you find the extra hours worked outpaced the extra income people have gotten. it is a great thing for the economy that so many women have entered the labor force, particularly because women are attaining skills at a higher rate than particularly when compared to japan which has not seen that trend, but for all of that extra work and the next a benefit that women are bringing to the labor force by entering it, a typical household is not seeing the returns you would hope for. host: this is the census bureau poverty,ncome, insurance coverage, medium income, 2014 according to the --sus bureau, $53,000 $700 $53,700. overall, about 14%, 46 million

people of poverty rates by age, the elderly are 10%, the working years folks, 13.5% and under 18, 20 1% in the poverty arena. coverage -- let me find the right chart, significant drop and this is the real headline for this report. significant drop in the number of uninsured in the united states. much.you both very thank you everybody for watching and joining in the conversation. ♪

>> coming up in about three hours, governor gary herbert will talk about his initiative to highlight efforts by the nation's governors to solve problems at the state level. the governors speech at the national press club at 1:00 p.m. eastern on c-span. i wrote to the white house coverage continues this afternoon at 2:30 eastern as hillary clinton visits florida to speak at the grassroots organizing meeting. the labor department out with their latest jobs numbers for september. the u.s. economy added 142,000 jobs last month of unemployment rate remained at 5.1%. the hill.com adds that the jobless rate remains at the lowest level since april 2008 but this is the second month in road row to perform:

expectation. reactions this morning from john boehner and part of his statement where he says too many middle-class families are struggling in the economy instead of expanding washington's reach, the president ought to work with republicans to expand opportunity for every american. next up, several journalists covering the presidential campaign and they start up a couple of hours of interviews and conversations part of this week's washington ideas for posted by the aspen institute. al gore, catherine rogers, senator mike lee, cory booker, elizabeth warren and former secretary of state madeleine albright are all ahead. ♪ everybody looks great. good music. [laughter] >> we are going to help to keep

it in check for our 17 minutes talking about politics. we have some of the smartest people covering the campaigns on capitol hill, so we will jump right into it and i will start with the question we talked about upstairs which is i am going to do the thing that candidates paid at the debates which is the raise your hand game. if joe biden gets in the race, can you and the nomination? you changed the wording of the question. >> did i? ryan? do you want to put it at percent chance? ryan: i think he has a nonzero possibility, right? it is highly, highly unlikely that he could win unless hillary clinton collapses. >> i agree completely. popularity is a function of this relative isolation from

partisan politics and if he jumps into the race, there is a good chance that all of his -- becometory will suddenly more scrutinized and he will never for it. >> maria, teresa, isn't he the authentic candidate? the candidate of the obama administration? the candidate polling better in the general election? >> because he is not in. i think it is something we have to understand. he does not have the fundraising right now that is needed, and infrastructure to turnkey. i think what he is looking for is he is basically the democratic party's land b. if something -- parties plan b. comellary clinton can't back from something, he will step in >> but absent that, almost impossible. we know that at the end of the a, the deadlines will have closed, including texas and ohio, so if there is an

emergency break glass, he has to decide before the end of the year, can we agree? >> he has to get in. if you once to be the plan be candidate, he has to be running. there is an historical thing where no vice president or two-term president has ever sought their party's nomination and lost, so in a way, joe biden could have the historic run for president. i agree that there is a nonzero chance that he wins but he really is plan b. >> john, we will start with you and have everybody jump in. i know you as the guy covering "the hill" for these years, tell us about this quote from the soon-to-be former speaker john boehner. thingsre is a way to get done so i do not burden my successor, i am going to get it finished." what on earth does that mean? [laughter]

what does burgeoning his successor me? does that mean he will try to get some stuff push through that republicans don't lock -- don't like whether it is the transportation bill or something else? can he do that? you do immigration? john: he has been the only adult in the room for a long time and the recent kevin mccarthy is able to ascend is because john boehner has taken on the tough task and crackdown on the rebellions, the guy who has read up a budget bill and debt limit increases. i think what he is saying is he will try to figure out what he can get done that has not been done that does not destroy mccarthy. it is a pretty good idea of what would destroy mccarthy and i think a lot of stuff with destroy mccarthy. >> what would destroy mccarthy? think everything he has a gun. >> because he is one of the folks behind closed doors that advocates for immigration or is that white? john: i think that could reshuffled the republican

conference. he will have a window for a couple of weeks between the election and when the next speaker actually takes over and if you try to jam too much there is are, possibility they would look to vacate the chair as they planned to do with john boehner. i think he will have some leash but not a lot. maybe he will try to get a budget deal done but a bill that is longer for december. >> molly, do you think that is possible? , a budget that gets us out of this crisis moment that we seem to be in? molly: this has been an impossible dream for john boehner for years. heit were possible to do, would have moved heaven and earth to do it already. i think something we learned from the announcement of his exit was sort of how little goodwill they was for him. i do not think this is a conference disposed to give him a big legacy gift on his way out.

you saw the amount of celebrating there was among his fellow republicans when he announced he would not be speaker anymore. i do not think he is the only adult in the room, i think the majority of the republican conference are grown-ups and only a minority have the trouble but it is enough of them, and they represent enough of the party base that it is almost impossible to get the grown-ups together and did the grown-up thing. >> so the possibility of another government shutdown threat in december -- high? molly: it is always possible. we went to years without the shutdown. >> woah! [laughter] [indiscernible] molly: the point being that there was enough of a thought that things ran more or less smoothly for two years.

on the other hand, i get around this issue of planned parenthood i do not know. topics toto change donald trump because everybody wants to talk about him because why not? a number of you have written about the fact that he has picked. -- peaked, maybe we are on the other side of trump momentum. do you agree with this? what happens to him next and what about the rise of ben carson? >> i think trump's rise is exquisitely a function that he has received, depending on the week, 50% to 80% of all coverage of the presidential candidates who entered the race on june 16. if you look at the graph of media coverage and polls, it is almost a perfect correlation. since the second debate, he has dropped -- we have five polls or six national. and he has dropped and it is

rated about the rise. he has been eclipsed just a little bit by people like carson and free arena and the tone of the coverage is a little bit more hostile. i think for the first time, maybe this is a phenomenon that is not all that different than herman cain and shall document and rick perry and newt gingrich in 2011 and 2012 who had similar polling surges because they were in the news and then declined and people got a closer look. hitt now, if we actually peak trump, it would have been that second debate. master ofalso a getting himself in front of the cameras and keeping our attention on him, so i would not underestimate the ability to keep it going. i think there is a lot of mental energy that goes into describing what trump is and what the republican party is becoming because of trump. i am skeptical that most of those analyses that he is some new, right-wing european-style

candidate or the base of the republican party changing. i think it is mostly a function of him being the most famous name that you know about and when the pollster calls you at 6:00, he is the person you heard on the news and he is famous right now and that mostly explains his rise. [indiscernible] i think it is 50% that and 50% trump doesn't represent legitimate anxieties and fears within a nontrivial portion -- i trivial, a nontrivial portion of the republican party. this portion has always been there. it is not a new phenomenon in republican politics that because of trump's fame gives it more visibility. i think there is a temptation and you see this of candidates like ted cruz. you sought unsuccessfully with scott walker of trying to go office in the shape or form and that is a real thing that will persist as long as the nomination continues.

>> i think that is one of the reasons you see ted cruz betting up the trunk, knowing that he is on a dissent but he needs about-face. when you look at the republican party versus the democratic party, i would argue the republican party when you talk about carly fiorina, ben carson and donald trump, they know the american they are trying to win. they note the america they are trying to rally for better or worse. the democratic party is so disconnected for the most part about the majority of americans emerging, women, people of color, that you have a hard time again that connection. example, when you see bernie sanders, bernie sanders went to los angeles. a vast latino community and he felt at the staples center. one of my colleagues was excited and he causes data and to lay and asked if his dad was going to bernie sanders and his dad responded -- bernie who? there is a huge disconnect for who he is rallying for that does not necessarily reflect the

folks that he needs to win the presidency. >> i was just in iowa with them and it is interesting that you bring that up because i saw him at the latino heritage festival in des moines and the audience maybe 90%5% white, white and there were latinos and latinas that saw him but it was a small minority of the group. maybe 100 people, 120 people at most, but it was -- despite the fact that he was at the latino heritage festival, it was a super white crowd which struck me. >> i don't think sanders -- much like i don't think is a very classic democratic insurgent candidate. he is bill bradley kind of redeemed. he is the kind of person who will persist through the entire process but always at this -- he will never be able to get past a certain pass because he appears -- appeals to liberal white.

this is like the comparison to trump and sanders is instructive, we know that ideological base of bernie sanders. we have enough competitive lastratic primaries in the decade to know he is bill bradley, gary hart, howard dean and barack obama until he broke there was nonwhite voters. 20% to 30% sort of nationally that they will get against the big party establishment against a figure like hillary clinton. if you look at trump and the polls, he does not have an ideologically consistent base. some people say that he is winning evangelicals, business conservatives and however else you want to size up the republican electorate and i look and say that is a sugar high from fame being in the news because he does not have an ideologically coherent face in the republican party. it is all over the place. i think that is a big difference between him and sanders. >> i think it is what you see right now in the house with this because we can say that on stage, hell, no.

but those guys are not ideologically together. you cannot define them by region or by ideology. basically, i want to run the place down and i think trump has tapped into that and the question is, and i agree that the polls come down and it says there is a moment when we see the teflon wearing thin the little bit and he is being scanned, but the question is how low does he go? how strong is that base of -- i just want to rip everything up? i think it is a significant portion of the republican party and if there are other candidates in the race to several states, donald trump could basically take off. >> i think what you bring up is rather interesting. has he done so much damage to the republican brand that it does not matter who the republican party runs because of that? the idea that he will not attract women and people of color based on what he is talking about. i think that is where all of us in the republican party has to have a deep conversation. you want to be a party that

controls the house or do they want to be a party that controls the white house? that is their challenge right now. >> and i think you bring up another important point which is it points to the failure of the rest of the field of any other candidates to be compelling enough to surpass trump. the reason he is in first place with 20%, sci-fi percent of the vote is no other candidate has imaginations in that way. the only other candidates are outside of candidates. the ones that the establishment had pinned so much hope on, particularly jeb bush, have had a hard time getting voters interested in the candidacy. assuming that trump is not going to go away on his own, somebody has got to do better than him for him to stop being in first place. >> i wonder, how they failed to get the voters interest or the media's interest? [indiscernible] republican party created this

scenario. how long can you go saying that you want to tear down government? that you don't want political insiders tell when your party? how long before the candidates a produce are outside of the game? i think that is one of the reasons they are challenged. >> don't shed some many tears, there is a lot of commentary about shutting tears for john boehner, but he built the majority on a certain ideology and style of politics and you cannot be shocked when the people you bring in [indiscernible] so they had a huge tea party rally outside the capital. michele bachmann put it together at some of the conservatives and the big question is -- is john boehner going to come to this? you considered the crazier of the house that not only did he go to it but he walked them out. yellow tieore the which was the color of the two parties so he was like, i am in. >> he was both feet and. >> john boehner is a french revolutionary who gets eaten by his own evolution.

-- own revolution. [laughter] >> i want to go to democrats because i agree with you that republicans may be doing some damage and they have already done serious damage to their brand with minority communities, younger voters. at the same time, this idea of the obama coalition transferring hillary clinton also has to be questioned, especially to among african-american voters. todo pay a lot of attention latino voters, we should, but if you look at the margin of victory for barack obama, it was eggs to african-american voters in places like ohio, florida. can hillary clinton get that same level of turnout and can she excite that coloration? >> it is a bit of an open question among political scientists who agree that whether obama's turnout of blacks was obama or was it obama being familiar enough with my politics to engage black civic groups and organizations and the

entire realm of black community life into an effort to get. for obama and the democratic party? i tend to lean toward the latter's that this is a function thentense organization that fact that he was a black candidate. my case study for that is the 2008 -- the recent virginia editorial election where they were able to get obama levels of turnout among african-americans following a very similar strategy. [laughter] : --y >> so it is the latter of that engagement that there is nobody better insight democrat politics than the clintons in terms of organizing constituencies in order -- and energizing them. >> i actually think a lot of folks are betting that that emerging majority of the obama campaign will transfer to hillary. when you are on the ground and talk to her natural base, which

is women, and they are not excited, i think there is an enthusiasm gap we are not talking about. i actually think the challenges, if let's say trump all of a sudden disappears and the caustic language around him disappears with anti-women, and for everybody, unfortunately -- [laughter] mean is not necessarily she is a shoo-in because she has to get folks a vision of future that they can buy into. assured't mean she is that if you talk about the general election, you are talking about working the inside system. she is pretty good at that. but she has to energize. >> the function of campaigns is to get people energized and engaged and if hillary clinton is a nominee, then people start paying attention in the summer. is mechanistically getting engaged. i tend to think presidential

elections are very mechanistic and if i were a democrat, i would not be too worried about being engaged in politics. i think that will solve itself. >> we are out of time. that was fantastic. we have to wrap up asap. thank you all very much. thank you to our panel and we will head out this way, right? [applause] ♪ good morning. [applause] thank you very much, margaret and thank you for coming anti-right to vice president out cold for joining us. thank you for making the effort. yesterday on a blog on the atlantic's eye, the vice president has something to talk about that you may not be expecting. tore are things we will get that you will expect given have political expertise and the things you know about what he has been doing in the year since

the vice presidency, the nobel peace prize, the two oscars, the two number one bestsellers and other things of that sort, blah, blah, blah, as they say. i got to immerse myself in these things in an article about what vice president gore has been up to joel b in "the atlantic" in about 10 days. and those of you at the conference have it in your conference application. that is what i want to ask you about. i have to queue up the question because we were not supposed to talk about your achievements in this realm yourself. there is a company called generation investment management based in london, which vice president gore was a cofounder of the chairman. it is now reporting what is achieved over the last 10 years and the 10 years since you started managing many in the global equity market. in the 10 years, which included to multiple around the world, the huge financial crash of 2008, the bubble that preceded that, everything in europe, china, you could go on and on.

the average for msci global equities was 7%. large managedl return, which.7% you figure out is barely above, once you remove the fees from an index fund would have been. the average forum generations main fund in the last 10 years versus the 7% base was 12.1%. points aboveasis what the market has done. of all the 200 major management firms that the company in london surveyed, generation was absolutely the number two in the return over the past 10 years. based on this track record of having succeeded in the way that the financial markets care about has, vice president gore gone public on what that means because there is something unusual in the weight you have made this much money and what is

that? vice president gore: thank you for inviting me, the setup, i want to briefly thank david bradley and james bennett for guiding this amazing magazine and walter isaacson who is guiding the aspen institute and what you guys have done together is amazing. what is unique and different about the news, if you will, that you referred to is that my partners at generation and i set out 11 years ago, we spent the first year setting this up, we set out to invest in a completely different way by fully integrating environmental factors and social factors, ethical factors, sustainability in large into every part of the investment process. our mission has been to prove

the business case that it investors, rather than assuming sociale environment governance factors are more or less extraneous and kind of distractions that will hurt their returns if they pay attention to them, if instead the investment process is designed to fully integrate them into every part of the analysis and all the decision-making, you can actually enhance returns. we have only had 10 years and i have learned to knock on wood and whatever this is. there has got to be would in there somewhere. wood in there somewhere. but 10 years is long enough to give some evidence that there really is a basis for believing that the conventional wisdom in markets about sustainability is wrong, and that fully

integrating these factors does not cause a trade of values for value, it does not lead to lesser returns, it can and if skillfully executed, this process can enhance returns. >> this is a point that struck me when i was at their colleagues in london, we are used to thinking of socially responsible investing as being a kind of tax, something you do as you can afford to but you argue it is the root to higher returns. vice president gore: absolutely. in the mainstream investment marketplace, there is a little a cold stove problem. the farm -- the famous mark twain story. >> explain it to us. [laughter] vice president gore: no, why don't you? >> there is a risk to my piece about how much vice president gore was exciting things. vice president gore: so let me

explain. we make sure some of that. [laughter] mark twain once said the captain burned on a hot stove will not sit on the hot stove again but won't sit on a cold stove either. a lot of investors learned from the 1960's and 1970's version of so-called ethical investing back in the anti-apartheid years, which was successful in killing apartheid but they learned that using a negative checklist or screen actually hurts returns. when somebody brings up sustainability in the modern era, they instinctively recoil. it is a cold stove problem. now a new generation of investors of which we would like to believe at generation we are leading the way toward the new realization that if you fully integrate these factors and it correctly, you do not lose returns, you really do increase returns and there are a lot of reasons for it.

of researchference that tends to support the proposition that we began putting forward one decade ago. >> let me ask you to questions about the difference in think your example can make. your generation on the one hand is relatively sizable, $12 billion under management now. a tenure record and it manages 400 times that many. a firm likehink yours will make a difference in finance at large? and second, the kinds of companies you investing, some of them are ones i have never heard of and they do environmental stuff and others are fairly mainstream companies. how do think you will make a difference in finance and with the kind of companies you support? vice president gore: first of all in markets, when a new model is proven over a sufficient to produce better results, it attracts imitators, it attracts interest from those who want to do better, and as

you said, it is a darwinian process. successful,odel is then people pay attention to that. we hope that they will. and there is some evidence that they are. -- you manage risk better for one thing. you unlock investment opportunities better. we have used the spectrum analogy and you explain that fairly well in the piece, extremely well, but just to quickly use it because it is a simple way of communicating this. the portion of the electromagnetic spectrum you can see with your eyes is very tiny, but i spent eight years in the white house starting everyone you with a cia briefing, after you may have read, collected information from the full spectrum. the resulting picture was far more complete.

same way, what comes across the bloomberg screens and the quarterly reports and the kinds of reporting that has standard in the industry is a narrow slice. how does the company deal with employees? how does the community in which they and the supply chain operates? those things turn out to be extremely significant. early on, we invested in bp. doing some very interesting things. then they expanded into north america and we -- our analysts again to suspect that the safety culture and environmental culture that they had in the u.k. had not been extended into north america. long before duke water horizon, the cause of these concerns, they noticed a refinery fire in texas, a pipeline accident in alaska, they dug deeper and said

we have to get out of this and we did. not too long after that, the deepwater horizon event took place. it was avoidable but most conventional analyses did not include their safety culture, their environmental management. the point is that is not just a feel-good ads on, it is central to the success or failure of a business like that. in other kinds of businesses like financial service business, the human culture is really central, and if you understand more about how they are managing their people and how they are spreading their values throughout the workforce, you will learn more than simply looking at these quarterly reports. make a little joke in the piece about how you spend half your time on climate reality and have to, technology and another half a generation and another half on something else. --h what half of your time

what do you anticipate doing on the sustainable capitalism beat? is this something that you have to pen your record and be an active in public debater? gore: absolutely. my cofounder and i have been writing a lot of office in "the wall street journal," "financial times," etc. and in the trade press that serves financial services industry. we give i percent of profits to a foundation that focuses on sustainable capitalism. there is an ideological hegemon in the world a democratic capitalism. both halves of that compound ideology are now under seized, democracy has been hacked, is in need of reform, serious reform. the short term is and that has been the mode by buy some of the leaders of the biggest firms in global markets is really hampering the success of

capitalism in building value and reaching his goals. the repeat and increasingly frequent crises that now radiate globally and much more frequently because of the emergence of earth inc. and interconnected global economy, the ignoring of central factors like the failure to measure the impact of negative externalities like pollution and the depletion of natural resources, positive externalities like the investment in public goods, inequality of wealth and income. now we see these financial reports that say gdp has gone up the .5% and then you look closer and median income has gone down 3.5% and solution has gone way up, depletion of resources has gone way up, and inequality has gotten out of control, and there of investment like

public goods like education, health care, environmental protection and this is to everywhere the dominant version of democratic capitalism is being pursued. that needs to be changed. in the capitalism part of that, it is really important to adopt the kinds of reforms that more and more people are seeing are greatly needed. >> there is a lot more to say about generation of sustainable capitalism and i've refer to the next issue of "the atlantic." vice president gore: i have to say one other thing. i do not want to fighting publicly on stage, i have been doing this for 10 years -- i do not want to fly there you publicly on stage but i have learned a lot and i commend you. much and tovery live for the time your people spent on it. we could spend hours or days with their view on the world's climate situation. if you were to spend three

minutes or four minutes giving us what we should think of as the state of events and the despair versus progress versus next up, what is the overview on al gore's sense of the climate as of 2015? gore: if you do an analysis to a sporting event, we are behind on the scoreboard. the time is running down, but the momentum has shifted. everybody can feel it and there is just enough time on the clock to score enough points to actually win. i think we are winning. i think that we have just in the last couple of years begun to cross the tipping point. you see it with the pope's visit to the united states, you see with china's announcement of a capping trade system with president obama's success in mandating reductions in co2, and

interest, we will get an agreement in december. what do i mean when we are behind on the scoreboard? we are still on a global basis putting 110 million tons of heat trapping pollution into the atmosphere every single day. the cumulative amount of man-made global warming pollution is now -- is not trapping as much heat energy in the atmosphere as would be released by 400,000 hiroshima class atomic bombs exploding every day. that is a conservative measurement. todid deny lists were able pick apart that statistic, they went cap. it is a conservative estimate the most goes into the ocean so in a hurricane like the one off the east coast right now picks up energy from the warmer a new categoryrs of threat. that is what happened with superstorm sandy. when the ice melts and the sea

level rises, i was in miami the last three days, there were fish swimming in the streets of broward county and miami beach streets and they now have what they call a sunny day putting with a saltwater comes out of the storm drains. they are spending $400 million to raise the seawall and put in ponds and these are temporary measures. we have to take action. it really represents a collision between the way we have organized human civilization and the surprisingly fragile ecological system of the earth and the most formal part of which is the very thin atmosphere. we have quadrupled population, our technology is more powerful and the short-term thinking that what is reflected in our current capitalism and also in our politics and culture is driving this collision. the people are awakening to it. i do think that the most exciting source of hope is that

the engineers and scientists and business investors have come up with a stunning cost down curb with sharp decreases in price for electricity from solar energy and it is cheaper than electricity from coal and lots of places and this has shifted investing toward renewable energy in a massive way. this is oversimplified, but if there was a single thing you would like people listening to you to do or to think or to change, what is the next steps you would most like an audience to do? vice president gore: it is important to change to efficient lightbulbs, windows and so forth that more important to change laws. solve the climate crisis, we really have to address the democracy crisis. andus another hold subject we may or may not want to get into that here, but individuals can have more influence than they realize.

when you go into the marketplace, businesses actually do pay a lot of attention to the increasing numbers that are asking for greener products and technologies, and the business community is leading the political community now. it is really incredible. we need to restore the vitality of democracy so that special interest are not completely in control so that the public interest is once again lifted up and this is the principal issue where that has happened. to the is a nice segue final topic. most people who sat in the chair in the last 1.5 days and asked if they would run for president -- vice president gore: how many people have you asked? >> i have not asked. vice president gore: are you thinking about it? [laughter] i would support that. [laughter] >> i happen to be a national when they drafted al gore, so can -- are you even considering

a draft al gore movement or what would be your reaction? vice president gore: i have overused the answer i will give you but i am a recovering politician. [laughter] the longer i go without the relapse, the less likely one becomes. [laughter] let me ask about the landscape you survey. you had number one best-selling book called ". being sold on reason" would you apply the logically. there to the republican field now, in particular mr. trump. you talked about the debasement on democratic discourse. what you make of the republican spectacle now? [laughter] vice president gore: it is really something, isn't it? it is astonishing to me. all, here is what i think has been happening and i think there is a big wheel turning slowly and we are now in a phase where our politics

really have been graded and democracy has been hacked. that is a metaphor of course that refers to the operating system being taken over so it no longer works for the owner. the american people are being left out of the equation. there is a lot of evidence for this. interests and the holders of big amounts of money now make all the relevant decisions? here is what i think is the underlying cause. founded,country was the information ecosystem, forgive the clunky phrase, was formed by the printing press and it had certain characteristics where individuals could easily enter the public square and exchange ideas. if their ideas had all you, then others might glom onto them in the critical mass and it could like emerge. the freedom of press had to be protected before the constitution was ratified. more often than not,

were treated according to a meritocracy of ideas. in the middle of the 20th century, in particular the last third, television pushed the printing press off of center stage and now, still, the politicians spend 75% of the money on 32nd tv ads. 30 secondation -- on tv ads. the information is different from printing press because individuals can no longer enter easily -- they are gatekeepers who charge rents. television stations and networks collect tons of money, so who gets in? well, corporate advertising is dominant and local candidates have to spend three quarters of their time, that is what is going on right now, they can rich people and special interest for money in order to get into the television square. what that means is human nature

being what it is, they begin to think more about what is the big donors and what they want them to do and they think less about how their constituents are going to react. final point, this wheel continues to turn and now internet-based media are beginning to push television off the center of the stage. and the internet actually recapitulates some of the favorable aspects of the print universe in that individuals can get into the conversation more easily. we now see everyday bloggers who have taken the time to dig deeply and find out the truth of things, getting other people climbing onto their ideas. if it goes on and, then they can have enough power to change the course of the debate. i am optimistic, but the most urgent task is to accelerate the migration of democratic forms

and principles into the internet age so that individuals can take part again. the wisdom of crowds, kind of a buzz phrase that has come out of internet business in recent years, the wisdom of crowds is the real thing. it is a really important reality in our lives. the reason why the united states of america rose to the position of leader in the community of nations over a century and a half was because he harvested the wisdom of crowds with this wonderful software called the u.s. constitution to make better decisions than any other nation. now we have begun to make really stupid decisions. -- we invaded iraq because three quarters of a spot saddam hussein was responsible for the world trade center. hello! we sold 7.5 million subprime mortgages to people who got the who was not present --

thought the risk was not present because even know they cannot make monthly payments, there were lots of them and they were lumped together and they were sold into the global market as soon as people began to look carefully and they said, oh, my god, they have no value. now we have $21 trillion of sub prime carbon assets. we are challenged to make the right decision where that is concerned. the day before yesterday, mark carney, the head of the central bank in the u.k., gave an amazing speech which i commend to you about the risk to the global economy inherent in the stranded carbon assets and called upon the u.k. business community to look at the fact that they are over invested in carbon and to look at the enormous opportunities that are inherent in the carbon eyes in, ing,alling -- decarboniz installing solar equipment and one final point -- when we were founded in the great depression, the global economy is lifted up i was about to give up by the mobilization detached of them

here at the post post -- the post-world war ii was brought about partly because there was a shared conviction that we needed to do things differently. but that the united nations, world bank, imf, nato, new trade agreement and the world moved in the same direction and a lock that amazing economic dynamism. now we are in an economic system where the conventional tools for lifting it up, much less recovering, if we had another downturn in the business cycle which does happen from time to time, usually they drop interest rates by 4% or 5% and now they are zero. traditional tools do not work. we need an inspiring, collective , global, morley-based mission to create hundreds of millions of new jobs and we just happen to have such a mission. save theoduct, we can future of human civilization. >> that celtic a great plan. thank you very much. [applause] thank you. ♪ >> congresswoman cathy mcmorris

rodgers and jonathan. ♪ jonathan: i like the walkout music. congressman, you are the chair of the house of the republican conference. just to be clear so everyone knows what that means, you are the one that is supposed to bring the house republicans together. you actually convened the meeting, -- wow. the 247woman rogers: republicans from every corner of this country bringing us together. speaker boehner's announcement sentiday has spent -- shockwaves throughout capitol hill and the country. jonathan: let's be clear, that announcement came at your meeting. , swimming: that is to, a regular gathering of the house -- alike, swimming: that is true. a regular gathering of the house

and i leave the meeting each week and i had just invited speaker boehner to come to the podium and give his remarks when i was clipped this little note that said -- the speaker is going to be announcing his retirement. [applause] jonathan: you had no indication before. and youwoman rodgers: read it and go, what does this mean? was going onwhat and i stood there and listened to him announce his news. it was unexpected. i really thought that we were in a better place. the pope had just been to capitol hill for the first time for the pope to visit, address a joint session of congress, and he did such a positive day for congress. and obviously the speaker decided later on that evening on thursday evening that, you know what? my be time for me to go. jonathan: the news broke and

there was the family values forum going on with the presidential candidates. the presidential candidates, including marco rubio, ted cruz, they were celebrating this news as it was a great victory. in the case of ted cruz, they got john boehner had been vanquished. he is the republican speaker of the house. how do you assess his legacy because so many other republicans have been so critical and ungracious since he left. what is his legacy and what kind of the speaker was he? i hadsswoman rodgers: the opportunity to work closely with him and i believe that he was the right man at the right time to be leading us. it did not mean that every member agreed with every decision. and there was a lot of people suggesting that speaker boehner

should have made different decisions, could have gotten something done on more than what he did. what i saw in speaker boehner was someone that was trustworthy. out, thaty in and day is why he remained speaker as long as he did. the members really did trust him when they told him something. they knew that he was not playing games. and in the second part was that he made decisions based upon what he thought was good and right for america at the end of the day. every --e, i may not always agree with every decision but you have to respect someone who is willing to make the tough decisions at times. a be something that maybe not did not -- did not go over well with the republican party but some of you was really trying to do, day in and day out, what was best for the country and what was going to improve people's lives. acts,an: one of his last because he doesn't step down until the end of the month, but

one of his last act was to bring up the bill yesterday to find the government temporarily justin december 11. i was amazed to watch that yesterday. you voted against a government shutdown yesterday. 151 house republicans voted to shut down the government. conference when you have that many willing to say, just because we are not getting everything we want, we are not willing to pass the bill that would keep the lights on? for thoseman rodgers: republicans who voted against the resolution to keep the government open, i believe it was the message to the senate and president. there is a lot of frustration that we have not been doing our basic job, i responsibility of getting a budget in place. that is ready fundamental. every year, the federal government needs to get a federal budget in place. that is how you keep the government running an operating. there were high hopes, high

expectations that in january of this year, for the republicans especially having a republican -- aliken the senate jonathan: you are should be able to do it just like that, right? we wentwoman rodgers: to work on the appropriations bill and the house -- this was a high priority for us to get these appropriations bills done because that is the way that we assert the power of the purse. that is the way that, we as legislators, really make clear what we do not agree with the executive branch and what they may be doing, if we want to address funding levels, not fund certain programs, that is where we get to really assert our power. it was very disappointing. it was very frustrating that not one of those bills passed the senate. jonathan: this was a striking vote because it is only to keep the government running

temporarily so you can negotiate a long-term deal. because it would have continued government funding as it is and as it has been were ages, which includes funding for planned parenthood -- congresswoman rodgers: it did not include funding. jonathan: but it did not cut off? : the moneyan rodgers has already been spent. jonathan: so because it did not cut off the funding, majority of republicans said they would rather see the government shutdown? this would not have passed it on the democrats did not vote yes. you voted yes, leadership voted yes, but most republicans voted no. commerce woman r -- there isoman rodgers: a frustration with the status quo on capitol hill and i think this vote underscores the is status quoich

and it is across the board. i think we are seeing that in the presidential played out, when republicans and democrats, see country wants to congress function. they want us to get things done, they want as to make decisions, they think is best for the people that we represent. there are a whole bunch of people and they see the arguing and dysfunction and they are sick of it. it is reflected in the members, too. jonathan: now becomes kevin mccarthy's problem and you assume like i do he will be the next speaker of the house. odgers: yes.n r jonathan: good luck to kevin mccarthy. i believe john boehner was the one who was singing his name and not mccarthy. he faces intense witticism for what he said about the benghazi committee. he suggested the benghazi committee was responsible for bringing down hillary clinton's poll numbers so that people see her as untestable, i think that stable, i think that

was his word. [laughter] what do you make of what he said about that? i believeman rodgers: hillary's poll numbers reflect people who do not view her as trustworthy. i think there are a lot of questions related to whether or not she has been forthright, whether she has cooperated. it has been difficult to get the e-mails, etc., but i do believe that the work that we are doing in the benghazi committee is imported. it is important that we know what happened that evening in benghazi. we have to responsibility to do that. hado not -- we have not yet important questions answered. fou americans died and it is appropriater that the legislative branch -- that they get the answers. >> you are lying!

i do notoman rodgers: care who is in the white house or secretary of state the american people, this is where the legislative branch has responsibility to hold the ministrations accountable and to ask the appropriate questions and that is at the benghazi committee is seeking to do. and trey gowdy is an honorable man, he is a former prosecutor who knows how to go about it and he has done it in the way -- i would encourage you to look at the way he has approached this. he has approached it in a way where he is asking questions he it political. jonathan: when you disappointed when you heard mccarthy say what he said? why did he say what he said? he seemed to be say, look, we did this and her poll numbers came down. it looked like the committee was designed to bring down hillary clinton. from dayoman roders:

one, this committee and trey gowdy has made effort about getting answers as far as what happened that evening. and we have a responsibility to do that. jonathan: what will happen when we get to december and now it is going to be mccarthy's problem and you have to come up with a more enduring solution for doing all the congress of what they still have to do, including the function of keeping the government-funded. how we get agreement among this group that you have to convene together every week when they cannot even agree on a temporary funding measure? we needwoman rodgers: to do our jobs. we need to come to the table, we need to negotiate. jonathan: compromise. yes.esswoman rodgers: we need to figure out how to reach common ground and move forward. i think we recognize -- i recognize that we have got -- it

is in our best interest to keep his government-funded and we will debate funding levels, we and debate priorities, republicans will bring certain priorities to the table, democrats will bring certain priorities to the table. this is regular order. there are a lot of calls for regular order and regular order is when the house produces a product, the senate comes to a conference committee or you come together and you figure out how you can agree on something to move forward. jonathan: paul ryan got together with patty murray and you are able to come up with a solution to avert a crisis for two years but now that has expired and you have the debt ceiling and we face the possibility of default, and you have got this question of how to fund the government. with the planned parenthood issue. a large portion of your conference, the conference is in the house, said they would rather shove the government down then see pug parenthood continue to get funding.

wantare saying they do not to raise the debt ceiling the matter what. how do you deal with that? congresswoman rodgers: what we proposed as it relates to planned parenthood, and these videos cap raised serious concerns and it is appropriate that we do an investigation, so we are going to be launching an investigation. we have been calling for a one-year hold on the funding that would go to planned parenthood, transferring it to federally qualified clinics. and allows some time to really ask some questions. there should not be taxpayer funding used for abortion. jonathan: which is the current law. rogers:woman through our investigation, we are going to ask those questions. we are going to get some clarity. i think people should recognize paththat is an appropriate

for us to take, and a thoughtful approach to some really concerning videos that have been released. jonathan: that will be quite a battle. we don't have much time left, i have to ask you about the presidential campaign. morning, thes current front-runner is still a york, donaldm new trump your what are the chances that he is the republican nominee? congresswoman rogers: i don't see it happening. donald trump is an excellent entertainer. his slogan, "make america great," has struck a chord. i'm very proud of the fact that we have a diverse field. exciting to see republicans -- we have senators, governors, people from the private sector that have been very successful. i look at where we are as a

party. the republicans, we want to be a party of the future. we want to be the party that is really embracing new ways, challenging the status quo, and addressing outdated models that are not meeting the needs feared look at these agencies. look in the budget the administration -- look at the veterans administration. these are outdated models. in the house right now, we have the next generation of conservative leadership. we have had two thirds of the republicans in the house elected in the last five years or less. there has been a lot of turnover, a lot of new blood. are people who ran for office because they are really concerned about the direction this country is taking. even more fundamental than that, there is a fundamental fear that

we are losing our government, losing representative government. when you see so made decisions being made outside of congress, being made by the administration, by the executive branch, or the judicial branch. no matter if you are republican, democratic, or independent, you should believe in the power and decision-making that belongs in the legislative branch. that is what i believe is the number one priority right now, to restore trust and confidence in the legislative branch, on behalf of the people of this country. if we could do our job, figure out how to be more effective in the legislative branch, restore the trust on capitol hill, i believe that is the best thing we can do for people across this country. jonathan: it will be quite a challenge in the weeks ahead. thank you very much. i appreciate it. ♪

jonathan: let me make sure i have this right, you are republican, and you are democrat. [laughter] jonathan: you have been working together for a long time, on what always used to be a hot button issue that divided democrats and republicans. the issue of sentencing reform at criminal justice. by the way, you're not just any republican. you tend to be a little bit to the right. i mean, i don't know there's anyone further to the right in the senate. there may be people further to the left, but not many. how did you end up working together? senator booker: the rush to -- ease bipartisan minimums increased minimums was a bipartisan rush.

we were all participating in it. in terms of senator lee, to say we weren't working together, diminishes him and elevates me, in the sense that senator lee was working on this issue far before i came into the senate. as ame about it prosecutor. he got to witness many of these cases. he brought in authenticity, and understanding, to this that was extraordinary. by the time i joined the senate, almost two years ago, some of my earliest conversations were with them to get that emerging group in the senate to push for what we announced today, which was a copperheads of criminal justice bill, some of the core pillars of which, he has been advocating for for years. jonathan: republicans for years would run against immigrants by saying, "soft on crime."

here, you come out, senator lee, and say, maybe we swung a little too far in the other direction. is wer lee: what we see can be tough on crime by being smart on crime. it is not always the answer to ratchet up the sentences. it is not always the best way to fight crime. it comes under two minutes cost. a lot of republicans approach this from the standpoint of looking at the financial cost of incarcerating that many people. i look at the human cost. we have a whole lot of people, a lot of husbands, fathers, uncles, nephews, and brothers, locked up a lot longer than they need to be for nonviolent crimes. as corey said, i came at this as a former federal prosecutor. i witnessed a case in utah, where i worked, where there was

a young man in his mid-20's, father of two young children, he made some mistakes. he sold marijuana on three occasions. he had a firearm on his person. the way that federal sentencing laws work, it produced a 55 year minimum mandatory sentence. he will be in prison until he is 80, without some meaningful reform. i remember when that case was n opinion was issued, where it was said that congress tied his hands. there's no reason we should lock him up until he is 80. jonathan: i want to take a step back to you too. we are living through this era where the political divide is as ieep as it has ever been -- even heard some of it in here,

when i was talking to kathy -- kathleen morris rogers. we had a member of congress boycott the pope's speech. what do you do when you hang out ? what your colleagues say about that? [laughter] senator booker: that part of it occurs a lot more commonly the people might think. whereare a lot of issues we don't disagree. i see this as one issue where we can attack problems that we agree upon as republicans and democrats. this is a problem with an available solution that is neither conservative or liberal, republican, or democratic. it is simply an american issue. it comes naturally to people like me and senator booker. jonathan: why does almost never happened then? senator lee: first of all, i am

new to the senate, and my experience as a mayor, is you just have to fix things. there's no the or republican way to fix a problem. for me, the urgency of being a big city mayor, every day, i your partywhat is, if your house is on fire, you don't stop and ask the firefighter if they are republican or democratic. the governor of my state is republican, the biggest city and the state needs to have a partnership with him. i said to have, but separate the 95% of things that we disagree on, and find the fibers of .hat we agree on when i got to the senate, i do the strategy had to be the i was going to the senate to do the only thing you can do to get things done, which is work with people on the other side. , there has to be a

compromise. from the get-go, out of the block, i would say the overwhelming majority of legislation i have answered -- my first piece of legislation with tim scott on workforce apprenticeships, other countries , to theing us behind criminal justice work i'm doing with my glee. i try to find those areas where there is bipartisan support. jonathan: you have been very critical of the republican , an independent force in the senate. what is your sense, on the democratic leadership, do you look back at harry reid's leadership of the senate, did he not do enough to find and of common ground with republicans? senator booker: i really not one of -- i really not one of those guys they get stuck casting stones.

alle is for stone casting -- right. [laughter] grassley, therman chairman of the judiciary committee -- my biggest issue, in many ways, when i come to the senate, after i saw the destructive impact of the criminal justice system on a city like new york, that is over 80% minority. we have a criminal justice system that is so biased, influenced by the wealthy and privileged. in fact, you get treated better if you are wealthy and guilty then if you are poor and innocent sometimes. chuck grassley was giving speeches on the senate floor that i radically disagreed with. his leadership was a block to reform. i could have started out by a attacking him, but instead, i sat with him, and began

conversations with him, and worked overtime to a point where allre today, where we are praising each other in a press conference that we just came from. of thisrty shenanigans leadership is doing this, that leadership is not doing that -- i am trying to work below all of that noise, because i think it is not productive. we know that the debt issues in our country will be severe if we don't start dealing with things like social security, the medical expenses for this country, where we are paying much more than our competitor nations. --oke around, trying to find one of my first votes against something that the president signed was the farm bill. i don't see how we are subsidizing the very things that are making us sick.

i don't understand that. [applause] assad allies on the republican side who were with me. to getthat is the way things done. i know we are in a town -- i always say that democracy is not a spectator sport, but in this town, people sit back with their popcorn, and root for red or blue. as have got to be a place where we get back to the governing. , and our generation, this is what do stresses me, and we're both passionate about it. we used to be the top nation in graduates -- top nation in the glow in all of these industries indices. we have fallen on everything.

one of the things that they target for is having a dysfunctional political system. invite, you have a choice to make every single moment of your acceptce, to excep things for how they are, or try to change things. ofave become such a fan senator lee, who i disagree with on a lot of things, but we have found some common ground. [applause] can you find common ground on those tougher issues? fundamentally agree on this issue of criminal justice reform, but you can do something like social security, spending priorities. there are a lot of lines in the sand drawn -- on your site, you will never agree to revenue increases.

be repealed,t absolutely not a dime for planned parenthood. how do you find common ground on the big issues? senator lee: we are not always going to agree on the big issues. experiences like this one, and working on criminal justice reform, can be a confidence building exercise for us, where we were not able to come together. we did not always have the same priorities, but we were able to identify some common priorities. depending on the level of abstraction that you start at, you can find some common principle. the well-being of the american people, or something specific. i think there's always potential for agreement. jonathan: let's get to one tough one. guantanamo bay. wantsesident desperately to see it shut down before the

end of his term. where are you on that? you have fewer and fewer detainees, and the cost becomes overwhelming. is there possible, ground? it could be there forever, couldn't? senator lee: it is difficult to say. if we were to move in that russia, i would want to know what the alternative is. if i would hear a reasonable proposal, i would consider it. jonathan: you're not completely adamantly opposed to the idea of shutting it down? senator lee: i would not call the existence of guantanamo bay prime directive from which i cannot depart. it is not something britain into the constitution that we have to adhere to. jonathan: the way some people talk about it, you might get the sense it is. senator lee: it might be for some, it is not for me. senator booker: my sense is i

have traveled the state of new jersey more than most new jerseyans. i have met with the wealthiest suburbs, the poorest, orthodox jews. can tell you, i've never heard anyone from i say talk about guantanamo. [no audio] [laughter] i have heard people talk to me about social security, or the tax system. what i scanned the horizon for is things that matter for my state. i'm not saying that this does mostatter, but with the valuable resource that a human for me, i'm- scanning the horizon for things of monumental importance. texas,m new jersey, not

exports.xp i believe, if we stay on the trajectory we are on now, we will still only have by 2030, about 20% renewables in our country. we are able to renew the tax credit, and could ask again to 40% or more renewables in our total package. i live in new- i'm writing a book right now about a kid that died from asthma. the particulate matter in the air is causing so much to the -- costing so much to the productivity of our kids. is there common ground to say, maybe we can allow more

exports if we can allow business to do what they need, giving them reliable expectations of what the tax take sure what look like -- tax picture will look like for a while. social security is a controversial issue. we just did i a bill. there always a certain number of styles. a discussion. i may enter with my number one issue that there are still roughly about 5 million american seniors living below the poverty line. i may come into that discussion saying, that is the problem. jonathan: you want more? senator booker: i know what the dials are. i hear from people like chris these are dials

we can turn. jonathan: why is that discussion not happening? john boehner tried to have that discussion. senator booker: who says it is not happening? i met with a group of democrats the other day to have a conversation to open a dialogue. there are a lot of people in the senate -- i know what captures the headlines, and what people want to write about, but my colleagues are not there to waste time, they are there to solve urgent problems. i have only been in the senate for two years, and people asked me, what was your experience? would want to build a park, and we would build a park, they say, it must be a tough experience in the senate. it has been a great experience. roger wicker, for example, we have states that are very

similar -- jonathan: mississippi and new jersey, two peas in a pod. [laughter] senator booker: we came together in a way that the house didn't, and open a passenger rail, and got a compromise on a pretty good bill that will get more resources to an area of the country that is the busiest in rail transportation, the northeast corridor. it moved the ball forward. it made no headlines. jonathan: this is a shockingly optimistic discussion. i'm a little concerned. [laughter] jonathan: we are almost out of time, by have to do a little 2016 presidential politics. senator booker: we will not run on the same ticket. jonathan: that would be really interesting. [laughter] jonathan: let's start with you.

i have lost count. i think it is at least three of your colleagues. senator lee: i'm actually currently the only republican senator not running. [laughter] jonathan: what is going to happen? first, let me ask you the question we asked earlier. is there any chance that donald trump is your nomination? senator lee: who knows. he is doing really well in the polls right now. it is an understatement to say he is an unconventional candidate. i do think you will see some surging by other candidates. s hink rubio has begun a urge. some have suggested that you might see senator cruz making a search. it is for difficult to predict at this point. we have never had this many candidates from the outside who have taken off quite like how these guys have.

donald trump, carly fiorina, and ben carson. jonathan: you have kind of a darth vader-luke skywalker relationship with ted cruz. you are darth vader, i guess. you helped him get elected when nobody thought he had a chance and texas. no offense -- what is your sense on him? it has been fascinating to watch him and rand paul go at it. rand paul said that ted cruz is done, finished, has ruined all of his relationships. you are friends with both of these guys. i think he is hoan solo. senator lee: a friend of mine recently said, trying to discern every decision made by a presidential candidate is like numberto smelt the seven. the reason i have stayed out of

endorsement is because i have several friends running at the same time. i want to help be the referee but between them and make surey do not beat each other up. jonathan: could you see yourself supporting donald trump? senator lee: i see myself supporting whoever is the nomination. jonathan: even if it is donald trump? senator lee: we will see. [laughter] jonathan: i saw somebody float bookerea of a biden- ticket. senator booker: like we will go to the movies together? i definitely think that is a possibility. jonathan: you are tight with biden. senator booker: you know, i do not know if biden will run or not. i have come out in supporting

hillary clinton, and i look forward to working on her campaign. [applause] jonathan: would you prefer if biden did not run? senator booker: no, actually, i think it helps the democratic process further to be debates about the issues. i think it is great that my colleague bernie sanders is in the race. he is being a very good ideas. he has been one of my trusted allies on a lot of issues. i don't think this is a bad thing to have a lot of people on the republican and democratic side. i think this is one of the more vibrant elections we have seen. i'm grateful for trump, not just because it has made my watching of late-night tv much more fun, by think he has been additive in terms of awakening more people to the process. when you get 20 million plus people watching the presidential debate, that cannot be bad for democracy. what we will have to repent for is not the bad people, but the

assignments and indifference of the good people. our nation's biggest problem is not the engagement of folks, but lack of engagement of folks. i celebrate the political process that gets more people in the game. jonathan: thank you. [applause] ♪ jonathan: i know she needs no introduction, by been told i need to give her one anyway. elizabeth warren is a first-term the mechanic senator from massachusetts. the consumer financial protection bureau was her idea. of chaired the oversight professor, and i missing anything? thank you so much for joining us.

just a start off with an idea, since we are at the ideas festival, do yo you and newt gingrich have joined to take on the charge to increase funding for the national institute of health. how did this on couple -- if you odd couple, into fruition? senator warren: start with the idea behind it which is what are the functions of government? think about our future over a long arc. i will give you some bad news. the fastest growing age group are those over 100, then 90, than 80. you see a pattern. we are getting older. not me, obviously, but in general, as a country. alzheimer's, one of the

principal age-related diseases. year, we will spend $225 billion just in care for people with alzheimer's. that is care, without the ability to delay onset by one day, or the ability to promise the hope that we can get any kind of amelioration of what is happening with this terrible disease, as it moves forward. how much are we spending on research? here we are, on my toes, on the edge of being able to do more, and how much of that $226 billion are we spending on research? .ess than 2/10 of 1% since 2003, the national institute of health has had

their purchasing power cut by 25%. when you think about how we build the future, research is a big part of how we build a future. right now, the united states congress is cutting back on nih. it is treating nih as if it is a stepchild to our budget, and our future. speaker gingrich -- i lost it again. that was fun. is someone whoh gets it. he wrote a piece in "the wall street journal," about how we should think about investing in particular,e, in and take it off the books. it is an investment in the future. i read the op-ed, i picked up "this is, and i said,

a, want to work together on this?" he said, absolutely. this is about building a sustainable future for all of america. research is one of the pieces that is right at the heart of that. obviously, we are in the presidentialresent jo campaign. you said you will endorse the democratic candidate in the primaries. senator warren: i pretty sure it will not be one of the republicans. [laughter] senator warren: i have seen enough. you were one of many female democratic senators to find a letter, urging secretary clinton to run. should that be seen as an endorsement in itself? senator warren: she is running, along with other people. they are getting their ideas out there. i think that is what should happen in this part of the season. >> you just wanted her to run?

i want everyone running for president to get out there, put their ideas out there, talk about ideas with the american people. that is how democracy is supposed to work. >> when i spoke with senator bernie sanders, i asked him where he and secretary clinton differed. he mentioned a number of areas, including reestablishing glass-steagall, raising the minimum wage to $50 per hour -- $15 per hour. i think you and senator centers align closely on all of the major issues. to andu decide who doors, is it just going to be about who you agree with the you be taking other things into consideration, such as who has a better chance of being the nominee, or winning in november? senator warren: at this moment, i don't know because i'm not

there. peopledo know is that are out talking about these ideas, and i think that is exactly the right thing to do. i think we should be talking , and thess-steagall role that the major financial institutions play, not just in this economy, but in the political sphere and washington. i think we should be talking debt minimum wage, college . know where you want to put the focus. this is a time where you can see a sharper difference between republicans and democrats. a sharpers are taking focus. the idea that here we are, we need to get a budget together, there is a lot to be negotiated

around the budget. what is the first thing the republicans say they need to stand up and do? planneddefund parenthood. that seems so out of touch with reality, with what it means to govern this country. they think they have to argue something to move women back to 1955. that is first on their agenda. they are just wrong on that. [applause] i want to talk about planned parenthood in a second. senator warren: good. [applause] just the i entirely subject, do you disagree with the idea that you and bernie sanders seem to be more closely aligned on issues that other candidates running for president? kind of my job is to gather and keep pushing these issues. i will say this. gets out and fight for

what he believes in. he fights from the heart on these issues. i think he has done an enormous service by pushing afford the agenda. i think that secretary clinton has also been pushing forward issues into the agenda. for example, she just endorsed senator baldwin's bill to slow down the revolving door in washington. that is really important. nonetheless, at least we have some democrats out there, talking about the things that matter to the american people, talking about how we build a real future. democraticee the party moving in a more progressive direction that the 1990's? senator warren: i have to say, yeah, i think we are. i think we're getting in touch with what really matters. part of the reason is the

urgency. watch what is happening to the american middle class, the working families, the poor. let me do one quick facts. one more5 to 1980 -- thin time. from 1935 to 1980, we're coming out of the great depression. we are doing two things. investing in our future. we build america's great middle class. 70% of all wage growth in this country. gdp is going up. families across the country, they are doing better. trickle-down economics hits in the 1980's, and you watch it reverse. from 1980 to 2012, the latest

year that we have data, the 90% -- everybody outside of the 10% -- you know how much they got? they got 0% of income growth. gdp% of income growth -- kept going up -- 100% of income growth went to the top 10% of america. that has become clear now to us, even in the bubble of washington. that is what democrats are talking about. they are talking about what are the things that we need to do to build the future. not just for us in slice at the -- for a thin slice at the top, but for all americans. >> what do you make of the fact that two of the leading republican present joe kent it is and jeb bush, are now endorsing closing the loophole, when it comes to hedge fund

managers? senator warren: it means that even when you're ears are stuffed with money, you get a little sound that comes through. [applause] what iswarren: that is happening here. it is like, hello, yeah, billionaires should not be paying taxes at a lower rate than teachers and firefighters. that has even seeped through to a few of the rich guys -- stunner. , let's talk about planned parenthood because you brought it up. senator warren: is that the only reason you want to talk about it? >> no. it has been in the news. there was a hearing earlier this week. obviously, your position in supporting planned parenthood is well established. was purportedly these videotapes of planned parenthood

officials saying things that even planned parenthood questions. is there nothing in the videotapes that bothers you at all? senator warren: remember what we were debating for the united states senate. that was the funding -- def unding planned parenthood. we have to start by remembering what that means. 2.7 billion people get their health care from planned parenthood every year. one in every five women in america will get her health care from planned parenthood. 90% of what planned parenthood does is about cancer screenings, screening for stds, and birth control. parenthood, half of clinics, are in places where there is limited access to

health care. for many people, for many women, it is their only health care divider, sometimes there principle health care provider. the number one thing, everything can go forward, but the first thing we have to do is defund planned parenthood -- that means defund health care for women. make no mistake. what this is really about is access ton's abortion. even though not one federal dollar goes to pay for abortions through planned parenthood, the republicans want to find one more way to make it impossible woman, who is facing one of the most difficult decisions of her life -- they want to find a way to make it harder on her to get the health care she needs. all i can say is we have been in

that world before. when i talk about 1955, i'm talking about a world in which women died, or committed suicide, rather than going forward with the pregnancy that they could not handle. what the republicans are saying is they want to go back. i want to make it where we are not going back. not now, not ever. [applause] >> too bad they're not doing historical here -- a straw poll. senator warren: i will tell you something. we are doing a straw poll called the 2060 elections. the republicans want to get out there and shut down women's screenings,ncer strainin birth control, and women's paids to naught government

for abortions. they will have a real fight on their hands. let them do it. [applause] >> you have been a longtime advocate for finance reform. in the past, there have been words between you and then senator joe biden. you pointed out that his home state delaware is one where a lot of banks are headquartered. you recently met with him. what can you tell us about that meeting, about where he is on these issues that matter a great deal to you? senator warren: well, we had a talked about a whole range of policy issues. principally, about how we will rebuild america's middle class, about how we create opportunities for working families. how we treat opportunities for poor families. ofs is the principal role

government here it is about the investments we need to make, and we need to make together. we also talked about the need for accountability on wall street, for support for the good tumor protection financial bureau. it was a good conversation. joe biden is somebody who cares about america, and cares about america's families. i think that has been true for a long time. that is what the conversation was about. >> you have disagreed very sharply. senator warren: yes, we have. you bet. it was over bankruptcy laws that the credit card companies wanted bankruptcy laws poorueeze profits out of families. senator biden was on one side, and i was on the other. i did not hold back. >> are you still on opposite sides? senator warren: on that issue,

yet. -- yeah. a move to replace the director of the consumer financial protection bureau. some say it will be a protection if a republican is in the white house. senator warren: that is what the american banking association came out to say yesterday. worriedthat he is so a about keeping the agency up and he wants to make sure there is a 5% commission, like there is over at the sec, because that will keep it strong. [laughter] >> you don't buy it? senator warren: do i look d umb?

>> no. doejust in case you were wondering what my answer was. [laughter] on the record, you don't look dumb. you are also being accused this week of leading ideological purges. that is from the "wall street journal" opinion pages. you were not a fan of larry summers becoming chair, you block the undersecretary of domestic finance. thently, you checked int presentation of it -- you objected to the presentation of a paper at brookings. are you leading an ideological purge? senator warren: let's start with the situation brookings. this is not personal. a studyten published

that was way out of line with the findings from other independently funded research. >> about a specific role? senator warren: about a specific rule, whether there should be a conflict of interest rule so that investment companies cannot recommend products for consumers that are really great for the agency recommending them, but not for the consumer. the department of labor has put out a rule. what the research shows is givingn families are l about $17 million per year to an industry who just favors themselves. that is the broker over the customer. we have done a lot of research about this, and the study comes out the other way. then, it gets criticism in academic circles for the methodology.

he came in front of a committee i'm on to testify, and there is a little line in the testimony about research supported by one of the companies that stands to lose money, if the department of labor rule goes through. . just followed up i question, for the record, for more information on where the money comes from. we found out a couple of things. $38,000 forly, got this. a company that he works for got more than $70,000 for this. and, the company that funded it was the sole funder, and they got to look at, revise, and reviewed the work as it was a work in process. that raises some real questions about the independence of the

research, and the findings. i wrote a letter to the department of labor because this research has been cited a lot by the industry. the industry has been pounding on this research. i wrote a letter asking brookings about it. that is where went from there. the time we have. senator elizabeth warren, everybody. [applause] ♪ this morning, education isretary arne duncan stepping down in december after seven years in the obama administration. he is tapping john king junior, according to the associated press, to serve as acting secretary through the end of the term. secretary duncan is one of two remaining original members of the obama cabinet.

the agriculture secretary being the other one. the president planning to discuss this change this afternoon at 3:30 eastern. look at coverage -- look for coverage at c-span.org. secretary arne duncan speaking yesterday at the washington ideas festival in washington. we will take a look at that now. >> secretary arne duncan, it is great to be here with you. we were just talking about his long legs, and how they will reach the front of this platform. i'm delighted to be here. i want to start with something you unveiled yesterday. a proposal to redirect the money being spent today to incarcerate half the people who are convicted of nonviolent crimes, and put it, instead, into paying teachers, who are working in the highest need schools, and

toughest communities. you said that you want to tackle the, you called it, school to prison pipeline. secretary duncan: no one can defend the current status quo, and say that mass incarceration has worked, made us safer. if we just took 50% of nonviolent offenders, instead of locking them out, find other paths for them. if we took the 20% of schools in the nation with the highest poverty rate, we could take every teacher in those schools, and give them a 50% raise. we should pay all teachers more. great teachers make a huge .ifference in students lives great teachers lead to less teenage pregnancy. lockingnt to stop people up, if we could attract and retain good teachers, that

would be life transforming. we cannot talk about this without talking about race and class. the disproportionate number of men of color locked up -- if we want strong families and strong communities, we have to give them a chance at the front end. that is what this is about. , what would you do differently in the way you treat young, nonviolent offenders? where would you give them a break? secretary duncan: again, i think they're all kinds of paths to help them then locking them up $50,000-$60,000 per person. you have to give them training programs, but at the end of the day, the vast majority ends up jail.back to the cost for the community is staggering. if you could take $50 billion and stop spending it on prisons, and spend it on teachers, and have incentive for those teachers to work in the most

challenging communities, it would change everything. make teaching in tough communities the pinnacle of a teachers 's career? >> you say paying teachers more of thesege the lives individuals. how do you make the connection? secretary duncan: one great teacher -- out of harvard university -- one great teacher increases the lifetime earnings of the class of students by a quarter million dollars. one great teacher reduces teenage pregnancy. one great teacher increases college going rates. the children in the communities that need the best get the lease. i want to reverse that. i want to make sure they get the best. if we do that, their life

radically will be different, and long-term, we will be locking up fewer people, and specifically, got men of color. [applause] >> wouldn't you have to couple this with other reforms as well? secretary duncan: yes. there are a million other things we have to do to reduce poverty. great teachers transform young people's lives. today, in our nation, we have very few incentives, and lots of disincentives for the hardest working teachers to work in our inner-city communities. i want to challenge the status quo full on, flip it on its head, to retract and -- attract and retain the best talent. ed.his one is in higher this is the idea of giving young people what you call micro credentials.

secretary duncan: historically, what has been fixed is time and location. you go to a lecture hall like sat, and listened. that needs to become variable, not fix. young people need to be able to learn any time they want, anywhere. the chance to earn credentials in importable way -- we all need to be lifelong learners. the idea of sitting in a class for nine months to learn this does not fit the reality of the students today. average college -- the average college student is nontraditional, their older, they might have kids. the traditional is becoming nontraditional. we need to meet the needs of those who want to learn, but also employers. we are doing a lot to accelerate the change through experimental

sites, moving to shorter-term credentials. >> give us an example of a micro credential. secretary duncan: if you can months, code in three four months, five month, and go from not having a job to earning $50,000 per year, we should be able to incentivize to offer those opportunities. >> how is that different from , and clearly different from the idea of getting a four-year college degree? secretary duncan: there is a whole set of new jobs emerging where short-term training can lead to real evidence. i worry about the lack of economic mobility. the lack of folks to be able to get skills for the new economy.

historically, four-year programs still have an important place, but we need to be much more innovative in our resources. if we can get more resources to places that are thinking differently and can help more people get on their feet and get a higher paying job, we need to incentivize that, rather than have money stifle innovation. >> the department of education had the ambitious goal of raising the retention rate to 60%. is this partly in acknowledgment that this is harder to do than you expected going in? secretary duncan: it is not quite the case. we have a new economy. today's learners look very different than the learners of 10-30 years ago. yes, we do need to learn the world in college completion

rate. we did one generation ago. we are now 12th. 40 to 60. go from we have a long way to go. in a globally it competitive economy, jobs will go to the nations with the most educated workforce. i want that to be the united states, and not other countries. we have to continue to innovate, and get better, faster than we are. we are very pleased that high school graduation rates are at an all-time high, dropout rates are down. again, other countries are moving after than us. i feel a real sense of urgency here. you have also focused on countryege debt in this here you have talked about number of ways to deal with that. d deal withhas to do

income-based repayment plans. explain what you would like to do in that arena. how does it work? secretary duncan: it is sort of a bigger issue. first, going to college is the best investment long-term that anyone can make in their future and their families future. that part is true. it is also true that for too many young people, college costs too much. some are starting to think that college is just for wealthy people, not people like them. that is a real worry. we have to take this on in a number of ways. one, we want to make community college free. that is the college promise plan. that is not the president's plan , or arne duncan's plan, it comes from the governor of the republican governor of tennessee. today, and high school diploma

is important, but insufficient and getting a good paying job. pre-k-14o make pre-k, the norm. moving insufficient forward. debt yout debt is get when you don't get a degree. we have to challenge universities. yes, we have done huge amounts to increase access, and increased programs, but is not just about access. it is about completion. some universities take that mission very seriously, and do great with held grants, first englishtion learners. income-based repayment simply says we will index repayments to your income. if you work as a social worker, you will pay best that as an investment banker.

we think it is the right thing to do. it is not the option for everybody, but how we help people manage their debt is something we have to get better at. criticism we the are hearing from a number of folks in congress, and elsewhere, that what this does in part is it gives colleges the possibility to once again raise tuition? secretary duncan: there are many legs to the stool. we need to invest. we also need to provide maximum transparency to people. we put out the college scorecard . historically, this has been very, very opaque. it has been hard to navigate. the more we can empower families to make good choices, it will force the marketplace to adjust and change. universities have to do a better

job of containing cost. i have talked to a number of college presidents recently who have not only kept tuition slot, but cut it 20%-40%. they are very accepting to that. finally, we have to encourage states to reinvest in education. there are at least four legs to this stool. we have to hold ourselves mutually accountable to make college more affordable, and focus on success. in manyare many ways -- ways a hot topic in the media. secretary duncan: i don't think that is true. >> i will not ask who is competing with you, but some recent profiles point out that the matter in which the obama administration reforms were carried out has in part incentivized states to