>> production assistance was provided by all the written communication and politico, reporting on the legislative, executive, and political arena. >> i moved to report the bill as amended. >> this week on "inside washington," as senate democrats move the health care reform package forward, republicans prepare to fight. >> let me point out that this legislation has not one single provision that is aimed at reducing the cost of health care. do you -- >> you think you have a temperament problem? >> no, sir, i believe my reputation is such that i ask the hard questions but i do it evenly for both sides. >> supreme court nominee sonia sotomayor plays it cool. >> basically people used the cia as a whipping boy.

>> also, why is congress leaning on the cia? yes, it was 40 years ago that an american first said on the moon -- set foot on the moon. >> that's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind. >> republicans have been saying the president's health-care plan will bring -- brig the bank. and this week the congressional budget office seems to buffet the arguments. douglas coleman door of the says the legislation in the senate will do the oppositee thelmendord. >> the legislation significantly expands the federal responsibility for health care

costs. >> the president said doing nothing is not an option. >> the price of doing nothing about health care is a price that every taxpayer and every business and every family will have to pay. >> health care reform is not a democrat or republican issue, it is an american issue. at the start of the health-care debate, democrats have completely set aside -- >> i know i keep s the me question week after week. how're we going to pay for the reforms? one house solution, tax wealthy americans, another, to which the white house is opposed to the taxing employer benefits. do we want to tax police and firefighter benefits? and the democratic party is running ads that target democrats. one in north dakota is targeting senator kent conrad, although not by name. >> this debate is going directly at the white house. i think what we're seeing right now is the emplace against the sky -- left by ted kennedy's

absence. he was going to be the one to forge a consensus and he knows the subject better than anybody and he is a mist. the president understands that his administration will rise or fall on the passage of a serious reform of national health care. and if they don't do it, democrats in 2010, forbade it. they will be associated and identified with a failed administration. >> colby? >> i don't see it quite that way. but these are seeing is the first that taken by a committee that authorizes this sort of thing. traditionally the committee in -- but tansy -- mackenzie committee, now shared by chris dodd, the ones that put out the benefits. the tough withdraw will come from the finance committee where they have to figure route how to pay for this thing. that is whether robert will really hit the road. everybody knows it will happen

-- it will happen in the senate and house ways and means committee. and the president really comes in when the bill passes both bodies and has to be worked out in conference. that is when we are going to see what obama is made of. >> charles? >> if this thing fails, which i think it now might, i think people will trace it to the moment -- the emperor's new clothes' moment. obama had any central contradiction from the beginning. he says correctly that the expense, how much we are spending, is destroying our economy and that has to stop. that is true. and then we get these proposals out of congress, all of which come as the head of the cbo is saying, raises the curve rather than lowering it. you cannot core overs -- sure over spending on health care by proposing an expansion and huge new entitlement. it is a contradiction. an answer to a question asked by a democrat chaired by democrats. i think it is a significant

moment. >> nina? >> you pay for, and there is no free lunch. you tax everybody. rich people who have benefited enormously by the bush tax cut. but the other way you pay for it and you make it work is by having some real controls on the way health care is apportioned, spent, treated in this country, and that is completely missing at the moment. it is only pilot programs in this bill. no 0 control from the department of health and human services. and the president understands that, but he's got to do something. he can't just sit there and wait for his absence. >> how will we get there? >> he may not get it from august recess. i think the president has played a useful -- the person who played a useful and productive role is elmendorf by laying it down and saying this is an

expensive bill. everybody knows that. now how you pay for it. this is what they're going to have to do. the fact you have senator grassley, ranking republican, still at the table trying to work and this thing suggests to me it is not close to failure but add that really critical moment where now compromise is going to have to be worked out and republicans will have to come on the deal. >> crunch time? >> nobody i know questions the intellect or the temperament of barack obama. the question is about the steel and the spine. this is the time for the steel and the spine. the reality is this -- house democrats, who are not terribly sympathetic group, already passed one potentially keller vote for climate change. now you're asking them to vote to raise taxes. $554 billion, even though it is all the wealthy.

they still don't know where the place of no return is an non- negotiable items for the white house. still waiting for the senate to cast any kind of tough vote. this is where the president has to come in and play the role of ted kennedy, that lyndon johnson did, great presidents do when the administration's agenda is on the line. >> one person who has not distinguished herself in this debate is the leader of the house, nancy pelosi, because they have no serious proposal for handling control of costs. her answer on that issue was, well, we will have to look at the waste, fraud, and abuse issues, which, of course, an insult to our intelligence. secondly, we will have to look at prevention beard there is study after study that shows prevention is nice, it saves you a life, pain, but it does not save money. actually it increases expenses. they have no serious answer on

how to control costs. that is why they have to end up with the huge increases in taxes. >> there are serious answers but they are not biting the bullet. >> you don't have some and how someone like dan rostenkowski -- or mills. >> and they don't have tom-all -- tom daschle. we live in a free lunch era. tax increases of any kind to be avoided. the reality is the mother going to have to be and across the board. >> we have a problem with money for health care, but i should point out, goldman sachs had its best quarter ever. we put, like, $10 billion into it. does that mean we give something back by goldman sachs? >> not unless we raise taxes on the folks earning it. just think about it, the political dynamite. we have a financial and economic

crisis in this country, created in large part by the excess of, great, and probably criminality of those in positions of influence in the financial world, particularly on wall street. if and the country is suffering. an informant going to double digits. at all -- akron, toledo, people are in pain and you find out that these folks, these architects who were bailed out of the people in akron and toledo arnelle living large, paying for the hamptons -- it made for a populist revolt for 2010 if the republicans are smart enough. >> goldman sachs paid back the $10 billion, i understand. aig is one of the gets me. they were selling stuff they did have, basically. >> normally you go to jail for that, right? >> i think so. >> on wall street you get a bailout. >> didn't vernon made of cells

stuff he did have? >> hank paulson was on the hill this week tried to explain it, including the bank of america deal where he pressured that bank. he said, look, if we hadn't done something we would be in worse shape today. at the time some of us said, look, there were made to pay any were made to pay -- and look at it, it is not just goldman sachs. great profits, morgan, big profits, even bankamerica, profits. where is the rest of the country want -- left holding the bag. >> i rise in defense of scrooge. >> let him finish. >> i respect the populism of my friends, and i might even support a marks -- mark shields goldman sachs tax. however, the injustice is palpable. however, the reason why we have

high unemployment and the country is in a rut and our currency is shaking is because last year we had a collapse of the financial system. and both republican administration and democrat administration put billions of our money, akron and toledo money coming into the system, recognizing that unless it is saved, we all go down. so the injustices is absolutely there and perhaps what you want to do is tax away the profits with a special tax. however, we want to see health in goldman and cici -- absolutely. because if we don't have it, we will not have -- >> you should have let me go first, charles, because having me make that point would be much more powerful. >> will be the judge of that. thank you. >> perhaps less articulate. >> maybe. really no other way to do this. as much as i hate to admit it, if we don't have healthy banks we don't have a healthy country.

what we can do is, trying to negotiate an unbelievably low rates for paying back stuff. we don't have to do that for them. we did not have to do them any more big favors. they ought to be on their own now. >> let's look at the banks individually. how did they get the profits? in the case of citi, big charges -- what you call it. >> mark? >> let's go back to history for a second. when it happened last fall secretary paulson said i need the money to buy up the toxic assets. it went instead to its big banks, and they are well and still have the toxic assets. >> judge sonia sotomayor, soon to be just as the sotomayor. >> can you give me an opinion about whether or not as a country -- and i personally as an individual citizen have a right to self-defense?

>> i said, i don't know if that legal question has ever been presented. >> unless you have it complete meltdown, you are going to get confirmed. >> members of the senate judiciary committee tried for the better part of this week to pin down judge should my door on a number of issues. -- judge sotomayor on a number of issues. they failed. if he is right, what is the point of for endless days is what is the point? >> they didn't have much else and republicans wanted to extend a hand to their constituents, their conservative constituents that wanted blood. and there is no blood there. practically no blood because she obviously studied and memorized the transcript of the alto and robert hearing and motherly -- alito and roberts hearing and literally use the same. one thing she said -- -- she stayed away from.

she stuck to their script and a republican were just as frustrated as the democrats were a few years ago. >> what we know about this judge? >> a lot less than we know monday. i have to tell you, controversy- free. i have been told that she blow away the president in the interview. she just absolutely, when she went in she was not at the top of the list and he was so impressed. whatever she did in that interview, she kept under wraps. >> we know he didn't ask about abortion. >> that's right. but the reality is this -- bob bork who was intellectually combative and engaged and controversial, gave combativeness and engagement a bad name and since then everybody does the roke a dope. that is what we had. >> what if we took the cameras away? get it over and half a day? >> there would be no audience. i thought she demonstrated legal

competency. she reflected her years as a jurist. there is no question that she knows block. -- the law. senator gramm was reduced to telling her that people thought that she was mean -- senator lindsey graham. that was kind of an irrelevant part of the hearing. with men it is assertive, with women in its aggressive. >> that's right. >> i'm really mean. >> charles. >> i thought the four days was sort of a testament to the triumph of conservative judicial philosophy. she ended up giving exactly the john roberts -- which is interesting. it shows that even if the of a popular president, you have an incredibly strong majorities in the congress, you have to pretend if you are a liberal that you are not liberal in

judicial philosophy because the vast majority of american people are conservative in looking at the law. but in the end, it ended up as day after day of disingenuousness to the point of, of what i would say, if you ever want to make a lead shaikh mohammed taught, you make and watched those hearings and leslie. he will say anything. [laughter] >> what are the chances president obama will one day look at this justice's sake, i made a mistake. >> she will be the reverse on the court. >> i think -- let me just say something here. i think she is more conservative on some issues than you anticipated and we will see it right away. although, most justices, you don't get a real good feeling for them until after they have been on the bench a few years. but we have this case of this year that was 5-4 that said that you can't just set a report, you

have to have the person who did it -- lab technicians. justice scalia wrote it. one of those odd coalition of liberals and conservatives. i think there is a good chance that that decision will be reversed and totally undercut and she will be the fifth vote replacing center the other way. >> this is a woman who spent 12 years at the hispanic legal defense fund in which she struggled mightily for all kinds of liberal causes. for which i cmdr. the idea that somehow ascending on to the highest court, in which you essentially "make laws the tiered he will relinquish -- a live look -- relinquish all of those ideological goals, not a chance. >> that was probably the worst moment, to say that she was on the board but had not read the legal briefs that it generated.

>> i actually talked to other board members saying they made a point of this because if they were confirmed, it would have conflicts. that was the whole point. >> so much of the four days was a scripted kabuki dance about abortion. >> and the gun rights. >> that is secondary. that is the 800 pound gorilla in the room or elephant or whatever the hell it is. that is what it will come down to. she is pro-choice -- and ito and roberts were pro-life. what it proves once again is the political process of the allowed to work. we were headed toward resolving abortion politically and legislatively and it was set -- short circuit in by the court and 36 years later it is still front and center. >> i agree entirely. and ruth bader ginsburg said that before she ascended on to the court --

>> privacy is in the constitution somewhere. >> where is it? >> i'll find it somewhere. >> i'll bring in my copy later. is congress about to investigate the cia? >> to have a massive program that is concealed from the leaders of congress is not only inappropriate but it could be illegal. >> i think we should be looking forward and not backwards. >> a difference of opinion. the story behind this -- apparently the cia had a plan to kill or capture al qaeda roberts is on the ground. the agency spent some money, train for it, based on a 2001 presidential finding that authorized it. when a new cia chief heard about last month, he canceled and told congress about it and they are making noises about investigating. aside from what congress did in know, why is it acceptable to take out al qaeda from the air with unarmed drones, risking civilians, but not acceptable to kill them at a range of 400 yards with a

sniper? >> as an understanding -- as i understand it, it was not just killing al qaeda on the battlefield or drones, but also seeking out and killing them in foreign countries, presumably places like stockholm, bangkok, or lagos and training assassins to do it. this is what caused congress to get up in arms because they hadn't heard about it. it raises a lot of questions, not just the operation but the extent congress ought to be directly involved in every idea and every plan that the central intelligence agency has been coming up with. i think we are on a real shaky ground here, and not only a question of what the cia can do but how other intelligence agencies around the world that work with the central intelligence agency will you cooperation with us if what they

are talking about and planning gets on the hill and becomes on the front page. >> these are too often when we hear about them, black and white questions. there is a difference between telling about every plan senate plan that has gone on for a sense of a seven years. if it is still on the drawing board -- >> but it was never implemented. >> but apparently it had started to be implemented. that is not the point. the point is when you are still doing something and i am not saying that the idea of a bad one, i'm just saying if you are doing something this series that can indicate all kinds of questions and you don't tell congress, at some point coming years and to the planning, you are asking for trouble. >> do we need to be debating this in public? >> we wouldn't have to if they told them about it. >> look, the scandal is for eight years we did not have a program of targeted assassinations for al qaeda. if al qaeda is in afghanistan, you can hit them with a drone.

as you say, it is not discriminating. it kills women and children. if the guy isn't stockholm, you might shoot him and capture him there. a predator cannot capture bin laden, but only kill him. s but believe it is problematic to do it from the sky with a predator -- tactically. there was no program. we saw in that clip it was a massive program, reaching the stage of perhaps implementing training, that is why panetta raised it. up until then it had not even reached a training level. there was nothing in there, no scandal led all, a concoction to protect policy retroactively because of the accusations about cia lying. >> we are not talking about the speaker of the loss. the burden is the law. this is the law. you break in the lot and ignore it -- the law requires you to inform congress.

dianne feinstein is not a liberal one world, she is tough- minded, and she was totally excluded. how many times do you break the law and the public trust and destroy confidence in your government? and at what point do you have to tell them? -- >> at what point do have to tell them? >> the law says you have to inform on significant operations. this was not operational. it did not even exist. it was an idea. >> the decision was made and the vice president of the united states, the report went, proving this, from ,yu at the justice department directed to the white house that said don't inform the congress but that serious. >> there wasn't a program, operations, it was only an idea. >> the moon landing revisited. >> the eagle has landed.

>> neil armstrong climbed down the ladder of them lunar module and became the first human being in history to set foot on the moon. but that's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind. you can see the stars and stripes. beautiful, just beautiful. >> that was 40 years ago. if you want to hear a good column about the challenges of space exploration, reid charles krauthammer this week. with all the economic problems, can we afford to meet the challenge? slow, soft, right over the plate, charles. >> spending billions of dollars on chung. the one thing that will happen as a result of our neglect on -- of space is september of next year we will lose the ability to put anybody on space. we will have to hitch a ride with the russians and chinese indefinitely. is that where america ought to be 40 years after the unbelievable achievement of landing on the moon and a spirit

of john kennedy? i think not. >> i wish we could have talked about this without getting to the stimulus package. i don't see the connection. we needed the stimulus package and we also need exploration going as well and i think we can find a way to do both. simply because the president of the united states has not said he is going to do something with the moon walk -- moon space exploration is not necessarily to say all is lost and america is going to end the way we know it and love it. >> mars, we got to get to mars, and nina. >> look, everybody remembers where they were when kennedy was shot and we landed on the moon and i would much rather remember the landing on the moon. i have been at one blastoff, and it was incredibly impressive. >> you witnessed one? [laughter] >> a couple of them on this show.

>> it was an incredibly exciting and impressive. but i really can't figure out why she week -- why we should do it. >> it was a great national moment. i think the desire to recapture that, that sense of national purpose and mission, setting a high standard and doing it, is something yearned for. the last word. see you next week. >> for transcripts of this brokamp, log onto insidewashington.tv.