first of all, a number of our local unions local 21 and the municipal employees the frepd and the police officers association. i want to thank the alliance for jobs and global our city hall and our merchants association and as well protect our benefits that represents our retiree city employees. all those organizations have endorsed this ballot measure. i want to thank in particular the mayor's office office and kate howard, our controller ben rosen field and others. i look forward to any 0 dialog today colleagues in certainly bringing this is to the voters florida we do this san francisco will be the only city to do this. thank at this time i'd like to open it up our public comment. please come up and line cabins the wall (calling names) >> i want to verify that there's great support on the ballots measure. for the released that the supervisor articulated today. so very well. we're greatly appreciate of supervisor farrell reaching out to labor and to include us. we're pleased with the focus on financial discipline to ask the city for increased distributions. we feel that this route actu

local city workers from unions local 21 and sci 1020 say they plan to walk off next monday. union workers told me this move came after 15 weeks of "unsuccessful negotiations with the city." for local 21, this is the first time in its history they are calling for a strike but workers say this should not come as a surprise. the union took a strike vote two weeks ago and gave their notice to the city yesterday. [ inaudible ] i want to say we are proud to show our true colors standing here in blue. we will be on strike monday, july 1. >> reporter: union workers claim they have made several concessions and cutbacks in the back, pension, healthcare, possibly wages. workers say with the economy improving, this should not be an issue. the unions are meeting with city leaders as we speak and they will be meeting with them throughout the day. both of them want to find an agreement before next monday because this will have such a huge impact on the local community. frank, back to you. >> i guess. cate, we know some of the seiu1021 members work for bart. what other workers could strike monday morning? >> reporter: frank, we're talking about front line workers so parks and rec, libraries, seni

event that was political, there was the under current that the two union locals could cause transportation havoc in the area. >> their local is atu. we have other unions here as well. we're coming together to show our unit for ooet each other's situation -- each other's situation. >>. >>reporter: they want to see them as a major stumbling block. >> if it would come to a red lock in the bay area and all of us including our members and including myself, we're all inconvenienced. please know that atu local 192 did everything possible to prevent this. >> what is good for the drivers is good for the riders. >>reporter: whether the riding public seems it that way. remains to be seen. >> some of the sticking points between union members and bart is a 23% pay raise over three years in response, bart management releases make showing that the average base pay rate of a worger start$79,500 and they receive full benefits. an issue for bart management is the pension plan that bart employees don't pay into but the company pays for. >> right now they're paying nothing into their pension. that's unheard of. state employees pay into their

local 43 [speaker not understood] local union. as was said before, so many of our members have lost their homes. they've lost so much during the last recession it's truly affected them. they're starting to go back to work. as you can see around the city there's a lot of projects. from one project they go to another project. i guess what i'm trying -- your job is to make sure these projects are good for the city and what i've heard here today, this is a project that the city needs and it will bring good to the city. i representative local 43. i'm also a resident of bernal heights. my friend and family lives in excelsior. my in-laws live in glenn park. most of the community that i deal with live in bernal heights and they've been waiting for a new hospital, a state-of-the-art hospital. and i guess the other thing is that we really need to look at why the hospitals are being redone. it's to retrofit them and make them safe for earthquakes. and i think the longer we roll the dice, the more chances there are of something going wrong. so, i just urge you, move this project forward and deal with the hospitals. thank you very much. >> thank you very much. next speaker. >>> hello, my name is [speaker not understood]. i am past president of the natural alliance on mental illness, both in san francisco and at the state level. i have 35 years experience in the field. the corporation appears before you with a plan to care for san franciscans needing hospitalization where they have bed for the 8% of people with cancer? yes. will th

local hire from year to year and more projects doing it under local hire we have heard from labor unions and others to do everything we can to make sure the pipeline is as robust as possible. the school board's adoption of the policy and can coordinate with city build and partners and we ask you to increase funding for this program which is currently funded to $100,000 to $300,000 to engage all critical stakeholders, including unions and contractors to add hundreds of workers to the pool of qualified and ready apprentice level and journey workers ready to go to work as need increases. thank you. >> good afternoon supervisors. my name is jackie flynn. i am the executive director of adolf randall center in san francisco. after two years of applying the local hire the efforts of -- [inaudible] labor unions, community advocates and a strong network of providers we guaranteed outreach and engagement of qualified local workers training and support for success in trace career paths and supply the city with workers to perform thousands of work hours for projects. program partners such as the labor 261 are in full support of the efforts to prepare workers and restore opportunities for many of those that have lost their jobs during the difficult times. as we continue to recover it's important to restore and maintain the local work force. recently the conversation of local hire has been broadened to include the san francisco school board's adoption of the city local policy creating a huge potential for more local jobs. we must continue to project investments that the city has made for developing a work force for construction. i am asking for your support of the local hire policy and increase funding from $100,000 to $300,000 to take advantage the

members of the service employees international union, local 1021 and the international federation of professional and technical engineers, local 21, announced the strike in the past hour. they will hold a one-day strike on monday from 6:00 a.m. physical 6:30 at night. dangerously high temperatures for parts of the country including california. death valley is expected to hit 129 degrees close to the century old record of 134. las vegas will be above 115 today. phoenix will be well in the triple digits up to 119. video of the sunrise this morning, but wyoming, idaho, colorado, all with highs over 100 degrees. the bay area certainly not immune to the heat wave. >> it is hot. this looks nice right now. meteorologist mike nicco has a look at the forecast. >> few areas have cover and sfo is getting a breeze off the ocean at half moon bay are two degrees cooler than this time yesterday. but santa rosa, fairfield and concord, eight to ten degrees warmer. that is where we are going do see the biggest push of heat the next 24 to 48 hours. from our roof camera, embarcadero looking nice and awash in sunshine. temperatures are three to se

locally controlled, not just co-ops, but community banks instead of city banks, credit unions instead of bank of america, farmer to consumer markets are 8,000 and growing all over the country, renewable energy locally, and many other local efforts that speak the strategy of displacement of large multinational corporations by getting their customers to move into the community economics world, and just a couple more, and then we can have a good discussion. i have columns on very enlightened ceos, and my favorite is the late ray anderson of interface corporation who decided in 1994 for the company's biggest carpet tile manufacturer in the world out of atlanta, georgia. i heard a lecture on industrial ecology by paul hopkins, and he was a man changed calling himself a recovering plundering of the planet. [laughter] and he swore he was going to turn his entire company around so that within 20 years or so, it would have zero pollution and 100% recycling of the carpets. he would actually represent out the carpets, and he was moving towards the goal with brilliance keeping the costs lower and lower, and out competing his competitors and providing a great place to work because it was such a mission-oriented -- and he wrote sever

local hiring goals so this is our concern and hope that directors can look into this issue. thank you. >> thank you. >> and then we have manny florez. >> good morning commissioners. manny florez local 22, the carpenters union. i want to thank director sartipi for the kind words and get the word out and speaking to middle schools and doing our part but it works both ways. i have to commend her and her staff and the rest of them they work with us, anything that we want, we ask, we get, and one thing about maria she makes sure we're doing our job. hey, how's it going on? she does her part but it's a two way street and she wants to see this project successful and it's not easy. it's a lot of work. we hit roadblocks but we get over it and i have to tip my hat to her and her staff and they make the wheel go and i want to say thank you and pass that along. thank you very much. >> thank you manny. >> thank you mr. florez. any other speakers that would like to speak that didn't turn on a card? seeing none public comment is now closed. we now move into our special calendar and if the board is okay with this i thought we could move up items nine and 10 first because i think they are shorter items and end with the bud

local hire and do some energy-efficiency work and he wanted to be all union and he wanted to do it all together through a project labor agreement and he said i want it to be real local hire and i want some of the folks working in san francisco to be at the table. and some folks said, well that is -- i don't know if you know this, but at times local hire has been a bit controversial and he said here is the deal. if the community folks aren't at the table to negotiate local hire, i'm not doing a project labor agreement and he got us to the table, first ever time in history that the community has been able to negotiate on a project labor agreement and it was great. we work with the building trades and worked with larry and got the job done. it was great. about 70% of the work was local residents and i'm very grateful for that opportunity to actually participate in a project labor agreement negotiation. he is coming up big with community and labor particularly around landscaping. there has been tons of questions how the landscaping services are being performed at the island and he has been the outstanding support for quality and leadership that we hope continues for a long time. potentially citywide reform, really soon, not to say too much, but really excited. please support the re-appointment of director larry del carlo. thank you.

local hiring goals so this is our concern and hope that directors can look into this issue. thank you. >> thank you. >> and then we have manny florez. >> good morning commissioners. manny florez local 22, the carpenters union. i want to thank director sartipi for the kind words and get the word out and speaking to middle schools and doing our part but it works both ways. i have to commend her and her staff and the rest of them they work with us, anything that we want, we ask, we get, and one thing about maria she makes sure we're doing our job. hey, how's it going on? she does her part but it's a two way street and she wants to see this project successful and it's not easy. it's a lot of work. we hit roadblocks but we get over it and i have to tip my hat to her and her staff and they make the wheel go and i want to say thank you and pass that along. thank you very much. >> thank you manny. >> thank you mr. florez. any other speakers that would like to speak that didn't turn on a card? seeing none public comment is now closed. we now move into our special calendar and if the board is okay with this i thought we could move up items nine and 10 first because i think they are shorter items and end with the budget. i thought we would keep the proposal after the budget since that is included in the informational budget hearing. is that okay? okay. so could we please call item nine. >> item nine is approving contract to contract no. 08-04-cmgc-000 authorizing webcor,obayashi to award to bradken, inc. cast nodes structural steel superstructure package by increasing the cost by $17,085,547.20 and increasing the authorized construction services fees by $1,401,014.87. >> director steve webcor obayashi will move the item. >> i am ready to move approval when anybody is ready. it was a good written report. >> it was a good report. since there is a motion already i don't know if there are specific questions on this board item? okay so for the sake of the public could you do a brief summary of the item and i think we all in support of this and it's a step in the right direction. >> thank you. good morning directors. there are over 300 cast nodes required for the project as part of the steel super structure of. the perimeter consists round columns that come together in these nodes. there are custom castings specifically for the project and over 70 different configurations for the nodes with over 300 required for the project. the one foundry in the country bradken, inc. who is the largest in the country has committed pricing for the project. they were the bidding that were used by [inaudible] when they built the project originally and as purchasing it now in the purchase order opposed to the steel package we save about eight weeks on the schedule and helps with the delays of the structure steel and we will save money from the steel bidders and i believe have more control of the nodes through the vendor working directly for tjpa. any questions? >> i think there are no questions from this board. we do have a motion and a second on this item. >> and no members of the public indicated they wanted to address you on the item. >> thank you very much. so let's take roll call on this councilmember. >> with that director harp everybody. >> aye. >> director lloyd. >> aye. >> director metcalf. >> aye. >> director reiskin. >> aye. >> chair kim. >> aye. >> that is five aye's and the item is approved. >> thank you. go ahead and call item 10. >> approving the minutes of the april 11, 2013 and no members of the public wanted to address you on that item. >> moved. >> second. >> we have a motion and a second. >> i will do a roll call vote. director harper. >> aye. >> director lloyd. >> aye. >> director metcalf. >>ide. >> director reiskin. >> aye. >> chair kim. >> aye. >> that is five aye's and the minutes are approved. >> thank you. can we please move back to item seven. >> item seven is a presentation and public hearing for fiscal year 2013-2014 capital budget not to exceed $282,814,000 and fiscal year 2013-2014 operating budget in an amount not to exceed $5,612,895. >> is the cfo able to report on this item? >> good morning directors. this is the presentation of a two quit million dollars capital budget and $5 million operating budget for the next year fiscallary year and it's based on the staff report if the staff approves the baseline budget increases later this year we can amend the fiscal year as needed at that time. there are only three line items that i anticipate we need to amend if the budget increases. that is construction would be the major increase. a small amount in pre-construction and small amount in the engineering and the design for the transit center line item. i want to note that on the current budget it is as also divided into our main categories: administration, specialized and professional services and construction and line items. 88% of the budget is construction. it includes right-of-way. the line item goes up a bit this year compared to last year because we expect the eminent domain proceedings to conclude this year and small amount for others and reserves. on the revenue side we do have sufficient revenue to fund this budget. we show committed revenues that are sufficient as well as planned revenues, a small contribution expected from ac transit. we are working with funding partners to identify new revenues and we are seeking assistance to certify contracts to continue to award contracts as the project moves forward and construction ramps up, but there are no revenue issues as far as funding the accrued expenditures that are planned for this coming fiscal year. i am happy to answer any questions rather than go through the report line item by line item. >> director reiskin. >> i just had one and had to do with the staffing line, the salary line on the capital budget. i know as the project moves into heavier construction there is talk about having tjpa staff with the consultant driven project and looked like the salary line was flat from last year to this year and i am wondering if we're fully using the budget this year or if there is room to grow the staff or plans to grow the staff? >> our salary budget has been conservatively done for these positions and we have a construction manager starting in june so this budget includes that position that is current. >> all right. thank you. >> are there any other questions from board member oses this budget? i did miss this item last month but i read it in the meeting and again saw it again in our budget which was the $100,000 for the caltrans attorneys which i think part of our state agreement. i understand it's part of the state agreement but i am wondering if there is a response to that? and even if we are required to pay it seems rather high. >> we are required to pay it under the cooperative agreement and we have identified a pretty competitive rate and luckily hopefully they're not watching but the rate -- this coming year the rate is going up. we have been paying about $7,500 a month for 24 parking spots in downtown san francisco, covered spots and go up to $7,800 in the coming fiscal year. i cannot confirm this we heard there is an attorney that the attorney offices maybe moving. if they move out of san francisco that obligation of course ends. >> do we displace -- because obviously they're not all working on our project. >> they were formerly parking in the trans bay terminal and that's why it's part of the cooperative agreement. >> i see. we don't need to take action on this item but the budget will come to the full board in june i believe. >> correct. >> okay. well thank you very much. >> this is an opportunity for the public -- it's a public hearing so they have an opportunity to comment on it and we have not received any indication that a member of the public wishes to do so. >> okay. if there are no members of the public that wishes to speak on this item we can move on to item eight. >> okay seeing none item eight is approving the operating assistance for april 30, 2013 and for the resolution of project compliance for the allocation of the measure 2 funds in the amount of $4,231,795 for the transbay transit center. >> this is before you every year to get the funds for the temporary terminal. it will be an allocation of 4.$2 million. that funds the -- >> >> that covers the operation and maintenance expenses. we also have a small amount of advertising and rent that you see in the operating budget and the previous item that goes to the reserve but this allocation covers the o and m for the terminal and this resolution is a formality required by mtc. >> and just a quick clarifying question. i know the differential before the operating budget and the one that is covered by the regional measure two is roughly about $1.4 million that is complete covered by advertising and rental costs. >> and a construction from ac transit. we're unable to use the rm2 money to fund the operating and maintenance reserve required by the lease agreement by ac transit, so in turn for having their additional expenses at the terminal covered they are making a contribution to the operating reserve and that's what the additional 1.4 is. >> thank you. >> director harper. >> move approval. >> so we have a motion to move forward and we have a second. actually was there any public comment on this item? >> not they am aware of. >> let's take roll call on this item. >> director harper. >> aye. >> director lloyd. >> aye. >> director metcalf. >> aye. >> director reiskin. >> aye. >> and chair kim. >> aye. >> that is five aye's and item eight is approved. >> thank you. at this point we will recess the special meeting and to convene into closed session. can we take a motion to convene into closed session. >> moved. >> second. >> we have a motion and a second. >> we do have one public comment on closed session and comment on item 15. >> hello again and thank you for the opportunity. i mentioned sfg tv earlier and i want to quote from transcripts to highlight issues and staffing with directions on multilotions. as example chair directed staff to come back to the board and discussion [inaudible] and the december or january meetings and director metcalf asked that this be considered in the supplemental eir. the board has the opportunity to address this issue during closed session. my reminding that the chief executive that california does this -- and moving this forward is transfer the project to a different lead agency. thank you and i look forward to your report on closed session. >> thank you. >> that was the only member of the public that indicated wanted to address you and at this time we can clear the room and get you into . >> the tjpa meeting is back in session and counsel will report on closed session. >> in regard to item 131 regarding existing litigation and the payment for property and interest in 85 natoma street #9 the board unanimously authorizes the executive director to have an agreement with wendy roess-decenzo and christopher decenzo to purchase 85 natoma street #9 and upon successful closing of the property tjpa board releases the eminent domain action and in regard to 60 tehama street and property and interest in same the board authorizes the executive director to authorize a purchase agreement with peter byrne for the trustee of the peter f. bryne revocable trust and for the purchase of property the board releases the eminent domain action. as to item 14 conference for legal counsel for balfour beatty there is no action to report and for the next section there is no action to report of that i'm aware of. >> thank you. could we please call item 17. >> item 17 is thurz the executive director to execute an agreement with dispute resolution agreement with webcor,obayashi not joint ventue for the performance of its work. >> directors if you have questions we have someone available. >> i would like to move. >> second. >> we have a motion and a second. is there about public comment on this? >> i meant mike [inaudible] >> there is no public comment. can we cake roll call on this item. director harper. >> no. >> director lloyd. >> aye. >> director metcalf. >> aye. >> director reiskin. >> aye. >> chair kim. >> aye. >> that is approved. >> thank you. are there any other items on the agenda? >> no. >> seeing none the meeting is adjourned. thank you everyone >> hi today we have a special edition of building san francisco, stay safe, what we are going to be talking about san francisco's earth quakes, what you can do before an earthquake in your home, to be ready and after an earthquake to make sure that you are comfortable staying at home, while the city recovers. ♪ of emergency management. hi, alicia thanks to coming >> it is a pleasure to be here with you. >> i wonder if you could tell us what you think people can do to get ready for what we know is a coming earthquake in san francisco. >> well, one of the most things that people can do is to make sure that you have a plan to communicate with people who live both in and out of state. having an out of state contact, to call, text or post on your social network is really important and being able to know how you are going to communicate with your friends, and family who live near you, where you might meet them if your home is uninhab hitable. >> how long do you think that it will be before things are restored to normal in san francisco. >> it depends on the severity of the earthquake, we say to provide for 72 hours tha, is three days, and it helps to know that you might be without services for up to a week or more, depending on how heavy the shaking is and how many after shocks we have. >> what kind of neighborhood and community involvement might you want to have before an earthquake to make sure that you are going to able to have the support that you need. >> it is important to have a good relationship with your neighbors and your community. go to those community events, shop at localusinesses, have a reciprocal relationship with them so that you know how to take care of yourself and who you can rely on and who can take care of you. it is important to have a battery-operated radio in your home so that you can keep track of what is happening in the community around and how you can communicate with other people. >> one of the things that seems important is to have access to your important documents. >> yes, it is important to have copies of those and also stored them remotely. so a title to a home, a passport, a driver's license, any type of medical records that you need need, back those up or put them on a remote drive or store them on the cloud, the same is true with any vital information on your computer. back that up and have that on a cloud in case your hard drive does not work any more. >> in your home you should be prepared as well. >> absolutely. >> let's take a look at the kinds of things that you might want to have in your home. >> we have no water, what ar

local -- the prevailing local wage. what happens is, that's not the union wage and in many cases as the gentleman from georgia has pointed out, it's the nonunion wage. but it is determined by a survey of the department of labor of the wages in that area, the danger it's meant to deal with is that in some areas of the country where there's no work and folks are dealing with a recession or a depression-like conditions in the construction industry, unscrupulous contractors can go down there where workers don't have any shot of going to work and they can take them at very low wages an transport them to another area of the country that has work. and then depress the wage base in that area. that's what davis-bacon is meant to deal with and that's still the situation we have today and the danger that we guard against. on these federally funded construction projects, davis-bacon protects these workers by preventing wage exploitation while still ensuring that the value for the taxpayer dollar and work quality are not compromised. this amendment would bar funding to administer these wage requirements. without davis-bacon protection, unscrupulous contractors would be free to exploit trades men and women who despite a slight recovery in their job numbers still today face high levels of unemployment. mr. chairman, i want to speak for a moment about my time as an iron worker and my involvement with the men and women of the building trades. these people are incredibly hardworking, they are immensely skilled and they work in a davis industry and truly care about the draftsmanship and work, they're dead kayed to getting the job done, doing it right, working side-by-side with them was a true honor for me. generations of trade workers by the sweat of their brow and the toil of their hands built our great nation, they ke serve our respect as does the work they do. protecting davis-bacon does just that. the amendment offered by the gentleman from iowa will not create jobs, it will not house our military and it won't result in better care and services for our veterans. all it will do is take away critical wage protebses and open our workers to exploitation in a race to the bottom. i urge my colleagues to stand behind our american workers and stand mind our veterans and oppose this amendment. i thank my colleague for the opportunity to speak and i yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman yields back. for what purpose does the gentleman from texas rise? mr. culberson: i move to strike the last word. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for five minutes. mr. culberson: i rise in strong support of the gentleman's amendment, it's commonsense that the free market and competitive, open biz bidding process is going to result in savings to taxpayers. and davis-bacon artificially drives up the cost to taxpayers at a time when we can't afford it, with record debt, record deficit, at a time when all of us is, as stewards of the treasury, need to do everything we can to protect our constituents' hard-earned tax thrars, i strongly support the gentleman from iowa's amendment to make sure we have a competitive bidding process where the lowest price at the obviously free market wages in this environment, the 21st semplingry are going to be fair wages with good compensation and good benefits, we truly don't need to pay higher wages in an era of record debt and deficit. i would, madam chairman, like to yield the remainder of my time to the gentleman from iowa. the chair: the gentleman is recognized. mr. king: thank you, madam chair. i appreciate the gentleman from texas yielding. first, in response to some of the remarks that were made that davis-bacon wages are based on surveys. well, technically they are her rate urveys but shop employers don't always answer those surveys because union organizers show up to organize employees shortly after that. it's often not smart to turn in your wages to the department of labor because it results in labor organizers coming in to drive up wages more. the statement about the cost of davis-bacon wages saving money in katrina reconstruction, that's a new one for me. my recollection is george bush after ka tina suspended davis-bacon so the money could be best supplied to get the cleanup and then the reconstruction dobe down in new orleans in that area under katrina and shortly thereafter he lifted that order so i don't know how a study could show how much money was actually saved if my memory is correct that it never really was implemented for any length of time that was appreciable. i don't know of a study that shows imposed union scale davis-bacon wages saves the people money unless that is funded by the unions themselves there is no argument that this is the last remaining jim crow law. e law that was designed to lock black americans out of union trade, particularly in new york city, the vestiges of that remain today and i think it's worthy to go back and look at the study and see what ethnic populations are represented in construction trades in place like new york city. i think it would be constructionive to look at that also, labor is a commodity, the value of it needs to be determined by supply and demand in the marketplace. just like gold or oil or corn or beans, where i come from you won't get the real wages unless you let competition determine that as an employer, i want to pay the best wages i can, i want to provide the best benefits i can, i want to hire the best people i can, and in doing so, your people are your company. when you hire good people and pay them a good wage, you get to keep them. when i set up -- what i set up a business model on was hiring people in a seasonal business to work 12 months out of the year. not going to the union hall and putting them to work for a few tais but saying to them you could have a career here. i'll give you 12 months' work for 2 months' pay, i'll give you a benefits package and i want to compete with that. but when the federal government comes in and tells you somebody on a shovel has to be paid this, somebody on a back hoe this, somebody on a motor grader has to be paid this you'll see them machine hopping during the tai because they'll always be maneuvering to get on the machine that pays the highest wages, not the one that does best for efficiency to get the job done. i've had to go in and police that and go in and build a spread sheathe that call cue lays the movement of everybody on our jobs in order to determine i could comply with the federal government's requirement i pay the wages they demand and insist insthofede simplicity of saying here's what i'll offer you for pay and benefits and they've said, what's my job? i'll define your job for me, help me make money. and i'll pay you for that i want to reward you by trying to give you enough money and ben fits to keep you. that's how free markets work. we can't be out here sitting up a union scale imposed by people in a back room, can't be supporting the last vestige of jim crow laws, letting the federal government decide what job categories are going to be paid what wages when we just want to put people to work and let them develop and -- develop a skill and develop their trade. so the machine hopping is something that gives me a lot of heart burn and even if we have an actual representation of prevailing wage, it's still not representative of supply and demand because many states have passed mini davis-bay cop laws and the market has been so distorted we don't have a concept of what that cost is, madam chair. i urge adoption of my amendment and yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. for what purpose does the gentleman from michigan rise? >> i move to strike the last word. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for five minutes. thank you, madam speaker. >> come from flint, michigan and it's a community that is proud of the fact that in this area and true across the country that the notion has been if you work hard and train yourself and focus on a trade and go to school, you will be paid a wage commensurate with the contribution that you make to the work that you're doing. we live in a time when we are seeing decreasing compensation for the value the worker brings to the workplace. between 1945 and 1975, we saw worker productivity rise in this country by 97% and we saw household income rising in that same 30-year period. here was parity for the work and compensation they received. fast-forward and we have seen a period of economic growth and expansion, increased worker productivity. 0% over the last 30 years. 10% increase in productivity. we are not compensating the average worker for the quality and the work that they do and contribute to the highly productive society we live in. this is yet another attempt to continue the race to the bottom where we see real wages go down and productivity continue to rise. i have done a tremendous amount andork in local development as a private citizen, been involved in lots and lots of construction projects involving hundreds of millions of dollars and i will tell you one thing, there is nothing sacrificed that making sure the people are paid a wage that is fair and fits the marketplace. not only good for those families that benefit from a decent and fair wage, but supports the local employers and the small businesses that we all talk about every day that we are trying to support. where does the money come from into communities that support those folks? the workers have a decent living wage that allows them to pay their bills, set aside money for their families and contribute to a local economy. fair wages contribute -- davis-bacon wages contribute to the ability of workers to train as well. this is the wrong direction for this country and certainly the wrong direction in this budget connected to the work that our nation does and what we fought for in this country was a society that rewards people f

local government in the country. the existence of public employee unions is without question a big part of the reason people of so little trust in government these days. they are the reason so many state and local minas appellees are flat broke. they are behind public pensions. today i'm calling for a serious national debate about them. on the federal level, the first thing we should do is stop the automatic transfer of union dues from employee salaries at the taxpayers expense. [applause] if the unions want their dues, it should be incumbent on them and not us to pay for it. the assault on free speech continues, and it is fairly an uphill battle. but if we are alert to the tactics of the left, and take these assaults one by one, i am confident that we can beat them back. let me give you a few final examples of what i'm talking about. right now there is an effort over at the federal communications commission to get groups that buy campaign ads to disclose their supporters. this is utterly, utterly irrelevant to the mission of the fcc. and we need to say so. the sec is being pushed to display their public supporters. this proposal does not protect shareholders and it does not protect governors.

and the local pauls not held accountable for the failure to plan and be truthful in the past. >> some of the local pauls can be voted out because of the unhappiness of the unionsf. >> right. the ohio insurance department announced this week that premiums on the exchanges will be 88% higher than what people paid for individual insurance last year on average in ohio. >> but, real fast, doesn't this mean that the overall cost of obamacare goes up? we're going to be shelling out more money because more peoole -- >> definitely. the president in san jose, california said this week that people buying on exchanges get a better deal than they've got. maybe if you're uninsured, that's true, but for everybody else, they are really losing a lot of money in the deal. >> betsy, we appreciate you being with us again. >> thank you. >> carbon pollution down in the united states thanks to fracking. will -- fracking for natural gas that is -- will that open the door in california for them to frack and go get their own natural resources? our resident california has a decision on that next. >> apple unvailed some new items yesterday, and they made fun of steve jobs while doing it?

union of an became active in local 1129 in raleigh. worked part-time as a special i.t. organizer. in 1973, through 1976 and was elected secretary-treasurer of local 1129 in 1975. he also held the elected positions of local chairman and legislative representative and a served as a delegate to five utu international conventions from 1979-1995. i want to extend a particular welcome to our next witness, jim redeker, commissioner of connecticut's department of transportation, and he has a long and distinguished career in transportation, most tickling beginning with his great in the new jersey transportation department, 1978 he joined in j. transit which was created the following year helping to build the third largest transit agency in the country. in 30 years since he has held positions of increasing responsibility. his portfolio of experience includes strategic planning and policy, capital program, transportation planning, transit service planning and scheduling and many other areas of expertise and expense but perhaps most prominently and importantly, he asserted with extraordinary dedication and success as commissioner of transportation for connec

local government in the country. the existence of public employee unions is without question a big part of the reason people of so little trust in government these days. they are the reason so many state and local minas appellees are flat broke. they are behind public pensions. today i'm calling for a serious national debate about them. on the federal level, the first thing we should do is stop the automatic transfer of union dues from employee salaries at the taxpayers expense. [applause] if the unions want their dues, it should be incumbent on them and not us to pay for it. the assault on free speech continues, and it is fairly an uphill battle. but if we are alert to the tactics of the left, and take these assaults one by one, i am confident that we can beat them back. let me give you a few final examples of what i'm talking about. right now there is an effort over at the federal communications commission to get groups that buy campaign ads to disclose their supporters. this is utterly, utterly irrelevant to the mission of the fcc. and we need to say so. the sec is being pushed to display their public supporters. this proposal does not protect shareholders and it does not protect governors. for the left, this is not about good government or corporate governance, is about winning at all costs. even if that means shredding the first amendment and that is why we need to be vigilant about every one of these assaults. they might seem small and isolated in the particular, but together they reflect a culture of intimidation that extends throughout the government. a culture abetted by a bureaucracy that stands to benefit from it. the moment a gang of u.s. senators started writing letters last year demanding the irs enforce more disclosure upon conservative groups, we should have all cried foul. the moment white house proposed a draft order replying applicants for government contracts to disclose their political affiliations, we all should call them out. when the hhs secretary told insurance companies, back during the obamacare debate, told insurance companies that they could not tell their customers how obamacare would impact them, we all should have pulled the alarm. as soon as we learned that left- wing groups were manufacturing public outcry for corporate disclosure at the sec, we should have exposed that for what it was. there might be some folks other waiting for hand signed memo from president obama to lois learned to turn up. do not hold your breath. what i'm saying that a court made a campaign to use the levers levers of government to target conservatives and stifle speech has been in full swing and in open view for all of us to see for years. it has been carried out by the same people who say there is nothing more to the disclose act then transparency and no more two other disclosure regulations than good government. but the irs scandal puts the lie to all of the posturing. because now we know what happens when government gets its hands on this kind of information. when it is able to isolate its opponents and whether you are a pro-israel group, or a tea party group in louisville, they can make your life miserable. they can force you off the political playing field which is precisely what we cannot allow. there are a lot of important questions that remain to be answered about the irs scandal, but let's not lose sight of the larger scandal that has been right in front of us for five years. a sitting president who simply refuses to accept the fact that the public will not applaud everything that he does. this president expects the public to applaud everything that he does. my plea to you today is that you call out his attacks on the first amendment whenever you see them, regardless of the target. because the right to free speech does not exist to protect what is popular, it exists to protect what is unpopular. the moment we forget that, we are all at risk from right to left. if liberals cannot compete on a level playing field, they should make up better arguments. what is wrong with the competition of ideas? if your argument is so weak that you have to try to intimidate and shut up your opponents in order to win the game? look, the only way to beat a bully is to fight back and that is all of us need to do. be wise to the way of the left and never give an inch when it comes to free speech. thank you very much. [applause] >> we have time for some,, yes, yes ma'am. >> hi, my name is barbara from new york. is there any suspicion that intimidation goes beyond the irs and the things you mentioned. it is frightening considering that our government has things like stunt guns and star wars. >> i will not speculate where else they exist, where they already exist is pretty stunning. we have seen that at hhs. they sent out a directive to health recoveries that they cannot tell their policy holders with the impact of obamacare would do to them. this is the same secretary that is shaking them down for money in order to run television advertising supporting obamacare. then of course over the fcc obama proposed an initiative that require you a condition to pursue what ever cause you may have to disclosure donors you are making advertisement. and then we have seen what is happening at the irs. the president himself has been demonizing these people and so the point i'm making here today is that it is not surprising that the bureaucracy would pick up on that. and think they would pick up on that and say that is what we are supposed to do. the ceo has laid out the game plan, so i don't know what my else be going on, but the things we do know are going on our right in front of us and they are beyond disturbing. leave me, if this were a republican administration and these were liberal groups that were being subjected to this kind of treatment, this would be big news on the front page of "the new york times," on a daily basis. >> i am elizabeth regular citizen. tank you for coming and educating us. they after day, we hear a litany of corruption and abuses which should not surprise us because we know that president obama has in his mind and is determined to fundamentally change and transform america. despite what karl rove advised, is there not any of these abuses which legally rises to an impeachable offense? i'm sorry to put you on the spot, but you will not answer my e-mails. >> i think we need a thorough and complete investigation and let the facts take us where we will go. i am confident the house of representatives will have a thorough investigation, at least two committees i am aware of. they are pursuing this and a methodical way and i don't want to jump to any conclusions, i just love the fax to take us where they take us. i am prepared to say that the president and his political allies encouraged this kind of bureaucratic overreach by their public comments, but that is what different from saying they ordered it. i think we need to find out who is responsible and the investigation will go on for quite some time. >> hello, a couple of your colleagues have proposed a constitutional amendment that would specify that no rights in the constitution would apply to corporations. i'm just wondering if you could react to that and maybe discuss what some of the consequences of that would be. >> give them some points for not hiding it. the constitution has been amended very rarely in our well over 200 year history. for good reason, it has served us well. they were not uncomfortable with corporate free speech when corporations that owned newspapers or television stations were engaging in it, they only become uncomfortable ones of report said why should there be a carveout for corporations that own the media out and for no one else? it is an absurd proposal.it will not go anywhere. >> what you think about the efforts of michael bloomberg to encourage democratic donors a particular amount of votes in the senate. >> he can express himself, and i support the right for him to say whatever he wants to. i obviously, from a partisan point of view, i hope they [laughter]him. >> i am part of the mccain institute and i'm currently a student at the university of texas and i am wondering about this issue, it seems like they are starting to notice obama's immortality is disappearing and that he is flawed. what will it take for them to go maybe it is time to see the light and understand that he is not all he's cracked up to be? >> i think it is keeping your eyes open and watching what is happening. simple observations. it is not surprising -- the biggest difference between the two parties today in america, they are the party of government and we are the party of the private sector. that is not that we should think there is no government at all, but they really trust the government. that is why they are in such a tight alliance with a look employee unions who are the principal benefactor of larger government and to have little or no interest in bigger and bigger debt. to the extent that they have become skeptical, that maybe this degree of government is not such a good idea, that is an encouraging sign. one of the great things about being young is that if your health holds up, you get older. it is amazing how your views change as you advance in age and i hope they will simply observe what is going on. this is what you get when you elect a government that believes government is the answer. and for two years they owned the place. they had a great election in 2008. they can do whatever they wanted to, and they did. $300 stimulus, take over american healthcare, the student loan program, first four years of $20 deficits, they could do whatever they wanted to. the encouraging thing is that in 2010, they look to that initiative national restraining order. my guess is they were younger voters who began to have second thoughts. the president was reelected, but he did not have the kind of election he did in 2008. he did not flip the house am a change the senate much, it was status quo at the federal level. at the state level 30 out of 50 governors are now republicans. it was not a wiped out election. now we have divided government and divided government can do one of two things, they can do great things as reagan and tip o'neill did when they raised the age of social security and they did the last conference of tax reform, or even bill clinton when he joined a republican congress and did welfare reform. what has been missing during this time of divided government from 2010 until now is a president willing to tackle the single biggest issues in country. it can only be done on a bipartisan basis, and the transcendent issue of our time is the size of our debt. what i have been waiting for with this president, i have plenty of differences with the president, he will be here for 3.5 years and what will he do? if you want to pivot and help us solve the biggest issues confronting your generation in the future, we need to try and do that, but i've not seen any evidence of it. i've not seen any evidence that he is willing to leave this ideological place or he is put himself in for virtually all of his presidency and move in a different direction. i have wondered the field from your comment, but i think younger voters are getting more skeptical because they are watching what is happening. >> mpr had a story this week where they quoted if you left- wing organizations that said they have undergone undue scrutiny as well, that they have been asked unwanted questions. don't we want the irs to make sure that those groups are not being given tax exempt status? >> i think it will be easy to get tax-exempt status whether you are on the left or right. i'll think the government should deny a status that should be rather easy to achieve. i am not a fan of harassing either right or left. >> i just want to follow up on that. this claim is being made that these groups are abusing their tax status, i'm not seeing any proof of those claims. if they were not 501(c) organizations, presumably to be 527 organizations and from the standpoint of revenue collection does this make any difference for the federal government and the irs? >> none whatsoever. good point. >> senator, you mentioned about the fact that 501(c) organizations do not have to disclose their donors, and that is true that they do not have to disclose them publicly. i represent the national organization for marriage. donors were released by the irs illegally. the goal opponents and it is still posted on their website. would you support a legislation that they would no longer have to disclose their donors to the irs? >> i have not thought about it, i assume you've given that case examples to the house republicans. >> yes, we asked foran investigation a year ago, but the irs will not give us a report because they are hiding behind taxpayer confidentiality and they are saying it is confidential. they will not tell us the identity of the individuals within the irs who were responsible for that disclosure. >> my bias is in favor of as much political speech as possible with minimal amount of government interference and harassment on the left or right or anyone else. i think the last thing the american people suffer from is too little political discourse. that would be my general philosophical approach to all of these issues. there is a rational basis for groups like as not having to disclose, that is what the supreme court decision was all about. it is one thing to require disclosure when you give to a candidate or to a party, i do not oppose that. i think my voters and all of you should know who supports my campaign and my party. but these are not contributions to candidates or parties, these are contributions to groups and sometimes that does intersect with what is going on politically because it is important to remember that only those who get elected make policy. so, a lot of issues that people want to discuss certainly do intersect with the political discussion that is going on because they might have views that are better represented by one point of view versus the other. to me, this is not a subject we should be alarmed about. that we should think is something that needs to be dealt with, i think it is something that needs to be encouraged. >> senator, -- >> i have enjoyed you over the years, norm. you have been wrong about almost everything. [laughter] i've always wondered who has eaten lunch with you over the years. some of the worst things that have been said about me have been said by you. you have been entirely wrong on virtually every occasion i'm glad to see what is on your mind. [laughter] >> one thing we agree on is that some of the worst things that are said about me have been said by you. >> i didn't make anything up, i was quoting you directly. >> my first question is that in 2000 on "meet the press," you gave an eloquent defense on disclosure and why a little disclosure is better than a lot of disclosure. in the citizens united decision, we had eight justices including robert scalia and alito all caps and equally full throated defense of disclosure of all sorts including shareholders knowing what their companies doing in the political front. why -- >> of course that is not accurate. they didn't say was a matter of constitutional interpretation, i am sure that if we passed it they would not strike you down. with regard to disclosure, you have to go back to the 1980's to find a time when i suggested -- which i did and i was wrong bout it -- to find a time that i suggested that disclosure of 501(c) was a good idea. i made a mistake, the supreme court left that up to congress to decide and the democrats tried to pass the disclose act selectica the names of our critics and we want to make it difficult for them. >> let me ask one more question about 501c. the law says that they are supposed to be exclusively welfare organizations, to believe that organizing for america and america's crossroad gps are exclusively welfare organizations? >> the interpretation that the rs has had going back 40 or 50 years, i agree with. let me tell you what norm is really for. what he's really for is the government telling candidates for congress how much they can spend government mandated spending limits, and using tax money to pay for it. if norm had his way, he would push the private sector all the way out of the process of getting elected. you would file, the government would tell you how much you could speak and spend, the government would give you the money to pay for your speech. a total government takeover of the whole process from the time you file, to the time you're sworn in. what congress is that likely to produce? the kind that was to go the government because the government would be in charge of how they got there. make no mistake, norm is a good old-fashioned far left guy. i like him, he has been wrong for as long as i can remember and it is great to see you i want to spar with you for years. [applause] >> paul from cnn, the issue of immigration tuesday, one area that the two parties are omprimising. how do you think this will sort out? >> i am not doing an immigration press conference here. we will be on that matter for nother week or so. how about that young lady right there? >> senator, thank you so much for coming. i was wondering, just looking at mexico and how they have had political turmoil and yet they are still pushing forward a number of substantial legislation and policy they want to get accomplished, they are still able to do that even though they have had a ethical political environment. you said the president has been unwilling to negotiate and deal with the government that he is faced with. is there anyway we can work through that and the comp but some of the things he mentioned like tax reform, dealing with irs? >> i hope so. it is up to the president. the president and our system is unique. there is only one person in america that can sign something into law and only one person who can deliver to the members of his party. the speaker and i have tried to engage the president for 4.5 years to tackle the transcendent issue of our time, unfunded liabilities and our current debt which is stunning. i think, as part of his responsibility, what i hope what he will decided to engage in a serious discussion about how to get an outcome to the biggest problem facing our country. we've not seen that yet, but i can't give up hope because he will be there 3.5 more years. we have do deal with the government we have, not the one hat we hope for. >> do you have any thoughts about reauthorizing the anthony statute so we can get some of these investigations out from under the thumb of his partnership? -- department of justice? >> i have let that happily expire in the late 90's. i don't think it's her of the country well at all and i would not be in favor of bringing it back. it was one of the post watergate reforms -- most of those have not worked out very well. i don't think going back to that would be a step in the right direction. >> hello, i am in internet freedom works and i was curious about what you are thoughts were on the nsa's overreach as far as wiretapping? how would you think it should be addressed? do you think it needs to be reformed? >> i will confine the discussion today to things that are largely related to the subject of my speech and the independent counsel is in a way because it was part of the post-watergate reforms. any other questions on the topic that we have been talking about this morning? ow about right here? >> hello, i just wanted to -- in relation to public employee unions and your decision to have them scaled back, i just wondered if you want to comment on scott walker and how that can be translated nationally in other states? >> i think it has been a emarkable success story. i might not have this totally accurate, but roughly accurate that once the employees in wisconsin were given the option of not paying their dues, apparently the support plummeted. meaning that the employees, when given the choice, decided that representation was not that important to them. regardless of whether you have them or not, the larger question i wanted to raisee today is the appropriateness. that's why i went back to fdr, the appropriateness of unions in the public sector because in every negotiation there is a missing person, and the missing person is the taxpayer. the negotiation is between today's public official in today's union leader reaching an agreement to obligate the taxpayer and their future and there is no taxpayer there. i believe that is why fdr, at least initially, felt that unions are entirely appropriate in the private sector. i support private-sector nionism. there is an election, a secret ballot election, winners when, and losers accept it. but it seems to be as fundamental a incompatible. if you look at the results of that, with the pension problems all across the country, virtually every state in the country is awash with pension roblems. he of people that work in the government actively discouraging and bring the power of the government down on the people who think the federal government s too big. it strikes me that this is a 50 year mistake and it is time to have a discussion again of the appropriateness of unionism in the public sector. in the private sector, find. -- fine. i don't have a problem with that. but because we are suffering the consequence is that. i will take one more uestion. >> first, an observation about norms comment earlier where he talked about social welfare. when congress set up that statue in the 50's, there is no evidence that they intended to exclude political activity. i wondered your thoughts about his. do people trying to improve their government, couldn't that improve the social welfare in our nation if people use political activity? >> obviously, that is my view. i think we should be encouraging this sort of thing and not discouraging it. the whole disclosure game has nothing to do with anything other than going after your donors. it would never offended by this until the last few years when conservatives started doing more of that. all the sudden, this is a fairly recent outrage here. this is about nothing other than getting the names of your donors o you can go after them. we should be discouraging that in every way we possibly can and encouraging this kind of participation. this kind of involvement is the kind we ought to have and goodness gracious to have the government itself picking winners and losers in the game of political speech is -- outrage. thank you for being here so much. [applause] >> tonight on c-span, the congressional internet caucus discusses data collection programs and privacy laws. followed by a like at cyber ecurity for u.s. businesses. then alan greenspan. tomorrow on "washington journal" we'll talk about the federal research's plans for its sometime yu luss program. followed by issues important to younger americans, including student loan interest rates. and the washington post reports hat they use photo database to identify suspects in criminal investigations. e'll talk with the reporter. "washington journal" live on c-span at 7:00 a.m. eastern. >> when you talk about transparency to the american public there is -- you're going to give up something. you're going to be giving signal to our adversaries about what weaknesses are. the more specific you get you are having people sitting around saying ok, now i understand what can be done with our numbers in yemen and in the united states and i'm going to find another way to communicate. there's a price to be paid for that transparency. where that line is drawn in terms of identifying what our capabilities are are out of our hands. there's a price to be paid for that transparency. >> this weekend on c-span, outgoing f.b.i. director robert muller makes his last scheduled appearance. on c-span2, books and issues in the news on book tv. sunday at 10:00, immigration stories. interviews with key house judiciary staff, discussing whether there were there was grounds to impeach president nixon. >> a report about collecting phones and e-mails. a caucus internet committee held a meeting today. eakers are from the cato institute. this is about an hour. withful s roger, i'm r.j. c. associates and i'm a founding board member. on behalf of the internet education program and the caucus welcome to today's discussion. let me tell all of you that the tweeter hashtag for today's #icacnsa. for about 20 years, the internet ducation program has pursued policies on the education and done this in a completely nonpartisan and educational way. this includes the work of the professional internet caucus advisory committee, of which today's discussion is apart, and they also include the net conference, mobile net, and get netwise, and we expect soon on internet applications. i encourage you to visit our website -- neted.org --and learn more about the internet a education. f you like our work, i encourage you to be one of our upporters. today's discussion is one of the series of discussion sponsored by the internet advisory committee. the internet caucus advisory committee is made up of trade organizations, nonprofit organizations, professional organizations, businesses, and others who are interested in and supportive of a neutral and open dialogue about the internet and its activities and functions. like all such events, it is made possible true the support and leadership of the internet caucuses cochairs, senators leahy and thune. again, the hashtag is #icacnsa. and the website is neted.org. our topic could not be more important or more timely. we will conclude by 1:00. the discussion will be led by mary ellen callahan, a partner with the law firm of general and block and former chief privacy officer of the department of homeland security. we all look forward to an interesting program. mary ellen, thank you. >> welcome that -- welcome, everybody. i want to briefly introduce my colleagues on the panel. we will go very quickly and cover a lot of topics. we will try to keep on our time. alphabetically to my left i have alan davidson, a visiting scholar at m.i.t. and former director of public policy at google for the americas. next to him is michelle, the legislative counsel at the americans civil liberties union. julian sanchez rom the cato institute, and at the far end, mike, a partner at steptoe and johnson and formerly worked at the department of justice. we are going to talk about these issues and the information. i will give you a brief overview based on public accounts and recent testimony. this is an overview of the accounts as we know them related to programs. this will help us inform and define the rest of the discussion. first, what is the national security agency and why was that getting the records? the nsa's technical and legal authorities of expanded over the decades to expand to foreign intelligence and counter intelligence and in the past primarily operated outside the united states. the programs we are discussing today, however, direct the content of manage data directly to the nsa after the fbi secured fisa court orders to secure documents. in this capacity, nsa is operating as a technical service provider of sorts, receiving the information directly, but on behalf of the fbi and analyzing information under the fbi's jurisdictional activities. the fisa act as a 1978 law that has been modified several times. it was designed for procedures of election of foreign intelligence information between foreign powers, agents of foreign powers, as well as those elated to terrorism activities since september 11. the original intent was to revive judicial oversight of covert intelligence activities. the fisa court has been appointed by the chief justice to serve for a seven-year term. he fisa court is ex parte. let's talk about the programs. first, the collection of business records, also known as section 215 of the usa patriot act. the patriot act as the -- takes business records. business records are defined as any tangible thing." they have the authority to produce on behalf of the fbi telephone records for communications between united states and abroad, or wholly within the united states including vocal telephone calls. the local orders are appeared to commence on the issuance of the fifo order and run 90 days. the leak -- if the leak is indicative of the overall process. according to the doj, the leaked order is one of two orders issued simultaneously to be read together. the other order outlines what the fbi can and cannot do with he access information. doj has also testified about the limit of access and use of this data and some of those internal procedures were disclosed by the guardian yesterday. the data includes the number that was dealt from, the number that was doubt to, the day and the time and the length of the call. the fbi received 21 business record fisa court orders and nine in 2010 according to doj testimony. prism is section five of the fisa amendments act. section five is designed to facilitate the acquisition of foreign intelligence information concerning non-us persons located out the united states. it cannot be used to intentionally target any u.s. citizen, u.s. person, anyone within the

local government in the country. the existence of public employee unions is without question a big part of the reason people of so little trust in government these days. they are the reason so many state and local minas appellees are flat broke. .hey are behind public pensions today i'm calling for a serious national debate about them. on the federal level, the first thing we should do is stop the automatic transfer of union ats from employee salaries the taxpayers expense. [applause] if the unions want their dues, it should be incumbent on them and not us to pay for it. the assault on free speech continues, and it is fairly an uphill battle. but if we are alert to the tactics of the left, and take these assaults one by one, i am confident that we can beat them back. let me give you a few final examples of what i'm talking about. right now there is an effort over at the federal communications commission to get groups that buy campaign ads to disclose their supporters. this is utterly, utterly irrelevant to the mission of the sec. -- the fcc. and we need to say so. the sec is being pushed to display their public supporters. this proposal does not protect shareholders and it does not protect governors. for the left, this is not about good government or corporate governance, is about winning at all costs. even if that means shredding the first amendment and that is why we need to be vigilant about every one of these assaults. they might seem small and isolated in the particular, but together they reflect a culture of intimidation that extends throughout the government. a culture abetted by a bureaucracy that stands to benefit from it. the moment a gang of u.s. senators started writing letters last year demanding the enforce more disclosure upon conservative groups, we should have all cried foul. the moment white house proposed a draft order replying applicants for government contracts to disclose their political affiliations, we all should call them out. when the hhs secretary told insurance companies, back during the obamacare debate, told insurance companies that they could not tell their customers how obamacare would impact them, we all should have pulled the alarm. as soon as we learned that left- wing groups were manufacturing public outcry for corporate disclosure at the sec, we should have exposed that for what it was. there might be some folks other waiting for hand signed memo from president obama to lois learned to turn up. do not hold your breath. what i'm saying that a court made a campaign to use the levers levers of government to target conservatives and stifle speech has been in full swing and in open view for all of us to see for years. it has been carried out by the same people who say there is nothing more to the disclose no then transparency and more two other disclosure regulations than good government. but the irs scandal puts the lie to all of the posturing. because now we know what happens when government gets in the hands of this -- gets its hands on this kind of information. when it is able to isolate its opponents and whether you are a pro-israel group, or a tea party group in the legal, -- in louisville, they can make your life miserable. they can force you off the political langfield. -- playing field which is precisely what we cannot allow. there are a lot of important questions that remain to be answered about the irs scandal, but let's not lose sight of the largest -- the larger scandal that has been right in front of us for five years. a sitting president who simply refuses to accept the fact that the public will not applaud everything that he does. the president expects public to applaud everything that he does. my plea to you today is that you call out his attacks on the first amendment whenever you see them, regardless of the target. because the right to free speech does not exist to protect what is popular, it exists to protect what is unpopular. the moment we forget that this is -- the moment we forget that, we are all at risk from right to left. if liberals cannot compete on a level playing field, they should make up better arguments. what is wrong with the competition of ideas? is so weakument that you have to try to intimidate and shut up your opponents in order to win the game? only way to beat a police to fight back. fightbe a bully is to back and that is all of us need to do. be wise to the way of the left and never give an inch when it comes to free speech. thank you very much. [applause] >> we have time for some,, yes, yes man. , my name is barbara from new york. is there any suspicion that intimidation goes beyond the irs and the things you mentioned. it is frightening considering that our government has things like stunt guns and star wars. >> i will not speculate where else they exist, where they already exist is pretty stunning. we have seen that at hhs. they sent out a directive to health recoveries that they cannot tell their policy holders with the impact of obamacare would do to them. this is the same secretary that is shaking them down for money in order to run television advertising supporting obamacare. then of course over the fcc obama proposed an initiative that require you a condition to pursue what ever cause you may have to disclosure donors you are making advertisement. and then we have seen what is happening at the irs. the president himself has been demonizing these people and so the point i'm making here today is that it is not surprising that the bureaucracy would pick up on that. and think they would pick up on that and say that is what we are soliciting. -- that is what we are supposed to do. the ceo has laid out the game plan, so i don't know what my else be going on, but the things we do know are going on our right in front of us and they are beyond disturbing. leave me, if this were a republican administration and these were liberal groups that were being subjected to this kind of treatment, this would be big news on the front page of "the new york times," on a daily basis. >> i am elizabeth regular citizen. tank you for coming and educating us. they after day, we hear a litany of corruption and abuses which should not surprise us because we know that president obama has in his mind and is determined to fundamentally change and transform america. despite what karl rove advised, is there not any of these rises to an legally impeachable offense? i'm sorry to put you on the spot, but you will not answer my e-mails. >> i think we need a thorough and complete investigation and let the facts take us where we will go. i am confident the house of represented -- house of representatives will have a thorough investigation, at least two committees i am aware of. aey are pursuing this and methodical way and i don't want i jump to any conclusions, just love the fax to take us where they take us. i am prepared to say that the president and his political allies encouraged this kind of bureaucratic overreach by their public comments, but that is what different from saying they ordered it. i think we need to find out who is responsible and the investigation will go on for quite some time. hello, a couple of your colleagues have proposed a constitutional amendment that would specify that no rights in the constitution would apply to corporations. i'm just wondering if you could react to that and maybe discuss some of the junta point is of that would be. >> give them some points for not hiding it. the constitution has been amended very rarely in our well over 200 year history. for good reason, it has served us well. they were not uncomfortable with corporate free speech when corporations that owned newspapers or television stations were engaging in it, they only become uncomfortable ones of report said why should there be a carveout for corporations that own the media out and for no one else? it is a -- it is an absurd proposal. >> what you think about the efforts of michael bloomberg to encourage democratic donors a particular amount of votes in the senate. >> he can express himself, and i support the right for him to say whatever he wants to. , from a partisan point of view, i won't listen to them. -- i hope they listen to him. >> i am part of the mccain institute and i'm currently a student at the university of aboutand i am wondering this issue, it seems like they are starting to notice obama's immortality is disappearing and that he is flawed. what will it take for them to theaybe it is time to see light and understand that he is not all he's cracked up to be? >> i think it is keeping your eyes open and watching what is happening. simple observations. it is not surprising -- the biggest difference between the two parties today in america, they are the party of government and we are the party of the private sector. that is not that we should think there is no government at all, but they really trust the government. that is why they are in such a tight alliance with a look employee unions who are the principal benefactor of larger government and to have little or no interest in bigger and bigger debt. to the extent that they have become skeptical, that maybe this degree of government is not such a good idea, that is an encouraging sign. one of the great things about being young is that if your health holds up, you get older. it is amazing how your views in age andou advance i hope they will simply observe what is going on. this is what you get when you elect a government that believes government is the answer. and for two years they owned the place. they -- they had a great election in 2008. they can do whatever they wanted to, and they did. $300 stimulus, take over american healthcare, the student four yearsm, first of $20 deficits, they could do whatever they wanted to. the encouraging thing is that in 2010, they look to that initiative national restraining order. my guess is they were younger and younger -- younger voters who began to have second thoughts. ,he president was reelected but he did not have the kind of election he did in 2008. he did not flip the house am a change the senate much, it was status quo at the federal level. at the state level 30 out of 50 governors are now republicans. it was not a wiped out election. now we have divided government and divided government can do one of two things, they can do great things as reagan and tip o'neill did when they raised the age of social security and they did the last conference of tax reform, or even bill clinton when he joined a republican congress and did well form -- welfare reform. what has been missing during this time of divided government from 2010 until now is a president willing to tackle the single biggest issues in country. it can only be done on a bipartisan basis, and the transcendent issue of our time is the size of our debt. what i have been waiting for with this resident, i have probity of differences -- i have plenty of differences with the president, he will be here for 3.5 years and what will he do? if you want to pivot and help us solve the biggest issues confronting your generation in the future, we need to try and do that, but i've not seen any evidence of it. i've not seen any evidence that he is willing to leave this ideological place or he is put himself in for virtually all of his presidency and move in a different direction. i have wondered the field from your comment, but i think younger voters are getting more skeptical because they are watching what is happening. mpr had a story this week where they quoted if you left- wing organizations that said they have undergone undue scrutiny as well, that they have been asked unwanted questions. plaintiff advocate, don't we want irs -- the irs to make sure that those groups are not being given tax exempt status? >> i think it will be easy to get tax-exempt status whether you are on the left or right. i'll think the government should deny a status that should be rather easy to achieve. i am not a fan of harassing either right or left. >> i just want to follow up on that. this claim is being made that these groups are abusing their tax status, i'm not seeing any proof of those claims. if they were not 501(c) organizations, presumably to be 527 organizations and from the standpoint of revenue collection does this make any difference for the federal government and the irs? >> none whatsoever. good point. >> senator, you mentioned about the fact that 501(c) organizations do not have to disclose their donors, and that is true that they do not have to disclose them publicly. i resent the national organization for marriage who schedule -- the continental schedule donors was released by the irs is legally to a non-. the goal opponents and it is still posted on their website. the jews support a legislation to say that -- would you support a legislation that they would no longer have to disclose their donors to the iressa? about it,not taught i assume you've given that case examples to the house republicans. andes, we asked for it investigation a year ago, but the irs will not give us a report because they are hiding behind taxpayer confidentiality and they are saying it is confidential. they will not tell us the identity of the individuals within the eye rest were responsible for that disclosure. asmy bias is in favor of much political speech as possible with minimal amount of government interference and harassment on the left or right or anyone else. i think the last thing the american people suffer from is too little political discourse. that would be my general philosophical approach to all of these issues. fore is a rational basis groups like as not having to disclose, that is what the supreme court was all about. it is one thing to do -- to require disclosure when you give to a candidate or to a party, i do not oppose that. i think my voters and all of you should know who supports my campaign and my party. but these are not contributions to candidates or parties, these are cognitions to groups that have -- these are contributions to groups and sometimes that does intersect with what is going on politically because it is important to remember that only those who get elected make policy. so, a lot of issues that people want to discuss certainly do intersect with the political discussion that is going on because they might have views that are better represented by one point of view versus the other. to me, this is not a subject we should be alarmed about. that we should think is something that needs to be dealt with, i think it is something that needs to be encouraged. >> senator, -- >> i have enjoyed you over the years norm, you been wrong about almost everything. [laughter] i've always wondered who is eaten lunch with you over the years. some of the worst things a been said about me have been said by you. you have been entirely wrong on virtually every occasion i'm glad to see what is on your mind. [laughter] we agree on is that some of the worst things that are then set about me have been said by you. >> i didn't make any thing up, i was quoting you directly. >> my first question is that on 2000 on meet the press, you gave an eloquent defense on disclosure and why is a little disclosure is better than a lot of disclosure? in the citizens united decision, we had eight justices including robert scalia and alito all caps and equally full throated defense of disclosure of all sorts including shareholders knowing what their companies doing in the political front. why -- >> of course that is not accurate. they didn't say was a matter of constitutional interpretation, i am sure that if we passed it they would not strike you down. you regard to disclosure, have to go back to the 1980's to find a time when i suggested -- which i did and i was wrong to find a time that i suggested that disclosure of 501(c) wasod idea -- a good idea. i made a mistake, the supreme court left that up to congress to decide and the democrats tried to pass the disclose act selectica the names of our critics and we want to make it difficult for them. >> at me ask one more question about five once he. the law says that they are spoke to be exquisitely well for organizations, to believe that organizing for america and america's crossroad gps are exquisitely welfare organizations? >> the interpretation that the irs has had going back 40 or 50 years, i agree with. let me tell you what norm is really for. what he's really for is the government telling candidates for congress how much they can spend government mandated spending limits, and using tax money to pay for it. if norm had his way, he would push the private sector all the way out of the process of getting elected. you would file, the government would tell you how much you could speak and spent, the government would give you the money to pay for your speech. a total government takeover of the whole process from the time you file, to the time you're sworn in. what congress is that likely to produce? the kind that was to go the government because the government would be in charge of how they got there. make no mistake, norm is a good old-fashioned far left guy. i like him, he is been wrong for as long as i can remember and it is great to see you i didn't want to spar with you for years. [applause] paul from cnn, the issue of immigration tuesday one area that the two parties are optimizing. how do you think this will sort out? >> i am not doing and immigration press conference here. we will be on that matter for another week or so. how about that young lady right there? >> senator, thank you so much for coming. i was wondering, just looking at mexico and how they have had political turmoil and yet they are still pushing forward a number of substantial legislation and policy they want to get accomplished, they are still able to do that even though they have had a ethical political environment. you said the president has been unwilling to negotiate and deal with the government that he is faced with. is there anyway we can work through that and the comp but some of the things he mentioned like tax reform, dealing with irs? >> i hope so. it is up to the president. the president and our system is unique. there is only one person in america that can sign something into law and only one person who can deliver to the members of his party. the speaker and i have tried to engage the president for 4.5 years to tackle the tristan an issue of our time, unfunded liabilities and/or current debt which is stunning. as part of his responsibility, what i hope what he will decided to engage in a series discussion about how to get an outcome to the biggest problem facing our country. we've not seen that yet, but i can't give up hope because he will be there 3.5 more years. we have do deal with the cover we have, not the one that we hope for. do you have any thoughts the anthonyorizing statute so we can get some of these investigations out from under the thumb of his partnership? happilye let that expire in the late 90's. i don't think it's her of the country well at all and i would not be in favor of bringing it back. it was one of the post watergate reforms -- most of those have not worked out very well. i don't think going back to that would be a step in the right direction. hello, i am in internet freedom works and i was curious about what you are thoughts were on the nsa's overreach as far as wiretapping? how would you think it should be addressed? do you think it needs to be reformed? the will confine discussion today to things that are largely related to the subject of my speech and the independent counsel is in a way because it was part of the post- watergate reforms. any other questions on the topic that we have been talking about this morning? how about right here? inhello, i just wanted to -- relation to public employee unions and your decision to have them scaled back, i just wondered if you want to comment on scott walker and how that can be translated nationally in other states? >> i think it has been a remarkable success story. i might not have this totally accurate, but roughly accurate that once the employees in wisconsin were given the option of not paying their dues, apparently the support plummeted. ,eaning that the employees when given the choice, decided that representation was not that important to them. regardless of whether you have them or not, the larger question i wanted to race today is the appropriateness. that's what i went back to fdr, the appropriateness of unions in the public sector because in every negotiation there is a missing person and the missing person is the taxpayer. the negotiation is between today's public official in today's union leader reaching an agreement to obligate the taxpayer and their future and there is no taxpayer there. i believe that is why fdr, at least initially, felt that unions are entirely appropriate in the private sector. i support private-sector unionism. there is an election, a secret ballot election, winners when, and losers accept it. but it seems to be as fundamental a incompatible. if you look at the results of that, with the pension problems all across the country, virtually every state in the country is awash with pension problems. he of people that work in the government actively discouraging and bring the power of the government down on the people who think the federal government is too big. this is a 50 that year mistake and it is time to have a discussion again of the appropriateness of unionism in the public sector. in the private sector, find. i'll have a problem with that. but because we are suffering the consequence is that. i will take one more question. first, an observation about norms comment earlier where he talked about social welfare. when congress set up that statue in the 50's, there is no evidence that they intended to exclude political activity. i wanted your thoughts about this. -- i wondered your thoughts about this. do people trying to improve their government, couldn't that improve the social welfare innovation? .> obviously, that is my view i think we should be encouraging this sort of thing and not discouraging it. the whole disclosure game has nothing to do with anything other than going after your donors. it would never offended by this until the last few years when conservatives started doing more of that. all the sudden, this is a fairy -- a fairly recent outrage here. this is about nothing other than getting the names of your donors so you can go after them. we should be discouraging that in every way we possibly can and encouraging this kind of dissipation. .- this kind of participation this kind of involvement is the kind we ought to have and goodness gracious to have the government itself picking winners and losers in the game of political speech is ridiculous. thank you for being here so much. [applause] >> senate republican leader mitch mcconnell completing his remarks today at the american enterprise institute on capitol hill, his senate colleagues continue their debate on immigration let relation as we look live at the senate floor. , the other things bipartisan immigration measure would increase voter security and create a 13 year path to citizenship for immigrants. they're hoping to come to an agreement. relativeses some concerns about border security. you can see live coverage of the senate right now on a companion network c-span2. and here on c-span we will have more luck coverage coming up, today it new in eastern we will renew a discussion examining the nsa pogroms about the mass lection of phone records and internet data. we'll have live coverage here on c-span charting at public hot eastern. -- at 12:00 noon eastern. is a public a new sound for new york and is deputy attorney general during the george w. bush imitation. he nearly resigned in 2004 over concerns he raised about a laconic surveillance he deemed illegal. president obama will introduce his nominee this afternoon in the white house rose garden. you can see live coverage here at 2:00 p.m. eastern on c-span. the senate is in session, the house is not. they wrap up their work for the week. before leaving, they voted down the farm bill. the bill set down policies over a five-years for farmer subsidies and nutritional programs. house with an republican majority leader spoke about the bills on the floor of the house. there was frustration expressed about a minute that would've created further cuts to the food stamp program. they spoke for about 20 minutes. very friendly, i was not going to mention what happened on this floor today, but the gentleman has brought it up. the gentleman is correct. democrats voted for the bipartisan bill. 62 bravoem is that lukens voted against it -- 62 republicans voted against the bill. amendment wasast draconian and we turned a bipartisan bill into a partisan bill. i will tell my friend very frankly, you did the same thing, your side of the aisle, did the same thing with respect to the homeland security bill, which was reported out on a voice vote from the appropriations committee, that we would have voted for on a bipartisan basis, except an amendment was adopted knowing our side could not vote for that. i will tell you i was not going to bring up what happened today, but you turned a bipartisan bill necessary for our farmers, necessary for our consumers, necessary for the people of america that many of us would have supported and you turned it into a partisan bill. very frankly, 58 of the 62 republicans voted against your bill voted for the last amendment, which made the bill even more egregious. we disagreed with a $20 billion cut, and your side upped the ante. i will tell you, we are prepared to work in a bipartisan fashion, and with respect the student loan bill, it was close to the president's bill, and we would have supported it had it been closer to the president's bill. what your bill did it puts those taking out student loans at risk of having their interest rates substantially increased in the future. the president suggested let's get a variable rate which reflects market rates, but when you take out the loan, just like you do with your house loan, you know what your interest rate will be. we have a difference on that. it is a good-faith disagreement on that. we will say that, yes, i have been concerned about the inability to take a bill reported out of committee that is bipartisan in nature and turn it into a partisan bill. that is what happened on the floor today. it was unfortunate for farmers, consumers, for our country. if the gentleman wants to pursue that, i will yield to him. >> allow me to respond. the amendment to which the gentleman speaks is an amendment that had been discussed for some time with the ranking member, with the chairman, and the gentleman was aware of the amendment. the amendment reflects what many of us believe is a successful formula to apply to a program that has, in the eyes of the gao, in the eyes of the independent auditors who look at these programs, a program that is in dire need of improvement, because of the error rates that are occurring. in addition to that, it reflects our strong belief that work, that able-bodied people should have the opportunity and should go in and be a productive citizen. that is what this amendment says. it gives states an option. it was a pilot project because it reflects a winning formula to the welfare reform program, back in 1996, that was put into place, with unequivocal success. able-bodied people going back to work. working families beginning to have productive income. there was still an intention for our side to say we want to take away the safety net of the food stamp program. absolutely not. this is a pilot project. it was up to the states, whether they wanted to participate, to see if they could get more people back to work. again, consistent with what the gao report had said over and over again, these programs are in need of reform. it was not as if this amendment came out of thin air. the gentleman, the ranking member, the entire leadership on the minority side to the amendment was there. the gentleman is talking about regular order, talking about the need for us to have open process, let the will of the house work and be worked and then go to conference. that is what the goal was, that the will of the house allowed to be seen through, work its will, and go to conference and then we would try and participate in a robust discussion with the other side of the capitol to see if we can see reform measures on a bill that is in conference ready. what we saw today was a democratic leadership in the house that was insistent to undo years and years of bipartisan work on an issue like a farm bill and decide to make it a partisan issue. and, mr. speaker, it is unfortunate that that is the case, i do agree with the gentleman, but i hope we can see our way to working on other issues, where there is potential agreement. yes, we have fundamental disagreements on many things, but we are all human beings representing the 740,000 people that put us here and expect us to begin to learn to set aside those agreements, find ways we can work together. today was an example. the other side did not think that was their goal, did not think that was an appropriate mission, and instead decided to emphasize where perhaps they differed when we wanted to reform in a certain area. i yield back. >> i thank the gentleman for yielding back. we have a profound disagreement. when we were in the majority we got no help on your side, mr. leader. you remember that. there was no opportunity to have bipartisan dialogue, to have agreement. the gentleman refers to regular order. the person who talks about regular order most is your speaker. you talk about regular order. to pass a bill and when we have an agreement. some 90 days ago we passed a budget. at your insistence, the senate passed a budget. good for them. we have not gone to conference, you have not provided an opportunity to go to conference, you have not appointed conferees. that is regular order. the gentleman wants it on one bill, but not all bills. i tell my friend we want regular order, we want to go to conference. we want to undo the breaking of an agreement we made in the budget control act which said there would be a firewall between domestic and defense. you have eliminated that firewall. the sequester is in place. sequester is bad for this country. you and i tend to agree on that, i think. the fact is there's no legislation to undo that sequester, except the legislation you talked about passing in the last congress, is dead and buried. yes, we want regular order. the reason the bill lost today is because 62 of your members rejected mr. lucas' plea, which i thought was eloquent, in which he said i know some of you do not think there is enough reform in this bill, and some of you think there is too much reform. but mr. peterson and i brought out a bill that was a bipartisan bill, supported by the majority of democrats and the majority -- i think all the republicans, maybe i am not sure that -- but the fact of the matter is it was a bipartisan bill, just as homeland security bill was bipartisan, and it was turned into a partisan bill. that is exactly what mr. lucas was talking about. he was saying some people do not think we went far enough and some people think we went too far. mr. sutherland thought we had not gone far enough. and 58 republicans voted for sutherland that turned around and voted against the bill, the reforms you're talking about. do not blame democrats for the loss today. you did not bring up the farm bill when it was reported out on a bipartisan basis last year. you did not even bring it to the floor because your party cannot come together supporting their chairman's bill. that is where we find ourselves. i was not going to bring up that bill at all. what happened happened. frankly, when we lost on the floor, it was because we lost on the floor when we were in the majority. we produced 218 votes for almost everything we put on this floor. do not blame democrats for the failure to bring 218 republicans to your bipartisan lucas- supported and peterson-supported piece of legislation on the floor. we believe that loss, that partisanship in that bill, will hurt farmers and our country. let's bring that bill back to the floor and have a vote on it. i think it would pass. maybe not because of your votes, that has been your problem all along. do not blame democrats for the loss of that bill. do not blame democrats for being partisan. you knew those amendments -- yes, we knew about them, mr. leader, just as you knew about them and you knew we were very much opposed to those amendments, notwithstanding the fact that all the leadership, i believe, i have not looked at the record, voted for those amendments just as they voted for the king amendment on homeland security. yes, you pushed my button. i am not prepared to work in a bipartisan fashion, but not when it said this is what we agree on, meaning your side, though you better take it if we are going to have an agreement. that is not how it works. it never worked that way in america. that is not what america is about. america is about us expecting to be working together. this reported will was on an overwhelming bipartisan basis, would have been passed on a large bipartisan vote, and was precluded by the actions taken through these amendments on the floor, most of which we did not support. and you knew -- i do not mean you -- your party -- so i'm surprised when you talk to me about regular order and there is nothing, nothing to do on the budget conference that you wanted the senate to pass a budget. they did. you have just told me that you wanted regular order and that we should have passed the farm bill so we could work together. you are assuming that the senate would have gone to the conference. i hope they would have, i think they would have, because i talked to the chair. she would have wanted to go to conference assuming we got the republican votes. we also want to go to conference in regular order on the budget to solve the stark differences between the two parties. that is the only way you will get to where we need to be -- by having a conference and trying to come to an agreement. my premise is that you do not have a conference because there's nothing to which patty murray could agree, that mr. ryan could agreed to and that he could bring back your caucus and get a majority of votes for, because they are for what you passed and nothing more than that. we are $91 billion apart. if we divide it in two, split the difference, you could not pass it on your side and i think you know that. i do not know if i have any more questions, and i do not know if they could be particularly useful. i yield to my friend. >> i thank the gentleman for yielding. as far as the budget conference is concerned, the budget is something that traditionally, as he notes, has been a partisan affair. it is a document that each house produces reflecting the philosophy of the majority of those bodies. and the budget contains a lot of different issues, two of which the parties have disagreed vehemently on over the last several years, taxes and health care. we understand you, mr. speaker, that the other side rejects our prescription on how to fix the deficit in terms of the unfunded liabilities on the health care programs. we said we want to work toward a balance, we think a balance budget is a good thing. unfortunately, the position on the other side of the capitol is no balance, no balance, and raise taxes. when you know that is a situation, there's no construct in which to even begin a discussion. again, the budget has traditionally been that, a partisan document whether who is in charge of which house. and then to be a guide by which you go about spending bills after that. the farm bill, my friend, is a little different. it is for working farmers, for individuals who need the benefit of the food stamp program. we believe you need to reform the snap program and reduce some of the costs because even the gao, independent auditors we bring in, year in and year out say that program is rife with error rates that we should be ashamed of. so we put forward our idea to through the sutherland amendment to try to reform, put in place those reforms. but it still, in the construct of the farm bill, again to the gentleman's point, we want to work together, but it is going to have to be about setting aside differences, and insteadin of saying, as the minority aleader did today, you disagreed with that program, we anddisagreed with that program, we areare out of here, and entire farm bill does not have a chance or ato go to conference, beyou arereconciled, hopefully inreforms adopted so we can make yousome progress according to what the independent analysts say should be done. andeally is a disappointing day. youi think the minority has been a disappointing playeryou atoday, mr. speaker, on thea apart of the people. but we remain ready to work with the gentleman. ai am hopeful that tomorrow, perhaps next week, will be a better week.and you are you a>> i thank the gentleman for yielding back. mr. speaker, the majority leader andcontinues to want to blame the democrats for his inability and the republicans inability to give a majority vote to their own bill.as ismaybe the american peopleyou are a isthink they can be fooled. you are in charge of the house. as ayou have 234 members. 62 of your members voted against your bill. that is why it failed. we did not whine when we were in charge about we did not pass a bill. we got 218 votes for our bill that was pretty tough. we got zero from your side. you got 24 from our side to help you. mr. peterson stuck to his deal. on the budget you say we have got different philosophies. yes, we do. mr. gingrich gave a speech on this floor about different philosophies, 1997 or 1998. he was talking about the perfectionist caucus. he made an agreement with president clinton which to some degree was responsible for having balanced budgets. but your side thought it was not a good deal. not all of your side. on a bipartisan vote, we passed that deal that was reached between mr. gingrich and mr. clinton. a lot of your folks said our way or the highway, and he gave a speech that he called the perfectionist caucus speech. that is what in my view i am hearing on the budget. yes, we have differences. the american people elected a democratic president, they elected a democratic senate, a republican house. the only way america's board of directors will work if we compromise. the place to compromise under regular order is in a conference our ideas and their ideas meeting and conference. the most central document that we need to do every year is to do a budget. but you are not going to conference. your side will not appoint conferees. your side will not move to go to conference. patty murray wants to go to conference, senator reid wants to go to conference. your side over in the senate will not go to conference, in my view, largely because they know you do not want to go to conference, and they do not want to make a deal. they do not want to compromise on what their position is. so we will take no blame for the failure of the farm bill, none, zero. as much as you try to say it, you cannot get away from the statistic, 62, otherwise known as 25% of your party, voted against a bill, which is why we do not bring it to the floor last year when it was also reported out on a bipartisan fashion. so i know you will continue and your side will continue to blame us, that you cannot get the votes on your side, for your bill. because you took a bipartisan bill, and that is what mr. lucas was saying. i thought he was very articulate, compelling, and pleading with your side, join us, join us. it does not go as far as it would like, and reform -- you talk about reform and that is a good thing to talk about, the senate bill has reform in it, mr. leader. the senate bill has reform in it. now, it is not in terms of dollars, cutting poor people as much as this bill does, but it cuts. it has reform in it. what sutherland wants, what apparently your side wants, is your reform, not a compromise reform. mr. lucas brought to the floor $20 billion and couched it as reform, and said on the floor, it may not be enough for some and maybe too much for others, but it is a compromise. he was right. but it was rejected by 25% of your party, and that is why this bill failed. unless the gentleman wants to say something, i yield back the balance of my time. i yield back the balance of my frank lucas said he we're weighing all our options. timetable has been set to take the measure back up. republicans voted for the measure, 62 opposed it. just 24 were in favor. 172 rejected the final bill. we spoke to a capitol hill reporter about what happened. jerry hagstrom is the editor of the "hagstrom report." the farm bill -- why was it defeated? >> there are basically two reasons. that is there was a dairy amendment that was not popular with democrats, and that dairy amendment passed. also there were more restrictions placed on food stamps and democrats did not like that, and there were a lot of republicans who thought they could somehow have a bill that would cut food stamps even more. those were the basic reasons. >> majority leader eric cantor blamed democrats for not providing enough votes to help pass the bill. what do you think about his assertion? >> there were only 24 democrats who voted for the bill. i think it is a reflection of the deep gulf in the country between the people who get food stamps and the politicians who support them and the farmers who benefit from the farm program. since the 2010 election, you have had such a gap between these republicans and democrats. it is basically about that. >> how have democrats responded to what majority leader cantor said? >> they said they should not have put on this last amendment that would impose work requirements on food stamp beneficiaries, that there have never been such requirements for it, and that was the straw that broke the camel's back. also, there was an amendment on dairy that passed and the dairy farmers do not like it. >> who were the big losers? >> the people who are advocates for people eating more fruits and vegetables, for local production, for organic, because it is those programs that will least likely be continued. i think the food stamp program will be continued if there is an extension. so will the crop insurance program. all the big agriculture will be continued, but not the stuff for the newer, more innovative small and local programs. >> what is the next step for the bill? can it be revamped and passed? and what is the timetable? >> it can be brought up again, possibly changed. most thought it would get through when it got through conference. people were too angry, but also there were these 62 republicans who voted against the bill even though they got a lot of amendments on that that they liked. and a lot of provisions, and they will also have to reevaluate their views on the bill. >> what will you watch for as the leaders decide what to do next? >> whether they will bring the bill up and if and also over the fourth of july break, whether there are people who want this bill passed so much that they p

local government in the country. the existence of public employee unions is without question a big part of the reason people have so little trust in government these days. they are the reason so many state and local municipalities are flat broke. they are behind public pensions. today i'm calling for a serious national debate about them. on the federal level, the first thing we should do is stop the automatic transfer of union dues from employee salaries at the taxpayers' expense. if the unions want their dues, it should be incumbent on them and not us to pay for it. the assault on free speech continues, and it is fairly an uphill battle. but if we are alert to the tactics of the left, and take these assaults one by one, i am confident that we can beat them back. let me give you a few final examples of what i'm talking about. right now there is an effort over at the federal communications commission to get groups that buy campaign ads to disclose their supporters. this is utterly, utterly irrelevant to the mission of the fcc. and we need to say so. the sec is being pushed to display their public supporters. this proposal does not protect shareholders and it does not lead to better governance. for the left, this is not about good government or corporate governance, is about winning at all costs. even if that means shredding the first amendment, and that is why we need to be vigilant about every one of these assaults. they may seem small and isolated in the particular, but together they reflect a culture of intimidation that extends throughout the government. a culture abetted by a bureaucracy that stands to benefit from it. the moment a gang of u.s. senators started writing letters last year demanding the irs enforce more disclosure upon conservative groups, we should have all cried foul. the moment the white house proposed a draft order replying applicants for government contracts to disclose their political affiliations, we all should call them out. when the hhs secretary told insurance companies, back during the obamacare debate, told insurance companies that they could not tell their customers how obamacare would impact them, we all should have pulled the alarm. as soon as we realized that left-wing groups were manufacturing public outcry for corporate disclosure at the sec, we should have exposed that for what it was. there might be some folks other waiting for hand signed memo from president obama to lois lerner to turn up. do not hold your breath. what i'm saying that a campaign to use the levers of government to target conservatives and stifle speech has been in full swing and in open view for all of us to see for years. it has been carried out by the same people who say there is nothing more to the disclose act then transparency and no more to other disclosure regulations than good government. but the irs scandal puts the lie to all of the posturing. because now we know what happens when government gets its hands on this kind of information. when it is able to isolate its opponents and whether you are a pro-israel group or a tea party group in louisville, they can make your life miserable. they can force you off the political playing field which is precisely what we cannot allow. there are a lot of important questions that remain to be answered about the irs scandal, but let's not lose sight of the larger scandal that has been right in front of us for five years. a sitting president who simply a sitting president who simply refuses to accept the fact that the public will not applaud everything that he does. this president expects the public to applaud everything that he does. my plea to you today is that you call out his attacks on the first amendment whenever you see them, regardless of the target. because the right to free speech does not exist to protect what is popular, it exists to protect what is unpopular. the moment we forget that, we are all at risk from right to left. if liberals cannot compete on a level playing field, they should make up better arguments. what is wrong with the ompetition of ideas? if your argument is so weak that you have to try to intimidate and shut up your opponents in order to win the game? look, the only way to beat a bully is to fight back and that is all of us need to do. be wise to the way of the left and never give an inch when it comes to free speech. thank you very much. [applause] > we have time for some,, yes, yes, ma'am. >> hi, my name is barbara from new york. is there any suspicion that intimidation goes beyond the irs and the things you mentioned. it is frightening considering that our government has things ike stun guns and star wars. >> i will not speculate where else they exist, where they already exist is pretty stunning. e have seen that at hhs. they sent out a directive to health recoveries that they cannot tell their policy holders with the impact of obamacare would do to them. this is the same secretary that is shaking them down for money in order to run television advertising supporting obamacare. then of course over the fcc obama proposed an initiative that require you a condition to pursue what ever cause you may have to disclosure donors you are making advertisement. and then we have seen what is happening at the irs. the president himself has been demonizing these people and so the point i'm making here today is that it is not surprising that the bureaucracy would pick up on that. and think they would pick up on that and say that is what we are upposed to do. the ceo has laid out the game plan, so i don't know what my else be going on, but the things we do know are going on our right in front of us and they are beyond disturbing. leave me, if this were a republican administration and these were liberal groups that were being subjected to this kind of treatment, this would be big news on the front page of "the new york times," on a daily basis. >> i am elizabeth regular citizen. tank you for coming and educating us. they after day, we hear a litany of corruption and abuses which should not surprise us because we know that president obama has in his mind and is determined to fundamentally change and transform america. despite what karl rove advised, is there not any of these abuses which legally rises to an impeachable offense? i'm sorry to put you on the spot, but you will not answer my e-mails. >> i think we need a thorough and complete investigation and let the facts take us where we will go. i am confident the house of representatives will have a thorough investigation, at least two committees i am aware f. they are pursuing this and a methodical way and i don't want to jump to any conclusions, i just love the fax to take us where they take us. i am prepared to say that the resident and his political allies encouraged this kind of bureaucratic overreach by their public comments, but that is what different from saying they ordered it. i think we need to find out who is responsible and the investigation will go on for quite some time. >> hello, a couple of your colleagues have proposed a onstitutional amendment that would specify that no rights in the constitution would apply to orporations. i'm just wondering if you could react to that and maybe discuss some of the junta point is of that would be. >> give them some points for not hiding it. the constitution has been amended very rarely in our well over 200 year history. for good reason, it has served us well. they were not uncomfortable with corporate free speech when corporations that owned newspapers or television stations were engaging in it, they only become uncomfortable ones of report said why should there be a carveout for corporations that own the media out and for no one else? t is an absurd proposal. >> what you think about the efforts of michael bloomberg to encourage democratic donors a particular amount of votes in he senate. >> he can express himself, and i support the right for him to say hatever he wants to. i obviously, from a partisan point of view, i hope they listen to him. >> i am part of the mccain institute and i'm currently a student at the university of texas and i am wondering about this issue, it seems like they are starting to notice obama's immortality is disappearing and that he is flawed. what will it take for them to go maybe it is time to see the light and understand that he is not all he's cracked up to be? >> i think it is keeping your eyes open and watching what is happening. simple observations. it is not surprising -- the biggest difference between the two parties today in america, they are the party of government and we are the party of the private sector. that is not that we should think there is no government at all, but they really trust the government. that is why they are in such a tight alliance with a look employee unions who are the principal benefactor of larger government and to have little or no interest in bigger and bigger ebt. to the extent that they have become skeptical, that maybe this degree of government is not such a good idea, that is an encouraging sign. one of the great things about being young is that if your health holds up, you get older. it is amazing how your views change as you advance in age and i hope they will simply observe what is going on. this is what you get when you elect a government that believes government is the answer. and for two years they owned the place. they had a great election in 008. they can do whatever they wanted o, and they did. $300 stimulus, take over american healthcare, the student loan program, first four years of $20 deficits, they could do whatever they wanted to. the encouraging thing is that in 2010, they look to that initiative national restraining order. my guess is they were younger voters who began to have second houghts. the president was reelected, but he did not have the kind of election he did in 2008. he did not flip the house am a change the senate much, it was status quo at the federal level. at the state level 30 out of 50 governors are now republicans. it was not a wiped out election. now we have divided government and divided government can do one of two things, they can do great things as reagan and tip o'neill did when they raised the age of social security and they did the last conference of tax reform, or even bill clinton when he joined a republican congress and did welfare eform. what has been missing during this time of divided government from 2010 until now is a president willing to tackle the single biggest issues in country. it can only be done on a bipartisan basis, and the transcendent issue of our time is the size of our debt. what i have been waiting for with this president, i have plenty of differences with the president, he will be here for 3.5 years and what will he o? if you want to pivot and help us solve the biggest issues confronting your generation in the future, we need to try and do that, but i've not seen any evidence of it. 've not seen any evidence that e is willing to leave this ideological place or he is put himself in for virtually all of his presidency and move in a different direction. i have wondered the field from your comment, but i think younger voters are getting more skeptical because they are atching what is happening. >> mpr had a story this week where they quoted if you left-wing organizations that said they have undergone undue scrutiny as well, that they have been asked unwanted questions. don't we want the irs to make sure that those groups are not being given tax exempt status? >> i think it will be easy to get tax-exempt status whether you are on the left or right. i'll think the government should deny a status that should be ather easy to achieve. i am not a fan of harassing ither right or left. >> i just want to follow up on that. this claim is being made that these groups are abusing their tax status, i'm not seeing any proof of those claims. if they were not 501(c) organizations, presumably to be 527 organizations and from the standpoint of revenue collection does this make any difference for the federal government and the irs? >> none whatsoever. ood point. >> senator, you mentioned about the fact that 501(c) organizations do not have to disclose their donors, and that is true that they do not have to disclose them publicly. i represent the national organization for marriage. donors were released by the irs illegally. the goal opponents and it is still posted on their website. would you support a legislation that they would no longer have to disclose their donors to the irs? >> i haven't thought about it. i assume you've given that case examples to the house republicans. >> yes, we asked foran investigation a year ago, but the irs will not give us a report because they are hiding behind taxpayer confidentiality and they are saying it is confidential. they will not tell us the identity of the individuals within the irs who were responsible for that isclosure. >> my bias is in favor of as much political speech as possible with minimal amount of government interference and harassment on the left or right or anyone else. i think the last thing the american people suffer from is too little political discourse. that would be my general philosophical approach to all of these issues. there is a rational basis for groups like as not having to disclose, that is what the supreme court decision was all about. it is one thing to require disclosure when you give to a candidate or to a party, i do not oppose that. i think my voters and all of you should know who supports my campaign and my party. but these are not contributions o candidates or parties, these are contributions to groups and sometimes that does intersect with what is going on politically because it is important to remember that only those who get elected make policy. so, a lot of issues that people want to discuss certainly do intersect with the political discussion that is going on because they might have views that are better represented by one point of view versus the other. to me, this is not a subject we should be alarmed about. that we should think is something that needs to be dealt with, i think it is something that needs to be encouraged. >> senator, -- >> i have enjoyed you over the years, norm. you have been wrong about almost everything. [laughter] i've always wondered who has eaten lunch with you over the years. -- over here? some of the worst things that have been said about me have been said by you. you have been entirely wrong on virtually every occasion i'm glad to see what is on your mind. [laughter] >> one thing we agree on is that some of the worst things that are said about me have been said by you. >> i didn't make anything up, i was quoting you directly. >> my first question is that in 2000 on "meet the press," you ave an eloquent defense on disclosure and why a little disclosure is better than a lot of disclosure. in the citizens united decision, we had eight justices including robert scalia and alito all caps and equally full throated defense of disclosure of all sorts including shareholders knowing what their companies doing in the political front. why -- >> of course that is not accurate. they didn't say was a matter of constitutional interpretation, i am sure that if we passed it they would not strike you own. with regard to disclosure, you have to go back to the 1980's to find a time when i suggested -- hich i did and i was wrong about it -- to find a time that i suggested that disclosure of 01(c) was a good idea. i made a mistake, the supreme court left that up to congress to decide and the democrats tried to pass the disclose act selectica the names of our critics and we want to make it difficult for them. >> let me ask one more question about 501c. the law says that they are supposed to be exclusively welfare organizations, to believe that organizing for america and america's crossroad gps are exclusively welfare organizations? >> the interpretation that the irs has had going back 40 or 50 years, i agree with. let me tell you what norm is really for. what he's really for is the government telling candidates for congress how much they can spend government mandated spending limits, and using tax money to pay for it. if norm had his way, he would push the private sector all the way out of the process of getting elected. you would file, the government would tell you how much you could speak and spend, the government would give you the money to pay for your speech. a total government takeover of the whole process from the time you file, to the time you're sworn in. what congress is that likely to produce? the kind that was to go the government because the government would be in charge of how they got there. make no mistake, norm is a good old-fashioned far left guy. i like him, he has been wrong for as long as i can remember and it is great to see you i want to spar with you for years. [applause] >> paul from cnn, the issue of immigration tuesday, one area that the two parties are comprimising. how do you think this will sort out? >> i am not doing an immigration press conference here. we will be on that matter for nother week or so. how about that young lady right there? >> senator, thank you so much for coming. i was wondering, just looking at mexico and how they have had political turmoil and yet they are still pushing forward a number of substantial legislation and policy they want to get accomplished, they are still able to do that even though they have had a ethical political environment. you said the president has been unwilling to negotiate and deal with the government that he is faced with. is there anyway we can work through that and the comp but some of the things he mentioned like tax reform, dealing with irs? >> i hope so. it is up to the president. the president and our system is unique. there is only one person in america that can sign something into law and only one person who can deliver to the members of his party. the speaker and i have tried to engage the president for 4.5 years to tackle the transcendent issue of our time, unfunded liabilities and our current debt which is stunning. i think, as part of his responsibility, what i hope what he will decided to engage in a serious discussion about how to get an outcome to the biggest problem facing our country. we've not seen that yet, but i can't give up hope because he will be there 3.5 more years. we have do deal with the government we have, not the one hat we hope for. > do you have any thoughts about reauthorizing the anthony statute so we can get some of these investigations out from under the thumb of his partnership? -- department of justice? >> i have let that happily expire in the late 90's. i don't think it's her of the country well at all and i would not be in favor of bringing it back. it was one of the post watergate eforms -- most of those have not worked out very well. i don't think going back to that would be a step in the right direction. >> hello, i am in internet freedom works and i was curious about what you are thoughts were on the nsa's overreach as far as wiretapping? how would you think it should be addressed? do you think it needs to be eformed? >> i will confine the discussion today to things that are largely related to the subject of my speech and the independent counsel is in a way because it was part of the post-watergate reforms. any other questions on the topic that we have been talking about this morning? ow about right here? >> hello, i just wanted to -- in relation to public employee unions and your decision to have them scaled back, i just wondered if you want to comment on scott walker and how that can be translated nationally in other states? >> i think it has been a remarkable success story. i might not have this totally accurate, but roughly accurate that once the employees in wisconsin were given the option of not paying their dues, apparently the support plummeted. meaning that the employees, when given the choice, decided that representation was not that important to them. regardless of whether you have them or not, the larger question i wanted to raisee today is the appropriateness. that's why i went back to fdr, the appropriateness of unions in the public sector because in every negotiation there is a missing person, and the missing person is the taxpayer. the negotiation is between today's public official in today's union leader reaching an agreement to obligate the taxpayer and their future and here is no taxpayer there. believe that is why fdr, at least initially, felt that unions are entirely appropriate in the private sector. i support private-sector nionism. there is an election, a secret ballot election, winners when, and losers accept it. but it seems to be as fundamental a incompatible. if you look at the results of that, with the pension problems all across the country, virtually every state in the country is awash with pension problems. he of people that work in the government actively discouraging and bring the power of the government down on the people who think the federal government s too big. it strikes me that this is a 50 year mistake and it is time to have a discussion again of the appropriateness of unionism in the public sector. in the private sector, find. -- fine. i don't have a problem with that. but because we are suffering the consequence is that. i will take one more uestion. >> first, an observation about norms comment earlier where he talked about social welfare. when congress set up that statue in the 50's, there is no evidence that they intended to exclude political activity. i wondered your thoughts about this. do people trying to improve their government, couldn't that improve the social welfare in our nation? >> obviously, that is my view. i think we should be encouraging this sort of thing and not discouraging it. the whole disclosure game has nothing to do with anything other than going after your donors. it would never offended by this until the last few years when conservatives started doing more of that. all the sudden, this is a fairly recent outrage here. this is about nothing other than getting the names of your donors o you can go after them. we should be discouraging that in every way we possibly can and encouraging this kind of participation. this kind of involvement is the kind we ought to have and goodness gracious to have the government itself picking winners and losers in the game of political speech is a true outrage. thank you for being here so much. [applause] >> here's a look at our prime time schedule of the c-span network. starting at 8:00 p.m. eastern po nomines james comey as the f.b.i. director. then on c-span the debate over the immigration policy. a final vote is expected before uly 4. on c pa the latest out of afghanistan, including the talks with the taliban. all of this at 8:00 p.m. eastern networks.an earlier today the congressional internet caucus held an advisory committee meeting. here's a look at how the data programs are disrupting them. >> as we look at the specific cases described in hearings earlier this week, i think what we see is what seems like fairly dramatic claims, dozens of terror plots being foiled. it looks less dramatic under closer scrutiny. if you separate them out, you say 40 of these terror events, against what that is, were overseas. so they may have involved prison in some significant way, then you have 10 or 12 that are domestic. then you look at what that means, how many were used -- specifically used this data program? the majority, we believe. ok, six or seven, then what are the cases? one involved finding someone who d been donating money to the ethiopian terror group but that's not exactly a terror plot foiled. it is not clear in that case why the same thing could not have been achieved using traditional orders.ke subpoenas and he appeared to be linked to a terror internet address, already being monitored. it is not clear why a more targeted use of that could not be possible. there was talks about a bombing the new york stock exchange. was it is a serious plot? the director of the f.b.i. says it seemed it was serious, there was not jury trial, these people were convicted for terrorist support, meaning money, assistance. the new york stock exchange part of it involves the fact that the u.s. person involved scoped out sold over terrorist targets and did not provide very good information. it abeers to be abandoned. the u.s. attorney that worked the case says there was not plot. if these are the show piece cases they are bringing up to justify the collection of all americans' phones and possibly internet records, it is not clear that is a justification that passes. >> that was an event that held earlier today in washington. you can see the internet event tonight at 9:00 eastern or any time online at c-span dolce & gabbana. >> in a lot of ways this is a challenging time for people who are conservatives. we have a democratic president and a quite liberal president. who has not only been elected but re-elected after putting in place ideas, programs, a and projects, that i think are very wrong headed. the public had a chance to think about that and they decided to re-elect him. it is an exciting time if you're is ng toed to --ed to modernize conservative. bring it into lines with the challenges that the country faces now. also think about how to confront the challenges in the 21st century. neither party is doing a good job of that. there's a lot of opportunity to think about what americans in the 21st century need to change about the way it governors itself to get back to economic growth, get back to prosperity, and get a cultural revivalal we need. t is challenging but it is exciting. >> more on sunday at 8:00 on c-span's "q&a." >> first ladies have a chance to person fie if they choose. there's two things. one, they are women, real people who do things. but then there's this also econdary capacity of being a personifying figure, charismatic figure. many first ladies have been faced with this larger than life. that is something that dolly figured out. she makes the white house into a symbol and she fosters the attackment to the creap city. in 1814, the british is going to burn the capital city and all this work she put into what they called the white house is going to pay off. it's going to give the surge of nationism around the world. >> our focus on first ladies ontinues every monday night. monday night at 9:00 eastern on c-span. >> up next a look at president obama's recent trip to europe and his meeting with g-8 leaders on issues facing the united states and the union. his is 45 minutes. host: joao vale de almeida is the ambassador here in washington, d.c. thank you for being with us. let me begin with the g-8 summit until northern island and the debate continues here in u.s. and in europe. austerity, budget cut acts versus stimulus. you saw what happened where the stock market. are we're do you come down on that issue? guest: both sides are addressing the economy, to bring growth back. it is not easy. we are facing enormous challenges on both sides. we have different kinds of responses, different kinds of contacts in america. i think the common concern is to make sure the recovery is a sustainable one that we don't go in an up and down in terms of economic performance. i think we have established a few lines that are common. we need financial stability and we need to increase our competitiveness. we are facing enormous challenges in emerging economies. we need to adjust our economy for training and education and we need the skills in the job market. for the moment i think the g-8 has clearly identified that. we need to join efforts at the international level to create a right position. host: what needs to happen? guest: i think we need to consolidate our accounts and put our house in order in terms of the debt and deficit. that is crucial for our credibility of our efforts. at the same time, we need to invest in a new way, we need to create the sources of competitiveness for the future. so our economies can go on creating jobs and building up marks in the world. host: this is a recent study done on a u.s./european trade deal. 13.5% increase in u.s. income er person and 5% increase in european income if this is worked out. guest: they -- the promise of the studies are different. the starting points of the study are different. i wouldn't pay too much attention to those studies. one element is this will be good. this trade deal across the thrake will be benefitial fsh our consumers and the job market. it will create jobs and it will be good for the households. we're talk agent an increase about .5% in america, this is huge if you consider the size of our economy. it could add $160 billion to the u.s. economy. this means, you know, dozens of thousands of jobs being created in europe and america. more investment on both sides. this is one of the responses to the crisis that we have today and we were happy to see our leaders president obama and leaders in europe agreeing with these negotiations should be very soon now. host: the e.u. followed by canada, china, then mexico and japan. the top partners to the u.s. are china, russia, switzerland. guest: together we are half of he world's wealth. together we do more than 800 million consumers. this is big. this is big. it could have an enormous potential in bringing togethers also the world economy, which will open more market, more markets for us. a win/win project that we launched this week. it is kind of an historic week for trans-atlantic relations. we're very optimistic of what we can do. again, to deal with the issues that are the heart of the political agenda here and in europe, jobs and growth. host: from your perspective, has the euro worked out as expected? guest: i think it's a great success. if you look back at the last 10 years, we managed to keep the inflation under control. the growth pattern of our countries was very good. we brought a number of countries outside of the our row area to the core of -- euro area to the core and it was a success. some of the weaknesses of our model were revealed, we're dealing with them. i think you can expect europe to return growth by tend of the year and hopefully, start a new positive cycle. if we link that with the trade agreement that we are about to net, you can have in a couple of years a very good context where the american economy benefits and the european economy benefits. today, i'm optimistic and positive about the prospects we have in front of us. host: over the last few decades we have followed the government margaret thatcher critics of the euro and david cameron. do you image the british will join the euro? guest: i don't think it will come in the next couple of years. we have democracy, right? joining the european union is a free decision of people. joining the euro, again, is a decision that has to be made by each country. we have 17 countries today. next year another country will join the area. so the area is expanding because countries believe this is the est way to promote and protect their interests. the british people will have to decide. let's see how it evolves in britain but to be frank, i don't expect britain to join the euro in the next couple of years. that is clear. under the debate -- the democratic debate is there. for a moment, sometimes i, you know, hear people say britain is out of the euro -- out of the union, it is not. it is a full-fledged member in the union. they are not in the euro but they are a very important member of the union. host: let's share comments from president obama as he finished up his meeting in ireland and headed to berlin. he spoke about thish yufe terrorism and issues in europe. here's more from the president. [video clip] >> we must move beyond the mind set of war. in america, that means we're doubling our efforts to close the prison in guantanamo. it means -- [applause] it means tightly controlling our use of technology by drones. it means balancing the pursuit of security with the protection of privacy. i'm confident that balance can be struck. i'm confident of that and i'm confident that working with germany we can coach each other safe, while at the same time, maintaining those essential values for which we fought for. our current programs are bound by the rule of law and their are focused on threats to our security not to those of ordinary persons. they keep keep safe here in the united states and here in europe. but we must accept the challenge that all of us in democratic vernments face, to listen to the voices who disagree us with. to have an open debate about how we use our powers. host: what did you hear in that speech and did the president ease any concerns that the european community i may have had on this eves dropping, phone records issue we're dealing with the here in the snuzz guest: i'm glad to see that president obama brought the good weather from berlin. it was an important speech and we're glad he visited berlin. it was a special speech about console darety. there were a number of issues we address on a daily basis on economic and foreign policy. but there is also societal issues. they are a subject of debate and discussion across the atlantic. sometimes we have different stopping points. on the issue of security and privacy, you recognize that sometimes in europe, we're particularly attent tive to the protection of privacy and personal data. in this particular case, we have been seeking clarification from the american side of the aspects of your fight against terrorism, which we fully share and cooperate with. hopefully, we transparency and dialogue we will overcome difficulties in the debate. we're fully committed and share your objective of ensuring the security of our city. this is a primary goal of our political leaders as well. host: i want to follow-up on the security issue in syria. to t to remind our view join the conversation with your calls or on facebook. i want to share you the comments by president assad as quoted in "the washington post" in a germany newspaper. he says "if the europeans ship weapon, europe's backyard comes a terror terrorists' place, and terrorists will return europe with fighting experience and extremist ideologies." guest: there's no silver bullet to figure out the syrian problem. what we're doing together, i'm happy to see how close we are working, americans and europeans is to try to find the best way out. we are insisting on a political solution, on a political process, negotiations in syria to come to a negotiated outcome. we're also very attendive to the humanitarian, which is catastrophic today. we're having the worst refugee crisis in many decades. we need tok to look at the political side and the humanitarian side. we need to keep a number of options open. in europe, we decided not to prolong the embargo and consider the possibility on the selective basis to provide support to the opposition. we are evaluating all the options. we're discussing with our friends and we're supporting a process in geneva in talks to try to find a solution. we work on different grounds with the common aim of finding a solution for a very complex and difficult problem. host: from portugal, not far from one of our c-span callers. guest: yes, i was happy to have the conversation just a while ago. we were born, more or less, the same place in zral. host: let's get to the phone calls. the republican line. caller: good morning. since the italian supreme court president has called for a criminal investigation of 911 scientific th the evidence that explosives were used to bring down the buildings in new york, would they be open to opening their own 911 investigation? host: we know there is a concerted effort to flood the r waves -- caller: please don't interrupt me. host: i am going to interrupt you. we had a caller call in and disputed everything that is being called on this question. we ask that you choose another network or another venue. we ask that you take your calls somewhere else. caller: i have no comments. host: we'll go to barry in michigan. good morning. caller: yeah, it's always been a thing for the united states where you -- [unintelligible] if president obama gives weapons to the rebels who are affiliated with al qaeda that is giving weapons and aid to our enemies and, in fact, that is treason. i believe if he does this, him and any other politician who is involved in this should be tried for treason. am i right in my understanding f what treason is? guest: i don't wish to comment on internal american affairs. if you're talking about sirs ya and the european union, we're extremely attentive to all the supplies and military support to any group in syria. we're balancing all the arguments in the way we could evently provide some support to the government. i think this is at the heart of the leaders to do the right thing, solve the problem and not add to the problem. this is very much of the discussions we have with our american friends. host: what about an idea of a no-fly zone in syria? guest: we're looking at all options and we know from past experiences in similar situations, some options work better than others. i think the military people are looking at all that. i want to return to my initial point, there is no silver bullet as far as syria is concerned. there is no magic solution that will provide all the right answers. we have to have a combination of different solutions for it. we need a political solution at the end of the day. there has to be a negotiated outcome out of this situation. we should focus and concentrate and invest in creating the political conditions for that discussion to take place. around the g-8, there were conversations with president putin about this. he is a member of the g-8 so they had frank discussions about this issue. we support the initiatives of secretary kerry to have talks in geneva. we're working to create the best conditions for this but no easy solution for the syrian problem. host: let me have you react to two photographs. this one in "the washington post" as the g-8 leaders meeting in northern ireland. it took place sunday, monday, and early tuesday. en there's this frath from "the new york times." you can look at the body language between the president and the rurn president putin. -- russian president putin. guest: my point is the g-8 is very important. and i was directly involved in working with that for many years. so know the kind of atmosphere you can create in a g-8 and it is unique because you have 10 leaders around the table discussing the hottest issue of the day. they can find the kind of intimate setting where discussions can be very frank. so my experience from the g-8, i was not there this time, but from the past it is maybe the best and most intimate setting for discussions of our leaders, regardless what the photos show and reveal. in any case, it is a very good occasion to discussion things like syria or iran or any situation. host: you have to admit that relationships with russia are not at the best right now, not only happening in syria but the adoption issue, which is restricting americans to adopt russian babies. guest: i know. ur relations with russia are sometimes difficult. i can tell you they are always very colorful and we are very committed. we're very frank. some issues are difficult, as you know. we insist on a number of points that are not very comfortable for the russians. we have a number of irtapts in our trade and relations but the political side is always there but they are a good partner. it is a neighbor of ours. it is a major partner of yours. i think we need to engage with our russian friend and try to find platforms. on iran, we need to find platforms and russia is one of the countries negligenting with iran. the russians are on board. st: so if you were doing a dictionary, and you were describing colorful, how would you define it? guest: i will let you use your imagination. host: let's go back to the phones. good morning. caller: good morning. i was wondering how the people germany how you felt having this barrier between the president and the people. it seems to separate him from the public he was trying to address. were they comfortable? host: thank you. guest: i was not involved in the preparation and i cannot provide a specific answer to that. it was a very symbolic that he made this speech in front of the brigade. i've been to this place and it's o powerful in representing the rereconciliation of the fall of the iron curtain and the berlin wall and it is very meaningful with the president choosing to do it there. everyone understands these days that we need to be sure that nothing really happens. we should retain the message and protect the symbolism of the count. we need to ensure prosperity and security for our people. i think it was good that the president went to europe, good that he went to berlin. we hope to see the president more often in europe because this is very -- he is very much welcome in europe and this is a powerful way of underlining trans-atlantic ties. host: as the president outlined is plan to reduce by 1/3 the u.s./russian nuclear arsenal. herself more from the president's speech, wednesday in berlin. [video clip] >> i'm announcing additional steps forward. i'm demonstratored that we can ensure the security of america and our allies and maintain a strong and credible deterrent while deploying nuclear weapons up to 1/3. i tend to seek negotiations with russia to move beyond cold war nuclear postures. [applause] at the same time, we'll work with your nato allies to seek bold reductions in u.s. and russian tactical weapons in europe. we can forge a new international framework for peaceful nuclear power, reject the nuclear weaponization that north korea and iran may be seeking. america will host the summit in 2016 to continue our efforts to secure nuclear weapons around the world. and call on all nations to begin negotiations on a treaty that ends the production of materials for nuclear weapons. these are steps we can take to eate a world of peace with justice. host: joao vale de almeida is the representive here in the u.s. what happens next? the president puts this on the agent da, says this is one of his goals by 2016. how does he execute that goal? guest: i think this is a very important agenda. we share the concerns about nuclear proliferation because of north korea and iran were mention bird the president. we're in full cooperation with americans on addressing these issues and many other partners as we know. this is a collective effort. this will require a collective will to achieve these goals. i think the president outlined n agent da and the reactions are already known. all the countries in the european union are committed with this, as you know. we have to deal with our partners in host: sometimes colorful. guest: sometimes colorful. engagement is the key word. engagement in finding the right solution. but it is a very powerful positive agenda the president outlined. host: talking about the g8 summit and what happens next. new york, our line for republicans with the eu ambassador here in washington. good morning. caller: i have my own beliefs on what is going on. i have always believed the united states has always wanted to deal with one country which controls a lot of countries. with that in mind, the euro is a way of controlling countries. we had world war i, germany lost, world war ii, germany lost. now we have the euro, and whenever a problem develops, it is germany that has the last word. as countries begin to default, germany will pick up the pieces without ever firing one shot. thank you very much. guest: i must say, i don't share that view of things. i think the european union construction over the past six years has shown that we are a powerful tool to ensure stability, peace, and prosperity. this benefits germany as much as it benefits all of the other countries. if you look back the last 60 years of history in europe, the longest period of peace on the continent ever. it has a lot to do with the fact that after the war we decided to join efforts and build a common future. we started with a common market. most of our countries, we have a single currency. we have the beginnings of a foreign policy and security policy around the world. so, member states of the european union, the 28 -- because croatia is joining in a few weeks -- half a billion people. they realize that if they want to influence the world, if they want to have a say in the way the world is governed, they have to act together. because at the end of the day, in relative terms, all our member states are relatively small. and this is good for the u.s. the u.s. has a partner, half a billion people, 28 countries, that basically share the same principles, values, and the same strategic interests, and the u.s. can deal with us as a single partner. this is very important. germany is part of it, of course. germany is a big country. it is a central country in europe. but i totally reject the idea that this is any way at germany conspiration to achieve the power that they didn't achieve otherwise. i totally reject that idea. germany is at the heart of the european project and contributing a lot to strengthening our construction in europe. once we overcome this difficult situation created basically by the financial crisis, you see europe coming back to growth. a stronger partner with the united states. host: british prime minister david cameron also put on the table the issue of tax evasion. can you explain how much that is costing the european economy, european jobs, and the european government? guest: at the moment, we are asking our citizens to do a lot of sacrifice in order to adjust to the impact of the financial crisis. we cannot allow a number of people to escape, a number of people to evade their tax responsibilities. so, i think this was a powerful message from the g8. very much supported and initiated by the europeans to make sure that our tax system is fair, that everybody assumes its responsibilities in terms of taxation, and that when we ask normal citizens to make sacrifices, we should at the same time ensure that any of the people that tries to escape is sanctioned. cooperation among states is an effective one, and this is what they discussed in the g8 and what we are implementing. we are happy to see that we are on the same wavelength with the americans. host: what about switzerland? is switzerland one of those locations used as a tax haven? guest: switzerland is not part of the european union, but we have a solid relationship with switzerland. we made a number of agreements with switzerland regarding tax cooperation and we continue to work with them and with other jurisdictions around the world in order to ensure that there is no escape for those who are not aligning themselves with the rules in terms of taxation. host: do you have a number how much it is costing the european union? guest: you can quote different numbers but it is substantial. particularly in times of crisis, you cannot allow that to happen, because otherwise how can we justify that we ask our citizens to make enormous efforts as they are making in europe to try to adapt and adjust to these situations. it is an issue of fairness, an issue of effectiveness of our tax system that we are addressing here. host: our guest is the european ambassador to the united states. anna is joining us from ohio. good morning. caller: i wanted to ask the ambassador -- last night on msnbc he had this reporter matt taibi from "the rolling stones" who did an article about the rating agencies of the banks and how scandalous the rating systems were. i wanted to ask the ambassador do you think the european people responded more strongly in demanding accountability from banks in regard to the situations in different countries there compared to american citizens demanding accountability from the banking system and the rating agencies here in the u.s.? and i also wanted to ask him in regard to the nonproliferation would you and obama's movement toward breaking down the system or breaking down nuclear weapons, would the european union stand stronger in demanding that israel sign the nonproliferation treaty and kind of come out into public? i know i spent a lot of time at the u.n. website reading letters and documents at that website. there are a lot of nations in that part of the world who feel threatened by israel. host: we will get a response. ambassador de almeida? guest: we should all abide by our responsibilities. there are international agreements that are to be respected. i think we will continue on both sides of the atlantic making sure that there is a level playing field in terms of responsibilities being assumed by all states of the world. i think that is the case as far as israel is concerned right now. but we are together working on those who are not respecting the agreements. you know what we are doing about iran, about north korea. and again, we support all the efforts to revive and re- energize the world effort toward reducing nuclear arsenals and putting in place the right systems. as far as the rating agencies are concerned in the banking system, it is clear with the financial crisis in 2007, 2008 2009, and the aftershocks, the banking systems, rating agencies, all the financial agents -- the observation by public opinion. there is a lot of debate going on in europe, and i understand here as well in terms of the specific role of each of the actors and how they should behave and how they should be regulated. we have an effort around the g20, major countries in the world trying to do the same thing. i think it was quite successful in creating a new regulatory framework for banking activities but also for rating agencies. in europe, there was a particular concern about the way the rating agencies were observing and assessing our countries. the sovereign debt of our countries. but also assessing other economic actors and the banks and the other operators. i think there is a debate here. it is difficult for me to say who is tougher. i think we are equally concerned about making sure that each actor of the financial system works under a regulated framework and assumes full responsibilities. i have seen also the reaction from the rating agencies, open to reform. different solutions on each side of the atlantic. but i think a common trend to say, we need to regulate better. we need to organize better the way the economic and financial operators intervene in the system. there are nuances that have to do with the way the public opinion reacted to it. maybe i could say that in europe there was more acute awareness of how before the rating agencies to operate in a different way. what i see a lot of elements of convergence on both sides of the atlantic, including the way we deal with the rating agencies. host: in defining your job description, how much of your time is spent diplomatically and how much on economic issues? guest: i have been here for three years. in the first two years, i think it was mainly economic, in the sense of dealing with the aftershocks of the financial crisis, explaining to people what we are doing in europe in terms of addressing the euro area problems. now we in recent months, a lot of work being done on syria, a lot of work being done on iran and other issues of foreign policy. and more recently, a lot on trade. because we are about to launch the negotiations for the free- trade area across the atlantic. it is a major product. i dedicate quite a lot of energy with that and i want to share with you how important it is for jobs and growth in america and in europe. so, my agenda is a very diverse one. elements of foreign policy, economic policy, and trade and investment. across the atlantic. but i have been busy but very happy to see we are progressing well in terms -- host: a quick follow-up, on the greek economy, in a word or phrase, how would you describe it today? guest: still a lot to be done. going in the right direction. still a lot of sacrifices asked from the greek people. a lot of important reforms being implemented. so, i think greece bank -- greece is on the right track, not completely out of the woods. but i want to pay respect to the efforts done by authorities, and particularly by the greek population in addressing a very difficult situation. for greece and many countries in europe, by the end of this year, next year and the coming years, we will see a return to growth, the beginning of, we hope, a solid recovery. we believe that after this adjustment, europe will be in a much better condition than before to be more competitive to open up a world markets to address some of its structural problems, the aging of population, in a more effective way. host: richard, good morning. mount laurel, new jersey. caller: good morning, ambassador. let me apologize for the conspiracy theorists we got in this country. we seem to have that in every corner. my main question is with syria. back when the u.n. condemned that and the security council -- namely russia and china -- went against it, i haven't heard anything else about that. at one time i heard that the arab league was going to do something. it seems to go by the wayside. i was wondering if maybe there is a different perspective from someone else -- another country that voted for that, what their opinion was or if anything also is being done. host: thanks for the call, richard. guest: a lot is being done to try to address the syrian problem, as i explained earlier. the arab league plays a role. other regional organizations play a role. we of the european union, we have been very active. our european foreign minister is in the region right now in close contact with secretary kerry. all of the ministers are fully mobilized toward trying to find the solution. the issue was discussed in the g-8, particularly with president putin. other arab countries are involved, obviously turkey is involved. there is a mobilization of the community to try to find a solution to the syrian problem. again, not easy. no silver bullet. no magic solution is available. we need to assess all the options we have. i think we given ourselves the flexibility to maneuver to consider all of the options. a decision in europe not to prolong the arms embargo. look of the decisions taken by president obama a few days ago in terms of support of the opposition. look at our common efforts to energize the geneva negotiations and bringing all of the actors onboard. and at the same time, dealing with an extremely difficult humanitarian situation. you know, on our side in the european union, we provided more than $1.5 billion in the region to address the refugee problem and the humanitarian problems. it may be the biggest refugee crisis in many decades that has been created in that region. and we cannot forget the regional dimension of the situation in syria. there are a lot of actors involved and we need to keep an eye on the big picture in order to understand what happens in the country. host: up until now, in excess of 90,000. guest: the most serious and difficult foreign policy we have to address today. no one has the silver bullet. no one has the solution. all of us need to contribute to find the right conditions. host: joan, eastlake, ohio. you are next. caller: my question is basically most of the problems in the world i think, can be solved by jobs. i know the g-8 are trying to create more jobs worldwide. i feel if people are working -- really working and have good paying jobs, they are not going to be going to war. it is an oversimplification, but in a lot of these countries, there is so much damage from the wars, you know. let's put down our arms, let's give them the money to rebuild their cities, rebuild the countries, build infrastructure in our own country. i admire germany because they have been so wonderful at creating jobs and keeping the economy going. they are a good example for the rest of the world, but how can all of the g-8 leaders really focus on jobs? because i feel if you give people good jobs and a good education, of course, two, then problems could be solved. what do you think? guest: i absolutely agree there is an economic dimension for these problems we have been discussing here this morning. if you look at the middle east, if you look at the southern mediterranean, if you look at all the countries that were involved in the so-called arab spring, you have very difficult economic situations. you have high levels of youth unemployment. so, you need economic growth. economic growth and economic opportunities, jobs, are part of the solution for this intricate diplomatic and political problems. our strategy to this region is also at the same time diplomatic, diplomatic efforts, political efforts and dialogue, but at the same time creating the conditions for job creation and economic growth. we are supporting the economies, we are promoting reforms that eventually will mean that bad economic situations will concentrate people's minds in prosperity instead of situations like the one today. how can we contribute to that? americans and europeans, by assisting and providing help and supporting reforms in these countries. but also putting our own house in order in our economies and --rking together across this the atlantic to promote world growth. this is what we are doing right now with the free trade area agreement, another contribution to reenergizing the world economy, creating more opportunities for other countries as well, opening up the markets around the world. so, i greet -- i agree with you there is a strong economic dimension to this economic and foreign policy problems. jobs can do wonders in terms of creating new situations and more positive scenarios for countries like the ones we are dealing with this morning. host: finally, how long will you stay in your current position as europe's ambassador in washington? guest: about another year or so, i would expect. still a lot to do. i am very hopeful we can make progress. i am very optimistic about it. at the end of the day, americans and europeans have a lot in common. values, tradition, history, backgrounds, languages, tradition. we also have strategic interests. we both are industrialized countries facing a number of challenges. and we believe that if we join hands, if we work more together and i am here to contribute modestly to that -- we can find a better solutions to our problems, domestically and for our capacity to influence what happens in the world. i am optimistic. i have another year or so to continue my job. and i am looking forward to good results. host: ambassador joao vale de almeida, eu ambassador to the u.s., thank you for stopping by. look at the a federal reserve plans for a stimulus program with anthony sanders of george mason. in a discussion on issues important to young americans, including student loan interest rates. egal.e joined by matthew siega we will talk with the national technology reporter. plus your e-mails and phone calls. live saturday at 7:00 eastern on c-span. here is a look at our schedule. starting at 8:00 on c-span, president obama nominates james comey as the fbi director. immigration policy which the senate will continue to debate with a final passage debate before july n3, the latest on afghanistan. all this tonight on the c-span networks. >> when you talk about transparency, you are going to give up something. you will give signals to adversaries. the more specific you get about programs and about the oversight , the more specific you get about the capabilities and the successes to that extent. you have people sitting around saying now i understand what can be done with our numbers in yemen and in the united states, and i will find another way to communicate and i will keep that in mind. there is a price to be paid for that transparency. ofd a line is drawn in terms what our capabilities are, is out of our hands. you tell us to do it one way, we will do it away, but there is a price to be for that transparency. >> robert mueller makes his last scheduled appearance before the senate judiciary committee saturday at 10:00 a.m. eastern. and issues inoks the news. and sunday at 10:00, immigration stories. on american history tv, interviews with key judiciary staff investigating whether there were grounds to impeach nixon, sunday at 3:00. " washingtonto journal." this is 40 minutes. >> let's begin with sudeep reddy from "the wall street journal" with the question that will really drive the situation, which is what creates employment and the country. guest: if you look at the economy overall, at the core there is a question of demand. if businesses are seeing demand from people across the country, then they will hire workers and add to their employment and perhaps even raise wages over time as demand comes in. and if those workers are doing well and those companies, than those workers might well go out and spend their money somewhere else, perhaps spend it at a faster pace, and that will lead other businesses to higher of the workers. eventually you have a self- sustaining cycle in the economy, especially in a recovery where one leads to another and the economy picks up, employment picks up, and everything gets a lot better and the unemployment rate comes down. and of course, when you are in trouble, as a recession approaches, you have the opposite occurring where people pull back, businesses pull back, and start to cut jobs. host: let me follow up on this chart that sudeep reddy was talking about. millions leaving jobs every month through separation in retirement. a relatively small change in the levels is essentially what makes implement go up and down. since the recession has begun to end, job openings are increasing, hires are climbing slowly, but there are also increasing slowly and the layoffs have returned in some sectors to these previous session levels. guest: yes, all of these things are an indication that the labor market is just moving very slowly right now. if you look simply at hires, there is a lot of hiring going on. you can see in this chart, over 4.4 million hires in april. april is the most current month for which we have data. 12.4 million hires against 11.7 million unemployed -- you would think the problem should solve itself quickly good look at all the people we are hiring. but if you -- if you could go to the next slide, i am sorry. where you see the separation component added, now you get to see what is going on. there is a different here. when you've got 4.4 million hires but only 4.3 million separations, then that is a very small net increase and that is what we are seeing, very small net increase in in unemployment. if i could return to the previous slide, you could see what is happening with hires and my apologies. this is set up to show you the first column showing the peak of hires. not just the business cycle but the peak of the hires data series, november 2006. by the time the recession started in 2007, they have already dropped somewhat. but they fell much further by the end of the recession, by june of 2009. you can see they have recovered but they only gained back about 800,000 of what they lost. we are still at 1.1 million short of the november peak, november of 2006. so, that is what is happening here. hires are coming back, but not very quickly. host: based on that, the jolt report, job openings and labor turnover, how important is the information on a weekly basis on the monthly jobs report interview businesses looking to expand, contract, and what it means for those on the unemployment line? guest: the labor department gives us a lot of data about where we are in the course of the recovery. that is why it is so important to watch these closely, whether they are weekly figures on jobless claims, how many people may have been laid off when they were looking for unemployment benefits, or the monthly figures we see. and we hear a lot about, the first friday in the month, when the monthly employment report comes out with the unemployment rate and payroll figures. what we get in those reports, we get a lot of data. what we pay attention to the most are the headline figures -- how many jobs employers added over the course of the month, where did the unemployment rate move to. what we often don't see is what is happening under the surface. that is why the figures in jolt are so important because you can get a little under the surface and find out how many job openings there are across the country, how many workers there are per job opening and really how the momentum is shifting in the labor market. what you can see in these numbers are the remarkable changes, turning points in the economy. it gives us a little bit of a better sense of the health of the labor market. we are obviously struggling still right now four years in the recovery to see a truly strong labor market. but we have a fair number of signs of progress, which is important. it's so do these numbers et al. host: do these account for what are called the frustrated workers, those who have stopped looking? guest: in the survey we do not differentiate why people left a job. once people are in a state of unemployment we are not tracking them in the job openings and labor turnover survey because we are an establishment survey. if they are not connected to an establishment, we can't survey them. we capture when they separate from a job that we cannot really track them much after that. the bureau has other programs that do, but not this program. what we do is we can break out separations, at least in one way. people who left their jobs voluntarily versus people who involuntarily. aired host: host: host: based on that, explain this chart. guest: ok, this is a breakout of the total separations. the light on the bottom, the yellow, total for the month of april. about 4.3 million. most of those were quits, the red line, 2.2 million. over half of the total separations were people who voluntarily leave their jobs. 1.6 million, 1.7 million. about 38% of the separations. the rest are residual category that would call other separations which includes retirement, death, disability, things like that that did not fit easily into either category. this shows you that even though times are not particularly good right now on the labor market, there are still more people voluntarily leaving their jobs than being laid off. host: we will get to your calls and comments in a moment. but sudeep reddy, one of your colleagues asking this question to chairman ben bernanke when he held his quarterly news conference following the latest information from the fed, that the quantitative easing program will slow down either late this year or early next year, causing a steep selloff on wall street. the question on the state of the economy and the job after and the fed chairman on wednesday. [video clip] >> it is the case the fed overestimated the growth rate, very often in the past in this recovery. we have gone through a period and the first half of the year with pretty subdued growth. i would like to hear you explain where this optimism comes from and how confident you are that these expectations are going to be met. >> the fundamentals look a little better to us. in particular, the housing sector that has been a drag on growth since the crisis is now a support to growth. it is not only creating construction jobs, but as house prices rise, increased household wealth, support consumption spending, consumer sentiment. state and localgovernments, which have been a major drag, are now coming to a position where they no longer have to lay off large numbers of workers. generally speaking, financial conditions are improving. the main headwind to growth this year is, as you know, the federal fiscal policy which the cbo estimated something in the order of 1.5% of growth, and our judgment is that given that very heavy headwind, the fact that our economy is still moving ahead, at least at a moderate pace, is indicative that the underlying factors are improving. and so, we will see how that evolves. obviously we have not seen the full effect yet of the fiscal policy changes. we want to see how they evolve as we get through the fiscal impact. host: fed chairman this past week. sudeep reddy, based on the jobs market, what did you hear from him? guest: what the fed chairman is trying to do as he sets policy with his colleagues on the federal reserve is trying to understand where we are in the cycle of the labor market. that is