stephen breyer's retirement, decreasing the public confidence in the high court. join the discussion with your phone calls, facebook comments and tweets. washington journal starts now. host: good morning from washington, everyone, on this sunday, january 30. we're going to begin our conversations this morning with your healthcare experience during the pandemic. did you delay a procedure or avoid a healthcare visit? did you have trouble accessing healthcare during this pandemic, or did you or others contract covid-19 and have to go to the doctor? we want to hear from you this morning. we've divided the lines regionally. if you live in the eastern, central part of the country, 202-748-8000. mountain and pacific,

202-748-8001. you can also text us, share your story at 202-748-8003. you can also post it on facebook.com/ cspan or send us a tweet with the handle, @cspanwj. your experience with healthcare during the pandemic, that's our conversation. we'll get to your phone calls and your texts and your tweets in just a minute, but first, healthcare news. "washington post's" amy goldstein reporting this week sign ups in affordable care act marketplaces reached record 14.5 million. amy goldstein is the national healthcare policy reporter for the "washington post," joining us this morning to talk about the news. so, amy goldstein, why? why was there this record reached? guest: good to be with you, greta. well, as you were saying, this is the most people who ever signed up during a regular

annual enrollment period for affordable care act health insurance, either through healthcare .gov or state marketplaces that are run under the affordable care act. and we don't know yet exactly why people signed up, but the obama administration thinks than administration, it's early in the morning, the biden administration thinks they had a lot to do with it. they're saying that health plans now are more affordable because people can get a little bit larger federal subsidies for the monthly premiums, and this administration, unlike during the trump era, put a lot more effort into outreach so people knew this was the time of year to sign up. host: did congress, in their recent covid-19 relief bills, do anything to booster the affordable care act in the exchanges? guest: they actually did. you know, there have been several coronavirus relief laws that congress has passed since the spring of 2020, and early

last spring the one that congress passed included something that hadn't happened before in the 10 years of the affordable care act, which was that they increased the amount of the federal subsidies, and they made them available for the first time to people with a little bit higher incomes. and the administration says at least that that made things easier for people to get coverage. now, the catch is that those improved subsidies last only until the end of this year that's just begun. the big question whether congress is going to make those improvements longer lasting. host: overall, what's been the trajectory of the affordable care act since its inception? guest: well, the law was passed in 2010, and these market places opened the beginning of 2014. so we're now a good way through a decade of this health

insurance. it's never insured that many of the people with health plans in this country. these plans are designed for people who can't get affordable health benefits through a job. and people might remember that the first sign-up period in the fall of 2013 into early 2014 was a bit of a mess. there were all kinds of computer troubles. but they eventually settled down. the previous high was in 2016 when there were nearly 12.7 million people who signed up. so this year it's almost two million more than that. during the trump years, that administration, you might recall, really did not like this law, and they did a number of things to try to weaken the marketplace as they shortened the sign-up period, they cut money for things called navigators who are people who coach people who are trying to sign up. they did a lot of things to try to make it harder. the involvement never dipped

that much. it never dipped below 11 million, but 14.5 million is a new record. host: why are people -- is it the pandemic that people are getting healthcare, that didn't get it before? guest: well, we don't exactly know yet who these people are. we know that in certain states, including several states that had not expanded medicaid under the affordable care act as most states did, have particularly large sign-ups. so perhaps there are people in those states who had lost jobs during the pandemic with all the economic chaos that this virus has brought along with it, and they realized that they could get these health plans now through the federal system. but we don't yet really know who's been signing up. host: you mentioned this exchange, this act is for people who don't have it through their jobs. are you seeing any trends where

companies are saying we can't afford to offer you health care, but we will help you with the subsidy to go get healthcare from the affordable care act? guest: you know, some of the opponents thought that might happen. it was a term called crowd out, that employers would just say we're going to stop because you've got another way of getting insured. that really didn't happen very much. and there were predictions at the beginning of the pandemic that the number of people with job-based coverage was going to plummet. the most recent figures that are kind of the gold standard for health insurance in numbers in this country is the u.s. census. the most recent numbers, which came out early last fall, showed that there had been a little bit of decline in job-based numbers and a little bit of an up tick in public programs. more medicaid than the insurance exchange at that point. but they were basically continuing existing trends, so

it's not entirely clear that the pandemic brought about huge changes in that, but the pandemic did cause millions of people to lose their jobs, and with it, their health coverage. host: amy goldstein is the national healthcare policy reporter with "the washington post." thank you for getting up early. we appreciate it. guest: good to be with you. host: we'll turn to your views here this morning. maybe you're one of those people that decided to get your insurance through the affordable care act and help reach those numbers of 14.5 million. or are you somebody who could not access healthcare during this pandemic? look at this from ucla, health.org, they found in a study access to vital healthcare services fell during covid, particularly for poorer americans. so this is something that the health and human services secretary javier basser adiscussed at a virtually event

last week and how this has really caused, this pandemic has caused a further exposure of healthcare inequities in the united states. here's the healthcare secretary. >> in a way, we've identified, we finally have been able to uncover where some of those gaps in our healthcare system, our public health system lie. no one can deny that our healthcare system was too porous. covid exposed that. so now that we know and now that we know where some of those gaps are, it's up to us to close those gaps. when i came into office a year ago, it was in may i got reports the number of americans who were receiving vaccines, white americans at that point in may, two out of every three white americans had at least one shot of one of the vaccines. african-americans, just a little over half, about 54% or so. l.a. afternoon owe americans, about 55%.

we got to work, because again, those are the gaps. and today, at least as of the end of december, the latest numbers that we've gotten, 83% of white americans have received at least one shot. 82% of african-americans now have received at least one shot. and latinos, 84% have received one shot. and so we went out there, and also, it was no accident. that's the kind of stuff we need to do. we can see where the gaps are, and it's on us to make sure we reach out to everyone, about where they are instead of waiting for them to come to us. host: health and human services secretary xavier becerra. did you feel them during the pandemic? we're asking you this morning your experience with healthcare during the pandemic. here's how we've divided the lines regionally this morning. so dial in, eastern and central part of the country, mountain/pacific. you can also text to 202-748-8003. we'll take some of those texts and your tweets with the handle,

@cspanwj or go to facebook.com/cspan. another issue is telehealth. that became a bigger issue during the pandemic. here's a headline from the "new york times." telehealth became a lifeline for older americans, but it still has glitches. the commerce committee last fall held a hearing on expanding telehealth. we want to show you a portion of that hearing. here's republican senator john thune. as a resident of a rural state, i've long been a proponent of telehealth. if you live in a major city, you usually don't have to think too much about where you'll find a doctor if you need one. that's not always the case for americans in rural areas. the smallest towns in america access to specialty care can be a challenge. the only providers may be primary care providers, nurses, pharmacists. these providers are essential to

rural families in times when specialty dare is needed. when there isn't a specialist close by, telehealth can get patients to the mel care they need from a remote location through the use of technology. telehealth services are also critical in nursing home facilities. in my state, we have strong programs designed to bring on-demand support into facilities to help avoid unnecessary emergency department transfers. by reducing unnecessary senior hospitalizations, i should say by reducing them the rush act would facilitate more arrangements like we have in south dakota allowing groups to collaborate with nursing homes, provide telehealth services through a alternative payment model. i'm also pleased to support the bipartisan connect for health act, which claims to expand telehealth services through medicare and is supported by more than half of the united states senate. bipartisan cares act played an important role in further expanding access to telehealth throughout the covid-19 pandemic, and i look forward to continuing the conversation with

my colleagues at the senate finance committee on the path forward for medicare reimbursement post-pandemic. i will continue to advocate for the expansion of broadband services, which has allowed more patients in rural areas to take advantage of telehealth services. it is critical that any additional broadband funding goes to truly underserved areas to expand the next generation services like telehealth. host: from a hearing last fall on telehealth. is that how you accessed healthcare during the pandemic? brent in midland, texas, you're up first. good morning to you. what has been your experience with healthcare during the pandemic? caller: well, i'm actually a ludite, so that means i do not like technology and never used a computer in my life, so i have to call up and wait for a lock time. it's hard to get appointments. it's really worthless, and i can't get tests. it's just ridiculous. i've never used a computer and never going to. i don't know how they expect

everyone to get access to all these things. i try to call and sit on the phone for hours. no one answers. they hang up the phone. this biden administration is out of control, absolutely terrible. nothing they do is working. host: brent, what appointments have you tried to make and have you skipped any appointments? caller: i've had appointments cancelled because people are losing their jobs because of the mandate. and i've had appointments -- i've never cancelled an appointment. it's hard for me to get an appointment because i've never used a car, never had a bank account, never had a credit card. so i have almost no way to get to these appointments. it's absolutely ridiculous. host: ok, we'll go to mike in chesapeake, virginia. mike, your experience with healthcare during the pandemic. caller: hello, greta. how are you? host: i'm fine. caller: my doctor and my healthcare system here was very good with me. i got the covid. it was very terrible. i got covid. my son got covid.

but my healthcare provider, she did a real good job. they wouldn't let you in the office and stuff, but, you know, at first. but for follow-up or checkup, they had like one room devoted to the covid, and that's where you went to. but they did the best they could. there was like you couldn't get no therapeutics or anything because they didn't have any. but they did what they could and went home and you suffered through it. that was probably the worst thing i ever got was this covid. host: so you didn't have to go to the hospital? caller: no, i got the vaccines and i would strong urge people to get the vaccinations, because i truly believe that saved my life. because i have asthma, and i was so scared to get covid because i didn't have the vaccine at

first, and when they come out i got the moderna, and that messed me up for like two or three days. it was like you got everything, it all the symptoms of covid. it's like it went through your body and you got kind of sick with every little thing. but from what i understand, that was like maybe your body getting used to the vaccination. i can't get the booster, because i got the covid. she won't let me get the booster yet. so i'm a little scared about that. host: yeah, and i heard you cough, mike. is it still lingering? caller: yeah, probably. and we had the big snowstorm, so it's cold, and i have to work in the snow sometimes the past two weeks been real rough as we have to make sure all the equipment is ready to run and everything. the cold doesn't help. some days when i go to work, it's like the covid is still

lingering, because you get real fatigued real quick. some people, they seem to get over it better than other people. my wife seems to be better than i. her experience was a little better than mine, even though she got real sick that weekend. she slept the whole weekend, she was so fatigued. host: during this, your doctors just checking in on you over the phone? caller: well, i don't use a lot of the telehealth stuff, but they did. they called me on the phone. they had me come in. they checked me. of course, like i said, i give kudos to the medical people, because the nurse came out and checked me, and she was all garbed up in safety equipment, but they came to the car and checked me, you know, took the test, took the test and went back into their building. on the way home, the quick test, she calls and said, well, you're

ok. then the next day she called back and said the longer acting test, you're not ok. so i was like. host: mike, i'm happy to hear you and your wife have recovered. all right, let's go to called well, new jersey. hi, larry. caller: good morning, greta. short after i retired, i went, i got a cool coppy, then i went to my dentist, went to an ear doctor that didn't take medicare, because i had already signed up for medicare, he's a good ear doctor, but we've been fairly fortunate. we haven't really been going out that much. my wife has been to her dentist several times. and it's difficult. but i think part of the responsibility, if not all of it, lies with the people that fought obamacare, that did everything they could to derail the process that initially was a

good process, and i feel that hopefully everybody will come to terms with the fact that they need the vaccinations. it will help the whole country. host: so you are not then avoiding your normal checkup, your vaccinations or your shots and all that stuff. you've been doing that during the pandemic and staying current. caller: fairly, yeah. no more than normal. i typically only went for a yearly checkup. but i have friends that were in some sort of ill health and did go constantly to doctors. and they seem to fare well, although two of my friends had to get the ant bodies when they got covid. because their health required it. host: ok. well, thank you for calling in this morning. appreciate it. some headlines to share with you

related to what we were just talking about. this is npr's headline, with hospitals crowded from covid, one in five american families delay healthcare. and then you have this abc study, study raises renewed alarm about missed cancer diagnosis during the pandemic. and then there's this from web m.d., americans missed almost 10 million cancer screenings during the pandemic. are you one of those people? we're asking your experience with healthcare during this covid-19 pandemic. barney in florida, we'll go to you next. good morning. caller: my experience was great. i took my shots of everything. and what we really need to realize, we ought to congratulate barack obama for the healthcare that he brought to the united states. the man deserve a great round of

applause. if it was not for obama, more people would have died. and the republicans are trying to kill obamacare. host: we'll leave it there for now. mental health also a big conversation during this pandemic. goldie hawn weighed in on it in a "usa today" opinion piece, covid trauma, she wrote, is hurting a generation of kids. we've failed them as a nation. "usa today," if you want to read her piece, mental healthcare crisis is one that has been discussed by governors in their recent state of the state addresses. here's a portion from south carolina republican governor henry mcmaster from earlier this month. >> we must also recognize that a mental health crisis exists in south carolina. i say a mental health crisis exists in south carolina, especially among our young people who have weathered two years now of disruptions, virtual instruction, isolation, and constant changes to normal

routines. they cannot handle it. the crisis is here right now. students must have access to professional mental care, counseling, and services. because 60% of the south carolina children are served by medicaid, i've directed health and human service director robbie kerr to initiate an immediate review of our state's behavioral health funding and delivery system. time is of the essence. we must do better. the cost of doing nothing for these children is unimaginable, and the damage, well, the damage likely will be immeasurable. we must act. [applause] host: governor of south carolina earlier this month. your experience with healthcare during the pandemic. james in connecticut. good morning to you. caller: good morning, ma'am. how are you today? i'm pretty well, thank you. oh, god, i got hurt a few months

ago, and wound up being laid up, and i was going to get back to work just before christmas, and i wound up getting a knee, water on my knee, they thought. i went to the hospital. and i was in a lot of pain, a lot of pain, really bad, like i'd never had before. and when i got to the hospital, the line to get in the hospital was atrocious. some woman had said she was there for like 13 hours and hadn't gotten anywhere. i was like, oh, my god, i can't deal with this. so i went to a walk-in clinic, and they diagnosed me with water on the knee. they couldn't figure out what was on my knee because, i mean, with an x-ray, you can't do that. but i went home. and i had some friends coming over for christmas eve, and i was in such pain, i is not them home with all the makings for a nice christmas eve dinner and i sat with my wife, and i made an

appointment for my doctor, which would have been right after christmas. i couldn't get one any sooner. so i was in so much pain, i wound up going by ambulance to the hospital, and then they treated my knee, and i had an infection in there. i've been on crutches for the last month, or a walker. i'm doing this therapy. but my wife and i both had the covid, and we've had the shots, thank god. but hers, well, she had lung cancer about a year ago, a year and a half ago, i guess, and it kind of rattled her cage more than mine. i had no side effects or anything from my experience with it. but right now, i'm negative. i've since retired. host: happy to hear it, james. do you think that your knee

would have not been infected if you had been able to get into the hospital that day and get some treatment? caller: no, it was well on its way. i also have some got in there, too. host: james, you were in line, and did the line stretch outside? where were they keeping all these people? caller: no, no, they were inside. i don't suppose, they were socially distanced, i don't think so. but when i went there, it's a little hospital, and to get in there, i couldn't walk. oh, my god, i can't hear what you're saying back, but that's ok. host: you could walk, it's not like you could wait in the waiting room by standing up. caller: no, i couldn't. and i decided i'm not going to sit in a chair for 15 hours. so i went home, and then two days later i wound up by ambulance, and i think i made a good choice christmas eve doing that. because otherwise i think it would have been really bad.

i had a septic infection, and i probably could have, you know, had a really bad time. host: so james, you said it's a small hospital. is thomason a rural area of connecticut? caller: it's a suburb of waterbury. host: ok, james in connecticut. happy you recovered. this is from the daily yonder. after a year of federal funding lifeline, rural hospitals once again are facing financial strain. increased financial support from the federal government stemmed the tide of hospital closures in 2021, but as the additional funding dries up, the experts say rural hospitals could see their doors close. miguel in san antonio, texas, good morning. caller: good morning. host: thank you, good morning. caller: good morning. yes, during the pandemic, my mother had covid, and i was kind

of keeping an eye on her with over-the-counter, just kind of measuring her oxygen levels and her heart rate and her temperature. i noticed that things weren't going so well in the right direction, because she was guessing more fatigued as covid progressed through her -- have a telechat with the nurse practitioner, and i presented her with five days of monitoring with my mother, and she was able to prescribe some steroid antibiotics, and i think that really helped my mother from actually going into the hospital. host: the telehealth helped? caller: oh, yes, yes. having that access right away, as soon as i noticed after the fifth day that she wasn't getting any better on her own and just taking vitamins and over-the-counter products, i went online, registered for good r.x. telehealth chat, spoke with a nurse practitioner via chat, and she prescribed medications

right away, picked them up within the hour, and my mother got a lot better from that. i really think that prevent her from getting to the hospital and taking up another bed at the height of the pandemic. host: miguel, what insurance do you have or does your mom have? caller: she didn't have, you know? she didn't have. she's been healthy, no health issues, and covid hit, and it was one of the unexpected things, and having that ability to just get online and have that resource there just helped us out completely. i can't imagine what would have happened if we didn't have it. host: yeah, so any motivation to get insurance now? caller: oh, yes, definitely. amongst my siblings, we'll be talking about getting plans for my mother and getting on insurance, so taking advantage and hearing the numbers and the easability that affordable care act is allowing now, i think it might be more affordable for us. host: yeah, we talked to amy

goldstein of the "washington post," her headline from this past week, sign-ups in affordable care act marketplaces reach a record 14.5 million. here's what president biden had to say about that, the american rescue plan did more to lower costs and expand access to healthcare than any actions since the passage of the affordable care act t. made quality coverage more affordable than ever, with families saving an average of $2,400 on their annual premiums and four out of five consumers finding quality coverage for under $10 a month. as a result, millions of our fellow americans have now gained the security and peace of mind that dependable health insurance brings. in the meantime, as long as any american liza wake at night wondering how they're going to pay their medical bills, my administration will keep fighting to lower costs and expand healthcare coverage, even more, even include my build back better agenda. on that point, the house majority whip last weekend in

virtual discussion with "the washington post" says he's optimistic a deal can still be struck with west virginia senator joe manchin on health-related portions of the build back better plan. here's what the leader had to say. >> increase, expand medicaid, and we've got thousands, literally thousands, if not millions of people who need healthcare coverage who don't have it, and we want people to go back to work. if you want to go back to work, give them healthcare coverage. let them be able to take care of their children. we don't want to pass the legislation that allows them to take care of their children, allow them to have healthcare coverage, but they want them back on the job, on these jobs that they don't have any healthcare coverage on. so i think he says he's far left, so there's a lot in build back better that he says he's for, so let's do that. i think the president says let's

pass this chunk and that chunk and maybe we'll get something. host: the leader of the democratic party in the house, talking about hope for parts, portions of the build back better agenda getting passed with the support of west virginia senator joe manchin. bruce in cleveland, ohio. ruth, good morning. what's your experience with health care during this pandemic? caller: good morning. i think it's been great. i'm a 68-year-old air force veteran. i was in the service in the early 1970's. my local v.a. called me, contacted me immediately when they had the shots available. they made my appointments quite quickly. i went down, i've had all my shots and my booster, no problem. i think it's been great. i think the availability of the vaccination for this country, especially military personnel, has been well more than it ever

should have been. i mean, all these people talking about they don't want to get the shot, they're scared to get the shot. there's no problem with the vaccine. i had one slight effect from it. i had a sore arm for two days. that was it. other than that, it was great. i had no problem. host: all right. did you have the same experience as bruce or a different one? we want to hear this morning from you. if you live in the eastern/central part of the country, 202-748-8000. mountain/pacific, 202-748-8001. remember, you can text with your first name, city and state to 202-748-8003. join us on facebook.com/cspan. or send a tweet with the handle, @cspanwj. here is a text from james in troy, michigan, my healthcare was perfect when i had covid. the price keeps going up ever since obamacare began. now almost three times the cost, he writes. and william miller on twitter,

several of my doctors have gotten covid themselves and had to close offices and go to telephone interviews. covid is a killer, get vaccinated. and from scott in houston, texas, a.c.a. is nearly 12 years old. i'm still waiting to hear the republicans' plan. pam, i had a mass that needed to be removed but had to wait several weeks because the hospital was overflowing with unvaccinated covid patients. i don't think their rights extend to violating mine. and that's it for right now, but again, text us, tweet us, post on facebook, and we'll read some of those. katherine in burlington, new jersey. hi, katherine. caller: good morning, greta. this is katherine from snowy burlington. i have managed to keep up with my healthcare. i finally made a dental appointment after two years for just a cleaning. because of the close proximity,

but i've been well. the family's been well. now i got to go out and dig out the snow. host: so, katherine, what kind of insurance do you have? caller: i have medicare and tricare. host: ok. and what have you seen with your coverage during the pandemic? caller: it's been wonderful. i managed to get all of my routine checkups. you know, like i said, the dentist was the only one that i was reluctant to go to because of the closeness of the care. so i've been fine. the family's been fine. knock wood. host: ok, katherine, good luck with the snow. john in new york. hi, john. caller: hi, greta. thank you for taking my call. yeah, i'd just like to make a comment. recently within a week, the past week, had my second surgery. i had multiple kidney stones in each kidney, and they were removed, plus i had other issues dealing with my liver.

surgery was great. and everything went good. i have absolutely no complaints. i would like to give a shout out for the nurses, they're phenomenal. they did absolutely wonderful work. so i'm quite pleased with the level of healthcare. i'm not in a rural area. i'm in upstate new york, around the albany area. and for my point of view, accessibility, quality of care, it's, in my opinion, quite good. i would like to say, i do have a little bit of a conditioner with these recent arrivals, all this new immigration coming in. i'm hoping that it doesn't overwork the healthcare system and stress it out to the point where it just dilutes the care. thank you for taking my call. host: you fully recovered? caller: i believe i am. my wife says no. i get a lot of heat when i go

out to snow blow and shovel the snow. but yeah, i am. i feel good. i don't have any issues. the quality is evolving right now in terms of what they're going to do for people, and i'm just grateful, very grateful. host: john, you know what you say to your wife when she says that. you say yes, dear. caller: i've been saying that for almost 40 years, greta. [laughter] host: and that's why you're still married. john in new york, thank you. some headline from "the washington post," omicron wave is receding nationally, but cases continue rising in some states from their reporting. death rates are also high in many states and have more than doubled in the past week in virginia, oregon, nebraska, washington, and florida. the seven-day average for total deaths in the united states reached 2,430 on thursday, a total not seen since january

2021. the regions with the highest case rates have less protection than the northeast, where 73% of people are fully vaccinated. in the west, 66% of people have full vaccination. in the midwest and south, the rates are 60% and 59% respectively. now to connecticut, good morning. caller: good morning. i wanted to tell you that we had mixed experience. we had a very good experience. unfortunately, a family member that wasn't covid related was very, very sick with cancer. his cancer returned, and he ended up going to the v.a. in west haven for hospice, and there's a place called the fisher house where family members, when it's too far to drive and you want to be with your family member, you can stay there. and it was just at the lull of covid, because they had been closed for a while, so we were able to stay there. they took such good care of our

friend. and it was a little hard staying in, because we were supposed to mask the whole time you were living in the covid house and the fisher house unless you were in your room, and there were some people that wouldn't mask when the staff was not there. and they weren't vaccinated. but luckily it was a really lull, june, july, it was a real lull. then the sadder thing, my daughter, only in her 20's, was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. she's one of the people that put off medical appointments because she was in chicago and then moved to connecticut, and it was early as she should, and the virtual treatments in connecticut were not too good, so she ended up going to sloan kettering, where they're taking good care of her. i really want to tell people about the fisher house at the west haven v.a. i think there's quite a few v.a.'s that have it. they take good care of service members and their families. host: sorry to hear about your friend. kenneth in diamond, missouri.

kenneth, your experience with healthcare during the pandemic. caller: well, i've had all three of the shots. and i'm doing well. but why i called in is about the big low of obamacare. the people in the upper middle class that make too much money and don't get the subsidy, the out of pocket expense is astronomical, and in essence, they don't have insurance. there's million of people out there that does not have insurance because they don't get the subsidy. if you don't get the subsidy, you're up the creek without a paddle. so, no, obamacare is not good for a lot of the population. host: how do you get your insurance? caller: i use the united healthcare, that's what i got. host: through your employer? caller: so i'm covered there.

but i'm talking about friends of mine that can't get healthcare because of the cost. host: understood. kenneth in missouri. we shared with you this headline from ucla, a study they found access to vital health services fell during covid, particularly for poor americans. and this is what they found. some of the most socioeconomically disadvantaged patients, those with medicaid or medicare were far less likely than those to return to using outpatient services as rates approaching normal pre-pandemic levels. the study published this week in the "journal of the american medical association" based on 14.5 million adults in the u.s. raises concerns about patients missing treatments for acute illnesses, delaying preventive care, lacking a clear understanding of when to seek help during the pandemic. james, colorado springs, good

morning to you. caller: good morning. i just wanted to say that i myself and my smother my brother, we all had pretty much easy access to things we needed to get taken care of as far as health and getting our shots and things like that. i think it's how you plan as an individual. we vanity had any problems at all with any helping. i actually had to have, about a month or so ago, had a biopsy, and everything was easy to get to. i just followed the mask protocols, and showed them where i got my shots and that sort of thing. host: so you had to show that you were vaccinated in order to go inside or what? caller: i just showed them. they do not ask that. that's why, i don't know, this

is in colorado. hopefully nobody will try speaking, i'm not going to speak for anything, i'll say here in colorado, they don't ask you that. i just showed them to put people at ease with everything. so this thing, where i'm hearing everywhere you go, they're forcing you to do this, forcing you to do that. it's like, no, i do not that, and most of the time they say, you know what, you don't have to do that. the person working in the health field, they say you don't have to do that, but they appreciate it. so this is in colorado and everything, and from my own experience, you know, i haven't had any problems coming down, and i also take my mother to her appointments as needed, for her eyes and that sort of thing. i'm just speaking from my experience. i don't see where it's that difficult and everything, because people are not really in anybody's face. any time i go out, people are wearing masks, they're wearing them. if they're not, i'm not running up to somebody and say put on a

mask. that's their thing. so i don't see the strife i keep hearing on the news. host: understood. gloria in hawkins, wisconsin. caller: yes, i am in a rural area in wisconsin and healthcare is a problem. host: ok. caller: i just got over covid. i started it, my symptoms about three weeks ago, and i'm finally about 80% better. when i started getting sick, i wanted to go get a covid test, and i could not get one in my area. couldn't even get a test, p.c.r. test. i ended up three, four days into my covid, having to drive 70 miles one way to get a test. and i was sick while i was driving. because i wanted to know if i had it or not. well, i was positive for covid. i'm on medicare. and i have a supplemental, like i say, i'm in a rural area, and care was not available, and i guess i wanted to make that appointment. host: when you say care, you're talking about getting a test.

caller: i couldn't even get a test, no. and then by the time i got a test, my doctor told me it was too late for me to get treatment, because you have to get the i.v. ant bodies within seven days of your symptoms and i was already too late for that because i couldn't get a test. host: do you know why you couldn't get a test where you live? caller: well, i had called -- we have a small rural hospital clinic by us, and they're the only ones that do a test, and i kept leaving a message day after day after day that i wanted a test, and nobody even called me back. i ended up having to call my own doctor at her clinic. host: and then she set you up with a test three, four hours away? caller: yeah, 70 miles away, that was the closest one i could get, that is a true story, yeah. and i had one vaccination and i was one of those unfortunate people that had an adverse

reaction to the vaccination. i was very, very sick from my covid vaccination, so i could not get any more vaccines. host: have you received any bills for your test or anything from this covid experience? caller: no, i did not receive a bill. i'm pretty sure that's going to be paid for, because i vanity received one yet. but it's the point that i had to drive 70 miles, and i was sick while i was driving. i mean, i'm lucky i did not get in an accident, seriously. but i wanted to know. host: i'm glad that you're 80% record and i hope you get the rest of the way there. yesterday the former president held a rally and the headlines this morning, "washington post," trump suggests that if he is re-elected he will pardon january 6 capitol rioters. here's what he had to say. >> and another thing we'll do and so many people have been asking me about it, if i run and if i win, we will treat those

people from january 6 fairly. we will treat them fairly. and if it requires period, we will give them period, because they are treated so unfairly. this hasn't happened to all of the other atrocities that took place recently. nothing like this has happened. what that unselect committee is doing and what the people are doing that are running those prisons is a disgrace. it's a disgrace. we will treat them fairly. and we will take care of the people of this country, all of the people of this country. host: former president donald trump in texas yesterday. this morning, until the top of the hour, we're asking you about your healthcare experience during the pandemic. here's greg in cleveland, ohio, with a text to us, obamacare is based upon income. if you can afford to pay for health insurance, then you will

pay for it. if you cannot afford it, then the government will subsidize you. that was increased under the biden administration and this congress, and as we showed you earlier in "the washington post" report, a record 14.5 million have enrolled in the affordable care act. marion in charlotte, north carolina. we'll go to you. good morning. caller: good morning, how are you? host: i'm fine. so what's been your experience during the pandemic? caller: i actually have got covid, was in the hospital for over a month. and while i was there, i didn't know that my insurance and disability, i didn't know the medicine and everything they give you there was taken out of the insurance. i thought if you lived, if you had insurance, the medicine and everything would be covered just by hospital care. i was in i.c.u., cardiac care unit. when i got out of the hospital,

i didn't know i had medicine benefits. i cannot afford the medicine. my medicine ran from $200 to $1,000. i can't afford it. i tried everywhere to get help. i couldn't get help nowhere. my insurance could not help me anymore. i couldn't get medicaid. i couldn't get anything. so this is not helping the seniors with anything. we can't get help nowhere. and i don't understand that. host: so you were in the hospital for a month. you left the hospital, couldn't afford the medicine that they wanted to put you on once you left? caller: yes. host: how are you doing now? caller: actually my credit card debt is horrible. and since i'm on disability, you can't make no money, you can't do this and you can't get that. so i had a choice to either

stand outside and say i need drug money or i had to go back to work. so i had to go back to work in order to afford my medicine. so that was horrible. now my disability is going to be cut off because i had to go back to work. host: and are you able to afford this medicine now that you have income? caller: now that i am working, i can't afford it now, but the money that i'm making is going towards medicine and my bills and stuff is still high, because i have to leave work to go to the heart doctor, to go to this doctor, go to that doctor, and it seriously is not working still. host: and your credit card debt, you've put, you had to pay your bills with credit cards? caller: yes. host: marion in north carolina, hope things improve for you. wally in iowa city.

hi, wally. good morning. caller: good morning. can you hear me, greta? host: we can. caller: ok, well, i will say i'm work in a small hospital in iowa, and it's had quite an effect on our hospital. we've lost a lot of workers through going to other hospitals and put a lot of stress on, got a lot of travelers right now, so it's very expensive, so, you know, the whole hospital is a little bit upside-down that way, but otherwise i had my vaccines early and got covid, and then i waited two months and got a booster, and i'm kind of disappointed how all of the unvaccinated now, we have a lot of covid in our hospital. we have a lot of people in the i.c.u. and then lately we've had a lot of surgery. i work in the surgery department with more covid-positive

patients than i've ever seen weekly. for surgeries. host: wally, do you think this hospital can survive financially? caller: yeah, i think they've got a pretty good backing in our county. it's johnson county in iowa, and it's a relatively stable, healthy environment. we have the university of iowa, the hawkeyes and the big hospital, you know, our so-called competition, but we're fortunate to have the healthcare we do in our city. and my doctor and dentist both postponed my dental treatment and my physical, but since then i was able to get it. that was early on. but i just -- it's just unfortunate, the vaccinated are bottlenecking up the whole system, and we had to go with no surgeries a while. we're back to doing electives,

but it's mostly gone to an outpatient elective surgery except for emerge incident surgeries. host: all right, wally in iowa. bob in arizona. hi, bob. caller: hi. i just have a comment. about a month ago i had to go in the hospital, transported to the hospital with my wrist had swollen up. this was in the middle of the night. and they got through x-rays and everything, they said we can't help you, so they were going to send me home. and i had no transportation to get home. so they said the hospital has a way of doing it. they have a driver that case you back and forth. so i said ok, and i got on it. and i have medicare, by the way, both medicare. about three weeks later, i got a bill stating they charged

medicare $860 for my 15-mile trip. i think that was outrageous. i could have probably went all the way to phoenix and back for that amount of money. i was just thinking that some people ought to be alerted to the fact that this transporting system that's installed is absolutely terrible. that's all i have to say. host: all right, bob, keep calling this morning. text us, tweet us, post on facebook as well, your experience with healthcare during the pandemic. want to read other headlines for you. this is from pages of the "new york times" this morning. denouncing dark money, then deploying it in 2020. there's a report, democrats outstripped the g.o.p. in raising millions without disclosing donors. here are the figures. president biden and the campaign 2020 cycle rated a record $1

billion. and former president trump raised $810 million. so that from the "new york times." there's also this front page of "the washington post" about the campaign to pressure justice stephen breyer to resign, and we're going to be talking about that decision coming up here on the "washington journal." they report of this year-long pressure. they report during a harvard law school lecture last april, justice stephen breyer made clear that he viewed the judiciary as divorced from politics. once a judge takes the oath, the supreme court jurist said they are loyal to the rule of law, not to the political party that helped to secure their appointment. but just three days later, a new phase in an extraordinary year-long campaign was launched to pressure breyer to rethink his loyalties and focus far more on the political party that

helped secure his appointment and the court's dwindling liberal minority. the group of democratic operatives circulated an online petition, activists protested his prevents, op eds appeared in newspapers. the truck circled the supreme court building with a bill board that read, breyer, retire. georgia, good morning to you. tell us what your healthcare experience has been like. caller: good morning, and i'm hoping you're well today. host: i am, thank you. caller: my experience has been that the hackers, the people that tap in to anything that they can extrude money or information, i actually got a bill from an emergency room, and how they are getting this information is just, it our daily existence, how we get out and run our days. it got cleared up, but just be aware that the hackers are hacking in to everything.

if it's anything that they can get. and i'd like to say one thing, i was exposed to a scenario of cabinet pictures of presidential cabinet pictures -- host: dixie, i'm going to move on to sarah in michigan. tell us what your healthcare experience has been like. caller: hi, greta. we haven't had any issues here with healthcare experiences other than just friends and family members that have lost their jobs based on not wanting to get, you know, and i don't understand why they don't say to people more that this is under emergency use authorization. this is an experimental gene therapy drug. this isn't going to affect everybody the same. if it was working the way that supposedly a vaccine work, which your immune system takes its way, no matter what shot you get, you don't get or get. that's what i don't understand why they don't explain to the people that this has never been

used in humans before. i even, this is new. and so in 2020 when this came around, you know, in hospitals and all this stuff, and, you know, not too many people were doing bad off, but it seems in 2021 when they started distributing shots, it seems that this is now becoming worse. now, i can say here, where we live, there hasn't been too much tragedy or covid hospitalizations or deaths. basically most of the people i know don't have shots, and we're doing just fine. you understand where people's hesitations are coming from and what their worries are about, because this is just all new and they keep forcing, forcing, forcing, and it's like what the heck? host: so those friends that did not get vaccinated, they lost their jobs? what are they doing now? caller: well, some of them -- ok, so hospitals around here have -- most of them have pulled their shot, because they can't

lose anymore workers, right? so it just depends on the hospital. for instance, mclaren hospital in michigan, they're union. they haven't really lost any of their workers, shot or not. they're not forcing it. kind of strange, right? but nonetheless, my girlfriend's daughter finally was pushed to get it, and she got the one johnson & johnson. not all the nurses see what's happening. she got it, but then two weeks after the hospital pulled it. so, you know, there's even nurses right now that are going to try to sue their hospitals based on they forced them to get it and then pulled their mandate. it's the other thing i don't understand. there's no legal law that says you have to do any of this, anywhere. these are words that are being used, literal words. to say it's a vaccine is not being honest about your marketing, because it's an experimental use authorization use emergency drug. so when you get your sheet when you get your shot, it says it right there when you sign your

documents. my older son had two shots. and he was affected by them slightly, right? but it says right there in your informed cannot, it should anyways, right. i just really appreciate you listening to me, and thanks for letting me talk. host: dan, georgetown, massachusetts. caller: hello, thank you for having me on. and that last caller, she knows exactly what she's talking about. and this makes my -- makes me feel like our medical industry here in the united states is a failure. i'll tell you very early on when i was looking at this pandemic, i was looking at what other countries were doing for treatments. and other countries were using basic anti-viral drugs, which we've all heard about, but a lot of people have called them like, you know, horse medicine and aquarium cleaner and stuff like

that. but the fact is there are some anti-viral drugs that have been around for a long time that have actually won nobel prize for being a safe, effective, affordable drug, in the case of ivermectin. if you look, these drugs do work. other countries were using them. and here in america, our medical industry, they actually put tests together to make these drugs look bad in tests, and then the industry came down and they told all the doctors and people that could prescribe this don't do it or you're going to risk losing your license. i know this firsthand. i called my doctor early on, and he said there's no way he could prescribe something like that. i would have to go see a

specialist in viruses or something. host: dan, i'll leave it there. dan in massachusetts. we are going to change topics here on the "washington journal." stay with us. we're going to talk to "new york times" global economics correspondent peter goodmancorrn about his book, how the billionaires devour the world. later we took too long, long supreme court watcher who previews the battle ahead to replace stephen breyer on the supreme court. ♪ >> in 2019, reporter ben raines discovered remains in a swamp outside of alabama. tonight on to end a he talks about his book which details the history of the ship and how and why you transported 100 10

slaves to alabama more than 50 years after the transatlantic slave trade was outlawed. >> it serves as a sort of proxy for everyone in the united states in the world whose families arrived in whatever country they are in in a ship heard most of those people, millions upon millions we know nothing about because the stories weren't reported. millions of people who were stolen from africa and that really is what so unique about it. the whole story of slavery all encapsulated in one piece and we know everything about these people and what happens in their lives. >> tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span's q and a peer you can listen to our podcasts on the c-span now apple.

this week on the c-span network, the house and senate are both in session. the senate will vote on nominations including the university of pennsylvania president to serve as u.s. ambassador to germany and rita -- to be president of the import -- export import bank. at 10:00 a.m. eastern on c-span, they will appear before the senate homeland security plan. then live on c-span.org in the c-span now app they will testify before the senate budget committee on thursday at 10:00 a.m. eastern on c-span three. former employees of the washington football team testified before the house oversight committee about reports of sexual harassment and discrimination in the organization. the hearing comes the day after the team is expected to announce its new name. watch this live on the c-span

networks or on c-span now. also head over to c-span.org for scheduling information. c-span, your unfiltered view of government. >> washington journal continues. >> peter good men is a global economics correspondent for the author of this book -- for the new york times and the author of this book. mr. good men, who is the davos man. guest: it's a term that was brought up in 2004 and he was using it for people who go to the economic performance with soul and which is this gathering of the most powerful people on earth. the billionaire class, heads of state. not only people go there, the billionaire class, but people

who would have us believe in what i refer to as the cosmic ally, it's got a lot of force that's taken over our political discourse. and we organize our economies around sending more wealth to people who already have most of it, tax cuts by weakening labor, limiting antitrust enforcement, we all somehow win, something that in reality has happened zero times. the perfect example of this is the ceo of salesforce, who last year at a meeting in davo's said we are the heroes. ceos of the heroes of the pandemic, not frontline medical workers, essential workers delivering food, not parents dealing with kids learning. ceos. he said the government didn't save you, nongovernment organizations saved you, we

saved you. he was talking about vaccines and credit being readied by finance companies that staved off bankruptcies. there's been a lot of good done, but this idea having pillaged government as the billionaire class is done through a series of bottom-up transfers of wealth, of leading sleeving government largely unable to deal with problems in an emergency like a pandemic and with other people like stephen schwarzman, of blackstone, whose very savvy investments in health care have enriched him while leaving our health care system vulnerable going into the pandemic. it is pretty rich to say given these guys have participated in weakening the system of the front end their own game but if somehow saved us through the giving us of scraps.

benioff, side and the fact he pulled strings from friends with china and secured ppe, face masks, medical gowns and distribute them to frontline medical workers, that's great. i am willing to believe that that probably saved people's lives. but it's also great to add why are we dependent upon the largess of attack billionaire in the middle of a pandemic to outfit our medical workers in the worst pandemic in a century? host: how is the davos man winning and everybody else losing? guest: systematically prayed we absorb this idea that globalization is so complex, automation is complex, flows of money around the globe, these things are so vast that nobody can regulate them. that's just a way of kind of protecting themselves from them

using -- for us using our democracies which is -- to do with a to do which is redistribute some wealth. we see this again and again through the use of lobbyists. amazon has more than 100 lobbyists in washington. it's not an accident that jeff bezos are seen his fortune expand during the pandemic. we all like the convenience of e-commerce. it's been critical during the pandemic. why do we have a -- have to have a situation where jeff bezos is worth 200 billion dollars in the laborers are working during the worst days of the pandemic without protection and without paid sick leave, something amazon has lobbied heavily to prevent. we are talking about systematic extremely sophisticate campaigning over the last four decades through tax cuts, deregulation and weakening of labor power and the net effect

is to transfer the huge amount of wealth from the middle class and the working class to the richest people in the world. host: we have seen their wealth increase, one newspaper saying 70% during the pandemic. why? guest: because the rescues that have been crafted during the pandemic, same as after the global financial crisis have largely focused on asset prices. there are some important exceptions. we've seen emergency unemployment benefits that it had a significant effect. things at the child tax credit. we have had a lot of money outside of it but most of the money has bolstered assets and who owns assets, wealthy people. so simply by owning amazon shares, jeff bezos's wealth skyrocketed. schwartzman, the blackstone ceo,

he doubled down on his health care investments, he's now vying at buying up huge numbers of warehouses and leasing them to places like amazon on the e-commerce boom. benioff, who also says the pandemic has been this great unifier for humanity, vulnerable to one biological reality while he's riding it out in his $20 billion oceanfront mansion in san francisco or maybe his oceanfront mansion on the big island of hawaii. i can keep track. this idea we are all united is belied by the fact we have to look at who is delivering packages, bedpans and nursing homes, whose delivering our food. we are clearly seeing inequality in all sorts of ways. some measurable and some in terms the death toll where the people who start out going into

the pandemic with the ones who had to make that brutal choice to be protecting their paychecks or their livelihood what the people going into labor and jeff bezos is warehouses. host: how many are there? how many davos men are there in the world? guest: there are seven hundred 45 billionaires in the united states. there's a few thousand worldwide. this is a very select group of people that's managed to get their hands on the levers of major democracies and essentially taint the operations of governance in their own interest. time and again while protecting themselves by selling us on these false binaries that are throughout our discourse. we may look at the charade of davos, i've been nine times and seen billionaires engage in the

simulation of the syrian refugee experience. ball thing unfolds under this mantra committed to improving the state of the world which is quite ironic given these are the biggest beneficiaries to the status quo. and they are going and submitting to being led around in the dark summons hollering at them in a language they don't understand. see meal -- simulations and then they will congratulate themselves for their empathy and that will be underwritten by global bank with caviar and champagne. we may see through that part of it. that seems a gay straight up charade but we tend to accept if you criticize the status quo, the widest bezos and up with most of the benefits of the asset, people say don't you appreciate amazon in the middle of the pandemic. of course we do. if you criticize the fact that pfizer has managed to monopolize the benefit of public refinance research and then sell its covid vaccines to the highest bidder

around the world with the result being if you're lucky enough to live in the u.s. or britain or other wealthy countries there's a good chance you're protected and if you live in south asia and parts of africa you may be a frontline medical worker and you may not have vaccine protection yet. the result of that is omicron. the variants we've effectively invited through this lopsided distribution of vaccines, we the public are effectively subsidizing monopoly profits for executives at companies like pfizer through the closure of schools and disruption of children's education, through death and fear. if we make this point, reason oh people will reflectively say aren't you grateful for the vaccine. of course we are, we don't have to accept this false binary that we have to have the current set up where davos man wins everything and gets the whole benefit and we leave many people

vulnerable or maybe the backwards ideas. venezuela diving indentures for dinner. there are other choices. that's the ultimate way in which davos man gains through these false narratives. host: was the moment you thought this was a book? guest: i was working on a book about a year before the pandemic. i'm now starting to flesh it out. i was based in london, i was covering for exit and the implications of trumps trade war not just across europe but around the world. i was spending time in places like italy where the extreme right wing was rising demonizing immigrants. a similar situation in sweden where -- we think of sweden is the ultimate social democracy and this party that has its roots in the neo-nazi movement was suddenly the third most

popular party in the country. i thought what was going on here. there was this sense between brexit and trump and the other stuff i described, inequalities unleashing some strange effects on the global economy. there were a lot of panel discussions about inequality everywhere i went to the billionaires had solutions that involved something other than we need to accept we will have to share some of our wealth. so i started to flesh out the book and put together a proposal in 2019. early 2020 the pandemic happens and i briefly thought i don't know maybe this is the best time for such a book. then i started to think about the fact in the summer of 2019 a lot of important people led by the business roundtable, this group of ceos in washington had declared stakeholder capitalism was upon us. the days of milton friedman that

we would just maximize shareholder benefit, that's gone. , but is a push for social progress, they are committed to labor in local communities, i thought well the pandemic is really a big test of the principles and you can quickly see that by that test that was an abject failure. jeff bezos signed the business roundtable statement of purpose and you know he kept workers laboring without protection and then doubling down by calling them essential workers, of thanking them for sacrificing so that amazon can save other people's grandmothers. i talked to christian who led this labor uprising in staten island and was fired for violating quarantine when he was saying everyone should be quarantined and he was especially upset that bezos said

we prioritize types of goods and we make sure we get these critical goods out. when you look to the boxes was the same stuff as ever. everything people are stockpiling in the middle. then i realize the pandemic had strengthened my thesis, that inequality was ultimately creating opportunities for these right-wing movements that would demonize immigrants will really masking the fact but beneath that was the systematic pillaging by the billionaire class and he created this unhappiness and anger that these political opportunists could capitalize on. i started writing in the middle of the pandemic. host: the this is what he writes. the book has selective indignation. in this telling public-sector failure doesn't exist, every ill is the fault of the private sector. according to mr. good men,

amazon wage hike didn't really count as a raise because it was done more as a way to harm competitors then to redress unfair treatment. one prominent davos man, george soros, is mentioned only briefly in the narrative. one the devotes more attention to the role of government and one that is reasonable and fair. guest: it certainly gave more than a fair treatment from matthew's lawyer, which is essentially underwritten by davos man too perpetually the cosmic lie, this idea that if we de-regulating and counting on trickle-down economics everyone wins, something that has a say in the book has in reality has happened zero times. it's ironic matthew specifically takes the shot at the book given that his own salary is essentially underwritten by davos man. host: let's get to.

david in new york. caller: good morning. i just say free-market capitalism is what's created all this wealth. and where you don't have that you have venezuela, cuba, those third world countries now wealth is going to be created and it's going to be distributed and the guys who create this wealth. eventually it all devolves back anyway. nobody takes it to the grave with them. competitors outcompete each other. you could eliminate human self-interest, because that's what we are and as part of our survival. may be you could hit this world,

i don't want to take too much more of your time. guest: it's a great question. i'm all for free-market capitalism but it's a great way to generate wealth and innovation. we should try more of it. what we've got is basically corporate welfare for billionaires and rugged individualism for everyone else. the caller i think illustrates the impact of this false binary that the billionaire class has sold on us through careful lobbying. this idea that we either have to status quo or that we are venezuela or cuba. that is just nonsense. we've had periods of dramatic economic growth the united states plus a social safety net plus progressive taxation plus innovation. we lived through that from the end of the second world war to the mid-70's. i don't have a fetish for that

period of american history, we had jim crow then in the vietnam war, we had systematic racism and gender discrimination, we made a lot of progress we ought to hang onto but we had one element that we ought to go back to and that's that we had the gains of our capitalism flow to workers commensurate with productivity. that did not happen by accident, that happened with collective bargaining, labor strength and we need to get back to that so that more people get the benefits of capitalism. yes we need capitalism, of the market is a wonderful mechanism, but it's been perverted by the billionaire class so that they are not simply competing. amazon's success again does reflect a lot of innovation, a great idea from jeff bezos and a and shopping. we can hang on to that and still have progressive taxation, labor

protections and ensure more people get the benefits. host: marcus writes on twitter, the billionaires worth as gone off because of stock prices per they are invested in the companies they run or develop. we do not tax wealth. guest: we don't tax wealth. we do tax wealth one way. any of us who own a home are effectively playing wealth tax because we don't have to sell our home to realize the gains to share some of that with uncle sam. we pay local wealth taxes like things like schools and sewage symptoms and electrical grids and maintenance for roads. things we all benefit from and there's an understanding those property owners have responsibility to finance those arid in the same way that if we do not tax wealth, then bezos's

earns 80 -- $83,000 in change, that's his salary. he's not a pay wealth tax and the result is a very regressive situation where people like bezos, like mark benioff are devoting a lot less of their income and wealth to government and taxes and the people who are scrubbing their toilets. it's not only unfair, it leaves our system starved and it also leaves huge numbers of people like they are getting a raw deal which generates the rage we are now dealing with an american society. host: bob in pennsylvania. caller: i find that mr. good men is a straight liberal and i as a conservative do not feel the billionaires are taking advantage. if it wasn't for their moneys, they have helped this country

and i'm sure the workers that they've hired. i'd like to ask him what you think about immigration, where's that money going? do you complain about people coming across the borders -- what do they bring to this country at this time? guest: there is a lot of literature on this. immigrants bring labor, they are taking jobs a large number of americans simply will not take. in many cases they are paying taxes. this is a classic example of how davos man, billionaires have advanced. they financed think tanks to washington to pollute us with this idea that our problems are the other, our problems of the people coming across our borders, from china. china is a significant challenge in the global system and one that we ought to tackle but they divert us again from the reality

that inequality in the degradation of the american middle class is a home-cooked problem for a problem the reflex decisions made in board in new york and seattle, a problem the reflex policies in washington and congress, presidential administration's, these of the ruse -- this is the ruse and we are falling forward again. rather than taught -- tackling our real problems. host: give us an example of a decision made in a board room but cause this inequality? host: our tax -- guest: our tax policy would be the primary one. trump gives us this 2017 tax cut. by any reasonable analysis it showed the benefits were vacuumed up by the billionaire donor class, people like steve schwartzman, mark benioff, people like jamie diamond,

playing a key role in getting these tax cuts paid they are served up in the name of. they are served up in the name of reviving growth and this will generate all this innovation. most of the money ends up being paid back to shareholders. dividends and share buybacks. there's no increase in investment, no increase in wages. we don't get wage increases until the pandemic shocks the global supply chain and suddenly workers have momentary bargaining power. that's a perfect example of how davos man preys on the problems that the systematic pillaging has created. these people and not wrong to say we need some help, we need some revival, some innovation and new policy. but that impetus is already used to the livermore policies which

created the inequality and exacerbated the equal -- the inequality. host: georgia new mexico. caller: hello, good morning. thank you for c-span. i've been thinking about corporations a lot lately. and their bylaws are centered around chopped -- profit maximized. if they are entities then we have to help them evolve. you can go down the line, the newest information -- iteration was b corp where you basically have employee profit sharing. where employees can aggregate lee collect their share. and then if they aggregate pull their shares or profit out they

can either keep the cash or reinvest. i think the profit-sharing is based on compensation. it's written in as an insurance plan, an insurance employee plan overseen by the foundation, the foundation leadership can be voted on by the shareholders which again are employees. so the whole of the profit is shared as a percentage and then the foundation, -- host: let me get peter's thoughts on this. guest: there's lots of different models. i am all for shareholder maximization. i'm not critical of this idea that corporations are maximizing -- this milton friedman idea. i'm critical of the idea we can count on corporations to organize themselves to fix all their problems. this is an idea pushed for the

world economic forum, championed by another guy we talked about, larry fink, the ceo and founder of black rock, of the world's largest asset management company. they literally manage $10 trillion in pension funds from around the world. and they are all pushing this idea that milton friedman is dead and we can now look to these companies to solve the biggest problems of our time, a change, the pandemic, preparedness for all sorts of problems. in from the right they are being told that's woke capitalism and that's wrong they just maximize profit. and then some reviewers have accused me of coming out them from the opposite end of the spectrum. i don't have any beef with the idea of publicly traded companies have a fiduciary responsibility to return profit, fine. we get a lot out of that.

if there's regulation, protection against monopoly power, there's worker standards and we have things we don't have like antitrust, that can work very nicely. i'm just saying we shouldn't be writing a blank check and just expect now that we can outsource the responsibility of regulators, labor unions and put our faith in their hands because they are so good. they are good at what they do which is returning profits to shareholders. host: what's the solution? is it we are not using the levers of our democracy to fix the situation. what do americans need to do if they agree with you? guest: we've been here before. the robber barons concentrated and consolidated at essentially took over the american economy in the late 19th century into the earliest part -- early part of the 20th.

we then had the trauma of the great depression, and then ended up with a whole bunch, in one industry, the cattle industry we got the packers and stockyards act in 1981. which crates a level playing field are ranchers and farmers and other industries. we have companies that were broken we had social safety nets so we could have can'tism, so workers could take on risks and entrepreneuring could take on risks, and when people failed, people went and did something else, and capital flowed to the winners. that's our capital stick system. but we had a floor beneath the people who failed, so we had versions of national health insurance. we had expansive unemployment benefits that covered more than our current benefits cover today. and the result was we had rapid economic growth. we had much higher rates of

taxation at the top that financed cutting-edge infrastructure, research, and from 1945 to 1975, we had the old cliche of the rising tides lifting all boats. if we have aggressive taxation and antitrust enforcement and an increase in labor power, we would solve an awful lot of these problems. it's not easy to execute, and that's true, because davos man is not lying down any time soon. he wants to prevent any of those policies. and there are things we can do locally. there are things we can do in our own communities. cooperatives have become a solution to some of these problems in places like spain, actual until parts of the midwest, where if you organize your company so it doesn't have to return profit and can pay higher wedges, and yet still compete with profit-making companies for a whole range of services. there are ways to pool

procurement funds. there's an idea advanced by an outfit in cleveland called the democracy collaborative that has gotten all these huge healthcare systems in america to reorient their procurement, whether they're finding somebody to handle their bed linens or cater their meals or build a new building. they try to ear mark their funds for companies that are in their local communities to avoid sending it away to some distant shareholder and they invest in their communities. these are sort of ideas in the margins, but ultimately we need progressive taxation and antitrust enforcement. host: mike in massachusetts, good morning to you. caller: good morning. i want to thank the guest for doing all this heavy lifting. this is a lot of information he's putting out there, and it's a lot to refute. and i don't know what my point is, but i guess my point is i've listened. that guy that called in and immediately turned this around into talking about immigrants

was a real encapsulation of one of the reasons why we're having these problems, i think, in the guest did a great job at refuting that, that form of otherrism. but what gets me, i feel like this is a cultural issue, and it's like some kind of poison in america where people are -- i don't know how people support the status quo here, the issues that we're talking about. i think the guy that called about immigration is a good example of how this turns into this emotional issue. host: mike, let's take that. peter goodman? guest: yeah, i think that's a really good point, and i think one of the things i try to show in the book is if this is not just an american problem, this is really a global problem. i mean, brexit, which i call an elaborate act of self-harm, britain leaving the european

union, severing itself from its largest trading partner, this is totally a reaction to immigration. there's an organized fear mongering campaign by the people promoting brexit for very selfish answers. there's a civil war within the conservative party, and one side, the side that boris johnson is part of, you know, ultimately takes power by denigrating the other side as in the thrall of the european union and their bureaucrats. meanwhile, a very cynical group of hedge fund managers underwrites this campaign to get out from under european union regulations on the sorts of shenanigans that helped generate the global financial crisis. and yet they seize on immigration. they scare people with visions much immigrants coming through turkey and into the european union and into britain. we see a similar reaction in italy. i mean, this is a reaction to years of systematic tax evasion

by the richest people that have just destroyed the infrastructure, that have created dramatic inequality, combined with trade deals that have put textile workers, leather workers, shoe makers out of business while most of the money is going to these publicly traded companies, these giant multinationals that are tapping chinese labor to undercut italians. similar situation in sweden, where we get this influx of immigrants in 2015, and the sweden democrats take what is really just a racist position, but they cast it in terms of fiscal rectitude. well, you know, we're not against immigrants, we just don't want to pay our taxes for these generous social services that we have in sweden that will be used by people who don't speak swedish and will have a hard time working. in each of these cases, instead of talking about the lowering of wealth taxes in sweden, tax evasion in italy, the fact that in great britain we had bailouts

forbackers after the financial crisis -- for bankers after the financial crisis, a cutting of slashing services for ordinary people, instead of talking about this, oh, let's talk about the fear that outsiders will come and blow us up or they'll steal our jobs. i mean, this is something that trump did very effectively in the u.s. and again, who's underwriting the trump campaign? people like the world's largest private he can quit magnate who benefited directly from policies that have actually weakened the very working people who are then giving allegiance to a candidate who's promising to build a wall on our border, something that's not going to solve any of our economic problems and is simply going to antagonize our relationship with the neighbor. host: let's go connecticut. patty, good morning to you. question or comment here for peter goodman? caller: good morning. i like to hear something about this man, george soros.

everything i hear is evil. he's got thrown out of hungary. he was thrown out of the u.k. he gets involved in our government. he comes here, becomes a citizen. he's ruining our voting by giving billions of dollars to prosecutors for what he wants, it's like a shadow government. and his foundation, i'd like to know more about that. host: ok, patty, peter goodman? guest: i mean, you know, there's a lot of anti-semitic depictions of george soros. no question, he's a billionaire. he's engaged in all sorts of speculation that's been beneficial to him, not beneficial to anyone else. he has promoted a lot of causes that are dear to his heart, like european immigration. this has earned him a lot of enemies. his pro democracy work around the world, he is somebody who goes to the world economic forum, throws a dinner every

year where he's actually very critical of others in the billionaire class, so he's an example. he's worthy of scrutiny, as are all of these guys. but i'd be careful about the anti-semitic tropes that accuse him of special conspiracies. and i would note that i'm not alleging any sort of conspiracy. this is not some sort of puppeteer conspiracy. the things i'm writing about have happened in plain view. we can all see tax cuts, deregulation. it happened so gradually, and yet over years it's almost like invisible. sort of like climate change where nobody really cares about fractions of millimeter changes in water filling up a basin somewhere until there's a terrible storm and suddenly lots of people are under water. and now because of the pandemic weir in an emergency. we got to look at the billionaire class writ large. no individual is powerful enough

to explain these changes. host: rick in florida. caller: yeah, good morning. i'm a conservative guy. i agree with a lot of what you're saying. you know, you bring up really good points. i think to get folks that are conservative to listen to you and to read the book, my concern is that you took a very, very one-sided approach, because you could bring somebody on with a very much opposite view of the benefits of capitalism. you know, united states, i'm a physician. the drugs that we use to treat covid in the pandemic were created by u.s. publicly traded companies. most of the vaccines around the world were created here in the united states. so, you know, there's good and there's bad, and you have to take both. it's obviously a very, very complicated system. but again, i agree a lot of what you're saying.

i wish you would -- the influence that you described that we're all exposed to through the media, you've been exposed to that as well as has a writer at the "new york times." and it would be helpful if you would see that and maybe take a little bit of a more balanced approach. host: rick, hang on the line. peter goodman, i want you to respond and then go back to rick. guest: sure. i just want to say, again, i'm not attacking capitalism. i'm celebrating capitalism. capitalism to me is about more entrepreneurs getting a fair shake instead of being victimized by predatory pricing from the likes of amazon. you know, it's about more people with good ideas being able to take a risk and then see the benefits instead of being squashed by some competitor that's able to hire lobbyists the way most of us buy socks or silverware. and, you know, the vaccines are

a special example. yes, it's true, we should be grateful for this tremendous acumen in the u.s. these pharma companies should be taking a bow for setting in motion what will hopefully soon be the end of the pandemic. but we should also be noting that the research that they've used to give us these miraculous vaccines comes in many cases from the taxpayer. not only from publicly financed research institutions, in moderna's case, the intellectual property is actually owned by the u.s. government. so we do have a say over the terms of sale, and that should reflect something more than just profit for these executives who run the companies. it should be reflect the public interest. and the public interest is that there be vaccine he can quit, not because that's a nice, fancy, liberal-sounding word. because if we don't get everybody protected we end up with things like omicron.

and again, we are subsidizing through our own willingness to challenge these monopoly claims on these royalties. we are subsidizing with our own disruption and the continued extension of the pandemic, these monopoly profits for the shareholders. host: ok, so we lost rick, can't go back to him. we'll go back to edward in massachusetts. good morning. caller: good morning. there was an idea around globalism. what he did was over many years of developing his ideas, he built alliances of people, mostly corporations, because that's part of his -- of his globalism approach, and he organized those people into alliances and developed great networks around them, very much

organized, and so he gets a lot of attention, and he gets a lot of policy from governments. but there's plenty of people that have different ideas, have different organizations, have different approaches. the problem is they don't already into alliances, and alliances are what are pretty much driving policy everywhere around the world now. it's basically democracy. it's bringing a bunch of people together. host: peter goodman? guest: well, i'm glad you raised kyle schwab, we go back to the beginnings of stakeholder capitalism. he's been using this term since the 1970's. i would push back on this idea that this is democracy. this is democracy where the votes are very unequal. schwab, in building the world economic forum, has pushed the idea of a public-private partnership. who could argue with the idea that business and government

should get together and solve problems? businesses have lots of smart people who know -- i mean, we're not going to solve climate change without getting to the table people who are engaged in fossil fuel extraction. that's a perfectly sound idea. schwab is not lived up to his own principles of the forum. so as i argue in the book, he's essentially helped the billionaire class insulate itself from any accountability by inviting them to davos where they can virtue signal and say, look, here we are at least in the same place where there are seminars on climate change, on gender equality, so we've taken care of all this. meanwhile, schwab has tapped the forum itself, which is officially a nonprofit as a kind of venture capital fund. i detail this in the book for his own profit making venture. he sends his nephew to boston in the 1990's where he sets up a video conferencing software that eventually gets sold to a publicly traded company, and at

the last minute kyle schwab tells his nephew to transfer the proceeds of the sale. we're talking like $20 million, into a new foundation that his nephew has never even heard of that under swiss disclosure laws don't require any sort of transparency, so we don't know where the money goes. this is the kind of structure that schwab favors. there's a lot of lofty talk about public-private partnership, about democracy, while there's really this very self-serving machine that has directed a lot of capital his way while inviting the billionaire class to virtue signal without actually addressing change. host: peter goodman, let's end with this text. who is the next theodore roosevelt to take on robber barons assist a campaign strategy? guest: well, theodore roosevelt didn't really do the job that many people think he did. that's hard to know. i mean, interesting to see that biden, in grappling with inflation, is now talking about

consolidation in industries like cattle and beef has gone up 20% during the pandemic. consumers are paying more than ever, but cattle ranchers are going out of business, why is that? because meat packers have increased their share of the market from about 35% in the 1980's when reagan started lifting antitrust enforcement, to 85% today. now, whether biden will succeed in actually altering that picture, who knows, i'm not all that encouraged by talk of increasing capacity for slaughterhouses. it's a lot more complicated than that. but it's interesting, he's the first president since reagan who's now actively talking about antitrust as a potential solution to the problem. that's at least interesting. host: peter goodman, global economics correspondent with the "new york times," you can follow his reporting at nytimes.com, and his book on your screen,

"davos man: how the billionaires devoured the world." thank you. we'll take a break. when we come back, turn our attention to the retirement of justice stephen breyer and who will replace him on the bench. we'll talk with amy howe of scotus blog, co-founder and long-time supreme court watcher. we'll be right back. >> weekend on book tv feature leading authors talking about their latest nonfiction books. wealth management expert david discusses his book "there's no free lunch: 250 economic truths" in which he argues the u.s. system is being threatened by socialists and progressives. then auto "after words," barbara walter with her book "how civil wars start and how to stop them," which examines the warning signs that often precedes civil wars and asks the

question, could another one happen in the u.s.? she's interviewed. watch book tv every weekend and find a full schedule on your program guide or watch online any time at booktv.org. >> on the cover flap of debbie applegate's 2021 book "madam: the biography of polly adler" is break-in the following, simply put, everybody went to polly's. polly adler, who lived 1900 to 1962, was a diminutive dynamo whose manhattan brothels were more than an oasis of illicit sex, where men paid top dollars for the company of her girls." according to the author debbie applegate, polly's pals included franklin delano roosevelt, frank sinatra, desi arnaz, and duke

ellington, among others. applegate is a yale-educated historian based in new haven, connecticut. >> debbie applegate on this episode of book notes plus. it's available on the c-span now app or wherever you get your podcast. >> c-span offers a variety of podcasts that have something for every listener. weekdays, washington today gives you the latest from the nation's capital. and every week, book notes plus has in-depth interviews with writers about their latest works. while the weekly uses audio from our immense archives to look at how issues of the day developed over years and our occasional series "talking with" features conversations with historians about their lives and work. many of our television programs are also available as podcasts. you can find them all on the c-span now mobile app or wherever you get podcasts.

>> "washington journal" continues. host: amy howe is joining us this morning. she's a co-founder and reporter for scotus blog here to talk about the future of the court, how stephen breyer announces he's going to retire. why now? guest: that's a good question. the past few justices who have announced their retirement have announced it in the spring. i think in terms of announcing it this term, that was not unexpected. i think the democrats are concerned about whether or not they're going to be able to keep their majority in the senate after the elections in the fall, and there was a real concern that if they lost the majority, whether or not they'd be able to confirm someone if justice breyer steps down after november 2022. justice breyer worked in the senate for several years, a

staffer on the senate judiciary committee for senator edward kennedy. he was well aware of this. so i think he wanted to step down to give president biden a chance to nominate and confirm a successor and perhaps stepping down, announcing his retirement a little earlier than some of his predecessors, to make sure there was plenty of time to get that done before november. host: "the washington post" front page story this morning writes about a pressure campaign, a year-long pressure campaign on the justice. what was it like? guest: there were a lot of calls for him to retire. there were trucks driving around downtown washington, you know, justice breyer, retire. he released a book this fall about the authority of the court that was intended to sort of push back against some of the calls for reform of the supreme court, including calls to add

members to the supreme court. but when he was doing press for the book, a lot of the discuss was about when are you going to retire? and, you think, i think there were concerns among progressives about whether or not he was going to retire in time for the president to nominate a successor and for the senate to confirm a successor after what happened with justice ginsburg, in which she was trying to wait until after the 2020 elections in the hopes that a democrat would be elected and could nominate her successor, and she passed away in september of 2020 and president trump very quickly nominated amy coney barrett, and the republican senate confirmed her. host: in 27 days. what is the timeline to do, for democrats to try to get a replacement on the bench? guest: so it's interesting, because justice breyer, in his letter to the president, said he would step down at the end of the term, but also would stay on

until a successor had been nominated and confirmed. the president at his remarks at the white house the other day said that he plans to nominate someone by the end of february, so i would expect that the senate would hold confirmation hearings relatively quickly sometime this spring, but then whoever is nominated and confirmed wouldn't actually take the bench until after the justices finish up issuing all of their opinions in late june or early july. host: let's go through the shortlist of who could potentially replace justice stephen breyer. the president has promised to name a black woman to the bench. give us names and their credentials. boy a couple of the front-runners, one of the judges who was a front-runner, even back in 2016 when the president,

president barack obama at the time was considering who to nominate to replace justice antonin scalia. he ultimately chose judge merrick garland, now the attorney general, nominated judge garland to the senate, never held hearings for him. but one of the names rumored to be on the shortlist back then was judge ketanji brown jackson, who at the time was a judge on the federal district court in washington, d.c., has since been confirmed to fill the spot left open when judge garland became the attorney general. the u.s. district court for the -- on the u.s. court of appeals, i'm sorry, for the district of columbia, the federal appeals court is often called the second highest court in the land. it's where justice calf knew and chief justice john roberts sat before becoming justices. the late justice antonin scalia and the late justice ruth bader ginsburg, clarence thomas was also a judge on the u.s. court of appeals for the d.c. circuit.

she was a clerk for justice breyer. he has called her brilliant at one of other confirmation hearings, i believe, and she's widely regarded as a front-runner. she was just recently confirmed, so presumably there wouldn't be a lot of surprises if the president were to dominate her. she's also a relative by marriage of former house speaker paul ryan, who's a republican, so she might have some bipartisan support much she's considered one of the front-runners. another one is a california supreme court justice named leondra kruger, who is only 45 years old, but has already been sitting on the california supreme court for several years. she is well known in the washington legal community. she clerked on the supreme court as well, came here after law school and worked as an assistant to the u.s. solicitor general, which meant that she argued cases on behalf of the federal government in the supreme court. she argued 12 cases in the

supreme court and then worked in the obama administration elsewhere on the department of justice before becoming a california supreme court justice. she, again, is also very well regarded in the washington legal community, reportedly was offered the job of the u.s. solicitor general, which is the government's top lawyer in the supreme court in the biden administration, but turned it down, presume annally this is an attractive job that might lure her back to washington from california. i know i'm looking at the snow in washington right now. it's hard to come back to washington from california, but perhaps this is a job that might get her here. another name that's often mentioned is judge michelle childs, who's a federal district judge in south carolina who had been nominated for a federal appeals judgeship very recently. she has the house of house

majority whip james dry burn of south carolina, who said she also would have the support of that state's two republican senators, tim scott and lindsey graham. the white house, i believe, has said that her nomination has been put on hold because she's under consideration for this job. host: so of the three that you mentioned, do any of them have a tie to the president or a tie to somebody who has influence over the president? guest: i'm not aware of any. i think they all have ties to the washington legal community or the political community in different ways. they're all very well known commodities. i think they each bring different things to the table, and it's just a question, i think, of what exactly the president is looking for. it may come down to, you know, as some of the interviews for supreme court jobs in the past, to the interviews themselves

with the president, you know, there's a story of when justice breyer went in to interview for the supreme court the first time, ultimately it went to ruth bader ginsburg, and he had just broken some rings in a bicycle accident -- some ribs in a bicycle accident, and reportedly the interview didn't go well, and then he was up for the job the second time around. the interview went well, and he did get the job. host: we're talking with amy howe about the future of the supreme court. we want your questions and comments this morning as well. steven in palm harbor, florida, independent, we'll go to you. hi, steve. caller: hello, and good morning. i'd like to ask amy her opinion on the unprecedented actions of the president announcing prior to any candidates being

nominated, announcing that he's going to pick a particular gender, number one, and number two, that he's going to pick a particular race. the implications are a little scary that we're getting into this race-based, gender-based type a world. and where is this going to lead us in the future? host: amy howe? guest: well, thanks for your question. you know, as for gender, this is not at all the first time that a presidential candidate has done that. president ronald reagan, when he was running for president back in 1980, pledged to put a woman on the supreme court for the first time, and he did that with sandra day o'connor. and i think it's not that unusual for presidents to talk about their supreme court picks as part -- or presidential candidates to talk about potential supreme court picks as part of their candidacy.

president donald trump, when he was running for president in 2016 and then again in 2020, released lists of potential supreme court nominees and said i'm going to choose from these lists. and people who know a lot more about politics than i do credited that move as a really smart one in gaining support from conservatives, who may have been skeptical about trump for other reasons. and i don't have a dog in this fight. i'm not a pundit, you know, a beat writer. i don't know a lot about judge childs, but i will say that ketanji brown jackson and leondra kruger are candidates who would be on any list that i would compile of potential supreme court candidates if i had to sort of prepare for who the president might pick because of their qualifications.

i mean, leondra kruger has argued before the supreme court 12 times and is a sitting california supreme court justice. they're both incredibly well qualified by the relatively narrow criteria that are used these days to vet supreme court nominees. ketanji brown jackson has a resume that's very similar to david suter who he was nominated for the supreme court back in the 1990's. host: fox news reporting that senator roger wicker has made comments that the president's promise to seat the first black woman to the supreme court will be, and this person will be a "beneficiary of affirmative action," and he predicted the pick will probably not get a single republican vote. amy howe? guest: this is so strange in politics, which is not really my

beat. i would be surprised if based on the candidates that have been floated so far are all incredibly well qualified, and i would be surprised if they didn't get a single republican vote. ketanji brown jackson was confirmed last year with three republican votes, i think susan collins of maine, lisa murkowski of alaska, and lindsey graham of south carolina, who have said in voting for other democratic nominees, you may not have been the candidate that i might have chosen, but elections have consequences, and you're highly qualified, and i'm going to vote for you. host: and what about the others as far as their credentials and getting conservative support? guest: i think as i've said, i think it's a mistake to say

right now without the president having nominated someone to assume that whoever he nominates is not going to be well qualified, because the names that are being floated are all very well qualified by whatever measure you choose. again, like leondra kruger, under any -- under any circumstances, incredibly well qualified to be on the supreme court. host: there's the american bar association who says people are qualified. what are they saying? guest: they don't rate candidates until they are actually nominated. but again, i would assume that whoever -- i think it's a mistake to assume that whoever is nominated is not going to be well qualified. host: bill in florida, good morning. caller: oh, good morning. let me just ask sort of this

question of race in a different way. i am a great admirer of justice thomas. and second, i wouldn't in any way feel uncomfortable if we had nine black justices. but as you look at nominating these black women and then you look at justice thomas, on the questions of administrative law, on the question of row v. wade, on some of the -- on roe v. wade, on some of the big questions, how are these -- i mean, forgetting race, how are these politically different camps, in other words, what judicial tests do these justices, are these potential

justices that biden may nominate, what hoops do they have to have gone through, not for qualifications, but in terms of what they ruled and what they believe as opposed to justice thomas? how are these people as a camp different? that's my question. host: amy howe? guest: not quite sure i understand your question. to the extent that they are sitting judges, which also ones that i've heard floated so far are, you can look at their opinions. judge jackson has been on the district court for several years and is now on the d.c. circuit, and you can read the machines that she wrote as a district judge, and you can anticipated the opinions that she's written at the court of appeals judge or joined as a court of appeals judge, and the same is true with

justice kruger on the california supreme court. and, you know, you can draw your own conclusions about where they fall on the ideological spectrum if they are nominated and at the confirmation hearing. justices, senators can certainly ask them questions about their judicial philosophy. i'm not sure if that answers your question, but that's certainly how the process will work. host: is there any distinction between the three potential candidates that you talked about on previous rulings? does anything set them apart or come up? guest: apart from each other? host: yeah. guest: yeah, i will say that we're still in the preliminary stages, and so it's hard for me to say right now. judge jackson is a trial court, spent more of her career on the bench as a trial court judge.

justice kruger is on the california supreme court. they have a lot of unanimous rulings. i wouldn't want to draw distinctions that i'm not ready to draw yet. i haven't had the chance because justice breyer's retirement happened so recently, to really dive in and start drawing distinctions. i think it's a good point, you know, because justices with similar qualifications who appear relatively similar on their face can still reach different conclusions. and two of president trump's nominees i think are good example of that. you have justice neil gorsuch and justice brett kavanaugh, both conservative judges, and in many cases will vote the same way, they went to the same high school even, but don't always vote the same way. in some cases, for example, the decision in the supreme court about whether or not federal

employment discrimination laws protect lgbtq employees reached different decisions based on the text of the statute. you can't always assume that two people, even when they appear to have relatively similar qualifications, are going to vote the same way. i'm not quite to the point yet in my review of their decisions where i'm ready to draw the decisions. i'm sorry. host: no, and as you mentioned, stephen breyer still on the bench and will remain on the bench until the end of this term, june of 2022, or if they extend it for decision days. remind our viewers what cases they have taken up this term and some of the key ones in decisions that they have to make. guest: sure, we're still waiting on a couple of huge cases. one of them is a case called dobbs jackson, women's health organization in which the court is considering a challenge to the constitutionality of a mississippi law that banned

almost all abortions after the 15th week of pregnancy. it's a direct challenge to the supreme court's landmark decision in roe vs. wade and planned parenthood versus casey. the court heard oral arguments in that case in early december and has yet to usual a decision. they could issue it theoretically any day now, but in all likelihood not until late spring or early summer. they're also considering a challenge to a new york state gun scheme about whether and when you have the right to carry a gun outside of your home for self-defense. so a major second amendment ruling. they recently announced, just a little less than a week ago, that in all likelihood next term they are going to weigh in on

the consideration of race in the undergraduate admissions process, so that is a really landmark case that justice breyer's successor in all likelihood will be hearing oral arguments on. host: donald in west virginia, republican. caller: hello, good morning. i just want to know, how do you feel about -- i know -- one has been not only six months on the bench, the woman from california. and then there's jackson that's an activist. you know, activist, going into the activist role that's not a good thing for the supreme court. used her activism in her judging. how do you think that will be better for america?

host: amy howe? guest: i guess i'm not a fan of the word activist. i tend to feel that it's been overused and that it has come really to correlate often with a decision that people don't like. i know that republicans don't like some of judge jackson's decisions. she, for example, issued a decision in a case involving don mcgann, one of the house judiciary committee issued a subpoena for his testimony about the russia investigation, and former president trump's efforts, possible efforts to obstruct justice. the president tried to block don mcgann from testifying, and she ruled that presidents can't

issue a blanket block on one of his aides or advisors testifying. so that was want a popular decision among republicans, but i guess i'm just -- i can't sort of go along with the use of the word activist these days. it's been used so often that i feel like it's lost its meaning. host: conrad in philadelphia, a republican. caller: i have a couple questions. i hear people calling and saying that president biden shouldn't be deciding on using a woman or man based on race, but i look at it this way. the supreme court justices are there. there's no color there, because they read the law. they don't go in there deciding, they might like abortions, but they go by what the law is. most people think because if i put a republican supreme court justice in there, he's going to throw out all the abortion

rights. that's their opinion. but they there to read the law. most people don't understand that they think because if i put a supreme court judge and he's against abortion or he's with trump, you know, we going to win. but people that was put on the supreme court, they was republicans, they was trump. trump thought that they was going to overturn something that he wanted because they republicans, but they read the law. host: ok, let's take that point. amy howe? guest: i think that's a great point. he's referring to the recent efforts by former president trump to block the handover of documents to the committee investigating the january 6 riot at the capitol, and only justice clarence thomas i believe dissent or issued that he would have ruled in favor of the president. so all three of the trump appointees effectively ruled against the president, the

former president. i have to quibble a little bit with the idea this is something that i do every time we have a confirmation hearing. the justices, i think would agree with you, always the chief justice john roberts put it in his confirmation hearing, they are just calling the balls and strikes. but people who know baseball will tell you that the strike zone varies depending on the batter. the idea that there is sort of a black and white and really easy to figure out what's right and what's wrong in the law i think it just really not how the law actually operates. the reason that questions get to the supreme court is because they are difficult questions. in many cases, they get to the court because they are difficult questions on which the lower courts which are also made up of very smart people and everyone

but elena kagan on the current supreme court came to the supreme court from the lower federal courts have reached different conclusions about what the constitution or what a federal law says. and so for the supreme court justices to issue rulings in these cases, they have to bring something else to the table, you know, whether it's a judicial philosophy or, you know, some kind of life experience. so the idea that there is a right answer and a wrong answer, and it's very -- if there were computers to do this, i guess this is my response. host: north carolina, democratic caller. caller: yes, i would just like to know why they're making such a big deal out of what branch the woman is and so forth, and they're qualified ladies. why not have a black lady on the supreme court?

my uncle was on superior court in washington, d.c. he was my uncle. he passed several years ago. i don't understand that. i just really don't understand why so much bias against what type of woman and what color she is. as long as she knows the law and respects the law, and most of all, respect god, that's the main thing that people need to do is respect god first and then they can proceed in what they're doing to help other people. host: ok, explain for those that maybe can't remember how the confirmation process works. guest: so the president will announce his nominee. he said he's likely to do that by the end of february. there will be presumably some sort of ceremony at the white house, probably not in the rose garden at that time of year. then the nominee, she,

presumably will go and there will be meetings with senators to sort of get to know them and get to know their concerns. she'll also see meetings with officials from the bide be administration. they have what are called murder rose in which she prepares for the confirmation hearings, answering possible questions. she's also filling out what's called questionnaires with forms, answers to questions from the senators. then have a confirmation hearing. it will be nationally televised. the senate will hear from the nominee herself, and then from people who support or oppose her nomination, then the senate judiciary committee will vote, and then the senate itself will vote presumably all of this will happen in the spring, and then if there's a confirmation, which i would expect there would be if the democrats can keep all of

their senators on board, the new justice would take her seat sometime probably in early july. host: steven in lake oswego, oregon, independent. caller: good morning. my question is has the court ever been this politicized. it seems justice breyer stepping down very specifically because biden is president, and he wants the democratic president to replace him. and that in itself is an indication that things have just gone too far. has this been this way in the history? guest: i think in terms of the idea of stepping down so that a president of the same party that nominated you can replace you, that's not a new idea. i mean, justice antonin scalia, justice ruth bader ginsburg both passed away while they were on

the bench, but that certainly what justice anthony kennedy, justice and is a day oh con, no, justice david suter, not john paul stevens, because he was appointed by a republican, but what several of the other previous justices who stepped down also were trying to do. in terms of the other part of your question about the court being sort of politicized or divided, i do think, i'm want a supreme court historian, but i do think that the court does seem to be divided. they're hearing a lot of politically contentious cases right now. they've taken them on. a lot of the cases that they've taken on, cases like the new york gun rights case, the abortion case, the affirmative action case, those are all cases that could disturb over in the case of the abortion case and the affirmative action case,

cases that will overturn federal law or cases that they didn't have to take because the lower court essentially left the federal law in place, in the mississippi abortion case, the lower courts, the conservative u.s. court of appeals for the fifth circuit has said no, mississippi's law is in conflict with roe vs. wade, and in the affirmative action case, both the first circuit and fourth circuit had said that these policies did not violate federal law or the constitution. the supreme court was this new 6-3 majority in the wake of justice ginsburg's death and justice came i coney barrett coming on, feeling confident that they could take on some of the more contentious issues. so it is certainly a court that is more divided, i think, and that's been some of the reporting in recent weeks than it has been in some time.

host: and then you have a poll showing the approval rating of the u.s. supreme court down to 40%, a new low. guest: yes, i think it's still doing better than congress and the executive branch, i think, but it's definitely a low for the court, which had been much higher even in the last few years. and you wonder how much the justices think of that, but on the other hand, how much some of the justices, you know, feel like they're ready to issue rulings in these cases without regards to these polls, to do what they think the court should be doing without regard to the polls. host: ok, pennsylvania, democratic caller. caller: hi, good morning. i just believe the self-proclaimed nonracists reveal themselves at times like this. half my life the supreme court was people by only white mails, and i doubt if any of these

callers would be calling up talking about that. you don't have to expressly say something for it to be so. and the main contender is a harvard law graduate, but i've heard people already talking about, and two of them are those type of graduates talking about qualifications. it shows how you really feel. host: dave in san antonio, texas, republican. dave, good morning. you're talking with amy howe of scotus blog. go ahead. caller: yes, the suggestion that racism is brought into this decision making process is only because they have eliminated white men, white women, and black men from choosing. they are simply, they eliminate all the competition, and then choose only the women, the black women. and what they're saying is that they probably would not get

chosen if everybody were included in the decision making process says. so it doesn't say much for the person that gets nominated, because she simple was chosen only because they eliminated all the other competition. host: amy, what has the president said about the importance for him to name a black woman? guest: i think he said in his remarks at the white house the other day that it was long overdue. and this has been part of his broader mission when he has been nominating other judges to the federal judiciary to nominate people who have been historically underrepresented, not only in terms of race, but also in terms of professional experience, and so he has put more public defenders and civil rights lawyers on the judiciary than in other administrations,

because he and other officials in his admission feel like they too have been underrepresented. i have kind of a funny story from when i was talking to my daughter's girl scout troop a couple of years ago, i was telling, they were doing their government badge, and i was telling them about the supreme court. this was when justice ginsburg, justice sotomayor and justice kagan were all on the bench. and this is coming from someone who remembers quite well when justice o'connor was nominated as the first woman on the supreme court, and i said, so there are nine justices on the supreme court, and i paused, and i said and three of them are women. to me, that's a big deal. and the room of 9 and 10-year-old girls exploded, that's not fair! so, you know, different perspective coming from a different generation. host: tom, san jose, california, democratic caller. caller: hi, amy.

the court seems to be political. you're very diplomatic, may i say. just look at the texas abortion law that was just upheld by the conservatives on the court. i mean, that wasn't even a law, what was that about? and i think it's wonderful that biden is going to nominate a black woman. it's going to drive the right wing crazy. already you've shown fox news' position, and they're calling it affirmative action. it's typical to degrade her already. and what was clarence thomas? his wife is filing amicus briefs. come on. he won't even recuse himself. the court is so political because of mitch. come on. don't be so diplomatic, please. host: amy howe? guest: he's referring to the, at least in part to the story in

the new yorker about clarence thomas and gunny thomas and her involvement in amicus briefs. it's great reporting. i urge everybody to read it. host: rob in michigan, republican. caller: good morning, thank you for taking my call. i had a career where i worked with a number of minorities and females, and they told me to a person that the biggest barrier they had to overcome was when they said, look, i hired this person first of all because they were a minority or female, but they're also qualified. i think the president is doing a real disservice to whoever he nominates. that's unfair to the qualified candidates. secondly, i hope the republicans that sit on the committee for confirmation show a lot more decorum and integrity than their democratic counterparts did during the hearing.

we don't need to be making false accusations or innuendo trying to insult the integrity of the person, their family, hurting their children. that's bush league. and the republicans, i hope they rise above that, when the candidates proves to be highly quad feud, that they will vote for confirmation. let's show the difference between those with integrity and those who are just filled with hate for the president. thank you. host: amy hoy, do you have any thoughts on that? guest: i'm good, thanks. host: we'll go to anna in texas, democrat inning caller. caller: good morning. great subject. donald trump nominated barrett, kavanaugh, gorsuch. and i grew up doingization, and they were always told we have to be 10 times better for us to get

a job, for us to be in politics. and when i heard mitch mcconnell speak, no, i'm not going to nominate her, this is america. i have two nieces who serve in the military, have been there for 20 years. it's ok for them to fight our wars. but they can't have a woman of color to represent them on the supreme court. i had a nephew who died in iraq in 2005. it's ok for him to die for this country. but no one should be represented anymore on the supreme court, especially a black woman t. i

say to women in this country, you have to rise up, and we have to support each other. i didn't call in to say, oh, kavanaugh, barrett or -- i knew that president, former president trump would do that, would nominate that. and then you go back to ronald reagan. oh, yeah, i'm losing this president, let me just pick a woman. i have so much respect for president biden to get up and say i'm going to put a woman of color in the office. host: ok, anna. amy howe, let's end with who you're watching or what you're watching. is there one person in the administration that you're watching closely as this process unfolds? guest: so the president's chief of staff is working on this process. he has been involved in more of these confirmations than just

about anyone anywhere, both while he's been working in obamd biden and clinton-gore administrations and also as senate judiciary staff. so watching and father could be a little bit of radio silence. we could be operating off of the rumor mill for a little while. as the president does is vetting and interviews. we could have a nominee. host: thank you for the conversation. guest: thank you for having me. host: when we come back, open up the phone lines for the open forum. what public policy issues on your lot -- on your much -- mind? ♪

>> sunday, february 6 on in-depth. law professor cheryl cassian would be alive guest to talk about race relations and inequality in america. her books include her latest, "white space, black hood." live sunday, february 6 at noon eastern on book tv. on c-span. -- on c-span 2. this week on the c-span networks, the house and senate are both in session for the senate will vote on nominations including university of pennsylvania president to serve as u.s. ambassador to germany and the president of the export import bank. on tuesday, two hearings for the

nominations of white house budget director and deputy director. at 10:00 eastern on c-span, they will appear before the senate security committee. live on c-span.org and the c-span now app. they will testify before the senate budget committee. on thursday at 10:00 eastern on c-span three, former employees of the washington football team testify before the house oversight committee about reports of sexual harassment, verbal abuse and discrimination in the organization. this comes a day after the team is expected to announce its new name. watch this week live on the c-span networks or on c-span now. also head over to c-span.org for scheduling information, live or on-demand any time. your unfiltered view of government. ♪

>>'s. host: we are back in an open forum. what is the public policy issue on your mind. you can keep talking about the supreme court and president biden's pledge to nominate a black woman to replace retiring justice stephen breyer. you can talk about u.s. tensions with russia over ukraine, covid-19 response by federal, state and local governments or

president biden's build back better agenda. we will begin their with one of the leaders of the democratic party in the house talking about in a discussion this week with the washington post about a possible deal with joe manchin over parts of the build back better agenda the deal with health care. >> we've got thousands, literally thousands if not millions of people who need health care coverage we don't have it and we say we want to get people back to work. if they want to go back to ash give them health care. -- if you want them to go back to work, give them health care. we want them back on the job on these jobs that don't have any health-care coverage. he says he's for that but

there's a lot in the build back better he is for, so let's do that. maybe we will get some parts tom. host: doug in north carolina, a democrat caller. what's on your mind? caller: good morning. would really kind of bothers me because i know you get some callers who are for trump and say their patriots and believe in the constitution but after his little rally yesterday in texas it's like how can anybody support this guy when he says if he's elected he's can a pardon the people who stormed the capital. it just blows my mind that is like i don't care as long as they're mine and i'm get a release them. that really just bothers me. that's all i wanted to say.

host: let's listen to the former president who was in texas and this is what he had to say about the january 6 rioters. [video clip] >> another thing we will do in so many people ask me about it. if i run it i win, we will treat those people from january 6 fairly, we will treat them fairly. and if it requires pardons, we will give them pardons because they are being treated so unfairly. this has not happened to all of the other atrocities the took place recently. nothing like this has happened. what that one select committee is doing and what the people are doing that are running those prisons it's a disgrace. we will treat them fairly and we will take care of the people of this country, all of the people of this country. host: former president trump at

a rally in texas yesterday saying that he would pardon those protesters from january 6. what is the public policy issue on your mind? john in virginia, republican. caller: good morning. kind of had a guest suggestion for you. with all the crime and all the major cities on tv, we -- i was watching on tv. my thoughts were chicago, think of these poor innocent people living in the city having to put up with the crime and my thought is always why were these people keep electing democratic leaders, why don't they wake up and make a change. and that i saw a robert woodson on tv and one of the things he stated in chicago in the section where everybody's getting shot, only 6% of the people vote.

now with all the talk of voter suppression, wire people if they're in chicago helping those people vote to change the government rather than put up with all that crime. i believe it's dr. woodson, he was a civil rights leader. host: we have had him on a lot. you can go to our website and put his name into the search engine at the top and you will find interviews with him, he was on recently. cj in minneapolis, independent. caller: thank you for letting me get in, good morning to you. the reason why want to get in on this, the native americans away they're being treated, with the pipelines on their land and the protests in their being thrown in jail for protesting, the minnesota news network in the twin cities not even covering it

all. some of the things that's been going on for lease for five years. the company is in violation of a lot of things that this supposed to be taking care of and they are getting away with it. nobody is even talking about it at all. host: in the reporting of the local papers? caller: i don't really read the papers so i can say that they do or do not. but i do know on a mainstream you don't hear enough of it. the native radio show that comes on from 6:00 to 7:00, they talk about it every day. host: cj in minneapolis. massachusetts, a democrat line. caller: i just want to make a comment that it is tough to find a title wave of misinformation

and i think they should bring back the fairness doctrine from the 80's or at least do something where it forces these very biased media outlets to at least show the other side and to report things fairly. that will do a few good things to our country. thank you. host: michelle, staten island, new york, independent. caller: high, how are you. i just had a comment on what president trump just said about treating the insurrectionists fairly. how can he say that when we lost police officers? it was horrible and he wants to treat them fairly. that's a real shame.

i just feel terrible. host: you may be interested in this article from political. -- from politico. the january 6 select committee on friday subpoenaed central players in the gop effort to submit illegitimate presidential electors in 2020, push the became a key component of donald trump's attempt to overturn his defeat. the select committee is seeking documents and testimony from two pro-trump electors each from seven battleground states all one by joe biden. republicans sought to deliver their own slate of electors paid we believe the individuals we've subpoenaed today have information about how the so-called alternate electors met in who was behind the scheme. we encourage them to cooperate with the investigation to get answers for the american people and ensure nothing like that ever happens again.

among those subpoenaed were david schaefer, the current chair of the georgia republican party and the chair of the nevada republican party and michigan rnc committee woman kathy burns. the subpoenaed individuals have two weeks to provide documents to the committee and are asked to appear for a deposition by late february. john in washington, democratic caller. we are an open forum. good morning. caller: good morning. i'm a little concerned about biden being on the campaign trail. it seems like he's not there and using his old speeches where he came out they all sound the same. every speeches is just the same. kind of concerned about corruption with ukraine. he's got his son hunter and his father-in-law making money and i

just don't know if i can trust him anymore. these insurgents at the border, all these people coming across and drugs. i just don't understand what's going on with these people that don't have american interest at heart. host: the united nations security council will take up the debate over russia's threat to ukraine on monday. they will have that discussion. we are going to air that it 8:00 p.m. eastern time on c-span two, on our website where you can find it before then. you can also download with our free c-span mobile video app called c-span now. where you can tune in and watch that by the united nations security council. diana, republican. >> good morning.

thank you for taking my call. what i wanted to just say regarding the supreme court candidates, i think biden really shouldn't have limited who he was going to select for that. i think a woman could be qualified, i think a black woman could be qualified, but a hispanic person could be qualified, i just don't think he should have limited to just a black woman and that's just my thought. host: janet in illinois, democratic caller. your turn, you are on the air. caller: yes i'm calling about the gated communities in the united states of america. many of them inhabited by people in the 30's and 40's.

people who apparently find it convenient to move to the north during the summer and gated communities and then go back down to phoenix, arizona in the winter and apparently are too scared to look out the door of their cars because there might be a black or brown person nearby these people are racist bigots who were very wealthy and why do gated communities keep popping up more and moral of the country? we may try to get rid of racism here by passing laws, but if they can get themselves penned up into a gated community where they can live, they don't want to be bothered by all these unsavory people who are outside the gated doors. host: ok. on the tensions with russia here's the washington post. front-page story, allies all

over the map on ukraine. reporting for the post that is russia amasses tens of thousands of troops on its borders with ukraine along with tanks and artillery, missiles capable of striking the capital, officials in washington, a key evan across the nation are weighing the timing of invasion. one camp is convinced a russian strike is imminent. but ukraine's president is now personal -- is not persuaded that the intelligence western nations of shonen backed up their dire assessment. some think russia could strike but are not sure of the timing and whether he will accept diplomatic compromise that he can sell as a nato retreat. that in the washington post.

tom in north carolina, republican. tom, good morning. caller: yes i'm here. host: we are listening. caller: nancy pelosi kicked the two republicans off the committee -- host: you keep breaking up, apologies. hopefully you can call back. new jersey, independent. caller: i believe americans in this country have a really conflicted way of thinking. every policy we have so far since the 20's have been replaced with socialist policies and i believe everyone is missing that point. the stuff being implemented now is well overdue. a black woman being nominated

for the supreme court is amazing and is overdue. i would like to see more of a change like that. >> bill in -- we will go to nick in pennsylvania, democratic caller. caller: two comments, one is mostly about china and how republicans keep pounding on it and all the issues with china is the democrats fault. dr. oz has endless commercials on now. most of these people don't understand what started way back in their early 70's when richard nixon open up relationship with china. and another issue is that they have so many -- we have so many companies that are now, they complain also about the

immigration in the united states, let's bring some of these back to the united ash job spec the united states. maybe we can put an end to the mass immigration coming here in the united states. host: richard in new york, a republican. caller: good morning. i wanted to talk about how the media has taken what president trump said about treating the january 6 fairly. i think it's being taken out of context by the media. what he's saying by fairly and pardons are the ones who may not of done anything. and more importantly when he says fairly is comparing to those who in 2020 destroyed businesses, beaten innocent americans, tormented police officers, the one from new york said how dare he talk about

treating fairly about the police officer that was injured on generate six. all the police officers around the country that was during those riots. i think the media's taking what he's saying, can't -- out of context. and one more thing about the supreme court pick, i think biden make a big mistake by saying he's going to appoint a black woman. i think those things should be based on qualifications and i think any black woman he picks he is doing an injustice to by limiting the pool of the people for that position. host: early this morning we talked about -- we talked to peter good men about his book "davos man." you can find that conversation on our website. the washington post, the moral calculations of billionaire.

this features leon who swears by capitalism and the excerpt is in a class that reaped historic gains, one asked why my villain. from the washington post reporting, he notes in here that cooperman manages $2.5 billion that he made during a career as an investor and a hedge fund manager and also in the reporting of notes the past year had been the best time in history to be one of america's 745 billionaires, who stink -- wealth has asked -- grown by an estimate at 70% since the beginning of the pandemic even as tens of millions of low-wage workers lost their jobs or their homes. together those billionaires are now worth more than the bottom 60% of american households combined. in each day he could see that cap widening on his balance sheet up an average of $4788 per

minute the stock market 1.9 million per day and 700 million total in 2021. st. louis, missouri, independent. >> good morning. first, like to say i really liked this open forum at the end of the show. it is great. three things, in 1980 i voted for ronald reagan and he appointed sandra day o'connor and timmy she's been the best person in my life on the court, secondly if we were like men we would want all women on the supreme court for a few centuries like they had. i think we need a few more on the court who will look out for the average person and not just the richest and who's not a racist. i don't think that's too much to

expect. lastly we never needed health care for everyone more than we do now. what happened to biden's promise to give workers a choice between keeping their company's health insurance or obamacare. he campaigned heavily on that and that is the one thing that guy really needs to get done. host: charles in new jersey, democratic caller. caller: good morning are you doing. i'm going to say this and i hope you understand me. i'm good until you how you can stop 65 to 75% of the crime, a 75 to 85% of school dropouts. host: what is it? caller: all schools, public schools should have training for

young men when they come out of the school they have a trade from truck driving, painting, all of them, women and men should have a trade. then with a come out of school they can get a job. in the city for those who don't have education, teach them. let them go to school to learn how to get their ged and learn how to get a trade. then you won't have a problem in this country. host: sandra in freeport, pennsylvania. what's the public policy issue on your mind? caller: good morning. i was heartened to see when a question arose about the trump rally that c-span followed the comment with showing a clip of that rally where trump clearly

said that the folks who were arrested at the capital would have their cases looked at and considered so that they might be fairly tried. that's verily -- that's very different than the response of the moderator that indicated that number one it was a riot or insurrection, which there's clearly a question there. and that was very disappointing based upon the comment of the caller that said the participants would be forgiven

their trespasses there out of hand. that's clearly not what our former president trump said. if you would review that you would see that his comments were different than saying they would all be released or forgiven. i am so concerned that the truth is not getting out for reasons such as this that there -- host: what would you call what happened that day, the video people breaking windows to get into the capital and breaking through doors, pushing, etc.? what would you call what happened? caller: i would call that an unfortunate representation of a

number of citizens who were out of line. and i would say that those who did the damage or hurt anyone were in fact individuals who should be looked at very carefully as to their motives and their activities, there seems to be some question and you may correct me here that there are films of the activities there that have yet to be released by someone who has a concern about making it all available to the public first hand. host: ok. james in north carolina, democratic caller. caller: thank you for taking my

call prayed as a couple of comments. it seems the viewers have a short memory when they talk about biden shouldn't of come out and said he was going to appoint a black woman, they seem to forget former president reagan did exactly the same thing. he said he was going to appoint a woman to the supreme court and he did, he appointed sandra day o'connor. all the fuss about this and than the other caller i want to make it brief here, another caller said if the president had opened it up to everyone none of these black women the more talked about he's considering would've been qualified. that's the ultimate -- i can think of the correct word. but it's basically saying that no black women are qualified if

there in the mix with whites and other nationalities. host: we talked to amy earlier about the three women who have been mentioned as candidates, leading candidates on the short list. they went through their credential so you can find that again on our website. chris in illinois, republican. >> thank you for taking my call. what i think is a big issue is the criteria that being used to select the judges and i would challenge any democrat or republican to tell me what is different when the republicans use the federalist society to filter all the conservative

judges down to a single set of people that you meet their own criteria and then hand that list over to the president who then picks from that list, how is that different than the president saying he's got to select a certain person or certain type of person to be the president. host: we are sure to hear more on this next week in washington on what's next and the process for replacing justice stephen breyer on the courts. that's it for today, thank you for watching. we will be back with more conversations with all of you. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2021]

>> the spanish unfiltered look at government -- c-span is your unfiltered look at government. >> do you think this is just a community center? it's way more than that. >> comcast is partnering with community centers to create wi-fi enabled areas so low income families can get the tools they need to be ready for anything. >> comcast supports c-span as a public service along with these providers giving you a front row seat to democracy. the national governors association winter meeting continues with a discussion on bipartisanship. the nga chair will participate with david rubenstein. watch live on c-span. online at c-span.org or follow

along with our new video app, c-span now. >> in 2019 reporter ben raines discovered the remains of a slave ship in the swamp outside of mobile, alabama. on cue and day he talks about the book "the last slave ship," which details the history of the ship and how and why it transported 100 slaves to alabama more than 50 years after the trans-atlantic slave trade was outlawed. >> it serves as sort of a proxy for everyone in the united states and the world whose families arrived in whatever country they are in in a ship. most of those people we know nothing about. so this is a proxy for this lost history for these people who were stolen from africa and spread all over the world.