from the moment he set foot on american soil in portsmouth hampshire in december, 1777,, he showed -- showed quite well this talent he had for making friends, and he did it in a very politically astute way. whether or not he was coached by been franklin, the silence dean, is difficult to say but he went out of his way to make friends with people of all political inclinations, to make friends with those who were -- those who were very fond of george washington and made friends with those who were not. he went out as we for example to make friends with sam adams, who certainly wasn't a big proponent of the standing army alone foreign officers, and with horatio gates, who by this point was in many ways washington's rival for commanding of the army. he went out of his way to flatter gates in particular to send him letters congratulate him as the legendary victor of saratoga and invariably steuben didn't have a problem in that regard. and he made a big splash when he -- when he came to the united states especially when you moved from portsmouth to boston waiting to be summoned to the contr

host: portsmouth, virginia, robert on the independent line. caller: thank you. first i would like to say about the polls. i feel all polls in general are not giving the people at the bottom that have problems with computers, their opinion is not being registered and it would be all negative as far as anybody trying to stop healthcare for all citizens. secondly, after all the money that has been blown in the last eight years, i don't want to hear there ain't enough money to get from wherever. take the top 2% richest people and make them start over. whatever you have got to do. thirdly, the ultimate physician, jesus christ, told people to get in line. anybody that doesn't want their fellow man, much less fellow citizen, not to get the full benefits of all the medical care in this country, you are saying to jesus christ you can't -- you ask yourself would i tell jesus christ not to get this medicine? jesus said in the past that we were told to love thy neighbor as you love thyself. guest: i want to be clear. our poll is a telephone poll. you -- the responses don't

. >>> the homeland security visited sports -- portsmouth. she says her department is examining the port security grant program to make sure moneys are going where they are most needed. >>> so will judge sonia sotomayor manage to win over any republicans? with me is role call newspaper erin billings. listening to the proceedings all i could think of is the line in the song everybody talking at me. for hours they talk to her until she hat had a shot at her. do you think any republicans are likely to cast a vote for her? >> in the community i think a couple. i think orrin hatch is a possible yes vote and lindsey graham said unless you have a melt down you are going to get confirmed. there's going to be a couple but the conservative republicans really want to take her to task. they want to press her on the empathy issue. who they believe is an activist judge. they want to make sure she will adhere to the rule of law. that's what the conservative base wants them to say. so today i think we will see an interesting hearing. yesterday was really cho

joining us we have jack rutherses, chief investment officer at harvard rise re portsmouth which holds ge widely across its client portfolios. mary is still with us. jack, what do you say -- i mean, i know you've said that you would actually hold this stock for three years, and you think if you held it for three years, you would double your money. but when it comes to the here and now, you're neutral. what's your biggest concern about ge right now? >> the biggest concern continues, trish, to be the real estate portfolio. i was on the conference call this morning, and they point out that there are $5 billion in unrealized losses there. which they expect to absorb through earnings over the next three years. if, in fact, the commercial real estate market gets more challenging, which we expect, then that -- that unrealized loss could overwhelm earnings, and they would have to start taking impairment charges. >> but hasn't that been factored in to a certain extent, jack, with the stock price already that there is more deterioration to come in the commercial loan market? >> well, we think so

here's another e-mail from elizabeth, in portsmouth, new hampshire, do you think the government will increase security measures in the currency, in response to release of your book? >> oh, boy! no. i would really like too say the book inspired a change in our currency, that would be incredible bragging rights. but, they are actually -- there are plans to reinvent the currency every ten years. and this is in response to the rapidly growing technology. and that, we were supposed to -- there were stories, that we were going to have a new $100 bill last september with this incredible technology, in it, called, micro lenses where you would see floating above the surface of the bill, like a hole gram, of either a denomination mark or perhaps an iconic image, and this was supposed to come out in september, according to the associated press, and, i called the boulevard row of engraving and printing -- bureau of engraving an printing a couple of weeks ago and said the new money, where is the new money we have heard about and the ap story came out and it sounded like we'd have a new $100 bill

paducah, kentucky, portsmouth, ohio, moabb, utah, oak ridge national lab in tennessee, idaho national lab in idaho, brookhaven national lab in west valley, new york, santa suzanna in california, hanford, washington, argonne national laboratory, illinois, and the los alamos national laboratory in new mexico. if i might focus on the one in moabb, utah, this is a cleanup of a uranium site where there was a uranium plant that during the boom times when we were mining uranium as rapidly as we could, processed that uranium and left behind tailings that have been judged as being very damaging. these tailings were very close to the arizona -- to the colorado river and, indeed, the senator's own state of arizona is downstream from this tailing site. by appropriating this money in this bill in a manner that would be outlawed by the senator's amendment, we are accelerating the cleanup process. and in this time of economic difficulty, more jobs, more activity and, quite frankly, lower prices, as contractors are anxious to gain work and will bid in lower than they would otherwise, it is a logical

it is a town like thousands of other cities in ohio, like zanesville and glea zenya and portsmouth. it is a town not much different from dozens of cities around the nation much my tad was a family doctor. practiced into his late 70's. lived to be 89. died about nine years ago. my dad, for years, made house calls caring for his friends and neighbors, regardless of their ability to pay one patient, i remember, gave my dad a little arrowhead collection after my dad had done very important wor on -- for his health. today the health, education, labor and pension committee passed historic health reform legislation that restores my dad's sense of quality and compassion in our health care system. this legislation was not written for the insurance industry. it wasn't drafted by the drug industry or any other segment of the health care industry. we remember not that long ago in this chamber -- i remember it more intensely in the other end of the hall in the house of representatives where i sat on the health committee. we remember in those days that the drug companies wrote the medicare laws.

those same people around my state, people in zenia, springfield, mansfield, akron, portsmouth need that same access to generic versions. the vote earlier this week was not in the best interest of patients suffering from multiple sclerosis or arthritis or cancer or alzheimer's or heart disease. it was not in the best interest of taxpayers because who's paying the bill here? either people are paying out of their pocket -- most can't afford it -- or insurance companies are paying it. insurance companies are going to raise their rate to employers and the patients. or taxpayers are paying it. that's who it's costing money. the beneficiaries of it aren't patients. it hurts innovation. the beneficiaries are the drug executives and the biologic company executives. it's not in the best interest of taxpayers. it was in the best interest of the large drug and biotech industries that fought to continue unchecked monopoly. there is an article in "roll call" or "hill" today or yesterday that pretty much said that biologic industry bought this one. the biologic industry spent $500,000 in ads in the la