he loved those summers when he life guarded. he always said that he did not have to worry about money because he could not spend the money. he would go into the early- morning and work until late at night. he never had a chance to spend the money. >> did you know his parents? >> i knew his mother. his father died very young, 58. it was before i knew ronnie. >> anything you see your from these early years, just holler. we're going over to the hollywood years. >> there has been so much talk about this movie. i thought the movie was funny. i thought it was cute. nzo.ime for bonds

>> what year was it? >> i do not know. >> what was his first year for acting? what was your first year? >> to ask me years is fatal. , had to be 49.as in theater before in new york. >> what was it that got you interested in movies and acting? >> my mother was an actress. i had gone to college and graduated and had not found the man i wanted to marry. i did not want to sit in chicago and do nothing. i became an actress. your favorite?re

is our firstthis visit to new york after we were married. i was so excited. >> did he change from that day as he got older? >> never. ronnie stayed the same all the time. he never changed. >> how many movies? >> 11. did you act together? >> once. it was fun except there was a inne, he played a man service and i played a navy nurse.

there was a scene where he was supposed to be telling me goodbye. we had not been married to long. -- too long. i ticket all very seriously. i started to cry. they had to keep reshooting it. >> there is a picture want to ask you about. got to president reagan here, jack benny, george burns -- did you know all these folks? >> i did not know al jolson. burns,jack benny, george and ronald reagan. i did not know what this was. >> right over here --

>> this was a favorite picture of mine. clover cleveland. i love that picture. i want to ask you about this picture with president truman. of truman. big fan >> are people surprised when they find out? >> yes. >> what did he like about him? >> he thought he was strong and direct. he just liked him. >> were you interested in politics? >> i was not. i knew nothing about politics. fatherour mother and political? >> not really. >> do you remember the first time you got interested? >> after i married ronnie. he was always involved in politics.

he would always go out and campaigned for whoever. he would get in a theand drive to whatever event was. never occurred to him to ask for gasoline money. ofright behind you, pictures your husband with a lot of leading ladies. is it hard to watch your spouse in some of these scenes? >> no. yes and no. no. he always talked about the actress who would get leading lady-itis. out our marriage license.

>> how many years ago? >> 47. it will be 48 in march. >> let's move over to the inauguration years. before we get there, let's go to the governor's time. ,he years you're in sacramento what were they? >> eight years. they were wonderful years. wonderful and they because that was during the 1960's and berkeley and there were difficult years. wanted ronnie to win the primary because he thought

he would be easiest to defeat. it turned out to not be so. these are the p.o.w. bracelet's. that is listening commander john mccain. -- lieutenant commander john mccain. came back, weirst had dinners for the first ones to arrive back. presencee wonderful they would give me. some brought me the tin cups or a package of cigarettes. stories, you cannot believe what they went

through. unbelievable. youhought to yourself, wondered if you would be in the same spot, if you could withstand that. i do not know. >> let's go on to the inauguration. the 25th -- 1981, you remember what you felt like standing there? >> an emotional moment for me. it was like we got married. i remember very little. when the even remember man said i pronounced him man and wife. i wish we could run it all over again. can we do it all over again? theo you feel the sense of

rain is being passed on when you are standing there -- the rain is being passed on when you are standing there? >> i do not think it hits you until after the parade and you walked into the white house for the first time an entity. -- and then it hits you. >> what kind of things would he talk about? at the beginning of all of this. was he excited about it? >> he was excited, yes, of course. people,de and seeing the groups that were in the parade. our friends all being there. they're only 39 people who had never done that.

>> there is a button right over here that has to do with the hostages that day. >> yes. the hostages were released. he did not announce it until we went in for lunch because he wanted them to get out of the iranian airspace. >> when did you know that was going to happen? -- itdid not know until was after the swearing-in. not announce it, did not want to announce it until they were out of iranian airspace. >> when people come to the library, is there one or two things they find to be their favorite? >> you would have to ask them. i think they are always curious about the berlin wall.

the whole thing is so -- it is all here. everything in his life is here. sayould be hard for me to which one they would choose. >> right over here is march 30, 1981. you heard you when the president was shot? , at ans at a luncheon art gallery luncheon. for some reason, this never has happened to me before, and god willing will not happen to me had the suddenly feeling i had to go.

i do not know what it was. i had the feeling i had to get back to the white house. did. i went up to the solarium. detail -- there was a ramp up to the celeriac and he came to the bottom any backing for me to come down -- the salariat and he beckoned to me to come down. he said there has been a shooting. by that time, i am on my way to the elevator. he has not been hurt. .e got downstairs i am going to the hospital and

he said, it is not necessary. he has not been hurt. george, i did the car or i am going to walk. -- either get the car or i'm going to walk. .e got to the hospital there were police all around and a lot of it is and they put me in a small. there was one desk and one .hare -- one chair they kept saying, he is all right, but you cannot see him.

i he is all right, why can't see him? finally, they let me see him. he was lying there with a thing on his face to help him breathe. he said, honey, i forgot to duck. >> did you talk about the danger that you face? >> we never thought about it. you do not think about that. maybe your husband might get sick, but you never think he will be shot. ever. ray.ou have the actual x- what was the decision? up an inchet ended

or two from his heart. they could not find it. think they had it and it would slip away from them. me upt time, they moved to a room of the above. they kept telling me what was .appening and the progress we cannot seem to get it we might have to leave it in there. finally, this wonderful doctor who had been up all night founded and got it out. we almost lost him.

>> we were at the ranch yesterday. one of the things that hit me comment talking to the secret service, any time you are at a little house, there were 54 secret service members. me you would feel very funny. >> you were not aware of it at all. the house did not seem so little to us. it seemed wonderful to us. want a great big house. vacation, ronnie .lways liked to be outdoors

we made a lot of changes in the house. we replaced the porch. it was have been -- heaven for us. >> it can be very cold in that hot.e and a ho how did you deal with it? >> i love it. i miss it. i cannot go there without ronnie. why it was taken.

when did you first notice the president was having a memory problem? i forget, you forget. don't you? remembernot be able to somebody's name, but i cannot remember people's names. i did not notice anything. we went for a checkup in august of that year that he was diagnosed. .> this letter was written is that the actual letter? number fifth, 1994. how did you decide to do that? -- november 5, 1994. how did you decide to do that? >> we had always gone public.

i had cancer, he had operations. thinking it would help people. in each case, it did. he felt a very strongly about it. people were very embarrassed and self-conscious about alzheimer's. that it was anow disease, like any other disease. embarrassment about it. and there should not have then. -- been. now it is amazing how many people come up and say to me their mother or father, someone in their family has alzheimer's.

to talk aboutfree it. he did a great thing. >> what have you learned? >> it is probably the worst disease you can never have. are not contact and you able to share all those wonderful memories. we had a wonderful life. >> can you have a conversation? >> not now. itself, what were the circumstances in which he wrote the letter? >> we were in a library, sitting at the table. he sat down and read it. that was it.

first draft. he crossed out one word. i do not know what that was. could write a letter like that. himself.e expressed i do not know of anybody else. >> one of the stories that came out of all of this was george shultz. 7, 1994. >> he had not seen george in a long time. the letter is a very sweet letter.

devastated he was to hear. it is a very nice letter. >> as you go through this disease and you begin to lose contact, how have you dealt with when people come to visit? have visitors. >> when it did happen? >> we never let that happen. >> the other thing we learned about is you have been the care giver. what do you tell people who are watching you as an example? how do you do it from day to day? they say it is tougher on the care giver. >> it is. it is tougher.

he would do the same thing for me. i know that. i am not the only person. many people out there are who are caregivers. it is very difficult to watch somebody you love. >> what kind of shape is the president in now? >> he was referring more to another year. he does not swim anymore. john did come to see him last august, i think. he was going to the baseball game. i think lani recognized him.

-- ronnie recognized him, but he does not do the other things john was talking about. >> the assassination attempt and the cancer. what have you learned about dealing with villainous? how did you deal with it -- how what have you been learned about dealing with illness? >> you just do it. you take each day as it comes and you put 1 foot in front of the other, i do not know. stop on our trip is the oval office. >> ok. before we go there, why did you build an oval office? size of his office. everything that was in his office -- they have done it.

they can get to washington and if they're lucky, they can get on a tour. this is the exact replica, everything that he had. the history of the western saddles, everything is exactly as it was. the route that we had in the oval office, everything is the same. >> exact rug. this desk? anything special? john kennedy --

>> is this the desk? >> no, this is a copy. >> how many times did you come to deal office? >> only when i was asked. ovald you sit in the office very often talk? >> no, never. -- when he was through in the oval office, he would come home. >> what time of day? every day it was a little different. 6:00.ly around >> when he was president, we used to do programs with him students. he used to do it when he was time, heand then one

came back and called. did you ever see that? i wonder how often -- it seems i'm going toaying, call that call-in show. much information television? >> of course. free, wead an evening would sit on trays and a library and watch television. >> did you follow the news? >> yes. >> what does it do to you when you see yourself on television? is it a good idea to watch yourself? >> i thought so. ronnie is curious about something is covered.

>> it is better not to get mad. in this office and on the desk is a tiny plot that we hear a lot about. we hear aplaque that lot about. limit to what a man can do -- >> or where he can go. >> if he does not mind to gets the credit. that was in sacramento. he firmly believes that. him.d not matter to ever. did you feel the same? looking back on the drug program, did it work? >> i thought so.

yes, it did. sorry it did not continue. , the expression, i'm sure a lot of people think that was handed to me by an agency or something. it happened by accident. oaklandat a school in talking to sixth graders in one little progress is to hand and said, mrs. reagan, what do i do if somebody offers you drugs? i said, just say no. it became a rallying point. obviously, that was not the whole attitude, but it got the attention. the expression is used. >> one of the things that a

library like this does is provide history. how do you think president reagan is doing in history? >> i think he is doing very well. a lot of people are taking another look at him. they're seeing things they did not see before, perhaps. i think he is doing very well. [inaudible] i am disappointed. i will not get into that. anybody inu advise the future to have somebody come into the middle of a demonstration like that as a biographer? >> i am sure it can be useful.

it depends. be writtenthere to from what you know is available? beingot of books are written about ronnie. until thiseld that book came out. a lot in the process of being written. ook, which is a very good book, is being re-issued. other people three who are writing about him. >> what do you want your own history to say?

>> i would like them to talk about the drug program. think that was probably my finest hour. the fact that i tried to make the white house more livable and attractive. if you take for granted that you spend a lot of your life protecting your husband from others, you agree that that is something you do a lot of, how hard is that to do? how did you do it? i think i had little

antennas that went up and told me somebody had their own agenda. him.ld tell he did not always agree with me, but i would tell him. what was the first thing he would notice if somebody had europe -- their own agenda? >> you just know. you just know. you have those antennas. >> thank you. >> you are welcome. >>, next, a discussion about the

military use of drones. nicholas burns on the syrian civil war. >> ronald reagan, he made mistakes on defense. the defense budget was not just a waste of money in those eight years, it is what created the war machine that we have used to create so much havoc in the world and create so much anger and problems due out the world that were totally unnecessary that made as an imperial power. that was a real negative. on the other hand, and he did, for the first time since -- thewer stand up for

state is not the solution to every problem. ofrefore, the idea technological change, the idea of people should make their own decisions without some big nanny in washington, he stood for all of those things. i agree with all of those things. lost it. he he really did not stand up for closing more of the deficit. ronald reagan spent a lifetime before 1980 as the greatest spendingf deficit there ever was. he left a massive deficit which permitted his followers to say that reagan approved deficits do not matter. reagan with former budget director david stockman

sunday at 8:00. >> a bipartisan policy center discussion about the military's use of drums. the panel includes two attorneys the worked for the george w. bush administration. this is over an hour. to call this an all store -- all-star panel is a bit of an understatement. i sort of feel like a guy who splashes paint on house is about to talk on portraiture painting. introducing the panelists. seated -- seated next to me is john bollinger. he is a former legal adviser to

the u.s. state department. he testified before the house committee on the judiciary. when can the u.s. targets alleged american terrorists overseas? is theto his left director of the aclu national security project, which is dedicated to ensuring the security policy practices are consistent with human rights. she has litigated cases. her work includes a focus on the intersection of national security. she is a lecturer at columbia law school. he is the associate dean of the university of virginia. a former counselor of the secretary of state, the executive director of the 9/11 commission. he has served on national

commissions. he is currently a member of the president's intelligence advisory board. philip, welcome. a national security correspondent for the new york times." he is author of a recently published a book. on point to our discussion this morning. here is the book. i recommend it to you all. to -- if you could begin by framing some of them for us.

the i testified before judiciary committee, i started and ended my testimony with a plea for more bipartisanship. one of the byproducts of 9/11 has been a national security issues have become so divisive when we ought to be pulling together. -- i wassident present at the creation of the legal basis for the use of drones. we were thinking about using it against al qaeda leaders. developingnsible for the legal framework. , do think as a general matter it is permissible under both domestic law, under the

authorization to use military force act, for the united states to use drowns to kill al qaeda leaders were planning attacks against us. the main legality of the are correct. details. is in the the problem is we do not know a lot of the details. the obama administration when never have guessed that four years later, they would be , have the war crimes aclu suing them, having the human rights counsel conducting investigations on whether the obama administration is of violating national law. a british law has sued the british government for sharing

intelligence with the obama administration, resulting in the death of a man in pakistan. four years later, the administration is finding some of the same charges that are leveled against the bush of ministration. at thee of years ago, time, i was being provocative and i was trying to nudge this administration to do a better job of explaining the legal basis of what they were doing, the policy basis and to be more transparent. i did not really think that becometrikes could obama's guantanamo. i do you think that is seriously at risk. this has become a real problem for them. officials,umber of others have issued a series of statements.

the problem is, and this is my point, no other country in the world has publicly agreed with the legality of our program. right now, the united states is isolated as the obama administration has launched more han 300 from strikes -- drone strikes killing more than 3000 people. the rest of the world this finding this controversial. -- they are beginning -- the challenge for is to try toation

convince the rest of the world ist what they're doing lawful. they are rapidly on the back foot, the administration, i know they are working at this inside the white house to do a better job of explaining the legality of the program, who they are targeting, white it is lawful, and why the rest of the world should agree with what they're doing. in the a moment, i would be happy to get into the legal details. >> thank you. thank you very much to the bipartisan policy center for having this event and for inviting me. let me start out in the spirit of the center, agreeing with a lot john has said. program --d killing

right now, the public debate with respect to those questions is crippled because we do not have a lot of the information that we need in order to determine the full extent of where the program is being carried out, with what investigation and with what measures to prevent harm to civilians. let me also start out with another point of agreement. the idea that people are against people may very well be. as a legal matter, i do not think they are unlawful. they raisedmatter, important questions because they are easier to use without risk to forces, and able to be used in places where we are not otherwise at war as has been

explained to the american public. there becomes a legal issue when you talk about who is using the drones. reported thatdely the cia is using drones. program isat the secret is one of the worst kept secrets in the the world. oftakes us to the question how are we using this weapon, or any other weapon, to carry out the program of targeted killing. that is the heart of this debate. what we know is troubling. there is general agreement amongst international law scholars that the use of lethal force is permissible under

international law, human rights law, in response to a specific concrete and imminent threat. ita lot of for context, would be permissible against civilians who are directly participating in hostilities those terms defined under the laws of war. respect theate and speeches have been made, as well as the paper that was leaked, those are not the standards that are being applied. this is the white paper that was a summary of all legal memo used to justify the killing of a now qaedaen who is leader, or alleged to be one. the paperctions

recognized on what constitutes an imminent threat, when you read it, you realize that what appears to be limitations are in fact permissions. it turns out that senior high level official making the determination about lethal force -- actual evidence that a plot is going to take place. it is a sudden, expensive, and something similar happens with respect to the requirement and capture. recognizing now is raisehe requirements

significant concerns about whether the legal requirements are being abided by. if we have that concern with u.s. citizens, we should have that concerns with non-citizens. one u.s. citizen has reportedly been publicly targeted, three others have been otherwise killed. reports that 4700 have been killed -- non-citizens have been killed. there are fewer things that are more likely to undermine the legitimacy of our country as well as our national security than even the perception that we are not abiding by the rule of law with respect to non-citizens as well as our own citizens and that we are different -- in different to civilian casualty.

what do i think needs to happen? on thenimum, disclosure legal standards with respect to who can be targeted. what is the process by which those decisions are made? who is the senior high level official who would use the decisions of high-level officials? who are the militants or the civilians who have been killed? those numbers should be disclosed. to the extent the identity is known, that should be disclosed as well. that we kind of debate expect of ourselves as any liberal democratic society, one based on checks and balances, without that fundamental transparency which is necessary to accountability.

>> thank you. to first explain that because i am a member of the president's intelligence advisory board, i am constrained about what i can say about this program publicly. i am not here as a representative of the administration. nothing i say should be construed as representing anyone in the obama administration. let me try to navigate a path. i want to take a moment and explain to you an argument how toow to do -- conduct the u.s. has been involved in a global armed conflict but al qaeda and its affiliate organizations for approximately 15 years. inqaeda new it was engaged

the global arms conflict before the u.s. government was in it. to al qaeda was able forcefully impress on the u.s. .overnment into such a conflict here we are 15 years later. we are talking about whether that conflict can be conducted with remotely piloted vehicles in many countries around the world. let me offer you two different paradigms for how to think about this. i will try to make this very later and maybe to clear. -- too clear. you need to do three things. to find the doorway you need to enter that will allow you to kill these people. what is the doorway? second, having passed through that doorway, i have to define

which people i can legally kill the government. iird, having defined that, must set some sort of standard of evidence and circumstances under which people no finding can be targeted. there are two contrasting approaches for how to answer all three of these types of questions. one approach i will call and on [indiscernible] which i support. the other is a constitutional/self-defense approach which worries me. let me explain the way these two approaches work. for the doorway, if you are in an armed conflict approach, the doorway is and must be a public doorway.

the country knows and discusses that it has entered into this armed conflict. andcongress debates that may pass an authorization for the use of military force , thessly authorizing it government to wage wars on its enemies around the world. this is a healthy attribute of a democracy. under the constitutional approach, the doorway is some entity or person that poses an imminent threat to the u.s. that allows us to defend ourselves. that need not be public. that determination can be concluded in secret, whether or not the government has determined it is in an armed conflict with some larger entity. this and other words rises to the stature of a war or warlike

thing rather than being a person or group of people who are dangerous to us in our secret determination. you can see the significance of these paradigms. to both see references of these paradigms. what you're hearing from me is a strong argument about the significance of the dangers of what about the definition of the people of whom you can kill? ider a law of armed conflict, must cite the bush administration badly mangled this definition. discredited. expanded that term of enemy combatant to include anyone who -- is given some

kind of support often in the context of the autonomous -- guatanomo. becausevery pernicious the enemy combatant standard is very important. an enemy combatant is someone with whom our military can lawfully kill or capture without a lot of advance notice. that is a determination that should be up roach with care. , an enemyefined combatant is someone who as international law expert but it is directly participating in hostilities. dph standard.ed a

obama administration has publicly endorsed that standard to defining enemy combatants. in my view, has restored it ability to that kind of approach. credibility that was touted when the obama ministration entered office. in the constitutional paradigm, the definition of who can be killed doesn't use necessarily these law of determinations. judges whether that person is a member of the larger entity with whom you are engaged in the armed output. informationives about that individual on the threat posed by that individual. that isotice potentially pernicious in some ways, but it also begins assuming an extraordinarily high standard of intelligence and evidence of particular individuals that is really attainable.

that is whatlevel, evidence and insurgent is that unique, we have a great deal of experience and a lot of people who are well-trained in the application of the dph standard and enemy combatants. that is a result of 15 years of warfare. that a now a standard lot of people understand and know how to apply. second-guess to mistaken applications of that. we have a lot of trial and error with this. we had some seasoning and how to make judgments about this. assuming that the government involved is one of good will and does not want to abuse its privileges, it will want to set in the bestandards

case. the irony is that i look back on that year's around 9/11. there is a level of which we are a little spoiled about intelligence we might have about certain people in areas we have been watching very closely for a long time. areas that we now know better than people living in fairfax county know the street map of arlington. i'm serious. don't assume that the evidentiary standard is going to be met in other situations we will encounter. that evidence may look a lot like the pre-9/11 story. if you read the commission report, you will read all kinds of uncertainties of who else is there and judgments made and repeated questions coming up.

should we shoot? in every case, the decision was made not to shoot. for reasons that in retrospect some might question. step back. offering a paradigm that is very public about how you get in. it is well understood standards. take into account the inherent uncertainties of warfare in making judgments about when you construct. that is because the country has decided it is in a war and can debate that decision. in the other paradigm, it your constitutional paradigm, you can buy parse -- bypass a [indiscernible] you can make these constitutional determinations and go in and ways that would be less open to the public and less open to debate with whom we

and imposet war standards of evidence upon you that make it harder to deal with the source of and minis we may encounter in the future -- whatere might be would we have like to be able to do in libya last year? if we had had a little bit more information than the information we had and have more assets? let me stop there. >> thank you. mark, you thought deeply about these issues and investigated them. .> thank you it is terrific to be here. i was a last-minute addition to the panel when the original rembrandt was going to be here. i'm honored to be here on this panel. i come at this of it differently than everyone up here. i'm feeling person who is not a lawyer.

even the former cia guy is a lawyer. [laughter] .'m a reporter a national security reporter. thee trying to get to question of what is happening now and what has happened in the past about these issues will about these-- issues. we're trying to get some answers. reporting for the new york times and in my book is try to basically describe as much as possible the history of the secret war that has been waged since before 9/11. has been is a war and a secret since those early years. i think by now we sort of know of the war in iraq

and afghanistan. what is happening in pakistan and yemen and other parts? be told.ries need to that is what i have been trying to do. and it that we do focus is somewhat the media's fault on there is theeapon. science-fiction quality to it. .hey are not killer robots i think it is legitimate to write about it legitimate to talk about. the question is how they are used and the idea of targeted killing or not targeted killing in places where officially the u.s. is not at war. that is what i have written has become the

default that the u.s. does its business. begun by thenly bush administration and over time the bush administration went from primarily a capture strategy and interrogation totterjee -- strategy starting the detention and interrogation program in the cia and targeted killing started to escalate and obama's ministration that administration came in at not only embraced it, but expanded it in many ways. to understand how the obama administration sees war and how it has conducted war. also the question of will there be read percussions --

repercussions, a blowback to this war being conducted. john mention that he thought using drones to kill al qaeda anders is certainly lawful he supported it. i think what we see these days is drones being used on targets that are far from al qaeda leaders. al qaeda is a shadow of what it was. what is the bar for targeted killing? who is being targeted? are the enemies of the state of pakistan? are the enemies of the state of yemen?

?re they the counterinsurgency these are questions that i think are being answered, but obviously we need to know more about. if this is the default way of doing business, if we do not expect to see another , and totan very soon see a lot more yemens and somalians, i think everyone up your understandable agree there needs to be greater transparencies and discussion on these issues and greater on how the war is being waged will stop i still find it striking that as a reporter, i was recently covering the john brennan confirmation hearing. he's been confirmed for the cia director. i wished that he found members

of the senate intelligence committee, i doesn't people in congress were authorized to the highest -- a dozen people in congress were authorized to the highest levels, do not have the legal memos that are underpinning the targeted killing program. the white house makes a point that congress is not entitled to them and congress thinks they are. as an outsider, it is striking to me that the members of the intelligence committee that was overd to provide oversight the cia and other secret agencies. from a upper spec of, not having those memos does limit their ability -- from an outsiders it, not having those memos does limit their ability. it is tougher for citizens, people not in government, to really make informed judgment about what we think about these things.

i hope for more discussion in the future. >> mark, thank you. john, can i invite you to respond to the two paradigms that was laid out? what is your reaction to that? >> yeah, i was going to respond with a slightly different angle, but i understand that he is saying. a couple of things. we talk a lot about drones. the problem is not the use of drones will stop -- of drones. it does not actually targeted killings. if we were in a real war, if we develop a weapon in which one could only kill a single person rather than engaging in massive bombings, everyone would say that is wonderful. that is legal and good. it is not that targeted killings

are bad. targeted killings when they are lawful and legitimate could be good. is thate here really there is a fundamental disagreement around the world which i experienced when i was a legal advisor is whether the u.s. is in a war at all. we about the only country in the world that really thinks we are in a arm conflict with al qaeda. -- armed conflict with al qaeda eared i was engage in a -- armed conflict with al qaeda. i was engine -- indigenous dialogue. dialogue. in a what is going on now is that there is a different debate. this administration has decided a do not want to do detention anymore.

the bush administration got in trouble with detention. so now they will just kill people. instead of detaining members of al qaeda, they are killing members of al qaeda. issues not targeted killings. ,he issue around the world is is the u.s. in an armed conflict around the world with a group? can you be in an armed conflict with the group that goes on not in just one country,, but a lot of different countries? through successive they have been, unable to persuade allies that the u.s. remains in an armed conflict with al qaeda that allows us to use lethal force against members of al qaeda around the world. this this together with what philip said.

from the rest of the world's perspective, other countries really do not care that much about u.s. constitutional law. they apply a paradigm on human rights law. they do not think we are in a war. therefore to the extent that the u.s. may use force lawfully on international law would have to play a human rights law paradigm. meaning one could only target someone who poses an absolute eminent threat under the human rights paradigm. other international lawyers would say, yes. a person is sitting in pakistan and about to launch an attack and pakistan is unwilling to do anything about it, then yes, the u.s. can act in self-defense. there is a stark contrast between our view in the u.s. that we are in a war with al qaeda where we can kill members of a credit matter where they are and the rest of the world aspect is that the u.s. is not in a war and is very surprised

to find the administration adopts this on conflict paradigm that european countries thought would be dropped like a hot potato as soon as obama administration came into office i did not only continue the war paradigm, but rebuffed the use of drones. for the u.s. versus international perspective, there is a law of war paradigm we are applying for is is a constitutional paradigm and human rights paradigm from the rest of the world. togenerally i think one way think about it is the constitutional standard and the human rights standards are very similar. what the constitutional allows is no question about the ability to invoke those rights in the u.s. courts. let me pick up from where john left off about how the rest of the world not only doesn't

agree, but we have to be concerned about the precedents that we are setting for the rest of the world to follow. to thet with respect use of drones come up the legal framework we are arguing in which we can conduct targeted killings. i will footnote this as well. we can discuss this in a very literal sense. you may have read us ignore her -- signature strikes and stuff. settingck to the standard, there is no question that multiple other countries, non-state actors emma will have access to drones and other technology -- will have access to drones and other technology. what we use today, we have to accept that other countries are going to fight back to us tomorrow. terrorism is a global threat.

the idea that we are engaged in a global war on terror which allows an executive ranch regardless of which it is to declare people unilaterally in a specific state and order their killing without judicial review before or after the fact is one that we must at least debate and sears they consider whether that is the kind of world in which we want to live. it used to be that our country condemns what we know: card and showing. it will be the case tomorrow that other countries will carry them out. we look to ourselves as a standard setter for international law, the rule of law. we undermine our own status and legitimacy and ability to argue for a rule of law approach if we do not recognize the limitations

we want today, might want for others, are the ones we had to recognize for ourselves. i want to talk very quickly about the facts. the reality is that the majority of the people who are being killed now are not senior-level all qaeda leaders. they aren't lower-level and surgeons do not necessarily pose a threat to the u.s., but my pose a threat to pakistan, yemen, and other countries. at the least we need more information and debate about where we are committed to being at war, why, and for what reasons in order to be able to really have sound policy going forward on these issues and an informed public debate based upon which u.s. people can let their policymakers know what they're talks are.

>> any response to what they had to say? >> i do not disagree entirely with john. he is right about the human rights area nine is out there. i think the two paradigms i'm describing are important in american context. iacting to both comments, have to observe that countries under attack are the ones that get get to decide whether they are at war or not. whether or not that is a legal printable, i will make that observation as an absorbed -- historian. if they think they are at war, they will act accordingly. it carries came to shanghai and blew up its leading building and kill thousands of tiny citizens tomorrow, it would not matter what president we had

set her wet labels we had applied. if the chinese thought it came from people overseas, it would act as if they were at war and they would use 100% of their available power to attack the people who had caused that. to theolute limit -- absolute limits. they would do that. frankly, so would any other government that felt it had a responsibility to its citizens to the limits of its powers. thanknk you fullback -- you for that. i have a couple of more questions i would like to pose myself. mark, we talked about aspects and legal frameworks. does thelicy side, use of drones and targeted killings, when we think about the long term potentially doing more harm than good, i know you

made a similar point during your recent testimony to congress. i will come to you next. i think this is something we'll come to find out in the years ahead. as i said before, blowback for what is being done now, at this point there is anecdotal evidence of radicalization happening as a result of drones strikes in yemen and pakistan. one of the most famous cases is in may of 2010. they tried to and thinkmes square we was unsuccessful. he went into court and said the reason why he tried to carry this out was because of the drone strike in pakistan. one example of one person. saidw that john brennan there's very little or no evidence of radicalization.

i think making firm judgments is a littlet dangerous. i think the cia -- if they're doing their job, they should be doing thorough analysis on the analytic side. the drone strikes being carried out are having on the views of the people in pakistan and elsewhere. will that mean more radicalization or more attacks? from some is a tax in al qaeda things like the boston bombers? attacks from someone in al qaeda or the boston bombers? what does that mean? >> a quick response.

>> i was mostly quoting people more knowledgeable and myself -- than myself. i'm a lawyer, but my point is to note people who really are in the know and are concerned that our use of drones while certainly effective, we quibble -- are we reaching a point of, much theunderstand how u.s. is becoming hated around the region because of the use of drones. my concern as a lawyer who has to defend around the world is that we are losing support amongst our allies in europe who are willing to give president obama the benefit of the doubt in a way to not willing to give president bush. these drone strikes have ramped up.

their journalists are beginning to put pressures on their governments. why you're not saying anything about this? are you sharing intelligence? these are reallythese are reallf guantánamo, so fill is right that any country that is attack has a right to decide if they are in a armed conflict. but it becomes a serious problem for the united states, who needs the support of our allies and is committed to the rule of law, if none of our allies really believe that we are in that armed conflict. where philip and i really worked very hard in the second term of the bush administration was to get out and do a better job in the second term than we had done in the first term to try to engage our allies in dialogue, explain to them what we were doing, explain to them for example why one can detain people under the laws of war without charging them, which is

something that we absolutely did not accept. this administration problem, because they feel they are on the side of angels, is that they have not had to explain themselves. we had been attacked, everybody ought to be behind us. we got into a deep hole. philip and i know that we worked hard in the second term of the bush administration to convince our allies that we were doing the right thing. these are exactly echoes what happened. the obama administration now finding itself maybe not in as deep a hole, and they have the support of their allies, but they need to get on top of this and explain to our allies why

what they are doing is legal, why it is permissible under international law. , philip, a very quick response from you, and then hina, a response from you, in that you have talked briefly about the number of dead. >> i think it is time to have a debate about the public authorization of military force that the congress passed into his house in one. that was 12 years ago. that is the corollary of my argument. it is time to have a renewed debate about are we still in a war, or should we move this into another paradigm that maybe treats this as something less than a global armed conflict because of the different size and character of the enemy we face now. i think it is an appropriate time for that. if this year is not the right time, 2014 as our posture in afghanistan, which really was the catalytic event that -- for which the congressional legislation was passed in the first place, that we can move into a different phase.

i think we are entering a period where it is time for renewed public discussion of these issues, of what framework really is appropriate for this particular set of people. >> philip, you have anticipated and answered well a couple of questions i have had. i will skip those, if you can just comment on this issue. >> last week the senate judiciary subcommittee headed by senator dick durbin and ranking member ted cruz had a telling hearing on these issues. and to the extent that folks have not looked at the statements there, i would urge you to do so. i think the issue -- two issues. i don't think even with those explanations are allies in europe or elsewhere in the world will agree that this war based framework is one that accords with international law. thinkreally have to

through the fact that we have to ratchet set down and abide by the laws of war, which i think allow us to maintain our security and do so in accordance with a set of standards that the rest of the world recognizes and that we helped establish. what happens when we don't? one of the testimonies that i thought was most powerful last week -- and kudos to senator durbin and senator cruz for inviting a very first time a young man to discuss the human cost and consequences of targeted killing operations in yemen. this is an exceptional young man. he comes from a remote village in yemen who has learned english and went to university as a result of u.s.

scholarships, and to high school >> sees himself as an ambassador of american values and principles to yemen, and six days before his testimony his village, drones were used to strike it. what he had to say was up until then what people knew about the united states was based on his love of the country and his talk about american values and what it meant to him about this nation. now what they know are drone strikes that killed someone that he and other people think could easily have been captured by yemeni forces, and that instead of this capture what resulted was death, fear, and a real backlash against the united states. so we need to hear more from people who are actually impacted on the ground to inform what

otherwise might be a sterile legal argument and recognize that, as i think stanley mcchrystal said, general mcchrystal, that what may appear riskless to us here, to the perspective on those on the receiving end is very much like war. that is part of what we are doing and what we have to consider going forward including whether we want to expand authority at a time when the public is tired of the blood and treasure that has gone into war-based endeavors, and when our policy makers are telling us that al qaeda and other organizations have been decimated. it is a debate we have to have, a debate we have to have more information to have on an informed basis. >> thank you, and i would like to open it up to your questions. we do have microphones. wait till the microphone comes, then please state your name and organization. if you would like to direct a

question to a particular panelist, these do so. >> john gannon. >> thanks, great panel. john bellinger mentions the obama administration was making efforts to clarify this issue. i have read those speeches, and it seems to me what i have read is more of a rationalization for what we have done rather criticalblishing a framework for where we need to go. a couple of questions have come out of that. what is it with regard to roles and responsibilities? i think no one has any trouble with the imam, but when we go to his 16-year-old son two weeks later, we learned that that operation was not conducted by cia, which was supposedly in charge of this, but by the department of defense.

on the issues of roles and responsibilities and accountability that comes out of that, what is the legal foundation for either of those agencies or departments to be involved, and how do we get that clarified so that we can have clearer policy and then embed that in law? and the final point that hina has made are the international implications from a legal standpoint. i would expect any president to use any capability available to them at the time of an attack, but we do come to our senses as time goes on and realize that we have to rain this in, because we are a country of rule of law.

thank you. >> please keep your responses concise so that we can make the questions possible in the remaining time. >> as i would expect from john, a great question. they really are good speeches, as far as they go, and i think they need to go farther to explain, for the multiple reasons you have heard those precise legal parameters, if they want to persuade other countries to go along with us. the administration has not felt that they need to go along with that. to constrain want the criticism on other countries using drones, we need to be extremely precise in what is lawful use of lethal force and what would be unlawful. i pity the poor state department spokesman who at any point this year, when china or russia uses a drone and the spokesman hasan

stand up and they say that it was in the legal targeted hasing, the reason that been difficult is we have not been as precise. that is a challenge for the administration to explain that in more detail. i have seen the echoes of guantanamo, and in some ways echoes of the cia interrogation program. perhaps an overreaction to 9/11. now we have the drone strikes, again proposed by the white house being in a difficult position of saying no. now they need to keep all on special footing in the second term. >> on the roles and admissions point, i think that the administration has made it clear that it intends to make a move towards greater reliance on the

department of defense for the conduct of warfare in the 21st century and i support that. quickly, i want to say on this point, it was one of two recommendations of the 9/11 commission, taking paramilitary function out of the cia and giving it to the the part of defense. the opposite occurred, where the of aas become so much paramilitary organization that the counter military organization has become the beating heart of the agency. there is indication that the administration wants to move back in the other direction. we will see what happens. that he is no question

is one of the most unsympathetic characters in terms of being a poster boy for anwar alaki,f not who after that? right now the administration takes the position that we cannot confirm or deny that we actually carried out the killing. this is in essence a political question solely for the executive branch decide.

without being subject to judicial review after the fact. >> in the back? >> thank you very much. thank you for this very interesting panel this morning. i had a question for john and philip. help me understand better these , ifments for the legality al qaeda was to get their hands on this technology -- unlikely, but if they were to use them to attack u.s. military sites year or government offices involved in playing -- planning the attacks, would be the legality of that, you think? if al qaeda was to fantasize

that requirements, with parsley galilee internationally? so, we are discussing warfare against people waging warfare with directly positive vehicles. there is nothing in international law that prohibits people from one to war with the united states. there are consequences from it. legal to go to war and it would be legal for us to wage war against the people who did that. >> historians through history, and we have had what has been a

suspensive civil-rights, we have done things that have been profoundly legal, but never had a war that lasted 15 years. the idea that you could be extralegal for this period of time with a program like this that kills people -- i do not even know authorizes this. no idea who it is, let alone the legal framework for the rationale for this kind of thing. spreads,echnology throughout history we have been a refuge for revolutionaries. people rallying against their government and we make a home for them here. we often support they're doing. we have been doing that since our earliest days. does that mean some other country has the right to target them on american soil?

profoundly troubling questions year unless we get the kind of legal framework that are asking for. >> yes? >> [inaudible] >> what? >> i was in pakistan in october. there were many families impacted by the drum strikes and it was apparent that the signature stripe -- signature strikes the to mention the fact few.he affected quite a target killings, but was the legal framework for that? we did not even know who the individuals were. anyone wish to respond? >> i think that that is one of the concerns, even for those of us who think that some drum

strikes are legal, but how the strikes came to fit in the rationality administration. surprise that he is personally approving from strikes, at one point a year and a half ago there were stories in the new york times suggesting that the president was personally poring over the lists, targeting only people who propose the most significant threats, senior al qaeda leaders. that does seem to be inconsistent with the so called signature strikes of the people who bear a certain so-called signature. we do not know enough about the rationale of the administration because they have not explained it. i can immediately criticized it because they have not explained what it is they need to be criticized of, but something that we almost all agree with is if you do not want to give further back around the world,

it ministration needs to explain who they are targeting and why, as the rules stated, what they said. >> to take this out of the pakistani context, suppose that you were talking about a signature strike against a taliban encampment in afghanistan. unitede knows that the states conducts military operations in afghanistan. so, then you would say -- you might say -- how did you know it was a taliban encampment? what are indicators about people have observed causing people to conclude that it is an in camera people with hostilities against serb forces. we have made hundreds, possibly thousands of those judgments in

afghanistan and iraq without going into any place else in the world. not all of those judgments are always accurate, but in work they are. there is an arcane terminology regarding signature strikes, in a way they are the kinds of strikes conducted in war and you get into the arguments around what the intelligence indicators are that provide compelling evidence that these of the people we are in combat against? >> a quick comment? >> there are three major problems with signature strikes. one, i agree, it is a form of forced operation that is conducted in more. this is further away from what is referred to as a hot battlefield. it is not clear that the administration is abiding by this standard or what their definition is. thes very struck when

former u.s. ambassador to pakistan asked -- what constitutes a militant that can be struck here? any mail between 20 and 40. he was pressed on that. one man's militant is another man's chomp who went to a meeting. it presumes to turn civilian status on its head. civilians have a presumption in war and outside of it of not being tartabull. i agree that we do not have enough information, we certainly need more information, but there ,s a real role of war threats seeing as how some of them and not be, and the final concern is -- how did that lead to counting civilian casualties? if people are categorized as militants, civilians without

being reported to the cia, who knows who they have killed until after they're dead? how do we know? what are the numbers? we still do not know that. >> listening to this i am concerned that the pendulum is swinging too far in one direction. was a survivor of the national security council before and after 9/11, responding to all their requests regarding what you're doing prior to making the country safe and why did you not do it, i can tell you that all of these things, particularly on one side of the spectrum, these drone strikes are causing damage around the world, but on the other hand if you are president of the united states, sworn to make the country safe,

your cia director is suggesting that another 9/11 could happen and you do nothing, you also have a problem. thissure that administration looks back of the investigation done by the commission, suggesting that not enough had been done and they were mindful of that. although all of us have made some concerns about drone strikes, suggesting that these are not incredibly difficult decisions taken by the president and his advisers. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2013] futurean tomorrow, the of special operations forces. at 2:00, a pentagon briefing with the british defense minister. live coverage, here on c-span and c-span.org.

>> this year the c-span wasentcam competition deemed -- a message to the president. we spoke to the winners about the documentary's. >> my father was featured in the video, unemployed and going to the process of appointment. i thought that he would be a good subject follow. i followed him. >> at the time i was taking introduction to law. i was into children's rights, if you will. i realize that we do not have a say in the creation of the debt, but we will have to pay it off. >> it was tough at first. infrastructure and the growing need for public transportation in this country.

in austin they were not very excited about the top picks, but after i had explained it to them they caught on. while researching high-speed rail as one of the segments, that was important to the topic. >> more from the top three winners, saturday morning at 10:00 eastern, on c-span. intelligentsia is driven by this certainty that religion and reason are in different boxes, that science and religion are in different boxes, and that the two are at war with each other. someone who is rational is not religious, someone who is religious is not rational. science is the antidote to religion. science is rational, an antidote

to religious irrationality. the belief is that religion is inevitable in the west is untrue. religion underpinned science and reason. >> the winner of the orwell prize for journalism, melanie phillips takes your calls, e- mails, in debt, three hours, tv," c-sunday, "book span 2. >> on "washington journal," a talk with nicholas burns about the reported use of chemical weapons. this is 40 minutes. host: nicholas burns is our guest. thank you for being with us. guest: great to be with you. host: he is also with the harvard kennedy school of diplomacy and international policy.

iswant to talk about what happening in syria. "washington post said"as -- give us a sense of where things are at right now and if they are inching forward, is anything changing at this moment? guest: it looks like the obama administration is now considering greater u.s. military assistance from syrian -- for syrian rebels but that does not mean the united states will put american troops on the ground. there is no agreement for that whatsoever. might the united states transforms to the rebel forces fighting the syrian dick taylor, assad. the war is in its second year. 80,000 people have been killed. there are more than 1.4 million refugees that left syria and have gone to iraq, jordan, and turkey and an equal number or greater number of refugees inside the country that lost their homes and living in tent

cities and lost their jobs. it is a very difficult humanitarian situation. the assad government is using conventional forces, fighter aircraft, artillery, against civilian populations and their allegations in the last week by the united states and israel and france and britain is that weaponsw used chemical against his own population. that is illegal in international law. the situation is getting more and more intense. nowunited states has reportedly considering going beyond where we have gone and that would be, possibly, to arm the syrian rebel opposition. pieceyou did a recent that ran in "the boston globe." what are the options on the table? guest: the united states first and foremost has provided a lot of humanitarian assistance,

money to support the refugees, to build tent cities and provide water and food to people who are hurting and that is in the american tradition. that is one thing we can do. the second is to give greater support to the syrian opposition forces. these of the people who have come out of their homes and communities and the last two years to fight the assad regime to form these irregular militia groups. some of them are quite moderate and some of them are quite radical. the administration has tried to get support only to the moderate groups. that is an option for the administration. whether we should provide arms will be a big question. some people worry if we provide arms, they might fall into the wrong hands like radical groups. there is an offshoot al qaeda group. the president has been president and patient and i agree with him. this is a very difficult issue. i think the stakes for us are very high.

if we don't act to do more for the rebel opposition, there is a likelihood that assad survive and the war will continue and more people will be killed and the possibility that the war could spread into lebanon and iraq and jordan and neighboring countries. we don't want to see that. the calculation is that if we do provide more lethal than the size of support to the opposition groups, it may be that bacon drive assad of power and bring the war to a close. that is the press -- that the decision the president has to make and it is now aa difficult because of the accusation of chemical weapons. that is a very serious violation

of international law and we don't want to see the use of chemical weapons anywhere in the world, especially in the middle east, which is so turbulent and bloody. the stakes are high and the president needs to make a big decision. it brings us back to the fact that we are a world leader and "provide the most vigorous and aggressive support to pull the rest of the world together to support these rebels. there's a big spotlight on the obama administration. according to the press, the president is rethinking his decision and may be inching toward more legal support. host: if you want to call, here are the numbers. listen to president obama at yesterday's press conference about this issue. [video clip] >> as i said, we are already invested in trying to bring about a solution in sight of syria.

optionsy, there are that are available to me that are on the shelves right now, that we have not deployed. that is a spectrum of options. as early as last year, i asked the pentagon, our military, our intelligence officials to prepare for me what options might be available. detailsot going to the of what those options might be but clearly, that would be an escalation, in our view, of the threat to the security of the international community, our allies, and the united states and that means that there are some options we might not otherwise exercise that we would strongly consider. speakingsident obama yesterday -- upi as a story -- nicholas burns, what would

arming look like? guest: the rebel forces grew out of their communities, people from all walks of life took up arms when their communities were attacked by the assad regime two years ago said they are not well-trade. they're not well-arms. providinging about light arms, may be anti aircraft material to the rebels. assad has control of the skies. they have been bombing civilian ever of its indiscriminately for well over a year. this is a brutal warfare. we would give them arms of this happens to defend themselves and take the fight to be assad regime. is a big step because the united states has tried to stay disengaged and not put ourselves in the metal. beyond this, you've got all the other arab countries in

transformation from egypt, which is now undergoing a tremendous political and economic crisis, to libya where we lost our ambassador, chris stevens last september in benghazi. that country is in the middle of a revolution. yemen is in great turmoil. the administration has to calculate that we cannot be everywhere. we cannot fight everybody's battles. where is the most important for the united states to be an increasingly, given the humanitarian crisis, and given the apparent use of chemical weapons, we need to be more actively involved in syria in order to limit the possibility of further war. i think that is where the washington discussion in congress and the ministration is now headed. host: let's go to buffalo, n.y., a democrat blind. caller: were you under secretary of state during the bush administration? guest: yes, i was. i was a career official. i also served in the clinton administration. i was an intern in the carter

administration. caller: did you ever explained to the president what the heart of secretary and violence is? i do not think the president was aware of a sunni, and what the basis of the conflicts are. this is lack of knowledge. also, these countries were created by the british and the french after world war i when they defeated the ottoman empire, and they created the countries for their own self interests.

it paid no attention to tribal alliances. they had product -- problems almost immediately. iraq was never a nationstate. i am looking for you to impart knowledge, not to get generalities. what is the heart of the problem? what is the cause of the problem question mark make -- problem? make the american people understand this is religion. host: let's get a response. guest: you make some good points. i disagree with some. one of the principal causes, not the only one, is religious differences. you have had a faction of shia islam led by the assad family that has been in control of syria.

the majority of the population is sunni muslim. you are seeing a battle between the majority sunni muslim population, and on the other side, the loi, the kurds, the business community -- it has a sense of religious conflict, but it goes beyond that. there is no question that ideology in place. assad has ties to russia and iran. the sunni population does not have those relationships. where i disagree is i am not sure if you are referring to president obama or president bush, but these are intelligent men and they know that difference between sunni islam -- president bush was involved in the middle east, and president obama inherited those wars. whether you are a democrat or republican, we have had smart people in office. i disagree with you on that

point. host: nicholas burns, either comparisons between how the obama administration is approaching syria and how the bush administration approached iraq? are there similarities? guest: there are similarities because american interests tend to continue from one administration to the next. that was true in my career. president obama, when he ran for the senate and the two times he ran for president, he was clear that the united states had to be careful about getting into land wars in the middle east. he brought us out of iraq and is on a path for afghanistan, you saw him yesterday on

the question of chemical there are some that want him to leap into the war and use force against the side, but the president has said we have to establish the facts and be sure of what we mean and what we say. that was part of the problem in 2003. it we said one of the justifications for the war in iraq was the presence of weapons of mass destruction, and it turned out while they had been there in the 1990's, they were no longer there in 2003. inhink president obama is, my view, right, to be patient, prudent and cautious. let's establish all of the facts before we launch another military adventure in the middle east.

even if the president decides act, he could arm syrian rebels, but i do not think he will put american troops in syria. host: nicholas burns served as undersecretary for political affairs in the george w. bush administration. he was career foreign service for 27 years. he was also the u.s. ambassador to nato, to greece, and served on the national security council at the white house. he is now at the harvard kennedy school, a professor of the practice of diplomacy and international politics and directs the future of diplomacy project and is faculty chair for programs on the middle east, india and south asia. don. centreville, virginia. you are on. caller: good morning, mr. burns. i must disagree with you on your response to the previous caller. i spent a big portion of my life in egypt, and i was

shocked, dismayed, frustrated and disappointed by the response of the current administration to the so-called revolution in egypt. it is said that people that do not learn from history are doomed to repeat mistakes. that is what is happening now. this administration lacks a basic understanding of the makeup of the people in the middle east. i agree that president obama is a highly intelligent man, and president bush was a highly intelligent man, but the makeup of the people, and the way older and younger generations think seems to be hard for this administration to grab. look at where egypt is now -- under the control of a gang of the muslim brotherhood. after the resolution -- revolution happen, hosni mubarak, who was an ally of the united states, was thrown to the curb because people took out

to the streets in egypt. a big portion of the people that moved to the streets were made of hamas and the gangs coming from the west bank. host: let's give ambassador burns a chance to respond. guest: thank you. i will have to disagree with the first thing you say. we have a lot of smart people in washington. sometimes the government does not function very well, though we had smart, sophisticated people who understand the middle east. people who spend their entire lives training for this. i would not want you to think that we are unaware of basic realities. i think we are. we can differ about policy. i happen to think that the arab

revolution that began in cairo and entire square in -- tyree or square, these were difficult issues for president obama and he has done well in responding. mubarakrue that hosni was an ally of the united states, but he clearly lost credibility in egypt and control of the streets when you saw well more than one million people on a daily basis in the streets. it was a difficult decision for president obama to cut loose our ties with him and throw support for the young people in the streets. what is now challenging for us is the muslim brotherhood supported government is in power. they have not performed well in cairo. they have mistreated the liberal, secular opposition and not make good decisions in terms of economic reform. a lot of us are concerned about basic stability in egypt.

it is a keystone country in the middle east, the largest country, a trendsetter. if the revolution does not do well, it will have a profound impact on other countries. we have to hope egypt can write itself, and the united states can support it if we can. asks on twitter, bill about the role of egypt in syria -- egypt has the biggest and strongest military in the region, let them handle the mess and then mark says turkey and jordan have a major role to play in the situation. explain what is happening there. guest: one of the reasons why syria is so important is where it is located. i do not think you will see

egypt take on a major role. egypt is imploding on the weight of its own problems, but the twitter response was correct in that surrounding countries are involved. withn has been inundated refugees from syria. in iraq, which is very unstable and violent, is also being affected, and turkey, a very strong country, is one of the leaders in responding to this crisis, supporting the opposition and opposing aside. -- bashir al-assad. as the u.s. thinks about what we ought to do, we can rely on sport -- on the support of turkey, qatar, saudi arabia. we are not going to be alone on this, but it is important for us to lead and it is in our

interests to help stabilize this key country in the heart of the arab world. host: jamie. woodstock, georgia, go ahead. caller: good morning. i am a long-time watcher, first time caller. as far as backing the rebels, in the 1970's the united states backed saddam hussein, who was a rebel at the time. in the late 1980s, we back bin laden as a cia informant to give us information on the east. the syrian rebels right now have an alliance with al qaeda after a 12-year war and we're going to start backing them. whatever is going on over there -- i think that the american

government owes the people to speak the truth, and this has been going on through history. you have gaddafi that we back, noriega that we back, and i will take my answer off the air, hopefully truthful one. thank you very much. guest: thank you for your comments and questions. where i agree is we do need a national conversation about this. i do not think there is a prospect of the united states getting involved on the ground in another big war. we just had to really will big ones in iraq and afghanistan, but we certainly need to talk to the people more about why it is important for the united states to continue to lead in the world. why in the 21st century, where we are so much more integrated, why it is in our interest.

where i disagree with you is the united states never supported saddam hussein when he was in power. certainly never supported osama bin laden. we never supported noriega in panama. host: we see in "the new york times" a poll is showing an isolationist streak in america. here arson details from them -- here are some details from the poll. 62% say no. 24% say yes, the u.s. has a responsibility in syria now. then it says that those that are

following the news closely are far more likely to think the u.s. has a responsibility to get involved there and nearly half of the group thinks the united states has a responsibility, but about the same amount think they do not. to expand on that, we have from twitter -- even if they are chemical weapons, how do we know who set them off or if we will install a better regime, and joyce says what about the stakes for the u.s.? we do not know who these people are. guest: those are tough questions that the united states will have to answer. i am not surprised by the whole that you quoted from from "the new york times." we have a lot of people hurting at home. we had this major effort in iraq and afghanistan where hundreds of thousands of troops have served with great valor and the country does not want to

into another foreign adventure that i certainly understand that. on the other hand, our interests are at stake. a lot of our jobs depend on how successful we are overseas. we have an alliance system in europe, a nato alliance, we cannot afford to abandon those people. isolationism has been in american history since the founding of our republic. from back and forth withdrawing from the world to engaging in the world. in the 21st-century first century we have to be committed to lead and be involved in the world because any other stance

in the united states, to pull back, he would be a recipe for failure -- economic and political failure. we have to be involved. where your callers, and the people on twitter, where they are right to be asking the tough questions is we cannot be involved everywhere. we have to pick and choose. thinkady said that i president obama's caution has been right here, but now the events in syria are spinning out of control. millions are suffering. the world leader, the united states, has to organize the rest of the world to at least get them economic assistance and maybe arm the rebels to this deed -- to speed the end of this ugly war that the assad government started. host: eugene robinson had a piece in "the washington post" called "stay out of syria." he said if we --

host: that is liberal columnist eugene robinson. is there a point no return? guest: there is. the problem with terry intervention and we have -- military intervention, and i think winston churchill said this, once you start a war, you do not know where it is going to end. that is a problem for president obama. the administration had a lot of smart people. i think there is a way to fund humanitarian support, to provide legal arms for the opposition, to do all of that, but not be drawn into a land war. we were able to intervene in bosnia and kosovo and

essentially use air power to end big wars. we only put troops on the ground after the wars ended after we put together peace in both places. that was resident clinton's administration, and it was done well and effectively. that is a possible model for president obama to look at. host: nicholas burns, the harvard kennedy school. lily is our next caller. california. democrat line. seek out good morning -- caller: good morning. i do disagree with you on your stance on the u.s. getting involved in syria. you say that we can fund the rebels. who are the rebels?

how do we know the rebels we assist will not later turned against us as did the people in afghanistan where we provided them missiles? secondly, with respect to gas being used, i employ you to look at japan where terrorists used gas on commuter trains and look at what the affect was there. a fox analyst had observed staff without a mask on, and the next day the hospital staff had masks on and they even put something on the patient. i do not believe the united states should borrow funds from china to pay for weapons to give to the rebels, and not fund social security, which i am on, and do not want to see that cut. host: tali, billy. touching on that -- thank you, lily.

from twitter, as china agreed lend us money? guest: i do not think china wants to see interference in international affairs. the caller asks a good question on who we will help, and this been president obama has prudent and has hesitated. we need to make sure we can rebel groups in syria that

we believe, should they take power, they will not be adversaries. groupsll be moderate that essentially want to build democratic government. we do not want it to go to an al qaeda offshoot. there is a group that are al qaeda-affiliated, and we would not want to see them in power. can the united states government and turkey and jordan arrange arms transfers only to the good guys? that is difficult, and that is why the president has hesitated. you are right to raise the problem of the japanese group that launched a chemical weapons attack in the tokyo subway 20 years ago in 1993. these chemical weapons are so dangerous and the president spoke to this in his press conference yesterday -- we need to be careful to do everything we can to see that they are not used again. that is another reason why i

believe we ought to be more active in syria to make sure they cannot use chemical weapons because the president around the world is dangerous. host: nicholas burns, former undersecretary of state. jim. republican, georgia. caller: good morning. no insult to anyone in washington, d.c., and i am not a obama supporter, but let's go back through history. intelligent people gave us korea, vietnam, 60,000 people killed, not including civilians. the cold war. trillions of dollars wasted. when will we keep our nose out of other peoples business? those people are religious fanatics. guest: well, sir, the point i was trying to make earlier, as i said, i have served in both republican and democratic administrations. people in washington are trying to do their best. they are well-meaning,

intelligent, and they are trying to serve the american people well. these are tough questions that you race, going from wars in korea and vietnam to more recent wars. we had a big national debate when i was young over vietnam. overrtainly had a debate whether it was right for us to go into iraq. i would say we have to be skeptical about the use of force. we cannot shoot and ask questions later and we have to be tough-minded and ask the gett questions before we into a conflict,, but i would not agree that the united states should just stay home because there are times where we have to do the right thing and help people in distress. i mentioned before, in the clinton administration, there was a huge humanitarian crisis in bosnia and kosovo, and americans were skeptical that we should go in, but we went in, save lives, stop two wars, and t into a conflict,, but i we did not lose a great number of american soldiers.

i would grant you that iraq and afghanistan have set a different tone because they have been so costly in terms of human life and have dragged on so long -- we are still in afghanistan. aboute to be judicious the use of force on the but we also have to lead. i am in favor of american engagement with the world because that is in the interest of our own country at our jobs are at stake. our young kids have to compete to preserve american jobs

against competition from the rest of the world. we have to help allies survived and countries in great distress. host: nicholas burns joins us from boston at the harvard kennedy school. here is a recent pc did for "the boston globe." "syria is melting away." he writes -- here is a tweet from becky -- if iran and syria are allies, could ran perceive u.s. intervention in syria as an attack on iran and retaliate? guest: they might not like it, they will oppose a we do, but they will not see it as an attack. iran is a difficult, brutal regime, but it is a rational government and it will not take us on because we are a lot stronger. that is a different issue on what we should do to stop them from becoming a nuclear weapons power, but one of the reasons there is a benefit to support rebels in syria would be to

decrease terrain in influence in the arab -- or rainy and influence in the arab world. host: joy, california. democrats line. caller: i actually agree with one of the republicans that called in that we should not have to fight these fights alone. we should have more help from our allies. i disagree that we have to be the leaders of this. of these conflicts. -- you cano iraq find it on youtube. john mccain said we will be in and out of there in six months. here we are.

mr. burns made the comment that president obama and president bush were both intelligent man. as far as i'm concerned, bush could not what they can lead sentence together. where i would agree with you is not on your last comment but your first comment. we should not try to act alone. we are the world leader, the yet powerful country and we have to have other countries help us. in the case of serious, if we do , we weapons to the rebels will have a lot of help from the arab countries, the european countries, and turkey. i would agree, share the responsibility, ask other countries to step up and pay for a lot of this. some of the arab countries in the gulf will pay for the great

majority of these arms. that is called good leadership. we are the world leader. there is no country that approaches us and power. vision aecause of that responsibility to the world. i won't belabor the point -- it is in our interest that we'd be active in the world as well. i try not to be partisan. i support president obama but i served resident bush. he is a good man. he saw that last week at the opening of the library. he wants the best for our country. i think it is important to be fair for people -- two people. people who run for office make an enormous sacrifice. whether you agree with bush or not, he is a good person and he is smart, as is president obama. caller: i feel that the reason

we are being bombed and always against us ists progresse because we are sticking our nose implant and they don't need to be stuck into all innocent people we are killing, they breathe the same way we do and they will retaliate. danger on either front. anger at the u.s. and other nations for not getting involved or for getting involved. the united states has a lot of countries that support it. some of the people that have been bombing us, let's take 9/11. that was osama bin laden and al .aeda president bush was right to strike back against them in afghanistan in october of 2001. i live in cambridge and across the river two weeks ago we had a

bombing on patriots' day at the end of the marathon. the two young men alleged to have carried out that bombing, schoolrothers, went to and lived a mile from the studio where i'm speaking now. and what we know about them why they undertook this action, i don't recognize any legitimacy in what they did. nobody does. these are young men with evil in their hearts and they chose to set off bombs in crowded places and maim little kids and .nnocent people the u.s. base a stand up against that kind of terrorism. we are not the cause of it we did not bring this upon ourselves. todid not do anything promote such an action. he took them in as immigrants. they had a chance to succeed in this country but they turned against this country.

and our democracy. so i am not ready to blame the united states because we are active around the world. i don't think that's an excuse for anybody to take out violence against us. we have a right to go back to the source in the case of the brothers to put this younger man, the 19-year-old on trial. andto hopefully convict him sent him to prison for the crimes he committed. we had a right to go after al qaeda for the incredible damage it inflicted on us on 9/11. host: 27 years in the u.s. foreign service. at harvard kennedy school where he is a professor of diplomacy and international politics. take you for joining us this morning. guest: thank you. >> on the next washington journal, the former director of national intelligence talks , the intelligence sharing syrian civil war and president obama's upcoming trip to mexico.

than more about the presidents latin america triplett also includes coastal --latin america trip which also includes coast that regarsta rica. .e'll talk live on c-span everyday at 7:00 a.m. eastern. >> tonight, pores of the george w. bush and ronald reagan presidential libraries -- tours of the george w. bush and model reagan presidential libraries. then later the military use of drones. >>. people think she did not participate much. that is not true. she was very involved. her own bedroom upstairs right across from the

president's office. she was always able to hear. she was very active. she read daily newspapers and bought it from points of view to the president and was able to calm him down. and she was the grandmother of the house as well as taking care of her daughters and grandchildren. >> eliza johnson, now available on our website, c-span.org /firstladies. tune in next monday on first lady julia grant. today, the bush presidential center open for official towards. the center sent out a photo. he surprised some school kids and the area. this is a look inside the mockup of the oval office. greeted 43resident kids on the dallas area at the bush residential center. here on sees you, -- here on forn, we open it up

questions about the presidential libraries. a number of list boxes already. responsesr of already. facebook.com/cspan. have you been to a presidential library am a what did you learn? we will read posts later on. a back to dallas and a tour conducted by former first lady laura bush.

>> what we really wanted, when we picked our architect, is a modern building that would fit in the collegiate georgian campus of southern methodist university. they have a very strict code. they want their buildings to look georgian. that is how the campus was designed, 100 years ago. one of the great things about having bob stern as the architect is, i knew he could make a forward-looking building. we wanted it to be modern, since george was president during the first decade of the new century, but also traditional, in the sense that it would fit with the georgian campus. that was embraced, with the sides of the building that come forward, the fountain in front. then, you can go straight into the museum at that point, into the big hall, and stand under the tower, the lantern, freedom hall. bob stearns saw that design when he did that, with the lighted tower, as a blend of freedom, and a nod to dallas hall, the first building built on the campus.

it is a presidential library, but also very welcoming. there is something stately and dignified about it, which i appreciate. >> there are almost two different views, when you enter the front of the museum, and on the side, you see the institute and adjoining park. >> you can look straight to the front windows, in the center courtyard, all the way through the building, into the center courtyard. the center courtyard defines the museum, and the national archives and storage space. it was signed over to the united states government the day before the dedication of the building. the center courtyard remains with the institute. that is where we are now. we are in the building that will belong to the bush foundation,

that the bush institute will be run from. we are in the library right now, one of the presidential reception rooms, on the top floor of the institute building. these are rooms we can use to entertain speakers before they speak right below us in the auditorium as part of the institute. this is where we can have the egyptian fellows who are here right now in the united states as part of our women's initiative -- we can entertain them here, in future years, when the women's fellowship initiative -- when they are in the united states. we have two buildings, the one that will belong to the united states government as of april 24 people may not know it, but the papers and all the artifacts from every one of our presidents belong to the people of the united states.

they are kept and conserved by the national archives. that building will become one of the national archives buildings, staffed by archivists. >> this is a room the public will not visit? >> this is a room that will be used for entertaining. of course, the public will see it, is in the sense that we will have tours. people will be invited, along with programming. >> in terms of putting this together, explain your role. you are a librarian. your dad was a builder. how did that come together? >> i am very interested in architecture. have always been. i grew up with house plants.-- house plans. my dad was a builder in midlands. build houses for all those people who moved out to work in the oil business in the 1950's through 1970's. i also trained and worked as a school librarian, and am aware

of the roles archivists play in the preservation of artifacts and papers, and why it is important to preserve that history, to have the papers preserved of all of our presidents. things are pretty finished in the building. most of the furniture has been delivered. the institute staff, the fellows working in the bush institute, are almost into their offices. they have moved everything from the warehouse, where things were stored, in lewisville, texas, to the terrific storage that is part of the library and museum. now, at the end, the museum is being installed. every day that i walk through it, more things are there. more videos are up and running. more of the displays have been installed.

that has been thrilling, to be able to see it. we worked month after month and year after year since we started working on this building. we have been working on what the museum would consist of, and what it would look like. >> is there a little bit of lady bird johnson in you, in developing this park? >> lady bird johnson is one of my favorite first lady's. i was always very proud of her, the idea of being able to use our native plants, recognizing beauty in our native plants, to use them in the landscape. she was one of the very first conservationists. and i knew her, because she built the lady bird johnson wildflower center while george was governor. we had a luncheon for the center opening. and then george and i went to the opening that night. i got to show her the white house one time.

she had had a stroke already, but her daughter, linda, brought her to the white house. i got to show her around her old home. we worked with the lady bird johnson wildflower center. our landscape architects are not from texas. they worked with the wildflower center to develop this landscaping, which is native prairie and native wildflowers. we worked with the lady bird johnson wildflower center even to develop the grass we are growing everywhere, which is a mixture of four texas native grasses. it will be a turfgrass. it should stand up to a crowd standing on it. and it needs less irrigation and needs less mowing because it is a mixture of native grasses. so i was highly influenced by the other texas first lady, besides my mother-in-law, barbara bush. that is lady bird johnson.

>> very different roles, first lady lady and librarian/designer. what is challenging? >> it is always challenging, i think. there is an emotional challenge to serving the country that is difficult. that is both seeing your husband criticized in a lot of ways, but also just -- i think great first ladies do this. really understanding the pressures that are on the people of the united states. but at the same time, realizing what it privilege it is to have a chance to serve our country like that. and to serve the people of our country in that way. >> let me conclude with a process question. you touched on this already. what has this process been like? what have you learned about you, your husband, putting this together, and how do you make this project live on in perpetuity? >> this has been interesting and

fun. i loved every minute of it. great landscape architect. great architect. they are both very established firms, with a lot of people. they are very good at what they do. neither have done a presidential library before, but bob stearns has done other libraries and university buildings. and there was another campus. that was one of the reasons i wanted to pick him. he had done native landscaping on the wellesley campus that i knew about. i had also worked with him on the redesign of pennsylvania avenue after september 11, when we knew pennsylvania avenue was going to stay closed. both of them are funny. they are smart. they are fun to work with. it was intellectually interesting to work with them. also willing to try to figure out and forecast what it is we would want. what did we want for the museum

that would be interesting to people, but that would also be really be able to transmit what it was like to live in the white house during those first eight years of the new century? and in some way to give people an understanding of the presidency itself, which is what i think presidential libraries should do. what the job of the president is. and the very idea in our country that the president comes from all the people, is chosen from all the people in our country, that we are not a country that had -- even though, in our case, we did have a father and son. i think trying to figure those things out, and make those sort of forecasts, was also an intellectual part of it. how successful we are at being able to do that, we will see when the library and museum ♪pen.

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>> we are here at the very opening of the library. we just walked through this entry hall, the biographical part about george and me. it includes huge, wall-sized photos of our ranch, taken by a very famous texas landscape photographer. then we come up to the campaign, and the recount.

even some hanging chads are in there in a jar for people to see. 36 days, obviously, before we knew whether or not george had been elected. finally, we see these videos that show that he won. >> as you look back during that time, was there ever a doubt in your mind that he was going to be elected president? >> at every recount, he won again. each recount in florida, george stayed ahead. but we did not know. we went to our ranch. it was very odd for us. we had been on the road, traveling around the united states for months, campaigning. we went to the ranch and waited to hear. we got a slow start. we did not have the day's other presidents had to get ready, to think about actually living there and getting your administration set up.

>> but the display behind you recounts everything that happened, including that night. take us back to the evening where al gore was about to concede. he did not concede. >> he conceded, and then he called and took it back. we were there with jeb bush, governor of florida. the stations had called the race before the panhandle had voted. florida is in two time zones. i know the stations did not realize, or the networks would not have called the race that early. we were with our whole family. we just went into limbo, i guess, sort of a zen mode, especially when we went back to the ranch and waited for those 36 days before we knew. >> that picture became a theme of the library.

>> "a charge to keep" is a hymn sung at the first prayer service. someone called and said, i have a painting, which was a wedding gift, a turner painting, called "a charge to keep." it is a painting of a cowboy, writing very hard. you can tell there are people folllowing behind. he loaned it to the governor's office. and we took it to the white house as well. it was in the oval office. now, joey has it again. >> there is a statue of president bush and his father. what was the genesis behind that, and who designed the statue? >> one of our very good friends

commissioned it. he wanted a statue of george and his dad, which we really wanted, because his dad is such a huge influence on our life, on all of the children's lives, but especially ours, because of this bond from being president. the artist is a portrait painter, and he painted the portrait of my mother-in-law, barbara bush, that is in the white house collection. you would see it if you toward the white house and walked by all of the first lady paintings. >> as you walk over here, no child behind. >> this part of the museum is what we thought we would be working on all eight years we were there. the first big display is on the way to get out of the recession we were in when george was elected. no child left behind was really what george had campaigned on, both when he ran for governor

and when he ran for president. that is education reform to make sure that children do not just get shuffled through school, but that they do get a good education, and that we know it, because schools are held accountable, schools, teachers, and administrators, who do what they can to make sure they are using the right strategy and curriculum, to make sure every single child learns. t-ball in the white house started that first summer, 2001. it was the perfect place to talk about that. but also to include the big race big baseballon.-- colletion. these are only a few of his baseballs. the national book festival, which i founded, was on september 8, 2001. we have a reading book with all the posters. george established the community and faith-based initiative as soon as he was elected.

that is over here in the display. our first state dinner was for --xico, onset timber 6, 2001. on september 6, 2001. we really thought that we would be spending most of our time with international neighbors with our southern neighbors, mexico, central and south america. that is what we knew best. having been the governor of a state with such a long border with mexico. >> let me ask about the cost of the museum and the endowment you have to give the national archive. >> we raised the money for the museum. we will sign it over to the national government, the national archives and records administration. the people of the united states on the presidential papers and all of the artifacts, including all of the gifts that were given to us by heads of state from other countries. they are seen as gifts to the

people of the united states. those are all held here, in a huge warehouse that is below us. of course, there are no windows or any way that light might affect the documents and the archives. the united states government will own this part of our presidential center -- the museum, the library, the warehouse. it will be administered by the national archive. obviously, we raised the money privately to build the building, before we give it to the u.s. government. then, we give a certain percentage of the money raised to the u.s. government as an endowment for this part of the building. the bush institute, which is the policy arm of the bush center, where george and i will spend the rest of our lives working on the policies that were most important to us, is separated from this building by a courtyard. the bush foundation owns that

building, and will obviously do all of the uptake on that building, for the rest of time. >> was raising the money difficult? >> amazingly, it was not difficult. we ended up raising about $500 million. half of that will be an endowment for the bush foundation, and then to give to the national archives, as part of the endowment. amazingly enough, because the economy was in such bad shape when we moved here, at the end of the administration, we worried about being able to raise the money. but we have many supporters from around the country who were very generous. we had more than 350,000 donors, from every state in the united states, and obviously from other countries as well. george and i are very, very grateful. the building was paid for, and

we are proud of that. it is on time, below budget, and paid for. we turned the corner from the issues i talked about, and this is what happened. the things we thought we would be working on the whole time, which we did continue to work on this changed everything for us. behind us is the large piece from the world trade center, from the 82nd floor, where the plane hit, at the point of impact. it is here as a sculptural memorial to the people who died on september 11. their names are in the wall we are looking at. i think people will be very, very moved by this, just seeing, in person, what it looks like, what the building -- the impact of the flight, how horrific it was. the videos around that side our minute by minute, from the first light to shanksville. we had day by day, september 11

through september 20, when george spoke to the joint session of congress. each of those days. i know, because every time september 11 comes up, friends or acquaintances, or even strangers that i am talking to, one to tell me where they were on september 11, and how they heard about september 11. we have installed a booth where people can type or talk into the microphone to record where they were on september 11, to leave their memories here, so they become part of the broader archive of everything about september 11 that is here at the bush center. >> you were in washington that morning. you greeted the president as he landed on the south lawn. do you remember the conversation? >> i do not remember what we talked about. he came downstairs and spent the day with senator kennedy and senator gregg.

i was at the capitol to brief the senate committee on early childhood education. obviously, after a wild, i was taken to a secure location, and then came back to the white house right before he landed. i was down in the bunker with lynn and dick cheney. i remember that we hugged each other. what was there to say, really? we were safe, and our girls were safe. all we could think about were the thousands of americans who could not say the same about their own load once. and about how our lives had changed, and the duty that had fallen on george to lead our country now through the dark shadow that had fallen over it. >> a lot of interest in this exhibit as part of the museum. what do you want people to walk away from? >> i want people to remember it. i want this to be a memorial to the people who died, and after that, the military who served

for us, and many who lost their lives. and all the ways the united states came together. i think it is a very important lesson for us to remember. and as we get away from it -- it has been 12 years since september 11. fewer and fewer people will remember. george wrought a group through recently, and the children were not alive on september 11. they did not have a personal memory of it, like people our age do. i think it is important for all of us to remember the ways that we can come together, and the reasons we should come together. >> one iconic moment -- the bullhorn from manhattan. >> that is right. a lot of the artifacts are here that came from september 11. a lot of letters george received. the program from the memorial service at the national monument.

the national cathedral, rather. the badge that arlene howard gave george, to remember her son. even now, when i see these, and when i see this video -- here is the pentagon in flames in the video. i am reminded again of what it was like. the crushing anxiety that came with it. the fear that many of us had. how vulnerable we felt as americans, really, for the first time. other than pearl harbor, we had an act in our homeland.-- we had never really been attacked in our homeland. the unexpectedness of it, and the shock of attacking people who were going about their daily life. >> did the events in boston serve as another reminder? >> they did. it is crushing, really, the idea of harming innocent people for

some sort of theology, or some sort of ideology. it is very hard for us to imagine in the united states. >> let us head to the oval office. this is it. >> this is the oval office. it is full-scale, exactly like it was when george lived here. of course, these are reproductions. the real rug and the real furniture stay in the white house collection. they are all still in washington, in the facility where presidents' furniture is kept. several of the presidential libraries have oval office replicas for people to see, because most people will never have a chance to really go to the oval office. but this has the same aspect as the real oval office, with the south sun pouring in the big

window, and even a rose garden we can step into. this is a replica of the desk that george used. and this is a gift from an american who called us, a supporter from ohio, who said he had the resolute reproduced, and used it in his own office for a while. he wondered if we wanted it. this is a gift, which is really great to have. he even has the little door with hinges, with the famous photograph of little john kennedy, looking out the door while his dad worked at the desk. >> what is the story behind this desk? >> the resolute was a gift from queen victoria to the united states, named for a ship that had gone adrift. an american navy ship had towed it in, kept it, and returned it to great britain. when the ship was decommissioned, queen victoria used the timbers of the ship to

build a desk for the president of the united states. many presidents have used it. i it. i think president obama continues to use it. george's dad used another desk, but george wanted to use this one. there is a little glass arm.-- a little platform. it is raised a couple of inches. it is a beautiful piece. and it speaks of the friendship between the united states and great britain. >> do you remember the very first time you went to the oval office, i assume during president bush's years? >> i think we went over there once or twice, when we would come visit them for christmas holiday, or another holiday. the very first day that george moved into the office, after the

inauguration, his dad was upstairs. they were staying with us for the inauguration. he called his dad over. there is a great picture of george and his dad together on the first day. this is the picture "a charge to keep." this is a reproduction of the painting was in george's office when he was governor and then president. it shows a horseman leading a group behind him. it is named for the wesley hymn, "a charge to keep," which we sang at the inaugural prayer service when he became governor. >> the lighting is typical of the oval office. or is a different feel in this room than other rooms of the white house. >> i think it is because of the

big bay window. the other thing i like is that it is really human in scale. it is a lovely space. i think the oval shape makes it graceful. it is not like throne rooms in european countries we visited, or other very magnificent offices that other heads of state have. i like that, because we are a country who elect our president from the people. i like it that our president's office is human in scale. >> as we look outside, there is an exact replica of the rose garden. you are calling it a texas rose garden. >> this is something i think none of the other presidential libraries have. we planted a texas rose garden. it is part of the museum tour.

people can come in here. you can get your picture made, standing at the desk. this room will not be roped off, like it might be in other libraries. and you can go outside. i think, after you have been through the part about september 11, and then the war in iraq and afghanistan, that being able to step outside and sit on the benches will give people a chance to refresh and think about what they have just seen, and the loss that we incurred on september 11, the many, many people who died. >> was it your idea to have the break in the middle of the

museum? >> it is a good idea. people get museum fatigue. museums are dark to protect the documents. there is not a lot of light. and there is a lot of information. halfway through, if you have a chance to walk outside, you have a chance to be refreshed. we are fortunate that we had the sort of space where we could put the oval office here and have a rose garden. >> president bush required everyone to have a jacket when they came to the oval office. >> george respected the oval office, and he respects the presidency. he thinks it is very important that all of us should do that. that is one of the reasons he is not into politics now, and not talking about our current president, or any political issue he might agree or disagree on, because he thinks that just the respect for the president also means a respect for the office itself. that is why he wanted people to wear a coat in here. while they had a chance to serve the people, by working for the president or working in the administration, to show that kind of respect. >> what does the president of this replica? >> i think he -- i think he likes it.

it we were able to have a full- scale replica, exactly like the real oval office, with the same fabrics, and reproductions of all the furniture and paintings we had -- the portrait of lincoln, the portrait of washington. we borrowed the rest of these paintings from texas museums. >> as they leave the texas rose garden, they enter "living in the white house." this is what many people want to see. they want to see what it is like to live in the white house, what the rooms are like, and what the family personal life is like. we have pictures of our dogs. spot died in the white house. she was born in the white house. we have a huge map of the white house, as you can see behind me, so people can see what the rooms set up is. i read did the lincoln bedroom, restore the lincoln bedroom, while i was at the white house. there is a section on the lincoln bedroom, including what

the wallpaper was like. we have other great parts that i think people will be interested in. the whole setup for the state dinner for queen elizabeth, including my down, and george's white tie, which he is hoping to never wear again, i am sure. that was our only white tie dinner, and condi and i had to persuade him that was perfect for a queen. he said ok and did it. we have a section on air force one and marine one. people are always really interested in that. a big sports section includes the baseballs and footballs, from all the championship teams that come to visit the president. we chose to put at the back of it the girls' basketball team from baylor university, when they won the ncaa basketball and came to the white house.

without people from around here would love to see them. they are still a great basketball team. they did not win this year, but they almost did. >> the south lawn view -- you of course have the truman balcony. how much time did you spend on the balcony? did you have a favorite part in the white house? >> one of our upstairs rooms opens directly on the balcony. every year, i hosted george's birthday party on july 4. his birthday is july 6. our friends from around the country came. we would stand on the balcony to watch the fireworks over the washington monument, all eight years. in fact, now i get e-mails from all of our friends on george's birthday. they think they will never have as much fun at a birthday party again, because we will not be there, watching the fireworks from the truman balcony. >> did it seem like home to you? >> it did.

and i knew it would. we had been there with my in- laws. i knew my mother-in-law had made it into a home. it is a home. you live with the furniture and decorating of presidents before you, but it is a home, and a wonderful place to live. our girls came up, and our friends stayed with them. george's brother and sister -- one brother and sister lives in the washington area. they came over for family dinners with their children. of course, his parents stayed with us when they were in washington. it really is a home. >> as people come here and view the exhibits, what will they learn? what is their takeaway? >> they will see that it is a home. as magnificent as it is, and as historical, you really do live

with the other presidents. you think about the challenges they face. certainly, lincoln is the one you think about the most. his son died while he was there. our country went into civil war. there is something very comforting about living with that history. you know that we can overcome challenges. in those days after september 11. you know it was comforting to be there, and to think about other families when they live there, and how our country was able to move through each of those times, through world war ii, and the civil war, and president lincoln, and the sadness he had when he lived there. i think there is something great about living in a house with such history, our presidents getting to live with the history of our country like that. >> finally, a look at the humor in the white house. >> we have a little video back here, and a little screening room, set up like the red velvet screening room at the white house.

it includes some of the funny things from all the dinners that i know you have been to, the white house correspondents, all the rest of them. >> this is our final stop for the tour. the policy and politics of the presidency -- where are we? >> we are here with my travels, with things i did. certainly, women's rights in afghanistan, and other parts in the world, in burma and others. i traveled to 76 different countries. i was there when george founded the emergency plan for aids relief. people in the united states for helping people in africa live full and productive lives by providing antiretrovirals to all the people who had been dying

with aids. it shows right behind me a decision points theater. this reminds me to say that the museum is very interactive. there are lots of videos for people to watch at every part of the museum. there are also tables of games for children to look at. there is a lot about iraq and afghanistan on one table, where boys and girls can learn about both of the countries behind us. the curved wall is the decision points theater. that is a place where a class or a group of friends who come together can go in and study decisions that george made, on the financial crisis, on the surge in iraq, hurricane katrina, afghanistan, and get the information he was given at the time, and he prodded by the press.

what are you going to decide? they can make their decisions on what they would have done if they had been president with any of those issues. behind us is a lie and that the president of tanzania gave to george from me got there, in thanks for all the ways the people of tanzania benefited from the aids relief and aids initiative. >> let me go back to the decision points. does that reinforce the decisions the president had to make and the choices he was confronted with? >> that is what it does. it does not reinforce his decision,, but it shows people what he was faced with. the information he had at the time, why he chose what he did, and to see if that is what they would have done. it also gives people an idea of what it was like to be president, and to have those

serious decisions to make. all the decisions that come to the desk of the president of the united states. in fact, nearly every big problem does come to the desk of the president of the united states. >> leading on the issues. >> this is a national archives site map, all of the documents from the bush presidency. this is just a chance for you to see different documents. some are just speeches. others are bills he signed with the pen he used to sign them. scholars and researchers will be able to come here. there is a beautiful reading room, and part of the national archives space, where people can

call up different documents or papers from years that george was president, to do the research that people will do. >> in the lobby, as people depart or arrive, a rotation of displays. >> this was our architect's they are filled with gifts. they all have to be things that can't be damaged with light because the hall has a lot of windows. they are things like the diamond and sapphire necklace that king abdullah from saudi arabia gave me. >> as you know, your husband had a lot of critics. will this change the way people view his presidency?

>> i do not know that it will change the way. it is not meant to do that. it is meant to explain what happened during those eight years of history, to talk about the different things we faced as a country, and his choices and decisions he made to respond to whatever the challenges were. i think people will learn a lot. i think there are things people did not know, for instance, about the aids relief from graham, about the generosity the american people funded. i think there are a lot of things people will learn about. i think it will also give people an idea of what it is like to be president, the successes and failures. it is just like in any life. we all have that. our presidents are human. we will have the same sort of records. >> has it met your expectations?

>> i think people will find it very interesting. we have tried to include everything. you cannot include every single thing. you and i have not even talk about our support for dissidents and the freedom movement, as part of this wall i am looking at behind you. thank you so much for being here. >> the george w. bush presidential center includes the library, museum, and the bush institute. the library houses material including 43,000 artifacts, 200 million e-mails, 4 million digital photographs, and 70 million pages of paper records. the facility is 226,000 square feet, on 23 acres of land. it is part of the southern methodist university campus. it is the 13th presidential library to be administered by the national archives and records administration, and the

third presidential library in texas. the total cost -- $500 million, raised from more than 325,000 individual and corporate donors. in a recent interview, president bush discussed what researchers will have access to inside the library and museum. >> i think historians will see that i had a very deliberative process on making tough decisions. sadly, i was a wartime president. i took on the duties of commander in chief, particularly i was loath to commit them to -- them to combat. when i did, i supported them to the max. one of the things i am comfortable about saying is, for any administration to be

properly analyzed -- in other words, history has a long reach to it. if they are still writing about washington, we are not going to have to worry about what they are writing about me for a long time. historians will be able to take a look at my administration. they will have a lot of material at his or her disposal, on which to make an analysis. >> for more information on the bush presidential center, log on to the website. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2013]

the opportunity to testify on behalf of my fellow library directors really are pleased to have called this hearing and are honored to appear before you and especially with anna eleanor roosevelt. we are indebted to her grandfather's vision which led to the creation of the first presidential library. franklin roosevelt encouraged the country not to be fearful as he launched his presidency, during which we became a leader of the free world, he valued transparency as an essential element of government. citizens understand how the government works. with the recent addition of the nixon and george w. bush library, our presidential library system representing our 13 most recent former presidents, is made whole and has become a model for the world. presidential libraries hold the memory of our nation.

the allow researchers and museum visitors an opportunity to relive the events that have shaped us as a people. programs create a more informed citizenry. i believe the current model works well and provides immeasurable benefits to our nation. we rest on four pillars. -- thevate funds used to revenue stream from our museums and related enterprises. one of the strengths of the system is a strike the right balance. each library is built in a location determined by the president and his family. when visiting them, one is immersed in locales like independence, abilene, and grand rapids for our presidents lived. they are guided by standard set by the national archives that inshore our holdings are protected, our museums objective. >> that is the jfk presidential

library director testifying in 2011 on capitol hill on maintaining the presidential library system. here on c-span, we thought we would spend the next 40 minutes looking at presidential libraries at the opening of the george w. bush residential center last week. we will look back at 12 other libraries we have covered over the years. in particular, going back to the 2007 series looking at presidential libraries. some background to start with -- the first presidential library was the fdr library. he donated in 1939 his presidential papers and personal papers. congress passed its first law regarding presidential libraries in 1950i've. the presidential libraries act of 1955 established a system of privately built and federally maintained libraries and encouraged other presidents to donate their historical materials to the government. in 1978, it made the presidents

official documents and other materials federal property by law and gave custody of those records to the national archives. in 1986, the presidential library act required foundations associate with the libraries keep five endowments linked to the size of the facility. the archives uses these endowments to offset a portion of the maintenance cost for the library. now with the george w. bush library, there are 13 presidential libraries from herbert hoover to george w. bush. their average annual federal is $75 million. the bush library is now the largest presidential library to read we will spend some time looking at video from 2007 and other years and will give you a chance to participate online. we pose the question earlier about presidential libraries. have you been to one? what did you learn? .acebook.com/c-span

here is a viewer that has been to all 12 and looking forward to the third team. susan says -- there an ongoing discussion on facebook not just on the library but on the politics behind the president. one more thing here from usa today. when the center library opened last week, an editorial about presidential libraries. they write the fantastic sums meeting a lot of groveling, sometimes beginning when a person is still in office. we will talk more about that later in the program but let's get started with some of the video going back to -- we will show you some video looking at a

letter written by fdr to hitler. and also to the lbj presidential library, some of the home middle east made by lady bird johnson -- some of the home movies made by lady bird johnson. >> the first one i want to show you is an extraordinary letter that fdr wrote to adolf hitler in 1939. roosevelt was feeling impotent with regard to what he could do because of the isolationism in the country as well as the neutrality laws. as you can see on the second page of the letter, roosevelt is right thing to adolf hitler. -- writing to adolf hitler. it seems inevitable