dr. redletter, please get us the benefit of your thinking. if you would, please. i expect you can be prepared to get quite a few questions from the panel. >> looking forward to it. thank you very much. i appreciate the opportunity to be here. i have known many people in this room for quite some time. we have been through a lot of issues and struggles to gather -- struggles together, and i feel privileged to speak to all of you on the blue-ribbon studies panel. i am going to try to keep my remarks pointed and specific as i can. part of the introduction should have been that i am a person with that half into glass -- with a half empty glass. as opposed to have full. full disclosure. i want to say there are many issues to explore as we think about disaster readiness in the united states. not that most americans thought much about this issue before that beautiful sunny day in 2001 when america was attacked by terrorists on the very day, as it turns out, was new york city 's mayoral primary election that did not have been. -- did not happen. clearly, mostly but not ent

dr. erwin redletter. many of you know him as the professor of health policy and management at columbia university. he is also director of the national center for disaster preparedness. we will invite erwin to share his thoughts with us. a pleasure of working with erwin since my days in the white house. dr. redlener, please get us the benefit of your thinking. if you would, please. i expect you can be prepared to get quite a few questions from the panel. dr. redlener: looking forward to it. thank you very much. i appreciate the opportunity to be here. i have known many people in this room for quite some time. we have been through a lot of issues and struggles to gather -- together and it is i feel a privilege to speak to all of you on the blue ribbon studies panel. i am going to try to keep my remarks pointed and specific as i can. part of the introduction may be should have been, i am a person with a half empty glass instead of half full. full disclosure. i just want to forewarn. i want to say there are m

dr. redletter please get us the benefit of your thinking. if you would, please. i expect you can be prepared to get quite a few questions from the panel. >> looking forward to it. thank you very much. i appreciate the opportunity to be here. i have known many people in this room for quite some time. we have been through a lot of issues and struggles to gather and it is i feel a privilege to speak to all of you on the blue ribbon studies panel. i am going to try to keep my remarks pointed and specific as i can. part of the introduction babies should then i am a person with a half cent to class. i just want to forewarn. half-empty glass as opposed to a full glass. full disclosure. i want to say there are many issues to explore as we think about disaster readiness in the united states. not that most americans thought much about this issue before that beautiful sunny day in 2001 when america was attacked by terrorists on the very day as it turns out, was new york city mayoral primary election that did not have been. clearly mostly but not entirely unexpected attacks

dr. redletter at our lunch talk, random act of preparedness. what we're hearing here right now is we have the space of the need for innovation. and the challenge status quo. we need the private sector involvement in this space in a big way. and we need to proper incentives for the private sector to be involved in this space. we also need innovative ways to actually, if we make something, to be able to get it to the population quickly and in time. and even though the postal system doesn't sound like innovation, it is in this regard. we have imposed on us and this system, whether you're in the program and government or whether you're in the private sector trying to serve the public good in this space -- it becomes very risk averse to the business model of medical countermeasures developing and we need all this to be able to, we need innovation to drive change. we need that collaboration. do we need for any of the panelists, a manhattan style type project to really make us more effective? to drive in, bring the innovation, bring better participati

dr. earl redletter going to be our luncheon speaker. any of you in the military you can understand what i'm about to say, you have 10 minutes, you can swallow it now and chew it later. we're going to reconvene at quarter to one. thank you very much. >>> with congress in recess, book tv is in prime time tonight beginning at 8:00 eastern. and followed by william bennett and eric phoner. here on c-span3 american history tv has the fall of prime time. >> the head of the u.s. northern command showed that backup systems worked but there are also infrastructure vulnerabilities, this pentagon briefing is 35 minutes. >> how are you doing? i'm going to turn them over to you guys. >> thanks for giving me the opportunity to talk with you all, been in command about four months, going on four months at norad 58 years young. people don't understand what norad and northern command do. to get my head around it i break the activity down into what we call lines of operation. and the dominant line of operation is defending the homelands. it's a darn good m