ve alleged that there is some kind of conspiracy at the justice department and that this is politically motivated. burgess: eventually there is going to be an actual indictment , if what we have seen reported is true, and that is when this will hit a fever pitch. susan: thank you for being our questioners on his maker this week. >> tonight on q&a, the director of the georgetown medical watchdog project on pharmaceutical companies and how they influence doctors and what medication to prescribe. >> it starts 7-10 years before a drug comes on the market. while it is illegal for a company to market a joint before it is approved, it's not illegal to market a disease. drug companies have sometimes invented or exaggerated diseases and certain conditions, or

exaggerated the importance of a particular mechanism of a drug. then they blanketed medical journals and medical meetings and other venues with these messages that are meant to prepare the minds of clinicians to accept a particular drug. and protect -- prepare the minds of consumers to accept a particular condition. >> that is tonight on q&a. >> our road to the white house coverage continues tonight with ted cruz in lincoln, new hampshire. he is the featured speaker at this year's dinner. you can see that at 9:35 p.m. eastern here on c-span. >> the national press club heard from senator bernie sanders. the independent lawmaker talked

about economic policy and answered questions about the possibility of him running for president in 2016. this is one hour. john: >> good afternoon and welcome. my name is john hughes, i am an editor for bloomberg first word. and president of the national press club. the club is the world's leading professional organization for journalists. we are committed to our profession's future through programs such as this and we work for a free press worldwide. for more information about the club, this is our website, press.org. to donate to programs offered to our clubs journalism institute visit press.org/institute.

i would like to welcome our speaker and those of you attending today's events. our head table includes guests of the speaker as well journalists who are club members. members of the public attend our lunches so applies you hear is not necessarily evidence that journalistic integrity is lacking. [laughter] i would also like to welcome our c-span and public radio audiences. you can follow the action on twitter using the #npclunch. after the speech we will have a , question and answer period. i will ask each of our guests to stand briefly as their names are announced. from your right, mick bolick,

director of public affairs of the national conference of state legislatures. john heltman, covering the fed in the fsoc. bryant harris washington , correspondent for japan's largest newspaper. christopher gentlevisto. a journalist at huffington post. jane sanders, the senator's wife. [applause] a reporter at "usa today" and vice chair of the closest speakers committee. skipping over our speaker for a moment. a reporter for bloomberg news

and the committee member who organized today's event. thank you. [applause] the chief of staff for senator sanders. congress reporter for bloomberg first word. lacy crawford, jr., and phil contrino, chief analyst at boxoffice.com. [applause] senator bernie sanders is widely known in vermont simply as bernie. he began a life of activism as a student at the university of chicago, where he led a sit in two protest discriminatory housing policies. after graduating and living on an israeli cabinets, he moved to vermont and had a series of jobs in areas ranging from filmmaking

to carpentry. he ran and lost as a third-party candidate for several offices before winning a race for mayor of burlington in 1981. his margin of victory was 10 votes. sanders gained popularity by promoting burlington's local businesses, fixing potholes, and bringing a minor-league baseball team to town. vermonters elected him to the house in 1990 and to the senate in 2007. when sanders arrived on capitol hill, he was the only independent in the house. he has gone on to become the longest-serving independent in congressional history. he caucuses with the democrats and he has become the ranking member of the senate budget committee. sanders speaks out frequently on issues he is passionate about , such as cutting military spending, taking action to protect the environment, and working to reduce income inequality.

in 2010, he conducted a nearly nine hour filibuster against tax cuts for wealthy americans. so many people followed his effort online, that the senate video server crashed. these days, sanders is considering a bid in the 2016 presidential election and what better place would there be to announce such a bid and the national press club? [applause] not that we are suggesting anything here, senator. [laughter] sanders has also been tinkering with his crusty persona. as the boston globe recently wrote, "sanders is an issues oriented class warrior who has begun to loosen up on the stump, softening his crew grudgingly

demeanor with an occasional joke." [laughter] we at the national press club have also been known to relax our demeanors from time to time. we want to do that right now by giving a warm welcome to vermont senator bernie sanders. [applause] senator sanders: thank you very much. john, thank you very much for inviting me. let me thank all of you who are here this afternoon. before i begin the thrust of my remarks, let me give you a very short thumbnail sketch of my political life, because my journey here to washington, d.c. has been a little bit different than many of my senate colleagues. as john mentioned, i was born in brooklyn, new york in 1941.

my father came to this country from poland at the age of 17 without a penny in his pocket and without much of an education. i always think back about the extraordinary bravery that was his, as well as many other millions of people who came to to this country with so little. my mom graduated high school in new york city. my dad worked for almost his entire life as a paint salesman. we were solidly lower middle class. my parents, my brother and i lived in a small rent-controlled apartment. my dream was to move out of that apartment and buy a home. she died young and never realize that dream.

i learned what money means to a family and that is a lesson i have never forgotten. my wife jane and i have been married for 27 years. we have four great kids and seven beautiful grandchildren. and without trying to be overly dramatic about it, the reason what motivates me politically why i do what i do, is to make sure these kids and all of our children can live in a wonderful country and a wonderful world. representing the great state of vermont, as john indicated, i am the longest serving independent in american congressional history. i served 16 years in the house and as vermont's lone congressman, and in 2006 i was elected to the senate and reelected in 2012. i began my rather unusual political career back in 1971 as a candidate for the u.s. senate

on a small third-party called the liberty union, and i received 2% of the vote. not dissuaded, a year later i ran for governor of the state of vermont and received 1% of the vote. [laughter] not being the brightest light on the block, i ran again for the senate and received 4% of the vote and two years later i ran for governor and received 6% of the vote. i thought i would give the people of vermont a break and i retired from politics in 1976. remembering one particular guy who said, bernie, i promise i will vote for you if you promise me you will never run for office again. [laughter] in 1981, i was persuaded by friends to run for mayor of burlington, the largest city in

our state, against a five-term democratic mayor. i ran as an independent. nobody, but nobody thought that we had a chance to win. we did. in that very remarkable election, we put together an extraordinary coalition of workers and trade unionists, of environmentalists, of activists, of low income organizations, of women's groups. that type of coalition politics, bringing people together around a progressive agenda changed my my view of politics today. shapes my view of politics today. in a campaign that cost $4000, i, and the people who supported me, knocked on thousands of doors in the city, and let me tell you, it gets cold in vermont in march. on election night when the votes were counted, we won the working

class wards by something like two to one and won the election by all of 14 votes. it was the biggest political upset in modern vermont history , and after the recount, the margin of victory was reduced to 10 votes. without going to any great links here, i took office with 11 out of 13 members of the city council, democrats and republicans, in very strong opposition to my agenda. and trust me, if those of you in this room think that president obama has gotten a rough time from republicans, that was nothing compared to what i and my supporters experienced during my first year of office. a year later, a slate of candidates working with me defeated a number of incumbent obstructionists.

a year after that, in an election in which the voter turnout was almost doubled from what it was when i was first elected i easily defeated a , democratic and a republican candidate, and continue to get reelected. in 1988, i ran for the u.s. congress in a three-way race -- two years later, i ran that election with 16% more of the vote. a candidate who spent three times more money than anyone had ever spent before in our state's history, and ran a very, very negative race was who i was against.

in 2012, i won reelection with 71% of the vote. as mayor of burlington, my administration took on virtually every special and powerful interest in the city and in the state. against the wishes of developers and the railroads, we created a beautiful people oriented waterfront and bikeway along lake champlain. we developed the first land trust for affordable housing. we won national recognition for urban beautification by planting thousands of trees throughout the city, and we made major improvements in our streets and sidewalks. we implemented the largest environmental program then in the state's history by building a new wastewater facility to prevent untreated waste from going into the lake. we started a youth office which created a beautiful day care center a little league program,

, afterschool programs, all of which continue to exist today. we were the first city in vermont to break its dependence on a regressive property tax. we made changes to the police department, moving in the direction of community policing. we started a very active and successful arts program. the result for the last several decades, burlington has been considered to be one of the most beautiful and livable small cities in america, and i invite all of you not only to visit burlington, but to visit our beautiful state of vermont. in 1990, i became the first independent elected to the u.s. house in 40 years. during my first year there along with other house members, we formed a congressional progressive caucus that stands , as one of the largest and more important caucuses, doing a great job representing working families of our country. one of the first votes in the house i cast was against the first gulf war. i believe that history will

record that that was the right vote. [applause] as was the vote i cast years later against the war in iraq, a war which i consider to be one of the worst foreign-policy blunders in the history of our country. [applause] that were -- and i speak as the former chairman of the veterans committee,. i have learned what the cost that war is. that cost us not only be lives of thousands of beautiful and brave young men in women, but it also created the situation where today hundreds of thousands, 500,000 men and women have come

home from iraqi and afghanistan with posttraumatic stresses order and traumatic brain injury. they have come home with a loss of arms and legs and eyesight and their hearing. that is the cost of war. and before we get involved in another war, we should remember what war is really about. [applause] and that war in iraq also destabilized the entire region and opened up the can of worms that we now see. we are now fighting the barbaric organization called isis and we are deeply concerned about our remaining influence over iraq. while a member of the house financial resources committee i , was one of those who led the fight against the deregulation of wall street. an effort supported by both the

republican and democratic leadership. in retrospect, i think it is fair to say that most people today do not believe that it was a great idea to in glass-steagall and allow agreed regulus -- recklessness and unregulated activity on wall street to go unchecked. [applause] i also strongly oppose the trade agreements written by corporate america, and again supported by democratic and republican presidents, like nafta, cap to which have led this country into a race to the bottom. and needless to say, i strongly oppose the transpacific partnership trade agreement. [applause] while in the house, i took on

the pharmaceutical industry and the outrageous prices they charge our people and became the first member of congress to take americans across the canadian border to purchase prescription drugs there, and i will never forget that trip where women struggling with breast cancer bought the medicine they needed for 1/10 of the price in montréal that they were paying in the united states. [applause] and my understanding is today hundreds of thousands of people, sadly, have to continue buying their medicine in canada rather than local pharmacies. as the chairman of the senate veterans committee, i worked hard in a bipartisan way to pass the most significant veterans legislation passed in many, many years. this legislation put over $15 billion into improving veterans health care, and to making certain that the people who put their lives on the line to defend us get the best quality health care possible and get it

in a timely manner. and i have -- [applause] and one of the wonderful honors i have received in recent years is to be the recipient of the highest awards from the american legion and the vfw, and i'm very grateful to them for that. as someone concerned about health care and our dysfunctional health care system, i worked with jim clyburn to put some $12 billion into federally qualified community health centers which resulted in some 4 million lower income americans gaining access to health care, dental care, low-cost description prescription drugs, and mental health counseling.

we also significantly expanded the national health services board. the president was very supportive of these efforts, and in my view, this program has been one of the success stories of the affordable care act. as one of the leaders in the senate trying to combat the global crisis of climate change. i helped create the block grant program that put billions into energy efficiency and sustainable energy. several years ago, working with several of my colleagues, i found it the defending social security caucus and we were successful in beating back massive efforts to cut programs social security, and benefits from some of the most powerful people in this country and that is an effort i will continue to make. [applause] ? now, that is a very brief description of my life and

political history. let me go to something more important, and that is the future of our country. and what i am going to tell you now, i suspect not many people who come up here will talk about, but as someone who has been described as being too gruff, a grumpy grandfather, i have to live up to my reputation. so i will be gruff, i will be abrupt, and i will let you know what i think. today in a nation plagued by many, many concerns, the most serious problem we face is the grotesque and growing level of wealth and income inequality. [applause] this is a profound moral issue. it is a profound economic issue.

and as a result of citizens united, it is a profound political issue. this is the issue that impacts all other issues. job creation, health care, tax reform, climate change, the environment, education, you name it. they are all fundamentally impacted by income and wealth inequality. let me be very honest with you and tell you what very few elected officials will tell you. and that is that given the incredible power of the billionaire class over the economic life of this country, over politics, over media, i am absolutely convinced that the struggle for economic and social justice, the struggle for a strong middle class, the struggle for a vibrant democracy in which elections are not

bought by the wealthy will not be won in our lifetime and less an unprecedented grassroots movement is developed which is prepared to take on and defeat the power of the 1%. [applause] ? over this last weekend, my wife and i had the opportunity to visit selma, alabama and montgomery, alabama, along with many other members of congress and tens of thousands of citizens to honor the incredible bravery of those who marched and were beaten on bloody sunday 50 years ago. i was there with my good friend john lewis and many others. standing outside of martin luther king's small and modest dexter avenue church in montgomery, i was reminded that real change never takes place without struggle, without the

active participation of millions of people who are prepared to stand up and fight for justice people who are prepared to put their lives on the line in those struggles. these political battle of this time is not republicans versus democrats. it is not the political gains inside the beltway that preoccupy much of the media's attention, it is not the ugly 30-second tv ad that flood our airwaves. the challenge at this moment in our history is a declining middle class of millions of people working longer hours for low wages, if they are lucky enough to have jobs, against the power of a billionaire class whose greed has no end. [applause] it is the struggle of americans,

black, white, hispanic, asian, native american, women and men gay and straight. they are struggling for decent jobs any income to adequately take care of their families, struggling for retirement security, struggling for decent education for their kids, struggling for health care struggling for dignity against the greed and power of a few on top who apparently want it all. economically, the great middle class of our country once the envy of the entire world, has been in decline. despite exploding technology despite increased productivity despite the global economy and the increase in trade, millions of americans today are working longer hours for low wages and we have more people living in

poverty today than almost any time in the modern history of america. today, real unemployment is not 5.5%. real unemployment is a 11%, and if you include those workers who have given up looking for work or working part-time when they want to work full-time. [applause] youth unemployment is over 17%. and african american youth unemployment is near 30%. shamefully, we have by far the highest rate of childhood poverty of any major country on earth, and despite the modest success of the affordable care act, some 40 million americans continue to have no health insurance, while even more are underinsured, have heavy compliments -- copayments or

deductibles. we remain the only major industrialized country that does not guarantee to its people health care as a right, and that is a shame to my mind. [applause] now there are a lot of angry people all across this country. some of them from the occupy wall street movement. they consider themselves progressives. some are in the tea party movement and see themselves as conservatives. but let me give you a hint as to why we are angry and why they are angry. since 1999, the typical middle-class family has seen its income go down by almost $5,000 after adjusted for inflation. the median male worker made $683 $783 less last year than he did

42 years ago. are we better off than when bush left office? of course we are. anyone who does not understand the suffering, anxiety the middle class and working families of our country are expressing today has no idea what is going on in this country , and that is my perception on capitol hill. there is a world here on capitol hill that is very different from vermont and the rest of the country, and i think it is imperative we close that gap and begin to understand what is going on with the working families of this country. meanwhile