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tv   Key Capitol Hill Hearings  CSPAN  October 7, 2013 12:00pm-2:01pm EDT

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at that point, all of the candidates are qualified. is it political? see the rest of this in the c-span video library. the house is about to gavel in. members about to begin the morning our. we expect to hear about the government shutdown, now in its second week. live coverage, here on c-span. the speaker pro tempore: the house will be in order. the chair lays before the house a communication from the speaker. the clerk: the speaker's rooms, washington, d.c. october 7, 2013. i hereby appoint the honorable george holding to act as speaker pro tempore on this day. signed, john a. boehner, speaker of the house of representatives. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to the order of the house of january 3, 2013, the chair will now recognize members from lists submitted by the
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majority and minority leaders for morning hour debate. the chair will alternate recognition between the parties with each party limited to one hour and each member other than the majority and minority leaders and minority whip limited to five minutes each. but in no event shall debate continue beyond 1:50 p.m. the chair recognizes the gentleman from alabama, mr. brooks, for five minutes. mr. speaker, the band of brothers episode, why we fight, reminds me of an experience my father, jack brooks, shared with me. at age 23 dad was a combat engineer in general patton's army. near war's end, dad was ordered to help at a german concentration camp. dad and his fellow soldiers saw human boddings decomposing and stacked bike cord wood five and six feet height with lime sprinkled on them to retard spread of disease. those camps helped my dad and
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america understand why we fought in europe. today washington is in an epic political battle that will affect america's future for decades and centuries to come. some see a fight between republicans and democrats. i see a fight between those who are financially responsible and those who are not. between those who have the understanding and backbone needed to prevent an american bankruptcy, and those who do not. why do i fight? i fight for america's children and grandchildren. i fight for america's future. president obama's five deficits have averaged $1 trillion per year. the worst in history. america soon will blow through the $17 trillion debt mark. the worst in history. mr. speaker, it is challenging to grasp trillion dollar deficits and a $17 trillion debt. let me simplify. in each of the last five years, the federal government borrowed
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20% to 30% of its operational costs. how many american families or businesses could avoid bankruptcy if year after year 20% to 30% of what they spent was borrowed money. not many and not for long. economic principles don't care if you are a family, a business, or a country. if you borrow more than you can pay back, you go bankrupt. america's been warned of the consequences of financial irresponsibility. greece is further down the debt path than america. greece's unemployment rate is 27%, worst than any year in america's great depression. earlier this year cyprus confiscated as much as 60% of their citizens' savings and checkings accounts. the detroit in stockton municipal bankruptcies risk retirees losing their pensions. president obama's former chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, admiral mullen, warned
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congress that america's greatest national security threat is not iran, not al qaeda, not china, not russia. it is our debt. admiral mullen is prophetic. in recent history, no enemy has done as much damage to america's military national security as have debt and sequestration. president obama's comptroller general warned congress and the white house earlier this year that america's deficits and debt are unsustainable. which brings us to today's fight involving a government shutdown, debt ceiling, and socialized met sin. no question, a government shutdown hampers the economy. between 1976 and 1995 there were 17 government shutdowns. yet america's economy boomed in the 1980's and 1990's. shutdowns can be overcome. no question. not raising the debt ceiling poses economic risk. no one knows for sure how much
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risk because america's never crossed this threshold before. whatever it is, it can be overcome. knowing these risks, why do i fight over funding bills, the debt ceiling, and socialized medicine? because too many washington politicians pander to next election voters without caring one twit about america's future. because appropriations bills, continuing resolutions, the debt ceiling, and the like are the only leverage i have to cajole financially irresponsible washington politicians into doing what must be done to prevent an american bankruptcy. because as bad as government shutdown and debt ceiling risks may be, they are relatively inconsequential compared to the economic devastation resulting from an american bankruptcy. think about the chaos and hardship that will ensue if america has no national defense, no f.b.i., c.i.a., or d.e.a. no social security, medicaid, or medicare. no nasa, no justice system
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because an american bankruptcy has deprived us of the money needed to pay for them. why do i fight? i fight to minimize the risk of america suffering a debilitating bankruptcy that can destroy america that took our ancestors centuries to build. mr. speaker, it is my duty to use any tools i can to win that fight because this is one fight america cannot afford to lose. that is why i fight. mr. speaker, i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the chair recognizes the gentleman from michigan, mr. levin, for five minutes. mr. levin: i ask unanimous consent to address the house. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. levin: well, mr. speaker, this will be a short five minute, indeed. a short one minute because it call -- all can be said a very few words. yesterday, the speaker said there are not enough votes in the house to pass a clean bill to fund the government and to
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end the shutdown. there's one clear way to find out, mr. speaker, let us vote on the floor of the house. on saturday, 195 of us democrats sent a letter to the speaker saying we are willing to vote yes. and the reports are also 22 republicans at least are ready to vote yes. that's a majority. there are enough votes to end the shutdown. and, mr. speaker, if you don't believe it, let us vote. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the chair recognizes the gentleman from connecticut, mr. courtney, for five minutes. mr. courtney: thank you, mr. speaker. mr. speaker, today marks day seven since the rollout of the health care exchanges under the affordable care act. again, listening to the hysterical rhetoric from the majority party in the house, you would think, again, that america's basic freedoms and
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economy would be in ruins after day seven. in fact, there have been some problems in terms of some of the accessing through the database that was set up. part of the problem is the fact that millions of americans, far more than anyone expected, even the most ardent supporters of the law, have swamped the system which, if you think about it, i think speaks volumes about the fact that there is a tremendous need out there for this affordable care which, again, the law, i think, made a historic step in terms of advancing it. i am proud of the fact that coming from the state of connecticut, which, again, is one of the states that did not stone wall the legislation, governor malloy moved forward as quickly as possible and set up a system that was actually ready last week to deal with the onslaught of emails and calls into the call centers. as of friday, they tallied over 100,000 contacts that came into the system. again, they enrolled actually
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over 1,000 people, even though, again, coverage doesn't begin until january. so for a lot of people, again, the need to enroll right away doesn't exist right now because you have to actually write a check if you're going to enroll this early. but nonetheless, still, 1,000 people have already signed up and 100,000 were able to contact the system and interact with it with little or no problem. first of all i would like to just, again, congratulate the lieutenant governor who has been shepherding and quarterbacking this process over the last few months or so. again, to make sure that connecticut system was ready. i wanted to share, again, a couple of the stories of individuals who contacted the connecticut health exchange over the last week or so to describe their experiences. again, there was 48-year-old elie banos who said she was pleased to be one step closer to enrolling in health insurance. a new briton woman who spent the
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entire day after having been out of work for a year. she was excited to learn that she could get good individual coverage for about $70 to $200 a month or possibly even qualify for expanded medicaid coverage. i had a conversation, email, with a woman from nor witch, a 50-year-old self-employed individual, who again said to me, i certainly pay $980 a month for coverage for myself. i have a rare pre-existing ondition which is treated by medication and four annual visits to my doctor. for this i am considered, quote, heavily utilizer. my condition interferes with my ability to earn, and right now what she's paying is on par with her mortgage payment. after speaking with my insurance agent, i found out that my premiums under the affordable care act will be cut to $440 a
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month. when i spoke to her on the phone the other day, she said when her agent called her and gave her this news she did a happy dance in her office knowing that her health insurance premiums would be cut in half. again a 50-year-old working individual who is now paying $980 a month is seeing her health insurance bill cut in half because of the health care exchange. again, she's one of these people who have contacted the system, but she hasn't enrolled yet. but she will, believe me. again she cannot believe that we are at a point right now where there is a concerted, intentional effort to shut the government down in an effort to deny her, somebody who, again, has a pre-existing condition, access to a smarter, more rational marketplace than the one that existses -- exists today. the stories go on and on. i have a letter from an individual who actually wrote to the "new york times" talking about the fact that on day one there was reports about how terrible the system is.
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and she said i tried to sign up. i have absolutely no difficulty getting all the answers i needed and the forms to fill out on the very first try. the entire process was simple, direct, and easy to follow. i don't know -- please don't forget all of us who -- maybe not newsworthy, are a large part of the equation. her name is hugh. the folks at the health care exchange who have been planning and preparing for months have demonstrated that, again, that demand can be met if you, again, can the right planning in place. and that when people actually have a chance to get past all the nonsense that is thrown around out there about the end of american freedom and actually see they can buy private health insurance plans, again, connecticut offers three private health insurance plans, anthem blue cross, connicare and healthy connecticut. that's why we must keep this government opened and not buckle to the folks who want to just repeal and defund the affordable
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care act. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the chair recognizes the gentlelady from texas, ms. jackson lee, for five minutes. ms. jackson lee: i ask unanimous consent to address the house. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. ms. jackson lee: thank you, mr. speaker. and good morning. i thought it was important to come as soon as i arrived after 24 hours in my district, which after voting to restore the payment compensation to our federal employees, some 800 thousand-plus how -- 800,000-plus who are now laid off, i wanted to go home for a moment to be able to interact with my constituents. and in that period of time i met doctors, i met carpenters, and millrights. i spoke to those in the arts community. i commemorated the 70th
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anniversary of catholic charities. had a mass at sacred heart cathedral. listened to our cardinal talk with great faith, the card naffle our community in houston-galveston diocese and the cardinal that is named by the previous pope who now resides in our community. who gave us the words that just live by faith. and i indicated that i would come back to let this body know that the people who are being affected are not republicans or democrats, green party, or independents, or any other definition other than american. and i was overwhelmed by those who came up to me and indicated from airline pilots that negotiation and interaction is important, but don't break on the issue of the affordable care act and getting this government opened. they understand it.
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these are people who are being impacted. like the workers today of an aircraft company in connecticut .hat -- laying off 2,000 people the pentagon contractor that will soon be laying off -- people.f people t the tax deadline for those who haven't filed coming up on october 15. needing i.r.s. workers to help them with issues that they have in terms of filing their tax forms. or even the federal courts for the moving of justice in this nation. and so i think it is extremely important that whatever is tying you up, whatever is keeping you from looking at the common good, and i would offer to say to the american people, everyone knows that we are not greece. we wish the best for the people
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of greece, but america's the richest country in the world. $4 trillion in economy, and the country that is looked to from all around the world. our economy is bigger than the european union. that means countries like spain, germany, france, england, all of those members who as well are our allies but look to america, how shameful it is for someone to be held and, if you will, tied up by their own individual personal interests. one would ask if the founding fathers, as imperfect as america was as she began, if the founding fathers had came from the 13 colonies and various districts and probably interests had held to those specialized interests, would we have created a nation that started out by saying we organize to create a more perfect union, albeit that there are groups of populations that did not have dignity and justice and citizenship at that time, something that i could look back in bitterness, but i
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do not because this is the greatest nation in the world but we are not showing ourselves that way. it is not the truth to suggest that there are not enough voters, members of congress that would vote right now today to open this government. it's something called a continuing resolution, but it's a bill that you put on the floor that has been passed already by republicans and democrats in the united states senate. this is not an idea of anyone over another person. republican and democratic senators have already voted for this clean bill that we could vote on today. we have martial law. what that means, and my colleagues know what it means, you can put a bill on in just minutes. so rather than deciding amongst your children which one to feed, which is the approach my friends in leadership are doing, squeezing out one bill that leaves out the f.a.a.
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inspectors, leaves out i.c.e. that deals out immigration, leave out those that are dealing with young people that are undocumented, leave out those who are helping young couples who want to get a home with a mortgage processing, who knows whose homes dealing with the rains up and down the east coast, who will need federal assistance, all of that is being dumbed down, lost, because we have not opened the government. i come today, mr. speaker, to ask us to turn to our american card, hold up the american card, i am an american, and vote to open up this government. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. -- the gentlelady's time has expired. pursuant to clause 12-a of rule 1, the chair declares the house in recess until 2:00 p.m. today.
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national weather service, american indian programs, head start, and federal aid to school districts. any record or both will happen at 6:00 30 eastern. the senate, senators return at 2:00 eastern today to continue speeches on the government shutdown an upcoming debt limit expected in 10 days. to pay forgreed local workers. the bill is awaiting action in the senate. no word on when senators will take that up. you can see live coverage of the senate on our companion that were, c-span2.
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the house to for return, earlier today we spoke to a reporter on capitol hill to talk about the latest developments in the government shutdown and potential impasse over the debt ceiling. david drucker, let's begin with but we heard on the sunday talk shows yesterday from house speaker and john boehner. guest: i reported friday evening . i do not expect a clean debt ceiling bill to be brought to the house floor. there are not enough republican votes in the house to get it through. i know there are some people who think there are, but i do not think there are. going tons are not provide the votes that would be to getry for a 60-mobile a bill through the senate. that is what they are telling me. i was surprised to hear with the
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speaker said. given the speculation over the past week, that that was something that he would do, it is possible he felt he needed to make it clear that he was going to want negotiations with the president to do something on the debt and debt deficit as a part of the deficit. that show the viewers what john boehner had to say yesterday when he was on abc this week. [video clip] >> the votes are not in the house to pass a clean debt limit . the president is risking default by not having a conversation with us. >> under those circumstances, will you pass a clean -- down that not going path. how can you raise the debt limit and do nothing about the underlying problem? we have spent more than what we have brought in for 55 years. this year, the federal
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government will have more revenue than any year in the history of our country and yet we will still have a $700 billion budget deficit. futuresquandering the for our kids and grandkids by not dealing with this problem. david drucker is with us on the phone. what are republicans saying they want in exchange for raising the debt ceiling? question.s a good we are not sure yet. what they want are forms that would have to do with entitlements and spending, economic growth and other things . they are putting together some sort of legislative vehicle to .o all of that it could look similar to the republicans attempted thatontinuing resolution is all that we will see in terms
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of the affordable care act, whether it is the medical device repeal or something else. they have been pretty clear all expect to doey something with the debt ceiling other than simply a debt increase. in many ways, it would be tougher for republicans to push a clean debt ceiling than it would a clean cr. toy republican did not want go this route tactically with the government shutdown and wanted to pass a clean continuing resolution and focusing their negotiations on the debt ceiling. you do not have the same level of support at all for anything resembling a clean debt ceiling. over the next few days, at least by the end of the week, we will know what they are angling to negotiate. a question of whether
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those negotiations happen. host: what did we hear from the administration yesterday? guest: the same. setting thes are precedent that this is something that you negotiate over. senate democrats and the administration are pretty adamant about this, so we will have to see what happens. host: what does this mean for the government shutdown? thet: i believe that government will be shut down until this is resolved. if you asked commerce members why, they would say, if we give here, imagine what the other side would do on the debt ceiling. i think both of these things get wrapped together. the debt ceiling has to be raised by october 17. that is next thursday, i believe. the closer we get to that, the harder it will be to solve the issue of the government shutdown
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without one side or the other worrying that they will lose their negotiating leverage. i think it will all be wrapped up into one big decision come a whenever theynd can solve both of them, they would do it together. host: why do people call this a partial government shutdown? guest: not everything has gone dark. even when the shutdown started immediately, some agencies, related to national security and other things that did not shut .own and then the congress passed a bill making sure members of the military get paid. there are other things that are up and running, postal service. it is not a 100% government shutdown, but the impact is pretty severe still. house and the senate
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are in session today. what do you expect they are working on? guest: nothing important. in later this be afternoon. the senate will be in at some point this afternoon. unless every -- anything has changed over the weekend, i expect the house to continue to work on some of these piecemeal bills as we have called them. exchange. will likely they will pass a bill that makes sure furloughed employees get back pay once the shutdown is over. other than that, i do not expect much. host: david drucker, thank you for your time. here are some remarks from members of congress on the government shutdown.
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we would like to hear what you think about the government shutdown. in session until 2:00 eastern today. legislative business will begin at 5:45 with a debate over funding of the fta. recorder votes are expected to take place at 6:00 30 eastern. the senate meet at 2:00 eastern today. senators will continue speeches on the government shutdown an upcoming debt limit. coverage on c-e span two. the nation's highest court started its term today by turning away hundreds of appeals , including virginia's bid to revive its anti-sodomy law. the court has announced it will despite theally
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shutdown through the week. justices are hearing six arguments, including a challenge to limits on campaign contributions. they also agreed to hear cases on housing discrimination, the president recess appointments, abortion coverage, and cell phone privacy may find their way onto the courts calendar. here is more on the new term of the supreme court. we will show you as much of this as we can until the white house briefing set for 1:00 eastern. it is opening day for the supreme court. we have two veteran reporters of the court to talk about their agenda for this term. this is the headline in the unit your newspaper. the case follows contentious citizens, united rulings, and justices also weighing affirmative action, public prayer, and abortion. liptak.h us is
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let me begin with you. in your piece you write, the court new term which starts monday will feature an extraordinary case on constitutional issues including campaign contributions, abortion rights, affirmative action, public prayer, and presidential power. are we headed for another newsmaking term with the court ?host: and then here -- the last to the below terms were so spoiled with voting rights, same-sex marriage, health care, and then a term which the court is grappling with may get a little bit lost by comparison. by the standards not of the last two turned but of history, this is a rich term. host: why do you say that? term cane ordinary have one or two cases that capture the public imagination. here we have happened dozen.
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host: agree? guest: i agree, but it depends on how far the justices want to go. this is a core that has not shied away from broad decisions when it feels necessary. that is where the suspense comes. host: a lot of focus has been paid to what you get top billing to, campaign billing. what will they be hearing when it comes to this case? guest: it involves a cap on aggregate contributions. federalw under the campaign finance scheme, individuals can give a limited amount to each candidate or political committee but there is also an aggregate cap of $120,000 they can give to all candidates and committees combined. if you have more than $120,000 to give to political forces that
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you favor, your rights are being violated if you cannot give that much. who brought this case before the court? guest: and alabama businessman. i want to give to the 18th and 19th and 20th, and i do not understand why there is an overall aggregate cap on what i want to get if i do not abide. host, who is arguing the other the federal government who says this is a way to avoid corruption and to avoid people using interlocking committees to circumvent campaign-finance limits. you can think about it as a sequel to the citizens united case which looked at one side of the campaign-finance system. corporations unions, individuals can spend independently as much
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as they want. now we are looking at the other basic campaign-finance. this could be the beginning of the unraveling of that second like. who are you watching on the court? which one will play a pivotal role in this decision? guest: the key justice to look at is john roberts. the chief justices generally stepsmore incremental towards constitutional goals that he believes are important. prefer togeneral they avoid controversial's weeping decisions but not all members of the court agreed. in this case involving contribution limits, members of the court has said there should not be any limits on contributions. limits are believe
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constitutional. we do not know where the chief s stand on itther but it is possible they may wish to avoid shaking up the system in way citizens united did 2010. host: why would they avoid that? are conservative institutions. in general they do not like to make a earth shattering announcements because as an institution they are supposed to solemnity, steadiness, security. they are supposed to embody the stability in society. if there are lots of decisions that constantly change whenever there is a new member of the court to change the majority, it makes what they and to look more political and less judicial. or the public acceptance of what they do, the fact that these people rely on decisions, the courts tend not to shake things up so much the way that an
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elected official may want to, campaigning on a particular issue. the wall street journal editorial this morning. assuming the liberals go the other way, that makes chief justice roberts the swing vote. guest: obviously, you have to
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take the journal seriously. kidding. the journal will never forgive john roberts for his boat in health care case. that was a deep disappointment to the political right. they are hoping that he takes a bolder step in this campaign- finance area. the chief justices impulses are to be an incrementalist. he is sympathetic to his project of the regulating campaign- finance. but he is only 15 years old and is willing to play a long game and take it step-by-step. inhas shown that in the past decisions where he has made a minor step, criticized the right . justice scalia called one of his ax minimalism. this dynamic of the right wanting someone whom they could consider their guy so that they
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could grow faster and bigger, you see over and over. host: what is before the court, what are their options? narrowlye way to rule in these cases, assuming the chief justices agree with the general direction of removing these kind of limits on political spending is to say the of 100 $30,000 or so is unconstitutional because it does not serve any purpose beyond the purpose served by one atom called the base level limits, limits to individual candidates. that would leave intact these individual amounts, saying the anti-corruption goal of then that would serve the purpose. the way to go more broadly, and already we have three justices that have indicated that as their preference, is to remove the limits on contributions altogether.
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the buckwheat case you referenced a moment ago. that case distinguished between campaign expenditures which the limitedid ship not be and can't paint contributions. several justices do not believe that distinction makes sense. one retired justice said it does not make sense and both expenditures and contributions could be limited but three justices on the court now hold the view and that neither can. a big decision get rid of all occupations. i read in one of the papers that mitch mcconnell's lawyers will be arguing the case. the court sometimes gives anotherargument, allows party to take the case. i suspect it is because he has been a central figure. his name has been on important decisions, and in some respects,
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having another branch of government here is perspective. host: moving onto another case. nlrb. what is this about? guest: this is about the president's appointment power. the constitution says when the senate is in recess the president can make an appointment without such senate approval. the question in the case is what happens is the senate is on a short break. is that good enough, does the recess appointment power kick in? a lower court decided to leapfrog the question of whether it is a short break and asked, what the reason is in the constitution means at all and came to the con collusion that the only reason that counts is the one that counts between sessions of congress. if the court were to uphold that interpretation, it would dramatically limit a power that residents of all parties have used routinely. >> how did this case come before the court?
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there was a stalemate between republican blocking majority members of the national labor relations board that the president has nominated. this is a bore that make decisions involving the national labor relations act and employers. the courts have previously held it cannot act unless it has a quorum, so the board only had two confirmed members. it could not do anything in effect. it was neutralized. the president, frustrated by this recess appointed a majority of the members of the nlrb, started making decisions. an employer who lost the case filed student and said it cannot make decisions because those members are not legitimately in office. host: is it unprecedented that it got to the court as quickly as it did? not really.
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an appeal from the national religions board goes directly to a federal appears court. it does not go to a trial court. then the government appealed that decision to the supreme court and they took it. other courts have reached different conclusions on the same question. , what is at stake is a century or more of practice in washington by both parties, but the main authority that the government has operated on has been opinions from the department of justice rather than the courts. in some ways you can look at it as a case of the definite article versus the indefinite article. what does the word the recess mean in contrast to a recess host: those are two cases that court watchers like yourself will be viewing. "the new york times," starting on monday, notable for the major
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precedents overruled or reversed, how many cases is the court going to be taking up in this new term? how many will get media attention? guest: the court decides about 70 to 75 cases per year and i would say maybe eight to 10 are candidates for the front page, focusing public attention. so far they have not decided on all the cases they are going to take. but of those there are already six or seven pretty ones. >> in your opinion, what should we talk about next? >> tomorrow we will have the case that we started talking about and one week later we will have another angle. last week the court ducked the question as to whether the court allowed public university to take account of race and now we
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have flipped the question, the question now is if michigan voters, could they say that they did not want such racial preferences? and whether they are entitled to do that. in a sense whether the constitution requires it. here the argument is if in passing that kind of amendment the michigan voters restructure the political process in a way that disadvantaged. guest: the state of michigan attorney general are defending this referendum that the voters passed, so that is one side, the other side is civil rights groups and fro affirmative action groups contending that this measure, that the affirmative action itself is not the direct action for the court, the way that it was framed is
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have michigan voters taken steps to disenfranchise voters from the opportunities for admissions preferences that other groups have. other sorts of groups are allowed to seek preferences from the admissions office. but minorities have to amend the constitution again to seek preference. minorities being kicked out of the process and the restructuring mentioned as opposed to the requirement. that is the argument. host: those are three of the major cases that the court will take up. they will be considering the rules for religious invocations before legislative bodies. in december the court will
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examine the proof needed to show discrimination under the fair housing act. awaiting scheduling is the so- called abortion bill under -- introduced under the name ru 400 86. we will get your thoughts, questions, and comments on them getting now. lauren, minneapolis. go ahead. caller: unfortunately, my question is in regards to the current quick -- not to the cases you talked about, but potentially an upcoming case that could come into affect. the ncaa said that they would fight this through the supreme court. the gentleman may be more familiar with that case, whether or not people get -- college sport athletes can get stuff
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like that or if they can use their rate and stuff. i believe that the gaming company electronic arts just paid like $40 million to buy out and they are going forward to fight it to the supreme court. host: adam liptak, do you know the case? guest: fighting to the supreme court is something that is said a lot. i think what we are talking about is the so-called right of publicity, whether video game manufacturers can use the likenesses of college athletes without paying them. there is a significant first amendment issue in the case of both of the court of appeals in philadelphia and san francisco, who ruled against the companies, and as the caller said, at least one of the cases was settled for $40 million.
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host: this from twitter -- guest: the case coming up in the story comes from upstate new york, a town called greece, it has to do with the prayers the begin the meeting of the town board. there are some, in some senses, contradictions within the constitutional dirt -- constitutional tradition. one has to do with prayers. thomas jefferson used the phrase wall of separation between church and state and yes, the continental congress and until this day they have begun their meetings with prayers brought by a minister, rabbi, or other religious figure. the question is -- how much prayer is too much prayer? how much becomes a constitutional problem when it is seen by the courts to be
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advocating one religion over all others or denigrating religions or excluding people, these are the concepts that the courts look at when they decide the level of ray or before a public meeting. this case does not really challenge the concept of prayer is altogether before a public official meeting. it would be extraordinary if the court so found that they could not have these prayers. i am certain they would find that some form of prayer is acceptable, but the rules that this town used in selecting the people that came before it to pray meets a constitutional standard, there is some indication that the supreme court will feel that the town of greece was ok, the lower court, which found they favored christianity, applied to a strict level of review to the way the town selected efficiency, but we will have to see them to be sure.
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host: that was expected to come up next month. florida, lonnie. caller: i wanted to comment on the lemonheads. the amount of money that private donors can donate to political parties. i believe that the real problem there is that quite often these political parties are not associated with the ad, but they really are. and they lie in these ads, there are no controls. if the candidate that is being lied about comes back and defends himself against the ad,
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then the problem is you give validity to the ad. and the -- so, they don't defend themselves and you have unlimited money going into a lie. host: all right, adam liptak, "the new york times." guest: the basic thought is that the speech of first amendment politics is about heart of it and they said at least that when the spending is uncoordinated with a candidate it is ok for people, corporations, and unions to say what they like, but the caller is quite correct, it could lead to a real mess. that kind of rough and tumble is nothing new with the political system. in the early part of the public the republic, they were very rough.
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host: one argument is that if you do away with limits from wealthy donors, it helps challengers and hurts incumbents. that the whole point was to keep a hold of their seats. guest: that is a very nice point, greta. the people that they put in place are the people they may protect. incumbent protection may be an underlying goal of finance writer laois and and what the first amendment does is be skeptical of the government saying who can speak and who cannot. there is a line of thinking that is quite consistent with that. host: bill, independent caller. caller: the case in greece, i
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think the suit was brought about because someone felt that only christianity or christian prayer was being used rather than other ones, but that is not what i called for. i called because i have also heard about this case about campaign contributions, that they wanted to be able to just dump money into the coffers of the politicians. just unlimited. they do not want to declare who is giving the money and they want to be able to just put it in the bank anonymously. guest: there are people who are critics of the whole campaign finance system, particularly since watergate, who want that privilege, who argue that exposing the identity of donors infringes their first amendment rights because they might be more reluctant to give money if everyone were able to see who
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they were giving it to. but that is not an issue in this case as the court has framed it. it has to do with limits on contributions, particularly the aggregate cap. in citizens united we saw the case began as a narrow question and the supreme court found that they needed to reach a much broader question regarding political spending in order to resolve it and there is always a chance that the court could choose to seek new argument or do more things to open the scope. right now i would say that the aggregate cap constitutionality altogether is enough for the just -- justices at the moment. host: iowa, jodi, good morning. caller: good morning, how are you all? i have three real quick
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questions. host: ok. caller: gentlemen, i am assuming that both of you have read the constitution. guest: is that a question? the answer is yes. caller: ok. the first thing i am confused about, the supreme court under the obama law had to rewrite the tax code in order to make it a law, correct? guest: that is not how they have put it erie of the chief justice said that the key provision was susceptible to to readings and he was going to read it as constitutional. guest: based on what? part of the constitution? guest: the spending clause -- caller: based on what? part of the constitution? guest: the spending clause. caller: ok, my next question is i thought only the house of representatives could make taxes, not the supreme court. that is why i am confused about that. guest: that is exactly
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what the chief justice said, the house and the senate had passed a law that did impose this kind of structure. host: get your questions answered? caller: that was one, the next is you are talking about individual contributions. you just read this morning mayor bloomberg going to give cory walker $1 million. is he legally allowed to do that? guest: he can spend money independently to support. i guess the truth is he is a state candidate, so it depends on state law. i take it back. and then he can give $2600 per election cycle. host: it is an independent ad campaign he is doing. guest: that is a question that often gets lost, citizens united
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says that so long as you spend independently, uncoordinated, you can spend what you like, but if you want to give directly there are strict limits. guest: and that would not affect mayor bloomberg's ability to spend his own money. if he is an individual spending it independently, he could have done it before citizens united. host: alex, you are up next. independent caller. good morning. caller: the things i wanted to mention, the rights and the rules, if every third-party reached every other position in the supreme court, they should change what is neutral to
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support republicans or democrats. obama should do his job and do it wiser, and i am afraid he is not doing his job exactly as we want them to. host: tina, alabama. caller: part of the constitution says that the free exercise thereof shall be left to the citizens on the practice of religion. host: who are you referring to? guest: this is a question -- sure -- well, the free exercise clause in the constitution does not come into play here because we are talking about a government meeting. there is nothing in the practice of the town of greece, new york, that interferes with anyone's
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practice of going to church or anything like that, the only question is whether the town government itself, when it sponsors a prayer, when it invites people to come and pray, it provides a forum. sometimes these clauses overlap. the free exercise of religion this is really a question of if the state is going to far for the establishment of religion. it is not infringing anybody's power or right to go and pray within the town of greece. host: we are speaking to jess bravin and adam liptak. republicans have been lining up outside to get the limited
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seating they have inside the court, and supporters will be going up there as well. what happens on opening day? guest: nothing special. the courts get down to business and here a couple of cases, one involving age discrimination, the other involving securities fraud, like most of their cases they are relatively technical and routine. host: and then what happens? they work every day until when? guest: june is when they usually issue their biggest cases. guest: they hear arguments to the month of april. people coming to view washington, it is an essential part of government, so they are open and they typically here arguments three days a week, two days a month, through april, and then they essentially disappear from public view for a couple
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months until the last bastion of opinions come out in june and they take a recess from july until they come back in the first monday of october. host: justice kennedy has been called the man to watch before. who's court with a he this time? guest: particularly in five-four cases, he is the guy to watch. he swung right 10 times, swung left six times, that is sort of typical. he is the key in many, but not all cases. the other key to watch is the chief justice who holds the key to an extent, justice alito, who when he replaced o'connor 2006 took a moderate position and move the court to the right. host: a lot of people are saying
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that it will be justice alito's court. guest: that is because he was the first person in many years to change, according to some, the alignment of the court. regarding from evident -- affirmative action, justice o'connor used to split the difference, religion, she saw herself coming up with solutions. she had a very pragmatic cowgirl kind of approach. justice alito comes out of a different judicial tradition. he grew up as a lawyer during the reagan administration and has a fairly clear, definite, conservative philosophical approaches to questions, so on many of these matters that were decided 5 -- four with justice o'connor in the majority -- a 5- 4 with justice o'connor in the majority, they may change if it is believed they aired in their
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past up to -- past approach. host: what is the chance that we will see another retirement at the end of this term? guest: for the longest time everyone thought it was justice ginsburg, who is 80, but she has given no few interviews in which she has said she enjoys her position as a senior member of the liberal wing of the court and all the indications are that she may hang on into the next term. she told bob barnes and a nice profile over the weekend that she believes the next will be a democrat, meaning there is no strategic reason for her to step down. host: we were showing our viewers the cover from that interview. just getting some color from
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these justices and their time off as they begin their new term today, bob barnes writes -- host: that is what struck me, 80 something years old and she is staying up till 2:30 in the morning. guest: she has always been a night owl, but she has a lot of energy, is sharp as a whip. if you take her at her word, she may not be going anywhere.
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if you take justice ginsburg out of the equation, it is not clear that anyone else will go voluntarily. guest: they could be seen as volunteering their work, in sense they are working for free, saving us the cost of hiring another justice. host: explain that. guest: if you served for so many years, you can retire at full salary depending on how long you have been on the bench. by continuing to work rather than retiring, she is collecting her. array but there is no new justice to replace her, so in fact she is working for free. justice scalia has commented several times that he is essentially a volunteer at the court erie people who want to save taxpayer dollars should hope that the rest of them keep working for free as long as possible.
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host: is the court impacted by that gecko guest: they have announced in the short-term release that they have the funds to continue and have deemed themselves essential. there probably comes a time when the judicial system starts to show the effectively shut down. host: back to the calls. richard, ohio, republican caller, thanks for waiting. go ahead. caller: my question is -- the president of the united states has a constitutional right to change or alter an existing law without the house of representatives or the senate passing a comparable legislation? guest: can you be more specific? caller: specifically concerning extending the employer mandate. guest: a lot of statutes give a lot of discretion to the executive branch and the agencies that have to carry about because congress cannot anticipate everything that has
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to happen when designing air traffic control systems, what have you. many differ to the function of carrying them out. they do not consider that changing the law, they consider that implementing the law. guest: there is likely to be another affordable care act challenge. now, to the question of whether employers have to provide contraception coverage to their employees, insurance coverage, there are lower courts to have split on the question in a way that is equal to citizens united because the question is whether secular for-profit corporations have free exercise of those rights as we learned they have free speech rights. in that case the solicitor general of the united states said they have a 99% chance to 100% chance in this term.
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it has religion, sex, it is a journalistic dream. [laughter] host: laura, next caller. caller: i wanted to ask, because it really baffles my mind, everyone fighting over the affordable care act, when we brothers and the special interest groups giving billions of dollars to senators and all to go fight like for the pharmaceuticals why can they not put a cap on that gecko if i had $1 billion to donate and wanted to open something gecko guest: something? you know what i mean? wouldn't do it, but i couldn't
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do it. guest: when we talked about political campaign engineering, they first said that congress shall not abridge the freedom of speech. that is supposed to be the core part of the first amendment. some members of the court in the minority and test the minority say that money is property, not -- contest the idea that money equals speech. they say money is property, not speech. other members of the court these days believe that that money is essentially speech because you cannot talk and no one can hear you. it takes money to buy advertisements or a biomedical phone or prince handbills from your own printer. all of those things cost money. that is really one of the conceptual divides of the supreme court right now.
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host: this case before the court, they will hear arguments on tuesday. guest: it is one thing to say that you can spend your own money on coordinated with the candidate and say what you like, it is another thing for the coke others to give $1 billion to senator. they aren't allowed to do that. they can give a limited amount directly to the candidate and the question in this case is whether the debt limit is in the constitution. -- that direct limit of candidates is constitutional. host: the court will hear those arguments on tuesday. thank you both, appreciate your time. we will continue taking a look -- will -- theg court supreme court will continue to work normally at least through the end of this week.
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the justices are scheduled to hear 50 cases this term on issues ranging from affirmative- action and freedom of speech to the president from power to make appointments. -- the u.s. house is in recess until 2:00 p.m. eastern. consider temporary fda fund thefunds to program until december 13. the senate will also start their day at 2 p.m.. we expect more discussion of the government shutdown and the debt limit. you can see live coverage on our companion network c-span2. be a hearing on possible fraud and abuse in social security benefits for the disabled. for informers at daschle social security -- current and former
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members of the social security administration will attend. president obama is thinking federal employees for their hard work, especially the last few days. they are talking about preparing for violent weather in the midwest. we are likely to hear about that during the briefing. that is set to begin -- actually it was set to begin at 1:00. it is running a little bit late. we are also expecting more on the capture of a high-value terrorist leader. the will get underway with white house press secretary jay carney here on c-span.
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>> again, waiting for the start of today's white house press briefing with jay carney. we will have that in its underway life here on c-span. though, a look from today's washington journal. >> look outside at the supreme 2014-2014t begins its year. it has a deep dockets. clerks,cumbent on the the law clerks of the supreme court to do this job. we have two former clerks with us. we have a former clerk for justice breyer and william j, a former clerk for justice scalia. thank you both. we appreciate your time.
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let me begin with you. what does a law clerk do? the short answer is they do what the justices meet and the justices use their law clerks in different ways. the justice that the tone. the law clerk's job is to be useful to the justice. some justices use the law clerk for research, sifting through cases with a lot of transcripts. justice breyer likes to tell the world that he has had his law in theread every case world about this particular subject. willce scalia, my old job, ask for the first draft of opinions, but he rewrites them very heavily. did you experience that firsthand? guest: absolutely.
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host: what have the law clerks done to prepare for today? i can speak personally about this. writtenks will have bench members typically in those cases. they take a shot at analyzing the case, giving the clerk their perspective after doing research, digging deeper beyond the brief to give the justice as since of where the key pivot points live. will appears, it that the justice has come with her limitary thoughts to the clerk, so the clerk will devote special time in preparing those issues. it will essentially be this
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written dialogue between the justice and the clerk before the argument, essentially using the a sounding board. those are some of the steps that oh into the floor. as far as the cases picked for this new term, how many do the law clerks have to sit through, and are they the cases?pers for these the law clerk's job is to do a request for the petition. there?ow many are i saw one figure -- over 8000? was going to say 7000.
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they are less prepared, in a less formal fashion, often by cannot afford a lawyer or who have had lawyers appointed for them. some of run the gamut. them are just as sophisticated and meritorious as any petition and some are difficult to understand, and written, perhaps need a little extra help sifting before you can even understand ist the case is. >> so it the difference -- what does the law clerk do? what is their job? -- guest: the argument is be,as refined as it might and the job is to delve into
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those papers and see if there is mightially an issue that warrant the review and to lay criteria.n the one of the main issues is whether there is a conflict between the courts below, and if the supreme court has to clarify. they have to see if there is really a conflict that would warrant the intervention. host: has that happened? a lawyer list petition making it to the court? -- lawyerless petition made it to the court gecko guest: there were 2 -- court? guest: there were two last term, so it does happen. it does not happen often, but it does happen regularly.
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guest: even if the issues are not presented in as sophisticated of a way, if it really is the kind of question that the court should be taking up, that will be brought to the attention of the justices. the case mentioned makes it clear, once a case is taken up you get the full benefit of the presentation. in the case mentioned they were appointed as friends to the court. the court had top-notch advocacy on both sides. the case started coming out of guam. guest: exactly. this is one of the few times where the clerks are not necessarily working for their particular justice, but are
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working for eight of the nine justices. it is the inside lingo for it. screening all 8000 cases on their own, ensuring the second pair, this is a bit of a different function where you are pinpointing your arguments. here it is broader, eight out of nine, providing an objective analysis on whether it meets certain pride -- certain materia. -- certain criteria. host: to better understand the role of the law clerk, we want to show you a compilation as part of our 2010 supreme court documentary, talking about their role.
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[video clip] >> something different goes on here than what goes on in the capitol building or the white house and you need to appreciate how important it is to our system of government. >> this is the highest court in the land and the framers created it after studying the great lawmakers of history. >> the government can see that the destruction of documents or seeds history. >> you do not sit here deciding who should win, we decide under the law that the people adopted who wins. >> you will be surprised by the high level of collegiality. >> if fo you are -- if four out of nine want to hear the cases, we will hear them. >> this court decides important questions, which means you have to do your best to get it right.
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>> why is it that we have elegant, astonishingly beautiful structures imposed echo it is to remind us that they have an important unction and remind the public when they see the building of the importance and centrality of the law. >> it always gives me faith in our country to know how much people trust the courts. >> the danger is that sometimes you could come into a building -- >> we believe this discussion to go live now to the white house for the rest briefing. here is white house spokesman jay carney. afternoon on this very rainy monday. thank you for being here. i trust that you heard the
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president speak at fema, where he talked about the hard work agency on behalf of the american people, the hard work that continues there, despite the effects of shutdown there as elsewhere. and about the need for congress to pass a budget, open the government, pass a bill so that the united states can't this it -- can pay its bills and not continue to do or threaten damage to our economy. before i take your questions i wanted to note earlier today the president received another up dates on the effects of the mastern from alissa monico, rob neighbors, and sylvia berlin. is of the items they noted
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in total we have seen headstart closures in six states -- alabama, connecticut, florida, georgia, mississippi, and south by seven grantees who operate approximately 100 centers. this comes on top of the 57,000 children cut from headstart this year in every state in the nation due to the harmful effects of sequestration. , there are multiple negative consequences to the shutdown of the government, a choice made by house republicans to do this, and those effects are being felt in the second week since they made that choice. it is really bad. >> thank you. said that he would negotiate with the republicans on a variety of topics after they passed the clean cr. i wonder if the white house would in somehow in more specific terms lay out what they
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are actually willing to negotiate on to somehow put it in the bill or some negotiable way to give speaker boehner a little bit of cover to take the bill to the floor question mark >> let me say two things about that. i appreciate the question. the president has laid out what he is willing to do and negotiate in his budget. and the president said at the time when he released his budget that he knew he would not get it past verbatim -- passed verbatim, that more negotiation and compromise would be required. but what is also required is for republicans to compromise and negotiate. and the president has been open to negotiation all year long and he remains so today when it comes to how we make our choices -- ournd our priority
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priorities and our budget, to make sure our economy grows, make those choices in a way that ensures our economy grows in a manner that most helps the middle class. because the stronger our middle- class, the debt or the country does. that is what history has taught us. allthe door has been open year long. again and again and again, republicans have, when it came to the process in the senate and the house that they demanded, refused to appoint conferees for that regular order to continue the negotiations could take place there. even in meetings with the president, some of which were productive and thoughtful, republican lawmakers never came back with a compromise proposal of their own. but he is ready to do that. just not under threat of shutdown. not under threat of default.
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those are fundamental core responsibilities of congress that they need to fulfill, and he won't allow the american people and the economy and the american economy to be held hostage to ideological demands in return for fulfilling those simple functions. let me also say when it comes to putting a bill on the floor of the house, which the speaker could do today to reopen the government, because apparently everyone but the speaker is confident that that bill would receive a majority in the house and would receive vote from republicans as well as democrats , that would be simply extending government funding at levels that republicans set. let's be clear. democrats have been going along with a temporary continuing resolution to ensure the government would shut down. -- would not shut down and allow
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time -- would not shut down. is not a fulfillment of democratic priorities. you know that. democrats and the president have asked for and believe it is necessary to have additional funding beyond the levels that by the cr, but have made no demands associated with that. none whatsoever. euro. -- zero. >> you're making these points before the government shutdown and it does not seem to be having an impact on speaker boehner. i understand the point that you are making. given that the politics in the house seem to make it is difficult for him to it on the floor the cr, isn't there tothing the president can do give the house what they want to give boehner the cover? >> the question contains within
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it, i think, the essence of why americans hate the dysfunction here. the suggestion is the speaker of the house cannot do the obvious and right thing because of his internal party politics. that this has to do with, you know, his job as opposed to the jobs of those who have been furloughed, or the jobs of those americans who would be out of the house republicans were to allow the unthinkable, which is to default on our obligations. i hope and do not want to believe that is the case. there are republicans and the speaker has said, they have staked out their position. they insist on getting something out of this. extracting some political concession in return for opening the people's government, in
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return for paying the bills they racked up. what the president is saying is we can't do that because that would be putting in jeopardy the stability of our economy for the long-term, and it would do great harm to our democratic system if every time it was necessary for the united states to take action , apay its obligations minority in congress, a faction of one party in one house of one branch of government. could mae a series of ideological demands and refused to pay our bills if they did not get it. willdless of party -- that be true of a republican were sitting in the oval office and the roles were reversed. it is a president that should not and must not be set. [indiscernible] of keepinge benefits
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him in international waters? confirm thatously he was arrested and is in u.s. custody. have more details for you. the confirmation do use military force in 2001 authorizes the use of military force against al qaeda and related forces. the operation was made possible by the superb work and coordination across our national security organizations and the intelligence community. the fact of the matter is that libi has been
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hiscted in connection with -- in connection with al qaeda plots to attack u.s. embassies around the world. that indictment has been pending , and we believe in a system that brings people to justice indictment, and that is what we are witnessing now. yes? today, james sperling said he would not rule out the possibility of a debt limit increase that would last only two or three weeks to give a short amount of time to talk further.
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with the president except something like that? >> there has been some misunderstanding about this. we do not, at the white house, get to raise the debt ceiling. we don't get to set the time frame under which the debt ceiling is raised for the duration of this raising of the debt ceiling. it is our view, as i think both those officials stated this morning, that since the whole argument is to remove uncertainty, the uncertainty created by the threat of default, the threat of not raising the debt ceiling, that the longer you raise the debt ceiling or, the better, and we will -- the debt ceiling for, the better, and we will support a movement to raise the debt ceiling for year. that would certainly be viewed here is something we did support.
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but we don't get to make those determinations. what our position has always been was not raise it for a certain amount of time. it has been raise the debt ceiling without drama and delay. , ourver the duration position will not change, which is raise it so that the united states can continue to pay its bills and continue to ensure that the world knows we are good to our word and we fulfill our obligations, and when it comes up again, our position will still be, we will not negotiate over congress's responsibility is to pay the bills that congress racked up. so, i think a way to view this is really around the issue of certainty. constructive is past experience in our recent task here to demonstrate how
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this works. in 2011, republicans and the firstecided for time in our history to threaten default if they did not get what they wanted out of negotiations over the budget. that threat, once people realized it was real, caused significant harm to our economy. default did not happen. cause harm.f it measurable harm. d a downgrade of our credit for the first time in our history. eight months ago, the congress -- essentially the same congress ceilingded the debt without drama, without delay, without making a lot of ideological demands. until, you know, time we'red of
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running up against now. i think you saw not only there were no harmful effects to our economy, there were positive impacts, if you can it dollars the lack of drama, lack of uncertainty about raising the debt ceiling contributed to sustained economic growth and contributed to the significant job creation we have seen this year. we saw what happened when you mess around with things. when you threatened default in 2011. you saw what happened when raise the debt ceiling without making these kinds of threats. certainty is what it is about in our view. boehner said there would be no increase in the debt limit without -- [indiscernible] >> dr. getting -- contradicting a host of times when he himself said we would not default. we now see the leader of the republican party on capitol hill saying he will not raise the debt ceiling if republicans do not get what they want.
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that is highly reckless and irresponsible. is astounding, really, if you think about it. on october 7, given how little time there is left, that the speaker of the house is announcing to the world he will not allow a bill to raise the debt ceiling pass if republicans do not get their specific commands. that is very -- john, i am having a conversation here. i am sure what you would -- i'm sure you will represent what the speaker is saying in a minute. no. -- mark,e would not you asked the question. is your say what it understanding the speaker said? >> the speaker apparently said in no case will he raise the debt ceiling without concessions from the president.
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>> and our position is, this is too important to demand political concessions in return for fulfilling our responsibility by congress to ensure we pay our debts and do not default. over the weekend, apparently the rate in somalia failed to capture the intended target. can you talk about whether the president ordered that specific rate and if he was disappointed with the outcome? say the president approved both operations in libya and somalia. although it is -- it is important to note that although they happened at the same time, these were two different operations that operated separately. there is discretion given to commanders as to when the initiate and fulfill those missions, so it is a coincidence they happened at the same time. i think it is an ordinance -- it is important, because there's a lot of conflation of the two.
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mission in somalia, most of the questions about it, i would defer to the department of defense, but i can confirm october 4, the u.s. military personnel were involved in a counterterrorism operation. against a known al-shabaab terrorist. no u.s. personnel were injured .r killed again, for more information about that operation, i would refer you to the department of defense. jeff? -- it'sthe speaker said fair to say it would help if you had a short term debt ceiling increase to turn down the temperature, give both sides little room to talk about this -- asking,i'm glad you are because i know you have been remarking about this as though it is huge news -- >> that is not the case.
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understand it has been out there. our position has never been to say the debt ceiling should be raised for a certain time. our position has been the debt ceiling should be raised without drama or delay. if the problem around these votes is always been the uncertainty created by threat, at least in 2011 and this year, by republicans not to raise the debt ceiling, not to fulfill their obligations to ensure the united states opens the vault, unless they get what they want and they have a list of demands. again, what my two colleagues -- , that thereporting might be some conciliatory language coming out of this white house with respect to a debt ceiling increase of -- >> all i am saying is -- >> you are saying -- we have never stated and are not saying today
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the debt ceiling ought to be or can't be any particular length of time. , the our view the longer longer debt ceiling increase, the substantial debt ceiling is a good thing and we would support what senate democrats are initiating now, which is a bill that would extend the debt ceiling for a year. but whether it is for that amount of time or shorter time, what will not change is the president's view that he cannot a ransomnot allow for situation to occur when it comes to fulfilling that responsibility. he will not. he will make no demands from congress. will ask for nothing in congress in return for
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congress raising the debt ceiling. and that will be true this time and it will be true next time, whenever that is. out a specific duration, and i want to make that clear. i'm just saying our view is longer is better, because we continue to have these -- at least of late -- we continue to have the suggestions from republicans that they would threatened default if they don't get what they want. and i think that congress ches his it rea determination about what it's going to do here, they have to take into consideration when they want to deal with this themselves. it is no mystery for those who cover congress or know how it works, this is not a pleasant vote for a lot of members. , there have been times when congress has increased the debt ceiling for a longer duration, for that reason
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as well as others i have mentioned. the administration know what a debt default would look like? >> it will look bad, jim. >> what would it look like? >> there are independent reports out there about the consequences of default would be. i would refer you to the department of treasury for more information about our view. we are hard-pressed to say with any specificity what the catastrophe would look like since it has never occurred before. and we know from the 2011 experience, and you saw the report from the treasury last week, what even the threat of default can do to our economy, can do to our economic growth and job creation, what it can do to confidence and the willingness of investors globally to invest in the united states. we know those consequences would be severe. i don't think anyone credible
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doubts that when you talk about suggesting the idea that somehow the fault would not be so bad. -- default would not be so bad. they are really wrong. i don't think any credible economist for financial institution would take this claim seriously. >> as you know, who has been thee to the president over years, said we will not go into default on october 17. is he wrong? >> yes. i don't know if he is talking about prioritization, but prioritization is debt by another name. -- default by another name. when you are the united states of america -- us keep it local here. if you pay some of your bills, but not all of your bills, you are default on all of the bills
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you did not pay. moreover your credit rating even if youhless paid some of your bills. the next time you try to get a say, well innot know i can pay my budget. i know i did not pay the phone bill and my cable bill, but i paid my mortgage. you have to pay all of your bills. that's how you maintain credit worthiness. prioritization is the fault. -- is default. the treasury department has laid out they run out of measures to postpone the fault -- default, and that will create a scenario we have never seen before if the house republicans and we cannot pay our bills.
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president willing to create a situation where the republicans would offer a permanent increase in the debt ceiling? offer ist sure that available or on the table or what you mean exactly. if republicans act and allow congress to act to raise the debt ceiling for whatever duration, that obviously need the condition the president set and he is willing to negotiate -- assuming they also act to reopen the government -- but situation where the president says, yes, he will negotiate. because he has been. that is the thing that is so important to remember. the president has been negotiating and has demonstrated a willingness to negotiate all year long.
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in the process that the republicans demand, demand is that this must take place when it comes to passing budgets and those budgets which obviously were different, the one in the senate and the one in the house, being reconciled through a conference, the president said, ok, let's do that. democrats in the senate said, ok, let's do that. that was a principal demand of republicans in negotiations last year. then of course once we did what they asked, they refused to do what they said they wanted to do, which was allowed conference to take place where those budgets could be hammered out. and this could be eliminated and a compromise could be reached. the president is very eager to start the process again, but not under threat of default, and not under threat of continuing shutdown. has said that he is not going to pass a clean
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debt limit increase. he is not going to have a closed at limit increase. if the speaker of the house sticks to that position, are we going to default? >> you would have to ask the speaker of the house. >> if he sticks to that position, are we going to default? that if thee saying speaker attaches to the debt to increase a recognition of, you know, the importance of motherhood, we might except that. .- accept that i'm trying to be funny, but nobody laughed. i apologize. shutdown a long already. we are not going to negotiate about congress fell responsibility to raise the debt ceiling. ist he and others have said they want concessions from the president, presumably because they could not get them through other legislative or electoral
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means, concessions from the president in return for raising the debt ceiling. to, youamic amounts know, in attempt to extort from the executive branch and democrats in congress concessions in order to prevent default. that's off the table. for not doing that. the damage to our economy in the long term and to the ability of this president and future presidents -- i mean, this president's successors and future congresses to make sure we do not become a laughingstock internationally because we either come to the verge or point of default every quarter or every year, or we do default every quarter or every year, we cannot have that. the president is making clear, he's not asking for anything in return from congress. for congress to do its job. when it comes to opening the government when it comes to
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setting levels of spending republicans upset. he is not after anything from congress for congress to do its job and paying our bills. >> so we do go into default? >> the president's position is clear. positionscans' change with every new day on the calendar. i cannot predict where the speaker's position is going to be. >> was the speaker of the house not telling the truth when he said there are are not the votes to pass the clean spending bill? not done the vote counts here, especially among republicans. i am just noting there have been public accounts, i think more than 20 now -- has 21. house republicans have said on the record in public they would vote for clean cr, the one that
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passed the senate already. if you add the democrats who would vote for a clean cr, you have the majority you need. i would note other republican , as well ashe house other republican commentators and political folks who know a lot about republicans in the house, have said at least that many would vote for clean cr if the house speaker would allow it to come to the floor. we responded over the weekend or yesterday when the speaker said that, i think if he is sure that he is right, that the majority does not exist, then he should put it to a vote. why not vote? just vote. we could resolve this, but the dispute about who is wrong and there is aht that majority and the shutdown if you
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would simply allow it to come to a vote. >> how many people have attempted to access the website for health care? >> let me see what -- what facts and figures i have. as of now, from the first 72 .gov had over 6re million unique users. there were six times as many on that website that have ever been on the medicare website at once. >> you still don't know how many people have signed up? >> let me be clear about it. when it comes to enrollment data, we will release data on regular monthly intervals just like was done in massachusetts and just like what is done when it comes to medicare part d. peoplecan confirm now is are signing up through federal
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exchanges, but this is an aggregation process and we are not going to release data on an hourly or daily races. we will follow the models for existing programs including the similar program in massachusetts and medicare part d, which is the most recent weatherall example of this kind of thing and will release a moment data intervals.y, monthly >> you can track him he people go to the website, but not how many people -- >> this is a large volume. we have a rough estimate about the volume. one of the reasons we have provided the information about the volume is it is the principal reason we have had slowdowns and other issues we have had to resolve to make the consumer experience better. >> you mention the january experience of raising the debt ceiling. as you are probably aware, there was a sidecar understanding
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about raising the debt ceiling. was that attached -- was not attached to the debt ceiling, but was a sidebar of understanding. model, is that something the white house would be open to? >> a sidecar? >> yes. it's not a brand-new legislative technique. >> what he means there and i think it is an important question -- our position has been congress should raise the debt ceiling without drama or delay. so, how they do that -- and i have answered this in different ways when it comes to past congresses in past years when the debt ceiling has been raised without drama or delay -- >> as in january -- >> you are talking about the distinction between clean and without drama or delay. it is true in the past prior to
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2011, there have been times when raising the debt ceiling has been attached to something, but there has not been a threat made by one party to withhold payment or allow for default if they do not get what they want. so, i'm not going to -- >> the republicans had a procedural priority -- [indiscernible] i know the drill about them doing that. so, they achieve something that they want. thathey achieve something they were seeking that was unrelated to the debt ceiling, and it was all within the same legislative neighborhood. you know what i'm saying? is that something that could be achieved in this context? could other things we added -- >> we support the efforts being worked on now by senate democrats for a clean bill
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raising the debt sewing. our position has always been congress needs to raise the debt ceiling so the united states can pay the ills congress has racked up without drama or delay. how they do that, i'm not going to ossify or rule out anything. , we i'm going to say is cannot negotiate over a series ideological demands or concessions from the president on spending priorities in return for congress fulfilling its responsibility. how they fulfill it, as long as it is without drama or brinkmanship were threatening default, it's up to them. the duration, again, is up to them. bethe duration can sometimes a political question, because the longer you extended it, the more money is being added to the debt ceiling, and for some
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constituents, for some of these members, that is a problem. when you say that is acceptable, that sends a signal to the congress. is that the signal you intend to send? >> as i explained to jim, we are not sending a signal about duration beyond saying -- >> [indiscernible] >> what we will say is whether weekstoday or a number of from now or number of months from now or number of years from now, it will always be congress fell responsibility to raise our debt doing -- our debt ceiling so the united states can pay the bills that congress has incurred and it will always be president obama from position that that responsibility is not negotiable. it's not -- there is not a game of trading for political priorities or agenda items that
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in this case republicans have not been able to achieve through legislation or through the ballot box. >> what is the policy reason not to take up the house republican offer on the case of fema? the fact that the president said that we dodged a bullet. fema would be up and ready. >> may comes to response to disasters, there is a fund that is funded that is available that is different from the shutdown process, and we made that clear in the run-up to that tropical storm, and its possible negative consequences for the united aides. there's a whole -- for the united states. there's a whole series of negative consequences that could occur. it makes the question. why not open up the government? if you're going to say this is ok and that is ok and this is ok -- some of the things they say
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are ok is because they have been raised in the media by you guys about impacts whether it is in ih or fema. -- nih or fema. our position is open the government. openly government. why play these games? open the government. continue funding it at levels republicans embrace -- in many cases with weat enthusiasm -- so that can then continue to discuss our noter-term budget deal, with the government shutdown and not with the threat of the shutdown. >> you can see the rest of today's briefing online at c- span.org
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the speaker pro tempore: the house will be in order. the prayer will be offered today by our guest chaplain, reverend andrew walton, capitol hill presbyterian church, washington, d.c. the chaplain: let us pray god of light and life, our prayer