Transcripts For CSPAN Washington 20240703

Request for support israel and ukraine. He argued u. S. National security interests require it and failure would reward terrorists and dictators and embolden them to continue their assault on democracy. What do you think . Do you support new aid to and ukraine . Do you support one and not the other . We are taking your calls this first hour. Republicans, 202 7488001. Democrats, 202 7488000. Independents, 202 7488002. You can post on social media or on facebook. Com cspan and instagram. Welcome to visit today welcome to todays washington journal. This is the New York Times commit with the headline, israel launches intense strikes on gaza as u. S. Backeds delaying invasion. The article says israel set on monday it had struck hundreds of targets in the gaza strip and attacked hezbollah positions in lebanon as President Biden led in an International Diplomatic effort. In a joint statement sunday, mr. Biden and the leaders of britain, canada, france, germany, and italy urged israel to protect civilians as a defendant itself. And called for the release of all hostages believed to be held in gaza. More than 4000 people have been killed in gaza since october 7. When israel began retaliating for an attack that killed 1400 people. Lets look at what senator Mitch Mcconnell said about linking aid to israel and ukraine together. It requires a worldwide approach rather than trying to take parts of it out. It is all connected. The chinese and the russians said they are now friends forever. Iranian drones are being used in ukraine and against the israelis. There is resistance among some republicans, including in the senate, about bundling things together. Is it possible to pass ukraine aid if it is not tied israel . I think that is a mistake. I know there are some republicans in the senate and may be more in the house that think ukraine is somehow different. I view it as interconnected. You have said you believe there is enough oversight of aid to ukraine. Why has that not persuaded some members of the Republican Caucus . If you look at ukrainian assistance, a portion of it is being spent in the United States and 38 different states, replacing the weapons we send to ukraine with more modern weapons. We are rebuilding our industrial base. That is what President Biden seeking to do. It is correct. No americans are getting killed in ukraine. We are rebuilding our industrial base. The ukrainians are destroying the army of one of our biggest rivals. I have a hard time finding anything wrong with that. Host wonder what you think about that. He said it is all interconnected and he supports the aid package that the president has asked congress for for israel and ukraine. We are talking your calls. Republicans, 202 7488001. Democrats, 202 7488000. Independents, 202 7488002. You can also send us a message on facebook or on x. Some news also from over the weekend, the ap is reporting israel says two americans held hostage by hamas have been released. It says that hamas on friday freed an American Woman and her teenage daughter, who had been held in gaza, israel said. The first such release from our mung roughly 200 people the militant group abducted. Judith ranaan and her 17yearold daughter natalie were out. Hamas said it release them for humanitarian reasons and an agreement with the qatari government. A few posts from members of congress. Representative Roger Williams says, biden has requested an additional 60 billion for ukraine, yet only allocated 14 billion for our greatest ally, israel. Ukraine has received 75 billion, yet we still not know what that money is being used for. We must pass in a package specifically to israel. And thiss senator john cornyn. Our support aid israel and ukraine, but without meinul policy changes that address the biden border crisis, such aid is in serious jeopardy. No more money should be spe simply to facilitate Current Border policy. And rick scott says, ukraine and israel are two separate issues. Any attempt ge additional money to ukraine risks complicated the process and prolonging the time it will take to get aid to our ally, israel. Destroy hamas and get american hostages home. Finally, representative Marjorie Taylor greene says, you never see the war that you have been forced to pay for in ukraine on tv like you see war in israel 24 7. Where has our money gone in ukraine . I think it is a money long a Money Laundering war. Ukraine is not the 51st state. Stop funding corruption. I wonder what you think about that. Before we start taking your calls, i want to show you this article from the Washington Times dock it is on the the Washington Times. It is on the front page. Escalation of war looks to be inevitable. Israel pounded hamas targets in the gaza strip and struck militants in the west bank and syria while warning lebanonbased hezbollah of devastating consequences, should it enter the war. Fearing escalation of the conflict, which began with the october 7 attack on israel, officials announced the deployment of naval assets and Missile Defense batteries to the persian gulf region. Defense secretary lloyd austin said he was putting more troops on prepared to deploy orders to join at least 2000 u. S. Personnel given such orders last week. U. S. Forces in the middle east have come under fire by militias linked to iran. Late last week, iran backed rebels fired rockets and drones from yemen that officials said were aimed at israel. American warships shot them down. With hotspots popping up across the region almost daily, Biden Administration concede that escalation seems all but inevitable. We are taking your calls this morning for this first hour. We will start with jim in new jersey. Good morning. Caller good morning and thank you for taking my phone call. You peopleok. That being said, i am for aid to ukraine and israel for the simple fact that they are combating autocracy and dictatorship and terrorism. But at the same time i would hope that the United Nations would take this on and be forceful with the belligerents responsible for the invasion. That is what i have to say. Host liz cheney, the former representative, was on state of the union yesterday. She talked about it would make the u. S. Look weak if we stopped supporting ukraine. [video clip] as i said before, america is facing four adversaries right now. And major adversaries in china and russia and north korea and iran. What happens with respect to our willingness to defend ukraine has a direct impact on all of those other challenges and conflict we face. The idea that we are now in a situation where you have this growing movement on the part of republicans not to support american aid to ukraine is dangerous, wrong. Anybody today saying they do not support aid to ukraine needs to be asked, and i hope they will be asked in the Candidate Forum for speaker, why would you be engaged in surrendering to american americas adversaries . If you do not support aid to ukraine given the context in which we are living, you are helping americas adversaries. You are demonstrating weakness at precisely the moment when we need to show strength. Host back to your calls, dennis is in new york, independent. Caller in the case of israel, we see only 2 of the population could have a gun and with that gun only 50 rounds, which seems ridiculous. Particularly when individuals are nextdoor to dangerous people, and that is what the left wants to do here in the u. S. In new york, they are counting bullets. Very dangerous stuff. Background checks on lawabiding citizens. Host what do you think about further u. S. Aged israel and ukraine . Caller we would not have had this situation because we would have had people fighting back. We would not have lost 1400 people because they would have had guns in their homes to fight back against these individuals. Ukraine, i think it is probably we need your up to get involved. We have to count exactly how many dollars we are sending to ukraine and better understand where the money is going. That is all. Host if you are on the line, stay on the line. We will get back to you shortly. First, we will talk to a pollster. Mark blumenthal joins us. Lets talk about the poll you recently did on u. S. Support or public support for israel and how that is changing. Could you give us the high level before we drill into details . Guest yahoo news does a poll about once a month. We completed our monthly survey with about 20 questions about the conflict between israel and hamas. We found a lot of, but the ones that stood out most were those that support for israel, simply for israel rather than the palestinians had increased significantly since a prior poll we did two years ago by about 13 points. Sympathy for israel was up from 30 43 as opposed to 9 for palestinians. It had been 15 . There was an increased number who blamed hamas for the and a greater percentage to consider it important to protect israel in the middle east. Host i was want to drill down on the difference between republicans, independence, and democrats on support for israel as opposed to the palestinians. Guest this is one of the more interesting findings and changing spirit sympathy for israel increased, almost entirely among democrats and independents. There was no increase in republicans. Part of that is because republicans have been more supportive of israel two years ago, so a fairly large difference between republicans who had a lot of support and democrats and independents who had less is that the democratic and independent number went up. But it is still a sort of defining feature of this issue and it is an interesting part of President Bidens initiative on it, that in some ways his position is more likely to resonate with republicans than some democrats. Host one of the start says americans back aiding israel but are divided on the best policy toward the palestinians. Explain that. Guest i cannot see the chart. Host would you support or oppose the u. S. Government providing humanitarian aid to the following . Between israel and palestine. And do you think each of the following guest there is americans have i do not want to say divided. They have diverse opinions on this issue. We had a question about whether we should be doing whether United States should be sending continuing aid we have, sending less, making it conditional. There are pockets of support for all of those positions. And i have seen that on the other surveys as well. Host you asked of participants considered israel an ally or enemy. Why did you phrase it that way . Guest this may be a poll done for cbs news, which well you give did it while yougov did it i did not, but we try to write questions that are balanced and offer the ability to take whatever opinion they have commit to express it. If the response choices were ally or not, it is because those are two offsetting options there to be chosen. Host there was a question about President Bidens handling of the current situation. How did he do . I will pull that up here in american views on bidens handling of the war. Strongly approve among all u. S. Adult citizens is 36 . Not sure, 25 . Then strongly or somewhat disapprove and then you break it down by democrats, independents, republicans. Obviously to mike krantz having a higher view of President Biden democrats having a higher view of President Bidens handling of the israelhamas war. Guest i am fairly certain both surveys have roughly the same question. The results were subtly different. But essentially the same. You have a net negative rating what happens with this is that the rating of bidens policies and rating on all other things, democrats are generally supportive. Republicans are generally more likely to say they disapprove. What you have here is, at least on the yahoo news poll, one of bidens better ratings as opposed to other issues. And there is a little less polarization on this question than on other aspects of his ratings, so there are a small number of republicans who will approve of bidens handling, that he is taking a position that should resonate with what republicans feel, and there are a small number of democrats who disapprove. Host can you tell us about yougov and what you do . Guest yougov is an organization that does surveys online. It was one of the pioneers of doing surveys online. We recruit americans and people in the u. K. And all over the world who are willing to do surveys online here and there is a sophisticated effort to support select respondents so they are representative of the u. S. Public, in this case. Host thanks for joining us. Back to your calls now. Contessa is in florida. Caller thank you for taking my call. The coverage i wanted to say that i am independent and a floridian, fourthgeneration. I feel the climate is getting has been tense. I think that the republicans and the crazy eight need to come together and decide to work for what is in the best interest of us all and i believe supporting our allies is the way to do that. We should give them what they need to succeed. Host gary is in new hampshire, democrat. Caller thank you for taking my call. I do not know how we can judge how biden is doing because we have a congress that is so inept and refuse to come up with a House Speaker. I feel Kevin Mccarthy did not have a prayer to begin with, which was his own doing. I would like to know, what proof does jim jordan have to prove that biden had something to do with his son dealing with the Energy Company in the ukraine . I think that is nothing but petty baloney by the Republican Party because they are mad because donald trump lost the election in 2020. It is about time they got their heads out of their butts. Host what about aged israel and ukraine . Do they supported . Do you support it . Supplemental aid, are you in support of that . Caller i am for it. Russia needs to get out of ukraine. At the same time, the house needs to get their act together and get a speaker elected so this can be done and also the government can be prevented from being shut down november 17. Host over the weekend, by sunday at noon, everybody who wanted to run for speaker had to put their name in. Here they are. There are nine people from the house. This is in alphabetical order. Kevin hern, mike johnson, austin scott, and pete sessions. They will discuss today at 6 30. They are having their internal meeting and we will keep you updated on that. Denny in ohio, democrat. There you are. Caller hello . Host go ahead. Youre on the air. Caller i have an opinion on the relationship, the United States relationship with israel. In this scenario israel is a little spoiled. And i wonder about israel. [indiscernible] it may be they are more interested in absorbing the west bank as israel proper. Host the netanyahu government has said they are not supportive of a two state solution. Lets take a look at a portion from yesterdays state of the union. This is representative mike turner of ohio on the committee on intelligence. He is the chair and he shows support for a package that addressed National Security concerns brought up by the lack of a House Speaker. [video clip] i do support the package. It is important we move forward to stand up against the authoritarian regimes that are trying to undermine democracies that are our allies. I think we should be more focused on russia as a threat to the United States than we have been because this is not just an issue of ukraine or not ukraine. This is an issue of russia is our adversary and they intend to do us under allies harm. With israel, this is one that has great clarity. We have all seen and been saddened by the atrocities we have seen and the need for addressing the issue of hamas. With respect to National Security, having a house that does not function is a Security Threat for our country. This aid package is not being delayed as a result of the house. The senate has taken up the aid package. It looks like it will be about two weeks before the package comes out of the senate itself and we all hope we will have a speaker by then. Host we are taking your calls on the topic of if you support or oppose new u. S. Aged israel and ukraine. Keith is calling from toledo, ohio. Good morning. Caller good morning. I think we should give aid to israel and ukraine. Why do we start things that we cannot finish . I always believe you do not start a war or a fight, anything, unless you are committed to finish it. Why would you start it if you are going to go halfway through . We have been sporting israel for years. We are just going to stop now . Hamas is good for nothing. The palestinians, it is terrible what has happened over there all around, but the palestinians had a chance for their own state years ago. Now what do you have . Host as you said, the u. S. Has been supporting israel for many years. Typically it is in the three to 4 billion range per year. This is now 14 billion. Do you agree with that . Do you think you should be kept the same . Caller do we realize there is 1000 billion and 1 trillion westmark we are spending trillions like it is nothing. It means really nothing in the big scheme of things. Host do you support continued aid for ukraine . Caller ukraine is a little different. We gave them a lot more. In a short to much of time, so israel is not even a comparison to that. Like i said at the beginning, do not start something you cannot finish. Do not help ukraine. They have to have an end game. You should always have an end game to what you start. Why would you start something if you do not know where it is going to end . Host matt in maryland. Caller as a democrat, i do not believe the polls, necessarily, that the gentleman presented. I also like to say that i believe that the money we are giving is too much money. I believe israel already gets enough of our money and the palestinians are the people that need our help and i completely am against what the palestinians did but i think the israelis are going overboard and it is just an excuse for them to nudge the palestinians out further from their land, but i think any money that we do gift israel, as long as we are trying to establish peace there, is insist israel does not use it for military purposes and the palestinians need more of our money than israel. They get enough already. Host tim in pennsylvania, good morning. Caller i am in full support of backing israel, just a tragedy. Anything they need to help them out. I am opposed and have been for about a year now for support for ukraine. Youre not going to dislodge putin unless nato gets involved and once nato gets involved that is world war iii. Youre just not going to move him out of there. I think all of the effort should be an approach to find a peaceful way, a peaceful settlement. He has a long history. They were supposed to give the ukrainians that part of the country. A lot of ukrainians sympathize and want to be part of russia. Zelenskyy should give them a vote on becoming part of russia and he turned around and changed his mind on that. We are giving him all sorts of aid and his wife is dressed to the nines shopping and parents. I think the community should come together and make a settlement. Any more money and ukraine i think is cruel at this point. The ukrainians are just getting ground to duster. The young men do not want to serve their they fled to other parts of europe they have to track them down and drag them back to the war, so age to israel eight aid to israel. Host our previous caller was in support of the u. S. Sending funding to the palestinians, civilians. What do you think of that . Would you do that . We support israel and humanitarian assistance . Would you support israel and humanitarian assistance . Caller from what i read, the polling shows anywhere from 70 to 90 of the palestinians support hamas. I think generally the palestinians they elected hamas. They put them in power, so i think the palestinian nation as a whole, from what i read, supports what is going on. They want them wiped off the earth. You get the government you vote for. So if they wanted to go down this path host you know hamas has not had an election since that first one in 2006. Caller neither has ukraine. The palestinians across the board and go to work just like our southern border with the mexicans. They go to work and they come home. Host got it. Lets take a look at what tony blinken said on meet the press yesterday. [video clip] i would ask you about the more than 100 billion in a that President Biden aid that President Biden is requesting from congress, currently in a state of paralysis. How can the u. S. Deliver on that aid if you cannot get it through the house, where there are also deep divisions . We need to see the continuation of strong, bipartisan support for ukraine and israel. We have two friends under attack in different ways you heard the president speak very powerfully to this the other night, speaking to the American People. If we let wouldbe aggressors act with impunity, whether it is a state like russia, terrorists like hamas, we open a pandoras box for other aggressors around the world to try to get away with the same thing. So we have to stand strong with our friends, with ukraine and israel. We have to look out for the people of gaza, who are caught in this crossfire. The supplemental budget request, the money the president asked congress for, would do that. It gives us the assistance that ukraine needs and also that the people of gaza need with humanitarian aid, so we need congress to move forward on a strong bipartisan basis we have already seen and i hope the people of gaza. Host that was the secretary of state. We are taking more calls until the top of the hour. Robert in california, and dependent. Good morning. Independent. Good morning. Caller right now, going through a lot of stuff in my body. Just checking out and listening and i do not understand why we have anything to do with the wars and any kind of money at all going to them when we should be helping ourselves more than anything. If you start something, you have to see it through to the finish. That means you have to know where the finish is. Not just running out there and seeing what happens. Anyway, i am watching. Host glad you are watching. John in alabama, democrat. I support the money for ukraine because russia is trying to colonial lies. I do not support the money for israel because israel is colonizing or trying to colonize palestine. If i look back over the last 15 years and there has been 6400 palestinians that have been killed by jews and a little over 300 jews that have been killed by palestine, and this war that they say is a war in israel, this is not a war. This is something that is genocide and the United States is supporting israel in their genocide. So that is why i do not agree with the money going to israel. Host on facebook, we have jane saying no to ukraine. We cannot g aaccounting of where the money and weapons den has been pouring into the coupt country have been used so far, although it is reported that the u. S. Citizen is paying for government pensions. Michelle says, i suppo money come up the requests should brated. The money, but request should be separated. Israel suffered a massacre only two weeks ago. More than 200 hostages are held by h that is the immediate emergency. Do not use the beheaded babies in israel to fund something else. It is insensitive. Anime anna may. Caller i would like to know where biden things we are going to get 100 million to send anywhere. Host it is billion. Caller i mean billion. But we do not have the money. So where is he going to get it from . We are in debt. Ok. Host kim in florida. Caller i want to say that i think the entire idea of us funding israel is silly. They continually champion themselves as being strong and independent, yet america is basically propping up their efforts against a local militia, and i think they are a total disgrace to america. Thank you. Host summer is a democrat in illinois. Caller i do not support israel is really giving them support. Im going to have to say america is good at funding genocide. I do not know what that is. We already know that netanyahu is not supportive of a two state solution, so how are you going to back the country with a leader that does not support a two state solution . I am very confused. Host danny in arizona, republican. Caller good morning. A couple things here. First, i support the money going to israel because what hamas did to those families and those babies is reprehensible. I think the Biden Administration needs to worry about our southern border, which he opened completely. So far in the month of september, we have had 18 terrorists on the watchlist get caught. That is not counting the got a ways. Im sure there are terrorists there. On that list. Not only that, Rashida Tlaib and the socalled squad, they are nothing but bad actors. All they are doing is they were to leap Rashida Tlaib was confronted in the hallway by hilary vann from fox, trying to get her to answer questions, and she just ran to the elevator. She would not answer about beheading of babies in this and that. All she did was run to the elevator. So did that omar girl. I think the southern border down here, we have a crisis down here. We have the cartels running our border. Biden just opened it wide open for these people. Host take a look at the headline of the Washington Times about the border. Biden hopes border funds sweeten bill. Republicans skeptical of approach, saying the request is dead on arrival. David is next in new york, and. Good morning. I support financial and military aid in the short term for israel and the same for the ukraine because these are wars that if we do not fight them there and get rid of the terrorism and route them out that one day they are going to be here in our backyard. Having said that, two state solution sidebyside, socioeconomic and political reform for both is the way to go. If that does not go, then one state would be the way. Perhaps the alternative. The second alternative is to annex gaza to egypt and the west bank to jordan. Having said that, it is the Islamic Republic of iran that has sponsored every terrorist activity in the region and has taken 89 Million People of iran hostage for 44 years. Whether we like it or not, our policies have been we essence acquiescence been supporting them. Ideologically, trying to make sure everyone knows their ideology is failing. Host how does that happen from the United States . What do you think the u. S. Should do . Caller the u. S. Should be clear in terms of protecting the american ideals everywhere. That is democracy, liberalism, secular government, and social economic and political reforms. Host do you want the United States to fund organizations within iran that are prodemocracy organizations and things like that . Caller that has to be on the table, but at least having a clear message of on one hand not providing rhetoric for human rights and supporting the people but on the other hand cutting a deal with the Islamic Republic and giving them back their money that really belongs to the people of iran in excess of 6 billion or even during Obamas Administration something in the order of 100 billion, that is not the way to go. We have to have a clear message. We cannot be on both sides. Host lets talk to shirley, ohio, democrats line. Caller good morning and thank you for your program. I support them, ukraine, gaza, israel, but only for a certain amount of time. Netanyahu is not for peace at all. He is like a donald trump. He wants it all for himself. He was to go in and obliterate gaza and take that little strip of land, all about a little piece of land. He cares nothing about the people. I do support ukraine and israel and gaza. Please help those people that cannot help themselves. But do not let netanyahu start running things like trump has ran things over here in america. Host you said you do support it for a certain period of time. What is that time . What is the time limit on the support for israel . Caller give us a year. Give us one year and maybe things would be better in just one year, just support the people. I am not trying to support the dictators. I want to support the people. I was doing pretty good as a black female until i have been crying every day, but i was doing pretty good until friday when a young lady was on and was about to be killed. She prayed and she says, god, if im going to die, im going to die with a smile on my face. That did it for me. That just killed me as a mother. Somebody please help those people. Host lets look at what former speaker of the house Kevin Mccarthy said yesterday about linking ukraine and israel aid together. [video clip] we will look at what they put up. The one thing the ministration has to no from the day i became speaker, they had to stop ignoring the southern border. Israel should have their money now. They are at the brink of war. There are more americans dying on our southern border than in ukraine. Ukraine has 9 billion right now, so lets sit down and look at what they need. Israel 31 americans 31 americans just lost their lives. Lets make sure our border is secure. 31 americans just lost their lives in israel, not something we have seen happen at the southern border. Let me be very clear. Would you support linking aid to ukraine to aid for israel . I would not want to delay any aid for israel. I would have already sent aid to israel. If i was still speaker, i would have done a number of things. We would not even be talking about it today. I would have made sure that no longer would we pay for american hostages. There would be consequences for any american and no one is going to get left behind. I would have stood up to the antisemitism and lies being said by the democrats. I would have made sure we had looked at our own border, that we do not have any sleeping cells here, that we would actually stop terrorists coming across our own border and i would have made sure from that perspective Going Forward that israel had every weapon they needed to defend themselves. Then we would have brought up ukrainian aid at the same time were talking about our own southern border and we would have been able to get the job done. Host that was the former speaker of the house yesterday speaking on nbc. Heres the breakdown of the proposal. Ukraine is at 61 billion. Israel, 14 billion dollars. Border security, 14 billion. Humanitarian aid, 10 billion. That is from reuters. Brandy is next on the republican line, kentucky. Caller until you played the video of the interview, i was going to Say Something else. But the lady that was interviewing mccarthy said 30 americans have been killed over there and have not been killed at the border. What is she talking about . We have had hundreds of thousands of people in the United States killed because of that border being open down there. All the killings and murders that the cartels do getting in and out of here and in the black community that they settle in or resettle them in, it is just really a nightmare. How can she even compare that . That is weird. I was going to say you have a little over 9 billion israeli jews. We have allowed close to that number to cross the border. Why dont we just bring israel over here, just bring the whole nation over here . We got room for them. If the palestinians do not want to that to happen, maybe we can just trade the homes people in israel have now. Host what about funding . Caller if it takes america, we have to give them america because we will not exist without gods chosen people. It will be desolation, but ukraine that was all our mistakes and our doings. Lets go to washington, independent line. Are you there . Caller i am here. It ok to talk . I am offering a look at this book called the politics of antisemitism. This is michael newman, a professor, back in 2003. He said, well before the hit era, hitler era whose very existence they contrive to ignore. Zionist atrocities were not part of the initial plan. They emerged at the racist obliviousness of persecuted people blossomed into the racial supremacist ideology of a persecuting one. We need opposition media cannot not to knock on your particular channel because i think it is one of the relatively few that you can actually get different direct forces on. Those are my comments. I will stay on if you want to have a rebuttal. Host john in illinois, line for democrats. Caller i wanted to give a shout out to and rest in peace to Michael Brooks for the clearest answer i have heard on the situation in israel and palestine. He passed away a couple years ago. He said there is no symmetry of power between israel and palestine. If you were to put the israelis in a situation that we have in gaza that just had an arab country ruling over them we would all agree it is a messed up situation. Obviously we do not condone any arab attacks but analyzing the problem is not the same thing as justifying it. If anyone felt like going out on youtube and looking up Michael Brookss name and watching or if you wanted to play it here, it is not that long. Michael brooks has the best explanation on how we should look at this situation. Host johnny is next, a republican in kentucky. Caller i think the problem we have is iran. All this is coming from iran. We should bomb iran, blow up the oil fields, burn their oilfields, shut down the oil industry, bomb their nuclear sites, bomb the uranium arrangement plant, enrichment plant, and completely shut them down. I would like to have my congressman i would like to have his phone number. I like to bring up a vote on the house floor to expel rashida to leave she did to leave Rashida Tlaib and l had omar. Ilhan omar. We need to attack iran and shut them down and cut down cut off the oil they are getting from iran so they cannot cut off their oil. Host we got that point. Bill is an independent in texas. Caller good morning. This is the first opportunity i have had to talk to you. I think you do a good job. I would like for somebody to tell me something. About a week ago, i watched she said we must stand by israel. Why . I would like to know, what has israel done for us . They wont even help ukraine out. They wont send one penny over there. I served in the military. I cannot think of any missions that israel has done for the United States. It seems like they want our money. I do not want to go off the deranged side of things as some callers does but i noticed a lot invoke god, that we most must stand by israel because israel is the chosen people. To lose american lives because israel is committing genocide im going to ask the American People what is right and what is wrong. When Marjorie Greene gets on their there and says these protests are going to turn into black lives matter protests, no. I say to all those people who hate black lives matter, care for one another. If youre are going to quote the bible, then read the bible. Understand what it says. God wants us to be peaceful. This is the first time i got a chance to talk for a while, so i do thank you. Host from illinois, good morning. Caller i tell a lot of people to watch cspan and washington journal to be educated about what is happening in our country and the world. I have a few questions that other callers may want to come in and answer. Number one, what is the government run on . Does it run on air . Does it run on water . Does it run on sand . It runs on taxpayers tax money. That money is reduced. Our ability to function is reduced. When trump lowered the taxes on the rich and the corporations, that took money out of the government to run itself. Now, i am going to go to history. When hitler came into power and blamed everything on the jews, the jews were in the arab countries during the bible, before during egypt. There were jews there. So why do these people say they do not belong there . Did they have a country . No, they were nomads, but they were also trying to establish something. Ok. Host lets get to the part about support of funding. You would be in support of funding israel . Caller israel and ukraine. Somebody said something very smart recently. There was an axis part. What is happening now is history being repeated. There was an axis you will have to excuse my ability to say certain words. I had surgery on my throat. Axis powers at one time during hitlers again, the holocaust, was japan, italy, and germany. Now we have an axis power and somebody said it recently, iran, russia, china, and north korea. We are in trouble as a world because those are the bad guys. We are not the bad guys. But the same kind of propaganda has been thrown out there. We have people who are doing it in our government. Just like during hitlers time, we had nazis in our government. Host lets move to ronald. Caller good morning. I want to say wake up to the democrat party. The people going into israel and destroying them and trying to take over, they are the same that brought the twin towers down. Wake up. Host same in what sense . Same one in what sense . Caller they had it all plotted. They got into our country and got the planes and flew them into our towers. These are the same people people trying to take out israel. Host michael in brooklyn, new york. Caller we should fund israel, not ukraine. We should make it a condition of the two state country. We basically should we basically should make netanyahu agree to peace keepers like we did in north and south korea. Host philip is next. Caller good morning. I think we ought to fund the ukraine not israel. If we are going to do something, we need to give the palestinians or whatever they call that as well. I am not for this jim crow on steroids two story two state country. I do not know. I just figured i would give my opinion on that. Host appreciate that and everybody else who called in as well. That is all the time we have for this segment. Next, we will get the latest on the House Speaker stalemate with Bloomberg News reporter erik wasson. Later, Bradley Bowman of the foundation for defense of democracies discusses u. S. Military strategy with conflicts in ukraine and the middle east. We will be right back. Tonight, watch the cspan series in partnership the library of congress, books that shaped america. We will feature mark twains novel, adventures of Huckleberry Finn. It was controversial from 19 from 1880 from 1854. It sold 20 million copies worldwide and has a profound impact in American Literature. The library of Congress Says Ernest Hemingways is all modern American Literature come from one book, Huckleberry Finn. Classes have been taught on Huckleberry Finn for many years and a teacher will join us. Books that shaped america featuring adventures of Huckleberry Finn tonight live at 9 p. M. Eastern on cspan, cspan now, and online at cspan. Org. Also be sure to scan the qr code to listen to our companion podcast. Diana henriques is the author of five previous books. Originally from bryant, texas and roanoke, virginia she spent 22 years as a reporter the New York Times. In her latest book, she writes in her preface my mission is to describe just one of the new deals most significant achievements, clearing out the vicious jungle that was the nations financial landscape in the 1920s and replacing it with a well tended terrain where ordinary americans could save and invest with confidence. On this episode of book notes . Cspans documentary competition is back celebrating 20 years with the theme this year, looking forward well considering the past. We are asking middle and High School Students to address one of these questions what is the most important change like to see in the next 20 years in america or over the past 20 years, what has been the most important change in america . We are giving away 100,000 in total prizes with a grand prize of 5,000 and every teacher who has students participate in this years competition has the opportunity to share a portion of an additional 50,000. The deadline is friday, january 19, 2024. For information, visit studentcam. Org. Washington journal continues. Host we are back with eric wasson the congressional reporter from bloomberg. Welcome. Guest thanks for having me. Host there is a House Speaker candidate form tonight at 6 30 p. M. There are nine people running. What strikes you about that list . Guest its very large. We never seen anything like this. The last round was Steve Scalise versus jim jordan. Steve scalise came out on top and bowed out and jim jordan tried to get the full speakership and didnt get it. This will whittle down quickly. On tuesday, the loser of each round gets pulled. This is a very large list. Host are you surprised so many people want the job . Guest thats right, its become a tough job and some say its the worst job in washington. Can buck said he would support a candidate because he did like him. Host there is a form tonight at 6 30 p. M. So what happens there . Guest it will be a closeddoor meeting in each member will introduce themselves or two minutes and it will be a q session and closinga remarks and they will lay out their questions before the conference like handling israel and ukraine ate and how you will and void how you will avoid the Government Shutdown and how you will pass these appropriations bills. Even the conservative ones the House Appropriations committee has passed, theyve had trouble clearing the floor. Host who can get to two hundred 17 votes . Guest thats right, its just a simple majority. You can see 111 out of the 221 people supporting it. Host whats been the mood of the gop congressmen. How has it changed . Is there a sense of fatigue that has set in . Are they all on antidepressants . Guest there is a lot of outrage and high tension. It was remarkable on friday that a lot of people came out redfaced and angry and yelling. We see that sometimes in foreign legislatures with fistfights and so forth we are almost getting to that point. They said of the meetings continue, there would be physical altercations. People are angry and embarrassed. Michael mccaul said is the most embarrassing thing hes been involved in. There is a sense this disarray cannot keep going. There is a Government Shutdown deadline coming so this could drag on for a few more weeks. We get to the mid november deadline and congress has to act. When they have to act, they tend to get their act together at the last minute. Host you can join our conversation and the numbers are 202 7488001 for republicans, 202 7488000 democrats, and 202 7488002 independents. You can send us messages on facebook and x. How did the jim jordan thing fall apart . Guest hes very popular but members here for longtermer member that jim jordan was the matt gaetz of his era, controversial and picked fights with leader john boehner and other longtime appropriators. He was railing against them as rhinos. Institutionalists who were here for a long time have that memory and they think they were unwilling to support him. We see a list of people on here of very conservative policies who were basically the same menu but different waiters. This is a different set of personalities. These people perhaps dont have the same enemies jim jordan did in the conference. Host why do you think he went to three votes . Steve scalise was out neatly but jim jordan stayed in even though he got less and less support with each vote. Guest its not clear but he was in backdoor talks with the new york delegation, three members who were interested in specific policy goals, 9 11 victim funding and state and local text inductions. They wanted to see that doubled or tripled. There was some progress as negotiations. There was a sense that maybe those guys would come on board and show some momentum. There certainly was a sense if you got into the single digits, the opposition would collapse. It was worth trying and i think its the closeddoor vote that happened friday night, had it gone differently, he would have continued all weekend to try to hammer it out. He tries to wrestle opponents. Hes a very determined individual in congress. Host how do you think former President Trumps endorsement of jim jordan affected his candidacy . Endorsement of jim jordan affected his candidacy . Guest it certainly boosted it and solidified it. In the end, it caused Steve Scalise to bow out. There is a series of events that happened there were jordan got a tepid enforcement endorsement of scalise. Trump will be a fairly big factor. Some talk about the whip who is running. He is the front runner but he has trump issues. He did not vote to overturn the 2020 election that something trump held a grudge against him for. That will make it difficult for him to get to the majority. Host the idea of the motion to vacate, what are you hearing about the status of that staying in the rules package once the speaker is chosen . Guest after maccarthy was deposed, i heard a lot about that being changed. But as it dawned on people that they were not sure who would be the speaker, is not clear they want to change that. Its sort of a last resort. If jim jordan got in there, maybe moderates want that in their back pocket if jordan started covering governing in a way that was too conservative. There is a sense of leaving adam place. To leave that in place. Many people have not supported the speaker designate. Steve scalise got the vote and is there some way to motivate people to get in line . There might be some way to get more unanimity instead of a carrot approach. Host lets talk to our callers. Chantilly, virginia, democrats line. Caller hi, good morning. This is a crucial time for israel. The hummus terrorists the Hamas Terrorists have no sensitivity. You cannot equate Hamas Terrorists to israeli citizens. There is a small faction supporting israel 100 of the time. Most people their support hamas. Some are sympathizers. Host where is the supplemental aid package going . I understand the senate will act on that . Guest it looks that way in the Biden Administration set up a request which is 14 billion for israel and 61 billion for ukraine. The senate is moving pretty slowly. I thought they would get started on this this week but the senate Appropriations Committee is having a hearing on this october 31. Is later than i expected. They want to build support for this. Mitch mcconnell is very big support of ukraine was to see this package put together the way the Biden Administration has put together. They want to support israel which is more popular in their conference separated and leave ukraine. They also want to tie it to border security. Its not just money for border barriers or the wall but also changing u. S. Asylum and immigration policy. Thats a real redline for democrats. They feel the asylum system could be speeded up at the dont want to see the right people seeking asylum be affected. Host ohio, republicans next. Are you there . Caller can you hear me . Host i can, go ahead. Caller yes, for me, this is just no more than the chamber of congress does not want anybody they do not control whether thats the speaker see. Jim jordan and the Freedom Caucus do not take corporate money. Therefore, their corporate stooges would not be allowed to vote for them. Congress is controlled by special interest, its not controlled by the people, we know that. Its the old adage, money talks and bs walks and thats where we are down to it that. This serves another purpose for them to approach to push this budget vote out to the end so they can push through a big package that they want. Host what do you think . Guest thats certainly the Freedom Caucus argument and i think theres an element in which the defense hawks interested in the u. S. National Security Posture and the Defense Industry lets be honest, are worried jim jordan would be very comfortable with allowing 1 acrosstheboard cut to the pentagon. I think there is a sense in which defense hawks like kay granger the head of the Appropriations Committee, mike rogers, head of the Armed Services committee were worried about that aspect. Business has their interest in seeing defense dollars flow to the right people. Host independent, next. Caller i like the way you let people express themselves. I believe the creator, god or whoever you want to call him, is allowing the American People to see just how disoriented come out of order and sometimes downright perverted congressman and congresswomen are as far as taking care of the peoples business. Jim jordan should not be a congressman, let alone the chair. Hes been implicated in many things, january 6. He is an election denier. This is a time for the American People to take a good look at who is leaving us. A lot of people reference the bible when they call in. I have a scripture and it says when the blind lead the blind, they both fall into the ditch. One more, as far as israel, those people in gaza are i a five mile area . No food, no water, no medicine. And they are supposed to be godfearing love god and love jesus . Cant they see those people need food, water and shelter . On the news, ive seen bombs falling on threestory buildings day and night. Israel is a giant as for his military. Test as far as military. As far as military. I would put a buffer between gaza and israel and let the palestinians have their own state and americas help should help though them back up and put a buffer there and see what happens. Host he did mention election deniers. Talk about the nine candidates and how that might play into the speak race . Guest a telling vote was the vote to certify the election are not. We know several congressmen voted to certify the election and other candidates did not. Democrats would categorize that as being insurrectionist or election deniers. Democrats in the past and raise questions about certifications but thats a telling vote and that separates the field in a way. It will be interesting to see who gets the nod for speaker in light of that. Host i want to ask you about jack lews Senate Confirmation hearings and what the processes for that . Lets take a look at an between him and republican jim riche from last week. [video clip] my problem goes back to your performance previously. To quote from the Washington Post opinion piece lew must explain why in 2015 he promised the same committee he would not allow iran access to the u. S. Financial system on the test under the recently announced plan and he secretly tried to do that by turning 5. 7 billion in iranian assets into convertible assets. I will pursue that line at this point. I want to ask you first of all if you recall sitting in that very chair in july of 2015 and stating iran will continue to be denied access to u. S. Financial and commercial markets. You recall that . I remember that testimony well and i believe we kept iran from becoming part of the u. S. Financial system. And im happy to discuss the implementation of the jcpoa. You and i may not agree on the policy. Thats an understatement. What we did was we implements a policy that was transparent and i testified before this committee on in terms of what was being done. We negotiated with iran to have them rollback their Nuclear Program in exchange for which they would have access to money that was there money we had frozen. All we did was facilitate that transaction. We did not welcome them back in to the u. S. Financial system. Host your reaction to that and are we expecting a vote on his confirmation this week . It may come up for a committee vote. This is clearly something the republicans are preparing to oppose. Jack lew former treasury secretary for obama, a jewish american, very proisrael but also someone who is involved in the con in the controversial irannuclear deal. They rollback the threat of an Iranian Nuclear weapon. Republicans come to see that as a mistake and blame everyone involved for it. Host wisconsin, democrat, good morning. Caller good morning, what are the chances republicans are actually possibly making a deal with the democrats to get this all wrapped up considering the democrats not going to allow an election anywhere near that [inaudible] . Guest we havent seen that kind of Coalition Government in the United States but you see it a lot in europe with small parties coming together. I think it is a last resort. Perhaps it wont continue. We have a strong list of nine candidates and one could emerge as soon as tomorrow and get it on the floor. If it continues, there is interest among the problem solvers like Brian Fitzpatrick for the republicans. It would deafly not to put Hakeem Jeffries in the speaker chair. They will not vote for a democrat. Could it be mchenry getting powers through to conduct business as a temporary speaker . Democrats want to see something for that. What they are looking for is maybe one more seat on the rules committee. Its balanced for republicans. They could see the change on the suspension calendar. They could argue they have someone on there and they may still be popular. There is talk about doing that. I think its a last resort and would only really come up in a situation where the next nine candidates all failed and chaos was persisting. Host lets go back to what you are saying on the next deadline of november 17 when the government would not have any more funding. There would be a shut down november 18. What are the chances of that and what needs to happen before to keep the government open . Guest chances remain high. I thought jim jordan would get the speakership and he would reduce the chance a bit. They wouldve raised the chances to a spring shut down. He had already pitched that to his supporters. His supporters were excited to get a Freedom Caucus number in there and seemed to be willing to go along with that. Maybe there were some holdouts but that seemed to lower the temperature a bit and now we dont really know how it will play out. They need to figure out what they are saying about government funding and are they pitching a claim cr stopgap bill or will they try to be more confrontational . Host Point Pleasant peach, new jersey, republican. Caller how are you, good morning. I have a quick statement i want to ask your guest a question. The guy before me said jim jordan should not be the chi because he is an election denier. The Democratic Party denied my president a chance to be a president. After spying on him and using the fbi and cia in every agency to undermine him and even having a meeting before trump was elected, how they undermine general flynn. Jim jordan is a denier because he wanted to protest on january 6 which is constitutionally allowed to check out but she didnt push back on that, im wondering why. Guest i love the new jersey accent because im a jersey guy myself. Both parties right now, republicans are arguing about investigating him and democrats were doing the same. Both parties continually undermine the president of the opposite party. The distinction is when the results were coming in at there were certain activities by the president that are under investigation by the authorities potentially to overturn the result of that election. Thats where it really lies. There is a distinction there thats worth making. Jim jordan says what he was doing was questioning and raising issues and not trying to create a fraud that the democrats allege. Host austin, texas, good morning. Vicki, go ahead. Caller thank you for taking my call. What areemers chances . Who else is among the nine that doesnt have the ma baggage and what are the chancesga are that democrats would coming to get a moderate in place . Guest i thinkemer has a good chance and hes the whip. He has an operation place and has the leadership experience. He is slightly more moderate than mccarthy coming from minnesota. Pete sessions is interesting. That pushed out jodey arrington. He was Campaign Chairman when they took back the house after big in the wilderness for decades in the 90s, rules committee chairman. He is an institutionalist and deeply conservative. Austin scott who was obscure but was president of the freshman class and he moderated a bit. His stances are very conservative. He does not like the Freedom Caucus bomb throwing approach. He is focused on specific issues like farm bill and i think his candidacy is representative of that and he will put himself up there and make sure whoever gets the gavel will make commitments to get the farm bill across. Jack bergman is relatively minor figure but has military experience in the marines. I put these people on the more moderate wing. Byron donalds and would be historic being the first black republican speaker. These relave no. He was involved in crafting this government funding extension with an 8 cut. He has negotiated with the Mainstream Partnership folks. Hes a very personable person. Kevin heard is also very personable and has proposed in the past cuts to future so security benefits but someone is wellliked. Mike johnson is number five in leadership. Dan muser is from pennsylvania. One that surprised me was garpalmer from alabama. It could fall to someone like meuser or palmer get in a deadlock. Host virginia, independent line, youre next. Caller yes, hi, i was listing this morning. I find this to be an important subject. I just wanted to say to you, moderator, im disappointed for your mentioning of antidepressants. For all those people out there who have a situation with disability regarding Mental Health and suicidality host you are right, i should not have said that. Im sorry about that. I should not have joked about that. William and pennsylvania, republican, go ahead. Caller you keep on calling jim jordan an extremist. Nancy pelosi is an extremist but she still had her speakership for some reason. For all these socalled moderate republicans, you keep calling people extreme. These guys will never be in office again because primaries are coming up and i have a feeling that all of them will be gone in 2024. Thats just my extremist opinion. I will leave it at that, thank you. Guest i dont really use the term extremist. Its a pejorative but jim jordan probably embraces he is more conservative than the majority of the caucus. Bloomberg did an analysis and he leans far to the right of the center of his conference. Thats something he has proudly embraced. I agree extremist is not an appropriate term. One thing about primary members is the Republican Party could do that but that was severely limit their ability to hold those seats and risk turn the conference the house over to Hakeem Jeffries and the democrats. Host what will you be watching closely for whatevers happening with the speaker candidate form tonight and tomorrow . Guest i will specialize in spending and tax policy in an interesting to see how the speakers can answer the questions on how to keep the government open how you plan to reduce the deficit and what your strategy. How will you fund ukraine, israel and handled the border situation . Im interested in that and interested in what kind of deals they cut. Will we see the state and local tax to ductions change . Thats tens of billions of dollars. It was almost changed an a backdoor negotiation and homages in those policy details. Having met these guys, im personally interested. Host john in pennsylvania, democrat, good morning. Caller i have two things to say here. First of all, isnt it a great thing that palestine has no women and children in this battle . Only israel has women and children. Israel is not going to invade. They will starve these people out. You can tell i dont want to fund either place. In the end, they will come around after they shovel all this money in and they say oh my, we have to cut so security cut Social Security, we can afford this. How can you afford this other stuff . About a month ago, you had a guy on their, on the program and i watch every day come i think his name was brad and he was a former representative. I think he would be great as the speaker of the house. I thank you very much. Host last word, eric. Guest the numbers are tough. Ukraine is 100 billion dollars but the issue of Social Security is trillions of dollars and thats bigger. You can argue about the wisdom of sending billions of dollars to israel. The magnitude is very different. If you are talking about the shortfalls of security, its probably most closely related to tax policy. It involves the trump tax cuts and raising the cap on the payroll tax which would force higher income people to pay more. Social security is heading torry fiscal cliff in the middle of the next decade but there are ways to do it and probably not by cutting foreign aid. Its too small a piece of the budget. You have to look at big items like tax policy or big reforms to Medicare Medicaid Social Security which are orders of magnitude bigger. Host ericwasson, congressional report for bloomberg. Thanks so much for joining us. Guest thank you. Host coming up later on washington journal, Bradley Bowman for the society of to discuss military conflict in the middle east and more of your calls on the House Speaker battle and escalating teions in middle east. The numbs are on your screen, you can start calling in now. Live sunday, november 5 on indepth, the author and former aclu presint joins book tv to talk and take calls about civil rights, free speech, censorship and more. She is the author of defending pornography, hate and th recently published freespeech, what Everyone Needs to know, a guide to free speech law. Join the conversation with your phone calls, Facebook Comments and texts. In depth with nadine stross on book tv on cspan2. Tonight watching cspans series in partnership with a of congress, books that shaped america. We will feature mark twains novel adventures of Huckleberry Finn written in 1884. That was controversial from the beginning because of the subject matter and use of dialect. The book has sold more than 20 million copies worldwide and has had a profound impact on American Literature. The Library Congress quotes Ernest Hemingway as saying andrew leavy, english professor at Butler University has taught classes on Huckleberry Finn for many years. He will join us on the program to discuss the book. Watch books that shaped america, featuring the adventures of Huckleberry Finn tonight live at 9 p. M. Eastern on cspan, cspan now, and online at cspan. Org. Also be sure to scan the qr code to listen to our companion podcast we can learn more about the authors of the books featured. Listening to programs on cspan on cspan radio just got easier. Tell your Smart Speaker play cspan radio and listen to washington journal daily at 7 00 a. M. Eastern. Weekdays at 5 p. M. And 9 p. M. Eastern, catch washington today for a fastpaced report on stories of the day. Listen to cspan any time. Tell your Smart Speaker, play cspan radio. Cspan, powered by cable. A healthy democracy doesnt just look like this, it looks like this where americans can see democracy at work where citizens are truly informed and the public thrives. Get informed straight from the source on cspan, unfiltered, unbiased, word for word. From the Nations Capital to wherever you are, you get the opinion that matters the most which is your own. This is what democracy looks like. Cspan, powered by cable. Washington journal continues. Host welcome back, we are taking your calls on two things come on House Speaker battle and also the war in the middle east. Take a look at this article from the hill. I wonder if you agree with that. This is chuck in manchester, maryland, republican. Caller hello, how are you doing . My comment is simply that i blame the Carter Administration for the indecisive or failure to act decisively in 1979. I believe that encouraged terrorists around the world that they clearly understood that they could get away with their terrorist act based on our inaction in 1979. Host what happened in 1979 . Is this the Peace Agreement between israel . Im talking about the failure to take Decisive Action in the terrorist act in tehran in 1979 when the u. S. Embassy was overrun and the hostages were held for 444 days. Host ok. Candace is in nashville, tennessee, independent. Caller good morning. Yes, our government is currently involved in crimes against humanity against us, american citizens and illegal surveillance. Giving error data and intellectual property over to our suppose enemies which includes terrorists, russia, china. This illegal surveillance thats been going on is a crime against humanity. It is not being talked about openly. Everyone knows here that its happening but everyone is under trauma based mind control and have been corrupted since 2020. We know through the Pandemic Research at Oslo University which was preplanned by weapons and all of us. No one has been held accountable and we are spending money on rigged elections. We are actually under fascist totalitarianism and to think that any of this government is for us while they are making us intentionally poor so we cant even escape genocide and then expect us to sit and watch them do this to other countries with our tax money and expect us to work for this kind of society host we got it. Look at the front page of the Washington Post this morning. John is in easton, pennsylvania, democrat, good morning. Caller hi, i think the israelites should not only take out the gaza strip but i think they should move into iran and iraq. They are the only reason why we dont have Nuclear Proliferation in the middle east. They took out the syrian powerplant years ago. If any of these wacky doodle countries get a hold of these bombs and purification of plutonium, we are up a creek without a paddle. The whole world is because they are nuts. They are really, really nuts. Host jodi is next in arizona, republican. Caller good morning. You look lovely as ever. Host thank you. Caller i would like to make a comment about the gentleman that was on previously. He made a statement that its the opposition to the president in power is the reason why we are going after biden and the other team, the democrats, went after trump. Im terribly sorry, biden and his family have been corrupt and selling is out for decades. I would like one person to tell me what did trump do besides the made up he had a conspiracy to do this and a. Thought to do that biden has ruined our country and has been benefiting financially for decades. Any democrat that wants to debate me on that, go ahead. You all have a great day. Host neil in new york, good morning, democrat. Caller good morning. I was wondering if anyone has done a study with regards to media in the United States on who owns most of the major newspapers and Media Outlets in this country. I never hear about i would like to know how many palestinians own newspapers or Media Outlets in the United States. It seems to me that if you can control the message, you can control the populace. Thank you. Host all right, we are going to talk to a reporter. You can keep calling in but Julia Johnson is joining us from the Washington Examiner. She is the politics reporter and welcome to the program. Guest host host thanks for having me. We will talk about camping 2024 and the week ahead. I want to start with former President Trumps legal issues and whats going on with that. We had the news about Sidney Powell and Kenneth Chesbro so if you could explain that. Guest they both took plea deals and are agreeing to testify. In the past, we have seen president s legal troubles only provide him a boost in the polls. Now when you got people who are sort of on team trump and are and will testify, we dont know what we will hear from them. That trial is still a ways away and it could certainly mix things up when it around. I dont want to speculate whether it would be good or bad for him because its such a curveball. Host you wrote a piece in the Washington Examiner about nikki haley and how she is turning to surge in the polls. Whats going on with that and how are her opponents trying to go after her . Guest nikki haley was sort of stagnant when she entered the race. When she got on the debate stage, she performed well and was well received. It was relatively unexpected. She had lower expectations than ron desantis for example. She began to surge. She is still not anywhere close to donald trump just to keep that in context. But she is showing an upward trend which a lot of people are not. That has sort of resulted in some attacks, putting her as a moderate, painting her as a centrist, something that will not bode well for a republican primary electorate. You dont want to be voting for someone that is seen as a weak republican. You had tim scotts super pac telling donors she is a moderate and shes not going to win and shes a moderate. Amid the mudslinging between her and ron desantis this past week, to santos pretty much called her a moderate. And that she was being politically correct to appease both the left and the media. Thats a pretty big claim when youre talking about the republican primary election. Host in general, how are the candidates different on this subject of the war in the middle east and support for israel . Guest many of the candidates relatively similar. One candidate i think of that seems to be different is ravine quorum swami roddick ramaswamy. I almost think Governor Ron Desantis is trying to show some kind of difference with those opponents. He made this big call for no refugees from gaza. He challenged his opponents to comment on this and explain their own stances. He successfully forced many of them to address it including nikki haley. He even was able to take her response and attacker for not fully addressing it and claiming she wanted refugees in the country. She came out and said she is not for accepting refugees from gaza. Host what has former President Trump said about the israelhamas for . Guest trump obviously has a very good record on israel. That something people look to. His response has been a lot centered on himself, saying this wouldnt have happened under me, it has to do with prisoner swap deal that biden did with iran. He did come under fire a little bit for attacking Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and even saying that hezbollah was very smart strategically. He has said he would expand the van he had on various middle eastern travel. He said this at one of his rallies, talking about the most recent attack and the war on israel. Thats something people host host seemed receptive to. There have been several polls coming out this week showing that an election between biden and trump would be either very close or some showing trump leading biden. What is the significance of those numbers . Its incredibly significant because its so close that its practically too close to call. Its shaping up that if these two are the nominees, it will be it could go either way. Many of these polls are conducted in swing states like when you look at pennsylvania. They been tied on several measures there. Thats a state that could decide the election. Even michigan is very close and arizonas very close. Its really shaping up to be a tight race. Its specifically in those battleground states. Host what events are candidates are you watching for this week . Guest im looking at nikki haley because she is the one who seems to have momentum. Right now, there is an oped in South Carolina saying get out of the way for nikki haley and clear the field. There is no sign that people are getting ready to clear the field. Thats something that donors are looking for an something anyone whos hungry for a nontrump candidate is looking for. There arent many signs of that. They are all signaling they will stick it out through the primaries and through iowa. Host Julia Johnson, their online at Washington Examiner. Com. Thank you so much. We will continue with taking your calls on the House Speaker battle in the war in the middle east. Robert is in pennsylvania, republican line. Caller thanks for taking michael. For taking my call. I have a comment for people calling in. Before they give their comments, they should be educated enough to know what theyre talking about. As far as the house goes, its disgraceful that they need to hand it over to the democrats so we can get something done. Host you are saying that as a republican . Caller yes, maam. Host all right. Betty in buffalo, new york, democrat. Caller good morning. Like to make a remark here. I dont know why america always has to be the caretaker of the world. Nobody elses getting involved in the problems in israel. Its terrible. Our men are over there fighting somebody elses war. We should worry about ourselves like trump said. We should be worried about us, not about somebody else. Nobody elses getting involved. Its disgraceful. All those people that are dead. This is uncalled for. What are we going to do . And they want to give money . All that money like biden said to them . What about us . Weve got people sleeping on the street in california. Why dont we help them . Thats all i wanted to say, maam. Host brent in florida, republican. Caller good morning. I was watching mark levin last night and i think hes an intelligent individual. Abraham lincoln stated that if the country of the United States of america goes down like rome did years ago, it was because of the interior eating away at itself. Thats exactly what is happening. We have a big hype going on about what the wars over ukraine and a big hype about the war in israel and palestine and hamas and hezbollah and iran and the rest. Thats been going on for many years. We have an interior situation going on in the United States of america with hamas. Their sites are all over the country on different states. I would say wake up, america, because i will tell you something right now, we will have a problem in this country and you can see it happening on the campuses of all our universities and colleges. If these people want to fight that bad, they need to put a uniform on and go back to their own country and fight over there, not here. We dont need it here. Host missouri, independent, good morning. Caller yes, is for is the israelithomas war. Hamas war. There are 22 countries around israel they could easily absorb the 2 billion muslims in the world. I do not understand white they will not absorb these people why they will not absorb these people. As far as the house goes, i think representativecole from oklahoma gave democrats the best gift in 40 years when he said the other day in his speech when he was trying to help out representative jim jordan, that our platform is to get rid of Social Security, medicare and medicaid. I think that speaks volumes and thats all i have to say, thank you. Host on the speaker race, here is the front page of usa today tash james is going from tennessee, democrat, good morning. Caller good morning, i agree with robert the republican from pennsylvania. They should go ahead and elect Hakeem Jeffries because he is closer to getting to 217 and even though it might be 50 of republicans voting republican because they feel they have the majority and they should be over the house. But you would have the other 30 or 40 or voting for other reasons. They didnt vote for jordans last vote and could have voted for Hakeem Jeffries or at least five of them could have voted for him, we would have a speaker by now. Host we are taking your calls on the two issues of the House Speaker battle in the war in the middle east. The numbers are on your screen, republicans 202 7488001, and independents 202 7488002. Lets go to fargo, North Carolina north dakota next, good morning. Caller good morning at thank you for taking my call. Why is nobody speaking about 2. 5 weeks ago when the x leader of hamas put out his statement about world jihad and he said go to the streets and take on the whole world. And we have the people in the United States that acted on this and im x military, x lawenforcement and im very patriotic. In my opinion, that was a terrorist expression given by a terrorist. If you are acting on that on our soil and our universities, why are they acting on a terroristic threat white is never lawenforcement not doing anything about it . They can say its approach is for their acting on a terrorist that told them what to do. In my opinion, thats wrong. If we were to do that here, we dont know what would have happened. We see it every day what happens. Why are these people from other countries allowed to come in and do this we are the ones suffering for this . You might find this interesting from usa today. Host in israel george is in sacramento, california, independent. Co. Read ahead. Caller you started your show and i was struck on Marjorie Taylor greenes comments. She needs to understand, we dont hate israeli people. You see that all over the arab world and all the surrounding countries. The same goes for ukraine. If russia was indiscriminately bombing the population, ukraine is simply trying to reestablish a democracy. I dont understand the representatives who have such twisted beliefs. Its unbelievable. It just a comment. Host lets go to atlanta, georgia, democrat next. Caller you know what, i basically see that israel is suffering from the same thing the United States was suffering from during the last administration during trump. The problem is, Benjamin Netanyahu and donald trump have the same things in common. They have the same thing in common with a common criminal. If you are a criminal, what is your goal . You try to get away of with it. He was simply trying to get away with a crime. It is just like a dog. Hamas is going to be hamas. If you take your eye off of him, you leave your the door wide open and you are surprised it is happened. He was to busy looking after his own hide. Just like donald trump in office, he will still have his illegal cases. Every day will be spent trying to use the state to help them get away with the crime, like i say, that he has committed and one guy came on that talked about how he listened to one person. At the end of what he was saying, they try to couch this crap superintend to pretend, it makes sense. They showed their true colors. Donald trump says that if he had not been in office if he had been in office, russia would not have they invaded ukraine. If john Biden Joe Biden he would be sitting in kyiv if donald trump had been around. Host tim in minnesota, republican line. Caller i love the format and the ability for me to call in from minnesota and talk nationally. Thank you for the opportunity. I go back to this hostage deal, we made with iran. The billions of dollars that we gave for a single, 6 billion for five or six. Six people. I wondered if that emboldened the radical muslims to do what they did. They talk about this was a security miss from the israelis and it was. What about the u. S. Side . Dont we as americans look at what is going on in the world and investigate and track what is going on with all those groups . How did we miss that as well . On the previous the previous caller was talking about on trump. I wish donald trump would go away, as a republican. Nikki haley would be a great opportunity but we need to have a choice other than biting and trump other than joe biden and trump. They need to retire and it is ridiculous that the u. S. Has a choice been between those two. Host camille, independent. Caller am i going . On . Host yes you are. Caller i love cspan, thank you for cspan. Especially on the israel, hamas conflict. People think being antiscience and people think being antiscientist is an attack is antisemi antizionist is antisemite. I saw the real nazis, they had big antisemitic things and it is so sad people dont have and the profiles on people are pulled palestine and not hamas and not antijewish. They are just looking to start the genocide in gaza but if you see neonazis, you should stop them from having a real protest because they are coming out and it is getting bad with fascism coming to america and around the world and protect yourself by protesting. It would you have to do to make sure we have a happy and safe first amendment. Host is go to the line in mississippi lets go to the line for democrats, mississippi. Caller i have two questions. How can the republicans passed bills if they cannot get their house together . And then they want to run the peak country and tell people what to do. The next thing is donald trump, this meant does not need to be present again. These people need to listen. I am a black man. I see that young 25 and 30yearold black man, i mom and my grandma will vote for dont jump. People have a right to vote for whoever they want to. I watch the news every day. Host best take a look lets take a look on posts in soal media. Stephen on xays this. Anthony says, defd the asinine, amoral wars in ukraine and israel. First black speaker, something the dems would vote for. He is one person saying, i checked my list and seven of the nine republicans running for House Speaker voted to overturn the election hours after january 6. Jonathan is calling from san diego, and dependent in dependent. Caller you for taking my call. I hear all these people calling in and the word on the street and people talking about hamas and israel and what have you. A lot of people, especially in this country, cannot have any concept do not have any concept on what is happening in that region. I have a rock effect i have iraqi friends, iranian friends, friend from jordan and egypt and they are good people and they have sole analysis to what is happening over there and they have families there. My best friend is in lebanon and now has law hezbollah that has jumped on the bandwagon. It is like in the 60s, what happened back then, to prevent these things from happening. The defense contractors, the politicians coming out of the woodwork with the media and they keep fueling everything. It is a hotbed over there, with israel. Gaza strip essay is a small place and they are basically prisoners in their own countries. They dont leave that the gaza strip. The israelis, they have a legitimate concern. There is no question about that. The news media and these defense contractors have a lot to do with it. Is nation has turned into a war mongering this nation has turned into a war mongering nation. It is sickening to me, as a former Vietnam Combat vet, i know what war is. These people calling in, saying send them over there and wipe them up out, you have no idea. Pick up a m16 and grenades and go over there yourself and see what it is like because there are innocent billions involved civilians involved. Host lets talk to melvin in arkansas. Caller my question is, we have a problem picking the speaker of the house. I am assuming, if everyone every republican were to wait on the vote of Patrick Mchenry being the speaker of the house would be pretty much set. We have a raging more war in two countries, ukraine and is israel. If you can get together as a unity if we can get together as a unity, both Hakeem Jeffries are Patrick Mchenry, i am sure we can get things done. We assume these wars are heading towards the United States, in america and we are trying to stay out of the way. We want to provide more protection, but we cannot get anything done unless the republicans pull themselves together to support this nation. Host joseph in california. Republican. Caller i would like to thank you for taking my call. I wanted to mention, forever in the house race whoever in the house race, whoever they pick, they need to get rid of the vacate. They have to make it so it takes a lot of members to bring up that motion, otherwise this could happen again. There needs to be a Strong Border package for any kind of ukraine funding. They have to include some kind of policy change with that, like remain in mexico, change the asylum. Someone can say i want asylum and you let them in, all the security in the world doesnt mean anything. As far as israel and palestine, we see all this fixation on the civilians but when you look at it like, the civilians do bear some responsibility. They elected hamas, just like the germans elected the nazis. When you do that, there will be some kind of consequence and i am not saying there arent instant people but the idea, they are all innocent and humanitarian and aid. They do bear some responsibility so i think that has to weigh in on this. They should get aid. There should not be it is all really fixated on and the fact is we are dealing with the worst of human people. Evil. It has to be dealt with and it will get ugly and it needs to get ugly because who would want to live next door to this, if this was your neighbor and your kids were outside, would you want this kind of danger living next to you . Host lets talk to independent line. Caller first and most importantly, i appreciate having the opportunity to speak with an open line and god bless the United States and its people. Lets come together. These issues have been outsourced for over 45 years, why doesnt the una go in the ewing un go in and take out the terrorists and rebuild gaza and let them live sidebyside just like they promised during the bill clinton era . I would be nice for that you win the u. N. To clean it up. What is your opinion . Host then you end the u. N. Is in gaza but cleaning up is a lot easier send said than done. Caller let the people have the free elections. Host they will not go easily. They are not just going to accept a u. N. Force and go around arresting people without a fight. Caller criminals do flight when they are allowed to be apprehended but it would be much easier on the israelis. Host darrell, bronx new york. Democrat. Caller good morning to cspan. I have two comments. One on the israel israelhamas war and the comment on the speaker debacle. I dont pretend to be an expert on the israeli and palestinian conflict. I would say this. In my own perception, it seems to me, you have the western world, countries treat israel as though they are living in a constant victim state. Israel, in my mind, is a bully. The way they can find the palestinians they confine the palestinians, on the gaza strip, it is an open air prison. They have all the support of the western world and palestinians dont have anything so when you are upset they elected hamas, i dont understand. If israels intelligence is so great, why cant they pinpoint hamas and route them out . To punish a whole society by cutting off electricity and water, those are war crimes. I dont understand the western world, not just call it what it is . I have sympathy and empathy for israelis. We cannot be hypocritical in our socalled democracy principles, the democratic principles. As a relates to the speaker debacle, the republicans have the majority. It is 217 they need. Why would they expect members of the conversation Opposition Party to support their nominee for speaker when they cannot support their own . I get so frustrated with the journalists and media supporting their talking point where the crazy aid and voting with the democrats to vote at the speaker. This was mccarthys doing. He should never have allowed one member of his own congress to vacate to vote to vacate the chair. This is a republican debacle. Democrats have nothing to do with this and who would not expect them to support their own leader, Hakeem Jeffries . Host up next, Bradley Bowman of the foundation for defense of democracies, discusses u. S. Military strategy, conflicts in ukraine and the middle east. We will be right back. As part of our new series, we are asking you what books do you think shaped america . One book i think to kill a mockingbird by harper lee. Go to our website cspan. Org booksthatshapedamerica, click the viewer inputo have input tab. Be sure to watch books that shaped america on cspan. Cspanshop. Org is cspans online store. There is something for every cspan fan and every purchase helps support our nonprofit operation. Shop now or anytime. Since 1970 nine, in partnership with the cable industry, cspan has provided complete coverage of both halls of congress, from the house and Senate Floors to congressional hearings, party briefings and committee meetings. Cspan gives you a front row seat of how issues are debated or decided, with no commentary, no interruption and completely unfiltered. Cspan, your unfiltered view of government. Tonight, watch cspans series in partnership with the library of congress, books that shaped america. We will feature mark twains novel, the avengers of Huckleberry Finn. The book has sold more than 20 million copies worldwide and has had a profound impact on American Literature. Andrew levy has taught classes on Huckleberry Finn for many years and he will join us on the program to discuss the book. Watch books that shaped america, featuring the adventures of Huckleberry Finn, tonight live on cspan. Also be sure to scan the qr code to listen to our companion podcast where you can learn more about the authors of the books featured. Celebrating 20 years come up with this years theme, looking forward while considering the past. We are asking middle and High School Students to create 56 minute videos addressing these questions, and eight the next 20 years, what is the most important changes you would like to see in america or for over the past 20 years, what is the most important change in america. We are getting away 100,000 and a total prizes with a grand prize of 5,000. The competition deadline is friday, january 19t 20 24 and for more information, visit our website. Washington journal continues. Host welcome back to washington journal and we are joined by Bradley Bowman. The center of military power, senior director at the foundation for defense of democracies. The u. S. Has searched surged forces insecurities forces and Security Systems in the middle east. Guest you have the ford Carrier Strike group. This is an Aircraft Carrier and a guided missile cruiser and it was in the mediterranean but they repositioned it in the mediterranean. That was headed toward the Eastern Mediterranean and recently they announced they will position that in the u. S. Central command and perhaps even into the closure the persian gulf and they sent additional u. S. Air forces and that includes f15, f16s. They sent Additional Air force capacities. It is a militant a middle tier of air defense for america. They put thousands of u. S. Troops on preparing to deploy orders and debris present and repositioned a 26 marine unit. They sent the uss mount whitney, a command control and intelligence ship. Host lets write that down break that down. I want to talk about the prepare to deploy order. He said there will be more juice to be put on prepared to prepare to the ploy deploy. What does that mean . Host when you are when you issue those orders, you have a shorter recall. It could be a matter of hours so if you have units taking all the steps you would expect them to take so they can get on aircraft and ships and move as quickly as possible. It reduces the reaction time. According to the pentagon, these are different kinds of forces from the army and air force and marines. They will do all types of functions including air and Missile Defense. Host youve mentioned defense of weapons. There is the fee the iron dome. There are offense of weapons we are sending to israel. Guest we were talking about the u. S. And the stuff they are taking to protect our interests. We know they uss c the uss carney interceptor missiles heading towards israel. The u. S. Has provided over 1 1800 of these joint unit kids that allows israelis to conduct precise attacks on minimizing civilian casualties and they provided a Small Diameter Bomb. We provided 155 millimeter shells. Be provided we provided replacement for the iron dome system. It is the israeli system that is shooting down rockets fired from hamas. We are providing two u. S. Iron dome batteries to increase their air and middle Missile Defense capacity. Host there is a weapons stockpile the u. S. Maintains in israel. What is it . Guest a lot of people are not aware of it. That u. S. Has maintained a stockpile of weapons for decades and it was established solely for our purpose and congress provided permission under certain circumstances for israel to access those weapons and that has happened at least two times in the past. For israel he has that israelis have requested access to that. There are debates on whether it is the right kind or quantities of equipment but some of it will be helpful for israel. I will invite our viewers to join the conversation and you can call us on your lines or lines of our, republicans, 202 7488001, democrats, 202 7488000, and independents 202 7488002. They u. S. Interest with the Israeli Military positively in peaceful peace times. What do those interactions look like at war . Guest in january, the u. S. And israel conducted a bilateral military exercise called the juniper old exercise, the largest exercise between the u. S. And israel in history. You had an american carry strike group off the shore up israel and more than 7000 involved in many bases in israel rehearsing many of the abilities that will be relevant now. You build a people on people connection, the capabilities and capacities that will yield real world benefits that israel is facing such a significant threat. Host we have a question from x, from phil o says, how many countries are we expecting t tally when israel does its Ground Invasion . With all the weapons, there is no way this is just about hamas. Guest the primary concern for the Biden Administration, when the president looked in the camera last week and secretary often did so in israel and we saw secretary austin repeat it again. They looked in the. Camera and said dont. Who are they talking to . They are talking to the Islamic Republic of iran. Hamas is one of those terrorist properties and hamas receives iranian arms and training and funding as does hezbollah. I must hamas is nothing compared to hezbollah, which is in lebanon. Hezbollah has something between 150,000 two to 50,000 missiles 250,000 missiles. It has blocked comes into the conflict in the north of israel in a major way, that is a major problem from israel for israel. The goal for u. S. Military employment is to protect our troops from iraq and israel. Host you wrote a opinice for the defense news where you talked about these initial steps by the Biden Administration are laudable but not enough. What more do unit you want to see . Guest guest i think the bite the administration deserves credit for moving quickly. They went to israel and said what do you need . The steps i called for, the peace is old. They have already started to take. I asked the u. S. To provide two batteries for the iron dome and they are doing that and i said we should revise all of our interceptors for the iron dome batteries and they are moving to do that and a lot of stuff i called for, they are doing and i dont take credit for that but as i think tank but as a think tank, when that happens, you are not to upset. Caller i will have comments and i will hang up. In the 70s through the 90s, all of the middle east experts liberal and conservative all race always said there was no military solution to the palestinian, as really conflict. Palestinian and israeli conflict. George shultz, Ronald Reagans secretary of state come up with come on the shows and said it seems obvious to me that the not work and that is a ridiculous concept that someone will sign a Peace Agreement because israel has a Strong Military. It cost the palestinian extremist to develop their own terrorists. It makes no sense. I grew up in 19 the 1970s watching tv and watching palestinians with their faces covered throwing rocks at israeli tanks. I had a tilted view of this. It makes no sense that if youre having a Strong Military is going to force peace in the middle east. That israelis having a Strong Military is going to force peace in the middle east. Guest must not forget what happened october 7 lets not forget what happened in october 7. It is the single worst attack on jews in since the october holocaust. Bay are hunting civilians in their homes and when you compare that number of about 1300 people and you compare that per capita that is roughly compared to 9 11, it is important for American City in sitting in comfort in the u. S. , remember how you felt during 9 11 at how angry few were and were feeling in concert insecure. Imagine they came from old mile or two away and came into your living room and you begin to understand the israeli perspective, this is some mixture of 9 11 and pearl harbor. What would you expect any country to do but to go and get the terrorist group that committed the atrocity so you raised important historical points but this was an intelligence failure. Israel will take a study to understand what happened but they have to defend their people and i do not think we should expect any different from israel and Israel Defense force. Host eric, republican. Caller my name is eric. I had a few comments about the protesters that are protesting for palestine. I dont understand exactly why they are not you dont have more protesters we dont have protesters that are for that palestine for the palestinians leaving the hamas government. That is my first question and if they have an iron dome, is there any type of ai people are against ai, and eai back with the text arc any ai that would detect the arc of where the missile is coming from that would destroy the battery that has been fired and that is all that i really have to say about guest thanks for the call. It gives me an opportunity to make quick points. It is important to differentiate between hamas, a designated terrorist organization that committed the ultra atrocities on october 7 and the palestinian people. Go read their charter, hamas stated position is the extermination of the state of israel and the killing of jews. That is what they were trying to do october 7 and they killed a lot of americans and a lot of americans are hostages so we need to run for that and we need to remember hamas deliberately uses human shields. The militants and the terrorists hide in the tunnels and they build infrastructure and put weapon supplies beneath hospitals in schoolyards opened the israelis hoping the israelis dont track them they are and if they do, they can blame that israelis. And makes it very difficult and this they are doing and israel is doing all they can to avoid human casualties. You ask about the rockets coming out of gaza. We have the hospital that was struck in the images of injured men and women and children should be hartman heart wrenching. Many people jump to blame israel but when we take a look, it was an errant jihad rocket that did that. One of the impressive things about the iron dome system is that once these rockets are law launched, they take a ballistic trajectory. Israel can determine where it will land. If it will land in an open field, they will let go and if it hits an area with people, they will launch to take it down. Israel can detect where they are coming from. Host we have a common for you on x a comment for you on x. It says the sbd, whose objective is to separate the u. S. For attacking a run for the benefit for israeli regional identity. Thank you, cspan, for the objective guest. [laughter] guest our top foreign policy. Our work in the u. S. Senate for nine years and i advised three different republican senators including the Armed Services i went to fdd, a 501c3 that focuses on National Security policy. We dont take money from foreign governments and as a point of policy and principle i am proud of, i talked about weapons but in my power, we dont take any from defense contractors and when i am talking about sending a Small Diameter Bomb to israel, i say that because i want them to have capabilities that minimize casualties. It is really easy to throw around charges like that but if you are interested in fact, there in facts, there they are. Host what do you think with that militarys response . Guest it is a tough question because as i detailed, that u. S. Has sent its ordinary combat power to the middle east and there was no military in the world that could project that kind of power to the region that quickly and the demonstration is trying to backup it would backup its israel and hezbollah are treading fire. We had u. S. Troops in iraq and syria attacked by iranian supported terrorist groups. We are not seeing major war on the hezbollah north. I do worry that if we continue to have attacks on u. S. Troops in the u. S. Does nothing, i round iran will be left with the impression that the biden adminstrations warnings are somewhat hollow. Host independent line. Caller what i found disturbing with the reporting going on, concerning this conflict, and it has to do with democracies. Our country has the Second Amendment, every citizen is guaranteed at least a shotgun or rifle or a pistol. After the conflict rep to come Israeli Government decided to open the gun shops and license or distribute more firearms to the citizenship for immediate protection in case all hell broke loose. As a democracy, where you trust your citizens, if you have an armed citizen, that can respond to these instantaneous massacres or attacks from other people, let alone your own government and that has been debated and downplayed. I wish people would see the actual fact, of what it would mean to be a minuteman. In becca balints in that kibbutz, they have to discharge the weapons appropriately. Hamas the game plan of all these buildings because they contracted out to the palestinian people. The painter, the grass cut or. The grass cutter. They had all the intelligence needed. Usually with a citizenship that has free will, they have a right to protect themselves. Guest i focus on u. S. Foreign policy and defense policy so i am not an expert on Second Amendment issues at home but what is true is with the seven surprise attack by hamas, targeting israeli men and women and children and infants, there are a lot of people in their homes unarmed and when they knew danger was coming, they scramble to the bomb shelters and you have hamas using iranian produced weapons to burn and blow up homes and penetrate those bombshells bomb shelters to assassinate the men and women and children. If those people had been better armed, they may have been able to defend themselves but it is easy to say that when you are talking about, sitting from afar but the bottom line is, the Israel Defense force and israel cannot tolerate having such an enemy like hamas that does things like that at their borders so i am sure they will have to change your military posture and transform at least rosen gaza to prevent northern gaza to prevent this from happening again. Host margaret in california, democrats line. Caller good morning. I find it really disturbing to listen to, but i will call american propaganda what i will call american propaganda and watch the smile on your face as you discuss the iron dome. You discuss israel being a victim and i find it unfortunate with the history that has gone on with the jews, that they would have their own approaches that they would mirror their own oppressors. What they are doing with palestinians, it is nothing short of genocide and war crimes are being committed and it is being paid for by the american public. What we see is we see a population that has been what has truthfully been called a openair prison. It is a long strip that has a population of over 2 Million People. Half of those are very young. There are children. They are children. They are being massacred and netanyahu announced that he put out a map. He did not hide it. He said this is basically going to be the new israel and it did not include the palestinian region. What that will be will be part of the new israel. The world at large is calling for a ceasefire and deescalation. Theyre calling for humanitarian aid. They are pointed out as war crimes. We have a steady stream of propaganda coming up host lets get a response. Guest a lot of strong words and i will try to address the points. You said i smile when i talk about iron dome. I have to admit, i like it when you have a weapon systems that protect innocent people from murder so if israelis didnt have the iron dome, you have hundreds of thousands of dead, innocent israeli so when i think about innocent people, not being murdered, i do smile and i think you smile and i wonder if you would bring the same sort of moral outrage to be barbaric events of october 7 and if you dont, you have to consider if you are becoming partisan. If youre unconcerned about death on one side of this, maybe we need to look at ourselves and you talk about an openair prison stuff look at the Border Crossing in egypt. Israel is dropping leaflets with gazan citizens to move south because that is where most of hamas citizens enter structure is in the north. Hamas infrastructure is in the north. Who is telling the palestinians to stay put, hamas. They want to use them as human shields. Why isnt each of opening the border and allowing palestinians to move to egypt temporarily at least. Turkey, iran celebrated the murder of the israeli murder women and children, why dont turkey and orion support palestinians as the Biden Administration has worked so hard to do but to allow callista indians to want to leave gaza to to allow palestinians to want to leave gaza you should ask why that is not happening and you cannot blame that on israel. Host steve in salina, republican. Caller good morning. I have to tell you, you have the nail on the head. Thank god that somebody on that desks station, makes sense. You will never convince the opposition that israel has the right intentions but the thing is everybody is talking about a two state system. A two state system would be suicide for the jewish people because the doctrine from all the palestinians is to eradicate the jews. If you have a legitimate two state system, you will have to state at war with each other until one eradicates the other and it is so great listening to you and the information that you are given and i a lot i hope a lot of these people dont understand what is going on with jews for the last 5000 years, get educated about it. It happens to be never again. Guest thank you for that call. I hope fulcher listening to what we are hearing i hope fulcher listening to the protests in the middle east and the u. S. I hope folks are listening to protests in the middle east and the u. S. I hope you know what they mean when they say that. From the river to this evenings no state of israel. River to vest the to the sea means no state of israel. When you hear someone chanting from the river to the sea, understand what they are saying. It is the real reason why we dont have two states today is primarily because of groups like hamas. They dont want to share the land and they want all of it for themselves and they are willing to kill innocent people to exterminate the state of israel. Finally, look sitting in a safety in the u. S. , you have to consider whether what is the widespread israeli view. Israel prevails in the conflicts, taking the terrier the territory from which there attackers attack. What is israel get . They can has blog with tens of thousands of rockets trying to murder israelis in their homes. We tried that and that did not work well, israel, you need to get out of gaza. Israel said, we will get out of gaza and we would giggle and we will dig up jewish graves. What you get in gaza . You get hamas. They get attacked and the feet that aggressor and they take land and everyone gets upset and they withdraw and every time they withdraw, they get terrorists on the border doing things like what we saw in october 7. We should try to understand the is really expected the israeli perspective. Host first, does the United States have enough artillery to send to israel without impacting american readiness and i would imagine ukraine is alarmed at this . Guest it is a great question and i published this on january, there was reporting of the u. S. Stockpile of israel, the u. S. Have been taking tens of thousands of 155 millimeter artillery rounds to get to ukraine. At that that was appropriate but i call for replenishing stocks as quickly as possible. Some people oppose supporting ukraine, and they are trying to suggest we cannot move from ukraine to israel. There is very little significant overlap when it comes to air defense because there are no iron dome systems in ukraine, a Small Diameter Bomb. We have more than enough reduction capacity to provide what we need for israel but the one area we have tension is they are burning through them quickly to address putins unprovoked invasion and israel need some and we took some out. According to earlier reports, that is what we are sending back to israel because they are using them but they will not use them anywhere to the degree that ukraine is. The sense of the february 24 invasion by putting to ukraine, u. S. Has increased their capacity. That is one area to watch and there is overlap between providing the 155 to israel but it can be managed. Host if there is a ground war, does that mean that u. S. Military support will change . Guest on october 7, right after the horrible news, i said israel will need air defense and precision ammunitions and i said if we see a long ground incursion, what israel will need will involve will evolve. If you see a long ground war in gaza, it will be a growing overlap between what we are providing for ukraine and what israel wants. That is undeniable but the multitier procurement the increasing investments including in this new package the Biden Administration proposal will address that but it will take time. Host independent. Caller i wanted to ask mr. Bowman to comment on something he said about hezbollah being somewhat stronger in the north and i am wondering how much that figures into where i give blame to donald trump, deserting the kurds the way he did. You dont care about them anymore and if they were there, what has love be as strong as they are . Glenn donald trump for what i blame donald trump for what israelis are going through now. Guest i would say the kurds have been reliable partners for the United States and for Northern Iraq and syria, if it were not for the kurds in syria working for the u. S. Military, we probably would still have an axis caliphate in syria. They have been valuable partners. The main reason hezbollah, their territory is so strong, iran is training to equip them and they are the puppet has love is the puppet of the puppet master in iran has below is the puppet of the puppet master and i are on hezbollah is the puppet of the puppet master of iran. The degree to which they want to risk has below risk has below to prevent israel and risk it, whose primary do you use that varsity team to try to save a potent burlesque valuable Junior Varsity team potent but less valuable Junior Varsity team, hamas . Host vicki is in new york city. Caller what kind of weapons does israel use against hamas such as planes, artillery, rockets and how many have been dispensed against israel . Guest thanks for the question. Israel under normal circumstances would not reveal a lot of that information and we have noted that they have been closer holding this conflict than usual in terms of talking about the performance of the iron dome. There may be many reasons for that. This is a moment a particular threat for israel. They have not published they have been transparent but have not published some of the specifics like the way they have. I dont know for sure how many have been consumed so far. We have looked at thousands of rockets launched by hamas toward israel, more than 6000 under a day. A good portion of those, israel would have law launched their interception interceptor. The real priority has to be increasing its Production Capacity and standing up a u. S. Based total Production Facility for those interceptors. Israel will continue to have proxies around their borders and they want to fire rockets and they need all the interception they can get. I dont know how many they can consume but we dont know how long the war will last and that is why we need to help to get israel what they need. Host we have a question from x. Michael says, look at what response our response to 9 11 got us. Guest i wrestle with this. When i was in the army, i deployed to afghanistan for six months and i referenced 9 11 earlier trying to help americans have some empathy for israel in terms of what they are experiencing. I talked about on a per capita basis 13 times will be experienced on 9 11 but your point stands, there is a lot to criticize in the u. S. Response after 9 11 and i mentioned that in addition to grief and insecurity, americans were angry. If you are not old enough, ask your parents on how they felt. It is safe to say a lot of mistakes were made on a bipartisan basis. A lot of americans are providing friendly advice to israel on what to do in gaza. Everyone understands that urban warfare is difficult and we should think about what happened in roka. When you combine that with fighting a terrorist group that uses human shields, that has many miles of underground tunnels they can use to survive environments and conduct surprise attacks, a major Israel Ground incursion into gaza will be difficult and you have americans trying to share advice. From an israeli perspective, you cannot have a group like hamas maintained the means of murder they employed on october 7. Host one more call in tampa, florida. Caller good morning. Give me a moment to talk to this gentleman. I notice he said he is a west west point grad. Why didnt he go the next five years to get 20 years . He said something, i am not against all four come israel or whatever but what i dont understand, when he said the palestinian or hamas dont want to share their land. How many things is he sharing . Lets say Homeless People move into his neighborhood and they began to take over, what is he sharing . Ask the indians, but the americans call it, indians . Ask them what happened when that settlers came and they were ignorant enough to where they wanted to share land. Host we are running out of time. Guest i will not bore you about the details about my career served but i loved the u. S. Army i love the u. S. Army. I worked in the pentagon and that is why i left and i was honored to serve in the u. S. Senate or nine years and i am sharing. We should do better sharing and be generous with others but the bottom line is, i dont see a longterm solution. You have an understanding that israel exists and will will continue to exist until you have a partner or piece that recognizes israel to exist, this will continue. Host the foundation for defense of democracies there at fdd. Org. Thank you for coming by. A few programming notes. Former government officials and others discussed the u. S. Israel alliance. You can watch that live at 1 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan two and also on cspan now, and online at cspan. Org. Today, 2024 republican joe sintial debate president ial debate candidate donald trump speaks. That is it for todays washington journal and we will be back tomorrow morning at 7 a. M. Eastern time. Until then, have a great day. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2023] this evening at 630 p. M. Eastern, House Republicans will hold a closeddoor speaker kennedy formollowing last weeks vote to rejt ohios jim jordan as a potential replacement. He was removed after failing to win a majity in three separate spker elections on the house floor. The house will be back in session tomorrow morning at 11 00 a. M. Eastern and cld hold another boat for speaker and they gavel in. Follow live house coverage on cspan and live coverage of the House Speaker election also here on cspan. A look at alive coverage coming up today on cspan 2 15 p. M. Eastern, President Biden will deliver an address on the state of the u. S. Economy from the Nations Capital. At 3 p. M. Eastern, former president and front runner for the 2024 republican nomination donald trump older rally in derry, new hampshire. Tonight watch cspans series in partnership with the library of congress, books that shaped america. We will feature adventures of Huckleberry Finn written in 1884. It was controversial from the beginning because of the subject matter and use of dialect. The book has sold or than 20 million copies worldwide and is had a profound impact on American Literature. Andrew levy from Butler University has taught classes on Huckleberry Finn for many years and will join us on the program to discuss the book. Watch books that shaped america featuring adventures of Huckleberry Finn tonight live at 9 p. M. Eastern on cspan, cspan now, and online at cspan. Org. Also be sure to scan the qr code to listen to our companion podcast where you can learn more about the authors of the books featured. Cspan is your unfiltered view of government. We are funded by these Television Companies and more including comcast. You think this is just a un