Transcripts For CSPAN Washington Journal 20140517

Schools. Michelle obama said yesterday that School Districts that hold back on efforts to emigrate, others say success has been made. Schooloughts on segregation and if it is still an issue in this day and age. Heres how you can make your thoughts known. We divided the line regionally. On the eve of the 60th anniversary of brown versus board of education, First Lady Michelle Obama in kansas making comments that only about the state of education and her experiences, but also segregation issues as she sees that race saying raised inequality still exists and that School Districts have pulled back on efforts to integrate, even as schools are becoming less diverse. Much has been made of a study that came out of ucla this week. Amongst the study, they put several charts taking a look at most integrated states for black students. This is for 2011 and 2012. Earlier this week in the pages the wall street journal here is some of what she wrote in the wall street journal pages. Again, we will take a look at more issues as we talk about the 60th anniversary. The topic, School Segregation. If used inc. It is still an issue. You can give your perspective on monday believe that or perhaps not on our two lines this morning. Appalachia, new york, our first call this morning. Jack, good morning. Dont think School Segregation is that much of an issue anymore. J from souderton, pennsylvania, go ahead. Well. read studies and i think Michelle Obama is correct. The problem is forced integration militates against the mystic tranquility. You cant force people together. Some of the wiser than me once said that if diversity really was a wonderful strength and a beautiful thing, people would practice it spontaneously, you wouldnt have to have always. Iversity apparat chicks preach diversity the loudest are people who live in places like chevy chase maryland, georgetown up in vermont in places like that people live in buckingham, pennsylvania who live in neighborhoods that are 100 white while they put their kids in allwhite schools. Nobody practices it. When you look at the inner cities like philadelphia, you have the problem of black people going from classroom to classroom beating up chinese kids. They have to orientations to keep things in line. California is the greatest example of where we are going. You have hispanics and blacks that are fighting warfare in the , they have have lees presence in schools to keep the race riots from happening. You have the thing that happened with the American Flag. The courts says in california that it was ok for a school to suspend a white kid for wearing an American Flag on Cinco De Mayo because it caused so much racial tension. Jay starts off the morning giving his thoughts. Heres another call from knoxville, tennessee. It is an economic issue. My friends, lot of i always spent a disproportionate amount of my income in order for my children to go to grade school. Sometimes it was more than half of what i made. In a military town in Columbia South carolina. For my children, as they grew live in may be allblack schools. Me and a lot of my friends had always spent way too much for rent. I wasnt a home buyer at the time. Muchimes i was paying as for rent this people pay for mortgages. It is an economic issue today. Host do you get a sense of how tennessee is doing as far as integration is concerned . I grew up in South Carolina and my children grew up in South Carolina. They are living and working in other places as adults. Cassette, where i live, that is what i thought. It depends on where you live. Lucky to people are live in a more diverse area with more resources or if you dont, you have to bend too much money to get diversity. Host gotcha. Lets hear from patrick in new york. Hello, patrick, how are you . Caller im a Public School teacher in new york city and ive been very troubled by the segregation. Ive taught in chelsea and also in the south bronx. The level of segregation by is out oftatus control. You have school that are 100 black and latino. What can we do to encourage this . Troubledher, im also by the racial demographics of the teaching profession. When you have teachers who dont look like the students, they teach, what message does it send to the students . When you look at the ucla report that came out, it does include charts this morning. The percentage of blacks in majority white schools, first in rank as california. It goes on from there. It also gives a percentile of black students and 9200 minority schools. New york is leading their lives followed by illinois, maryland michigan, new jersey and pennsylvania. Are thejim crow schools reality of life in the south. City schools are about 85 90 africanamerican. It seems to me that a lot of this is a legacy of jim crow. It is not that it is practiced in the same way, but is it proud a product of discriminatory housing and all kinds of things. In particular communities were africanamericans predominate and have the greatest number of houses on the water. Schoolsy knows that the are of lower quality. Argument thatn this is a legacy of jim crow and it is going to still be with us. What we do about it nobody is sure. So as far as doing something about it, to think that means is more of a role for the federal government in this case . Caller i do. Court would not even allow seattle and louisville to voluntarily integrate their schools. The government has stepped out of this. This is a huge mistake. Theres also a voluntary Desegregation Program which allowed minority students from the city to go to suburban schools. That is still alive in a limited format, and is eventually going to disappear. And this seems to have a very positive impact on kids. Kids benefit from being in middleclass schools. That is the thought that dennis had from washington dc. This is ruby from virginia. I went to school at polish kids and other kids. In schools were desegregated 1970. Our schools are basically black and hispanic in richmond with a few white kids, thats it. Host why do you think that is . Is probablyink it i think it is housing. White people move out, black people and hispanics move in. Gain anything from her childhood experiences . Aller caller i never even thought about it, that is just how it was. I hung around his polish kids. I came down here in the 70s and the people who are 20 years old who didnt even have any white friends. When i came down here it was three years before i had any white friends. It was shocking to me. D have children in School Enrichment . Caller who are olderople than i was actually were shocked and had black friends. People who are old enough to be my parents. Were talking about segregation and if you think it is still an issue in this day and age. This anniversary today of the 60th anniversary of the decision by the Supreme Court, brown versus board of education. You can give her thoughts on this topic on two phone lines this morning. We have divided them regionally. You may have seen that event just before the start of this program. Taking a look at the brown decision. One of the speakers was eric holder, the attorney general. He talked about the continuing need to monitor School Segregation cases. His was an event that took place yesterday. Here are some of his thoughts. The department of justice continues to actively enforce and monitor nearly 200 desegregation cases where School Districts have not yet fulfilled a legal obligation to eliminate segregation root and branch. In those cases, we work to ensure that all students of the Building Block of educational to advancedm access placement classes to facilities with a crumbly walls and old safe and positive learning environments. We are partnering with the department of education to Reform School discipline policies that fueled the school to prison pipeline, and that have resulted in students of color facing suspensions and expulsions at a rate that is three times higher than that of ers. White years letter from penny in fairfield, california. Caller high schools are definitely on segregated. Most of the schools are lacking the teachers with the skills to teach the different students with challenges. Educationparents like to teach them history. The students are lost. We have come a long ways, but it is still segregated. Host when you say that schools there are segregated, what you think drives that . What you think is the cause of that . Redistricting, is it economics, what goes into that . Biter it could be a little of the economics, but some of the School Districts place most of the charging students all in , if therechool, which are decent teachers there, they lack the skill to teach children with challenges. Other students are put in different schools. Theoure just faced with teachers not having the skills to teach students with different challenges in their neighborhoods or whatever. Believe if the schools were integrated with a variety of different students from different backgrounds, i believe that will be teachers sent are more diversified to teach. Host from ebony was in dublin, ohio. I just wanted to comment and say in a grievance with the caller from tennessee, dublin is a city is a suburb of columbus ohio. I went to Columbus City schools. Ended upgraduate, i with my ged. I knew i wanted Something Better for our children, so i looked to the outskirts of the city. Dublin is a Wonderful School district, but what i found is that it is a matter of taxpayers. Out here you have those who have gone to college, have college degrees, they make higher incomes. Any school levy that comes up passes. They have the funding to provide what it is that the students need to get the education they need to become the future leaders of this nation. In the city of columbus, you have tax papers taxpayers with lower incomes. The students are not passing and getting what they need out there. Africanamerican and latino. T is pretty sad it is not segregation as far as race, you have a lot of white students that are out there, too. Out here where i am, you have a mix heard it is very diverse. You have all different types of cultures, but it is a matter of money. And the ability to move into those districts that have Better Schools and so on. Im 750 a month in a twobedroom apartment with four children. Im a single parent for children. Income wise it is a struggle for me. It is a struggle am willing to take on to ensure that my children have access to good education. I have awesome children, straight a students. Involved in all types of sports and everything, but it amazes me as the difference of offered to them out here and what is offered to children in the city. To think his topics of integration and going to school is other than themselves is something theyre aware of . I had an African American pediatrician. She felt that is going on here was a disadvantage to my children not being around other africanamerican students. Truth be told, my youngest child is a fifth grader. She is one of two africanamerican students in her class. But she has people who are from , there is aafrica student from canada, one from russia. She is exposed to all types of cultures. But their customs and beliefs are, i did not find it a problem. It is my job as a parent to know that my children know their background and culture and have the opportunity as a child to grow up and experience all of that. I felt that was something good for them. Yes, much underappreciated. Data set something in elementary where the children but all different types of food. My daughter had so much to say about that. As a child, i didnt have that. What i learned, i learned from books, not actually having a oneonone conversation with someone who grew up in a household. , betterit prepares them prepares them for the world. Theyre going to be exposed to even more once they get to college. They will look forward to that. They like it. Im happy about that, but my heart is broken for the. Nercity youth from lets go to Michael Bloomfield hills, michigan. The last caller to me exemplified one issue. The 50 that throughout states there is a lot of. Iversity ohio is one thing, michigan is different. Michigan there is a virginia has county School Districts. The funding and how you find it is different in different states. You cant make generalizations, not that she was. Here in detroit we still have a lot of segregation. Over the last 30 years, the 30 years ago it was 90 white in the Public School system. As immigration to southfield has occurred over the last 30 years, africanamericans have selfselected to move into that suburb. Now that suburb is 80 black in the schools are 100 black. There are still liberals and democrats complaining about segregation. But in fact, they have self segregated. They couldve moved to one of those other School Districts, most of which are a majority white, but they chose to move to southfield for comfort, for a lot of reasons. I cant say what those reasons are because im not africanamerican, but it isnt because the School Systems are segregating. , if you gotsystem caught segregating, youd be in really big trouble. 500 some School District subbase geographically. As people move in and out of , they arericts subject to certain segregation. Host bruno says this off of twitter. And in him as john mccain specifically talks about what is been going on with Veterans Affairs and criticizing severe secretary eric shin seki. Here are his thoughts. Auditordered a nationwide to the practices of nationwide v. A. Centers. The v. A. Office of Inspector General is investigating the phoenix v. A. I respect Important Role of Inspector General, but my fellow veterans cant wait for many months it may take to issue its report. They need answers, accountability and leadership from this administration and congress now. Clearly, the v. A. Is suffering from a systemic cultural problem that congress cannot resolve these meal responses. What is needed is a total refocusing of the v. A. On its core mission of serving veterans , stretching from its top Political Leadership all the way through to its career civil servants, who as recent reports suggest, have been too often motivated by all the wrong incentives and rewards. Give v. A. Ust also administrators greater ability to hire and fire those charged with caring for our veterans. Most importantly, he must give veterans greater flexibility in how they get quality care in a timely manner. Host if you go to military , the editorial in the army times is calling for the the v. A. Secretary eric shins back to our session jesse from endicott, new york. Caller lately i noticed you have been getting quite a few obscene phone calls echo what are you going to do to crack down on that . We open the lice a lot of different topics. We try to do the best we can, but clearly, people will say what they say. We have to keep going with what were doing. Michael from lithia springs, georgia. Caller i was listening to the lady from ohio who called earlier. That is a problem with the whole thing. I never had a problem with separate but equal. The problem was equal parts. Yet to try to take our children than they are supposed to learn something from being with white folks. I dont get that part. White people have their superiority complex where they think it is a benefit for black kids to be with their kids or something. Equal facilities is all we ask for. Thanks. Host that is michael from georgia. We hear from barnala in decatur, georgia. Caller i think it is still an issue with segregation but primarily because of income inequality. It is ironic that the current policies woulds help to curb some of that one if, because number minimum wage were raised, it would allow some children to have a better chance at getting into Better Schools, health care , if a parent get sick and it takes a large amount of their income to battle their illness, then that will hinder a child better education. I do believe it is still an issue. The primary cause is income inequality. You reference it ministration policy. You see any hope and change is coming from the federal government in order to counteract what is been going on when it comes that issue . Caller i do believe so. I was listening to the Program Prior to your program and i was moved by eric holders speech. The Justice Department is monitoring over 200 cases involving segregation. I believe the policies are meant to address the issue. The gridlock in washington is preventing a lot of these policies from addressing the issue, which it always comes down to income. Host jesse from kentucky, good morning. Caller i live in an area of kentucky where i dont agree that you should have segregation , but then i am in a conundrum wheree i live in an area i am dealing with this now with my children. I grew up in innercity schools. My children are only two percent of the population in the schools there in. When i asked the school about what they do, theyre not even societynterested as a and a people in the area that i live in. They are. I found out a little bit of history yesterday. The people from the area moved to this particular county so that they could avoid the desegregation issue. It is still like that in 2014. It is a little shocking to me. When you say you go to the schools and talk to them about it and you say they are not interested in this, why do you think that is . I have learned that the attitude is that this is the way it is. Is jesse from kentucky. The Washington Post leads off this. We talk about subsidies. This is from a conversation that took place amongst those who administer it. Steve from blackshaw, north carolina. Caller first off, let me say that i taught in high minority schools for quite a few years, thatou had a caller saying the greater number of schools are out of proportion. Or out ofions proportion. That is not true. Was, you canearned lead a horse to water but you cant make him drink. Those are issues that need to be addressed. I think segregation. As really good it brings people together. Host john from lancaster, pennsylvania. This, i thinksay American Education system needs a complete overhaul, the Public Education system. I dont live far from philadelphia and the children dont have books to take home. The suburban districts are very wealthy and very wellfunded. I dont believe that separate is equal. Moreover, my own children were educated in a multicultural system. I moved to suburban philadelphia. Based on a report that was written by the department of mid80s thatthe said the world will be changing, we will have the brick countries ,ise to prominence, brazil russia, india, china. My children vastly benefited by having a multicultural education. Predominantlyto Ethnic School with one ethnic group being predominant. Of onlyd does not exist that ethnic group. I think it is extremely important that we further integrate our School Systems so that minority children can interact with white children. That will change over time, ok. I think that there has to be integration among our groups to prepare our children for the globalization that is ongoing now and will continue to go on. Think youdo you further integration more than it already exists . Caller i think you have to take children from all these various districts and give them vouchers to go to any schools that they want. We just have to have much more because it is not a good idea to have schools that are overwhelmingly consisting of minorities. There is not a benefit to that. I think there has to be mass integration. We have to look more like brazil in many ways. That is going to prepare our students. As you can see, the asian groups and hispanic groups, it is best that they integrate with everybody. This is america. As president reagan said, you can go to japan, but you cant be japanese. But japanese person can come to the United States and the american. This is what we are about Service Order values are about. We have to demonstrate is through the education system. Host those are some other thoughts as morning on the topic we are engaging in varied School Segregation, if you think it is still an issue, this being the 60th anniversary of the Supreme Court decision on brown versus the board of education. More from that ucla study. Shotting in the 90s and going onto 2011, a decrease. Starting in the 90s and to 2011, a decrease is evident. He may speak experientially and he ripped out some of the two lines we are provided by region. Here is nancy, vineyard haven, massachusetts. My husband was the first white teacher to teach at the Junior High School that was one of the two cases in brown versus board of education. In a highas involved school in annapolis, maryland. Another case was in kansas, was net . Anyway, our children were in school there. Theon was in second grade year that they integrated. The teacher was so cruel to the that was his classmate, that my son had to go on medication. He felt so appalled at this behavior. Insulting him and teasing him. It was ridiculous. Cap playing with a ball of yarn. She was enjoying herself. What would your husband say about the Current Situation as far as integration is concerned . We were upset because we could see was disintegrated. The irony is that the college integration of the historic black colleges like morgan here becauseand integrate whites can go to it free, because it is encouraging integration. Maryland is integrating. Host has your husband ever spoken about why he thinks levels of integration are decreasing . Any thoughts on why that is happening . He died in 1993. I think it is so tragic that people are getting such satisfaction from insulting other people. We are all supposed to be americans. You just see these little needling things. Perspective of the wife of a teacher who had direct experience with the brown case. Another story from the new york morninghis tony from canton, ohio. Go ahead. Caller i was calling in because i dont think that schools are segregated nowadays. I was speaking more on student debt. Host ok, go ahead. Moronici was talking college level, because im in college. When you think about student debt, we dont necessarily think about colors. Host that is tony from ohio. Politico has a story taking a look. Lets go to our last call. This is greg, wilmington, north carolina. Schools usehborhood the word to keep the schools segregated. You cant live in a certain neighborhood, then you cant go to their school. Thats all i have. Is correct from north carolina. We did continue our discussions about the 60s anniversary of the brown versus board of education case. I guess is from the naacp Legal Defense and educational fund. We will talk about her thoughts on sedition on segregation in the modern day. We will hear from free speech about the advocate people who stepped away from giving speeches and about free speech on College Campuses. Our guest is weak on the newsmakers program, mel watt. He gives his first interview atce taking the position fannie mae and freddie mac. Here is some of that conversation. There are a bunch of things i didnt talk about. I still have my little sheet. That is list of things very long, that we are working on. Housing trust fund is one of those things. Return to have to make a decision about that. And we will. Will make it, we will articulate the reasons that we go one way or the other. Decision in every the first 120 days. There are multiple things that fall in that category. Housing trust fund is one of those. We will get to it. What are some of the other issues that youre hoping to tackle soon . The want to show show toou want to hare your list with us . No. I cant share that information with the press. Anywhere. N the speech not directly, at least. We didnt talk about Housing Trust fund. We didnt talk about the stress test. Leadd all of that in the to this piece. I said there are a bunch of things we have been working on. About otherlk transactions. There are multiple issues that we have to make judgments about, and we have to do it responsibly. Take tos the longer you evaluate something, the better the result is that you get. I dont feel a particular timetable or rush to judgment on any of these things, which is why took a 120 days to give this speech. Washington journal continues. Host joining us from new york sherilynn ifill. Good morning. We think is a Lasting Impact of the decision of brown versus board of Education Today . It,t we are so used to were so accustomed to an america that is diverse, in which we expect that everyone has an equal opportunity. We expect to see africanamericans and people of all races and genders and leadership positions throughout our states, including Southern States and throughout the country. We almost take it for granted. What we should remember is that the america we see today was essentially birthed by the Supreme Courts decision in brown versus board of education, which really opened up the door to america being able to be true to what it claims it is, which is a society of equality and justice. The Supreme Court decision in that case essentially may the 14th amendment to the constitution, which had been 1868, made it finally true, ensuring that africanamericans were equal citizens in the United States and not second class citizens, as they had been under jim crow segregation. It, what is the state as far schools are concerned when it comes to segregation issues . Guest i am sure many of your viewers have been reading the accounts and studies that have been released over the past few weeks. They show the ways in which our School Systems throughout this country are very much segregated. The term that has been used is resegregated, which is a term i quibble with a bit because it implies that our schools had at one point been integrated. It is true that some schools really benefited from not only brown but subsequent civil rights legislation and it and litigation by organizations like mine and in some instances leadership within the community or within states to integrate their schools. Sadly, very few School Districts were truly integrated. In any case, what were seeing today are very racially and economically segregated schools. The results of that is that we have a very stratified School System. This is an issue we have to continue to work on. It requires us to look at the whole range of issues. Requires us to look at the ongoing issue of housing segregation. It requires us to look at suburbanization, transportation policy, mixed income housing, and affordable housing. Dividing incentives for the construction of affordable housing. There are lots of factors that go into the issue of ongoing segregation now that statemandated or statesponsored segregation has been eliminated. We have to continue to work very hard on those things. Host so Economic Issues aside, integration is taking place, would you say that . Anybody Walking Around America Today would have to say so. If you are walking on our ateets, if you are looking our statehouses and our legislatures. If youre looking at the United States congress, if you are looking at leadership of fortune 500 companies. If you are looking anywhere in the United States, you would now see what you have not seen in the united in 1953, which is that there are people of all are in leadership positions, who are participating as members and colleagues in those institutions. That is a new world. Theres a world that is less than 60 years old. I think sometimes when we talk about the anniversary of brown and people talk about schools being segregated again, we actually forget that the world that we live and did not exist before brown, and that the largely integrated society in which we live and work was really created initially by and pushed by civil rights legislation. It is very very young. Is less than 60 years old. Ucla put out a study taking a look at the 60th anniversary. An increase up to about the mid 80s and then a decrease. Is there basic explanation of why we saw those increases and then a decrease . 1967 and early 70s was really the height of the integration. Period. A series of Supreme Court decisions are beginning to move back the dial on school desegregation, actually helped result in the resegregation of School Districts that had a gun to be integrated. The Supreme Courts decision in milliken versus bradley, which essentially said you cannot use a sing across district lines, meant that white flight, the desire of whites to flee from cities where their children would be compelled to go to school with black children, essentially could flee to the suburbs and be sure that they schoolst be bused to that were integrated and black children would not be bused to their schools. We have to look at the decisions we make to support and encourage suburbanization and sprawl. This there is an ongoing desire of unfortunately too many flee fromwant to living in integrated or mixed neighborhoods. That continues to be a problem in this country, as well. She says it is demeaning. She says it is racist to assume that minority children cant learn or cant learn as much unless they are immersed in a student body in which whites are the majority. The most Sophisticated Research whitest find that having first, the material that was assembled in the brown case actually did not just talk about the effect of segregation on black children. In fact, the many social scientist who testified in the brown case and who did studies in the brown case also came to the conclusion that segregation was harmful to white children. Member what the purpose of statesponsored segregation was. It was designed to subordinate the black population. It was designed to suggest that white population was superior and the black population was inferior. It was not segregation just for the purpose of having separation and having to excellent School Systems. It was for the purpose of subordination and to keep blacks as secondclass citizens. That message turned out was not only harmful to blacks, but also harmful to whites. And created moral cynicism confusion and why children and distorted their personality development. In a diverse country like United States, to separate ourselves by to the entirel society. Not because black children cant learn alone. Theres no question that they were excellent in some instances, segregated schools. We have historical black colleges that do an excellent job of educating black children. However, that would present too rosy a picture of what segregation was like. , as iny schools Clarendon School in South Carolina. The schools were in terrible condition in the black community. The schools did not have indoor plumbing. Didnt see used in outdoor privy , but kind of an earthen toilet, where they got their water from a well that they used with a dipping spoon, where they had no individual desks. They had only handmedown books that came after the white schools did want to use them anymore. We dont want to create a rosy picture of what segregation was like, and we dont want to thate some kind of image somehow the idea of desegregation was about some magical pixie dust that happens when black children sit next to white children. The truth is that resources follow race. We want to make sure that all students have equal access to Public Resources. The best way to do that is to make sure that all of our students are being educated and participating together, so that we can be sure theyre giving the same resources and the same quality education that every american child should be entitled to. Do you want to ask her a are on thehe lines screen. Send us an email or a on twitter. James from twitter says this. Guest i think james makes an excellent point. The reality is that one of the most important aspects of the brown decision is that the Supreme Court articulates the in our education society. First, the Supreme Court says that it is the most critical function of State Government to provide education. The Supreme Court also says that education is the foundation of good citizenship. That is what the unanimous Supreme Court said in brown versus board of education. The unanimous Supreme Court said it is difficult to imagine an american child being successful with not having access to quality education. Court described education in a way that we now recognize, but at first articulates that role for education so clearly in 1954, is a most important state function, as the foundation of good citizenship, and asked fundamental foreign american child to succeed in our society. The first question we have to ask is what we prepared to do to make sure that happens . Int is that is about resources that we do not send money with the child. Well, in this country, education tends to be supported by property taxes, if you live in a wealthy jurisdiction, that lots of money follows the child is derived money from property taxes and the School District will be well resource. If you live in a poor neighborhood, then the resources that follow the child are also poor, and thus the outcomes that you can expect in that childs education will most likely be poor as well. Do we as americans think that that is fair and proper . If the Supreme Court has said no child can really succeed without a proper education, if the Supreme Court has said that education is the foundation of good citizenship, if the supreme isrt has said that education the most important function of the state, then why is it that we allowed this kind of disparity, that we allow some children in our country, who are citizens, who are entitled to the opportunities for success, why is that we allow them to be theted simply by virtue of fact that the neighborhood they live in is not wealthy . Host so to that idea, which you support giving a voucher to a child to go to a Better School system or maybe be in a Charter School with use of public money to put students in a situation where they learn a specialized skills and things like that . The naacp Legal Defense fund, and i do want to point out that we are a separate organization from the naacp and have been for 50 years, we support Public Education because our focus is first and foremost on educating all children. Charters were originally developed to provide opportunities for competition and for us to be able to learn what are some of the features that the Public School system could adopt that would improve the Public School system, and i have no problem with charters as that kind of experiments, but charters are never going to educate all of our children. All of these studies and the statistics show that charters in essentiallyes are preening be best students or the students best resourced, not the students who have learning disabilities or who need extra help or who dont have the kind of parental support that allow them to be the kind of engaged parents that Charter Schools tend to want and need. Canhile Charter Schools play a limited role, they are not the answer. The answer is our commitment. When america decides that it is committed to quality education for our children, then there is no question that we can do it. The resources that we have lavished on the prison system over the last 40 years, a prison system that has grown exponentially from the 1970s when there were 250,000 people in u. S. Prisons to today, when there are 2 Million People warehouse in u. S. Prisons, and that growth is largely attributed to nonviolent drug offenses. The money that we have lavished on the war on drugs, we could lavish our attention on the war on our lack of education, and we could decide that we wanted, that we have the will to ensure that our children are educated. So we should not be nibbling around the edges. We should be going all in for americas children because of course americas children are americas future. Host our first call for you is germane from washington, d. C. On our republican line. Good morning. Youre on with Sherrilyn Ifill. Caller good morning. This has been one of the saddest episodes in American History, which has been poorly ood, that is the education or lack there of the education. Going back following the civil war, where the series of extraordinary laws, which really remade americas social amendment the abolishing slavery, the 14th ensuring protection under the white ort or black, black, and in the 15th of may, giving blacks the right to vote. And then the full and equal enjoyment of public accommodation. Eight years later, the Supreme Court overturned these Civil Rights Act is unconstitutional with the point to equal protection provisions of the 14 commitment. Fast forward to today, you will not be able to find yourself in a job or place of employment that is not federated, that is not a mix of all cultures, so there should be an open is in the School System. He i beg to differ that you put a fine point on it, but myself, i was self educated. Alknew that the loc library had almost every book that i wanted to read and i did not have to worry about the School System. Or pay 80 for a book or 130 for a book. Host ms. Ifill. Last point, on the you know, there is no question that education does not just happen in the schoolhouse, you know, it is supposed to happen throughout a childs life, and that means that the community has to be rich with the kind of resources that provide for education. I had a library that was two blocks from my home that i could walk to that i went to every read andmorning, and i i took the books out. I could walk to that library safely. That library was clean and accessible. Allowed me to go to that library, and i knew that i can walk there safely and walk was aafely, and it tremendous resource in my community, so there is no question that there are other things that you have to do to become a truly educated person, and that speaks to really frankly all of the Public Resources and infrastructure that we make available to be able to support young people in dur community becoming full an excellent citizens. It is not just the school. The school is really just a reflection of the commitment at we make to the community. From vermont, good morning, on our independent line. Go ahead. Biger well, we have got a problem here with attendance at these schools. The schools in my area we are plus 90 attendance. You drop over to detroit where i used to live, and they have trouble on anyone day getting 50 of the students at the school. You cannot teach them if you cannot get them to school. We have laws in place already that require the students to go to school, and we do not enforce these laws. You can spend all the money you want, and if the students are not in the classroom, you are not going to teach them. You need to force the laws that we have, like i said. I could not agree more. All of the studies show not only for k12 but also for College Education as well, half the game is being there, showing up. Not only showing up but developing the value of showing up, developing the habit of showing up. You have to attend school. So there is no question that in forcing School Attendance policies and having a robust practice in School District that children get to school, communicating with parents, showing up at parents homes if necessary, finding those kids and getting them in the schools. Schools are an amazing place. All of the studies also show the School Remains the safest place for children, despite the fact that we have horrible, abhorrent incidents like sandy hook. Schools are the place where children are safe this. When children are out of school, they are more vulnerable to danger, but most importantly, as indicated, there is no chance that the child is going to learn unless the child makes it to the school, and so School Attendance is critically important. Host here is karen, new york, democrat line. Caller hello, thank you so much. New York City Schools seem to be oblivious to segregation issues. That keepdrawn lines the wealthiest people in one zone and leave the poor people out. Todents in harlem are closer one of the best schools in new york city, but shall not attend it. Students in Lower Manhattan in the financial district with wealthy parents have priority to that school. The zone laws in new york city keep whites and to some extent asians in one area and move and children out, poorer children out, no one cares. Host new york led the list of 64. 6 . Surprising, although new york city is densely packed and people lived closely together, it is also quite segregated, and economically also segregated, so this is not just a southern problem or a problem of niche jurisdictions, this is really an american problem. Host that was karen. Ms. Ifill, 60 years later, have we see more diversity in teachers . Guest you may have seen the recent studies showing that diversity amongst teachers is really lagging behind diversity among students. This is a real issue will stop i think we are seeing still a 70 of the Teaching Force in the white states remains and female. As a something we have to be attentive to as well. And there are lots of factors that go into this. One of the key factors i think to the we have to return idea of teaching as an honorable profession. So much of the public conversation about teaching denigrates teaching as something that a young, ambitious, smart person would want to do and commit their lives to. We have to redo murray teachers in ways that allow the best and brightest to teach and to support their students. We have to provide the support particularly need, in challenging School District to be able to manage their classrooms, that means class size, to be able to provide the resources they need so they are not having to come out of their paper,ket and buy and ensure the students in the class have a social and psychological and Mental Health support the very often some of our students needs so that the teachers can have the support they need in dealing with students who have challenges and needs. So i think what were doing is we are dnc devising deincentivizing some of our brightest people and brightest young minority people as well from going into the teaching profession. And this it seems to me is an issue that we have to get our hands around and grapple with as well. Ifill joining us from new york today, the president directive counsel for and a place to be legal in defense of fun. Walter from dallas, you are up next on our republican line. Caller thank you for cspan. It is amazing to me, one of the things we are not paying attention to is certifying teachers. [indiscernible] reading, writing about arithmetic is not the only thing that should be taught in the School System. And in mississippi, pages who look like them, came from the score. Teachers who look like them came from the school. It is good to have white teachers, but there should be some blackmail teachers black male teachers as well. [indiscernible] host walter, thank you. Ms. Ifill. Think there is no question that it is important to have a Diverse Teaching staff. I think the issue, one of the issues i think i heard walter raise was the issue of africanamerican male teachers, which i think many think are critical, especially in middle school and high school, in School District where you have large populations of africanamerican boys and girls. Absolutely there is no question that that is important, and it is also no question that teaching is more than abcs and 123s. Critical thinking is important. If america is going to remain competitive, if our young people are going to become adults who can engage in the world, be innovative, creative, successful, entrepreneurial, then they have to also know how to critically think and not just to be able to fill in bubbles on a test sheet. So we do also have to think that the quality of education that we are providing our students as well, and i think that was the point that walter was making. Host here is a viewer from twitter who says if black students can fail in segregated wantc schools alternatives, they should be given federal vouchers for private schools. Guest i think i answered the questions earlier. Efforts to exterminate quite interesting, but the answers require us to go quality,d seeking Public Education for all. And we should not have to require a cookiecutter response to particular students because they live in a poor district. We should make decisions about whether or not we support americas children and their right to learn and their rights to be good citizens. We cannot later on denigrate young people who become poor citizens and who make poor choices when we have not equipped to them to be good citizens, as the Supreme Court said, education should. Host from fairfax, virginia, democrats line. Good morning, john. Caller good morning, ms. Ifill. Doelieve the best way to that would be to set up a Scholarship Fund where students would be paid every day to show up to school, they would be paid more to do well in school, and they would be able to earn enough money to maybe start a business or go to college by the time they graduate from high ool, and they can also be so i think it just makes good sense as a way to make reparations. Any thoughts on that . Guest no, that is a new one. I would have to think about that. The part i can speak to is the question of the financial incentives for students going to school and doing well in school, a key issue is becoming the affordability of College Education, and increasingly young people being burdened with overwhelming levels of student debt who do the right thing, who make it through k12, who do well enough to be admitted to a good college and want to go to college and to go to college, and the consequence of that, we give exchange, we saddled up for the next 10 years, 20 years with debt, and we do have to begin to think of ways that we can create some opportunities fundsudents to have or to set aside funds that ensure the students will not be burdened with this kind of death, that they will be able to Enter College with a kind of credit account of some kind that allows them to be able to pay for college and also to bring down the cost of college. So that issue it seems to me is critically important because we cannot be saying on one hand the students in k12 education show up to school, study hard, do well, go to college, college is essential, have them do all of that and then say ok, now an exchange im quick to put this burden on your back for the next 10, 20 years, it is going to affect your life, your childrens life, your ability to start a business, to own a home, and so forth. So i think we are sending some mixed messages with what has become the on affordability of college at the same time that we are encouraging our students to do well in k12 and to go to college. Ms. Ifill, one thing that abigail brought up since around is that the core problem is a study of transformation and the racial topography of the schoolage population that has resulted from immigration and the different fertility rates of immigrants and natives. Does that have a factor in what is going on today . Guest it is interesting that you left out white flight, which is the principal reason that the immigrants that the demographics look the way they do. There is no doubt that it is changing and will continue to change over the next 40, 30 years. Andhe issues combined, issue a both a racial and an economic federation, and those two are going to become more closely entwined as the demography changes, and that is why am emphasizing the importance of looking at whether or not you come from a poor would assert or a wealthy School District because at the end of the day, if you are a white kid who happens to live in a poor neighborhood, say a poor black neighborhood, you are also not going to get a quality education, so we do have to grapple with the complexity of this issue. I do want to make sure i point out, though, that there is some good news. And i do not know that people are aware of this, but High School Graduation rates in america are at an alltime high. I think it is 80 or 82 at this point. We have been turning things around as a relates to High School Graduation, and the population that has really been turning around is africanamerican and latino girls and boys. In baltimore city, the turnaround has been dramatic over the last eight years, and the principal driver of that has been a turnaround among africanamerican boys, so High School Graduation rates are tremendously, and this shows us that we can make change, that we can actually make a difference and make it better. And that is why i am also emphasizing what are the opportunities we then give those students who do the right thing and who do graduate . What are we then telling them and what are we providing them so that they can make the next step to post secondary education, to College Education, without being overburdened with debt . Host here is charles from tennessee on our independent line. Good morning. Caller hey. Thank you, cspan. There is no way the kids can do anything without their parents. I dont care if you stick 1000 in their pocket on the way to school. If the parents are not helping, they have no chance. Why dont the minority people why dont they take care of their kids and have them prepare for school . It is their only skate. Nobody can be any broker than my family, and my family went to school. We made sure he went to school, now he makes 30 an hour at the 20 years old. It was as a regular old school, but we made him do his homework to our the night. A parentm twitter the apathy parents have an education can be measured by the lack of voter turnout represented when asked to vote on school budgets. Guest School Board Meetings and participating at that level as well. With regards to the caller, im going to object to the blanket statement of why dont minorities push their kids education because that simply is an incorrect statement. Most parents of every race care about their children, want the boats for their children, and work hard to try to ensure that their children do well academically. It is also true that to do that anuires a support system and ability to engage with your child in a way that allows you to support what they need. I have seen it in my years living in baltimore. Moms who care deeply about their children and want their children to do well, who wake up very early in the morning, and they stand at the bus stop to go to their jobs, which is what they need to feed their children, but eave thee to l house before their children leave the house to catch that bus. Inadequatet, an transportation system, the job is across town, and they are not able to be there in the morning to take that child to school or to make sure that that child has put their homework in the backpack. So we have to also start to think about how do we support parents who are trying to do good, and we support parents who are trying to do good by their kids by providing within the community the types of Public Resources that i was talking about earlier, that allows the parents to have things to rely on. After School Programs so that their kids are not home by themselves or in the street by themselves while the parent is on their way home from work. Both of my parents worked, and itd not get home until 6 00 or to0, but we were able produce a page in place after school into activities after school that allowed us to be occupied. So we want to make sure that those things are available in the schools for children, but the other parts of i think it was bills statement that i think i would agree with is the parent absolutely have a Critical Role to play, and we cannot scapegoat, you know, that factor. Parents are responsible for their children. They are the people who communicate the message about school and education. We communicate that message by waking your kid up in the morning, no matter what, rain or shine, and making sure that they get up on time and that they make it is time, that they are prepared for school, that they have what they need. But we also should recognize that many parents are dealing with pressures that make it difficult for them to be the best parents they want to be, and we have to do the best we can to help parents be the best they want to be. Thatect to any suggestion this is an issue of minority parents because i have seen too too, and i have lived in many black communities. I myself am the youngest of 10 children, so i know what it into make it,shed and i know the ways in which parents struggle, and sometimes dont have the support that they needed to do the best that they can do, but we have to do better supportingy parents, but everything time, we have to require parents do their best. That means being engaged, owing to the School Board Meetings, voting on the school initiatives, remaining informed, but we also want to make sure that the School System and the electoral districts are providing the information to hardworking parents. If you work from 8 00 in the morning to 6 00 at night, you need that mailer in your mailbox in plain language that regular people can understand that explains what the School Funding referendum is all about. You need that meeting to take place at a time that you can attend it, not at 5 00 because you get off work at 5 00 and you are not home at 5 00. You need for there to be childcare so that you can attend the meeting. You need things to be able to participate in the civic life of your community as parents, especially if you are a singleparent, but most americans, even twoparent homes, are working more than ever. They are working like crazy. Long hours. And very hard. And its put incredible pressure on the family, so we also want to have wages that support families so that it not have to work two jobs and three jobs just to make ends meet. We have got to create a structure in our society that allows parents to do the best job they can do as parents and as citizens because that is how are our children are going to be best prepared to participate in a quality education system. Host up next for Sherrilyn Ifill is jimmy from lakeview, arkansas, democrat line. Caller yes, thank you for taking my call. If you would give me just a moment. I have been involved in the theggle for equality under law for 40 years. I have practiced law for 40 years. My school, the lakeview high school, filed the original lawsuit in the state of arkansas of funding underity the law. When we won a lawsuit, the the remainingve africanamerican high School District in the state of arkansas i was a member of the Arkansas Legislature for eight years. I came in with bill clinton when he was the governor. One of the problems of brown that no one wants to talk about i have been associated with it over the years, is the fact that africanamerican citizens who had not broken the law, who attended various schools, their schools were closed in the south especially. When the socalled desegregation order came. No white schools were closed. No schools where persons on the ground had been violating the constitutional principles and their schools remained open. Host jimmy, thank you. Guest i think jimmy raises a really important point, and im glad he raised it, about what happened after brown. I think too often when we have talk conversations we about brown in 1954 and we skip to today. What happened after brown . Within hours, and in some instances days of the Supreme Courts decision, leaders all over the south declared their intention not to comply with the Supreme Courts decision, not to integrate their schools, not to have black and white children go to school together. All throughout the south. You had 101 United States congressmen signed the southern in 1956, a document in which they declared their intention to resist the Supreme Courts decision in brown. You had massive resistance announced by the senator from virginia in which all means were to be used, all what they said were lawful means, although many of them were on lawful, to resist brown. You had the creation of private white academies throughout the south where white parents pulled their children out of the Public Schools, educated them in private academies supported by public funds, by the way, until litigation filed by the Legal Defense fund was able to stop that practice. You had white flight from the School District. You had the Prince Edward County School board close the schools of Prince Edward county for five years in virginia rather than integrate. And you had as the caller indicated, and the name of integration, the closure of schools in black communities and kids tong then of black the white community, which is what happened to me, friendly, and the white cities. So what happened after brown was the socalled resegregation. You have to understand that the resistance to ground was powerful, was from the bottom to the top. Parents, community leaders, politicians, United States congressmen, governors, and the in aa cpu Legal Defense fund spent the first 10 years after brown trying to push back that massive resistance. Frank way, most of the integration that happened happened especially in the north after the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed because that act a provision that said federal funds could not go to programs that discriminate, so the possibility of having federal money cut off to local School Districts produce some pd some measure of integration, but what the caller is referring to thatis critical period Many Americans have amnesia about or want to forget, and that is the period which across the entire south, and frank, in the north one must not forget an effort tore was massively resist integration, and what we lost was the beginning of us breaking the covenant with our children around Public Education. It was not because of teachers unions, not because we needed a common core, it was brown. Iconicrock nine, the case, and the picture of the nine students trying to enter school in arkansas, which is where the caller litigated and worked on school issues, occurs in 1958. Brown is 1954. President eisenhower has to call out the air force division to protect teenagers trying to go to school. When we talk about brown, lets not jump from the case the legal to end fund litigated segregation, the high moment of the Supreme Court declined a segregation violated laws, and then jump to 2014. You have to deal with the period after brown, which lasted until the 1970s, and it was met by the Supreme Court beginning reversal in the late1970s around the idea of integration. That is a story that has to be told. Ms. Sherrilyn ifill, where do we go from here . Guest learning how to make change happen. Brown was the result of a Strategic Plan implemented over naacprs by lawyers of the Legal Defense fund that below believed they could break the back of segregation, and we have to be vigilant if we want to break the back of poor education in america. But we are going at legal thense fund is how to make allin push we have been talking about, how we can convince School District and americans to experiment with taking very seriously the education of our children, and it begins with our commitment, our resources, and really recognizing this as a critical state function that the Supreme Court and brown said it is, and assuring that we do not nickel and dime our students and try to create cookiecutter, piecemeal solutions to a problem that requires the full american commitment. Ldf continues to have cases on our desegregation docket, which allows us to be part of discussions about equity and School Districts throughout the south. We work on School Discipline policies that push kids out of school and bring criminal justice practices into school. We work very hard on ensuring there is equality and lack of insperity in the kinds of disparity on the kinds of opportunities provided within the School District whether ensuring thates, are certified teachers in minority School District, and so forth, and we also work on Higher Education issues and affirmative action, ensure the pipeline and opportunity for Higher Education remains open to minority students. We are so very, very engaged in the work of education, and we this brownof, with anniversary, a renewed vigor and commitment to ensuring that we work on providing quality education for all of our children. Host Sherrilyn Ifill, president and director counsel for the naacp Legal Defense and education fund. Two are for jordan us. Guest thank you. Host coming up, we will talk about free speech on college. Ampuses with Greg Lukianoff this stems from the series of people invited to speak at colleges and then disinvited. Then, sudeep reddy will join us to talk about doubles. You bubbles. You have heard about housing bubbles, and tech bubbles, and. Hat consists of a bubble we want to tell you about the work of our local content vehicles that travel the country. We are currently on a tour. We are featuring the history and literary life of mobile, alabama, on American History tv and booktv. At 5 00 p. M. Today, we will have offerings as we visit with an author. The attack was quite a surprise. It probably should have not been in that it was a former military unit, all militia units. The fort itself was badly built. The gun loopholes, which should have been about 5, 6 feet above the ground, whereas threefoot levels, so they were simply on the level of the attacking force. The battle went on for quite a long time. There might be 750 or so read sticks in the attacking force, and several hundred actively fighting inside amongst the many civilians and many people inside the fort. By sometime around the afternoon, 2 00, 3 00 in the afternoon, the battle stalemated, so the red sticks withdrew. Eventually, they set fire to a good portion of the fort and the fire spread, at that point defense was impossible, so the few remaining defenders try to escape, and quite a few were killed or captured. 25 made it out of the fort. Washington journal continues. Host on the program, Greg Lukianoff. Tell us about your organization. Guest we are celebrating our 15th anniversary. We were founded in 1999 to defend free speech, due process, and Academic Freedom on College Campuses. On becausevited you three people caught our attention Condoleezza Rice, Christine Lagarde, and ayaan jissi ali. Tell viewers what happened with these folks. Up in it started bubbling 2000 emily we had an increase where students and faculty members would get together and demand that students that speakers would not speak there. Internally, we would have this joke that it was invitation season, but it was less funny over the years because every year it seemed to get more intense. I am a First Amendment lawyer. I am fine with people protesting, wearing black armbands, but i do not like it when the goal is to get someone to not speak on your campus. Host these three individuals were all invited, either declined the invitation or were disinvited. In the face of protest. Guest in the face of protest. In thereza rice stuck for months. As soon as it was announced, faculty and students made noise that they did not want her here, noise,yre going to make and disinvited. I thought it would be fine, and then she ended up withdrawing. The same thing happened with Christine Lagarde adam smith. The telling and sample was with Ayaan Hirsi Ali , where they went to her behind the scenes and said it would be a mess when you show up, so will give you a chance to withdraw your name, she said no, so they had to revoke her invitation. Host where the protest so intense that it forced the decision . In eacht is different case, but generally it is a relatively small minority of faculty and students. The smith case, the christine mostde one, is the striking about how little the protest was. It was Something Like 500 signatures on an online petition that convinced her not to come, which i think is a low threshold. Students put out an open letter in the newspaper. Here is part of what they said guest and as far as students writing that, that is the kind of speech that we defend every day on a College Campus, and wearing black armbands, that is totally fine, but part of the idea of a College Campus is it is supposed to be a marketplace of ideas and i wish we wouldnt still the oldfashioned idea we would instill the oldfashioned idea of i should hear this person out. Patch this is not happening. Host thiss not is not happening. Guest it is not happening enough. Smalls up being a minority having a hecklers veto. Host there is another story with this. The latest speaker i will name. Ly not pronounce his anyway, he is not speaking. Could you tell his story . Guest sure. He if he is not pure enough, nobody could pass these tests. When it comes to different issues, he would be considered good. The Main Objective was that he called the police on occupy wall street, but then essentially apologized and blamed the police for handling it wrong, but because of that, students insisted that he actually concede 29 demands, and he said demands, and he said no way, and then the next day he withdrew his name. Host there examples are there examples where the houses decided to keep the speaker . Guest on time. We keep a running list. We are up to about 180 different examples of speaker controversies, and in about half of them, actually more than half of them, the university will stand by the speaker. It has been an unusually bad and there have, this ut 75 successful invitations, and then you have the hecklers veto. Host in the cases where protests happen, is it studentdriven, facultydriven, or a combination . Guest it depends. Driven, andfaculty birgeneau was studentdriven. Host if you want to join us to talk to Greg Lukianoff, if you are a College Student i want to give your thoughts, students actually involved in the protest outside, do College Students really Pay Attention to these kinds of things . Guest i like to think that they do, i like to think they are less apathetic than they are given credit for. A great example is what took place at around university. Police commissioner ray kelly was invited to speak. I am a civil libertarian. Andtally disagree with stop frisk and i understand why the students were angry, but because they were initially angry, ray kelly agreed to do an hour of questionandanswer after his speech. So, if you wanted to put a hard question to ray kelly, he agreed to let you do that. So, there were students that wanted to have these tough questions, but other students, when he tried to speak shouted him down, made it impossible for him to go on, and those that were angry with us or political students who wanted the chance to ask the hard questions. Upon thethere a burden speakers that pullout shouldnt they just the as willing just be as willing to speak . Guest in Christine Lagardes case, she ducked out easily, but Condoleezza Rice stuck with it for months, after hearing the protests would be more intense. Host our guest also wrote a book on censorship and the end of the american debate. When did you become interested in this issue . Guest my entire life. Freespeech is a passion of mine. My father is russian, my mother is british. They have different ideas of what you should be allowed to say, and growing up in that background, certainly the government should not be saying what you should be allowed to say. You should suffer the consequences of what you say. I specializes at stanford. Studied censorship i worked with the aclu of northern california, and despite all of that background, i was not ready for how easy it is to get in trouble on the modern College Campus. Lukianoff, on the foundation for individual rights in education, the first call is richard. Independent line. I appreciate being on your program again. I am a retired school administrator. And a history teacher. A lot of host richard, are you there . Caller yes. Host keep going. Caller i have seen a lot of changes over the years. I was there when segregation was kicked out of the schools, or try to be picked out of schools, freedom of speech denied, people being able to come in and talk against segregating students, and then, all of a sudden, when the threat of communism has less and less is fear of communism, i have seen a shift back towards that. Host thank you, caller. He said, as far as these types of things of freedom of speech on College Campuses, what has been the trend restricted over the years, stayed the same . Guest fire was founded in 1899 and i started working in the 1999, and001, and i started working in the field in 2001, and i always had the impression that things were betters in the 1970 things were better in the 1970s, the 1980s, and then became more politically correct in the 1990s, but nothing prepared me for how easy it was to get in trouble. A lot of this comes from the ofer bureaucratization universities. They frankly try to regulate everything. That leads to some particularly absurd examples we have had parity in the course of four months we had individual incidents were a student at modesto junior college, and then students at the university of hawaii were told they could not pass out copies of the constitution because they needed advance permission, and both times they were told they had to go to the freespeech zone on campus, the faraway part of campus, and they had to apply to use it in advance. Some of this is driven by the very same forces that are usually driving up the cost of college. Host is it legal to put freespeech in a zone . Tiny zone,t is a absolutely not. Every time they have been challenged, they have been laughed at by a judge. Could you prevent people from having a rock concert at 3 00 in the morning . Of course you can, or interfering with a function of the university . Of course you have. Cases, where there was a freespeech zone that was only one stage on the campus, only available from noon until 1 00 p. M. , and 4 00 to 5 00 p. M. On weekdays. Protesters from the same political spectrum . Guest not always. You are likely to get more protests if you are a socially speaker, and then other cases where james franco was protested because he was not lerner, sogh, lois it is not always that dynamic. Host our number that mitt romney got some criticism for speaking at Liberty University i remember that mitt romney got some criticism for speaking at Liberty University. Georgia. Caller good morning. Students havethat the right to protest because they pay the tuition, and the schools, in most cases, pay the speakers to come, and in addition, i think this is the students way of pronouncing their freedom of speech. Enough, iannot say it have said in everything i have written, fire defends the right of students to protest. What concerns us is when the goal is not to protest this week, but to make sure the speaker does not speak at all on the campus. That is a difference that concerns us. What you end up having is you end up making it so that is very a university to choose a speaker that makes everyone happy, and that waters down the marketplace of ideas. Given how tough the purity test for speakers are on campus these days, i think youll end up with all schools ending up like a college did back in the 1990s, which invited kermit the frog to speak at commencement because he was safe. Host , from twitter says one of is about the captive audience. Guest i have heard the argument, and i do not totally agree with it, the ability to protest, wear armbands there are a million different ways you can show your protest. As i said, what i feel like were missing is the good intellectual habit of hearing the person out, and when you look at some of the speakers Condoleezza Rices personal story she grew up in the jim crow south, and grew up to be the first africanamerican woman secretary of state. What she would probably talk about in her commencement would be her personal stories. The idea of having epistemic humility, to show up and say they be you will learn something from the speaker, it is something that i do not feel like my generation had a lot of virtues on a lot of different things, but we did showed up did show up for commencement speech to hear them out. Host i think ms. Ayaan hirsi ali was invited to come back at a later date, but she declined as well. Guest as far as a personal story that is interesting, hers is amazing. Host chicago, illinois. Republican line. This is frank. Much of what you are hearing from students is rage and impotence over the fact that none of these people have been prosecuted over alleged crimes they committed while in office, which included extreme versions of having preventing other people from having speech. I think Condoleezza Rice might be on par with major criminals that might want to be interviewed on College Campuses but denied the right because criminals. Jor she, on the other hand, continues in the public eye as if she is some heroic individual. I believe that people should not be shouted down in public venues. I do agree, but given the fact that there are no legal remedies for dealing with these types of public criminals, in a lot of cases im not saying she is a public criminal, she has not convicted, and apparently, like a lot of the bankers, she will not even be charged. A lot of what you see is extreme rage, and i would like to see your organization direct itself to the fact that there seems to past, publicly, for people like that, to skate free after they have committed crimes were allegedly committed crimes. Host thank you. Freespeech and Economic Freedom on College Campuses, and what i see as interesting is when we talk invitation season process, people will focus on the speaker that they do not like, and they will say certainly you cannot defend this persons freedom of speech, and the answer is, of course we can. If you look at this as a trend, it is becoming very difficult to find someone that you could actually invite to speak on a College Campus these days. When my Vice President went on saidngton post live, he could we invite president obama by the standards we did not rutgers, and he reached a point where he said pauly reaching the point we cannot have a sitting president give a commencement speech and the answer was essentially yes. If you go down this rabbit hole, it is hard to imagine where you end. Make then colleges decision about speakers, do students have direct input . Guest it depends on the school. Host columbus, ohio. Edward is a College Student. Observing on time a College Campus over the years i think a big part of it is an onset in changes in journalism, such as the onset of people getting all of the information from a blog or a website that only agrees with their ideas, and they end up in an echo go back to they same source of their own ideas, and that is when you see the marketplace of ideas truly fallout. More. I cannot agree it is a major theme of my book on learning liberties. Talkf the things that i about is that censorship does not work in the sense that it changes peoples minds, but it can convince people to talk to people they already agree with, and that is what is happening on campus. There is a disturbing statistic i found in the course of writing it. There is an inverse correlation between how much education you have and how Many Political the scrimmage at with an average week or month. The more educated you are, the less likely you are to be exposed to disagreements along political lines. To me, that is intellectually unhealthy, and it shows that we that alleaching people educated people should think of it as a duty to seek out and hear out intelligent people with whom they disagree. Host either College Campuses that advocate those kinds of issues . St one of the collis is colleges that i have been pleased with is the university of virginia. Princeton has been well behaved on our watch, too. Host what do they do that others do not . Guest they have controversial speakers, stand by them, debates, and different points of view, and generally we have not seen as many incidents where students get in trouble for speaking their mind were cracking jokes. Host there is an announcement from Wake Forest University that Jill Abramson from a former executive editor of the new york times, is still scheduled to be the commencement figure, and this is something we will do on cspan, showing a lot of different kind of immense and speakers, but we find it interesting given our Current Situation. It might be interesting to hear what she has to say. As far as issues when it comes to the way you look at it, what invitation season say as far as the future do you expect more of the same, and you expect it to increase . Guest i think it could be cured in till you always, one is positive, one i do not consider very positive. First, you have administrations really cultivating in students the belief that being offended could be a good thing, that hearing people out is particularly important, hearing a people whose opinions that you hate. Is a scholarly approach there is a scholarly approach where theres an opportunity because i can hear where this person is coming from and get ready to argue if you are allowed the opportunity, but definitely to know your enemy, or find out if that person is your enemy in the first place. Now, that is the appropriate prodiscourse, proAcademic Freedom outcome. What i think is more likely is universities are going to invite safer and safer speakers to come on campus, and i think that is happening. That is one of the reasons why dis invitation season gets more private. Host springfield university. This is brian. Caller i have to agree with one of the earlier callers, researching on the internet, people only look at views that they agree with, but my point specifically is that bringing a controversial speaker on campus is much better for a forum rather than the graduation ceremony. I think the graduation should be more celebratory, but as far as infering opinions, i think Public Schools around the country, bowing to standardized testing, the emphasize on math and english, i think there has been a lot less emphasis on civics and civics programs have been cut and downsize and deemphasized for the standardized testing that goes on. I think people have not been taught civics, and what that means as far as public discourse. I think it translates as these kids age up into college, and i think that hurts the political discourse on campus. Guest i entirely agree. I think that students should be taught civics, and i also think something that would really help what i think is the poor state of the Exchange Ideas on campus would be part of orientation would be to have a proper oxfordstyle debate, and not on a week issues, but serious, strong issues that americans disagree on because there is a certain shift that happens to people. When you are put in a position of having to take the other side of the argument, it becomes harder to see anyone that disagrees with you as an embodiment of pure evil. It is an intellectual habit that we are not teaching students. As a talk about in my book, i do not blame the students as much as i do administrators for not teaching students the right lessons about what it means to live in a free society. Host richard. Brooklyn, new york. Caller yes. Couple of things you mentioned that are interesting. You mentioned that in one of these groups there were only about 500 people protesting. You can equate this with the vietnam protests. The protesting itself, through the media, through the throughtion, and throughtion, and suddenly became a majority of americans who protested the same thing. Brings up the additional fact that in terms of general freedom of speech, the First Amendment itself may be a rowistic. Nbeing a because in the old days before there was anything like media, a soapbox, andn people didnt like what you said, you didnt have very much freedom of speech and your word didnt spread. Radio,f course, came the television, and now the internet spreads so rapidly these days that you never know what the effect is going to be. A big influence on things. Perhaps the First Amendment has to be revisited. Guest i think the First Amendment is more important than ever. I think if what youre saying is that we should reconsider freedom of speech because now possibility the individual, regular folk have the possibility of reaching entire global audience, i could not disagree more. Im very excited about new regularbout seeing what people have to say rather than people who just own the presses. Lake,al from crystal illinois. Independent line. Caller thank you very much for taking my call. Question is why dont you the have the president of College Speak and then the whole . Ssue would go away guest its a great question. I think thats probably where were headed. But i think were headed there reasons. Rong the idea of commencement, taking someone who is accomplished in it might be ad surprise, it might be someone you disagree with, and hearing what sort of life wisdom they share, i think its a great tradition. The idea that we give that up because students and faculty dont want to hear from people they really disagree with, i a very bad end. And believe me, if we humor this youret too much, what going to end up is University President s themselves being students, individual being told we dont want the valedictorian speaking because wrote this badoned. Trust me, that is where were headed. Host next weekend cspan will be airing several commencement speakers. Republicanisiana governor, the massachusetts patrick. Deval the host of speakers that we have taken in, and we will show all weekend starting next weekend during memorial day to andthe varying thoughts perspectives. If you want more information, go cspan. Org. Te at is a commencement speech a paid speech . Is paid. Nerally it as far as how much theyre paid i think sometimes is excessive. As . such guest Condoleezza Rice was supposed to be paid 35,000, which is really steep. Protesting that and writing opeds and picket being that, thats a legitimate argument. But, again, trying to get her excluded from campus is too far. Host and in some cases it was a well, an Honorary Degree on top. Guest right. Host this is robert up next from massachusetts, republican line. Caller thank you for taking my. All im a native of hungary. I lived through the communist. Ra. Remember the 1966 revolution clearly this is not the way of life that i wanted to live. Being said, initially i was a democrat. Time when you had youj. , j. F. K. , people that could take seriously. Now i became a republican. Feel that the intolerance of offensiveecame so that just became intolerable, people for punishing their ideas. Thank you for taking my call. Guest i consider myself a political liberal, but i have been very sad about how oftentimes when im fighting for free speech on College Campuses there are people who claim to be liberals who are on, in my opinion, the wrong side of this. Found jarring i was i did a debate at the National Constitution center eric pozner said free speech absolutism is something only conservatives are concerned about now and that liberals about free speech in the 70s and 80s. I was horrified by that accusation. Is one of those things wanted to write an article saying my fellow liberals, are that . Ing to take host you mentioned something before called speech codes. What is that . Guest speech codes, the modern veering of speech codes i never say there was a perfect, free speech on College Campuses. Maybe a week in 1977. But the modern era of speech began in the 1980s and with the best of intentions. Like Richard Delgado advocated for codes that would was offensivehat to women and minorities. As any First Amendment lawyer can till, these things take on a their own. One example of a code defeated. Inconsiderate jokes and inappropriately directed laughter. Yes. Ofs was the University Connecticut of all places when this got out to the public, the funny. Found it very the courts found it funny, too. It was overturned in 1991. Tenacious these codes are is that very same code, inappropriately directed laughter and everything, was on drexelnd universitys books as of 2006. We had to get together and fight that then. And what scares me is i think that students really take these of codes for granted. I have to explain to them that under this code every single one of violatinglty the speech code. Host how do you get convicted at least charged of violating the speech code . How does that process work . Guest they have to be applied selectively and with double standards. A lot of times they get charged under the speech code if an administrator doesnt like you. Students are9 of guilty of it. They will only apply it in pretty arbitrary reasons. Host i suspect theres a due process . Guest due process helps make a most absurd free speech problems go away because ill take an example from the book. Example. We have a case going back to 2007 where a student was reading notre dame versus the klan. It was about the defeat of the and celebrates the defeat of the klan, which makes it more ironic what happened. He was found guilty of racial harassment by administrators at indiana university, Purdue University in indianapolis. Reading aas just book. Guest just reading a book, an antiracist book which makes it more ironic. Was found guilty but found guilty by the administrator with no chance to appeal, no chance out. Heard but i believe if there had been due process in place, this would stood passed the lab test. Host up next is mike from washington, oklahoma. Independent line. Morning. Go ahead. Mike from washington, oklahoma, time. Re lets go to millie, asheville, north carolina. There. Caller hi, gentlemen. I have to agree with a gentleman that called earlier. It seems to me that most of these protests come from the liberal side. And if that had been more conservative students that had protested Condoleezza Rice, they have been called racists. So why cant these liberal protesters be called racists . I think its just gotten ridiculous. Guest everything i see on College Campuses, i completely agree it has gotten ridiculous. Were dealing with a case right now in new jersey where a a professor posted a picture of his daughter wearing a game of throne tshirt, which included a quote saying i will mine with blood and fire. A great show. Im a huge fan, huge nerd. Violent the words blood and fire on it the suspended and sentenced to mandatory psychological counseling because bywas interpreted administrators at his university as a threat. It has really gotten out of control. Said, you would think after 13 years nothing could surprise me. Am surprised every day. Host when you go to College Campuses to work these cases, to you . He response guest its funny. Id say nine times out of 10, talked when im on a panel, when i talk to on College Campuses, administrators will show up and say free speech is very important. Arecases you talk about ridiculous. I go, ok if we agree, why does it keep happening . There are some answers. Sometimes they have people who think theyre saving the world, that you shouldnt hear this tonion because i want protect the little guy. But in a lot of cases it is administrators who have maybe a power and tooh much time on their hands. In other cases its a group thinking dynamic. Cases its fear of liability. Universities have been convinced that they can be sued for practically anything. Be offended is something theyre afraid of. So im afraid that a lot of antors are contributing to environment where its increasingly difficult to have regular freedom of speech that rest of us take for granted off campus. Host on our independent line springfield, tennessee. Hi. Caller hi. Ahead. O caller is the fact that theyre awarded an Honorary Degree for being the speech, could that more of the problem as to why the students dont want her to want cause they dont its one thing for her to speak, but then the gift, the award being more the insult . Guest one thing that i really every interview ive done about this and every article ive written about it, i commencementus on is a little overblown. I think people should be focusing on how difficult it is speaker on campus in general, including commencement. But a lot of the cases ive talked about over the years, particularly. Ray kelly case when he was shouted down at brown, those werent commencement speeches. All year around you end up with people invited to campus and disinvited or forced to withdraw. So if it was a problem just limited to commencement, i would more sympathy for the position. But given this is something that happens all year around, it more concerned about the general environment for dissenting views on campus. Host your organization, is it students who primarily come to you for help . Guest primarily students but we well. Aculty as most of our cases are protecting the free speech rights of students. Supported . Re you guest about onethird 2 3 individual donors which i like because it can o single donor were not too reliant on any one person. Host whats your team like, how lawyers on these things . Guest at this point actually about 22 lawyers. Not 22 lawyers. Sorry. 22 Staff Members and about half of whom are lawyers. One thing that im andaordinarily proud of that i talk about is that i have never even heard of an as internally politically diverse as fire. We have republicans working with working with democrats working with independence working with radicals, working with muslims, raised with the people jewish, with christians and atheists. And we all disagree fundamentally on so many different issues, but we agree on free speech. Freedom we academic agree on due process. Which means when we have Company Really fun. re host from baltimore, maryland, bee, goodline, morning. Caller good, month. Angeles, in los california. Concerned, black and white didnt matter. We all got along, for the most part, very, very well. Host i think youre calling on the last segment. Lets move on to walter, dallas, line, collegedent student. Walter, go ahead. Caller thank you very much. So proud [inaudible] would you allow hitler to come back and get an Honorary Degree . Not. Urse this woman spoke loud and clear. Saidoom cloud is what she which led to the death of hundreds of thousands of iraqis and how Many Americans . Its unbelievable. To ratify what she did, to lie send people to their death based on some Mushroom Cloud . No. Im proud. If they hadnt, i would have it inmy degree and put the river. Guest thats the thing when to disagree on the problem with the invitation, theyll focus on the one person say that the most and person shouldnt be invited. Well what of the list of the those we have. Chances are someone you believe be invited will not to speak. Someone whom you believe has very important things to say to invited will not be basbecause of this overall phenomenon. Freedom of speech is to hear out even those people orpassionately agree with think very wrong things. In fact, it may be more out. Tant we hear those host what about the idea as he said, an endorsement from the personsbout the positions and views . Guest thats something the Smith College president addressed. It would bely the lalry im would be literally impossible for everybody to be a what theative of college actually thinks. You obviously end up having people who disagree with each other. Ive watched universities try to play this, oh, no this is an endorsement, saying we agree this. Its impossible for an entire university to completely agree with any one speaker, anywhere planet. Host Greg Lukianoff is the president of the foundation nor forvidual rights individual rights and education, a discussion about free speech on College Campuses. Thank you. For having me. Host coming up, a look at the concept of bubbles. You probably heard terms like the financial bubble or the tech bubble. Well find out what it means to be in a bubble. Theif any bubbles are on horizon. Sudeep reddy will join us for that discussion as washington this. L continues after you can remember who first influenced you to just think about issues . Think about government . Father, mother. I was so impressed i put it in a traditions, how they raised four children two boys and two girls, in a factory town england. It was conversation around the dinner table. There was no looking at tv or to radio or looking like this. We talked. Us. Challenged in if a nice way. Asked us questions, needled us us. Joked with the bottom line was freedom civic responsibility. You cant just say i want freedom. Theyre freehink because theyre personally free. They can buy their own clothes, friends, gown wherever they want. Listen to whatever music, eat want. Er they that doesnt mean theyre civically free. Have to engage in democracy. Youad used to say, if dont use your rights, youre going to lose your rights. Sunday, 8 00, cspan q a. The wonderful thing about the think sot is its i underappreciated. Thats good because it gives us about. O write if we were in new york or San Francisco or chicago, those soies and places are all wellknown. Of course, new york is a literary capital, but here on the gulf coast we tend to think of that, say from texas to the florida panhandle, there really is a pangulf sensibility. We have a similar environment, similar types of trees, live oaks, longleaf pines, palm soil, salt in the air. The gulf of mexico, of course, es and supplies us with , rivers, seafood places like mobile bay are wonderfully rich in tradition and culture. Have been books, memoirs and so forth sort of in and around all of these things for hundreds of years. So its an extraordinarily rich subject to take. And then, of course, along comes where allill in 2010 of a sudden we are at center stage and people are beginning gulf coast and think about, wow, whats it like there . What moves them . We didnt know we got so much of our oil and gas from there. Good lord. The nation became tuned in to how important the gulf is. The rich history and literary life of mobile, alabama, on book tv and American History tv today on 2 00 onand sunday at spinning 3. Cspan 3. Continues. Journal host joining us now, sudeep from the wall street journal. Good morning. Guest good morning. Aboutwere here to learn bubbles, as theyre known what is an expect bubble . Guest a economic bubble or bubble is essentially a situation in which the price of an asset gets severely disconnected from what would be considered its underlying fundamental value. Very difficult things to assess. But if you look at some of the seen overles weve the last two decades, its pretty clear in retrospect what bubble. In the late 1990s, we saw stock boom, pricesotcom soar through the roof. A lot of these companies didnt werent returning to shareholders, they were inflated in price. Their stocks were inflated in thoughtcause somebody they were going to go up even further. And it wasnt about their fundamental value. Hopingbecause they were somebody else, perhaps a sucker down the road, would come in and buy that stock. Housing boom we saw over the course of the decade earlyhe late 1990s, 2000s, 2006, 2007, home prices 30 ,s the u. S. Soared sometimes 50 , 60 , 100 in some whats and went far beyond would be considered a fundamental value based on what people could afford, family incomes, household incomes. As a result of that, housing saw at the end of it when people realized this has gotten way out of hand. Anyone else to buy that asset at an even higher price and eventually people oflized this has gotten out control. Prices of housing ended up ended up with we a severe recession as a result. Things increase, there has to be something to support it to keep it from doing so. Guest exactly. The entire reason you would buy any kind of product, whether there house or a car, is is some fundamental value involved. You think its going to be worth something either as an asset that its going to do something worthwhile for you at the moment. So if youre buying even a house property, it will draw some income. Youre also buying it based on the expected future value. What a stockially market is about youre buying a stock not just for what its in earnings right now, but earnings over a decade or a couple of decades. Look athy we fundamental ratios of corporate earnings as a basis of the stock price. Host are there signs that you aboute when a bubble is to break . Guest there are some signs you can see about when a bubble is about to break. Include panic selling. You see little moments of panic in a stock price. You see moments of panic in a market where suddenly people are this and theres something called the greater fool theory. You want to pull out before everyone else does. And eventually you have so many people realizing, ok, the partys over, we all need to pulling back that once everyone pulls out of a market, of it has to drop pretty quickly for somebody else to come in and buy that declining asset, which is essentially like catching a falling knife. Nobody wants to do it. The prices keep going down and down and down. Its a pretty precipitous decline, sometimes over the course of days. Sometimes it can take months or years. Thats the fundamental problem, something has gotten out of control, when the bubble is going to pop, how will spreaddamage and whether you can get out in time. Actuallyfar as when it happens, what determines if you can recover it or not . Guest if something was in a toe bubble, which we tend only know in retrospect, then youre going to see the value of precipitously and not come back for many years until of that stockls or of that asset recover. Seeingetimes were now Certain Companies that were in the stock market in the tech late 1990s, they obviously saw their stock prices soar and then drop down to to practically nothing. And 10, 15 years after that youve actually seen some of recover and build sustainable businesses. They are delivering much higher based onces fundamental values of what theyre earning in profits as a company. When housing, you look at the Current Situation, would you say weve recovered or are recovering . Guest in housing weve actually entered a period that some people think could be another bubble. Highly debatable, whether were in another bubble for housing. 2000 to 2007 this huge run up in home prices. After when the bus started bust started, you into see 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011 prices had dropped and started to stabilize. Many places theyve gone through the roof. And its not necessarily occurring because people suddenly feel like the economy is better. Economy americans the doesnt feel a whole lot better. Wages are flat. Youre not going to feel like huge assets to buy Something Like a new home. But a lot of investors have poured into housing partly due to really cheap Interest Rates partlye Federal Reserve, due to just having cash on the sidelines. They poured into housing and these assets at really cheap values and push some of them up, again, a little higher than they probably merit based on fundamental values. Well just have to see in the coming years whether those are sustainable. Host as far as bubbles, are entities when the federal government keeps a close eye on these things . Particular, the Federal Reserve, the nations central bank is charged in part the financialg system. It has a team within the fed dislocationsng for in markets, looking for financial risk across the economy and across the Financial Sector. It is looking for all of this stuff. Its very difficult to figure out what to do once youve identified a bubble. Longrunning debate at the Federal Reserve and sen tall banksaround central around the world. What happens when everyones look at this and they say, ok, bubble . Clearly a how do get into that without destroying the rest of the economy at the same time . To have al banks tend blunt tool, Interest Rates. They can go in and raise Interest Rates. Raise Interest Rates, its going to affect everything else, the price of a much it a business, how costs you to buy a car. You cant necessarily just asset an individual through a tool like that. So when theyve identified it, to use regulation. They will go in and try to prevent banks from taking on of that added risk, to limit how that builds up. Go in and use the bully pulpit and warn about saw that inthat you the mid 1990s when Allen Greenspan warned of irrational exuberance. We still saw years of climbing beyondstock market far where it was when he warned of it. And it didnt do a whole lot of fed chairman who was seen as an oracle at the time had warned about it. Ended up in some bit of disaster. Host and they get blamed for bubbles. G guest and the fed clearly missed an important piece of the housing bubble. To everyone that housing prices were going up. The hope at the fed and the hope the economy was that when the housing bubble justed inflating it would stabilize at that level and would perhaps see a decade or two of catching up to those values. It had gotten out of control. And when that bubble burst, it the entire sector that was underpinning the bubble. Ended up with a financial crisis that we are still paying the price for five later. Host sudeep reddy with the wall street journal here to talk about financial bubbles. The history of. Well talk about the future of. If you want to ask questions a viewer on twitter says bubbles speculation. N of guest thats what happens when you have any market where somebody is going to be guessing of that asset. E youll see people running it up. Of thingsthousands you could call a bubble. Thats the problem here. You cant say everything is a expect that everything is eventually going pop. P like a bubble would there are allegations now that bubbles inot only stocks at least in tech stocks, in parts of the housing sector country. Theres a belief that theres a in bit coin, 9 Virtual Currency. There may be a bubble in art where wealthy consumers have gone out and the value of art and other luxury items. There have been plenty of a bubble in rare scotch because its something fundreally shouldnt have mental value as an asset. Speculation. S that will happen. The question is what is too much and what goes too far . Viewer asked the question, taking a look at the United States specifically, the 17. 5 trillion debt, is that a bubble forming . Importantts a very question to have a bubble in thething so fundamental as United States debt is probably a stretch. Its clear that the u. S. Debt is could begh and there problems from having debt that high, but to think that theres bubblee and when the buivelts the value of bursts, the value of u. S. Debt will misplacedis a little because u. S. Debt is the fundamental underpinning of the Global Financial system. Have to see some Pretty Amazing armegeddon for the value it collapse. Host is that more related to who we sell our debt to and who it . S guest its partly related to who holds our debt because everybody whos holding our debt as a safe asset. If youre buying u. S. Debt, you think its one of the safest assets around. That could be a risk by bidding debt up as much as it is. During moments of financial panic and during moments of stress even in the stock market, you see investors pouring into u. S. Debt and not pouring out of it thats the in a lot of cases right now. Host first call for you is from our from new york, on democrats line. Good morning. Caller good morning. How are you doing . Guest good. Caller a quick question. What do you think about the u. S. Market . I know that the fed balance sheet, after 2008 the market blew up. I think it was like 900 billion. And now five years later its up to i believe 4. 2 trillion. Prettyive years theyve much i dont know what the percentage increase, 300 , what, money that they pumped, the fed printed and pumped into the system. Say is the fed supposed the market and bubbles,sk and reduce it seems doing that complete , like theyre trying to reinflate the markets when they kind of the true value. Bubbleinflated into this situation. Guest that is a fundamental question around the federal now. Ve right is the fed doing something that is supporting the rest of the the long run or is the fed essentially creating theher bubble to deal with consequences of the last bubble which was created to deal with the consequences of the tech bubble . Its an important question. The fed is, of course, different from everyone else in that the is the central bank and controls the ability to print money. Fed can print money and determine when to pull the money out of the system, then it do a lot more than the rev of us can in dealing with assets. Ng fundamental so the fed, of course, as you noted, has gone from a balance of 800 billion to more than 4 trillion. That its just money has created out of thin air to flood the Financial System to try force investors. What its been doing is buying bonds and trying to force mover out to move out of these government bonds, these super safe assets investors have been buying, and to move into stocks. The debate, hotly debated right now is whether the fed in doing that has pushed investors too . Ar off on the risk spectrum have they push it had into some area whether its the dark the Financial System or whether they pushed them into just regular stocks that have gone up way too much in value because you cant get yield, because you cant get interest on your regular checking account, on your savings accounts . Have you gone out and sought riskier investments to the point where youve gone well beyond their fundamental value . End up in at youll stormy market environment and reassessll start to whether fundamental values have gotten out of control with the stock market. Certainly consider blaming the fed and what it has done in the treasury market by that. Host chris from connecticut. Es on a republican line caller yes, hello. I was hoping to make a couple of points and hopefully hear comments afterwards. I know the wall street journal recently reported that the russell 2000 currently carrying p ratio of about 100. I think thats a bubble by any standards. Shiller, the nobel prize economist, is now saying that his current p. E. Metric puts the youent stock market know, theres only been four other times in the last 100 years its been this high. Think he called the caught the last two bubbles. I think hes calming a bubble in right now. Arket my opinion is that a lot of it likeo do with fed policy, the last caller was talking about. I know that the quantitative i think has been a massive transfer of wealth to the top percentile. 90 ou look at statistics, of the Income Growth that was the top 1 gone to since the 2008 bubble. The expansion of the balance sheet, i find, is very. Erveracking as far as monetizing u. S. Debt with quantitative easing, i very badts also policy. I think were creating more bubbles here. Let our guest respond. Guest those are all very good points and are central to the been having the last couple of years about the role of the Federal Reserve and the economy. Inlike to think of the u. S. Particular as a free market, as capitalism. Ered obviously when you have a central bank controlling Interest Rates and guiding the economy, the economys direction, it is not a true free market. In thatguided economy sense. So you have to consider what as a government in allowing the central bank to do what it does. Will most people believe having a central bank involved will cycle,e the business prevent even worse booms and and at least provide a suggestion when things fall apart. Were seeing right now that that debated. Theres really little question this measure that you cited. Robert schiller, a yale certainly wellknown for identifying the tech bubble, the housing bubble. Course, now said that stocks are a bit over valued they should be. The fundamental point he makes, though, is we dont know how and wegher theyll go dont know if they come back values willlevated they crash down to earth or will momentarye a bit of a correction that gives the economy time to scratch up . Identifying the bubble or at bubbly environment, isnt entirely difficult. Stock marketat the over the last year, year and a half, and see that the stock 30 foras climbed reasons that should leave most foam scratch their heads. Corporate earnings have certainly not risen that much and expected future corporate earnings have not risen that much. Stock market values have only been higher than we are right in terms of a pricetoearnings ratios in a housing bubble and the housing crash and the runup to the tech crash and, of to 1929. Put the facts out there and you say, well, this looks like a bubble. There are plenty of people saying its not a bubble. That this time is different. To question whenever anyone says this time is different, whether this time different. Host there is a notice that a bubble is expanding to keep it to a breaking point to slow down the rate of expansion so to speak . Guest usually when something gotten to a point where it looks so much like a bubble, its gotten out of everyones control. Here. The problem if the price of an asset has couldone up 3 , 4 , you say, well, its not that bad. Its not going to get out of control. Gone uptimes its several times, 10 times, 20 times, theimes, 100 price of the upped lying asset underlying asset. Think this is crazy, nutty behaver, going to crash down to at some point. Its just a question of timing. Host the Washington Post look atstory, taking a the Student Loan Debt. Is that a potential bubble . Guest the Student Loan Debt an interesting one. If you look at what has happened in the economy in recent years, credit has been climbing in a fairly modest pace. Though, has debt, just been soaring. Its begun through the roof over last decade. Some of it has to do with government policy. Some of it has to do with the profit colleges that are going out and encouraging take out very cheap loans and essentially turn the it toaround and give forprofit institutions. And some of it is driven by a weak economy leading people to spend more time in education. A point whereo its kind of hard for student that just a double collapses because so much of Student Loan Debt is held by the government. So it can control and monitor to that deflates if it needs deflate. But what were seeing is a very severe, fundamental economic that too Many Americans are stuck with Student Loan Debt to spendre going decades, most of their lives, hanging back. Thats going to inhibit them and their ability to buy a car, buy a home, buy a lot of other things. Next from new up jersey independent line. Caller good morning. Job losst is that caused the bubble. Anyone losinghan their jobs and not being able to pay for their homes caused the problem. Saw that sector happening noticed that it was time to take their marbles and go home. Thats typically what happened back in 1929. Thats what happens every time we run into these recession periods. Sectors inin job different sectors of investment. And as soon as they see a little pressure, they want to take their marbles and go home. Keep something solid, we can continue to have a good economy. Understand why we dont build housing like we build cars. Create jobs, build factories that make housing. Is necessary all over the world. We could ship these units everywhere and never lose those jobs. It will always be a solid sector. Guest thats an important here, what eventually leads a bubble to pop and what underlying fundamental Economic Issues that lead the bubble to pop. Weve seen into the tech bubble, the very final tech bubble and the very final stages of the house bubble job growth was actually climbing into the final moments of those periods in 2000 in 2007. It was only at the end of that where you saw job growth tend to fall apart. It looks like that job declines a lagging factor with the bubbles rather than a leading factor. But its often hard to disentangle these things. Values tend to reach some kind of a peak level realizeen businesses that the economy is over extended and they pull back and are both related in simultaneous events. Host from washington, d. C. , line. M, democrats caller thank you. Im curious about the word responsibility. Little people im not too little but we wonder why have about people gone to jail this whole thing. And i cant help but the impression with regard to the derivative industry, which i even know about a few years ago, that the big guys playing these games have owned congress, get congress to pass laws that make what they do legal so nobody is breaking the law. People claimen its too complicated. I always believe in corruption stupidity as an excuse for things. So im just wondering, why responsible, more held more responsible . And is that a real cause for this . And the current thing i wonder, i worry current bubble about is almost an inverse, inflation. My personalt and experiences everything is going up at least 10 a year, parking, food, travel, stuff like that. Not corn maybe. Who keeps these things so that the people that make huge amounts of profits and look corrupt to the ordinary person responsible . D guest the responsibility question is an important one in all of this. Obviously coming up in just a few months on the sixyear anniversary of the u. S. And Global Financial crisis bych was obviously driven certain excesses on wall street that encouraged the housing to develop into a bubble by securitizing loans, by break into individual and place. Them all over the that demand from yield from investors all over the world up. Ed push it but the problem is identifying what is the bad may haver, the incorrect behaver, and wheres the line in this . Its usually easy to see in expect retro expect once you do these post mortem reports about what happened and where the perfect storm built up. But things are kind of difficult to do in the early stages. If youre a regulator, youre worrying. Ere there are dozens if not hundreds of potential bubbles coming around you. Theyre getting paper every day identifying possible bubbles. Prick . Nes do you which ones do think are the ones that are going to bring down the economy . Ones if you try to attack them are you going to are inhibit lead you innovation in the economy and in the Financial System . Innovation from allowing wall street to do some of the things that its been able to do. Weve seen more people have access to credit. Buildseen people able to their lives much better than they were generations ago as a this. Of obviously it all gets out of control. Theres a greed factor in everything that is the fundamental piece of any financial or economic bubble. Out where the line is is extremely difficult, even if information. T of host a story looking at the housing situation in london. It,es a chart attached to he but it but it shows when it comes to pricing housing wise, heres where the United States is. London much higher. Mean as far as potential bubbles . It means the United States is actually better off than much of world when ite comes to these bubbles. Its difficult to look at individual countries. Thats an important chart because can you tell a key whether something is in a bubble is the value of that peopleo incomes to what would be able are taking in to be able to support the value asset. In the United States, on a generalized level across the nation, if you put up put the incomes and all the housing stock, then were not doing so bad compared to the world. The theres certain places where youre just thinking this is a little out of control. At new york City Real Estate or San Francisco or any of the really big cities, even washington, d. C. You start to look at these things and scratch your head saying what is this . Ting all of and there are usually individual cases. And washington, the enormous buildup over the last decade of the lobbying sector has helped housing values because there are so many people drawing private sector work off who have been able who are living in and around washington. Values of pushed up homes and other real estate. In new york city theres a Financial Sector thats doing it. In london there is a Financial Sector. Theres also a limited limited capacity in a place like that. And if you want to live in the center of a city like london, youre going to push the value of that housing up so that youre not doing an hourlong that can actually lead to a dislocation. And eventually in some of these would the people who support the Million Dollar property or Million Pound in this case ends up thatee them rise up but sector eventually hits its peak and starts to fall apart and will drop. Values these things in certain cities take years or decades. Host say the London Housing bubble or bursts in another there a Ripple Effect . Could that effect the United States . Guest the key question when a housing bubble bursts is who is lind it. Behind it. When any asset bubble bursts, who is behind it. Is it people who have plenty of money to speculate and its not deal . T big of a im not concerned about the luxury art bubble bursting. The people buying luxury art, spending millions or tens of millions of dollars for it are toy money. H it doesnt really matter. Might see that if the bubble were to burst in one of those areas and asset prices decline,recipitously they might not go out and spend on a whole lot of other things. But its likely they have a lot theyre money when doing that. If in another case, though, if bubbleck market is in a and its not clear entirely clear how much of a bubble its in, but if it were to decline precipitously, then youre going to see some of whats called the wealth effect. People who see their wealth decline will eventually spend less. But only about half of america right now is invested in the stock market. Not like this is going to hit everyone in the economy. The problem is the half that sin been the half that has been holding up a lot of Economic Activity and economic recoveryring the largely because the other half has seen an economy that is so they havent their incomes havent climbed and haventset values climbed. Host sudeep reddy talking about financial bubbles. Jim from spartansburg, South Carolina. Republican line. Caller good morning. How are you . Guest good morning. Aller i wanted to propose different theory and get your opinion. But since world war ii when we stationed our troops in germany and kept peace there for six back andnd traded forth with them, theres been like neverted before. And maybe theres so much capital as a result of that, hasss capital that it nowhere to go. Nowhere logical to go. So it flees or flocks to these bubbles or whatever is hot of the day, whether its tech estate. R real you really cant necessarily blame wall street on all of this because its human consumption and human investment drives it. Seeing in ireland people lined up around a block ready to invest in new condos being built. Forced them to go there. And that was like in 2005 and 2006. So whether what you need to do is to make sure that you dont have to bail out the next bubble, that its done in such a way that theres no loans underpinning it. If all the loans would have been paid back in the real estate of people taking out the loans, none of those derivatives would greatlye bust or preponderance of evidence there of. Of. Reponderance there so i think you need to put a handle on somehow this excess capital. Agrees, i dont know how you quantitatively measure that. You cant take human demand out of this. I remember back in the 1990s mutualwere demanding funds get more aggressive. Janus,nt you outpacing t. Rowe price . They leaned on those groups to produce more returns. Just wall street or the Banking Sector or the fed. Host thanks, caller. Guest a great point. Is awash in capital. That was one important theory bubblehy the housing built up, because there is so much capital around the world, countries developing. They wanted to pour money into they thought the values would rise. Directed money to the United States. Thats how some of these housing securities were built up and spread around. How to control that is a very problem. Fundamentally it comes down to a question of regulation. Howe all familiar with tortured our discussions are in this country about regulation, should financial regulators, how much should other regulators, be stepping in and deciding, no you, the Financial Institution or you, a loanrican may not make about this asset value or for think itose because we may at some point down the line, down the road in a time period manner that we cannot predict it may lead to a bubble pop and may hurt the rest of the economy. Mays ine a lot of between there that youre going to have to assess if youre making that kind of determination. Way back far and the world war ii era. Bubbles have been around for centuries. Century, there was a bubble in holland, in the tulip market. Had been bit up. Relatively new to the region at the time. They had been bid up in price. People were selling their entire estates, their possessions, because they wanted to go and buy tulips. Ridiculous bubble. Its been well documented. Andtulip bubble of 1636 1637. Everyone thought this is something thats going to have alue, this is an elite item, tulip that i want to own. The values went out of control. Through the roof. In 1637 the tulip bubble burst values came crashing down. People lost their livelihoods. Do protect against that . The value . If people are going to make a inpid decision and invote something that doesnt have a whole lot of underlying value, how do guard against that . Make that decision . Thats obviously an extreme case. But every century youve seen a bubble of some kind build up. Whether there are plenty of things that have been identified as bubbles that dont quite turn out to be bubbles. There are Property Value that have gone through the roof in cities that you might think is a bubble but it turned out to be a leading edge of economic Economic Activity in those areas. Whoever made that decision is now. Quite well right host loretta, florida, democrats line. Hi. Caller good morning. Call. You for taking my mr. Reddyuestion for about bitcoin. How is it relative to our currency . I assume its connected with the. Nternet guest it is a Virtual Currency created out of computer code. So it is essentially traded over the internet. Is no physical item that would hold for bitcoin but really the case with most currency. Theres nothing technically backing the u. S. Dollar other than the full faith and credit of the United States government. Hasnt been backed by gold for decades. Currency created as an alternative to other currencies. Shows aboutntire bitcoin. There have been shows here and about what should be driving bitcoin. But thats a clear example. Chart,pull up any theyre all over the internet. Just type it into google. Youll see any chart of the asset value. Bitcoin. It bounced around in a low range for a while. Over the last year youve seen these incredible spikes in bitcoin values that are just. Efy logic there are people who believe that this is the wave of the future that youre going to have currency thats driven by knock more than the people it and are driving its value. Host it took a hit, right . Hit. a huge but it is still inflated beyond would have expected a few years ago when its bitcoin isn if around 10 in value and it goes trading,000, an if at 100, its a ridiculous asset value for something unproven and new. Ely thats a big question about these things. When something comes crashing down, is it back in its original value or still over valued at that point . Make a determination of this. Nothing more than a measure of what you can based on what you can buy with it. Thats what the Federal Reserve the value of the dollar, what are the purchasing power of it. It . How stable is if you were to see the United States dollars value fly around see bitcoins value if you see any curren currency,any national luck in gatfluctuate to that exu probably see revolutions if not armegeddon in most of countries. Host this twitter guest that is an interesting question. A lot of things we could have avoided if we hadnt gotten to the point of needing andail out wall street banks. The fact that we bailed out isntinstitutions necessarily directly connected to what weve seen since then. In the aftermath of the crisis the fed lowered Interest Rates to near zero. Benchmark rate. Buying bonds. Thats what we were talking about earlier, buying government bonds. On a 3. 5 trillion buying spree for buying bonds to interestwer market rates even further. That is what were seeing right now. On normal debt have gone so low that people who might have been invested in who would have been keeping their money in a bank account, are now forced by Federal Reserve by design to go out and make riskier investments. Riskierthose have been investsments that are good for the economy by leading somebody they a corporation, if see Interest Rates this low, will want to go and make the upgrades to their plant, want to use that to some valuable purpose. Homeowners have seen Interest Rates this low and have gone to refinance their mortgages. Thats helped them have more disposable income. So there are good results of that. But its also forced a whole lot of investors to do things that crazy. D of host art from peru, illinois. Republican line. Youre on with sudeep reddy of the wall street journal. Ahead. Caller thank you. My question is, if the united debt orovernment had no has a surplus, what effect would Global Economy . Thank you. Guest that is a great question and a short question and theally something that United States faced in the late clinton budgets were suddenly balancedde balanct partly due to the the Clinton Administration and the House Speaker gingrich, they came together, created a balanced budget. A concern at the fed at the time of how are they to operate their markets if there isnt Government Debt because Government Debt is underpinning so much of the Financial System. Its a world were not used to until the modern financial since world war ii. Its not clear what exactly will will drive the International Financial markets if you dont have a benchmark of u. S. Debt. And there were debates and there are reports about the debates in and 2001 about what the u. S. Government would do and reserve wouldal do if you had removed the deficit. That was what that was about. And started paying down the debt. So low thatdebt there isnt u. S. Treasuries bouncing around at the same pace. We havent faced that yet. Probably lead investors to try to seek out other safe perhaps other Government Debt abroad. The german Government Debt is as not safer in Financial Market terms as u. S. Debt. Investors to then pursue other kinds of assets that might be considered safe securitizedre Insurance Products or perhaps of thingss or a lot that you might consider as a safer asset if you didnt have the United States government as the safe asset at every moment. Host the current u. S. Fiscal ifdition, what would happen a bubble happened soon given the current condition of our economy now . Guest thats a very troubling question because the economy is weak. Pretty we have only recovered in certain measures from the. Inancial crisis the recession we went through, and we havent really taken off as a result of it. Big concern among policymakers around the world whenever they gather, that the buffers that they had in the system before really arent there. There isnt a whole lot of cushion if you were to see an economic downturn. There isnt a lot of cushion to stimulus package, another cushion to respond to some kind of a disaster. Probably prolong the pain for millions of americans for workither looking or have given up and hope to wait out the downturn. It will certainly lead to some protracted problems in if other places around the world that as weve discuss ready in some ways than we are. Host deputy Global Economics editor for the wall street journal, sudeep reddy, talking to us about financial bubbles. Thanks for your time. Guest thanks. Host thats it for todays edition of washington journal. A fresh Edition Comes your way at 7 00 tomorrow morning. Then. See you nappincaptioning performed by te institute. Ptioning [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2014] next, a u. S. Chamber of commerce discussion about infrastructure, then president obama talking about the need to spend more on infrastructure work. After that the heads of the and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission discuss strengthening Financial Markets. On monday, Thomas Donahue told republicans to pass Immigration Reform or dont bother running a candidate in 2016. His remarks came during a forum on americas aging infrastructure. The u. S. Chamber of commerce, the National Association of the council on competitiveness, and the organization for international event. Ent hosted this this portion is good morning. I am the executive director of transportation and infrastructure. This morning on behalf of the council on competitiveness, the organization for international investment, we are pleased to kick off what we hope will become an annual week of spotlighting the Public Infrastructure that serves a platform. A man challenge to organizations, the chamber in the council to Work Together to raise the profile of the infrastructure issue to recruit