superficial aspects of the relationship. the relationship has to be in service of our national issues emma whether it is nuclear or burma, or whatever it is. >> i would like to come back to business briefly, this about americans. i completely agree that we need to be more confident perhaps. that can be sometimes disagreeing with americans when we have to. can i dig down into more detail military role our capabilities play in the relationship? we know the special relationship is based on a variety of factors , two nations sharing military

capability. to what extent is there concern cut into itss military capability? can you give us any more feelings on that?you listed it as one of the , but can you be more graphic? can you give us any more detail as to the extent about the cuts to our military capability. -- our military capability? statess in the united and one of those involved in protecting the government's thetion when we published strategic defense and security review in october of 2010. remarks, in my opening the administration at that time, although there were some underlying concerns, they were persuaded that we were going to spectrum of full

capabilities, that they were reassured that our defense spending would remain above 2%, certainly throughout the life of this parliament, and that the numbers we were talking about for interventions in the future were scalable. they were not as great as we have managed before, but they were nevertheless militarily significant numbers for continuing operations and for large single operations. i talked also about the niche areas. they were reassured may be surprised we were putting an extra $1 billion with this parliament and that money was going to continue to go into in turgeon's special forces. thatnk we persuaded them this was decent work at the time, which would maintain our role. as i was saying before, i think certainly,orried --

a very senior member of the u.s. military said only a few months ago that there were worries about our ability to contribute to future operations. come as aat government, we persuaded the administration in 2010 that we were maintaining a very high level of ambition as far as our defense capabilities were lifetime over the through to the 2020 horizon, but i don't think we persuaded everybody. if you look at some of the commentary at the time, "the wall street journal," it was much more critical on the decision about aircraft carriers. i think there is an undertone of concern. i think americans, the administration and others, are by and large sitting this out for the time being and waiting

to see what the key decisions, what the symbolic decisions are going to be in the next parliament. i'm not sure they are expecting major further decisions from the current parliament. >> can you give us your opinion as to where we must go forward before it really has a materially affect on that aspect of the relationship? i'm talking about military capabilities. >> it is difficult to give numbers. though, isbilities it our ability to join the u.s. in force military intervention, none of usarea? >> find it very easy to predict where we will be. i think i said i share a widely held view that we are not going to be engaged in major ground intervention for a long time. effectearly is the net of iraq and afghanistan. there may be moments where we need to. weging by the forces numbers

have had to put in the field in iraq and afghanistan, they are going much below the 6500 and 7000 number we can deploy in a single operation over time. it doesn't feel to me we can do much less than that. we have a significantly larger operation at the end of afghanistan. for some years in iraq, we were around the number. i think it would be difficult to imagine in the future, if we want to to, to have that capability. numbers are quite difficult to imagine him coming down. i think the americans will look particularly at those areas where we have important day-to- day capabilities, intelligence, ofer, special forces, areas obvious british expertise, and interoperability with united states and a great deal of experience in those areas with united states.

there are a lot of other things, as well. i mentioned the anti-mine warfare element. it is one tradition where the united states has placed a lot of reliance on u.k. capability. finally, the cynics, the skeptics with regards to the relationship with the u.s. would point to failures, in their eyes -- the balkans, our attempts at , thete change international arms trade treaty, etc. in your time when you were there, can you point -- i'm sure you can -- two successes and failures at the tempting to get the u.s. to agree to something that is in our interest where we have to make the argument? my examples are

actually a bit of each. they are things where we did not initially succeed, but try, try, and try again, and sometimes you get it in the end. i hesitate to mention this with mr. stewart here, but on the issue of afghanistan and the emphasis to be given to negotiation and reconciliation, that was something which the previous british government put some emphasis on, got relatively little traction with the bush administration, began slowly with the obama administration, but it did become a central part of the administration's policy from year one or you're too, i would say, of the obama administration. you can argue about whether it was as vigorous as it might have been, but that was something that was a very clear asked by the u.k. of the u.s. to adopt a different approach to that. i think we got there in the end.

the arms trade treaty you mentioned. we hads something where initially quite a negative reaction, but where, not just british lobbying about lobbying by others, as well, brought united states around the position which was adopted under the president. on climate change, i think you aed to look at this through complicated prison. under the bush administration. there was no way through in terms of getting our objectives met at the federal level. we had to concentrate on a very different strategy of trying to and agreement at the local and state level in the united states. we had some success in that, which is continuing in my time at the end of the bush administration and the beginning of the obama administration. for example, in the agreement between the u.k. and individual american states -- we had them with california, florida,

virginia -- it was a way of herecting the political weat -- no pun intended -- without having to get at the most tricky issue, which was the absence of federal legislation. with the obama administration, they started in a different place, but still were not able to get competence of climate legislation through. many of those activities at lower levels were important to us diplomatically. you were just talking with about theitnesses transatlantic trade and investment promotion agreement. this was particularly promoted by the u.s. chamber of commerce and by business groups in the united states. initially, the u.s. administration was a bit hesitant and cautious about it. u.k., i don't claim the was the only effective advocate,

but i think we were one of those who very early on sunday advantages of this. we were pushing not just our partners in the eu, the commission, but also a wide range of voices in the united states to adopt this. eventually, that better the president. he agreed. thing in thehat bp example of congressional legislation, which we were able to influence. another bit of congressional legislation that came in with the big package, the stimulus package into thousand nine, -- 2009, very i'm open to us, but we in the european countries were able to tone down the buy america provisions. it did not apply to you member states. >> very briefly, you listed a series of successes. perhaps the exception is afghanistan were others have

contradicted to bring in the u.s. around. apart from afghanistan, is there anything else as a success we have managed to achieve and british interests without necessarily relying on partners? also, could you just highlight one or two failures? you have outlined a lot of success but no failures in trying to sway americans. >> i wouldn't have given an example if i didn't think we had a significant rollback. others -- going back a bit, maybe going back a little bit earlier, i think on iran policy, i think it is another example where the u.k. -- not alone, and you've are very rarely going to be completely alone where the u.k. has over a decade had a continuing

, inuence on american policy favor of the twin track approach, which was not an easy -- easy thing to explain and negotiate in the united states when our outreach to iran began, but we were in the end a successful during the second bush term and since president obama has been in office. committee might want to put sailors to me if there are particular things you've got. >> falkland? >> you are talking about the course,-- i think, of the administration, to our ear, gave us inadequate support at different times over the past two or three years, but maybe just to put it in context, uncomfortable for us, not what we wanted, not what the embassy

was advocating for with the state department and others in the united states, but this was unfortunately a moment where , which mayat stake be seen by the rest of the world as an absolutely key, top issue for american foreign policy or even perhaps for hours -- ours. i agree with you that the language they used on several occasions was unhelpful. far as we would have liked. it would have taken a lot to have adjusted that. whether it ranks alongside some of the things we have been discussing today. thank you very much. >> one of the major countriesons into working side-by-side was a direct route this day, there are still questions.

inquiries by this committee. currently, we have the chilcote inquiry. it has taken something like four years. rumors are beginning to emerge that a lot of this delay is caused by the united states. is there anything you can out -- you can add to that? , mr. chairman. if there have been delays on the u.s. side, this would have been , not the time i was at post in washington. i'm not aware of those contacts on that issue. i think the cabinet office did put out a statement about this last week when the issue came up again. -- you i don't know don't have any inside knowledge, i hesitate to speak at all of it, but i would guess that there

would be two sets of discussions here, obviously between the cabinet office and the inquiry it has been documented over a couple of years that there are discussions going on about particular categories of u.k., u.s. exchanges -- u.k.-u.s. exchanges during the conflict. ,econdly, maybe more recently the issue was reached by the united states itself. u.s. mind isthe whether the early release of top-level exchanges between prime ministers and presidents were matters of war and peace. if they are released well ahead of the normal time in the political lifetimes of the people who are involved, would of thefect the nature trust and confidence in each

other for future presidents and prime ministers and make them less likely to stick to each in futureidentially crises? i think that issue might legitimately be a risk. is yes.nal view on the sort of issue where you are talking about the most fundamental issues. i don't want to terribly get with you.r direct i realize it will be a contrary view. -- there may are well be a knock on effect in the future. given that our country does derive advantage from the tandoor -- from the candor of american administrations, we american administrations derive value from our tandoor

towards them. i think it would be a problem if there were some inhibition over the quality of future exchanges. >> thank you. >> i can't help reflecting on that hase of newsprint been devoted to the whole question of a special relationship with -- relationship. as quoted president obama described in relationship as being an essential one. i wonder if he did that because that would more closely coincide with your analysis of the relationship. an essential relationship is clearly different from a special one. is that more accurate? does that more accurately affect -- reflect how you think the relationship is and how it should be? >> i don't myself think there is a huge difference between the two when it comes to it.

i think that your predecessor committee drew some conclusions about this when you did your report on u.s.-u.k. relations last time. as a practitioner, i'm very conscious people get very hung up on the adjective, whether the relationship is special or not, and as a practitioner, whenever i used it, i didn't like it. i would spend the next two or three paragraphs explaining what i meant and defining my terms. during the statement in 2011, changing tack and putting the emphasis on this concept of a central relationship, which is a different phrase, as i said earlier, it was to emphasize the contemporary relevance and operational quality of it. you get away from this sense that it is swathed in nostalgia and the mythology going back to churchill and every big

relationship. i think that was the purpose of it. i'm not sure that either david cameron or barack obama would decline to use the words of special relationship as well. linguistically, we can tie ourselves up in knots over this. >> there is a risk. i'm pleased to hear you say that a should not consider this wave of nostalgia, but rather the coincidence of contemporaries. >> absolutely. >> last question. >> in reference to the less committee report, what struck me all academics, british diplomats serving and retired were advising us that it is not sensible to keep using this term because it does have all those contexts, which were referred to

as nostalgia. i think what struck me recently is actually the americans seem more keen to use the words to reassure us than british people who -- british people do who talk about the practicalities. >> you say that they are using it in and need to reassure us. i do not think that is always the case. i think they are using it because of a regard to the u.k. as a critical ally for the united states, with which they have a set of unique relationships, on which their security, at least in part, depends. the more that we can embrace defensiveecome less and relate our interests and 'slationship to each side interests of the day, i think it is the better. i agree with you. i have been in a lot of conferences in america where

people volunteer it. they are not under pressure. they say it to please us. it means something to them. committee was looking at this a few years ago, it was very much in the aftermathf the first months of the obama administration, where i think there was a feeling, more pronounced than today, that the obama administration just was not interested in allies. i think what i was try to save remarks, therks -- obama administration has realized that has gone too far. certainly, the practice of foreign policy in the last five years has shown they need to use allies around the world in order to get and achieve things in the world, unless they have that sort of functioning relationship. i think that the backdrop that the previous committee was operating under has changed somewhat in just the way the obama administration, not only

in relation to the u.k., but more broadly, talks about the world and talks about the building blocks of american influence and power. >> the fact that you can describe not one inquiry but to inquiries by this committee much of a valuable witness you are. thank you very much for coming on. it is appreciated. meeting closed. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2013] in a few moments, a discussion on the future of digital currency. in about 45 minutes, today's presidential medal of freedom ceremony at the white house. after that, president obama marks the 50th anniversary of the assassination of president kennedy with a read-laying ceremony at the eternal flame in arlington national ceremony. later, national security adviser susan rice on u.s. policy in the a ship is a thick region. region.e asia-pacific

on the next "washington journal," congressman mike doyle discusses the health care law and how he thinks the rollout could affect democrats in the 2014 midterm elections. south carolina representative trey gowdy looks at the future of immigration legislation and whether he thinks congress can come to an agreement on how to move forward. plus, your e-mails, phone calls, and tweets. "washington journal" is live at 7:00 a.m. eastern on c-span. this weekend, book tv is like in florida for the miami book fair international. coverage kicks off saturday at 10:00 a.m. eastern on c-span 2 with dave barry, roy blunt meltzer, andrad continues with appearances by lawrence wright, doris kearns goodwin, and a scott berg. king collins with sherry and susan herman. sunday's coverage starts at 10:30, and includes mark

halperin, bill ayres, chris matthews. the miami book fair international, live this weekend on book tv on c-span 2. don't forget to weigh in on on nor -- on our november book club question -- what books are you reading on jfk? poster thoughts anytime on our book up -- bookclub chat room, booktv.org/bookclub. >> next, a discussion on the future of digital currency. this is 45 minutes. host: on wednesdays we take a look at our spotlight magazine articles, today taking a look at "wired magazine." inside there is this piece, "how to save bitcoin." the author is joining us this morning. let's start with -- what is bit coin?

guest: a form of money born in the digital age for the digital era. it is a way for people to send money back and forth that is as close to friction free as we have ever seen. it is simultaneously indicative of the explosive growth in interest in alternative currencies, alternative to the u.s. dollar, euro, what have you, yet it is completely unique and unlike anything we have ever really seen in the past when it comes to different kinds of money out there. host: how is it used? guest: it is used to send money from me to you, down the street or in singapore, to buy and sell goods and services online. sometimes everyday products, sometimes services.

for example, down the street here in portland, or as a lot of us have heard, for more nefarious purposes, like purchasing drugs online. one thing they offer that is both enticing to a lot of people and worrisome to law enforcement is that it provides a cloak of anonymity that is almost on par with a cash transaction. in other words if you buy drugs from someone on the street with cash, it is pretty much an untraceable transaction, unlike credit cards. bitcoin offers something very close to anonymity. on the other side of the coin, pun intended, how do you track this stuff in a civil society? we need to track the income that people are bringing in so that we can tax it.

host: is it a currency or a commodity? guest: sundays it feels like people are talking about it as the latest version of cash and other days like it is gold, because it has this limited supply, which is frustrating to people who are worried about the fate of the u.s. dollar. if we just keep issuing more and more dollars, does that not deflate the value of the dollar in our pocket? it is hard to know exactly which one of these things bitcoin is, because money serves multiple functions. it is a medium of exchange, a standard account, store of value. so, what on earth is bitcoin? it is a currency because anything can be a currency. as long as people engage in the

transaction and infuse the currency with value by way of their faith. if you believe that these uncut rubies that i am holding are a sufficient payment for the pizza that you just made and want to sell to me, bingo, we can have a transaction. with red feathers, wampum shells, japanese yen. in that sense, bitcoin is another currency. on the other hand it is something more, it is almost like the internet of money. from a technical standpoint it is an open source platform. we can build on it and build things out of it. it is a currency, but it is much more than that and we are already seeing just a hint of what that could be with products like an e-mail service that you can use the platform for to protect the anonymity and privacy of your e-mail correspondence. so, it really has nothing to do

with the currency. but as we know, currency has caught fire of late, these were the hearings yesterday in washington. host: right, there were several hearings on capitol hill taking a look at digital currency and what it all means. but how could it be currency? isn't a nickel a nickel? a dollar a dollar? when you look at the value of bitcoin, the price range from five dollars per bitcoin to $20, than april 1 to may 1 the price ranged from $79 to $237 per bitcoin. and then you have seen it trade just recently at $400 per bitcoin. guest: in the past day or two it has shot up to even $700. these hearings, with government

officials saying that with a number of caveats there is nothing explicitly wrong or illicit about bit point or other digital currencies, for that matter, but you are absolutely right, the value is all over the map. these price fluctuations, and this is what i tried to cover for "wired," the price fluctuations are very scary to the everyman. if you do not understand how the technology works, unless you are filthy rich it seems too risky to engage in this kind of speculation. this is -- what some people say is the achilles' heel of bitcoin, other people are just calling it the early days and something inevitable, you will see speculative value much more than trade value. in other words 20 years from now let's say that bitcoin really takes hold, more and more people own and transact with it. the value, theoretically, will settle down as people use it to buy and sell goods online, much

as they do with the dollar and the euro. that is a huge question mark. no one knows if that will actually happen. again, the volatility in the price is what scares people. but the idea that price volatility by itself somehow disqualifies bitcoin from being a currency is nonsense. the somali schilling is a currency. the u.s. dollar is remarkably stable, but it's value still function waits because it is not anchored to any real-world substance that you can dig out of the ground. there are attributes to national currency, currency issued by central banks that gives them more stability. one is just the fact that most of us are using those currencies for almost everything, so that

widespread acceptance and use of this form of money for a medium of exchange, for value, for a standard unit of account, this kind of settles the price down, but again, it still moves, but bitcoin is sort of getting tossed around in the wind because it is so completely new. with this recent discussion and disclosure of interest in bitcoin, that is when everyone is sort of jumping in the pool and kind of money managers will say investors, backup. this looks like a bubble. host: in this piece that you wrote you say it is time to take it mainstream. how do you do that? guest: well, there are a couple of things that could happen. the idea in the east that frankly agitates a lot of super users of bitcoin is the notion that although bitcoin's magic and power comes from the fact

that it is decentralized, it is not a currency issued from on high by a central bank. it is controlled by this network of users and computers that monitor and keep track of all the transactions. because it is a mathematically based currency, new bitcoin are created based on algorithm, not the decision-making skills of individuals sitting around a mahogany table. host: i wanted to interrupt, because i wanted this to be clear, there is no centralization to this. no federal reserve. guest: exactly, and this is what makes bitcoin unlike anything we have seen before. this facet is really exciting to a lot of people who are again worried about the long-term value of a national currency controlled by a central bank.

it is also attractive, frankly, to a lot of people of the super libertarian stripe, worried about government control, privacy, want to return to the gold standard, they like the idea of a currency that has value that government cannot touch. indeed, that is a very powerful, if not world changing idea. another way to think about that is that there is no there there to shut down. people think that if it becomes too problematic, law enforcement can shut it down, but they cannot. it would be like shutting down the internet. you can try, you can nibble around the edges -- for example, there are bitcoin exchanges that help individuals convert u.s. dollars in two bitcoin or back and forth, you can shut down exchange -- indeed, some have been shut down because they were involved in criminal endeavors, but you cannot shut down bitcoin.

this is sort of a magical aspect of this new form of money. how do you take it mainstream? to me the issue, or the problem, is this price volatility. the everyman, when you are not superrich, you do not want to engage in that kind of risky activity with your money. you certainly do not want to do nominate your children's college fund into bitcoin anytime soon. how can you do this online using bitcoin? the idea that really rattled a lot of enthusiasts is that maybe it requires a little bit of centralized control. when you say those words, you infuriate all sorts of bitcoin enthusiasts, because their default mode of thinking is that now you are talking about a central bank, a federal reserve, human beings deciding this stuff, not mathematics. they think that not only is that

garbage, but it changes exactly how bit point works. what i would say in response is that we still need some kind of guard rails in effect to keep the currency within a reasonable boundary so that the boundary is not so low or high that you get this spiraling out of control that will just send everyone fleeing for a safer form of money. in fact we have seen hints of this already. there is a group behind bitcoin in a way that has stepped in on occasion to make sure the software is working smoothly and that these transactions are being settled appropriately. i just do not think it is outlandish to think that that group could make limited controls to provide a guard rail for bitcoin. one swing too far to the left or right and maybe that would make it more reasonable to the everyman.

that is step one. step two, of course, is showing the everyman that this is incredibly valuable to you. having to pay two percent, three percent, four percent for every credit card charge out there -- right away this is like what bit point is doing that is attractive to merchants, you are talking about frictionless or nearly frictionless form of money or payment transaction. so-called person-to-person transaction. you are cutting out the middleman. by just getting money from me to you. this is why people talk about virtual currency as revolutionary and why a lot of the levelheaded discussions during the hearings in washington this week talked about the potential, the positive potential of something like bitcoin for the economy as a whole and for consumers.

host: we covered a couple of those hearings here on c-span. for viewers who are interested, they should go to our website, www.c-span.org. the headline yesterday was "virtual cash increases problems around the world." we have this twitter message -- guest: no, not at all. for me this is what is so exciting about the future of money. i did not really know -- i started this project a couple of years ago, looking at the fête, possibly the dubious fate of the u.s. dollar, specifically in its cash iteration. we are not talking about the death of the dollar, we are talking about paper money.

at the time i thought that this was kind of the two-part valentine, one part eulogy to these rectangular slips of paper that we all have this unique relationship with. something that was both dazzling and a dizzying happened when i put the dollar under the microscope, figuratively and literally. you start to learn about not just where currency comes from and the history of the dollar, but where it is going and what it could be in the future. in the digital realm, money could be and really already is taking all kinds of different shapes. again, because anything can be a currency as long as the users infuse it with value by way of their faith and by using it. just think of the dollar, for example. nothing makes a dollar worth a dollar except that our belief that it is valuable and our confidence that some third party will accept it as payment later. there is no there there, there

is no gold in a vault somewhere, it is just paper that we have come to accept based on the full faith and trust of the u.s. government, etc. it is the same thing with alternative currencies that we see sprouting up -- ithaca, new york, has something called ithaca hours. they have them in the berkshires, massachusetts. anything can be a currency. in the digital realm, there is nothing stopping us from having -- i am holding my hand up like this all the time because i am picturing on your mobile phone what is essentially a rainbow of different currency options to make payments at a merchant or online, depending on which currency, for which transaction, makes the most sense for you as a consumer in that particular moment.

host: i was just thinking, that sounds very complicated. that future of deciding which currency to use based on what you are buying. guest: yes and no. 10 years ago my default mode was to picture a cash register. you would be crazy to think that it would be yen, euros, dollars, pesos, etc.. you are going to provide correct change in all of these? how would you be able to convert the proper exchange rate in that time and place? but mobile ubiquity in your pocket, you have these computers that can do all of this convergence on the fly. the idea is to present to people the obvious value proposition. an example that i like to use, it sounds cutesy on the surface but it is legitimate, i think, something like airline miles or,

even more so, disney dollars. that is a community currency that you use at disney land when you go there to buy and sell on- site. now, if i am going to emerge and by a latte, computer, new paris sneak her, and they say -- if you transact using disney dollars, when you have them in your virtual wallet, when you take your family 14 months from now and you use the disney dollars there, you will receive what amounts to a 15% discount on all of your transactions. for a lot of families on the margin financially, they have been saving for years and years to go for a family of five, this is a lot of money in savings. it may seem confusing on the surface to have this rainbow of currency options, but once people see the value in using this currency, they will do so.

the fact that airline miles are already so popular and being used by people to buy trips or hotel reservations, rental cars? that is proof that this kind of thing can fly. and of course, government has no problem with it as long as the airline miles you are issuing do not look too much like the u.s. dollar in their physical form and you are not advertising them loudly as a competitor to the u.s. dollar. host: david wolman, i have to get to our callers hear. he is the author of "the end of money: counterfeiters, preachers, techies, dreamers, the coming cashless society." texas, good morning. caller: i am going to speak by

going in the wind, from here to there, but you will see the point i am coming to. some of my educated words are not too well. i will show you what i have directed. russia, canada, america, the tri-force. there will be a different alignment. america taking over this world -- not this world, but with the war there will be a new relief formed. this goes back to the ancient greeks. there will be a new testament. there will be certain zones for churches, some of them will pay their tithes to the federal administration. the illuminati and the governing of the stars, bringing the balances together, this will link us universally in the ocean, putting pressure on the court, causing earthquakes for the

zoning of oil. host: ok, i am going to leave it there and move on to a tweet -- guest: that is a great question. i do not actually know if you can borrow in bit coin. my guess is that they do not exist, but i would like to hear from people who know otherwise. this is indicative of the fact that bitcoin is so unique. will there be banking services? will there be an online wallet that holds onto it for you wetjen market could you ever get credit? -- or could you revolving

credit? could you denominate a mortgage? i do not know about the interest rate question and it remains to be seen if bitcoin will mature in that fashion and be embraced by the more formal banking sector or if it will remain within the purview of the technocrat. host: tom, good morning. caller: can you hear me ok? the one thing that scares me about bitcoin, there are countries that feel that the american dollar is insubstantial, nothing that we can depend on as we have in the past. americans do not realize that if a terrorist wants to buy oil from saudi arabia or somewhere, they have to change the money into american dollars. the american dollar is used as the basis for trade and whatnot throughout the world. a lot of people feel, though,

that america cannot be depended upon anymore. if they decide to pay in other forms of money or exchanges to use the sides the american dollar, people hate the central bank because they print out all the money, but people have confidence that the money coming from the central bank is good money, that it can be used throughout the world to keep our economy going. host: tom, those are your concerns with bitcoin? caller: something to the point where the american dollar is under pressure. host: david wolman? guest: this is precisely representative of the anxieties that people have about the state of national currencies and our government, that it is driving people toward bitcoin. you can think a lot about digital gold. you have to think again of this idea, the full faith and trust of the u.s. government. what makes one dollar one dollar?

that is our case with issuing institutions. behind that faith is the government. if you do not have faith in the decision-making that the government is conducting to protect the value of the currency over the long term, you are going to look for something else. this is why i imagine, greta, you do not denominate your kids college fund in somalia shillings, because you do not have faith in the currency. with the government shutdown and everything before that, the fiscal cliff, the confidence of people in the dollar is being rattled because their confidence in washington's ability to get anything done has been shaken. that being said, the status of the dollar as the so-called reserve currency of the world is not in jeopardy anytime soon. most international transactions are still settled in dollars.

most central banks the world over pay for money unreserved so that they can buy and sell currency to adjust their own prices. one way to think about it, the thread from cormac mccarthy, if you completely lose faith in the u.s. dollar you might as well go get your blankets and your guns. all currency values are free- floating. they are all tethered to the u.s. dollar, but the dollar is not tethered to anything. there is no wire connecting it to the ground with some real-world substance. when you start to really worry -- is the u.s. dollar hyper inflating into the heavens? it could lead you down this line of tanking that frankly it's kind of scary and i just do not think that that is going to

happen. although i sympathize with the caller's concerns, i just think that for better or for worse we are all tied together in this endeavor of protecting the value of the dollar. host: we have this tweet -- guest: that is a great question. i think that with venture capitalists right now, the mentality is that these early days, at least some of the people i have talked to, the early days are now like the early days of the internet. nobody outside silicon valley really understood what it was or what the potential might be. a lot of people outside silicon valley pooh-pooh'd it as a frivolous experiment. i think a lot of people in

silicon valley are trying to look the on what is today an obvious bubble in the speculative value of bitcoin. what they are seeing is less the kind of super libertarian i do not want to be a participant in government ideal, they are actually seeing this marvelous tool for online transaction, this idea of peer to peer money. the internet has never really deliver that to us as consumers. people in silicon valley, when they talk about e-commerce, that is what they are thinking about with peer to peer transactions. that is where they see it as potentially the most powerful. whether you are a mom and pop shop of eight people or a giant corporation. that is where at least i see venture capitalists primary interest in bitcoin. as far as cozying up to legislators, does that suggest some sort of alternative motive or nefarious purpose?

i do not really know, but i do think that the fact that a lot of people who are positive about bitcoin, they are not just posting blogs about how they do not ever want to pay their taxes and by carolyn. -- and buy heroin. they are saying that this is a new and legitimate form of money and if it is going to be that, we need to embrace regulation and regulators and help them to understand what it is and help them establish parameters so that it can become enmeshed in the financial system, so that it does not flee overseas and all of the usage and innovation. we do not want the usage to flee overseas because that would potentially leave the u.s. and silicon valley entrepreneurs out of what is potentially a great profit. host: we are talking about bitcoin, its value, what it all moot -- and what it all means.

this tweet -- host: here on the cnbc website, they have a look at the value of bitcoin, the last trade was 550 two dollars. larry, go ahead. caller: good morning there, greta. long-winded, ok, so let me tell you something there, the boy had a song in memphis and it was that i owe my so to the company store -- soul to the company store. we did that with our currency and the goaltender. you are forgetting -- well, you

are young. you are forgetting that legal tender only came about because gold became too hard to carry around. earlier we went on the barter system, meaning you had to learn a trade, i had to learn a trade, we benefited each other. people did not need each other's crafts and all they had to do to develop legal tender was have gold. instead of the gold standard we went on the person standard. it in other words, we employed people. now we have fewer people employed and taxes are not coming like they should be. copper is becoming emptier and emptier. what we do not need is another way for people to own their soul to the company store, to bring us back around to the metaphor, we need something that enhances everyone to learn to do something besides gather and collect money, which has been easier and easier, the ones and zeros in the computer.

host: david wolman, your thoughts? guest: well, it is all just zeros and ones on the computer. this is the idea that frightens a lot of people. even if you are not talking about bitcoin, the fact that most money today is already digital. so much of it vaporized, all of that value was gone a few years ago with the financial meltdown. again, your caller, to me it is analogous to the way that people think about gold. they are just so worried about the dollar and where it might go , they want something that they perceived to be is more stable. in a way, these people are perfect potential bitcoin users because of this idea that bitcoin has a limited supply and

that the algorithm has set a limit on how many will be out there. 21 million coins will be created or issued and that is it. that is exactly why it is not a viable currency, some say, but others say that this is precisely why it will thrive and have strong value into the future. we will see which camp is right. host: the gao is reporting that there may be as many as 11 million bid: --bitcoins. mike, new york, go ahead. caller: did you speak to a constitutional lawyer or expert on this piece? in section eight, section 10, it states that only congress can coin money, no one else can coin money. i think the reason these people are going to congress now to

lobby them is to try to buy them off so that they can make it legal to coin their own money. guest: well, i did not look into that for the essay we are talking about, but in writing about "the end of money," i looked into that and more, and the reality is that much more innovation with currency is permissible under the law than most of us might think upon first glance. where we run into problems, actually, is if you start to mint coins that look very much like a u.s. nickel, dime, or quarter, that is going to get you in trouble. the same thing, of course, for counterfeit engine mins. -- counterfeit benjamins. but the boundary between what is and is not permissible currency is really not clear. some of those things are clear

-- if you make a representation that looks too much like a $100 bill, you will get in trouble, you are a counterfeiter. but with something like bitcoin, disney dollars, airline miles, ithaca hours, facebook credits -- there are all kinds of new forms of money being born all the time and they are not illegal. when we talk about beagle tender -- frankly, this is something before writing the book that i misunderstood, i thought legal tender was -- you have to use dollars. that is not the case. it only means that if i owe you money and i have a debt that is denominated in dollars, we have agreed that that is my debt. when i come to pay it in dollars you cannot subsequently say to me know, you have to pay me in uncut rubies, euros, what have you. it is all for settling debts, but there is nothing from

stopping me from pain you with airline miles for your goods and services. host: david wolman, to questions from twitter -- guest: i can do my best. the first one, how can you participate in bitcoin, as a copy out right now, it does really look like it is -- caveat right now, it does look very expensive. i would not advocate for anyone with asked -- anyone without excess money to jump into the fray. but if you do want to participate in bitcoin, do some reading online first and foremost. the best access point is probably one of these exchanges. much like a currency exchange

window at an airport where you are going to change your dollars into euros for your trip to europe, you go to a currency exchange online and you can change dollars into bitcoin. you buy some and then you have them in a virtual wallet that you can the ploy as you see fit. so, that is one. as far as how it differs from paypal, paypal is a way to settle a transaction that is relatively swift and is enabling online transactions for merchants that really did change the world, but paypal transactions are still kind of wrapped up in the credit card network. but paypal transactions are still kind of wrapped up in the credit card network. to open a paypal account, you still need to give them credit card information. with bitcoin, you are taking this virtual alternative currency and using it directly for the exchange of goods and services you are acquiring. you are leaving the credit card industry, the banks, the

national currencies out of the equation when you are using it. host: we have this message from twitter -- host: let me add to that, what are miners? guest: who will be using it is whoever wants to. there is this chicken and egg problem, because i am not going to use bitcoin if no merchants around me will accept it. for the merchants the problem is ash why would i go through the trouble of making it possible for my business to accept this if i do not see any consumers out there who really want to use it? there is this chicken and a difficulty, but nevertheless a lot of people are already using bitcoin to buy and sell a lot of things online.

the same question, miners, this gets more into the nitty-gritty of how the distributed network of bitcoin works. one way i like to think about bitcoin is like a 19th-century merchants ledger of all the transactions coming in and out, except this ledger is not just sitting on one shopkeeper's desk, this ledger is distributed over the entire network. so, every transaction denominated in bitcoin is recorded in the ledger. the process of doing that recording, of validating the transaction, is also known as mining. in that process, people's computers out there are settling a transaction and also performing these computational puzzles and they are rewarded

with new bitcoin when they do so, when they win the race. that process is also known as mining. host: john, you are next. portsmouth, ohio, republican caller. guest: my question is such -- governments thrive off of taxes. they use this to pay their employees, to pay your congressman, your president, to pay their soldiers, to pay for their warmish scenes. how are they going to tax this throughout the world so that governments get their money? i will take the answer off the air. guest: a great question, and right now they have no idea how to. that is the short answer. that is partially why these hearings are taking place. but for a bit of perspective, even though bitcoin is in the press right now and the value has skyrocketed recently, it is still such a miniscule fraction of the modern economy that i do

not think government is too worried about it yet. having said that, if you are making tens of millions of dollars worth of bitcoin with your new venture a few years from now, the irs is going to want some of that. you know, people have a different feeling about that, depending on the politics. but there is no question that this is a puzzle for governments and for tax collecting agencies. host: one of our viewers says -- host: michael, bloomington, indiana, independent caller. caller: i just had a comment. well, a few comments. your question earlier about

bitcoin lending and borrowing, there is already a healthy economy in this. several third parties who provide security services for transactions between peer to peer lending. number two, the a coin -- bitcoin ledger is a secured by cryptology -- is secured by cryptology. whether it becomes the currency of the world or not, currencies are heading in this direction of cryptographic security, because it -- it is the safest method of for taking current sees from double spending or counterfeiting. some of the exchanges are [indiscernible] --

host: the average person is getting pretty confused at this point. can you explain what michael is talking about there? guest: another way to think about it, if bitcoin fails for some reason, there will be -- if not already are, 8, 18, or 38 bitcoin -- bitcoin-like innovations out there in the wings. i mentioned in the ledger earlier that tracks all the transactions. he is right that the identities involved in the transactions, those participants are rejected by cryptography. this is why bitcoin is so close to being anonymous is a medium of exchange. almost as good as cash when it comes to protecting your privacy .

but it is not anonymous in that all the transactions are tracked on this ledger. that is crucial with this issue of double spending. in other words how do you stop someone from turning the 20 bitcoin into 40 bitcoin because they are good at computer coding? this is the answer, you have this enormous ledger tracking the transactions so that once a bitcoin is spent, not only can you see that it has been spent, but everyone in the network and see it has been spent. this is part of the power and magic and ruler of bitcoin is the crypto currency of the future. host: we are running out of time, quickly, who started bitcoin? guest: nobody knows. to me this is another ingredient in the power of this currency. a currency needs trust and faith for people to use it and for it

to have value and i think that the mysterious creation myth of bitcoin is part of the magic of conjuring this value. there is a name for this guy or group of guys out there, but no one knows who did it. host: wolman david wolman, joining -- david wolman, joining us from portland, oregon, thank you, sir. guest: my pleasure. host: live coverage of the house begins now. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2013] >> on the next "washington journal," mike doyle discusses the health care law and how he thinks the rollout could affect democrats in the 2014 midterm elections. south carolina representative takes a look at the immigration legislation and whether he thinks congress can come to an moving forward. plus, your e-mails and tweets. live at 7:00 a.m. eastern on c- span." --

>> a senior congressional reporter for politico, writing today that progress is being made in the negotiations between patty murray, the budget committee chairmen in the senate, and paul ryan in the house. what is the status of things? >> they are still negotiating. right now the hope is they will get a small deal. they're not talking about abe a, grand bargain deal -- they are not talking about a big, grand bargain deal. they are dealing with narrow sequestration, automatic spending cuts that are set to deepen in the new fiscal year after january 15. the hope is they could replace at least one year, may be less than a year of those cuts, change that around other portions of the budget, attentional mandatory spending programs, increased revenue, not by increasing taxes but by

potentially raising fees and other areas as such. the hope is they can cut some sort of middle ground on that, at least get a narrow agreement to deal with the sequester, and then set overall spending levels for the federal discretionary spending in the new fiscal year, and that would allow budgets to be written and lessen the chances of a government shutdown come january 15. there are still a long ways to go, but they're getting closer. >> in your article, you write about the pressure being applied by house and senate appropriators. who specifically are you hearing from? >> the senate appropriations chairwoman, barbara mikulski, the house appropriations chairman, how rogers are among the appropriators pushing for -- wishing very hard for a top line agreement on the overall

discretionary spending number by early december. their hope is to write a big omnibus spending bill for the if entire federal -- for the entire federal government, rather than a stopgap resolution which appropriators hate to do, bouncing month a month, threatening to shut down. they are not able to set priorities legislatively. the hope is they reach a deal on the overall spending level. if they do, it will make their jobs easier. >> when mitch mcconnell came over to speak to the house republicans tuesday, what did they hear specifically about the budget negotiations? >> he said that we should stick to the budget control act levels. meaning in the new fiscal year, after january 15, when the new round of sequestration takes effect, it would lessen the overall federal spending to $967

billion. he really wants to stick to that number. the issue, though, is those sequestration cuts come from mainly defense programs. there is a $21 billion hit to defense programs. a lot of republican defense hawks are very concerned about that and told mcconnell that directly in the closed-door session. at is the issue that republicans are going to have to struggle with. they want to cut spending, but they also do not want to see these cuts hit from defense programs, and that is really the incentive for republicans to cut a deal now to avoid those cuts to the pentagon. >> you mentioned appropriators

want some kind of number by early december, and that december 13 date is looming. what are a couple of the possible trouble areas that could pop up that could grind to a halt again? >> it always comes down to the issue of taxes. revenue, democrats are saying they are open to considering things that would raise revenue that would not involve closing loopholes that would raise revenue, something republicans do not want to raise revenue, raise taxes of any kind. if there is not a large enough number where they can raise revenue from other areas and democrats insist on raising taxes at least to make up some of the changes to sequestration they are talking about, that could blow up a deal at the end of the day. also, if republicans insist on deeper cuts, mandatory spending programs like health care, medicare waste programs, that could blow things up at the end. it is really the same issues, taxes and environmental programs, that have dogged congress on many years and that the two members will have to get around to get even small targeted deals by the end of december. >> you can follow manu and read his political reporting on politico.com. think you for bringing us up to speed. >> in a few moments, the presidential medal of freedom ceremony at the white house. president obama remarks the 50th anniversary of the assassination of president kennedy.

after that, national security adviser susan rice on u.s. policy in the asia-pacific region. between thecussion u.s. and united kingdom. events to telle spanabout tomorrow on c- three. the senate judiciary committee that looks into government surveillance programs at 10:00 a.m. eastern area -- eastern. 2:15, the political situation in north africa, hearing from the pentagon and the state department. >> a typical day would begin with her coming in in the morning, probably around 9:00, and she would come in toting a straw bag in each hand filled with some of the things you see on the desk that she had taken home for signing or

speechwriting or event planning, whatever she was working on, and she would come in and get to work. her death was always very orderly. as she worked on her death, with letters she was processing or things, when she completed things, she would put them on the floor. she loved this office because she could look out at her alma mater, and to the capital. in the city she loves so much. we had three office staff at the time. a person who handled her came froma person who the white house as her press secretary who helped work on speeches, and then i was in the office. about 5:00 in the afternoon, she was ready to leave and go to the ranch, which she called home. say at 3:30 in the afternoon, she would ask if she had anything else to do and if the answer was no, she would say to tell secret service shoes ready to go. >> c-span.org/firstladies.

our series continues live monday as we look at first lady pat nixon. >> president obama awarded the residential medal of freedom to 16 people today. recipients of the nation posses highest civilian honor included bill clinton and sally ride. this is a little less than an hour. >> ladies and gentlemen, the vice president of the united states and dr. jill biden. ladies and gentlemen, the

recipient of the presidential medal of freedom. mr. ernie banks. mr. ben bradley. the honorable bill clinton. ms. irene inouye accepting on behalf of her husband the honorable daniel inouye. dr. daniel conovan. the honorable richard lugar. ms. loretta lynn. dr. mario molina. ms. tan owe seancy accepting on

behalf of her partner, sally k. ride. mr. walter neagle accepting on behalf of his partner, byer russian. mr. sandoval. ms. linea smith accepting on behalf of her husband, dean smith. ms. gloria steinem. reverend c.c. vivian. the honorable patricia wald. ms. oprah winfrey.

>> ladies and gentlemen, the president of the united states and mrs. michelle obama. >> good morning. good morning, everybody. everybody, please have a seat. have a seat.

on behalf of michelle and myself, welcome to the white house.

this is one of my favorite events every year. especially it's special this year as i look at this extraordinary group of individuals and our opportunity to honor them with our nation's highest civilian honor, the presidential medal of freedom. and this year it's just a little more special because this marks the 50th anniversary of president kennedy establishing this award. we are honored, by the way, today to have with us one of my favorite people, ethel kennedy and a pretty good basketball player, president kennedy's grandson, jack. this medal has been bestowed on more than 500 deserving people. tonight i'm looking forward to joining some of these honorees, as well as members of the kennedy family, as we pay tribute to these 50 years of excellence.

this morning we are honored to add 16 new names to this distinguished list. today we salute fierce competitors who became true champions. in the sweltering heat of a

chicago summer, ernie banks walked into the cubs locker room and didn't like what he saw. everybody was sitting around, heads down, depressed, he recalled. so ernie piped up and said, boy, what a great day. let's play, too. a man who came up through the negro leagues making $7 a day and became the first black player to sut up for the cubs and one of the greatest hitters of all time. in the process, ernie became known as much for his 512 home runs as for his cheer and his optimism and his eternal faith that someday the cubs would go all the way. and that's serious belief. that's something even a lifetime fan like me can respect. but he is just a wonderful man and a great iraqon of my

hometown. -- a great ikon of mytown. speaking of sports dean smith is one of the winningest coaches in history. his successes go far beyond x's and o's, he graduated 96% of his players. the first coach to use multiple defenses in a game. he was a pioneer who popularized the idea of pointing to the passer after a basket player should point to the teammate who passed them the ball. with his first national title on the line, he did have the good sense to give the ball to a 19-year-old kid named michael jordan, they used to joke that the only person who ever held michael under 20 was dean smith. while coach smith couldn't join us today due to an illness that he's facing with extraordinary courage, we also honor his courage in helping to change our country. he recruited the first black

scholarship athlete to north carolina and helped integrate a restaurant and neighborhood in chapel hill. that's the kind of character that he represented on and off the court. we salute innovators who pushed the limits of science, changing how we see the world and ourselves. growing up, sally ride read about the space program in the newspaper almost every day and thought this was the coolest thing around. when she was a ph.d. candidate at stanford she saw an ad for astronauts in the student newspaper and she seized the opportunity as the first american woman in space. sally didn't just break the stratospheric glass ceiling, she blasted through it. when she came back to earth, she devoted her life in helping girls excel in fields like math, science, and engineering.

young girls need to see role models she said. you can't be what you can't see. today our daughters, including melia and sasha, can set their sights a little higher because sally ride showed them the way. all of us have moments when we look back and wonder, what the heck was i thinking? i have that quite a bit. psychologist, daniel conaman has made that simple question his life's work. in a storied career in israel and america, he basically invented the study of human decisionmaking. he's helped us to understand everything from behavioral economics to does living in california make people happy. and there's some questions. he's also been called an expert

on irrational behavior so i'm sure he could shed some light on washington, but what truly sets daniel apart is his curiousity. guided by his belief that people are endlessly complicated and interesting. at 79 he's still discovering new insights into how we think and learn, not just so we understand each other but so we can work and live together more effectively. dr. mario molineas, love of science started as a young boy in mexico city in a homemade laboratory in bathroom at home. that passion for discover which led him to become one of the most respected chemists of his era.

he was awarded the nobel prize not only for his path breaking research but also for his insistence that when we ignore dangerous carbon emissions we risk destroying the ozone layer and endangering our planet. thanks to mario's work, the world came together to address a common threat and today inspired by his example we are working to leave our planet safer and cleaner for future generations. we also have to salute musicians who bring such joy to our lives. loretta lynn was 19 the first time she won the big -- she won

big at the local fair. her canned vegetables brought home 17 blue ribbons and made her conditioner of the year. that's impressive. for a girl from butcher holler, kentucky, that was fame. fortunately for all of us she decided to try her hand in things other than canning. her first guitar cost $17. and with it this coal miner's daughter gave voice to a generation, singing what no one wanted to talk about and saying what no one wanted to think about. now over 50 years after she cut her first record and canned her first vegetables, lore relta -- loretta lynn still raines as the rule breaking record setting queen of country music. as a young man in cuba, an dough balance loved jazz so much it landed him in jail. it was the cold war and the only

radio station where he could hear jazz was the voice of america, which was dangerous to listen to. but artero listened anyway. later he defected to the united states knowing he might not see his parents or beloved homeland again. without freedom there is no life. today he's an american citizen and one of the most celebrated trumpet players in the world. there isn't any place on earth where the people don't know about jazz, he says. and that's true in part because musicians like him have sacrificed so much to play. we salute pioneers who pushed our nation towards greater

justice and equality. a baptist minister, c.c. vivian was one of dr. martin luther king jr.'s closest advisors. martin taught us, he says, that it's in the action that we find out who we really are. and time and again, reverend vivian was among the first to be in the action. in 1947, joining a sit-in to integrate an illinois restaurant.

one of the first freedom riders. in selma on the court side steps to register blacks to vote for which he was beaten, bloodied, and jailed. rosa parks said of him, even after things that supposedly had been taken care of and we had our rights, he was still out there inspiring the next generation, including me, helping kids go to college with a program that would become upward bound. at 89 years old, reverend vivian is still out there, still in the action pushing us closer to our founding ideals. early in the morning the day of the march on washington, the national mall was far from full and some in the press were beginning to wonder if the event would be a failure. but the march's chief organizer, byron russian didn't panic. he looked down at a piece of paper, looked back up, and reassured reporters everything was right on schedule.

the only thing those reporters didn't know was that the paper he was holding was blank. he didn't know how it was going to work out, but he had an unshakable optimism, nerves of steel, and most importantly a faith that if the cause is just and people are organized, nothing can stand in our way. for decades this great leader often at dr. king's side was denied his rightful place in history because he was openly gay. no medal can change that, but today we honor his memory by taking our place in his march towards two equality no matter who we are or who we love. [applause] speaking of game changers, disrupters, there's a young girl named gloria steinem who arrived in new york to make her mark as a journalist and magazines only wanted to write articles like, how to cook without really cooking for men. gloria noticed things like that. she's been called a champion noticer. she's alert to all the ways large and small that women had been and in some cases continue to be treated unfairly just because they are women. as a writer, speaker, an activist she awakened a vast and often skeptical public to problems like domestic violence, a lack of affordable childcare, unfair hiring practices. because of her work across america and around the world, more women are afforded the respect and opportunities that they deserve. but she also changed how women thought about themselves. and gloria continues to pour her heart into teaching and mentoring. her one piece of advice to young girls is, i love this, do not listen to my advice. listen to the voice inside you and follow that. when patricia walls after she had come become after having her first child, she said she would like time off to focus on her family. devoted almost 10 years to raising five children.

but patricia never lost to practice law. while her husband watched the kids at home she hit the library on weekends. at the age of 40 she went back to the courtroom to show the young kids a thing or two. the first female judge on the d.c. circuit, patricia was a top candidate for attorney general after leaving the bench her idea of retirement was to go to the hague to preside over the trials of war criminals. patricia says she hopes enough women will become judges that it's not worth celebrating anymore. but today we celebrate her. along with gloria she shows there were all kinds of paths listening to your own voice. we salute communicators who shine the light on stories no one else was telling. a veteran of world war ii and more than a dozen pacific battles, ben bradley brought the same intensity and dedication to journalism. since joining "the washington post" 65 years ago, he transformed that newspaper into one of the finest in the world and with ben in charge, the post published the pentagon papers, revealing the true history of america's involvement in vietnam. exposed watergate. unleashed a new era of investigative journalism. holding america's leaders accountable. and rereminding us our freedom as a nation rests on our freedom of the press . when ben retired, senator daniel patrick moynihan put the admiration of many into a poem,

owe rare ben bradley, whose reign has has ceased, whose nation stands, its strength increased. and i also indicated to ben he can pull up those -- pull off those shirts and i can't. you always look so cool in them. early in oprah winfrey's career, her bosses told her she should change her name to susi. i have to pause here to say i got the same advice. they didn't say i should be named suzy, but they suggested i should change my name. people can relate to susi, that's what they said. it turned out, surprisingly, that people could relate to oprah just fine. in more than 4,500 episodes of her show, her message was always, you can. you can do and you can be, and you can grow, and it can be better. and she was living proof. rising from childhood poverty and abuse to the pinnacle of the entertainment universe. but even with 40 emmys, the digs continuation of being the first

black female billionaire, oprah's greatest strength has always been her ability to help us discover the best in ourselves. michelle and i count ourselves among her many devoted fans and friends. as one of those fans wrote, didn't know i had a light in me until oprah told me it was there. what a great gift. finally, we would salute public servants who strengthened our nation. daniel inouye was a humble man and didn't wear his medal of honor very often. instead, he liked to wear a pin representing the good conduct medal he earned as a teenage private. to behave yourself takes special effort, he said, and i did not want to dishonor my family. danny always honored his family and his country, even when his country didn't always honor him. after being classified as an inme alien, danny joined a japanese-american unit that became one of the most decorated in world war ii. as the second longest serving senator in american history, he showed a generation of young people, including one kid with a funny name growing up in hawaii who noticed that there was somebody during some of those hearings in washington that didn't look like everybody else, which meant maybe i had a chance to do something important, too.

he taught all of us that no matter what you look like or where you come from, this country has a place for everybody who is willing to serve and work hard. a prows hoosier, dick luger has served more than a half century from a young navy lieutenant to a respected leader in the united states senate. i'll always be thankful to dick for taking me a new junior senator under his wing, including travels together to review some of his visionary work, the destruction of cold war arsenals in the former soviet union. something that doesn't get a lot of public notice, but was absolutely critical to making us safer in the wake of the cold war. i should say traveling with dick you get close to unexploded land mines, mortar shells, test tubes filled with anthrax and the plague. his legacy, though, is the thousands of missiles and bombers and submarines and warheads that no longer threaten

us because of his extraordinary work. and our nation and our world are safer because of this statesman. and in the time of unrelenting partisanship, dick lugar's decentcy, commitment to bipartisan problem solving stand as a model to what public certificate vase ought -- public service ought to be. last but never least we honor a leader who we still remember with such extraordinary fondness , he still remembers as a child waving goodbye to his tomorrow, tears in her eyes, as she went to nursing school so she could provide for her family. i think lifting up families like his own became the story of bill clinton's life. he remembered what his mom had to do on behalf of him. and he wanted to make sure that he made life better and easier for so many people all across the country that were struggling in those same ways and had those same hopes and dreams.

as a governor he transformed education so more kids could pursue those dreams. as president he proved with right choices you could grow the economy, lift people out of poverty. we could shrink our deficits and still invest in our families, our health, our schools, science, technology. in other words, we can go farther when we look out for each other. and as we have all seen as president he was just getting started. he doesn't stop. he's helped lead relieve efforts after the haiti earth yake, hurricane katrina. his initiative has helped to save or improve the lives of literally hundreds of millions of people. of course i am most grateful for his patience during the endless travels of my secretary of

state. so i'm grateful bill as well for the advice and council you offered me on and off the golf course, and most importantly for your lifesaving work around the world which represents the very best in america. thank you so much, president clinton. those are the recipients of the 2013 -- these are the recients of the 2013 presidential medal of freedom. these are the men and women who in their extraordinary lives remind us all of the beauty of the human spirit, the values that define us as americans, the potential that lives inside all of us. i could not be more happy and more honored to participate in this ceremony here today. with that what i would like to

do is invite our honorees to just sit there and let all of us stand and give you a big round of applause. [cheers and applause]

>> i guess we should actually give them the medal. here we go. >> presidential medal of freedom recipients. ernie banks. with an unmatched enthusiasm for america's pastime, ernie banks slugged, sprinted, and smiled his way into the record books. known to fans as mr. cub, he played an extraordinary 19 seasons with the chicago cubs

during which he was named to 11 all star teams, hit over 500 home runs, and won back-to-back most valuable play irhonors. ernie banks was elected to the baseball hall of fame in 1977. and he will forever be known as one of the finest power hitters and most dynamic players of all time. >> benjamin bradley. a titan of journalism, benjamin

bradley is one of the most respected newsmen of his ghen generation. after serving our nation in world war ii, ben bradley went on to defend liberty here at home. testing the limits of a free press during his tenure as

executive editor of the "washington post," he oversaw coverage of the watergate scandal and successfully challenged the federal government over the right to publish the pentagon papers. his passion for accuracy and unyielding pursuit of truth continue to set the standard for journalism. >> the honorable william j. clinton. among the finest public servants of our time, president william j. clinton argued cases for the people of arkansas, served his state in the governor's mansion, and guided our nation into a new century. as the 42nd president of the united states, bill clinton oversaw an era of challenge and change, prosperity and progress. his work after leaving public office continues to reflect his passionate, unending commitment

to improving the lives and livelihoods of people around the world in responding to needs both at home and abroad, and as founder of the clinton foundation, he has shown that through creative cooperation among women and men of good will, we can solve even the most intractable problems. irene her rono inouye, accepting on behalf of her husband, the honorable daniel k. inouye. a true patriot and dedicated public servant, daniel k. inouye understood the power of leaders

when united in common purpose to protect and promote the tenets we cherish as americans. as a member of the revered 442nd regimental combat team, daniel inouye helped free europe from the grasp of tyranny during world war ii for which he received the medal of honor. representing the people of hawaii from the moment the islands joined the union, he never lost sight of the ideals that bind us across the 50 states.

senator inouye's reason and resolve helped make our country what it is today, and for that we honor him. dr. daniel conaman. daniel conaman's groundbreaking work earned him a nobel prize in economics after escaping from occupied france as a young boy and later joining the israel forces he grew interested in understanding the origin of people's beliefs, combining psychology and economic analysis and working alongside dr. amos versky. he used simple experiments to demonstrate how people make decisions under uncertain circumstances and he forever changed the way we view human judgment. the honorable richard g. lugar. representing the state of indiana for over three decades in the united states senate, richard g. lugar put country above party and self to forge bipartisan consensus. throughout his time in the senate, he offered effective solutions to our national and international problems, advocating for the control of nuclear arms and other weapons of w.m.d.. work -- weapons of mass destruction.

working with senator snapple nunn, richard lugar established the nunn-lugar cooperative threat reduction program. one of our country's most successful national security initiatives, helping to sustain american leadership and engage nations in collaboration after decades of confrontation. he remains a strong voice on foreign policy issues and his informed perspective will have broad influence for years to

come. loretta lynn. born a coal miner's daughter, loretta lynn has followed a bold path to become a legend in country music. a singer, songwriter, and author. she has written dozens of chart topping songs, released scores of albums, and won numerous accolades. breaking barriers in country music and entertainment, she

opened doors for women not only by winning tremendous achievements, but also by raising issues few dared to discuss. fearlessly telling her own stories with candor and humor, loretta lynn has brought a strong female voice to mainstream music, captured the emotions of women and men alike, and revealed the common truths about life as it is lived. dr. mario molina. the curiosity and creativity that inspired mario molina to

convert his family's bathroom into a laboratory as a child has driven him through decades of scientific research. born in mexico, dr. molina's passion for chemistry brought him to the united states where

his investigations of cloro fluorocarbons led to breakthroughs and our understanding how they deplete the ozone layer. the impact of his discoveries extend far beyond his field. affecting environmental policy and fostering international awareness, as well as earning him the 1995 nobel prize in chemistry. today dr. molina remains a global leader, continuing to study air quality, climate change, and the environment that connects us all.

>> tan owe seancy accepting on behalf of her life partner, dr. sally k. ride. 30 years ago dr. sally k. ride soared into space as the youngest american and first woman to wear the stars and stripes above earth's atmosphere. as a astronaut, she sought to keep america at the forefront of space exploration. as a role model, she fought tirelessly to inspire young people, especially girls, to become scientifically literate and pursue careers in science, technology, engineering, and math. at the end of her life, she became an inspiration for those battling pancreatic cancer and for the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community. the stale of a quiet hero, sally ride's story demonstrates the sky is no limit for those who dream of reaching for the stars. walter neagle, accepting on behalf of his partner, baird

ruston. baird ruston was a giant in the american civil rights movement. opening-e openly gay, his unwavering belief we are all equaling members of a single family took him from his first freedom ride to the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender rights movement. thanks to his unparalleled skills as an organizer, progress that once seemed impossible appears in retrospect to have been inevitable. 50 years after the march on washington he organized, america honors ba y. ard russin, as one of the greatest architects for social change and fearless advocate for its most vulnerable citizens. ar tureo an dough balance. -- san dough balance -- sandobal. arturo is one of the world's finest jazz musicians. born into poverty in cuba and held back by his government, he risked everything to share his gifts with the world, eventually defecting with help from dizzy gillespie his mentor and friend. in the decades since, this astonishing trumpeter, pianist, and composer has inspired audiences in every corner of the world and awaken add new generation of great performers. he remains one of the best ever to play. linea smith accepting on behalf of her husband, dean e. smith. dean e. smith spent 36 seasons

taking college basketball to new heights. as head coach at the university of north carolina at chapel

hill, he led his team to 11 final fours, two national titles, and 879 victories, retiring as the win yeggest men's basketball coach in history. dean smith brought the same commitment to supporting his players off the court. he helped more than 96% of his lettermen graduate and in an era of deep division, he taught players to overcome bigotry with courage and compassion. he will forever stand as one of the greatest coaches in college basketball history. gloria steinem.

a trail blazering rider and feminist organizer, gloria steinem has been at the forefront of the fight for equality and social justice for more than four decades. instrumental to a broad range of initiatives and issues from establishing ms. magazine and take our daughters to workday, to pushing for women's self-empowerment and end to sex trafficking. she has promoted lasting political and social change in america and abroad. through her reporting and speaking, she has shaped debates on the intersection of sex and race. brought critical problems to national attention, and forged new opportunities for women in media. gloria steinem continues to move us all to take up the cause of reaching for a more just tomorrow.

reverend c.t. vivian. equipped only with courage and an overwhelming commitment to social justice, the reverend c.t. vivian was a stalwart activist on the march toward racial equality. whether at a lunch counter, on a freedom ride, or behind the bars after prison cell, he was unafraid to take bold action in the face of fierce resistence. by pushing change through nonhaven't demonstration and advocacy, c.t. vivian established and led numerous organizations to support underserved individuals and communities.

his legacy of combating injustice will shine as an example for generations to come. [applause] patricia wald. [applause] patricia wald made history as the first woman appointed to the united states court of appeals for the district of columbia circuit, rising to chief judge of the court.