our joint chief of staff chair is admiral mike mullen, and he said that our national debt is our biggest national security threat. wouldn't you think when the chairman of the joint chief of staffs said that our greatest national security threat is debt. that maybe the commander in chief might listen. you would think in a normal white house that's what would happen. but instead in washington, we are debating raising the debt e ceiling. and that's the right to give congress the authority to borrow more money they don't have and keep spending money. what your opinion on raising the debt ceiling? i knew i would like you before i walked in here. you know in the last 10 years, congress has raised the debt ceiling 10 times. i have been in washington three terms and in that time we have been asked to raise the debt ceiling half a dozen times. and every time i voted no on raising the debt ceiling. and right now i will be voting no again. because there are no serious cuts, there is only smoke and mirrors. and washington, d.c., that game is over. it's over. because do you know, if you got a dollar

you know, when the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff are taught military guide when asked what is our biggest national security problem says the debt. when the co-chairman of the president's deficit reduction commission and former bill clinton chief of staff says this is the most predictable crisis in history, when you have a $14 trillion debt as big as our economy plus over $50 trillion in unfunded liabilities on popular programs like medicare, medicaid and social security, what else do we need to know? this is the time to come together and hopefully in connection with the debt ceiling, we can do that. >> schieffer: let's talk about that just a little bit because that's the next big deal you've got to do here is figuring out whether or not to raise this debt limit. do you think that the two sides are going to come together and raise that debt limit? because talking about political courage, most people don't really want to do it. the experts say it has to be done. people say they're not sure we ought to because the spending is out of control. will you be willing to do that? >> wel

usual suspects the president and the white house the secretary of defense and chairman of the joint chiefs of staff members of congress so i'm here to began an hopefully an action program with funding from my government but we've got. to be starting the cover i mean you can. fast forward. and call that. way here said and not show what i'm taking it we should expand your operation clean up the beach on red beach one would be my primary objective because my son is a language but you can understand my anger and having seen businesses' gratian on how the ground work on red beach leon had developed an action plan for a base you know that included two phases the first would be to set up refuse containers and collection centers throughout the beaches and employ local citizens the second phase would be to establish state of the art incineration systems that would recycle trash as well as provide electricity for the island the anzacs and plan could be used for any island or some dimension land sources. the local fiji television station he can interview your own story and his current mission to terrill. year

the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, admiral mike mullen, said he was not surprised by the choice of the egyptian militant to succeed bin laden, who shot by american forces in pakistan last month. our security correspondent reports. >> he is already a familiar figure. he worked with osama bin laden for many years and has given al qaeda much of its strategic direction and has long been the group's most visible spokesman. here he is just last week, saying the war with the west will go on. his appointment has been largely welcomed on jihadist web sites. bin laden and zawahiri collaborated closely. both have been fugitives and for years, hiding out in afghanistan and pakistan. zawahiri it is now named the fbi's most wanted terrorist. the leader of al qaeda. >> it is not a surprise he has moved into that position. he and his organization still threaten us. as we did both seek to capture and kill and succeeded in killing bin laden, we certainly will do the same thing with zawahiri. >> what do we know about zawahiri? he is a lifelong egyptian extremist who will be succeeded this sunday.

washington usual suspects the president and the white house or secretary of defense charm of the joint chiefs of staff members of congress so on here are two big and hopefully an action program with funding from my government but we're. really starting out there are many. nasty or. call that. hits in a nutshell what i'm thinking is we should expand your operation clean up the beach on red beach one would be my primary objective because my salty language but you can understand my anger and having seen this desecration of how the ground work on red beach.

usual suspects the president and the white house the secretary of defense the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff members of congress and so on here are two began and hopefully an action program with funding from my government but we've got. to be starting to see how there are many. faceted or. call their. way here is in a nutshell what i'm thinking is we should expand your operation clean up the beach on red beach one would be my primary objectives because my salty language but you can understand my anger and having sane business desecration of how the ground war on red beach. leon had developed an action plan for be sure that included two phases the first would be to set up refuse containers and collection centers throughout the beaches and employ local citizens.

usual suspects the president and the white house the secretary of defense the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff members of congress so i'm here to began and hopefully an action program with funding from my government what we've got. is really starting to see how there are many. plastic bottles. and call that. way here in a nutshell what i'm thinking that we should expand your operation clean up the.

he felt they could lead to the holocaust whereas maxwell taylor who's head of the joint chiefs of staff for kennedy and headed the army when ike was there believed in limited war and wrote a book called "the uncertain trumpet." and their argument was in the nuclear age the only kind of war you could fight was a limited one. and so that's a great debate. but i do not, i cannot conceive of eisenhower having okayed that operation the way kennedy did. but that doesn't mean he had no fingerprints on it. it's probably, you know, as i like to say, the

president obama nominating martin dempsey as his new chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. >> nearly 40 years in uniform, martin dempsey is one of our nation's most respected and combat-tested generals. and just as he challenged the army to embrace new doctrine and tactics i expect him to push all of our forces to continue adapting and innovating to be ready for the missions of today and tomorrow. >> once confirmed by the senate, dempsey will oversea all pentagon and military operations, he will replace admiral mike mullen whose term expires october 1st. the nomination is the latest in the administration's overhaul of the national security team. astronauts aboard space shuttle "endeavour" wrapping up a successful 16-day mission to the international space station. this brings an end to "endeavour's" 19-year flying career, and marks the second of nasa's three shuttles to be retired. "atlantis" will make one last supply run to the space station this summer, to close out the 30-year shuttle program. for "teen kids news," fox news channel, in the classroom. >>> astronaut sandra magnus spe

military came back and said we have to change the dialogue between president kennedy of the joint chiefs of staff and the producers of who is it that dialogue is dialogue from the historical tapes of the white house case and the military still said no we're not going to give you access to our where you can even though the dialogue is his story actually accurate it still means the military in a bad right now really is just incredible you know i want to go back to something he said that he said to you don't think of the military has an obligation to let's say point in their ads or in their recruitment videos that you might die if you join the armed forces or if you go to war but if you look at some of the laws that we have in this country on the books that congress has passed you know let's say cigarettes for example not only are they not allowed to markets to children they have to get rid of joe camel alcohol is the same way but these also have to come along with strict warning labels that say they you should not smoke if you're pregnant you have cancer that you can die essentially why should the

after that, if the president, secretary of defense, and chairman of the joint chiefs of staff certify that the military is ready for this change, 60 days later the repeal becomes official. for "religion and ethics newsweekly," i'm betty rollin in quantico, virginia. >> the answer to that question about whether marines can ask not to share a room with another marine just because they say he's gay is no. >>> in other news, amid growing criticism from congress, president obama defended his decision to intervene in libya. in a report released wednesday, the white house argued the president did not need congressional approval, under the 1973 war powers resolution, because the fighting was not sustained and ground troops had not been deployed. the report came in response to a congressional demand for more clarification of the president's decision. separately, ten lawmakers filed a lawsuit calling for an immediate end to the military action. >>> in syria, the government crackdown intensified this week, as troops targeted protesters in the north of the country. refugees continued to flee to n

troops will stay longer than planned with the latest expression from the chairman of the joint chiefs of staffs and station faces a tough challenge to keep election promises says artie's a major contributor to this latest video blog. time is ticking for the u.s. president to come up with their final solution aas far as the strategy review for afghanistan is concerned if a bomber wants to avoid paying more for doing this seem and counting on the diminishing returns from afghanistan he has to admit that cognitive dissonance between the u s military and civilian force concentrated in afghanistan on the one side and on the other qaida taliban during the latest farewell conference for us secretary of state robert gates admiral mullen alluded to an idea that the united states cannot leave afghanistan because somehow the united states has a vital entrance into this area but the bad news the united states does not have any vital interests in afghanistan that sept to become politically and unconditionally eliminate all and accountable fields oh a cross afghanistan. a mother's decision to use the interne

i have received forthright and loyal council from the leadership of the joint chiefs of staff and i willays be grateful to them for their cooperation and their friendship. i want to thank the chairman of the joint chiefs when i arrived. and my battle body of four years. mike mullen. without his effective leadership the record of the last several years would have been different. he was never shy about disagreeing with me, but never failed to stay loyal to me and the president that he served. he is the epitome of a leader and an officer, a man of supreme integrity and a good friend. the practice in the spirit of collaboration is important for those dealing with intelligence and diplomacy. the blow against al qaeda exemplifies a remarkable transformation with military operations in the 21st century. my views have evolved over the years. i started out as a staffer with president nixon and his national security council. the nixon white house was not exactly a hotbed of admiration for the foreign service. it was thought of as people with last names for first names who took time to implement th

the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff expressed support today but the admiral admitted the plan is riskier than prepared to accept. >> we want to get back to a story we had a bit of technical difficulties with. the breakdown in talks on a dale deel to raise the debt kreeling. here is karen travis. >> after seven weeks and seemingly little progress, the bipartisan debt negotiations have broken down. the house majority leader and senator pulled out of the talks. they said the group reached a stalemate over tax autos talks i think could continue if they're willing to take hikes off the table. >> we want to to remove tax breaks that list goes on. and i don't know that that is a reason to walk away from the table. >> republicans insisted.$5 trillion would be needed to get them on board. that is where they hit a log jam, republicans dug in their heels on tax increases. and relationships said it's time for the president to resolve this issue. >> he's the president and he needs to leave. >> lawmakers continue to grapple with the deficit, the bochl said would it release 30 million barrels o

joint chiefs of staff our military our rifles what do you think this is really about here this is nothing to it probably reduction except that what it has to do with is chevron's projecting its political military might now i was down in ecuador meeting with the president of ecuador and then going to the jungle. to see the damage for myself i also spoke with chevron. and what happened there is that you see you see toys kids poison people in hospitals all over their arms. literally. i saw scores of people were just dying of well toxins it's dumped all over the place was there texaco corp which is bought by chevron a seventeen year trial took place. chevron wanted that trial in ecuador because he said it's an honest court system and now they're saying it's corrupt because the ruling went against them well i used to be a fraud investigator for united states government and i can tell you in my years of experience investigating well and howard that the evidence is overwhelming that being poisoned where they dumped their toxins all over the amazon got into the water supply and didn't want. and t

that is a -- in fact, the joint chiefs of staff do an analysis about every five years on the strategic threats facing the united states and analyzing all the threats facing our nation, the joint chiefs concluded that one of the greatest threats to america's strategic, one of the greatest stratenalic threats america faces, is our national debt. this unfunded liability, these crushing obligations that our kids are going to inherit if we as a congress don't work as we have on this subcommittee in a way without regard to party for the benefit of the nation to find ways to make sure that social security, medicare are solvent that we get the entitlement programs under control because they're going right off a cliff unless we make sure we rescue them and make sure they're solvent and there for our kids. we've got to make sure that we're doing everything within our power in the annual appropriations process to save every single dollar that we can. now -- there's been some debate, mr. chairman, some members of congress in the past have said, we just need to raise taxes. my predecessor, bill arc

war department or the air corps was not willing to do that and general marshall chairman of joint chiefs of staff's had a spokes man who said the army is not a sociological laboratory. the rest of the united states is segregated every other institution is, why should we solve a problem nobody else could solve?aty has long as the military had civilian leaders.at and the naacp pushing for this and they were at unwilling to accept half of the loaf of and a training program but several black newspapers thought it wass wo worth it and a step along the way to get us there. the tuskegee institute became the hub for black aviation and had been fishing for this and convince the war department to create the program there. they wanted that to happen and it was good for their community and students' and graduates. but that was the divide between the naacp and the tuskegee institute.an and where did you e. b. du bois rate argues against the b pragmatic against booker t.nd washington much moreuch idealistic washington and is much more pragmatic it is a debate they have been having over 30 years at this point*. t

have the undersecretary of defense for policy and admiral mike mullen, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. we were talking of the day. he made the comment that people kind of figure -- have made comments to him that, well, you're just going to coast through the next so many months? he said, yes, like i have coasted to the last four months. -- through the last four months. people were probably not in the about egypt, yemen, libya, all the different things that have happened. again, i thank you for your many years of service and for making the extraordinary effort to be with us here today. we will listen now to mr. flournoy -- miss flournoy -- excuse me, admiral mullen. >> distinguished members of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to discuss with you the president's decisions regarding the beginning of our drawdown only afghanistan. our continued transfer of responsibilities to the afghan national security forces. i support the president's decisions, as do generals mattis and petraeus. we offered our views freely and without hesitation and they were heard. the commander in chief

general marshall, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff had a spokesman who said the army is not a sociological laboratory. the rest of the united states is segregated. why should we try to solve a problem no one else has been able to solve. as long as the military has civilian leaders you can bring political pressure on civilian leaders and make it is sociological laboratory. general marshall was wrong in that instance. the naacp had been pushing for this. they were unwilling to accept the half loaf of segregated all black flight training program but several of the black newspapers thought it was worth it. this was a step along the way that is going to get us there. tuskegee institute which had become the hub for black aviation had been pushing for this and convinced the war department to create this program tuskegee. they wanted that to happen. it was good for their community and graduates. they believed it was good for african-americans and americans in general. that was the divide between the naacp and tuskegee institute and that goes back to the founding of the naacp. were w. e. b. du bois

he felt they could lead to the holocaust whereas maxwell taylor who's head of the joint chiefs of staffor kennedy and headed the army when ike was there believed in limited war and wrote a book called "the uncertain trumpet." and their argument was in the nuclear age the only kind of war you could fight was a limited one. and so that's a great debate. but i do not, i cannot conceive of eisenhower having okayed that operation the way kennedy did. but that doesn't mean he had no fingerprints on it. it's probably, you know, as i like to say, the weeds are mixed with the flowers in these situations. >> thank you very much. >> thank you. and thank you folks for excellent questions. [applause] >> and now more of booktv's all-day live coverage from the 2011 roosevelt reading festival hosted by the franklin d. roosevelt presidential library and museum in the hyde park, new york. coming up in just a moment, mario dinunzio examines fdr's new deal legislation. it's booktv live from the roosevelt reading festival. .. used of all presidential libraries and this year's group of authors reflect the wi

he also worked at the pentagon on the joint chiefs of staff as deputy director for joint requirements. that must be quite a business card when you have something like that. in that role, he provided intelligence support to the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff as secretary of defense. mr. johnson graduated from the air war college at maxwell air force base in alabama. he received a master of public administration from the university of oklahoma, a bachelor's degree in public administration from eastern connecticut state university. mr. johnson, you're recognized to summarize your testimony. thank you. >> ranking member spears, mr. chairman, thank you for allowing me to testify today. since coming on board this january i have had the opportunity to work closely with undersecretary wagner and my colleagues at the united states coastguard, immigration and customs enforcement. as the assistant administrator for intelligence for the gsa, i oversee three primary missions. in the case with a warning, predictive analysis, and response. the gsa office of intelligence can receive, assessed,

sitting around that table, maybe me more than any of them except maybe the chairman or the joint chiefs of staffke mullen. have been in this job four and a half years. i took it over when iraq was in really dire straits. so it has been a long haul. but the point i've tried to make to people is they need to understand, i know we talk about a ten-year war in afghanistan. but the truth of the matter is after we ousted the taliban in 2002 and also al qaeda from afghanistan, the u.s. sort of turned its attention away from afghanistan. and really didn't turn back with the full resources, a full strategy and so on until really early in 2009. >> lehrer: when you leave office which is a week from today, are you going to leave with a feeling of confidence that down the road, this afghanistan mission that the united states and nato are involved in is, in fact, going to be successful? >> it is in my view, if you define success the way i think we should, which is that we have prevented the taliban from forcefully overthrowing, forcibly overthrowing the government of afghanistan. that the afghan security forc

when the claimers of the joint chiefs of staff when he's asked what is the greatest threat to our national security he says theebt and the deficit, we ought to pay attention to him. when it is said this is e most predictable crises in history and congress has done nothing on it this year and we' setting still not doing anything and we know this debt limit's coming upon us. we know for us to did not over the next year, year and-a-half, hour debt that have to make major changes in how we spend the taxpayer's money. and our grandchildren's money that we're borrowing. $.40 out of every dollare spend right now of the federal government we're borrowing against our grandchildren. those are obvious things. it is the greatest thet to our nation but it's also the greatest threat to our future. and what we love. no matter what your political persuasion is, if you go on a trip with somebody who is your polar opposite what you find is 90% of the this you actually agree on when you start talking about america. we discount that and we only talk about the 10% that we dis agree on. that 90% that we agree o

i will call upon the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, admiral michael mullen. >> thank you. i am honored to appear before you today to discuss the president's fiscal year 2012 defense budget. as the secretary laid out, this budget combines with the efficiencies effort -- providing for the well-being of and troops of our families, fully fund current operations in afghanistan and iraq and helps balance the global risk through streamlined organizations, smarter acquisitions, and prudent to modernization. the army will cancel procurement of the launch system. but it will continue production of the joint life tactical vehicle and spearheaded the development of a family of armored vehicles. the navy will give up its second fleet headquarters, reduce its manpower shortage, and increase its use of multi-year procurement for ships and aircraft, allowing it to continue development of the next generation of ballistic submarines, purchase new f eighteens and combat ships and the marines will cancel the expeditionary fighting vehicle. they will reinvest the savings to sustain and moderni

that is a -- in fact, the joint chiefs of staff do an analysis about every five years on the strategic threats facing the united states and analyzing all the threats facing our nation, the joint chiefs concluded that one of the greatest threats to america's strategic, one of the greatest stratenalic threats america faces, is our national debt. this unfunded liability, these crushing obligations that our kids are going to inherit if we as a congress don't work as we have on this subcommittee in a way without regard to party for the benefit of the nation to find ways to make sure that social security, medicare are solvent that we get the entitlement programs under control because they're going right off a cliff unless we make sure we rescue them and make sure they're solvent and there for our kids. we've got to make sure that we're doing everything within our power in the annual appropriations process to save every single dollar that we can. now -- there's been some debate, mr. chairman, some members of congress in the past have said, we just need to raise taxes. my predecessor, bill arc

i'm grateful to the members of congress, the secretary defense, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff for their confidence so support and assistance extended to me since my nomination. and of course, i am and have always been humbled by the incredible sacrifice of our service members and their families who've continued to serve the nation despite many hardships. mr. chairman, at this point i must note the will of this committee and its leadership in providing crucial support to the men and women who have offered a plea served in afghanistan and iraq. thank you for the support. i would like to start by acknowledging and thinking general david petraeus whose surface is a commander of isf has been so essential to generating the progress that we've seen in afghanistan. if confirmed i will seek to emulate his principled resolute leadership and if he is confirmed to be the devotee of the central intelligence agency, i look forward to a very close working relationship with him and the rest of the intelligence community. i would also like to express my admiration for investor eikenberry and h

i'm grateful to the members of congress, the secretary defense, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff for their confidence so support and assistance extended to me since my nomination. and of course, i am and have always been humbled by the incredible sacrifice of our service members and their families who've continued to serve the nation despite many hardships. mr. chairman, at this point i must note the will of this committee and its leadership in providing crucial support to the men and women who have offered a plea served in afghanistan and iraq. thank you for the support. i would like to start by acknowledging and thinking general david petraeus whose surface is a commander of isf has been so essential to generating the progress that we've seen in afghanistan. if confirmed i will seek to emulate his principled resolute leadership and if he is confirmed to be the devotee of the central intelligence agency, i look forward to a very close working relationship with him and the rest of the intelligence community. i would also like to express my admiration for investor eikenberry and h

nominee, and i want you to listen to what the chairman of joint chief of staff testified to. the issue is afghanistan, also the regional issues including pakistan and the taliban. here is part from that hearing. >> i get the al qaeda and no al qaeda or small number in afghanistan. that is not the case in pakistan. i just never looked at this as a single country approach. you can't, from my perspective, do that. it is the region and part -- the other core objective if you will of this strategy is make sure afghanistan is stable enough so it can't return to where it was when al qaeda grew up there and in the first place, or some other outfit that would seek to do the same thing. and there are growing numbers of those. and that is not where we are in pakistan. that is where we are in afghanistan. admittedly al qaeda is not there in any significant numbers. al qaeda, however, is very tightly wound with a network that continues to try to destabilize afghanistan and take over that government. the taliban's goal is to still run the country. i'm hard premis-pressed to thine taliban g

know your thoughts on president obama nomination of general martin dempsey as chairman of the joint chief of staff and what you think about that nomination? >> well, i tell you i have met general dempsey before. i've had discussions with people over the weekend who have known him. he's a soldier's soldier. i think. but the important thing to understand is now we are taking someone away from training in the army, taking him away from being an operational combatant commander. now we're talking about him being a force provider and the number one advisor to the president. i would hope that he will understand the battlefield and help the president to make the right type of decisions based upon the council that he receives from the respective service chief. i look forward to general dempsey continuing on his lifelong career of service. i got to tell you i'm glad that the army has a chairman of joint chiefs. >> what is your final position? >> you talked about beating the enemy in the information war. >> yeah. >> could you give some examples of the messaging that the united states should put out with resp

may i now call upon the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, admiral mullen. >> mr. chairman, senator cochrane and distinguished members of this committee, i'm honored to appear before you today to discuss the president's fiscal year 2012 defense budget. as the secretary laid out this budget combined with the efficients effort that he led provides for the well-being of our troops and families, fully funds current operations in afghanistan and iraq and helps balance the global risk through streamlined organizations, smarter acquisitions and prudent modernization. the army, for instance, will cancel procurement of the surface to aramisle and the nonline of sight launch system but will will continue production of the joint light tactical vehicle and spearhead the development of a whole new family of armored vehicles. the navy will give up its second fleet headquarters and increase its use of multiyear procurement for ships and aircraft, allowing it to continue development of the next generation of ballistic missile submarine, purchase 40 new f-18's. the marines will canc

military control which means its taking its instructions more from the chief of army staff and not even the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, although it's a joint services agency. they are not taking instructions from the prime minister. the reason for that is quite clearly the government in pakistan seated control over many aspects of policy through the military. it has failed to muster support within its extremely fractured and weak coalition to be able to have a solid voice on relationships with india, afghanistan, with the united states on nuclear issues. we preceded this ground, and as a result, the isi turns to others for instructions. the reason why he was elected as was said before, he didn't have an intelligence background. it was primarily because he was a close friend of haqqani and continues to be close to him. he was a reluctant appointee to the post and reluck at that particular time to accept -- reluctant to accept the position also. only he can clarify the situation, but the fact he was from outside means there's now a direct relationship tween the army chief and the head of the isi. by all

officials all the way up to the admiral mike mullen, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff have repeatedlyrepresents the most direct threat to the u.s. homeland right now. >> given what's happening with the president, a lot of fears al qaeda in the ariebian peninsula would fill the vacuum. specifically, why drones? why is the cia running this covert program? >> there's been a small team of special u.s. operation forces training yemen's counterterrorism forces. maybe about 100 off and on, rotating in and out of the country, but that training has been suspended because of the situation there in yemen right now. there's a feeling some of those targets may have been flushed out in the open because of the unrest there, and also the unrest, the instability in the government there is giving them a possible opportunity to sort of strengthen their position in the country and launch their attacks. it's an opportunity that u.s. officials do not want to miss. >> chris lawrence, thanks so much. president obama visiting a place where no sitting u.s. president has been in 50 years. plus, it's being calle