Transcripts For CSPAN Washington Journal 20130303

It could send us an email or tweet. The question we are asking this morning is in a word how would you describe sequestration . 202 is the area code. You can also join us at email, journal cspan. Org. In the but some of the headlines from outside the beltway, beginning with to the boston sunday globe. A focus on afghanistan. In arizona, the arizona republic, the gallup poll has been asking many of you what you think of sequestration and we found this. In a word, how would you describe sequestration and the larger the word the more often it is used. From disappointed and good to scary. The Washington Post focusing on the politics of sequestration, obama sees 2014 as the key to his legacy. Theyre right they write she is a republican from washington state, here is what she had to say from sequestration. These devastating acrossthe board cuts imposed by the president will affect the lives of so many hardworking americans. Yet this week the president traveled 180 miles to virginia instead of travelling 1. 5 miles to senator harry reid is office office. Reid ands offis the senate never passed a bill to replace the sequestered. In the last year the house of representatives have passed those republics two proposals to replace the sequester with smarter spending cuts. In addition we are looking at ways to close tax loopholes and clean up our tax codes so that we can lower rates and help create jobs. These ideas get government out of the way so we can bring jobs home and preserve the american dream. The president wants to take a different route. He wants to continue singling out americans for tax increases, even after he raised taxes just two months ago to avert the fiscal cliff. The American People know full well that if they give this white house more tax revenue it will be spent on new similar projects and government programs. The president must stop using this debate as an excuse to raise taxes and start seizing this opportunity to cut spending. Host the republican response from the national journal, this morning those were the words used by the president to described the cuts on america by the president. But the president didnt do is accept any responsibility for the sequestration that took effect friday. House Speaker John Boehner was what do they do . They blame each other. That is Available Online at nationaljournal. Com. Some of you weighing in on our twitter account. In one word, necessary. From jupiter, florida on the independent line caller this is only the beginning of what needs to be done. Host what do you want done . Caller cutting. If people want to spend money for things that are not necessary, the money has to come from someplace. Unfortunately the sequestration might not be the best way to cut. It has to start someplace. Host we will go to charles from connecticut on the republican line. Caller necessary. If they dont stop spending sooner or later we are going to end up another greece. You cannot keep spending money you do not have. How they are going to get the money they need, i do not know. One suggestion i have is eliminate Social Security. About three counties in texas were in the kit were independent from Social Security. Host 1 of the leading industries in this town, lobbying and lobbyists. , lobbyists fight again sequester cuts moving into new phase. People can receive instructions how to get in touch with their member of congress. The Transportation Security Administration and Border Protection will make people think twice about their work or a fence or Summer Getaways if sequestration states into effect. In a word how would you describe sequestration . George is on the phone from kentucky. Good morning. Caller i believe the word is necessary. It is just a republican ruse to not obamas second term good. They failed to stop him from a second election so they are going to use this sequester as a bad administration. Host the story Available Online act the wall street journal, saying you can read more online wsj. Com back to your calls, frank joining us from buffalo, new york. A while. Ts been to make a point, i would call it a Social Security has only been in effect for a number of years. Host about 85. Guest we have been increased on Social Security twice. Host when Social Security took effect into the mid 1930s the average age group was 63. Now the average american is living to about 80 years old. Caller i hate to say this, everyone has a loved one in their family. When you get to 86 in the next 10 years there is going to be a big domino fall. Do you realize that 50 people in one city alone, buffalo, new york, per day die. The main point is this, you have x number of baby boomers retiring every day. If they do not replace those new jobs with new people shame on them. For that generation, they need to pump up the money for their Social Securitys so they will have it later and you should be working in reverse today because there are no manufacturing jobs. People are retiring, those people are going to work. How many are there of us . 70 million . Host it is 10,000 per day on average. Caller it is called arithmetic. Host thank you for the call. There is this from our twitter page. Skyfall, the taxpayers pay back. Fromound out this morning tha the town talk, a government now borrowing 35 cents of every dollar and since reduces borrowing by two since and nothing bad happened. Of you this morning a view this morning. Mark is joining us from philadelphia. How would you describe sequestration . Caller a disaster. To all of these people say we have spending problems, here are some facts. The largest Multinational Corporation in this country in recent years have made two hundred 5 billion and have not paid 1 cent in taxes. Gov. Romney made 32 million in 20102011 and paid a 10 tax rate. My wife and i are both working people. I did my tax return last year. My wife and i 35 . My effective tax rate is 25 more than gov. Romney. We have a huge revenue problem, let us get the facts out here. Lets close tax loopholes that allow facebook and to ge and horizon and all of these corporations not to pay any income taxes and get refunds. Host the republican argument is they have already given the president a tax increase to wealthier americans, we are not going to give him another one. Caller there is going to be a tax increase on facebook, on ge. From 0 to 10 . Come on. If these corporations were wealthy individuals, maybe they go from 10 to 15 . You cannot fund the operations of this federal government with just middleclass taxes alone. Host mitt romney is making his first public appearance since losing the election on Fox News Sunday. He talked about sequestration, calling it a missed opportunity for the president. We will have more details on other programs coming up. In a word, describe what sequestration means. The Gallup Organization has taken a look at some of the words americans surveyed on. Larger see the the word the more often it was used. Jim has this on our twitter page front page of the new york times, let me share with you a couple of censuses of sentences she wrote this morning the front page analyzing where we have been and where we are going regarding sequestration. Bill is on the phone from massachusetts. In a word how would you describe sequestration . You are calling on the republican line. Caller overdue. And thee mid 60s advent of Lyndon Johnsons great society, we kicked the can down the road 70 times. We have raised the debt limit over 70 times. We have 535 individual pepyses. We need term limits. Sequestration is the version of a time out. Host thank you for the call. This on our twitter page the president using his weekly address to take aim at congress and is using it to work out an agreement wit. Here is more for president obama. [video clip] it sounds like youre saying this is a republican problem. Give me an example of what i might do. What i am suggesting is i put forward a plan that calls for serious spending cuts, serious entitlement reforms, goes right at the problem that is at the heart of a longterm deficit problem. I have offered negotiations around that kind of balanced approach. So far we have gotten rebuffed because we cannot to any revenue. We cannot do a dimes worth of revenue. What more do you think i should do . I just want to clarify. If people have a suggestion this is a room full of smart folks. That was the president in his News Conference on friday speaking to reporters. One had asked if there was more to be done from the white house and you heard the president s response. Michael barone writing about it this morning. He says the do we have a president or a perpetual candidate . In a word, how would you describe sequestration . Caller good morning you washington journal. It is criminal mischief, reckless endangerment, and finally it is disorderly conduct. It is a pretty low bar. Loitering tradecraft is a top down power push. No District Court lawyer would charge them with criminal mischief. Wreckless enda ngerment. Tradecraft be wedded this. I have a solution, spend some in congress. Give them two weeks vacation in the summer and winter and let everyone else go inside the wire. That would take care of term limits. Host thank you for the call. From our twitter page, most say the spending cuts would have major impacts on the economy and military. Three words the president used, dumb, arbitrary, and inexcusable. On our republican line, good morning. Caller this is designed to create fear and disrupt our economy. The last caller said reckless endangerment. Those are all acts of terrorism. I am concerned because i am going to be leaving for church in two hours, i guarantee people are going to be asking me what is going to be happening. How much more are they going to have to pay for gas . This is a tax on the middle income. We are going to have to absorb it. Host one word by one of our viewers, selfish. From politico, no big splash but the department insists the sequester is dangerous. The onset of sequestration already has begun to gum up the works in the pentagon. The navy is standing down four of its airways. The first to set the idle next month. The chuck hagel said the service has already cancelled the popular blue Angels Flight demonstration. The army will curtail all training units except for those account for afghanistan. It will hit 80 of the active force. Thousands of employees are expected to be furloughed in april. Next call is jessica from louisiana. Good morning. Caller good morning. I just see this sequester as confusing. In my field i get to meet people from everywhere. I had an mp months ago say, he chief. Y commanderin you respect the position, not the paul 6, when you are in the military. Not the politics when you are in the military. Since when is it illegal to be rich . It is not illegal to be rich. I see people getting food stamps every day that have been on it for generations. I voted for change. This election i did not. I am frustrated the people are so selfish that we are seeing this. I think what a sequester is is a bunch of bullying. I do not like that. I want to see accountability. The military and entitlement programs need to be cut. What is not cut is entitlement. The military already got a cut. I want to be rich one day. The thought of winning 10 million in a lot of scares the crap out of me. You would never get half of it. But it is not a crime. In louisiana our own governor paid for obamacare. I am not for bullying and letting people get away with not working and not doing something. The sequester is confusing because it has already hit. When are we going to work on some new stuff . Host joe has this in a word, joy. From cq weekley, concerned the risks outweigh the rewards. International forces accidentally killed two young boys in an operation in southern afghanistan. The command of u. S. And allied forces in afghanistan offering his quote the Coalition Takes full responsibility for those deaths. The boys were killed on thursday and Coalition Forces fired at what they thought were Insurgent Forces in the southern province. He joined afghan nato teams yesterday. Emily has the story inside cq on afghanistan. President cars side has insisted both publicly and privately that he has no interest in holding on to power at the end of his current term, which expires in 2014. The cover story of cq weekly, focusing on afghanistan. Bob is joining us from michigan on the republican line. Caller my word is i will plan it this way the president promised he was going to cut the deficit in half in his first term. He is going to jump up and down like chicken little while 85 billion this guy is a joke. He is a liar. He is running around saying that this guy is going to fall that the sky is going to fall. He promised he would veto those bills to kill the sequestered. He turned around and blamed them for it. The guy is a joke. Host what is the solution . Caller there are thousands of solutions. Get rid of the chamber of commerce, department of energy. I bet there are stuff going on that can be eliminated. You cannot eliminate all kinds of stuff. I know people who get food stamps that have no business getting them. It is just ridiculous. There is all kinds of waste. Host speaking of chambers of commerce, front page of the chicago tribune. The president appeared on 60 minutes and said cathy is on the phone from albuquerque, new mexico on the line for democrats. How would you describe sequestration . Caller i was thinking about the two previous callers. I voted for change. I think it needs to be a bipartisan approach. I dont demonize the wealthy. There are a lot of people in the lower level that are suffering. We need to come together and start at the lower parts. We build these people out. There are a lot of people hurting. I do want change. If we do it in that regard, it is proven to work in other areas. I agree that we need to pay for things that were already spent on. I want everyone to come together and try to work this out. I do not to demonize the wealthy at all. There are a lot of people hurting out there. I am a democrat that voted for obama. I dontnk it think health care went far enough. That is all i wanted to say. Host we featured recently on the tv he points out billions of dollars of waste in government, i called a sequester a joke. The conclave is ready to meet tomorrow at the vatican in rome. Timothy dolan of new york and Shaun Omalley are being talked about as contenders for the papacy. Jennifer is joining us from geneva, new york. Good morning. Caller i just want to read if you fax. Read you a few facts. 1. 6 billion, new tax paloophols for hollywood. Workers doing union work while the taxpayers are paying them. 12 billion more being wasted on greek energy. 2. 2 billion for iphones. And they just released 2000 criminal aliens into the system. There is definitely something wrong here. Thank you for letting me talk. Host thank you for the call. A question on our twitter page what was the article steve reference on a penny pritzger . This is a story from the washington times, nearly 215 campaign by lawyers raised thesectors include the actors include will smith and eva longoria. Here is the president in his weekly address taking aim at congress. [video clip] business is working with the military will have to lay folks off. Hundreds of thousands of americans who served their country, Border Patrol agents, fbi agents, civilians who worked for the Defense Department, will see their wages cut and their hours reduced. This will cause a ripple effect. People will have less money to spend. The longer these cuts remain in place the greater the damage. Economists estimate it could cost a 750,000 jobs and slow our economy by onehalf of 1 . None of this is necessary. It is happening because republicans in congress chose this outcome over closing a single wasteful tax loophole that helps reduce the deficit. Just this week they decided protecting special interest tax breaks for the well off and wellconnected is more important than protecting our military as middleclass families from these cuts. I still believe we can and must replace these cuts with a balanced approach. That is how we can reduce our deficit without laying off workers or forcing parents and students to pay the price. I do not think that is too much to ask. The majority of the American People agree with me, including a majority of republicans. We just need republicans in congress to catch up with their own party and the rest of the country. Host the president in his weekly address that aired yesterday from our twitter page. George will in his syndicated column they are saying the sequester he begins by saying christine is joining us from pennsylvania on our line for democrats. Good morning. Caller my word is job scrap. The reason i say that is, to me it is on the elected corporate control. If these jobs are eliminated and sequestration is suspended, that means these corporations will accumulate far more people that are privately employed vs publicly employed. Private corporations have very few goals. They are lower wages, long working days, fewer benefits, no health care, no pensions. It is greed. Once they have these jobs it will cost us as taxpayers more and we will pay more. People will have fewer benefits. We will all pay. Corporations that will be in control of our government we will have that much more money for their ceos. It is a job crab job grab. Host among the most often used words come good, and disaster. Let me share with you some of the words from this survey on how would you describe the budget sequestration. Bad, good, disaster, god help us, great, dibilitating, democrats introduced bills and a sequester in both the house and the senate. Well go to florida on our line for independents. Welcome to the conversation. Caller i had a couple of points. Where are these illegal aliens being released . Are they being released back into the United States or are they being deported back to their country of origin . Do you know . Host i do not have the answer. Caller isnt that something we should know as american citizens . With all of these reporters yesterday and obama went on and on about how bad it is and how it will ruin this and that why didnt one reporter say why didnt you sign it into law . Host i think that was one of the questions from the associated press. Keep in mind the president was saying that sequestration was not going to happen, it was when to be avoided. Caller why did he sign it into law . What we have, unfortunately, as we have members of congress and the deaths administration holding 3100 million members of congress in this administration holding 310 million americans hostage. We had to pay them for that. There are a lot of americans who do not make a hundred 74,000 per year. Make 174,000 per year. What are we supposed to do as american citizens . Are we supposed to go out and risk millions of dollars on business every day to lose money or break even . Host from our twitter page joan is joining us from florida, good morning. In a word how would you describe sequestration . Caller it is twofold. We all know Ronald Reagan ran and tripled his deficit from the first to the second term and experienced a much milder recession than we are now. Bill clinton had surpluses. The word jobs has been lost in all of this talk of sequestration we have people not working for the good of the American People. They have to be Americans First and democrats or republicans second. That is all i can say to washington to host from c weekly from cq tweet washington. Host from cq weekly, fromis joining us massachusetts. Welcome to the program. Caller my word is education. So many people in america just listen to what they hear on the news and all of the hooplah. All they have to do is pick up a paper or book on the internet to see where our money is going. The u. S. Has a 15 trillion dollar gdp. That is to show people we are a growing economy. We are doing better than we were a few years ago. People need to get educated on this. Read more about it, contact your reps. It is easy to point fingers but the more we know the more we can help the situation. Host later on the program we are going to focus on bi of terrorism. Today is an anniversary 100 years ago in march took place on the eve of the inaugural ceremony for president Woodrow Wilson. We will take a look at how that led to the public outcry providing womens right to vote. Diane is joining us from california, democrats line. Caller good morning. Nice to talk to you. I call this sequestration a dysfunctional diatribe. This is just payback for the president when he it has only been 90 days since the 2012 election. Talking about campaigning grover norquist, mitt romney, Paul Ryan Paul ryan voted for sequestration and so did a number of other republicans. It should not take our country we have masterminds. We have some intelligent legislatures. We have justices. It should not take someone to interpret the backstabbing and the constant interpretation of ones own communication. Somebody makes a comment and somebody jumps on another line of our jobs on a social network like twitter or facebook and they interpret someone elses words to libeled them and slander them. It is degrading for our economy, for our National Security, and the United States. Any representation of our military overseas and here in this country i wanted to bring up bill moyers. That is an excellent piece. His new book is capitalism hits the fan, and he is deado on. We have been raising up the top 1 and the 99 hasnt even gotten a pay raise. Our spending power is zero. I am in the middle class, my son is in the middle class. The president our deficit has been going down. They are completely out of line. This is something that should be taken to a Supreme Court justice. Congress is not functioning correctly. I have called on twitter for a speaker protest to go up ther e and do some legislation. Host im going to let you revise and extend your remarks on twitter. It did not be a stranger. We appreciate hearing from you. Caller , so much. Host from our twitter page one other story we want to bring your attention to before we go to our sunday round table this is from the washington ost, the story from inside to the Washington Post. Our conversation with ron wyden, and our focus looking on the impact of sequestration on the environmental issues. Here is a preview newsmakers, last week i was at hanford which is the most contaminated piece of federal property. The sequester would hurt our ability to get that clean up. That affects the columbia river. You think the sequestered to put that in danger in terms of leaking tanks . The way i would characterize it the combination of delays in the cleanup of schedule and the leaking tanks constitute an unacceptable threat to the pacific northwest. It is time to make sure we get this cleaned up. That is going to be a big focus for the next energy secretary. There is a widespread expectation that while of course this is not official yet, if i could ask is speculate or address the hypothetical if you were to be the nominee, is that the nomination you would be pleased with it . I generally do not get into potential nominees. We have some history with respect to hanford. We will have conversations on natural gas and exports. Should he or anyone else be the nominee c. Will be leading the agency in terms of promoting the president s policies. I want to ask him a number of questions as it relates to and natural gas. Particularly renewables. We have the opportunity to tap renewals that have gotten short trip. An important study was done by mit the talks about geothermal. We will have plenty of discussions for a new nominee. He had a fair amount of involvement to him further involvement with hanford. It can look forward to that at the confirmation hearing if he is in the selected. In to we hope you tune ton newsmakers. That will come up after washington journal. Coming up, our sunday round table as we look at sequestration. People ask both our guests how they would describe what sequestration means in a word. Later alison young will be joining us. What impact it could have here on the u. S. And around the world. A look at the sunday morning programs. A look at the lineup in cspan radio. Good morning. The sunday network tv talk shows, today will include sequestrations spending cuts. As you mentioned you hear the ears of these shows beginning at noon eastern. On meet the press, john boehner, Gene Sperling and more. New hampshire republican senator kelly i yet. At 2 00 p. M. It is Fox News Sunday in an exclusive interview with former republican candidates mitt romney and his wife. The state of the union follows at 3 00 p. M. Eastern. At four oclock it is face the nation. They talk with Lindsey Gramm and john mccain and assistant majority leader dick durbin. The sunday network tv talk shows this afternoon on cspan radio are brought to you as a Public Service by the networks and c span. 1 00, this week. At 4 00, face the nation. You can listen to that at91 fm in the washington area. Listen on your smartphone or go online to cspanradio. Org. I was fascinated by her feminist view. That of the ladies are going to be trouble. She warned her husband. You cannot rule without including what women want and what women have to contribute. This is the 1700s she is saying that. Abigail adams on first ladies influence and image. She was outspoken on her views on slavery and womans right. She provides a unique window into colonial america and her life with john adams. It joined in on the conversation live on monday night at 9 00 eastern. You washington journal washington journal continues. Host we have will rahn and Sabrina Siddiqui. We have been asking our viewers in a word or phrase how they would describe sequestration. Will, we will begin with you. Guest my word would be, meh. Host how do you spell that . Sabrina . Guest unneccessary. It does have potentially devastating impacts. It is difficult to protect at this point in time. It was designed to force congress to act. Congress has not acted and now we are facing 1. 2 trillion dollars in cuts over 10 years. They are indiscriminate and that is completely unnecessary. Host here are the phrases gallup survey. Failure, ok, expected, scary, good, disaster, and bad. Guest there seems to be a lot of negativity. Guest i would like to know who said, excellent. Host from the new york times, the toll is too high. It does not result in a grand bargain. Guest these cuts we are going to see how severe the turnoff to be in the coming months it is roughly 2 cut from rising spending. I think we are goin got see various gimmicks from agencies. Maybe the Washington Monument to a turnoff for a few days. Host this is an editorial cartoon fromthe guest there has been a lot of attention drawn to these cuts and what their impact will be. The white house upon sounding the alarm for several weeks and you saw the president essentially a campaign about it. He had multiple speeches where he warned of the consequences of sequestration. On friday, i would not say they were walking it back. They said the impact would be more gradual and not immediate. Ever when poked fun and said the Obama Administration makes it seem as if the sky will fall on march 1. At the same time, there are multiple productions projections about job losses and some put it at 250,000 jobs. Some put of 2. 4 million over a few months and there are concerns about job losses and that these cuts are across the board. You cannot differentiate between high priority of low Priority Programs or which programs have access funding. Host this is from one of our viewers guest i think that his criticism of the president , that he has had some trouble answering. There seems to be a distance that the president has created between the problem and solving the problem. He talks a great deal about it. It does not seem that he treats it with the same urgency that his words would imply. Host it is reported that sequestration could take months and we could be dealing with this into the spring and summer. They say there is no shortterm solution. Guest the next pressing deadline is the continuing resolution for funding for the government which expires on march 27. It does not look like there is an appetite to replace the sequester. They could bear it with a temporary replacement bill or a longerterm replacement bill but the likelihood of both sides come together in the next 3. 5 weeks to do that looks unlikely. I think we could potentially see this dragged out into the summer. It could come up again during the upcoming negotiations. That discussion will kick start again in may. We could certainly see this into the summer. That is when the effects and i think will be felt more. At least the administration is not hoping people will suffer but in terms of matching the consequences, over the summer, they are hoping as people start to feel the pressure, republicans will then come to the table and possibly cave on taxes. Host why isnt john boehner, the speaker of the house, being held accountable for accepting entitlement cuts that the president put on the table . Guest one of the great knocks against sequestration is the fact that entitlements generally other than medicare and doctors reimbursement fees go essentially untouched. It seems to have been the conventional wisdom in washington that we need serious entitlement reform. The question from the speakers offered the retort from the Speakers Office say these are not really serious cuts that we need particularly medicare. Pairing them with a tax increase which is what the president usually tries to do with these things would not be sufficient and, if anything, damaging to the shortterm and longterm of the economy. Host lets put this in perspective we have moved from the debt limit of 16. 4 trillion dollars. It is now 16. 60 trillion. That is significant just the last two months for the nations debt. Were talking about 85 billion in budget cuts and 1. 20 trillion over the next 10 years. That is only about 2 of the federal budget. This is a small amount but yet we hear about the potential these cuts will have across the country through september. Guest both sides do not like these cats. These cuts. It goes back to the way that the cuts were designed and they were designed to be so devastating in how they take effect that it would force both sides to come together because no one would want to see the deficit trend of this way. They are divided equally beef between defense and domestic spending. You have this impact to National Security and military readiness. You have heard about the defense cuts and the kind of furloughs that will go on in agencies and on the domestic side, is everything from nutritional assistance for women and children to other lowincome programs that rely on government assistance. They dont have the funds to be trimmed. It is worth going back to the fiscal cliff negotiations because he saw a twomonth delay of sequestration. There is the idea that the file a counter offer put forward by the white house, according to analysts, was a 1 1 ratio. Chain cpi is unpopular with democrats and that is where i think there is also some questions to be raised around the republicans saying that the president is not willing to compromise. If you ask them, it is in that proposal and it and as if they dont know what he offered john boehner. He walked away knowing he could not get the majority of his caucus behind him. Guest that is what it comes down to. Speaker john bender probably would have taken either that deal or a deal similar to it. There is the political question of forcing something for your own body. There is republican resistance to tax increases. Host we welcome our Radio Audience as well and this is our sunday round table. Rich is joining us from virginia beach, rate virginia, republican line. Caller i am very disappointed with the overall performance of folks that are supposed to be representing us on the hill. I think they forgot to they represent. They seem to want to make cuts to goods and services that will affect us but nowhere have i heard any of them say anything about cutting the aged day send it to other countries. When we had the recent disaster of the hurricane on the east coast, i did not hear other countries in the world send money to us. The new secretary of state recently came back and said we need to start sending aid to other countries such as syria. They need to face reality. We dont have the funds to support our people here who pay the taxes, maybe we need to cut back helping other countries until we do. Host thanks for the call. Guest i think he raises a good point. It is something to be looked at. The old argument for foreign aid is not only can it help alleviate poverty in these countries it builds up a real friendship and makes other countries somewhat dependent on us for that age. Aid which we can use as a negotiating point. The problem with foreign aid is theres a lack of accountability as to where the money goes and how often the money once of the wrong hands. I am generally proforeign aid. I think the pros outweighed the cons but these of the kind of cuts that we need to look as we move forward and we have to have a discussion to make the hard choices about what gets cut and what does and. Host have you seen this . Guest i would not necessarily agree with that. The blame game was twosided. The republican strategy for sequestration was to emphasize that this was the Obama Administrations idea. That overlook the circumstances under which sequestration was agreed upon the budget control act of 2011 was a resolution to this up to that sommers debt ceiling crisis. To that summers debt ceiling crisis. In terms of the media, i think there has been scrutiny to what extent the administration is telling the truth about what the consequences will be. You saw last week that the White House Press corps pressed j. Carter repeatedly on how the white house could just make it seem as if they had gone after him after a briefing with arne duncan. It was found to be misleading. That is Fact Checking going on on both sides. The question that the media has is that we know what the strategy is. It is not changed from the fiscal cliff talks but it was more confusing for some people to understand what the republican position was. It seems to be no new tax revenues under any circumstances. If both sides talk about compromise, if that is their position, then there will be no compromise. I believe that most American People probably see it that way, too. The polling shows that the American People support a combination of spending cuts and tax increases. Host john quotes the president from a year and a half ago guest i think the president was passing along a piece of conventional beltway wisdom. That turns out not to be the case. We can lose sight of how inefficient our congress can actually be. It came to pass. The question of who is responsible for this is not really a question that anybody in the country really cares about. They blame all of our leaders. The interesting question now is whether this will resulted more blow but for republicans or more below back for the president and democrats. Host if you are just tuning in, our phone lines are open you can join us on facebook or send us an email. Or you can send us a tweet. Let me follow up on a question the president received friday as he met with reporters. [video clip] you say this is a republican problem and this is something you dont bear any responsibility for. Give me an example of what i might do . Im suggesting that i have put forward a plan that calls for serious spending cuts, serious and taliban reforms, goes right out the problem that is at the heart of our longterm deficit problem. I have offered negotiation around that kind of balanced approach. So far, we have gotten rebuffed because of what Speaker John Boehner and the republicans say they cannot do any revenue. Not a dimes worth of revenue. What more do you think should do . I just want to clarify. If people have a suggestion, this is a room full of smart people. Host what is your reaction to that exchange . Guest that was a little testy from the president. It was one of the more interesting things about the News Coverage of the president. In recent weeks, the media it seems slightly less enamored of his strategies than they have in the past. Ask an awkward thing to member of the press what i should be doing more but critics of the president have read look and rightfully pointed out that you can actually sit down and negotiate with congress and sit down with john boehner and get him on air force one and talk to him. He makes speeches and cares a lot of people and he says republicans are just about raising taxes. There was a deal to raise revenues and that was made a few months ago. It was a huge moment for the Republican Party to agree to any revenue raising. Right now, this is the sequestration deal that our representatives in Congress Worked out and this is the one we got and this is the one we have to liv with. Host this is from the New York Post although public respect for the ins medi stilla resides the basement, it has proved to be unsustainable. Guest this question was highlighted by the incident with bob woodward most people who read the email exchange in question concluded that in no way was it a threat. Unfortunately, it focused the debate on the wrong side of things and the parsing of words. The reality is, this is a practice of many administrations. To pressure reporters or place angry phone calls and sandy e mails and try to explain what their perspective is or why they believe that a piece is misleading or not representing the story. I think it is fine for anyone to wait in but i dont believe any administration should be telling reporters what they should and should not right. I dont think that was happening here. I dont think any reporters were being told how they should report this. It was more of a question it was more about presenting both opinions and making sure that both claims are fact check to. Ed. The Obama Administration is saying to check the facts but just dont take the report that put a damper on the flip side, republicans are saying the president s is paying people to play video games. On smokingg money machines. I think you get angry calls from both sides of you are a reporter. Certainly, you did not accept administration telling you how to do your job. Host Sabrina Siddiqui is a political reporter from huffington opposed. Post. Lets go to phil from port arent, republican line. Caller the word i have is misdirection. I mean misdirection of the American People. You mentioned Woodrow Wilson earlier in 1913. You also showed the death clock of 16 trillion. The debt clock of 16 trillion. This backandforth misdirection is the national debt. Where does it come from . Who do we owe . You see this whole thing about us going back and forth and keeping our eyes off of that. There is a great short video on youtube. It is entitled conquering the spirit of the debt. It is about 45 minutes. It explains how this government gets its money from a Private Banking cartel called the federal reserve. The government just spends and spends and puts us in debt and then youve got people coming home from work and half of them plugging into msnbc or post the other half goes to fox news and yet theyre talking points and in the morning, you turn on cspan and you have a republican line and a democrat line. They just repeat what they heard the night before. I am talking to all americans right now. Wake of the heck of because the fact that we are going back and forth with each other is were all getting screwed. It is time to grow up and wake up. Thank you very much. Host let me put his point on the table. This is from ann Mark Willimas says on all these points, your thoughts guest we will see exactly where the blame winds up for sequestration once we start effects. He f you will see longer lines at airports as tsa workers are furloughed. In terms of where the blame goes, it is hard to say right now. It could go right or left the Republican Party is in such poor shape and there messaging is in such poor shape, there is little room for airport for president obama and the democrats. I dont think he has been handling of this process very skillfully. He has been going around the country saying doom and gloom is coming on monday and large segments of the press which are often sympathetic to president obama, are ridiculing him both in the newspapers and the opening in journals and online and on twitter. It was in the president went a little bit too far with his warnings and people were not buying i. Host lets go to fred joining us from pontiac, mich. , democrats line, good morning. Caller good morning, might one word would be predictable because it seems like whatever the president does, the republicans in congress will rebuff him. You can use the analogy of lucy with the football and she pulled it away from charlie brown. How many times can you offer compromise when they keep saying no. Guest if republicans effectively declared any tax revenues of the table, it is unlikely there will be any compromise in washington on any of these fiscal debates. I mentioned the deadlines earlier but the feedback from the callers and readers emphasizes the frustration with washington right now. Sequestration was probably one of the ugliest showcases of politics in terms of the blame game, so much time was spent pointing figures to determine whose idea sequestration was when the reality was everyone agreed to end the majority of them voted for and the president signed into law. Americans dont care whose idea it was. They want to see both sides come together and come up with a solution even temporarily to avert sequestration. That could have been a temporary replacement package. Perhaps the president could have met with congressional leaders. That meeting on friday that he had seemed more of a a getting together of leaders on the day a suspect sequestration. It was less than an hour. That could have been a couple of weeks ago but during these meetings, the question remains will they be able to negotiate . Speaker john boehner has been asked about the issue of tax revenues and he said no and the president has said any longterm approach must be a combination of spending cuts and tax revenue. It was the republican position to close the loophole floated by ms. Brown may flooded by mitt romney floated by mitt romney. The white house strategy is to turn their words against them. Republicans want to close tax louvre locals but on not in the context of sequestration. I think they can meet and discuss but if the lines in the san continue to be drawn, there might not be much point to these discussions. At least one side needs to be willing to compromise here and that is not happening. Host this is our sunday brunch with brunchsiddiqui. She has worked for bloomberg and businessweek and will ron is a co author of the lizard king. Guest it was a satirical book based on the obama white house. Host you were on another morning program. Guest Joe Scarborough is a fantastic guy who is smart and dedicated and as one of the greatest work ethics i have ever seen. Host the you take away from that program . Guest i would say is one of the better morning programs out there on cable news today. Host lisa is joining us from pittsburgh, okla. , republican line. Caller i would like to discuss the definition of sequestration. It ise dictionary it say interesting. We already cannot afford insurance and are budgets are cut for grocery and we cannot afford our utilities. You tell me where we are supposed to cut back as far as the efficiency of our government officials. You take a group of democrats, republicans, and independence and you put them in a factor in your their boss and you tell them to straighten up this department and run it right. If you walk in at the end of the week and that department is in chaos and they are pointing fingers at each other, you are going to and everyone of them pink slip. I think that is exactly what needs to be done. Guest yeah, the fact is that both sides know i saw a liberal commentator this week about this both sides are aware there is simply huge amounts of waste going on in the government. There is a lot of fat with muscle and we can cut some of that away. The fact that half of the cuts taking place right now are on the defense side none of us seem to be worried that the taliban will come and occupy washington, d. C. Or the mexican army will come across the border even though we will have to par back a great deal really says something to the fact of how much money the government uses and, in many cases, waste every day and that includes the domestic side. Going forward, it is very hard to imagine the government operating at this size for the long distant future. They are going to find the cuts and that means you have to furlough workers and eventually, you will probably have to close down certain departments and figure out a new solution to deal with medicare, whether it be trying to cure the diseases themselves or some sort of privatization scheme that people on the right have fondness for. We have reached a point where something must be done and it will have to be dramatic host scott bird has a new book out on Woodrow Wilson. He pointed out he points out that Woodrow Wilson was the one that returned to capitol hill to deliver the state of the Union Address even the lawmakers in his own party called it an arrogant speech and a maneuver. The essence of the stories that Woodrow Wilson traveled to capitol hill on a number of occasions to work through some of his budget and a legislative deals saying this president needs to do more of that. Guest i think the president could come to capitol hill more if he would like to or invite congressional leadership more often to the white house to hash of these things out and discuss where they could see eye to eye and where they could foresee a compromise. There has to be a point to these discussions. Cannot be an endless series of negotiations that are not really negotiations. We saw that with the fiscal cliff deal. That is the best example i have. Yes, ultimately republicans voted to raise taxes and the president did not get exactly what he wanted at the outset a bad deal. There was compromise on both sides but he and Speaker John Boehner tried to negotiate in earnest. When there is an issue of lines that have been drawn the sand that dont appear to be disappearing, i am not too sure what can come of these discussions. With 2014 around the corner, the majority of lawmakers on capitol hill are thinking about that. Republicans want their fingerprints a new tax revenues and there are democrats who would be concerned about the politics of cutting popular entitlement programs. Host this is referring to your time with Joe Scarborough guest ok, i will let joe field that one. Host the definition of sequestration this was set back in the 1980s under the grammrudman plan and has become a part of the political lexicon in 2013. This goes back to how this has been designed. It is early to tell what the actual consequences will be. You do look all of these agencies who have to furlough hundreds of thousands of employees and you look at School Superintendents who say will affect special needs programs and theyre not making that up. One of the things on friday is when the irs announced it would not furlough employees until after techs season. Tax season. That is somewhat of a blow to the Obama Administration in that it is good that taxpayers will receive their refunds on time but americans will not feel the consequence of the sequestration in the time line the white house is hoping that would put pressure on republicans. Republicans look poised to take the blame for this but if the consequences do not unfold predictably, the administration will probably take more of the blame or be blamed for over hyping this. Host let me go back to the story about bob woodward and the exchange with bob henry and j kearney. Over guest when youre telling jessica about the tone of that evil was respectful last night a Senior Adviser of the white house put out a tweet that compared bob woodward to an aging baseball player and the little them. Is that respectful . Does the white house support this . Guest there was an accusation that gene had been threatening and everyone who knows gene knows that is hard to believe. Gene has been working on these issues all his life and work 20 hours per day. The president will continue to help middleclass americans. I have enormous respect for the work that bob woodward is famous for. Many of us probably got into the business in part because we read all the president s men saw the movie or both. We have a factual disagreement that we stand by which is that the president was very clear from the beginning that he would push balance to deficit reduction. How can that be a mud and a mystery . Thatthat was his position when e signed the budget control act. The phrase moving the goalposts is not one we agree with. It is just a disagreement about the facts. Host here is a headline from a former adviser to george w. Bush what is your response . Guest from the beginning, this president has not had to do battle with the press. This is very much a nonissue. This is something we like to talk about in washington and bob woodward likes to talk about it. Maybe he was sensitive about it or just trying to sell books. I dont think we should read that much into this media tour that he is going on right now. It speaks to the relationship with the press that i think is getting a little bit colder. I think it can be related to what is going on with sequestration and the president s persistence that the sky is falling that did not seep into the consen andsus. You dont hear the phone calls and the emails from congressional offices. This is being met with the kind of giant yawn by the american populace despite the president s attempts to gin it up. The president has a bully pulpit and a tremendous amount to move legislation like this forward. You look at what Lyndon Johnson was able to do and he was just leaving the senate in the 1957 soberride he worked people constant civil rights act. You find the guy and you find what will be a good deal or a trade that will make it happen and the president , from the beginning of his term, has seemed completely not interested in moving legislation that way. It does not like to own any of it. I think people are picking up on that and that could be a problem going down the line. Host the white house announced that he will be attending the gridiron dinner later this month but it is closed to cameras. Were joined from detroit michigan on the independent line caller thank you for receiving my call. If youre a democrat or republican, you are running for office. Once you become a senator or congressman, you become a u. S. Congressman or senator. You should be working for the people of United States. The 55,000 pound gorilla in the room is that you have an historical example. Everybody seems to be falling short of recognizing that he has been the most disrespected president in this country and it is a shame. Youve got two mines youve got a mind that is going out and youve got the new mind and we see that. Youre not reporting the fact that they would not do anything this president put forward. They have dug their heels in. We have seen a president who he vents his policy and the congress and the senate carries it out. Guest i think that is what the issues that the Obama Administration has raised several times in its defense which is that this president has faced overwhelming opposition from congress, certainly when republicans took back the majority in the house. That is one the reasons why he feels limited in terms of his ability to meet with and discuss a deal. Does that mean he should stop trying . Of course not. With sequestration, he did not reach of and try to negotiate with Speaker John Boehner. It remains to be seen that they would have been able to negotiate on the fiscal cliff. Speaker john bennett said he would no longer negotiate with the president. Speaker john boehner said he would no longer negotiate with the president but i dont know if he was serious. But point about being elected into office and now representing the people of this country and not drawing party lines, that is how everyone outside of washington sees it. Sequestration indicate playing to ones base. With the of the relationship within the republican conference, that is an area that it has hindered the possibility of a compromise. We saw a light of the tension that john boehner face from his conference during the fiscal cliff talks. Some have accused him of delaying a fiscal cliff deal for his own reelection and the called off the Hurricane Sandy relief on the last day of the 112 congress, two days before his reelection. Do you think on these fiscal issues, is there a possibility that the speaker could rally his conference over some kind of compromise . Guest i think it would be exceptionally difficult for the speaker to control his body like that. I think there is more opportunity, given the divisions within the republican caucus, for the president to take advantage of those divisions. There is a lot of splits in the big 1 10 that is the gop and there is a lot of weakness and figuring out a basic message for the future has elude them. The president has a fantastic opportunity to really legislation,ces of th ideas that he has given the weakness of the Republican Party. We are going to see if he is able to muster up the political talent and the desire to do that in the months ahead. Host host we will conclude on this point from the Washington Post. What are you expecting this week . Guest i would have to say that there is not going to be much different than last week. Guest this week, House Republicans are moving on a bill that would be a clean six months funding of the government. They are attaching military preparations to that to give flexibility to defense to adjust sequestration but they want to keep the top line. Will see if the president and democrats are open to that. Host thank you both for being with us. When we come back, well take a look at a u. S. Say today cover story focusing on by a terrorism and the reporting by alison young will be joining us a moment and later, well take a look at what happened on this date 100 years ago. It became a watershed moment of the wegmans separatist march in washington. Up next, we want to preview programming on cspan 2 on book tv and American History tv as we traveled to albuquerque, new mexico. At 5 00, a special series of programs looking at the history of albuquerque, new mexico including one of the most famous roads of america. [video clip] if you decide to motor west, you take the highway, all of thats the best. We are talking about route 66 from chicago to l. A. That is where we are now. It is midway between chicago and la. A in albuquerque, new mexico. It the start of the east and, you can travel 18 miles along old route 66 which was the main street of albuquerques central ave. This is what many people regard as one of the most authentic stretch of route 66, 18 miles. People anticipate coming to albuquerque and experiencing been immersed in the real 66. It was established in 1926 from a fellow from oklahoma and he tried to knit a bunch of existing tourist together to make one road from chicago. When he looked at how to plot that routes through mexico, he saw the only way he could make it happen 1926 was to take the road in santa fe and come back down to albuquerque because you have mountains that year that blocked access to albuquerque from the east. By 1937, they blasted through the mountains and route 66 was coming down right through here, right out these windows in 1937 that when this part of albuquerque started to boom. In 1950, the population was about 96,000 and 10 years after that, the population had doubled. They call red 66, the mainstream of america and we are driving on the main street of albuquerque and you can see how roadside businesses cropped up to serve the tourists. They had cafes and motels and trading post and rattlesnake pets. Route 66 serve millions of travelers during its heyday which was the 1950s and 1960s but soon became too popular and it started getting overcrowded and even not safe. Host route 66 was part of American Culture and music and have a look this weekend on booktv. 5 00 eastern, we look at albuquerque, new mexico and the 17mile stretch which is one of the most famous and unique American History. You could check out our program and online at cspan. Org local content. Our local content vehicles around the country highlight travel and culture as well as books and they are Available Online anytime at cspan. Org. Alison young is the Investigative Reporter with usa today. Let me share with you the front page story last monday. You have been focusing on this story for a number of years. What is the threat and how real is it . Guest across the country, we have dozens of labs that are experimenting with some of the most dangerous germs and toxins like anthrax which are paid which people are familiar with given the attacks in 2001. There are also germans such there are also germs the ebola virus and ones that call box cause botulism. These are various entities and germs and toxins that the government says poses a potential to be used as a by a terror weapon. The experiments in these labs are supposed to be going on under significant security and safety measures. What weve found over the last couple of years is that there is some potential chinks in that armor. Host you say this could have compromised the cdcs ability to protect these agencies. Guest our report this last week involved obtaining reports from the health and Human Services Inspector General. The operations of these labs are secretive. That is in part because they are a security issue. The office of the Inspector General reports which were not posted on the internet, there are ones being restricted and sensitive in nature, they showed that the cdc, when they look to their labs in 20082010, there were a number of issues going on in these labs which potentially compromise the safety and security. There were things like not making sure that the people who you were working with the select agents or approved individuals. There were issues related to the training of people working with these agents. There were also issues found with select agents, these are by of terror agents. When they were transferred from one lab to another across the country, it was not the approved individuals receiving these packages. Host highlight these three points is anyone being held accountable . Guest dark concerns among Congress Like the commerce committee. They say they will take further steps to investigate this. It is a difficult area told the agency accountable because it is operating its inspections in an era of secrecy and the cdc is the agency that inspected its own labs. Host let me go back to your three points securing potential bioterror agents and ensuring the workers are around those agents have proper training, and making sure that only approved individuals accept packages containing potentially hazardous materials. That all seems pretty basic. Guest that is what the experts say and that is what has caused concern among people who study these kinds of labs. The cdc is the Agency Setting the standards for all of these labs. The concern that has been raised is that the cdc is not making its standards so what is the security at other labs around the country . Host our telephone lines are on screen you have been focusing on this story for a number of years. What questions remain unanswered . Guest are many questions. One of them has to do with we have the office of Inspector General and their most recent report was 20 tents of as a couple of years ago. How consistently are these labs meeting the kind of safety and Security Standards that are required of them . We have been focused on the cdcsa labs but other federal agencies have these high containment labs and their working with these dangerous pathogens. How well are they protecting the security of these agents . This is a concern because the office of Inspector General for these particular reports began this examination of federal labs because the 2001 anthrax attacks was a federal scientist who was implicated who have been working at u. S. Army labs. The concern is that it is not just outsiders who we have to be concerned about gaining access to the select agent also those who are potentially authorized to work with them and that is why the security procedures are important. Host what does anthrax or these other materials lookalike . How are they stored or transported . Guest all of those details of how they are stored in transported are the kinds of things that are not released because of security issues. Based on the record we reviewed, all of them are under multiple layers of security and often held in freezers and they have security procedures behind them as well. Some of these toxins, it takes a small amount of that poison to harm people. This has to do with how easy it is to weapon is them it varies by agents. Host is the potential threat for these toxic materials to be distributed in the environment and damage or kill or sicken hundreds of thousands of americans . Guest the cdc says there is not a particular threat because they have multiple layers of security. They would say that there lab complexes have security on them and to get on to the campus, the workers go through screening. They say they are behind multiple safety and Security Walls and freezers and the like. The concern among the Safety Experts is that we have had at least one incident in this country where a federal scientist was implicated in using anthrax in a way that harms many people. Tulsa,ere joined from okla. , republican line, good morning. Caller thanks for taking my call. I think you ask my question already about transportation. We have a trend line that runs through our town. I notice that a lot of the rail cars which are chemical railcars are not even marked with what is in them, whether it is Radioactive Material or anthrax or biohazard. If those trains iraq, we have no clue as to what is hitting our talent. I know they are being transported from lab to lab. If they are being transported by vehicles, that is even more dangerous. Theyve got to have some sort of system that if there is a release, the public can be notified immediately. Host 5 cervical. Guest thanks for the call. Many of these agents which are being transported are not in huge volumes. The kind of work that labs do with these agents would not the entire trainloads of materials. They would be relatively small but the concern that you are raising has to do with there being a danger when these things are moving. There are some Security Experts that say the transport of these various agents is one of the riskiest security areas for the potential loss or theft of the items. The cdc this last year released some data that showed that after studying many years of transportation of these agents that there had only been one incident of confirmed loss of something. They believe it was destroyed in transit and no one was harmed. That is a concern on the transport of these items. Host our guest is alison young who has been with usa today for the last three years. She has worked for other newspapers. Jody has this question guest my focus has been on the cdc labs. We reported last summer on a number of incidents that came out through leaked internal cdc emails. One of those incidents involved a potential safety issue. There are a couple of potential issues like the old laws and that and there is the issue of scientists are others in the risk of becoming infected. Worstcase scenario, transporting the disease outside into the public is a concern which the cdc says is a low risk. We reported last summer that there was an incident in the cd lab in february, 2012 where a group of visitors who were not wearing protective gear were in a clean hallway walking past the cdc biosafety level lab and as they were standing by an observation window, a door opened on the interior on the dirty side of things and a puff of air blew out into the faces of these visitors. That caused a significant concern among those who were out there in the hallway witnessing best. One of the security measures in these labs is they are supposed to operate under negative air pressure to the coming from the queen always going into the area where experiments are happening, that that is a barrier. That is one of the most recent incidents we have had. The cdc says no one was ever at risk. They say they have now corrected those air flow issues. We have been reporting on those air flow issues going back now many years in that same building. Host why do we have bio weapons . Guest when these various agents are being experimented on, they are not necessarily being experimented on to be a bio weapon. They are classified by the federal government as the kind of germs that could be used as bio weapons. The kind of experimentation going on has to do with how you protect people. And simply the Science Behind these various agents. Host darren is joining us from bridgewater, new jersey, good morning. Caller good morning, i am shocked of the lack of discussion of the problem of dispersion. Supposed to operate under negative air when the Defense Department gets appropriation for whatever weapons it has produced, they are dispersed throughout the country purely on the basis of politics. Hes congressman wants to have their local operation going. When these things are put together, there is a real safety problem. This is worse because it is on a smaller scale and there is i am shocked because this lady has a poor science background and micro organisms that ground. She is forced into the investigation of the proper handling and dispersal that give proper jobs to various departments and universities that are politically completing with each other for these privileges. Host thank you. Guest there has been a proliferation of these kinds of labs all around the country. Congress in 20 07 held a hearing looking at potential safety risks as we have more labs and scientists who are experimenting with a dangerous germs. As you have more labs there is the potential increase in having accidents and potentially having issues of threat. The cdc would say the track record has been good so far and there have not been significant problems. Host has sequestration impacted all of this . Guest i asked the cdc about that. They say that despite the kinds of cuts that Public Health agencies are getting, the issue of security is not going to be affected. Host we are looking at security concerns at cdc and its potential threat to all of us. Our phone lines are open. Richard is on the phone from california. Good morning. Caller thank you for having me. I do not watch a lot of news because it is pretty much bad news. As far as this topic goes it was quite a while ago that this was brought up. The level of the lab and the protection like underground level 4 needs to be so many feet underground. That kind of thing when there is leak or whatever. What surprises me is that i understand why we are doing this and i totally agree to be read y to deal with the problem should it arise. Guest the issue of security and how you make these facilities as secure and safe as possible is really important. The cdc a few years back opened a 40 million Infectious Disease laboratory on its main campus in atlanta. This lab is the main one we have been writing about. It was supposed to be a state of the art lab for research on these kinds of agents. Over the years both here at usa today and before the Atlanta Journal constitution, there have been a number of issues. Everything from around 2007, 20008, a power outage that shut down some of the air flow systems that are important for by a security. For biosecurity. We have also reported about the air flow problems simply from the flow in and out of these buildings. A few years ago i was writing about how the cdc used duct tape to seal one of the doors. That is something that causes concern among members of congress. Host let me go back to this report. He quoted a congressman who said it was troubling. And from california, there seems to be a longstanding problem at cdc labs that underscore oversight. Guest one of the issues is the cdc is the main issue is the main portion of the government that oversees security of bio terrorism labs. The usda is another agency that has secondary authority. Their focus is on livestock and animals. One of the results of usa today reporting about the security instances is that the cdc said they did not contact the u. S. Department of agriculture. They recognize there is a potential concern about policing at the agency. That said, needed the usda for the cdc will release copies of those in sectional reports inspection all reports. They say they are covered by security. The u. S. Say the the usda will continue to report. De believe these by terror reports are necessary . Guest these are agents and germs. They arent always something that might be a threat to us from a bioterrorist. It is important to try to find ways to cure or develop vaccines from all kinds of agents. Host katharine is joining us. Rom cincinnati, ohio caller caller the actual threat from these bio terror agents in our society as you know we have a stringent budget. I recently heard from our teachers that we are close to the dc area and there will be education cuts in our area. I am concerned they be the government is focusing funds in the wrong direction towards bio terro labs that may not even pose a threat. Guest there has been a debate among Public Health leaders. We have had limited funds for all kinds of issues that our Health Threats to people. For instance, lead poisoning is something that the fax thousands of children all around this country and yet congress cut the lead budget by 80 a year ago. That is an actual threat to children. At the same time there are those that would say we must be prepared for these potential bi terror threats bioterror threats. Host marcus joining us next from maryland. Some recommendations from the secretarygenerals audit at the cdc. Caller i am curious i think you are living in a fantasy. I am curious about how many labs there are that are actually handling these agents. It is difficult to believe that they would be out of the general population and not behind government facilities. Can you ask about the personnel reliability program, the level of clearance for those people, and the distinction between common diseases and poisons like grison. Host this is from one of our viewers guest i do not have an exact count of number of these labs. The air at universities. There are private labs as well as government labs. If you are a lab working with these select agents, various agents that government has determined have the potential to be used as a bioweapon, you do have both register you do have to register with the federal government. These labs are required to have layers of security. You have to have even to work not in the select agent portion of these facilities, you do have to have various levels of clearances. What the office of Inspector General has found is that some of these facilities have thousands of workers, everyone from people who clean floors to the scientists who are doing the experiments. The concern is that even those who are approved, they have not undergone the kinds of training for security purposes that they need. One of the things we have been reporting on last summer based on these internal emails and other documents is that even those that are approved in areas, they are leaving security doors opened and unlocked. They transport various things around and leave them open. One of the internal emails we obtained last summer involves an authorized man been found in one of these select areas. Host are they in atlanta . Guest in terms of the cdc the office of Inspector General reports looks at labs both in atlanta and fort collins, colorado. This bsl 3 and bsl4 labs, those are all over the country. Host thank you for waiting. Caller thank you for taking my call. I was wondering if the cdc outsources and if they do, why . I only ask because in the late 70s there was a Chemical Company in my home town that had a fire in between the shut off valve and the vat. The chemical that was in the spontaneously broke down water into its Component Parts and exploded. They could not tell what it was, water inwhat ito put it. I does want to know if the cdc is still outsourcing to private companies. They had no security whatsoever. Host thank you. Guest i do not know about those particular. The cdc does use contractors for various aspects of its operation. In the reports we obtain from the office of Inspector General for last weeks story, they were heavily redacted for security reasons. One of the things we do know leading to the receipt of passages, among the people of the rest in receiving them were working for contractors. Host let me get the front page from last monday. What is the biggest and most serious threat we face from all of this . Guest one of the things the Security Experts say is that they are most concerned about the potential vulnerability of deatof the theft or loss of thee agents. That is what the experts are most concerned about. Host gary is joining us from michigan, good morning. Caller my concern is both computer hacking and some of these outlaws can manufacture their own out here. We have our own enemies within our country. I was kind of wondering about wikileaks. Host thank you. Guest the reports i have looked at do not look at the issue of Cyber Security but obviously that is an area of concern for the government as a whole. Host our next call is paul from south carolina. Good morning on the republican line. Caller i caution you on being very careful here. You may get apples and oranges confused. For example, the gentleman had the concern about tanker cars. There is a tremendous amount of lack of education in our public that will allow people to be concerned about that type of thing. Inspector generals, and i do not know how familiar you are, they are not always blessed with a great amount of talent. I am not saying this particular team was lacking that because i do not know. But i can assure you if there is a facility and lab that has a power breakdown, there are backup generators. I would stick my life on that. I am not in the cdc business but i do know a little bit. Very concerned about that. There is a whole bunch of things that we did you have to be very careful. But the gentleman caller from michigan like the gentleman calling from michigan. Guest hosdouble for your call. The surprising thing is that in fact cdc did have backup power for this 240 million building. This is an 11 Story Building that has 500 people. It also has deep dsl three labs the bsl3 labs. There was an hourlong power outage, the facility had backup generators, they just did not work. Host steve is joining us next from tampa, florida. Are you with us . We will try one more time. We will go to russell in west virginia. Good morning. Caller good morning. I want to know where the island is being really hated to in the win best is being relocated to in the midwest. Guest i am not familiar with that particular biolab. Caller the other, i had to make was about security clearances. I have held topsecret and secret Community Top secret and secret security clearances. I can tell you i have a felony in my background that does not stop me and did not stop me and still would not stop me from working in the communications field. I work for general dynamics. Im still qualify to get a job as a janitor at one of these labs and it secret clearance. A lot of our Prior Service members have security clearances and not all of them are at well mentally balanced. It is very easy to get a security clearance in this country. I see it as a big problem. I have keys to almost every communication cabinet in the United States, eight combinations to almost every facility in the United States. If i was a terrorist i would be quite dangerous. Guest the kinds of issues you are raising our part of the reason the cdc would say it is so important to have multiple layers of security, it is not a security clearance it is even if you are an employee allowed to become one of their campuses you then have other layers of security that would only allow you to access certain areas. The specific areas are carted in a way that you cannot get to. One of the issues was in the office of Inspector General reports that we wrote about last week. One of the reports found that the electronic key cards were programmed in a way that people had overly broad access to agents and freezers that were not within their specific authorization code. The cdc has corrected it but they have faced questions why it happened in the first place. Host our last call. Good morning, debbie. Caller this idea that everything is so secure everyone knew about some islands. The rumors were that lyme disease got out. Supposedly the lab is to be moved to kansas, which is in the breadbasket. If lyme disease that out of that facility got out of that facility, we are going to put it in the center of the United States . We do not want to start a panic. Could you elaborate what went down on the island. Guest i am familiar with the concerns people have raised about the facility as well as relocating it into areas that are closer to agricultural interests. This issue of security is not just for human beings. Obtaining access and doing something with these agents these are living organisms. There was an instance in europe where ultimately a leaking water line there are things that can be tracked out into the public and potentially have the echoes of these agents. It is rare but that is why it is so important that these facilities are at the raleigh secured. Host thank you for joining us. Your report is Available Online at usatoday. Com. A quick look at other headlines, beginning with the boston globe up. With the boston globe. They should be able to take some of these budget cuts. 85 billion across the board. Some of the most significant cuts in the defense budget. The story focuses on medicare and other programs that eat up a big chunk of the u. S. Budget. Front page of the arizona republic. Cq weekly is examining the role u. S. Forces would play in afghanistan after the troops depart. And the Weekly Standard is looking at paradise lost. There is a caricature of california gov. Jerry brown. Front page of the Washington Post, a note about secretary of state john kerry who continues his travels through europe and the middle east, hoping for reforms in egypt. Some of the head but on this sunday morning. Coming up, what i did years ago in march in washington that led to the Womens Suffrage Movement. This is a live you here in our nations capital. We will be focusing on what happened 100 years ago and its impact on women in america. Washington journal continues. A new moon is in the sky, placed into place by a russian rocket. One of the great scientific feats of the age. There was a very Rapid Organization or mobilization of resources in the United States. The United States attempted to put a man in space. The russians did its first. The u. S. Tried to put two people in space, the russians did it first. The russians put women in space first. The United States caught up to the feats that the soviet union was performing in space and began to take the lead. The ultimate goal was to get to the moon. From the dawn of the space age to the Space Shuttle discovery, from the National Space museum today at 7 00 eastern. I was fascinated by her feminist views. She warned her husband we cannot rule without including what women want and what women have to contribute. Abigail adams, this monday night on cspans new history series first ladys the influence and image. She was outspoken about her views on slavery and womens writes. As one of the most prolific writers, she provides a unique window into colonial america and her life with john adams. Join in on the conversation live monday night at 9 00 eastern on cspan, cspan radio and c span. Org. Host a. Live at you in washington as the march on capitol hill begins to make its way down pennsylvania avenue, recreating what happened on the state 100 years ago shortly after 9 00 a. M. On march the third 1913. As many as two budde 50,000 people lining pennsylvania avenue which ultimately led to a womens right to vote. That came in 1920. Kristin gwinnbecker joins us. Why did it happen on the state 100 years ago . Guest 100 years ago is the eve of the inauguration of president Woodrow Wilson. The organizers of the market knew that hundreds of thousands of people would be in town for it. Host what led to this movement and why did it take seven years to go from this march ultimately to the right for women to vote. Guest we march 1848 as the beginning of the movement, seneca falls convention. It took until 1931913 for the National Movement to gather strength. They had been an acting suffrage statebystate on the local level. 1313, a new movement emerge that focused on the changing of the constitution. Host what were the instincts of men in 19th Century America that wanted to restrict a womens right to vote . What were they thinking . Guest i do not know i can answer that. Host in your research, what have you found . Guest historians debate to this topic. Certainly there were men with an of Womens Suffrage Movement within the Womens Suffrage Movement. Some of the arguments to womens suffrage was that a woman ats place is in the home. A womans place is in the home. There was the rise of the temperance movement, the womens progress of movement, against drinking which led to prohibition. There was a fear amongst a certain segment that womens voting would lead to prohibition. Host two significant anniversaries. The march in washington, the Vice President will be traveling down there today. You have the 50th anniversary of the march on washington and dr. Martin luther kings famous speech. Guest this march was only the second march on washington so we are kind of used to thinking of these historic marches this one was conceived the organizer did not have a large president. A large president. A large precedent. Host how was it organized . This is the pre social media age. How did it come about . Guest it was put together in a short period of time. Two women who are seen as the head of the organizing were alice paul and lucy burns. Alice paul is considered one of the greatest pr geniuses of all time. They knew a lot of people would be here for the inauguration. They spend two months handing out pamphlets, generating interest. They turn the march itself into a media spectacle. It created this essentially beautiful pageantry that would force Media Attention and public attention to the issue. Host our phone lines are open as we look at the march on washington 100 years ago. Some of these are archival films and photographs courtesy of the National Womens history museum. 202 is the area code. You can join us via facebook or send us an email or twitter cspanwj. There is discussion about a museum on the mall here to focus on what . Guest to focus on the contributions of women in americas history. It has continued its effort to gain a space on or near the national mall. It has existed and continues to grow as a powerful online resources to promote its Educational Mission as well as sponsor lector series and traveling exhibits. Host where could potentially be . Guest this week a legislation was introduced in both houses to commission a study that would identify potential spaces for the museum on the mall. Host on this the 100 years ago, the march on washington on pennsylvania ave. That march being recreated. We have our camera outside the u. S. Capitol on the west front. This demonstration gets under way. It will continue over the next several hours. Our first call is ironically enough from selma alabama. You are on the phone. Caller my question is to get theguests repsonse to correlation between the Womens Suffrage Movement and the right to vote. Here in somehow we are commemorating bloody sunday, which gave all americans the right to vote. I want to hear her speaking on the correlation between the Womens Suffrage Movement and why it took so long for African Americans to get the same right. Guest it is an excellent question. The relationship between the general movement for expanded suffrage, these are linked. In 1913, because of the 15th amendment, suffrage was extended to black men. In 1913 at the Womens Suffrage Movement was looking to expand for all women. You instantaneously expanded the right to vote to more people than any other act of legislation. It certainly continues to take time over the last hundred years for progress to continue. Host this is a photograph from the library of congress. You can see that there are women in this picture but also a lot of men guest there were men in the march. The march was interrupted. The onlookers at a certain point began to jeer and harass the women. They spit on them, i yelled insults at them, the police did very little to protect many. Police actually encouraged a lot of the violence. A lot of what youre seeing in the images is a man in the crowd as well. Host did this generate a lot of attention from the Washington Post, the washington star, and other publications at the time . Guest the march generated Immediate International media response. The eruptions of violence enhance that Media Attention. In many ways it contributed to the message of the march being spread that much more widely. Host you talk about the part of history from the mid19th century to mid 1920s. From this march until 1920, what changed . Guest the National Womens suffrage association, the Broad Coalition that worked on a statebystate level, continued its efforts to gain the right to vote on a statebystate basis. The continued success in that. At the same time, alice paul and the Congressional Union worked in dc to lobby congressmen and focus on the president to speak for womens suffrage. In 1917 the focus on the constitutional amendment became much more aggressive. Within picketed the white house. They chained themselves to the gates. They demanded his attention. Host these pictures are part of the collection at the National Womens history museum. You can watch live Coverage Today on cspan3. We will take a look at the movement that changed the u. S. Constitution. Gene is joining us from new mexico. Welcome to the conversation. Caller im calling because i think this is all a lot of hyperbole. I found out that this government host we can hear you. Caller i am happy for all of these things women are getting. I am a 75yearold single woman. When i came to retirement age at found out that this government has the right to take back 40 of my Social Security benefits. They passed a law in the reagan terms that says because i taught school for 18 years and had a little bit of time, i did not need all of my Social Security. I have been tried to get something done about this over the last 10 years and nobody does anything. Good luck, women. Guest i think it is fair to say that we continue to make strides towards progress. 100 years ago today more than half of the population in this country were denied the basic right to participate in a democracy. The achievement of that is certainly a moment worth paying attention to. Host we are seeing a lot of red hats and red jackets on a chilly march day. Guest 1 of the main backers of this march is eighth surety which also participated in this march in is a sorority which also participated in this march in 1913. They have been turning out in great numbers. Host a piece this morning from the Washington Post thomas is joining us now. Good morning. Caller i had hardly seen a black person on cspan. To mek your guest this was a movement for white women. African american women were looked at as servants. We know how the men were treated. Even in this last election we had the republican white men omen. King withi you never saw many black women. You see them representing organizations. As an oversight, why arent there more black faces sitting in the seat across from your host. The most segregated groups of women were black women. Host i would argue that if you watch this network youre seeing a diversity of opinions and faces and points of views. Black, white, male, female. To your larger point lead as get a response. Let us get a response. Guest historians have discussed many ways in which race politics affected the Womens Suffrage Movement. I think it is very important to know in 1913 as a segment of the movement started to focus on a constitutional amendment that part of the logic in doing that was the recognition that state by state state level granting of the vote would not happen in Southern States of the former confederacy. That constitutional amendment was going to be necessary to guarantee the right to vote to all women. Host you touched on alice paul a few minutes ago. If she came back today which she recognized where women today are in our country. Guest she was a quaker who was highly educated and went after her phd. She went to britain and learned from the Suffrage Movement there, the acts of civil disobedience and getting arrested which she brought back to the movement here. She was the most recognized leader of the Congressional Union. There were many other important leaders. Of the federal movement to get the constitutional amendment she became white she became quite well known. If she came back today which she recognized the state of women . She died in 1977 so she would not have too long to look ahead. I think she would see the progress that has been made and still determined there was more to do. Host harry is joining us from pittsburgh. Good morning. Caller this was an election where democrats kept using this more and more. Now a woman can get drafted. Now they are put on the front line to get shot at. Host we will go to philadelphia. Good morning. Caller can you hear me . We have a problem in philadelphia where a woman is trying out for a democrat position. They would not let her speak. She is on the ballot here in philadelphia. They would not let her speak at a televised debates. We have bigtime racism here in philadelphia and we cannot change it because when you try to run for mayor they will not let you speak. We need to deal with the situation. It is a civil rights movement. Even obama knows about it. They do nothing. Awful things. Host double for the call. Are you familiar with the politics in philadelphia . Guest i will say that women running for Public Office preceded by many decades and women from the 1860s up to the multiple obstacles in their efforts to gain Public Office. Host our area code is 202. You can join in on the conversation. Were just outside of the u. S. Capitol for a march, recreating what happened 100 years ago on the state on this date. A public outcry for women to have the right to vote. Let tonya is joining us from jacksonville, florida. We will try one more time. Air. Are on the caller ai caller good morning. I am not seeing where African Americans are being represented and yet the Republican Party is in need of more diversity. We need to be more represented in the political arena. Guest i tend to be more comfortable talking about the 1913 and 2013. Host we will go to the democrats line. Caller i am the state director for unite women. I just want to refer to one of the callers. They basically asked the question about the 1913 march and the black Womens Movement as a partnership with the voting rights. One thing i realized as the state director for the state of oregon is that when i was elected to the state director a lot of people in the movement here stopped being engaged. I am a black woman. I think that what we need to do to a reflection of the 1913 2013, instead of making excuses we need to look at the partnership between the black women and the white women and going forward. Racism is really rampant in our country right now. I think that this movement can pull it together. Within the movement we have to pull ourselves together. There should be someone from unite women or any other organizations to show that unity. After this march they have to go back home and get people involved. To have to see values. Host let me point out we are covering the offense so you will hear the voices of all of the people we have been showing you over the last half hour. A diversity of people on the mall here in washington d. C. You can also watch our coverage on americas history programming. Guest the National History museum has a Broad Coalition of more than 46 organizations representing 8 million members. We believe that it is important to extend the mission to educate about all of womens contributions to the history of our nation. We do that through coalition building. Host well go to carol in Eastern Washington dc. Caller i wanted to ask about two people involved in 1913. The first was Frederick Douglass and the next one was carry chap. Guest thank you. I am not familiar but the role that Frederick Douglas played in march at this point. Gary chapman was at this time one of the main leaders of the womens suffrage association. That was the organization that was working on a statebystate level. Him and other leaders endorsed alice paul and lucy burnss idea. After the march in 1913 the Suffrage Movement did kind of split a bit. Gary continued to organize efforts at the local level while what became the Congressional Union in washington d. C. Focused on the constitutional amendment. Host a reminder that at 11 00 eastern and again at 6 00 eastern, 3 00 for those of you on the west coast, we are featuring programming on the march that took place on the state 100 years ago. Grace from miami, florida, good morning. Caller i have been listening to your program as i recall an African American abolitionist was a womens rights activist as well. I remember reading that she gave a powerful speech in ohio. She hasnt been recognized at all and i wonder why. I think she may have been at the front of this suffrage. Why hasnt she did recognized . Guest she was a very important figure in the womens rights movement. I do not recall this moments, how long she lived. She certainly was an important figure. By 1913 other figures had emerged as leaders in various areas. I am not familiar with at what point she died. She was an important figure earlier in the movement. Host let me go back to the idea of a mall museum. Rep maloney leading the challenge of this. Is this something that would be paid for by federal dollars . How is this coming about . Guest the legislation was introduced simultaneously in the senate by senator collins and mikulski. It would be funded entirely by private funds. Host the next call is kevin joining us from west hartford, conn. Good morning. Caller thank you for having an interesting and informative best answering our questions this morning. The question i have is between the Womens Movement and Peace Movement in United States history. Guest excellent question. The Womens Movement, especially during this era that recall the progressive era from 18 80s to 1890s up until the first world war, brought a number of movements for social reforms and an international Peace Movement was one of them. Many women were involved in both movements. Many women had training in the Suffrage Movement, gained their political participation experiences, and then continued them beyond the Suffrage Movement into the Peace Movement. Host what is the message today to those marching here in washington . Guest i think the message today is it is important to remember that in 1920 women werent given the vote. There were 72 years of struggle , of violent confrontations, and political maneuvering that women earned this right to vote. They earned it in the face of great obstacles. I think that story inspires us. It is important the government teaches that. That celebrates the stores and continues them. From inglewood, colorado, good morning. Caller i am calling in regard to the labor. I used to be a cna for a hospital. Having to do all of the ticket transfers on heavy people there was no way for monitoring the loads. The cartilage in my knees are gone now, my left hip is heard, my left ankle is hurt. The hospital is able to misdiagnose me. Host that is totally off topic of what we are trying to focus on. Do you want to talk about the movement that took place 100 years ago . I and and stop you there. It is a totally different topic. We moved on to barbara joining us. Calle caller i am a retired teacher and i have studied womens history. I certainly believe and agree that we need a museum. We need more womens history in schools. There is a tremendous amount of information that people do not have when they start to talk about womens history. Especially concerning black women in history. Taughthat isnt being that needs to be taught . Guest we could have a whole separate show. Womens history is not as prevalent in our textbooks. The fact that we do not have an National Museum indicate how little we know about the Suffrage Movement. It is probably the most well known of womens contributions to our nations history. The event of 100 years ago are still relatively unknown to people. That indicates the large amount of information that we need to be talking about. Host our last call is kathy from pennsylvania. Good morning. Caller i just wanted to comment that i was upset to hear all of the African American callers complain about the lack of representation. I think it is important to recognize this is the anniversary of the womens suffrage and it is important to remember that the reason that this is happening at this time had there been a constitutional delay on the federal effort to pursue civil rights for African Americans. I think both groups need to remember that. My question actually is could you talk about president Woodrow Wilson and whether or not the movement having the data for his inauguration would have been helpful. I know he turned out to be a bit of a disappointment in his time in office. Host rabbi thank you. Guest it is fair to say the organizers at the march were hopeful that his intention this would influence the president early on in his presidency to join and back the Suffrage Movement. They were disappointed it took another seven years. Host our guest is a historical consultant to the National Womens history museum. Thank you for being with us. We will continue this conversation tomorrow morning. Among our guests, jacquueline simon. John felmy looking at oil tax credits. And paul light on the size and scope of these federal contracts and what it means when federal cuts start to kick in. Thank you for joining us on this sunday. We hope you enjoy the rest of your weekend. Live coverage continuing from the mall of the capital, the 100th anniversary of the march on washington. [indiscernible] today on the