been offensive. a new republic editor about andrew cuomo's resignation as new york governor. ♪ host: good morning and welcome to washington journal. president biden pushing an effort to tackle the high cost of prescription drugs in the u.s. he is calling on congress to help him. the cost of many prescription drugs is outpacing the general pace of inflation in the u.s. and making it harder for americans to get the care they need. many pharmaceutical companies say the federal government should keep its hands off their industry, saying the free market and capitalism should prevail

like in other industries. that is our question for you. which of the federal role be in lowering prescription drug prices? we will open up regional lines. if you are in the eastern or central time zones, your number is (202) 748-8000. if you are in the mountain or pacific time zones, your number is (202) 748-8001. keep in mind, you can always text us at (202) 748-8003. we are always reading social media. facebook at facebook.com/c-span, on twitter @cspanwj and you can always follow us on instagram @cspanwj. president biden came out on thursday to talk about lowering the cost of prescription drugs and urging congress to take action on reducing those prices. here is what president biden had to say thursday.

[video clip] >> there are a lot of things almost every american can agree on. i can safely say that all of us, whatever our background or our age or where we live, can agree that prescription drug prices are outrageously expensive in america. today, i would like to talk about how we are going to help millions of americans save money and ease their burdens by lowering the cost of prescription drugs. let me start by acknowledging the groundbreaking and lifesaving work that many pharmaceutical companies are doing. look no further than the vaccines they are manufacturing and delivering that are helping us beat this pandemic and save lives, but we can make a distinction between developing these breakthroughs and jacking up prices on a range of medications for everyday diseases and conditions. right now, here in america, we

pay the highest prescription drug cost of any developed nation in the world. let me say that again. any developed nation in the world. about two to three times what other countries pay. host: let's see what president biden is actually proposing in his proposal that came out of the white house. under president biden's prescription drug price proposal, it would allow medicare to negotiate drug prices. it would cap the beneficiary's out-of-pocket cost. it would penalize drug companies that raise prices faster than inflation. it would allow states to import lower-cost drugs from canada and accelerate the development and update of generic drugs. that is the proposal president biden came out with on thursday to help lower the cost of prescription drugs. what do you think the federal role should be on this issue? let's start with howard, who is

calling from indiana. howard, good morning. caller: good morning. i think the legislation is a good start, the proposed legislation, for bringing us to universal health care. i would remind everybody that biden advocates, and i agree with him, the view of health care as a right available to all citizens, so i think this is the first step to get there. ultimately, i think we need to get to a single-payer system where the patients are never involved in the payment loop. patients cannot bargain for health care. we have no leverage, so governments should own the payment string. hospitals, clinics will be private enterprises, but it should be single-payer. it will streamline the process significantly and the government

has the negotiating power to negotiate the best price. host: what would you say to those pharmaceutical representatives who say that their industry should be treated like all other industries in america? they should have the right to set the prices where the market can bear it. it is a free-market society. why not set the prices they know they can get? caller: that is an argument for a commodity type of market, where customers have an -- have availability to competitors, can make a bargain for choice. you don't have that in any aspect of health care. health care is not like any other market economy. we cannot let pharmaceutical companies get away with it. companies do not -- individual patients do not choose their pharmaceutical. their doctors do. so a patient is not a customer

like a typical customer who makes a decision and evaluates all trade-offs. patients don't have that ability. that is my answer. thank you. host: let's go to james, calling from aberdeen, south dakota. james, good morning. caller: good morning. yes. i have to disagree with him. that sounds more like a socialist government. this is a capitalist republican constitution and that's what this country is built on, and if you take all the clinics and everything else that built themselves fairly, i would trust them more than the government trying to solve my problems. host: james, a lot of people we will probably hear from this morning will say we need these

drugs to survive and we cannot afford them. the government could step in -- government should step in because this is a life or death situation. your response? caller: what obama said when he was president, he said sometimes we cannot do everything, and you might just have to have the pill. in other words, you are going to die. host: you think the government should sit back and let people die because they can afford their medicine? caller: yeah. they are saying we cannot afford it all, so we cannot do it all for you, but we are a capitalist country. what it was built on in the beginning. and that's how we got to be the greatest country. and there's a lot of different hospitals and place different places -- please -- in

fact, i got out of the hill --[no audio] -- caller: my doctors prescribed is made by astrazeneca. it costs me five dollars a -- it costs me $550 a vial.

when you get the same thing from india. this is crazy. research in this country is done by the nih and that is funded by the taxpayers. there is no country in this world, like you said, that has no control on drug prices. there has to be some price controls for the benefit of all people. there are many people who cannot afford drugs. i have been to pharmacy a sailor ceiling -- succeed. thank you. host: during

-- caller: my husband is a severe diabetic and he was put on a new medication and we are having to pay $555 for 30 pills. and we didn't have insurance. that is tough, along with your mortgage and household bills, etc. i think, personally, that president biden is more looking into and dealing with the infrastructure deal. i think this high medication problem is just stuff someone through on his desk.

he is looking over, will deal with it. just like he promised the $15 per hour for restaurant workers, etc., which hasn't happened, but yes, i hope they can, somebody in washington, help us to lower our prices on med. thank you. host: the proposal that president biden is pushing is actually part of the reconciliation bill that the democrats are trying to push through congress. the new york times has a little bit on that process. "the president was pushing an open door. congressional democrats have already said they want to include all three measures in the so-called reconciliation bill that the house and senate committees -- the finance committee will be a central part of the debate when it comes to lowering health care costs and making health care

available to more families. ron wyden of oregon said, as democrats unveiled a blueprint that will allow them to pass the legislation without a republican vote, democrats have been pushing most of the measures for years, meeting with fierce opposition from the industry and republican leaders -- but donald j. trump broke with the republican orthodoxy in 2016 when he railed against the drug lobby and vowed to use medicare users negotiating power. so the proposal that president biden came out with on thursday is scheduled to be part of the $3.5 trillion budget blueprint

democrats are trying to push through congress after the infrastructure bill. let's go back to our phone lines and talk to crystal, calling from wilkes-barre, pennsylvania. good morning. caller: good morning. when you asked the question this morning, i had to call immediately. i went to cvs to fill the prescription i have each month and it was $28 when i first got it filled. yesterday, it was $120. i told the pharmacist, i think you are making a mistake, so she checked the computer. she went under the discount card. it was $139, but under medicare, my medicare prescription plan,

it was $138 and i could not believe it. i cannot even get the pill because of the price increase. i said, is it that much? she said, yeah. call them. she printed something out to show that i paid this amount last month. i could not even afford to get it filled, so i think biden is doing a great thing to lower this cost. this is ridiculous at this point, that you cannot even get your prescription filled because it went up that much, so i like biden. i like what he is doing for the middle class and those of us who cannot afford these drugs, so thank you for bringing up this topic this morning. have a great day. host: the stories we are hearing this morning are reflected in the polls being taken about prescription drug costs in the u.s. here is a pull from the kaiser

family foundation that says about three in 10 americans say they have not taken their medicines because of the cost. i will show you the pole, where it says 19% of the people polled in the last 12 months say they have not filled a prescription for medicine because they cannot afford it. others, about 18%, say they have taken and over-the-counter drug instead. 12% say they have cut pills in half or skipped doses. and almost one third, 29%, say they they have -- say that they have done at least one of those things above because they cannot afford their medicine. again, our question for you this morning is what should be the federal role in lowering prescription drug costs?

let's go to david, calling from monks corner, south carolina. caller: good morning. i hope you do not mind if i address the bigger picture of the government's role. i believe that the insurance industry is a non-value-added service. it is an extra cost that does not need to be there when it comes to public dollars. i think there needs to be a two-tier system. it would be wrong to ban private health and associated industry, everything it has, but we also have to remember that, in response to an earlier caller, medicine is not quite free enterprise because the supply of health care is limited by the government so, through limited numbers of seats in medical schools, limited numbers of schools, and the certificate of need process, where you cannot

just go set up shop like you can a garage. so there is a limited surprise. therefore you will have higher prices and an increased demand situation. evidence of that is when a number of doctors cannot meet the needs of the people they have delegated, certain procedures and things people were not licensed to do in the past, and we have seen a huge growth in the nurse practitioner and physician assistant industry to keep the number of physicians low for price reasons, but there needs to be public dollars spent on health care in the non-fee-for-service salary basis for doctors to eliminate the fee-for-service incentive for unnecessary charges and for covering legal risk, so a great number of tests are done in the

case of malpractice for legal protection. if that was eliminated for public health care providers and they worked on a salary without fee-for-service and eliminate third-party payment, the public dollars could be done much more efficiently, much the way medicine was done in the -- host: let's go to james, calling from murphreesboro, tennessee. james, good morning. caller: good morning. can you hear me? host: yes. go ahead, james. caller: drug companies are just getting rich and some of these pills cost more money than anyone can expect to pay except for people who have money. you have people calling in talking about capitalism and how everything was great. well, it was not built that way.

it was built -- it was built on genocide, murder and slavery. the rich got richer and the poor got poorer. thank you. host: kathleen in indianola, mississippi, good morning. caller: good morning. the reason i am calling, i am disabled, but i still get social security, ssi, medicare, medicaid, wix, united states department of agriculture. i used to get $15 a month, but now i get over $190, but when they added the united states department of agriculture, i called medicare.gov. they told me i had to pay $1400 before any surgery. last year, you know, everything was shut down because of

covid-19. this year, the hospital is full, so we are sitting at home. i just don't know. children back to school, but most schools are shut down lake greenwood, greenville, because of covid, the delta variant. we are scared. i mean, we are still wearing our masks. we got vaccinated. we may have to go get a third shot, but don't give up on mississippi. host: president biden actually spoke about the need for medicare to be able to negotiate prescription drug prices in his statement this week. here is what president biden had to say. [video clip] >> there has been long been talk -- i mean, for a long time, since the days when i was in the senate -- about giving medicare

the ability to negotiate drug prices. medicare takes care of millions. my plan will allow that. every other type of health care service, from the cost of a doctor, how much the doctor can charge for a visit, hospital visit, crutches, we -- wheelchairs, medicare is allowed to negotiate. they will say we will pay no more than the following amount for those things. the only thing medicare is not allowed to negotiate our prices for prescription drugs. my plan gets rid of that prohibition. the proposal i made while i was running for president is that medicare should negotiate drug prices across the board. congress is currently debating a more narrow vision, letting medicare negotiate some of the most expensive drugs, particularly from those companies that don't face competition for that drug. we are going to provide

competition through medicare. medicare is going to negotiate a fair price. host: let's see what some of our social media followers are seeing about the government -- the federal role in lowering prescription drug prices. here's a post from facebook that says "investigate why prescription drugs cost more in the u.s. than anywhere else. i have never heard a good explanation. why? possibly because there isn't one." another tweet that says "none of the drugs you buy should be made overseas. we are seeing things like nasal spray absent from shelves. stop letting china make what americans need." another tweet that says "i believe the federal government has a role -- doctors and companies make such a profit."

another tweet that says "i am concerned when the federal government steps in to regulate costs. if they lower costs, will companies stop research and development?" a text that says "we want lower drug prices. we need to vote people who rail against lower drug prices out of office. those people are in the pockets of the drug manufacturers." one last text that says "the highest cost of prescription drugs is a big problem, but the federal government should not get involved setting prices in a free market. however, neither should they permit conglomerate businesses to lobby and block research and development of generic medications, which would lower cost." we want to know what you think the federal role should be in lowering prescription drug prices. the kaiser family foundation also polled to see what

most adults would favor the government doing to lower drug prices. i will bring that to you here. the most popular item that people think the government should do would be allowing the government to negotiate with drug companies to get a lower price that would apply to both medicare and private insurance, 80%. time with that would be making it easy for generic drugs to come to market, which was also approved by 80% by -- by 88% of people asked. another thing americans favor would be placing a limit on out-of-pocket drug costs, allowing americans to import drugs from canada, and allowing medicare to place limits on how much drug companies can increase the price of drugs based on annual inflation rates. americans seem to favor, according to this poll, actions

the government could take to make prescription drug prices lower. some of those actions were in the proposal president biden came out with on thursday and democrats say they plan to put into the three point $5 trillion reconciliation bill that is supposed to follow the infrastructure bill that's been passed by congress. what do you think the federal role should be? let's start with kevin, calling from texas. good morning. caller: good morning. i don't like the way this is framed. i mean, what is the government to do? i mean, it takes the assumption that the federal government has to do something to make drugs more affordable. i want to be clear. this is not a free market of drugs by any means. i mean, the fda decides who can

sell to the market. we subsidize most of the cost through medicare and medicaid. everything is -- the government forces us to have insurance for it. everything the government has done has increased the price of the drugs. i mean, what you have here is you have the federal government limiting the supply of drugs, saying who can buy, who can sell, and then they are subsidizing demand, so you are decreasing supply, raising demand. i mean, that's what's going to happen. i would like for the federal government to have less of a role. you have a whole list of options of what the federal government should do. well, here is an option. the less, ok -- do less, ok?

we started these drug laws back in the early 1900s, where a consumer would know what they were buying, ok? they made it a law where, if you are selling a drug, you have to let the consumer know what is in there, ok? that's great. that's part of a free market, actually, to make sure that people are not lying or defrauding somebody. that was back in the 1900s. ok? today, we have resources unimaginable to decide what drugs to take, what doctor to see. these are decisions we need to make. people who think the federal government should control it, i wish they would keep in mind that what the federal government can do to help people get drugs

they can also do to help manufacturers make more money. host: let's go to richard, calling from california. good morning. caller: yeah. we already have socialists in this country. medicare is socialism, medic aid is socialism. you could go to the fire department and on and on. it is not a totally capitalist society. the thing about medicare is everybody will need medical care. it is not equal across the country in terms of access, especially with these different companies. i work for an hmo. my prescriptions are five dollars each because i have a good plan. if you are out of that loop, you don't know what kind of plan you are going to get, or if you are working for a company that doesn't supply a good plan, you

will have varying prices for all kinds of care. that's why the affordable care act was put in. it was trying to level the playing field so everybody could get affordable care, but it got interrupted by republicans, so this is what is going on with health care. i disagreed -- it is greed in the medical profession, the pharmaceutical companies, the insurance, the hmo's, and that's why you cannot have a level playing field in this country, so the federal government has to step in. we pay more for medical insurance and costs in this country than any other country in the world. but we have millions still uninsured and cannot get care. host: mary, calling from richland, washington. good morning. caller: good morning. i just wanted to say that i

think that it is a good thing because, basically, a lot of people don't realize that all of the people that make these drugs, and not just the ones in china, are on the stock market and they make money. if there is a way of making it, they will. when i was young, i worked for walgreens, and i think it was $1.5 to $2.5 for insulin. i think my granddaughter said her husband was trying to get it down to like $100 for one of those little bottles and it is ridiculous. i remember going to the doctor and he had one receptionist. he paid her. it was $50 to see the doctor and he had one nurse. that was it. but then, you know, the people

get in there. people just need to start -- whatever president biden is doing, he is trying to clean up the mess that the last president that wasn't really there had put forth and trying to give us some kind of respect in the world again. host: well, during a hearing last month, the senate investigated the rising cost of prescription drugs and pharmaceutical companies and lawmakers talked about the cost of research and development for drug companies. here is a portion of that hearing. [video clip] >> from per se legal cartel conduct, antitrust enforcers apply -- assessing anti-competitive practices. they ask whether the conduct

under scrutiny yields consumer welfare and efficiency that would offset potential anticompetitive effects. of efficiencies might include practices that reduce manufacturing or distribution costs to the benefit of consumers. they might also involve enhanced product innovation facilitated by patents and other intellectual property. in the pharmaceutical sector, anticompetitive harm and procompetitive efficiencies are often associated with patents. patents may be used to deter entry from competitors. at the same time, they may facilitate enhanced distribution of new technologies. there's a good reason why the u.s. is a leading country in the production of new pharmaceuticals, and that has been our robust patent system. they can be abused but can be important as well.

i will argue that congress should likely not legislate in this area except in cases of clear abuse, as in one example. host: the pharmaceutical industry is arguing that the federal government should stay out of the pricing of prescription drugs. we have a statement from the president and ceo of pharma, the pharmaceutical research and manufacturers of america and here is what he says. "we stand ready to work with lawmakers and do our parts so patients can see lower costs at the pharmacy and continued access to the cures and treatments they need. unfortunately, the policies the president outlined today will undermine access to life-saving medicines and fails to address and coinsurance system that shifts the cost -- to address an insurance system that shifts the cost onto patients.

medicare is not a piggy bank to be rated to fund -- to be readed to find other programs. this is a misguided approach. this is a reminder that bipartisan reform is possible and patients to -- patients deserve the same bipartisan leadership." that's a statement from the pharmaceutical research and manufacturers of america responding to president biden, who is pushing congress to take action to lower prescription drug costs. we want to know what you think the federal role should be in lowering prescription drug prices. let's talk to john, calling from watsonville, california. john, good morning. caller: yeah. i cannot take any of this seriously. i mean, if they really cared

about drug prices, they would form committees, make studies, and they have never done this. all this is is an afterthought, a sugar sprinkle on a massive power, money and civil liberties grab called -- what do they call it? -- the reconciliation bill. that is all this is, people. don't be a sucker. they don't care. if they actually cared, there would be actual legislation. they are pretending that they care about lowering drug costs. host: let's go to mark, calling from new jersey. mark, good morning. caller: good morning, jesse. i hope you are doing well. there was -- not your last caller, your previous caller,

stole my thunder, but i agree with what biden is trying to do. i just want to present or pose a question to my republican and libertarian brothers and sisters out there. you know, the founding fathers, who they are so eager to tout as the be-all and end-all, like their old testament pr ophets, never address the concept of corporations and companies, even though things like the dutch east india company already existed, and the fact that this is a threat to ordinary people, that a small group of moneygrubbing people can control so much wealth and power. they never address it. so i want to ask the question, and i know my republican

brothers and sisters are out there, and i want them to address it. what guardianship do we the people have against pharmaceutical corporations, against mortgage companies? what do we have if it is not a strong federal government? because this pretty-sanding talk about liberty -- this pretty-sounding talk about t liberty, it sounds good, but it is leaving us in the lurch. so tell us what we have if not a strong federal government against the power of pharmaceutical companies. host: let's go to clifton, calling from union, mississippi. good morning. caller: yes, sir.

i have a medical problem. you have to go -- let me see how to say this -- anyway, you have to pay every three months, and it is north of $600 under obama. when president trump come in there, for the first time, it went down to $400 and something. the second time, it went down to $289 and stayed $289 through january. it went back up to $400 and something. the last time, it was $500 and something. the next time i get it, it will be more than $700 most likely. i don't know what biden is doing, but he is not lowering the price of drugs. it is probably going to turn out like the border, a calamity, a

total mess up. host: let's go to jim, calling from tucker, georgia. good morning. caller: hi, jesse. good morning. how are you doing, buddy? host: just fine. go ahead. caller: we are expecting way too much out of that two-ring circus in washington, d.c. we have a fantastic medical industry here, the best in the world. we develop drugs nobody else can develop. and if congress starts tinkering with that, then, you know, it is going to, i think, produce some unintended consequences. so, you know, congress should just lay off. the thing is, anything the democrats are going to do, the republicans are just going to say no to.

it truly is the party of no, but congress should lay off, not get involved, let these people who are smart enough to develop these really borderline miraculous drugs, let them do their thing and don't -- don't -- mess it up. host: let's look at the price increases for some popular prescription drugs as brought to us by aarp. a drug used for pain relief has gone up 60%. vicotza has gone up 42%, a pill used to treat diabetes. eliquis has gone up 33%. it treats atrial fibrillation and prevents stroke. symbicor for copd has gone up

46%. the last drug, 41%. this information comes from the aarp, which also says that in 2020, more than 200 commonly used medications that they track have increased in price by 2.9% while inflation has decreased by less than that -- has increased by less than that, so the cost of prescription drugs has gone up and we want to know what you think the federal role should be in fighting that. let's go to jim in vance berg, kentucky. good morning. caller: for the last, i don't know, 10, 12 years, we have all been talking about lower prescription drugs.

we have been talking about better rates on insurance, and this includes george w. bush, barack obama, the president we have now and donald trump. my premiums or medicine have not gone down one bit, so i think, actually, you are wasting your time talking about this subject, but i enjoy your program and tune in every day. have a good day. host: let's go to diane from st. paul, minnesota. good morning. caller: yes. i tried not to call. i just like to listen, but i would like to say something. for low income people and people who need insulin. amy klobuchar went and made it possible -- because we had people who were dying, who could not get there insulin -- and she

made it so that my grandson could get it for $42 for a month, and also inhalers. inhalers are costing me $153 for three on my plan that i have to have for my asthma, so there are often things that can be done. our legislators, we have to get them involved, because we got amy klobuchar involved to make sure people got there insulin and minnesota -- insulin in minnesota. we can do that. what is happening to our young and old people too working in minimum wage jobs and at small businesses, and when they get a health plan -- because i know working at a small business -- it is not a good plan. when i went to the doctor, i would pay as much as $75 for a dr.'s visit -- and i had a drug

that cost $700, where, if i was using this plane instead of the medicare plan, i would be paying $700 a month just to get the drugs that i got for my arthritis. host: during that same senate hearing that we showed you earlier, republican senator mike lee talked about what he called the danger of government price controls for prescription drugs. here is what senator lee had to say. [video clip] >> we often hear calls for government mandated price controls as a response to the rising cost of prescription drugs. do you think that approach would work? >> i don't think so, senator. as a general matter, history shows price controls create shortages, reduce investment and innovation. the classic example is the

federal oil and gas controls in the 1970's. we have major shortages. in the case of pharmaceuticals, that would mean fewer drug improvements and drugs, meaning patients would be denied the opportunity for cures. the u.s. leads the world in innovation and r&d and would surrender it if it adopted price controls. canada deregulated drug prices -- canada regulates drug prices, which has led to widespread shortages according to a university of british columbia study and they are getting worse. also consider that pharma r&d fell in canada between 2001 and 2017 significantly while u.s. pharma r&d more than doubled to $56 billion during that period, so importing drugs from canada with the aim of reducing prices could also reduce availability

and investment. host: let's see what some of our social media followers are saying about the federal role in possibly reducing prescription drug prices. here is one tweet that says "i hate to say it, but the government needs to intervene. the free market system does not work in lowering prices. it is not as if all diabetes patients can organize a boycott on their life-saving medication until prices come down." another tweet that says "the u.s. provides the covid vaccine to anyone for free, yet many citizens die without affordable medical care. saving the people or the economy?" another tweet that says "the federal government knows exactly what to do to lower drug prices. it just cannot bring itself to stop taking bribes from formal lobbyists." another tweet that says "the reason the u.s. leads the world

in prescriptions is because taxpayers pay for crazy research and development. we need to get that back." this says "i pay $300 a month. even so, my meds cost me another $100 a month. i can afford it, but would have others not so fortunate? the government should step in -- the government should step in." the last, "the american drug industry's version of capitalism is to couch americans and put foreigners first." the rand corporation put out a report back in january talking about this. i will bring that report to you. "prescription drug prices in the u.s. are higher than in other nations. prices in the u.s. average 2.56 times those seen in 32 other

nations according to a new rand corporation report. the gap between prices in the u.s. and other countries is even larger for brand name drugs, with u.s. prices averaging 3.4 times those in comparison nations. the rand study found that prices for unbranded generic drugs, 84% of the drug sold in the u.s. by volume but only 12% of u.s. spending, are slightly lower in the u.s. than in other nations. brand name drugs are much higher in the u.s. compared to various other nations, but unbranded generic drugs are slightly lower in the u.s. according to a rand corporation report they came out earlier this year. we want to know what you think the role of the federal government should be in lowering prescription drug prices. let's talk to bob, who is

calling from florida. bob, good morning. caller: good morning, sir. host: good morning, bob. caller: everybody wants to blame the pharmacy companies for the price of drugs. the reality of it is is we have quite an expensive process to release these drugs in the u.s. they have to be approved. it is not a cheap process for the drug companies. i take a drug that is cheap, but i call the manufacturer -- that is not cheap, but i call the manufacturer and i get it free. and i'm not on welfare. i do not get medicare. i am not poor, but my income falls below a high amount, and they send it to me free every six months.

you know, it is -- we want to charge the drug companies a fortune to prove the medicine works so we can release it in this country. other countries get the drugs first and cheaper. it is, you know, we are basically the ones -- well, not us, but the government is basically the ones who are proving that, you know, we are going to charge the companies a phenomenal amount and then we expect them to release it at a lower price? you know, it is not a question of them making billions of dollars. it is a question of them covering costs. host: let's go to mark, who is calling from pennsylvania. mark, good morning. caller: good morning. how are you doing? host: just fine. go ahead, mark.

caller: i want to know how anyone expects congress to be the solver for the problem when they cannot police their ranks and catch their own and do nothing about it. it was not long ago that joe manchin's daughter was caught up in the epipen scandal and all they did was bring the cost down from $800 to $300 on a product that was $75 before. you have the fox watching the henhouse. that's all i have to say. host: let's go to mike, calling from virginia. mike, good morning. caller: good morning. if we look at england, large span, it is almost the same as ours, infant mortality.

the most expensive drug in england is $15,000. if you are -- this country, it is much richer than england, but the drug companies are greedy. they are making billions of dollars and we cannot do anything about it because the republican party is working for the insurance companies. host: let's go to parisi, calling from arizona. good morning. breezy, are you there? let's go to tim, calling from asheboro, north carolina. tim, good morning. caller: good morning, jesse. i am a 78-year-old veteran and i am not on v.a. because they say i make too much money. i am currently taking eliquis

and paying an outrageous price. every time i see a commercial on tv for it, i think, i paid for that. i would like to see a law that would limit would form a companies can deduct for r&d, or set it to what they can conduct for r&d to the extent that it exceeds their advertising. thanks. host: the kaiser family foundation has another poll where they asked people about their support for federal government negotiation with drug companies and possible results. i want to bring that poll to you here. when they asked whether people would favor or oppose allowing the federal government to negotiate with drug companies to get a lower price on medications that applies to both medicare and private companies, 88% of

the people were in favor of that, but the numbers begin to change when they add a caveats to it. for example, if they ask people if they would approve those negotiations if people would save money, 90% were in favor of it. if applied to just medicare to save money for paying -- save money by paying less, 81% approved of it, but if they added on that those negotiations could lead to less research and negotiation for new drugs, the approval dropped to 32%. and when they said what if it could limit people's access to newer prescription drugs, it dropped to 31%, so the role of the federal government in negotiations with drug companies can shift if there are negative

consequences possibly to those negotiations. we want to know what you think the federal government's role should be in lowering prescription drug prices. let's talk to daniel, calling from elizabethville, pennsylvania. good morning. caller: the caller from texas, most of the drugs that are on the market are funded by taxpayer money. the messenger rna was developed by the national health service, and of course, university grants and what have you. that lovely woman from i believe it was south carolina suffering from diabetes, insulin was developed by two canadian researchers. they never patented it.

and the eliquis thing, on the insurance, you buy it for $485. i got mine in february. and in january, you have to do another co-pay. if you bought in december, in january, you'd have to pay another 480 five dollars before your insurance kicks in. thanks for taking my call. host: let's talk to earl, who is calling from atlanta, georgia. good morning. caller: hey. how is it going? host: go ahead, earl. caller: i would like to see a graph with all of the congresspeople and their involvement, direct involvement, financial involvement, with drug

companies, because we found out recently that there was -- that rand paul had some involvement, so, you know, let's see a good graph with all the statistics laid out. host: let's go to kelly, calling from bluefield, west virginia. good morning. caller: yeah. for those that have been calling in and it saying that the united states is a free market and that it should stay that way, well, just think about walmart. walmart buys closed from china and sell them at a cheaper price. well, you cannot open up a pharmacy in the united states and by drugs from canada. -- and buy drugs from canada, have them shipped over here and sell them for a cheaper price. try opening a pharmacy and i guarantee the government will

step in and say you cannot do that. if there was a free market, people would be able to open up a pharmacy, get the drugs imported from canada or wherever and sell them at a cheaper price, so for those saying it is a free market, it is not. host: let's go to chris from louisiana. good morning. caller: i am calling because i have been listening to the show myself and all i want to say is it is amazing that we have not made much of any progress when it comes to medication and pricing in our country. it is appalling to know that many of our veterans and our elderly and even every other american citizen are being taken advantage of like this. when i think about it, i think about what is really going on, that people are coming to the table and they are working and

negotiating but they are not negotiating on the public's benefit. they are negotiating so that their pockets get increased with finances. you know, our politicians and congress -- and that is what i call them, politicians -- they are our congressional people, but i think when it comes to these companies, these drug companies, these drug companies are paying them to take care of them and i think that is why we are still in this situation. thank you. host: coming up next, we will turn our attention to the deteriorating security situation in afghanistan. that conversation will be up next. and later, the cuomo era in new york politics is over. or is it? we will ask a reporter with the new republic. stay with us.

we will be right back. ♪ >> weekends when you the best in the american history and nonfiction books. saturday on american history tv, a discussion on the results of c-span's historian survey of residential leadership with historians richard norton smith, douglas brinkley, and amity slays. the survey ranks presidents from best to worst in 10 different categories. in the lectures in history, journalists such as nelly bly faced societal pressure to balance traditional femininity and having a career in journalism. iowa state university professor tracy luke talks about the challenges these pioneering women overcame. watch american history every weekend and find a full schedule on your program guide or watch online at c-span.org/history.

>> all next week at 8:00 p.m. eastern c-span looks at discussions from congress and how the institution operates. monday night, a conversation about modernizing congress with representatives tom graves and brian baird. tuesday night, hearing focusing on bipartisanship and civility. on wednesday night, a second hearing on political civility with psychologists, scholars, and journalists. on thursday night, representative derek kilmer of washington and william jennings of washington talk about waste but -- ways to foster bipartisanship. watch all next week at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span, online at

c-span.org, and listen on the c-span radio app. >> "washington journal" continues. host: we are back with kelley vlahos, the senior advisor for the quincy institute for responsible statecraft. she is here to talk to us about the military and political situation in afghanistan. guest: thank you so much for having me. host: tell us what the quincy institute is. guest: wow, the quincy institute is a think tank dedicated to a new foreign policy based on restraint, military restraint, and diplomatic engagement with the rest of the world. challenging the consensus foreign policy over the last 70 years, has been more about military domination in the world and american primacy. we are looking at a foreign policy that sees diplomacy as

the major engine for engagement in the world and reorganizing foreign policy to be more about american interests and the interests of the broader world. we do not think the foreign policy of the last several decades, particularly after the 1990's has been particularly good for the world or america. it is a major challenge, as you are seeing in the world today, the status quo has not worked, and so we are out there, we are on capitol hill. we are talking to americans. i edit a magazine that is promoting writers and contributors every day who are taking a different view of how we have done things in the world. and it is hard, that i think it is working, because i think americans are ready for change. host: where does the quincy

institute get its funding and do you consider yourself conservative, liberal, independent? guest: this is the neat thing about the quincy institute. we get our funding from both left and right donors. our major donors are george soros and charles koch. if that tells you anything about our trans-partisan mission, i think that gets to it there. our founders had a vision that they were tired of the partisan politics that were dominating foreign policy in this country. i think if you talk to americans on both left and right they are tired of endless wars. they are tired of sending our troops to places and for missions that our politicians cannot even describe clearly or articulate anymore. it is not a partisan issue.

we see that democrat and republican presidencies, one after the other, have sent our troops across the globe in harm's way way to police the world and meddle in other country's politics. we realize it is going to take the energy of both the left and right and all of the enthusiasm that i have seen in my career as a reporter in communities across the country to harness that energy on changing our foreign policy and the way that we see our role in the world. it is unique in that way. is it a challenge? yes. we are trying to talk to people who are living through an era of partisan polarization. but it is a challenge i personally have taken on because i am dedicated to this idea that there is common ground. this is about the wars, this is about the military-industrial

complex, this is about elites directing our foreign policy for the last 70 years and becoming more and more disconnected from regular americans. if we take the partisanship out of it we realize we have a lot of common goals together and we need to sort of bring it all together. that is what quincy is trying to do and i think we are doing a good job of it. host: let's switch over to talking about afghanistan. what is your view on president biden's decision to withdraw troops from afghanistan and the consequences of that decision, as we see the fighting increase and the taliban again to take over the country again? guest: my personal view and that of the quincy institute are intertwined. quincy institute has supported the 2020 doha agreement president trump signed that would have withdrawn all u.s.

troops from afghanistan by may 2021. that did not happen, but we supported president biden's effort to get our troops out and end the military chapter of this war by september 11. that was accelerated. most of the troops are out of that country now. what you are seeing today is not the result of the withdrawal. i think a lot of critics of president biden and his decision to end the military chapter of this war are saying, look, what you are seeing on the ground today is a direct result of that. no, what you are seeing is a direct result of 20 years of a bad policy, a bad interventionist policy. we had basically put a band-aid on the situation for the last two decades. and the withdrawal, yes, ripped that band-aid off and you are

seeing it bleed everywhere, and it is horrifying. the images you are seeing from afghanistan among the people there, the anxiety that afghans are feeling now, the fallen cities -- one after one after 1 -- but what that tells me is that the politicians who have been running this war for the last 20 years have been lying and misdirecting about the actual conditions on the ground there. and we know that. reporters know that, analysts know that. we know that "the washington post" came out with the afghanistan papers last year that basically said our political leaders, our military leaders, had known that this war was not winnable, they kept that band-aid on because it was politically convenient. i commend president biden for actually taking that really brave, bold step of saying no, we are bringing the remaining troops home and we will work

with the afghan people to come to a political settlement. we will work with our partners in the region. we will build up our diplomatic machinery there. we cannot win this war with boots on the ground. he spent a lot of capital on it, because guess what, you are seeing all of the rotten fruits from our intervention there and from all of the policies and poor strategy. it is going to be tough, because you do hear mainstream voices saying, see, should have left troops there. see, americans did not have the stomach for war. biden did not have the stomach for war. come on, people. one more year, 15 more years, 20 more years and that country would not stabilize, what is going on on the ground there. it is going to be a tough road, but i think this is the best thing for not only the afghans, but for american interests as

well. host: we did the u.s. go wrong? was it entering afghanistan in the first place? was that the management of afghanistan's government and helping prop up the government for so long? what could have been done differently? guest: as somebody who has lived through this experience as an american, i can tell you after -- it is almost 20 years since the 9/11 attacks. we are headed into a 20 year anniversary and the u.s. military was deployed to afghanistan to rout the terrorists and their taliban friends who had harbored them, al qaeda being responsible for those unbelievable tragic events that happened on 9/11. and they actually accomplished that mission. that is when we should have gotten out. in 2004 president bush said we

were refocusing our efforts there, not only to get the remaining terrorists in the country, but to help taliban -- i mean, to help the afghan government build itself, to rebuild a republic. but what happened was we were trying to rebuild a republic in our image. we set about a nationbuilding task, pouring upwards of -- it's going to be $2 trillion when all is said and done. basically trying to imprint our form of democracy, our form of a republic on afghanistan. that is where it went wrong. at the same time we were trying to do that, we were pursuing a military solution to their problems. we had at one point surged 100,000 troops, or enough troops to equal 100,000 troops on the

ground during the obama administration. what did that do? what did that do? the taliban has become more emboldened over the last several years. civilian casualties have gone up. afghan security forces, as much as we have poured $85 billion into building a military and police force their, they have been taking casualties over the last four years, like triple than they were at the early part of the war. you know, there is just so much to talk about on that score, but i think it is when we redirected our initial counterterrorism mission to a nationbuilding mission. host: let's let some of our viewers take part in this conversation. we are going to open up our record -- our regular lines. republicans, you can call in at

(202) 748-8001. democrats, your line is going to be (202) 748-8000. independents, you can call (202) 748-8002. we are going to open up a special line for afghanistan war veterans. afghanistan war veterans, want to hear from you on what you think about what is going on in afghanistan right now. your number is (202) 748-8003. keep in mind, you can also text us at (202) 748-8003. and we are always reading on social media, on twitter, and on facebook. now, president biden said this week that afghanistan's leaders should come together and assert that their forces actually out number the taliban. first of all, is that true? and is it plausible for afghanistan's security forces to

come together and repel the taliban right now? guest: i don't want to impugn the president, but from what i have read, and this has been true over the years, and this is not just me or reporters, this is the inspector general, the special inspector general for afghanistan. we don't really have a handle on how many afghan security forces there actually are. i think that they are saying officially, i think it is 300,000. host people or most analysts would put that number at about 1/6 of that. even that we don't know for sure. the problem is there has been so much corruption in not only the military there, the afghan military and police forces, but in the government at large. there has been a cooking of the books, and so the special inspector general for

afghanistan here in washington has been saying repeatedly over the years that there are plenty of ghost soldiers, ghost police officers, people who are on the books, but they don't know where they are. to say that the taliban is vastly outnumbered is a bit suspect, to me. i think what we are seeing in afghanistan today is the result of the corruption and the forces very much stretch then in places where they have not and well-equipped, they have not been well fed. when you hear of these forces caving to the taliban, it is usually because these poor guys have been out there at these outposts without reinforcements, without food. i was reading a story today about these forces -- forgive

me, i think it was in kandahar -- who have been eating potato spots for the past week and they were handed a handful of slimy potatoes and they said, forget it, we cannot do this anymore. it has come down to that. you say, wait a minute, put $83 billion into this military and they are eating potato spots and there is no reinforcements? that is the result of the widespread corruption within the government there, within the bureaucracy, which, you know, that speaks more broadly to the fact that we have put billions and trillions of dollars into a country which acted sort of like a sieve in terms of our money and resources. it hasn't gone to the places and for the things we promised our people, the afghan people. now when push comes to shove you see unfortunately these military

forces just crumbling, and some of them being bought off as well. so, you know, i understand biden is trying to build more out, that i think that ship has sailed. host: just this morning afghanistan's president had a recorded speech broadcast in afghanistan. i want you to react to some of the things he said. there is the story from the new york times. in a recorded speech early saturday afternoon he promised to prevent further instability did not resign. he said he has begun extensive consultations at home and abroad and that the result which should be -- would soon be shared. he said we mobilizing afghanistan's defense forces was a priority. first of all, do you think mr. ghani should resign and do you think it is possible for him to

re-mobilize afghanistan's defense forces? guest: i don't want to say whether i think ashraf ghani should resign or not. i think the problem all along has been american voices, american politicians, and the military telling other countries who they should elect to be there leaders. i will say this. i feel that mr. ghani has been an ineffectual leader. i think he, broadcasting the sort of confidence he could immobilize the defense forces, that he is bringing in outside partners to embolden that process, you know, i think these words are basically empty. so, you know, i don't want to pick or choose who should stay or who should go, but he has been overseeing a very, very corrupt government over the last decade.

he has won an election that many felt were not credible and fraudulent. i am going to leave it at that, but when you look at 20 years of him -- not all 20 years, because his predecessor was also there for many years, but he has overseen a country that has gotten billions of dollars from the u.s. government and what you are seeing today is that that government, that country is in no better state or condition than it was when we got there, and that says a lot about ashraf ghani's tenure. host: let's let our viewers take part. we will start with paul, who is calling from indianapolis on the independent line. good morning. caller: good morning and thanks for taking my call. i guess the question when you talk about this issue is, where do you draw the line?

a lot of people, like victor davis hanson, have been saying getting involved in afghanistan was a mistake from the beginning. never from the time of alexander has ever been a good idea. do you believe the -- believe the united states should have intervened in the balkans back in the 1990's? should the united states have intervened in cambodia much earlier? the north vietnamese had to end pol pot's regime. could have intervened in rwanda. you are dancing on the edge of baseboard, it seems to me, -- edge of a sword, it seems to me, and it has to do with how much responsibility you take for anything. guest: the cases you have

identified, the different between the first, which was the intervention in afghanistan, and the others, is that we were attacked. we were attacked on 9/11. i haven't pulled the american public on this question, but i feel like the majority of americans felt like it was an -- it was a valid reason to go after those responsible for the attacks on american soil. the other cases, we did not get attacked. you could make a case that some of those interventions or some of those wars that were happening in these conflicts were not directly harming national security. i know that is probably not a satisfactory answer, but as we have seen in our wars, particularly post-1992, post persian gulf war, which, you

know, i hate to bring this up -- i don't hate to bring this up, it is an uncomfortable fact that we have gotten in more conflicts in the past 30 years then we had during the 1900s. most of the conflicts we have fought in this country have been after 1990. we have used our military to solve problems in that period rather than diplomatic engagement. as it worked? has it made the world a safer place? we can talk about cambodia, but i think the growing consensus, particular at quincy, is that u.s. military intervention doesn't often, or at all, make things better. it creates conflict for people on the ground. it puts civilians in harm's way. it puts our troop in harm's way.

it creates more insurgencies, or enemies. it creates secondhand conflicts over borders. when you look at what happened in iraq, for example, a war of choice. it was the obvious argument we now know is a lie about weapons of mass destruction. there was also lies about saddam hussein being connected to al qaeda and the 9/11 hijackers. we made the choice to intervene and depose saddam hussein. please tell me, or at least point out how the world is in a better place because of that war. we have seen the middle east on fire ever since that war. we have seen billions of people displaced over time, or millions, rather. we have seen civilian casualties

upwards in the millions. it sounds like, yes, the u.s. is a powerful nation, a rich nation. we should use our resources for good, if that even means intervening in human conflict overseas, we have to look at the repercussions of that down the road. and i think the best example is the iraq war, our post-9/11 wars. our interventions have consequences. host: some of our social media followers are thinking that perhaps we are paying attention to the wrong place in this situation. they have a comment for you. here is a question. how involved is pakistan in helping the taliban? the next one was, in this discussion we never discussed the fact that lawton was captured and killed in pakistan.

should we be negotiating with pakistan rather than the taliban? guest: this is been the story, the elephant in the room for as long as i have been covering the war here in washington for 20 years, is pakistan's role. we know they have had this very strange relationship with the taliban where there has been tons of winking and nodding over the years about the connections between their intelligence services and the taliban and other extremists right over the border. these are two countries that have this tenuous border, so the taliban have gone back and forth. we have had cia operations in pakistan throughout, since the beginning. we know what the connection is, the problem is that the

government has told us, you know, subsequent presidents through the years, that they are on our side, that they are fighting the extremists, that they are taking care of business. it has been very frustrating for the american government, because we know that for as long as we have been fighting there and making gains and holding key places that these taliban fighters have been refreshed and refurbished and resourced out of pakistan. so, yes, the listeners are correct. we should be negotiating or talking with pakistan. and those talks have been ongoing over the years, it is just now we are entering a phase where we are actually losing control of the situation in terms of being the primary negotiator. the taliban is in the catbird

seat right now. they are in control, increasingly. you don't know what the state of the afghan government is right now. pakistan is sort of gauging their role, their future role and relationship with the taliban. they have said that we are the problem, because now all of a sudden these regional players are jockeying for position. i think, yes, pakistan will be involved in the future of the region. i just don't know if it is going to be up to us anymore. i think we will be playing a role diplomatically. i hope so. we don't want to completely withdraw from the region. i think it is important that we stay connected and build relationships and help whatever comes of the next few weeks and months and years of afghanistan.

but i am just not sure how much control we will have over the situation and dictate who pays, who doesn't, you know, who gets the better seat at the table and who doesn't. host: let's go to earl, who is calling from nashville. morning. caller: good morning. how are you doing this morning? host: just fine, go ahead. caller: i might choke up because i spent two tours over there. i would say that we should have went right ahead and kept going. we should have never stopped. we should have kept going and took care of the whole business and rot our soldiers home. now we are -- and brought our soldiers home. now we are looking at a situation we cannot win. now all of these afghanistan

people, they are not going to fight. they are going to put down their weapons and the taliban will use it against us. i would say that, as being a veteran, that we have put a lot of money in that country. we have lost a lot of my brothers over there. my white brothers, my black brothers that put their lives on the line. and it hurt me to my heart to see this stuff unfold, because i have been there and what my white others and black others, blood is in that country. this is how the united states is being treated. host: go ahead and respond

there. guest: thank you so much for your call. believe me, i can't truly empathize with you because i haven't been there, what i can tell you the reason why i got into reporting in the first place is because i grew up in post-vietnam era. and i had friends and family and a community that spilled a lot of blood in vietnam and i could not understand why we as a nation did not remember and did not learn our lessons from that war. i started reporting in the 1990's and the troops were coming home with undiagnosed illnesses and i saw how the v.a. and the government was responding to their wounded veterans coming home, then i was aghast to see we were willing to put tens of thousands, if not millions of soldiers, into afghanistan and iraq and not be

prepared to take care of them when they got home. so i really sympathize with the veterans of today who are looking at what is going on in afghanistan and probably wondering, what the heck was it all for? that is part of what i do -- why i do what i do. i don't think we should be sending our men and women over to war zones and conflicts in leslie -- endlessly for no reason. i mean that. i mean we have a country now that looks the same as it did 20 years ago. but in the intervening years we have lost over 2500 troops, tens of thousands of wounded, men and women who would have died on the battlefield in vietnam have been taking care of with advanced

medicine and triage, but they are living today with multiple head injuries, amputations, heart injuries, you know? ptsd. i don't want to see that anymore. i want to see a country in which we cherish our men and women and we only send them into war when it is absolutely necessary, when we are attacked and defending this nation. so i feel for the veterans today, because they must have a ton of mixed feelings about their service. but i point out that poll after poll have shown most veterans feel the withdrawal of troops by president biden was the right thing to do. and they don't believe the war was worth it. they have been polling that way

for years now. that says something when american veterans are saying, that is done. that goes for iraq as well. they said get out of rock, it was not worth it. -- iraq, it was not worth it. i can't say how mortifying it is to even say those words, but that is how veterans have been polling, and i feel for them today. host: there are some opponents of president biden's decision to pull troops from afghanistan, including mitch mcconnell. i want you to react to this statement mitch mcconnell put out. when you look just at how the -- sorry, wrong statement here. unless president biden adjusts course quickly the taliban is on track to secure a military victory. the news of a further drawdown in our embassy and a hasty deployment seem like preparations for the fall of

kabul. president biden's decision has us hurtling toward a sequel to the humiliating fall of saigon in 1975. president biden's strategy has turned an imperfect but unstable situation into an embarrassment and a global emergency. resident biden is finding that the quickest way to end a war is to lose it. the costs and ramifications will echo across-the-board -- echo across the world. what do you think? guest: senator mcconnell is one of many politicians who over the years have been saying the same exact thing over and over and over. any time there was some sense a president or there was a movement to get out of that war, to reduce the troops, to start ringing our men and women home there have been politicians like

senator mcconnell who say, don't be defeatist. this is going to be an embarrassment. everything is fine. we are turning a quarter -- a corner. victory is right around that next heads. as an american public we have seen how -- where that has gotten us. i mentioned the afghanistan papers. that is the key. what are the afghanistan papers? the afghanistan papers, published at "the washington post," was a series of interviews. it was a series of interviews that was done after it was found the special inspector general for afghanistan had a sickly brought in hundreds of military officials and diplomats, all american and other government people, and talked to them about the war. it turns out that most of them, many of them, admitted off the

record or felt like this was not going to be public, that this war was not winnable. this was at the same time that many of these same people were publicly telling the american public that victory was right around the corner. all we needed was a surge of troops, all we needed was putting more money in and training more luke perry over there -- more military over there. well, craig whitlock got wind of these interviews and he followed them up, he foia'd them and exposed the fact we had been lied to over the last 20 years. when mitch mcconnell gets up there and starts talking about how, oh, we are turning a stable but imperfect situation into an embarrassment, embarrassment is the policy that has been shoved down our throats for the last 20 years.

you want to talk about imperfect? i have heard these arguments and seen them on twitter about oh, we haven't lost but two troops in the last several years, but the afghan forces have been losing triple the number of people they were losing to the taliban three years ago. their casualties have gone up. our casualties have gone down, their casualties and civilian casualties have been going up. the taliban has been gaining territory since the trump administration, since the early part of the trump administration. this is a culmination of things that have been happening under the radar for years. it is just the media hasn't been covering it. the american people, we have had other things going on, so our focus has been distracted, and the politicians don't want to talk about it. don't tell me this is about

biden's withdrawal. that is disingenuous, that is a lie, and i don't think we should be listening to people like senator mcconnell, because they have been misdirecting us for the last 20 years. host: let's talk to bruce, who is calling from baltimore, maryland on the republican line. good morning. caller: good morning. do me a favor and don't cut me off. first off, i find it disingenuous that c-span generally goes to the "new york times" and "the washington post co. -- post." i have a subscription to "the washington times." the new york times and washington post have a particular agenda. for the veteran that spoke before, hats off to him, brother. i have never been in the military, but i can see what is going on with joe biden. what he is doing to the

military. that is another issue right there. just tell the truth. you are going to blame this on what happened 20 years ago? and sure, there have been mistakes, but the truth is with joe biden -- and you edited a lot of mistakes that joe biden makes. he mumbles through conversations and he does not do a very good job. it shows his weak is on the world stage. we are not just concerned about what is going on in afghanistan. so, 28 days, unfortunately it will be the anniversary of 9/11. that is where some of the islamic terrorists started this nonsense. what is going to happen is not only what has happened in afghanistan. now the taliban, al qaeda, and some of the fundamentalist islamists that want to support

terrorists around the world, what is going to happen is this is going to be concerned about what is possibly going on in israel. i voted for donald trump because -- listen carefully, and i'm going to say this. some people might be offended. some of the regressive jews out there -- host: let me go ahead and let you respond there. guest: there is a few things i want to respond to, you can say whatever you want about donald trump, but his appeal at the time when he was on the campaign trail in 2016, much of his appeal was that he was calling out -- excuse me -- the iraq war as a failure and he called george bush out as a liar in terms of the weapons of mass destruction, the reason we got in the war, ostensibly. that was a big draw, that he was

calling out the forever wars and that he had pledged to end them and bring our troops home. we can debate about whether he really meant it or whether he was actually effectual at that, but he did set into motion the withdrawal of u.s. troops from afghanistan that we are seeing today by signing that doha agreement. this is not about democrats or republicans or even left or right. that is why i work for an organization that is harnessing efforts on both sides to end these forever wars. this is about washington consensus thinking about our role in the world, about american primacy, about using the military to get our way across the globe or meddle in other people's problems. that is why you see, from george bush, to president obama, president trump, you see the use of military all throughout.

the blame does not go to one side or the other in my mind, because they have all been part of this failure in one way or another. president obama had increased the drone war. he increased the number of bombs dropped on other countries and civilians killed and efforts to disconnect the american people from what the military was doing. there is so much to talk about, that i want to emphasize this is not a liberal or conservative issue. this is an american issue, and we need to address it as such. host: let's try jonathan, who is calling from conyers, georgia. could you get as a quick question in? caller: just a quick comment. good morning. trump told wolf blitzer that bush -- i will say bush, cheney

-- should be impeached for lying us into iraq. regarding the middle east, when hasn't it not been on fire? 6000 years ago? the pakistani isi was largely responsible for the civil war in afghanistan, and aligning themselves with and creating the taliban. the pakistanis hid and give safe harbor to osama bin laden. in pakistan there is 30,000-plus schools teaching radical brand of islam. why don't we focus on that? we give them billions of dollars . until they start reforming this system they have that produces this type of mentality in the world, we need to cut them off. host: kelly, can you give us a quick answer here? guest: i would go back to the mujahedin.

we supported the mujahedin against the soviets in afghanistan. the mujahedin give life to osama bin laden. i will go back to my original point here about u.s. interventions and not seeing the consequences of them. host: we would like to thank kelley vlahos, the editorial director for the quincy institute for responsible statecraft for being with us and talking us through the military and political situation in afghanistan. thank you so much for being with us. guest: thank you so host: coming up next, we will talk to the editor of the new republic magazine about andrew cuomo's resignation this week. later, in these times magazine contributor kat cisar discusses her recent art -- recent article about redistricting. stick with us. we will be right back. ♪

>> sunday night on june day, elizabeth becker, author of "you don't belong here," tells the story of a female vietnam war correspondence. >> there was no embedding like we have now. there was no military censorship, so it was probably the first and last uncensored american war. the south vietnamese had their censorship in the boston telegraph, so it was, for women, a gift. because it was only because of this lack of codification, this openness, that women could get through it had been the biggest barrier as a war correspondent, that you were not allowed on the field. >> journalist elizabeth becker. you can also find all q&a

interviews ever you get your podcasts. ♪ >> british writer charles dickens is credited with creating some of the world best known fictional characters. over 2000, for that matter, scattered throughout his 14.5 published novels. american authors and politicians often refer to situations as being dickensian. jenny hartley, professor at hampton university in london, has published three books on charles dickens. the most recent one, titled "a very short introduction." we asked professor hartley to tell us about dickens' life, including his trips to the united states. >> author jenny hartley on this episode of book notes plus. listen at c-span.org/podcasts or

wherever you get your podcasts. >> "washington journal" continues. host: we are back with michael tomasky, who is the editor of the new republic. he is here to discuss his recent piece on the resignation of new york governor andrew cuomo. good morning. guest: nice to be with you. host: first i want to start out by reading a comment from you in your article, and i want you to tell us what you meant by it. you write, in 2020 -- 2021 at last, it is not possible as a democrat to survive serial allegations of sexual harassment. the same cannot be at said of the republican party. indeed, republican voters made their serial abuser the president of the united states.

what did you mean by that and how does this affect andrew cuomo in new york? guest: well, look, the parties have different basis. the parties have different constituencies, and those constituencies have different sets of values and concerns. in the democratic party, which obviously has liberals and feminists and people who generally speaking are more concerned about these allegations, then people in the republican party. we see this difference not only with respect to trump, what with matt gaetz, who has very serious allegations hanging over him about sex with an underage girl. i have not heard a republican say boo about that. maybe a couple have, but he still goes around the country giving speeches defending trump

and january 6, and so on. in the democratic party it is different. constituencies care more about these kinds of allegations and take them more seriously. her in mind, there may be an occasion where a democrat could skate through something like this. like, let's say, for example, the lieutenant governor in new york were a republican and cuomo was going to be replaced by a republican. and i think the politics of this situation would be different. i'd knowledge that. by and large we have reached a point where in the democratic party there is no tolerance for this sort of thing anymore. i think that is a good thing. host: do you think andrew cuomo would still be governor of new york if he had been a republican? guest: yeah, i basically do. i don't think, as i just said, there is a machinery, say, within the republican party that, you know, gets terribly

upset about these kinds of things and that seeks to punish it in the same way there is in the democratic party. host: how does the #metoo movement play into this situation in new york with andrew cuomo? guest: well, you know, i think, himself put it pretty well in his resignation speech, although it was kind of pathetic. he said the rules have changed in a way i did not grasp. he should have grasped that. the #metoo movement, which started in 2016 with the allegations against harvey weinstein and a lot of the prominent people in the media, you know, has definitely changed the rules. and men need to understand that and men need to acknowledge that, and particularly elected democrats.

the party is not going to put up with that sort of thing anymore. it has had a big, big impact, and he was slow to recognize it, slow to take it seriously, refused to take it seriously, and it cost him. host: you say particularly that democrats need to pay attention. what is this not extend to the republican party as well? guest: because the republican base does not care as much about this. we saw this in 2016. if that access hollywood tape that donald trump was on, using that vulgar term and talking the way he did with that reporter, if that had emerged about a democrat, the democratic support would have cratered, i believe. and turnout would have been depressed, and so on. for the republican base, it did not matter. host: you brought up andrew cuomo's resignation speech. i want to play a portion and i

want you to react to what he said. [video] >> there is a difference between alleged improper conduct and concluding sexual harassment. now, don't get me wrong, this is not to say that there are not 11 women who i truly offended. there are. and for that, i deeply, deeply apologize. i thought a hug and putting my arm around a staff person while taking a picture was friendly, but she found it to be too forward. i kissed a woman at a cheek at a wedding, and i thought i was being nice, but she felt it was too aggressive. i have slipped and called people honey, sweetheart, and darling. i meant it to be endearing, but women found it dated and offensive.

i said on national tv to a doctor wearing ppe and giving me a covid nasal swab, you make that gown look good. i was joking. obviously, otherwise i would not have said it on national tv. but she found it this respectful. i take full responsibility for my actions. i have been too familiar with people. my sense of humor can be insensitive and offputting. i do hug and kiss people casually. women and men. i have done it all my life. it is who i have been since i can remember. in my mind, i have never crossed the line with anyone.

i did not realize the extent to which the line has been redrawn. host: michael, i want you to react to that part of his statement. guest: yeah, well, it is defensive and it is not very credible, and it is kind of nonsense. if you read about what these 11 women say he did, it is pretty different than a friendly hug. we all know what a friendly hug is. a man can give a woman of his acquaintance a friendly hug. maybe a friendly peck on the cheek, depending on what the nature of their relationship is. everybody knows what a friendly hug is, but you read about what these 11 women say and what they say is that this went way beyond that and in some of his touching and some of his comments. we going to believe? none of us was there, but it is

11 women and it is very damning. host: let me remind our viewers that they can take part in this conversation. republicans, your number is (202) 748-8001. democrats, call (202) 748-8000. independents, your line is (202) 748-8002. we are going to open up a special line for new york state residents. your number is going to be (202) 748-8003. keep in mind, you can also text, (202) 748-8003. and we are always reading on social media on twitter and facebook. michael, are you surprised that governor cuomo decided to resign ? and what was the breaking point? what made him decide he was not going to be able to stay on as governor? guest: i was surprised, and i

think everybody was surprised, everybody who has watched andrew operate over the years. i met the governor in 2002 when i was covering city and state politics. i have subsequently moved to washington, i have watched his gubernatorial tenure. he is -- tenacious is a nice way to put it. thuggish is a way other people put it. a very aggressive guy, and, you know, not known from backing down from any fights. everybody was surprised to see him resign, i think, but the reason he did it is that he was cornered. he did not have any choice. they were doing headcounts in the state assembly during the state assembly would ring the impeachment charges, and vote on those, and then if they voted them out it would go to the senate for conviction.

there were enough people declared in both bodies, as i understand it, that his removal was virtually certain. he decided to do this in an effort to head off an impeachment. now we learned yesterday through this morning's headlines that the assembly, indeed, will not pursue impeachment against him, which does leave open the remote , to me, possibility that he could have a come back someday. host: which was going to be my very next question. does he have a future in politics in new york state, new york city, or anywhere in the united states? guest: right now i don't think so. you never know about these things. there are always second act in american lives. third acts, i guess it would be.

this is not like he got caught with his hand in the till or got caught in some minor petty corruption thing or rig contract or something like that. this is a violation of a set of values that democrats and liberals now have and hold pretty dear, and i think it is less likely that people are going to be willing to forgive and forget something like that then some other kind of ethical lapse. so i think the road back for him is very tough. he could come back and appear to be chastened and so on and so forth, but, you know, i just think it is going to be hard, especially with a woman the go'. host: you write in your article that you think the cuomo era in new york politics is over. what gives you that hesitation? his father was new york governor

mario cuomo and then andrew cuomo followed behind him as governor. do you think the cuomo era is over? >> as i said, i do. never say never, right? we cannot predict how things will work, what people will think about this for years on, eight years on. he is still not particularly old , early 60's. a comeback eight years from now is not the question. i think it is over. this is another point i was trying to make in the call, i used to cover and have observed this cuomo era and it has lasted almost 50 years. it was i think in 1973 that jack newfield of the village boys wrote a piece bringing to the public's attention this lawyer from queens named mario cuomo.

ed was always marry a, not mario -- mario, not mario. he did a good job there. that is how he became famous and ran for mayor in 1977. he lost narrowly, but then governor of 1982, he ran against koch and eat him. that beat him. then he lost to a republican, than there were others in between, but his son andrew finally took over in 2010i guess it was. host: looks like some of our viewers -- let's let some of our viewers take part in the conversation. we start with anthony calling from new york on the democratic line. good morning. caller: hi. i think politically it is over for him. but that is why i am independent because i think the mccarty

party has no rights. i think women have too much power and that is what i see. that is why i can't be a democrat no more. host: go ahead and respond to that. guest: you know, if that is to stay, that is his take. in the democratic party, there are lots of women officeholders and lots of women in positions of power, and they have made a difference in the way people in the democratic party think about these kinds of issues over the last 20 even 40 years as more and more women are better at politics. i think the vast majority of democrats would say that is a good thing, not a bad thing. host: here's a comment from one of our social media followers that says something similar and we heard this also from andrew cuomo's lawyers so i want you to react to this as well. the comment is "i think the

democrats have gone too far to the left with regards to sexual harassment." due process is not being provided to the accused. we heard that from andrew cuomo's lawyer as well, that he has not been given due pross. what you think about those arguments? guest: i disagree with that. he asked for this investigation by the state attorney general, right? when these allegations first surfaced a month ago, cuomo went before the cameras and said i deny this but what i request is that the attorney general conduct an investigation and we will see the results of that investigation and we will go from there. so he got per cicely the due process he requested. i would contrast this with one case, which some might come up, al franken. he was denied his due process, the normal due process of the united states senate.

it's an investigation by the ethics committee and was hounded out of office by his democratic colleagues before he had the opportunity to have that due process. i would say cuomo got the due process he requested. an investigation, and the findings came out and they wear what they were and he had to react the way he had to react. host: let's talk to terry calling from ormond beach, florida on the democratic line. good morning. caller: good morning. i lived in new york for many years and have been a foreigner around eight years. i remember when he was attorney general, cuomo. he was fantastic. he went out after a lot of corporations ripping people off. i like the way he handled the beginning of covid where the government was not helping him, trump government, and he had to fight like crazy to get anything done. as far as this case, this #metoo

movement, i am almost 80 years old. something does not ring right. even cuomo's lawyers said these gals, i think there are 10 or 11 of them, have never signed an like oath or report where you are under oath, documented what is happening. me too does not count. you can't have women saying me too. i saw pictures of the recent gal around -- with her arm around the governor's neck. very cozy. the first one that made allegations actually confided in the governor about her sex life, about how she was accosted at one time. you don't do that with your boss. there is something wrong here, and especially i want these women under oath. host: what do you think about her comments, michael? guest: it is interesting.

i wouldn't read too much into one photograph. i would not put too much stock in one photograph but good luck. 60 spent -- 60% of new yorkers said he should respond. -- should resign. that is not my opinion, that's the majority of a large opinion of new york -- large majority of new york, republicans, democrats, and independents. so the majority clearly thought these were serious enough for him to not be the governor anymore. host: let's talk to lauren calling from alexandria minnesota on the republican line. good morning. caller: good morning. i think you are wrong on that, that democrats are more dominant with these sex allegations. ted kennedy cheated on his wife,

bob john kennedy was a womanizer. john was cheating on jackie left and right. so democrats are not more -- than the republicans. host: on our social media page, we have a couple people bringing up names like bill clinton and ted kennedy. what do you say about those who say you're being hypocritical if you say democrats don't actually care about these things. guest: no, no, no. that's ridiculous. i talked about 2021. i specifically said in the call and we reached a point in 2020 one at last where democrats cannot survive these kinds of things. bill clinton was 20 something, 25 years ago, monica lewinsky i think was 23 years ago. quick was 1969. jack kennedy was 1961-1963.

of course they did those things in those days and went unpunished. those things were not punished in those days in either party. my column says things have changed now just in the last few years, and now in 2021. so these people are not listening. host: let's talk to pamela also a new york resident calling in on the democratic line. pamela, good morning. caller: thank you for taking my call. i wanted to say couple things, because anything i say will be construed as she is a democrat and she will stick up for him or be biased. let me tell you something, a man was elected president, who got on television and admitted he would grab a woman's parts, private parts, and was elected president of the united states. i think this whole thing is absolutely ridiculous that they

would take this man down over alleged things he said and supposedly did without him having the right to get up there and say this is what really happened. anything he says now is being construed as him just saying stuff to get himself off of the hook. i think it is outrageous. i am devastated by the loss of andrew cuomo. i just lived in oregon for almost two years during the start of the pandemic and every morning i tuned in to watch him and cried over how wonderful he was getting this thing under control. i think the whole body of his work, everything he has done, overshadows any kind of rumors or any kind of things like that, because let me tell you something, what he is trying to say without saying it is i am an

italian american myself and i can tell you up here in upstate new york people kiss on the lips. one of the city administrators who knows my family well kissed me on the lips during a democrat fundraiser. i did not get appalled, wrong, and say he is sexually harassing me. host: go ahead and respond, michael. guest: i would encourage the caller to read through the attorney general report, read the allegations these women are making. they are not just like social kissing at a family picnic. i am italian on my mother's side. my name does not sound italian but i grew up going to italian family reunions all of the time. i understand how that is. that is not the same thing as something that feels inappropriate and sexual to the woman. it is just not the same thing. obviously she is entitled to her

opinion, but i do not have any quarrel with her. 60% of new yorkers said he had to resign. host: in a couple weeks, new york will have its first woman governor. talk to us about our audience about current lieutenant governor kathy hochul. caller: she is, from what i -- guest: she has, from what i understand, liked and admired. she is from buffalo, the major city upstate, one of the major cities, and she has had a pretty impressive career. she won the congressional seat in buffalo in 2011, in a special election. there was a seat held by republicans for 40 years. she lost at sea the next time because they redrew the district and may the republican more district -- made the district more republican. but then she worked for governor eliot spitzer. then cuomo chose her as his running mate in 2014 in part because cuomo was facing a

primary from a woman and he decided he needed a woman running mate. then cuomo kind of wanted to get rid of her in 2018 but she held on and one. the love -- the governor and lieutenant governor ran separately. she won her race against a pretty tough challenge. she is known for being calm, reasonable, competent. not that the lieutenant governor has that many things to do, but those are the words used, to me, to describe her. it will be very interesting to see what she does, not only the first woman governor but the first true upstate governor in a long time. i think about a century. and who see chooses for her lieutenant governor is an interesting question and what kind of tone will she said and what will her relationship you like with the speaker of the state assembly and the leader of the state senate, both of whom

are democrats. both who have majorities in the houses. there are a lot of interesting things to watch, but those who i talked to seem hopeful about it. host: she will be probably the first upstate governor in new york in a long time, but that means many people downstate, new york city, don't know who she is. is that an advantage or disadvantage for her? guest: that's a good question. probably both in different ways. on balance, it is probably a slight disadvantage. she will probably have to spend a lot of time in the city and getting to know the various powerbrokers, political and economic, in the city. because the new york state democratic party is so concentrated in new york city and in the immediately surrounding counties like westchester.

so she will have to choose a lieutenant governor from downstate, i believe. both legislative leaders are from downstate. the a simile speaker is from the bronx, and the state senate leader is from across the line. -- across the line from the bronx. she will have to demonstrate to downstate or that they will want to insist to her that we still run the show. host: let's talk to maxine calling from leavenworth, kansas on the democratic line. maxine, good morning. caller: morning. i think you are right about democrats and republicans have different sets of morals. andrew cuomo had allegations, unproven allegations, of harassment, donald trump admitted himself he sexually assaulted women. my question is, do you think cuomo would have been forced to

resign if he had been a republican, and republicans had been in power in new york? host: go ahead and respond michael. guest: i don't believe he would have, no. i do not think the republican party is as worked up about these kind of issues as democratic rank-and-file voters are. host: i want to ask you a little bit about month's new republic, where an interview of mary trump will be in this month's issue of the magazine. what will readers learn in this interview? guest: it is not an interview, it is an essay by mary trump, the cover story of the september new republic, which is on our website, www.tnr.com, and should be on new stanza soon. i asked her to write this piece because a lot has happened since her book came out. a lot of interesting things,

january 6, the aftermath, and the rest. i thought it would be interesting for readers to hear from mary, who is a terrific writer and smart person. what she -- on what she makes of these most recent events and whether she would seek the presidency in 2024. people should read the piece. it is a very powerful essay i think about the danger she believes he and the republicans still posed to this country. host: people can find the essay right now on new republic.com ash newrepublic.com? -- newrepublic.com? guest: while it is tnr.com, but i think that will redirect. host: thank you for talking us through the resignation of andrew cuomo. thank you so much.

coming up in this time, magazine contributor cat sees our will talk about redistricting, her article, and how some are trying to change the process. ♪ >> weekends bring you the best in american history tv and nonfiction books. sunday on book tv, hear from authors attending freedom fast in rapid city, south dakota, including new hampshire based author carly garrick on her opinion pieces and short stories in her book, the a static pessimist. then a columnist with his book,

our broken elections, which he argues liberals use the covid-19 pandemic to change the election system and make it more vulnerable to fraud. economic historian deirdre mccloskey with her book uttering human makes, which looks at a new kind of economics that focuses on science and a better understanding of human action. george gilder talks about the future dominance of artificial intelligence in his book gaming ai. on afterwards, conservative podcaster and journalist ben shapiro discusses his new book the authoritarian moment in which he argues the progressive left is pushing an tort -- any authoritarian agenda in america. he is interviewed by eric with taxes. watch book tv every weekend and find a full schedule on your program guide or watch online anytime at book tv.org.

♪ >> "washington journal" continues. host: we are back. for our spotlight on magazine segments, we will be talking to a contributor to in these times magazine, and she will discuss her article looking at gerrymandering and how activists in wisconsin are trying to change the process. good morning. guest: good morning.

thanks for having me. host: for our audience, tell us what the publication for in these times is about. guest: in these times is based in chicago, around for 40 years, and focuses on investigative journalism, government oversight and accountability, corporate accountability, and also labor. there is a lot of labor coverage as well. host: what point of view does the magazine take? does it can several -- considers up to be liberal, independent, conservative, in the middle? guest: i would say tends to be more progressive. host: tell us exactly what gerrymandering is. we have heard a lot of talk about gerrymandering, especially now that the census numbers are out and we are redrawing congressional districts. what is gerrymandering? host: it's all over the news -- guest: it is all over the

news. to understand, we had to understand what deed it -- what redistricting is. redistricting happens every 10 years across the country in everything was state. it is based on the latest census data which came out on thursday, and basically it is a way to keep electoral districts even and representative of people who live there. people are born, people die, population shifts, so they want to make sure districts are representative of the voters who live there or residents that live there i should say. in most states in the country, this process is done by a partisan body, legislators draw the map. in a handful of states, maybe 10 to 12, there is a separate kind of process for doing that, whether it be some kind of

commission or a nonpartisan body of civil servants. in wisconsin, redistricting is done by the state legislature -- state legislation -- legislators, sorry. the last time in 2010, we saw a really extreme example of gerrymandering happening in wisconsin. basically, gerrymandering is rigging electoral maps to benefit a partisan body, one side or the other, or some other special interest group. they do this through words that are commonly used, cracking or packing voters. packing would be, and this happens a lot in rule districts, packing -- rural districts,

packing voters who have a record of voting a certain way and a small area so their votes don't count as much and cracking would be in milwaukee where we have seen voters in the city kind of divided up and put into suburban districts so their votes don't count as much. it is basically a way to weaken the votes of the opposing party. there are different types of gerrymandering. the one we are focused on the most is partisan gerrymandering. but there is also racial gerrymandering where you try to weaken the votes of a certain racial group. there is prison gerrymandering which involves for example in prison, people in prison should not vote in most states, but they are counted in the community where the prison is located. so when they get out of prison

and go back to their home community, they are not counted as part of that district where they live. so that's another way to weaken voters power. host: out of all of the states and the union, you decided to focus on wisconsin. why wisconsin? guest: wisconsin has one of the most extreme gerrymandering in the country. back in 2010, the republican leadership basically drew the maps in secret in a locked room in a private law office across from the state capital. it was not a transparent process , and everything we know about the process now has only come out through litigation and discovery in court because our current maps has been challenged so much in court.

and federal judges decided the state is gerrymandering. host: before we go any further, our viewers can take part in this conversation. we will open our regular lines. republicans can call (202) 748-8001. democrats you can call (202) 748-8000. independents, (202) 748-8002. we will open up a special line since we are talking about wisconsin. we will open up a line for wisconsin residents. your number will be (202) 748-8003. you can also text (202) 748-8003 . you can talk to us on social media, on twitter, @cspanwj and on facebook, facebook.com/cspan. you just talked about the wisconsin legislature redrawing their maps in secret. is that a common practice across

the united states or is this something that only happens in wisconsin? guest: i would say it is common that the process is not transparent. and i also would like to make the point, i thing my article gets into this, that gerrymandering has been happening since the early 1800s. politicians have always gerrymandered. democrats, republicans, you know, one of the experts i quote in my speech said gerrymandering is an equal opportunity activity. but what is most concerning i think is in the past decade, we have seen republican leadership use gerrymandering as a nationwide strategy to stay in power and wind districts. so it is not something that is just scattered here and there but it is something -- and they

openly talked about this too. this is not secret at all. in 2010, there was a program called red map that specifically they bragged about switching districts to republican districts, republican-majority districts. the outcome of this is that even in wisconsin, which used to be a purple state, it is now more of a red state, yet the majority of voters support democratic candidates but our state legislation is majority republican. so it creates this imbalance in government. host: is there a push going on in wisconsin and other states to get rid of gerrymandering? guest: absolutely. that is something i focused on, the activists that have been working for -- before 2017 but starting say 2017 it has been ramping up and it is a

grassroots upper. they are starting from the smallest government bodies up. for example, one of their big strategies has been to put this issue to voters, and there has been an 32 out of 72 counties, wisconsin counties, have had referendums on should wisconsin switch to a nonpartisan commission or system of drawing maps. while over 70% in these referendums have supported nonpartisan redistricting versus the current system. i think it is 55 out of 72 wisconsin counties have also passed resolutions in favor of nonpartisan gerrymandering. so it is a popular -- nonpartisan redistricting is popular with voters and

gerrymandering is something that is for politicians, by politicians. it is not something that i don't even think in recent years that republican voters have been asking for. this is something that is happening at the height of republican leadership to hold on to a shrinking voting block. they are trying to make their voting block bigger as that shrinks due to democratic factors. host: you brought this up and i want to ask specifically about this. is this a republican issue, i democratic issue, or does this cross political lines? guest:guest: it is a nonpartisan issue. certainly the activists working for nonpartisan redistricting and what they call fair maps see this as a nonpartisan issue because they feel gerrymandering

hurts everyone, republicans and democrats and all voters, because what happens when electric representatives are insured staying in power is that they don't really have an incentive to be accountable to the people in their district. so they are more apt to have influence from lobbying groups or dark money coming in from the outside versus people who actually live in their district. it creates hyper partisanship, and pushing people further to the left and to the right. i just want to note for your viewers also that even the republicans have done this extreme gerrymandering across the country where they have been able to, there is in maryland, a state that has democratic gerrymandering. it is something both parties have done, but it does not benefit the average voter at all. host: you were talking earlier

about the local groundswell in wisconsin against gerrymandering. are these resolutions having any effect on the state legislature which actually has to redraw the map? guest: i'm not seeing evidence of that. the purpose of these referendum -- the referenda and resolutions at the county level is basically to build a body of evidence when wisconsin maps inevitably go to the court. the system right now, we have legislators draw the maps but it has to be approved by the governor. and we have a democratic governor. it is almost inevitable that that map will be made up by the governor and lawsuits will start happening. the census data came out thursday and with them, less than 24 hours, we have a lawsuit

filed trying to get the courts to go ahead and draw maps because there is so little confidence in a map not going to the courts. host: let's let some of our viewers join this conversation. let's start with randy calling from madison, wisconsin on the democratic line. randy, good morning. caller: good morning. i want to guess to comment on the fact that how upside down wisconsin is. i believe the partisan numbers are 60% of wisconsin once a democratic government, yet we only received 40% of the representative of the state. 40% of the republicans yet 60% of representatives were totally upside down. republican -- republicans in the legislature have been messing with the governor along with making people vote during a

pandemic, messing with the election in every way possible. host: go ahead and respond. guest: that is correct. i don't have the exact numbers in front of me, but for sure we have a lopsided legislative body, and that is because of gerrymandering. host: let's go to sean calling from florida on the republican line. good morning. caller: good morning, everyone. i want to say to the host, a previous caller -- previous colors were slandering president trump, he never said those words. i think you should clarify that. gerrymandering, as a former democrat, i agree. everything should be fair. we should not try to scam people and move both around that should be -- votes around that should be counted. i believe if you have done your time, you should be able to come out and vote. until we fix the regular

election, nothing really matters because no sitting president has ever won florida, ohio, and iowa and lost the election. this election was rigged. host: go ahead and respond to the gerrymandering comments. guest: all i would say is evidence for voter fraud or a rigged election have not -- the evidence is not there. i think that there has been a lot of talk in the past year about voter fraud and suppression and arguments about that. but i would argue partisan redistricting and the effects of it and gerrymandering have a much greater influence on our electoral system than voter fraud or voter suppression. though i consider gerrymandering a form of voter suppression. host: let's talk to ron calling

from cottage grove, oregon on the democratic lines. good morning. caller: good morning. i would like to know why the federal government allows the states to do this. and why can't they stop it? host: go ahead and respond. guest: that's a great question. so there is -- there are rules against racial gerrymandering as part of the voting race act of 1965, but -- voting rights act of 1965, but there is no specific law against partisan gerrymandering. in fact, when cases alleging partisan gerrymandering reach the federal level, and when it got to the supreme court, this cream court said this is a political issue that needs to be decided by states. so it is really kind of solved

in the courts, even when judges have said there is a gerrymandering happening here, but they do not feel they can do anything about it. then they punt it back to lower courts. caller: one of the groups -- host: one of the groups you reference in your article is the people's maps commission. what is that? guest: thank you for bringing that up. the people's maps commission was started by governor e vers of wisconsin and it is a group of people from across the state, not politicians, not government officials, i believe there is a librarian, a teacher, you know a couple doctors, and the commission's role is to draw a map or several maps to basically go and counter what the state

legislatures are going to draw. it is essentially a symbolic body, because there maps will be my -- will be nonbinding. it has basically shown what a nonpartisan redistricting process could look like. the commission heard public testimony starting back last fall and going through i believe it was april. because of the pandemic, it was all virtual. it was all on the department of administration -- wisconsin of department of administration youtube page and i recommend those public hearing videos. they are helpful for understanding redistricting in general because for the first hour of each public hearing, the commission invited in experts, lawyers, government officials, election officials, mathematicians to help explain redistricting because it is

quite complex. much more complex than i think i portrayed in a few words here. that was helpful to me to help understand what redistricting is and what a fair district looks like. host: one of our colleagues -- one of our callers asked earlier what the federal government can do fighting gerrymandering. one of our social media followers one stick no, is a u.s. -- followers wants to know, is a u.s. constitutional amendment needed to address gerrymandering echo guest: that is something for the people would address. there are things in the bill that would address gerrymandering and nonpartisan redistricting, but it does not look like that would pass. host: let's talk to chris calling from hampton, arkansas

on the republican line. chris, good morning. caller: good morning. i've only got a comment. sounds like gerrymandering is not a good thing, but i wonder as a private citizen, am i being gerrymandered over here in hampton? i don't understand. it's not a great city or big community, but i wonder if redistricting -- i wonder if it has an effect on me. host: that's a good question. how does someone find out if they are in a gerrymandering district or not? guest: so there are maps of this, if you google it, you can find maps that show what the likelihood of a gerrymander is across the country. it is hard to understand. there has been attempts to

create an app where you would put in your zip code and find out where you stand, but i think this really addresses one of the issues with the current system, that it is not transparent. so there is no way to find out why a district was drawn the way it was, because there's a lot of factors that can go into how i district is drawn. it is not just population. you also have to consider issues like communities of interest, that is something that comes up a lot. if you have a greater metro area, you might have people commuting in from another county, for example. it makes sense for them to be in that district along with the urban residents that are spending most of their working hours in the city. there are all kinds of ways to look at a community of interest,

whether it be a religious community, racial community -- racial identifying community, and you know, rivers, tourism. communities can interpret this in a variety of ways. so drawing maps is very complex and it would be great if we knew exactly what the reasons behind these maps -- and that is not typically part of the process when it is drawn bipartisan body. as we saw in 2010 in wisconsin, it was completely secret. host: you can always go on your state's website and look at the maps for the political lines in your state, the congressional district, the state legislative districts, even city, town, and schoolboard lines should be available to you on your state or local website. you can go on those and look. for example, we are looking at

arkansas here. i will take -- take the time and look at the political lines in your neighborhood and maybe you can see whether you are being gerrymandered or not. let's go back to our phone lines and talk to doug calling from wisconsin on the republican line. doug, good morning. caller: hello. when we are talking about gerrymandering, are we talking about wisconsin specific, or does it retain to say voting percent are -- voting for senators, the president. isn't that a popular vote? i guess i'm a little confused about why we are talking about the federal government getting involved in this. host: we have had a similar question from someone on social media who wants to know the difference, how does gerrymandering affect the whole

one person, one vote situation in the united states? guest: that is a great question. thank you. so yes, it affects our votes for senate and congress. it does affect the votes for federal representatives as well as local representatives. it is not just wisconsin. i want to make that clear. it is across much of the country. texas for example has a lot of gerrymandering going on. i think i mentioned maryland before, so it is pretty widespread. guest: speaking of -- host: speaking of texas, our next caller is ted from -- ed from houston, texas on the democratic line. good morning. caller: good morning. i am interested in knowing if it is a fact that politicians,

generally, pick their constituents instead of the constituents picking a politician. because what they are doing, they are drawing districts, democrat and republican, to maintain power, so the democrats do not have any challenges in november, let's say, and republicans don't have any challenges in november either. what happens is the real battle is in the primary. does that sound right? host: go ahead and respond. guest: i think that is right. you put it var -- very distinctly that this is politicians choosing voters and out the other way around. your point brings up an issue i want to address as well, which is that one effect of gerrymandering is that elections become a lot less competitive, and when elections are less competitive, you don't get the

best ideas out there, you are not having -- politicians are not having to defend their positions as much as they would have if they had a strong, viable candidates running against them. host: in your article, you talked about red map and we talked a little bit about red map today. right lines 2020, is that a successor to red map? guest: it is. it is basically this round of redistricting attempt to focus republican advantage in the redistricting process. host: i want to read a little from your article where you talk about the success republicans have had using red map. according to the university of southern california, the 2018 state legislative election established gop minority rule in

virginia, north carolina, pennsylvania, ohio, and wisconsin. meaning that despite winning a minority of voters, the gop still controlled the legislature. wisconsin was ranked second for virginia for the worse gerrymandering in the country. virginia voters recently approved redistricting reform, effectively bumping wisconsin to the top battleground for reform. so this actually was successful in keeping republicans in charge at the state level in several states. guest: it was very successful. it was very successful. [laughter] host: is there a democrat equivalent group to red map and right lines 2020. guest: not that i'm aware of. there are democrat-backed groups focusing on redistricting, but those groups are pushing for nonpartisan redistricting to my knowledge, not specifically on

trying to gain party advantage in elections via electoral maps. host: one of the things we talked about earlier was that a lot of these maps end up going to court where someone sues over gerrymandering or just because they do not like the maps. one of our social media followers has a question and wants to know, how much do these lawsuits cost and who pays for them? guest: taxpayers. [laughter] it is -- at least two defend them in court is paid for by taxpayers. this lawsuit filed yesterday in wisconsin federal court is filed by prominent democratic lawyer in washington dc who specializes

in election reform. so don't believe that would be paid for by taxpayers, but a lot of it is paid for by taxpayers. host: let's go back to our phone lines and talk to steve calling from rockville, center -- rockville center, new york on the independence line. good morning. caller: good morning, c-span. cat, my question, if you have a non- -- kat, my question is, if you have a nonpartisan group deciding district lines, what are the best ways to do it? is it to create competitive corrections, to make the districts less convoluted geographically, is it at the county line, the city line? how should it be done if it is done in a nonpartisan way? guest: that is the million-dollar question. i think that -- i have heard the comment when i was listening to

the public hearings and people say why cannot -- why can't we just divide the map and be equal blocks of land. that would be nice if it were that easy. to your question, it is different depending on the district. the rules about redistricting are that the district the as compact as possible and that it be all together in one area. you can't have part of district one over here and another part up here in district five. and then you get into more qualitative factors like communities of interest and county lines, school district lines, city limits, all of these , there are a lot of factors to consider. there is a long running joke about gerrymandering, that

gerrymandered districts look like -- i should go back to where the term gerrymandering comes from is from this politician in massachusetts in 1812 who gerrymandered a district and his name was jerry eldridge. a cartoonist drew the district and it looks like this mythological salamander because it was so misshapen and that was called the gerrymander after jerry eldridge. that is where this comes from. there's this idea that gerrymandered districts always have to be looking nuts and have various parts. that is sometimes true, but you could also have a district that does looked compact. it's a complex issue, and i think one reason we have seen such extreme gerrymandering in the last round is the level of

text we have for mapping. mapping has become very high-tech. you can put terabytes of data into an algorithm and get very refined mapping data. i heard one expert describe it as a used to be a dark arts, gerrymandering used to be a dark arts and now it is a dark science. it is a double edge sword because the flip is that mathematicians are also now developing ways to test, actually mathematically test if a district is gerrymandered. they use a model called computational mathematics, very specific. my math is not good enough to really fully explain it, but basically, they are comparing the current map to every map

that could be possible statistically and they have an equation that comes out of that that can give them an objective answer about whether one party or another or one group or another has an electoral advantage. host: just to emphasize the point you made about it coming a dark science, i want to read this paragraph from your story. a voter suppression tactic such as pole literally see -- pole literacy tests gerrymandering is a slick assess. as our matted -- editing are to put it, today it is a multi--- with armies of lawyers, terabytes of voting data, and advanced software. is that what we are seeing when we see these new maps being drawn. is that what we see over the

next year or so? guest: it's going to be a mathematical site over these maps for -- mathematical fight over these maps for sure. host: let's go ahead and talk to mary calling from las vegas, nevada on the democratic line. good morning. caller: good morning. i feel what is going on throughout the state's akin to being in like a banana republic. hundreds of thousands of people have been thrown off the voting rolls. greg pallas talks about the people that have been thrown off of the voting rolls. what is the danger if the gop takes control of all of these legislators, that they throw off people that do not define their interests, that they can overturn your vote. so we need federal legislation. host: can congress do anything

about this? guest: they could through the for the people act would be one way to do it. i'm not familiar with what mary was talking about, throwing voters off of the voter rolls. that is not something i know anything about. that is not how gerrymandering works. it is -- you vote in gerrymandered district but your vote is weakened in the context of your district and district surrounding. host: if you are in a gerrymandered districts, you are still voting, it is just that your vote does not have the influence it would have if you are in correctly districted district. my understanding that correctly? guest: that's correct. it is not one person, one vote. host: let's talk to joann calling from nevada on the republican line. good morning. caller: i would really appreciate it, the lady from

vegas that called, but i was redistrict and now i am represented from two senators from vegas. the north isn't even represented in the senate. so where is my voice? where's my representation? it took my map from northern california and put a little tip into vegas where we got the population. took my representation away to these southern people. you people just piss me off. host: go ahead and respond there, kat. guest: i listened to hours of public testimony before the commission in wisconsin, and they were similar to what she was saying, people do not feel heard, they feel their elected representatives take them for granted. there was one mayor of a fairly

big city in wisconsin who said her elected representative, i'm not sure the senator in congress, but this person never visited her. there is a big disconnect between voters and their elected representatives as a result of this system. host: we talk about earlier that a lot of these new maps coming out of the census will end up in court. of course the highest court in the land is the supreme court here in washington, d.c.. -- washington, d.c. how has the court dealt with gerrymandering issues in the past? guest: the president now is that they are not going to address claims of partisan gerrymandering because they say that is a topic for lower courts to pick up. i don't want that to be misconstrued that federal courts have certainly said there has

been gerrymandering happening. it is just as a preen court has been hesitant to take that up and they hunted it back to lower courts. -- punted it back to lower court. host: we talked to bob on the independent line. good morning. caller: michigan and wisconsin are somewhat similar in their makeup, national elections have a fairly democratic and statewide an extremely conservative, almost run -- almost reactionary republican state and senate. what we found, in 2018, the people voted overwhelmingly to redistrict, and that was three years ago. they just made the panel this week to start the process if that gives you any idea. what i have seen myself is that the democrats, even though they are the vast majority --

minority of the state legislature, don't seem to be too concerned with that situation. neither party seems to be concerned with the heavily gerrymandered situation of the state. both parties do not talk much about it. host: so how do you get people interested in the issue of gerrymandering like what is going on in wisconsin? guest: i think one of the activists i spoke with said she talked to people about issues that they care about. her example was public education. that is something that has pretty broad support across party lines, but it is not something we are getting a lot of support from our elected representatives four. so when people see how it affects actual issues and how it affects what is happening in their communities, i think they are more able to understand it.

but that is exactly -- the politicians in michigan don't seem to be interested in gerrymandering, and that is the issue, that politicians are not incentivized necessarily to care about this. right now, we have a strong push from democrats for nonpartisan redistricting because they have a personal stake in it. over 10 years ago, i think in 2009, democrats were in control in wisconsin and they could have switched to a nonpartisan system or created a law, changed the constitution so we had a nonpartisan redistricting commission and they did not because they were hoping to gerrymandered. it is really sucked -- gerrymander. it is really something that i

think needs to come up on the grassroots from voters. host: real quickly, where should we be watching to see issues talking about gerrymandering from this point in wisconsin and around the united states? where should we keep our eyes? guest: definitely on the lawsuits coming up that are being filed. this is going to be a court battle. then i would say on, you know, voting rights legislation. this is in the end, gerrymandering is a threat to democracy. i think all voters should care about wanting their vote to count. so any legislation that is related to voting rights i think needs to be carefully considered and looked at. host: we would like to thank kat cisar, a contributor to the in these times magazine, for coming

on this morning and talking about gerrymandering and how activists in wisconsin are trying to change the process. thank you so much for being with us this morning. host: thank you so much. we would like to thank all of our callers and guests and viewers. join us tomorrow for another edition of washington journal. have a great saturday. wash your hands and stay safe. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2021] ♪ >> c-span is your unfiltered view of government. including charter communication. >> broadband is a force for empowerment. that is why charter has invested

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because of you." i screamed it. >> this is because of you! >> i think i was representing four years of angst and anxiety and anger. many of us are this coming from a mile away. i think i represented millions of americans who felt the same way. at that very moment the entire country, including myself recognized the fragility of our democracy. i have great appreciation for the traditions of congress. i don't like the violated, but i don't regret it. it is what i was feeling and it was four years of pent up anxiety about what was transpiring in front of our eyes. >> this week you will hear from democrat jamie raskin to maryland, republican brian fitzpatrick of pennsylvania. january 6: views on