with the chinese program. it is a program in its infancy. >> what is your guess of what space travel will be like 20 years from now? >> 10 years from now we will still be operating, i hope, on the international space station. i would love to say 10 years from now humans will have landed on mars, but that's not the course on which we are embarked. the hpt has challenged us to put humans on mars or at least the mars' environment in 2030. that's a little outside the 10- year window. we should be there. we should be there now. there may be humans inside that 10-year window if nasa is fostering in commercial space and trep neural space like what we are doing right now. there are some private businesses that really think they can put humans on the moon. we have formal agreements with some to provide engineering expertise. my personal belief is that it probably is a little outside the 10-year time frame. >> what about either russia or china? >> not in 10 years. tech logically, we have the capability of doing it. we're about leading the world in exploring deeper into space than we've ever done before. so that's why we're embarked on two big human event prices over and above the international space station right now. by 2025, humans should have come in contact with an affidavit reside -- asteroid. they will be in -- some call it translunar -- but there will be an orbit around our moon interacting with a new asteroid strategy that we formally introduced as part of the president's 2014 budget. and as a follow-on, if we are able to develop the technology from that, solar electric propulsion, increased efficiency in our environmental control and life support systems, such as the cabins in which the humans live can withstand an eight-month trip to mars and living in perhaps something like that for long periods of time. and then just new space suits, new space walk suits. there is mediation protection. it is probably the biggest challenge now for an extensive trip all the way out to mars. but that's where we're going. >> where did you grow up? >> i grew up in columbia, south carolina. my wife and i are proudly from columbia, south carolina. my wife, jackie bolden as people know her. we are both the products of teachers. my parents were life-long teachers until they died. jackie's parents were life-long teachers until they died. we both grew up in the segregated south. so my being here is very improbable. if anyone had asked if i would be here growing up, i think it would have been a resounding "no." >> how did you get into the naval academy? >> i fell in love with the naval academy. they talked about life in the naval academy. there was a west point story. there were a lot of military stories when i was growing up. i saw the uniform. that's probably the biggest thing. and the fact that lots of girls came to the naval academy on the weekend. with no knowledge of the navy or the naval academy, i said, that's where i wanted to go. i decided to go to the naval academy in seventh grade. in ninth grade i started writing my congressmen, two state senators, and the president of the united states and vice president saying i really want to go to the naval academy. each year i would get a letter back saying, a little too early. write to us when you are a senior. i became a senior. i graduated in 1964. most people who are my age or close will remember in november of 1963, we lost president kennedy. lyndon johnson became president. i was no longer eligible for an appointment from him. i said i know you can't help, but i can't get an appointment out of south carolina. can you do something? about a week later a navy recruiter showed up at my front door and said, i understand you are interested in going to the naval academy. a couple months after that, a retired federal judge by the name of judge bennett traveled around the country at the behest of president johnson looking for young men of color who were interested in going to the service academies. so between judge bennett and the navy recruiters, i got an appointment through congressman william dawson. >> who was african-american? >> he was african-american. he was an army veteran. i never met him. i mean, he's long gone now, but i never had an opportunity to meet the person who was helpful to me. >> who was the congressman in south carolina? >> olin johnston and strom thurmon were the two u.s. senators and albert watson was the congressman. in each case they all responded -- strom thurmon was the most honest. he said "politically infeasible to do this." >> because of color? >> because of color at that time. olin johnston offered to appoint me to the marine academy. i wasn't interested. i never heard from albert watson. my mother to this day believes strom thurmon played a role, because every single milestone in my life until he died i would get a note from strom thurmon. >> you go to the academy, and you switched your uniform. >> i sure did. >> the united states marines. >> i knew two things when i graduated from high school. and they were both negative. under no circumstances was i going to go into the marine corps. you have to remember, i lived in columbia, south carolina, an hour, hour and a half drive from island. and they were both negative. where else would they go? the would go to columbia, swimming pool where i worked. i got to see marines up close and personal. they were crazy. and i did not want to fly airplanes. i thought that was inherently dangerous. the two things i knew, i would not fly, and i would not be a marine. any first year at the naval academy, my company officer was a gentleman by the name of john riley lowe. he was an infantry officer so much like my dad. he was tough, but incredibly helpful. he so impressed me, i said, i want to be like him. >> how many sortis over vietnam? the>> i flew 100 missions into north vietnam, laos, and cambodia. so during the campaign, i flew cal combat planes. >> what kind of planes? >> i was an a-6 fighter pilot. the best arpte god ever made. it was an attack aircraft. no super sonic flight flying. no sonic flying. all we did was deliver weapons to a target on the ground. most of my flying was done offer in north vietnam. low-were generally night, level interdix missions -- interdiction missions. you seldom went out with more than one airplane. >> how young? >> i was young and foolish. i was a first lieutenant. so i was probably 24 or 25. >> so you think back to those missions over north vietnam. what's the motion moment that you remember? >> the one moment i remember is the time i didn't think i was coming home. i didn't think i was going to get back. it was just a mission we went in. we had a particular -- back then we were kind of stupid about how we did things. the target times were almost always the same. everything was repeatable back then. so we were at liberty to arrange our ingress anyway we wanted to do it, but the targets were going to be the same no matter what. there was one area, an area called qenky bridge that was in the southern area of north vietnam. every time you went in there, they knew you were coming, they knew what time you were coming, and they started shooting every -- even before you got there. this time the firing was incredibly intense. we were inbound to the target. there was stuff all around. we knew the worst of it would be to turn around and go out because you are going to spend that much more time. we pressed onto the target. we were 500 feet above the ground. so you knew that they could see that thre were depending on sound. and probably not picked up on radar. we just didn't think wre we were going to make it that night. i distinctly remember that. came back, not a scratch on the airport. you know, our trousers may have been damaged. other than that, everything was ok. >> where were you playing out of? >> flew out of a place calls nam pong thailand. we affectionately called it "the rose garden." i was taking my wifmente my son had just turned 1 year old. >> he's a commander now? >> he's a lieutenant commander, a drone squadron in cherry point, north carolina. he's been in cherry point twice. he went over 20 years in the marine corps last week. it could be his first time being there and last time. i took my wife and son back to columbia where my mom and dad and jackie's mom were and put them in an apartment. we went from travis air force base to what i thought was going to be iwankanichi, japan. i brought my dress drawers and a trunk. i landed, and they said, squadron, that's yesterday. take your trunk, go over to the hanger, and get out enough underwear and flight suits for a month. because you are going south. i said going south where? they said, can't tell you. when i called my wife, she said, what's this secret airbase? i said what are you talking about? she said it is on the cover of "time" magazine. i ened up in the jungle. the c.d.'s had gone in and cleared all the cobras and the jungle out. the air force had started putting in a runway for the f- 111, but could never get it to run the way they wanted it, so they abandoned it. they gave us an extra 1,000 strip, and we lived there for a year. >> i'll come back to the personal stuff, but how big is nasa? >> roughly 18,000 people, so approximately the same size as the third air force command i retired from the -- retired from. >> what is the budget? >> this year we'll spend 16.8 billion. that'sget was 17.7, and what the president requested for 2014. but under sequester we took a % spending at 17.7, we're spending at 16.8. >> an historical nasa budget. one of the things to look at is percent of the budget. if you go back to 1966, which was the highest, 4.4, and if you come up to 2012, it is .48% of the budget. what's the difference? >> why the difference? >> why. >> a number of things. primarily apollo is the time twad it was -- apollo is the time it was 4.4%. we had a russian enemy, the evil empire, and president kennedy beermined we would not second to the soviets when it came to space and exploration. and it is historic now. he uttered the challenge to nasa to put man on the moon before the end of the decade and bring him safe wli home. that's where that $4.4 billion. and it is a gradual ramp down from the apal owe -- apollo era to where we are today. our enemy is us. we do still have an enemy. the enemy is wlnch we -- the fight is whether we will maintain our position as the dominant nation in the world tech logically. the president talks about it all the time. the nation that out inknow vates, out educates, and out -- the nation that out-innovates, out educates, and out builds, will be the greatest nation in the world. education is really under a lot of strain. the president has really tasked all of us and challenged all the federal agencies to come up with a stem program to get our kids interested in science and math, so when you and i go to deliver a commencement address, we're not going to see all the kids going to engineering being from other countries today. the way it is today. we have a big challenge. >> you were electrical? >> i was supposed to be an electrical engineer, but i flunked electrical cal magnetic, so i got a masters. >> and you went where? >> a university of california. it was a system u.s.c. put together. >> when you left the marine corps, your rank was? >> a major general. two-star general. >> here is some video. it is back from the 2012 campaign. it is gingrich. i'll show you what he has to say and allow you to reflect on this. [video clip] >> we will have the first permanent base on the moon, and it will be american. \[cheers and applause/] nearll have commercial earth activities that include science, tourism, and manufacturing that are designed to create a robust industry precisely on the model of the development of the airlines in the 1930's, because it is in our interest to acquire so much experience in space that we clearly have a capacity that the chinese and the russians will never come anywhere close to matching. \[cheers and applause/] wend by the end of 2020, will have the first continuous propulsion system in space capable of getting to mars in a short period of time. because i am sick of being told we have to be timid, and i am sick of being told we have to be limited to technologies that are 30 years old. [applause] >> how much of what he said do you believe? >> he had read the president's -- i am serious. i am certain he had read the president's, you know, national space policy, and he had read the president's presidential campaign space platform. so much of what he says we are -- is already true, as a matter of fact. we have been living and working in space on the international space station now for almost 13 years. spines science and engineering investigations technology development goes on there every single day. we just launched our latest crew last week. karen nyberg is the american astronaut. thees she's one of two american astronauts there. the other is chris kasteny who fought as a navy seal and is now an astronaut. there is an italian who is there along with russians. so we are doing that part already. we provide commercial exploration for cargo. which is not a big business. not a large industry provider, traditional provider. we have a stecked company called orbital appliances -- from right here in dulles, virginia, that loun muched their anteris rocket from island, 2 1/2 hours drive from here. we'll have two american companies carrying cargo to the international space station. if we can get the president on board -- if we can get the congress on board with the president's plan, we will select probably one to one and a half ato three american competitors to carry our crews to space. it is criminal to me that i have to authorize my budget people, my financial people to write a check for $454 million, a little bit more than a month ago, to extend our contract with the russians to continue to carry our crews to the international space station on souyuz because we have not yet brought the capability that comes with our american crew program. the president's budget calls for $28 million for commercial crew. 5 $828 million. we are not halfway there. my job is to try to persuade the congress that the plan is good and that we're going to be efficient users of the taxpayers' money. i have not been successful on that yet. we're up to 525. as i told every member of congress to whom i've talked, $824 million for the 2014 budget is vital if we are to make the 2016 date. so what newt gingrich said is true, so that americans are transported to space from american transport. when he talks about faster propulsion, that's what we're doing with the asteroid program that we have proposed. larger solar electric systems that are made available through much larger solar cells. the engine is sized by the power that drives it. tech logically we don't have giant solar cells, but we're getting there. thehen did you command shuttle with the rugs? with the russians. >> 1994 was my last space shuttle mission. people always ask, what's your fondest memory from your time in the space program, meaning, what was the greatest thing that happened to you in orbit? my fondest memory of my 14 years in the space program prior to now is the two-plus years i spent training with sergei krikolov and vladimir titov and having their family live along side of us in houston. having my family know theirs, and for me that was priceless, and we remain the best of friends today. that was 1994. >> why, when you read the daily rourts reports coming out of russia, it doesn't look like we have much of a relationship compared to what we expected to by now. why do you get along in space but not politics? >> because we have a mission. we are doing something both nations recognize has a tremendous impact on humanity and the world. we are both dedicated when it comes to technological advancement of humanity. they want to do deep space exploration with us. they would like to do some robotic missions to the moon. they teamed with us to get to mars. russia has been trying since they were the soviet union to put something on the surface of mars and have it work. the first time that happened was when they flew a radiation instrument as part. scientific package on curiosity. it is today the source of much of the radiation that we have talked about that talks about the radiation environment getting to mars and on the surface of mars. and it is going to help us, as we further the design of the vehicles to carry crews, and of the plates in which we live. we have a mission and a common goal and a common juneding. i did not want to fly with russians, by the way. i was working for dan golden, the nasa administrator teth at guytime, the number three in the agency, thinking i would never fly in space again. one of my endorsers came and said, we want you to go back to houston. i said that's great. he said we want you to fly and we want you to command a mission. at the time one of my hidden desires was to go back and fly as a commander for the first hubbel surfacing mission. i had flown on the mission that deployed it. it wasn't -- it was great but not in the best shape when we left it. so to complete the circle, i really wanted to come in the first -- command the first h.s.t. servicing commission. theflight after that was first joint russian-american shuttle commission, and i got named to command that. i told him initially, you got the wrong guy. i train -- i said, i'm a marine. i trained all my life to hate them. they said, would you calm down a little bit. go have dinner with them. ser gay was a fluent english speaker. air naughtics champion. vladimir was a colonel in the russian air force. spoke not a word of english. russian pilot: the flee of us had dinner, and all we talked about was our families, our kids, and what we wanted to do fment i said, i can do this. >> so why didn't we think the russians were going to look at our secrets and take them back to russia? >> we did worry. but we had practices and policies in place that allowed us to limit their access to certain things. n't go ak.c. or j.s. c. the kennedy space center or the johnson space center. they did not have any briefs to sit in on classified meetings, et cetera, so we jealously guarded information that we did not think they needed to know. but over time the trust grew anung us and our training teams, and by the time we flew -- i mean, real small things. drawing blood for experiments. researcha, we do human all the time. primaryts are the guinea pigs, because that's all you have. at the time that we flew, russian cause naughts -- cosmonauts were not very well paid, so they sold blood. one of the experiments i worked on was a blood instrument. they called for frankly disz who was my -- diaz, who was my twin on my crew. but now we have the first woman to command the international space station after they became an astronaut. in order to get the russians to participate, we would have had to go through a great, long process to make arrangements to pay them, and we just weren't going to do that. today when i go to conferences with the russians, like something called the international space-medicine summit that was held in houston, they talk about the exchange of data. we want to bring russians out of the russian segment of the international space station into the u.s. segment. we want to make it truly one space station the way it should be. we're working hard to do that. >> what about the chinese? >> i am prohibited by law from working in a bilateral respect with the chinese. >> why is that? >> well, because the congress -- after i -- the president and -- made an agreement between the u.s. and china to do what's called joint committee in many areas. i went to china as a part of that agreement to see their human space flight program. but some members did not appreciate that, so they put it into the law. they wrote it into the appropriations act that forbade nass why from doing -- forebade nasa from doing bilateral work with china. but we are working on future missions, going to mars, working on an asteroid. >> explain this. we can let the chinese buy $1 trillion of our debt, but we can't work with them on the space station? >> this will come in time. i've only been the nasa administrator for fewer four years, and the president has given me a very challenging agenda of what to do. i happen to love the president, the person for whom i work, and i am dedicated to making sure nasa full fills what the congress and the president asks asks us to do. and for now, in human space sflite, it is trying to develop a mission that will allow us to put humans with an asteroid by 2025 and get on to mars mars in 2030. it is intended to lead the world in science and f -- and exploration and development. missions on the way to jupiter and pollute owe. we have missions on the way to almost every planet in the solar system or operating around almost every planet in the solar system or other areas that have not been visited so far. >> what are the ways that you differ from the obama administration? there has been a lot written about that. >> i don't know. i read all the time. i will tell you one thing i don't do. i don't twitter. i don't tweet. so i don't pay any attention about what is out there about whatever these disagreements are. i refer blogs every once once in a while if someone refers me to it. i have the best job in the world right now. i run the space agent sifment i run the world's greatest space agency with the world's greatest scientists, administrators, engineers, you name it. we are the best place to work in government. i don't have time to deal with things over which i knt control. i can't control critics. there are far too many people in this country that do not like the president and will never accept him. that's their problem. not mine. i like him. i work for him. his ideas are big ideas. you know, he is looking to make this country -- to continue to have this country sustain its position as the foremost dominant nation in the world in terms of technology and everything. >> should the shuttle have been shut down? >> oh, yes. it should have been gone before we were able to do it. we just were not able to do it. and the reason had nothing to do with safety. a lot of people say, well, it was unsafe. not true. shuttle was -- the last two flights we demrue flew were flawless. it is because -- in fact, we spent as much time on development of things and looking at safety issues for the very last flight as we had done for the first flight. probably more. but we could not explore -- the president knew if we wanted to go beyond, we could not continue to pour $2 billion a year into just maintaining the shuttle. so we had to finish shuttle out. it was really important for this nation to really utilize the capabilities that we have in our industry, and allow industry to do -- it's not routine, but that's the best word i can use. routine access is the business of industry, commercial enterprises, and entrepreneurship. we have equipped the nation's industry to do that. we work with them. they know how to do it very well as demonstrated by space-x, soon to be demonstrated by orbital. we have three excellent companies viing to become the nation's first commercial provider for transportation for crew. we couldn't explore from it. we had to get into another vehicle once you got to where you were going. now we have embarked on the heavy lift launch vehicle, multilift vehicle. to get people to mars and more disassistant places in our universe. that's what we ought to be doing. >> how many astronauts are on the space station now? >> right now there are six. as i mentioned before, 2-6 are american. that's a typical compliment. typically there will be two to three americans, two to three russians, and then one or two at max of partner nation astronauts. many united nations. >> we have video from nasa tv. >> yes. >> this gentleman's name is bobak ferdowsi. >> he's the mohawk guy. >> yes. combine this with another mohawk story. let's watch this for a moment. [video clip] >> hi, i'm science director of the mars flight to mars mission, and i'm back with another rover report. this past year we went to mars. we took a deep breath on mars and looked for chemicals. we also did a drive. along with the drive, will you see our tracks on mars. >> hello. this is charles bolden speaking to you -- >> we had a few firsts. we played back an audio file from mars from nasa chief administrator, charles bolden. roll the sound. to mars let's reach for the stars ♪ >> and second on tuesday, we played back "reach for the stars" and that's the first time a song has been played back from mars. >> so you have fun. we just recently watched the government having fun like the i.r.s. how far can you go? >> how far can you go and have fun and stay out of trouble? >> yes. >> you have to be very reasonable and measured in what you do. you have to make sure that the fun you are having is clearly related to the job you're trying to do. our job is to inspire young people and to inspire today's generation. it is generally done through the arts, not through science. science is incredibly exciting and important, but there are probably half the kids out there who will one day be rocket scientists who don't know that they like science today. they love music. so will.i.am was at the launch for the kennedy center. and he was in pasadena, california for the landing. and his dream was to -- he said, you know, you guys aren't cool. and i want to help. i said, ok. what do you want to do? he said, i want to write a song. he wrote a song, composed a song. got i think 200 kids from all over the world to sing this song and an orchestra. and he directed it. we beamed it up to curiosity, and the day after -- i think it was the day after i beamed the message down, we played "reach for the stars from mars" and it went viral over youtube. that's the way we communicate today. that's fun. any who wants to argue with me that that's a bad use of the taxpayers' money, everyone loads to youtube now. we are recognized as one of the most innovative agencies of the government, and we are very proud of that. when you innovate, when you allow your workers to do things out of the ordinary, mohawk guy, just think about it. in the apollo era would you have seen a mohawk guy, you think? >> nasa has had a channel. now the pentagon has one, called the pentagon channel. has nasa had an unfair advantage by selling what they do? >> quite the contrary. if you look at nasa's communication -- if you look at our budget, i defy anyone to find the line item for communications. david weaver, my director of communications rvings one of the things i agreed with him is he would not have to go around town with a tin cup. i haven't been able to do that yet. david goes from director to director digging for money to help tell their story. so our communications department put on the video that you just saw, that that was with funds that the science mission director, for example, had designated an amount of money for education and public outreach. i that is an example of what call a very wise expenditure of the taxpayers' funds. >> you could also say that's a clever way of hiding the communication expenditures. >> there are people that that.e and if you want nasa not to communicate its story, then theoretically, someone could take away all funds and prohibit us from ever broadcasting anything about what we do, and . say, you must rely on commercial television to do that. >> you were involved in dwate kuwait. >> i was. i lived in kuwait for a year between wars. >> what were you doing back then? >> i had left the space program and come back to the operating portion of the marine corps. at the time i was commanding general of what was called the expedition ri push forward. we were at that time representing the warfighting of the marine corps. it is the largest warfighting unit. it has a ground compune component, a wing component, and a lodgistics component, which today is a marine lodgistics group. so i had representatives from those three components with me living and working in kuwait in case saddam hussein kind of went berzerks -- berzerk or something. we were the forward force. >> what was your last day of the marine corps? >> jan 1, 2003. that was my official retirement. but i'm still in the marine corps. >> and were you nominated by bush -- >> yes. >> what happened with that? >> the president withdrew the nomination under pressure, i think. that's water under the bridge. >> what kind of pressure? >> i don't know. and i don't ask questions. i heard it came from secretary rums felled because we were about to embark, if you remember, this was post 9/11, and i was told secretary rumsfeld felt he couldn't justify sending an active duty officer back to a civilian agency. >> does it work? putting a military man in a civilian agency? twoell, we have had administrators -- i'm not active duty, wasdick truly, i think he active duty when he first came in. >> sean owe keefe -- acting o'keef had been director of the navy. isyou have a person who qualified, it doesn't matter if they are enlisted or not. i love my job. my job is to facilitate their success, to make them the number one place to work in government. one thing i have done is make them the best place to work, and allowed them to make us the best place to work in government. >> you mentioned chris cassidy having been in iraq and afghanistan, and he's an astronaut now. where is he now? >> he is on the international space station. he's a seal, a navy seal. >> how does that happen? >> well, he wanted to be an astronaut. you know, i haven't talked to chris about whether this was a life-long dream of his. we have a number of -- at one time about half of our astronauts were active duty military. they come from all walks of life and from all over the military. i was a military test pilot when i applied for the space program and i was picked up. i went all the way through my 14-year career on my own from the marine corps. nasa reimbursed for my salary, but the marine corps let me go for 14 years, and then i went back. >> so you say the international space station has been up there 13 years. what does it do? >> we do lots of stuff. most of it is scientific investigations and everything from life science, microbiological science, solar science. we now have a number of earth science experiments that are there looking at earth, looking at the atmosphere. we now are doing technology development. there is something called the alphamegnotics electrometer. there are many nations -- it is a science experiment. it is a baysic physics experiment looking at the beginning of time. >> who is in charge? >> of a.m.f.? >> the international space station. >> you could say i am, but i'm not really. the united states is the senior partner. there is a five-organization partnership. the u.s., represented by nasa, russia represented by cosmos, japan represented by their space agency, jaxa, the canadian space agency. then 19 european administrations represented european space station. >> what are the obvious things from time to time that you degree about among those nations? >> flight opportunities. who is going to get their astronaut to fly in space. and the agreement, it's a treaty that brought us together as this entity. this is one reason i think that -- on a sidenote -- i think the stationional space should be nominated for the nobel peace prize. you asked this question earlier about the u.s. and russia, our relationship. the international space station is a working relationship, a conglomea -- con glokglom racial -- a con depfment lomeration of 20 different countries. every one of them wanting to do what they want to do. and the flight opportunities have come with donations to the station. there is no exchange of funds except between us and russia. every other nation it is in kind. they either put a module up, they take components that go into the station. and the more they contribute, the more opportunities they have to fly an astronaut. so because the u.s. is the dominant provider of supplies, funds, and everything else, we paid for the transportation for all of our international partners. >> why are we paying russia $450 million? >> because at the time in the beginning, it was -- when we started thinking about this, it was still the soviet union when we started thinking about things. >> what is soyuz? thet is their -- they use same thing over and over again. soyuz has been around since the beginning of time. >> have you been in one? one,have never flown in no. they are small. it is a three-person capsule, smaller than the apollo capsule, and that's how we get our astronauts back and forth to space. what is going to be critical about having american capability, it takes us two soyuz flights to get a complete crew to the international space station. all of our commercial partners are developing seven-person, seven-crew capability. so it is their two pilots plus seven passengers they can get up. so we can get a complete complement to the space station, plus the american capability it will have. >> i want to talk more on the show, because we talked about chris cassidy -- >> yes. >> this is not serious, as you will see. let's watch chris cassidy in space. [video clip] >> i'm going to go out on a limb here. so please join me in the barber shop. this is how we cut hair in space. have you the standard hair trimmer, the hair would go all over the place. so we need to connect it to a vacuum cleaner, which is right here. then we're ready to cut hair. what do you think so far? should i stop here? that's pretty close to what luca has going on now, but not quite. nasa wants it completely smooth on the top, so i still have one more step to do. what if he does this every day? it kind of hurts. >> luca is the italian? >> yes. now? >> yes. >> was that his gd idea to do that? >> totally chris' idea. people have always accused chris of he and luca looking alike, so it is sort of to make luca feel at home. this is the story i was told. chris decided, shucks, i look like you anyway, we may as well become twins. >> how long do they stay up there? >> they are there six months at a time. luca now is about halfway through chris' tenure. chris came up halfway through chris hatfield's tenure. chris hatfield became an international sensation because of his guitar playing and his downlinks to students in the classroom and everything else. chris will go home about halfway through luca's tenure. youou look back and you say think the job you have now is the best. talk about this. we have some video of you over the four trips you took on the space shuttle. >> yes. >> which shuttle were you on? >> i was on columbia, my first flight. >> you can comment. >> probably on columbia with now senator bill nelson, as a matter of fact. that was my very first flight into space. it was a flight immediately prior to challenger. we lost the challenger 10 days prior to this landing. my second and fourth flights were on discovery. the second was when we doe employed the space telescope. then my third flight, which was the first time i was actually the commander on a mission, that's a hubbel crew right there, with dr. kathy sullivan who is now the acting administrator and was america's first woman to walk in space. that's me on the treatmill. everyone says it is absurd that i am wearing a headband, as if swealt would go into my eyes, but gravity would have taken the sweat up. this is atlantis on what we called the america's first mission to earth. this is steve harley and i. hubbel is 2,500 pounds, weighs nothing in space. very complicated mission -- complicated, the mission turned out to be. that's prelaunch on hubbel. you didn't see us prelaunch on my first flight, but on my first flight, we wore a regular old suit and helmet. then we felt wearing the suit, if we had another challenger type accident, it would allow the crew sometime -- that heat becomes a co-cune -- cacoon. it becomes a small space suit. so that's what we did. ando both the challenger columbia. what did that do? >> for me, or for the nation? >> just for you. >> columbia was devastating in and of itself. because i had been on the vehicle. >> was that 1987? >> that was 2003. >> challenger was -- >> challenger was 1986. that was very difficult. i trained with christie mcculiff. my first crew was the teacher in flight. ofn we took a member congress. thenrned out to be congressman bill nelson and rod sieker, because we flew a classified camera that bob was the expert on. challenger- to lose 10 days after we had come back and the most spectacular time in my life at that time just goes to the bottom. you couldn't go much farther. i decided in a few nano seconds that this is what i wanted to do and should be doing it and dedicated myself to staying around. >> did you feel different by -- did you feel different the next time you went up? >> by the time we went on the hubbel mission, i had gone back to the state of mind that you don't worry about your own personal safety and you focus on the mission and what you are supposed to do. hubbel was the perfect mission to me to follow on to challenger. because we did not know -- we had no clue how significant hubbel was going to be. we had no idea that it was going to change humanity's total understanding of our universe. >> how has it done that? >> it revolutionized our understanding of the universe. it has rebritain textbooks. a lot of it -- even several of einstein's theories -- some it has substantiated, others, oh, he wasn't exactly right. just as the universe expanding or contracting. hubbel has put definition on that. it ha -- it allows us to see almost to the beginning of time. i'm not sure people comprehended what hubbel was going to do in terms of opening up our horizons or understanding of the universe. we still don't know in addition, -- we still don't know everything, by the way, but we still know a heck of a lot more. areow many astronauts currently operating in america? >> i would say we have 60 some- odd dk -- next week we will announce eight brand new astronauts. americait is something will be interested to see. it is a new breed of cats. i would never have made it with this group. incredibly sharp individuals, every one of them. anyone who knows anything about space will be really interested. >> with all the space stations having astronauts, what -- >> -- what are those 60 people doing? >> oh, they are over-worked. to go up on soyuz, they have to be qualified to go on soyuz. there are three thirnings they have to -- things they have to do today that i didn't have to do. they have to be fluent in russian, because they have to be able to read the instruments in soyuz, and they have to be able to communicate with the russian launch group in moscow. they have to be fluent because of the mechanical armor the japanese arm, and then everybody has to be able to do a space walk. when i was in the program, pilots, not only did you not get an opportunity to do it, you were prohibited from doing a space walk, because there were only two pilots on board and we didn't want to lose -- take the risk of losing a pilot because of some of the risks that went along with it. today every astronaut has to be available to do a space walk on the international space station. so real different than from when i was there. >> you meet those little kids as you do from time to time. do you think there will be more opportunities or less in the future? >> far more. the reason there will be more, shuttle was one giant leap. it went from the space program, the astronaut program, being all white males, 5' 10," i didn't look like any of them. nate jermanson didn't look like any of them, sally ryan didn't look like any of them. it allowed people like that to fly in space and in groups of seven -- at one point we had eight people flying. now we are about to usher in the era of commercial space, provided the companies can jn rate -- can generate the interest they think they can. normal -- "normal" is a bad word, because astronauts are normal people. but when you -- you go into space and come back down, those thertunities are now on verge of taking place for normal human beings. one>> where do you come down this constant discussion about neil armstrong's first words on the moon? >> i don't argue about it. neil was a dear friend and a true american hero. it doesn't matter to me what he said. >> it was a -- >> "one small step for man and a giant leap for mankind," or "one small step for a man and a giant step for mankind." i'm not a purist. >> why do people fuss over that? >> we fuss over everything. we fuss over if it is lunar space or -- lunar space when we do our asteroid retrieval system. it is important to some people. so don't get me wrong. on this constant discussion about we spend too much time over trivial things. but the importance of the fact is, the u.s. demonstrated that they could do something that no other nation in the world had ever done and has not done since. there have been 12 people to walk on the surface of the moon. every single one of them was an american. >> that's important. >> that's what's important. not what neil armstrong said. >> so the chinese will be on the moon what year? >> that's up to them to decide. they may never get there. >> do the rugs care? >> do the russians care about being on the moon? >> i think every nation cares. every nation wants to be -- it is hard. you know, sometimes i sound arrogant. every nation -- every other space agency head wants to be in my place. they want to lead the most thenant space agency in world. they want to be a part of the only government organization from the only country that has ever landed humans on another heavenly body, or the only country in the world that has ever successfully landed a vehicle on another planet, which we have done, i want to say, six or seven times at least. no one has -- the russians landed a vehicle on mars, and we never heard about it. we think it landed successfully. but i don't count it a success unless it lands and talks to you and is doing something for you. >> nasa administrator, charles bold yn. thank you. >> thank you. >> for a d.v.d. copy of this program, call 1-877-662-7726. for free transcripts or to give us your comments about this program, visit us at q&a.org. these programs are also available as cspan podcast. >> next, live, your calls and comments on [video clip] rep discussornia emigration legislation in the house and live at 1:00 p.m., the former hewlett-packard ceo talks about her work as chairman of as360 its helps companies donate excess merchandise to charities. role.y have a tremendous they're talking about the thing that martin gave george but going to camp every winter was huge. it was not just valley forge pretty it was every winter of the eight long years of the revolutionary war. she hated it. it was dangerous, the road toward dangerous, she was a prime octave -- object of hostage-taking but she was key to troop morale. he felt that very strongly and she would organize the other officers wives and they would have -- they would cook for the soldiers, but with the sow for the soldiers, there would nurse and pray with the soldiers and put on a great entertainment. it is believed that the washington deemed -- genius was keeping the army together. washington would say he could not have done it without martha, and he begged her to come to camp every year. so that she could work with the troops and the troops had torture. >> as we continue our weversation on first ladies, discussed first ladies from martha washington to michelle obama, tonight at 9:00 eastern on c-span. the irsmorning, national taxpayer advocate discusses her proposal of a taxpayer bill of rights and apology of payments up to $1,000 to taxpayers whose cases are mishandled. then the national public radio correspondent looks at preparations for the launch of the health insurance exchanges. formerross johnson, senior executive for radio free europe talks about the purpose of the broadcast and how the government determines its effectiveness and concerns with leadership and oversight. "washington journal"is next. host: good morning. the congress is out of session all week for the july 4 recess while president obama continues his overseas trip to africa, visiting tanzania today. student loan interest rates are set to sharply increase today after congress failed to come to a compromise last week. and obama administration officials now have exactly three months ago before new health insurance exchanges are scheduled to open as part of the federal health-care law. we will get to all of those issues this morning on the open "washingtour