captioning sponsored by macneil/lehrer productions >> ifill: a debt default averted; the federal government back in business. but the deal to end the stalemate sets the stage for a new budget battle in the coming months. good evening, i'm gwen ifill. >> woodruff: and i'm judy woodruff. after weeks of capitol hill acrimony, we get perspective from cory booker, the new jersey democrat who'll soon be the senate's newest member. and sylvia mathews burwell. the white house's budget director. >> ifill: plus, ray suarez reports on the debate over smart guns, part of a high-tech approach to firearm safety. >> you'll see the light turn green-- from green, which means he's the authorized user, to red, which means i'm the unauthorized user, and the firearm will not shoot. >> ifill: those are just some of the stories we're covering on tonight's "pbs newshour."

>> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: ♪ ♪ moving our economy for 160 years. bnsf, the engine that connects us. >> and by the alfred p. sloan foundation. supporting science, technology, and improved economic performance and financial literacy in the 21st century. >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations.

and... >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> woodruff: our lead story tonight: the federal government was back at work today. after votes last night in the house and senate, and a presidential signature, ended a 16-day shutdown. the deal also raised the nation's debt ceiling, removing the threat of default. but the short-term agreements set up the possibility of new showdowns to come early next year. "newshour" congressional correspondent kwame holman begins our coverage. >> welcome back, everybody! >> reporter: the vice president greeted workers returning to the environmental protection agency with hugs, handshakes and breakfast. >> by the way, i didn't bring enough muffins. i brought muffins, so... >> reporter: tens of thousands of federal employees were back

on the job, after last night's agreement. elsewhere: other signs of things returning to normal. in the nation's capital, popular tourist sites reopened. the national zoo's beloved pandacam came back online, although the zoo remained closed until tomorrow. the senate's ohio clock resumed ticking, its time-keeper no longer furloughed. and national park sites across the country, from the great smoky mountains to alcatraz island, welcomed back visitors. but at the white house, president obama said despite the late-night congressional action, americans were completely fed up with dysfunction in washington. he called on lawmakers to put aside partisan differences and work together for the good of the country. >> now that the government is re-opened and this threat to our economy is removed, all of us need to stop focusing on the lobbyists and the bloggers and the talking heads on radio and the professional activists who profit from conflict and focus on what the majority of americans sent us here to do.

>> reporter: the president outlined three priorities for the remainder of the year-- passing immigration reform and a farm bill, plus reaching a long- term budget deal. that process got underway this morning, with the four top budget writers in congress meeting for breakfast. afterward, neither side offered any guarantees. republican paul ryan chairs the house budget committee: >> i want to have a budget agreement that gets this debt and deficit under control, that does right by future generations and helps us grow the economy. and we're going to try and figure out if we can find an agreement to do that. >> reporter: democrat patty murray heads the senate budget panel. >> chairman ryan knows i'm not going to vote for his budget. i know that he's not going to vote for mine. we're going to find the two common-- the common ground between our two budgets that we both can vote on. and that's our goal. >> reporter: the budget group was formed as part of the plan approved by congress yesterday that funds the government for just three months until mid- january; and increases the debt limit through february 7. the deal passed the senate with

overwhelming bipartisan support. but only about a third of house republicans voted for the proposal. many of those voting no said the deal failed to rein in the president's health care law. while the cloud of uncertainty hanging the capitol temporarily had been lifted concern lingered about the economic consequences resulting from the latest political standoff. standard & poor's estimated the shutdown trimmed $24 billion from the nation's economic activity. the president said the crisis not only had caused financial pain, but hurt america's reputation as a global leader. >> nothing has done more damage to america's credibility in the world, our standing with other countries, than the spectacle that we've seen these past several weeks. it's encouraged our enemies. it's emboldened our competitors. and it's depressed our friends who look to us for steady leadership. >> reporter: a long-term budget

resolution is not expected come soon, most lawmakers left washington last night following the vote. >> woodruff: we'll have more on the fallout from all this, later in the program. in other news, stocks staged an impressive recovery on wall street today after the last- minute deal to avoid a u.s. default. the s&p 500 closed with a record high. the dow jones industrial average erased its early losses and ended the day down just 2 points to close above 15,371. the nasdaq rose 23 points to close at 3,863. there are new revelations the c.i.a. is collaborating extensively with the national security agency to carry out drone strikes against targets abroad. that's according to documents "the washington post" received from n.s.a. leaker, edward snowden. they showed the c.i.a. relies heavily on the n.s.a.'s ability to gather vast quantities of e- mail, phone calls, and other data to track down terrorists.

president obama plans to nominate jeh johnson to lead the department of homeland security. an unnamed white house official said the president will make the announcement tomorrow. if confirmed, the former pentagon lawyer will succeed janet napolitano who stepped down in august. international researchers now say air pollution is a more serious cause of cancer than passive cigarette smoke. the cancer agency of the world health organization made that declaration today. it's the first time it has classified air pollution in its entirety as causing cancer, even though the risk to individuals is low. new jersey elected newark mayor cory booker to be the state's next u.s. senator. in the special election, the 44- year-old democrat won 55% of the vote to republican steve lonegan's 44%. booker will finish out the term of senator frank lautenberg, who died in office in june.

he spoke last night to crowds of his supporters in newark. >> too many people are forgetting that the lines that divide us are nothing compare to those ties that bind us. it forgets, this cynical attitude forgets the idea that ideal, the truth that we are all in this together. >> woodruff: we'll talk with senator-elect booker right after the news summary. more than 60 people were killed in a fresh wave of violence across iraq today. most of the car and suicide bombings targeted shi-ite districts of baghdad. nine car bombs detonated in the capital, including one near a playground that killed two children. the explosions rang out as iraqis celebrated the muslim holiday of eid al-adha. the annual hajj pilgrimage in saudi arabia came to an end today. nearly two million muslim pilgrims took part in the final day of commemorations in the holy city of mecca.

they performed their last round of rituals before leaving the grand mosque-- islam's most important holy site. in australia, unseasonably hot temperatures combined with strong winds to fan the flames of nearly 100 wildfires. and 18 of the fires in new south wales-- the most populous state in the country-- were burning out of control. smoke plumes stretched for miles, and even cast an orange haze over downtown sydney. conditions are still too intense to get an accurate number of how many homes have been destroyed. >> we are unclear yet as to how many properties have been lost, but it's suspected that by the time we finish counting, it will at least be in the hundreds. the fact is that today's conditions, both the hot, dry conditions but also the wind conditions-- have contributed to the difficulties faced by firefighters and communities on the ground.

>> woodruff: nearly 1,500 firefighters are battling the fires, which authorities say are the most serious in a decade. the social network facebook has eased its privacy rules for teenagers. facebook users between the ages of 13 and 17 will now be able to share their information and photos publicly, instead of with only their friends network. facebook said it made the change to allow teens to have a more powerful voice when it came to positions or causes they support. we'll have more on this story later in the program. still ahead on the "newshour": the senate's newest member; the economic impact of the shutdown and debt fight; a high-tech approach to gun safety; what teens share online and the history and philosophies behind the stalemate in washington. >> ifill: now, for more on new jersey's new senator-elect. when he is sworn in, probably

later this month, cory booker will be only the fourth african american elected to the u.s. senate. but he brings his own celebrity with him, including as the subject of an oscar-nominated documentary in 2005: "street fight". i spoke with him a short time ago. mayor booker, congratulations on your election last night. >> thank you very much. i'm grateful and grateful to have a chance to be on with you. >> ifill: you know, you're a big guy on twitter. everybody knows you do a lot of communicating with people that way, and one of the questions i posed yesterday to you on twit ser why does he want to come to washington in the middle of all this? >> you have a lot of people in my world excited that you tweeted at me. look, i've been a mayor who has been trying to push a city forward way lot of great people from all sides of the aisle, and we just faced a lot of headwinds because some of the things that often seem very obvious that washington isn't doing to help out. so take, for example, gun violence in my city. the majority of guns that we recover don't even come from new jersey. they come from criminal gun

runners who are not law-abiding citizens, who should have a second amendment right. they come from criminals who can walk into secondary markets and buy weapons and having commonsense background checks that 90% of americans agree on make sense but we're not getting it done. so on a number of frooshz kids that go through my colleges and get degrees and things that can barely spell. but as soon as we educate them and use our taxpayer dollars to do that, and they graduate, they're ready to start businesss and to add to our economy we tell them they can't stay here and end up pushing them out of our country because they can't get a visa. i can go through dozens dozens of issues that would make new jersey stronger, more economically competitive and safer but we're not getting it done in washington right now so i want to be a part of what i hope will be people coming to the get work done for the people of new jersey and the nation. >> ifill: you just named two issues, gun control and immigration, which don't seemed to be going anywhere, even in the democratically controlled senate. why do you think your presence there will change that? >> well, look, i'm-- i think you and i both know that one

senator, especially now the 100th in seniority, won't necessarily walk down there and everybody will be spitting sunshine and rainbows. i'm very knowledgeable of the challenges before me. and i also go there with the right attitude. i've got a really-- i work hard and humbly and work as hard as i can and find creative ways to join with others to make a difference. i promised the people in scourge of new jersey i was going to work dismard find creative ways to move the ball forward and that's what i intend to do. i know we can do better. i know america can. and i know this current state of sort of brinksmanship, zero-sum-game politics is note work for either party. it's not working for america, and i hope i can join with other people who want to go a different way. i'm confident that american history is a testimony to the achievement of the impossible, and in newark, i come from the hard city where people said we couldn't make a difference, couldn't make a change, couldn't reverse trends like our population declining, our city tax base declining, but we've

reversed those trends now. we've done what others said couldn't be done and i'm ready to take that to another level. >> ifill: there are a couple of different examples of what a new senator in washington could do, that you can follow, especially senators with reputations that precede thernlg like yours. hillary clinton came to washington, he kept her head low. ted cruz came to washington and obviously didn't keep his head low. which example would you try to follow? >> neither. i want to be myself. i want to be as authentic as possible and that means doing like hillary clinton, having a humble heart, and focusing on getting work done, but also making sure i'm staying true to myself in the way they found the best way to get things done, and so in newark, we were everywhere tactical. you know, my first year in office, i think i spent most nights in a police car 2:00, three:00 4:00 in the morning, working on crime issues, up in the morning, greeting people at schools, trying to give heart to people in our city. but at the same time, sometimes we found it necessary to elevate newark's profile, to bring attention to our city, so we can draw investment.

i don't know what the strategy will be in washington. the reality is, i've got to go down there as my mentor, people like bill bradley, have told me to do. get to know your colleagues on both sides of the aisle, recognize that they, too, beat with the same heart, and the same type of blood. and learn procedure of the place because it does have its own rules. and then become a master of a number of issues that you can really make your own and drive the ball forward. and in every way possible be a scraper, try to find ways to score point, hit singles and doubles for the people you swore an oath to represent. >> ifill: last night during your acceptance speech, i said democracy was not a spectator sport. what do you say to people who are alienated by the whole process at this point? >> we cannot afford to surrender to cynicism. think of the frustrating times of our past when many people should have thrown up their arms, when civil rights legislation kept failing, where lynchings kept getting worse, where women were did need again and again the right to equal

suffrage. there were so many times when there was justifiable reasons even more so than now for criticism. our generation who stares that t the incredible history of working through frustration, has no right to indulge in cynicism. we don't. what we have is an obligation to keep working tat, to keep fighting, to never give up. washington has to work for america. our nation was founded with a bunch of founding legislators who joined together to move our country out of the blocks and get us started and every generation since then has found a way to advance the ball down the field. so i've never been one who would-- indulges even cynical folks or that kind of negativity. i want to find ways to really find ways to create uncommon coalitions for uncommon results. and i know, i'm confident, i have faith that we can get some pretty remarkable things done in this country that we're still a nation where impossible dreams can be made real. >> ifill: which is more important to you, that you are the fourth elected african american to the u.s. senate in

modern times, or that you are the 21st mayor to go straight to the u.s. senate? >> i think those are both really important questions. the first, being the fourth african american, speaks a lot to our nation and really to my state that, that was not a central feet nur this campaign, even, shows a lot of evolution of our state. the latter to me is a very important. because when i watch the senate, and again, from a distance, and i don't want to say they know all about that body or much about the internal workings, but when i step back, i often see issues that face urban space spn america, that face urban issues. they're just not being addressed. and a lack of urgency that i've had to live with as a mayor every single day that doesn't seem to be made manifest. and so i want to join with other legislators in that body who believe like i do that 85% of americans live in cities or in their suburbs and that we've got-- in fact the brookings institution now rightfully is

talking about if you want to create a robust economy where the majority of our g.d.p. is driven is in our cities. you have to have an urban vision for america. and i want to go down there with the practical skills that i've learned and add to that understanding and that sense of urgency, be and the reality that in america right now, there are large swaths of our country who are less and less seeing the kind of social mobility that my parents saw, who are more and more finding themselves in trappedz economically that they can't escape because they don't have access to the basics. and that's a threat to our economy. >> ifill: newark mayor cory booker, senator-elect from new jersey, congratulationses and thank you for joining us. >> thank you very much, gwen. it's great to be on with you and talk with you yet again. >> woodruff: now, more on the 16 day shutdown and its repercussions on the entire american economy and on the federal government itself. for the latter, we turn to sylvia mathews burwell, the director of the administration's office of management and budget. i spoke with her a short while ago.

sylvia burwell, welcome to the "newshour." >> thank you so much for having me, judy. >> woodruff: so how smoothly did today go? >> i think today went relatively smoothly, people got back to work and are starting to bring the government back up as quickly and effectively as possible. >> woodruff: but 16 days shut down. what are the the challenges of getting the government back up and running or some of the government back up and running after something like this? >> so, a number of challenges. the first was making sure that employees knew, and i think you probably know that things went quite late last night, so making sure we had things in place so government employees would be notified that the government would be up and running would be a starting one. others have to do with things as simple as information technology and the use of handhelds and mobile devices and how those work after for 16 days not being use. and then there comes some of the longer term issues of there's a lot of work that's backed up that people will need to focus on. for instance, during this time

period, we had the end of the fiscal year. so just like any company, the government needs to close out its books and so now we'll have to come back, bring everybody in and close out the books for the last fiscal year at the same time we're moving forward. >> woodruff: you had some people who were designated as essential. more, i think, than people expected. i think, in fact, most government employees were disig naiptd as essential. how do you explain that? does it give you a sort of new understanding of how the federal government work and what you would do the next time there's a shutdown? >> so, the term that has developed over the period from 1995, even until now, is exempted employees. in terms of what is open in the government when there is a shutdown, there are two main categories. one is a category of people whose funding friday sources-- comes from source other than the

appropriations we're talking about. that can be in the form of fees or other things. the other category are exempted employees and those are employees that are exempted to protect life and property usually. and so those are our military forces and those are people that do checking of our food and food safety, and so those are some of the exempted categories. >> woodruff: so the fact that most people, most government employees were designated as essential, it-- i guess it made-- it made-- there was just a question about i think that-- it wasn't everybody. if you're working for the federal government yreport you essential? >> well, i think that's part of why we like to use the word "exempted." and i think one of the things that has happened during this time of shutdown is there has come to be a realization of the many important functions that people serve in government, and whether that's helping people get their small business administration loans to keep moving the economy forward and creating jobs or many of the

other functions that i think people missed during this time when the government was down. we have four-- we actually have five nobel prize winners that work for the federal government, and four of those were on furlough. >> woodruff: for people who don't know how the federal government works, finally, sylvia burwell, how disruptive was this? >> it was extremely disruptive, and i think anyone can imagine when something is shut down in & working in ways it shouldn't be. every day there are questions. there are applications of law and new things happen and you have to evolve. for instance, when we heard about tropical storm karen, fema needed to bring people back on in order that we would be ready to handle a storm if that storm had landed and caused damage. another example of things going the other way is at one point in time, the veterans' benefits team ran out of money, and so over 7,000 people were furloughed, even though they had not been furloughed nicialgly. it is an evolution and changing

things that every day because it's a very unnatural and damaging state. >> woodruff: sylvia burwell, the director of the office of management and budget, thank you very much. >> happy to be here. >> woodruff: as for the shutdown's effects on the broader economy and the uncertainty that some see going forward. we check in with two economists who have been examining this: beth ann bovino of standard and poor's and mark zandi of moody's analytics. welcome to you both. so mark zandi, to you first. how has the broader economy been affected by all this? >> well, by my calculation, the shutdown and the brinksmanship over the debt limit shaved bay half a percentage point off g.d.p. growth. that's the value of all the things we producedded, in the fourth quarter of if th year. the recovery continues, we're still growing, but because of these events, we're going to grow a lot more slowly and we're still going to be very uncomfortable with the rate of growth we're getting. >> woodruff: beth ann bovino, what would you add to that to

help people understand the effect on the economy overall? >> well, i think-- i'm a little bit more close, but a little more conservative on what i'm expecting. i'm looking for aue know, about .6% or $24 billion in terms of a loss from the government shutdown. there, though, i'd add that one of the reasons why i'm a bit more concerned is that because even though we've had the shutdown, again, the politicians have to come back to the bargaining table in just a few months, and what's that key? well, another shutdown or the risk of the debt ceiling not being increased as well. all these things add more concerns, more worries, lingering lost confidence, and that's going to keep people from spending. and this is right during the christmas holidays. >> woodruff: mark zandi how much does that uncertainty about whether there's going to be another shutdown in a few months affect people's thinking and behavior? >> you know, i think this is very important. and i agree that the-- because of the way the deal has been structured and the fact that this is-- we're going to be in

the middle of this again in the holiday season, into next year, that this is going to do continuing damage. and it's consumer confidence and their willingness and-- to go out and spend more aggressively, but perhaps more importantly, it goes to business people and their willingness to go out and hire more aggressively and to invest and really take those risks that are key to making our economy grow more quickly. and in my view, at this point, the key reason why this economy is not growing more quickly is because of the unsupporter created by-- uncertainty created by what's going on in washington. every six months we're back at this, and this is now starting to do a lot of damage. and i really don't think our economy can kick into that higher gear until washington really addresses this issue and gets off the front pages of our newspapers. >> woodruff: beth ann bovino, can you break it down by sectors to some extent. tell us how you see housing, for example, hiring across the board, tourism, or break it down any way you want? >> with no new government data, i can certainly try.

let's see. i mean, we can start looking at the number of employees that were furloughed without pay. and then you would add to that-- i mean, i know it was 800,000 at once, but it was braet braut down to a little bit less than that. but then you would add all the essential workers, including a friend of mine, who was working without pay. and of course the contract workers as well. well, that means those people, they do get their paychecks but i think because of the heightened uncertainty going forward, they might be a little bit reluctant to actually spend that backpay. you add tourism. tourism, then, of course you have the shutdown of monuments and also of national parks. well, that means that's lost tourist revenue. that goes into g.d.p. and that's no longer available. i believe sylvia had mentioned earlier that you're looking at what happens with all those businesses that wanted to have loans, small business associations was down to bare bones, and soafs the agricultural department. that meant that farmer loans, small business loans weren't getting out and she that means those loans were really what

drives this economy and keeps things slow. >> woodruff: mark zandi, are these things that can bounce back now that the shutdown is behind us? or is the damage longer lasting? >> well, we'll get some of this back. you know, the small business administration will get up and running and make those loans. the folks trying to import and export goods will get their permits and be able to do that. the mortgage lenders will ramp it back up again. and of course the furloughed workers are going to come back. they're going to get paid, and they're going to start spending on the things they didn't spend on during this period. so we'll get some of it back. but we're not going to get all of it back, and more importantly, if lawmakers take us down this very dark road again early next year, i fear it's going to undermine consumer confidence and business confidence and perhaps even investor confidence to the degree that it's going to start doing even more damage, real damage, and we're not going to bounce back from that. >> woodruff: there was a bit of a scare a few days ago, beth ann bovino, when fitch's rating service announced they were putting the u.s. credit rating

on a watch, i believe they called it. does something like that have a lingering effect? >> well, i would say that one of the-- i think one of the issues, largely coming from the debt ceiling debates, that what's on top of the shutdown, all those two combined, it's certainly going to hit confidence. you certainly saw banks interest rates kind of on the not near-short, maybe a three-month, six months, they're still rather high, and they were high during the week. that meant that borrowing costs are up for investors. that's a drag on the economy. in terms of questions of whether there will be another downgrade, of course i'm not a sof-- i'm an economist, not a sovereign's rating analyst but that will weigh on investors' news. >> woodruff: finally mark zandi, what do you look for in the weeks to come to see whether the economy is getting back to the state where it was before all this started to happen? >> you know, judy, for me it's about jobs.

i think we have to watch these jobs reports. i just picked up an e-mail just before we started our conversation. it looks like the bureau of labor statistics is going to release september job numbers next week, and the october numbers a couple of weeks down the road. that's very, very important. if businesses stopped hiring or even started laying off, and job growth slowed substantively, then what happened in washington about da lot more damage. if business is headline tough, i think we'll be okay. but it's really quite critical at this point that lawmakers get it together. if they don't, at some point businesses are going to stop hiring people and lay off workers and we're not going to bounce back. >> woodruff: mark zandi, moody's analytic beth ann bovino, standard & poors, thank you both. >> thank you,. >> thank you. >> ifill: next, can guns be made safer by making them smarter, so to speak? ray suarez explores the possibilities of personalizing gun technology.

>> this is button number one, two, three, four. >> reporter: at a firing range in southern california, belinda padilla prepares to demonstrate a new gun. the gun knows if you are allowed to fire it. >> once you sync the watch to the gun it is now a personalized firearm and you can never use it as a regular firearm, only the authorized user will be able to shoot the firearm. >> reporter: the new handgun, manufactured by the german company armatix, uses radio frequency built into a wristwatch that must be worn to fire the gun. so these two units speak to each other? >> yes, it is radio frequency technology. >> reporter: belinda padilla is the president and ceo for the u.s. division of armatix. a personal pin or code number activates the gun. >> if i only want to activate the gun for four hours, or two hours, i can. >> reporter: the armatix gun is not yet on the market in the u.s., but national debate this

past year over how to decrease gun violence has brought attention to owner-authorized technologies. >> the purpose is to provide safety for the americans that want to protect their family. >> reporter: padilla showed us how the gun wont fire when taken away. >> what victor is going to do is shoot a few rounds, and i'm going to demonstrate how the technology works, i'm going to take the firearm from him, once he shot the two rounds, and you'll see the light turn green, which means he's the authorized user, turn to red, to red, which means i'm the unauthorized user, and the firearm will not shoot. >> reporter: well, let's see. the red light on the handgun indicates padilla is not the owner. >> it will not fire. >> reporter: and then he takes it back and it doesn't have to do anything.

>> and yes, there's the green light. >> reporter: long in research and development, owner- authorized guns like armatixs have been dubbed, smartguns. other personalized technologies in development include the use of biometrics, like >> what's a ppks .9 millimeter. hollywood wowed movie goers with the personalized gun technology in the james bond movie "skyfall." >> it's coded to your palm print. only you can fire it. >> reporter: and while the bond style gun is now only available on the silver screen, gun safety advocates believe the time is right for such technologies. stephen teret, is the director for the center for law and the publics health at johns hopkins bloomberg school of public health. he believes not enough focus is spent on changing the design of guns as a way to decrease gun violence. >> instead of saying to people, here's how you have to handle your gun, here's how you have to behave with you gun, we should look at the product itself, the gun, and say, "is there something we can do to the gun

to reduce the amount of deaths?" >> reporter: the latest gun death figures from 2010 reported more than 31,000 deaths from firearms. 61% of those, three out of every five, were suicides, some of which were teenagers, between 2% and 4% were accidental deaths, and the rest-- more than 10,000- - were homicides. armatix hopes its technology will prevent some of those deaths. >> we don't want children killing children. we don't want mentally ill committing suicide. our goal is to provide firearms that are safe, that only the authorized user can fire. >> reporter: professor teret says technological changes to guns could make a difference-- the same way automobile deaths decreased sharply after safety devices like seatbelts and airbags were introduced. >> the most effective tool was changing the design of cars, and

that's in large part why i believe that we and do the same thing with guns. we do have to get people to act prudently with the gun that they have, but if we change the product, we're going to be even more effective than trying to change the behavior of hundreds of millions of people. >> reporter: that is not a view shared by lawrence keane from the national shooting sports foundation. >> every firearm can be lock in some way without the use of some high tech gadgetry or so called smartguns. >> reporter: keane says focusing on product safety and changing the design of guns is unwarranted. >> firearms are safe if they're used properly, and so, and the statics support that. accidents are declining, firearm manufacturers providing a locking device with their products free of charge, so if you buy a firearm today, you're going to get a lock with that gun, federal law requires locks to be provided by the dealer

when they sell a handgun, for example. >> reporter: armatix agrees that meanwhile, politics has taken aim at the gun market with the introduction of a law that would mandate the sale of so-called smartguns. congressman john tierney of massachusetts introduced the personalized handgun safety act of 2013 which would not only fund more research for owner- authorized guns but mandate its sales. >> it gives a two-year period of time, after which all the manufacturers have to sell only handguns that are personalized, whether they use the radio technology, or fingerprint, or palm pressure. >> reporter: and while tierney's bill has little chance of passing the congressman says he wants the legislation to bring attention to accidental child firearm deaths. tierney points to cases like that of 14-year-old brian crowell-- a boy in his massachusetts district-- who in 1997 was shot and killed accidentally by a loaded gun in

his best friend's house. ann marie crowell is brian's mother. >> the gun went off, and it hit brian right in the neck, and the last words he said to his friend were, "i can't believe you shot me." he ran out of the room, and he attempted to run home, and he only made it down the stairs to the living room in the boy's house, and collapsed on the floor. it was life changing for the family. >> reporter: since the accident crowell works to get parents to ask other parents if guns in their house are safely stored and locked. she supports the legislation. >> i'm not against people wanting to feel safe in their own home, but what is wrong with having a little more safeguards to it? >> reporter: but lawrence keane doesn't believe the personalized guns are safer and says mandates are the wrong way to go. >> the industry is not opposed to the research and development

of this technology, what we are opposed to is legislative mandates to require this one size fits all technology for all firearms owners, and we don't think that that's the way things ought to work. you can bring a product to market, if there's consumer demand, consumers will buy it, but you shouldn't force it upon all consumers. >> reporter: armatix hopes to have its owner authorized gun available for sale in the u.s. this fall. >> woodruff: next, we take a closer look at facebook's decision to relax rules about what teens can share online. the changes mean that teens between 13 and 17 years old could share whatever they posted with the general public if they wish to do so. but facebook also said that it would post two reminders like this one to make sure that teens were aware of the risks of posting information.

the move has raised concerns anew about privacy online. hari sreenivasan has our conversation. >> sreenivasan: and for that, we turn to stephen balkam of the family online safety institute, a group representing major players in the tech industry. he's a member of facebook's safety advisory board. and jim steyer, founder and c.e.o. of common sense media, a not-for-profit group that studies the impact of technology on kids. so jim steyer, let me start with you. what's your concern about these changes? >> facebook's privacy policies are sort of like the weather-- they're constantly changing. that's about the only thing you can be sure of. and as the parent of four and running the biggest kids' media group in the country, you know that these privacy policies are going to confuse parents, but most of all they're going to continue to erode some of the privacy rights of children and teens who are on facebook. we really are particularly concerned that in many cases, kids will self-reveal before they self-reflect, put out information that can be damaging to them, can be bullying to

others. and in a public context, the consequences can be bigger. so we have a lot of concerns about this latest set of changes to the privacy policies at facebook. >> sreenivasan: stephen balka balkam, what about those reservations? >> actually, the first thing to be said is we applaud facebook's changes to default to friends only for teerms. this is something we've been talking to them about for quite some time, so we actually think that's going to add to the safety and privacy of teenagers. the other change regarding allowing teens to post publicly, i think that you have to consider do teenagers have any free expression rights? let's take malal, the 16-year-old pakistana girl shot by the taliban, i mean she has created a global phenomenon and campaign, but up until now, has not been able to do that on facebook. so actually, i think in some ways, this is a very good step. >> sreenivasan: jim steyer, isn't this the type of transparency that privacy groups

have tried to advocate for and ask facebook for? >> no, definitely not. i would not say that at all, hari. i think what this really is, is primarily an effort to monetize the personal information of teenagers. the public nature of the post that's now permitted will allow facebook to actually use those in sponsored stories, which are the most lucrative form of advertising, when you talk about the material that children and teens-- remember, one of the big concerns that privacy advocates have with facebook is that there are millions of kids under the age of 13 who are also on facebook. and they don't have the impulse control as children or as teens to think through what they're going to post. so while steven's right there can be very good usage of public postings like malala, the far more frequent public postings can be things damage of damaging to kids' reputations, that can be forms of cyber bullying. and again, teens often time self-reveal before they self-reflect. so in the broader scheme of

privacy, while we do appreciate the fact that kids do need a voice and i'm a first amendment law professor at stanford, so i really like that, in general, this is an erosion of privacy for kids and teens that privacy advocates i think in general are pretty concerned about. >> sreenivasan: stephen balkam, i want to get to the cyber bullying in a minute, but something jim said, basically it's the old adage-- if you can't see the product, you are the product. are these changes primarily so facebook can make more money. a lot of parents are already very tenuous about letting their kids on social networks and i think there's a high creep factor when they talk about the content these children are generating actually selling product. >> well, everything that i've read, this has not changed at all the advertising towards children or adults, for that matter. the sponsored stories will still be just sent to friends only. so there's no change in the advertising side, and if there is further down the road, we'll be the first to raise a red flag. you know, i think it's important

to also recognize that facebook is incorporated teachable moments as a child chooses a public setting to send out their posts and will be reminded on several occasions. so they've gone well beyond what many other social networks are doing at the moment. >> sreenivasan: stephen balkam, i want to stick with you for a second. what jim steyer said about cyber bullying is also kind of interesting to us. as we make this content across social networks more permanent and perhaps more searchable, doesn't that enable other teens to start using that content in perhaps a campaign on cyber bullying, just like a procter & gamble could use that little quote to help sell bleach? >> we certainly need a national dialogue and a national campaign on cyber bullying, and bullying under generally. i think we all have to think before we post. i would also say that facebook and youtube and google plus already provide delete buttons, by the way, for stuff that

people put out there, kids themselves that they would prefer to retract. having said that, sure. i mean, if you put stuff out there, you have to be aware that it can be replicated and it can be sent anywhere on the internet. so we all have to raise our awareness of how we use digital media. >> sreenivasan: jim steyer, how about that notion of some semblance of personal responsibility. nobody is forcing to you join these social networks. you can perhaps keep your child off of one until a certain age if you're incredibly good at policing them. >> it's tough. i can tell you, as the dad of four. you know, of course personal responsibility does matter. you know, common sense, we are pioneers in the field of teaching kids digital literacy and citizenship. but the bottom line is pretty clear-- kids have much less impulse control than parents do, and that's true for children as well as teens. millions and millions of whom are on facebook. so the downside risks here are very substantial, and the more public this becomes and more that kids are encouraged to be

public by facebook, primarily in our opinion for montization reasons, the more likelihood of significant consequences and damages in which cyber bullying is one of the big ones. and that is something that is a phenomenon that every parent, every school, and every community in this country is aware of. and so while facebook does-- has made some pop-up reminders now, which i think is a positive thing, steven mentioned those-- in general, this is a very troubling strend trepped. the bottom line is it's being drif bean a commercial imperative at the tech industry. it's not being driven by the best interest of children and teens, period. >> sreenivasan: jim steyer, stephen balkam, thanks so much for your time. >> thank you. >> thanks for having us. >> ifill: as washington continues to move almost breathlessly from crisis to crisis, it seems like a good time to take a step back and examine the political history and philosophies that bring us to the brink, again and again. jeffrey brown has that.

>> brown: in those larger terms, just what is it that we're witnessing today in american politics? and what impact does it have on citizens? author eric liu looks at these questions as founder of "citizen university" which seeks to engage people on progressive issues. he served as an adviser to former president bill clinton. steven hayward is a visiting scholar in conservative thought and policy at the university of colorado boulder. and historian beverly gage of yale university joins us once again. she studies political movements in u.s. history. well, eric liu, i want to start with you with something you said to our producer in thinking about these issues. you said people have stopped drawing any kind of line between pol dispiks government. now what does that mean, and what kind of line should there be? >> i think the reality is that, that line is always hard to draw, but there is a difference between politicking and trying to appeal to one's base in electoral terms, on the one hand, and on the other hand,

actually just governing, running the operations of government, and what we saw over the last two weeks was a very dangerous blurring of that line, where the, for political purposes, we were willing, as a country to, go almost to the brink of putting our full faith and credit on the line, and stopping the functioning of government all together. and i think that's the tricky spot here is that of course there is no purity in government. but the question is as citizens, can we in fact have a certain measure of full faith in the way that things operate every day in government and not treat it as just another football in the constant political games. >> brown: let me ask steven hayward to answer that, respond to that. what do you see happening in terms of political movements, such as the tea party, and attitudes today about government. >> right, well, that's-- you know, a big tangle there. i can take eric's distinction between politics and government up to a point, but i think i

would say back that the bigger government exwets, and the more things become politicized and centralized in washington, the more we're going to have these fundamental clashes over our disagreements, deep disagreements. i think if you take the long viewsh the way i've been explaining it is this-- if you go back 40 years ago and think about the antiwar movement and how it transformed the democratic party, the tea party is now the republicans' version of that. if you think back to the war movement, a lot of people didn't like their tactics and dispositions -- a lot of liberals-- but they did tend to agree with a lot of their point of view. today, the tea party, while a lot of people, even in the republican party don't like the tea party because it seems to lack prudence, sensible cool claigz about things, they do agree with their aims, and they do agree that there's something deeply wrong with out-of-control government. >> brown: beverly gage, you often look back for us. ideological divisions, of course, are nothing new in american politics, but what do you see that can help us

understand what's just been happening these last few weeks? >> it's certainly true that ideological divisions are not new. i think the thing that's new about whose happening now is really the frequency with which we are having these crises. so as soon as one is resolved, we're already starting the countdown toward the next crisis. and it doesn't seem like there's anyone out there who really has a definitive solution about how that's going to end. and so while we have had these conflicts in the past. >> really don't think that we've had them at this level of one after another after another. >> brown: and so, eric liu, let me ask you, because i know you're trying to engage people in the act of citizenship, what do you see the effect of all of this? are they more engaged? are they just more disgusted and turned off? >> well, i don't think those are mutually exclusive. there is disgust, but because of the disgust, there's actually more engagement. and that's true on both the left and the right. look, i think the reality is

when steven was speak a moment ago about the encroachment of ever-growing, and ever-larger government, we can have reasonable debates in this country about what the proper size and scope of government ought to be, but we ought to regard those debates not as on-off, yes-no, my way or we shut the whole thing down kind of debates. i think the danger of the tea party argument that every new thing, whether it's obamaed care, or something else, is another slide down the slippery slope, look the bottom line for responsible citizenship is our job is to build stems on the slippery slope. it's not to say if you take one little step it's down to oblivion and tyranny. our job is to figure out how do we negotiate these balances, how do key calculate, if by temperament or ideology you are not wanting to calibrate or compromise then we're going to have a politics of perpetual

crisis. i think people are ready to hear each other and see one another and not the caricatures of one another and try to figure out where is it that we can manage to agree on the role of government, and where we can't agree, how can we recognize to be a citizen isn't just a single shot-suddenly death game. it's infinite repeat play and you're going to win some, and i'm going to win some. >> brown: let me ask steven hayward to respond to this. do you see the result of this as people ready to work together or more divisions that ever more polarizes? >> i think there are two things to think about here. one is we have divided government once again. the voters, god bless them, have a lot of cognitive dissonance. in the last week, what you saw is people say, "i don't like obamacare, but i don't want the government shut down. i don't want it to be a matter of a budget fight the way it's become." that's why republicans lost this battle. but if you look at some of the poll numbers right now, i think

they ought to be very worrying for everybody, but i think more worrying for liberals for this reason. you've seen record high numbers of people who now say-- i think 65% in one poll-- that government is a threat to their rights. you've seen a long-term trend going back really to the nine 1960s of the number of people saying they have confidence that the federal government will do the right thing down in 15%, 20%, when it used to be in the 50s, up to 60, 70%. to the extent that you're liberal and you believe in political solutions to our social problems or government engagement with our problems, you want the public to have confidence in the federal government's capacities and so it seems to me as much as this might have been a train wreck for republicans the long-term effectes of this might not necessarily play out that way. >> brown: beverly, when you look back at what could be called police crises of the past-- political crises of the past, what happens in terms of public response to those? >> i think to some degree,

steven's quite right? that i would kind of like to subscribe to eric's view that we're going to have a much more serious conversation, a much more bipartisan conversation, but i think it's equally possible that you're actually going to see people throw their hands up and say, "it's all such a mess. i don't really want to make sense of it. i don't want to deal with it." in that way, it sort of serves an antigovernment message, and in some ways, even serves sort of a tea party message in ways that maybe were intend spd maybe weren't. but i think there's also a danger for the republican party in all of this which is to say that's these divisions that we're seeing right now within the republican party between moderates and tea party conservatives and also between a sort of establishment business class, which is very, very alarmed about what's happening, and this more right wing part of the party, that actually may in fact spell destruction for the republican party. those are division thalz have been there for a long time.

they've often been papered over. but when you're on the brink of financial catastrophe in the way that we were, we may not see them be papered over, and we may in fact see some sort of political realignment coming out of this. >> brown: we have just with a minute left, eric liu i want to ask you briefly 30 seconds and give steven hayward the same, is this some kind of evolving sense of common good that we're seeing? how does that fit into what we're watching? >> well, look, this is a question for us, for the viewers right now to, decide. this is not going to be a thing that either speaker boehner or president obama waveaise wand and says, "we will now enter a period of civility and common cause. we have to decide as citizens what kind of tone we're going to set, what kind of engagement we're going to ask of ourselveses and our leaders. and i cothink there's an opportunity right now, even as the republican party figures out what it wants to be when it grows up, for americans of both parents to learn how to talk to each other. >> brown: steven hayward, last world, briefly.

>> when i hear eric's idealism in a student i always applaud it and it. and try to nurture it. i'm reminded of something james madison wrote in the federalist papers, he said sometimes deliberatative wisdom will be conspicuously absent when most need. i think if you plopped james madison down today he would say i recognize this. this is how i thought things would go. >> ifill: again, the major developments of the day: 16 days after it shut down, the u.s. government got back in gear after congress reached a last- minute budget deal. president obama urged lawmakers to find a way to cooperate and pursue compromises. and a wave of suicide bombings in iraq killed more than 60 people. >> woodruff: online, how a classic american children's book series was shaped by libertarian values.

guest writer christine woodside explores the history and self- sufficient ideology behind laura ingalls wilder's "little house" books. find that on making sense. all that and more is on our website newshour.pbs.org. >> ifill: and that's the "newshour" for tonight. i'm gwen ifill. >> woodruff: and i'm judy woodruff. we'll see you online and again here tomorrow evening with mark shields and david brooks, among others. for all of us here at the "pbs newshour," thank you and good night. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> and the william and flora hewlett foundation, working to solve social and environmental problems at home and around the world. >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations. and... >> this program was made

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