developments in the conflict between israelis and palestinians. we will also take your calls and you can join the conversation on facebook and twitter. "washington journal" is next. ♪ host: good morning. it is may 16 and we want to talk to you about your wallet. higher prices for gasoline these days, and concerns about inflation as the costs of many goods and services. what is your situation? how concerned are you about things like gas prices and inflation? is there anything the folks in the washington, d.c. can do about it? here is how to take part in this conversation. eastern and central time zones call (202) 748-8000. mountain and pacific, (202) 748-8001.

plus, some other ways to reach out. you can send us a text at (202) 748-8003. please leave your name and the city you are texting from. you can also post a comment at facebook.com/c-span. a flavor of what is going on out there courtesy of the washington examiner. they say the price of gas hit restaurant -- hit record highs in virginia. seven dollars a gallon at one station. they write that virginia drivers who drove to a richmond gas station were left stunned after they would -- after they witnessed a nightmarish price tag. a record high 6.99 nine, just under seven dollars at that beast -- at that bp station. "i pulled in, started pumping my gas, and realized i put $80 in my truck."

the driver added, the lady next to me put $100 in her car. she started crying because her car doesn't take that much. the figure is more than double the city's average gas price and tops the previous record high. ridiculous, i will go somewhere else to get gas or stay home, one other driver told the outlet. that comes at the same time as a chart here at cnbc. gas prices are spiking in the south. here is where the jumps are highest. mostly in the south. they are mostly siding the colonial pipeline incident leading to a spice in the gas prices. on the far end, and 9% increase in gas here in georgia. les in south carolina, north carolina. these are mostly southern

states. alabama, tennessee, virginia with a 5% increase. mississippi and texas, about a 5% increase in gas recently. that is according to nbc news. all of this speaks to inflation. u.s. inflation, writes the bbc, highest jump since 2008. they talk about the various costs of various items rising to the highest level since 2008 now. here is the white house chair of economic advisers chair. she is chairman of the white house council of economic advisors, talking about all of this friday. talking about inflation with reporters. >> look, this is the purview of the federal reserve. we try to maintain their

independence, but what economists worry about is when inflation becomes de-anchored. people expect this to be temporary, where temporary is where the economy fully recovers. we understand there are not structural factors that should lead to inflation the federal reserve cannot control. >> there seems to be this assumption from people within the administration that this inflation is temporary, and i'm wondering what your take on the data is that suggests this is true? is that hopeful guesses based on the pandemic or are you actually seeing something that does not lead to that worst-case scenario? >> as i just gave an example, much of the increase last month was in airline prices. airline prices ticked up because they had completely cratered

last year. there has been a riposte increase -- a robust increase, but they are not close to what they were this time last year. clearly the airline industry is recovering. i don't expect those prices to continue past where there were last year. at some point people will stop -- i don't think people take multiple vacations, but many people have been cooped up and would like to travel. so we are seeing increased demand. let's take the auto sector, which accounted for one third of that increase. again, i expect that to be one-time. there is this misalignment. that is what happens in economics. prices are signals, right? i fully expect that will work itself out in the coming months. host: the chair of the white house council of economic advisors. u.s. inflation sees biggest jump

since 2008. we have several calls coming in. kurt is up first from pennsylvania. tell us what is going on in your area. caller: right now my area, gases above three dollars a gallon. which is expected. i think right now pennsylvania has actually the highest tax on gasoline. i think we surpassed california. we are over three dollars a gallon. host: what else are you noticing with other products when you go to the store? caller: other products are slowly increasing. the price of other products are slowly increasing, but a lot of that is due to the basic supply and demand theory. you have a lot of people, a lot of other countries under covid lockdowns. unfortunately they supply a lot of the material we need to do things. so that has increased the price of things.

the other thing, with inflation, what causes that is when the government starts handing out a lot of money everybody is flush with cash, the value of cash goes down. so, prices go up. host: what do you do for living? caller: right now i am a fabricator/operator. i put together fiberglass storage tanks. host: have the prices at your own company gone up in the last several months? caller: oh, absolutely. we are experiencing material problems, material supply. we buy a lot of our fiberglass, unfortunately, from china. it is not available in the united states. we are experiencing problems getting our material in. what can i say? host: thanks for starting us off

this morning. john is in philadelphia. what would you like to say about inflation, gas prices, your situation? caller: gas is a little higher in philadelphia, more toward four dollars. i was noticing what you put up on the screen was $6.99 price for gasoline in virginia. i wondered why law enforcement was not called in on that. what they could do is, is that legal in virginia? can they just price gouge gas? host: did you get the sense that this is happening a lot in your area? caller: prices are way up at the supermarket. not -- there is a lot of things you are not able to get a hold of now.

it seems like half of the world decided that since this pandemic we are going to hunker down at home and go that route. and wait and see what is going to happen. the other half the world is impatient, running out. maybe i said it wrong, but that is how i look at it. when you go to the supermarket there are items missing off-the-shelf every week, and there are items that are not replenished more. host: how much of a pinch is this putting on you personally? caller: actually, i was a painter for 40 years. i am disabled. i am just surviving. host: good luck to you. thank you for calling in. let's head to the west coast here. seattle, trish. what is the situation in seattle? caller: thanks for taking my

call. we have -- seattle, we typically have higher gas prices than most of the country. i filled up. i didn't really need to fill up, that i was at cosco, the lines were not particularly heavy, so i needed a quarter of a tank, so i filled up. i think it was $3.49. taking up, you know, as the months have passed, but i guess my main comment here -- and i know this is a multifaceted issue, but what really upset me the other day when i read in the "seattle times" that kroger's ceo had a pay increase of something like 8% while the regular frontline workers that has really busted their butt

this past 14 months, they had two qfc grocery stores closed down because the city pretty much made the grocery stores pay their frontline workers an extra four dollars an hour. they shut down two stores and the ceo makes a pile of money, and for me that is what i find really disheartening, as there is inflation, and yet the ceos all across the board -- jeff bezos, everybody -- has made a boatload of money and, again, it is the little guys that have to take it in the backside. it just gets so frustrating and weary. even though they tell us we can take our masks off, i don't know that i want to do that. host: thank you for calling in from seattle.

here is kevin mccarthy, the leader of republicans in the u.s. house, addressing this rise in inflation. this was after a meeting with the president and congressional leaders on infrastructure. cripes i think there is an opportunity we could work together on infrastructure. let me pre-face that. as long as there is not anything about tax increases and it is dealing with infrastructure. we start with the concept of, what is the definition? you modernize law from the 1970's so roads get built, they get faster. what i really want to work on is making sure turning this economy around, getting people back to work, active school, and back to normal. i want people back in school. the other thing you have to understand, those numbers we heard today on inflation -- that should terrify every american. it is not a question of whether

there is going to be a tax increase, you just had the biggest tax increase you have had in more than 10 years, and it it you already. that is why we've got to incentivize people to get back to work, get the economy moving again and stronger, and stop this inflation. part of what congress has recently done by printing -- by spending those trillions of dollars is the wrong action to take. you could propel inflation even greater, affordability more difficult. those are the things i want to discuss and correct. host: kevin mccarthy from the white house earlier this week. here is a headline in the washington post. late economic tremors hit white house at crucial moment for item policy agenda. the administration tries crafting major economic package. here is what larry summers had to say.

he is a former treasury secretary under bill clinton. he says policymakers at the fed and white house need to recognize a vietnam fillets -- inflation scenario is greater than deflation risks. it should now be clear that overheating, not excess slack, is the dominant economic risk facing the u.s. this is what larry summers said recently to cnn. we have michael on the line from memphis, tennessee. one of those states with significantly higher gas prices lately. what is going on in memphis? caller: when you pay folks to stay at home they are not going to get a job. you need to increase the minimum wage is what you need to do. increase the minimum wage.

democrats had the right idea. joe biden has the right idea when he did that. they are paying people to stay at home. they are making more home than they do getting paychecks. what is the sense in that? host: robert from new york. what is the name of your town? caller: queens. host: go ahead, please. caller: i'm saying that as far as inflation, yes, we are suffering in new york and new jersey because of high prices in stores. i think republicans do not understand that stimulus is to try to help you survive, because everything is going up around us. host: give us a sense of what is going up for you in queens. what do you usually buy and how much higher is it?

caller: toilet tissue used to be one dollar, now it is $1.75. you have meat products, horrendous. as far as chicken wings, it is $20 for a small pack. and people are trying to deal with this. in new york city the rent for a one-bedroom apartment is $2000. how much did the stimulus help, you know? as far as the gas prices -- host: go ahead. we are talking about gas? go ahead, please. caller: as far as the gas, it is $3.18, but the problem since the pandemic is buying groceries. these senators don't understand, because they don't go grocery shopping. host: thank you for calling, robert. a couple of folks concerned

about gouging here. these are twitter comments from steve. i'm concerned about overall price gouging in the groceries. i think businesses are trying to get the profits back and i will call it greed and gouging. sony a rights there should be enforcement of anti-gouging laws, overall the economy will adjust. there is margaret. margaret is on the line from texas. go ahead, please. caller: good morning to you and to all. personally, the gas shortage doesn't affect me. since 2017i have been driving an electric car. that does not bother me. i would advise everyone, that is the way to go. i get four point eight miles per one kilowatt of electricity. figure that out.

for the year, the only maintenance i have are windshield wipers and tires. as far as the inflation goes, that is a scare tactic, i believe, that the government always uses that is in power when they don't want to do anything for the average worker or the poor, like raising the minimum wage to what would be called a living wage. it is always called inflation, and the money still flows to the ceos. when you look at what they have made and look at what is happening on wall street, the tax breaks under trump was the old trickle down theory that has been put forward for over 20 years and has never, ever worked. it simply goes to the ceos and the buybacks of stock. so, i just don't take any notice

of the inflation. if i have to pay more for my groceries, well, that is what i have to do. i am on social security, plus a little bit of dividends, and i just live within my income. host: margaret, thank you for sharing your situation with us. we will continue to take more of your calls. here is a text. from allen in west virginia. i think inflation could cause a recession, and it is partly due to the last stimulus package. it is a little too much considering we have an effective vaccine. sue in new jersey read of course inflation and rising fuel prices concerned me. it is more concerning to see people panic buying due to the pipeline hacking. it is no joke when people hoard

something we all need. remember the toilet paper shortage? let's keep our cool during a crisis. there is a headline in the washington post that takes us back in time. long lines, high prices, and fisticuffs. fuel shortages fueled that lump. -- fueled bedlam. here is a story about -- here is what we are dealing with today compared to bakhtin. >> i have seen all of these cars parked everywhere and i was like omg, i have to fill my tank up. ♪

>> america's energy demands have grown so rapidly that they now outstrip our energy supplies. as a result, we face the possibility of temporary fuel shortages and increases in fuel prices. >> what happens if you don't get hit and you have to run to the hospital? i have seen quite a few cars parked along the road out here. >> we have now had two wage a wake-up call experiences. one in texas, one here, each

with a different cause, but each reminding us of the work we have to do. host: a video they are by the washington post. here is the headline in the middle of the screen. long lines, high prices, and this cuffs. washingtonpost.com is the place to go. we have troy calling -- actually troy, ohio calling. go ahead, please. caller: yeah, i'm thinking they should make a task force, because we had the gas line attack and we have had the power outages in texas, we have had dams that have broke. they should make a task force. host: what kind of task force? who should i get up -- who

should make it up and what should it do? caller: they should go around and look for vulnerable areas and then address them with changes. host: you are saying a government entity should put together the task force? caller: yup, and they should look at key areas, because a lot of these things that have happened could and should have been prevented. they should not have happened to begin with. host: what else would you want to find out from this task force? caller: oh, i'm not sure, really. i would look at everything. i would look at the fuel system, fuel supply, our delivery system, railways. everything needs to be updated to a 21st century. we are behind in everything. host: how do you feel about all

of the talk about a multi-trillion dollar infrastructure bill right now? caller: it is needed. there is so much we should be doing right now. we have technology to make a lot of clean energy, clean water, food. we should be building cities to accommodate foreign people that is coming across the borders. they could help build a city they could live in and produce food and everything. host: from ohio onto maryland now, it is larry. thanks for waiting. what are your thoughts about inflation, gas prices, your wallet these days? caller: it is all because of joe biden and his foolish policies, raising the corporate tax.

we are getting inflation. they have passed laws for the banks and the gas situation, i looked at the graphic on news, from texas to new jersey it is up to thousands of gas stations without gas. it is major. this is a massive cyberattack. we have been under cyberattack since 2003, but they have been lying. the situation in new york not too long ago, the power lines. we are headed to a global depression. people better wake up and face reality. host: he will hear from president biden in the moment. here is a text from j.t. things haven't changed much where i am. i winter in florida. it went up 50% -- it went up $.50 there.

i am making out pretty good. one more tweet. this is the same person, but something different. people should not be allowed to fill multiple gas cans during a situation that causes a gas shortage. that is from steve there. here is president biden from thursday addressing that colonial pipeline attack, talking about what his administration is doing on that area and on price gouging overall. pres. biden: still, we expect to ca region by region return to normalcy this week and continuing into next week. in the meantime, we want to update you on what our administration is doing to mitigate shortages and protect you from price gouging. protect the american people from price gouging.

first, we relaxed rules for pipeline operators to provide flexibility for emergency personnel to help manually get portions of the pipeline up and running earlier this week. secondly, over the weekend we reviewed and worked with the company to get a portion of the pipeline system from north carolina to maryland to operate under manual control and deliver its existing inventory. we put in place emergency orders that left the hour restrictions and allowed states to lift weight restrictions for tank truck drivers to be on the road. this allows those drivers to carry more fuel to the affected regions. third, the environmental protection agency issued targeted 20 day waiver of standards and the several states to give fuel suppliers more flexibility to use available fuels where they are needed, which will used -- which will

boost fuel supply. those last two actions have made tens of thousands of gallons of additional fuel available. the extraordinary measures the administration has taken, we estimate, sent enough gas to stations to fill the tanks of over 5 million vehicles in the last few days. fourthly, as part of an effort to use every means to accelerate fuel deliveries, last night i granted a waiver of the jones act to fuel suppliers. this allows non-u.s. flagged vessels to transport refined fuel products from the gulf of mexico to affected areas. and we will grant additional waivers if necessary. these steps are temporary, but they remain in place until full-service is restored. host: a couple of other headlines this sunday morning. ron johnson calls the

cyberattack's an existential threat, following that colonial pipeline shut down. financial times asks this question? how will the federal reserve respond to surging inflation? perhaps we will be hearing more from the fed this week. president is supposed to have more meetings this week on the infrastructure bill. it is considered a key period for negotiations if they want to get something done by the summer. more calls. this is palm city, florida now. bonnie, thank you for waiting. caller: yes, i would like to say that i think that infrastructure is needed. i think most american people accepted, however there is incredible pork in it bill and there needs to be disciplined about removing men. -- about removing that. i just heard a remark by president eitan about allowing bigger tank -- by president

biden about allowing bigger tankers. recently i saw someone from a large trucking company. you know, it seems that all of the different politicians pluck out the things they want to emphasize to the exclusion of the others. host: take us through your thoughts a little bit more on present -- on infrastructure. what are the top two or three or four things you think need to be addressed? caller: bridges, roads, airports , you know, those are the top three. general transportation, buses and community, those are the top ones. i think anybody who is a driver who has gone over a bad bridge and worries about it or sees congestion that is unacceptable would be supportive of

infrastructure, but it is the pork that is the problem. the lady that called an earlier said, i have an electric car and i have only needed windshield wipers and needed tires. well, i have a gas card and that is all i have needed in the last year. -- eight gas car and that is all i have needed in the last year. i'm not against gatt -- against electric cars, that they require cobalt and there is a major issue mining it. i think these slogans that politicians put out are ineffective. i think the american people are smarter. i think they need to recognize that they need to address these kinds of issues and not just view this with slogans. host: let's go to livingston in northern new jersey.

good morning. caller: good morning. having been around in the 70's, i never forgot when i bought my first car i had to pull it into the driveway and leave it there. we had a governor who came up with a simple idea and it instantly worked. before that we were waiting one day, two days on lines to get gas. he made everybody with a license plate number who had an odd number and even number, he told all of the gas stations, this is the day i'm going to assign for those people who have odd numbers, this is the day i'm going to assign to people who have even numbers. guess what happened? instantly stopped the problem. believe it or not, it did. something so simple. the paranoia that everybody is going through instantly stopped, because they can't go into the gas station, oh, i only got

three quarters, let me get another quarter of a tank. that happens. there is such a simple way of doing it, and it works. as far as the prices, i have to, because i am handicapped, use instacart. i knew my food was going up. when i'm paying 200, $300 for food i instacart -- because they do add fees -- i knew something was wrong. greed is always there. one other thing i wanted to add -- colonial pipeline is owned by the coke brothers. thank you. host: steve is hanging on in baltimore. good morning, steve. caller: good morning, how are you? host: doing fine, sir. caller: this is the sign of the great third world country the united states is becoming. when we lack infrastructure --

i'm 57 years old -- lacked the ability to change our tax code -- have an immigration problem that has been going on for 20-plus years. we have debt. we are printing ourselves into oblivion, yet we don't address things. every year we talk about these things. the health care costs, food shortages. covid has shown us one thing, that we are dependent and reliable on other countries for goods and services. what we should be letting people know is that we are watching what takes place in third world countries. united states is becoming that next great third world country. the writing is on the wall. we ought to be letting the immigrants know, you were coming in the wrong direction. we are turning into what you have become. our legislative branch is inept.

it is the branch of the government that is going to take us to where we are headed, which is the next great third world country. have a nice day. host: words from steve in baltimore. the president's economic proposals, just as a reminder. their american rescue plan, you may remember that, signed on march 11, price take their $1.9 trillion. then we get into the infrastructure bills right now. the american jobs plan, $2.3 trillion being negotiated, and another $1.8 trillion, called the american families plan. it is under this umbrella of infrastructure. they are breaking it down between the roads and bridges and airports, and then other people-related items like rock band and childcare. all of that being -- like broadband and childcare.

here is a text. the increase in gas prices should be expected. it goes up every summer and down in winter. loosening pandemic restrictions results in more driving. we have william in atlantic beach, north carolina. how concerned are you about things like rising gas prices, overall inflation? tell us what is going on at the coast. caller: at the coast, yes sir. those things concern me not. it is all within the universe and religions and governments, as i have said before, once we reconcile each living creature after its kind and man is the last one that has been put here and you have been made stewards and your religions and

governments, they are not going to save you. all seven continents, all seven churches, all seven spirits, the educational system, commerce, trade, all of this is coming to a quick and because you all have been bad little kitties and father does not -- bad little kiddies and father does not like it. i have made peace with what is about to happen. it is the rest of you, after your kind, whatever kind you may be, whatever label you may be, whatever caller, whatever nationality, all demons, all saints, all angels. you all have nowhere to run. host: we are going to get some other voices in. we will do this for about 20 more minutes, asking you how concerned you are about inflation, cost of goods and services going up. eastern and central time zones,

(202) 748-8000. mountain and pacific, (202) 748-8001. other news out there this sunday morning, a $1.9 billion capital security, what they call a supplemental spending bill, is heading to the house floor. immigrants are preparing to push the measure through without gop support. senate packing is also unclear. -- senate packing is also unclear. this is a story in the hill. the top democrat and republican on the homeland security committees reached an agreement friday on legislation to establish a bipartisan 9/11-style commission to probe the january 6 attack on the capitol. these are two items coming up on the floor this coming week. new york times, airstrike kills

dozens in gaza as the un security council prepares to me. an israeli attack appeared to be the deadliest of these current hostilities. international pressure to find a diplomatic solution was building. just the frontline headline there in the new york times this morning. oakwood, georgia. sherry, you are on the line. caller: how are you today? host: doing fine, how are you? caller: i'm doing well. i periodically watch your show, and i hope this does not offend anyone, but this thing that is going on with the government is another distraction. if you look around to see with the democrats are really doing and bypass these distractions -- i went to the 1960's, 1970's, 1980's, 1990's, and it is

another distraction. that is my comment. host: to take it deeper into your thinking, what are they doing? what do you see? caller: it is just another distraction, a sleight-of-hand to what they are really doing. you will have to draw your own opinion of that. they are like an octopus, and tentacles everywhere. opening the doors of the legion of locusts that does nothing to destroy, devour, and contaminate our ground. even the water we drink. what they are doing is opening the door for a terrible onslaught of the innocence, such as the unborn. and things like that. you just name it and that is what they are doing. this gas shortage and killing lacked people and stuff like

that, letting all of these immigrants in here to destroy our way of life, that is what they are doing. shortage on gas is a distraction to get you talking about something else. host: sherry from georgia there. let's go to florida now, where greg is calling. thank you for calling us. caller: i just want to know, you guys are talking about this gasoline shortage. nobody talks about the 1.2 million gallons dumped into the ground in north carolina. why don't we talk about that? host: remind us of what happened there, greg. caller: i'm not sure what happens. i live in florida, that there is all kinds of stuff on the colonial pipeline about all of the leaks. nobody should be saying anything about clean water or anything like that when you are dumping that much fuel in the ground. host: do you have a particular message for the folks in washington when it comes to that

issue or gasoline or overall inflation? caller: i would say you just need to clean up your own act before you say something about other people. host: understood. thank you for calling this morning. on to texas now, where monty is on the line. tell us what is going on in spring, texas. caller: not a whole lot going on in spring right now. gas prices are ready decent. unfortunately for some parts of america they don't see that. my call is in reference to the myth of energy independence. america is far from energy independent. we supply about 40% of our own oil. the rest of it is non-domestically required -- acquired from other nations. as far as this oil is only one example. legal immigrant labor, which the previous caller was going on about, it's shows she is not

educated about how labor works in america. maybe we should stop hiring them. we have millions of undocumented illegals. no one seems to go after the producers of illegal labor. it is the same way with the oil company. the big deal about the pipeline, all of that oil is canadian tar sands oil. it will be sent overseas. we are a net energy exporter. our refining capacity is not even geared up to handle the domestic oil we produce. we need -- infrastructure needs to be making this country truly independent we are never going to be independent of labor. we can start regulating labor and weeding out the bad elements. the same thing with energy production. we can look at domestic energy independence. host: monty from spring, texas.

thank you. he said, all of this would happen if biden was elected. trump was right about everything. all of the poor people will be hurt the most. that is from dana. robert from michigan, this is not the first gas shortage i have witnessed and america's knee-jerk reaction. they could have limited people, considering peoples temperament, maybe that would not have worked either. here is chris now. chris from michigan as well. welcome. caller: hi. i wanted to make a comment about the lady who said the democrats have their octopus tentacles and everything. if we had a republican party that would vote or that had plans or that would even take

part in the government, but the republican party has not done anything in years. now mitch mcconnell, once again, 100%, we are not going to go along with anything. i would like to see liz cheney start a new republican party, because her party that she believes in so strongly and that i very much like her, is gone. host: what would a new party or new republican party, what would it believe in? what would it focus on? caller: i think it would focus on working together, or partisanship. why have two parties? i mean the whigs becoming the

republican party, because when you get to a point where you are useless, like what is going on with republicans, then they come back to their districts -- oh, look what we did. we are giving you this and we are redoing the roads. i'm not gonna vote on anything that a democrat puts forward. democrats are the only ones who give a damn about our constitution. they don't want to even call the insurrection an insurrection, like it was a day at the park. host: thank you. go ahead, finish up. caller: i am disgusted with people like that. you asked her to remain -- to name something democrats are doing. of course she does not have a clue.

so, anyway, god bless. host: thanks for calling. here is a story at politico.com. biden pressed to send clear message on economy as morning signs flash. white house's reaction to unexpected price data has opened the administration up to gop attacks. the administration is taking pains to explain to america where the country is headed as the economy spits out anxiety-inducing data. it is struggling to find a clear message. janet yellen spooked markets this month when she said interest rates could rise if the economy heated up too much. president biden held a news conference to discuss a disappointing jobs report and circle back three days later to address the issue, suggesting he was concerned about public reaction. the president has called for his multitrillion dollar infrastructure package to be paid for with tax hikes, which

indicates he is worried about too much spending, even as the administration downplays deficit fears. we have linda calling now from georgia. morning. caller: i just want to rebut the things that have come in about mcgrath. if i remember correct -- about democrats. if i remember correctly, the economy was great, israel was calm and peaceful, the illegal immigration problem was being taken care of a lot better. we did not have this horrible thing going on with people and the children and drugs being brought in. the pipeline was working well, money for sitting at home has been paid out now, and that is

why nobody is working. we were energy independent, which was amazing. right now the democrats are spewing money out like water. in the first 107 days, that has been destroyed. look at what is going up. the illegal immigration is horrible. the gas prices have gone up. the biden administration has destroyed everything that president trump got done. if you can't see that, then you are totally blind. host: ok. crystal on the line from philadelphia. hello. caller: hello, hello. good morning. that woman from georgia is just another fox-watching, dry sponge soaking up all of the sour grapes of the nonsense, of the loser trump. loser. democrats always have to clean

up the mess republicans leave behind. angry, hate-filled nonsense like -- what's her name? green. running wild idiots. we have to help americans and that is what biden is doing. trump looked out for his people. those folks that think trump wasn't speaking to them -- he did not give a rats behind about you all. biden tried to help everybody. yes, some people probably take advantage of the benefits that biden is trying to help americans with, and on the whole most americans appreciate it. and republicans, let me tell you something, you need to clean up the water. he would not want to be drinking any led-infested water. trump wanted to clear the mountains out in colorado for

speculators. you have got to care about america. the borders -- look, you do not want your kids picking peas and cutting cabbage, but other folks appreciate hard work. immigrants. it will walk 1000 miles get here for work. my folks picked enough stuff. host: crystal, thank you for calling. here is a tweet from the li bertonian. i am concerned about supply-side economics, which has shown it will never work. i live in alabama, writes lisa. the colonial pipeline story has been blown out of proportion. if stations ran out of gas. the price went up by maybe $.30 cents two weeks ago. tony writes the colonial

shutdown is temporary, but gas prices have been increasing steadily all year. here is the u.s. national debt clock, we take a look at from time to time. $28 trillion and counting. the u.s. debt clock, if you ever want to look at it yourself. debt per citizen is well over $84,000. gilbert is hanging on the line. hello there. caller: good morning to c-span. about the nation becoming a third world country, and another one about a global depression. here in the alabama i went to the pump and it was $3.45 for premium. i think it was about three dollars for regular. the other day when i first heard about the pipeline problem i

just topped off my tanks and all of my cars because i knew this would come to this. what is happening that the american public are too tired of this republican and democrat thing. if you take a survey, these people have been in office for over 40 years. they are a part of the problem we have. they allowed all of this globalism with china and all of the manufacturing base out of the country, and now you want the same people that created the problem to solve the problem. it is not going to work. let me tell you this in closing. with the situation about his real, we have defended it. we need to try to help ourselves. how can we help anybody in the dire straits we are in in this country? this is a pandemic.

america trying to treat a pandemic like an epidemic. host: last call is from glenn in madison, illinois. caller: good morning. host: good morning, sir. caller: we had gas in illinois under two dollars a gallon. it was one dollar 98 cents, something like that. trump signed the paper with saudi arabia and the next day we were over two dollars a gallon. $2.50, something like that. all of this was saudi arabia and all of these other towns, countries. everything is just coming back to haunt us, what trump did.

this president has got to go ex-president. get his nose out of politics. liz cheney is doing terrific, and she is going to put him where he belongs. and that is about it. host: that is about it for our first hour of calls here. about gas prices and inflation. i am sure we will be getting back to this topic at some point. a lot of folks comparing president biden these days to the former u.s. president, jimmy carter. we will talk after the break with jonathan alter. jonathan alter recently wrote a new biography on the 39th president. a little bit later we will be joined by henry olsen, washington post columnist and senior fellow at the ethics and public policy center. we will talk about the future of the republican party following

this week's events within gop leadership ranks, where liz cheney was replaced. your watching "washington journal." we will be right back. ♪ >> american history tv on c-span3, exploring the people and events that tell the american story every weekend, today at 6:00 p.m. eastern on "american artifacts," tour of richard nixon's birthplace. tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern on "the presidency," three programs on thomas jefferson. an interpretation conversation between jefferson and john adams. exploring the american story. watch american history tv today on c-span3.

♪ >> on c-span's the weekly, a lesson on america's supply chain. however our pandemic, a pipeline supply tack -- supply tack, and the suez canal teaches that we are vulnerable. >> what happened is doing covid demand for a lot of things went down. some things went up, but people were conserving, they were not spending as much. some more of these supply chains slowed down. as people got vaccinated and started to see life coming back into the economy, people started spinning again. these supply chains don't start on a dime. they take a while to go up. you don't step on the gas and they start going.

>> join us for more on how the supply chain works on c-span's "the weekly." you can follow and listen wherever you get your favorite podcasts. ♪ >> "washington journal" continues. host: we are here to talk about this book. it is titled "his very best: jimmy carter, a life" it came out in the fall of 2020.

the author is jonathan alter, a longtime editor, author of this book, among many other things. good, thank you for joining us. guest: my pleasure. happy 2 be here. host: tell us first about the title of the book. "his very best." what does that suggest about jimmy carter's approach to life and politics? guest: let me tell you a story about where comes from. in 1950 two jimmy carter was an officer in the navy. the most elite program at that time was nuclear-powered submarines. actually attached a nuclear power plant to the back of a submarine. before, they were used for power on land. this is a result of admiral

hyman rickover. carter was trying to get to -- trying to get into rickover's plan. he would do things like people, when he was interviewing them, go over and open that window, and the window would be nailed shut. he wanted to see how they reacted to pressure or he would say, call your girlfriend and tell her you are breaking up with her if you want to be in this program. if they follow his instructions, they were out. they were not going to get in because they were too suggestible. carter's interview had gone ok, and rickover asked him, would you stand in your class in annapolis? carter thought that was pretty good, and rickover said, did you do your best? and carter said, well, i guess not always. said well i guess not always. i did not always work as hard as i should have.

and he said " why not your best?" and the interview was over. carter thought he had not made it into the program because rick appreciated him telling the truth. i argue that for the rest of his life to the present day, jimmy carter has been all in all the time. he never goes on miller time -- let's put it that way. even when he is flyfishing or learning to ski in his 60's, whatever he is doing, it is always his very best. his campaign autobiography, which came out the year he turned 75, the year before he was elected president was titled " why not the best?" host: we will put the phone

numbers at the bottom of the screen. jonathan alter, author of " his very best." we will have lines for republicans, democrats and independents. democrats, call (202) 748-8000. republicans, call (202) 748-8001 . independents, call (202) 748-8002. how is jimmy carter doing? caller: -- guest: he is getting ready to celebrate his wedding anniversary. misses carter was delivered by jimmy carter's mother was a nurse. a couple days she brought her nearly three-year-old over to

see the baby. they did not start going out until he was in the navy, but both of them are healthy. they are frail. jimmy carter fell twice in 2019, and up to that point, he seemed like he was 80. he was traveling all over the world. i interviewed him on many occasions for this book. i helped him build a house in memphis for habitat for humanity. in 2019 he had these two falls and they took a lot out of him. his mind is all there, but he has trouble speaking. he is a little hard to understand. he has trouble seeing, so he has been listening to my book on audible rather than reading it. when president and misses biden

visited recently, he was getting ready to go out for a swim, and they had a nice conversation. i spoke to a woman named jill stuckey, and she sees them every day. she told me how thrilled they were by the president's visit and to well they are doing, but they are old. host: you wrote in the preface of your book that jimmy carter is the most misunderstood president in our history. why did you say that? guest: jimmy carter was a political failure. he was crushed by ronald reagan when he ran for reelection in 1980. he made a number of political mistakes. you could argue that he was politically tone deaf in many ways. he was a substantive and even farsighted success.

as journalists, people like me look at presidents based on how popular they are or how is the economy doing when they are president and in carter's case, the answer was not good. we were in the midst of the opec era. we had high interest rates, high inflation rates. he could not get the hostages that had been seized in iran before the election. he could not hold the democratic party together so ted kennedy mounted a challenge against him for the nomination. politically he was failing, but if you put -- look at the points on the board and how he changed our country in the long run, he is totally misunderstood. there were 15 major pieces of environmental preservation

legislation. many know he put solar panels on the roof of the white house but that was a symbolic example of the way he was preparing us for the future, preparing us for energy independence and many pieces of legislation we could talk about all day but just a few that are relevant, donald trump would never have been impeached the first time, if it were not for the whistleblower protections and ethics in government act of 1978. the inspector generals established in -- many institutions we take for granted now took place in the carter administration. not just of department of energy, the department of education, but fema, created by jimmy carter!!

deregulation has powered our economy. that is something he did that was marred conservative -- more conservative. trucking deregulation has basically established just-in-time delivery now. fedex would not exist were it not for the carter president the. -- carter presidency. there was not a shot fired in anger while he was president by american troops,, first time since thomas jefferson but he prevented a major war in southern america with the panama canal treaties, which was a very heavy lift in congress. we would have sent 100 thousand troops there in perpetuity if carter had not got this done.

normalizing relationships with china. jimmy carter did that in 1979. the human rights policy, which helped to lead to a rebirth of -- or birth of democracy in latin america and across many parts of asia. it was hypocritical in many ways because there were dictatorships he supported, but it helped end the cold war. it gave comfort to dissidents like bosco poppel and many around the world. camp david is the most enduring peace treaty since world war ii. they have not been -- as bad as things are in the middle east,

they would be a lot worse if there was not peace between israel and egypt. that gives you a little bit of a sense. i am also interested in this book in his epic american story, growing up in jim crow south and the way he did not always cover himself in glory in the civil rights era. to me it is an utterly fascinating story about how he grew up and was an adult in one of the meanest counties in the south, in sumter county, georgia. the white terrorism in his community is quite a story as well. host: before we get to calls in just one minute for jonathan alter, here is jimmy carter in

1977, first a headlines in the new york times following up this speech -- " he urges the moral equivalent of the war to barring national catastrophe." >> we must face the fact that the energy shortage is permanent. if we all cooperate and make modest sacrifices, if we live fruitfully and remember the importance of helping our neighbors, we can find way to adjust and make our society more efficient and our own lives more enjoyable and productive. utility companies must promote conservation and not consumption. natural gas companies must be honest with all of us about their reserves and profits. we will find out the difference

between real shortages and artificial ones. we will ask private corporations to sacrifice just as individual ones do. all of us must waste less energy. we could save half of the current shortage of natural gas. host: you also write in the book that jimmy carter was the first president with no washington experience since woodrow wilson. almost all presidents have been army generals or like the roosevelt governors who had previously served a stint in federal bureaucracy. carter had none of this. he stormed the citadel without the help of any establishment/

. with the temperament of an outsider and a white house staff as unseasoned as he was a bumpy ride was almost inevitable." guest: i think we all know that he is an enormously ethical, moral person. he believed if he told the american people the truth everything would work out. there are is a lot of times when we do not really want to hear the truth. we are a nation of shoppers, let's face it. we like shopping, we like consuming. if a president comes along and preaches sacrifice and it tells us " you cannot have that," that will not sit well with many people. in that clip you just heard, we were in the midst of an energy crisis that begun under his

republican predecessors. the arab countries had us over the barrel so to speak. carter was trying to introduce conservation measures and other things to try to encourage mastic energy exploration. he had -- encourage domestic energy exploration. he had the opportunity to control domestic prices. part of it was political in 1976 to please the folks in texas, but the natural gas boom we enjoyed in later years would not have been possible without that decision to do control prices. -- to decontrol prices. when you look at why he eventually became so unpopular, at the time he gave that speech that we saw, he was as high as

70% popularity. it was not until he got swamped by events in 1979 that he went down to those nixon level lows in the upper 20's. for most of his presidency, he was more popular than donald trump's average. trump never got above that 50%, and carter was above 50% popularity for much of his time in office. host: steve is calling from anaheim, california on the republican line. caller: i thought jimmy carter was one of our better presidents. he was the captain of a submarine. he dealt with three mile island. what killed him was inflation that started under nixon.

nixon could get reelected. he did the same thing trump did, give out money, and then we had to pay it back. he took us off the gold standard, which made it even worse. as far as carter goes, there were a lot of things he did that i really admired. he was forward thinking as far as energy or how we should have gone in this country, but he ran up against washington itself, and you are absolutely right. he was not experienced enough to know how to deal with the congress. host: mr. alter, your reaction? caller: -- guest: he never became the captain of a submarine because his father died and he went home

to assume his father's business and civic responsibilities. you are right on energy. he was very forward-looking in many different ways. -- he was very forward-looking in many different ways. clinton and obama had a democratic congress for 2 out of 8 years. carter put more points on the board then either of those presidents. i saw donald trump, jr. criticizing carter the other day. my reaction was that carter got 10 times as much legislation approved as your father did, and one of them, just to give you a tiny example, we take for granted that utilities use green

energy now. that did not start until the carter administration. on the environmental side, it was before the world really knew about climate change, but instead of playing golf, jimmy carter liked to read scientific journals. he knew as early as 1971, i found that the carter library underlined in this article the word " climate change." at the\ end of his presidency, there were -- at the end of his presidency, there were a few reports released by the white house on climate change. this really blew me away.

he wanted to bring co2 emissions down to precisely the level that the paris climate accords stipulated. this was in 1980! those climate accords were 2015. he was really farsighted. there are many other issues, policy issues we could talk about where he was also peering over the horizon, thinking not " how am i going to get through the next news cycle?" but " how is this country going to get through the next 30 years?" caller: -- host: hello,, nathan? you are on the air, sir. caller: the united states of america is the only country in the history of mankind to

legalize satanism. does god care? guest: can i actually address that western because it relates in an interesting way to jimmy carter -- that question because it relates and then interesting way to jimmy carter. the previous caller mentioned inflation -- it was jimmy carter, not ronald reagan who appointed the chairman of the fed, and voelker ended inflation in this country in the 1980's, just not soon enough to help carter get reelected. that is on carter's record not reagan. in answer to this caller's comment about satan, carter was arguably the most religious man whoever became president of the united states. he prayed as often as 30 times a day in the white house.

i think everybody knows, until very recently, he taught sunday school in plains, georgia. he has written with great skill about faith. he also was a strong believer in the separation of church and state, as president. even as early as a state senator in georgia, he introduced a measure when they were rewriting the georgia state constitution, they wanted to put god into it, and he said " no, it should be like the amendment to the u.s. constitution. congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." he is a constitutionalist on that issue despite his personal views, so he would not have

prayer breakfasts at the white house. on the other hand, when he had conversations with foreign leaders, he would often bring up faith with communist leaders he knew that had many catholics and christians in their country the leader of poland. he would -- country like the leader of poland. this became most important in his conversations with the leader of china when he made his historic visit to the united states. china had the gdp of a sub-saharan african country. i was there a couple years later. everyone is on bicycles. one tv for 300 people. , the relationship they are establishin changes the world -- the relationship they are a

stop wishing changes the world -- the relationship they are establishing changes the world. on the last day of his visit,, the leader of china says " is there anything i can do for you?" carter says " when i was a boy in georgia, i used to send a nickel a month to baptist missionaries in china, so i feel strongly about this, that people should be able to practice their faith,, so i would ask that you allow missionaries, bibles and churches in china." the next day shortly before he left the united states, he said to president carter " i cannot allow missionaries into china. they were not good to our people at the turn-of-the-century, so i cannot do that, but i think that

if chinese people want to go to church and have bibles, they should be able to do that." the situation that we have now started almost as soon as carter returned to china after he left office in the 80's -- there are state-supported churches, and state published, not censored, bibles. while christians have challenges in china that we can talk about, there are now hundreds of millions of chinese christians. i would argue that makes jimmy carter arguably the most successful missionary in the history of humanity. host: we have 25 minutes left

with jonathan alter, author of this book " his very best: jimmy carter, a life." i wanted to ask you about this headline -- " gop tries to cast joe biden as a modern-day jimmy carter." what are they trying to do here? guest: they are trying to use inflation and gas lines as a way to slime jimmy carter. they know he is seen as a one term president, as a loser. they do not mention that donald trump, jr.'s father is in the same category, a one term loser. they want to just make life a little harder for biden.

they are trying to tag him with the idea of being a loser to put the stink on biden. if joe biden can be a peacemaker, and environmentalist and a moral exemplar like jimmy carter and avoid some of carter's political problems, then the comparison is merited. joe biden was the first u.s. senator to endorse jimmy carter in 1976, then he's stuck with him when many of his friends were going for ted kennedy. he just paid that visit to the carter's, in plains, georgia where they took that on photograph -- odd photograph. that gave republicans an opportunity to slime both carter

and biden. host: let's go to david in hope sound, florida. caller: good morning. i think jimmy carter was probably the worst president of postwar america. i think that biden is doing his best to equal that status and let him keep on doing what he is doing and he will make it. host: why do you feel that way? caller: let's see -- as was mentioned, a degree of inflation that is being equaled today -- guest: why do you feel that way? caller: let's see -- as was mentioned, a degree of inflation that is being equaled today. guest: i mentioned d control of

natural gas -- decontrol of natural gas. what does that do to the energy industry? it dramatically encourages natural gas companies to explore for more natural gas and they found it, so carter did more than any other president to put us on a path to energy independence. my only request for carter critics, and there is a lot to criticize, my book is very much worth send all -- warts and all, but if people are going to say he is a bad president, they need to have their facts straight before sliming him. host: here is a tweet from one

viewer -- she believes that carter's greatest compliment is egyptian and israeli peace. this is from january 20, 1979, jimmy carter talking about world peace. [video clip] >> a preference for those of that share with us and abiding respect for individual human rights. we do not seek to intimidate, but it is fair that a world that communism dominates with impunity and a threat to the well-being of all people -- the world is still engaged in a

massive race designed to ensure continuing equivalent strength between adversaries. we pledge wisdom in our efforts to limit world government. we will move this year a step toward our ultimate goal -- the element nation of all --the elimination of all weapons from this earth. host: what did you hear there? guest: what he was looking toward obviously elimination of nuclear weapons from the face of the earth has not happened, but he push for -- pushed forward initiatives for strategical arms

limitation talks, the salt ii treaty. he negotiated it with depression have -- brezhnev. when the peace treaty was signed, brezhnev leaned in for a kiss. after they did, the treaty was pulled from the floor of the senate by robert byrd, because there were not the votes for it anymore after the soviet invasion in early 1980. what happened was both sides abided by the terms of salt ii even though they had not ratified the treaty.

that became the predicate of the star talks that ronald reagan began and completed. that was an important part of the reduction of nuclear weapons. the human rights policy he talked about, carter created the first to bureau for human rights. lawrence eagle burger who was the ambassador to yugoslavia into later became the secretary of state in a republican administration said that he was wrong about jimmy carter's human rights policy at the time. he thought it was naive, not in tune with what they needed to do in the cold war, but he had a lot of company. he realized it was important to hollowing out the soviet union, the soft power that helped win

the cold war and turned so many dictatorships back towards democracy. we think now, " it is terrible we have authoritarians in charge and so many countries now in hungary, in the philippines, in brazil," but there are many more democracies now in the world than there were before carter took office, and they did not flip to democracy while carter was president. he did not get much credit for it at the time, but over the next 10 to 15 years, many dictatorships moved toward democracy. many other historians agree with me that this is an undervalued part of his legacy. host: we are getting a call from lawrence in alabama. caller: thank you for this important book about a morally

good man. i appreciate you mentioning the camp david accords, which began the separate people to a -- peace between israel and egypt. you mentioned warts and all -- let me ask you about two of carter's initiatives. first was the initiative towards north korea. i remember he gave a bear hug to kim il sung and decide we could solve this problem with north korea quickly. as i recall the clinton administration was caught flat-footed, had no idea what was going on. was carter freelancing with or without administration direction? secondly, the soviet invasion of afghanistan.

carter was caught flat-footed. despite brzezinski being his -- pyongyang and the problem guest: those are both well-informed questions. in 1990 four when carter had been out of office for -- in 1994 when carter had been out of office for 4 years, carter went to north korea. president clinton allowed carter to go to north korea, but he was mostly supposed to talk to kim and open channels of communication because there was a lot of talk about a war. the war drums were really

sounding in washington and on the korean peninsula about time. carter became -- i have a chapter entitled " freelancing secretary of state." he went beyond his instructions and struck a deal with kim il sung. bill clinton was really kustoff about it -- pissed off about it! analysts said it prevented a war at the time and they got direct talks going in vienna between the united states and north korea. unfortunately,, shortly after the meeting kim il sung died and progress was stopped. there were violations of the accord on both sides. to read some things it seems like just the north koreans were

violating the agreement. both sides were violating terms of the agreement. if you read the work of people who know more about korea than i do like don over north -- don over door for -- then i do, they conclude that jimmy carter prevented a war. that same year he prevented a war in haiti, which is a greater story. carter gave an interview to frank reynolds of abc news shortly after the soviet invasion of afghanistan. i think it was new year's day, 1980. he said he learned more about the soviet union then he had ever learned before and it made him look really naive. it was a dumb thing to say.

the truth is he was not that surprised by it. the evidence did not come out until years later when we found that starting the previous summer he had signed brezinski told a french newspaper -- this is how we found out about this initially -- that carter had signed a finding in the summer of 1979 nearly six months before the invasion supporting the mujahedin, the muslims who were trying to undermine the soviet backed regime in kabul. the hope, as brezinski put it, was that they could create another soviet vietnam and get them bogged down there in a quagmire that would hurt the soviet union. that is exactly what happened. they had a long, unsuccessful soviet vietnam in afghanistan.

historians say that contributed to the demise of the soviet union. at the time, it just looks like carter caught blind sided. arguably, he overreacted. boycotting the 1980 olympics in retrospect what was very popular at the time 97-3 in the senate, but it turned out to be unpopular, not very effective, and the embargo he imposed was even worse because the soviets just bought from other nations. mondale had recommended against that. mondale was right. carter was wrong. people to this day will tell you they are still mad against carter for the grain embargo. host: our next caller is a republican. caller: thank you for taking my

call. respectfully, i have respect for jimmy carter for many of his efforts, especially in the domestic area, and his brilliance as a nuclear engineer. he had his hands in a lot of pots. unfortunately, it all pales with this unfortunate decision to enforce the shadow, invite the ayatollah back from paris to iran and pave the way for the mullahs to take over. instead of having a great ally for the u.s. and israel and a strong army and a powerful nation, he created the largest,

greatest terrorist country in the world. it foments trouble wherever, continuously. host: that was david from california. you write in the book about the admission of the shah for medical treatment. it led to the takeover of the u.s. embassy in tehran. the fate of the 52 american hostages became jimmy carter's own. even though they all returned safely, their captivity stigmatized him forever as the personification of impotent american leadership." guest: i want to address what

the caller raised with the admission of the shah. the first was about what the carter administration did during the iranian revolution in late 1979 -- 1978 and early 1979. carter and his people took their eye off the ball. they did not know enough about radical islam. they did not know enough about the region. it is a little bit like what happened in the truman administration during the chinese relive -- chinese revolution 30 years earlier. the chinese revolution and iranian revolution were to have

the most important -- two of the most important events of the 20th century. it is really hard to see how things would have gone differently. it was not the shah who invited the ayatollah to go from paris back to iran. the shah had fled by that point. it was not the united states who invited him. the revolution was basically fit a complete -- you can argue that carter lacked imagination. he urged the president of france to prevent the ayatollah from leaving. he was not creative

diplomatically to keep that from happening. there were proposals to shoot down the plane but there were a lot of journalists the board so they could not do that to and there were a lot of complexities , but i do fault carter for not getting that done. ultimately for the united states to have intervened in iran, it was shortly after vietnam, iran is a bigger country than iraq and we know how hard it was when we intervened in iraq years later so i do not think it is fair to blame carter for the break of the shah. the shah was a smart guy. he said to a visitor at one point " the difference between a

monarch and a dictator is a monarch does not shoot their own people in the streets," and he already had done a bit. he realized if he mowed down protesters on one street they just to go to the next street the next week. it was a lost cause for him. the second issue is letting him into the united states for medical treatment. i argue this was the single biggest mistake of the carter presidency. nelson and david rockefeller's people who were close to the shah when he was going from country to country because nobody wanted him, they pulled the wool over carter's eyes and made it seem as though the shah

could not be treated for his cancer in mexico. carter bought that line and he was heavily lobbied by kissinger, brezinski, pillars of the american foreign policy side, " let the shah in," and shortly afterward they seized hostages. caller: good morning. in 1976 i was 18 years old, and since i was able to vote, i had always read the newspaper and studied and it did everything in my history class in high school, so on and so forth, so i voted for jimmy carter in 1976 because we had suffered through

watergate. my father used to refer to gerald ford as the only honest republican. in 197 i joined the air force8. jimmy -- in 1978 i joined the air force. jimmy carter was my commander-in-chief. we always admired jimmy carter for his measured response. it was a totally different story once ronald reagan got into power. he loved it too rattled the saber, unlike jimmy carter. i feel that jimmy carter was probably one of the most intelligent presidents we have ever had from all of his political work with the doctor brezinski to putting solar

panels on top of the white house, which was one of ronald reagan's first things to take off the white house. guest: you mentioned his intelligence -- in my interviews with him, by the accounts of many other people, his intelligence is extraordinarily impressive. pure iq level. unfortunately, in the presidency intelligence is not enough. the first book i wrote is called " the defining moment: fdr's first 100 days." after he was inaugurated, he had

champagne with oliver wendell holmes and when roosevelt left holmes famously said " second-class intellect, first-class temperament." i would argue that jimmy carter has a first-class intellect, but i second-class temperament. -- a second-class temperament. that temperament, the way you connect to the american public, the way you connect to legislators, temperament is ultimately more important than intelligence in the presidency. i think that joe biden is more like fdr -- second-class intellect, first-class temperament. i think jimmy carter is more

like obama -- first-class intellect, second-class temperament. he made a mistake when he sold the yacht they used it to lobby members of congress. i could go on all day about the bills he signed. we need to mention his legislative failures. tax reform, welfare reform, certain energy provisions, and most important on health care reform, where he ended ted kennedy were like oil and water. -- he and ted kennedy were like oil and water. if he had more --had a better

temperament maybe we would have had something like the cares act. the unbelievable level of racial injustice in georgia in carter's earlier years. to that i think the kennedy-partner relationship i spent a lot of time chronicling -- kennedy-carter relationship i spent a lot of time chronicling, to me that was the most interesting. if carter had a better tented -- temperament, he would have been a better president. he was a better president than people recognized but he could have been better still if he had avoided certain mistakes. host: our guest has been jonathan alter, author of " his

very best: jimmy carter, a life." thanks as always for your time and insights. guest: thank you for having me. if you are interested in my interviews with other people who are a little older and wiser, i launched a new newsletter called " old goats" at oldgo ats.substack.com. do not get too focused on culture that mostly respects the young and new. host: after this break we will be joined by henry olsen, senior fellow -- to talk about the

future of the republican party. later in this program we will turn our attention to the escalating violence between israel and palestine. we will be right back. ♪ ♪ ♪ >> walking from washington dc to new york city, neil kang

reflects on his nearly 3 million mile journey. doing it a year -- >> doing it a year later, that long covid winter, which was horrific, the events we saw play out on january 6 at the capitol, there is a lot of bad blood in the year overall, so i went out on the fifth the day of spring and walk through this spring and see it unfold and look up close and slowly at the country i was going through and meeting people along the way and trying to understand where we were as a nation. >> neil kang on his nearly 3 million mile journey tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span's q&a.

you can also listen to q&a as a podcast where you get your podcasts. >> if you miss our live coverage, it is easy to find our latest briefings and the biden administration's response. go to c-span.org/coronavirus. >> washington journal continues. host: joining us now is henry olsen, author of a book called " working-class republican." thank you for joining us. i wanted to get to the liz cheney story. she is now out as house republican chair. what is this -- what does this move signal to you about the state of the gop? guest: it signals to me that the

gop wants to unify around a conservative movement and a populist movement and liz cheney does not fit in either. she was not able to stand message with respect to communicating the values of the people she sought to lead. the conference wanted someone who could do that. host: this is what she had to say. [video clip] >> we must go forward based on truth. we cannot both embrace the big lie and the constitution. going forward, the nation needs a strong republican party. the nation needs a party that is based upon fundamental principles of conservatism. i am committed and dedicated to ensuring that that is how this party goes forward and i plan to lead the fight to do that. -- i will do everything i can

to ensure that they former president never again gets anywhere near the oval office. we have seen the danger he continues to provoke with his language. we have seen his lack of commitment and dedication to the constitution. and i think it is important that we make sure no matter who we elect they are faithful to the constitution. host: " it is about the truth," says liz cheney. there is a piece here -- to her point about the truth, what is your take about what she had to say to reporters? guest: it is important for the republican party to explain my trump's theory is -- why trump's theory is wrong.

i have called for cheney in my articles to take to the house floor to explain why. trump lost. it is something that is important for her to do and now that she is no longer in leadership she can do it. once she not only starts denying his argument but starts presenting the case for the truth, they will start to believe her and dislike him. host: put phone numbers on the bottom of the screen for henry olsen. we will take calls from democrats at (202) 748-8000. for republicans (202) 748-8001. for independents, (202) 748-8002 . what kind of future as -- one

more question about liz cheney, what kind of it future does she have in the party? guest: she has to decide if you wants to be in -- she wants to be in communion with the republican party. she calls that memo neo-marxist when it simply calls for a tough line on china and appeals to the working class and a tough line on illegal immigration shows she is out of touch with the majority values of the republican party. she can have an important part in the voice of the minority, but not the majority. host: what do you think of the leases to phonic -- police to phonic -- elise stefannik?

caller: -- guest: stefanik is a millennial. if she can bring that sensibility to the republican leadership they will hear things they did-not hear- -- host: before we go to calls, here is what mad vest but had to say -- matt vespa had to say -- " her incessant need to prove -- " she doesn't need to speak up about everything. if she kept her mouth shut and stopped antagonizing the base may be this would not have happened.

" that is from matt vespa. guest:party is going to be a conservative party with strong populist elements. it is going to reach out to people who call themselves moderate, people who have not had an orthodox bent before. i don't think liz cheney understands that. not just with respect to her comments on trump, her attitude toward the drift of the party. a new center-right movement that has populist elements is one that can easily become the majority. host: trent is calling from louisiana. good morning. caller: we are quick, i have to apologize for using a bad word last time i was on. i'm sorry. i got a little upset. host: thank you. caller: thank you. i am the patriarch of a large

family. lots of grandchildren. half of them are military, half of them are educators. i feel like i have a micro civil war going on in my family. we have to touch each other very gently these days. the long game of the trump movement, i'm trying to tie in with that letter the french retired generals wrote to macron, that they might get involved to stop a civil war in france. last week some of our retired generals sent out a letter saying that they see america careening toward socialist marxism. last year i bought two books. one was by buckley, "american secession," and david french's "divided we fall."

you can see where there is a lot going on. thank you. i appreciate esther olson's insights. host: mr. olson? guest: americans are increasingly divided from one another. we have descended into partisan hatred. what that does is give reason to think that we can no longer live together as a country. i think it is up to our political leaders to create a new political identity around shared values. it requires courage to bring it about. that is something that leaders on both sides have been failing to do and has contributed to the bitterness, anger, and hatred. i am hopeful that in the next few years someone will emerge who will make this all look like a bad dream as we go forward

into a new american unity. host: we hear from shirley now. republican caller. hello to you. caller: good morning. i have heard that liz cheney thing already. i take that as a terroristic threat to the past president. host: anything else? caller: no, that is all. guest: mr. olson, reaction? caller: i think that representative cheney is going to be saying what she is going to be saying. i don't see it as a threat to the current or former president. i think she has a political agenda. the political agenda is to make sure donald trump never comes close to sitting in the oval office again. that is a political threat, and nothing more. host: here is the headline in the washington post. in the gop, survival means

allowing trump's election lie to live on. what you make of that? guest: i think there is a lot of hyperbole in the press that doesn't understand what is going on in the republican party. that is willfully blind about discussion in the republican party. i would like to see republican leaders challenge trump's lie that it is one thing to be concerned about election integrity, it is another thing to support the lie that the president is spewing about a stolen election. i think where the republican party wants to be is in that spot. should show more courage about saying what they know to be true, which is that the president legitimately lost and that he needs to accept that. take us deeper into the dynamics of the party. what are we not finding out? what should we know from your perspective that we are not

getting? guest: the republican party voter devotion to donald trump is nowhere near as deep as the media thinks it is. this poll from echelon insights shows republicans either don't follow trump would like to see a new leader who has trump policies but is not trump himself. pulled from the wall street journal/nbc poll, for a long time they have asked republicans, do you see yourself as a supporter of trump or the republican party? before january 6 it was two to one in favor of donald trump. the more recent one had a majority saying they saw themselves as a supporter of the republican party. his influence will wayne and that is something the media is missing. host: that being said, he is

bringing back rallies next month. here is one headline from vanity fair. it is the goal of these rallies? guest: first of all i want to point out that bernie sanders had wonderful rallies and lost two runs for the presidency. enthusiastic markets do not create a majority. they do not demonstrate majority approval. what trump is trying to do is rebuild his brand and influence. i think what is going to happen is we are going to see a very strong minority, but we will see over time whether or not he can re-expand that into majority support. his challenges to people he doesn't like in the 2022 midterms is telling. he has to when all of those challenges, to governor kemp, to liz cheney, to others who to impeach him. if he loses half of those

challenges he will be shown to be an emperor with no clothes. host: democratic caller. hey there. caller: i think the guest has been making some excellent points. i can say that i have been very sad to see the republican party dissolve into this sort of religion of trump that lives in fantasies. i'm surprised they don't have an anti-evolution plank. i see liz cheney's ouster as the opening of a door of a possibility of reform and give people a place to go and gather and, you know, forms some sort of coalition. host: chris? i think chris is gone. what do you think? guest: there is two ways to look at that. one is that the people who agree with not just liz cheney's

criticism with trump, but criticism with the drift of the party. they can either form a third party. that is kind of a futile hope. there is not enough support in the country to support that. or they can be a conference and caucus within the party. old line bush-era 2004 conservatism is part of the republican coalition, but it is the minority part. it is the dialogue between the minority and majority that will determine the course of the party. if the cheney side thinks they ought to become the dominant element in the party that they were 20 years ago, it will find that challenge will be beaten back, and beaten back handily, because that is not where republicans are or want to go. host: on to arlington texas. -- arlington, texas.

hello. caller: how are you doing this morning? the republican party is nothing more than a socially-acceptable fascist movement. it is comprised of white people, most of which came after the civil war. they have nothing invested in democracy. they only participate in democracy as an oppression against blacks. they have no platform other than inciting people to vote for them on culture wars. they have no value system. you can see that based upon the rule they set during the obama administration saying they would not support a supreme court justice nominee up into the election year. they violated their own made up rule and dominated amy barrett. she is now a supreme court justice. we are still waiting for the trickle down economics from the reagan administration. the republican party is a disaster.

it has no basis in our democracy. they don't even believe in democracy. donald trump has all of the tenets of an autocrat. he has memberships -- not friendships, -- not memberships, friendships with vladimir putin. he has the cadence and vocabulary of a third-grader, and somehow we is considered a genius among republicans. host: the left a lot out there. a comprehensive critique of the party, the former president. what is your reaction? guest: i think that is a common critique among progressive and democratic circles. malik expressed it whether -- it rather well. i don't believe the republican party is anti-democratic. i think it is clear that is not the case. i think if you were to going to a republican gathering you would

find incredulity that somebody could actually believe that the republican party is anti-democratic. host: what do you make of the top republican congressional leaders and their work right now? mitch mcconnell, kevin mccarthy? guest: they have different objectives and styles. mccarthy is somebody who likes to bring people together and lead conference in opposition. he has never been in the leader in the majority. and was in california he was the minority leader. he excels at fundraising and bringing together people in the opposition. i expect that as a role he will shine in. mitch mcconnell is the supreme legislative tactician. i like to say that if this were a chess game, would always choose black, because he likes the other side to go first, then exploit their weakness. he is stymieing democratic

fruits -- democratic efforts because he is a tactician. he will be interesting to see how the voters respond to these tactics and whether or not they are willing to give the republicans the majority in 2022. history suggests that they will. david shore, the democratic data analyst, shows that people in power tend to lose five points from their first quarter polling, which would suggest the would get 48% in the midterms. i think both leaders know that and know that if they can stymie the democrats for the next 18 months they are likely to be in charge of congress in january 2023. host: greg is calling from springfield, missouri. good morning. caller: something your guest said changed my question a little bit. i was going to ask about the --

whether or not the democrat's refusal would embolden the radical wing, but he repeated the republican talking point about election integrity. we just had the cleanest, most fair election in our history. this is unanimous. 50 secretaries of state, the federal department of justice, and over 60 courts have said so. yet republicans have introduced hundreds of laws designed to limit the vote, to make it more difficult to vote, and i don't understand -- well, i think i have made my point. they can talk about election integrity all they want. he can talk about how committed the republican party is to "democratic values." they are not, and everybody sees that.

i am aghast that they continue to repeat the lie that they need to have all of this voter suppression. i am just flabbergasted. host: let's get a response. guest: i would be happy to -- in this short time i can't possibly describe why voter suppression isn't happening, why election integrity concerns are real. i will say that we did have a fair election. donald trump lost. there was not a steel. i have written that and i still believe that the republican party needs to say that. having said that, there is nothing wrong with requiring photo id to vote. polls show that democrats and independents agree. there is nothing wrong with requiring serious signature verification measures if you are going to vote by mail. in the australia you can vote by mail, you have to give a

personal identifying question that is like, what was your third grade teacher? republicans are not doing anything as restrictive as that. what we are trying to do is ensure people that are real vote and fraudsters don't have an incentive to create ballots for nonincentive -- for nonexistent people. it could happen in the future and republicans are trying to make sure that our elections are secure so that the will of the people is expressed and that it is a genuine expression of the people. i think voter suppression lie is every bit as deleterious to american democracy as the voter fraud live. they are both lies and things that ought to be rejected by the partisans on both sides. host: on to miami, florida. good morning, diane. caller: good morning. host: go ahead, please. caller: i would just like to make a statement comparing this

administration and trump's administration. we had low gasoline prices. we had control of the border. we had low inflation, low unemployment. and i never saw so many people, especially in the black community, going out and shopping and enjoying their lives. i am a pro-lifer, which is very important. what is interesting is that these riots for the black community, black lives matter, i wish that they would pickett planned parenthood, who is killing 40% of the black babies

in america. they are not doing that, and planned parenthood are in the ghettos, or in the poor districts because they know that they have connections with the black community in destroying their generation. so, i believe these riots are formed with kids living in the basements of their parents and the parents don't care about them, and the only way they get attention is when they are arrested, put in jail, and the parents have to come and bail them out. host: that was diane, mr. olsen. reaction there? guest: i think diane has expressed some widely held views in the republican community. with respect to the next couple of years, the binding administration has a lot riding on it. there are polls showing majority of americans disapprove of his

handling of the border. he is have to get that under control if he wants to keep control of congress. inflation is over 4% and many people expect it will go higher. he is going to have to control that at the expense of some other things he wants to do. if he wants to get in control of congress after the midterms. the same is true of employment. we have more job openings than ever that we still have millions of people who will not take those jobs, and i think biden is going to have to deal with the employment crisis. those are three things she mentioned the trump administration did well. if the binding administration cannot show they can have growth without inflation and control the border they are going to have many moderate voters decide that maybe that republican party is not so bad. host: republican line for henry olsen. hey there. caller: good morning.

i am a compassionate conservative. you can call me a bush republican. host: so, rick, let me jump in. does that mean to you in 2021? caller: that is where i was going. i was almost forced kicking and screaming to vote for trump because of the opponent, hillary clinton. in the last election i voted for biden, because he is more of a moderate. i really want our party back. however, if at the next election i am forced to choose between a radical left or a radical right, i will always go radical right. i believe our future is in the middle. i would love to see more moderate democrats like we have had in florida, like bob graham. more moderate republicans.

i believe that is where common sense and the future is. i want our party back, if we are forced to choose between a trump or an oak osseo cortez or clinton, we will go with trump all of the time, unfortunately. host: mr. olsen? guest: i think the caller very simply put out the challenge for both parties. democratic party assumes that people like the caller are generally moderate and dislike donald trump and voted for joe biden are going to stay in their coalition regardless of what the democratic party opposes. what that has meant is a massive shift to the left. i think that the caller is going to have a very difficult time in 2022, because he is going to have to look at a democratic party that is not as moderate as he had hoped it was going to be and i think he is going to vote

republican. host: you have touched on your writing. go back to elise stefanik, who was put in place as republican conference chair. here is the headline to your opinion piece. elise stefanik could be what the gop needs. here is what she had to say after her election about the goals for the party. [video clip] >> first i wanted to thank my colleagues for the opportunity to serve as the conference chair. i have prioritized listening to all members of our republican conference, and my focus is on unity, because that is what the american people deserve. i also want to think this leadership team. i look forward to working with them, shoulder to shoulder, to make sure we are fighting on behalf of hard-working americans. i also want to thank president trump his support. he is a critical part of our team. host: mr. olsen, a little bit more on elise stefanik? guest: i think that strikes the

right note. the republican party is a coalition. there are people who are moderates, the last caller. there are people like liz cheney, who like 2004-style conservatism. there are religious conservatives. they need to be heard. the problem with cheney's that she became somebody who was not listening, but was talking. what stefanik's statement says is that she wants to be a leader. i think that is what the leadership needs to be doing right now. host: we have sam in organ. democratic caller. caller: hi. i think an investigation needs to happen of what does trump have film of these republicans

doing in his hotels? the way they are following him with bowls -- like bulls with hooks in their noses, he must have something on them. host: is that something you want to respond to? guest: not particularly. host: let's go on to bill. public and. good morning. -- republican. good morning. caller: good morning. i'm glad you have a good guest on today. i am a republican, i support president trump. let's face it, he defeated hillary clinton. that makes him one of the best presidents during my lifetime. he also woke up what i would consider republican party that did not do anything for the majority of its constituency. it gave us choices like mitt romney and bob dole and people

that i really cannot support. he -- i will tell you, what i want to ask mr. olsen is why he thinks donald trump lost? in particular, if donald trump had been more populist and maybe not passed a giant tax code to the rich and dunmore infrastructure, would that have helped? and how is it that he spoke about the antiwar rhetoric, yet joe biden is the one bringing us out of that after all of these years? so these two points, populism and building the infrastructure of this country, and also moving out of this warmongering. i will tell you what i did. i told the republican party, as

long as liz cheney is in leadership, i will not give you more than one penny and i would take one penny to every request for money that they sent me. host: mr. olsen, several points there. guest: i will try to briefly touch on three of them. i think trump would have been helped had he pushed his party to adopt the infrastructure bill he wanted. the party did not want to engage in that level of spending, and i think they are regretting that now. you take a look at mitch mcconnell saying, we will accept an $800 billion infrastructure bill -- they could have passed that under trump and gotten the credit. once again, trying to resist what is necessary when it comes to government action to end up capitulating in the worst possible way. i think the tax bill was generally good, but trump should have pushed more populist elements of it and i would have

wished he would have done something like a $10,000 exemption on the social security tax so that the working-class people have gotten a real tax cut. i think the real reason trump lost was he did not demonstrate a sufficient degree of president xi allergy -- presidentiality. i think that is what the moderate members, like the previous caller, who are not hard left but are not hard right, they would have liked to have seen that. all he needed was an extra .5% of the vote and he would have won the electoral college. just the littlest show of compassion, putting safety first in covid, just a few less derogatory comments on twitter, showing up for the first debate and acting like a human being rather than somebody trying to stir up an rage machine.

all of those things hurt him. i agree that populist economic policy would have helped. host: you mentioned infrastructure. what areas might there be to cooperate with democrats on this year that might yield a benefit? guest: i think it would be in the republican interest to strike a deal over core infrastructure, even if the democrats try to put the rest of their measures through on reconciliation. it would allow them to say, here is what we are for, and here is what we are against. as opposed to locking it altogether. i hope they do pursue a bipartisan, hard project. roads, bridges, water mains, and so forth. it is unfortunate they could have had that and claimed credit for it on their own had to been willing to do with the president wanted. now they are forced to share

credit with the democrats, but i would rather have them do that then say no. host: last call. marine. hello. caller: good morning. i was wondering, if you don't believe these election laws republicans are passing are not suppressing voters, then what do you think about project rednap in preparation for the 2010 census? guest: i don't know about project red map. would you like to educate me? caller: very shocked he would not know about that. the republican strategist -- it has been. guest: i know that typically republicans will prepare for redistricting, just as the democrats prepare for districting, but i'm not familiar with a 2009 project called project roadmap. host: we are out at of time.

in re olson, senior fellow at the ethics and public policy center. author of a book called "working-class republican." thank you for coming on and talking about the future of the gop this morning. guest: thank you for having me. host: we will take one more time out and then we are going to turn to the violence in the middle east. continuing this weekend, special meetings underway at the u.n. we will turn our attention to the situation between the israelis and palestinians with jon alterman. be right back. ♪ >> book tv on c-span2 has top nonfiction books and authors every weekend. tonight on "afterwards," massachusetts democrat senator elizabeth warren talks about

persistence and her life as a senator and democratic presidential candidate. she is interviewed by white house reporter annie linsky. tonight at 10:00 p.m., the development of precision bombing during world war ii is the subject of author malcolm gladwell's new book "the palmer mafia." -- the bomber mafia." watch book tv tonight on c-span2. >> monday night on "the communicators," bob latta discusses issues facing congress on broadband access. >> you're looking at making sure we get broadband across the country. it is so important, and when you think about 5g, and when you think about accountability of big tech i think those are some

of the top issues right off the bat. when you think about, especially on the broadband issue, i look across my district in ohio, you know, there is a lot of areas don't have broadband. it is so important we get it out there and so important after we have seen what has happened with covid. we saw everything from telemedicine to people working from home. it has been essential that rock band be out there. i think this is an issue that is not republican, democrat, or independent. >> watch "the communicators" monday night at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span2. >> c-spanshop.org is c-span's online store, with a collection of products, and every purchase helps support our operations.

go there to order a copy of the congressional directory, with contact information. browse our newest products at c-spanshop.org. >> "washington journal" continues. host: our guest is jon alterman. thank you for joining us this morning, sir. there is a lot to react to. one of them is the reaction from the associated press to the israeli airstrike the other day. the headline says ap horrified by israeli attack on its office. an israeli airstrike destroyed this high-rise building that housed offices of the ap and other media outlets saturday. all ap employees and freelance employees evacuated safely. the president and ceo of the ap

released the following statement. "we are shocked and horrified that the israeli military would destroy the building housing ap's euro in gaza. they have long known the location of our bureau. we received a warning that the building would be hit. the israeli government said the building contained hamas intelligence assets. we have called on the israeli government to put forth the evidence. this bureau has been in this building for 15 years." first, your reaction to that part of the story? guest: it is impossible for me to judge whether there was an hamas operation in the building or not. the israelis certainly are not very interested in allowing international journalists to do a lot of sympathetic stories about the effects of the attacks on gaza. whether it was in fact both of

those, we can both cut down some of the sympathetic reporting of palestinians and take out hamas assets, whether the story of hamas assets was invented, whether they are really not serious assets but that it was a pretext, i don't know. it is very hard from outside, certainly in the fog of war, to sort out these kinds of claims. host: i wanted to get your broader sense of what is going on. here is a vox.com headline. what is happening is the inevitable result of a grim status quo. why are we at this point right now? guest: in many ways this has happened before. it happened in 2014, it happened in 20 -- 2008. the israelis have come to call this mowing the grass. there have to be military

operations to destroy hamas infrastructure and reinforce israeli deterrence of hamas. you can argue that if you have to keep doing it it is not working, and israel always faces this problem. what we know is that hamas is not going to defeat israel. israel has no intention of preoccupying gaza. israel is reluctant of having any ground incursion into gaza. have to exchange, largely through airpower, kills a bunch of people, terrorizes a lot more people. then we go back to where we were. what is probably surprising to some people and not surprising to me was the sense a lot of people had in the trump administration that we were done with this conflict. that the problem. i think this is a reminder that the problem is not solved. there are millions of palestinians who feel stateless or disenfranchised.

i think increasingly we see israeli arabs who are feeling threatened and disenfranchised. you see a growing number of israeli jews who feel threatened by israeli arabs. this is tearing apart the fabric of israel in the way that, to me, reinforces the need to move forward to some sort of durable solution. for many this has been a polarizing episode, to convince people there is nobody to make a deal with. host: two phone lines for our guest, jon alterman of asis. if you live in the central or eastern time zones, call this, (202) 748-8000. if you live in the mountain or western time zones, (202) 748-8001 is the number. so, what do you make of the

biden administration's response to all of this so far? guest: this also seems to fill the poem -- the familiar pattern the united states response to this episode of violence first by talking about israel's right to defend itself. there are gestures about restraining the israelis. i think there are moves toward diplomacy. nobody wants hamas to come out as a victor here. neither israel nor the united states, nor surrounding arab states. i think there is willingness for hamas to get a bloody knows, it also widespread willingness to not have this get out of hand. i think what israel often has is a two weeks or three weeks to try to do some damage, to try to teach some lessons, in their mind, to hamas. then there is a movement toward some sort of cease fire.

the u.s. has been speaking to the egyptians, it has been speaking for -- speaking to the jordanians. there is an effort toward diplomacy. it will probably take another week or so, but it feels like this is a sad repetition of a pattern we have seen many times before. each time we see people die. -- ca people die. host: who is leading the diplomatic effort for the u.s.? guest: the secretary of state is responsible for israeli-palestinian issues. he is in israel now. frankly, that gives you a lot of room to escalate up. the deputy secretary of state is not a senate-confirmable position. you can go to the assistant secretary of state, you can go to the secretary of state. in many ways you have somebody on the ground to say we are doing something, but you are still leaving room for and we

get close to something, you start bringing in they heavier guns. host: first call is from paul, from the united kingdom. we will take a look at the series of photos from the associated press from inside gaza. paul, go ahead, please. caller: the question is to jon. will there be peace between the palestinians and israel? permanent peace? host: it is a big question. guest: permanent pieces hard. let me put this in a different context. which shows you how different this situation is. you have three simultaneous political crises. you have a battle for the leadership of hamas in gaza. a negotiator with the israelis.

you have a political crisis in the palestinian authority. mahmoud abbas, long overstaying his term. just canceled legislative elections. in large measure because he thinks his side can't win. fatah in particular is of diminishing credibility. his ability to speak to bella 10 -- to ballot 10 -- the palestinians is compromised. on the israeli side you have benjamin netanyahu, who has failed in his effort to put together a majority coalition after israel's fourth round of elections. we seem to be going toward a fifth. i think you have a battle, in some cases to try to play a nationalist card to show we are not going to take it. people in the israel said this

is helping benjamin netanyahu, who is comfortable playing a nationalist card. when you talk about actually resolving this in a longer-term way, i think it is hard to make a lot of progress when you have these political vacuums with hamas, with the palestinian authority, and israel. it could be that a crisis could pave the way for a deeper discussion about where we are trying to go with this and what is the endgame. that discussion has not happened, and as long as bombs are flying, i think that discussion is not going to happen. host: on to indiana. caller: good morning, thank you for taking my call. huge fan of "washington journal." you are doing an excellent job. i was waiting a long time for this subject,.

in my humble opinion, this is pretty easy to solve. israel does not have the right to exist. it is occupied palestine. it started out, the united states had banned european jews before, during, and after world war ii. i can understand before, but if they cannot put up after world war ii, and we would not accept the jews, dump them on the palestinians, who cares? they were left there. they overran the country, and we have been bankrolling this occupation and oppression of the palestinian people ever since. there will never be a peace between israelis and palestinians. benjamin netanyahu even said this. there will never be a two state solution. i think what we need to do is we

give foreign aid to, any country we give foreign aid to, if they get nuclear weapons, we stop. we cut off trade with them, don't give military weapons. these palestinians are throwing stones and sticks at tomahawk missiles and up actually -- and apache helicopters. you give palestinians the right to return, one man, one vote. be a true democracy and not be apartheid of the middle east. thank you for the time. host: thank you for joining us. mr. alterman, any thoughts? guest: alan and i disagree with the history, freight. we can start with un resolution's which recognized the state of israel. there are certainly some very difficult issues that need to be

untangled and difficult issues that israelis and palestinians haven't agreed on, i don't think the answer is -- but i don't think the answer is 8 million jews have to leave israel. the answer is we have to find some way to have people share what was palestine, and i think that is where the u.n. is, and it is certainly where the u.s. government has been. that is the appropriate place for the u.s. to be. host: let's go to paul, another paul from alexandria, virginia. good morning. caller: hello, this is the first time in many years i have call. thank you very much for taking the call. what i think is being ignored in this entire coverage is that one the iranians have been powered by biden's policy to reopen

talks with iran and iranians are now testing the waters by supporting their clients in gaza, hamas. in light of all of that, there is elections going on in the palestinian authority. you have many factions involved, and hamas is flexing its muscles irresponsibly and israel is not going to stand by and be attacked. that is about all i have to say about this. what do you think about this? guest: paul, i totally agree with you on the fact that hamas is flexing its muscles

irresponsibly. there was a problem in jerusalem and hamas turned a problem in jerusalem into a palestinian-israeli war. i think it was a mistake of israel to allow hamas to determine the time and place of confrontation. i think i disagree with you that this is tied to anything involving iran. i don't know that there is any evidence that the iranians are supporting hamas in this endeavor. i think the iranians have their hands full right now. while they certainly don't oppose it, there is a difference between causation and correlation. it is not a policy that they are advancing. as i said, the biggest problem from an israeli perspective is this problem of polarization

inside of israel, polarization inside of mixed arab-jewish towns. the rise of vigilante groups on both sides. there are serious vigilante groups on both sides. i think for a democracy like israel, that is a huge problem, it is a huge warning sign, and frankly israeli politicians have been encouraging the default meant -- devolvement of those groups for some time. that is laying the seeds for future conflict, unless israelis and palestinians can turn it around. that will require a healing of palestinian politics, which i think mahmoud abbas has been -- has become part of the problem. host: 10 minutes left with our

guest, jon alterman. here is president biden on all of this. pres. biden: one of the things i have seen thus far is that there has not been a significant overreaction. the question is how we get to a point where there is a significant reduction in the attacks, particularly the rocket attacks that are indiscriminately fired in the population centers. i expect that i will be having some more discussions. we have not just spoken with the israelis. the egyptians, the saudi's, and others. it is a work in progress right now. host: mr. alterman, you're reading a lot about the president can eat from the left in his party are not taking a

stronger stance against israel. that is bubbling up. what do you make of that dynamic? guest: there is clearly a much broader discussion in the democratic party than they used to be, but i will tell you, joe biden is an old-style foreign policy democrat who cared about the cold war and cares about ties with israel. and i was a staffer to the late senator moynihan, joe biden was a senior democrat. joe biden is committed to the security of israel. while that is less of a common view among younger democrats, i believe that it is a deeply held view that president biden has had for decades and decades. it is not about to change. host: let me share this headline in the washington post. it says trump's mideast deals fade amid war.

scenes from gaza. how about that part of the story? guest: it is an interesting problem, because there were a number of states -- the united arab emirates especially was looking for a different kind of relationship with israel. and said that the old kind of relationship is not serving their interests anymore. they had many of the same enemies. why are we keeping ourselves from working with the israelis? i thought that was a very courageous, and some ways, others would say reckless, but it was certainly a bold move. i think that the uae finds itself in a difficult position. virtually every arab state is very hostile to hamas. but they are also sympathetic to israeli arabs.

they are sympathetic to palestinians who seek to pray in jerusalem. it is not easy, and i think what they would like to do is they would like to turn this into an israel-hamas conflict where they can say we are not supporting hamas, because they don't. as this becomes more of a jewish -arab conflict within israel, it raises some uncomfortable questions for arab states that want to sustain close not only diplomatic, but economic insecurity ties israel. host: here is a text. why does saudi arabia not support the palestinians? who does? trump moved the embassy. how is that working? did bigo -- two questions. guest: two very different questions. the saudi's are interested in supporting the in some ways. the saudi's are interested in

having an interest in the mosque, but they are not fans of the palestinian authority and are hostile to hamas. in terms of moving the industry to jerusalem, i think that was meant to reassure the israelis. the jerusalem compound is small. the tel aviv complex is large. i'm not sure it has done much. when you look at what the effect on israel has been, as it led israel to make bolder gestures of peace? i think in some ways the last four years persuaded israelis the problem was gone and the problem did not require compromises or anything else. what we are seeing now is the problem is not gone, and the

problem is no longer a cross-border problem, it is an internal israeli problem. 20% of israeli citizens are arabs. that is a problem that does not go away easily unless work it. i think israel is moving toward feeling we don't have to work that. in the coalition building discussions there is a tradition in israel, you don't have a majority coalition that includes arab parties. in some ways that requires everybody to have a super majority. nobody is able to get a super majority, and we seem to be on the verge of bringing in an arab party into a coalition in the way that would have been historic for israel, reaching out to everybody in israel. i think that has been set back a bit, and it creates some unsettling problems for israelis

about what kind of society they are going to have. this is a question for all israelis to deal with, but i think it is not a question we can sweep under the rug. host: we have wanda on the line from tennessee. hello. caller: hello. can you hear me? host: we can hear you just fine. caller: my comments are all people, black, white, green, because i have had friends who talked other people about me instead of coming to me straight up, they distorted information. that being said, these people, fine african-americans, -- today i heard a lady talk about african-american parents as though they need anyone to do anything but mind their own matters. that is one african-americans

need. -- what african-americans need. then you move to your inheritance, inherited drama. prisons built for us, to have african-americans. who misinformed african-americans about their inheritance? host: let's move on to debbie in new mexico. caller: hi. i have a theory that i talked to my rabbi about. what if abraham was wrong? what if the chosen people were homo sapiens? what if the chosen land was earth? that would change everything. i can't envision as a jew how god would create all of whom -- all of human beings and pick out one. we didn't all make the cut, but

homo sapiens did. if we got it wrong, there is a good reason why there is all this conflict. because we got it incorrect. i will take your opinion off -- just tells me -- just seeing her tells me your answer. guest: here is the important thing your question raises. we all come to this through narratives. we all come to this with stories about how we belong. the challenge is, sometimes we think stories never change. it seems to be -- to me the stories change, the way anybody telling the story will change emphasis. there is a certain dynamism in the stories and we give up something important when we assume that the stories are static and rigid and can't change. what i thought was interesting about your comment was, it suggests the possibility -- there is a rich jewish tradition

of these evolving stories, not preserved in amber, but stories that can empower you and move forward. i think it is incumbent on people in the jewish community and the arab community in israel, which is both muslim and christian, to use the stories, to use the narratives in the ways that empower people to imagine different futures. this is a great book about the middle east written by a medievalist at uc santa barbara named stephen humphreys. i think in some ways it captures this conflict in a very important way. it is between memory and desire, and connecting those in an intentional way, and a creative way can lead us. it is hard to imagine that when bombs are flying and civilians

are dying on both sides. host: let's get john on the line, beaverton, oregon. caller: i have followed this conflict since the 1960's and i was an eight-year-old. one of the things then is the story of israel being surrounded by these many strong arab nations. but, to me, that alan soft power has changed. in my mind, and in reality. one of the things i would like to see is the recognition of that balance of power, and focusing on conflicts of power within the palestinian and israeli and really look at it. are their politicians seeing politics as a or simply power?

then, a two-state solution. really move toward a two-state solution and away from this narrative of this as a cycle, but break it with a two-state solution. host: thanks. mr. alterman, last thought from you? guest: john said a couple of things. first, israelis have been complaining about israeli politics for decades. the leaders who believed in service have yielded to a bunch of people who are political animals. the fact that israel has been through four elections that were inconclusive i think is something that reflects israelis' frustration with precisely the politics you are talking about. palestinians complain they have never had real politics. there was a hope that mahmoud abbas would lead toward genuine palestinian politics, that has

not played out. in many cases people on the ground feel the same frustration you do. politics is leading towards greater conflict and greater polarization. the challenge of the two state solution, which has diminishing support on both sides, is rising numbers on both sides fear that it is a concession to the other side, which will keep you fighting from a weaker position. the challenges that word " solution" persuading people there is a solution that would lead to a different future. host: we thank you jon alterman for joining us. he is the leader -- thank you for being with us. thank you to everybody who called in and sent in social media messages over these past

three hours. we hope you enjoy your sunday. we will see you back here at 7:00 for another washington journal. ♪ >> c-span is your unfiltered view of government. we are funded by these, including these companies and more, including comcast. >> comcast is partnering with community centers so students from low income families can get the tools they need to be ready for any. >> -- ready for anything. >>