but not to recognize we have to get our deficit down in order to help our economy recover. >> thank you, mr. speaker. will be prime minister take a few minutes over the easter days -- [inaudible] in economic affairs which was announced last night? because if he does i am sure it will get my -- some good ideas as to why leaving the european union should become part of our long-term economic plan. [laughter] >> well, my honorable friend and i agree on many things, but i'm afraid this isn't one of it. isn't one of the i will have a look at the incident pamphlet, as a potential piece of holiday reading and see how it competes with other alternatives but -- that is another choice for this

>> you have been watching "prime minister's questions." the british parliament will be in recess for the easter break. "question time" returns wednesday, april 30. and you can watch anytime on c-span.org. senator bernie sanders at a town hall meeting

in new hampshire. after that, attorney general eric holder testifying before the house judiciary committee. later, "q&a" with tomko born -- tom coburn. >> the first thing i would do is not let the largest cable tv the second largest cable tv company. that is where it starts. on the judiciary committee is to, at these hearings, to raise my concerns. , he seemsmr. cohen like a really smart guy and a really great guy. he earns what he gets. was to ask him the tough questions. they have 107 lobbyists on

capitol hill. they are swarming capitol hill, their lobbyists. people, more0,000 than 100,000 people write me their objections. the first thing i would do is stop this deal. i would not let this go through. it is not up to me. it is up to the sec and the doj. weighs in onanken the proposed comcast-time warner cable merger. monday on "the communicators." >> vermont senator bernie sanders held a town hall meeting at saint anselm college in new hampshire. he talked about issues ranging from civil liberties to income equality. he took questions from the audience. senator sanders is an

independent. he said he is considering a presidential -- a presidential run in 2016. new hampshire traditionally holds the first presidential primaries. this is part of c-span's road to the white house coverage. [applause] >> thank you very much for that kind introduction. let me thank the new hampshire institute of politics for inviting me to be with you this morning. senator, in my political career, i have done hundreds of town meetings throughout the state of vermont.

it is great to do a town meeting here in new hampshire. the reason that i do town meetings and the reason why meetingselm's holds like this, i think there is an understanding that the way we do politics in this country, very often, is basically not the right way. the smartest guy in the world cannot talk about major problems facing this country in a five-second soundbite. the media does a disservice to us and our nation when they look at politics as an "american idol" show. win?s going to who is up-to-date? who is down tomorrow? the problems are serious. if we take our responsibility seriously as american citizens, we need to talk about the real issues, respect each other's

different points of view, and learn from each other. you a begin by telling little bit about myself and about my political history, which is very different from most folks in the united states senate. life living iny brooklyn, new york. heard of that town, south of here. [laughter] dad was a paint salesman. that is what he did his whole life. he came to america from poland at the age of 17. without a nickel in his pocket. his life with a lot more than that. he worked very hard and never made a whole lot of money. not being very political, i perceived as i grew older how much he loved this country.

he loved this country because it gave him the freedom to raise two kids. he did not graduate high school, but his kids graduated college and that was a big deal in our family. he had financial security in the sense that he always had a job. something to somebody who started out without any money. went to the state of vermont just about 50 years ago, the best decision i ever made in my life. in the early 1970's, iran for statewide office. senator winston, some of you remember him, he passed away and there was a special election. i contested the election. iran really hard. on election day, i ended up with

2% of the vote. but i was a persistent guy. i was not going to give up. we had the regular election in 1972 and iran on a third-party. -- i ran on a third-party and i got 1% of the vote. [laughter] not being the smartest guy in the world and not knowing when to quit, i came back and ran for senate again. i got 4%. 1976, i think i got 6% of the vote. then i did figure out, that was enough. running on a third-party without any money. back in 1981, a friend of mine came up to me and said, there is a race for mayor where i live. or lincoln, as you all know, here in new hampshire, is the largest city in the state of vermont. a beautiful city. am looking over the

election results over the last time you ran. you only got 6% of the vote statewide, but you got 12% in burlington. and there were some lower class votes where you got 14%. maybe you should run for mayor. so we got some people together and we thought about it. we decided to run as an independent. in 1981, at that point, i was taking on an incumbent mayor who served five terms and nobody thought that this democratic him., that one could beat the point that i want to make is not only that i won the election by all of 10 votes, to everybody's great shock -- that was after the recall -- but how we won that election became a

political lesson that has stayed with me for my whole life. nobody thought that we had a chance. -- at together a coalition coalition in politics is kind of like an old friend. we said to the low-income people in the city who did not think they were getting a fair shake in terms of city services -- in fact, i did press conferences in low income housing projects and we talked to the union workers who work to the city. we say, you are working hard. you deserve a fair shake in terms of contract negotiations. we talked to women who had never had an opportunity to get into city hall at that time and we said, we are going to open the door. working people, low-income people, and women. we are going to do that. we talked to the environmentalists in the community who were concerned about a number of projects.

and we put together this strange coalition. i often worry what would happen if we got them all in the same room at the same time. they are very different people. but they had to believe -- they had the belief that we should open the doors on government. that we should let everybody in. that government should not just work for the downtown and big-money interests, but all people. we won that election by 10 votes. i am very proud of what i accomplished in -- as the mayor of arlington. -- of burlington. of all of my compliments as mayor -- accomplishments as mayor, probably the very top of the list is one that most media people would think is irrelevant. here is what that a congressman

was. -- here is what that accomplishment was. we doubled voter turnout from 1981 to 1983. [applause] that and what is that lesson today? what exists all over america today is that millions and millions and millions of people, working people, low income people, young people, they look at the political process and they say, not for me. i do not know what these guys are doing, but it is not relevant to my life. i am not going to vote. so we have millions of people who do not vote. we have other people who go into the polling booth, hold their nose, and vote for what they perceived to be the lesser of two evils. people who would vote for this or that issue.

burlington that i have never forgotten is that if, in fact, you listen to what people have to say and what they -- andd you do your best it is hard and you are not perfect and you make mistakes and you cannot do everything you want -- what if people know you are listening to their needs and you fight for them, they participate in the political process and they come out to vote. [applause] we ended up winning in burlington. we took on democrats and republicans. -to-oned up winning two in the working-class parts of the city. that lesson always stayed with me. to you make element relevant all the people in a democratic society. how do you involve people in the

process? how do you stand up and fight for ordinary americans? and what i ams going to be talking about today is that our great country, we all love our country and worry about our country, but our great country today probably has more serious problems than at any time since the great depression of the 1930's. and if you throw in what the scientific community tells us, that climate change is real and is already causing devastating problems and it is likely to get worse unless we reverse and cut back on greenhouse gas efficiency, we throw that in and we may have more serious problems today than at any time in the modern history of this country. at the center of what those problems are, what people

perceive and what every poll thes us, people understand sad reality that the great middle class of this country, which was once the envy of the entire world, that middle class is disappearing and people understand that millions of people are now falling into poverty. that we have more people living anyoverty today than at time in the history of the united states of america. that real understand unemployment, if you include those people who have given up looking for work and people who are working part-time when they want to work full-time, they understand the real unemployment is not 6.5%, but closer to 12%. youth unemployment is near 20%. african-american youth unemployment is almost double that. becausele understand

they are living the reality that millions of americans today, despite a huge increase in productivity, despite all of the robotics and all of the space-age technology and all of the increase in productivity so that the average worker today is producing more, people understand. because it is their lives, they are working longer hours for lower wages. and that many people in my state and in your state, they are not working one job. they are working two jobs, three jobs, trying to cobble together an income and maybe some health insurance. and people understand, when we talk about health care, that there is something profoundly when, in this great nation, we are the only major country on earth that does not guarantee health care to all people as a right.

[applause] now, there are a lot of angry people out there. they are angry in vermont, they are angry in new hampshire, mississippi, california, all over the country. , and iey are angry about am going to bore you with statistics but i think it is important that you hear it. they are angry that, since 1999, the typical middle-class family has seen its income go down by more than $5,000 adjusted for inflation. you got that? people are working hard. why is their income going down? sameare angry because that typical middle-class family, that family right in the middle, earned less income last year

than it earned 25 years ago. we mightt is an issue want to be chatting about a little. they are angry because the $283al male worker made last year than he did 44 years ago. you see these guys and they are angry and they are furious. they do not quite know where their anger should go and that is why. they are working and their incomes are going down. a typical female worker earns $1700 less last year than they -- in 2010 despite all of the increases in productivity. the bow are angry and they are frightened -- people are angry and they are frightened.

half of all americans have less than $10,000 in their savings account. can you imagine that? half of all americans. that means you are one automobile accident away from disaster. one illness away from disaster. and 55, 60 are 50 and they are thinking about retirement and they have $10,000 in the bank, they are nervous. about the future of their lives. america, over 5.5 million young people have either dropped out of high school or graduated high school and they have no jobs and they are hanging out on street corners in vermont and new hampshire and california and states all over this country. a lot of these kids with no jobs are doing destructive or self-destructive activities. i do not have to talk to about

addiction.piate there is something fundamentally wrong in our country when we end up happening -- having more people in jail than china or any other country on earth. [applause] and when people talk about what is happening in america, they get angry because they go shopping and tried to buy a product and look at the label and say, where does that product come from? it comes from china, vietnam, mexico. meanwhile, they look in their own communities and they know that factories that used to pay workers a living wage have long been gone. corporations are taking advantage of our disastrous shutdown ines

america, even if they were profitable here, and they go to china or other countries where they can pay people low, low wages. not so many years ago, general motors was the largest private employer in the united states of america. they paid their workers, who were unionized, good wages and good benefits. today, the largest private-sector employer is walmart. vehemently antiunion, who pay their workers low wages with minimal benefits. if you want to look at the transformation of the american economy, you can look at it from being a general motors economy, producing real projects -- real wages with good benefits, to a walmart economy, and of union, low wages, minimal benefits. [applause]

in terms of education, and i think we all understand that the nation does not go forward, we do not compete effectively in the global economy, we do not do important things unless we are a well-educated nation. many yearsbe, not so ago, that the united states ranked first in the world in terms of the percentage of our people graduated college. today, we are, i believe, tied for 15th place. hundreds of thousands of young ,eople, bright young people have given up on the dream of going to college because they simply cannot afford it or they do not want to leave school $30,000, $40,000, $50,000 in debt. most sadly and most

people,tally, middle-aged people, working headses, they shake their not only in terms of the stress of what is happening to their own life, but even more significantly, they worry about their kids and their grandchildren and ask themselves , is it going to happen, for the first time in the modern history of america, that our kids are going to have a lower standard of living than our generation? kids going to be able to go out into the world and get a job with a living wage? our kids going to be able to go out and find any jobs at all? do you know what it means for a kid who graduates high school and cannot find a job in one year, two years, three years? do you know what it does to that

kid? that is what parents are worrying about. maybe the most important point that i want to make this is not just to talk about what is happening to the working people of our country and to our middle class, but to point out to you as formally as a possibly can -- as i possibly can that this economic collapse is not happening to all sectors of our society. yes, unemployment is high for working people. yes, the middle class is shrinking. yes, over 40 million americans today, despite the modest successes of the affordable care act, continue to have no health insurance. but there is another economic reality out there that everybody in this room and everybody in this country should also understand.

today, the that wealthiest people in this country are doing phenomenally america isrporate enjoying record-breaking profits. in fact, we are becoming a nation in which some people are at the top and have more money than they could ever dream of while, at the same exact moment, you have working people in new hampshire, people with jobs walking into emergency food shelves, trying to get some food to take them over the week for their families. has, byhe united states far, not even close, the most unequal distribution of wealth and income of any major country on earth. and that gap between the very rich and everybody else is

growing wider and wider and wider. !% -- 1% owns over 38% of the financial wealth of america. that 1% owns over 38% of the financial wealth of this country. who knows? before you asked me questions, let me ask you a question. who knows what the bottom 60% of the american people own? , what do i hear? five percent, what do i hear? 7%, what do i hear? the answer is 2.3%. you took the wealth of it into ad converted

large pizza with 100 pieces, you have one guy getting 38 slices of pizza and the bottom 60% sharing 2.3 pieces of pizza. wealth is worse than at any time since before the great depression. family, the walton family of walmart, is worth about $148 billion. that one family owns more wealth than the bottom 40% of the american people. over the past decade, the net worth of the top 400 billionaires in this country has doubled. got that? we are seeing more and more millionaires and more and more billionaires and their wealth

income is exploding. charles and david koch. .he koch brothers [crowd they are entertaining some of their friends. this becauseention it gives you an idea what is going on in america. want to be the wealthiest family in america. they are doing ok. year world went up last from 68-80,000,000,000 dollars. -- their wealth went up last $80 from $68 billion to billion.