Resource. I mean, henry is 89 years old, im 81. So im not a kid in that sense. And those of us who are still around who will remember the holocaust need to be able to talk about that and tell it because many of us are concerned about something that was said about 120 years ago do you remember who said those of us who do not learn our history well are doomed to repeat it . Who said that . Who said that . Thank you, sir, but youre not one of the kids. [ laughter ] were you there . [ laughter ] no, but its very, very important. I have used that particular line and the reason is not because its an important line but the point remains if we dont know where were coming from, we have no way of knowing where were going to go. I think that applies to every field of endeavor, every field of life, every career in the mill tash inside or outside. If you dont know where youre coming from, you dont know where youre going. So its incumbent on us to learn where we have been. Part of my rob is is to talk about where i have been and i will do that in a minute. I want to set the stage. The description of henry green balm, were concerned why we didnt answer the call to be picked up, is a different history than mind for several reasons. One, henry was about nine years old eight years older than i. Had i been henrys age, i probably would not be talking to you, id be dead. Secondly, henry comes from the you may have been to those of you have who have been to the museum may have seen very early in the tour of the museum if you walk through on the fourth floor, theres a chart. Theres a chart of what were the Jewish Population of various countries of europe. Anybody remember that . You dont . Let me tell you. Most of the Population Centers in europe had very, very small Jewish Populations. Poland was an exception. Poland was almost 10 jews in the country. As a consequence, the greatest amount of people who almost 10 the country. As a sequence the greatest number of people that died was in polan. Has the henrys story. You need to know the holocaust took place in other places including where i was raised. You were told i was born in latvia. That tells you absolutely nothing. Is there an old story that says you must be born where your mother is, right . My mother and father were in latvia, because i was born in latvia. As soon as i was born, they were waiting for me to arrive, they were transferred to native budapest, home to both of them. My mother comes from southern hung g hungary, southern yugoslavia, and a man who comes from transylvania, who is that . My father did not know him. He reason i mention that hungarys relationship to the government was unique. Anybody know who that was. Only italy had the same relationship that hungary did. What do we call countries that are aalie allies. Allies. Because of the holocaust the consequence itself comes very very late to hungary. You recall that the war ends when did the war end . What day . What month . Very good. Why is that significant . Do you recall what he said . Its my birthday. The war and i were born the same the end of the war and my birth is the same day. Let me put antidotally, theres another person whose birthday was born who was the president of the United States when the war ended may 8th, 1945. Harry truman was born on may the 8th, 18 something or other, i dont know the birthday. It was harry, the war and i share a birth date. The important point here is hungary does not get the nazi invasion until march the 19th, 1944. If you think about march 19th, dday is in june, the war is over within a year. Much much later, in our experience, than henrys experience which went from 1938 on, but i want to give you here in terms of the time that we have is really an antidote about something i remember as an incident which had no connection to the holocaust, as i understood it at the time. The reason i understood it didnt have any connection because i was 5 1 2 years old. In december of 1941, we traveled from budapest by train, south to yugoslavia, where my mother was from, where my grandparents, her parents and two of her sisters lived. Those who could still go by train, just going for four weeks vacation, around wintertime, christmastime that kind of thing. I dont recall what we did the first day or two. About the third day of the morning about 7 30, somebody came up the stairs and said theres something funky going on on the street. Within five minutes two policemen came up, knocked on the door. My recollection is they were very decent and civil. They said, ladies and gentlemen, you need to dress warmly, you need to come outside, we have to run a census. Now, we do a census every 10 years, right . The nazis did a census every 20 minutes, i think, because they believed if they knew where everybody was at all times, and i exaggerate of course, if they knew where everybody was at what place at all times they could control the population, which was very true. It was unusual to have a census in the morning, on the street. It didnt seem like there was anything about it that was dangerous or anything. Come out to the street, stand on the sidewalk, line up, turn left and start walking in that direction. And we walked for some time. Im 5 1 2 years old, a little guy. I walk, my mother carried me and my father carried me. Eventually after maybe two hours or so, as i remember, we went to a place i recognized. Those that have been to europe or served in europe might know communities are not on an ocean or big lake, but a river. The river becomes a summertime beach. The danube river, a major river in the middle of europe runs through the city all the way south to the black sea. It runs through the city and in the summertime having been there the previous summer in august i was there and there were whirlpools and wave pools and hot pools and amusement parks and restaurants by the edge of the water, a beautiful place. But this is winter. The river is frozen three feet thick. I recognized the stockade fence were walking next to, which separated the street from the beach area. You have to imagine heres the major road, heres the sidewalk, heres the stockade fence and about 3 to 400 yards to the left is the beach. No idea why were here. I didnt, of course, as a 5 1 2yearold but neither did the adults. Like, why . Okay. As we were moseying along this stockade fence which is quite long we notice the big gates are open, stockade gates are open, people are making a left turn towards the beach area, and again we think nothing of it because we have no idea why this is happening. As we are moseying towards this gate, were some distance away from it still, theres a policeman standing on the right side, says to my feather, says, lester, what are you doing here . My father says, im visiting with my family. My concern is here you are with a group of maybe a dozen people now and youre not from here. If you include in the count in the census it will mess up the numbers. We cant have that. Stand aside. So our little group stood aside. Almost within minutes of the time i remember we stood aside, a staff comes out from the other direction, an officer in a uniform gets out, has a powwow with his cronies, gets on the bullhorn and says, ladies and gentlemen, the requirements of the census have been met. Go home. If i look bewildered, im just thinking with what happened 75 years ago because i had no idea and so did the adults, no idea what just took place. They said theres a school over there you can get coffee and hot chocolate. We grabbed the first three taxicabs we could find and went back to my aunts apartment where we were staying. So you ask, what happened . First of all, the first call we still had telephones at the time we were staying with my mothers younger sister. The next younger sister also lived in a community the other side of town and keeps calling all day, we have plans today to do something. Where were you . We tell her. Thats interesting. 7 30 in the morning, two policemen came to my door, knock knock we have to do a census. What she did was invited him for coffee and cake. Ladies and gentlemen, when my aunt gave coffee and cake, there were 17 coffees and cakes and a room full of dishes, these guys had the best breakfast of her life. They asked her three or four questions, goodbye. That was her census experience. As the calls kept coming in we began to understand what happened. Remember my description the water 3 or 400 yards, the fence, the sidewalk, the main street. Those people that made the left turn towards the river, marched to the edge of the river, which had been broken that morning by cannon fire. At the bank of the river, they were shot in the back into the water. They were never found. If they were found they may have been found floating 50 miles down the river, or they were found at the edge of the river in march, when the river thawed. But what is this . Well, in the literature, this is called a pogrom, a senseless purposesless, useless and valueless experience in saying i can do something to you and you can do nothing about it. Now, for those of you who study history, you might know in those days in yugoslavia, there were some bands of people that tried to fight the nazis in their own fashion. They were guerrilla fighters, explode a truck, explode a railroad car, explode some railroad ties, in some way to impede the nazi approach. Something happened some place in the farm area of this community. And in retaliation for that, they put in this pogrom. 700 people were killed. Several hundred people were killed. My aunt, her inlaws were shot in their farm, i have no idea, maybe they didnt want to leave or do what they were told, they were shot, killed. I want you to have a sense of a memory of a 5 1 2yearold who had no idea what this was all about. In the years there i began to understand and now i do understand what a pogrom was, what took place and what i witnessed. I wanted to give you a birdseye view, as a witness to this holocaust experience that took place. I know what the timing is that we need to stop or do we have more time . We have more time. Good. Now, we took this trip as a vacation trip, and for us, for me it became a vacation because after all as a 5 1 2yearold i had no understanding. I need to add a few more things to this and say the next morning, for example, something took place i did understand. I thought it was great fun. My father decided what we need to do is leave early next morning on the first available train back to budapest, because somehow when catastrophic takes place you want to go home. Here we are with my grandparents and two aunts and family in this community but no family in budapest. My father thought somehow budapest became home and thats where we need to be. He calls for a taxi. In those days in that community there were taxis and very interesting taxis to a kid 5 1 2 years old. They were one horsepower taxis. Any idea . Horse and sleigh. Theres snow on the ground. This is terrific for a 5 1 2yearold to go to the Railway Station on a horse drawn sleigh, it was great fun. That i could understand. You have to understand who i am at the time. We took a train back to budapest, we were back there. The holocaust comes to hungary late but the war doesnt come to hungary late. Were bombed once, sometimes twice a night. We lived on the fifth top floor of an Apartment Building and every time there was an airraid, one or two a night, down to the shelters in the basement. The problem was when the bombs fell, bombing from one side by the russian allies and the other western allies, the problem was when you came up in the morning and you saw the buildings around you, you had no idea whether the building next door to you might have been bombed and the kid that went to school with you might have been killed. It didnt happen but could have. Bombing, if any of you have been under any kind of bombing experience, i hope not and hope you never are even if youre in uniform. Maybe in maneuvers, thats about as far as you want to go. The war was much more of an issue to us than the holocaust that early. Let me jump ahead with a number of things that began to happen. I said to you that the holocaust comes to hungary in 1944. Do any of you know the name herm herm herman geuring, sometimes known as fat herman. Those with air force uniforms should know. He was a flyer and became the then german situation created the german air force. Fortunately by the time he re unfortunately by the time he created the air force he was too fat to get into a plane. Thats not important. He wrote a letter on behalf of hitler in 1941, which talked about the final solution to the jewish problem. What was the final solution . Annihilation, right . It was not in fact put into practice in 41. In 42, there was a conference in berlin, called by the leader of the Nazi Movement in eastern europe, who lived in prague. Thats where a man was appointed to make sure that the trained run on time and all the countries are clean. The mans name is adolph ikeland, mentioned before, a Lieutenant Colonel in the german army. He did a very good job in terms of what he had to do. He cleared all the various countries, france and belgium and holland and everybody else. The last country he comes to is hungary. On the 19th of march, 1944. A piece of that story you already heard, in that as soon as he arrives, ladies and gentlemen, to go and see him and talk with him was more difficult than seeing the pope. He was that much of an important figure at the time. Two men were able to go see him and began to discuss with him some arrangements for some kind of a deal. The deal was to have been what they called in german. Bluet blood survive for material. The atumssumption was ridiculou if he were to release a million jews from concentration camps he didnt have but if he had it they would supply him with 1,000 trucks for the war effort. None of this existed and everybody knew it. One of the two men as a matter of fact, was dispatched to cairo, where the british held sway and the british were controlling certain types of supplies. He didnt have a hubcap let alone 10,000 trucks. This discussion was initiated because by this time, much of the german command knew the end of the war was going to come sooner rather than later. They were looking for ways to make arrangements for themselves, something to deal with after the war. Ikeland survives the war. Where does he live the next 10 years, 15 years, anybody know . Argentina. Where does the famous doctor of ashe wits, live his life . Argentina. There were negotiations, many others. Hemler himself, being number three in the nazi regime would have gone argentina if he hadnt been caught, escaped, recaught and took cyanide. These 10,000 trucks became much smaller for 700 people to be taken to a neutral port to be dispatched out of europe. Hitlers position was get them out of germany, get jews out of europe and the world. He accomplished two of those goals. My mother and not my father were part of the 1700. Its a whole different story. We were taken some place to neutral port, spain, portugal, turkey. We lined up as it was told to you before. It was not a death camp, a labor camp, starvation camp. I spent five months there. After five months the negotiations continued and we in fact were taken by german train during the war, from germany to switzerland. Why . Because in order for ikeland and scronitz to get the loot, this was not in cash because cash was useless but in diamonds and jewels that you can convert into livable material, in order to have that given to him he had to release the people. You couldnt kill them. You cant deal with dead hostages. We had to be kept alive so that at least we can be traded. In december of 1944 my war now ends because im now in switzerland a neutral country. I think both of these gentleman are standing which tells me to stop. [ applause ] i. Now, you can see why i said we were very fortunate to have him here today. We have time for one question. Make it a good one. I think its you. Nice and loud. Im from george mason university. How have your experience is in the war affected your thoughts on the humanitarian crisis today, like sudan and myanmar. I want to answer in the following way. Number one, it makes me understand it. I want to in some way caution it. What is happening in the world today looks like what happened, its not the same thing. We ought not to permit ourselves to think what is happening in these terrible places as the same thing that happened in most of europe from 1933 to 1945. Why is a much longer story to answer. It makes me understand mans inhumanity to man. That i can understand. I will never connect what happens in miramar and rwanda and all these other places. All these other genocides are not the same issue. The reason is different, the effect was different and what happened was quite different. Let me leave it at that. Thank you for the question. Actually, that was a question that henry greenbam was also asked. I will answer one sense of his answer. Thats wrong, that connection he said wednesday in his interview. His voice grew louder as he shook his head to the underscores conviction. That was oneofakind. There was only one nazi, germany. I think thats what manny is saying, you cannot make the connection to the hatred of that one nazi. Lets give them both a round of applause. We appreciate it. We take you live now to capitol hill where the House Rules Committee is meeting to consider the rules for debate on the revised tax reform bill, which the house is expected to take up tomorrow. We expect things to get under way shortly. While we wait for the House Rules Committee meeting to resume, we will show you a segment of this mornings washington journal. Sarah westwood joins us, White House Reporter for washington examiner, hannah with bloomberg. It is a week with a lot to get done. We talk about the tax reform bill. A lot of other materials on the table as well. First of all, your impressions, as the year began, did either of you expect the week before christmas there would be so much to get done in not a week but five days. Sarah westwood. Certainly not. Republicans control all three branches of government. They started this year with a lot of high hopes what they could get done. There was talk about an infrastructure package done by the end of the year. Health reform and tax reform. I dont think republicans correctly assessed how challenging it would be to get things through the senate with such a slim majority. As you were covering it, did you see this big ball of things to cover and expect to reporting it before christmas . Exactly. Because we werent able to get these other things done, passing tax reform is all important. They have to have something to show for the first year of united government. The tax bill checks off a lot of conservative priorities and talking points to say they were able to accomplish something. Some will be temporary and wont get the simplicity they had hoped to but gives them a political win if they can get it through both chambers on the president s desk. Lets talk tax reform. The rules Committee Meets and the house supposed to take it up tomorrow. Maybe even the senate on tuesday. Are there still potential stumbling blocks of tax reform in either the house or senate . Nothing is a sure thing until its done. Theyre in a good place in the house of representatives. I dont see pockets of resistance. It seems like theyre excited to vote on this bill. In the senate it looks like they have the votes they need although senator john mccain will miss the vote because of treatment for his brain cancer in arizona. Jeff flake is not a sure vote. It looks like they have bob corker in tennessee. Looks like theyre in pretty good shape but not a sure thing. The Vice President will be present for votes this week as edgerton mentioned, senator mccain not there, back in arizona, the Vice President canceling a trip to the middle east to be at the capitol for this. How else will the white house be involved to get this pushed . Certainly if jeff flake or any last minute holdouts will need whipping, the president will be working the phone, inviting senators out to play golf with him, working the phones. He traveled to capitol hill physical lay few times to pitch senators on their home turf. Hes really been trying to be a cheerleader for this whole thing while giving Senate Republicans space to negotiate. The white house didnt want to see the Corporate Tax rate go higher than 20 but had to expect the bill out of conference raises it to 21 . Thats not something the president wanted but the white house did let senate and House Republicans negotiate the finer points and didnt try to get in the way because they knew it would be difficult to get through without their interference. Its a busy schedule this week and were joined by the washington journal reporter and bloomberg for comments. 2027482001 the number to call for democrats. And and independents, call your number. Anna, i say the other, there are many things packed into this week, certainly what has to be done is a spending bill, because the current measure, current government funding ends friday at midnight, correct . What is tentatively the plan for republicans to continue funding . Right. They set themselves up for this crush right before christmas because their last continuous resolution only went from december 8th to december 22nd. H they really wanted to give themselves time to get the tax bill out of congress is the main priority and then turn attention to spending negotiations. Theyve been working on it. Its clear taxes are a priority and the two chambers in the house and senate have taken different approaches on the spending bill and they will try to figure out how to reconcile those two approaches and get something through chambers before friday. Is this, particularly in the house, an opportunity for the Freedom Caucus on the republican side and democratic caucus, in terms of their opposition, the fact theres currently no stipulation for the dreamers, the daca provisions, this is a potential area this could actually grind this procedure to a halt . I think its unlikely that the daca protection for dreamer is going to make it into the bill this week. Those negotiations have not advanced much even though congress meant from both parties say its a priority that needs to be taken care of. I think what you will see is tougher negotiation over spending levels and nondiscretionary defense spending and the budget caps they need to negotiate in order to get a bill through both chambers. Is the white house happy with the budget caps, raise tleflg of spending . The white house wanted to lift spending caps, their priority going in. Theres talk about appropriating money through september for defense, doing a temporary spending through all other areas of the budget through december 19, seems to be what the leadership is pursuing. The white house said from the getgo they had no plans to include immigration and think it should be left from when lawmakers come back from the holidays. The white house resistance and leadership resistance is why youre not seeing it as part of the spending mix. If they can keep this on appropriations and not this. Is there funding for the border wall . It doesnt seem the white house has been interested in going to the mat. The daca legislation for dreamers, they know theyll have the most leverage and that seems to be when the white house will Push Congress to appropriate for the border wall. Lots of issues to talk about. Who will go first in san antonio, texas, christopher, on our republican line. Caller yes, sir, id like to applaud the Congress First of all, getting this tax bill. One, raising the standard deduction from 12 to 24,000, that puts a thousand dollars in my pocket, just looking at the tax table from last year. For a middle income taxpayer a thousand dollars is a lot of money, so please work out all the fine print on this bill, get it through and give the great people of this nation a great for christmas that President Trump has promised us because we deserve it and we just need it. Thats all ive got to say. What do you think the break through was for the tax bill . Doubling the deduction is important for middle class families and will allow people to get that break without itemizing different kinds of deductions. However, that thousand dollars the caller mentioned is not going to be every year. Its hard to calculate what exactly the tax burden or benefit will be for different families in different situations. Theyre using chain cpi to adjust income meaning families will be pushed into higher income brackets faster. That means the tax breaks you see initially are not necessarily going to be there in the following years and also the individual tax rate cut was made temporary in this bill because of budget concerns and the deficit impact. Republicans were able to win over senator marco rubio friday or late last week. He had objections over the child tax credit, raising refundable portion from 1100 to 1400. What do you think his concern why was he holding out . This bill is a lot about messaging and trying too convince people this is a middle class benefit, when the bulk of this tax cut is for corporations. Out of 1 1. 5 trillion, about a trillion goes to the Corporate Tax cut, 35 to 21 . Part of senator rubios concern was being able to say, were working hard to make sure middle class families, working class families get the benefit they need. Next to ralph in charlottesville, also on the republican line. Go ahead. Caller yes. I had a question. Thanks for cspan on the exemption. I understand the final bill eliminates the exemption for an individual, 4,050 or 450 each, if so a married couple would lose 8,300 in exemptions and 12,000 gain and the standard deduction would not help that individual that much. Also, mr. Rosensteins statement on these contributions by employees high level ought to be considered as far as repercussion against those employees in their emails and so forth involved in that situation, so thanks this is kevin brady day at the rules c
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