teacher. can you correct me on that? my final comment is that, this terrible tragedy, the biblical admonition of pride comes before fall, by certainly learned our lesson because the shuttle program was set back for so many years. and once again if you could address that question. host: in the cnn fast facts, they don't note whether or not another teacher. i don't recall another teacher being included in another shuttle launch. we can look into that as we continue to take your phone calls. we'll do a couple more calls here from our viewers on this. your memories of the 30th anniversary of the challenger explosion. before we get to those calls, though, i want to show you what donald trump had to say on fox news last night. he was back on the network. he was on bill o'reilly's show. this is what he had to say about his decision to not show up at tonight's debate in des moines, iowa. >> putin will come at you. the mullahs will come at you.

certainly the terrorists are going to come at you. it's going to be personal. they are going to do everything they can to diminish you and -- you as the president you have to rise above that, all right, and do what's best for the country. this exposition that we are talking about today, people are going to sarkse trump, he's too self-absorbed to be president. he needs to look to bigger picture. get your message to the folks. it >> there's got to be something you set the all time record in cable history and so did cnn. >> they want to know you. they want to know you. >> that's fine. a lot of people do know me. >> you're not giving them the opportunity -- >> i am not walking away. no. >> would you do me a favor -- >> bill, i'm not. >> i bought you so many vanilla milk shakes, you owe me. will you just consider, i want you to consider, all right,

think about it, say, look, i might come back. forgive, go forward, answer the questions, look out for the folks. just want you to consider it. you owe me milk shakes, i'll take them off the ledger if you consider it. host: donald trump on bill o'reilly's show last night. donald trump said he would not reconsider. he said, too, that the two of them discussed bill o'reilly not asking him that question on air, whether or not to reconsider. he said it would be embarrassing for fox. a little bit in the papers about this. "washington post," trump's boycott of debate big mistake or crafty move. they report in this phillip rucker, when multiple g.o.p. officials called wednesday to privately p inquire whether trump would pull a stunt and appear after all, donald trump's campaign manager said he meant

what he said and would not appear. the committee tried to navigate the situation care flifment looking to sustain its relatively warm relationships with fox news and the trump campaign. the chief strategist was on the phone regularly on wednesday not to hurge him to reconsider but get status updates. donald trupp said that fox news is toying with him and that's why he made that decision. he did not like the statement that fox put out saying that a source told him putin and ayatollah would not be fair to him if he were to become president. on that statement that fox put out, "washington post" reports that according to fox executive who spoke on the condition anonymity to discuss private you conversations, roger put together a tongue in cheek statement to take the heat off of megan kelly. it was roger, according to "washington post" and executive, that wrote that statement that was the trigger for donald trum top say i'm not going to show up

at the debate. linda in knoxville,town tfpblet we'll be asking about all of this late -- knoxville, tennessee. we'll be asking about all of this later focusing on campaign 2016. go ahead. caller: hi. i remember where i was and what i saw. my memorys as well as other people is the shock. what's different is they immediately got out the television monitor and turned to cbs. except cbs was not covering that launch. and had no footage, knew nothing about what had gone on. and we discovered the only people who actually knew it was happening and was covering it was cnn. first time i got the idea that the traditional news media had changed profoundly. i'd also like to point people to to richard fineman, the famous cal tech physicist book, "what do you care what other people think" published in 1988. he was also appointed to the challenger commission and he's

the guy who famously stuck the o-ring in the glass of ice water , fingering them as the actual culprit. what he later discovered was that he had kind of been set up by william rogers, the guy who was talking on that clip that you showed, and had kind of been played like a violin. they already knew what was wrong and what happened, but they needed somebody to bring it out in a politically acceptable way. the last thing i would point out is the columbia crashed because of damage from foam coming off the main fuel tank. and john young, my all time favorite astronaut, was on after that with bob crippen, both john and bob flew the first shuttle. and john young said rather soberly that after they flew the first shuttle, one of the engineers had told him the tiles

on the shuttle that they had flown had been damaged because of insulation coming off the central tank. lessons were learned and lessons were not learned. host: linda, knoxville,town tfpblet john in louisiana. john, you're our also this morning. go ahead. share your memories with us. caller: fellow pilot, i was in the air force for 28 years. a fellow pilot was at barksdale air force base that morning watching the shuttle. we both flown combat in vietnam with dick scooby and the squan done of caribous over there. it was kind of a poignant moment. to the people that make the criticism, an aircraft accident of any type is a very complex part of the investigation. it's a change of events not any one thing cause tfments they zeroed in on the o-rings. we thought there was more to it than that. i remember dick quite well from combat. a great warrior.

a true warrior and fellow air force pilot. never will forget that day. host: john in louisiana. thanks for all the calls this morning on your memories as we mark this 30th anniversary of the challenger explosion. january 28, 1986. we are going to take a short break. we'll come back and talk with former house intelligence committee chairman and republican of michigan, pete hoekstra, about the fight against isis and the role of national security issues and how they are playing out in campaign 2016. later, iowa caucuses are five days awafmente political scientist david redlawsk will join us from des moines to talk about his book, "why iowa" the history of the hawkeye state rule. we'll be right back. [captions copyright national able satellite corp. 2016] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. isit ncicap.org]

>> we have main engine start. four, three, two, one. and lift off. lift off of the 25th space shuttle mission, and it has cleared the tower. >> every weekend on american history tv on c-span3, we feature programs that tell the american story. the highlights for this weekend include saturday morning at 11:15 eastern, author and new york state supreme court judge, dianne keisel, discusses the life and accomplishments of civil rights activist dorothy faraby. at 10:00 p.m. eastern on real america, 30 years ago this week, the space shuttle challenger exploded shortly after lift off, killing all seven crew members, watch president reagan's address to the nation about the explosion. in 1986 nasa video report detailing the accident's causes. >> today is a day for mourning and remembering. nancy and i are pained to the core over the tragedy of the

shuttle challenger. we know we share this pain with all of the people of our country. this is truly a national loss. >> sunday morning at 10:00 on road to the white house rewind, a look at the iowa caucuses, including howard dean 2004 speech featuring the dean scream and the conference on the history of the iowa caucuses, speakers include retired democratic political advisor tim craft. who was the iowa caucus' campaign manager for jimmy carter in 1976. also two panels with former campaign managers and political reporters. at 8:00, journalist, paul brandeis, on his book, "under this roof, the white house and the presidency, 21 presidents, 21 rooms, 231 inside stories." he explains how presidents from george washington to barack obama have left their imprint on the executive mansion. >> here's what i find interesting about the theater. if you look at records of what the presidents is have watched over the years, tastes are very

eclectic and everything, they reflect the tastes of the presidents. they reflect the times in which they lived and everything. there is one movie, this is a quiz section of our evening here, there's one movie that really resonated with more presidents than any other one, can you guess what that one movie might be? >> for the complete american history tv weekend schedule, go to c-span.org. "washington journal" continues. host: back at our table this morning, the former congressman, peter hoekstra, former intelligence chairman and senior fellow now for the investigative project on terrorism. let's begin with the candidates, field that we have right now. which one do you think is doing the best job talking about national security issues? guest: i have aligned myself, i have endorsed john kasich. i think john kasich both on domestic issues and foreign

policy issues is the candidate that brings the experience and the track record to be the next president. now, there's a number of candidates that are clearly have taken a different direction than what this president has done, but i really think what we are going to need in the white house in january is a president that comes in, admits to the american people for the last 14 years what we have been doing in the fight against radical jihadists is not working. that he has a plan, he or she has a plan to move forward, but that he's going to make sure he or she is going to make sure that the direction that they go s a bipartisan plan that, as some sustainability to it. we need a long-term strategy. i think john kasich is the candidate. not only that has plan for national security, but as one that can also bring republicans and democrats together so we have a long-term, sustainable plan and takes this old national

security foreign policy debate out of the political realm and brings it back into one that is real substance. host: what is governor kasich saying that you like? guest: what he's saying, we -- clearly we need to be strong. we need to build an international coalition. we need to recognize the mistakes that we have made. perhaps most significantly the mistake we made in libya. bringing together an international coalition, bringing together the american people, and strongly confront and contain and ultimately defeat isis. host: there are peace talks happening in geneva and the situation in syria. they can't agree on who should be at the table. is that an important first step to fighting isis is getting that situation under control? guest: i think the most important first step is actually having more success on the ground. and that can take place in iraq where you can empower the -- and

equip the kurds and sunni tribes, as well as the folks out of baghdad. we have left the sunnis and kurds on the sidelines. right now we still had not -- we can't demonstrate very many places where we are winning the fight. and once other folks see that the west, sunnis, kurds, iraqis, that we can tilely confront and contain identify -- actually front and contain isis, at that point in time there will be incentive for folks to come to the peace talks. the concern on syria, some people don't want to come to the table because they don't see the u.s. committed to this fight and winning this fight. host: is the answer as senator ted cruz said to carpet-bomb isis? guest: i don't know exactly what the senator means by that. but if it means moreau bust and aggressive a -- more robust and aggressive approach to isis, that is something that is needed. i might say it differently, but

clearly a more robust attack against isis so people can see that we have the momentum and that we are committed to actually defeating them on the military grounds. then i think that's exactly where we need to go. host: let me ask you this, why not donald trump? guest: i'm not -- didn't say not donald trump. i think there is a number of folks that can move forward and can take this strategy. i think right now, like i said, kasich brings the experience of bringing people together. donald trump, i'm not quite sure exactly where he goes. obviously in the business world he has brought people together and has been phenomenonly successful. but in terms of what he would do in politics, it's very much a wild card. don't know what kind of a political leader he would be and whether he could actually work with the people that work in the place that's behind you on capitol hill. and be successful in getting things done. i think we need somebody who can

bring republicans and democrats together effectively, especially on national security. host: there is another candidate who has a lot of experience, but on the other side, hillary clinton. there is another candie who has a lot of experience. hillary clinton. i want to show you her latest ad and get your opinion. >> think about it. one of these republicans could actually be president. >> sit down and shut up. >> i think wages are too high. >> defund planned parenthood. yourself, who is the one candidate who can stop them? hillary clinton. to stop them, stand with her. host: congressman? guest: it is interesting. book based on her performance in libya. that was a disastrous

foreign-policy decision by the united states, one of the theest mistakes we made in past two decades. we actually got -- we got him to do everything americans wanted him to do. and this was democrats and republicans having a consistent policy against gadhafi in libya. to the reparations victims of his terrorist activities and then he started to actively work with us in fighting terrorism. and then hillary clinton and this president decided to take him out. they aligned themselves with radical jihadists and they left. is now a hotspot of radical jihadists. exporting ideology and

weapons and fighters to the middle east and throughout northern africa. we are contained -- we are completing a study that shows the levels of fatalities as a result of radical jihadi attacks since 2001. the numbers are startling. they are rising dramatically. that report will be out within the next week. the committee looked into what happened in benghazi and there have been several reports. opinion, been, in your evidence that hillary clinton did something? she was part of the team that created this instability in libya. and somewhere along the lines, our master was in a place he shouldn't have been in benghazi.

why he was there, it is not clear. the intelligence community and the state department should have known that going into benghazi on that date was a really bad idea. everyone else had pulled out of benghazi in terms of saying, this is no longer a secure environment. we are leaving. so a lot of mistakes were made. i am hopeful that this final committee will get more of what happened in that critical 72 hours leading up to that fateful day. those hours during the attack and what happened afterward but i think the bigger story in libya is how we lost libya over years by going in and roofing gadhafi. partome time, when we were -- when we were partnered with him, he stabilized libya and major that was no longer a

launchpad for radical jihadists into the rest of the region. play what role did the cia in benghazi and what responsibility does that organization take? head at thats was time. guest: again, we reference the special committee. we don't really know what was going on. i have my own suspicions and there is a lot of evidence and some circumstantial reporting that there were weapons going from libya through turkey and into syria. not necessarily being directly facilitated by the cia or the state department but may be encouraged by those organizations. but that program was run by an opposite -- by an outside third party. i think the number of weapons being funneled into syria was to overthrow a sod.

and many of those weapons made it into the hands of a group that became known as the group of isis. host: what is the lesson of libya? lesson of libya for american foreign-policy, and i talk about this in my book, we have to be careful about when we go and break something that it is very hard to put the pieces back together. : made. a statement that you break it, you own it. therehink the real lesson and i think this president started to appreciate libya, and i think it is why he is stepping back his strategy in syria saying well, overthrowing gadhafi didn't turn out so well plan if wehat is our do get rid of the sod. and at that point in time, the

obama administration began realizing that they didn't have a plan for syria and they didn't know exactly who we were arming and equipping in syria. we have been muddling through with a muddled strategy for the last two or three years. host: let's talk about the e-mails with hillary clinton's e-mail server. what was the criteria for you to -- and nowssified there is another level above that? how do you classify that? guest: it is simple. you never get anything that is on your personal e-mail. your staff would never send it to you. -- my stafftaff who would always be very careful about, whenever i had given secret information and it was a

, youant relearning process can't talk about this, these documents stay in this room, they don't go anywhere else, and it was a constant reinforcement. it was the way we lived at it is the culture with in the intelligence committee. if you're dealing with information that stays within the confines of these itilities, and if you use digitally you have to have a secure communication. to drive over to grand rapids and you are going to use their equipment for us to have the right kind of communications to ensure that we don't jeopardize any information. i did have a secure phone at home but it was only for urgent communication. i never had a secure lack or anything like that. yout is a culture that

develop within the community of the people that you are working the that it appears that culture of being sensitive to these various classifications that there wasn't a lot of ness there. host: there's also a report saying they didn't have enough equipment to have secure computers for themselves? >> you would think that the state department would put a priority on making sure that no one could have access to secure information. this could be one of the most important foreign-policy that you would want. point andnother people who weren't familiar dealing with classified information, we were frustrated

with this. we would the in a classified briefing and we would walk out the door and reporters would be asking us -- based on the washington post or the washington times, here is the stuff -- and we couldn't say anything even though that was what we had just been briefed on. how do they know this? in some cases we would wake up we were restricted from talking about anything because we would be confirming what was in the newspaper. host: have you read what the inspector general said about the late report? did she do anything wrong? guest: absolutely. having this information on a personal e-mail and these types of things, it is clear. i wrote an op-ed on this in august. it is very possible and likely

that she broke the law as did a number of her staff in the way that they used classified information and the way they distributed it. she is in big trouble. host: what are the consequences? guest: well consequences for people in a similar efficient is that they are indicted and they reach an agreement with the justice department or they are indicted. host: what could happen? guest: it will be interesting. i subscribe to the theory that thebeen articulated that fbi will bring forward a recommendation that hillary clinton be indicted for the mishandling of classified information. and then it becomes a decision of the justice department as to whether they will move forward with the indictment. al, ane go to independent caller. we are talking about national security issues in the campaign 2016. what are your thoughts?

that they thoughts are republican party all seem to think that war is the answer to everything. congressman in michigan was able to destroy the middle class up there. and i don't understand why anyone would want to see a copycat of the united states with any other country in the world. congratulations mr. congressman for putting the oligarchs in charge and taking the focus off of the middle class that has given everything to the big money. congratulations, you did a great job. guest: thank you. i appreciate the voice of encouragement here. you will notice that for most of the time i was a congressman in michigan, we were under democratic control and they controlled the state policy. i've been excited about the work

that our governor has done at the public administration has our in terms of bringing state back. just like john kasich has bought a callback -- bought ohio back. i think this is one of the big lessons that we have learned. war is not the answer. you need to confront the front from isis but you have to confront it effectively and i am more than willing to say that the policies under the both bush and measures and the obama administration over the last 14 years have not worked. isis and radical jihadists now have a acre footprint than they ever had before. number of fatalities that we are seeing worldwide are higher than we have ever seen them before. it is time for america to forget about being republicans and democrats and actually develop a strategy to contain and defeat

the threat of radical jihadists. it will be a long war and we can't change all our policies every 4-8 years. we need consistent policy like we had in the cold war. that is the only way that we are going to be able to do that. host: john in oregon, a democrat. the attempt since of kicking the soviets out of afghanistan and aligning with the same organizations that are basically leading to every are today, it has been a consistent policy that has been used and well -- he ishas not a senator anymore, but he has come out and he has given an extremely detailed policy to deal with it using other nations to get involved.

and he has broadcast that one time. second one anda i only saw that one time. the real question here, i don't think it has been a consistent policy. there has been a real difference under the george bush policy to the obama policy but the bottom line to you and others is to ask -- are we being successful? do we feel more comfortable and confident that america and the west in other parts of the world are more secure today them what they were four years ago, eight years ago or 12 years ago? and i think the answer is no. we are at greater risk than what we have been since 2001. that has been a result of ineffective policies over the last 14 years. we need to develop a better way

and a new way. missouri, a democrat. good morning to you. caller: it seems like all i hear are about benghazi and before -- thens peel -- before four americans killed. anything about how we slaughtered gadhafi and his people. just murderers. into iraqe used to go slaughter saddam hussein and his people -- look at it now. host: congressman? guest: america is a great country. we haven't been spending most of our time talking about in ghazi. we are talking about the bigger

issues. and i might use a slightly different language to describe what has happened over the last 12 or 14 years but i would agree with you that the policies have not worked. but that doesn't mean that we can't develop a different set of policies to defeat the threat of radical jihadists. we just have to recognize it for what it is and develop a set of consistent policies. host: tom in fort wayne, indiana. an independent. caller: first of all, i don't know why we keep developing more weapons. we have a jet we can't fly. people can fly it that fast. all, most of the people out there are supposed to be our allies. they have the biggest armies

so why do we need this huge army. i think we could get away with a smaller one if we stopped doing stuff going into a regime change every year like we know everything. when we use our military appropriately and effectively, it is one of the most important tools that we have for diplomacy. it helps keep america safe and it helps keep the western world safe. i think that he is right. we need to ask more from our allies to make sure that we have a broad coalition as we move forward on every strategy. why in the reason middle east, a number of those countries should be stepping up to take more of the refugees. they should be caring cash they should be carrying more of a military role rather than the united states or our allies.

good morning, you are on the air with peter hoekstra. go ahead. caller: there is not an honest bone in his body. -- i see you have done more than six terms. you know that is a lie. [indiscernible] the only thing your care about is going to war. host: how do you respond? guest: he's absolutely correct. i did serve more than what i initially pledged i was going to do. i went back to my voters and i explained why i broke the term limit pledge they reelected me mike sixingly and in

term i was appointed to be chairman of the intelligence committee. i served three more terms and then i left congress. findingtalked about weapons of mass destruction, there were weapons of mass destruction that were discovered. everything, those were clearly displayed whether they were weapons of mass destruction that we went to war for, that is a different debate. but there were clearly weapons of mass destruction that were formed. i think this is a disappointing thing here. this is something we have to work towards. with someoneree politically, there is no reason to go personal. i am more than happy to talk about the personal things that i have done.

but there are no personal attacks. and that is the problem. too much time is focused on personal attacks. is a good reminder for our viewers. keep the conversations civil. it is easy for you as somebody who is watching to sit and sling arrows while we have our guest here are national tv. so let's debate the policy and the politics. host: george, a republican. hello. caller: hello. [indiscernible] isis and thanks to he created vietnam. war, i consider that another vietnam war.

congress did not support the who is doings wife he was takings -- drugs from central america. and now we have a problem here in the united states. we have a problem in 2016 because the president's want more. the republicans. in 2016, a republican president becomes war, they will send $200,000 -- host: ok, the sentiment was heard. i want to ask you about that sentiment that the republicans are chomping at the bit to go to war. guest: i think that is the wrong lesson. there is a somber mood on the hill, those among the republicans and the democrats. realizing the cost of war.

number one, the cost of lives. many of us who are on the hill meet personally with all of the families of people who are killed in these conflicts. we meet with many of them and it is a very sobering experience. and to be talking about that anybody wanting to go to war -- i can't imagine that is the case. i've never fought in a conflict with people shooting back at me and i think the statement that war is hell for those involved is absolutely correct. casualtiesho suffer and for those families, it is hell. that is a huge price to pay. and the families that i have had to talk to oures awesome and inspiring but it doesn't take away the pain. to argue that anybody wants to go to war, i can't imagine that. what we do want -- we want to

keep america safe. we have to confront this. we have to contain this. it is going to come here. and this is why -- and i think the democrats feel the same -- we all want to keep americans safe. ands time for democrats republicans to come together and explain to america what the threat is and how we are going to deal with the lessons we have learned over the last 14 years and how it will influence our thinking moving forward to resolve this. host: up next is david in california. welcome to the conversation. caller: a couple of comments that peter hoekstra has made. he made a statement about how there are more deaths now from terrorism than there was ever before? i can't challenge that. i don't know that.

and he also made a comment about finding weapons of mass distraction. i chuckled on that because we know that's not true. we know what he is doing. he is minimizing the mistake. but the real question that i -- is host: we will take your comments. guest: to talk about the level of such allergies since 2001 on an annual basis, there have been a number of groups that have given this information to the process and we have gone through that and within the next week or 10 days, will have that worked out that shows the level of the talladega. in terms of weapons of mass destruction -- they found them. i'm not trying to re-articulate the debate about going into war with iraq and saying that we found enough weapons of mass destruction. i would argue at this point that

even if there were more significant quantities of itpons that had been found, still might not have been the right justification or enough justification to go to work. over andbeen litigated over and over again. we need to learn our lessons. we need to recognize that intelligence only gives us partial information. sometimes it is wrong and sometimes the decision that we wee a be right or wrong but need to move forward from the decisions that we've made. in lancaster,is california. a republican. caller: good morning. it paints the to hear these callers call in. they are americans and i don't know who they hear this stuff from -- whatever new station --

that they are being misled. the republicans are always the bad guys. that one guy can leave the country anytime he wants. but he is still here. i don't really know what to say. if i put myself in your shoes, who knows what would happen? using someein was kind of gas? guest: he gassed the kurds. caller: who knows what he would have done if he had a heavier weapon? i appreciate the call. in a lot ofdo see the calls you see the frustration. you see the frustration and the anger. americans are not used to looking at a problem 14 years

later and saying the situation is worse today than what it was when we began. andike to solve problems most people today, republicans and democrats, foreign policy is not working and we are all frustrated. we are news today that they are not talking about exit strategy when it comes to afghanistan. why is it that we cannot withdraw from afghanistan? what is going on on the ground? guest: what you are seeing is -- and again, our study will show this -- the levels of attacks are going up which means the threat level in afghanistan is increasing. meaning that we want to maintain and to maintain a level of stability and security in

afghanistan, it requires american troops. that is the same argument that was made in iraq. story, my family is an immigrant story. we liberated from the netherlands when i was three years old. is reason they immigrated that 12 years after the end of world war ii, a bunch of europe had not been rebuilt. it was a frustrating place to be. a lot of people think that after world war ii, everything was rebuilt and there was prosperity and we moved forward. but 12 years later, my parents looked at europe and the netherlands and said -- there is no future here for our kids. that theythankful were liberated by canadian and american troops. they were thankful that america opened their doors to a lot of us in. how americaike

opened it stores to syrians who may be feeling the same thing. guest: we are an immigrant country. we need to open our doors and keep the doors open but we need to do it in a smart way. take a look at what is going on in europe. the swedish government reports today that they have letting 160,000 people already and they may have to return 80,000 of them because 80,000 of them don't make it through the vetting process to qualify for resettlement into sweden. the germans have identified dozens of people who have come flow,ough the refugee people directly connected to isis. and this is talking about the governmental systems. not the people but the governmental systems. syria, yemen, libya --

these are failed states. so the information we get on these people who want to come and the united states are garbage. it is garbage data. many may be good people but there is no way to effectively that who should come in. and it is also the view of the director of the fbi. host: this from the new york times. hunger grows in syria. there are hopes that peace talks can get underway in geneva that half a million people are at risk of starving because of the conflict in syria. jerry, you are up. good morning to you. caller: thank you for taking my call. historythe lessons from -- the republican party have not learned. you are not willing to prosecute wars properly. overwhelming force like: powell what was necessary.

you are not willing to pay for it and you are not willing to learn from it. we had regime change and korea used to be a dependent of ours. you are not willing to pay for or get the world to go against president assad. you wouldn't do that in iraq. that man should have been brought to the hague. host: let's leave it there. see iti'm glad that you so clearly that it has clearly been republican policies that have failed and that the policies of the seven years have been so successful under the obama administration. inave been magnanimous saying that republicans and democrats have a lot to learn over the last 14 years of policy, how it has been conducted, how does work and not worked.

take time for americans to those lessons and develop a coherent strategy moving forward as neither a republican or democratic strategy that an american strategy. his everyone is now admitting that this is going to be a long war. republicans and democrats have both made plenty of mistakes. i want to have hillary clinton's response to this inspector general report about her e-mail because she pushed back and said it was another leak. as the state department confirmed, i never sent or received e-mail marked as classified. guest: it is a wonderful play on words. d."rked classified o most of the stuff that will be communicated through e-mail is talking about these issues. it is still classified that yeah, she is absolutely correct. they are not stamped.

but that doesn't need it is not classified. it is very possible that just talking about stuff of classified information you are violating rules. host: the wall street journal reported that the nsa fight on the is a role -- on the israel prime minister with members of congress -- what do you know? guest: i would ask a couple of questions. identifiedericans who were talking to netanyahu -- were those names transferred to the white house and to the white house use those names for any follow-up activity? spying on netanyahu? that is what spies do. we spy on our friends and face by on us. people get upset about it but the whole world is a spy world.

the french due to us, the germans do to us and we do it to them. spied on americans and we continued the practice of spying and that information was transferred to the white house to identify who the people were at the white house did anything with that information, that would be a serious breach of national security. it would show that our intelligence community which is walled off from spying on americans, here or internationally, they cannot do that. the nsa and our intelligence community are very good at what they do but they need to stay focused on people outside of the united states. most resources can't be turned on us. was former congressman peter hoekstra. thank you for being here.

we will take a short break and then we will turn our attention to the iowa caucus which is five days away. we be joined by political scientist david redlawsk. we will dive into the history of the hawkeye state role. in iowa, our c-span team is there. we are talking to customers at smokey road coffeehouse. snooki road coffeehouse is off interstate 335 in des moines. it is a spot for bible study and people who want a cup of coffee. adam came in this morning and he said he is not -- he said he was not involved in politics but now is actively involved. >> i like to be involved rather a bystander.ng

this year i am supporting ted cruz so i have been helping people get involved in that. i have done phone calls and talk to people to get background remission. >> what attracted you to ted cruz? >> extremes seem to pool the extremes seem to rule the day and i think a more balanced candidate would be better. he is consistent. that is why i'm voting for him. >> where will you be on the iowa caucus night? >> jefferson elementary. >> what is your plan that night? >> voting. >> i shouldn't have to speak. what would you say if you had

to speak for the candidates? >> i would touch on a couple of the big things for me which is abortion,y, government giving back to the state and local authorities and a couple of other topics. >> thank you. we will be here all morning in des moines and just across the bakerfrom adam is greg who works for the family leaders here in des moines. family leaders is a christian ministry that works to bring the gospel to the arena. explain your work in evangelicals? we are helping pastors turnout out their congregation to vote. whether democrats or republicans, we want the

caucuses to be accessible to people of the church. they are usually a pretty stable voting block, are they turning out more? more than any other group in the state of iowa. only at one are time of day as they have a pretty low turnout, far lower than the general election. -- one at democrats 220,000 republicans and one edge of 40,000 democrats. you have to prioritize it. and readyo be right at that time. so we are helping to communicate with the pastor to mitigate with the congregation that this is important to prioritize your time. will turn upeople because of the candidates or the times that we are in? >> i think the times that we are

in. [indiscernible] to go beyond that we have to find new ways to turn it out. the times we are in has them more alert. >> greg baker, i appreciate it. host: that was in iowa this morning. -- our our cruise their crews there. the caucus is on february 1. joining us from des moines this redlawsk, theid author of why iowa? so, let's begin with the history of the iowa caucus. who decided that i was should go first and why? guest: good morning.

accident,e or less an not so much that it was decided to go first but after the disasters democratic national convention of 1968, the democrats revised their rules, they made it so that caucuses and primaries tend to be more open and available. and one of the effects of that in a caucus state like iowa was to require that the party publicly advertised and provide information about upcoming party events like caucuses. it is important to recognize that iowa is a caucus convention state. it is followed by county conventions in everyone of the 99 counties and send the congressional district conventions and finally he state convention. 1972,the rule changes in it turned out that the iowa

-- itatic party couldn't got pushed into my. you have to backtrack those steps and once you get back tracking, you find that you have to hold the caucuses in late january 1972. new hampshire had been first in the nation pretty much for as long as primaries existed. no one paid careful attention to that. it was rather an oddity rather than anything that happened on purpose. host: how do the caucuses work? guest: it works differently for the two parties. basic aspects are the same. voters go to a location in their precinct, not the place they usually vote in general elections -- a location in a school or church or public opening of some kind.

will call a chair caucus to order. at that point, if you are not signed in, you cannot participate. the doors effectively close. state, the chair will call the caucus to order, and do party business and then the parties diverge. if you are a republican, you will sit down and listen to other members of your caucus who are lucky and who are in a lucky spot -- you might get a candidate. you hear them talk for just a moment and with 11 candidates this year it will take longer than usual. following that, publicans will vote. the chair passes out a ballot. people will mark their preference and drop it on a box.

it will be counted as reported to a caucus and said reported using a brand-new mobile app in des moines. at that point, republicans will move on to collecting delegate and they will elect some large. they also do party business with electing precinct people and voting on potential platforms to send to the county convention. democrats do much of the same stuff but the thing and that is different is how they vote. when the chair says that it is time, what he or she will do is tell people to go to a particular part of the room. to physically stand up and move. have a publicts vote. everyone can see who use of art. they moved to different parts of the room, they are counted and if any of the groups and candidates do not have 15%, they

have to do a real line. and in the real line process, anyone can move but usually people who move will be those in groups of less than 15%. they can try to get people over to them or they can go somewhere else. finished, everyone will be counted again. if there still remains a group of less than 15%, just the people in that group must then realign or they can go home. at that stage, the chair will do caucus count and they will count the number of delegates that each group is entitled to elect based on the size of the group. the group's elect the delegate. so the hillary clinton group will elect hillary clinton.

the chair will report that delegate count to the democratic headquarters in des moines and then they move forward and do business. how will we know the winner of the iowa caucuses? probably relatively quickly this year. by relatively quickly i mean within a couple of hours after the 7:00 start time. republicans take about an hour to do this process. the expectation this year is app,because of the mobile the results will come in electronically at the party will begin to approach the results online as they come in. so we will see the trend almost immediately. we will begin to see the big picture soon after that. for the democrats, it takes longer. that process can run as long as

two hours depending on the need .o do the final realignment and they will report the results as a covenant that but i would expect the republican numbers before the democrat. host: this used to be referred to as a beauty contest. how has that changed? guest: the beauty contest aspect was on the public inside. that was because the votes had no connection to the delegate counts. could win most of as the ron paul folks did in 2012. the reason they could do that is because they stayed when everyone went home and they did the party business and elected themselves and they got county committees and so on. are year, the republicans

binding the reports for the national convention. that means the island republicans will report the iowa at thein national convention if there is a contested first ballot. if there is an uncontested ballot than the chair will work on hundred percent of iowa's vote for that person. unlikeat means is that 2012 when the ron paul delegates go to the floor of the convention, they refused to vote. and that cannot happen. either the vote will be proportional or it will be hundred percent to the winner. becomes -- then the delegates are free to vote. on the democratic side, they are not bound.

but because they are elected by their preference group, hillary clinton people are elected by delegates, and in they are less likely to shift their allegiance unless their candidate asked them to. host: we are talking about the role and history of the iowa caucuses. we have a line for the iowa voters. we have david breslau skier -- we have david redlawsk here. are on the line. caller: i am deeply offended by the two ugly that has existed since 1976. i never agreed to have iowa and new hampshire go first. we have 50 states here and your guest seems like a nice this is outrageous

that these two small haveresentative state subverted our process. .e need to start from scratch i would like to see a national referendum of the 50 states and see if the other 48 states agree that iowa and new hampshire second forirst and the remainder of our democratic form of government because i don't think it is right. has said, it was an accident of history. host: why is it right? guest: well, the interesting thing is -- this argument is made all the time. otherrly every cycle states try to go first since this started in 1972, they haven't been successful. there are a lot of things to argue on both sides but the basic ideaf