Transcripts For CSPAN Tonight From Washington 20090814

>> i know it. >> we just heard the center take questions about health care. you can see that town hall meeting again tonight on c-span. in a moment, we will take you live to pittsburgh, pa. for the net route nation conference of progress bkloggers. we spoke to reporters about the conference. what what is happening with pittsburgh? the economic summit, it seems of pittsburgh is really in the political limelight these days. what is happening? . u.s. steel workers union in a conference call. he claimed that pittsburgh has snagged these big events because of its excellent record in labor and business relations, public/private partnerships -- they went back over the whole they went back over the whole story of our renaissance that 1950's and said it has all led up to today. frankly, there are probably other reasons why we got picked to be the site of the g-20 summit. i still have not figured the not yet, but i am assuming that we are attractive because we are perceived as a green city. we have a convention center which i believe was the first leed-certified convention center in the world. many buildings around town have been greened in that regard, so they are impressed by those efforts by arrest belt city to raise its environmental profile. also, i think barack obama has some pretty fond memories of pittsburgh. in the pennsylvania primary he spent a lot of time here last spring in the state and came to the city a few times. and also we do have a fairly strong labor presence here. i'm just speculating here, maybe he just felt it that he owed it to supporters and laborers to do this. host: tonight will be the gathering of liberal, left of center, bloggers. how many are expected for that convention? guest: those who have signed up will be from 1800 up to 2000 people, bloggers, and various interest groups who want their messages to be blogged about. it will lead off with a keynote speech about president bill clinton. that will probably end up being about 10:30 p.m., who knows. there is also a conservative counter-convention in town, and i believe they did this last year as well -- americans for prosperity. about 600 people are expected at that and the headliners are mainly a journalist and political pundits. some oakland"wall street journa" types. host: it sounds like there's a lot, how recovering at all? guest: good grief, there is a lot. there are little mini communities there and we will talk about that. we will cover some of the bigger panels including howard dean, having a town hall meeting on health care tomorrow. in addition to bill clinton, there will be the ellery jarrett -- valerie jarrett -- she will appear on saturday. i expect we will give a lot of coverage. host: thank you so much. we appreciate your setting the stage. congratulations on your front page billing this morning. guest: >> a live picture from the david lawrence convention center in pittsburg pennsylvania, set of that -- side of the netroots nation conference. they have gathered for four days of lectures, training sessions, and panel discussions. the keynote speaker tonight is former president bill clinton. the event should be getting underway shortly. while weight, a look ahead to this weekend on the c-span networks. -- while we wait. >> radio talk show executive brian jennings on the new fairness doctrine, why it is a bad idea, and alternatives to censorship. he is interviewed by radio and television commentator monica crowley on afterwards, part of book tv weekend. >> british voters are expected to go to the polls in national elections next spring. this weekend, conservative party leader david cameron on how a tory government would change current domestic policies. sunday night on c-span. >> sunday, ellis cose on his public radio series, against the aunts, which profiles people who have overcome significant obstacles in life. >> back here live in pittsburgh, pa. at the david lawrence convention center. the netroots nation conference, four days of lectures, training sessions, and panel discussions with progressive online activist, bloggers, and politicians. the keynote speaker is former president bill clinton. our live coverage on c-span. >> under way to work tomorrow, look around. there is a union l. there busting their balls for you. we plug up the holes in the role of so you$pç don't [beep] up yor car. >> [unintelligible] dall i know is we are hard- working taxpayers like you. >> hello, netroots nation. i did not approve that message, but i love watching its. what i do approve is the message our 1.6 million members are sending all across this country. we worked for change. we voted for change, and now we want the change that we fought like hell for. we are proud of our role in american politics. we are happy to be a part of netroots nation. we are honored to be sponsoring this opening reception. i hope it is good. i hope there is some news here and some food here, and i hope you enjoy it. our members make up the most active and powerful union in america. today, we are in the battle of our lives as we push congress to enact real health care reform. we are using our union's power to counter some of the union lines that are spreading from coast-to-coast. we have spent roughly $1 million in the past month alone countering those lovely friends of america, the insurance companies. we are prepared to spend that much more in the months ahead. ouróy nurses are on tv with a powerful ad advocating for real health care reform. we have put organizers and staff into key congressional districts. we will not back down from this fight. america's working families are depending on us. this month, we are joining progressives in taking our message directly to members of congress with a nationwide highway to health care campaign, a rock-and-roll theme that is crisscrossing the country. nobody had better get in our way. stop by our booth and vigorous schedule. better yet, when the rv hitch your city, on board and blog about the energy you are seeing for healthcare reform. in communities all across this country, afscme activists are fighting for the values we share with the activists of netroots nation. ó÷like you, we believe that all americans deserve a shot at the american dream. we are not going to lay back, sit back, or kick back. we are going to fight like hell for the future, because we are afscme. have a great time in pittsburg. >> yes, yes, yes. [applause] welcome to pittsburg, netroots nation. my name is chuck roche. we are going to ge÷ the political speakers of the way first. there will be a lot more official people give you official greetings. i am just going to be the mexican comic that will warn you of. if you have not met anybody from pittsburg, this is the home of the world champion pittsburgh steelers at pittsburgh penguins. we also have a really good aaa minor league baseball team called pittsburg pirates. [applause] i also want to let you know, for all you big city folks who are here, if you happen to stumble upon the subway, yes, that is the world's smallest subway system. if you get lost and write it from the beginning to the end, just get off and what back. about eight blocks. i don't know if you realize, but the pittsburgh steelers kickoff their first preseason game 10 minutes ago. right now is the prime time to go still a new refrigerator or t be -- or tv. they are rooting like the end of the world just came. forget bill clinton, the steelers are playing tonight. let me help you out. if you have not figured out yet, i am not from pittsburg. i am from a small stake in the south and -- a small stake in the shot. a big shout out for the texas delegates. let me help you like i wish someone would have helped me when i moved to this city. if you hear someone say yins+2b that is the same thing as ya'll. if someone calls you jag, that is the same thing as an idiot. netroots nation. this country has come a long way. i remember when i hired into the mail when i was 19. factory worker, had played football for nine years. i had no idea what the internet was. i had never seen a computer. i had never owned any kind of mobile technology. now we are on the cutting edge with the unions. now we are on the cutting edge of grassroots mobilization via the internet. i remember 1996 when i first got out of the factory to work my first race. the afl-cio send me a brand new laptop. the first time i had ever laid eyes on all on one. they sent me a brand new beeper. i did not on a mobile phone. i went down to the mobile phones store and bought the latest, state of the art mobile phone, and it came in a bag. i am not lying. you plug it into your truck and had to roll up the window. i would pull up next cue girls and act like i was on the phone. i really could not afford to make a phone call. i was in dallas with a beeper, mobile phone, and a brand new laptop. i drove a black pickup truck. most people thought i was another drug dealer in arlington. let's get serious. they said this day would never come. they said we set our sights too high. they said the country was too divided to ever come together around a common purpose, but at this defining moment in history, we have done what the cynics said we could not do. hang on, that is not my speech. i wrote that for somebody else a long time ago. how many of you recognize that speech? raise your hand. congratulations to you, because of you and millions of union members and young people all across the country, that men stood up, our president, and could give that speech because we voted for hope and we voted for change. you are the reason why. [applause] now, let me tell you what my pawpaw told me growing up on the form. i spent most of my time with my grandparents. we would go out and plant corn and squash and strawberries. i would look at him and say i hope that's up comes up, because i love strawberries. >> he said hope does not just happen. sometimes you have to help hold long. that is what we have to do, just like that vegetable garden. planting is simply not enough. he needs to be fertilized. for all you tree huggers, organic fertilizer. we need to be pulled and pests need to be kept away, and i mean no disrespect to rush limbaugh or sarah palin. it is up to us to make this president do what he promised us he would do. he is not just going to get in there and do it. we have got to force his hand to give us the things he promised on this beach. there are a lot of people around him that do politics the old way, back when i did not know what a laptop was, because of the cut of their suit or how much money they have, they think that equals power, and it does not. power is with the people, and the people in this room. we elected a lot of congress people. we elected a lot of centaurs. hello mr. franken from minnesota. it is up to us to keep the pressure on. i cannot name the number of chiefs of staff that call my office and say this is a tough vote for us. we are in a marginal seat and we have to make sure we do not get too crazy. it is going to be a tough election. no shit. we were there when you got elected the first time. remember that e-mail's and the labor unions and young people? we will be there again, but you have to perform. you will have to show us what you are made up. -- made up. in these most marginal congressional districts, the general public voted 47% democrat and 47% republican. the union voted the same congressional districts. recon what the margin of victory was? don't tell me about a tough race. accountability is where it will be. if these people lose their way or go astray, i know how to run a primary. [applause] the netroots nation is not the future of the movement. netroots nation, young people, and the unions are the backbone of the movement. this dust the mail? who makes the phone calls? who knocks on the doors? his sense of the e-mail's? who blogs? who makes a facebook events page and invites everyone from across the world? i live in pittsburgh. i cannot attend your thing in toronto, canada. quit sending me that. we do the work. politicians should listen. politicians should listen to us, not just a couple of hundred disrespectful people at town hall meeting who scream down their elected officials. [applause] there is freedom for everyone, but there is a way to be respectful of that freedom. you know there is a lot of education and needs to take place when a retiree stands up and says i am on so security and i do not want the government in my life. hang on. i am not the sharpest pencil in the box, but we are the only ones fighting for regular folks, young and old, whether you work in a factory or a cubicle, no matter what the color of your skin is. when i started in that factory in east texas, i was 19 years old. my father worked in the same factory and so did six of my uncles, many cousins, and kids i went to school with. it was the best job between dallas and shreveport. they may passenger tires in that plant since 1965. these people paid their taxes and more active in the community. the union hall was a center of activism within the union -- within the community. they made a profit. guess what, it was not enough of a profit. they figured they could import these tires from overseas and make even more of a profit, and destroy 1000 people's lives in east texas who had always played by the rules and lived right. that is what is wrong with our economy right now. it is the lady working at the doctor's office who read my x- rays. she had health care and could provide for her family, a single mother. her job is now in india. those x-rays are emailed every night to india, and all those ladies who did that job are out of work. my grandmother in tyler, texas, this week we had a meeting of the family. she had a stroke and has been in intensive care in a long-term nursing facility. her medicare will not pay for her to be there anymore unless we put her in long term. she has to switch over to medicaid. my mother and her two brothers had to figure out, can we afford to have a nurse come to the home so my grandmother can pass away with dignity, or do we have to leave her in a nursing home and hope medicaid can pick up. this is not feel sorry for chuck rocha. everybody in this hall can tell that same story at some level. my family is not the only one having that meeting. their families all over the country having that meeting, and we need health care reform now. [applause] it is up to us, the people in this room. you have the power, just like the unions had the power and young people in this country have the power. we do have the backbone. we do not give a damn, and we will stand up and tell you how we feel, because that is the way we were raised. you have the power, whether you have 100 people or 100,000 people in your network. it's time to fight and to recruit more. if we want health care reform, we are going to have to fight and force him to give us health care reform ticket if we are going to fight against bad trade deals, we will have to force him to do that. that is our job as americans. this is our government. we are supposed to have a say in our government, not screaming disrespectfully at congressman, but have a debate and talk about the issues. we cannot do this alone. that is why this convention is so freaking awesome. if we combine our mobilization with a little bit of old school unionyñ÷ activism, and all those wonderful young people who voted for the first time in the last election, those people will soon be leading our state parties all across the country. we need to invite those young people in and make them part of the dialogue. [applause] a 5% of union members get it -- 85% of union members get e-mail about the issues. the steel workers already have a stated the our website. you have probably seen us out in the foyer. we are involved in social networking sites like facebook, and we are willing to build those coalitions. we cannot do it alone. we cannot have the netroots nation doing this thing and the young democrats doing that thing. we just want all our lives to be better. we just wanted to be there. a lot of people are just like my family back home in texas tonight, dealing with a very personal matter. they are sick and tired of being sick and tired. we voted for hope. we cannot let hope of escape. let me end by saying this tonight, for you to think about. i was 19 years old and working in that factory. i thought i would be there my whole life. somebody came up to me and asked me to be a union steward and a volunteer to be involved in the union. i did not have a very good education, either. i got involved because i got along with people. i got along with white people because i sounded like them, and i got along with black people because i look like them. to be really honest, if that guy had not come up and ask me to volunteer, i would not be here tonight. there are a lot of chuck rocha 's out here tonight, and they are not all working in a factory. they are sitting at their computer. we need to find an issue that immobilizes them and ask them to get involved. they may have the same grandmother story that i just talked about. maybe there brother just lost his job. is is up to each and every one of us to double the size of this room by the time the next convention comes. they are always going to outspend us, but they cannot out mobilizes. the internet and computers have broken down a lot of walls across the world. we see what happens all over the world. there is no reason we cannot break down the same walls to get into someone's living room and asked them to get involved to help change the country and have a say so in their government. these coalitions that we built together will be the power that we have to change the future. we cannot let barack obama walk down this path alone. he is out there now walking along, and he is taking shots every single day. [applause] when you go home, somebody to be involved. ask them, the worst thing they can do is say no. i ask people to come tonight, and they said hell no, we are going to the steelers game. i want you to have a great time in your workshops. remember what we said, it is a new day in politics. to all my facebook friends i have never met in the room tonight, i do not have a lot of time to the inner mafia, and yes, that is my picture from the eighth grade. thank you. [applause] >> how is everybody doing tonight? you guys can do better than that. that is what i like to hear. my name is raven brooks. i really glad to have everybody here tonight. i wanted to talk about -- netroots nation has a rich tradition of alpine -- amplifying the voices. you made it happen and got the speakers here. there's a rich tradition with doing this with elected leaders. our speaker on saturday night is a great example of that. she was identified as being a leader that was worth following. that percolated up to the national level, and now she took two runs at elected office and now is leading the charge with progressive policy in congress. we are starting a new program at this convention called making progress. each year, we will pick a few more people to bring out and amplify their voice, let you get to know them and learn about what they are doing and let them engage you. we are going to be doing this year round. the first one i would like to bring up is somebody who is one of us. judd legum started the blog that is recognized as more of the premier policy blogs on the internet. he is now lawyer and is running for the maryland house of delegates. he is taking the next step. i would like to welcome judd up to the stage to address everybody. [applause] >> i want to thank raven and the whole convention for having me here. i know many of you came specifically to 90 hear me became tonight to hear me, but i encourage you to stay for the rest of the program. you might be pleasantly surprised. i had an opportunity to attend the first netroots nation in las vegas at the beautiful riviera hotel. if you remember, there was a swarm of media there. you really could not use the restroom without stepping over someone. the story they were covering basically was, who are these freaks, and why are they using the internet to talk about politics? why did mark warner build them and ice sculpture? now, most of the media are not here, and the reason why is they are at home trying to figure out how to be more like the people in this room so they did not go out of business. [applause] what they did not understand and what many people still do not understand is that this community is not about the internet. it is about an approach to politics. he is about moving from a kind of politics that is clubby and transactional and hierarchical and toward one that is open and transparent and participatory. that is what really motivated me to get involved and to start blogging. i was working from a think tank, and to try to present all the great work that was done then and today at the center for american progress and open it up and make it more accessible. that work is still going on today. that is the same thing that motivated me now to run for the house of delegates in maryland, where i am from. [applause] in annapolis, which is where the state house is, and also where i live, the state house sits in the middle of a circle. the college stake circle. you can guess why. all around state circle are a series of fancy restaurants and hotels. we have had ethics reform in maryland, so that you as an individual lobbyists cannot take a single legislative or and take into one of these fancy restaurants. you now have to take a group of them to the restaurant, a whole committee or caucus. a lot of the work that is done today, a lot of the discussion gets carried out in the back rooms of state houses and hotels and restaurants. i am trying to bring the discussion at the state house and onto the street, into people's homes, and on to the internet. i am not interested in doing that because i think that the internet is groovy and that this is the future. i am doing that because i believe, and i think many of you believe that when more people are involved, that when the barriers to entry are lower, when there is more engagement, we get better policy results. that is really what this is about. it is not about youtube or twitter or blogging or whatever 10 years from now everyone will be into. it is about trying to make things happen and impact people's lives. the impact that this community has had at the federal level is very well known. there has been a string of victories, social security privatization and the iraq war and the presidential election in08f 2008, but there is also incredible work that many of you are doing on the state level. for those of you who are not yet working on the state level, i would really encourage you to make time to do so, because i know just from being in this for a few months that on a local campaign, on a state campaign, one volunteer, one can vassar, one donor can make the difference in thousands of races all around the country, including my race. i just want to say i am really privileged to be here and consider myself part of this community. i am really excited to keep coming back here and keep working with all of you to try to make this country a better place. so thank you. [applause] >> the next person that i wanted to welcome up to the stage is my very own secretary of state, debra bowen. she has just done an amazing thing for california. she ran a grass-roots campaign and won the secretary of state race. typically, those races are not something that a lot of people focus on. she has done some amazing things towards election reform and integrity. further, she is one of us. she is a deep like everyone of us in this room. -- she is a geek like every one of us. she is very technically savvy. she is just as comfortable going to a conference like this as some tech conference in santa cisco or somewhere else. it is a real pleasure to be able to welcome her to the stage tonight and to include her as one of the first people we are honoring as part of this program. so i would like to welcome debra bowen to the stage. [applause] >> this evening, fellow roots, and a big shot out to although roots who are with us digitally somewhere. i did not say watching us, i said with us, because the big change is that you can participate without being physically with the people you are working with. so all of you out there who are going to tweet me, a shout out to you, too. thank you, raven, and to judd for talking about openness, transparency, and participatory democracy. all of those are what motivated me in 1993 to carry legislation to put the california legislature on the internet. in 1995, to ask for special permission to have an e-mail account, because that was just not done. politicians did not have e-mail accounts. and then to put my campaign finance information on the web, and on and on. what is coming next that i am really excited about is we are going to use goingwiki and the secretary of state website in a discussion about what a participatory democracy might look like if we were to use all the new organizing tools like facebook and twitter. we will be doing that soon. the tag is social voter. we will keep you posted as that effort goes forward. it should be very soon. we had a great turnout in california last year. we had about 80% of california's registered voters. thank you to all of you who worked on that. it is great, but not good enough for me. i am aiming at 100% of the registered voters, and i am aiming to get every eligible voter register. part of that means changing the way we register voters so that we can put as many people on the rolls automatically whose identity we can verify. that will happen in california within the next few years for anyone who has a driver's license or a state id. from there we can move to get a lot more people on the rolls without having someone stand out in front of your favorite place that you stand out in front up. one of the things i was proudest of in the last election is that because of the work that we did in california, shoring up the security and accuracy of the state's voting systems, californians spent a lot less time worrying about how they were voting and more time focused on who and what they were voting for. that is the goal for all of us. i do not have to tell you in this room that following the elections of 2000 and 2004, there was a great hunger to get by the wounds that were caused by the methods in which those elections were conducted. they were wounds that were rooted concerns about the fundamental fairness and reliability of the tools that we use to decide on thae peaceful transfer of power. voters deserve transparent and verifiable elections. just trust the government is not a solid basis for democracy, and for anyone who is waiting for proof, check out iran. [applause] we cannot expect our citizens to do the hard work of democracy if they do not believe that it will be reflected in the results of their elections. california's checks and balances, are mechanisms for self correction have to assume that errors in judgment sometimes be made. trust will sometimes be violated, but the system will be tough enough to discover the truth and to recover its bearings. that actually is one of the reasons we are using paper ballots in california. we do not want to have to say we are sorry, we are not sure how those people voted. [applause] doing the work to look at the voting system where using, and then to establish uniform security procedures is not a partisan issue, nor is it a radical idea, but it was certainly easier said than done. we know that when voters have confidence in the election results, the turnout goes up. i believe there is a strong role for the secretary of state, a role that includes being a strong advocate for every voter's right in bringing more transparency to the government that the people own. i also believe there is a role for the secretary of state that has a strong code of ethics and does not allow any conflict of interest. that is why you do not find me cochairing anybody's presidential campaign. [applause] yes, it is something that i learned from a couple of other secretaries of state, notably those in florida and ohio. lessons well learned. but i grew up knowing that nothing happens by itself in politics, and that as thomas jefferson said, eternal vigilance is the price of liberty. all of this only works if we believe that our elections are fair. it is up to each and everyone of us to continue the work that was begun by our founding fathers over two centuries ago. had our democracy not evolved since then, more than half of the people in this room would not be voters, because you had to be white, male, and in most dates, you had to on 50 acres in order to be eligible to cast a vote -- in most states. so we have evolved to include all our citizens in the electorate, although in some instances it took some people a much longer time than it should have. we have evolved to improve our electoral system, to strengthen the checks and balances of government, and have evolved to connect with one another in more ways than we ever thought possible. from the net routes to the grassroots, facebook, twitter, who knows what is coming next? but we have to continue his quest for progress and self correction in all aspects of our government. it is at events like netroots nation that i get inspired talking to people. i look forward to seeing you all over this weekend. i remember john f. kennedy telling us that democracy is not a final achievement, but rather a call to an untiring effort. you are on the front lines of that untiring effort, carrying the torch of democracy, spreading the word about campaigns and about engagement. your work did not end when the campaigns of 2008 ended , and 2008rocha's speech -- chuck rocha's speech let us know you are still out there is spreading the word. let's see what we do with wewiki form of participation that will let all of us take a proposal to do voter registration and differ way, or educate people about instant run of voting, and let everyone have a chance to look at what is being proposed and to have their say, before the policy or the rules of the bill gets drafted. see whether or not we can create a better results if we get people involved as we go along the way, rather than only at the end. i strongly believe that we will, and i also welcome your ideas, if you think there are other ways we can do this. we have moved from the government gives them permission to you to the government gives your information to you and now we will take email, too. people are talking not only to one another but to their elected officials and the staffers. it is a lot more complicated. it is a greater challenge, but if we do it well, the payoff is much greater in terms of what we can accomplish together, and how well armed and inform you all or if you think the results coming out of the process do not reflect the well-being of the united states citizens, but instead reflect some other interest. it gives you an incredible amount of power. i look forward to working with you. great to see you at netroots nation. i look forward to talking to many of you this weekend. thank you so much. [applause] >> hey, everybody. i am simon rosenberg. i. i for those of you who do not know, my organization back in 2003 and 2004 was the first mainstream political organization to host a guy ran a small plot in northern california. i had the temerity to flight marcos all the way to washington in the spring of 2004 to speak at his first gathering in washington. in the year that netroots nation was launched, they invited me to write the foreword to their first book called "crashing the gate," which i was honored to do. i have been around from the clinton presidency and this remarkable event. i just wanted to reflect on these two things tonight. one of the things that has been very clear to all of us who have been laboring in this movement in recent years, in the first half of the first year of the obama presidency, is that our work is not done by just having elected barack obama in the fall of last year. the idea of what a movement really is, so much of what brought many of you to be involved in netroots nation and blogging and citizen activism was an anger about where our country was going, and a discussed of the leadership that president bush was providing. there was a sense that if we just elected democrats, that we would sort of solve that problem and get it all done. we have come to realize that the work we are signing up for is really the work of a lifetime. we will not solve any one set of problems right away and get it done and then retire for the next 20 or 30 years. if you look back at progressive politics, whether it was all that fdr did in his time about defeating totalitarianism and communism and fascism and establishing social security, and all the remarkable challenges he met in his day, or the work that lyndon johnson did in the 1960's along with john f. kennedy to bring about the civil rights act and to establish medicare, or the work that bill clinton did in 1996, were we were able to oversee the largest economic expansion in all american history. we are able to move from deficits to historic surpluses. we cut taxes and made the tax code more progressive. we were able to raise median income of over $8,000. i could go on and on. in his day, he faced a different set of challenges. it reminds all of us by his presence here tonight that the work we are involved in is a continuum. a movement goes on overtime. even in this remarkable age and a remarkable leader like barack obama, and the challenges he has decided to help us take on in reforming immigration and all the things we will be working on, at the end of those eight years, we will not be done. there'll be another set of extraordinary challenges, and our movement will continue. this is important as we look to hear from president clinton later tonight. one of the things i hope we can all commit to is that this remarkable man, my political mentor, who was so inspired by for all of his eight years as president, i hope we can commit tonight to make sure he is not sitting on the sidelines of this great battle for a better america, but very much at the front lines. we will hear from him a little bit later. i hope he discusses this in just a moment when he speaks. why is that you matter so much. when i moved to washington with president clinton in 1993, i was like many of you. i had come from the private sector. i made the choice, having been inspired by a particular candidate and his cause to move into the public life. when i moved to washington in 1993, with the first democrats who had been the white house in 12 years. jimmy carter's administration had not been all that successful. it had been all the way back to the 1960's since we had a successful time in washington. what we found after 12 years of reagan and bush was what confronted us, something different than any other democratic president had confronted, a robust, well funded, conservative movement. we did not understand it when we came into the white house, what we were up against. we sought to play out in front of our eyes, the rise of fox news and rush limbaugh, legal challenges that docked the clinton administration, the robust talking points and political activity we are all seeing played out today in this debate. that stuff all was brand new. david brock writes about this eloquently in his new book. it took us a long time to figure this out. one reason i got so excited in 2003 when i first met marcos and jerome and i started reading the blog every night. you saw average, everyday americans just riding, people from small towns saying i just gave $25 to howard dean tonight, the first time i ever gave money to a campaign. i feel like i have taken a step to making my country better. [applause] in my mind, that effort became about -- i was sitting up in my attic in my house late at night, a obsessed with the dean blog. my wife thought i had gone crazy. i was experiencing politics in real time with real passion and real people, making it clear that they wanted a chance to participate in their democracy and to make their country better. there were dissatisfied with the path, and this path,judd had said earlier. what i realized in that moment was, that i wish that we had those people and these tools when will fighting the conservatives during the clinton era. i know that the president is going toi[b around this room and wished that he had all of you buying by his side the way that barack obama does now. we did not have the kind of tools that all of you have built. not only the blogs, but all the organizations, at this ecosystem that has been created over the last six years. we now have a different moment in our movement. for the last six years, what we all did together was extraordinary. we built the beginning of a 21st century progressive movement. we helped elect barack obama with the largest margin a democrat has gone since 1964. tçñwe have seen in democrats in congress have a more ideological and political control than they have had since the 1960's. how different that is from when marcos started logging in 2002 and 2003. -- started blogging. the republican party was a more -- these were dark circumstances and dangerous days for our country and for politics. because of these organizations we have built and the politicians that have shown leadership, look how much we have changed the country. the most important work we have to do together is still in front of us, because now we have power. we have the trust of the american people. we have these modern institutions. we have americans working side- by-side for your blogs -- through your blogs. now is not the time to reject the other side, but to use our imagination to imagine what kind of america we are going to build together. how we will continue to build a growing and modern american movement. that is what makes this gathering the most exciting we have ever had. this is a time for us not to reactor be defensive but to imagine and inspire each other. i want to close by saying two things. first, i want to thank all of you for giving president clinton, who i think is one of the most -- we only elected three democrats for two terms entire 20th century. he is a rare bird, one of:u ony three democrats to be elected to two terms, it clearly left america and the world better than he found it. he was a remarkably successful president and an inspirational leader. [applause] i want to thank you for helping put him, not on the sidelines, but very much at the front lines of this battle. he has a lot of years left and a lot of fight in him, and we will hear this and a few minutes. i also want to thank all of you. this has been a remarkable journey we have been on together. as much as we are connecting with the struggle and the fact that the right is not going away, the battle of our lifetime, not just part of a decade, that you will make the decision to sign up for this battle in whatever way you choose to fight. we are stronger together. when i got into democratic politics, when we imagine the campaign, what we saw in our mind's eye was a torment hit by a candidate, a 32nd spot, and 200 kids in a headquarters fighting every day for that candidate. now our model is 10 million people going to work every day, side-by-side, as partners in the fight. that is a model that you created, a better model than we had before. i want to end by saying thanks to all of you here tonight. [applause] . . [applause] [applause] >> i just want to give a brief history. it was one of the most prosperous towns not only in the state but certainly in the country back in the middle of last century. that is where andrew carnegie started his fortune. we were a bustling town of 20,000 people with wealth creation. in 2009, we are a shattered community of under 3000 that lost 90 percent of our population, buildings, businesses, and homes. since the economy has turned south, i have been asked what it is like. we have been waiting for you to catch up. our unemployment consistently ran 2.5 to three times the national average and we could not get credit before the bank's collapse and we still cannot now. things are getting better not just because of the work that we are doing but because of the work of the man that i am here to introduce tonight has done. i am here tonight to introduce dan onorato. [applause] dan is the chief executive of allegheny county with its 1.2 million residents. under 3000 in my community, yet dan is looking to see what he can do to help the less fortunate not only in my community but communities throughout the meinong the haley the valley. from putting in a basketball court, senior housing and our community, to two weeks ago, i got a call about a building just collapsed in the street. guess who i called? guess who came through for us? there are no votes, no power, and no money to be had. dan onorato is out there because it is in moral conviction to help the less fortunate not only in this area but in the region as a whole. a lot of press has been given to green and redevelopment. he has spearheaded the largest project certainly in the state if not in the country. he has taken an abandoned site and is bringing it back as a green enterprise zone that is going to help drive the community. [applause] furthermore, of the three communities that comprise the side, two of them are in municipal bankruptcy, what we call it in this state act 47. he is doing it that brings along the least fortunate of us including my own community. without further ado, i would like this opportunity to introduce my friend, the county executive of allegheny county, and the next governor of pennsylvania, dan onorato. [applause] >> thank you, mayor. let's hear it for the mayor. [applause] will come to netroots nation. thank you for coming here. [applause] i want to give the official welcome to the greater print -- to the greater pittsburgh region. that michaux a raise of hands whose first time to pittsburgh. per your hand down for a second. raise your hand if you were shocked how nice this place look when you got here. that is what i thought. you are going to be our best ambassadors when you leave here today. people have one image of the greater pittsburgh area. when they get here they sealed -- they see the real image of what we are about. we are proud to be the city that turned it around and took advantage of the green movement, and now we use our rivers for recreational activities and we have opened up the whole area. we have figured out one thing about the green movement. it meant jobs for us in western pennsylvania. we produce products for the green movement. [applause] you should build green because it made good sense to build green. it made good business sense to the landfills, just for reusable products, and because we realize we have thousands of jobs in western pennsylvania that are producing the products that go into green buildings. we are now one of the leaders on how to build green, and we take a lot of pride in that right here. let me tell you a little story about our region because most of you that raised your hands, you know us as a steel town. we still make steel here but we still have steelmaking, and we are proud of those jobs. we work closely with our friends, the united steelworkers, when figuring out how to manufacture it in a clean way and in an advanced way. we are showing the world how you could have advanced manufacturing and make it work. we also figured out we needed to change how we do business. over the last 30 years, we went through a major transformation in western pennsylvania. now that i have been the county executive, i look back on what has happened and how fast it's moving. just six years ago in this region, we were down on our backs. the city of pittsburgh was filing for bankruptcy. we were losing jobs. we had old steel mills contaminated up and down all of our rivers. that was six years ago. today, the new york times" has done to stores on how pittsburgh is the one bright spot in this economy. newsweek has done a story about the turnaround of southwestern pennsylvania. [applause] in a few weeks, we are working hard around the clock because president obama said i want to bring that g 20 summit to pittsburgh. [applause] that happen because a lot of good people rolled up their sleeves and said we are going to change the way we do business in western pennsylvania. what did we do? in the last six years, we clean it environmentally contaminated sites, 1,500 acres on our waterfront. did that to for us? it allowed us to bring development back to the old in for shropshire and its stop this urban sprawl problem that we have going on because it was not competitive. those brown fields are now competitive and now back on the tax rails. today, we have on employment 3% below the national average in western pennsylvania. it does work. it can work. as i sit here i deal with other bigger issues that we are all dealing with together. this health care debate that is going on. i watch these news clips and i see those rallies in this town hall meetings. it is easy to say no to everything. one thing i know is that the status quo does not work. it needs to be fixed. we need washington to step up and help fix this problem. the biggest threat is the out of control health-care costs and where is headed. i know many of you are dealing with it. i thank you for fighting this battle with us. locally, with the county, the 28th largest in the country, our health care costs in six years went up $30 million for our employees. i can tell you that watching what is happening to health care, watching people lose health care and the cost of health care, i want to do a special thank you to our friends in labor. the united steelworkers. whenever unions are here today. because they are fighting, they are fighting for the pay scale and the benefit package that we are asking congress to help us with. it is a daily struggle. it is a very fine line that if we do not win this battle, people are going to fall below that line. it is you and your organizations that have helped create and maintain and continue to fight to keep the middle class in this country the size that it is because without the health care costs going out of control, without a decent wage, we are not going to have a middle-class anymore. it is those unions who are willing to fight this battle and say that we understand change has to happen in washington d.c. don't tell me know. don't tell us now. tell us how you want to fix it. tell us that it is wrong. tell us how you want to fix it. saying no is too easy. we have been saying no for a long time in washington. it is time for them to invest in our people in this country. that is what president obama is trying to do. [applause] we had democratic administrations that were willing to reinvest in our infrastructure. millions of dollars to clean up environmentally dirty property. millions of properties -- millions of dollars to do the development. you have to invest in your people if you want to see economic revitalization. you have to invest money in people to make sure they have good paying jobs. we tried that for 30 years after the steel industry had a downsizing. those sites that we cleaned sat for 30 years. if you do not clean them, you do not have the development in the private sector that we have today. the government has a positive role to play here. we need a partnership at all levels to understand that those investments are important. i want to thank you all for one thing in this room. for your grass-roots activism that obviously got a lot of coverage in the last presidential race, and as a politician who several years ago ran for my first office at 29 years old back in 1999 -- 1991 with no money, i would not have won if it was not for the 100 volunteers that i had walking on the streets every day in the city of pittsburgh. you have shown that that kind of grass roots can be done at the national level. you showed us that the blogging, the internet, the small community that you have created electronically can easily be converted out into the streets and put bodies anin the streets out there. every race is going to be like that now. whoever can put down the ground forces is going to win these races. people need to be heard. you have showed us the way to do it. you are going to be critical in the future. this debate is just getting started. if we sit back and do nothing, by saying no and criticizing a proposal, that can win the day. we are not going to allow that to happen. i want to thank you for that. i want to thank you for your our reach. i want to thank you for fighting back and letting the voters and the elected officials know that we expect them to make the changes that are needed. when you have done is unbelievable. i am glad you are here in pittsburgh. i know that all of you raised your hand, you are going to be treated to a great city with great activities. remember, it was not that long ago that we were not doing ourselves that way here, but we do now. it was because of progressive government action working with the private sector saying that we are going to remake ourselves. it was not a bunch of people sitting back and doing nothing. it was because we made changes. that is what the president is trying to do it and let's hope congress also participate. thank you, keep and called, i look forward to talking to many of you after this. [applause] >> good evening. my name is adam bonin. i am from philadelphia, pennsylvania. now the home of michael veeck. [boo's] seriously? donovan mcnabb is my quarterback. i am the chairman of the board of directors of netroots nation. please silence your cell phones and also make sure you have your birth certificates out and on the tables. they will be inspecting later on in the evening. [laughter] it is so good to see everybody here again. it has been quite a year. barack obama is now president of the united states of america. [applause] our senators taking over from republicans. [applause] our good friend donna edwards has banned elected to her first full term in the house of representatives with many, many more to come. [applause] i have to tell you as someone who works with netroots nation every year, we had to be ready for the alternative. we had to have our other agenda in place in case the other actions turned out otherwise. some of the panel's we had in place. "no, we didn't." food policy and the mccain era. advocating the canadian immigration process. [laughter] taking your message to the people, billboards and skywriting changed elections. rob emanuel. meet the supreme court's first supreme court justice, alberto gonzales. reforming the vice-presidential selection process, how to find the village with the biggest idiot. [laughter] [applause] on behalf of our board, i can't say enough about our tremendous staff that works year-round to put this conference together. raven brooks, karen colbern, we would not be here without you. [applause] we would not be here without our volunteers. we would not be here without the guiding spirit of our founder. [applause] or with folks who have been here since the beginning. we are in the presence of so many heroes here tonight. jane hampshire, slinker wink, we are humbled by your leadership in the fight to give health care to all americans which is their moral right. [applause] to our team behind netroots for the troops, what you guys do every year is astounding and what you guys do for the troops is heroic. [applause] we are honored by your leadership in the fight against torture. and for carl singer, raising more than $65,000 for the obama campaign from small donors. he was a leading advocate online and he is only 15 years old. those last two speakers would not be here but for your support for a scholarship program. thank you so much for bringing them and so many great activists here for this event. [applause] speaking of heroes, we lost a great one this week. her loss must be acknowledged this year. before her, people with intellectual disabilities were called retards. she changed all that. thanks to her founding the special olympics in 1968, millions around the globe have an arena to experience athletics, competition, and fun. she changed the world and made it a better place, and her spirit is one that should guide us all. [applause] obviously, our thoughts tonight are also with her brother, ted. we are hoping and praying for his complete restoration to health. we need him in washington as soon as he is ready to be there. america needs his leadership again. [applause] i am here tonight to introduce someone who has been a true hero and has never once sought attention for it. congressmen brad miller has represented north carolina's 13th district. [applause] up to the virginia border, rather than telling his whole pyrography which is impressive as hell, running his democratic party at the age of 31, i want you to understand something. no one gets netroots the way brad miller understand the netroots. somebody might remember back into the five there was a big battle that people were involved with before congress to see how the loggers are going to be treated. did we have to register? was there something the legal that we were doing? one morning, i received an e- mail from an unfamiliar source. i would like to talk about campaign finance law and the internet. i think i can help. -brad miller. he did not sit on a committee that had anything to do with this stuff. he was a reader and an occasional diarist. we work together to talk about legislative solutions. he introduced a bill in congress to do what we needed which was to treat bloggers the the exact same as traditional media. if we wanted to endorse someone we could do it. if we wanted to be partisan as hell, we could be a partisan as hell, and no government agency could do anything about it. i am not the only blocker that gets e-mail's like this from brad miller. he is someone that posts his own diaries. the post's his own comments. he jumps into other people's diaries when they are talking about things of interest to him. he is dedicated to the principles of interactivity and transparency that define the movement. what does he get for that? in 2006, his opponent was vern robinson. at one of his campaign mailings, brad miller's san francisco soulmates with a large picture of marcos in the corner of the mailing referring to him as brad miller's internet partner from san francisco. he attacked brad for posting on the same sidte with photos of a gay prostitute. he attacked brad for using the c word "crap." they called him an embarrassment to voters. he raised more money than brad was able to raise for his own campaign. brad miller beat him down 64-36. [applause] that same year, by the way, brad miller came to vegas. he was the only sitting member of the house to come to the first convention. he came back last year. he came back this year for a panel. he does not come with an entourage. he comes to our party, are panels, he is one of us. he can do a little bit more about it then we can predict right now, his main battles are in the financial world. to continue the fight for legislation, and the fight for accountability on the bailout. he had a talking points memo a couple of months ago. he wants change to believe in but he can not notice it yet. these are risky steps. it brad miller gets it. as barney frank said of him a few weeks ago, that people listened to brad miller five years ago, we would not have had a terrible subprime crisis. congressmen brad miller is a fierce advocate for the people in his district, a true hero, somebody i am so proud to call my friend. please welcome me in welcoming brett miller. -- brad miller. [applause] >> thank you for that very generous introduction and congratulations on michael vick signing with the eagles. i know you must be proud. i began per dissipating five years ago to attract attention -- i began participating five years ago to attract attention to an issue i was working on in congress that i could not get any attention anywhere else. the issue was subprime mortgage lending. it was probably not my blogging alone that did not call that issue to have a higher profile. in reading it, i quickly realized that the democratic party needed the energy that i sought in the blogosphere. because of your energy and because republicans messed up everything they touched, we have a democratic president and i m in the majority in congress. thank you. [applause] democrats now have the best opportunity in my lifetime to do great things and to be the majority party for a generation. democrats may be the majority party even if we do not get it right and do great things. i have read a lot of smart analyses that republicans have made themselves, and i did the party composed of every shrinking demographic. their definition of real americans leaves out more americans that it includes and their bases insist that they do not budge from that. thank you justice sonia sotomayor. [applause] it is less comforting to me that maybe to some of you that republicans have become a regional party competitive only in the south. the south is the only place i compete. that the democratic party just becomes an identity party, it may leave me out. it would certainly leave out many people that i love. i am not a democrat because i am a hip urbanite despite the insinuations three years ago. i had to google teabagging to figure out what the snickering was about. [laughter] [applause] but i grew up believing that the democratic party stood for ordinary americans. my grandfather died when i was a small child and i never got to know him. he and my grandmother raised 11 children on a farm outside of spring lake, north carolina. yes, i am a cracker. my mother told me that when will rogers died in a plane crash, my grandfather cried because will rogers spoke for him. if we are that party, if the democratic party is that party, will rogers party, we will certainly govern this nation for a generation. more importantly, we will deserve to. [applause] because our party will not be defined by who we are brought by what we do. change will not be easy. we are now in the worst economic times since the great depression. even if we have hit bottom, there is a lot of pain in front of us. millions of americans will never recover what they have lost. the leaders of the financial industry blamed the financial crisis on a weird, unpredictable combination of the events,. who could have known? i don't claim to have seen the collapse of the world's financial markets coming, but i knew that the mortgages that proved toxic for the financial industry where toxic for homeowners. congress is now working to address systemic risk to protect the financial industry from getting itself into such trouble in the future. but we have to do a lot more than prevent the masters of the universe running with scissors again. we need to reform the consumer lending practices that have now trapped millions of working and middle-class families in hopeless debt with mortgages, credit cards, pay date loans, and on and on, what the financial markets profit. the proposal will include a proposal to create a new agency, a watchdog that will take the existing powers of various financial regulators have and had it used and give those powers to one agency that will use those powers. [applause] defeating their creation of a consumer financial protection agency is the top legislative priority for the financial industry. three-quarters of a century ago, president roosevelt pushed to regulate the securities industry even after all the corruption in the stock market in the 1920's. that so clearly contributed to the great depression, the securities industry [unintelligible] will rogers said the boys on wall street do not want a cop on their corner, and they do not want a cop on their corner now either. the slot become a political deal in the senate in 1978, home mortgages are about the only kind of debt that cannot be modified in bankruptcy. that has prevented congress and the obama administration from doing anything effective to get control of the foreclosure crisis. earlier this year, the senate voted down legislation that would have allowed sensible, predictable modifications of mortgages and bankruptcy so people that could afford their house but not their mortgage could escape foreclosure. an article in the huffington opposed by ryan gramm who is here quoted an unnamed aide to the house leadership as saying that the issue was frustrating to work on because the members who were against it did not know what they were against it. they said things in public and in private, like "i support banking laws but i cannot go along with letting judges reduced debt." what did they think was the point of bankruptcy? [applause] those members are celebrated in the washington political culture as thoughtful, sensible, centrists. working and middle-class americans have been cheated on their mortgages, their credit cards, overdraft fees come on and on, and now they say their taxes are going to bail out the very people that cheated them. their anger is righteous. i am angry, too i am not ready to make nice. [applause] my greatest fear for the last year has been an economic collapse as bad as the great depression, or maybe even worse. my second greatest fear was that the economy would stabilize, perhaps to recover, the financial industry would have the clout to -- my greatest fear seems less likely lately but my second greatest fear seems more likely every day. congress and the obama administration must give urgent priority to fixing our financial system but that does not mean just going back to what we had two years ago when the financial industry profits topped 40% of all corporate profits. [applause] in addition to the opposition of powerful economic interests, we also face a fierce opposition of republicans who see the defeat of every democratic proposal as their best path back to power. there's strategy is clear. oppose everything, predict dire consequences, and hope things really do go wrong. they will make no serious proposals of their own. a bipartisan compromise and consensus is a pretty idea, but not really an option. [applause] republicans say we have the best health care in the world, and we do have the best doctors, the best hospitals, the most sophisticated technology, but we spend twice as much as other economies like ours, prosperous countries, and americans do not live as long. we are 45th in the world in life expectancy. most americans say they are satisfied with their health insurance, but the truth is, they do not know when they got until they get sick. americans are right to worry that they will lose their health insurance if they get sick or if they lose their jobs, or if they get sick and lose their job. i met last week with a woman from north carolina. she and her husband had been married for 30 years. they put two daughters through college. they always had health insurance through their work. sally's husband was diagnosed with cancer in january. it will be the fight of their lives. last month, sally's husband lost his job. under the law, they can continue his health insurance for 18 months by paying the entire premium, which is kind of hard to do when you just lost your job. they can't do that and pay their mortgage. after 18 months, there is no way they can find new insurance that will cover treatment for cancer. to help people like sally and her husband, president obama has proposed rules for health insurance that are less strict than the rules most states have for car insurance. for that, [unintelligible] deep rage on the right may be organized from washington. it may be funded by the insurance agency and scripted by republicans in congress. it may have more to do with identity politics. but it is real and intensity matters in politics. republicans hope that the rage it will defeat reform this year and defeat democrats next year. in other words, they want 2010 to be 1994. if that happens, when will we ever have another chance like this? when will we have -- when will we achieve the changes our country needs? president obama must do his part, i must do my part, but so must you. we have always known that there was a right wing in our politics, but now it appears they all have each other's e- mail addresses. the reason that 47% of republicans in north carolina think that barack obama was born outside of the united states because they read it in an e- mail, and now they are the mailing each other about the health insurance reform. they are talking to their friends and their friends do not know what to believe. president obama cannot reach them all. i cannot reach them all. you have to. you have to talk to your friends, your neighbors, your co-workers. you have to persuade democratic senators and congressmen that not everything that starts as a compromise does not have to be compromised more so it does not do it much anything at all. [applause] even if the washington pundits just loved [unintelligible] next year, you need to be there for us. the same way you were last year and three years ago with all the same energy and more. because we have come too far to turn back now. thank you. [applause] >> ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the 42nd president of the united states, william jefferson clinton. [cheers and applause] >> thank you. [applause] thank you. thank you very much. thank you. [cheers and applause] thank you. thank you for the warm welcome. thank you, raven brooks, representative miller for that great talk. i was backstage listening. it is funny when he said 47% of the north carolina republicans do not think president obama was born in america i am glad it is that low. [laughter] thank you for being here, mayor. i just had a visit with the allegheny county executive and i thank him for giving us a convention center that is actually a leed-rated building so you could meet in a place that is doing the right thing. [applause] i apologize for my voice. i have been on too many airplanes for the last few days. [cheers and applause] first, i would like to thank you for what you do and the contribution you have made to dramatically elevating the level of our public discourse and the base level of knowledge of people who participate in reading all of the things that you put out through the netroots nation. i keep a file with me on economics and a file on energy. i was looking through it the other day and i was stunned of the percentage of articles that i printed out and the cat that came from web sites as opposed to newspapers. i think that one reason is, you can have more authors because you are open and because people have more opportunities and often the full-time staff newspapers due to write one piece a week or two pieces a week and really look in depth into things. so i think you for that. i also thank you for another thing which i particularly appreciate. if you have an opinion and you are taking a side, whether it is on an issue or an election, you don't have to feel like you are pretending you are not. i appreciate that and think it is very important. [applause] i have had two sessions with bloggers in my office and that found them very helpful. this year between september 22 and 25, right after the g-20 meets here in pittsburgh, we are having the fifth annual global initiative. last year, we had more than 70 there. i hope we will have more than 200 this year. i want to invite you to come and cover it and see what is going on. because what i tried to do with that, the next logical step, i believe, to the activism that you represent. when i left the white house, i knew that i wanted to continue to work on things that i cared about when i was president, where i could still have an influence. the last phrase is important. the right thing about being a former president is that you can say whatever you want. but nobody cares what you have to say anymore unless your wife becomes the secretary of state, then they only care when you screw up. [applause] hillary and i basically switched roles. when i first met her she was already active in a lot of non- governmental organizations. i just thought politics would be my life. when i became president under her influence, i began to met with leaders in turkey, africa, south asia, all of these places that i went. i thought that i would like to do that work when i got out. it has changed my perspective a little bit. most of the time when i was in politics, i noticed we debated two questions. what are you going to do and how much money are you going to spend on it? both of those questions are important but i would argue that in the first few decades of this new century, there is a third question which is equally if not more important, which is how do you propose to do it? how do you propose to turn your good intentions into positive changes for people around the world? that is basically what non- governmental groups do. that is the business i am in. the "how" business. we offer the world's least expensive, high-quality retro virals to 2 million people in 70 countries. [applause] about two-thirds of all of the children that get pediatric medicine. last week after working for years only with the generic drug companies principally in india and south africa, we announced our first big agreement with a large pharmaceutical company, pfizer, the biggest of all, has agreed to work with us to cut the price by 60% of the only drug we know that is affected at treating tubular chlorosis with people who have had aids for a long time. in other cases, all this medicine almost makes the conditions were spread half a million people die from this disease who have aids. the interactions of the madison and the t.b. medicine is often not good. the fact that they were willing to cut the price 60% will save a couple hundred thousand lives a year within two years. that is answering the how question. we tried to do the same thing in climate change where we are working with 40 cities around the world to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by retrofitting public housing, or big public buildings, or changing the street lights, or putting in new led streetlights in los angeles, or making ports more efficient, are working on better public transportation. my presidential library is the only platinum leed building in the entire system, and that is something you can help on. [applause] i say this to set up the point i want to make now. all this is important, but politics matters, too. it matters whether we get a good congress -- a good climate change bill out of the congress for the president to sign. it matters to get a new agreement, and the one depends on the other. [applause] it matters whether we correct the single most significant efficiency of our economic recovery, which i do believe it is well underway, 9% of the home owners eligible to mortgage relief have gotten it because too many of the people find it more profitable to collect fees for closing on houses and then selling them again. we have to find a way to do that. that matters. [applause] it matters whether this congress passes a comprehensive health- care reform bill that the president can sign. [cheers and applause] it also matters that notwithstanding the work that i do, it matters a lot, and i can see it already, that we have taken a new approach in our relationships with the rest of the world, offering a hand in partnership wherever possible. it matters. [applause] heathery is concluding a trip to africa now with the only female elected president on the continent in liberia. a couple of days ago, she was in the congo, one of the most difficult refugee camps in the entire world. i don't know what you think, but i think the american secretary of state should be in the places of human misery around the world. i think they should speak up for rape victims, for women who cannot get an education, make a living, or do these things. i think that is a very important thing. [applause] consistent with the message president obama has delivered in gonna and in the united states, and every other place he has traveled, america wants to share the future. we would like to lead the world in a progressive way but we do not want to dominate it, and we know we can't. we seek a feature of shared prosperity and peace. these things matter, and you can help them happen. now, i would like to offer a few observations about this. first of all, briefly on the politics. we have entered a new era of progressive politics, which if we do it right, it could last 30 to 40 years. [applause] it is something i have literally spent my entire adult life working for. i was a 20-year-old intern in the united states congress working for my senator who is chairman of the foreign relations committee when the last conservative era started in the midterm elections of 1966, when the democrats suffered terrible losses, and i knew after that it would be very difficult for us to hold the white house. the people were voting on fear and division, upset about civil rights, women's rights, by saying rights in the street, vietnam, you name it. the republicans developed in that election a message that exploded the resentments and exploded the fears and exploited the divisions. we had a chance to overcome it in 1968, the first election in which i was old enough to vote, because robert kennedy explicitly tried to reach across the divide, but when he was killed we lost our chance and they won. president nixon who was actually a communist compared to most people that came after him in the republican party -- [laughter] he believed in the affirmative action, he signed a bill creating an environmental protection agency. he still thought arithmetic mattered when you put budgets together. [laughter] he went to china. they were really good at dividing people and building on resentment, the silent majority, and all of that, which was a racial call to signal, really. they went along with that and tell president reagan came along with his unique contribution to this. reagan could tell a story like nobody. he convinced everybody that the government would screw up a two- car parade. trickle-down economics was actually good for poor people and middle-class people, he said. with those two constraint, the cultural division and a corporative economics, they managed to triple the government debt in 12 years while in comes continued to drop for middle- class people. and then came the second president bush. i will say more about that in a minute. from 68 to 2000, the democrats only won the presidency twice. once because of watergate and president carter won and then when i was elected in the country was in trouble economically. i was reelected partially because the country was changing and part because people believed the government could make people's lives better. in this whole period, the republicans had a bass boat of about 45%, and ours was about 40%, which should tell you all you need to know about why we did not win the white house very much. we either had to be twice as good as they were as politicians or we had to have very bad conditions. all natural elections are determined by three things. the political culture, the conditions of the time, in the quality of the candidates. sometime in my second term, our political basis began to even out. partly because of the performance but i have to give credit where credit is due. i think the biggest reason because america was moving away from being a biracial nation to being a multi ratio, a multi religious nation, more oriented psychologically to solutions. in 2000, in 1998, the democrats won the midterm elections for the first time since 1822. thanks in no small measures from some of you in this audience. in 2000, the republicans got close enough to win 5-4 in the supreme court in a decision that i will think will go down as one of the five worst decisions ever handed down by the united states supreme court. [applause] but to give credit where credit is due, president bush ran a terrific campaign in 2000. it was a brilliant slogan, which reflected his guide to understanding that the country had changed, they would not tolerate overt racism any more, plus he had a good relationship with the latino community in texas, and a fairly progressive stance on immigration at the time. they haven't quite come over to the side that the government should be an integral partner to our future designs. compassion conservatism meant to swing voters, not their base, hey, i will give you everything bill clinton did with a smaller government and a bigger tax cut. wouldn't you like that? but then, after he won, he ran into the old adage that life's greatest curse can be answered prayers because the sense the first time president nixon was elected in 1968 and president reagan added to their message, the american people actually got to see what would happen if they could do what they had been talking about all of this time. they did not like it very much. in 2002 and two dozen for elections occurred in the shadow of 9/11 could we never replaced the president during an ongoing conflict but the margin of victory was the smallest since 1916. in 2006, the democrats won the congress. just like 40 years earlier, in 1966, it was the canary and a coal mine. i told hillary if we don't nominate a convicted felon, we are going to win in 2008. [laughter] there is nothing they can do about it. so look at what happened in 2008. we had a better candidate. they had terrible conditions. and the culture it was with us. america is a different place today. we don't have time for these divisions over race, gender, sexual orientation, or anything else. we know we live in an interdependent country and an interdependent world. everybody knows that one major significance election is that he is the first african american president and for people at a certain age, that is a very big deal. it lifts a burden off of the history of the presidency and allows parents to tell their kids that they can live to their dreams. that is important. [applause] but for your purposes, the second element of significance of the obama election may be even more important. particularly for those that are younger, for your future. this was the first presidential election to occur in a country that is self consciously communitarian. that is not always more liberal on the issues but understanding that we are going to rise or fall together. we don't have time for these phony divisions anymore. we'll have time to pretend that we don't need to care what other countries think of us anymore. we are too diverse and in every other way. for a long time, hawaii was the only state that had no majority race. for the last several years, california has had no majority race unless immigration slowed to nothing, the united states would have no majority race by 2015. . . in order for them to join, and they have to abandon -- you know, you ought to go to one of those congressional health care meetings. you do really well there. [laughter] i will be glad to talk about that. if you will sit down and let me tell. -- talk, but did you stand up and scream will not be able to talk the other guys love to have the. -- talk. the other guys would love to have the. here we are. it is a different world. it is not like the 1990's. you could not deliver me any support in congress and they voted by a veto-proof majority in both houses against my attempts to let gays serve in the military and the media supported them. they raise all kinds of problems. most of you attacked me and says the congress. that is the truth. secondly --it is true. you know, you may have noticed that presidents are not dictators. they were about to vote for the old policy by margins exceeding 80% in the house and exceeding 70% in the senate. they gave test vote to send me a message that they were going to reverse any attempt i made by executive order to force them to accept gays in the military. the public opinion is more strongly in our favor than it was 16 years ago. i have continued to support it. the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff under may was against lifting gays serve and is now in favor of it. this is a different world. that is the poin and tryt to make. -- the point i am trying to say. when general colin powell came up with this, it was defined while he was chairman much differently than it was implemented. he said it he will accept this, here is what he will do. we will not pursue anyone. any military members out of uniform will be free to march in gay rights parade, go to political meetings. whatever mailings they get, what ever they do, none will be a basis for dismissal. it turned out to be a broad because of the enormous reaction against it among the middle level officers and down. nobody regrets how this was implemented it anymore than i do. the congress also put that into law by a veto-proof majority. many of your friends voted for that. they believe the explanation about how it would be eliminated. i hated what happened. i regret it. i did not think that the time and the choice. if i wanted any progress to be made at all. can you believe they spent $400,000 to get rid of a speaker recently? the thing that change may forever on do not ask do not tell was when i learned gay certification below were allowed to risk their lives in the first gulf war, their commanders knew the war gay, as soon as the war was over they kicked them out. that is all i needed to know. that was all anybody need to know that this policy should be changed. [applause] while we are at it, let me say one thing. the reason i signed delma was -- i thought the question about whether gays should mary should be left up to states and religious organizations. if we were attempting to head off to send a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage to the states. if you look at the 11 referendum much later in 2004, i think it is obvious that something had to be done to try to keep the republican congress from sending back. the president doesn't get to be to that. i did not like signing delma and i did not like the constraints that were put on benefits and i have done everything i could. i am proud to say the state department was the first federal department to restore benefits to gay partners in the obama administration. i think we are going forward in the right direction. all these things illustrate the point i'm trying to make. america has rapidly moved to a different place on a lot of these issues. what we have to decide is what we are going to do about them. the republicans are sitting around reading for the president to fail. one reason people are so hysterical about all this health care meetings is they know they have no chance to beat healthcare unless they can mortify with the rooted fears. why did they know that? they do not have the filibuster this time. last time all that was necessary -- i offered to write a health care bill with senator dole to do you cannot let the democrats pass any kind of health care or we will be a minority party for a generation they had 45 senators. they got their filibuster. this time there is no 45 senators thanks to a lot of you. there is no filibuster option. there is no option year but to terrify people. let me say a word to about healthcare. reword or two about health care. -- a word or two about healthcare. there are three things that make healthcare really hard. first of all, it's complexity. anything that complex can be easily misunderstood and this honestly manipulated. it is hard. secondly, and not a step that will make the most difference over the long run is to cause doubt. you saw the cbo giving a body blow to the house. why is that? the only things they can count today are tax increases and medicare and medicaid cuts. they are tangible and hon. things. we know how much money and electronic medical records will save it directly. it is hard to know when those things will materialize. we know that delivery systems like the guy sing your health plan in eastern pennsylvania which has hundreds of doctors following what the president wants to do has enabled them to offer a guarantee to every in early that if you have any complications with surgery, and the complication with surgery, within 90 days of leaving the hospital and you have to come back, they paid for it not you. it will be no cost to you and no change in your premium. the error rate has dropped to nearly zero because it has gone down and do not have the same kind of inflation that to do elsewhere. if you have a delivery system for doctors are paid for performance not procedure like the mayo clinic, you can get higher quality care that much more modest costs. the mayo program was cheaper than 70% of the alternatives anywhere in america offering the same kinds of coverage. it is hard. the third problem the president has was articulated by machiavelli in the 15th century. he said there is nothing so difficult in all of human affairs than to change the established order of things. because, i will switch now to clinton's jargon -- because the people who got it are certain of what they will lose in the people who will gain are uncertain of their advance. [applause] if we spend 16% of gdp on health care in canada spends 11%, that means we are spot in all of competitors a hundred billion dollars a year. if we ensure 84% endanger 100%, where is the money going? follow the money. that is what we are all facing. that is what the president and congress is facing. what should you do about it? if you do nothing for plan is good enough, it is time for you to advocate a public auction. i personally favor that. i always have. i also favor letting people buy into the federal plan because there are 36 different options of the single people who would want a more catastrophic type coverage. there are all kinds of options here. first things first . i do not know how many of you saw the present town hall meeting. i thought he did a terrific job with it, because he may be essential case. i read a lot of your blogs on healthcare. they basically assume that everybody is reading -- that is reading has is a base level that you do. they start off here and go up. i do. so i like him. the president did an important thing that only a president can do unless everybody is reinforcing its. i would like to suggest that if he did not see what he said, you go back and look at it. even if you want to disagree what is in the house or senate plan, start with what he said. he had a three-point argument. number one, the worst thing of all is sticking with the status quo. it is a gripping america, making families insecure, and undermining the future of the country. [applause] in but am -- a lot of americans were touched about the man screaming at senator dingle. i have been working at this for 17 years now. i went to 300 towns in america in march through may last year. 300. i did not meet in the disabled children worried about losing their coverage. i'm a disabled children and their parents to a party lost their coverage who did that get in a covered in for worried about whether they are going to double to put food on their table. that is far more important. you have to make the case that the worst thing we can do is the status quo. you have to figure out the three or four things at 100% will agree on. it has to be in the bill. and the three or four things and none of us wanting a bill that we are being accused of. helping someone draw up a living will is not the same thing as an by the seniors to die. [applause] it is a legitimate thing. in order to save our expenditures, -- when they have their wits about them, there is nothing anti-life or anti- american about when hillary's dad had a stroke, he hung on for a long time. with the first things we did after we went to that experience, both of us, was to make out a living will. that is not have anything to do with all these crazy charges that are being made. then you can say whatever you want about what is wrong with the senate or house plan. whenever you believe is fine. trying to get the best bill you can is fun. first, we have to win the big arguments. the worst thing to do is nothing. hear the things that everybody wants. hear the things that nobody wants. -- here are the things that everybody wants. here are the things that nobody wants. the president need your help. because need your help. this is really important. i wish many of you would write -- it is not all of the morally right thing to do, it is politically imperative for the democrats to pass a health-care bill now because one thing we know -- [applause] one thing we know is that if you get out there and do not prevail the victors did to rewrite history. -- get to rewrite history. everybody knows what happened in 1993 and 1994. a bunch of them are just wrong. of the two or three examples. not to go back there. i want to point out what could happen now. we have to preserve this progress of majority. we have to. everybody knows that hillary presented a complicated 1300 page bill which would have broken the backs of the federal statutes. what she should have done was refused to present a bill and it does have her committee issued a report to congress with recommendations. here is the problem with that account. the bill she presented to account for hundred more pages of federal law that it put in. it reduced the number of pages the federal law devoted to health care. it simplified the system from what it and then was. why do people not know that? the insurance companies got to rewrite history. second thing, we actually pleaded with the chairman of the house ways and means committee to let us send a report with recommendations and have the right to the bill. he said of the court i will not take this up and less to send me a bill. there is not enough base level of knowledge to resist it. we will never get anywhere. this will not happen unless you get a bill. we did as we were required to do by the congressional order. the point i'm trying to make is if you want to do that again. i do not care how low they drive support with misinformation, the minute the president signed a health care reform bill, approval will go up because americans are inherently optimistic. secondly, within a year when all those bad things they say are going to happen do not happen in the good things to begin to happen, approval will explode. we cannot let people lose their nerves. i am pleading with you, it is ok with me if you want to keep everybody on. a vice is a big you do not agree with, criticize me. try to keep this thing in the lane of getting something done. we need to pass a bill and move this thing forward. it is imperative. it is so important. i feel the same way about climate change. [applause] a.q. dentists, the bill that the house is working on -- if you notice, the bill that the house is working on says it will not reduce emissions. once it will be twice as much as they thought. it was all due to the theme with cap and trade in everything to do with accelerating our movement to efficient buildings, accelerating our movement to efficient electricity generation and closing some of these old coal powered power plants. again i say the same thing. the president stuck his neck out here. the congress that its neck out. we have to have a bill. will never get china and india to play unless we have a bill. if you want the progress, but look of what really works. -- let's look at what really works. i'm asking for your help having nothing to do with washington. we work with 40 cities on different continents to help them reduce their greenhouse gases. we work with 1100 cities to get them discount clean energy technology. we are trying to retrofit the empire state building to cut emissions 40%. i met to the budget people in puerto rico yesterday you want to make their island energy independence with a clean energy and efficiency. these are things that can be done. there are a lot of practical things that need to be advanced before we can get there. i will give you one example. this cash for clunkers program has worked great. it has been better than all the mechanisms of reorganizing the auto industry. we ought to put that on steroids when we can sell electric cars and buy them. there ought to be a six month waiting list for every electric car that any company can turn out before the first one is sold. because of the financial incentives. we should advocate it. it would make a huge difference. the other thing i would like to say is, the biggest thing we can do to help the president economically and help our country is to concentrate on the least sexy parts of the climate change debate, efficiency. the american council of energy efficiency says we can get half the greenhouse gas savings we need by 2015 with only efficiency. mckinsey says if we spend $520 million on energy efficiency we can save almost $1.20 trillion in the lower electric bills. what is the problem? the problem is there is no parallel financing for clean energy in america. if you want to build a coal powered power plant, began finance of over 20 years. 12 building a clear one, 30 years. california has decoupled their rates. a few others have followed suit. california will let the utility finance this. that is the best we need to get banks to do it. before the banking collapse, i have the agreement of five banks spending a billion dollars on retrofit as long as the savings were guaranteed by energy service companies like honeywell. the consumer paid back only for utility savings. then the bank's collapse. they do not want to do it anymore. let's take taxpayer money and create a small business guarantee fund like the one for the sba and has 10 times as much retrofitting down. that is the kind of thing you need to think about. i do not want to bore you with statistics. let me ask you to think about one thing. the banks of american today $900 billion in uncommitted cash reserves. that means that tomorrow, in theory, they can make $9 trillion in loans. do you think that would end the recession? think about that. that is their lending capacity. if we could dramatically accelerate the retrofitting of all large public buildings, housing projects, everything with user-friendly systems, we could put more than 1 million people to work. we the lower people's power bills. we could close 22% of markell power power plants -- coal howard power plants. we are not doing it because we have not found user-friendly systems that have parallel financing. this is the kind of stuff i spend my life working on. i hope that you will think about that. that is the last thing i want to say. i hope i see more blocks sides saying that this is what i want president obama to do. this is what i want congress to do. this is why i think the trades are wrong. here is something you can do, reader, to help solve the problem no matter what is going on in washington, d.c. [applause] i wanted this to last 40 years. i want us to be mindful that sometimes we may have to take less than a full load. in 1992, i ran for president saying that i wanted to have 260,000 young people serve in america. by the time i left office, a total of 700,000 had. i just went to president obama's bill signing saying there will have 2002 under the thousand people a year -- 220,000 people a year. it is still a great thing for america. we have to be willing to understand that. when i was president, we started having the federal government issue and guaranteed student loans. it saved every student $1,300 in repayment costs for every $10,000 they borrowed. in eight years, the taxpayers pay $4 million to save the students $9 billion. now president obama wants to make that a universal program in america. do i think we should do it? you bet i do. is it worth the 16 years it took? absolutely. the secretary of education is going to state after state asking them to abolish the limit on charter schools. as long as there are standards and accountability. when i campaigned, every advisor i had said i was crazy as a loon because there is only one charter school in america and their only two states that were authorized. when i left, there 2000. i left money for another thousand. if arne duncan has his way, there'll be 10 or 20,000. was it worth a long time to get it right? you bet it is. you hold the seeds of a genuine revolution in our public life. you do it by mobilizing people and generating emotions and getting people to think. people trust you. even people who do not agree with you, they believe that you believe what you put down. they do not believe that you budget the facts -- fudged the facts. if you make a mistake, it is a mistake of the head not the heart. they believe they can engage with you in this debate. they believe we can create a great burgeoning american community where we argue these things out. i am not against are doing. we should not pretend that we are all going to may [unintelligible] we should realize that we have been given this staggering responsibilities. i have been waiting 40 years, all my life i worked for a time when people believed our common humanity was more important than our interesting differences. all my life, i waited for a time when people would in theory believe that we have to search for more win/win solutions and system win/lose solutions. i waited for a time when people with respect and find fascinating all these differences that make america. you are the trustees of this moment. most of you work like crazy to get it. we have to make the most of it. brian miller is living in a state that this pretty evenly divided. this battle is not over. we have big time responsibilities. it is an honor for all of us to be alive and to carry the responsibility. we cannot be in the peanut gallery. we have to-- we cannot ask the president or congress to do it alone. you have proved this the do you prove did work. do not give up now. for goodness' sake, do not the downtrodden and not get pessimistic. do not lose your energy because things do not work out the way you want. it will not take you 40 years to get the legislation you want. it cannot take 40 years to get america on the right side of global warming. politics better prepare you can help. in the four years of my second second term, w[unintelligible] that is the suspect i am most proud of. -- the statistic i am most proud of. this matters. this matters. in these four years and the next four years and four years after that, we can go far beyond all of the changes if all of us do what we ought to do. this could be the most exciting time in all of human history. are there dangers, yes. we are assaulting the inequality and instability and on sustainability that the devil of the modern world in america. we have good people and government. they are working hard. they are trying to do the right thing. so are you. allegis all stay in the same boat so we can reap the reward -- let's just all stay in the same boat so we can read the same reward. thank you. god bless you. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2009] >> of our live coverage continues tomorrow morning on c- span2. former vermont gov. howard dean holds a town hall meeting on health care. that begins a 9:00 eastern. vader on c-span, pa. center arlen specter and a challenger will give remarks to the conference. that is live at 11:00 a.m. eastern. tomorrow we will hear from a republican who is running for senator specter's senate seat. he is attending an event hosted by americans for prosperity. live coverage begins its 7:40 p.m. eastern. up next, i was senator chuck grassley hold a meeting on health care. then david sloan ways in on the health-care debate. robert gates talks reporter about i iraq and afghanistan. >> three days of peace, love, and music. 40 years ago, a half million people gathered at the farm for woodstock. saturday, michael texas behind the scenes at 9:00 p.m. eastern on book tv. >> voters are respected to go to the polls in national elections next spring. this weekend, david cameron on how government would change current domestic policy. >> now center chuck grassley of iowa host a town hall meeting to discuss health care legislation. he takes questions from constituents on health care and other issues. lawmakers from across the country are holding similar meetings this month. from the united methodist church in athens -- afton, iowa, this is an hour and 10 minutes. church, this is an hour and 10 minutes. [applause] >> will you stand up here with meat and when people raised their hand for questions you can call on them. -- stand up withme. -- stand up here with me. this gentleman is going to ask the first question. i will make a few remarks before he asks the first question, but then he is going to stand up here, because i do not want anybody to think i want to avoid taking questions from anybody. there will be three times as many people raise their hands as we will have time to answer questions. so if you get mad because you do not due to question asked, it mad at him, did not get mad at me. [laughter] >> that proposition was made only if i got to ask the first question. >> the other thing is, i want to thank the methodist church for opening up their facility for us. [applause] i have been in the city hall before, and it was big enough, but there are issues now that many people are interested in. we want to accommodate as many people as we can. the last time i was near the pulpit of a methodist church, except as a person sitting in the pews, i used to get a lot of invitations to speak in churches on sunday for the sermon. i suppose they wanted to find out if a person in politics could be a believer in jesus christ. i always used to speak about second corinthians 5:17 on being ambassadors for jesus christ, on being saved to three jesus christ, how it takes the responsibility of spreading the word about jesus christ and those sorts of things. but i have not been asked to do that lately, so maybe i am not much of a preacher. prior to 10 years ago, but -- i bet i did it six or seven times a year. we are here in the first place, because you know my policy of getting every county, every year, to have a town meeting. you are the 2844th town meeting i have had since i have been in the united states senate. [applause] i have two more scheduled, and i have been in 71 before today, so some of the things i have been doing on health care reform are reflected in what i have learned from iowans over the past few months that have held a 71 town meetings. also, we are here with such a large crowd because people fear for america. [applause] i believe is a culmination of things that the health care issue has brought to a head, nationalization of factories, banks, things of that nature, debts that are tripling over the next 10 years if we stay on the course we are on. people are concerned about the future of the country. i never thought this would have voted on all these issues in january and february and back in the time when i voted against the stimulus bill and the bailout and the appropriation bill, and the four trillion dollars budget that was adopted that will triple the national debt, but i would be -- 08 to beat holding these town meetings if i had voted that way. before you ask the first question, i would just like to say a little bit -- first of all, we will take questions on any subject. this does not have to be health care. if you want to bring up other things, bring them up, because i will let you set the agenda. we are having these large turnout because of the health- care issue. there has been a lot of concern expressed about what my views might be and what i am doing in washington, whether i am listening to the people of iowa and those sort of things. first of all, i express to you that i think we have the best healthcare system in the world. it does not mean is perfect. -- it does not mean it is perfect. there are things that could be improved. some people have a hard time getting health insurance, and it is awful expensive, and a lot of other things you can say. my goal, the principles i go by, and i will not express all the principals in the opening here, but some of them will be expressed in response to your questions or my listening to your comments. i am not going to do anything that is going to nationalize health care in america. [applause] i do not intend to do anything that will allow government bureaucrats to get between you and your doctor. [applause] i am very concerned that we do not do the things that lead to rationing, like what happens in other companies were the government runs things. i am particularly concerned about government as they did in england putting a dollar amount on life, so that the older you are, the less health care you might get as opposed to somebody younger. i think that every life has value, and i think that we want to make sure that if you like the health insurance that you have, you ought to be able to keep it. i do not want a government-run plan, because i think that is a step in the direction of a canadian-style health care system, based on studies that have been done that people will be crowded out and premiums will go up. saying you have the government running everything. i believe that is something we can legitimately fear. they'd need -- they use the word that we need competition. i see government not as a competitor but as a predator. from that standpoint, we have to be careful not taking that first step. i am telling you that i am not for that. i hope most of you. i have been on television so much thathis year, you think i d it before. i know that you are all working hard and paying taxes and doing what you have to do to support your family probably do not want as much television as i think you do. i wanted to say that again for you. there is probably a lot of other principles of i ought to go into, but i think they will come out in your questions. maybe just a note here that reminds you of something. just in case you wondered -- i didn't know if you read in the papers -- you get it some places. grassley is sitting down with other republicans and 23 democrats to talk. -- two or three democrats to talk. he can raise with you ought to do that. i hope that i am not -- if i were not doing that, the lust for five months of the standing around -- the last 45 but i would be standing around with my feet to my desk. i think you hire me to keep on top of things. i am a person that believes you are born to be on top of things room and said oxide the room. you have to realize that we you have to realize that we you have to realize that we study this in government. we have a checks and balance system of government. the congress checks the president. the present checks the congress. other party responsible. the other party responsible. otherwise they are not doing their job. that is more true in the senate than the house because you have to have the super majority to get anything done. it gives minority some rights. the republican minority is not a very big minority. the democrats have 60 votes that they can do anything they want to do. there are a lot of democrats that have some questions about some of the other democrats want. sometimes by working together you can bring some sensibility to it. if you cannot, you just say what is not write about it and fight it that way. it seems to me that there is nothing wrong with talking -- and maybe one thing i do not have to worry about. you heard the president on his town meeting yesterday. he was hinting that he is about ready to ask his people to go ahead with a strict bipartisan bill anyway. if that is what he wants to do, he can do that. i am not walking away from the table. i am being pushed away from the table. i figured that you paid me to do your job. these a the principles that i use -- these are the principles that i use when we talk and make a firm agreement. maybe cannot. the way i do things, there is no agreement until you have a total agreement. that is where we are. i think i am ready to take your first question. i am interrupting you. [laughter] you are going to see me taking notes here. it does not mean i'm not paying attention. if i do not write something down, by the way, if anybody wants to hold me up i have enough wire -- look at all these. i could be a terrorist in baghdad. [laughter] i'm going to take notes on every issue that comes up. >> this is not directed at you personally. you can fix the health care crisis by doing one of two things, eliminate the 11 page 31100 page document that congress will not read or understand and get everybody in this room the same health care plan that covers congress. [applause] it that is not agreeable, then we will like everyone in congress or all elected officials to be under the same health care plan that we are. if congress cannot do that, you are at the you root of the problem that is distressed, lack of integrity and do what is best that america. do not tell us what is right for our health care plans. >> my goal was not to have a government plan. this is the first step toward canadian-style government-run health care. if there would be plan, i think congress should be a part of it. it is not based because i am here to look good to you, but i need to give you background where i did something similar 13 years ago. it took five or six years to get it done. congress has passed several laws affecting u.s. business people and employers. there were and safety laws, management laws. congress exempted themselves from every one of those. i thought, how can i represent the small businesses you are able to take care of themselves. how the represents small business if i do not have to abide by the law and i have a work area that you call an office. ocea never came to my office. we had two sets of laws, one for the rest the country and one for capitol hill. i got what is called the government accountability act passed in 1995 so that all those laws applied to congress and the same principle ought to apply to what you are asking about. >> i have a question about cap and trade. it you have expressed -- you have expressed the will probably not be voting for cap and trade. are you willing to support that? are you willing to strengthen other standards independent of cap and trade? >> i know the cap and trade. i knew the renewable portfolio standard issued. what is your question? >> if it was independent of cap and trade? >> the answer is renewable portfolio standards would say as a matter of policy. a certain amount of electricity from renewable sources like wind comics cetera. the answer is it i would support it at a 15% rate. someone -- some people want 20%. i support 15%. the further it out it is like 25% or 20% is more astute. i have voted twice in the past four years for that. i am for a renewable portfolio plan. does that enter your question? -- answer your question? >> i have more of a statement. when 9/11 happened, i was terrified but i'm more terrified now. i thought my government was going to protection. now i'm afraid my government. banks are taken over. now a i reading now i feel our health care is taken over and we are moving -- now i feel our health care system is taken over and we are moving toward socialism. >> i can listen to more people. how can you and the other conservatives control them? >> what can conservatives in congress do about the things that she fears and she has mentioned, a trend toward socialized medicine that she used examples of general motors and banks and things of that nature. what can we do? we are in the minority. it makes it very difficult. sometimes people think it is not going exactly right. that is assuming republicans are sticking together. it seems to me we have two responsibilities. one come to see if we can change programs that are way far out so that they are getting bipartisan support and changing them. if he cannot do that or even if they are changed not enough, then you have to expose what they are and you do that through debate and you do it through your no vote. if you are going to be irresponsible minority, then you have to have today a response walleye more -- if you are going to be a response to a minority, you have to have something to say. i alluded to the president that he alluded that he wants to go to his own way. then we are in a position to think the things that we think can improve our health care system. there are conservative senators as i can work with in regard to that. the chances of getting it adopted a probably not very good unless turnouts like this changes the mind of members of the majority party. eventually, every two years to have an election and an opportunity to express your views and there are significant times when the elections and make consequences. we are finding that out right now. you can study history and find out that people change their mind from time to time. >> i've heard 40 million uninsured people. 10 million of that is another i have heard. that includes illegal immigrants. that is 30 million. that is only 10%. but will have to answer of a problem, why do we fix that 10% as some of overhauling -- if we only have 10% of a problem, why do not we fix that 10% and some of overhauling the entire system? >> i think to make a good point. -- you make a good point. it is based on the proposition that more things ought to be done. one of those principles is to make sure that people that do not have insurance have insurance. you are zeroing in on those. depending upon what these town meetings mean to different congressman that if a comprehensive program does not go through or cannot get through, then you will find some incremental changes along the lines of what you are suggesting, more a day rifle shot approach as opposed to a shotgun approach. i'll tell you why people in congress are already concerned about it. there are others that have come to the conclusion that maybe some of the things of your being proposed and not good. i had one senator that i will not one senator -- >> who is that? >> i will not give you his name. i think a private conversation ought to be kept private. he said to me as we were going to a vote, he says, you need to slow things down. you need to slow things down. he said that we need to do things more incrementally. you did not use those w

Related Keywords

Vietnam ,Republic Of ,Arlington ,Texas ,United States ,Vermont ,East Texas ,Pennsylvania ,Allegheny County ,Turkey ,China ,Minnesota ,California ,Methodist Church ,Iowa ,Washington ,District Of Columbia ,San Francisco ,Mexico ,India ,Spring Lake ,North Carolina ,Hampshire ,New York ,Los Angeles ,South Africa ,Canada ,United Methodist Church ,Iran ,Afghanistan ,Congo ,Florida ,Virginia ,Liberia ,Toronto ,Ontario ,United Kingdom ,Puerto Rico ,Iraq ,Baghdad ,Las Vegas ,Nevada ,Maryland ,Ohio ,Dallas ,Capitol Hill ,Hawaii ,Iowans ,Americans ,America ,Canadian ,Mexican ,Californians ,British ,American ,David Brock ,Ryan Gramm ,Alberto Gonzales ,Brad Miller ,David Cameron ,Arne Duncan ,David Lawrence ,States William Jefferson Clinton ,Chuck Roche ,Chuck Grassley ,Adam Bonin ,Colin Powell ,Brian Miller ,Robert Kennedy ,Donna Edwards ,Michael Vick ,Monica Crowley ,Lyndon Johnson ,Dan Onorato ,David Sloan ,Vern Robinson ,Barney Frank ,Ellery Jarrett Valerie ,Thomas Jefferson ,Brett Miller ,Simon Rosenberg ,Jimmy Carter ,Barack Obama ,Donovan Mcnabb ,Jesus Christ ,Debra Bowen ,Sarah Palin ,Andrew Carnegie ,Brian Jennings ,Chuck Rocha ,John F Kennedy ,Michael Veeck ,Sonia Sotomayor ,