morris. join the discussion with your phone calls, facebook comments, text messages and tweets. washington journal starts now. ♪ host: this past week in washington, preservation and expansion of democracy. on capitol hill, the house passed the print -- protecting our democracy act going only one republican supporter. president biden hosted a virtual summit for democracy with world leaders facing -- discussing the world challenges. good morning. it is december 12 2021. our first hour, we will ask you about u.s. democracy and whether

it is still an option for the rest of the world, if you say yes, 202-748-8000. if you say no, 202-748-8001 we welcome your thoughts as well by text, 202-748-8003. intel is your name and where your texting from. look at our associate -- social media as well on http://twitter.com/cspanwj. this is a headline on that report from the washington post. very few believe u.s. democracy sets a good example. we will get to that momentarily on the program. go ahead and start dialing on the lines. we did want to address the devastating tornadoes that swept

through northeast arkansas and missouri and into kentucky on friday night into saturday. this is the headline you're seeing on the screen out of louisville and they are reporting from that newspaper. they write that a quartet of tornadoes carved a path of destruction over western kentucky. damaging buildings in bowling green and other towns. the worst of the devastation came from a massive tornado that for through three state and barreled across more than 220 miles of land slamming into mayfield along the way. he announced the death toll might end up exceeding 100 lives before the day was done. we will show you the comments of president biden who also

addressed the devastation in kentucky and elsewhere yesterday and talked about what the federal government was prepared to do. >> i'm monitoring the situation very closely. this is likely to be one of the largest tornado outbreaks in history. i called the governors of the states that experienced severe impact. arkansas, illinois, kentucky, missouri and also tennessee. i talked with mitch mcconnell. governor andy beshear said and i was -- his comment was it looked like a war zone. jill and i, and i sincerely mean this, we pray for those who lost loved ones.

they lost their homes, their businesses. it's a tragedy. and we still don't know how many lives are lost and the full extent of the damage. i want to emphasize what i told all the governors. the federal government will do everything, everything you can possibly do to help. i spoke several times a day with the head of fema as well as the director of fema who has already deployed emergency response personnel, search and rescue teams, water and other supplies. fema is on the ground working with each of the states to assess the damage. it's just been announced, i also approve the emergency declaration that was requested a couple of hours ago by dr. -- by governor beshear from kentucky.

i stand ready to do the same for the government of the other states. i made it clear to them if they emergent -- if they requested emergency declarations. host: we expect updates later this morning. we will update you with that information later in the program here on washington journal as we give you a chance later to call in as well. his first hour, we are asking you about democracy worldwide and if the u.s. is an example. a couple of major happenings on capitol hill and the white house reflecting that. 202-748-8000 is the line if you have desk if you say yes, the u.s. is a good line -- is a good example for the world. if no, 202-748-8001.

this one says if not as long as donald trump is the leader of the world best of the free country. this is the headline from the washington post. they write a few people in the united states or other developed countries as an example for the rest of the world to follow. survey shows the global attitude , 18,850 adults about their views of american society and politics. it included britain, canada, australia, france, germany and south korea. very few think american democracy is a good example for other countries to follow. 70% said u.s. democracy sets a

democracy that sets a good example while 57% said u.s. democracy used to be a good example but hasn't been in recent years. used to be a good example or perhaps is never bent and perhaps -- or has never been. 19% surveyed they are good examples, 72% in the survey says the united states used to be a good example, but has not been in recent years. a percent saying the united states has never been a good example for other countries to follow. what do you think? if you say yes, 202-748-8000.

no is 202-748-8001. let's hear from new jersey. go ahead. >> good morning. the reason why i say no. as of this we have the electoral college, it's impossible to be an example because it's not one man, one vote. with the gerrymandering and you have the district of columbia that pays more taxes than a lot of states, does not have any senators with any taxation without representation. so, no. no way. host: you think united states is ever been? caller: technically, no. at one point, only landowners

were allowed to vote. women were not allowed to vote. the assault on democracy they implemented over 500 laws to stop voting even though the premise is voter id, but they've shut down a lot of polling places throughout the country to make it harder. only in democratic process -- precincts, you have people waiting hours in line to vote 10 hours. the reason why we had the biggest turn out this last time because people voted by mail. even though they say there was a lot of fraud, but it's mighty funny in the republican precincts they said it was no fraud.

but it's only fraud in the democratic precincts. host: to steve, indiana. your next up. go ahead. caller: it may have been something good years ago, but biden could not possibly be trump. they're going to try to cheat again. that's the democrats for you. it's just not fair. this country is in trouble. the president -- host: the president hosted at the white house and talked about democracy. >> democracy does not happen by accident. we have to renew it with each generation and this is an urgent matter in my view. pointing in the wrong direction.

in 2020, that marked the 15th consecutive year of global freedom and retreat. another report noted more than half of all democracy have experienced a decline in at least one aspect of democracy over the last 10 years, including the united states. these trends are being exacerbated by global challenges that are more complex than ever and which require shared efforts to address these concerns. outside pressure, they seek to advance their own power, export and expand their own influence around the world and justify repressive policies as a more efficient way to address today's challenges. that is how it's sold. voices that seek to fan the flames of social division and

polarization. perhaps most importantly, by increasing the disaster that the satisfaction of people with them a credit governments. they feel like they are failing to deliver on their needs. in my view, this is a defining challenge of our time. democracy, government by the people, for the people, of the people. it's capable of self and self-improvement. democracy is hard. we all know that. it works best with consensus and cooperation. host: your response is if you say yes, 202-748-8000. if you say no, 202-748-8001. nathaniel is next. caller: i'd like to say i agree,

democracy is an example for the world. what mr. biden just said on your video, there's a lot to add to that. democracy is under threat, but i think for anyone, republican or democrat, liberal or conservative, i believe most americans have a lot in common and they don't realize it because they are picked apart so what i would advise everyone to do is go into your archives. the national archives. all the library of congress and ask questions if you have questions about where we stand and what we are doing. more importantly, get involved in your state and local governments. not listening to what they say, looking at the paperwork yourself. there's a reason why.

every state has resources of value that belong to the people that are literally being extracted and sold to the highest bidder when everyone should be equal if desk in their employment and wage and health care. those are things you should not have to depend on another person for. host: thanks for the call. let's go to timothy. illinois, good morning. he says yes, the u.s. is an example for the rest of the world. caller: yes, i think because the u.s. has so many people compared to most of the democracies that often we hear from china, we have one for you people so we need an iron fist. even with whatever we have, we can still do it. also we have our history of slavery and ethnic diversity. most of york countries and korea

or japan -- most countries into korea or japan don't have that. we could use different political parties, more than two. we need national referendums. there's a lot of things we can do to improve, compared to what we could have been yes. host: appreciate that. the study in the article, despite criticism of u.s. democracy overall, a midian of -- says the u.s. government respects the personal freedoms far greater than others. the survey also revealed a sharp partisan divide. it democrats and independents leaned toward the democratic party. independents leaned toward the republican party to say american democracy has never been a good

model for other countries to follow. akron, ohio. we hear from david. caller: thanks for taking my call. sadly, no, american u.s. democracy is in peril. look at the facts. even the republican secretaries of state and the last election found there was no fraud. every single case that went to the courts was thrown out because there was no evidence of fraud. what's happening is more minorities and people of color are voting and the republicans realized that the only way they can hope our is with voter suppression or, even worse, with gerrymandering. they have taken away the people that have counted the votes. he certified the election, he said i'm sorry there's no fraud

here. what did they do? they took him out of the loop when it came to vote counting. not only are they suppressing the vote, they are shutting down polling places and desk in heavily democratic areas making it so that people have to stand in line. they even made it against the law to give water to someone standing in line. this is diabolical. it's unbelievable. i can't believe it's actually happening in america. people have to stand up and wake up because it's just not democratic at all. brad raffensperger who counted the boats that she counted the votes, they even took him out of -- they even took him out of the loop. they are going to win because somebody is going to count the votes. host: past what is entitled the protecting our democracy acts

and legislation would prevent abuses of the presidential pardon power. it would suspend the statute of limitations. it would enforce the foreign domestic emoluments causes of constitution. adam kinzinger of illinois was the one republican who voted in favor. republican congressman who was the ranking member says the democrats were just trying to punish the previous administration by that legislation. >> the democrats playbook is about as predictable as a hallmark christmas special. we while seeing this movie. the bill before us today is based on local fiction and it is the latest attempt to resurrect democrats investigation of the

past. this bill unconstitutionally disrupts the separation of powers by diminishing the executive branch and ignoring the judicial branch. the legislation interferes with the president's pardon power, a power completely vested with the president. but this bill gives congress access to sensitive white house liberations and communications about pardons. what legislative purpose does that serve? congress has no authority to evaluate the residents pardon power. this bill also overrides the use of additional by attaching definitions to us additional language that the supreme court has already spoken to. it would change the definition of the monument and indulge members, -- members conspiracy theories. remember, it's like i don't know madame chair. host: is it u.s. democracy and

example for the rest of the world? this is from the headline. it's not clear americans care. they write that during the opening speech, president joe biden told the assembled international leaders that mistakes at their meeting, that the survival of democracy itself depended on what his audience did next. "we stand at the inflection point in our history or code -- history. no one other than the secretary of state was in the room to hear biden's call to action. absent the applause of the in-person event, widens words rang strangely hollow. it was as if he was issuing a warning to no one in particular. it read more, all of that article at fox.com.

jim says this. democrats have been historically a bad example of democracy for the rest of the world and it continues to be today. this one says, democracy requires a free and fair voting system as it is now. we are an example of what not to do. democracy would not be so hard if we worked at it. we do not get democracy and no one is working on it. let's hear from gregory in charleston, west virginia on the no line. caller: hi there. good to see you folks early this morning. i'm a disabled american veteran so bear with me just a little bit because i'm having a very hard time. host: that's fine. caller: i'd like to just state that when donald trump was in office, our country was stronger

and better than it ever has been in years. we got a hoodlum out there that does not nobody's doing. we need to restructure the administration and get some people in their that really care. host: ok, gregory. north carolina. caller: morning. i want to tell you, you people aren't going far enough back in history. i which you would stop reading about what you did to the black people talk about what he did to the first people in this nation. i certainly do appreciate you doing that for me. host: bobby and baltimore, is u.s. democracy and example for the rest of the world? >> caller:caller: -- number one

note because we are not a democracy. democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting for what's for dinner. we need to go back in history. we are not a democracy. we are a constitutional republic and we always have been and that's what we are having issues in the world today. we are running around saying we are something we are not. this is alien to the constitution itself. oh, and by the way since people what's a bring up race. i'm black, by the way. host: tell me why it matters to you, the words we use. you are right. we are a constitutional republic. we talk about american democracy. the style of government that we have. what do you think is wrong in using that term? caller: once again, we are a constitutional republic. a democracy is, like i said, two

wolves and a sheep voting for what's for dinner. host: there are other parliamentary democracies, for example. the united kingdom. there are different types of democracies where the people get to elect their representatives. i'm asking you, and using that phrase democracy to define broadly with the united states is, you don't like the nature of that term? caller: it has nothing to do with me. it's the simple fact that it is wrong. i pledge allegiance to the flag and to the republic for which it stands. it is not say and to the democracy for which it stands. host: thanks for your call. let's go to bill in pennsylvania. welcome. caller: i'm going to follow-up

on the last scholars comment. i think c-span is probably one of the best sources of civics in the united states for educating people. of course, you show, you broadcast the senate, the house in session. you broadcast the oral arguments of the supreme court. what that gentleman said is actually true and there is a lot of misrepresentation that we are a democracy. you even hear our political leaders saying that referring to us as a democracy. we are a constitutional republic. we have a representative form of government. we do not vote. you had another caller criticized the electoral college. these are all things that were structured in our form of government, and there is the

argument that we should be of "democracy." one person one vote is a democracy. we do not have that. everyone knew that when the arguments went on in the forming of our country that the smaller states would get two senators and so they have more power. this was all done to try to even out the agricultural versus for the small state versus the more powerful states. what i want to say is the form of representative government fails because special interests, money interests influence the representative and they do not represent the people. they begin to represent those special interests that pay for

the power. why does a mcdonald's worker who makes $12 an hour pay lots of taxes and a hedge fund owner or operator pay almost nothing in taxes? because we do not have a form of government that represents the people. we have a form of government that representative government that represents the moneyed interests. host: thanks, bill. a lead sponsor of that was democrat adam schiff. his comments following that vote. >> because of the abuses of the last several years are more sweeping in nature than anything undertaken during the next and -- during the nixon demonstration, the need for stronger guardrails is now more important than ever.

to address the vulnerabilities that the last four years exposed, the bill would expedite enforcement of congressional subpoenas. the necessity of which is being demonstrated in real-time time as top officials in the former administration seek to stonewall subpoenas. a congress that cannot enforce subpoenas is no more a congress that a court will remain a court without the power to compel witnesses to testify at trial. instead, it becomes a kind of plaything. although the trump presidency demonstrated the need for reinforcement of our democratic institutions, protecting our democracy act is less about the past that it is about the future. the bill's provisions address many of the deficiencies revealed, not as a punishment of the last president who is now beyond legislative reach to guard against any future president of either party who would attempt to make themselves a king. host: on the elections from the

new york times this morning, control of elections. when thousands of trump reporters gathered in washington dc for that stop the steal rally, one of them was a pastor and substitute teacher named -- teacher. he had traveled with the group to join in protesting the certification of joseph biden's victory. three days later, he complained that media coverage focused solely on the negative aspect of today's events. he said he had been in washington standing for the truth to be heard. shortly after, he declared his candidacy or charge of elections, a local pennsylvania office that administers polling on election day in the local jurisdiction. his victory in november in this conservative, rural community is a milestone of sorts in american politics. the arrival of the first class of political activists who

galvanized is u.s. democracy ande for the world, if you say yes, (202) 748-8000. if you say no, (202) 748-8001. by text, (202) 748-8003. steve in new york sends us this.

this one says: back to calls. we will hear from michigan. go ahead. caller: good morning. thanks for taking my call. i don't think we have a democracy at all. as long as you have the electoral college, there is no democracy. as long as state governments can draw the electoral maps the way they want to, there is no democracy. that is how you have trump getting elected, with fewer votes than hillary clinton. thank you for taking my call again. host: next up, jason in san diego. caller: good morning. thank you for letting me talk. i hear people say we are a republic.

i remember going to school, i look at the country, the countenance. i would see the republic of red china. the republic of ussr. the republic of the congo. the republic of north korea. if those are the same as the republic you said we are, you need to check that out. they are strong men. thank you. host: to tucker, georgia. hello. caller: good morning. i heard you talk earlier to a fellow who said we do live in a constitutional republic. why is it ok to say democracy? we are a great example for the world because we have such wise founding fathers.

benjamin franklin said -- we live in a republic. the democracy thing, it's a euphemism. maybe capitalism. we definitely live in a capitalistic society. that's ok. it's been effective. there is a lot to say about capitalism. that leaves out a lot of people. it's a challenge. on the whole, we are definitely a good example. because of the hard work. we put into our form of government. it's a lot of work. not only is it a lot of work in the government, it's a lot of work in industry. it's a reflection of how hard

americans work. i think that's part of the equation. host: a few calls ago, he complained about the electoral college. he said we are not a good example. we are not a democracy because we don't have one man one vote. you pointed out the electoral college. do we live up to those rentable's of a democracy? caller: that's a great question. that's just for the presidency. that's just one branch of our government. that's part of why it such a complicated question. we have a legislature that makes laws, we have a court and an executive. they are responsible for negotiating treaties.

one of the things i think we have fallen into is the execution that we have maybe lost our way. the legislature now, they don't declare wars. it's all in the president. it has morphed over time to what it was supposed to be. we could improve on our execution. the electoral college question, that's a good point. that's only limited to the one branch. that was put in place by founding fathers to protect -- it was set up by the senate. the senate played a different function. host: let me ask you about congress. you said congress has given up the warmaking power.

what about the supreme court? has the country seated too much legislative authority from roe v. wade up to today's court, from the warren court up to today, do our unelected justices have too much legislative authority over our lives? caller: that's another really great question. that is probably over my pay scale. for my money, that's why they are there. their role is to protect an out-of-control legislature that might pass laws that are not constitutional. at the state level, it's a little bit different. host: we will go to bob in texas. good morning. caller: thank you for the

opportunity. i hope we can have a back-and-forth. i say yes, it's an example for the rest of the world. of what not to do. we are a republican form of governments. our constitution is a contract, the vocabulary is very specific. every time we change words, it does bad things. the first time democracy entered the u.s. code, was under the fdr administration and he tried to reorganize government. that was with the government reorganization act. that brought in social security and the works project.

questions for me? madison said that democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention incompatible with personal security. madison knew it. now you do. host: in that passage of the protecting our democracy act, rodney davis spoke out against the bill. this is what he had to say. >> the built we are debating today is another attempt by the

outgoing majority to relitigate many of the sham investigations. many are unnecessary and recycle attempts to take away individual state sovereignty. if we were here to talk about protecting our democracy, we would focus on voter rolls to ensure only eligible citizens are eligible to vote in federal elections. congress passed the national voter registration act in 1993. this law requires states to contact list maintenance to make sure the roles are up-to-date. this requirement is incredibly important. the doj refuses to enforce it. progressive focus on defunding the police and embracing wallace miss, keeping our capital shut

down, labeling concerned parents as extremist threats. if democrats were focused on protecting our democracy, the justice department would investigate california, where the number of registered voter exceeds the number of adults in the state. alex padilla from the state of california about the problem and refused to address it when he was secretary of state. republicans care about election integrity because our constitutional republic means nothing if our citizens don't have faith in our elections. when americans hear reports of individuals on active voter rolls who have moved to another state, died, it frustrates them

because it calls into question if there vote actually counts. it is so frustrating because the fix is so simple. democrats refused to address the problem. it is common sense and has been federal law for decades it only eligible americans should be on our voter rolls. republicans want every eligible voter to exercise that right. democrats dilute your vote. republicans restore it. host: that passed in the house completely on democratic votes. this time, the international democracy summit was hosted. the foreign policy headline:

in california, in santa barbara, joseph. go ahead. caller: everybody has been pussyfooting around what is so different or important about a

constitutional republic. they have a parliamentary system and many other countries. our constitution is the law of the land. the only way it can be changed is by amending it. this is very important. in a parliamentary system, parliament can change the law of the land any time it wants. it can take away rights and give rights. that is not possible in our constitution. how it's getting eroded is we fail when we don't stick to the constitution and try to change the law of the land by getting rid of the electoral college or

all of these things the democrats want to do. that's where we get in trouble. that's why we are in trouble now. that is the important difference. the constitution is the law of the land and can only be changed by amending it. the process was made it very difficult for that reason. when these social issues percolate through society, it gives society a chance to catch up. when you try to force something down people's throats, not only is it against the way the constitution should be changed, it causes this friction. that is the real important

thing. constitution is the law of the land. host: how hard do you think it is compared to other decades to change the constitution, the amendment process. it's always been a difficult process. in the political climate, what do you think? caller: i think it's difficult. we have more states and it really ends up being the same thing. when you go through the process, even though it takes a long time, it gives society a chance to discuss it, to have it percolate, to have accepted. by the time the processes through, it's acceptable. that is still the best way. host: it's accepted or it's

rejected? caller: right. if it's rejected, it doesn't get to be an amendment. host: appreciate your input. omaha, nebraska. go ahead. caller: good morning. i think it's declining, at least the ideals we were built on. recently, there is a bad racial profiling going on in nebraska, in particular stewart county. i was driving through their after coming from colorado.

one of the policeman there i referred to them as government officials. he followed us for 20 miles. blocked us behind a truck, bypassing us when there was a slow moving truck. then gave us a ticket for following too close. he was in front of the truck. so many of our basic liberties are broken. host: what recourse did you have to contest that? caller: i went to court. i had a little bit of marijuana.

it is legal in colorado. they only target brown and black people. the recourse i had was to go to court. when i went to court, all of the lawyers there were telling me to plea bargain. i can't plea bargain. my brother died in vietnam. i am named after my uncle who died on d-day. i can't deny our rights. i have to stick up for our rights. i am going to trial. when a jury hears about the liberties we talk about, that doesn't make sense anymore.

i hope i can say that we have to protect our democracy from government officials. they don't know the constitution or -- it was even with the judge said. the judge said that's fine. he can follow you as far as he wants. he can do whatever he wants. they can search you. i lost total faith. my daughter is an officer in the air force. my son is in the navy. host: good luck with that trial. is u.s. democracy and example for the world? if you say yes, (202) 748-8000.

if you say no, (202) 748-8001. we have some tweets. president biden at the virtual summit for democracy this past week talked about measures the u.s. is taking to strengthen democracies worldwide. >> as we work at home to bring the united states closer to what we call a more perfect union, we are doubling down on our engagement with democracies around the world. this week, i released the first

strategy on countering corruption, which elevates our fight against transnational corruption. it evaporates confidence the people need to have in government. the strategy includes working with other partners, all of you around the world. reduce their ability to use the united states international financial system to hide assets and launder money. i am proud to launch the initiative for democratic renewal. it will focus efforts across diplomacy, across our foreign assistance program to boelter -- bolster resistance. working with our congress, we are planning to commit $224 million in the next year to shore up accountable government.

promoting technology that advances democracy and defining and defining what a fair election is. let me give you a few examples of the work this initiative will entail. a free and independent media, it's the bedrock of democracy. it's how the public stays informed. around the world, press freedom is under threat. to sustain independent media around the world. we are going to be standing up a new fund for journalists. help protect journalists against lawsuits designed to prevent them from doing their work around the world. we are going to watch two programs to help anticorruption activities across civil society.

we are going to help eliminate money laundering. host: a report, democracy under siege is the headline of their report. they are looking at democracy worldwide, a growing gap. 15 years of decline. this includes a large jump in 2020. let's get to a few more calls here on our opening topic. steve is in maryland. good morning. caller: so much to talk about. first of all, i think democracy in america has never been stronger. i submit that america survived

trump. are you not happy with that? i see a split in the thought between the republicans and the democrats. the republicans believe in sovereignty. the democrats believe in globalism. president trump up to the united nations and said we will never surrender america's sovereignty to an unaccountable and unelected global bureaucracy. i bounce around in my echo chamber. i follow fox. i also read a lot. i've been reading jeanne kirkpatrick. if there was a mount rushmore for women, she would be the first i would put up on there. she talks about rationalism and

empiricism. rationalism is what is possible. she points out that democracies evolve. they become trial and error. the rationalists would be your marxists. we can't develop a utopia. this is the last point i would like to make. the carter administration he wrote a book between the ages. america in the technotronic era. he uses terms -- you can find it online. i asked my wife to get a copy for christmas.

he uses terms like rational humanism and how political borders will disappear. he actually uses the term fiction of sovereignty. that's their philosophy. i see the democrats, the globalists and the republicans as sovereignty people. host: i've got a couple of more calls here. in maryland, good morning. caller: i believe in this last election that democracy was a good example for the rest of the world. let's define what democracy is. i think some of the colors are confused. if you look it up in the dictionary, it's the power to vote. we have a representative democracy. we elect officials to go to washington and they vote for us.

yes we have a democracy. it's the power to vote. what i think about our democracy , it probably doesn't matter as what our last president throughout about our democracy. he said america has the most corrupt elections of any third world country. that's what your ex-president thinks. he thinks we have the most corrupt democracy in the world. he thinks it's corrupt because he couldn't get -- he just needed 11,000 move warts in georgia. he is the corrupt one. it is so good that even though that attempted coup, it's all going to be found out. the government held. the democracy held.

in a lot of the states starting with georgia. they have new laws to say that even after we count your votes, even after we count your votes, if we think there is fraud, we don't have to have proof, we can send the electoral college the people we want to congress. this is where democracy is falling down. host: this is from inside the washington post this morning. 18 steps to a democratic breakdown.

let's hear him been in california. go ahead. caller: -- host: we lost our last color. there are more -- more of the program run washington journal. up next, the quincy institute will be with us. she will talk about her recent piece in the american spectator magazine including our military is in decay. the center for international studies global health policy

center director will talk about global covid-19 vaccination efforts and programs to achieve that goal. ♪ >> this week on the c-span networks, congress returns with a shorter workweek because of the holiday break. the senate takes up a bill increasing the nation's debt limit. the sun also continues work on the defense bill. monday at 7:00 p.m. eastern, the house committee investigating the january 6 attack on the capitol meets to consider holding former president trump's chief of staff mark meadows for contempt of congress. then the confirmation hearing for the food and drug administration head. wednesday at 2:30 p.m. eastern on c-span.org and the c-span

mobile now internet app, ceo's discuss the impact of the pandemic. watch this week on the c-span networks. or watch our full networks on c-span now, our new mobile video app. head to c-span.org for scheduling information or streaming video. c-span, your unfiltered view of government. ♪ >> june began working at the nixon foundation as the 14-year-old marketing -- tonight on "q&a," he talks about the life of richard dixon and the work of the foundation. >> we are looking ahead to the 50th anniversary of his trip to china, the end of the vietnam

war, the 50th anniversary of watergate -- we, as a foundation, build educational experiences and events, conferences around these type of programs -- or around these 50th anniversaries and make them into types of programs and push them out on so social media. and we are connecting. we hear from young people who say, gosh, i didn't know about that. or i'd only heard there was this thing called watergate, i did not know that president nixon was first president to negotiate an arms-control agreement with the soviet union. there are real learnings being had. >> jim byron tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span's "q&a." you can listen to "q&a" on our c-span now app.

>> "washington journal" continues. host: kelley vlahos has reported on public policy issues for many years. she is with us to talk about the state of the u.s. lee terry. she is the senior advisor and editorial director at the quincy's to for responsible statecraft -- quincy institute for responsible statecraft. good morning. what u.s. to the topic was your peace in the american spectator titled "our military in decay? facing some hard truths." we will get to that in just a moment. tell us about the organization, the quincy institute for statecraft. guest: we consider ourselves an action tank. we are 2-year-old as of two weeks ago. we were started in the spirit of trying to bring left and right together to reform foreign policy come away from a militaristic foreign policy in which we go out in search of

monsters to destroy, find -- fighting wars to settle our problems, military primacy, stationing troops all over the globe, instead pursuing a foreign policy of diplomacy and engagement with the world, not to disengage with the world but to engage through diplomacy, trade, and other non-militaristic ways. we are doing pretty good. we call ourselves in action tank, because we are both a think tank in that we have experts generating a lot of intellectual rigor, but we are actually advocating, so we are very active on the hill, we are writing papers, op-eds, trying to get into the media with our message. we are doing a lot of things for a little group with a lot of power. but i think we are actually resonating with people. i think the american people actually want change on this front. host: what was the trigger that

drew you into the topic of military spending, particularly how it is being used in statecraft, worldwide by the united states, and your peace in the american spectator? some extensive reporting there. what was the initial draw on your part? guest: i am a journalist by trade, and i've been very involved in veterans issues and war issues, obviously, for the last 20 years that we have been at war. one of the things we have been trying to do at the quincy institute is draw attention to the military-industrial complex and the amount of money and resources, american money and resources, that have gone into the military, into our wars, into the proliferation of weapons, very much at the expense of american interests. one of those things that we have found in the wake of the 20 year war cycle is that we have spent all of this money but yet a lot

of the core interests of the military, having a strong defense, seems to have been eroded in, i would say, lieu of the big-ticket weapons systems. so we are looking at a military that is tired, that has been stretched too thin with multiple deployments. we have had 2.7 million service members who have went on i think 5.4 million deployments over the last 20 years. we have military families who have been struggling to we have national guard -- national guard has contributed 35% of the man and woman power in these twenty-year wars. they are tired. there quitman has been sent overseas. we have helicopters that can be used for fighting forest fires in the west that are overseas right now, because they have

gone with the national guard. we have seen a real impact on the domestic military in terms of our readiness. we have seen an impact on our budget. we have seen an impact on the militarization of everything, so this is part of a piece of it. why i decided to write this story was because i noticed kind of a seachange. i noticed that men and women in the military, whether they are still in the military or recent veterans, have a feeling of real betrayal of what has been going on for the last 20 years. the withdrawal from afghanistan really opened the floodgates for a lot of criticism, and i felt this is the first time i am seeing and sensing military people speaking vocally about their disappointment and their leadership -- in their

leadership, the disappointment of the war strategy. i see that as a real warning sign interns -- in terms of the readiness and strength of our volunteer military. host: you lead your story with that, the comments of lt. col. stuart scheller, who was court-martialed. he is still in the service, correct? guest: he has agreed to resign from the marines, but from what i understand, a story i saw earlier this month, that it could take months to even years for him to actually cycle out of the military. so he is going to work every day, but he has agreed to leave the service. host: you kind of touched on this earlier, about the level of spending, the types of things being spent. you write, unfortunately, instead of pouring resources and energy into maintaining readiness, much of washington's views today is at throwing money at shiny new objects, big-ticket

weapons systems, ship and aircraft that either take years to build, become obsolete, or either do not work. a boon to the beltway defense lobby, not so much for the fighting forces. but it seems like it has been that way for a long time. guest: it has been like that since the beginning of the cold war. as you and, i am sure, your listeners and viewers no, president eisenhower and his farewell address warned of a military-industrial complex, the pouring of money and resources into weapons, particularly nuclear weapons, but all sorts of warmaking material at the start of the cold war. he warned that that would become an albatross around the neck of the american system, whether it be washington, whether it our budget, our taxes, and it is true -- as we have mobilized over the last 70 years for war,

whether it be with the soviet union before 1990 or against islamic terrorism after 9/11, we have spent an increasing amount of our gdp on defense. the house just past the defense policy bill -- $770 billion, which includes a $25 billion increase for defense even though we have just officially withdrew military operations from afghanistan. so it is a scale that goes like this. it never goes backwards during peace time. and much of that money is going to defense contractors, who bore -- pour billions of dollars into lobbying every year in

washington. so we do the math, and it turns out that war is a big boon for defense industry, not so much for the american people. host: kelley vlahos is with us. she is with the quincy institute. her piece in the american spectator on american defense spending. we welcome your calls and comments the lines are (202) 748-8000 if you are in the eastern or central time zones. (202) 748-8001 mountain and pacific. for active and retired military, that line is (202) 748-8002. the revolving door in the military world and the pentagon world and defense contractor world is nothing new, but how, in your reporting, has it become exacerbated in recent years? guest: i just want to correct myself, because i said billions of dollars, and it probably seems like it, but the defense industry has put $1 billion into lobbying over the last 20 years,

with a $2 trillion return in terms of government contracts. just let that settle in for a second pair that is over the course of the war. i think it has gotten worse as the industries have gotten more powerful. we have top five defense industry companies, raytheon, lockheed martin, boeing, general dynamics, northrop grumman, and they have pretty much carved out the ultimate dish -- niche for themselves. they are getting far the majority of federal contracts. so you have very powerful companies with serious interests in seeing everything go their way every year in the budget, and what they do is they hire away all of our generals and top officials and admirals from the pentagon every year. 280 top officials left pentagon jobs for lobbying, top

consulting jobs in those five companies. host: do ethics rules applied to the officer class who leave the military, officer and noncommissioned -- do ethics rules applied and going to defense contractors? guest: there definitely are ethics rules cured whether they are being followed for a that is a different question. there has been a lot of work on this come a lot of activism on the hill, trying to harden some of these rules in terms of the cooling-off period. i think the cooling-off period -- and please forgive me if i do not have it right -- is one year. or is five years. sorry i do not have that information at my fingertips. but it is a cooling-off period, so if i left the pentagon today, i couldn't lobby for a major defense contractor, and what

they do is there are loopholes. they do not go to lobby in which they register as a lobbyist, they go and consult. so what is the difference? this is washington. so i am a former general of -- a colonel, and i go and i am hobnobbing with folks at raytheon, and back and forth with my old buddies, and i can say i am a consultant, but literally what am i doing? i am tried to get federal contracts for raytheon or boeing with my old pals. that is how it works care that is why they call it the revolving door, because then you have folks like casper, former defense secretary, who worked for raytheon as a lobbyist and then became our defense secretary. raytheon is one of those top companies, and it gets billions of dollars' worth of contracts from the federal government, particularly throughout the war.

so i think it has gotten a lot worse in that regard, because you have so few of these companies with tons of money, and they are able to hire these guys and gals right out of service, and they are doing their bidding. host: there is a recent report from the ronald reagan institute about america's confidence in the military, declining confidence according to their survey. i want to ask if you think there may be a connection to that and the state of the spending you report about. in terms of confidence in the military, the level of a great deal of confidence, in 2018, according to the reagan institute, that number was 70%. this year, the has dropped to 45%. guest: it is dramatic, absolutely dramatic. why? because as americans face, in their -- as americans' faith in

their institutions have plummeted in the last 20 years, the military seems to maintain a special place with americans in that they felt they were the most trusted institution we had left. now, as you noticed, it goes from 70% two years ago to 40% this year. and this is by the ronald reagan foundation and institute. this is not a left-wing organization that wants to see the military in a bad light to begin with. and so this is big news. i do not know if -- i know it is not merely the budget, because unfortunately, americans have allowed more and more of their tax dollars to go into the defense department, the military-industrial complex over the last 70 years and really have not paid attention --

grumbled about it, but it is not going to move the needle over whether they trust the military. this is 20 years of war, this is 20 years of failed war. this is an afghanistan withdrawal in which people saw the chaos on their screens, and they were told by military leaders that, well, they knew that this war was unwinnable from the beginning, or during, and yet, 20 years, we had officials in washington, both the billion and military, telling us that we will just stay in there for a few more years, and victory is right around the corner. then we see, wow, the taliban took over rapidly. we saw 13 marines and service members killed during this chaotic withdrawal situation. we have seen afghans suffering from starvation, from cruel punishment and retribution by

the taliban, and for what? they know. they're not stupid. the american people know that we put more than $2 trillion into these wars, and we see an iraq rife with corruption and violence, and now we have afghanistan run by the taliban, rife with corruption, violence, and now poverty and starvation. they are looking at our military leadership and saying we believed in you. we believed, for the last 20 years, that you knew what you were doing. and when you sat up there in congress and told members of congress that victory was right around the corner and we just needed to have more stomach for the battle, we just needed to put more troops in and do counterinsurgency, and americans said, ok, let's do this. host: kelley vlahos our guest. her article in the american spectator asking "our military in decay? facing some hard truths."

is -- and i let's get to calls. we go to joe in white plains, missouri. good morning. caller: i am glad you are on this morning, but you are explaining stuff we already know. i think we should have never stopped the draft. everybody my age, we got drafted because of the vietnam war. we had over 2 million people active. we do not have enough people. -- general militia court-martialed and shot for calling the chinese to let them know we are going to attack you. if i did that, i would be doing 10 years or more. we do not have any confidence in our military, because general milley is getting away with treason. host: kelley vlahos? guest: two points on that. thank you. one, i think the caller highlights another reason why

the plummeting trust numbers we see, and that is the politicized asian -- the politicizatoin of the military. enter millie, we saw him with a photo op with trump, defending putting troops, national guard troops, in the city for the george floyd protest. then fast forward, we see him in various books talking about former president trump and how he was having back channel conversations with the chinese and warning them about trump, saying we will warn you if we actually have an attack or a war. and he is not the only one. general petraeus and one of the commemorative military were sitting in these congressional

testimonies talking about counterinsurgency and talking about victory right around the corner, and we all know he was playing politics, playing the members of congress. a lot of these folks, like petraeus, general mcchrystal, and others, have gone on to write books and get tens of thousands of dollars in speaking engagements. they people look at the failed war, they look at the veterans coming home with ptsd and wealth health problems and fighting to get recognition with the v.a. and get prescriptions and even just get appointments, and they say this seems to be an imbalance in how the celebrity generals have been able to benefit from the war, and our men and woman who obviously have not benefited from the war. the second point he made about skin in the game -- i believe that. i believe more and more americans, particularly veterans, are frustrated,

because you have less than a percent of americans have served in the wars over the last 20 years. they have skin in the game. they care about what happens. they are the ones who are really disappointed in feeling betrayed right now, because of the failed war policy. americans have -- the rest of us -- have been on autopilot for the last 20 years. we have vague feelings about the war. we support it, we don't support it. i feel like if we did have more skin in the game -- your caller mentioned the draft -- we would not have been at war for 20 years. host: that's go to our callers for the line for military, retired and active duty, (202) 748-8002. earl in ohio, welcome. caller: good morning. i will be 83 years old next weekend, and i only have one

question. what will we do with all the people who make their living working in the military-industrial complex? i have one suggestion -- if we could take the time and move them to the railroad system like we have in germany and japan. thank you. guest: the caller makes a great point. we always talk about infrastructure. we just past the massive infrastructure bill here in washington. there are things that we could be doing. we could be pouring our resources, whether it be human resources and otherwise, into infrastructure projects. i know there are plenty of people who would like to see some of those military-industrial jobs be turned into green jobs, for example. i am not an expert on this, but i do believe that there are enough studies out there to say that this canard about how the military-industrial complex, particularly new weapons systems

that come down the pike like the f-35, in which different parts of it are sprinkled around the country so you have 1000 jobs here, a few thousand jobs there -- they say oh my goodness, we cannot end this trillion dollar boondoggle because we will lose all these jobs. but i think we will see they do not produce as many jobs as one would think. yet there are tens of thousands of people who work in the military-industrial complex. i feel like, if we put our minds to it, we can find other ways to spend that human capital. host: next is paul in indianapolis. caller: good morning k thanks for taking my call. i was a dod auditor for 25 years. i think ms. vlahos needs to check her numbers very carefully. we actually decreased military spending, in real terms, in both

the clinton administration and the obama administration. you also have to remember that, during the same time we were decreasing the spending, we were also increasing the personnel benefits. the pay went up, the other benefits went up. so we were spending less and less on long-term investment and weapons systems. you cannot build a ship overnight. you can raise a company of infantry overnight. you cannot raise a ship overnight. the other problem we have is that i do not think democracy is doing a good job of military militaries. george marshall said that franklin roosevelt was -- george -- franklin roosevelt's mistake leading world war ii dragged the war out for a full year. compared to that, mismanagement over the last few years is relatively minor, although you have to say that, when the obama administration decided to keep spending resources in

afghanistan while reducing the real budget, he really -- which was typified by having 20 combat aircraft destroyed by a hurricane because they were in hangars because there were no spare parts to repair them. host: thanks for your insight. guest: well, i mean, in terms of the spending, we have spent more on weapons systems. and i believe the american people have been ripped off in terms of how the money is being spent. for example, we built a fleet of literal combat ships. we have already started decommissioning them. they were $500 million apiece. i think there were 13 ships. we have already started -- host: what is the reason we are decommissioning these literal ships? are they no longer part of the

defense strategy of the nation? guest: no longer a part of the defense strategy, but the key is they are too extensive to upgrade, so the navy found it was $2.5 billion to upgrade these ships, so they are starting to decommission them. so all that money is just down the toilet. when you have 5 major defense companies that dominate the industry, that dominate the market, what they are able to do is also its of cost overruns. they are able to extend contracts. they say we need to upgrade, they say this is classic f-35. it is 20 years in the making, this fighter plane, and yet it has not fully passed combat readiness, after 20 years, because of upgrades, because of upkeep. they have all sorts of bells and whistles of technology they have loaded onto this plane, which is

a boon for the contractor, but what happens is they cannot fix them, they cannot get parts, then they have to upgrade again to keep it advanced -- 20 years ago, there was different strategies, different capabilities they wanted. this is how the contractor is able to get its share. but yet we have people out there, experts who are much smarter than me, who say here we have this f-35, we are probably not going to use it. by the time it axley passes all these capabilities, we will need something else. that goes for the ships as well. so it is about the increases, but it is actually also about how we are spending the money and whether or not we are being taken advantage of by contractors, who see this big pot of money and see they will keep getting what they ask for, but we do not hold them to task for how it is being spent,

because that is part of the culture in the military-industrial complex. like if everybody, whether it be the personnel, the military officers, the industry itself, if they are all working to get that money and spend that money, there is nobody left to raise the red flag. the pentagon has never fully passed an audit. let that sink in for a second. they finally did an audit a couple years ago and did not fully passed they did another one -- same thing. american people, we need to hold this agency, this ecosystem, if you will, to task. if we ask everybody else to be put in front of an audit and account for the money they are spending, my money in your money, i think the pentagon should be put to the same accountability. host: you touched on the billion dollars in lobbying, the broader overall spending you write

about. kelley vlahos writes that retired army lt. col. daniel davis, who also served multiple tours in iraq and afghanistan, blames the influence of private industry, particularly its cozy relationships inside the pentagon for the dysfunctional nature of procurement and acquisitions. private defense firms spent $1 billion lobbying washington since 2001 and, in return, received some $7 trillion in taxpayer funds over the course of the post-9/11 wars. that's half of the $14 trillion spent for those wars. a call in phoenix, good morning. go ahead. caller: i wonder if you have any information on this. i was wondering about systems that detect lunches from other countries. we have seen china has a supersonic delivery system that can get to the united states

very quickly. i was wondering whether we have anything that can detect -- i saw something on tv recently where a russian military men was the only person that could see that there was a launch coming toward russia, when they found out it was just the reflection of the son of of the clouds in said you only had 10 minutes to make a decision whether it was a lunch or not. i wonder if you have any information on systems like that that can detect whether it is a true launch or not. guest: i would not want to deceive you into thinking that i know anymore than i do so i do not have any specific information. i know that is a big concern. whether or not it is a threat the way some in washington are calling it now, but i do know

there are some specific concerns about being able to detect the hypersonic weapon. host: is that hypersonic weapon and other moves in china like the south china sea driving more spending? guest: this is the classic gap that we had witnessed in the 1960's. now we have an arms race right before our eyes china with the hypersonic weapons being one threat, you have the maritime security issues in the south china sea and every single day there is another headline, another concern, almost hysterical rhetoric going on in washington on the hill about having to keep up with the

chinese. one of the more recent is the nuclear weapons, satellite photos of nuclear silos in china and we have members of congress immediately rushing to the podium saying we need money to keep up with them because if we don't they are going to overtake us, which considering the u.s. and russia have several times the number of nuclear weapons than any country in the world, the idea that somehow china is going to catch up with the united states is a joke. let these things are used every single day, whether it is ships, nuclear weapons, hypersonic weapons, satellites, you name it . this is about in washington. the house just passed $770 billion pentagon budget, much of that was fueled by the concern

that we needed to continue to be competitive with china militarily. both republicans and democrats have vocalized that concerned. we call it at quincy threat inflation. what does threat inflation do? it ensures those budgets will be passed. there are plenty on the hill advocating for budget cuts and that is not even close to happening. if anything there was a $25 billion increase over the president's proposal, and that for 2022 was slightly higher than trump's last budget. so there was no decreasing in the cards here and a lot of that was because of china threat inflation. host: let's hear from john in new york. caller: kelly, thank you so much

for pointing out a lots of these terrible things that are going on in our country today. it really bothers me and i have given a lot of thought to who is really prospering from these wars. agro grubbing the 1960's, vietnam was there. as the war was prosecuted, you learn things about body counts and the war became unwinnable, but still prosecuted. it went on for 10 years. and after vietnam, we got places like iraq and afghanistan and i was -- that was especially disturbing. one of the things that really bothered me was nobody paid attention to history. the british were in afghanistan and they couldn't take it. the russians were there for 10

years when we were in vietnam and they couldn't take it and nonetheless we went into places like iraq and afghanistan and you had to question why did it happen because they have been proven to be unwinnable. the more you think about it, it really questions your faith in the military. we were told that the russians were ahead of us with missiles and they really weren't. actually, we had the advantage. so thanks again for doing this. i wish you would make mention of the fact that the lobbying groups like you have been staying are really destructive of our democracy. host: thanks, john. guest: you make a point that i wanted to make earlier about the

american people and how the american people have suffered throughout recent history from wars and war policy. one of the things we are trying to do at the quincy institute is pursue a democracy in tatian -- a democracy as asian -- democratization which is americans for national security and too long decisions have been made by the blob, the military-industrial complex and the politics and think tanks and the firmament that it is all about the status quo in keeping the money going in one direction and keeping the foreign policy militarized and global police and the american people are done with that but unfortunately they are so disconnected, and when

you have the lobbyists more integral to the process than the actual constituents, then you don't have a say. i believe more that like what i am doing here in conveying it you what i am seeing and the more the american people feel emboldened to get involved in foreign policy and realizing it does affect them and realizing their communities are contaminated by base and other toxicities and men and women who have served and their families affected to the bread and butter issues. maybe it should be going into health care and infrastructure but it is going overseas. that is what has eroded the faith. as much as there is a

disconnect, i think there is a feeling of real angst over what has happened over the last 20 years. you are seeing that in the poll numbers but also in men and women who have come home and they don't want anymore and as the caller said, after vietnam and what we've seen the last 20 years, i think people are just tired of just taking what the government says about these worse at face value. host: let's hear from retired and active military line, troy, who is retired military in pittsburgh. caller: good morning. i was just going to let her know that we didn't -- those were not failures of the military aspect. we want able to chase down the military when the cost borders and went into afghanistan and

china and other nations next to them. we are the military might of the world, even though we are predicted to be knocked out of it and -- by china. america is as wealthy as it is and as large as it is because of military engagements throughout history for our country. the money that is going into the military is to protect the publicans tyrants like russia and china. and she was saying china could never catch us.

north korea has 64 nuclear bombs and they don't even had the capacity that china has if they wanted to catch us, they could catch us. host: may ask you about the spending in afghanistan, in particular the reporting of greg wilcox. some of that from the special inspector general for afghanistan. the money that was spent there, the money that was wasted there, was any of that a surprise to you? guest: it was not a surprise to me because i had been skeptical of the afghan war policy from the beginning. that is on a personal note. what craig whitlock did with the afghan papers was just truly a gift to the american people and i hope that the american people realize that. what he did by collecting -- and

he did it to lawsuits because the government did not want to give it up -- but collecting the quotes and admissions by american officials and military officials who had said over the years that this work could not be won is proof the american people have been pouring their tax dollars into a sieve in terms of spending money on raising a military there in afghanistan that would not able to fight, pouring money into civic institutions that would not hold up after we left, pouring money into infrastructure projects in afghanistan that crumbled because we couldn't -- because of a maintenance weapons system that won't fly because the pilot can't fly them. i think what we have is a trove of evidence that we rely to over

the last 20 years. it is up to us what we do with it. we have told members of congress and institutions, particularly the military, accountable for the lies. i believe that my story was in part way to keep that conversation going. host: another headline, defense contractor spent big in afghanistan for the u.s. and then the television took control. michael from morris, illinois. go ahead. caller: good morning. i want to thank ms. vlahos. she is doing good reporting and i like her necklace, incidentally. the m-16 was the state-of-the-art technology. we had a small ground radar set that we tried to use to detect

people infiltrating. now things have leapfrogged many times. i heard that china actually supplies a lot of the magnets in different electronic components that we use in our military equipment. this capitalist system that we use to build our weapons and supply our military, i mean it is just ridiculous. maybe we should nationalize all of these defense industries so that the people get a fair shake on what we spend on this stuff. host: let's hear from kelley vlahos. guest: i know there is a debate about industrial policy and whether or not too much of our pipelines, and this is an

overall debate we are happening, too much of the pipelines and defense pipelines are actually in hock with the chinese and they could turn off spigots at any time. and a piece of any weapons system could be completely curtailed if they decided to be rep beautiful on that score. there is a conversation about supply lines, monopolies. i don't know if nationalizing it is the way to go. i am sure you would get much opposition there. but i do feel this is a conversation, as much of our industry has gone overseas and the most protective of them being the military. if we are flying planes with components made in china where they could literally shut off

radar or other very important key technologies, that is a concern and i know there plenty of people writing about it. host: kelley vlahos with her perspective. thank you for being with us. still to come, we focus on global covid-19 vaccination efforts and u.s. programs to achieve that goal. our guest is the center for strategic and international studies on global health policy is stephen morrison. and we will take more of your calls. >> at least six presidents recorded conversations while in office. here many of those conversations on c-span's new podcast,

presidential recordings. >> focusing on the presidency of lyndon johnson. you will hear about the 1964 civil and presidential campaign. and also the march on selma in the war on vietnam. not everyone knew they were being recorded. >> certainly johnson secretary knew, because they were tasked with transcribing many of those conversations. in fact, they were the ones who make sure the conversations were taped, as johnson would signal to them through an open door between his office and there's. >> you will also hear blunt talk. >> i want a report of the number of people assigned to kennedy the day he died. i want them right quick. >> yes sir. >> i promise you i will stay behind the gates. >> presidential recordings, find it on the c-span now mobile app

or wherever you get your podcasts. >> up to its neck in debt. >> we believe where the greatest things to be american is we are striving to provide equal opportunities. >> the documentary competition 2022 good students giving us behind the scenes looks as they work on entries using the #studentcam. if you are a middle or high school student, you can enter by creating a five to six minute documentary using c-span video clips that answer the question -- how does the federal government impact your life? >> to be passionate about what you are discussing, no matter how large or small you think the audience will receive it to be. and know that in the greatest

country in the history of the earth, your view does matter. >> remember that content is king . remember to be as neutral and impartial as possible in your portrayal of both sides of an issue. >> c-span awards $100,000 in awards and you have a shot at winning the grand prize of $5,000. entries must be received before january 20, 2022 p four rules, tutorials -- 2022. for rules and tutorials, visit the website. "washington journal" continues. host: stephen morrison is the director for the center for strategic and international studies. the morning, stephen morrison. guest: good morning, thank you. host: what is called the covax

program, how successful has it been thus far? guest: covax is a solidarity mechanism that was established in april 2020, early in this pandemic, as a mechanism to attempt to bring vaccines in a timely and affordable way to 92 low and middle income countries. it has had a very rocky year. one of the major problems it has confronted is the destruction and supply from india. it made a big bet on the astrazeneca vaccine from india, one of the major producers worldwide. when the pandemic struck, the delta pandemic struck fiercely in india in the spring, india imposed, like many countries, on

nationalist grounds and export ban and that has only been relaxed very recently. it was hugely disruptive to covax. there were other problems that covax experienced. it was not terribly good at creating reliable and accountable contract relationships with many of the manufacturers. it wound up being subject to great delays in deliveries and uncertainty. often times the vaccines delivered were very near their expiration dates. recently, as they are approaching the end of the year, it looks like they will accelerate delivery by the end of this year. they will have delivered about 800 million to 900 million doses.

the original target was 2.3 billion doses and they are falling quite short on that front. host: on that, how has the demand now from the rest of omicron put pressure on that covax program? guest: it is still -- let's get to omicron and a moment. omicron is crating greater anxiety and pressure to accelerate vaccinations. in low income countries, we are still looking at vaccines at under 6%. vaccine in high income countries , above since he and about 70% fully vaccinated in the population. one last point on poetics, two points and want to make, the

united states and over a billion doses of the pfizer mrna vaccine over the next many months. those liveries have begun and running at about 50 million per month. the european union has committed half a billion doses, and those are beginning to flow. overall within the world, production is rising dramatically right now. by the end of this year, which is fast approaching, western vaccines will have risen to 7.5 billion total production. if you add in the chinese and russians and others, we are looking at 11 billion or 12 clean and that is expected to double in 2022 -- 12 billion and that is expected to double in 2022. i think covax will be able to

function better and supply constraints will begin to ease. one other point, because of the stumbles that covax has experienced this year, countries were not passively waiting. they went out and struck their own delivery deals and regional organizations stepped forward and became much more active as well. the africa cdc and africa union got together and began striking deals with j&j and others, so it is a more diversified environment right now i wish low income countries are finding vaccines. covax will continue to be important and very reliant upon donations. host: on the low income countries and the smaller percentages of vaccines, is logistics the main problem of getting vaccines the number one problem? guest: what we are beginning to

see very clearly is that for low and lower mingle -- lower middle income countries there are three major problems they confront. one is affordable, timely, predictable, manageable supplies. not all showing up all at once and having an ability to predict and not showing up with expiration dates two weeks. that is problem number one. problem number two is the ability to deliver those vaccines. to take delivery and manage the distribution and get them into people's arms. we are seeing many countries failing in that regard. we saw a million doses in nigeria past their expiration date this past week. the third problem that has been grossly underestimated and not well understood is vaccine hesitancy and refusal, which is

fueled by misinformation, disinformation, conspiracy theories and the like on social media and elsewhere. that problem is proving to be as significant in low and middle income country as in our own country, or we have 10% to 20% and higher of our population refusing to take vaccines. host: our guest is stephen morrison, director of the goebel health policy center and the center for strategic and international studies. we are talking about global and u.s. vaccination efforts we welcome your calls. for eastern and central, the number is (202) 748-8000. mount (202) 748-8001 is. in tracking the vaccinations worldwide, the new york times says that as of this morning,

57.3% of the global population has received at least one dose. as you pointed out, if you look graphically at the map, of those countries that have yet to receive, they are under 20% of the population, a large part of that is certainly in africa and some up into parts of asia as well. when this program started, where their higher hopes that those countries would have been vaccinated faster? we may have lost our guest momentarily. we will work to get stephen morrison back. we will take your calls at (202) 748-8000, eastern and time zone. (202) 748-8001 is mountain and

pacific. i understand you are back with us. guest: yes, i am. host: in tracking vaccinations around the world, the new york times says 57.3% of the world has received at least one dose. looking on the map, and you pointed out some of the countries as low as 7% of the population vaccinated, a large chunk of that in africa and into asia and parts of eastern europe as well, the question is -- when the covax program started, where there higher hopes that the vaccination rate would be on a faster timeline? guest: yes, of course. there were targets set earlier this year, some stimulated by the imf and other major institutions, set targets for having 10% vaccinated by the end

of september, 40% of the world's population by the end of the calendar year and 70% by next september. the reality is that for many, many countries those targets are simple he not going to be reached. they are unrealistic. we underestimated the power of nationalism and hoarding and the degree to which the marketplace for vaccines would be and transparent -- on transparent ro which simply the muscle and power of the most powerful and most prosperous countries would dominate. and so there's been some really hard lessons. and this -- and of course as we talked a moment ago, we underestimated the gaps in limited accessibility. it's a very complicated,

difficult situation. and the risk, of course, is that we will transition in the course of 2022 into very geographically differentiated world in which we have large populations and low and middle income countries where there is uncontrolled transmission and uncontrolled replication. if we have countries stuck at some middle zone of only 20% vaccination levels, that's not going to bring effective control over the pandemic. and that is the fear. that we are heading into a long war stretching out the next four or five years. the struggle will be how to overcome these obstacles and get to some level of control and begin to break this pattern where we are seeing dangerous variants appearing where there is uncontrolled transmission. host: that target you are

talking about had been 2 billion. the world health organization, the u.n. aiming for 800 million shots this year. the chart looking at that yesterday, there were just about 600 million. it looks here, the numbers that are out there. the two from china. johnson and johnson, moderna. astrazeneca with the biggest jump and one more from the institute of india which has a version of the astrazeneca. these other pharmaceutical companies that have not been able to ramp up their production to produce more of the vaccine, is that part of the problem as well? guest: we have seen steady increases in production capacity. we are going, of the western

vaccines we are seeing seven and a half billion doses. add china, russia. you are getting over 11 billion. those numbers are going to double. production capacity is ramping up dramatically. one of the big issues is trying to create a regionally attributed manufacturing capacity so that countries will have production nearby and it will be less disrupted by export bands and other measures to control supply chains. so there's a big push right now to create capacity for production in south africa, rwanda, senegal. places in latin america and asia. it's going to take time for those capacities to be stood up. it is a big debate over whether those are simply fill and finish. in together the final product with the product being produced

somewhere else. host: let's go to our callers. let's hear from brad in minnesota. caller: good morning. i wake up and i start listening to this and i just gotta explain to the viewers that the fact of the matter is that there is no more people dying today than there was from 20,000 that 2017, 2 thousand 18, 2019, 2020. 2020. there is no wuhan virus. why would you take a jab that would not protect you or stop you from transmitting it? what we are finding is that this is propaganda scaring us. you are seeing big pharma making billions of dollars. the gentleman that is up here talking, that's where he gets his income. that's where it's from, the

pharmaceutical companies. it's just, it is what it is. enjoy your day. host: care to address that? guest: the mortality in the united states, we are approaching 800,000 deaths. that number of 800,000 is an underestimate by at least 200,000 deaths. we've experienced here in the united states, that exceeds the 1919 spanish flu. worldwide numbers are over 5 million. the true numbers are probably between 10 and 20 million deaths worldwide. that number is expected to double in 2020 two. these numbers are not fake numbers. these are real numbers. they are real estimates. they are recorded cases, over

500 million court -- recorded cases. as to why take a vaccine? because even, it's still, even with delta and omicron coming upon us, the single most reliable way to avoid a severe illness and death is through vaccination along with the other steps that will enhance protection. the variants are threatening human protections that come from vaccines. we are now moving toward boosters. boosters, we know, are very effective in reducing severe illness and death from delta and we are beginning to discover the same with rick -- with respect to omicron. as my own dependency on the industry, i'm not paid for by the industry. i work and an independent

bipartisan pink tank in washington dc. host: our guest is next. caller: i have a question for either of you, there is a company out of california which is now operating in south africa trying to build vaccine plans therep --lants. this coming to some agreement with the baylor college of medicine and texas children's hospital. have got this off the internet. emphasizing boosting immunity, a wall of community that is durable. it includes killing the cell and

not just taking out the contagious hooks but killing the cell and boosting the t cell which blasts, right now they don't know the extent of its durability. but they have been stymied in the u.s. and this is on the internet. host: what is the name of the organization? caller: immunity bio. host: have you heard of them? guest: i'm not familiar with that specific firm. it there are firms that are forming partnerships in places like south africa, rwanda, senegal. there are institutions in senegal. aspen which is a south african

production firm that is partnering with external vaccine manufacturers. and i think we will see more and more of that happening in the future. there are many american biotech firms that are currently in that sector and i would expect to see more of that. the united states government is, through its developing finance corporation, tempting to help in the financing of some of these ventures. also very promising. host: announcing an additional $400 million for the global vaccine campaign including $315 million of that for vaccine delivery, $10 million for vaccine manufacturing and $75 million for additional funds for

the rapid response support by usaid. you mentioned doses going bad act -- bad, expiring in nigeria. how often has that been the case? guest: it's been more common. it has been the experience of countries taking receipt of vaccines, realizing they were not going to be able to distribute them in the timeframe permitted and turning them back. the democratic republic of, go -- of congo turned away a large delivery for that very reason. we are beginning to see accounts of spoilage. i don't think the spoilage test reached a huge scale, but it's a concern because but we are going to see as we talked about earlier is a significant expansion, ramp ramp-up of

delivery of vaccines into middle and lower income countries. it is an understandable anxiety right now to make sure that the capacities are there. there is a rush to try to understand what needs to be created for governments to come up with their own national plan. because it involves regulatory oversight it -- site -- oversight. it requires management oversight and health care workforce. health care workforce including our own is exhausted, fatigued and depleted. many people have left in exhaustion and frustration from the health sector. we have to be very attentive to that dimension, in particular human dimension of delivery in these countries that 400 me and dollar usaid program is welcome. it is much needed.

fraction of what is really required. the united states is doing more than any other country and rising to the occasion. we've invested about $18 billion in the last year or so toward different forms of the response, but much more is going to be needed looking ahead. host: let's hear from jeff in new york. caller: thank you. i have a comment about basically the entire responsive solution for the world of covid. i think people need to step back and look at the historical his specs that we -- look at the historical aspects. we knew for 20 years that there was going to be a pandemic somewhere along the scale of 1918.

exercises that were held for 20 years are indicated that capacities were not here -- were not there. the problem with that is we weren't prepared. that's what you pointed to. health care systems get overrun, the workforce is depleted. we don't have the capacity. more importantly, we don't have the trust. we don't have the trust of the people because basically the political inventors have politicized the issue. if you give me a moment, -- political banterers have politicized the issue. basically, it's a means of separating to the public health infrastructure capacity building

to an organization there will be funded off budgets just by the federal reserve system so that it cannot be politicized and it would simply take the money just the way the federal system -- -- federal reserve system does and accountable to congress and spend it on all the public health and researcher. it will also provide for committee participation and everybody's well-being because they would be partnering with adequate workforce and every single community to respond to outbreak and public health. host: response from our guest, stephen morris. guest: i think jeff's points are very apt and quite accurate. we, here in the united states and other countries, have dealt with these health security threats in a very inconsistent way. we tend to fall into a cycle of

crisis response followed by complacency and neglect and we are at risk of experiencing that same pattern in this instance. so we've under invested in this sort of capacity to detect respond -- detect, respond and event these dangerous new pathogens coming up and disrupting our lives, our economy, our security. and we really need to face up to that now. united states was estimated to have the highest level of preparedness by the one estimate the threat -- the nuclear threat initiative that came out just before the pandemic struck. but yet we are proving to be among the guest -- the last -- proving to be among the less prepared. trust is an enormously important dimension. confidence in science.

has to be rebuilt in a systematic way. stumbled, have been attacked, have seen public trust and confidence in them erode and that is dangerous. i do believe that americans across the political divide share a certain common consensus , a certain amount of common sense that we have not done very well in this theory. most can agree that this has been a really difficult. that's a really difficult period and we need to focus on a capacity.

we need to rebuild those caller: --caller: a lot of people brought up some points that i agree with and a lot of it is, you know, the vexing hesitancy and i will give you some real solid reasons why this that's why there is serious hesitancy. our government, and it seems that as though our medical system entirely ignores natural immunity and the way this virus is, it's very similar to the chickenpox as far as i have been able to tell in my research. it is durable t cell immunity with a whole bunch of the spite cells that are in the virus so not recognizing natural immunity which by all studies shows is the best position for a human

being to be in to fight covid. number one. number two, very early on in the study there were some countries having great success with people testing positive for covid, specifically south korea. they were using two doses, two mild doses for hydrochloric and that they have no deaths and no cases early on. that lasted for a while. that until the u.s. government got involved and told them to stop using it. this is proof. there is a peer review report about how all these other reports were intentionally made to make it look bad. move on to iver machen. this is -- this is an absolute proven safe drug that wipes out

the dot that wipes out the virus if taken at the right time. but what we are doing and it's right on a flow chart the cdc for people that do in the medical industry, way for people to get so sick that they have to go into the hospital and then if it looks like they get worse, let's hit them with remdesivir. host: ok we will hear from our guest. guest: there are several points that dan has made. in terms of natural immunity and natural immunity from infection does provide some level of perfection -- south protection, but scientific studies are showing that immunity erodes fairly rapidly, far more rapidly than the immunity required through -- acquired through a.

there is certainly a third of americans have been infected and they carry some level of immunity, but as we are seeing with delta, with the breaker cases, after several months those protections fall away and we are seeing. we are at about 130 -- an arc of those current waves in america starts in the southwest and the four corners states and extends up to the upper midwest and into the northeast. 120,000 cases a day. at 1200 deaths. many, the vast majority of those cases are either unvaccinated or people who are getting reinfected who had some level of immunity protection from their earlier protections, but that is fallen apart. we are seeing in south africa with omicron, almost vertical

spike in infections and that is shocking to be will because they expected that the last wave, which infected a large portion of south africans was going to provide protection. but omicron is tearing through that population. it does not provide protection. what we are seeing in scientific studies of omicron is that the best protection you can receive is through a booster shot, which the laboratory tests that are coming forward are showing. that is your single best protection. the next best protection is being fully vaccinated with one of the high-quality vaccines that are fused -- that are approved. on hydroxychloroquine and iver machen, there is no scientific proof that either of those are

effective. quite the contrary, iver machen can be quite dangerous. host: south africa dr. says that omicron is milder than delta. what are you hearing? guest: well, let's just, there's three questions that people are attempting to answer about omicron since it first appeared a month ago in south africa. it has now become the dominant strain there. 57 countries, it is been discovered and verified in over two dozen states in the united states. it is moving very rapidly into the u.k. and europe. there are three questions. is it more transmissible, more contagious, does it move faster? number two, is it able to evade immune protection and carry immunity?

third, does it cause more severe or less severe disease? those three questions, we are seeing data come in from early studies and so it's still not complete. we fed studies here in the united states, in japan, sweden, south africa. south of that south africa has had the most detail. u.k.. and what are those results showing us? it's too early to say whether or not omicron is less severe or the same level of disease profile as delta or more. it is to that it is pretty mature to say that. some of the data is coming from populations like south africa where i very young population that is been admitted to that admitted into the hospital. there is a lag time in understanding severe disease and death. there is several weeks before we

can begin to conclude. we have to be very cautious. i think it's premature to jump to a conclusion that it is more severe or less severe. i think we need to take a middle position and be cautious and vigilant. i think it's -- i think it's pretty clear, if i could just finish, it's pretty clear this is a very fast-moving and highly transmissible. exactly how much more is still being weighed. in terms of ability to evade protection, there's a lot of evidence accumulating that it does evade detections from prior infection and it evades protections from that prior vaccination. host: do you think some of the reporting on that that there is mild case in south africa that some kind -- that sometimes can influence people's decision in that country? hearing that it's mild, i'm not going to get the vaccine. or the reverse of that.

i'm hearing it serious so i'm going to get vaccinated. guest: i think all of his early data concedes people's predilections and can perhaps steer people in a direction we don't necessarily intend to be signaling that. and that's why i say it's premature to say oh this is going to be milder form and we will learn to live with this. one would hope that this virus will evolve in that direction over time and there are other precedents that may suggest this is true. this is another world with the coronavirus and we need to be very cautious. it remains to be seen. some of the world's best scientists are saying the disease profile is quite likely to remain pretty much the same as delta. the other point i want to make is if this, let's imagine this is in fact slightly milder.

in the disease profile, and the severity. but it's able to evade protection and is able to move much faster. what that means is you are going to have 50 million americans infected pretty rapidly if it becomes dominant in the united states. when you get to that large number, inevitably you are going to get high numbers of hospitalizations, extreme illness and death because you have a large enough population of people that are quite vulnerable. host: let's hear from diane in miami florida. caller: i wanted to ask a question very simple question. i understand that the vaccine took three months to develop. number one. why are the pharmaceutical companies and the insurance companies not covering for side

effects from this shot? number one. also, in africa the shot was given and 10 years later women there cannot have babies. host: wishart are you talking about? caller: 10 years ago, bill gates was in africa. he gave shots to women, and it's been spoken about. it depopulation. my main question is why aren't the pharmaceutical and insurance companies covering side effects? companies insisting on people, their employees, getting the shot. host: let's go there. stephen morrison, any final

comments on that? guest: i think diane is raising issues around side effects of vaccines. vaccines, there's no perfect vaccine. there is no vaccine that doesn't have some level of side effects. the question is what is the safety profile, risk tolerance? we've gone to enormous links to insist the united states -- in norma's lengths the united states that were carried out in a record case and that has distressed. what we've seen in the profile of these vaccines that they've been introduced upon millions of people is a remarkable safety record. we are not seeing the proliferation of large numbers

of dangerous side effects from the vaccines that have been approved for use here in the united states. we are fortunate in that regard. we have to remain highly vigilant about this because we may discover some things over time and we are still in the midst of this long war. we are going to likely be, as this virus becomes endemic, we are likely to be going through boosters pretty regularly. the long-range issues are going to be with us around what are the health consequences. there are unknowns out there. i think diane's concerns are legitimate. and we need to be very vigilant as we move forward. and we need to insist that our agencies that are there to protect americans are doing their job well. host: stephen morrison is the director of the center for strategic and international studies global health policy

center. . for our remaining half hour, we will open up the phone lines to hear from you on the topics we have discussed so far. global vacillation, defense spending or other -- global vaccination, defense spending. the lot delight -- the line for republicans, 202-748-8000. democrats, 202-748-8001 independent, 202-748-8002. we will be right back. >> this week, congress returns for the shorter workweek because of the holiday break. the senate takes up a bill increasing the countries that limit. the senate also continues work on the defense bill. on monday 7 p.m. eastern on c-span, investigating the january 6 attack on the capital. it needs to consider citing mark meadows.

for refusing to cooperate with the investigation. the confirmation hearing for to be commissioner of the food and drug manager asian. -- administration. airline ceo the impact of the coronavirus pandemic other industry. watch this week on the c-span network. or you can watch our full coverage on c-span now. her head over to c-span.org for scheduling -- head over to c-span.org for scheduling information. c-span. your unfiltered view of government. ♪ >> c-span offers a variety of broadcasts. weekdays, washington today gives you the latest from the nation's

capital. and every week, in-depth interviews with writers about their latest works. the weekly uses audio from our archives to look at how issues of the day developed over the years. our series features extensive conversations with historians about their lives and work. many of our television programs are also available in podcast. you can find them all at the c-span now mobile apps or wherever you get your podcast. >> washington journal continues. host: it will be arpin -- it will be open from and till 10:00 eastern -- open forum until 10:00 eastern. military spending and more. public policy issues or news items you are following. republicans, 202-748-8000. democrats, 202-748-8001. independent and others 202-748-8002. just a brief update, on the

terrifying tornado that tore through arkansas, missouri and particularly through kentucky, this is the headline at this hour from the courier-journal out of louisville. we were trapped. survivors accounts their escape. bringing out bodies and survivors. we understand in mayfield, kentucky, and updated report. this is printed or online, on the report this morning from the associated press. a photo from that article. they write in the article that rescuers comb through the fields of wreckage across the middle of the u.s. leaving dozens dead and communities in despair. a twister that could rival the longest on record as the storm front messed apart a candle factory, rushed a nursing home

and flattened in amazon distribution center. "i pray there will be another rescue. i pray there will be another one or two, -- one or two." your calls, let's go to north carolina. first up is carol on the line. go ahead. caller: i was trying to get through to the doctor, but you guys ran out of time. this whole coronavirus thing, i thought would end once the president gets office because what i want to know is back in january 11, 2000 17 it looks like where he had said no doubt, trump will face an outbreak. how would he know that in 2017 that this was going to happen

two years later? do you really take it as truth? look where it's going. it's going to go all the way till the midterm. it makes no sense. you get a shot, you can still give it to somebody else. now we've got all these boosters. and polio was so long ago. they keep comparing it to covid. this isn't 1913 or 31. this is all ridiculous. people need to think, when stump -- when someone starts like this , while in the world would you be leave anything that's why would you believe the government about anything? host: democrats line. caller: are you ready? can you hear me? host: yes we can. go ahead. caller: i have an issue. the masking. you don't hear enough about it.

i'm a navy retiree. i studied it in jacksonville, florida. i know what i'm talking about. i wish you would put somebody on there that knows that masking prevents spread of the vaccine. simple as that. host: to can in arizona. --ken in arizona. caller: your previous speaker, i can't believe he said natural immunity is not as good as the vaccine. that is strictly not science. he is lying to the american people and your audience. host: this is a story related to the tornadoes, the washington post. the link between climate change and storms. they write that meteorologists

surveying damage to determine whether this past week's storm was a single tornado or several. if it was a single tornado traveling on the ground without interruption, it will rank as the longest tornado in the u.s. history in the course of four states as the death toll is expected to swell, it will become the deadliest on record. the deadliest december outbreak occurred on december 5, 1953 which killed 38 people in mississippi. departures in the zone ravaged by tornadoes rose into the 70's to near 80 degrees on friday afternoon. providing the conditions for but severe thunderstorms to develop that night. dozens of record highs were set that day and states hit hardest. memphis, temperature soared to 79 degrees breaking a 103-year-old record. to our republican line from texas, go ahead. caller: thank you.

i'm just curious. first of all, the news media is pushing these shots constantly to the united states americans, or the people in the united states. so i want to set -- so i want to know if this is so important, why are we being flooded in texas with all the illegals. they are not just from mexico. they are from all the countries, and they have not had vaccinations. so is the rise in the virus now, are they putting these people and all these other states and is this causing it? i don't understand. host: what part of texas? caller: west of san antonio. and i was born and raised on the border in the valley.

this is something we would like to know about. host: dana, flint, michigan. caller: i vote democratic, but in my heart i'm independent. there's a lot of good republicans, good democrats everywhere. the woman who spoke about trump and his knowledge of the coronavirus two years before, i suspected maybe he and are involved in this catastrophe. i believe some dictators plan 10 years ahead of anything that they really want to be able to change. negatively, but as far as the shooting and death in california , the movie.

host: alec baldwin? caller: yes, what we have to connect the dots. i think that maybe there is sabotage, truly i do believe, especially in this era. misogyny, hatred for women, disconnect with william -- disconnect with william -- disconnect from women. stay positive. take care of our bodies. by the time he decides to, if he decides to run 2036, we will be ready. thank you. host: this is from bloomberg. they have a vaccine tracker. covid-19 tracker says the biggest vaccination campaign in

history is underway. 184 countries according to, the latest rate was roughly 42.8 million doses per day. good morning, ron. caller: all the people they got the vaccine already, if you've got to be persuaded, bullied, pressured, like to, shamed, threatened you know it's not in your best interest. they are dropping in the middle of the field of their sport. host: tom is in pennsylvania. hello there. caller: hello.

unfortunately, what i have to say is probably the most important thing that needs to be said this week. that is on this day of december 12 and the year of our lord, and i want everybody to hear this because the most powerful people in the world listen to c-span. not only that, the enemies of america listen to c-span. that is it is more safer and easier to operate a store in iraq today than it is in san francisco or los angeles. i just want everyone to think about what i just say. you can operate and safely shop easier in baghdad, iraq. baghdad, iraq. then in los angeles california. who's fault is that? is that trump's fault? i don't know. host: tom, where'd you get the

information on this in terms of buys -- business licenses in baghdad versus san francisco? >> caller: -- my buddy is a third-party defense contractor there. he said you can walk the streets. you walk to san francisco, louis vuitton has boarded up buildings. they don't worry about pronouns in these other countries. i take that back. you know what the pronouns are? dead americans. that's the pronouns. host: washington journal. this is an updated story on, kentucky governor expects the death toll to rise. governor beshear says he expects the death toll to rise. he told jake tapper that more than 80 kentuckians have died as a result of the severe weather conditions that worn that the number is going to exceed more than 100. he says this is the deadliest

tornado event we have ever had. i think it is going to be the deadliest and longest tornado event in u.s. history. marion heights, pennsylvania, frank is next up. independent line. caller: hello. host: good morning. go ahead. caller: i have a question about the last caller. i don't know where he is gathering his studies from. his information. it meant definitely doesn't work. i know people personally, they have loved ones in the hospital with covid and they wanted them to have ever met them in history -- ever make 10 -- and i don't see why not so i know people that snuck it in the hospital with vitamin c, vitamin d and zinc and they ended up getting cured in two days.

host: independent line, good morning. caller: my comment has to do with covid-19 and the variant and it's kind of out there but i was thinking about it. could countries be sprayed with a minimum amount of vaccine missed that would ramp up people's immune system to stop covid-19 and the variant? people would be ok healthwise with the spray, but the variant would be muted to a level of say a common cold. and i thank you. it might be quicker. host: do you know if that is even possible? to deliver the vaccine in that manner? caller: i don't know, but i just thought we spray, we sprayed

mosquitoes to prevent malaria. we sprayed, we used agricultural to prevent harmful insects from destroying our crops. i just thought maybe sprain would help, at a minimum. it wouldn't hurt people, but it wouldn't ramp up their immune systems and host: to brad, international falls, minnesota. caller: good morning. i got to speak earlier to your guests and he's made, they always make these goofy host: i'm going to let you go. you got through earlier today. the rule on the program is one call per 30 days. answer: again, but call back in

30 days. edward is in battle creek michigan. caller: i keep reading hit -- horrendous things about the planning of the attack on the capital, january 6. and now the latest thing is they've leaked this powerpoint that explains 40 different steps how to overthrow previous election. mark meadows is involved with this. some people in texas were involved. lawyers in texas wrote up a 36 page powerpoint. they released two pages. one called for declaring that there was interference, it's loony. enter parents from venezuela and cuba. -- interference from venezuela and cuba. host: election denier who circulated powerpoint as he met with meadows at the white house.

retired u.s. colonel proposal to challenge the 2020 election by declaring national security emergency. says he visited the white house on multiple occasions after the election, spoke with president donald trump's chief of staff maybe eight to 10 times. phil waldron was working with trump's outside lawyers and was part of a team that briefed the lawmakers on a powerpoint presentation detailing options for 6 jan. focus on his claims of interference in the vote as discussions for the white house. made its way to the white house, chief of staff mick nash mark meadows on january 5. that information surfaced publicly after the congressional committee investigating released a letter that said meadows

turned the documents over to the committee. up is bradley in marietta georgia, good morning. caller: the callers calling in today and our country is tearing itself apart. fox news, the republican party has dumbs down our population to the point they are still the leg being in hydroxychloroquine. i don't know what to say, but get boosted. we try to sit back and wait for these neurons to die off. host: to the independent line, jacksonville, florida. it is open forum. go ahead. caller: i guess i want to link up the first topic that you have the state of american democracy. and the last caller took a little bit of what i was going

to say. i want to link up the first topic with the last topic about covid-19. i don't know if the american democracy has serious problems and a lot of it has to do with straight up disinformation and lies and conspiracy theories and so far that are being -- and so forth that are being spread. the right wing news channels and so forth. the lady they called up a little while ago talking about the conspiracy theories between fauci and the timing of the election and all of that. this is just nutty lot this nonsense. she left out the reason why she thought the virus was going to be gone after the election. that's because a year ago, just over a year ago, the conspiracy theory at that time that trump was spreading is a day after the election, the virus is going to be gone. trump, ted cruz and the usual worth spreading these conspiracy

theories. it allowed people to actually does a lot of people actually believed it. the latest conspiracy theory, the democrats are doing all of this just again or power, to gain more advantage in the next election. i believe in free speech and all of that as much as the next guy, but when it comes to people's lives, i think the government possibly should play a role in stopping some of this disinformation. it's real simple. when you scare people with lies, less people will get the vaccine which is going to lead to more deaths. shows on fox news. puts out garbage stuff like thousands of people have died from the vaccine which is a complete and total misrepresents and -- total misrepresentation.

i'm just giving you one example of the vast amount of conspiracy theories out there. i mean, i think, you know, people have a right to their own opinion and so forth, but free speech has limits. you can't cry fire in a crowded theater because people can get killed. for the same reason, there may be a need to limit the amount of so-called free speech that some of these so-called news outlets are putting out because people are dying as a result. we've had a vaccine now for a year. last time i checked, almost all the people in the hospital, 90% are there because they didn't have the vaccine, ok. host: thanks for your call. this from the new york post this morning amazon warehouse collapsed as part of that tornado. jeff bezos response the edwardsville amazon warehouse

death. they said jeff bezos said he was heartbroken over the death of at least six amazon employees and an illinois it warehouse hit by a tornado on friday. the amazon down there was blasted on social media earlier saturday for failing to mention the deli answered in -- the deadly incident. the news from edwardsville is tragic, he said in a statement. we are heartbroken over the loss of our teammates and our thoughts and prayers are with their families and loved ones. kennesaw, georgia. go ahead. caller: this is just a comment on bradley from marietta. i also live in cobb county and i'm not surprised of bradley's comments because marietta has turned into a communist enclave

sewing course -- so of course he would convince everybody to get the vaccine and follow the government's policy and do exactly as they're told. that's my comment. host: getting the comment means you're a communist? caller: certainly not. everybody should be able to make their own mind. my comment is that i'm certainly not surprised that bradley's comments because i also live in cobb county so no that's not what i meant. host: to diana in california. republican line. go ahead. caller: donald trump is still president of the united states. i headlock, desk glaucoma surgery. -- i had, surgery. host: you are getting a little confused. make sure you mute your television. caller: joe biden and kamala harris tried to imply that i

had. i never had transgender surgery. host: for republicans, 202-748-8001. 202-748-8002 for democrats. for the washington post, one way to reform the u.s. house. americans and serving the members in action generally don't end up wishing there were more of them. the house is dysfunctional and intensely polarized. its members often seem like the embodiment of what is gone ron -- gone wrong in our politics. and yet, for just that reason, it is time to expand the house. the framers of the constitution assumed we would do that regularly, we have now failed to do that for an more than a century. as the nation grew, the house expanded by statute after senses

throughout the 19th century. it reached its size in 1913 when each of its 435 members represented about 210 thousand people. the numbers have not increased since then even as the country's population has more than tripled. and that has changed the very meaning of representation in congress. apiece -- available at the washington post. here is lori in pennsylvania. go ahead. caller: make sure you mute your volume and go ahead with your comment. democrats line. caller: my only comment, it sounds like the average iq of people calling in his eight. as long as you guys are talking

about conspiracy theories, the disease that's a lot larger and it apathy. everyone knows somebody who has died or has had covid. if you can think about somebody other than yourself for a few minutes and just get the shot. it's not a communist takeover. it's a shock protect people. host: i appreciate that call. we will get to lori on -- lori in pennsylvania. caller: thanks for calling my call. i turned down the volume. i think a lot of what is happening is we forgot we remember we used to volume nurses -- valued nurses, teachers, sciences, doctors. today, everyone is so quick to lame each other and find fault with each other that we forgot how to work together and respect -- and respect each other. the fault lies with our

respondent's representatives because they capitalize on it. they keep us angry and apart from debating because they stay in their office outlet. it's becoming really dangerous what they are doing. some of the stuff that our representatives say, it's downright dangerous. and i'm not, i don't want to yell out against a certain party. i would like to see a new show with a couple of people on one side, a couple of people on another side, and let them talk about it without yelling and calling people names. but finding factual facts and finding respect for teachers and doctors and nurses and scientists. let them work on this disease. they knew that one day something like this would happen.

they knew this was going to happen. they've been studying it for decades. host: thanks for your call this morning. stephen is an -- on the independent line. caller: i would like to make a comment on how this country is totally being torn apart by the news media itself. and the intelligence of the normal people is being insulted by the news media. it seems like, hello? host: we are here. caller: it seems like they are pitting individual person regardless of party or race or religious beliefs, and constitutionally they are breaking a lot of constitutional laws, the people who are in charge or so-called leaders and are never held accountable for

it. if a man with still a tv or a woman a loaf of bread, you would see jail time. i would like to say talking on the streets to a lot of people and cultures and getting to know people from different areas, it seems like a lot of people have the consensus you better be on the right side of the ditch when the gunfire starts in this country when there is an a people because on -- because constitutionally, the january 6 wrapped they are putting out there, we have the right to overturn our government. we have the right to any means to overturn to radical government. host: gotta let you go there. thank for all your calls this morning. we are back tomorrow morning at 7:00 eastern and hope you are. enjoy the rest of your weekend. ♪

announcer: c-span's washington journal. every day we take your calls live on the air on the news of the day and discuss policy issues that impact you. monday morning, the government accountability office discusses a new report on bullying, hate crimes and other hostile behavior in schools. the chief medical advisor of the bipartisan policy center talks about the latest on the coronavirus pandemic and a new report on how to improve the u.s. public health system. watch washington journal live at 7:00 eastern monday morning on c-span or c-span now, our new mobile app. join the discussion with your phone calls, facebook comments, text messages and tweets.

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50th anniversary of president nixon's trip to china, russia, the ending of the vietnam war, and the signing of the paris peace accords, the yom kippur war and watergate. we as a foundation build educational experiences at events and conferences around these types of programs, or i should say these 50th anniversary programs, and then we push those across social media. it is working. we hear from young people that say, gosh, i did not know about that. or, you know, i had only heard there was this thing called watergate. i didn't know president nixon was the first president to reach an arms control with the soviet union. there are real learnings being had and that supports our mission. announcer: jim byron tonight at 8:00 eastern on c-span's q&a.

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