jurisdiction where the question is undecided and different courts have come out differently in other jurisdictions, we don't think the fact one court has decided in one way is -- we think the court looks to this question of is this a difficult question. >> i forgot one thing which may be obvious. we are not talking about the difficulty of construing the fourth amendment itself. we are talking only about a difficulty in construing a criminal statute where in fact the reason for the stop or seizure is based on a violation of criminal law. >> that's right, we think the probable cause standard allows for the officer to act with reasonable grounds. >> what about the qualified immunity standard? >> we think in order to have reasonable grounds for a stop, he needs something in the statue to affirmatively support his view. this seems to acquire a president of what the officer does. in order to protect those who

are acting -- except those who are clearly incompetent. >> the only thing in your brief i did not follow is the importance in getting this question solved. here is the question, what is the rule, one light or two lights. yet in this case the evidence that came and had nothing at all to do with the traffic violation. so the court would not need to decide the traffic violation case. i think the north carolina immediate appellate court said there was consent. there was consent, and we never have to deal with what the traffic regulation was. >> that is correct, and this comes up into context. sometimes it will be litigated because the officer issued a citation. our concern is if the court takes the position that whenever an officer is wrong about the

law he violated the fourth amendment. it's going to deter officers from making stops when their arguments on both sides. >> do you agree if there is any legal stop, the consent is the fruit of a poison tree? >> that is a difficult question. we don't necessarily agree with that. even if the stop was a -- cause, that does not necessarily mean it was a poisonous tree, but it has not been briefed here. we would address simply the question. >> you start your argument by saying you were going to give three reasons why they should be the right question rather than a remedy question. you said history, which frankly i think history probably does not say as much as you think it says. i want to know what number two and number three are. >> sure, we think this is a simple standard to simply ask officers to decide, the courts to decide whether an officer could reasonably think a person

has committed a crime. you don't have to separate the question of law or fact. the third is we don't think there is a normative reason to treat the stakes of law and fact effort lay. when an officer makes a stop in this situation, he can just as reasonably confused as to what the law is under the statutes as to what the facts are. if we are going to treat mistakes of fact as the right analysis, it make sense to treat reasonable mistakes of law in the same way. the court has no further questions. thank you. >> mr. fischer, you have three minutes left. >> i would like to make four points. to start with reasonableness. mr. chief justice, i think your hypothetical of differing court of appeal opinions in a state, i think there is the analysis that it would violate the fourth amendment in half the states and not the other states, because each would be binding in its own

component of the state. that shows why this court has rejected that kind of analysis and cap amended only to the remedy stage. >> in this case, do the dissenters in the north carolina supreme court say the adoption was surprising? all we have to say unreasonableness is if it is surprising, if the correct interpretation is surprising, then the contrary interpretation is reasonable. would we have to defer to them on that? >> i think you do because you have to give more teeth to it. with the inspector general said is you have to have a foothold in the statute. i think that is more or less what was recited today. there is a recent d.c. court of appeals opinion that holds that a police officer could argue that all license plate frames are illegal. they rejected that under the code, but that is one of innumerable arguments a law enforcement officer might make

in the reasonableness test would give grace. >> one court one way, the other court the other way, the officer loses. it has to be unusual. >> i think, justice breyer, the problem with that is the core presumption the officer needs to understand the law as it is construed, and mr. chief justice, i think you asked about the ignorance cannon. states response is, well, if somebody is reasonably mistaken about the law, we would convict them. the reason why as we would assume that if the court of appeals split and this court divided five/four, they are still convicted because we assume they knew the law when they acted. all we are asking for today's the same assumption comply to police officers. we do respect the founding documents don't help them.

they are only remedy cases. what the court did not distinguish his rights from remedies. if you want to look at the founding, the controlling rule would be the common-law rule. as we said in our brief, with no disagreements on the other side, the common-law rule dating back centuries was ignorance of the law on the police officer's part, even if perfectly reasonable, did not justify the stop. if i could say one last thing, justice scalia, with all due respect, i really do think there is nothing unusual about a party litigating a case up through the courts. it may arise in federal court or state court, but they can choose the arguments they choose to raise. when we got a judgment in our favor from the north carolina court of appeals, it was up to the state at that point to choose what argument that wanted to pursue further. just like a state, a party may look at the right questions

instead of a remedy, we think that all applies here. >> thank you, counselor. the case is submitted. >> the senate confirmed the next u.s. surgeon general five vote to 51-43. there were several nominees being considered before the end of the current congressional session. senators return tomorrow at 10 nomineesern to vote on at the state and homeland security departments. watch live coverage -- coverage of the senate on c-span2. q&a, katieweek on pavlich a what she perceives as the war on liberals. >> what is your problem with ted kennedy? >> like i said, where the idea came from was the dnc convention

where they were showing this tribute video and portraying him as a women's rights champion, a young woman to drown in his car. if he had not gone back for nine hours and try to save his own behind, she would have probably survived. you cannot do an entire video at to glorifyn claiming someone like that while not including that part of his life in a video about his women's rights record. >> sunday night at 8:00 eastern and pacific on q&a. we are erring one program from each year starting december 22 at 7 p.m. eastern on c-span. johnmocratic congressman dingell is retiring after 60 years in the house of representatives. he was first elected in 1955, making him the longest-serving member of congress in u.s. history.

congress, his seat will be held by his wife debbie, who won election in november. before the house adjourned for the year, several lawmakers offer tributes to congressman dingell from the house floor. quick 21 years ago, january 1993, i was sworn in to the 103rd congress as the 28th representative of the historic first congressional district of illinois. one of the first members of was the o welcome me most heartwarming words and the widest smile, was none other than my friend from the great state of michigan, congressman john dingell jr.

john david dingell jr. john dingell has trained me, me far ith me, inspired more than most of the members of this house. i can't think of any other member who has spent the kind of time and energy with me in this congress, teaching me the ropes, than john dingell. john dingell, mr. speaker, will go down in u.s. history as being one of the most powerful house committee chairmen of all time. that's why, mr. speaker, around washington, d.c., throughout the nation, throughout this congress, he was and will continue to be respectfully known as the lion of the house.

the lion of the house. that -- may aspire, aspire that honor to his forceful personality, mr. speaker in my experience with john and watching john operate as chairman, he used a scalpel more than a sledgehammer to score his legislative wins and to gather up and earn the respect of all the members, not only of the committee on energy and commerce, but the members of this house on both sides of the aisle. many would say that the secret to john's success has been his rivaled mastery of

parliamentary procedure and his institutional memory. i would agree that he has superb parliamentary knowledge -- knowledge of the parliamentary procedure and has essence of his institutional memory. but what makes john dingell successful and a genuine american treasure, who was just last week awarded the highest civilian award that this nation bestows upon an individual, the presidential medal of freedom, john knows how to deal with people. he knows how to work with people. and john doesn't go around talking about all his great

exploits. i recall a few years back, mr. speaker, i was traveling to michigan to campaign for john. at a challenge. and little did i know that the an who i was championing had at one time been sworn in his own district because he voted for the voting rights act of 1965. i didn't know that about john dingell. i didn't know that. but his -- my respect for him just mushroomed to the top even more than i had before. because he was a man who when he believed in something, when he believed something, he has a commitment and the courage to stand behind his beliefs. mr. speaker, what john says -- he means what he says and he says what he means.

and no one can ever say anything different about john david dingell. mr. speaker, john dingell, chairman dingell, my friend, i wish you continued health, i wish you continued strength and prosperity as you leave this house of representatives, this house of the people and return to your family, friends and your constituents in michigan. may god bless you and keep you. i will forever hold you dear, i will forever look toward your example in terms of committee work and work on this floor. i want to thank you, john dingell, for all that you've contributed to this nation, to your constituents, to this house and certainly to the committee of energy and commerce. thank you very much, mr.

speaker, i yield one minute to my friend from texas, chairman or ranking member of the science committee, eddie ernice johnson. ms. johnson: thank you very much, mr. rush, and i appreciate the fact that you're holding this hour. mr. speaker, i rise for the honor of the work of mr. john dingell who will retire this year as the longest-serving ember with 59 years as a michigan representative. since 1955, congressman dingell has represented the southeastern michigan area and served on the committee on energy and commerce and twice as chairman. when i learned that mr. dingell would retire at the end of this term, i was saddened to know we would lose such a fine leader

and advocate for social democracy. however, we must continue mr. dingell's fight for all americans. he is well known for his battles on behalf of civil rights, clean water, medicare and workers' rights. he's also the author of many pieces of legislation that enhance the protection of public health such as the affordable care act. why he expanded public health nd advocated for environmental conservationism, mr. dingell so combated corruption and waste via his chairmanship of the committee on energy and commerce. he exerted strong, unwavering oversight of the executive branch through his committee and his successes in congress earned him the 2014 presidential medal of freedom. through his career in congress, he was willing and able to work across the aisle to accomplish tasks that made americans' lives

better. a true advocate for the people, mr. dingell dedicated his life to ensuring that public health and safety of the american people was always in the forefront. whether authoring the clean air act or the patients' bill of rights, mr. dingell was unwavering in his quest to protect americans. i urge my colleagues to recognize the accomplishments of congressman john dingell and join me in congratulating him on an outstanding career in public service. i thank you and yield back. mr. rush: i thank the gentlelady. i recognize now the chairman of the -- the ranking member on the judiciary committee, the one who will ascend to the dean of the house, a civil rights icon, the egendary john conyers. mr. conyers: i thank my colleague for yielding and i

want to say, mr. speaker, and members of the committee, that i rise today to honor a true statesman in every sense of the word. the deep of the house. chairman emeritus of the energy and commerce committee. and a champion of the people of metropolitan detroit. the honorable congressman john dingell. now i've had the distinct honor of working with congressman dingell for the last six decades. first as a member of his congressional staff, and then as his colleague in the michigan delegation. over these six decades we have fought together successfully for medicare, for clean air and water, for workers' rights, and most importantly for civil rights. over these decades, he has herculean truly

tasks including passing the endangered species act, the 1990 clean air act, the safe drinking water act, the affordable care act, the patients' bill of rights, and the children's health insurance program, among many others. congressman dingell is a masterful legislator, but most importantly, a man of conscience. as he passes the torch on to another extraordinary leader, congresswoman-elect debbie dingell. i am so proud to salute his legacy of compassion and service and i reserve the balance of my time. mr. rush: i thank the gentleman. i now, mr. speaker, recognize congressman from texas, the

former chairman of the energy and commerce committee, my friend, congressman joe barton. mr. barton: i want to thank the congressman from chicago, the right reverend bobby rush for recognizing me. mr. speaker, we always in texas refer to the former speaker of the house, sam rayburn, who served for 48 years, as man of the house. in fact, there have been books written about rayburn with that title, "the man of the house." but -- and i'm a sixth generation native texan so i'm -- i certainly would be considered to be somewhat texas-cent rick, but in all honest -- texas-centric, but in all honesty i have to say that the true man of the house is the honorable john dingell of michigan. his father served before him, elected, i believe, while

president roosevelt was president of the united states. and john dingell literally grew up in the house of representatives. when the japanese attacked pearl arbor on december 7, 1941, president roosevelt, i believe the very next day, december 8, addressed a joint session of congress in his famous day of infamy speech. john dingell was on the floor to hear that speech in person. not as a congressman, but as the son of a congressman. he got elected to replace his father when his father passed away in 1955 and it's been mentioned, has served longer than any other member of congress in the history of this nation. if you count not only his service in congress but the time he spent as a child when his father was in congress, he has

literally been in the house for almost a third of its existence as an institution. i'm not sure how many members he served with, but it is in the neighborhood of 2,500 members that he has personally served with. when i got elected to congress in 1984, i did not get on the energy and commerce committee my freshman year, but i did -- but i did my sophomore year in 1986. john dingell was then chairman, and was chairman until the republicans took the majority in the election of 1994. so i served with chairman dingell for my first 10 years in the congress. he was a chairman in every sense of the word. the legislation that he helped craft during his chairmanship, his legislation that -- is legislation that is some of the

most important in the history of this congress. certainly things that he would be most proud of would be the clean air act amendments of 1990, some of the health care legislation, some of the telecommunications legislation, those are laws that were passed under his chairmanship and are still the basic law in their field in this country. when i became chairman in 2003, he was the ranking democrat on the committee. e helped me sometimes in public, sometimes behind the scenes, even when he didn't agree with the legislation that the republican majority was pushing. he was always thoughtful and giving me tips on procedure and process and sometimes policy. move e passed a bill to television from an log to

digital -- from analog to digital, i wanted to put a date certain very quickly and with his counsel he, convinced me that we should -- with his counsel, he convinced me we should draw that out and he said the final date of the transition shouldn't be until after the super bowl, just in case there's a problem, people will get to watch the super bowl and won't be cussing you and the congress for moving from analog and digital and he was absolutely right on that. with chairman upton's leadership who is on the floor this evening, several years ago, i went to chairman upton and suggested that we ask the speaker to name the energy and commerce main committee room on the first floor of the rayburn building, 2123, the john dingell room. chairman upton thought that was a great idea. he recommended it to the speaker. and that now is the john dingell room. i could go on and on, mr. speaker, but i do want to say

that we are truly losing one of the giants of the congress when john dingell retires at the end of this session. he's still going to be here. his wife debbie has been elected to succeed him. so hopefully we'll still see him in the congress, but you know, i really have difficulty imagining a congress that john dingell is not a member of. he will be missed. we honor him and i consider it a personal privilege that he calls me a friend. with that, mr. speaker, i yield back and thank the gentleman from chicago for yielding me some time. mr. rush: i thank the gentleman. i yield, mr. speaker, one minute to the chairman of the energy

and commerce committee and i want to just be -- remind people we have a growing list of speakers, so i yield one minute to the chairman of the nrbling and commerce committee, the gentleman from michigan, mr. upton. mr. upton: one minute? an i have a couple of minutes? thank you, mr. rush. i'll try to be brief. i do want to put a statement in the record from mr. camp who was here a little while ago and wanted to speak. dingell,nt to say, mr. mr. chairman is what we still call him. i have known him since 1977 when i came here as a staffer. he treated me just as well as a staffer, which was great, as he has as a colleague and now for me as chairman of the committee. we're the best of friends. we really are. lots of different issues we worked on and he took me under

his wing a lot of years ago and we discovered, too, for me it's better to have dingell on our side than being on different sides. but he's -- when he's on the other side, he certainly is a powerful adversary. our delegation in michigan is pretty close. we're involved in so many different issues. jobs and the economy, particularly the auto sector is one of the things where john dingell has led and cared about. as we know, he's the long -- longest serving member of congress ever in the history of this institution. he has cared about so well. and i remember bringing over congressional records from years past and as joe barton said he, served weapon -- he served with -- said, he served with 2,500 members here. when you go through the journal with some of the big votes, like the voting rights act and going through what the members said on that particular day. he was a fair chairman.

always went by the rules. had a command of the issues. a brilliant staff. still their loyalty exists today. and of course the light of his life, the lovely debra. a great person who we know is going to be taking his place, serving those 700,000 people in the next congress from soviet michigan. -- from southeast michigan. when you look at his life he served his country from the first day until today. a world war ii vet, something he has always been so, so proud of. chairman of the most pow everyful committee here in the house. but in addition to -- of the most powerful committee here in the house. but in addition to all that, e's been a friend, a father, a husband, a colleague, whose word has always been his bnd and who has defined the very utmost of what we would like this place to

be. a great american. thank you, john dingell. i yield back. mr. rush: i thank the chairman. mr. speaker, i yield one minute to the gentlelady from the great state of texas, congresswoman sheila jackson lee. ms. jackson lee: i thank the distinguished gentleman mr. rush and i thank mr. pallone for convening this special order. all of the members of this committee and this house of representatives that have come on the floor today with joy. it is often said it is not how long you serve but how you serve. for john dingell that is not mutually exclusive. he served six decades and he served it greatly and grandly and with distinction. reminded of a description of him as a 6'3" distinguished gentleman, towering over witnesses, but having the biggest of hearts, coming from the best of legacies in his

father that served 22 years. reminded of his commitment to the clean air act, safe drinking water, the endangered species. but john has always reminded us new ones, relatively speaking, that his greatest love was to proride the affordable health care to every american. and after decades -- decades after his father introduced such a bill, he never gave up. he never gave up. i stand here today to thank you, john dingell, for the affordable care act. they call it many things or ba macare, but i'm getting ready to call it dingellcare because you work without ceasing. thank you for your service to this nation where you stood in the shadows of world war ii and stood as an american willing to serve. i'm grateful for the service he has given and the long years of service as chairman of the house energy committee. let me conclude by saying that there is much more that all of us can say but you can see so many members have come to the

floor. on a personal note, two items that i want to acknowledge. thank you, john dingell, for recognizing that my voting rights, my opportunity to vote, as an african-american and the thousands and millions that you lped in 1965, will never forget your willingness to sacrifice personal political statute and do what is right. i also want to thank you so very much for being the kind of person on the floor of the house that asks about every member, every member who came to your attention, you asked them how they were doing. including these remarks, his final words about the civil rights act, he said, he was glad to vote for a bill that solved a problem that was eating at the soul and heart and liver of the country. only john dingell. john dingell, i salute you as a great and grand american. thank you, debbie dingell, i

continue to look forward to your service. and, we are going to -- and john, we are going to look forward to your service and of course your long life here in this great country and in your great state of michigan. again, john, thank you so very much. i yield back. . mr. rush: mr. speaker, i yield one minute to my colleague from the great state of illinois, mr. john shimkus. mr. shimkus: i know there are a lot of members. i'll be quick. you really have to come down to the floor to recognize a man who served honorably for as many years. 58 years, to be exact. i'd like to highlight the fact that at 18 he joined the united states army and rose to the rank of second lieutenant and was prepared to be part of the invasion of japan until the bomb was dropped and the war ended. john won a special election to follow his father and then has been here ever since.

he was a leading congressional supporter of organized labor, social welfare measures and traditional progressive policies. he's also known as a big hunter and fisher, which we heard many, many times. i also want to highlight that he is well-known for dingell grams, which were sent to the administration, regardless of party, that held them account for public policies and the excesses of the executive branch and he's well-known for that. i know he will be followed ablely -- ably by his wife, debbie, and i look forward to working with him. may god bless you, john dingell, and may god bless the nited states of america. mr. pallone: thank you, mr. speaker. i yield to a member of the energy and commerce committee -- i don't know we'll know this -- but we'll be hong him tomorrow night, mr. waxman. mr. waxman: thank you, congressman pallone, for

acknowledging me that i'm the ranking member at the present time. of course, he will now take on that job very ably i'm sure. and both of us will follow in the tradition of john dingell. it's so appropriate that room where the energy and commerce committee meets is now known as the john dingell room. john dingell has been the leader of that committee, a leader in the congress for longer than anybody else has served in either of the senate or the house. but what i want to say is from my own personal perspective. i've served on that committee for 40 years, and i've learned more from john dingell than i have from anybody else that i've served with as a colleague. there were times when we had disagreements and we argued them out and then resolved them and compromised them. but most of the time, he was a

stalwart defender of the interest of the working people of this country, a protector of the environment, a person who led the efforts for civil rights, a man who cared about people and understood that government had a very important role to play in people's lives. from his father, who was active in the new deal under president franklin rosevelt who led this nation to use the government in a positive way, to help people who had nowhere else to turn, john dingell carried on that tradition. it's the liberal progressive tradition, and i associate myself with it. i learned everything i knew as a member of the committee, and i learned everything i knew as a potential chairman and a short-term chairman from john dingell. he's a member's member, and he is going to go down in the history books as one of the

outstanding members of congress and leaders and chairman of the oldest committee in the house of representatives. mr. speaker, i know we don't have a lot of time, so i just want to say to john dingell, i wish you all the best and i know you will whisper to debbie if she has any questions, the right course to take but, of course, she's been with you long enough she'll probably by this time know what to do on her own. god bless you, john dingell, and i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: under the speaker's announced policy of january 3, 2013, the gentleman from new jersey, mr. pallone, is recognized for the remainder of the hour as the designee of the minority leader. mr. pallone: thank you. now i'd like to yield one minute to the gentleman from west virginia, who's been the ranking member himself of two committees. mr. rahall: thank you, mr. pallone. i appreciate you yielding. mr. speaker, one of my distinct pleasures in serving for 38 years in this body has been to

work with the dean of the house, mr. john dingell. throughout our almost four decades of serving the people of our respective districts and those of our nation, my respect and sincere appreciation for this son of michigan has only grown each and every day. few, if any, who have served here in the people's house over the last nearly 60 years would have a different view of the worth and the value of john dingell's contributions of the day-to-day work of this distinguished body. in fact, mr. speaker, representative dingell's vast legacy will assuredly be the liegeans of members and staff who have learned the lessons of leadership under john's tutelage. basic, fundamental, timeless lessons on how to get the people's business done. we're always at the ready for any member to partake in and adopt for their own future use. and all of us can remember times when big john felt it appropriate, timely and

beneficial to just gently impose one of his lessons on members. even on this body as a whole, if he felt it would move our country forward. first and foremost, john dingell has always valued good old-fashioned trust. he sees a person's word as their bond, a bond that never shifts, even in the strongest political wins. in john's playbook, loyalty, particularly loyalty to principles is a powerful force that can move the entire country forward. and he insists on one other attribute for success, time-tested hard work. one must put in the time doing the hard work, the home work with great attention to the details, ensuring that every t is crossed and every i dotted. these virtues exercised by my friend rather by his hand wielding a gavel or his sizeable arm embracing your future in the back of the house chamber, he's served our nation

productively. upon this many compromises have been struck to serve the people, their environment, their health and their livelihoods. a champion of the american worker, of the auto worker and of our nation's coal miners, john dingell fully appreciates the role that our government can and should play in supporting the breadwinners in every american family. from the moment john dingell came here to the moment he leaves and well beyond, these are the legacy that will always burn brightly in my mind as well as warm my heart. had i but served a single term with john dingell i would have count many blessings because of it. multiply 29 times, suffice it to say, the entire nation can itself count many blessings thanks to the good work of our dear friend, john dingell, the dean of the house of representatives. i thank the gentleman for yielding. mr. pallone: mr. speaker, i yield now one minute to the gentleman from new york, mr. tonko.

mr. tonko: and thank you, mr. speaker, and thank you to the gentleman from new jersey for the recognition and for leading us in this special order, paying tribute to representative john dingell. it is my honor to stand on the house floor this afternoon to say thank you to john dingell, thank you for your service to country, thank you for your service to the state of michigan, thank you for service to your congressional districts through the years and certainly thank you for your interaction and networking with your colleagues, which has crossed over party lines and has shown an exemplary fashion how to get business down -- in exemplary fashion how to get business done here in the house. your service to the military by serving us in the army and serving us during world war ii, also, the great lakes state, michigan, has produced a leader of greatness in john dingell. john, it is an honor to say

here this -- during this special tribute that you were indeed everyone's coach. i know the person of humility that you are, you shed that praise when it comes your way but make no mistake about it, it's been your coaching, your reinforcement, your encouragement to each and every one of us, certainly to those of us who enter as freshman, you were right there to shadow us and guide us and remind us that there is a nobleness with the small end of service through the house that can influence policy and speak to the needs of those most marginalized in our society. to that end i want to thank you for identifying so very strongly with struggle. you saw a struggle and you moved to address it, whether that be through health care, through human services, through education, certainly through all sorts of efforts that speak to public safety, our environment and our energy policy, you saw a struggle and you met it head on and you made certain that challenges were responded to. you showed us how to work across party lines and you

showed us how to be factual and to see your word as your honor. with all of that, i salute you, john dingell, as being an awesome leader who taught by example how to conduct yourself in this public arena. you're proud of your heritage. we talked about that many times over. that has fed you, those roots have fed you so very well and have enabled you to be this person of greatness coming from the great lakes state. so thank you so much for your service to country and to all of us here in the chamber. with that i yield back. mr. pallone: mr. speaker, for unanimous consent request i yield to the gentlewoman from new york, mrs. maloney. mrs. maloney: thank you so much. i'm testifying before the rules committee right now, but i request permission to place my statement in the record to know him is to love john dingell and he taught me that dedication to the legislative process and getting it done comes first. so may i place this in the record and get back to the

rules committee? the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mrs. maloney: thank you. mr. pallone: the gentleman from texas, mr. green. for one minute. mr. green: thank you, mr. speaker. i thank my colleague and our new ranking member of the energy and commerce committee. i rise today to pay tribute to one of the great lawmakers of our era who has dedicated his life fighting for civil rights, strengthening our nation's safety net for the vulnerable and elled leer and pushing for workers' rights and protecting american jobs. i'm honored to call this man a mentor and a friend, the dean of the house, congressman john dingell. mr. speaker, i'd like to ask that my full statement be placed into the record. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. green: with the -- what the history books will never be able to share is the respect and kindness that john has been given to all who have been fortunate enough to work with him. john has always been generous with his time and sharing his institutional knowledge of the people's house. in 2005, john was a vital voice in supporting efforts to pass

the energy act which was the key federal support for the energy renaissance, lowering energy prices for the american people today. outside washington, i was fortunate to spend time with john on hunting trips where we had the opportunity to get to know him better as a man, a father, a husband and an avid sportsman. mr. speaker, before i conclude, i'd like to personally thank john for his decades of public service and fighting for america's working families. our chamber will not be the same without him. god bless john dingell and the nited states of america. mr. pallone: mr. speaker, i yield one minute to the gentlewoman from colorado, ms. degette. s. degette: thank you so much. mr. speaker, in 1997 as a 39-year-old freshman, john dingell took a risk on me. he put me on the energy and commerce committee as a freshman, and since that day i have learned at his knee every

single day. he's become a friend, he's become a mentor and like so many of us on both sides of the aisle, our experience here in congress would not be the same without him. a lot of us know about the long arm of john dingell. over the years when chairman dingell would put his long arm around your shoulders and he would say, diana, i have a ttle chore for you, you knew that that little chore was anything but little. it was a part of something much, much bigger. whether he was just moving a minor amendment to a bill or a large bill itself and no matter what the issue was, it was always an honor to work together with john dingell to get something done for the american people. as the now ranking member on john dingell's subcommittee, the oversight and investigations subcommittee of

energy and commerce, i feel a special responsibility to his legacy. john dingell, over the years, held powerful people from all around the country, from every part of industry accountable to the american public, and today it's up to all of us as members of his distinguished committee to take up the great mantle of that legacy and to make the powerful tell truth to the american public. i commit myself today, along with all of us who carry on his legacy to do just that, to make this committee a committee that john dingell will be proud of. i'm going to miss my dear friend. we all know about few retirements are as well

deserved as such distinguished service as mr. dingell, and so i want to say, john, job well done, god speed. mr. chairman, i yield back the alance of my time. mr. pallone: i yield one minute to the gentleman from michigan, mr. levin. mr. levin: if a test of a career is whether you made a difference , big john's career has been a big success. in so many ways, john was tall in stature physically and in every other way. there has been much note about the particular accomplishments. i would like to spend a few minutes today talking not about

those accomplishments that are so vivid and so clear, but to talk about john dingell and his character. he remembered his roots. never forgot them. there was always, i think, a sense of the underdog. i think his family came to this ountry and felt in a sense the underdog, thankful they had the opportunity in this country to rise and it's so clear that john succeeded. might summit up this way, john ngell was a legislator's legislator. he combined courage and siff i willy, dedication and decency

and strong views with strong friendship. i don't remember exactly when it was that down the hall here when john was being honored, he decided to talk about this institution. and what he had seen happen to it. and it was a very frank talk. moaned recent be visits here, where it was much more difficult to have strong views, but not to have strong comradery, to have strong views but not have the ability to compromise them, to have strong views, but not find a way to seek and find common ground. that was so convincing, so

persuasive for someone who's been in this institution longer than anyone else in the history of this country. so i think our best salute to john may be the best way to remember his contribution in addition to all of the particular legislation that came to be and meant so much to millions of people in this country. is to try to pick up the mantle that surrounded him all of his career here, to really see if we can seek and find some way in this institution to operate the way john dingell saw so much of his career and why he felt it was such a loss when it dwindled. so i would like to join

everybody else with some emotion. our two families have been so close for so many decades. our two families, the leffins and the dingells and the dingells and the levins have had their lives so interwould he haven, so interwould he haven, coming from somewhat different backgrounds, but those weren't an obstacle, those were really an opportunity. so, i join so many others in saying to john and to debey, who debbie, his partner -- more than a job well done, a path that all of us should seek to follow. i yield back the balance of my ime.

mr. pallone: i yield to the gentlewoman from california, ms. capps. mrs. capps: i thank my colleague for yielding and it is such an honor to follow in paying my tribute to follow one of mr. dingell's best friends, sandy levin, his colleague from michigan. i rise with great pride as well as deep humility, to honor the longest-serving member of congress, the dean of the u.s., united states house of representatives. the congressman for the 12th district of michigan and my personal friend, mr. john dingell. john has served his country with such honor and such distinction, first as a second lieutenant in the united states army during world war ii and the past 59 years, right here in congress,

over the term of 11, that's 11 nited states presidents. yes, we are losing this man's incredible institutional memory, but hopefully neither he nor we will ever lose our love for this institution. john dingell's hand has helped construct every major advance in social policy that this country has known over the past six decades. policies that support working families, that strengthen our middle class, and support the united states economy. many of us here speak of significant events in united states history. but john dingell can speak of these historic events because he was often right there, standing by the presidents' sides.

he knows this institution inside and out and it is that knowledge, coupled with his belief that congress does have a vital role in making this country better for all of us. and that is what has made him so influential over the years. for all he has done for the nation, john has been and continues to be such a great friend to each of us, no matter which side of the aisle we sit on. when i first came to congress, john dingell took me under his wing and helped me to earn a seat on the energy and commerce committee, his beloved committee. he told me we did need nurses at the table and has been a passionate advocate for quality health care. he is such a good friend to my own calling, the nursing profession. the good people of michigan are losing a great advocate for their state in congress, but this country is losing a passionate and brilliant

representative and what i'm told is the best twitter feed on the hill. and i'm losing a personal friend on the floor of the house. and a real mentor on the dais on the committee of energy and commerce. but we won't be sad for long. next year, we will have another dingell, who will be here as one of us and that's john's very own, lovely wife, debbie. i look forward to working with her and she will continue the legacy of service that john and his father before him have established. i do not say good-bye dear friend but best wishes and know that we are all so full of gratitude and great debt to you for your service, as you have so long been of enormous service to each of us. yield back.

mr. pallone: i yield now to our emocratic whip, mr. hoyer. mr. hoyer: i ask unanimous consent to speak out of order. i thank the gentleman for yielding. i thank him for taking this special order. mr. speaker, in this -- when this new house convenes on january 6, it will be the first in 59 years not to include the distinguished dean of this house, mr. john dingell of michigan. we will still have a dingell from michigan. it will be his wife debbie, whom so many of us in this house have come to know and admire. i have worked with debbie for every year. she won the election to succeed john and surely, we will continue to have him in our midst as a congressional spouse.

sorelywill be very, very missed, all of whom he welcomed to the house as the longest serving member in the history of the congress. a lot of people like to put to john's tenure in the house and when he came to congress, eisenhower was president. brooklyn had a championship team and elvis presley had his first gold record. what did americans not have? they did not have medicare. seniors were unprotected from the rising cost of health care in their golden years until john dingell introduced legislation that was the precursor to medicare. and he presided over this house when it passed medicare in 1965. americans did not have the civil

rights act or the voting rights act. when john dingell took his first oath of office as a member of this house, millions of african-americans across the south, could not vote for representatives in this house. just four months after taking office, he bravely challenged the eisenhower's administration leadership on civil rights. he rows in this chamber with great audacity to demand that the president protect those being denied those fundamental rights as americans. it almost cost him his seat. but all of us who know john understand why he was willing to risk everything for a cause that was just. americans did not have the clean air, the clean water act or the safe drinking water act. nor did they have the endangered species act or the environmental policy act.

john realized that if congress did not act to protect our environment, future generations would inherit a nation spoiled by neglect. o he became a crusader for con conservation. the american people didn't have s-chip. he fought his entire life in public life to make affordable health care access to all needed t. >> are signify the passage of that law, it was the same gavel that was used by john when he announced passage of the

medicare act nearly 50 years before. i was proud to nominate john for the presidential medal of freedom, our nation's highest civilian honor and to be on hand last month as president obama presented to him at the white house that medal of freedom. let no one mistake john's legacy as one of simply longest. had he served nine terms and not 29, we would surely be here on this floor to praise him as a man of vision, of principle, of courage, of achievement and of a deep love for this country and its people. and for this institution. i have had the privilege of serving with john in this house for 33 years. throughout that time, he has been a dear friend, of whom i have learned much and shared many memorable experiences, on and off this floor.

john dingell, my colleagues, has been and is a man of conviction. has embodied civily and worked in a bipartisan fashion. his example is one if we follow it would benefit the country and he house. measures to promote manufacturing here in this country. his mericans will remember determination to root out waste, fraud and abuse throughout the u.s. government and save the u.s. taxpayers and improving how the government works. 3 years ago this week, a young john dingell jr., then a house page, sat in this house chamber in which his father, john sr.,

served while the president delivered his most famous speech, asking for a declaration of war as a result of the attack on pearl harbor, on that day of infamy. four years later while serving in the united states army, second lieutenant john dingell was preparing to invade japan when the bombing of hiroshima and nagasaki brought the war to an end and quite possibly saving his life. we're all grateful for that, that providence spared him so he could come to the people's house and do the people's work for 59 years. we will miss him dearly. i will miss him, but i take comfort in knowing that he will still be here among us as a private citizen, as the husband of a new member from michigan's 12th district and as an elder statesman for our country who i hope will always be ready to share the wisdom of his experience with those who will continue his work in this

house. john dingell has been a great american, a citizen who loved his country and served it well. god bless you, john dingell, and thank you. mr. pallone: mr. speaker, i yield one minute now to the gentlewoman from ohio, ms. kaptur. ms. kaptur: mr. speaker, it's an understatement to say dean and chairman john dingell is a gentleman of this house and a respected man of the law. he's served our republic his entire life, beginning as a page for this house at the age of 12, followed by his enlistment in the united states army and his service during world war ii. he's a bona fide representative of the greatest generation's dedication and enduring legacy. he's a member's member, always available for counsel, always with an encouraging word. how many of us have benefited from hisess tute advice.

this chamber -- his astute advice. this chamber says thank you to a man who knows how to negotiate, who knows how to legislate and who knows how to foster great change. he's a master of the art of compromise. his service has been honorable for over half a century. he's been indefat kabul. he's walked forth rightly in the shoes of his father before him and he served his nation nobly in this house and the people of michigan who re-elected him 30 times. his service has established an historical record 59 years long of consistent dedication to liberty and to the people of our country. his torecally he's assumed -- historically he's assumed his place as a strong timber, a mast of the rules and decorum that should attend to our privileged service here. he's a champion of the dignity of the house. generations to come would be well-advised to emulate his service. he understands and treshes this house, -- trerures of this

house, the centralities for our democratic service. of american manufacturing and the auto industry, of energy independence for america, of social security, as his father was before him, of his natural environment, legal basis for respecting it, our great lakes, the fish, fauna and creatures that form the wild kingdom, the park systems and wildlife refuges, the rivers and ocean systems that maintain and sustain the stunning beauty and bounty of our land and frankly sustain us. and he's the heartbeat of m o-town. personally will tresh -- of motown. i personal hely will tresh the visiting of manufacturing platforms, of creating the first international wildlife refuges in our country, in the great lakes region, spanning our ohio-michigan border with canada. the clean water and clean air achievements, the tours of the

company lazy boy and their firm's stellar involvement in stewardship of our ohio-michigan region. i shall always treasure our encounters, countless as they are, the ohio-michigan border that we share, the hundreds of plane rides together, often with deborah, along with colleagues like john conyers, billy ford as well as our car ride back to michigan together after 9/11. we have shared the priceless opportunity to guard liberty and extend her welcoming arms to the people of poland, our shared ancestral heritage. as poland cast off the shackles of communist oppression. though each of us dreamed of the day when that incredible moment might transpired, that achievement is one of the most glorious moments. so the gentleman from michigan, house seniority ranked number one, the dean, you have inspired millions of people and ably met the call of daniel webster in your time and generation to perform something worthy to be remembered. you have met that test.

my colleague, may god bless you and deborah and hold you and your loved ones dearly. america thanks you and so do i as dean of ohio's delegation. god speed. i yield my remaining time back to the gentleman. mr. pallone: i thank the gentlewoman. mr. speaker, i yield now to our democratic leader, the gentlewoman from california, s. pelosi. ms. pelosi: i thank the gentleman for yielding and appreciate his friendship with the distinguished leader of our -- of the ren tire congress, he dean, number one as congresswoman kaptur said. mr. speaker, i'm going to be brief and yield -- put some of my statement in the record an hopefully return to the floor in the couple days ahead to say more about mr. dingell because so many members are waiting and i hope more time will be afforded to sing the praises of this great man. every now and then you hear the expression, somebody is a

living legend. that doesn't even begin to describe john dingell. he is a living legend. he has had a hand in every -- nearly every major legislative accomplishment over the past six decades from protecting civil rights and workers' rights -- i'm so glad to see john lewis here -- to ensuring food safety, to enacting consumer protections, to creating jobs in michigan's 12th district and throughout our country. yet, among his countless achievements none holds greater significance than his contribution to the good health of the american people. each congressional term since 1955 he introduced legislation to secure affordable health care for all americans. in 1965, he held the gavel in his hand that -- as medicare became law of the land. in 2010, more than half a century later, it was my privilege to hold that same gavel in my hand as we passed

the affordable care act, realizing the dream of the dingell family. to work alongside john dingell is to be inspired by his strength, by the history of our institution, by the seriousness of his work, not only the length of his service, for sure, but the quality of his leadership. he is our distinguished chairman, our distinguished dean, a cherished colleague and friend, a living legend, as i said, but that only begins to tell the tale. his experience, his leadership, his partnership and his passion will be southerly missed by all of us -- sorely missed by all of us who had the honor to serve around him. we wish our soon-to-be colleague, deborah, and his family the very best. he's a public servant of unmatched leadership and quality. with that i yield back to the distinguished gentleman from

new jersey who follows in many footsteps of mr. dingell as the ranking member of the energy and commerce committee, thank you, mr. pallone. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. under the speaker's announced the of january 3, 2013, chair recognizes the gentleman from -- the chair recognizes the gentlewoman from minnesota, ms. ball clubmann, for 30 minutes. -- mrs. bachmann:, for 30 minutes. mrs. bachmann: i yield to the gentleman from new jersey, mr. pallone, 10 minutes. mr. pallone: we have a lot of speakers so take one minute. i yield to mr. kildee. mr. kildee: as a freshman, i have learned to be brief. i will be brief. you know, coming from michigan and growing up in a political family and actually succeeding my own uncle, dale kildee, in this seat, one would think that dale is the first congressman that i really knew. but if you're from michigan and you were born anytime after the 19 -- middle of the 1950's,

john dingell is the first congressman that we knew. he was a strong voice for our state and really was the picture of a member of congress for so many years. but his longevity is obviously remarkable but it's what john did and stood for that's most remarkable over his long tenure. he first was a witness to history in this place when 73 years ago, this past monday, when his father was here and he was a page he sat and watched franklin rosevelt give that famous speech on december 7. . made history in this body i remember just a few months ago watching on c-span, as i do occasionally, in watching the signing of the 1964 civil rights act and watching john dingell stand there and receive a pen from president johnson as that act was signed into law.

and sitting with him the next day and discussing that time in our history and realizing what an amazing privilege i've been given to serve in the same body with john dingell. so he's a witness to history. he made history. more importantly, for 59 years john dingell was on the right side of history. look at his record. look at what he has stood for. and he's always been ahead of the rest of the country. the one thing i do hope is that we can take a lesson from his service and realize that there has been a time in this body when you can be a strong and passionate voice, when you can hold to principle but still find ways to work across partisan divide and find compromise and get things done. that's the lesson of his legacy and it's one that i think we all have an obligation to try to live up to. i yield back.

mr. pallone: thank you, mr. speaker. i yield one minute now to the gentleman from georgia, mr. bishop. mr. bishop: i thank the gentleman for yielding. you have heard that representative john dingell of michigan is the longest serving member of the house of representatives in the history of this institution. you heard that he's been a member since 1955 and his held a seat in this body since president eisenhower sat in the white house. you heard that exactly one day in 73 years ago a young john dingell, a page in this house, was standing in this very room when president roosevelt gave his declaration of war speech against japan. he was a page. needless to say, it's been a long road of public service for our friend and colleague, john dingell. a great defender of civil liberties, john dingell stood aside president johnson as he signed the civil rights act of 1964. over his illustrious career he fought for civil rights, for

clean water, for medicare, for american workers rights. on a more -- workers' rights. on a more personal note, he shared his overflowing reservoir of knowledge and wisdom about the history and customs of this body and the workings of congress. he will be missed. i will always remember and appreciate his character, his integrity and his courage in the fight for a better quality of life for the american people. the poet wrote a tree that never had to fight for sun and sky and air and light that stood out in the open plain and always got its share of rain never became a forest king but lived and died a scrubby thing. a man who never had to toil by hand or life in life's turmoil, who never had to earn his share of sun and sky and life and air never became a manly man but

lived and died as he began. good timber doesn't grow on ease. the stronger winds of tougher trees, a father sky, a greater length, the rougher storms, the greater strength. by wind, by sun or snow and trees are man good timbers grow. john dingell is good timber and, sir, you will be sorely missed. thank you for your service. mr. pallone: thank you. i yield now to the gentlewoman from illinois, ms. schakowsky. one minute. ms. schakowsky: i am so proud to join with many of my colleagues in celebrating john dingell and recognizing the many, many things he's achieved for our country. it's not just that john dingell has been the longest serving member of congress in history, it's what he did in his 30

terms in the house. many today will honor him for support of civil rights and voting rights, his life-long support for working men and women and their unions, for the environment and much, much more, but for me it's his passionate advocacy for national health care. i came to congress with the number one priority of affordable, quality and comprehensive health care for all americans. i worked to join the energy and commerce committee so that i could learn from john dingell, who's been called a legend in the fight for universal coverage. chairman dingell introduced the u.s. national health insurance act in his very first term and fighting to make health care ever since.

john dingell sat in that chair when we passed medicare and medicaid and gaveled it into law. he pushed for the patients' bill of rights and created the health insurance program for children and key reason we were able to pass the affordable care act in 2010. because of john dingell today, more than 120 million americans have access to health insurance in large part of us his leadership and vision and i'm so grateful to have had the privilege of serving with and learning from john dingell a and i hope we follow his strong legacy and continue to make improvements in health care and improve the lives and well-being of all americans. thank you, john dingell, for your unparalleled service to our country. i yield back. mr. pallone: i yield one minute to the gentleman from georgia,

mr. lewis. mr. lewis: i thank my friend and colleague from new jersey for yielding. mr. speaker, i'm pleased to join my colleagues tonight to honor my friend, my brother, the longest-serving member of congress, the honorable john dingell. i knew him long before i came to the house. i knew he followed in his father's footsteps on his path to public service. he was one of the youngest members of congress at the time. i heard he would stand up, speak up and speak out and fight for the issue of civil rights and social justice. john dingell is one of the most able and respected member of this body. yes, he is the dean of the house of representatives. he had the capacity and the ability to say we have a right to know what is in the food we eat, what is in the air we

breathe and what is in the water we drink. he battled on the front lines of medicare and medicaid. only member of congress still serving today who voted for the civil rights act of 1964. he helped voted for the voting rights act of 1965. in closing, i want to say, john dingell is embodyyment when legislators did not hesitate to use the power of the federal government to do good for all. john, my friend, my brother, my colleague, thank you for your service, thank you for all of the good that you have done to make our country and to make our world a better place. and i yield back, mr. speaker. mr. pallone: i yield one minute to the gentleman from california, mr. garamendi. mr. garamendi: thank you, mr. speaker. a new insurance commissioner in

california in 1991. a lot of problems with pensions and insurance companies going broke. i was summoned to come to washington to explain. grite fear in my mind. the famous john dingell was chairing that committee. his goal and mine were the same, that is to find ways to protecting people. a deep friendship ensued for many years. and my mentor is leaving, leaving this session. i'll miss him. i know everybody in this house will miss him in many ways. he is a good heart. his heart is as big as this >> david cameron will appear before a parliamentary committee to answer questions about the u.k. pause climate change

priorities.he will also take a second round of questions on efforts to combat extremism. that is live at 11:00 a.m. eastern on c-span. later in the day, the center for strategic and international studies will hear from dr. fauci. he will be part of a panel discussing the latest research being done to create an ebola vaccine. that is live at 3:00 p.m. eastern on c-span. >> coming on c-span, a look at the future of u.s. foreign-policy. that is followed by a discussion on iraq and the chance of reconciliation between the differing factions that make up the country. later, the supreme court rules on a case questioning the use of evidence of and during a police traffic stop.

the center for american progress hosted a discussion on the future of u.s. foreign-policy. included to former officials from the reagan and george w. bush administration. they looked at america's leadership role in the world and the future of relations with china and russia. this is an hour and a half. >> good to see a great crowd out here. we are extremely pleased to be drawing to the end of the year with what we think will be an extremely lively discussion about future directions for u.s. foreign-policy. it is a interesting time right now. the world is certainly in a state that many are describing as chaotic. balancerd to see how to threats from everything from terrorists in ungoverned spaces and large refugee flows to the trajectory being chosen by big

powers like russia, the rising powers like china, that might be looking to change or update the international order. many of us in washington struggle with these issues every day. today we are very fortunate to have a kind of unique, crosscutting spectrum of views. right now, the left and right within the left and within the right on how america might think about is role in the world. we are very lucky to have with us people who are actually spokesman from all of these different vantage points. the event today was inspired by an article in "the american prospect." article that looked at realism, old and new,

and explore the idea of whether the obama administration has been tugs between two different views of america's role in the world, one being the one that is rooted in american leadership and america having a unique role in leading on the world stage, another being a more pragmatic look at what america's power and capabilities and influence are in an area of great change with rising powers challenging. we thought it would be a good in not only his voice but the voices of others who have been writing recently on these issues, and all of you jim well. he is one of the greatest commentators of foreign-policy. is well recent book

known by anyone who looks at foreign-policy and tries to figure out how decisions are made and how we choose courses of actions. along with jim, we are going to have chris, the vice president of cato. he is the author of several ng -- chris is a well-known and thoughtful critic of american overextension and american interventionism overseas. he often suggests we should focus on truly vital national security interests, that we often exaggerate threats and often find ourselves squandering precious resources in efforts around the world that are not only unwise but also unnecessary and very costly to the united states. he's also joined by kim holmes, the distinguished fellow at heritage, longtime vice

president and really one of the pillars of heritage's foreign policy and defense programs. kim has recently authored a four-part series in "foreign policy" magazine, saying america needs a new foreign policy for 2016. he talks about a more active american role in the world, stepping away from any notion of retrenchment, and committing the resources that would be necessary for a robust american leadership and for intervention in world affairs in order to advance american interests. brian cotules is a senior fellow here. he is the author of "the prosperity agenda" and runs our mideast program but thinks broadly about how america functions on the global stage. he argued against disengagement in a recent article in the "journal of democracy."

so we look forward to a very robust discussion today. the panel is going to be moderated by our own larry korb, our senior fellow and former assistant secretary of defense who needs no introduction and who is a frequent and prolific contributor on the debate. i'm really pleased that all of you all are here today, to have what i think will be the first of many debates on the u.s. role in the world, as we start entering a new political season. we're really thrilled that all of these very thoughtful leaders in national security and defense and foreign policy have joined us. please welcome our guests. thank you. [applause]

>> let me join in welcoming you all here today, which given the folks that we have, it's going to be, i think, a very vigorous, and enlightening debate, given all the challenges that the that the country is facing right now. this event was a result of jim's recent article. by the way, they are out there, copies of the articles that all these people have written. and jim, again, you are the one who started this debate, so we're going to let you go first and tell us about the realism, old and new. >> all right. thank you, larry. and i'm glad to be here. i've spent most of my life as a journalist, a writer. i consider myself on foreign policy mostly a critic.

i've sometimes told conservative audiences you would not want to hear my views on health care or on taxes. but my role in foreign policy is simply to question assumptions that take hold, most notably on the idea that trade and investment would lead to political liberalization in china. in this piece, i focus on the current fixation with calling the united states the indispensable nation. it's a phrase that goes back to the 1990's, usually madeleine albright is given credit for it, although it really started with bill clinton and some of his aides in 1996. and it's not a uniquely democratic -- it's sort of a

democratic phrase, but essentially the same idea comes up in the republican incantations of american leadership in the world. what i want to do is question whether that's a viable phrase or whether it actually gets in the way of american policy or even american power in the world. the place i want to start is with a disagreement i noticed between the clintons, bill and hillary, or if you look at it differently, between the public and the private bill clinton, because after bill clinton left office, he at one point told his friend, who wrote about it, strobe talbot, who was deputy secretary of state, that he really thought his job as president was to build the world for our grandchildren to live in where america was no longer the sole superpower, for a time when we would have to share the

stage. and talbot said, gee, how come you never said that when you were president? and clinton, bill, told him, um, that's why you're a wonk and i was president of the united states, because if i go around talking about a time when america is not going to be the top dog in the world, i'd be ridden out of town on a rail. nevertheless, his own administration's phrase "indispensable nation" lives on as strongly as ever. and what i want to ask really is, do we really play that role today? can we play that role for the foreseeable future? and should we? and my answer to all of those questions really is no. do we play that role? yes. but not always.

we tend to not notice when we're not playing that role. and the example i would use is ukraine where it looks from over here, where this is a cold war-style dispute between american power and russian power, if you get to europe or you actually look at what's going on, you see that the dominant -- the interlocuter with russia and the country that really counts is germany and angela merkel. and sometimes people think here that she's too accommodating. germany has stepped up the sanctions. their own sanctions, slowly. when they do, putin notices. we can't do this on our own, because actually our trade with russia is much less than germany's. i'm not saying that's a bad thing, but the truth is germany is has much more influence with russia than we do. and that gets to the question of

whether we alone are as powerful as we are working with allies. so we can talk about, you know, stepping up sanctions against russia. but in fact we work with germany. and the larger point is that our alliances are the basis of our power, that if we get out too far -- and that's true in dealing with russia, true in dealing with china as well -- if we get out too far in front of our allies, then it weakens our power. and we have had to learn some the hard way, the realities after the end of the cold war. i'm sure that many people in this room think that the intervention in iraq was a disaster, and it was. but what you don't see is that one of the disasters was a diplomatic one, because i was covering the bush administration, preparing to

write about it in the run up to the war, and i can tell you that they sincerely believed what i call the leadership hypothesis, that if the united states took certain positions at the u.n. and elsewhere, ultimately, the allies, like the french and the germans and the british, would follow. and they honestly believed that. and they were wrong. they were spectacularly wrong, because they didn't quite analyze the fact that after the end of the cold war, the allies were less dependent on us than they were before 1989. the other problem with "indispensable nation" is the more we run around and tell everyone that, the less other countries are willing to do on their own, because the united states is taking care of it. and the more they get a little bit offended. so in short, when bob, the

editor of the american prospect, just called me with a random question, would i like to write a piece on what a policy of realism means today, and i said sure, but i thought that progressives sometimes don't quite understand what realism is, since the end of the cold war, younger progressives have taken realism to mean anti-interventionism, because that's what it meant at the time in 2002. but in fact, realism has a much broader history of believing in simply balance of power politics, on power diplomacy, at the expense of values. and those were views that i thought that progressives should not buy into. but in thinking about it, i

thought that realism in a new way would be a realistic view of an america which is not always going to be the world hedgemon. finally, i do think that on this, for all of the criticism that he gets, that obama has been ahead of his time. i think that he has recognized and will be recognized in history as having tried, whether it succeeds or not, in moving towards a more modest and therefore realistic view of america's future role in the world. and i'm sure that i will be criticized by some of my colleagues, but the example i would use is libya, where in describing -- first of all, the intervention in libya came about for two reasons. one is the one that most of you

read about, that there was a strong desire for humanitarian intervention and that many people in the administration believed it. the second strand was that the british and the french, particularly the french, were coming to the united states. they were more concerned with libya than the united states was. and they were saying things like, you know, we are helping you all over the world, translate afghanistan and troops, and we would like you to help us out on this one. and in that context, the fact that obama allowed the french and the british to have the lead out front there and to show their sum of the financial burden, and they described that as leading from behind, i have yet to understand what the problem was with leading from behind. and the answer to me is that it touched this nerve that we have to be, as the united states,

what we were in 1946 or 1956 and in 1990 and '91, after the collapse of the soviet union, and and i think that episode and the reaction to "leading from behind" shows me that we have not yet begun to move off from this fixation that we have and have to be always in the front. thank you. >> thank you very much, jim. in addition to writing this article and book, jim was -- worked for 20 years for the "l.a. times," covered things all over the world and really knows an awful lot about china. he was one of the first reporters we had out there. chris prebble, who in addition to being at cato, is a former naval officer. and chris, i was looking at your biography. you came in, soviet union collapsed. we won the gulf war. then you're able to get out.

>> they gave out certificates from everyone who served in the cold war, and that's one of my proudest certificates. chock one up for the good guys. i will admit, i'm really thrilled to be here. partly because larry's invitation prompted me to read jim's article for the first time. it had been discussed but i hadn't had a chance to read it. so i read it last week. i read it again. my favorite part, by far, is the kind of bottom line, which is this conceit that we are the indispensable nation. he writes it has become downright, well, unrealistic. and even before i got to that line, i started reading the article. and that was the word, unrealistic, that sort of struck out in my heads. it is not unrealistic, in the sense of kind of alice through the looking glass. this is more like a virtual reality. people inside of washington believe their world view is an

accurate one. the problem is, and i think kind of the fundamental disconnect, the reason why the current grand strategy is not realistic, is because it is so disconnected from the view of reality of people outside of washington. there are so many different polls that show this. but interestingly, i think that a lot of astute observers of u.s. foreign policy have known about this for some time. one of my favorite lines is from a book that didn't get as much attention as it should have, a book called "america at the crossroads." mostly people focused on the fact that this was a neoconservative criticizing neoconservatives on iraq. he sees, it rests on a belief in american exceptionalism that most nonamericans simply find not credible. the idea that the united states behaves disinterestedly in the world stage is not woodly believed, because it is for the

most part not true. we expect that any country around the world, when they execute foreign policy, its primary obligation is to the interest of its people. that we arement is different and it i think it is hard to sustain that believe over time. observer made the case for goliath. foreign policyat charity begins at home and he predicted that america role in foreign-policy was if americans not scrutinizing it too closely. we all know what happened in 2005 and 2006. the financial crisis in 2008 has

really caused a lot of people to revisit the fundamental propositions of the u.s. foreign-policy. my modest case today is the one approach is to continue to count on this disconnect between the people and the elite. it is not a new phenomenon and frankly it hasn't really mattered it plays out that way and a minute. i think that is a reasonable approach. the other way is to opt escape.

-- to obfuscate. there is a couple different ways this manifests itself. during the cold war, this presumption of course, it was a bipartisan problem. this is how vital it is. i would urge people to make a case honestly for american hegemony and to not resort to the sort of hyperbole that characterizes u.s. foreign-policy. this is from dean acheson's book. they were making the case for the truman doctrine. senator vandenberg defies that dean acheson scare the hell out

of people, and he said i will paint a picture clearer than the truth. this is a long history of american foreign-policy, speaking in a way that it doesn't expect them to respond well enough or urgently enough unless things are painted to them clearer than the truth. let me lay out three aspects that will bring the american people into the discussion. first of all, is the argument about allies. what is the relationship with our allies? what are they purporting to do? what do they actually do? are our allies's interests synonymous with what we do? what do they actually do? american exceptionalism, at some level, depends on them being synonymous. can we make the case for hegemonic grand strategy? without resorting to threat inflation? terrorism is not an existential threat.

russia is not on the cusp of re-creating the soviet union. iran's military spending is 1/77th of the united states. in his book, he argued that iran is romania, not germany if this was the 1940's. the last part is more broadly tied into the benefits of u.s. military hegemony and economic leadership around the world. i think there has been a long-standing belief that there are clear economic benefits down to the united states and the american people for playing the role that we do, and i think there is really good research that calls that in the question. i point to some of the work that sandra's hair -- that dan dresner has done. i will leave those three on the table and i'm sure we will have a lot of time to discuss. >> in addition to this article that is out there about hillary, isis, he has written a terrific book called "the power problem: how american military dominance

makes us less safe, prosperous, and free." let me move now to kim holmes. when you think of heritage, you think of kim. i went back and checked 30 years on and off. he and i were on a panel together in the early days of the bush administration. how come you're not in government? the secretary of state for international organizations, what do you think in terms of what you have heard so far? >> i am delighted to be here with regards to distinguished panelists. i think of was thinking back on the days in the reagan years and the first bush administration. there was a lot more interaction between people who call themselves liberals and conservatives back in those days.

we spent a lot of times each in our own bubbles. i do that myself and i suspect you all do that as well. i have a feeling there is a yearning that we want to move beyond that. i suspect we want to learn what we have in common more than what divides us. even though i do disagree, we will try to and on something that's a bit more positive. the year after barack obama took office, i wrote an op-ed called "the new liberal realism." the alliance forming in the wake of the controversies of the iraq war that did not have much to do with one another. at least not that they did with president obama's foreign policy. and i said at the time what was

driving president obama was less realism as it was commonly understood as a doctrine. but it was more in a reaction to the perception that the iraq war was a disaster. that we were over extended. it was time to try the opposite. it ended up being very much along the lines of whether you intervene or don't intervene with military forces and that became the driving controversy. and, i think we are still in that, and i think that there are some faultlines in that alliance. i think it has something to do with the fact that many of the objectives and policies that president obama tried to do, which were in line with the view of the world, they have been

tried and they are not working very well. the president tried to reset relations with russia which he thought was based on the fact that george w. bush had been too harsh against the russians. forgetting the fact that the reason we had 2008 relations with russia is because of russia's intervention with georgia. before that, president bush and maggie thatcher looked in putin's eye and thought they could work with him. after georgia, he was disappointed and there was a pulling back. i think president obama over interpreted that, being too much of a cowboy and apply that to the policies of russia and it didn't work. in some ways, we did farm out

foreign policies to the european union. we try to get closer to the european union. it actually sparked russia over the ukraine. we did see our national interest involved in that particular intervention. they also had commercial and economic reasons. now live yet is in chaos. it is not just about what happened in benghazi. our intervention there was not followed up on. it turned out to be a disaster. on this whole question of the

indispensable nation, those of us that work in foreign-policy. we write about it. we grab these words and politicians grabbed them and they are used in a certain ways that sometimes we over interpret them. they become almost like buzz words. so sometimes, the indispensable nation is used interchangeably with hegemony or used interchangeably with american leadership. and each one of us here probably has a very different definition of what each one of those things means. for example, i'm pretty pragmatic about whether america is dispensable or not. the question is, what other nation could perform the task that we perform in the world but us? we do things that even our

allies cannot do and it is not just military power. , otherconomic interests things we do with the united nations and elsewhere. to that extent we are indispensable. but that gets over interpreted abmean that what we are is in overaggressive foreign-policy where we would be hegemonic and all these other things. i think that sometimes the example of the iraq war with respect to germany and france not following the iraq war is used as a case example of this. i was at the state department at a time when the u.n. issue came up, and i do remember that yes, germany and france had their own particular reasons not to want to support the iraq war. but i also remember going to moscow at the time and talking to the russian foreign ministry, which at the time was more supportive of what they were doing then the french because they had no reason at that particular time to do it.

i don't see germany and france as an acid test. we have 37 allied countries in iraq with 150,000 ground troops. ground troops. which is not something anywhere close in the coalition against isis. i don't think it should be dismissed out of hand. the last point i will make is it's not just the issue on russia. i think the president pulled out of iraq faster than his military advisers wanted to. as a result, he's been forced back under dramatically worse circumstances had he stayed. and yet, as i show in my articles by every objective standard it's actually greater and worse than it was six years ago. many of our allies are complaining because they don't have the certainty of knowing what u.s. policy is. it is also a component of

leadership. been straightened consistent, not just going out and bossing them around and telling them what to do. playing the traditional role of consulting with them and doing what the united states can do to get things done. i don't believe it's a case of simply bossing our allies around. and we define leadership i going out and telling them what to do. i think it is much more subtle than that. that is, we have to figure out where we have a common interest with particular allies and realizing that the allies will change. they have their own particular interests. not just france and germany with respect to iraq but other countries that do very much want the connection with the united states strategically and with nato, because we fear russia. we are not as indispensable as we used to be.

i will concede that point. but it doesn't mean we are not indispensable at all i don't mean to suggest that you are suggesting this, i think your analysis is much more subtle. but we have to be aware of any kind of -ism. you start trying to create a doctrine. by which weomething can discuss amongst ourselves, the obama doctrine and the like. but at the end of the day, there there will be so many outline principles of the doctrine that you will not get a lot of guidance. i think it is true of your are a conservative realist or a liberal one. >> thank you very much, kim. in addition to his article, he has written a really great book

"rebound: getting america back to great." our last speaker has been a bulwark over the last decade. he knows more about the middle east than anyone i've ever met. he's worked there, he's lived there, he speaks arabic. he's got his article against disengagement. >> i want to thank jim and cam for coming, i hope this discussion brings you into this and we are in a time of transformation when we think about national security strategy. in substance and in terms of politics. and i think we've seen the politics quite clear. it's not just what happened last week with the budget and the domestic scene, but if you look at things like syria war vote, the one they had on the

non-strike event and the lineup on support for the opposition split within both parties. and i think, in part, we talked to the hill quite a lot, we are in this transformative moment. i have a lot that i agree with in jim's article. the first point i want to make is that i struggle to bit with realism and a realistic term because somebody that has studied international relations. essentially, i agree with your main point as i understand it. obama himself as a pragmatist. he is not driven by a particular balance of power theory or liberal internationalism. if you read henry kissinger's new book, he talks about this

where there is a delicate balance between the two. the main thing that has driven much of president obama's foreign-policy which i think has been transformative is what is the limiting factor? how do we limit our own engagements? i think we needed to learn from the previous decades. we needed to learn why he brought the combat phase of the the iraq war to an end, or the afghanistan war coming to an end later this year, how much more can we do in terms of expending that? it is a realistic assessment. i don't think obama looks at state actors as a fundamental actor, in and of itself. this second thing i think you

definitely get right and our analysts need to get in sync with where the country is at, is that obama pragmatically recongizes a rise of the rest. when he was running for president, that was an appeal to say ok. i have no problem with the phraseology leading from behind. there are other ways you can describe it, politically, but i think that getting others to have an interest and recognize that, we will be in trouble. because others, as jim notes in

because others, as jim notes in his article, germany has a closer interest in dealing with ukraine. sometimes you overstate the alaska alaskach our distracts or sanctions them from that. i think they understand that they had an interest. coming back from jordan in the middle east, i think there is a recognition that they have an interest in the anti-isil coalition. which i think we will talk about. and i think finding the right fit in terms of u.s. leadership in countries like israel, they do look to the u.s. to call some plays, but not in the way that we are going to shock and awe the region with our military might and force which i think we tried in the previous decade. i mentioned this already but the third point i would say, the bush administration experienced this as well.