responsible about that. preventing this should be simple. as i said, raising the debt ceiling is a lousy name which is why members of congress in both parties don't like to vote on it because it makes you vulnerable in political campaigns, but it does not increase our debt. it does not grow our deficits. it does not allow for a single dime of increased spending. all it does is allow the treasury department to pay for andwhat congress has already spent. but as i said, it's always a tough vote. people don't like doing it. although it has been done 45 times since ronald reagan took office. nobody in the past has ever seriously threatened to breach the debt ceiling until the last two years. and this is the creditworthiness of the united states we are talking about. this is our word. this is our good name. this is real. and the government shutdown millions of americans face inconvenience or outright hardship in an economic shutdown , every american could see their

401-k's and home values fall, borrowing costs for mortgages and student loans rise, and there would be a significant risk of a very deep recession. at a time when we are still climbing our way out of the worst recession in our lifetimes. the american people have already fought too hard and too long to come back from one crisis only to see a handful of more extreme republicans in the house of representatives precipitate another one. the good news is over the past 3 1/2 years our businesses have created 7.5 million new jobs. our housing market is healing. we have cut the deficit in half since i took office. the deficit is coming down faster than any time in the last 50 years. america's poised to become the number one energy producer in the world this year. this year for the first time in a very long time we are

producing more oil than we are importing. so we got a lot of good things going for us, but the uncertainty caused by just one week of this nonsense so far has caused businesses to reconsider spending and hiring. you have seen consumer confidence plunge to the lowest level since 2008. you have seen mortgages held up by thousands of home buyers who aren't sure about the economic situation out there. and all this adds to our deficits. it doesn't subtract from it. so we can't afford these manufactured crises every few months. as i said, this one isn't even about deficits or spending or budgets. our deficits are falling at the fastest pace in 60 years. the budget that the senate passed is at republican spending levels. it's their budget. the democrats were willing to youput votes on to make sure the government was opened while negotiations took place for a longer term budget. and what's happened, the way we

got to this point was one thing and one thing only, and that was republican obsession with dismantling the affordable care act and denying health care to millions of people. that law ironically is moving forward. most americans, democrats and republicans, agree that health care should not have anything to do with keeping our government opened or paying our bills on time. which is why i will sit down and work with anyone of any party, not only to talk about the budget, i'll talk about ways to improve the health care system. i'll talk about ways we can shrink our long-term deficits. i'll also want to talk about how we are going to help the middle class, strengthen early childhood education, and improve andour infrastructure and research and development. there are a whole bunch of things i want to talk about in terms of how we are going to make sure everybody gets a fair shake in this society and our economy is growing in a

broad-based way and building our middle class. by the way, if anybody doubts my sincerity about that, i put forward proposals in my budget to reform entitlement programs for the long haul and reform our tax code in a way that would close loopholes for the wealthiest and lower rates for corporations and invest in new jobs and reduce our deficits. some of these were originally republican proposals. because i don't believe any party has a monopoly on good ideas. i have shown myself willing to go more than halfway in these conversations. if reasonable republicans want to talk about these things again, i'm ready to head up to the hill and try. i'll even drink for dinner again. but -- spring for dinner again. but i'm not going to do it until the more extreme part of the republican party stops forcing john boehner to issue threats about our economy. we can't make extortion routine

as part of our democratcy. democracy doesn't function this way. this is not just for me, it's also for my successors in office. whatever party they are from. they shouldn't have to pay a ransom, either, for congress doing its basic job. we got to put a stop to it. the last point i'll make. already this week i had to miss critical meetings in asia to promote american jobs and businesses. and although as long as we get this fixed that's not long-term damage, whenever we do these things, it hurts our credibility around the world. it makes it look like we don't have our act together. that's not something we should welcome. the greatest nation on earth shouldn't have to get permission from a few irresponsible members of congress every couple months to keep our government opened or to prevent an economic catastrophe. so let's pass a budget. let's end this government

shutdown. let's pay our bills. let's avert an economic shutdown. let's drop the gimmicks, put aside what's good for any particular party, and let's focus on what's good for the american people because they know we have a lot of work to do. with that, let me take a couple of questions and i'll start with julie of a.p. >> thank you, mr. president. obviously if congress does pass a clean c.r., debt ceiling bills, those may be short-term measures. does your offer to negotiate with them on issues like health care and spending and deficit reduction still stand in the intervening week they pass perhaps this week? >> absolutely. what i have said is that i will talk about anything. what will happen is we won't agree on everything. the truth is is is that the parties are pretty divided on a whole big -- bunch of big issues right now. everybody understands that. by the way voters are divided on

a lot of those issues, too. and i recognize that there are some house members, republican house members, where i got clobbered in the last election. and they don't get politically rewarded a lot for being seen as negotiating with me. and that makes it harder for divided government to come together. but i am willing to work through all those issues. the only thing that our democracy can't afford is a situation where one side says unless i get my way and only my way, unless i get concessions before we even start having a serious give and take, i'll threaten to shut down the government or i will threaten to not pay america's bills. so i will not eliminate any topic of conversation.

and i show miself willing to engage -- myself willing to engage all the parties involved, every leader on any issue. >> that applies no matter how long it is on the bills they pass. >> the only thing will i say is that we are not going to pay a ransom for america paying its bills. that's something that should be nonnegotiable and everybody should agree on that. everybody should say one of the most val ubling things we have -- valuable things we have is america's creditworthiness. this is not something we should even come close to fooling around with. so when i read people saying, this wouldn't be a big deal. let's take default out for a spin and see how it rides. and i say, imagine in your private life if you decided that

i'm not going to pay my mortgage for a month or two. first of all you're not saving your money by not paying your mortgage, you're just a deadbeat. and you can anticipate that will hurt your credit. which means that in addition to debt collectors calling, you're going to have trouble borrowing in the future. if you are able to borrow in the future, you have to borrow at a higher rate. what's true for individuals is also true for nations. even the most powerful nation on earth. and if we are creating a atmosphere in which people are not sure whether or not we pay our bills on time, then that will have a severe long-term impact on our economy. and on america's standard of living. that's not something that we should even be in a conversation

about. that is not something that we should be using as leverage. ok. juliana. >> thank you, mr. president. the economic consequences of default, but if we were to get to that point, would you prioritize and pay bondholders first and maintain -- rather than social security recipients or military? how would you go ahead and make that determination? >> i am going to continue to be very hopeful that congress does not puts in that position. and i think if people understand what the consequences are, they will set that potential scenario aside. i do know that there have been some who said that if we just

pay bondholders, we just pay people who bought treasury bills, that we really won't be in default because those interest payments will be made and to them what i have to remind them is we have a lot of other obligations not just people who pay treasury bills. we got senior citizens who are counting on their social security check arriving on time. we have veterans who are disabled who are counting on their benefits. we have companies who are doing business for our government and for our military that have payrolls that they have to meet. if they do not get paid on time, they may have to lay off workers. all those folks are potentially affected if we are not able to pay all of our bills on time. what's also true is if the markets are saying that we are not paying -- seeing we are not paying our bills on time, that will affect our creditworthiness even if some people are being paid on time.

just to boil this down to personal examples, if you got a mortgage, car note, and a student loan that you have to pay. and you say aim going to make sure i pay my mortgage, but not pay my student loan or car note, that's still going to have an impact on your credit. everybody's still going to look at that and say, you know what, i'm not sure this person is that trustworthy. at a minimum presumably they are going to charge a hire interest rate. that's what would happen to you if you made those decisions. the same is true for the federal government. so we are exploring all contingencies. i know the secretary of the treasury will be appearing before congress on thursday and he can address some of the additional details about this. but let me be clear, no option is good in that scenario. there is no silver bullet. there's no magic wand that allow this to wish away the chaos that

could result if for the first time in our history we don't pay our bills on time. and when i hear people trying to down play the consequences of that, i think that's really irresponsible. and i'm happy to talk to think any of them individually and walk them through exactly why it's irresponsible. it's particularly funny coming from republicans who claim to be champions of business. there's no businessperson out here who doesn't think this wouldn't be a big deal. not one. you go anywhere from wall street to main street and ask a c.e.o. of a company, or ask a small businessperson whether it would be a big deal if the united states government isn't paying its bills on time, they'll tell you it's a big deal. it would hurt. and it's unnecessary. that's the worst part of it. this is not a complicated piece of business.

and there's no reason why if in fact republicans are serious about wanting to negotiate, wanting to have cafferings, wanting to talk, there is no reason why you have to have that threat looming over the conversations. think about it. the only reason the republicans have held out on negotiations up until the last week or so is because they thought it was a big enough deal that they would force unilateral concessions out of democrats and out of me. they said so. they basically said, you know what, the president's so responsible that if we just hold our breath and say we are going to threaten default, then they'll give us what we want and we won't have to give anything in return. again that's not my account of the situation. you can read statements from republicans over the last several months who said this

explicitly. and so for them now to say, it wouldn't be a big deal if it happens, that's not how they have been acting over the last couple months. if it's not a big deal, why would i give them concessions now to avoid it? it is a big deal. and nobody should be getting concessions for making sure that the full faith and credit of the united states is retained. >> when speaker boehner will hold a vote on clean c.r., what assurances can you give with a longer impact? how worried are you personally that the sequestration levels may do harm to the nation's economy. >> you're making an important point which is what we are asking of the republicans right now is to keep the government opened at funding levels the

democrats think are very harmful to the economy and inadequate to make sure that the economy is growing faster, more people are put back to work, and the middle class is growing. we are willing to pass at least a short-term budget that opens up the government at current funding levels. it doesn't even address the harm that's been done because of sequestration. now, the democrats have a budget that would eliminate sequestration, this meat cleaver approach to deficit reduction, and make sure that we're adequately funding basic medical research and head start programs and v.a. programs, and a whole range of things that have been really hard hit this year. but we recognize that there are

going to have to be compromises between the democratic position and the republican position, and in the meantime we shouldn't hurt the economy even worse by shutting down the government. so let me just give you an example. very specific i -- specific. because of sequestration, because of the meat cleaver cuts that have taken place over the course of this year, thousands of families have lost head start slots for their children. you have parents across the country who have been scrambling trying to figure out how can i find some decent, quality childcare for my kids. the government shutdown means several thousand more are going to be losing their slots. if we vote today or tomorrow or the next day in the house of representatives to go ahead and reopen the government, that leaves those additional several thousand people will be spared the difficulties of trying to

scramble and figure out where your kid's going to be when you're trying to go to work. but it doesn't solve the broader problems. if we were going to have real negotiations, the democrats would say, let's solve the bigger problem. what about those thousands who have been hurt by sequester? the democrats aren't making that demand right now. we understand there's going to have to be some give and take, but we are saying is don't hurt more people while we are trying to resolve these differences. let's at least make sure that we keep the lights on while we are having these conversations. >> you talked about the credibility around the world that this impasse has caused. i'm wondering what you and your administration are telling worried creditors, china and japan, calling and asking about whether the united states is

going to avoid defaulting on its debts. >> i won't disclose any specific conversations, but obviously my message to the world is, the united states always has paid its bills and will do so again. but i think they are not just looking at what i say, they are looking at what congress does. and that ultimately is up to speaker boehner. this will not get resolved. we are not going to calm creditors until they see speaker boehner call up a bill that reopens the government and authorizes the secretary of the treasury to pay our bills on time. and until they see that, there is going to be a cloud over u.s. economic credibility. but it is not one from which we can't recover. we have been through this before. every country, every democracy in particular, has tussles over

the budget, and i think most world leaders understand t. they themselves have been through it if they are in a democratcy. what you haven't seen before i think from the vantage point of a lot of world leaders is the notion that one party in congress might blow the whole thing up if they don't get their way. they have never seen that before. and that does make them nervous. particularly given what happened in 2011. keep in mind we have been here before. we saw what happened in 2011. i think the assumption was that the americans must have learned their lesson. that there would be budget conflicts, but nobody would threaten the possibility that we would default. and when they hear members of the senate and members of congress saying maybe default wouldn't be that bad, i'll bet that makes them nervous. it makes me nervous. it should make the american people nervous. because that's irresponsible.

it is out of touch with reality. it is based on a flawed analysis of how our economy works. you cannot pay some bills and not others and think somehow that the fact that you're paying some bills protects you from a loss of creditworthiness. that's not what happens in our own personal lives. i don't know why people think that's how it works for the united states government. we have used a lot of our emergency powers. jack lew has used extraordinary measures to keep paying our bills over the last several months. but at a certain point those emergency powers run out and the clock is ticking. i do worry that republicans, but also some democrats, may think that we've got a bunch of other

rabbits in our hat. there comes a point in which if the treasury cannot hold offers to sell treasury bills, we do not have enough money coming in to pay all our bills on time. it's very straightforward. and i know there's been some discussion, for example, about my powers under the 14th amendment to go ahead and ignore the debt ceiling law, setting aside the legal analysis, what matters is is that if you start having a situation in which there's legal controversy about the u.s. treasury's authority to issue debt, the damage will have been done even if that were constitutional, because people wouldn't be sure. it would be tied up in litigation for a long time. that's going to make people nervous. a lot of the strategies people

have talked about, the president can roll out a big coin and -- or he can resort to some other constitutional measure, what people ignore is that ultimately what matters is what are the people who are buying treasury bills think? again i'll just boil it down in very personal terms. if you're buying a house and you're not sure whether the seller has title to the house, you're going to be pretty nervous about buying it. and at minimum you'd want a much cheaper price to buy that house because you wouldn't be sure whether or not you would own it. most of us would walk away because no matter how much we like the house, we would say to ourselves the last thing i want after i bought it is i don't actually own it. the same thing is true if i'm buying treasury bills from the

u.s. government and here i am sitting here what if there's a supreme court case deciding that these aren't valid. that these are val i had -- aren't valid legal instruments, obligating the u.s. government to pay me. i'm going to be suppressed. which means i may not purchase it. if i do purchase them i am going to ask for a big premium. so there are no magic bullets here. there's one simple way of doing it and that is congress going ahead and voting. the fact that right now there are votes, i believe, to go ahead and take this drama off the table, should at least be tested. speaker boehner keeps saying he doesn't have the votes for it. what i have said is, put it on the floor. see what happens. and add minimum let every member of congress be on record. let them vote to keep the government opened or not.

and they can determine where they stand and defend that vote to their constituencies. and let them vote on whether or not america should pay its bills or not. and if in fact some of these folks really believe that it's not that big of a deal, they can vote no. and that will be useful information for voters to have. if it fails and we do end up defaulting, i think voters should know exactly who voted not to pay our bills. so that they can be responsible for the consequences that come with it. harry. >> you mentioned the supreme court, the term started today with the campaign finance case. you call citizens united devastating to the public interest. i wonder if you could weigh in. >> the case would go any further than citizens united. essentially it would say

anything goes. there are no rules in terms of how to finance campaigns. there aren't a lot of functioning democracies around the world that work this way where you can basically have millionaires and billionaires bank rolling whoever they want, however they want, in some cases undisclosed, and what it means is ordinary americans are shut out of the process. and democrats aren't entirely innocent of this in the past. and i had to raise a lot of money for my campaign. so i -- there's nobody who operates in politics that has perfectly clean hands on this issue. but what is also true is that all of us should bind ourselves to some rules that say the people who vote for us should be more important than somebody who is spending a million or 10

million or $100 million to get elected. we don't know what their agendas are, their interests are. and i continue to believe that citizens united contributed to some of the problems we are having in washington right now. you have some ideological extremists who have a big bankroll and they can entirely skew our politics. and there are a whole bunch of members of congress right now who privately will tell you, i know our positions are unreasonable, but we are scared that if we don't go along with the tea party agenda or some particularly extremist agenda, that they'll be challenged from the right. and the threats are very explicit. so they toe the line. that's part of why we have seen a break down of just normal routine business done here in washington on behalf of the american people. and all of you know it.

i'm not telling you anything you don't know because it's very explicit. you report on it. big chunk of the republican party right now are in gerrymandered districts where there is no competition and those folks are much more worried about a tea party challenger than they are about a general election where they have to compete against a democrat or go after independent votes. in that environment it's a lot harder for them to compromise. >> thank you, mr. president. this week the president of china has visited several of the asian countries you were going to visit and had to skip because of the shutdown. he's also taken a big role at a summit both of which your administration has made a pretty big priority of as part of the

broader asian -- does china benefit from the chaos in washington? then more broadly, you said in general that this hurts the reputation of the united states overseas. are there specific things that you can point to where you already have seen some damage? and one that occurs to me is the trade deal you tried to do in asia. the leaders today announced they still want to wrap it up but they no longer are able to say they want to wrap it up by the end of this year. had you been there do you think could you have gotten that additional push? >> i think that's a great example. we don't know, but it didn't help that i wasn't there. to make sure that we went ahead and closed a trade deal that would open up markets and create jobs for the united states and make sure that countries were trading fairly with us in the most dynamic, fastest growing

market in the world. i should have been there 8 -- been there. i can tell you because hi to apologize to some of the host countries that they understood that the most important thing i could do for them and the most important thing i can do for the bilateral relationship and america's reputation is making sure we reopen our government and don't default. i don't think it's going to do lasting damage. as i said if we deal with this the way we should, then folks around the world won't attribute this to the usual messy process of american democracy. but it doesn't do lasting damage. in the short term i would characterize it as missed opportunities. we continue to be the one indispensable nation. there are countries across asia

who have welcomed our pivot because they want to do business with us. they admire our economy. they admire our entrepreneurs. they know that their growth is going to be contingent on working with us. they care about the secure environment that we maintain, help maintain, and the freedom of navigation and commerce that is so important to them. it's not as if they have other places to go. they want us to be there and they want to work with us. in each of these big meetings that we have around the world, a lot of business gets done. in the same way that a c.e.o. of a company if they want to close a deal aren't going to do it by phone. they want to show up and look at is eye to eye and tell them why it's important and shake hands on a deal.

the same thing is true with respect to world leaders. and the irony is our teams probably do more to organize a lot of these multilateral forums and set the agenda than anybody. we end up being engaged much more than china, for example, in setting the agenda and moving this stuff forward. it's almost like me not showing up at my own party. it creates a sense of concern on the part of other leaders, but as long as we get through this, they'll understand it. we'll be able to, i believe, get these deals done. the last point i'd make, though, is we can't do it every three months. back in the 1990's we had a government shutdown. that happened one time. then after that the republican party and mr. gingrich realized this isn't a sensible way to do

business. we shouldn't engage in brinksmanship like this, and then they started having a serious conversation with president clinton about a whole range of issues and they got some things that they wanted. they had to give the democrats some things that the democrats wanted. but it took on a sense of normal democratic process. so here we already went through this once back in 2011. and at the end of last year, right after my election, we went through something similar with the so-called fiscal cliff. where republicans wouldn't negotiate about taxes despite the fact that taxes actually went up anyway even though they refused to negotiate. they could actually have gotten some things from us that they wanted if they had been willing to engage in normal

negotiations. so we got to stop repeating this pattern. i know the american people are tired of it. and to alt american people, i apologize that you have to go through this stuff every three months it seems like. and lord knows i'm tired of it. but at some point we've got to kind of break these habits. and get back to the point where everybody understands that in negotiations there is give and there is take. and you do not hold people hostage or engage in ransom taking to get 100% of your way. and you don't suggest that somehow a health care bill that you don't agree with is destroying the republic. or is a grabbed socialist scheme. if you disagree with certain aspects of it, tell us what you

disagree with and work on it. if you're concerned about long-term debt, that's a good thing to be concerned about. don't pretend as if america's going bankrupt at a time when the deficit's been cut in half. that's what the american people expect is just civility, common sense, give and take, compromise. those aren't dirty words. there's nothing wrong with them. and i think the american people understand i may -- not i may, i have flaws. michelle will tell you. one of them is not that i'm unwilling to compromise. i have been willing to compromise my entire political career. and i don't believe that i have the answers to everything. and it's my way or the high way. but i'm not going to breach a

basic principle that would weaken the presidency, change our democracy, and do great damage to ordinary people just in order to go along with what the house republicans are talking about. >> specifically about china and i'm wondering to what extent -- >> i'm sure the chinese don't mind that i'm not there right now. in the sense that there are areas where we have differences and they can present their point of view and not get as much pushback as if i were there. although secretary of state kerry is there and aim sure he's doing a great job. but i have also said that our cooperation with china's not a zero sum game. there are a lot of areas where the chinese and us agree.

on trade in particular, though, here's an area where part of what we are trying to do is raise standards for example, intellectual property protection, which sometimes is a big problem in china. if we can get a trade deal with all the other countries in asia that says you got to protect people's intellectual property, that will help us in our negotiation was china. .richard mcgregor. >> going back to the -- [inaudible] >> no. >> what are your legal willilities -- [inaudible] the senators be paid first? >> you know what i'm going to do is i'm going to let jack lew, the secretary of the treasury, make a formal presentation on thursday before the senate committee. because this is obviously sensitive enough and i think people would be paying close

enough attention that details count. and i think prepared remarks from secretary lew on that topic would probably be more appropriate. but as i indicated before, we planned for every contingency. so obviously, worse case scenario, there are things that we will try to do. but i will repeat, i don't think any option is good. stephen dennis. >> mr. president. i was wondering if you could talk about budget process. in the past, you've negotiated, along with the debt ceiling, with blue dogs, for instance, in 2009-2010. along with a debt ceiling increase then. pay as you go reform. you named a fiscal commission. the republicans today are talking about what may be another committee that would work out our differences over the next few weeks. is that something that you could talk about on the side,

something that wouldn't necessarily be a concession, but something that would be a format for getting a deal done? >> here's the thing, stephen. i know that speaker boehner has talked about setting up some new process or some new supercommittee or what have you. the leaders up in congress, they can work through whatever processes they want. but the bottom line is either you're having good faith negotiations in which there's good give and take or you're not. now, there is already a process in place called the budget committees that could come together right now, democrats have been asking for 19 months to bring them together, make a determination, how much should the government be spending next year, the appropriations committees could go through the

list and here's how much we're going to be spending for defense and here's how much we're going to be spending for education. that's a process that's worked reasonably well for the last 50 years. i don't know that we need to set up a new committee for a process like that to move forward. what has changed or what seems to be motivating the idea we have to have a new process is speaker boehner or at least some faction of the republicans in the house and maybe some in the senate are holding out for a negotiation in theory but in fact basically democrats give a lot of concessions to republicans, republicans don't give anything, and then that's dubbed as compromise and the reason that democrats have to give is because they're worried that the government's going to stay shut down or the u.s. government's going to default. and, again, that -- you can dress it up any way you want.

if that's the theory that the republicans are going forward with, then it's not going to work. so let me just give you one specific example. i've heard at least, and i can't confirm this, that one of the ideas of this new committee is you could talk about reductions in discretionary spending, you could talk about entitlement reform and reductions in mandatory spending, you could talk about how long you'd extend the debt ceiling but you can't talk about closing corporate loopholes that aren't benefiting ordinary folks economically. and potentially if you closed them would allow us to pay for things like better education for kids. well, i don't know why democrats right now would agree to a format that takes off the table all the things they care about and is confined to the things the republicans care about.

so, again, i don't know that that's exactly what's being proposed. my simple point is this. i think democrats in the senate and the house are prepared to talk about anything. i'm prepared to talk about anything. they can design whatever format they want. what is not fair and will not result in an actual deal is ransom taking. or hostage taking. and the expectations that democrats are paying ransom or providing concessions for the mere act of reopening the government or paying our bills. those are not things that you do for me and they're not things that you do for the democrats. >> is there room here where it's not necessarily a concession, where it is you negotiate what the negotiations are going to look like you?

don't have to agree to overturn obamacare, but you can actually negotiate what the talks are going to look like, so everybody's comfortable. and you know, you mentioned yourself, this is a tough vote for all these house republicans. you're asking them to take a very tough vote for the debt ceiling. usually people in both parties want to have some cover, something that they can point to and say, hey, i want some budget process reform before i approve another $1 trillion in debt. >> which is fine. and so if they want to do that, reopen the government, extend the debt ceiling, if they can't do it for a long time, do it for the period of time in which these negotiations are taking place. why is it that we've got hundreds of thousands of people who aren't working right now in order for what you just described to occur? that doesn't make any sense. the small business administration gives out $1 billion worth of loans every month. to small businesses all across the country. that's not happening right now. so there are small businesses in every state that are counting on

a loan to get their business going and you've got the party of small business saying small business administration can't do it. that's what they call themselves. and yet they're suffering. you've got farmers who are waiting for loans right now, those loans cannot be processed. the republican party says they're the party that looks out for farmers. i happen to disagree. i think farmers have done real good under my administration. but having said that, why would you keep the government shut down and those farmers not getting their loans while we're having the discussions that you just talked about? the republicans say they're very concerned about drilling. they say obama's been restricting oil production, despite the fact that oil production is at its highest levels it's been in years and is continuing to zoom up. but they say, you know, the democrats are holding back oil production in this country.

you know, one of the things that happens when the government's shut down is new drilling permits aren't processed. so why would the republicans say to the folks who are interested in drilling for oil, sorry, we can't let those things be processed until we have some negotiations and we have some cover to do what we're supposed to be doing anyway? that doesn't make sense. if there's a way to solve this, it has to include reopening the government and saying america's not going to default, it's going to pay our bills. making -- they can attach some process to that that gives them some certainty that in fact things they're concerned about will be topics of negotiation. if my word's not good enough -- but i told them i'm happy to talk about it -- but if they want to specify all the items that they think need to be a topic of conversation, happy to do it.

if they want to say we're going to go through line-by-line all the aspects of the president's health care plan that we don't like and we want the president to answer for those things, i'm happy to sit down with them for as many hours as they want. i won't let them gut a law that is going to make sure tens of millions of people actually get health care. but i'm happy to talk about it. stephen cohen. i'm just going through my list here. >> [inaudible] are we going to see u.s. military operations all around the continent, how does that square with your contingent that america cannot be at war forever? >> if you look at the speech i gave at the national defense college several months ago, i

outlined how i saw the shift in terrorism around the world and what we have to do to responds to it. and part of what i said is that we had decimated core al qaeda that had been operating primarily between afghanistan and pakistan, but you now had these regional groups, some of which are explicitly tied to al qaeda or that ideology, some of which are more localized. few of them have the ability to project beyond their borders, but they can do a lot of damage inside their borders. and africa is one of the places where, because in some cases a lack of capacity on the part of the governments, in some cases because it is easier for folks to hide out, in vast terrains that are sparsely populated,

that you're seeing some of these groups gather. and we're going to have to continue to go after them. but there's a difference between us going after terrorists who are plotting directly to do damage to the united states and us being involved in wars. the risks of terrorism and terrorist networks are going to continue for some time to come. we've got to have a long-term plan that is not just military-based. we've got to engage in a war of ideas in the region and engage with muslim c.r.s -- countries and try to isolate radical elements that are doing more damage to muslims than they're doing to anybody else. we've got to think about economic development, because although there's not a direct correlation between terrorism and the economy, there's no doubt that if you've got a lot of unemployed, uneducated young men in societies, that there's a greater likelihood that terrorists recruits are available.

but where you've got active plots and active networks, we're going to go after them. we prefer partnering with countries where this has taken place, wherever we, can and we want to build up their capacity. but we're not going to farm out our defense and i have to say by the way, the operations that took place both in libya and somalia were examples of the extraordinary skill and dedication and talent of our men and women in armed forces. they do their jobs extremely well. with great precision, and great risk to themselves. and i think they're pretty good examples for how those of us here in washington should operate as well. >> did the capture of mr. libby comply with international law?

>> we know that he helped plan and execute plots that killed hundreds of people. a whole lot of americans. and we have strong evidence of that. and he will be brought to justice. >> mr. president, while you're waiting for the shutdown to end, why is it that you can't go along with any of the bills the house is passing, funding the f.d.a. and fema, where you were yesterday, and veterans benefits and head start. you've got to be tempted to get funding to those programs that you support. >> of course i'm tempted. because you'd like to think that you could solve at least some of the problems if you couldn't solve all of it. but here's the problem. what you've seen are bills that come up where wherever republicans are feeling political pressure, they put a

bill forward. and if there's no political heat, if there's no television story on it, then nothing happens. and if we do some sort of shotgun approach like that, then you'll have some programs that are highly visible get funded and reopened, like national monuments, but things that don't get a lot of attention, like those s.b.a. loans, not being funded. and we don't get to select which programs we implement or not. there are a whole bunch of things that the republicans have said are law that we have to do. and i don't get a chance to go back and say, you know what, this commaimy idea that this republican congressman came up with i really don't like so let's not implement that. once you have a budget and a government with a set of

functions, you make sure that it's all operating. we don't get to pick and choose based on which party likes what. that's where the budget discussions take place. now, if there's some things that the republicans don't like, they should argue for eliminating those programs in the budget, come with an agreement with the democrats, maybe the democrats will agree, and those things won't be funded. but you don't do a piecemeal approach like that when you're dealing with a government shutdown. ok? >> on the military death gratuity -- [inaudible] >> i'm going to take one more question. >> mr. president -- >> your persistence has worked. >> mr. president, you talked about the political dynamics that leaves house republicans feeling that they don't want to negotiate with you, they don't want to come to you. i wanted to ask you two things about that. look back at the 2011 default discussions and the budget

drama, is there anything that you wish that you had done differently in 2011? and after this, what cau you call this nonsense ended, what do you expect the political dynamics might -- how might they have changed to move forward? >> i think that's an interesting question. in 2011 i entered into good-faith negotiations with john boehner. he had just won the speakership. it was at a time when because we were still responding to the recession deficits were high, people were concerned about it and i thought it was my obligation to meet him halfway. and so we had a whole series of talks and at that point at least nobody had any belief that people would come close to potential default. i don't regret having entered

into those negotiations and we came fairly close. whenever i see john boehner to this day i still say, should have taken the deal that i offered you back then. which would have dealt with our long-term deficit problems, would not have impeded growth as much, would have really boosted confidence. but at that time i think house republicans had just taken over, they were feeling their oaths and thinking, you know, we don't have to compromise. and we came pretty close to default. and we saw the impact of that. i would have thought that they would have learned the lesson from that as i did. which is we can't put the american people and our economy through that ringer again. so, that's the reason why i've been very clear. we're not going to negotiate around the debt ceiling. that has to be dealt with. in a reasonable fashion.

and by the way, you know, i often hear people say, well, in the past it's been dealt with all the time. the truth of the matter is, if you look at the history, people posture about the debt ceiling frequently but the way the debt ceiling often got passed was you'd stick the debt ceiling onto a budget negotiation and once it was completed, because people figured, well, i don't want to take a bunch of tough votes to cut programs or raise taxes, and then also have to take a debt ceiling vote. let me do it all at once. but it wasn't a situation in which, you know, what if i don't get what i want, then i'm going to let us default. that's what's changed. and that's what we learned in 2011. and so as a consequence i said, we're not going to do that again. not just for me, but because future presidents, republican or democrat, should not be in a position where they have to choose between making sure the economy stays afloat and we avoid worldwide catastrophe, or we provide concessions to one faction of one party in one

house. but let me tell you a lesson i did not learn. i did not learn a lesson that we shouldn't compromise. i still think we should. i still think there are all kinds of issues that we should be talking about and i don't expect to get 100% of my way. and i'm still very open to having conversations with not just the speaker but any republican over there. go ahead. >> if you enter into a series of short-term funding bills or a debt ceiling bill, you will be back in the same place, presumably, with these members. what has changed in the political dynamic if you do the short-term -- >> i think what has changed is they're aware of the fact that i'm not budging when it comes to the full faith and credit of the united states. that that has to be dealt with, that you don't pay a ransom, you don't provide concessions for

congress doing its job and america paying its bills. and i think most people understand that. i was at a small business the other day and talking to a bunch of workers and i said, you know, when you're at the plant and you're in the middle of your job, do you ever say to your boss, you know what, unless i get a raise right now and more vacation pay, i'm going to just shut down the plant. i'm not just going to walk off the job, i'm going to break the equipment. i said, how do you think that would go? they all thought they'd be fired. i think most of us think that. there's nothing wrong with asking for a raise or asking for more time off. but you can't burn down the plant or your office if you don't get your way. well, the same thing is true here and i think most americans

understand that. all right? thank you very much, everybody. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2013] span 3, 2 about the affordable care act also known as obamacare. house oversight committee looks at the irs role in implementing the healthcare law. at 1 p.m. eastern, the houses small business committee on health and technology looks at how the law affects small businesses and part-time workers. you can watch both hearings live on c-span three and c-span.org. bring publice affairs events from washington directly to you, putting you in the room at congressional

hearings, white house events, briefings and conferences and offering complete gavel-to-gavel coverage of the u.s. house all as a public service of riot industry. we are c-span, created by the cable tv industry 34 years ago and funded by your local cable or satellite provider and now you can watch us in hd. >> on c-span this morning, journal" is with your phone calls and the house returns for general speeches at 10 eastern and admin, members consider a bill to provide payments for military death benefits during the government shutdown. coming up in 45 minutes, the latest on the government shut down. a member of the budget and appropriations committee and donna:40 a.m. eastern, edwards on the house speaker

ebbers to create a committee to negotiate on the budget spending issues and the presence stance that the government will be reopened before negotiations. ♪ [indiscernible] the latest proposal from the republicans, to form a supercommittee of sorts. enforcement of the debt limit until next year. meanwhile, the president in a long ranging press conference yesterday communicated his desire to see government reopen or engaging with republicans on fiscal matters. it is the ninth day of the government shutdown, and with that a debate over the debt ceiling is continuing. in our first 45 minuth