Transcripts For CSPAN Politics Public Policy Today 20120410

of all the people i have met and talked with and spend time with. it is a man i must a fan of. it is who i admire most of all. he is my personal hero. martin luther king put his money where his mouth was. >> his career spanned 60 years. mike wallace died this weekend at age 93. watch any of his almost 50 appearances including his interviews with irani president. the c-span video library every c-span program since 1987. >> tavis smiley recently moderated the form at new york university on poverty in america. a the next two hours you hear a discussion on poverty, voting rights, and reproductive rights. [applause] >> good evening for the center for performing arts here in new york. i'm honored to be joined by an all-star plapanel on poverty in america appeared at want to ask you to think this panel for being here and giving up their time. please, thank them for joining. i want to mention that this conversation is being heard live around the country. specifically here in the great city of new york. i want to jump into the conversation as i get to them. i want them to jump into this the conversation. we're going to do this for three nights. let me start by asking me to think and why you for having us here. >> i want to starts by going first to the labor secretary. i said that i was so delighted that you want to be here. it seems to me he cannot have this conversation without talking about the numbers. that is a dreaded statement for many of us. i know a lot of us who do not like numbers are talking about numbers. women and children are falling faster into poverty than any other group of americans. it is the case that you get this out. the younger you are, the more likely you are to be poor. something it seems to me is wrong and nation that allows its women to fall into poverty faster than anyone else. why is that the case? while our weapon in children falling into poverty faster? please welcome our labor secretary, hilda solis. >> one of the things that the president did was help provide funding to provide support and a safety net for all of these possibilities. the emphasis here. education and training is what the key is here. it is about jobs. let's make sure that young people have opportunities. what we have seen is more participation on the part of one man because they have fallen out of the work force. they have been stagnated and part of their wages. they still have the 80 cents on the dollar. it gets harder when it is a minority women. our efforts have been tried to pick more people back into new kinds of jobs. it is also stretching our imagination. it is fitting funding and did things that did not exist. i have to give that to the folks who gave funding. now is that the time to put away that safety net. there folks in washington that like to see us go back. . 50 million more women are taking a advantage of our work forces. that tells me that we have a long way to go. when the to make sure be incentivize tax breaks so we can create jobs and allow for individuals to stand up on their on. they also need to look for their own jobs and create their jobs. we are about people to do work sharing, stay on the job. and to start of your own business. that is exciting for women. many of us are the full breadth earners. you have seen a lot of minority kids dropping out of school. to some of our programs are the hardest to serve programs. right now we need to see these programs expanded. >> i find in credulous of the relax to the people who do not want to just change the conversation to what i said that they want to change the conversation to one a deficit reduction. how is it possible that anybody in his or her right mind in washington possibly think that austerity is the answer? part of the mess calculation is that you cannot do both at the same time. this is what the priority for this administration is. there is also that very bright torch has effort to expand our job training programs. i am happy the president is doing that. he is making a concerted effort to do that. we have funded our community colleges. if he did i get it right, you will keep finding things that do not show a good project. we are showing the way we talk to businesses. we are looking at jobs that will be a real jobs that pay well. they also bring professionalism. it'll help 2 million people. these people do not even get minimum wage. we are pushing out rules to allow that. women can look at each other's wages across the board with different corporations. they can start making some assessments and negotiating for higher salaries. we should not have to wait for major legislation. we were talking about pay equity. no one should have to be discriminated during the same job a man is doing. those women and many like her have lost out. that money was not put into their paycheck went to his working 20 or 30 years on the job. the labor sector would give me all the room i needed to run with. i want to go first to my friends. she is the president's of the college for women. please welcome dr. julianne malveaux. i am glad you're here. you are one of the nation's most brilliant and ernest and should telling economists. i want to ask you whether or not the belief the numbers that we are being given coming out of our governments. we are told that there are about 50 million of us living in poverty. we are told if you combine those living in poverty and near it there are 150 million. that means one and two americans are in. let me start by not covering this question too much. do you believe the numbers that we're told tax is where's? it is certainly wars. the secretary would can see this. it details the unemployment rates. if the unemployment rate is 8.3%, the alternate measure is something like 13%. capt. americans and members almost 25%. i think that is important. we have not talked about the people that have dropped out of the labor market. we have not talk about what it costs to look for it. it is an expensive proposition. you have to get your clothes claim. i'm not trying to be trivial. in 90, the average congress had a net worth of $250,000 excluding their home. by 2010 they had net worth of $750,000 of slitting their home. what happened to congress said they could triple their wealth? for the rest of us, everybody else the same level but these members of congress found a way to enrich themselves. i'm not hitting on members of congress. people who have that kind of wealth did not understand some of that needs an extra $40. when you get mad romney betting $10,000 in there, how many months you have to work to get $10,000 tax the average white african american household has $31,000. he is walking down with a third of black people pay. the numbers that we see, let me put those up there. we need to understand them. that overall, our poverty rate 15.2 percent. again, that's almost one in six americans. for african americans, the number is 27.4 percent. for latinos it's 25.8 percent. for asian americans the numbers are lower, and interestingly, ceci, the numbers on native american people are not published. theoretically, the sample size is too small. now, how do we have people in our population, and their sample size is too small? well, i know why. but i'm just saying, rhetorically speaking - >> no, no, tell us why. >> well, under a president that will go unnamed, but he was president about 1981, they actually wanted to stop collecting racial and ethnic statistics. they said, "we're all one america." this is this post-racial notion. well, when i have a post-racial unemployment rate, then we can be post-racial. when black folks have the same unemployment rate as white folks, as everybody else. the native data, the native american population is one of our smallest populations, but it seems to me that we ought to invest the resources in finding out what's going on with this vital population in our society. see, we're cutting education. president of bennett college for women, the most challenging thing, we got young sisters and brothers who want to go to college, but the dollars are not there. the pell grant is $5,500. tuition, room and board at bennett is $25,000. so where's a sister going to get the other $19,000 from? loans. now, if you take out a loan for anything, you should take it out for education, to invest in your education, but i don't understand why -- and suze might disagree with me -- but suze, i'm a college president. i need those students enrolled in my college. so to cut education while the president has said he wants us again to lead the world in the number of people with aa and ba degrees, it's foolhardy. this is like a farmer that decides they're going to eat their seed corn as opposed to planting it next year. we should not be cutting education. while you have these task forces looking at the middle class, which we do care about, let's also look at poverty. >> since we're in new york, when he hears me ask this question on national television he'll probably run down here, so don't be surprised if bill clinton walks in the back door in about 10 minutes. but let me just ask you forthrightly and directly, specifically with regard to women and children in poverty, how much of this is bill clinton's fault? you know what i mean by that -- 15 years ago it was our friend bill clinton who pushed through this welfare reform bill, and peter edelman, the husband of our dear sister marian wright edelman, who's the most courageous fighter in this country on behalf of children, her husband quit his clinton administration job over this issue. so let me just ask you how much of the -- are the chickens coming home to roost? how much of this mess right now is bill clinton's responsibility? >> well, certainly. you call it welfare reform, i called it welfare deform. because you took a system that may have worked imperfectly, and you made it even worse. you have a lifetime cap on the number of -- how long you can stay on public assistance of five years. that makes no sense. bill clinton was pandering, frankly, to the right when he did welfare deform. we all love bill clinton, but he was pandering to the right, and he was excoriated on the floor of congress. but let's be clear that right now i don't think anyone has an appetite -- this particular congress is one of the worst i think that we've seen in a very long time, especially around issues for women and children. they don't mind cutting anything. they're running around the country basically talking about austerity at the same time that we're seeing people falling into poverty. >> faye. so dr. malveaux says that this is the worst congress in recent memory with regard to the rights of women. i want you specifically to connect this war on women specifically now being waged in washington, this assault, with poor women and their babies specifically. >> well, there's always been a war against the poor. this is not a country that has had a tremendous sympathy for poor people, so i think that the notion that somehow we have slipped into an era in which poor people don't matter is not quite the way our history would define it. we really don't care much about poor people. so when we think about what is happening today against women in public life and in political life, it really isn't something that is new to our particular society and to the political landscape. it's been going on for more than 30 years, and americans really -- these are not acts of god, no one came down from the mountain and struck lightning and said, he used the term economic justice. >> to new? you look at reagan who always talked about the 13 kids. there's the woman with 13 kids. no one has been sympathetic to poverty. we changed it from a social problem to a personal problem. i know the timing of this was so propitious given this war that is now being waged against women. i am honored to have the first african-american woman to the national president of planned parenthood. please welcome faye. they say this is the worst congress in recent memory. with regard to the rights of women. i want you to connect this war on women specifically being waged on washington. >> there has always been a war against this. this is not a country that has had this. there is the notion that somehow we have slipped into an era in which poor people do not matter. it is not the way our history would define as. the johnson and ministration saw to change that at a time when the country was going through an enormous change out of the civil rights movement. there was a tremendous upward mobility for this country to be a different country. unfortunately just as rep construction -- reconstruction was cut short, this is taking us to a different place. it was cut short by the right wing political movement that took wing in the early '80s. now that we think about what is happening against women in public and political why it life, this is nothing new to the political landscape. it has been going on for more than 30 years. no one came down to the mountain and struck lightning and said you shall oppose women and you shot takeback women's right and you shall invade women's vaginas and ordered to advance your political agenda. this has been a very long time coming. we have allowed it to happen. women still do not have first- class citizenship. all this there have been working for that. it is a very long journey. what we see going on is a very long legacy. it is a long legacy. it will take place in states across the country. it has occurred over this last decade. it is interesting that that chipping away always seems to focus only on sexual decisions of women and our reproductive decisions. we have to really ask ourselves why are there more children in poverty? why are families and disruption? women are primarily the heads of households now. we are not perceived as real first-class citizens. there is an effort being taken to take us back for real to the traditional role that we have played in society which is mother and tear caked your ass to women who deserved the did nancy -- we have played in society which is mother and daughter, who deserve dignity. this is really pretty stunning at the beginning of the 21st century. we are engaged in a really serious and political conversation with all that is before us and all the challenges of our society. there is desire for peace in the world. they had used as in many ways as a template for the aspirations of peace that our conversation has evolved into a conversation about what birth control pill you will use. it is unbecoming of a nation that we are engaged in this kind of conversations. >> i want to ask a follow-up before i do that. i want to acknowledge that this conversation is being recorded for c-span. a lot to ask a question about women in washington. thanks c-span for carrying this conversation. i want to thank them for carrying this. they follow us around these -- around the country. i want to thank them for being so kind for letting people be a part of this. there's nothing he said i disagree with. i did not get to church this morning. mama's on the front row. not the 1992 was the year of the woman. there's so many women running for national office. they are running for high office. many even one. just 20 years ago, we are celebrating the year of the woman. 20 years later there is a war on women. how did that happen? i hear your point. we are celebrating not to 1992 that women were making a breakthrough. now women are being under attack. what role do women now have to play to reverse that trend? >> we may have been celebrating. the fact that we were celebrating one year as the year of a woman is demonstrative of the status of women. we're celebrating one year as the year of the women. >> we have to be careful about our friends. sometimes our friends mask the war that continues. after 1992, at there was a tremendous amount of complacency. why should women's rights ever be based and pivoted on who's in the white house? we do not talk about press censorship based on who is in the white house. we do not talk about a lot of our fundamental rights. they are not right that is generally talked about. there is no question that women's reproduction is still a very difficult issue for a lot of people not the least of which is the catholic church and hierarchy. we have to be careful bop falling in complacency when we think that our friends will take care of us. the only thing that has ever taken care of freedom in this country is ourselves. we have to work to protect our freedoms. there is really no substitute for that battle and the recognition that is a long distance battle. i in the grandchild of a slave born grandmother. i knew her. that is how very short our history is. this is a very long distance journey. this is a journey that if we lose vigilance we fall back. we let people occupied the public space and dialogue. we say let's be quiet about this. let's not get into controversy. if we are quiet we would not have all of this conflict and difficulty. when people are engaged in rhetoric that is designed to deny any citizens are fundamental rights, we have to speak out. there is another voice that is heard. >> let me say something real quick. this came on the heels of the humiliation of anita hill during the clarence thomas nomination. but that these women ran in reaction. they were walking down. the year of the woman was not about empowerment as much as it was about reaction. >> let me ask you very quick follow up. how do women then the compelled to exercise their agency to run for high office? whether we like it or not. that is the. in which these issues are addressed. we can all speak out. we need to be a part of that. >> women have to support women. sometimes we are our own worst enemy. the difficulty that women running for political office have is finding that early support that does not say if you are guaranteed to be a winner any more than men are guaranteed be a winner when they go to their donors to say support me. a have to do the research necessary. women simply do not find that kind of resources available to propel us. this is going to be over. we are half the population. there is no reason for our me children to be in poverty. there's a willingness of women to do what was done in the first part. it made it possible for all busted is sitting on this platform. >> women are not just half the population. they make of the majority of americans. i want to of and that. i'm not disagreeing. -- i want to augment that. i am not disagreeing. >> women make up the majority of americans in poverty. i raise that only back to what the labor secretary said earlier. i want to get everybody involved. they're people waiting that have not spoken. i want to come to cecilia. cecilia fire thundered. i want to come to you. all this woman have compelling stories. she was born on the south side of chicago. everybody has a great story. she has a story that is just mind-boggling for me. so often we do not include our native american brothers and sisters. i'm glad to have her here for that particular reason number one. my friend was in the case, we started this on a native american reservations. we asked them for this documentary. what about the recession index has impacted you? do you know what they said? you know what the women said to us? "what recession? what recession? it's always this way for us on the reservation." and so, cecilia firethunder is a single mom back in the day. she has two kids, she goes on to become a nurse so that she can take care of her kids. she later runs for office and becomes the first woman to be the president of her sioux tribe. it's a wonderful story of single mothers -- of single mothers exercising their own agency. so that when dr. malveaux says that we don't even keep track of what happens on the reservation, cecilia firethunder, tell me what it's like for women these days, poor women and their children, just trying to navigate life on a reservation where the recession means nothing to them because it's always so much worse? >> first of all, i'm one of millions of american women who identify as native american. we represent a little over 500 tribes in america, large and small, the largest being the navajo, of course, and the second largest is mine, reservation, 2. 5 million acres of land, 40,000 citizens living in my country. over half of our population are 18 and under. he talks about "what recession"" during the depression i can recall my father and uncles talking, "what depression?" so in america, unfortunately, there is a huge piece of land between l.a.and new york city called middle america, where we live. many of the indian reservations are in middle america. we have much land, lots of poverty. one of the things i like to remind the audience is that the american indians are the only ones mentioned in article vi of the united states constitution where in fact the quote is "to honor all treaties made by this government and the united states of america." so the question arises if we are mentioned in the constitution of this country's founding documents, then why are we always hustling around trying to get more money to address the poverty in our communities? the other thing i want to be very clear is that we have at this point, that the majority of the women who work in tribal communities are women. most of the college graduates in our tribal communities are women. many of the positions held in our tribal communities, whether they be principal, superintendents or teachers, are women. so when you take a look at this huge leadership amongst women in our tribal communities, people say why are women, indian women, taking the lead? we have a lot of entrepreneurs, we have small businesses. one of the greatest challenges that we face in our tribal communities is access, access. we are so rural and so isolated it's really difficult to get from point a to point b. then you factor in poverty, then that makes access even more difficult, to get to a grocery store, to make sure your food dollars go farther, to get to a town to see a specialist. so when we begin to take a look at where indian people live, we're looking at isolation and large miles between point a and point b, and that makes it difficult many times. in a city you have subways and you've got mass transit. out in our rural communities, we don't have that. yes, poverty exists and it has existed for many, many years in our tribal communities, and it will continue to exist unless some changes are made to be able for young women to go back to school. we changed the laws, we changed the snap laws, what we call the tanf laws. there are many, many federal programs that may look good, but actually, when you start to implement those programs it makes it difficult for people in rural communities to be able to use those types of services and programs. one of the other things that's been really successful is just getting our young women back into school. we have a high dropout rate, and our dropout rate is connected to other social problems. and i'm not going to -- i could sit here and talk about everything, however, in many tribal communities like mine, women have stepped up to leadership roles. as the first woman president of my tribe, white women -- i'm sorry, white women have a glass ceiling. how many of you have heard of the glass ceiling? well, in indian america we don't have a glass ceiling, we have a buckskin ceiling. the buckskin ceiling works like this. okay, buckskin is pliable, so it stretches. so for many years they made it -- we felt like we were really making progress, and we'd get only so far -- bang, it just knocks us flat on our rear end. then what it is is that that internalized oppression, and how in our communities of color we hold each other back. not only women -- thank you for making that comment -- women hold us back, but sometimes some of our men hold us back, and this is where the buckskin ceiling came into play. one of the things i wanted to share with you is i took my oath of office to be the leader of my nation, i was given a knife, a symbolic gesture, to use this knife to cut through red tape and to go -- there's places where there's barriers. so i always wanted -- i tell this story because it's so true. the first person who cut that buckskin ceiling, made a little cut, was wilma mankiller. the next person who jumped up and made another little cut might have been winona laduke. so as we take a look at indian country, there were women who were cutting that buckskin ceiling. so on the day of my inauguration i took my knife and i went and it opened up. >> i want to go to randy and a second. we spent some time on a reservation. give me a sense of what life is like for a poor child on a reservation. >> when you take a look at poverty, is tribal community is one, 2 , 3. one is the river. we had eight tries in south dakota. many of our children are in communities where there are many financial challenges. being poor has been several generational. it has been ongoing. one thing i want to be really clear about is occupational systems, our children have access to a pretty good education. they come to the school which is paid for by the government. they go to the classroom which is paid for by the government. 20 have high rates of poverty, but the children go without. -- when you have high rates of poverty, the children go without. one thing i notice is that everybody has a television set. they can find a way to put their resources down there to get something that they can benefit from. because of the poverty, we have many households that are mixed. we have many people living in one household. the housing situation is at its highest. we have multiple families living together. it creates another problem. the statistics are out there in terms of who we are and where we are at. my sister talked about the move very little data on indian women and poverty. i just wanted to celebrate the tenacious this of indian women. indian women are so awesome. they are really smart. many auto mechanics. >> you got me on that one. i cannot encapsulate that in just a short amount of time the donna website you will find that data. >> as i said earlier, this would not be possible iit or not for the generous support of teachers. please welcome randi weingarten. the link between education and poverty is so well established. even republican agrees that there is a link between miss education and a ruling -- lack there of. what is the link between poverty and the trout ability to learn in the classroom? >> let me just start by saying thank you, because we don't ever talk about poverty enough and it's always a one-off, and the fact that you are making this a priority so that we shine the light on poverty so no one can say it can be ignored. thank you very much. >> i appreciate it. >> i find it in my field just morally reprehensible that the debate is a total false choice. of the moment you utter the word "poverty," if you are a schoolteacher, you immediately get, "well, you're using it as an excuse." now, i don't want to use it as an excuse, i want to mitigate it. i want to make sure we address it. there's a bunch of things we need to do in terms of the advocacy, which this town hall is a part of, but also in terms of the interventions which people don't believe we can do. so i think that you have to have both tracks at the same time. so the question we asked was about the interventions. so right now, what we see, and this is pre-recession, there's a 40 percent achievement gap between rich and poor kids. >> four-zero? >> four-zero. that is double the achievement gap between black and white kids -- 40 percent. that is before the recession. 44% of the children in the united states of america live in low-income households. this goes back to the point about priorities. i want to give back to rural education. priorities. we know that 1/3 of the achievemen achievement gap, whir about, happens for a child between zero and five years old, because kids are so nimble then, that's when they're sponges. they pick it all up, right? one-third. we also know that when there is a good early childhood program -- everybody, republicans, democrats, everybody loves early childhood -- that there is a rate of return on investment of $7 for every $1 you invest in early childhood. don't know too many investments that are better than that. so less than 30 percent of 4- year-olds are in publicly funded 4-year-old pre-k programs in the united states of america. so we know it works, we know it's a great rate of return, we know particularly for kids who are poor, if we can get them in, it's fantastic, and we don't. take a place like new york, my hometown. it's harder to get into a pre-k program here than it is to get into harvard. so when you talk about the issue of austerity, this is an intervention that we know will work, and why are we not doing it? not just doing it in a pilot program, and secretary of education has a pilot program trying to put some money together, secretary of labor has been fantastic in trying to find ways to put pieces of money together for these interventions. but that is the measure and the caliber and the character of are we going to solve the problem. this is an intervention that works and can work hugely well. rural poverty is ignored more than urban poverty. tavis knows that my unit is involved in a pretty audacious experiments. we essentially have taken the county of mcdowell. middle appel asia. alachia. as we have said that we have to improve the education system. we know we have done a lot of wrong things. we have to address that, including the fact that we have to focus not only on fairness but insuring quality. if someone cannot teach, we have to say that they can. we also have to make sure that we give people the tools and conditions. all of us have to step up and take more responsibility. [applause] what we have done is say "can not be the teacher. it cannot just be the parent. we are looking to a multi strategy intervention. " we are the lead partner of 40 partner. we all sides a covenant that says we will revitalize the entire community. we're going to talk about transportation. we're going to talk about technology. we're going to talk about housing and do something about housing. we're going to talk about education and do something about education. that kids are bored. if kids are sick, and what we're seeing in places around americawhat we're seeing in lotf places around america, two- thirds of kids have their only real meal, nutritious meal, in schools. teachers these days are spending on average $25 a month to feed kids. but we are bringing a partnership together. let's let's each take a role in this to do work force development and may schools into communities. we can do some college education on school premises. we can open schools up 20 hours a day. we can have a social services there. we can do the kind of things that turner community does. we have to give up the ghost and say that education is here and everything else is here. bring it all together, use schools as the hub and also focus both on fairness and quality at the same time. >> i've got a thousand follow- ups once i -- there is no community pushing harder right now on this issue than our hispanic brothers and sisters. this dream act has got to get passed. it has to get passed, it has to get passed. it's got to get passed. nely galan is a latina, obviously. she is an entrepreneur, has her own company, doing a lot of great work at the adelante movement to engage and involve women. you know her from "celebrity apprentice." please welcome nely galan. i have never seen a community that people want to exploit more politically, socially, economically, culturally. people want to exploit them in so many ways, and yet i've never seen a community that madison avenue here in new york craves more. they are trying to get to latina moms more aggressively than any other consumer in the country right now, and i wonder if you might speak to that dichotomy between being exploited on the one hand - >> mm-hmm, right. >> -- and being craved on the other hand. >> it's very difficult for all of us to read continual statistics about us that don't really explain who we are, and that's why i related so much to what you said, that kind of are a downer, that make us feel like we are -- and that kind of are framed in a way that make us feel like something's wrong with us and we are taking something away from this country. the dichotomy is that when then you go to consumer products companies and to advertisers, they look at us as we're like the greatest thing since sliced bread, and that's because their numbers are nice numbers. their numbers show that we're living in a multicultural society, 30 percent of the country is multicultural, and 16 percent of that group are latinos. by the year 2030 we will be 30 percent of this country. do you know that latinas come from countries in latin america where, we or our families come from latin america, where we've seen governments come and go, where banks have defaulted, where we live in cash societies, where someone like me could never grow up to be me, ever? i could never be an entrepreneur in some other latin america country. so we come here in gratitude and in hard work, and when we hear things about poverty and our relationship to poverty, it almost is like -- we say in spanish [speaks in spanish]. it's a little shocking, because we don't live in a state of mind of poverty. we think it's a transitional thing. we've been in and out of poverty for generations, and it doesn't mean we're stuck there. i think that's very important. latinos do not see ourselves as stuck in poverty, ever. when latinos were in the worst boat, latina moms, out of nowhere, were striking in the numbers. i saw how they looked at stat istics. numbers? the good in the middle of the worst economy, when everything was horrible, latina moms were starting businesses. when they went further and said, why, what is it? they don't want to be rich, they don't care, they don't want to be famous -- none of the american values. because they didn't want their kids to go under the bus. when i've looked at the numbers, what are the women missing facts what is it they need? if they went from here to here, they make more money. the companies want us to make more money. they said what will it take for these women to go from here to hear? -- here to here? what they need this community. what they need is women to come together. latinas for latinas. they also need african-american women, white women, to bring in information they do not have. they need to know how to access capital. they need to know how to get a government contracts and advertisers that give away dog tracks. -- contracts. i decided i am going to start a movement for latinas. there has never been a movement for latinas, and it's called the adelante movement, because "adelante" means "move it, move forward." and it's true. i engaged advertisers. it is like talking to the wall with politicians. let's talk to people that are they get them. advertisers know the most important thing we have in this country is our buying power. and what we purchased, we have right for that purchase power. we do not realize that if we just bought from each other we would all be rich. so we started a tour in december and we're going to go through the country, and all the information all the other people get, we're going to give it to latinas. we have to remember something else that i hear in these board rooms all the time. if we want to ask people for something, then we have to come through too. if we're asking the government to do something for us, then we have to vote. if we're asking somebody -- if we're asking a corporation to give us money, we have to buy their products. if we are asking a network to put more african american and latinos and native americans on tv, then we have to watch their shows. it can't just be a one-way street. we are no longer in a world -- the world has changed. it's not about them giving to us. we have the power to make or break their companies. we are bigger than the main -- we are the mainstream. [applause] >> that's a nice segue to suze orman. please welcome susie are meze o. suze's latest "new york times" best seller -- they all are, aren't they, thanks to you -- "the money class, how to stand in your truth and create the future you deserve." how's that for a segue? suze, last time you and i saw each other, you said something to me that just arrested me, and i must tell you i've been using this line across the country, and i ain't going to lie, i haven't been giving you attribution for it either. >> i bet i know what the line was. >> what was it? >> that there is a highway into poverty and there is not even a sidewalk out. >> that's it, that's it, that's it. >> i know when i say something that's good. >> that was it, by the way. >> i know. i heard you. but i have been stealing from suze oreman. >> but if that's true across the board, how much more true, then, is that for women and children, that there is a highway in but not even a sidewalk out? >> yeah. i've been sitting here and i've been listening. aren't you all surprised how quiet i have been - >> i was. >> -- this entire time? because i've been listening deeply. i'm listening deeply because they're all good reasons that we are here. the congress this, the education this, native american, latina -- the whole thing -- and it all, in my opinion, boils down to what is every single person in this audience today, what is every single person who is watching this program today, tonight, listening to it on the radio, what are you going to do for yourselves? women are very interesting to me, and it is no doubt that women have the ability to give birth, in most cases. in most cases, women have the ability to feed that which they have given birth to. so on some level, it is a woman's nature to nurture, and she, in my opinion, will nurture every single person -- spouse, family member, pet, plant, employer, employee -- before she will nurture herself. the reason i think it affects women and children more than it affects men, is women stick by their children. women stick to what they have brought into this world. when they are alone, if they do not care. they will rise to take care of their children. but it is not until a woman is about 50, 55 or 60 and she is all by herself, her spouse has left her, her children now are grown and still living in her house -- it's true -- that she finally starts to say, "what about me?" [applause] we can sit here all we want. we can quote stats and blame this. i am here to tell you that every single one if you in this room that are watching this, you are not the victim to your circumstances unless you want to be. you can pick yourself up. you can be more and you can have more. but you have got to do it for yourself. now when women come together, rather than working against one another, which girlfriend, they do. i cannot even begin to believe how much women love when i fail, as if when i fail at something it's going to make them a bigger success. their ratings will be better on their tv shows, people will buy more of their books. women, we have got to stand by one another. we have got to -- we have got to help one another. [applause] today i am sitting here. i am lucky enough to meet cici and she's telling me what is going on in south dakota and out of these women and kids do not get to eat because they're trying to cut expenses from feeding their children. tell everybody the stats when someone does not eat, what happens to them ta? >> it can affect the brain's of children. it can affect their bone development. it can hinder their growth. >> what do i do? i am going to reservation. i am going to speak. she is going to bring them all together. i'm going to do it i might die to see what we can do to teach them -- on my dime to see what we can do to teach them about money so they can stay away from the payday loans that people takingebut then to keep out. -- want them to keep taking out. the solution, tavis, in a very strange way, is everything everybody's doing right here on stage, but it's what you're going to do for yourselves as well when you go home. are you going to stop giving the store away to family members who could be working but they're not working, so you're supporting them? are you going to stop doing things that squander all of this money that you are making? ladies, the day that you mattewh the money? ladies, the day the matter to who you are, to yourselves, and you're willing to not come off of that point that you matter, is the day that true change in the united states of america begins. [applause] >> i love having these conversations. this is the nectar and get 30 minutes to delve into these topics. -- this is the night when i get 30 minutes to delve into these topics. there's so much stuff to follow. there's one other person who has not spoken. >> i want to hear from sheryl. sheryl has done expert work on global poverty, and so this is not just a domestic thing. i want women to know that they're connected to women around the globe. the gap in poverty between men and women is wider in this country than anywhere else in the western world. that tripped me up. someplace else, maybe. but not the western world. the gap in poverty rates between men and women is wider in this country than anywhere else in the western world. of the 1.3 billion people living in poverty around the world, 70% are women. 1.3 billion people living in poverty of around the world, 70% are women. please welcomethe co-author of "half the sky," she's pulitzer prize winner, sheryl wudunn. the book is called "half the sky" because women hold up y."lf the sk one of the things that we know works in terms of solutions is biker financing. we see women all of the world in various countries who are starting their own businesses courtesy of a micro financing loans. >> i am honored to be on a panel with all these women. there are many things here that echo what i have seen in global poverty. i am not in the field helping people. i am the messenger. it is a very broad view. in the first case, i think overall in this country we tend to look at poverty as a drag on the economy. julie and explain some of these statistics. why do we have to pour more of our budget into this effort? what we have to do is move from the discussion of the problem. if we're trying to grow the economy, wherewhere are we going to get people to do this? you need education. i have seen solutions are around the world. they could really work well here. some places in kenya and cambodia have done a better job with education than they have here in the west. that is kind of embarrassing considering we have such experts here. [applause] i would like to draw on the experience of china. and as a lot of people think china is run by dictators. they have a purity of also done something remarkable. 20 year-- and they have also doe some been remarkable. 20 years ago, most of the were in poverty. they were under a communist society. not only did they have to come back to an economic challenge, but the king back to a political and social challenge. -- but they had to cut back to a political and social challenge. there's a lot of bureaucracy in the world. the u.s. is still full of bureaucracy. there is so much bureaucracy. 20 years ago, and they said education was critical. if we can educate our girls, even if they can just get to the middle school level they can work in factories. there were the best alternatives that a lot of graduate had. they worked their butts off. the factories were located near the community. he could take something that gives a goal for the people in the impoverished community to look for. if they know that they can just graduate from middle school they can, even if it's a vocational school, they can just get that job at that local shop or that local factory. that's what happened. so girls were educated, they actually were able to, as they became women, they were able to work in the factories. they started bringing home a paycheck, and that elevated their status in their household and in their local village and in their local region. that's what's so critical, is giving people a way out of poverty, and there are ways out. so i know, suze, you were saying the highway into poverty, you go on the highway, but there's no side streets out. there are side streets out, and i think that we need to make sure that the conversation focuses on solutions, not the drag that poverty presents. >> now, i want to -- thanks for being so patient. we're going to shorten these answers. i thank you for your understanding. madame secretary, sheryl said something now that i want to come back to you on first. for those who are watching this program right now who will invariably say that this is the absolute wrong approach, for government to be making poverty a priority, that we have already spent more money than we should have spent trying to life women and children out of poverty, to them you say what? >> i say they're absolutely wrong. that we need to continue that safety net. you can't make choices about cutting back during a time when we are not fully in recovery mode. we still have very high rates of unemployment. you heard it here -- 8. 3 whatever percent. we know it's even higher in some communities. women have suffered the most. while we're represented in the workforce, we're not making the same wages comparable to where we should be and with men. i keep saying that. so the real answer here is about more investments and training and certification. that's why the president is putting a proposal forward to put in $8 billion to put into k-12 and also community colleges. we want two million people to come out of community colleges after a year with certifications and licensing. employers keep telling me, and when i travel around the country, "i want better-trained people, i want them to be flexible, adaptable. i don't want the ph. d. i want the person in the middle, the technician." there's a lot of folk out there that can be trained for these kinds of jobs. so i'm saying let's make it happen. but something that was said earlier about empowering women to run for office, emily's list is a good example of starting to help to give funding to support women. i was someone who ran for office and got early support, early money, from women, always women, but also learning that you have to build coalitions with other people. women look at issues and problems very differently from males. we look at not so much to get credit for the solution but how we work together to get that solution done well. that is what i say continually with many of the woman i serve with in congress. we lost more women in congress because we had a bad recession. more people had to work. it is still not easy for an elected individual or women to be able to balance everything. so let's have fairness in the workplace. let's treat women easier and better if they decide to go into professional careers as an elected official. i don't want to say politician, i want to say elected official, because i take that very personal. there are a lot of women who ran for office that are not rich, and i know many of them. they gave up a lot of lucrative things, even the security of their families, to serve the public. we consider ourselves in many ways public servants. so i want people to remember that, that it isn't a bad thing to do, and there are a lot of good women that i know that serve in congress that care about domestic violence, that care about women getting an upper hand, getting a good job, making sure that they have retirement security and that everyone has a fair shot at education. >> randi, i'm coming in one second, i promise. dr. malveaux, since madame secretary raised this issue again, the numbers are clear. black and latina women are twice as likely to be in poverty in this country as white women. dr. julianne >> mm-hmm. >> the numbers are clear about that. black women, the numbers right now are so abysmal for black women in particular - >> yes. >> -- for black people more broadly, the numbers are worse for us, but black women in particular. there's a deafening silence in black america with regard to the obama white house and this administration and what they ought to be doing about poverty across the board. to my mind, the president, respectfully, hasn't use the word poverty enough, hasn't talked about the poor enough. that's my own assessment and we can debate that another time. but what we cannot debate is that there has been a deferential silence on the part of black people more broadly, and black women specifically. i love barack obama, i love michelle obama, i love the two kids, i love the image, i love all of that, but there's been a deafening silence in our community about poverty. why, how, can black women be so silent about their own poverty right now in this area? >> that's a great question, tavis, because when you look at melanie campbell and some people had a thing friday, and she talked about the voting patterns of african american women. we are the most loyal democrats that there are. we voted overwhelmingly, 97 percent, someone said, for president obama. now, having done that, what have you done for me lately? that's really a question that we have to ask. but i think there's a schizophrenia in the african american community about president obama. everybody loves him. i love to love him. the brother's fine, he's smart, he's got it going on. >> he seems a little bit. >> the singing does not impress me. i refused stereotypes of all black people have to sing and dance. the schizophrenia, we bought them on one hand. the law and is a lot of people silent. this president has had enough challenges. people think he has so many challenges, why pyle its contacts you're not piling it on. your talk about what really needs to happen. -- you are talking about what really needs to happen. tactically, given the recession, i think that the president should have done jobs first and then healthcare. by doing healthcare first, he used up a lot of political capital, took a long time. then he gets these republicans and tea party people who do not understand that they get social services. >> yeah. >> yeah, tea party's people's mamas get social security, because [unintelligible] not supporting him. their kids go to publically supported schools, but they're sitting here saying, "cut, cut, cut, cut." as faye said, they diverted the conversation by talking about reproductive rights as opposed to economic rights. if you don't like abortion, don't have one. that's all. it's real simple. african americans, i think, are extremely understanding of president obama, but that >> the end of 2011 had district of high employment. they oppose the jobs bill. it is disgraceful. you saw mr. john boehner with his posse behind him. we're not going to pass the jobs bill. four days later, you saw him standing there pitiful by himself sagging "we will do it for two months." african-americans are extremely understanding of president obama but that should not prevent us from speaking in our own self-interests, and it should not prevent african american women from talking about this poverty, our children. president obama has done some wonderful things. he did the lead better act in his first week in office. it talks about equal pay. the fact that you can see appeared she cannot sue because she did not know she is getting an equal pay until years later. she said the statute of limitations had expired. there was a pay equity act that was passed. that pay equity act has never been in force. under president carter, there were attempts to expand child care. everyone has talked about what happens with women. 3% of the fortune 500 companies offer chop here on site. some say -- child care on site. some say they say that but it is a hot line. there are things that women can say. everyone has talked about the way women have been working against each other. we do not have the coalitions among the as we need to have. -- among us that we need to have. y's list did not s upport her. we do have to be louder. here's the other piece. okay, can you imagine a president gingrich or a president romney or a president santorum? we might as well just check our wombs at the store if president santorum would be president. so for any flaws we see in president obama, i think in this season he is better than any alternative that we can look at. he needs to be turned up. we need to speak up. i am so glad that we have a latina on the supreme court. i'm so mad we do not have an african american women. if you vote for someone, give me seven. >> this whole -- what is interesting, and their three things i want to say. this notion about individual responsibility and collective responsibility. they both have to happen. beterms of elections, let's a little bit real about citizens united and how much money it costs to run. that is also a self-fulfilling prophecy we need to deal with. think about this do conference. it is not the people's house anymore. the one thing i would broaden is that -- look. i am part of the labor movement. i'm giving you one statistic that is sobering. between 1973 and 2000, the number of people who were in unions went from about 34% to 8%. in the same time, income and inequality rose 40%. that was a way of creating a collective work, creating a community and labor together, having the coalitions. but the little real. -- let's be real. it is not a war on women. it is a war on voting. i looked at what was going on in terms of alabama. worse than the war on the voter i.d. laws is the fact that in alabama we have the most vital anti-immigration law. if anyone that is perceived to be anundocumented can no longer reach their house for fear of being arrested. what we have right now, and this is part of how we need to fight this, is you have teed of the zero very different philosophies. -- you have two very different decilphilosophies. there is a philosophy that basically says we're going to take away rights from people. that is what we have to fight about right now in the next few months. >> i just went right to them. >> i want to get back to the question posed to julianne. whether they are the markers of health-care whether there are studies that have demonstrated that we get the least desirable care, whether they are economic statistics, whether they are educational system six. what we have not discussed seems to be the political forum is the enormity of the power of popular culture and the media to define black women in terms of non- dignified, and non-working. that we're not worthy of being perceived as being equal. the characterization's and the stereotypes that are reinforced about black women in our society really deserve an uprising among black women at this point. the lack of are prevalent in closer and advertising and imagery that sends a very strong visual messages that say this is equal and the individual deserves the same respect and treatment are fading in a way for those that came about in the '60s and '70s is shocking. the larger society values system is really something that we need to challenge. popular culture in the media and public conversation really all need to be challenged. >> give me one second. i am glad you said that. you are the honorary black women. >> i am a black woman trapped in a white woman's body. to face one about media, that poverty is just a question, an issue, particularly women and children in poverty, that we just don't find sexy enough t this is the most difficult symposium my people have ever produced. that is why i am thankful for the radio right now. if you are watching on c-span, i think c-span. if you're watching on pbs, i think pbs. because i've done so much of this, you put together a panel of experts. i got a few friends on the industry. it is not difficult to get the platform. this has been like pulling teeth, to get the focus and attention on this issue. what say you about this? poverty is just a question, part of the early women and children that we do not find sexy enough to talk about. >> what is interesting about me talking about money every week is that for 11 years now i've had a show. for the past for five years it has been the number one rated show on cnbc. you would not know that. even i hear anything about it. you will not seek the support that somebody truthfully of my stature should have. i am telling you i do not have it. i have to fight and crawl and begged and scratch for every single thing that i still to this day create. women do not have a basface in media. they do not have it the way that they should. women hold up half the sky. >> i take care plan. >> i wanted answer your question. it is very difficult to talk about poverty. in a country whose [applause] that's true. when you classify yourself as poor, you might as well be a leper. nobody wants to call themselves poor and, even when you read it, it's uncomfortable. >> but half of us are, nely. >> we are, but i'm telling you why it's painful to talk about it. i'm answering your question. it's part of our collective, but it's a part of a collective that we deny. what we haven't said is that what's going on in the collective in our country is that the values in this country have gone to hell. they've gone to hell. [applause] what we see in the media with what's going on with the republican debates is embarrassing. and what we see in the media and what we've seen over the last few years in the media, what we put out in the world is that money is god and, if you don't have it and by any means necessary to get it, you're nothing. i think the important thing is that what we know is that women are the holders of the values in our families and we have to go back to upholding what is really good. when we say that immigrant children should not have education, what happened to a country that, from the time it was founded, we wanted all children to have education? what happened to those values? i think that's why you're right. it's painful to discuss. it's very shameful. it's shameful in this country. it's not shameful to be poor in other countries. people don't ask you right away, "what do you do and how much money do you make?" they ask you, "who are you? who are you? who are you in our community?" [applause] >> sheryl wudunn, you respond any way you want to respond. i take nely's point and i agree with it. >> i just want to give the point of view from the media because i do think that's why, in "half the sky," we say that the moral challenge of our time is gender inequity. >> exactly. >> poor women, poor girls, lead to gender inequity even in the u.s. as well, so it applies in the u.s. as well. but i think that one of the major problems why it doesn't get so much coverage, why people aren't so interested partly is, you know, the way we tell it. you know, so much of what is covered in the news media, in the television, is how you tell stories. i think much more investment and thought needs to go into how we tell stories. so in "half the sky," what we do is we actually tell individual stories of women who have faced challenge, but also who have actually come out of those challenges. i think that's really important even when we talk about how to engage elected officials. you need to not only tell the story of the challenge, but also the way out. there are many, many ways of helping. we need to focus on that. >> dr. malveaux, if i say to you that, to my mind, there is a bipartisan consensus in washington -- and you know how difficult that is to get. if i said to you there's a bipartisan consensus in washington, that poverty doesn't matter, that the poor don't matter, political or moral, there's a consensus in that town that the poor don't matter, it's just not a problem in this country, you say what? >> i say absolutely, tavis. i mean, one of the words, you've talked about the [inaudible] of discussion about poverty, but there's another word we don't talk about very much. that's capitalism. we don't talk about what the flaws of capitalism are. i know suze orman's going to come get me, but let's just be clear that what capitalism does is it creates poverty. i mean, the people who have the payday loans, they're making fun off poor people. -- making money off of poor people. the people who are using these credit cards -- you've got a great credit card product that i hope you'll talk about -- but the people who have these prepaid credit cards, they're making money off people. back in 1963 or 1964, a man named david caplovitz wrote a book called "the poor pay more"" it talked about the many, many ways that poor people are extorted. so dr. martin luther king in 1968 in "where do we go from here," he talked about economic structure. he said there are 40 million poor people in america and you have to ask what kind of country creates 40 million poor people? when you ask that question, you have to ask about the very structure of our economy. the income distribution becomes unequal. he went on to say, who owns the oil? who owns the iron ore? if the world is two-thirds water, why do we pay water bills that do not try that with the water company. it will not work. [laughter] we are only second to sweden in the inequality of our income distribution and nobody wants to talk about -- if you talk to the other people, they will say, oh, this is class warfare when you begin to talk about the differences of who earns what, or they need to work hard. i'm going to tell you, there's nobody harder working than an undocumented person who is cleaning up somebody's house and getting paid under the table. >> i want to go to secretary solis and to cecilia in just a second. but since dr. malveaux raised these prepaid cards, you have a card that is called the approved card that's different than anything else out there. julianne -- offered an opportunity for you to respond to that, i want you to respond and tell us about what makes this approved card different. >> let me first say there is big business in people being poor. the more poorer you are, the more you pay for insurance, the more you pay for everything, the more money they make off of you. so i would not disagree with you at all about capitalism. there's a good side to it and there is a horrific side to it. that's true. when you are poor, you have bounced checks. in order to transact business, you need plastic. you cannot have loads of cash. although, tell that to the latino community. they will not walk into a bank. when you have bounced checks, you cannot get a checking account or a credit union account. if you can't get a checking account or an account at a credit union, how do you get a card to transact business? you need a piece of plastic to order something over the internet, to go into the grocery, so you're not robbed. fine. came the big business where many people brought out what was known as prepaid cards, cards that you didn't have to qualify for, but they were issued and you deposited money on them and you used them. many of them are highway robbery. they charge you $35 to $50 a month to use them. how many of you out there have one of those? uh-huh, quite a few of you. so i decided i was going to do something about it and i created it, funded it myself, something called the approved card. the approved card, if you use it the way that i ask you to use it, will not cost you more than $3 per month and that $3 per month is for four cards. the $. 75 a month, you can pay your bills online for free, blah, blah, blah. you can read about it at theapprovedcard. com. fine, do that. but here's the point. when i brought out this card, i have never in the 30 years that i've doing this seen such opposition of outright lies from the television community, from the newspaper reporters, from everybody because, if i succeed in this card, the banks fail. if i succeed in this card, the other people who have these prepaid cards that are making a fortune off of you fail. you cannot get out of poverty if you do not have a good credit score. do you understand that? you cannot get a credit score if you use cash or a debit card. if this experiment works, 24 months from now when you use a debit card, it will go onto your credit report and you will get a credit score, that you can be a viable human being. but you got to work with me here, people, because everybody else wants this project to fail. it's called theapprovedcard. com and, if it starts to succeed, the $3 a month that you're to pay, i vow to you, will go away 'cause i want a card that's better than cash. >> randi? >> i wouldn't be accused here of class warfare, but i was just in china, singapore and japan. what is remarkable and, you know, we talked about the [inaudible] factories. i want to be clear when this administration took office, we lost about -- but say, the first month of the inauguration, 8 million jobs lost. as soon as we got the recovery act in and we were able to put more funding in as a safety net, 50 million americans benefited from that 12 million children. now we come back to another debate that we had almost a year ago because we had a struggle with this new congress that did not want to extend payroll tax credits, poor people, and working-class people. every time $1 of that benefit is used, it is bent back to the community and generates two more dollars. it keeps mom and pop stores open and gasoline tanks filled. it is a stimulus, if you will. but there are still a lot of people in washington and other places that believe the program itself is something that keeps people at home, that folks are not looking for work, and they are just using that as an excuse. i tend to say that is not true. we need to make our programs work better and not give erroneous arguments to the opposition that say these people are slackers. i know there -- they are not. they're looking for jobs. but when you still have for people looking for one job, we are not creating enough jobs. we have to try to stimulate, but we have to have the partnership with businesses and corporations. a lot of them are sitting on a lot of money right now. they have made a lot of profit and we need to incentivize and have the public collectively tell the new members of the house and otherwise to get on the ball and make sure that we are passing laws that are fair. all we're looking for in this administration is a fair balance. >> let me push back on this notion of incentivizing them. i appreciate this. that word trip to be up for a second. the word you want now, incentivize, the banks sitting on a trillion dollars, these are the same banks we gave them a trillion dollars to bail them out in the first place. and we did not have strings attached to the money that we gave them. now it is up to us to come up with another government plan or some other process to incentivize them to put money back into the economy? >> is not just the banks, though. we also lost over the course of three decades of lot of jobs that were out the door. when this president is talking about in sourcing jobs, getting jobs to come back home. we should do that right away. i think this is something that the public agrees with. there are chemical oil companies, other big corporations. we want to bring that back and tax people appropriately. and if you are -- and give you a break if you are creating jobs here in america. i remember a conversation that president obama had when he met steve jobs. it caught covered everywhere. -- it got covered everywhere. and steve jobs said, mr. president, these jobs are never coming back. where are they going? and number two, where is the incentive for any american corp. right now to hire anybody if they can do more with less? the thing is to squeeze as much proper -- as much as you can for your shareholders. where is the incentive to hire americans? >> let's look at the automobile industry. who said they wanted to make a difference and who said they did not? 100,000 jobs in two years, good paying jobs that put people back in the middle class. i'm talking about men and women, people and -- people of color, a large proportion. now they have profit sharing. you see assembly lines coming up. i'm not saying all of it is coming back right away, but because of the policies put in place to create an incentivize -- create new vehicles that will be competitive against korea and japan. now you have vehicles and batteries being created here, not abroad. that is what the president is talking about. and we need to do more. whether it is manufacturing overall, let's keep our raw materials here. >> incentivize is a back in strategy. -- back and strategy. they should be made to do it. >> i would not be accused year of klas where it -- class warfare, but i was just in china, singapore, and japan. what is remarkable and we talk about the fox crowne -- foxconn factories. in our terms, they're sweatshops, in their terms, it's upward mobility. but they have in china an industrial policy. this lady over here, and the president -- and i have issues. i think it was put the right way in terms of what the stakes are in terms of the president and others. we don't have an industrial policy in the united states of america. there are a lot of people in labour who lost a lot of money because of the dual pay scale now and things like that. the auto companies could not access capital anywhere. the government was the capital of last resort. if we lost the auto industry, detroit would be dead. what happened was, they took a risk. the secretary took risks, the auto companies took a risk, the unions took a risk, and right now you see this remarkable change. that was the closest we ever had to an industrial policy. i think we need more of that kind of industrial policy here. i think what we're saying on this panel is it's important to shine the light so people don't feel shamed, but then it is equally important to have a set of strategies that we go forward with, both capital strategies, industrial strategies, educational strategies, all underlined by values because it is our value in the united states of america. look, we're right by lady liberty, which is "give us your tired and your poor." it is we are a country that will bring ourselves up, have the american dream, but we need those strategies. i think what comes out of this, as i'm listening to the amazing ladies on this panel, is that if we could actually collectively, strange bedfellows as we might be, end up having a set of strategies that we all pursue, that would be a change. teachers every single day see poverty firsthand. >> what do you say to those women and children watching and listening right now who have nothing against industry, but are waiting on some individual? americans want some fundamental fairness, and they see all this help for wall street and the auto industry. and i'm not saying that was necessarily a bad idea. i say that on main street and on the side street, there ain't no help coming in for women and children. that does not seem fair. >> it is not fair. and part of white we said earlier to austerity, cart -- part of coming out of the deepest recession since the great depression, the worst thing you can do is austerity. we have to stimulate the economy. the fact that we lost the jobs act. there are thousands of schools that need to be repaired. teachers every day see poverty firsthand. they are on the front line of seeing it every day and we fight like hell -- sorry -- to try to keep schools open, to not destabilize neighborhoods. my members take money out of their pockets every single day to buy supplies, to buy food, to do all of this stuff. you're totally right. we see it firsthand, but we have to have long-term as well as short-term strategies. we have to have a job strategy, but we also have to have a lifeline strategy. >> cecilia? >> that brings me back to this discussion of my reservation, which is 100 miles by 50 miles, 40,000. we have tribal schools, colleges. one of the things that we are doing in our community is taking a hard look at the existing way of educating our people. unfortunately, the western model created by somebody in washington, d.c. trickled down to our community. education, when it began in my community, was only to do two things, civilize us, speak english and be christians. so when the united states government first invested in education, it was not to teach us how to read and write. it was to say, "our father" and speak english. today we are taking a hard look. we have a captured audience and this is what i like to say. the boundaries of my reservation and everything that goes on inside of there is our responsibility and it's up to us as tribal citizens of that community to look at where we've been, where we are and where do we need to go. one of the areas we're looking very hard at is the educational system. we say education is the key to get out of poverty. however, not everybody can go to college. not everybody's going to be a dentist or a doctor. when you take a look at our community, what kind of jobs do we need to train our people for? our community and our land, we grow hay, wheat, sorghum. we grow rib eye, we have a lot of cows. in our community we have to take a look at what it is we want our children to know how to do so they can also make a living and live off the land and provide for themselves and the community. so part of the challenge is to take a look at what we can do to change how we do business in our community and that goes back to changing the educational philosophy of this country so that it fits the needs of everyone community in america. [applause] >> i've got less than 10 minutes less -- left of this very rich conversation. two things i have not gotten to in no particular order. i will come to you first. >> just like there's a link between, randi, inadequate education and poverty, there's also a link clearly, faye, between poor health and poverty. talk to me about that link. >> well, there is an enormously strong link between poor health and poverty particularly among women, especially among women, and it's especially tragic because not only do we fare less well in the healthcare system in our own experiences, but we are also mothers of children and, when we are not healthy, our children can't possibly be healthy. yet most healthcare policy programs are aimed at children as a way of legitimizing somehow taking care of women. speaking of policy adjustments, we need to change that. we are also the caregivers of our parents and other disabled. the affordable healthcare act, however, for the first time will provide preventive services without a cost-sharing, meaning that the individual or consumer doesn't have to put up a certain amount of money in order to get the care. who would have ever imagined that we would engage in a major national debate over whether contraceptive care would be included as a fundamental requirement under preventive healthcare? when i speak about healthcare, i think we have to also put into that category a freedom from violence against women in our society. in 2010, 20% of women did not have coverage for their health care. what did that result in? that resulted in prescriptions not being filled. that resulted in postponing recommended treatments. it resulted in not going to specialists when we needed to go to specialists. it resulted in a general state of a lack of optimal health care. and when i speak about health care, we also have to put into that category, freedom from violence against women in our society. [applause] the organization that i co- founded a few years ago published a survey among 3,300 women in which we thought that we were going to find the usual conversation that we've had here today for over two hours, economics, economics, economics. what came back when we asked what do you believe ought to be the number one issue addressed in this country, it was to stop violence against women. [applause] you know, it is a marker of how we value women in this country and our health -- i am speaking to the healthcare question -- when the only time that we're concerned about a woman's safety is when she has been physically injured or has been killed and that we really don't much care about the circumstances of her well-being with respect to her safety and security, her health security, unless there are just enormous threats to her well-being. >> but there's also data, as you know, that links that cycle of violence to poverty. >> to poverty, precisely, and that links that cycle of violence to the state of motherhood, that a homicide against women is among the highest, among pregnant women. it is important to link the status of health care in this country for those uninsured. they are young women who do not have high school educations. they are women in the hispanic community much more likely than the african-american community. the subcategories of womanhood are still those we must address. i must say over and over again. these are not acts of god. these are acts of complacency. women -- women are not victims. we have the power to change the circumstances and help ought to -- health ought to beat the no. 1 agenda. >> thank you very much. i appreciate it. one of the other issues i wanted to get to today that we did not get to at all in this conversation, dr. malveaux. you referenced dr. king earlier and quote him a couple of times. king once famously said, as you well know, that war is the enemy of the poor, that war is the enemy of the poor. that's true for all poor people, but is especially and particularly true for women and children because those resources that are being squandered abroad and not being available here at home for women and children's services, tell me more. i feel you agree with it. >> oh, absolutely. dr. king really looked at war, you know, as an act of violence. the combination between war, capitalism, because who makes money from war? what we notice is that, among women who are enlisted in the army, 40 percent of them are african american women. we're 13 percent of the population. there's an economic draft. we don't really have a draft, but there's an economic draft. people go to war because they don't have a job. we have women, tavis, who have left their children with their momma so they can go to war. you have people who have enrolled in the army reserves or somebody's reserves because they could get an extra $250 a month and, the next thing you know, they're over there in afghanistan somewhere. i wanted to say to faye that, you know, we talk about violence against women. battlegrounds are breeding grounds for violence against women. the number of women that are great. -- raped. another thing we have not talked about is -- it's economic violence, patriarchy, another word we have not used, the power of men. patriarchy allows an economic violence against women with the situations that we're put in, the sexual harassment that so many women experience, and people say, well, just go away, quit. some people can't afford to quit. so we women have to be more united. we've accepted a structure that discriminates against us systematically. it starts with the culture, as you said, with the music videos? that's to say, tavis, what you end up with. as a president of a college, i had to tell some students one day that it is not against the law for you to cover your body [laughter]. nothing bad will happen to you if you don't show your body parts. the war piece is a huge piece that's sucked resources out of our economy and women and children have paid for it. >> gandhi once said -- i love the gandhi quote that "poverty is the worst form of violence." poverty is the worst form. i got a minute and a half to go. i want to close where i began with our secretary here, our labor secretary. in a minute and a half, tell me, if you can, why in this particular moment with all the numbers not giving us reason to be optimistic whether or not you are hopeful and that women and children in america should be hopeful. >> i am hopeful. even starting tomorrow, we're going to be celebrating the passage of the affordable care act where more uninsured children, latino, african american poor children, are being covered in phenomenal numbers. this is a 70-year span of time where finally this president got something done and no one thought that this was going to be that hard. it was hard, but more people are reaping the benefits. i have hope because, when i look back at the past, 3. 9 million private sector jobs created in a span of, what, three year, two years, two and a half years? part of it is because people have confidence, optimism and hope. 11,000 jobs created per month. we have been able to kick out the numbers. yes, i do believe the numbers can improve if people believe that we can help work with each other, build coalitions, empower each other, and make sure that we're sharing and we're coalescing and that we're really standing up and that we hear the voices of the public. the bottom line, folks, is that our destiny is wrapped up together. it's not the white house and washington, d.c. over here. it's all of us working together as a community. >> it's the final night of our conversation. let me ask you to thank nely galant for being here. cecilia thunder. fe walton. .ue's ormon brandywine garden cheryl ohlsson, holding up the whole sky. and dr. julia moul vote. [applause] i could not have been more delighted to be here with this august panel of experts on the issue of women, children and poverty in america. and let me thank c-span. and pbs. and me. [applause] >> for this year's student camp competition, we ask students to submit a video telling them what the less important part of the competition was and why. we spoke with simon, an eighth grader from washington your video was about due process and the digital age. can you explain what the due process is? >> it is the government seeing you fairly and giving you the right in court and legal circumstances. >> what the facts have the digital age had on the process? >> is a huge effect. today, so much technology and we are carrying around cell phones that can give off our location. 25 years ago, that did not exist. we have to figure out today what the government can track, i can know about you three your information and what they cannot. >> can you let us know what that stands for and how it represent technology? >> ccp 8¢ for the electronics act. 25 years ago it was passed when we did not have as much technology as we did today. we could not imagine that they be able to store as much information about us online. now it is a question of what the government should be able to access online. it is a perk where they can find out anything you can leave there? or is it more like your home and they have to come in and search for you? >> how do they help you understand the different sides? rex i do not think any amount of research could have helped us as much as they helped us understand a topic and the different sites. we talked to those who are representing the government side. your location is obvious to anyone you can see you, so we should be able to know about you and everywhere you are online. >> how does your research affect your opinion? >> i did not know before about what the government could know about me on line enter facebook and all of that. after doing this, i have a greater understanding of what they do know. everything opposed is not just for me. it is for the government if they want. -- everything i post is not just for me. it is for the government if they want. >> what did you learn? >> i learned a ton of stuff. i learned all about due process and due process in the digital age. i also learned how to work on a team to make this documentary come to life. >> what you want others to take away after watching your video? >> we use technology all the time, at school, work, at home, and on the go. the information people poste online is not only for them. the government can access it. we need to think about what we put on line and make sure it is secure. >> thank you for joining us and congratulations on your wan. >> thank you. >> here is a poet -- a portion of his video. >> if you go to email, or hot meal, then it's hot meal or google decides to give that information to the police, there is nothing anyone can do about it. now people are saying, so much of my private life is in the hands of google, i should be able to insist that the government get a warrant before it sees it. >> recently, the government argued in court that users give up that information when they voluntarily give that information to their carriers. and just this past april, they also argued in court that they should also have access to some e-mail and other information without a search warrant. in 1986, they would have to deploy it police resources to track someone. but with today's technology, the government can monitor anyone with a gps enabled device or anyone wired to a cell phone network. >> you can watch this video in its entirety, as well as all other winners on our website at student campus.org. >> in a few moments, and aspen institute forum on race relations in america, looking at recent -- race in america and what it means to be an american. after that, we will be air the tapas mighty forum on poverty in america. several political events to tell you about this week. on wednesday, we will cover the gop primary debate between richard lugar and richard murdock. that is live at 7:00 p.m. wednesday at c-span. our road to election coverage continues friday with mid centaurus -- mitt romney and rick santorum and newt gingrich addressed the national rifle association annual meeting. live coverage 2:00 p.m. on friday at c-span and on-line ads c-span.org. now, part of an aspen institute forum on race relations in america. one of the panels from this day long rate -- the day the dow -- this day-long event but that voter issues. this is an hour. [applause] >> good morning. i hope my microphone is working and you can hear me. think you for the kind introduction. i was thinking of those kind thoughts about myself as you were speaking. [laughter] it is a pleasure to be here this morning with all of you. bank you for that introduction to this difficult topic -- thank you for the introduction to this difficult topic because it age and the divide are critical to -- i think age and the generational divide are critical to the discussion of race and the 21st century. as david noted, the context of the discussion this morning is really set by the bruising political race that is about to begin, our race that patients -- features that nation's first african-american president seeking reelection and a race that comes at a time of tremendous shift in terms of attitude and and ideas in our country. to help it go through this scenario, this landscape, we have some expert guidance this morning. let me introduce our panelists. charles blow, editorial columnist for "the new york times. he is also author of the blog "by the numbers." became the papers and design director for news before going on to national geographic magazine. he then returned to "the new york times" do his column. he has appeared on many tv shows. he is a graduate of [inaudible] university. please help me welcome charles blow. [applause] the immediate past president of -- to my immediate left is karen, the immediate past president of the american past justice center. she was also vice chairwoman of the leadership conference on civil rights, the nation's oldest and proudest of rights coalition and chair of the rights working group, a coalition of civil, human come in the emirate -- immigrant rights groups were looking at the erosion of civil liberties. she is served on the board of common cause, independent sector. and she currently serves on the advisory council of wal-mart, nielsen media group and comcast. please help me welcome karen. [applause] to my right, norm ornstein. he is a resident scholar and long-time observer of congress and politics, and i think the best. he writes a weekly column and also serves as an election analyst. the co-director of the brookings election reform project. i think it is pertinent again in a season in which we have so much money in the political system that you should know that he helped to shape the mccain finance law that was recently overturned in the course of the citizens united decision. he is author of several books, including the forthcoming "is even worse than it looks." please tell me welcome norm ornstein. -- help me welcome norm orstein. [applause] let me begin by talking of our race and politics in the american society. i want to throw out two names, mitt romney and sherriff joe arepao. >> if you recall dimly in the past, there was a debate in the primary in which joe arepeo -- he set an audience nodding and smiling as mitt romney said he would take a little bit further.i can punctuate that with a third name, which is russell pierce, author of the bill that was recalled and bounced from office because of his extreme views who said just a few days ago that mitt romney's physician on immigration is the same as his own. now we see him pushing the reset button. he has changed the focus. as we see it surveys that show mitt romney's support among hispanics has been hovering around 14%, about a third of what george of the bush thought, barely more than half, a little bit less than half of what john mccain got. if you look at the presentation that we had on the distribution of votes, this is a huge problem. what it tells us it is you have a set of forces in the country now, which is primary voters and the base of the parties poll of candidates in the direction that is the direction you have to go if you're going to appeal to the center and to a group of voters that are critical. -- it is inimical to the direction you are going to have to go if you are going to appeal to the center and trade group of voters that are critical. it will raise the issue of race with hispanic voters to a different level. i think what everyone feels about the specifics of that immigration law or other immigration bills a message out there, which is we do not want your kind here moves to a different level. it is not clear to me that if you pick a cuban american to put on the ticket that that will necessarily mitigate against the views for the mexican americans or poor regions or others that -- porter ricans or salvadoran americans who will -- will be critical voters. >> you are referring to marco rubio i suspect. >> correct. there is the governor of new mexico, suzanne of martinez. -- suzannah martinez. and brian's hand of all, the governor of nevada. -- brian sandoval, the governor of nevada. >> let me ask you, when you were speaking a moment ago about the potential for the hispanic population to change the racial conversation in this 2012 election, i was struck by the idea that the assumption is the black vote goes totally to president obama. >> i think the black vote will go in the same percentages or numbers it did the last time, which was something like 96-3. the question there is turnout. there has certainly been a lot of talk of what the enthusiasm level is. that is where the name trayvon martin comes up picket -- comes up. the democrats have a disaster on their hands all across the country because the voters who turned out and dramatic numbers drop off. this was in 2010. what happened to those voters? that means young voters, african-american and asians. and hispanics. with the african-american population it was 96-3. it was two to one with the other groups. my guess is that now that we have seen a sharper focus, some of those racial issues. today there was a front-page piece that looked at communities where some of the sharp divisions on racial questions that it will raise their profile here on those issues. they will change the dialogue we have in this campaign. >> i want to ask you a question, karen, to get your position as you look at areas of expertise, and the question is, all of us know the tremendous growth in the latino community, but also in the asian population there has been tremendous growth. the question is, where do you see these populations? what is going on with the asian population? it is kind of obvious that everyone is battling over the hispanic population, but what is going on with the asian population? >> i do think it is the sleeping giant that the latino vote was talked about 20 years ago. the asian boat has not only grown exponentially, it has grown faster than the latino population and is spreading out.we are no longer in the gateways of california and new york, illinois. we are actually one of the fastest-growing populations in nevada, which is a battleground state. we are now 9% of that population. clearly contributed to senator reid's reelection, and he knows that. he knows that and leaned into that vote very heavily. he has been one of the view of the mainstream of elected politicians who is looking at the demographics and understanding in elections this community will matter. there are now half a million asians in virginia. va went for our bomber lost -- went for obama last time, largely because of northern virginia where asians are strong hold together with latinos and african-americans and they can make a big difference. in a lot of places like florida, pennsylvania, ohio, it is no longer smoke and mirrors. we are no longer portending agents can be a difference, they -- that asians can be a difference, they really are a difference. in california not much of made of the fact that in the last election of 27 the elections -- of 2010, when democrat, even though the white vote went republican. it was latinos and african- americans who elected to send the governor in those states. i think the republicans are making a big mistake. the latino and asian communities are groups still very much up for grabs. in the 2010 vote, we saw asians and latinos the other leading democrats. -- leaning towards democrats. they are soft democrats. a lot of the asian vote is still independent. they're being pushed there by many of the forces that norm talked about. the very anti-immigrant vote. it is becoming so harsh that even african americans, who anti-immigrants were hoping they would be able to get them in their column are so struck by how extreme the party has gone in parties -- places like alabama's that they have actually joined forces in forging a new alliance. it will be interesting to see not just for each ethnic groups, but now the coalitions that are being formed in this new election. >> i was listening to you, and i was struck that everyone has focus so heavily on the hispanic vote. you said the smoke and mirrors are gone with respect to the asian community. that is a substantial vote. you mention nevada with a substantial asian population. are there others? >> we're very much looking at virginia, which the democrats are hoping to hold, but it is unclear given how the 2010 election won. -- went. they lost three of the democratic congressional seat. we're looking at florida, pennsylvania, ohio. i think the other thing that is really important is that obama does not come and the democrats do not have a lock on the immigrant vote. they're hoping republicans will continue to be so anti-immigrant that they have no place to go but the democratic party. latinos are not that happy with president obama either. he has reported record numbers of immigrants and has enforced much more effectively banned bush did, all of the immigration laws. and they are upset about the racial profiling happening in these communities. and it is forging new alliances with the african-american communities becauselatinos and asians are beginning to feel the impact of racial profiling as well. the question is, will either party really invest in a real way and getting out the votes. these are voters that vote on the issues. they are not partisan yet. many latinos are looking at the african american community in san we do not want to be taken advantage, maybe we need to send a message. like the democrats have taken advantage of the african- american vote. maybe we need to send a message to the democrats who cannot take us for granted either. >> what you are saying, i thought was, given the climate, there is no question the asian boat is being forced towards vote is leaning, or being forced toward the democratic column. >> what is the turnout going to be? is there going to be the excitement? yes, i think the majority of the asian boat will continue to trend democrat, because that is where republicans are pushing them, but how many will turn out to vote? the challenge has been to get the registration numbers up and get them out the door and boating. -- voting. >> charles, you have been doing groundbreaking recording in terms of the trayvone martin case as a potential trigger in terms of black turnout, that it could excite a critical days for the obama campaign that otherwise might be somewhat nonplussed by his performance in office. >> last time we have record african-american turnout. however, if you look at -- we elect presidents through the electoral college. if you look at the electoral college and look at how the state's editor, if every -- add it up, if every african-american had stayed home in 2008, barack obama would still be president of united states pierre de barack obama -- of the united states. barack obama did not need the record turnout he got. this time he will need those of voters, because his support among the white population has gotten so soft. there is a portion of that group that is so hostile to him that to make the numbers add up, there are a few states where it becomes critical. it is the virginians, the floridas where you only have three percentage boats, and -- 3 percentage points, and you have new voter laws that basically you can shave off 1, 2, 3, 5% of the vote in a state where you are ready had a softening white vote. that means you actually need heavy turnout from the african- american population. that said, i believe you will have a high african-american turn out regardless. the obama machine is enormously efficient and enthusiastic machine. when it kicks into gear and they paint a portrait of a president under siege, you will have the circling of the wagons among african-americans. it is true. people say that is just because he is a black guy. not necessarily. black people always vote democratic. they get republicans. -- hate republicans. even though on virtually every social issue they're pretty much in line with republican views. they're very conservative. because of what they see as a racially-changed kind of campaign push back against them ever since reagan -- reagan was the last person to win eddies set% of the african-american -- to win a distant percentage -- decent percentage of the african-american vote. no one has come close since then. that was the big -- that was the last time i can recall a push to include african-americans and the dialogue included in the republican platform. that has not shown up again that goes to the core of the convention. -- to the floor of the convention. after that what i always see in obama's numbers is that 10 percent about 10 percent among whites. there is the racial element. >> let me boil down two things that i think everyone will be interested in. there was laughter when you said blacks just hate republicans. i can go through this of rights -- blowback to goldwater in 1964, the civil rights act and all of that, but then you come forward in time, and i think george bush did pretty -- george h. w. bush did pretty well with black voters. i think of congolese a rice. -- onnolly's their rights condoleeza rice. and i think of the tremendous attack on george w. bush in terms of the james bird act. and but in the current environment, is it wrong to assume that because the incumbent is a black guy, that black voters would not respond to him? i have heard so much from people who say he has not performed for black voters. do you buy that? >> i do not buy that necessarily. you have a president comes in it -- this is addressed an -- this is not even a partisan issue. this is an extraordinary time in american history where the economy was going off a cliff, and how you pull that back means you have to make choices, and you cannot sue to everyone's priorities. -- you cannot suit everyone's priorities. where there areas where people felt like he could have done better? of course. i am chief among those. are there places where he did make significant -- i think the affordable health care, obama care is significant piece of legislation that helps minorities, and in particular black people. you have to look at each piece of legislation come each victory from the white house and look at how that thing, even though it does have a black face on it or hispanic face on it, how it helps minorities communities. so people then turned to its and say the black unemployment rate is much higher than the one of the unemployment rate. -- the white unemployment rate. there are few times in history -- let me take that back, where the black and a plan rate is -- unemployment rate is always higher than the white unemployment rate. the few times in history when it gets as worse as a possibly gets for whites does across the line of where it is as good as it possibly is for whites. -- for blacks? wendy white is at its highest, it rarely crosses the point when it is at its lowest for black people. we are always in recession. right? this idea that he was supposed to rectify hundreds and hundreds of years of the black recession in america is just ridiculous. what we have to look at is saying when it comes to unemployment, the election will be about the trend line. is the line moving and the right direction? it will not be fixed. >> first, you have to look of voting in support as separate things. he gets 40 something%, but as soon as he takes office, his support among whites is really high. when he is elected, they like the guy. what we see now is they really like the guy. how that translates of the voting booth, i do not know. i think that people will line up and say this is a choice between two people. is it romney the robots or barack obama? i do not know which i am going to go for. however, i do believe this has become, race has become such a partisan issue. if someone said today race has always had an underpinning in the political system. politics and laws were used to enforce people's beliefs about race, but there was a moral component to the racial discussion. the election of barack obama has essentially stripped away the entire moral underpinning of the conversation, so that all you are left with is this hyper partisan discussion of race as an issue. the moment you bring up race in america, you have people fall into partisan positions about who is doing what for whom or to whom for a political perspective and not moral perspective, and i think that is how a lot of people have come to see this president. they do not see him over we -- their objection is not overtly racist. that is a loaded word. i do believe that race snakes its way into their assessment of him in implicit ways, ways about how the country has failed racially, on the racial front altogether, and at the teeth with the topic of race, and he starts to a body that fatigue -- to embody that fatigue. if you are a small government conservative who believes in a strong military, that is just the way you believe, and it has nothing to do with this president. add on to this as i will say, that 10 percent inflated about 10 percent among blacks. that 10% sneaks in, and whether they articulate it or not, that part is real. >> i want you to pick up on that, but the trigger early after you come and pick up on the notion of the softening of the white vote to give us an idea of why it is that white voters look right now to be disenchanted with the incumbent. take a share. -- >> sure. the problem barack obama has had is working-class votes. it is particularly acute in the south. what charles was saying brings back a century-old said it up tensions where you have a populist movements in the south going back to reconstruction in and even a little bit after trying to unite poor people who had a lot in common because they were oppressed by a small group of elite. the race card was played and created divisions that ran through the south, certainly at least until the 1960's and 1970's, and we still have the tensions now. one of the real questions now is whether mitt romney can continue the appeal to working-class whites in the south, given his image in the things the of been saying that make populous celebrate. you can go through the whole litany of the whites having to cadillacs and i do not quite know how much my net worth is within $50 million, but i earn a little bit of money on the side that is $374,000 from speeches. all of that is not designed to appeal to working-class whites. one of the questions is whether race is played more overtly to create more of a wedge. if it does, we will see more of the racial tensions play out. >> try to narrow it. >> if we look beyond trayvone martin, the supreme court that just heard obama care is the sheer going to hear in will probably rule on what remains of affirmative action and higher education. there is a pretty good signal that on a 5-4 vote they are going to throw out a fairly delicate balance that sandra day o'connor built in. there goes affirmative action. the voting section 5, which is very much in the news, both because of the voter laws that charles mentioned, but also redistricting. there is pretty good signals from previous decisions that it is just a matter of time, and this is probably the time when they throw at section 5 of the voting rights act. >> and they have the arizona case. on immigration. >> there is on the case as well. just a point on asian- americans. goodwin wu rejected on a filibuster by republicans. we have the energy secretary, and asian american nobel prize winner that has been a punching bag for republicans because of solyndra and other issues. we may see if those issues become frightened, particularly with chu and a continued effort to focus on the energy department create a different level of consciousness among asian americans drum along partisan lines. >> you already have the hostra ad. >> hostra is running for reelection to senate and it ran an advertisement that has this chinese-looking woman say it very scarily that china is taking over, and think you to the opponent for selling out america to china, and that got splashed all across the asian community. it took great offense of the notion that somehow people will be running against them by using race and that way. and i feel like the republicans have a death wish in a long- term. the bay are ignoring demographics in going after asians and latinos. we have mitt romney going after a latina on the supreme court. -- they are ignoring demographics in going after asians and latinos. what they are born to do is not go after that but, but there will try to keep minorities from voting. the anti-0 loss he was referring to, and it is not just the new identification balls, those are crazy enough, but cutting back on voter registration, not allowing votes on sunday when black congregations turnout the voting. it is difficult to register people in florida to vote legally because your turn and registrations of a certain hour of the day. it is so complicated to understand that even the lake of -- league of women voters say they will not do registration and florida. all of that is very intentional. the group that would be putting money into asian votes has been union, said the attack on them has been very direct. it seems to me the decision has been we do not think we can get these votes, even though i think we're wrong, we will just suppressed their vote as much as possible. about think they're wrong whites. i think they're selling short white voters and ignoring the amount of interracial marriages that are happening. it is not just a growing minority vote, but where is the white boat eventually going to go? when our family is going to become increasingly multi- cultural and look like the rest of america? >> from what i am hearing from the three of you, you see race as absolutely driving much of the politics this campaign season, that there is no getting away from racial discussions, even though we already have a black president. to pick up on something they could set about the paradox that more progress will be made the more we have to go, the more we realize we have to go. race is at the forefront of this. let me shift in say in response to you, caring, but isn't it the case that the front runner, which looks to be the inevitable nominee, is responding to what an overwhelmingly white republican party wants from the canada? they are in fact angry over high levels of immigration. they are in fact concerned about an increase in the size of government and entitlement spending. they are concerned about china owning american debt and playing a larger role in the economy, as well as a military power accounted to america's dominance. so isn't romney responding, the generational divide. older america is largely white. so isn't he responding appropriately to represent what his party's base once? >> i think he is responding to a segment of the republican party. there is the south and everybody else. if you look at intermarriage rates, the south is still the south. to go into marriage rates are highest in the south. -- >> intermarriage rates are highest in the south. >> for blacks. you can see that in the incredibly crazy local immigration laws that got passed. an alabama they were trying to keep kids from going to school. they are trying to keep people from getting utilities. they are supposedly aggravating and a contract to make. really stepping over the line. this out as the south. there are three latino governors. two asian governors. how did that happen? they are being forced in a box. when the dream act was voted on in the house, the only republican to voted with the democrats to pass it in the house, guess what? but asian american, vietnam and -- the american and asian american. the question is, do they want to go back to the big tent party of ronald reagan? if i were them, that is what i would do. they could still get them, or they could play to this increasingly narrow part of their base. >> charles, let me come to you and say that i think there are people who feel under siege by immigrants in this country who think this is not the america big crew of income and they feel like someone needs to be a voice for them, and much of that has come from the tea party. saying this is not racist to say. we have too many immigrants of all kinds come up a specifically undocumented immigrants. why does this invite the racial backlash? take a first of all, it is never want to be the country you grew up in ever again. all you have to do is look at the census bureau report him look at projections come and that is never want to become and that scares people to death. i think what is happening is republicans are banking on us for system politics, which is the only way to preserve your way of life is circle the wagons. that means that it is anti- everything. anti-immigrant, anti-policy. our money, tax money, everything is being taken from us and given to them, and we want to reverse that trend. whether or not that works is the question in the short-term. there is no fighting the map. you cannot look at the numbers and believe that as a long-term strategy, this works. >> you are saying this is a naked racial appeal -- >> no. look at republican primary voters, that is the last amount of white voting in america. >> that is true, but so what? >> let me finish. what they are doing is playing to the worst fears among the population. and i think that part is naked. it is a place of fear, and it is the fear of the bogeyman out there, and the only way you could have what you have when you grow up is for us to keep this country as close to that ideal as possible, which is an impossible thing to do on the map, but you can look it ways to reverse emigration trends or look at ways to try to diminish in panama programs or whatever. if that is the path they want to take, they can take it. what the gamble is, can you grow the resentment that existed among the poorest of the less educated of the white population into the working class, and even higher into the electric? if you look at appellation vote. that is the closest, poorest boat that more closely resembles immigrant population because they are also getting started, therefore poor whites. immigrants to starting. a lot of them are poor. they voted very differently in 2008. 410 at counties in appellation that stretches from alabama to new york, western parts of new york. barack obama 1 like 44 i think of those. -- won like 44 i think of those. fewer than any in democratic history. those people are saying no matter what my situation, i am not in for it. i am not voting for the sky for whatever reason. what they're trying to do is figure out how to we growth that fear and take advantage of it? >> to get back to your question, a few points. we saw a bipartisan bill pass about 20 years ago. the idea was you will have some form of amnesty that people come in illegally before, and then we will make sure to secure our borders, and obviously did not work very well. we have 12 million or so people who are here with their families illegally, most of them have been here for a very long time. they have established lives in pay taxes. in dealing with them is not an easy thing to do. second, many of the fears you mentioned are heightened whenever you have a lousy economic situation and high unemployment, and people suddenly see competition for jobs they did not see before with illegal immigrants. mostly they are wrong. it is jobs that nobody else will take or want. what we are seeing is a crackdown. we are finding gaps. we do not have the migrant workers to come in and do things, backbreaking jobs for very little money that no one else wants to do. i have been waiting for someone to do a movie like "it is a wonderful life" we're it looks at what life would be like with all 12 million left. that is one part of it. a second part of this is to look at how far the republican party has gone. it was john mccain and lindsey gramm who led an effort to find a bipartisan approach that was along the same lines. we will find a way to take those that are here in act in a humane and practical fashion, and we're for to find ways to tighten up on the borders. we're also going to enhance legal immigration, because that has been the basic reason this country is as great as it is today. you look at rick perry, basically thrown at totally on the defensive, because as a practical matter as a governor with a long border of mexico, he tried to come up with some way of making sure you educated illegals that happened to be in texas. that, as much as anything come it drove him down from a strong position in the race. even the attacks that newt gingrich got when he talked about the grandmothers, we can find a way not to give them citizenship but regality. that came under siege. it look at it romney's position talking about self deportation. it tells you what was a bipartisan approach to the issue no longer exists, and there are legitimate concerns. this is the real and important issue. you now have a party that is driven by a narrow portion of the base. this is a short-term concern coming getting through primaries in winning the nomination, how you can then pay it back when you are forced in a position that is so far over, to one that becomes reasonable. prodigious about the election dynamics, we have to solve this problem or at least cope with it as a society. if we get into a situation where you are not even have a breeding on who is deported, where you will start to see cracking down on employers because they have hired illegals and do not have much other option, and we may see restaurants closing or other things happening. it will create an explosive situation. it is another issue where we have moved so far apart that what is required, which is a bipartisan approach, the dream act was thoroughly bipartisan and now it is not. it tells us a lot about the polarization of politics as it plays out with the polarization along racial lines. >> is the polarization among parties. when we were take students on the hill, republicans were sympathetic to the issue, who had been co-sponsors earlier on were basically saying they were afraid to go forward, not because it would hurt them in the general election, but because they were afraid that someone would be run to their right. >> let me stop as here, because we have gone so strong that race will be a defining factor in this campaign. let's bring audience and for questions. if you could be pointed, not a lecture role. a pointed question, we would be delighted to take it and consider it. >> why is it illegitimate for anybody to represent that point of view? >> it is certainly not a legitimate to represent a point of view. one, is it going to be colossally stupid politically to represent that you so strongly that you, both in the short run lose votes, but in the long run, given the demographics, you're going to force yourself into a position of a minority party for a long period of time. >> wait a minute. you and i both know it is about winning now. not down the road. by applying to those anxieties, and i'm trying to help to resolve these issues, mitt romney could become president of united states. >> he could. but what we see right now, among the swing voters, he has appealed so much to that base that any support among swing voters has eroded. a starter with women among the contraception issue. it moves to other swing voters because the rhetoric is starting to make them uneasy. you have to be careful in the short-run. >> you'd have to be careful how you present that. is it us versus them? or are you going to presented as we can find a solution together? that is the challenge. >> the challenge in general is a slippery slope. you start with us versus them on immigration and then you take a hard line. you lead to, we want to cut the things that help to feed poor children who cannot feed themselves. you keep going and that leads to things like women should not be able to access contraception when they want it. it leads us so far in the wrong direction that you start to alienate some pockets of of voters that you only have a few left. that is not a winning strategy. winning a national presidential election is always about winning the metal. you're always went to have your partisans lined up on either side. you have to be able to swing the middle. and if which were doing is setting up a situation where you're almost destined to lose the middle and make everybody forget and say, i never said all that stuff. i said it, but i did not mean it. that is the problem that i think republicans will have. >> she stole my question. one that i can except, the anxiety there has to be expressed. what troubles is the consequence. how do you act on that. if somebody has a legitimate concern about their livelihood being taken away and the solution is to put them in a pickup truck and drive them 3 miles down the road, i'm not sure that as a proper response. my question, is there any way to restore stability to the differences we have? nobody is testifying racism. what has become so distressing is the lack of civility. i watched you in south carolina during that debate when the audience was, you know, let's kill him, let the guy died without medical insurance. that kind of vitriol is so damaging to our country. is there any hope we can have a discussion that does not breed more hate and contempt? [laughter] >> throw that to me. here is the thing. the idea of discussing race requires a preset that we do not necessarily always employ, which is that it takes being able to look at the same set of factors from different points of view. what we choose to do is look at them from our own points of view. if i looked at race only as immigrants coming into my neighborhood, or at least i perceive it that way, taking away jobs we would otherwise have, the other side of that issue is that democrats, most enterprising people in the country, the most likely to start small businesses. these are exactly the kind of people you want in the country. these are people who do work that no one else will do. these are people who generally have more families. these are exactly the kinds of people you should want in the country. being able to look at one set of facts and say, i can understand your side of this issue, will you allow for mine and that both things can exist. then we can start having a conversation about how much do we give or take on this issue. it is a kind of civility that i think has evaporated. now, we cannot even -- everything is entitlements. that kind of slip of the tongue, very poor children. we know you're talking about, do not have a habit of going to work unless it is something criminal and there is nobody in their neighborhoods who work. who says this kind of stuff because there is no way to look at that set of facts and objectively. that is the only reason anybody would let that come out of your mouth. >> it worked. he won south carolina. >> it is the south. >> i look at as one of the changing demographics of the u.s.. there is a real impact. the reality is you cannot even keep agriculture in this country. a response to shutting down immigration was four than to serve buy land in mexico. follow the cheap labor. i would love to see the business leaders stepped up and say the money that goes into the pacts, -- the pacs, say, enough. stepping up and say, this is not good for america. this is not good for our business. we're going to stand up and call for a rational conversation to solve these problems and we're going to hold people accountable. they're not going to get our money if they go down this road. >> i wondered if you had evidence or research on whether particularly asians a vote because of their ethnicity or other economic issues. f. in other words, do we know what triggers the asian vote and then other minority group double boats? >> thank you for the question. there's a little but a study that has been happening. summit from the academics. -- some of it from academics. it shows that the challenge for asians is that we have a lot of immigrants. 60% of our community is foreign born. what we are seeing, though, 30% of the asians of voting are actually voting for the first time and they are newly naturalized citizens. what gets them to vote is the outrage. investment in the average were they hear from leaders. whether it is their church leaders, their temple leaders, whoever. explain to them how the elected officials connects to whether they get a youth center, or senior center, or sufficient funding. that is what gets asian- americans' out to vote. the justice center i just retired from will be out to ask that question to see how asians are looking at this election and what will motivate them. >> we have another question. my name is paul. question about the trends that i hear you talking about and if you look at the makeup of state legislatures, that if you look at the makeup of congress, that there is a different trend that seems to be occurring. that is that republicans are winning all over the place and that the whole question of whether we are going to have a continuation, if the trends you are talking about, in which we have divided government kind of for the foreseeable future, related to the differences, the turnout, intensity, all the things that determine local voting as opposed to the national vote. >> there is a couple of answers to that. republicans are winning ever were, but a large part of that is a sweep in 2010 where they had unprecedented gains at the state legislature level and pick up seats in the house of representatives which was the most in our lifetime at least. whether that continues remains to be seen. what is also clear is we have an almost evenly divided country by and large. democrats have a little bit of an edge that has been given died -- it is not even divided across the country. it is very across states and regions. in many states now we are seeing where republicans have all the reins of power, to tilt the voting population in the direction that will give them a longer-term advantage, despite the fact that they may not otherwise win these elections. part of this that we are unique in this world that we have partisan election officials. no other country does this. everybody else has independent career people who handle these things. that makes a difference. we also see changes in laws designed to suppress some kinds of boats and others. that may provide a level of leverage that provides a difference down the road. i would make one final point that the polarization that we have seen in congress, the kind of tribal politics here, have clearly metastasized across to a very large number of states. you see these divisions in wisconsin, but they play out in my native minnesota. the kind of confrontation that we had over the debt limit here in the 90's. you sit here in state after state after state. we're not going to get out of this for some period of time. amplified by a media that make a lot of money off of dramatic differences and extreme views from talk radio on through cable news and others. fasten your seatbelts. this bumpy ride will continue for some time. >> off but also, national politics for the president, and to some degree, senate elections, are a little bit different from the house elections and from state-wide assembly elections because the way the boundaries have been redrawn with redistricting, it will benefit republicans in the house, not necessarily in the sand at because it is still -- in at the senate because it is still a state-wide election. republicans -- conservatives consistently hold a two-one advantage over liberals when it comes to how people feel. i think that still has to be taken into account. the country is much more conservative, that is social issues. >> it is still vital to the country as a whole, it is just not of vital in our politics. the senate elections, look at what happened to the summer caskey. look at what happened in delaware. look at what might happen to orrin hatch and the senate race in indiana. we are seeing basically an electromagnet force that is pulling our representatives, including senators, further and especially to the right on the republican side, even if the electorate does not feel that way. >> i think that means our time has come to an end. this has really been an eye- opener in terms of the important role that race will play in the 2012 race. thank you you all. thank you very much. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> we as students across the country what part of the constitution was important to them and why. this winners led to the 14th amendment. >> topology has potential to undermine the constitutional protection. -- they have the potential to undermine the constitutional protection if they're not careful. >> i have no idea what that is. >> i do not know. >> me? no. >> what is due process? >> it says that when the government deals with people, they ought to deal with them in the procedurally fair way. >> this is to be a fairly simple thing. this not affect any person without due process of law. how do we establish guidelines of the government to access of information in locations digitally? >> the intellectual property of honors in hollywood have said that someone can commit piracy by stealing or copying a movie or a piece of music. if they do it three times they should be picked up the internet. that seems pretty reasonable. now you can not even earn a living. the kind of process before you kick someone off the internet might become a lot higher. it is such an extreme punishment. >> this is guided by the electronic media act which is passed in 1988. the stock unless the ad stated since. few people had ever heard of the internet. >> tied the 1 per text electronic communications while in transit. it also permits search warrants. title to protect communications held and not turn it storage. protecte twp pro communications held a in servicstorage. >> if you give your e-mail to hotmail, if they choose to give that information to the police, there's nothing you can do about it. >> read correctly, and they argued in court that day had given up the privacy of their location. just this past, they argue that you have to have access without a search warrant. the police used to have to deploy research in order to attract someone. in early november, met the united states heard the case of anton jones. it deciding whether or less a gps tracking vehicles a warranted this. >> you can basically check anyone anywhere they go. can the police or federal agents track them for a month or two and follow everywhere they go? the government's argument is that you have no right to privacy when you are on the street. the fourth amendment protection or right to privacy at home. the notion is that once you get into your car, an officer can follow you. since you have no right to privacy, we can use this to follow you everywhere and track you. >> they need to get a warrant. we are not saying that the police should never be able to put a gps tracking device on a person's car. we are saying they need to get a warrant to do that. they should show that they have because for people engaged in criminal conduct in checking the location will provide evidence of that. the alternative is that there would be able to do this anytime they want without having to able to justify in any way. we think that is dangerous. the danger grows as is applied to more people. >> it is obvious to anybody who is walking by on the street. the idea that you can say you don't know i am here, that does not make any sense. i think people who are creating an issue over location are fighting laws that are settled for a long time. >> congress is being pushed to update the act by major corporations. >> technology is constantly evolving. it is everywhere we book. look. go online to what of the winning videos and continue the conversation about today's documentary. in a few moments come at a discussion of what it means to be an american for a forum on race relations. a form of poverty in america. then you'll be there the discussion on race as a campaign issue. >> martin luther king is a man. of all the people i've spent time with, and he is a man that admire most of all. he is my personal hero. martin luther king put his money where his mouth was. >> his career spans over 60 years. mike wallace died this past year at age 93. watch any of his 50 appearances in the c-span library. thi>> more now from an aspen institute for on race relations in america. what it means to be an american. this is a little more than an hour. >> we started the morning with some specifics and analysis of the democratic trends. with the debt the importance of race in politics. the new look specifically at the latino vote now appeared to be have talked a lot about the minority-majority population, but it is also a multicultural population. you want to move into what the new american identity means, and how might that play out in the coming elections in our society. returning the panel back to one williams. -- juan williams. >> thank you. the me to choose the panel. toure, the author of "who's afraid of post-blackness?" he writes regularly for several publications, including "the new york times," and "ebony" magazine. he also has a collection of short stories called "never drank the kool-aid." [applause] >> we heard a minute ago from carlos, the director of the school of transport studies at arizona state university, a professor and founder of the transport studies school, the first such school in the u.s. he has pioneered new territory in social sciences for his work on the investigation of human rights violations and civil- rights concerns. he is credited with more than 50 scholarly articles, including a book that is widely read called "border vision." please help me in welcoming carlos velez-ibanez. [applause] >> to my right, jose antonio vargas, the founder of define american. he is a pulitzer prize-winning journalist, the founder of define american, a campaign that seeks to elevate the conversation around immigration. he won the pulitzer as part of a team covering the 2007 massacre at virginia tech 4 "the washington post." born in the philippines, he emigrated to the u.s. at age of 12 and recently wrote a piece that appeared in "the new york times" called "my life as an undocumented immigrant" in which she reveals his status and struggles as he works in journalism in the united states. [applause] the first two panels were so strongly political and their contents, and the difference here is this is going to be about the intersection of politics and identity, and how identity is so changing in america as we have an increase in the number of model minorities but immigrants, people travelling in a global, economic, and social structure. and how does that changed identity impact the united states? earlier, in discussing some of the reluctance of older, white americans to embrace the shift in identity, be talked about how the cliche has come into being, this is not the america i grew up in. the question now becomes, how does the new american identity for it? what is that identity? is it inevitably going to create a conflict with old? toure, i wanted to start with you and simply ask, how does racial identity, as it is being redefined, play into politics today? >> there are a lot of answers to that. part of what we see from the historical cycle is, when we have a moment of marching forward in black power and black rights, after that there is a moment of reassertion, realignment. let's put you back. emancipation and engine grow. civil-rights and then the rise of mass incorporation -- incarceration, where we can legally discriminate against millions of people for being ex- convicts, and their brightest -- restoring jim crow. we see this push and pull, and even with a new america, people will say we want to go back to the old america. the rise of obama is going to lead to a realignment, where we see small things, like what happened in tulsa over the weekend where people are angry and black americans. they are going to take it out on them. the rise of voter id laws. it will be interesting to see how this plays out with obama and romney. if you look for me, we are all moving forward as a nation. many americans bought into that. he had hillary and mccain trying to paint him as the other. you are socialist, from the philippines, -- these are subtle ways to say you are not one of us. historically, from nixon through the last bush, successful gop politicians nationally have been able to use race as a subtle way, via the cloak of a crime, to say, vote for me, i will keep the blacks in control. interesting to see if from the can do that, will try to do that. i do not know if it is in his stomach to do that. it will be interesting to see if he is willing to try to attack in the general elections. not sure if it is is sort of thing. >> as i was listening, i wonder if the republican party, in your mind, has become a white party? is that when you are saying? >> i mean, yes, i see quite a bit of that. do we not see that? >> i just want to know what you think. what is the identity? do we want the status quo? for example, when the professor did introduction today, he talked about the older generation that about to protect its interests. you are saying, protect my identity, my reality? >> i am not going to say that the democrats are perfect in all these regards, but they also want to maintain some of the status quo. absolutely. if you like the way things were, you are probably going to be aligned with the gop, don't you think? >> for the sake of argument, you may not like the economic picture. i am sure the republicans and mitt romney, the likely nominee, are going to make the case that that is the issue. your racial identity, your sense of the other, sense of belonging or being alienated, should not obscure the focus on the economy. >> absolutely. it would be interesting to see if we have some sort of way to reach out to poor people. i am not sure if mitt romney could sell that idea. >> carlos, let me ask you about identity. your area of expertise is in the southwestern part of the united states, and i suppose coming into mexico as well. here, we have an area that i think, in some ways, is a preview of what is coming for the rest of america. the whole notion of the border, racial identity, ethnic identity, is greatly confused and mixed. it is hard to put people in one box, which had been the american tradition. it is hard. so, given what you are seeing there, is there one single american identity that you find, and as people come into the american experience, that they adopt? today immediately say, i am going to check either non-white hispanic on that box, or do i check white, or do i check black, indian? what happens? >> it depends whether you are thinking about it internally or whether you are checking a box for the census bureau. even the notion of a hispanic member during the mission administration. it is a category from the outside population. the whole region, nw mexico, southwest united states, has always been a region of multiple identities. people used to cross back and forth since the 19th century. people have to understand, the united states is only 160 years old where i live. that is a different reality, a different region. we have always accepted that dynamic of the border region. for the folks coming in, not only are they easily excepted, but sometimes they become mexicanized. let me give you an anecdote. during the 1950's, a number of irish families moved from boston to tucson. that is where consolidated aircraft plants were situated. the only place that you could rent or buy a house was in mexican neighborhoods. they move into mexican neighborhoods, and they were also catholic, but they did not know what we were. they thought we were italians. so they started calling us derogatory terms calling us -- having to do with the italians. so we started banging each other's heads. these are tough working-class irish kids, we were tough mexican kids. we beat the heck out of each other, until we met each other as brothers and sisters in youth clubs founded by an irish missionary. then we fell in love with each other as brothers andthen we feh other as brothers and sisters and all of that. my sister, in fact, started to date a young man. i fell in love with sheila campbell and gloria martinez at the same time. the point of that, mexican homes have always been welcoming. any non-mexican that marriage into mexican that merck's gets very much sucked in. the notion of multiple layers of identity has been very much a part of our lifestyle and the way that you approach life in general. now, it has been very recent, especially after world war ii, up to this point, where you have very large numbers of residents from minnesota, michigan, and so on, who are not used to the fact that this is another historical reality. and they bring with them also all the fears of not being like these other folks who speak differently, speak another language, or we can switch back to english. these are kind of weird folks. the tea party movement, i can tell you, has been very important, highly politically affective format, because they have created us as the others. we are the others. the fact of the matter is, because they are so historical ignorance, tucson was founded in 1776. by -- does anybody know? o'banyon, an irish-spanish mercenary. that history of multiplicity of cultural aspects of ourselves as an important part of our lives since the founding in tucson in 1776. >> let me interrupt you. i want to move along. part of this notion of multiplicity of identity is in contrast to the american tradition of the great melting pot. everybody comes here in order to become one, e plurbus unim, one out of many. here is a situation where people are coming into the southwest, but they retain their distinct ethnic, and even language and identity and insist on it. you say that they get sucked in a matter where they are coming from. is that in contradiction to the american tradition of everyone coming in and assimilating? >> that is the east coast model. the east coast model is based on the fact that you have the british coming in from the east to west, but you have to remember spanish-american go from the south to the north. you have two histories. you then have a problem of an historicism of not recognizing the west of the mississippi. that is present -- pervasive through the educational system itself and continue to promulgate the notion that we all have to erase. i am a former marine, but i am still a mexican. >> you do not call yourself mexican-american? but you are an american citizen. >> that is right. that is part of the cultural elements that we live. >> how does that impact your politics? >> if you only want to erase me, then i am going to respond in a rather negative way. certainly, we are responding in a relatively negative way, especially to the extreme right wing of the republican party. >> jose, let me turn to you. my first question is, of course, your group has been doing groundbreaking work on the immigration reform issue. i wanted to ask you about the relationship -- just to bring us back to politics as we focus on identity -- the relationship between the immigration act and the 2012 elections. >> first of all, thank you for having me here. i am hoping that ice and immigration are not here. [laughter] i came out -- for the second time, and now i am done with my life. as a journalist, this is what i do. i spent about a year reporting on an issue that i have been so afraid to confront. what has been fascinating for me is how so many of the dots that must be connected are just not being connected. what i mean by that, looking at even the history of immigration in this country -- let me give you an example. i just finished reading toni morrison's "a mercy." it is interesting because it talks about primitive america. when everyone was undocumented. everyone in america was undocumented. everyone here did not have papers. in 1790, the government decided that only white people could could become citizens. and the dread scott decision said -- not until 1924 -- finally, the native americans, the original americans, were finally granted citizenship. any move to the 1965 immigration nationality act which comes right after the civil rights act, which fundamentally changed why america looks the way it does. the quota system was changed. used to be a race-based immigration system. all this sudden, people from asia -- by the way, people forget. when you talk about 12 million and documented in this country, at least 1 million are asian- americans. we never talk about that. we never realize, in some ways, the migration history of this country has a lot to do with economic and foreign policies of this country that it has always had. as i have spent the past year -- i have them maybe 60 events in the past 10 months. i have been to alabama, because i am crazy. the toughest immigration law in the country. back to your original point. people ask me, a white conservative people that i talk to, they asked me, where did my country go? i am standing there -- my name is jose antonio vargas which does not get any more spanish. i look asian, which confuses them. i am gay. in college, i majored in african-american politics. if i marry a jew or american, let's call it a day. [laughter] as far as i'm concerned, this is america. the country is only going to get gayer, blacker, more asian. so what is going to happen when you have policies and political theater and political decisions that attack the very nature of that identity? this is what the republican party is playing with. i cannot vote because i do not have papers, but it is fascinating for me, having covered in the presidential election for "the washington post." when obama got elected, some people said that racism was over. the conversation just started. it just started. for us to not connect the dots and for us to not realize and honor and question our own history is going to lead to our own detriment. i would love it if the republican party -- actually, i have been talking with the partyers. i would love to have an honest conversation about immigration. that is what america is working towards, but we have to come face to face and talk about it. >> the election of obama has thrown the discussion of diversity and race into total conflict in that there are a large group of people that want to say, now we have reached the mountain top. now we can stop talking about these issues because we are in a post-racial, colorblind society. these meaningless terms have arisen where there is nothing there to define what these terms are. as a linguist, they bother me because they do not mean anything. and people use them to meet different things. we do not even have a consensus on what they mean as a nation. but there are people that say we have reached it, so we can stop talking about this stuff. then another group of people say, we have always had superstar, successful blacks. that does not mean that things are happening down here on the ground that have actually changed anything. now we are forced to prove that these things are still going on. i talk about these things in the media and people are like, you are a waste-baitor, you are a pimp. i do not know what that means. [laughter] you are the problem rather than actual perpetuation of racism as the problem. >> certainly, things have changed. no question, we are not at the same point that we were in the 1950's, 1870's -- >> but the election of obama has not changed anything. >> we have never had a black president before. in modern times, only one other than barack obama and carol moseley-braun, ed brooks. i'd say that is the universe of black officials. something has changed. we are not getting away from that. >> it is a spiritual change, but it does not represent an actual, pragmatic change. that changes life for black people in america beyond the spiritual self esteem in diction of, we know we do not have this glass ceiling any more. >> what i wanted to add. i move to this country in 1993. my introduction to american culture was o.j. simpson and his bronco. i remember when the verdict was announced. i am neither white nor black. i look at how the white kids and let kids reacted. what toure is saying, when obama was elected president, every single person in america that has ever felt like the other, -- latinos, blacks, asians, gay people -- we all said, that is the change, how is this going to play out? i am sure crows can talk more about this. the president himself, who is the son of an immigrant, who got to america through a college visa. some people called him an anchor baby. he is a first-generation american. the fact that he has deported more than a million people in three years, more than bush ever did in eight years, i do not know how the president will ever explain that. i do not know how he is going to explain and justify, 20 years from now, how he separated families, people who have been here since they were kids. i do not know how he will justify that. and with us, the non-black, non-white americans, documented and undocumented, how we fit in this conversation, -- i was a political reporter in d.c. i always felt political reporters were always talking amongst themselves. it is a largely white, some blacks, political punditry. it is interesting how race and identity becomes mere props. it seems as if you can cut off all of these things and we are rarely traded as full human beings -- treated as full human beings. that is why i think, in some ways, american identity is at stake in this election. it is bigger than obama or romney. the american identity is at stake. >> what do you mean? >> the fact that i can go to alabama and arizona and you can have voters say, these people are not american, when they were born in this country. alabama, by the way is 7% hispanic. birmingham is 4% hispanic. they are questioning if these people are american citizens when they were born there. >> you mean the law that seeks to say, if you are the child of an illegal immigrant, you should not be given citizenship? >> beyond that. in alabama, when hb 56 was passed, and ask teachers to check the immigration status of students. the monday after it passed, 3000 latino kids did not show up to school. many of them are probably documented, but their parents are not. this is why one of the questioners asked about mixed identity. 6 million homes in america that are mixed. that is the reality of immigration in america. there are voters within these households. when i say that the american identity is at stake, the fact we are even being questioned whether we are americans, to me, that is what i find most damaging, and in some ways, i feel most pessimistic about, having been in a place like alabama. >> it is emotional for you, tremendously. america says it wants to take everybody in, e plurbus unim, but what happens is we have us and others and we have to fight for our rights, rather than the centrality of america being a white experience. >> carlos, you said you define yourself as mexican. here is jose questioning whether i am american, even without the papers. your experience is an american experience. you feel like an american. you are an american boy. but you did not say that, why? >> we have a lot of cultural luxury where we live in the southwest. i do not have to go to sonora to speak spanish. i do not have to go to mexico city to see aspects of ourselves. i can see the adobes that were built in tucson and know that is part of my daughter creek, cultural geography. -- geography, cultural geography. being american is a reason experience. my dad, who went to example -- who went to high school in tucson, did not refer to arizona as arizona. he referred to it as the place where pimas live, the old spanish-mexican term. we became americans recently. we fought in american wars. we want a bunch of medal of honor is. i have uncles and cousins who fought in world war ii, korea, vietnam, the of storm, etc. being an american is not necessarily having to become johnny smith. being an american can be and which one is carlos velez- ibanez, very proud of his father and his father's father, my mother's mother, and everyone else, as mexicans, culturally. at the same time, we can switch to english, as i am doing now come and call into these layers of myself when need be. we have the luxury of being contractually able and having the capacity to shift and change according to your needs of communication, -- not my needs. >> you said you live in the same town of sheriffs are pious. when he sees you, i think he sees a mexican. -- sheriff joe arpaio. at that moment, your try to say, wait a minute, i am an american. >> but i'm also the funding for him when it is to be mexican. there is a difference between the african-american anglo experience, because of slavery. that cut off, from my particular point of view, is the special relationship between anglos and african-americans. slavery for real. slavery that does not end until the day before yesterday in and a logical terms. -- anthropological terms. the white prison that is connected to that slavery still exists. it is a white prison which defines african-americans still from my point of view, and look at jan brewer's finger-pointing at obama at the airport. if that is not the biggest disrespectful kind of relationship of behavior i have seen -- it goes back to the antebellum jump. with mexicans, it is very different. >> he threatened me. [laughter] >> for mexicans, it is very different. this population was taken over at different times, once by war, another by secession. following that, the entire region was integrated economically. both sides of the border. you have anderson and clayton owning most of the agriculture on the south side of the border. colonel green opening up the copper factories in arizona. you have this integrated economy. any time you have an integrated economy, one must have labor. and it is not cheap labor, it is labor. you have forman, technicians, people who knew had to dig out copper. you had a whole experimental dynamic there where people were needed on the new side of the border. so, for us, any time there is an economic downturn, mexicans are booted out, and the identity that is required by the population is one of commodity. so for arpaio and the rest of these folks that see us from this white prism, it is not the same for african-americans. they are looked at through this prism, but as former slaves, and they cannot get past this. with us, they cannot get past our backs, as if the only thing we are good for is to serve as a commodity, at the pleasure of the bosses. >> so you are saying, hispanic or mexican identity in the u.s. is one of labor, cheap labor. >> yes, that is the identity. my relationship to arpaio, i think and for saying i am a mexican. because my view of being mexican is very different than the one he presents. let's say this has to do with self-inscription as well and the way that others try to define you constantly. there is always a conference between the two, especially if it is an east coast prism that does not know anything west of the mississippi. >> toure, then ask you. i know the demographer is no longer use the melting pot, given what we have been discussing. when we talk about is the grand mosaic, where everybody retains distinct identities, but works together in the american experience. so, toure, where are we going in terms of commonality, if we have more elements that are quite distinct in the american salad bowl? do you see us coming together or pulling apart because of identity? >> that is an interesting question. i struggle to see what the full commonalities that we are all experiencing as americans. especially in terms of the assertion of identity, homosexuality, and the rights of latinos and blacks. it is hard to find those commonalities. >> i was thinking you would say, we all watched the same tv, we all watched the same movies -- >> but we do not, especially with music and television. you and i are old enough to know that there was something called mono culture where the music and movies were all sort of similar, everybody was embracing the beatles, motown. we do not have that at all. we do not have much common ground on culture, not only because we have thousands of channels, there is a complete breakdown in music. i never encountered people that are light -- i am listening to x, y, z -- i have never heard of them and i make music journalist. but i am listening to -- i just downloaded his album yesterday. it is the tower of babylon. it is up thousand options and we are not on the connections. >> i still think there is some things such as popular music. >> what is popular now is less popular than it used to be. it is more of a wider tail. there are so many different options. to the time-shifting devices. we have to be home at 8:00 to watch "dallas." now some of these people who are "madmen" fans did not see it the other night and they can watch it any other time they want. in terms of identity, i am going in the opposite direction of the professor in terms of my relationship to america -- carlos. he is reaching for cultural power and call himself an american. part of a talk about in my book is, black americans need to deal with an emotional relationship with america. we see so many people that say, i am a new yorker, new orleans, what have you, but their emotional relationship with america is not great. they do not want to call themselves americans. we have strained protests like, we do not vote because they do not represent me. there are ways that we distance ourselves from america. i feel we need to fully embrace american because otherwise it is a self-fulfilling process -- prophecy. we are rejecting america before the projects us, and then we say, that is proof. but you rejected it first. >> that comes from a perspective of having to reject something. i found out, when i was 16, at the dmv, but i did not have papers. since then, i have wanted to be here. and it is funny, people were asking me, why didn't you just leave? just go home. thankfully, i am a writer. the internet does not require a passport. i can be a writer anywhere. but i am staying here, if i could say this, because this country has always been a flight from the beginning. which is why it is fascinating to me -- i did not know if you have met any of these undocumented students, these dreamers, who are fighting so hard, who want to give back to the system that has provided for them. when i talk to them -- and i am privileged and blessed enough to be in a position like this -- we are fighting for that. and by the way, what the professor said, i happen to the filipino. carlos. i happen to be filipino and also american. those two things can exist. they can all exists. that is what i find interesting, looking at this election, the narrative. politics and everything as americans. you have barack obama and mitt romney. they represent, from and narrative perspective, and even from a physical perspective, which is why it will be an exciting, scary election, because of all the code phrases that will come down about obama having an agenda, for example, or what they will say about mitt romney. >> what does that mean? >> i am looking at this from the outside, when mitt romney says the president obama has a hidden agenda. we are now in a culture of nichees. this is what technology and internet has provided us. i can go to a blog called the angry asian man, the gay man, any other place, and i can see how they fared differently interpreted in what was said. >> and when romney says a hidden agenda, you think it is -- >> the black man is trying to hide something from you. it is funny because it is not just the black bloggers reading that. it is the agents, too. >> the food stamp comment. >> and when you look at the statistics, the majority of people on food stamps is white people. this is why i said in the beginning american identity is at stake. dovetailing into what toure said -- and i'm going to throw in something crazy. in some ways, the soul of the heterosexual white man is at stake. what i do know is, for everybody in this country in which america has always been a fight, they are looking at him, in which everything has always been given, and we are going, ok, do you see yourself? do you fully and comprehensively see yourself in how you fit? which is why politics cannot be divorced from economics. that is a very big thing there -- >> when i look at cuba second bush and mccain, these are real men, right? >> what does that mean? >> you know, there was an alphaness to them, even though he was not in the military, he seemed to be one of them. it seemed like they could not keep out if maybe. if mccain could have, before his back stiffened up. [laughter] romney is none of those things. >> he is like a nice guy. >> but he also seems to me an empty signifier. you could pour anything an empty signifier. you could pour anything into romney. i am not sure he is ready to tell us. >> you just heard what jose said. >> that he is? >> no. this is a battle for the american identity. >> is that because, as a referendum against obama? >> i do not think it is a referendum. you look at the demographics and how the numbers are turning out. how big is his empathy quotient? >> it seems to be zero so far. >> i do not know that. >> we generally want to see in politicians they seem to love people. politicians and we never had political innocents. we grew up in the shadow of watergate. we never believed in it. tell me that you love people. and i find it, sarah palin was excellent and making the people feel she loved them. >> when i say that the soul of the heterosexual white man is at stake. what i mean is this conversation that needs to happen with white americans who are growing up, i am a millennial, i am 31. looking at these undocumented kids, these illegals, these gay people, i went to school for them -- from them. we come from the same community. >> 1981, you are at gen x. >> you think that because romney or white men would see you as the other by york -- that you're not really not american? >> in general. this is the conversation -- this is from my perspective. only white people can talk to white people about white privilege. it is a conversation. they ignore it. >> i am constantly in discussions where they're like, showed to me, prove it to me. oro have no power and privilege to soak clearly it has -- it or they have no power and privilege to see it clearly. >> whether or not you can see this notion of battling against white males playing out in the election, you see that going on? >> in know the adage about all politics are local. if you look at local politics you are seeing something interesting wally cryan my state of arizona which used to be sonora, pimeria alta. that is that russell pearce was booted out of office. he was with an alliance with chicanos and african-americans, there are not many in mesa, arizona. they've booted him out. pearce decides to go to another district and runs for office. the mormon church put up another mormon, conservative but not of the ilk of pearce. at the local level, you see people resisting and reacting in positive ways, organizing together against the intellectual locutions -- lilliputians. identity --t see the >> that is still there. that is the traditional prism. people talk about founding fathers, who are they talking about? they are talking about that prism and all these guys are slavers, all of them. >> let's go to the question. >> i am with the usc attenberg school. i am struck by repeating we have to change the conversation. how do we do that and i would like to throw keywords. there seems to be a divorce between civil rights and national identity and ethnicity. how do we recapture the o safeguard and protect our identity. >> american identity means that you do not insist on civil rights? >> yes. in public conversation we are separating what happens in civil-rights with what happens in cultural space and what happens in cultural -- it is what happened in post-9/11. >> let's stick with one. welcome back to. >> when you say we, are you talking about the media? >> this is my second point. this is my second point. where do you take that conversation and what is the role of the media? i would say we referred not to just what is happening in the media but what happens in these kinds of fora, at universities, what happens in the halls of power in d.c. and elsewhere. it seems to be a compartmentalization that happens along the way which we proceed with rhetoric, the way we engage. >> the point you're making is people who wave the flag and say i am a true american disregards the rights and liberties for everyone who might be categorized as a minority of one kind or another. >> i am not saying they disregard them. they're treating them as separate issues. >> as far as i'm concerned, immigrant rights and gay rights or civil rights. >> absolutely. >> black people get very upset to link civil rights and gay rights. how can we not see that these are connected? >> i did an event at the 16th street baptist church at the basement and all the african americans were on the same page on immigration and one later said to me, in alabama right now, the hispanic man is the new negro. for an african man -- african american man to see that speaks volumes. but to your point, it is so huge. it is so huge. if you think about how people think about illegal in america, what do we have cemented in our head? the role of people jumping over the fence. when people think that, that is what they have in mind. in the media has failed in representing the reality. about the fact that we are integrated. that was one of the most optimus -- optimistic things. you have churches and schools, you have families standing up saying you cannot deport that kid, that kid belongs to us, he is an american. i've always thought that arthur miller said. the newspaper is a country talking to itself. i do not think we have that anymore. i am not quite sure the media at institution -- facilitates a broader conversation as we should. i am walking comfortable conversation. all of us need to have some comfortable conversation. >> the narrative which has been shared for 20 years for guarding immigration and undocumented immigration, has always pulled the issue as the brown horse running across the border. -- hordes running across the border. you are looking at 11.2 million. of that, 60% are mexican. you're looking at 5.8, 6 million mexicanos. 40% are overstayed visas. you have 2 million and you have 3.5, 3.8 million persons actually having crossed the border. what is the percentage of those numbers in proportion to the united states population? half of 1%? but yeah, you have an entire security apparatus, one trillion dollars created to keep out less than half of 1% of a population who cross the border during bad economic times. in addition to which you have that integrated economy keeping that going back and forth. there millions of visitors and people who live in nogales, live and go-- who back and forth. >> what is the anger that generates the call in terms of border security? there are 300 million americans. 1 percent, you're saying. half of 1%. why the political anger? >> it goes back to the aspect of fear. fear is based on the recognition by some, these folks are not dumb in the changes of political demography. it is a fearsome thing to behold over the next 20 or 30 years. >> you believe it is white male power that is being challenged. >> it speaks so clearly to poor whites. they're taking our jobs. and i will do something about that. that is the narrative. >> let's take another question. >> i am proud alumna of ucla's chicana, chicano studies department. you can see how errors and i can move to eliminate hell they can -- how they can eliminate mexican-american studies. how do we have these conversations, how're the dialogue going to take place? would you say is the importance of ethnic studies? do you think we can move it from a marginal discipline to mainstream as part of our discussion of a more comprehensive american history? >> i founded the first mexican american studies department at san diego state. i spent five years as an anthropologist at ucla. i know the study center very well. the elimination of mexican- american studies in tucson is part of this year. this prism. them.remove you have a pushback and it is other folks are talking to school districts about incorporating this history west of the mississippi into the general historical panorama of teaching american history which is not done. chicano studies and the rest, african-american studies were necessary because we were left out to lead. and the history that was being told, is this single prison again. if and when the time comes that history departments have integrated and i am talking at the university level. have integrated that knowledge base within the departments of history, english, or interdisciplinary departments, there is not going to be a need as such for programs like the ones i found it and the ones i intended to. that is not going to happen. the necessity for ethnic studies programs and schools that incorporates both sides of the border tell the narrative of both sides of the border and how this entire region came to be. >> why is it you think there will not be an integration of that story, the narrative into the broader tale of american history? >> because as long as the same prism is being used, the east coast american british prism and i exclude the irish, by the way. as long as that prism is maintained in this mythic american narrative, that is going to be the case. >> you were in -- an african- american studies major. >> i do not think you can understand american history without understanding american -- african-american history. i was the only non-black person in the whole program. i was now that we're moving to country,rity-majority it is incumbent, it is inevitable that hopefully that chicano problems or -- programs or asian-american programs, -- i had to seek that out. the philippines was the first iraq. i did not know about the spanish-american war. all these things that are coming together, the first university to have a college of that? studies. i wish we could call it american studies fact and merge it together. >> i am under the gun for time. i want to get everybody in. let me ask a quick question. >> one thing i noticed is you kept it in a merrill -- male normative view. sarah palin galvanized america ns. what is the role of women of color? >> the basis of all cultural learning is in the hands of women, period. they are responsible for the birth of the child as well as a nurturing and developing that child to become a hilde -- if full human being. also what goes with it is the cultural learning the child goes through in order to fit in. the guy i is the progenitor but he is usually out the door. that is the basis for all culture is in fact, the role of women. without women, for it. there is no culture. >> what about women and especially you were saying women of color? in this in the mix where we talk about the threat to white males or british eastern economy? anybody want to jump in? >> i am not quite sure how to address that. the rise in power of the black woman, more educated than the blackmail, better employed often than the black male is yet another threat to the white male normative -- heteronormative power structure. it is interesting in talking to 105 black people for my boatok, male and female, people were not telling me there is a significant difference between, we know about the sexes and that black women are dealing with. people are not hitting me over the head with our experience is different to where you need to reshape your identity theory to include women or to not miss include women. that is not the experience i was getting. >> next question. >> earlier jose joked the country is becoming more gayer -- gayer. i was wondering if you can talk about the record -- the intersection of race and sexuality. whether you feel within those communities it has become more socially acceptable to be lgbt. >> certainly not within the black community. we deal with a a very natural or historic situation where of the gay people we know, we begrudgingly accept them or accept them completely and ignore that jimmy is different. the gay people we do not know are there. i saw this -- how can they spark the black community to be more publicly anti-gay marriage to create a legislative war of words in the media between the black community and the gay community, splintering them and preserving the status quo. conserv- noit is a ative group. national organization for marriage. not the marijuana group. i am encouraged that the marijuana group is on the tip of one's tongue. i must say that i was surprised at your response to the question. when i look at numbers, you can look at the most conservative group of voters and the power of gays as a wedge issue has diminished. it is true that in the black community -- >> how white people look at the issues, especially white gay people talking about gay issues. most organizations -- gay organizations, even as within the lgbt community do not know how to talk race and immigration. which i think is again, a struggle. let me give you something tangible. people have told me, why don't you get married? i said i am like sandra bullock in "the proposal." even though new york state allows same-sex marriage, the federal government will not recognize that. because of the defense of mayor jack. -- defense of marriage act. the layers of injustice and unfairness can get really high. i am trying to have as full as a conversation as we can. >> i will refer to it as romantic segregation and maybe people will understand what it means to prevent a large swath of americans from getting marriage -- married. >> i was struck that there was a conversation on race. there are better for its dialogues and intercultural dialogue. one of the questions is, what was the legacy of this first set up town hall meetings? what is the impact of these questions around faith and race and how those have been talked about. is it possible to have a conversation at that same time but also track. i am struck by the example in august. president obama has an executive order on diversity inclusion. people argue maybe the conversation is not happening but there are actions that are taking place that are focusing on i would say, this knowledge that they are changing demographics. >> in terms of the first conversation that clinton had, i do not think they amounted to much. i will let anyone else who wants to defer jump in. it ended up with conversations about reparations and disappearing off the map. the second question? >> on conversations that talk about faith and muslims. >> as a way we can come together? >> some of the same groups -- are those conversations that are taking place about faith impacting this conversation about race as well? >> in a positive way? >> that was for the panelists. >> are you suggesting that evangelical whites would act in a way as to hurt the broader conversation about race and racial diversity? >> no. i was saying in some of the questions i have been having about faith, some of those questions have come to talk about how you define americans. can a muslim be considered american and so on. some of those groups are ethnic? -- ethnic-based. >> if this definition is not applicable to include anyone who believes anything, it is wrong. anyone can come to this country and become american, right? being a muslim is obviously not antithetical to what it means to being american. you're not saying -- muslins al- noit was al qaeda. when we started talking, maybe it is the media is the message sort of thing. a recall personally and in magazines and the national dialogue, there was conversation where the tone seemed to be let's learn from each other, let's talk together. so many people are able to hide through social media, in a computer contexts, use a different things than you would dare say face-to-face and there is a lot of anger and frustration in terms of where we still talking about this, let it go. your the one perpetuating this conversation. america would be fine if you end al sharpton and jesse jackson stopped bringing it up and let it go. we're taking a step back because obama has emboldened people to feel like it is over. we do not have to deal with this anymore. we're back to let me explain to you. >> we got it. last question. >> you said that he was too new to realize what is at stake in the trayvon martin case? >> what did he say? >> that he was too new as an emigrant from britain to understand what is important in the martin case. >> i began that appearance talking about what is at stake and this incident is not going to go away anytime soon. this matters and this is affecting the soul of america. this will be one of those markers that we recall. you talked about o.j., it is like that. the atlanta child murders, it is like that. we see the recent polls that say americans are divided and is it too much, is it too little? he has shown a rather tone- deafness on this issue which is related to a lack of understanding about american history and where this flows into american history that he would return and say something like, you would not say that to nelsen done -- nelson mandela. to show you how ridiculous his lack of understanding is. they have to denigrate what replying. i would not say that to nelson mandela. this comes from the one country that would understand tangible in the straight races, like any other country in the world. >> our question is where you putting down -- >> what is at stake in your opinion? >> i think that the ability for us to exist as one america is at stake. we're very much to america separate and not equal. this is bringing it up from under the rug that this is true that this is happening, we feel different about this case, we're angry that this is happening and continues to haping to our young boys and white people are saying, let it go, why don't you deal with -- many white people, why are you not dealing with black on black crime where you so angry about this? it is a scar on the american soul. and an extraordinarily important moment in american history. and some people are not recognizing that. people say to me, some black boy got killed in florida, this is a major moment in american history? the continued dehumanization of trayvon and all black men by association goes along with -- does it matter? >> it want to thank -- i want to thank you. it has been a great panel. thank you for listening. [applause] >> a great morning. please join us for lunch in the next room. our television audience, we will begin again at 215 pm >> several political events to tell you about this week. on wednesday we will cover the indiana senate gop primary debate between richard lugar and his challenger, indiana treasurer richard murdock. that is live at 7:00 p.m. eastern. the indiana primary is made. our road to the white house coverage continues friday. live coverage friday at 2:00 p.m. eastern on c-span. c-span radio and online. at c-span.org. in a few moments, a forum on poverty in america moderated by tavis smiley. in two hours and aspen institute forum on race relations in america, looking at race as a campaign election. then we will free air the discussion of what it means to be an american. discussion.he several events to talk about. the u.s. institute of peace host a forum on the peace process and the afghanistan transition. this before 3:00 p.m. eastern, president obama is at florida atlantic university at book over time to talk about his tax reform proposal referred to as the buffet rolule. we will cover mitt romney at an event in wilmington, delaware. that is before 6:00 p.m. eastern. tavis smiley recently moderated a format on poverty in america. over the next two hours you will hear a discussion on combatting poverty, violence against women, voting rights, and reproductive rights. >> good evening from the center for the performing arts. i am honored to be joined for a conversation about women and children in poverty in america. i want to start by asking you to think this of this panel for being here. i want to mention that this conversation is being heard live around the country. thank wbai for carrying this conversation live. and it is great to have my public radio family join us. thank you for making the feed available for this conversation. i will introduce these panelists as a get to them because i want to jump as quickly as i can into what i know will be a good conversation for those turning in. we will do this for three nights on pbs. i will bring all these women into the conversation as we move around. i want to start by going first to the labor secretary. i said a couple of hours ago to some friends of mine i was delighted you were going to be here. you can have a conversation about women, children, and poverty without talking about the numbers. that is a dreaded statement for many of us. i know a lot of us do not like numbers are talking about numbers. women and children as you well know are falling faster party than any other group. the younger you are in this country, the more likely you are to be poor. women and children are falling into poverty faster than anyone else. i want to start with you and ask why is that the case? why are women and children falling into poverty faster than anyone else? please welcome hilda solis, or labor secretary. >> i would like to begin by saying that one of the things the president did as soon as he got into office is help provide funding to help provide support to my safety net for these former will populations, particularly women and women of color and children. the emphasis was to provide a network of services in the department of labor, and education and training is important. let's help people get a job. let's make sure that young people have opportunities. we have seen more participation on the part of women because they have fallen out of the work force. there have been stagnant in terms of their wages. there is still that gap. we have the 80 cents on the dollar per mail when -- and it for women.arder i would say that our efforts have been trying to put more people into new kinds of jobs, renewable energy, itn stretching our imagination and put funding into programs that did not exist in the last decade. i have to give credit to those folks that help to support the funding for these programs but now in my opinion is not the time to take away that safety net because there are folks in washington who would like to see as the back because they want to make the deficit the issue as opposed to helping me vulnerable populations. it is time more than ever, 15 million women are taking advance it -- advantage of our training program. we need to do more to make sure that we incentivize tax breaks to we can create jobs and allow for individuals to stand up on their own and look for their own jobs, create their own jobs. we're looking at using the yueh benefits to allow people to do more work sharing and get paid at subsidized salary but to start up your own business. i think that's really exciting for women and especially because many of us, we are the sole bread earners in our household. that's what you're seeing -- you're seeing a lot of kids, minority kids, that are still dropping out of school. but by the same token, some of our programs are serving the hardest to serve population. the job corps program, the youth build program, and right now we need to see these programs expanded. >> since you referenced deficit reduction a moment ago, i find it incredulous that there are actually people in washington, to your point, who don't just want to change the conversation from -- well, not change, poverty has not been a conversation as much as it should be -- but they certainly want to change the conversation to one about deficit reduction, but there are voices increasing in washington, particularly given what's happening around the globe, who are calling for austerity. how is it possible that anybody in his or her right mind in washington could possibly think that austerity is the answer? >> well, part of the i think miscalculation on the part of those folks that don't understand what's happening is that you can't do both at the same time. what you do is you ease into it. so you have to yes, look at where there is excessive spending that won't hurt vulnerable populations, and that's what the priority for this administration is. even in this upcoming budget debate that we're having for 2013, there's also that very -- how could i say -- very much prioritized effort to expand our job training programs, and i'm happy that the president is doing that for the first time for dislocated communities, displaced workers, but also hard-to-hit neighborhoods. he's actually making a concerted effort to do that, and we've done already some of these programs through demonstration projects and also funded our community colleges, working hand-in-hand with entrepreneurs. because if you don't get it right you're going to keep funding things that may not show a good product or end result. so we're forcing the way we do curriculum, the way we're talking to businesses, to be a part of that partnership and to make sure that there's a lock on it, and that we're looking at jobs that are going to be real jobs, secure jobs that pay well, not just minimum wage. we're seeing up new applications on the internet, what we call apps, so that women can look at each other's wages across the board with different corporations, so they can start making some assessments and hopefully negotiating for higher salaries. sittinwe shouldn't have to waitr major legislation that just recently got passed when the president got in. but lilly ledbetter -- come on, we were talking about pay equity here. nobody should have to discriminated doing the same job that a man is doing but not receiving any kind of wage increase or benefit package as well. that poor woman and many like her have lost out, in my opinion, anywheres up to $360,000 worth of earning power because that money was not put into her paycheck when she was working 20 or 30 years on the job. >> as i expected, the labor secretary would give me all the room i needed to run with, and i'm going to run with it. there's so much she said already just to unpack, i want to go first to my friend dr. julianne malveaux. she is the president of bennett college for women. she is one of the nation's leading economists and the author of this book, "surviving and thriving, 365 facts in black economic history." i want to ask by putting you on the spot and asking you, with all due respect to the secretary, whether or not you believe the numbers that we are being given -- all kinds of numbers coming out of our government. i ask that because we are told, for example, that there are about 50 million of us living in poverty. we're told that if you combine those living in poverty and those near poverty it's 150 million people. i wasn't a math major, that means one out of two americans is either in or near poverty. then you get into the specifics of the hispanic unemployment rate and the african american unemployment rate, et cetera, et cetera. but let me just start by not coloring the question too much, asking you whether or not you as an economist believe the numbers that we are told, or is it worse? >> well, with the unemployment rates, tavis, it certainly is worse. i think the secretary would concede monthly something is published called "employment and earnings," and it details the unemployment rates. but inside this publication, buried inside this publication, is alternate measures of unemployment. now if the unemployment rate is 8. 3 percent theoretically, the worst alternate measure is something like 14 percent. so 8. 3 versus 14. for african americans, the number is almost 25 percent. so that's one in four -- one, two, three, you. i think that's really important, so we haven't talked about the people who've dropped out of the labor market, the people who have part-time jobs who really want full-time jobs. so the numbers that we see, the poverty numbers, tavis, let me just put those out there, because we need to understand that poverty is at a level that has not been since 1993. the average member of congress had a net worth of to record $50,000. by 2010 the average member had a net worth of $750,000 excluding their home. what happened that they tripled their wealth? in a 20-year period. the average person had $20,000 in 1990 and 2010. these members of congress found a way to address themselves. i'm not hitting on wealth or members of congress. people who have that kind of wealth do not understand somebody who needs an extra $40 and that by weekly check to take the bus. [applause] when you get mitt romney adding $10,000 here and there, how many months to you have to work to get $10,000? the average white household has an income of $49,000. the average african-american households $31,000. this man is walking around with one-third of black people's pay, betting it. like the casino. the numbers we see, let me put this out there. poverty is at all levels that has not been since 1993. our poverty of rate rose to 15.2%. that is almost one in six americans. for african-americans the number is 24.4% 27.4%. for less than one in four. for latinos, 25.8%. for asian americans, the numbers are lower and interestingly, the numbers for native american people are not published. theoretically, the sample sizes too small. how do we have people in our population and their sample sizes too small. i know why. i'm just saying rhetorically speaking. >> no, no, tell us. >> under president that will go on named but he was president about 1981, it wanted to stop collecting racial and ethnic statistics. they said, "we're all one america." this is this post racial motion. i have opposed racial unemployment rate among them can be postglacial. black folks have the same unemployment rate as anybody else, we can -- as everybody else. the new american population is one of our smallest but it seems to me we ought to invest resources in finding out what is going on with this population. you talked about the deficit and this coming conversation. you said what is wrong with congress? i do not want to answer that. you can only be flippant in answering that. we rode over together. and somebody has wrapped up somebody on the head. we're cutting education. the most challenging thing, we have young sisters and brothers who want to go to college but the dollars are not there. the program is $5,500. where is the sister going to get that $19,000 from? loans. now, if you take out a loan for anything, you should take it out for education, to invest in your education, but i don't understand why -- and suze might disagree with me -- but suze, i'm a college president. i need those students enrolled in my college. so to cut education while the president has said he wants us again to lead the world in the number of people with aa and ba degrees, it's foolhardy. kicked us out of the state lottery fund. that is $1,800 that students were getting. that is gone now. to cut education while the president has said he wants us to lead the world and the number of people with aa and ba degrees -- we should not be cutting education. we should not be cutting these essential services that we need especially for poor women and children. there is not the poverty conversation. there is a middle-class tax force. i wonder where the poor people's task force is? we've seen poverty rise and the population that concerns me is the group of people called extremely poor. we have a party-line $11,000 to one person and 16,000 for a family of four. some people make half of the poverty line. can you imagine having earnings of $5,500? how do you begin to survive? while you have these task forces looking at the middle class which we do care about, let's also look at poverty. >> we will talk about the middle class and education. let me ask you if there is a short answer. i want to be forthright about this. wittlet me ask you forthrightlyd directly with regard to women and children in poverty. how much of this is bill clinton's fall? 15 years ago it was our friend bill clinton who pushed through this welfare reform bill and peter edleman, he quit his position over this job. of the chickens coming home to roost, how much of this is bill clinton's responsibility? >> certainly. you call it welfare reform, i call the welfare reform. you took the system that may have worked and you made it worse. it took a lifetime cap. that makes a sense. bill clinton was pandering to the right when he did welfare reform. we all love bill clinton but he was pandering and he was excoriated on the floor of congress. let's be clear that right now i do not think anyone has an appetite. this congress is one of the worst we have seen in a long time especially around issues for women and children. they don't mind cutting anything. they're running around the country basically talking about austerity at the same time that we're seeing people falling into poverty. clinton may have started it. it continues. mr. bush instituted a tax cut for the wealthy. we could restore and get rid of that tax cut, that would be billions of dollars that could be used for social services, for education, and for other things. mr. bush had facilitate the financial crisis that we experienced in 2008 because he never met a regulation he liked. literally, you have these banks robbing people. now we have something like one in three people have underwater mortgages. the mortgage is worth more than their house is. almost one-third of the african- americans who have subprime loans qualify for loans. we can call it clinton but let's call the roll spread there has been a hostility to party. lyndon johnson was the best president who spent money on it and talked about his social service program. let's follow that by -- richard nixon is the father of minority business development. inside his -- they met established a small business administration. economic justice. >> her new fax -- who knew? you look at reagan, every time he opened his mouth, he talked about the woman with 13 kids. roles.all the we have changed poverty from a social problem to a personal problem. i've known faye for years and i knew i wanted her on this panel. i had no idea that the timing of this conversation, faye, would be so propitious. i am honored to have the first african a woman -- african american woman to be president of planned parenthood. dr. malveaux says this is the worst congress in history. i want you to connect this war on women specifically now being waged in washington, this assault with poor women and their babies. >> there has always been a war against the poor. this is not a country that has had tremendous sympathy for poor people. i think the notion that somehow we have slipped into an era where poor people did not matter is quite the way our history would define it. we do not care much about poor people and it is true the johnson administration tried to change that at a time when the country was going through an enormous change. there was a tremendous upward mobility and aspiration for this to be a different country. just as we construction was cut short, the war on poverty and taking our country to a different place that we cared about all the citizens, was cut short by the right-wing political movement that took wing and took its force in the early 1980's. when we talk about what is happening today against women and public life and political life, it is not something that is new to our society and to the political landscape. it has been going on for more than 30 years. americans really -- these and not act of god. no one came down from the mountain and struck lightning and said you shall oppose women and you shall take back women's rights and you shall invade woman's vagina is in order to advance your political agenda. this has been a very long time coming and we have allowed it to happen because women still do not have first-class citizenship in our society. all of us here have been working for that. it is a very long journey. let's make no mistake about it. we see going on in congress is all long legacy. it is a long legacy and the composition of the supreme court, it is a long legacy i and all that has taken place in states throughout the country. chip away has occurred. it is interesting that the chipping away always seems to focus only on the sexual decisions of women and our reproductive decisions. we will have to ask ourselves where they're more children in poverty, why are families in destruction? a lot ofbecause a lot of what hs taken place is that women are primarily the heads of households now, and we are not perceived as real first-class citizens. there is an effort being taken to take us back, for real, to the traditional role that we have played in society, which is mother and caretaker, as opposed to women in our own right that deserve the dignity of our humanity as women, whether we are mothers, whether we are wives, whether we are sisters or brothers. we are women and deserve the right of that dignity. the war on women's reproductive lives is really pretty stunning at the beginning of the 21st century, that we are engaged in a conversation, a really serious and political life, with all that is before us, with all of the challenges of our society, with all of the desire for peace in the world and movements taking place all over the world that have used us in many ways as an example and as the template for the aspirations of peace, that our conversation has devolved into a conversation about what birth control pill you will use. it's just simply unacceptable. it's undignified and it's unbecoming of a nation such as ours that we are engaged in those kinds of conversations. >> help me understand, though, how -- [applause] 1992 was labeled, you'll recall, i want to ask a question. please thank c-span for carrying this conversation. i want to thank them for being so kind and generous to let the american people be part of these conversations about poverty. there's nothing you said i disagree with. if this were the black church, i would say amen. we're recording this on sunday. i did not get to church this morning. sorry, mom. 1992 was labeled the year of the woman, because there were so many women running for national office, running for high office, many of them even winning, obviously. so in 1992, just 20 years ago, we are celebrating the year of the woman. twenty years later there is a war on women. how, then, do women get compelled to exercise their -- we were celebrating in 1992. now we're back to women being under assault, women being under attack. what role do women have to play in reversing that trend? >> we may have been celebrating and the fact we were celebrating one year as the year of the woman is illustrative of the status of women. we are celebrating one year as the year of the woman. that is what you can make of it. we have to be careful about our friends because sometimes our friends mask the war that continues. after 1992, there was a tremendous amount of complacency, the notion that we have a president in the white house and why should women's rights ever be based and pivoted on who is on the white -- in the white house? we do not talk about press censorship based on who was in the white house. we do not talk about our fundamental rights, they're not settled rights. they're not right that any generally -- there is always the fringe but mainstream america grappled with or struggled with. there is no question that women's reproduction is still a very difficult issue for a lot of people, not the least of which is the catholic church and the catholic hierarchy. we have to be careful about falling into complacency when we think that our friends will take care of us, when the only thing that has ever taken care of freedom in this country is ourselves that we have to work to protect our freedom. there is no substitute for that battle and the recognition that it is a long-distance battle. i am the grandchild of a slave born grandmother and i knew her. i knew her, that is how very short our historys.

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