because the other party will simply attacked him for it. what mechanism is going to have to be put in place to try to address the long-term budget issues, medicare, medicaid, social security? >> i think you are right. we should not be afraid of that. get a dialogue going in this country so we can figure out how to fix these problems. one of the things we ought to do is change the way our federal budget process works. in the last segment, you were talking about accounting. john and i agree on a lot of things.

this federal budget process does not reward tackling these big issues. the to make this more enforceable, more transparent, and more accountable. there are accounting changes we can do to bring on the books these liabilities. the way we do the accounting, if you are in american corp., you would be in jail. we do not fully recognize the liabilities we have to the taxpayers. it would make it easier for us to tackle these goals. we need to have budget enforcement. that is why i am a fan of spending caps. if congress expands the spending caps, -- there is a lot more we can do to fix this.

we need to fix this process. >> one of more than 400 -- his first appearance on c-span back in 1995. we have gone back through the archives to take a look at some of the major issues in this campaign. medicare, social security, and the overall budget. has there been a consistency in his statement over the years? >> paul ryan has been very consistent. he has taken criticism for that. the only inconsistency democrats would point out is that he voted against the stimulus plan.

but then saw money from that program. -- sought money from that program for businesses in his district. >> he is a key committee chair. >> he has been in congress for seven terms. he has been a budget committee chairman comment he has been any the in these big issues on medicare, a trade. he was a former staffer for the senator brown back. he knows these issues. he is only 42. he can talk at length about some of these issues. >> we will learn more about the paul ryan budget. summarize what is in the budget package and why this has become such a big part of the republican campaign. >> the big piece of it is medicare reform. he wants to make it more privatization, a private companies are competing with

traditional medicare. the budget plan also has caps on social service programs. on the medicare plan, he took a lot of heat in 2011 for that medicare reform. he went to a democrat from oregon, and change the plan, it so that the traditional medicare would not be taken out of the option that seniors would have. that is what you were going to hear paul ryan talk a lot about. he has worked with john spratt on a line item veto. at the same time, he did not support the goals and senate budget reform. member say he was not bipartisan. >> if you look at the budget and made into a pie chart, how much

is defense spending? discretionary spending? more than half goes to these medicare, medicaid, social security supplement. >> they say there is no way you can fix the budget problem because the entitlements is such a large portion. defense is well over a quarter of the budget. there is also not discretionary spending. if you look at the charge the cbo puts out, the bulk of the spending problem is dealing with entitlement programs, specifically in medicare. in the 1990's, medicare was also a problem and congress passed a balanced budget. that helped the situation. >> he was a staffer on capitol hill and he made his first appearance on this network on may 27, 1995, as a legislative aide. he talked about the budget

process. >> i would like to go back to the first caller statement read this budget debate, what is this about? this is evolving into a fundamental difference between the two parties. the republicans, we say we have to budget the -- balance the budget. it is interesting to note that the clinton's administration's budget proposal projects building more deficits. adding on top of the debt. we think we have to balance the budget as soon as possible. during a seven-year budget plan is a credible responsible to balance the budget. it increases spending at a slower rate. when the republicans were in the minority, we also offer the alternative budget plans, which did balance the budget. >> that was paul ryan in 1995.

>> it shows should that even at that young age, he knows what he is talking about, he is a budget guru. attacking the sitting president as a staffer. you do not see that very often. a lot of people know paul ryan knew he was going to send up the ranks of the gop. >> first elected in 1998. thank you for being with us. paul ryan is a policy wonk, a smart politician and heidi id -- a highly ideological. hussy of bald or has there been -- has see involved -- has he evolved?

>> in terms of his rhetoric and in terms of the thrust of his policy positions, i do not think there has been a whole lot of movement. he has always stressed the same set of issues. he has always talked in the same rhetorical terms about party thinks the republican party should go and what he thinks of the role and size of the federal government should be. >> would 6 issue -- what shakes his views? >> he gravitated -- he is an earnest young man who gravitated towards -- as he got into college, he did not come from a super political family. his father was a fan of ronald reagan, but not really political.

he gravitated towards a conservative way of looking at the world. by the time he got to college, by most accounts, he brought some of that with him. after college, when he hooked up the senate republican from wisconsin, who was a strong jguy and jack kemp and bill bennett, everything crystallized for him in terms of his economic world view and limited government and pro- market orientation. >> he mentioned that paul ryan likes to talk about policy. there is no doubt about that. how have you seen him talking about politics. he does not like to apple length

about political issues as much as a policy wonk issues. he has just been picked as vice president. how do you think he is going to handle that? >> he likes to talk about how disinterested he is in politics and how he is a policy guide. in fact, i think he is a very good politician who does have some political acumen. i have had conversations with him over the years where the conversation will drift over politics. he has opinions about the presidential race. he will offer tactical and strategic opinions. people should not miss the political dimensions. there is paul ryan the policy guide, there is a very illogical can -- ideological

conservative. you see reflected in his relationship with the media. he is a good communicator, good and at ease with reporters. those are some of his political skills that work. >> why the budget? what led him to propel himself to be the chairman of the budget committee? it is a political document as well as a policy document. >> he has a certain economic orientation. he wanted to become an economist, never getting there. when he got to washington, that was his policy interests. he saw the potential to turn the leadership on the budget committee, whether it was ranking member or budget chairmen into this platform comment into this role of influence in terms of -- even

though we all know the budget chair is not the person with the power. he made something of this position, which was unconventional. he made it into a forum for projecting his view of for the republican party should be on government. >> thank you very much for being with us. the day after the president's very first step of the union address in february of 2009, paul ryan was the ranking republican on the house budget committee. he joined us to talk about the budget process. >> we're going to pass the rest of the current fiscal year. last congress did not finish the job. then we call the budget resolution. thursday, the president sent his abbreviated version of the budget. our timeline is to get this done in the first week of april. we get that done, we send

instructions on their funding targets they have to hit. that occurs over the course over the spring and summer. by end of the fiscal year, these 11 appropriations bills will be passed into law. thursday starts the ball rolling. by the beginning of april, congress should have passed the budget resolution. and then we bring all those bills back together and these things ought to be passed by the end of the fiscal year. lately, that has not worked that way. we have gone past the deadlines, past the fiscal year deadlines. to date is an example. we are passing an appropriations bill today. 8.8% increase in discretionary spending. these are bills that were supposed to be passed last september 30.

we are really increasing spending dramatically and that is going to hurt our ability to reduce our deficit. that is a big concern. >> paul ryan in february 2009. let me ask you about how he is viewed by his colleagues. >> he is respected on both sides of the aisle. criss and holland and him get along very well -- chris van holland and handed along very well. he is respected so much that there has been talk of them making a leadership bid against john boehner. he never did that, but they have to look over their shoulder because there was a respected up and comers who was urged to run, but opted not to do it. >> how will this play out?

what are republicans going to be doing? >> we have seen some of it already. what i think we will see down the stretch is social security reform. you go back to 2005, that the bill did not go anywhere. that bill, the main sponsor was paul ryan. he was taking on a big entitlement program, it was not popular with seniors. on social security and medicare, call brian is going to be attacked. mitt romney knew that. -- paul ryan is going to be attacked. mitt romney knew that. the chances of major reform along the lines of what they want are not going to happen. >> thank you for being with us as we talk about congressman paul ryan and many of the evidence we have covered over

the years from the "washington journal to his policy speeches, all part of c-span's a video library. one of those events came in chicago at the economic club in which he talked about medicare. this is paul ryan may 16 of last year on the issue of medicare. >> our budget also gets health care spending under control by an powering americans to fight back against skyrocketing costs. our budget makes no changes to those in or near retirement. it offers future generations is strengthened medicare program that they can count on would guaranteed coverage options, less help for the wealthy, and more for the poor and sick. there is widespread bipartisan agreement that the open-ended fee-for-service structure of medicare is a key driver of health care cost inflation. ask any hospital executives and it will tell you the same thing.

medicare is not the train being pulled along by the engine of rising costs. medicare is the engine and the rest of us are getting taken for a ride. this disagreement is not about the problem. it is about the solution to controlling costs in medicare. if i could sum up the disagreement in a couple sentences, i would say this. our plan is to give seniors the power to deny business to an efficient providers. [applause] their plan is to give the government the power to deny care to seniors. what our budget does, given that medicare and medicaid -- those two programs alone are the biggest contributors to it. you have to restructure how these programs work.

the trustees gave us a new warning last week that medicare is going bankrupt a lot faster than we thought it was. if we did this now, we can do it on our own terms as the country. we do not have to pull the rug under from people look already retired. people who are 10 years away from retiring are preparing for it. do not change their benefits, but in order to do that, you have to reform this program for the next generation. you have to make a solvent system so that you can cash flow the current generation. the weighted did that, we believe, is not by given a panel of 15 bureaucrats the authority to micromanage medic kit -- medicare. we say, let's younger people select among the list of medicare guaranteed coverage

options. it works like this system federal employees have. you subsidize insurance. give support to the people that needed the most and less support to the people who needed the least. it helps solve our debt crisis. can this be done? i hardly think this is some radical idea. this is the same kind of recommendation that president clinton's bipartisan commission recommended in the late 1990's. it worked just like current medicare benefits for today. medicare advantage works like this. by near the supplemental insurance works like this.

-- buying or supplemental insurance works like this. we believe the best way to get at this issue is by giving the patient the power. a consumer directed system. hospitals, insurers, doctors compete against each other for our business as consumers. we spend a lot of money on health care, but we do not spend it very intelligently. we need a system, where we have transparency in price, transparency in quality, so we can have apples to apples metrics comparison. i do believe you need to do it -- we subsidize people and the higher income brackets allot more. that is upside down. we want a system where the

individual is in the driver's seat, not some bureaucrats. i would argue for subsidizing those with pre-existing conditions of they do not go bankrupt. we bring more competition, more choice to the health-care sector. if we did this, i think we will be fine. we will grow the economy. we can have insurance for everybody who does not have it and we can do without breaking the bank. [applause] >> as the newly elected chair of the house budget committee, he delivered his remarks and to questions at the chicago economic club focusing on medicare, one of the key issues in this election. we're looking back at the video library. all this is available to you at any time on c-span.org.

this is a significant budget issue, social security. >> what i propose is a system of voluntary personal retirement accounts. raise taxes, cut benefits, or in less and borrow more money. there are two ways to grow the rate of return. have the government invest the money, or have personal retirement accounts for individuals. what we're talking about is not privatizing social security. we are not talking but giving people the ability to take a chunk of their payroll taxes and taking it outside the system.

people are not buying this choosing stocks and bonds. under that system, people under the age of 55 will be able to take half of their payroll taxes and a personal retirement account. the rest would go to fund the current system. survivors' benefits, and disability benefits. transition financing is a big debate, how you get from here to there. i will not go into how i propose to do that, but i have a very sophisticated plan. >> people are very interested in this topic. what happens if you are an investor who takes advantage of the option to invest separately and you get a street for the market goes down? >> under my plan, i have a

safety net. we should have and maintain the social security safety net. >> no risk plan. >> if you are under 55, you'll get what you would have otherwise gone from social security. how you guard against -- that is why we proposed a life cycle account. it changes your portfolio as you grow older. when you are younger, you will have a mix of heavy stock index funds, light on bond index funds. you are completely out of the stock market so that you do not fall prey to a down market by the time you retire. another thing that is very important, there is no 20-year time or we did not do better in

social security than we're doing right now. social security is a long-term investment. part of the reason why we are saying 55 and under it is said they have time to plan and grow their investment. at the age of 35, all i have to do is get that 1% rate of return for me to do better than i would other ways -- other ways wise do. all we have to do is get a little bit better than that to do better for ourselves. >> i want to get to people's call spread the president has explained that it is not -- i want to get to people's calls. >> personal retirement accounts

help us choose solvency -- achieve solvency. if susan, you take a portion of your payroll taxes. that portion you are diverting over to your personal retirement account, the government is not going to get that money. the system is off the hook to pay you that part of your benefits for those dollars because you'll get that benefit out of your personal retirement account. the system reduces the expenditures by that amount. that helps bring the system and to solvency. we are about the same age, as you would have to do a little bit better than that to break even. >> the safety net, which would

guarantee me, won't that draw? >> as workers grow that fund, the safety nets is completely paid for. we can go into the financing part of all these things, but right now, over the long term, we face a $12 trillion debt on social security. >> from march 9, 2005, paul ryan talking about social security. some of the key issues in this budget plan. earlier, we heard his comments about medicare. it was last year when he became a chair of the house budget committee. he outlined details of what is now known as the ryan plan.

>> look at our historic sites of our government, right around 20% of gdp. here is the path to your on right now. this is the path the president's budget is complicity with. the size of our government is double by the time my kids are my age. here is the spending path that this prosperity plan presents. we bring the size of government back down to 20% of gdp. we have budget enforcement mechanisms, multiple spending caps. this is how we get $6.20 trillion at spending cuts the first 10 years. let's take a look at deficit. take a look at where we are headed. we had deficits and the past. look at where we are headed with our deficits. this is where the president's

budget plan is completed with. this is the path of the status quo. these are the kinds of deficits will be racking up if we do not do something to fix this problem. here is the path we are proposing with respect to our path for prosperity. very different choice of two different features. let's talk about debt. we have had debt in this country before. people get a mortgage to buy a house. typically, you measure your debt as relative to your income. take a look at our debt. over -- we if that had been before. that was temporary. then went back down. it would down to reasonable levels but look at what the congressional budget office is telling us is our future of debt. this red ink is gone to destroy our economy. we know we are giving the next

generation a lower standard of living. we asked the cbo to tell us what the future of the economy looked like. they ran a computer model stimulating the economy forward. the models break in 2037. they cannot conceive of the time in which the economy can continue past that moment because of this burden of debt. this is our debt path. we get this paid off. that is the future we want for our children. we believe we have been more responsibility to put the kinds of controls and reforms in place to keep this country growing. we need job growth. we need economic growth. we ask the heritage center for

data analysis to review this budget. they use the global inside model. here is what the results show. this plan result in faster economic growth. $1.50 trillion in additional economic growth over a decade. 1 million jobs next year to be created under this plan. the unemployment rate goes down to 4% in the year 2015. in the last year of this budget, we're kicking greeted creating 2.5 million new jobs in the private sector in that year alone. it also predicts higher wages. it also predicts higher family income, nearly $1,000 per family per year result from the better economic growth this plan for prosperity presents. this is a plan for prosperity. when you take a look at the

choice of the two futures we have, we can either choose the red line, a sea of debt and deficits, or we can choose that green line, or we face up to the challenges confronting this generation now to give our country a better future. we've always had a legacy or each generation -- where each generation cakes on challenges of the next generation is better off. we are not going to be giving our children a better standard of living. we know we will not make them better off. that is a fact that is not daunted by any independent fiscal expert. we owe it to our country in kids to fix this problem. what of the worst experiences i've ever had was in the 2008 financial crash. that cottas by surprise.

-- that caught us by surprise. added that resulted ugly legislation. and then we witnessed trillions of wealth of being lost. then we witnessed millions of seniors lose their savings. and then we witnessed millions of people lose their jobs. we're still trying to recover. what if your congressmen, your president saw it coming? what if they knew was going to happen? what if they knew what could be done to prevent it from happening? but they decided not to because it was not the politics. what would you think of your president? you're a member of congress? that is where be our right now. this is the most predictable economic crisis in our history. what are we doing, playing politics?

we do not need politicians, we need leadership? we believe we have a moral imperative, we got together on the budget committee and we decided it is time to stand up and do what is necessary to fix this country. we to be honest with the american people about the problems and face. with the fact base budget. no more accounting tricks, no more accounting gimmicks. i will be happy to take your questions. >> [inaudible] >> this shows you how deep of a hole this country is then.

-- is in. what matters the most is we get this contained. this shows you the sooner you act to fix this problem, the better everybody is. the kinds of reforms we are proposing did not affect senior citizens. they did not take benefits away from people who are 55 and above. we can achieve that if the canal. what happens of the keep kicking the can down the road, we go about $10 billion into the hole. that means cuts to seniors, tax increases. we want to preempt that kind of austerity. it is gone to take awhile to dig their way out of this problem. [inaudible] >> we do not proposed increasing

taxes. if you raise taxes, can you move the numbers are there? you lose jobs, you lose economic growth. we need spending cuts and economic growth. raise taxes on the economy, you do not get the growth. we are now in the 21st century. we are in a global economic environment. in wisconsin, we're competing with people from india and china. the only tax our businesses and at the highest tax rates, we lose and they wenin. >> april 5 of last year, congressman paul ryan allied and details of what is now known as the ryan plan.

from the "washington journal, his speeches in washington and elsewhere in the country, now on the campaign trail. he made his first appearance in 1995 as a staff member. three years later, he returned as a newly elected member of congress. this is from november 17, 1998. it is all part of c-span's video library as the track his career in washington and wisconsin. you can check it out anytime at c-span.org/video library. >> we are in the countdown to the convention. coverage of the republican convention from tampa. live on c-span, the front row seats to the convention. coming up, a campaign rally with mitt romney in new mexico.

that is followed by terry o'neil, president of the national organization for women. later, at a forum looks of state legislators under the age of 30. on fraud is "washington journal, thomas -- on fridays "washington journal, thomas burr. later, part of our online media series. "washington journal" is live every morning starting at 7:00 on c-span. mitt romney held a campaign rally in new mexico. he outlined his energy plan.

it would aim for u.s. energy independence by 2020, expand drilling and give states more responsibility over the permitting process. he says it would create 3 million jobs and add more than a trillion dollars in revenue. this is 25 minutes. i think the smith family did build this business. to the many men and women who work here, i appreciate the fact that you are building this

enterprise as well. i do not think government builds these businesses. as you know, the president said something about that that was pretty revealing. he was in virginia. there were very revealing of what he believes. he said, if you have a business, you did not build it, someone else did that. he went on to say, you're taking me out of context. go look at the context. the context is even worse. if you are successful, you may think it is because she works hard. a lot of people work hard. where is he going with that? we value in this country individuals to apply themselves to increase their knowledge and their capacity to think and learn and we welcome people in this country who work hard and

understand those people who are smart or card, make enterprises better. i need someone called their to hold on to that. we welcome people who are smart and work hard because there are people of achievement. whether it is a person who works hard to get a promotion and did a raise or the kid who makes the honor roll. she works hard, she studies hard. we recognize she had to go on a school bus, but when she makes the honor roll, we credits her with doing it, not the school bus driver. i happen to think the president's lack of understanding on how individual initiative and hard work and

education and risk-taking of how that drives our economy led him to put in place a series of policies that have not worked for the american people. the evidence is around the country. you had 23 million people who are out of work. you have half the kids coming out of college this year you cannot find a job. one at of six americans has fallen into poverty. the policies have not worked. almost everything he has done has made it harder for this economy to recover. middle-income families across america are having a hard time. another report, yesterday showing that middle-income families are having a harder time maintaining their standard of living. this expense inexplicable to see

a nation with some many middle- income families having tough times. the median income has dropped in the last 3.5 years by $4,000. even as gasoline prices has doubled and food prices have gone up. this is the best the obama team can do, but we can do better. and we will. i have gone across the country over the last several months describing a five-point plan. one of them i will talk about in some debt today. number one is taking advantage of our energy resources. we have to make sure our schools are world class.

this mission ended education and we have to fix our schools. we have to have more trade, we need to open up trade with latin america and other parts of the world and crack down on cheaters like china when they cheat and steal jobs. we will not get businesses and individuals to risk starting enterprises if they think america is going to become -- we have to get serious about cutting federal spending and finally balance our budget. we have to champion small business. we have to help small business keep their taxes competitive, get regulators to see their job is to encourage business, not crush it. take off that big cloud that is scaring away hiring for small business. i am talking about obamacare.

[applause] define the president of the united states, i will set a national goal of america and north america energy independence by 2020. that means we produce all the energy we use in north america. it is achievable. this is not some pie in the sky kind of thing. i have a charge that is still holding up the pier. -- up here. on the left-hand side, you see a bar that represents -- you cannot read the writing.

that bar shows how much our total demand is in the united states right now. we're making about 15 million barrels a day. the rest we import. we are producing about two- thirds of what we use and we are importing about one-third. as they go across the line, there are various sources of additional energy. i have a bar representing conventional sources. there is a great sliced. that suggests the conventional sources, are probably going to see a reduction in production over the last 10 years. we're going to have to make up for that reduction. we will add about 2 million barrels per day and not sure -- offshore drilling.

it is a big source of additional supply. alaska. this will add additional oil production in this country. national gas liquids, natural gas is booming as a source of energy. you get some liquids and those liquids can be refined and used to create gasoline for automotive purposes as well. then we come to biofuels. it will produce about 1 million barrels per day of additional capacity. and then we come to canada. we will take advantage of those and build that keystone pipeline to make sure we have the advantage of their energy sources. the last little bar is mexico. mexico, i am not counting on any increase. they have actually been

declining slightly. by virtue of a new president, we will find ourselves being able to work with mexico to share our technology to help them become more productive and add to the energy produced in north america. by 2020, we're able to produce 23-28 million barrels a day of oil and we will not need to bite any oil from the middle east or venezuela or anywhere else. [applause] you might wonder how in the world i'm going to do all of those things because those opportunities have existed for a long time, we just haven't taken advantage of them. so there are some things i'm going to do differently that makes it possible for us to be able to achieve those improvements in production from all of those sources i described. number one, on federal lands, the permitting process to

actually drill and get oil or gas is extraordinarily slow. interestingly, on state lands and private lands, state regulators have streamlined their permitting process, there a valuation, their environmental process and say process. they have found a way because states compete with each other and have found a way to do things more efficiently. in north dakota, it takes 10 days to get a permit for a new well. in colorado, it takes 27 days to get on state land a permit. but do you know how long it takes federal government regulators to get a permit on federal land? an average 307 days. here's what i'm going to do -- i am going to have the states take responsibility for the permitting process on federal lands. [applause]

of course the process is going to have to be reviewed and approved by the federal government and will be overseen and monitored, but will have state regulators not just regulate oil production and gas production on state lands and private lands but also on federal lands, and that will improve the creation of new oil wells and gas wells and get more production to the people who need it. i also want to note another way we are going to get more production and that is with regard to our offshore resources. right now, the federal government has been holding off offshore development. what we're going to have to do is speed that up, so i'm putting together a five-year leasing plan to lease offshore sources and we will make as part of that, carolina, virginia and the gulf will have companies that do the drilling responsible for getting this target and if not, we'll have corrective measures. but we're finally going to make sure we implement state of the art safety procedures for offshore drilling and a sure as we put in place these regulations and procedures their design for safety, not designed

to stop drilling for energy resources, using the law to stop drilling for energy is not in the best interest of our people. [applause] #3, going to establish an energy partnership with canada and mexico. we're going to work collectively have a fast-track process to make sure infrastructure projects are approved. particularly, we're going to get the keystone pipeline in -- keystone pipeline approved. number four, it's time we get an accurate inventory about how much energy we have. the president keeps talking about the idea that we only have 2% of the world's oil reserves. that's a dramatic understatement of the energy resources of this country. it's probably seven times that amount or more. i'm going to authorize a seismic study of our onshore and offshore resources to find

out what we have had where we have an going to require those that have the service -- have these surveys to collect them and share them with one another and take advantage of an understanding of what our resources are so we can plan accordingly. i am also going to do something that has been around for a long time -- i'm going to change to regulatory and permitting process to make a more transparent and make sure as we put in place regulations, they are designed to actually help get production where is needed and not using regulation to stop the production of energy. if sometimes i have the impression that the whole regulatory attitude of the administration is trying to stop oil and gas and coal. they don't want those sources. they want to get those things so expensive than so rare that wind and solar become highly cost-effective and efficient. i like wind and solar like the next person, but i don't want a lot to be used to be stopped -- to stop the production of oil,

gas, and coal and i'm going to get to lot to be transparent time lines, statutes of limitations and stop using a legal suits to stop the production of energy in this country. number six, i want to promote energy innovation. what do i mean by that? we have watched the president followed different paths. he has taken federal dollars, your money, to invest in companies, smaller companies, when companies, about $90 billion in so-called green jobs. $90 billion has gone to this. the government of the united states is not a very good venture capitalist. he says he's picking winners and losers. mostly he has been picking losers. there is a long list of these businesses he is investing in. i don't want government investing in companies, particularly companies of his campaign contributors. i want instead to have our government investing in basic science and research, finding new sources of energy, also finding ways to be more efficient in our use of energy. i happen to believe that dotted line i have there where it says

american energy uses -- usage will stay about the same. i say we can bring that down three -- we can bring that down. we may even be an exporter of energy at some point when you consider all our resources. but this is where we should be devoting our federal dollars, not on trying to put money into businesses which often fail. instead, putting money into technology, science and research. we do that and you will see new opportunities to get america and north america energy independent. what are the benefits of all this? if we actually get there, and i am planning on getting there. if i get elected, we're going to get there. [applause] let me tell you what the benefits are. 3 million jobs.

3 million jobs come from doing this. 3 million jobs. that is 1 million in manufacturing. that's a lot of energy-related jobs. 3 million jobs come back to this country by taking advantage of something we have underneath their feet. that is oil, gas, and coal. we're going to make it happen and create those jobs. it adds $500 billion to the size of our economy. "that is more good wages and the opportunity for more americans to have a bright and prosperous future. it also means potentially hundreds of billions of dollars of tax revenues going into states and federal government which can make sure we have a military second to none and schools that lead the world and care for our seniors, better roads and bridges. [applause] accomplishing what i described right there means lower energy

prices for american families. by the way, for american businesses, so that as businesses are thinking about or to build a factory and a look at the cost of production of a particular product, they see in north america, we have ample energy and it is low cost. that will bring businesses back here. he will see more manufacturing come back to the united states as a result of doing what is so clearly in our best interest. [applause] by the way, we have all noticed the trade deficit. that's how much more we buy from other people than they buy from us. doing what we describe will reduce that trade deficit by 80%. think of the impact of that. [applause] let me mention something else -- we have to have a national security strategy which takes into account the fact america will be stronger if we have all the energy we need to power our economy and our military.

this is not just a matter of economy and jobs and rising incomes and a growing economy and more tax revenues. it is also more security. it means we don't have to rely on people who sometimes don't like us very much. america will be able to stand on its own. the can stand with our friends from mexico and canada and make sure we have all of the energy we need to make sure our military never has to borrow from some across the ocean that

might not be our best friend. [applause] i happen to believe if you do what i described, and i'm planning on doing it when i get elected, if we do that, and those other four things i described which are fixing our schools and training programs and making sure we improved trade and make trade work for america and finally attack it -- tackle our deficit and champion small business, you do those things and this economy is going to come roaring back. [applause] the other day, the vice president was talking about how things are getting some much better for the middle class in america. i wish you'd go out and talked to some people and the people across this land. it's not getting better for the 23 million people out of work or stop looking for work it's not getting better for people who are seeing their incomes go down and their costs go up. it's not getting better for people getting out of college and can't find work. what i have described here will make things better for the middle-class america. people all over this country will be convinced again it's great to be middle-class america. moms and dads will no kids coming out of school will be able to get a good job. this is critical for our generation, the coming generation, and for the world. i say for the world because people around the world look to america.

they need a strong america. they know a strong america is essential to peace on the planet. a strong america keeps the world's worst actors from doing the world's worst things. i had the privilege a few weeks ago of a meeting with lech walesa. he said through an interpreter that you are probably tired. you sit down and listen, so i did. he began to speak for about 15 minutes uninterrupted and his message was straightforward. he repeated it again and again -- where is american leadership? we need america's leadership. america is the only superpower on the planet. we need america to be strong. [applause] getting north american energy independence is key to american leadership.

so is fixing our schools and balancing our budget, making trade work for us and understanding the power of small business, individual initiative, hard work. this is what america is all about. i have been inspired as i've gone across the campaign trail for the last months and i have seen americans who have taken the initiative to try to build enterprises for themselves and improve the lives of their families. i am inspired by the power of individuals. changing the life of people in the family. i've seen my sister do that. she is so enthusiastic and positive and energetic, she has raised a terrific kids. seven of them are married. her eighth is a down syndrome boy, he is 43. she's 75. her husband passed away so jeffrey lives at home with her. she devotes her life to caring for him and caring for the kids

and grandchildren have -- and grandchildren. also in this economy. i have got across the country and that the entrepreneurs of all kinds and impressed by their capacity to lift others through their ideas. i met a woman who had her own business. i said how did you get your company started and she said my husband lost his job and he took a class in upholstering. she because she was the better business mind decided to start a company of her own and she hired him as her first play. she went on to hire 40 more people as the pollsters -- upholsterers. she has a successful upholstering company. melody mara liasson -- macnamara found a way.

she would focus in one small segment. she makes furniture for hospitals and waiting rooms. by making a quality product at a good price she has been able to maintain her business and the jobs of 27 people for work with her. i met another guy who by virtue of his inside and imagination and hard work and smarts was able to change the lives of a lot of other people. his name is jim, graduated second in his high-school class. second from the bottom. he decided college was not in his future. is that loaned him the money to get a business started. they spotted 5050. -- split it 50-50.

he bought a grill and a hot dog roller. it was more expensive than he had money for. the only thing he could do was make sandwiches. he set up tables in the garage and he delivers them to people in business. his business is known as jimmy employs 60,000 people. one person making a difference. it is amazing, america where individual initiative, individual know how come the hard work, people pursuing their own course, their own dreams have built america. freedom has built america. when the founders crafted the founding documents of america

act, they came from god. that is what makes us the unique and exceptional nation we are. individuals, the ads, moms, kids in school, and entrepreneurs, even political leaders who have an initiative, in sight, passion, are willing to take a risk and make a difference. it is what makes america what we are. the president thinks it is somehow government that makes us what we are. that is not the answer. the answer is to rely on individuals and their dreams and passions. i will keep america are strong by returning america to the freedoms we have known. bringing to us, each individual the capacity to achieve, to pursue their dreams. i love america. i love the principles upon which america was founded. i know if we do the things i described, those five things, america will come roaring back. our families need it, our kids need it. the world's needed.

we will keep america the shining city on the hill together. will-- we will get new mexico to get me on track. thank you. great to be with you. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] ♪

>> press secretary jay carney was asked about the rum the energy plan. here's what he had to say. >> his campaign -- [inaudible] some of the goals they are

laying out, creating more than 3 million jobs your energy production and independents by 2020. does the president think the goals are feasible? >> the president believes we need to pursue a policy that embraces a bold and robust all the above approach to energy. and what we now is that the policy the president has pursued has led already to the doubling of production of renewable energy from sources like newble wind and solar. we know that under his leadership and during his presidency, domestic production of oil and gas, natural gas has increased and our reliance on imports of foreign oil has decreased to its lowest level in something like 16 years.

i think what distinguishes the president's approach, all the above approach to our energy future from the republican approach is that the republican approach is essentially one that is written by or dictated by big oil and focuses almost entirely on oil and fossil fuels. this president believes we need to embrace all forms of domestic energy production including oil, including natural gas, including nuclear energy which as you know this illustration has invested in for the first time in 30 years. including renewals like wind and solar. while the republican approach denigrates forms of energy like wind, this president believes that investing in renewable energy is essential to enhancing

our energy independence. i would know as the president did last week that congressmen ran has called wind energy a fad. maybe governor romney called it imaginary. this is a narrow view and a dangerous view if you think about how important energy security is and domestic production of energy is to our security interests. this president will continue to push for an all the above energy approach that insures that we aggressively pursue domestic oil and gas production and we aggressively pursue renewable energy production and make the investments necessary to secure our future. >> of the components include increased -- some of the components include increased drilling and increased energy production on federal lands. does the president think there

is a place for some of these ideas that governor romney is proposing? >> i can tell you that as you know, under the president, we have increased production on federal water and land. the administration finalized plan that will build on the millions of acres we have made available for production by making 75% of offshore resources available for production. i think again if you look at the president was a record, he has been very aggressive in pursuing ways to increase domestic production of energy. he has done it also in a way that is mindful of the need to produce it in a safe and reliable fashion. one other point, representative of the president's approach on all of the blood of -- above, we have more coal miners employed that we have had in the past 15 years. this president believe that -- believes that america's national

security and energy independence depends on complete all the budget approach -- all the above approach. it insists on continuing gas subsidies and oil subsidies while ending the tax credit, the wind energy tax credit that is so important to the development of the wind energy industry which as you know his opponents oppose. despite the fact that republicans in key states were wind -- where wind energy is important support extending that tax credit. in four days, gavel to gavel probcoverage of the convention. your front row seat to the conventions. tonight, terry o'neil talks

about herber's priorities. the national conference of state legislatures looks at the next generation of leaders under 30. and the work for the online news source. on "washington journal," a discussion of mitt romney's mormon faith. and then the president of the national mining association talks about the ruling by the d.c. court of appeals striking down an epa air pollution regulation. later, an online media series. every morning at 7:00 a.m. eastern on c-span. >> i think our job is not to ask god to questions -- gotcha

questions. whitecame bloomberg's house sorbonne -- correspondent in 2009. >> i am not looking to catch -- when j. carney is that the press briefing, i am not looking to catch him in, that is not what you said the other day. it is trying to get information to inform people with. >> more on "q&a" sunday. >> the republican national convention starts monday. next, bob buckhorn on the importance of hosting the convention. >> all of you know that we have posted four super bowls, we have posted an unusual invasion every winter in the form of the [unintelligible]

invasion. this is a big deal. bigger than anything we have ever done by a long stretch. if you multiplied all the super bowls together, the magnitude of this and the number of movie parts -- moving parts would surpass that by tenfold. the security issues are very unique to these events. that is why this has been determined to be a national special security event. you will hear some things that we have not been accustomed to dealing with over the super bowls we have posted. this team that you see in front of you as well as our partners and i see colonel at dunkin from the -- ed duncan, others have been wonderful to work with as have our other partners in law enforcement. col. duncan in green and --

these uniforms are purple. there two interchangeable agencies -- they are to interchangeable agencies. thank you on behalf of the blue team for all the work that the green team is doing. there will be challenges. we all understand that. there will be traffic issues. there will be congestion. there will be security concerns. there will potentially be confrontations. it is the nature of these kinds of events in a post-9/11 environment. there will be cigna to get security issues that are involved in this as we make sure that we protect the nominee and protect the people that want to come as delegates and those that want to come to offer an alternative opinion. we are choosing between -- we're not choosing between the two.

we do not care what folks are protesting about. that is not our job. we're not here to pass judgment. we're not here to cut -- care about the politics. this is an economic development opportunity for this community, the likes of which will never see again. let me tell you about the scope of this event. other than the olympics this year, this will be the second most viewed television event in the entire world. this is the opportunity to shine on the world stage like we will never get again and we have never had before. it is our time to tell our story and to tell the world what a great place this is to grow your business, to build your business, to invest, to buy real estate, to visit, to travel, to enjoy the tampa experience that we know because we live here. whenever going to get the chance again. i think what we look back on this 10 years from now there will see about this moment this was the time when tampa played on the international stage like it has never done before.

this is our coming out party. this will transform the city in the eyes of the world in more ways than we can imagine. we are not here to discuss how we got here. we're not here to discuss politics. we're not here to discuss the ordinance. we're not here to discuss romney or romneyville. we are here to prevent -- to prepare. i wanted to know and hear from all these people in each of whom have pieces of this weather is terrible police department or solid waste. there are so many moving parts to this i want you to know each and every one of them and i want you when you leave here to have a better understanding of what has taken place and the amount of study and preparation that has gone into this but what to expect during the week of the convention and how you can plan your lives accordingly.

we want to minimize the impact on you but we recognize that there will be an impact on this community. the benefits will outweigh in along run the short-term impact that we will have. any minor inconveniences that we will have. >> the republican national convention starts monday in tampa. the keynote speaker will be governor chris christie of new jersey. senator mark kerviel will -- but -- marco rubio will introduce mitt romney. we will have gavel-to-gavel coverage on c-span. a look at issues related to women this election season. guest on "il was a washington journal." >> thank you for being with us.

host: would have been your election efforts? >> our goal is to get the word out about what is at stake for women in the 2012 elections. it is a huge leap consequential election. i am sure your viewers are very much aware of the enormous scandal i think going on around todd akin's comments suggesting that women who were subjected to so-called legitimate rate cannot get pregnant. this is used as a justification for making it impossible for women to terminate a pregnancy that resulted from a rape. these are issues that are very serious for women. my job and my organization's job is to get that message out. it is not just about the reproductive health care that is at stake. women's economic security is

very much on the line. we know the middle class is struggling in this country. it will get worse if the budget were to be enacted. women who support over half of the middle class families, over half of women are the sole support for an essential support for their family. the budget converts medicare to a voucher program that has had a disproportionate impact on women. sets of social security for benefit cuts that congress could not slow down. very disproportionate impact on women. the cuts to medicaid that are proposed in the budget would again have a very disproportionate impact on women and would force thousands of nursing homes around the country to close. the budget -- proposed budget would cut an entire range of social programs that women rely on and that employed women as

teachers, nurses, and nurses' aides and child care workers. and social workers. there is an enormous amount at stake. this is an election in which i think that the positions are very starkly different between the obama-bijan to get and the -- biden ticket and the romney- ryan ticket. host: what has the controversy done? >> women are paying close attention to -- they are paying close attention to what the republicans say in their convention but they will be reading carefully the republican platform. the akin controversy has put a

spotlight on these issues. absolutely. we need that controversy. we need to get the word out and that takes resources. latest polls are showing an increasing gender gap. that will grow and i think that is a good thing for our national spotlight to the on these very -- be on these issues so they do not fly under the radar. so that when voters go to the polls and vote, they really know what they're voting for. otherpartnering with women's organizations to get this word out. i think that moderate women, independent women voters are the ones that are taking a close look at this and they're going to be voting -- there will leave the republican party and voting

for democrats in droves. i would like to see that my organization is a non-partisan organization and i think it is a problem for the republican party to be so dominated by a very thin slice of the extreme faction in its party. the party leadership's policies, the shutting down of family planning clinics, the anti-birth control, anti-abortion even for victims of rape or incest or for women who are ill and need to terminate their pregnancies for their health. those kinds of policies are not shared by the vast majority of voters in this country and they're not shared by mainstream republican voters. i am hoping that this election cycle will demonstrate to the republican party leadership they need to come back more to the center and be more in tune with what the mainstream of voters

really want in terms of policy. >> in fact, here is two articles related to what we have been talking about. this is a poll, women negatively swayed by romney's views. and "uproar over abortion could recapture efforts to senate." our guest joins us from virginia beach, virginia. visitingam, family. caller: there was a study i saw

on one of the learning or discovery channels that have to do with how some lady, i believe she was a member of n.o.w. and wanted to find out if the n.o.w. dominated in the animal kingdom. they studied monkeys, apes, bad loans and they did a study in england where they're much more sexually inhibited -- uninhibited. and did a study -- host: what is your question? caller: the question is when women will find out when they control life. host: we are going to ron in

raytown, missouri. on the independent line. you're on the air. caller: no one wants to admit that race is at hand from the time that gentleman called the president a liar, it seems like the democrats talk to their tail between their legs and the republicans have gotten away with every sort of thing imaginable and you know what, it is disgraceful that we are in a time that we are when the rest of the world is going forward. america is stock in racism and sexism. it is very shameful. thank you very much. i am a first-time caller. host: welcome and thank you for

calling. you said there was a gender gap when it comes to voting. men going more republican, women going more democratic. what is your view of that? is that a good thing, is that a negative thing? guest: it is an indication of how the republican party is going in the wrong direction. women are over 50% of the voting population of this country. you would think that such a large proportion of the country would be more evenly distributed across the political spectrum. i think that in fact women are more or less evenly distributed across the political spectrum. compared to the entire population. what is happening is the republican party leadership is living mainstream people behind. that said, it is true that women

tend to skew more progressive than men. some studies that show that. i think the enormous gender gap we're beginning to see now is a reflection of how out of step with the mainstream of american society the republican leadership has become. that is a terrible thing. we have a two-party system in this country and will rely on both parties to provide options for voters to provide choices for voters that would reflect the policy preferences. right now the republican party leadership is pushing policies that do not reflect what the majority of people in this country want. that does not mean they cannot get elected. we know that ever since the citizens united decision came down, we have billionaires' and corporations pouring money into these elections and people who do not respect or reflect the views of the majority of people

in this country. i think that more than one of the reasons you're seeing this enormous gender gap is because you have a lot of money coming in in 2010 and have politicians getting elected that do not reflect what the american people want. and now, women and men are looking and saying, what do you mean you are opposed to birth control? over the spring, the blunt amendment in the senate and the companion bill in the house which vice-presidential candidate paul rand firmly supported would block women's access to birth control. of all things. that is way out of step. i think the gender gap is a symptom of something that is going very wrong with politics in this country. host: the next call comes from kara in massachusetts from our republican line. caller: i would like to make two

quick comments. this election concerns more than just the women's movement in this country. second, the remark about todd akin absolutely blows my mind. she knows and i know in the country knows he was referring to the thousands of men who are sitting in prisons today who were wrongfully convicted of rape by vindictive woman or spouses looking for a favorable result in court and that cannot be denied and is wrong that they are -- it is wrong that they are taking that attitude with todd akin. any comment? guest: i have frequently heard

that. any women who say they are -- they were raped her lying because their vengeful against the man they accuse. rape is a seriously underreported crime in this country. rape has begun to be treated seriously only toward the end of the 20th-century in this country. we have the violence against women act has brought us a very long way toward preventing rape and stopping it from happening. we have a long way to go and rape is a scourge in this country. women do not claim they have been raped lightly because very often, they feel the system betrays them. many women feel -- say they feel free the second time when they make the accusation and try to bring the perpetrator to justice so that is a problem. i do want to say something on what the caller said that -- about individuals being wrongly convicted. the good news is that we do have

dna testing that can much more accurately identify a rapist. the dna process has resulted in freeing a number of individuals who were wrongly convicted of ain number of crimes. that needs to go forward. rape kids are languishing for lack of -- kits are languishing for lack of resources to process them. we need to get serious about processing the rape kits and putting resources into them to make sure there process. because of the violence against women act and because of dna testing and a program of franticrap -- forensic rape examinations, we have learned that although one in four women will be raped in her lifetime, it is not all the case that one

in four men are perpetrators. it is a serial crime. it is a small minority committing a large number of rapes. dna testing can help us find them and put them in prison where they belong. host: n.o.w. endorsed president obama and vice president in. here is the announcement. i have heard it all now. n.o.w. is a non-partisan reservation. please list the republicans you will be supporting this year. >> before the republican party took the equal rights amendment didof its plant,k, n.o.w. endorsed the republican party.

somebody send me a republican who is in favor of women's rights, who supports equal marriage for same-sex couples, who understands women's needs for the full range of health care, who understands the needs for economic security. to understand that women today do not have equal pay for equal work and is willing to take a leadership role in changing that fact. in fact i believe at the state level and the local level, there still are some republican policy makers that chapters can work with and indorse but we are nonpartisan. we're for the women. president obama and vice president biden are our choice for this year's election because they have shown themselves to be supportive of women's rights. they are putting us on the right path toward equality. so that is what we look at. sabrinarry o'neil,

schafer was our guest. guest: paul ryan is seen as a true fiscal conservative. it was a nod to the conservative voters who want to see him standing up for free market policy prescriptions and when he selected paul rand, that was extremely helpful to him among his base. it was new blood for the left to say, look how bad he is, he is going to be one of those conservatives who hates women. host: terry o'neil? policiesaul ryan's could not be worse for women. i do not know how he is -- feels about women but his policies could not be more devastating.

there is the budget which is the romney-ryan budget and that budget devastates woman. women cluster in a very small number of job classifications. only in 25 out of over 500 job class that -- classifications do you see women have a 50% more of the jobs. women are two-thirds of minimum- wage workers. two-thirds of the minimum wage workers are female. paul renne's policies would devastate low income workers by taking away things like food stamps and headstart and pell grants and after-school programs. these are all programs that women disproportionately rolen. a woman who currently is benefiting from an after-school program in her community, she can keep her job because she knows her child or children have a safe place to go after school.

if that school program is shut down which under ryan's plan it would become a she has to leave work to make sure they get to child care in a safe place. the budget plan that drastically cut programs for middle income and lower income communities in order to enrich billionaires', that is simply bad for women. i do not know if he hates women. i know his policies are fiercely and partially -- harshly anti- woman and that is a fact. host: you are on with terry o'neil. caller: i have been a big fan of c-span and i've watched a lot of government programs. the house function, the bill their packaging -- they're

passing is the reason we have gotten into this mess. the republicans are about saying one thing and doing another which is evidenced by the bills they passed. go to the government website and see what they have done this year. he might be amazed that three- fourths of the bills they passed concerned abortion, controlling women's rights to choose, planned parenthood. it is ridiculous. i do not know of the public is being fooled by what they see on television but caring organizations like hers need to let people know what is going on so we can stop being fooled by these pretenders who are not what they say there. host: terry o'neil. guest: thank you very much. i appreciate those comments. i have heard from other quarters not within the women's movement a concern expressed that in the media, there is an effort to be

frankly bipartisan as opposed to non-person. i think it is important to -- for everyone to stop and reflect on the difference between being bipartisan where you say, the republicans have one view and the democrats have another view. they're equal and we will present these to -- two people views. that is my view of bipartisanship. non-partisanship is telling the truth. telling the truth about a policy even it -- if it turns out that the truth about the policy makes the person who was pushing that policy look really bad. if it is a bad policy, and needs to be identified as a categorically bad policy. to say that paul ryan is a fiscal conservative does not capture his agenda. he is a radical transferer of wealth. the budget has been described by

an economist, a well-known economist as the single largest wealth transfer from middle and lower income families to the very wealthiest in this country that our country has ever seen. by the way, the budget is not fiscally conservative in the sense that it does not reduce the federal budget deficit. it simply takes money from one sector of the economy and ships it to another sector. all the savings from cutting medicare -- converting medicare to a voucher program, cutting medicaid, cutting social security benefits, cutting all the programs, all the savings goes to increase military spending and enhanced tax breaks for millionaires and corporations. there is virtually no deficit reduction. if you want to be non-partisan, it really have to be reported that the budget shifts money to

the wealthy even though they feel that makes them look bad. because if in fact they are bad, they need to be reported as being bad. that is not a failure of neutrality. it is a conversation that is beginning to be had within journalism circles and in the media about how to report something truthfully, even when the side that feels it is being made to look bad does not like the truth. host: we are talking with terry n.o.w. president of please go ahead. caller: i am so glad i got in with terry because i like what she is saying. my comment is, i am opposed to hal republicans are saying that -- how women can

miscarry when they are rape. i know how it feels to be raped. my other steven is republicans should be uncovered for what they have been their entire lives. i am so appalled at how they disrespect our president. the only do it because he's a man of color. the respected president bush. they cannot even say president obama. thank you and i pray you keep speaking out for women. it is sad when you -- they tried to take us back to where we came from. you stand up and speak for us.

thank you for listening. guest: thank you so much. i think it is really important, some of the points the color made are very important. one thing about the restrictions on abortion that she raised, they really are troubling. todd akin is pursuing a policy to outlaw abortion in cases of rape or incest or to preserve a woman posing health. that is the same policy that paul ryan is very aggressively in favor of. todd akin justifies this policy by saying that women who are legitimately rate cannot get pregnant. paul ryan has disavowed that justification for his anti- abortion policy even in cases of

rape. paul ryan on a number of occasions has voiced the opinion that womanlike, that women cannot be trusted, that women are deceitful about their health status and whether they have been raped. what i mean by that is for example, he was a sponsor of a bill in congress that restricted women's access to abortion care with a rape exception but only if the break was -- rape was "forcible." the reason for having this qualification is the belief that a woman in fact will lie about having been raped but only if she shows purses or broken bones or cuts on her body. should we believe her when she says that she has been raped? that is deeply, deeply disrespectful of women and that is something that paul ryan has

supported and said. he was on the floor of the house of representatives on tape when he was complaining about how women are deceitful and will lie about their health status. he does not want any exceptions to abortion bans. in cases where the abortion is needed to protect a woman's health. the reason he does not want exceptions is he believes women will be deceitful and will lie about their health status simply in order to have an abortion. you have to be clear about this. women who have breast cancer, whose birth control fails, they are dealing with this disaster of breast cancer which affect your entire family. to terminate a pregnancy which she needs to do to protect her health will cost $5,000 or greatly more. the policy of being anti- abortion even when it is necessary to protect a woman's

health is her family has to come up with five dozen dollars -- $5,000, up to $10,000. paul ryan would allow that women to suffer that way because he believes that women generally are deceitful and would lie about their health status. there is something very wrong with that attitude. i think the caller really brings that up. one in four women. look to your left and you're right. someone you know has been sexually assaulted. it is a trauma and what society needs to do is provide services for survivors and accountability for perpetrators and not blame and shame the victims or control their reproductive health decisions after they have been raped. host: darryl tweets in, with the battle lines drawn, why are some

women staunch republicans? guest: i think party loyalty is strong. i am glad some women are staunch republicans. some women share the views of politicians like paul ryan and todd akin. there are a large number of republican women who are determined to make a positive contribution to their communities through the republican party. my hope is that those women will be allowed to come up into leadership and bring the party more to the center and have the republican party that is more in tune with the policy preferences of women at -- of this country. host: next call for terri o'neil -- terry o'neil. you are on the air.

please go ahead. caller: i am a staunch republican and i am anti- abortion. i do believe in certain circumstances, but all those america, that is not our only concern is a boarding little babies and ripping them from their mamas bellies. you are so concerned with saving the world that you do not care about a little old tiny innocent baby. there is something wrong with you people, do you hear? one of these days you're going to pay for it. the good lord is not going to slaughter the babies. do you understand? they are nursing and they are playing with their feet, the get hiccups. how can you justify going in

there and dripping that little old thing out? there is something long -- wrong with you. host: we will leave it there. terry o'neil? guest: that passionate view does exist. i have talked to a large number of women over the years. i lived in louisiana for 20 years teaching at tulane down there. a lot of women have told me this. i think abortion is wrong. i think it is a san. -- a sin. but sometimes a woman has to do something that is wrong. i have had women say when my daughter had an abortion, we thought it was wrong but we were glad it was available to her. because sometimes doing the wrong thing is the right thing to do. it is astonishing how difficult this issue is. i have to tell you the truth.

my view of abortion is that is health care. it is part of women's reproductive health care. one in three women will have an abortion by the age of 45. it is an extremely common and necessary aspect of women's reproductive health care. the rate of abortion would go down if we had better birth control which thanks to obamacare, women have much better access to reliable, safe birth control which is only good. the reality is, abortion is health care and every woman has the absolute right which no one can legitimately take from her. they can exercise power and illegitimately take it from her. no one can legitimately take away her right to be in charge of her health care. here is a tweet.

how do you feel about women being members at the vester golf club? -- august golf club? guest: that was the brainchild of a coalition of women's organizations. it was proposed that the golf club should come into the 21st century and start hosting women. i am happy for condoleezza rice and marla moore. i look forward when half the members are women. that is pretty appropriate. host: do you believe that places like a private club should be

able to maintain its own policies, whether or not who'd to admit? guest: absolutely not. augusta is a place where business gets done. it is a place where the ceo's of the top corporations in this country do deals, top business, and that needs to be opened up completely to women. national golfsta club wants to change its position, if they want to become a small, little book club or a golf club, find that they're not. these clubs where business gets done, those are clubs where people of color and women need to be openly admitted on the same basis as anyone else. host: if abortions are legal,

why cannot a woman go to a hospital to get one? guest: abortion care is an extremely safe outpatient procedure and is not appropriate to have medical procedures done in one place where it is -- when it is more real to do them in another. some are done in hospitals. one of the most unfortunate things that has happened in the last several hundred years is the demonization and politicizing of abortion care. abortion care like all the other aspects of women's reproductive health care should simply be dealt with as health care. as medically appropriate. we need to have ongoing research so that medicine provides women with the health care they need. we need to do more research, provide better care overall for women, and that includes abortion care.

over 90% of abortions take place in the first trimester at a time when the most appropriate facility is an outpatient facility. host: the independent line. caller: thank you. i am a naturalized american citizen. it is a great country. it has not gotten past racism and sexism unlike the other caller alluded to. violation of a woman against her wishes is plain and simple unacceptable in and dance country like america regardless of party affiliations. i happen to be an independent. when this happens when a woman is raped and she gets pregnant, it should be plain and simple as her taking the appropriate steps to protect her body from the ongoing reminder of four -- her ordeal, and i do not

understand why this is being debated. no one should be telling a woman how she should handle the situation, especially after she is -- has been raped. and she continues to be read for the rest of her life? that is ridiculous that is even being discussed. a woman should be allowed to abort the child if that is what she chooses to do. there may be some women who may not do because of their beliefs but if a woman wants to abort the child, i did not understand why this is a discussion. that is my point. thank you for giving me this opportunity. guest: two things that the caller mentioned that i wanted to lift up. the ongoing issue of racism as well as sexism in our country. i think there is some troubling studies that show extraordinary wealth disparities across racial lines. it has got to be dealt with. the median net worth of white families so far exceeds the

median net worth of african- american families and latino families it is mind-boggling. as a country we need to address that. that correlates directly with health outcomes. there are studies showing racial disparities in health outcomes among women. that is something we desperately need to address. the other thing the caller mentioned is about what a woman decides to do after she has been raped. women need to be told by every single hospital that she goes to after she has been raped about the availability of emergency contraception. that can prevent pregnancy after rape. hospital should be required to not only provide the information but provide the emergency contraception after the rape. there are 31 states in this country that cannot believe it or not, allow rapists who impregnate their victims to actually asserts fathers'

rights to custody of the child. that legal right has been used in a number of cases by rapists to avoid prosecution. he cuts a deal with his victim that he will stop seeking access to her child if she decides to continue the pregnancy. he will trade off his agreement to stop trying to have access to the child in return for her agreement not to hold him criminally responsible for his crime. it is completely a rages and my understanding is there are 31 states that allow this to happen. that needs to change. host: the last call from winona, new jersey. a democrat. you are on c-span. caller: when my daughter was 13, some animal broke into my house, raped and sodomized her. he was caught, he had many rapes

before and my daughter was brought to the hospital and given something to make sure that she was not prevent. i did not want that little old ab of that animal inside my daughter to break -- baby of that animal inside my daughter. it is ridiculous to tell a girl carry the baby full tuerm. paul ryan is in favor of that. guest: thank you for calling. i am so sorry this happened to you. when that happens it usually happens to her entire family. it is deeply traumatic and my heart goes out to you and

your family. it is important to hear these stories. host: thank you for being with us this morning. >> on friday, thomas burr discusses mitt romney's mormon faith and the role of religion in the 2012 presidential campaign. and then harold quinn talks about the ruling by the d.c. court of appeals striking down an epa regulation. and more on our online media series here on c-span. we are on the countdown to the conventions. in four days, gavel-to-gavel coverage of the republican national convention. here on c-span, you're from road

to the national conventions. -- front row to the national conventions. and then the discussion of the online news for reservations. and a look >> what i like watching on c- span is the live coverage of the debates going on on the floor. i am going through the major news channels, there tends to be a lot of talking heads, not a lot of substantive talk about what is actually going on. that is what i like about it. it is the fact that it is basically stripped of that letter of bias. you are just showing us what is happening on the floor of the house of representatives today in that moment, giving us that insight into how the process actually works. >> daniel watches our programming on comcast. c-span, created by america's

cable companies in 1979. brought to you as a public service by your television provider. >> the republican national convention starts on monday. here is tampa police chief jane pasteur, security planning. >> thank you. i just want to go ahead and go on about what the police department has done to prepare for this event. before i do that, i want everybody to know the the first element of any special event deployment is that we cover the neighborhoods. we want to make sure there is no reduction in service to any of our neighborhoods. the rnc is not any different. every neighborhood will have the same number of officers that you have on any other day of the year. we will use all the officers in addition to that to function in

the rnc. this takes about 3500 to 4000 police officers in order to secure an event of this magnitude. we do not have that number in the county or in the tampa bay area. we have partnered with other law enforcement agencies throughout the state to come here and assist us with this event. there are two events going on. you have the political event inside the secure zone. that is controlled by matt miller and the secret service. that process is to elect a candidate for presidency. then you have the band on the outside of the secure zone that we are responsible for. that is where people will be able to come and express their viewpoints and exercise their first amendment rights. both of those processes are equally important, and it is our job to insure that everybody has a sixth platform on which to express their views.

the community-oriented policing is not a philosophy, not a division, a bureau in the police department. it is our philosophy. it is our way of life. that defines the tampa police department. that is the way we have been able to reduce crime so dramatically of the last nine years. we have reduced crime in the city of tampa by 64.3%. we have reduced auto theft by 90%. we did that through community policing. we are going to use that same approach with the rnc. all of you have seen a map of the eve and. in the of the end zone, it will be broken down into four smaller areas. each of those geographic areas will be overseen by a commander from the tampa police department or the county sheriff's office. in those areas, there will be smaller geographic areas,

especially in the downtown, of several blocks that officers will be assigned to. they will be assigned throughout the rnc. everybody will get to know them. business owners, residents, visitors -- they will get to know the officers in that area. the officers will get to know their area as well. we will be very successful. we obviously have the ability to expand and contract on that if we have kraft management issues in a particular area, we have the ability -- crowd management issues in a particular area, we have the ability to send more officers. these of uniforms you will see. i know everybody loves this polyester uniform years, but we will be using a tan khaki uniform that is cotton. we chose that for two reasons. one, it is cooler for the officers. two, it is more approachable. it has a friendlier look. people will not hesitate to come forward to the police officer

and approach them. the crowd management year, which we affectionately refer to as the turtle gear, you will see put a graph of that. that will be donned whenever there is an issue of public safety or a large crowd we have to deal with. it is our hope that nobody will see that, but that is probably unrealistic. our job is to identify individuals that are bent on destruction or destruction and remove them from the crowd as quickly as possible so that we can restore that peaceful environment in which individuals are able to demonstrate. the vast majority of individuals coming to tampa to express their point of view, to demonstrate, will do so peacefully. there will be a very small group that will be, as i said, bent on destruction and destruction. we will be dealing with those

individuals. we have done a great deal to communicate with all levels of the individuals that are involved with the rnc at town hall meetings. we have had meetings with the business managers, building managers in the downtown area, we have met with a lot of individuals to try to communicate exactly what to expect and what we will be seen during this event. we have communicated with individuals that are coming to take -- tampa to demonstrate. we have participated in two panels with the aclu. i participated in a national webinar dealing with the rnc that was hosted by the aclu. frankly, the aclu was singing our song. they were telling everyone that they do not support any criminal activity and their expectation is that everyone will follow or

abide by the lawful roles -- rules of any police officer. they said there will be individuals whose job is to incite everyone into taking actions and normally would not take, and they cautioned individuals throughout the hour- and-a-half to not get involved in that. again, it is our job to insure that everybody has a safe time and everybody gets to express their viewpoints. as was stated by linda, we have a parade route, but we know there will be spontaneous events. we are communicating with those individuals as well so that we can develop a route and a process that will be advantageous to everyone. we certainly expect that as well. here is the uniforms i talked about. on the left is what you will see on a day to day basis. on the bottom is what we affectionately refer to as our turtle. -- turtle gear.

have done a great deal of training for the rnc. officers get 10 days of trading. we have intensive crowd management training put on by the department of home and security. that involves three days of training that every officer involved in crowd management has gone through. we have also done a great deal of training on the philosophy of enforcement and the first amendment. the golden rule at the tampa police department is that everybody is treated with dignity and respect. everyone. there is no exception to that rule. that is the same thing with the rnc. obviously that is a cornerstone of law enforcement, and all officers will be expected to treat everyone with dignity and respect. again, we are reinforcing with all the officers that are coming to assist us with this yvette -- we have done five sessions of

two-day supervisor and commander training. this is not your everyday policing where an officer deals one-on-one with a witness, a victim, a suspect -- this is group policing. officers will be expected to act as a group on the commanders instruction and not act individually. we have trained all of the supervisors and commanders and let them know that we expect -- have set the bar very high, and our expectations of their leadership, they are to ensure that the officers are showing restraint, that they bring an extra supply of patients with them, and that they only act on the commanders orders. the sheriff and myself dedicate -- have a message that emphasizes the message for every

officer coming here. if that was not enough, we wanted to make sure the stock with every officer. we have a test that all of the officers have been obligated to take and pass. we have done a great deal of training. we believe that everyone will be prepared. frankly, everyone is prepared for this event. we will make sure it is positively reflecting on the city of tampa. >> no. republican national convention starts on monday in tampa. the keynote speaker will be governor chris christie of new jersey. senator marco rubio of florida will deliver the introduction to presidential candidate mitt romney, who speaks on thursday. we will have gavel-to-gavel coverage of the republican and democratic national conventions on c-span s. >> friday, republica

presidentn canada it mitt romney and his running mate paul ryan will be campaigning in michigan three days ahead of the convention. we'll be live, starting at 12:00 p.m.. >> what do we see when we look at the debt at antietam? they responded to this into dominant ways. one, by describing the bodies in great detail. often stopping in the middle of that very detailed description and saying, it is too horrible, i cannot actually put this into words. words cannot convey this. >> this weekend, on american history tv, and teatime's dead. meghan kate nelson of harvard discusses the impact of the images of dead soldiers on the public during the civil war. also, this weekend -- >> america will stand up for the

whens that we believe thein, we are operating at our best, and we want to see this country above all else returned to the path of peace. >> more from the contenders, our series that looks at key figures who ran for president and lost the changed political history. this week, 1972 anti-vietnam war candidate george mcgovern. sunday, american history tv, this weekend on c-span 3. >> a look at some of the nation's state legislators under the age of 30 and the impact they are having on american politics. the national conference of state legislators hosted this discussion. >> good morning. celock of thenifer esohn

upington post. my pleasure to -- it is my pleasure to welcome you for what i hope is an exciting and lively session on her younger elected officials and staff. we have a diverse and dynamic panel of legislators, staffers, and a non-partisan staffer. i would like to thank the staff coordinating committee and the young professionals program for hosting the discussion. i want to start out with a little bit of background on the topic, just to help lead into today's discussion, and then throw it to our panelists. young elected officials, 35 years and under -- when i came up with the idea for the book about six years ago, it had come from the fact that a lot had been written about why someone in their 20's or even as a teenager runs for elected

office. it does not matter -- you get the quick, almost quirky story of a young guy runs for office, that is it. you do not get anything of why they are running, who these people are, what impact they have on public policy, what drives them, motivates them. one thing i have noticed is a lot of young people who run for office and choose to get involved as political staffers, a reason they decide to do it is that there is an idea of, i will do it. that is the idea of why i decided to write the book -- i will do it. i wanted to touch on a few quick facts. not only were 13 presidents in the 20th-century starting as young elected officials, in 2008, three out of four of major candidates started as

young elected officials. president obama was in his 30's when elected to the senate. vice president biden was 29 when he was elected to the u.s. senate. sarah palin was in her 20's when she was elected to the city council in wasilla, alaska. in some states, you see a lot to people running for state legislators and an early age, in especially in the midwest. one of our panelists is from missouri. others who do not have term limits, ill., or my home state, new jersey -- the start at a younger age. i want to point that there is one district i have found incredibly fascinating. it is a multi-member district. we have one senator and two house members from it.

until sometime in 2009, every single legislator from that district was under the age of 30. senator schneider had a birthday. one of the members had won this year. the district -- there are a lot of people in their 20's running. there one incumbent is here, from the district in grand forks. the old guy, in his late 20s's. that district is interesting -- the university of north dakota dominates it. one last thing before we go to the panel -- one thing i found in interviewing current and former young elected officials around the country is for things that sort of drives them to run for office. one, the person who wants to make politics their career and says, i want to be governor, i went to the senator, i want to be president. they decide to start at a young age. the second, and it will be

interesting to see what our staffers have to say, the person who starts off as a legislative staffer, primarily in a partisan staff or on a personal staff, who then decides i will run for office. is the next up on their career path. the next, and there are several examples of this, like the minority leader in new jersey or any from york assembly -- they are the son of a politician. that is the family driver, drives them to run for office. the last one is idealism. somebody who wants to go out there, they feel they want to make change. that is how they are doing it. i found multiple examples of this. three that come to mind immediately are actually three are iraq and afghanistan war veterans. there are multiple veterans running for office.

there were three in my book to were definitely driven by idealism. one jersey city councilman and two state representatives from missouri. without further ado, i will quickly introduce might panelists by name and then go to them. starting on my left, the minority leader of the arkansas house. tish geiser, clerk of the alaska house. bryen johnson from illinois. jennifer esser from wisconsin. clem smith from missouri. quicklyart out -- introduce yourself, what drove you to run for office? >> thank you all for being here. i am a state representative from arkansas. i was elected in 2008 and and going into my last term.

something we discussed a lot today will be term limits and have that effect youth running for office. in arkansas we have strict term limits. you are limited to 32-year terms in the house. i was elected at age 23 in 2008. i am now going into my last term, unopposed. i am currently 26. i served as house majority leader for the republican party in arkansas. that is a position i've recently left in march after two years. i would only give that up and passed on to another person. it was an enjoyable position. it was something i enjoy greatly, but it is a job you only want to do for two years, then you are ready to move on. it was an interesting time to be in arkansas, certainly as a republican and the leader of the caucus, just because of national politics and how that affects things on the state level. i am sure will discuss that more. that is a brief biography for me. as far as what may be run for office, i was thinking,

everybody knows that if you are going to be president but for the, you have to start early. [laughter] the truth is that most or run for office because they are driven in some way, not by ambition, that is not always a bad thing, but with national politics being what they are, the political environment being what it is, people are a lot more motivated to get involved on every level. that includes at a under age. my brief story is that i was a manager at wendy's when i was in college, and active in college republicans. i got to know the state representative from my district, two hours south of my home town. i work for a few years as a manager. we got to know each other. one day he came through to get meals for his kids. he handed me his card and said, let's stay in touch. he is now in the senate. as he was leaving the house, so was the legislator from my district.

he convinced me it was a good gig to be in the legislature and convinced me to move back to my home town out of college to run. i was fortunate enough to have support of older people like him in my home district is made possible, but it was really -- in short, i ran for office because somebody serving convince me that it was a worthwhile goal and that you could do it at a young age. that was the main driver for me. >> my name is tish geiser. i am assistant chief clerk and the alaska house. i have been doing that job since 2005. i got my first job working for the legislature in 2004. i was 23. i was a page for the senate finance committee. i fell into that job because, after graduating from college with a political science degree, i have found myself in alaska for the summer. i was working with the cruise ship industry and having a good time. i like the town. it was also the state capital.

i thought it would be interesting to try working for a session. i found that first session to be very exciting, kind of overwhelming. the legislative process was far more complex than my political science u.s. government class in college have led me to believe. i really enjoy the work that i do. i feel like i am well suited for it. it has been compelling. i have not wanted to leave yet. >> good morning. my name is bryen johnson. i am a member of the senate democratic staff in springfield. my job -- i worked as a director of creative services division. we handle a lot of web stuff. we do quite a few things with social media. member websites, things like that. i got into politics in college. i am a siuc grad. i got to work there at the

public policy institute with paul simon. this was 2003, 2002. he kind of gave me my introduction to politics. i took an internship in springfield in 2004 i have since done a lot of different things on staff. i worked with members on communication needs, things like that. there has been a big push towards turning our efforts and focus towards the web. it has been a great thing to be a part of that. we are constantly looking for different ways to improve ourselves and to make sure that people know the good things we are doing. it is a pleasure to be here. i look forward to the discussion. >> good morning. my name is jennifer esser. thank you to everyone for being here and for sending the invitation for me to be on the panel. i began my legislative career in wisconsin state senate, working

for our caucus staff. i went on to work for the senate majority leader. then i went on to work for the senate president as his chief of staff. most recently i worked for senator pat galloway, a freshman lawmaker. unfortunately, she had to resign due to family health issues. she had a lot of things going on. that has led me to my most recent job in the house, working for the majority leader. i got into politics working for political campaigns in high school and into college. i am looking forward to the discussion today. thank you very much. >> thank you for being here. i am clem smith, a state rep. i represent the 71st district in st. louis county. i was elected in 2010, coming to the end part of my first year -- i have an election tomorrow for my second term.

[laughter] good thing i was unopposed, but it was due to a whole lot of good work that first term. i have the pleasure of representing a very diverse district in st. louis county when it comes to economics, racial diversity -- it is a wonderful thing, a wonderful place. how i got into politics was through, i do not want to go that far back, but i will start, it was to the labor union. i worked for chrysler for 13 years. the united auto workers were organized at the plant. they had a political action committee started -- i started volunteering, working on different campaigns. i thought, this is pretty fun. from that, i was promoted to the point where i was lobbying for united auto workers in the capital of missouri. i moved from st. louis city to st. louis county.

the representative decided he needed -- wanted to run for senate, so there was an opening. there were a lot of contacts i had made to being an activist. the opportunity was provided for me to run for state rep. i am here now and i really love the job. >> i want to stay with clem for the first question. there's a lot of this in all the states -- in what ways are young professionals in legislatures speaking outside -- and thinking outside the box and challenging the way the legislature has always done business? >> one-term i learned when i was first elected was that, it is always business -- always been this way. that is a term i am not accustomed to. a lot of stuff, we would go to the session, all of a sudden, the last two weeks were rushing to get everything done.

i am still trying to work through and get knowledge to try to see what is going on. a lot of younger people, i can tell, are not really happy. they say, why are we hear all session if we will wait to the last two weeks, three weeks, to get everything done? you have bills that may not have been thoroughly debated or discussed on the floor. you have a small grouping of individuals that would like to see that change. a lot of this is with ideas -- it was because of term limits that i am in the legislature now. we had a lot of people who were there for a long time, knowledgeable individuals, but when they had to move on, we had the opportunity to run for office and get there and bring new ideas -- changing world, changing time, not that we are doing anything better than they were, but bringing the new perspective is helping with the

legislation being filed and some of the ideas being grown or thrown around. >> i agree with that. i will call them the millennial, the new generation of people. there is a vast difference in how, when i started my career, versus a young co-worker of mine in a former office -- for me, i worked my way up. i do not think people have the time or the patience anymore to do that. they really want to get involved, make a change quickly, and move on to the next thing. i think that is going to be interesting. it is certainly shaking up the legislature in wisconsin. we are electing a lot of younger lawmakers were not in it to be career politicians or career staffers. people want to make a mark quickly and effectuate a change in a more aggressive way, which i think is a really good thing. >> i think i will agree with

these two. for my perspective, we are challenging a lot of the way that we communicate, from old members, members of the past two years. i think that some members believe in it the less is more model. there is, in the way that we communicate today, people want to know information and they know -- want to know it now. they want to know everything there is to know about that 30 seconds ago. our job is to make sure we provide that information to the folks who are seeking that. we have been working with members and trying to get them to buy in to what people are interested in, how they get their news these days. in 2006, there were 44 news correspondents in the capital. now we are down to 26.

people are getting their news on the internet these days. we as a staff are trying to turn ourselves into a new service. my boss is in the back, his name is john paterson -- he worked for the "daily herald." we talk all the time about sds, the senate democrat news service, because that is what we want to turn ourselves into, the place for people come to. we are challenging ways of how to transfer information. is the way that people get their information -- that is the way we are challenging the old way of doing things. >> i totally agree with brian. in the legislature, we see the public is demanding greater and easier access to information. i think that both young professionals and veteran staff are working to accommodate those

demands. in fact, one of the women in my office who, i would say, is maybe our foremost innovator, is also the youngest -- oldest member. as young professionals, we are well suited to meet this challenge because we are ambitious and we have the skill set and are comfortable with technology. i also think that we welcome new approaches. i think, for better or worse, we are not as constricted by traditional boundaries and hierarchies. we are interested in sharing in permission and we want to find new ways to do things. i think that, though we have less experience, this also makes us better suited to adapt to the future because we are more objective. we are not bound to the way things have always been done. i think that those are always -- always that we are challenging the way things have been done. in my role i also have a strong desire to see my work product stay relevant and fresh.

that takes work. >> thank you. i agree with everything that has been said. from serving in the legislature, i joke sometimes, in jest, but some are true, that whatever skills i have in the legislature i have benefited from being so young, because sometimes the legislature can be like high school. if you are 60, it is hard to go back and relearn all the things that may high school high school, but the fact it was a reason for me makes it somewhat easier to deal with. some things that might normally frustrate people serving in office. we have in arkansas a host of young members. there are two here in the audience today. we have a very high percentage of our members under the age of 40, certainly. the perspective that it brings, at least for myself, i would not trade it for the world.

i think it helped me tremendously, being young. it is like everything else you are experiencing, it is what you make of it. i see a lot of older members come in. if you are 60 years old and a successful businessman, you do not see what you do not to be in charge and they want. you get to boss people around. sometimes it is a struggle. a basic role i tried to live by is that, whatever your stereotype is, try not to play into a period being done, i try to the listener, i try to be accommodating. when you are in a building with 135 egos, 100 to define people who think they should be in charge and thus other people around -- 135 people who think they should be in charge and hospital around, being the young and being willing to step back and listen, i struggle with it sometimes, but having the perspective of knowing you did not know everything sometimes is

more helpful than hurt or -- hurt for. >> i will say, as somebody who uses legislative websites on a daily basis, i appreciate them being upgraded to a more user- friendly and easier way to find things. i think there is still a great place for especially online media outlets. >> i would agree with you. we are just trying to compete with you, that is all. >> i welcome the competition. tisha, let's start with you on this one. what is the biggest challenges you have faced as a young professional working in the legislature? what techniques of work to overcome the? >> the biggest challenge has been knowing how and when to initiate change in a culture that really value tradition, history, custom, president. -- precedent. i have developed an approach

overtime. that is, to approach this first of all gradually. it is easy for us when we are coming into our new roles or fresh in then, we see things you would like to change. it is easy to overwhelm our coworkers in trying to do that all at once. i also think that is not always a good idea to initiate change mid-session or in the heat of a moment. an example of this is, one of my jobs is to work on the house journal, an official record of house floor proceedings. the second week of the session, the second of our two-year session, i thought it would be good to change the way we reflect bill's sponsors in the journal. it was quickly decided by myself and my peers that it is probably not a good time to do that for the sake of consistency and clarity. hold on to the ideal and talk -- idea and talk about it in the interim. it is important to make change collectively. as young professionals, it is important for us to seek the advice and perspective of our co-workers who have maybe more

experience to offer, a different perspective, and hopefully to get their input in the change you want to initiate, even though there is the best game might not get behind it. -- reiskin they might not get behind it. it is important to propose changes respectfully. i work with some women who have worked their entire careers working in the legislature. i will come to them with my original idea only to find out that it is not original. it was tried seven years ago and did not work out so well. approaching them with a change needs to be done respectfully and with a little bit of humility. hopefully, keeping those things in mind, there is a balance that can be found between preserving the past and the way things have been done but also adapting to the future and moving forward. >> as far as challenges, i think

is one that young professionals have a tough time with. you start working in the legislature and have that first job, you are eager to make that change right off the job. when you are in, you want to be doing different things, getting your legislation passed. you want your member to be on the front stage, communicating on a big issue. i also think that, as a young professional, some folks that i have seen do not have the patience to withstand this beginning years when things might not move as fast as you want to. that is one of the challenges that we face is an professionals. part of dealing with that is

being measured in your expectations. that is what i try to preach to the understaffed. we have to be measured in our expectations and, -- younger staff. we have to be measured in our expectations and move forward slowly. take those successes in and know you are doing something good. >> i would agree. for me, i was mentored by a number of colleagues -- in wisconsin, the senate to work for is a very traditional body. they do not take kindly to people coming in and brought the trying to shake things up. -- a corrupt the trying to shake things up. try to shakeabruptly things up. i got to know the members first. having their respect makes it easier to sell your ideas.

now i have the idea to mentor a number of my colleagues. that is the first thing i say -- sit back a little bit, get to know the members, the colleagues, and you'll do much better. it does not take as long as people think. there is a lot of impatience out there with young professionals. take the time, make the investment, that is something nobody will regret the cure it has been quite a few challenges with me. --. >> -- it has been quite a few challenges with me. people should already take too seriously, you should not have to prove you are serious about what you are trying to do, being a legislator -- that is one of the problems that happens with me. people are thinking, i am supposed to be in a box already, you are a black legislator, you are younger, you are supposed to do whatever the black caucus tells you what to do. your in box instead of digging to be a person. other individuals, you win an

award, somebody is like, i have been here 10 years and i never got that award. little things, high school years -- high school things, like he said, to happen. it puts you a position where you want to do something bold. it has got to be something good for the people still. sometimes you get a little bit of hate for older members and people who have been in the legislature lugger the new -- along pretty new. people who look at your ideas like to do not know what you are talking about. they say, i have done this -- i say, let's go check with someone else. i say, i am not pulling this out of the sky. this comes from a place and the people i work with. getting people to understand you are serious about this, that this is not a joke, that we are not looking like this -- looking at this like it is west wing, we are planned politicians -- we

are here to make a difference. >> on the policy side, i would wake up every morning while i was getting ready and play the rolling stones "you can not always get what you want." it was followed by "the gambler" by kenny rogers. know when to hold them, know when to fold them. that is always important in a policy perspective, especially when you are in a minority party, you have the democratic governor, all the things you want to do -- you have to push the line as much as you can and then realize you have the best position possible and make a deal, make a compromise, however you want to put it, but realize, when you have done your job as the loyal opposition, knowing what to take, you had effective policy on the level you are supposed to. from a personal -- and this

said, there are always stereotypes. i have always seemed that older members can get away with things that number members cannot. that is true, even though it might not be exactly the same -- and there are always different standards if you are a female or minority legislature, but there are also different standards if you are a young remembered. the older member can wear jeans to a committee meeting and nobody says anything. if i showed up, they would think, john does not take his job seriously. there are things, you cannot begrudge them, you can not just accept them. no matter what profession you are in -- if you are just where, instead of being bitter about, just accepted as the way the world is and probably always will be. do not let it become a hindrance in the way you do your job. do the things that people like to make issues about, do your best and where it matters. start with, let's you on the next question -- what

motivated you to get into public service as a young age or, in the case of john and clem, what motivated you to run for office? >> mine was a combination of idealism and i really did want to run. i had my whole path laid out. i was an undergraduate, working in the capital, then law school, then a run. i made the decision rather quickly that that really was not what i wanted to do, run for office. once i was there, i fell that i was getting to observe -- serve the public in a different way. i appreciate what i can do as a staffer to help my boss to make a change, be it a public policy standpoint, helping the constituents -- i felt extremely fulfilled and that role. i no longer see the need to run for legislative office, but i am grateful to my roots in the

campaign, which is what really motivated me. you mentioned campaigns, how much fun they are to work on, the people you get to meet -- absolutely invaluable experience for me. >> like i said before, i will go back to the beginning. it started when i was younger. my father, there was a department store in st. louis, black people were spending money there but they would not hire them. the naacp and other organizations put a march together. the old man said to us, you are coming with me. i did not know what they were marching about until later on in life. he told me to do it, this is what i will do. fast forward, i am a teenager, 16, 17, watching tv. i see the st. louis city board of aldermen debating. they would play it on public access. they were debating a curfew that was going to affect me.

they thought the curfew would curb crime and put it back in the classroom or whatever they thought it was going to do -- they showed the gallery, nobody was in it. i thought, this guy who does not know me is about to make a decision about how i am going to live. i was not comfortable with that. i have never been comfortable that, i have learned. those were the sparks or what ever. it just later grew when i started working with the legislative committee, at the local i was with -- it grew and grew, and i still never thought, hey, i want to run for office. when you are working for a campaign, you can say things that you cannot say when you are elected. i am like that. i like to speak my mind. sometimes i have to filter it now. i was perfectly comfortable working with the man, next to the man, not wanting to be the man. then i got a call when i moved into that area, saying, hey, you should run.

it was not something i sought out to do. i was working -- i was working 9:00 to 5:00. i still work 9:00 to 5:00 now when we are not in session. it was that sparked early on that nobody can represent me or bring my perspective like i can. since being in the legislature, making that decision process that i will run, it was looking at the makeup of the legislature and thinking, there is nobody like me there. i am a working guy. of average intelligence. but i have something to bring to the table. i wanted to be there. i did not feel like the people up there were representing what i wanted my perspective, my view of the population. i said, hey, instead of just talking about it, let's run this campaign and do something. >> mine was college. i started, when i went there, i

wanted to be a reporter. then i started to take political science class. i took a class called politics and the media. knowing what i know now, it was the two worlds of what i am doing now. it was hosted by a gentleman by name of mike lawrence. he was a press secretary for jim edgar, the former governor. after that class, he gave me the opportunity to work at the paul simon public policy institute. that was incredible. i would literally sit there and answer the phones at this place. it was amazing, the people who call. one day i was sitting at the front desk and it was howard dean during the whole thing. he was calling to get -- to talk to paul simon about it. one day, i pick up the front, it

is oprah winfrey. it was crazy. one of the things that i did was file all this correspondence. he would correspondence from heads of state, amazing array of individuals, and he always said to me, it only takes one person to make a change. i know that sounds really high in the sky, but this guy could do it. he was paul simon. he could pick up the phone and call somebody. he really inspired me. that is what kind of got me involved in this, what gave me that idealism. going to the legislature, my idealism is somewhat tempered a bit. i am not paul simon. one day maybe i will work for another paul simon or somebody like him. >> like i mentioned earlier, i graduated with a degree in

political science. i was interested in international politics, working for a non-profit, but i found myself in juneau. i found myself working for the legislation -- legislature. it was partly timing and where i was. after spending one session there, i felt like i sort of got to be addicted. it is really a dynamic work environment. even the the job i do is really similar and constant, a session by session there are so many things that are changing all the time there. also, for a number of years i worked seasonally. i worked during the legislative session, and i went to work in the tourism industry in the summer. as a young person, that was really appealing to me for the first two years, to have that variety in my life that accommodated my lifestyle well. overall, i have found has been a great fit. >> as far as what motivates the -- motivated me to run for

office, i shared some of that earlier. it goes back to a common theme, we all appreciate it. i am a big believer in luck -- you could call it fate, but it is also putting yourself in the position to take advantage of that. for me, if you like football, it was like being on the right part of the field when the ball was fumble. speak toi've chance to different groups, young people, high-school age, i tried to emphasize what i firmly believe has empowered me to do what i have done -- surround yourself with the right people. friends like elevators, they can take you up or down, but it will take you somewhere. surrounding yourself with people -- somebody who sends it to mentor to you, paul simon's. surrounding yourself people you want to help and can help, trying to be helpful in the process, these opportunities,

whether in public service, elected office, anything else, the people around to make that happen the most. >> let's start with you on the question, brian. so if somebody in high school or college said, i want to run for office or work in public- service, what advice would you give them? >> if somebody were to arrest me they -- that they wanted to work for a legislative staff, i would say, if you are looking for unique experience, you are looking in the right place. no other place do you get to be next to legislators and talk to them and not just talk about what policy we are working on. you get to become friends with these legislators and have a relationship with them. that is one thing, working the late nights, i am sure,

everybody on this panel knows about that. working with interest groups and trying to get the best results -- it is definitely something that is an extremely unique experience that you will get in no other job in your life. i would tell them that if you want to unique work experience, if you like politics, you are looking in the right place. >> i would absolutely encourage anybody to work in the legislature or run for office. i think that lawmaking is an honorable profession. it has been run through the mud. lawmakers have been chastised. i think it is unfair. there are so many well- intentioned lawmakers that i have had the privilege to work for. they have done remarkable things, from passing monumental pieces of legislation to helping their constituents in unique ways that nobody will ever talk about. for the constituents, it meant

the world. it has been a privilege for me to work for the wisconsin legislature. it has been a unique experience. i have met some of the best friends i ever had. many of them are lawmakers on both sides of the aisle. i cannot think of a better work experience i have had. it has fulfilled all of my career goals so far. absolutely, go ahead, go run for office, come work in the legislature. it is truly a privilege. i am very privileged to work their c. >> if anybody asks, i would say, go ahead, do it. when i tell you to do anything, first and foremost. but i would question more their reasons for wanting to do it and help them out in any way to dispel some of the mets or rumors they may think. if i do this, then this will happen, then this will happen. it does not always work that way. i would encourage them to run

for office, try for that job, but what is your motivation for doing it -- is it coming from a real place? try to help, i guess, answer questions. they may think one thing is one way, but in my experience it may not be. i would give them that information, but they would ultimately have to make their decision. >> i would say they should consider it. it is a dynamic and non- traditional work environment. we literally get the front row seat of state -- state policy being crafted. history is being made. it is really an honor. people do not realize that they are in a huge range of job possibilities in the legislature, from a copy operators to researchers to programmers all the way to caucus and policy staff. jobs like my own. i really think there are just a lot of opportunities for all different types of people. >> thank you.

i will play a little bit of devil's advocate, which is sometimes what i do. if somebody i really cared about was asking whether they should run for public office, if you have ever read jim baker's book, titled "study, work hard, stay out of politics." if it was somebody i really cared about, i would probably give them that a vice first. it is a very intense job. the environment we are in -- it can occupy everything about your life. if you are not prepared for it or if your life is not in a situation where the people around you, your family, are prepared for it, it can absolutely take its toll. professionally, as far as your career, but also personally, your family and others. i would seriously give that advice, but at the end of the day you have to have good people running for office. some people are good for it and some people are good at it.

we cannot always dissuade good people from running for office. without good people, you do not good policy. >> all of it is very helpful for us. a lot of people have said similar comments. the wide range. john, let's stick with you for the next question. everyone on this panel who runs for office at a young age, starts in the state legislature, starts sf -- you want to give back. giving back to the public, what is the most rewarding thing about your job? >> it is the part of giving back. when i first got elected, all you can do is push and one day it might move. you might not even know it, but it did. undoubtedly, the place for you feel like to make the most impact is on a local level,

working with constituents. i get calls very regularly. we do not have a staff in arkansas. we are limited in the view of the legislatures role in government. we do not have a paid staff, so i take all my calls directly on my cell phone. i because of the week from people who need help. sometimes it is permit applications, business is having trouble with work for services, or any of the other things politics deals with -- people trying to deal with a federal agency like disability or social security, having trouble, so it is very nice to be in a position where you can push a those smaller rocks and make the move a lot faster than you can on a policy perspective. undoubtedly, now that i've been there for four years, i am able to go to the events in my district. i am not saying this to be pretentious, but almost every event i go to, somebody says, thanks for the help on that,

thanks for helping my daughter apply for the source of, that kind of thing. that is rewarding. >> i think that for me what i find most rewarding is being part of something bigger. like i mentioned before, i really enjoy working for the legislature because of all the moving and changing parts, but there are a lot of constance -- rules, parliamentary procedure, precedents, and my job is to uphold those things. i feel honored in that role. in my office, behind my desk, i have bookcases full of the house and senate journals for the past 40 years. sometimes a research project causes me to have to flip through those. i see the names of all these people, some of whom are recognized, who served as attorneys, legislators, quarks like myself -- they have been there and watched the state celebrate achievement and worker obstacles. now my name is going to be in one of those books. i play a very small role, i keep

a journal, up from the voting board, relatively small things, but it is my role and i am really privileged to have had it. >> if you talk to any normal staffer, they would tell you it is not the pay. i genuinely think that the people who work in the illinois capital have a love for what they do. as a staffer, we are working for legislators to in their hearts are trying to do what is best to move the state court. that is gratifying. i think it takes a special type of individual to be there under the circumstances to really perform well. i think, with performing well,

that is the rewarding part. you are really trying to set yourself on a path to overcome these obstacles. everybody has financial challenges. everybody is dealing with pension issues, things like that. these guys you are working with and for are trying to the best foot forward. you are part of that. you are trying to help them do that. you have a lasting impact on policy. that will be in the books for years to come. >> as a staffer, it is my job to help my boss to move their policy agenda forward. it is my job to make sure constituents are there to work on the cases. for those of you in the audience on lawmaker's staff, constituents contact you. you can relatively quickly turn

around a case. i once spent 18 months working on one constituent case from start to finish. the senator was relentless in trying to do each and every thing he could to help his constituents who had an issue with their natural resources department, a squabble about a shed in a wetland. we drafted legislation, the law was vetoed by the then governor. we went to the attorney general. always call and say, sorry this is taking so long. we have to see this through. in saying thank you for what you are doing, that felt tremendously great. at the end of the day, we were successful and we did help him. again, it was all i needed, my way of giving back. >> number one on that list would be the constituent service part of it. if someone calls with an issue,

you know is right. they may be having a problem with one or more departments in this day. all of a sudden, the issue was handled. being in the minority, which the democrats are in the missouri house, it is a small victory when you can get an amendment added that you know the you care about that can really benefit your people. and hopefully this bill will become law. you get an amendment added. it is a good feeling because you know it will probably never passed any legislation unless i sell my soul which is -- it is one of those things. being an elected official, you get access. people ask you to come speak at different events. to build airplanes as his day job, i may not be able to get

it. i talked to a group of youngsters that are on their way to high school, hopefully to get to college. i was able to sit in front of them and give them little information. that was because of the job or the position of state representative that i have. those moments right there where you have this chance to connect with the community. you have something to say positive. >> you were talking about getting amendments, the elected colleagues in the democratic caucus of misery was very proud of that amendment he got past three times. to be in the university of kansas jayhawks logo. it has been signed by gov. nixon.

they take no side in the war between kansas and missouri. i want to make sure that that is clarified. helping people is my most rewarding thing. this is one that i find very interesting. people watching on c-span both in politics and outside of politics, i spent two years recently doing volunteer work with the searching for work group sponsored by the presbyterian church. this is a group of people that obviously, given the economic climate are searching for work. it is open to the entire surrounding communities.

networking, it is something that you hear a lot. networking is very important. and you have any stories about your network experience? and any other advice? >> networking is a very important piece of life of being an elected official. a lot of the knowledge that i have learned has come to me because of networking. with do a lot of traveling the state that i men. talking to different people, it

is good for me to go talk to cattle ranchers. another story i have, it happened in a crazy way. i missed it on a different level. you have the delegates all over the state of missouri, normally you would never see them at this meeting and they have to vote to see who the delegates will be. i had to travel throughout the state and form a genuine relationship with these people. when i am sitting there writing, they say, we know you. this is amazing.

i had no idea that i knew this many people. and when the vote totals came in, i was able to get that position because of networking. sometimes it is the east side of the state or the west side of the state, fighting over resources. that never would have happened because i decided to get outside the box and go talk to some people that historical you don't talk to him. you don't talk to republicans in this area. networking is key. it can point you in the right direction. that is part of why i am here at this conference. it is meeting different people, getting different policy ideas. something might be working in georgia and we can bring it to misery. i would not know this if i didn't network with those individuals. >> i don't think i would be on the stage if it wasn't for

networking. when i worked on campaigns in high school and college, those people became lifelong friends. i am where i am today because of them. there is no doubt in my mind. when you are a young staffer, you are not quite sure who to speak to or what to do. these people pointed me in the right direction and give me advice, such as joining the softball team or the volleyball team. if you want to go out for a beverage after work, it is a great way to meet people. that is the one piece of advice that i give to my co-workers and interns in my office. cut out with me. let's meet people. you never stop working. just because you get the job doesn't mean you stop. if you have to keep going. i met connections through my boss as well. at that opened up doors.

it is the most important thing that young staffers should do and continue to foster throughout their tenure in the legislature. >> definitely throughout the tenure, networking is important. for me, personally, some of my best friends were in the legislature or with lobbyists. they had come from work experience. i think that working is super important when you start talking about being really good your job. you need to know and have the information from others. i think staying on top of your game doesn't just involve you, it involves the people around you, knowing what they know. keeping those relationships and building those relationships is important to your success and the people around you. i had an experience just five minutes ago, five minutes before

we started. the gentleman asked me for my business card. i don't have that. make sure that you carry those with you always. >> i find networking to be intimidating, so i try to be natural and think of it in terms of building relationships. in alaska, we have legislators and staff that come to juneau for three months. there are lots of fun activities that go on to give people something to do. i think they serve as networking opportunities, things like softball or bowling. there are various ways to get involved. the last few years, i have gotten more involved with my staff section composed of clerks and secretaries from the other states. that has been really fun and rewarding because we kind of play a unique role in the

legislature. sometimes it is difficult to talk about our jobs with other people that don't work for the legislature. there is a little bit of mystery surrounding it. it is frustrating talking to people that dealt with the same challenges. coming up with the challenge or thinking of a new process that we know another state has undergone, because of that, we can contact them. i see lots of reasons to keep doing it. >> i get made of sometimes -- fun of sometimes, but networking is very important and everything that has been said is very true.

there is plenty of that stuff to go to and i am a firm believer that you should. i am a firm believer that if you are doing the job nobody else wants to do, you have opportunities that nobody else has. as minority leader, when i was trying to get someone to meet with the staff, everybody was busy. when we had dinner, everybody was free. it was hard to get a group to study budgets. go and shake hands and meet the other people you need to meet. at the end of the day, knowing that idealistically our hard work and talents will give us opportunities more so than just standing around talking about how great we think we are.

>> as a kid, growing up, it was opening up to people. you talk about networking and you will have to go up to somebody. there will have to be some sort of discussion. some people are terrified of that. some people in this room, probably. you talk every day to people and all it is is a conversation with someone you have not met before. be with each other all the time, says next to something you haven't seen. -- sit next to somebody you haven't seen. there are some common interests, like, or dislikes that a conversation can start from. that is what is happening. it weakened this like and we somehow start to talk.

you have a connection. sometimes we go to these -- that reading can blossom into something good. >> definitely very true. i serve on the board of columbia university and we have the member reception's once a year. don't talk to me at this. talk to everyone else. talk to the other -- it is very true for networking. we have a microphone, actually. over there, the c-span cameras. if you could introduce yourself to start, your name and your position. we will start in the front row.

>> i am a first term member from the arkansas house. we are both in opposition parties and in the minority party in our respective states. what's tragedies do you used to work to pass legislation? >> i am still learning on that one. when you have -- here is an example. we have 163 state representatives. we had more new republicans coming in than in the democratic caucus. psychologically, he did something to the democrats that were there. we have to be together first and foremost to try to make things happen. currently, we don't even have the votes if we got together to pass a bill. some issues you get fracturing with the republican party.

we can stop stuff happening or get legislation amended, but it is a bit of a challenge. it is a difficult thing. in committees, sometimes you can get amendments and things of that sort, things altered, language changed. i don't know if my caucus or maybe i missed that meeting, i don't know what we can do at this point other than get more members. it is a psychological thing that you lose every vote on the floor and you have got to stay with it. and throwjust give up the tallinn.

>> don't worry, i have my notebook of out of the successful in the minority party and i will pass that to you in 2012. and we will pass an appropriations bill and it probably gives us a little bit more impact than maybe some states. in arkansas, that was very impact with the way that we approach the budget. undoubtedly, the republicans have their highest numbers in legislatures in arkansas than ever before. i think we had a successful impact on the budget but there

is the charge of partisanship. when you have the debate that never existed before, it is very challenging. how do you affect the budget but not pace yourself the corner -- in a corner? the band is marching down the aisle and there is nowhere to go. they walked into the wall. how do you successfully impact the process and the policy without boxing yourself in? i think as the minority party, by holding out some appropriation bills, there are different things where we end up passing higher amount of tax cuts. in the fiscal session that we just came out of, it did not change the budget all that much. most importantly, at the end of the day, we had one of the

shortest sessions that we ever had. we did all the things that we would want to avoid being compared to washington. anytime there is debate and discussion, you want to make sure that you end up with a final project and you can talk about what you have done. >> before we move on, jennifer brought in the majority parties. when you were in the senate, the majority party. anything you would want to add from that perspective? >> the pendulum's which is all the time, so the best advice i ever got was from my former boss, that we work both sides of the aisle. it waws the best advice i got, transcended sitting in the

democratic caucus. i took notes for our caucus. in that room, i formed friendships. if you treat people as people and find some common ground, it does help. they are a little strange, and that is putting it mildly. for me, having worked both sides of the auto, this has been a struggle for me. i would just encourage people to try to reach out across the aisle to the best extent that you can. and don't just try to talk to someone because they are of a particular party. it will pay dividends as it has for me.

>> definitely do both sides of the aisle. the pendulum hasn't swung in a while. we have been in a position to be able to have a great legislative impact. as far as being part of staff and on the floor, a lot of the things we do our very non- partisan. it is important to work the other side of the auto for those partisan issues so that they know you are not just trying to jab that when those things come down. i will let you know this is coming. it is just the way that it is. >> rep ryan wilcox. several of you mentioned that you struggled with legislative

changes that you wanted to make. we tried to make a lot of significant changes over the last few years. that has been my largest obstacle, we do it because we have always done it that way. what has been the one thing that has been the most effective tool that you have used to affect change on a larger scale? because we have always done it that way? >> i would say that my experience is probably unique. i probably single-handedly changed the entire way it had been done in arkansas. i probably got in the boat when the tide was going out and the tide in this case was being effective term limits that were passed. eventually, it made its way from the national scene.

they passed very restrictive term limits. it was the beginning of the past six-eight years. at this time, they served when bill clinton was governor. they serve their 6 in the house , and the point is, the term limits are finally happening. high-definition, you have a fresh perspective, fully in control of the legislature now. and things are changing undoubtedly because of the whole structure of it. we have got 46. it will probably add to that number. anytime you have a change in party, you will have a change in instruction. it is easier to change those. if you were coming in, it was

the same people that had been there for 20 or 30 years. it would be much cooler. >> in missouri, it will come down to relationship building. has there been one thing that i have done? ins hort, -- in short, no. not other than have that discussion. instead of saying that we are used to doing it, explain to me that there is some significance to this happening. having those discussions and having those relationships across the aisle with other individuals on this subject, saying, why are to some bills getting heard, properly that it? we have had a few issues that

have come back that have not really been like that. if measures would have been taken before hand, we would never have been in that situation. it is having that discussion personally and building the relationship with members of the majority party that will hopefully i send -- ascend to positions to make those changes. >> if you want to jump in, the more administrative. >> some of the changes that we might implement in the clerk's office might not be on a grand scale unnecessarily. planting seeds and may be waiting for the right time. i feel like part of it has been me realizing that tradition, our

rules, if we have been doing something for 20 years, it is legitimate. it is frustrating sometimes as a young person, but i also have learned to see that it is functional. i guess it has been a balance. some battles might take some time. these people are open-minded and receptive to new ideas. those things really help. i guess that would be my thought. >> we have to wrap it up and about a minute. speaking of the elected officials, i worry. in 10 words or less, since we

started with john, we will go back down this way. what is the thing that is most surprised you about being a young official? do this't know if i can in 10 words. i am trying to think. the perspective, the way i see things and how some things have just been the way, bringing in the new idea. let's do it this way. it was easy in some instances, being young and bringing a new perspective. that was it, being able to visualize an issue that we have been looking at for years. >> don't let 8 stop you from making a change.

don't be discouraged. how you can make a difference. >> of the best way to build yourself is by having those success stories. you have success once and you will build on that. those are the things that young professionals need. you keep building from that. >> just make the most of what you got. i have discovered a lot of opportunities that may be initially i did not see. i really enjoyed that. >> i think people are as loyal to you as you are to them. be a giver, don't be a taker.

>> i want to thank everyone here, thank you for attending. have a great time in chicago. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> gavel-to-gavel coverage of the republican convention from tampa. our front row seats at conventions. coming up tonight, discussing his work for the on-line news source. paul ryan in his own words. that is followed by campaign rally. journal,'s washington

he discusses the role of religion in the 2012 presidential campaign. president of the international mining association talks about the ruling by the court of appeals striking down that regulation. as part of the online media series, a washington journal ha live every morning. >> we are introducing our new web site. today, it is being unveiled. jeremy is going to introduce it to us. >> the words can engage in content at the convention.

it will be campaign 2012, they can find all sorts of things. he will see live video and featured video. we show live video every single day and it is hall archived. but you will see some new things. the first thing our user generated clips. every video for the convention and before that, you can clip segments of the video. rather than sharing a session, it can be 30 seconds or two minutes. ensure that on the various social media networks. below that, you will see twitter streams coming from two sources. anyone using the past tax for the republican convention or for the democratic convention in

charlotte, it will end up their. we have compiled a list of delegates that we will be leading from each convention. you see of the athletes from delegates that we have already targeted. next week, we will have theirs as well. >> everything is available at sea spans website. they can what speakers have already spoken on line. they will see wheat from the delegates, fellow the words, political tweets. facebook? >> this will all be sure will. towards the bottom of the page is infographic. that is something new for us that people will be able to share. that might be ", numbers, we

will be doing those day-by-day of the convention. >> people want to go to this website. >> c-span.org/campaign2012. you can find every single speaker down to mayors and members of congress. along with those that will be down there for delegates. >> friday, a discussion on challenges facing service members. the lgbt bar association is holding their hoc conference. -- law conference .we'll have it on c-span 2. >> this weekend, beginning sunday at 4:00 p.m. eastern,

from the 2010 interview with what williams, from his book no apology. >> of the president was not going to be a strong defender of american values, human rights, free trade, free enterprise. those words of apology have emboldened those that find us as a wheat and enemy. >> the boston globe investigator explores the early years in michigan. part of the book tv weekend on c-span 2. >> a look inside the daily caller. neal munro is the white house correspondent and was a guest on washington journal for 35 minutes.

host: we want to introduce you to neil munro of "the daily caller." we have been looking at online media sources. today, neil munro of the daily caller is joining us. what is the daily caller? how long has it been around? give us the basics. guest: it is very new and is a free market publication designed to give news. it has been very successful and growing faster than projections. host: you say it has news for a variety of people. what kind of articles do you do? guest: politics is the main draw but our readers are not full-time political fans.

we do articles on culture and guns and the economy. we to politics. host: what do you do? guest: i am the white house correspondent and that keeps me busy these days. there seems to be a lot of trauma emerging from the white house. -- drop of merging from the -- drama from the white house. i have been doing this a little over two years and i used to work for "the national journal." i did a lot of different stories from different angles as a science reporter and communications reporter. host: what was it like going from a national journal-type publications to a more opinionated publication? guest: i am shocked.

it is a breath of fresh air. subscription publications are very different. the reporters and editors said that headquarters and a day each think of what the readers would be interested. in the on-line world, we know precisely what they're interested in. we're in much closer contact with our readers. that means we focus on what they want which is true interest and stuff. we're not in the fake a drama business. we focus on true political news. our readers don't want unballasted information. some will say we are biased. publications with

subscriptions, the reporters sit in the newsroom and they don't feel the customers' interests. they don't feel the owners and shareholders desires. they tend to be on their own. if you're on a major publication, you take your shoes of what is important from each other -- you take your cues from what is important to each other. the interest of the reporter guides' those publications in a way that does not happen in online publications. online is more fair and more accurate and more concerned with giving the reader is what they want. it is a breath of fresh air. for example, i was a science reporter ed "the national

journal." when it came to political matters, the tea party group started bubbling up and i noticed on line a map showing planned meetings in april of 2009. i showed my editors and a couple of weeks later, there were more meetings planned for april, left about this. the instructions were no, that will be taken care by someone else. by sheer luck was in south carolina on april 15 and the road to an article and it was an accurate and true and very balanced article that was cited for two years after.

it was the first "national journal" article on the tea party. i was a science reporter and i wrote the first national journal article on the tea party. the editors and reporters guide each other what is important. you see this all the time in " the new york times." host: you talked about getting about cues from each other. is the white horse press corps a groupthink mentality? guest: there is a common interest among reporters in the white house to report drama which means more exciting news. fine. the white house beat is a terrible, awful beat. most reporters do not have the

clout or independence to argue and push and fight with the white house. if you are a major publication and you put up a fight, the white house can simply turn to somebody else and that makes you look bad in front of your editor and major editor look bad in front of his boss and makes the boss look bad and from the donor. it is hard to fight against the white house. this happens all the time so they are very constrained. they may be good reporters but very few of them have the clout and the ability to argue back. beyond a few of them, it is just terrible. host: you've got the president's attention on june 15 and we want to show that. [video clip] >> it is not a permanent fix. this is a temporary stopgap measure that lets us focus our

resources wisely was giving a degree of relief and hope to talented, driven, patriotic young people. it is the right thing to do. excuse me, sir. it is not time for questions. not while i am speaking. precisely because this is temporary, congress and the answer to your question and the next time i prefer you let me finish my statement before you ask that question -- this is the right thing to do for the american people. i did not ask for an argument. i'm answering your question. it is the right thing to do for the american people and here is why -- this is the reason, thank you very much >> what about american workers who are unemployed and you employ foreigners? host: when you were watching that, you were reacting a little bit. was it uncomfortable to watch? did it make you angry? guest: it is on comparable to

watch. the thing that amuses me still it is as the man never taken a question on immigration? it is astounding and what he said was 800,000 workers can into the country and they will get a work permit. that number has drifted up to 1.6 million. we have record unemployment. he did this on their wedding plans as his own authority. -- he did this on his own authority. this was an amazing move. how many questions has he taken on it? host: did you interrupt the president while he was speaking? guest: when his voice went down at the end and he talked about young people -- before going

into that in the morning press conference, they would not take questions on the record. they were trying to get this announcement tour without much fuss before the weekend, before the summit in mexico. sometimes someone asks a question when he walks away from the podium. it was an amazing news event. i thought i would get him but he turned away. otherwise, we would not get anything from him that day. his voice went down and i thought would be a fairly short speech. he is announcing a 800,000 people when it was being rejected by congress.

it was a campaign trail pitch. it had to be short. his voice goes down as he says young people. i asked the question. i shout about the question why you prefer foreigners to americans. it was a dramatic question that farmers can easily s because americans are very court. -- that foreigners can easily as because americans are very coy. he still does not answer the question. host: what was the reception you got from your fellow white house correspondents after that? what is the reception you get from the white house currently? guest: he walked away and the video appeared on the campaign

site very quickly. it appeared on the spanish- language side for several days. i turned around to walk. reporters crowded around me and asked who was. i was surprised. then i walked quickly away. i never expected any of that from a large crowd of interns. i walked back to the office. when i got back to the office, i found i was stranding more than lindsay lohan. -- trending more than lindsay lohan. i explained that sometimes arrested question too early. it was not an interruption, it

was just a mistimed question. i wrote the story and it was a good story. 50% of young african-american man, it is an extraordinary story that he should bring in this many guest workers when his core groups are so amazingly damaged by the economy. why does the white house press corps reporters, why do they not see what is going on here? you have to go back to what makes journalism. people ask the media is right wing or left wing. the answer is we are neither. we are pro ourselves.

we love drama and excitement. we love war for a while and scandal and shock. we are for us. that is our primary bias. which part gives us more drama? it is pretty obvious. the republicans are small government and they would reduce their footprints in washington. they would move power out, lower taxes and make business more important. that's less interesting with less drama. the majority of reporters and irrational interest to snuggle up to democrats. the make government bigger and make us more important and increase our status. democrats are our allies. in the same with the general

motors loves cars. people in hollywood like a video. the majority of the media naturally is pro-government. here we have this amazing story of which there are many amazing stories in washington that keep getting ignored. my colleagues are not terribly interested. the president had a press conference the other day and there was nothing about this. host: neil munro is our guest and i wanted to have a chance to chat with him. he is the white house correspondent for the daily collar which was started by tucker carlson. our first call is from new york, on our republican line, go ahead. caller: thank you for taking my

call. i would like to thank neil munro for coming on the program especially following the previous guest. i want you to know that the - old that if you believe what i'm telling you or you believe your lying eyes? -- is something i have kept in mind for several years now. i think the daily caller, when you put clips of what is going on on the internet, how is anybody able to believe something else? the daily caller puts videos up of politicians and other elites saying things and you got the media denying that they said those things.

guest: we provide true and interesting stuff you will not get elsewhere. host: i want to show some of your stories. this is the front page of the daily caller, the website. is this your story? guest: yes, partly. host: presidential debates. guest: the commission on presidential debates picks the moderators. in so many ways, it is they

flambe of special interests. the two guys in charge are former clinton spokesman and business-related lobbyists. what are reporters allowing this group to pick people for the presidential commission? it should go for the board members. let's be serious. this allows business interests with politics in washington allow them to pick questions. there are three or so republicans and they're not considered very prominent in the party hierarchy.

host: these of the interesting stories that neil munro has won and they include -- guest: the story has not been picked up anywhere else. host: do you think if you have put this in "the national journal, "it would have been picked up elsewhere? guest: it might have been. in "the new york times" that would have been a democratic confession. host: here is another --

our son, robert on our democrat line. caller: thanks for listening to my comments, both the moderator and your guest. i'm a strong democrat in many ways. i would like to have your guest listen to my views on government and politics. my first point would be the ongoing wars that we must all pay for. at the end of world war two, corporate taxes or 93%.

everything was paid for and people had jobs and their programs put in by the democrats because we had been relieved from a depression caused by the republicans, i believe. all would like to have you critique that. i would like to have you critique and answer to me how it is that abortion got to be such an issue considering that abortion laws got to be under a republican administration. do you know much about the voting on that decks host: we will leave it there. any response? guest: i could talk about various aspects of that. public memory of many things is

distorted. for example, the great depression. you are an american. you get to go out and decide under oath. you can read the daily caller if you want to get a different perspective. you will find some interesting stuff. you are american enough to make up your own mind. host: mobile, alabama, independent line. caller: good morning. you are a breath of fresh air. i saw you asking those questions to obama and i was so proud of you. you don't know how proud i was. i'm a black person from the deep south -- please don't let them intimidate you by using the race card. they would do that to silence you but we need you.

if we don't have people such as yourself, standing up asking real questions and hopefully getting real answers, we will lose this country to obama. that is what i am so afraid of. i'm afraid to even look at him on television because he is trying to take this country down. thank you and keep up the good work and again, please don't be intimidated. do your job. you have been doing it. host: is it intimidating to stand there? guest: thank you very much, this is our job, to inform and provide to with information that you make up your mind. you don't have to rely on the washington reporters with their own interests and thank you for saying that.

i have to pay off my green card and that is the thing i would like to work for. the more people say that, the better as the daily caller will work. host: is it intimidating standing in front of the president? guest: [inaudible] you try to ask questions. tunnel vision, you can't see anything. you're trying to ask a question, even at a press conference. host: has he called a new voluntarily? guest: it would not make sense for him to do so. if the ast " the new york times" guy, he will get a better question for his friends. it is rational for him to do what he does. he is a rational guy.

host: here's a tweet - guest: what turned was there? did he take any questions? nonetheless, having asked a question, i thought if he had heard that i wanted him to answer. it was an important issue. i fell into this having mistimed the question. there is no way you can calculate this or work it out. forget it. i just made a mistake. host: the couple more stories neil munro by.

guest: you have no idea -- host: that is the headline. if you are curious, you can go the daily caller to.com. we don't have enough time to discuss every story. guest: that is a lovely question. i have had a share a typos and messed up for its. the worst thing i ever did was i wrote an article years ago and i got called up and said the article was wrong so i wrote a correction and we printed it and he turned out to be right.

alas. host: how big is the step the daily caller @? guest: we have 10-15 reporters and many independents. host: democrat, good morning. caller: two quick comments and the question -- your statistics about unemployment in america a specialist in new york -- it has always been much higher than the standard national unemployment rate. it was like that before president obama went into office and you are using it as a lightning rod. the same thing about imported workers in this country. over the past 100 years, how many imported workers have been under every regime?

why are you making that an issue under the obama administration? when you were disrespectful and i am upset about the way you'd to spur respect the president of united states. i have never seen that in my 53 years of living. when you were disrespectful to the president of united states, was that of your own volition or did the managing editor put you up to it? guest: no, the top guys were not happy at all. they did not want us to behave badly or to be rude. it was straightforward. it was a mistake. my timing was wrong. i did not wish to disrespect the president or the office. is a perfectly good question and your point about african- americans is per irrelevant.

should we care less because the president is also african- american or care more now that the rate is even higher and immigration has continued higher? we will see more and more ways of robots coming in and displacing workers. this is not the time to be important low-skilled workers to compete with the existing surplus of low-skilled workers who are having difficulty getting jobs now. as for the disrespect, it is a perfectly relevant point. host: santa cruz, california, republican. caller: how are you doing? maybe you can help me out but i believe it was president bush who would keep getting questions from

-- he finally just quit calling on her because he refused to answer any of her questions. are you associated in any way with rupert murdoch? you meth? guest: i would make a joke meth but it would be in bad taste. no association with rupert murdoch. comparing me to helen thomas , you wound me. host: use a don't compare me but she would stay point of view in her quest and guest:. ok --

there is a firm line between the fact. or questions. all questions tend to imply a perspective. i try to be pithy and direct and clean as possible. my last memory of helen thomas is for the jews to go home. i am not like her host:. a republican from oklahoma city, go ahead. caller: 90 neil munro you, for what you do and we know that obama only cares about people -- he does not care about people who are not working. he only cares about people that don't make him money like

solyndra and gm. seven out of 10 gm jobs went to china. he has to pay back tax money. the labor for ask why some women are republicans and it is because we can't afford to take care of 10 kids that you should not have them. thank you again and hang in there. guest: that's sweet. what planet is he on? we try to stick to facts. we asked direct questions.

we try to come up and find interesting news so likelyndra, fast and furious, political decisions and the white house, national security and spending. host: fayetteville, n.c., our democrats line. it helps if i push the button. please start again. caller: he is sitting there making all these remarks. we all understand where he was coming from. he is a republican. that is what republicans do and have been doing for years. we understand he probably won't be reelected because he is a black man and the white people don't feel he should be able to

run this country. i know i will be cut off but i just have to speak the truth. they don't think a black man should be able to run this country. i think he is doing a good job with that and he was dealt. when he took over this country, it was bankruptcy. guest: i don't want to argue but for a minute, try to imagine mitt romney with a -- was a black guy. do you think the republicans would be jumping for the life that they have a black guy? they would love it. this is not a racial issue. when you have blocks voting for or against people based on

color, that is a racial issue. like the president's policy, it is not a racial issue. host: an independent from brooklyn. caller: neil munro is an immigrant and i've also noticed that in the media, there's a proliferation of people who are not native americans. you are wanting to attack the president for taking away jobs. there are hundreds of thousands of educated black people able

to take your job. that does not -- does the irony of that affect the attack and your president? guest: there is no irony there. it is a useful thing to explore. americans are sensitive about emigration. many washington reporters are reluctant to say anything disagreeable or point to any problems about immigration. when i signed my paper, by force what loyalties to foreign potentates. i am an american now and i like being an american. i write about american issues that are important to americans. it is not a color thing. it is just news. it is true and accurate and

interesting news you will not find in many establishment publications. we exist to provide interesting stuff, true stuff that the others don't want to produce. host: did the daily caller have any trouble getting white house credentials to guest:? no. host: were the easy to get? guest: yes and no. if you work for an established and recognized publication and use on up to go to the white house frequently, at some point, you could argue with the guys at the white house and have a permanent pass to walk in. when we want to go to the white house, we e-mail in. sur saye. i don't particularly have a press pass. i am a reporter with press identification. to get into the white house, i am let in as the same terms as everyone else.

if you work for publication and you come to the white house, they let you in to cover the president. the area you go into is a small little room. there isn't much room to wander around. you cannot walk levels of the white house. when i covered the pentagon 20 years ago, you could walk around there. that has been shrunk down. i am let in under the same terms that most other reporters are. it would be terrible if the president were deciding which reporters they were letting in. we behavior and we report accurate and truthful information.

[captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> on friday, thomas byrd discusses the role of faith. then, the president of the national mining association talks about the ruling by the court of appeals tracking down an air pollution regulation. later, we will have an online media series. "washington journal," live every morning. friday, mitt romney and his running mate, paul ryan, will be campaigning in michigan, three days ahead of the republican national convention. we will be live from michigan study that 12:05 eastern, here on c-span.

>> hour countdown to the conventions continues until our coverage of the republican convention starting monday and the democratic convention starting september 4. every minute, every speech, live. feature speakers include, and romney, chris christie, congressman paul ryan delivers his vice-presidential acceptance speech, and thursday, mitt romney. use our online convention hub to watch what exclusive video feeds. creek in share video clips. all at c-span.org/campaign2012. >> from the c-span video library, with ticket with a congressman paul ryan in his own words. on medicare, social security, and the budget. we examined some of the major

and elements that make up the plan. this is 35 minutes. >> as you know, the obligated debt to our kids, $49 trillion, they estimate that by 2020 the entire budget is going to be interest on the debt. the reason we have this huge debt is because no party is able to fund -- to address these problems. what mechanism is going to have to be put in place to actually try to address these long-term budget issues? >> i think you are right. this has been very vexing. if republicans try to say, fix social security, democrats demagogue them.

both parties his political tactics. we should not be afraid of that. get a dialogue going in this country so we can figure out how to fix these problems. one of the things we ought to do is change the way our federal budget process works. in the last segment, you were talking about accounting. john and i agree on a lot of things. this federal budget process does not reward tackling these big issues. the to make this more enforceable, more transparent, and more accountable.

there are accounting changes we can do to bring on the books these liabilities. the way we do the accounting, if you are in american corp., you would be in jail. we do not fully recognize the liabilities we have to the taxpayers. it would make it easier for us to tackle these goals. we need to have budget enforcement. that is why i am a fan of spending caps. if congress expands the spending caps -- there is a lot more we can do to fix this. we need to fix this process. >> one of more than 400 -- his first appearance on c-span back in 1995. we have gone back through the

archives to take a look at some of the major issues in this campaign. medicare, social security, and the overall budget. has there been a consistency in his statement over the years? >> paul ryan has been very consistent. he has taken criticism for that. the only inconsistency democrats would point out is that he voted against the stimulus plan. but then sought money from that program for businesses in his district. >> he is a key committee chair. >> he has been in congress for seven terms. he has been a budget committee chairman comment he has been any the in these big issues on medicare. he was a former staffer for the

senator brown back. he knows these issues. he is only 42. he can talk at length about some of these issues. >> we will learn more about the paul ryan budget. summarize what is in the budget package and why this has become such a big part of the republican campaign. >> the big piece of it is medicare reform. he wants to make it more privatization, a private companies are competing with traditional medicare. the budget plan also has caps on social service programs. on the medicare plan, he took a lot of heat in 2011 for that medicare reform. he went to a democrat from oregon, and change the plan, it so that the traditional medicare would not be taken out of the option that seniors would have.

that is what you were going to hear paul ryan talk a lot about. he has worked with john spratt on a line item veto. at the same time, he did not support the goals and senate budget reform. member say he was not bipartisan. >> if you look at the budget and made into a pie chart, how much is defense spending? discretionary spending? more than half goes to these medicare, medicaid, social security supplement. >> they say there is no way you can fix the budget problem because the entitlements is such a large portion. defense is well over a quarter of the budget. there is also not discretionary spending. if you look at the charge the cbo puts out, the bulk of the

spending problem is dealing with entitlement programs, specifically in medicare. in the 1990's, medicare was also a problem and congress passed a balanced budget. that helped the situation. >> he was a staffer on capitol hill and he made his first appearance on this network on may 27, 1995, as a legislative aide. he talked about the budget process. >> i would like to go back to the first caller statement read this budget debate, what is this about? this is evolving into a fundamental difference between the two parties. the republicans, we say we have to budget the -- balance the budget. it is interesting to note that the clinton's administration's budget proposal projects building more deficits.

adding on top of the debt. we think we have to balance the budget as soon as possible. during a seven-year budget plan is a credible responsible to balance the budget. it increases spending at a slower rate. when the republicans were in the minority, we also offer the alternative budget plans, which did balance the budget. >> that was paul ryan in 1995. >> it shows should that even at that young age, he knows what he is talking about, he is a budget guru. attacking the sitting president as a staffer. you do not see that very often. a lot of people know paul ryan knew he was going to send up the ranks of the gop.

>> first elected in 1998. thank you for being with us. paul ryan is a policy wonk, a smart politician and highly ideological. hussy of bald or has there been -- has see involved -- has he evolved? >> in terms of his rhetoric and in terms of the thrust of his policy positions, i do not think there has been a whole lot of movement. he has always stressed the same set of issues. he has always talked in the same rhetorical terms about party thinks the republican party should go and what he thinks of the role and size of the federal government should be.

>> what shapes his views? >> he gravitated -- he is an earnest young man who gravitated towards -- as he got into college, he did not come from a super political family. his father was a fan of ronald reagan, but not really political. he gravitated towards a conservative way of looking at the world. by the time he got to college, by most accounts, he brought some of that with him. after college, when he hooked up the senate republican from wisconsin, who was a strong supply sidejguy and jack kemp and bill bennett, everything

crystallized for him in terms of his economic world view and limited government and pro- market orientation. >> he mentioned that paul ryan likes to talk about policy. there is no doubt about that. how have you seen him talking about politics. he does not like to apple length about political issues as much as a policy wonk issues. he has just been picked as vice president. how do you think he is going to handle that? >> he likes to talk about how disinterested he is in politics and how he is a policy guide. in fact, i think he is a very good politician who does have some political acumen. i have had conversations with

him over the years where the conversation will drift over politics. he has opinions about the presidential race. he will offer tactical and strategic opinions. people should not miss the political dimensions. there is paul ryan the policy guy, there is the very ideological conservative. you see reflected in his relationship with the media. he is a good communicator, good and at ease with reporters. those are some of his political skills that work. >> why the budget? what led him to propel himself to be the chairman of the budget committee? it is a political document as well as a policy document. >> he has a certain economic orientation.

he wanted to become an economist, never getting there. when he got to washington, that was his policy interests. he saw the potential to turn the leadership on the budget committee, whether it was ranking member or budget chairmen into this platform comment into this role of influence in terms of -- even though we all know the budget chair is not the person with the power. he made something of this position, which was unconventional. he made it into a forum for projecting his view of for the republican party should be on government. >> thank you very much for being with us. the day after the president's

very first step of the union address in february of 2009, paul ryan was the ranking republican on the house budget committee. he joined us to talk about the budget process. >> we're going to pass the rest of the current fiscal year. last congress did not finish the job. then we call the budget resolution. thursday, the president sent his abbreviated version of the budget. our timeline is to get this done in the first week of april. we get that done, we send instructions on their funding targets they have to hit. that occurs over the course over the spring and summer. by end of the fiscal year, these 11 appropriations bills will be passed into law. thursday starts the ball rolling. by the beginning of april, congress should have passed the budget resolution.

and then we bring all those bills back together and these things ought to be passed by the end of the fiscal year. lately, that has not worked that way. we have gone past the deadlines, past the fiscal year deadlines. today is an example. we are passing an appropriations bill today. 8.8% increase in discretionary spending. these are bills that were supposed to be passed last september 30. we are really increasing spending dramatically and that is going to hurt our ability to reduce our deficit. that is a big concern. >> paul ryan in february 2009. let me ask you about how he is viewed by his colleagues. >> he is respected on both sides of the aisle. chris van holland and him get along very well.

he is respected so much that there has been talk of them making a leadership bid against john boehner. he never did that, but they have to look over their shoulder because there was a respected up and comers who was urged to run, but opted not to do it. he was often urged to run but did not do it. >> how will this play out in the fall campaign? what are republicans doing and expectan we respect -- from democrats? >> we have not heard a lot of democrats talk about it yet. you go back to 2005 when president george w. bush was pushing for accounts and that bill did not go anywhere. the main sponsor was paul ryan. he was taking on big entitlement

programs and it was not popular with seniors. and both social security and medicare, paul ryan will be attacked but mitt romney knew that when he picked him. this is going to be a huge test of whether medicare and social security can be tackled at the election. if mitt romney and paul ryan, the chances of major reform are on the lines of what ryan and romney want will not happen. >> thanks for being with us as we talked about congressman paul ryan and many of the events that we have coverage -- we have covered. one of those events came in chicago at the economic club in which he talked about medicare. this is congressman paul ryan, may 16 of last year on the issue of medicare. >> our budget also gets health care spending under control by empowering americans to fight back against skyrocketing costs.

our budget makes no changes for those in or near retirement and it offers future generations -- a program they can count on with guaranteed coverage options. less help for the wealthy and more for the poor and the sec. there is widespread bipartisan agreement at the open ended -- that the open-ended fee-for- service schedule for medicare is a key driver of inflation. medicare is not the train being pulled along by the engine of rising costs, medicare is the engine. the rest of us are getting taken for ride. this disagreement is not really about the problem. it is about the solution to controlling costs in medicare and if i could sum up the disagreement in a couple of sentences, i would say this.

our plan is to give seniors the power to deny business to inefficient providers. [applause] their plan quite to the opposite. is to give the government the power to deny care to seniors. >> what our budget does is weak, given the medicare and medicaid are the greatest drivers, those programs alone are the biggest contributors to it. you have to restructure not only how these programs work to save them, the trustees give us a new warning that medicare is going bankrupt faster. what we're saying is if we do this now, we can do it on our own terms as a country meaning that you do not have to pull the rug out from people who have retired. people who are on medicare, they have organized retirement around that program. people 10 years we are preparing for it. our whole point is to not change their benefits but in order to do that you have to reform this

program for the next generation. for those of us under 54, you have to save and make a solvent system so you can cash flow the current generation and make good on the promises the government made to them. the way to do that is not by giving a panel of 15 bureaucrats the authority to micro-manage rationed and price manage medicare. that is being imposed and seniors. we say, let younger people select among a list of medicare guaranteed coverage options that medicare provides. it works like the kind of system that members of congress and federal employees have. if you are poor and sick, the subsidize the more and if they're wealthy, less. give support to people who needed the most and less to need it the least. during -- doing it this way makes the program solvent, secure some my generation can

count on it when we retire and it helps solve our debt crisis. the question is can this be done? i hardly think this is some radical idea. this is the same recommendation that president bill clinton's bipartisan commission recommended in the late 1990's. the idea comes out of the brookings institution, a left- of-center think tank. it works like your medicare benefits today. prescription drugs works like this. medicare advantage works like this. buying or supplemental insurance works like this. private providers competing against each other. we believe the best way to get at this issue, help inflation is by giving the patient the power. the consumer directed system where the providers, hospitals, insurers, and doctors compete against each other for our business. we spent two and a half times per person on health care.

we spent a lot of health care -- on health care but we do not spend it intelligently. we need the system where you have transparency in price, quality, and economic incentives to act on those things so we can have apples to apples metrics to compare so we can shop. we need to do a tax exclusion. we subsidize people in the higher income brackets were then people in the lower income brackets, that is upside down. we want a system where the individual is in the driver's seat, not just bureaucrat. we want a point where we inform the insurance laws and i would argue for subsidizing those with pre-existing conditions said they do not get a grip when they get sick. we do that through risk pools and we bring more competition, more choice to the health-care sector. if we do this, i think we will be fine. not only will we grow the economy but we can have

insurance for everyone who does not have it. we will do it without breaking the bank, without taking the sector over by the government. [applause] >> qana asman paul ryan delivered his remarks and to questions at the chicago economic club, focusing on medicare, one of the key issues in this presidential election. we're looking back at the video library all of which is available to you any time. you can check it out on c- span.org. another significant budget issue he addressed, social security. >> what i propose is that -- a system of voluntary personal retirement accounts. there's three ways to fix social security. raise taxes, cut benefits, or borrow more money or grow the rate of return. there are two ways to grow the rate of return. at the government -- let the

government invest the money or have personal retirement accounts for individuals to own their own retirement accounts the her -- that are invested in markets. what we're talking about is not privatizing social security or partially privatizing. we're not talking about giving people the ability to take a chunk of their payroll taxes and to announce in the system are saying, let's do it so people can have some of their payroll tax dollars inside social security in their own personal retirement account that they own and control but it is run like a federal first savings plan will that i as a member of congress have. people are digging into that broker inside the system, run by social security, managed by social security and under that system, people under 55 will take half the payroll taxes in their personal retirement accounts. the rest is going to fund the current system. survivors' benefits, disability,

all those stay unchanged and to fund the rest of the new retirees' benefits. this is the big debate, how you get from here to there is what transition financing is. i have a sophisticated plan that does that. >> the lines are lit up. people are interested. what happens if you are an investor under your plan who takes advantage of the option to invest separately and get a street where the market goes down? >> under our plan, i believe we ought to maintain the safety net. you will get what you would have gotten if you stayed in social security. whether or not you exercise -- there is no rest on that end. if you're under 55, you'll get what you would have gotten from social security. how you guard against market swings, getting in -- retiring

in a down market. that is where we propose the account. the life cycle count changes your portfolio as you grow older. when you are younger you'll have a mix of heavy stock index funds to the point where you get near retirement, you're out of the stock market into bond index and government-backed bonds so you do not fall prey to a down market by the time you retire. you're not in the stock market. another thing, there is no 20- year time where we did not do better in social security than we're doing right now. we did not do better in the markets. social security is a long-term investment. the reason why we're saying 55 and under can invest is so they have time to plan and grow their investments. at the age of 35, all i have to do is get a better than 1% rate of return for me to do better than i would otherwise do.

today's workers are getting a 1% to 1.5% rate of return. my children are scheduled to get a - 1% return under the current system. we have to get better than that to do better for ourselves through personal retirement accounts. >> the president has explained that his plan that is not to address the solvency issue. it is about ownership. >> that is technically not correct. they help us achieve solvency. let me explain it this way. if you take a portion of your payroll taxes, that portion that you are diverting is over your personal retirement accounts. the government, the traditional system will not get the money so the system is not going to get the money you put in but the system is off the hook to pay

you that part of your benefit from those dollars because you are getting that benefit out of your account. because of these -- the system is off the hook, the resystem reduces its expenditures. for you to say that i think you are at one point to 5% rate of return. we're about the same age. you would have to do a little bit better than that to break even or do better. >> the safety net which would guarantee me, well that draw funds? >> as workers rolled the funds over, the safety net is paid for. my bill has been scored three times and achieving permanent solvency. we can go into the financing part of all these things but right now over the long term we face a $12 trillion debt. we need to have to continue to

pay benefits in the future. >> congressman paul ryan from march 9, 2005. some of the key issues in the budget plan earlier. we heard his comments about medicare and it was last year when he became chair of the house budget committee that he outlined details of what is now known as the grand plan. a number of videos available including this news conference april 5, 2011 on capitol hill. >> look at our historic path of spending. it has been around 20% of gdp. here is the path we're on right now. this is the path the budget is complicity with. this is the path of spending or the size of our government is double and egos of from there. thats the spending path this prosperity plan presents.

we bring the size of government back down to 20% of gdp where it has been and lower from that. we have budget enforcement mechanisms with multiple spending caps to enforce this. this is how we get $6.20 trillion in spending cuts off the budget in the first 10 years. 4.4 trillion dollars in deficit reduction. take a look at where we're headed. we have had deficits in the past and we had a small time surplus. look at where we're headed with our deficits. this again is where the president's budget plan is complex said. this is the path of the status quo. these are the kinds of deficits we're going to rack up if we do not do something to fix this problem. here is the path we're proposing with respect to a path for prosperity, our budget. very different choice from two different pitchers. let's talk about debt. we have had that in this country before. people are familiar with that.

get a car loan and you measure your debt is relative to your income. take a look at our debt. over the last -- since world war ii we have had that to and it went up to 108% of gdp. we had high debt before. that was temporary. we loaded mostly to ourselves but it went down at reasonable levels. look at what the congressional budget office is telling us. this red ink will destroy our economy. it is fact that we're giving the next generation a lower standard of living. we asked the congressional budget office to tell us what the future of the economy looks like. the models break in 2037. the computer crashes because they cannot conceive of the time in which the economy can continue past that moment because of this burden of debt. this is our debt path. we get this paid off.

that is the future we want for our children. we believe we have been more responsibility to put the kinds of controls and reforms in place to keep this country growing. we need job growth. we need economic growth. we ask the heritage center for data analysis to review this budget. they use the global inside model. here is what the results show. this plan result in faster economic growth. $1.50 trillion in additional economic growth over a decade. 1 million jobs next year to be created under this plan. the unemployment rate goes down to 4% in the year 2015. in the last year of this budget, we're kicking greeted creating 2.5 million new jobs in the private sector in that year alone.

it also predicts higher wages. it also predicts higher family income, nearly $1,000 per family per year result from the better economic growth this plan for prosperity presents. this is a plan for prosperity. when you take a look at the choice of the two futures we have, we can either choose the red line, a sea of debt and deficits, or we can choose that green line, or we face up to the challenges confronting this generation now to give our country a better future. we've always had a legacy or each generation -- where each generation cakes on challenges of the next generation is better off.

we are not going to be giving our children a better standard of living. we know we will not make them better off. that is a fact that is not daunted by any independent fiscal expert. we owe it to our country in kids to fix this problem. what of the worst experiences i've ever had was in the 2008 financial crash. that cottas by surprise. -- that caught us by surprise. added that resulted ugly legislation. and then we witnessed trillions of wealth of being lost. then we witnessed millions of seniors lose their savings. and then we witnessed millions of people lose their jobs. we're still trying to recover. what if your congressmen, your president saw it coming?

what if they knew was going to happen? what if they knew what could be done to prevent it from happening? but they decided not to because it was not the politics. what would you think of your president? you're a member of congress? that is where be our right now. this is the most predictable economic crisis in our history. what are we doing, playing politics? we do not need politicians, we need leadership? we believe we have a moral imperative, we got together on the budget committee and we decided it is time to stand up and do what is necessary to fix this country. we to be honest with the american people about the problems and face. with the fact base budget. no more accounting tricks, no more accounting gimmicks. i will be happy to take your questions.

>> [inaudible] >> this shows you how deep of a hole this country is then. -- is in. what matters the most is we get this contained. this shows you the sooner you act to fix this problem, the better everybody is. the kinds of reforms we are proposing did not affect senior citizens. they did not take benefits away from people who are 55 and above. we can achieve that. what happens of the keep kicking the can down the road, we go about $10 billion into the hole.

that means cuts to seniors, tax increases. we want to preempt that kind of austerity. it is gone to take awhile to dig their way out of this problem. [inaudible] akin said these programs from bankruptcy. >> we do not proposed increasing taxes. here is a big difference. if you raise taxes, can you move the numbers are there? you lose jobs, you lose economic growth. we need spending cuts and economic growth. raise taxes on the economy, you do not get the growth. we are now in the 21st century. we are in a global economic environment. in wisconsin, we're competing with people from india and china. the only tax our businesses and

at the highest tax rates, we lose and they win. >> april 5 of last year, congressman paul ryan outlines details of what is now known as the ryan plan. one of more than 425 appearances. from the "washington journal," his speeches in washington and elsewhere in the country, now on the campaign trail. he made his first appearance in 1995 as a staff member. three years later, he returned as a newly elected member of congress. this is from november 17, 1998. one of a series of injuries we did with members of congress.

part of -- it is all part of c- span's video library as the track hisr whi>> we're in the o the conventions. gavel-to-gavel coverage of the republican convention from tampa. live here on c-span. your front row seat to the conventions. next, mitt romney campaigns in new mexico. followed by terry o'neil. a forum looks at the impact of legislators under the age of 30. >> on friday, thomas burr discusses mitt romney's mormon

faith. and the president of the national mining association talks about the rulings by the d.c. court of appeals striking down an epa air pollution regulation. and later, part of our online media series. "washington journal" at 7:00 a.m. eastern on c-span. friday, discussion on challenges facing transgendered service members. the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered bar association is hosting annual lavender law conference in washington, d.c. this week. we will be live at 9 eastern on our companion network, c-span2. >> i think our job is not to ask the questions. >> she first covered barack obama in 2007 and became

bloomberg brajah bloomberg correspondent in 2009. >> that is how i approach my job. i am not looking to catch when jay carney does a press briefing, i am not looking to necessarily catch him in a, that is not what you said the other day. it is trying to get information to inform people with. >> more with julianna goldman on "q&a". >> mitt romney outlined his energy plan. the plan which expands onshore drilling and gives states more responsibility over the permit process. he said his energy plan would create 3 million jobs and add more than $1 trillion in revenue. this is 20 minutes.

>> thank you. thank you to lt. gov. sanches for being here. appreciate the work they're doing to make new mexico strong. i think the smith family did build this business. the many men and women who work here appreciate the fact that you are building this enterprise as well. i do not think government builds these businesses, the free people of america build the enterprises that keep a strong and build our economy. the president said something about that not terribly long ago that was revealing. it was in virginia. i'm sure he wishes he could take the words back but there

revealing of what he believes. if you have a business you did not build it. someone else did that. he went on to say you're taking me out of context. a look at the context of his remarks. the context is worse. he said if you are successful it may be -- you may think it is because you work hard but a lot of people work hard. a lot of people are smart. where is he going with that? we value in this country individuals to apply themselves to increase their knowledge and their capacity to think and learn. we welcome people in this country also, work hard and understand those people who are smart and workout -- work hard regular price is better and increase the understanding we have of how our economy works. i need some of that here to hold on to that.

we welcome people who are smart and work hard because the people -- they are people of achievement. whether it is a person who works hard to get a promotion at work and do a better job and get a raise for the family or the kid that makes the honor roll. she works hard and study hard. when she makes the honor roll -- the president's lack of understanding of how individual initiative and hard work, education and risk-taking is -- his lack of understanding of how that drives the economy to -- let him to put in place a series of policies that have not worked. around the country, 23 million people who are out of work or

who can get part-time jobs. you have half the kids who cannot find a job or cannot find a job consistent with their college degree. one out of six and has fallen into poverty. the president's policies have not worked. almost everything he had stunned has made it harder for this economy to recover and as a result, middle income families are having hard times. just another report came out yesterday showing and -- middle income families are having a harder time maintaining their state of living. this is inexplicable in a nation that is so prosperous as our own to see a nation with so many middle income families having such tough times. the median income of an american family has dropped in the last three and a half years by $4,000. even as gasoline prices have doubled. electricity rates have gone up and food prices have gone up and people are being squeezed and people are being squeezed and living paycheck