current gun control debate and dozens of tax to expire atre set the end of the year, and lisa editor from deputy paris on the u.n. climate change talks. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. . sit ncicap.org] ost: good morning, it's saturday, december 12, 2015. yesterday, congress shaved off a otential shutdown by passing a short-term spending bill that funds the government through mid-next week. the extra time will allow lawmakers to complete a budget deal as well as an of expiring dozens tax breaks. we'll talk about some of those program.ions on today's we'll begin today discussing gun ownership in this country in the shootings.ent mass reports over the last two weeks ndicates that gun sales are surging as are applications for

console and carry permit. this morning, we want to hear from you this morning, if you've bought several weapons, if you've considered it and decided against buying a gun. tell us about your experience. we're dividing our phone lines a bit differently this morning. if you don't own a gun, call 202-748-8000. guns, own less than five it is 8001. less than 20, 8002. you can also catch up with us on social media on twitter, e-mail us @journal@c-span.org. surging gun sales in this country. the "new york times" in the wake of shootings, a latest call to arms shows a jump in weapons

suns. amid gun control talk. americans stock up on weapons after california shooting. wesson gun sales surge. ere's a story from a local paper from the "herald tribune" local gun dealers are trying to cope with the massive need for ammunition, accessories. there are two reasons, the attacks and the president's speech in which he control laws. most customers want a.r.-15 carbines, full-sized hand guns and silencers. overdrew, nagle said. we've usually got more. chris wickhoff said his seeking a.r.s and pistols. quote, everything is selling like crazy, he said. this is the first time i've

nearly sold out of resolvers. what started the rush and happened in california added to it. we want to hear your stories this morning. tell us about your experience buying a gun, your decision you made in coming to buying a gun use guns for. tell us about it. first from florida, for those of who you don't own a gun. good morning. caller: the reason i don't own gun is because i have an autistic grandchild. that is the only reason. i think everybody needs to have can afford, as they as big and as many as they can and carry them all the time. i think every american should have guns and be carrying them, otherwise they'll be killed by come into thisis country and the government won't protect you. killing all the jews, it's crazy, everybody needs to get as many guns as they can. host: all right. edna in florida.

five and that own less, sammy, you're on "the washington journal". caller: i have approximately three guns. you go to mcdonald's and a child happy meal or a something like that, they can be sued. think that the gun manufacturers should be responsible for anybody that's a victim of a crime. they should pay for the funeral. they should pay for any medical type things, the manufacturers bullets that prove that they're a hazard to the community. the n.r.a. should pay for the funerals and expenses. host: what do you use your guns for? caller: i keep it for home protection only. use it other to than target practice. i've been in the navy for 20 tors, and i never really had use the gun in the navy, other than qualifying for marksmanship. host: how easy is it to get a kinkingston, north

carolina. prevalent in our community. we have a lot of young people. >>: we're losing you there, sammy. sorry about that. we'll go to bob who's waiting in jacksonville, texas. who own ine for those 20 or more guns. bob, good morning. washington he journal." caller: good morning. call. you for taking my host: go ahead, bob. caller: oh, okay. i'm not motivated by these other things, i guess because i do own quite a few guns. i have almost 50 but, you know, they're collector guns. i used to hunt but i don't even hunt anymore. home protection off ve got a sawed double-barrel shotgun and i don't believe there's a man alive that can get past that, vest, he's wearing a

it's going to get his face. i'm not too worried about home protection. and i don'tany need own one either. i don't see any need at all for assault rifle. they're no good for hunting, you know, i'll take my shot gun any day. host: with reports about gun surges, bob, around the country, do you think people are buying fear? t of caller: i don't think they're really stopping and thinking about it, you know. this concealed carry thing, you concealed carry license, but i don't carry my side arm. i've got a .357 that i bought 25 30, but i probably, or don't carry it unless i'm in through an w, going area or traveling where i think

i really might need it. but every day, no, i don't carry my side arm. foolish, but know, i don't understand why, you know, the so paranoid otten about this, myself. or : paranoid about guns about terrorism? paranoid about what, bob? both, you know, i mean, if you -- you know, i for you should have a gun home protection, sure. so sure about ot terrorism thing. if you're in an area where it, maybe so, but personally, i live kind of town and i'm not too concerned about it. for the call from jacksonville, texas.

on our facebook page this overng, over 100 comments, 200 comments at this point. tom blackford writes in: the and the nonstop self-righteous crusade to demonize law abiding gun owners and the 2nd amendment, that is what is making me think about getting my first gun, he writes, to annoy liberals. no, l writes below that: why would shootings make me want to buy a gun. he amendment that says we have a right to bare arms should be null and void. destroy them. unstable to carry guns. even the most mild mannered person could lose it and use one. so get rid of the problem and destroy all guns and not sell them to the public. have you been motivated by recent shootings to buy a gun. our phone lines are a little bit different this morning in our first segment of the "washington journal." if you don't own, it's 202-748-8000. less than two, it's 8001.

80002. 20, it's own more than 20, it's 202-748-8003. here's some of what's coming out of the white house in terms of executive control. he white house is finalizing a new executive action that would expand background checks on purchases, according to one of the president's top aide senior advisors, the president has a ed his team to send him completed plan in short order, according to the associated press reports. considering rtedly a proposal that would close a legal loop hole where gun shows prevent existing background check provisions. we want to hear your stories this morning in our first 45 minutes. james is up next from dunkirk maryland on the line for those who don't own a gun. good morning, james. caller: thank you very much.

there's angry white m men, who believe it's all obama's fault. they don't have the kind of jobs they used to have. they're just angry at everything, and blame it on obama, they just want to protect themselves from this man, you know, making the country, you privileged and are clueless and also, you know, if of them killed in the black community, downed by guns illegally. host: talk about your experience. what has been your experience in you considered owning a gun in the wake of what's happened recently. caller: i trust in my community and the police. there's nothing i can do. if you live in unsafe fine, orhoods, maybe -- you know, to me, i

believe -- and i trust and this is me -- in the police to protect me so i don't really need it. because if you have it then you want to use it or you find every mean, to want to go -- i go for it to get somebody or something. believe me, if you notice, all black lings done in the community or are done so by angry white folks that go to gun shows, sell them real cheap, and that's why they find themselves in the black community. host: already, james in maryland. we'll go to michael on gadzen, line for those who own less than five guns. michael, good morning. you're on the "washington journal." caller: how are you doing this morning. michael.ood, go ahead. caller: yeah, i own one gun. years ago, i got a -- you or, you know,

now, and i'm in the process of getting my gun back. it's a hunting rifle, and that's it hunting. for i never really cared for hand a short use i got temper, and i don't trust myself ith one, but i think they should be, you know, some , you know,checks and all these people talking about obama and stuff. he's the president of the united states. have a little respect for the man. i mean, they're so disrespectful. i've never seen so much president ofward a the united states. whether you like him or not, man.ct the ut, yeah, i think they ought to -- i haven't bought one in alabama and i don't even care if obama does background checks. you might know more than i do. ost: thanks for the call from

gadsden, alabama. steve is waiting in charlotte, north carolina on the line for those who own five to 20 guns. good morning. caller: good morning. how you doing? host: i'm good, steve. go ahead. caller: yes, sir. and of the nting generation that won't go stomp around the woods unless we've shot gunhing pole or a or something like that. prepared, actually, iraq, before we went into because things didn't look good. luckily, the country didn't blow up, so i did buy one sem semi-assault rifle type, sks. but the rest of them are for pistols for home protection, so it's one thing, i grew up in memphis during the era, and so some of it's just home protection, because there was a lot that was -- you know, the

shot gun behind the door is something you wanted to have. say you uld you ever bought one of those guns out of fear then? was it a reaction? caller: you could definite -- well, you know, duck-and-coverthe generation where we thought social order was going to completely break down, i did buy one assault-type rifle. it's called an sks. precursor to the a.k. i can'teally cheap, and you ve i have them now but could get something like that into $200 before we went iraq. after that, i've never seen the kind of gun hysteria that we've had in the last 20 years. host: thanks for the call from charlotte, north carolina. president bout the with some of the executive actions that could be in the works when it comes to gun control. of ourse, on the other side this debate, leading the other n.r. a.this debate, the

has been very vocal in some of he response to the president's proposal and what the president is considering. that came .r.a. ad out recently featuring wayne n.r.a. president talking about guns in this country. >> you and i didn't choose to be care, but the age of innocents like us will continue in concert tered halls, sports stadiums, restaurants and airplanes. no amount of bloodshed will ever satisfy the demons among us. dream of rds inflicting more damage, more terror.g, more no target is too intimate or too sacred for these monsters. they will come to where we worship, where we educate, and where we live. but when evil knocks on our no , americans have a power other people on the planet share. full-throated right to defend our families and

ourselves with our second amendment. let's face this guy, as mercy is offered to the demons at our door. i'm the national rifle i'm iation of america, and freedom's safest place. usa and yesterday in today, there's a column by senior chief petty officer james hatch, the good by with the gun myth is what hatch writes about. someites in his piece: in cases, can a good guy with a gun and save e a threat lives, absolutely, but it doesn't happen very often. it's perpetuated myth sent out by people who have never been shot at. i value the second amendment and the right of responsible americans to own guns for self efense but people need to know it is a fallacy to believe that the everyday gun owner can be expected to make all the right choices in a dangerous

fast-moving situation, like in a mass shooting with high-powered weapons. when the bullets are flying, he writes, determining who's who in is hard. that's senior chief petty officer james hatch, founder of spikes canine fund and a member of veterans are responsible solutions. his piece appeared in "usa today" if you want to read the full column. waiting in oretta clinton, arkansas on the line for those who own less than five guns. thanks for waiting. caller: hello. host: sorry about that, go ahead. caller: and i am a 78-year-old 79.an, soon to be i've owned a gun all my life. and they knewkids and respected guns all their lives. if i had problems and i needed the law, it would take one 35 to 5 minutes to get to where i live and my neighbors. i use it for snakes and things like this. gun or we all need a

two. host: and in clinton, arkansas, gun? sy is it to get a are there background checks required there? have you ever had a problem getting a gun? caller: yes, you have to have background checks, and they good, do check you out and all those places where you get them, at wal-mart, and one shop that sells guns, and they ks really good background chec here. host: thanks -- oh, go ahead. i thought you were done. aller: and they've been checking on our people for -- if you want to buy a gun, you good reputation. host: thanks for the call from clinton, arkansas this morning. npr had a recent story from last week that looked at gun laws by states. one of our callers from alabama licensewas asking about or permits being required to purchase or own a gun. here, the dark t brown are a license or permit d for all firearms. the lighter brown, the states

permitquire a license or just for hand guns. you can also see waiting periods states that e require waiting periods, again, for all firearms and hand guns, assault weapons or just handguns only and background checks is the chart below that. you can go through the npr story. it's online. december 9th under the headlines, here's where gun your state.n back to mike, bloomington, illinois on the line for those guns.wn 20 or more mike, good morning. caller: good morning. how are you doing? good, mike. caller: fine foggy morning here in central, illinois. host: tell us about you. have you bought one recently? caller: the last firearm i purchased was a glock, that's been not a year ago. hello? host: have you ever purchased a of responseear, out to a specific situation, mike?

purchased an i years ago.ple of i guess call it part of the stimulus.earm was talking about, you know, i don't know, i think the best to g democrats could do reduce the number of guns on the talking just to quit about it, because every time you open their mouth, you can almost -- well, you can look at the spike in background checks. kind of a silly thing. personal e for protection, i have some that i just like the history behind. i think my big thing is if any of these things that were being proposed after a shooting would have actually stopped the shooting in particular, then i sense behind that. but they -- are you still there? host: yeah, listening, mike.

caller: well, i mean, to take san bernardino thing, that was already illegal because it was a small purchase from what we're hearing. somebody else bought these two rms for these perpetrators and as to whether they could have bought one probably because, you know, there was no system, andwith the the system works pretty good. a ad an issue with bipolar -- with my daughter. ago been about nine years now. i was arrested but not charged for domestic battery, and, you e a , when i went to purchas firearm a year later, there was a delay in that until it was out, okay, he was not violating anything. so there is a system in place that i think, you know, what's there does what it's supposed to

do. but i would just ask people to look at any of these shootings and look at what's being shoot, like e required background checks, that that oregon, i think, shooter. they already had that. solutionnow, give me a that actually addresses a particular shooting and i might, ou know, i could probably get behind that. but that's why they just run to the same usual suspects, and i'm just never going to suspect that. host: mike, you mentioned san bernardino. here's the latest report of what point.w at this this is from the "washington post." one of the attackers who san d 14 people in bernardino last week received the assault rifles used in the friend to avoid arousing suspicion by purchasing law himself, according to a enforcement official by "the

focused n post." they on a neighbor. used by ed the rifles farook and his wife, tashfeen people and illed 14 injured 22 others. "the new york times" also focusing on this story noting marquez talked of sleeper cells before the rampage, is the headline in the "new york times" front page lead story this morning. ack to the phones, marilyn is waiting in ohio for those who don't own a gun. good morning. caller: good morning. i don't have a gun. i have owned a gun. i see no problem with owning a gun for your home, but these me, ult rifles, they scare and i have different scenarios. in ahappens when everybody dark movie house is packing a kill nd these people who people, they don't have no

ntentions of coming out alive a gun ybody else having isn't going to deter them. shooter in is a there and everybody gets to shooting in the dark, they don't perpetrator is. you've got a good samaritan shooting other good samaritans don't know who to really strike, and it's going to make it more difficult for the police. how is the police supposed to show up at the movie house, at the mall, and everybody's packing a gun? how are they supposed to know who the perpetrator is? nd who is going to send their child to a movie house or to the mall knowing that everybody is packing a gun? host: marilyn, you mentioned your concern about assault weapons. you may want to stick around for "washington ent on journal." jim kessler will be joining us. he was a key staffer back in 1994 when the 1994 assault weapons ban was passed.

we're going to talk about the history and political climate of our country back in 1994 and how he assault weapons ban has continued to impact this debate through today. so stick around for that. 7:45.s coming up at go to shawn in west palm beach florida on the line for those who own five to 20 guns. good morning. you. : how are host: i'm good. what kind of guns do you own? aller: my wife and i would own, i would think, four or five semi-automatic hand guns. we own two assault rifles and shot guns. host: is it mostly for protection? caller: yeah, we're shooting enthusiasts as well so, you people choose to spend their leisure time doing different things. going down to the range. i have one hunting rifle. now not been a hunter until but i have friends that hunt so i thought about taking that up. you know, i think that you're spike right now in gun sales.

i think every time there's some sort of legislation which is proposed or somebody even begins conversation about it, and oftentimes, you know, the left who brings that up, and then of who are e right often funded in large part by the gun lobby, they have their own fighting against it, but just from a common sense standpoint, you get people, you know, when they hear there's going to be some restriction on the guns, they want to get them suppose they can, i but i think what's going on specifically after this latest is therein california, is -- i have people with whom i mindedho are more liberal- than i am, and they're beginning to talk about getting hand guns at least for some sort of protection now for their family, i think, because truth be told, police to way for the respond in time to an active situation. you know, you have -- it's always a clean-up crew. they ome in afterwards, secure the site or whatever

dead. 20 people are so i think that if people who are responsible -- i heard the caller, about everybody in the theater and the mall packing. do have a concealed weapons permit and i obviously am aw-abiding and i don't go into a gun-free zone carrying something like that but if i go into a local store or in public my concealed weapon on me. i'm the type of person who range.-- i do go to the i am proficient in the use of my weapon, you know, i believe in a law-abide iing individuals, and if the need said, i amse, like i proficient and i could take steps to protect myself and and i understand there's concern, you know, friendly fire, getting caught in the cross fire or something like that but when you see these situations that come in, especially like the one in what, 120 e was people or thereabouts who were slaughtered. t was like a shooting gallery and there was no recourse on

those individuals. they had no way of protecting themselves. so i think it's multifacetted. think the ban on assault rifles, the thing with them, i think there should be a conversation, i own more than one. there should be a concern about that or the magazines. polarized sort of a conversation where it's knee-jerk on both sides. if that n i ask you, conversation were to advance to another assault weapons ban, willing to turn over the rifle that you have, if under that ban? -- i : you know, i'm think if the question is whether or not i would comply with the i always have , at this point, so i don't suppose there's any way i could avoid that. i don't imagine it's probably going to come to that. rifle ban. you know, people already owned something and i don't think they're going to go

house-to-house. and it's, you know, to take away something that somebody already has is a lot more difficult than simply saying we're not going to llow the manufacturing and/or sale of a certain product. i understand it's a hypothetical. hypothetically speaking, you know, i'm not going to do anything that puts me on the wrong side of the law. host: shawn, you mentioned conceal and carry permits. today's a story in "washington journal" talking about concealed carry requests on the rise. uthorities across the country are getting a flood of applications to carry concealed weapons in the wake of those shootings. the sheriff's office in san bernardino california after last eek's shootings said it received about 80 applications for conceal and carry permits this week compared to 10 or 12 they might receive in a typical week. heriffs in some counties are actively encouraging people to quote, i want to encourage people who are licensed to carry a firearm to so, according to

a riff paul blarkham in december 3rd message on his office's facebook page. f you want it read that story, t's in the "wall street journal." it's not just new gun in rol measures, democrats congress spen time talking about this issue, including nancy pelosi. here she is on her press conference on friday talking anniversary oming of the newtown shooting and the gun violence toll in the united states since then. ms. pelosi: i mentioned the shooting at sandy hook elementary school, it's been two years. that's a little more than 1,000 days. and in that 1,000 days, there's been a little more than 1,000 mass murders. more than 1,000 mass shootings. almost one a day. sandy hook and san bernardino tragedy ends of a daily

of gun violence that tears apart communities across the country. claimed over as 90,000 american lives in the past three years. we have a responsibility to address this. it's a public health issue. epidemic, and we join the vigils that are happening. and d it yesterday here across the country to honor those who not only lost their lives at sandy hook, at newtown, but across the country. host: republicans in congress also talking about this issue in response to some of the proposals that the president and democrats have put out there. congressman jeff duncan is a republican from south carolina tweeting this week, how are those restrictions on firearms working out in chicago? violence is less about guns and more about morals of society. speaking of tweets, follow along with the conversation this morning on "washington journal." it's @cspanwjis where that

place.ation takes peg writes, i have a right to have a reasonable level of be rity and should not forced to carry a weapon in order to have any sense of security. to get any believe gun, it should be like having to license.est for a pilot jody writes: if someone wants should lt weapon, they join the arm. my mind goes back to the little instructor.ng her and another, we need more guns, this is the only way to fight the terrorists. obama won't. he doesn't know what to call them. we're taking your comments this morning. this question we're asking, have recent shootings motivated you to buy a gun? lines for those who don't own a divied up by a number of guns owned, if you want to call in. eresa is calling in on that line for those who don't own a gun, golf breeze, florida. agood morning. you're on the "washington journal." caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. i love this show.

host: appreciate it. caller: i have really been safety in bout my only by try, not terrorists from outside, and islam, but crime, drugs, i mean, it's really getting bad out here. it's really become a very unsafe society because of many factors, and also the mentally ill. so combine it all together and middle age citizen, class citizen, you have to go out and work and shop and take to events, and go it's become very frightening. so i think it's important to know how to defend yourself, not but also, hand gun, you know, taking karate classes, self defense, whatever you need to do to empower yourself. he problem is a lot of people don't take guns as seriously as they need to. hen you have children around, you need to be very careful, and

use yourto know how to firearm, and you need to be confident with it. -- because when you're being attacked, as any ilitary person will tell you, your adrenalin goes up, and you shaky andy afraid and you have to really know what you're doing. so you know, how does the government ensure that? g people we're allowin o drive cars that are very powerful and texting and killing people. host: would you agree with jimmy who in his tweet said that, to get a gun, you should take a test like taking a test pilot's license? caller: well, you know, i hate to have the government involved more than it is, but i think when it comes to firearms, you need to, you know, on the sameleast as

level as getting a car, a car.se to drive a you should be able to prove that you know how to use it and you yould be able to prove that understand how to clean it and prove that you have so someplace safe to keep the weapon. that's like basic safety and how do you control that? you either leave it up to the eople who are buying the firearms to understand this and certify themselves, or you get and overnment involved, that's where the, you know, that's where it gets tricky because you have one set of people that don't want the federal government legislating more, because they have failed. they're grossly negligent in and so it they do, keeps coming out. border, t control the they can't control the drugs, they can't control the crime, the can't control universities, they can't control anything. are really, you

straw. - it's the final host: thanks for the call. gene is up next, statesville, orth carolina, the line for those who own 20 or more guns. jeanne, good morning. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. host: what kind of guns do you have, jeanne. fromr: we have everything a .22 pistol up to an assault ifle in this home, and we are avid hunters and just shooting like to say but i'd that none of the guns have been bought out of fear and here in you go to get, if a gun permit, they don't have to give you that gun permit if they kind of red flag -- even if you've not been charged with a felony or anything, they won't give you a gun permit, so i think we have good laws in place to stop people from getting guns that don't need it. but the thing about it is, terrorists can get guns anywhere. they don't have to get the guns legally. they can just go buy them off

the street, you know, so the more -- i believe in the second and all these more gun control laws, it's not going to help anything. t's not going to stop the criminals from getting the guns. host: you said you never bought fear. out of have you ever bought a gun out of concern that the government might take your right away from kind of at particular gun? caller: well, i have not, but my son has. he has bought an assault rifle because he just likes to shoot, and he was in fear they might stop selling them, yes. host: and what kind of rifle was that? caller: it's an a.r., it shoots a lot of rounds, i know that much, you know. host: and what does he use it for. caller: just to target practice, that's it. and nobody here carries a gun on their person. home, you re all at know, we don't carry a gun on our person. ut all these shootings have made me think about going to get

my concealed permit, because if and somebodyopping tries to come up and mug you or kill you or something, you really need that on you for your protection and me as a weapon, know, a big ou person will overpower you. i'm a small woman. a big person can overpower you and it has made me think about for my concealed permit. host: thanks for the call from statesville, north carolina. calling from ext alabama on the line for those who own five to 20 guns. morning. ood caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. host: go ahead, harold. have recent shootings motivated you to buy a new gun? caller: no, sir, no, sir. i've owned guns every since i was a kid. how to hunt ht me rabbits and squirrels, and i harm have thought to do no with no gun no more than that, and i may have when i was 18 years old, i did buy a pistol to

family in case somebody did, but i wasn't looking for trouble. but i just wanted to make a point this morning. and the lady before me, she had a real good -- she stole my i'm going to add something to that. what problems we have in the in, i have some good friends and now when they hear that they're going to take your away, that puts fear in and, and they are going out buying all the guns they can buy and all the bullets they can buy up. illness,le with mental a mentally ill person cannot plot no killing. these are evil people. because people say president obama is going to take and i'm a preacher, by the way, and i was in the guy was re, and the talking about taking the guns.

angry with to get him, and i just stood back and asked him, i and i said he not going to take these guns. his wife said, no, he just playing. what's going on is intimidation. people say they're mentally ill, they're not mentally ill. what it is, they're evil and somebody's going to take them. these guns been killing people every since i was born and still killing people. everything is ke on him. he is the evil person. he's not god. be at the same place at the same time. and we don't want the government us anymore, we want to do it on our own and you have your family, gun, it takes a strong person to pull a pistol, it really does. the lady talking about being overtaken being really small,

when most people see the gun, o do thing they're going t is hit the floor. everybody arm everybody, it's going to be like the wild, wild west. somebody i hate, i don't like, i can start an argument with that maken and make that person me shoot at me, because that's what i want. he have an say, well, gun. i don't even have a gun. i think the message is sent out. i'm chvrallenging all preachers the ones and pastor, that make millions of dollars, i can't say anything because i don't have any money, i can just "washington on journal." address your people about guns. better. it would be ecause the guns should be upon god, not man. host: all right. time for a few more calls. review for our viewers

what happened yesterday though on capitol hill. in house joining the senate passing a stop-gap funding measure to keep the federal government running. they passed that bill yesterday to give congress until the middle of next week to complete a deal on a year-end appropriations package that's needed to fund the government nd, of course, the senate passed their version by voice vote on thursday. negotiators plan to work through the weekend as they haggle over what policy writers should be attached to the legislation and separate package of tax breaks for businesses and individuals. e'll be talking about that second part, the tax break for businesses and individuals coming up later in "washington journal" this morning at about 8:30 or so. we'll be going through some of the tax breaks that are being considered if you want to stick around with that. pete will be joining us this morning from the national taxpayers' union. calls to get a few more in. this question, have recent shootings motivated you to buy a gun?

flo is up next from fort lauderdale florida for those who own less than five guns. good morning. caller: good morning. this is an interesting topic. personal idea about gun ownership, but here in we had an -- on i-95 a couple of weeks ago, we had an eight-hour hold up, two people were shot. the paris attack, one gun was florida, one of the assault weapons. nd if you're a black belt in kara karate, you can be shot. n rochester where i came from, this black belt had a shot at a as station where she was working. bruce lee -- and i don't know what's going on but you have to reader.d you have to know what we're doing with these guns. then we have the trayvon martin case. on the other hand, if somebody is trying to break into my house, i want the right to protect myself. host: is that what you use your guns for, for a sense of protection? have you ever had to draw your weapon? caller: no.

but listen to this. my father-in-law who made his for g.e., e worked everybody -- the kids were brought up with strict -- they were very strict on taking care of their guns. thenver had a problem, but when he was older, he almost shot his own arm off with his wn weapon so i'm all over the place in this. host: flo, where are you in terms of increased gun control in this country? is there -- are there certain you think are appropriate? caller: well, i think some gun control, but people even seem to be opposed to that. host: what does common sense mean? what's an example of common sense gun control? caller: well, common sense, they have that no-fly list where they want to ban people on the o-fly list but then there's people on the no-fly list that shouldn't be on there. so i really don't know what's you? n, do host: we're working our way through that, flo. we're going to be following all the movement here on capitol

hill. the no-fly list issue that you brought up, the president his oval office address on sunday trying to get congress to move new legislation hat would keep guns from the hands of those from being purchased by those who appear on those no-fly lists. let's get a few more calls in. john is in sterling, virginia on the line for those who don't own a gun. good morning. caller: good morning, john. call. you for taking my i just want to say that people have to realize one thing, it's not the gun, i don't want a gun, i don't have to have a gun. i think the problem with america is that people like fox news are telling people. when you keep telling the american people that the government is a problem, people are frustrated. they will say that, okay, i have to defend myself. i'm listening to some of these -- as anand i'm really immigrant who came to this country 30 years ago, they don't nderstand what they have in this country. when you keep attacking and the a narrative that government is the problem,

barack obama is the problem. it is not the problem. the gun em is manufacturers and people that they pay money, the lobbyists money from the gun manufacturers. this: everyhere is time that our childrens have new slaughtered like in hampshire, i don't know, the people will not change their mind. we need to have sensible laws that people can own a gun. but who should take the responsibility when the gun that you bought killed innocent people? that u going to take responsibility, or are you going to say, oh, my son is mentally sick? look what happened to the children in new hampshire schools. host: you're talking about connecticut, john? caller: the flag, we put the lag down halfway every six months, we cry, and life goes on. when are we going to stop these crazy things? host: and we'll try to get in alex from manchester, new those re on the line for who own five to 20 guns.

alex, good morning. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. peoples' comments this morning have been a target-rich environment. i'd like to address two of the previous callers. virginia, caller from there is not a collective solution to an individual problem. there's the first problem in the firearms.of people in and second is that woman from florida who's comparing a river's license to owning a firearm, that's a serious amendment f second rights and privileges. there's a huge difference. country thinks everything is a right, healthcare is a right, food is a right. privileges.re thomas jefferson, to paraphrase thomas jefferson, without the second amendment, the other amendments are useless.

host: are you condition? -- are you done? alex in manchester, new hampshire. we're going to talk about the history of guns. coming up in the next segment, at the assault weapons ban from 1994 and we'll talk about how the condition continues to influence the debate today. nd pete sepp will join us regarding so-called tax extenders. tot's a dozen tax breaks set expire at the end of the year unless congress renews them. that's coming up next on "washington journal." >> this weekend on c-span, tonight at 9:00 eastern, pandora and rom spotify on how technology

impacts the entertainment business from this year's aspen forum. >> there's certain parts of the is not the only thing you want to listen to so orning commute is one hypothesis that we're testing right now, is that when you're n the subway or you're in your car, et cetera, maybe you don't only want music. maybe you want some news, a weather report. you want to see -- if you're on the subway, not while you're riving, like a clip of jimmy fallon or something like that. you 's some other content want to experience during that period of time, and that's kind of the hypothesis we're testing it see if people are interested in experiencing that. 6:30, sunday evening at g.o.p. presidential candidate casik on the john council of foreign relations on international allianc alliances. >> thanks to my 18 years on the house services committee, i knew many months ago that the only way to solve this problem is to call for an international isis, syria defeat

and iraq. we have to join with our nato in es, importantly, allies the region, jordan, egypt, the gulf states and saudi arabia to organize an international coalition to defeat isis on the ground and to denight them the need to that they survive. hose with long experience know that an air campaign on its own enough.ly not >> for more schedule site,mation, go to our web cspan.org. >> "washington journal" continues. host: president obama this week aid lawmakers need to make it harder for people to buy powerful assault weapons like those used in the san bernardino shootings. this morning on "washington journal" we're looking back at an assault weapons ban was passed. helped use staffer who move that 1994 piece of

legislation. take us back to 1994 and explain the political climate at the issue of unding the guns. guest: it was a very different time. crime was really the number 1 social issue in the country. if you remember in 1998, mike lost the sentially presidential race over an ad about willy horton, someone who let out in jail and under the dukakis administration and had raped and killed crime was much more on the top of mind for voters than it is now. all sorts of things that were happening to try to .educe crime in the country we passed the brady law in 1993 that had background checks for all firearm purchases. it was a major law. there was a major crime bill as well. part of the way, crime bill was the assault weapons ban, kind of specific weapons,military-style a and, you know, it was a donnybrook. very, very close vote that, you know, we prevailed and

schumer at r chuck the time. 216-214.iled host: you said you worked for chuck schumer. we want to show our viewers a video of chuck schumer during his debate over the crime bill of which the assault weapons ban was a part that was included. >> it doesn't mean equal but it does mean a fair share and the bill is fair. each of a fair share to the basic elements we need to crime. police, prevention and punishment. -- the course, the ban bill had the assault weapons ban we approved in the last conference. the more than people want this ban against deadly killing machines and the american people are demanding we pass it now. now, we can all pick at this to what we don't like and recreate the grid lock of last week, last year, and the last decade.

but the moment is here. the question is clear and america is watching. a vote for this bill is a vote for a good tough smart crime bill. it is a vote for the future. my colleagues, a vote for this bill is a vote for confidence. of confidence that america can rise above the race, of of party, of class . of s a vote of confidence the work of wisdom in this house working as a bipartisan team. let's pass this bill and go home with our heads high. host: jim kessler, as we showed bit ago.rs a assault weapons ban focused on 8 specific firearms, certain models a.rvrnlts 15s, bans on ertain military types of features on weapons that are limited on high-capacity

agazines in effect for 10 years, but the definition of what an assault weapon was was debate.ey part of that explain how you came up with those 18 specific firearms that included here. guest: well, so like anything comes, it involves compromise, this was a bill. when a bill passes 216-214, in definition of designed to get assault weapons but also, what is the most we could do and still get enough votes to pass? so the term "assault weapons" actually came from the gun industry. because there is no actual definition of assault weapons. there's no particular type of weapon called assault weapons. t comes from "guns and ammo" magazine in the 1980s. there was a new civilian type of gun that had a lot of features.style so specific guns were banned. tech-9, the a.r. 15.

but they were generally guns and guess the way to think about it is the guns that sort of reassembled those you saw on "die hard." they were designed to be shot from the hip rather than the shoulder or, you know, of the chest. they were guns that had ilitary-style features, and then what was also there, people thought, well, you're going to gun. away my there was a list of over 1,000 not that were specifically banned on the list, look, if you have these, you're fine. it was the g else, nexis of what would be the most effective and what could get the maximum amount of votes. host: and the push-back came definition. here's wayne la fierre, the then-president of the n.r. a., in the spring after the assault weapons ban was first prevailed, provisions in it. chart ou look at the pie

of weapons used in u.s. homicide, these firearms are less than 1% of u.s. homicides. they are not the weapon of america, as we've heard. >> why does anyone need this type of gun? why? >> people hunt with self-loading firearms in all 48 states. in the olympics. they're used in competitions. they're used for personal owned by and they're 30 to 40 million americans and they're about as main stream get.arm as you can the president says that he knows uns, and yet when he goes duck hunting, he picks up a benelli shot gun, which is exactly the same type of gun he wants to ban. what i'm saying is these people simply don't know guns. i was in a gun store in alexandria yesterday listening to the customers and surrounded by a group of united states marines. they're all shaking their head and they're saying the president just doesn't understand guns. so my challenge, if he does, ride n out to the fairfax

and gun club high noon on wednesday, bring your bad guns, and we'll show you they don't shoot any different, mr. president, than the good guns to ban. you don't want host: jim kessler, a key staffer during that debate. some of the push-back then, is it the same push-back you hear today when it comes to gun debates? guest: yeah, i think it's very similar. the argument of the difference and other guns used in crime tend to be more osmetic than, you know, functional. i don't think that's true. these guns are different. you can take high-capacity clips. you can shoot them very rapidly. it's not a fully automatic weapon but sometimes they can be converted into fully automatic weapons, and the truth is, yeah, to guns used in crime tend be hand guns but the question also is what kind of society do we want to live in? a society in which guns more having ak-47s, to uzis than

bringing them out to places of iolence or do we want to have amendments on on the second amendment rights? every amendment has limitations. the question is where are you going to draw that line? host: for our viewers, if you want to join in the conversation with jim kessler, vice president for senior policy there, worked in the house at the time the passed, weapons ban was also served as director of policy and research for americans for gun safety which eventually folded into third way. 202-7488001. it's democrats, 80000. independents, 748 of 8002. we'll get to your calls. for 10 years, it was in effect. it sunseted in 2004. it was not renewed. was it effective? effective. was it brought down the number of crimes committed with those types of guns. there were two gun control laws passed in the 1990s, the brady law and the assault weapons ban.

he brady law was the more important law, no doubt about it. the background check law was more important but the assault more important too and it would be nice if it was still in effect. host: we're still talking about the debate. rudy is from up san antonio, texas, line for democrats. good morning. caller: good morning. thanks for taking my call. as a combat marine with 14 and a purple ons heart, i don't understand how -- they can use the term "assault weapon" for protection. assault means taking a village, going up a hill or taking -- it's an offense word. it's a word that means going on the offense. ow, i'm a second amendment supporter, but -- and if you rifle and ry your m-16, that's fine, but you're limited to three rounds. hy do you have to have 30 rounds to go hunting? bullet leaves the

the chamber, when the bullet goes down the barrel, if it hits the perpetrator, it's still going to go through him into another why do you need 30 rounds? i would have a law you can only carry three rounds in a magazine and anything over that you will be charged 10 years, automatic, you go to jail. host: thank you. rudy. texas. the debate over magazines and the capacity of magazines. guest: that was in the assault weapons ban. it limited the number that could be in a gun. there are magazines that have 30 rounds, even more, these days. i think your caller, rudy, was right. why do we need something that has that level, what is the

purpose of this, and where do we draw some sort of lines here? when you had wayne lapierre andng i was in a gun store people were shaking their heads, when we passed the assault weapons ban and the brady law, people in the military, like rudy, they were mostly on our side, saying these are weapons used in war, not at home. i challenge when my pr as to whether -- wayne lapierre as to whether military people were against us at that time. host: judy. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. the gun-control issue is out of control, as far as i am concerned. every time obama talks about gun control, doesn't he realize that soars gun sales? remember, obama, himself, and his people have gun protection

around him 24/7. shame on obama. does he think he ishell -- who the hell does he think he is? shame on him. guest: it is true that under democratic presidents, gun sales go down. -- gun sales go up. with republican presidents, they go down. when there is an incident like sandy hook or san bernardino, there is a spike in gun sales. that is true. individuals in this country, private individuals, more than 300 million guns. in every single state there is a right to carry firearms on your person, outside of your home. we have a country where guns are

very, very prevalent. it is not working well for us. rates, mass crime murder rates. we need to do more -- not a ton more, but more to protect innocent people against the violence that is out there. host: what do you expect might come out in terms of executive action or what are the current legislative efforts and whether ?ny of them will get momentum guest: it will be difficult to do something about guns in congress. if you are on the no-fly list, you might be added to the list of prohibited buyers. that might be good. that is a fairly minor change in the law. congress has been broken on guns for a long time. on executive action, what you heard was the president trying to figure out some sort of way to get some private sales -- if

gun, you and ia lived in virginia, i wanted to sell you a gun and we are complete strangers, i could sell you the firearm and there is no background check. president, through executive action, is trying to find some way to put it under the rubric of a sale that requires a background check. in the the big hole system. you have this entire framework, legal framework with background checks, and then this changing -- selling guns without background checks. how do you change the loophole. by executive order, he might be able to tighten that a little bit by what is called the in -the-business clause. say i am selling firearms to you, if i am in the business of selling firearms, i am supposed to perform a background check on you. that is a murky definition.

what we have heard is the president is trying to strengthen the definition. host: by possibly number of sales each year -- number ofpossibly sales. i heard the number 5 -- if you are selling five guns, you are in the business, and possibly by where you are selling the firearms. if you are at a gun show -- just the fact that you are at a place of commerce selling that gun should have a background check. host: anita. -- bonita. wyoming. line for republicans. caller: good morning. thank you for c-span. i do not believe what is going on here. people are out of work. they cannot feed their families. their children are going hungry and they are tired of this. that is what blows up this gun thing. the democrats want to take the guns. guns are needed.

we are in wyoming. would they turn the grizzly bears loose on us, the wolves loose on us? they think those things don't attack people? there have been so many attacks this year from grizzly bears. what are you going to do? you cannot even go for a walk. i do not own a gun anymore. i am an old woman and i do not need a gun. but i tell you what, the young people should learn how to shoot and everybody should remember the holocaust because it happens, and it isn't just going to go away if you don't have some protection. i appreciate your time. thank you so much. host: the argument that bonita is making right there -- here is argued from the house for in 1994 during the debate over the assault weapons ban. this is arthur, republican of

south carolina. [video clip] of course, the most objectionable feature in this bill is its assault on the second amendment and in that context i would like to remind the house of a couple of things. you know, if they had banned the 1775, weeapons of probably would not have been able to win the first american revolution. when they were touring the death camps after world war ii, and a group went to show blanca, the question was asked, how could 6 million jews and other minorities, twice the population , how could they have let what happened to them happen to them? why didn't they fight? and of course, the answer was with what? jim kessler, the arguments

today, to 1994. guest: it is great to see arthur ravenel raving on the house floor. no one is talking about taking away people's second amendment rights. in fact, the latest up in court decision, the heller decision in 2005 -- the supreme court justices that ruled the second amendment is a right, they said it is a right that allows for restrictions and specifically mention things like assault weapons. the question is where we going to draw that line. linee 1930's we draw that with fully automatic weapons -- the tommy gun, which you saw in gangster movies. they could not be sold for civilian use with some very rare exceptions. the republic has survived, ok? weapons, that is another place where we should be drawing this line. there will still be 299 million, 500,000 other guns people can

use to protect themselves. a thingt going to be where people's guns are going to be taken away. even with an assault weapons ban, it is just that you cannot manufacture anymore or sell anymore in stores. no one is talking about gun bans . host: let's head to florida where phyllis is waiting period line for democrats. -- waiting. line for democrats. caller: thank you for taking my call. i am curious about the studies -- the public health studies in relationship to guns and violence. i hear there is -- that you also, where does the

community stand on this studying of violence in public health. guest: thank you. ban that congress has passed that presents the -- prevents the centers for disease gunrol from studying fatalities from a public health standpoint. it is one of the special provisions that the gun rights lobby has put into congress that is unlike anything else any other industry has, and i want to give you another one. there is a law that says you cannot sue gun manufacturers or gun stores. fromhey have immunity lawsuits that no other industry in the country has. so, they operate by special rules. thetruth of the matter is

gun rights advocates, the second amendment purists -- they have a fear of data and information. so, information about gun traces is traced,n the gun who bought the gun, who sourced it, they are afraid of information. some polling from "the new the times made headlines -- majority of americans oppose assault white -- assault weapons ban for the first time in 20 years. here is the actual polling question asking if people were in favor or oppose of a national ban on assault weapons. 50% saying they oppose, as opposed to 44% saying they favor. surprising to you?

guest: a little bit. discussion the ban -- in some ways i feel the country has moved from the ban discussion to a discussion of other things that have to happen with guns including background loopholes.htening i feel, as the caller from wyoming said earlier, there is fear right now. you know, i is -- think people are pulling back a little bit. i just want to say one other thing about guns and one of the is very hard to pass these gun laws. for the most part, done crime in -- gun crime in this country is concentrated in urban areas. gun ownership is very diffuse. we had the caller -- i think it wyoming.a from it is not really matter what gun laws you are going to pass in wyoming. it is a world state, very sparse. it is a rural

state, very sparse. but those senators get a vote, and the house gets a vote. the number of gun homicides committed in january 2013 in chicago equaled the total number of homicides committed in new hampshire, maine, vermont, montana, south dakota, and north dakota combined over the course of a year. so, crime is concentrated. gun ownership is diffuse. host: chico, california. mark is waiting period line for independent -- waiting. line for independents. caller: good morning. i'm a disabled vietnam veteran. i did two tours in vietnam. i owned guns before i went in ae service and after having

couple of my best friends killed -- when ie in my arms got back i got rid of my guns and i have no use to shoot or have somebody shoot me. i think it is reckless for these assault weapons that are needed for work, but until you have -- war, but until you have somebody died in your arms that you care hell.-- war is we are not in war over here. you know, i do not mind people

with, butpons to hunt it is just until people are really in positions like i have , they mightife think a little bit different. thank you. host: thank you for the call, mark. guest: well, mark, thank you so much for calling. thank you for your service, and for your very, very passionate words. you know, people should be able to own firearms to protect themselves. i am a second amendment supporter. there is a line we have to draw. we true the line in the 1930's with machine guns -- we true the line of the 1930's with machine guns. there are still weapons that are sold for public use that have no business being in civilian hands. they have no business

proliferating. then do not make this country safer. and if the country less safe. host: franklin, tennessee. eric is waiting. line for republicans. caller: how are you guys? host: good, eric. caller: well, i have a farm in a rural -- in rural country. the driveway is half a mile long. i have had to call the sheriff over the years. it takes 25 minutes. carbine that944 m1 magazine.apacity i have four of them. i have never used it, i've never threatened anyone, but, you know, if it comes to protecting myself, i am the one that can do it. i have some antique winchester -capacity,t have seven

.ou know, barrel tubes i do not know the difference between a lever action winchester that holds seven high-powered rifle rounds, holds my m1 carbine that 14, you know? 14 is an assault weapon, certainly, but my winchester is more powerful, more dangerous, and more effective. so, i do not know. how do you get rid of all of these things because it is a collectors item, but it is fully functional and, from my is aective, my driveway

half-mile long. if i needed a gun, i am not sure which one i would pick up first. host: jim kessler, again, on the definition. guest: well, i think the m1 carbine is a fully automatic gun, meaning it is a machine gun. there are very few of those still out in civilian hands. you can get a special license, but that is a machine gun and it is very hard to get. yet, the definition -- there is a line to draw. so, the definition in the assault weapons ban is a gun that can take a detachable clip and a series of other characteristics. a detachable clip is, kind of, the first thing you have in the definition. then it is thing like ban it mouths, -- bayonet mollis, threaded launcher, so you can hold the gun like this and it

does not heat up. things like that. a line needs to be drawn somewhere on this. again, i said to your caller, to eric, no one is talking about taking away his right to own firearms and protect his home. people thathere are live in places like rural areas of tennessee where the way they protect themselves it is not going to be police coming to them. they live 30 minutes away. so, we felt that law struck the right balance. host: what about the criticism of the law that it focused on the wrong problem if the end goal was to protect more americans? a column in "the new york times" in 2014 said the law that barred the sale of assault weapons in 1994 made little difference, as it turns out big, scary, military rifles did not kill the majority of americans murdered each year.

guest: true. right. so, if you're going to die from a handgun -- or from a gun in this country, the most likely way you are going to die is from bulletsn, and not from 10, 11, 12, and not bullets 1, 2, or three. that is absolutely true. that is why we need the brady law, require other laws that crackdown on gun sales, cut down on gun trafficking," polls that bring guns from the legal market to the legal market -- trafficking, laws that ring guns for the legal market to the illegal market. there is a reason why there is a small number. we did impose a ban on these. it did have an effect. when we did the assault weapons ban in 1994 the number of crimes

and killings with these types of guns like the tech nine, the mac 10, and ak-47 knockoffs, they were on the increase, and in the gang gores happen in the late-19 80's and the early-19 90's, ofse became the weapon choice. at the time, they were on the upswing, showing up more and more in crime, and very importantly, police across the country were in favor of the ban because they felt outgunned. they felt they had no chance against these guns. host: edward on the line for democrats. louisiana. go ahead, edward. caller: i was calling because i was in the military when the our rifle first came into

inventory. it was the happiest moment of my life. i remember one of the statements that our commander made at the time. the statement that he made to us as military personnel was that we must do everything that could weapon out ofs the hands of the civilian community, because this weapon, the m-16, is made for war. called an assault weapon to assault ase it particular land area to kill. that is why it is called an

assault weapon. there is no one that can convince me -- by the way, i amountwo two wars in the in -- tours in vietnam -- there is no neck and convinced me people need an assault weapon. that is why we have the weapons to fight the war. guest: thank you, edward. this is another person with military experience who is calling to cities are what weapons. there are other weapons -- calling to say these are war weapons. they saw there was a dividing point in these types of firearms. host: is there a coalition that you think could be formed again in this day and age?

comments, president's we need to make it hard as for people to buy powerful assault harder formake it people to buy powerful assault weapons. guest: i think that coalition has to include police, not just associations and police chiefs in washington, but local police chiefs and sheriffs in counties and in cities. the we passed those laws in 1990's, and again in 2004 when it expired, i former group, americans for gun safety, we were able to pass it through the senate. we could not get into the house at the time. we had 700 local police chiefs and sheriffs supporting that and and -- that wall closing the gunship -- that closing the loophole.

host: diane feinstein from inifornia dropped a bill 2014 but was not able to move an assault weapons ban she worked on. it was january of 20 13 she introduced the assault weapons ban. i think that is the most recent that gained any momentum. guest: yes, and it is stronger than the law that passed in 1994. the law in 1994 was detachable clip and then two military-style characteristics versus detachable clip and one characteristic. so, it is trying to make a lot more stringent. washington. david. thank you for waiting. caller: if we are all minute men, why limit the capacity to

magazines? it is no secret one time we had to take up arms. we know the enemy is amongst us all over. they are coming from every direction, different countries, everywhere. you limit our capacity to defend whoseves, well, i wonder side the administration is actually on, you know? stand uptry needs to and take it back before it is says, becausemp it will slowly be taken away from us. you see that it is going away. the enemy is all around us. like you did in california recently. host: jim kessler, go ahead. guest: that perspective that david just brought, that is the perspective that dominates the modern day gun rights movement, which is, you know, we are very close to having this country being taken over by external forces or by an evil, internal

government force that is going to impose tyranny on americans. viewis not a mainstream out in america, but that is the view of the activists gun rights community right now, and really for the last 10 or 12 years. the thing that i find scary view of a is not this future world like the terminator or the road warrior, but that is whatiew that is dominated congress does and what is happening in state legislatures. -- dominating what congress does and what is happening in state legislators and we need to shrug us off and have a more rational perspective of what is going on in the country. host: oklahoma. roger. on the line for democrats. caller: i just want to clarify

-- there seems to be conclude -- confusion -- the law that was passed in 1994, they got rid of the bayonet clip, and they made the magazine down to 10. that is all that was done. the argument is over semi-auto. it was still there. the gun was still available, but just without those things i mentioned. in new york state and connecticut they just got rid of the semi autos altogether. you cannot even own -- is my understanding. that is what the debate is. it has something to do with assault rifles. it is just a term here it even during the ban, you could still get the 30-round clip online or over the table. it was still readily available. the second amendment says you can have a gun, for the right to have a militia against a term

radical government -- chairman echo government. so, you cannot fight a tyrannical government without a assault weapon. the supreme court made the comma a period, so now they heard their own cause. because they are making it a period, they could make the autos.t that an and semi the whole argument should be over the semi auto. sold: nearly every firearm now is a semi automatic. between fully automatic and semi automatic -- the difference is if you press the trigger, the gun continues to shoot with fully automatic. semi automatic, each time you shoot, you have to press, but the next round is automatically loaded into the chamber.

nearly every firearm sold now is semi automatic, and even in the 1990's they were semi automatic. it was whether it had other military-style features. i want to read something from that important decision. this was written by scalia. it is called the heller decision , and it is the decision that basically said you cannot ban people from owning all firearms, that there is an individual, constitutional right to own a gun. "like most rights, the rights secured by the second amendment is not unlimited. nothing should be taken to cast doubt on long-standing prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws prohibiting the carrying of places."in sensitive that is not ruth gator business very -- ruth bader ginsburg. that is justice scalia.

ban people cannot from owning firearms period, but there is a place you can draw the line. ony just rejected a case assault weapons. it said yeah, they are constitutional. the assault weapons bans that the states had, the federal government had at one point or another, they are constitutional. you do not have to worry about breaking the second amendment. only a minute or two david in texas. yes, sir, how do you equate the sandy hook shooting with the san bernardino shooting? guest: so, i think they are different. i think the sandy hook shooting is a particular style of mass shooting where you have someone that is insane and has easy access to firearms and what they

can do. san bernardino -- we are learning more about san bernardino, but what we are -- what we know right now is this is more a crime against the country. this is somebody trying to make terrorist-type statement, and a different set of motivations. host: david, did you have a follow-up? caller: yeah, you are carrying water for the democrats trying to make this san bernardino shooting appear it was not a terrorist act of radical islam. it is really pathetic. guest: david, let me be clear, san bernardino killing was a radical islamist, jihad terrorist attack on innocent americans to the best of our knowledge at this point.

and that certainly seems what it is to me. ofhink this is the beginning a trend that we are going to see. i do not think this is the last terrorist attack within the on somethat is based level of religious extremism, jihadist extremism. i think it is one of the reasons why we need to tighten our gun laws. it is not by far the only thing we need to do here. there are other things we need to do to combat this terrorism. but i think the notion that somebody could buy a gun and then sell it to this horrible terrorist without a background check, without breaking the law, i think that is a crime, too. host: jim kessler is senior vice president at third way. you can follow them on twitter. we appreciate your time this morning. guest: thank you very much. host: next, we will be joined by

heat sepp, president of the national taxpayers union, discussing tax extenders. later, lisa friedman will join us from paris on the latest that has -- on the deal that has emerged from the climate negotiations that have taken place the last two weeks. we will be right back. ♪ >> every weekend on "american 3, 48y tv" on c-span hours of programs and events that tell our nations story. this afternoon at 2:00 p.m. eastern, historians and others on the legacy of carmichael, a voice for black rights in the usa and her organizer for the revolutionary party. they are joined by charles cobb. cobb: he calls the city in

movement in apprenticeship in andggle -- sit in movement apprenticeship in struggle, and i think he is right. i mentioned, he most to africa, embraces pan african socialism. other people embrace the democratic party. >> then, elizabeth gray on the use of opium in the 19 century and public opinion of its abuse by men and women. professor gray: the attitude toward women drinking at the time was that this was inappropriate, a woman should not drink. why would it be an alternative? 10:00, wemorning at look back at the 2000 campaign of al gore as he toured the state of new hampshire. : for the last six and a half years you have seen new

hampshire change from a time when you are losing 10,000 jobs a year to a time now what you are gaining 12,000 jobs a year, and that is partly because we have had fiscal responsibility. president clinton and i have put in place an economic plan that is balance the budget, doubt the biggest surplus. gore won thel democratic nomination but lost the general election to president george w. bush in one of america's most contested presidential elections. american history tv all weekend on c-span3. >> she was such an authentic person. i always thought there was more to lady bird than anybody had covered. she became the first modern first lady. she had a big staff, a very important project. she wrote her book as soon a she left the white house.

she really invented the modern first lady. >> sunday night on "q&a," an inside look at the marriage and political partnership of lady bird and lyndon johnson. >> lady bird johnson is a part of example of a conclusion that sawme to -- those women something in those men -- the ambition, the ability to make a climb and they married them despite of parental objections. she is a good example and that is why i decided i had to find out more about her. >> sunday night at 8:00 eastern "q&a."ific on c-span's >> "washington journal" continues. pete sepp is back at our

desk. start off by explaining what tax extenders are and how they become this annual provision. are about 65 provisions, some very small, some affecting no one, others affecting millions, that are put on temporary lifespans. unfortunately, members of congress have a real problem for a variety of reasons, budgets going, plain politics, in trying --make them parliament permanent. permanency is a good thing in the tax code. if you can keep provisions in the tax code like expensing for businesses on a relatively stable basis continuing year after year, that is good for the economy because business owners can plan years in advance on those kinds of things being around for them when they make investments.

this kind of process, where every other year we have to go through this tortuous debate over big and small tax is not only a problem for the economy as a whole, it is a problem for the advancement of tax reform. if we want to do an overhaul of the entire system, we can never get to it if we are spending the better part of the year every two years debating these 55 provisions. debate happening alongside negotiations on the on the mess -- omnibus spending bill. the other part is expected to be a tax extenders package. let's talk about what is estimated to be a price tag of this year's tax extenders package. how many provisions, how much might they cost? guest: this is the interesting part. it is one of the contradictions or the conundrums of the extenders package. renewing all the

provisions on the table would cost the treasury over $70 billion over the next decade. you could think of it that way, but then again all of these provisions were current law until recently, so if the treasury really losing money by these extenders being put forward again, or is the treasury simply gaining a windfall at the expense of taxpayers by allowing them to lapse? this is one of the debate points surrounding the package. us an example of one of the extenders on the table right now -- something that would apply to a lot of people in the country. guest: that is the deduction for state and local sales taxes. americans have long been able to the duct income and property taxes they pay to state and local governments, but several years ago another deduction was added for folks that live in states where there are no income taxes, so they could deduct sales taxes. people might deduct sales taxes even if they live in an income

tax state, but the option is there. that affects 10 point one million filers in the -- 10.1 million filers in this country. when we think of extenders in terms of the outrageous ones, we can talk about those, but there are very broad provisions that would mean financial hardship for folks who would not be able to claim them on their tax returns. host: what is an outrageous one, and are they looked together -- lumped together to try to get the outrageous ones past -- passed? guest: you are onto it. the outrageous ones sitting get a ride off. one that is mentioned is the motorsports entertainment complex recovery period, which is essentially saying if you put up a race track for nascar or

other motorsports, you get a seven-year period in which to recover your investment instead of the normal 15 or 39-year period others might get. nascar might argue i am creating jobs, it is a good ring, but those concerned about fairness given to why not someone who puts up a shopping mall, or a boxing ring, or anything? fairness in the tax code is what we're talking about with pete sepp. if you want to join the conversation -- up first.er is butler, indiana. line for republicans. walter, you are up with pete sepp. caller: you are for taking my call. the biggest problem i have is

the government takes our money and does not use it properly. if the american people have seen the things like where they do studies where shrimp are on treadmills exercising, or harry reid says we have to have the poetic cowboy association singing songs out west. it is blasphemous what goes on. if the government has to have a balanced budget amendments, you should be able to do your taxes on a napkin, everyone pay 10%, and let the americans. be unleashed. it is porkbarrel spending -- spirit be unleashed. it is porkbarrel spending. they sit and ivory towers and decide who will get something. the state should be able to keep their money instead of passing it to the almighty government and saying please give us some crumbs. next they will be telling us to eat cake. the whole thing has fallen apart. in america, the entrepreneurship

and small business is being crushed by the hard-handed, pressing down of a thumb of the authoritarian overreaching of a government, and until we throw these bombs down, or remove the irs system totally, we will always be under the oppression of a government that thinks they are entitled to our money. it drives me nuts. we live on a budget and know how to balance our budget because we are hard-working americans that have a conscience and know we should not spend more than we have the here we government, these entitled people that sit there and pick and choose winners and losers. the whole thing is corrupt. it is a shame. the good news, i live in a state like indiana where it is low taxes and common sense. i wish everyone a merry christmas and got bless you. thank you. host: thank you. you might want to check out the website of the national taxpayers union. pete sepp. guest: we tend not to think about the spending side of the

ledger when considering taxes, but they have an impact. lots of points the caller brought up. we can talk about one of them -- the tax reform solution called the fair tax. there are many types of tax reform ideas on the table. this one has been around for the better part of 20 years. what it would do is replace the , capitalncome payroll gains, death taxes, almost all federal taxes with a single, retail national sales tax, something on the order of 23%. some would argue that when you include the various economic impacts, it is more than 30%. that a very steep rate would occur on all goods and services purchased at final sale , but it would replace a lot of .axes at the same time when you consider that you are paying income tax and payroll tax at the standard rates,

middle-class rates, you are already paying 25% out of your own pocket anyway. that is one way to go. there are others. for the tax extenders being considered right now, we have gone through a few of them -- dozens are on the table -- generally, are they and that individuals, corporations, small businesses? guest: they are split. when you take a look, for example, as small business provisions, these are actually pretty important and they might point the way toward tax reform. at stake here -- the biggest ones -- what is called section 179 extension and bonus appreciation. these are mechanisms that allow businesses to recover investment costs more quickly for tax purposes rather than having to write them off over multi--year, sometimes multi-decade depreciation cycles. the feature of any good corporate or business tax system

would be something, i think, that allow the business to write off expenses upfront in the year they are incurred. well, this gets us closer to that goal. it does not get us all the way there. of extenders,mple if properly structured, might engender a discussion in a instructive way than a petty way. host: pete sepp is our guest. robert. south pittsburgh, tennessee. line for democrats. robert, good morning. caller: good morning. host: go ahead, robert. would like to know why the nfl is a tax-free organization. guest: oh, yes. this has to do with some of the way that the nfl structures part of its operations now. the teams themselves involved in

the national football league or any of the other professional sports leagues can be pro--- for-profit entities. their players pay taxes, there are taxes involved in some of their operations, but the leagues themselves are nonprofit style organizations. that is why they do not have tax liabilities in that conventional sense. they are regarded almost as associations of businesses, almost like a chamber of commerce would be. aneone say that is certainly unfair area and ought to be addressed because the definition of a nonprofit organization is a real battleground. folks think that well, maybe, churches, of course, those seem identifiable as charities. they ought to be nonprofits, b even there you have controversies over what constitutes a church. host: jackson, texas. ron is on the line for independents. go ahead. te, of these 55 tax

extenders, give me an example of one you think is really effective as far as the economy in general in the united states goes? i was mentioned. say, the section 179 business expense reduction and bonus appreciation -- those get us closer to a system where a business just makes an investment and writes it off in the year that it happened. it is simple, predictable, and it is pro-growth. there have been studies -- one was researched by the federal reserve bank of kansas city talking about how this irregularity in renewing these two deductions alone have affected decisions of agricultural businesses in terms of making new investments in farm equipment. so, the tax code is directly impacting investment decisions on the ground.

that is unfortunate. host: what is keeping a provision like that from being prominent? why does that have to be year-to-year? lawmakers are budgeting to a score. they are saying look, if you make this provision permanent , it will-year period amount to tens of millions of dollars in lost revenue. well, depending on your philosophy, that can be lost revenue or taxpayer savings. it all depends on how you want to define it, but that is something that lawmakers take very seriously because they worry about the impact on long-term deficits, and because they are so often ill inclined to cut federal spending at the same time these questions arise. host: florida. laura is waiting period line for democrats. caller: good morning to you.

i remember at a time when my husband used to write off his workboots,, -- clothing, things for work -- and they took that away. they took awaye the things that the working man had been able to deduct, but they have added things that corporations can deduct, and the workingman, it is like they owe, and the big corporations, they don't owe. it is backwards. these lobbyists are killing the country. we need to get these tax codes erased. start from scratch. i will tell you what, the poor working man in this country -- i , the the older you get more you have to pay. people on social security are paying into income tax.

i mean, it is ridiculous, but you can write off a corporate jet, you know? i just do not get it. i think we need to start from scratch. guest: well, you know, this is a very interesting point because in 1986, when we last had a major overhaul of the tax system, both for businesses and individuals, there was basically a bargain struck with the american people and congress. congress said, ok, if you are willing to give up a lot of write-offs, including the boot right off the caller mentioned, you can get a much lower tax rate. from 50%educe rates brackets, just two and you will pay the lower tax rate on more types of income, but overall your burden should remain the same in your taxes should be easier to complete. well, unfortunately, congress has been pushing back on that bargain year after year.

1990, under president george h.w. bush, there was a third tax bracket introduced at 31%. under bill clinton, we got more tax brackets. so, the rates kept going up, but the deductions were not keeping up with those rates, so tax burdens again to climb. in recent years -- began to climb. in recent years, certain credits have begun to bring the burdens down for some classes of individuals, but not all, so starting from scratch does make sense. we can do that, actually. it will be a complex process, the congress has already been at work examining all of those parts of the tax code over the last two years through structured processes. host: what do you think speaker paul ryan can bring to that process? hast: well, speaker ryan already said he wants to make tax reform, especially on the business side, a priority in 2016. people might say you cannot do that in an election year, but

just as i said, the last major tax reform was also in an election year. we can pull this off if we are able to rely on the research that has been done under the house ways and means committee under chairman dave camp, at that time, and the senate finance committee's working groups. they release reports last year and this year that can serve as fine guides for both parties and congress to start broadening the tax base, reducing the tax rate, and figuring out how to treat multinational companies so they are not tempted, indeed forst, to move some of their operations overseas. this is a real problem. south carolina. john is on the line for democrats. caller: good morning. i am a good listener and a regular caller. here is the problem with the taxes. i have worked for over 40 years

and each paycheck is taxed on my , on myent that is taxed social security that is taxed. ok? due -- do nt in time you give me a tax break because i have worked all of these years and paid taxes, and now that i am retired, i still get a w2 form, or whatever, for taxes? i mean, i don't get it. corporation, who is a taxes.-- don't pay any

in fact, we get some of those subsidies. so, at what point in time? thank you. host: yeah. this is a very difficult situation because many folks who may have proceeded along their careers or business paths thinking the tax system would be one way find that 20, 30, 40 years down the road, it is quite a different system. we do, now, tax certain portions of security -- this should carry benefits depending on what your income is. tax laws lots of state that could be unfavorable to pension incomes, even if you relocate to that state. so, those are equity problems we need to address in the system. now, for companies relocating overseas, for example, we are having an experience of inversions in this country because number one, the rates are very high, and also the

administrable in of the system is very difficult. you have to consider complexity in the tax code costs the american economy an estimated $240 billion a year. that is our calculation. the irs likes to claim we are a very efficient tax system. only $12udget is billion. that is because the cost of compliance and collecting really are not on the irs. it is on businesses and individuals to file the returns, do the withholding. that costs money. that hurts the economy. as for businesses getting subsidized, that is a terrible situation, and it is happening come a not so much through the tax code, in my opinion, but through all kinds of spending programs, regulatory preferences, and, sometimes, in a quibble tax treatment among businesses -- inequitable tax treatment among businesses. we often think of tax fairness

in the context of his the rich guy paying a lot more than the poor guy? well, the congressional budget office, lots of other government agencies say yeah, the system is progressive as is, and we can talk about statistics there, but we really ought to be looking across the income scale rather than up and down the income scale for tax fairness. do people or businesses with roughly the same amount of profit or income pay roughly the same amount of tax? answer -- nowhere close. that is the biggest problem with our tax system. host: pete sepp is our guest with the national taxpayers union. ntu.org. we are taking a questions and comments as we go over tax extenders, the debate over taxes, what could happen in an election year, 2016, with tax reform. william has been waiting columbus, georgia. line for independents. though head. caller: -- go ahead.

caller: i was just trying to find out -- i work every day. i can work eight hours and they can take a local tax. 13 hours, ihours, do not see my overtime because they take so much of the tax. to 62, 63, iet have to get my social security because i want0% to retire or -- at 62? they take so much. guest: yes. these are penalties, unfortunately, for early retirement. bedeviling aspect of tax withholding. the fact is, the more you make, the more they have to withhold as a percentage because the employer is obligated to figure out -- well, this guy might be moving into a higher tax

bracket. they have to be withheld at a higher tax rate. so, this is, on the ground, the disincentive that the income tax system ground, incomeincentive that our tax system provides for working harder, and it's a serious need to address. host: james in enterprise, republicans. for jim, you're up. sir.er: okay, thank you, the change don't we ax code, why just do away with all of these silly laws and go to a straight sales tax that instead of the all. and slaught paying it guest: well, a 10% retail sales tax is one approach. there have been -- there's the

23% national sales tax under the fair tax system that we were recently discussing. o there are a variety of options. still others on the campaign ed a have suggest value-added tax which would be levied on consumption at each a gooder roduction in service, like when a pencil lead mated togetherre to become a pencil, that's value-added. it would be taxed. the way that europe taxes consumption right now, and one -- actually, cruz andandidates, ted rand paul on the republican side to replace d a vat part or all of the corporate tax systems. wants to on twitter talk about the affordable care act on taxes. ow many taxpayers won't be getting a return due to the affordable care act? guest: plenty, if there is continued lack of participation n the affordable care act's

exchanges and other minimum insurance requirements because there are large penalties for failing to have the coverage that's required under aca, and don't have now who this coverage are probably used to paying penalties of a few hundred dollars. the problem is, under the law, those penalties are going to ramp up severely to the point where a family of four might be in ng well over $1,000 penalties. there are a host of other taxes, too. an excise tax on high benefit plan, so-called cadillac plans. addressed ng to get right now in the extenders and the budget negotiations. hiatus for the cadillac tax, but there are a tanning others, on beds, on medical devices, all of which are very controversial, but the most important aspect that's overlooked about all of this is the administerability of the affordable care act from a ive.perspect

the irs has been terribly overburdened having to figure portions administer of this law. the irs has had to re-tool its computers to define income for purposes of the insurance urposes, interact with insurance companies and other agencies in ways it never has. when you think about that burden, you begin to understand get eople aren't able to through to the agency to get other tax questions answered. they are overloaded. host: michael on the line for democrats, you're up. caller: good morning. i would like to discuss a flat ax, and i'm trying to understand, say a person makes a million dollars a year, he gets 10% of tax, pays $100,000 in tax, he's got $900,000 left over, okay. he doesn't have to do anything with that. he doesn't have to put it anywhere, so he can accumulate wealth over, you know, a shorter

period of time, like 10 years or whatever, and the way the taxes up now, i'm trying to understand this, is like a lot of the taxes are set up so you need to put that money some break, like a tax charity, et cetera, things like you have to move that money around. you can't just put it in the u nk, put it in the bank, yo know, you don't have to do anything, but i'd like to know how that works out in the long run. it sounds great short-term, but long run bothers me. guest: sure. you know, jerry brown, the current governor of california actually one of the foremost proponents of a flat tax. he interesting, because feels it would end a lot of the special interest gaming of the i think he understands that argument of looking across the income scale down.ll as up and if you want to have a system where everybody with roughly the same incomes pay roughly the

same taxes, well, a very or sparent system with one two rates and well defined base go.ht be the way to now, we also have this question brought up of how much do we want to build into the tax system to affect people's behavior? do we want to, for example, activities that conserve energy, or not? do we want to favor certain industries that are engaged in manufacturing versus retailing. these are all questions that if we get too far down that hole we getmbers of congress, into social engineering, and that's really an important problem, because that adds complexity to the system, additionalcosts, and economic distortions. you're almost better off making neutral as s possible so that other factors ffect peoples' decisions

whether to buy homes or give to charity or start a certain line of business. you make taxes the minimum consideration. host: let's go to haymarket, virginia, where steve is waiting on the line for independents. steve, good morning. to me yes, it seems that the genesis in the bible 20% the tax rate at under -- from the teachings of oseph, and the other thing i'd like to see is that all of our taxes, state, federal and local go into a bank account which the monitor from the congressman's office, and then, 15th, you on october write a check to all the relevant agencies and then the first part of november, you go and vote. and that would have two effects. he responsibility of the taxes goes directly into the hands of of course, man and,

in october, you would allow vote on whether this congressman is to be rewarded or punished. there have know, been proposals to move tax ayment or tax filing day or closer to election day and vice versa. there is a degree of missing ility that's from our system right now, not burdens and tax lso what those tax burdens are spent on. here's also withholding from taxes from paychecks and other types of income, that can only what us to not we're paying but the complexity payment, in making the and we have to going back to when withholding was instituted. the entire scheme was crafted by fellow who was a federal

reserve bank official and macy's executive, because his skill was needed to show that, well, if pay things in to small chunks on time, they'll they ever would if they had to write a check up david brinkley commented on this in his book "washington goes to war" that the federal government learned what used car salesmen had a long time ago, let people pay stuff in chunks, and they'll give you much more of their genesis that was the of withholding. host: north carolina is up on the line for the republicans. caller: good morning. i just want to comment on the pros and cons on the sales tax. me would be the most fair, because you know, the people obviously are all going and they'reame rate going to say that the poor person, it's not fair for them

to pay 10% when the billionaire is paying 10%, but if you look buy, at they're going to they're obviously going to buy different things, and so it's a choice and, you know, the person buying the yacht is going to pay more than the person buying the bike, you know, i ean, it just makes sense, it's fair, and ultimately, everyone included, you know, if somebody robs a bank, they've got to spend that money somewhere. money, ey spend that they're going to pay taxes on it, but it just seems to make something to have like that. thank you. guest: there is an interesting this about how you protect the poor and the tax ng class from heavy burdens and a reformed system like a consumption tax or the flat tax.or a and you can design it that way. every n to think that person should be able to provide for themself before they provide for government.

well, you can design a flat tax system, for example, and this is imbedded in legislation and congress where a family of four an have an income of up to 45, ven $50,000 before the flat rate tax applies. with the fair tax system, you a pre-bate.called where families are sent an mount that covers a tax on purchases up to whatever a family at the poverty level might need for basic necessities. so when we talk about fairness single or that have a lat rate, we need not worry, necessarily, about the poor or the working class being affected, if -- "if" e design the exemption systems properly. host: pat is on the line for democrats from west virginia. pat. morning, caller: good morning to c-span and mr. sepp. get your i'd like to

comments on a couple of points i'd like to make. hate it when i hear these people get on here, these financial experts, and i read columns wherecial forcing these corporations to send their money "forcing." we're not forcing anybody but we're never going to hear that they makeedia because their profits off of large corporations. these corporations send their make more there to money for primarily the large stockholders and the ceos, the little small investors you hear s and oh, well, pension other types of investments are involved there. yes, they are, but they're not the majority make off of this. and that really disturbs me that addressed.ver there's no forcing there. he reason this occurs is the wal-marts and the other large corporations get tax breaks, locating in a or

certain spot. subsidies hey get from the government through such things as seminars for their to get on ployees food stamps, medicaid, and other the that they manipulate system. and they have a whole cadre of corporate in order to provide these methods paying their ound fair share. and you know what, you hear from all the different aspects of overnments, democrats and republicans alike, how the common man and the small businessman, and the small businessman who can't afford the lawyers has to pay a self has to pay b & o tax whenever wal-mart gets a tax break to locate a certain place for 10 years. also, there's a couple of more points. first of all, terrorists with the way our government was to this taxes, whenever

government was first born. there was no such thing as an obligated to make man outno car

sure that they minimize their tax load and sometimes that inverting part of the operation overseas. thered to understand that are not direct tax incentives for locating companies or profits overseas. here are disincentives for staying here. we are one of the only countries in the industrialized world who has a taxation system, meaning a company who earns profit in another country is taxed by that country as well as by the united states, and then there's a ystem of complex credits and deductions to help offset part of that. why not scrap all of that and say we're going to have a low

rate that treats most businesses, virtually all businesses, about the same, and much better would serve our system for those who believe companies should be paying a bigger share or those who think that the current share is fine, whatever. transparent system so we can have a rational debate all of this. host: see if we can get in a couple of more calls. earl from massachusetts, go ahead. caller: thanks for taking my call. have a question, and being a native american, i want to know what does it mean when it said indians not taxed? and my second question is how would you explain taxing a treaty. that's the second part of it. i don't know, i think those questions right there might opefully give me some idea of what i'm trying to find out. guest: well, there are a lot of that native s

americans are liable for just as any other american would be, and there are actually provisions in bill regarding, i believe, coal production on tribal lands, several other provisions, and so the federal government definitely does touch native americans with its tax syst system, no doubt about that and as for taxing trees, there are state and local property taxes. we could do a whole show on the nature of arbitrary tax assessments at that level. omeowners have long had to contend with that problem. host: pete sepp, hope you can come back and do another show. we appreciate it. pete sepp with the national tax union, ntu.org. up next, lisa will be joining us from paris on the deal that's emerged from the u.s. climate

negotiations taking place in the past two weeks. "newsmakers" this week, we were joined by hoyer, how ep steny e thinks the timing will play out next week when it comes to budget deal. >> first of all, there are two separate issues. one is about funding the government and ensuring that the government has the opportunity to operate in an effective and fficient manner to serve the american people, and to defend our country. we need to pass that. it's a must-pass. the extenders bill is not a must-pass. it's an auto-pass. and, of course, what the senate two-year they did a extension. am not for the 800 billion or $750 billion bill that's being discussed. irst of all, i think it makes the deficit worse. secondly, i think it undermines our ability to get to a

comprehensive tax reform, which need.er ryan has said we the president has said we need. i agree with that. i think most democrats would and most that, republicans do. standpoint of funding the government, we won't be voting, but the house will go into session for a short period of time, and reached agreement is will be filed. the reason monday is important the cause that gives

republicans theoretically -- and because it tically, may be as few as 26 hours, but monday, ys, that is a tuesday and then wednesday, to -- consider and pass under this appropriations bill as well as a tax extender bill that is filed at that point in time. so i think that's what the procedure is going to be. may do some discussion on tuesday. ready to have an agreement and the republicans believe they have the votes that we will consider both the tax xtender bill, and the appropriation on the appropriation bill to fund the wednesday. on entire interview with hoyer minority leadership will appear on sunday. you can hear it on c-span and newsmakers is available online

www.cspan.org. in our last segment of the "washington journal" this morning, we're opening up our phones to get your thoughts on any public policy issues we've talked about today or issues that have been on your mind. but first, i want to be joined friedman of e & e climate wire where she's in u.n. climate g the negotiations that began two weeks ago. we're a day past when those negotiations were supposed to end, but it appears there's finally a deal on the table. bring us up-to-date as to what happened today? ms. friedman: thanks, john. media room where several people are passed out. usualeen days and days as with this problem are. e seem to be on the cusp of a first truly global national agreement on climate change. the onference president,

french prime minister brought a couple of minutes ago. democrats and activists have been huddled around the text going through it. speecha pretty emotional a few hours ago where he told 200 omats from nearly countries that this is their moment of truth. they'll go back into a plenary in just a bit and we'll find out not. have a deal or host: if there is a deal or not, how far reaching is this, emissions know about and reductions and obligations that the united states will have to agree to? ms. friedman: sure, well, one of the key things for the united being has been not legally bound to the targets themselves. the u.s. has pledged to cut 28% below 2005 levels, before 2025. states and theted

obama administration has been trying to avoid is making those and ts legally binding, on making commitmentos financing, to make it legally binding so they won't have to come before the senate for consent. there's some pretty artful language in here but they have managed to do it. they've agreed to pursue policies aimed at implementing these targets, falling just shy of promising to implement the targets themselves. host: besides the targets, i big side of the the cost n has been the cost of fset global warming and the impacts that are happening. what do we know from the agreement there? ms. friedman: sure. i think one of the we sformative things that keep hearing from a lot of ngos ere, and really something that i've been covering in these, this is my eighth, it's very ifferent than anything we've

seen before, is that for the first time ever, developing countries countries, wealthy developing ountries, china, saudi arabia, singapore, countries that are developing for the purposes of developing this architecture here at the u.n. but clearly ave a lot of capacity and wealth are being actively nudged give to oney and to countries even for themselves. change really stark from the past 20 years, which wealth countries as designated by 1992 gdp statistics do one thing, and everyone else does another. host: and is there a dollar sign that americans will be seeing in the coming days and weeks? ms. friedman: sure, it's another place where there's been artfulness. the $100 billion of united states and other wealthy countries vowed back in

copenhagen to mobilize by 2020, that is in there and is a floor that s will keep growing. there's an unspecified amount and they will ramp up continue to give by 2025. it doesn't mention a number in there, but what it does very learly say is that after 2020 there's very much an expectation that everyone will come to the for thed put money down lease stable to address climate impacts. host: and you said you've covered several u.n. climate negotiations. an you talk about the mood on this negotiation and this being the last day? friedman: this was the most different u.n. climate conference i've ever covered. normally, it very starts out very bleak centuries fight over agendas for sometimes days and days before getting down to business. this time you had president modi, billme minister

gates all here the first day momentum. a lot of it's tipped a little bit towards the middle yesterday, maybe was sort of the darkest day when people really thought that there as going to be a very unambitious deal. i would say the mood is fairly right now. i grabbed the chinese negotiator su wai on the way out, and asked do we have a deal. he said very close. i talked to todd stern, the u.s. lead negotiator, and he said that he was optimistic about progress. anything can happen, and sometimes dramatic things happen at the last minute in these a al plenaries, but there's lot of optimism here right now. host: before we let you go back to your work there paris, lisa, can you just talk about secretary of state john kerry, who's been leading the u.s. effort here after president

obama left in the opening days of the climate negotiations. ow is he going to be viewed by the environmental community coming out of these negotiations work there? ms. friedman: probably as a rock star. he has said ry, as in pretty much every speech he's this kind ofn with process since the beginning, and he's really given it his all here. he's been around everywhere. he's been to plenaries, been in back meetings, been meeting with the saudis, been meeting with the chinese. clear here that secretary kerry has really put someone who isas passionate about climate change line here and i think that's very much appreciated by the climate community. you know, we'll have to see how much it's appreciated at home. host: we appreciate your time from paris. lisa friedman is with the climate wire, the deputy editor there.

you can check out her work at eenews.net. thank you so much for your travels. ms. friedman: thank you very much. host: for the last half hour this morning, talking about the public policy issues that you want to discuss this morning. it can be any of the issues e've covered so far, anything happening on capitol hill in recent days and weeks. 202-748-8001, independents, , 748-8002. to remind viewers as to where we are on funding the federal government, yesterday, the house passed the stop gap spending bill that would give congress until the middle of next week to year-end a deal on a appropriations package needed to fund the government. the senate passed their legislation and their version of this on thursday. negotiators are planning to work through this weekend as they the policy writers, what should be attached to the legislation and how to handle

the separate package of tax breaks for businesses and individuals that, according to the washington post story on it. as to what nsight may appear in the final deal that's negotiated on the budget. here's the story in today's noting reet journal" that lawmakers are likely to on that decades long ban u.s. oil exports and the final deal that comes together. at l certainly be looking what comes out of that deal week.ted mid to late next carol lynn is up first in walker town, north carolina, on the line for democrats. carol, good morning. caller: hi, i want to talk about gun control. i believe that people who buy guns should have to buy insurance when they buy guns. there's too many people who have of the ured and get out hospital and have to pay a

hospital bill, and they were completely innocent. guns in you own any your family? caller: no, i don't believe in guns. i've never had any reason to they've killednd more people. i've seen when you have children get ahold of it and kill each people, d kill other there's too many accidents. call from ks for the north carolina. john is up next on the line for independents, westchester, pennsylvania. it's open phones on "washington journal." caller: good morning. when bush andthat cheney started this senseless iraq in 2003 and then in stopped collecting the 34% corporate tax, which was for the war, and

those two acts have added over to our national debt. and i don't hear any of the candidates talking about restarting the 34% corporate tax. which is needed. companies like exxon, i've heard, have stored up reserves trillion dollars, oming from this not collecting this 34% tax. nd we need that to be able to start work on the infrastructure back to work. host: is there anybody out there who's saying the right that you this issue think could make the right presidential candidate? haven't heard one

andidate mentioned restarting the 34% corporate tax. host: go ahead, john. one of them, for whatever reason, seem to want to done, out what has to be and i think it should be done made retroactive to january 1, 2015. host: all right. david is up next, baldwin place, ew york, on the line for republicans. david, good evening. caller: yes, good morning. i called to express great oncern on the part of millions of americans whose heritage and lies in the osedly middle east, in particular, i'm really referring to iranian-americans, many of whom live in this country, law abiding, very affluent and contributing to the society, and the current visa restriction voting house has been

n, if it is fully implemented, impale the 38 countries to apply the same type f restrictions to americans of iranian heritage and other nationalities, even after a few generations of having been here, not to be able to freely travel to the 38 countries, most of in europe ns to be and southeast asia. this is really a travesty. not happened. haven't ans who really had any major terrorist activities in europe or in which can really be traced to anyone with iranian heritage, and then slapping them in the face as the orphans on the saudi hile arabians and pakistanis who ironically are the nationals who have been convicted in western committed and

inflicted terrorism against urope and america, continue to remain off the hook. host: okay. bob is up next. we'll open phones on "washington journal." bob is in oklahoma. good morning, bob. caller: thank you. i'd like to comment on the situation with the climate conference. host: sure. caller: yeah, we're not hearing much of what's going on behind the closed doors there, and when people are interviewed around this conference, they're not really able to say what they talk about when they bio fuels or they talk about most simple things hat people can do or the most sustainable things that people can do across the board. ending no mention of cannibus prohibition so farmers in the united states can once again grow hemp, which would be base for our manufacturing and

provide many, many jobs and that would hold true across the world. so there's no talk about this, and this would be one of the couldmportant things that be done at this conference. on that some comment someh somehow. host: bob, appreciate it. always looking for new topics to cover here on the "washington journal." some other headlines that have made the news. from the "washington scalia stirs controversy again with the questions in affirmative action case. heard on thursday. senate comments he made seemed o stuff the value of diversity at selective universities by sharply questioning whether instead mericans might be helped by having them go to a less advanced school and slower-tracked schools where they do well. the argument from that case were released, and i want to show you

a bit of the comments that have headlines.ade those here's justice scalia. justice scalia: there are those african nd that americans, to get them into the university of texas where they do not do well, as opposed to having them go to a less a slower-tracked school where they do well. one of the briefs pointed out that most of the black scientists in this country don't come from schools like the university of texas. they come from schools where they're ot feel that being pushed ahead in classes youare too fast for them. know, i'm just not impressed by that the university of texas have fewer. maybe it ought to have fewer. the number ofmore

blacks, really competent blacks admitted to lesser schools turns out to be less. it stands to ink reason that it's a good thing for the university of texas to admit as many blacks as possible. host: if you want to hear the full oral arguments from that available on our web site now at c-span.org. speaking of our web site, if you missed our land mark cases baker on the 1962 case of v. carr, catch that on our web site or watch it tonight at 7:00 p.m. on c-span. here's a clip from that school that looks at the warren court landmark decision on reapportionment. >> the question of whether a protection of l the laws was a judicial question, and we have the right it, and we held that the legislatures must give equal

representation to everyone. that was where the expression "one man, one vote" came into being. sense, i think that that case in which all the other reapportionment cases followed is perhaps the most important had since i've been on the country. >> why would the chief justice this as the most important case? >> the decision in this case change in door for a the way we govern ourselves. apportioned power in their state legislatures, ccording to various different methods that, in many cases, wound up with much more power in rural communities than in urban communities, and as population grew in the cities, the rural communities gained more and more strength so that the power in state legislatures was confined smaller number

of people in terms of their representation. how that was done changed how we are governed in this country in a dramatic way. host: and you can be sure to watch our landmark cases series, again, on monday nights at 9:00 p.m. this monday, we look at the supreme court decision behind miranda rights, the 1966 case of miranda v. arizona. for about the next 20 minutes or rnal," moreington jou open phones, talking about public policy issues that are important to you. new york ling in from on the line for independents. you're up next. hi.ler: i didn't catch the entire segment on the income taxes, but i did catch a couple of callers near end who were both retirement age. i guess one was. he was talking about and omplaining about the fact that he had to pay income tax on his pension and part of his social another one who

omplained that he couldn't collect full retirement age social security at 62. nd it just seems to me that this is the problem that will reform or an honest reform of an income tax. host: what do you mean, robert? caller: well, everyone is bringing their own vested interest to the table. for example, there are young people now who are out there who, as he payroll tax, far as they're concerned, if you ask them, they're never going to it, and thereut of are people complaining because the part -- for example, the guy that was 62, the part that was contributed by his employer, which he never even put in, and as actually deducted from the corporation when it was paid in, nd he'll have to pay tax on that. and that's only if he meets a certain threshold.

so what we're saying is there are people out there who they their own situation as it should be tax exempt. i'm retired. therefore, i shouldn't pay tax. why is that? we should look at it in terms of if it's income, and it's above a should be eshold, it taxable. host: less optimistic about large reform in the next year or two? caller: oh, i don't think there will be one. host: do you think there will one? do you think there will ever be one? caller: no. there's too many vested out there. , i work and old also started 66, i to collect social security. we're setting up a situation now going to have a generation war. i don't mean guns and those things.

one generation against another. he younger people -- it's unconscionable to take 6.7% of every dollar, unless you're getting earned income credit, individuals are looking at a future where they may never collect a penny on yet there are people who are older complaining about the fact that they have to be axed, i mean, if you're retired, that means you don't go to work. that's what that means. you still have income and that income should be looked at the same as anyone else's. concept nderstand the that because you're retired, you hink you don't have to pay taxes. host: thank you for the call. if you want to catch the full egment with pete sepp who was our guest in the last segment, it should be available now or ery soon on our web site, cspan.org. let's go to laura in michigan on the line for republicans. good morning. open phones on the "washington journal." caller: good morning. to t of all, i would like

say that i'm an american. hello? host: i'm listening. you're an american. caller: oh, okay. four questions, short, something for people to think about. number 1, why are we trying to countries l to other when we import 7 million barrels daily? who are we trying to hurt by doing that? $176,000 a year is tors get paid.la this coming year, they're 86 days. to work slighted in 's equity, because there's so many people, due to gerrymandering, that they don't even have to go out and try to collect money. it's a vacation for them. number 3, social security

increases. in the last, i believe 10 years, social security recipients have not gotten an increase. yesterday, i went to the store. the cereal that i buy was increased by 30 cents for a box. somehow, that doesn't seem fair. ow, something that's very serious gun me, the legislation will never be passed encounter something like what happened years ago irate person was looking tom delay. part of the some building. capitolalking about the shooting? caller: yes. policeman directed him the wrong way. ell, when tom found out, they

went immediately into protective mode, spent millions of dollars the capitol center information, whatever it's called. the only time we'll have a serious legislation is when one of our legislators is killed or their family or somebody like that. last question. ost: so do you think the shooting of congresswoman abrielle giffords in arizona changed the discussion among lawmakers? mm, not very much, obviously. you can see, i mean, she's still, tirelessly, and the legislators are bought and for by you know who. number 4, there are so many president.ing for a lot of them are sending out letters with solicitation, you whatever, me money, whatever. many of them, i don't believe, spend all that money.

are they allowed to keep that ? ey for their own purposes it would be interesting to find out. or is there any legislation which, of course, i'm sure because legislators never legislate against themselves. host: we certainly do a lot of segments on the campaign and campaign finance is always a topic of discussion that we get into here during election years here on the "washington journal." appreciate the call. speaking of the campaign. ere's a headline from today's "washington post." ruz works to keep his bromanslaughter with trump alive. spent much cruz has of the year in an odd political bromanslaughter. however, a rocky patch in their relationship began this week cruz audio emerged from a fundraiser where the candidate raised doubts about trump's judgment. donald trump talking about ted cruz last night in the answer to a question at his campaign rally

in des moines. here's a bit from that event. >> this question comes through from forum, directly .hyllis staffley this is the question. when nominated, what do you intend to do with ted cruz. will you name him your vice -- ident or -- or mr. trump: he is a good guy. and phyllis is a great person. him to the united states supreme court. mr. trump: okay, thank you. it's interesting. that second is interesting, because he is -- i really do. i like ted cruz a lot. he's doing well, i'm doing well. contest t's not a between the two of us, just so we understand. we have to make that -- but i do like him, and i would say that we would certainly have things honest for ted, to be with you. i mean, he's somebody that i could certainly see there. i likes me.he

he actually put out a tweet , donald nd he said trump, is -- i think he used the word "terrific." that's a nice word. i can tell you other candidates are not exactly saying that about me, right? host: you can watch the entire rally on our web site cspan.org, out, u want to check it along with all of our campaign coverage of campaign 2016. mike's up next, modesto, california, for democrats, open phones on "washington journal." caller: good morning, hello. nyway, i just have a couple of observations on the unliberalness of our good president. who points a dea head immediately jumps up and says that medical marijuana is a joke, and he's laughing up there. i don't know if any of you have seen the specials on cnn about marijuana, a little

vitamin c 50 to 100 a day, and now she's fine, and jump up leman wants to knows ry favor with god who. and then, i think the slogan on hat should be "make america white again." you, thisst thing for is kind of how like white people look at things and why they're o afraid that sort of like the guilt of eternity is going to fall on them or all of a sudden they're going to take the heat for what we've done, you know, it's not that white people now for -- it's not our fault what happened, but we have to it, so myd and look at nutshell thing is either you nderstand what's happened to certain people that have been stomped on every which way and with help them and deal it without blaming this generation of what people. other se, the only

viewpoint is it's just an inferior people, and that's just goes, and that's the favorite card of too many for them, i'm sorry certainly no - better than me, but it's very bad. host: mike in modesto, california. stephanie is up next on open phones in pennsylvania, line for independents. stephanie, good morning. caller: hi, listen. i would like to say that the tax does not have to be like 10% or 12% or across the board. a flat tax should be a progressive flat tax like 5% for levels, 10%, 15%. the thing is, you just don't get any deduction. now, i like donald trump's idea that people making less than $50,000 don't pay any federal really, it takes $50,000 to live a halfway decent

life, and the third thing is about the mortgage deduction. 50% of the people in this country don't have a mortgage. nother 30% probably have a mortgage that's very small, and probably average mortgage people know, but it's to probably less than $100,000. most of the mortgage deduction very, very wealthy, and that's where you need to take off the mortgage deduction. but i think actually, because mortgage, i e any think that should be wiped away. thank you very much. host: thanks for the call, stephanie. speaking of donald trump, donald trump dominating headlines once again. "the wall lumn in street journal." a rash leader in a grave time. times" has a story concerning some recent statements by donald trump. congresswoman doris matsui who was born in the arizona desert

in a desolate internment camp, during world war ii, spoke about onald trump's recent statements. she said, we don't talk about it referring to the internment camp there, but that reticence is ending now, that donald trump and before him the virginia, haveke, approvingly invoked president franklin d. roosevelt's internment program as policy precedent, amid fears of growing terrorism. what mr. trump did not mention s that roosevelt's incarceration of 1942 to 1945 about 100,000 japanese xtraction is not only considered one of the darkest moments in american history, it officially repudiated in 1988 by an act of congress. world is in the donald trump even drawing this onnection now, ms. matsuu said from the capitol hill office. the mayor of roanoke is one hing, but this person is

running for the president of the united states and is becoming a vessel for all of these horrible types of things, fear-mongering bigotry. you can read that in "the new york times". line for the republicans. good morning. caller: thanks a lot. i had to pick up the phone and espond to the person a few calls ago that was seemingly incredulous that taxpayers would keep, you know, their social security pension without paying a tax on it. taxpayers paid that tax, and then when they find themselves higher income, due to their hard work, their investments, their income triggers a tax, all the social security benefit that other people don't have to pay and the earned income credit causes a lot of inequities. just this weekend, they rejected a proposal to require earned income tax recipients to supply their social secured number.

there's massive fraud paying the earned income tax credit to eople and the spineless -- would cut down on that. i would also like it say to the woman who talked about the mortgage deduction. he mortgage deduction incentiveses people to pay for their own housing. they're not asking the them section give 8 vouchers. they're just having them pay for their own houses to support themselves and their family and the mortgage deduction allows that. and essentially, it comes down to the government increasingly taxing thetent rate, people who have money to pay for things that people should pay for themselves. thank you. host: all right. lisa is up next, san antonio, texas, line for democrats. luis.orning, caller: hi. i'm from texas, as you can tell, very, very large

state.ke almost everybody here carry -- not carries a gun but has a gun. anyway, the reason i'm calling is i'm asking and pleading for owners to please take seriously.wnership i have three instances in my own life where all my family are gun wners could have seriously jeopardized someone else's future. ne, my brother, when he was 19 years old, got into an argument with some other young men. we were not home at the time, but when we came home, he was unning down the stairs with a rifle going after to shoot these young men because they had followed him home. thank goodness my husband had the opportunity to take the gun away. a commander in the navy, but his whole future could because of anged

that one incident. have another friend that lost a 19-year-old daughter because into an ter got argument with her boyfriend and er sister on the same day and went in there and got a pistol and killed herself. and then my son, who like i owners, who all gun had two very, very dangerous rifles. they were on vacation, came home, the house had been broken into. those rifles were stolen because he did not have them locked up or hidden away. ended up with ho the rifles except that they're somewhere out there with thieves. that's all we know. just want gun owners to seriously. uns more host: luis, have you watched this gun control debate that's

cropped up since the recent mass shootings? do you think that there are any imits that would be agreeable, that you'd agree to, for gun ownership? or is it the responsibility of the owners themselves and not the federal government to get involved? caller: you know, i think the n.r.a. and other -- i listened to a lot of the callers on c-span, and one of the things that really upsets me is when i hear these people call in had a gun since i was nine years old, you know, never shot anybody, i'm a law-abiding citizen, blah, blah, blah, well, we're happy for you. but we're not trying to take your gun away. to be ust asking reasonab reasonable, and i really think come ofhing is going to this until we've had so many eople slaughtered that it actually affects someone and their family. texas, not -- like in

we have a lot of gun shows, here anybody can just walk in on any sunday and buy guns. there's no questions asked. the ou know, you can watch news every night, you know, people are getting shot right and left, but because texas is such a gun-toting state, nothing's ever going to happen here. host: you mentioned texas and the number of people in texas who own a gun. a columbia, university, study earlier this year sought to try to figure out how many people in each state owned guns. this is a survey of about 4,000 people, found a broad regional variation in gun ownership in individual states, ranging from delaware to p in 61.7% gun ownership in alaska. texas there on the chart at 35.7%, according to that study.ia university time for just one or two more calls. charlie in new york on our line

ents.ndepend you're up next. good morning. caller: yes, yes. corporations and people in general are not paying their fair share of taxes. it's the american people that made these corporations billionaires and what they do is they goir factories and to other countries and, you know, that's illegal in europe. they can't do that in europe, which is why those economies in europe are doing better than us. we should make that illegal. other corporations come over here, they use our roads but hey don't pay their fair share of taxes, use up the american people's labor, take it to another country. we need to wake up. our ally, if you look at tax rates from like 50 years ago, they were a lot higher on corporations and rich people in to pay and they need their fair share of taxes. host: charlie in new york. the last caller on today's "washington journal." we'll be morrow, oined by daniel halper of the

weekly standard. he's the online editor there. we'll talk about donald trump's relationship with the republican party. we'll also be joined by richard a recent scussed report that shows that the american middle class has shrunk o the point where it no longer constitutes the majority of adults in this country and we'll giamattid by actor paul and brian dory, the founder of on tor of war, they'll be discuss combat veterans healing from the psychological wounds of war. it's a production from the works of the ancient playwright sophacles to help modern ptsd ry families discuss and the reintegration from the war zone. that's all tomorrow morning on beginning journal" 5:00 a.m. . eastern, pacific. have a great saturday.

house homeland security chair michael mccaul of texas discusses the president strategy to combat isis. then, presidential republican candidate jeb bush holds a town hall meeting in manchester, new hampshire. after that, a discussion on how to update the government clearing security process. this week, house homeland security chairman of texas, michael mccaul, discusses homeland security, terrorism, and the present strategy to combat isis in a address at the national defense university in washington, d.c. it is just over one hour. >> good afternoon and welcome. it is wonderful to be back at the national war college. it is such an important it