if there is an opportunity, we seize it. so let's begin tonight i recognizing that the state of ourunion is strong because people ou are strong. [applause] >> the state of the union, first postpone will not take place tonight. watch as president trump delivers his state of the union address live from the house chamber beginning at 9:00 p.m. eastern on c-span, followed by by democratic response stacey abrams. livetate of the union, tonight at 9:00 eastern on c-span, c-span.org, or listen but the free c-span radio app. coming up in one hour, former speechwriters krupin are mere the state of the union.

at 9:00 a.m., don third -- dr. anthony fauci on the recent measles outbreak and the anti-vaccination movement. host: good morning. it is tuesday, february 5, 2019. the senate reconvened at 10:00 a.m. this morning. the house is in at noon and will prepare for the state of the union address tonight in the house chamber. we will talk about expectations for that speech later in our program, but we begin "the washington journal" with questions about the ability to achieve the american dream in today's economic system. we want to know if you think there is enough economic opportunity in the united states today. phone lines put up by income levels. if you make less than $50,000 a 0.02-748-800

we also want to hear from you on social media. on twitter you can join us @c -spanwj. on facebook, it is facebook.com/c-span. eam american dr -- thisy defined as morning we want to know if you think this country still offers the economic opportunity to do that. having this conversation in the wake of a dow jones industrial backs over 25,000. and rosie numbers, 304,000 jobs added in january. in january, the unemployment rate was at 4%. this issue of economic

opportunity was discussed instituteat the aspen in washington, d.c., and hank paulson, former treasury secretary, talked about the headwinds out there in today's economy. >> if you are just reading the economic headlines about job numbers and growth, you might think everything is going pretty well. is that far too many american workers and families are falling behind. low and middle income wages have stagnated now for decades. disparities in income and opportunities have widened. and the ability of american to grow up earn -- and earn more than their parents is eroding. these problems stem from profound economic changes happening in america today, and

frankly around much of the rest of the world. they are structural, they are not cyclical, and therefore they are not easy to reverse. but we would not be working on these issues if we thought they were insurmountable. progress is possible, and we see many opportunities for both sides -- for democrats and republicans -- to come together to address a range of festering issues from wage stagnation to low levels of labor, force participation, and the need to upscale the workforce. are notne said, we going to get far on these issues without commitment to evidence-based analysis and principled compromise. [end video clip] host: more from that event yesterday in washington, d.c. economic opportunity was the subject of that conversation.

it is the subject of our conversation in this first hour of "the washington journal," asking you, is there enough economic opportunity in the united states? the phone lines are put up by income levels. if you made under $50,000 last , 202-748-8000. if you made between $50,000 and 8001.000, 202-748- $100,000,e over 202-748-8002. host: kimberly said there would be if workers were paid more. charles said economic opportunities are diminishing as our national debt increases. mary says, no, there are not enough economic opportunities unless you already have money.

michael is saying there are more jobs than workers available to fill them, the further verse -- for the first time in decades. we are spending the first hour of our program having this discussion. annapolis, from maryland, may less than $50,000 last year. good morning. caller: hello? host: go ahead, sir. caller: i think the american dream is on its way down. it is because without education, this is a knowledge economy, a technical and knowledge economy. we saw what all the nation did with jobs. the manufacturing jobs. now you are about to have ai, which china is doing better at it. that is going to kill a lot of jobs. wage -- thece in gap between income and wealth, that gap is just getting larger

and larger. you know, that is not the way it worked out 20 years ago. when americans could make more, and they would share in all this money that is going to the top. without an education, nowadays, there is no way to fulfill your dreams of -- you know, to get the best possible life in america. host: what kind of work are you in? caller: i was in information. in politics.as host: are you retired now? caller: i am retired now. host: did you feel like it was easier to move up back then when you are talking about economic opportunity? caller: i am a living example of it. i got a scholarship to college. i worked hard in high school and had a scholarship to go to college. but i would have on to college

anyway because it was $3000 and you could borrow the money and it was realistic to think that you could pay it. i went on to law school and did the same thing. it was between $3000 and $5,000. now it is $50,000, $60,000. i went to a good school, ivy to a chicago went law school. it used to be you could do it and you had a lot of options in life, in careers. that is no longer the case. host: mike is in cary, north carolina, made between $50,000 and $100,000 last year. upbeat,i am generally not as negative as the last guy. but there have been some good points made on the negative side. mr. paulson did, too. education is important, but that is a generic, wide sweeping term. what is your education in? do you know how to operate a

machine tool? do you know how to operate a backhoe? can you design and install an oil rig? those are well-paid professions. learn them going to in the ivy-covered walls of harvard. if your degree is in many of the liberal arts, not that i have a disrespect for a solid liberal arts education, but again, we are talking about jobs now. blog on this recently. in the history of american migration, from the first pilgrims that arrived here, for religious freedom and economic opportunity, right through the expansion through the great plains in the west and onto california, the great migration of many blacks north after the civil war to participate in the industrial revolution of the great it was cities of detroit and cleveland -- i grew up in -- evend -- even after

during the great depression and the dustbowl, people were forced to move. they had to move. we have been a mobile society, and statistics show people are mostly -- not all, but mostly unwilling to relocate and move to where the jobs are. host: why is that, mike? why is it stickier now? caller: that is an excellent question. i really don't know why. people are tied to their communities, but people have always been tied to their communities, either by ethnicity, by religion, by ties to the land or whatever, but when economic conditions or geographic or other traumatic conditions like the dustbowl, like the great depression -- it is like, ok, we can either stay here and love the land our family has been on for 50, 100 years, and die, or we are going

to head to california. the great book and movie, "the grapes of wrath," that is a classic american story written by john steinbeck. i do not know why people are less willing -- i have moved four times in my life. i just started a new job this year. i am 63 years old. now, maybe i fly against the standard here of being able to get a job at my age, but i have constantly reinvented myself and my career. host: what industry are you in now, mike? caller: i sell 3d printers. salesn advisor and engineer for a cutting edge american company, and we make 3d printers. our printers are used in a variety of industries. ,ental, hearing aid manufacturing, prototyping for the automotive and aerospace and defense industries. this industry did not exist when

i started college at the university of colorado in 1980. host: you called in on that line for those who make $50,000, between $50,000 and $100,000. will you be over $100,000 this year? caller: this year yes -- this year, yes p i took a two month break, a self-inflicted wound because i changed jobs and decided to take time off. i consider myself very blessed, i truly do for my age and for my ability to keep seeing -- we have to be observant, and things are -- like the last person said, it is not like it was 20 years ago. no, it is not. it is changing incredibly rapidly. where are all these people in the world trying to get to? host: that is mike in north carolina. david is in los angeles this morning. they less than $50,000 last

year. david, go ahead. caller: good morning. i think the economic situation in the united states is getting worse and worse. -- let it is because of me give you an example. as i have read from news, the -- confiscating properties, i want to know your opinion about it. trump, our lives became disappointed. if this continues, our democratic image will be destroyed in the world. i would think it would be disgraceful about humanity to give someone large amount of not belonging to them, edition from children to elders. host: got your point.

we are focused on economic opportunity in this first hour of "the washington journal." a couple of viewers bringing up the topic of education and the importance of that when it comes to economic opportunity. at the forum yesterday in washington, d.c., rahm emanuel talked about the importance of education in his multipoint plan to bring economic opportunity to chicago. here is what he had to say on that topic. [video clip] city ofeople in the chicago have a college degree, 29% when i started. we have worked hard at retaining four year degrees. with free community college. major, major is socioeconomic benefits of that. 81% of kids who take it are the first to go to college. we are over 6000. at a time when you earn what you learn, we have to make sure that

folks -- [video clip] [end video clip] simple.e question is is there enough economic opportunity in the united states? ,ric is in seattle, washington may less than $50,000 last year. go ahead, eric. caller: yes, thank you. privileged -- a white privileged economy. most of your wealth comes from your homes. there are times after world war ii, most whites were given land, homes, where black people were discriminated against. the system is basically designed to keep people -- our republican president cuts taxes. reagan cut taxes. you see what happened after that recession. bush cut taxes when we were on a surplus, from bill clinton. and you saw what happened in 2008. it did not work out too well.

trump cut taxes. it is nothing but a sugar high. the economy was doing well and we go into a recession. you could wake up in the morning, your 401(k) could be zero. this is what always happens. the rich people always extract the wealth out of the economy. right now trump is giving bailouts out to farmers. reagan gave them out to the savings and loan people. republicans talk socialism and really they give out these subsidies, these oil companies are the socialism party. the democrats continue to let people -- whenever the economy are going --ou they are going to like her you had larry cut life -- larry economy downn the turned into thousand eight. host: we hear the word socialism. is socialism a bad word? caller: wilbur ross, all these

people are crooks. host: got your point. from owns ville, maryland, made over $100,000 last year. caller: there is definitely economic opportunity in this country, but we have to give up our fear. there is no reason anybody cannot make $100,000 in this country. ,e need to reemphasize them engineering technology and mass. it has fallen drastically. we do not educate our people. i have been making over $100,000 for the last 4, 5 years, just doing the same job. i am now at a company that -- the last company i was with paid for my masters degree. the company i am with now paid off my undergrad degrees. host: what kind of work do you do? caller: i do data analytics for

health care and insurance and i work two days from home, but i am also a dialysis patient, so that is why. host: respond to this from jodey on twitter. she writes in that, "i am 60 and i believe my parents were the last generation who lived the true american dream. my dream has been stolen by corporations. ,f they cannot use robotics have moved to other countries to fulfill their corporate dream and now they are people, too." caller: we have to educate, retool, people have to make themselves valuable. that is all you have to do. host: walter, sterling heights, michigan, made over $100,000 last year. good morning. caller: good morning. to answer the question, the opportunity in america is just

not equal. when you look at education, you -- you had alleges few callers who mentioned education, one caller who mentioned white privilege. most of the real issues go unmentioned because of the stickiness of the conversation. europeans came over here and were given a pickax and a shovel and free land. hads what happened -- you free slave labor, so you had home many years of just riches piling up on top of riches, not paying people and keeping them from being educated. no one talked about the impacts that has on people nowadays who do not learn that in school but they realize it, going to libraries. read. trying to cultivate their minds and their children's minds. the money situation to make it to college, to get that higher

level of education is not there or you cannot get in, you do not have the money. you have guys saying pay 3000 to get an education and be a lawyer and an attorney? right, that is not going to happen these days because people do not have the money to do that. so what do you have to supplement that? apprenticeships, tuition assistance, affirmative action. you have people pumping money into engines to eliminate apprenticeships, to eliminate affirmative action. it leads to frustration and people not caring. so these things need to be addressed if we want to talk about opportunity changes in america. host: that is walter in michigan on the issue of college tuition. --ight-in roosevelt is waiting, takoma park, maryland, on the line for

people who made between $50,000 and $100,000 last year. caller: all i want to say is that here in the united states, i think that a lot of people need to move where the economy is moving, which i believe is in the tech industry. $50,000en making over since i was the age of 19. and i think that i have always -- all those making over $50,000, i had to go where the economy is shifting. that is technology. while i was working, i enrolled i self in school and i was able to pay for it. i understand that everybody cannot do that, but as far as that is where the economy is in the united states shifting. so in the tech industry, a lot of industrial jobs are dying at the moment and a lot of people

need to understand that, they do need to educate themselves in order to keep up with the standards. thank you very much. host: that is roosevelt in maryland. a few more tweets. matthew writing in saying there are more jobs than there are people to fill them. morning,hank this saying less and less opportunity. you should try being born into a wealthy family for your opportunity. daddy's trust fund can make you president someday. more state ofised the union discussion later in our program, but here is one story about the state of the union that ties into this question about economic opportunity, and it has to do with the outfits that house democratic women's plan to break out for the state of the union. house democratic women planning to wear white suits and dresses for the president's state of the union. the reason is to promote economic security for women and

families. the story from roll call noting that their interview with the chairman of the democratic women's working group, and their interview about their plan to wear all white for the state of the union. items on their agenda include paycheck fairness, combating sexual harassment, creating family-friendly workplaces, providing more resources for child care. why white? it harkens back to the days of the suffragists. i know there is debate about whether or not they were white, but symbolically white is associated with the suffragist movement. speaking of the state of the union, we are expecting the president to talk a bit about the economy tonight, likely to reference the jobs report from last friday. at the aspen institute forum yesterday on economic opportunity in this country, the head of the white house counsel of economic advisors, kevin

hassett, joined in the discussion. he talked about what the trump administration has done to promote economic opportunity. here is what he had to say. [video clip] that paper -- >> that paper led in part to the came a years that ago. that part i am pretty sure you liked. that hopefully sends capital to the places where -- sends jobs to the places where people are kind of stuck. we have paid a lot of attention to the fact that with technological innovation and artificial intelligence and so on that they are increasingly moving toward a world where people might be stuck with the wrong skills. situation where we are basically charged over a two-year period and we are

trying to help people re-skill. there enough economic opportunity in the united states? is the american dream still achievable under the economic system we have in this country? phone lines lit up a little bit ash phone lines split up a little effort this money. if you make under $50,000 a 202-740e line is 8-8000. if you make between $50,000 a year,nd $100,000 a 202-748-8000 one. 202-748-,000 a year, 8002. jeff? caller: my parents made under $50,000 a year. because i was blessed with i.t., i made over $100,000 a year. it is an opportunity in this country. host: before you go, the word socialism has come up. is socialism a bad word? caller: i think it is.

i think it is because everywhere it has been applied -- kind of like communism or dictatorships -- it always starts out bad. we have socialistic things like that to care and social security, but i think those all should be tempered. host: what are your feelings on the word "capitalism"? caller: i think it is a great word. it gives opportunity, and probably the biggest proof of capitalism has got to be communist china, who you look at , sinceyears under mao they opened up with free enterprise, look how their economy has changed. host: mike is in huntington, indiana, may less than $50,000 last year. go ahead. caller: yeah. we have a spending problem, i think. and another thing, when you get rich, they start a nonprofit something.

there is too much nonprofit. when i was a young kid, a graveyard was the only thing that was nonprofit. host: and what did you do after that, mike? what business are you in? caller: i worked in foundries most of my life. host: and did you feel like you were able to move up as you were doing that for most of your life? caller: i didn't move up, but i just did not spend a lot of money, so i made it pretty good. i still work. i am over at the graveyard in the summer, and i am 73 years old. host: how long do you plan to do that for, mike? caller: until i pass. you do not quit working if you are healthy. host: thanks for the call. indiana, steve, charleston, south carolina. let me apologize, first. i hit the wrong button.

call, that last caller. i am 71 and am still working. i will be working as long as i can, not because i have to, but because i have to get up and do something. the caller from north carolina said such a mouthful, my goodness. high school guidance counselors are failing children in school when they are pressing the need for every person to go to college. there is a big need for vocational schools, trade and prep schools, and people -- there are jobs available in this country. people have to get out of the comfort zone and maybe be willing to move. most people do not want to do that. i do not want to do that either because it is hard. here, weouth carolina incentivize people to come. we are doing real well. the economy is great, businesses are moving here. why? because we are not on a political high horse and we offer incentives, whether it is utilities and taxes, tax breaks to companies to move to south carolina. we have bowling right here in

north charleston. we have the biggest -- we have boeing here in north charleston. mercedes he appeared but if you mention the word incentive, my god, politicians say you're making the rich richer. -- they payers taxes on everything. it all comes back to you. people have got to quit worrying. you look like you are pretty happy. what the bosscare of your company makes? i do not care. i am happy. i make a decent living. if you ever say something like that is going to make the ceo of mercedes or volvo rich, i do not care. people have got to get off of that. host: part of that incentives issue -- is that something we should be hearing more of on the national level? or does it work better on the state or local level? caller: every state is different

politically. some people just cannot get past that worry about making some guy, the boss of a company, rich. it is not about making him rich. it is about getting that company in here and getting people getting paychecks in people's pockets and letting them get that revenue flowing back into the economy. let me tell you something. walmart,y something at inventory is reduced. that inventory has got to be replaced, and some person in some factory in the united states has to make something, and that is another factory somewhere. you have to keep revenue flowing and we have to find a way to do that. host: are you worried about factories not being in the united states to make those products? caller: pardon me? host: we had a caller earlier saying we are not making things anymore in this country. that is not the direction of our economy. caller: there is manufacturing going on here. we are proof of it here.

we have factories here, too. we build tires here. michelin has a big factory here. you are not going to get past this thing of cheaper labor, able to provide cheaper labor then we provide here. who's fault is that? that is the unions' fault? -- that is the unions' fault. we are a right to work state. my god, right to work? no unions? that's right. people go to work, they spend money, and the economy goes good. host: from charleston, south carolina, this issue of economic opportunity certainly something we are already hearing on the campaign 2020 trail. here is a poll that was put out late last week. the share of those who responded to it, excited for eight 120 presidential candidate who promises to reform the economic system. overall, 70% would be excited to

do that. among democrats, it goes up to 90%. saying theylicans would be excited to vote for a 2020 presidential candidate who promises to reform the economic system. that pole also looked at this , the word "socialism, which we talked about earlier. democrats and young adults are increasingly favorable towards socialism. 18 to 24-year-olds, 61 of them view socialism positively. just 58 viewing the word capitalism pollen -- positively. respondents tend to be more wary of socialism. democrats are more favorable towards socialism than independents and republican spirit 64% of democrats in this survey say they have positive views of socialism, while 83% of republicans and 61% of independents have negative views. men are much more bullish about

capitalism than women. women are more favorable toward socialism, and 41% viewing it positively 36% of men saying that. more from those surveys from the data, but especially more of your stories throughout the first hour of "the washington journal." enoughstion, is there economic opportunity in the united states? thanrom illinois made less $50,000 last year. good morning. caller: hello. host: go ahead, sir. caller: not springfield, chicago. i do not know who is feeling calls in your organization. host: go ahead, ken. motility,e economic viability of this country has suffered since the reagan administration when he took a unions, starting with

patco and giving a signal that the business community could decimate workers' rights, workers' ability to collectively bargain. that is all a union is, a mechanism for a reasonable effort,of a collective both management and labor, to know,with -- you equitable, you know, ability. enough of we have had that. i mean, you had from world war mid-1980's,the prosperity, fairly solid prosperity, and it was not just the workforce. reagan -- he -- he decertified

-- banking was affected. systemlity to have a shared --perity was you did not have ceo's making 1000 times more than the lowest paid workers like you do now. host: i assume you are union? caller: regrettably, i never made it past the probationary pe riod. if i would have, i would have had a much more solid income history throughout my life, but it just did not work out that way. host: what industry? caller: huh? host: what industry do you work

in? caller: i am in machine tools? -- i am in machine tools. i like working with machine tools. machinists, welders, pipefitters, what have you -- that has diminished. in variousery sectors of the blue-collar segment of the economy. how are you supposed to -- you know, and the employer's art -- -- and the employers are -- we do not have apprenticeships. host: in illinois, this is lauren, st. paul, minnesota, on the line for those who made between $50,000 and $100,000 last year. caller: economies are not stagnant. do not drive the streets today in horses and buggies like we

did 150 years ago. here is the main point, and this is not going to be popular with a lot of people. not an ivory tower statement, this is from somebody who has walked the walk and talked the talk type thing. we have a growing underclass in this country, and by growing underclass, i think i mean people who do not have a good education, are not prepared for the market place, et cetera, et cetera part of that driver, and this is from working in a lot of nonprofit organizations and other agencies. our growing acceptance of single-parent homes in our country, in what is going on, is you have people -- kids who are ,oming home to no parent parents are not participating in programs with schools, et cetera. and we continue to have programs in this country that increases the growing underclass because,

quite frankly, we are not taking parenting as seriously as we did previously. we have got to understand the only way we are going to solve this problem is to make sure we take our parental responsibility serious, make sure kids are fed, closed, educated, those types of things. so when we talk about solutions that are going to go down the road, it really, in my mind, needs to start with our responsibilities as parents to take care of those kids. host: market, before you go, what do you think about the economic system we have in this country, and how much it enables parents to be involved in kids when they are growing up and going to school, and being in these programs that you're talking about? should we be doing more to allow parents to do that while continuing to work full-time jobs? -- i think we can always find innovative and

creative ways to assist. what i do not see -- i am going to back up a second. my forefathers, my grandparents, moved out of the south, into the north as part of the great black migration in the 1920's. my grandfathers and my grandfather's -- my grandfathers and my grandmother's worked very hard. the people i grew up with were part of that group that talk about that today, how our parents worked hard. was there assistance out there? sure, there was assistance out there, and there are things we can do, particularly with churches and other nonprofits. but again, the responsibility has to be with parents taking their responsibilities, and not shifting that responsibility to others. host: thanks for the call, from minnesota. a few more comments from twitter this morning.

rod saying the only thing holding back economic opportunity in america are democratic regulations and hiring quotas. eric saying it is not rocket science. if you want more money, you have to have a marketable skill. democrats tweeting -- when republicans help rich people, they call them tax cuts. helpdemocrats try to anyone, republicans call it socialism. we talked about the 2020 race this morning and the economic opportunity issues that are coming up already on the campaign trail. here is a story from today's "wall street journal" on one of those topics. at least five declared or likely presidential candidates want to restrict how much stock u.s. companies can buy back from the chances, raising of a comic tool -- of a common tool becoming a campaign issue. elizabeth warren, kirsten gillibrand, bernie sanders -- the largest cup in his have

repurchased shares at a record pace. democrats argue that buybacks of rich executive's and shareholders at the expense of workers and long-term economic growth, investors generally oppose just lace and that would restrict corporate investing decisions, but wall street is divided over the impact buybacks have on the broader u.s. economy." if you want more on that story, today's "wall street journal." james from san diego, california, made over $100,000 last year. what line of work are you in? caller: this is passive income. when i joined the workforce in 1960, i joined the military and made $62 a month. made $62 a month. so i admit i spent 26 years in the marine corps. never went to college. at the end of that 26 years, i made $3000 a month. after that i decided i had to make more money, so i went out and joined the california

department of corrections, where i worked another 15 years. il those 40 years of working, had two jobs. i did not stay in just one. i needed to make sure i had a good income so that when i retired i would be able to progress, move forward. now i make over $100,000 in passive income because i took that money and invested that money. had $33,000 in my 401(k) plan. i left that money in there. today that money is worth over half $1 million because of the stock market going up. i also took that money and invested it in real estate. so i do not understand, if you can have a job being a truck driver and make $50,000 to almost $100,000 a year, i do not understand why people are complaining. i just do not follow the reasoning. host: colleen is next, glen falls, new york, less than

$50,000 last year. go ahead. caller: yeah, am i on the air? host: yes, go ahead, colleen. caller: yeah, it is not so much about me, but it is a little bit. me and my boyfriend tried to buy a home last year. don't know ---- i $3000 between the two of us, and we came across a house that was under $100,000, and we have good credit, no bad credit. between the two of us. yeah, we were turned down for the loan. why? i don't know. we had had other loans that we have given -- that people have been more than happy to give us. but for the household, we were turned down. -- for the house alone, we were turned down. i have another issue. i was just watching that program

about community colleges. now, i do not understand how kids,an -- some of these they can send these kids to college for four years and then the ceo's of these corporations can offer, with the government's help, and cooperation with the government, internships and apprenticeships, and instead of the company paying them, social services pays them. what is up with that? host: colleen, a discussion about community college is something we can talk about on another program. we did talk last week on "the washington journal" about plans for free college tuition. if you want to go back, i believe that was last tuesday or wednesday on "the washington journal," a good place to check for that discussion, on c-span.org, where you can watch

all of our segments on "the washington journal." only 15 minutes left on this segment of today's program, asking you is there enough opportunity economically in the united states. is the american dream achievable? if you made under $50,000 last 202-748-8000 is the number. if you made between $50,000 and $100,000, 202-748, 8001. this story having to do with jerome powell, dining last night , with the president of the united states and with treasury secretary steven mnuchin at the white house. jerome powell has been a frequent target of criticism, "the wall street journal" notes, the federal bank raising interest rates four times last year. had -- pumping the

president to vent his advisors about whether he could dismiss the fed chairman. mr. powell saying last week that put little pressure, including from the president, had not and would not influence federal reserve policy. one trump administration official on the dinner last night said it was cordial and collegial, more important than if they had met in the oval office. more from "the wall street journal," if you want to read that ahead of today plus state of the union. from pasadena, maryland, on the line who make -- on the line of those who made between $50,000 and $100,000 last year. caller: i own a company and i make between $50,000 and $100,000. host: what kind of company? caller: a consortium firm. i am -- most of my employees are mostly from mexico. made $200,000o

last year, tying steel with his tools on. the guys make great money. number one. theer two, the unions -- unions in d.c. and baltimore took their money. weak union out here, and they are going out of business now. number three, there has never been more opportunity in this country. there is so much opportunity, it is unbelievable. i am a high school dropout. i have done very well for myself. i have been in and out of business my whole life, getting my but kicked more than anything else. i have lost far more money than i have paid. just in baltimore alone, at the many, there are so longshoremen. it is unbelievable. and there are so many kids walking around with squeegees on

the corners, but there is so much work around here it is unbelievable. host: you said most of your workers are from mexico. you said most of your workers are from mexico. these are legal immigrants that you hired for your company? caller: eventually they became legal. many of them started out illegally and we put them in touch with lawyers. host: how do you feel about e-verify? it is a topic that has come up. it is like anything else. it is a great thing if everybody is doing it. but it is just like the unions. unions come in there and inflate these wages, which they do not pay the employees. they pay their management. a couple of guys do well but most guys get screwed. it is the same thing with e-verify. if everybody is doing it, great. if only certain people are doing it, it is not going to help anybody out. host: do you do it?

caller: we do not do e-verify. we have enough regulation. with safety for example, there are so many regulations now. to go to a jobsite now -- we work on several construction sites every day. you get on a jobsite now, you have to have so many background checks, urine checks, drug checks, to go and build a foundation. and the safety is ridiculous. there are 10 or 15 safety people on a job and they have no clue about safety. they know about programs but they do not know anything about safety. they create more of a hazard than they do a safe environment we have far too much regulation. we need regulation on other things, but the fundamental stuff, the low-hanging fruit, they have just wrecked in this country. if you are not a billionaire here, you're not trying hard enough. and if you are not -- if you are black and you are not a

billionaire, you certainly are not trying hard enough. there are more opportunities for blacks than there has ever been. host: as somebody who has hired illegal immigrants, how do you feel about building a wall across the u.s.-mexico border. caller: personally, i would love the work because there is a ton of work and we are ironworkers. my guys are from mexico and they love trump because of one thing. i am sure they badmouth him behind his back, but they do not say it because of me because i take holes every day on the job site. olls every day on the job site. you cannot throw him out, we cannot throw them out because that does affect the labor pool. i am a high school dropout. i am not very articulate, but i will tell you, i make a ton of money. i have lost tons of money. there is far more money to be made in this country through the trades and the services, far more millionaires to be made

with the trades and services then we can with some college degree. and i have three kids i am putting through college. i have put money together for them and i am trying to discourage them from college over buying a house and starting a business. host: and marilyn, right -- in maryland, from russia's -- last year made under $50,000. go ahead. caller: i want to comment on the last caller. my husband is also an ironworker and is prospering without a formal education. pursuecouraging him to the safety aspects because his because of his experience. i do not husband any hurt on the job or any of his coworkers. as far as bringing the workers up from mexico, i mean, it is a relevant fact. a problem that i hear him talk unwillingnessan

to actually work. on the opposite end of the spectrum -- host: what do you mean by, an unwillingness to work"? caller: getting these guys motivated to put out the effort and the energy, the work ethic, which seems to be lacking. host: where are you specifically seeing that in rochester, pennsylvania? oh, i don't want to go into that. what i was really calling about is that i am at the opposite end of that spectrum, where i am in debt with a degree and i am failing to thrive. the barriers to success began on a personal level, at least in academic -- at least an academic

failure to thrive. thereby dampening the economic opportunity. i think there is a lot of parenting going on, while a -- something that is being overlooked is just trauma. people are disgruntled in general in their personal lives, and it is affecting their work and their academic success. i do not think that we are spending enough time addressing the harsher realities like addiction, mental illness. there are a lot of communities where citizens and their basic needs are not being met. host: is any of that impacting you? you say you think you are failing to thrive. caller: right, because i am making less than $50,000 a year, i have significantly more than that in student debt and i have a degree. host: misty in pennsylvania.

domingo is in midland, texas, may less than $50,000 last year. good morning. we lost domingo. from arkansas, made between $50,000 and $100,000 last year. go ahead. caller: i was calling on economic opportunities. some of the comments i heard, for me, i rebrand myself. degrees are what was needed for us to succeed, so getting a job, and it does not even pay enough to even cover your student loan, it is not because we are not trying or we we wereant to, instilled from the day i remember that education was important, and that is why i did get an education, and it is why i continue to rebrand myself over and over again.

most of the jobs and things that are available, so many of them require two and three years, to five years of experience coming out of college. and where will you be able to get that type of experience to even do a job? enter ships are only -- internships are maybe only for a year. host: do you think we need to raise the national minimum wage in this country? we needyes, i do think to raise the national minimum wage. host: what would be fair? -- so right now it is, what, eight dollars, nine dollars? certain states because states can set their own minimum wages. caller: right now in arkansas it is $9.25. but $11, 12 dollars, that is still low.

how far will they go in a household of four, a household of five? host: what do you think about $15, which is a proposal that has been thrown out in a lot of states that has been taken up? caller: that would help tremendously because that would take the average income and it would help some. it may not eliminate all, but it would help. host: le voorhis in arkansas. that aspen institute forum yesterday on the issue of minimum-wage. david, -- david newmark spoke about the importance of economic -- of the minimum wage in economic opportunity. [video clip] minimum wages are going up. may be going up higher. my colleagues teased me that i am losing this battle, to which i respond there's would only be higher, if not for my research. higher minimum wages are popular

with the voters, they are popular with politicians, perhaps because of the voters but also because they can appear to be doing something on equality without raising taxes, which is part of the issue i am trying to address. i am also convinced there is debate about this, but i am convinced that while vitamin wage clearly offers some benefits -- while minimum-wage clearly offers some benefits, there also some potentially long-term adverse effects. obviously, those of you who follow literature know that not everybody -- i think almost all economists of every stripe are at least uncomfortable with some of the higher minimum wages we are talking about, minimum wages 40%, 45%, evenr a higher percentage of the workforce. the purpose of this policy is to kind of recognize the momentum

toward minimum wages, and rather than just say do not do it, to say how might we ameliorate these policies and make it somewhat more effective, reduce some of the adverse effects, and then a bit more pie in the sky perhaps, rebalance in some sense the discussion about redistribution of policy. host: again, if you missed that forum on the aspen institute, you can watch it on our website, c-span.org. in this discussion, whether you think there is enough economic opportunity in this country, eddie as been waiting in melbourne, massachusetts, made between $50,000 and $100 last year. go ahead. and $100,000 last year. go ahead. eddie, are you with us? caller: there are some good things and bad things about socialism. social security is fine. -- medicaidok or, is ok, -- medicare is ok, but

medicaid is bankrupting us. there are thousands of people with pre-existing conditions. i had to look at being born in new york city, and we took advantage of rent control, but we finally had to get out of new york city. the school systems were lousy. i went to brooklyn technical high school, which was excellent. open enrollment, it went downhill. i succeeded but i had to move out when my children were born. thank you. host: clarence's next, from kentucky, may less than $50,000 last year. clarence, go ahead. i think it is different around the country. in a lot of places, there are plenty of jobs for the most part, though. in a way there ain't enough opportunity. appalachia,entucky, the coal country. if you want a good job out here,

you work in a coal mine. or youve a coal truck, sell it illegal drugs. the rest of the jobs -- and i would dare say most of the country that works -- most people, they live from paycheck-to-paycheck. people do not save money no more because they do not make enough to save. think the president is trying to help the american people out, but when they say more americans are working more now than ever, well, is that the truth, or is that because people that used to up ono work, they gave it. they are not even on these statistics no more. it is expensive to live in america. host: we had a caller earlier say there are good jobs to be had in parts of this country if you are willing to go there and take those jobs. you said there are a few good jobs in your part of kentucky.

what is keeping people from leaving and going to those other places to find those jobs that are there to be had? do do: a lot of people that. i'm 55. i'm 55, when i worked i moved around the country and did all right. at onelmost middle-class time. i was able to save some money, i can't now. like i said, it's expensive to live in america. there are plenty of jobs, but a caller earlier said should we raise the minimum wage? should, but it will drive up the cost of everything else. so what do you do? call,thank you from the

our last caller in this segment, stick around we turn next to the topic of the president's state ,f the union address tonight two former presidential speech writers, mary kate cary and stephen krupin join us for that discussion. and later on i guess will join us to talk about the recent measles outbreak and why the anti-vaccination movement is helping to fuel it. we will be right back. ♪ [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2018] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] over the last year the world has seen what we always knew, no people on earth are so fearless, or daring, or determined, as americans. if there is a mountain, we climate. if there is a frontier, we cross

it, if there is a challenge, we face it. if there is an opportunity, we seize it. let's begin tonight by recognizing that the state of our union is strong, because our people are strong. [laughter] [applause] the union, first postponed because of the government shutdown will now take place tonight, watch as president trump delivers his state of the union address, live from the house chamber beginning at 9:00 on c-span, followed by the democratic response by former georgia gubernatorial candidate, stacey abrams. the state of the union, live tonight at 9:00 eastern on c-span, c-span.org, or listen with the radio app. it seems to be happening every week, someone, a famous person or an ordinary man on the

street was getting subjected to social media condemnation, to find themselves in the middle of a shame tornado for some kind of misbehavior, either genuine or perceived. pile on'spylons -- were much bigger than they had ever been that -- at any time in human history because of the internet. >> the managing editor of the washington examiner magazine experienced online shaming, she is our guest on q&a at 8:00 eastern. >> it was a difficult decision to write this essay, it brought back what was very troubling and almost a traumatic experience in my life. actually ant was headline i read in the new york times about a man that had committed suicide in a parked car in the west village and had not been found for seven days. , the worstellow

moment of his life was when he server atndwich at a mcdonald's for giving him the wrong order, she turned out to be pregnant in the story made the newspapers. it was at the top of his google search for the rest of his life from then on after it happened in 2013. he couldn't get a job, any time anyone googled his name this story came up and perspective employers thought i did not want to hire this guy and it ruined his guy -- his life. online shaming, sunday night at 8:00 eastern on q and a. >> washington journal continues. host: a discussion now on the state of the union address coming up tonight in the house chamber with two former presidential speech writers, mary kate cary was a speechwriter for george h w the, stephen krupin was

senior speechwriter to barack obama in 2016 and 2017. let's start with the audience that this is being delivered to, the live audience in the house and the upwards of 50 million people watching at home. how does that impact how the president delivers the speech and who he is delivering it for? number ofhas a audiences, the people in the room, the government, a course -- of course. but this is really a speech for the entire country because that audiences also being listened to by the government, the agencies that are listening to their boss and trying to get direction for what they should do in developing policy in the coming months. host: do those different audiences change the goals for president trump? >> in the past, most presidents use the state of the union as a way to go around the media and speak to the american people. the problem is that it's a long speech, there's not a lot of

opportunity for humor, stories, anecdotes, the things that make a speech fun. that's why president reagan started bringing in the guests and the galleries -- in the galleries to make it more interesting so people would tune in. but this year, in particular, donald trump already has a way of speaking to the american people directly and he uses it directly and often, through twitter. i would argue that he would be better talking to the people in the room, and not so much to the american people. he has been trying to speak to the people in the room and in the last three weeks it has not gone well. host: how do you define success for a state of the union address? >> if you can move the ball forward and see some results, so it's not just a speech into the ether. we like to see our speeches bring things about and change the world. if that can happen, especially this week in washington, if they could get to a deal by the next 10 days as a result of the speech that would be incredible. krupin, you wrote

speeches for the obama administration, is the definition of success different for president trump than president obama? guest: takes place in the house chamber but not in a vacuum. -- it takes place in the house chamber, but not in a vacuum. what he says tonight needs to be judged in the context of what he has said in the previous months. after he calls for unity and bipartisanship tonight, tomorrow, or the day after, will he do something to undermine that message? it has to be judged in the whole context. the: how much of a state of union address is a speechwriter and how much is it the president? thet: i can we speak to previous administration, president obama was always the chief speechwriter in that process, it was very collaborative not just among communications and policy staff, but also cabinet agencies and members of the administration at large that are fighting for that real estate.

when a policy is mentioned in the state of the union it is elevated. same mary kate cary, question and how was it under george h w bush? >> there's a very elaborate process that i think many presidents use, it starts with directions from the president, and the cabinet secretary sends out the call to the agencies and the senior staff, everyone sends in -- what do they want on that precious real estate? they only get one sentence so what do they say? and the speechwriter has to wade through the mountain and come up with a good draft and it gets fact checked by those same people, then it goes to the president and the president can rip the whole thing to shrek -- the whole thing to shreds, he could say it's what he wanted, but the president has the final word and you never want to have a situation where the president goes to a podium with a speech changed after he approved it. host: as we talk about the state

of the union address, mary kate cary worked for the george h w bush administration and stephen krupin worked for the obama administration, we are asking you to join the discussion this morning. the phone lines are open, (202) 748-8000for democrats --for democrats (202) 748-8000, for republicans (202) 748-8001, for independents (202) 748-8002. bi-d you remind folks what potisan? it's -- >> it's our podcast, stephen and i are obviously from opposite sides and it's about all kinds of things, we think the country needs more of that. last week it was on the politicization of sports and how we get around that in our country. host: here's a picture from the

new york times about president trump's preparation for tonight's speech, we want to get your reaction to it. the president was doing a fairly unusual thing for him on monday, working on a draft for the speech and practicing delivering it after spending part of the weekend in mar-a-lago, he spent two hours going over it with stephen miller, his chief policy advisor in the overs -- the oval office. he also spent time practicing in the map room with a handful of senior officials, he was expected to do another practice session today with aids giving notes. nick will -- mick mulvaney along kushner, sarah sanders, and his communications director has been involved in this process. your thoughts on the prep work? says something that this feels abnormal, this is an extremely normal part of the process. i think it underscores that the state of the union address is

perhaps president trump's most unnatural venue. it doesn't suit his personality or speaking style. and content wise, the state of the union is a national moment for unity, which is not how president trump is used to communicating. he is used to speaking to his base and being extremely divisive. rhetoric,or careful and president trump is careful -- as anything but careful in his rhetoric. he is rambling and reckless and the state of the union is a moment for truth, i think the ship has sailed on his credibility there. host: can you talk about the difference between teleprompter trump and twitter trump? >> if you took the state of the union and joint session address, these are speeches that most every republican president could have delivered. they are big on bipartisanship, unity, the topics he picks tonight, we hear he's going to talk about prescription drugs.

workers, infrastructure, these are things that both sides can agree to. that's why i think there is some hope for a deal. the problem is in the past when he talks about bipartisanship, he misses the opportunity to continue the goodwill, and usually gets on twitter within a few days and changes the narrative. i'm hoping this is an opportunity for him to stick to the script and not be twitter trump in the morning. we will see what happens. host: other topics he is excepted to focus on tonight, the associated press reporting on what we have seen, immigration, trade, infrastructure, drug pricing and national security. and c-spanng at 9:00 coverage starts at 8:00 tonight in the house chamber. we hope you'll join us for that and we will -- and we hope you join us for this discussion. you can call in on lines for democrats, republicans, and (202) 748-8002--and for independents.

good morning. caller: when president obama gave a state of the union politician pointed out -- started yelling you lied. i imagine the chorus -- if the democrats were this disrespectful to president trump. host: on that moment, do you remember? guest: i do, it was during a joint session that was called for the affordable care act. it looked a lot like the state of the union, what representative wilson did was a huge breach of protocol, and extremely disrespectful. i have a feeling you will not see the same kind of outburst from anyone in the future. certainly not from democrats. host: the headline at the washington journal, "you lie," moment headlining the president

of speech, do you agree we will probably not see that? >> i hope so. most speech preparation includes some staffer unexpectedly heckling during the speech, so that the president gets used to that, and has a few clever remarks to say back to try to defuse the situation. you don't want that deer in the headlights look, you keep right on rolling and have something humorous to say. that's part of the process, to be prepared. host: how did barack obama handle that moment? >> as i recall he was very gracious. guest: he didn't say anything in response i don't believe, but i think that is the right thing to do, not to give any -- >> don't make it worse. host: stephen, on the independent line from connecticut, good morning. caller: i always wondered about

the speechwriters, this is a great opportunity. there's a couple of topics, you guys, not you per se, but there seems to be you get bogged down in a laundry list speech. and my other topic, i want to talk about these three big ideas, big science projects like i would like to see a fusion power plant in the united states. a big one. and maybe a 5g network that's not -- based. and on national security, it's not the middle east, israel and saudi arabia could march their way to iran. and iran is not the problem in israel, it's the pacific ocean .nd the south china sea's

the arming of those islands is completely disturbing, and the next secretary of defense should be a naval guy and the world is changing really fast. we have to get off calling jihadi's in pickup trucks. host: thank you. on the first part of that, on how the speeches made and your job as a speechwriter turning it from a laundry list into a speech. >> any presidential speechwriter who gets assigned to the state of the union has to balance between looking backward and talking about the president's accomplishments, and giving credit for what they have done. but also pivoting to a forward-looking speech that people want to hear, like what is the big idea? are we going to mars? those are the best beaches, the ones that have the forward-looking optimism and hope and the big idea. but that's the problem. the government moves slowly and

it's hard to get people to sign for big ideas and have a budget for them. host: how many speeches did you write in your time? which was the most memorable? >> i was very jr., only 24 years only 24 years old. after i left office i wrote -- helped write a state of the union response in 1995 for the governor of new jersey. that was the first woman, the first governor, and the first state of the union response to be broadcast outside of washington. -- from outside of washington. and i am more experienced in responses. host: what was your favorite speech? speech was when he went to celebrate the 50th anniversary of pearl harbor, he gave a number of speeches that day. he was 17 when pearl harbor happened and he remembered where

he was, and how that changed the trajectory of his life. he enlisted and becoming an aviator in world war ii. host: same question, how many speeches in which was your favorite? more, i wrote maybe 50 or my favorite was the one that president obama gave on veterans day in 2016, his first major address after the election. there was a moment to honor veterans, of course, but also telling the broader story of where the country was going on to remind us what humility and selflessness -- and selflessness and service look like. host: do you get writers block? guest: i think that something speechwriters don't feel, we call it research block. when you have not dug into what your speaker has said in order to say something different and move the conversation along, and you have not dug deeply enough to find some interesting stories, that's when you don't feel prepared to write. host: how long does it take to

come up with a five minute speech? guest: it depends on if you're saying something new or something derivative of other remarks the president has said. there are five speeches that can take you a whole day. host: we are talking about speechwriting with two former presidential speechwriters. in youngstown, ohio, on the independent line. good morning. caller: good morning. your speakers have already mentioned bipartisanship, as an independent, obama had some resistance. but for the most part, it was something good for the country. the policies went along with him on many issues. i think what i'm seeing, and i think that people that are paying attention are seeing that trump is willing to give in certain areas and the democrats are holding out this ridiculous even once policy, issues that in the past they

have been in favor of. they will just resist against this president, i'm talking about a border wall, for example. absolute -- just and therein resist, even policies that will benefit our country, i think it's ridiculous. host: in ohio. mary kate cary, this speech coming tonight after a shot down over the border wall, and out 10 days ahead of the next potential shutdown over a border wall, how does president trump threaten that deal? >> i think there's an opportunity and i think he realizes there are a lot of people like dan who see what is going on. there is a bargain to be made, i think, in exchange for border wall funding for say treatment of the dreamers. i think there's a lot of opportunity, the list of things he has chosen to speak about tonight are all ones where that

potential exists. i think there are plenty of democrats who are for infrastructure, plenty who would vote for lower prescription drug prices, and republicans. there is a lot of common ground and i think that's where he's looking. donald trump likes to win, he likes to say i win with a deal. as stan pointed out, there is something to be said for what he is trying to do, i think people see that democrat resistance is not getting us there. host: the editorial board saying it's an opportunity for the president to be unpredictable tonight, the state of the union or a surprise, president trump likes to be unpredictable, here's a chance, we'll find out together at 9:00 tonight. you can start watching at 8:00 on the c-span network and you can join this discussion about the state of the union until 9:00 this morning. josh called in from connecticut, a republican. good morning. caller: good morning, i hope trump does not listen to the

advice of respecting people like these people. they are the people that people and for thet, record, if there's any people that trump supporters do not like more than democrats, it's never trumper's. and i hope they realize that bueno ino way no -- the republican party, at least as it is now. host: do you just not like speechwriters? caller: speechwriters are alright, they are doing a job, but trump is better than them. no offense, that he's the man when it comes to -- i think you should roast the whole room. i think that's his best play, roast the room and i think he'll get the best response. host: stephen krupin? guest: i don't know if he will get far legislatively by roasting the whole room, the purpose of the state of the union's accountability.

it's not the president speaking to the country or the congress from the oval office, he comes to the people's house at their invitation because it is required that he update them. it's a reminder that our government, our democracy, is based on checks and balances. that's the only way things work. for the first time in president trump's administration we have a divided government, and the president needs congress. that's the lens to watch the speech. host: mary kate cary? looking for something totally unexpected as well. as a speechwriter, at fun part. nobody wants to write a boring speech that plays into the stereotype in the conventional wisdom. i hope he's right, i hope trump does something unexpected, and the president said yesterday stay tuned, it will be very exciting. we prompted some speculation that he would declare a national

emergency and use the money, but i was thinking he had something else up his sleeve. host: what about the dynamic that will be at play, you mentioned this is the first time he has a divided government and nancy pelosi will be over his shoulder. >> i think there will be a lot of drinking games of people are watching for shenanigans, he will not be able to turn around and look behind his back. i saw a brookings panel last night where they were talking about how many times will she smirk, will she keep a straight face? what's going to be going on behind his back? we will see. guest: i don't know if we should root for surprises, it may make for good tv, but this speech has to -- it only matters if the policy -- it only matters to the extent that congress is behind him to enact the agenda. trying to surprise congress to make a good show may not benefit him down the road. host: we are halfway through this discussion and you can join in by calling, for democrats (202) 748-8000, for republicans

(202) 748-8001, for independents (202) 748-8002. robert is in massachusetts, a democrat. caller: thank you for taking my call. sadly, you see trump supporters do not look at the country as a whole. they still want to divide and don't understand that we have a president that is unreasonable ofunbriefable, we have all these things popping up in new york and people don't understand the country needs to unite to the point that we cannot let a guy who always looks at the bottom line. he does not govern the country. and now he's going to -- this is the first time i'm gonna watch the state of the union. i'm excited about how our country will be, because were going to talk about a man who

wants a wall. being done, not everybody is for themselves. and one part i'm going to mention, because he always told me i should not bring it up, when netanyahu came in and disrespected obama when the republicans invited him, that is something that will go down in history that was very sinful. i'm hoping tonight that this guy will try to unite the country, not make a talking point. host: he said this is the first time you are excited? were you excited last year? caller: it gets worse and worse you kind of hope there will be a change, but it gets worse and worse. not i'm saying you're excited over hearing, because we hope the president

will bring the country together. host: howdy feel about that? onet: we should not confuse night call for unity with a genuine effort to do so. of president trump comes out and says he wants bipartisanship, right after midterm where you mentioned speech or -- speaker pelosi sitting behind him in the house chamber, that's easy to do. what's hard to do was govern that way. we should watch and listen to what the president says tonight but judge it by relative -- and judged by what he says in the coming days. host: our next collars from ohio, and independent. good morning. years old, we are the greatest civilization known to mankind. and that was labor unions, the billionaires were taxed at 90% and there were

antitrust laws. evolvedpoint it's through the greatest generation of the midwest, we fought the wars, they came back and they joined the unions. they would take on these horrible, and people, going back to this -- and people, going back to the civil war. we had ast coast depression and now you have california the fifth largest economy in the world, while the midwest is bankrupt. what's interesting is that all media, 100% of all media is headquartered in new york, connecticut, california, and texas. we have been raped, robbed, and pillaged in the midwest by evil people, you wrote for the bush family. created al qaeda and isis. host: bring us up to the state

of the union. caller: the state of the union is going to be written by billionaires from new york, connecticut, and california. there is tremendous frustration in parts of our country that president trump keyed in on during the campaign, these forgotten people that this caller is speaking to. i think that has changed our politics, and rightfully so. there were a lot of people who felt left behind by the economy and politics. that's what's making the dynamic so interesting in washington, howdy respond to that? host: you mentioned the president using their guests to highlight these issues, we want to get your thoughts on some of the guests president trump will be bringing to tonight's event in the house chamber. it has been released by the white house, three generations

of the family of gerald and sharon david in reno, nevada, who were killed in their home in january. the suspect in that home was an immigrant living in the u.s. illegally. timothy manson is being recognized for being wounded as part of the swat team that responded to the mass shooting at the tree of life synagogue in which 11 people were killed. also being honored is a holocaust survivor and synagogue member who survived that shooting. trump, anvited joshua sixth-grade student in wilmington, delaware, who enjoys science, art, and history. unfortunately he had been bullied to do to name. -- bullied due to his last name. >> i think it's fascinating who gets invited, it's a thing they will never forget. , i think thethers

illegal immigrant one is a little more predictable, because the president has brought victims of illegal immigrants who were killed to previous states of the union. the one i think we are little more surprised and newer are a gentleman named matthew charles, he was the first man released from prison under the first step act, there was tremendous bipartisan support for that in congress. and i hope the president will highlight him as part of a bipartisan rhetoric. this is a release from the trump administration that we are showing on the screen, keep going. opioid addict,d recovering from addiction, and that's another slamdunk bipartisan with massive support for the opioid bill that came through congress last fall, and was signed into law. there is another agent from homeland security who specializes in human trafficking

, another huge scourge in our country where there is massive support on both sides for success. that tells me he will start going towards the middle and keep talking about things that are bipartisan issues. if it was all victims of criminal aliens, i think it would have been a more resolute speech, and this tells me he will stick to bipartisanship. host: your thoughts on the guest list? guest: as it relates to the immigration related gas, thing that furthers to me at sizes immigrants which is part -- guest, that only further stigmatizes immigrants which doesn't rally congress to get anywhere closer to a deal. from a speech writing perspective, you have gas because in a long laundry risk -- list policy heavy speech, you need to tell a story, including real people who have been affected by policy is a way to

demonstrate that this is not just a conversation in washington between the president and congress. it affects everyone. in 2015, president obama focused mostly on one couple, the minnesota.rom their story of perseverance coming out of the great recession was a good metaphor for the country's ability to rebound. i think what viewers and listeners should listen for when president trump references the people in the gallery is whether he is using them to talk about aspirations or fears, whether he's exploiting them because he's telling a story that appeals to our basest fears, or he's trying to bring us together. maryland,ville, alicia is an independent. good morning. caller: good morning. to someone i spoke on a committee of workforce development, something bipartisan and dear to my heart.

surprised that they are expecting trump to have some shenanigans during the state of the union address. i think contrary to that what we need to hear after coming out of 35 days of furlough and in the midst of tax season what we need to hear is how his past reforms are affecting the middle class. we need to hear some solutions and resolutions, we don't need shenanigans. thank you. want to make clear that i was pointing out and watching a panel where other people were anticipating what was gonna be going on on the podium tonight. i couldn't agree more. i think this is a serious time for our country and the tax reform especially i think has potential for changing people's lives and lifting people out of poverty, and all of the things you want our economy to be doing. i agree with you, this is a serious time and i didn't mean to be late -- making light of it.

elinor is in michigan, a democrat. caller: good morning. i have seen a long list of items he wants to bring up at the state of the union, and it's just a list of things he failed ofdo for the first two years his administration. he had complete control in washington, d.c. and i'm tired of the republicans blaming the democrats for things that trump has failed to get accomplished. had both the white house, the house, and the senate, and all he needed to do was convince a handful of democrats to vote them to accomplish infrastructure, health care, immigration, then he is not much of a negotiator. not only that but you can believe a single word he says, he agrees on the deal, and the next day he tweets that -- he

tweets and it blows up everything. so i will skip the state of the union because it's just a waste of time. have a nice day. host: what's the last date of the union you watched? -- state of the union you watched? caller: i watched a little of the last state of the union, but i just -- i stopped may be midway through. host: if you change your mind you could watch it on c-span, our coverage begins at 8:00 tonight. john, in boston, and independent. good morning. caller: good morning. it's interesting to listen to someguests and to hear frustration that's coming out of a lot of the callers. i think one of the biggest issues facing our country now is immigration, and how we define it.

there seems to be a reluctance to use the word illegal, we wouldn't need a wall if we could enforce our legal immigration system. and we've been doing a good job of doing that when it comes to white western europe, which we have been doing for over half a century, by keeping europeans out in our legal system and ignoring the tens of millions of people coming here illegally. i don't know how work in us all that problem when you have someone who has just taken over the house who says we are not going to put a dollar towards the wall. , illegal immigration, and not being able to control the legal system properly and enforce our laws properly, is one of the problems that we really face. you name it,jobs, it affects everything. i don't know how we will ridge

that gap because we don't talk about it properly. we knowephen krupin, that immigration is a topic that will come to -- come up. these speeches are often broken down by the amount of time the president spends on each subject, what your expectation for how much time he will spend on that issue? guest: i think he will spend a lot of time on that issue but to judge the speech, listen more to the beginning and the end of the speech, the middle will be a lot of policy and a long list of topics to talk about because we are a big country. we have a government that has jurisdiction over a lot of different issues and that we -- and we have a lot of challenges. the beginning and the end of the speech or where the president has the opportunity to show leadership. if you want to talk about bipartisanship, i don't think he can do it credibly but if he wants to give it a shot that's the place to do it. it depends on the tone. host: does that break your heart? to listen to the beginning and the end but not the middle? , everyone two goals

who writes a speech knows that it can be televised in the viewer will sit there with a remote in their hand and if you cannot win them in the first 10 minutes or so, they're not in sit there for another hour and a half. you have to frontload the speech and make sure you have a grabber at the beginning. you are really building your argument, talking about the shared values important to us, you're telling the story that makes your case and marshaling the arguments so at the end you can tie it up with a bow and say my way is the best way. here is the best means to the ends that we agree on. that's why the beginning and the end are important. host: let's talk about the response, that is something you have been involved in in the past. democrats gave the launchpad to stacey abrams, your thoughts on the pick of the democratic candidate for governor in georgia as the one to respond to president trump? >> over the last few years, the

state of the union response has become a way to spotlight up and coming talent in the opposition party. i found it odd that they chose someone who is not currently holding any elected office, and has not announced for president and doesn't seem to be in that group of people that are the up-and-coming talent. i found it a mystifying pic, but it made me curious, i want to see what she has to say. i'm rooting for her, in general, women tend to do better at the state of the union response than the men do. i believe she will do a good job. host: why is that? >> i don't know why. but if you look at joe kennedy last year with the chapstick issues, marco rubio with the drinking of the water, bobby jindal didn't do well. but you think about nikki haley, jodi herz did fine, for some reason the women seem to avoid

all of the pitfalls. i'm sorry to tell you this. we will see what happens tonight. host: you mentioned marco, for those who do not know what you are talking about here is >> the drink of the water. -- the drinking of the water. >> nothing has frustrated me more like the choices the false -- the false choice is the president has laid out tonight. the choice is not between big government or big business. krupin, there was that incident and you mentioned the chapstick, congressman joe kennedy with advice for stacey abrams he tweeted be yourself, you will crush it, you will talk longer than you expect to keep snack sandy. misplace your chapstick, you have millions of americans standing with you. good luck. hear: i'm very excited to stacey abrams, she is the energy and the future of the democratic party. she is an incredibly well qualified public service who did

extremely -- servant who did extremely well in a bright red state. we haven't seen the last of her and i don't think anyone should underestimate her. right, its hat -- hard to speak after the pomp and circumstances of the state of the union but i'm looking forward to the country meeting her tonight. host: we have 15 minutes left, we will get to your calls. frank, in new york, a republican. caller: we have the greatest president since george washington right now, and every time we turn around all we do is keep getting republicans and democrats that do not like him, putting him down and talking bad about him. it's time that we get term limits. nancy pelosi has been there so long she is started -- he started at 140,000 a year. how is she worth 106 million dollars now? at the state of the union is everyone for the country but all

i see are democrats against the country. nancy pelosi, i just have to point that out. just like the wall. were going to hear about the wall. were going to hear that bill clinton wanted the wall, we are going to hear barack obama wanted the wall, we are going to finally's --humer definitely say that he wanted the wall. obama, pelosi, now that president trump is the president , no wall. all aboutnows it's not giving the president a win. everyone in the country, half the country likes trump, half likes democrats, it's back and forth. host: mary kate cary, how often will a president reference a previous president in the state of the union? is that a no-no? thoseally they reference from the same party, you may not reference those from the other side.

if he's as tonight unifying as he likes to bp to that callers point -- two that callers -- to that caller's point, we see specific issues that have not been solved. as a health care -- as a republican i'm still upset that republicans came into office threatening to repeal without a plan. another caller was talking about frustration with immigration reform. and there was such an on that. i think that -- and there was such resistance on that. thatnk that's why you see president trump's rating is lower than his approval for the policy. i'm hoping we get past that people don't listen to the messenger and talk about the policies that are frustrating people and they want solutions. i think that's where the president can do some good. host: you mentioned poll ratings, stephen krupin, what's the best pole to watch to get a

sense of the thoughts on the state of the union question mark where do you turn? guest: i think the best pole is to talk to people who you is to talk tol people who you respect and who you share common values with. you can justify any pole to justify anything you believe. , listenwatch the speech to the response from stacey abrams, and read the facts check that will and heavily come up tomorrow. host: wendy is a democrat in new york. good morning. caller: i think the speech has to, donald trump explain that he is facing real challenges. russians, butll, what he has to be careful of is going off message. , and undoesen does

any good that could possibly be accomplished. donald trump could not get the wall in the two years when he did have the congress and the senate, and i begin to wonder if that was done on purpose so that the republicans are controlling in the next two years. i just think that donald trump is not the president for the people, he's only out for himself. the american people, as a whole, are not benefiting from him. he has learned to control the as a television figure. and unfortunately he cannot

control the entire mass of , we don't because want to be controlled. your point, that's wendy, this is linda, an independent, from tennessee. caller: good morning. i wanted to say that trump does not have to talk about the wall, we have people out there with the democrats own words and they are take, and going to people in the united states, because families have had bad people from drugs and stuff and showing him that the democrats don't care about the american people, they care more about illegal immigrants. that's what obama done.

it's already started. thank you. host: those last two calls, boast with different ideas about what the president -- both with different ideas about what the president does or doesn't have to do. >> it's a moment in our politics where there is such a rorschach test of where you sit is where you stand for things. were donald trump can do one thing ain't it gets completely interpreted in so many different ways, depending on where people stand. and those two callers are examples. there's frustration on many sides but great hope on others. it's a real moment in our national psyche. host: 10 minutes left if you want to call in, we will get to your call, but along with the president inviting guests, members of congress can also invite guests, one guest has -- they have an extra ticket in the seat for the gallery above the house chamber, here are some tweets from members of congress about the guests they are

bringing, senator mitt romney is bringing chief petty officer jason workman, who gave his life in service to this country. i am humbled to be joined by his mother at this years estate state of the union address and he sends a link to read more about him. marsha blackburn is bringing a knoxville fire captain as her guest. the son of that fire captain was killed by an illegal immigrant last month. ofther congresswoman california is bringing a climate scientist as her guest, saying climate change is the most pressing issue of our generation and it's time we pressed trump on his policies that undermine facts. and jennifer wexton, a democrat from virginia invited linda, who works at the washington air traffic controller center in virginia, she was furloughed and she's worried about the government shutdown again if the

president does not sign a bill to keep the government open. your thoughts on the message that gets sent there, who the audience is for those guests. guest: i think it's a powerful way from members of congress to make a statement about what they think the speech and what president trump's leadership should focus on. it's telling that we are speaking a lot, your viewers are calling in about it and some of the guests you mentioned are about immigration. there's a way to talk about immigration in this country, the way we've talked about it for hundreds of years, which is a positive and aspirational story of why people come here. only inut immigration the contracts that immigrants are bad people who kill people, which is the message from the guests, the president, and the republican members guests are bringing, it really stigmatizes immigrants. and it's not the way to move forward. if president trump wants to talk about bipartisanship and unity, and at the same time exploit

these people, were going to end up where we started. host: a great note for our viewers to keep track of guests that members of congress are bringing, they usually tweet about them and they include the #sotu, there has been a whole slew released over the past 24 hours. members of congress are announcing their guest and there's a great place to go for that. michigan,s waiting in a republican. good morning. caller: i wanted to say that i actually do agree with what stephen just said, in order for trump to unify the country a immigrants,ore with and not portray the stigma on illegal immigrants, i think he should not do that. i agree. but i do think that the word illegal, is one of the call --

as a caller said earlier, should be brought up. we did not need to have some -- we do need to have some semblance of there are too many illegal immigrants coming through our country. i think that's a keyword that should be mentioned, and hopefully it will be. and the other thing i would -- and hopefully you agree with that, and the other thing i would like to say is all of this discussion about taxes really scares me. i really don't think, unless we want to become a real socialist country, it doesn't work. if we are taxing, it's too many taxes that have been proven to not work. that's about all i want to say. i do applaud trump, for all he is doing, and not taking a paycheck. and really trying to negotiate with everyone. thank you. mary kate cary, keywords,

as a speechwriter, what are the five or six keywords the president should say tonight? >> we were talking about this before we came on, the words we predicted that we will hear the most. the speeches is going to be creating greatness, so i think we will hear a lot about greatness, but to the caller's point, i hope the president will talk about us being a nation of immigrants, and the greatness. he is a grandchild of immigrants, im, are you? -- i am? are you? host: yes. >> i think there needs to be a celebration of all of the good things legal immigrants -- immigrants -- legal immigrants have brought to our country. i think a discussion about how we are a nation of laws is important, and access and opportunity, access to health care, and opportunity in our

economy, those are the things i'm hoping to hear because those can be translated to specific policy points. that's what i would say. host: keywords? >> -- guest: bipartisan, unity, i think we speechwriters know that actions are more important than words, so we will see. host: on the independent line, good morning. fairr: thank you for the approach, and both sides being presented, i think that's fantastic. i want your opinion on returning to the fairness doctrine, where each side had to be reported or presented on television and radio, and cable tv. what is your opinion about the fairness doctrine? do we need to have the fcc bring back the fairness doctrine? host: thank you for the question. >> this came up when the

president made his speech a few weeks ago from the oval office about immigration. there were a lot of networks debating about carrying the speech at all. my thought was, of course you carry the speech, it was not a campaign rally. it was so not -- it was not something inappropriate but there should be a democratic response. and we saw speaker pelosi and chuck schumer both responded. that is the way it should be. to the caller's question, i'm not sure whether the fcc should get involved and i don't know the specifics of the law. but that was a good example of how it was handled well without turning into a federal court case about it. that's what i'm hoping we see more of, that there's a response and both sides are heard from, and people want to know both sides. host: stephen krupin? guest: i agree, you get both sides on this issue as well. the principles behind the fairness doctrine are important to our democracy, which is

making sure there's accountability and an opportunity to respond. we will see that tonight in the house chamber, we will see with stacey abrams's response afterwards. and we will see this with hopefully diligent fact checking from reporters around the country. but there's also a responsibility to view the speech in the correct context. president trump loves having this opportunity to speak on this grand stage to the entire company -- country. one of the risks is that the ship has sailed on his credibility, he needs to check on the other side. host: a few more calls, in houston, texas, on the republican line. good morning. caller: i'm calling a strong support of the president. i'm a lifelong republican. senior,ack woman, i'm a i am a professional woman, exquisitely trained. thealso very supportive of president and everything he does for us and i wish we would let them i knew should go and tried

go. let the minuate i really worry that we are not taking ourselves seriously enough and we are quite literally fiddling while rome burns. host: what's an example of it? what's an example of the my new tae? -- minu affairs, theide miscellaneous women, the flaws that men, for the most part, exhibit in some portions of their lives that that -- that have to be accounted for later. we don't need to worry about things like that but we need to worry about china and the south china sea. we need to be thankful that trump has gotten us together with north korea, and there's a number of other accomplishments that we don't seem to want to give him credit for, and that's really a shame and its shameful to us. we cannot give the credit when the credit is due.

nobody is perfect, we know that. we've gone through a series of presidents with their own personal failings. that's not the point. the point is we need to focus on what makes america better, and pointing out somebody's personal failings, most of which are shared by the people pointing the fingers, we need to stop that. john, a democrat, from wisconsin. caller: all i would like to say is that these people that come on, and they give trump this praise, that's wrong. that guy is a crook. he's as crooked as can be. she just pointed to each one of you and said each one of you was an immigrant. they've been getting that wrong for a long time. african-americans are not immigrants, they didn't immigrate to this country, they were stolen from their lands and brought here. that's all i have to say. host: on those last two calls, we have a minute and a half left

in this segment. your thoughts on final excitations for tonight? presidenting the moves the needle forward. i think there's a frustration in our country with the gridlock, with the partisanship. and the one hopeful thing i see in these numbers, on the viewership tonight, is the number of people who watch it on it under president clinton was high at six to 7 million, but we will see 50 million people watching it tonight, last year set a record for the number of people on social media during the speech. to your point about the stories, the people coming as guests, that's one way for people who may never even focus on the state of the union, but they know that firefighter, and they will start tuning in. and i think that the more people get involved, on social media, commenting about the stories on the people involved, that's better for our democracy and

that gives me hope. i'm hoping a record number of viewers and social media posts means that more americans are involved. host: final thoughts? guest: i would say the state of the union is about accountability, that's the president and to make suggestions on policy. it's about leadership in this country. both sides, both chambers work together. it's more than lip service, it has to actually happen. and we are going to be able to tell if this is a successful speech not when the president stops speaking at 10:30 or 11:00, but afterward when policy actually happens or maybe we reach another shutdown. more writing can be found on twitter. time, you canyour also check the podcast out.

thanks for having us. host: we will turn away from the state of the union and focus on the measles outbreak. we will be joined by a doctor of the national institute of health the talk about the outbreak and why the anti-vaccination movement is helping to fuel that. we will be right back. ♪ trump: over the last year, the world has seen what we always knew. no people on earth are so fearless or doering were determined as americans. if there is a mountain, we climate. there is a frontier, we cross it. if there is a challenge, we came it. if there is an opportunity, we seize it. so let's begin tonight by recognizing that the state of our union is strong, because our

people are strong. announcer: the state of the union, first postponed because of the government shutdown, will take place tonight. watch as front delivers his state of the union address live from the house chamber beginning at 9 p.m. eastern on c-span, followed by the democratic response by former georgia gubernatorial candidate stacey abrams. the state of the union live tonight at 9:00 eastern on listed --span.org, or or listen with the free c-span radio app. announcer: c-span, where history unfolds daily. c-span was created as a public service by american cable television companies. today, we continue to bring you unfiltered coverage of congress. the white house, the supreme court, and public policy events in washington, d.c. and around

the country. c-span is brought you by your cable or satellite provider. announcer: washington journal continues. joining us now from the national institutes of health in director ofyland, the national institute of allergies and infectious disease. can you first update us on the status of that measles outbreak that you have been monitoring and how it compares to other measles outbreaks in the post measles vaccine era. well, in the end of 2018, beginning of 2019, we had a couple of outbreaks. one in new york city among hasidic juice in that area and brooklyn and also in washington state. 2018, the end of 2018, we have the second worst outbreak year of measles since

the year 2000 when we had eliminated measles from the united states and hopefully, we thought we had eliminated it, but then when people started sharing away from vaccinations, we've had these outbreaks, several over the last several years, 2018 was one of the worst outbreak years that we've had. are these outbreaks only spreading among those who have not been vaccinated, or those who have been vaccinated are also at risk? it's very unusual for someone who has been vaccinated to be one of the individuals in the outbreak. the overwhelming majority of the people who contract measles during these outbreaks that we are talking about are individuals who have not been vaccinated or who have not had the full component of the two vaccinations. but when you look at mostly children and even some adults who get measles, as we are

seeing now with these outbreaks, clearly, overwhelmingly, the vast majority have not had the measles vaccine. host: do we know how many children and adults are not vaccinated against us? we have, countrywide, about a 92 to 95% compliance with vaccinations. that's what you need to get what immunity orrd umbrella protection. once you are below that, or into the 80's, you get a problem. if you look at the entire country, the entire country is in that framework, but they are all isolated areas, groups of people, demographic groups that have a much lower level of we saw with the situation of the jewish community in brooklyn as well as the somalians in minnesota who had a very low level of

vaccination, way below that critical level. host: how many people in this country, what are the regions most the that people don't vaccinate themselves? is it religious reasons, or is it fear of what the vaccines might do? guest: it's clearly mostly the latter. and i must say, it's an unwarranted fear because a lot of this information, particularly about the measles vaccine and its relationship to autism, something that has been clearly debunked and is based on fraudulent information that came out of the u.k. several years ago, but the three major reasons or four major reason people don't get vaccinated, one is religious reasons, one is medical reasons which is valid if you are immunosuppressed or if you have a situation like a disease that lowers your immune system, you really don't want to get

vaccinated. philosophical reason, which is the area that tends to get abused because anyone can say i have a philosophical reason, but i don't want to get vaccinated. many of the hard-core anti-baxters are in that group of saying they have philosophical reasons because they think that the vaccines are more harmful than helpful. so those are the categories. and for some individuals, unfortunately, he may not have the health care access to vaccines. it is it just because they may not want to get vaccinated, but because it might be difficult for them to get the access to vaccinations. you think we should make it harder for people to choose to not get vaccinated against the measles? there are, clearly throughout the country, rules and guidelines about admissions to schools that you need a certain state of vaccinations. what has happened in certain areas of the country that there has been a considerable degree

ofsome abuse of the category philosophical objections. in fact, some states and some clearly made it much more difficult to have a philosophical objection for a philosophical waiver. it's religion, health, and individuals who have a health reason, those are important. but i think we should be a little bit stricter on what we allow for philosophical reasons. not only for the protection of the children, but because of the responsibilities to society. because you really want to protect the community by making sure you keep the level and the percentage of vaccinations above that critical level. posts: we are talking with the director of the national institute for allergy and infectious diseases. you are joining the discussion this morning telephone lines are open for you to do so. in the eastern or central time zones, (202) 748-8000.

manson or pacific time zones, (202) 748-8001. talking about the measles outbreaks around the country. youolks are calling in, can talk about what measles is, and what it does? guest: measles is a viral infection, predominantly among children. it is one of the most contagious viruses that we know of. it's extraordinarily contagious. it starts off with a fever, individuals get a runny nose. they get red eyes, they may get a cough. a couple of days later, they get a rash and spots on the face and it spreads throughout the body. it is sometimes incorrectly said to be an inconsequential mild disease. it's not. the children are extremely uncomfortable to get measles. and the complications are really not trivial at all. one in 10 children get an ear infection that can lead to death

-- deafness. one in 20 get pneumonia that can be very serious. andin 1000 get satellite us one to three per 1000 actually die and if you look historically at measles, it is one of the great killers of children throughout the years. in fact, prior to the vaccination availability in the 1980's, there were a few million deaths per year among mostly children who had measles and in fact, even today, when there are vaccines available, not really accessible to everyone throughout the world, there are still about 120, 100 50,000 deaths for year throughout the world from measles and a few million cases. a serious disease. even though most children recover, nonetheless, it's uncomfortable and it can lead to complications. host: let's chat with a few

callers, josh from nashville, tennessee. good morning, you are on. caller: good morning. it's an honor to speak you. .'m not an anti-baxter i do believe in vaccines, but i just want to point out to people watching the show that the host made the comment, should we make it harder for people to opt out of vaccines. and that just demonstrates the value forack of freedom that people in washington, d.c. have on both sides of the aisle. the host is not a liberal, and that just shows that you have total power over the individual and that's just egregious. host: we are asking the questions this morning, what you ink? mean, i think he was criticizing you for what you said without a question. i think you need to put things in context.

when you say force people to do things, you don't really want to do that, but my approach has always been to try to explain in ways that people can understand, the importance of vaccination rather than focusing on forcing someone to do something, but have someone come to the decision on their own accord why it's important for the protection of their own child. but also, what i refer to as the responsibility of society. members of al are society, and we all have responsibilities. we take advantage of things in society, but we also have responsibilities in society. and we know as a fact from decades and decades of experience, that if the vaccination rate gets below a certain level, you are going to get outbreaks that can be very dangerous if not deadly to people. so what we try to do is convince people about it, considering clearly and carefully, what the

reasons are for not wanting to get vaccinated. about ways talking to force them to get vaccinated. try to get them there of their own accord. host: california, good morning. much forhank you so the time with you. you know, i've got a couple of questions, so please bear with me. we will start off with of the measles issue first and i really need you to stay with me after that. there's a thing called 3-d measles and the regular measles. kid, i had a measles vaccine, but when i went to europe in the army and i went to spain, i wound up getting the and that was a terrible experience with a high temperature and i thought i was going to die with a lot of splotches all over my body. you have to be able to explain to the people that this is a public health issue.

and the difference between three-day measles and regular measles. that's the first question. the second question, more people in a public health situation understand that if you take a polio vaccine, it's going to say that a lot of lives because it's going to save your child and yourself, but by taking the polio vaccine. and when you put, when i was in the army, i need you to listen to this quickly. we had eight different vaccines given in a gun. that gun turned out to be a real problem for passing on different issues to people in the army during the 60's. now, the second thing is today, there were only eight vaccines that i was given in the army. that was in the 1960's. today, they give you like 20 or 30 or 40 vaccines and they are giving them to young babies.

so you have to explain the difference between all these vaccines and why they have to come up with all these cocktails of vaccines. whoave a dear nurse understood this. she said they are not messing up the vaccines before they give it to the kids, and that was causing problems. so please help me out. host: doctor? of all, i'm not really sure what you are talking about when you say three-day measles. we don't refer to three-day measles versus regular measles. measles is measles. if you were vaccinated which apparently you were as a child, the regiment is at around 12 months for your prime and around four to six years for your boost, but i'm not sure what happened after you went into the army and what they were referring to as three-day measles, because as physicians and health care, we don't refer to regular measles and three-day measles. it must be another virus that they were talking about like a german measles which is rubella.

that's why think people get confused. measles, which is a clear-cut disease, and what people incorrectly referred to, because the real name is rubella which is german measles. it's an entirely different type of virus and i think that the confusion that you might be referring to. with regard to getting a whole bunch of vaccines, the reason that is the case is that there are a considerable number of what we call vaccine preventable diseases. vaccinesally give the to children in order to build up the immunity that they will have for the rest of their lives. when individuals going to the service, they can boosts of some of these and they can also vaccines that you would not want to give to the general public because the people who would be defending the country might get exposed to the kinds of diseases that you would not get exposed everydayr normal, life, for example, in the united states.

for example, certain situations, some of the military, not all, get vaccinated against smallpox. no people in the community in the united states right now have any need for smallpox vaccinations. because smallpox has essentially been eradicated. the military, some of the military might get it because of the possibility of germ warfare. but those are the kinds of things you have to keep in mind when you talk about the difference is of the vaccines that you might get after you go into the military versus the vaccines that you get in your normal back summation schedule as a child. host: frank is in pennsylvania, good morning. caller: how are you doing? i was sevenhen years old, my twin sister and i got the measles. and we didn't know whether it was the german measles or regular measles or what it was. and we were quarantined. our parents informed the school and the teacher that we had the measles.

up i know when i was growing in a certain family or a kid had the measles, and they were quarantined, or they got the chickenpox or something, some other family sent their young kids over to get it with them while they were young. you couldn't give it to the mother or somebody else would get it when they got older. ,ow, if we had the measles could we get it again? and he was talking about o'connel we are immune, we had our smallpox vaccinations. i know9 years old, and some people who got vaccinated every time they left the country and came back and they got vaccinations all over themselves and they love to the border with smallpox that we can be vaccinated with even though we've been vaccinated for smallpox. host: couple issues. guest: a couple of pages. i'm not sure i can address all

of them, but let me just try some of the important things that the caller mentioned. and they really are important. that's somewhat of a confusion about the difference between measles, what we talking about now, and chickenpox. for a child, chickenpox is a relatively mild disease. so, what happens? we don't necessarily recommend it, but with some families over the years, the figure you might as well get chickenpox out of the way so you don't have to worry about it later. so when a child gets chickenpox, sometimes they bring other children over to the house in order to get them exposed, to get them out of the way, to get chickenpox, they are done with it. you don't ever want to do that with measles. measles, i think what your mother did, the caller, was the correct thing. if you had measles as a child, to isolate you and not have you spread it to other people was the correct thing to do, because

measles is one of the most contagious diseases literally in history. in fact, if you go into a room and there are people who are not vaccinated and are not immunized, don't have immunity to measles, and there is a child or a person in a room who is measles,and has acted and you have a naive population of vulnerable people in the room, 90% of them are going to wind up getting infected. if a person with measles comes into a room and sneezes and coughs, and then leaves the room, the virus still lingers for one to two hours. someone who walks into the room, even after the person who has measles has left the room, is honorable to getting measles. whatso contagious that your mother did about trying to isolate you from going out into the community was the correct thing. that's a different story than what we are talking about when you talk about chickenpox, which

is relatively mild, and some people want to essentially get their children infected to get it over with. two very different things. aboutto the latter point people crossing the border with certain diseases, there was a report last week about a migrant flesh eatingd with bacteria. how concerned are you about migrants bringing diseases into this country? know, if you are talking about migrants coming over the border, that's not how you get diseases into the country. we can get, most of the time you get diseases like tuberculosis were someone would come in, usually in a very legal, of the board way, coming into the an area of the world where they have tuberculosis because many of the cases of tuberculosis that we have in this country are from people who come from outside the country. usually legally.

even measles, we often get people who have measles and countries in which the vaccination programs are not as they are here in the united states. example relatively recently is the hasidic jewish community in new york, in the brooklyn area, they were very low in their vaccinations. someone, a visitor, came in quite legally from israel. with measles, brought it into the community, and that's how you have the outbreak among the community in brooklyn. certainly, diseases can come in from the out side, but that is something that happens all the time and it isn't the problem with the disease is already in our country. host: mike in maryland, good morning. caller: i wanted to answer a few of your questions. one is why people aren't taking vaccines. it's because people are not drinking fluorinated water and

with that, they are also realizing that nutrition is the key to health. not vaccinations. and i'm note padded padded, you should worry about me because you are wearing pads. guest: i think nutrition is important and vaccinations are important. i don't think they are mutually exclusive. you should try to get good nutrition to the extent possible and you should get vaccinated against vaccine preventable diseases. minnesota, good morning. caller: thanks for taking my call. i have a couple of things, actually. i have a nephew who is 21. when he hit that, he was three and a half. he did that second mmr shot. within three weeks after he had that shot, he was a totally different kid, he was walking and talking up until the had that does, and now he has

autism. that's a different story. i guess the one that i really want to talk about is my 25-year-old daughter who i made sure she went through the whole regiment of the hpv shots and about three weeks ago, he was tested positive for hpv. of the is the point vaccine because now my daughter has tested positive when she did the right thing. guest: well, first of all, i think it's important to point out that the evidence is that the vaccine or any vaccine does not cause autism. so again, there's that data that came out from the u.k. which was totally fraudulent data. now, children develop autism at a certain age. unfortunately, children also get vaccinated at a certain age, and that is the reason why there's something you can. but when you do any of a number of studies to prove otherwise, it is very clear that

vaccinations, particularly measles vaccinations, don't cause autism. is aregard to hpv, hpv quite effective vaccine. it is possible, i don't know exactly the caller talking about the age of the child who got vaccinated with hpv, and whether or not they had hpv before or after, it's very difficult to say. but you could also say that the vaccines are not 100% effective. it is conceivable that you could have gotten vaccinated against dumping like hpv and still got an hpv. it's unusual, but it can happen. host: just a few minutes left on the autism issue, i want to point viewers to this story from on the president's previous tweets about autism and vaccines. i wonder what your conversations have been with the white house and trying to enlist the president in this effort to get people vaccinated. guest: i have not had

conversations with the president or with the white house about this, but we have some white house personnel have come early on to get briefed by us about the data associated with vaccines and autism and we have made it very clear to them exactly what i said to one of your callers, but there is absolutely no evidence whatsoever that vaccines, including the measles back seat, or a cause of autism. we are very, very clear on our statement and our basis of our data and our evidence that we discussed. host: time for maybe one or two more calls before he has to leave us. louisiana, go ahead. caller: hello. i would like to bring up an issue. i started working with a disease and costa rica in 1966 and during that time period, several people in the lab were injected and there is ate

treatment that is not widely known where you can apply heat to the infected area and it will --e thermal lash minaya says minaya's. guest: it's a disease that we deal with, we have group -- it canparticularly be a very serious disease because it can be disseminated throughout the body. i've not heard of nor have any information about the information the caller is talking about, but we do have fda approved drugs for the treatment of it. host: last call from alexandria, virginia. tell the wanted to doctor that i agree with you in terms of how vaccines and

nutrition are not mutually exclusive. in fact, when we talk about immune systems, it depends on nutrition.and however, i don't agree that vaccines create lifetime immunity and i know that's why we have boosters. you were talking earlier about having a bunch of vaccines all at once, a cocktail in order to make lifetime immunity which does not happen and a third thing of it like to say is that autism, while we may not know exactly what causes autism, by the same token, scientifically, we have not come up with a science that says that vaccines do not cause autism so if anybody ever tells you that vaccines do not cause autism, that's still based on a believe system and not on science. host: i will give you the last two minutes. i totally disagree with the caller. there is overwhelming evidence that vaccines, particularly

measles, do not cause autism. with regards to her comments about lifetime immunity, she's correct. you are a lot of different vaccines, some vaccines don't require boosters like tetanus, that's the reason you get a cap miss booster every year. vaccine ata measles 12 months and then at four to six years, an overwhelming number of people have lifetime immunity to that. some give you lifetime immunity, some require boosters. host: we will let you get back your work at the nih, the director of the national institute for allergies and infectious diseases. we appreciate your time as always. guest: good to be with you. returnoming up next, we to the discussion about the state of the union address taking place tonight. asking you for your expectations for that address. for us a call on fun ones republicans, independents, and democrats on your screen and we will be right back. ♪

trump: over the last year, the world has seen what we always knew. that no people on earth are so fearless or daring or determined as americans if there is a mountain, we climate. if there is a frontier, we cross it. if there is a challenge, we came it. there is an opportunity, we seize it. so let's begin tonight by recognizing that the state of our union is strong because our people are strong. announcer: the state of the union, first postponed because of the government shutdown, will now take place tonight. watch as trump delivers his state of the union address live from the house chamber beginning at 9 p.m. eastern on c-span followed by the democratic

response by former georgia gubernatorial candidate stacey abrams. the state of the union live tonight at 9:00 eastern on c-span, c-span.org, or listen with the free c-span radio app. c-span, where history unfolds daily. in 1979, c-span was created as a public service by america's cable television companies. today, we continue to bring you unfiltered coverage of congress. the white house, the supreme court, and public policy events in washington, d.c. and around the country. c-span's brought to you by your cable or satellite providers. announcer: washington journal continues. host: here's the schedule today on capitol hill. the senate comes in just about a half-hour at 10:00, expecting the house in at noon. the house will be in for two hours today before they recess

to prepare for the state of the union address. that will begin at 9:00 eastern tonight. our coverage on c-span begins at 8 p.m. eastern. you can watch it on c-span, c-span.org, or listen on the free c-span radio app as we look ahead to the state of the union address, we're asking for your expectations for tonight. give us a call on phone lines for democrats, (202) 748-8000. republicans, (202) 748-8001. independents, (202) 748-8002. have the discussion adult on a this morning on the washington journal. we have talked about, we have spent an hour this morning talking about the state of the union address and the mechanics for putting a speech together. one of those mechanics is the invitation of guests by the president. the white house has released a list of guest that will be in

the gallery in the house chain or -- chamber. a story on that from the washington times. will generations of family be in the chamber. gerald in nevada were killed in their homes in january. the suspect is an immigrant living in the united states illegally. mr. trump has cited such cases in his call for stronger border security including the wall. pittsburgh police officer to the madsen will be in the -- timothy gallery,ll be in the he was a responder in the tree of life synagogue that killed people. they have also invited joshua trump, a sixth grade student in wilmington, delaware who enjoys science, art, and history. according to the release from the trump administration, joshua has been bullied in school today his last name. he is thankful for the first

lady and the trump family for their support. just a few of the guests that will be in the chamber. we want to hear from you about your expectations. michigan, a democrat, good morning. caller: good morning. i would like to talk about that border wall. i'm sure the president is going to talk about it tonight. it seems that the trump organization has hired a lot of illegals, and i keep hearing the right say that we separate american children from their parents whenever they commit crimes, so maybe we should make the laws a little stiffer. them, maybelly hire we should throw these people in jail that are hiring them. and then, with the use the civil forfeiture laws to seize their assets from their companies. use that money for border security, and we could take their children down to the border, put them in the same

cages with the immigrant children, and let them see what it's like to have their children taken away from them. i think they would stop hiring them. they wouldn't need a law. save the taxpayers a lot of money. twittere president on this morning talking about a border wall. tremendous numbers of people are coming up through mexico in the hopes of flooding our southern border. we have sent additional military. we will build a human wallet necessary. if we had a real wall, this would be a nonevent. we know immigration will be a key topic of the president's address tonight. the white house has released some of the themes of the address. including trade, infrastructure, drug pricing, and national security. we are told there will be emphasis on bipartisanship at the white house as a preview the state of the union theme. republican, west virginia, good morning. caller: good morning.

host: what is your expectation for tonight? caller: well, this is also about the wall. i'm just an old senior, but i do believe the wall with the more .ependable you would not have as many people if you had the wall. and it would be more dependable because state law, as anyone knows, has computers and glitches and it's messed up half the time with technology. so i want the wall first and if to have a little bit of technology on the side, that's fine. on you can't always count technology with these computers going out and everything else. once that wall is up, they would not have to hire as many people. coming over to watch and everything. dale, independent,

good morning. caller: good morning. i would like to make a comment about the so-called scandal in virginia, the lieutenant governor also for that matter. just one,, let he who is without sin cast the first stone. thank you. on what is happening in virginia, from page story in today's washington post on the status of governor ralph northam , we talked yesterday in this program about the meeting he had yesterday morning, some reporting on what came of that meeting. staffers in urged the meeting not to quit, promised to decide his fate soon, but how soon is left unsaid according to three people familiar with what transpired. days, according to one person familiar with the governor's thinking. he is trying to assemble

evidence to prove that he was not in the racist photo that was in his medical school yearbook and is exploring whether he has enough support in the government to continue to be effective. that's in the washington post today. roger, independent, your thoughts on what going to happen tonight, and your expectations? caller? i'm hoping that everybody will become united and then hoping that everybody will understand that the left and the right need to come together. i see the division between how the democrats want to use people and have the republicans want to use people. iss is not how america america. america unite as one. we see division here between different cultures of younger people and older people who have now gained office status in d.c. what i would like to see is everybody come together and unite as one, as we can all join

in making america, not great again, but a better place to live. and we need structures on our borders to protect us as americans. i mean, it would be unethical for us to just shut down the border and just completely keep one side away from the other side. we are not a middle eastern country does that. we protect our people. tovoted for donald trump protect the people of the united states. all the other presidents and all the other people have never done that. donald trump has been the only president in my 40 years of voting as a republican, i have voted democrat before. ,nd i have voted for jennifer the governor of michigan at one point in time. and i went back to being a republican because when you have donaldunited as one,

trump is a united person and he tries to unite as for the democratic party wants to continue, and i mean continue to pull support. and i can't understand why the democratic party wants to pull us apart. donald trump is a wonderful man. he's the people's president. he's the only president i know in the united states of america who has been a voice for the people, who speaks directly to the people. everything has always been hidden host:. that's roger in michigan. thestarted by talking about young people who have been elected. a story on some of the younger members of congress and who they plan to bring to the house chamber tonight. each member of congress gets a next her ticket to a seat in the gallery and they often use that to highlight different issues that they are involved in. the new york times story noting from new of cortez york is bringing sexual assault who cornered a

republican senator in an elevator demanding to know if you was going to vote to confirm justice brett kavanaugh to the supreme court. it democrat from washington, and chairwoman of the congressional progressive caucus is bringing a climate change scientists, a democrat of minnesota and a somali refugee is bringing a liberian refugee who is threatened with deportation, all wearing white as part of an effort by democratic women in the house chamber to highlight economic issues related to women. one other representative highlight in that story, a democrat in georgia. jordan davis, 17, shot to death in 2012 by a man upset that he was playing loud music. he's bringing jeff bigley, a killedof someone who was last year in a shooting at a yoga studio in tallahassee. members of congress have been tweeting out their guests quite

frequently over the past 24 hours. we have a twitter list on c-span twitter page following members of congress tweeting about the state of the union. that's a good place to go to learn about some of these guests and different members. evan is next in alabama. public of -- republican. caller: on calling up because i'm actually glad that our president wants to protect our built on topica is of america and i think that the wall is supposed to really help, it's going to help our country because we got a lot of drugs, we've got a lot of people coming ng our american people, and it's got to stop. we have a lot of drugs being seized over here and i think the democrats need to start waking up and coming together like everybody else is saying and try

to figure out a better solution. host: north carolina, democrat, good morning. caller: hello? host: good morning. go ahead. caller: yes, i'm going to speak on the wall. and i've been listening to your i think it was a 1980's. wall, it seems to me, i'm 68 years old. it seems to me that i've listened to a lot of people ,alling in, it might be my age they've been calling in for the president. nothing that the wall is, they are reaching back to a time of something about the civil war. it's not so much about the wall.

i work with immigrants in florida, and it's not about the wall. . i don't know,ut brothers and my we protested that machinery was coming into the fields. that, but the machine won so we went into the , we had to so educate ourselves in higher education for what was going on in america. host: illinois, republican, good morning. caller: good morning. a great network and i'm glad you are on television and

i'm glad you have a great procedure. i enjoy president trump, i'm glad he's elected. his pointsdidacy, way, the a terrible lack of disrespect for voter rights to vote. my vote should be respected. just like everybody voted for president obama, and they accepted president obama, and they accepted his health care plan. our insurance plans would not change. well, our wages have been garnished immensely and our insurance plans have changed. board, trump has

one important issue, to protect the constitution of the united states. and our vote matters. and what the democrats need to respect to the republicans votes. host: here's a story on the front page of usa today. this morning, some of the headwinds that trump is facing as he goes into this speech tonight, the headline weakened trump will call for unity, state of the union comes amid some political headwind. in a will deliver his call new era of divided government and in a time he has been weakened by the government shutdown. in addition, robert mueller still investigating possible russian coordination with his presidential campaign and is still issuing indictment stories. it goes on to talk about the other headwind facing trump. we talked recently with senate historian don ritchie about the state of the union addresses in

general and asked him whether any other president had faced similar circumstances going into the state of the union. here's what he had to say. similar, but unusual circumstances. i think perhaps the most unusual was in 1999. while the sun was sold on the impeachment trial, the president chose to come up and gave a speech as if nothing was happening. it really surprised everybody. justthought maybe he would send a message or whatever, but he made it clear that he was doing business as usual. i've remember that is one of the more stunning and surprising messages. there have been some sad moments, president reagan had to delay his for a week because the challenger exploded, the shuttle , traumatic moments, right after wars have been declared, right after an assassination.

there have certainly been moments that have been hyped, perhaps, in terms of drama. year, it's a dramatic effect. the inauguration is the only time when all branches of the government come together. you've got the supreme court, you've got the military, you got the cabinet, the senate, the house, the diplomats. spouses and the guests in the gallery, every seat in the press gallery is taken. it's a very high drama situation. aboutdon ritchie talking other branches of government that attend the state of the union. a story on that in today's ruthngton post focusing on bader ginsburg who made her first public appearance since undergoing cancer surgery in december. she attended a celebration of her life presented in song. the justice attended a

ofduction of notorious rbg women in the arts in washington. she has not made a public appearance since undergoing surgery after doctors discovered a cancerous nodule in her left long although the washington post notes it's unlikely that she will be at the capital tonight for the state of the union. she has attended past state of theunion addresses but justice has not attended any of trump's. she skipped his first speech to congress in 2017 and was out of town at a speaking appearance last year. an engagement that she accepted before the date of the state of the union was announced. she had made all of barack obama's speeches. noting theton post, justices who have attended the various state of the union addresses over the years 2001, justices breyer, kagan, and kennedy as well as chief justice

roberts. oregon, democrat. caller: good morning. i think that we've got a real problem other than what the president is. that was a problem generated some years ago by ronald reagan, by the fairness doctrine. as long as we have 30 to 40% of their populations operating under misinformation and inaccurate information, this country will stay divided because you cannot separate people with the truth. the truth ends up being the thing that puts us together. right now, we have no truth. it's both sides have a problem with the truth, and we need that fairness doctrine back in. we need money out of the politics.

this country is in real deep trouble as it is. host: you think fairness will be satisfied tonight with the response that we always see from , thearty not in power state of the union address tonight, the democratic response will begin by stacey abrams. the 2018 gubernatorial candidate in georgia. no, because the misinformation is already put out. and when that becomes the fact, then it's no longer viable. and that's what's going on in this country. you have people call up and talk about ink that have nothing to do with the truth. you just have those people calling up about taking measles shots and causing something that had been proven a lie. as long as though things are need to beur airways aligned with the truth, not this

fallacy that goes on. ronald is next, new york. republican, good morning. caller: good morning. i have a comment and a question. general,think that, in whether democrat, republican, or independent, americans should watch the state of the union address and respect the office and the importance of the things being discussed. now, my question is, i just want to ask you regarding your c-span office that you broadcast from now, i was wondering, what happened to the previous office. was it looking out on washington , it was so attractive, what happened there? host: at studio is still there,

there was a fire a couple floors up from the studio and some smoke damage happened in our studio on the day the fire happened. had to be watching washington journal that morning, it was discovered actually about 15 minutes into the program. the programending early, something we very rarely do, but we are working on getting back upstairs so you can have that nice view of the capital. but in the meantime, this is one of our other studios on the first floor of our offices at 400 north capitol street and washington, d.c.. so i hope you are enjoying this studio while we are here. our staff here has worked hard to make this available so we can continue to do this, but we will be back up there soon, but thanks for asking. rick in tennessee, republican. go ahead. caller: thanks very much for taking my call. time, irepublican this

was a democrat, voted for president obama twice. but this time i voted for president trump. the reason i did is because of what he stood for. and i support this president 100%, and i believe that the media, and i'm not going to name these two stations that are so biased in their reporting, that every day, if you watch them, they do nothing but prevent negative information against the president of the united states and nothing sticks. it just keeps going on and on and on. they speak very disrespectfully about the president of the united states, and i agree with the previous caller that the people, it's not just about disrespectinge the american people who voted for this president and still support him 100%. alli say go president trump the way, stick to what you

believe is right. the american people support you. we will hear from the president directly in about 11 hours. the state of the union address at 9:00 eastern tonight. you can watch it at c-span, c-span.org, listen to it on the free radio app. our coverage begins at 8:00 eastern tonight. so we hope you'll join us for that. time for one or two more calls before we end this morning. diane, georgia, democrat. caller: good morning. i would just like to say the only reason some of these people are still even supporting call on is what they the lives. it is pathetic. they have to know that this man is psychologically and morally unfit to be president. his andriminal, unindicted co-conspirator. in theater, i mean, the only

reason he's even in office is because gop dirty trickster's working in cahoots with russians to get that man in office. wasn't duly elected by the people, and no, i don't have to kiss his bought and kiss their butts voting for him. i am disgusted with the people who voted for him. host: are you going to watch tonight? will, evenrobably though my blood pressure will shoot up 30 points. you know. i will have to probably force myself to watch it. the whole thing, his cult personality is really getting old. these people still supporting him the matter what, and like you said, he could go out and shoot somebody on fifth avenue and they would still love him or vote for him or whatever he said. was,razy i thought that and how actually it was absolutely true, and he knew it then.

if these people think that i'm proud of them, and i say o, way to go, they've got a real problem. host: this is will in indianapolis, independent. is, it seemsmment that people forget the past eight years of president obama in office. the rhetoric that was thrown his way. you had congressmen standing up saying that they are trying to make him a one term president. they did not work on a lot of the stuff he was trying to get past. i can just imagine the stuff a trump is doing, if obama had done it, what with the rhetoric and the outcry be from people against him? you know, i do respect the president's office. but what i'm saying is that a lot of this stuff he is doing, donald trump, it's just amazing

to me how people are accepting it. and saying respect the office of the president. is so muchhere racial issue going on not just with the president, with this country in general. we see so much divide, and i would just like to see people come together, stop the rhetoric, stop the hate, and talk about stuff that they agree on. host: when was the last time we did that as a country? caller: i just look at it as my circle. it diverse group. we get along. people just walk around the areas with their neighbors and stuff like that. take small steps. it is spread out throughout the country. because there's too much hate going on.

house,u walk around my you see confederate flags, and i'm like wow, this is crazy to me. supporters,ut trump but i wear a black lives matter should sometimes, and you should see the stairs i get, -- of the stares i get, the comments i get. it's just people in general that are buttholes, and i think the majority of people aren't buttholes, they just want to have peace. your point. monroe via, california, republican. us -- are you with us? lewis in salisbury, north carolina. democrat, good morning.

caller: good morning c-span, good morning america. , i got myof the union pills ready, my high blood pressure pills. blood pressure pills. it is going to be about duct tape,. he is doing fear tactics on a lot white people, i think they are biting into it. get a wall, they what are they going to say next? blacks go back to africa? what is he going to say next. all jews have to leave america? if you play into this craziness, you will be crazy. i just laughed at the people who said that we need a wall, because we are scared of people coming in. they have got to understand, you have a lot of white people who took that free label, and then they want to kick them to the side.

they got a lot of free labor when slavery was going on, and now they want to kick black people to the side because they cannot get that free label -- labor. crazy that america needs a wall to need say -- to be safe. we have other things to worry about. russia, we arend already looking at him as treasonous. he will be benedict arnold out of the box because they are traitors to america, and they need to wake up and see the coffee before they smell the coffee. host: that is lewis. we will hear from the president at 9:00 p.m. eastern tonight, coverage begins at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span and c-span.org and on the free app. that will do it for our program. we take you off to the senate side of capitol hill, the senate judiciary committee is holding a hearing on the pending nomination of naomi