with congress men jim himes of connecticut. representative randy forbes. will speak about the espionage act. >> great harm has already been done by opening this up. and the consequence, i believe, is our security is jeopardized. there is no doubt in my mind that we will lose capabilities as a result of this, and that not only the united states, but those allies that we have helped will no longer be as safe as they were two weeks ago. ♪ that was general keith alexander of the nsa testifying before the senate appropriations committee yesterday. he meets in closed session with house intelligence committee members today. we want to get your reaction to what he had to say about phone and theird the nsa

halting terror threats. (202) 585-area code, 3881 for republicans, (202) 585- 3880 four democrats, (202) 585- 3882 for independents. you can also make a twitter comments, @cspanwj is our twitter handle. you can also go to facebook.com /c-span. you can send us an e-mail at journal@c-span.org. here is a story in the "new york times" this morning. it cited article, it says --

host: now that it is out there, it will be looked at in a different way, an official said. everyone is raising questions about -- host: that is a little live from the "new york times" this morning. inside the "wall street journal ," how the nsa could get so smart so fast.

host: they are also unable to handle pictures or video. new size of databases that emerge in late 2009, such as -- host: a little bit from the "wall street journal" this money.

senator alexandria saying phone records have halted terror threats. we will begin with our republican line from susan in kingston, literally. good morning, susan. news should know better. they should not put anything about government on. and making up stories about it, making the public scared. , are you saying you do not have a problem with -- caller: i used to be a republican, but it is too --barrassing now host host: if we get sick to the topic, we would appreciate it. jason is a democrat in tennessee. hello, sir. we're talking about the nsa database. i.t. person with a

background in psychology. people push the limits. the people who are in office are no different. people who are put in at the nsa are no different you. we have a system of checks and balances for that reason because human nature is to push the limits, especially whether they're trying to do this for our safety or not, ipods at the question -- we don't really know a lot about what can be done, what can be done in the future, because the law states that computing power is going to double every 16 to 18 months. it is consistently showing us that it can do that. what are they going to be able to do with this in the future? if you can let me finish with saying this -- i have a quote here "even if you are not doing

anything wrong, you are being watched and recorded. it is getting to the point where you don't have to do anything wrong, you simply have to eventually fall under dhs,cion from somebody, see something, say something, right, and then they can use this system to go back in time and scrutinize every decision you have ever made, every friend you have ever discuss something with, and attack you sort of deriveo suspicion from an innocent life." that is actually from the "traitor," the person you guys are saying is treasonous. i want to save one final thing and thank you, but how can we trust a congress that has been caught doing insider trading? to every much. host: -- thank you very much. host: again, if you want to make a comic, the numbers are on the

screen, the area code is 202. here's the front page of the "washington post" this morning -- ♪ [video clip] want to give general alexander a chance to answer a has toick question that do with americans concerned about their own private computer

.ecurity and privacy i saw an interview in which mr. snowden claims that due to his position at nsa, he could tap into virtually any american's phone call or e-mail. true or false? >> false. i know of no way to do that. >> thank you. i just want to clarify that because perhaps that is one issue we could put to rest. host: and from our facebook pages morning, jesse says -- don't believe him, and don't care either, the role of law is better to defend than whatever he thinks a thwarted. otis is an independent in illinois. what are your thoughts about yesterday's hearing? am from omaha, nebraska. the zip code may have gotten

transposed. i am looking at this from a different angle. i am not a huge newt gingrich calledt he is a term social engineering. when you look at a database like this, take out terrorism altogether, and look at the information that is collected and look at how -- the field i work in, some of the things i do is reporting services on databases, all the different information you can pull from a database to get the pulse of the people, see how the people are feeling, maybe we need to do this, that. i think people are looking at this from the wrong angle. just focusing certainly on terrorism. you can literally use this for social engineering on the people if you are listening to and monitoring everyone. you can keep your polls on the people. pulse on the people by running reports. and that information just looking for keywords. you do not need phrases or sentences heard -- sentences. host: is that a good thing or

bad thing? caller: it is definitely a bad thing. there are palpably people who feel differently. peoplee are probably who feel differently. when you have a database this large and you can go and pull out any report you want to depend on how you do it -- host: all right, we got your point. abby is in florida. caller: i think it is a bad thing, too. if you really want to get criminals or terrorists, you are not getting them in this way. they are using disposable phones that you buy for $20 at walmart and just throwing them away. they buy them cash, and there is no way to trace them. i cannot imagine what they are getting through the type of things they are looking through. thank you for calling in. author tweets and -- wouldn't any terrorists deliriousl -- seriously planning to harm us have long since ceased using cell phones and internet to

communicate plans? waitr facebook page -- till there's another republican in the oval office and then ask the question again. suddenly it will be a terrible intrusion again. from the front page of the "washington times" this morning -- prison use like bush -- prism use like bush on steroids.

host: years at the helm of the intelligence committee -- host: john on our independent

line from pennsylvania. hi, john kerr. caller: good morning. i would not put much stock in alexander's response. hundreds of instances where the government has been lying to us. i would not put much stock in it. what i would like to know from him is he has been in charge of that outfit for nine years. why doesn't he know why snowden had the capability of pulling out those top-secret documents? , time, like to see date place and names of all of these suppose it terrorist attacks they have thwarted. cheney used to pull a number all the time. he never could come up with anything that really was true. so i do not put much stock in what he had to say. host: brian is a republican in

california. caller: hi, c-span. what i've seen over the last two weeks, i've been a republican for a long time, and i find myself in alignment with an awful lot of democrats all the sudden. in looking at this whole thing, these absolutely old face lies that our -- bold-face lies that our intelligence officers are giving to congress. i agree with the previous color from a three -- previous caller from a few days ago on the "washington journal" who said there needs to be a big tidal wave that goes into washington, suites them all out, and somehow we get new people in. these databases, these database centers, these huge expenditures on surveilling ordinary americans are clearly against the fourth amended. these people need to be swept out of town. thank you.

host: chuck is a democrat in maine. caller: good morning. i had a personalized various with this. i think it-mail -- was a week ago -- i sent an e- mail to a friend in alabama. she received it under some kind of code name, letters and digits, and she asked me what that is, so i followed up and called the office in a say in let them know about. they told me my e-mail was going out under an alias. i try to find out what this alias thing was, and they said they do not know. when i asked for a written reply from the telephone company, they refused to say. i don't trust this system at all. i am 74 years old, and i am really scared for what this is doing for the country. thank you for listening. host: wild and wonderful tweets

-- these laws have allowed the intelligence community to reach far beyond your phone records, e.g., your bank account. this is the front page of the "financial times."

has traveled is overseas in a certain way. chuck, i am sorry, we're going to perry in a maryland. good morning. caller: i'm quite disturbed. i'm glad you are having that's this morning. the supreme court said we could do the dna, we are learning what they have been doing with this. the concentration of information and power in washington and in our corporations is more than scary. it is changing the way this country operates.

i'm quite disturbed about it. i agree with the last three or s,ur colors -- caller especially the one it was a tidal wave to come in here. i do not trust large corporations, and i do not trust washington. in big trouble. people better wake up. monte asks the question -- is the nsa going to monitor some 6 billion people around the world? don is a republican in michigan. caller: good morning, peter. , dozensup the examples and dozens of examples where the effectiveness of this to seeon -- i would like with the czar. the reason i bring that up is that george bush -- see what these are. the reason bring this up this george bush held up example to what he considered serious threats.

one was the group in miami, the miami seven, if you recall a group of guys who were basically living -- they were homeless people, i think they were. they were going to blow up the sears tower. they call that a serious threat. they actually interrupted mr. "larryr interviewed on th king" breaking a story. and also for, some group of guys were going to take on fort dix. so that was also held up. , athose are some examples least with bush, and now he says there are dozens. if you go overseas, you're going to find terrorism. know,wonder here, you here in the united states, i just wonder about the money we're spending any effort. it worries me. i think that the previous colorallers, i would have to be

allied with them. thank you very much. , at: that was john republican in grosse pointe, michigan. a couple of facebook comments -- nobody said they could stop 100%. they had staves -- saved american lives. what they haven't. ,urt says -- make no mistake everything done in washington is done with one goal in mind, to enslave the american people. if you would like to continue the conversation on our facebook page, facebook.com/c- span. the comment section is up all day long, so you can read other peoples comments and make your own. back to yesterday's hearing at the senate appropriations hearing -- appropriations committee. [video clip] >> has the intelligence committee kept track of how may times phone records obtained in section 215 of the patriot act were critical to discovering and it disrupting terrorist threats. >> i don't have those figures today --

>> are those figures available? make thoseoing to figures available. >> how soon? >> over the next week, it would be our intent to get those figures appeared i've talked talked to the intel committee on that yesterday. i think it is important to -- >> you talked about the intel committee yesterday, but you did not have the figure yesterday. >> it is dozens of terrorist events that these have helped prevent. collect millions throughions of records 215, but dozens have proved crucial or critical, is that right? >> that is both here and abroad in disrupting or contributing to the destruction of terrorist attacks during >> out of those

millions, dozens have been critical. >> that is correct. call, gettingyour your reaction to what nsa chief alexander had to say, phone records halt terror threats is what he said. you can see the number on the screen jim is an independent in indiana. caller: good morning. i just wanted to say that i think -- i have no confidence in what the government is saying. they stopped it, it is a farce, they have no credibility. i guess that the people -- the government is the one that seems like it is committing treason. so i hope people will take some action and stop them from doing this. " thisfrom "usa today

morning -- controversy revives debate over secrecy. host: isn't hurting the

cooperation and finance between private sector companies -- host: sheila, republican in new york. sheila, you are on the "washington journal." what do you think? caller: hi. they're collecting data from everyone in the country who make telephone calls.

when there was the underwear bomber, he was on a watchlist, that there were so many people on the watchlist they could not pick him out to begin with. this same thing with the bomber in boston, the boston marathon. there were too many people for them to follow this guy. so what good is it to have everybody in the country on a list? furthermore, everybody should have always known that their e- mail is not private. and they should have supported the post office, which right now, i don't think they are censoring mail. --and i think the

government should be more open give us security. host: all right, sheila, thank you for calling in. jim is in houston, democrats line. caller: good morning. i voted for obama twice. militaryalso an ex- member. i am not surprised at what nsa does. we do something similar to that dream the cold war against our enemies. .ut i also support it i think the nsa can do what the tsa cannot. the tsa checks the diapers of 18-month-old. i think the nsa canvassing was between i call my grandmother in arizona and when an american is calling somebody else where. i think it is an important project.

it is not make us safe, but it makes us safer. so i am a supporter. host: jim, what kind of work did you do in military intelligence? ofler: i was a collector unique and highly perishable national security information. host: ok, can you tell us anymore? can you be more specific? caller: i was a -- host: what was your clearance process like? caller: phillip paperwork, fbi check this out, contacted family -- friends, i knew someone one of my friends in high school, his father worked for boeing and was part of the program. he was definitely one of my contact persons for my security clearance. host: do you still have a security clearance? caller: no, no, no, i am out of the game. i was out since before 9/11. host: thank you for calling in. new york, independent

line. what are your thoughts about phone records, the nsa, and terror threats? caller: i think that it should be transparency of the agencies in our government -- should be interviewed. all those in the agencies should be interviewed by you on pbs all the time until this division between security and the fourth in the midst if ironed out. isthe fourth amendment ironed out. it may take a while. it is important to understand to have this security. we will probably escape from more bombings, time square, boston marathon, etc. but we need to have this security. we need openness as well. up.eed to open it all the whole pandora's box. let it all out, and let the genie out of the bottle, and

find out what we should do. it should not be not disclose. that is my opinion as an independent. ok. host: d were for calling in. from "usa today", google disclosed on wednesday --

host: this is the lead editorial this morning in the washington post -- loosen the gag on google. ever since edward snowden leaked top-secret documents about internet data gathering, google has pushed back. it is not a participant -- the company insisted, no one at the nsa has any kind of direct or open-ended access to our service. they were very surprised to learn that the nsa is apparently metadata ofthe every phone call to or from the united states --

the obama administration, it says, should allow google and other tech firms to say a little more about their relationship with the government, but the transparency should not stop there. the revelation that surprised google that the nsa is collecting all that followed data, apparently relies on a novel interpretation of section 215 of the patriot act. barry is a democrat here in the suburbs -- mary is a democrat. calls thatn i hear

questioned whether we should trust the government -- i work in the same world as the director works in, let's say it that way. i have no general sanders since he was a colonel in the pentagon. trytarted in the mid-1990's to plan for the world we live in now and how technology would completely change what it is we would have to be watching. this infuses sort of the older generation, and the technology is so far beyond what they grew up with that they see it as scary. they cannot understand the basic process that has been revealed, and that is that numbers are watched. there are millions and millions.

if you see one tagged as lead to a number overseas that has been leaked to terrorist activities, then they look at it court. after they go to at some point, people are going to have to trust that their , andnment is responsible they are trustworthy people like general alexander, which is why he is the director of nsa that has been for almost eight years now. a step.re going half there are people that do understand the technology and respect civil liberties and will not be day gated to personal information. -- will not be digging into personal information. listening to chick chat with your brothers and sisters is crazy. chat with your brothers

and sisters is crazy. , do: but on the other side you see how people could see this as creepy and unsettling? caller: i firmly believe, having grown up in this world and i am still in this world and i am on the inside of what is going on, which most people are god, the idea that the government would take the time -- which most people are not, the idea that the government would take the time to do this thatsound indicator that communication was tracked back to already-identified problem individuals. , ins practically impossible the practical sense, i mean. the overreaction is actually

related to our international security. a three with everything the general said yesterday. -- i agree with everything the general said yesterday. host: you have clearance, correct? top-secret clearance? caller: beyond that. host: what are your thoughts about the contractors? i do think that is a problem. but the reinvestigation process is actually conducted by contractors. i am getting my review right now. host: edit it is done by contractors? caller: contract individuals. they are documenting that these people are trustworthy. they do not really the itty height clearance to do that themselves.

-- they do not really need any height clearance themselves, but it is interesting. host: some of our viewers and twitter followers have asked a question in a credulous way, which is how could general alexander not know that edward snowden had access to all this? caller: oh, my lord. a tidy, tidyn is actor in general alexander's actor ina tiny, tiny general alexander's world. he hascess by which clearance is attached to the contract he is on. he can call for certain types of people with certain skills. they would be hired with those skills, and in this case based on clearances that had been given to him in previous positions. that is probably something

that really needs to be looked at. but you are never going to able to know what is ,n someone's heart and terms of like if they said the process is bothersome, that is a hard thing to clear some what about. but that is probably something that is going to be looked at more closely. we encourage independent mindedness and concerns for civil liberties in this country, and that is a really healthy thing. but there is a balance. the president said that last week. there is a balance. we are always looking for it. we should always be talking about it. there are certain things that if they are revealed, people will be killed probably.

and if there are events that we will not be able to prevent. general alexander has been working on this day and night for years and years. if there's anyone to trust to do do it right, it would be him. host: that is mary in virginia on our democrats line. we appreciate your time. this tweet -- how many more of these young nerds are still out there ready to disclose all they know? we did about now. michael is an independent in p aurea, illinois -- in p aurea, illinois -- peoria, illinois. caller: for the most part i agree with most of the callers. it is a little bit disturbing. the last lady seemed to have and seems toight know the subject in an intimate way. i do believe that most of our

rulers, you know, people in congress and those that admit it -- administer the stuff are trustworthy and doing their best. at the same time, it is a very slippery slope having all that information. it is having your thumb on all is a-- like i said, it slippery slope. too much power in one place. the whole american experiment is should beyou know, it run from the bottom-up, not the top-down. does that make sense? time thiseciate your morning. front page of the new york times this morning --

host lead story, new york times. richard, texarkana, texas. we're talking about the nsa phone records and terror threats. what are your thoughts? caller: i was thinking about the thing that sheila jackson-lee

said back in 2010, that they had this secret capability of amassing all this data. i was wondering if they could do it on the voter machines am a you know, because it goes across the internet. i do not really believe it so as tos national security like gerrymandering congressional districts and things like that. they are keeping up with credit card data. what if you buy a box of shells or something like that? they are keeping up with all of this information. i totally disagree with that other lady. you can profile people and they have these phone recognition that, you know, when you call a place in the machine talks to you, that machine knows what you say and it can actually put you in where you need to be.

it needs toto say be -- [indiscernible] thank you. --t: a new gallup pole americans disapprove of government surveillance program. 53% is approved and approved, 37%. part of its effort's are to investigate terrorism and obtain records from u.s. telephone and internet companies. that just came out yesterday .ro from politico this morning -- fbi must stay a step ahead and maintain civil liberties.

att: this hearing begins 10:00 a.m. and will be live on c-span3 today. the house and senate are both in session so they will not be on c-span1 or c-span2. c- you can also get that on span.org. the next deputy director of the cia -- the deputy director stints to retire and be replaced by an agency outsider. the director said --

nancy, maryland, democrat. what do you think? , i think it isw a good thing that they do it. do sometimes people just the wrong thing. everything is high-tech now.

so you are going to run into things, just like with the telephone came up, everybody thought something was going to occur. but their are bad people that are do bad things -- there bad people that will do bad things. but this guy should have known better. there are other ways of doing things. those secrets out loud like that. he could work through the agency or somebody else. and the journalists -- if the president is not above the law, how in the world is journalists that let out all those secret deals out there? host: thank you to all our callers. we have three segments coming up in two involve members of congress. later, representative randy forbes will be out here, republican of virginia. coming up next is jim himes, a

democrat from connecticut who is a member of the house intelligence committee. we will be right back. hasc-span video library reached a milestone. since its online launch in 2007, there are now more than 200,000 hours of original programs. public affairs, politics, history, and nonfiction books, all free. a public service created by private industry. america's cable companies. , cocaine early 1900's was used by a wide number of americans. it wasn't coca-cola, for example. it was in a number of products -- it was an coca-cola, for example. there was a concern with black people started using cocaine. there was an article in 1914 about black folks being the new

southern menace, black cocaine being a new southern menace. and the way cocaine was talked about or black people being under the influence of cocaine was talked about was that it caused them to be more murderous. it caused them to rape white women. it caused them to be unaffected by holy spirit all of this nonsense. this was going on then -- a cost of them to be unaffected by bullies. all of this nonsense. wags he argues that drug laws are based on race and class rather than behavior resulting from drug use. sunday night at 9:00, part of book tv this weekend on c-span2. " washington journal" continues. host: i want to introduce you to , aresentative jim himes democrat from connecticut. you are meeting with general

today at 10:00 a.m. what is going to be your first question? guest: probably how effective has this program been, where the nsa is gathering the phone records of every single american, mine, yours, everybody watching -- i am very and comfortable with that. we have a tradition in this country that they can go after that information on you provided they have a reason to believe that maybe you are involved in something nefarious, probable cause. now we have switched over to gathering information on all americans. i really want to know what the benefits are. i have not yet heard a convincing argument that there are terrorism investigations that portend on the government having all this information on us. host: is there a general feeling in the house right now? guest: i was in a classified reefing with most of the congress, with a variety of officials -- i was in a class -- classified briefing. there are those who really believe this is worth doing if

they can help us catch a terrorist here and there. a lot of people say that i trust this administration and these people. general alexander is a fine man. but what about the next guy? how do we know that 10 years from now there is not some government bureaucrat that those i am a republican, democrat, maybe i had an hiv test, it is a chilling thought. host: has congress done its due diligence when it comes to these programs? guest: i do not think so. it is hard to know where the system broke down. very few members of congress knew about this. i am not blaming necessarily the nsa or the cia because they did brief the intelligence committees on these programs and made available the information. but that was not advertise to people. but the vast majority of members of congress were unaware of these programs. host: what was their reaction, the people who were not aware? guest: the intelligence

officials have said that we told the committees, and with the committees do with that information is your business. i am not sure that is satisfactory answer. i am not blaming the intelligence community. they did brief the cam unit -- committees. -- they did brief the committees. host: do you feel comfortable with the briefings you are getting from the, cia, whoever, that you're getting full and complete and relevant information? , ist: in watch rome once have gotten to know the leadership of our intelligence -- and four months, i have gotten to know the leadership of these programs. these are the most dedicated, intensely focused, thoughtful about the constitution i have ever met in my service here. these agencies are not being fully honest with the intelligence committee. sometimes we do not necessarily

know the questions to ask. we are not intelligence professionals. i was very troubled by the director of the national intelligence's director to senator wyden in which he denied this was occurring. i understand there are questions about what he could say to avoid exposing a classified program in public. but i will tell you that saying the opposite of what he do to be true was probably the wrong path to take. host: you have oversight obligations. i think i saw a quote by senator feinstein a couple days ago that be renewed byto congress every three months. do you vote on these programs every three months? three no, it is not every months. in five years i have been doing this, there have been one or two votes on the patriot act. it is way too broadly worded.

act i think is been reauthorized once or twice. not every three months. host: the legislation, is it public? or is the legislation secured? guest: the legislation itself is public. anybody can go to the patriot act and look at section 215, which says that the government has the right to ask for any tangible thing. wording.retty broad so i say, look, i do not think there is any question that the intelligence community has broken the law here. i do not think they have. they're within laws that congress passed after 9/11. to my way of thinking, the right thing to do is to go back and say, hey, we stepped over the lions. when we are collecting information on every single american, we have stepped over the lines.

so let's take these laws and constrain them. host: jim himes, democrat of connecticut, a member of the house intelligence committee. the numbers are up on least ifen -- are on the screen you like to participate this morning. you can also send a tweet at http://twitter.com/cspanwj. approximately 800,000 contractors, outside government employees, have security clearances. is this a matter of discussion in congress? , to a quiets extent. people talk about the growth of government. if you look over the last 10, 15 years, ever make collectively has grown largely because we have built up a national security apparatus.

people talk about government growth and do not know where it is concentrated. it raises the issues we have been discussing about whether the agencies are not overstepping their bounds. i believe we have gone in that direction. it also raises other questions. if you have one million or several million people including theselitary with clearances, statistics tells you that one of those people is eventually going to do what happened last week. i have taken a pretty hard line. i really do feel like the intelligence community has perhaps overstepped. i know to blame them. they're operating within the law. but they have overstepped privacy rights. that does not mean that the one disgruntled individual are those who think the the government has done something wrong can do with this guy did, which is exposed the united states to sit very serious -- which iss -- exposed the united states to some very serious repercussions.

are constituted by an act of congress. when they became really active in response to the concern, the very appropriate concern, about wiretapping under the bush administration, we thought, ok, we want another branch of government -- this is key. what i am hearing from the president and his people is do not worry, we have got this. our system is set up with checks and balances. other branches of government get to check in. lookinghe fisa courts over the shoulder of the cia or the fbi, i think that is a good idea. who: do members of congress are not on the intelligence committees, are they a little upset that 2.1 million people with top-secret clearance is no more than they do? guest: one of the good things

that will come out of this that i think my 434 colleagues will pay attention to is what is available to them. each year i have been here i have said that i would like to look at the classified intelligence a budget. to do that, you have to call a committee, set up an appointment, and go sit in a secret room. you have to put yourself out in a box. you have to work to make it happen. i suspect this experience will cause a lot of my colleagues to focus on this more closely. sunday, we will be doing a segment on this. our guest, democrat of the caddy kit -- of connecticut. he graduated from harvard, a rogue scholar. he worked for goldman sachs for several years before coming to congress. the first call for him is from north carolina. democrat. ie non-a'slo

americans has happened for years. it took a brave whistleblower to give up his normal life to make politicians and the media acknowledge it. is congress going to wait for someone else to give up his life before you acknowledge that only explosives could have brought down world trade center building seven on 9/11? host: let's go to her referring to mr. snowden as a whistleblower. can you agree? .uest: let's do that as somebody who was at the sight of 9/11, i am troubled about some of the allegations. the definition of whistleblower is somebody who is blowing the whistle on a violation of the law. that is what a whistleblower is. there is no indication out there that anybody at the nsa or within the intelligence community was violating the law. mr. snowden, whatever you may think of him, and he has provoked discussion our society these two have, but he is not a

with lower. he is a leaker. a lot of people break the for good purpose. he has said i take responsibility. more if hepect him we cannot have -- what ever you think about him, we cannot have a society where one individual says i do not like what i am seeing, i will blow the cover on this. you can imagine what the united states would look like. we would not be able to conduct any of the operations that have been conducted very successfully to degrade the terrorist organizations to at this time are thinking about how to kill americans. i do think he will be appropriately prosecuted. i give him credit. i think he realizes that. and the right thing for him to

do is to say i believe i did the right thing, i will bear the consequences of my decision. bruce inlatin rouge -- baton rouge, louisiana. caller: he broke the law for a good reason. our cia has killed so many people. you cannot do it. did not even try. country has killed some people it is a crying shame. you break the law for right reason you should not get prosecuted a matter what. wake up, america. guest: i disagree with two things he said. one, we should try to avoid having americans killed by terrorists. we have spent a lot of time,

energy, money, and a lot of people have given their lives in the service of this country to make that happen. and that is a key responsibility of government to keep its people say. sometimes people will break the law for a good reason. martin luther king, civil disobedience. thatembraced the idea walls are sometimes wrong. therefore, breaking them in an ethical sense is the right thing to do. that is why i said if he really isn't that tradition, i do not happen to agree where we can live and then -- that we live in a society where one individual can blow the secrets, but if he really believes that, the right thing to do is to bear the consequences of my action. the gentleman is right, sometimes people brake loss for what they believe are ethically the right reason. does not mean they seek to escape prosecution. host: how his this issue

vibrated with constituents? is this one of the top of things you are hearing from them? guest: it is a lot of concern. and the answer is this is new, and i have been in d.c., so i do not have a really good thing there on the polls, but it has generated less concerned than i would hope. a lot of people say these are records you can get any way. when i go on line i give up all privacy. i tried to say it would you go on twitter and facebook and put a picture of the party you were at last night, you are right. you do not have to be on facebook. you could agree the terms of the proceeds -- participation are. with the government you cannot do that. here is the way i think about it. i do not think laws were broken. i am troubled by it than if for no other reason about the old

story of boiling the frog. be a little bit turning up the heat. what is next? front page today, collecting dna samples of americans. should the fbi be allowed to collect the garbage of americans? pretty soon you are living in a world where the intelligence it agencies and law enforcement agency knows everything about us. that is not the america we grew up in where we have an expectation of privacy, knowing the government does not know what we're doing moment to moment. tweets in --e that is true. in smith vs. maryland, a case in the early 1970's, the courts meta that met a data --

data, that americans do not have a reasonable expectation around that. that is why i said i do not believe the intelligence community has violated the law in this case. to me, more a question of they are doing it to all americans. that is a huge leap for us. we have always had the tradition if there is suspicion are reasonable doubt, go through my garbage. by all means, i will support you in that, but every single american. i do not think that this is laws that have been broken, i simply are taking it one step too far and need to ask ourselves what is next. dna collecting? what to what we do day today? a troubling thought. host: darrell tweets in -- guest: the intelligence community did go to the

intelligence committees of the senate and house to talk about these programs. it appears it did not go beyond. i am on the intelligence committee and did not know about these programs. that may be shame on them, maybe shame on me. i do not know where the fault lies. i will tell you we have a system whereby the vast majority were unaware of the programs. that is the fact. host: rich on the republican line. rep himes is our guest. caller: i have general comments. i think the public really needs to be educated. i wish the government leaders would educate them. here are basics. theou are familiar with acronym fte, full time equivalent. congress limits the number of

how many you can have. if people say we just want government employees with security clearance as needed, they do not fund the number of employees that would be required. so they limit the number of them, requiring contractors. if you go to any government to say and i am sorry this, but if you go to government offices, if you will see a lot of contractors making up the number differences who are often doing the exact same thing as the government employee. working the floors are buildings just to get through the lobby where you have to show id. a lot of the id, depending on the agencies and departments to work for, will have a numerical number or maybe not, but it would have a chip on the card

just to gain access into the floor were you work. said, comeall that to your conclusion. inler: if you talk generalities, a lot of information can move people in the right direction and make informative decisions. if we get there wrote information initially put out, i think these numbers, when you say millions of people, a lot of government employees only have secret clearances and never see anything, but it gets them to the floor for their work. what they turn on their computer, it is set to a certain limit. they may not even be reading anything. we have to educate the public. are you a contractor? you have a clearance? ago.r: i retired two years i only had access when the time

when i needed it. i am now contractor, personal service contractor. ts clearence. caller: just because you have the clearance does not mean of access. i wish you had people who could educate not only this new congressman but others said they could basically judged the speakers who are providing the information of the shows. guest: this raises a whole bunch of questions. people ought to drive around in virginia and outside of the sea. when you try to arlington in those areas you see glass tower after glass tower has gone up. all of these powers have an initials on it. the growth in government has largely been in the security and

defense apparatus. it is the contractors, the private companies. it raises a host of issues. one, are we spending too much money? are functions that only the government gets to do? about men and lot women under arms. raises a whole host of issues for us. host: we had an earlier calller who had a top-secret clearance as well. she was talking about the process and the fact that she is getting a renewal on her clearance and being done by contractors. is their chatter on capitol hill about the number of contractors and how they got access? sure there is. if nothing else there is concern that an apparatus as big as the

national security apparatus, as big as it has become, military people in uniform that a subject to one code of ethics. it is civilian government employees who are subject to working for the government, and it is private sector people. that is a very complicated and large operation. there is all sorts of possibility for information to leak. you have to treat those people differently. if you are in the military and a uniformed officer there is one set of accountability and things that can be done to you if you break the rules. if you are contractor, what is the responsibility? you can be fired. as americans become aware of how complicated this is, we want to understand, is it working? water the downside of being so big and complex? he downsideste of being so big and complex? i certainly think people

like inspector general and others need to take a hard look at how contractors are hiring people. what little i know about mr. snowden, college dropout. had some difficulty in a variety of things he tried. we should look at how the hires are made. we have millions of people running around with clearances. statistics alone would suggest you are going to have a problem from time to time. did ando know what they what did they did it right. remember private manning. he is on trial right now for giving information to wikileaks. he was a uniformed member of the military. i want to know about this, but i am not sure this will vilify a particular organization. >> thomas in ohio.

you are on with rep jim himes. caller: i just have a few comments and a little bit of history. in 1963, i believe it was, i was -- elite college and one of the upper class and told me if i was interested in assets -- mathematics i should look at the nsa. it was six-seven years later that they even acknowledge the nsa existed. at ae mid-1970's i was graduate school and had about 30 graduate students in my engineering school that i got to know. half of them were from the middle east. wouldtely none of them talk in an unguarded way on the telephone. happened and gone on

for quite awhile. another thing, another i think they have been able to listen through machines. none is listing what the machine is. guest: there is one big difference between then and today, and that is computing power. you heard stories about j. hacker hoover wiretapping this and that. it was beyond anyone's wildest dreams that we would have the computing power to look at all 320 million americans and say we will gather information on each

and everyone of you. that could never have happened even 10 years ago. now we have the power to gather unbelievable quantities of information. can russia? could the chinese? who can hack into that information? as the german point out, what about other governments? these are things we have to think through. host: what is the attitude of the democratic leadership? would they like to see hearing, legislation, more talk? to cook the democratic leadership has not been very vocal on this yet. i think they are doing the responsible thing which is to not get out there and inflamed sentiments. i do not miss an opportunity to say they are not listening to your phone calls. they are getting the data on your phone calls. making sure people understand what is really happening. looking at the legality of this.

i do not believe it is illegal, it is problematic. i think the leadership is waiting for the hearings to occur in the hearings to become evident before they make affirmative statements. legally treated the same as u.s. postal mail? guest: no, and that is one of the problems we have in terms of how we protect americans policy. there are walls decade old that determine what and what you cannot do with the mail. 20 years ago who would using e- mail? technology has gotten way out in front of the law. we need to say we live in a world that was unimaginable 30 years ago. no one had conceived of google or facebook or even email. one of the things we need to do is go back and make the laws linesore clear along the twitter.ebook and

host: gene makes the comment big business does not give a stock option of business -- privacy only the illusion. next call is from eddie, independent and mission, texas. i am no constitutional expert, but i do believe the fourth amendment was designed .or innocent people they do not want them to face under scrutiny. i also have a question. congressman, do you feel foreigners who happen to be american citizens may face extra scrutiny because they may have family in the middle east or africa and may have a critical view of the government, which we

all have. i was raised that it may be disproportionately scrutinized or even watched even more quickly. do you feel this would be similar to a chinese internment camp? it is probably most likely if you are a foreigner who has a critical point of view of the governor -- government and have family overseas, there is a high likelihood you are being watched. are u.s. this and you are entitled to the full protection of the united states constitution. there is no secondary rights or anything like that.

you do raise an interesting question. i would suspect if you are spending a lot of time in places like pakistan or yemen or afghanistan, if you are having a lot of conversations and communicating with people that you may beuspicion, treated as a terrorist for that reason. maybe they are watching you. here is the thing, if you are communicating with someone, and obviously i am not saying you are more likely to do so because to come from pakistan, but if you are, that could rise to the level of reasonable suspicion.

we do not want terrorism in this country and links between terrorist abroad and here. this is the core of what i am saying. the reasonable suspicion. the notion that you may be up to something wrong is a threshold you have to cross before these agencies watch you. kristin, iowa. -- creston, iowa. caller: how long are they keeping the data? the mega data? host: did you have a follow up after we get the answer? depending on the link, and the question is the fis the court specifically says foreign. i do not understand how necessarily collecting everything on all americans.

everything from our cell phones, where the gps put us. everything that we happen to download. why would we be looking at something like that? why would we constantly be keeping it? what i am afraid of, and you said it at the beginning, i am afraid that this can somehow go back. say i said something bad about the government awhile back. that is what i am concerned about. couple of things. we have had callers where intelligence agencies have feared the intelligence agency may be watching you because of your belief. would be a profound

violation of our constitutional norms. they clearly overstepped the bounds and targeting people who were searching for tea party groups. no one believes that is the right thing. there is no evidence anyone is doing that, and that would be atrocious. if the fbi here is you or has r communicating withe under suspicion in pakistan, they cannot just tap your phone. they need to go to this court because you are a u.s. citizen and say we want to tap the phone because we think she may be communicating with terrorist. not because she believes the government is overwhelming. i am pretty sure the judges will laugh that out of court. if there is believe you may be doing something wrong, they

would go to the court. that is how it operates. >host: going back to the question how long this data is kept. 10 years, 15 years, or just over night? guest: this gets into a gray area where i do not know if the details are in the public domain. >> is it something that perhaps general alexander will be asked today by house intelligence committee members? guest: he may be asked, but i'm trying to be sensitive about what may or may not be in the public domain. of theare the names judges public? guest: i believe they are. there are some that have gone on and off the court and have talked about that. kathy in texas. democrat. saic bothse allen and

got security once bush was not rigid bush was elected president. they are owned by his uncle that was sold to the carlyle group in may of 2008. the bush family pretty much has all the national security. need tothing, if we collect dna and get a urine tests to get a job and the government is keeping our phone messages, texas, credit card purchases, if they are not protecting my freedom. they are protected a police state. saic have the original anthrax suspect that work for the bush family. maybe we can follow the money some day. thank you. need to give president

bush appeared to defend himself and that case. kathy said a lot there that i am not sure it is exactly accurate, but she has a concern that i share, which is there is no evidence the agencies are collecting credit card information, but if we say keep phones, is our medical records next? i believe we need to draw some lines and so that americans have confidence that they know what is being gathered, because before now no one knew. that in and of itself is problematic. how can we have a discussion about what is fair game and what is not if we have no idea what is out there. if we draw the lines americans police know what they have agreed to so that there is not this uncertainty about what is being gathered. is theren tweets in,

anything the congressman is uncomfortable about the intelligence area that has not come out in public yet? guest: there are all sorts of things that have made me personally uncomfortable. i have got to know the intelligence community. i am very impressed by the capability and desire to follow the law, to report to congress. these are tremendous people, very patriotic. however, who just three weeks ago we were hearing about the department of justice being harsh with the associated press. stepping over them. that was a little bit of an overstep. in some ways more serious about what we're hearing then the nsa. journalists need to be able to do their job.

the role that the press plays keeping government and guys like me on this could be eroded. more conversations of the president's power to go after u.s. citizens. as the american public knows, by themalarki was killed u.s. government. he was a bad guy. most people agree that was the right thing to do. is it true that he has the authority, without going to a judge or judiciary branch without going to congress in advance to say here are five americans that need to die? that is a conversation. there is no clear bright line. one of the things about this topic is that if everything is classified, there is no way for us in a democracy to have that discussion to arrive at an agreement of a group of americans. from joet call comes

and indiana. this is -- i am not telling you guys anything that you probably do not know. i served in the u.s. military, and i have studied a lot of history. back as far as 20-30 years we have been involved in operations in the middle east. we have been intruded on these people's livelihood. we have invaded iraq and been involved in afghanistan. even back when bin laden was fighting the soviets we have been involved for years. in terms of the september 11 terrorist attacks, when you go towards local dominant, you cannot expect to have some kind involvedack of being

in the middle east as we have been. one of the biggest things we fail to realize is when we become susceptible to attacks here in the united states, that people become afraid. when they become afraid and they do not fully understand the there of the history and beast in general that they give up civil-rights. they start thinking it is ok for people to spy. terroristay to catch sometimes is to invade the privacy of u.s. assistance. jove raises an issue that i have been rolling around in my head since the boston bombing. again, having gone to know the intelligence agencies in the past couple of months, they do a great job. they have done an incredible job against al qaeda. you did not want to be a senior official in al qaeda today.

you are probably living in the cape communicating by carrier pigeon because intelligence agencies have been so good about what they do. on the other hand, while i think we are reasonable safe from that terrorism, a discounted individual but is not necessarily communicating with egypt or pakistan as foreign sponsors may be will be able to get away with stuff. we have forced ourselves or in a world where we believe a single incident like boston necessarily means massive failure. as the israelis will tell you, you can have the sharpest and best anti-terrorist machine and they do -- in the world and will never be 100 percent but there could be a disgruntled guy in chicago who picks up a fire arm and because he got radicalized by a tv show out of pakistan, this has to go -- decides to go somewhere and kill a bunch of people. we are never going to be perfect.

perfection, what will happen is elected officials will say if the american people are demanding perfection, which is odd, they will overstep. they will say people are demanding 100 percent safety, and therefore, i will step over the line with civil liberties. we need to think whether we really believe or are really willing to put up with the consequences of demanding the lonef violence out of the wolf and los angeles who watches a tv show and get radicalized. it may be the only way you will find that guy is to put an agent in his living room. that will stop it. that is obviously not the society we want to live in. edward: what damage did to national

security in your view? nott: unfortunately we do know that. we do not know he is finished the vaulting whatever information he has. whenever you disclose the program's the intelligence agencies use, right or wrong, when you disclose these things, people who wish us bill now have a slightly better day. now they know they should not do x, y, z, whatever it may be. not steppingwe are over the line does not mean these are very dangerous people we need to be careful about. i think he has done some very real damage to the national security of the country, even though he is generated a discussion that most americans have said they want to have. host: we have been talking with

representative jim himes, democratic rep of kentucky. he will meet with general keith alexander at 10:00 this morning. thank you for being on "the washington journal." coming up, randy forbes. we will continue this conversation and broaden it out a little bit. after that, a segment on the espionage act. this was enacted into law in 1917. he will be out here to help us figure out what the espionage act is. first, this news update from c- span radio. >> while the discussion today its revolving around and as a surveillance programs, politico is looking back to this day in 1971. that is when the new york times began publishing sections of the pentagon papers about u.s.

defense department involvement in vietnam from the years 1945- 1967. the study was classified as stops -- top secret, classified. henry kissinger worked to identify the leaker and halt further publications. on june 30, 1971, the supreme court ruled 6-3 that the government has failed to meet the burden of proof required for a prior restraint -- restraint in junction. daniel ellsworth, the employee returned against the vietnam war smuggled portions of the paper out of the pentagon and gave them to "the new york times." he said the documents demonstrated unconstitutional behavior by presidents and a violation of the oak and a violation of oath of everyone of their subordinates. he added he fleet the papers and received what he thought was a wrongful war.

los angeles grand jury indicted him on charges of stealing secret documents. may 11, 1973 the district court judge declared a mistrial, dismissing all charges against ellsworth, ruling the totalitarian -- the totalitarian defended justice. than 20 years later, in 1996, our reporter who covered the war broke the papers demonstrated that the lyndon johnson administration had systematically lied, not only to the public, but also to congress about a subject of transcendent national interest. the pentagon papers were declassified in publicly released in 2011. that is your news update on c- span radio. he led his army north of the

potomac because he believed he had the situation he needs. on the evening of june 27 he has a conversation with one of his subordinates. a commander as a general officer with no command. so he talks to lee. he says to tremble that they will come up probably through frederick. broken down with hunger. strung out from a long line and demoralized would come to pennsylvania. i shall throw an overwhelming force of their advance, crush it and follow up with success to drive one back on another. and it surprises before they can concentrate, create a panic and virtually destroy the enemy army. >> this historian and author is one of the scholars you can watch during the full day of coverage commemorating the 150th anniversary of the battle of gettysburg.

live at sunday on june 30 on c- span3. now joining us on washington journal is the representative randy forbes, member of the armed services committee and the judiciary committee. just to continue the conversation we have been having with the worst and best. as a member of congress, a member of the judiciary committee, seven terms you have been in congress. about whatd you know has been revealed about the nsa and phone records and data mining? guest: we had fairly limited knowledge of exactly what was taking place. when it comes to some of these programs, when you really look at them, there is little light the tree democrats

and republicans. it is fairly bipartisan trying to defend and protect the united states, but one of the difficulties we have is even when you have access to the programs in know what is going on, we are very limited on what we can talk about. you heard jim oftentimes skirting. he really was not. it is because we cannot talk about whether the programs exist or deny much less talk about specificity. i think what you have seen in congress now is a renewed commitment to make sure we continue to do the oversight necessary to make sure we're holding the programs intact. to go when the headlines first and a in the papers, sick, etc.. what was your reaction? >> we always have concerns. we always have concerns. we are ordinary citizens, too. we have the same concerns everybody else has about our

privacy and the privacy of the people we represent. i think one of the most instructive things was the comment that a fellow member of the judiciary committee made and was chairman when the patriots act was written and author of many of the provisions. he said this is never what we intended when we wrote this act. verynk it was all concerning thing for a lot of members of congress. host: are you privy to this information if you so choose? guest: not always. there are different levels of classification and different times information is reported. one of the other things that is a very unfortunate thing, but you have seen this of the past several years, one of the big concerns we have is that we do not always have a confidence that the administration and agencies are telling us everything has they are doing and how they're doing it. you often get the feeling that

even if they are not intentionally misrepresenting it, if you did not parsed the words exactly right, they are not giving you the whole story. that is something we have to overcome. is our guestorbes talking about the nsa surveillance programs and other issues, including military and defense spending. numbers are up on the screen if you like to participate in the conversation. you can also send a tweet. speaking of military spending, the house appropriations committee just passed its spending bill, but you as a member of the armed services committee have passed the authorization bill. what is the difference between appropriations and why are they different amounts? question.at authorization bill is the bill that does with the name indicates. we authorize these programs when they're coming into effect.

we tell the military this is what you have the authority to do and do not have the authority to do. , then thererogram is another check and balance on that. we then have to come in and say we're going to put the dollars there for these programs that have been authorized. we have a very good relationship between the appropriations committee and the armed services committee working together. most of the time we are able to work the differences out. the great news about the armed services committee, it is probably the most bipartisan committee in congress. we have a great working relationship. 552: you ought to raise billion for defense. additional foron overseas spending as well. 512 appropriations. is there nsa money in there? is any of that intelligence

money? guest: there is obviously overlap between what these various committees do, especially as it relates to intelligence, because you have equipment overlaps. is disclosed and some very did to other line items. you could appreciate why that might take place. caller: when should we expect legislation on the house? guest: that began last night. it will be all day today and conclude tomorrow. anyone inserting any nsa language or some kind of amendment? guest: we do not think so. -- do you foresee any when inserting any nsa language? with are you satisfied tell congress has conducted due diligence over the intelligence committee? guest: you are never satisfied

how congress does due diligence over all of the committees. i think we consistently have to do a better job in the oversight roles that we have. it is a very difficult balance, because oftentimes you know the questions to ask, but it is hard to get the right answers. sometimes you do not even know the questions to ask. it is a very difficult role to congress -- for congress to play. i think we will continue to be buried for bed in our oversight roles as we go forward. representsmeone who southeastern virginia, you represent a lot of shipbuilding, a lot of military and federal employees and contractors, many of whom make no more than you do about -- who made no more than you do about intelligence operation -- who may know more about intelligence

operations. guest: they could but it is unlikely. it is very important that you are consistently learning and making sure we are holding accountable the people who are there to protect and defend us, because if you let power go without any accounting for it, we can get bad consequences. host: are you hearing from constituents on this issue? guest: obviously our constituents are concerned about this. i think one of the things is the american people have a right to have two things. first of all, they need the right to know that their government is not going to be abusing the civil rights and civil liberties. they have to have a confidence into things. one that it will not take place, and if it does, that they will get to -- true answers. one of the things we have seen

of the past few years is we have developed a mentality that of the end justifies the means. we see that with the internal revenue service, state department, and maybe the intelligence community. that is about place for us to be. the second thing is we have to make sure agency hits -- heads are forthright with us. the american people have a right to that. at the same time the american people have a right to know that the government is competent from protecting them from real threats out there. congressman forbes, are you supportive of any legislation on sexual assault in the military? guest: we have legislation on that. great bipartisan effort. they came together to say this is a problem, we have to deal with it.

we have legislation. there is legislation in the bill that will change the way we deal with sexual assaults. it keeps it in the chain of command but takes away the commander's ability to change the verdict that take place, which we thought was very important. a commander could come in and over read the verdict. also, we put teeth and the law by giving minimum standards and guidelines on penalties that can take place. we have basically of zero tolerance principal and give a lot more protection for victims to make sure they have options for victims and to make sure they're not afraid to do the reporting when it comes up. host: randy forbes on the republican line. caller: since the government is willing to deceive the americans on this nsa issue, why could the same not be true about what really brought down building 7 on 9/11 since there is

overwhelming evidence that explosives were used to bring it down? host: you do not have to comment on that. you feel the nsa has deceived? think we always have situations where people and government may not tell the whole truth, but that -- but that does not mean the bulk are not telling the truth. you had someone across aisle from me but we were both telling the truth and that some new people are doing a good job, and we cannot rush them all to say they are misrepresenting us in these issues. caller: good morning. i would like to start off by saying i feel like the nsa thing is just another way to change the u.s. and two more of a police state since they could not get it with banning the

guns. that is how i feel. i feel it is another way to change the u.s. to a police state. guest: i can understand your concerns about that. every time we hear about these programs they do give us that concern. that is why i think we have to have balance. none of us want to move to the police state. we're all very concerned when received a growing technology and the ability people have to look into the record in privacy. it is not just the government doing this, some of the corporations are doing this. they have had the capability to monitor what you and i are doing. i think we have to be vigilant in continuing to protect the civil liberties and those rights and rights to privacy. eric, another call from new york city on the independent line. thisr: i do not believe guy broke the law.

we alreadybroke -- know how the government's listens to us. so i believe that the government is collecting information on the american public to use it against us in the future. guest: one of the things i would did is that if mr. snowden not break the law, he has indicated by his behavior that he thinks he broke the law. he fled the country because he did not want to be accountable. one of the things we have to realize is when individuals have classified information, whether it is me or mr. snowden or the secretary of defense we have laws that prohibit him from releasing that information. he needs to come back here to be

accountable by the courts. if he did, he should be prosecuted for doing that. and we simply cannot have a rigid government where we put confidential information of people's hands and allow them to make their own choice as to whether they want to disclose the information or not. host: representative forbes. did you support the fisa act? guest: i did. we felt we had a very good idea on when we would target in on this. we will have continued hearings. you heard from the previous guest that the intelligence committee is having hearings on this. the judiciary committee will have hearings even as soon as i lay -- as soon as i leave here. if we feel the law needs to be tweet, we will do that. we are covering that live on c-span3.

the house is in session during defense authorization. they hearing with the fbi director will be on c-span3 live at 10:00. what is your first question to the director? of that depends on the previous questions that were asked. a lot of it will focus on the breast and expand on this program on what he can answer on an unclassified basis. the reason for that is some of these answers that we have, but we want to make sure the american people can hear those and get an understanding of what actually took place. host: utah. republican line. caller: good morning. here is my take on this. if it were just one item i may not be concerned. when you start playing the game called connect the dots with the

things that happened in libya, the justice department, the irs, nsa, the fact that the department of homeland security is piling on billions rounds of ammunition, vehicles, i do not know if it will go start a war. you put all these things to the am hearinge calls i coming in, people are afraid of what their government is doing. talking about they are afraid of terrorist. i have never been as afraid of enemies outside the state as i am at those that are in washington, d.c. where people in suits call themselves politician saying they are trying to keep me safe. i do not need them to protect

me. in order to keep someone completely safe, you have to wrap them up in bubble wrap. very quickly. did breakr. snowden the law but the founding fathers also broke the law and wrist execution because of what they did. guest: i would agree with you on probably 95 percent of what you said. wedink it is inexcusable you -- when you look at what happened. i think what is even worse is the kind of cover-up that took place after that. horrible situation. i sat in the hearings with the attorney general holder when i heard him basically say he had never even heard of any of these potential prosecutions of journalists. then we find out that was

exactly what the truth. we recognize with the irs has done. numerous other agencies are doing that. i will not take issue and defend those things because we are tied to the oversight and i agree with you. it concerns me greatly would you put this much power and government. that is why i have been always been in favor of limited government as opposed to the expanded government. the one thing i would say to you is the word you would use -- you use to say completely safe. there is a balance that has to take place on that. about once we are trying to achieve. we do not want to do that of the price of during voice of liberties and civil rights. that is the point you are trying to make. tweetsild and wonderful in -- guest: first of all, but i am not saying the law allows this.

that is the kind of thing we want to continue to look at. if the courts are interpreting the law and a different way than they should have been interpreted, then we may have to tweak that's a narrow it down. whistleblowere status -- ] guest: i disagree. we cannot be in a military situation where we are allowing everyone within the chain of command to expose classified information just because they may disagree with that. outlets to other cover approach. he could have approached members of congress. i can assure you there is an of diversity in congress to cut up on someone to listen to what he was saying and to raise some of these issues. he chose to do none of that.

but that is something the courts need to decide. ian tweets --rary o i cannot say the exact number of how many do that. -- tell youou for the members have very high clearance levels. if noller: my question is one knows how much money the government agencies, the spy agencies are getting, how can you do adequate oversight of them? we need to know what these people are spending, the exact amounts. as far as the secrets go, keeping secrets from the american people?

i do not see that. after 9/11 and the people in pennsylvania took down the plane, i did not have any concerns about what americans would do to protect themselves. they would take over the plane and deal with the hijackers adequately. people lost their lives. i do not think the government is helping us by taking us into a war in i rack because a man because a man iraq could blow up the world trade centers. i do not believe that -- i do not know what the death toll was. getting a little off topic. i think there is plenty to respond there. guest: you did have a plethora of issues thrown out. we could argue whether the war was the right approach, whether

the president is taking the right approach now in afghanistan. all of those are fair discussions and debates. the one thing i do not think we can argue legitimately about is whether or not there are enormous threats to the american people. every day they get greater and greater technologies that can create more devastation to huge numbers of american people. and i can tell you the reason there is very polite between democrats and republicans is because they realize just how serious the situation is out there. having said all that, it does not mean that we then throw away the civil liberties and civil rights in the process of trying to defend and protect. it does mean we need to strike the right balance. that is a huge issue for us, but one that we need to continue to pursue. host: susan tweets in --

an independent and california. -- mike. caller: i would like to follow up on the utah calller. it strikes me we're well on our way to a police state. this happens in the context of the patriot act that would allow the richard nixon to avoid any kind of impeachment problems. national defense authorization act empowers the president to suspend the writ of habeas corpus, you're right from being arrested and detained indefinitely. finally, with respect to conduct with a global war on terror, and six trillion dollars. killed hundreds of thousands of people. theite that, despite

world's greatest military in the history of the planet, against a psychopaths.f road you dof the have a police state. guest: guest: first of all, i share your concern about the overreach of government. where i would probably disagree with you is the fact that you have not seen the number of plots that have been foiled, the things that have been stopped because of activities that the government has taken under both republican and democratic administrations. that does not mean that they have a justification to do everything and to take away our civil liberties and civil rights. but i think it is important that we realize that we do have to continue down 2 paths -- one a path of defending with vigor and

strength without bending our rights to have freedom of privacy rights and our rights to have our civil liberties protected. at the same time, we have a huge commitment to continue to defend against actors that would do in our miss harm in this country if -- that would do in our miss harm in this country if they were left unattended and we don't focus energy and effort to stop them. that balance is not an easy balance, but it is a balance that elected officials have to youto strike, and i think will see republicans and democrats working together to make that happen. host: congressman forbes, as the armed services subcommittee chair, member of the judiciary committee, can you go to somewhere in the capital and look at intelligence information? .uest: in many instances not every piece of information that's out there. peter, you've got to understand that on some of these programs, you don't even know the programs are existing.

that is one of the difficulties. different committees have toferent things they have disclose to them. seeing things be would be more what happens strategically from a military context and how we would be defending against state actors who might be trying to infiltrate or harm the united states. host: as a member of congress, do you know what the nsa's budget is? guest: i do know a large part of that budget but it is fair to say i don't know all of that budget. boehner andeaker nancy pelosi privy to all of the information that the intelligence committees are getting? guest: it is my understanding they are. host: do you think that all 535 members of congress should have the same access? guest: i do not. host: why? guest: i think that there are some situations in some

committees and some of these classification -- and some of these classifications are so high and so stringent that i think they should be limited to certain leadership positions and certain -- various committees that have been properly vetted so they can do that. now, understand that both of these parties -- this is a bipartisan thing, so both the parties have representation in that rate i think that is important that we do it but i don't think necessarily that 535 members of congress should all have access to the same permission. host: we have about 10 minutes left with our guest randy forbes. it has gotten a little dark behind him and us -- guest: "a little dark." host: it has arrived in washington. thanks for holding, josh. caller: good one,, smit. guest -- good morning,, smit congressman. guest: hey, josh. may be do you think it

an inevitability that this kind of information will be gathered on all of us now that we are in , and thatation age the unit is -- it is a big step for the united states government to be part of the information tethering and the feelings of outrage that people are having are on the notion of privacy from a bygone era and we just need to accept the new time in which we live? guest: josh, you raise an excellent point. one of the things i live with everyday is that i realize that foreign governments are oftentimes monitoring things i didn't even when i going to restaurants, when i go in places across the globe. we know that they are monitoring things that i do sometimes within hotel rooms. oftentimes we have to have my office swept because we know that people are listening. but i am also concerned that because every time we go on the internet, you and i know that it is not only the government,

but sometimes these companies are getting information every time i look at something online. that concerns me because i came from an era where it they couldn't do that, and i think i have a right to be concerned about that. i think that just because technology has changed and all of this is happening we don't give license to the government to have that kind of broad swath to be able to collect all that information and data on us. i think that is where we have got to draw the line and try to strike that balance. that is why i really do believe that members of congress are trying to over the coming months make sure that we are holding that line and trying to protect a degree of privacy that we can for the american people. connecticut, democrats line. randy forbes, republican of virginia, is our guest. caller: hi, randy. guest: hi, alan. caller: i'm considered by the same things everybody else is here with having a look at the law and the comparison or justification of the constitution or alignment with the constitution. it does seem that we have turned

the corner and come very close --the coming police state to becoming a police state, particularly when legislators are not able to discuss with us what is going on down there. some say they did know about it or do know about it and some say they don't. they were not briefed about it. the president said they were. and the massive cover-up here -- i think we should really know what is going on and have no private sessions in these discussions. i can understand military activities being very private, but our private information -- the way this has gone now, it makes my fighting for the rights of people in other countries to have rights similar to our constitution -- it makes a mockery of it. i'm a little disappointed in what i did -- host: all right, let's get a response from the commerce in. thank youst of all, for talking about the constitution. it is something we don't see

many people talking about today and we should be. i keep a copy of that right on my desk to make sure we are constantly looking at it and making sure that we are staying in compliance with what i think is -- i think as a government we need to do that. second, i absolutely agree with you that there are far too many things that take place in secrecy. peter asked me if every member of congress should have access to all the information that everybody else has. i don't necessarily agree with that, but i think that somebody -- sometimes reclassify far too much data and sometimes we classify it so that it cannot be disputed. we have to be very, very careful about that. the second thing we need to be careful about is all the things that happened behind closed doors. it is not just whether you get classified information, but i don't even like the fact that we are having more and more of these gang of five, gang of eight, gang of six getting behind closed doors for years 1/3bringing out a bill to of the american people and saying, this is the bill that you have to have. it is important that we have that transparency and it is open and i appreciate the fact that you have groups like c-

span that peter mentioned is going to cover in three of these hearings as they come in the debate on the armed services bill. i am glad that people tune and listen and pay attention. host: mike tweets in cash , itt: well, first of all doesn't more aspects than you think. oftentimes what you see in the press is kind of the extreme and you see the people that are fighting with each other. you don't see the kind of working relations that i see everyday that are taking place in congress congress, and they are on a host of fronts. i worked very closely with a member of congress was a democrat on healthcare issues. i worked very closely with my for the seapower subcommittee, and not just a colleague of mine, but a dear friend of mine, democrat, mike mcintyre of north carolina. we haven't ignobly close relationship. i think you see those

relationships -- we have an incredibly close relationship. i think you see those relationships but they don't get out in the press and to disclose as much as i wish they could. obviously, i wish they would expand and more in congress than what they have. host: john tweets in not a goodortable is word. you asked that question earlier, are you comfortable with these things -- i don't think we are ever totally comfortable with them and i don't think we should be and that is why we continue to do that oversight and monitor, because i realize that what i may be comfortable with today, peter, i may be uncomfortable with tomorrow, if we are not constantly holding people accountable to what they are doing. caller: host -- host: representative randy forbes of a virgin is our guest. hi, forbes ofentative randy virginia is our guest. hi, paul. caller: foreign flagged ships

bringing goods to the united states to ensure the protection of the united states navy. why can't you put an import tax on these ships to offset the costs of the united states navy service and then apply these monies directly to our national debt? thank you, sir. guest: well, thanks. we do have a merchant marine and they do great jobs from as you know, throughout the history of our country. the navy now is working on a very integrated basis. it is not just navy ships, but commercial ships that we used to do a lot of the hauling that needs to take place, the logistics work that has to take place. i think that what we need to do in terms of looking at the strength of our navy is making a commitment about what we need to do and go as a country in terms of changing the curved lines. it is not what we tax other

ships but what we do in terms of the commitment to other naval vessels. we are reducing the number of ships that we have dramatically. that is not a good curve line for us and we're trying to change those. host: has sequester hit your district at all? guest: sequester as hit everybody across the country. i voted against the sequester and fought against it every year, but it is not just sequester but the massive cuts did ministration took before the sequester. , putting$587 billion to their records. according to the armed services committee, it is more like 700 $80 billion. -- it is more like $780 billion. you need to do the analysis first and see what we need to protect and defend the country. the budget shouldn't be driving the strategy. the strategy ought to be driving the budget. we haven't seen that. sequestration has had a huge impact on national defense. host: what about your district? guest: when you look at my district and look at virginia as

a whole, it has had a huge impact on the because we have been able to stave off a large portion of that impact short- term, but over the long term it is going to take a huge toll. host: as a republican, were you one of the few to fight against sequestration? guest: i think this year i was the only republican or democrat who voted against all of these budgets. i was one of the few who voted against sequestration. i launched a tour around the country to try to raise awareness, because as you remember, peter, having to go back to the thesaurus and say " what is sequestration?" the public didn't even know. we were trying to raise awareness and say that if we don't get this thing change, it will have a huge impact on national defense, and unfortunately we failed. host: south carolina, republican line, last call for were presented to forbes. caller: thank you.

good morning,, smit. how are you? guest: doing great. caller: you mentioned a lack of transparency earlier and that is fisa court.ith this we are told that that is our line of defense against the nsa overreaching, and yet we don't know how many people are on the court, who are they, who appoints them, how long as their term of service. i think they should be changed pretty regularly so that people don't get too comfortable in that position. i wonder if you could explain whatever you can about this court and how it works. guest: let me tell you this -- first of all, you raise an excellent question. as i go back to the judiciary committee, one of the things we try to do is make your we get more transparency how the court operates and who would operates -- and who it operates. be information on to disclosed and the american public ought to be able to get access to that and have it.

these courts -- if they operate -- even if they are doing a good job and a fair job and they are applying constitutional principles we want them to come if the american people don't have transparency, they will not have trust and confidence. to make sure we are disclosing that information in a more transparent way. "washingtonday on journal," 9:15 a.m. we will be doing a segment on the fisa court. you can watch on sunday to learn more about the fisa court system. matthew tweepts in guest: i think that they have said we want to control this and we want to balance it, but i think, peter, most of the people who watch these programs and of seniors programs kno -- and have seen these programs know the tremendous risk the united states is exposed to and they want to make sure we are defending against that.

with we have been talking representative randy forbes, republican of virginia. we appreciate your time. one last segment coming up on "washington journal." we will be looking at the 1917 espionage act to see how it fits today and how it is applied. our guest is brian fung of "national journal." another news update first from c-span radio. >> 9:15 a.m. eastern time. jobless numbers show the number from arkansas seeking unemployment benefits dropped by 12,000 to a seasonally adjusted 334,000. the labor department says that the four-week average, less volatile measure, a priest to 345,000. both figures only about 3000 above the levels of a month ago, the lowest in five years. spending and retail businesses stepped up in may at the best pace in three months. it was mostly field by more car purchases. again shown that consumers

remain confident despite -- but again shows that customers remain confident despite higher taxes. the house judiciary committee will be posing questions to fbi director robert mueller. chairman bob goodlatte says that he and fellow lawmakers want to know more about what he calls the "stalled investigation" into the attack that killed four americans in benghazi, libya. the committee also has questions about the boston marathon vestigation and the leaks of classified information. listen to the hearing live at 10:00 a.m. eastern on c-span radio or watch the hearing live on c-span three. those are the latest headlines on c-span radio. >> in the early 1900s, cocaine was used by a wide number of americans -- used in coca-cola, for example. it was in a number of products. there was concern when black people started to use cocaine. for example, "the new york times" ran an article in 1914

about black folks being the new southern menace and black cocaine being seen as the new southern menace. the way that cocaine was talked about -- black people being under the influence of cocaine was talked about -- was that a cause of them to be more raperous, it cost them to white women, it cause them to be unaffected by bullets. all of this nonsense -- this was going on then and it is going on now, although the language has been tempered. the drugs are such easy scapegoats. >> columbia university professor carl hart argues that drug laws are based on race and class rather than behavior resulting from drug use. sunday nine at 9:00, part of booktv on c-span2. "washington journal" continues. host: we want to introduce you to brian fung. he is with "national journal"

and is identified as a technology writer. he is here to talk about the 1917 espionage act. what is it? the 1917ll, so espionage act was measure that woodrow wilson proposed in order to try and prevent americans from interfering with the war effort against germany. and what wound up happening was act gave theonage executive pretty broad authority indict people and also to monitor people's speech as well. -- have people been prosecuted under the espionage act? guest: yes. critics of the espionage act have said that president obama has actually used the espionage act more than any of his predecessors to go after leakers. , what arein the past some of the names we might know from the espionage act? guest: some of the most famous

names -- the rosenbergs, who were spies for the soviets. you also have jeffrey sterling, who in most agent recent decades was tried for getting information to the "new york times" reporter james risen. and today you have the bradley manning trial ongoing. host: what about jonathan pollard or aldrich ames? were they tried under the espionage act? guest: yes, they were. ames in particular was investigated for giving information to the russians. it was a major, major scandal back in the day. -- is theley manning espionage act being applied to him? guest: the government would like to. the government's argument is, when bradley

manning released a whole set of documents to wikileaks, among those was a video file called " collateral murder video," and it showed a helicopter attack against what were supposed to be suspected militants. , bothecame a major issue because americans had never actually seen the video even though previous reporting had revealed its existence. but also because it allegedly gives the government a little bit more fire copper against manning himself. here is a little bit from the 1917 espionage act.

host: for some of us, that is a lot of gobbledygook, but what does that say? guest: essentially it suggests that anyone who is engaged with activities that would interfere with u.s. military activities or with activities connected to congress and related to military efforts would be breaking the law, essentially. fung, you mentioned that president obama has used the espionage act against journalists. how so? what are some of those cases? can you detail those for us? guest: to clarify, the president has not used the espionage act against journalists per se to prosecute journalists come but he has used it to prosecute and go after supposed to leakers of information who have given information to journalists read host -- information to journali.

host: who are some of those? james rosen of fox news, we know that one. guest: as well as james risen from "the new york times." right now, obviously, with the nsa surveillance scandal, people are talking about potentially whether or not the espionage act would apply in this case. and whether or not the government would try to use the espionage act to go after either edward snowden, the nsa greenwald, "the guardian's" reporter. host: the numbers are up on our screen if you want to talk to brian fung of "national journal" about the espionage act. we will begin taking your calls in just a minute. this act was written in 1917. is it up to date.

guest: that is a matter of a great deal of debate. it was written in 1917 and later after with the sedition act, which was then allowed to expire in 1921. andver, the espionage act many of its original principles contained in the espionage act survive today, and many people think that the espionage act is of the artifact of history and doesn't really reflect present times. host: so if not the espionage act and the government wants to prosecute mr. snowden for what happened, how would they do it? guest: actually, the espionage act would be the likeliest way that the government would go after snowden. absent that, the government would have to -- would have a

very hard time going after snowden. some people have called snowden of trade or -- have called snowden a traitor but the definitions of treason are very specific and would not apply to snowden. host: daniel ellsberg was connected to that. what is his connection to the espionage act? ellsberg was indicted under the espionage act, although because of mistrial he got off later and is today a free man. host: brian fung is our guest, "national journal" is his publication. kathleen is a democrat. caller: say our legislators were to go after manning or snowden under the espionage act

-- i think the mark in public, from my view, a lot of us are very upset about if you would apply those standards of the espionage act over there, why would it have not been applied to, say, for instance, cheney, fleischer, karl rove, in regard to the purposeful outing of a cia agent, valerie plame? the public is never found out what type of injury or undermining of national security was done by that purposeful outing. if it is applied over there, why not over here? rosen-ard to the aipac- weissman trial, which was jane harman interfering with that investigation, talk about that espionage application and the reason that trial was dismissed. thank you. host: any comments for that caller? guest: with regard to the bush administration, when president

obama team on board in 2009, one of his first acts of president -- acts as president was to pass -- was to say that the past is past and the time for moving forward is now. that it is given the obama administration's decision whether or not to go after those investigations, the president has made up his mind. i'm a little skeptical of any possibility that we are really going to learn much more out of that, unless president obama changes his mind. host: what are some of the acts that qualify as espionage? what has to happen? does intent have to be involved? guest: in some cases it can be a matter of holding government information the on your terms of employment -- beyond your terms of employment.

there was one case recently in 2010 or 2011 that involve a former nsa employee who had actually held onto some of his records at home, and was indicted on those grounds. tweets in -- guest: i think that in both cases, the patriot act and espionage act were sort of product of a very particular .ime i think that the patriot act in particular was the direct first real america's encounter with terrorism. in some ways there are a lot of questions going around about whether or not americans didn't really foresee the consequences

of the patriot act when they signed it into law, and now that we have seen what the surveillance state has been able to accomplish, we are sort of rethink our just desserts. -- we are sort of freaking out just desserts. host: ken, independent line. caller: how you doing? you can go back in your archives -- a couple years ago you had a guy from one of those telephone company's that said they was already doing this a couple years ago. i feel that the nsa -- too many people are seeing the government -- all the buildings in virginia and maryland are related to counterterrorism, and a new building in utah. and the reporter who won a pulitzer prize should do an investigation on the generals

-- [indiscernible] defense contractors. the united states -- [indiscernible] that's all i have to say. host: any response for that color, mr. fung? hast: the magazine "wired" a great story this morning, i highly recommend it -- a profile of general alexander, the head of the nsa and u.s. cyber com, the united states cyber warfare division. i highly recommend reading it. i am only halfway through it myself but i definitely intend to finish as soon as i am off the air. he participate in the interview or is it just a profile? guest: he declined to be interviewed for that profile. host: general alexander is scheduled to speak at the black hat conference in las vegas at the end of july.

are you familiar with that conference? guest: yes. host: what is that conference? guest: that conference is a collection of "hackers." a lot of what it involves is a conference where so-called black hat hackers and white hat hackers come together and discuss security vulnerabilities and how to promote security. terms are important to define -- black hat hackers involve hack, for allegedly malicious purposes, and white hat hackers involve people who are involved in security and protecting networks and so on. host: why is he speaking to the black hat conference? guest: i think there is a pretty deep connection between the hat hackers black and the intelligence community, not for an official sense, but in a sense that the black hat hackers are often the ones who first find out about are mostlities, who

knowledgeable about vulnerabilities, and you have an ability to communicate to white hat folks what executive needs to be changed. technologys a writer writing about the 1917 espionage act? guest: that's a great question. i think that with the nsa surveillance scandal, and all this business about edward snowden, there is going to be a ome more to calm -- to c with regard to moving that case forward through the legal process. it is going to be a pretty long story. go throughcides to it with the extradition process, that is going to be a long and drawnout process. there is going to be a lot to dig into as we move forward. host: has the u.s. started that process? guest: we don't know at this point. we don't know the whereabouts of mr. snowden.

the last anyone hasn't seen of him is when he checked out of his hoteland on: -- in hong kong. apparently he is still there because he has given an interview to a local newspaper, the "south china morning post." his exact whereabouts are pretty much unknown. host: canyon lake, texas, republican line. these go ahead. -- please go ahead. caller: if i was snowden, i wouldn't trust obama's government -- are you there? host: we are listening. caller: we have seen the listening -- the bigotry and racism and wright denying and complete lack of integrity in the obama government. we know that a democrat calls and and didn't know that nothing was proven against cheney or anyone in the administration about valerie plame. get a clue, democrats. another thing that is kind of crazy -- we listen to all this from the irs and everything and we don't know where it came from. obama pretty much sent this

through -- his first -- said this through his first campaign, second campaign, and demonized everybody in the tea party and republicans and the conservatives, and the bigotry and racism of the democrat denial,d the right still elections like obama did the last election -- it is what happens all through history. the democrat party is a sadistic, evil bunch of people. host: all right, we will leave your comments to stand there. to go back tont something you mentioned earlier. -- hass espionage act the administration used the tools available to it more than other administrations in the past? guest: absolutely. there is no question about that. in previous administer since, the espionage act was only invoked about three times to go after supposedly cursed. in this administration,

president obama has gone after leakers using the sp not shaq at least six times -- using the espionage act at least six times now and with the sp -- and with the nsa scandal, it may be the seventh. host: brian fung is a graduate of middlebury college and the london school of economics. lantic" forhe at a while, is that correct? guest: that is correct. host: next call. caller: i am glad to see another minority on tv speaking for the better good all people. i am an independent. i just wanted to ask you a question. i am wondering what role espionage lays -- plays in city government,, state government, and not just government itself, because espionage doesn't just start at our government. it has to come from someplace.

i would like to know from you how this process of espionage, by the time it becomes espionage in our political system overall, how this process really begins to affect us as american citizens long before it affects our country. you understand what i'm saying? host: all right, let's see if mr. fung has any comments for you. guest: i think you make a great point that espionage has to come from someplace, and what we call espionage often goes a different definitions. if you look at the case of snowden right now, he has given interviews where he basically charts the origins of his opposition to the surveillance that the obama administration has conducted. with a healthyn skepticism about surveillance

but as he began to look more and more into the business of surveillance and got deeper into the intelligence community, he has to realize -- he came to realize that even what he thought was happening was going beyond his limits. snowdenthink that flipped the switch and decided overnight, andy" some would contest that what he did was spying, but over time snowden did come to realize from a very perhaps innocent place that what he was doing didn't sit right with him orally. host: brian fung, you have been writing about google and facebook and the other tech companies wanting to be more transparent in the types of requests they get, etc. a recent article in "national journal"

what is their goal in doing this? guest: google has historically periodic a transparency report where they talk about the data requests from the united states as well as other governments. this would be part of a broader effort to expand that report. what google would like to do is fisade what are called requests in the transparency report. fisa requests are essentially appeals made to a secret court law-enforcement must go through to ask businesses for information related to national security investigations. requests come along with our gag orders that prevent fisae who has received a requests from talking about it. that means that google has received some number of the requests, but they can't say how many. i cannot -- and they cannot

disclose what those requests were for. what google wants to be able to do is tell people how many fifa -- fisa requests it is getting. facebook has come along and said that we historically have opposed the idea of a transparency report because of the inconsistency in information, but we think that now may actually be the time. host: is this a business decision? guest: i'm sure at some point everything at these tech companies comes down to a business decision, but i also think that for many businesses in silicon valley, there's a culture of openness and transparency and almost libertarianism that permeates pretty much everything. and encourage that kind of -- host: do you think you are hearing ash they are hearing from people that, hey, i don't want you to have that kind of information if you are going to share it with the government? guest: i'm sure that facebook

and google have always heard from americans that are skeptical about data collection, and given the laws on the books, google must comply with any court order requesting data. the only way that they could contest that is through the secret court. just like any other subpoena, google and facebook and the other tech companies -- if they receive oa fisa requests, they are allowed to challenge that in court, but citizens would not know about that behavior. host: what is the reasoning behind keeping even the requests secret from the american public? guest: from the government possibly effective, if you keep the requests secret -- from the government's perspective, if you keep the requests secret, you limit the possibility that the target will find out about the request and to deduce what it is that the government is trying to do. host: michael is in her most beach, california, republican line. caller: good morning, gentlemen

could that guy from texas stole my thunder in so many points, but i will be brief. thet of all, regarding propagandist lady that called even after it was debunked, and someone attending on your show -- dieter, i don't think you are the host -- sit and offer the law that this lady try to say that scooter libby and cheney and everybody violated. there was no law rogan. withie plame outed herself joe wilson in a big spread in " vanity fair." she was not covered by that law. and as that man from texas put so eloquently, this is what democrats do. guysnow what, i heard you talking about communications companies just now. i am from san francisco.

they are all packed with liberals, and the same people who refuse to help bush win you could smell the flesh burning they reach out to obama and give him this -- could and give him personal information and data fast enough. i find it outrageous that the very woman about the verily -- the very woman who lied about the valerie plame issue a couple calls ago -- host: all right, we will leave it there. everybody has had their say on that issue. we will go back to talking about the espionage act and phone records, etc. our guest is brian fung of "national journal." guest: that's a great question. to be honest, i don't know that we will know the answer to that until long after the obama

administration is out of office. it is pretty clear that the obama administration has used the espionage act to go after sneakers, and in general, the obama administration is very extraordinarily, i would say, pursuant of leakers, more so than any other administration in history. , as to why president obama feels the need to use the espionage act specifically to go after the leakers is an open question. tweet fromfollow-up that same if you were -- guest: people who are convicted under the espionage act generally don't receive very heavy penalties, and in many cases they get off after i handful of months.

it is not -- the punishment is not quite as onerous as you might think. that said, to be convicted of espionage sounds like the terrible thing. mount sinai, is in new york on our democrat line. caller: good morning, gentlemen. i would like to open a saying that susan swain is gone, connie gone, i brian lamb is want you guys to know that when you miss other things -- , we miss you greatly -- host: susan swain is president of c-span. host: i don't see her -- host: she is the host of the series on monday nights -- like familyguys are members and we feel a great deal of comfort seeing you and having you guys dissipate or

disappear into the background is disheartening because we feel such a close bond to you folks. at least that is how i feel. especially brian and connie and susan and there was a gentleman from a long time ago -- your 25th anniversary, he opened with shaving his mustache off to do the introduction. i don't think anybody recognized him, but i did. he is from way back. anyway, my question, sandy berger has been caught -- this 9/11, he was in the national archives and he ate some of the documents and he put them in his pants and stole them. isn't that a form of espionage, and more importantly, did anybody find out what he was trying to cover up the documents he removed from the national archives? thank you for c-span. you do an outstanding job of bringing the news. when you compare c-span2 other forms of journalism come there is no comparison. host: thank you, anthony. we will leave it there could is that an issue you are familiar with? guest: to be honest, i am not a

legal reporter. i cover technology issues. my background in that subject is not enormous. that said, eating documents and taking them out with you is a very creative way of doing things, absolutely. host: in the series in "national journal," you have been writing about this issue. snowden's case is unique is that -- and that it uncovered a previously unknown surveillance apparatus that is massive in size and scope." guest: snowden is unique in that he uncovered something it at we had no idea existed, but he is not unique in the sense that he is one of a vast number of at mid-levelrk positions in organizations all over the country. a great deal of power because of their position in being able to control and monitor computer networks.

we have focused in this country quite a great deal over foreign hacking, particularly the threat posed by china. but is it is also important to note that people -- just as many vulnerabilities exists inside the networks as from outside. how: when you say that -- many serious attacks do you know have come from hackers is a matter of debate in the cybersecurity community. there are those who think that --kers and not insiders are posed the main threat, and those who say that 2/3 of all data breaches in the united states that get reported, at any rate, come from insiders as opposed to hackers. host: max is in lansing, michigan, independent line. caller: hi.

what i am wondering about is exactly what the obama administration's role is in all of this. obama has been catching a lot of flack for the whole thing, and i'm not necessarily here to defend him. but i'm wondering, wouldn't the intelligence committee, headed by my representative mike rogers, have been the ones to make this call and request in the first place? how many of the decisions to get information like this and other things under the patriot act or espionage act or any of these things -- how many of these decisions were obama and how many were the decisions of mike rogers and others on the committee? guest: you bring up a two really good questions. the first is what was the role that congress played in authorizing these. to that question i would say that congress had a very big role to play in approving the measures like the patriot act that enable the surveillance to crop up. that is why you see people like diane feinstein who have come

out strongly in favor of the surveillance as something that has existed for years and years and we should be comfortable with. senator harry reid has also said this is not new, and that is true. , too your second question what extent does the obama ownnistration responsibility over this issue, i would say that one of the interesting things about the fisa court, the court that approves all of the nsa's requests to gather data from businesses, it is a secret , an interior that is the judiciary's check on the executive. -- and in theory that is the judiciary's check on the executive. but when the judiciary is totally opaque and the legal justifications for why obama can do what he is doing is being withheld from the public, that

sort of limits the utility of the judiciary to oversee it. tweets incal taoist -- host: does it? not, again,now, i'm familiar with the dna court case, but i would say that it is unlikely that the government is tracking our dna. host: i should let you know that the front-page story of " the new york times" was about that issue and we read that earlier, so i think the caller is talking about that. sid, republican line. caller: hi, good morning. my concern with the patriot act is when these things expand, it is always in layers, now we ndaa, and how do we

know how much is being gathered, how do we know what is going on? everything is so layered in secrecy. that is -- there is absolutely no way to get any kind of accountability when the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing. it is putting a damper on -- [indiscernible] what youto be careful respond on yahoo news or google news or any of the things where you might normally freely, and -- you might normally freely comment. you can do that anymore. with the ndaa, you have people in bureaucratic positions labeling you as one thing or another. now you have the terrorist label. comment on that, please. guest: you raise a really

interesting question, and there are two ways to look at it. one is that to some extent, surveillance has been going on since at least 2006 or 2007. your behavior, your day-to-day exactly the same, more or less, today as it was six years ago. you still have to go to work, you still have to hop in your car and use your credit card to .uy gas and groceries all the day-to-day activities we engage in, we may think about them in a different way in light of this revelation about the nsa. but in general, the activities and life has to go on. how hasian fung, ha

technology changed the government's ability to gather information? guest: google and facebook and the other tech companies are sweeping up tons of user data. advertising and marketing companies are also sweeping up large amounts of behavioral data about what we do online and what we browse online, what we buy online. that is a very tempting source of material to figure out patterns of human behavior that can be used for both ill and for good. host: dorsey, missouri, democrat. good morning. good morning, thank you for for taking my call. i would like to say that, first ,f all, i'm grateful for c-span and i am also grateful that the president and all of the people working for the president and all the people who try to keep us safe. if we would clean up our acts in america, we would not be so scared of anybody spying on us. we need to get clean mines and clean hearts, and if we are not

doing dirty things like talking on the phone -- talking on the phone every day, going on the internet everyday -- if we would be about our own business of being a help to the world instead of trying to figure out how we are going to hurt toebody or how we are going commit espionage ourselves, we would not be so concerned about what's going on. host: mr. fung, any response for the caller? guest: there is a major debate going on in washington about whether or not our concern over terrorism and security has exceeded the bounds of what society is willing to give the government in terms of authority. i think that now it is a really important time for all of america to sort of get involved in this debate. 9/11, everyone was very eager to give government as much authority as it needed to pursue terrorism.

and sort of assumed that terrorism was an all- encompassing threat. i think that when you look at the numbers, however, far fewer people in the united states i or have died of terrorism than from car crashes or accidental gun discharges or drowning in your path to erie it -- or drowning in your bathtub. i think that is a comparison and a discussion that people in the united states should be re- engaging with. host: matt smith tweets in -- washington, independent line. brian fung of "national journal" is our guest. caller: good morning. i question is, if the government pursues charges against snowden for leaking the information about the prism

program, will they also bring thates against the people leaked it initially in 2005 and reported by "the new york times" that the prism program was going on? or will they be selective in who they prosecute here? are you familiar with the fact that prism was leaked in 2005 or 2006? guest: i think there were some inkling that something like prism was going on at that point. electronic found here for a nation -- electronic frontier foundation for a while has been saying that at&t has been involved in some kind of government program to surveilled u.s. citizens. but at that point, nothing like like the s -- nothing size and scale of prism had been revealed, at least to the extent that snowden has revealed it this time. host: brian fung, this tweet --

guest: i think that's absolutely right. the constitution doesn't make an absolute guarantee of privacy. has a any case, privacy subjective definitions. privacy means different things to different people. in some cases, folks are comfortable with having buddies look at their behavioral data and shopping -- with having cubbies look at their behavioral data and shopping data. aher aren't treated as result result is written with where you draw the line. host: buddy in -- bonnie in kansas, republican line. caller: good morning, gentlemen. i'm wondering if we have not declared war, how can we be using an espionage act that pertains to war? we have been for all these years in a war where we have sorry,scripted --

'snscripted the president family, the congressmaens' families, the 500's families. it seems to be all for people who have to keep returning -- all poor people who have to keep returning, even until injured or dead from suicide. bonnie,u know what, we've got a point that we have mr. fung respond to. any point there you want to talk about? guest: it is definitely true when you look at the demographics that lower income americans are predominantly the ones who are serving in the armed forces. beyond that, it is very hard to say to what extent that has an impact on guest in a shack.

-- on the espionage act. host: we began this conversation talking about the 1917 espionage act. is it specific to war? guest: at its outset, yes, it was, and over the course of its later extensions, it came to be covering a larger set of issues as well. you: brian fung, what are going to be writing about the next couple of days? guest: i think we will all be following this nsa scandal very closely looking at where bradley manning -- bradley manning, excuse me -- and were snowed in is and where he goes -- edward snowden is and where he goes, figuring out whether the united states will engage in next edition procedures with him, and figuring out where else the united states government may have access to and figuring out where the tech companies stand. glennwhy did he talk to greenwald? any thoughts there? guest: snowden has gone on the

record saying that he believes that greenwald is a trusted journalist and that he would fairly represent snowden's interests. there has been outside reporting by "the washington post" and others looking at the timeline 's contacts with both "the washington post" and "the guardian." snowden had contacted "the guardian" according to glenn glenn called as early as february. "the washington post" had also been in contact with snowden, but the terms of their discussions -- "the washington post" felt like it could not uphold the requests that snowden ,as making, and so snowden said i'm sorry, this is now a multilateral fair, and which point he took it to greenwald. host: and we have been talking

to first time "washington" guest brian fung. we appreciate your being on " washington journal." guest: thank you, good to be here. host: the house is coming into session and it will be working on defense authorization, as we learn from our guest, representative randy forbes earlier. the senate is also in session. on c-span3, you can tune in and mueller as hector testifies before the house judiciary committee. that is live on c-span3. thanks for being with us on "washington journal." here is the house. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2013] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute] the speaker pro tempore: the house will be in order. the chair lays before the house a communication from t