that come from that kind of an undertaking and advises decisionmakers very, very well. this is an important one. this was the birth of a new species and i was happy enough to witness this october 1 boundry dam up in canada became the first place where someone's retro fit a coal plant to capture the emissions. using basically counter technology, similar to mitsubishi's technology, similar to the norwegian technologies for u.s. companies. it's an aiming solution and basically the steam coming up up top means it's operating. it was venting 1.1 million tons a year. it's not anymore. it's going underground now. they like the idea of doing another one or two of these. they already learned enough to cut the costs by 30% on the second project. that is a very important finding. it's something we find is

robust across the portfolio, as people deploy these things, they all come to us and say we know how to cut the cost of our first project. we'll just do the second project instead. the second project is always cheaper than the first by a lot. 20% to 30% is a very typical kind of number. i want to dwell on this for a moment because it helps make the point that i made earlier. an environmental group approached them and said you're going to spend $1.4 billion on this project, that's a lot of money. how about you put a bunch of different solar panels, wind farms, do a bunch of efficiency measures, and that will be a better use of your money, better for your company, and it will be better for your customers. reasoned, impassed pitch. the president said you know we're in canada, right? it's dark here half the year. and when it's dark is when we need the energy. solar isn't a really great solution for us. also, we can't put up wind 900 because they run

miles an hour and rip apart the wind farms. canada has put through a lot of energy a measures. so for our customers, this is the right solution. i want to underscore that line, for our customers, this is the right solution. not for everybody, not everywhere, but for some part of the world, this is what clean coal looks like. virtually no knocks, virtually no particular, virtually no mercury, and a 90% reduction in carbon dioxide emissions. we have not been idle about this in the united states. canada got there first, but we've got a number of projects come online which we've put a lot of money into. the total investments into the u.s. side of this so far, a commitment of about $4.5 billion, so a substantial commitment to see this up and running. the reason why is it comes down to projects. projects are the source of

innovation, not just in technology, not just in engineering design, but in business, in policy, financial models, financing, all these things that all are projects, because when you put that kind of money on the table, it focuses the mind, and people get serious about figuring out how to make it work. let me give you a couple of examples. this is one of our favorite projects. this is a success in many ways. part of that is we're scaling up very useful technology. it took us 25 years to develop that. this is a 582-mega watt power plant. it's a big plant. the thing i want to draw your attention to, one, that little black pile in the corner. they're mining local coal at $10 a ton. they've got a 80-year supply. it is an incredibly cheap source of fuel for this planted.

in this part of the country, where they need to maintain resilience because of weather disruption, the southern company thought this was an important component of their portfolio. another thing that is not obvious, but it's a fact, this is a net water positive power plant. the power plant produces water as a consequence of its function. part of the reason why is because they have to dry the dole make it work. when they do, they recover the water and return it to the environment. we don't often think of fossil energy plants as sources of water, but they do put water into the environment. that's one of those things we could consider, and in fact, the d.o.e. is thinking about it in its portfolio. you may be familiar with this project. this is a huge active power plant. i think the total output is something like 4,400 mega watts, half gas and half coal. these guys went, and we gave them money to do a 60 mega watt retro fit. they crunched the numbers and said this is not going to cut, it we have to go big. let's make four times as big.

they did a retro fit with no additional investment of government money. they innovated their business model. this is the first vertically integrated power plant, merchant power plant. these guys own the power plant. they also are owning the capture facility, all those blue things that are pointed out. we broke ground in september. they poured the concrete, but they also own the pipeline and a quarter of the oil field that it's being injected into. in fact, they are able to make the finances for this project work by trying a new business model. it's important to note that this is also a model of what the future looks like in terms of international partnerships. this project is 50% financed by japanese banks and its partners , and, in fact, it has japanese technology. mitsubishi's technology. we think there's going to be a lot more projects like this with international financing and other projects of ours are

ones in which other governments are looking to play a role as well. this is a utilization project, small by our standards, but this is -- i love this project. these guys are making baking soda. there's not a huge market for baking soda, but they're capturing the co2. their feed stock is salt, and they're selling the baking soda and hydrocloric acid. they're trning a profit on this and looking forward to the second, third, and fourth plant. important to understand, once they saturate the baking soda market, they're going to sell road aggregate basically at $11 a ton. it's cheap, but they can make it with their feed stocks, and there's a market for it. these guys are being very straight forward about what to do. we were glad to see it built and operating. this is just outside of san antonio. i encourage all of to you look

at the cement plant where they're capturing the co2 and putting this into the market. when it comes to what the department of energy, in particular my program is doing, our top priority are projects like this. one of them is already working, texas, the air products project. we already put 1.6 million tons of co2 underground, operating very well. part behalf we have to do is deliver a deep, rich set of public learning from all these projects, because this is what they're for. they're to advise the public. we have precombustion, post-combustion, fire projects. we're injecting into oil fields . we're doing new builds, retro fits. we're doing industrial projects, power projects. we are covering as much range as we can to deliver the rich sense, richest set of public learnings fact to the nation.

we take that mission very seriously. we have to reimagine our r&d portfolio. i'm only going to talk about that for a meant or two, but if you want the nine-hour version that have talk, let me know, i'm theep give t. our program was conceived in 1997. the world has changed since then, so we're trying to think what is actually important. how do we make the clean coal r&d portfolio what it needs to be for the modern world? the third priority is international partnerships. our research program was conceived in 1997 in which a unilateral united states seemed obvious to all, not so obvious these days. there are many international players in this space. there are many partners, and the world has become more integrated, more complicated, more multinational in its actions, and we feel like that's an important part of aking this situation work. i do want to take a moment and

talk about the financing of these plants. the primary reason is because this is where, if the focus is projects, then issue with projects is finance. a lot of people say the issue is about cost. my rejoined certificate issue is about financing. i'll unpack that in the next ouple of slides. i think it's fire say that the cost of a plant is more expensive than the cost of a plant without it. we're talking about something different, what clean energy alternatives are out there, how do we bend that emissions curve in an important way. it's also not just about the technology. a lot of people say to me that this is an unproven or untested technology. it's hog wash. we've been capturing it since 1938. we've been storing it underground since 1972. right now there's maybe a dozen vendors worldwide who will sell you technology project, will

sell you a capture technology heavy equipment at a price with a performance guarantee. the potential to improve on this is very, very large, and i'll speak briefly about that. we'll talk about it more. right now we do these gas separations at about 15% of efficiency. we're leading 85% on the table. there's a lot of room to improve from an engineering basis, from an integration business, from a science basis. there's just a lot of room to improve this, and that means there's a lot of room to ratchet down the costs. with respect to finance, how can you finance these things? many options, which are open to other technologies, are not open to carbon capture storage today. these include things like investment tax credits, renewable portfolio standards, which allow you recovery. tax-exempt debt financing,

utilities that will provide that service, and i absolutely want to be clear on this, i do not have a dog in that hunt. i do not make or recommend policy, period. not what i do. but if up to the get the financing done, it's worth asking what kind of policy choices are available to us, and that's a conversation in which we are very happy to have and eager to discuss. the punch line -- other countries, they're actually pursuing that as well. in the united kingdom, they have a lovely mechanism called difference of contract, which they're exploring. this is the first off the block. the european union, they have feeding tariffs. they have not been applied to carbon capture storage yet. that's a question i know that the europeans are considering. this question, is how do you get these things built? one of the ways we try to do it is in addition to the $6

billion we spend on my program, we proved $8 billion of loan authorities, and clean coal is very much at the top of those lists. peter davidson is the new executive director of the office, keen to get these proposals, starting to get them now. now that that program is proving profitable, we are keen to see how it can be -- how the success of this program can be leveraged into clean fossil energy projects, i think the majority of which will ultimately have c.c.s. to talk specifically about the cost issue, i wanted to show you this analysis. this is a cost electricity analysis. let me start by saying the obvious. these are thorny devices estimates. i don't want to you draw too much from the specific numbers here, but this is an analysis that was done by world resource institute and published in their seeing is believing document back in october. the reason i mentioned this is that this shows, i think, very nice what will all of the above

actually looks like. if you look at the cost of this, there's coal, natural gas without c.c.s. and with it, and a range of cost estimates for nuclear, solar, thermal, all of these technologies. to a first cut in some markets, some of these is the cheapest. in other markets, they're not. you can see that here. we don't have a lot of data points yet for c.c.s. one of the things we need to do is figure out what the range is around that. where will it be higher and lower, as we start thinking about this, what do costs really look like? at this point, basically you're talking about something that's a few cents per kilowatt hour added. there's a lot of assumptions that go into that. how much capture are you going to do? is it 50%, 90%? when you start looking at the

range of these costs, one story emerges, which is it's all of the above. there isn't a silver bullet that looks -- that you can point to that and say this will always be that thing for the market. you'll do efficiency to some extent, and then you do others. one of the things that comes out of these kinds of analysis is the recognition that -- and the policy option that's a engineering option, as a deployment option, this is a very important one and a real one. one of the things that makes it work in the united states, it may be harder in other parts, is enhanced oil recovery. i can't overstate this enough. the low-end estimates are many tens of billions of barrels of production that can come from co2 injection underground. that in itself would provide tremendous revenues. if you look at the difference in costs associated with some of these products, the tax revenues are break even on the order of seven or eight years, which means they're net revenue

positive to the government after that. you don't always think about it anyway, but it's an important finding. in terms of storage potential, when you do enhance it, you do store carbon dioxide. we're looking at something on the order of more than 25 billion tons of storage. that's a very large volume of carbon dioxide. that would be half the coal fleet for 20 years. it's lot of carbon dioxide. in fact, we are short about 100 million tons a year right now in terms of what the market would buy if you can supply it. there's grounds to think this would be helpful, and this helps with the financing. if finance sergeant issue, getting some of the financing done is a good thing to do. in that context, this is something being considered in the context of e.p.a.'s draft regulations. what's interesting about this, and i don't want to dwell on this, is that this is a

compliance option, especially under 111-b. that's pretty straightforward. also, how this is treated is flexible. the way that this is accounted for, i think it's something that's still being sorted. we're trying to figure out how to make the best recommendations we can to what it is they do. they're a regulatory body and take their jobs very seriously, and we hope it's received. but we think that having these successes with e.o.r., getting these projectses built is going to be important in thinking about the opportunities in the power sector around compliance. something that is usually not spoken about is residual oil zone. for those who are sandoil gas economists, you probably don't think about these, because they're not resources and not reserves. if you inject water into a residual oil to produce, it you get nothing. it actually only works when you inject carbon dioxide. you something might not know is people have been doing this around the country for about six years now.

there's eight fields in the united states that are producing their residual oil zones. a study done looked at just four counties in texas. that's the yellow box, blope up box is one county in texas, the red box. their conservative estimate for how much oil could be produced from that is 109 billion barrels in those four counties. one of the things i'm glad to say is we've negotiated a way for them to continue and expand their studies to look to develop the methodology that can be applied to other parts of the country. one of the things that i care about in this is that those residual oil stores would store between 0 and 100 billion tons of carbon dioxide. also important in this is that would be net carbon negative oil. let me say that again, net carbon negative oil production. today, if you inject between

6,000 and 7,000 feet, that's ose to break even at about 7,500 per barrel. on a molecular basis, on a math . sis, that's decarbonized if you're using natural co2, it's just more carbon out of the ground. and i had the great pleasure of meeting with an oiply can the other day, which only uses co2 for their enhanced oil recovery, and typically injects energy per barrel. these guys are actually negative carbon i'll today. they're taking carbon dioxide that was going into the atmosphere and putting it underground. it's an important finding, wft things the department of energy wants to be more clear about and mormon strabble about in the coming years. but in thinking about these residual oil zones, they're

almost always net carbon negative. i want to talk about international partnerships. this is where a lot of the action is. these are required. the global environment is shared, and one of the things that came out of lima is every country has a job. we're trying to figure out what this looks like. in my program, we've got things like the leadership forum that are supporting not just information sharing, but the development of new policies and development of new projects. we've been very excited by the leadership the secretary has shown with this group, and the leadership that other ministers have shown in response. the next is also in the kingdom of saudi arabia next november. there's going to be interesting things to come. international partnerships are also required for congress. at the end of the day, what will help the negotiations is good trade. we can anything out is through

the project productions that will help everybody. it's like showcase projects in this country and others. also international partnerships can accelerate the learning and t can accelerate deployment. it saves money and time in a very usable way. the international landscape is also changing dramatically. i'm sure many of you here watched the u.s.-china accord that was announced in november. we were all very, very pleased with this. this includes, among other things, a large c.c.s. project in china and a science project that is a joint international project shared by the united states and china and other nations. we were thrilled with this outcome. there's also a new pilot, liken hansed oil recovery, only instead of pulling out oil, you pull out bryan, and you use pressure that when you're using

an injection. very interesting stuff. this technology has been worked in for about five years. we're ready to pilot. we're seeking a pilot in the united states. i'm happy to say other countries have said that looks like fine, we'd like to do t. there's a new european accord. october 23, european union inked a deal. it was a very ambitious climate target, 40% reduction. one of the things that was interesting they called for policy well nuclear, and they said that these are also clean energy options that should be considered in the context behalf we do. about the same time, the united nations economic council, was it economic council, they amended a statute to include carbon capture storage as part of clean energy technology under the u.n. framework convention. these policy shifts actually are materially important, and we want to see more from it.

they've n to that, put forward the innovation fund. so far, so good. it looks like that fund can be used to not only support the development of technology, but hopefully support projects as well, and we're discussing this with our european counterparts to find out what it means and how we can help. there are also new actors on the scene. the u.k. is putting forward a project. that's a storage project. we're very excited about that. they're pursuing this new business molingts with it. two groups in the middle east, the kingdom of saudi arabia and the united arab emirates are in the process of building large projects. saudi arabia will be online next year. they're capturing from refineries and steel plants. this is going to be the first big project, and they're going to use it for enhanced oil recovery. it's important to note that saudi arabia is building two 500-mega watt plants, and they've announced between 3,000

and 5,000 megawatts of new home construction. they are also looking at coal as part of their future, which is a very interesting development. finally work the energy reform to mexico, we're seeing some interest from them also on c.c.s. that is also welcome. we just saw canada and mexico, and this is one of the things we discussed. we're eager to continue to work with all countries to try to figure out how we can further this kind of deployment. in many ways, china is the main event. it uses half the world's coal, and they have to shut down the freeway because people can't see the cars anymore. they are very serious about trying to figure out how to manage pollution in general, but c.c.s. is part of the conversation now. a lot of that is going forward under the clooment change working group. i'm delighted to be part of that discussion and help support that with the state department, the treasury as they move forward, and we are

seeing them continue to invest and increase their investments in carbon capture storage and enhanced oil recovery. they are really very serious about this, but they see coal, even have a coal cap, even with diminished coal use, a big part of their future. they use a lot of coal, and they're going to be doing that for a long time. they acknowledge this is part of what they have to do at some point, and we're pleased they're interested in doing this sooner rather than later. i'll be going to china next month, in part to identify opportunities and discuss what can be done together. ne example of this is the fact that we saw projects. we identified a series of projects, some in the united states, some in china, which would serve as an opportunity to accelerate learning and shared deployment. this is what success to a lot of people looks like. you have john podesta and the

chimet envoy vice chairman, and in front of them there's a commercial deal being inked by administrator, a commercial eal by government. the last thing i want to say, and trust me, again, i could do this all day, is that part of the reason we are so committed to the technology angle of this, the research development demonstration piece, is that technology often prestages and does, in fact, form policy decisions. just as an example, in 2010, the e.p.a. put forward the first class six regulatory framework, built on technical findings that came out of the program. as we built these projects, as we develop technology and demonstrate their efficiency, as we ratchet down the cost of things like advance manufacturing technologies or using super computers, these

things are all going to result in technical findings, which then decision make considers look at and think about. ultimately we have to build and deploy the large projects. that's the work. that's what's required. and there are real learning opportunities for doing that. the opportunities to share that information, to build engineering models which can be picked up by industry, for industry to lead, the development of this project, and to tackle financing through the many potential paths that are out there to get these things across. there's a lot of second and third-generation technologies we're enthusiastic about. we realize we have to partner with many in the united states at the state and local level with industry and, of course, internationally. because coal will be used. the first part of my talk was that, coal will be used. it will continue to be used in the united states and everywhere, and co2 must be controlled. we have to take the climate issues very seriously while we act nothing that first part.

as a consequence, now is the time to build. now is the time to get on with the work which we know we have to do. with that, i thank you for the opportunity to talk and look forward to some questions. [applause] >> that was a really fantastic and wonderful conversation, not only about the work that you're doing, but over the course of the conversation -- or your presentation, i recall being in the offices many years ago where they put forward their idea for a plant that was right for their customers. it was a really important part of their message. there was a lot of criticism of whether it was possible or whether it was the right choice. and again, they said if we weren't the ones to do it, we won't see the cost reduction. we've got about 10 minutes left for questions. if you do have some questions, please raise your hand. we've got a couple of ground rules. we have a number of cameras in

the room. we do appreciate if you wait for the microphone, because then they can hear your question, state your name and affiliation, and we will do our best to get as many as we can in. please raise your hand. what i'd like to start with, really quickly, is there's often a component of between sort of these demonstration projects and creating a market for clean coal, especially c.c.s., and those broader visions of having a significant enough scalable version to have the cost reduction it would have for any decarbonization pathway. a lot is about transportation, right? transportation of the co2 from consumption centers to places where it can ultimately be captured. i know a lot behalf your program does is focus on the learning that can be had to inform policies around those issues. i wondered if you could speak about that transportation issue.

>> thank you, this is actually one of my favorite topics. rom a technology standpoint, there's nothing to talk about. the department of transportation has been managing them for 30 years. the issue is actually about the infrastructure itself. if up to the take co2 from where it's admitted to where you wish to store it, pipelines are part behalf you're going to do and almost always a large part of what you're going to do. even in cases where there's opportunities to finance a project, trying to get the pipelines built is kind of a different issue. one of the questions i think we are asking ourselves in the department of energy and elsewhere is that since we know we have to do those things, what are the options we have to get those up. what is the appropriate role for states? what is the appropriate role for it's not actually obvious. the problem with pipelines is it's pretty cheap. one maybe two bucks a ton but it's all capital up front.

somebody has to build the thing day one before you inject the co2. so the upfront costs are high and people are reluctant to carry those costs so i think we as a nation need to think harder about that. i'm delighted that the department of energy is not nly a topic of the secretary's passionately interested in and we're talking to this along with other topics associated with national infrastructure and the energy sector. >> you probably get this question every day but right now the plant is being decommissioned in the united states every two weeks. isn't that a risk that abundant and cheap natural gas cleans the interest in clean coal investment except for projects underwritten by the dough? so how can you make -- doe? so how can you make sure, what

is the plan for that? >> right. so you're correct. this is something, this is a constant and frequent topic of conversation in our office. we do see the emergence of low cost abundant natural gas. it's not just a real market phenomenon but the science shows us that we're likely to have a lot for a long time. broadly speaking i think that serves the nation well. we have reduced emissions. we also have kept production prices low. it doesn't solve the climate problem. we still need to do ccs on plants as well. we haven't figured out exactly when that is. but even with the chloe sure of some co--- closure of some coal plants, with the baubdnt of natural gas, our analysis is there radio mains a large supply of coal and suggests that any number of potential

scenarios you would actually still deploy ccs on some of those plants. we've looked at the plants from a heat rate perspective, from a permit perspective from a space available perspective from an engineering design from a vintage perspective and you end up retro fitting some of those plants. i think we also learn from the polar vortex last year that gas prices can spike and do even in an era of abundance. a lot of our utility partners are building more gas but worried about the price shocks and they see keeping coal in the mix as one of the ways that they can avoid those kinds of shocks as part of what they do. last thing i will say of course is that's the united states' story. in other countries, coal is much more prev rent in the availability of gas much more limit ds. from a global perspective we see coal as an important player not just in the united states or north america but in many arts of the world.

>> charles from brookings. it seems no an outsider that the administration is a bit schizophrenic on ccs. and coal in general. because on the one hand we have the excellent work that you've high lighted that d.o.e. is doing and yet when we look at exfment bank opec and so forth exls our positions we seem to take a very negative attitude towards financing coal and other localities. can you make a comment on whether you think there's any chance the administration might follow your lead and pursue these opportunities to help other countries with advanced coal? >> let me start by saying from inside it doesn't seem schizophrenic. and i would sort of reject that characterization outright.

i think the administration even in casting its policies around the xm bank said they're interested in fin nsing clean coal projects one that would include ccs. that seems actually to be a very consistent position. i would also say that on that topic obviously the landscape is changing in real time we're talking to the administration. we know what the policy position is now which is we don't want to finance plans that will lead to locked in large emissions and -- because that's a serious concern. beyond that we are trying to figure out what other things we can do, what is rational. and i would watch the space. t's an interesting time. >> thank you so much for coming and doing a great key note. my question concerns, i can see how the ccs with the eor feature is economically viable

for some of the economies with the hired carbon resources and including china, when we look at the even less developed countries though, how -- what are some of the ways that the ccs could be a little more viable? and then also i wanted to see if you could please elaborate the potential role that the water recovery sort of benefit may have. i'm not sure if it's -- i haven't really thought about the different structures say in africa or south asia but how that may be sort of a potential game changer to go about that. >> sure. let me start with that second art first. the secretary has repeatedably underscored his commitment to energy water progress and he sees that as a very important

undertaking. one of the announcement that came out of the china agreement is that the u.s.-china clean energy research centers would add a program to energy. and that's very welcomed. when we look at the water technology we're mindful of the fact that oil is between say 1,000 to 2,000 a ton in terms of its value and water is on the order of half a dollar a ton. you can't actually really finance these things. but we do think about this as a good news story because it's in part about the social license to operate. and in water scarce areas the value of the water could be very real. again, it wouldn't surprise you to know that some count rigs that are very water scarce are very interested in this technology. our estimate part of the reason we need the pilot and demonstrate. our estimate is that the cost is the about half the cost of conventional desal nation. if that comes true that could be a very interesting option in

terms of pairing management with water treatment. with respect to developing countries, first of all, i am simply not the state department. i'm not the person who talks about developing nations and their roles in this. what i would say though is back to our school in thinksing this through. if you're a developing country without enhanced oil recovery opportunities crmp cs may not be the best option for your country this is not -- we're not technology shoving. we're not trying to make everybody do everything at the time. if you're in a country in south africa it might work it might not. those countries have to determine on their own what makes sense for their nations in terms of both emissions reduction strategy and its national needs. i think a good role for developed countries in particular industrialized

countries like the united states and japan, like china and members of the e.u. is how can we ratchet down those costs for demonstration to create a wider option nalt for more countries? because if we can get the cost down to a place where countries want to adopt it that gives them more options for their lands. >> we've got time for one last question. >> as far as ccs is concerned, you need to have specific ground properties to be able to push that. so there will be some restrictions on where it could be applied, it cannot be applied everyplace. is that a correct assumption? >> that is 100% correct. i didn't put that in this talk but i put it in very many talks. and it's something that a lot of people don't really internalize in their thinking. if you do not have a storage site you do not have a

sequestration project, period. if there's no place to put the co2 your options are limited. in some countries, let's say souds korea they don't have a lot of storage options. so even though they could develop and sell excellent carbon capture they can't deploy it themselves because they don't have the storage options. north america is blessed but not every country is. initial assessments of china is it's pretty good. in india i think the assessments need more work. i don't think we know what the viability of deployment in south asia is. in parts of africa it looks promising in other parts not so much. it's just like gold. if you have it on your property you have a natural resource. and if you don't, you don't. it's a natural resource. and it really is a natural resource and it's one that if you have you consider and exploit. in thinking about the deployment of ccs in the united states, states that have this option have an option that other states don't. and it will put that into their

calculus and figure out how to make it work and if that option is viability viable for them. but the gulf coast and the illinois basin are world class co2 storage options. those states i'm sure are more glad that they have that option than not. with that, i really appreciate the opportunity to talk with you today. thank you very, very much. [applause] >> in his weekly address, president obama discussing jobs and the economy and his administration's legislative accomplishments. in the republican response, representative mike kelly of pennsylvania talks about energy policy. wrr hi, everybody. as 2014 comes to an end we can enter the new year with new confidence that america is making significant strides where it counts. the steps we took nearly 6 years ago to rescue our economy andre build it on a new

foundation helped make 2014 the strongest year for job growth ince the 1990's. in a hopeful sign for middle class families, wages are on the rise again. our investments in american manufacturing have helped fuel its best stretch of job growth since the 90's. america's now the number one producer of oil and gas saving drivers about 70 cents a gallon since the last christmas. the thanks to the affordable care act about 10 million americans have gained health insurance in the past year alone. and since i took office we've cut our deficits by about two thirds. meanwhile around the world america is leading. we're leading the coalition to degrade and ultimately destroy isil. we're leading the fight to combat the ebola outbreak. we're leading global efforts to address climate change

including last month's joint announcement in china. we're turning a new page with the cuban people. and in less than two weeks after more than 13 years our combat mission in afghanistan will be over. and our war there will come to a responsible end. today more of our troops are home for the holidays than at any time in over a decade. still many of our men and women in uniform will spend this christmas in harm's way and as commander in chief i want our troops to know your country is united in our support and gratitude for you and your families. the 6 years since the financial crisis have demanded hard work and sacrifice on everyone's part. but as a country we have every right to be proud of what we've got to show for it. more jobs, more insured, a growing economy, shrinking deficits, bustling industry, booming energy. pick any metric you want.

america's resurgence is real. and we now have the chance to reverse the decades long erosion of middle class jobs and incomes. we just have to invest in the things we know will secure even faster growth in higher paying jobs for more americans. we have to make sure our economy, our justice system and our government work not only for a few but for all of us. and i look forward to working together with the congress next year on these priorities. sure we'll disagree on some things. we'll have to compromise on others. i will act on my own when it is necessary. but i will never stop trying to make life better for people like you. because thanks to your efforts a new foundation is laid. a new future is ready to fw written. we have set the stage for new american moment and i am going to spend every minute of my last two years making sure we seize it. on behalf of the obama family i wish all of you a very merry christmas. thanks and have a wonderful holiday season.

>> good morning. i'm mike kelly and i have the tremendous privilege of representing pennsylvania's third congressional district. now, today i'm offering president obama a lump of coal for christmas. not because he's been bad this year although i'll get to that. no. i'm offering the president a lump of coal because this product right here holds the potential for a 21st century economic revival. you see coal is our most abundant and valuable resource. it puts food on the table for more than a 40,000 families. about: country. it is about the whole country. no other country has been blessed with such a abundant

resources. with all that god has given us, we should not be just keeping up with the pack, we should be world. the if only we had a president who could see this opportunity. he is leaving out everything that is below. he spent his presidency trying to bankrupt. federal regulations have already forced to pull power plants in my district to close over the past two years, and hundreds overare set to shutdown our country. he has set up so many roadblocks that our production is coming from private lands. even when his own party stopped him from imposing his cap and trade tax he said it was just one way of skimming the cat, then he direct it the epa to do his job for him. the president should let us use

our god-given resources and talents to help a americans get back to work and let our nation be the energy superpower it can be and it needs to be. what is stopping these regulations? is so much more we can do to encourage the development of all forms of american energy. not just republican solutions. these are common sense american ideas that support both parties. you were going to see them again in the new congress, starting to approve the vote of the pipeline. things, making things, and doing it better than anyone else in the world is what america has always been about. that is how we build such a robust and dynamic economy. we can make 2015 the year we restore our nation of builders. that is next to her. asidenow, i hope you set

a moment to pray for those seasong this holiday away from their loved ones. merry christmas, everyone, and may god continue to bless everyone in america. >> next, seth rogen talks about political humor in movies. and at 7:00 a.m., washington journal. some of the look at programs you will find christmas on the c-span networks. holiday festivities start at 10:00 a.m. eastern, starting with the lighting of the national christmas tree. lighting of the capitol christmas tree with michelle obama. and celebrity act vests talk about their causes. jed bushorida governor on the bill of rights.

on c-span to add 10 a.m. eastern time, steven pinker. sidead 12:30, the feminist of wonder woman. later, talk about reading habits. and at 8:00 a.m. eastern, the fall of the berlin wall with george bush and bob dole, with speeches by president john f. kennedy and ronald reagan. noon,en after that at first ladies fashion and how they represented the time. later, tom brokaw. that is this christmas day on the c-span networks. for a complete schedule, go to cspan.org--

took place before mr. ogen briefly r discusses why he made the movie. it is part of a larger discussion on how actors use for their politics. this program contains language that some might find offensive. this program is about one hour and 10 minutes. >> hello everyone, i am maggie williams. welcome to the john f. kennedy for him in the institute of politics. our mission here is to inspire students toward a career in politics and public service and we have some laughs along the way.

has hosted chevy chase, stephen colbert, al franken. i hope you will enjoy this discussion as much as you have enjoyed the others. leading our conversation tonight is a young woman who knows a thing or two about humor. she was named this past january as the first african-american president of the 138-year-old national lampoon. >> thank you. all right. started her writing career at age seven that when she began her memoir entitled "i am the only one who knows about she is ayou come economics studies

when she is not writing comedy. and is fromntern wisconsin. please welcome alexis wilkinson. >> thank you so much maggie. needed to be obituary-perfect. i could die now. we are here tonight to discuss the role of politics in humor and what is becoming more apparent. from tina fey's memorable impression of syrup: it that some people would really argue influence the way the entire country saw her as a candidate to vote daily show and the politics andt, humor are obviously more bound together than ever.

with that in mind, our very talented and funny guest tonight instead, aight coproducer of the daily show. forhas campaigned contraceptive axis and abortion rights. she has appeared on comedy central, hbo, cnn, and pbs. a book aboutored her own life into career. please welcome miss winstead. [applause] onto seth rogen. an actor, writer, and comedian. he has appeared in such blockbusters as the 40-year-old virgin, not that, and funny people. his comedic partner is also here tonight.

he wrote pineapple express, super bad, and the most recent interview,"e starring seth rogen and james franco. he is an ardent supporter of marijuana, gay rights, and alzheimer's awareness, testifying to congress about the importance of research. pleasing given up for seth rogen. [applause] >> ok, basically i am going to ask them a couple open-ended questions we are going to watch a couple video clips and then we will move on to q&a when evan will join us. -- liz, youo started as a comedy writer before teaming with mr. smith burned.

some 80% of millennial's watch the daily show. what was short -- can you describe what your original vision was for the show. was, it was af it long path. >> i was kind of a hack, dopey jokes, great to danes it should have to wear underwear in public. >> that's great. it is so embarrassing to say, but it is sort of true,

>> -- i imagine it was humid. on a date to the guy shows up at my house and he is wearing a yankees hat and a yankees jacket. >> i have a theory about guys who wear double sports gehrke, they won't go down on you. was born toory i play out, actually. , "i wanthe said to me vita. isn'tce

that in black and white? " we wanted to the movie, he fell asleep after the movie and i i took myso much that greasy hand and smeared it on and i felt jacket unbelievably horrible guilt and when he woke up i could've ended the date, but i said no, let's go have a drink. we get to the bar and it is the war. of the first gulf it was when there was just cnn. and 87 song and hot people talking about war. i was like, are they reporting on a war or trying to sell me a

warm. it felt really weird. and right when i thought that, " this isid, awesome." are screwed., we after that, i started talking more about the media, i did a couple one-woman shows and comedy central said, hey do you want to create a show that is on everyday about the news. i said, i do but he one thing i think we should do is key is we do not actually just make fun of the newsmakers but we use the news as a care for. we look at the way they do the news and we make fun of that because the manipulation is part of that. i'm sorry, that was really long. but that was how it was. >> ok, thank you. today, a lot of your work is more directly merging.

let us go to a clip from your organogenesis -- from your organization, called the fate of the uterus. x, there is a screen. it is up there. >> madam fallopian tube. madam other fallopian tube. and all of the other uninvited guests in my chamber. the state of our universe is strong. the end of last year left us unstable. i know that. when the government shutdown, there was panic. with no politician in place telling it what to do, our vaginas ran amok. ginarchy. but i am here to tell you that republicans and republicans

alike are tirelessly working so of america will have the same rights as the uteri of saudi arabia. [applause] >> just recently legislation, passed in several states, mandating closures like planned parenthood are leaving women with a lot -- without a lot of options. what made you want to be involved in this fight? what made you communicate this message? >> leaving women without options is always bad and so i was like -- and also i realized that people were not aware of what was happening. planned parenthood is a really strong rant.

when you are living your life and you are very busy, you do not even understand what the assault is. i also just think that people -- when i hear people talk about this issue that are anti-choice, they set a set of circumstances that are not true. one, that there was some age of abstinence we need to get back to. in the there was never history of forever people not having secs. people have secs. mistakes happen, or whatever. why not have birth control? why not talk about it in ways that are fun and interesting in and also get men involved? because, as it turns out, women cannot get pregnant by themselves. yes, it is true. so i just feel like -- i just feel like if women cannot control everything about their destiny, they are going to have a destiny whether or not they want to have kids, they are

never going to be part of the power structure which i would like to see more women part of the decision-making, starting with their own bodies. >> awesome. thank you. let's move on to seth. >> dumb yourselves down a bit. >> it you are most known for outrageous block dusters and your love of cannabis. i know you care very deeply about alzheimer's research and creating awareness for that. can you explain how you can be involved in the opposition in and when it was like to testify before congress earlier this year? >> my mother was diagnosed with early onset alzheimer's when she was in her early 50's and i had just starting my -- dating my wife around that time.

portrayed in was movies and stuff like that, and i very quickly got like a crash course in kind of, all things, alzheimer's. one of the most interesting and install journaling things that i do not know -- one of the most interesting and to startling things that i did not know is that there is literally no treatment at all and nothing you can do. it is ridiculously underfunded in comparison to things that kill much less people and have many forms of treatment. then you look around and you are just like, no one is doing anything. as far as, you know, diseases that are cool to talk about, it is below polio. hip in anynot capacity, because i think they're a shame associated with it. i think there is a weird microphone thing happening. i apologize. the whole thing is foxed.

-- fucked. what was almost very startling is how very quickly i was able to become the most well-known advocate for the disease because there was no competition. it was really mine to take. got older, you realize not everyone -- well not everyone, but i am of famous person and a lot of people pay attention to what i say, and i generally just say stupid shouldn't -- stupid s hit, and maybe once in a while i could use that to flash illumination. i don't really know anything. i am not very educated. it was a struggle for a long time, honestly, morally. then this thing came into my life when i could just talk about it in a personal right.

i did not have to memorize any fact's or statistics or anything like that. i could spend for my own experiences. all of a sudden i was raising awareness. not something of his was doing. they invited me to go to congress. it was disheartening in a way, i guess. theyhave these ms setup so can hear people's personal plans on issues, and no one shows up. that is the norm. there are 17 people on this matter, and two people were there. and then when i started to kind aret like,, why the fuck ande only two people there, they were like well this is how it happens. and i thought, what a great job. you are defended in your choice to not show up. but at the same time, people hate the government and that is

why. it is an efficient. i had a front-row seat to that. for a brief moment i made alzheimer's something that man -- went viral i guess. the speech got a lot of views on youtube. it was c-span's most-watched video or obama's inauguration's. of competition. in a way, it showed me that, oh, i can, even for a brief moment, shed some light on something and that is a microscopic step towards affecting some relevant change, i guess. you know. >> the next thing i want to ask you about is your new movie, the interview. you and james franco are hired by the cia to kill north korea's kim jong un.

let's watch the trailer. into --upreme leader is interested in doing an interview. >> did you just say china? it just say dong? >> three weeks from now i will be traveling to interview north un.a's kim jong rappaport, i am ms. lacey. you two are going to be alone in a room with him and we would like for you to take him out. >> 14? for coffee? >> what? you want us to take him out? >> hello, north korea.

i watched every episode of your show in preparation for this interview. enjoyed -- ly >> gentlemen, you are entering into the most dangerous country on earth. please remember kim jong-un is a master manipulator. >> he is crazy cute. >> i just wish we had an escape land. >> why don't we go to japan? >> it is across the sea. it is really, really far. >> michael phelps stated. >> that is not true. >> nice tank. is that real? >> it was a gift from my father. a sound system in

here? >> no, no, no. do not touch. katy perry? i love katy perry. >> i spent a lot of time with kim and i think he is not a bad guy. >> you cannot pull out of this. x you cannot pull out. you are leaving it in. >> i have been pulling out for years, son. [applause] >> ok, so someone unsurprisingly the actual north korea hasf flipped its shit. the most notable example being barrette. i do not think they have nukes.

how did this idea for the movie think that and to to north korea would actually respond? a the idea came about from kind of anecdotal conversation. like mike wallace interviews of osama bin laden. -- journalists are allowed to be in a room with people and would be in a good position to do away with them if they were so inclined. so i figured that would be a good thing to just talk about. meanwhile, we were fascinated with north korea. a lot of people are. it is kind of a bizarre place. the more you read about it, the more bizarre and mysterious it is. the deeper you dig, the mystery k isas to what the fuc

going on over there. so eventually, we combined the ideas. an interviewer who gets an interview with kim jong-un, and then decides to kill him. as we load more about north korea, we started to see crazy rhetoric is the name of their when they wanted -- you know, the opening scene of the movie makes fun of that idea. when they ultimately came out with this rhetoric, it was not ultimately that surprising --ause it, again, just can just confirmed the theme of the movie. yes. >> are you an author for about the war actually do something? >> not really, no. i would hope they have better things to do. don't take that as a challenge. no. yeah. i would hope they have better things to do.

>> is the streaming in north korea tonight? >> i do not think the movie has been released in the clear. i expect little box revenue there. >> ok. so, the next topic i want to talk about with you both is, there has been a lot of talk lately about gender and comity and gender dynamics and feminism and that time of thing. people are trying to look at pop-culture and humor in particular. lows, the question i have for you is, you have obviously worked in comedy for a long time. you have done a lot of writers room. late-night tv. political satire. there seems to be comic especially for that genre, a real dearth of women. i know when stephen colbert is leaving and another's taking over, my black self was happy, but the woman self not. what do you think can be done to correct that?

>> well, since i have so much , i think it has made great strides from where we and then where we are going. i think that, you know, there was an old world for a long time. the old girl -- the old guard is retiring. withhave come up the ranks women and people of color, and those people are now along for the ride. the predisposition that women are not funny is not there either. so i feel good about that. you go into any comedy show now, you will see tons of women and people of color. that is really cool. i think that, you know, it is always amazing to me. i look at late-night into different realms. the hosts as different

animals then a david letterman kind of show. when i watched the daily show, i get 150 writing submissions from women. those women did not have the chops to do that show at the time. that has changed exponentially. there is a product you can watch, and you know what to write for it. it is very different. if you are thinking about it, if you're going into the world of film writing or tv writing or whatever, there are few jobs for nerdy, funny, political junkies who also have historical and of knowledge of life politics and who can say, all my god, nixon said that, reagan said that. there is weird fdr radio clip. onse people exist and work those shows. you have to be a combination. on top of that, you have to love

the tone of the show. you're not writing monologue jokes. you are examining the landscape of the media and politics. a lot of people just go, there is more sitcoms then shows like that. so, i think that it is hard to -- and also, if you look at the ratings on the daily show or cabana, they are very different than modern family. or cable news. i think that people interested in doing those things are not as great, and people of color doing them are not as great, and women doing them well are not as great as that, so it is really hard. the poor smaller and smaller and smaller when you inc. of what it takes to make those shows great every night. it has nothing to do about anybody, it just has to do with the pool of people. seth.,

>> all right. >> all right. you are known for these romantic comedies where usually a bunch of dudes try to do anything that is a stupid thing and they son how get out of it i doing something stupid. but you took to twitter to defend the movie "neighbors," like when the washington journal tried to say it was a sad reflection of the street. sayreplied, how dare you that caused a lunatic to go on a rampage? neighbors, your character's wife, in the face of typical roles of women in the movie whose killing us all the fine, she isn't on the action and is crucial to the plot. thinkat is to say, do you about the gender dynamics of

film making and how much of that should go into what stories you want to tell. >> as we have gotten older, we have thought about it more. when we were in our early 20's making "super bad." in, you know, was very much from that perspective. women, inof the movie was what itample, should be. but as we got already are, we put a lot of thought into how do to be asose burn important to the comedy and the story and how do we not make the story about a couple who is in conflict but make a comedy team out of a has-been and wife who really get along with each other and like each other.

there was a lot to the story, i think i overshadowed bat with my rage. i was hurt because that one specifically was one would put a lot of thought into specifically not doing that. i think a lot of people responded very well to that in seemed to understand that was a key element of that movie. are in anyway responsible for a mass murderer just sucks. i think that is also where i was coming from to some degree. the older andten smarter, i guess, we realize that -- i think just the nature of how movies are structured themselves lends itself towards sexism, honestly. the traditional structure of a movie that is romantic. the structure that has worked for 100 years, which is why

people keep doing it, is very much the structure that a lot of movies follow which do not and women in the most independent, best plot-driving, comedy-driving light. once we were like, let's not do that, it was interesting how many conventions we had to unravel. holy shit, a lot of standard movie mechanics are trying to rush of this into that kind of role. i hope as we continue making movies we do that more. again, we're trying to be more aware of that. ask the more you get to women in writer's room and women as creators, and in life in general, women in positions where they are making decisions and you see women in all these different roles, then the roles of those women will also be reflected in film. i think that is the problem.

if you have a life where you do not have women all over it, then you do not create movies from the perspective of a woman. how many women are running studios? how may women are doing that? it is a fallacy the child still. it will say, oh there are women's comedies and then there are men's comedies. i think movies like "rights "bridesmaids" and staff have broken that mold. be stuck then, we will in that same formula. >> on that same note, how do you feel about -- i mean, i don't know if you remember the cancel colbert campaign that happen not to long ago about a joke he made about redskins, i think in general do you feel like

comedians should have license to push the boundaries, offend people, and not need to apologize, or because those things that they are saying could reverberate, that they have a social responsibility when it comes to joke-telling? think -- i mean -- i think -- we were talking about it -- i think you have to be able to defend your own material on a certain level. i would never tell a joke that has a political view i do not believe in, because i do not want to get asked about that someday and i do not want to be stupid. i think a lot of people who try to be edgy or cold, who feel unfairly are being targeted by the political correctness crowd forget that

they have to be funny as well as edgy and political. look at theou people who complain about that and the people who don't, very few of the people who are complaining about it are high larry is. -- about it are hilarious. the rest never complain about it at all. i think every time you make a joke that you know in your head is slightly controversial, there is almost always a group of people that have to react negatively in order for the joke to remain valid. and you know the one to do it, that it isthe joke making. that there is a group of people who think the joke is not what you're thinking. they will say their thing, and sometimes they will say something that offends more than just as people by accident. apologizingedians sometimes a end i have never done something that i felt like i had to apologize for.

and i have seen people make jokes and i have thought they should apologize for it. i do not think it is a loss. it is an admission that they made a joke that went too far. we screen our movies a lot. in a lot of our early screenings, there jokes ago too far and are in bad taste, and by the time they reach mass consumption, and they have filtered this out and we haven't even realized it, or the way it is in the room or something we realize we were wrong about that. we try to be sensitive towards that personally. but i personally do not you like , you know, i -- that there is some political correct squad that is trying to revenge me from doing my job in the best way that i can. shocked at, i am what i'm able to get away with, generally speaking. to, -- ialways adhere

would never tell anybody not to say anything. we were talking about this earlier and i say it often. you must understand, though, that when you say something, the lips, in passes your everybody else gets to interpret it however they interpret it however they interpreted. alwaysh that -- it is mindful and not a bad idea to think about what your intention is, be able to defend it, no there is going to be haters no matter what. people that misconstrue and maybe not have the information right. i tell you, i doubt there about one year and a half ago that was like a horror show for me. -- it wass, was i during the time when the republicans were having those andings about the irs saying that obama had only targeted republicans in the irs

scandal. at a time whenso the religious right had the storms on gaysg and lesbians. the -- having that knowledge, the oklahoma tornado was coming down the pike. said, i wonder if the oklahoma target is only going to republicans. i don't have a drink, i come back to my twitter feed, and it is hit. there are children who have died. and i have a tweet out there saying that. on meeople shitting relentlessly.

it, people don't know how many people are do that comparison. it was not worth it for me to defendant. i took it down, so i said, i tweeted this, let me have it, i get with this thing exploded into another thing. my life.ved on with of course, people do not let it go. but that is one of those things that i look at and thought, holy shipped, that was one of those things that was just talked. that was one of those things that was just fu cked. sometimes, i think i'm just going to double down on that. i am not thrilled with her because i think the theaters, or i just believe the statement was orht and made a larger point whatever. you just have to take it all in because you are putting it out

there into sometimes you never know where you are at comedic unless you hit a barrier and say well, that was weird. >> that was too much. >> yes. you have to own it when people come down and you take lumps like everybody else. you just feel good about knowing you can defend it and take the hits when you need to take the hits, i guess. >> all right, thank you. audience go to questions i have a few nonserious rapidfire questions. lightning round. whatever comes first. let's knock these out. kerry do you think clinton is more of a samantha or a charlotte from sachsen the cities. from "sex adn the city."

to pick one of those? >> do you think she is miranda? nothat if i said i did watch insects and the city and so i am stumped by the question. >> i think she is a mr. big. i am tearing down the gender walls. >> i should have asked you before hand if you watched it. deal, there is a lot of hair, shoes, and sadness. >> so seth, do you know the pledge of allegiance? no. >> i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states and to the work for which it stands one nation under god, and then i do not know the rest.

[applause] x ok, lewis. obama. most good accident or worst bad president? -- worst good president or worst bad president? say, best black president. asked by that logic, he is also the first black president. i always feel like he is the president who has given us as much humor as he has other things. he gave us health care, so he gets a pass.

x -- >> >> seth, if marijuana were illegal in all 50 states, which state to think would have the best read? weed? x i would imagine that vermont or something. somewhere of the leaf. i picture a lot of green pastures and stuff like that. vermont. then in jerry. good ice cream. >> it is all about the food. this is a two-part question. is it better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all? and, which state to you think

has the most of abortions? >> is it better to of loved and lost her to have never loved at all? yes. and, the worst abortion laws, believe it or not is hard. oregon is the only state that has not curbed of since moving rate. do you think it might be texas? you would be wrong. louisiana and it , itt be north carolina might be mississippi. i think anyplace with one clinic of which there are five states that only have one lyric that has axes. i would say the southeast

region, and ohio could be in there. >> you cannot even rent dirty dancing in texas. sex torre's sell in texas. we wanted to go down there and do a vibrator buyback program. >> ok. awesome. >> two g just thanked me for that? >> i did. good information for me. texas. the new. seth, one. option eight, james franco still hits on underage girls on instagram, or james franco has moved on to tumbler? >> i will go with tumbler.

any evolution is a good one. >> now we are going to start the q1 day. you need to introduce yourself. to join us.g >> he was my writing and directing partner. expect her road to interview together. you have toe introduce your self. you need to keep it short. it needs to end in a? . semi-colon bullshit. >> high. my name is alex. president of the

business school republicans. are there any candidates that you want to win even though you disagree with them just because you know they will provide you with good material? ask no. i always put social issues above my own personal well-being. it is hard sometimes. -->> >> i do wince a little bit when they lose. like ron michele bachmann decided she was resigning. i am from minnesota. i think, no. i do not. no. >> we had a movie about a crazy

politician who is offer reos -- goes off the rails. i'm vince mine is attached to it and going to make it. high, my name is ben. i am a harvard alum. most importantly, if the leader of north korea were to give you an invitation to screen your movie in north carolina -- in north korea but the insurance that you would return alive in want is, would you go to north korea to screen the film? pretend magic exists for a second, which it might. if there is a magical spell you can put on us and it was like you are 100% going to be ok, i

would do it. yes. just to see the reaction in person. i'm always curious to see how the movie plays. so, yes. that. do again, if magic existed. part again?first dennis rodman. what is funny is when he wrote the movie before that happened. g il was actually the first star, then he died it so we recast them. the movie was about an idiot to goes to north korea and it was seduced by his leader and we wondered if it was too far-fetched, and then it fucking happened. it adds credibility to the whole thing. it made what could be a very far-fetched story seem very

plausible. and yes, it kind of a validated the whole thing and kind of grounded it in reality even more than it was. >> >> i'm jacob. i'm a sophomore at the college. it is satire was ruled to be constructive nor is it very suited to that. but i am wondering how in satire or one of road paying the jerk in the group project who only ever shoots people's ideas down and tells them how you will not work. you know that? >> i have got to disagree with you on this one. i think satire is constructive. if it is not, people will not enjoy it and it will go away. that person will no longer be viewed as someone you want to

receive the satire from, because they will just be preaching to you. there are just being mean-spirited. if you are trying to be like, the daily show, every joke is a little difference. >> and although they are attacking things that are stupid, by doing that they are directly or indirectly bolstering things that are not stupid. action-reaction reality. i think comedically it is a little harder, it is easier to e comedic -- >> comedies very essence is negative. the two rooted in negativity. that is brought comedy is. but what evan is saying is right. rejecting aby negative view our bolstering a positive.

in dr. strangelove, there is no moment where they say nuclear bombs are good. i think that is more what we are trying. >> taking louis ck as an example. is saying a lot of valuable stuff, and i think my life is better by what he says. he is complaining, but he is teaching me that it is like to be a dad. i am seeing it through his lens and seeing the small things he thinks are funny or wrong or right. i feel like i learn a lot from satire. >> i do too. toeel like also, being able you want to expose means that you do a lot of research on it. casholbert character is a is very nuanced. and it thought process

gives people a little bit of an insight into things. i'm sorry, we all disagree with you. >> but good question. thing?i ask you one often when one person asks a question like that they have something specific they are thinking about. is there something specific you thought was all of those things? asked not necessarily. especially thinking about the daily show, there are certainly satire where, as you are pointing out when jon stewart makes fun of cna and the giant touchscreen, it is kind of obvious that this sort of alternative to that is. but sometimes there is not an obvious alternative. so i will close this out really quickly. part of the reason that i have started this new medium and got into this new medium is that i

agree with you. it is not satire is will to solve problems. it has sometimes rolled to expose problems. but if you're somebody that love satire and then you want to say, i want to be able to throw that the world and then have some place where people can go and try to fix it themselves. but that was not the point of having a tv show or stuff like that. but i am happy that exists, because then you can do it that way. we cannot go any further, but i will talk to after. >> hi, my name is tests. i'm a staff writer for the harvard political review and also a correspondent for harvard's internet comedy group on harvard time. my question is, since i'm now going to be figuring out what my

future career plans are, what you recommend i go into comic keeping in mind that my parents will be watching this online? >> comedy or politics? >> or a combination of of the two? >> you want to laugh or be serious all the time? >> it is really fun to work in comedy. >> you can do both. at the daily show. x you can become the funniest politician never was. >> i bet it is easier to inject politics into comedy than to inject comedy into politics. nobody was electing anyone because they are hilarious. i would suggest you become a comedian who is politically oriented, rather than a politician who is comedically oriented. >> because oftentimes they do not know they are. >> you will never compete with some of those guys. >> hi, my name is william greenlaw. veblen mentioned that a lot of people are complaining that

folks were unfairly targeted for further comedy are not very funny. sometimes yousaid retract jokes because you think they have gone too far. my question is, how do you know what a joke is gone too far? >> when the onset, the only thing we have to go too far on set so that we never went far enough. we can always turn at bat. everybody on the set has to be mature about that. with a jokes that were sent on set and will turn around and look at the crew and they are like no. >> but we also test the movies a lot to with test audiences. we really listen. people will not laugh a lot if a joke as mean-spirited or they feel morally wrong. you can just feel it in the room. fucked-up, something

people are just like -- argh. can feel the energy get sucked out of the room as soon as it happens. next there has been times when we think the joke is morally and intellectually sound and the audience does not. to again, we do not want offend most of them. there are some people that no matter what are going to be offended. but we have to be able to defend it. sometimes it takes testing a joke to realize we may have done something that would be hard to defend just because people would be saying in the focus group afterwords that the joke is fuck ed up. don't do that. aret depends upon who you developing your material for. "offend" mean?

should we not talk about religion? should we not talk about abortion? should we not talk about executing a world leader? should we not talk about executing a world leader? should that be off-limits for comedy? should we not ever talk about rape? line -- there is only what you feel in your gut personally that you cannot defend. you do not want to put it out there in the universe, really. >> that is exactly right. we have to talk about our work a lot. that could quickly just lead to, asshole now that you mention it. " that are designed to play in a theater full of

people. that is our litmus test. how does a theater full of people respond to it? do they all laugh at it? afterwords, it does someone point out something that to them is specifically offensive? the end ofthis is making fun of christianity. yes,people would be like, this movie is offensive. is that is not who the movie for. you are listening to the people of the movie is for. which is people who would go pay to see that movie. if they are put off by something, they are right. if it does not get a laugh, how do you defend that? it means it is not funny. ex and i would add that how you feel you want to defend something and how you write things is also super-crucial to

who is in that room with you. diverse writing stuff? what does that mean? all of a sudden, if you have a writing stuff that is reflective of the world you live in, then everybody does a different kind of check. that is why it is important to have diverse writing staffs with women, with the color, and was then you really think about what does this all mean. you may all about and say you are willing to take that someplace, but what is sure to check in at that point. it is brave to be in a room full of good people and think you are -- andupersized take think you are being super satirical. that is important to talk about when one thinks about the creative process. >> my name is branson.

i am studying film and video production. haveghout your lives you had small and medium projects. i am curious. how have you been able to preserve what you find to be your own creative and comedic thee in the production of plethora of this media, and where are you willing to compromise? >> with movies, i think there is a temptation to try to acquire as much money for your budget as humanly possible. is a sign of success on the surface at least. in hollywood, if you make it-expensive movies that is the upper echelon. implication is you want to make bigger, more expensive movies. when we were getting more successful, that is what we did.

we were able to make a $150 million movie, and so we did. we very quickly found that ajit robbed us of everything that made us creatively valuable, basically. about the we enjoyed process itself, which is, if we think of a new idea we can just do it. if someone pitches a joke, we can just load. what we learned is that money robs you of something very large , which is creative control and freedom. money,-- mo' mo' problems. movies that are half the price of what we could be making and we are getting in half of what we could be getting, but what we're getting in exchange for that is the ability to pretty much do whatever the fuck

we want. we will cut our own budget down. rules say, o 30 year authority and tell us a lot of stuff and at 30 or not? explain literally ask them the number of debt allows them to not listen as much. >> i have basically been in conversations with these two. we started the daily show, capable still cheap. i have never worked on anything that there is a budget. what that means is, a small a lot ofo means ownership. that is what is really fun. have six writers and were working balls off or whatever, i don't have any anymore, work tomorrow all off, when you work so hard that everybody sees a joke on the air and sees that part of the process, it is really rewarding because the bottom line in this business is there is no making it.

there's only the path through which you make your work. if that path is not rewarding and full of corporate, you were going to wake up one day and ea which a son who does not have many cool experiences. -- the eight person who does not have many cool experiences. who does notn have many cool experiences. to pay ss that's we enjoyed that is inspiring to us experienceo be an taht we enjoy. that was a big revelation for us creatively.

>> i think we have time for one more. for liz.stion is successful has your comedy withat disarming policy the lunatics that seem to hate women's sexuality down here. >> we just launched in july. the great part of the disarming thing is that in an issue as controversial as abortion rights and reproductive rights, somebody has to be the fall guy. i think i have decided i am going to be the fall guy in the sense of when somebody says to me, how do you laugh at killing babies? i say, i do not buy your premise. are they killing babies?

stop that, it is against the law, that is terrible. to break through the language that has been co-opted by really radical who do not listen to science and do not listen to the medicine of this, they do not know what to do with me because i do not back down. i am relentless. when they come at me and say how dare you advocate for birth control is because it is women poisoning themselves with chemicals? i am like, well, i cannot wait to join you and trying to get one of the cigarette industry. when are we going to start that? i will work with you on that. then they start -- is stare at me blankly. then they say, why don't women just shut their legs. and i say, why should they? somebody needs to start saying this kind of things because otherwise we just are with their narrative when they say things like, you know sometimes women

take this control pills for andrew mutual houses. -- endometriosis. but i say, yes but mostly they just want to fuck. people are attacked clients appropriate things, i am not one of them. i think it gives people a little bit of a sigh of relief to go, i have been through this experience. one in three women have had an abortion in our lifetime. that means that one and three women are holding onto information that is very personal. and guilt about that. sarah silverman has been a great champion with me and working on this project, and amy sure and other women have come together to put it out there and say, nothing should define you, especially a medical journalist that you make. that is where we're going. two. to a level of, you went to the doctor and you had that they so

that you could be the best person you could be, because that is what we are striving for. [applause] >> could we take one more question so we do not end on an abortion question? >> yes. in knocked up, jonah hill's character is making suggestions ...shmezmortion. to leave abortion unnamed. it,liz?ou think about it self washe joke commenting on people's discomfort with it and how stupid that is. jonah's character and that is an idiot and he is acting like an idiot would in thinking that

abortion is something that dare not be named. i think a lot of them forget that in our movies were penetrating morons. thatrselves are not moronic. how we areis funny as described the personality traits of the company i'm mocking in our work. this problem more than david mcbride. he made up the character of a redneck idiot because he hates redneck idiots and now everybody thinks he was a redneck idiot. iflways ask anthony hopkins he thinks it is ok to eat people's faces. that joke was making fun of people that lowe's is also making fun of. >> in somebody's comedy and art, they do what they need to do. me, it is more important that

the people who are actually making policy and providing these services and the activists around this issue are saying they are not advocating pro-choice, there legislating abortion. it is whatever someone chooses to do, but in the practical sense, it is a thing we need to start saying so it is not stigmatized. >> and we did it again. and it on abortion. anybody? have a quickie recipe. >> that is all the time we have. forum, iop, and all those guys coming out, thank you for letting me be moderator. it has been a pleasure. have a good night.

>> next, your calls on washington journal. tom, georgia congressman price. after that, president obama talks about cuba and the recent sony cyber attack during his and of the year news conference. x this week on q and a, town hall editor katie pavlovich on what she perceives as the hypocrisy towards liberals. it goes back to where this

book came from. the tribute video because he had passed away and portraying him as a women's rights champion when he left a younger woman to drown in his car. if he had not gone back for nine hours and tried to save his own behind, she would have probably survived. you cannot do an entire video at a convention claiming to be pitching and fighting about the war on woman and glorify him while not including that part of his life in a video about his women's rights record. >> tonight on c-span skew hyundai. we are airing one program from 20h year starting december second on c-span. >> this morning, washington post correspondent jim tankersley talks about what has gone wrong with the middle class and what

the country must do to get the economy working for everyone. david milleraaron talks about his book "the end of greatness host: good morning. this is a live view of the u.s. capital. this is the christmas holiday week. among the headlines, the u.s. is asking for help from china with korean hacking. thousands protest inside mall of america. this is because the aftermath of the shootings of eric garner and michael brown. nypdhooting deaths of two brooklyn isers in being called