bargain talks that have failed. joe biden talks had failed. ,hat are the chances particularly now that republicans have given up chances ofat are the getting a bigger agreement to tackle our deficit? >> that is a very fair question. i was disappointed in the fact that the supercommittee did not achieve a positive result. round, theest democrats have been trying to get to the negotiating table since march. that is when the house passed the budget and the senate democrats. we were blocked by republicans in the house and senate. now we're finally going to the table. talks does not guarantee success. he mentioned examples where we were not able to get funding accomplished. if you refuse to talk, you are

guaranteed failure. we hope within the scope of these conversations we are able to move the ball forward. they will have to decide what the scope is. how much we want to fight off and shoe as part of these negotiations. that will be one of the early decisions we try and reach. the good news is that we hope that our republican colleagues have learned the right lesson from the debacle we just went through, unnecessary pain. it did not have to be that way. we are hoping that our colleagues will put down the clubs and recognize that this negotiation should be between the two budgets and no one should try to gain advantage again by threatening to shut down the government or default on our debt. if we can put down the clubs and have a serious conversation, maybe we can advance.

murray,re calling pat saying that you are going to look for common ground. common ground is different than compromise. when of the areas where there might be common ground is to try to get rid of some or all of these across the board cuts in the pentagon or every domestic agency. is that probably what we're looking at? what are democrats willing to give up in order to alleviate sequestration? >> we have to decide what the full scope will be. part of any conversation would be to try to replace the so- called sequester. these are the very deep and , importantboard cuts investments like transportation, science and research. the congressional budget office recently said that if you keep those lower funding levels in place, that five this time next year you will have to eat

hundred thousand fewer jobs in the united states of america. that is a self-inflicted when we do not think the country can afford. we want to replace the cuts with an equal amount of deficit reduction but done in a smarter way over a longer time. you do not have the immediate drive on the economy but you do get the benefit of long-term deficit reduction. there are a number of proposals. i put one for that would replace the sequester this year with a combination of targeted cuts. we should also get rid of some of the tax subsidies. that is just one example. you mentioned republicans having said that revenues might not be part of this conversation. i hope they do not take that position. hear a speaker banner saying we want to negotiate on everything but we took something off the table. that is not the way you come to a negotiation.

hard for people to understand how the republicans care about the deficit and debt but then say they refuse to close a single tax loophole for the purpose of reducing. question,is begs the can you accept an agreement without additional revenue? >> let's decide what the scope of this is. we believe when you're talking that replacing sequester you should take the balanced approach. we should be able to close some tax. >> can you accept the agreement without additional revenues? >> it totally depends on what we are talking about. it depends on what the scope of the agreement is. if you'review that

talking about moving forward with any significant long-term deficit reduction you have to consider. we believe you need to implement, cuts. i would just post the question to our republican colleagues. saying -- whater is so precious? are you interested in protecting spending on the national defense. those are questions they will have to answer. >> you and i talked about a month ago. you always had a good relationship with chairman ryan. you are quite frustrated before congress came back. the relationship seem to be not what it was. personalof that feeling get involved here? will you go back to that relationship or have you become so distrustful that it will make difficult to break the ice?

>> we are not distrustful. a working relationship. we have very deep differences on these fundamental policy issues. if you were to come to a hearing, you would hear this difference is expressed in a very simple manner, sharp on the issues but very simple. we are determined to try to get an agreement. one of the first orders of business is to decide what the scope of the discussion and that agreement should be. that will be something we try to determine if the next several weeks. >> when will you be sitting down next? how often would you sit down? meeting onur first thursday morning. we had a great discussion in terms of laying out our commitment to trying to make this process work. ,n terms of the next steps

those are decisions to be made by the chairman of the conference committee. in this case by rotation. that will be paul ryan. we expect to have a meeting a week from now. we will have to decide what the pace of the meetings are. you can have meetings of the full conference committee or some subset in order to get things done. >> you have a december 13 deadline. >> that is right. it sounds like a long time. rapidly.es very i hope you will make productive use of it and hope we get right down to the meat of the issue. islet me follow up on what on the table. is the affordable care act on the table? budgets, aook at the lot of things are on the table. the scope of this conference is republican budget.

the republican budget gets rid of the affordable care act. i should say it gets rid of the good parts. it gets rid of the benefits. it only balances in 10 years because they kept all the medicare savings. when republicans say they want to get rid of the entire acts, if you did that it would not budget. the answer to your question is scopehere is a very wide potentially for this conversation. going to bees of accelerating job growth. that really has to be our focus, getting the economy moving faster. that means making sure we invest in our infrastructure where you

continue to have high levels of unemployment and we have huge unmet needs. we do believe we have to replace the sequester. whoe are many republicans agree with that. it is a drag on the economy. that weve to the extent think we should tackle long-term deficit reduction, e need to do it in a balanced way. that is the approach every bipartisan commission has recommended. there are also cuts to special interest experts. >> president obama scored a overy significant victory the republicans. republicans wanted the confrontation over reopening government and increasing the debt ceiling. they thought increasing the debt ceiling was such an important piece of legislation that they might be able to barter and get

something for it. this sets a that precedent, what happened this week, in which we will not see this kind of governing anymore? they may have learned that -- about the balance of power when you have the president of one party? >> that is a really big question. think we are ever going to persuade the tea party caucus , this really reckless group, that they should not try again to shut down the government or should down the debt ceiling. the question is like other leaders in the house. are they going to step up and try to forge bipartisan compromise?

they just commissions and report saying since the 2010 elections nineost the country hundred thousand jobs. these are self-inflicted wounds. we really hope they will get beyond that. that will depend on the leadership stepping up. one thing they could do is show that they are going to allow democracy to work in the house. have this on october 1 and the house. it would have the same outcome. the speaker refused to let the house work its will on immigration reform. bipartisan bill sitting in the house. if only the speaker would let its dust would let it go. it may be one of the lessons here for the country will be to ask the speaker and let democracy work its will in the

house. do not allow this faction to block things which caused us six days of unnecessary pain in this country. and they are blocking immigration reform bill. let's get on with the business of the country. >> democratic leaders have said we are willing to talk about the affordable care act, reopen the government and we will talk. what areas of the affordable care act would you be willing to talk about? we're going to look at adjustments as necessary, as they come up. if there are specific areas where there are identified problems, we are happy to look at those. there are some questions about family coverage. there are some very specific, discrete issues we would like to work on. the challenge we have had is that while we want to work on our colleagues, their objective has not been to try to improve

the affordable care act. their objective has been to wipe it out and defunded. they have made a conscious effort not to work with us to fix it. that has been the problem. issues, specifically what family issues which you consider discussing? >> there is an issue with respect to if you get coverage through your employer, whether that employer covers an individual who is employees or whether that coverage also affects other members in the family, it has to do with the percentage of income people are supposed to spend on their health insurance. these are very specific, granular issues. they voted 47 times and the house to read peel obamacare. we would like to sit down and

work on issues in the spirit of the working of the law. want torea republicans do is repeal the medical device tax. would you agree? >> members had different positions on this. i do not think we should repeal it. it would at $30 billion to the deficit. it was curious to hear people talk about increasing the deficit and debt in the context of lifting the debt ceiling. unless somebody has a much better way to adjust the deficit, i do not think there is a good reason to replace it. that will certainly be part of the conversation. all those things are within the scope of the budget conference committee. the other thing that is important to remember is the medical device tax, the rationale was that you were

going to have a lot more insured americans that can now afford health care and afford to be covered with medical devices. the medical device industry benefits from the affordable care act. there are a lot more people now that can have the coverage to pay for medical devices. that was the whole rationale. there are lots of people that would like to go back and get a special benefit for themselves. me there needs to be a policy rationale. >> prior to being the top chairman ofu were your party's campaign committee for a couple of cycles. one cycle you rode a wave coming in and the next you rode a wave going out. politicalt on your hat and tell us your assessment of the midterms? i know it is early.

there is a lot of worry there has been so much gerrymandering of districts, in fact he participated one in maryland, -- in fact, you participated in one in maryland, that people are .ocked into solid seats the president's party typically loses seats in his sixth year in office. give us your take. >> to be clear on maryland. , mystate legislature district that more republicans. i do not draw the lines. i would be happy to have more constituents. sad to lose my old. there is no doubt that the way the lines have been drawn around the country create some advantages for republicans. we all know they lost the popular vote for congress but ended up with more members of congress because the wavy lines were drawn. if you look toward the next

election, i think people are looking at this house of i do believees this unnecessary pain, because get whatsion to try to they won it by looking down the government, i do think a lot of americans have looked at that and said we do not want any more of that going forward. we want people who are willing to work together. republicans are going to have to decide for themselves how they want to conduct business in the house. one way to show they are willing to act on a bipartisan basis is to take of the immigration reform bill. the overwhelming majority in this country support it. the majority support the farm bill. that would be a way to show that they really want to govern from

the center for all america and not bowing to the tea party's actions. >> the leadership of your party in the house is in their 70s. they're not going to be there forever. you're in your 50s. you may be there a while. you have aspirations to be the democratic leader or speaker sunday? i am focused on the budget committee. the future what holds. >> i want to take you back to politics. in swing districts, would you advise democratic candidates have obama or joe biden ended the campaign for them? >> i think our candidates would welcome the president and the vice president. everyone has to make their own decisions on that. me message they have been large parts ofth

the population, including people in these districts. if you look at the president's budget, the kind of investment and jobs and education and trying to get the economy moving is exactly what people are looking for. i am hoping we can move forward. his number hit 41%. that does not show an overwhelming approval for him or his policies. how do you read the 41%? >> have been a whole lot of polls recently. they have shown the president's as the congress has shown even greater and greater dysfunction. you have to measure these things in relative terms. everybody has been sinking in terms of public support.

the president is held in much higher regard. it should be a small comfort to that you are just less unpopular than the other folks. this is an opportunity for congress to rebound a little bit. on the speaker making a decision not to allow the tea party factions to continue to have disproportionate influence, to continue to lead the house of representatives by the nose. you cannot have a situation where senator kruse says something and the speaker reverses himself on an agreement he made. let's move forward on these bills. immigration reform, the farm bill. hoping to get into some of the specifics that you are dealing with. when you're on the

ofercommittee, you had a lot circular negotiations. there is this non-health savings. the committee said it is ready to go. are foryour once security costs. youyou talk about when start putting some of these ideas together and you bring them out to the public or to your colleagues, aren't they really going to take a look and say this is going to be harder than we think? >> on the one hand, people say it should be easy to find all sorts of savings. when he began to look at specific areas, sometimes it

becomes more difficult. as part of the budget control act, we did cut $1.2 trillion the discretionary spending, the things most people think of as ongoing government expenditures, national parks. >> that was a very generic cut. >> right. it was not specific. >> it was taking out of projected spending. they are the places were say we're going to have to make these decisions. with respects to the appropriations process, that is exactly we want to get to. set the levels that they can work with. level was sonding low that the house republican chairman said we need to get rid of this sequestered. unable to pass the transportation bill because it

included such deep cuts to projects. they could not even vote on the education bill. it would impose on scientific research and education. in terms of other areas of the which, i mentioned one are the agriculture subsidies. these are excessive payments. insurance is a very reasonable program. overly on.en they are subsidizing the pain. here is an example of what we call a mandatory program. with respect to federal the budgetas part of conference, we actually did change the law so that they

for acontribute to he significantly. on one area that has been hit is the federal employee area. >> i want to turn back to politics. attorney general gensler has had a broccoli -- rocky week because he is being called a backstreet influencer -- a backseat driver. he said these reports are exaggerated and denied many of the allegations. just keepsmbeat that going and going. you know him very well. assess the impact on the gubernatorial campaign. >> it is hard to tell. it is still relatively early. there are three terrific candidates in this race.

i think they would all be good governors. it is hard for me to judge these things. campaigns do have their ups and downs, the ebbs and flows. >> as you travel to montgomery county, what are people saying? >> in the last few weeks people have been talking about nothing but the government shut down which i certainly understand. they have had to weather a real country.oughout the it has been particularly intense. >> thank you for being our newsmaker. we appreciate your time. >> thank you. we are back with our reporters, andrew taylor and david lightman. what did you hear from the top democrat on the house budget committee budget committee as they go into negotiations?

>> same thing i heard thursday at the press conference. they are negotiating. it is talking. isn't it great we are talking to each other. we did not expect it to say here is where we give. i was not interested in the comment about the affordable care act. they got a little bit specific on issues. areas of some discussion. no one is going to blow it apart. there is potential to talk. >> what does that mean? look at the republican conferees. they all voted no, correct? is there another fight brewing over the issues? i do not think we will see

another shutdown. i do not think the debt limit is going to be as dramatic or as much of a crisis in the future. there is a lot of pressure because they do want to get rid of some or all of these across the bed -- board cuts. this is the public forum to do it. there are people more senior that will have the final say. is not a lot of it therey can find searching for common ground. it is a relatively limited set of options. be pressuree will on democrats to care more about the sequester's effects on domestic programs and you will not be able to get a tax increase out of this.

>> you see what they are working on really is about sequestration. >> the politics could end -- could get interesting. democrats now are all in on this budget conference. it is going to be much more difficult for them to point fingers at republicans should this break up in disarray. we will see what happens. i think democrats have to be more aware of the politics. it'll be a little bit harder to put a tilt in their favor. >> how does house speaker boehner get his rank-and-file to vote for something if they come to an agreement that does not include something on the affordable care act that the conservative republicans wanted or in the senate? >> one of the things we learned

this week is what happens when lawmakers go into a fight with heightened expectations. that is the way the republicans went into this fight over the debt limit. think expectations will be tempered. do not forget. just as democrats want to get rid of spending cuts, these really go after the pentagon. that is notuance commonly known which is that the cuts actually grow deeper from the just completed fiscal year juste fiscal year that began. it is about 20 billion in additional cuts relative to last year. that all comes out of the pentagon. that are a lot of talks have a real interest in seeing these talks succeed as well. you saying that this is just about sequestration

basically. all the other fights that we saw, i different times or on a different policy front. >> republicans are not going to get in on revenues. they will not give in any affordable care act. it'll take over. it is an election year. this will be in november. for a lot of people it will be on primaries. the primary season begins very quickly in two thousand 14. particularly in the republican party, it is going to start playing itself out very quickly in the heartland, not in the lead conference rooms of washington. >> thank you both for your time. we appreciate it. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2013] can see the interview with chris van hollen again later today at 6:00 p.m. eastern here on c-span. there's also a rebroadcast on c-

span radio. c-span radio has a new channel radio.xm satellite you can listen on channel 120 and hear the audio broadcast streaming live at c- span.org/radio. >> over the years, when you look back over the looks but had an impact on the president, what did you find? >> that is one of my inspirations for writing this book. i was curious to see whether they had an impact. michael harrington wrote a book in the early 1960s about poverty and west virginia. kennedy was supposed to have read that book and it led to the war on poverty. it was not quite that simple. what he read was a book review by dwight macdonald. tell themred him to

that they look into policies that could be used to alleviate poverty. he said this is my kind of program. >> now discussion about the obama it is rations relationship with the press and a recent study by the committee to protect journalists. new is hosted by the america foundation. it is 1.5 hours.

>> hello, welcome to new america. i am the managing editor. a edit the digital magazine "weekly wonk." i am here to welcome you to this event, the obama administration and the press. if you have not had a chance to see this report, it is all about protecting sources. those of us who have done the job in reporting know that the sources are our lifeblood. if they come for the sources, we better speak. you are familiar with the court cases against sources, it is a bleak picture. the u.s. attorney in chicago put a lot of guys away. when he came here to prosecute scooter libby, he asserted that journalists are witnesses to a crime. thank you for coming.

these fellows will have a fine discussion. we are excited. before i introduce the moderator, one bit of business. this will be webcast on c-span, please be sure to wait for the microphone. your moderator, kurt wimmer. he was a general counsel and advocated for a federal shield bill. take it away. >> is a great honor to be here along with these experts.

i am the only person on this panel i have never heard of. [laughter] >> this is one of those panels where everyone needs no introduction. to my left, leonard downie, professor of journalism at the cronkite school at arizona state. very well known to this audience

as vice president at large of "the washington post," he was executive editor from 1971 2008, 44 years in the newsroom. joel simon, executive director also the author of "imperial life in the emerald city." this became the basis for the movie "the green zone" with matt damon. a terrific piece of work. he has been the post's bureau chief in baghdad and work at the johns hopkins school for advanced international studies. i would like to start off with an overview of the report we are here to discuss. >> the question of reporters being subpoenaed was brought up yesterday or the day before. "the new york times" lost a

court case to not have them before us to testify. it is in the report. it was up to the point of a court decision. that will probably go to the supreme court, a major test of the relationships between reporters and their sources. what rights to reporters have to not be forced to give away their sources. the shield law plays into that. if there were a shield law, that case might be different. but there is no shield law. i was asked to this report because i have written a couple pieces for "the washington post." pieces about the obama administration's war on leaks, the aggressive way they have been going after government officials who provide information to reporters, particularly classified information.

that was asked by the committee to explore the relationship between the obama administration and the press. in the context of the kinds of art that the committee to protect journalists does worldwide. the protection of the press' right to work. i was surprised with what i found. it went way beyond the war on leaks into other areas. i found the administration to be remarkably controlling. i will tell you about how that happened. the report on my findings were based on several dozen interviews with reporters, news executives, and government transparency advocates. plus research that i did and that sarah did in the investigations. those are the most complete accounts that anybody else has

done. we looked at the bush and obama administration to make comparisons. the patriot act and the nsa. and a one sentence summary, the obama administration's war on leaks and efforts to control information that the news mania needs are without equal. they are in direct conflict with obama's stated goal of making his administration the most transparent in history. i should add that i was one of the editors of the watergate story in the early 1970's. i make a comparison with knowledge. six components to what i found. the first, chilling effects of the investigation and prosecution along with concerns about the nsa programs. obama administration officials are increasingly afraid to talk

to the press. every signal journalist i talked to said that that is the case with their source in the government, whether they deal with classified information, but especially if it involves classified information. six government employees and 2 government contractors have been prosecuted since 2009 for leaks of alleged classified information to the press. it has been done under a 1917 espionage act enacted during world war i to punish people for spying for foreign entities. here, we have government officials talking to reporters who are prosecuted under that. there are only three such prosecutions in the 90 years from 1917 until 2009 when they began during the obama administration. in several of these investigations, probably the most frightening thing for government officials, the justice department and the fbi were successful in secretly subpoenaing and seizing e-mail

traffic between different organizations and news outlets. there were decisions made by the justice department after an outcry from the news media over those cases. they still allow the attorney general to refuse to notify news media about communication records and still contain an exception for any leaked information that the government considers harmful to national security. that is a big loophole that you could drive a truck through. the shield legislation also has a similarly broad exception for national security information. it would require a judge to make a final decision rather than leaving it to the attorney general. congressional passage is still very much in doubt. also in doubt is how we define a journalist by law.

in the digital age, that is very broad. anybody can commit journalism. it is a concern that joel may talk about, defining who a journalist is currently two government licensing a journalist. saying you are a journalist but you are not a journalist depending on the action they want to take. reporters told me they worry about compromising their sources when their contact could be traced. many sources will no longer talk to them at all. we're not just talking about these investigations, there are other investigations where they have for tonight then lie detector test given to government officials suspected of talking to the press. reporters do not want to get their sources in trouble. number 2, the insider threat program. in the aftermath of private manning, the insider threat program.

employees have been monitored and report any suspected insider threat activity which includes relations with the press. the director of the project of government secrecy is one of the leading government transparency advocates in washington. he said that this has created internal surveillance and heightened paranoia, making people conscious of contacts with the public has. a third issue, the administration controlling -- they have what they call unauthorized contact with the press is discouraged. they make clear that they have a president do not want any kind of leaks to the news media, not just classified information.

routine inquiries from reporters are referred to public affairs officials who are unresponsive and hostile. they sometimes refuse to provide reporters public information that we allhave a right to. the government transparency that president obama has promised has turned out to be a public relations strategy honed during 2 campaigns, creating government websites and social media to dispense favorable information generated by his administration while restricting the government exposure to accountability program by the press. they are full of government created content, photos taken by the press photographer while all other photographers are banned. they produced videos and even a newscast called "west wing week" that are closed to journalists.

posts by obama aides on blogs, twitter, facebook, and social media to promote administration views. the former cnn reporter and now director of the school of public affairs at gw told me that the administration is using social media to end run news media completely. dialogue with the public isn't is good, but if used for propaganda and to avoid journalists, it is a slippery slope. the third issue is excessive classification. reporters call somebody up with a routine question, it turns out that the information is classified.

even though there seems to be no good reason of it. the administration has taken credit for declassifying and posting on a new intelligence community website some of the courteously secret documents regarding nsa surveillance programs. only after revelations by the press and stories based on documents leaked by edward snowden. the administration has not acted on a report recommending specific steps to take to carry out the president's aim to reduce overclassification. this would free government officials to discuss more of the public distance with the press. the fifth issue is the failure to approve the freedom of information act process. they have made little progress on another of the president's

promises -- a directive he issued in january 2009 --to improve government responsiveness to foia requests. advocates have found that too many departments too many foia requests. or demand expensive -- excessive fees to fulfill them. an associated press survey found that the number of foia requests from the press that were turned down on the grounds of national security or internal deliberation had increased during the obama administration. more than 80 prominent organizations that advocate for transparency met here in washington last week to work on recommendations for the obama administration to make foia work better. i have talked to some other leaders, they are worried about whether the administration will listen. the fifth issue, the treatment of whistleblowers. president obama has said he supports encouraging and protecting government

whistleblowers who reveal bureaucratic abuse. he and his administration have drawn a distinction between bat and revelations to the press about government policies. they punished with investigations and firings. he signed the whistleblower act in 2012, along with a policy aimed at protecting the retaliation of government whistleblowers. the same time, his administration won an appellate court decision that takes away from federal employees and national security positions the right to appeal actions by their agencies which could include retaliation for whistleblowing. the prosecution of some whistleblowers as spies under the 1917 espionage act leaves the president's position unclear. lastly, the international implications. in addition to the threat posed to foreign journalists by nsa surveillance -- they're not supposed to spy on americans, but they can spy on the can and of non-american citizens. the obama administration's policies provide a questionable

example for other countries at a time when this administration has been advocating for freedom and the rest of the world. president obama faces many challenges during his remaining time in office. the outcome of which will shape his legacy. one objective he could accomplish without outside opposition is fulfilling his first promise, making his administration transparent by opening his closed doors. that is the summary. >> make you so much. i would like to invite anyone tweeting about this to use the hashtag #obamaandthepress. it is really great work, pulling threads into a fabric that exposes a lot about the thrust of the administration.

for many years, there seem to be a detente between government and the press. we recognize that the government had secrets to keep, we would try to get them. the ones that were relevant and should be published, we would. it seems in your report, you are talking about administration that has stepped over a line, chilling the ability of members to speak to the press. >> two things to say about that. the decision by the supreme court which made it unique in the world. if you are the administration, you can always punish us and our sources afterward. secondly, 9/11. a lot of attitudes changed.

including the whole balance between what you were talking about -- the revelations of government activity and national security. i lived with that balance during the bush administration when we published stories that require conversation with the administration. they continue during this administration in a different atmosphere. the third historical thing is, when obama came into office, they were put under great pressure by the intelligence agencies. they were upset by the previous stories, secret stories in the new york times. they put pressure on the administration to do something about that. investigations begun under bush

both democrats and republicans on the hill. also, i believe that the president himself, he has not really spoken about this. i believe he has -- he said something that he did not want secrets revealed that put our boys at risk. i think he has a strong bend towards secrecy. >> rajiv, joel? >> pretty compelling. >> it is. a point he makes, particularly as an editor overseeing a publication of some of the stories over time. you look back at the cia black sites story, the new york time'' reporting on warrantless wiretapping. the bush administration's

responses to those. as well as decisions and discussions that led up to the publication of the stories. particularly, how previous administrations have responded to stories they have not liked, they have fought have compromised national security. yet, in most other cases, increase administrations, there have been expressions of disgust. there have been some cursory investigations. nothing of the sort that we are seeing now. when you look at some of the investigations that have taken place in recent years and you compare them to some of the previous stories, it seems like it is penny-ante stuff. going after tom drake at the nsa, which you write about. even the verizon case. in the grand scheme of things, if you talk to experts, those stories do not have a meaningful impact on american national security.

and yet, those are some of the cases being pursued with particular vigor. there really has been a fundamental change, in my view, in the approach taken by the government in recent years compared to in the preceding decades. >> in the two cases rajiv mentioned, they were classic whistleblowers. it was not whether the nsa program was too expensive. >> an argument made was that the documents found in his home were not actually classified. eventually, the case fell apart. >> what i want to do is put the report -- i think it has made a contribution. we have seen the attention it has gotten. some of these investigations, people were aware of them. putting them all together suggests that this is not a haphazard response to certain particular events. there is a systematic effort

here to marginalize and undermine the work of the press. that is what the report really accomplishes. what i want to do is talk about why we undertook it, and what the significance of that is. the cpj has been around since 1981. we started out focusing on the life and liberty of journalists around the world who work in repressive and dangerous environments and have to fear for their lives when they do a story. the framework in which the cpj was founded was the recognition that we have journalists in this country, we have the protection

of the first amendment. in our early years, when we were a small organization, we focused on reporting efforts. the recent events in this country and also our conversation with journalists covering this administration led us to conclude that the atmosphere was different. that had an impact, not only on the work of journalists here, but potentially on journalists around the world. one of our colleagues wrote the u.s. presence -- the u.s. press reports for the world. any erosion here has an impact on the affirmation available everywhere. the u.s. inspires other journalists around the world. they are threatened by an

erosion. thirdly, governments take solace from deterioration in press deterioration freedom, giving them the ability to take action. we asked glen to do this independently. we provided some research support, we helped review it, these are his independent findings. we took the report and reviewed among our staff and provide recommendations. those were done independently. that was the process. >> this is pretty remarkable. this is an organization that normally devotes its resources and still does -- to investigating and seeking action, journalists murder in the philippines. for cpj to want to devote

resources to shining a light on these issues is a remarkable step for international press organization. >> the obama administration focuses a lot on trying to promote free expression in other countries. what do you think that the types of issues that are catalogued here due to our credibility? >> i can think of a specific example. we have been advocating for president obama to raise concern with prime minister erdogan in turkey.

president obama with the prime minister. there is about the seizure. >> i do not know whether it was on the agenda. confident it did not. if president obama had raised back, i think he would have been very upset. same thing happens with the of the statedce policy that president obama had articulated. i do not hear this so much

anymore. i do not hear it so much. the constant pressure to stop leaks at any time. they referred to the public affair their officers who then discourage them to do the right stories. then just the presence of the nsa surveillance. they reported having been spied on. existence have a tremendous and chilling effects. i would stop by reporters. they said i wish you would talk to me. this is their daily life.