Transcripts For CSPAN Morning Hour 20131028

Members from lists submitted by the majority and minority leader party for morning hours, since there are n none prursuent to clause 12a of rule 1, the chair declares the the house will return at 2 00 eastern to begin legislative business. Members will pick up a number of suspension feels bills. Later, lawmakers will consider legislation disapproving of the recent increase in the debt ceiling. Live coverage of the house at 2 00 eastern here on cspan. A lot of pictures this afternoon from fbi headquarters where president obama will deliver remarks at the installation ceremony for james call me, sworn in as fbi director last month, replacing robert moeller. A former Deputy Attorney general during the george w. Bush administration. Live coverage when it gets underway here on cspan. While we wait for that to get underway, a discussion from this mornings washington journal. Joining us to continue on a discussion about the health care law. Joining us for the discussion, Senior Health correspondent. Welcome. What is the latest . But unfortunately the sub contractors that runs the data hub had an outage last night. It was still down this morning. I checked before i arrived. Yet another woe in the long saga that has dogged the website. There was a congressional hearing last night. They recommended more testing earlier. Talked about how federal officials decided to turn off of browsing function that required a double make accounts. That created a backlog. A lot of attention and focus on the website. Www. Cspan. Orghost you get the homepage and then i was able to set up an account. I will give that a try. Got a message the website was down. The smiling girl on the website, a story about that now missing as well. She is gone and have replaced it with more information about what to do if you cannot get on the website. You can call the 1800 number. Even if you are on the story there are stories about how people are having a problem getting on the website. Trying to make it clear there are many ways to apply. Making it clear they are working hard to fix this. They made the changes in leadership about who is taking control. What is his role in talk about what is going on . He has been brought in as a troubleshooter. Well known to the white house. The first chief performance officer at the white house. Rod into thick something called cash for clunkers in 2009. People were offered financial incentives for more info more efficient car. He was brought in to fix that. He is the head guy. Elevated to the status of a contractor that was part of a program to bring guns into say they will now be the chief contractor to do that. That is the Quality Software services known as q ssi. One could say they are part of a faulty always faulty rollout. The thought is to bring in a new contractor at this point. They have a lot of time to get up to speed. Lets go with this company. They are known as the federal data hub, one of the pieces that has been worked in. Host what did you learn from having the contractors testify about what they did to the website. Go guest that there is a lot of blame to go around. They were blaming each other. Members trying to get more specific information about what happened when. It was a window into what is ongoing. The house ways and Means Committee Kathleen Sebelius will be in front of energy and commerce on wednesday. I think the story continues to unfold. Want to invite you into the conversation. If you want to call and comment about the Affordable Care act ask questions about it, we have divided the phone lines. If you find yourself uninsured the number on the screen. Pick a line. You can tweet us as well. What do we expect to hear from the secretary, sebelius . Guest you cant expect a lot of followups. What specific steps did you take . What was the white houses involvement . You can now go on to the site and look at rates without creating an account. You can give them more information about qualifying for the medicaid expansion. It was slightly reduce the sticker shock that you would see on the browsing feature. Host hasnt been any indication on how she might respond . Guest she and other officials have been very open that they should have tested more and tested earlier. Other officials have done that. They will acknowledge what they have done wrong. They are talking about what they are trying to do now. They have a heightened sense of awareness that this has to be done. If you want coverage to start january 1, you need to be enrolled by december 15. That will help people make that deadline. I think people are getting a little nervous about the timeline. There are problems happening with that. Host joe manchin talked about maybe a delay. Guest Jeanne Shaheen has talked about increasing the time for the enrollment period. Right now able and on march 31. Joe manchin is talking about delaying the mandate and penalty for a year. Joe manchin is working with a republican on the individual mandate delay. This is not where the ministration wants to be with the conversation. Host who expects the november deadline will be met . Guest i would say there is a healthy amount of skepticism. Many of these same officials said we will be ready to go on october 1. Lots of things have happened. We didnt anticipate we would have so many people on the site. Host this is dana, insured. Good morning. Caller i would like to see some consideration by the caller i would like to see some consideration by the administration looking into the thousands of embedded bush political operatives that opted to become federal employees at the time that Bush Administration ended. I have not heard anything indicating that over the last six or seven years. An after was made to identify potential individuals working in the executive branch that may in fact impede the operations for the purpose of political ends and not for the good of the people. Host why is it important to you . Caller many years ago i learned from it may have been cspan but i learn that tens of thousands of bush people that were put into various executive branches to make sure that the policies of the Bush Administration were being followed by employees in the executive branch. Guest i have not heard that at all and i find it interesting. I will keep my ears open, thank you. Host this is michael from new jersey, uninsured. Michael, good morning. Caller good morning. My opinion everything because generally he is host lets go on to gary who is insured. Caller good morning. My understanding is there were Insurance Companies involved in writing the obamacare policies. If that is true, they lean towards a policy more advantageous for them. Guest Insurance Companies did give their input to capitol hill and every sector, whether it is an Insurance Company or hospital, would want this law to work out well for them. There is no doubt they have lobbied to get provisions they liked and disliked. Congress takes all that information and create the law as they see fit. I do not want to say industries do not influence it. They will get a lot of new customers as part of the creation of the Affordable Care act. They do not like some of the new fees and taxes on their industry. There is probably a next bag for a lot of Companies Involved in health care. Host there was a story by the lost angeles times. Some of their Health Insurance is going to get pricier. Our health Insurance Companies changing their policies for members because of the Affordable Care act . Guest lets talk about what is happening in the individual markets. There are policies that may not offer the same comprehensiveness of coverage that the Affordable Care act has. It covers Maternity Care and hospitalization and so on. They are getting noticed that the current policy will not meet the federal standards. This story has gone a lot of attention in the press this week. This coverage is no longer adequate. You can enroll in a different policy. You may pay more or less for your coverage. This is something that is upsetting to people who like the policy they had. Host jane up next from tampa, florida, uninsured. Caller good morning. I have not applied for the aca but my son did and he didnt have a problem with it. I do not understand why it is such a problem for people to say that the aca is crashing or whatever. A time you apply for food stamps or medicare, you have to wait for it. Anybody that applies for those things know that. There is a long. Of time and i do not understand why it is such a big deal. Guest congratulations to your son. That is great he got through to apply. I understand the point youre making for other americans. There is a period of time where you need to wait. Key elements suggest the Affordable Care act up and running and to spread the risk is to get a lot of Young Healthy people into the system. If you need health care coverage, youre going to hang in there on healthcare. Gov until you can get the coverage locked down. For others who may be on the fence about, do i need this, is a cheaper for me to pay the penalty, the concern is they might get frustrated and not persevere to sign up for health care coverage. Host there is an article in the New York Times about that. See the rest of this discussion at www. Cspan. Org. Going live to at the eye headquarters. President obama speaking at the installation ceremony this afternoon. James calm he was a Deputy Attorney general during the george w. Bush administration. Lex please be seated, everybody. Please be seated everybody. Good afternoon and welcome everyone. My name is sean joyce, Deputy Director of the at the eye. Today we are truly honored to be joined by president barack obama. Mr. President. [applause] mr. President , on behalf of every fbi employee, it is my crib wedge to welcome you back to fbi headquarters. [applause] we also have a number of other special guests here today, including former director webster, sessions and the special warmup welcome back to director mueller and his wife. [applause] we also welcome former attorney general ashcroft. I would also like to have the directors join me on stage including to my far left, robert dortch, a friend and colleague with whom director call me worked to help some of richmond hardest hit areas. Most importantly, director call me his wife. Thank you for taking part in todays ceremony. We are also pleased to have the directors children, maureen, Kate Brian Claire and abby. [applause] also, director call me his brother. We are here for two purposes. First, director call me was sworn in during a private ceremony in attorney general holders office on september 4. We reviewed the rules and regulations and determined that oath was invalid. So officially i have been director. Second equally important, we wanted to be able to officially welcome director call me and his family into the fbi family. [applause] we are all honored to mark the occasion, along with director call mes family and close friends. Now, with those that are seated please rise for the color guard. Please remain standing for the singing of the National Anthem by jimmy wheeler, a retired new York Port Authority Police Officer with whom director call me worked in new york director colmey in new york. O say can you see by the dawnss early light, what so proudly we hail at the twilights last gleaming whose bright broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight. Oh the ramparts we walk were so gallantly streaming and the brock rockets red glare, the bombs bursting in air gave proof through the night that our flag was still there o say does that spar star spangled banner yet wave, oer the ramparts oer the land of the free and the home of the creator of the gift called life. We thank you for another day and the breath of your spirit. This fills us with opportunities. We thank you for this moment to celebrate the installation of james colmey to director of fbi. We call on you to bless the ceremony and every one a part of the celebration. We thank you for those of us that go before us and for the opportunities to enjoy life and liberty. We thank you for the men and women and their families. Without fanfare for the weakening joy the proofs of freedom. We thank you for jim and willingness to accept your call to serve as director of the fbi. Equipped with the intellect innovative spirit and integrity for such a time as this, to serve the nation and to bless this world. As we embark on this journey, i ask that you will bless him and his family plus him with all that is needed for him to be successful in this endeavor. There will be good days and not so good days but blessed him with the faith to call on you the fortitude to forge ahead. Bless them with the resilience when setbacks come his way. Now god i pray that not only will you bless jim but you will bless america. Not only do you bless where we live, but i ask that you would bless how we lived. Bless america with a shared vision and purpose while we embrace our differences and continue to strive to Work Together to build a better america where freedom and democracy and justice for all will shine for all americans. Not only do we ask that you would bless us, but blessed the world in which we live where love will be the common part. The world will be a more blessed place for our children and children all over the world. All of gods people together said amen. Amen and amen. God loves you, and god bless you. [applause] thank you for the wonderful blessing. I would like to invite judge walker and director to come forward for the real administration of the oath of office. I will be very brief. It is a very crowded day for jim, denise and his five children. President obama, attorney general holder and a man who hired him 28 years ago. And even prouder day for the women and men of fbi and all of us that care about the Law Enforcement agency, including all of the former fbi directors and former attorney generals, many of whom are here today. Ever since our year together which is great fun by the way as we both learn new jobs. Jim did not mean any talking from me. A modest guy. He has always been serious about his work, but never takes himself too seriously. After that first year, i had high expectations. They were exceeded in no small part due to the open, generous, modest person that he is. Jim is a fine lawyer come off hardworking and smart. He is also an actual leader who inspires those around him. His ability to inspire has been a part of his entire career in Law Enforcement. The u. S. Attorney for the Southern District of new york, Deputy Attorney general under a attorney general ash crop in the Bush Administration he has achieved what one thought was a pinnacle of the life and forced Law Enforcement career, and now it is. All of this past experience makes temperature coolly well suited. Jim appreciates the full worth of what you do. You can be sure that your director will steer a straight course. He will insist investigations be thoroughly pursued for wherever they may go. As a former prosecutor in the frontline against terrorism, he will lead. He will be independent and a town in which politics determine so much. Perhaps too much. He will pay no heed. For him, there will be no room for this. As a law clerk 28 years ago he first took the oath of pumpkin off of office that he will not take, the very same oath. These words have a special meaning. It will guide him as fbi director. Will you administer the oath . Please raise your right hand. Repeat after me. I do solemnly swear that i will support and defend the constitution of the United States. Against all enemies, foreign and domestic. That i will bear true faith and allegiance to the same, that i take this operation freely obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion and that i will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office for which i am about to enter. So help me god. [applause] it is official. The 84th president of the United States, president barack obama. [applause] thank you. Thank you thomas f ei. Thank you so much. Thank you very much. Thank you so much, please. Good afternoon, everybody. I am so proud to be here and stand once again with so many dedicated men and women of the at the i. You are the best of the best. Day in and then day out you work power leslie tirelessly to address the crisis our nation faces. You serve with integrity and protect americans at home and abroad. You lock up criminals, secure the homeland against the threat of terrorism. Without a lot of fanfare seeking the spotlight, you do your job. All the while upholding our most cherished values and upholding the rule of law. Bravery, integrity that is your motto. Today we are here to welcome a remarkable new leader for this remarkable new institution. One who lives the principles out every single day. Jim call me. I have to give a special shout out to bob moeller who served longer than he was supposed to but was such an extra narrator leader to some through some of the most difficult times we have had in national security. Thank you very much. [applause] jim has dedicated his life to defending hours. Making sure all americans protect our Justice System writes and there will being. He is the grandson of a meatpacker. Prosecutor who helped bring down the gambinos. The relentless attorney who fought to stem the bloody gun violence. Defeat walk whitecollar crime and defeat terrorist. Just about impossible to find a matter of justice he has not tackled and hard to imagine somebody who is not more uniquely qualified to lead a bureau that covers all of it. Positional threats like i went, organized crime that is constantly changing for us by cybersecurity. Of course jim is also a famously cool caret there. Here is what a fellow former prosecutor said about him. He said if you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs on the that is jim. During the trial jim won an award and when the court convened the next morning everyone was buzzing about it. A note was passed down from the defendants table and was handed to jim and read, congratulations on your award, no one deserves it more than you you are a true professional sincerely lorenzo. [laughter] we do not know how sincere he was. We do not know whether this was a veiled threat or a plea for leniency or on honest compliment , but i think it is fair to say jim has won the respect of folks across the spectrum. Including lorenzo. The most effective form is cooperation. He has worked with more than 35 dozen and and women of the ei during his career. It is his admiration and respect for all of you as individuals, recognition of the hard work you do every day, sometimes under extraordinarily difficult circumstances, not just the folks in the field but folks irking the back rooms. Folks doing the hard work. Out of sight. Recognition that your mission is important. This is what compels him to answer the call of the country again. The fbi joins forces with intelligence, and Homeland Security professionals to break up all threats. Taking down drug rings to stopping those who prey on children, to breaking up al qaeda. And your mission keeps expanding. The nature of the threats are always changing. Fortunately the reason unfortunately the resources allotted to the mission have been reduced and sequestration. I will keep fighting for those resources because our country asks and expects a lot from you, and we should make sure you have the resources you need to do the job, especially when many of your colleagues put their lives on the line on a daily basis to protect and serve citizens. The good news is, things like courage, leadership, judgment and compassion those resources are potentially limited. Critical to get the best people to serve. Even those who have difficult circumstances. Not just a keen knowledge of the law but also a moral compass that they and we can always count on. That is what we have in jim comey. I interviewed a number of extraordinary candidates for this job. All with sterling credentials. What gave me confidence was this is the right thing for the job. Was not his degrees and resume but talking to him and seeing his amazing family, a sense that this is someone who knows what is right for us all. And is willing to act on the basis every single day. That is why i am so grateful he signed up to serve again. I will spare you another joke about how today no one stands dollar stands taller. I want to thank the fiber mark boal children they have. I want to thank most of all the men and women of the at ei. Fbi. I am proud of your work and grateful for the service and confident the agency will continue to flourish with jim at the helm. If he gets lost in the building i want you to help him out. Thank you very much, everybody. [applause] now, ladies and gentlemen, it is my honor to introduce the seventh director of the federal bureau of investigation, james b comey. [applause] thank you, sean and mr. President and gracing us with your presence, honoring us in speaking so eloquently about the mission of the fbi. Thank you, also, to our friends and families here today, my entire life is lived with literally represented in this crowd. It is a pretty picture. These are the people i have known and loved my entire life and from whom i have learned so much. I am especially grateful that my dad and sisters could be here today. I wish so much that mom could be here today to enjoy this amazing day. I can still hear ringing in my tired teenage years, her voice as she snapped open the shades every single morning and said rise and shine and show the world what you are made of. It made us who we are. I will never forget that. Of course, with the caveat she would be ok because the president would never pick me. [laughter] i have to say this is your last chance to talk to him about it. Mr. President , i am so grateful for this honor and opportunity to serve with the men and women of the at ei. They are standing all around this great courtyard and standing on duty all around this country and world at this moment. I know already this is the best job i have ever had and will ever have. That is because i have a front row seat to watch the work of a Remarkable Group of people who served this country, folks from all walks of life who joined the fbi for the same reason teachers, soldiers and Police Officers and scholars and Software Engineers people from all walks of life you want to do good for a living. They want jobs with a moral compass so they join this great organization. I thought about them as i stood in the courtroom cory are just a week ago. This is an artist depiction of the words from our shield the president mentioned. The ability, bravery and integrity. As i thought about the statute and words in ceremony i thought i would take a couple of minutes to tell you what the words mean and why i think they belong on our shield. First melody. Fidelity defined as a strict in continuing faithfulness to an obligation, trust, or duty. To my mind that reminds us the fbi must provide two obligations at the same time. First, the f ei must be independent of all political forces. A must stand apart from all institutions of american life. Second, at the same time, it must be part of the United States department of justice. Constrained by the rule of law and checks and balances built into the brilliant design by our nations founders. Those are the values i see in that word. I think that is reflected in the term i have just begun. The term is 10 years to ensure independence but a fixed term of years to ensure power does not become concentrated in one person and unconstrained. The need for reflection and constraints of power is what led louis three to order all new agent classes to visit the Holocaust Museum here in washington so they could see and feel and hear in a palpable way the consequences of abuse of power on a massive, almost unimaginable scale. Paul mueller continued that practice. I will again when we have agents graduating from quantico. The balance reflected in my term is a product of lessons hard learned from the history of this great institution. Our first past century or so was a time of great progress and achievement in this country and bureau. It also saw abuse and overreach. Most famously Martin Luther king and others were viewed as internal security threats. As i think about the unique talent is represented with independence on one hand and rule of law on the other, i think it also makes sense for me to offer those are reminder closer to her own history. I will direct all new agents and analysts visit the Martin Luther king memorial here in washington. I think it will serve as a different kind of lesson, one more personal to the bureau of the dangers of becoming untethered to oversight and accountability. A word fidelity longs on our shield. Next, bravery. We have perpetrated a myth that being brave means not afraid, but that is wrong. Mark twain once said lavery is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear. If you have ever talked to a special agent that you know well and ask he or she about a dangerous encounter they were involved in, they will almost always give you the same answer, i did it but was scared to hack the whole time. Scared to heck the whole time. Only a crazy person would not fear pounding up a flight of stairs to execute a search warrant or fast roping from a helicopter down into hostile fire. Real agents like real people fear that in the bottom of their stomachs. No difference those folks do it anyway. They volunteered to do that for a living. What makes the bravery of the men and women of the ei so special is they know exactly what they are in for. They spent weeks and weeks at an Academy Learning just how hard and dangerous the work is and raise their right hand to take an oath to do the work anyway. They had seen have seen the wall of honor and i held i guess well get to see. Those who gave the last full measure of devotion to their country as fbi employees. Civil war general constant sherman said this i would defined to courage to be a perfect sensibility between the measure of danger and willingness to endure it. I called a special agent a few weeks ago after he had been shot during an arrest. I knew before i called him that he had are ready been injured severely twice during his career, once in a terrorist bombing and once in a helicopter crash. Yet when i got him on the phone, i got the strong sense he could not wait to get me off the phone. He was embarrassed by my call. It was a through and through wound. No big deal. More worried about his car that he had left at the scene of the shooting. He felt ok because his wife was going to go get the car so everything was fine. The men and women of this organization understand perfectly the danger they are in every day and choose to endure it because they believe in this mission. That is why bravery the longs on our shield. Finally, integrity. Integrity derived from integer meaning whole. A person of integrity is complete undivided. Sincerity, decency, trustworthy are synonyms of integrity. It is on our shield because it is the quality that makes possible all the good that we do. Because everything we do requires we be believed. Whether that is promising a source we protect her, telling a jury what we saw or heard or telling a professional organist site Oversight Committee what we heard. Without integrity, all is lost. We cannot do the good all these amazing people signed up to do. The fbi and segregation is a gift. Given to every new employee by those who went before him up but it is a gift that might be protected and that that must be protect it and earned every single day. We protect that by taking mistakes and admitting them, making promises and keeping them , and by realizing that nothing no case, no source no fear of embarrassment is worth jeopardizing the gift of integrity. Integrity must be on the fbi shield. You see those three words fidelity bravery and integrity capture the essence of the fbi and its people and also explain why i am here. I wanted to be here to work alongside those people, to represent them help them accomplish their mission, and to just be their colleagues. It is an honor and a challenge beyond description. I will do my absolute best to be worthy of it. Thank you very much. [applause] thank you director comey. Now please will come back jimmy wheeler. Gather far across the sea to swear our allegiance to a land that is free let us all be grateful as we raise our voices in a solemn prayer. God bless america land that i love stand beside her and guide her to the night with the light from above from the mountains to the prairie, to the ocean white with foam, god bless america, my Home Sweet Home god bless america, my Home Sweet Home [applause] thank you, once again mr. Wheeler. I want to thank our special guest, director comeys family and in particular my fbi brethren for honoring the special day director comey and his family. Thank you, everyone. We would ask you that you please remain seated as mr. President and the director in family enter the exit the building. Thank you very much. [applause] president obama officially welcoming james comey on board. He was sworn in last month to placing director mueller. Coming up shortly, live coverage of todays white house rethink with jay carney. Set to begin at 12 45. Running a little bit late. We will have it when it gets underway. The u. S. House is in today. Members return for general speeches at 2 00 with both in speeches later. On the agenda, consideration of the number of bills dealing with veterans benefits. Later this week, bills dealing with changes to the dodd frank regulations law. See live coverage of the house when members return at 2 00 eastern here on cspan with both at 6 30. Coming up wednesday, health and Human Services director Kathleen Sebelius will testify about problems encountered with health care. Gov website. Also tonight, the Jack Kemp Foundation honoring Florida Governor jeb bush was annual leadership award. The ceremony will include remarks by john boehner and South Carolina senator tim scott five at 7 30 eastern on cspan three. The courtship of bess wallace and harry truman began here at her home in independence, missouri. When my grandfather visited independents, 26 miles from where he lived at the time, he often stayed across the street at the nolan house or his aunt and two cousins lived. One afternoon he was over there with his cousins, the family, and his aunt brought in a cake plate that my great grandmother had given her a cake and she had cleaned the cake plate and was asking if anybody would take it back over. My grandfather moved with what my mother once described as something once described as the speed of light and grabbed the plate and ran over here and rang the bell on the front door in the hopes that my grandmother would answer the door, and she did. She invited him in and that is the beginning of the formal courtship in 1910. Continuing the series on first ladies, live at 9 00 eastern on cspan a discussion now on the earned income tax credit. A recent report from the Treasury Department director general found that part of the eit see amos last year should never have been made. We will show you as much of this as we can before the White House Daily briefing which is scheduled to begin shortly. Host were going to be focusing on a program that offers tax credits to low income earners and