what's wrong with the way that universities were running up until the time that john sperling came along with phoenix? >> john saw the constraints of most... most college professors. you know, anybody who's got any new ideas in college are quickly beaten down. the academy hasn't had a real change in how it worked for almost 500 years. >> smith: mark defusco arrived at the university of phoenix in the mid-'90s with a phd in education from usc, but he quickly embraced the phoenix model. >> phoenix, people go to school all year round. we started classes every five weeks. and instead of starting classes in september, in january, we started classes in january, february, march, sometimes two in april. if we had more students than we could handle, we'll build another site and handle some more. we built campuses by a freeway, because we figured that's where the people were. so, if you went by any major freeway in the southwest, you're going to find a university of phoenix campus. >> we put schools 20 minutes apart, because that's about as far as somebody could drive at rush hour. >> smith: to ke

national economic council director gene sperling, thank you for your time. >> thank you, gwen. >> ifill: immediately after that conversation i turned to wyoming senator john barrasso, vice chairman of the senate republican conference. senator barrasso, thank you for joining us. >> thank you, gwen. >> ifill: we just heard gene sperling say... press the president's case for the tax on the wealthy as a way of paying for the payroll tax and we see senator mcconnell has a different proposal. which do you think is the better approach? >> well, i think the american people realize that the problem with this government is that we spend too much. they don't think we're taxed too little, it's that we spend too much and i agree with the president that we do need to extend these tax breaks for people all across this country who are stuck living under the obama with 9% unemployment in this country. and we need to extend that and allow those people to have an opportunity to have more of their hard earned money in their own pockets but i think it should be paid for. i don't think you should just add it to the debt, and the white house hasn't yet said no, no, we won't do

sperling. and house speaker john boehner on jobs and the economy.couple of live events to tell you about tomorrow. the subcommittee holds a hearing on international organized crime at 10:00 a.m. eastern, here on c-span. reports out of the department of justice and the treasury. later, the joint deficit reduction committee will hear previous bid proposals. the will include the cochairs of the committee on fiscal responsibility. that is at 1:30 p.m. eastern. republican presidential candidate herman cain was at the national press club today, talking about his economic plan and foreign policy. during the event, he was also asked about allegations of sexual harassment, a major weekend news story. [applause] >> thank you all. thank you. good afternoon. >> good afternoon. >> i normally speak to audiences that are alive. it is nice to know that you are responding back. it is nice to be here. thank you for that introduction. before i begin, i want to take a few seconds of my time to recognize a gentleman who has worked at this club for 44 years. his name is