>> pelley: today on "face the nation" nelson mandela's health takes a turn for the worse. breaking news on immigration reform and washington remains mired in controversy over leaks, scandals, and sexual assaults in the military. prayers are being said all over the world for the ailing mandela who spent a second night in a south african hospital in serious condition. we'll have the latest from pretoria. the president and the chinese leader wound up their summit and smiled for the cameras, but the issue of cyber security is far from resolved. and leaks about classified u.s. spy programs put the president on the defensive. >> nobody is listening to your telephone calls. >> schieffer: back in washington america's top generals were hauled into congress and red the

riot act over sexual abuse in the military. >> not every commander can distinguish between a slap on the ass and a rape. >> schieffer: we'll talk about all of it and we have breaking news on another key issue: immigration reform. we'll hear from new york democratic senator kirsten gillibrand, california democratic congresswoman jackie speier, new hampshire republican kelly ayotte, maryland democratic congressman elijah comings and chairman of the house homeland security committee michael mccaul. plus analysis on all of that from an all-star panel. and in our "face the nation" flash back, a look at the career of the longest-serving member of congress john dingell. we'll have it all because this is "face the nation." captioning sponsored by cbs from cbs news in washington, "face the nation" with bob schieffer.

>> schieffer: good morning again. former south african president nelson mandela-- who is 94-- was hospitalized overnight for a recurrent lung infection. his condition continues to be serious but stable so we're going first pretoria and cbs news reporter debra patpah. >> a presidential spokesman says he had no word regarding nelson mandela's health from his doctors. this means the official statement still stands, he's serious but stable and able to breathe on his own. cbs news has also been told that he had a good night's rest. family members have been to see him. his wife was with him when he was rushed to hospital. she's been by his side ever since and we're told this is a source of great comfort for him. the south african nation has been dodd pray for nelson mandela at sunday morning church services. nelson mandela has been hospitalized four times since christmas. his health has deteriorated in

recent months and every time it's the same problem: a recurring lung infection. and whilst he has sought medical care at his johannesburg home, he needs a special machine only available in hospital to treat this condition. a presidential spokesman says that whilst there is still public anxiety around mandela's health, there is growing acceptance that he is an old man and this was echoed by an old friend who spent many years in prison with mandela. he says "it is now time to let mandela go." and certainly there is the sense that the south african nation is hoping for the best but preparing for the worst. bob? >> schieffer: thank you so much, deborah. and now, back in washington, we're joined by the chairman of the house homeland security committee, congressman mike mccaul in austin and the top democrat on the house oversight committee, elijah cummings, he's in baltimore. gentlemen, we have plenty to talk about. let's start with the leaks

coming about. has nasa in your view -- i should say the n.s.a. in your view, mr. chairman, overreached with these latest disclosures we're hearing about about gathering all that data about people's telephones and so on? >> well, i think that is the issue congress will be looking at providing our oversight responsibilities. let me say first, though, this was a lawful program, it was approved and reviewed by the fisa court so you had that approval. it has -- the program itself has stopped terrorist attacks in the past, including the 2009 new york subway bombing plot by mr. zazi but on the other hand it does raise concerns, i think, on several levels. one was when i was a counterterrorism federal prosecutor we could take the number and run them through the phone companies, through a national security letter or subpoena. now what has happened is they literally have taken all these phone records and maintained them -- taken the them out and

maintained them in the public secondor within the n.s.a. i think that gives a lot of americans great pause and great concern and lastly if i could just say the optics are terrible in this case when you consider the latest scandals, whether it be the i.r.s. targeting conservatives, whether it be the a.p. being targeted by the justice department and the fox news reporters, you have to ask yourself this question: can you trust this administration with your phone records? >> schieffer: i guess i would ask you, then. do you believe that they ought to be curtaild? even if it is legal now, as you say? have they gone too far? should new steps be taken to restrict the government in being able to do this? >> again, i think it's the warehousing of all the phone records from all the major carriers within the federal government is what gives most people the great concern. i think it could be run through

the private sector as we used to do it and that's something i think we'll be looking at in the congress. you know, i think there's a fix to this. on the other hand, this program, we're talking about national security and protecting american lives, that's our number-one mission. >> let me get to mr. cummings. what's your take on this congressman? >> i tell you, i voted against patriot act and one of the reasons why i voted against it is because i was afraid of unintended consequences. here we have a situation where we clearly -- since 9/11 clearly we have to be very very cognizant of a threat to our people and coming from afar or within our borders. but at the same time we have to make sure that we guard our bill of rights and guard constitution. that right to privacy is extremely important to americans. so a lot of this information, of course, is classified.

we're going to have being a briefing in congress come tuesday where we'll get even more information but i've got to tell you, i understand the balance has to be struck, i looked at president president's presentation in defending this but i think we have gone too far and i think, again, we're now open from debate. we want to have that debate and hopefully we'll strike the appropriate balance. the question then becomes, bob, how far does it go? if this becomes the normal now, what's going to be the normal tomorrow? >> schieffer: mr. cummings, i also want to ask you about this outrage in washington over reports that the white house is using the i.r.s. to go after conservative groups. this is the charge made by the chairman of your committee, dirl issa, who you say has accused the white house of not only doing it but is now -- he says they are lying about it. you sent a strong letter to him. what's that all about? >> well, chairman issa has a

tendency to make strong allegations and then go chasing the facts and usually never finding them. we have a situation here where we now have interviewed the manager of the executive office in cincinnati of the i.r.s. he is a conservative, 21-year veteran who spent six hours with our committee the other day talking in an interview and he explained to us that this tea party situation started with one case back in 2010, somebody -- one of the screeners brought it to him, he looked at it and said-- he said-- we must send this to the technical office in washington because this is high profile, this is a unique situation and we want to have consistency. so washington i.r.s. technical office did not ask him for the case, he sent it. now, keep in mind what i said, bob, this was a 21-year veteran

and he turn termed himself a conservative republican. >> schieffer: all right, well are you saying the chairman of your committee is a liar? >> i would never do that. i think those kinds of words are inappropriate in our -- on capitol hill. what i am saying and what i've said to him over and over again, we must maintain the integrity of our committee and of our work product and in order to do that we cannot make these wild accusations, bob, and then be able to back them up. because then when we say anything people begin to question it. and i can tell you that in this case chairman issa, with all due respect, is absolutely wrong. this republican --. >> schieffer: okay. >> no, no, let me finish. this republican manager said there was no white house involvement, no political involvement, none of that. he made the decision doing the best he could to have some kind of consistency. >> schieffer: all right, i want to go back to chairman mccaul

quickly. james clapper, the director of national intelligence, says these leaks investigations he is asking now for a criminal investigation of this. doff you think that's necessary? >> well, i do. this is probably within of the most highly sensitive programs out there in the executive branch and for the united states to protect american lives and the fact of the matter is somebody leaked this information putting the -- not only the courters, the slide show presentations and very sensitive data out there on the internet. this is the kind of thing that while some may applaud the person for doing that and it will give us a chance to provide additional oversight into what the administration's doing, i do think in terms of when you look at national security law that this is ha serious breach and a serious violation. >> schieffer: all right. well, we thank both of you. i want to turn now to new hampshire republican senator

kelly ayotte who's with us this morning. senator, i want to ask you about some of this, too, but i want to start with the news. i understand that you have decided to endorse the bipartisan immigration reform plan being sponsored by the so-called gang of eight in the senate. this is a big deal. i don't want to get too far into inside baseball but this is a big boost for those that are pushing that bill. why did you do it? and i trust you are going to do that. >> i am, bob. and i've looked that the very carefully. our immigration system is completely broken. we've got 11 million people living in this country illegally, in the shadows. we have a legal immigration system that isn't meeting our needs to grow our economy. and so i looked at this carefully. this is a thoughtful bipartisan solution to a tough problem and so that's why i'm going to support it. i looked at the border security provisions, the e-verify to make sure we control who's getting a

job in this country, and also making sure that there's a better legal immigration system, bring the high-tech workers here to make sure that we can have the best and the brightest here in this country to grow our economy. and finally the 11 million bringing them out of the shadows a tough but fair way for them to earn citizenship go. to the back of the line. pay taxes. pass the criminal background checks. learn english. so this is a good bipartisan solution and i look forward to supporting it. >> schieffer: so there are now five republicans who have expressed support for this plan. you make the sixth. and what that really means is it will be extremely difficult-- if all the democrats stay on board-- to filibuster for republican -- for republicans to filibuster for this bill down the line. this is not really inside baseball. you may turn out to be the key player. >> i don't think anybody wants to filibuster this. this is a debate we have to have for the nation and the status quo is unacceptable. we need to solve this problem to

make sure that we have the work force we need and that we don't have another wave of illegal immigration and that's what needs to happen. >> schieffer: i want to ask you about the whole n.s.a. situation. you're on the arms services committee. do you think the government overreached here? >> well, bob, we have a responsibility to protect people's constitutional rights, but let's not forget that we are still at war with terrorists. this program has stopped terrorist attacks against our country according to the intelligence officials and this threat still remains and so we have to step back. this is reviewed by the fisa court. i think there needs to be more rigorous congressional oversight over this and this comes up for periodic reauthorization. we ought to make sure that we're not capturing records we don't need to protect america. but we cannot allow the terrorists to make -- we need to make sure that we keep going after them and i don't think it's an accident that administrations from two very different philosophies have supported keeping this program in place. >> schieffer: i want to also ask you about this whole situation

on the famous talking points issue by susan rice after benghazi. you were one of those who were very critical of susan rice for coming on television and saying what she said. will you support her now that she's been named to the national security council? that does not require senate confirmation, of course, but is she the right person? >> well, i think ambassador rice did a huge disservice to the nation in the representation she made about the attacks on our consulate on this show and on every major channel. even what she said after following the libyan president, really, contradicting him that this was a premeditated event even though secretary panetta, chairman dempsey knew right away this was a terrorist attack. so -- however, i will -- it's the president's call and i will work with her where i can to make sure that we're focusing on the security of this country. >> schieffer: i also want to ask you about this extraordinary hearing when the members of the joint chiefs of staff were hauled before the senate last

week and really read the riot act about sexual assaults in the military. where do you see this going? >> well, this is a huge problem, bob. i'm married to an iraq war veteran. we have the finest military in the world. but this is so wrong what's happening with sexual assaults in our military. we need to hold the commanders accountable. they need to be fired if they're not going to take this seriously. and we also need to make sure that we have the most supportive system for victims of sexual assault. i'm the co-sponsor of a bipartisan bill with patti murray to make sure that every victim gets a special victim's council to be supported within the military. i expect that we're going come up with tough bipartisan legislation to address this because zero tolerance has to be where it is within our military. >> schieffer: do you take the punishment out of the hands of the military commanders? >> well, bob, i'll tell you this: i appreciate what senator gillibrand and others have been doing on this. however no problem gets solved in the military without the chain of command and i don't want to let the chain of command off the hook. we need to make sure that they have additional responsibilities

and checks to make sure that these cases are prosecuted. so whatever we do, i think we'll come up with a strong solution this week. they need to be held accountable and they can't be let off the hook for what is done and what is happening within our military. >> schieffer: did you get the feeling that they got the message during that hearing? >> i think they got the message but they're going to get the message even further after we're done with this issue in the senate arms services committee. we're not letting this go. we have to solve this. status quo is unacceptable. >> schieffer: all right, senator thank you very much. we'll be back with n one minute with more on this sexual assault in the military story. look, every day we're using more and more energy. the world needs more energy. where's it going to come from? ♪ that's why right here, in australia, chevron is building one of the biggest natural gas projects in the world. enough power for a city the size of singapore for 50 years. what's it going to do to the planet? natural gas is the cleanest conventional fuel there is.

we've got to be smart about this. it's a smart way to go. ♪ pull out the paper and what? another article that says investors could lose tens of thousands of dollars in hidden fees on their 401(k)s?! seriously? seriously. you don't believe it? search it. "401(k) hidden fees." then go to e-trade and roll over your old 401(k)s to a new e-trade retirement account. we have every type of retirement account. none of them charge annual fees and all of them offer low cost investments. why? because we're not your typical wall street firm that's why. so you keep more of your money. e-trade. less for us. more for you. >> schieffer: we turn now to democratic senator kirsten gillibrand of new york and democratic congresswoman jackie speier. i want to talk more about this amazing hearing in the senate. it's rare for one thing to see all of the top military commanders at one table at one

time and the senators especially the women on the committee really pull no punches. senator, you were at the hearing and here's just -- i want to have another look at what you said. >> not every single commander can distinguish between a slap on the ass and a rape. >> schieffer: (laughs) you were angry! you were angry! do you think the military understands that this is a problem i mean, do they get it? >> i think they understand it's a problem. i think the chairman of the joint chiefs said he felt he dropped the ball toll a certain degree. what we have here is a crisis. we have 26,000 unwanted sexual contacts, assaults and rapes a year. we know of the 3,300 who are willing to report that 70% of them are sexual assaults and rapes. it's a serious problem. these serious crimes. and what the victim tells across the board is that they're afraid to report because of retaliation because they've seen other women be retaliated against.

or they feel that they'll either be marginalized and their careers will be over or they'll be blamed. so until you have transparency and accountability and objectivity where the decision maker, whether you're going to trial or not, is an objective prosecutor, not a commander, you're not going to have the kind of reporting and, frankly, justice that we need in this system. >> schieffer: congresswoman speier, you have actually said the military has become enablers of sexual assault by not demand that these cases be taken out of the chain of command. that really kind of goads against the military way of doing things. i mean, the commander is a guy who who tells the people "you've got go up that hill and if you don't go i'm back here and you have to deal with me." if you take this out of the chain of command, how can the military -- how can they maintain discipline? i guess that's the argument they will make. >> i think's a distinction between discipline-- which they absolutely should have total control over-- and crimes. felonies.

violent crimes. and that's where the distinction should be made and i think that's both what kristen and i are interested in doing is fixing that component of it. they're enablers because this has been a problem for 25 years and 25 years they've trotted up to capitol hill, they sat in committee hearings and they said all the right things, zero tolerance. but then the scandals keep happening. >> so what is it that you want to do in your legislation? >> we want to do what a number of our allies have already done. israel, the u.k., other allies we fight side by side with. they have removed the serious crimes: rapes, murders, sexual assaults, outside of the chain of command into trained military prosecutors. and they made that shift because they needed objectivity in that decision. we believe that same change here in the u.s. system would make a big difference because frankly that's what the victims are telling us that they have such fear of retaliation, such fear

of having their careers be derailed that they aren't reporting and until you see justice being done, until you see accountability in the system you will not bt able to change the culture. this is a cultural problem. it's from top to bottom and that's why you need to see a major shift. >> schieffer: do you agree that approach, congresswoman system? >> absolutely. until there are more prosecutions and more conviction this is problem is not going to end. >> schieffer: well what happens then -- let's say somebody is assaulted. what does that person do? >> so presently they have to file a report and it goes up the chain of command. and typically with the chain of command you have someone who knows the assailant, may even be the assailant or is also concerned about a promotion. and having something under your watch take place that's a violent crime may not look to good when they're trying to be b promoted. so historically they've found ways around it. either non-judicial punishment or saying to the victim "you know what? we think you have a personality disorder so we're going to give

you an honorable discharge but you're going to leave." so typically you have the perpetrator getting promoted and the victim getting kicked out. >> schieffer: and under your bill what would that person do instead of filing this report, as you say? >> there's many places where you can report today. you can report in many places, not just to your commander. but the difference is the decision maker of whether or not you're going to take this case to trial rests with a trained military prosecutor. in that wayedly there's objectivity. you can base it on the facts of the case, no pressure about their own promotion, no bias because they know the perpetrator or the victim. that decision will be made the a more objective way which we hope will instill more confidence by the victim in the system that he or she has a chance to receive justice. and just to be clear this is not just a woman's issue. more than half of the victims are men. this is a problem that is corrosive, that's undermined the integrity of the whole military. and undermining our military readiness. and if we want our troops to be

ready for any event that our military needs to prepare for you will not be as strong as you need to prepare for the ranks. >> thank you. we'll be back.

>> schieffer: president obama came out of his first meeting with china's new leader and said "we are in uncharted waters when it comes with dealing cyber security, that may be an understatement. the marvels of modern technology have crossed us into a whole new world that goes beyond the current controversy over government snooping and how we strike a balance between security and privacy. we're in the midst of a changing culture where we are redefining the whole concept of privacy. younger people routinely post on facebook things that those of my

generation once hesitated to discuss in mixed company. our phones and credit cards leave a trail of where we go and we don't go many places outside the view of street cameras that monitor our speed, among other things. a nation that has depended on a free press to provide it with independently gathered and, for the most part, accurate information is now overwhelmed by information from all sides, some accurate, much of it totally false, and a lot of it disgraceful and mean. the internet allows us to transmit the news instantly and that's a good thing. but the down side is the nuts can find each other now and find someone to agree with them no matter how twisted or evil their logic. that is not so good. you're right, mr. president, these are uncharted waters. but i'm afraid there are some rough seas ahead before we reach shore. rough seas ahead before we reach shore. back in a minute. anagement started as t hourly associates. there's opportunity here. i can use

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and a second helping. [ both laughing ] when you feed your plants... everyone grows with miracle-gro. >> schieffer: some of our stations are leaving us now but for most of you we'll be right back with our panel to talk about that national security agency monitoring of phone and internet records. plus, the president's summit with the new president of china and for our "face the nation" flash back today a special interview with the longest-serving member of congress ever. stay with us. ,,,,,,,,,,

>> schieffer: welcome back to "face the nation." our panel now on a lot of things. with us today chief washington correspondent of the "new york times" david sanger, the national editor of the "washington post," rajiv chandresekaran, plus harvard university's joe nye whose new book is "presidential leadership and the new era" and mark rhett brennan. let's talk about the summit. the president and the president of china met, they talked about global warming, keeping north korea from becoming a nuclear power. i'd like to get the takeaway from all of you. joe, let me start with you. >> i think it's probably the most important meeting between an american president and the chinese president or leader in 40 years, since nixon and mao. >> schieffer: why? >> because xi jinping represents

a new china and he's also a new kind of man unlike his predecessor hu jintao. he's a bit more relaxed and assertive at the same time. getting the ability to communicate informally between obama and xi jinping is very important to manage this relationship for the next few years. >> schieffer: so it's not what they agreed on but the fact that they met? >> exactly. they met in an informal situation and the fact that there weren't deliverables, concrete things that had to be signed and all that pomp and circumstance, that was a good thing. >> schieffer: david? >> i would agree with what joe said. it's almost impossible to imagine xi's predecessor, hu jintao, sitting for eight hours, relatively unscripted with the president of the united states. it couldn't happen. that said, there are forces both in the united states and in china that could force both men into a direction that is clear what from what they said they

don't want to go in. we're at a tipping point of do the territorial disputes, cyber allegations, intellectual property theft tip the relationship more toward a cold war relationship or does it tip toward cooperation between the world's two largest economies? both leaders made it clear they want to go the cooperation route both have militaries and intelligence services that may push events the other way. >> schieffer: rajiv? >> we've got now almost a full term for president obama to continue building this relationship. this engagement here i think leads us down a path where, as david and joe were saying, we can open an important new chapter, particularly at this moment with the cyber issues that are royaling in washington. it is the -- one of the

principal issues in the u.s./china relationship. some prance incremental progress being made in these discussions where does this go from here. getting these two men in an informalal setting to start to tackle some of these things is an important step forward. sheave. >> schieffer: do you think that was the state department's objective? is this what they wanted? to get them to sit down and know each other a bit? >> well, the sort of shirt-sleeve summit idea, it's about building that relationship. the messages that secretary kerry and clinton brought every time i went to beijing was a rising power and an existing one don't have to clash and they're trying to set that tone. but there are a lot of paths they're set to clash on. one thing the administration seems relatively pleased with so far is that at least in the past few months the chinese have been bringing pyongyang to task a bit in trying to rein in their new leader in terms of the cyber

rattling that he's been doing. so there has been some somewhat of a deliverable on that front that at least beijing is cracking down with some sanction but you won't see easy resolution. with chinese, diplomacy is incremental. >> schieffer: as your colleague graham allison at harvard has pointed out, when you have a case since the time back to sparta and athens where you had an existing pow and a rising power if those junctures in history most of the time they wind up doing to war. >> not always. there are some cases that are the exception and even the original case going back to ancient greece could have been solved differently. i think the key point is if you look at the u.s. and china we have deep conflicts but we also have areas of cooperation that are even more important. you can't have financial stability, you can't manage plank plan to change, can't deal with terrorism, can't deal with cyber unless we and the chinese

overcome the differences that we have in cooperating with in these areas. perhaps the most important thing of this summit may be that on the issue of cyber-- which is a big deal-- we've been talking about that for some time. the fact that it's now raised to the level of the president and president to president, that's a big step. >> schieffer: the president did not accuse china of stealing our stuff but there's no question of anybody you talk to in the u.s. government or anybody who deals with all of this that the chinese have been hacking into our system stealing our plans too make the various kinds of weapons and all of that. is there a chance, can the president of china do anything about this? >> well, that's the fascinating bit that the obama administration is taking here. i'm told the president sat and went through specific cases. he kept them all to the territory of economic espionage

he didn't go into whether it was the chinese who took part of the design for the f-35 or traditional military conflict. and the argument he was making was that china over the long term can not keep managing at these levels if investors believe they can't bring serious technology into china. what we don't know about xi jinping is if he's going to have control over the people's liberation army or that unit that does the cyber spaying to bring a halt to this. or whether the interest inside the pee lay, is going to overwhelm it. the good sign is he now has the title early on as the chairman of the military commission. his predecessor didn't have that until he was in office for

several years. >> schieffer: margaret, did you get any indication -- we know they talked about north korea but what happened on that >> we have heard from u.s. officials that they think pyongyang has gotten the message that they need to reengage with south korea. that does not mean that they're ready to give up their nukes. there are no signs of progress on that front. but what we have heard is that in recent visits they were brought to task and they were told you need to bring this down here. they were told we need to speak one on one with the space walks group. the issue is that they're trying to break apart in alliance so they're more willing to engage and it's not the bottom line that the obama administration wants, which is give up their nukes and we can talk. >> the north koreas have quieted down from some of that high rhetoric. we don't know exactly. >> but they haven't sign tonight the phrase denuclearization

which is what the chinese used. >> pelley: we'll take a break and come back in one minute to talk about other things.

>> schieffer: we're back now with our panel, a jooef, senator mccain who was just in syria met with the the rebels put out a report this morning that he's heard from rebel leaders who say the situation in syria is more desperate than ever. do you have any insight on what's going on here? >> certainly over the past couple weeks with the addition of more hezbollah fighters crossing over from lebanon, backed by iran, it's allowed the assad government to reclaim critical terrain. terrain between damascus and the port city of aleppo. the assad government is in gaining ground here rebels are being pushed back to so the dynamics are changing and going

forward i think poses an important new test now for the president's new national security team with susan rice coming in as national security advisor, samantha power going the united nations. two individuals that have expressed concern in the past at american inaction with regard to genocide in the case of africa, we're not there yet in syria but they're about a million and a half syrians who've been displaced outside the borders. significant humanitarian crisis. and the situation there continues to get more grave as the months roll on here into the third year of this war. >> schieffer: margaret, are you getting any indication that we may do more or we won't do anything or what are do you think happens? >> schieffer: i think where rajiv is just pointing us towards is the next step here is that question of ethnic cleansing and moral imperative to act. that's something that the new ambassador to the u.n., samantha power, has written a lot about. and right to protect.

also we've seen humanitarian intervention as instinct from susan rice herself what other tools are in the president's tool box short of intervention? that's the one thing he's taken off the table here. >> schieffer: so there won't be military intervention. >> but you are hearing other tools in the tool box. can the u.s. help organize the arab league to help support some sort of military intervention. can we get something on another end? the french and british are trying to nudge us to do more and from the rebel leaders i've spoken to in the past week and even just this morning they are incredibly concerned that we are taking this turn towards ethnic cleansing. you've seen the hezbollah fighters come in, you've seen fighters come in from iraq. they're getting to this level of panic. whether or not we can check those boxes to say that is indeed happening, therefore international action has to happen, it's not clear. but it seems to be where the conversation is going next. >> schieffer: let's talk about these leaks, these new revelations about what the government is doing. you have a new story today,

david, in the paper where you say we're now giving help to those in the middle east to help them fight cyber attacks and so on. what's going on here and where does this whole thing about these -- seem there seems to be a flood of leaks coming out here. >> well, there is a big flood and the guardian and the "washington post" has had some pretty remarkable stories and our story today was really about the u.s. trying to help allies in the persian gulf defend themselves against iranian attacks and if the united states and israel were attacked by a cyber weapon -- the first big state uses of the cyber weapon attacked the iranian nuclear program. so that's a tit for tat element here. so as americans have come to recognize the degree which the national security agency has

moved to the manipulation of big data keeping these huge logs as we were discussing the first half of the show of every telephone call and so forth, there is a new question about where we draw the line and just because something is effective against terrorism doesn't necessarily mean that it's the right thing for the united states to do if the impingement on privacy is too great. you heard the president talk about that balancing act but he only talks about it after there's been a revelation. >> schieffer: have americans' privacy rights been violated by what the government is doing? >> only a small amount if i compare that to what's happened in the past. we live this country between security and liberty. it's a pendulum that swings back and forth and we've done most damage to our liberties. abraham lincoln suspended habeas

corpus in the civil war. franklin roosevelt interned japanese citizens in world war ii. so the president's argument that he has to figure out where's the tipping point between these two polls i think is an appropriate point but as david said we need to talk about this. there are limits on privacy but we don't want to give up fourth amendment freedoms and where do you get that tip? you can't talk about it that it's hyper secret. we need to have a public debate about this. >> schieffer: why should these things be secret, rajiv? i can understand why some of it has to be secret. sometimes when an entire program is classified it seems to me of whether it ought to be classified. >> it cuts off reasonable debate in congress and elsewhere about the merits of it and more specifically the implementation of it. people have been generally

willing to allow the national security agency, the federal government to engage in certain types of programs in the spirit of keeping the nation safe. but what was different this past week, bob, was we learned that the n.s.a. was vacuuming up phone records of all of americans, at least from what we know about what they were doing with verizon we can extrapolate to that being with other carriers and the story the "washington post" reported about the n.s.a. searching material, google, yahoo!, facebook among others it raises some real questions about how the government is going about conducting this. so long as it's 50% focused on foreigners, that's good enough, this dismissive attitude that

they were taking in material about american citizens. so i think if congress starts to act ask questions it will be less about the framework of the law and more about how were n.s.a. officials actually implementing this. here you sort of connect potentially even to the i.r.s. scandal where you're looking at how were federal employees actually carrying out their duties? i think for some americans all this stuff will start to conflate. >> i agree with that. there's a big question about whether everything we've seen that was so heavily classified really needs to be. for example, on friday we saw a presidential directive signed in the fall about the use of offensive and defensive cyber weapons that laid out a good case for the american state using significant restraint in this. and i've asked the question from the white house, why was this document classified at all? much less a top secret level until 2037. i still haven't gotten an answer. it would seem to me much of it

could be made public in that debate. >> schieffer: all right, well, i want to thank all of you. this is one of those issues thaw is so complicated i can't decide whether what they've done right or wrong because i can't figure out what they did! (laughter) thanks all of you for being here. we'll be right back with our "face the nation" flash back. 97

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>> schieffer: on friday michigan congressman john dingell became the longest-serving member of congress in history. a record of 57 years, five months, and 26 days. more than one quarter of the years that congress has existed. that is our "face the nation" flashback. dingell came to congress in 1955 when dwight eisenhower was president. i want to ask you a little bit about as you look back on those years how many presidents? >> 11 presidents and 11 speakers i served with. >> schieffer: you'll notice i do not say that you served that long. >> you're wise but i know some

folks do. >> schieffer: as you look back on it, who were you favorites? >> if you look there's a picture signed to john dingell. franklin delano roosevelt. i didn't serve with him but he was to me right after god. he'd speak to the fire side chats. the country stopped, people wanted to listen to him. and he had that wonderful speaking style. after him i think truman who is an extraordinary guy who has the remarkable ability to simplify enormously complex questions into a simple yes or no. >> schieffer: what about l.b.j.? >> he was a tremendous president. there was only one thing that destroyed l.b.j. and that was vietnam. probably at the bottom of that have was his ego because he was i think very much afraid the people were going to see who lost vietnam. johnson didn't know how to

defend it so he stayed and kept racing the ante in vietnam and it cost us a huge number of lives. >> schieffer: but he also passed the civil rights bills. >> i think that was one of the great pieces of legislation in history because we eliminated discrimination against deserving decent american people. i almost lost the election over that and i've had to go around and say now i want you to explain to me why is a black man or woman should not be able to vote if they're a citizen when an american who happens to be a white man or woman can vote? and people responded. >> schieffer: when you look back in those days, those were the days of these great across-the-aisle relationships. i mean, i don't think there's any question lyndon johnson could not have passed that without everett dirkson, the

republican leader. >> you're a wise man, my friend bob. he could not. and the interesting thing is that dirkson and l.b.j. talked. they're friends. you don't find no that now. it's hurting the institution, it's hurting the country, hurting the congress and keeping us from making progress because now everything has to be a fight and the media sends you down here to fight and they put the five, ten, 15 second soundbites on where people denounce somebody or say something bad about somebody and now we have a situation where people will shout at the president or cause the white house press staff a paid liar. that's not the way it should be done. >> schieffer: do you think you could fass 1964 civil rights bill today? >> i've said the other day i

wasn't sure we could pass the ten commandments in this place. money has become a curse in this place because everybody's chasing money all the time and the result -- and that's true in the senate, too. and the result of this is it's just a place that's simply locked up and we have people who are coming in here that don't have the vaguist idea of how the place works, they don't know where the restroom is but they're on the floor making a big speech and talking to their press manager about what's the statement they're going to issue today and when they ought to be talking with the other side working out the problems. >> schieffer: his proudest moment it was vote he cast for that 1964 civil rights bill. his greatest reyet? >> it was one vote that i have regretted ever since i made it and that was the vote i made on the golf of tonkin resolution. >> schieffer: that is the

resolution that gave lyndon johnson the green light to go to vietnam. >> i went out on the floor, i got light, i was going to vote against it. i thought you know, lyndon johnson is the president, i'm going to help him do what he thinks ought to be done. well, it turned out the information he had about that was wrong and it committed us to vietnam which cost us thousands of american lives, untold treasures. vast wealth which hurt generations of americans, particularly the guys who went over there honorably to serve their nation that's what i'm sorry about. there was one that taught me something so that when the second bush wanted to go into iraq i voted against it because i thought that was a dumb thing and i didn't think they had the basis for it. >> schieffer: what was your favorite time here? >> the first year i was here because i didn't have anything really important to do.

all i had to do was look around and act important. and this's easy to do. it doesn't take much intelligence. and then when lyndon johnson came because we began to realize all the things that we wanted to do. medicare which was -- which my dad was the first author and which i introduced every year since and when i got over to the house when we passed medicare. i still got the golf sitting over yonder. >> schieffer: will dingell run again? he says he and his wife debbie will make that decision? january-- as they always do in an election year. our "face the nation" flash back. ,,,,,,,,

>> schieffer: well, that's it for us today. tomorrow on "this morning" house majority leader eric cantor. plus the latest on nelson mandela. we want to thank you for watching "face the nation." see you. captioning sponsored by cbs captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org ,,,,,,,,,,

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