>> this morning in washington journal, we start with a look at the news interviewer phone calls. then, robert daly discusses u.s. relations with china. later, lance morrow will talk about his new book, "the noise of typewriters: remembering journalism." washington journal starts now. ♪ >> it is the washington journal for february 26, you've seen the

reports on high inflation stories and statistics showing how some are forced to change spending habits. there is reporting that shows americans are not afraid to spend money in some cases with consumer spending up, despite inflation. the cost of living today technically is determined by the amount of money needed to live in certain areas and meet basic necessities. with that in mind, how has your cost-of-living changed? for eastern and central time zones, it is (202) 748-8000. mountain and pacific, (202) 748-8001. if you want to text us your thoughts, you can do that at (202) 748-8003. you can vote on facebook and twitter, and always follow the show on instagram. the recent looking at inflation from the labor department shows headlines from the ones you've

seen the last couple of weeks or so, k-fed inflation more than 0.6% in january, more than expected, according to some sources. that fostered a response from the biden administration, the president sending out a statement when it comes to looking at inflation at inflation and how it affects american saying today's report shows we've made progress on inflation, we have more work to do. inflation is down from the summer while the employment rate remained at a 50 year low and take-home pay has gone up. the statement saying we continue to make progress since the report gas prices down, down more than $1.60 since last summer speak after putin's invasion. there may be setbacks along the way, but we face a global economic challenge from existing -- from a position of strength and i will not allow republican members of congress to undermine that strength.

some have supported cutting taxes for the wealthy and large corporations, critical programs american seniors and families count on and take credit of the united states hostage. if you look at other reports from the federal government when it comes to personal spending, npr highlighting personal spending rose 1.8% in january. as consumers splurged on goods and services, like going out for meals and movies, lots of people have money in their pockets to spend thanks to strong job growth and rising wages. retirees got a raise, social security benefits rose 8.7%, that is the largest cost-of-living increase in four decades. the npr story also tracking the in addition, many people filed away extra savings during the pandemic when spending opportunities were limited and the government was stripping

relief payments. americans are still sitting on a lot of additional cash. those are the stories about inflation, personal spending habits of your household, especially cost-of-living, what it takes to maintain your standard of life, so to speak. how has that changed? eastern and central time zones, it is (202) 748-8000. mountain and pacific, (202) 748-8001. you can text us at (202) 748-8002. one of the people addressing these issues was the fed chairman jay powell earlier this month, telling an audience economic club in washington about the process of bringing down inflation, what it means for the consumer. here is a portion [video clip] >> the message we were sending is that the disinflation area process, the process of getting inflation down has begun in a

good sector, about a quarter of the economy. it has a long way to go, these are the early stages. the services sector is not really showing any disinflation yet. this process is likely to take quite a bit of time, it is not going to be smooth. it will probably be bumpy. we will need to do further rate increases and we will need to hold policy at a restrictive level. then comes the labor market report for january. it is very strong, stronger than anyone expected. we did not expect it to be this strong. it shows you why we think this will be a process that takes a significant period of time. the labor market is strong. it is a good thing inflation has

started to come down -- since then, financial conditions have tightened significantly. host: that is jay powell talking about inflation, you can factor that into telling us about the cost of living, what it takes for you to maintain the standard of living in your household. (202) 748-8000 for eastern and central, (202) 748-8001 for mountain and pacific. npr also highlights this, saying that everybody is flush with cash. folks are struggling and businesses are not confident that spending habits will continue. spending grew faster than income in january and shoppers may be nearing their limits. walmart is projecting modest sales growth this year. the ceo says shoppers are

focused on basic necessities, like groceries, while limiting spending on discretionary items. prices and cost-of-living issues highlighted by some members of congress, republican ones putting on twitter talking about this. they include senator roger wicker, who says food prices are still the top problem in american homes. inflation is not easing. another representative saying president biden wen yu jobs reports comes out, but ignores what is hurting america most, adding inflation -- when will he abandon the socialist spending spree that is causing record high inflation. sender ted cruz commenting on his twitter saying 36% of americans have more credit card debt than emergency savings. inflation is so bad we are burning through savings and relying on credit cards to make ends meet. some of you posting when it

comes to personal experiences, you can do that on facebook and twitter, from facebook saying cost-of-living increases did not keep pace with inflation, the cost is up, it hurts the elderly and disabled. tammy adding her perspective, housing costs are out of control and the lack of available housing has hit me hard. i've been in a rental house that is now up for sale. finding an affordable apartment has been a nightmare. luckily i have an excellent rental history. i was so hopeless, adding she is 62 and disabled. i never had a problem finding a decent apartment before now and that is distressing. those are some personal experiences. if you wish to share, you can do that on facebook, twitter, you

can call us, again (202) 748-8000 eastern and central and (202) 748-8001 mountain and pacific. how has your cost-of-living changed? let us hear from scott in illinois. caller: good morning, can you hear me? host: go ahead. caller: good morning. my wife and i are senior citizens, i know this is going to be a crazy call-in show. other than the normal food costs and gasoline costs, we are now getting bills -- the house and surge just went up -- insurance just went up $500. we have not done anything, no claims. the people with expensive houses are getting too, three, $4000 increases and motor vehicles in illinois are outrageous. if the government wants to help,

reduce it a little bit. the question about the house insurance and things like that, once this is over, help us. i do not think they will reduce prices. once the prices get up there, that is it. i will let everybody else talk. host: did you mention you are on social security? i may have misheard you. caller: yes. host: some talked about the cost-of-living adjustment that social security beneficiaries received, does that make a difference for you? aside from the housing issues you talked about. caller: it helped a little bit, you still gotta pay for part b, for medications. getting older, they lotus up on medications and that is how we live longer. to me, $100 is $100.

when you go to the grocery, it eats it up into bags. it is relative. -- in two bags. it is relative. host: south carolina, this is steve. hello. caller: good morning. i'm 75, on social security. i have a part-time job, one day a week. i had that job until august of last year, full-time. they cut back. i'm working eight hours a week, that affected me drastically. aside from food prices -- we know they are high. i have other things that have affected my cost-of-living dramatically. one is my homeowners insurance went up, it got a warning, and email that it was going up in march. so i'm shopping again for that. my real estate, house taxes went

up drastically last year. almost doubled in berkeley county. it killed me. insurance for cars is going up. it is running through everything. they are not taking any prisoners. it is everything. when it hits, it races through every part of your life. i get gas at sam's for less than three dollars a gallon, i know other people pay more than that. i do not think we should be paying two dollars a gallon, but anyway. it is up and down between $2.90 and three dollars. every insurance, every tax, car taxes have gone up. the state is trying to find ways to pay their bills, i get it. when you are on fixed income, just that little race we got for

social security, it was substantial. but it got eaten up right away. we are backing up. host: steve talking about some similar things as the previous caller, larry in georgia, hello. caller: i just want to say about social security, i'm 72 years old. when social security first started with president roosevelt , it was something he set up for all people over 65 they have something coming in. what i want to say is, the interest rates that are going up now wit credit cards and housing. the housing is so high right now.

i am on fixed income, i am disabled. i had to go back to work, but i can make it. the way things are set up now with housing and interest rates going up, it is hurting the people. it is making money for the banks, credit cards and housing so high that president obama has set up something for the housing market -- our payments were so high, he had it stopped. what president biden has done, president biden has the economy going in a way where it was coming back by itself in people realized that, so they jumped in to start the interest rate talk about inflation. as long as people are working and making money and paying for it, the economy is coming back on its own. i appreciate you listening to me.

remember, social security is not going anywhere. all the millions of people are working every week and of that money goes into social security for those working. social security is not going anywhere. host: larry in georgia, you can add your experience to the mix with the numbers on the screen. some other democrats have talked about the current state of the economy and what it means for consumers, especially when it comes to cost-of-living and spending habits. too many communities disproportionately suffer from the burdens of pollution, the epa's investing more than $550 million to advance environmental justice. if you are saying my cost -- a view were saying my cost-of-living is higher because we are couched by companies. another viewer in florida sing

the cost-of-living has not changed much the last few years, people are having difficulty paying bills because of inflation. do what i did during the reagan years, get a second job. it worked for me, pay my bills and bought a house. i am enjoying retirement. if you want to do that at (202) 748-8003, text us. a report shows some of the least expensive places to live and ranks them by state. on the top was mississippi with an average cost-of-living index of 85, the lowest cost of living in the nation with housing costs 32% lower than the national average. mississippi consistently ranks as one of the worst states for public education, many do not have health insurance. next is oklahoma, utility costs

are 9% less than the national average. there is likely one reason aaa says it has some of the lowest gas prices in the country. oklahoma's prices are almost 30% low the national average, making it the second lowest in the country for cost-of-living. number three is kansas. housing costs almost 30% lower than the national average, average rent in kansas is $912. average home value is $164,000. a study that looked at grocery costs in each popular city. perhaps you live in one of those places. you can tell us about your cost-of-living and how it has changed. this is john, good morning.

go ahead. caller: yeah, i wanted to talk about -- we live in maui, we've been here for a while. everything has always been expensive. but housing is incredibly so high than it has ever been and lack of -- if there is a housing shortage on the island. gas prices are outrageous. they were always high, but some places it is like five dollars. groceries, same thing. everything has gone up, it is crazy. it is getting hard to survive,

it is like only the rich can survive. host: are you a native of hawaii? caller: yes, born and raised in a wahoo -- ohahu. i've seen the changes. it has gotten worse. the islands are almost forgotten. but we matter. host: you talked about housing. do you rent or own? caller: we rent. we've been trying to get into the housing market and by, but it is crazy. there is no way. unless something is done, they figure a way to lower the prices or put a cap on what people are

asking for their homes, my guess it has probably gone up. something that was 300,000 or 400,000 has gone up too close to $1 million. host: that is john telling us his story, many of you mentioned the housing factor. some mentioning gas and social security. you can put others in the mix if you want to talk about your cost-of-living and how it has increased. rob in new york. caller: good morning. everything is expensive. we had eggs in new york at seven dollars a dozen, it came down to six dollars and stores made a big deal of it. even gases like $3.50 a gallon with the discount.

everything is nuts. biden's administration has no plan to bring any of it down. i heard mr. powell, the fed chairman talking about what was going on. that guy is so out of touch. he does not have a clue. host: the eggs, were you a big egg heater? -- eater? you dropped off. another senator put on her twitter feed, she goes to medical issues saying no one should have to choose between paying for insulin or other everyday essentials like food or rent. i was in tacoma to discuss house -- how the inflation reduction act is capping insulin for seniors and i will keep pushing to cap the cost for everyone. medical issues the issue for senator murray, you can add that to the mix. this is gary in north carolina.

caller: i think the plan is falling apart. with the new green deal and stuff. our road taxes paid by cash tax. if everybody is going to electric, they cannot get the tax to fix potholes and stuff. i do not know where that money is going to come from. the other thing is the poor prisoner was trying hard to do something to clean up the air and everything that moves around , plastics, asphalt, everything comes from oil. when you move something, it costs a lot. it will reflect in the cost. the situation with people not

liking what is going on or moving to other states, it is driving housing out. we have immigrants that need a place to stay. that is driving housing out. the plan is falling apart. it started out a good idea, but it is falling apart. host: north carolina, that listing of states ranks north carolina at the 24th least expensive, saying despite the low cost of living, north carolina has some of the top health care facilities in the country, extensive education system and easy transportation, including for international airports. diverse technology, finance and aerospace job market. lowest corporate income tax rate. that helped keep prices low and the state more affordable.

your experiences may differ when it comes to cost-of-living and how that has changed. we are inviting you to let us know. (202) 748-8000 eastern and central, (202) 748-8001 and pacific. the ranking shows tennessee is the 10th least expensive state to live, according to the data that was found. you can find online. senator blackburn of tennessee took to the senate floor, talking about economic issues. what it means for consumers. here is part of the speech. [video clip] >> what we are hearing in tennessee is this. there is less meat on the dinner table then there was a year ago

because it costs so much. 9% more to buy chicken and beef than last year. they probably do not have cereal for kids in the morning because the price of one box of cereal has arisen about 16%. here we are in the dead of winter, tender -- people in tennessee are paying upwards of 15% more to keep the heat on in their houses. 15% more than what they paid last year. if kids lose a coat at school, it will cost 3% more to get a new one. if it snows, socks and boots come at the same premium. these percentages are adding up. right now, these families are praying they will be able to move around money so they can keep the kids warm, keep them in

school, keep the house dry. these are not things that are luxuries. they are necessities. the impact of inflation is measurable. host: that was senator blackburn of tennessee, giving her thoughts when it comes to inflation and what it means for the cost of consumers. senator john kennedy of louisiana sharing his thoughts on twitter, sing president biden fueled inflation by spending money we do not have, not americans are dishing out an extra $395 a month for the same goods they bought last year. chairman powell and treasury secretary ellen have raised interest rates too late. wages are not keeping up with inflation. the cost of living in every area has gone up, i do not understand how raising interest rates and taxes helps people.

(202) 748-8003 is how you text us. bill in virginia is next. caller: good morning. i thought the ceos were the ones that raised prices on everything, doing a little bit of research, 70% of ceos in the country are republican. i do not see why they are blaming president biden. i'm 65 years old, in my lifetime i have seen three things. social security, food stamp program and health care. democrats have given us every one of them. if anyone must sell republicans have done to help the poor people, call and let me know. host: how is it personally impacting you? the cost of inflation, higher prices, how is it personally impacting you?

caller: i'm on social security, i got a little raise. but the governor of virginia raised everyone's utility rates 35%, he was a republican. i am wondering what the republicans have ever done to help the poor people or the middle. someone please call and let me know. host: lacey is in tennessee, you are next. caller: my wife and i, about year and a half ago we were doing well. everything went back. but the prices and things all went up, we barely can afford food to eat. that is fact. i do not know what we will do, we've got a decent place to live. we are not going to be able to live and stay here.

i know there has to be lots of other people out here exactly in the same condition that we are in, i am sure of it. all of it is a bunch of crap, these corporate people in utility companies use that to line their pocketbooks. they don't care anything about us. host: there is a recent story on the foxbusiness website talking about how credit card debt has done when it comes to dealing with prices in meeting demands, americans are drowning in it as uncomfortably high inflation makes the cost of everyday necessities more expensive. credit card balance increased by $61 billion, according to the new york federal reserve bank quarterly report.

that smashed the previous high of 920 $7 billion recorded before the pandemic again. household that climbed to a record 16 point 9 trillion by the fourth quarter, increase of 2.4%. latest data marks the major reversal from two years ago when households were paying off credit card debt with stimulus payments received during the pandemic. fewer americans were spending on big-ticket items because the virus demanded lockdown. more of the on the foxbusiness news site. maybe you can compare it to the pandemic or post-pandemic that some have brought up when it comes to social security, housing, insurance, food. you can call (202) 748-8000 if you live in eastern and central, (202) 748-8001 mountain and pacific. janet is in ohio. caller: yeah, am i on now?

host: do not listen to the tv, just say we've got to say. caller: why don't you show a chart of corporations making like pepsi and kellogg's cereal, they are making millions in profits. you love to show a picture or speech by blackburn in tennessee , just propaganda. where is greta? host: greta is with us, talk to me about how corporations impact the cost of living for the average american. caller: they are making millions of dollars, i wish he would show a chart of what they are making. host: you said that, how do you think that impacts what people do as far as they are paying for everyday items? caller: just what i'm saying,

they are making millions of dollars and we the people are paying for it. you have blackburn trying to blame biden. host: you don't think inflation is anything to do with what is going on? caller: it has to do with corporations making millions. pharmaceutical companies, kellogg's and pepsi and all of that. they are making millions. host: philip in michigan, go ahead. caller: i wanted to know what republicans did. trump opened up the petroleum and got it down, some places $1.90 for a gallon of gas. the second biden entered office, he turned off all the pipelines. we still have an opportunity to bring it back if we turn on the little guys, oil guys. host: many of the pipelines are

open, there was the one keystone xl project in the mix when the biden administration to place. as far as cost of living for you, what is it like? caller: everything is higher because of gas. gas controls the prices of everything in america. government land, they are not allowing pipes on government land. trying to clean up the ocean and shutdown these things in the ocean that pump oil, there is enough oil in the gulf of mexico to last us 100 years, if not more. host: taking a look at grocery prices, they have ticked up nationally in january after an apparent inflation respite in december. groceries raising 0.7 percent in january, compared to the prior month.

why it matters, for many of the approximately 63% of americans living paycheck-to-paycheck, rising food prices can be a difficult financial challenge. such prices are vulnerable to outside forces such as climate change and geopolitical happenings. chris in california -- sorry, tom in tennessee. go ahead. caller: thanks for taking my call. we are down here in tennessee, the south has always been a low income place. other states for income is high, they are buying up everything here. that is driving housing prices up. the talk of cutting social security out, they take social security way, i do not know what they are going to do.

everybody is working here. you want a job, go to work. low-wage places, retirements and stuff. my brother has good retirement, he is sitting fine. but the south has been a low income place. we talk about the government needing to do something, we've got to regulate. cutting social security is not the answer. host: in california, we will hear from chris and el dorado. -- dean el dorado. caller: my question is with insurance, they are saying my

insurance will be over $18,000. i live in a little house that is overrated. they say it is worth $350,000 and with the fire thing, i have no idea what i'm going to be able to do as far as ensuring my house. it is hard to eat, fuel is expensive. i do not know how they will change things. i am used to $1400 a year insurance and a $16,000, i was quoted friday, is unbelievable. how are we gonna save the people that live up in the mountains or even in the lower cities? host: on top of that, what or homeowners taxes likely you live? caller: they have not gone not

much at all for us. i am not quite sure how they rate the value of my house, it is about $2000 a year, which is unbelievable compared to my insurance. host: you can bring insurance into the mix, this is from facebook. of course the cost of living has gone up, it's gonna be every year for nearly 60 years. those will blame administration on the biden administration act like a new home did not cost $391,000, this is from pete bruno, putting the were tripled on his post. kathy from facebook saying energy prices, food prices up. it is insane.

susan in iowa city, hello. caller: my husband and i moved from california seven months ago to iowa. a girl ran after me with a hammer, she had 14 warrants out for her arrest in the police said there was nothing they could do unless she murdered someone, so we moved to iowa. the last seven months, inflation has gone crazy. for the first time ever in my life -- my husband is retired from the military, i stood in line and went to the food bank last week because grocery stores, you go in and you have to sell your first-born child. we are sending billions and billions of dollars to ukrainian all over the world, what about helping the american taxpayer? host: moving to california to

iowa, was food the only thing expensive? did other costs come down? caller: nothing came down. we thought if we moved here, the cost-of-living would come down. nothing came down because inflation went up. host: the city itself, did you move because he had family? caller: we had family here, we had not seen grandchildren regularly and a long time. -- in a long time. we moved because we lived -- our town was evacuated because of fires, fire insurance was expensive. the police would come and say i am sorry, i cannot help you. we had a rental, we had a squatter in it. when we went to court to get the squatter out, the judge apologized to the squatter for

having to put him out of our rental. we were trying to sell it so we could pay off the mortgage in iowa, the judge in california sat in court and said i am sorry mr. cunningham that i have to put you out of their house. that is california. host: this is pam in tampa, hello. caller: good morning. cost of living in florida for the average family -- my husband and i have been on the borderline of low income, on her way to middle income. i am privileged enough that cost-of-living kept us afloat. we are third-generation in a home. that comes with a lot of repairs

. we were not completely locked down in florida, but a lot of businesses closed. i work in health care's, so i was able to work. we had to go to a single car home. just with increased costs in food alone has been ridiculous. i have coworkers who are single parents, they are becoming roommates with more than one kid because they cannot afford housing. you have people combining several households into one, almost to the point of a family per room. people are moving to florida because they are comparing prices to other prices, not accounting how much we get paid or how much it costs to live here and they are getting a slap in the face that it is very expensive when you compare what

you are making to what you are expected to pay. it has been rough. host: you are welcome to share your experiences during the 19 minutes we have for this segment. (202) 748-8000 eastern and central, (202) 748-8001 mountain and pacific. many people brought up the cost of food. we showed you the story taking a look at grocery prices, that was part of the testimony from a republican senator commenting on high grocery prices. taking a look at federal food programs, here is part of the testimony. [video clip] >> nutrition programs play an important role in helping families navigate difficult times. we know perhaps the biggest economic challenge facing americans is inflation. families have been hit hard by

inflation at the grocery store. since president biden took office, the food at home price index is up 19.6%. grocery prices have skyrocketed. chicken breast prices up 32%, milk up 21%. ground beef up 21%. as we have a discussion about nutrition programs ahead of the next bill, it is important that we recognize how inflation and policy contributed to and impacted the ability of families to put nutritious meals on the table. host: that is senator fischer talking about the food programs, inflationary costs. bill in south carolina, hi. caller: i'm from upstate south carolina. to answer your question, inflation has caused the prices

in upstate south carolina to rise. but listening to some of the people that have called in, they seem to be blaming somebody else and not taking responsibility for themselves. we do not have some of the memory that older people do. when my wife and i -- after i got out of the service, we bought our first home. 1980. interest rate was 11%. actually, the interest rate for that year, the max is 18.6. when it came down to 9%, i refinanced the house. when it came down to 7%, i refinanced. when it came down to 5%, i refinanced again and paid it off. a lot of these people do not

take responsibility for what they are doing. anybody with any memory remembers that bread 30 or 40 years ago cost one dollar per loaf. there are cycles in our economy, there's been 12 or 13 recessions since 1929, they are going to happen. that is why you save money and prepare for the stuff that does happen. host: let us hear from a viewer in wisconsin. this is john, hello. caller: thanks for taking my call. the previous person had a lot of excellent points. in northern wisconsin, it's gotten a lot more expensive to keep people warm in the winter time. when the electricity bill start going through the roof because it will be 90 degrees or 100 degrees, the earlier caller from virginia, the governor does not

raise utility costs. that raised by companies, the price they are paying to get it from people pulling it out of the ground. when i purchased my first house in 1993, i paid $70,000 for it. 8% interest. i refinanced it, lowered it, paid it off. it's about taking responsibility and not living beyond your means. that is all i have to say, thanks for taking my call. host: a columnist at the washington post writes about many issues, one of the things she writes about is looking at savings, 401(k) balances. they are up, the number of

savers with over one million is down saying the number 401(k) millionaires has dropped significantly, according to new data. 299,000 401(k) millionaires at the end of 22, 32% drop from 442,000 a year earlier. the fourth quarter showed fewer individual retirement accounts of ira millionaires. you can read more in the column online. let us go to pittsburgh, this is patrick. hello, thanks for calling. caller: mike grocery bills have doubled. the cost of things in pittsburgh has quadruple. they paid $8.70 for a large container of eggs, i don't know

what the guy calling and telling people to take responsibility for yourselves, we have a nation of corporate cartels that are gouging the living hell out of the country, using every mechanism at their monopolistic disposal to destroy the equity of the american people. the drop in millionaires, here's a newsflash. millionaires are leaving the country in droves. we've started this war with russia, everything we are dealing with, we create the crisis. these cartels are maximizing misery for the american people. no one is doing anything about it. no one is saying the legitimacy of what we are doing as a country is going to stop, it will just get 1000 times worse.

to exacerbate the situation, we are sending in troops to taiwan. the american people are living in an alternate reality. host: david in missouri. caller: good morning. i want to talk about price increases. the democrats tried to push through a bill for attacks on corporations, during covid the government funded the vaccines and everything, then they turned around and made millions of dollars, billions of dollars off of the vaccines that we the people help them with. exxon mobil, all the oil companies. in the 80's, a barrel of oil cost the same as a share. that has tripled now. you go to the grocery store,

people are not just hit with prices. they've downsized all the things in the grocery store. i live in the country, people that have eggs for sale on farms have gone up from two dollars to $3.50. when you go to the livestock auction, cows are not getting much more for farmers and the price of grain has gone up. everybody takes advantage of the people, it is not right. i hope we get the profit checks back in. the war we are involved and now came right after covid. our government is being taxed doubly, but i do have hope. i think things wiring themselves out. but it is going to be a long road. host: let us hear from susan in florida. caller: what people seem to be

forgetting is ukraine is a major producer of grain and fertilizer , which is used to feed all of our animals and everything else. the more costs to feed them, the more it costs us to eat the product that the grain and fertilizer create. that is why the war in ukraine is a must win for us. prudent and -- putin and xi are looking to take over farmland to feed their people and hold the rest of us hostage, just like the arab nations are the opec of the oil industry. everything is based upon how much it costs to grow items. fertilizer, grain. ukraine is huge farmland for the world. instead of blaming biden for all of this, republicans need to turn their focus to their buddy

putin who is the creator of all of this inflation on a global basis because of the impact of oil and natural gas and what they are doing to ukraine. it is a trickle-down effect, stopping ukraine from being the producer of grain, which affects everybody. host: the story from usa today, one of the aspects of cost-of-living's energy bills. the number of households receiving energy assistance this winter season rozen estimated 1.3 million, the largest one-year increase since 2009. the applications for energy help are made through the low income home energy assistance program and each state, the talk of

energy prices, the white house press secretary in recent days asked what the biden administration is doing to counter that. [video clip] >> the president has been traveling the world, pledging to help other countries solve their energy issues. the latest was poland. how come there is no pivot in energy policy here at home to help the inflation we are seeing here? caller: have you read -- >> have you read the inflation reduction act? the inflation reduction act does just that. the inflation reduction act helps lower energy costs and gives americans breathing room, which is part of the president's economic policy. you think about what he has said the past two years, making sure we have an economy that works from everyone, building from the bottom up in middle out. it is important because it deals with energy policy, lowering the costs.

it deals with health care, things that are important to americans across the country. making sure we are capping at $2000 for medical drug costs, that is important. the president has been talking about this in dealing with in a real way. host: a few minutes left, asking you about the cost of living. you can call us on the lines in the next few minutes. gwen is from detroit, good morning. caller: good morning, can you hear me? i think we're looking at this wrong. if mia chance to explain, i know i do not have long. the inflation is always 0.6%, the fed is trying to get at lower, 0.2 or 3%.

that is impossible. with all of the jobs being made, people are making more money. that is the downside of it. if the fed would stop raising interest rates -- it is not the inflation that is hurting people. it is the interest the fed is putting on the cost of everything. why don't you have a show that talks about what would happen if they stopped raising the interest rate? if they leave inflation alone, right now 0.6%. what would happen if the fed stopped right now? host: when in detroit -- gwen in detroit bringing in the federal reserve, we did a series of segments last week looking at the federal budget and some specific spending categories,

inflation was one of those regular categories. if you go to our website, you can find those programs archived. a weeks worth of them looking at aspects of the federal budget. let us go to james in new york. caller: i am 67, i helped my kids get through college. we are in debt about $600,000, they got pretty good jobs out of it. i am feeling the pain. i had to go back to work. i am wondering if folks remember in 1979, we had inflation, but there was a lack of jobs. not anywhere near as bad now. there could be an upside to inflation, it will force people to conserve more and insulate homes, with global warming and pollution and everything.

the other thing is food, look at the obesity problem in this country. it will force people to eat healthier, by the basics. -- buy the basics. host: this week in the supreme court, the battle over president biden's loan forgiveness plan is a sweeping debate about presidential power. the high court begins to pick through the $400 billion student debt plan over the course of several hours of oral arguments, the decision is expected later this year and could torpedo mr. biden's ability to pursue other policies unilaterally, such as abortion and immigration. that could prove tricky for a president presumably seeking reelection. when the supreme court hears these cases, we take audio in and let you hear them. you can follow along on our

website at c-span.org. let us go to sandy in georgia, good morning. caller: good morning. inflation has been impacting me on my salary as a substitute teacher. exxon mobil made a profit of $36 million last year. oil companies in general made more profit last year than they have in the last 100 years. it is the corporations we should be blaming for high prices. if you look at the stock market, it is going up. they are not losing monkey -- money, there making money. to blame the administration or biden, we are placing blame on the wrong people. i want someone to answer the question that was asked, what have the republicans done for

the working and middle-class people? what programs have they put forth? host: one more call from new york. caller: thank you for taking my call. i am in new york, one of the things ac continually is an exodus of people from the state. the policies are driving people out. the governors and state legislature running in overtime, legislation for farmworkers. upstate new york is a big farming community. farmers are citing the fact a lot of them might be going out of business. i will not keep you, i know you are pressed for time. the thing that is bothering me is spending. it is chaotic. i think i read a book, the man

was paul johnson, a professor at university of wisconsin. he said if the u.s. goes down, it is not from an outside force, it will implode from within and it will be economic reasons. some of the spending is understandable, controlling big business and taxes understandable. quite frankly, i do not understand the maniacal spending frenzy the democrats are going through. it is going to bankrupt the country and we will all pay for it. host: john is finishing off the hour of calls, looking at cost-of-living issues. our first guest takes a look at the state of u.s. china relations. robert daly other wilson center talks the fallout of the chinese spy balloon, taiwan, and

concerns of beijing and moscow. that conversation coming up next. later on, lance morrow talks about his new book “the noise of typewriters: remembering journalism.” those conversations coming up on the "washington journal". ♪ >> tonight on q&a, history professor matthew connelly talks about the increase in u.s. government secrecy from what role to today -- from world war ii to today. >> these are all topics over the

years i've tried to research on and every single time you find is what you would like to know is still classified. when i look more closely 10 years ago, i found there are departments depending on -- departments even after 25 years when they are supposed to declassify this information, what you find 90% of the time they find some reason not to release this information. >> matthew connelly tonight at 8:00 eastern on c-span q&a. you can listen to q&a and all of our podcasts on our free c-span now app. >> next week on c-span network, the house and senate are back in

session following a break for the presidential holiday. tuesday morning a hearing on countering chinese communist party and house armed service committee here from defense department officials the party -- defense department officials. wednesday merrick garland testifies on oversight of the justice department. watch next week 50 c-span -- watch next week live on c-span and go to c-span.org for scheduling information. >> "washington journal" continues. host: our first guest robert daly with wilson center. he serves as the director of that institute. thank you for your time.

the shooting out of the balloon. what is going on in ukraine, taiwan is an issue. how would you describe the state relations between our country and china because of those things? guest: the relationship is worse since we established relations in 1979 and we are now on a new cold war footing. it is not like the original with the soviet union, but a cold war in that is going to be long-term, high-risk, costly, wasteful, and dangerous. distress and competition are constant and extreme i think it is the right framing for it. host: is it these issues or other outlying issues? guest: no, issues in place. the chinese spy balloon over montana, if you pay close attention to u.s. chinese relations it did not tell you anything new. it took washington dc concerns

and it brought them home to the rest of the country. for most americans, the challenge from china had been over the horizon and suddenly it was overhead. the balloon socialized watch with his concerns. host: what possibly are we taking now? what are the positions of the two countries? guest: the balloon in of a, it is a blip. the trend was towards a level of cold war distrust competition. china's position on the balloon is a silly american overreaction which shows the world how apparent we have a, because we live in fear of losing -- how terrified we have become because we live in fear of losing. we do these shoot down with they

would say is a weather balloon. united states view is the spy balloon violated america's sovereignty and it is a sign of china's growing aggression and threat it poses. the balloon has been somewhat overblown. it is a dramatic, good story. it is not change the trajectory of the relationship. host: did open eyes to the public between the state of relations, gave them a concrete example? guest: now americans say the chinese are out there. you do not fill it at the street level. america has a chinese go about their lives but it raises the consciousness that these two countries are in competition. host: our guest is with us until 8:45 a.m. he was asking questions in light

of the stories you have heard about, republicans, 202-748-8001. democrats, 202-748-8000. independents, 202-748-8002. you can text us at 202-748-8003. there are two headlines when it comes to china and ukraine. one in response to president zelenskyy for china's plan to resolve that issue. the other u.s. morning china not to send weapons to russia because -- how do you put those two things together? last friday china issued principles for guiding resolution in ukraine. it is not a peace plan. it is a series of things china has said which are vague. it includes things like complex problems really have simple answers. well, thanks for nothing jack. this is not the guide for

solving the ukraine crisis. china says every sovereignty is important and it must not be violated. all the while not mentioning russia invaded ukraine. china is trying to posture a position itself as a neutral that can settle or broker peace in ukraine without criticizing russia and without offering real solutions. we should not be entirely cynical about what china might do because there may be a point they could help save lives and slow things down. but we are not there yet. this is china posturing to his own people to say we the chinese love peace and are above that and where being constructive while america and the west are providing weapons that kill people in ukraine. that is largely posturing to

date. secretary of state blinken has warned and the leader of nato there is credible evidence china's considering providing aid to russia. we do not know what that is. china has discussions about this. similarly there closer to doing something. i do not think they do that yet. china had good relations with ukraine before the russian invasion. i do not think china wanted this invasion. ukraine is a member of china's road. they trade heavily with ukraine. the invasion has hurt china where matters, especially in europe. i do not think china would

provide legal aid because it will be discovered on the battlefield and would harm china's relation further. if they provided weapons or drones or something else, what would be the reason? the reason is they are afraid russia is going to lose and putin could fall. china might provide lethal eight if they were afraid they would lose the most powerful partner in their competition with the united states. i do not think they are there yet. they want to see how the role of peacemaker works. i would be surprised if they do anything in short term. host: the president was asked yesterday that was an area would come true, would be the reaction from the united states? [video clip] pres. biden: i had a frank conversation with cp this past summer on this issue and i

pointed out to him, the conversation with like this. i said mr. president, he saw what happened when the rest of the world saw the brutality in what putin was doing in ukraine to ukraine. i said without any government prodding 600 american corporations left russia for mcdonald's to exxon across the board. i said if you are engaged in the same brutality by supporting the brutality going on, i said he may face the same consequence. i do not anticipate a major initiative of providing weaponry to russia. host: there is the president and his take on what could happen

economically in china or in ukraine. guest: china is concerned about this. it still claims to be neutral in ukraine although it is consistently backed russia's assertion that it was the united states and nato that caused this war with e-sports expression -- east expansion. it provides other goods to russia that can directly help the war effort. it has not provided lethal eight. they do worry about being caught up in further sanctions about becoming a pariah state. china sees the united states treating it as something tend separate estate already -- kin a s a pariah state already. i would be -- every time president biden talks about xi

jinping, we never hear what xi jinping said in return. both leaders talk about what they said. neither talk about what they heard. i would like to hear more about the conversation xi jinping reply. host: robert daly joining us for this conversation. mail in california, republican. you are on. go ahead. caller: thank you for having me on the line. i am frustrated from what i am hearing for the cause come in and seem to be challenging how much any republicans are doing about anything. from the get go, i through her -- after we were involved in covid, the booster i got because they had heart conditions cause

me to have oxygen problems. i have to catch my breath here between words. the price of everything increasing between biden, if you do not believe your lying ears, you can watch biden put his hands on a young woman's shoulder and look at her. host: you are calling in from the previous segment. robert in massachusetts, democrat line. caller: good morning. when we talk about that balloon, that balloon flew 60,000 feet on the edge of space. we had this ufo that was flying at 20,000 feet came to a stop, the pilot witnessed this said

this think was out of this world. that ufo flew to a stop. the pilot said it took off, it was u -- it went up. we shot three of them down. i want to know where i the three ufos we have shut down. we have navy, pentagon, cia, everybody looking for the spaceships. host: got your point. guest: we shot down the chinese spy balloon. we know what that was. we find out more because we recovered everything it was carrying. the other three small balloons were almost certainly weather

balloons. there is a lot of stuff in the air. what surprised america's we are only just now learning the air is full of balloons. and other objects drifting around like jellyfish in the ocean. they're not all deadly. all the evidence technicians that looked at these, these are not spy balloon's. they did not come from beyond the earth. there probably harmless balloons which we may have overreacted. host: you may not be surprised by this statement fm the chinese foreign ministry that reads, u.s. to assist using armed forces, violates international convention. china will depend its rights and interests of enterprise involve and retains the right to respond further. guest: china making the

statement u.s. overreacted excusing a missile. we do not have anything other that missiles to take these down. mike pompeo called for this sky balloon to be pulled out of the sky to be better because we would not have to fight in the ocean but we do not have the means to do that. we have a high altitude, it is a missile or nothing to take it down. china is posing as the injured party and will not admit guilt and they're going to stay with that but we will find out soon what was in this balloon and china will deny it and stay with the story it was a weather balloon. host: how in maryland on the independent line. hi. caller: can america do without china? anytime i want to order anything from amazon, i tried very hard to get american but i can ever get american. it is always from china.

if we cannot do basic necessities coming from china, what are we talking about in this relationship? who needs this relationship more, americas or chinese? guest: this is a good question. this is something can -- kin to new cold war. as al says, we continue to import more from china. the trade war failed. our deficit with china went up. i exports have expanded and so have our imports. we do not have to buy from china but if you want to buy from elsewhere, america or another country, we have to pay more. the question becomes -- host: we did not want to. guest: we do not want to.

what price are we willing to incur, sacrifice in this competition with china remains an open question and if you want to source everything from the u.s., we need industrial policy that is cost sectors. were going to have to pay more. is that our principles or pocketbooks? who needs who more? there are things we depend on them for. we get almost all of our criminal -- critical minerals from china. we get most of our medicine and medical precursor from china. no china, no advil. you get to bed with your headache. we get many of are non-evident semiconductors in our washing machines from china. they depend on us for evidence semiconductors and so will we have not worked out as we are deeply distrustful. rick competing with each other -- we are working -- we are

competing with each other and actively hurting each other's interests. the administration has not taken that all yet. host: we seen the biden administration invest in minerals on the domestic side. we have seen egypt's act -- chips act. guest: we're not leaving it to the market which usually is are as follows. we cannot leave it to the market in these cases. if we take critical minerals, the united states has a lot of them. united states and canada has everything you would need but mining them as a long-term investment. it is highly polluted and you have to refine these chemicals. even those that we mine are

mostly refined in china. why does the government has to be involved? if you get back into the business, people have to make long-term investments. 10-20 years. because china dominates the market, and the time sector was to invest in north america, china for less than market and lowers the price as aggressively invested. you have to have determined government to stick with each other through political cycles. you cannot take your mind every four years. we are not good at mobilizing for the long term. if we compete with china effectively than it is going to take the government leadership and the chips act is a good start on that. host: charles front the republican line in arkansas. your own with robert daly of the wilson center. caller: good morning.

the covid-19 virus was release in china by rcra. i did that. -- by the cia. i do not think china did that. i do not think russia blew up the pipeline. i do not know why we are finding -- funding the ukraine effort when it is a european problem and they retire at 45 and we are raising our retirement age. this is a european problem. we need to worry about the things we have to worry about here which is ohio and the homeless and the border. host: ok, caller. guest: charles guess at what is the role of the united states in the world. can we see every major problem in the world as our problem when we have income disparity, invest

in american communities, immigration policy, etc. the u.s. is used to being the world's only superpower and now we see more power, more resources in the other part of the world, china especially and problems we cannot afford to be involved in. it is an old american debate about internationalism and isolationism. in ukraine, had we not organize and lead, europe would not be countering vladimir putin and food would have ukraine by now and we will an emboldened enemy who is determined. they should be more of a public debate. i do not think pure isolationism is going to work for us. you would find we are deeply integrated in the world and failures elsewhere have consequences here.

at the same time, we cannot solve every problem. host: more reports of troops coming to taiwan. why is that happening? guest: we had reports of 20-30 american technical advisors in taiwan training to do more into use more advanced equipment in their defense we are going to 200-300 advisors in the kennedy area we began with growing numbers of advisors and that tenant to escalate -- tended to escalate. we are worried china might move to an invasion to do what has said it has a right to do which is incorporate taiwan and to the people's republic of china. we oppose this. taiwan is a democracy and reporting trading partner and the world top supplier of advanced semiconductors which we

rely. we try to make taiwan a tougher target far china. make it more prickly with more weapons so china does not decide to fight it. more involved we get with taiwan, the greater the risk of provoking china into moving against the island. since 1972 with the original communique and subsequent communiques and other laws we have passed here, american policy towards taiwan has been one of strategic ambiguity. we do not state we will defend taiwan from china because if we talked i want we will defend it, we embolden taiwan to declare independence which china might attack and we are in war with china. we do not say that we will defend taiwan. we also did not say we will not defend taiwan. if we say we do not, we leave

china to attack. over the past several years we have been eating away at our one china policy, or strategic ambiguity policy and drawing closer to taiwan which irritates beijing and is bringing us closer to a potential for conflict. it seems we are inching more court support for taiwan without deciding we would defend taiwan. i would ask you to your listeners, do we have vital interest in defending taiwan and risk lives of tens of thousands of american soldiers and sailors? is washington, we know from holy -- in washington, it is in american interest to defend taiwan. but is it true nationally? most americans do not know the

difference between the taiwan and thailand. are we really willing to risk world war iii to do something that we want to do, preserve taiwan independence is a democratic island? we have not made that decision but would provoke china and we need more clarity among ourselves of where we stand. host: we saw then the speaker pelosi go to taiwan and other members of congress, republican and democratic, go to taiwan for you when these visits have been, how do the chinese view it? guest: it is a provocation. we have to ask ourselves before speaker pelosi goes and now speaker mccarthy goes, do these trips make the people taiwan safer they placed them in greater peril?

that is to be the measure of how involved we come -- we become with taiwan. china's view is it is in us finished -- unfinished civil war. ms. our business and -- we have to acknowledge china has big advantage of proximity. blodgett miles off of china's coast, not ours. china has an advantage of will here. while we were rather incorporate taiwan peacefully if it can, i did not doubt they're willing to pay a high price if they think they have no other choice. i'm not sure the u.s. has figured out exactly what price we are willing to pay and yet, we are acting as though we've already decided we will defend taiwan at all costs. host: robert daly is our guest from the wilson center. he is here to take your calls. republicans, 202-748-8001.

democrats, 202-748-8000. independents, 202-748-8002. joseph in new york. caller: good morning. i am calling because you mentioned 1979. isn't that when the epa started enforcing the environment so lost? -- the epa started enforcing the environmental laws? most of the company splinter china and over the years, we have allowed more and more corporations to go to china because the cost of wages were cheaper but now that china is on the same playing field is us, it causes a problem. the problem i see is bringing these corporations back is going to be a difficult thing because

china will run out of money from a corporation is moving back to america and to get involved with taiwan which this off the coast of china is a small republic that i do not see us being able to win in a conflict with china considering how many people they have comparatively people we have. host: thanks, colors cape. guest: we have not had much yet -- look yet. there's lots of encouragement from american companies come back to be profitable and patriotic. that not work because the cost of manufacturing here are so high. through the chips act we invest and encourage more investment.

they're putting in a new plant near phoenix but the head of ts is he has said manufacturing here, the cost is going to be 50% higher than in taiwan. the economics of it are not a very good. was a have more supply chain for security reasons but it is not make economic sense. this is going to cause the american people in the form of government support pre-the companies went to china for a reason which the caller mentioned. not because we want the industry's here we are encouraging companies to come back. we've had little luck so far because the cost of manufacturing is too expensive. it's on the biggs -- big issues we have to address. host: you address the troops,

what about naval power is self? this u.s. repositioning to prepare for a conflict that way? guest: we have been pivoting for asia for a while. we see that the most important theater. u.s. marines are changing some of their war fighting doctrines thinking about asian-pacific or indo pacific contingencies, so is the army. we are pretty more capabilities in the region. we are working with allies. japan has agreed in consultation with us the government spending 1% of its gdp defense to 2% or more. the philippines which under president has been leaning towards china but is worried about chinese power now is going to give american military access to four more bases.

we are increasing our capability. china does have the world's largest navy by tonnage and is concentrated in western pacific were as ours is spread out over the world. should there be a conflict in west china sea, we would have more sailing time than china. we are moving towards asian-pacific. we are working with australia, u.k. to manufacture american nuclear powered submarines in australia and we working with those partners on hypersonic weapons in australia. we are active in increasing our capability in the region but a lot of these programs likability nuclear power summaries is a 20 year horizon and many in washington are worried we could face a conflict in taiwan sooner than that. host: jeffrey joins us from of kalama. republican line.

caller: thank you for taking my call. this is interesting and it is so much running through my thoughts about some of the statements that have been addressed. for me personally, i'm curious if this gentleman can answer this, how america got into debt with china and on top of the mention of the u.s. be the richest nation on earth and he just mentioned a little while ago about manufacturing companies developed america due to the financial costs to have a plant in america because of the excessive. we are the richest nation on

this earth and we have billionaires and millionaires to where we should be acknowledging the things you are expressing about the danger that china is building and we are trying to keep up with them. the rest of that everybody was trying to keep -- the reverse of that when everybody was trying to keep up with us. americans as investing trillions of dollars in the space race with china. i'm confused on -- are misinformed what is the urgency of investing billions of dollars like that in space when on this planet is self we have in our own country and backyard so much poverty situations with people with no jobs or companies leaving america.

just mentioned the military and the threat of china with the military is out in the west why we are not in a position to build our military. host: i will leave you right there. guest: the big issue jeffrey is getting at is important. this is something like a cold war and were going to have a lot more conversations about guns. president eisenhower said every dollar we spend for military purposes is in some sense a theft for americans who have insufficient resources. how are we going to balanced competing with china whether it is with the military to build new systems were competing for a new space race, how are you going to reconcile that with rd ms in education and -- with our

need to invest in education? it is going to be a growing issue. china's economy is slowing down. it is going to be an issue for china which has a problem with uneven development. they have 600 million people living below the poverty line. they have an aging population. one of the things that may limit our ability to harm each other is the need to focus on these domestic needs. if the united states is the wealthiest country, though there have been measures of purchasing power parity which suggests the chinese total budget may be bigger than ours. china also has another advantage, unless is economy slow down rapidly, which there is a lot more wealth in america, lots of that wealth is concentrated in the hands of the 1%. the government cannot touch it. we cannot access it in service

of our national interests. in china, one-party dictatorship, even if the chinese economy is slower, the government can place a higher percentage of its national resources at the service of his security agenda and national goals then we can. china is operated military on its western pacific. does not have military doctrine that says asked to dominate everywhere worldwide and perhaps even fight wars in different regions. we are spread out all over the world where china has geographically concentrated interests. we need to address how much competition can we afford while remaining strong care at home. host: there's a story taking a look at the bipartisan effort in congress to counter china. they highlight saying, only a

few centers drawn enough interest that include legislating to ban to talk -- tiktok. limit exports and imports. what about those efforts congressional wide to counter china? how effective are they? guest: they have been ineffective. i encouraged your listeners to watch tuesday night a primetime hearing of the new house select committee on china which is looking at all these efforts you have discuss and bring them together to be more focus to be more effective. this will be their first public hearing. you get a good sense of what washington is concerned about and where congress is likely to go. the problem with some of these causes like tiktok or american farmland is there a small niche

issues that congress seizes on and uses as poster children for the whole that china narrative and goes after them. should we ban a tiktok? the argument for doing that, this is a chinese company that can collect data on americans, which you can use to harm us and through machine learning to train his algorithms in ways that could harm us. the other claim is that tiktok care center -- says is content -- tiktok can since there is content and put propaganda against united states. i understand the discussion. the challenge from china is so great that if we ban tiktok we have not made americans safer. it becomes a symbolic issue, like the issue of chinese buying american farmland.

american farmland remains in america. we could tell it is being used as farmland or not. it a poster child. the media take these topics to the point americans think it is a crux of the issue and these are not a. these are sideshows. sometimes doing this can be dangerous. we now have laws, georgia's most recent, in which state legislators are proposing chinese citizens not be able to buy real estate. this is extraordinarily dangerous. america has benefited from the info of talent from china for the case. every chinese scientists, chinese writer, chinese professor who becomes american and contributes to america goes through a period in which they are a green card holder, a chinese citizen and building their families and careers here.

if they are not allowed to buy real estate in the united states, they will not stay in united states. they'll take the tellers back to china. i worry we pick out causes of the day and go at it constantly as it constitutes a huge that to the united states and these are sideshows. we need to throw hard the printers we can land -- punches we can land on china's jaw. some of these causes you mentioned are of that sort. host: james is here on the democrats mind. good morning. caller: good morning. i love "washington journal" and c-span, thank you. i have a nonviolent solution to place china in the nose -- punch china in the jaw.

what if every american, democratic, republican, independent boycotted chinese food restaurants? most of them are owned by chinese nationals. they sent a lot of their money back to china and some of them will work hard, good people but they work 10-15 years to make a lot of money and go back to china anyways. these are not engineers or technicians you were talking about. these are people with restaurants. if we did that, it would hurt the restaurants and they would go to other people back in china , families and this would get to xi jinping and say we cannot do this. i was take your pays off of the air. -- i will take your opinion off the air. guest: boycotts never worked.

there is one exception we saw was apartheid in south africa. south africa was not involved as in the american economy as china is in south africa never provided a cuisine americans all over the country love. americans love chinese restaurants. i would disagree with the caller on this. a lot of chinese restaurants are run by families who have immigrated and they build up the united states rapidly. i taught at cornell and i had a student whose parents ran a chinese restaurant and they had never registered, think they were illegal immigrants and they worked every day of the year except christmas and they had three children all of whom went to ivy league schools. two became doctors and one victim engineer. -- and will became an engineer.

i think no matter where we go with china, our priorities have to be we cherish and protect chinese american communities and do so much for this country. host: robert daly director of the kissinger institute. thank you for the conversation. we have 15 minutes left of open form if you want to participate. we have from mass tomorrow the author of the book “the noise of typewriters: remembering journalism.” it want to participate in open forum, republicans, 202-748-8001. democrats, 202-748-8000. independents, 202-748-8002. we'll take those calls when "washington journal" continues. ♪ ♪ >> book tv every weekend on

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free today. >> "washington journal" continues. if you want to participate in open forum andy want to text us you can do that at 202-748-8003. president biden sat down and was asked about if he had intentions to run for another term in office. [video clip] >> everyone is asking, are you running? pres. biden: someone interviewed my life today and i heard -- my wife today and i heard. my attention -- there are other things i things in the near term before i start a campaign. >> he brought up wife traveling in kenya she was asked today, is all that is left setting a time and a place for the announcement and she said, pretty much. your grade?

-- do you agree? pres. biden: i meant what i said. i have other things to finish before i get into a campaign. host: that was president biden yesterday. former president trump making efforts to gain more support should he make it to a nominating convention. his team has invited state party leaders to mar-a-lago ranging meet and greets between state leaders at the former president traveled. also met with senior republican party officials of washington. many spoke on private conversations, his advisers say the outreach is less about the many changes now and more about cultivating relationships when they could call for rule changes and tried to shape who the

delegates are for the convention. more there as far as the washington post is concerned. open form until our next guest. chris in texas. you're up, go ahead. caller: i think on the prior caller, i think the u.s. should look at an overall energy policy to make sure we have secure energy supplies at home. we should focus on key industries we want to have make sure that stub is made in the u.s., especially medical supplies. areas where we note the chinese are spying on us and other countries as well, how are we countering that effort? it has to be something that looks at the long-term, not just

next week, next month, next year. it has to be what is our focus in the next five-20 years. host: in florida, republican line. good morning. caller: good morning. just a follow up with a fellow you had on earlier, china is are equal economically and militarily. we cannot order china to do anything. if they cut off trade with us, this country would sink into a depression like we have never seen. china asked us to jump, our question is going to have to be how high. if they invaded taiwan, there's nothing we can do about it. make a go as smooth as possible -- make it go as smooth as possible.

they are equal and we have to treat them like are equal and not like a stepchild i did want to mention, we just had a president bateman to ukraine and offered -- we had a president who went to ukraine and offered to subsidize their pensions. we have a $33 trillion debt and we are going to build out the pension system of ukraine. host: scott in kansas, democrats line. caller: good morning. this is open form, right? host: correct. caller: briefly mention kansas politics. we had a vote on abortion and the republicans are writing new abortion restriction laws. it seems like that is not what the people want. they're talking about going to

lay flat tax. i wrote a thesis one time that said a flat tax will eventually, when you buy because, if it costs, thereby let's and the individual savings go up for people, but the economy slows down because it is not people consuming and buying so there are more layoffs and causes -- but i am saying is, there is a consequence when they make major changes. host: i. the flat tax proposal post -- passed by the kansas senate. caller: if it does, it is to have a long-term ripple effect. a lot of people suffered would be happy brownbag experience and i think this was just as radical. on china, it is a global supply

change has been disrupted. i do not think isolation thinking is the right way to go in the world today. the big thing in the room is the climate change affecting crops and different things in that nature we have little control over. host: john in new jersey, independent line. caller: hi. very good stuff. always love watching and listening. first of all of climate change, it is a money grab. our member in the 1970's when they had the global ice age and it was a big money grab for all these nonprofit organizations to get federal grants. in went nowhere. this is the same think. it it is a scam.

as far as china is concerned, we need to look at russia and make friends with russia. it is not 1985 per the cold war is over. we have to see the big picture and be friendly with this guy. the russian people are going to be s and they're going to be on our side. we need them as allies for us to make -- we need them as allies. for us to make enemies of them is ridiculous. ukraine, obama and biden have been in bed with those guys for years. there both croaks. the most corrupt country in the world. for us to be back in ukraine is insane. it is not just the democrats. it is the republicans two. this is absurd. host: from maine, republican line.

this is lisa up next. caller: good morning. thank you for all that you do. there was a gentleman on yesterday in regard to the snap program. it kinda irritates me because what people are allowed to buy on the snap program. i go to sam's club and people are buying ships, cookies, soda. non-necessities. we are paying for that. i do not think that is right. i think that program should be for basic necessities. peanut butter. formula for the children. i am in maine and we see people buy and this program. that is a luxury not a necessity. thank you. host: clyde in oklahoma. democrats line. caller: good morning. there is no way, you can in the

bible, if you pump the bear, you get the dragon -- poke the bear, you get the dragon. this is going to happen whether you want it to happen or not. host: washington post reporting on those investigating events of january 6. a secret legal fight over the cell phone of scott perry has prevented the justice department from reviewing more than 2200 documents in the investigation of former president trump and support her efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election. chief judge of the u.s. district court in bc finds the need for secrecy in the constitutional battle over perry's claims and historic investigation.

this event republican has asserted the documents contained on his phone are shorted by the constitution speech and debate clause which grants members of congress immunity from criminal investigation in their official capacity but in a ruling, how it rejected the claim for more than 90% of the records ordering perry to turn over text messages, emails, attachments after concluding there were only incidentally related to his status as a lawmaker and not central to that status and constitutionally protected. there's more to best in the washington post. -- to that story in washington post. jim in ohio, go ahead. caller: thanks for c-span. i want to comment about china, he had -- he had the guy who

said how much are we willing to pay for chinese goods? i've had a standard where for a comparable quality item, i will pay twice as much for an american-made product. after that, i had to start saying, i do not know, but i pay twice as much for something made in america. and a comment about earlier caller. i got a brand-new plug in hybrid and here in ohio the solution for road tax, my plate cost as much as five times as much as one for regular nonelectric vehicle plate. host: you said you would pay twice as something from the u.s. what have you paid for in avoiding chinese products? what you pay

caller: tools, i bought a milwaukee impact wrench. it is hard to find things not made in china. but yes, stuff like that. stuff i regularly need and use. host: thanks for that. one more call, from walter in indiana, republican line. caller: thank you for taking my call, this is a little bit of an odd topic, it is important. i've never been on a computer in my life, never had a cell phone, smart phone. used to be a political junkie, turning on fox and cnn all the time. i had bumper stickers, i was drinking the kool-aid. about four years ago, i got tired. i cannot tell you how wonderful it is to not be on the computer, not have a cell phone.

if you cannot control it, do not concern yourself with it. i would like to pass out that everybody, when you go to a restaurant today with your family, take your phone, shut them off. ask yourself this question. is there anything i can do to change the outcome. if you can't, do not concern yourself with it. enjoy being in the moment. whatever happens in the world, do not concern yourself with it if you cannot control it. unplug, everybody stares at the phones and think it is important what they think. nobody really cares. i like to pop onto your show and listen to people going that's about stuff. can you fix it? no. cut your grass, clean your house, love your family, pay your taxes and do what you can do. host: how are you monitoring our program?

do you watch television? caller: i have a regular antenna television, i can get some basic channels. i like watching years and wheel of fortune and jeopardy, the basics. i just like being happy and peaceful. i voted, i served in the military. that is all i can to. --do. god bless you and your family. host: next, the next guest has written a number of books over the years, taking a look at a variety of topics. he turns his attention to journalism,@the author of --lance morrow, the author of "the noise of typewriters: remembering journalism," will have his comments when we return. >> live sunday, march 5 from the tucson festival of books, and investigative journalist will be our guest on in-depth to take

your calls on history and american outlooks. he has written books about bonnie and clyde, charles manson and the mexican border war as well as the 51 day standoff in texas in 1993 between federal agents. join the conversation with your phone calls, texts and tweets. in-depth live sunday at on march 5 at noon eastern on c-span two. >> c-span has unfiltered coverage of the u.s. response to russia's invasion of ukraine, bringing you the latest from the present -- president and other white house officials. we have international perspectives from the united nations and statements from foreign leaders on c-span networks, the c-span now free mobile app and c-span.org/ukra

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c-span is america's network. unfiltered, unbiased, word for word. if it happens here or here or here or anywhere that matters, c-span -- america is watching on c-span. >> washington journal continues. host: our guest is an author and his latest book, "the noise of typewriters: remembering journalism," lance morrow on washington journal. thanks for your time. guest: great to be here. host: before we start on the contents of the book, could you tell your experiences in journalism, particularly the work for time magazine? guest: i work for them for many years, 40 years. mostly as an essayist on the back page of the magazine. i was a writer in new york, writing national news for a while.

then, i did the essay section. before that, i worked for the washington star, which was closed a number of years ago. i worked briefly for the danville news in pennsylvania, which is also extinct. that is when i was in high school. i spent a summer on the buffalo news when i was in college. i was mainly in magazines, mainly time magazine. host: was it those experiences that lead you to write this book? guest: my parents were both journalists when they were younger, of course it was those experiences. also, it was the change from the earlier america and earlier journalism to what we have now,

the change from typewriters to computers, which is sort of a symbolic divide, which suggests the vast difference between that world and the one we have now. i've been increasingly struck by that difference, also you get old, you get nostalgic. i thought i would try to evoke that world that i grew up in as a journalist, my parents inhabited the generation before me. host: one of the key characters of the book, who is he? guest: people have forgotten who henry was. i call him the most significant journalist in the 20th century.

as a very young man, age 25, exactly 100 years ago, started time magazine with his partner. he founded fortune magazine and life magazine and presided over the extremely successful time life magazine empire in what was really the golden age of magazines. people today have little conception of how important magazines were in the ecology of information and the life of the country, before smart phones, internet, all of that. this was before national newspapers. magazines were enormously important, henry luce was

enormously important in his impact, especially upon the american middle-class and american leadership class. his influence upon the people in power in america was enormous. for that reason, plus the fact he was an incredibly good journalist. i think among the best, just as a journalist. but his influence as a publisher of these magazines, especially time and life and, to a lesser degree, fortune, cannot be overestimated. he was really an important character. he is mostly forgotten now. host: in your book, you say in some ways he is the key to understanding journalism in the 20th century. his career raised central

questions about the nature of journalism, politics of storytelling, morals of power. he was a brilliant american success story and a cautionary tale. can you elaborate? guest: i call him a myth maker. he had a very 19th-century idea, following carlisle or emerson, it was the great theory of history, napoleon is the key to events, for example. he was a myth maker, he idealized america and, because he grew up in china until he was 13 years old, when he came to the united states as a scholarship student and went to yell, until then, he was a stranger to the country in many ways. he idealized the country. he comes back home as a kind of immigrant, except he came from

old american stock. coming from china, he was a kind of immigrant. it is my theory he used the magazines to invent and reinvent america and its meanings. as the son of a presbyterian missionary, he had a highly moral and religious sense of the united states. something of the manifest destiny idea, the kingdom of god on earth. a project always in progress. these things were reflected in his magazines. at the same time, he was an excellent hard facts journalist, reporter. it made for an interesting combination, but his

storytelling, the storytelling in his magazines was very calculated and powerful and controversial, extremely controversial. it is for those reasons i say that he was a key -- americans are very self-conscious people. luce told them who they were and what they amounted to, whatever they did was good and whatever they do is bad. he sort of judged them in his magazine. this was very consequential in american politics and policy. the american psyche, really, across the country. for those reasons, i think he was a very considerable character in american life in the 20th century. host: lance morrow is our guest

until 10:00 if you want to ask him about journalism and the theme of his book. (202) 748-8001 for republicans, (202) 748-8000 for democrats, independents (202) 748-8002. to that end, you wrote that he sent a mineralized small town america, the ray -- way of rockwell. his admiration for powerful corporations, powerful ideas, powerful accomplishments. one of the questions journalism has at its base is about bias. to what degree did those biases impact the content of the magazine? guest: he was interested in two things, american power, but he was very much interested in morality and the virtuous use of power.

he was not a craven or a bad guy about power, he was very concerned with the virtuous use of power. he gave a speech in 1946 after the war in which he sort of was trying to meditate on the american power and how to use it. what was the virtuous way to use power. all of this power and money that america had after the war, it was the last -- it was the great superpower. everybody else have been badly damaged by world war ii, when america was this flourishing, vigorous democracy of democratic power. he was constantly asking, what do we do with this power? he was earnest about these things and people mocked him often for the earnestness of his

meditations. he was not a bad bad, he was a very interesting and good character, very american guy. in interesting ways. he was always trying to find both the hard facts, the journalist's to find hard facts, but he was constantly trying to find the meaning of the hard facts. what does this mean? he believed america had meaning, meaning was to be sought and sometimes, at the hands of his writers and editors, this search for meaning in stories would become kind of silly and superficial, may be wrong. but nevertheless, at his core,

he was a guy who was trying always -- he learned storytelling in part at his father's mission of the parables of jesus christ -- excuse me. each of those parables has a meaning, of course. he learned from the meetings -- meanings of the noble grecians and other roman classical writers who examined -- they wanted to know the meaning of great men's lives and so on. out of that very rich tradition, both christian and classical, greco-roman. he brought that through his magazines, to mass circulation

magazines, because he believed very deeply in america and he had a kind of anguished since that -- sense that america had to mean something in the lives of americans had to mean something. host: as far as the impact of time, life and other magazines, the average person at home who received a magazine at their doorstep, what happened after they received it and what influence did the magazine have about telling the average reader about what was going on in the world? guest: people forget, in those days they did not -- we are talking about my youth, little before that. people did not have this continuous flow of news and social media. on wednesday or thursday, time magazine would arrive in the mailbox.

in cities all over the country from des moines to baton rouge to wichita to boise to sacramento, the people -- the father, the mother, would take time magazine, sit-down in the evening and would devote the evening to reading it cover to cover. they would depart from that experience with an impression they had learned what was necessary to know about america in the world in the previous week. luce and his editors were good at creating that sense of comprehensiveness. it was nonsense, of course, in one way you could say. there was an awful lot going on in the world.

his critics always said that. at the same time, one of the great virtues of henry luce was he vastly expanded the idea of what was news? before his magazines, the journalism newspapers tended to be very local, rather limited, politics and wars and floods and fires and murderers. he added sections on the law, medicine, science. in the 20th century, which was plagued by the idea everything was becoming more and more obscure, more and more difficult to understand, luce asserted and made general the assumption he and his people good report on anything and they could make it

comprehensible and the reader could comprehend anything. this was great for democracy. a well-informed citizen is the key to a democratic success. that was part of his influence, he was not afraid of trying to explain the law, education, metaphysics, science. increasingly specialized science. this was a big contribution. host: greg in ohio, independent line. you are on with our guest. go ahead. caller: my son has a journalism degree, it is like a lost profession. when you look at the news, the big news story this week was the trial. how many people are affected by that?

not that many. how many people are affected -- like the last guest, china and u.s. relations? everyone is affected. as a senior citizen, i wake up some mornings thinking we might be in world war iii. it is a great possibility. our administration is egging on russia and china. we could have stopped all of this when russia built up for three or four months, but we did not do a thing. as a christian, i hope god is on our side. i wonder with the way the nation is going. our morality has slipped. mentioned this in a speech this week, we are the evil empire, not russia. host: started talking about

journalism, a portion of america focused on this trial. i suppose that goes to the nature of how magazines, theories other broadcast entities and newspapers decide what content to give to the viewer at home. guest: this has been an argument i have heard, listen to and been a part of all of my life as a journalist. there always has been -- it is not just now, always, a tremendous conflict between the sensational murder trial and the big deal political story. the big geopolitical story and some entertainment thing. i can remember dozens of instances in which the choice --

it was a story conference at time magazine, we were trying to decide, the editors were trying to decide whether to run a big cover story in russia versus i don't know, liza minelli or something in like that. the calculation always, in the back of the mind of the editor, certainly the publisher, is what is going to sell, what is the newsstand -- the economics of journalism are difficult, very difficult. that calculation always enters into it. that trial footage is, in part, purely financial, economic consideration decision, rather

than an editorial decision. i agree with what the caller said, the china story is infinitely more consequential. but as i say, i've been participating and listening to precisely this argument for many, many years. it is a perennial question. host: this is larry in texas, democrats line. larry in texas, hello? caller: yes. i am in agreement with the fact that journalism is losing out, we do not have near -- we have the quality of journalism, but it is losing readership.

an example is i am a member of the texas association of single sailors, in 1985 we started. we would take people out for $50 a day, go out and assail, 10 of us on a sailboat. anyhow, the paper buddy hold and sent somebody out, said do not tell them who we are. they put up a presentation about it, which was like six pages. they did not have a phone number , the vice commander but her number and. when it came out, and she called where we had the hotel where we had thursday night meetings, she got her first phone call at 4:00 in the morning. we told them we did not know how

many people would show up, 5000 people show up for the meeting on that thursday night. today, you could not do that. you could not get a five page story on a local issue, nor could you get that many people of what i would call the prime age for readership between 25 and 45. host: thank you. anything from that? guest: on the other hand, you can get -- you can use the internet to muster crowds or mobs or whatever you want. very fast, very rapidly. the local papers are dieting -- dying to the point of extinction, they are going out of business.

there is a compensatory effect in the sense that the caller is describing. in the internet, you have a tremendous and instantaneous exchange of information. what i take from that is that technology has vastly changed journalism and how information is passed around. information is still passed around rapidly. host: there is a viewer on twitter who makes the statement editorial control seems nonexistent. i want to go back to henry luce, you talked about his personal worldview, did he surround himself with people that would counter his worldview in order to have a balance? guest: one of the interesting

things about henry lose, one of the marks of his intelligence and character was that he did not like people who agreed with him too much. sometimes a lot of them did, but when he started fortune magazine , he hired a bunch of socialists to edit the thing. even communists, very left-wing writers on fortune, which was a magazine -- a brilliant, wonderful magazine devoted to the subject of industry, capitalism, finance. he hired figures on the american left in the 1930's, which meant something in the neighborhood of trotsky and stalin.

he liked people disagree with him. he had a quarrel with teddy white who, as a young man, prodigy out of harvard, had been luce's protege in china, correspondent for time in china. they disagreed over something very close to luce's, the future of china. luce constantly put them on the cover of time, it was almost a fetish. he was very much opposed to the communists. teddy white was sorry i'd about it, but luce tolerated teddy

white's dissent from the company line, which he laid down. he tolerated that for a long time. before they finally parted company. luce was not reactionary, was not a dogmatic, ironfisted, autocratic character. he was very imaginative in his hiring of editors and writers. he was very civilized about the way he treated him. there were a lot of stupid myths about luce that were perpetrated by some of the very people, the left type characters he hired, who turned out to be kind of wrong about certain things that happened in the 1930's, about

the outcome with china and so on. i think luce, with a few exceptions, comes out pretty well in that historical debate. host: let us hear from richard in maine, democrats line. caller: i wonder if you might have something to say about any of luce's major competitors, that was curtis, based in philadelphia. curtis was a native of portland, maine and perhaps we remember him best because he made a bigger contribution, a cultural treasure.

you mentioned the brothers in an earlier program on c-span, i would like to hear what you might have to say about curtis and his association with and competition with henry luce and his publishing company, thank you. guest: i spoke a few minutes ago about the golden age of magazines, curtis of course, the curtis publishing company in philadelphia, publishers of the saturday evening post, my father was a washington editor of the saturday evening post. he worked for the curtis publishing company. he succeeded george lorimer, the editor for many years.

he was one of the great editors in the golden age of american magazines. the saturday evening post was in a normal sleigh consequential magazine for decades. as i have said, before the arrival of any substantial television news and before the arrival of the internet and cnn and will for our news, the magazines were immensely consequential in the culture, the political mind of the united states. they wrote a column for the saturday evening post, which my father edited for a long time. we lived right of the block in georgetown from joel.

so, the curtis publishing company was an immense influence in american culture, because of especially the saturday evening post. there were giants and they were addressed to a broad american middle-class, really. luce was not exactly competing with the saturday evening post, they were running along side by side, i think. host: lance morrow joining us for this conversation, the author of "the noise of typewriters: remembering journalism." you can call him on the lines and post on social media. i want to ask about your personal take on journalism. you wrote all journalism implies the concealed metaphysics, even a theology, all truth is part of a whole.

be tolerant of chaos, be patient, wait for stillness. that is journalism 101, according to me. can you elaborate? guest: i was trying to get -- in that paragraph is an implied criticism of the journalism of twitter and facebook. what i am saying there is, in my view, journalists ought to be a lot more patient and disengaged, far less arrogant than they are now. not really arrogance, there is a tremendous pressure to deliver oneself of twitter, tweets, facebook, instantaneous opinion. i believe journalism should draw back and be careful about other

things inserting themselves too much into political stories. except in certain cases, i do not believe journalists -- in journalists getting two hotly involved in controversy-- too hotly involved in controversy. journalism has an obligation to cover as many sides as it can, there is now a fashion of saying neutral journalism is morally unacceptable, you cannot do that. you have to be on the right side. the people who say that mean you have to be on my side. it seems to me that journalism is a higher calling, journalism should not be so partisan, except in the case of somebody like adolf hitler. it is sort of disgraceful for journalists to be so

self-righteous and so convinced of the rightness of their partisan views that they feel free to insert them into the new york times or washington post, somebody like that. i think journalists need to have more of an individual integrity and more of a sense of personal responsibility and dignity in the face of a complicated and dangerous world and should stop shooting their mouths off in situations in which their job is to understand and report as comprehensively and intelligently and sympathetically but also critically as they possibly can. host: this is john in florida, republican line. you are on.

caller: actually, you probably just answered my question. my question is, it seems in modern journalism, there seems to be in editorializing in every single piece that we read. it does not matter whether it is left or right. i wonder if we will ever get back to that golden age of brinkley and morrow when they said their opinions. i remember hearing a piece -- i forgot who the journalist was, they were giving a story and said he had a leftist or progressive view, which we never knew as participants of journalism. do you think we will ever get back to the time where there will be objectivity of presenting the news? guest: in my view, it is a

failure of leadership. tremendous failure of leadership. the problem starts at the top. the failure of leadership in many major news organizations. a long time ago -- i am not all that starry eyed about the past, but it was absolutely not tolerated for some 24-year-old who was wet behind the ears to be inserting a lot of adjectives and adverbs into his story that reflected a particularly intense personal point of view. the city desk -- the city editor , the national editor, the foreign editor.

they would act as the superego of the news organization. they did not prevent that kind of thing. quite often, there is a presumptuous something that gets into such reporting. it is a failure of leadership not to bring under control. you have got to support what you say. in any case, you have to look around. many of these younger reporters -- he cannot possibly criticize someone for idealism. that is wonderful. but there has to be leadership, which can ride herd on this kind of idealism. you have to have the story, you have to have the sources, the

perspective. the editor has to say yes, but what about such and such? you uncovered it from this point of view, what about this point of view? that is what gets lost. the weakness, the failure and frankly the stupidity of a lot of -- lack of leadership at the very top is a scandal. it has badly damaged a lot of news organizations, although some of them who practice this kind of thing are doing great financially. but morally and journalistically speaking, i would say they are bringing the whole thing down. whether the old standard will return, i do not know. the old standard was not so perfect, believe me, either.

but there was that insistence -- certainly not involving your ego too much. but trying to be if not objective, be very fair and comprehensive and understanding various sides. host: go ahead. guest: it is all right. host: i wanted to follow up, several of our viewers have mentioned fox news in recent days, the story of some of the hosts spouting conspiracy theories, privately denying the theories. i wonder if you've been following that and how it affected some of the state of journalism as you see it today. guest: i've been following it a little bit, i know what they are talking about. in a way, i am not surprised.

trump was such an immensely disruptive and still is an immensely disruptive figure, not only in politics but in media. it is terribly embarrassing for fox. when you are abetting someone who is doing something you privately disapprove of and rep are hand, but you abet it anyway, that is wrong and bad, that is bad journalism. it is bad morally speaking. i think that is all there is to be said about that. i am sure there are many, many

criticisms of the left side of that and many criticisms of the fox side of it. i believe in general, and i have tried to do it for years in my own career, i've tried to keep myself from getting into a position where i am just seen as somebody who is advocating one partisan position or the other. i think you lose a tremendous amount as a journalist if you are seen as partisan. there are many kinds of journalists and journalism, there have been great journalists who were great partisans. but in general for me, i think it is best to try to be comprehensive, intelligent.

you are representing what you think of, what you have in your mind as an intelligent fellow citizen. you were there at that citizens proxy and you were trying to find out what you can about a story and tell that fellow citizen what is going on, what is the story and what does it mean? i believe a lot of this either cynical or fatuous partisanship is a bad idea. host: this is paul from england, good morning. caller: good morning. the question i want to ask about general issues, trim support in politics -- what is going on

behind the scenes? that is the question. guest: i am not sure i understand the question. caller: do we know the truth -- tell the truth, basically? host: i think -- i am paraphrasing, forgive me. ultimately, he is saying once we have the journalism, do we still know the truth of what is being reported? guest: well, no, never. journalism is very imperfect,

you have to keep added even though you know it is imperfect and the truth is often difficult to get at. furthermore, the truth changes as time passes and as the situation changes. i cannot quite zero in on -- he was breaking up a little bit on my end. i was not quite clear of what the question was getting at. but journalism is not for nothing, it is referred to as the first rough draft of history. host: let me ask you this. it is a little bit about your own personal philosophy. you might sort out journalists -- one might say i, by contrast,

belong to this team's school. it is hard work, it demands details and double checking. you may have to explain, go ahead. guest: the russians have two words for truth. one is more the hard facts truth, man's truth, cops truth. somebody got shot, the murder weapon was 38 caliber, victim was a woman aged 42 years old, something like that. hard facts. the other is, as i understand it , more god's truth in this sense of what is the inner meaning? what is the core of the thing? what is the spirit or the essence of something?

i thought it would be an interesting way of thinking about certain kinds of journalistic performance. what did you ask? host: highway to elaborate on the idea -- you applied it to your own personal approach to journalism. guest: there are some reporters who are frowned on reporters, not in politics, in the mechanics, the spirit of hard news, hard facts. henry luce was both, he was ambidextrous in that sense. he went for both of the story.

i love the essay, i've always been an essayist, basically, for years and years. an essayist is one who tends to try to shift meanings of things and get into the spirit of it. on a newspaper, you would say the columnist or essayist is the character. the police reporter in the hard facts reporter are the other. there is an interesting case,

she used hard facts of things in order to get at an interest since. she was such an interesting writer for that reason. in other words, to stick with the terms, she was a sensibility using it to get there. i am beginning to sound ridiculous. but that was it. she was a genius of mood, for example. emotional, cultural. she could use hard facts and the juxtaposition of strange images, such as the rattlesnake in the mailbox or the king snake on the

seat of her corvette in malibu in order to convey her very spooky and interesting metaphysical sense of southern california and the time of the manson murders that alienated strange period in california. host: let us hear from brian in pennsylvania, independent line. caller: i am just wondering if you ever ran into ralph ingersoll, who worked with henry luce? guest: i never ran into him, he

was a fascinating case. he was well known in his time, first the new yorker then went over to time to work for henry luce. he was very left-wing. he is a guy who, when he was the editor of fortune magazine, he stood one evening a week in a marxist study group. he became very important to luce . ingersoll said he was going to leave time to start a left-wing newspaper and luce begged him not to leave because he relied on him so much. he offered him $1 million to stay, that was major money. ingersoll said no, i want to

found tm magazine. he was interesting, he was the lover of -- i am having a moment. lillian hellman. lillian hellman, the lovely playwright, was a stalinist and remain that way into the 1950's. this is luce with a pretty left-wing right hand man, not reactionary. ingersoll was long gone from the scene when i came. host: did you personally meet henry luce? guest: no, he retired in 1964.

i came to work for time in 1965. he would come back occasionally to the time life building and meet with editors upstairs and meet with editors upstairs in private dining rooms. once i glimpsed him as the elevator doors were closing. that was sort of an apparition. i say in the book he was like the ghost of hamlet's father. but no. i met his widow, claire. i sat next to her once in the 1976 republican convention in kansas city, one of us would be delegated to sort of babysit clear luce -- clear luce-- claire luce and talk to her about what was going on, i did

that duty for a while. host: let us hear from david in texas, republican line. caller: good morning. going to get your book for sure. i did not call about this, but 32 or 34, the pulitzer prize for stories about ukraine takes part in canceling the welsh reporter leads the u.s. recognizing the soviet union, which helped bail them out. later in the 80's -- 80's or 90's, they had an independent professor come in, did a study, said they should return the prize, it was based on lies. the pulitzer committee said we would let hague keep it -- let him keep it. that is not what i called about,

the china thing. luceluce you talk about -- you talk about luce growing up in china, one of the most important appointments overseas of an american general. fought tooth and nail against the state department from a reading of that book, ultimately loses to the politicians that make him 44. the state department covered up a lot of the truth. it seems to be on top of things. a lot of reporting coming out was misleading. now going to go down, we spent zillions of dollars. look how that turned out. i do not know how much of the reporting was wishful thinking

because reporters thought it over the state department pushed it that way. another book, the best and the brightest. i feel like it is the same thing. it is about vietnam, luce retired and 64. the difference in the way it the eisenhower administration -- vietnam and 54 said we were not help the french versus the guys that kennedy sent in 64, he did not realize exactly what their thoughts were. host: you put a lot out there for the guest, we will let him respond. go ahead. guest: will i do not know where to begin. luce you go all the way back,

the new york times should return the pulitzer prize he was given in 1932. just to fill in the background for a second. he was the moscow bureau chief of the new york times in the early 30's, had been the premier foreign correspondent anywhere and probably -- in probably-- improbably. he wrote a series of articles praising stalin in 32, the moment when stalin was starving millions and millions of people to death in ukraine in the great famine, taking their food away because of a failure to collectivized on their part. it was a scandal.

in my book, i write about is what people called the worst journalistic failure in the 20th century. the whole story of china and luce and stillwell up into vietnam is a progression of misunderstandings and tragedies in all kinds of complicated stuff. luce certainly had a vision that came from his father. he felt he should fulfill his father's work as a missionary somehow, he believed in evangelizing china or somehow uniting china and america in

some kind of ideal understanding that approached his idea of the kingdom of god. he had a very unrealistic idea. he was not corrupt in the venal sense, he was surrounded by corrupt people, including his wife's family and generals, very corrupt and taking american money and to stuffing it into their own pockets instead of using it as they should have to pay their own soldiers and so on. there was a lot wrong with the luce performance, where china was concerned. host: i apologize, we are out of time. you are the author of "the noise of typewriters: remembering journalism." lance morrow talking about several themes of the book, you can find more in the book

itself. guest: great to be with you. host: another edition of washington journal comes your way tomorrow morning at 7:00, see you then. ♪ [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2023] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org]