that we would continue to use active-duty military forces for these

domestic missions when we had ample strength and structure in the national guard for these domestic missions. why should we use the 82nd airborne for civil support missions when the 82nd airborne was trained and equipped for overseas warfighting and we had superbly trained national guardsmen who could execute domestic missions without impairing our ability to project power overseas? that was the rationale of our strategy until we broke into the strategy -- and i personally wrote the languages that said henceforth the department of defense would have a focused reliance upon reserve component capabilities predominately the national guard for our domestic missions. that was a direct reversal of the policy that had been in place during hurricane andrew. we did not realize just two months later during hurricane katrina that policy would be. put into be when hurricane katrina occurred august 29,

2005, most of the force, 70% of the military response to hurricane katrina, 50,000 national guardsmen, came out of the reserve component and 3% came out of the active component. a change in policy and i think a good one. an amendment was passed by congress subsequently. that amendment allowed national guard forces to protect critical infrastructure in a way in which we previously would have relied upon rapid reaction forces from the active-duty army and active duty marine corps. that mission transition to correctly to the national guard. that would mean the national guard forces in title 32 would defend critical infrastructure.

it also meant that secretary janet napolitano was right. the policy finally caught up with her vision on that subject. we were henceforth able to use national guard forces in title 324 critical infrastructure protection. secondary i will mention and then i will move to a conclusion. i realize i pushed the limits of my time, steve. steve blum, through his personal leadership, build, expanded, and in some cases initiated cases initiated see burn response capability that was unprecedented. that capability was located within the national guard. the national guard recognized that in the 21st century our adversaries accommodation states and terrorists, for now have the capacity to acquire incredibly destructive weapons, weapons that can be miniaturized and easily transported, that could conceivably cause great numbers of casualties within our own country. we were extremely vulnerable to

that type of asymmetric chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, high explosive attack within the borders of our nation. the national guard under steve's personal leadership step up and said we can do something about that. under the leadership of the national guard, 17 enhanced response force packages were created. 57 civil support teams were established. ultimately, and a little later, homeland response forces got all established in title 32 status within the national guard. because of dod's increased reliance on the national guard for domestic military missions, critical infrastructure protection, any reduction entitled 32 funding will directly impact on the safety of the american people here and home. cuts would reduce the national guard ability to protect critical infrastructure from terrorist attacks, would diminish the national guard

ability to respond to vote major disasters whether natural or man-made. let me close with a quotation from craig moe tenleytown, steve's successor as chief of the national guard bureau. speaking in may, when talking about the impact of sequestration on the domestic military missions of the national guard, critical infrastructure, disaster response under very challenging circumstances, the general mckinley, stepped down as the chief said the following, "we find ourselves obviously in the midst of constrained budgets and depositions. -- and tough decisions. no doubt we must all curbs spending, but not at the expense of our security. that's why i must tell you that sequestration would follow to substantially and devastate our national security -- would

hollow the force. the national guard is already facing difficult budget cuts, cuts that impact equipment and personnel. further reductions would significantly limit the guard's ability to function as an operational force, a decrease its overall credibility, and reduce the department's capacity to protect a homeland and respond to emergencies. if sequestration is imposed under the provisions of the budget control act of 2011 and in january the d.o.t. experience is an immediate cut of $55 billion, none of the bill are power projection capability is produced overseas, our domestic security will be placed at risk because of inadequate national guard title 32 funding. that means 20,000 fewer national guardsmen with less equipment, less prepared to execute their domestic emissions. that is the ultimate impact of

sequestration upon the national guard. >> thanks, paul. that is and unintended but perfect segue to what i want to talk about. first, thanks, because i think you laid out a very good umbrella and background approach to what we are really facing here. this is a serious time, no question about it. the nation does not possess infinite resources, limitless resources. we really aren't every day becoming more aware of how finite those resources really are and really why we have to be better stewards of those resources than we have been in the recent past or even in generations.

this is not a bogyman that does not really exist or a threat that's not out there. this is the reality that we are facing. the national guard is not an organization with substantial discretionary budget money. it is a bare bones, underfunded organization historically, because it was a originally intended to beat it strategic reserve for so long, for 67 years, that was to be a deterrent force against a threat that is no longer out there. commission of the guard is still the same, but its utilization as an operational force in rotations overseas is well known to most of us in the audience. if not, the u.s. military has not done anything in the last 15 years overseas without

significant dependence on the national guard, so that we could expand the capacity and capability theour active forces and reduce the stress on our active duty force and an all volunteer force of professionals, professional airmen and professional soldiers, so we could expand that and actually serve when necessary or at least reinforce the forces in the field or expand the forces in the field or capability is required to utilize in the national guard. so this is no longer a national guard that sits around and waits for world war iii and is not used in the meantime, so you can afford to underresource it in terms of equipment, not trained to be ready, let it stay dormant in a somewhat less than

ready posture. it has to be ready on a moment's notice. that is for overseas missions. for domestic missions, for usage in the united states at the command and control of the governors that are the commanders in chief of the army and air national guard, when they are in the service of the state rather than in the service of the nation. when they are in the service of the nation, they fall under the normal chain of command with the secretary of defense and the president and they are entitled 10 status and are in distinguishable. the good news is the training now is uniform, the standards are uniform, so everybody is trained in the same schools with the same standards and has the same enlistment criteria, same selection criteria to become a member, and to remain a member, so that their

performance is absolutely identical to the active duty force when it is called into service of the nation. what most people don't realize is that the national guard is called into the service of the governor's each and every day. i did not realize how much that was the case until i was lucky enough to be appointed chief of the national guard bureau by secretary donald rumsfeld under president bush back in 2003. for the five and a half years i have the honor of being the chief of the national guard bureau before i went to be the deputy at u.s. northern command i kept a record of how many states call out the national guard on any given day and the daily average was 17 states had their guard called out on some

level -- some as few as a few people with a truck and water trailer going to an area where a municipality might need water where a well was contaminated or the water purification system. the aftermath of hurricane katrina in 2005, we have the largest, fastest, military response to a domestic disaster, natural disaster, not only in the history of our country but in the history of the world. guam, puerto rico, district of columbia, and every state of the 50 states send their national guard. they were asked asked to come and not order. they drove and pull together in record time over labor day

weekend. it happened on a labor day weekend. in less than six days we generated 60,000 citizens soldiers from members of code in this country with exactly the right capabilities and sometimes in excess capacity, because frankly we did not know exactly what we needed down there, but we guest pretty right and we really restore the faith of the american citizens, particularly the citizens of louisiana and mississippi, in the fact that their government would not respond when the local situation was overwhelmed. we were operating seamlessly with active-duty soldiers that came in later from northcom that were ordered in by the president. shoulder to shoulder, side-by- side, in distinguishable to the

people that were receiving help. they saw the active-duty forces and national guard forces actually operating in a seamless fashion to save american lives. 17,443 american lives were saved by national guardsmen in the aftermath of hurricane katrina. that was a small city that would have been lost had we not intervened. 70,000 u.s. citizens removed from an area of uncomfortable, suffering and misery to be able to reestablish their lives in new places or at least be taken out of the misery and suffering and maybe even ultimately disease or death if they would have remained in that area. today, if you check, it's almost invisible to everybody. if you really peel back who is responding to the fires in washington this morning,

washington state, it's the national bar. who is responding to the drought relief or anything that happens that above and beyond the normal ability of the local and state governments to handle, the national guard comes in. one of the good things that happened to the guard, frankly, was the decision to use the guard as a part of the operational force, because not only are they value added on the battlefield overseas when they bring civilian skills to these complex environments like afghanistan and iraq, but when they come home from that they are far better citizen soldiers and citizens airmen with contemporary, real world combat experience they can apply, the same command and control, logistics, planning, and reaction, and highly disciplined response to anything we would require them back at home. so we now have probably the very best force of citizen soldiers this nation has ever

been blessed to have. it is an all volunteer force. how did you tape people that you have asked go overseas 3 or four goore's, walk away from their family and their jobs as long as two years, 18 months, six months on the short side, repeatedly over the last decade, whether it is to appear at an airport on no notice because we did not have tsa at the time and we need to secure the airport zappos 9/11. -- to secure airports post-9/11. whether it was to guard the skies pose 9/11 or critical infrastructure. whether it was to expand the capability of governors to protect critical infrastructure in the last 10 years. whether it was to put boots on the ground in places like afghanistan and kuwait, the horn of africa, iraq, and 34 other countries where the guard has

been asked to serve. and they did a superb job in the balkans, kosovo, bosnia, all at the same time. katrina hit with no notice. 50 cows and national guardsmen from every state and territory responded. -- 50,000 responded. at the time we have the high water mark for the deployment overseas. we were literally surging in the army to allow the u.s. army to step the army into their current configuration. we stepped up and took that rotations of the u.s. army to take a pause in the war and reorganize and refitted to their combat brigades. some of you may remember that. so you take that and take the last 10 years of what we have asked them to do. and now you have this specter of sequestration hovering over

an organization that is under sourced, is pure muscle and bone, has very little discretionary, has no big accounts like intelligence or research and development, underfunded for equipping themselves, are trying to come out of a whole that was dug in 1947, and now tell them get ready because you are going to be part of an across-the-board cuts. if you are overweight and have access pounds and you want to lose 18 pounds, there's. a way you can there's. -- this is a couple ways you can do it. you can change your diet and exercise and become lighter and better and maybe even more attractive. attractive.

as attractive. or you could cut your head off and or you could cut your head off and lose 18 pounds immediately. but i don't think that is the preferred way for weight loss. this sequestration is much like that. when i look at the audience and i seen who is represented and where you come from and hopefully where you go back to and take some benefit of our discussion today, i would like you to consider two things, and then i will turn it over to the moderator. the most successful businesses in the world today size their full-time work force that get full benefits, retirement, entitlements, health insurance, pension plans, matching 401k plan, all that kind of thing, they size that for their smallest, steady state, business day. they size their part-time force, trained, medic professionals, salesman, distributors,

transporters, retailers, wholesalers, all of them. they size that for their most optimistic market demand. and then they adjust that and let the market drive that. and they make a profit internationally in a very challenging economic time even today because of that model. the companies that are failing today are those that are failing to make those kinds of adjustments and are hanging onto an older industrial age model that predates the 21st century. they are finding it very uncomfortable and very unprofitable and are kind of melting away like an ice cube. that is one thing i want you to think about. when you are talking about a

sizing of the active component and the reserve components, particularly when the reserve component is not the same reserve component that it was 10 or 15 or 20 years ago. it is a much different reserve component. is an interval, interdependent and not interoperable piece of the entire service and joint force that fights and protect our country here at home and overseas and has great utility that reduces the burden on the active force to respond domestically to a significant degree. so anytime you diminish that force, you are actually raising the probability you'll have to dip into the already too busy actor forced to do something that they are really not comfortable doing or they want to do, nor are there really trained or resource to do, nor do they have the local knowledge, political, geographical, social, and

otherwise, that the citizen shoulders who come from that area have. not to mention it will have to live in that state afterwards. so how they deliver their capability and capacity will be quite different than someone was 18 years old and came into active duty and learned how to fire their weapons and do their military jobs and then are transplanted into an area and culture they're not familiar with and then are going to leave. the degree of acceptance and respect is intangible and is something that should not be ignored. the second thing is everyone of you lives someplace. very few of you in this room live anywhere that has a 100% full time professionally trained and paid firefighting force to protect you. anybody that lives in a place called a county does not have a full-time firefighting apparatus. but none of you sleep at night

and stay up worrying that if your house catches on fire that the fire department is not going to show up on time and they're not going to come with sufficient people and training to save your structure, your life, and your loved ones and pets that. -- and pets. they do it with either a mix of a so how do they do it? they do it with either a mix of a few full-time professionals to keep the equipment ready and keep the communications and alert system ready. they depend on citizen fireman, volunteer firemen who stop whatever they are doing, get out of their own comfortable bed in the middle of the night if necessary, walked off their jobs if necessary in civilian life to respond to either a danger or alert system or just sirens in some small towns.

they go and when they show up nobody asked them if they are part-time or full-time. anybody ever ask that question? when they come, they have gear that makes them all look like a fireman. nobody comes on an old firetruck that barely runs. nobody comes with hand-me-down fire equipment. the community saves on the huge expense of having to pay full- time firefighters. so they rely heavily on citizen volunteer firefighters. i suggest that in a time where our nation is facing finite resources and a significant risk, a way to buy down the risk is not to do the real jerk

reaction the pentagon has already announced. sequestration is coming, we already have it and regardless this way. that's like hitting your knee with a rubber hammer and it flipped as a reflex action. the pentagon and the system has reacted to budget cuts like that this way for so long that it's almost an automatic, unthinking response. i am saying, since i'm talking to people who are from the think tanks and from the hill and from organizations with in this arena, that maybe it's time to look at how people do that our profits matched their active full-time force with their part-time force. we look in an area because you're going to get this is not a business, this is the military and in the military we are about saving lives.

let me tell you, if you want to talk about an organization that response on no notice, or lives hang in the balance every day, and is the fire fighting community in our country. they are putting their lives on a line to respond online, on target, to ensure that you survive and your structure survived and your neighbor's house survives. i'm thinking maybe we put away some of the old paradigms' and start looking at some new paradigms' as to how we are going to apply precious resources that we are going to be providing to the taxpayers. clearly this will allow us to buy down some risk. sequestration is obviously not the answer. sequestration will gut the national guard.

it will exist. it will survive, but it will be in under equipped, less trained. it will have less money. you will find how painful this will be because when they start closing 600 armories and shutting down 1800 construction projects that are on the books, you are going to find that these armories are in congressional districts that. -- that people care about. literally kill off small businesses that are dependent you will find that it will literally kill off small businesses that are dependent on and have waited for and competed for and have been awarded this contract that will no longer be there to build an army, build an annex, build a- facility, builder readiness center, refurbish some older things that have not been looked

at in 40 years. you will find that even if you start this, it's not going to be easy to recover from. the unintended consequence is that a building project in a state has state-matching funds in varying percentages. those funds have to be voted by the legislature. the states are also cash for right now. they are strapped right now. if they have a chance to take back that money through the cancellation of the project, they will. your probability of scene that money again in less than 10 years is pretty remote. if it's a renovation project, you really will be delaying that indefinitely. if it's an expansion project, you probably have lost it. you will find out how much that's going to matter because the citizens of the community, the citizens of that the code, that congressional districts will make their feelings fell to their congressional representatives. and it will be personal.

this is an unintended consequence of sequestration. sequestration is one -- you don't make threats you're not going to carry through. certainly, if you're going to carry through with this, you have to wonder, this is not just a shot in the foot. you may as well cross your feet and catch both feet, because of the unintended consequence of sequestration is walking back the most superb force that this country has fielded in its history, military force, and walking it back 30 years to 40 years back to the hollow force. as i look at the landscape internationally right now, this is not a benign landscape. we used to talk about hot spots that could be problematic

quickly and there were only a few of them. virtually anywhere you look right now there are some real issues, real tough problems out there that could cause us to do things with our military that we do not foresee, nor do we desire. and that does not mention the weather patterns, earthquakes, any of the natural disasters that occur, not to mention that the chlorine tanker does not have to fall off or railroad track because of a terrorist. it could be because our infrastructure is decaying. it could be because of human error. but the effect is a release of chlorine in an urban area will be unbelievably painful. if that or anything like that

were to occur, the requirement for the guard to respond would be absolutely one of the first things that would have to happen. a guard under even minor sequestration, under minor cuts, would been slower in its response and it might be two or three states responding rather than one state. in my people of all your hours getting there or a few days before you could get everybody over there. let me give you an analogy or metaphor. if a loved one has a heart attack in your house, you call 911. three days later, five ambulances show up to your house in response to that call. you are not going to be satisfied. you're not going to feel like you are well served. what you expect is the-- what ye

ambulance would be there on time to save his life. if they are going to show up late, they may as well send the mortuary unit, because they're not going to save your loved one. so time delay really translates into lives lost. domestically, you are going to get one chance to do this. i've said this over and over and i will say it one more time. this will be the last thing i said before turning over to steve. we took faluja more than once. -- fallujah more than once. in afghanistan and iraq and in almost every military operations be have had places and towns that we took it and they took it. we retook it and they retook it. that works overseas in a combat zone.

you are not going to get to redo in cincinnati or on losing d.c. or wherever you come from, wherever your hometown is. they are not going to tolerate the american military not being able to respond properly and on time here in the united states. time here in the united states it. we swe saw that in spades in 2005 in hurricane katrina. we came that close from the u.s. military swinging and missing on louisiana and mississippi. we were lucky to recover that. it will shake the confidence of the nation and for any administration when the american military cannot properly respond at home.

read read secretary paul mchale's paper. read this and think about what i just said. you will not be very comfortable when you read this. the trouble with this paper is it's true and it's factual and accurate. thanks. >> sequestration is an irrational and irresponsible approach to national security policy. when most of us walk in here this morning we knew intuitively that a cut of $500 billion over the next 10 years, a cut potential in january of $55 billion would inevitably impact on the department of defense ability to project power overseas. i don't think it was as obvious when we walked into the room that sequestration would have a devastating impact on our security here at home. because of changes, the changes in policy, over the last 10

years, the protection of critical infrastructure in the united states against a terrorist attack has been primarily assigned to the national guard in title 32 status. that would be subject to any reductions imposed by sequestration's. over the last 10 years, because of good changes in policy, the primary reliance for disaster response has been tasked to the national guard in title 32 status. that changed during katrina when steve and i walked down to the deputy secretary's office and encouraged him to approve the title 32 status for those 50,000 national guardsmen who had deployed in response to hurricane katrina. that had never been done before in u.s. history. to the great credit of the deputy secretary, he proved -- approved that. now we used title 32 pretty routinely for major disaster response. that would be subject to any

reduction caused by sequestration. we must recognize that our domestic security would be similarly impacted. >> i have a couple questions ar listed at the beginning, but you guys have answered all of them. i don't know if i want to beat a horse or not. anyone have a question? >> thank you both for being here. i wonder if you could drill down a little on border security? if you could explain the guard's presence on the southwest border and how sequestration might affect their mission?

>> i have a little trepidation because i am not absolutely current in terms of the existing status of national guard forces on the border. but i am pretty sure that i have a grasp on that. with the risk that maybe i am partially in error, let me answer your question. n jumpstart. that was the initial deplo ymi have the responsibility for civilian oversight of operation jumpstart. that was the initial deployment of national guard forces along the southwest border. we have roughly 6000 national guardsmen deployed over a two- year period along the southwest border. steve was chief of the national guards bureau. we spent a lot of time together, steve and i, discussing the rules of the use of force and everything and what status the national guard would have during that order of deployment. my recollection is became to the -- is we came to the conclusion the guard would be

entitled 32 status. that's the middle ground where gubernatorial command and control would be exercised over those forces but dod funding would pay for those forces. the type of funding used to pay for in general answer to your question, the type of funding used to pay for the national guard forces, traditionally along the southwest border, would be adversely impacted by sequestration. >> a think that is an accurate answer. just to give you a little bit more, the unintended consequence would be -- dod would be faced with less money than it would normally have to do that mission. it was painful to dod to do it when we were better-resourced. it created frankly great thank you to -- great angst. -- great angst between the air force, the army, and the

national guard. where were told to pay the bill and transfer the money to the national guard. so they had to reduce the number or defer it or not do it at all. it created some unscheduled reprogramming. it created angst that was not seen because everybody tries to stay professional. but it hurt the relations between the army and the army guard because the army, who was under funded at the time, had to give more money to do a mission that they did not see as important and frankly felt that the border patrol or department of homeland security should have paid for it. but that decision was made at far higher levels than even the department of defense. in answer to your question directly, sequestration might mean that we couldn't do it at all, to be zero -- to be totally honest with you.

or, worse, we would do it on the cheap and it would probably not be effective. wastingyou're really your money because she did not -- you did not quite put enough of the right capability and capacity in there because you're trying to do it basically based on a $-- a dollar sign rather than on the requirement cost. that is what i find so absurd about the sequestration peacpie, because it is not attached to affects, capabilities, risk, or anything the military is supposd -- or anything that the military is supposed to put their resources against. >> this is an important footnote. in that paper that i just

prepared, one of the points i emphasizes that the cultural aversion within the department of defense, with regard to the domestic mission of the military, including those of the national guard -- dod is heroic and has predicted our nation -- protected our nation capably over many decades. but in the 21st century, september 11 being the prime example, asymmetric attacks employing weapons of mass destruction must be seen as part of that national security landscape and the protection of our cities and our people here at home must be seen in a larger context of national security and the role of the department of defense. frankly, at dod, there are some folks who are steeped in the traditional power projection who have not realized that changing circumstances. what can you do if you can fight effectively in baghdad but you cannot protect brooklyn? protect brooklyn. -i am talking about the method f

warfare that will likely extend over decades. our adversaries are likely to employ it asymmetric attacks using ever more powerful weapons for decades to come. and that recognition has not really been inculcated in the warrior the close of the -- warrior ethos of the department of the defense. so when sequestration hits and dollars need to be say venture -- saved -- and missions need to be chosen responsibly, the missions that are most likely to be pushed aside are those in the domestic arena. at least within the department of defense, absent a change in direction. we have made considerable progress since 9/11, but what i spelled out in a monograph is that we return to the status quo ante -- the status quo empty. i am worried that sequestration will hit domestic missions including critical infrastructure protection and the burn response

disproportionately. -- and seaborne response disproportionately. >> as of last week, the administration in formed leadership that they intend to do that. fence off military personnel accounts. but the across-the-board cuts gone from 8.5% to approximately 11.3%, do you see potentially a hollow force to develop for the national guard to revert to a strategic reserve? >> the unintended consequence of what you just said, if you think about it, means that the only place you can get your savings is equipment, operations and maintenance, and that is critical, tempo and training and education.

even if you keep the people, you really reduced their capacity and capability in that the will be less trained. the will be far less equipped and the equipment they have will be far less maintained than what we currently have. in the 21st century, what makes us the greatest military in the world is not that we are the biggest, not the mass numbers. we don't send mass, a human wave against an objective. we have highly trained professionals that are superbly trained and educated in the use of the equipment that we give them and we give them the best state of their equipment that -- best, state-of-the-art equipment that science and

technology can deliver and it is highly maintained so it is reliable and effective on the battlefield. so everything that i just said -- and they are highly motivated volunteers. so you take highly motivated volunteers and you start giving them less equipment than they are used to, poorly maintained equipment, and start reducing the training that they have become accustomed to, how highly motivated will they remain? or do we have less members, less quality force and a less capable force? the answer to all of those questions is yes. that is not the intent, but that will be the impact of sequestration. >> it is -- >> is it morally responsible to keep thebenefit s people and then put them in an opera -- put them in operational jeopardy? that is really the net effect of

that approach, which has the benefit of perhaps retaining 20,000 national guardsmen who would otherwise be cut, but then denied to them, as a result of reductions and operations and maintenance funding, the equipment, the training, the capability they need to go forward and execute their missions? that is hardly a solution. i had to the house of -- the president of the united states called off of the house floor to tell me that i should vote on a bill. i said to the president, sir, you don't know what will happen in the senate and neither do why. i can only consider what is in front of me right now. after it comes back from the senate, i will be happy to support it. and i did. we would hope that we can protect the 29,000 national guard personnel that would otherwise be cut. but it is the height of irresponsibility to shift those funding cuts. we're talking about domestic missions. we have to make sure that when we send those men and women in

uniform for word that they have the equipment that they need to execute their mission. and that it is easy enough to protect the personnel. it is a lot harder to ensure that they have the training and equipment and capability that they deserve. >> if you think back to chernobyl, the courage of those people was enormous. the commitment was enormous. the casualty rate was horrific. they all died within 30 days, most, some a few months later. and the reason was that they were not trained and few had the resources they needed. there responded, but they paid an awful price for that. we owe our young men and women much more than that. >> where would you take money out of the pentagon?

in this day and age, it is not ok to say don't cut me. we are in dire financial straits. >> if it comes in a part of the question in timing? for instance, i believe that, once we come to irresponsible resolution of our combat operations, is inevitable that -- it is not only responsible, but inevitable that we will see a drawdown of the force. i would support that. historically, we have drawn down the force after major combat. we have done that in the context of very poor judgment. we have not been very good at intelligently drawing down the force. but when u.s. were would you cut -- when you ask where would you

cut coming the aftermath, that might be 2014 and it might be later than that, that we have essentially completed the drawdown from afghanistan. we should look at a very thoughtful reduction in the overall size of the force. we have not done that. and unless we have very significant civilian oversight come including congressional intervention, what we're likely to see is a disproportionate cut in reserve component when coming in fact, i think the drawdown should be primarily in the active component, maintaining a robust capability, but a drawdown in the active component while realizing a cost effective nature of the reserve component. we ought to retain a very strong operational reserve and draw down the enormous personal cost associated with an active component force that was correctly sized for ongoing combat operations, but is

probably too large for a peacetime or a relative peace time environment. secondly, without going into details, there are in number of weapons that i think are highly questionable and we ought to take a hard look at some of those systems that are enormously expensive. but the reality is that something like 70% of the defense budget consists of personnel costs. a drawdown in the active component would make sense in the aftermath of the conclusion -- not during a conflict, but at the conclusion of a conflict in order to right size a force during peacetime environment. >> natalie that makes -- not only would that make sense in which he is talking about, but in a business model for firefighters and municipalities where they decide to go across the country with great success, but frankly what he just described, and expansion -- an

expansion of citizenship and only a small percentage of them serve, we don't want a candor that turns into america's foreign legion. -- a cadre that turns into america's foreign legion. when the guard reserve cents sea unit from you name it, small town whatever state you're from, whatever county or from, that is your home town team going. that whole town deploys with them. that whole town tracks that unit and its record and what is going on with that unit the entire time it is gone. that whole town now has skin in the game or equity in what we're doing and seeks to better

understand why we -- why they were sent, why is the pew and bempty in church on sunday or at the synagogue on saturday or at the mosque on friday. -- on friday? my neighbor, why isn't he here? why is he serving? or in the classroom or the business place were fellow farmer or educator, whatever this person might be, a doctor or nurse electrician, it doesn't matter. there is a whole area business -- a hole in every business, in every social gathering, at every dinner table. these people now have neighbors that have equity in this america. in other words, when you call- up the national guard, you call out america. when you call out the 82nd

airborne, you are calling out the superb young men and some young women. the only people they know that went with the local vendors in, say, fayed bill, not carolina and it will have an economic -- fayetteville, north carolina and it will have an economic impact. when you call up the guard, you do in fact call out america and that is a very powerful message to send to our adversaries. and on some of these stability and operations, peacekeeping operations, more complex operations that we have been involved in in the last 15 years to 20 years -- when the people in that country coming to you and find out that this man here in the blue shirt and tie that i am looking at is wearing an american flag and the informal -- uniform of one of the services uniforms and realized that he has a job and a family and this is not all he

does and he doesn't have to do it, he volunteered to do this, it says more about what is right about our country than our state department and our finest ambassadors and foreign service officers could ever say. and that is an intangible that you don't want to lose. and that is an intangible, frankly, a trained full-time professional soldier, sailor, airman, or marine has a lesser message. when i go back, i'm going back to my farm. you have a farm? why are you here? i chose to be here. i am here to help you with your problem. and when i am done, i am going back. that is a very different message then and occupier or a mercenary in the eyes of the local people, that you are a personal -- a professional mercenary rather than a citizen soldier.

it is a very powerful tool. we should want to optimize. the constraints on the budget, hopefully, could have a very positive outcome. if you're going to maintain a volunteer force, you have to have the backing of the american public and the decision-influences, the coaches, the teachers, the parents, the neighbors, the employers -- all of that has to be feeding that system if it will be successful, particularly if it has to grow much larger than it has in the past. the way we are able to bring that up, our capability last 20 years has been the guard and reserve. it has moved to an operational reserve.

it is a far better value for the american taxpayer because you are paying them exactly what you would pay an active duty force when you need them. but when you don't need them, they are out earning their own living, paying their own taxes, raising their own family, building their own communities, building our country. and they are getting civilian- acquired skills so that, when they do get called by their nation nor their governor to respond, they will be much more capable and have a much greater capacity to respond than they would otherwise. >> it is worth pausing to recognize -- there is a terrific subtext your question. your question is where would you make the hard choices? making hard choices is the antithesis of sequestration. sequestration is arithmetic. it is multiplication. it is irrational. and it is a breach of trust to our men and women in

service. it is a way to avoid hard choices. i am fairly sure that my views would differ from others. but it is an abdication of leadership and responsibility and ultimately democracy if we fail to make those choices. if we resort to sequestration and apply an across-the-board cut, that is a failure of leadership, a failure of government and which ought to be ashamed of ourselves. -- and we ought to be ashamed of ourselves. we can baker vigorously and have majority rule at the end of the day. but making hard choices is what the business of government on a good day is all about. applying arithmetic is irresponsible. >> we will get this gentleman right here. you too will be the last two. -- you two will be the last questions. >> i am with the army national guard. mine sort of piggybacks on the

gentleman's question. >> with in the dod strategy, you talked about responsibility -- the reverse ability clause which impacts us tremendously how is that even functionable even in light of sequestration? how can you implement that? >> i am not sure you can. >> it cannot. [laughter] >> i knew the answer. >> we have gone pretty far down the road in anticipating in irresponsible way what sequestration would mean in a responsible way what sequestration -- we have gone pretty far down the road in anticipating in a responsible way what sequestration would mean. no one really knows for sure personnel will be protected, although it is likely. $500n't know how that billion would be cut over 10

years. when we move to a question of reverse ability as a matter of strategy, that is frankly too far out in the darkness to define the challenge with any degree of regularity. -- granularity. all we know is that the national guard now plays a vitally important role in terms of our domestic security. that role has changed considerably and in general moved in a positive direction over the last 10 years. the reality of asymmetric warfare, weapons of mass destruction, terrorist adversaries and nation states to execute these kinds of attacks prompted policy that moved the national guard to the forefront in terms of the safety of american citizens here at home. most of those missions would be executed intel 32. -- in title 32. title 32 is federal funding that is received through the department of defense. and sequestration would cut that funding. so the impact on domestic missions is inevitable and i think unacceptable.

>> politico. this may be a good question to wrap things up with. what do you see as the solution? this all depends upon whether congress can come up with a deficit reduction plan, which is a whole other can of worms. i know there is uncertainty with sequestration, but how do you see this playing out? them kicking the can down the road? or sequestration actually does happen? i know it is a crystal ball question, but i would like to see what you guys think will happen. >> is going to happen or should happen? i'll answer that. i'm involved with a number of think tanks, including the aspen institute. i had dinner with some high-

ranking officials about a week ago. i launched into my boys got description of the legislative process in the were the democracy and i talked about some of the men and women i have known in the congress of the united states who are truly courageous, or willing to make hard choices -- who are willing to make hard choices and you know that this is more important than the continuing progress of their political careers. and when the people spoke to -- i spoke to stopped laughignng, i pressed that point. there -- stop laughing, i press that point. there are good men and women on both sides of the aisle. i am a democrat. i take a fairly conservative approach to security policy. i work folks on both sides of the aisle who are truly patriotic. the exhibit of branch of -- executive branch of government can strongly influence and

inform policy choices that will be made and the power of the purse is in the congress. the budgetary decisions that have to be made and it is the duty of the executive branch to provide the kind of leadership for our country and in providing recommendations, budget recommendations, to the budget -- to the congress of the united states. if you cannot make ouhard decisions, get out of congress. it may mean that a large number people leave the congress. but this is too important. we're not talking about secondary issues. we're talking about the security of the american people in their own homes. 3000 people died on our own soil. and in our own airspace as a result of the attacks of september 11. 3000 people dead. >> and we dodged a bullet on that. >> that type of attack was not an occurrence. it was a case study. and asymmetric warfare in the 21st century. so we only to sober kilobit, -- we all need to sober up a

little bit, a lot in some cases. to make hard choices, debate fiercely and sincerely, and then count the votes. we can no longer duck these issues because what is at stake is not a political career. it is the security of the american people here at home. and the images of september 11 should be burned into our memory, not as a matter of fear mongering, but as a sobering recognition of what warfare looks like when it comes to our own soil. and these issues have to be debated. choices consistent with budgetary constraints have to be made. and responsible judgment has to be made in kind -- in -- has to emanate from congress in coordination with the executive branch can we decide to draw down the forest research and degree in a way that makes sense

that will provide continuing defense to our nation. i am still enough of a boy's got to believe that good men and women on both sides of the aisle in the legislative -- boy scout to believe that good men and women on both sides of the aisle in the legislative branch can dand executive branch can do this. this generation is capable of making the same tough choices. >> ladies and gentlemen, the reason we put this panel together was that a lot of people understand sequestration if they live in fayetteville, n.c., san diego, calif., places where there are large defense facilities. but my concern is that there are a lot of folks in this country that don't understand that, if not done with some degree of nuance and sense, these cuts will affect every single state and territory in america and a adversely in their

ability to deal with the local is 1617 states today that have -- 16 to 17 states today that have guardsmen called out or, god forbid those events that are describing here in our capacity to respond to them in a knee -- as a nation. the guard is a huge part of that. sequestration is cutting off the fat guys head when the bad guy really needs orthoscopic surgery on his bad knee and a counselor. we need procurements and that kind of thing, not just lopping off a chunk of the body. that is a poor way to do it. and the guard come in this case, whether we like it or not, the guard will be adversely affected by that. this is an awareness and

education session. i would ask you to join me in thanking our panelists. there have been very eloquent. [applause] and we thank c-span and abc radio for joining us and we appreciate you all being here at the heritage. thank you. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> coming up tonight on c-span, at 8:00 p.m. eastern, a look at personal liberties and rights hosted by the independence institute. here is a brief look at that. >> it can be as beneficial to brain chemistry as some of the best drugs they can give out, even better than the health lady -- the health food our first

lady pushes. where did all of this come from? it came from the modern public health establishment, the public-health movement. more often than not, i think the public-health movement is a menace to our public safety. it was originally about stopping an epidemic. about 100 years later, we procured and iran heated -- we cured and eradicated things that used to kill tens of hundreds of millions of people. it is now basically eradicated. you have to stay relevant. there are millions of government grant dollars at stake. if you price yourself out of the market by being irrelevant, the money dries up. you have to find something else to do. there is some part of the public-health assessment -- establishment that is about aids and cancer, and that is good.

it has become a social science instead of a hard science, and that is the problem. you have a lot of what side- academics who cannot cut it in the laboratory. uasiacademicsui who cannot cut it in the laboratory. there is a professor at uc san francisco, of course, san francisco, who is on tv claiming that sugar -- a spoonful makes the medicine go down -- is so dangerously toxic that the government should regulate it like alcohol. on cnn, gupta nods as though he has received some great wisdom from the man in the mountain. come on, it is sugar. we have seee people

airbrushing -- we have seen cigarettes airbrushed out of old movies. i cannot wait until we see willie wonka w -- "willy wonka" redone with broccoli. >> republicans will be meeting in tampa for their national convention in august. democratic convention is in september. watched c-span for every minute of both conventions. -- watch c-span for every minute of both conventions. chris christie will be one of the speakers. --ly a. ok'd, artur davis kelly ayotte, artur davis, and governor bobby jindal. just a reminder, campaign 2012, our web site, has a video of all sorts of -- has video of all

kinds of speeches and endorsements. there are the latest media postings from the campaigns, media viewers, and more. house budget committee ranking member said that he has a good personal relationship with paul ryan. he said that mitt romney's newly-announced running mate -- he said he said they have "very deep and fundamental differences about where we should go." he made these remarks at a politics and eggs breakfast in bedford, new hampshire. it started in 1996. it continues at st. anselm college. >> >> thank you. thank you, jim, for that very warm introduction. thank you for your leadership with the new england council. thank all of you who are members of the new england council. it is great to participate in this tradition of politics and eggs.

i look forward to signing a couple more of those eggs as the morning goes on. i want to thank the new hampshire institute of politics were hopping to organize this -- for helping organize this effort. i want to recognize some of my former colleagues, one person who i the privilege of working -- who i had the privilege of working with, paul, who was here this morning. thank you for all your service and what you are continuing to do in your various capacities. mike, thank you for your leadership and past service to the country. larry, thank you for helping to pull this together. to all of you, it is really a privilege to be up here in the granite state of new hampshire. we all know this is a pivotal moment in the presidential election, and other elections taking place, which present a very clear choice for all of us. i know from my own state of maryland and my travels around the country, including new hampshire, that the american people are fair and that they

will examine the facts. they will very clearly examine this choice. i know that new hampshire, given its unique role in the presidential selection process, takes those responsibilities very seriously. i'm very privileged to be with you here this morning. i do believe that the choice in the presidential election has come into much sharper focus since mitt romney, governor romney, selected paul ryan as his running mate. i should say at the outset, and larry indicated this, jim indicated this, the personal relationship we have is a very good one. we get along well. we have, however, very deep and fundamental differences on where we should go in this country. the good news is that i believe in the budget committee and on

the floor of the house we have been able to express those differences in a civil manner, in a way that has sharpened and elevated the debate and made the choice is more clear. i very much hope that as we head into the final days of this election we will focus on those choices that are before us, focus on a very deep policy differences. i fundamentally believe that, when you examine the ryan- romney plan, you will discover that it is simply returning to to a failed trickle-down economic strategy, a strategy we tried during the bush of ministration, -- administration, which crashed against the heart wall of reality. after those eight years, we lost private-sector jobs and the deficit was skyrocketing.

if you look at the ryan-romney plan, it does provide the big tax breaks to people at the very top on the theory that somehow the trickle-down effect will boost everybody. that simply did not happen. i did not -- i do not know why we want to return to that approach. let's review the facts. it is important to start at the beginning of the last four year story. we all know that the day the president was sworn in he inherited a huge financial and economic mess. there can be no disputing that fact. let's review some of the specifics. we know, at that time, that the economy was in total freefall. over 800,000 americans were losing their jobs every month. the gdp was plummeting toward great depression levels at a -

8% g.d.p. rate. -- at a -8% gdp rate. that was spiraling downward. if you compare retirement savings from the fall of 2007 to the time president bush left office, their value had collapsed by 1/3. these are retirement savings, 401k plans. that is what the president walked into. i should say that it is a very good thing that we did not take the advice of former president bush and paul ryan to privatize social security. the reality is, had we made that choice that they were strongly advocating, there would have been millions of americans who were put at total economic risk at the time of the collapse of the economy. i am glad we did not roll the dice and take that chance with seniors at that time.

millions of seniors rely entirely on social security. millions more have social security as their primary source of income, and yet, when you have that collapsed in the 401k side of the retirement system, that is all many people could have fallen back on. you are rolling the dice with -- people would have been in great jeopardy. that is the situation that the president inherited. he acted very quickly. he acted very quickly. in the face of that economic collapse, he worked with the democratic congress to pass the economic recovery bill. he worked with the congress to rescue the auto industry and american manufacturing. he took those steps immediately. the results were good.

we all know that we have a long way to go in the economy, but let's review the results as determined by the nonpartisan congressional budget office. i am on the budget committee. we have lots of back-and-forth, but there is a referee. the referee is this agency called the congressional budget office. they are professionals who examine the facts and make the best projections they can and best analyses they can. they have determined that as a result of the recovery act and other actions that were taken we saved over 3 million jobs in this country. we are spiraling downwards, you youct the recovery bill, h began to turn the corner and move upwards. we have now had 29 consecutive months of positive private sector job growth. those retirement savings that took such a big hit have now comeback and are at a higher level than they were before the big fall.

there is much more retirement security there for the american people. since elections are about choices, it is important to ask the question, what was mitt romney proposing at that time? what were the republicans suggesting? mitt romney said, he thought there was an important government role in rescuing the financial sector. when it came to the meltdown in wall street, he said, yes, i think there is a role for government there. when it came to rescuing main street and the auto industry and american manufacturing, he said now. -- no. let them go bankrupt. it is not that he does not see

the government playing any role in times of emergency. he was all-in to rescue wall street. he was awol when it came to try to help main street and american manufacturing. you remember when he was in nevada. housing prices fell to no fault of homeowners. he rejected the idea of coming up with a plan to help credit worthy home owners whose home prices have plummeted and were under water on their mortgages. he said, let it hit bottom. that was his answer. he did not what wall street to hit bottom, but the auto industry, american manufacturing, homeowners who were under water through no fault of their own -- no government role there. what about the new vice- president candidate, paul ryan? it has been reported that, three days before the president was inaugurated, paul ryan and a group of what are called the

young guns who are now big leaders in the republican house leadership, they gathered in washington and decided to come up with a plan and how they were going to work against the president. as one of them said, their plan was essentially to oppose whatever the president proposed. this is before they even knew what the president was going to propose. that was their plan. we all know the remark that was made by the republican leader in the united states senate, mitch mcconnell, who when asked what his top party was, he said, not -- top priority was, he said, not jobs, not the economy, but defeating the president. right from the start, the president was facing a major effort to defeat him rather than focus with him on solving the problems the country faced. so what happens?

the first bill he proposed was the lilly ledbetter legislation to allow women who have been discriminated against based on pay in the work force to have an opportunity to get justice. every republican and the house leadership and voted against that. that was the first bill. pretty straightforward. only three house republicans voted for it. paul ryan voted against it. next up was the recovery bill. not a single house republicans voted for it. again, that playbook was, what the president proposes, we will oppose. that did not stop a lot of republican members of congress, once the recovery bill was passed, -- some of that recovery -- was passed from asking for some of that recovery, some of that stimulus

money to boost jobs in their own states and districts. many who had been widely reported at the time. just yesterday the "boston globe" had a story about how paul ryan had sent a letter to the department of energy in december 2009 asking for funds to help boost the local economy in wisconsin. the letter said that he would help stimulate the local economy by creating new jobs. again, no votes for the recovery bill, hard illogical line against it, -- the ideological line against it, yet republican members recognize it could help in their local economies. the president has been the first to recognize that we need to do a lot more to help put americans back to work. he understands that this recovery remains very fragile and that millions of americans

are hurting. he has proposed another major jobs initiative. he submitted that to the congress last september. it includes a number of very important elements. one of the most important elements to be a major new investment in our nation's infrastructure. new roads, bridges, transit, ports. if you look at the reports by the american society of civil engineers, not a right-wing group or a left-wing group, they give the united states a grade of d when it comes to the state of our infrastructure. if we will compete with international competitors, we need a 21st century infrastructure. an energy infrastructure, the foundations that help move goods and services around the country and the world. the president proposed $50 billion. major initiative. he proposed additional measures

to help small businesses. that was in september. we have not had a vote in the house of representatives on the president's jobs initiative. we have now voted 37 times in the house of representatives to repeal obamacare, the affordable care act, but not a single vote on the rest of the president's jobs initiative. now less september the president also submitted a plan for long-term deficit reduction. we have to big parties. -- two big priorities. one is to nurture and boost the fragile recovery we remain in. it is important to pass a jobs initiative. we will take other measures to accomplish that. what other measure the president -- one other measure the president has proposed is providing confidence to the country by extending a immediately tax relief for the vast majority of american people.

98% of the country. 97% of past-through businesses. -- pass-through businesses. overwhelming amounts of the american people support this. we need to do that now to provide confidence, but we also need to be serious about taking a credible plan and posture with respect to our long-term deficit. our long-term growth is going to require that we get our deficits under control. we should do it in a balanced way. if we do not get our deficits under control, over time that additional government spending will crowd out private investment. we have got to do that. the question is, how do you do that? last tender, the same time the -- last september, the same time the president submitted his jobs initiative, he also

submitted his plan for a long- term deficit reduction. here submitted that as part of -- he resubmitted that as part of his budget. it would reduce the deficit over 10 years by $4 trillion. that was the target established by the bipartisan commission. he does it in a balanced way. it includes $2.50 of spending cuts for every $1 of additional revenue. a balanced approach, a shared responsibility approach. erskine bowles, one of the co- authors of the report, recently -- the simpson-bowles report, recently penned an op-ed in "the washington post" that says the following. "in contrast to romney, the president, like the gang of six and other like-minded members of both parties, has embraced the central principle that america will turn the corner on its debt only if republicans and democrats come together to support a balanced deficit- reduction plan.

the president has embraced the central principle of simpson- bowles, that we need a balanced approach to deficit reduction. -- reduction." anybody who is a true old-style fiscal conservative recognizes that we have got to get our overcits under control and th the long-term. if you are serious, you recognize that we have got to deal with both sides of the budget equation, spending and revenue. that is the great family -- o failing of the romney-ryan approach. the ryan budget, which has been embraced by governor romney, he says he would sign it if he were president, takes a totally uncompromising, hard-edge, right-wing ideological approach -- hard-edged, right-wing, to ourical approach to

economy and our budget. it doubles down on this notion that somehow tax breaks for folks at the very top will boost the economy. it does so at the expense of everyone and everything else. let's online this a little bit. -- let's just unwind this a little bit. it would provide these big tax breaks. the theory is that providing people like mitt romney another tax break will trickle down and boost the economy. as i said, at the outset, we have tried this before. it is no longer a theory. we have the evidence. the results are in. at the end of the eight years of the bush administration, after tax cuts that disproportionately benefited folks at the very top, we had a net loss of private-sector jobs. the only thing that went up was the deficit, and it went way up. so why in the world would we go back to a playbook that did not help the economy and drove up the deficit?

we know from the clinton years that a balanced approach to the economy and to the budget and to deficit can lead to huge job growth. 20 million jobs were created during the clinton administration after the 1993 clinton tax plan. the president is saying with respect to fall to the very top, -- to folks at the very top, we can no longer afford that. republicans have taken a position -- they will not pass it now because they will hold middle-income taxpayers hostage until they can get cuts for the folks at the very top. i thought they agreed we had this long-term fiscal challenge we had to deal with in a balanced way. that is one problem. the economic theory has been tested by reality and it failed. here is the thing that will become very clear in this campaign to the american people. it is not just that tax cuts for the wealthy do not work in terms of boosting the economy -- they come at a huge cost to the

rest of the country. if you are serious about deficit reduction over the long- term, and all of us should be, if you ask nothing from the faults of -- folks at the very top, if you subscribe to the grover norquist pledge, as 99% of the republican house members have, it says not one additional penny of revenue can come from the wealthiest americans to help reduce our deficit. not one penny. the american people can do the math on this. if the sick and the outset that if you say from the outset you -- you are not going to ask for one penny from the wealthiest americans, and you want to deal with the long-term budget deficits, everyone and everything else gets hit. let's look at a couple of examples. let's start with middle-class taxpayers. the tax policy center, which is an independent, non-partisan

body, recently did an analysis of the romney tax plan. they concluded that by providing these tax cuts in a deficit-neutral manner, you will end up raising the tax burden on middle income taxpayers. you will have to eliminate a lot of deductions in the tax code that to help middle-income taxpayers. mortgage income, the current exemption for the cost of health insurance provided by employers, all of those deductions are at risk. therefore, the price to be at the very top, another round of them, if you want to do it in a deficit neutral manner, which they want to do because they say they are real fiscal conservatives, that means other people are going to have to pay more through eliminating some

of those important deductions the people rely on. i can support tax reform, but i cannot support tax reform masquerading as a trojan horse for just another round of tax breaks for the folks at the very top at the expense of everybody else. i should say that, early in this campaign, governor romney pointed to the tax policy center as an authoritative, independent source when they did analysis that work in his favor. because they are an authoritative source. it should be said that under the ryan tax plan, mitt romney's tax rate would drop to below 1%. i can understand why governor romney likes the plan. but an independent analysis was done the other day that showed, if you apply that version of the rhine plan to mitt romney's 2010 taxes, it would drop from 15%, which is already pretty low effective rate with some of

that income, down to 1%. who picks up the tab for that? everybody else. so it will hit middle-income taxpayers harder. we had an amendment that democrats offered when this plan was put forward by paul ryan. it said, ok, let's test this. we had an amendment that said, when you do tax reform, do not increase the tax burden on taxpayers earning under to the energy to thousand dollars. they voted against it. they know that is the fundamental indication of that plan. who else is that it? it's our economy and our growth. it hits the opportunity for more americans. again, if you are serious about deficit reduction, and u.s. nothing from people at the very top, you will cut deeply into education funding, deeply into

research, science, innovative technologies, and will cut deeply into infrastructure. the rise in budget cuts deeply into infrastructure spending. under the budget plan, it would dramatically reduce it next year. reduce it, not provide a bigger investment as the president called for, but cut it. that is a time when we have needs and also 14% unemployment in construction workers. it will compete with china and india and everybody else in the world, we need a first-class, 21st century infrastructure. had we do that? training and community colleges, -- is a bad investment to do that. to cut that, which allows everybody to reach their full potential. i want to focus on this very

important issue -- it hits seniors very hard. seniors on medicare and people who rely on medicaid. there is no doubt that now and over the longer term we need to deal with the issues of rising health-care costs. rising health-care costs are not unique to medicare. we have rising health-care costs throughout our system. we spend 18% of our gross national product on health care, far more than any other industrialized country. there is no doubt that we need to deal with those rising costs. but there is a fundamental difference between the way the president is proposed to do it and democrats are proposed to do it, and the way that governor romney and paul ryan have proposed to do it. under the president's approach,

as we began with the affordable care act, what we say is that we need to move the health care system, especially in medicare, away from a deeper service system that rewards the volume and quantity of care over the value of care and quality of care. we need to move the incentive structure away from that to reduce costs in the health-care system. let me give you an example. hospitals -- when you are a patient who goes to the hospital, the hospital gets paid by medicare. it should. they get paid. the patient gets released in the hospital -- they develop complications from the same condition that the patient originally went to the hospital for. they are readmitted. the hospital is paid again by medicare. the hospital has no financial incentive under the current system to coordinate care for

the patient once the patient has left the hospital. that does not make sense. as part of the affordable care act, we changed that. we're moving for payments to accounts will care organizations to make sure there are incentives to coordinate care for that patient so you avoid the extra cost for repeated hospital admissions. let me give you another example. a lot of people do not realize that medicare already has a private plan component, medicare part b, private health insurance. it turns out that medicare was compensating private insurance plans on average of 114% of the fee for service plans. in other words, these private plans that work established to reduce the costs of medicare actually increase costs. one of the things we did is that we began to eliminate those overpayments, the excessive subsidies. they were paid not only by taxpayers to buy every medicare

recipient who is in a fee-for- service plan. they pay higher premiums for those plans. we said, that does not make any sense at all. we reduced those. we used some of the savings to strengthen some benefits in medicare. the prescription drug doughnut hole was closed so that fears of high prescription drug costs are not left high and dry. we eliminated the co-pays for preventive health care so more seniors will get preventive care before they get more chronic conditions that are more costly. those of the kinds of things that we did to save money on medicare. that is how we use some of the money to strengthen benefits. i should point out -- i have two, but i just want to point this out. this is an important issue that we should be talking about. this is what the medicare

trusties report says. this is non-partisan. "the financial outlook for the medicare program is substantially improved as a result of the changes in the affordable care act." substantially improved. because of some of the savings we talked about, the dollars can go farther. we use some of those dollars for the purpose of improving the benefit side talked about. what is the romney-ryan approach? it is not to reduce overall health-care costs. it is to simply transfer those rising health-care costs from seniors on medicare to seniors. that is what the congressional budget office said that under the earlier version of the ryan plan, 10 years from now, seniors on medicare would pay $6,000 more for the same set of

benefits. the new plan, it will cost seniors more for the same reason -- they are simply transferring costs off of the medicare program, not reducing costs are saving costs. they are transferring them to seniors on medicare. at the same time, your budget says they will provide big tax breaks for the very top. the other point i want to make is that in the health-care plan for members of congress provides protection for members of congress against rising health-care costs. it is a fixed percentage, premier support as opposed to a voucher plan. as health-care costs rise, members of congress can be

assured that 72% of those costs will be covered by health care -- the health care plan. they are proposing a much worse deal for seniors on medicare than they have for themselves. a much worse deal. under their plan, the way they save money is to de-link the amount that seniors receive from the medicare program from the costs of medicare. the result is that -- i guarantee this will be my last chart -- see the screen here, that represents the steady premiums support that members of congress get under their plan, 72% coverage. that red line is what happens to medicare recipients under their voucher plan. the amount that senior citizens get for medicare drops dramatically. that means that i did their costs go way up or they get less coverage and less benefits. again, at the same time, folks at the very top are getting a

better deal. i will make one last point on this medicare issue. you hear a lot about the fact that the republican plan does not touch seniors over 55 years old. that is not true. here is why. i mentioned that we use some of the savings by getting rid of the overpayments to private insurance companies and medicare to close the prescription drug doughnut hole and -- the budget of republicans does not cover those things. it reopens the prescription drug doughnut hole, so if you are a senior with high prescription drug costs, you are going to be paying thousands of dollars more. if you use a lot of preventative health care services, that will save money. it will cost you more. immediately, not 10 years from now. it costs you more immediately, and in 10 years when the other

plant goes into effect, that is when seniors get a much worse deal than members of congress. mitt romney is out there running an advertisement, saying, the president of the democrats -- they cut medicaid. i think hopefully i have been clear that no benefits were cut. we did get rid of subsidies. companies that were being overpaid. it was a waste of taxpayer dollars. the medicare trustees said that helps extend the life of the fund. we used that to strengthen this, and in the ryan budget, they took all of those savings. they wanted to pocket the savings from the affordable care at, but they did not spend one penny on strengthening the

medicare benefits. they did not get rid of the doughnut hole or help with preventive care. they did not do that. that is why you saw paul ryan on television. they are taking these and running ads against them. they did not strengthen this in their budget, but we did. this is a fundamental debate. this reduces the health care costs by finding greater efficiencies and changing structures. we do that, and that we can reduce costs without hurting seniors.

i am going to close now. this is a brave and courageous budget. i disagree. i do not think it is brave or courageous at all to provide tax breaks to very wealthy people at the expense of seniors on medicare, at the expense of infrastructure and at the expense of taxpayers. i do not think it is courageous at all to offshore more american jobs rather than creating more jobs right here. i do not think it is good for the medicaid program where two- thirds of which help seniors in nursing homes and individuals with disabilities.

and they really lack that. i do not think that is brave or courageous. take the balanced approach that they say the president's approach takes. the hallway or the highway approach. this will take us back to the road of the eight years of the bush administration, and we know what happens at the end of that road. this is going to be huge for the country. i appreciate your time and attention. i hope this will be about fundamental choices. more for the grass words politicking, the american people will make the right choice and reelect president obama. thank you very much. [applause]

i am happy to take questions, yes. >> we can take one or two questions. >> i am involuntary spokesperson for aarp. i am glad you mentioned this. fortunately, i get around to the members and other seniors, and seniors are concerned not only about what is going to be there for their children and grandchildren. they are concerned about something on both sides, and they read and hear about a $500 billion reduction in care, and that is $700 billion.

savings. is that right? >> that is right. this is what they're trying to perpetrate on the american people. >> was hoping for an answer like that so i could look smart in front of my audience. >> this is the great hoax that is being perpetrated by the romney campaign. they achieve medicare savings. we use some of those savings to strengthen medicare benefits, including providing improved access to services. they take the savings because

they recognize that these are part of medicare. they are running totally misleading hypocritical ads. cutting the picture, they are saying that they did not cut benefits. increasing benefits, which republicans cut, and not 10 years from now, now. >> you are right on target. why should we be subsidizing private insurance companies. >> thank you for the clarification. i have been saying part d. putin substitute c i said part d. and the other thing with

medicare, it is a complicated program. you have part a, part b, part c, part d. part c, medicare advantage. it is not part d. these are complicated issues. and the romney campaign is taking advantage of this to confuse people, and that is shameful. >> a few weeks ago, a commissioner testified before the committee for the affordable care act. essentially, and i do not claim to have all of the details. he postulates in a somewhat unusual an unconventional role, and it is not certain. i think we would all agree that

it is a 2000 page bill that is complex. are there ways that you can envision that the act may be made simpler or less complex? and what is the likelihood of that occurring after the november election? >> he is hoping that any constructive suggestion, this will fully kicked in in 2014. the reason the irs is part of this program is because you want to make sure that people can afford health care. it provides tax credits based on your income, so you go into these exchanges, these markets for health care insurance, very much like what federal employees and members of

congress have. you go into these exchanges, you will qualify on your income for a tax credit, which would be administered by the irs. the other part is the same as what the romney massachusetts plan does. they probably turn to him and said, "you have a great plan in massachusetts." and most everyone in this room knows that this was initially a republican idea. therefore, everyone should take personal responsibility for the costs.

otherwise, everybody else's taxes go up. let's try to have everybody take some responsibility, for those who need it, you would provide some tax credits, but it would bring down costs overall by creating an exchange, and this will also bring down the costs of medicare and health care system. there would be tax credits to make this more affordable. and the sec and wait for the romney plan, for those people now can afford health care but decide that they are going to free note on the system, there has to be some mechanism. it is a very mild penalty.

it is patterned after that. >> with the leadership council. i was just curious, after the dust settles, there will be a lot of dust, i assume. do you think there would be an effort in congress to reform this, some of the shortfalls that they do anticipate this is where the doctors are reimbursed. doctors would face a significant cut. we have been dealing with this on an ad hoc basis. we need to put this on a sustainable long-term footing, so, yes, i hope we will address

that. second, we should build upon the ideas of the affordable care act in terms of reducing the costs overall in the system. they are experimenting with improving the delivery of care for the medicare and medicaid programs. there are about 10% of the overall population, but this is about 30% of the costs, and this is between medicare and medicaid for providers, so there are opportunities for some to game the system. so rather than take the romney/ryan approach, to offer

low costs on to seniors or dramatically cut medicaid, which, again is what they rely on and others, we should look for ways to eliminate these misaligned incentives, and there is much that can be done. some is underway. we can build upon these ideas. again, this is the fundamental difference between the proposal with what they put out, with the affordable care act this is putting those costs on the backs of seniors, who, by the way, have a median income of $23,000. the median income of a senior on medicare is $23,000. a good part of that $23,000

income comes from social security. so then i get back to the essential point about the totally unbalanced aspect, to get more for mitt romney and leave everybody else to pick up the bill. >> ok, well thank you very much. [applause] >> he articulates the positions of his party so well and so clear. these are issues that you can see, and you can see this in his presentation today.

this is with the congressional candidates throughout the country. these are very, very important issues. i think you have to feel pretty good that we a people like chris van hollen studying these issues and trying to be objective as much as he can in try to find some resolution. and we look forward to having him back here again. it is good to see you all here again. >> thank you. thanks for having me. thanks for these introductions. >> i work on them. >> i can tell.

[captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> you have support. >> there is so much information out there. so you are with the health care -- no, i am with -- [inaudible conversations]

>> can i bother you? >> this is quite a tradition. very nice. thank you. take care. >> great job. thank you so much for coming. you did a really nice job explaining everything today. i appreciate it. >> thank you. >> and thank you for coming. >> thank you very much. >> how are things going? >> [inaudible]

>> thank you so much. [inaudible] that was wonderful. >> thank you. [inaudible] >> right. the ads against them. i agree. he lives in maryland. i did not believe he is in your district. >> no. >> thank you very much. -- you did such a very good job. [inaudible] >> under medicare, -- [inaudible] in the private market, these are -- [inaudible]

>> they wanted to control all of these. >> there is a constant back-and- forth. the insurance plan and a position. the negotiation back-and-forth. in some parts of the country, you will have -- [inaudible] there are other areas. [inaudible] and a lot of competition. it is an issue with medicare. >> thank you. >> i did not want to monopolize

the time. -- your time. >> i saw you on television this morning. >> thank you for coming. >> i saw you on tv. i am surprised he did not mention anything about the debt commission. >> i was thinking there might be a question on that. >> here it is. >> we put together a plan. it is a balanced approach. the cuts were terrible. the deficit reduction. >> had the handicapped it?

-- how do you handicap it? >> they will not except one penny to help reduce the deficit. >> what is the probability of the automatic? >> we will have to see. hopefully the election -- republicans will have to take a balanced approach. >> thank you for coming. it is nice to me to. it did a good job. >> thank you, i appreciate that. >> i just wanted to tell you, -- [inaudible] i voted for you. >> thank you.

>> can i take a picture? >> sure. >> i e-mailed him the question. now he is not going to have to answer it. thank you. >> i got it. >> he has got to go. thank you very much. >> thank you. >> i just want to mention, my daughter is a friend of one of your staffers. >> at the remember what staff member? -- do you remember what staff member? >> [inaudible] >> thank you a lot.

what did i do with that pen? sherlock. [inaudible] >> it was very informative. that is the light side of it. it is a serious room. people have a tendency to try to simplify things to the point where it did not convey the importance. >> absolutely. >> thank you so much. >> thank you. >> take care.

>> it is not by the victors four years ago, the economy, stupid. it is the kind of nation we are. where we possess the grit and determination. i of this first hand and so to you. it is right. we have the lowest devine rates in 28 years. the rates reserve with the minimum wage law.

>> we are in the countdown to this year's conventions. you can watch live coverage of every minute of the republican and them had at national conventions. -- democratic national conventions. >> i started as a copy boy in the new york times. i was in a training program after we got out of the army. >> the washington post columnist talked about his various jobs as a journalist. and his extravagant u.s. spending overseas with criticism of the defense department's the budget priorities. >> you spend $4 million on an elementary school, that won't

raise questions. >> walter pincus on c-span's q&a. >> the tenth annual alcohol and firearms party, speakers talked about personal freedoms and government regulation. but we will have that for you tonight at 8:00 eastern. >> bloomberg is a great example of this. he manages never to be photographed in his many costume but i think he dresses that way on the weekends. i think there are people whose blood pressure spikes when they have too much sodium. people who are allowed to have access without supervision. who is a bloomberg vitellus what to put in our food anyway? if you are of a major dose of

hypertension drug and you go around looking margarita glasses, you are a moron. but bnl moron with a modicum of freedom beat the hell out of letting someone create a plan it for you to levin. planet for you to live in. >> what is the role of government in regulating what people eat and drink? nicholas smith saying that the fda serves as an important role in forcing producers to properly labeled containers. the if it is safe to consume, the government has no right saying you should or should not concern the product. -- consume the product. >> the brookings institution

held a meeting on student retention policy. harvard case death toll professor -- professor martin west said that students with further help outperformed their peers when tested at the same grade level. amary -- mary bragg talked about seeing positive results from retention policies. this is about 45 minutes. >> welcome to brookings. i am the senior fellow here and i run the center on children and families along with my colleagues. we also runs something called a budget and for national priorities that is not part of the agenda today.

i want to begin by thanking our sponsors and a campaign -- the policy alliance, and the planning committee. we have done a lot of events. probably 10 or 15 events a year. i have never had of that with so many fingers in the pie. we got a lot and made good decisions and i was really pleased with planning. ralph smith, lisa klein, and barbara o'brien. we had great comments from lila feister that made excellent suggestions on the policy brief. i am grateful to all of them. i will summarize why the planning committee organized this event in seven propositions. individuals need a sound education to prosper in the

twenty first century economy. second, we are at undereducated nation. our students do poorly in national comparisons and despite huge increases, our students learned about as much as they do two or three decades ago. we have some closure in the gap between black and hispanic students in the white and asian students on the other. but the difference in achievement between kids and wealthy families and poor families has increased substantially with the facts on children's prospects for america. we claim to be the land of equal opportunity and there is gaping wound. literacy is the key to education. it follows the school system must insure that all of children can read and read to learn. the question for this event is

whether greater retention can be a constructive part of a plan to ensure that all shoulder and are reading by a third grader. -- all children are reading by third grade. we will have an overview of the policy brief and that we will have a panel of people that react to the policy breve. i am going to play the famous and the brookings game of stump the panel. and we will give the audience the chance to ask questions. we are fortunate to have barbara o'brien here. you have a lot of biographical material and we don't usually read things that you can read yourself so i will make a few comments first. she has had an illustrious career in politics and as a child advocate. she is the former lieutenant governor of colorado that left

the electoral politics at the height of her power and she now continues to think and write about education as a senior policy fellow at the peton foundation and the campaign for grade-level reading. i had a lot of experience in the last few decades with policy makers and i have the highest admiration for any politician that gets out before they desire to be reelected to work their views and values -- warp their views and values. [applause] >> thank you, ron. i should say my husband is also grateful because i left while we were still married. i also want to thank everyone at the center that helped organize this. there were a lot of moving parts because we had so much

interested partners coming together to support it. you did a wonderful job of coordinating, so thank you. i am here today wearing two hats. the but both of them, the campaign for grade level reading any the foundation are focused on helping give vulnerable children opportunities in life. iit is trying to not only improe school readiness for low-income children but to try to connect the best practice to public policy. we see this advantage of an opportunity to really think deeply about one of the policy issues that is rising for a rural country, and match it with what we know about growth development have the learning of young children. the campaign for grade level reading is based on the belief that schools must divide it -- provide effective teaching in every classroom every day.

and as director of the national policy group that is part of the campaign for grade level reading, we have tried to put that into a concrete action and every level of our communities in states. -- into concrete action at every level of our communities and states. it will require engaged communities that are mobilized to remove barriers and assist parents in fulfilling their roles and responsibilities in order to be partners in the success of their children. this topic today about how to address reading proficiency and what to do for kids that are behind fit perfectly with trying to mobilize communities and policy makers around the challenges facing vulnerable children. we have focused on three things.

in the readiness gap, children from low-income families are less likely to read or be spoken to regularly whore to have access to books. literacy rich environments, high-quality early care, and pre-kindergarten programs. these children may hear a 30 billion few were words that their medellin come appears before ever reaching kindergarten. -- middle-income peers before reaching kindergarten. kindergarten and first grade students nationwide and is nearly one month of school each year it excused and then excused absences. these students cannot afford to lose taught task especially early when that reading instruction is essential parts of the curriculum. children from low-income families lose three months of

reading comprehension skills over the summer. by the end of fifth grade, there are three grade levels behind their peers. clearlyhehree pillars involve what happens in the lives of children to be ready for school. and what communities do to help students do a good job of teaching and reading to buy -- reading by addressing absences. we are here today because sponsoring an event like this is an opportunity for people that care deeply about kids do not only engage and discuss difficult topics, but to come together at least around a consensus that we have to make great-level reading and reading proficiency at the end of third grade a national priority. martin west has raised what i think you will find are very

important questions and his policy brief. is retaining students in the early grades and self-defeating? if we take academic success seriously and are convinced that reading by the end of third grade is critically important, how do we prevent students from ever falling behind? second, how do we respond when they are still be high and had about to go in the fourth grade -- behind and about to go into fourth grade. if we are serious about third grade reading proficiency, we must hold ourselves accountable for increasing the number of students that achieve it. if we are serious, what are the metrics for a meaningful state, city, and district investments in preventing young children for falling -- from falling behind

in the first place. how do we evaluate and continuously improve efforts that students catch up? how do we respond when data systems identify students in pre-school, kinderarten, first grade not on track? what has not worked? i am worried that it will be easy to make promises. who doesn't want children to learn to read? will we have the intestinal fortitude to make tough decisions about budgets, programs, and policies. everyone in this room knows that high-quality child care would make a huge difference in the school readiness of childre. n. most child care is mediocre or

worse. the how many cities or states have subsidized child care at a level that allows low-income parents to purchase high- quality? how many states tolerate waiting lists for preschool for low- income children despite overwhelming data on the return on investment by other than the federal reserve? ben bernanke recently said at a meeting of the children's defense fund, economically speaking, early childhood programs are a good investment. and with the inflation- adjusted, only an economist would write like this. the annual rates of return of father dedicated to these programs estimated to reach 10% or higher, very few alternative investments can promise that kind of return. notably, a portion of these economic returns accrue to the

children themselves and their families. studies show that the rest of society enjoys the majority of the benefits reflecting the many contributions that skills and productive workers make to the economy. when you have been bernanke talking like that, you know there is a place where the country can put much more attention and we are failing to do with. we are here today to talk about when and if you create retention policies as one tool for improving student reading proficiency. but long before having to make the difficult decision of whether to retain a student in the early grades, we should have done everything in our power to give that child a good start in life. to eliminate preventable the

laser and -- delays as many other nations already do. to prepare children for school and preschool. to provide good instruction in every classroom and to ensure that every child has high- quality teaching in every setting every day. to provide intensive, customized intervention to students that are behind. we're used to saying that children are our future. the but state and national budgets telling a different story. we have failed time and again to deliver on promises about child health, early care and education, and level playing fields. we have systems that can't change the fact that children that are behind will almost certainly stay behind.

the current fiscal distress in the federal government and the states will require cuts in many programs over the next decade and beyond. how long can we continue to do more with less? this is unacceptable. we can start by putting a stake in the ground around the importance of strong reading skills at the end of third grade. that is the foundation of school success as students take a lot more challenging material and the higher grades. we have the first years in the life of every child to help him or her get ready for school. thrived in school, and love reading by the end of third grade. the question is, how serious are we? thank you. [applause]

>> when we have an event like this, we like to have an intellectual product that sets the tone and summarizes the issues. we do something called a policy brief. we look for someone that has a lot of knowledge and is a andeto not pussyfoot around, say, on the other hand, this and that. people don't want to do that because they might ruin their reputation, but marty is young chance. i think it did exactly what we and willing to make -- take a wanted. it takes a clear position and will induce a serious discussion during the panel. in addition to being a professor at harvard, he is also a deputy director of the kennedy school of policy and governments. india's the executor of

education known to express an opinion or two. i know something about him that is not bought any of your papers and i don't think you will find that on the internet. he was a champion high school wrestler. when he gets at a tight debate, he could put his the in a headlock where they can't breathe or talk. he wins a lot of debates that way. glad to have you. [applause] thanks, ron, for that introduction. not what i expected. but brings back good memories. if it is a pleasure to be here today. we are here because of the growing recognition of the importance of early reading proficiency to future academic success. not just in reading, but across all subjects at the probability of graduating from high school and going on the college and a

successful career. this program has begun to inform policy in many ways. the government support for a scientifically based early reading instruction, no child left behind, the obama administration is following up with its own proposal to put reading first. and the primary and secondary education act. when it comes to innovation, and that happens at the state level. the interesting to see that 32 states have policies that are explicitly aimed at promoting third grade reading proficiency. hoffa requiring that students be assessed early autumn their educational careers. and interventions offered to those students at risk of reading deficiencies. and there is a flurry of activity, 13 states have enacted

or modify policies -- modified policies. the activity is encouraging, but it raises an uncomfortable question. what should be done when those measures fail to occur or prove unsuccessful? should students be retained and provided with intensive remediation? or should they be promoted along with their peers? increasingly, states have been answering in the direction of retention. 14 states require, to some degree, retention for students with low test scores in grade three. several policies are being debated in other states currently. there are variations in the particulars and the exemptions for students to demonstrate their proficiency through other means and what services are required to be offered when

students are retained. the despite the differences, the debate follows contou abler. -- a fairly stable contour. the policies are not to increase home attention but to use the threat of pretension to create incentives for educators and students to meet performance expectations. they can be expected to increase retention rates and opponents argue that those students will benefit from the opportunity for individual instruction before moving on to more challenging material. the enactment of these policies has not been without controversy, however. critics have a response to these points.