paid to the songwriters, artists, it's not under an fcc umbrella, correct? >> correct. >> whose umbrella is that under? >> i don't know but it's not us. >> that's a good thing. i'll yield back for the moment. >> bmi is in charge of that. >> mr. diaz-balart. >> thank you very much. good to see you. let me first start by madam chairman telling you that the commissioner drk the chairman and his staff have been exceedingly open to us and to my staff. and i thank you for that, to have the opportunity to not only speak with you but to meet with you. i want to thank you for that. we spend a lot of time today speaking about transparency in a number of different areas. we were preparing for this meeting and the issue of light squared kind of came back. i was kind of -- because since you've been so open to me, i was a little shocked at some of the things that i've read about light squared, about the fact that had you a member of the senate saying he couldn't get the information, the fcc told him information of that sort is only given to members of relevant committeeses

the fcc decided not to enforce it back in 1987. the chairman i think very graciously took that cue and then got rid of it from our books. the bilger issue can be when you say fairness doctrine all the phones at radio stations light up and the blogosphere starts to light up as well. there are other ways the fcc can regulate speech through broadcast license renewals. as we go through the media ownership rules which could determine what the licensing term is, eight years, three years, what would be the criteria for getting your license renewed et cetera. it is always important to look at these rules as well. anything that could be the fairness doctrine. mark my words it won't be called the fairness doctrine. we need to keep in mind always. >> i have some questions about broad band to come up later. is the fcc the -- the proponent agency on -- i won't get this term right, i can explain it the royalty fees paid, artists? it's not under an fcc umbrella. is that correct? >> correct. >> and who's umbrella is that under? >> i don't know. but

the increase on the fcc of employees earning $150,000 or above. so even though the number of employees may be flood, those making one and $50,000 above have increased rather dramatically, and that's what madam chairwoman, this chart reflects. >> i will submit that for the record. >> thank you. it's a huge increase of individuals that are now turning over 150% -- $150,000 in salary. and let me see if i can get you some of those numbers. jumped from 4 46 in 2008 individuals, to 431 in 2009, the 535 and 2011. that's a pretty. so what changed between 2008 and 2009 that required such an increase in pay? is a different individuals? i'm not sure what that actually shows us other than the fact that numbers are pretty astonishing. >> so, i'm not familiar with the reason for that particular increase. in general, the work of the fcc increasingly requires highly skilled engineers, economists, others with advanced degrees to do our work. over time, the employee base at the fcc has become more and more focus on that as we moved from paper to digital, and there'v

up next, a house hearing on the fcc's budget. the president is asking for almost $347 million way push for a expanding access to the internet and rural areas and making broadband space available for increasing use ever mobile devices. monday the house operations committee heard from fcc chair and the commissioner robert mcdowell. this is about two hours. >>> the hearing is going to come to order. and i'd like to welcome our two witnesses, chairman jankowski and commissioner mcdowell from the federal communications commission. thank you so much for being here today and for testifying on the fcc's fiscal 2013 budget request. while the fcc is funded by these congressional oversight over your budget is an important check on agency activities. this committee is committeed to fiscal responsibility and we intend to make sure that all agencies under the subcommittees jurisdiction are operating both efficiently and effectively. the fcc is an agency that places an important role on our country's telekman kegs television and cable industries

rules that had been in efblgt for a long time and the statue orders the fcc to carry out those provisions. the issue that is raised in this proceeding is part of a broad effort to move from paper to digital. in fact, the suggestion in the proposal that was made in october which was based on a widely praised report from about a year ago identified the broadcaster public file as one of the last pieces of disclosure that was purely on paper. in fact, the files literally are in filing cabinets at tv stations. so the proposal in the notice was to enable the movement of owl after that information from physical public files to digital. it's a proceeding that's open now. we're looking carefully at the record and i know that i personally do not have to go to a tv station that i can get this information in -- as all our campaigns do today. i'm injurous as to why we're doing this. what is it in the political file that you all tell us all of the pieces of that? >> again, the the proposal in the notice would apply to all of the different elements of the public file. the i

there are pieces we will work on at the fcc. we have a public ct homeland security bureau that's a very focused on it, making sure that we harness the modern communications for the first responders with a mobile broadband public safety network and next generation of the outbound mobile alerts so they can reach people. these are very high priorities and each case the present some have very challenging issues to work through. spec we wish you the best because it is going to be a challenge one everybody will be looking at. there is a question i've asked in the last couple of years every agency that's come before us that has a special interest. what about the territory's? as you know the territories are always an afterthought. the congress, corporate america and everywhere else, and in fact if he were to ask americans are the folks who live in the territories of the american citizens we may be shocked at how many americans do not know because they don't live in a state. it got so bad that a couple of years ago at the hearing i was to

these will be the most complex the fcc conducted to date. please update us on the agency's plan for these auctions as it stands now understanding that things will change as we move forward. we won't press you for a figure today, but i imagine there will be additional administrative costs associated with these auctions. can you comment on that? >> well, the auctions will be, present and opportunity to deliver a great return for the american economy and the american people. raise billions of dollars for the treasury, for the spectrum, for ipads and other mobile devices. it also willi isbe incredibly complex. the two sided auction congress authorize, this will be the first of its kind. it will require a great deal of hard work, engineering work, economist work, and we're privileged to have that responsibility. the staff is now analyzing the statutes, developing an implementation plan, determining what effect it will have and more importantly, what needs to be done to maximize the benefits to the public, to our treasury, to the economy. there's a

these will be the most complex auctions the fcc has conducted to date. please update us for the agency's plans for these auctions, understanding things will change as we move forward. we won't press up for a figure today but i debt you there be. can you comment on that? >> well, the auctions will be an opportunity to deliver a great return for the commit and. it also will be incredibly complex. the two-sided okay shun, it will require a great deal of hard working engineering work, commit work and we're privileged to have that responsibility. the staff is now analyzing the statute, developing an implement ago plan, determining what effect it will have and most importantly, developing a view on what needs to be done to max mied the benefit into we like to make sure that the challenges ahead that we don't short chang the person public because we don't bring the right economic and engineering resources to bear. >> now, you tell us that you're at the lowest staffing level in tn years. so if view of these responsibilities what can you tell us about the present

is the fcc the best agency to achieve such ends rather than the federal election commission? are duplicative to fcc rules violate paperwork reduction act and number three and my many others and they're more in my written testimony where's the fcc and singling out tv broadcasters for such disclosure or car and twin political campaigns spend money on it plethora of outlets that influence voters such as radio, newspapers, the internet, direct mail, outdoor advertising, tayeb -- cable-television settle rate radian tv paid activist to knock on doors and many for voter our reach. i'm hopeful that we as policymakers can strike the right balance between protecting court call political speech and encouraging transparency without disproportionally perjuring -- versioning one of many outlets. finally all of the should be concerned with a well organized international effort to give an arm of the united nations known as the international telecommuting sheets and -- telecom eight telecommunications union any treaty. the internet has flourished under deregulation not only within our country

meanwhile, the debate over whether how the fcc should shape the outcome of this process. history has proven that regulators tend to overengineer spectrum options backfire so i hope all of us can apply the lessons learned from the commission's past missteps in ram with al and this new love. r. option rule should be minimal and future-proof allowing for flexible uses of spectrum and technology and markets change in the years to come. furthermore i'm optimistic we can create a structure that offers opportunity fo s

these will be the most complex auctions the fcc has conducted to date. please update us on the agency's plan for these auctions as it stands now. understanding that things will change as we move forward. we won't pressure for a figure today, but i imagine there will be additional administrative costs associated with these auctions. can you comment on that? >> the auctions will be, present an opportunity to deliver a great return for the american economy in the american people, raise billions of dollars for the treasure, three of spectrum for ipads and other mobile devices. it also will be incredibly complex. the two-sided auctions that congress authorized, this will be the first of its kind. it will acquire a great deal of hard work, engineering work, economists work, and we are privileged to have that responsibility. the staff is now analyzing the statute, developing an imitation plan, determine what effect it will have come and most importantly developing a view on what needs to be done to maximize the benefit to the public, the benefit to the treasure,

first, as we discussed in the last month's hearing, the fcc chairman is proposing a voluntary isp codef conduct as a way to alert consumers when a bot net or malware infection is discovered. today's witnesses will be on the frontline in ensuring such best practices are effectively implemented and obviously i think that you will talk about that. i look forward to it. second, i would like to hear more about your views on this supply chain security. i continue to have grave concerns stemming from my eight years that i recently completed at the house intelligence committee about the implications of foreign control tell communications infrastructure companies providing equipment to the u.s. market. in 2010, i wrote to the chairman asking for a better understanding of the fcc authority to address the challenges and what kind of transparency requirements should be placed on companies seeking to sell telecommunications infrastructure equipment to u.s. network providers. third, i would like to learn more about any unique challenges in securing mobile networks. as more data is transmitted wirele

the fcc upcoming release of the cyber best practices report developed by the communications security reliability and interoperable council such a long name reduced to srioc. i understand the chairman is planning a third hearing with government agencies. i commend him for this series of hearings and look forward to what our witnesses have to tell us. i want to thank you, mr. chairman, for organizing a bipartisan working group to study cyber threats and inform the committee of the findings. this is a good opportunity for staff to work together on the issue of common concern the i look forward to hearing back from the working group and exploring for further actions. thank you for the hearing. i thank the witnesses for being here. i look forward to the testimony. i yield back. >> the gentleman yields back his time. we have a lot of big brains on the committee. we need them all to protect america. thank you for agreeing to serve on that working group. gentlemen, we are delighted to have you hear today. we will start with mr. livingood. we appreciate you being here. from comcast corporatio

and so from this decision the fcc created a new category of entity and it's a mouthful and i believe it was recoined here by our friend here as the super pac. >> i know why i came up with that term. >> the other name was so catchy. so let us move on to our other panelists. but from that creation story as it is, i just want to underscore three particularly troubling assumptions that super pacs are based upon. one is this idea that independent expenditures are noncorrupting. i mean, this notion is, quite frankly, ludicrous here and i know all about it and that infusion of money is, let's say, given to me at a critical moment in my campaign and necessary for me to achieve a key win. it is crazy to think that i would not feel indebted to that individual in some way. the second fallacy is this notion that the coordination rules are sufficient to prevent true coordination the way that you and i talk about coordination and there is political money and i'm going to end illustrating that the best to steven colbert. have you guys talked to him yet? >> as many of you probably know, comedian and

the fcc, the federal communications commission, which is supposed to make sure the broadcasters don't completely get away with highway rob-- excuse me, airwave robbery, the fcc has proposed to the broadcasting cartel that stations post on the web the names of the billionaires and front organizations paying for those campaign ads. that's all, give citizens access online to find out quickly and directly who's buying our elections. doesn't seem like an unreasonable request, given how much cash the broadcasters make from the free use of the airwaves. but the broadcasting industry's response has been a simple, declarative, dismissive, not on your life! speaking on their behalf, robert mcdowell, currently the only republican commissioner on the fcc, said the proposal "is likely to be a jobs destroyer" by distracting station employees from doing their regular work. the party line has also been sounded by jerald fritz, senior vice president of allbritton communications. he told the fcc that making the information available on the internet "would ultimately lead to a soviet-style standardizati

what we've done at the fcc is done two different things. we've set goals for where the country should try to strive to on broadband. for example, set a goal of 100 megabitz to 100 million people by 2020. 1 gigabyte access to everyone in country. at the same time, universal service fund. we have to decide what are we actually going to pay for? it doesn't make sense to say we're going to pay for 100 megabytes for everyone in the country based and current usages. in the university service fund ord frerd a few months ago we defined that level as 4 megabytes buy an ongoing obligation for the krk fcc to look at looking for a job, for education and making adjusts to that over time as is appropriate. >> you know, let me close by saying that, something that you both know already, bumt i think it merits repeating in public. you have one of the most important responsibilities in our society, in our government, and i mean that. because a lot of people who work in government and head agencies and sit on boards, affect certain segments of the population a

and he said no, i sent the fcc the same documents i set my customers.[laughter] and inspector general said, but weren't the sole stock units? and that's when he uttered that line, after a long pause, i can see how you think they might be false. so he defended himself. i'm him as a psychiatric nurse and she has to tell me that the mind will not see what it cannot. c. that people will defend themselves against knowledge that they cannot bear to it now which. maybe there is something of that in madoff's assistance that he really was an honest and successful manager or many years. the government says no for most of this years to recruit. he really was failing on this record. while no, he wasn't. i think he can really bear to face who he really is. and until he does, i don't know that anything like the kind of remorse that we might expect to see a demand would cause such devastation, besides his son's suicide, two other investors committed suicide in the aftermath of the retired british military man who went into a park and blew his brains out in a french mo

invests are and engineers build out networks, they've passed that idea buy and you have to go back to the fcc with another rule making to change what another micromanagement might be from the government. it good to have flexible uses. the light squared did not rise to a level of the commissioner's vote. that was handled by the chairmanman's office. any detailed questions i would defer to them on that. >> i just think it's useful to keep that situation relevant as we discussed how we were going forward. i think there were a lot of fierce whether they were going to come true or not. those fears themselves have an impact on other decision that other companies make. as we go forward, there are companies that are making

but i'm of the opinion that their political appointees at the fcc. rush has so much money, he can keep the thing in court for two, three election cycles, regardless of first amendment. >> john, let's have a question for stephanie? . you can address what he said. bill maher, calling governor palin, a derogatory word used for women. that similar, and should president obama as our tweeter asks return his campaign contributions because of that? >> there is -- again, there is no place for this kind of dialogue. but i would argue that in the case of rush limbaugh, he has gone so far here. an he has done really very, very little to get himself out of it. i was so insulted by the first round of statements. i was shocked that he inessence doubled down the next day, thinking this was a good idea. and then he instead of having a full-throated apology, threw something up on his blog over the weekend. this is on our american airwaves. this is not on a cable show. this is on our american airwaves. and it's enough. he has been doing this for years, and now he is ins

we work with folks at the fcc and they have a lot of expertise. have enough here, that's a tough question. i don't know the answer. >> i don't think there's any agency that has the right expert tease do that. if we knew what the expert was, we would be doing it. i don't think it's a knock on any one particular agency but i think any agency that is capability right now. >> i would agree with ed. the answer is no but i don't think anyone does and i think that is the importance of collaborative relationships. you do need to bring people in from all sorts of the federal arena as well as private industry arena to work together, do just the evolving nature of threats in this arena. >> mr. olsen? >> it's an important question i'd have to agree with mr. livingood, i don't know whether they do or not. >> mr. totske? >> i don't know, either. think what you're hearing here and it's common amongst the panel, the defender job, the job to protect your information is, exceptionally hard and it's actually much more difficult than being on the other side. >> speaki

in addition, century link's ceo chairs the fcc communications security reliability council which is working on voluntary best practices for bot net remediation and domain name security and internet route hijacking and other issues unique to the communications industry. more can and should be done, but carefully. public/private partnerships have yielded significant process by building a framework of defense and cooperation and helping us understand the cyber threat. as many of you have pointed out, we are entering into a new era of cyber security threats where our adversaries are sophisticated. the need to step up our game is acute. we have hr 3523. the cyber protection act and similar provisions in bills that could enhance cyber related public/private sharing. as communication providers, we see a number of areas where we can make improvements. such as improving information sharing and improving the federal government's posture and expanded research and development. shifting to a mandated-based approach would be counter productive. we strongly caution against the traditional regulatory appro

what we've done at the fcc is we've done two different things. we've set goals for where the country should try to strive to on broadband. for example, we set a goal of 100 megabits, affordable to 100 million people by 2020. one gig gag bit access in every community in the country. at the same time, for universal service fund where we have to decide, okay what are we going to actually pay for, it doesn't make sense to say we're going to pay for 100 megabits to everyone in the country based on current usages. in the universal service fund order from a few months ago, we defined that level as four megabits basically with an ongoing obligation of the fcc to look at the uses that are essential force participation in our economy, for small businesses, for looking for a job, for education. and making adjustments to that over time as is appropriate. >> you know, let me close by saying that something that you both know already. but i think it merits repeating in public. you have one of the most important responsibilities in our society, in our government.

the key. so it's almost kind of a moot question whether it should be dhs or fcc, because i'm not sure what they should be telling us. that's the problem. and, you know, there are some things, i said i'm part of the team. i'm trying to make recommendations. i'm not -- i don't want to lead you to believe that we're not trying to reduce the risk, but i would say from an agency perspective if there was an obvious set of things that should be done right now, kind of thinking the groups that are here would be doing it. we are insented to do that. that's the problem. so i hope that addresses the question. >> okay. yes, thank you for that answer. and mr. livingood, you mentioned that comcast -- is an active participate on the fcc reliability and interoperability council. can you describe for us how you envision the council's contributing to the improvements in cyber security, especially with the attacks, like the bot nets? >> sure. there are a number of working groups. i'm on one. one of the folks that works with me is here. they focus on the security of the routing infrastructure. dns sect and a whole

we work with a lot of folks at the fcc and enjoy doing that. they have a lot of expertise. whether they have enough here, i think that's a tough question. i don't know the answer. >> i've said earlier, i don't think there is any agency that has the right expertise to do that. if we knew what the answer was, we would be doing that. i don't think it's a knock on any one particular agency. i just don't think there is any agency that has that capability right now. >> mr. mullen? >> and i would agree with ed. the answer is no, but i don't think anyone does. and i think that is the importance of collaborative relationships. you do need to bring people in from all sorts of the federal arena, as well as the private industry arena to work together, do the evolving nature of the threats in this arena. >> mr. olsen? >> it's an important question, but i would have to agree with mr. livingood. i don't know whether they do or not. >> i don't know either. i think what you're hearing here and common amongst the panel is the defender job, the job we're trying to do to protect your informatio

thisy have joined in saying it is time for the fcc to crush rush. the co-founders of the women -- the women's media center accused them of using sexist, racist and homophobic language and we shouldn't insight speech. as the left often does, the three say that if clear channel won't drop rush they should step in with the sec banishing him from the airways. let's go to the senior media correspondent playing with a red pumpkin. >> basically it is a war on pumpkins. and that is a metaphor for a lot of the wars. we will get to snooki later though. that wasn't even worth it. michael, the best part in this fonda, gloria stenam op ed is a claim -- they claim it isn't political. how is this not political? if this was bill mar, this would not happen. >> i saw daily beast op-ed. they compare him to joseph gerble. they are immediately disqualified. i think she disqualified herself by going to north vietnam. the factor is giving aid and suffer to the enemy of war. that said let's move to the real issue. gloria all re d, my anger is directed to the media. i hate s

than we're in big prouble when it ccmes to cutting othee wasteful spending, becuase this is easy" the fccalso trying to crackdown.last year they searched the database looking for people who had recieved more than one phone. they fund over a quarter of million offfree cell phones won't be easy.we asked a worrer at a location giiing away phones if ttey check to see if applicants alrrady receievd a free phoneandthe employee told us yes.1:16:29q;"can people get multiple cell phones?"a; "nobut accorring to crawford, controls ae lax1:12;36"i could go to the same plaae tomorroo and get another hone it's a disconnect that bothh people in baltimore.1:08:23 "not eveyrbody is going toodo the right thingand members of congress.00:34:266wehere does &pthis end?"means the lifeline we spoke to the f-c--, who administers the "life line" they've recently issued new no one receives more than one phone coming up ... ...in sports...tim tebow is picked up!the new team he's playing for. 3(break 3)) d97 coming up in our 6 bride... our... here comes the this is one loooog train... where it was created... how long

the staff to work with the fcc staff to get right. what we did not want to do is create a situation where some of the principal buyers would be excluded at the beginning. att and verizon. there was a lot of chatter coming down to the commission at its highest level. its highest level. they can do all that. we can take away anyway -- any of that authority. they can deal with issues related to monopolies and that sort of thing. what we wanted to do is maximize participation, maximize duration, maximize the ability to fill this to get more spectrum into the market will protecting the rights of those who have it today, creating a fair system and further, actually implement recommendation to build a network and pay for it. >> let's talk about the broadband network. that network could cause of -- cost up to $16 billion. >> let's see how the issue plays out. i commend the commission for getting their payments done on time to create the board. they -- we will be doing oversight. remember, the national broadband report did not say give them the

bill marr thing is not a good analogy, he doesn't have the fcc, he's on cable. >> andered by the fcc. >> we were talking about -- oh, 2 years old, healthcare is. >> woogy woogy woogy. >> chuck e. cheese. ball jump. >> but that soup of bacteria yuck, no, thank you. hmm, hmm hmm. >> just inincredible, who two years ago, passages healthcare reform is armageddon because it will ruin our country. >> any random republican. >> that's actually right. john boehner. >> that's about as random as it gets. >> healthcare reform -- did i see a picture of him crying on st. patrick's day, what was he crying about? >> he was crying because there was some irish music playing. >> give me the cabbage. >> all his orange ran on to his green tie. it was a mess. >> it just made an ugly dark brown color. >> who said healthcare reform will destroy the country because in the next year or so america will have to dramatically cut the military because we can't pay for it? >> mitch mcconnell, the talking turtle. >> frothy, former senator rick santorum. >> who said there will be no insurance industry

in addition, senator link ceo chairs the fcc communications security reliability in danger of ability council which is working on voluntary best practices for the remediation for the system's security, internet routt hijacking and other emerging issues unique to the communications industry. more can and should be done carefully. the part purchase of yield a significant progress in the last years by building a framework of collective defense and cooperation helping us understand the cyber threat to as many of you have pointed out, we are entering into a new era to the career of cybersecurity threats for the adversaries have become more sophisticated and determined. to collectively step up the game is more acute. we are particularly encouraged by legislation like h.r. 3523. reza brenda watson sharing and protection act and provisions in the senate bills that can clarify and enhance the cyber related public/private information sharing. as the commission providers, we see a number of areas for the congressional action to make a valuable and provides for the nation's labor security such as

as soon as that work gets done, based on what we are getting from the fcc, even under obama, we have moves by a very massive corporations to take control of the internet. advocates that have been working on that are pretty afraid that if we don't move soon to set up a public broadband system in san francisco that covers the entire city, we will get preempted from doing that by corporate takeover. as soon as we get community choice put to bed, we need to jump on that right away. commissioner olague, i wanted to make sure you got that message. commissioner campos: any other member of the public that would like to speak? public comment is closed. >> item nine, future agenda items. commissioner campos: colleagues, this is an opportunity to discuss or introduce any other item that you would like for lafco to consider as we move forward. why don't we open it up for public comment. seeing none, public comment is closed. item ten. >> adjournment. commissioner campos: meeting adjourned, and i want to take this opportunity to wish a happy birthday to commissioner pimentel. she makes me feel ver

we support the fcc's attempts to look at althouernative strategi. one would be to go away from the net asset additi-- fixed net as approach. i think the industry will reject that pretty categorically. what else could be done? one approach would be essentially to create more capital. they have limited capital at it this point, and there might be ways to build up the capital base. so that's one possible approach, and then either complementing that as a separate approach would be something that involved not allowing the draw out 100% immediately. if you think about that, what that really does is that it makes it unattractive to be the first person to withdraw your money, and therefore, it reduces the risk of runs considerably. it also has an investor protection benefit, which is if you're a, quote, slow investor and not monitoring the situation moment by moment so you're the last guy to take your money out, you're still protected because there's this 3% or whatever -- >> i've heard from some investors and from some funds that given the low margin that m

and he stays here in washington at least until 1944 working at the fcc. all right. so now we're actually going to get to ernest's story. and this is the story that pretty much takes all the air out of the room. i think the story -- i think bumby's story and lester's great are both great. and they had a lot of adventure, more than many of us will experience in a lifetime. but ernest is going to go one better. no what's going to have the most excellent adventure of anybody in the family or social circle. and this is one that to a surprising extent is focused on intelligence operations in one way or another. and this is even though ernest doesn't take his own advice. he's married and has two wives and two kids -- three if you count bumby. but two small kids to worry about. it's interesting to note, that for about a six-year period he puts his writing career on hold. he's off doing the intel tasks and following the war rather than sticking to his writing. so when we encounter ernest in the war, he is living in cuba. he kind of goes to a different place every time he swit

and i spoke with the fcc. many say they should have disclosed this because it is such a unique lawsuit. >> that statement is very generic. it could mean anything. >> legally, they are covered. >> okay. interesting. julie watts, thank you. >>> it has been over a decade since anthrax packages shut down the post office and crippled capitol hill. well now deliveries with a suspicious white substance have returned. tonight, only cbs has learned what is inside and what the sender is threatening. robert lyles has exclusive details. >> february 22, seattle fire crews race to the side of patty murray. a package of white powder has been found. 3,000 miles away in philadelphia, another white powder package evacuates republican senator, patrick's office. then, 212 miles away, a staffer opens a pack canal dripping with white powder at joseph leberman's office. what's going on? cbs 5 has secured an intelligence bull ten from the fbi. a weapons of mass destruction directory, to be exact. each package contains a picture of jo

topic of the communications commission testifying before the house appropriations subcommittee on the fcc budget. by the way, one programming note. we focus on communication issues every week on c-span's the communique tors. schedule information by logging on to c-span.org. we'll continue the conversation tomorrow morning. the executive director of the independent women's forum will be joining us as we talk about the gender issues of the women vote in the 2012 election and the

what has been the role of any of the fcc in all of this? >> i mean look, fox is a cable network which means "fox news" i should say, is a cable network which means the role that the fcc is fairly limited in its regulation. i'm also going to say and this is a personal point of view now. i really believe in the first amendment first amendment and what the first amendment says is that government should not interfere in free speech so i think it's our jobs as activists and progressives and media watchers to fight for a better media. i don't want the government stepping in and saying don't do this and don't do that and don't do this and on a personal level, that i don't like. i think we as a people should stand up and make your point now and when we see something in media that is not right and recent events have shown that we and i'm not counting people here but we as it community and progressive movement have a tremendous amount of power to influence the media and i think that is where we should look and not look to the government for remedies.

now we have occupy the fcc which submitted a 325-page comment letter. that's never been done before like people like us, getting involved in the regulatory process. there are all these different groups, all these different kinds of people lawyers journalists, activists involved that weren't involved in the fall and that's why it's bigger. >> is this a change in strategy or evolutionary. >> it is evolutionary. there are more people physically involved. they reached out to people who were involved in a lot of these realms of the economy and they needed more expertise what could they do to bring more pressure to bear and be more effective. they're targeting their resources more effectively. i think you'll see them have even more of an effect in the coming year. >> is that why you use the term "we" to define occupy. >> i guess i'm doing this. i'm peripheral to all this. >> there you are we are. is that a royal we, an unofficial we. we all know what happened to trotsky, not wishing you bad luck in mexico city, but almost to that point. the story that homeland

working group members ready off to act if the fcc learns anything that implicates the laws they enforce. the task force at the forefront of the administration efforts to seek justice for those devastated by the recent financial crisis. since 2009 we have helped to bring charges to secure convictions and obtain prison sentences up to 60 years in a variety of cases charging securities fraud, bank fraud and investment fraud. criminal enforcement tools, where possible, and civil penalties and sanctions where necessary. i think we have made great strides in holding individuals and ins tuxs accountable for the reckless, inappropriate and often times unlawful conduct that helped contribute to the financial crisis. by employing a similar collaborative approach we have been able to make history. in january the departments of justice and housing and urban development, other agencies, 49 state attorneys general, came to achieve a landmark 25 billion dollar agreement with the nation's top five mortgage servicers. largest joint federal/state record on settlement on record. this will provide signific

the fcc has requested $300 million, that is $11.5 million less than fiscal 20 12. the one commissioner to vote against the plan, his name is thomas rouche. >> i describe myself as the fiscal conservative. not my first stint in the ftc, i served as the drkter of the bureau of consumer protection, so i have an abiding interest in the agencies welfare and reputation. that said, i have been free to disagree with my democratic colleagues. and i have disagreed with them hopefully without being disagreeable on a number of years over the last seven year s. these have included the agencies 2013 budgets submitted to this committee. and the president's policy decisions which are reflected in that budget. the areas of disagreement with my colleagues have included authorized generic s, which i know that you have abiding interest in as well, chairman emerson, since you have legislation pending on that subject. financial services enforcement needs, and case selection. particularly since we now share jurisdiction with the new cfpb over my dead body i might add. oil and gas price s.

testifying before the sub committee on the fcc budget. when programming note, we focus on communications issues every week. tomorrow morning we'll continue the kofrgs on the washington jury snal. the executive director of the women's forum. we talk about the gender issues and the hispanic vote. the perspective of vargas, the national association of latino elected and appointed officials and just how safe is the food we eat? the food safety for the center of science and the public interest will be joining us at 6:15en for those of you in the west coast. thanks for joining us on this monday. i hope you enjoyed the rest of your evening. >>> in a few moments here on c-span three, general motors ceo dan akerson. and then three majors talk about education reform. this is c-span 3, with politics and public affairs programming throughout the week, and every weekend, 48 hours of people and events telling the american story on american history tv. get our schedules and see past programs at our websites. join in the conversation on social media sites

there was a case about the fcc where one cable provider had asked for something about cable lines and the service would have benefited all cable companies and all tv watchers basically. i can't think of a more public service than declassifying things that aren't classified anymore and yet now -- and they won't even give us numbers. they'll say whatever we decide to charge you, you have to agree to pay it up front or we won't look at it. >> i think the reason people aren't asking questions is because lunch is next. one last thing, jeff, quickly. you now, state and local law enforcement is involved in the intelligence game a little bit and you've been involved in some foias with state and particularly here in d.c. how is the process different and are they better at doing it? >> there's a lot of variation in state open record -- oh -- there's a lot of variation in state open records laws. i've done quite a bit of litigation in d.c., and a lot of times you can find out information that would not be redacted by the fbi, if you had done a request, because some of the provisions are a little