within 100 yards of the railroad track. in one of the things that helps us identify his crime as opposed to somebody else's is it usually happens at the intersection of chili railroad tracks. of two railroad tracks. he knew he had to get it out of town -- he knew he had to get out of town before dawn, and he did not want to be stranded waiting for a train. so being at the intersection of multiple railroad tracks gave him more opportunities to get out of town before the crime was discovered. >> sunday night at 8:00 eastern on c-span's q&a. this weekend on american history 8:00 c-span3, saturday at p.m. eastern on lectures and history, university of north carolina at chapel hill professor molly were then on --

professor molly on the growth of pentecostalism. areundamentalists conservative protestants who militantly opposed, militantly opposed new ideas about the science, and society. onand at 10:00 p.m. eastern real america, the 1989 documentary "island of hope, island of tears." >> over 12 million men, women, and children past this way, past through rooms in corridor is confident with the special stillness that was once noisy with human life. they bought tickets for 1000 places in america. they treaded their rubles for dollars -- they traded their rubles for dollars and saying their first american songs, and experienced their first american christmas and hanukkah.

givenhey waited and permission to pass over to the new land. >> sunday at 10:00 a.m. eastern -- 10:00 p.m. eastern. the wife who commanded u.s. forces india not. i worked on most every day and vietnamese hospitals. and then i went to -- once a week to do work. >> much american history tv, every weekend on c-span3. and about 20 minutes, we will take you to the republican national committee winter meeting in washington. until then, look at the government workforce from today's washington journal.

ist: joining us at the table the president and ceo of the partnership for public service. good morning. talking here about presidential appointments and the filling a federal positions. informationus the on the partnership of public service. guest: we are a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization tried to make our federal government more effective. there are 1.6 million nonprofits out there focused on all kinds of important things -- environment, national security, poverty, you name it. but at the end of the day, we only have one tool to deal with and that is problem our federal government. we need to see all of those nonprofits and others focused on making sure, in addition to whatever policies they want, we have an effective government in delivering good results for the public. that is our focus.

how do you get a talented government that it is well led and make sure the system is promoted effectively in delivering services, and had you get people to care about what government does and does it well? from isr funding comes or ever we can find it. like most nonprofits, we get donations from individuals, corporate support. we do a fair amount of work training with leaders in government. -- had to get the resources to feel the activity you are trying to get done? host: what is the president role for filling federal positions? guest: we have a crazy system. no other democracy on this planet have -- on this planet has anything close to it. 1200 appointees require confirmation.

it is a unique process in the world. of those, we identify about 630 we see as the most fundamental jobs in running the u.s. government. whopresident is the person chooses them in the senate confirms them. but the ultimately -- but the president ultimately has to create a system to fill these jobs of highly effective people. no president has done that well. the system has to change. unfortunately, this administration is well behind any prior administration. host: i want to invite the viewers to call in. we will have one line for federal employees at 202-748-8000. for everyone else, 202-748-8001. max dyer is here. you talk about 630 key positions. they are requiring senate confirmation.

239 have no nominee at this point. five are awaiting nomination. 245 confirmed. to 635.to 45 confirm that is roughly 400 positions that have not been filled. how come? guest: it begins at the vary beginning -- very beginning. -- all newsident's idents come to be president without having been presidents before. this administration did start well. you have governor christie who led the pre-election transition effort. he was removed after the election. and by and large, a lot of the work he did was ignored.

this administration got behind real fast. did they not have the infrastructure in place to build esese -- to fill this jobs of quality people. host: we said 635 key jobs. out of those, what other top jobs? guest: they are across the board. look at the world we live in today. right now, we don't have a nominee for ambassador to south korea. that is a critical hotspot. we are missing a director, one of the constitutional impairments. you look across the board, there is not an agency that is not missing fundamental talent. when i say that, there are people in those jobs in acting capacities, but they're not fundamentally equipped to do those jobs as effectively as we need them to do because they are not named by the president and confirmed by the senate. host: i want to bring up this

piece in the washington journal. he is the third highest ranking official that acted as a barrier. he is leaving. he served as acting secretary of state for 12 days last year between the inauguration of the president and the confirmation of rex tillerson. although the total number of employees has not diminished significantly, the state department has suffered a brain drain of experienced and respected diplomats, some have left for personal reasons, but others say they were pushed out or resigned because they could support the trump administration. your reaction? guest: it is sad. the state department plays a fundamentally critical role in protecting us as a country and

managing the relationships we have with the rest of the world. the data shows that morale is down. we produce the best places to work rankings across the whole federal government. the survey was from april to june of last year. and while overall government numbers one up, state department went down around senior leaders. it is challenging to be able to look at the data because we on theave the info highest performers, but there is a lot of anecdotal evidence saying that they are experiencing a real brain drain in a not being counted people in that are leaving. by and large, it is an agency that is in trouble. host: do you have a sense of what the administration's broad plan is at this point to fill out the rest of its positions? guest: my sense is, again, they are trying. .nd they have an operation

the challenge is we are a year plus into the administration. the equivalent of the patriots showing up at the super bowl and having a quarter of the offensive line and have their defense of line not on the field in the second quarter. they is no question that , buteen nominating folks bluntly, they need to do more and a need to do it fast. host: let's hear from brad from minnesota. good morning. caller: good morning. i know he is kind of a young man, but that is ok. i just want to ask you one question. what is the world going to conclude when they find out that we have in our premier agencies, we have political moles? if i can start by saying that you are the first person to describe me as a young man and a very long time. such as put a smile on my face. [laughter] guest: there has been a lot of

attention paid to the question , number beg political appointees. i want to be clear, i think there are way too many political appointees that take on career positions. there is a substantial effort being made to make sure that that is tracked very carefully. accountability office is a legislative watchdog that does a review of all of this. at the end of the day, the numbers are tiny compared to the full workforce. you're talking tens of thousands of people. bulk ofarge, the vast the federal employee workforce are people who are premier civil servants and are there because they want to help the american public. if you look at the data and compare it against the private sector, there are all kinds of places where the government

workforce is below the private sector with respect to their leaders. they are willing to go to? because they care about what they are doing. again, i am not pertaining you are not going to find examples, but they are tiny relative to the vast scope of the workforce. you have less political moles then the workforce said hasn't been invested in. of the workforce is under the age of 30. it is not a healthy workforce in terms of bringing new talent in and growing the talent already there. host: susan is up next. caller: good morning. questions with the workforce, are you specifying about the fbi, or specifying about the workforce in the white house and congress and stuff? we any question on any of it.

are you interested in any particular part of the government? caller: yes, the fbi. i have family members in the fbi in different states. and they want the memo to come out. see the ones doing good from those doing that. it is the same with cops, sheriff's department. another thing, i wanted to call the other day because i could not get online. susan, ande jump in, say we are talking about specifically openings within the workforce with federal employees and the fact that a lot of administration positions have not been filled yet. anything you want to say about that? , it is so hard to get them to be filled. it took almost three to four thehs for so many to pass

background. there is so much. a lot of people don't pass it. host: right. guest: you are entirely right. is a real challenge for the federal workforce. a set ofar, there are political appointees, 4000 is the number. there are 2 million career civil servants, not including the postal service, just by way of benchmarking that, that is the same number that existed in the early 1960's. a lot of times, folk say, the federal government is going topsy-turvy, but that is not so. it has been steady. but i think the caller's point is entirely correct. the only quibble i would have is three to four months to get through the process. unfortunately, it could take beyond a year. and there are a lot of folks i cannot wait that long. so one area the federal government has to change in is hiring. to pain point if you talk

anybody on the inside that cares about the operations of government will point to that one. host: explain why it would take three to four months or year or more. what goes into that timeframe? this, to be clear about the career hiring a political thing could take a long time as well. part of it begins with the process, which is incredibly difficult. there is a lot of information that is required. in many ways, the federal government adopts processes that are unique to it rather than what standard practice in the private sectors are. that is something that has to happen. the big difference our security clearances. there is a massive backlog on security clearances. that could be a huge hindrance in getting in talent. host: who would play the biggest role in making changes to the process? executive branch? guest: it is a combination. but the reality is the biggest the executiveof

branch. the rules need to be modernized. many of the rules that govern how the executive branch brings in talent and pays talent are 70 plus years old. the pay system was designed in 1949. so, most of it really belongs to the part of the leadership, the political leadership. needly, political leaders crisis management and policy development. host: back to your calls. ben. from virginia. good morning. caller: thank you very much to c-span a for taking my call. i want to start by saying to the gentleman, i really appreciate the effort of what you are doing. but i have some serious concerns with a couple of statements you have made. i have been in the federal government since 1999 and am a

veteran military officer. number one, regarding persons and acting capacity. you acquitted them to the substitute teacher. that is not accurate in my opinion, and i believe most government people will tell you this. i have worked with plenty of people who were any senior functioned in that role for years, and were completely successful in that role. whether or not someone in an acting capacity is able to keep the mention has much more to do with the individual them with any limitations as a virtue of it being an acting. is it the same as being in full capacity? no. but people are able to be fully functional and those rolls. the second one has to do with the difficulties in filling those positions.

what i have to say there is i truly believe that his administration has been handicapped by the response from the agencies. i spent the majority of my career in the intelligence committee. i left the intelligence community intentionally because issues.ver politicized i did not want to work in that environment anymore. work in an environment not related to intelligence. i believe absolutely, and i know many other people who work in government, that there is is a state under banging -- undermining this administration. you said something about numbers of people and talking about the burrowing in and that there were not a lot of people. the problem is the majority of federal employees follow the rules.

and they will not raise an issue about somebody doing something wrong unless the evidence is so , because otherwise, they know they will be the ones taken to task for raising a complaint and would stand to lose so much more from complaining then you do by breaking the rules. so the few people who are willing to bend and break the rules to assist the previous administration and hurt the current administration, are able to get away with it. go.: ben, i will let you you made many interesting points. guest: yes they are. i will try to pull out three in response to them. to begin with the first you raised, which is the metaphor of the substitute teacher. agreement have more and disagreement here, which is the people who are put in these acting roles are better qualified to do those jobs than the majority of the political appointees who comes from the outside and don't know the environments they need to

operate in. , and illenge is to have would expect would agree with this, is every one of those acting individuals would say they would be better off if they were the named person confirmed by the senate. they don't know that they are going to be in office for years and years. they don't know if they are going to be there three months, six months, or two to four years. they will not make decisions with the expectations that they will see them through to that time horizon, or perceived by those around them by having a longer-term authority. and it is the nature of the beast that people will not invest in the same way with somebody they expect to be around for a longer period of time. there is no question that wonderful person who was serving person, but they would be more better off if they were in a permanent position.

the second thing you talked about is the difficulty of filling a job. i personally think the whole notion of the deep state is a bad one. there are people who don't do to pushbs well, and try a policy, but the vast majority are actually there to follow the lead of the political leaders, and they understand their job is to do with the president is directing them to do. they may have differences of you, but they are smart to hold up a constitution a follow rule of law. filling the jobs is not related to that. the president has a responsibility to create an effective leadership team, whether there are people who may -- they are not the ones making it harder for him to find your pick people. that is his responsibility and that is something he and his

team owns very directly. the third point is very powerful. the question about people raising problems. that was a part of the survey that i raised earlier. it was question number 17 on the survey that asked, are you able to raise a violation of law or ethics without fear of retaliation? and i think this is a critical health question for any organization, and clearly for a public sector one. if you look at the obama administration and the challenges they had, whether at the general services administration earlier on, this question is fundamental to the problem they had. in big organizations, someone is going to do something stupid. but your question says, what does the rest of the culture do? do they sit on their hands and doesn't metastasize or get worse ? if you don't have a healthy culture, people don't raise that information to leadership. if you look at the federal

workforce, and this is not unique to obama or trump, by and large, federal workers don't believe they are in an environment they are safe to raise problems, and that is a big problem. the political leadership hold themselves accountable to creating that environment, and this is one of the key metrics of doing so. there are some agencies that will say it is only about a third of the workforce saying they can raise a violation of law or ethics. but the overall averages billy over 60%. that number is more than 15 points lower than it is the private sector. that is a problem. host: you mentioned the best places to work in your rankings. you can see the large agencies, nasa, transportation, commerce topped the list. working people read this chart? guest: you are a kind man. towork.com.n

government is fundamentally different. one key way is it is seeking public goods rather than financial returns. measuring performance is more challenging, not impossible, but more challenging. one commonality, whether you are in the private sector or in government, and a knowledge-based world, engagement of your employees is the most important element of success. and that is what this raises. -- and that is what this rates. host: is go to our next caller. virginiahe caller from said there is a deep state that is 20 undermines president trump. just the opposite. that was a real propaganda call. this is what i see. there is an expression, many a mistake is made on purpose. when you get what you have now, this authoritarian government where so many generals are running around the white house,

what they are going to do is downplay, or diminish the departments that they find unnecessary. they are going to focus on what they want. and what this administration wants is provocation in the middle east, especially claiming that israel and that jerusalem is a capital of israel, trying to destroy the iranian nuclear deal with was so hard put to get that going. take took years. israeli obvious what they are trying to do. the department of defense. general mattis said, i will more diplomats and less bullets. no. just the opposite. host: thank you. guest: i entirely and the president notion that i am entirely surprised at the notion of the deep state -- i am entirely surprised by the notion of the deep state.

one of the great challenges you of thea politicization career civil service workforce. unless you have calls for resistance, that is the reason you serve. on the right, you have claimed it is the deep states. is act, what we have workforce trying to do their best by the american public and they are being filled by the system they are operating in. nation want to stay at the top of the world, we need to make sure we are taking care of our government in an effective way. the other quibble i would have is this notion that the generals are a part of the problem here. really interesting to me. if you look at our military, they have the most effective talent operation, selling way more effective than on the civilian side. the military look at their people as an asset, but on the civilian side unfortunately, most folks look at the talent as

a cost. we need to see it as an asset if we are going to have government that will deliver in the ways we want. most people understand that the civilian workforce understand -- most of understand that the workforce operates more as a -- host: at the state of the union speech, the president raise the government employees. the v.a.ss passed accountability act. [applause] pres. trump: since its passage, my administration has removed 1500 v.a. employees who failed to give our veterans the care they deserve, and we are hiring talented people who love our vets as much as we do. [applause]

pres. trump: and i will not stop until our veterans are properly taken care of, which has been my promise to them from the very beginning of this great journey. [applause] pres. trump: all americans deserve accountability and respect. and that is what we are giving to our wonderful heroes, our veterans. thank you. [applause] pres. trump: so tonight, i call on congress to empower every cabinet secretary with the authority to reward good workers, and to remove federal

employees who undermine the public trust, or fail the american people. [applause] iron, your thoughts -- max dyer, your thoughts on the president's message. guest: yes. when he said i want to empower every cabinet secretary to reward good employees and get rid of the bad one. the focus has been entirely on getting rid of the bad ones. we will never have a government we want if all we do is focus on firing people faster. you have to create an upside, and that does not exist right now. risk-averseery workforce right now. people don't do it because they are at risk and there is no benefit if they are doing good work. host: last call. basil. welcome to the program. caller: thank you. i think this subject is the most

important one we face in our government today. people who are running this government. this president is a visionary. , not the solution problem. and by seeing that, it is like think we are going to see government employees rising to the top. and cleaning house themselves to make it a better running government, a more honest government. this president talks about the american public. that is his main concern. and it has to start with who is running the government that affects the life of the american public. this president is a visionary. he sees the solutions and does not get worried about the problem. we know the problem. it is the solutions we are after. and i think we are going to see more and more of that coming to

fruition as time goes on. , thee middle of this year american public is going to recognize that this man is talking to the american public. not to the political system. god bless him, and god bless america, and i hope we continue to grow. and i think we will. i'm an 87-year-old man, and this is the most promising future i see for our country through this man and this country today. and god bless our military. they do so much for your time. -- thank you so much for your time. host: final thoughts from our guest. guest: what the caller said about needing the folks on the inside to make the changes that we need in the government. have a workforce that is hindered by way too much by process inside. we need those political leaders in place to help give them top cover so that the idea that they

-- that things need to take place can happen. how do you make the place better? we have not accessed that talent and energy is fully as we should. powerful given the right leadership and the right institutional support. host: our guest has been max dyer. thank you a lot for your time. guest: thank you. >> live in washington, republican national committee is holding its winter meeting. we have heard from president trump last night, getting underway this morning, a business meeting of the republican national committee kicked off by the chair of the committee, mr. mcdaniel. our live coverage includes this afternoon, we will hear from the president's chair of the economic council at 12:45 eastern. the house and senate coming in

-- thert for former house and senate coming in for short pro forma sessions.

>> the republican national committee winter meeting getting underway shortly and we will have live coverage. the undercurrent of conversation in washington and elsewhere is a likely release by the president of the congressional memo alleging surveillance abuses by the fbi. house republicans are expected to make it public today according to a number of news reports. the president tweeting about it this morning, saying that top leadership and investigators of the fbi and justice department has lit a sized the sacred political process in favor of democrats, something that would have been unthinkable just a short time ago. we will get more details on the memo and it's possible relief today from today's washington journal. we will have that live once it starts.

we will bring to that interview and a little bit in our program schedule and you can also find it online at c-span.org. part of today's washington journal looks like this event, the winter meeting of the rnc getting underway shortly.

>> could everyone please take their seats? if everyone could please take your seats.