give us that flexibility. the last thing i think we are all seeking is predictability and some of the rules and procedures. ultimately what is happening now the federal government is there changing the rules by the day and by the minute. and therefore, i don't know if it is the case with other governors right now, we are trying to forecast our budget for the future and frankly we do not know the medicaid impact of how many more people are backing the medicaid -- >> and food stamps, right? >> the term is woodworking. how many people are coming on of the woodwork. and we frankly are having to do not want to -- i do repeat with the acronym means -- guessing the impact of the national policy on the states. i think that is going to be the great unknown in the state budget the next three or four months is the impact of medicaid rolls. are people signing up for new insurance or are they are just signing up on government insurance that currently exists and expanding the rolls, which is the state's responsibility. thos

governors also believe in what we call flexible federalism. pressing issues that are facing our states, improving our programs and policies, and also being able to bring innovation to many of the issues that are facing not only our state but certainly our nation. as you know, the president getting ready to release his budget, and that will be around the middle of march, so we are looking forward to seeing what his budget holds. in the meantime, we also as governors want to share some principles that we think are important for the president and the administration, certainly be a u.s. housing congress to consider. first of all, any type of federal reforms that we see coming from washington, d.c. that proposed to produce federal savings must also be able to produce state savings. in other words, as the federal government continues to look at ways to reduce our deficit, they also need to remember that states also have a budget, but we have to balance our budget -- unlike washington, d.c. we have to be fiscally responsible and we have to balance ou

>> chris, it's about flexibility for the businesses. what we are seeing for the first time in our -- let me try to finish my response. this is the first time in history -- if you'll recall, this is the first time in our history we are actually going to give americans a chance to have health security where they can have the peace of mind that they will not go bankrupt simply because they used their hospital or doctor. >> sir, forgive me, i'm asking you, the small companies have had the knowledge of what the employer mandate was going to be since the law was passed in 2010. they have had four years, why do they need flexibility now? >> because you're seeing quite a few changes taking place that require the insurance carriers and the employers to take on certain responsibilities, and you want to make sure the responsibilities are taking on in a way that work for not just the business person but also the employees. and what we have seen is over 12 million americans today have the health security they didn't have before. that is important. m

why do you need flexibility now?> you're seeing change that's require the insurance carriers and employers to take on certain responsibilities. you want to make sure that responsibilities are taken on in a way that work for not just the business person but also the employees. and what we've seen is over four million americans have the health security they deposit have before. that's important. make it work right. you tweak it here and there. that's within the president's discretion. and it provides the flexibility that small business own woehr like to have. >> senator lee, does he persuade you? >> no, not at all. this is a shameless act, a shameless power grab that is designed to help the president and his political party achieve a particular outcome in a partisan election. and that's wrong. look, the constitution doesn't give the president that power. his power belongs to the people. people delegate that power to their senators and to their congressmen. they don't give it to the president and that's a good reason fo

i know when we had the meeting with the advocates there were some that wanted that flexibility. since it wasn't clear is why i brought it up. i just want to make sure how you want to approach that. i don't think -- i think it's possibility to do it. it may draw a cost because we talk about what would be the option if there were no shell, but that's certainly doable. >>supervisor john avalos: the option being flexible to have one that includes shell and one that doesn't? >> right. along the line of what the commissioners have been saying. >>supervisor john avalos: okay. i think that's the right approach. and in the meantime, what was the timeframe for this rfp? >> well, the timeframe was to try to get enough comments and good robust comments to be able to feel that we heard everyone and we had incorporated or figured out why we were not incorporating what everyone was saying. in terms, that would include from my point of view the sfpuc. i don't know if we want to wait on a joint hearing or go forward. we have gone forward in the past with out sfpuc involved. it's up to your direc

give us some flexibility. recognize the national guard cost in protecting our national security, it can end up saving you money, so do not deplete us. it is nice among us to find a consensus, and at least make progress toward those areas terry >> what confuses me is that we have been talking about some of these issues for a long time. the uncertainty of not knowing the rules, and not knowing where the federal money is going, if it is going eric >> -- going. >> will business start dropping insurance? we would like to have businesses ay for insurance, subsidized the insurance of their mployees, but we do not know how they are going to go you know what, i will ask michael employee to go on the national healthcare act, and we will subsidize them to a certain amount, but now it is there is possibility. no one really knows what the impact of that will be, but from a financial standpoint, i'm eager going to see a lot of businesses do that, and it will change the whole framework of health care in the united states. re

flex will federal them -- a flexible spiral of them is the catchphrase you will hear all we can. we have to pursue innovation and unusual changes in policies to get the better outcome for the same under danish -- same money spent. we will focus on early childhood education. u.s. editor of education, arne duncan, will be here for the apples of it is not a question of republican or democrat but we are all going to have different ways of going about it. recognize the value of early childhood education and looking at what works best for us and our states and the federal government has to be a partner in that as we move forward. experimentation, the innovation is still happening at the state level. sunday afternoon we have governors on the health and human services committee who will participate in a roundtable drugssion on prescription abuse. we have been working tirelessly in each one of our states to try to slow that -- really what is a growing epidemic of prescription drug abuse. last year, governor robert bentley of alabama, myself, initiative toga really look at what the problem

. >> if the companies need flexibility, then the solution there is not to ignore the law, to pretend that the law allows this sort of thing to happen. the solution is for the president to come to congress. it is not the president's prerogative to simply make this the law by the stroke of the executive pen. >> now large he company had already gotten a one-year reprieve from the mandate of obamacare. this time companies with 50 to 99 workers will get more time to comply. democrats say this is only fair and is largely applauded by business groups. >> the same authority that every president has had to make sure that the laws are administered and executed in a way that helps all americans. the president simply providing small businesses with the flexibility they need to be able to start do thatting the law. small businesses support the flexibility. >> those medium size companies now have until 2016 to provide health care coverage to the full time employees. >> live in washington. thanks very much. is president obama acting as a government of one? we're going to put that very question to j

would agree and i think the key word here is flexibility. what we have to recognize is that this is kind of an ongoing war. the type of threats are changing all the time. -- whereechnology constantly raising the bar. whatever needs to develop needs to allow for that to happen rather than locking in at any particular time what might seem to be acceptable. but iid have a question want to make a statement that i hope we can avoid a situation where the government says you do something and you do it, and it is abiding by the regulations, and that may come up short of what we need to do. that is why cooperation is so important. >> i agree with that. even with the expertise of the four of you here, you couldn't tell me specifically what would be the greatest threat we might face 18 months from now, because these things are evolving, just as our best intelligence agencies and others cannot either. but we want to give you a framework and we want to have our framework that protects theirers so they know rights are being protected, but also protect our

and i agree that the standard has to be flexible. right now, we are talking about chip and pin, but the threats are emerging and evolving, and so does the standard, and it is specific. but, you know, i sit here with the attitude of most of your consumers, which is that half the fraud occurs in the united states, but only a quarter of the credit card use. something is wrong with this picture. in the continuing series of significant, even sensational breaches, an indictment of the american retailing industry in its failure to protect consumer information. we are talking here, after all, not about some sort of science-fiction technology. we are talking about something that is widely used in europe and could easily have been imposed here earlier. so my question to you, in light of your very welcome and important recommendation, and you have had the good sense to make it simple and a graph that is understandable to rudimentary laymen, would your recommendations have helped to prevent this kind of massive information breach at neiman marcu

where a blending those solutions, give us the flexibility. as we see in federal rules and the best way to help people get out of poverty is to give them a good paying job, in the skill sets that they need. producing state, i would like to see something move. >> i want to say that i do not know that we came up with the solutions to fix all the problems, but getting everything on the table, making specific suggestions is the beginning. thank you for having me, good luck in your meeting tomorrow. thank you everyone. [applause] we will take a five minute break and move to the governors only session. >> here at the national governors association winter meeting held in washington dc, we will be taking your phone calls and just a moment. give your thoughts on whether -- thenk it makes governor makes a better president than other political leaders. let us know whether you think governors would make good presidents. we will be showing you one of on how tog panels improve childhood education. we will take you live to one last session as to the challeng

we want more flexibility. those are all things that we have in common. so we may disagree about some policies, you know, how do you grow your economy? some states like to lower taxes, some states want to make adjustments with their taxes, maybe different ways you reform education or your energy policy may be different. governor hickenlooper and i work a lot together and governor dalrymple and governor herbert on issued in our state, but anyway that we can come together and collaborate, we think we are a strong force because while washington many times has in action, a lot of uncertainty, we have governors cannot afford the because we have to balance our budgets, we have to create jobs and improve education, so we are all about learning from each other and trying to find those best ways to do it. governor? >> just to add a point, i think nga is one of those rare but great opportunities for governors to work together on policy. it does not happen enough, is a greatd it opportunity. and i can talk to john hickenlooper about common goals that we have for col

we still have stigma around flexibility.s a, a, if you ask for those flexible policies, even if they're on the books, you are stigmatized, you are paid less, and you're n considered for leadership positions. >> it almost seems like it is the employers themselves that have to make the changes. only way to do that is to convince them that they're missing out on something. by not putting women in the positions. by not paying women the same. by not looking at them the same. is there a way to change employers look at this. >> well, yes. in the first place. we have much more research on having a diverse work force and, what that does for you in terms of energy innovation decision making. but the other of course its, just missing out on half the talent pool. right? if you look at how many women are now -- more educated than men, doing better in university than men, to shut those women out, is to really tie one hand behind your back. >> all right, ann marie. thank you very much for joining us today. i foe you are working on a book.

give states the flexibility to adapt to their own needs and give them the opportunity to do innovative things that can help to actually improve the health rather than just have this federal isernment mandate that it too expensive, not workable. obviously it is more than hhs can handle. they have proven that with their disastrous rollout of the system. they could not even give us the information about the people that we wanted to enroll in the health and wellness plan. so, after their system failed, we gave people an opportunity to sign-up on our system and it has worked much more effectively. conversation with governor terry branstad, now in -- fifth term, seeking rina reelection in november. democratic line, good morning. good morning. the republican party is just living off the stimulus package programs that president obama put into office. but you do not want to seemed to want to give him any credit for helping out your states. first of all, i have two parts. you republicans are against the minimum wage that would help me as a people. you are also for farm subsidies and you are agai

it is seen as the president describes it as more flexibility. he's saying they knew from the starts there would be fits and starts and the giant law would be complex and they needed flexibility to do it. critics will tell you that there are 27 of the flexible moves and they are doing this outside and around congress in regulation from hss and treasury. >> this is the second time this particular group of employees had this delay. i believe it the 28th or 27th time in some teinant of the law so politically speaking what is the fallout? >> the fallout is, that it doesn't instill a lot of confident that this is going the right direction and the democrats are having a hard time defending it especially the red state democrats, and makes it tougher. and politically, it may take the heat off of the small business short- term it creates businesses. these businesses get a break but the man date is in affect and these individuals are still liable for that fine eventually. and so when we get to march, what is the fallout there? the question is what is the b

now he has flexibility. he can do whatever he wants. >> good for people participating in the labor force. this is going to reduce that. >> 5 million people who have decided not to look for work. you think this is by choice. >> they will have flexibility. they will not be locked into a job and if they leave -- >> i appreciate you senator tester and van jones trying to spin good news out of this terrible report. but this is really the bill that you voted for, the bill that you are calling in montana a train wreck. this is something you want to go home to constituents and sell as good news? >> absolutely. you take a look at where we were. we were in a situation. by the way i was in the situation where i didn't have health insurance. every pain i got i thought was something terminal worried about getting in an accident on the farm and not only lose a lifetime that i have of building welt. that is not right. this bill gives people flexibility. they can afford to get sick. that is the bottom line. >> i'm willing t

boom bust days golden with george sheldon who joins me to talk about whether the gold standards in flexibility contributed to debt deflation in the one nine hundred thirty s. plus comedian and author of the can that makes a big deal dave you talk about how chevron tried to mend this relationship after customers had to go through an explosive mistake on their part chevrons far do you want to miss a moment and it all starts right now. with . our lead story today gold now india has long been gold's top consumer however china has recently overtaken india as the country with the highest demand for the precious metal chinese demand for gold bars coins central restored thirty two percent to record levels in two thousand and thirteen even as the price of gold slumped twenty eight percent now according to new data from the world gold council china over took india as the world's top consumer of physical gold importing over one thousand metric tons of the metal to india's nine hundred seventy five metric tons now while gold has taken a wild ride in recent years chinese buyers are obviously undeterred bef

rates i don't presume that they want more and stronger flexible rates they want. flexible rate in china they haven't had a change of policy but certainly in indonesia india brazil and south africa they're accepting global currency as a means to reduce their dependence on capital making their competitiveness increase by devaluing and by making important more expensive and that way rebalancing the trade balance so you saying that we have currency is advantageous no i'm saying that is the policy tool everyone uses because it's accessible it's creek is also dirty in the sense that it doesn't if you get too much devaluation you shy away from doing what you really need which is reform and completely strange in this business model which a country have so say in the case of russia in the short term russia accepted that we could currency to increase the competitiveness have they done anything on reforms absolutely not so the best is a little bit of devaluation a managed to get control devaluation and a lot of reforms unfortunately we're getting a lot of devaluation and ver

that stands for intelligent flexibility.hey know when to be firm and they know when to be flexible. when they encounter a tangle or knot they bend out of the way. the next time they get it. they loosen it up and then they completely detangle it. no pain, no tugging. no pulling, no ripping. >> that's a big thing, no ripping of hair especially if your hair is long. that's important. we are going to show how this brush works through you. would you mind showing us how this goes, cindy? we saw in the beginning it was very tough to get the brush, it was a tangle and now it just brushes right on through. can you show tuesday brush can you show us the brush itself? are there any hairs in the brush that have been caught up in the brush? no hairs in the brush. basically you also told me you can do it on dry hair. you did something amazing which is why i did this on set. show me what you did. you dry-combed your hair. back-combed it. you are making it purposely tangly. that's really tangly. turn to the side so you can see it from the f

there is the issue of it, and flexible and adaptable we will see widespread support. and the risk of increment of regulation is applied, that will have a chilling effect, it is entirely appropriate, to look at existing regulations in how to streamline and how to basically harmonize with the framework but the idea of incremental regulation, growing regulatory pace will have a chilling effect on companies ongoing support of the frame work. >> from membership of your institute? >> and benefit the framework is expected to have the supply chain for pieces of technology and industrial control systems. the liability protection is important to share information, primarily with who they know. getting the right information from the government in usable shapes and forms. the lack of legislation liability protection so that is important. another thing that is important is federal, state and local regulations. our regulatory agency is independent. streamlining regulations and i say this cautiously because god forbid we disturbed, it is the way it is. we know what to do with it. an

there is some flexibility on instagram.s very passionate and once told an author that being anonymous online was at the form of duplicity. they are being more flexible about that. >> other services like snap chat, you don't have to login with your real identity. >> going forward, some of them won't be branded facebook. some you can log on to anonymously. one of the quotes that jumped out at me, he said it is important for me, i see how things can be better. i am generally not happy with the level of service we are providing. everyone is their own worst critic. you don't normally hear a ceo saying that. >> it is very much in the vein of a steve jobs or jeff bezos. they want to push the boundaries and get better. they are relentless at pushing their own crews. it is one of the reasons why facebook just announced great earnings. mark drove the company. if you walked into the demo room, he ended the meeting if you did not show mobile first. he is a tough boss. >> the stock is going crazy today. you cover facebook. they said tha

they say looks at changes in the law to b more flexible. gerri: what is the impact on bottom line ifhey actually do this. >> if you're an irsurer this is driving you crazy. you price a plan, figure out the risk pool will be and put it out there. if they rejigger it this way, on other hand more attractive bet people i the pool but on the% other hand people pull their hair out because they don't know what the plan will sell. gerri: everybody is confused. the white house ss we're thinking about it? really? do you think they will do this. >> i'm supporte. anything that gives us more flexibility, gives us more affordablensurance coverage is a good thing. gerri: meantime we've completely ripped up the whole other way of doing business which provided exactly this kind of coverage. >> you know, maybe, two steps forward one step back? at some point the administration -- gerri: one step forward, two stepsack, half a mile back. few miles back. >> at some point the administration got to concede, small employers are not buying plans, individuals are not

and i think that the word is flexible. >> they do have it in the proposal here that if a lbe member, or part of the group does or decides to get out of somewhere along the line, and maybe before the lease ends, that lbe will be replaced by another lbe. >> correct. >> we want to preserve that space for those opportunities. >> because, in the past, like in the last, rfp, we had was for the old jelly space and it needs over a million dollars worth of work. and so that is a hurtle that a lot of our local small businesses can't take advantage of. ? so that is why because this was a turn key operation. we thought that it would be a good opportunity to open it up to the local smaller businesses. i would like to see it be the first of many. >> we have another one in mind, baby steps. >> i have one more comment and i have been involved with small business lending for a long time in my career and i think that everyone knows the success rate for small business regardless of the background is very, very difficult, and many, and so i just think that we, we need to say that we want a small busines

one issue is something called regulatory flexibility. these are places where we either expedited additional actions that would otherwise have taken a bit longer or done additional work on it. last year we had 76 instances of regulatory flexibility that we exercised, effecting a total of 68 products. there's a another way to try to speed the development of products or assure that products that would potentially go into shortage remain available. so several of the offices receive applications from sponsors for new factories, for new lines within a factory. last year my office of generic drugs expedited 118 applications involving a total of 62 accelerated new drug applications. so an important number of products where we worked hard to make certain they were more quickly reviewed than normal. our office of new drug quality, which is another office looking at supplemental applications to approve drugs, approve innovator drugs. looked at 52 supplemental applications. my office of biologic products, in terms of therapeutics, they expedited sev

let's make it flexible and have people find plans they have before.ri: that would be more like catastrophic, right? >> right now. catastrophic plans on exchanges, only 1% are buying them but they're not eligible for subsidies which makes them very unattractive. gerri: let's look at two guys proposing this. senator mark begich in alaska and mark warner in virginia. they have ds behind their names. what is going on, paul? >> it is election year and two people supported law. had rocky rollout. still controversial. gerri: can't keep your doctor. can't keep your plan. can't keep virtual anything you liked about health care before. >> how can you bend the law without breaking it? the president extended employee mandate twice. they say looks at changes in the law to be more flexib. gerri: what is the impact on bottom line if they actually do this. >> if you're an irsurer this is driving you crazy. you price a plan, figure out the risk pool will be and put it out there. if they rejigger it this way, on other hand more attractive bet people in the pool but on