winning before then. that is the "new york times." adds thisngton post" morning that the next gathering will take place a few days after christmas at a remote ranch. cruz will speak to some of the country's leading evangelical figures. they are still considering other rubio.tes, including rubio has stepped of his courtship act. , butbeing warmly received has encountered skepticism about his campaign's reliance on money from pulsinaul singer.

good morning to you from winston, salem. >> yes. hello? host: go ahead. >> i have no comments about who should drop out of the race, but i just wanted to say that i saw the new hampshire senat cemetery this morning -- i just wanted to complement him on his speech. he is really listening to what the american people want in it the way of a president after this time in our history and i wanted to complement him on what he said. host: why not choose somebody to drop out. i am in favor of that,

but i have to think more about who that should be. definitely, donald trump. host: peter is from highland park, new jersey. democrat line. caller: if for you to come to new jersey -- if you were to come from new jersey, he would find out chris christie is hated here. he is the worst. have newark, it is like 50 benghazi's over a weekend. people are afraid to go there and what has he done about that? nothing. you don't want to go there. he doesn't want to pay for

anything. we are really bankrupt. we can't even borrow money because we are so broke. arentic city, they bankrupt. they stole all the money and chris christie just flies around. the people of new jersey don't call and tell you how good christie is. he is a monster. he is nasty. he is terrible. new: that was peter from jersey. we had chris christie participating in a town hall in new hampshire yesterday. you might have seen a little bit of that before we began this program this morning. if you want to find that in total, you can go to our website at www.c-span.org and go to our video library. we have videos from all of those running for the office of

president of the united states. that is available at www.c-span.org. if there are those running for president who should drop out of lindsey graham announced yesterday he would drop out. you can give us your thoughts. "the wall street journal" took a look at the campaign of ben carson, particularly the spending on this campaign. spent $9.5s team million putting their efforts under water. documents also undermined the carson's claimed that he raise $10 million in october. spokesperson said the campaign has spent more money that it brought in during october.

said the campaign announced a $10 million fundraising call. charles from ohio, independent line. go ahead. caller: good morning, sir. think if you have not caught traction where you don't have 8%, i think it is time to back on out. the money going into your campaign, let it go to a campaign that has a chance of doing something. i think probably, from carson on down, we could probably do on the bigse people stages. they don't have a chance. they are not catching fire.

there is not a whole lot of reason to stay in this thing. i would like to see donald trump drop out. self the longest, hardest promoter i have ever seen. as humorous as he is, i don't think he would be great for this country. he would be better than hillary. her policy is so much like obama's and for the last eight years we have been stagnant. it is like i said. if you don't have at least 8%, you should move on out. happy holidays. host: from evansville, indiana, here is michael. go ahead, michael. caller: i am calling because i want to know, i want trump to

drop out. rubio.nd messes all you republicans up. i don't think we have been stagnant with obama. he killed our oil there. bush had tried for years. thing ifgot a good hillary gets in there. i think she will run the country very well. i think her husband did. --stice blackmun: host host: the front page of "usa today" takes a good look at the six service members that were killed from the bombing.

motorcycles were carrying a bomb. three were injured. the attack occurred outside of the u.s. airbase. the story also added in a separate incident, an american woman was shot and killed monday. provide further details. president obama put out a statement saying this, united states condemns this attack. we remain committed to supporting the afghan people and their government. we will not relent on our mission to conquer the plague of the region. we have this call from our independent line.

the scheduling of these debates, where there isn't any audience at all. host: before you go down that road, tell us who should drop out, bill. republicans, just about all of them. i have not heard anything constructive from the republicans in years and years. they definitely have not done wage increases. they took an allegiance that

they are not going to do anything obama wants to do. you can't have a government like that. climate change, the war, just everything. it is just pathetic.

caller: 77 years old. i'm telling you. don trump is a disgrace to america. who would represent us in other countries with donald trump representing us. thank you for taking our call. host: from "the new york times" this morning, statements of thatd trump -- arguing some voters who have expressed doubts about where obama's loyalties are are reacting to the fact that he is the first black president.

-- whatl to the country i say is they are specific to background. going on to say, i represent the change that worries them. from tennessee, here is william. go ahead. democrats are running this country. [indiscernible]

host: gary from massachusetts. democrats line. you are on, go ahead. caller: thank you very much. i would like to thank the woman that called just before the previous caller for sticking up .or women everywhere the comments that mr. trump made yesterday regarding women was just something that i cannot sit and tolerate. morningd the msnbc this , and the other four men were gloating over mr. trump. it was very sad. host: as far as our question about presidential candidates, who should drop out, is mr. trump on your list or are there others? well, if you were to

drop out, i think that would be the decent thing to do. announcing policy when it comes to gay and bisexual men. this is from "usa today" writing that can bisexual men are now permitted to donate blood one year after their last sexual contact. the one-year deferral policy which mirrors other countries policies was made by health officials as part of the plan to lift the blanket and that was put in place in 1985. the story also adding that the fda noted that u.s. manufacturers of blood and blood inponents into different use other countries may not be able to implement the fda recommended twelve-month deferral policy. these manufacturers may maintain longer deferral policies and

comply with global requirements on the furl policy. you can find that story in "the washington times" this morning. let's hear from betty. we are asking folks about presidential candidates and whether more should drop out. you are on the line from georgia. what do you think? caller: absolutely. i think everybody from carson on down should drop out. hillary clinton is such a liar. isis was formed during the stagnant administration and we have had 18 mass murders. she has lied so much about benghazi and the e-mails. i indefinitely voting for -- i am definitely voting for donald trump. i think he can turn america around. i think we should know how much immigration in iraq has cost us. it makes no sense. i indefinitely for donald trump. i hope many of them will just drop out, especially jeb bush. specificallytioned

jeb bush, dr. carson. tell us why specifically those two. caller: i think it would split the vote. i don't think they can win. jeb bush, i don't think would make a good dogcatcher. i think they should drop out. then, the votes could be more focused. , we are allriends supporting donald trump. we think he can turn america around and get us back on track. is up next from new jersey, independent line. caller: yes. my concern is that i have been watching the debates, and what i candidatesne of the have spoken specifically about anything they would do for this country. i do not care what is said about barack obama. he is an excellent president. we could be doing so much better in the world if we were able to

have jobs and put america back to work. america is not back to work because we have a congress who decided they will not do anything for the american people until there is a republican in the white house. it will not happen in 2016. what we need to do is realize every time we put sanctions on countries in the middle used, where we should not have been in place, it is a tool for isis to recruit. isis did not form during the obama presidency. it started in the second bush presidency. host: with that in mind, who should drop out at this point in your opinion? caller: you know what, donald trump should drop out. donald trump is an agitator. he is responsible for some of the stuff happening in this country with muslims. not all muslims are bad. not all white people are bad.

not all black people are bad. need to get together and be vigilant, instead of being angry and losing focus on what we need to do for the country. we need to get behind our president and say, a enough is enough. every time we put him down, isis recruits even stronger. host: ok. a couple off of twitter. this is cindy saying, anyone in the single digits needs to drop out. also this morning on twitter, craig jones says, let's get to the main event, trump versus clinton, that is the debate we want to see. there is a summit taking a look year. migrant crisis next

the list of refugees in need of for chile continues to grow, and at the same time, the international community has been unable to keep up. this year has shown with clarity that our current system is an hand.te for the task at the summit will be held during the u.n. general assembly in september and part of a big risk helpin effort to migrants regi resettle and find jobs. you are on. go ahead. caller: anybody in the single digit be out and anybody in congress should not be running. host: why the second one? caller: because they are part of the problem already. host: any current senator -- the two ones from

congress, they are not better than what we started with with obama. michigan's go to al in , democrats line. caller: good morning. i'm from grand rapids, michigan. e was inr town last night. i'm a democrat. he had quite a turn up. i was watching the local news it was quite a white crowd. blacks, no minorities. that does not represent the united states of america. it does not represent grand rapids, michigan either. as far as this war on isis goes -- ronald reagan started this when he doublecrossed iraq and

saddam hussein. host: let's hear from manny, maryland, republican line. caller: anybody in the single-digit should drop out. , republicans cannot win any elections. trump hasw donald been talking down on hillary clinton. women. down on they don't have any idea about women's issues. thank you. host: from "wall street journal" this morning, taking a look at mortgages. joe white writing mortgages can average up to 49 days to close, the longest closing time since

2013. behind the scenes, some lenders described the array of transactions as different interpretations of the same role. rolule. new terms are meant to make the mortgage fees clear. say that changes resulted in large technical and training challenges. from scott, michigan, calling in on the independent line. we are talking about presidential candidates, whether more should drop out. what do you think? scott from bay city? but go to gloria. gloria is asheville, north carolina. caller: how are you doing? host: fine.

how about yourself? caller: should i go ahead and comment? host: yes. we are asking about presidential candidates, should they drop out? we do not need another bush in there. i think rubio and ted cruz, definitely ted cruz, we do not need them telling nursery rhymes, like he did with his filibuster. hillary -- i have always been a democrat, and i will continue to be, but this time, i cannot vote for hillary. i campaigned for her the first time, by cannot do it this time. , he hasdonald trump never run for office before. ofhe can pull himself out bankruptcy, i think he can put

this country back where it has to be. host: you said you gave hillary clinton support last time, but can't do it this time, what changed? caller: there are many things that she is not being truthful about. bill clinton, he was a great president. i just don't think that because he was, she will be. just like i said, i campaigned for her, wholeheartedly, the first time, but this time, i cannot do it. host: one more call on this topic. this will be peter from massachusetts. caller: i do not think anybody should drop out. i think it is up to the voters. in fact, i think they should give more coverage to the third-party, like the green party. the way the last

debate was, they were given seemingly more time during the debate. they cut out the other two candidates. should the voters decide, the more options we have, the better. host: there are so many candidates, what do you think is the value of having so many candidates, especially on the republican side? caller: i do not have a problem with it, personally. one of the debates were cable channels. you could not watch it unless you had cnn, or whatever the other one was. it seems not right that it not .e on the regular airwaves i do not have a problem sifting through the candidates. host: that was peter, from

massachusetts, our last call on whether more candidates should drop out of the race. we will change topics to talk about insurance companies, especially consolidation, and what that means for the health care industry and people who receive health care. sabrina corlette will talk about that. later, constitutional attorney john whitehead of the rutherford institute will talk about his america: "battlefield the war on the american people." ♪ weekend, booktv brings you three days of nonfiction books and authors. on friday, back to back "afterwords."

>> the biggest mistake that i think we make on the conservative side of the is the one that should be the easiest which is get happy. that, notunderstood just for christians, but for any , you have to kill something in yourself, your .ession with status and wealth >> religion does point us beyond ourselves. for faithful people, the media -- what is in it for me is not

central. >> at 10:00, senator claire mccaskill talks about her book about her life experiences in local, state, and federal government. >> i do not think we do anyone any favors by dressing up politicians as though we are not human beings that have major problems in our life. 7:00, a panel discussion on william a oakley's run for mayor in 1965. then, a discussion on the book, "the general." one question i am asked is why did you choose these three men. my answer is that they embodied, characteristics of

courage, character, and patriotism. >> sunday night at 8:00, looking back at a turning point in history -- 1932 and the rise of hitler and fdr. then, a discussion on the book, "the influence machine." >> there is a reason i chose the chamber of commerce as the subject of my book. the single organization sums up how we got here to this place. >> this holiday weekend on booktv on c-span two. >> "washington journal" continues. host: our first guest of the morning is sabrina corlette, a research professor at georgetown university, who takes a look at the state of health insurance in the country. good morning. we have brought you want to talk about what we have noticed in

the news lately as far as several large health insurance companies announcing mergers. can you paint the picture of what is going on specifically with these companies and tells a little bit about why these situations are happening. guest: absolutely. there are about five big insurance companies that are household names -- anthem, aetna, sigma, humana. for them are proposing mergers. if that happens, we will go from the big five to the big three. to be honest, i don't know if anyone knows what the outcome will be for consumers if these mergers go through. guidee some history to us. unfortunate, what it shows is in most cases, when insurance companies merge, premiums go up. host: how much of the american

public is affected? guest: it could be pretty significant. millions and millions of people. most of their business is in employer-based insurance or what they call the government business -- medicare, medicaid. if you get your insurance through your employer, medicaid, or medicare, you will probably be impacted by this. host: you mentioned premiums, history tells us it goes up. what else to be no? do other services get affected? guest: sure. one of the arguments that the companies make is that by merging, they get to have greater clout with other providers so that they can negotiate lower reimbursement for the providers. they say that they will pass the cost savings on to consumers. they may or may not. we do not know. in theory, anyway, they could be

able to strike better deals. host: history, as far as other mergers that tell us how these things bear itself out? able tohey are usually get better negotiating clout with the providers, but generally they do not pass the savings on to consumers. there is a role here for regulators. whether it is the department of justice or the state insurance department, they could try to get something out of the deal. maybe better rates, more ,ggressive review of premiums certainly some regulars in the past with mergers, say for example with some of the blues. host: blue cross blue shield. guest: exactly. they were able to extract something out of the deal for consumers, but we do not know if that will happened yet. host: insurance companies

mergers. that is our topic. we have divided the lines differently. if you get your insurance through the affordable care act, (202) 748-8000. if you are insured through your employer, (202) 748-8001. if you are uninsured, (202) 745-8002. is there evidence that because of changes made under the affordable care act, this is leading to these mergers. guest: it is hard to tease out what is a trivial to the afford all caps versus what is the market trend and what has happened anyway. i think one of the reasons that insurance companies are pursuing these mergers is their reaction on the provider side. what we have seen across the country is they are acquiring physician practices -- as they get the monopoly power, providers are raising their rate, and to some extent, insurance companies are reacting to that saying, we need more

market power to push back. that is part of it. it is hard to say if that is directly because of the affordable care act or if it would've happened anyway. we do not know. make significant changes as far as who they except, those kinds of things. guest: absolutely. the portal care act has, without question, increased some of the companiessurance doing business. if they can spread those out amongst a greater population, they will be better off. there is no question the affordable care act has been a spark for these mergers, but it is hard to say exactly how much. host: aside from that, like ofer companies, saving cost operation is why you want to join forces with someone else. guest: that is exactly right. they are hoping to inefficiencies and save money. host: we have had other

instances where entities merge. are there other ways of approaching this on the federal level, state level? guest: that is hard to say. one thing for sure -- health insurance markets are very local . both at the justice department level, but also the state level, they will not be looking at this as a national perspective. they will be looking market to market. for example, in a state where there are other big insurance companies, it may be less of a concern that it be a state or market that is already highly concentrated. they may be looking at the dynamic with provider consolidation in different markets, which again, varies quite dramatically. host: the mergers you talked about previously, does this

affect various areas of the country and that may be why they want to merge to get a larger ?hare, so to speak t guest: the other adjusting different companies dominate in different areas. for example, in medicare, humana is the big gorilla on the block. one of the reasons that aetna and humana are interested in merging is because aetna would love to get a bigger slice of the medicare high. sigma, itm and is about expanding in the employer market. host: sabrina corlette, our guest from georgetown university. calls are lined up for you. you will start with jean. he is currently uninsured. go ahead with your question or comment. caller: good morning, how are

you? let me say this. there is no reason why every american should not have a single-payer. look what happened. republicans are we saying it is socialized medicine. no one mentioned the new health service at all. single we should have a in america.thing most industrial countries in the world do. host: go ahead. , certainlyink leading up to the affordable care act, and even beyond, there are significant numbers of americans that believe that a single-payer would be a much goe simple, more fair way to . , in thisto date

congress, there has not been .olitical support for that certainly, one of our presidential candidates, senator has been a major part of his health care platform. i would say, purely looking at the political support that exists today for single-payer, i do not think we will see that kind of reform for a while, yet. i think, also, there is a feeling that we need to see how the formal care act will settle out, and whether it will actually meet the goals. it is certainly a much more complicated way to go about health reform than a single pair yer way. host: from tennessee, tommy is up next. he has insurance from the aca. caller: good morning, happy holidays.

i am currently disabled -- permanently disabled. money for my extra state. will these mergers disqualify people who qualify for extra help and put more of the cost on people like me who are currently disabled? guest: i do not think the mergers would cause the state to drop coverage that you currently have. if the state were to do that, that would he a decision totally separate and apart from these mergers. that said, i think a number of states are looking at their budgets and the kind of health care that they fund. there is always a risk that state-supported health care could be trimmed in the budget cutting exercise, by do not

think it is strictly connected to the merger. host: ultimately, did the states make those decisions, the companies -- who to drop and to keep? guest: i'm guessing the caller has some form of medicaid which is a state-federal partnership that does provide health insurance to people who have disabilities. are at the decisions state level about what benefits to provide, but there are benefit -- limits that the federal government points. host: chris is in milwaukee, wisconsin on medicare. caller: before i retired, i worked -- my job was to take insurance payments and put them .n patients' accounts i can tell you, before obamacare, insurance companies were actually buying up smaller

companies, not changing their names, so most people were unaware of it. in fact, my supplementary insurance was bought up by and kept thetna and they cottonelle general -- continental general name. what most people don't realize is that the insurance companies negotiate with the hospitals or the doctors for how much they will pay. one time, while i was still uhc apologized to the doctors because they put the fee schedule so low that most doctors were not joining.

how it will be -- i don't know. my daughter happened to be in andmiddle of surgery rehab the doctor was no longer in uhc. everythingama about the list. d o's, and that is a choice of insurance companies and their employer that had nothing to do with obama. host: thank you for the call. we will let our guest respond. guest: the caller raised a number of important issues. i think one thing that is actually true is there have been insurance urges for generations. we have had them. expand or bysurers

up other countries. -- other companies. i think one of the reason they are getting the attention they are is because these are such big companies. we are going from the big five potentially down to big three. host: as far as impacts are concerned, we have of you are on twitter who asked will this hurt or help the insurance worker. i guess they are referring to the people working for the companies that will merge. guest: that is ultimately the decision of the company. mergers often do lead to layoffs. i think your twitter follower is probably right in pointing to that issue, that there will be some job losses. host: sabrina corlette joining us to talk about health

insurance mergers. here is julie from california, has insurance through the aca. caller: yes. how is this going to affect work in's comp insurance? insurance?s comp. i am on the taxpayer because of work and scott issues. many are not aware that it controls your pay and cuts your pay off so they can give you a settlement, and they throw everyone on the taxpayer to make people homeless and that sort of thing. guy,r insurance is our when we do you regulated that, those rates dropped significantly and we have many, many companies to choose from. i'm not for them getting bigger. i've for them getting smaller. i would like to hear, on the work wins, -- workman's comp issue. guest: they will have the greatest impact on health

insurance. impact any, if at all, on workmen's comp.. host: she mentioned car insurance with rates getting lower. are there alternatives if the larger mergers happen? are there smaller companies capable of taking on different rates are different providers? guest: that is something that the department of justice and state commissioners are examining, and will be looking very closely at. i think one of the things they will be thinking about is how hard is it for a new company to come into this market. the truth is that health insurance is one of the most challenging industries for a new entrance. that raises the bar on these

mergers, certainly, i would think, from the department of justice perspective. host: what is the biggest allenge for a new insurer? guest: they have to negotiate rates with hospitals and doctors in order to provide a competitive price. they haveo negotiate, to show that they have a pretty big enrollment of people so the doctors and hospitals will sit down and negotiate a deal. how do you attract all your if you are new to the market? you have to provide a competitive price. how do you provide a competitive price if you cannot get a good deal from the hospitals and doctors? it is a real chicken and the egg problem. anyone coming in has to have capitalization to not only get going and build that membership

base, but also most regulators have to require you to have a pretty big cushion of capital to take care of those claims, and make sure you stay solvent. host: what kind of money are we talking? millions? billions? guest: millions and millions of dollars. it depends on how big the company wants to be, but they were really hold their feet to the fire. you have to have some pretty anp pockets to start up insurance company. that is something that department of justice will be concerned about. host: david from garland, texas, you're next. caller: i had to file bankruptcy because i was diagnosed with cancer last december. my concern is will this merger lessify braids and make

complicated? the fact is my mother who had medicare and medicaid was diagnosed a few years back. i have insurance through my employer. i'm a veteran. my cancer is diagnosed with the v.a.. i use my insurance to get a is.ond diagnos that ran before ground for my deductible. at the end of the day, it was very expensive. i was so confused about which plan to take because there were so many to choose from. my concern is will this simplify things because there are like 15 to choose from, and when you get sick, you have no idea what you have, and then when you read the paperwork, you find out that what you thought was insurance really leaves you broke. if you could just add to that for me, it would be greatly appreciated.

guest: sure. i'm really sorry about your situation. i hope you are healthy now and feeling better. you mentioned your mother on medicare and how she had a health situation. medicare really took care of her. one of the political ironies is medicare is a single payer type of program. it is very popular with the american public. any time you talk about single-payer, it is not popular. there is the sort of irony that medicare -- this dirty secret, it is a single-payer program. one of the import unfortunate ts ,hat the caller referred to employers have been the primary source of coverage for all under 65 who are working, but

employers have been concerned about the rising cost, and as the cost has gone up, they have shifted or and more of the cost of care to employees. we see deductibles get higher, copayments that you pay get higher. there is much higher cost burdens for workers. host: this is troy from new york. caller: hello and good morning. i think this segment has been very difficult to follow for us laymen who do not understand these sorts of things, but certainly -- luckily i have a solution. host: bill is up next from massachusetts. caller: hello. all i had was a really simple question. anybody who can defend the

existence of companies, i don't see how they provide benefits on balance. that is it. i will listen off-line. guest: i don't think anyone would call me a defender of the insurance companies. i certainly had my complaints about them in the past. i think what they would say because of the value that they offer is they are a very important middlemen between the patient and the provider. withgo in and negotiate the providers to basically get ulk discountss -- b on behalf of the consumer. granted, it feels like they are proportion of the bill, but that is the role that they played.

often there is a lot of frustration with insurance companies and the challenges that we face dealing with them. host: if you are on twitter have this comment -- this. use that to us under these mergers, if i am a doctor, what am i facing under a consolidation of the industry? guest: i think one of the reasons that the physician groups and the hospital groups have been strongly opposed to these mergers is they are concerned that as the companies gain more market clout, they will ratchet down the rates that they pay. in some cases, that may be very appropriate. we do have one of the most s in theaid physician

world. physicians in this country are paid extremely well. it may not be such a bad thing if insurance companies can get in there and get some leverage to negotiate lower rates if the cost savings are passed on. host: if i am a bigger company, i can to take, we will only pay this much for services, or say to the doctor, you can only go this far. can they do things like that? there are two issues. one is how much does a provider get paid for doing a job. the other question is -- i think howt you are alluding to -- much the insurance companies tell the provider how to do the job. that is where we start to get into some really tricky issues, and certainly there were a lot of consumer frustrations back in the 1990's. i don't know if full's would

remember, but as we were moving in the way towards hmos, doctors complained and patients complained that insurance companies were trying to tell doctors how to do their job. there was a real backlash. host: from new jersey, here is john. john is uninsured. caller: thank you so much for c-span. this is for a simple. it is down to greet and profit for the shareholders. if they wanted to provide better services, they should be more competitive, and lower their costs. it is simply control over politicians, while we need a single-payer, as mr. bernie sanders has talked about because we have the highest costs than any other country in the world. this is something more greed and profit for shareholders. thank you so much. guest: thank you for the comments. int: from walter

massachusetts, good morning to you. go ahead, please. caller: good morning, c-span. i have beenng is -- watching the full thing with insurance and health care. ,s an american and a consumer what we are sick and tired of is having our health care turned into this for-profit business. health care means money. we have to deal with all of these players coming into play and setting up -- though obama act. for me, it was a scam. some people get something out of it, other people do not. is that real, conference of health care -- comprehensive health care? as a taxpayer, i do not want a scheme that is supposed to bring to help. that is not bringing help.

here, you have people getting stressed out. i remember when obama was running for president, we had universal health care on the table. there was discussion then. republicans were so adamant that universal health care is not as good as paying for health care. host: can i ask you a question. as anentify yourself employer. you provide health care for employeres? caller: no, i do not. i'm an average employee who knows he needs health care for himself. host: got you. thank you very much. that wheno think president obama, or at that point in time, candidate obama was campaigning on passing -- i

do not know if you call that universal health care, by do think there were high hopes about what he could accomplish. of course, as often happens in the course of the political process, there were compromises and i think if anybody were being truly honest, i think the affordable care act fell far certainlyhe goals of many progressives who were looking for more comprehensive of a single-payer type system. that said, i think it is a really important step forward, especially for anybody with a pre-existing condition, they can no longer be denied coverage because of that. there is important help now for people to afford the insurance. it is by no means perfect. in fact, it is far from it, but

it is better than what we had before. host: the census report of 2015 said that 50% of insurance is by thed privately, 30% government. if we see consolidation take place, what happens to the employers that provide insurance? guest: if i were part of the employer community, i would be concerned. you see consolidation in the insurance industry -- that is fewer plans competing for your business. i would be concerned about these mergers. host: kentucky, william who is on medicare. go ahead. caller: i just recently had example on medicare part d where my insurance company negotiated very good prices with walmart for my drug costs.

where ily had medicare could only have a 90 day supply of the drug p.m. medicare part d -- via medicare part d. when the insurance company for a 30s with walmart day prescription, four dollar co-pay, and the insurance pays one dollar. when the 90 days run out, i went to get the prescription on my own from walmart with quote no insurance and they charged me $37.50 for the same prescription. a seven-times increase in price. other thing, i would like to

mention just quickly, on medicare, says me and my wife have retired, we have spent over $10,000 on dental care. over $6,000 on hearing aids. every time you go into hospital, $1200re alone, you have a co-pay. you may go in the hospital for-five times a year, that starts to add up. if you are not sick, medicare is a very good system like any insurance, but if you end up having to spend your last years home,r life in a nursing i mean, you die bankrupt. host: thank you for sharing with us this morning. guest: a couple of reactions. one, he pointed out something frustratedways and puzzled me. parteeth, our eyes are

of our body, yet they historically have never been part of our health insurance. people have to pay out of their pocket if they have problem with their teeth or vision. it has always been a strange thing to me. and, unfortunate, as the caller's case, it can add up. i would also say, there are many people out there who are not yet on medicare there are actually looking forward. --what about the federal trade commission, do they have a role in this? guest: i think they work collaboratively, but it is my understanding that this is the department of justice that has the primary responsibility of

examining the merger. host: are there any indications that the justice department would go a long and let them to happen at this point? guest: we have not seen or heard any indication of that. it looks like generally, when -- look at the provider side certainly, i would hope they would do their due diligence as they do and examined these mergers very closely. host: as far as state commissioners, how much say they have for these to happen? guest: they can block them in their state. they only have jurisdiction in their state. there have been examples where state commissioners have blocked mergers. aryland locally blocked

merger in the early 2000, and more recently, in pennsylvania, the state commissioner blocked a merger. it is my understanding that many commissioners are holding hearings, getting testimony from the companies as well as proponents of the merger. are commissioners independent? do they have influence from the health industry at all? guest:. defense. in some cases they are independently elected, but in some cases they are appointed by the governor, they are part of the governor's cabinet. for being independent, i think they would say they are absolutely independent and not beholden toto the -- the insurance company. with many cases, there are revolving doors and you see people come from the insurance company, by think most of them

are trying to do the best job. host: let's hear from david in ohio. caller: to keep the insurance company from couching the insurers, i thought the aca included a rule so that 80% of the premium would go towards health care and 20% would go towards managing the funds. is that still true? guest: that is absolutely true and it is a good point. one of the reasons why the insurance companies would argue we should not let the past be the guide as to whether they the two cost increases because of ratio.%-20% i think there may be some merit to that which is why i have been cautious about saying it will definitely lead to premium increases, but it does not apply to the medicare program and it does not apply to large

self-funded employer-based programs. there are limits to that provision. host: kathy up next for michigan. hello. caller: good morning, sabrina, pedro, c-span. happy holidays. a couple of comments. i would really like to see a single-payer plan in place with an amount of regulation and oversight in terms of the money paid out. as a hospital worker, some of the hardest working people i have ever had the privilege to work with seven days a week, 12 hour shifts, holidays, weekends -- sometimes i think that gets at the how we look health-care system. i would really like to see a lot more prevention with public service announcements that address how we take care of ourselves as human beings. yeah.

i think one of the challenges that certainly policymakers face and others when we look at our health care system, i think, right now, we are close to 70% of gdp.- 17% that is a huge piece of our economy. as the caller pointed out, this is not an abstract thing. these are hard-working people who are delivering care and caring for some of our most affordable citizens. as we look at some of the problems in the health insurance industry and health industry wide, how do we cut down on costs without harming exactly the hard-working people that the caller mentioned? it is a real challenge for politicians. host: al is from oregon, receives insurance from the those hairy. good morning. there: i had thought

would be an audit annually on the spending of insurance companies. was i wrong in that? and the huge co-pays limits they are putting on takingce, they would be profit. guest: you are right in the sense that health insurance and health insurance companies are among the most -- one of the most regulated sectors of our economy. health insurance companies are regularly required to file financial reports, often to stay commissioners, which are responsible for assessing whether the health insurance company is solvent and whether the rates that they charge are reasonable.

in the wake of the affordable care act, there has and more regulation from the federal level. i think most health-insurance insurance industry folks would tell you that they get a lot of oversight from government regulators. host: let's hear from robert. robert is in north carolina. sir.r: yes, seeing that there are so many f insurance policies out , why doesn't some of that money come back to the person's family? say the person is deceased and they have been paying money into all of these policy. why doesn't some of that money go back to the families? thank you. guest: i'm not totally sure i understand the question. referring to,y be for example, annuities or life insurance where, if somebody

dies, does the family get to collect? i think in general the answer should be yes. i have not heard of incidences isre the insurance company payments.ke those to be honest, this is not part of the insurance company that i know a whole not about. host: as far as big companies, if five companies turn to three, is there a situation in the future with three companies could be consolidated into two? guest: that would be up to the department of justice. if they were to approve these go he,mergers and we and then maybe united and one of the others decide to merge again, that would be up to regulatory oversight. .

we will talk to him about his new book, battlefield america, the war on the american people later on. later we'll w he joined someone talking about lifting the ban on oil exports. if you missed the program, the series finale last night, it was on the 1973 roe versus wade decision and you can catch it this saturday at 7:00 on c-span as well as watch it on our website at c-span.org/landmark cases. here's a clip from the show talking about the male he received after writing the majority opinion on the case. >> for our final half hour talk

about the impact of this decision on the court and society. we will begin with harry blackmun once again talking about the public reaction to his mailbag after this decision. the expected comments to the effect your mother should have aborted you or i have been praying for your immediate death. in much of the course, it is abusive. i suspect i have been called every possible epithet ago name. hitler, butcher, pontius pilate, herod. thennot out run abolitionist judge and i suspect i can out run chief justice robert turning. again, if you want more

information not only on this show but others we've done as part of our landmark cases go to the website. you can learn about rove the wade and other cases. more information can be found at c-span.org. beeneek long we have talking to authors as part of our book series and joining us is john whitehead, the author of "battlefield america, the war on the american people". good morning.

military officer i had top-secret clearance, i worked on top-secret programs. i have seen some things that really bothered me. i am a constitutional list and believe in the fourth amendment. it says before surveillance is done on the american citizens or needs to be probable cause but now you have the nsa downloading e-mails daily. you have the post office recording our mail. millions of pieces annually. the fbi, cases we might want to talk about that i've been involved in where the fbi comes posts.ches facebook people have been arrested for just doing facebook posts. the government is watching everything we are doing and of the same time they seem to be bumbling. they cannot catch so-called terrorists while watching innocent citizens so that is why it is called battlefield america.

i represent the client and see what is happening across the country. to be honest, the subtitled the war on the american people, i am telling people it is time to be accountable and get involved in your government and stop sitting watching and listening all the time and get active. 40 years of experience, i think we are heading down a long train. i have study historical patterns with not toat i see germany and stalin russia, in this day, a 32 year veteran visited and said we are following the soviet model and i said what do you mean by that? security as and soviet phrase and we are moving into that era where everybody is watched and you can get in trouble for the slightest thing. we might want to talk about the cases i've been involved in. it is freaky. if you've been on the front line you've seen scary things. i think it is time to raise an alarm. the guy who wrote our bill of

rights said to take alarm at the first experiment with liberties. that happened a long time ago. our guest will talk about the specifics he writes about in his book. if you want to ask him a question, now is the time. call 202-748-8001 four forblicans and 202-748-8000 democrats and 202-748-8002 four independents. where do you see these infringements on our liberties? guest: i am seeing them everywhere. the government listening in on phone calls, the police are equipped with stingray devices handed out by the dhs. they download your cell phone and feed them to fusion centers that are located across america. when you arrive in big cities you are tracked wherever you go. the dhs has been handing out security cameras to local

communities and they tap into those. we live in a surveillance so society. i'm afraid the fourth of limit no longer works. nobody is enforcing it. you are watched everywhere you go. an example, innocent activity. i defended a marine several years ago, a 26-year-old named just doing who was facebook posts about obama. he came back from afghanistan, he was decorated by the way. he took weapons from al qaeda and defused mines. he didn't like the executive orders. he got the president should be arrested for treason. on a saturday morning he hears noise outside his home near richmond, virginia and walks to his screen door and looks out and vans with swat teams are pulling up. people i black suitsn. he stepped close to the screen door and says what is up.

they said would you step out. he says what if i done? -- what have i done? doned a background check on him, he owned no guns and was immediately arrested. he argued, he was thrown against the fence, his back was lacerated. virtually called every group and got a hold of me and i called the police chief and asked what he has done. the chief said he is committed no crime. i said wait a minute. this is an american citizen. what is the concern about his facebook post? had a five minute examination by a psychiatrist who said his pauses in answering, he didn't want to answer because he didn't have a lawyer, the fact that he is a 9/11 truther. he was put in a mental hospital, we filed a lawsuit and got them out of there. research't involved,

shows 1.5 million of these civil commitments happened across america on an annual basis. this was for a facebook post. this was free expression. we're supposed to have that. today you say the wrong thing and i tell people especially veterans were being watched from the dhs under operation vigilant eagle, be careful what you put on facebook. don't post weapons or things like that. .you can get arrested . that is the state of the land. i talked to former secret service agent to say the same thing. these are not made up. i am not a conspiracy theorist. my book has 35 pages of footnotes. host: one of the topics because of the recent events in san bernardino that came up was about social media. the presidential candidates were asked about it. hillary clinton herself was

asked about it recently about what needs to be done in social media and it being pushed back as a recruitment tool. to do that we need stronger relationships between washington, silicon valley, and all of our great tech companies and entrepreneurs. american innovation is a powerful force. we have to put it to work to defeat isis. that starts with understanding where and how recruitment happens. our security professionals need to more effectively track and postse isis'social media and map jihadist networks. they need help from the tech community. companies should redouble their efforts to maintain and enforce their own service agreements. and other necessary policies.

networks,their identify extremist content, and remove it. host: when you hear that, what goes through your mind? guest: if someone is directly connected to isis and there are facts that pertain to that, that is probable cause. when you track guys like the guy i just talked about and they knew about him, the other people i have felt over the years, but she used the word extremist at the end. listen. if you read what came out of the dhs in 2009, there were three memos under obama. one was right-wing extremism, left-wing extremism, and operation vigilant eagle. when i read them, what it said was these were extremists, by the way, environmental groups like peta. people who believe in state rights over in the right-wing

category, they believed in fema camps, they were extremists. operation vigilant eagle, all returning veterans were watched. when she uses the word extremist, who is she talking about? , sure. terrorist law-enforcement should be doing their job. if they are watching everything. when you have huge departments like dhs which i am told by people inside the government they are bumbling. tsa to give you an example. tsa, they did a mock test. and the different groups would sneak weapons in an so-called explosives. in 90% of the cases, those went through. we are dealing with a government , and i was told, they are watching everybody. you, your neighbor, innocent people. all returning veterans, we are going to miss this person because we don't follow up on leads. the computers are doing the job.

if there are facts leading to that, follow up on it. someone saying i'm a member of isis and they want to blow someone up? those these should be followed. tracking american citizens like i am seeing, if people want to live in a surveillance state that is fine. people have to realize there are 5000 federal crimes, over 400,000 regulatory crimes that you can get indicted on. a man spends 18 days in jail for overgrown grass. kids around the country in several cases where they were having the police shutting down their lemonade stands. there are a lot of laws i can be enforced if you live in a surveillance state. what i am saying is, and i back law-enforcement, follow the law. you have facts, do check those people out, they are dangerous, you round them up. , thef you watch everybody

san bernardino so-called terrorists, the fbi had vetted them. again, they are watching everybody. if you watch everybody you cannot get the real criminals. host: this is david from dayton, ohio. john whitehead, author of the book belfield america. caller: good morning and i will be buying your book. , riseago i bought a book of the warrior cop. , i knew this was going on until i saw what was going on in ferguson. cops, takingoops, aim at people. from tanks. these were literally tanks. these cops were going to shoot innocent protesters from.

it was in this book. how all of this, everything in the police force being militarized. it is shocking what's going on in the country. i will be buying your book, sir. thank you very much and i will take your comments on tv. have a merry christmas. bush, under president george w. bush, military equipment was handed out under different programs by the pentagon. that surge under president obama were now they are having mine resistant armor protection vehicles that were used in afghanistan, sniper rifles, everything you see policeman having today. with all the surveillance devices. these are all being handed out by the dhs. what the amazing thing was when i did my research is we were

told that was all used equipment. we can to find out almost 60% was new. corporate america is pushing these. also psychologists are saying there is a weapons affect. when a police officer walks up and there is a protester and they have guns and stuff like that, the weapons effect means citizens are reacting. they see that and it makes citizens more aggressive. you saw in ferguson the end of the protests, there was solid law-enforcement officers that got out there and shook hands,, moved with the peoplem, talk to them and simmered down the protests. in the police academies i have been told by people who teach them, it is 721 on ,ilitarization, aggression and how to defuse a situation. if you reverse that which i am told by officers that work in

academies, they think what we see today with people reacting to officers, i am here in new york city. i saw policeman driving by shaking hands with citizens, letting people take pictures with the horses. good idea. we have to realize this. are oneceman out there of us. i don't like the term civilian. the say he's an officer and i'm a civilian. we are both civilians. is and george washington and james madison and the founding fathers that put our constitution together warned saying ever have a standing army. we have experienced that. today we are creating a standing army with local police who are armed to the hill. i don't see many local police. they work heavily with the fbi and federal agencies. the fbi has moved into some

local police agencies now and recently opened with 10 fbi agents and they are watching social media and feeding it to the police and their watching. should they be doing that? then, in violation of fourth amendment. some viewers out there may want it but i don't. that is what our constitution guarantees. pushed think it will be back because there is too much money being made by a large corporate entities that are pushing it. you are going to see this increase. however your local communities can change that. iu get your city council and am advocating this with people creating several liberties -- civil liberties oversight boards where they were to defuse these situations. we really need 80,000 swat team raids across america annually? where people are getting shot, little kids, dogs, old people. host: let's hear from another

viewer, bob in utah on the democrats line. caller: good morning. your guest, mr. whitehead covered heart of what i will say about the police. i would like you to know how i felt about the policeman in by, i guess shot they are tea party because they waved at the tea party flag over their bodies or hung it there. that really bothered me to think something like this could go on in our country when these policeman are just having a piece. i will let you go ahead and answer that because our country is going downhill because we are staging a war between the people in it. we have trumped out there hollering, politicians that lie, we need somebody who cares. there's a guide by the name of huntsman and i'm a democrat and he wasn't excellent cup -- he

was an excellent governor. anyway, i had to let some steam off. host: that's jon huntsman, the former governor of utah. possibly an independent candidate mr. whitehead, go ahead. guest: i see that, i don't like the us versus them. i'm watching the debates and i don't like that. to bring ouris people together and our communities together. we are not doing that. as a look at our communities today, traveling by the way, walking through local communities, everybody is inside and no one knows who their neighbor is. we have lost our communities. when you get that you will get schisms and hate. when i hear hate rolling from politicians' mouth, i don't like that. if this country is going to make it, we have to get back to our roots.

one is we have to get back to the sense and i say this in my book, we don't teach the golden rule. that we should treat others decently. police officers, to me and these are older policeman saying i don't like the way you are police officers walk up to american citizens these days. i don't like the reverse reaction were they automatically hate everybody in a uniform. that can be defused by our politicians, it can be worked through in schools. getting back into community relations. we need to be involved in our government. how does the constitution start? what is the first three words? we the people. what does that mean. we the people are the government. president obama isn't, he represents us. the policeman isn't, he represents us. we the people. when you go back and say what is

the cause of our problems, we the people are not involved. i'm telling people get down the street and bring back community get-togethers. get to know your local policeman. make sure that when things are happening in your community, you know about it and are not oblivious. you shouldn't be shocked by some of the things you're hearing, you should know what's going on. folks, get involved. i think we can see a lot of the butf we're seeing cap down the government and police, nts, dhsnt age walking through with their uniforms, fbi, all those things. we can correct that but we have to do it ourselves. host: our guest is john whitehead, author of battlefield america: the war on american people. he's joining us as part of our author series. if you want to ask questions, 202-748-8001 four republicans, 202-748-8000 democrats, 202-748-8002 independent.

caller from the independent line. caller: good morning. filibuster,th his the senator from vermont, patrick leahy, was being interviewed. he addressed section 215. paraphrasing, lives are being ruined, education is destroyed. careers are destroyed. because people are being put on these watch lists and have no idea. they cannot defend themselves. they have no recourse whatsoever. a lot of these people that are on the watchlist have nothing to do with terrorism. i found a pretty interesting. also, people really cannot take action. you cannot sue anybody because

the minute you try, the first thing they start screaming is national security. you can't say anything. the country is in danger. really? i just don't buy that for a second. that's my first part. my second is if you can address a bit on civil asset forfeiture. i would really like your take on that. thank you and i will take your response on the other side. guest: that's a big question. terrorist watch lists do exist. government admits they have a database called main core. they use the word extremist again which bothers me. all the people i've seen out there like martin luther king, who is labeled an extremist and he reacted to that. they calledystem main core, a government system. they claim this is fact. they claim to have 8 million

names on that list. people that would be in times of emergency, might be rounded up. those of the terms they use. i would say if we live and a democracy, it is supposed to be transparent. if i am on a terrorist watch list i should know. the government should at least send me a note to say you're on a list so i can react and defend myself. but they don't do that. i talked with a client this week who was pulled over who was on the watchlist and went to the police department. he hadn't done anything wrong. that secret government stuff is the stuff i talk about in the book, stuff former regimes have stuff. stuff we should not put up with. if the average american is on a terrorist watch list, we should know. obviously so we can defend ourselves. itfar as asset forfeiture, is a huge program that police used to rake in millions of

dollars to share with the department of justice. if you're pulled over with cash, they are taking cars homes, stuff like that. it funds many police programs. i looked up some local police cemetery using the money for, carnivals, fairs. getting the property back if you are found not guilty will cost so much money that people give up. there are some communities reacting against it. it, somephasizing local communities have skill that back and some have done away with it and said we don't want asset forfeiture schemes in our community where police are grabbing cars and whatever because somebody's arrested. egregious and it goes back to whether or not we have private property. that is some thing i want to talk about before we get off the air. i see private property as going away. something the fourth amendment protects.

if police enter your home without a warrant and a swat team raids, crashing through shot,oor, people getting we don't have private property. moving in that direction. the problems as i see it, they are so don't overwhelming that sitting and talking about it is not going to change much. in my book i argue that community action may change these things. there's a lot of things many americans don't know about because we are not checking into it. democracy starts with the individual. it is self-government. it spreads out and if you are self-governing, you can have tremendous impact. host: eight from toledo, ohio, republican line. caller: bless you, gentlemen. the reason i'm calling is i'm a 1787 republican.

in 1787, two documents were written. the constitution and the northwest ordinance. nowhere in those documents do you find the word democracy or democratic. the government formed by us was formed on morality and on religion, the religion of jesus christ. this is defined by our founders. whenrst question is, everybody calls us a democracy, they are found calling our founders a liar. i am wondering why this is so ingrained in our people. in thend question is northwest ordinance, it demanded that ohio, michigan, etc. not only have a republican constitution, they have a republican government. stating again what a republican government is. by last question for mr.

whitehead since you mentioned democracy, is what does the liberty bell mean? i think you jim mentioned have a blessed day in the on united socialist states of america. spelt with a k and run by the republicans and the democrats, the parties of the rich and the famous. benjamin franklin was asked when he walked out of the constitutional convention what kind of government we had. he said a republic if you can keep it. i don't think we kept it. the word democracy, the way people use it today and white people want to use it is they want to participate in the government -- why people want to use it is they want to produce a and the government. i talk about in my book. voting is the illusion of participation. you are putting this down here. jimmy carter recently said it

takes 200 to $300 million just to run for president. whoever you are electing for president, i'm sorry, you will probably get disagreement. you are electing a corporate entity to a certain degree because they have tremendous isluence in funding over who elected. and 2000 14, princeton university in conjunction with northwestern university issued a report where they studied at 20 years of policies and laws passed from washington, d.c. at the end of their study and this was one of the best things i've ever read, they concluded that we live in an oligarchy funded by a moneyed elite. the average citizen has virtually no input in what , d c s in washington if that doesn't freak you out, it should. in other words you, the so-called citizen have no input in what happens. a good question.

do we have a republic? not in my opinion. eyesight that study that we live in an oligarchy. listen, the people who wrote the constitution, thomas jefferson, today he would be on the extremist list. madison would be on the list, patrick henry who said give me liberty or give me death and thought the constitution was too cumbersome. list, what ise the liberty bell mean? freedom. they wanted freedom. the freedom to be not watched, not touched by government agents, unless that agent has probable cause. freedom means to be left alone in your country. to be able to walk down your street without getting patted as in milwaukee, they are doing in a probes on citizens while they stand and watch.

they have been sued and people have been awarded. the right to travel along the highway without being pulled over in the middle of the night and women having their vaginas probed. these are happening on a daily basis. we've allowed this to happen. what does liberty mean? it means me saying i will not put up with this anymore. i will stand up for my rights. i want to change this thing. that's what freedom and liberty is all about and what the liberty bell stands for. the people who started this country today would be on a terrorist watch list. they gave us freedom. host: our guest is john whitehead of the rutherford institute, author of "battlefield america: the war over the american people. " you say the average american commits three felonies of a without knowing it.

guest: oh yeah. there are 5000 crimes, over 4000 regulatory crimes. cases of the rutherford institute, we handle legal cases. i find lawyers. me, theady called police were at her door as she has a chicken. it's against the law in her community to have a chicken in your backyard. she wanted it for eggs. a veteran calls who was pulled over on his front porch and questioned. defended in phoenix, arizona had 10 people in his living room and was told that was against the law. there are meeting for bible study. the police arrested him and he spent 60 days in jail. that's the kind of cases that are spreading across the country because there's so many laws. national groups that write the laws, and local communities in

them. walking down the street you can be accused of any crime. thing i don'ter like. neighbors, most of these cases, it is neighbors calling the police. they don't walk to the neighbor and say anything. this is what i say with community relations. they don't say hey, could you move your chicken? no, they call the police. they are not working with their community. we go back to the question asked earlier. do we live in a republic? no. not if you are participating in your government and are not working with your fellow citizens. that is the place to start. host: next is from pennsylvania, democrat line. caller: i want to talk about something very small. nobody talks about it because it

is humiliating. medication, a non-psychotropic medication by a psychiatrist. i had one of the known side effects. the presence of mind to realize i needed medical advice to find out what was causing the problem. and to cover her malpractice, she called the suicide police on may. most people think that when you call the suicide hotline or somebody calls it on you, that some nice mental health worker comes and reassures you. no, they send the police. they put me in handcuffs. i have osteoporosis, a gave me compression fractures. i was thrown into a county crisis center.

i was put on other drugs and i tried to call the lawyer that i planning, hestate was disgusted with me and hung up the phone. i had no one to call. on a list. not a terror list but another list. it means having had an involuntary commitment for a side effect of a medication for i am i was asking help, never allowed to work with the elderly or children again. it has wiped out the last 15 years of my working life. i am 65. my masters was in special education and social work. that pretty much wiped out my ability to work and gave me six at least years of ptsd. it is different from combat, i

am not a danger of anyone. i have never been suicidal. this list, every time i have reached out for help for being anxious, somebody calls the police again. host: thank you for the call. i will let our guest respond. guest: i have worked on a number of cases. withve several going on, what they called welfare checks. we had a case recently where a fellow argued with his wife and said he was going on a trip. the employer called the police and said you need to do a welfare check. the police, the fellow was getting ready to leave and the police sent a swat team out and surrounded the car. tape after police on they talk to the guy through the window of his car saying we shouldn't be here, this doesn't work. out thely, they smashed guys window, dragged him out, to him face down, and we filed a

lawsuit against them. this is happening across the country. it shows you, again, what is happening. pulleys, but her how good they are, are not trained in how to deal with somebody who may have a mental problem. they know that in most instances. i've seen that happen over and over again. again, we need some kind of government protection. this is an area that is emerging with so called checks and people getting arrested. people getting their lives destroyed and put on lists. me there should be a headline you call where you can talk to a lawyer or an attorney who will give you advice immediately before you are arrested. we dealt with an old guy not too long ago who said somebody was tapping into his cable. the police came to check it out. because he slurred his words a few times, they were handcuffing

him behind his back and took him to a mental institution, put him against the wall, and that a strip search. nothing was wrong with them. but he went through all this and is suffering from ptsd himself. this goes back and shows you what i am illustrating in my book. is the government views us different than they viewed us 30 years ago and maybe 20 years ago. for some reason, the average american i am seeing more and more seems to be the enemy or the one we worry about when you have crazies running around getting guns and wanting to shoot people in groups. again, not focusing on the real problem. next up is eric from daytona beach, republican line. caller: good morning, it is a pleasure to speak to you. i am a student of history and i'm wondering when did this happen? when did this start? i will take your call off-line. guest: i would say that as far

as what we are seeing with the police, if you want to talk about that, that started in the 1980's with the emergence of swat teams. there were 3000 swat team raids in 1985 to give you a figure. they were used against hostage situations, high tense situations. today there are over 80,000 happening across the united states on a daily basis -- i mean a yearly basis. that is increasing. 85% of those are from lawrence where police used to come -- warrants were people used to come and knock on your door. today that has changed. ge now where chan they smashed on your door. police were doing a sweep of this man's neighborhood, they crashed through his door in the

middle of the night and took his wife and child and put them in a closet. the only weapon he had was a hunting rifle. the police saw him, he got it was burglars. they fired over 70 times and hit was a 50 some times. police said he fired at them but the investigation showed the safety was never off the weapon. they entered his home and killed him. we are seeing this happen daily. children are getting killed. one thing i am seeing, people who work in the academy's who teach say the intense militarization process the young policeman are going through, they are being trained militarily and oppressing militarily. under the bush of administration handed out this equipment. what you put on as i show in the book, when you put combat outfits on anybody, a local policeman or whatever, their view changes. the person they are looking at becomes an enemy combatant.

we can change that and scale it back because here's the key. the fbi statistics show crime in america is at a 40 year low. per citizenzen crime. office is that a 50 year low. dutyficers getting shot on is at a 50 year low. people are making a lot of money off of this. shame on them. it, localange communities are sending back the local equipment. a don't want a grenade launcher in their community or a tank. i don't blame them. if you have high crime or whatever, you may need that situation. what i'm seeing is the history started

>> listen here. are 17,000 times more likely to die of a heart attack been killed by terrorists. to beght more killed by a policeman. a german named david who writes for a blog called rational consent. he referenced -- there is a gentleman named david who writes for a blog called rational consent. he says a police state is not a state with a powerful police it is when police forces are not covered by law or when the government wields police power arbitrarily. examples include socia r -- soviet russia, not to germany. ,he u.s. is not a police state this rhetoric needs to stop. how do respond -- how would you respond? guest: it is characterized by

massive surveillance. hyper violence against citizens is increasing. all the signs are there. history, thet government agents, the policeman i talked to tell me this thing. they are nervous about where we are heading. we can say it is not a police state but listen. everything you are doing is being watched. they round up x marines because they are doing facebook posts and crashing through doors. at the rutherford institute i work with students. i had a group of students from the university of virginia. a couple of years ago i had someone say they're working on a project and they would like to determine swat team raids. they came back and said we couldn't find a log of this in not to germany -- nazi germany or stalinist russia. they didn't see a lot of the

aggression. it was toward certain groups like the jewish people, but we swat raids.ng we are seeing over 1000 people being killed i police this year, many unarmed. you are seeing every action like an ferguson, missouri. do i think we are moving into a police state? history shows that and current fact. we are moving to a police state. it is time to stop it. host: devin from johnston city, tennessee. independent line. caller: good morning fellows. the country is in danger. you are 100% right when you talk about all the laws and regulations we have.

we can't even collect rainwater. blueberry tax, fishing license, cannabis, milk. we can go on and on. guest: swat team raids against farmers for goat milk. that is right. john mccain was on tv a few years ago. he talked about how he and hillary clinton both voted to arm isis to take out bashar al-assad. and obama didn't put forth. -- and got on their obama didn't vote for it. just type in john mccain voted for isis and he was on fox news talking about he and hillary clinton voted to arm isis. it was my mind. -- blew my mind. it was true, they both voted in

2012. and tell the government know, say we are not going to listen to you anymore. we do people have a choice. i read that we funded isis with weapons. there are brand-new toyota trucks, supposedly they tack -- trackback to this country. i don't know if that is true. as far as export it weapons, the united states is a big exporter of weapons and bombs. usedof the weapons being by former marines i talked to in afghanistan when they capture weapons, they are american.

some of our former colleagues were talking about morality. that they were saying at some point, let's be careful where we are handing out bombs. you mentioned a obama not voting for something. one thing that bothers me about he decides supposedly, who he will kill with a drone. so far, almost 2500 civilians have been killed. one was a 16-year-old kid. seemed to lack empathy for other countries and each other. that is something that i have seen with so-called, some that he mentioned us versus them. we are losing empathy and what that means to me is care for other human beings. and handing out weapons all across the world. that should stop.

the drones that will be proliferating across this country armed with their weapons will be all over the world. atee a future if you look technology. i talk about it clearly in the book where drones are heading and robotics is heading. become thel permanent state. the great russian dissonance said a state of perpetual war is an excuse for domestic tyranny. that is an exact quote. when you have a warring empire and history shows us with the roman empire being one good example, is that when you have a warring empire it comes back and starts imploding. all the weapons used in afghanistan and what we are seeing with local policeman that started overseas, tasers started being overseas. sound cannons they are using to

disperse free-speech protesters. all of that is coming home. we have a lot of decisions. thecomes a time when average american has to say i'm not taking this anymore and will stand up for freedom. martin luther king give us the model and said militant nonviolent resistance to oppression. he was labeled an extremist in his day and not well-liked. he was my hero at that time. happening, hethis said we are living in a police state and that was 1968 before he got shot. host: melvin from fort lauderdale, florida. john whitehead is our guest and on the line for you. caller: i think the whole changing the actual meaning of what happened and

what the facts were at the time. if you look at the constitution and it says we the people, the first thing you have to look at is the people that wrote that. what were we the people at the time? the only people at the time who whitevote were rich men. and you had to own property. therefore women couldn't vote. blacks couldn't vote. indentured servants couldn't vote and neither could indians. it was an oligarchy because the only people capable of voting who had the means to vote were rich white men and that went on for years. set up and say we are people meant everybody is absolutely wrong because it only meant those people who could actually determine what the law was and what could go on at that point in time. thank you. guest: that's a good comment. we the people at that time, you are right.

it was rich white aristocrats. they ran it but they give us a basis and we saw that with the civil war. african-americans finally rose up and said that's enough. martin luther king extended it. what i am arguing in my book is let's extend it further. let's get active. let's take what they've given us. they gave us the bill of rights. read it, and here's the amazing thing. the average american can't tell me what's in it. i have talked to 150 lawyers not to long ago and in the middle of my speech i asked i do a civics lesson? they look at me like i was not. room,y lawyer in this this was harvard, berkeley, those types. can any lawyer in this room give me the defined freedom and the first amendment? raise your hand in our call on you. one guy went up and put his hand down. my wife was in the back and said they were arguing at the table.

they gave us defined freedoms in the first amendment. the right to assemble in protest. you have those rights. we have the right to keep the army and police out of our homes. we have the right in the fourth amendment against the police state. folks, let's take it. we can complain about it, let's take it and run with it. let's create a new civil rights law. it expands this and gives the government off our backs and out of our homes and off our cell phones and computers. it keeps the police from smashing through our doors and killing someone. withas asleep on her couch her princess blanket and she got shot by a swat team and guess what, they were in the wrong apartment. they didn't follow the fourth amendment. i think we the people are the government. over theen changed years, there are more of us. i agree with the caller. host: republican line, this is

buzz from maryland. caller: i agree with most of what you're saying but i take exception with the ferguson thing. he went for the cops gun but other than that i'm with you. a theory goingg through my head that sounds crazy. when i think about some of the really bad neighborhoods around the country and what you were talking about where police are heavily militarized and are not really engaging with the community, i started thinking about special forces and what they do. they go into villages that invite them in and even though they are obviously able to take care of business on the military end of the gun, their deal is to work with the villagers and to do counterinsurgency. you bring them around and these villagers end up becoming

, people.nment they stopped doing the bad stuff. i'm sorry we lost the call. do you want to respond to anything he said? when thesten, baltimore riots were going on, i was talking to some african-americans in the inner-city and i talked to one lady who said she had two teenage sons. she said they called the neighborhood they would -- bv eirut. they said it's because of the arrests by the policeman and the way they treat the kids. that is happening in the inner cities. that could change. have to move away from militarism asian and moved to community support. working with the community. from militarism and move into midi support.

them off yourr porch because you had the fourth amendment in your back pocket and you knew what it said. community relations can change that and police should be working with it. i work with good cops today who say they are changing their philosophy. insurance fell, virginia during the ferguson situation i talked to local policeman who said there was a march downtown. i said one of you guys just not ?how up in full combat gear regular uniforms and watch and let people walk by, shake their hands and say we encourage free speech. .hey did it it was very peaceful, people came to me later and said hey, this works. the policeman were friendly. why not be friendly. we are citizens, let's work together for the community and get freedom back. then we can stop worrying about washington, d.c.

i've worked in and out of the sea for years and sued a lot of politicians. corruption buthe let's get our community relationships back together. host: from wyoming, kathy. caller: mr. whitehead, you are spot on and thank you. i have a quick comment and question. and i havey activist fought the dmv regarding the real id act because of the excessive documentation they require us to provide just to get a drivers license. also, the post office used a lame excuse with homeland security and reasons they wanted more documentation. just to take a po box. my son wanted to be in marching band so we had to give up his fourth amendment rights because of random drug testing policies. i do fight these things as much as i can but i get resistance from everybody because of national security.

my question is, how true is it or can you elaborate on and i think it's the nda a or patriot act that states that citizens can be held in custody without charge indefinitely. how true is that? the national defense authorization act which has been re-signed by president obama does allow the military if you are a terrorist but the word extremist is used. it allows the military to come to your door, arrest you, and take you away. we had that earlier with the marine who was taken from his door. dhs,was spearheaded by the they spearhead these raids. in this country if you are labeled in extremist and on that list, you can be rounded up. someone earlier said they don't believe this police state stuff. what this lady is talking about is happening across the country.

excessive documentation, the slightest mistake, you become an outcast in your community. some people have trouble getting credit cards and loans. sometimes for saying the wrong thing on facebook. is this stuff true? yes. it is documented in the book. most people out there are very lonely because many people have bought into the idea that we need all this to be safe. but san bernardino showed us it doesn't really make you safe. the average terrorist shooting .as happened in this country what is the first thing you are supposed to do when you walk into a building if you are worried about something like that? anybody? nowhere the exit is. there are other steps. the government should be training us. local government should be training us.

you can do it very effectively. we are not being told. surveillance,o do they should give us programs and show us how to stop getting killed when they bumble like the tsa that cannot get bombs and weapons. host: we have only a minute but after you've heard the argument that says you have nothing the hive -- nothing to hide. what is the big deal? guest: listen, the big deal is our constitution. even you want freedom or you don't. the constitution requires probable cause and a reason for the government to do it i didn't mention the x-ray vans that police have. drones that will have x-ray scanners going over your house. even you want freedom or you don't and that's the choice you have to make. .t is an important choice

the future hangs on the average american making the right choice. as patrick henry said, give me limit -- give me liberty or give me death. she is going to join us next as we continue. ♪ >> three days of featured programming on c-span. friday evening, congressional

republican leaders on ring dick .heney at the capital >> does it bother you when people compare you to darth vader? >no, it humanizes you. and, a discussion with the washington dc police chief. >> most people get defensive if they feel like you are being office of. requesting versus demanding.

those things change the dynamic event. >> sunday at 2:00, race and the criminal justice system with valerie jarrett, and others. then, portions of the washington ideas festival. speakers include former vice president al gore and author anne-marie slaughter. >> we have to banish the word "helping" at home. helping is not actually taking the burden off you. you are still figuring out what needs to be done. you are asking him to help. he is not the agent. he is the assistant. if we are going to get to where we need to go, men do have to be parents, or fully equal coparents. >> for the full schedule, go to.org. -- c-span.org. >> "washington journal" continues. host: joining us now, amy harder of "the wall street journal," .he covers energy for the paper

good morning. the prospect of the united states exporting oil. tell us where we are in that process. we never used to be able to do it before. guest: there was a ban in place for 40 years. congress first it in place in 1975 in response to the arab oil embargo. in fact, a lot of people do not on oil.re is a band o if the average american does not know it is there, we can get rid of it, and very few people will notice. it was not an issue for the last 40 years because we were not producing so much oil, but in the last seven years, we have a just oil and natural gas boom. oil production shot up. these economic changes have prompted the debate whether companies should export oil. companies that refine oil --

they are able to export those products in an unlimited amount and those have skyrocketed. host: do they benefit from this? guest: they actually get hurt the most because they are losing profits.all the producing company's only produce oil and not refinement, they sell to the refineries at a discounted price because the oil u.s.} the in the refineries were selling the gasoline on the global market and readioing more benefits. with the ban lifted, they will be able to export crude oil directly, which in turn, could hurt some profits of the refineries. host: politically, how did we come to lifting the ban? guest: first of all, it caught

everybody off guard, including myself. i would not have anticipated this happening so quickly until a week or two ago. i think there are three main reasons. number one, a significant drop in oil prices. low oil prices really enabled washington to do energy oficy an in an atmosphere where consumers are not focused on energy prices. opposition that was there was very fragmented. refineries. there are a handful of refineries worried about their profit, but that is not a compelling argument. not that many people are worried about the profits of refineries. environmental movements, they are opposed to exports primarily on the ground that allowing oil exports will encourage more drilling and more common in -- carbon emissions.

environmental movements have been more focused on the keystone xl pipeline, which rejected last month. democrats and the white house of a five month extension wind and solar tax credits, which was a policy very important to democrats and the presidents climate agenda. i talked to some democrats in the senate who said they would not be able to get an extension of the tracks products -- tax credits without giving republicans what they wanted. host: congress agrees to a ban a lift of the ban of oil exports to other countries. (202) 748-8001 for republicans. (202) 748-8000 for democrats. (202) 745-8002 for independents. now that the ban has been lifted, how soon be cds exports happen? .uest: that is the ironic thing the low oil prices has allowed

the political deal to be made, but at the same token, it makes it so that companies will not be rushing to the border to export their oil. press people who have been lobbying on it, and most say it is nice to have the option next year, the year after that, 5-10 years. the industry is very long-term even ifand know that now they don't need it, this is the moment politically. there have been some companies that say they will export as soon as the summer. host: which countries benefit the most, even if they can buy the oil market anyway? guest: that is the question. there will not be as many buyers as they were 4-5 years

ago. some places in asia have talked to u.s. oil companies about having some export deals. i think we will see in asia where there is a lot of growth in their economy, and europe as well because there aren't geopolitical aspects of this as well. the u.s. can say, we will give you do oil, and now you don't need it from say iran or russia, or other countries that there is some conflicts with. talk politically, you about how democrats and republicans are getting together on this. what was present obama's approach? is the something he supported. guest: he never talked about oil exports. he, himself, has never made a comment about it. some of his chief advisers -- john podesta and the energy secretary, ernest muniz, they

danced around the issue. they never took a position. they also took some incremental steps. the commerce department is the agency that oversees exports of oil. they took some incremental steps to allow some oil to be exported in smaller quantities. that has taken place over the last two years or so. generally speaking, the demonstrations that they were opposed to any legislation that would lift the ban precisely because they think they can ha e the authority to do it without congress. it was not until the president was ready to sign the bill that the white house press secretary josh earnest said, we are not becaused -- precisely diesel has been exported in record amounts. it was not cleansed and that they held off on an opinion until they got a deal. to discussarder here

the lifting of an oil export ban in the united states. charles is from colorado, on with our guest, go ahead. caller: i just have a question. right now, i was told that in saudi arabia, it costs $60 per .arrel, and now it is $30, if we go out there and lift this oil ban and through more oil too the world, is it going drive the prices down? how will that affect other countries? in our country here, i'm in -- a lot of the oil industry out here is slowing down because of the low oil prices. people are out of work because they cannot afford to go to work

for $35 or $33 per barrel. guest: that is a great question. i have spent quite a lot of time in colorado. the oil production has shot up some 50%-60% since 2008. colorado has enabled this domestic oil boom. you are exactly right. with more global oil, more oil on the global market, you will see, and this is what several reports have indicated, you will see the oil prices go down. that will put further pressure on countries like saudi arabia, but also the u.s. energy industry. they see it as a long-term play, that they can open u this up now so that when prices are high , this will be an essential market for them. host: ryan from ontario, democrats line. caller: i have a question. to my knowledge, gas prices --

well, the import everything is lower now. why are we paying more for gas in california than other states? i'm on social security, and we are not getting a cost-of-living raise because gas prices are .ower that is a stupid explanation because everybody on social security does not even drive. why are other people benefiting off of us? i will take my answer off the line. thank you. guest: california certainly does have its own unique challenges when it comes to gasoline challenges. right now, gasoline prices are averaging across the u.s. below two dollars for the first time since march 2009. in california, gasoline prices are still averaging somewhere around $2.50, or a little under that.

that is largely due to some of the infrastructure challenges and the fact that california gets a lot of its oil from the middle east, as opposed to north dakota or texas. that has an additional transportation cost. hadfornia has always higher gasoline prices. for: (202) 748-8001 republicans. (202) 748-8000 for democrats. (202) 745-8002 for independents. we see low prices now on crude oil. what if that reverses, what if we see increases? does that affect exports and the long-term? guest: there are two impacts. number one, you will see a lot of political campaigns writing advertisements alleging that tives voted to raise the ban. i can only suspect that if

prices go up, some political operatives will capitalize on that. from an economic perspective, there was about a dozen reports that were released over 2014, and that was an essential part of the lobbying campaign. it was not like the reports were oilahoots with the industry, but they found that if you export oil, gasoline prices will go up. in fact, all of the reports found that u.s. gasoline prices, if anything, could go down for-six cents per gallon. thatr: i would like to say over time, it will raise prices and make the companies that much more richer, pull that much

more oil out of the ground, and read more carbon around the world. we only have one planet. we are not making it easier. thank you very much. guest: the caller has expressed a lot of the concerns that some environmentalists have made. in the 11th hour of negotiations, you saw environmentalists startled that it was gaining ground and they were negotiating with the ban. you see concern about that among the environmentalists. the low oil prices enables democrats to think this is not going to have a big impact now, but we need those tax credits to be extended right now. that was the only window that they saw. what this is mike who askes

about the reserves we have? will that be impacted by export oil? guest: that is a great question. in the legislation that was a clause thats says the president can stop, up to one year, exports of oil. that is plan b if things get out of hand. that was essential to satisfy some lawmakers on capitol hill about that. the specific petroleum reserve a 770 million barrel capacity in case of emergency. congress has begun selling off , most notably, the highway trust fund. the oil boom has made washington

pretty confident, some would say oil. about using the if we get into a supply crunch, some of these decisions could come back to hot them. you forhello, thank taking my call. what i want to bring up was these oil companies exploit for , regardless of any consequence. wanted tont to ask -- ask, what companies stand to gain the most from this legislation and who lobbied congress to get this passed? i would like to suggest of e from el paso,gl texas who got 100 miles per

gallon out of the buick roadmaster tank. that was 1975. if you look at the history, because it was documented, to see the nature of these oil companies and who we are dealing with. i would like to know who is sponsoring the bill, who is lobbying for it. host: thanks. guest: the companies that were lobbing the most for this -- lobbying the most for this legislation for domestic companies. of course, the entire industry .as lobbying everyone from refineries to oil service companies to independent companies. a new coalition with action set up, specifically for the push to export oil. the numbers of that coalition were copies like -- the members

wereat coalition conoco phillips. continental resources ultimately dropped out. lobbying the most for this are companies that produce and do not refine oil. on capitol hill, there was a push across both chambers and both parties. some of the earliest supporters of it where lisa murkowski from froma, heidi heitkamp north dakota. and others who come from oil-producing states and were originally wary of lifting the ban.export as prices dropped and constituents got more squeeze,

they got more urgent, in terms of their lobbying. then, you saw this concerted push to lift the ban. host: of you are asked if this had any bearing on natural gas exports citing that domestic prices are low but worldwide prices are high. big debate onas a natural gas exports as well. similar to oil exports, there are restrictions on it, dating law saying938 that the u.s. can export natural gas to companies that we have a free trade agreement with freely that there is no government review. there is a government review, but not too rigorous. for companies that we do not have a free trade agreement with , we are talking about companies that what our natural gas, specifically in asia and other places. you have to go through a

rigorous process where the administration has to decide if it is in the national interest to export natural gas. instead of having an outright cumbersomeis a review process to do that. at the same time, the administration has reviewed numerous terminals throughout the u.s. there are exports from natural gas to oil when it comes to exporting. it does not need the infrastructure. you have to liquefy it and send it. whereas, with oil, you can ship it out. host: keith from florida, republican line. and merryod morning christmas to everybody. i've always been under the impression that a lot of the oil has been sent to japan for sale. also, the second question is --

is there not a strategic move besides sending money to europe to try to cut off putin. he has such a stranglehold on the european nations with natural gas and oil that they cannot do anything strategically if he starts coming into europe. is that not part of the move? part: that is definitely of the calculation on the administration. for several years now, then administration has been thinking about the geopolitical impacts of the oil and natural gas boom. he does not talk about much now, but one hillary clinton was secretary of state, this was one of the biggest component of her time there. this was all about -- her last speech was at georgetown and her speech was on how oil can help

the usb a bigger world power -- help the u.s. be a bigger world par power. since the u.s. has produced oil, are exports have -- imports have dropped. i understand that when administration officials talked to people, for example, with the iran sanctions, the u.s. was able to do those largely because the ministry's was able to encourage other countries to get their oil from other places. we were able to do that because the u.s. is importing less. with the ban being lifted, that is an additional argument from a gop perspective as to why it is good policy. host: of you are on twitter asks the implications for opec countries. has been relatively silent on this issue,

surprisingly. overall, i think it can only be less good news for them. they have decided to not cut production, which has led to lower prices. with even more oil going on the global market, you will see that price drop. i talked to the ceo of cottonelle resources who was one of the biggest proponent of the change in policies and said, i only have a company to take care of, saudi arabia has an entire country. saudi arabia, iran, the prices going down will hurt them more. host: sterling, virginia, let's hear from mohammed. caller: thank you for taking my call. my question is about the on thes that is going on gas prices. at some point in time, when the

blamed the high, we president. he has to come out and make a big speech about it. now, with the prices are low, nobody seems to give him credit. i want to know why that is. guest: that is a great question. that is how tough politics are. very unforgiving. when good policy happens, no one passes around the praise. president obama himself also does not talk about how low gasoline prices are. you think he would talk about it more. if we were in 2011, and he was in the reelection campaign, i suspect he would be talking a lot more about low income prices if they were low at that time. that is a great question. i think it comes down to politics. politics drives negative blaming.

you are on with our guest. caller: good morning, amy. you brought up with the caller before about the iranian situation and how they will come off a trade embargo. billion they got tied indiamoney to china and most of that is because of gas. one other thing. the republican congress, the when bill they consider 2015 was the xl pipeline. that was shut down by the president.

the first thing they were lobbying for was xl and the last thing they were lobbying for was embargo on our exporting of the oil. host: thank you very much. guest: to quick comment on that. on the iran nuclear agreement that lists some of the sanctions ifts some of the sections on iran, that was an essential part of the argument. it was a fairness argument that really appeals to a lot of members of congress, no matter what party you are from or your position on climate change our energy policy. on the second point about what youprices and

were saying about the keystone that isline -- interesting. i remember the fact that congress spent a whole month invading keystone. in january. i covered at all. we all knew that obama would veto it. it is ironic that we began the year fighting over a symbolic project about one company. however, i would argue the keystone does have implications broader than that. then, we and the year with the biggest change in energy policy and several years. if you asked the industry privately, they would be much happy and that exports are allowed then keystone to go forward. in washington, where politics is the name of the gay, with keystone, it became such a political football that

republicans or democrats did not see an area to negotiate on, whereas with oil experts, there was an opening. guest: now that we have moved past this, what do we expect in obama's last year? guest: i continue to be surprised about the last six months. it has been such a busy six months. you had august, obama announced the clean power plan which is epa's landmark climate change plan to cut carbon emissions across the country. several weeks later, you had obama finally be to keystone after seven years. i can't tell you how many times we have false alarms on friday afternoon, thinking it was coming, and it finally did come one friday. a few weeks later, you had the big climate agreement in paris. then, oil exports and tax credits being extended.

looking forward, i think you will see a continuation of obama's climate agenda. you still have some regulations that have not come out, for example, methane regulations on the oil and gas industry are expected next year. you will see a lot of legal action, as soon as next week, in fact, a court decision on whether or not to delay obama's climate role as the lawsuit goes through. i think there will be a lot of smaller steps after the last six months of a lot of action. host: amy harder from "wall street journal." thank you for your time. that is it for our program today. another program comes your way tomorrow at 7:00. see you then. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2015] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] ♪