. as always, we will take your calls and you can join the conversation on "washington journal facebook and twitter as well. " is next. ♪ host: good morning and welcome to "washington journal." this past week, senate republicans and democrats came together to discuss paid family leave in this country. while the concept seems to be bipartisan, there are clear differences in how families would be paid in the united states. we want to know what you think about a family lead. should the government fund it, should social security pay for it? will open the phone lines, and we want you to call in and tell us what you think.

if you are a member of a working family, we waited: at (202) 748-8000 -- we want you to call in at (202) 748-8000. if you are a business owner, you can call in at (202) 748-8001. if you are not in either one of those categories, you can call (202) 748-8002. and do not forget, we are always on social media, on twitter @cspanwj, and at facebook.com/cspan. now, this past week, the senate subcommittee on social security, pensions, and family policy held a widely watched hearing of a family leave in the united states. this is the first time there was a senate hearing on this subject in just about four years, and according to the "washington roughly 15% of

americans, u.s. workers, had access to a family lead through through family leave the family medical leave act. they have to have 12 weeks of leave every year to take care of a child or ailing adults, but in most cases, that is not paid. here is bill cassidy, the subcommittee chair, talking about why new legislation is needed on this topic. booktv -- television for serious readers every weekend on c-span2. -- [video clip] mr. cassidy: there are three reasons. first is the paid outcome. i'm a doctor. infant andned about maternal health. infant mortality is higher in the united states than in other developed countries. if a new mother takes paid leave, the admittance rates for

her and her infant decreased by 50%. second, helping families manage work and home responsibilities, particularly for lower income workers, the pew study reports among an individual taking individual or family lead, only 38% with families making less than $30,000 do not receive any pay. for families with higher income, 74% receive paid leave thirdly, creating an incentive to stay in the workforce. a product of labor productivity with an aging population, it is essential our workforce remains strong. a 2012 study found that women who work more hours per week for child earth and take paid leave afterwards are 93% more likely to be working nine months postpartum compared to a woman who does not take leave. another study found that work mothers who took

paid leave for 10% to 12% higher than before paid leave was instituted. bill, first,ax cut it included a two-year pilot program, a tax credit to employers who offer low to moderate employees at least two weeks of paid leave, and expanded paid leave after the tax bill passed, including starbucks, walmart, and lowe's. host: let's go to class, who is calling from brentwood, california. cliff, good morning. so you are pushing for social security to take on family leave? social security is bankrupt. the biggest ripoff inhumanity. pittance if you

live long enough. you take 8% of a young person's income, match by the employer, and put it aside, even 3%, i could retire at age 50 and millionaire page you keep changing the date on social security, keep changing the payouts, the rules, qualifications, all to our disadvantage. it always was a lie. it always was a rip off. thank you. host: let's go to george calling from california. good morning. caller: good morning. i completely agree with the previous caller. what we need to do is fully fund social security, make attacks dollar for dollar, no matter what your income is. it is a good idea, but first, we have to reinforce what we have in place. host: there is the top democrat on the subcommittee, senator sherrod brown, giving his take on family leave. [video clip] sen. brown: right now, paid thely leave is a drag on

economy. americans leave $21 billion in wages every year because they do not have access to paid leave. people who work in jobs like ours in the congress and the white house who wear suits, some made in the united states, some made elsewhere, have good benefits, may not realize that the vast majority of workers have no family paid leave at all. for too many americans, hard work simply does not pay off. when i say we do not value work in this country, i do not just talk about wages, i am talking about benefits people earn or should earn. 85% of the workforce, 100 million people, have no paid family medical leave. if a mother has a baby, she has zero paid time off, not a single day. if she is not back at work the day after she gives birth, something most of us would agree is cruel and absurd, she does not get a paycheck. this is not just about new mothers. all sorts of mothers face of possible choices.

they go to work and risk health to themselves and others around them, or do they stay home and lose a paycheck? day.cans face that every do they send a sick child to school, knowing they are risking the help of their daughter in the entire classroom, or do they jeopardize their job and give up a by taking a day off? as they grow old, workers often have to care for aging parents. when signs over the age of 50 leave the workforce to care for a parent, they lose an average of $350,000 in earnings and retirement savings. lose even more come an average of 320 $4000. to truly value the dignity of work in this country, we need to recognize that paid family leave is something all workers should have the opportunity to learn. know what youto think about paid family leave. should the government fund it, or should social security be used to fund paid family leave?

once again, we will open the phone lines. if you're are part of a working family, we want you to call in at (202) 748-8000. if you are a business owner, we want you to call in a (202) 748-8001. and everyone else, we want to hear from you at (202) 748-8002. now, the "hill" newspaper this aboutrought about th wrote a sy what you just heard. here is a little bit that they wrote. senator joni ernst spoke in favor of the gop approached you working on with senator marco rubio and likely, which would allow new parents to draw from their social security in exchange for delaying their retirement benefits. the approach is based on a proposal from the conservative independent women's board. democrats have a plan that is being pushed by senator kirsten gillibrand. gillibrand made the case for her

bill, known as the family act, which would create a national paid family and medical leave program financed through payroll taxes. she said her approach would benefit a larger swath of people and create more flexibility and allow small businesses to compete with large corporations that were more likely to offer benefits. who is go to sue, calling from colorado. sue, good morning. caller: good morning. i am surprised you have a west coast caller first and then me in the mountains on, because usually you get all of your calls this early in the east coast where it is 7:00, and it is only 4:00 in california. i am calling about f emily in general. some of us chose not to have children could women and sometimes men. iso not think it paid fmla particularly fair, because if you do not have children, you cannot take it.

you can for aging parents, but some of us in the older part of the workforce, our parents are already dead. so those two things are the most fmla, causes for using but if you are in the group that does not have children and no longer has parents, then it is not fair to those to have other people get paid leave. i think that women who were planning on having a family, or path they want to predict that they might have to take care of an older parent, that they should start storing some vacation time. that is what i think they should do, because it is not there. the concept ofn what you can take fmla for. and i would say pets would be one, where you have to take care of a pet who has to be put to sleep, and then you want to grieve or whatever. but if you put that on social security, people would be in an uproar. i think the plan to take it may be out of social security and use that money and then make the

person work longer to retire, maybe that would work. but i think it will cause an uproar if you try to use social security funds for people who want to take leave, and then there are people who cannot take leave, because employers do not allow you and things like that. i just do not think it is fair. it needs to be something you can save up for, vacation time or something like that. know, noave, fine, you problem, but that is my feeling. host: thank you, soup. let's go to bill, a business owner calling from pittsburgh, pennsylvania. good morning. caller: good morning. the factto mention that there are these concerns costs,ealth care and the but the little senator from vermont, bernie sanders, has it right on the money, and anyone that takes the opportunity to

listen to his views, especially on health care, do as i have done. supposingis philosophy was "too radical," but it is slowly coming around. i mean, the public consciousness is slowly coming around to his way of thinking. he is an absolute, positive top choice to run against trump or any other entry into the field. an opportunity for us to seize the advantage. 5% of the population is 90% of the wealth, sir. that is bernie speaking. host: let's go to tonya calling from shepherdsville, kentucky. you are part of very working family. what are your thoughts on this? caller: my thoughts are that we

continue to push back social security retirement age because of funding issues. i do not think social security can afford that, nor can the american working families afford more taxes to cover something else. many times i worked for a large company, and fmla is abused. and other workers have to cover the work that those employees are not doing. i just do not think it is fair to the working people or to the businesses. host: so, tonya, have you ever had to use any kind of fmla benefits for a family member? caller: i have used disability insurance, and i do think that companies should offer some type of paid disability, but that would cover not only women who are having babies but people who have heart attacks. i think the disability benefit is the way to go. host: ok. let's go to john who is calling from trenton, new jersey. john, good morning. . caller: good morning.

thanks for taking my call. if anyone watches anything on social security, social security is going bankrupt in 10 or 15 years, mainly because it was person that every takes money out, now it is down to two or one and a half. if you know second grade math, you know you cannot continue to do that. every time they had another benefit, like family leave or anything else, it just means it is going to go bankrupt quicker. i wish people would not jump to try to use that for something. it is doing good for a lot of people. once social security goes bankrupt, because we will not not pay people, we will take it from everything else. thank you for taking my call, even though i am half-asleep. host: thank you, john. let's go to bill, who is part of a working family in maryland. good morning.

caller: good morning. in reference to your first caller about the family leave, it is not just apply to a woman having children or an elderly parent that you have to take care of. it applies to the individual. somebody develops cancer and has to go to cancer treatments or has some other type of chronic problem that they have to take off for treatment or time off to heal, the family leave applies to them as well, and i think it should participation, payroll taxation, where you have that ability to take off, let's say if you had a heart attack and you had to be out for three convalesce, then that way you would have something, that you would not suffer economic hardship, allow you to stay home and recover before coming back to work. i think that is one of the beauties of family leave.

it is not just for having babies and taking care of the elderly but for yourself as well. host: bill, would you be in favor of the democratic idea of increasing payroll taxes, or the republicans' plan of using social security benefits? with one of those would you fall in on? theer: i would go with payroll tax for her social security is a separate thing, but i think the payroll, because if you work, if you're putting into it, you are already paying for health insurance in both cases, so i think that would go hand-in-hand with the fmla, because that right there, everybody that works would definitely be entitled to that, because social security how much you put in. if you take that out, it has to be replenished. so anything that is used from social security, you have to pay back what yo once you got back r feet, and that would put you back behind the eight ball.

if you are a person with a chronic illness, over a lifetime, you may never catch up to make your account whole, so to speak. host: let's go to frank calling from yuma, arizona. you are part of a working family. what is your thought on this? caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. i had to use it when i had back surgery. in arizona, we do not get to use the family leave act. hello? host: i can hear you. keep going. caller: my wife, she had my son three months premature. she lost her job. she took her medical leave, only two weeks, and she had been 23 years with the company. endher mother is in the stage of life, and she had to take time to help her mom. i think it is a good deal, i think payroll tax or social security, either would be a good thing.

go on welfarenot but they need time for emergencies that come up. thank you very much. host: thank you. let's go to my calling from chillicothe, ohio. mike, you are a business owner. what is your idea? caller: first of all, they need to start with congress. i think they make about $175,000 a year, and there is a cap on social security at $118,000, i think. is that right? i am not sure. host: i think you're right, but i'm not sure, either. [laughs] caller: been there is that come and we have this huge military theet, for example, that aircraft carrier, they spent named itrillion on and after gerald ford, and in flint, michigan, they are drinking led in the water, so priorities need to change, especially on that military budget. we do not need to be distorting the middle east and those people

who live on the dirt floor who have nothing to do with bnything, we need to go bom them and then get nato to take turns to bomb these countries, too. our priorities are all screwed up. i am a business owner. i have been in business as 1977, and i have not had a week's vacation since 1994 with the exception of two cancer operations. vacation for dow was back in four weeks after having a kidney removed. i know what this is all about. you have a good day. thank you. host: thank you. let's go to keep calling from illinois. good morning. are you there? caller: i am here. host: good morning. caller: how are you doing? what do you think about the discussion on paid family leave in the united states? caller: i am for it all.

i don't have an a -- but i am for it all, same for everything, all right? host: would you be in favor of the a family leave coming out of social security, or do you think we need to pay for possible family leave? i think we lost him. strabo, who is the head of the national partnership for women and families and head of the workplace policy, talked about family leave during a subcommittee hearing. here is what she had to say. [video clip] vicki: there are four distinct problems for imposing a penalty for taking paid leave. the plan that was described earlier will result in huge losses from a 6% benefit cut or about $12,000 for a typical mother of two, and women, people of color, and low waged workers would be harmed the most.

leave, it excludes 75% of workers and excludes those who use it early in the life and then need a family or medical leave later on. they would face retirement either way. andd, wage replacement benefit amounts are too low to help working-class people and could exacerbate rather than help gender inequities. and forth, it does not compensate any new resources for ssa, which is an agency that sorely needs them. it is not gender-neutral, according to the urban institute and other. s. host: paid family leave has been one of the interests of the ivanka trump, president trump's daughter and senior white house adviser. she attended the hearing and she also wrote a column on fox news.com where she laid out a conservative argument for paid

family leave. here is a little but of what she said -- "social conservatives formpaid leave as a way to bonds in families and protect infants at their most vulnerable . everyone shares the concern for country's plummeting fertility rates. if executed responsibly, paid family leave is targeted government action with the right incentives designed to increase the independence, health, and dignity of our citizens." let's go to hell in who is calling for michigan. helen, good morning. caller: good morning. host: what do you think about family leave? how should it be funded? social security or payroll taxes? how do you think paid family

leave should be funded? caller: i think family leave should be funded -- i do not think it should be with social security. with --it should be maybe with social security, but i do not think there should the any cap on what people put -- the rich should have to pay social security, no matter what their income is. host: helen, had you ever had to use the family leave or the medical leave act during your career? i worked forbut the head of the union, and there are very few unions around now, it seems. host: well, thanks. let's go to john, who is calling from oklahoma. john, you're part of a working family. what do you think of this issue? should the government pay for paid family leave through

payroll taxes, or should it come from social security? caller: in the 1960's, social security is to be solvent. after congress got hold of it, everybody wants a piece of the pie, and now they are trying to say social security does not have enough money in it, because everybody wants to have all of the money that social security has. i think we lost jill. so the paid family leave at some other seem to be two very distinct ideas being put through congress. n being pushed pla asked for a raise in payroll taxes, and republicans are pushing for a plan that would allow parents to draw from their social security in exchange for delaying their retirement benefits. of the idea behind all of this is also being pushed by a ivanka trump, the

president's daughter, who banks there could be a bipartisan solution to all of this. now we know that joan collins from kansas. good morning. caller: good morning. what do you think about all of this? caller: the government should not be using social security trust fund money, because what people pay for all of their lives, everyone who can pay for social security, data to social security and medicare their entire life that they work. that money is for people who, number one, either are retired and cannot work anymore, or are and are unable to work

as well. that is what the money is for. it is not to spend for anything but the people who paid into it. it should not be going into family leave. that is a waste. for anything other than people trying to keep their lives going when they are unable to work, and they pay into their entire , it is like an account that they paid into their entire life , the people's money, not the government's money. this is how i feel. and they should not be pulling money out of it. anyone who pulls money out needs to pay it back. if they don't pay of that, they court and have a

reason why they are not paying their money back, because as far as i am concerned, that is theft.robbery or can you hear? joni, who iso to calling from rockport, massachusetts. you are a business owner. what do you think about this issue? caller: i think there is no way they should touch social security benefits. if they want to talk about social security to find family leave, all they need to do is take away that cap, so that people who are rich can pay into social security. we will pay into social security, and we would pay gladly. i think it is very, very important for people have support during their retirement, and why of ivanka trump would put families against people who

lessener, you know, or our insurance when we get older is absolutely insane. she should really be ashamed of yourself that she is even proposing this. host: would you be in favor of the idea of increasing payroll taxes to pay for paid family leave, or do you think it should not be paid at all? the whole rest of the world has that accept us. host: so would you be in favor of the idea of increasing payroll taxes to pay for paid family leave? m, i would be in favor of doing that. would be in favor of raising the cap on social security, and i also think that, you know, this country should really get with it. host: how many employees do you have in your business, and are they offered paid family leave? caller: six and yescaller:. host: excellent.

let's go to read it in lexington, kentucky. you're part of a working family. what are your thoughts on this? caller: i think social security should be left alone for your is set up for those who have worked all their life be able to get by in their elder years. as far as payroll taxes paying for families, i also think not everybody should have to pay for it. if you are going to take paid family leave, you should set up yound on your own if think that is something you think you will, have a like a 401(k) fund, but have it set up separately. people should not touch social security for anything other than social security. host: have you ever had to use the family medical leave act? caller: no i have not. host: are you in favor of the paid family medical leave act, and are you in favor of paid family leave possibly in the future? caller: i think paid family

leave is fine, but i think people who are going to need it or want it should set up a fund on their own to do it. i do not think everybody should pay payroll taxes to do it. i think that it's wrong, because that is putting more taxes on people who probably will never use it. myself as one, i am 57 years old. i am going to be retiring. why should i pay more taxes for it? host: let's go to joseph, who is calling from magnolia, mississippi. good morning, joseph. caller: yo. it is a complete joke. host: what is a complete joke? tell us what you are talking about, joseph? caller: i am talking about using social security -- joseph, are you in favor of the family medical leave act? do you think they should increase payroll taxes to pay for paid family leave?

i think we lost joseph. let's go to richard, who is calling from massachusetts. richard, good morning. caller: good morning. an interesting topic, but i would not trust any policies from this administration regarding any benefits to the middle class, the poor, the disabled, the women with children who need support from different agencies. out toublicans have been destroy social security since it was enacted back in the 1930's. they never supported anything like medicaid, medicare. helping in regards to the government help out the middle class. this is a gimmick. this is to make the democrats look bad. what they should do, really, and you will never see it come from

the republicans, is what they actually could do is to tax these hedge fund managers, and you could get a tremendous amount of taxes from these guys, who have already been abusing us, taking all the risk that they do, and when they fail, the taxpayers pay for it. theyhen they went, aha, keep all of the profits, and we do not get anything. that would be one way to solve this thing. it is all over europe. it is not unusual. , the europeans see it, they have sick leave. they have all the benefits of the working class. over here, we have nothing. and like i just said about social security, it is an absolute necessity. i am legally blind. i am in my 70's, and i need that check the comes in every month to pay my bills. i do not have a lot left to live

on, but that is ok to me, because a lot of money never really made any sense to me anyway. so that is my idea. i do not know if it will get anywhere. i know bernie sanders has mentioned this proposal, and i love bernie sanders. we need more politicians like him. you guys have got a great show. thank you. there are some politicians who has some concerns about the idea of paid family leave. in fact, wyoming senator mike enzi talked a little bit about that paid family leave proposals could have on small businesses and small towns. [video clip] my question to all three of you is -- how would these proposals work for very small business in a small town where they do not have a workforce?abor again, short answers, because there is not much time. >> to the degree that i paid women whoosal helps

have children remain attached to a prior employer, it could help them in a sense that the employer would lose the employee for a short period while they are taking parental leave, but they would not lose them permanently, so it would be finding a temporary replacement, replacement, so you could say that the burden on small businesses might be improved. >> the good news for you, sir, is there is a lot of data from small groups about what works for them with respect to a paid leave plan, and the insurance model with shared the role deductions -- share payroll deductions is something shared the modelority, it is by main street alliance, who brought through a working group of businesses that decided what is best for them, because the issue you are talking about, the payroll issue, if you have a woman who has even birth, you almost certainly will not have that person working for you for some period of time. how you manage that work is something you would delve with

gore would be dealing with if you are in that business now as more women are in the workforce. but it frees up their access to be able to find that replacement worker, pay overtime, without shouldering both retirement leave and the replacement worker. this is a solution that small businesses have really started to gravitate towards. host: let's go to sherry who is calling from louisiana. good morning. caller: good morning. ought to be aware of a couple of things, and i just have a couple of comments. back when world war ii was fought, the government did not they tooke taxes, so it from the taxes we had, which was social security. and to this day, they have never paid it back. let's get the government to pay that money back that it does, grateful that president trump is in there and is going to help us

with all the billions of dollars that we have been giving to nato, reduce our debt. let's see what he can get back here in america, then talk funding leave for other people. the guy obviously from massachusetts is obviously communistic. you used to be arrested for talking about that stuff in the united states. now, it is just commonplace talk. when hillary clinton ran, she said she was more of a marxist. i just think we ought to give president trump a chance and people wake up and realize, do your research. come uple who did this with taking the money out of social security to fund the war and never paid it back, well, that if the government, and i think that each of them have to be held accountable for this.

hey our social security back. host: let's go to joni: from montclair, new jersey. you are a business owner. caller: yes, hi. my name is joann, by the way. i think governments should not paid family leave. i am a business owner myself purely pay enough in taxes. i believe social security should remain untouched. it will put us out of business. we pay too much in taxes now, and the people that are out there having children in need to leave, they should find some solution on their own. it is called personal responsibility, and leave us out of it. host: let's go to ruth, who is calling from news northridge, calif. you are a business owner. caller: in california, we have something called sbi. it is a medical leave program.

the employees already pay into this in california. as a business owner, i think social security should be left alone. the cap should be raised, because it would need to be refunded. also in california, we just increased for minimum wage, so owner, there is no additional money for small businesses to pay into anything for coming out of the payroll taxes unless it is another payroll tax that the employees pay into for funding. any sense tot make have another program, and lascivious funded by employees -- unless it is funded by employees. call.our next

caller: i am a first time caller, so i am a little bit nervous, so please bear with me. we can do this. the problem is the logistics. we all have differing opinions about what ou taxes should go for, but in the end, i think what we need to keep in with these numbers, i am not a business owner, so i do not pretend to understand the challenges that a business owner has to deal with everyday, but if you look at it from the perspective of a business owner, i think every business owner wants to have a productive workforce. come tot people to work, put in 100%, and not be disrupted. i think a person who has a family member at home that they care for, and there is no support for it, that person's

mind is going to be at least partially not at work, and that is going to impact activity. as an example, i know other people do not like when european countries are brought up as an example, like in germany, for example, they have thriving small, middle, and large business, and they have, i believe that they have lower business tax than we have in the u.s. other taxes, so i do not know overall effect a more or less, but i do believe they have a smaller business tax. but for the most part, i think the smaller and medium businesses, they don't even have an hr department, because the way they fund benefits is done differently than what they have here. and if a business owner does not intoto put effort administrating the benefits,

including the one that we discussed on this topic, that i think is a good thing for business, because they can focus on whether primary -- on what their primary area is, where they make money, and each employee pays a certain amount of tax, and that is basically how it is administered outside of business. so if germans can do it, i do not believe that we cannot. it is just about the logistics of how we do it. people have to understand that if you provide a benefit, some people think ok, there will be people who want to take advantage of it, and that is true, but i think that is also true for pretty much anything else. for what we collect taxes and pay for, it could be pretty much anything. while it is related, it is a separate issue, how we make sure it is working and there is no abuse. departments that deal with this, to reduce fraud. that is pretty much what i wanted to say.

i think so many strong countries, strong economies can do it, we can as well. who iset's go to anna, calling from nashville, tennessee. mi pronouncing your name correctly? are you there? let's move onto joe, who is calling from new jersey. joe, you are a business owner. what do you think about this issue? are you there? caller: this is kyle from traverse city. are you there? host: yes, whether do you think about the idea of paid family leave? should it be funded through social security, through payroll taxes, or should it be funded at all? caller: what i first want to do is correct the lady from indiana. federal income tax started in 1913, i am pretty sure, and she

maintained that there was no income tax until after the second world war. that is not correct, and that one slip by everybody there. i was very enthusiastic about her, it about getting arrested "you used to get arrested in this country for talking about communists and all that," well, that is wonderful, louisiana, while you go live in iran or russia so you do not have a first amendment? as far as your topic, i am for the concept. i am sure there is a way to find it through payroll taxes, and the previous caller who was a tost-time caller, he seemed have a feel for it but did not want business to have anything to do with it. withnow, it begins business. if it is a leave from your job, why should business not have to be involved with it? goodness gracious, the cost

of administering it, oh, i do not know," they would love to put the bill on social security so they can drain that fund some more. i am sure that is a republican concept. but also, let's remember that in a social security or disability funding can be fixed immediately by raising the cap on the income that is taxed to find it, and that ronald reagan was the guy that corrected that with the democrat congress back in the 1980's. thank you so much, and have a great day. host: let's go to william, who was calling from riverdale, georgia. good morning. caller: good morning. fella there, he was on topic or what i cannot figure out, how come -- and i googled over 50ow come countries in the world can fund

six months of paid maternity leave? it is amazing to me that this is country in the world and they cannot figure it out. here is the reason why -- they do not want to figure it out. the president even said he loves poorly educated people, and that is our problem. they are very poorly educated, and they do not want to know the truth. these billion is an millionaires, they want to keep their money and are not want to spread it around. thank you. host: let's go to murray calling from san antonio, texas. murray, good morning. caller: good morning. yeah, i agree with the lady from colorado, she was saying that maybe family leave for pets. i just want to say hey, welcome to the united states, democratic socialism. theknow, we all pay into pot, and that is how it is.

host: let's go to kevin, who is calling from south bend, indiana. kevin, you're part of a working family. what do you think of this topic? caller: i just wanted to say that the biggest problem is people abusing it. the family medical leave act, it is known around as friday-monday leave act, where i am from in indiana, and more of my biggest points is it should not come from social security. we need to find a way to fix social security, not big deeper into it. host: would you be in favor of the payroll tax idea? caller: no, i would not. i think each individual needs to find a way to take care of that on his own. the family medical leave act protecting your job is more than enough. host: let's go to jeff, who is calling from kentucky.

jeff, you are also part of a working family. what do you think of this topic? caller: i do not like it. i agree with kevin, the previous caller. theink they should fund family leave themselves. it should not be up to other taxpayers. host: what do you think about using family leave to take care of an elderly parent? do you think that is a good idea? but it should not be funded through our social security taxes. host: have you ever had to use the good morning. during your career -- have you ever had to use the family medical leave act during your career? caller: no, sir, i have not carried host. host: are you in favor of a paid family leave medical leave act in the u.s., or do you think that is going to far? caller: i think it is going to far. , who ist's go to herb

calling from jamestown, maryland. what do you think about this? caller: i think the republican senators, they need to keep their fingers off of social security, because we have people aving here in north dakota on fixed income, and they cannot afford a meal. i am on social security and ssi. i go off of it, i will be on the street begging. nor should they use it for family medical leave. the company should pay for it. host: are you in favor of the increase payroll tax that the democrats are pushing for? [no audio] not in favor of it. if they take money out of their pockets, like mitch mcconnell, multimillionaire, if you take money out of his pocket and put in social security, we

would probably have enough in social security. who: let's go to pete, is calling from south carolina. good morning, pete. caller: good morning. i am ok with the medical leave program, but my suggestion is it should be paid by a separate payroll tax, no contribution by the business, and every year that the program is reevaluated percentageset the configured so that the percentage keeps self funding without any need of the congress to get involved in it, it should be run by a separate trust the group that is not beholden to congress, because they have not onn able to fix the funding social security, so they would never be able to fix this

program, so self funding, rates reset every year, and i say it would be ok. host: andrew biggs is the former principal deputy to the commissioner under george w. bush. at this hearing, he discussed the problems that face paid family leave. [video clip] many large employers already offer paid parental leave and order to attain and employees.lo self-employed and get economy workers also lacked paid leave, so there is room to make public policy for paid parental leave more widely available here and there are some protesters some proposals would finance greatly three payroll tax. the political reality as many americans would not favor such attacks, in particular those who could not or would not take

rental leave and therefore be forced to subsidize those who do. likewise, saying that an leave,r should pay for they often react by reducing wages or hiring fewer eligible. this would hurt women of childbearing age. setting aside money to pay for it, while i do not oppose, and young workers often have low income, often carry student loans, and may not have time to save for when a child arrives. in an article for the "wall kristinournal," ms. schapiro and i offered ideas to work around this. should be able to use social security benefits -- should be able to use social and take itefits

later. they could do it across my 25 weeks hire than common law. it would not prevent a person from claiming benefits as early as 62 but does result in a benefit that is about 3% lower than it otherwise would be. it is easy to conclude that any reduction in future retirement benefits is unacceptable, however, if paper and to leave -- paid parental leave produces anything like what was done in california, the higher earnings could boost benefits more than enough to make up for the increase in a normal retirement age. host: let's go to linda, who is calling in from michigan. linda, good morning. caller: good morning. 1971 andd my son's in 1972, back then, you had to quit at six months, but i went to the unemployment office at the first one. at that time, they did not give it to me for unemployment, but then i got a check a couple of years later from unemployment.

let's go to tom, who is calling in from rutland, vermont. tom, you are a business owner. what is your ideas on this? theyr: i think right now, should leave it the way it is. the old can sign up for welfare if they do not want to go to work. if they need time off and they need money, they can go to the state, and the state will help them out the businesses, as you can see, there are storefronts closed everywhere, and small businesses are already hit hard lowgh, and the wages are so right now that people cannot toord to save in most cases take time off from work, and then we have the welfare system that they can rely on, you know. host: tom, how many employees do you have? have you ran into any problems with employees taking family leave? caller: no.

have is people bringing their family problems to work with them. host: let's go to surely, who is calling from schneider, texas. shirley, good morning. caller: good morning. hef people thought about people coming in from other countries? kids, those children, they all use social security and medicare, and i think that it should be left alone. it was not set up for every tom, dick, and harry. i am 81. when president roosevelt set this up, it was not set up to all of this. he set it up for all of the wars. thank you very much. host: before you go, are you in favor of the family medical

leave act, and are you for paid family leave, or do you think this is something that people should pay for on their own? caller: host: i think we lost shirley. let's go to cynthia who is calling from hendersonville, north carolina. you're part of a working family. what is your idea? caller: i suggest they leave social security alone. i had to take a medical leave of absence. my mother had bone cancer, and i had to take care of her. leave social security alone. i have blessed that i got the to take care for, but we survived with the family. i did not get paid for that. my coworkers all took up a fund for me to help me out during that time, and i think it is a personal responsibility. i worked for small businesses

that did no could not afford to when i took off. and i agree with the caller before, the 81-year-old, let's leave social security alone. that is my response. jeremiah, who to is calling from birmingham, alabama. what is your opinion on all of this? caller: i am not a business owner, but i talked with business owners. paid family leave is the responsibility of the people that plan to have babies. companies, if they want to do this on their own to attract more qualified and long-standing employees, that is up to the company, but ultimately, all of this stuff is passed on to us, the consumers, and i do not like it. and as far as welfare is concerned, it certainly needs to

be revamped. if you are not an old person or have a serious medical issue, then you should be given a to have welfare, offered educational opportunities, at least a two-year college, and go into a field that you can get a job, and then give them one year to get a job. you have people in this country, is building all over the country, brand-new housing puts peopleon eight workingnities where people themselves cannot afford to live. host: let's go to rosie who is calling from pottsville, pennsylvania. rosie, good morning. caller: good morning.

i am calling about social security. i worked all my life, i had my kids without social security. my husband had to pay for it. don't these pregnant women that you are talking about get support from their spouses or their boyfriends? everybody is living free. they are getting free cars, they are getting free money, they do not have to work. it is really sad. i won some money, and they took my social security away. i work so much all my life, and then they take it away. host: let's go to do joanne, who is calling from milwaukee. caller: i believe they should leave social security alone. i have worked since i got out of

i started, in 1978, and we paid into get. host: are you still there, joanne? caller: yeah, i am here. host: are you in favor of the family medical leave act? do you believe there should be paid family leave to take care of children and elderly adults? caller: oh, sure. i paid into a fund for that. we had it through our insurance, we had a leave that you could take. so i do not understand why they want to touch social security. that is for when you retire or if some inhabitants to you. i mean, they -- or if something happens to you. i mean, they need to leave that alone. they do not need to mess that up. thank you. host: thank you. coming up, "the daily "'s nick allen and

"ströer news publishing's" fabian reinbold discuss nato this week on newsmakers, which airs today at 10:00 and 6:00 p.m., the alliance for justice. the brettabout kavanaugh nomination. what does the timing do for both parties into the term? timing works for us. and i think it works for us because this is an opportunity for the supreme court to be a all of then in elections. which is a critically important conversation.

-- 26 talked a lot about it. one candidate didn't talk so much. will be an opportunity in candidates for house races and senate races -- to really talk about what the stakes are in an election. and the stakes for the supreme court. obviously, a presidential election is even more important because who is elected president name justices and judges to the lower court. but i also think if you take a look back in history a little bit. many years ago, 1986. there was one republican senator. great gorton. he was set to vote against daniel many in for a seat on the

circuit court of appeals but at the last moment, he changed his mind and voted for him and gorton lost his seat that year. if you look back to anita hill or clarence thomas after the bruising fight and hearing, a number of democrats who voted , they faced thomas a hostile crowd back home. in georgia, he lost his race. for trying tos up be reelected to a seat. and he lost his seat over this issue. so voters are paying attention, particularly at the supreme court level. and because there is so much ,ore engagement and excitement

at least on the progressive side, i think that will be a huge issue. host: nick allen, what was the most notable thing about the summit this week? trump, for a start. allies were somewhat shocked by the tone he took at the start. the outright demands to pay more. people in europe very nervous. because he didn't seem to commit to nato in the way that the u.s. has in the past. whenost notable thing is he said they didn't go to 2% gdp funding, he would be prepared to go it alone and that was a discrepancy over the wording he

used. but that was taken by some as an implicit threat. calling nato obsolete during the election, repeatedly. it sent shivers down the spines of his allies in europe. reinbold, what was the reaction in europe? to some of the statements trump made? did he blow up the alliance? germany, it was shock and disbelief. although the relationship has been rocky over the last 1.5 week thatwas in this many germans woke up to the fact that trump is specifically targeting germany and the german government. and we had a poll that came out on friday that has only 9% of

germans say that the u.s. under trump is still a reliable security partner. 89% said no. it is a major threat for germans right now. host: we want you to join the conversation. we will open up the phone lines to discuss the nato summit and the upcoming russian summit. democrats, (202) 748-8000. republicans, (202) 748-8001. independent callers, (202) 748-8002. if you are outside the united states, we want to hear from you at (202) 748-8003. you can also always reach us on social media and twitter and c-span. now, how are we able to see that

trump was relating personally from what we saw in the summit? we know that he had a relationship with emmanuel macron. not so much with angela merkel and theresa may. theyeir previous meetings were not long meetings. side meetings. and they didn't initially click at all. who what we know of people are friends with trump, he was expecting theresa may to be a kind of margaret thatcher failure to his ronald reagan and it didn't happen. and he described her as being docked camera ready but it changed by the looks of it. .hey had 1.5 hours together talking through the problems of the palace.

he was very pleased with his dinner. he got to sit in winston churchill's chair and the president himself described his encounter with theresa may as great and they got to know each other a lot better, personally. and personal relationships are important. and it seemed to come out from the u.k. perspective, they got well.lly host: trump is also claiming that he is getting nato allies to pay more on defense. is that true? guest: a good question. i don't think we see proof of that at all right now. chancellor merkel has said we need -- germany needs -- to look at if it can do more than what it has already announced that it

will be doing. increasing defense spending until 2024. but i don't see that she has commitment.ete host: let's go to our phone. we go to michael. good morning, we can hear you. caller: i think you guys in the 2%ia need to explain paying more to the people. because a lot of people don't understand when they say that the united states is paying for other countries. and it is expensive. that is true. has army baseses in other countries because as .nformation they need information which is why they have the army bases

there. nato, the countries in which is the one that is most likely to go to war? it is the united states. the united states goes to war, they send their armies to the united states. we pay with blood and sweat and tears. you need to explain this to people. is moreher country likely to go to war? nobody. guest: it is worth explaining the funding of nato. there is obviously the goal of inting 2%, which was around 2006 and it has formalized since 2015. everyone is supposed to pay 2% of gdp.

as pointed out, the u.s. is the global power. if youough it does -- add up and look at different countries budgets, you see the overall cost of nato, the u.s. pays 600 something of that. however, the money that the u.s. pays isn't just for the defense of europe, it is for u.s. interests around the world. so on that basis there is a disagreement over how much the u.s. has graduated to nato. yes, if you compare each country budget but as was pointed out, that is a global military operation. criticized directly a business deal between germany and russia during the nato summit. here is a little bit. when germany makes a massive

deal and germany pays billions of dollars a year to russia -- we are protecting germany and france and all of these countries. and numerous other countries make a pipeline deal with russia. they are paying billions of dollars to russia and i think that is in the rear. and the former chancellor of germany is the head of the theline company supplying gas. ultimately, germany will have almost 70% of their country controlled by russia with natural gas. you tell me, is that appropriate? it should have never been allowed to have happened. but germany is controlled by russia. because they will be getting

60-70% of their energy from russia with a new pipeline. you tell me if that's appropriate. i think it's not. host: what was the reaction? guest: it was quite a statement by the president. angela merkel put it in a nice way, she said that growing up in east germany, i totally know what it feels like to have germany controlled by russia. and this is not a we are experiencing now. like i said. germany. the tough for because this is what trump has been doing over the past week. he mixes it all up in an attack on germany. and migration and energy deals and trade deficits. so you take hit after hit. and it is hard for germany at the moment. let's go to kevin who is

calling from london. caller: i am phoning in about your presidents behavior recently. attackse arrives, he the allies of nato. united, wegether, can stand up to russia. but if nato is divided that we have no chance. , we are this president feeling in europe frightened because this man is not reliable. goodsn't even got the manners to keep his mouth shut, quoting what she said. your president is immature and arrogant and dangerous. don't forget that the british people paid through the world sewed don't quote americans on what you pay and what you

don't. we pay our share. and in the last week, britain sent 400 more troops to support american troops. toare doing ally and we try be your friend but your president is making it very difficult. europe is concerned. this is an episode in the long history of the special relationship. as you heard, there is a lot of anger in britain. time. isn't the first winston churchill coined the term and there have been low points before. there was the iraq war. processou look at the in the u.k., they were not on the scale of the iraq war protests when tony blair decided that was our future with the u.k.

the protests were big. moments a very difficult in the relationship and i think a lot of the people in person be lastinghere will damage. it is hard to say. this will continue. host: let's go to chris who is calling from reston, virginia. tired of am sick and paying for the socialist government in europe with our money. they have early retirement and all of the good things. of the security of europe and we are tired of that. -- that way they could learn something. john callingo to from france.

thank you for calling. say that would like to trump is a disgrace. he's disrespectful. and the reputation of the usa has been destroyed by the actions of trump. talks about costs and payment, he ought to remember that the european lives have been lost helping america fight isis. in afghanistan and the middle east. europe has done much more for world peace then he gives europe credit for. and i'm sorry that the united states has been unfortunate enough to elect a president like him. host: does europe feel underappreciated by the united

states? guest: probably we do because there are so many areas where we cooperate for mutual interest. and america does have a strong interest or always used to have, the liberalbeing of democracies in western europe. for the benefit of trade. the benefit of security or the benefit of having allies. for addressing global issues and right now, the sentiment in germany and europe is that although we consider friends with united states, maybe the current president doesn't have that concept anymore of friends and enemies. but everyone is more or less a competitor. we want you to join the conversation. democrats, you can join at (202) 748-8000. republicans, (202) 748-8001. .uests, (202) 748-8002

outside the united states, we want you to call in at (202) .48-8003 let's go to virginia who is calling from pennsylvania. first, i want to say that we love trump. that the first president has stood up to europe and told them they have to pay out. and if they think that because he did that that he isn't a good president then they are very mistaken. the american people have been upset and serious at our countries of porting all these deadbeats. who want protection but don't want to pay for it. they should be ashamed of themselves. the whole european union.

that's a disgrace. let's go to paul calling from indianapolis. i think one of the problems that people have with understanding this issue is that you have to go a little bit into the weeds. i know most people don't like to do that. but what you have to look at is what people spend their defense money on. germany has only three divisions now. none of them are floyd doubled outside of germany. latest defensee analysis, 90% of nato pasta playable strength, the people to would actually have to go defend them would be english or canadian.r

-- the greeks say that they pay. but it is their pension system. this isn't a complete discussion when you talk about the percentage of gdp. you have to look at what capacity is being purchased with that money. and who actually takes the risk. if you talk about the german or french contributions for the fight in afghanistan, but if you want to see what they are doing then look at the combat casualties for afghanistan amountd to the amazing of combat casualties for the canadiens in afghanistan. or the australians. so you really can't just talk about the money. you have to do analysis. and as an additional point, i have a lot of friends in europe and we argue about this issue.

i have a lot of polish friends and the last thing they want is armed germans in poland. host: there are a lot of americans who think nato is past its prime. to think we're seeing that? guest: from the american perspective, the cold war is over. in reference to the2%, they do spend over 2%. and they have been a reliable ally. there is a commitment to nato because we don't know what putin is going to do. he has taken a and is in ukraine nato is not obsolete

because there is from russia. when the nato summit was over, trump announced that people had committed. he talked about four percent gdp now. so you can say that going into -- it wasputin is a weakened by his opening statement. but when i left, you could argue that nato was stronger. guest: when you look at 4%, if germany were to pay 4%, it would mean that germany would spend twice as much for its military van russia spends for theirs.

and that is something -- yes, we need to spend more. the russians don't want that. and germany's neighbor doesn't want that. host: let's go to nikki. i would like to respond to the two people from virginia. nato is protecting american interests. and to the woman that suggested that trump was the first person to ask people to up their contributions? it was obama who asked first. he asked country to raise their input up to 2%. and gave them a deadline. so maybe you guys could explain that to the people from virginia.

germany, a question. germany really ended, 70%-90% on russia oil? let's explain that truth there to the american people because they listen to trump instead of doing their own research. do theecond question is, nato budgets, the contribution to nato, does any of that go towards the cyber security that all of us are so desperately in need of regarding do attacks on the western countries? guest: it is a true about 70%. it is less than 40%. that the gasrue is pipeline between germany and russia is controversial in the european union.

but it is nowhere near as bad as they said. it shows us that germany needs quickly.more act more quickly ends the president of the united states for spreading these falsehoods. this is a moment where we need to find a group roche to public diplomacy and react much quicker. host: let's go to tony. caller: good morning. lastted to correct the because about what the president said he could people seem to lose the lines. relying for 70%?

ultimately, i suggest you google that. if germany was, allows russia to control the until something terrible happens in ukraine or outlying countries, how does germany then join in the sanctions. in crimea, in the coldest part of winter, when all putin would have to do is reduce the national gas? it is lunacy. not the best spokesperson for his ideas. to me how itplain

makes sense for a nato country to rely on russia for its economy security then maybe i will rethink my session. guest: it is and 39 percent of the energy. it is 39% of the gas. 9% that germany gets from russia. we are not dependent on russia. but it makes sense for germany to pursue the project because we have always dealt with russia even during the cold war. that is that something new. and second of all, when you look at the proposed type line -- proposed timeline, it makes sense because it is the cheapest gas you can get, much cheaper than what america would offer.

and also, i think that russia is much more dependent on exporting its gas to germany then germany .s dependent when we talk about independence imposedook at sanctions on russia after he crimea annexation, we have to say that it was angela merkel who led the way of that aggression. so i don't see that germany would be inhibited right it pipeline or policy. host: let's go to ray. from michigan. somebody thought that should remind the reporter from --many that there was

[indiscernible] thank you. host: one of the topics that trump brought up was immigration in europe. about whatittle bit he said. i think that europe is a place i know very well. what has happened is very tough. a tough situation. we see the same terror attacks. we just left some incredible showeden and women who the things that nobody 20 years ago even talked about. i just think that it is changing the culture. i think it is a negative thing for your. -- and iaving germany

have a great relationship with angela merkel. a great relationship. but i think that is very much her germany and other parts of europe. and i know it isn't politically -- not politically correct to say that but i will say that and i will say it loud. i think the better watch themselves. you are changing culture. look at what is happening. hade countries never difficulty -- it is a very sad situation. i don't think it is good for europe or for our country. far superior to anything that has happened. -- we are doing incredibly well considering we virtually don't have immigration laws. we have laws that are so bad that i'll even call them laws.

foot on the land and you are tied up in a lawsuit for five years. so why would make that recommendation to europe. i have made it loud and clear. i laid it yesterday to 29 countries total. theresa may immediately responded to trump's comment with her thoughts about immigration in the u.k.. u.k. has a proud history of welcoming people who flee persecution to our country. we have a history of welcoming people who want to come to our country and society. and overall, immigration has been good for the u.k.. it has brought people with different out books and backgrounds. is that weortant

have control of the borders. what is inc. -- what is important is that we control who country.o the that is what we have been doing and we will continue to do in the future. response toas the the comments by trump and theresa may? guest: it depends on who you ask. but that sums up in a nutshell. diverse city. that was a process process against trump. that the anger there goes back to the election campaign and the proposed travel ban. as that time, hundreds of thousands people signed against the ban. and that has lingered in the u.k..

britain wants to regain control of the orders. and in particular with , they want to go down to 100,000. said that this was the reason for there were many other recent as well. not least the amount of money that the u.k. paid. brexit wasment of getting that money back. the figure used in the campaign was that if you get the money that, you could spend 350 million pounds a week more on the national health service which needs it. so we saw this comments from the president but there is a

differing loop and -- differing of opinions. guest: immigration is a decisive decision back home. germany faces its challenges. challenges to do for those who cannot stay. so we have our problems and in europe it is a decisive issue. very hard for chancellor merkel to get the support for her perch. what is not correct and what i hear a lot in the united states is that the situation in germany and that crime is rampant? we know that crime in germany has been going down. so people react ray sensitively a partents, that is it

of the irritation between trump and merkel. .ost: let's go to henry good morning. to the i want to mention people that nato was put in place for the protection of the allow nuclearto leaders to. -- to not take place. but now with the white house turning their back on europe, i wouldn't put it past them to unite mightier than they are and -- becomeo cooler super nuclear powers who then turned their backs on the united states to protect themselves. it's a shame that an individual in the white house is thinking of enriching himself rather than americans and democratic institutions. from russia to germany, the

united states has and equal tong going on from mexico the united states in houston, texas. they have a pipeline with a transfer of oil and gasoline. same thing from canada to the united states. germany isn't the only one doing international trade. we have a mutual understanding as an attacket up against nato is an attack against all. clear on the september 11 attacks as the response. caller: thank you for taking my call. both of the guests who are here. thank you for being here.

we want you to know and take the people that we, 70% of us, we value our relationship with you and that 30%-40% support the more on in office. now ties with russia to the gas --uation, what about america america having ties with china, , china had over 3 trillion four $4 trillion of our debt. so what about that? that is a security risk. that, bet you to know patient with us. for roberting

mueller to come through with this because we know he is guilty. and we are registering to get out to vote to remove this idiot. please be patient with the 70%. nato should go for what is best for you guys. thank you for taking my call. host: one thing we haven't talked about is the summit between trump and putin. what do you expect out of this summit. ?etween trump and often guest: the key is that it is a one-on-one meeting. in diplomatic circles in europe about what will be said when trump and putin are alone in the room with interpreters. there are theories on that side there may be concessions to

russia made, without recognizing crimea as russian or whether it is an agreement to remove troops from syria. that.rump could offer or it is feasible that he could agree to stopping nato exercises in the baltic sea. again, wouldn't go down well with european allies. singapore, trump came out of his meeting with kim jong-un and revealed that he had agreed south korean europeanexercises, allies, asian allies and the pentagon -- it was news to them.

there is no business in european circles about what exact the he is going to put on the table. when he meets putin. than: more nervousness about the kim summit. this is a much bigger issue. there is a fear that there will europe iswhere he left out. and for germany, it is the question about ukraine and crimea. trump has hinted at different occasions that he might move towards recognizing the annexation of crimea. this is certainly something that chancellor merkel would be concerned about. trumpm sure she told about nato. if anybody else

sees the irony in trump saying that nato isn't paying their fair share? an "businessperson" who filed bankruptcy five times and, either way, mar-a-lago wanted 61 immigrants to work in their building. does anybody see the irony in all of this? or is it just me? i doubt it. go to joshua calling from new mexico. caller: i just wanted to say here,hese two people on none of them are americans but we are talking about nato and the u.s. summit. these people don't care.

who is the "these people?" the people on your show. they don't care about americans. they don't care about us. donald trump cares about us. trump puts america first. bro.t on, pat. let's go to by somei am disgusted of the callers who have called it. trump is the most inept president we've ever had and he's going to ruin all the good work that's been done over decades. and thank you to the two gentlemen on the show, i really am disgusted by that, just made.

i don't know what else to say. but i agree with that other lady that 70% of us will try to get rid of this guy that lives in the white house. because i was a democrat and i am now independent because i don't like what happened during the last election. we have messed up. i could use another word but i won't on national television. that is it for me. guest: thank you for the questions. as we talked before about the america isationship, hugely popular in the u.k.. we have had a long relationship. seeing with nato and the eu, there are disagreements. but at the end of the day, it disagreements -- hopefully we come out stronger in the long run. guest: what we haven't talked

--ut yet is the big question how can friends actually deal with. so far, we have seen that chancellor merkel has a laid-back approach. i think she thinks she can't convince him anyway so the other approach with president macron or president trudeau -- it hasn't worked out at all. he is a challenge. how can you actually tried to influence the american president and convince of the advantages of a strong alliance. davis calling to from texas. caller: this is one of those mornings where the predominance of your calls is on one side. trump -- of.s. once

the u.s. wants trump thrown out. much are we dependent on iran? 9%. if you watch the world economy when anything political happens, it causes the price of oil to go up. it doesn't take much. it doesn't take much to throw an economy into turmoil. 9% is huge. and that is going to get bigger. but it isn't that number in my mind. it is that you do a deal with to guys who you are looking protect you from. they did the same thing in 83 when reagan came over there.

the soviet middle range missiles. people protested all over europe, standing up to russia. this is the history of europe. and british signed a secret agreement. our president went to their side to try to create world peace. nothing happened. the world carved of what was left. the beginning of world war ii. germans contributed 1.2% of their economy to defense and what we contribute to nato or , that is a small piece of what the united states contribute to the overall

defense of europe. nash the block of other countries working with them. you depend on us to keep them out only to -- and we have helped. we helped to rebuild your and japan after the war. 120 aircraft carriers. the only nuclear weapons for years among any other countries -- we gave it back. conquestas the wave of and we don't get that much credit for it. thank you. you are right.

a lot of england -- a lot of about that.e right there is so much interdependency for hearing and germany. on the unitednt states. this is why there is so much at stake at the moment for germans. we are so interdependent with other major players. so there is appreciation for what america has done. but there is a lot of concern that america is turning its back on germany. host: is their concern about trade being affected between europe and the united states out of this summit. guest: yes. said he would stand up for america on trade. eu.e is a deficit with the

whether it is 100 or 150, that is open to interpretation. getting trade deficits down. agree with the strategy of the tariffs, that is what he is trying to do. eu side, this is something we have to deal with. will talk about these friends asked all caps, we are chasing the same dollars. from been -- from britain's if, the great hope is that the eu will get their own trade deal. and that will be a lot better to a betterill only economic future for us. go to cyrus calling

and spain. i think he said that if germany where to spend 2% of the gdp, they would spend twice as much as russia but that is misleading. secondly, comments about europe contributing to afghanistan. europe came in to say ok, let's do nationbuilding. andnow the troops are gone american troops are there to a small degree. and i would like to take the that inity to to say disagree with mike u.k. compatriots. -- i't like trump hostile don't like trump style. he said germany spent 4%.

that is what trump suggested in brussels. and this is also something for the germans. they didn't talk -- they didn't have as many casualties as americans but it is a big commitment. due to our history we have been very hesitant to engage in combat operations. and this is something that germans take pride in. that we are the second largest -- we sent the second-most troops into nato missions. and we play an important role in afghanistan. germany would love to have this recognized by trump. to dennis calling from massachusetts. guests'soth of your

need reminding that a recent document confirmed that the secretary of state james baker promised gorbachev in return for the dismantling of the war and solution of the warsaw pact, nato wouldn't expand any further eastward than the previous position. then we found out that nato invaded the former yugoslavia and poland and the baltic state. natohis encirclement where -- try to become part of nato. we see this in georgia. it is aggressive in this whole episode. and the credibility is up there with the sun, the mirror.

political have a funny cartoon section. guest: i appreciate the comment about the cartoon. it is very funny. you are right. nato has expanded several times. it started with 12 nations. now twice the size of that. so there is a worry getting in circles by nato that keeps getting pushed back. and that is why trump metals in other countries. so the question -- how do we in europe make ourselves safe from putin? part of that has been getting other nations into nato. you have a kill block that stops

wars tween those nations. in the long run that seems like a good thing. i would like to make a comment about how it worked before under barack obama. crimear when we promise that if they turned over their nuclear weapons we would reject them? do?what did big barack nothing. when there was a redline in syria? nothing. his spineless absence caused a lot of the problems in europe. why are you guys urinating for the days when we stood up for that. we did nothing and nato did nothing. so what is the use and spending the money on military forces if when something you say you are going to do, you don't do. you walk away from.

listen, if it all blows up, it all blows up. i blame the whole effectiveness -- if you say you're going to do something and you don't than what is the use? why do you spend the money. thank you for your comment. i think the annexation of crimea ,nd the war in ukraine shows us the europeans, that the threat is far from being over. maybe we are less concerned then we should have in. so you are right. the reaction was not strong. why a lot of people, especially trump and people in europe, have come to the conclusion that we need to do

more for our own defense regardless of what the president here is saying. it is a project that has been started in europe. so yes, i think that is true. thinkt necessarily everyone does want the days of barack obama back, but you are right. it did create big problems over there. bob. let's go to caller: i would like to point out elephant in the room that has been missed. this man in the white house has subsidiary of money from russia out of deutsche bank. everyone knows he can't get money from american banks. go riding hisg to finger at people. tosnubbed people like her one.

i called in a few months ago when they had a couple of professors on talking about russian relations. old-fashioned -- which is what happened during man,ast election and this putin, head of the kgb. and during that time and for people to be so naive -- like i mentioned then on that call, if a president of the united states had been depicted as behaving in the way that this man is behaving. there would have been calls for the men in uniform that i served office remove him from to face the firing squad. abouts his mouth immigration. and if you listen closely to the interview in the sun -- and i would advise all of you out there to listen to that and

listen closely, what he is upset about is that it is no longer ethnically. . and i'm not going to go there thehe talks about immigrants nonstop. his wife couldn't produce her documentation. she was going to have a press buterence to show the media they had to cancel that because she couldn't produce her documentation. and if you listen closely, like i said, to this interview in the sun, he doesn't understand accountability. he wants to keep his tacky apartment when we -- when he owes a billion dollars. it is funny that people who worship him think he is a marvelous businessman. what he was marvelous at was

defaulting on money and suing banks for money that he thought they owed him. guest: you mentioned the sun interview. that did -- that did have a big as far asthe u.k. and is whybusinessman, that a lot of people voted for him. bringing the executive approach to the u.s. economy. i will talk about the sun interview because it is worth impacting -- because it is worth mentioning. related of that really to exit. that --as interesting it was unusual for a foreign leader to come to the u.k. and say so forthrightly into a heated debate in host countries.

-- the mainsaid was take away from the interview -- he felt that theresa may post brexit was too soft. and she had redlined that she initially set out about brexit had softened. like there will be no relate in the european court -- there would be no role in the european court of justice. so, it is a very unusual thing for him to do, and it led to an apology. he did actually apologize to her for doing that, so that was a very interesting development. host: we would like to thank our guests nick allen and fabian reinbold for being here today.

coming up, author marc ambinder will talk about his new book, the brink," and the nuclear war scare. we will be right back. ♪ [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2017] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] tonight on "q&a," >> when she came back, she saw me in the aisle and tossed it to me. i said right then and there, i'm going to get that amendment ratified. >> gregory wasson, the man responsible for getting the 27th amendment to the constitution ratified. >> i was in the library in downtown austin, texas, and i came across a book that had a chapter, an entire chapter, devoted to an amendment that had passed congress, but not enough state legislatures had approved.

and this one jumped right out at me. law varying compensation for the services of the senators and representatives anyl take effect until election of representatives shall have intervened. i can remember standing in the aisle, holding that book in my hand, and it was as if lightning had struck. i could feel the pulsating, electricity of it all. and i thought, you know what? theead of writing about equal rights amendment and this disputed extension and its ratification deadline, why don't i instead write about this amendment? if members of congress want to object their salary, they have to wait for the next election. >> tonight at 8:00 eastern on

c-span's "q&a." >> washington journal continues. host: we are talking with marc ambinder, the author of the brink, president reagan and the nuclear war scare of 1983. what made you look at this topic specifically? guest: it goes back to a day in 2011 when i was awoken by a source who told me that a flight down, andhad gone lost their connectivity with command, and that peaked my interest about nuclear command and control and i wrote about i was castingd through history when the nuclear command-and-control system seemed to be at odds with what policymakers wanted, and came across this fascinating series of events in 1983 that still had

a number of and answered questions to go along with them, primarily, delete come that close -- primarily, did we come that close to nuclear war? if so, why and how? and what lessons could we take from that incident and apply them to what is going on now? years, it took about 4.5 and i think, at least to my satisfaction, i have answered most of those questions, and now i want to try to help communicate those answers to others. host: exactly how close did we come to nuclear disaster in 1983? guest: let's go to november 8, 1983. this was the most dangerous moment in the middle of a nato wargame. it was a nuclear command post exercise where the united states practiced releasing its warheads to germans and other countries

who had the actual artillery that would be you flues -- that would be used in invasion backed by the soviet union. on that night, i'm announced to the united states -- on that the unitedknownst to mid rangee soviet ballistic missiles were on three minute combat alert. nuclear weapons across the soviet union had been dispersed. at a soviet union military academy in moscow, you were confined to your base, and sleigh,most nominative the equivalent of icbms, officers were send down with their weapons ready essentially launcht who refused execute orders. what is scary is not that these are her so thin that happened,

is that the u.s. did not know. to not broadcast and if the soviet union was that nato was going to use his exercise as a pretext to some first nuclear strike. so, we were pretty close. not as close as we were during the cuban missile crisis, but that crisis, the difference was, leaders were very much aware of how close we were at almost all moments. in this case, the countries were backing for nuclear conflict without intending to. host: we want you to join his conversation. we will open up the phone lines. democrats can call 202-748-8000. republicans can call in at 202-748-8001. and independents, you can reach us at 202-748-8002. and you can always reach us on and onmedia on twitter

facebook. now, why don't we know as much we been toldt about the 1983 scare as we have been with the cuban missile crisis? guest: a couple of reasons. the cuban missile crisis forms the paradigm of how we think about nuclear crises, which are political leaders having direct control over the weapons. as we later learned, there was a lots -- there were lots the u.s. did not know. case, a lot of the material has been highly classified because it involves very sensitive government equities, and it involves spy games and espionage wars and electronic warfare. and it has taken a number of researchers. and whenever i am talking about the book, i have to thank the people at the national security archives in washington, d.c.,

part of george washington university in particular, with nate jones to get some of these documents. the other reason is that you have a full accounting that has not been told because so many people have never told this years or realized 10 later, that they were a part of some practice -- or realized 10 years later that they were a part of some exercise. i say, do you remember this happening? and they say, yeah, that makes sense. as a historian, i had to put it all together and discover the truth in the gaps, sort of speak. 1983 is not too recent, but recent enough. a lot of the classification restrictions are still in place, and a lot of the systems we use for nuclear command control and intelligence are some of the same ones we used for icbm. the u.s. still doesn't like to talk about massive intelligence

failures of which this was one of them. from let's go to joe florida on the democratic line. joe, how are you doing? caller: i am fine. good morning. i was stationed in germany in 1983, and i actually participated. guest: tell me about that, please. please tell me your experience. caller: it was just for us, another routine exercise. during the cold war, we had many exercises. one, andjust another we went through the whole exercise. i mean, i was not on the front lines, i was administration, but i geared up like everybody else. and honestly, i did not know that we were that close to actually confronting the , or even having to go

into combat with them, until i was back in the states. and years later, watching the history channel, and they , andoned that launcher that it could have led us into a full war with russia. and i remembered that, i was there. now you are talking about it and it is bringing back memories. i spent my last years in the military in the nato headquarters in heidelberg. we did exercises, two joint exercises with all of these different scenarios. and if i had known that able launcher was as close as we ever came to an actual war with russia, the nose other exercises would have been a little more realistic for me, too.

guest: thank you so much for your recollections. when you have spoken to is part of what makes this so horrifying. which is that people who were participating on both sides were participating in good faith. of course, it was from a nato's interest to practice the transfer of the nuclear warhead and the communications procedures and order to do so safely because you are doing that you are dealing with extreme he powerful weapons -- because you are dealing with extremely powerful weapons. it was there he hard for the u.s. -- it was very hard and nato to construct these afterwards, but they were on alert and on their standby strips ready to fly at a moment's notice. and there were reconnaissance planes three times as normal over the soviet union. , they decided to

disperse of much of their nuclear weapons, all of which nato did not pick up. if you had known that, they would have, and i'm speaking in retrospect to some of the people who design the exercise, they went up modified the exercise very, very quickly. that is one of the lessons is how imperfect our intelligence can be, but how vital it is to inform our decision-making when it comes to nuclear signaling because we are dealing with weapons that nobody wants to use. jive withlection does a lot of the recollections of what people told. this was a regular exercise to them. and it was intense living in germany versus the united states. a little more tense, i think you would agree, but it wasn't until years later that many participants of able launcher

realized what they have participated in. host: marc, who knew and who did not hear? was it the command-and-control people on the ground to new and the people and the air did not know? guest: virtually no one knew. the senior intelligence pg since 1982the km were on a permanent a silence -- were on a permanent assignment, looking for signs that the united states and nato were preparing for a first nuclear strike. beforeout that fall and that, they received a number of signs. and a computer that they were using to assign weights to various signs and signals to the enemy were preparing for nuclear war. this computer they were using kept increasing the percentage. in this computer's estimation,

you could call it a very, very, antiquated process preparing for a strike. members of the soviet strategic rocket forces new at a certain knew at a certain level. a general knew-- and recalls being dispersed to his wartime location, secret wartime location, outside of moscow, with a number of nuclear missiles ready to hit the go button if he ever received the message. both -- with -- within within both of the nato and united states establishments, most of that information were

kept highly compartmentalize and there were a lot of rivalries and different interpretations of what the enemy was up to, so there really wasn't an agreement. in fact, there still isn't about how scary it was, or would have been at the time. so, that is one of the reasons what putting it together now, trying to unmask all of the allence -- trying to amass of the evidence that has been declassified, is something that the archives that george washington has been working on, and can contribute a more historical answer to that question. host: part of what -- part of it was neither side knew much about the other. to the russians, the american president seemed welled briefed, but not well-informed -- seemed well will-informednot -- but not well-informed.

was it the fact that neither side really seem to have good information about what the either side knew? were two main, if you could call it, horrific mistake, that both sides made when it came to the processing of information and intelligence. i think both the soviets and the west, and i will include nato. when i say the americans, i am including nato. they assumed that their intelligence was better than it was. and they assumed that the adversary would react to certain inputs in the way they would have to it. this is a classic fallacy known as the mirror imaging fallacy. and both sides fell victim to it. what reduced the tensions, and this is, you know, the second

half of the book was, particularly, on the american side, president reagan and others, being jarred out of that mindset, and really, really trying to understand what it was about their activities that were making the soviets nervous. and reagan putting himself in the shoes of the soviet leaders in the soviet military establishment, and tampering his rhetoric, finally realizing that this still clear establishment that is ruling the earth that both sides are enthralled to, the only ones who can contain it are presidents interacting on a one-on-one basis. company had i sat the confidence to go into a room and sit down with officials. and then when the soviets had a , heier, such as gorbachev

was ready, but he was ready because he has studied history, and he had broken through that mirror imaging mindset, you really understand the limitations of the intelligence he had been given by his intelligence community, but also he developed a new appreciation think ofsoviets would basic policy moves, that in the past, he would not have given a second thought to. there was an empathy to this political character that i do not think he is often given credit for, but i think it's truly a -- one of his more underappreciated characteristics as a president. host: here is what of some of what that here is -- here is what reagan said on this policy in 1983. >> we sought to reduce the risk

of war by producing a strong deterrent and seeking arms control. deterrence means simply this -- making sure any adversary who thinks about attacking the united states or our allies or interests concludes the risks to him outweigh any potential gains. once he understands that, he won't attack. we maintain the peace to our strength. weakness only invites aggression. the strategy of deterrence has not changed. it still works. but what it takes to maintain deterrence has changed. it took one kind of military force to deter an attack when we had far more nuclear weapons than any other power. it takes another kind, now that the soviets for example, have enough accurate and powerful nuclear weapons to destroy our missiles on the ground. this is not to say that the soviet union is planning to make war on us, nor do i believe a war is inevitable. quite the contrary.

what must be recognized is that our security is based on being prepared to meet all threats. after ablechanged archer for the united states and the soviet union? guest: i will get to that in one second. was from we just heard the speech of president reagan gave announcing the strategic defense initiative, which was -- globalas a concept for a space-based defense system against icbm. deathbed,, to his sincerely believed, and there is no evidence to the contrary whatsoever that he had a differing view of this -- truly believed that the u.s. would develop this as a defensive shield and would share the technology with the soviet union, and this would contribute to lasting world peace. a completelyook

differently because u.s. nuclear doctrine, as reagan referenced obliquely in that speech, had matured to a point where the u.s. believed it could not only fight and win a nuclear war, but prevent the soviets from using what the soviets knew as their second strike capacity. so, if deterrence, as president reagan mentioned, as having some equivalence that would prevent each side from launching the weapons at the others, the soviets came to believe that by that point, the u.s. was far ahead of them in terms of technology, and that the doctrine advanced to a much more aggressive point. so, you asked what changed? it took a while when the u.s. intelligence community receive the signs and signals that something had happened. but one of the main consequences was that at least beginning in 1985, and lasting through the

true end of the cold war, the u.s. and the soviet union, whenever they would exercise him and exercised quite frequent, they warned themselves in advance and gave each other detail of what they were doing. in particular, the navy stopped very aggressive exercises, that were designed specifically for this new, aggressive deterrent that reagan was talking about. so, there were policy accommodations made in order to account for soviet fears. but these strategic defense initiative is reviewed within the soviet union and could have been one of several things. for example, there were intelligence report that postulated that the u.s. had developed some secret weapons to completely disable the soviet nuclear commanding -- command and control center. the u.s. had developed those weapons, but were not based on satellite. this was an example again where

president reagan was proposing something that, in his mind, no rational, sane person could possibly reject. but the soviets saw it very, very differently. so he had to the extent possibly, break out of that mirror imaging in order for two negotiations to proceed. and again, to his credit, he did without losing sight of his ultimate goal, which was to rid the world of the threat of communism. it is fascinating. any time reagan talked about communism, he would talk about the effect on children and it really touched him in that deep way. and to reduce the threat of nuclear annihilation. thateagan succeeded and certainly -- and reagan succeeded in that certainly in a second term in office. host: let's go to paul calling

from smyrna, tennessee. good morning. caller: good morning. drills hadng these happened before in previous years? which --what makes this one different? did someone just close their eyes are shut their ears? we have had nuclear weapons for 50 years. to theif you think back 1980's -- if you think back to 1983, there were certain broad level things, one of which was the soviet union was spinning between 60% to 70% of its gross domestic product on defense. we talk specifically about nato defense spending and how the u.s. spends 4% of our gdp on defense. the soviets were spending 70 percent of their gdp on defense. of their gdp on defense and were at the breaking point of the deployment of troops, and technologically

in terms of the quality of weapons they had. andr leaders were dying there was a very optimistic and fairly aggressive american president, who had committed to increasing hundreds of billions of dollars in u.s. defense spending. there was a1983, thats of scary incidents you might recognize some of them, there was a shoot down of the permian airliner -- shootdown of the korean airliner jet because of a simple technological error thrown into their territory. there was a massive glitch in the soviet satellite in the control warning network where it seemed, for a terrifying period from minutes, five icbms the united states were flying at the soviet territory. but that was just the reflection -- but it turned out it was just

the satellite picked up. and there were more massive and aggressive exercises the u.s. was conducting. the soviets felt that they were at a unique point of weakness and the military doctrine. today within the correlation of forces had turned against them. so they felt very vulnerable at that moment. and in isolation, these incidences might not have contributed to something approaching able archer. but when put together, and when with the mindset of many soviet leaders, not all, let many, you can begin to see how heldises like the one nato in november of 1983, might have scared the soviets to a point where they would want to hedge against the possibility of a first nuclear strike, and that meant deploying their own troops. at any start to do that, they start to hedge against each other, the risk for accidental

nuclear conflict grows exponentially, and that is where we were in 1983. that is a great question though. host: let's go to fred calling from florida on the republican line. good morning, fred. caller: thank you. i think president obama and president trump knows that had not --nato i don't think the united states would ever use nuclear weapons against russia. the american people would not support this. i think it is like a president trump is talking to mr. putin. . thank you --thank you. host: are there parallels between 1983 and today? ofst: with one exception what the caller said, i think everything he said was correct. but nato countries by virtue of

article five of article five and commitment to the alliance, are obligated to defend each other if there is an attack from russia. course, nato's doctrine has always relied on it using nuclear weapons. right now, it has about 150 forical weapons in a bunker a conventional attack. it is really hard to imagine that in the end, if the attack thereymmetric, and if were 5000 russian troops that tried to take some territory back to the nato would respond with nuclear weapons. i completely agree with the caller. i am not sure what president trump is meeting with president putin, although it would be of the line items on the agenda, aside from talking about the election

interference, was a discussion of a new start treaty. the one we have expires in 2020. , it would bely greater president trump pressed president putin on russian violations of the nuclear force treaty. those were the missiles that managed nato in 1983. it is not clear what is on president trump's agenda. the white house has been perhaps not surprisingly, very short on a specific, but i think the caller's sense of what the american people would be willing to count in terms of nuclear weapons and forced to defend nato countries from certain types of russian innovations is probably correct. politics,ntally, nato and remember, i was listening to callers who called good the last

hour making this point essentially, i mean, nato -- you canave never go back years and years -- there has never really been a point in which nato was entirely unified at all. and of course, when nato was about to deploy missiles to respond to russian missiles in 1983, as one of the callers in the last hour pointed out, there were massive protests throughout germany. in fact, there were massive protest inside of the united states, and reagan, his party lost seats in the election because of a nuclear peace movement, of which barack obama led part of it at columbia university in 1982. but it became very powerful. and probably callers who are familiar with this time in history refers to this as reagan's evil empire speech. the reason he gave that speech

was to rally domestic political support behind the idea of a strong deterrent that is raised on a strong unified nato with u.s.les, and an increase military defense budget that get rely on that their weapons as part of a deterrent. the caller's points are very apt. n.st: let's go to lyn caller: good morning. able archer typically was a collection of drills, right? simulations,tiple drills, exercises, wargames, and they are highly compartmentalized, typically people who are involved in one drill may not know of the simultaneous joe going on in the military -- simultaneous drill going on in the military. septembere remember

11. there were workings going on at the national reconnaissance office simulated, the crash of a small playing into a building. -- there were two others a simulated hijacking of domestic airliners, of all things. if you were on the military -- onyou were in the military september 11, 2001, congratulations, you helped implement the most false flag psychological operation in american history. host: were you in the military? caller: no, but i have quite a few friends who work stationed in places like andrews air force base on the morning of 9/11 and new there were combat ready squadrons. the president was flying in and out of florida. they knew there was some kind of

stand down call, maybe the whole thing was faked. and we know the buildings were demolished in manhattan. that was quite an accomplishment, too, to make that look like a natural attacked -- to make it look like an actual attack. drills are a great way to freak out a population to make them do anything. like to stabilize a war. these drills and exercises are the most efficient way to conduct falls psychological operations and anybody in the military understands this. there is an interesting point embedded in the caller's response. 9/11 was not a false operation. of -- 9/11t a part was a terrorist attack on the

united states, however, one of the reasons why the soviets back in 1983 were so suspicious of nato exercises was because the soviets would often use exercises as a cover for their own military maneuvering. caller'sded what the narrative was, there is a kernel of truth, which is countries have used exercises in the past because when you're exercising, you are deploying troops. if you are an alien looking down at a military exercise, you don't know whether it is a preparation for the real thing, or an exercise. that is one of the reasons why it is a very seductive and fairly easy and efficient way to try and trick your adversary. and again, you can call it the standard soviet. i'm for its own -- you can call it the standard soviet -- just a put a very fine point on it, in no way was september 11 a

false flag attack and i feel compelled to say that be in washington that he and experiencing that. callingt's go to don from st. joseph, missouri. how are you doing today? caller: not bad, not bad. people don't realize it, but right now, we're in a situation that makes the cuban missile crisis look like kindergarten recess. [laughter] n keeps butting up against israel, israel will not put up with anything any longer after the holocaust. they will not be removed from their land. so you know, something could fire off and we would all be gone. that is all i have to say. terms of an area of the world were i think is most vulnerable, and that is to me a

conflict which could lead to a nuclear exchange, without question. i still worry about pakistan. i worry about the safety of security of their nuclear weapons. i worry because we have seen it just this week but the political instability and the terrorist attacks. and there have been terrorist attacks against nuclear weapon'' depots. -- as they are as secure insecure as we believe they are, a single explosion could set off dozens of weapons in the vicinity. no one would know who cost them. and you could react and you can sell me have a conflict in that part of the world. in terms of the possibilities are probabilities of a lack swan even -- of a black swan event like that happening, it could be.

it is for the u.s. to know what control mechanisms that other countries have, of the things that pakistan, from their perspective and rightly terrified about is that the u.s. relies on missile heavily because they have secret plans to steal pakistan's nuclear weapons if it ever gets too tense. host: the no about the cuban missile -- we know about the cuban missile crisis and now we know about 1983 because of your book. are there any other new we were scares between those two points that you can share, or even since then? guest: there have been a number of times throughout history where new year brinksmanship has thate a concrete reality citizens, not necessarily inside the united states, but another parts of the world, have had to deal with.

in 1973, the u.s. went to devcon three to prevent the soviets from resupplying israel during the practice over the juncker poor war. several occasions were president next 10 directed the joint chiefs of staff to make it seem like the u.s. was on the verge of some weird first strike in order to deter either china or russia. still not exactly clear, from making some moves in indochina. i just finished reading a new biography of president at howwer who was amazed he considered the use of tactical weapons in korea. head,ff the top of my again, we have a false sense of

security because there has only been one occasion, two bombs used by the u.s. in the waning months of world war ii, where nuclear weapons had been deployed. we have this falls sense of security that they will never be deployed again because no one would dare do them. but the history of our diplomacy is replete with examples of u.s. president does threatening others with nuclear accidents. about ate in his book tightened missile accident in damascus. in texas, there were live nuclear missiles transported accidentally across the united states and nuclear weapons seven dropped into oceans across the country. about the learning cuban missile crisis and how fidel castro was begging for permission to launch nuclear strikes against florida just

because he felt that this would be the only time he could do so, so the more we learn about history, the more frequent we began to learn about these types of incidents. i will give one example from fairly recent history, the transference of power during -- from gorbachev to yeltsin and briefly when there was an attempt by old guard members of thekpmg to take over remnants of the soviet union, in thelear football soviet union disappeared for a period of time in the u.s. had no idea what the nuclear command and control arrangements were, which is a very scary thing in 1991. these things happen more frequently we know. i bet we will hear more about them is the here more about history. host: let's go to jerry on the republican line.

good morning, jerry. caller: good morning. i was just wondering, i worked .n field jobs i was just wondering, i know that the materials are highly classified. about the wondering highly classified stuff that came out of -- thank you. guest: a lot of it remains classified because a lot of the techniques that were used during that time are still used by various agencies of the department of defense. area number of documents declassified, and i spoke to a number of analysts who worked with those techniques and able to share details of it, the caller is correct. a lot of that information

remains classified and remains in archives, and probably won't be declassified for quite some time, although researchers like myself and others are working legitimately through the freedom thehe information act and mandatory declassification review process, to try to get the historically-important documents declassified. but serving, we are sensitive to exist city -- we are sensitive to existing national security. and understandably, a lot of processes in class remain classified. host: let's go to stan from pennsylvania on the independents's line. good morning. caller: good morning. this is david, not stand. good morning, marc. you answered a question i had. i was stationed at fort ritchie in october 1969.

yes, sir. they did end the exercise early. no one ever knew why. of course, we were not told of the reason why. there was an article in "reader's digest" after my service, maybe 10 years, and it listed some of the close calls, and they did touch briefly on the reason for canceling high hills early. in now that you mention it nixon's provocations, things are starting to make sense. thank you very much for your information. if you can elaborate anymore on that situation, i would appreciate it, and have a good morning, sir. guest: i appreciated, and thank you for your service. the caller, when he says fort

thehie, he is referring to alternate has to military command center, which still is an enormous underground bunker under raven rock on the border of maryland and pennsylvania. it is no longer invulnerable to a new protect, it would have been the primary ultimate command site, and it has connectivity with nuclear forces worldwide. thatll nuclear exercises the strategic air command at the time of the pentagon, or the white house land, were also run through the center where this man served. i can only imagine the number of stories that he must be pretty to -- privy to. these were highly compartmentalized exercises. if an exercise was terminated summing without warning, often

the participants would not know why. and they would not know necessarily a classification -- a justification to ask that question, certainly would add doubt to their mind, or some degree of uncertainty. it is a fascinating story. saganis a book by scott about the 1969, the madman theory of richard nixon and his nuclear alert that i would point the caller to. it is scary and fascinating reading. in my book, i go into it in some detail as wealth -- as will. well. it is interesting to talk to people who spend a lot of their service in these underground bunkers because truly, they never believed or thought, or know,y sense that you their front-line service, and i consider it my service because they were at the tip of the

nuclear spear. doing -- what they were doing was working at a highly classified realm. luckily, we are able to tell some of the stories. another great book is a colleague of mine called "raven rock," about that facility itself. , in popular literature now, a number of books that fill in some of the gaps during that very, very tense period. host: let's go to al calling from hawaii. are you there this morning? caller: yes, thank you for taking my call. a really great show. i am in hawaii and i was in office with a guy that was a top guy in the navy for deep submersibles named john who helped find new their weapons lost at sea.

guest: a brilliant guy. caller: yes. come to his office to be debriefed. agency people, you know. there were a lot of journalists coming to interview him. intimate and his connections with people. he would have to go through a bunch of stuff that sort out stuff that was declassified that he could have in his office. he was already out, but basically had security agreements. you know, they used to allude to these things that happened. as far as a reference point, about the strategy of what the navy was trying to avoid in terms of their future intelligence gathering to prevent being caught off guard, and i remember a lot of

who werens with people asked of mariners from pearl harbor, but they can only discuss things in somewhat cold terms. documentsed a lot of that were declassified, i got the feeling that something very significant happened during that time point. --as curious what the navy's how the navy played with this because a lot of the declassified stuff doesn't really discuss that intimately. any comments on that? because at of that is lot of the changes during this period, at least could naval preparedness practice remained in operation today, the same way we detected submarines through

cetaceans minute cap of the blades of their engines are still in use. a lot of the technical information remains classified. in terms of doctrine, one big shift during this period, before this period in question, primarily the u.s. navy's role was to fortify the nato deterrent in europe. and it was under the secretary of the navy, where they took on a very new and aggressive role in not only fortifying a deterrent, but indirectly becoming another element of the determined to prevent the soviets from ever really leaving any of their deepwater ports along the pacific ocean. , and again, very, very recently, there was a

publishing about the declassified documents describing the theory behind matt, and the practice. in practice, much of that deterrent involved using america's massive aircraft carriers, putting nuclear fighter-bombers on them, and flying them directly at soviet installations commencing how soviets would respond. these exercises, which were a bit misleading a psychological operations, where a part of operations designed to scare soviet leaders to test their defenses, and to keep them on high alert, and to prevent them from doing anything else. it became fairly routine and ringler during this period, and definitely, contributed to some misease amongf soviet leaders could -- leaders. host: there was a detail in your

book about a movie called "the day after." inside thewas shown white house and president reagan himself was bothered by it. whether other details like that but came up that you would like to bring out to our viewers today? think one of the things i is particularly interesting to realize that president reagan, and this is a good way to talk about his religious believes, and how they informed his policy views. many of your listeners and viewers might know that president reagan believed very literally in the word of the christian testament, and believed the prophecies in the book of revelation were would happen in the real world. his -- at the end of

the cold war, may have paid lip service and was less vigorous in the idea that he as a human being could play a role in the world because of his religious belief, but i found the opposite to be the case. the way reagan figured it, primarily, after his assassination attempt in 1981, he met with a cardinal from the archdiocese of washington, and told the cardinal, look, this opportunity i have been given after my life has been stared tells me i have a role to play and what might be the final generation of mankind. but that role for me is to rid the world of nuclear weapons. reagan hattaway, and it was described by someone who knew him intimately and knew his beliefs, and the sense that he believed in the book of revelation. he believed that the prophecies would come true. he also believed as a human being, he did not know in what

form it would be true. and as a human being, he at every duty in the world to work towards peace, and to measure the entire world was as peaceful as possible in preparation for the return of jesus christ. that was what the president sincerely believed. and i think it helped them. and i think it in part it to him, a punitive and a sense of urgency as he grew older about these arms control talks. he was extraordinarily effected as movies, and as a movie actor himself, he screened the day after before it came out. and the white house had a particularly vigorous debate about what they should say about it because they knew in advance, will the movie was made, it would scare a lot of people, particularly children. it was children that reagan was primarily worried about.

there were a number of incidences throughout his presidency. character thats are not often brought out, even by some of his biographers, because they want to portray reagan as a masculine man that never cried about things like that. but reagan was quite sensitive. and was capable of significant empathy at times when it was called for. this was one of them. but he did see it in advance of tens of -- 89 americans i think watched it -- 89 million americans i think watched it. host: yes. let's go to greg. caller: i have enjoyed the conversation so much. i will even read the gentleman's book.

distinctionby the we have with the current president who i like to call fat nixon. everything we know about our president today tells us he is not informed. and he doesn't have the efficacy of president reagan. whyhe has talked about cannot we use these weapons when he speaks with subordinates? and that has to be explained to him why we can't. if he comes out of this meeting with his feelings hurt because mr. putin does not like him, and risk atare we a greater the time of your book, ""the brink?'s guest: that is a great question and a really hard question to answer, in part because, if you

put a gun to my head and asked me that, but my gut would tell you, my gut would tell you that presidential temperament absolutely matters in these cases. but we like to think of as the nuclear button, the president doesn't really have a finger on a nuclear button. i like to usehat is, the president is a safety catch on nuclear command and control systems. an impulsive president has to loosen the safety catch and this thing can go often people will move towards a war rapidly without realizing it. i worry about a conflict around the baltic states. even though i think that the american people would not stand for it politically. yes, i worry about president trump's temperament. be honest to reality as a writer and journalist. i am worried.

for future elections, voters should be informed about our nuclear weapons policy. not only questions about temperament, but very, very specifically about what kind of weapons we have and how they are used. during the primary season, they need to as candidates about these things. they need to make sure their presidential candidates talk about this early and often so it becomes a greater issue in presidential races than it has been previously. carl in kansas to fca city, missouri. caller: i am enjoying your program and am a veteran. kennedy save not only me but saved the country and i am no hero. i was scared to death. what i would like to focus on, seems like a lot of the is about failsafe

type stuff that we need to correct, what i am concerned about, and i would like to get the gentleman's comments, and i if you him entirely, but take the premise that nuclear war is out of the question, then will rivalries push situations, thinking, or assuming that there won't be any kind of mistake? and is that kind of thinking a little dangerous? it takes a very intelligent leader to play that game. thatollow the premise nuclear war is out of the question. again, it takes me back to the previous caller who says, excuse my disrespect, is talking about why we don't use nuclear weapons. i will be my thoughts there. if nixon had been elected

president, but i am glad kennedy worked it out and traded missiles and save my little butt because i have not a hero. thank you. guest: i think we might have to disagree on that. you state of that plane, and was willing to deploy, even though you said your little butt was scared. that is playing of heroism for me. you gave the answer yourself and that is, presidential character and temperament absolutely matters. these are incredibly complex issues, and they grow more complex as the years go on coming even as technology increases. the potential for safeguards, the conversations about escalation, thresholds, the conventional nuclear threshold, are far more complicated than they were in 1983. seven requires a greater level of concentration. and the threats have multiplied because a number of nuclear

weapon countries has multiplied. and now we have something that we do not have a 1983 is the real potential that a terrorist will figure out either how to make a steel a nuclear weapon and threatening us with its use against others. ,e worry about a lot of things this is something we have to worry about even more, and this book and other books that have been written like this can contribute to our understanding of how hard these questions are in some way, it would've been worth it. host: we would like to thank for being with us. thanks, mark. join us tomorrow morning where two ll be talking with people about president trump's with russian