people were placed with two actors pretending to be participants. as they sat in the room they filled out questionnaires and smoke began to fill the rooms. for participants who were alone, 75% of them told the experimenters there was smoke filling my room. only 38 percent of participants reported smoke. that is half as many people. even worse, when the two actors in the room, the actors would note there was smoke to one another and then just ignore it, so did most of the participants. only 10 percent in the third room reported the smoking in the room. what do you learn from this lab experiment? first, we learned as individuals, people like you and me are more likely to speak up when we know that no one else

will. we learned that when others are are around, we learn -- we wait for others to take responsibility. scientists have attributed major explanations to the bystander affect. first, people feel the need to be hit and socially acceptable ways. they take their cues from other people. that prompts them to either act or not act. second, and perhaps more important is the presence of other people essentially this uses responsibility. that is the essential -- essential problem. it can lead to extreme and action, and that is to the detriment of all of our bystanders and the whole society. this is precisely the condition we find ourselves in so many

americans,, in particular young people do not make it to the polls on election day. they may have an opinion about who should win, they may even feel really strongly about it, but as their dates fill up, the good intention to go vote goes away. they wake up -- maybe the wake up with the intent to vote in never make it to the polls. but what does that mean? ultimately they are falling back on the bystander affect. the belief that their boats is a marginally important, if that all. we we should never assume someone else can vote in our place, because unlike a smoked- filled room, other people may not be bothered by the same things you are bothered by. i am sorry to say that young voters specifically are and have traditionally been the epitome of the bystander affect.

that is the same as every count election. anything could have happened in every single vote allegedly was counted. we saw an increase in 2004. 40%, and in 2008, it jumped up college students are the young people that led that charge. there were more likely to vote in their age group. during my months on the trail, traveling to colleges, college students have opinions about politics. they understand issues and have a lot to say about than that. more importantly, as a group, students tend to be progressive. i do not mean liberal. i mean progressive. they have distinct opinions about things.

more importantly, college students have the ability and the inevitable duty to lead the rest of the country. throughout this country's history, it is students that have driven great change. take civil rights. i will read about my state a little here. on february 1, 1960, four black students began a sit-in at the woolworth's lunch counter in grennsboro, north carolina. this is known as the greensboro four. they were refused service, but were allowed to sit at the counter, so they did and they sat there all day. on the second day, 20 students showed up. on the third day, 60. on the fourth day, more than 300 people went to woolworth's. six months later, the greensboro four were finally served at the lunch counter. that is not all they accomplished. those four students, they were freshmen at the time.

that was an example that became an integral part of the civil rights movement, which was what ultimately integrated all kinds of places throughout the south. not only civil rights. since are the driving force behind powerful protest during the vietnam war, and students have shown their ability to get out front. after hurricane katrina, my dad took a group to the gulf coast to help rebuild houses down there. who did he turn to? college students. he was not disappointed. 700 college students joined him on that trip. during their spring break, they gave up the beach and instead, they lived on a gym floor in new orleans. they cleared debris, fixed houses, and helped their neighbors who were so desperately in need. i could go to more examples,

but young people have tremendous potential power in our country. so often, we forget, do not use our voices, to not use our feet. and you have all heard the jfk quote -- ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country. i actually think that in america today, it is ok to ask those questions. we expect our government to respond to our needs. the greensboro four expected more from america. for years, young people have been ignored. the obama election in 2008 the high point of youth voting in america. this is an enormous opportunity. for the first time in a long time, young people are a voting bloc that should not and cannot be ignored.

do not lose that important footnote. maintain your responsibility to vote, expressed in your voice be heard, but those who make decisions on your behalf. margaret mead once said never that that a small group of thoughtful citizens can change the world. indeed, it is the only thing that ever happened. i asked you to be that crew. i ask you to stand up to be heard and your voice matters. your vote is vital. it helps ensure you're not just working for your country, but that your country is working for you. there are other forms of responsibility outside of voting better just important. last year i left the practice

of law to start the elizabeth edwards foundation, in large part to preserve her memory, but i did it to continue work she had been doing her life in helping young people fulfill their potential to succeed. to give you an idea of what we do, we run a program that helped high school students who have great potential, but lack resources and support, and we help them get prepared for and get to college. the program indicates three important things that reflect my mother -- mentorship, advocacy, and public service. it provides the best we provide mentors to the students in the program and hope they can become mentors themselves.

we train the fellows to always get back to their communities for big public service projects. let me be clear, the world that you address can be big or small. you do not have to start a nonprofit. you do not have to cure a disease. sometimes responsibility is about addressing smaller communities and smaller needs. every single day you have the ability to do small things can make a difference in people's lives. my mom always taught me to call my waitresses by their names, first names. if they do not have a name tag, ask. i always ask her how her day is gone, and you are always kind. maybe that's small gesture does not seem like a lot to you, but it will be a lot to her or him. you cannot forget the small stuff. in meeting smaller needs is why i deal with the foundation and

starting very small, a handful of students in the fellows program in raleigh, north carolina. if we can help just one child reach for potential, help one get to a a good college, we have succeeded. because we have made the difference, even though it might seem like a small difference. sometimes responsibility is about speaking out when you see injustice. i do a lot of work in discrimination in civil rights. i see cases where someone sat silently by. maybe they heard somebody say the n-word and never said anything about it. maybe they saw a man being inappropriate to a woman at work and kept it to themselves. maybe they saw a group laughing at a joke about homosexuals and turned a blind eye. a lot of times all you have to

do is speak up. dante says the hottest place in hell are the when in terms of crisis you maintained their neutrality. it is not always that easy. responsibility is not about finding something good to do. sometimes it is about combating the bad. it is about stopping a bullet, standing up against bigotry and hatred. it is about speaking out. my mom taught me this -- you do not have to be the one who shouts loudest. being loud never changed anyone's mind. the greensboro four were right. if you are right, you can change minds with your message, not the noise.

it is also not about doing favors for people. we think about it that way, like charity work, but we do it for ourselves as much as anything, because it feels good to help other people. it feels good to help your community. it feels good to both and make your voice heard. fulfilling our responsibility serves us. when we speak about the dangers of pollution, we are working to save the environment we all live then. that includes ourselves. if we refuse to be bystanders, if we take our responsibilities seriously, we lift up our society, our community, we left our country. that means we lift up ourselves, lift up those are around that, we lift up america, we lift up the world.

so please do not be bystanders. be active. make a change that means something. thank you. \[applause] >> all right, we are ready to take your questions as soon as we get our mikes set up. hello? ok.

>> i have a few starter questions that i had some interest in. the first one here is, do you anticipate some day, perhaps even in the distant future, you would run for political office? >> i do not currently anticipate doing so. anyone who is called upon to serve a public office, it is a very brave thing to do, an important thing to do, and i do not discount it could be a possibility if there was a pressing need. i do not plan to run for office, no.

>> all right. a second question from our department here. did you watch the democratic or republican conventions on tv? if so, what were your impressions of the speakers or the content of the events? >> i did. i watched both conventions. one more than another, i guess, but i think it is hard for me to say what my impressions are entirely, because i like a format where there is more engagement between the parties, personally, versus a speaking format, but i think the important thing for america was to be able to listen to the platforms of both parties and be able to compare them, and i think ultimately, the conventions, the purpose of the

conventions , and i think the convention still take a job this year to make sure that they had stands on the issues, and they were well known, and i thought a lot of the speakers did a great job, showing how passionate they are about the work they do, which is hard work. >> outside of the president, who are some of your favorite speakers? >> i always love to hear bill clinton talk, so he is always entertaining, and i thought he did a great job. >> ok, a question from a student in the audience. as a young person, who has already had so many experiences in politics in making education and career choices, looking at the issues and challenges facing youth, what insights can you all for our presidential candidates? what are they getting right, and what are they missing?

>> that is a hard question. but i think one of the main things we have seen in politics recently is increasing partisanship, that is not what people want to hear. that is not responsive to the needs of young people, certainly not responsive to the needs of anyone, really, and i think that in particular, for example, politicizing things that really are not political is not useful, and my particular concern about partisanship of certain issues is that they turned young people off from politics. you are our future.

we need you to be engaged, we need you to care about where our country is going, we do not need you to be turned off about things that are not the issues. those are the biggest things i have had in recent years. >> thank you. another student question. what sparked your interest and engagement in politics and law? >> i have always paid attention to politics since i was younger, but i did not get into but i sort of landed in politics, obviously. it was not really need going after a political career or anything like that. that was just look, i guess. and in terms of a law clerk, i have always wanted to go into law. i grew up with two lawyers as parents. for some people, that is a

turnoff, but i heard incredible stories for but to my parents about people they were able to help and things they were able to do through the legal system and to the justice system and as advocates for people who could not advocate for themselves. i knew that that is what i always wanted, and i think the world of politics should not be that different. that is essentially what our elected officials are there today, to be an advocate of a part of the people who are not always able to do it themselves. >> on a related note, a student would like to know how someone can get involved with the elizabeth edwards foundation. >> oh, great. you can send me an e-mail. i will let you know how you can

get involved. it has been a really interesting thing to start the foundation and to learn a lot about our world that i was not familiar with, think that i learned about the non-profit world. everyone is really nice. they want to help you. it is so different from the legal world, in which not everyone wants to help you. there is no competition. it is a lot of people working toward similar goals, and it has been and the lightning experience. anyone who wants to go into that war, i encourage you to do so. it is a life choice and has been a wonderful one. if you are interested in getting involved, send me an e-mail. >> and "cate" with a c. >> we had a speaker come here last week to talk about the

flaws of the electoral college and how it contributes to voter apathy. what encouragement would you give young democrats to get out and vote in a state like south carolina, where they are the overwhelming minority? >> there are two things. one, i do not disagree about the electoral college. it might be antiquated. but your voice natters on whatever levels. it is not just necessarily saying that the south carolina and electoral votes are going to candidate a or candidate b. but it is off about the number of people that are getting out in south carolina, the number of young people that are getting out across the country to vote. the more you go, especially young people, the more people

pay attention to you. it is a sad truth that our candidates travel to places across the country and to specific groups that they feel are wrong to get out and vote. if you get out and vote, they will pay attention to you. your ideas will get hurt, and it is important to vote in every election. it is an example you are setting for yourself every year, and maybe one day you will live in florida or ohio. you never know. >> good point. what is the purpose of a college education? >> it is a good question, and one that being asked more, especially today coming into today's economy. i pull start by saying in my college -- and my family a

college education was always viewed as extremely important. my dad was the first in my family to go to college, and he likes to talk about that. for me, to go to law school, i had to go to college, but my college experience was extraordinarily enriching. he grew up in raleigh, north carolina, which i love raleigh, but in some ways it is a small town because you grow up with the same people for your entire life. i was born there and i did not leave until i was 18. i interacted with the same people for 18 years. go to college, i met people from across the country.

i met people who went off after college and lived in south korea and africa, and i met people from all different walks of life and you have interesting and different viewpoints. that experience has been incredibly enriching, first of all. second of all, the academic experience of college, there is nothing that can keep but this. it forces you to expand your mind, your views, it forces you to challenge yourself in ways and i do not know of any other experience that can do that. that is why it is challenging, but it is enriching. once you move forward in your life, you will look back on your college as important. >> do you have any suggestions on how we can improve our system?

>> i think money is diluting our system. i am a strong proponent of the slogan corporations are not people. the idea corporations can have an enormous impact on our system and our election process is disturbing to me, and that is a more recent phenomenon. it is something that really bothers me because elections and issues and candidates are supposed to be speaking to the populace, are supposed to be speaking to voters. the idea that corporations specifically can control what is said and push certain issues and can control what is done in

congress is upsetting, because that is not necessarily working for people. usually, but often it is to the detriment of individuals, especially working people. i do not think that is right, so one thing i would say is in order to fix it is passing an amendment at this point, seeing corporations are not people. there are things states can do individually to pass similar laws, and reducing the amount of money that lobbyists can give -- or eliminating lobbyists entirely so that public officials are not influenced by money they are receiving from

organizations. >> who are your political heroes? that is a very hard question. it is hard to say that martin luther king jr. is not a political hero of pretty much everyone in my generation. i certainly hope so. i am fond of hillary clinton, actually. i think she has done a lot for women and politics, and she's also -- but she is not given enough credit for her femininity, because she is a woman and being a woman has influenced a lot of who she is as a person and the way she talks to people, the way she

response to questions, the way that she has formed her beliefs on certain issues. it has helped us develop our foreign policy, under her. >> that note, another question, are you heartened by the number of women at the conventions? >> i like the idea that you did not have to be masculine to be successful as a woman in the man's world of politics. it is important we as women embrace who we are and do not ever doubt that we are just as powerful and have just as many

capabilities to lead it as men, and i am an enormous fan as well of elizabeth warren. she was my professor in law school, and she has been a champion for the middle-class for so long. she gave a speech at the democratic convention, and i have always been impressed by her. she is one of the smartest people that i have ever known, and she has been leading this fight against what we would call the war on the middle class for years, and now she is finally able to run for senate in massachusetts. i am extremely heartened by her decision to do that. >> another question from a student. living in d.c., you see american politics up close. how can we encourage american

youth to pay as much attention to our government as they dod to the kardashians? >> that is a good question. a difficult one. i do not watch honeyboo, for the record, and i saw her on "saturday night live," but otherwise, no. i think it is hard. i think it is difficult, because we live in a society where there is cuts and glamour on one side, and then there is politics on the other. it is hard to compete with the celebrity of hollywood. i do not think politics should. i think a lot of this falls on the media to make sure there is fair and comprehensible coverage of elections of what is happening on the hill, of the major issues that we are being

faced with. sometimes we do a great job with this, and sometimes less so. i do not know exactly how to fix that problem, but it is one that is worth approaching, and one that may be -- maybe one of the reasons young people are not involved in politics is that just not as interesting as watching reality television. in a way, maybe we need a reality show about politicians. so in a way, maybe we need a reality show about politicians.

i don't know. >> let's not do that. what advice do you give students in the elizabeth edwards foundation about actions or projects they can take to be involved civically? >> well, one of the things that we do that our program does, and actually just so i'm very clear, we're doing our pilot program this fall in raleigh so we don't have students yet. we're in the process of applying to the program and we'll be accepting them in a couple of weeks. so i have not sat down and given advice, so i don't want to one of the things we require our students to do is to identify a problem they see in their community, an issue they would like to address them and then as a group, design and implement a

community service project around that specific problem. that is to fold. obviously, one thing your teaching is the value of public service. also the value of their own ideas to make a change in the community that they see as being really important. anyone can do this. it does not take a structured to do it. anyone can start an organization or start a community service project to get others involved. it takes some sort of grass- roots work but if you see something that you think it needs to be addressed, do something about it. that is the sort of fundamental teaching that we are trying to pass along. you can all do the same things that they can, which is to find

out what is wrong and try to fix it. >> how have you found your own voice and purpose? has it been difficult? have your life experiences inform your decisions about your life and career? >> i think that everyone's experience informs their own decisions. oddly, it has not been that difficult for me to figure out what i wanted to do. i went to law school in 2006 knowing that i wanted to do public interest law. it has worked out the way it has worked out for me. clearly, some things have been difficult and some are for

anyone along the way, someone trying to figure out where my life is going. i wanted to take a breather knowing probably that i was going to go to law school. a lot of times it takes luck to get where you're going and a lot of times you just sort of stumbled onto something you care about. i was informed by my own life experiences and then i made a proactive efforts to go out there and found experiences that would be rewarding for myself. i did legal aid work through the legal aid bureau there and for two years of law school i spent most of my time not studying.

i spent my time actually helping clients in the greater boston area to needed legal services. that made a huge impact on me. before i did that, there were parts of me that were swaying back and forth, maybe i should go into the private practice. that experience made me certain that i wanted to do public interest work. there are things that we can all do to get out there and try to gather as much information about our potential careers and to make an informed decision. >> thank you. we have a few questions back in the political arena. why do you think can decide jon huntsman are shunned by their parties? >> it is hard to be a centrist

in a partisan system. that is a bad thing. it is actually interesting. this happened in 2004 during my dad's campaign as well because he was considered relatively moderate. a candidate considered moderate at the primary stages, the activist far to the right or far to the left, and they have the belief that are obviously very conservative or liberal that a candidate will speak to. that whose -- that is who the primary system is appointed to. maybe that is why the system is

flawed. it is difficult to speak to what you call the base, of course. it is difficult to speak to the electorate as a whole at the same time. you end up using the argument that i can win because the independents will vote for me. there is no one filling the hole in the middle. i guess the party should be producing the best nominee.

>> since the repeal of don't ask, don't tell, there have been many advancements toward civil rights hit in the lgbt community. what changes do anticipate in the coming years and decades? >> my strong belief is that in the coming decades this is sort of our generation's fight in terms of civil rights. they've got i'm a very strong opponent of gay marriage being legal across the board. -- i am a very strong proponent of gay marriage being legal across the board. one of the things that has been available is a -- that says that

the lgbt has the same rights under the anti-discrimination laws as any person in a protected class. reyes, gender, national origin, age, all of these are protected classes. for some reason, sexual orientation is not protected. that is a small step that we can take right now. i work with an organization called right to work which does a lot of wonderful work in this area and i think that is coming down the line pretty soon. that will make a big difference for a lot of people because the ability for people to work in an environment where they are respected and where they are being treated fairly is huge because that is where you spend a lot of your time at work. it is important for people to feel that they are being

respected. then, i think that game marriage will come sooner rather than later. president obama has endorsed it and hopefully that is something that we can work towards in the coming years, although it might take longer. it is a very politicized issue. i anticipate that being a fight worth fighting. >> i think this will be our final question because we're almost out of time. poverty was a big concern of your fathers. what can we do to do a better job to make sure that every child eats daily? >> this is a huge issue and i will say may be the one thing that i wish had been addressed at the democratic convention that really wasn't was that

poverty is not a political platform and so that is one thing that makes it difficult to get anything done. i think that we can start by making it an important issue. if it is an important issue to come of the voters, then it will become an important issue to our candidates. starting by recognizing that this is a serious problem in this country and this is not just a problem around the world, it is right here in america that this has become an issue, especially in recent years. the number of people who have lost their savings, lost their homes, lost their jobs, this is affecting more and more people into poverty. there are parts of the economic platform that we can use that we

need to make it a priority, especially in terms of addressing poverty. with children of living in poverty specifically, it happens very schools. free or reduced launched is important. what other ways can our schools start to serve older and living in pardee -- served children living in poverty? there are a lot of things that we can do? the problems with poverty specifically is that it is such a deep problem for people and there are just so many different services, so many different tasks that we can take. the first thing is that we can take the first up, let's start talking about it and doing something about it. >> thank you very much for your

time here. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> the presidential candidates have 14 days now. the election date. mitt romney and paul ryan are spending the next two weeks on the road. we will have live coverage starting at 3:15 eastern. they will then travel to the denver area for a rally, head back to nevada, then back to io wa wednesday, then back to ohio thursday and friday. the present rallied supporters in ohio. we are planning live coverage starting at 3:50 eastern. does the president rallied supporters in ohio -- the president rallied supporters in ohio. as the president and mitt romney

have finished their series of debates, third-party candidates began theirs. the libertarian candidate, gary johnson, green party candidate, jules stein, justice party candidate rocky anderson will all take part. that begins at 9:00 eastern here. >> i regularly watch "washington journal." whenever there is a hearing that is of any significance, i will tune in. i also watch c-span online. c-span gives us a affirmation that is rare in today's spin- oriented society we cannot get the kind of information that we need to make decisions for ourselves. we often have to hear it from

the left or right. the great thing is that on c- span to get the information directly from the policy makers to you can make up your own mind. >> gregory evans watches c-span on time warner cable. c-span, created by american cable companies in 1979 and as a public-service premiere television provider. for a look now that the missions that the obama and running campaigns are taking on trade. this is a debate hosted by the aspen institute. it is about an hour and a half. >> if i could have your attention, i think we will try to get going and get through the program in the appointed amount of time. if i could have your attention.

i'm the executive director of the program on manufacturing and 21st century here at the institute. we want to welcome you on behalf of the institute, both in the audience and those of you that are reviewing remotely. i wanted to ask our president, walter isaacson, just to say a few words. it is dangerous when your boss knows as much or as more as you about the subject matter. >> that is definitely on true. the one thing that we do know about the issue of manufactured is how important it is to america's economy and how ridiculous is it to think of an economy that does not have a healthy manufacturing sector. when we were looking at all the things we do in terms of the creation of jobs and the economy, we felt there was a huge gap because people kind of

understood the reduction of manufacturing jobs in america, that was happening. nobody was as focused as they should be even though there had been a presidential commission. when tom and i and others talked, it was with the realization that understanding how to make a healthy manufacturing sector in america was key to our economy and to the 21st century. that is why it is great to have tom and this program here. [applause] >> this is the seventh of a series of programs we have been doing. our next one will be on november 28th. we will be exploring the impact of the energy renaissance on u.s. manufacturing. it will feature the head of the american chemistry council, the boston consulting group, and tom

peterson for the center of climate strategy. they have recent reports on the importance of this subject. i want to thank the supporters who make the manufacturing program here possible. this includes the apollo group, madison capital partners, manufacturers institute for productivity and innovation, the national association of manufacturers, the national science foundation, a toyota motor, the u.s. chamber of commerce. today's program explores the policies needed to strengthen u.s. manufacturing in the near term. the topic of manufacturing was mentioned 15 times in tuesday's presidential debate. the two panelists are fully able to elaborate on the candidate's position but also their own deep knowledge of the subject. partner is the conference on the

renaissance of american manufacturers headed by gilbert kaplan. he is an alumnus of the trade department. he is a distinguished trade lawyer responsible for many of the actions we have taken in recent years. i would like for you to introduce our panel. >> thank you all for coming today. when we started the conference on the renaissance of american manufacturing about two years ago in 2010 and when the other group i work with look at these issues, we thought that we really needed to focus more on manufacturing in the u.s.. we needed to make this a central feature of the policy debate in washington and the political debate in washington.

that has been our goal. we're delighted to have this debate with the aspen institute focusing on these critical manufacturing issues. we think they're critical to the national security of the u.s., to the economic security. we also think that the relationship between trade and manufacturing is a central feature of this entire debate and it is great to have people that are so knowledgeable about international trade is our speakers. i would like to introduce grant d. aldonas who is the principal managing director of split rock international, a consulting firm that he founded in 2006. he also serves as an adjunct professor of law and a member of the board of directors of the institute for international economics laugh at georgetown university. from 2001 until 2005, he was the

u.s. undersecretary of commerce for international trade. in that capacity, according to his biography, he served as the america's sales man. i hope he got a commission for all of those sales. there are a lot of exports. before assuming his position as undersecretary of commerce, he served as the chief international trade cancel to the senate finance committee and he is here on behalf of the mitt romney campaign. our other speaker from the other side of the island is dr. jared bernstein. from 2009 until 2011, he was the chief economic adviser to vice president joe biden, the executive director of the white house task force on the middle class, and a member of president obama's's economic team. dr. bernstein area of expertise

include federal, state, economic and fiscal policies, income inequality, employment, earnings, international comparison and analysis of financial and housing markets and i'm also sure, manufacturing. prior to joining the obama administration, dr. bernstein was a senior economist and director of living standards at the economic policy institute in washington, d.c. we're happy to have as our moderator, hedrick smith, who was one of the great commentators and authors in the u.s. on policies and other issues and he is a pulitzer prize-winning author. for 26 years, he served as a correspondent for the "new york times" in washington.

in 1971, he was a member of the pulitzer prize-winning team that produced the pentagon papers series. he won the international prize for international reporting and he was the chief correspondent. the most exciting is that he has written this great book, who has stolen the american dream which talks about what is going on in the middle class, what is when all the problems we're facing and how manufacturing relates to that. we have about 50 free copies that are out on the table out there. i hope you will take them. if you don't get them, i am sure mr. smith will not mind if you go and buy a copy of this book.

>> of our object is to cover as much ground as possible. i have asked them to wait to these for 90 seconds. you can have 60 seconds in a bottle. 60 seconds for rebuttal. this is a roomful of people who know a lot about trade. we have audience around the country. i hope that you will speak american speak not washington speak. there are many who would say

that americans have been over the hill on manufacturing and that we need to move to be a service economy if we're going to be globally competitive. its manufacturing really important for the american future? if so, why? what we want for manufacturing? is it jobs at home, should we have a secretary of manufacturing to go along with the cemetery of agriculture and the secretary of wall street? >> the short answer is that it is critical. 90% of the products that are introduced every year come out of the manufacturing sector. what we want our their productivity increases.

this been soft employment of the cities. in terms of growth, this is where it starts. >> i completely agree. >> i would add that 70% of our need is in the sector. it is very easy to say that you get productivity and therefore you get all of these other benefits. we have seen a lot of the jobs disappear while we were getting things and productivity. 5.5 million jobs disappear. we have seen an awful lot of manufacturing jobs show up in other places. so, why is manufacturing automatically a good deal for america as a country? it is obviously good for the profits generated. what will this do for the middle class? >> i would like to point out that some of what we have seen

with respect to the decline in labor employment. i would remember when motorola outsourced its logistics' and its customs operation to gps. those jobs stayed overnight in america but they were registered as a decline in manufacturing employment when the reality was the boundary had softened and it now inc. its supplier, ups. we did not lose manufacturing jobs simply by shifting them. >> when you say you want to boost manufacturing, what are you talking about? there is the constant leakage, is it production jobs you're talking about? >> what i think about a manufacturing employment, i think about the entire value chain and i want to make sure that we have investments on that in the u.s..

we want to make sure we have the best investment in varmint across all of those things. surprising how they recognize pretty easily and that in the world we live in today that a tax on their supplier does not do them anything. >> i don't hear the answer. what kinds of jobs are you talking about? production, engineering, design jobs? what will this do for the american middle-class? for the american middle class to stop losing jobs that you say have been redefined. >> in fairness, it is both. i want the engineering jobs, i want the design jobs. i want to make sure that we have a very healthy set of suppliers that are part of that value chain to serve the global consumer market. i don't want to deny that that is important.

from a manufacturing perspective, they know that their suppliers have to be competitive as well. the answer is employing people better capable of the skills that can drive the global value chain. we need both, not exclusively focusing on the supply chain. >> it is a pleasure to talk we actually find a lot of areas of agreement. thank you for hosting today. here is an area where i think we disagree regarding where we are right now. i used to think as an economist, this is actually more benign than many democrats sought was.

in this space we are talking about -- the plural of the anecdote, so we are getting there. the cut of manufacturing based innovation our enemies, they are negatively -- the actual proximity of the manufacturing process to the technology involved in the production is very important. there are a couple of compelling case studies on this issue. the place you have not seen that so much, this is partially in

exception to the rule, and we actually see that happening there as well. we are falling behind in the solar area because we outsource too much computer chip production. and in taiwan, there is an example of a heavily subsidized initiative, with the kind of linkage between production and research together. >> i will feed this right to you. >> a big proponent of what i just said -- this hampers its ability to innovate.

with the commodity manufacturing that can lock you out of the industry. with the innovations to talk about, which continued heavy trend of offshore and. >> the reality, this is the hardest case. the reality is that apple dictates the machines on the tour -- on the floor, this misunderstands what those manufacturers are doing and they them asink o fthem aof manufacturing -- and when china adopts a series of policies to pull manufacturing jobs into china, we would agree, that is a

distortion that is inconsistent with how a trading industry should operate. i don't think -- we may have a difference offshore and on the margins. when i heard him speak, this comes to a different conclusion about trying to make this out. we want the clusters of innovation to be taking place in the united states. what people capable of participating in this process, and i think that -- >> i think that he is making me feel a little bit like the president felt in the first debate. the other guy is agreeing with the way to much.

-- with few way too much -- with you wait too much. i think the way is to highlight the difference between the candidates. there clearly supportive of those policies. with training, of which there is an $8 billion a initiative, working with the employers and empathizing the advanced manufacturers, i don't think he talked about this enough. this is on the books, with the manufacturing clusters. the commerce department has numerous policies, to

incentivize innovation. i can go into greater detail about what these are. the innovation centers of which they are running in uptown ohio. this is actually up and running. they're getting from the lab to the factory floor. they typically find a valley of death between those institutions. i think that the trend on this side of the aisle, this is going in exactly the other way. i think that you have to get down into the details that actually operational lives -- operationalize -- >> when you talk about the

candidates, let's talk about the candidates -- >> i want to come back almost to, specific cases. >> let me just say in terms of the candidates, both the president and governor romney -- the talk about manufacturing jobs. let's talk about the record of each one, and talk about your own candidate and not the other candidate. we have a president who's going to bring unemployment down, with the economy with 25 million people who are unemployed part- time, or dropped out of the labor source. they say that you can believe them as they look into the future.

many people are looking into this -- and this is the reversal of a decade-long trend, and you can't say that this will last forever because nobody knows the future. this is something the president has every right to braque on. this really relates to my last answer. the president has a very elaborate manufacturing agenda. he has proposed a set of changes in the tax code, to incentivize of shoring. with an elaborate set of tax plans, bringing the corporate rate down from with this, and unlike the opponents he is elaborating the base runners.

there are the innovation sectors that take the production from the universities, and they're making the tax permanent, and this is a certainty for the industry. romney opposes the tax credit, and if you want to call me on time when i am going through the agenda, -- >> >> we may have those come up later. let me just ask you on the basis of the record of governor mitt romney. they were not impressed with them as the governor of

massachusetts. when you look at the letter today and getting the government of the way, letting small business go, at least one person in the last debate will be worse than in 2000 and we had the worst job creation record with 1.5 million jobs in that decade. if you can separate -- if you can actually separate these things, this is very interesting. if you go to 2007, this is the worst job creation record in several decades, and 59,000 industrial components. what governor on the talks about doing paid off terribly. >> i want to know where you have these statistics.

being responsible for manufacturing, and understanding what we were doing, in response to the recession that we inherited, -- >> and the corporate scandals that were putting a depressing effect on the economy, with some very significant reforms, we have education accounts and health savings accounts, >> why did they lose so many manufacturing jobs during this time? >> there were other things in the economy that affect manufacturing, not just by virtue of the things are described, which is the outsourcing -- >> there is no doubt that what we have seen over the last 20 years with the integration of global markets puts enormous downward pressure on industrial goods.

this is driven a lot of productivity. any job that will be done by an algorithm, can be done by a computer. how do we train people would tell thee of rhythm does -- how the algorithm does, not saying we're doing the job at the turn of the 20th-century. >> do you have a rebuttal or would she like to move on? >> i would like to finish might last exposition. i will begin by reviving. at least your honest about this. we may have a factual disagreement here. i view the middle class as being quite strong and the middle-class did poor are in the 2000's.

this is not just a function of presidential policy. i thought that was part of it and those policies were hurtful for the economy but this was an ongoing process of inequality. middle-class income was actually stagnant over the full business cycle and poverty went up in those years. i agree with his assessment of the living standard in those years. very key parts of the agenda of the president, i think these are different in important ways. they have to do with trade enforcement, as well as investment in clean energy. i thought there was a big difference on autos, and this has made a very important difference with that sector of manufacturing. >> as long as you have the rebuttal time -- >> there was a wonderful gloss on the policy of the president,

and we mentioned the tax rate to rise to be the highest -- so you are having a big impact on if this is the place where they want to invest, so what does mitt romney say? we have to bring this down as a practical matter. >> the corporate tax rate. >> they need to be closing the loopholes. so let's look at an example of this. what are the policies in terms of expanding energy production? taking land and resources out of production, with the epa resisting the natural gas revolution -- with the petroleum. romney wants to eliminate these policies that are making this

emblematic. he wants to build the keystone pipeline and make sure that investment is going to flow to that rather than surrender this $90 billion in tax credits that will not work in the marketplace. >> let's go into this, energy. we do have the recent development of very cheap energy are in this country through natural gas. others tell me that this is three -- $3 through a thousand cubic feet here, so let me just ask you, the. the grant is making here, the administration is tendering the development of natural gas as rapidly as possible. >> i could not disagree more. the tendering of the use of natural gas in manufacturing is

the absence, the fact that the infrastructure is still young. for every $10 we spend on energy, only one of the mist or natural gas because we don't have the infrastructure to exploit that. >> and bring the gas to the manufacturer. >> and have the machinery run on that kind of gas. we're moving strongly in the right direction. we could meet the fact checkers on all the points that we disagree on. i think the president has allowed to brag about with energy production. and this is not just fracking. this is a good example of a government investment role -- and one theme of mine, and we agree on this, is the role for government in investments that

have important implications in building industries within manufacturing. natural gas exploration is very much a function of early government investment in that technology. this is one of the rationales for manufacturing. on the corporate side, i have to say -- >> romney wants to go to 25%. >> we will do corporate taxes. >> let's stay with energy for a moment. >> if you think about what you just said, with the case that you are proposing, we're talking about the problem of the infrastructure not being there, why would you say that imposing the epa rule, that cuts off the possibility of using coal-fired plants now, that creates a higher cost of adaptation to get

to the natural gas, why would you adopt that as a policy? >> the problem with the framing of the question is that -- it is the edie that these rules are pure cost and no benefit. the epa does not want to block energy innovation, they are trying to block the energy effect of this production. the president is for clean coal. by talking about the cost and other benefits, you are shortsighted. >> in the context of manufacturing, there is a valley of death between us and the infrastructure that allows us to get to natural gas, which i disagree with. all of the plants that are coming on line as soon we will

be moving to natural gas. do i have a five-year window to invest in china rather than the united states? >> how could this be a valley of debt when you look at the actual facts of the prices and the exploration, and the amount we are pulling out of the ground. i think it was 2011, the first time in 60 years we were and next -- a net exporter of petroleum products. >> when you talk about the infrastructure of power distribution, we have low prices and lots of supplies but that the infrastructure is there to drive it into energy costs -- one reason you see people saying that we should export natural gas and coal -- >> the epa is now preventing them from using natural gas as a

fieluel. >> let me shift you to the subject of china. what do we do about china? we have a $295 billion trade deficit with china, and a lot of this is in high-tech, which we thought would be our salvation. we have copyright materials all across the board, huge subsidies in china, indigenous innovation is a requirement and we have the currency problem. let me ask you if we should declare china the currency manipulator so that we can then in vogue counter strategies of tariffs? >> i am from the midwest. i grew up in a bad neighborhood in minneapolis. we were not afraid to say honest

things. we were not afraid to say exactly what is really going on. they do manipulate their currency. they have been intervening in this even more because the value against the euro is rising, as the hero falls against the dollar. europe is a larger market for them than the united states. we have made some progress bar right now, we see this driving down. this is a country that is not willing to actually adopt the policies that mean that the playing field will be level, and this will be a fair competition. and from the point of view of the u.s. manufacturers who have to go to the market for their capital, the cost of capital is zero for the infrastructure in

china. they say they need this to enclose the local provincial -- they are not competing for capital. this is the model of state capitalism that has to be confronted and addressed. this is where i applaud my friend, tim rice. >> we will come back. let me start on the currency question. should the president be considering china a currency manipulator? >> i am for both of them and i suspect that you are for one of them. i think if you have -- if you have the rule that people who manage the metula their currency should be labelled as such and you know that china is doing

this, not labeling them seems cognitively dissonant to me. it is true, and as a member of the administration i would scratch my head in meetings with colleagues, and what people will tell you, people will tell you, we understand this and it makes sense. but if you are sitting across the table to negotiate with these people, this is not going to get them where you want to go. i have never sat at the table and negotiated. if that is the case, don't have a policy that says that we will label people, and did not label them. i don't think this would do as much as levin or schumer legislation. this is had bipartisan support with 99 republican votes, and this is the bill that would provide the administration the

ability to see this, piece by piece. you have to do this product by product. i am quite certain governor romney would not. >> having worked on the hill, i am not interested at a in forcing people into a illustrative votes would have to make a political point. you can go after them on the basis -- >> there are things that you have to prove as part of this. the beauty of this in response to our friends, and is always the guys at the treasury department, who put on this and say that finances too complex. you cannot understand this. what they mean to say is leave us alone because we are happy in

our sandbox. the midwestern me says, this will not work. it is hard to call the bluff. >> and there is a danger in your mind because they hold $1.20 trillion? >> the line on wall street when you owe the bank and million dollars, when you owe them $1.30 trillion, then you owe the bank. the idea that this is as much a threat as people make out as seriously wrong. those dollars have to come back with buying our goods or making investments in the united states. in my view, we want to be exporting. i want this to be sound and based on market principles. so this is where i would be headed. >> and a weaker dollar -- this would help us in that regard.

>> let me change the subject. changing the subject of the chinese industrials. the former ceo of intel says it costs me $1 billion less to build in china that america. the capital costs next to nothing and the infrastructure is put in, and then there is the tax abatement for many years. how do we deal with that? do we go where we need to go and fight them on violating global rules? >> this is one of those things where i like what governor romney's strategy is. this is very aggressive with the enforcement of the rule. this is a little bit like civil rights legislation. the justice department drove a lot of issues where people said, i don't think that you can win that.

and they did that to prove that there was a problem with the rules and we had to do something more. i want to be very aggressive on the enforcement side, and our own domestic law. the other side is you have to create incentives. nobody is going to push the chinese anywhere, and nobody is going to push us anywhere. we have to have a set of disciplines and then we have to have this out-compete the chinese investment. >> and this is matching. >> we are matching out subsidy for subsidy. i want to create an environment in the most dynamic region in the world so that the rules are such that everyone goes to the market.

and then, i am it certain that if vietnam as part of that, they will start at out-compete china for investment. you already see this in the last trip to hong kong. because of the policy -- and we also have to try to have the shanghai reform movement in china. at the same time i want to hammer -- i want the incentive to actually come in the direction of better roles. >> only way to do this is the ways that have worked so far and to do more of that. it is true they have not labeled, and more than any

administration i can think of in the past, i would include the currency as well, we should -- with the subsidy currency, and if you read the work of joe gammon, this is not just china and this is very much affecting our economy. when you get the chinese on that particular good -- the case that brought against tires was very effective. the steel case, --

>> the idea is that the international body, i am blogging on the institution. if the country to subsidize exports to your country for a larger market share, you are able to do these policies that i mentioned and impose the tariffs, that makes those exports and imports into your country more expensive. and they have been they've been protecting their rare earth. and through policies that the administration has pursued, we've imposed and i think it's been effective. >> i want to give you a chance, you can answer that. >> just as a factual matter, and i'm not going to expect to you know this. this happens to be not only somebody who was a trade

lawyer, was the chief trade counsel on the committee, the department has made a series of decision dating all the way back to the second lumber dispute that actually belied the problem of what's known as the test with respect to certain subs dies. and what we have done in terms of thinking hard about duty law, and this administration hasn't done it, something any administration should do, in my view, is take a hard look at where those precedents would allow to you go after the chinese. now, if this is the fight that the chinese want to take to the w.t.o., that's where i want to have the discussion. right? because i want to either illustrate it, that we're right in imposing duties against these subdid is that pull jobs out of america, or i want to say the rules are insufficient in terms of disciplines imposed on behavior, which clearly undermines the value of the w.t.o. and the system. >> i just want to ask both of

you -- >> that was not addressed to the audience. >> ok. i just want to ask both of you in practical terms, i mean, almost everybody has said one way or another, and particular challengers say, you got to get tougher with the chinese. i want to understand how the heck we can distinguish between talking the talk and walking the walk. i mean, i just -- it's just too easy to say we got to do this, that and the other thing and you've got wonderful knowledge of and explanation of, but the question is in the end, how do we know that in fact is what governor romney is going to do or president obama is going to do in a second term? >> president obama has done the actions i've described in his first term. if i wasn't clear about that, i should be. the actions against the tires, the steel are all actions that were taken in the first term. now, i actually believe that it may well -- you sound like you know what you're talking about. which doesn't mean you do. >> and i'm a lawyer, too.

>> so it may well be -- >> you may discount that. >> i do. it may well be that the machinations you just described in your last answer can actually work, but i would be -- i would feel better if we actually had a simple piece of legislation of which this levin bill is that says when there is evidence of a subsidy, a currency subsidy that's leading to the kind of problems we're both very frustrated about and is robbing jobs from our economy, you can bring a case that the administration, without going through the w.t.o. and all these cuned of machinations can bring a case -- you may have to bring a case to the w.t.o., but you don't have to go to the w.t.o. to find out if you can bring a case, can bring the case in that area. to be honest, the administration has not said we're for this. i believe if it got to their desk they would sign it. >> ok, in walking the walk, how do we know? >> well, a couple things. one is clearly when he's been

asked again and again and again by skeptics about what he'll do about currency, he has said, this is coming from him, not his advisors, right, that he is going to declare them a currency day one, fully understanding what flows from that in terms of action under our trade laws. meaning embracing the idea that the currency necessarily does imply a subsidy and then we have to start moving under the duty law without waiting for the legislation. >> you're saying he will declare and then he would then start doing duties? >> and there's a number of other areas where the proposals that have been discussed and that he's put forward have talked about doing things we absolutely have to do. and i'm sure jerry would agree with this. the reality of our intellectual property laws and the tools we have are not adequate for the world that our manufacturers actually operate in. a lot of the violations of our i.p. laws come to us in a component in a finished product

that reaches our shore. and the way our rules work is very hard to get to that. so what we have to be doing is actually developing the tools that address the challenge that didn't use to exist. i was talking about vertical integration, that world we have an i.p. regime for. the world of global value chance, we do not have an i.p. enforcement set of tools for that world. and we need to build that. >> a very important thing to adhere, i think we should -- i think our disagreements on this may be actually pretty suttle. we both seem to agree that currency manipulation is a big problem and that we should do something administratively about it. i think i'd go further in you in terms of this legislation, but put that -- the other side of the coin is i think a very big and important difference between the two sides that hasn't come up yet. and that's the extent to which you would actually invest in domestic manufacturing here. and i'm not talking about beating the chinese at their

own game. i don't want to do the kinds of state-owned enterprise investments that they do or manipulate currency. i think that stuff should be set in markets. but you know, i kicked through these ideas earlier about the innovation idea, the cluster idea, some of the tax policies idea. i think that that kind of investment, infrastructure, clean energy, would tutly be precluded by the budget that i've heard from paul ryan and from governor romney. and i think that's really important. we haven't talked about it at all. i think grant has a lot of very good ideas in this investment space. i don't think there's any money for that in governor romney's budget. this is a guy who's saying i'm going to cap spending at 20% of g.d.p. 4% is going to be on defense. that means 16% has to be for everything else. had's not looking at the cuts that that implies agency by agency, you're going to have to cut right into the bone, and a lot of these programs, many of which aren't even all that large, the kinds of innovation clusters that i've been talking

about. i don't see how that investment becomes part of a budget that is that austere. >> i would say this, i have lots of friends who are alumni, we could find 4% out of $500 million that we would cut. and that wouldn't go materially to the sorts of programs that you're talking about. because in previous conversations we have agreed. i don't actually know governor romney's view of this, but i wrote a book a couple years ago about globalization of the american worker. one of the things i took away from that was the value of headstart programs. but everything's baked in a cake. by the time you hit grade school. i want a cup of milk in that child's table. >> i'm sorry. are you buying the kind of programs that government role in stimulating growth and investment in a variety of programs, such as -- >> no. what i'd buy are a suite of complementary policies that

actually help individuals. what i don't buy are things that give us things of that order. the problem, of course -- >> it wasn't a failure -- >> the problem is when you expand government from -- this comes from my background due to development economics. when you expand government from a 20% tick to a 25% tick, you have to consider what that does in terms of drawing the include of lobbying and potential corruption. we just had a case today. the more money that's in the trough, the more you're encouraging this behavior. the more money that's there, the more that you attract the rent-seeking behavior, which is the worst form of entrepreneurialism. so when you say that i want to p courage these sorts of programs, i would rather encourage a suite of policies that encourage investment and allow the market to dictate where that investment should go rather than trying to put somebody in the business saying winners and losers. >> do you buy the estimate of the u.s. chamber of commerce

that we're losing $1 trillion in growth in america and untold billions in exports because our transportation system is so out of date, because it takes a long to move a freight train through chicago as it does to glt it from los angeles to chicago, and that our airports and highways and bridges and all of the -- do you buy that argument? >> i'm from a town where the major bridge collapsed because of pigeon poop. yes, i do agree. jeez, we may be in a developing country. >> yeah, right. but, i mean, the next question is there a government role there? people are calling for infrastructure spending. that will mean not only construction jobs, but -- >> i got a great example. my parents were always wise enough to get me out of town in the summer. so a lot of it was spent in the boundary waters of minnesota. there is a light house there called the split rock light house. and the reason i chose that for

my little business is it's a perfect example, in the absence of the investment in that lighthouse, no individual company would have invested in that, you wouldn't have opened up either the iron ranch for the u.s. steel industry or the wheat lands on both sides of the u.s. and canadian border to world trade. you needed the lighthouse. that is the sort of investment the government has to do. i think we'd agree that we've actually done a very good job of focusing -- >> where do we get the money for that now? >> the reality is we have a lot of debts we're going have to pay off. now, that may mean that on a number of programs that we otherwise have at the commerce department, those are not going to be ip vested in because we do have to take care of infrastructure first as far as i'm concerned so that a lot of the things that we do as economic development, in the economic development administration, i'd be more interested in trying to drive that money through headstart first and then through infrastructure rather than saying -- >> i mean, i'm with you on a lot of the ideas that you're

espousing here, but i really think you need to take a much closer look at the budgets of your candidates here, particularly paul ryan. but also governor romney. you know, paul ryan proposes over $5 trillion of cuts. 60% of them come from low-income programs and that includes headstart. that doesn't mean that every dollar going into headstart is efficiently spent. i'm not defending every single dollar in these programs. but the commercial budget office looked at the implications of the budget that romney said he supported, numeous decades out and they found that outside of entitlements and interest on the debt and defense, there's less than 4% of g.d.p. left for all the things you just said. and you and i agree that those things are important. though investments will simply be unaffordable under the kinds of budgets that these guys are espousing, and, in fact, if we're going to have an amply funded government such that we can support a manufacturing sector in the way i think we

should, that's going to involve some new revenues. and again, that's a big difference in both sides. >> but in fairness here, given where we are and the investments we have to make, why would you invest in a-123? >> i'll answer that. first of all, the a-123 case is not a good example of what you're talking about. >> they went bankrupt. >> no, it was actually absorbed by johnson controls. and i just wrote about it this morning on my blog. and you should read about that because a-123 was essentially consolidated into johnson controls and continues to create advanced battery technology. and, in fact, this blog i wrote this morning called battery-powered growth, is all about how our investments, largery from the recovery act, have made a real difference in precisely the way i tried to introduce in our introduction. where governments have planted seed capital in a key sector

that is not picking a winner as much as recognizing -- as much as recognizing that there will be an economy out there, a country out there that dominates advanced battery production. i'd like it to be us. >> ok, i want to get to corporate tax reform. >> sure. >> i know you've got something else to say on the subject, but i just want to move to that topic before we run out of time here. how can we use the tax code to generate more business and jobs here at home, more manufacturing business here at home? you've got a situation here where companies that are working in america doing all their work here in america, whether they're retail companies or trucking or roads or hotels or whatever, there a paying pretty close to the maximum tax rate at 35%. and you got companies that are operating overseas, and we have a whole slew of them, i can rattle through a whole lot of them, pay zero taxes and a big reason was they had a whole lot of production overseas. now s. that a sensible system for building job growth in this

country or not and try to avoid going into global and territorial taxes. talk to us about taxing here. >> i think it's a perfect example of where the obama addtion has gone wrong. a signature idea in terms of trying to provide an incentive taxwise to reshore, i guess is the phrase. misunders what thoast of these investments are. 95% of humanity lives outside the borders. to be in those markets means we have to invest in those markets. even if it's just a sales office to for our experts. the idea you would penalize that income that's generated as a means of allowing it to be competitive in the global economy is simply false. the energy sector is actually a perfect example. let's think about exxon. we used to think of it, remember the days of standard of oil and then we thought of the seven sisters in the 1950's and 1960's when we were being

educated. well, the reality today is the top 25 companies in the world with the exception of exxon are all state-owned. exxon isn't in the top 20. now, the question is whether you want to raise the cost of capital for exxon because we still have the ghost in our minds, and make sure they can't compete for resources in capital with everybody else in that market or whether there are going to be what the reality of energy is and where we have to invest. the idea that we're penalizing that -- take away their tax credits. happens to be where the oil is in many instances. seems to me to be deeply inconsistent with the idea of that's where we have to be in order to compete in the global economy. >> i think you just argued that we should nationalize exxon. >> i don't think that's the route we want to go. >> i want to talk about --

>> this will be your last shot because i'm going to -- >> ok. >> corporate taxes. >> corporate taxation. it's very important in the manufacturing space for all the reasons grant mentioned. here's the thing that you got to know. i thought a lot of what grant just talked about, you know, respectfully, did get to the core difference here, which is this, the governor says he wants to bring the corporate tax rate down to 25%. it's 35%, but as you mentioned, lots of industries, there's a huge variation in the effective tax rate. we're very high in international comparisons. if you look at the actual effective rate because of all the loopholes and such and the international ones, in my view, are the most egregious, that's where you see fourth from the bottom in terms of how high our effective tax rate s the president wants to bring the rate down to 28%. the governor wants to go to 25%. you want to argue about three percentage points, i think we

probably agree that either one of those would be -- would be a fine goal. but the difference is, and it's a huge difference and i would love you to address, this i will cede whatever time you need, you've got to specify how you're going to get there. mitt romney, with apologies, has absolutely been terrible in specifying how he's going to broaden the base. he says trust me, i'll get to it later. excuse me if i'm very nervous about that because the history of washington is that when people promise low rates, you get a lot of the former and not much of the latter. the president talks about accelerating the depreciation. debt financing. the way inventories are treated. transfer pricing, all this -- tax deferal. all this favorable treatment for income abroad, that stuff just insent vises the outsourcing. i'll close on this. i'll bring you back to my first comment which was that when you offshore production, you offshore innovation as well. and that is not the direct for our sector.

>> you got about 15 seconds. >> sure. this highlights the problem with the president. in all honesty, he said he wants to reduce it to 28%. every budget he has actually submitted drove the rate to 44% and what it did was adapt a series of policies that actually took away things that exposed income to -- >> you're confusing federal income tax with the corporate tax. >> no, no, i'm talking in the budgets he submitted -- >> has the corporate tax rate gone up? >> the effective rate has risen to well above -- >> hasn't gone up at all. no. >> so let me go to the audience and let me just tell you that i would like to you identify yourself. wait for the ladies and gentlemen with the microphones to come around to you. please ask a question and don't make a speech and keep it relatively to the point. ok? i got one over here. >> and remember, i'm parked at a meter outside.

i have a vested interest in this. >> i listened to all of what you just said about corporate tax rates. deferrals are one of the biggest abominations out there. in fact, we see 70% of the goods coming into this country from china made by american firms that went to china. went to china, all they want is access to our market. it wasn't so much about the chinese market. and then they're allowed to hold the profits offshore and boost the bottom line. this is part of the screwed-up tax system of incentives. and the question is what would you do to get rid of deferrals? >> good question. >> the answer is i'd move to a territorial system. here's why. >> you got to put that in language that other people can understand. >> sure. right now we subject every dollar a u.s. firm earns to the potential for double taxation. and we try and come back to what taxing just the income and

earning in the united states is through the system of foreign tax credits and deferrals. the reality is is that taking away the deferrals, taking away the foreign tax credit is a way of saying i'm going to penalize american companies who are trying to compete in global markets. >> let me just understand what you just said means that you would not have any taxation on any foreign profits made by american corporation, is that correct? >> no american taxation. >> on income that's generated by activities that are done in those countries. >> overseas? and you and the president are on the other side saying we would get rid of the loopholes, that loophole which would cause that to be taxed without -- >> that's right. >> subject to double taxation. >> just trying to get the facts clear. >> so the president in every one of his budget, by the way, has proposed to get rid of deferral for exactly the reason the questioner raised. bnd a the way, all the -- all the tax solution that grant

suggested does is it takes the deferral thing is it accepts it and makes it permanent. instead of having to store your income over there, we'll make a rule that you just never have to pay taxes on it as long as you just keep it over there. that is an incentive to go exactly the wrong way. >> you mean to take jobs overseas? >> suggesting that it's not subject to taxation is foolishness. it is subject to very high taxation -- >> in china? in china? >> wait, wait, wait, wait. excuse me. excuse me? >> if you want to go after a pharmaceutical company -- >> a trillion dollars hiding in overseas -- >> hiding? hiding? how do you know they're hiding it when the i.r.s. knows it's there? seriously? i do want to go back to the point is that you said we're getting all these things from china. i want to make a very important point because it's -- it's a

misperception that drives a lot of the debate about globalization that i think is wrong. i'm holding an iphone in my hand. 6% of the value of this is the final assembly done in china. 0% of the value is what gets done in the united states. every bit of this comes to us as "an import from china." right? every bit of the value is as import from china. doesn't matter it's our 60%, the stuff that comes from japan, i think what the question goes to and i think deferral goes there, too, is we actually need to think much more deeply than we have at this point. and i'm afraid the tax debate obscures it about where value is actually created. i think in america, particularly in american manufacturing, we create value. not because of unfair competition, but we got to do that across the board. and if that drives our tax policy and it means deferral goes, i'm interested in making sure that we understand how value is created here and we tax that accordingly and we try -- >> very simple, i absolutely agree.

but -- about value creation. but value creation is intimately linked with innovation. innovation is intimately linked with the production process here within our borders. and when you have the kind of tax policy that is territorial that either allows the kind of games that are being played today or it simply exempts foreign earnings from american taxation, which is what it does, you start a chain of events that outsources not just production but innovation and jobs as well. >> ok, question here? >> a great panel, and i think you covered policy issues with respect to manufacturing very well. i was very disappointed that there wasn't a better answer to your first question, which is why is manufacturing so important to the united states? and here we are in the middle of a political campaign, and we're trying to get votes and

we've got a tv camera that's trying to communicate this to the public, and i think manufacturing is central to everything from national defense to innovation, to education. and i would like to ask both of these good panelists to give us an impassioned statement that they would give to their candidates about why manufacturing is important. >> it's a great question. thank you for asking it. and you're absolutely right. i think we gave that short shrift. i think we both very much tried to accentuate the importance, but not as passionately as we should have. so here's the thing -- >> this is like the first debate. >> here's my impassioned thing. not only as we mentioned is manufacturing responsible for 70% of our r&d and 0% of our patents, it's critically important for our productivist there's no way american living standards can increase without faster growth. take the manufacturing picture out of the, take the innovate

out of the picture, and we don't even have the potential for higher living standards. we have a big problem in that productivity growth has been diverging from compensation. that's the story that eye different. you've got to have the growth that's necessary. it's not sufficient, it's necessary. 17% pay premium. and not just on the wage side, but on the benefit side as well. it comes right from the value added. and then there's -- >> manufacturing workers are getting -- >> 17% more than nonmanufacturing workers. and that includes not just the paycheck, but the health insurance and the pension benefits. next point, our trade deficit. our trade deficit is a drag on growth. and it's not just exports, it's net exports. you have to think about exports minus imports. and we're getting -- and the only way we can unwind that in real-time is by a stronger manufacturing sector. people who say we can do it through services are patently wrong in the near term.

perhaps down the road. right now service exports are 25% of the trade deficit. >> great. go. >> let me amplify one thing. we once developed a manufacturing strategy together. we knew it was because, not only was manufacturing important in itself, but it provides -- thinking about manufacturing is a catalyst for what you want to see as good economic policy in every other aspect of american life, education, worker training. using this as the force that drives that is what's important. here's the one point and this is what i would close on. we didn't have to wait for congress to tell us to develop a manufacturing strategy. we knew what we were facing, and we knew that it required to put forward ideas to get the process moving, to trife the public policy process forward. and the goal was to release a strategy that would do that in an election year, in part because you wanted to frame the debate in a way that the issue was joined. sadly that's not what we've gotten from the obama

administration. we had people in congress demanding a manufacturing strategy. >> very quick, very quick -- >> no, no, no. i want to get that lady in the back there first. i'm sorry. i thought it was her hand. go ahead, sir. >> i wanted to ask -- i wanted to ask about the media's role in all this. listening to you, the trade policies are fairly similar, at least the rhetoric is fairly similar. maybe on tax and budget where there's differences. but the problem, is it not, is sort of this treasury perspective is still out there in the media. you look at "usa today" editorials and two "washington post" editorials decrying china bashing. when in reality, the united states is just trying to get china to live up to the rules of the new national trade regime. how do we change, take what you're doing and keep the candidates focused on, whichever one is elected, really having the courage to go against that mentality when they get in, either for the first or second terms?

>> great question. and it doesn't -- it doesn't let me take over where i wanted to go anyway. >> you were going there regardless. >> i can do it honestly. and it contradicts something my friend grant said a minute ago. look, by the way, i take this from a great chapter called "the evolution of u.s. trade policy," which is a must-read for everybody. it's from a book called "manufacturing, a better future for america." and it takes you through trade policy issue. and it shows the integral role of government in creating a manufacturing sector from the very beginning. i mean, tariffs were incredibly important. someone would think someone who is arguing that we actually have to have a manufacturing policy, a trade policy, push back on unfair practices by

other economies, was some kind of wild-eyed, radical socialist kenyan whatever. and -- >> it was alexander ham imton. >> exactly. born in kenya? >> he was born in the caribbean islands. >> i think what these journalists -- you know, what these editorial boards are reflecting is a bias in economics that evolved a few decades ago that has been shown to be completely bereft of actual real life. if nothing else, look at the financial collapse. but certainly in the manufacturing seblingtor it's very clear. so we really need to give these people some historical perspective and make it clear. i did a presentation -- we did a presentation. my presentation recently was about how it was -- i was taking part in a "washington post" editorial that was very much in the spirit of the questioner and it called us protectionist for going after currency management. that's not protectionist. that's being a free trader. they're being protectionist.

so it's topsy-turvy. >> whoa, whoa, whoa. sorry. >> we got -- i got to get more people involved. >> ok, sorry. >> i'm sorry. you get the next one. wanted toa different perspective, also very much in the news, johnson controls apparently -- there is some question about that but apparently they are making a strong bid. what i would like to get from both of you is a comment about a prior suitor who may be tried to get them, which is a chinese auto parts company. to the extent this is a firm that the united states put a lot of money in, that has technology that is valuable in some way, not defense related, should

there be a policy respect to screening of that kind of a potential acquisition from a foreign company? >> you can take this wherever you want. >> i will add to the question. as you know, we have a policy in terms of investment, and we have limited that because we want to encourage investment. the time has come to realize there are different sorts of ways to our security, and the reality is if we are going to allow investment by folks who are not responsive to the cost of capital, that do not have to pay their workers the would have to with a decent set of labor institutions, we need to be thinking carefully, particularly with the fact that they are investing, as to whether that is an investment we are interested in. do we want to say investment across the board, or do we have to exercise good judgment here

about the sorts of the commencement -- of investment. they're not competing the way exxon has to commit pete. i am not interested in that type of investment. just like there are standards. the things they do in their own and ensuring our economic growth. that is the kind of growth i am not interested in. >> there are so many other people. i am sorry. back there. >> thanks for an excellent discussion. i would like to ask about trade policy. we have not gotten into the free trade arrangement and where we are going and what is the difference between the two candidates. >> i am astonished the president says he signed free trade agreements. he did not sign any. he did not even launch and

negotiation. the one thing he has going in it inof negotiatinon start the bush administration. manufacturers were locked out of the market. that is not a trade policy that engages in the global trading system and takes our seat at the table with an effort to design the rules in ways that not only serve our interests -- i am capable of being utterly -- but just as important adopting the system we have in the bad states is the most powerful thing we can do for economic development. the idea we want state capitalism to run rampant, we're not willing to engage in shaping the roles that make a brighter future globally is appalling. >> a response? >> i like grant's previous answer anyway. there are too big disagreements

we have. the president is legitimate to take credit for the three south korea, panama, colombia, but seeing and getting a trade agreement over the hump we did is far more to the cult, and i was there for south korea. that was touch and go and very hard. i think we have friends here that may have something to say. >> remember when nancy pelosi pulled a -- >> as someone who worked on getting these trade agreements, it was a big deal. here is the thing, where i disagree pretty significantly on trade policy, which is the root of your question. i do not think these free trade agreements have nearly the impact on trade, globalization, and grant's answer would imply

it. it has never happened that way. they are always advertised that way, there aren't the huge benefits, and every time it never lives up to that, and i think the people who make those claims about how dramatic the economy is on to improve because we signed a trade agreement and how many workers will benefit, are hurting themselves, because the public does not buy it at all. if you want to have more free trade policies be signed, and you have to take down this rhetoric about how they are on to solve all of our problems. they are not. >> i would do that and heart bait if everybody would stop saying -- >> i want to get back to your point about the importance of head start. i think a major piece that is missing from our total educational system is what i will call complex systems.

we train people to be an expert. i will say we train them to understand their buttonhole, not understand that the but the whole is on your jacket or you are wearing the jacket or you in the repair everything is linked. we think people to think in stovepipes, and the connection so you understand the consequences of the choices you are making. i think there are dramatic changes that have to go on in our educational system, starting in kindergarten. >> you are absolutely right about that. the best work that i have seen come what we do in our educational system is weak at prepare young americans to work in the industrial economy in the early 20th century, which the great thing about what henry ford did is he created a system to replace parts. the bad thing he did was that he created replaceable people. the skills that you needed in that time or to turn their

rents, any attack. if you look at what an honor worker does today, very different. very, very different, but that training is not what you are prepared to do when you're coming out of high school. where not educating people from the start in the world they are going to operate in. [indiscernible] talking about it is a wonderful way to put it, because the way we deliver in terms of raising human capital does mean -- governor romney's, it on, improving the educational system, and i would add headstart said to that. education is one of those areas where president obama and artie duncan, what have been doing -- >> we are laying off hundreds of thousands of teachers while we are saying we need better education. >> the mike is not working.

just speak directly into it. >> do you hear me? i'm a professor? nyu, but i was director of ibm for 30 years. despite that, i have the greatest difficulty in following out the consequences of the various notions about making capital more easily, and the impact of that on manufacturing. i think it is complicated. i do not understand it. if others do come out hideout to them. my suggestion is that instead of emphasizing causes, we measure effects. let me be concrete in a proposal. we need a balanced trade, because we are hemorrhaging jobs through the imbalance. some years ago, warren buffett proposed a very simple and

straightforward way to balance trade. and not by putting in a particular tariff on this or that. but simply by giving exporters certificates which importers had to buy. in other words, if you are successful in exporting, you get a certificate, sold on the open market, and in order to import, you have to buy the certificate. that means is an incentive to export and a limit on imports, but it does not cut down imports, just balance them to export. it balances trade. it comes from warren, who is not an idiot. >> he is smart about making money. on public policy, this is a guy who talked about taxes, but he has played the tax code like a fiddle. >> he understands that. >> i am asking for consistency. the companies he invests in do not do what you are describing. >> i am not asking him to.

i am asking us to consider a proposal of his which seems to make sense which visitors the outcome of all these incentives. >> if you are saying i want action, you have to look at warren's action. he does not act in the way you are describing. .> i would be at hominem, alph, let's look at the facts. i do not think that just a persistent trade balances, but the imbalances we have seen have been so destructive for growth, and they very much embody the kinds of problems that i've been trying to stress drop the talk in hurt in the manufacturing sector of our friend from nam was asking about earlier. that particular plan is an interesting one.

it strikes me as extremely challenging, legislatively. i would think that just off the time of my head that the tax on imports would be in not trivial, and consumers would not like it. as a veteran of these debates, when you start working with the work places, things get complicated quickly. i think the cost of step that we buy and walmart goes up -- >> that strikes me as a potential issue. however, when of the reasons those costs are so low is because of the subsidies which have both been suggesting should be stopped, and that is a bit of a hatchet, but i am looking did -- i am interested in looking at those ideas. i want to thank you both very likely to discussion. it surfaced and number of disagreements in a genial way. [applause]

[indiscernible] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] >> shortly, we will go live to henderson, nev., for a campaign rally for mitt romney. is event is the first in a blast heading apple to election day. we want to hear from you about last night as president of the bay. we're asking what were the highs and lows of the final debate. we heard from over 70,000 of you. weigh in. we asked viewers what they

thought about the final presidential debate. here is what some of you had to say. am i was undecided until watching this debate. what i saw an obama tonight was presidential. what i heard was real leadership. i appreciated the fact that he was straightforward, was candid about his own position, and what i heard from romney was a parrot. >> i think governor romney won hands down all these debates. >> i am so proud of the president. he is presidential, a statesman, and when mitt romney is ask the question, he looks like a man that cannot take pressure. >> mr. romney seemed to me to be a little when she washy. earlier, he made a statement about having it back by. -- a backbone. there he states he wants to work

with china. he wants to deal with pakistan. padilla i want to try some the about the moderators and the debates. i think they are one-sided, i think. i believe in governor romney, and i hope people open their eyes and take notice of what is going on in our country. >> romney etch and the questions, he did not tiptoe around them. he is not. he is straightforward. he keeps saying the same thing over and over again, and is very consistent, as to where obama has not been consistent. >> i thought the debate lagged off the questions, because they got so much away from the foreign policy, which i thought was a focus, and they started talking about domestic economy. i try to tie it into what the questions were, and i do not think either candidate stock --

they kept going back to the economy. >> i felt that governor romney had done an excellent job today, very presidential, and the main point was the end of the comment where there is hope. our family has felt were not being protected as a nation, that our borders are open, and the issue that were discuss i felt that romney is going to get my vote for short. -- for sure. >> i thought governor romney was comfortable talking about the economy. i thought obama was comfortable talking about foreign policy, and he did a better job of tying in foreign policy which our current economy. aloha. >> a list disappointed with the president. i was looking for him to lay out a strategy for foreign policy, and i found him to be the ginny carter of our generation.

>> i am thinking that obama won this. romney sounded more like obama and less like himself, backing down a little bit. obama and romney -- president obama and romney both fell to say anything about the economy. >> out of all the three debates, this was obama's strongest showing. he was directed the point, straightforward, and assertive. he called out romney on some of his equivocations with such prowess and being so polite that it was admirable to watch our president defend his policies of the last four years. >> watch and engage with c-span. >> think what people saw in

governor romney was someone who was energetic. he was confident. ready to be commander in chief. he did it both by doing analysis of what has gone wrong the last few years and also by laying out a path fort. -- 4. president obama was very defensive about a number of issues. i think governor romney did a good job explaining how our economic challenges and our foreign policy challenges are stitched together. governor romney believes that broad isity to lead a broa

shaped by our economy. [indiscernible] ahmadinejad --a joh our ability to lead abroad is effective when our adversaries look at america at and [indiscernible] and our allies look at america [indiscernible] and friends rely on us in that situation. the state of our economy and affects our foreign policy. the ability to grow our economy is also affected by the state of the world. stable economy, stable markets,

very important for america opossum economy and how we grow and export. he tied that very well together. >> a lot of people expected romney to bring up the administration's [indiscernible] was there a reason why? >> the address benghazi in the context of a broader challenge. he looked at the failures in libya and the crisis in libya in the context of turmoil throughout the region. and whether it was 30,000 people dead in syria, iran getting , orer to a nuclear bomb offm, the situation in libya where we had the first american ambassador killed. when you look at all these

there is a sense of chaos in the region and an unraveling of foreign-policy. president >> in across -- the president came across strong. he has delivered on the promises he has made, together a global coalition. he talked about that this evening. ronnie came across as somebody who was [indiscernible] and that leaves a mark. [indiscernible] somebody who is uncomfortable with many of these issues, unfamiliar with policies, and somebody who is ready to -- >> governor romney less

aggressive than he was a week ago. how do you think people respond? >> [indiscernible] he was prepared and ready. i think the president was also holding mitt romney;s feet to the fire when he was not the truth about his position or about a particular issue. that is how americans will perceive that when watching at home. >> tell about -- what was your reaction? >> we knew what his record is, and he we knew what he said about iraq. he said he would have kept tens of thousands of troops there. it was not aligned with his record, and that was interesting to watch. >> we have been able to show

that to the american people, and everything this president has tried, hundreds of millions of dollars he has spent to make governor romney at into somebody that he is night has all been undone by these debates, and that is why it is a golden time for us. >> they are trying to portray him as an extremist. they're trying to make him unacceptable to the american people, but the debates are great. people say, wait a second, i like governor romney. i think he should lead this country, and a lot of his ideas make sense. those are things that make the big difference when it comes to polling and figuring out who was on to win and lose. [indiscernible] i did not know about that. i think governor romney is being very comfortable, and he is getting confidence and these settings, and he is showing the people he is ready to be

president. [indiscernible] i think it has been very important. in our culture, debates should become a big deal. people judge presidents often by how they are doing in the debate. the president has not been able to deliver an answer for how he will lead this country over the next four years. he is proving clint eastwood right every time we do a debate. he has the message. he has nothing on the table. what is there? what are the plans for the next four years? >> he spent a lot of time in this debate. that is important because we interviewed -- [indiscernible] governor romney has been all over the net. you want steady this as a

commander in chief. we will still talk about the need to end the war in afghanistan and stay vigilant against terrorism, but rebuilding our economy is the central challenge, and we think the president made that point, and we will did a lot more tomorrow and the next few days. >> on iraq, he said we did not want their troops there at all. come on iraq, governor romney has repeatedly said he believes -- he did it in 40 foreign policy speech. he said unthinkable president did not -- go to the video. governor romney, the effect of thing the president did tonight was in the governor romney down to his position.

he was wrong about iraq, afghanistan, going after big lot and, has been wrong and when he went has not been wrong -- the president has been clear, and this is a debate about straight, and who do you trust for your commander in chief. the president delivered a commencement date. >> what is the headline in ohio tomorrow? >> the president was strong and romney was weak and unsteady. the president was talking about nation-building at home. one of every eight jobs in ohio is depending on the auto industry. governor romney tonight made up a fairy tale about his position on the auto rest appeared from a were president, we would be

buying chinese parts here and int buying shanchevies beijing. >> was the line about bayonets off message? >> no, it was on message. secondly, he talks about our -- those strategy h numbers have shifted. of course we have more horses back then, but this is about strategy, capability, and never romney wants to turn decisions about our military strategy and our funding over to the members of congress and politicians. not our generals. my suspicion here is the exchange about military spending was a convincing section.

>> think they would see some differences in approach, especially when it comes to israel, national security, and the budget, the reckless budget that president obama is proposing versus about what governor romney is calling for, when it comes to ratcheting up sanctions against iran. there are clear differences, and we saw from governor romney an agenda to not have us be subject to intense run the world that shaped a fence around the world, and i think they saw from president obama defend his own policies and the inability to lay out his policies for the future. romney did a good job of laying that out tonight. >> two weeks left. where do you think you will go starting in a momrning?

>> we have momentum. things go to the battleground states, a discussion about our national security and foreign policy in the difference is there. they go very much did the discussions about the economy, and the economic strength and the national security strength and abroad are tied to one of the. there will be discussion about economic policy and debt. romney will highlight his plan for a recovery as well congressman ryan. we cannot afford four more years like the last four years, when it comes to job creation, to art that, when it comes to health care, and not when it comes to national security. >> portman said the president seems to be debating -- [indiscernible] >> it will be a close contest. i saw commentary that obama seemed to be in his approach to

this debate acting as someone who was a challenger, who was behind, but we know this will be a close contest, and when i talked to you a couple weeks ago, when things look like they were going great for a bombing, this would be a close contest. now.ve a meomentum it will be hard fought in these states, but i feel very good about where we are coming out of this last debate. >> the back-and-forth on the military budget -- and they will regret that it's a for a long time, and the president informed him what the military budget is. we do not have bayonets' anymore. >> got the impression he was on

the offense tonight, and i am wondering about that. >> you can be the leader and commander in chief. you saw him be very strong tonight, as his leadership has been the past four years trip romney was uncertain. the tickets between the two candidates could not be more clear, and you saw and assert the president, because he is commander in chief, and that is what the public wants. they want their leaders to be strong, understand where we want to go, and romney continues to change his positions on things, and he has been wrong. he was run in iraq, afghanistan, and tonight the public saw it. >> how important is this for your race now that you have a [indiscernible] >> and battleground states we continue to have an advantage.

every single opportunity to talk about the events as between the two candidates is a success for us. we heard that in good detail tonight, an important moment, and [indiscernible] i thought it looked really unsteady. >> the romney campaign said obama [indiscernible] seemed to behave like he was behind. do you think he is an underdog? >> president was a strong and steady leader, and romney was wrong and reckless, and he is unsteady. that is what you saw tonight. that is what we have, and that is why the american public saw that night.

>> we will take you live to for ason, nevada, campaign rally with mitt romney and paul ryan. an estimated 80,000 nevadans have cast their ballots. live coverage when the rally gets underway on c-span. until then, we talked with early voters to get their thoughts on last night's debate. host: early voters, teaneck in detroit. for whom did you vote and how did you vote? caller: good morning. i voted for president obama. host: how did you do it?

caller: i did it by early voting, and it was quite an experience. the polls look awful. -- the polls looked full. host: why did you vote for obama? caller: are are a lot of misleading statements from romney. between him and saying the changes in all his positions, i saw him, and i watched him from the primaries on, and the republican party is from paul ryan all the way down to the senate republicans and house republicans, they have signed on to the republican party platform. mitt romney is going a against it. with the bush cronies as his

advisers, i do not see any kind of way that he would be going against the party. his extreme views in my opinion are still a place, since conservatives said all they needed was a president with five working digits to sign the bill, and they are telling him what to do. host: what do you do it a try? tell us about yourself? caller: i drive a school bus. right now i am on a medical. i have been driving this for 17 years. host: for a school? caller: yes. i have watched my income status, how a change, and i watched the economy and how it has changed. also, i have been voting since i was 18. host: may we ask what age range you are in now?

caller: i would be considered middle age. sometimes i feel older than that, but i am 51. host: you are very young. caller: thank you very much. first of all, america is a very good prosperous, strong country. we have some very good working individuals i'm very proud of america. if we want everybody to know that american workers are the best workers in the world. we will give it our all. here is the trick. host: the trent public schools. what would you be your assessment of the school system and the students host? caller: i have been with the

students for 70 years treat the fundamental changes that in my opinion should be made basically on the administrative side so that the children can benefit, because we had a lot of mismanagement of funds, through contracts and all those sorts of things that parents did not really get into the basic numbers. they did not watch the numbers. they did not watch it, and what it did was ultimately hurt the children. now i see that they are trying to take better control of putting parental involvement with the actual services that the children received. now we are starting to see a little progress. it is not much help but it is some.

we're starting to see a lot of more dedication, and that was the main thing that we really needed. host: next is devante and albuquerque. tell us about your early voting experience. we're going to move down to anna in frederick, maryland. another early voting. caller: morning. i voted by absentee ballot. i have been a democrat for 30 years, and i could no longer in good conscience really support the democratic party. i spent the last four years doing extensive research, and this is a problem with people. they look at the surface, they do not go behind what they see on the surface and look at the

candidate and their background and with their air coming from. i have to tell you that i am convinced the democratic party has been hijacked. by marxists and socialists. it is no longer the democratic party of my parents, where we were taught if you want something, go work for it. no one will hand it to you on a silver platter. all i see now is people wanting everything on a silver platter. give it to me because i exist. just give it to me. i have to tell you that obama is the most divisive, deceitful president that i think we have ever had, and to sit there and blame his entire thing on bush, are we forgetting what the catalyst was that put this financial collapse in the motion? it was that committed the reinvestment act by carter and advocated by clinton, where he mandated that the banks had to

make the loans to these subprime borrowers. when you are making risky loans, where people -- and there are is no qualifying, and something has to give, and at some point the whole thing has to implode. it has to collapse. that is exactly what happened. as far as obama is concerned, he is a known element. let's look at all of his decease. i will cut the deficit in half. oubled it.be the eexpanded the patriot act. this is an infringement of our rights. let's talk about "obamacare." has anybody focused on obama in 2014 will have a health advisory panel, appointees that will be

able to dictate to the american people what they can and cannot receive as far as the health care is concerned. they can pass legislation without congressional authority. that is a violation of our constitution. he is setting up a dictatorship. host: up next, roberta n. ohio. tell us about your experiences as an early voter. how did you do it? caller: i voted for mr. obama. host: out early today open early voting? caller: october 2. there were lines of people, and everybody was moving. host: we have heard in the past about the voting machines in

ohio. are you satisfied with the integrity of the voting process? caller:i am. host: tell us why you are supporting obama. caller: he is truly for the people, and is not out just for the people in need of what ever. he is for everyone. i feel romney has already stated how he feels about that half of america, and i think people need to wake up and realize who is out for them. everybody criticizes what obama has done, but he saved several jobs, and save many people from going to the unemployment lines and the benefit lines and this

and that. everybody needs to wake up and see that he is honest, he is forthright with what he intends to do, and as far as things he has not been able to accomplish, he did not have congress backing him up you cannot blame him for whatever has not been accomplished. people need to wake up. callei work in corrections. i work with inmates. host: the county level? state level? caller: state. host: thank you for calling. caller: have you ever voted republican? host: never.

who is going to win? caller: obama. host: percentage? caller: 52%. host: up next is john from north carolina. good morning. caller: how are you doing, sir? host: tell us about early voting. caller: it has already begun. i am looking forward to it. i want to go vote for president obama. host: when? caller: we are going to do it as a family, this week. my wife is in the army, says she is the voting officer for per unit. she is advocating we need to vote as a family. host: what do you do?

caller: i am a stay at home dad. it has been hard to find a job, going from different states, but there has been things that have helped out by the different programs that have put in place for me to go to school to get a good-paying job. host: how many kids do you have? caller: three. host: as the military career for your wife? you find them to be republican, democrat, what? caller: my wife is a junior officer, a major, so it seems like to me a lot of the higher- ranked officers, they lean more

to the republican side, and when you look at her, some senior nc 0's, theywer-rate nc are leaning toward obama. for those who are listening, when our president has had his hands tied by our congress, for them, from the date of his inauguration, they have a meeting to say that they are going to make him a one-term president, by any means necessary, to me that is treasonous in itself, for this man to not even have raised his hands to state this oath, not even do his job, to say we are right to do anything -- host: isn't that their job?

caller: i never heard democrats have a meeting saying we will not make bush president, or clinton president, or jimmy carter. the other day, the house knocked down a bill that was paid that would put millions ofjust like today, the house veterans knocked down a bill that was paid for that would put millions, millions of veterans, millions of the veterans' jobs, and all republicans in the house democrats, voted against this bill, and it was paid for. it did not affect our budget. host: how old are your kids? caller: 11, 8, and two years old. host: i would think it would be easier to have a job than to stay home with those three.

caller: [laughter] when you look at the fact of the things that me and my wife have put in place to where our kids will have something in the future -- we are homeowners, we own two homes. when we are gone, these houses will be passed on to our kids, about these types of situations now in the future. host: that was john in north carolina. joe in west virginia on our support governor romney outlined. virginia? caller: it open on the 24th. host: how did you do it? caller: i have not done it yet it is not open on the 24th. it starts tomorrow. i want you to give me some time.

i'm a democrat, ok? i have always been a democrat. but i am voting for romney, because i do not trust obama. as far as the guy before that said that congress doesn't help him, hey, he had congress and everything for two years, the complete white house. he did nothing except his obamacare. earlier there was a guy who said he was a muslim. there was george shnopolos -- he said he was a muslim, because he was asked a question and he said "my muslim faith." go back to that tape and he

himself admitted he was a muslim. i don not believe anything hehe is too busy going on these talk shows and stuff. nothing wrong with that -- if you want to do that, fine. but don't let the country go by when he is busy playing golf and going on all of these tv shows. host: we are going to have to leave it there. >> we are waiting for the start of they wrote rally for romney and paul ryan and the henderson pavilion outside las vegas. this will be the first event since last night's debate.

a few more minutes. we will join it live when it gets underway. undecided voters called us this morning to give their impressions of last night's debate. host: want to talk to undecided voters only during this next segment, and tell us what you thought of the debate, what you think of each candidate. we will begin with a call from charleston, south carolina. good morning. why are you undecided? caller: good morning. i was not sure whether i wanted president obama to win or john mccain. this is my first year being able to the. i had trouble in south carolina, getting thought my voter's registration card. it took them a month for me to get my card, but i got it and i am excited about voting.

i watched all three debates from the presidential candidates, and i hear a lot of conservatives talking about the navy and how they bake -- the big they think it should be. we do not need a big navy. the secretary of defense has asked the president for certain things and has asked for certain things, to so to say that our navy is weak, that is not true. host: you say that about the navy? why are you undecided? caller: looking at romney, i did see that he does want a stronger military and i was not sure about whether i want to vote for the president is because of the fact that president obama, not being able to get congress to

bring together and when he came in the office, he said he would be able to do that. rummy is more moderate, and he tries to come off as. it is hard to choose one candidate or another. host: he said this is the first time you are voting. is that because of your age? caller: yes. i just turned 18. i'm a college student. that is another reason why lean towards the present even more. i cannot name 10 college students that have not received any state or federal money. when you talk about needing to take care of our own

responsibilities, now citizens can pay for college out of pocket. i am one of those tunes that cannot. host: your state is probably going for mitt romney. caller: yes, but let's get copper pipethey are pretty democratic. host: columbia and charleston. caller: we have numerous projects going in building our roads and we need money towards education. i was for governor haley, our first female governor. she talks about cutting education spending. am not for voting for another conservative governor. host: tj, we appreciate your time this morning. voters isn't undecided

in florida. this is frankie. tell us one thing you like or don't like about the candidates. call. both candidates are good family man. -- men. they seem to love their country. that says a lot to me. what i do not like about the candidates -- president obama -- the economy has taken a downturn. i understand what was inherited at the onset of his campaign. i do not like that we'll not see much movement over the years he has occupied the white house. as far as governor romney, he

doesn't seem to have a clear, consistent plan. he seems to be changing courses sort of with the wind, so to speak. he goes from saying one thing to changing the next time he is in public. my concern is that i do not know -- i know what obama is all about because i have seen his strategy. i don't know what romney will do. he tells me he is not for medicare vouchers then he is for medicare vouchers. he says he doesn't care about the 47%, low income workers and then he said that is a mistake, that he did not mean to say that. i respect -- you have to tell me something.

thomas something about the if about the deductions. theft buthe needs to tell me something. i have to stick with obama. i know about is 5-point plan. he is asked a question about what you will sacrifice to get there, doesn't give me an answer. host: how informative do you find the television commercials? caller: the television commercials are bombarding the airwaves.

they are saying the same thing. i do not know how to trust those either. i want to hear, what are you going to do for me? i have a home. are you going to take the mortgage rate away from me? what are you talking about? tell me something. host: tell us a little about yourself. caller: i retired back and 2010 in jacksonville, florida. i retired with full retiree benefits. i was blessed to have been able to do that. i do not have a steady income. i have investments, retiree

money. i have to be mindful about how spend it. i want to be able to have some fun. i'm stuck i am. i do not know what is coming. i just don't know. host: lambert in arlington, virginia. good morning. good thing about each candidate. caller: they are politicians. they just lie. host: where does that leave you when you go to the polls? caller: i do not know if i'm going to vote.

i think the president, know what you're going to get. mitt romney has a good point. >> we will go live a romney and paul ryan outside las vegas. hello, nevada. it is great to see you guys. nike so much. nevada, are you ready to help us win this thing? that is right. not forget, or early voting already started. you can get out there, and cast

your vote, we need your help. we saw last night and two other nights a man who is ready to become a great president, and his name is mitt romney, and you are going to help make in the next president of the united states. i want to thank your fantastic lieutenant governor what he has done for us, for your state, for his leadership. i want to thank my >i want to thank my buddy, dean heller. [applause] he is a true nevadan. indeed to send him back. and you have this new guy, a

true citizen legislator. the kind of man who has earned your support, joe [unintelligible] sent him back, he is exactly the kind of person we need to save this country. you have great leader's right here. you know what we saw last night? we saw governor mitt romney offer this country will ideas and leadership. in so many ways. we know this right here in nevada. look at the unemployment rate. we cannot afford four more years like the last four. you know what? please, go ahead, have a seat. president obama has not only failed to lay out his second term agenda, president obama has

decided that his path to reelection is to distort, is to try and distract to see if he can win this election by default. we are not going to fall for that, are we? it was four years ago when candidate barack obama was running for president and he said this -- if you do not have fresh ideas, use stealth tactics to scare voters. if you do not have a record to run on, paint your opponent as someone that people should run from. a big collection of small ideas. ladies and gentleman, that is exactly what he said for years ago, and sadly that is exactly what president obama has become. two weeks from today, he will become former president barack obama.

mitt romney will be the next president of the united states. because we can do better than this. we do not have to settle for this. we do not have to settle for conduct a million americans trying to find work. we do not have to settle for 11.8% in nevada. we do not have to settle for all of these underwater mortgages. we do not have to settle for 15% of our fellow men and women living in poverty. it will take leadership. it will take a man with a plan, a proven job creator reaching across the aisle to find common ground and get results. it will take the kind of leader that we have, mitt romney. [applause] do you know what we saw last

night? yet again another display of a man ready to be president. another display of someone with the demeanor, the temperament, with the skills to be a leader. what we saw last night was mitt romney being concerned about america's position in the world and president obama more concerned about his position in this race. the president has run out of ideas. that is why he is running a small campaign about small things and hoping that he can distract people from the reality in front of us. the reality is this, we can do better than this. we can get people back to work, back out of poverty and into the middle class. we can create jobs.

we have so much energy in this state, this country, let's use it and get people back to work. [applause] we have a leader with a plan to create jobs. we have a leader who is a proven job creator. at a time when we have a jobs crisis in america. would it not be nice to have a job creator in the white house? ladies and gentlemen, we do not have to wait for four more years of the same. we only have to wait for two more weeks. that means in nevada, you can help us. do not forget the early voting. we can get this country back in the right spot. his name is mitt romney and he is going to be your next

president of the united states. [applause] ♪ >> that is a nevada welcome. thank you, nevada. [applause] thank you, henderson. thank you, nevada. great to be with you. i need you to do something. i love the fact that you are cheering, it warms my heart, but i want you to make sure that you

are early voting. early voting has already started. get out there and vote right now. [applause] my guess is that you have had the chance to watch the debate last night. maybe a couple of them. these debates have supercharged our campaigns. there is no question about it. we are seeing more and more enthusiasm and support. we are making sure that the messages of these debates keep going across the country. i had to look at the president's campaign through the eyes of those debates. well, you know, he has been reduced to trying to defend characters on sesame street. word games of various kinds. and misfired attacks, one after the other. the truth is that attacks on me are not an agenda. we have gone through four debates now, with the vice

presidential debate and my debates. we have not heard an agenda from the president. that is why his campaign is taking on water and ours is full speed ahead. [applause] paul mentioned -- is two weeks from today, but you have to get your votes out there early. i want you to know, we can handle two more weeks of the attacks from barack obama, but not four more years of what he is giving us. [applause] i mean, can you afford four more years of 23 million americans looking for a job? can you afford four more years of housing prices going down to the bottom? can you afford four more years of doubling of gasoline prices? >> no.

>> how about this, would you like four years where you can create 12 million new jobs? how about four years where we are able to see rising take-home pay again. how about four years where at the end of which we get nevada unemployment down to 6% or lower. [applause] look, if we are going to see a real recovery and see that kind of direction, we are going to have to have real change. unfortunately, the president today represents the status quo. his campaign slogan today is forward, which does not suggest changing, does it? a better slogan for him might be forewarned. we have seen what happens over the last four years.

look, i am willing to do the work with paul ryan that it takes to change washington. the president said you cannot change washington from the inside, only the outside. we will give him that chance in a couple of weeks. if we go forward with the same direction of the last four years, he will keep amassing a deficit like this every year. america's future will look a lot like those troubled nations in europe. if on the other hand if we take the new and bold course that paul ryan and i represent, we go cap spending and get us on track.

going forward with this same old policy will mean that he will cut $716 billion from medicare for our current seniors. that is the wrong way. paul ryan and i will restore those dollars to our seniors in medicare and make sure that those dollars are there for our kids and their kids. we will keep the promises made to our seniors. four more years, four more years like the last four years mean that we will cut $1 trillion out of our military. look, i have the greatest respect for the men and women who serve in our armed forces and appreciate their great sacrifice. and i will not continue to reduce the number of ships we have, the number of planes we have, the number of soldiers we have. i will make sure that we protect our military and keep them

second to none in the world. [applause] four more years like the last four years, with all of the spending and borrowing you are seeing will mean that you will have an america where you have interest costs going up and up and the president will have to raise taxes $400,000 per family. he is also planning on raising taxes on a million small businesses. we have a different path, a path that will not raise taxes. we will cut taxes for the middle class, cut taxes for small businesses. we will make it easier for small businesses to grow. four more years like the last would mean that we would see obama care, meaning your health insurance premiums will go up

by $2,500 per person and it invites the government into the doctor's office with you. we will reverse obama care and it's extraordinary costs. [applause] four more years like the last, we will continue to have a president playing hide and see trying to find a plan to get the economy going, the great jobs. this is a president for whom creating jobs is another stimulus. how did that first one worked out? and he says he wants to hire more teachers? we love teachers, we are happy to see more teachers, but that will not get the private sector growing. his idea of growing the economy is raising taxes. does anyone think that raising taxes creates more jobs?

>> no. >> his vision for the future is a repeat of the past. we do not want to go into the past. our plan has five key steps to get the economy going, because we are serious about these things. we will finally get north american energy going using oil , gas. [applause] we will make trade work for america by opening up the markets in latin america. we have advantages there with language and time zone. we will crack down on cheaters when they steal our jobs through unfair trade practices. [applause] we're going to make training programs work for the people that need training. by the way, we can fix our own schools. we do not give our larger share

of our campaign contributions to the teachers' unions. we are going to do something to fix those schools across the country, putting our kids and parents first, and the parents first, with teachers' unions going behind. [applause] #5, no. 5 is this. we will champion small business. we want small business to grow and thrive and add more jobs. we want to help small business people with lower taxes and regulators who see themselves on the same team. we are going to help small business to grow and thrive in this country. i understand small business. i did not study small business, i live small business. we will help them grow.

[applause] this is a status quo candidacy. this is a message of going forward with the same policies for the next four years. that is why his campaign is slipping and ours is gaining speed. i am convinced that we can do better. i know that we can. and this is not just a matter of paul ryan and me, this is a move across the country, recognizing that we can do a better job. i have seen it from my life, the heart of the american people, a greatness. something that tells me that if we tap into it, allowing freedom to bloom if it can, we will see the economy roaring back to success.

[applause] i say that because i've seen the american people and entrepreneurship of our fellow men and women. what we have within us is a great desire. we want to help each other. we americans are ready to give of ourselves to something bigger than ourselves. we are a people that love great things, patriotic, care for our communities. this is a time to call on the greatness of america. i had an experience that reminded me of that. it touched my call. -- touched my heart. i was a boy scout leader, some years ago. it was at a boy scout court of

honor, we have this for my table and was seated at the end of it on the podium. the person speaking was the scoutmaster from monument, colorado. i hear someone from colorado in there. there you go. he said that there boy scout troop wanted a special flag, so they bought one. it was a flag with gold tassels around the outside. eventually at the end of the table there was a flagpole with a flag on a like the one he was describing. he said that they flew it at the capitol building. and then when it came home, they contacted nasa and ask if their flag could go up on the space shuttle. of course, space is at a premium in space. nasa said ok, we will take the

flag of this. they put it on the space shuttle and he said -- you can imagine how proud the boys were, looking from their home rooms at the tv set, as they watched the shuttle takeoff and rockets go up into the air. until they saw it explode on the tv screen in front of them. he said he called nasa two weeks after the challenger disaster and asked if they had found a remnant of their flag. he said he called almost any -- almost every week for months. have you found our flag? always, no. in september there was an article in the newspaper that listed some of the debris and it mentioned the flag. he called nasa again and as a matter of fact, they said, they had a presentation to make. the boy scouts were presented with this container, blackened,

and when they opened it there was the flag in perfect condition. [oohs] [applause] and then he said -- that is the flag on the flagpole next to mr. romney. i looked over and reached up, grab a hold of the flag and pulled it out. for me it was like electricity was running from my arms. i thought of the sacrifice of our sons and daughters, men and women, sacrificing, putting themselves in danger for learning, for discovery, for us. i thought about how much that typified the american character. i think about the single mother that scrims and saves so that she can have a good meal for her child by the end of the week. i think of the father with a couple of jobs so that he can afford making sure that his kids

have the same kind of clothes that other kids at school have. i think of a couple that decided not to share christmas with each other, exchanging gifts, so they could instead provide a christmas for their children. i think of the young person who enlist in the military to go to college. i love those who serve -- [applause] all of those who have served in our armed services, or are serving now, please stand or raise your hand and be recognized by the audience. [applause] i love those -- i love those words in front of our national hymns.

beautiful, heroes proved in liberating strife, who more themselves their country loved, and mercy more than life. the fact that they, like so many others, are living for something bigger than themselves. this is an important time for america. a time to choose the kind of america we will be. is this going to be a sacrifice for great things, or will we turn to government and expect them to do everything for us? will we have in america with an economy driven by freedom and economic opportunity, or an economy driven by low wage growth and high gasoline prices. this is the choice we will have.

what i need you to do is get out there and vote early and often. not here in nevada, right, governor? the governors saying no, not here. i need you to get out and vote because on election day i need you to get your friends to vote. over the next few weeks paul ryan and i need you to get energized, get out and vote. i need you to do something, find a neighbor who voted for barack obama next time -- last time and remind him of the promises that were made and tell him about the promises that were kept. we are going to take this country with rising take-home pay to keep us strong overseas. america is coming back. this is the comeback team. i love america. i believe in you.

i believe that our brightest days are ahead. thank you so much. we love you. [applause] ♪ >> there are two weeks until election day. mitt romney and paul ryan are in harrison, nevada. they are covering these rallies live with the republican ticket. phone lines ashe we get closer to the election. we are going to start off with a twitter message from a viewer -- "why does the media keep on asking questions on how to allow mitt romney win"? are you the imagemaker?

we have a call from new york. caller: i have a quick comment as a proud, new york republican who is self-employed. i am so ecstatic in watching both congressman ryan and governor romney take that stage. i am so enthusiastic and can honestly say that after four years i am better off today than i was four years ago because i am watching the next president of the united states. thank you. >> next, a democrat, atlanta. caller: i wanted to say that i was a democrat and voting for president obama and that i wish him the best of luck for his four more solid years. i wanted to know, mitt romney keeps yelling he will have these 12 million jobs, but he has not explained where they're

coming from. can you explain where they are coming from? >> thank you for your call. robert, republican. say, robert -- looks like we've lost robert. tricia, republican from lake zurich. caller: hi, how are you? >> good, thanks. caller: i watched all of the debates, but last night mitt romney had blue and red ties, which gave it a big signal. barack obama had on a totally blue tie, that was one thing and wanted to point out. the second thing is that mitt romney is totally right. i happen to own a small business and these federal regulations are just driving me crazy.

>> thank you so much. another twitter message. "mitt romney" will protect our military and keep it second in the nation." a call from richard, independent call, texas. richard? caller: [unintelligible] >> we are having trouble hearing you. can you speak up a bit? caller: i am an independent voter out of texas and i share the sentiment from it romney, i cannot support a candidate who cannot be truthful about his own religion. he talks about being a preacher for 10 years? there is no such thing as a preacher in the lds church, not in my faith. there is a bishop, what they

call a bishop. i just cannot trust the person who cannot be honest about his own fate. thank you. >> in addition to the rallies with mitt romney and paul ryan today, the president is speaking in dayton, ohio, which we have live on c-span 2. or you can see the speech from this morning in florida on c- span.org. next, democratic line, texas. you are on, richard. " caller: i am a democrat is going to vote for mitt romney and paul ryan. >> why is that? caller code they speak the truth. they do not beat around the bush. four years of obama, he has promised this and that. he loves government and we

cannot make the united states and other european country, as far as the government controls us. >> you voted for president obama in the last election? caller: i sure did. >> elizabeth, lawrenceville. hello, elizabeth. caller: good afternoon, i guess. good afternoon. i am calling in to say that i will be voting for barack obama. he has taken more time than i think the average american wished to get things done, and has had obstacles to overcome, but i honestly do not see how any reasonable person or voter could imagine what he had to walk into.

i will be sticking with him and i will vote for him this time. he should just basically stated course he is on. it is a slower journey than we would all like. i think we need to slow down in real life. we tell our children, be patient. the president is asking us to be patient. last night's debate was phenomenally good for him. >> bob, westminster, where listening.

caller, mr. romney has not said more about the debates. everyone says that obama is doing a good job. if i am on a trip and i go 50 miles south and wind up going north, we are getting farther away from what we need. i would like to know why they did not talk about the downgrade for the first time in the united states. >> you are an independent, who do you plan to vote for? caller code definitely mitt romney. >> why is that? caller: it is just a matter of his policies nonworking. $16 trillion in debt.

prices double. thanks a lot. looking at two key are up in st. paul, minnesota. bouillon to calvin, looks like we lost her. calvin, bacon springs. -- moving on to calvin, looks like we lost her. caller: when i listen to mitt romney and paul ryan is become the campaign trail, they are not wrong about what they will do for this country. when ronald reagan was a good actor and a great president, barack obama is a great president but a good actor. time to get rid of barack obama and bring the real people that care about our country. i see it every time they use speak.

because our country is going to get even worse. thank you so much for the time. >> olive, california. caller: yes, i am here. in washington they have the debate and i will always feel that mitt romney always repeat the same thing over and over. you know, president obama did a good job for the four years. he came in when there was trouble with the e-mail. he did a good job and i am proud of him. caller: appreciate the call.

the last one of the days from like in california. >> -- caller: hello? i want to talk about this last speech that mitt romney had in nevada. how out of touch do you have to be to talk about a shuttle crash where people died and you keep talking about a flag? he said he got electricity when he touched it? what about going to the graves of americans who died and feeling the electricity there? come on. really out of touch. i really do not want to vote for a guy who just reminds me of the next nixon, the next reagan. just sweating to the whole debate, a complete flip-flop for liar. just insane. >> we appreciate the call.

that was the last one for this session of phones. another rally today for mitt romney in morrison, colorado. our live coverage continues at 7:00 eastern with the indiana u.s. senate debate between richard murdock and jove anomaly. the race is being read as a tossup. they are vying for the stew -- a seat left by dick lugar. also tonight, the third-party candidate debate. larry king moderates from chicago. the candidates are the green party, the libertarian party, the constitutional party, and the justice party. we will have that tonight on c- span. >> with the focus on the presidential debates this month, c-span is asking middle school and high-school students to send a message to the president. students will ask a question to

the president about the most important issue to be considered in 2013. the competition is open to students grades 6 through 12. for complete rules, gone blind. -- go online. >> now to new york city, for more on the jewish vote. and the relationship to the republican party. tevi troy joins hank sheinkopf at hank -- at the university in new york. >> for those of you who arrived late -- the bush and clinton years, 1992 to 2008, an important time in terms of the

american israeli relationship. developments in the middle east resonated with the jewish vote. we are fortunate to have with us this morning two people well- positioned to see these events unfold and share these insights with us. we will begin with dr. try, -- dr. troy, his deputy secretary of health and human services. he writes regularly for other leading can -- publications. the doctor will be followed by hank sheinkopf, who will give us a different perspective as former adviser to bill clinton and other prominent political leaders. he has worked on an estimated 700 political campaigns, according to my notes, in his long and distinguished career.

we will start with dr. troy. >> good morning, thank you. i know that we have not gone to q&a yet, but it makes you wonder, hank, do you know the names of all of the people you have consulted for? >> not on purpose. >> like grandchildren. >> many of my grandchildren have not been born yet. >> i am not so sure that we will have different perspectives. we have worked together in the past. i think we will take different approaches to what we talked about in this period. i will start earlier, that is just as it is. i also want to begin with

something unprecedented in these scholarly types of panels. a shameless self-promotion plug. i have these six words that most people use -- i have a book coming out. the working title, which might change, "from cicero to study, how -- snooki, how culture shapes the president." it is a look at how information that comes to the present changes over time, when we did not have the types of technologies we have today back in the olden days. obviously, our founders were limited to performances onstage. there were still the argument i want to make is that with the

information it has to shout -- helped to shape their approach to israel. we can also understand a little bit about what kind of president someone is going to be by the types of materials they read. in a way, although the program says i am talking about bush, i am talking about how books shaped policies towards the people in them. what presidents have read about israel shapes their policy. we have to start with harry truman, we really do. if you go back to 1948, 1947, it was not clear that the united states would be an ally of israel or that the united states would support the creation of the state of israel. these were open questions. in fact on many of these questions, the state department was not in the right place.

they were not as supportive of israel. in fact, secretary of state marshall at one point threatened to resign if he went ahead with the position. truman stood firm against a statement. he did have the u.s. vote to create the partition, he did have the u.s. recognize israel. these were important statements that he made. one of the things that i read in the article, i think you can talk about this in the conversation later, the jewish vote was important. by supporting it the way that he did, harry truman helped to secure the democratic vote for a long time to come. there are a lot of reasons why jewish people vote democratic, but amongst one of the many reasons is that early on, harry truman was supportive of the creation of the state, which helped democrats to gain the

jewish vote. there are other historical reasons, lord knows that jewish people talk about them a lot, and we can talk about them later, but that really was an important step. the question is -- why did harry truman do this? another reason, harry truman was a huge reader. he was the last president not to have graduated college. think about it, president's not read during college? sort of unthinkable, today. no matter who wins this election, every president dating back to the post-1980 election will have had a degree from either harvard, yale, or in the case of george w. bush, both -- and you would not have guessed him on that, right? but back then that was not the case. harry truman, as i said, was a huge reader. he started as a child, his parents strongly encouraged his

reading. insisted on it. at one point his father talked about how he saved a whole bunch of money to buy a set of mark twain's books. he also read the bible over and over again, getting his vision and conception of the jewish people from his frequent reading of the bible. there was another book that frequently influenced him, great men and famous women. it was this book about rate figures in history. one of the people featured in this book was cyrus the great, the persian king that allowed the israelites to return after the babylonian exile. 70 years after the babylonian exile, the returned from babylonia at the allowance of the persian king, who let the go back -- let the jews go back.

he was very influenced by this. there is a story that truman came to give a speech in new york. he went to the seminary, 60 of blocks from here, and was introduced by eddie jacobson. his jewish friend from missouri. they had even had a haberdashery business together. jacobson blamed the demise of the business on andrew jackson. how could that be, jackson died 100 years before the business began. well, he said that instead of tending to the customers, truman was always reading biographies of and jackson. in this particular instance, when jacobson introduced truman at the event, he called truman the leader that helps to create the state of israel. helped create.

remember that assisting word. helped. truman was indignant. he said -- what the mean helped? i am cyrus. he clearly had cyrus on the brain in his views of israel. doing this was obviously beneficial to the jewish people and the state of israel. it led to the u.s. alliance with the state of israel and also, as i said, helped to secure the jewish vote for democrats for a long time to come, along with other factors. let's fast-forward a number of years. the rule of thumb for a long time going forward after that point where the democrats were more pro-israel. it was just assumed going into the 1970's that the democrats were more--- more pro-israel.

one of the reasons the man who assassinated robert kennedy did what he did was he did not want this pro-israel person to get into the presidency. these days you would not assassinate a presidential candidate because they were pro- israel. you have this situation where the republican party was not seen as pro-israel, as the democrats were. obviously, nixon in the 73 war got some crucial arms to the israelis. it took a while, and it seemed to be over the objections of his adviser, henry kissinger. but along with france and

britain, they retreated in the 56 war. certainly in congress you had people like scoop jackson, who strongly opposed the israeli democrats. then the 1970's happened. 1976, jimmy carter becomes president with the assistance of what later became known as the neo-conservatives in the coalition for democratic majority. these are people who were disaffected and left adrift of the democratic party. they were looking for something different. they will -- were not happy of realpolitik of kissinger, but they were not happy with mcgovern either. they were looking for something different. jimmy carter seemed to be the thing that was different. he had a very pro-human rights

view that seemed to appeal to these nascent neo-conservatives. when they elected him, they were disappointed on a number of levels. one was a personal perspective. they were almost completely shut out. elliott abrams has this famous, and where he said -- we did not get anything, all we got was the ambassadorship to micronesia. not even macronesia. they also said the foreign policy of carter was not sufficiently strong. and that the neo-conservative joke of the era was that the foreign policy was -- lose the country, a gain an ethnic restaurant. vietnam, afghanistan -- that was the sense. you had all of these ethnic restaurants popping up in washington, d.c.

carter had difficult relationships with israel. not as bad as after he was president, i must say, but they did but heads. seen as an alternative, not good from the pro-israel effective. reagan got 39% of the jewish vote in 1980. what is a bit about that? for a republican, it was a huge achievement. over the. i am talking about, a high water mark was 39%, the lower mark was 11%. i will talked about that in a minute. that range is really the vote of jewish support or israel romney,

no one says he will get a majority of the jewish vote, but if he gets into the 30's that is a good sign. there were three elections where republicans got 3% or higher of the jewish vote. even bush in '88. not for ensign nellie, republicans won all three elections. reagan talked about israel as an ally in the cold war, which was important -- . he also talked about them as being largely deficient in democracies, to say the least. reagan had that important feeling towards israel. people do not think about him being a big reader. the only way he did this was my reading "commentary magazine." he read a very famous article

and in it, kirkpatrick, a democrat drifting to the right for a very strong pro-israel policy and strong and tough policy against the soviets, he argued that in recent history, no totalitarian administration or regime had ever moved a democracy, where an authoritarian regime, if treated properly, did become an autonomous democracy, suggesting the reagan foreign policy should be as tough as policy as totalitarian regimes put work with authoritarian regimes. this was a very important theme of the reagan administration. kirkpatrick entered the administration and i -- >> i believe that was all laid years. >> reagan really helped to bring jewish voters and the republican

party. call he did help to bring them in, a very important development. now, after the reagan the administration, that we get george h. w. bush. as i said earlier, he hit over third -- he got over 30% the first time that he ran as the party nominee. so, bush started off with a nice base of support in the jewish community. however, he lost the support and he lost it hard. there are a number of reasons, some of them still famous to this day. he objected -- he came to a disagreement over loan guarantees for israel based on whether settlements were being built. it all sounds familiar. he gave a speech where he said he was one lonely guy fighting an army of lobbyists, seen as a

tough shot across the bout at a packed -- at apac. but worst -- worse than that, the james baker comment. where he said "f the jews, they are not going to vote for a senate ways." ed koch was the first one to print that statement. it was leaked to him by his friend, jack kemp. he was a strong supporter of israel. he told ed koch about this outrageous statement. he still has not gotten over it. support for bush plummeted. i will not say that the next thing is directly related, but the elder bush was not a reader. reagan was reading magazines and getting insides. that was not bush's interest. there was one time he was going

on vacation and was asked what you do on vacation. he said he would do a lot of running, a lot of tennis, lots of golf, power boating, horseshoes, and a little reading -- throwing that out for the intellectuals. there was another time out -- when he was asked about a book that influenced him in his youth. he said "catcher in the rye." it came out 10 years after he had graduated college. obviously he had not read that in his youth. he was just not a reader. some people are, some blood not, i do not hold it against them, but he was not getting ideas for how to articulate support for israel or even more generally foreign-policy from his reading, although he did in the 1992 campaign that was going badly for an, he talked about how he read truman at that time.

he did read that one. following bush, in fact in the bush clinton election that i am sure that hank will talk about, the jewish vote plummeted from the 35% that he got in 88 to 11%. that is the low water mark. a 11% of the jewish vote. which, i mean -- in most pre- obama elections the black vote was 10% for republicans. the jewish vote had sent to the same place as the african- american vote for republicans. there was the israel policy, then the economy not doing well, plus he was up against a political life for our in the form of bill clinton. clinton also had a very strong pro-israel background. he had that famous statement.

he was comfortable to the jewish people in domestic social policies, and on the foreign policy as well. so, they had eight years of clinton. then, the son of bush comes around, looking to step into the office after clinton retires. without the constitutional amendment, clinton might still be president, but he is not. we have that amendment. bush was running to replace him. i have a friend, an orthodox, yarmulkes wearing friend who was at an event with george w. bush around the election. bush saw him out in the crowd, grabbed him from the crowd and said -- i want you to know that i will not be like my father on israel. bush, w. bush, let's just say that, w. bush was from a very

different perspective. he had grown up in the northeast, that northeastern establishment, part of the real politick world. w. bush was more from the south, an evangelical background, groups that are much more supportive of israel. bush was also a huge reader. love reading. people do not think that about him, but it happens to be the case that he would read 80 books to 90 books for year. these are serious books. karl rove once said that in the 35 years he had known george w. bush, he never saw him without a book nearby. the guy loved to read. he did not advertise it. he especially did not advertise it when he was running for governor of texas. in fact he had lost an election in 1998 against a democrat, who

blistered bush for being a carpetbagger, pointy head, northeastern harvard and be of type. this is george w. bush we are talking about. bush was eviscerated on that front. after that election, bush vowed that he would never be out country'd again. and he wasn't. bush, even though he was a reader, did not talk about that until late in the second term when he was trying to change his reputation. but as hank tells you, when you try to change your reputation at that stage in the game, it is too late. nevertheless, the book that he read helped to shape his world view. he read the books of bernard lewis, a lot of neoconservatives thinkers, including ej when nick, who he would bring in to the white house. eliot cohen, who wrote about political leaders in general, including lincoln and winston

churchill. later he came into the bush and administration as an advisor to condoleezza rice. he also most famously read a book on democracy by sheranzski. it so affected him, he had his senior staff to read it. he had the other come in to visit and talk about it. afterwards the authors said that bush not only read the book, that he felt it. this idea of democracy became an important influence for the second inaugural address, where bush pushed for the development of democracy in the arab world. some say that the arab spring, which has turned into an unpleasant winter, but the initial impetus came from the ideas unleashed by that speech. so, with bush we had a very pro- israel president who fought strongly that israel was