as always, we will take your calls and you can join the conversation on facebook and twitter. washington journal is next. host: bernie sanders and ted cruz were the winners in yesterday's voting. senator sanders took the wyoming caucuses, and senator cruz won in colorado. both are closing the gaps just a little bit more with the front-runners. next up, a week from tuesday, new york. meantime, here in washington, the u.s. house is about to return from a break of nearly three weeks, and on the agenda, border security and vaccines for the zika virus. meantime, democrats in congress are trying to push nationally for something the states are doing more and more of these days, guaranteeing paid parental leave. the state of new york and the city of san francisco are the latest to put some plans in place, and that's our question

for you this sunday morning. how do you feel about government-paid family leave, either at the federal leave or the state or the local level? parents, call this number, 202-748-8000. business owners, 748-8001. ll others, 202-748-8002. do you support or oppose government-paid family leave? if not by phone, you can weigh in on social media. @cspanwj, handle is or you can post a comment on facebook. here is one of the headlines out there today about what's happening around the country. this is in "forbes" magazine. as new york and san francisco pass paid family leave, these 20 states could be next. we'll get to those states in a moment, but want to talk about the basics here with clare o'connor, staff writer for "forbes." good morning, clare. explain off the top, the family and medical leave act, the federal law.

it covers who? there are some gaps here, correct? guest: oh, are there ever, yes. well, unfortunately, the u.s. remains the only developed country in the world with no federal law guaranteeing paid parental leave. what the fmla does mandate is 12 weeks of unpaid maternity leave, so it's specifically for a woman who actually gives birth, and it only goes to full-time workers at companies of over 50 employees. this leaves out a lot of small businesses. so people working for small businesses wanting to take leave could be fresh out of luck. and it's a sad statistic that only 12% of american workers are offered paid leave through their employers. host: so that puts the states and the localities in action. explain to us what new york and the city of san francisco put in place now. guest: well, what they've done is slightly different. california already had a law on

the books, offering six weeks at 55% salary. so what san francisco has done -- this all sounds a little convoluted, because it is. there's no federal law on the books, so the states are left to their own devices. essentially they're plugging the gap. they're mandating that employers pay the 45% left over that the state is not paying. so employers are having to foot the bill for 45% of a worker's pay for six weeks. so, i mean, we're talking six weeks pay. this is not a staggering amount of time or money. what new york is doing is mandating 12 weeks of paid time off for all workers, whether it's full-time or part-time, and this is not just actually for parents. this is also for people needing to care for seriously ill relatives. and this program is being funded by paycheck deductions.

and while it actually hasn't been decided how much they're going to be at, experts are saying it's going to be something like 50 cents to a dollar a week. host: we did mention in your piece, you list many other states that are moving along the same lines, and we'll show the names of the states here while you discuss what else is happening around the country. can you do that for us? guest: yeah, sure. i moon, it won't surprise to you hear that there are some states where, you know, vocates -- there's a network that has someone in every state campaigning for this, thinking they have a better chance in some states than others. the states and jurisdictions, you can't forget d.c., the laces that seem most likely to follow new york next are massachusetts, connecticut, vermont, and washington, d.c. they seem closest. but, you know, there are bills being introduced in different

states at this time. actually the day after san francisco ace parental leave, democrats in ohio introduced a $1,000 d that for up to a week for 12 weeks. , yeah, 20 states, some of them, it's legislation that's being actively pursued, and some it's just kind of researching what would happen in these states. so, you know, there are varying degrees of likelihood that these will happen over the course of the next year. host: so, broadly speaking then, what's the reaction been like from the business community? guest: well, you know, i wish i had more time to be on the phone with small businesses getting reaction. i think also that it's, you know, it's too soon in a lot of cases to know what the fallout will be. but i have bony pointed towards

research that suggests that states that already have this sort of legislation, like california, like rhode island, small businesses have seen their retention rates improve when this sort of legislation has been brought up. you know, that being said, of course there are small businesses in san francisco that will be concerned that they won't be able to handle paying 45% of a worker's pay for six weeks. but you know what? some of these businesses are going to have to compete, because what we're seeing right now in san francisco and in silicon valley, palo alto, especially with tech companies, is that they've pen addressing this government shortfall themselves. there are, you know, big tech companies all over california that are introducing their own policies where the government has fallen short, like, for instance, last week, twitter announced that it would be granting 20 weeks for full-time employees. and this isn't just in california, either. there's etsy, the online

product shop in new york, has introduced six months of fully paid parental leave across gender. that's whether it's birth or adoption. so i think that in a lot of cases these businesses are already going to be competing with companies offering great policies. scommoip clare, do you see a scenario where the folks here in washington would get together and do something in this area on the federal level? guest: huh. well, a human being who's also a woman who has a job, i hope so. but i think, you know, obviously this is a contentious topic in the current presidential election, and i think that we'll see a lot more movement on it, if a democrat wins the white house, frankly. guest: ok, clar o'connor, thank you for joining us so early for joining us. appreciate it. guest: thank you for having me. host: want to remind you. numbers f. you're a parent,

call 202-748-80. if you are a business owner, try 202-748-8001. nd all others, 202-748-8002. we welcome your participation to the program, and we'll get to your calls as soon as they start coming in. the department of labor put together this fact sheet for folks who are interested to read. they say that the need for paurntal leave is as follows. they remind us that only 12% of u.s. private sector workers have access to paid family leave through their employer. too many workers, they write, still cannot afford to take unpaid leave because of the loss of income and sales or have to cut their leave short because of financial or work place pressers. millions of workers of care giving responsibilities for both young children and aging parents. and labor goes on to write about the benefits of paid leave. paid l.a. temperature leave can increase female labor force participation by making it easier for women to stay in the workforce after giving birth,

which contributes to economic growth. when parents are better supported at work through paid family and medical leave, they are also less likely to rely on public assistance benefits. they also write that paid leave leads to better outcomes for parents and children. maternity leave improves child health outcomes, increased birth weight, increased premature births and decreased infant mortality, among other things. a word from the independent women's for her oum all this, before we get to our calls. they're opposed to paid family leave, paid by the government anyway. they write this new mandate certainly will benefit some employees, but it will create real hardship for many others. higher employment costs mean lower wages and fewer jobs, particularly for those with fewer skills and less education. women also tend to pay the highest price in terms of lost economic opportunity for such family-friendly policies. they put that in quotes. some workers pay prefer higher

take-home pay instead of more generous paid leave benefits. that's from the independent women's forum on all this. calls are here now. it's thomas up first from north las vegas. good morning, thomas. caller: yeah, i'm against it totally. host: how come? caller: well, it's -- they say there's a war on women, but social security favors women to longevity by 33% you lose there. you lose another 33% on all your money that you put into medicare, medicaid. you know, they just -- even on the obamacare, women's healthcare costs are $100,000 more over a lifetime than a man's, so there's another $45,000 that a man loses over his lifetime. these funds all just keep adding up. when by to work, i'm not going to get paid leave. and i got no right to negotiate a relationship, because, you know, basically i'm not ever

going to have a child, because until i can reach -- have a contract that will be honored in the courts, i won't take the risk of a woman leaving with my child or having the child, too. host: thomas, thanks your sharing your thoughts. cal in west virginia, a parent. good morning, carl. caller: good morning. you know, sometimes i wonder how in the world my wife and i managed to raise five kids without government help. from what i hear from these democrats now, i'm just amazed. because, you know, like the guy out there in arizona at the v.a. hospital, he has been on paid leave for two years. now, that's punishment. that's the way the government is punishing him, by making him stay on paid leave for two years while they investigate. man, i'm telling -- why don't we just let everybody stay home? yeah. that's a good idea.

let everybody stay home. host: carl, some of the research in some of the pieces we've been reading say the type of thing the government paid family leave will actually help worker retention, and quentin sommerville ways it can be good for business. what do you think? caller: i think the government helps enough. i think it's time for the government to back off and let people live. the government plays too big a role in everybody's life. let's put a republican in there and shrink this government down to where it should be. that's the way i see it. host: thanks, carl. gaithersburg, maryland, a business owner named omar. good morning. caller: good morning. host: thaur for joining us. what do you think about all this? caller: well, personally, here's what i think. i mean, i'm 20 years old. i'm a college student. i'm a business owner. i have a very small real estate operation. and the idea that, as a business owner, you're mandated by the government to have paid family leave, to me it's

absurd. i think it's just another form of central planning, and central planning is never good for the economy. i think need to understand that the free market is an organism. it's just like a living organism. and no human being or the federal reserve or government officials can, you know, mess with it and make rules and laws that will make it better. i think the best thing to do is just leave it alone. if you think about it, let's say we went from cavemen to the industrial revolution, we did that without all these government mandates and laws and other forms of central planning, and i think we need to have less -- you know, i'm not a republican or a democrat, i'm an independent, but i do agree with the republicans as far as shrinking the size of government, and it would really help the economy. host: ok. thanks for calling, omar,

gaithersburg. and laura is on the line now holding in pennsylvania. laura parent. good morning, laura. caller: good morning. host: how are you? caller: i am fine, thank you. how are you? host: doing well. what do you think about this question? should question be government in paying for a family's medical leave? caller: actually, yeah, i believe that they should. i already feel that people who work part-time do not get enough benefits. and parents in particular, it's hard economically to get by. so if you're part-time and you don't get paid during that time, your family is there are distress, and this just adds to it. there's plenty of money to go around. and i think that, you know, young families should be helped out, especially when a lot of these young people cannot even get full-time jobs. so they're already at a

disadvantage. host: laura, a couple of the earlier callers, you mentioned the money piece of it, but government is too big, they said, and this is just another reason to stay home, another caller said. how would you react to those folks? caller: well, my last point would be, when we look at other countries and how these other countries take care of their people, i don't think there's enough discussion about comparing the united states to other countries. we're supposed to be such a strong, healthy, wealthy nation, yet, really, are we taking care of our own people? that's my whole point. are we taking care of our own? if we look at other countries and whether or not they're successful in this endeavor, then we should move in that direction. host: ok. thanks for call. that was laura there from pennsylvania. she mentions other countries. there's a chart that we found in one of the publications we're reading, and they talk

about the rest of the world here, and they break this down by color. and in the red, you can see the u.s. is the only country that doesn't guarantee all of this for people. the only developed country in the world with no federal laws guaranteeing paid partneral leave. and the folks that are doing the most in this area are in blue. it includes parts of europe and russia and canada, you can see. and then the next color down is the orange type color, less than 14 weeks of paid leave. so you can see that map. we'll just keep that on the camera just for a second. again, the red, no family leave , and the blue doing the most around the world. rick from florida. good morning, rick. caller: good morning, sir. i couldn't agree more with the

last caller, laura. one of the biggest problems that we have is misinformation, and these folks that call in and say that government is too big and that government is interfering with us, the government is us. the government is supposed to represent us. and the problem is, if you try to run the government like a big business, a business is there to do one thing, make a profit. the government cannot do that. the government has to provide services to people and have a heart. if you don't take care of your people, then your country is going to fail. the problem is that we have way too many republican ideas out there that have sent all of our jobs overseas. hat's why there's no jobs.

they have pretty much put a divider between americans, where we're pointing fingers at each other, saying that you're the problem, you're the problem , when, really, the problem is greed. you have to let people have time. and if it were to a business, you would be there all the time working for them. host: rick, thank you for calling. at twitter this morning, jim links together the minimum wage issue, a $15 minimum wage in some places, to this paid family leave issue. jim writes, the cost of living in new york and san francisco are sure to rise, somebody's got to pay, writes jim. here is what bernie sanders, the presidential candidate, has had to say about this issue. he spoke about this tuesday after he won wisconsin. here's a look. senator sanders: people are asking, how does it happen? how does it happen that the united states of america, our great nation, is the only major country on earth not to guarantee paid family and

medical leave? [applause] there are women giving birth in wyoming and wisconsin and vermont today where they're going to have to go back to work in two or three weeks, because they don't have the income to take care of their family, which is why together we are going to pass three months paid family and medical leave. [applause] host: on to the national review, san francisco's new family leave mandate, another barrier to job creation, they write. san francisco is celebrating a new law to require all employers with 20 or more employees to provide six weeks of paid leave time. as i explain in "forbes," this certainly will benefit some employees, but it will create real hardship for many others. and carrie lukas says this means lower wages and fewer

jobs, as we've heard earlier from the independent women's forum. and they write here that if we want workers to have the compensation packages they want, including higher wages and better benefits, then policy makers should focus on facilitating job creation so that workers have a variety of employment opportunities and bosses have to compete to keep them. unfortunately, this type of employment mandate takes us in the opposite direction and will be another barrier to job creation. you can read that in the national review. gentleman neen is on the line from new york, a partner. good morning, janine. caller: good morning. host: what would you like to say? caller: i want to say that it's 12 weeks is so basic. i mean, we don't do that already is ridiculous. and i would say that we can pay or this by making everyone pay their fair share. you know, corporations, if

they're paying their fair share into the system, you can afford to do this. host: anything else, janine? caller: that's it. host: all right, thank you. don in arkansas, good morning, don. caller: good morning, sir. i've got a solution for this paid family leave. let the businesses set up a program where they get sick leave and they build up their hours to where they can build up a certain amount of hours, then they can take family sick leave and get paid for it. that is the simple solution to all this problem that i see while watching on this program. host: do you think that would work? caller: that would work. it works for -- i tell you a business that has it and it works for people that works in there 20 hours to 40 hours. it is the united states postal service has a setup that if you -- after so many hours a week,

you get so many hours of sick leave, and you can build it up, and it will work. that would be the solution for the whole problem. host: thank you for calling, don. twitter, where in the constitution does it provide for services, it says here in response to this conversation this morning. sandra, massachusetts, good morning to you. caller: good morning. years ago i was put into this situation, years and years ago, it should have happened a long time ago, my husband was working, and i was working, and we had our child at an early age, and the thing of it is, after i had the child, i had no recourse, what to do or anything else, and we just fell by the wayside. and i couldn't figure out why there wasn't anything set up for women or men who are in

this situation, because there are single men, too, with children, and we need something, and there was nothing out there. host: what would that benefit have meant to you at that time, sandra? host: oh, heck, i would have still been working. i would have been able to do a lot of things. we had money set aside and everything. but it just hurt us terribly. and i think i was married for 50 years, and i'm telling you right now, that would have been the greatest thing that could have ever happened. women and men both need this. for their children and themselves. host: sandra, let me ask you. one viewer by twitter, who loses the work of parents if they are on leave? who will do their work? will employees double up on work or hire contractors? what about the work place itself if this were to happen more prominently? caller: yeah, they should set up something small.

they can do it. it can be done. let's worry about the financial setup for these people. it's crazy. host: thank you for calling from massachusetts. we have west virginia on the line. it's ernest. is it oak hill? oak hill, west virginia. go ahead, please. caller: ok, yes, i say no, mainly because the -- our taxes would go up, because who would pay for this if the government is doing it? taxes would go up. and i think if you look at the european model and what have you, they have -- your income tax pays for this. so we would have less take-home pay in order for us to have .his benefit, even healthcare host: so, yeah, i was going to mention in that piece in "forbes," the program in new

york, for example, is going to be funded by an employee paycheck deduction, amounting to between 50 cents and a dollar a week. is that worth it? caller: it might. however, if healthcare keeps on going up, also if mothers do t follow the physician's guidelines, obese guideline on keeping healthy, stop smoking, stop drinking, stop taking drugs, that might also help lower the cost of obstetrics. host: ok, that was a caller from west virginia. and we have a caller on the line in south florida, a parent from fort lauderdale. good morning. are you there? caller: yeah. host: go right ahead, ma'am. you are on the air now. you're live. go ahead. aller: ok.

i think the government stop with this people who come in to this country, like too many people come from cuba, it can kill more to the parent who just have babies. people who live in here for many years. and the government will -- like people come in from cuba every day. i even here for more than 42 years, and i see people come in from cuba every day. he thinking he should be part of this. host: take us back to the issue at hand here, government-paid family leave. any further thoughts on that? caller: no. host: ok, we're going to move on some other callers. there's lots more news out there today, including more news from brussels. this is the associated press.

they write that the prosecutors -- the same group planned an attack in france. they write in the a.p. that attackers who struck brussels on the 22nd of march had initially planned to launch a second assault on france, this from the federal prosecution office in belgian. but the perpetrators were surprised by the speed of the progress in the ongoing investigation and decided to rush an attack on brussels instead. the office said in a statement, and they write that sunday's statement provides confirmation of what many had suspected, that the series of raids and arrests in the week leading up to brussels, including the capture of the key paris attack fugitive pushed the killers to action. you can read more about that in lots of publications this morning. david, missouri, business owner, back to our calls. do you support or oppose government-paid family leave? caller: i support it.

and just like the other lady talked about, where she couldn't get off work when they had a sick child. i was in the military, and my son was on his death bed with leukemia, and even the red cross fought for me, and it just caused me actually to be discharged, because they said i was unfit to serve. but, you know, when a child is dying, it makes a completely different thing. and how do we pay for it? make the government -- make the pentagon expose their budget. it's very simple. they're to get half of our budget, half of the whole u.s. government budget goes to the pentagon, and when congress or anybody wants to know, they don't have any accountability. you know, the other man who called, well, the government does this, we make the government -- let's make it smaller, ok, let's get rid of all the social programs, national park system, the post office, everything, and then

what kind of -- you know, we have a good country. and we have the money to do this. but, you know, the government has got to be accountable, and we need to start with half of the budget, which goes to the pentagon. and there is no way, we don't even know how much they have. host: david, what kind of business do you own? caller: a small farm. host: how many people? caller: we got about four or five people. we're just trying to keep those good working and provide beef for a very reasonable price, and what we don't use, we give to food pantries. i thank you so much for having me on the air. host: thank you. on to mark now, seattle, up early this morning. good morning, mark. caller: good morning, sir. thank you for c-span. host: you bet. caller: and what i would suggest -- i'm 59 years old. i would suggest that we, you

know, we make our government dress family issues, and i agree, we should cut down that defense budget, turn into a country that are not out to kill start supporting families with jobs. and you can do that by voting for hillary or bernie and not trump. thank you very much for c-span. host: thank you mark for taking part in the conversation. anthony from las vegas. good morning. how are you, sir? caller: sign. fine. i support this. i don't know why the country has waited so long to have something liked this. leavey get paid family

about -- sounds fabulous to make. host: denise, you are on the line from raleigh north carolina. good morning. caller: i will try to make this brief. i was looking at your math. families, we are a republic, we have a democratic the of when you look at the math, -- map, some of those countries are socialist nation. if you work full-time, you do accrue sick leave and vacation. your sick leave and vacation because a lot of states, they do have family leave, but you have to use your vacation and your sick leave, which you can accumulate over the years.

i think the government should not be doing family leave. that is just another welfare program. the nations that you look at where you say they get family other ones,of the they are teetering on bankruptcy, or they are bankrupt. so, we need to have a common sense approach, get people working 40 hours a week. and i think we will be all right. andve raised three children they are all doing well. and we had no family leave, but at five needed to be off -- but if i needed to be off if my children, i had the sick leave and vacation to cover it. thank you very much. host: thanks, denise. we will show the map one more time.

his map of the world, countries this is a map of the world, countries in the red do not offer family leave for those who need it. families in the blue have 26 weeks. the ones in orange have some form of parental leave. they offer it in various degrees. there is a lot more news in the political area. bernie sanders won last night and so did ted cruz. the new york times headlines says sanders continues western .omentum with wyoming victory they point out that mr. sanders beat hillary clinton statewide by about 11%. although the end result was a equalach candidate took

hillary clinton's still stays. bernie sanders had already collected -- ted cruz had delegates.lected 12 the front page story and the "washington post" has this, trump team will prevail. they write that leaders of trump targets thathas will make him the presumptive nominee that will win the delegates to clinch the nomination. trump would have to go on a

month-long hot streak starting in new york that would deliver a sizable hall of delegates. they go on to write the earliest the trump has assembled delegates is on the final day of the primary when the states of california and new jersey vote. between now and then, they write, they got a lot of work to do. he will be campaigning in new york and perhaps elsewhere. back to your calls. more donald trump story in a second, but let's get

richard in. a business owner from alexandria. go ahead. caller: the young lady before me gave a very great point about the country being socialist. in those countries, you are giving up 50% of your salary to that country. i don't think we want to do that. most of my employees are very skilled. we build small buildings. these guys are engineers and for emen. when they take time off, they are all aside to small teams and that hurts the team's tremendously. where two oftion my girls were on pregnancy leave and one of my guys had a situation with an aging father. it literally brought one of my projects to a screaming halt. could not leave the job open. i would have to get another involved inneer

that project because the project's turnover is very quick. host: richard, what you make of point about longer retention about having these policies help you keep your people longer? in a recent case, a lot of my people are good, they still work for me. they were doing their work through the computer. they were calling in and giving their job assignments. they would check on the jobs. that is why we continue to move somewhat for it. but there will be a lot of employers that will not do that. that is a lot of pressure on the employer if they are skilled and to hold that job open.

you have to get someone into do the work. -- fromrk is on hawthorne, california. mark is a parent. good morning, mark. caller: good morning. how are you? host: doing fine. issue, with the sickboomers, we have leave. you have a lot of abuse of this creating particular remaining workforce that has to stay there in this time of the , and you want to give a bigger return to shareholders, we don't have the people we used to have in the workforce on the job. having a mother off.

for maternity leave, that is fine. i understand, but to have both parents off. it creates a very hard strain on the workforce. and i am just a member of the work or some of but i see it every day. host: mark, thank you for calling. we have a -- we have time for a few more calls. this affect the front page of the boston globe. deportations to begin. mocked up to look k front page. it is inside the boston globe's edition. they are making some point. editorial of -- making some point editorially. it is easy to find historical antecedents.

they go on and on to write subheads. u.s. soldiers refuse orders to kill isis families. scum inets absolute press. headlines to mock show what the "boston globe" things would look why can a trump administration. you can read more on their website. -- berthere from kurt is here from kingston, rhode island. good morning. caller: good morning. host: what do you make about this whole question of whether government should pay for families? federal level, state, or locality -- it is a good idea -- is it a good idea you go caller: i think it is a great idea.

[indiscernible] taxpayers have to pay health care and their food stamps. economic theory says you give people the money and they spend it and our economy grows and gets bigger. these businesses are complaining and complaining. -- but it all depends on the nature of your business. how big is big, and how small a small? i think bernie sanders has a very good notion of what is going on with corporate welfare. i think the american public should wake up and look at basic

economic theory. thank you. host: thank you. here is one tweet by patrick -- he asked, who said the government is paying for it? think outside the box. he encourages people to do. some state agencies are getting involved. it is a payroll deduction. not necessarily government has to do it. terry from longwood, florida. caller: good morning. thank you for c-span. without it, i don't think most people would learn anything. i want to point out the underlying problem is the trickle down economics that forces to people to have an income in their homes to meet basic needs. i think that is the underlying issue. we need to get back to asking those questions. trickle down does not work. it seems that we have a lot of independent contractors who should be paid -- we are losing

revenues there. and we are shelling out more for corporate welfare, even on a local level. i can see that on a local level. if you see how your commissioners disperse funds. that is all i have to say. i wanted to start addressing the underlying issue. why does it take two incomes? my mom could stay home, my god what a welder and was able to support the entire damage without question. we had vacations, a boat, we never struggled for anything. that's what we need to be asking. host: ok, thanks for calling. --facebook, britney rights, if you don't support it, but consider yourself pro-life, you're exactly why people should not believe your remotely genuine. government is we

the people and i supported. other news items, and afghanistan, they -- john kerry, the secretary of state, arrived in kabul with a message of support. bald down with dnfighting -- it has been bogge with infighting. the first visit by john kerry since 2014. or says heom the xp have to apologize for past transgressions. he is awaiting sentence is on the federal banking violations.

prosecutors have been providing details. committedt allegedly -- they outlined a series of lude encounters with young boys. we will continue to watch the news from their. teddy is on the line from baltimore. hi, teddy. caller: good morning. i want to make a very brief .omment about the family i am 55 years old. i am a baby boomer. i have children. back inember very well the 1970's and 1980's when off time vacation time was built

into your employment package. andime has gone on corporate greed has accelerated, what corporations have done as a of the kicking out of the unions, or decreasing the unions, that has been in my opinion, a program to nickel and dime working people out of any perks that we automatically used to get in this country. i think it's a shame. i think it is a shame they even want to not allow women there leave. they want you to have your baby on monday and be back on the office on wednesday. they don't even want to allow parents to have the first 30 days to bond with their infant.

i think that is an absolute shame. oft: teddy, what you make the earlier caller who ran a small construction company and said his project came to a screeching halt. there are situations in smaller businesses where there are only 25 or 50 employees. that does put a strain on the bigger picture of production situations. that is a different -- that is different from the major corporations in this country. time, we'reame americans. and family values are what we stand for all over the planet. that givingt think week, leave, at least a

to become familiar with your newborn children and/or sick leave. but i do understand the distinction between say a small construction company with a few employees and a larger business such as microsoft. host: thank you, teddy, for calling. calvin, you get the last word from lancaster, pennsylvania. caller: how are you? host: doing fine, how are you? caller: first of all, let me give you a big shout out for what you guys are doing. issue toringing this the forefront. i have a brief statement. my number one thing is i want to bring back people first, then

money. i have beenilies -- on my job for 14 years, and those 14 years, i have accrued a lot of time. notfamily paid leave does allow us to take off for an illness for my mother. stroke,a heart attack, cancer, automobile accident, you name it. now she is in rehab. we have to pull together as a family to help her and to get her back on her feet. leave is denying us that to get her back into the community. host: thank you, calvin, and everyone who called in in this last 45 minutes, we are going to take a short break and get some guests in here. we are going to talk about the pentagon's plan and what

congress is thinking about in restructuring the military. egeland and rudolph deleon will be joining us. a little bit later in the ofgram, director investigative journalism will be here to talk about the release of the so-called panama papers and efforts to stop save havens, liked those and panama. we want to show you a couple minutes worth of our "newsmakers" program. our guest will be senator mark warner, from virginia. he talks about encryption and security legislation. here is the senator. set the policy here. congress needs to do its job. as somebody who has spent a career in this field and has spent the last five years digging in from the intel side,

it is extraordinarily complex. i am not sure if there is enough technical expertise in congress at the moment when you got, for example, apple taking it absolutist position. come to not necessarily pass because there was a different way around this problem, at least in a san bernardino case. not getommission does legislature shortly, it loses its ability to get to a solution. the encryption debate takes place on the device in terms of software at the network level. one of the things that i would be worried about is if we mandated a backdoor -- two things could happen -- one, you would have smart terrorists and criminals buying a foreign-based phone not subjected to american

jurisdiction. criminalo, a smart would import from the cloud encrypted software onto the phone, even if it had a backdoor. there are challenges around all of this. it is not a debate taking place in america. there is similar legislation in the u.k., france -- it is going to require, i think, a global type solution. i am very reluctant that if we move in advance of getting a common set of facts, we could make americans less safe because -- everybody agrees that encryption is important to we have totional -- make sure intel has the tools. if we do an american only solution, we are want to push the bad guys to foreign-based hardware and software. aboutgoing to talk more

the military in a second, but remind you that senator warner will be on newsmakers today at 10:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. eastern time. he is a member of the budget committee. we are going to talk about the defense department and proposals . find out what congress is doing as well in this area. we have to gueste this sunday morning -- we have to guests this sunday morning. rudy de leon is a former secretary of defense. and we say good morning to mackenzie eaglen who is a resident fellow and security studies at the american enterprise institute. thank you for joining us. one it to kick this all off with a small piece from what secretary ash carter had to say about the future of the structure of the military. [video clip]

>> this year the world is changed. we face a security environment that is dramatically different from the last quarter century. it is time we consider practical updates to this critical organizational framework while still preserving its spirit and intent. in someple, we can see areas how the pendulum between service, equities have swung too far. the surface cheese enough in acquisition making accountability. where will defense suggest nudging the pendulum further taking more steps to strengthen the ability of the chairman and to support forced management, planning, and execution across the competitive commands. cuthe face of threats that

across areas of responsibility, as many increasingly do. mckinsey england, what did you hear from the secretary their? guest: he is trying to get in front of congress taking the initiative to update a 30-year-old legislation. times have changed and the nature has changed. congress sees the need to revisit legislation. secretary carter trying to get in front of congress on this issue to say that i have been proactive and want to have a debate about the role of the joint chiefs and the role of our combatant commanders. we have some functional responsibility for them as well. a discussion of what they should or should not do in the chain of command. host: rudolph deleon, what did

you see and hear? senate haveouse and been looking at goldwater-nichols many years later. there are lessons to be learned. one of the things a military is doing is always looking at the performance and how it needs to change the way it does business, but i think we have to remember that goldwater-nichols was driven from the congress 30 years ago, so it is appropriate that both the senate and house are having hearings on aspects of this question. inviteet me jump in and viewers to phone in. we are talking about the future structure and operations of the u.s. military. big topic area lots of money and lots of dialogue. here are the numbers to call. if you are a republican, call the 202-748-8000. if you're a democrat call 202-748-8001. independents called 202-748-8002 . active a fourth line for

and retired military is 202-748-8003. mentionedu goldwater-nichols from 1986. deleon, remind us what that was. guest: back in the 1980's, we buildup. the reagan it was important restoring military across the board. congress was driven by three things in 1986 -- one, the legacy of the failed rescue and the fact we were still in the middle of the cold war, and the armed services had no concept of special operations. how to look at a light that. next, there were questions after the peacekeeping mission in lebanon with the marines had been deployed.

in the great tragedy, the terrorist bombing against the marines. these raised questions about the command and control of our troops when they were deployed. again, it was the cold war, the main focus was the soviet union, and tensions were starting to change. there were requirements to move military personnel in different ways. the third one was by the second term of the reagan administration, there were issues of how well the defense dollars were being spent. this created the packard commission in 1985. group of individuals, dave packard coming out of a place in those days was not quite called silicon valley, but the center of this great entrepreneurial information technology boom at its beginning. dave packard came in and made recommendations. things went to congress and in 1986 in a bipartisan way past the vote goldwater-nichols

reform. how war has us of changed for this country? guest: one of the primary things you are hearing about the joint chiefs -- there are so many ways i am 20 focus, they are talking about. our enemies are not confined by sovereign territory and land borders recognized by other nations. islamic state is one example, but not the only one. the cyber challenges we face, having satellites, having our grid at risk, or the ability to take down health care companies militarily, we are seeing these things that across services. domains of ware fighting whether that is land, sea o, or space.

there was a discussion about doing need a super authority? i think that is a fair discussion, maybe late, but fair. host: before we get to calls, congress has been active in discussing this issue as well. bere might the common ground or differences between congress is putting out there, and what the defense department is putting out their? guest: were congress is, particularly the senate, and senator mccain has had important meetings on the topic. first, the role of military advice. goldwater-nichols may the chairman of the military advisor to the president. i think there is a view that we need to make sure that we are always hearing from the joint chiefs of staff.

for the last 10 years or longer, the joint chiefs have been brought in in terms of organizing and training the military forces, but not always at the table when decisions are made to deploy. one of the big issues pending in the role of the joint chiefs in terms of military advice. i think they feel, when we look at the current group of chiefs in the military departments, they are exceptional in terms of their knowledge in operational matters. they had been deployed and in .he field most of their careers making sure they are at the table rendering the best military advice, that is one of the objectives of the congressional hearings right now. i think that is the rub between the pentagon and capitol hill is the role of the chairman of the joint chiefs to bring that person inside the chain of command legally and statutorily to empower him outside. that is what they will diverge. secretary carter gave the

chairman more responsibilities. congress will probably seek to change that. the other proposal that secretary carter laid out last week are low hanging fruit. i think congress will largely agree. everything from the joint duty assignments for three years topping that to two, for example. producing the number of headquarters staff. a four-star general running it, it may be better to drop it to a three star. those kinds of proposals will be widely accepted on capitol hill. host: we want to get to calls. is a democrat from portland, ohio. caller: good morning. three quick things.

one, counterfeit and substandard parts. the other is porkbarrel. and the other one is to kill /cost ratio of weapons. weapons have gotten so expensive and complicated and sophisticated in relation to the weapons used to disable them. problem incond pill some of these systems. i am not an expert. i can i give more specific. i know some of these examples. rpg versus the cost of the aircraft it takes down. begin with one of our experts. guest: let's take the question of the cost. one of the issues on the house side, chairman thornberry, is getting us to the cost getting new systems to the field. in thise three pieces equation. one, what is the requirement? my do we need a particular capability?

second, the research and development. the third piece is producing the system and getting into the field. getting from that second category of research and , thatpment to procurement has been one of our most difficult challenges. we are seeing the house members focus on different approaches, but you are right, our caller is right, in terms of the incredible costs make it difficult to do what we did in the 1980's, which is to recapitalize equipment of our military force. so, we really do have to do a better job of not only maintaining the cost and getting cost down, but moving from next generation research and development in practical ways to help our troops in the field. host: mackenzie eaglen. guest: that is a great point. pentagon has been trying to reverse the cost equation. we built $14 billion aircraft

carriers. that is exactly what leadership is trying to undertake with his office strategy, which is an militaryo address technological superiority, which is in dramatic decline. we can see it in various ways based on what others are doing. capabilities that exceed ours in many cases. take for example, russia and technological warfare. we have a lot of work to do in this area. your marks are linked to that -- earmarks are linked to that.

they exist from the executive branch and congress has its own way of earmarking. it is much less to the degree when i was on capitol hill 10 years ago. host: we have larry from here in washington dc. good morning. go ahead, sir. goldwater-nichols from the first term -- it should stay the same. they should have weapons at work. workshe equivalent that -- have the equipment that works. problem is the dark days attack. i don't know what the plans are. forth is theand so biggest threat.

marines -- obama is reducing/cannibalizing the military. military has to be effective and focused, and not being capitalized. host: thank you for calling, larry. guest: there is no doubt that the u.s. military has been in the dog pound. it is been a bipartisan effort. the of it is driven by budget. defense spending, we never actually save money because the ramp up costs so much more.

i agree with you. the emp threat is real. it is something that both branches of government are speaking about. there have been commissions and studies. it has gotten the attention of washington policymakers. iest: larry, the one thing would say is that both avenues of pennsylvania avenue have not succeeded in a budget agreement. president ines january 2017, we have to get our budget house in order. 1980'sn the hill in the at the time of ronald reagan and o'neil disagree on a lot of things. but at the end of the day, they come to and a way to agreement. we have to restore that dialogue between the capital and the white house so we can start doing big things again, and it

starts with a budget agreement. we were down to a six-month cycle for the pentagon budget with continuing resolutions. that is no way for an armed forces of one million active one million onr reserves. we depend on their service. and to not have a budget or what equipment we are buying is pivotal. the strength of our defense begins with congress, president working together and putting this budget house in order. --t: mackenzie eaglen referring to defense, how can you restructured something you cannot audit? not quite accurate because audits have begun. explain what she is trying to ask here. guest: it is a fair question, which is accountability. the defense department is the largest federal agency and large u.s. military and

civilian workforces that support them. it is a large organization, the largest in the world. the dollars in knowing what they are buying is important. congress agrees -- it has been a difficult challenge. the marine corps is a service -- the closest to lay marine corps is a service that is close to an odd it. close to an audit. they buy so much in goods and services. the one that accountability and want to know what the money is going. it is a work in progress. it is under way, but not happening as quickly as we would likel like. says, the joints

that has 4000 of the headquarters of various defense es at up to 240 thousand people, excluding contractors, billion cost of $113 make up nearly 20% of the dod budget. host: oliver, good sunday morning to you. what are you doing in iraq? caller: i am handling personal business. the u.s.d to work for military as a contractor in various capacities. spending.d a lot of now we are paying for it. good as it is not as used to be. if you compare us to china, china is not in debt.

order to be sovereign military, you have to be solid economically. the time is now to fix these things. the situation in afghanistan is worse in 2001. what are they going to do? do they need a new president to do this a? the debt creeping up and up. you very much. host: oliver, thank you. first to rudolph deleon. first, oliver, thank you for your service. aspects are on the table. at the same time, we have a campaign against isis and it is very important for the current

trends, which is significant force in terms of the air and combined campaign with the kurds and others that we continue on that process. lower ourhat as we footprint in baghdad, we are going to be changing the contracting policies and thinks ipad. at the same time, we want to make sure that in place, some of the security progress we have made continues, so we will be working to find the right balance. agree i fundamentally that we need economic growth. that is why you are seeing the thatenge in washington rudy referred to about getting a bigger budget deal. the big budget questions are not exclusively about defense but about entitlements liked

medicaid -- like medicaid. also about our ever-increasing debt. with interest rates rising, the cost of servicing the debt will go up that will squeeze the defense budget even more. someone write said the defense department is the largest federal agency. what about social security and medicare? i want to go back to ashton carter. at a recent event he held the center for strategic and international studies. he talked more about clarifying the role of the joint chiefs. >> and other cases, we may have to respond to multiple threats across the board in overlapping time frames. in an increasingly complex security environment and the decision change that crosses the

combatant commands at the level of the secretary of defense, we are not postured to be as agile as we could be. accordingly, we need to clarify the role and authority of the chairman, and the joint staff in three ways. 1 -- to help synchronize resources globally for daily operations around the world. enhancing our flexibility and my ability to move forces between combatant commands. -- two, to provide objective military advice for ongoing operations, not just future planning. and three, to advise the secretary of defense strategy and operational plans. for example, helping ensure our plans take into account in a deliberate fashion, the possibility of overlapping contingencies. ande changes recognize today's complex world, we need someone in uniform who could look across the services and

combatant commands and make objective recommendations to the department civilian leadership about where to allocate forces throughout the world and where to report risk to achieve maximum benefit. host: let's hear from aei's mackenzie eaglen. first, the origin of the position of the joint chief. how did it come about? talk about the changes being discussed. guest: sure. to give military advice to the president outside of the chain of command. completely open and private and confidential. it is the most honest you can possibly get. and, secretary carter is referencing this challenge now which is trying to balance a chairman of the joint cheese who weighs in with the president of future military operations

versus things that are ongoing today. present-day challenges facing the military. there present in the world, and have to deal with the wolf closest to the door. chairman more discretion and authority to weigh in with the president and the secretary of defense earlier to have more of an impact. that is an interesting debate. guest: mood of daily on. deleon.- host: rudolph guest: making sure the military advice flowing in before we make the significant decisions on sending troops overseas. then we have integrated that discussion with the advice of thechiefs, which are at table, as well as a secretary of state, secretary of defense, rector of central intelligence, the chairman of the joint chiefs

, the president and vice president. all of these for the national security council and are there in the middle of these very important policy debates. the strategy and plans issue is to make sure that we look beyond simply the geography of how we have disorganized right now. the attack against computers does not know it geography. that is a global challenge. dealing with the intelligence that helps civilian populations deal with terrorism. that is a global challenge. wasink that third piece really, how do we make sure the best military advice is coming in? it is to be more people into the dialogue able to render advice and make decisions. eddy as to the conversation. we cannot afford to pay for the rest of the world.

we are talking about the proposed restructuring of the military by congress. our two guests this morning are mackenzie eaglen of the american enterprise institute. deleon, former defense -- former deputy defense secretary and former member of the house armed services committee. here is one of the many headlines we have been discussing -- one come i could ash carter, seeking new powers for the cheese for the war on terror. we have done on the line and elizabeth hill, pennsylvania. a democrat. good morning. morning.er: good everyone seems to mention a horrible interval even. the bombing of the marine barracks.

but nobody ever says anything about the back story. base was set the up on the ground surrounded by high ground. occasionally, they suffered sniper fire. and then, we were actually sent to lebanon as a peacekeeping force. to choose sides. and the commander of the base was actually screaming to be evacuated. his pleas went unanswered. up forikely are setting failure -- it is like they are setting up for failure to increase the bombing. that is all i have to say. thank you for taking my call. host: thank you.

who would lead to respond? think you are well read on the issue. the location of the marines was the beirut international airport. after the fact, there were big questions about how so many could be -- in such a small area. ultimately, decisions were made to u.s. guns of the uss new jersey. the u.s. to become a combatant. the issue for the congress as you consider goldwater-nichols was the kernel. he was sitting there in the chain of command -- he was sitting there and the chain of command really failed him. between the marine colonel and the secretary defense and ashington -- they had convoluted trail through europe and elsewhere. thehe core was to focus on

point of the point of military forces, and to make sure the chain of command was very, very clear. at the time after the bombing, the commandant of the coming the -- the commandant of marine corps stepped up. the key goldwater-nichols reform was chain of command accountability where our forces are deployed in the field. any person in the situation of that marine colonel today would be going through a combatant commander and have a correct -- and have a direct line. daniel, i thank you for paying attention to that issue and for your being so well read on this topic. goldwater-nichols wanted key reforms to make sure we have military personnel in the field, there is a chain of command that knows every day, what they are doing, what their mission is, what their responsibilities are. host: mckenzie, d1 to add to

that? -- do you want to add to that? guest: it is also to look at the ways goldwater-nichols overcorrected and the challenge of creating joint, capable officers to lead in various missions and to establish a joint miss and warfare -- a j in warfare. wa that is one of the areas to see what was lost, perhaps, or what we done -- whether any unintended consequences? bringing more emphasis in the chain of command for the power andreducing the overreach of commanders and the fundamental debate.

host: more back on about our guests. and boy, you have done a lot. mackenzie eaglen, resident fellow for aei. it has worked as a principal defense advisor to senator susan collins back in 2004. a legislative a sensitive to john sweeney back in 2003 and 2004. that is a mouthful. , you wereh deleon director of the armed services. what year was that? guest: from 1989 to 1993. on the committee professional staff from 1985 to 1993. host: let's go to mike in pennsylvania, a democrat. good morning. .aller: the panama papers we have the military running all

over the world taking care of corporate interests, spreading -- being the policeman of the war. the very rich benefit from it, keep fromtheir way to paying taxes to help support the military. i was wondering if your guests had any opinion on that? host: let's hear from them. guest: you are hitting on the budget. the government is spending more in. we are taking that is simple math. we have a hard time in washington making choices of what we are spending. our entitlements are on autopilot for spending. we don't have any real changes. every year were defenses considered discretionary, and incredibly debated, which is good and helpful, but i wish we had that across the federal

budget, 3.5 chilean dollars annually. as a big was until you are raising. disagree with the carriages a nation that the military are the policeman of the world. we have pulled back in the last eight years. administration before president obama, what we are asking the military to do, they are certainly busy reading the are doing more piece than a up activities, building partners in foreign countries. but this is something you are seeing coming up in the presidential campaign about what is the future role of the u.s. military. budget has been coming down, it has been doing less anyway. lecture from tony and district heights, maryland. it seems likely are both

prodefense. i don't know what they are, analyst, whatever. i want to speak to the gentleman that worked at the defense department at the pentagon in 2001. i believe rumsfeld mentioned before 9/11 that there was $1 trillion missing. that is why the pentagon needs to be audited. for some reason, that whole ordeal just went away after 9/11. that terrorism, for some reason, is benefiting the corporate interests that basically find congressional campaigns. so terrorism will never end. there are people making money off of terrorism. specifically these big corporations light bowing and raytheon. these are companies you guys support. this is a never ending war on terrorism. you guys benefit from it. host: thanks for calling.

do you both consider yourself code offense? are ini think we both favor of making sure the men and women of the armed forces of the united states have the training and equipment and quality of life they need. to make sure that our military is ready and capable. i certainly would say we support our men and women. the key challenge has always how to use the force, how to make sure the budget decisions are correct. that we are funding important capabilities, but not an open-ended checkbook. is thosewould say it things. it is a military that has the resources to act. what you want your military to do? americani both support internationalism and leadership. that means a proactive role for america using all of our tools across the government.

the u.s. military is the most visible. thethost: i am not sure what pacific budget was, but as my service came to an end as a part of the clinton administration after a 12 year effort, the budget was balanced. defense spending but he missed had been maintained, but defense spending was consistent with a balanced budget. it meant pay-as-you-go. every offset had to be justified by a revenue source. i think at the end of the bothon administration, secretaries -- making sure the force was capable and executing the national mission abounds in the budget were very much on their minds and a part of the goal and objective. john mccain has been

holding a series of hearings. here is a couple of minutes on the hearings in december of series ofabout the problems as he sees them in today's military, and then we will be back with our guest. [video clip] >> time and again during these howings, we have learned dramatic increases in civilian and military steps have persisted even as resources available for war fighting functions are increasingly strained. as former secretary of defense michelle harn i pointed out, the staffs have grown to 30,000 people. that is nearly three divisions worth of staff in just a combatant commands alone. we have to ask if this is truly necessary and what it is improving our war fighting capabilities. at the same time, we have to examine whether there are duplicated functions in the joint staff, combatant commands,

and subordinate commands that can be streamlined. that includes the question of whether we really need all of the current combatant commands. for example, do we need a really need a north com and south com? do we need a separate one in germany when the vast resources reside in yukon. we just got a little bit of this in this conversation, but is there anything you want to add to a senator mccain said? guest: what he is talking about ratiil ratio.o tale usually overseas, the preparation begins here at home versus all those who exist to support those people. ,he number of support staff functions come agencies,

contractors, contracts, everything has ballooned on the other side. the chairman season rightly as a great concern because what is coming out as budgets decline overall for defense is at the expense of real compact power generation and maintenance. that is the issue here, the battle of these -- the balance of these two forces. guest: it is appropriate that we see the size of the staff. again, when there was a great fiscal discipline, every thing had to be justified. during the 2000, during the buildup in iraq, staff size got much larger across-the-board. the senate has given the pentagon particular manpower reduction requirements on the staffing side to make sure that balanced.fs are

the other thing the germans talked about is where there is the regional and geographic structures that organize the combatant commanders is still the right one in 2016. that is an excellent question. that is still to be addressed in the debate. host: changes that would occur in the military. how do they formally occur? is the defense department able to do this entirely on their own? the congress have to approve any of this? guest: there is a lot of latitude inside the department of defense for organization, manpower requirements, things like that. what is important to note is the major reforms are driven from the outside. this is the 1947 defense reorganization driven by harry truman that creates the joint chiefs. this is the goldwater nichols. we talked about why it was created in the first place, but it was driven by the congress

talking to the reagan white house. the fact that speech was given by the secretary of defense in downtown washington last week is ouse ensign h are holding hearings, they are asking tougher questions, and they are using the authority to ask about how it is organized. host: you can want that by secretary carter on our website, c-span.org. the mccain hearings on this topic are also there as well. did you want to add anything? guest: that is right. it is a competition of effort. the most fruitful are those done a partnership, even if i party were reluctant at first. if the two are not eventually seeing eye to eye, they can step farmthe other branch -- stif

the other branch for as long as they want essentially. it was helpful that the seentary is trying to be as proactive on this question because it is coming anyway, and he does recognize that. host: we have 10 minutes left. let's get back to call. joan in south carolina, hey there. caller: john mccain has it right in that when it is time to cut, or we going to cut the fluff negatively impact the people who are keeping us safe? elective go back to , i would --mackenzie eagle like to go back to something you said. it is a shame that when you look at what is on the mandatory side , which is what i am alluding to address social people in thethe military have to fight and clot every year for every dime they get to keep the head above water. let me give you my background.

1965, charleston naval shipyard as an apprentice. i worked there until 1994. we were closed under base realignment and closure, brac. i am hearing rumors it is coming around next year by the way. but anyway, i was picked up by another government agency and worked there until 2007 for a total of 41 years of federal agency. i am getting back to what john mccain says. the agency is real big. the majority of work is in research and development. we know we cannot become stagnant. that is given or we will find fall behind. over the years as i moved up, i was invited to meeting after meeting to seek input, what do we need to do? it was a diplomatic drill in that in the end, they knew what they were going to do. if we were going to say this is a waste of time, now when the

pentagon goes to the ranks to people who know what it takes to maintain the fighting force and respond and knows what it takes to maintain and upgrade equipment, are they really going to listen or is this just the usual drill to make people feel good? your response please. host: thanks for calling. guest: thanks. that was very eloquent. it is a challenge. let's be honest, the result of what has happened is we don't have enough war fighters to support staff anymore. even in the u.s. military, we have a lot of people performing inherently commercial functions and never deploy overseas, so you're asking a fraction of the u.s. military to repeatedly bear that burden of whatever it is we're asking them to do overseas in particular. it is a huge challenge, particularly as budgets come down. it has been a downward trajectory for the last

fiscal year's anyway. bringing down the resources, asking them to do more congruently support and not be war fighting functions, which is what the chairman things we need more of. i would agree with you and him. host: the caller also said there are rumors that brac will come back. are you hearing that? of -- we had a series congress has been reluctant to do it. congress will probably be asked again and probably say no. it is important for us to understand when brac works and what it doesn't. right now, with mobilizations being what they are, we want to focus on as the gentleman just said making sure the troops are taking care of and have the resources for training and equipment and not go through a long process on brac, at least right now.

we need to understand we are at a high point in military personnel so we need to factor that in. half hour after this program is over content 30 a.m. in the morning eastern time here on sea c-span. paul is calling from england. good morning. caller: good morning. how are you today? host: we are doing fine. question or comment for our guests? caller: it was more of a comment. i do a lot of work as an expert an x personnel member of the navy here. one of the things we did in 1992, 1993 after the cold war was reorganize our military in the u.k. they went from the bottom upwards. you seem to be proposing with a military a top-down approach.

top-down approach is basically no good because the military, the people on the ground, the people fighting are the ones at the bottom and ones who actually know what is needed at the moment to fight and successfully win wars and battles. yet what seems to happen in the american way of doing things perhaps because you are quite us isalists compared to we have the chief and the generals, now let us tell everybody what to do. that does not always work well in the military because it is the grunts to put it bluntly that do the fighting, not the chief. you don't see a chief writing and take into battle -- riding a tank into battle. host: thank you for calling. caller: you are right -- guest: you're right. it is the privates and specialists and seamen that are

on the front line, but we talking about a president and chain of command receives advice. you are right. back in 1993, as part of my pentagon tenure, we actually did a big bottom-up review that looked at the total force started at the bottom. what are the critical capabilities we needed with the cold war being over?. most of that is still the organizational structure of today's armed forces in terms of the size and abilities. what is different is we balanced the budget in the interim. we have been to afghanistan and iraq. we learned something for lessons there in terms of what works and how difficult it is when you ask military men and women very professional and capable to do the nationbuilding side of this. it is not always satisfying. but we did do a bottom-up review in 1993. you can find it in the archives.

but you make it excellent point. guest: i think i agree. it is an excellent point, and it is one i would not want legislators on capitol hill or statutorily imposed by the isretary of defense but it something the current and future leadership have to take into account on their own and independently tackle. capita generalstrategic delegating down to the frontlines level and away from the general officer level but they still have visibility into what they are doing. this is the new way of military operations. i think it will continue and remain that way. anding their input absorbing it as the national and strategic level with the kind of congress and secretary carter are talking about. i don't know what is being done

right now, but if this doe chief does not do it, the next one will. host: good morning to you in round rock. caller: good morning. thanks for taking my call. the one from the u.k. made a lot of good points. i watch c-span a lot and i hear pundits and critics talk about what should be done and we will see what advice the president takes. give me a break. congress is bought and paid for. the president has his own agenda . the military and the v.a. will continue to get the short end of the stick. that is just the weight of it is -- that is just the way it is. follow the money.

i am so fed up and frustrated with the government, of elective burn it down and start over. host: thank you. we will give final thoughts from our guests. from virginia, think you for waiting. caller: i wanted to piggyback on the caller earlier talking about how this feeds the defense industry and the guy from britain in the 1940's to ramp up for world war ii when we rolled out the goco army base plan. now we have ammunition plans around the country operated by dae systems, a british company, for profit, yet it is owned by the u.s. army. taxpayers pay for the environmental permits. taxpayers release it from any taxes. it is federal land. at the holston and bradford arsenals, bae systems is a very bad environmental record.

was like i said was important to get us up to world war ii quickly so the government flooring costs, has been promoted in a way that bae is a landlord making profit off of toxic waste disposals for their tendency to not make anything for the military. it is just nuts. is cease-fire campaign working to eliminate the opening burning of hazardous waste at two operateds, the in virginia and tennessee. it is a crazy situation that needs to stop and be evaluated. epa needshy from the to explain why the army is violating the clean air act and open burning on their face. it needs to be looked -- their base. it needs to be looked into.

it would be great if you can look into that on behalf of the constituents. host: thank you for calling. mackenzie eaglen, you can go first. guest: there is a thing, which is the role of campaign donations and campaign finance and even the defense industry influence on congress and many institutions around washington. about even beyond that were bigger than that i should in thethe decline generational leadership in congress, those who care about national security who look across committees, who make a career focusing on one issue and not just for the benefit of their home district or state. there will always be a parochial politicians, by talking about legal waters in the nichols and the john war rens who made a lifetime of

learning. many of them are veterans. they focused on the u.s. military and making the defense department a more effective fighting warforce. we lost so many of these members, especially those in the middle. really hemorrhaged in the last years, so almost got completely. i think about the polarization in washington and all politics. this is a challenge for anyone on the armed services committee. callers fornk the the comments. a lot of the points they made are things we seeing played out right now in the presidential campaign. this is a time for american citizens to have their voices heard. i think those frustrations are coming through in this campaign loud and clear. part of the broader national debate. host: what is the timing for the

changes we talked about this morning? guest: congress is moving quickly, some of you will see is the policy committees, their markups begin and the house will kick it off in about two weeks. the senate is the guiding force under chairman mccain . they will try to have their bill passed by memorial day, so we will see this. secretary carter start of the debate but it will be raging in the next two months. guest: i agree. in the next six weeks, we will have a clear indication of where congress is. we have seen where the department of defense is with secretary cars important speech, and is will be a significant debate between may and october. host: we can do one more call. caller: good morning john into your guests. good morning america. here we go again. so much against the military?

these fighting men and women go through so much and their families who are left here. they don't get much support. host: what do you mean by they don't get much support and the president is anti-military? what has he done or said or not done and said that got your attention? caller: two points i would like to have them comment on. why is he trying to do away with the commissary and trying to privatize it? these poor families, they don't get a break at all. that is one area where they can at least get a reasonable amount of merchandise. wanthen also, why does he to have retirees pay to become

?art of the military retirement they have to pay. haven't they already paid enough? will you please verify that? i am not putting that straight because i don't quite understand all of it and i'm not part of the military, but i certainly speak up for the military people. i really think they do a lot, and we don't give them enough support. host: let's see if our guests can comment. guest: thanks for the call. excellent comment. first, the commissaries are not likely to change. the have certainly been a lot of questions coming from congress, from auditors, from things like that, but the benefit is not likely to change. it certainly has not changed under president obama's tenure.

i know a lot of people depend on it. on the retirees and the military pension system, again, that is a solid system. -- solvent system. we make sure retirement was on a strong financial foundation. it is one where the department of defense puts the money away to make sure that it is available. it has a different funding mechanism that social security. on both of those calls, i can assure the caller that not only has president obama supported the pay in competition for our armed forces, but those two benefits have not changed and have not been reduced. guest: there has been a commission, an independent commission established in washington. they reported their findings. what you are getting at is what they recommended, which was some privatization of the , with congress did you last session. i am with rudy on the

commissary's future. i think congress will reject the proposals although greater cost-sharing will plague the commissary question. the number was 5% recently and you will continue to see that debate. whether this reflects overall is a pentagon budget proposed by the president and congress each year undertaking it and looking at it that there have been a lot of small cuts to military benefits in different ways, whether that is the housing allowance or retirement or medical copayment fees enrollment fees, pharmacy, mail order, all of these things have come under consideration because the defense budget has been going down. it is not exclusive to this president, although he is certainly the boss and in charge. he has had a willing republican congress go along with him, but this is why did is to be a larger federal budget. the questions answered on the

table that we can get away from these smaller cuts because i think it is affecting morale among those who serve. they are feeling exactly what you said. host: our guests are mackenzie i and former .rincipal defense advisor and we say thank you to rudolph , who was formerly with the house of armed services committee. thanks to both of you. guest: thanks very much. host: lots to go through. guest: thank you. host: coming up at 9:00 here in washington and gerard ryle will join us next. it is the director of international consortium of investigative journalism. we will talk about these panama papers, what they are, how they became relieves, and efforts to stop these tax havens like those

in panama. we will be back with more of your calls. >> the book tells both the story of the fact that the manuscript this national treasure is not what we thought while also chronologically thinking about what was medicine in countering at the time? keeping those two narratives straight was quite tricky for a while. >> tonight on q&a, boston college lost the professor mary discusses her book, which takes a critical look at the notes james madison wrote during and after the constitutional convention of 1787. >> medicine to the notes on sheets of paper and he folded them in half. he writes on the front, across the middle and on the backside. all of point, he sewed

these little pieces of paper together into a manuscript. things we wonderful noticed is the last quarter of the manuscript, the holes he had so it were not matching with the earlier ones of this confirmed my suspicion at the end of the manuscript had been written later but you cannot see that in the microfilm. it was a wonderful thing to see that person. >> sunday night at 8:00 eastern on c-span's q&a. monday on the communicators, federal communications commission chair tom wheeler and his first interview with c-span since being nominated by president obama in 2013. because the issues facing the fcc, including net neutrality, set-top boxes, expansions of the subsidized lifeline program to the internet, regulation of the internet, and privacy, and the spectrum that is just beginning.

a author discusses how he views the future of telecom and the internet. is joined by brian song, technology reporter for the "washington post. >> what i>> was fortunate enough to be able to do indicate what industry and the wireless industry will was to be involved as they were bringing change to the american economy and the way they live their lives, and that is what we are dealing with at the fcc because we are in the middle of one of the great network revolutions of all time. how do we deal with the kind of changes that are happening all around us as a result of new technology? >> watch the communicators monday night at 8:00 eastern on sea c-span2. >> "washington journal" continues. host: at the table now, gerard ryle, who is director of the international consortium of investigative journalism. thank you for joining us this morning. guest: pleasure to be here. host: to talk about the

so-called panama papers, which has exploded into the news the last week or so. before we get started, explain what your organization does, who may set up, how is it funded? guest: we are based in washington, d.c., and what we do is find stories and that parlay them to try to get collaborations with major media around the world. we have been working out for 17 years. i have been there for five years. we are funded mostly out of europe by nonprofit foundations and individuals. host: having your organization get a hold of these panama papers? guest: we got them from the server journalists in germany. we have been working with them in previous investigations. once they got a hold of the materials, they came to us to build the international collaboration. host: to we know who leaked to the information and why they did

it? guest: it was a totally an ominous source -- totally anonymous source. a long-term offered material and it started to trickle and it eventually turned into a complete torrent. we ended up with 1.5 billion follows and 40 years of this law clients,cords, everything for 40 years up until the end of 2015. host: for those catching up to this story, remind us of what this information said. what do the panama papers reveal? guest: what it does is set up offshore accounts for clients all around the world, and they are major law firms, major firms.major penalty firm we focus a lot on the public interest of this because we were conscious of the fact that it was an anonymous source.

we went outside the documents themselves to make sure these companies were real. but in the end, we ended up with 12 current and former world leaders and 140 populations around the world and hundreds more of their associates. host: i have a phone numbers at the bottom of the screen for our guest. gerard ryle, the director of the organization the international consortium of investigative journalism. we are talking about a so-called panama papers that everybody it seems is talking about now. phone numbers are on the screen. . about some more of the detail as to some of the bigger guest: at the moment, there is a big crisis in britain because we named the british prime minister. has been admitted that the

benefited from this offshore structure that was set up, which has prompted the crisis and has now forced him to review six years of his tax returns. of icelandinister resigned this week as a result of the revelations. he had a secret offshore account when he entered parliament. what was significant was that that offshore company owned millions of dollars of bonds in iceland, which suffered a financial collapse a couple years ago and he was elected to sort that out. the fact that he did not disclose that caused an issue. we had people from fifa, the international soccer body, committee members that we revealed it was actually an accountant from us the people indicted by the fbi and he resigned this week. we had the president of the ukraine, associates of vladimir

putin in russia, and it went on and on. host: here's more of the cameron story. releases his tax records after the panama papers storm. it says that the prime minister publishes tax records on sunday in an attempt to draw lines under questions about his personal finances. revelations have led to demands for his resignation and handed resignation -- ammunition to lawmakers who? -- lawmakers who question why he did not release that. you think you could get in trouble? was firstn he confronted, he gave one answer and changed his answer. in the end, he changed it five times, so he was changing every day which is prompting the crisis. it was more of his reluctance to come clean with the truth of the always leads to

the reaction rather than the revelation. host: we have seen a number of headlines that suggest there are either no or very few american names involved in the paper. a, is that true? b, and why would that be the case? were quite a few american names and we were keen to get public interest, so we focused on public figures. amongst the ones in america were retirees, places like miami, florida, and it were no elected officials, so as journalists, you cannot make up the story but you have to go with what you are seeing and we were led right by documents. believe me, we searched very hard. host: why do think there were no american political figures? guest: i don't think americans use penama, even though this firm had offices in wyoming and nevada.

i think they also worked on the miami. there were not a lot of americans. it is not really a goal to hide their money. from let's hear from fred ohio on the republican line. good morning. caller: thank you. thatu find it curious there is a nexus between the many comments of donald trump's comments regarding money leaving the united states and the corruption within the western political system and trying to bring money back to the united states, and that even though you stated that they were few americans involved, but this pattern is systemic and it seems at an historic nexus here by the disclosures and the panama papers in relation to the issues donald trump tries to raise?

guest: i think we see clear evidence of the documents that people in america are trying to get money out the legally. one case i remember where they offered a very wealthy person from florida various options to get her money out of the country, including setting up a fake charity in panama. up rioso offered to set invoices from a real firm in the u.k., and at one point, they were talking about covering up the money, so there's no doubt that there is money flow around the world that is being held offshore to pervade taxes, but america is probably one of the biggest tax havens in the world. they are jurisdictions is a must caribbean islands. they talked with reporters the other day about the administration's efforts to deal with tax evasion. here's what he had to say. [video clip] stepsre are some specific that the administration has

succeeded in implementing that has been effective in countering some of the international tax avoidance schemes that were revealed in the context of this document. many of you wrote recall, and some of the world were called in 2010, the president signed into law the foreign account tax defined act. that was a piece of legislation that this administration aggressively pushed congress to pass. this was legislation that was targeted at countering tax evasion by u.s. taxpayers using offshore accounts. the benefits of this legislation was significant. in a variety of ways. the first, the law actually prompted countries around the world to begin reciprocal financial information sharing agreements. that is beneficial because there are now 112 countries that

exchange information with united states about financial transactions that are occurring in the country that were initiated or involved the other countries citizens, so this is helpful in getting and providing greater transparency into the details of these financial transactions. 150,000ult, more than foreign financial institutions have now registered under affect. foreign financial institutions that the u.s. government now has greater clarity into as a result of the implementation of the tax legislation. host: any thoughts? guest: there's no doubt that americans are leading the fight against tax evasion, but we are seeing another level as well. it is money laundering as well as tax evasion. one of the reasons why weise also so few american names of these papers is because of the crackdown in the u.s., but there

is no point in one country doing this. before he became president, president obama was talking very heavily about the kinds of shell companies and how stock basically struck people in charge of the companies. when he came to power, nothing happened. in reality, unless there is a global effort to stop this, it will never be stopped. you cannot have america be the only place in the world. post"in "the washington they had this headline -- panama papers, couldn't it be called something is? the law firm letters? tax free files? "it should be named the offshore papers as panama prime minister of finance." from a banking perspective undoubtedly, it should not be called the panama papers, yet, it is. deedee writes that twitter is a

firm revealed in the papers, just one, so elaborate. guest: very good question. it is one of the top five for doing this, but we have found from previous investigations that there were about 800 other firms doing this, so we are looking at the tip of an iceberg. host: moving on to shelton in louisiana, independent caller. i think my question was answered about u.s. theseals names on part of panama papers, but one of the things i want to find out is where you can find more information about it, and if there are specific areas of places where the royalty can hide their money and do these schemes in other places other

than panama? start by saying that the money is not in panama. the money is in the united states, britain and other first world countries. the major banks and financial institutions are the ones doing this. the drug dealers and the politicians that we saw, they as far asnes, but others are concerned, they did not know who these people were but they were just aiding the banks. the money is not sitting on some caribbean island but it is sitting here. it is the reason light real estate prices are so high in the western world. found aish counterparts street in london that were owned by the offshore companies we were looking at. host: diana, new jersey, democrat. welcome. caller: good morning. i went to ask icij who could be praised for their tremendous work.

2011, ifout this in not earlier, and why has it taken so long to come out and did it get them a chance to have their money before it came out? second, we are hypocrites. we are the biggest -- we moved up from six to number three to being the biggest tax haven with states like nevada where you can set up shell companies, and for another 50, have this guy put it on his name, so it just hides it. and american companies, which are not really american anymore, they have different schemes like pricing,ance, transfer and putting actresses on the cayman islands. it is only a small company and if you go there, there are no companies, so how can we, especially the american media mainstream doesn't report on this, how can we get the result and stop this corrupt and how the foreign aid is money

laundered, like the american public takes everybody on, how can we get the reaction? maybe the only one to tame it is bernie sanders, maybe? i would like a reaction to my questions and answers. guest: i think the only way to get transparency is by doing what we are doing, by whoever personker is, the brave who came forward and gave the information to the german journalist, which is around the world. to radicalto be done transparency. you are absolutely right. everyone has known about this or years. we at icn j where the past four years have been reporting on this. you mentioned that around this time last year, we were reporting on the internal files that we got from the switch branch company which exploded around the world. prior to that, we did a story in luxembourg about how it was being used by the terms, including american firms, to avoid taxes in the u.s. host: she mentioned bernie

sanders and the year 2011. here is the senator talking about this issue back then. [video clip] bernie sanders: it turns out panama is a world leader when it comes to allowing wealthy americans and large corporations to evade u.s. taxes by stashing their cash and offshore havens. the panama free-trade agreement will make this bad situation much worse. each and every year, the wealthiest people in our country and the largest corporations evade about $100 billion in u.s. taxes through abuses and illegal tax shore havens in panama and other countries. a tax haven has one of three characteristics, it has no income tax for a very low rate income tax, it has thanked secrecy laws, and it has a

history of noncooperation with other countries on exchanging information about tax matters." panama has all three of those. they are probably the worst. host: let's hear from our guest. is one of many different tax havens around the world, so i go back to my original point that this needs placed global and globally. we saw in the papers some interesting things. every time authorities tried to crack down on tax havens, they became more clever. we saw the oecd, evidence in the european union, and they are starting to test it in europe. host: newinvented ways of doing it. "the washington post" with the lead editorial -- mr. sanders, contrary to his prediction, it

shows that tax evasion has fallen in the lake of the free trade deal. here is a little detail. it was presented in several it showsgroups and that the panamanian-based law firm that specializes in training are setting us up for shell companies to what the people and has been steadily reducing its activity in panama for about a decade. host: the post goes on to say that in response to the sanders campaign, they did not address the data but they missed an opportunity to completely eradicate the panama packed. host: let's hear from amy in florida. thank you for waiting. caller: i completely disagree

should be able to say, "i told you so." wasn't she secretary of state when the panama trade act was pushed through? also, i am on the republican myd and i changed affiliation during the primary and i have switched to bernie sanders. in 2012.r ron paul i always try to vote for who i perceived to be an honest candidate with integrity. bernie did say, i told you so. ,anama is such a small country and they had very little industries, any to speak of, correct? that is one question i would put forward. why would we have a trade agreement with such a small country with very little industry?

also, even the very few american names surfaced in these panama papers, could you speculate that perhaps -- this was just one law withthat was associated that, isn't there more hidden money in panama with american names written on it? host: thank you, amy. guest: one point we need to make, even though we call this the panama papers, this law firm is quartered in panama, but they aren't china, the u.k., branch offices in the u.s., new zealand and other places. i go back to the point that this is global. make theot going to problem go away. you have got to go into this sort of shadow and parallel world of offshore, which basically -- by the way, it is largely legal which makes for a much more interesting story and

if it was illegal. but we are seeing -- the legality in the documents. host: the couple of tweets, sharon says that if no american politicians are involved in the panama papers, why should we care? isst: i would say that it the individual that you are looking at that are of interest. there are wealthy people in the documents that were evading taxes and if they are evading taxes, it means you pay more taxes, so that is one good reason to care. -- if younot have don't care about that, what do you care about? host: he published a chart on your website. what is the web address? guest: icij.org. www.icij.org. host: someone posts on twitter, why not post the entire list? guest: we are not going to publish all of the papers, and

the reason for that is among the documents, they are private. you have passport details amongst other things, but we do intend to do a redacted version, which would list the names and the companies. on the basis that we think this is the kind of information that should be made public. politicians have gone on the record saying that these should be record, including david cameron. he did a press conference at the white house three years ago or he said this is a sick information that should be out there. -- this is basic information that should be out there. host: when did you organization come into being? eight we started about years -- 18 years ago. i started their five years ago. host: let's go to new york, republican, good morning. caller: good morning. thank you for having me. there areke to know

many charitable foundations, many millionaires and billionaires set them up, and i think it is a way to evade taxes as well. that means that if we cannot tax these people's incomes because "hey are in "so-called charities like george soros, hillary clinton, and she was taken at the charity navigator because they could not determine how much went to charity and how .uch went to administration i think that should be investigated also because that means other people's taxes have to go up because you cannot tax them because they are in charities. see what very much. guest: i think if you are wealthy, they could create problems and those are problems they would not like to have, but

it is something i probably should not address because in the panama papers, we do see a lot of preferences of people leaving their money to international organizations like the red cross. when we contacted the red cross, they were not aware, so their name, and the names of other may major organizations like debbie bws, are being misused. they are doing that for a reason because it was a tax scam if you pretended the money was going to go somewhere else and you did not have to pay taxes on it. that was a new poll that allow due to use the money anyway you it is basically well-known scam in the offshore world. host: norma is coming from england. welcome. caller: can you hear me? host: perfectly. caller: he mentioned great britain and london and is there anyway i can find out about that

company? i have never heard it mentioned on the british media. guest: they were researchers that we are working with "the guardian" newspaper and i think they are still working on this story. it was about property and prices were going through the roof. in the panama papers, a lot of people from china and russia were buying properties in london and using offshore companies. once we were looking at the papers, we did not know who these people really were. host: norma, anything else? that is victory to write very much. if i could ask another brief question. about two months ago, america was curious about something related to our financial companies and china. any information on what that is? guest: no, i would not know. i am sorry. carol once to know by twitter, more about americans

and where they might be hiding their money. didn't switzerland used to be a haven? guest: we found the previous investigation that in fact switzerland was hiding or money, but switzerland has also, because of crackdowns, has had to get clever about what they do then you have these days is singapore. that is where a lot of the money is going. host: also, does panama have personal relationships with high wealth? had a taxama has haven based on delaware, so all the rules basically apply there. that is where a lot of drug money was going through. a lot involved major drug figures in the documents, including massive figures and accident drug cartels. host: how many people do you have on this case right now? about 300 70e

reporters working in 70 countries working on this story. getwe work is we basically the story and we don't interfere editorially and their plans for all we demand at the beginning is we decide the timing, and we like to do a global story while they do their countries specific stories. host: what is the base behind your organization? we rely entirely on foundations and individuals to give us support. host: robert from new york, republican. good morning. caller: good morning. i have two questions. one, saudi arabia, china, contactia have had due to fund. is there a link of this [indiscernible]

and since she was acting like a double agent, meaning that the american government did not know what she was doing with the and [indiscernible] what does the link have to do with the panama papers? question, does president clinton not know anything about [indiscernible] guest: we did look very closely and donors.ns in fact, we set up a system where we could back search for documents with names. we had spreadsheets. we have found donors in there. we had found people who have donated to both parties and we are still working on that in terms of getting stories out. we also need to be sure that

there is a public interest argument for bringing the stories out. we did mention in a lot of our stories a major donor to the republicans and the democrats, and this person was also linked to other things as well. may be an interesting story, and there is a question of stories s. the spies and spy world host: some of the names we have read about, china, a lot about the russian leader vladimir putin, tell us more about those two entities. guest: the most interesting one the one wherely, we found a lot of people close to vladimir putin. it seems like the companies were being used to basically take money from getting loans from public entities in russia and being routed through offshore havens. some of that money came through the united states.

we are talking about $2 billion. one of the people involved was the godfather of vladimir putin's child. we found the owner of a ski prudence child got married two years or three years ago. child got married two years or three years ago. we have known that this is the pardon. a lot of money is coming out of china and are sure. that money is falling. host: what about elsewhere in europe? guest: in europe, we found the president of ukraine. i am tried to think of other politicians. remember some of the name straight sort of a blur at this point. are: some of the names we reading around the world, the president of argentina, the icelandic prime minister. what is the situation there? has he resigned?

guest: he has resigned. the issue was that he had the offshore company when he entered parliament. in argentina, there are public protests against the president because he also had an offshore company linked to his business, and now he is president. host: saudi arabia's king solomont and the former iraqi price resident. anything to say about them? guest: also the family of the pakistan prime minister. their family, the kids, children, using offshore property to buy -- offshore funds to buy property in london. it was really about money flow and financial flows in secrecy. host: is there an overall dollar amount being associated with the leak? data not always handled the money themselves and it basically stayed in the major financial institutions.

what they were doing is a naked banquet come to them and the customer at that banquet once, for some reason, secrecy in the offshore world. they would set up the offshore company and sell that to the bank, which in turn would give it to the customer. you would have situations, for british, where the virgin islands company would be set up to be the owner of a bank account in switzerland, so if the authorities can looking for that person, that person could honestly say, it is not my money and be truthful about it because the money knowingly was owned by the auction company. storydo you see this dying down at some point or do you see the possibility for change? guest: i think it has the potential for massive embarrassment. we know the australian government is going after 800 people in australia. inquiries in multiple countries and rates by police in switzerland and other countries in south america over the last few days. it is the embarrassment that is

going to really prompt change here. the fact also that anyone who has been using offshore funds can never now be safe because they don't know where the next week is going to come from or what information we will find in the future. host: mary in pennsylvania, democrat. caller: hello, i would like to say one thing. maybe two things. first of all, bernie sanders has been talking about this for years. this is a huge problem in our tax system in america, why we are broke and broken. i hate it when conservatives say, if the taxes were not so high, blah, blah. if you do not pay taxes, a go to jail. these people are not only breaking our country and not paying taxes, but they're not going to jail. people in iceland and switzerland are out in the streets complaining and yelling about this. why don't they do that in america? i don't understand this country. it is likely just step into this

and the middle class and the poor suffer and they have to pay more taxes. it is just ridiculous. how do we get the word out of america? i don't understand why more people and not in the streets screaming about this. thank you very much. guest: i do agree, actually. i think we sought an amazing reaction around the world. there were several thousand protesters outside the prime minister britain's house a few days ago after the first day of the story. 22,000 people surrounded the parliament house in iceland and andcally beat pots and pans they finally forced the prime minister to resign. that is the kind of anger that differentmaybe it is coulters, but you seek huge reaction there and in the united states, we saw it to the major

newspapers two days to put it on the front pages. host: one more call from justin in california, democratic caller . caller: i watch your show and like it very much. i would like to ask your guests a question. when you mentioned the american bein in panama that was g put in these plus accounts of people not paying taxes, the amount seemed rather small. compared to switzerland, does that mean panama is smaller or they had not been in it as long? because these are billionaires putting their or hiding their taxes, so that is my first question. do you think it would be higher?

goingly, is switzerland to be changing at any time? host: thank you. guest: sure, i go back to my point about the money. the money does not reside in a panamanian account but it resides in britain and the u.s. and other places. the offshore companies are just routed through panama, or sometimes british virgin islands islandes like a little near new zealand. this is a global issue. they sickly, the money from here -- basically, the money from here doesn't relate leave here under pretense to repair. pretends to leave here. money never actually leaves here and it leaves the corporations that are now trying to get that money back by a reduced tax rate. host: what is next?

guest: our next move is to publish a redacted version of the names and companies and i think there will be more political reaction this week from various countries here at we have been working in 70 countries and we will expand the investigation because we have new information for about 200 different countries, so we will probably try to get more journalists involved. b,st: the website is icij.or the international consortium of investigative journalists. i've guest is the director of that organization, gerard ryle, we thank you very much for explaining some of the details. we appreciate it. guest: thank you. host: about 25 minutes left and we will take a short time out and come back with an open phones segment to talk about anything you would like him the panama papers, the presidential election, anything we had touched on today or anything else. numbers are, republicans, (202)-748-8001. democrats, (202)-748-8000.

that democratic number should say 8000. and independents, (202)-748-8002 . we will be right back. ♪ >> monday on "the communicators," commission chair tom wheeler in his first interview with c-span since the nominated by president obama in 2013. he talks about issues facing the fcc, including expansion of the lifeline phone program for the internet, regulation of the internet and privacy, and the spectrum incentive auctions just beginning. he also discusses how he views

the future of the internet and telecom. he is joined by technology reporter for "the washington post." >> i was fortunate enough to be able to do in the wireless and cable industry was to be involved as they were bringing great change to the american economy and the way people lived their lives. that is what we are dealing with that the fcc because we are now in the middle of one of the revolutions of all time. the job of the fcc is to say, how do we deal with the kind of changes that are happening as a result of new technology? communicators" monday night on c-span2. >> "washington journal" continues. host: we will do an open phone's segment where you can talk about any topic you would like. anything we have touched on this morning. and anything else that is out there.

there are lots of news out there. let me reveal the numbers one more time to make sure you have the right lines. republicans call this number, (202)-748-8001. democrats call (202)-748-8000. and independents, the number is, (202)-748-8002. we have one caller ready to go. stephanie from pennsylvania, independent. good morning. caller: good morning. i wanted to ask people for tell people that it is the time now to nationalize the oil industry for the people of the united states. my family works in the oil industry here in ohio, this pennsylvania, of ohio, west virginia, and all the companies are going bankrupt. the south these are coming over and buying the companies and they have caused to get the devaluation of these companies,

including bankruptcy, and now they are buying them up. i say it is time for the federal government to buy the companies and nationalize the oil industry for the benefit of the people in the united states. the ohio, west virginia and pennsylvania area is called the saudi arabia of america or something like that. because there is so much oil. you have aanie, primary coming up in a couple of weeks in pennsylvania. who do you like? caller: i am going to such an independent to republican to vote for donald trump. host: how come? caller: because it goes along with all the stuff we are talking about, the investigative journalist, he wants to blow apart the secrecy that is going on in the upper exelon's -- echolons in this country. why do think these big

republican parties are willing to lose the election to get rid of trump? he is bold enough to start naming names. when these big guys or republicans say, he is more qaeda, but is al that all about? how can he be more dangerous than al qaeda? be bold enough to blow apart but exactly is happening in this country. host: thank you. that.reciate i want to get some of the calls it in. daniel, washington, d.c., democrat. go ahead. caller: t5. i just wanted -- wanted toperry i just challenge all the secretary clinton state voters who care about safe energy and stopping the fossil fuels, which she says she will lead us to a safe

energy future, but bill clinton, her husband was the spokesperson and made television commercials for the keystone pipeline, so i really don't believe that and the other point i would like to make is only in d.c., are fighting gigantic developers to save 25 acre park space in the middle of the city called mcmillan, and it is a national issue and a nationally registered historic site, and that is the crux of what is going on. thecorporations and government, especially people like the clintons, are eroding the environment, are running big deals that are destructive to and iture of the planet, is time for us to support somebody like bernie sanders and also get involved in the national and global network to stop the corporations and get the government for the people

and for the environment. we need an international movement from the people. corporateink the big petroleum democrats are the way to go. like hillary clinton. host: thank you. bernie sanders making news last night in a positive way for him. he won the wyoming caucuses. here is a look at the "ap." he is pointing to his growing wins and hillary clinton with her commanding lead. this is leading up to new york. clinton looking right past the wyoming results and the said that she needs a big win in new york on the 19th of april to help her lock up the democratic nomination. it ends with, the senate we can go after the republicans full-time. they defended cruz on the republican side who won colorado

yesterday. he locked up the remaining 13 at the party state convention in colorado springs. .et's hear from mitchell mitchell is in marshall, texas, democratic caller. welcome to the program. mitchell, i think i got you now. caller: you can hear me now? host: i didn't have the button pushed. thank you. caller: thank you. i would like to comment on the theory of economics. it seems to me that it does not work. when the rich get richer, decor. they do not invest in their -- when the rich get richer, they hoard. they do not invest in their employees in any way. i used to work for walmart. the employees tried to unionize

at a specific walmart and they did nothing but shut that walmart down to keep it from being in the hands of the workers. is isam trying to say that when people, especially conservatives, say that it is not there to the rich to have them pay a higher share, even though they had something like corporate welfare in the tax shelters overseas, it does not seem right to me, especially when the conservatives are complaining about it and are from middle-class themselves and they feel sorry for those rich people who are basically just taking this nation for all that and obeying the law and pain their taxes -- paying their taxes. host: thank you. we have about

15 minutes left or so, good we want to trade one of the headlines regarding a major event that is happening right d.c.,nd headed toward th called democracy spring. the headline -- "mass civil disobedience, teach-in's, and valleys cut it to d.c." they're are supposed to hold a rally outside union station just before lunch sometime tomorrow. we are joined by phone with kai newkirk. good morning. guest: good to be with you. host: exactly where are you right now and how many people are in your group and what will happen? maryland and we are gathering up to start our march today.

this is day nine. we came from philadelphia. over 100 20 people have been on the entire journey. it will be 140 miles when we are finished, and it has been incredible. people have come from 33 different states to make the track because they care so much about saving our democracy. we are going to be heading into d.c. today. we will get to union station, columbus circle there, this afternoon where we will finish up the day and celebrate our arrival in d.c. tomorrow, we will gather there again and we are going to rally and proclaim again our demand to congress that we announced only left from philadelphia at the liberty bell, which is they take immediate action to end the corruption in the politics and to give us all an equal voice. there are things congress could do right now to end the

corruption of our political system and give us the government and biased for all people and not just the 1%. if they do not do that, when we arrive at the capital tomorrow, we will sit in in a massive, nonviolent, peaceful action and reclaimed the people's voice. they will have to decide if they're going to do their jobs or send us off to jail. we believe that over the course of this week as we sit in day after day and perhaps into next the, that this of be largest disobedience of the 21st century and it will send a message that no one can ignore, that the american people and not accept this anymore and that there will be a political price to pay. host: kai newkirk, is your organization supporting a presidential candidate this year? guest: we are not. it is an independent, grassroot organization and it is bigger than any election. we want the candidates to feel like they have to endorse the movement.

we want every president from city council on down to feel that they cannot run for office without making a crystal-clear were they stand, with the people or the corruption. what we are trying to do is build a movement to mobilize the public and people who do not accept the status quo anymore to stand up and to force congress to make a decision about whether they will fix the problem or not and to force every candidate to make a decision about whether they will be part of the solution or problem and if they make the wrong choices, we would take them out of office and there will be nonviolent resistance in their offices and the fundraisers, the streets and at the polling place until everyone who want to represent us in this country is committed to be part of the solution to give us democracy for all and government that represents all and it is not just a tool for the 1% to continue to maintain the growing share of power and wealth in our country. host: i should point out that we

will have a camera tracking the organization tomorrow, democracy spring, as it comes into d.c. kai newkirk, you mentioned that is betweenow 100 and 200. what additional support are you expecting in town? done: it is 120 who have over the entire journey and there are well over 200 that will begin the march today. we have spoken with 1000 people on the phone, and along with the 335 people online, so we can expect that there will be well over 1000 people who will be at the capital and risking jail or demanding an equal voice. we want to create a moment where people asked themselves around the country and seeing what is in the news, what they hear on something is that unprecedented and happening at the capital and ask themselves, with a rather lift a finger in the congress or send these people in the jail and it you

would stand with the patriotic defenders of our democracy who are willing to go to jail to ensure that after generations of struggle in our country, to realize and defend our democracy, as so many people shed blood, sweat and tears and we would not just about the bullying a class to run our country to the ground. host: kai newkirk is the director for democracy springs. thank you. guest: t-rex so much. -- thank you so much. host: we will continue to track the group outside union station tomorrow to see what their arrival looks like. we hear that they may hold a rally may be at 11:30 in the morning or so, so if that materializes, we will be there to see what happens on the hill. but bodies of congress come back into session. the house has been away for almost three weeks. and short session tomorrow before the get back to business and the senate

returns the session tomorrow to work on the faa reauthorization bill. in the house this week, security themes for the zika virus on their agenda, and we are waiting to see if and when congress will talk about the budget for the new fiscal year. florida, thank you for waiting period you are an independent -- waiting. you are an independent. what is on your mind? caller: i want to agree 100% with the new democracy spring right on. i also want to comment on your journalist that you had on the left. that was the worst propaganda i have ever heard. you never brought up the fact that the american people need to know. this was paid for by the united states. putin and china were never even

mentioned in this report. this is propaganda against russia and china and american consortium should be ashamed of themselves. i also bond to say -- i also want to say the only one who is going to bring this country back to what it is supposed to be his bernie sanders. the rest of them are a bunch of political hacks which are driving this country into the ground. also, i would like to mention for nine months, our american out andtally blocked ignored bernie sanders. how dare them? and the fact that you no longer ask pertinent questions makes me question you. thank you. host: thank you for calling. a lot from linda. duane is calling from wisconsin on the line for democrats.

caller: hi, first time caller, but i agree with kai newkirk as far as corruption, greed. two points. we could guarantee corruption great to get out of politics, like these regulations, all you hear are regulations are killing business. i wondered they think these regulations were just willy-nilly past, just sit and around one day saying, let's make regulations. there were laws committed, there are reasons there put into place and passed bipartisan and signed into law. all the candidates were in wisconsin last weekend and could not make the rallies, but i wonder if i would have asked trump if you would be willing to donate a salary to wounded warriors, saint jude, if anyone

could get that message to him, that would be a great promo, campaign promo. any of the senators, like john mccain, he did not know. how are these servants getting so filthy rich serving us? those are my points. host: thank you for calling. appreciate it. michael writes on twitter following up on the democracy spring interview, it will be interesting to see how the capitol police handle this demonstration and who in the d.c. political class gets involved. we just talked to duane. we have gus from virginia, independent. good morning. caller: good morning. i loved c-span. i think you guys do a wonderful job. is, when hison c-span going to put on some third parties, third-party representatives, i mean the

green party, there are several out there. i think the two major political parties have become so corrupt and so ineffective, and we are just not hearing anything about r the twotition froo parties. personally, i believe this country needs a third party. so, provide a little competition so that maybe one we had an election cycle that we have now, when nobody really likes any of the candidates, that there be an alternative. i will listen to your answer. host: stay tuned. there will be more from additional parties. i was going to ask gus who he wanted to see but he left. green partya presidential candidate a while back on the program, but point well taken. we will continue to see what is out there among the other parties and bring them to you. andrew, maryland, democratic caller. caller: good morning. i would just like to encourage

all the listeners and watchers of c-span, i think so many of the ideas are great. i am afraid that people get involved with what is going on in our country a little too late. civics and great if history were made a little bit more interesting to people so that people are not waking up when they are 50 or 60 years old and enraged that we had the government that we do, but they never really took the time to get involved. why do you think that is the case, andrew? that it is taking too long? guest: i'm sorry? host: you said folks are waiting too long a mac to get involved, and why do you think that is? why do i feel the way i do provide direct think that way? host: the second.

why do think the conditions are the way you described? guest: just a certain lack of interest. just a certain lack of interest , and again,sses they just find the interest too late in life. host: what difference do you think it would make on the process for folks who were involved earlier? guest: i think our leaders would the more accountable to us. i think change could really occur because the leaders are our elected officials and they without that we are informed, interested and we care. i think that we get the environment or the system that we have now when people do not we arend i understand busy with their own lives, but our system is for the people, by

the people, and that really means something. host: thank you from bethesda, maryland. steve from oklahoma. independent. caller: good morning, c-span. what i have seen in my 65 years is people have become complacent. i grew up with everyone they would know that people meant to what they were saying because it was masses that would come out. .nd speak that is what needs to happen more. another thing the millennials are starting to do that, and hopefully, that will continue because the government will not change unless the people's big. host: marketing people are grown complacent? guest: [laughter] i really don't have the answer

but that is what i have seen. i have millennial daughters and they are up in arms about this and they are proud of it. speak, tell people, hey, you have got to wake up because nothing will be changed. they will not listen if you come out in masses. they did in the 1960's and 1970's. they did not like it, but they listened. host: thank you. time for a couple more calls. tomorrow i think. thomas from cleveland. what we do like to say this morning? caller: i would like to say that i am 75 years old and -- say that act 75 result, bernie sanders is too old and i say that because i am a 72-year-old veteran. i know that with age comes diminished mental ability, and lse in sanders is another career all i see that -- and in sanders is another career politician that doesn't realize

that republicans will hold the house and he will, the nothing but strong conversations. host: true to you like? guest: none of the above. beingwould consider president is john kerry. host: does that mean you will not vote or will you wait to see what happens and the maybe pick somebody? guest: i want to vote, but as far as the president is concerned, i'm going to write in john kerry. last call from minneapolis, tom, democratic caller. you get the last word. guest: this is crazy. i don't know [laughter] if i deserve the last word. here it goes. i am echoing the last four calls or five calls. of things are wrong in our country and part of the reason is the people to really control things anymore. i think it is almost like the vietnam era, where things have gotten so bad that people were

in the streets and marching, and the university students got up and changed things. it has to do with the corporate and the way the company is controlled the leaders. when combined, it is really sad that the people do not have more of the vote. host: ok, tom. thank you and teamwork are taking part in this son -- thank you and thank you for taking part in this sunday edition. we are here every day. tomorrow, we will devote all of our program to public health issues. herell have some guests and at the center for disease control in atlanta, and we will with the:45 tomorrow principal deputy director of the schucat about immunization research and dr. beth bell will talk about

infectious diseases. she is the director for the cdc's emerging infectious diseases. and also dr. debra houry on opioid and heroine abuse. lots of different public health issues out there these days, so for the full three hours, tell us what you think, ask questions and we look for now, enjoy the rest of your weekend and we will see you back here tomorrow morning. >>