washington journal. >> joining us now is pete hegseth the executive director for vets or freedom and the author of this opinion piece in the wall street journal, give the surge a chance. you wrote you think that congressional leaders that there's a growing fear that general petraeus has a winning strategy. >> i was there from 2005-2006. unfortunately during that time we weren't using a counter insurgency strategy, but what i saw in samara and baghdad, the payback was enormous. seeing what pen petraeus is doing in baghdad, there was an opportunity to exploit an and

that progress could happen. on capitol hill there's seriously, definitely a lot of worries about political futures and a lot of calculation about what should be done about the iraq war, but i think little of it has to do with actual events on the ground. so i think the fear could be, as the domestic u.s. political timetables say, i think we should be leaving the events on the ground in iraq with the counter insurgency strategy that actually shows success which would lend evidence for a continued surge. >> yet, the report that he is going to come out is that newspaper articles are indicating, there will be no progress shown, that events on the ground that the iraqis have not met benchmarks that they needed to meet at this point. >> yeah, i think that's an important point and a difficult one, because the political piece for the iraqis is not where it should be and it's been lagging for quite some time. but in order to set the stage for political progress, there is a military component to that

and that's what general petraeus has been saying for some time. if i can do a brief recounting from the situation in iraq, '03 to '04 we tried to kill and capture our way out, from 2004-2006, we held up the iraqi army, we're not undermined or supported by a security situation that's improving. general petraeus says in order to sustain the gains and make them real and make the political progress real, you have to secure that on the iraqi street and the only way to do that right now is with the american military and setting the conditions for putting iraqi security forces in situations where they can actually be the top dog on the street where they can actually protect the population, when do you that, you create the space necessary for iraqi political leaders to make progress. now, the benchmarks that were set are important and need to be met. to say that we started the surge six months ago, in fact, he made a speech six months ago

to the day saying that we would do it and we would see that progress is premature. >> is september enough time? it's not enough time, it's a snapshot. and whether the security is providing the right incentives for political leaders, but i don't think we'll see the benchmarks met and i don't think we should have an expectation of petraeus with incredible improvements, but i think the trends are headed in the right direction. >> how much time should general petraeus and the administration have? >> that's above my pay grade, how much time it would take, i think we're looking at another year of this sustained surge at least in order to create the political or the security conditions necessary. but it's all-- it needs to be based on conditions on the ground. it can't be based on what we want, which are set definitive timelines, it has to be based on real progress in the iraqi army. in the past we did a lot of things that looked good.

in the military we did things that looked good on power point by december of such and such of year, iraqi forces will be ready and it's not based on whether or not they were actually ready. what petraeus said we'll use the military conditions so the security forces can go out and protect the population and when they do that, the government can take control and deny haven, i don't think you'll deny a timeline like that. >> we're talking about pete hegseth, vets or freedom, dialing in now democrats 202-p 37-0002. republicans 0001, independents, 0205. and you said the military might need another year, but newspaper stories indicate that troop levels at this 160,000 strong could only last nine more months? >> yeah, i don't want to tie myself to that year, i think i just sort of threw that out there without really knowing what it would take. i've heard the dates about the

march of 2008 being when we can sustain. i think if the military wanted to muster in and really was committed it would involve another rotation of national guard soldiers in order to do that and to be frank with you, i wish and i think we need another 100,000 troops there altogether if we really wanted to secure the entire country, but what we've got is the baghdad security plan. that's important to remember. they're trying to show results in the capital, in the center of gravity for iraq. it's meant to provide security in the capital and shift with gravity so that insurgents are pushed out away from the capital and forced to try to conduct operations from outside, once we pacify the capital, we can push more troops out to those areas. >> our first phone call comes from new york, the republican line. >> good morning. i was against saddam hussein back in 1980 i was a college

student studying in persia and iran, and opposed to him in the iraq-iran war, when rumsfeld was over there, a private citizen and a famous picture with him negotiating the same. and i was opposed to this war when the son of one of my best friends was there, 101st, he was a mechanic, great mechanical worked on big trucks and tanks and he was, now, doing double duty like a lot of people at that time, also patrolling the streets. now, i don't doubt that the surge is working within its parameters and it's going to continue to work and improve things as they're trying to, but my fear, i mean, i should say my belief is that iraqi owe site-- society and are deeply fragmented. and 45% republicans, 45%

democrat, and 10% in the middle. and a hard core. the tribal traditions are honor using effective in anbar and other places from what i read is so deeply fragmented and there's so much violence in it, as much as it may work as military strategy that the glass is too shattered for us to put it back together in any reasonable time frame. so-- >> to that? >> there is certainly a lot of fracture there and it's good that we're finally looking the tribal as the center of gravity and that proves successful for us using that tribal system. it's important to remember that iraqis are people just like you and i. they want the ability to go to the market and be safe and they don't want to be concerned whether they're going to die and they want their children to go to school. these are not just platitudes, this is real.

this is my experience of talking to shiite and suni in samara and baghdad. these people want an environment that's secure and an opportunity to have a better life. if they can present that to them alongside iraqi forces you'll see the population rallying around the government. yes, around a suni section of that government, and shia section so i think that local control is an important component of that. but there's an opportunity to bring the fractured parts together in some framework that provides stability around the country. when you were there, what were your concerns with the strategy? >> that we were trying to fight a conventional war, trying to fight a unt coulder insurgency with conventional means. i was with the 101st airborne in samara. we did a large air assault one of the largest air assaults of the operation called operation swarmer up into a vast swath of

desert. and it was a great military maneuver, but it didn't do all that much in denying haven. what we needed to do was push troops into the local population, into the city, into the town of samara which is not what we did. nigh frustration was that we were trying old tactics in a war that required new ones and that gives me a lot of hope what general petraeus is doing. if we would have applied those in samara. we would have seen even more progress even though we weren't using the tactics. >> on hello, virginia, the democrat line. >> i'd like to point out hamas has gaza now and lebanon is in fear of takeover by syria and hezbollah. jordan has 750,000 refugees, syria close to a million. iran is gaining power all the time. the middle east is totally destabilize $and we have hardly

any allies at all in the area. they're just private citizens. we don't have any governmental allies over there in the middle east, except for -- in lebanon and we've pretty much lost iraq through abugra and i don't think it means had a thing that they haven't attacked us yet because it's a matter of time. >> which comes first, a diplomatic solution or a military solution? >> a diplomatic solution has to be the final solution, but the military solution comes first. you have to create-- in iraq specifically on the ground. you have to create the conditions that allow for a government to maintain stability. if you're as a government leader more worried about whether you're going to make it from point a to point b securely than you are about political reconciliation, you're not going to make the progress you need.

you have to use the military to protect the population, to protect the government, to provide stable streets, so eventually political progress can come about and i'd like to make a mention about things like abu ghraib. did horrible damage to america's reputation, but that was an exception what's happening going on in iraq and an exception to military soldiers and marines were conducting themselves there. it's unfortunate the way it's magnified. i think the media gets beat over the head. but 32 straight days on the front page of the new york times is emphasizing something for reason just beyond exposing a story. i think we've done ourselves a lot of damage and haven't done enough talking about the good things that american servicemen have been doing in iraq. >> lawrence, alabama, republican line. >> yes, i'd like to just disagree with you slightly here. i thought that from the beginning of this war it was a good thing. i thought we should do what we did thought we should go in.

i thought those things because i thought our leaders would do what it took to win. we have a-- i'm a republican, i voted for george bush twice, i thought he would do what it takes. he will not do what it i cans-- takes, sir. and i supported the war even up to the surge, a few months ago, i was still defending this war, but the surge was the final straw, sir, it was supposed to be the last ditch effort and it's not working. i'm not going to-- i personally am in the going to sit back and hear someone tell me let's do one more thing and when that doesn't work out and lets he' just do one more thing and then when that doesn't work let's do one more thing. >> let's get a response. >> it's too early to determine whether the surge is work being. we got the compliment and the

surge in operations is finally just starting, it's way too early. this is not implementing a new tactic, it's finally giving the general what he needs. i'm disheartened by reports of the administration, thinking about bailing on a strategy they just started and for a general that was just approved. he was approved with a mission and sent to baghdad with more troops to execute it, here we are six months into it talking about whether or not we should change strategy and we need to dig in our heels, and not blindly, and not following, you know, not just continuing a war because we think we should fight it, because we've got the right strategy with the right general, and he's making progress. and he needs to be given the time and the resources necessary to see that strategy through. i think in september, if he's talking about this can't work, then i think we need to reevaluate what's going on. but i think he's going to show a measured report of the good things that are happening, the

security improvements that are happening and how political environments, political improvements, which are ultimately necessary, will actually happen. but we have to think about the ramifications ever american defeat. the ramifications of a failed iraqi state. it's a haven al-qaeda, a pr bonanza, and great around the region as the previously caller said. >> should the administration begin with withdrawing troops in september if the surge is not working? >> i don't. i don't think that you can do-- maybe on some level they'll decide to do that, but you can't-- saying in september the surge hasn't worked cannot be do done. you can't in nine months, especially when you implemented a new strategy, you can't say in nine months, it's failed. it's too easy to make that argument without backing it up without real data. a few car bombings bring in

massive casualties this week and they're all unfortunate, but that isn't a reflection of a failed strategy and neither are very unfortunate american casualties. people are going to talk about metrics and lost american soldiers and now what? we lost people when i was there and it breaks my heart to think about it, the sacrifice that they've made. but more u.s. losses in the last couple of months do not reflect a failed strategy, in fact, they reflect an actual implementation and an aggressive implementation of a strategy. pushing troops out ever big bases into the neighborhoods to actually protect the population and when we did that in samara on a much smaller level and we made relationships with iraqi leaders. those special relationships gave us the intelligence we needed to sift through who the inis your-- the insurgents were and the friendly folks were. and if you can do that on a larger scale, hold it and pass it over to the iraqi military and iraqi government. i think you have a chance, but nine months is way too early to

say this is it, it's not working we need to leave. if it's failing then we will have to recognize that and nobody is interested in trumping a failed strategy. >> atlanta, independent line. >> yes, mr. hegseth. >> hello. >> yes, sir. >> good morning, sir. >> i'm sorry? >> he said good morning. >> good morning, sir, good morning to you. >> i'm sorry to tell you that with all due respect, you're talking about the iraq-- the sha has never iran -- they never have power in that country. and the majority. we can put 500,000 u.s. soldiers in iraq, it won't solve the problem. the problem is they have the power and waiting for america to get out. we're working at cross-purposes. the shia want americans to get out and they'll take over the

government and the suni, kurds in the north. we can't do anything that we want to do in iraq it will not help the problem. it will not solve the problem. that war in iraq, it's about time we come home. >> well, i don't think that a suni majority in iraq is a problem, it's a fact. and i heard that in samara, too, and all suni samara, why did you get rid of saddam and give us iran, give us a shia majority? that's a fact of the matter in iraq, that shia where in the majority. if we left too soon, and they admitted, there would be mass bloodshed, they would commit some atrocities on sunis and others in the country. and more time to moderate that and more time to build a real could he police station and provide the real kind of political benchmarks that could provide stability would prevent

the kind of irresponsibility from a majority that we need to avoid. >> chicago, republican line, you're next. >> good morning. >> good morning. >> okay, i've got a quick question for you, because i've had this opinion about the war since it started. but i was-- i'm a prior service member and with the navy for 10 years. my question is why are we using a deployment type strategy with regards to the war? i mean, in prior wars, you know, you have a buildup. you send the troops there, until it's done. now we're discussing having troops home for two times more than they're there. it just doesn't quite make sense to me why we're not approaching this like a war, rather, and just separate deployments from troops from the country? >> sir, i agree with you wholeheartedly. i think one of the big problems is that troops aren't there long enough to gain a real understanding. so i think some of these extensions while unfortunate,

probably allow experienced soldiers to actually implement real change because they're there, they know people, they understand the situation, but when you're rotating troops over there over and over and over again you lose a lot of institutional memory and undermine your ability to fight it. it's a fair critique, we've rotated people out of there too quickly and i need to stay alive until my year is up, and i'm out of here rather than complete the mission. >> and there's a strategy set in the beginning of this year. >> yeah. >> what is your important of the former defense secretary donald rumsfeld? >> well, i think he was pretty set in following a strategy of light and lethal force that didn't need more troops on the ground and i think he was a little stubborn in the way that he stuck to that strategy. i don't have any bad words for the man and i don't know mimm personally so i don't want to-- >> i'm about strategy. >> well, i think it's

interesting to look at the current strategy versus his strategy. his strategy was less troops on big bases, you know, counterterrorism strikes when necessary and then-- which is exactly what the democrats and some republicansen on capitol hill are now talking about. and some strategy of the petraeus doctrine, with the rumsfeld doctrine. and you don't have enough troops, and al-qaeda and other groups have free rein in the cooperation and they'll lose huge swaths of the country and while i think his policies were largely a failure in iraq, i think what we're talking about now is a return to the failed policies and what we're talking about petraeus is a turn, and a way of thinking the way that the military is thinking about things. it takes for the army to change

course. petraeus wrote the book on it. and now he's in baghdad with more troops to say in six months, nine months, hey, your opportunity is done, it's time to leave, i think, is very irresponsible and would mark a return to sort of rumsfeld's approach. >> newnan, georgia. democrats line. >> thanks for taking my call, sir, this is the first war i ever seen that you go to war first and then you get the reason to go to war. and i was told that the oil would pay for the war itself. where the-- >> caller, can you repeat that? >> i didn't hear that. >> okay, i was told that the revenue would pay for the war itself. where the revenue from the oil? >> well, there's -- iraq is awash in oil revenue money they can't spend it responsibly so they've got plenty of money,

it's just releasing that into the political progress-- process so it's used responsibly is a difficult hurdle. as far as talking about going to war, it's easy to talk about that. where we are now, is what you have to deal with. you can't fight a war in the rearview mirror, and they're out there, and books have been written as senator mccain has said. there are swaths of problems, but what we've got to look at is what would happen if we abandoned it now. we've got to look at where our enemy is and al-qaeda has decided that iraq is a front line where they'll defeat the americans just like they defeated the russians in afghanistan and in doing so, will destabilize the region and set up a caliphate there. you have to look at what iraq is now and not how it was sold in 2003. >> pete hegseth is the executive director of vets for freedom. did you find -- were you the founder of this organization? >> i was not.

it was founded by wade, a marine in 2006 and they were active in 2006 and advocating for strategies in iraq and i recently took over about three months ago and our mission statement is to mobilize veterans to communicate america's strategic objectives in iraq and afghanistan. right now that largely means giving-- trying to give intellectual am mission to general petraeus and his strategy by those-- and our website is move on -- excuse me, vets for freedom.org. whenever i think of that i think of move on. >> a graduate of princeton university in politics in 2003. is that correct in. >> yes. >> and currently in the national guard. our next phone call from rockland, maryland. >> yes, morning, this is rockland, massachusetts. >> i'm sorry, go ahead.

>> and i remember in 2001 when america was attacked. every town you went through, everywhere you went people were flying flags. democrats, republicans, green party, liberals, conservatives. everybody was flying flags. then it became a political war. well, the democrats didn't like the fact that the republicans were so successful in getting america to join in on this war and they turned around and they-- they were in literally in fear that the republicans were going to be the party of this nation and so they started their propaganda and some of the greatest propaganda comes from this state of massachusetts where our liberal democratic leaders have ruled this state for 40 years. all the newspapers are owned by liberal democrats, we see nothing, but hate for this war in this state. we see nothing, but hate for

republican opinion and conservatives in this state. conservativism in this state is frowned upon. people hate conservatives in in state. everybody acts like a conservative, but when they go to the polls. they vote democrat. >> we're going to leave it there. >> sure. >> i think the important point is in 2001 he talked about people coming together and flying flags and i think it's important, again, to find a way to rally around our troops and their mission in iraq, but also rally around the fact that we all have a common enemy here. a radical islamist threat that wants to impose its distorted view of islam, its distorted view of the world on people there and around the world. i think we need to come together and recognize that threat. recognize that it still in iraq, despite the failed strategies of the past and recognize that general petraeus and his strategy are probably the best approach in dealing with that right now in giving

him the times and resources necessary to complete it i think is an important component. it's also important to remember that zawahiri and 0s osama bin laden hated before 2001 and before the invasion of iraq. >> you mentioned before you'd like to see the increase of 100,000 troops, but the headline in today's washington post, army's recruiting goal lags for the second month in a row. why do you think it's difficult to encourage more people to enlist in the service? >> it's a tough time. it is. it's a tough time to tell people, hey, you might rain up for six weeks, six months and then be in iraq right after that. so it's a recruiting challenge. i think a more important metric on that has been reenlistment within the military because the troops that have been there, have seen it, have been in the army are signing up at very strong rates.

there was just a ceremony on the fourth of july of 650 servicemen and women in baghdad reenlisting. you have people going on tours, and strong, strong levels as high as they've ever been. it's tough to convince new recruits join the army with the negatiism going on around the country, but troops who have seen it are reenlisting more. >> will you go back to iraq? >> i don't know, if we're called back, it's a possibility. i have three more years on my contract in the national guard. if that's the case, so be it. >> pasadena, you're next. >>...

>> in the report it was damning for the highest brasa military as being complicit in the actions. i think you've taken the time. >> thank you. the administration did itself a great disservice try to tie al-qaeda to saddam hussein in 2003. in doing so has made people step back and think i don't think we're fighting al-qaeda now. it couldn't be further from the truth. that may be where we decided to fight. i want to fight as. they have decided america needs to go down. >> what the caller was thing though is al-qaeda wasn't there before we entered iraq.

>> sure but al-qaeda was looking for any battlefield on which to fight the americans. it was in afghanistan first to get rid of saddam hussein and inside that's the second front. whether not that was right decision is for the history books but where we are is in a battle with al-qaeda in iraq. it needs to be completed. if you look at the way those people were treated it was a shame and a problem but you compare it with the way american servicemen are found when they are captured, , you compare with the way we know we'll be treated or i would be treated if i was captured by al-qaeda. it wouldn't be stripped and pile which is horrible, horrific. nobody wants, nobody is apologizing for that but you compare that with the headings and tortured of drills and hit and the types of things al-qaeda does. it doesn't make it any better by chapter look at the fight we are in and we have to do everything

we can to win it. >> do you believe the united states should be above those proceedings? >> yes. certainly above abu ghraib. no one is apologizing for that. you can't. the way we conduct ourselves is what gives us the moral high ground in this war. it's important we maintain that and we don't stoop to the level of our enemy. that's what gives us the advantage. in doing so we have to maintain the resolve and doing it the right way. >> new smyrna beach, good morning. >> i just want to make a couple status. i want to thank c-span for taking my call and good morning to pete. my hat is off to you. i believe our enemies are playing on our diversity and at the time at war, america's undefeatable.

every time they see our division there's more bombings, more murders, more death. there's just no end as we are divided and they're playing on it constantly. i would love to see us unite and really finish this and get it over with, bring our men home. it safer for our soldiers if we unite and that's all i wanted to say. thank you very much. >> there's one coat i wrote down in advance for this and it was a statement made on the fourth of july of this year. rejoice the victory is near. the herds of the crusaders have begun to split and their sole concern has become searching for a way out. our enemies follow our domestic politics probably closer than most americans do. thur members on capitol hill are saying.

it can be very unfortunate and undermine the mission of the troops when our leaders are saying the war is lost or are generals are out of touch or incompetent. the enemy raids at and exploits it as best they can and we needed more responsible for how we talk about this war. >> are you taking that argument and talking to members of congress pgh yes. that's going to be a big push in the next couple months is talking to members on the hill. not just members that agree with us but those that disagree and say hey, here's what we believe, here's what we've been come here's what we done, here's what we think general petraeus needs a time and resources to finish the mission. we're going to list soldiers to come up to capitol hill in september to talk to their members while general petraeus is reporting them. and also to get mobilized in august in their home districts to talk to their representatives. we are not the protesting business where not indivisible

making noise and yelling insults and we are in the business of ensuring our next understand how we feel about them complete this mission and we're going to get in a responsible way. >> arkansas, good morning. >> thank you very much for c-span. good morning to you. i salute your patriotism. this conversation is most relevant at this point in time. the way i see it the conflict is really about the struggle for truth. this whole iraq situation was based on untruth and its the conflict within that to continue this, blood and treasure, to continue to fight the principles, the administration, the people running it are all wrong, that they are part of the untruth and the way i see it nothing is going, general petraeus is a really great american, a heck of the military

individual. he's the right guy over there. too bad it's too late. if they would've went in with him in the beginning with that type of strategy we wouldn't be in the situation we're in now. this was to get bush through two cycles, two terms of presidency and the military complex to get a payday. no oversight by congress. there's too many things that are wrong for us to risk our heart, our soul and her blood to continue to fight an insane, instable civil war over there that no one will really face up to you. >> i don't like the statement and i disagree with the fact too bad it's too late. when you're fighting a war of the scale with an enemy that is declared on us and grand place in buildings in 2001. were talking al-qaeda and in the people push back when you talk about iraq but now they are

the same people have and iraq. to say too bad too late we've lost 3600 troops and it's time to go home i think is a shortsighted perspective when it comes to this global war were fighting. our enemies are fighting a global insurgency, not just in the middle east but we've seen repeatedly in europe with the bombings recently in glasgow and then throughout europe. the threat is real. the enemy is out there and we can decide whether were going to continue to fight them with the right -- i wouldn't be here this morning it was a same strategy that was years while i was in iraq. i wouldn't be here defending that policy. that was a failed policy. >> what would you be say? >> it's probably time to adjust strategy. we need to change strategy. [inaudible] >> mccain has voiced this. it's that with continued losing american lives as a fill

strategy. either adjust strategy or pull the troops out. i totally agree. if there was up late to adjust rank i would be jumping on the table saying get our servicemen and women out because they are not on the winning track. the reason i'm here is because we are on track. the minute we stop wishing that and i'll stop saying we need to keep fighting but i really believe and history and counterinsurgency principles support the approach we're finally taking with more troops in baghdad and iraq. >> our next phone call comes from appleton, wisconsin, republican line. >> good morning. thank you for being on c-span. i'm so glad to see someone out from the military from the veterans side who so articulate and seems to really know the situation. i spoke with one of my cousins who is in the 82nd airborne and is been a two tours over to iraq and the frustration is incredible on his part and all of his buddies that we're not hearing more of what you're

saying, the people that have actually been on the ground there know the story but the story is not getting out and i'm so pleased to see your out on c-span. are you going to be able to get out through other media outlets? nobody, i don't ever see anyone like you interviewed by the matt lauer or any of the major media. nobody talks to you guys. when asked talking to my cousin the frustration level was incredible but i want you to know there are so many people that support you and support the troops and support the mission and we know we can't leave. i have a three-year-old son and if we leave now when he's 20 he's going to be over there fighting this amended to finish the job and get it done. thank you again for your service and your time this morning. >> take her first question about other media outlets. >> thank you. we could do a better job of

getting out there talking about it but that is front and her efforts is getting veterans out there in the media talking about it. if you go to vets for freedom.org to read more about what would try to do. let people know where out there and let them know this is our mission and were trying to spread the word and make a big push in next couple of months to get involved. i want to make a point to the frustration she has. it's not soldiers are frustrated with the strategy or for going over there again. they are frustrated a good work they're doing and the progress happen isn't being talked about. soldiers the want to be painted as the victims, victims of administration, victims of this work, they getting stomped on by the powers that be. the soldiers we've got today fighting are nothing short of heroes that doing everything they can to stand guard on a front line of a very important. i appreciate the callers perspective. >> what is of some of the good things you saw when you are in iraq? >> i saw an iraqi leader the

president of the sunni, president of the city council stand up almost single-handedly and fight for his city. i saw him survive suicide bombings, cyber attack, ieds repeatedly. all the while building a strong and cohesive or attempting and trying to build a strong and cohesive city council that could govern and bring stability to a city. he didn't it with guns. he did with newspapers. he did it with showing people the political progress and economic progress is possible. one day we had a call dry ground patrol and and in insurgente passing out propaganda in said market. we spent over there ready for a confrontation when, in fact, it was his guys with a full eight-page caller newspaper and it around downtown say this is what you're security forces doing for you, this is what your

iraqi city council is doing for you. we didn't have our fingerprints in at all. it was our support for him and willingness to support them in tough times that emboldened him to make come to stick his neck out and say i want to bring about stability. unfortunately because we didn't have enough troops and we haven't and we didn't commit to a real counterinsurgency strategy after we left they actually blew up his entire house and he was forced to flee temporarily although he continues to return to baghdad to do what he can. there are so many stories of progress like that and iraq and if we continue to commit they will stand up if we can create the security commission force. >> independent line troy, michigan, good morning. >> hello? >> you're on the air. >> good. first i want to say thank you for your service to the country. i i am a combat medic from

vietnam. >> and best guy to have around. >> i tell you, the problem is that i see you guys running for and charging and wanting this warden. we have the same attitude in vietnam. when you come back you will be faced with a lot of problems if you come back. that's called the v.a. system. i work with suicidal vets, iraq events now. let me tell you the v.a. is doing nothing for you people. a practice policy, , they don't practice medicine. how can you turn around and look at your friend, because i've been a combat, how can you look at your friend and say go forward, fixed bayonets if you lose an arm or leg there any mess, and this government will drop them like like a rocke them by the side of a beach. >> thank you for the call and those are great points. we need to be doing everything we can to ensure the soldiers that fossil valiantly are taken care of. our medicine on the battlefield is incredible. the lives lost at 3600 would be

be much more if this was a war fought ten, 15 years ago, 20 years ago because were saving a lot more lives than we have in the past. you've got guys coming back to the states with real significant injuries. they need to be taken care of. i can speak specifically to whether or not the v.a. system has failed to give it has and i've heard anecdotes that it has. we need to be doing everything we can to be taken care of the soldiers because guys i'd seen that of an injured there have been problems and thus part of the message we're bringing to capitol hill. it's more so for us it is the job in iraq but at the same time for the soldiers we needed to getting we can to ensure they are taken care of. >> did you suffer any entries? >> i did not. >> how about mentally? >> no, i didn't suffer any entries but it takes time to readjust when you come back. waking up in the middle of the night and thinking about, it

weighs heavily on your mind and it takes time to adjust. some guys do come back with real problems and conditions that need to be addressed. war is real and you see things and you do things you hope you never have to see or do again. it takes time to adjust. >> our last phone call for pete hegseth comes from kansas city, missouri, good morning. >> hello. i'm going to be brutally honest. i i about republican, not a psychopath neocon. you sound exactly like on-site to say this, , you sound like a government mouthpiece that somebody is paying you to say these talking points. it's the same rhetoric over and over and over, and we parted before. listen, if you don't get this through your head you are -- the

al-qaeda was an invented by the cia don't you understand this? it was made to be an elusive enemy. you are never going to beat them. it's our own government propaganda and that's why they keep saying al-qaeda and iraq, al-qaeda and iraq did this. it's ridiculous. those people are fighting for the country and listen to me, you are never going to stop them. >> you've made your point. let's get a response. >> first of all i wish i was getting paid to do this. i'm not. to be accused of being a government mouthpiece couldn't be further from the truth. i'm standing up as a soldier who believes in it and thinks we need to talk about it. if they sound like talking points from the counterinsurgency strategy it's because i believe in that strategy. has nothing to do with me regurgitating what someone has told me to say. it's the experience of what i seen and how this can work. to speak to al-qaeda and iraq

being a manufactured enemy, i read the flyers that al-qaeda published in content and handed to the city council president accusing him of being a traitor and telling him there going to kill him and his entire family if he didn't leave and stop working with the americans. it's ludicrous to say al-qaeda is an invention of the cia, that we have and poses an hour or so, we're killing ourselves in there. those unfortunate statements and don't help bring us toward some sort of successful outcomeers ae nation's capital.

>> ladies and gentlemen, i want to introduce to you a young man you probably have seen on television quite a bit lately, his name is lieutenant pete hegseth, army national guard, executive director of the vets for freedom. i've watched this young man and he has begun his career as a television pontificator pundit. no, none of that. patriot. it was the key word i was looking for. he's done a marvelous job of speaking for all of us and we're so very proud of him. pete. [applause] i don't know how you follow a guy like chris hill. i got bill of goods on that one. what an honor true honor to be a today and they kept thank the gathering eagles enough for standing with and for the troops. i figured i would seize this opportunity to cite a man who while he's running for president he's probably best known for his

$400 haircut. that's right. john edwards claimed, he claims that are two americas country today. you know what? for once, for once i think he's right. there are two america's and they are on display here in washington, d.c. today. on one hand there are those who come to d.c. to desecrate our sacred memorials. are those who seek to use the death of america's heroes as a political stunt as you'll see today. there are those who want to retreat from the battlefield teeming with radical islamist terrorists want to kill us abroad and eventually at home. now thankfully on the other hand, there are those who have the courage to defend these memorials because they understand what they represent and those who respect the sacrifices of the fallen because they understand this precious freedom that flag are purchased

at a price. those who understand the threat we face and will stand and fight to defeat america's enemies defend her homeland and honor the sacrifice of the fallen, this america, our america understands from the blood soaked beaches of france to the bombed out back alleys of fallujah, the american g.i. has fought and died opposing that which is evil and oppressive and defending all things good and free. that's why we hear today. we cannot let a bunch of sign waving slogan chanting protesters who claim to represent the american people, they do not speak for us. they do not speak for us. if they speak for anyone it's a small radicalized elements of america the same folks who would run a full-page ad in your times denouncing the commanding general in a war zone. it's despicable.

we are here as veterans and citizens to stand up to these and stand up for the hundred dash of 160,000 troops in iraq at the third month for fighting for all americans. we're here to support general petraeus and his new counterinsurgency strategy which is showing i deniable signs of success in iraq. as an infantryman that fought over there i understand how difficult and complex to fight it is. just like it was in vietnam and in any work i understand the great mistakes of inmate and certainly understand it's going to be difficult but i also understand two important things. al-qaeda has drawn the a lin the sand in iraq, and seeks our defeat there to expand the global insurgency. listen to bin laden, listen to his people. they want to give everyone here if they could. the second thing is i understand general petraeus an honorable man of 35 years who came to this capital and testified last week as we do with american soldiers

hand-in-hand with brave iraqis and their turning the tide in iraq. the new strategy reinforced by new troops has al-qaeda on the run and americans are saying we want a victory. victory is possible and victory matters because history will judge us not when we leave but on what we leave behind. victory is defined by educated al-qaeda and a stable iraq. it's going to be tough but i say to you this is so important andd i ask you today keep up the fight. never stop. spread the word and tell the united states congress back here to to have as much courage and capitol hill as a troops in combat have on the front line. tell them that. tell them that. now was a time to stand by our troops. now is the time to stand by our commanders and now is the time to stand by their mission. god bless you all and god bless

this great country. school. >> thank you very much captain pete hegseth -- did i press that correctly? executive director of vets for freedom and infantry officer in the massachusetts army national guard and iraq war veteran. received his ba from princeton, pursuing a masters at harvard university, john f. kennedy school of government. that's all correct?

>> yes, sir. >> please go ahead. >> chairman lee, ranking member, other members, thank you for the opportunity to be a today. it's a privilege to take part in these proceedings. my name's pete hegseth and executive director of vets for freedom dedicated to supporting our war fighters and omission on the battlefield. i receive my commission from princeton in 2003 and that sir two tours in the united states army, the first in guantánamo bay, cuba, and the second iraq with the 101st airborne. currently infantry captain as chairman's and with the massachusetts army and a graduate from harvard university. i'm a citizen and a veteran and do not purport to speak a of the military. i'm going to start with the bottom line up front. we are in a nation at war. a nation at war with the vicious enemy on multiple fronts. i've seen this enemy firsthand. as have precious few for my generation. in any we face the test and

seeks to destroy our way of life. while completely ignoring and exploiting for that matter the rule of law. this context motivates my testimony today. i get serious concerns about elena kagan's actions towards the military and her willingness to myopically focus on preventing the military from having institutional and equal access to top notch recruits at a time of war. i find her actions toward most are recruiters at harvard and the come to civic leader and an befitting a nominee to the united states supreme court. ms. kagan is clearly capable academic and the present has right to choose as you please replace the only remaining on the court had to reach this in this country? we're nominating someone who unapologetically obstructed the military at a time of war? she chose to use her position of authority to impede rather that empower the warriors fought and two of fallen for this country.

i know a number of my fellow veterans will testify to a personal support of veterans on harvard campus and she said good things to say about the military which i appreciate. but for my money actions always speak louder than words. her actions towards recruiters with wars raging overseas undercut the military ability to fight and win wars and trump a rhetorical explanation. general petraeus calls counterinsurgency the thinking man's war. defeating enemy on the battlefield and in the courtroom takes the best america has to offer. yet in 2004 as you've heard many times, ms. kagan took the law enter own hands blocking equal access for military recruiters in direct violation of federal law. moreover, she encouraged students to protest and oppose the presence of military recruiters. these actions coincide with my deployment to cuba. so a legal maze of graduate-level proportions.

what not the legal situation they're in the courtrooms and iraq and afghanistan be better off with participation of lawyers from harvard law school caliber? don't we believe our best and brightest should be encouraged to serve? in response ms. kagan has stated despite her decision to bar recruiters, the number military recruits actually increased during her tenure. let's be clear about that. it increased in spite of ms. kagan not because of her. i ask more important question with that number not have been even higher had she supported recruiters rather than oppose them? to be fair i don't begrudge ms. kagan's opposition to the so-called "don't ask, don't tell" legislation. reasonable people disagree about this policy however her fears and activist opposition to the policy was intellectual dishonest and unnecessarily focus on the military. in enough assistance of statements to the press ms. kagan slammed the militaries

discriminatory recruitment policy. yet at a legal scholar she knows better than that. she knows the policy that she bores is not the militaries policy but a policy enacted by congress and impose on a trip in fact, after law was passed ms. kagan went to work for the very men who signed "don't ask, don't tell", president clinton. for her to call it the military policy is intellectually dishonest and her opposition to military recruiters at harvard had the effect of shooting the messenger. while ms. kagan sought to block full access to military recruiters she welcomed to campus numerous senators and conquer who voted for the law she calls quote a moral injustice to the first order. additionally harvard law school has three academic chairs endowed by money from saudi arabia. i country where being a homosexual is a capital offense. rather than confront the congressional source of the true legislation, or take a stance

against the country that executes homosexuals ms. kagan zeroed in on military recruiters for a policy they neither authored nor emphasize. in closing the real moral injustice in granting a lifetime appointment to someone who when it mattered most free to military recruiters second-class citizens. i urge you to consider this as you consider ms. kagan. thank you for the opportunity to address this important topic. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i think our military witnesses for with clarity stating the true facts of what happened at harvard was not a little bitty matter. it was not a matter that slid into reality and dean kagan was caught some in middle of the controversy. she was a leader, a driving force in effort and to remove the military from full and equal access to that campus.

after the admin at ten past and that was required. captain, where you with general petraeus in mosul. >> i i was not. i can have chances are under hi him. >> i was there with the one at first drink that time in mosul and alabama national guard attached to it at that time. but you talked about the backdoor, , having heat or maybe captain youngblood having to dine in the kitchen, not set up front. do you think just from your yale, you are harvard, your notre dame. do you feel that that policy, setting aside the impact them a pat on, sent a message of some kind to veterans and to the recruiters who made themselves

who come off the battlefield who came on the campus? what was at message. >> that message very clear is your service to the country is not valued by these institutions. >> it was not a message of support. i know she met with veterans on veterans day. she honored that the public occasions. that's appreciated by veterans. we learned that lesson from vietnam vets who did not honor but it's a whole nother thing when you take action on their behalf to practically given access, elevate their service show fellow classmates that indeed entering the military going into the j.a.g. court and being an army lawyer or air force one is way to contribute just like any other legal defense fund. that's one thing to say it another thing to do and she made that very clear. >> somewhat similar with the harvard campus understand the speech she made two approaches was at the same time a recruiter was in the next building attempting to recruit students.

she made a speech in which she condemned the military policy and spoke out in that fashion. do you think that if an asset to the recruiter in his effort in the next building? >> not going to help. also the fact it was encouraged that students would sign up for time with recruiters what f interest in joining the military to clog the time and clog the role so less actual possible recruits would have access. that something ms. kagan is purported to have encouraged. >> this veterans group you have any knowledge of it at harvard? >> i've been a member of some veterans groups. oftentimes we sit around and drink beer don't usually bring recruiters on campus for the veterans group at harvard didn't have a salary. they didn't have an office. they're just the group they got together on occasion. how do you feel, did dean kagan

testimony here about how the veterans association was offered the opportunity to be helpful to the recruiters. how do you judge that as a realistic explanation for denying him the official ability to utilize recruiting services and office? >> i don't think there's any way you could possibly say that is equal access. your thrusting it on students with a full workload. they didn't sign up to bring recruiters on the campus. they don't have the resources. the not able to publicize it. students oftentimes did note the recruiters were there. it's an issue with the office come in but has been at universe knows all the folks that come in to offer jobs go through the career services. read the bolded or look on the screen, you can meet with. when you don't have access. accessing the pool of students. in any sort of equal way. >> to the of the three witnesses apologize for stepping out.

i have greater testament and faq for your service to our country. we all appreciate it very much. i would like to note by weight of the question two things that struck me recently here one is the fact we all know so many of our great veterans of world war ii are passing on. time is taking its toll. joe flynn lives in my hometown and was part of the d-day invasion, battle of the bulge, so proud of his service in world war ii. i don't question for a minute what tom brokaw said, greatest generation. they serve for the duration when they decided to enlist in our armed forces. but there's also another historic event just last week the 60th anniversary of the beginning of the korean war. and we gathered in statutory hall and one of the first

persons to speak was congressman charlie rangel of new york. he was a combat veteran of the korean war. he had enlisted before the korean war in an army that the segregated and congressman rangel happen to be able to serve in korea in combat because of the efforts of president truman to integrate our armed forces. i raise a because i want to ask one of you, any of you if you think we can honor the greatest generation and our military mr. gaetz and much to our country and still look back with some dismay that it was a segregated force and it wasn't until the korean war that our military was truly integrated, and if you think that you can't at least you can, can you understand for a moment how some may have feelings about discrimination in our current military against those of a different sexual orientation

believe that discrimination should also be noted and people that want to speak out? i invite your comments. >> i would say i can understand that certain members of her society we feel excluded because a particular policy and many people have different opinions on that policy my testimony and my issue is the way in which ms. she could have done so i talking about the wrong subconscious like saudi arabia and execute homosexuals. she could've taken issue with it by not bring senators and conquered cognitive who voted for the she calls a moral wrong of the first order to campus. there are giveaways she could see her in on a policy and instead used the properly

known, man in the arena speech. >> jim, thank you very much the heritage foundation grateful for the opportunity. you got the book early, you read and engage with the appreciate that an offer to us. ungrateful and thank you. this feels academic reading and basically. in this audit and affect all of you for being here. so many wonderful faces, people of note and work with an folks online, thanks for sticking with us. first i want to think a bunch of people i i want to think thaty former colleagues here at concern fits which make a big bulk of this audit is ungrateful you're here. i wrote this to 8 a.m. in many mornings while working, while running cva. it was what we did at cva that

was the inspiration for me. you'll find it's a called action that is exactly the called action that is the organization. it was always a pleasure to work with you to appreciate the work you continue to do from jay and bill and carolyn and sarah and and and will and sean, amber and emily, kevin, fred and even my brother phil who's in the front row. i want to thank all of you and, of course, it is with us early on kate, also an inspiration for me to write this book. she told me you got ready, , you need to write it and it took her advice and glad i did. kate, thanks for being here. i want to thank my very good college buddy matt hoopes two is here and is acknowledged as well in the book. this book would not happen without matt come with that in teaching me how to think and write and argue in college and pulling it back from the brink of some absurd things i put in the pages of publications.

matt was a content editor of the princeton tory and for good reason. thank you for your help on this project. it truly would not of happen. so the that are not here. i wiped from our boys who i dedicate this book to. yes, i always get laughed at that. good southern ends end up e north. my parents, my brother who is a man in the arena himself. i want to recognize david who is a very good friend of mine who was a follow traveler, an author and also encourages this project. to the book itself when is in iraq and afghanistan and guantánamo bay i carried a quart in a black frame come durable black frame i was hung it up where i was in was teddy roosevelt man in arena quote. if you open up the first page of the book you'll see it. it's the quote, not the critic who counts of its then who's in the arena whose face is marred by blood and sweat and dust who strives, who strives valiantly,

who cares, comes up short again and again because her is no effort without sure come but he does strive to do the deeds the nose great enthusiasm with great devotions who spends himself in a worthy cause with the best knows indian high achievement and at the worst if he fails tales while daring greatly so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat. it's a famous coparent many of you heard it, many of you are motivated by it as well. this book aims to ask those questions of the american people today. this book is not about my life. i'm not audacious enough to believe i should be reading a biography at the age of 35. not a a state senator from illinois. this book is not about teddy roosevelt. it channels his historic speech by this thought about him. i'm not attempting to litigate his life as a conservative. i am aware of his progressive

lurch and what he gave us in 1912. to say teddy roosevelt as an american failed file daring greatly is generous. this book is not about me. it's not about roosevelt or dedicating where he is on the political spectrum. it is a call to action. it to me is meant to inspire motivate and remind americans of every generation what makes america special. and that it is worth fighting for. some of us carried a rifle and many in this generation still do but you don't have to carry a rifle to be in the arena. it's our job to instill it iy generation the principles that perpetuate what is a you will hear no an experiment, and extreme it in human freedom. if the 21st century isn't an american century, then the 21st century will not be a free century. it's just a fact. but the rent in the world today, there are threats loom,

ideologies around the world are quite different than ours. someday put in the book throughout is the phrase history is not over. history is never over. all we have to do is look to western europe to realize when you decide to cut your military, you forget you are. you have a tendency to end up writing the wave of future as a poster shaping it. if getting off to a good start is important to know what this will responsible for the 20th century being an american century than teddy roosevelt, a guy who charge of san juan hill in 1898, as in the great white fleet around the world in 1907 and who was the chief agitated for american involvement in world war i. woodrow wilson declared he wanted peace without victory, which would be i think quite difficult and would be a a vey different looking piece that what we have today. the 20th century was an american century on the back of teddy roosevelt.

why then, as a think about it,, when read the entire roosevelt speech that's when i i woke uo the power of the quote. the quote itself is powerful. the quote itself is motivating. but it is in some ways, there's no value assertion in the quote. it'd been in the arena. but what is the arena? what is the arena? when i write in the book is not your arena or mike arena or you do you argument. there is the arena for this exceptional american experiment that was gifted to us 240 years ago and has to be perpetuate in every single generation. we all know the quote the reagan quote we're never more than one generation away from extinction. you had to fight for in every generation. it doesn't get passed in the bloodstream. a beautiful quote but a bk reminder and more difficult reality on a daily basis. the quote man in the arena is one quote of the larger speech called citizenship and republic.

roosevelt gave it in 1910 in front of 3000 elite french elites at the university of paris. when i read the speech for the first time after looking at the quote and not thinking of the content i was blown away. in many ways it is un-pc before there was pc. it was, to me struck me as roadmap to what we need in america today in order to restore our republic. why should i stand up and declare what i think the direction of america should be? when instead i could channel a fantastic speech company historic speech that has timeless resonance today and remind us of the very ingredients of republic that are required in every generation. no matter what. the matter whether not with twitter or facebook or any other number of modern developments, ingredients, the basic seeds of our republic are the same. he posits a simple thesis.

the average citizen is being good citizen if great republics are to succeed. think about that the average citizen must be a good citizen if great republics are to succeed. not great rulers or even great citizens necessarily heroic citizens in every moment. good citizens that on a daily basis in a personal way understand what takes to keep and make america the greatest country in a world. good citizens are the only antidote to good government but small and more selfish the citizens the larger and more unchecked government becomes. as history shows us good citizens understand why america's exceptional and special they are the thin line between freedom and tyranny. they are the ones who understand our american experiment is exceptional, proud or boastful but because we understand this american experiment when it was first started was just that, an experiment.

europe, instead of a piece paper constitutions of what's going to stand between you and a tyrant. you're going to hand over power peacefully works there was the sense it was impossible. yet our founders reminded us our rights come from our creator and not government. they understood a balance of power was checked, the tendency towards tyranny and the patient. they understood freedom of religion as opposed to freedom from religion. they understood on them it's like the first and the second are indispensable to free peoples, the ability to articulate speech and ideas across the spectrum which roosevelt talks about hardly, tolerating very distant different opinions. that's power. the second amendment the right to bear arms and protect yourself. i understand we're a country of laws not men. he talks about good citizens in good patriots. good citizens at home and good patriots in the world.

that's the breakdown of the book, is, and it's intentionally in that order. i talk about when i talk about a fox announcer is foreign policy and the legit national security and you look at the wilted it and there's a lot to talk about. you can't talk about american leadership until you talk about restoring and maintaining citizenship. if you don't understand you are and what you believe and you don't educate that in every generation and you can forget about attempting to be the leader in the world. you need to shore up you might say homefront first. what is a good citizen? it's not just voting for jury duty. it's not protesting necessarily. those are ingredients of what we do in republics, it's what citizens do. boating and all those things are good but roosevelt points out it's the gritty homely version, the civic virtues, use the word efficient which is usually a word with a couple we think of light bulbs and starting

pitchers. you don't think of it when you think of citizens. his of u.s. citizenship is first in word. who are you as an individual and what do you do before deciding how others i live? he uses the first principle is work, earn success, the willingness to keep a job and provide for your family. the second is fight. a strong and viral people to separate the masculine spirit for men and women. strength and vigor and power holding your own. we are a bike helmet culture and we should be thinking about the barbarism of female subjugation middle east. we teach our kids to be wimps. return our men and women under women into men and we need to be willing to stand up and fight for the things we believe in whether it's on a battlefield or here at home. the third ingredient is large patriotic families, demographics, roosevelt wrote about demographics and talked about demographics in his speech. the antidote i use often is of an afghan interpreter i spent time with in afghanistan, not a

radical, young kid. he's in the united states today. he would risk his life for me and i would for him. we're talking about faith, religion, christianity, islam. he said pete, it is inevitable islam will rule the world. the prophet foretold. we're having ten kids and you have one. that was powerful point us in that phrase. when you look at western europe today, when you look at i mentioned they are getting their military to pay for the welfare state when you forget you are an you don't demand at some level allegiance simulation from populations that separate themselves and then at ten kids are you having one, that's how london becomes the most popular event in london becomes mohammed for newborn boys. for us to thing i can think things like that just go away is blindness, and so western europe whether it's 25, 75 years and up is going to look very different. that's not an anti-muslim

phrase. it's a reality because they don't do integration because a have done western europe are not the melting pot america has been so far, they're going to massive culture clashes as we've already seen here things like the migrant crisis only accelerate the problems we see their as many of you know europe and some which is a preview or could be a preview of america. the second chapter is about france and what we can learn from france that was frankly formerly great republic that decided to give away its status by making very intentional decisions at home and a can learn from that. with massive advantages that our revolution was different than theirs but we still have a lot to learn. the fourth aspect which you could put first in good citizenship is character. whether it's faith or believing something greater than yourself, george washington set in his first inaugural religion and morality are indispensable supports of our republic. without faith and you wonder why

we get lucky and our culture today. i'm not talking social conservatism. in the book as a former ardent, i still am a social conservative in many ways but a former ardent social conservative on campus at college you go to work and learn some things, you see something and you realize there's other things in my mind that i'm more important priorities are not talking pro-life issues. that's a fight conservatives should continue to fight every other week but we obsess over things like same-sex marriage and it inhibits our ability to talk about the real challenges facing families. the real challenges facing parents and kids in our culture. then he talks but after you focus on yourself looking outward and talks about equal opportunity which should be needs to be the lone star of conservatives and republicans. the left is the part of equal outcome. if you are not strident, don't strive daily to be part of equal opportunity, then we will miss

the mark. it's fair to say republicans and conservatives have missed the mark on that for a long time. talking things like marginal tax rates when people smites hits are different and they're seeing this massive shifts in our economy and await away the lived. we have to be clear eyed about attacking that end up approaching that. not just unburdening regulations and problems for those are pushing back against dependency for those at the bottom but also making sure those at the top weight by the same rules. it's the regulations. it's the tax code. it's the lobbyist that rig the system so that those at the top are able to deem it to their advantage and in many ways block out those who would otherwise have social mobility. the list talks with income inequality all the time it what we should what is social mobility is the ability to rise, the ability in this country to have every opportunity that your parents or other set in previous

generations. you have to start with citizenship. he talks but what undercuts good citizens and its citizenry focus on rights instead of duties, citizenry that police man is perfected or perfectible and, therefore, you longed for utopian ideas. citizenship that invest immoral relativism, that there is no right or wrong. we see that on the battlefield today. take for example, something like the abu ghraib prison scandal which was terrible but there's a reason why the near times had to put on the front page 32 straight days in a row. there is is no home team in america, the american press or other place today because it's passé to say america is good or passé dissent un-american and if i support the causes we undertake. even if the difficult ones. in many ways often controversial and open to dissent. the fourth is classic warfare. roosevelt talks about, at the end of the republic is at hand

when classic warfare commences which is what we've seen in many ways whether it left-right black-white male female young old, we seem classes and gender pitted against each other over the last seven years which is toxic to the body politic and citizenship. you start with citizenship because without citizenship you can't create the good patriots rb the good patriots on the world stage you need to be. you guys have all seen, i don't know if you seen the barbarous sticker, think globally, act locally. it's a pipe environmental bumper sticker. roosevelt admit that off and say think globally -- thinks locally, act globally. meaning remember who you are and be willing to act globally in defense of those principles which are indispensable, that america is good, america is worth fighting for, america's truly exceptional and america

has been a force of good in the world. and oh, by the way winning the ones with fight is a good thing. roosevelt talks about that in dispute are we at people willing and able to prevail? sounds like a basic, simple question but are critical moments and a right about iraq in 2005 and 2006 when i was there and the iraq surge in 2007 at 20,082,007 at 2008. i see some people who were parts of that. the light is a set in those difficult moments. when half the country or a lot of people want to take a political expedient route and say that set a timeline for the work, it's been difficult, controversial, costly. let's leave this difficult battlefield. the other houses no, this is the exact moment when you need to be willing to double down, when you need to be willing to take the fight to the enemy. i have never been more proud as our fight on gender ten, 2007 when george w. bush announced the surge in iraq and did the right thing in the face of

massive public pressure to double down to defeat a vicious enemy. he said the future of our security depends on the battle in the impact of anastrozole today if he was right. unfortunate of course he was. the surgeon did work and it was successful and al-qaeda and iraq was largely defeated, political progress was happening. by february 2010 joe biden was declaring iraq a great achievement of the obama administration. such a great achievement he happened to visit again for five days ago with political chaos unfolding. he took for granted the stability and the gains made through greedy decision in a ina dark moment and assume they would perpetuate themselves without understanding how central the feeding islamist in iraq was to their narrative at our narrative. are we the paper tiger that osama bin laden said the word? what we retreat from every difficult conflict if we are stuffed up? are or were able to show the

result of our forefathers and when the wars we fight? that's not a call for endless nationbuilding or fighting everybody meant on the horizon. it's a recognition for lesson we should learn from the last 15 years, the lessons we should learn from iraq is resolve works. not that all these middle eastern wars are terrible and just i get messed up there, let's nationbuilding tome, fortress america. that's it. the difficult part, the narrative on the republican and democrat party is moving in the wrong direction. to unlearn everything was on in the complex. what i do over a couple of chapters in the book is make the case that the iraq war is a ar we should learn from about what to do in the right moments as opposed to run from. republicans and conservatives should stand confidently in every forum they can appoint across the aisle to hillary clinton and barack obama and joe biden and say you're the reason isis as proliferate and

iraq and afghanistan for its american retreat that created those seeds. it was your policies that advanced chaos in the region and there's any number of, it's a more complex situation when you unfold every layer of that but ultimately it was a lack of military will and a lack of political engagement. we simply decided we over ir. that's because today we have as roosevelt warned about in his speech, the first president of the united states who considers himself first a citizen of the world. roosevelt talked about that in 1910, warning against those who see themselves first as citizens of the world whose international feeling for humanity swamps national feeling. in fact, he said citizens of the world are usually the worst citizens of their own country because they point out a humanity and the amorphous things we can do without focusing what makes in the republics case the country great

and why it's worth fighting for. i call these comp take coexist for policy. under the bumper sticker, you guys a scene that coexist. doesn't make you throw up in your mouth a little bit, too when you see it? yeah. that is an example of his mindset. it's not that coexisting is better coexisting is good but coexisting is a means not in and. just like engagement is a means not an end. for this administration when asked about his doctorate he said he's engaged. engaging is not a doctor. it doesn't mean you understand you are what you believe in. what you have is a series of progressive elites who went to school at places like princeton and harvard, and a lot of us know a lot of little obama's, wonderful people but they believed in the state, big believers in humanity and what we can accomplish that which is built enough internationalist institution. ..

their mind reads does not compute because they are not on campus anymore and the student lounge, they are the commander-in-chief. they learned on campus we are

supposed to lead to perpetual peace. their ideologies are interested in engaging on those levels. rather than going out real threats or fronting them, they look around for mutual understanding global, change so eagerly and self righteously do for graduate students except they don't work.

i serve knowing my kids will have to as well. whatever it is, every single generation has to contribute to this generation. are called to be engaged good citizens and an ongoing experience. we end of the book that of another woodrow wilson. a man who said on multiple occasions, too proud to fight this is enemies in the world and it has the exact same today. a friend told him that woke america and leave the roosevelt

division which ultimately never happened. i see people engaged fighting for the we represent. it can be a demoralizing fight but i would encourage you to go back to historical speeches like

this to be reminded of what our country represents, the men and women perpetuated, difficult things in difficult times. go back and read the speech in the book see you can make your own judgments about the speech but it might urge you to enter the arena. [applause] >> any questions?

i commented on it on national colors and so i will repeated. i take issue with his character, i think as they push back against that narrative, we on which is what it is. it may feel politically expedient but it is much more politically powerful and to argue even if you didn't like how he got in, it is important and has massive implications and george w. bush serves and has extras us will strategy at iraq and syria, the abandonment of iraq and redline, it hangs on the neck of barack obama and hillary clinton so interesting

is this campaign has been difficult for a lot of people. very few moments of been out on their articulation. marco rubio was asked and said it was not a mistake now remember saying somebody kyiv into that narrative so hopefully the reality is whoever in the next commander-in-chief is trump or usable willing to unleash war so what i do take issue is the way they characterized ted cruz on doing what it takes, not what we want to find a way. it's been over the vomit even if

they are hereby. we are going to bomb the oil trucks. >> are you doing? >> all right. >> you said there is a position and i don't completely disagree with that, water under the bridge but illumination of the white house and i think there's

a certain sense a lot of the world does not agree and they are motivated to push back. when foreign-policy looks like we will promote the kids there will be like i would know where being homosexual is illegal. it is more energy here at home

and opening statement and it was lost or one before it was anywhere else and a dead horse they can which prevents us from legitimate arguments about divorce rates with kids and keeping them together but we are dismissed as it gets maker points. it performs for them the morality of america that is

decadent. i just don't think it's an emphasis at any level. i don't think we should make a big issue here or anywhere in the world as well. >> was also my bunkmate four years. [laughter] >> thank you for the book. our core in the breakdown overall whether it's too much time on the phone rather than talking to your neighbors.

it's more than just coding but also engaging. what got you inspired? >> as i was writing, i've never thought of my parents is politically involved. in college was the first time i was introduced i realized what

insight parents really were. never asked for handouts or made excuses. my mom watched out the pda. i couldn't go to certain things at certain times but because she was paying attention to what was being taught in the classroom. i just make the case for large families and they raised a family full of boys to go out and dusted off and i absorbed a lot for memorial day because it

is a town of 500 will call city is there and everyone having an end at memorial park because we are memorializing like a sense of being a productive contributed to this country and as much as i want to rebel, the reminder that someone died on the cross and carried with it

reminded me of i was, the way more important ingredients the making sure my kids go to princeton or harvard which is wonderful but the more important piece is whether or not they cannot of childhood becoming good citizens. i worry i will have to deconstruct eight hours. we find a way to pay little christians catholic academy with a learned civics and classic they may not have a great festival team which i'm a little worried about but the world

today is much different, he will get infused with those immunity values and culture and media has been captured progressive elites about reading the declaration

and the talk about homeschooling. make homeschooling more robust and possible. i know wonderful and school kids who were wonderfully grounded and educated and amazing citizens and public schools are not an alternative because you can't afford a private school. we should make it easier pretty homely virtues of everyday and may not be cool on facebook but

really important. very little sense of public awareness but there's no one or there's ten so how do we influence the culture? >> i'm not a fan of universal

service you are serving some things disconnected but i do talk about the realist, envelope is meaningful? they want to do this or that? hopefully to the tax code or educational benefits and then it's honored but how many of us know people with they can say

and prepared to go to the next level i'm ready to do this or that. an interesting way you talk about that and there's no better example than the va. they are met by brick wall with those who are supposed to be or

and no one is being held accountable in the white house has no interest. bob mcdonald has been a failure at the va. government unions and civil service reforms. the cost government and those who work and government are held accountable. that's a pretty basic principle and then it's special interest and establishment we hear on the

political spectrum and they are unwilling to change and play nice with everybody at all times basic choice and accountability and they attack their opponents of the return didn't want to issue a report, just attack the opponents that's why things don't change and it's hard to be a good citizen and easy to get along and you will meet

resistance. all they want you to do is quit and every level. we can keep our jobs and nothing will have to change. nothing changes in everybody over promises and what i hope this will do is remind people the fight is worth it and you will never get at the first try for the first month or first year. the sustained iteration of the truth of what works in the advocacy behind it and the courage to believe in america and what it represents and not cower from those who have a new idea of what it means.

>> other than fixing the va, what is the thing we should be doing for our veterans? >> i think the first thing is recognizing and raising awareness without stigmatization.

they provide the folks who get out there and make sure and it's not going to be world to of war craft. they are not going to do it. they have no idea if we say

america is kinda good, if you don't educate and remind yourself and you will get the conference. >> good morning. [cheering]

greetings from everyone on the couch. we love you. i'm convinced i have the greatest assignment on television talking to the most amazing people in the country. turnaround and wave to fox nation. if you don't have fox nation, who got to get it. who controls the information close you are not going to get

this from netflix were susan rice is on the board you get the truth from people who believe in america, who believe in freedom. individual liberties. rights endowed by a creator, not by government. we have the best story to tell. the american story but if we don't tell it, then we lose it. i'm not here to do a promo for fox nation. well, maybe. [laughter] but i'm here to share education and information this generation to the next generation is how we keep our country free.

the miracle of 2016, thank god we live in donald trump's america today. but the question is whether or not 2016 was electoral, our election society so capable of going to the ballot box but not capable of the society overwhelmed by the rest. everything the left touches is utterly destroyed. i've got a new book out, mark stein wrote a book about ten

years ago called america, an amazing book how culture and everything the world faces centers around america being a freedom and four years after that he wrote a book called after america. what he observed so dramatic is with the left is doing don't america. i will tell you four years ago i wrote a book called in the arena being greedy, what citizens need. we are a republic.

crusaders went to defend their faith. we wouldn't have the american experiment today. four years ago the country said we are going to make america great again. we live in a similar moment.

my name is pete psaki take seth and i was almost a never trump our. some people saw it but a lot of people didn't understand the moment we were in and we were good at losing and feeling good about it and break glass and pace of presidents and realized this is not a debate about marginal tax rates a little higher or lower teeter here with.

love america or not. you believe in borders or warmth of open. do you support your cups are not you for capitalism or socialism? we are defending america and those of us who woke up out of our slumber and realized the do. what american crusade is about and it will be redheads versus

black. in the future of this country but we have to go deeper. if there is a place where they didn't get the fight will. because press and leftists was in the mind of the next generation. so is may 19 not only do we need to fight for education and everything this country represents will be better reelect the greatest president i've ever lived under donald trump. so much. thank you.

[cheering] american mind. >> please join me in welcoming headset. [applause] >> would crowd. welcome and thank you all for

being here. [applause] p, you are in the armed services. i don't think you started as a news guy, how did you and fox news meets? [laughter] my first television appearance ever was msnbc hardball chris matthews. [laughter] i've never done tv before in my life and i had a marine buddy of mine who done tv twice though he was an expert. [laughter] he told me, he said leaning forward, that's his first tip. it makes you look better posture. [laughter] don't let the host cut you off.

forty-six times he cut me off. [laughter] i was a newbie, i didn't anticipate i would go into tv. afghanistan one the battlefield and another at the va, still an ongoing issue obviously. through that, i did appearances on tv in different places and a lot of it ended up being fox and fox and friends and one day they said, have you thought about asking questions instead of answering? i should've happy to try anything one time and that was in 2015, early 2016 and tucker carlson who was a fox and friends weekend host took the primetime gig and i took tucker's spot and it's been that ever since.

[applause] got together. [laughter]

and as i do, i was talking to everybody in their talking about this school in north carolina. i'd known but it was broken, what do we do? you got to shoot an e-mail so i did. what do you do? the information and research in the kept reading it. on a regular basis, is this true? and we've got to make a movie out of this.

we get into that and what the progressives did in the whole story and what david had done was a no-brainer so we got to work on the film and eventually the book but none of this happened without goodwin. [applause] >> i but just about everyone in this audience has some familiarity with this whole article race theory being taught in our nations schools today but right up front, pushes the recent tip of the iceberg. it's as much as 100 years old is explained that.

>> what is an amazing part is restarted in march of 2020 before crt went front and center and before covid so interest early on, and needs to be part of the early 20th century. history was unfolding in front of us and the schools were deeply involved. and they do with them for a day. and no sooner construe with

research so as a whole i think it was something together had it not been the time and place and partnership. from the verysives have the beginning. they knew they had to remove the object inside. and to keep the indiana jones analogy and the artifacts and if

you take that off the pressure plate, the alarm bells go off. they would have revolted so what they ultimately wrote, how do we remove god from the classroom? and willing to upset to the state. in the didn't say under god originally. i revere it, a new idea more valuable difficult truth it's

almost a man or a woman humanist, socialist and eventually marxist to reject the idea of human nature and once you change that, then you create a laboratory for societal change had one thing he discovered this early progressives studied one of the first successful social movements.

and put into classrooms before john dewey. said if you do that with third grade curriculum, what else can you do with third grade curriculum? to change the entire way of society.

when socialist and they were after what you described to them in the ground is essentially the state. >> the original pledge did not include underground is added by eisenhower so it has no mention of god. not on both but we still respect

that you have. then they took a different approach. they started a school in gary indiana and try to change the way school works altogether. and they bill the plan there in indiana.

the subjects broken up and social science into it. christianity from the classroom in a pullout. i was reading the back-and-forth and editorial page in 1915 and 18 where they argue about how to get god out of the classroom for good. if you put it in a pullout. , we can eventually describe it.

>> you describe that some things this will and they could not believe when i read in your book in the united states and declaration of independence. there are harmful words in these documents. can it be? >> it's true, the declaration of independence and constitution of

the united states of america and is a trigger word from a potential violent content. thus the logical extent of the view of the left. they have rejected the ideas their theories were dedicated to the. then you have critical theorists who flee germany, they are all new york and welcome university where john dewey professor. what is columbia of the term? they arrived with the new theory critical theory. sound familiar? the precursor to critical race

theory and gender theory and they begin to teach it teachers colleges so in the pullout and become heads of their preference, they teach critical theory. what is it? critical theory is to deconstruct, effectively western civilization. it is as all things that lead to white capitalist system that must be torn down. they taught and in the economic sense but it became a cultural sense because class warfare wouldn't fly in the united states of america. critical theorists eventually

land on critical race theory to invite america from the beginning and we call it the 16th 19 moment because covid happens zoom comes into our homes and open up the laptop and they teach 16th 19. they've rejected 76 and dating america beginning is a terrible country. the new founding day despite their flaws has to be rejected.

head of accreditation in bed with the unit. a great friend of ours, she took on the teachers union for 30 years as teacher. [applause] got a lot from a lot of people and now they are paying attention.

>> what you mean by that? >> look at the school board's. they believe they should be able to stand on their own of the biblical wisdom and left because ahead and pushes out and would be there no matter what assuming this education would to new and

critical theorists and others so we are not trying to be pessimistic. parents rising up at four words and glenn youngkin. those actions in today's world government schools.

and it pulled up. and the program. in the union's and the accreditation.

and i'm going to end of thing is going to be okay. the problem is the pipeline. and it is dollars for dollars. his a progressives. >> ...

>> by today's standards and elite education would be princeton right with as an undergraduate or harvard where i went for a master's program but i don't know if you saw on "fox and friends" recently i did those open my diploma to harvard and rode returned to sender and sent back to them live on tv. because our most elite institutions are poisoning the minds not just for kids but our country. if we hold them up a standardbearers of excellence and gatekeepers of credibility then we continue to cycle of perpetuation. it's not just my so-called elite background. it's probably your alma mater, too. take your pick. unless you went to hillsdale or liberty or college of the

ozarks, i saw one back there, your university is probably duty for pumping out hard leftist and marxist at rapid pace. read your alumni newsletter. go back and take some coursework, peru's the website. we by default because would like to sports teams or nostalgia of drinking beer in college, we pump checks to these institutions. we might as will send you straight to the democratic party. any part of perpetua and that is part of perpetuating the cycle that's hurting our country. what i'm talking about our classical christian schools at the k-12 level because my mental reference to his name robbie george, an amazing conservative constitutional professor. there's a renaissance of princeton of conservatives, now 25 outed conservatives faculty at princeton. all because of one man who started an institution and is

built it, phenomenal, a a quon her book where he says they just read liberal professors would lick their chops at indoctrinating these naïve bible clinging kids that showed up at college. now it's the exact opposite. it's the liberal, conservative professors, a few among them who lick their chops at undoing the indoctrination of the kids who already show up woke and adopted it. the problem is not higher education. higher education is already gone. the problem is k-12. k-12. that's the focus of her book. they're consolidating that on k-12. when i talk about a great education not an elite education the kids are elite performers. they are elite students, elite critical thinkers, elite debaters. they're ready to go into the culture and engage and win. by that definition of elite the art elite. if you mean elite by paying $50,000 circuit can be woke,, they are not elite.

that's what elite high schools and middle schools look like that of pipelines to the ivy league. these are pipelines to wisdom. timeless wisdom the type of education our founders received they gave them the ability to debate, they debated 250 years ago and create this form of government that is republic if we can keep it. i got a standard, every time a talk to david dooley think the first fiancé like calico chemical back to larger schools? i learned almost nothing. if i look back at the social studies that i learned and we all took social studies, social sciences, social studies, guess what. all disciplines made up by marxists. all of them. and used to be geography and philosophy and theology and civics and politics. they deconstructed it to dumb it down to make it all a scientific method that could be explained because there's a more objective

truth. we all got a progressive education we didn't know it. what david is doing is unearthing a hidden form of education the progresses almost completely buried by the ths and is now giving the generation of a generation of americans actually educated. my seventh grader who's been a classical christian school for six years understands ancient greece and rome better than i ever will. which means he's engaging with the big ideas the founders engage with as he goes into a culture totally awash and avoid. that's what i would call elite and that's how i would likey to redefine it. >> wow. >> following about perhaps the to review launched off of the sentence in your book which you know is the problem is not what is being taught in our schools but what is not being taught in

our schools. give some examples of a classical christian education that you think will, in fact, develop elite thinkers. >> one of the things we have a tendency to do is take for granted things that history gave us so long ago we are forgotten. the basis of classical christian education, dated back to the ancient greeks and printable was if you're going to form some type of republic democracy, you had to prepare your children to think for themselves. if they just listen to it ever doctrine somebody gave them they would -- you're going to go back into tyranny. that was a fear of the greeks, the fear of the romans and it was the basis for this country when they built the country. that's why with eagles on our

stanchions, right? and many other roman artifacts because it will harkening back to his idea the republic requires freethinking people. the seven liberal arts the first three which is what i'll talk about here, grammar logic and rhetoric, training on how to use language welcome training i had use logic and to think well through the study of both formal and informal logic and practice, things we do is we practice thinking. we don't tell kids what to think. we practice it in the art of good thinking. different kind of education. there are roundtables, engaging each other, trying to learn, argue well. and the third subject is rhetoric which now is a dirty word because politics kind of shuffled it up. it was the art of understanding

comprehensive whole of a topic and being able to communicate that two other people. and persuade them to follow you which of course is a heart of our democracy. it's the heart of republic is to have discourse. what we're seeing now in our country is discourse is being shut down from every angle because we can't stand to hear things we don't like to hear. >> and the solution is not necessarily if you're a parent trying to figure out where should i send my child to school? the solution, public schools are the government schools you talk about which are the real problem. the solution is not necessarily why i spend $50,000 and send my kid to a private or independent prep school, cracked? >> correct. in fact, i would argue most of the private schools or even worse and more woke. in fact, a lot of the christian

schools and catholic schools are maybe not as bad on the surface enable you see it but they are still built completely on the progressive model of education. that's what should be so much at the beginning and working with david is what you start to dig into it and realize he likens it to attack size shipper if you been living in a capsized ship for 100 years you feel like the wall is the floor and that's what you lived in. but then when the tip the capsized ship back up when you realize you've been living sideways for one of years, every thing looks different. revive a loss from of education because it was almost completely gone. i would say the darkest days of education in this country with an aching '70s when there was no such thing as classical christian and almost outlawed homeschooling. very close to doing so. they tried to outlaw all parochial schooling as well in

oregon before that. they would select if they could. thank goodness the road we got last week in maine among other fabulous rulings. it's been a good day, a good week for our founders. and for some of the leaders in this country including ronald reagan who have been fighters for life for generations and you are. >> i would say you have to break down the assumptions you have about what education means especially in a christian context and that's why classical christian is so different. what we try to do is break down the notions of classical means outdated, dusty, old people and looked at homeschooling homeschooling means weird or not

socialize which is not the case. if you look at how it's done today and done so well, it's amazing what they're doing in homeschooling, including pods and co-ops at online curriculum and classical christian homeschooling. there are more options today than there is ever been for a great education for your kids and grandkids which is one of the good news stories. david has almost 500 brick-and-mortar classical christian schools across the country in 46 46 states. there's a bunch in california. there's a bunch across the country. we argue for parents and grandparents taking a reorientation of the lives and saying next to your family, and next to your faith, the next thing next if you can take is what you educate your kids, where they spend 16,000 hours between age of kindergarten and 12th grade.

16,000 hours, that was original working title of the book and 16,000 our war. that's what what it is. do you want to send your kids to 16,000 hours of democrat camp? that's basically what we're doing right now when we send our kids to 90% of the k-12 schools that exist in america today. i would argue you don't want that. even in some of the articles david uncovered the progressive wrote about that. you would know the quote better than me. what chance does one hour of training on sunday morning half against 40 hours of secular training during the week? >> charles potter. >> they knew from the beginning. sadly the christian church we did it to ourselves as a movement when the church abdicated its responsibility of education, david writes of beauty about this cumbersome

social justice and the fundamentalist arm ultimately the social justice arm joins with the progressives and the fundamentalist arm says we're here to save souls which is wonderful but it said were not in the school business anymore. what got created at that moment? sunday school. instead of sending our kids to school monday through friday that has god in it, we take that out of the school and we send them to school for one hour on sunday. you see what happens as a result. i would look closely at an elite school any private school and any christian school and look at the baseline prerogatives of what they teach and compare it against the liberal arts classical approach that david has and i think you'll see a stark difference. >> if i could jump in real quick, real quick. it's exhibit a in what we're talking about with the educational state where they control accreditation, teacher certification, because it doesn't matter if you go to a

christian high school or an independent prep school, , they are all trained in that system. that's the point were trying to make is the reason that i woke is because they get the same training as everybody else. the prescription we have in the book is out and go a totally different direction. >> tactical retreat is what we call it. sometimes when you're surrounded in this immediate moment the first movement is retreat. we argue in the book for educational insurgency. a form of warfare of the weak against the strong, small against the big. david started that through s schools and we're seeing arizona just have the universe educational tax credit program, a beautiful thing that there is a movement of air. >> turning to the audience for questions in just a minute but i have two trigger words that you

said, , p, the reminders. first is the reagan foundation, and institute we are blessed and able to get $1 million in college scholarships each and every year to often between ten and 20 students. what we're finding is more and more of those that are risen to the top that become finalists, competitors are home schools. it's really been a fascinating thing to watch. second thing before we go to questions from the audience, i wanted to read a quote from michael's father, president reagan indiscernible speech to the nation in january of 1989 the president said, and informed patriotism is what we want. are we doing a good enough job teaching our children what american is and what she represents in the long history of the world? and what it means to be an

american. we got to teach history based not on what in fashion but what's important. if we forget what we did we won't know who we are. i'm warning of an eradication of the american memory that could result ultimately in an erosion of the american spirit, right? that's it. [applause] >> that was the in. at the beginning of reagan's term he commissioned and educational assessment of america. i can't get this quote right but it essentially concluded that if a foreign country have done this with what is called an act of war. look it up. it's the report come up. >> we would like to turn to the audience for questions. just a quick primer. if you have a question of course raise your hand but please wait until we get a microphone put in

your hand so we can hear your question. question? we have one right near the front. >> pete, question for you. because the occupation and perhaps the circles you travel in you encounter media from the left and have discussions with them on the positions? you go back and forth or do you pretty much stay to people and reich write how does it work in your profession? >> just want to talk to juan williams. [applause] i would love to. i have no comfortable i get a chance to work some of the best conserved and business with rachel come will, and the guys, it's just, we are chock-full of him at fox m and grateful that. the left-wing media is not the most tolerant bunch in the world these days.

not only would it not want to have a conversation with me, i would count myself as someone who's gone through some pretty left-wing universities. i'm happy to have a conversation with you knowing we disagree and know that we're probably going to come to different conclusions at the end of the conversation. the problem is you talk to most members of the media on the left side of the aisle and the only way that conversation is going to go is there going to end by saying you're a racist. no, really. that's what it, absolute mischaracterization strawman characterization of the opponent as less than human. the private conversations i have with people left of center at fox a wonderful, wonderful. because they are at a place that actually tolerates. one quick anecdote. i've a bunch friends who worked at cnn who are conservative. every single one of them has

gone running for the exit because eventually they are cornered and run out and scream that until it horrible human beings are especially if they supported trump. find the door are you going to never be on tv. i've never met a liberal that works at fox that didn't say this is most wonderful place i've ever worked. because we do tolerate. we have discussions on the air. we have it out but if anything i can ask them about the kids and the lives and what you think about this and it will complement me on the book and i saw this. it can exist when you foster an environment that exist and that a private i believe at fox is the shared values america is a good country. and god is worth celebrating. when you can agree on the basics then you configure the other stuff out. >> over here. >> thank you so much from both being here. i'm so excited to read your book

it's a little overwhelming to listen, and i have three millennials kids that haven't had kids yet but do you have a suggestion as to how we can communicate besides just giving them the book, or how do we -- and also -- is a two-part question, because i like to be able to queue make it that took two other couples of my kids who are trying to have kids, to look at this. by the other side of it is what can we do in the audience to help this movement? >> i talked to a gal last week who had the same question. she wasn't sure she was going to get them to read the book but they did watch the missed education series and it was very influential for millennial kids. they have never heard that before.

i would commend that on fox. >> i agree. missed education of america is a six part series on fox nation. we tell the abbreviated version of the book and so forth and we work with a grippers john put it together did a phenomenal job. if not want -- are not going to want to read, i think people watch it and want to read more. ultimately come at the top of with humility to your kids which is what i'm going to do to mine someday when old enough to understand why we made all the choices we made, i had no idea. and so you go and want the best for your kids and maybe i didn't know that when i was going to because it wasn't so laid bare in front of me. but now i know and you would want to because i know you're going to want the best for your kids. like yourself a favor the five inbreed this book. and also i think the code would really did this, being more

intentional and i can say this to californians as someone who's lived a lot in minnesota, a very hopelessly blue state. being more and more intentional about where you live, meaning the city and the county that you live in. covid showed us how much were, in fact, the local control can have. that's why david's website has is a map where every scope of the classical christian school is on a pan on a map. i would move to a school. that's what my wife and i are doing, moving to a school. i think it's that important that you can't say well, here's the biggest problem we all pay property taxes and we probably moved to a place that's a nice because of the school and we pay those property taxes. that's a a hard thing to get t for some people but ultimately is that sacrifice worth the future of your kids and their souls and the way they view the

world? i think yeah, tell them to watch the movie. >> there's another benefit to this whole movement which is eyeing an association member so we help these many independent schools. they're all independent. outside of us that are other organizations doing classical education, classical conversations in the homeschool, the same thing for homeschoolers. your kids can't afford seven, $8000 a year in tuition, homeschooling is a viable option as are many other options these are all, classical christian education is 2000 years old. nobody owns it. we just have to recover it. >> well stated. over here. >> i went through the whole catholic homeschool and started my kid with that. he's in college now.

or graduated. but i had a big problem what you said about progressives plan. it was core curriculum. even though we homeschooled, because didn't have money, we homeschooled catholic, a school appearing, they still had core curriculum that we had to do. i just stopped going there. i'm not going to anymore and i tried, did other things for his schooling and groups but then we went wanted to go back to high school for sports and seven it wouldn't accept him. he had to go to an alternative school. it was, i was so glad i was able to homeschool because it just meant so much to me and he turned out great, you know, he's an eagle scout and all that other stuff we did. [laughing] so that was a big block for me.

i said why do have to cater for the core curriculum still? one other thing i wanted to mention. i noticed i guess lbj, he decided he didn't want to have school buses for christians and catholics and so even though we publicly pay, the taxa for getting kids to the public schools, he eliminated taking kids to christian schools. i would like to turn that around also, turn around the core curriculum thing, how we do tha that. >> the school bus things sounds like like a great challenge to the supreme court these days. i'm serious. i think the core curricular s part of how they consolidate the control obviously. david how you navigate that core curriculum software christian schools? >> we don't. they don't. i mean that's when you don't take the king's gold, at some level out that we were,, homeschooling is not that.

but you're right though. when the testing at the high school level requires the core curriculum aspect that's how they try to box most parents in and takes a lot of extra effort to do it on your own. that's why for next up is also, we talked about this in the book, the s.a.t. recently stopped testing for reasoning. because reasoning is racist. the same guy that took over the s.a.t. is a guy who wrote common core, which was a federalization standards under the obama administration. what david linked up with is a classical learning test, and s.a.t. for classical christian schools. there's pipelines of curriculum for classical christian schools. teachers colleges need to be creative. it's an entire ecosystem that will have the parallel to a progressive pipeline that controls every single aspect, to your point.

[inaudible] -- united states. i don't know if you're aware but when he ran for president the first time one of the main things his campaign was to get rid of the department of education, put forward by jimmy carter. the one thing really upset with after eight years of being president he was never able to get rid of the department of education that i remember one of his great quotes is when we cease b1 nation under god we are a nation gone under. i quote that all of the time when i go up and speak to young people. other than that where can people get a list of these schools for us people who have grandkids now? my parents sent me to a military academy. last night i went to a place we called st. john's manager alcatraz. [laughing] i was taught by the sisters of

mercy. [laughing] and that it he went to the j. so god was having fun with me from the very beginning. where do you get a list? >> at the credit to my wife in a front row. she's our webmaster and she's developed a great tool that you can sort by state, city, pins on a anything you want, classical, christian.org school finder. she built that and it will get you there fast. every school has its own page that you end up at because begin with an association of like-minded independent school. >> to your point the reason your dad i would believe the so adamant in getting rid of it is because he knew why and how it was created. we break that down in the book as well. a lot of the work rebecca has done focus on that. unions use conservative teacher association which were taken over by the unionization

movement. that movement turned around and endorse its first ever residential candidate in 1976, the teachers union had half the delegates at the 76 invention when the endorsed jimmy carter. when jimmy carter was elected president he turned round and gave a gift to this very same powerful teachers unions which was the creation of a federal department of education. the openly bragged that the would be no department of education without the teachers union. so from the very beginning the department of education has been a creation of those teachers unions. and politically than try to make it impossible for people who understand that to get rid of it because then you are at the education. which was the problem of so many other weak-kneed republican senators and congressmen of that era. who wouldn't be willing to make that move. i hope for at a point where because of how corrupt the unions are especially after covid that being against something like the department of education to be decoupled from

being against education. they have corrupted it so much they created an opportunity to expose it. >> we have time for one last question. i'm sorry. we will go over here. >> thank you. my grandkids are homeschooled, which i started to a lot about it. my grand is a sophomore at hillsdale. there's a lot of stuff out there. he provides courses for kids to high school. he has online courses you can take, no charge. it's wonderful. the reach they have this amazing and that colleges are to get into. they have a tremendous student body and they have a code of honor like a military academies. you break the code you are kicked out. one of the codes that my grand

daughter learned the hard way when she was still in high school. she lied to her mother. so i get the phone call and nicky said talk to emily. she lied to me. about doing, not doing homework. i called my granddaughter anderson look, lying about your homework, not too good, not doing your homework is to be a problem. he fix a problem if you own it, you fix it. line to mother is a character flaw. never do that again. so when hillsdale interviewed her and went to the code, are missing anything? she said yes, don't lie to yourself. my grandson issues making eagle scout this month. >> congratulations. [applause] >> i was just talking to jason chaffetz on his podcast about the book and talk but his friend

trey gowdy and trey gowdy said and all the use of prosecuting, i've never prosecuted, gets a question of education picky says did what i have had to prosecute a homeschooled kid or an eagle scout. we've got two of them here. that's a testament to parents have been ahead of the curve and willing to do something for the kids and i think what's encouraging is now there's a brick-and-mortar option and more on my options to the point where we get to a critical mass where we're public at three, four, five, 6% of graduates in this country they could be a part of leadership change in the future. >> each of you have an opportunity say hi to pete and on behalf of the strophic items i want to