computer support specialists in the coming years. estimates of over 65,000 dental hygienist, 30,000 more surgical techs. these are jobs that can support a family, saying between $40,000 and $70,000 a year. in many cases you get the necessary credentials at a community college, and then you build your way up the skills superhighway. that is the second piece of good news that i want to share with you. we are in the middle of a remarkably exciting transformation in the way in which we prepared job seekers of all ages for the middle-class jobs of today and tomorrow. we have gotten rid of what i have been calling the old train and prey model, where we train widget makers, and we pray that someone is hiring them. that is yesterday's paradigm. today's paradigm as we are focused on demand driven or job driven training. we are working more closely with

industry, with their bureau of labor statistics, and others, than ever before to understand with precision the needs of employers in granular detail. and then making sure that we design programs to meet those precise needs so that people can punch their ticket to the middle class, and employers can grow their businesses. when people ask him hey, tom, what do do for a living, this is what i told him. the department of labor is match.com. what we do is help make a connection, just the right fit. between ready to work americans, who want to punch their ticket to the middle class, and jobs and employers who need and want to grow their business. the secret sauce of this match.com is very frequently community colleges, who provide that critical training that enable people to move up that ladder. let me give you an example of this transformation at work. a couple of weeks ago, i met a guy named steve capshaw, who owns an advanced manufacturing

business in western mass. they supply critical component parts to the aerospace industry and in the medical device area. his entry-level workers started $20 an hour to $25 an hour with generous benefits. he described his experience during the great recession. in the middle of the recovery, 2010, 2011, as america was struggling to add jobs, steve's company was actually turning away large amounts of business for one simple reason -- he had a shortage of skilled workers. he raised wages, he increased benefits, he did all of that. but he still couldn't recruit the right people. as he listened to stories of stagnant wages and persistent unemployment, as steve said to me, he felt like he was living on another planet. those were his words. dol is match.com sprang into action. the middle skilled many

factoring initiative was born in western massachusetts. this is a joint venture of local manufacturing businesses community colleges, the workforce investment system, which includes federal, state, and local government working together. in our grantmaking, we were catalyzing partners like this in western massachusetts and in various growth sectors across the country. as a result, the father of twins who was stuck in a low-wage job cycle during the great recession, successfully completed a training program and is now a very highly valued and well compensated employee of steve's company. this was a win for steve, a win for dana and his family, and a win for america. in this example, it's not a one-off. we see this, and we are helping to build these partnerships in communities across the country. we are not simply tinkering with the workforce system. we are transforming it. just as president eisenhower built the interstate highway

system, we are building a modernized refurbished skills superhighway that enables workers to get good jobs in businesses to find good workers. we do this in partnerships with businesses, labor unions, colleges, nonprofits, philanthropy, republicans and democrats in congress, and our partners in state and local government. the new workforce innovation and opportunity act, which was passed this summer in a strong bipartisan fashion, will enable us to continue this transformation. the superhighway has plenty of on ramps and off ramps. the destination is a middle-class job, but there are many different groups to get there. unity colleges are one will traveled half, but we are putting up the orange cones and doing the road work to make that ride much smoother. the obama administration has made a bold investment of over $2 billion over the last four

years to help committed to colleges develop innovative training progrs and curricula that held people launch middle-class careers. technical training and a friendship is another important stretch of the highway, and we have been helped in this area by partnerships with labor unions across the country who figured this out for years. they get it. unfortunately, as a nation, we haven't kept up with the necessary renovations in the printer ship area. we have massively underinvested in apprenticeship. that's why i'm heading to germany and the u.k. to learn more about apprenticeship practices overseas. that's why i spend time with the finishing trades institute in philadelphia, learning from folks who get it, have done it, and can do it for so many people. they train people for the jobs of today and tomorrow, that came -- that pay middle-class wages. my folks taught me that education is the great

equalizer. that continues to be the case today. whether it is a four-year degree, an associate's degree, and online learning come on the job training, i met a guy who said i got the golden ticket. you ever seen willy wonka? i said not in a while. he said i got the golden ticket. i can go anywhere in america and earn a middle-class wage because i have the golden ticket. this is a critical step in the stairway to shared prosperity for millions of job makers across america. i talked about a lot of steps, i have two more want to discuss before i get to questions. i want to do that very briefly. the recent events at market basket i think it really illustrated the importance of

worker voice. he created an environment where every worker felt empowered, validated, and respected. to him, worker voice wasn't a threat to the company. it was an indispensable asset. that has a was been the case in the history of our country. worker voice can take so many forms. one of the most important of which is being part of a union. the obama administration continues to be resolute that when it comes to protecting elected bargaining rights in this country, we need to into new to protect these rights. they have come under attack in recent years. when i look at history, is a guy who grew up in buffalo, new york, there is an absolute direct relationship between the health of the middle class and the health and vitality of the labor union. let's look at the data from the

bureau of labor statistics. they report that last year, median weekly income for union members was $200 higher than for nonunion members. that aint pocket change. it doesn't even take into account severe benefits for union members. i would rather work at a ford plant and make more money, then a nissan plant in mississippi and make less money and less protection. [applause] i grew up in buffalo, new york. i saw firsthand that a job in a union shop was a surefire where to punch your ticket to the middle class. when i saw in buffalo and continue to see here is that unions don't succeed at the expense of business. they succeed in partnership with business. i was at the ford plant in louisville, kentucky. back in the height of the recession, that plant had an existential crisis. they had shared sacrifice, a good vision, and now they have shared prosperity. today, over 4400 workers, and that doesn't include the supply chain. i see that. i see partnership in action. in so many places, whether it is the uaw, whether it is the sei you in new york, with the health and hospital system, building a toy for century workforce, whether it is the folks in the

teamsters at ups, working together to make sure that ups competes in the global economy of 2014. we see partnership in action everywhere across this country. we need to create space in america for new forms of to medication between workers and their employers. one of the reasons i'm going to germany is to look at and study the work council model firsthand. i will spend the entire afternoon at volkswagen one day. that works council model is a wonderful model that we should consider importing into this united states. the works council is all about codetermination. you look at what the volkswagen leadership set about the works council model. they talk about the fact they consider the corporate culture of works councils a competitive advantage. that is volkswagen speaking.

i think they have a point. there are so many other models of success to give voice to workers. there are so many nonprofits emerging. one of the most recent recipients of one of the macarthur genius awards runs the national domestic workers alliance. she has created remarkable opportunities to advocate on behalf of workers in low-wage industries who are doing god's work in somebody different ways. giving voice to the marginalized workers. there are so many other opportunities to give this voice in so many different contexts. i was just recently at a meeting in vermont of the be court movement, and they are remarkably forward leaning and what they are trying to do in the be courp movements. they stand for the proposition that you can do good and do well. not only do you do good and do

well, you have to do good in order to do well. that is why i think worker voice is so important. worker voice is a function of the last observation i would like to make. which is sibley, the importance of leadership. leadership is an indispensable characteristic of how we will succeed in this country. in bringing shared prosperity to everyone. it has to be leadership from washington. president obama has demonstrated that if congress is not going to act, he will use executive authority to provide that leadership. the phone has been raining off the hook to deal well on all of these initiatives could the pen is off the ink. we have more initiatives to provide opportunities for people. whether it is people working overtime, billions of whom may be eligible for raises when we enacted the regulation on overtime. we will continue to work on those areas, the president will continue to exert leadership there.

we have seen leadership at a state and local level as well, because we see so many states who are not waiting for congress to act in the minimum wage paid leave and other issues of that nature because they recognize that so many people need a raise, and they are not waiting for congress. we see that leadership. i see continued leadership from the labor movement and other nonprofit leaders who are helping, for instance, in the fast food movement. those are great example of so many people working together. i see people who come in the labor movement, they define success not simply by the size of the membership, but the number of people they help area that is what shared prosperity is about. it is about helping your neighbor.

i see in my work every day, every week, the business community. employers tell you that income inequality and wage stagnation are defining economic challenges of our time. they are telling me that investments in their workers is an investment in the strength of their company. they are rejecting the false choices that are holding us back from shared prosperity. we simply stick notion that paying high wages undermines competitiveness, or come collective bargaining heard's economic growth, or that you can take care of your shareholders or your employees, but not both. they understand the treaty workers with dignity and respect isn't just a nice thing to do, it is good for your bottom line. the bcorp folks see themselves not only is accountable to their shareholders, but a broader universe of stakeholders. people who have esop's have the same thing. $1 trillion in that area. they understand the high road is the smart road, and they are taking that road. the gap has made a commitment to paying above the minimum wage, and have an emphasis on pay equity and promotion of women. if you look to the new york

times, you would see that prospective employees are drawn to places like the gap, and they had a 24% increase in their applications since they announced their policies. we see so many examples, whether it is the bcorp movement, or individual corporations like gap and so many others. you see it in every single business model around, whether it is cosco, the gap, whether it is so many others across the country. theynderstand that we have got to look long term. i had one ceo was said to me he was talking about a renegade shareholder, who wasn't interested in thinking long-term. this quote realistic in my head. this renegade shareholder was saying i would rather be rich than right. think about that. i would rather be rich than right. this ceo was saying i want to act long-term. we will continue to look long term as a nation. that is what we have to do.

i want to leave you with a story about where we started. which is, our friends from market basket. they have done or markable work. -- remarkable work. they have captured the imagination of the nation. they have done really a service. they have demonstrated that you can do good and do well. what we really need are more companies like market basket. more partnerships like the uaw and the ford motor company. these guys risk everything because they believed that a market basket without the ceo was not worth being a part of. workers say the company was like second family. mark worked 34 years there, now his sun is an assistant manager.

he talked about how they would start every day by emphasizing what he called our most precious customers. christie will tell you that he always said we are in the people business first in the grocery business second. mark will talk about the time when the founder of the company came into the store the first date opened, and mark said to him, thank you for trusting me to run one of your stores. and he grabbed him and said mark, remember, it is our store. not my store. we can talk to all these folks because they are in the middle-of-the-road here, along with others. they are all here. this is what we are about. they have shown that shared prosperity is indeed a reality of this country. we can do this. it is our store. just like it is our economy. it belongs to all of us. it is not functioning as it works for everyone. i want to leave you not simply with the words of their boss, but with the words of another boss. his name is bruce springsteen. [laughter] who said, you know what, nobody wins unless everybody wins.

i think we can get there is a nation. thank you so much. [applause] >> if you could remain here, and join me. we will try to do some rapidfire questioning. the unemployment rate has been falling in recent months for a how reflective is it of the real economic situation? >> for people like catherine hackett, who i met -- she introduced the president and one of the long-term unemployed events. she had been unemployed for three years, and she has a job now. it is a reality for her now. she has punched her ticket to the middle class. too many other people as i described are still struggling. too many long-term unemployed for instance. the figures are getting better. and too many people who are working hard and haven't had a raise in years. that is really the challenge for us. we are moving in the right direction, but we have to pick up the pace of growth and make sure that the prosperity that comes with growth is shared by everyone.

>> how happy are you with the quality of the jobs created during this recovery? >> i have heard some who have said this recovery has been a low-wage recovery. if you actually look, i see the commissioner here. if you look at the last year, the area that have the most growth in jobs was this is an professional services. over 700,000, if memory serves me. these are accountants. a majority of these jobs are accountants, architects, jobs that pay quite well. we have seen immense growth there. low-wage jobs tend to be the first jobs to be lost. and they have come back as well. what we need to do is work on

these jobs that are the middle class, middle skill jobs. that is why our skills agenda and our voice agenda, i think they can lead to prosperity across the board. >> you have said you haven't given up the push to revise emergency and employment benefits. at this late stage in the recovery, how many weeks of benefits do you think are the right amount for for unemployed jobseekers? >> i haven't given up the fight, and i applaud the efforts of jack reed, senator heller from nevada, and senator collins from maine. it has been a bipartisan effort in the senate. that is because once again, this issue is a bipartisan issue. historically. never in the history of our nation has congress, with long-term employment rates as high as they were in december of last year, failed to extend emergency unemployment compensation. never until last december. i sure wish that leader boehner would do what i do, which is meet with long-term unemployed as i try to do every several months.

when you meet them, you understand they need to extend these benefits. it is not a lifestyle. >> the obama administration has not been able to push through an increase in the minimum wage so far. is there any reason to think that will change after the midterms, or are we in for two more years of grinding and gridlock? >> i don't have a crystal ball, but i can tell you the american people want results. i worked in local and state government. what i liked about that was we could deliver results and got things done. that is what the president wants to do. he wants to work with anyone and everyone of immigration reform,

transportation infrastructure, minimum wage, any of these issues. i think you continue to ignore the will and needs of the american voter at your peril. we will continue to work with anyone and everyone across an ideological spectrum who is interested and willing to come up with common sense middle ground. compromise is not a dirty word for me, or this president. but regrettably for some, it is a talking point in a campaign. >> silicon valley business leaders are demanding immigration reform because they say there aren't enough workers to fill the demand for high-tech engineers. what steps are you taking to make certain that america remains a leader in the tech field? >> i have spent a lot of time with folks in the silicon valley. the silicon valley leadership group just released about one week ago, a book they have with essays from 20 different leaders across the ideological spectrum. i had the privilege of adding one of those pieces. what i love about immigration reform, and this is not new. is that the support is bipartisan. i hear from labor unions, we need immigration reform it. by here from silicon valley we

need immigration reform it. i hear from facebook. everybody, that we need immigration reform. that is what it was like when it worked for senator kennedy. we did 80 amendments in a committee want to work for him. i need one hand to count the number of partyline votes, because this has never been a partisan issue. the stories that i hear from both the silicon valley, from people whose families have been broken up very they tell your heart out. we can do better. that is why we will continue to advocate, and the president isn't waiting. that is why he will continue to take aggressive executive action. but there is no substitute for it bill. we can't help everyone by executive action. >> what ideas -- i know we are trying to go through rapidfire q&a -- what ideas do you have the fix detroit, the rust belt, and other cities that have not been able to retool or rebuild in the present day? >> we asked to have a detroit task force.

some of the most vexing challenges confronting america are requiring unprecedented levels of interagency collaboration. that is why we have been working together with the cap in detroit like never before. one of the biggest challenges that they have there is they don't have a regional transit authority. think about it. we are trying to bring more jobs into detroit, and we been successful so far. we need to pick up the pace. so many of the jobs are out of the suburbs, and if you can't get there, how can you work there? we are working together on transportation issues and skills and for structure. so may people are not trained for the jobs of today and tomorrow. we are working to build a seamless structure of education from cradle to grave that will enable people to be prepared for those jobs. those are examples of things that we continue to do. i think the stovepipe implosion will help not only detroit but many other cities.

>> if governor scott walker wins another term on november 4, it means he will successfully taken on the public employee unions. what that encourage other governors, especially republican ones, to do the same in their states? what will that mean for public employee unions? >> i will not going to speculate on who will win elections on november 4. every state has the ability to enact laws in the labor context. i think the efforts that took place in wisconsin and elsewhere were not in the best interest of workers. we watched a states like ohio, you saw a remarkable unsuccessful push back against efforts to limit voice. i think voice is an indispensable part of shared prosperity. whether it is labor unions, collective bargaining, supporting works councils, supporting organizations like the domestic workers alliance, whether it is supporting bcorps, the more we can do to support

voice in any way shape or form, the more we can do to build shared prosperity. >> a little personal. what was your first job, and how did it shape your life? >> growing up in buffalo, new york, my first job -- i had three paper routes. we used to have a morning paper, the courier express. i had that. i shagged all falls in a driving range. with a helmet. some people thought i didn't have a helmet on. i worked on the back of a trash truck. i worked at sears for a number of years. all of those jobs taught me the dignity of work and the value of whatever job you are at. you give your best, you work your hardest. >> now, to your next job, maybe. attorney general holder been a lightning rod throughout his tenure at the justice department.

why is that, and what can his successor due to prevent becoming a lightning rod? >> eric holder stood up for voting rights. eric holder stood up for common sense criminal justice reform. eric holder ended up working on issues like reducing the crack powder disparity in a bipartisan way in congress. these are many of the defining issues of our day. when you are going to work on some of these defining issues of our day, you will have folks who oppose you. i do not believe come as we prepare to celebrate the 50th anniversary of what he sunday, i don't believe the enduring voting issue 50 years later is in person voter fraud. i don't believe that because i did these cases when i was over there. that is a phantom problem. when eric holder says things like that, people disagree with him. i applaud his candor, and the

movement they have done in that area. >> what should be the justice department's top priorities? [laughter] >> i have not studied at issue since i was at the department of labor. i can tell you the department of labor's priorities should be putting people back to work, continuing the pace of growth, and making sure that we have shared prosperity. [laughter] >> we do have two more in the area of a possible next job. >> i'm talking about my day job here. [laughter] >> attorney general holder says he won't send journalists to jail for doing their job, suggesting that in new york times reporter is unlikely to spend time behind bars. specifically he said in an interview with msnbc, he's that i stand by what i said. no reporter is going to jail as long as i'm attorney general.

would you maintain a position, should you happen to become attorney general? or if not, do support that position? >> my singler focus is on the job of being at the department of labor. i know the attorney general very much values the role of the press as the fourth branch of government. he served under general reno. he often participated in her weekly conferences, whether it was good news, bad news, or indifferent. he was out there with her in those press briefings. he understands the critical importance of the press in so many aspects of our lives. >> we return to the labor department for a few questions. are employers doing their part to train workers, or his on-the-job train disappeared? >> one of the most exciting

trance for missions in our workforce system that we are seeing is the remarkable level of employee engagement. we cannot succeed, in the advanced manufacturing i talked about. it's designed with the input of the industry. when you hire someone, you know what you are getting. that level of employer engagement is one of the linchpins of our transformation. the reason is because too many employers were telling me that they were hiring folks. they had a credential, but they didn't know what was behind it. now that they are actively engaged in the development of that credential, they have skin in the game it. they understand it. as a result, they can do some at more. >> union strength and influence continues to decline in this country. so have a number of factors

related to worker security and satisfaction. how do we bring about -- how we bring back protections and fair pay and benefits to workers in this area of corporate rights and diminishing worker esteem? >> we start out by studying the experience of our neighbors to the north. the new york times had a story about how the middle class of the united states is not faring as well as the middle class elsewhere. they use canada as one example. for me, as i studied this issue, why is the middle class faring better in canada? their union density is over twice with union density is america. it's about 26%. versus 11% and change here in the united states. look at places like germany, where you have very low youth unemployment. very robust economy. you have robust union density.

again, it gets back to this issue a voice. we need to make sure that we have multiple mechanisms to give workers a level playing field. when we do that, as volkswagen in summary others have demonstrated, it works to the benefit of workers, employers, and communities alike. >> how can we close the wage gap without collective bargaining? >> i think collective bargaining is a very important part of the mix here. the health of the middle class and the strength of the union movement, when you study history, go hand-in-hand. the greatest generation, as tom brokaw you should talk about, they not only defended our nation and really defended democracy, but when they came back to the united states, what they ended up doing was -- they were our laborers, and forepeople.

they were the folks that helped accelerate the entry of the united states into the middle class. that greatest generation wasn't simply great on the battlefield. right in the workplace. one of their major compliments was that they help to grow the middle class through the importance of collective bargaining, through standing up for workers. we see so many examples, whether it is costco -- if you bought $1000 worth of costco stock 15 years ago, you would have 15,000 dollars now. they've outperformed the s&p 500 index significantly. other companies, similar examples across every business model. airlines. when i go to bwi airport, southwest airlines pays their baggage handlers a fair wage. you go up 95 to newark, and many of them as a result of a decision by some of the legacy carriers, they are making the minimum wage. i was up there talking to them a

few months back. that doesn't have to be that way. low wages are a choice, not a necessity. there are so many samples of that. >> thank you. we are all set of time. but before asking the last question, we have a couple of housekeeping matters to take care of. first of all -- one minute, we have an issue here. we will get to the mug later. first of all, i would like to remind you about two upcoming speakers luncheons on october 21, tomorrow. scott blackmun, president and ceo of the u.s. olympic committee. on november 7, robert mcdonald, secretary of veterans affairs. i would like to present you with our traditional mug come and we have done it so that it is lightweight and easily portable, just in case you need to move offices. [laughter] >> and less than $20.

>> if i can ask you the last question, in the labor department, can they do anything about the employment situation of journalists? [laughter] >> there are a few things that keep me up at night more than the employment situation of journalists. what we do is, we hire more journalists so that they can tell our stories. journalists like so many others have similar challenges. i hope you continue to do the great work you are doing to shine a light. when i signed your book, i said you are the fourth branch of government. thank you for yout time. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2014] >> today, the big 12 conference

hosts a for him on the state of college athletics. a panel of university officials discuss the money involved in college athletics and how it is spent. a discussion on whether student athletes are employees of the school for whom they play. live coverage from the national press club on c-span. be part of c-span's campaign 2014 coverage. follow us on twitter and like a fun facebook get the faith date -- date -- debate schedules. stay in touch and engage by --tware and us unsafe

following us on twitter kind us on facebook -- and fighting us on facebook. -- liking us on facebook. >> i'm amanda curtis and i approve this message. i'm amanda curtis. the only way to change washington is to elect folks who know what is like when times are tough. i come from a family that is a lot like most other montana families. i want to be a chance for working families like mine. working montanans deserve one of us in the u.s. senate. >> steve day is a fifth-generation montanan. he understands how important hunting, fishing are to the montana heritage.

he is fighting to increase our access to public land. areas arounding glacier national park and is protecting our montana way of life. >> former house speaker dennis hester and for minority leader richard gephardt discuss the environment now versus when they served. from the washington center, it is one hour and 20 minutes. [laughter] [applause] er was thest longest-serving republican speaker in history.

richard gephardt is president and ceo of gephardt group governors affairs and provides strategic advice before the house, executive, and legislative branch. mr. gephart served 28 years in the house from 1976 to 2004 representing missouri's third congressional district, home to his birthplace st. louis, missouri. he was house majority leader 1989 to 1995, and minority leader 1995 to 2003. how much money did you have to raise to get elected back then? the grand sum of $70,000 for two campaigns. the primary was highly contested and the general election. >> $70,000.

mr. speaker, you were a coach, highschoool coach, and you were offered a job, i believe, as a principal. but then you went to congress. how did your role as being a coach help you in your role as speakership? >> i think first of all, in your role as coach you had to look at what was the best thing for the team and how do you move a group of people forward and get things done. i think the skills you built during the those days of coaching are the same skills you did in leadership. had you to bring people along. you set goals, you tried to achieve those goals, and you tried to move forward. the interesting thing is when i was offered a job of a prince pal, assistant principal, you know, i looked at the principal's office where i worked, i saw him work every day. he had the same seven or eight chairs every day with the same kids in them.

smoking in the johns, raising problems on the school bus. and i thought, i'm not sure i want to do that. the other side were the teachers. they didn't want to ride the fan bus on friday night, they wanted to move somebody out of their class. i said, i didn't want to do this the rest of my life. i ended up running for legislature, never dreaming i would end up as leadership of congress and never dreamed i would be speaker of the house. and out my door were the same seven or eight chairs every day with the same seven or eight people. [laughter] >> now there are historic lows. what is the cause of that? is it the media's fault? is it twitter?

>> i think you have to start this discussion by understanding that congress is usually unpopular. there is a good reason for it. congress is a huge organization. it is 535 people, and they are trying to reach agreement on very controversial, emotional issues in the country. so it is always hard for them to operate, for them to make those decisions. i always say, politics is a substitute for violence. it really is. when people come here, they find out there are 534 other people in the building. in many countries, one person makes the decisions or a small group. here we have this huge group. so it is always hard. lately it has been a little harder than usual. i chalk it up to the fact that we had the worst recession since the great depression from 2007 or 2008 until just recently.

when you have a big recession, a lot of people lose their jobs, lose their house, lose their pensions. they get angry, understandably, and they tend to send people to represent them who are equally angry, and having made up their minds that these are the answers, and it's going to be my way or the highway. so there has been less willingness to compromise on some of the important issues. i think that's changing as we speak. i think people who came with that frame of mind are starting to either change their mind or they are leaving congress. so i'm an optimist.

i think in the days ahead, you are going to get back to a more normal situation stwen the congress, within the congress and with whoever is president. and i think you will get a better atmosphere. but remember, it is always hard. it was hard when we were there, and it was hard when anybody is there because the issues are tough, they are controversial, and everybody has a different opinion in that group of 535 of what to do. >> are you optimistic as well? >> yeah, i'm optimistic. look, this is the best governmental system in the world, as far as i'm concerned. you can talk about the problems that we have. yet, if you want real democracy, real participation, this is where it's at. i think most people around the world, if they had the opportunity, they would be here in this country. i see some of the same problems that my colleague sees. we were just across the river. his district in zhruse st. louis, my district of illinois are pretty close together. you know, i learned a long time ago that when i was serving in

the illinois legislature, i took a -- there are a couple people in the illinois legislature, i just couldn't understand where they were coming from. they were always getting up, they were anti-farmer, anti-business, and they were just, i thought, protaganists all the time. so i got on a train in springfield, went from springfield to st. louis, and i passed through the district these folks came from. i was down in what they call "gob down below." it was all closed down factories. it was refineries that were closed and broken up. it was very, very dire. i learned, you know, everybody that's in the congress, everybody that's elected comes from some place. they represent a group of people. one thing you have to realize, being a leader, everybody has a right to be there, so everybody has a right to be heard, and everybody has a right to be part of the process. the process isn't always pretty, but it is constantly trying to move people together. i think what the leader did and what i had to do is constantly put people around the table to try to fine some con sessous --

concensus to move forward. i'm not sure that's happening today. >> one of the questions is if the senate will flip. on the day after the 2014 election, we'll be talking about 2016 politics, will hillary run. of course the answer to that is yes, but everyone is watching her very closely. [laughter] mr. gephart, you ran for president twice. what was that like? how was it different in the two times that you ran? >> well, it was a terrific experience. it is a fabulous country and the people are fabulous. that's all i can tell you. when you go out and try to get people to help you and people do without asking for anything. they don't want anything, they just want good government, they let you stay in their house, they go door-to-door for you. they give you money, they give you food. it is an incredible experience because of the greatness of this country and the greatness of the

people both times i really enjoyed it. we put people to a tough test. it's a good test. we have to go through new hampshire, south carolina, a variety of states, and meet people one-on-one and in small groups like this. you have to make your argument, and let them know who you are, let them into why you want to do this and what your goals are, and what motivates you to do this. it is a fabulous system. it really wasn't that much different. i ran in 1988 and then in 2004. it was largely the same. the money amounts got bigger, because you know, time had gone on, inflation and so on. but the process was very similar, and the process candidates go through in 2016 will be similar to what they did in those years.

>> speaker hastert, john boehner is now the speaker, and he's been battling some tea party members, and he's been struggling to move some bills, especially fiscal bills. your name has been invoked a lot. they talk about the hastert rule. does speaker boehner have the toughest job in washington? >> look, i think the speakership is a tough job. it is a job where you constantly have to bring people with different sides together to find a solution. i see this unhappy discourse that goes on in politics today somewhat as a result of legislation that passed in 2000, and it was called the mccain-feingold reform. quote, "reform" unquote. people thought the rule resulted in legislation that was skewed

one way or another. so basically, the parties were eviscerated as far as a funding source for candidates. what i always thought was, the democratic party or the republican party was kind of a moderator. people elected to the two-party system weren't too far to the right or too far to the left. they are pretty mainstream, center-right or center-left. so what happened was, money was taken out of the political system from the parties, so money finds a place to go, and it went to the far left and the far right. not the choosing of the candidates, but the messages that are out there are paid for by people from the far right and the far left. these people are looking over their shoulders and realizing, if they don't listen, they will have a primary, and they will be

challenged. it only takes a small percentage to create this kind of back-and-forth within the party. so i think speaker boehner has a tough job, but i thi think that's what speakerships are for, for people to have tough jobs and get results. constantly his task will be bringing these people to the table. i also found you have to give people responsibility. there are always people in the caucus that aren't happy what they are doing, but you have to give them a stake. get them involved. give them projects and then bring them to the table and see what you can incorporate. so it is a technique, and i think it is part of what i did in my coaching process. it is not easy, but it is, you know, they called me the speaker, they should have called me "the listener." [laughter] >> we've seen the supreme court get involved with the citizens united case. richard gephart, super p.a.c.'s, are they a part of the problem?

are they a big part of the problem? >> there is no question about the problems with money and politics. we all have an idea of how important it is and what to do about it. in fact, one time long ago, i presented a constitutional amendment, which is the only way to really deal with it, if you want to deal with it, because we have freedom ever speech in the constitution. and the court has said, money equals speech. so as long as that's their opinion, if you are going to change this, if you want to change it, you have to change the constitution. so that's well ny to impossible. i don't have a brilliant answer. i have face in the people. you know, a lot more money has gone into campaigns in the last 10 years. have you super p.a.c.'s on both sides coming in with millions of dollars usually for negative

ads against some candidate they are trying to beat, and i have been amatesed that the public reaction to these ads has not been what i think they expected. people are tired of this, and they are just turning it off. in my view, a lot of the super p.a.c. money is wasted money. i'm sure the tv stations are happy to have it, but i don't think they are getting the result they want. the american people are smart. they don't want -- you know, when they hear negative on this one and negative on that one, you know, they are both horrible. who do we pick? so they start getting information from other sources about who they want to vote for. so i'm not so pessimistic about this whole thing. a lot of people think it is the end of our democracy, and it is ruining our politics. i can device a better system. it is the system that we have. it is in the constitution that we have freedom of speech and people who have money can speak

louder than people that don't. it's the way it is. and we just have to trust the people to ferret their way through all this information and make good decisions. i think they will do that. >> there are 435 seats in the house, and even though this congress has been called one of the worst congresses run by republicans in the house, democrats in the senate, as far as the house, 435 seats, and basically at the hill right now we are tracking 40 to 50 re-election rates. everybody in the house's spot is up every two years. is that a problem? some of the critics say it is gerrymandering and you have these districts skewed to one side or another. speaker hastert, does this need to be changed? >> you have to go back to the

constitution. the constitution says it is up to the states to decide how they are going to reapportion. unless you change the constitution, again, you are not going to change the process. one famous politician once made a speech, but the fact is, it is what it is. you work with it, you live with it, sometimes states lose, sometimes they win, depending on the give and take. my state of illinois, we lost five seats on the republican side last time because people -- you know, gerrymandering, reapportionment. it plays out. what we really want is that people elect who they want and get something done. what i think people are fed up with is this business of everybody blaming everybody else. set some goals, and work toward it.

you have to do it on a bipartisan basis. dick and i didn't always agree with each other, we were sometimes on the other side of the aisle, but while we were there we paid down $50 billion in public debt. that hadn't been done before and it hasn't been done since. so you can do things on a bipartisan basis. >> mr. gephart, what do you think of the idea of working together on a bipartisan basis? >> yes, i think you can. i agree with the speaker. you know, the redistricting process has always been a political process because people are trying to get more people in their districts. before we had computers, it was not a precise science. now with computer technology and

google maps, we can go down and say, we know his house, he votes democrat. i want him in my district, and i want to get rid of her because she's a republican. i'll give her to the republican. so it has become very previce, and very effective, i might add. so you have districts that are 85%, 90% republican or democrat. there is a movement to try to take this away from legislatures and give it to bipartisan commissions. but that's going to be a very hard process because legislatures and political parties don't want to give up that power.

i wouldn't be optimistic that a lot will change very fast. >> it is interesting the people who draw up the maps end up in congress. >> imagine that. i have just one more question, but if you have any questions, line up at the mics, and when we call on you, you can identify yourselves. one thing i wanted to ask, it is very important, when i talk to members of congress, they mention this. and because of the democratic administration, and it has happened in all administrations. basically, congress

congressional democrats don't feel like president obama calls them enough. he doesn't usually golf with democrats, and is this a case -- certainly we heard this when george w. bush was in the white house as well. congressional republicans, especially when the house was launched in 2006, they were upset, and they started to publicly criticize the president for not communicating better. mr. gep hard -- gephart, is this a problem that the president, and he served in the senate, is he not communicating enough with his own party on capitol hill, or is this lawmakers that basically want to have their ego stroked? >> well, you have to sit back and look at this job we call president and what it requires somebody to do today. i think it is by far the toughest job in the world. it always has been a tough job

because the president has to work closely with congress. the constitution created a lot of power in title 1. and it has to be, because the congress gives money. the congress declares war or not war. the congress sets up the gab -- approves the cabinet and other important positions. so there has always been a lot of time on task for presidents with the congress. and i guess i would say, presidents can't meet with them often enough. but we also have charged the president to be in charge of foreign policy in a world in which you are on this little bitty planet today. with today's transportation and communication, presidents are expected to talk with almost every country every day.

it is a demanding job with demanding requirements. now, you always have to go to the personality of whoever is president. you know, everybody istive. some presidents like meeting with congress. bill clinton was one who relished in it, and he liked it, and he did a lot of it. i think he was effective at it. it could be, and i don't know, i'm not there, it could be president obama doesn't have that exact personality and he wants to do other things that he thinks are equally important. i'm sure he has more than enough to do 24-seven. so i don't know. you always get some complaining, i think, from members that they don't get enough time with the president and the president is not spending enough time with them. we certainly have a huge range of problems in front of the congress. i don't know. you will always get that complaint. i think everybody is doing the best they can. i think you will get more bipartisanship in the last two

years of the obama administration than you have seen before, because he will want a legacy. he sees important issues like immigration, the budget, doing they may come together in the last two years more than they did in the years before them. >> i think it is an issue of who in congress has the power and who does the president have to work with. if there is a shift, which you talked about at the end of the bush administration, the shift went to the democrat side, the president has important things. to run his government, he has to get the budget done, and he has to deal with the people chairing the budget committees and chairing the plifrls -- plifrls committee, and chairing his jurisdiction. that's where he has to get his funding for his government. if it is in republican hands,

that's where they have to go. if it is in democratic hands, that's where they have to go. you have to go to the leadership to get those types of things done. i think it is a natural movement to power. you constantly have this pushing back and forth. but members of congress, if they are not getting the attention they think they should, they will get angry. we really haven't had a budget in a long time that is passed by the house and passed by the senate. when we were working on each side of the aisle, we pass the budget and the budget had to be out by the 15th of march. it had to be reconciled the april 15. everybody had their numbers. so that process went through.

if that process moves through, everything else moves through with it. when it doesn't happen, then you and up -- set yourself up, i think, for a logjam in congress and i think that is basically what has happened. of yourr as both careers, we have seen that as a leader, you're going to have members were going to get into trouble, get into scandal. we had famously a former member that stashed $90,000 in his freezer. you can only imagine, when the leader gets that news, he did what? is that the toughest part you do with that? there was a scandal in the house election process. is that the toughest part? conversely, what is the most reporting -- rewarding part? >> i think the most rewarding part is getting things done and sing things happen that are good things for the american people and for our nation.

tax reform, we did energy reform, we get health care reform, we did medicare reform. we did a lot of things that report important to the american people plus we had something , 9/11, widow01 make sure this country was secured. we would not let those types of episodes ever happen in this country again. kind of made a pact with ourselves. we went away from a peacetime situation to a wartime situation and make sure this country was safe. that was a whole different aspect. leadership is many faceted. working with the members of congress, bringing people together, getting things done, i think was the greatest

satisfaction i had. you had to work with the president on both parties. i was able to do that. you build those relationships. politics is how people treat each other. , whatever form or level you take it, is people relating to each other and being able to express to each other. and finally, getting results out of it. so it is the relationships that you build. i think that was the biggest that the goodelt, relationships that we were able to build on both sides of the aisle. >> the toughest thing i was involved in, similar to what the speaker said, and it was the balancing of the budget over a 10 year period. it took 10 years. it was the hardest thing ever got involved in. bob michael was the leader, and bob dole. newt gingrich came in

and speaker hastert came. it ran through all of those leaders. we all worked together over a 10 year it was excruciatingly hard. i want you to understand how hard it was. we worked on each of those deals for over a year apiece. and sometimes after we had gotten all of the work done and everybody was totally unhappy, which is the definition of a compromise -- [laughter] the floor and on lost. many times. and we had to regroup and put it back together and bake people to vote for it. -- begged people to vote for. harry truman said leadership is getting people to do things they really don't want to do. that is a lot of what you deal with when you're leading the congress and leading the country, is getting people to accept things they really don't

want to accept for the good of the whole in a long-term. that is the issue. said, you are a listener. you have to listen constantly everybodysly to what wants to say. i used to say the house, process is everything. why did i say that? meanse the process whoever i am, i feel i was fairly heard and i had a chance to win, and even if i didn't, the process was fair. so i will put up with a bad result that i did not want. the magic of democracy is that you go through all this disagreement and all this time -- and part of the reason people hate congress is because it takes so long to make a decision. people think congress is like one person.

535. so when they finally get it done, what you get from all of that is the losers -- and there are losers on every issue -- the asers don't want to pick up rifle or leave the country. that is the magic of democracy. because you put 535 people in the room, and all of their viewpoints and the country were heard, and then they voted and there was an outcome and you move on. and the losers don't want to leave in anger, and you can have another boat another day and go on to other issues and make the country better. >> you both mentioned listening as something you have to do. i imagine a lot of listening you ore to keep from groaning rolling her eyes. we have some questions. i'm sure they are much better than mine. please identify yourself and ask your question.

alexis andy name is i'm from pennsylvania. both of you mentioned campaign-finance reform and the election process. you mentioned can find gold the need for constitutional amendment to address the issue of campaign finance reform. therefore, i wanted to know your opinion on senate joint resolution 19 which is the constitutional amendment that should be coming up for a vote after the election which would address this issue. think i said it is ye to a possible to pass a constitutional amendment, and i believe that is what i believe it is not a bad issue to come up. it is not wrong to discuss it and to try to do things, and there are a lot of different ideas for campaign reform. but as i said, probably to be effective, you got to change something in the constitution to do that. i think it is because you have to get two thirds of both houses

and then three quarters of the state legislatures to approve w,hoa, you're talking 30 years at least. so it is just really hard. i look for other things that aren't institutional that might help the process. their ideas for revenue sharing if they raise small contributions, they get money that philanthropists to give to a fund that would come to them to match small contributions. so there are a number of ideas like that around that might help, but that is my thought. >> the basis of the elected, going out, running. i remember my first campaign. i was a schoolteacher. -- if a sudden, i had to had to raise probably $10,000. that was a huge amount of money. it was bigger than the salary i had at the time. how do you do this?

people give you $25 or $50 or maybe $100. i remember a friend of mine gave me $1000. it was like, wow, it was christmas all over. so what you have to do is, when people give you money or contribute to the campaign, those are the people who vote for you. those are the people who support you because they like your ideas in your part of the community. i have always said that if you have some type of regimen where you are not leased half -- you raise about half your money for your district, from the people you're going to elect two, the people who would to the polls and supported you and you had the ability to build an organization out of those people, that is where money really talks. if you do half from your district and you can raise the other half wherever you want to as long as you had it out there and some transparency so people know where you had your money, i

think those are the two things. local support and transparency. however you get into election reform, i think those two have to be the centerpiece of it. >> this side of the room? >> i go to st. lawrence university. you both talked about how the american democracy is so great because it brings everyone to the table and everyone can have a voice. i was wondering what your experience was working with women and minorities in the house and senate? because right now, the house and senate aren't very diverse with women and minorities. i was wondering if you could talk a little bit about that in women and minorities not only in the house and senate, but in leadership roles, also. >> well, i think if you had asked this 30 years ago, you would have been more troubled by the lack of diversity in the house and in the leadership of the house.

i think it has changed a lot. i think the house today is much, much more representative of the diversity of the american people . i can't give you the exact numbers. maybe the speaker would know them. in terms of women, it is a much larger number. when i came to the house and 1976, you could've put all of the women in a phone booth in the house. now it is a very large number. minorities, similar. it is a much larger number. of course, we've had court cases on civil rights as it applies to redistricting in the house. and that has made it possible for many more minorities to win office. one of the things i have loved about the house was that it really did represent the american people. when you are out on that floor and a big vote, where there was a lot of isagreement, it was -- there

nothing more exciting. it is more exciting than basketball or football because it is -- everything is hanging out. it is all over the place. everybody is represented and it is a very diverse organization. so i think we have come a long way in the right direction and i'm really proud of what has happened in the country. people said, don't you miss coaching? we had competition every day. you did not miss it. we worked hard to bring women into the leadership role in the house during my time as speaker in those head to earth or women who set on our leadership group. but yet always do better. we had a lack of minority groups in the republican party in our conference.

program or retry to bring in interns and minority groups. it was tough to do. hardly just because of the makeup of the parties. that is were we have to strive. from my side, our party, we are missing the boat on doing some reform on integration because you can't close down. the parties have the best effectiveness are the parties who can open up and bring more people to the program. if her republican is ever going to get elected as president, he asked to be able to do with conservative democrats and independents. you can just do your own small group of people. we have to constantly have and its that lift people works for women and minorities of elite. >> and other members have said unless republicans join an immigration reform, they're not going to win -- one lawmaker said they will never went

another presidency. do you think if they win congress come they should put immigration at the top of their agenda? >> it is the consequences of doing that. you have to face the issue. i think it is a real issue. are some good answers on the republican side and some good answers on the democrat side. you have to take a little bit of each. my personal view is, i did a lot of years working on illegal drugs coming into the united states because we lost 16,000 kids a year in drug or drug violence. i learned a lot about the borders because 75% of it comes across the borders. we have to have good border control. we have to know who comes across the border. not to say we can't let people in, but we have to have the places to let people in and let them know. there needs to be border control but on the other side, you can give other issues as well.

people.s how many 10 million, 13 million, i don't know how people are. the little town that i live in, country town, probably 60 miles west of chicago, 43% of high schools are hispanic. they are there. you have to legitimize those people and give them a green card or whatever kind of card and say, your legitimate in this country. there's no place else for you to go. on the other hand, if you want to be a citizen, get in line and be a citizen like anyone else. i think are some reasonable answers. there are reasonable issues to come together, and they have to come together, and do it in a bipartisan way. >> i agree with the speaker. i think something will get done on immigration probably next year. and i also think, if people really stop and think about it,

the diversity of our country is our greatest strength. it is our greatest strength. when i think back over my lifetime, you know, i grew up in the 1950's, and what civil rights were then and what they are now, it's like a different country. there is no resemblance to what went on in the 1950's. when people come to this country from anywhere else, it is the only country in the world where people say to themselves the first day they are here, "i'm an american. i'm an american." that is a huge strength. this is a huge deal for americans going forward, and i think they will get it done. >> hello. i am from brazil. i have a question about representatives. right now the united states has a population of roughly 320 million and a little more than

500 people in congress. that's a lot of interests to represent. so my question is, isn't it time for us to improve our system of democracy now that we have access to technology? isn't it time to come up with some inventive way that allows people to deal with this broad and complex issues that the congress has to deal with every day? >> well, i think we believe in and believe the representative democracy is the best system. if you are asking, should we go to direct democracy and have all the population vote on all the issues, i don't think that's a good solution. that's my opinion. i think we decided that a long time ago. i don't think that's going to change. i do think we could improve people's ability to vote in elections. and my personal meach belief,

and i've talked to people in the technology world, is that we're very close to being able to let people vote online for a candidate and maybe express views to representatives about issues without fraud and without worrying that people are misusing the system. and i really believe we can get there. and that will be a big improvement. if you can bank online, you ought to be able to vote online. i think once we get there, you will have more participation in democracy, and that's a good thing. then if you follow that up with more conversation between the people and their elected officials in an organized way, i think that's a positive thing. >> as long as you don't overdraw your account, right? [laughter] >> from the time i got involved in politics until the time i bowed out in about 2008, we

could get on a teleconference and have about 10,000 people in the conversation. someone asking questions and in real-time getting answers and getting people involved. there are a lot of things -- the polling and the things that you can do electronically to connect people, i think we've really seen a revolution. all the things that happen, the tweeting and the blogs and everything, i grew up in the 1950's, too. this is beyond me. this is a new technology. it is time for an old guy to bow out. but today, the american youth and the american people are so lucky to have such a great opportunity to be connected and talk about ideas. i think it is ripe for real democracy. elected democracy can only get better because of it, i think.

>> good afternoon. my name is emily dacey and i'm a junior at the university of massachusetts. i have a question regarding the recent change in legislation and regarding campaign contributions. as a middle class college student, and i'm sure you know, the last 20 years the average price of college has gone up over five times. that being said, at least for me with the debt i'm in, it is going to be very difficult for me to move past my current status as a middle class citizen. that being said, i'm a bit of concerned by the lack of pessimism and dairy say optimism -- there i say optimism, toward this recent change in law. i believe you said people with more money get to speak more, that's just how it is. and to be frank, i'm really not ok with that because i see that as my voicing less. so i would just like to ask why you feel that way? >> i wasn't saying i feel that

way, i was saying the supreme court feels that way, and their opinion has more weight than mine. they have decided the case, and until a court in the future changes that ruling, that's the law of the land. that's the way the constitution has been interpreted. i said, you know, i'm interested in anybody's ideas for how to change it. i think it is very hard to change the constitution, i'm just not at all optimistic about that. i would look for other solutions that are constitutional that would move the system in the right direction. like, you know, if you raise x amount of dollars through small contributions you would raise a philanthropic fund that would match that to you as a candidate if you spent the time, as

speaker did and i did, raising contributions in lieu of contributions from your district. that is moving in the right direction, but it would pass constitutional muster. >> one of the issues she raised is about the rising cost of tuition. that is something many people -- both parties haven't talked about. i know a lot of people, around our kitchen table, we talk about it. is this something policymakers need to focus on? as she mentioned tuition has trippled or quadrupled. >> it is a real issue. i was talking to janet napalatano the other day. she's at the university of california. 46 campuses. millions of students. she was saying half of the students in the system come from families that earn $50,000 a year or less and they virtually spend no money on their education. so it is picked up either by the state or through scholarships or

loans or other things. and i understand what you are saying about loans. if you come out of college with huge amounts of loans, you will be working a long time to get out of debt. there is no simple, easy answer to it. we have had active loan programs at the federal level. we have had grant programs, pell grants, so on and so forth. we probably need more of that. we also, i know in my view, i'd like to see a plan where if a graduate gives time in public service, whatever that might be, whether it is americorps or the military or if you are a doctor, you go to a rural area for a certain period of time, that would forgive the loan to a large extent. that would make sense to me. if people owe less, they do well

economically. we know that for a fact. the more we can do to help people get an education and then not be burdened with 2010 years, -- 10 years, 20 years of debt payment, the better off we're all going to be. i think it is the best investment we can make. >> thank you. i do apologize if i came off as anything other than courteous. >> that's ok. nest question. >> i'm dakota. i'm from texas christian university. i wonder if you think it would be beneficial to increase urgency to resolve some of the issues we face today? >> term limits have been around for a long time. when we did the contract for america, that was one of the -- term limits was one of the things that was in that, one of the 10 issues. it's the only one that really

didn't get past. we as members -- i remember a guy that had been here 36 years and he was for term limits. he always voted for, but it never happened. seriously, i think if you go to a doctor and he's been practicing for 10 or 12 years and he knows his craft very well, i think you probably have a better service than someone that just came right out of med school. i think there is a value of people who are in and work to learn and go through the system. now, granted, there are some people that get into congress, and i call them "plops" they get into congress and they just kind of plop there and don't do anything. that is their constituency. you have a term limit of twice a year. you have a primary and a general. so you have to go back and convince people that are you doing the job they elected you to do. that's a responsibility for

every congressperson. you have to do that twice. -- twice every cycle. i think there's a real test on term limits, and that's called the election. i think -- what should it be? 20 years? 10 years? 8 years? when is a person most effective? as long as a person goes to work and keeps in touch with his constituency and tries to do good things for his district, then, you know, he probably deserves to be re-elected. that's up to the people who elect him. that's an issue for his constituency. >> i agree with that. i used to get asked this question all the time in town hall meetings. i would say i'm for term limits. we have them. in the house, it is two years, and then the people decide. i don't know wr why we want to take that decision away from the people. that's what we are doing with term limits saying you can only be there six years.

you really saying to the people of the district, your decision no longer holds after six years. you have to make a decision. not going to let you do that anymore. i think it is undemocratic. i don't think it makes any sense. i also agree with the speaker. you know, if you were going to get your brain operated on, you would ask the surgeon if he had ever done it before, not "i hope this is your first operation." so i think being in congress is as hard as being a brain surgeon. maybe harder and more consequential for more people's lives. i think we ought to leave it to the people. i think the system the way it is can work well. >> i think there is another detriment, too, that happens. if a person cycles and can only be in the house four years or six years, the senate six years, all of a sudden the people making decisions are the bureaucrats or the staff that's been there forever. they all of a sudden become controling. and i think you will find in

some states with term limits, the staff of the people are the people making the decisions because they had the institutional knowledge, and the people cycling through don't have it. so i think there's a real detriment. crexendo the argument is the intelligence community, a big function of congress is oversight. a lot of members have said that some in the intelligence committee have said, certainly there is a new member on the intelligence committee. they don't understand the lingo. it is the smart congressmen who will stop them and stop use the acronyms. certainly, that is the power of the executive branch has too much power now. i just know a lot of people would not want their congressman doing brain surgery on them. that would be one thing. >> i from florida southern college. over the past couple years we've seen some of the dangers, shall we say, of a divided congress and what that can do to a

system. can you speak about what happens if we have a united congress under one party, but a different party in the power and the presidency. >> well, first of all, if you have a -- i'm not going to say it's going to happen. but if you have a republican senate and a republican house, in order to get anything done, you still have to negotiate something with the president who has veto power. so there is a balance. maybe there will be less things done. probably the maximum time to get things done is to have a party of both the house and the senate and the president, but rarely does that happen. that's when the congress really achieve a lot of things. but you are usually going to have a lot of -- a divided

congress or a divided congress as opposed to the executive office. then you have the checks and balances of the constitution. that's really why our forefathers wrote the constitution the way they did so that nobody has unbridled power. usually it is divided. that means it is a lot of wringing of hands and counting votes. people say, hastert rule, the hastert vote is 218 votes, you can move on. if you don't have 218 votes, you can't move it. constantly what the process is in the house and the senate is finding enough votes to move your legislation and then of course, it gets passed in the senate, coming back to a real conference committee, and having that result be able to move again through the house and the senate. it is a long process to move a piece of legislation, especially big legislation. but ultimately, you would have to be able to negotiate with the

executive department to make sure that something that even after all this work can be signed. you can't go through all that work and not have it signed. it's for not. >> i think it is important to look at a parliamentary system as opposed to our system. there is a real big difference, as the speaker just said. in britain or in france or in germany, the head of the party in the parliament is the prime minister. they run the government. and if you are a member of the ruling party in those systems, you all vote together. you are expected to vote together, yes, on the party's position on every vote. there is nobody off the reservation. it is a very simple system. it is designed to move a little faster than our system. i don't think it would work here, and i don't think it is the right system for the united

states because we are a large country -- 320 million people, on our way to 400 million, maybe a half a billion -- we are the most diverse country in the world. we probably have more division and variances in opinion of any country in the world. and you have to allow for that. so our system has division of power. our ancestors dispersed the power to a fair the well, and i'm glad they did because nobody can get their hands on the wheel and run the bus alone. the president has to have the congress and a vote and you have to review what you have to go through. you can get the house to vote for something, then you have to get the senate to vote for it, and they have the filibuster and all of that, which means you need a super majority probably in the senate.

then, when they get done, they have to reconcile their differences. then, if they can do that and get another vote in both houses that the reconciliation is acceptable, then you go to the president. and if he says "no," you start all over again. you are back to go. i mean, it is incredibly difficult to get anything done. but that, again, allows people, i believe, when it is all said and done, if i lose in that process, i don't want to leave the country or pick up a rifle. and that is what we gain from all that trouble that we go through. so i think it is the right system for us. the other system may be better for other countries. that's their business. but i think this is the best system for america. >> i think in the 1990's, i know some of the people in this room were probably in their diapers in the 1990's, but you had a

democratic president with a wrin -- republican congress and a fair amount got done -- the balanced budget act, welfare reform -- so we could be headed for that dynamic again, but we shall see. >> i'm daniel salazar. i go to texas christian university. my question is both about gerrymandering and term limits. i was wondering, how can a system with no term limits be useful when 70% to 80% of the house is decided in the primaries. they are not even decided in the general election. you don't have the full voting block. doesn't that perpetuate the problem? >> i have an answer with that. i had breakfast with a good friend about six months ago. he said, what happens today -- it used to be about april you started looking over your shoulder and you wonder who your general opponent is going to be. now you look over your shoulder to see who your primary opponent is going to be. it is just the nature of the

place. it is tougher. it puts -- most people are in a situation where you have two elections. you have a primary election, and then you have a general election. if you are not towing the line, if you are not conservative enough or moderate enough, someone is going to come after you. so the primaries have become very, very focused or very contested lately. especially in a district where you talk about districts that get p.a.c. if districts that get p.a.c., if you are in the other party, you want to put all your adversaries in one group and it opens up more options for your party to be in a majority, gerrymandering. so if you are in a district with 75%, 80% of your party, you know in the primary, you are going to draw people against you, same thing on the democratic side.

>> i'm not sure that i agree that 70% are only worried about the primary. i think it is a greater percentage than it used to be, but i don't think it is that high. when you talk about gerrymandering, we talked a minute ago about that, and my thought was, if you want to change that, you really got to get more of these bipartisan commissions in states to draw the line. so you get more 50-50 districts. i think that's a good idea. i think that's where we need to go. i don't like the fact that we've come up with a lot of 80% d, or 80% r districts. i don't think it is a healthy thing. that's the only way you can change it, and i agree it should be done. >> i think an even democracy means you have an ability to compete, and if all of a sudden things are skewed one way or another, you really don't have a chance to compete.

>> i want to outline what we're going to do now. speaker hastert is april to stick around. leader gephardt had a previous engagement. please thank speaker hastert and leader gephardt for being here today. [applause] i want to go back to one time during the house, health-care reporter in 2003, and the politics at the time were the republicans controlled both houses of congress. there was an outcry from seniors . seniors always vote. so is very important, they did not like the rising cost of prescription drugs. there was a push to add a medicare drug and if it gets seniors use a lot of drugs and it wasn't paid for.

so you have to have this expansion of the government. remember, we are going into 2004, president george w. bush up for reelection, he would face john kerry. in this isppened that the conservatives did not like the expansion of medicare drug benefit and democrats did not like the bill itself. so by and large, you had this struggle to get 218 votes. it was called the longest vote because those usually the house or 15 minutes. this went three hours where george w. bush had to be woken up in the middle of the night to make calls to his bigger hastert's colleagues on the house floor who were not voting. i've always wondered, i would ask someone when i was doing reporting, how do you wake of the president? who goes in and shakes them? i never got the answer to that. it is an interesting study of the dynamics. put into a place in

the 1970's because there was a need for senior health care costs. basically, in the 1970's, health-care costs were divided between two groups, doctors and hospitals. that was the primary. in 1972 if you add a heart attack on the green, you probably died. today, people are expected to live. partly because of the pharmaceuticals or the drugs available to keep people alive and healthy. the cost of drugs were not allowed in medicare, were not involved in medicare because it really wasn't an issue back in the 1970's. one of the things i thought was important, because i say whatever happens in politics as an economic consequence, whatever happens on the economic side has a political effect. seniors were not taking the drugs they were prescribed to them because they could not afford them. a senior had to make a decision whether they were going to take their diabetes drug or there

heart condition drug or get their groceries. decision -- you knew what that decision was going to be. we had to do something on an economic basis, and that was to find a way to add prescription drug benefit on medicare. now, the democrats always figured medicare was there barely went. they did not really like folks going out and try to find a solution. on afelt we were pinching territory. the fact was, was an economic thing. if someone could not by their insulin or their medication for diabetes or they could not purchase the heart care medicine, they ended up come if diabetes, you probably had a limb cut off or you had renal dialysis or if your heart andent, yet a triple bypass

that is something that would cost the government hundreds of thousands of dollars when you want to the doctors and hospitals to me yet, you can prevent it by giving them $30 a medication and prevent that thing. it was a preventative thing and i thought it was very important to have true health care for seniors, to have the third part of that benefit. and movedhree times it out of the house before get ever get it into the senate to pick it up. the third time we moved it out of the house, there were other consequences out there. first of all, you had a group -- this is real politics, how things happen. i probably had half a dozen of my folks go together with some democrats because they wanted to reimport drugs from canada. the drugs that were said to get it over there because of a deal that was cut during the clinton administration. only fixed cost would go on to the drug programs. canadians were buying their

drugs that we use at a discount, basically. if you reimport the strokes back to the u.s., first of all, the canadians are not getting the drugs that were supposed to and it would really screw the markup in the u.s. plus, yorkshire were those trucks were coming from. they could come back in the united states and be from bangladesh or india or someplace. you don't know there are legitimate drugs or not. if you have to have drugs, they have to be legitimate, you could break that then. that was when issue. i had some conservatives that just did that want to expand medicare because they thought it was a social program and they did not want to expand it. the ability to get something done is you get 218 votes. in this case, it was 216 because we had a couple of folks that were out. under leader pelosi, basically said, she

wasn't going to give us any votes. i knew i had up to 20 democrats i wanted to vote for this bill. there was aore -- deadline. the week before moving this bill forward, i had asked the president to meet with some of our people because they had concerns. there were holding out and wanted to talk to the president before they voted. the president went off to england to visit the queen or something. he was gone for a week. the night of the vote, he comes back post of the secret service puts into bed. and we can't get a call to get him to make the calls. so open a vote at 1:00 in the morning, by the time we did everything together, the amendments and the changes in things written out and distributed to everybody, it was 1:00 in the morning. not a good time to have a vote, but we're up against a deadline. it is the last of congress. we open the vote at 1:00. i finally get a hold of the president at 4:00 in the morning, three hours later.

ask a call to a couple of members, they're satisfied with the answer they get, walk over and give us the two votes we need. we get the 216 votes and we have 20 democrats vote for it, too. the fact is, if you have to do this by yourself, it is pretty tough. if you really believe this is an important issue and if you did not get it done you're never going to get it done, then there was no constraint on how long a vote was open. it was tradition, but not a restraint. you had to do what you had to do to get important things done. if you look over the things we did over that eight years, that was probably one of the most important votes we did for progress in health care and the in and people. >> do you think kerry would have .on -- he on the failure the democrats would've hammered you for not getting that done. >> i'm sure it would've made a difference, but i think there are more issues between the president and the contention of

the democrat rather than with the legislature did. of anittle bit off-the-wall question, but i've been told there's an interesting story behind where you work during the attacks on 9/11. given too much context, but could you tell me a little bit about where you were during the time leading up to the attacks and during them, i suppose? be here inhappen to d.c., it was a tuesday, beautiful tuesday. usually, congress does not come in until later in the day on tuesday. people are usually traveling back from their districts. i would do that, too. however, we had a tough economic situation. i wanted to talk to the president about we should bring some economists in and look over the horizon of how we should treat our tax treatment on investments because we had lost, that point, $250 billion in revenue just on capital gains.

we needed to get confidence of the markets. that was the discussion we wanted to have. i knew the president wasn't going to be there on tuesday, so i had an appointment and got in there monday morning or monday afternoon. i was in my office early tuesday morning. i was downstairs at an appointment at all of there's a knock on my door that said "mr. speaker, something happened to the world trade tower and there is a fire." i walked upstairs to my office and walked in just as i saw the second plane going into the world trade tower. all of a sudden, it was pretty evident this wasn't an accident. this was some type of terror. we do not know who or why or who the players were, but we had some suspicions, but we did not know. an interesting day because we were supposed to have a joint session in congress that morning with the prime minister of australia, john howard. if you have a joint session of congress, it is a commitment on

both governments to bring people together, bring their leader together. i'm thinking, maybe this is not a good idea. yet the house and senate and the supreme court and the president's cabinet and the joint chiefs of staff, a lot of that same -- all in room at one time. i'm thinking, this is probably not a good idea. if there is a act of terrorism out there, flying planes into things, maybe it is not a good place to do that. so i'm trying to get a hold of the vice president because the president, obviously, was out in air force one someplace. the vice president was in the basement of the white house with the secretary of transportation, trying to get every plane in the sky down. so every commercial plane every plane that was just a private airplane come at getting them down on the ground. we had planes coming across the atlantic, across the pacific and across the caribbean. they had to get down immediately.

i am trying to get a hold of vice president cheney. i.has a secure phone as do you have to push buttons and turn a key. we were not getting through. there's a phone on my desk. i had to have fonts, a secure phone and a red phone that i got all my calls on. there's a little light and every time there's a call, the light would go off. the light went off, so they put cheney through on the red phone. it picked it up and said, hello? this guy says, what are you doing on capitol hill? taxes are too high and i don't like what you're doing with this program. the koreans are selling too much steel. i'm like, wait a minute, who is this? he said, ever mind you this is, who the heck is this? i said, i think you have the wrong number and i hung up. as i looked out the window in my desk face the front of the and i'm a great desk, looking and there is smoke coming across the mall. i'm thinking, smoke is not

supposed to be her. we have smoke and mirrors, but not much snow, really, in washington. smoke, really, in washington. i get the guy who runs my office and say, sam, find out what happened. a said, i will be back in second. you get back inside, a third plane had just gone into the pentagon. anybody in thed senate. it was too early in the morning for them to be around. so i make a unilateral decision that we're going to close down congress. ever't know if that is been made before, but i was very abrasive to do it because i did not want to slide the australian government and say, sorry, prime minister, we're going to close down. i figured everybody understood this. i called the fellow in the chair. i was in my office. speaker pro tem was from florida later became the head of the cia. i said, porter, we're going to close and i wanted chaplin to

come say prayer. we had a visiting chaplain. prayer andg to do a adjourn congress, get people out of here, out of the capital. so i walked across the statutory hall and just get into the chamber and all of a sudden, two of my security guys grabbed me, one on each side, and kind of scooped me through the hallways and down the stairways and in a tunnel and across over to the rayburn building. the next thing i know, i'm at andback of an suv suburban hurtling across the back streets of washington. i said, what is waiting on? they said, there's a fourth plane in the air. and there was, but it wasn't the plane of pennsylvania, it was a cia plane going up and down the mall. people thought it was a fourth plane and it was going into the capital. just get out.le, go run. get away. people in the white house and the old executive office, because the smoke was coming from down along the state

department, that area, said, get out of here and go to the north, run to the north, get away. it was just kind of panic. i ended up out at andrews air force base. i got a hold of the vice president. he said, we have all of the planes down except three are coming across the atlantic that don't have transponders on. there's a flight coming from to washington, d.c., coming across canada right now that does not have its transponder on. if we can't get these planes down, we're going up to shoot them down and we don't want to do that. all of this drama was going on. they said, i'm going to put you in an undisclosed location for the day. the next thing i know, i'm on helicopter flight across the --th part of d.c., cross and there is no traffic moving. nothing on the bridge. everything is kind of dead. i fly over the reagan international airport. the planes are just stacked up

on the tarmac, but nothing is moving. there is not enough gates to take care of all of the planes. likenever seen anything that before my life. i look on the other side and the helicopters were going across from the airport. there is the pentagon. this blue/black smoke is belting out of the pentagon. dark orange flame underneath pushing it up. the northernss suburbs of virginia. this is a beautiful, crisp, september morning. it was just that blue black haze as far as you can see. ,'m thinking, i taught history taught about the burning of 1814 and the war of 1812. here i am, speaker of the house, and someone is did the same thing now. how is this going to change history? what was going to happen? i ended up and all of the leadership ended up in "not day.osed location" for the

we watched tv. we watched cnn, c-span, just like everybody else did, to find out what was going on and what happened. we did not have a real intelligence source. i talked to the vice president probably two or three times that day. the final conversation was, i said, -- they said, we're going to have the leadership come back the capital as 6:30 and the president is coming in at six: -- 6:00. we're probably in three or four helicopters. we come out of this undisclosed location and laid on the north lot of the capital. president pro was tem of the senate. i was the speaker. daschle and i were each going to mics.ime to the . it was going to be outside on the senate steps. we walk over to the senate steps

and the rest of the 250 members of congress, house numbers, senate members, democrats, republicans on the stairs behind us. i walk around to the sticks and daschle gives his 20 seconds and i say, look, we have a lot of work to do. we will be back to work tomorrow and try to solve these problems. in this country will stand shoulder to shoulder. as i turned around after that, summative broke out into "god bless america" and chills went down my spine when that happened. i thought, this country will be ok. we will get it done. years, i wasfive speaker and every time i would stand a lookout that window, i would think of watching that smoke, cross the mall. one of the great heroes we have in our military, the army and navy and marines and air force and coast guard and the people -- the firemen, the people who went up the towers and the police that tried to save lives.

really, great americans who wear the uniforms. the people who don't worry uniforms are also heroes. i would to the celebration of flight 93 last september. given there and talking to those families, those people, 10 or nine or eight or seven, we don't know how many, but took that with just a thing of scalding water from the coffee maker and a couple of utensils for breakfast. basically, to down four of these terrorists who are armed in some way come into control of the plane. they were on the telephone and they were talking back to their and theys and offices knew what was going on in washington and knew what was going on in new york, and they knew what their fate was. and those people stood up and made a difference. and we know today because of the hearings, that plane was

probably headed -- when i was trying to make a decision what to do -- headed for the capital of the united states, probably in my front window. i could not lookout that window for the next five years without thinking of those people who really made a difference, the real heroes. they may be sitting across from me in an airplane or across the room in a restaurant, but when the times come, people stand up and do the right things. i think that is one of the real strengths of our country. that is my experience and a will never forget those people. they're in my mind all the time. >> i'm afraid that is all the time we have. i would like to thank mike smith and the washington center. please thank speaker dennis hastert. [applause] [captioning performed by the

national captioning institute, [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2014] >> in the british house of commons, the defense beholds a hearing on u.k. response to combating isis in iraq and syria. that is live at 9:30 am eastern on c-span 2. >> c-span's 2015 student cam competition is underway. this nation what competition for middle and high school students will award 150 prices totaling $100,000.

create a five to seven minute documentary on the topic "the three branches and you." include c-span programming, show varying points of view, and must be summative by jennifer 20th, 1215. january 20, 2015. "washington-span, journal" is next. at 1:00 p.m., scott blackmun. at 3:00 p.m., a look at how the money in college athletics is spent. at 7:00 p.m., a massachusetts governor's debate. a discussion on gun control the selection cycle. our guest is chelsea parsons. governorformer utah

and bush administration for secretary michael leavitt. he will talk about the administration's response to ebola. and how federal agencies work with state ♪ good morning, everyone. with just two weeks to go before election day, the washington post is predicting a 93% chance republicans take control of the senate. the states that are likely to flip our alaska, arkansas, colorado, and louisiana. begin with campaign 2014. do you plan to vote? republicans, (202) 585-3881. republic -- democrats, (202