But being active, unless you are actually speaking no one will hear what you have to say. In less than 60 seconds, last question. I am a student at the Honors College at miamidade, im aware the press secretary must be a credible source that during a press conference, the question is asked and there is no answer, how does the press secretary answer the question by keeping his credible source . That is an easy question you say i dont know and i will have to do research and get back to you. Any other answer if they are trying to make something up or make up something it is pointless to try to spin the press that way. Ive been asked this question a different way, what you do when you have to lie to the press . I have never in my life lied to the press and it never would. Your credibility is everything and the trust you develop is everything. Sometimes i know the answer. And you cannot tell them. I say that is not sitting i can share with you right now. Just be honest, straightforward and transparent. Not something we are prepared to discuss. That is the only way to do it. Great questions, great programs. [applause] thank you all. Next, a look at some of the 2016 democratic president ial candidates. After that, q and a with andrew keen. Here are a few of the comments we have recently received on the state of the Union Address. I heard a lot of great things talking about science and nasa. As a scientist myself i can appreciate the president ial position on expanding nasas role. It is exciting to see someone looking to the future. A couple of points i wanted to raise, i thought the rebuttal we gave the republicans was spectacular. I have not seen a state of the union speech improvised a long time. Im happy to see that after 50 years of doing something the wrong way we are getting our act together and opening up trade which has been important with our hemisphere. But the same thing could be linked to Foreign Policy, we have been doing the same thing in afghanistan and iraq and the middle east as a whole and have been getting the same results. Every 10 years we go into a country and there is some kind of blowback. He even mentioned about using drones responsibly and has killed hundreds if not thousands of people without congressional authority. I have seen a few things about the state of the Union Address and some of the stuff leading up to it, i have to argue the opposite because they said unemployment has gone down and the economy is improving, i dont think that is the case. With unemployment you can on the have your extension for so long and then you dont qualify. When those people get dropped there no longer counted as unemployed. That is not an indicator of the economy going up, that is people falling through the cracks. If you look at it from that perspective, the rate of unemployment is probably 10 point something higher than the figures. Continue to let us know about the programs you are watching. Here is a look at some of the 2016 possible democratic candidates. From the washington journal this is almost 40 minutes. We want to welcome back Steve Mcmahon, a democratic aarti strategist. I dont twitter much, i should do it more but i am busy in other ways. If you want to follow me that would be great and i will try to do better. Host lets talk about the hill democratic field. Lets talk about jim webb. How serious is his candidacy . Guest he is a serious candidate. How seriously it will be taken in iowa and New Hampshire remains to be seen. He is the antiestablishment, antieverything, antiidentity politics. He was a senator from virginia for six years as you know Ronald Reagans secretary of the navy andesis got this instinct to talk about the plight of the working white male which is a constitwains that he feels is overlooked and often ignored by politicians in both parties but especially in his party. And it will be interesting to see how that goes. He was a pretty good candidate in 2006. He beat george allen, the incumbent senator from virginia and nobody really expected him to do that. He left after one term. Some people said because he thought maybe he couldnt win rely. Others believed because he was tired of the gridlock up on the hill. He is going to run a campaign thats based upon the idea that maybe the two parties can work together. He has worked for republican president s. He served as a democratic senator. He argued gridlock is keeping america from moving forward. A lot of voters agree with that. We will see. George will this morning in his column writing about Bernie Sanders, independent, who is considering a democratic bid for the white house and making an an analogy to Gene Mccarthy a lengthy piece about his possible candidacy candidacy. He has been in iowa and New Hampshire and staff saying despite his aiming, 73, 74 years old, he serious. Guest i think he is serious. There is a restive, progressive wing in the party that wants a debate that the Elizabeth Warren and others bring forward. Many believe that debate is healthy for the party keeps the democratic nominee whoever it is, in this case i think its probably going to be senator former secretary clinton t keeps them honest moves, moves them to the left a little bit. It holds their feet to the fire with the base, and there are a lot of people who feel like its a productive part of the process. There are others who think that its divisive, creates problems and moves your candidate farther left than they want to be. You can argue it round or square but Bernie Sanders is somebody Hillary Clinton will have to deal with. Joy biden telling abc after the state of the union he would make a decision this summer. Joe biden is somebody that i just think the world of and hes been a loyal soldier. He has been a great Vice President. He has been the guy that the Administration Sends up to the hill when they have to get things done. He is is able to work with Republican Leaders and his old democratic colleagues and bring them together whether its, you know ending the shutdown of the government or putting together a budget deal. He is a legislators legislator. He would a Lyndon Johnson like president if he could get there but there is no question that hes been completely eclipsed in terms of the coverage and the conversation by secretary clinton. So, i think his shot on friday was a dont forget about me but i think a lot of people in this town and particularly inside the add miles per hourstration believe if secretary clinton does run and most people think she will Vice President biden probably will not run. But i think thats a decision that he wants to make, and he doesnt want that decision to be made or imposed upon him by any of the washington ones. Elizabeth warren of massachusetts . She is interesting in the same way that Bernie Sanders is although i think if Elizabeth Warren ran she would be she would eclipse Bernie Sanders in the same way that Hillary Clinton has eclipsed joe biden in many respects. She is something that the left is intrigued by. Progressives love. She continues to say, i am not running for president. Its present tense who gets everybody who likes to parse words interested in asking whether she really means it, whether she might change her mind, whether she might be running for president in the future, whether it might include 2016. I think she has been clear and unequivocal to this point she is not running for president currently. I think she has left the door open enough if Hillary Clinton doesnt run she would easily and quickly be able to become a credible candidate. I think thats by design and not by accident. This is the headline from politico at politico. Com Hillary Clintons fear of leaks. Avowing to avoid a repeat. How do you do that . You have been part of a lot of campaigns. Gecht guest yeah. I understand their concern about leaks. Leaks were clearly a problem last time. It sort of goes with the taken tory, though. If you are trying to avoid the mistakes of the last time the mistakes really werent the leaks. The mistakes were mistakes made on the tam pain trail technical mistakes. After iowa and New Hampshire and when it was clear this was going to be a proceed tacted nominating fight. The Clinton Campaign hadnt filed delegate slates in all of the slates that were holding caucuses and primaries later in the process. They discovered that the Obama Campaign had done that. Thats why relatively early on people who understood the process and how delegates are accumulated and, after all nominations are determined by delegates at conventions and not bottom primaries by primaries won. People knew obama was going to win long before the Clinton Campaign knew obama was going to win. Late host late february early march guest and they were wondering why the Clinton Campaign was ringnizing the inevitable. Those are the kind of mistakes that the Clinton Campaign needs to avoid. The leaking is going to happen, you know, president ial administrations try to stop leaks. They continue to happen. Campaigns try to stop leaks. They happen. I dont think that was the principle problem for the Hillary Campaign last time. Host our guest is Steve Mcmahon, a veteran of a number of democratic campaigns. Now, the founder, cofounder of Purple Strategies which is what . Guest a bipartisan Public Affairs firm that was cofounded by myself and a guy named alex capiansa and we work with challenged brands and in challenging circumstances. We all kind of do democrats and republicans working together which is kind of rare in this town and they all do their campaigns at night and work during the day at this Public Affairs firm, which is a pretty cool place. Host let me ask you about the now former governor of maryland Martin Omalley who had visible appearances last fall, stepped down as the governor of maryland. Its been protocol quiet guest he is the most interesting wild card in this race. He was very active early, traveled, last year, i think to 23 states a twoterm governor of maryland a very successful governor by most peoples assessment. He was, you know, he abolished the death penalty, raised the minimum wage in maryland one of the first to pass civil unions to marriage equality. So gay marriages were occurring in maryland before they were elsewhere. He was against the war. After the torture report came out, he was the only candidate to say or potential candidate to say there should be a special prosecute. Or. He positioned himself if he wanted to be the liberal art alternative to secretary clinton, but hes gone kind of quiet lately. His handpicked successor was unsuccessful in the governors race and i think that was a little surprising to him and to a lot of us who watched maryland politics. I think he said he is going to make a decision, i think by the ends of this month but certainly in the near term. Host let me ask you about money in politics. An editorial in the new york times. Yes pull it i will pull it up. This is on a growing shadow of political money. 63,000,000,000 was spent in the president ial election and concongressional races of 2012, 6. 3 billion. These candidates have got to raise a lot of money in 2016. Guest thats going to be ultimately the big advantage for a candidate like secretary clinton or somebody like mitt romney or jeb bush who has either done it before or has a Famous Family name like jeb bush has. The big advantage they have is the ability to raise massive amounts of money very very quickly. What you saw last time in 2012 were candidacies that were not very successful at raising money at the Grassroots Level or even at the large donor level. And they were sustained by wealthyy wealthy donors through independent expend temperature committees. Rick santorum never raised any money. He stayed in the race because he had wealthy wealthy backers running a darkmoney campaign to support him. Newt gingrich had the same thing going for him for a while. Mitt romney had to raise his money. He did. He raised a ton, almost a billion dollars. Thats what the president raised is almost a billion dollars. Thats what it takes today. Thats going to be the challenge in the democratic primary for any of these people we talked about besides Hillary Clinton. Jim web is interesting but if he cant raise more than a few hundred thousand dollars or a few million dollars, he wont last very long. The same is true of anybody else that we just talked about. Host this elder in the new york times, the growing shadow of political money, as much as 8,000,000,000 expected to be spent. Charles koch saying we are just getting started. This is a piece from politico. Com, a big gathering taking place in Southern California this weekend guest everyone is moving from the big tent of steve king to the big tent of the Koch Brothers out in california this weekend. I think thats what you are going to see is these candidates and particularly the fringeier candidates will chase big dollars because its people like the Koch Brothers or the Koch Brothers who can sustain a candidacy for a long time after the candidacy has run out of steam and it can no longer raise money. Rick santorum, and newt gingrich, i suspect you are going to see some of the folks who were at steve kings event yesterday getting money from some of the players who want to push this thing far to the right. Thats going to create a problem for the event nominee because ted cruz is not going to get nominated by the Republican Party but he can make sure that whoever does get nominated is not electable in the general election if this goes too far. Host lets go to foenldz. Lisa on democrats line from louisville kentucky. Caller thank you for cspan. Hello, mr. Mcmahon. I think you are a very smart democratic strategist bur i am not really a Hillary Clinton fan. I think she has had her time. And i think its over. I would like to know what you think about governor Steve Bashear of kentucky. He had a successful healthcare rollout, which is very hard for a democrat to get elected two terms in kentucky and be successful. He also brings a lot of newer business from overseas to kentucky. I think he would be a great candidate, and i also like Chris Van Hollen. I would like to hear your comments. Host host thank you. Guest thank you for the nice kind words. My mother will be very excited to hear about that. I think governor bashear would be a Great Potential candidate. When i was just a child, i worked on his unsuccessful gubernatorial campaign. He, of course, was successful later and is now governor of kentucky. The rollout, as of mentioned of knet or kinet was so successful that mitch mccogtried to run for ely to the senate saying we can have knet and not have obamacare even though knet was the implementation of obamacare. So, he has done a pretty spectacular job. Chris van hollen is one of the leading thinkers in the Democratic Party right now who just came out with an economic plan that would actually work harder for the middle class by taking away some of the tax breaks that wealthy individuals get. Either one of those people i think, would be a great candidate. Governor bashear is a little older. I think i dont know if he is interested. But Chris Van Hollen is somebody you should watch because he is a comer in this town. Host you told us on newsmakers he is looking at the possibility of running as governor of maryland. His speech available as with all of our programming including this interview on our website at cspan. Org. Tony from glouster Virginia Republican line. Caller good morning. How are you doing . Thank you for taking my call. Host thank you for phoning in. Caller thank you. I had more of a comment than anything. I am more concerned about where the country is heading at this point. We are the we cant be our allies dont trust us. We are the laughing stock of our enemies. I dont agree with raising taxes, capital gangs or any other. I think there should be a flat tax rate. I am a conservative basically, more of a reagan conservative. I would like to see if we need to get a republican president. Im sorry. But thats just how i feel. Host the president in the state of the Union Address saying you need to raise taxes on wealthier americans to pay for roads and bridges and infrastructure. Caller i dont think thats necessary. I mean they have plenty of taxes from gasoline and all of this what are they doing with the money thats there for infrastructure . Think about that. Hoecht. Host thanks for the call. Following the state of the Union Address, this tweet from former secretary of state Hillary Clinton saying that the state of the union pointed the way to an economy that works for all. Now, we need to step up and deliver for the middle class. Will tax be a center piece of the debate in 2016 . I think tax will be a center piece of the debate in 2016. I think the president laid out a tax proposal thats probably going to have a difficult time up on capitol hill with the republicans in charge. Host Speaker Boehner is saying its dead dead dead. Guest i think he wanted to present a framework for a conversation its going to have this year with the congress and candidates are going to have to have with voters in 2016 and beyond. I believe, you know, that the middle class in this country is feel like they are working harder and making less which is actually true and having a more difficult time paying bills, which is true and they see the wealthy doing well. I think there are a lot of people including a lot of democrats and the president was a great spokesperson for this who believed its time to actually level the Playing Field a little bit more. And make the economy work a little harder for the middle and a little less hard for the very very wealthy. Host more from the president last tuesday evening in his state of the Union Address. [video clip. ] first, middle class economics means helping working class families feel more secure in a world of constant change. Means helping folks afford child care, college, healthcare a home retirement. My budget will address each of these issues lowering the taxes of working families putting thousands of dollars back into their pockets each year. Host Steve Mcmahon, you heard what the president had to say. Was it an eye on 2016 or a serious proposal for tax reform . Guest i think its both. In order to move tax reform a along the path toward priorities you think are important, you start by saying here is what we think we should do. The republicans will come with a different framework and say here is what we should do. There will be things in the middle. Both sides agree Corporate Tax reform is something that probably is good for america in terms of competitiveness and the ability of companies to create jobs. I think the republicans have a different set of priorities. They want to roll back taxes, Capital Gains taxes and do things the president would never do. The president wants to do the opposite. The question then becomes if either side wants tax reform there will have to be give and take. I think in terms of 2016, one of the beautiful things about what the president just did is this is going to force a conversation among president ial candidates and at the senate and concongressional Campaign Level where its going to be clear which candidate is on the side of working people and the folks who have, you know, worked harder and made less over the last 10 or 15 years and which party is on the side of Corporate America and the very wealthy. Thats a debate that democrats welcome and, frankly, its the reason the president won in 2012. Thats campaign that was successful when he talked about an economy that works for the middle class, an economy thats built for the middle class, an economy that doesnt just favor the people who have already made it. Thats the conversation where democrats actually move a lot of working class republicans to their side of the table. So, its smart politically. Host to the birthplace of john f. Kennedy in brook line massachusetts. Good morning. On this date two interesting tidbits in 1961, his first news conference. In 1960, he entered the president ial race. Go ahead, doug. Caller jim web has been targeted by apac for annihilation including other israeli lobbiests. Would your guest care to comments upon the power of these donors and their ability to affect United States outcomes . Thanks very much. Byebye. Guest that you have beening for the calml thank you for the call. Apec has a constitwains and an agenda. When their agending a is threatened, they speak out. When individuals are threatening it, they speak out against those individuals. They are not really unlike any other institution in this town the chamber of commerce or the pharmaceutical industry or organized labor or the Koch Brothers or folks that are able to fund independent expenditures or publically disclosed expenditures that addvocate for their point of view. There is no question that it will be better n my view if some of these voices were constrained a little bit more, particularly those who are funding the secret dark Money Politics that so many people object to. Apac is a legitimate Advocacy Organization in this town, as are many others and then there is the secret sort of off of the books super funds that do the more nefarious work. I have no problem with what apac does every single day or what they are doing to jim web because they do it, you know in pursuit of an agenda and a cause that they glooechly in that people can you know people can object to or agree with and they can fund if they would like. But this other no different than any other legitimate Advocacy Group in this town. Host different candidates but as you know in the 1998 primary a dividing situation. Jimmie carter. Clinton went to the primary process battered and beaten but came back stronger as a primary candidate and in 2008 where Hillary Clinton and barack obama we want all the way to june as opposed to barack obama wrapping it up in january or early february, saying that that actually helped the Obama Campaign kind of cycle through the process and really get its Campaign Mechanisms in gear. If Hillary Clinton is running with just token opposition how does that bode for her in 2016 . Guest i am one of those people who believes as frustrating when you are inside a campaign and you are the presumptive nominee or the presumptive favorite you are often frustrated by what you recall to be knees gnats out there swiping away at you but i have found over time when you step back and look at it, it makes you a better candidate if you run on your own campaign. The challenge is to not be forced into doing things that make it more difficult to win the you want mat prize. She is not running to be the democratic nominee. She is running to be the president of the United States host like romneyts comment. Guest i was going to go back to that. If i were a republican candidate, the wiser choice would have been to skip the steve king clown show and not pander to a base that produces caucus winners that dont get nominated and dont become president. If you look back at the winners of the iowa caucus, its littered with folks who didnt go very much further from Rick Santorum to pat robertson. The list goes on. It generally doesnt produce a candidate who is going to be the nominee and the president. On the democratic side, the history has been different. It often does produce the nominee of the party and somebody who either becomes president or who or who is very competitive and i think its, you know, a different constituency that those are the caucuses for democrats, but each youve got a situation where each of these things tests your character, your medal, your willingness to run your campaign and not campaign that somebody else is pressuring you to run. It makes you a better candidate if you pass those tests. If the you dont, as mitt romney failed to do in 2012 when he went way too far right on immigration, it makes it very difficult for you to come back and win a generally. Host do you think mitt romney will run . Guest i do. If you look at what he did last time, he lost the election by five points or so. He was running against a very he was running against an incumbent president and it may be the best political machine ever assembled. And he came within five points. So, if you are mitt romney, you know, whats the downside of running a third time . Ronald reagan ran three times and won the third time. So i think you will see mitt romney. Host jack in irvine, kentucky. Good morning. Democrats line with Steve Mcmahon. Caller yes this is jack. I am interested in miliary clinton and her story about being totally broke when the left the white house. I was in white house helicopters in the Marine Corp Marine corps. If she was flat broke, her and bill, we dont need somebody like that running our country. And if she lied about it, we dont need somebody like that running our country. Host jack, thanks for the call. She apologized for that remark but to jacks point. Guest well i mean, i think the context or these kind of remarks is important. What she was talking about was she said that she was inhe will gants and shouldnt have said it this way, was the fact when they came from the white house they came from the governors house where the salary is about 45,000 a year and they were in the white house for eight years and when they came out of the white house, because of all of the investigations and things that the republicans had gotten started, they had millions of dollars of legal bills. If you look at a balance sheet, what she had was accurate but if you look at a political context for the comment like that what she said was something that was ridiculous. She realized that quickly and she took it back but what she said was actually technically, if you are looking at a balance sheet, absolutely correct. This is from one of our viewers saying the democratic primaries will be all about who gets to be Vice President i am [with that. Guest thats with a comments. I am not sure the democratic primaries are about who is going to be Vice President i think hillary, assuming she is the nominee, the candidates who run against her, i would argue, are probably in no better position and may be in a worse position to be selected the Vice President ial nominee because of the nature of campaign. The only way they are going to do well or well enough for people to think they should be on the ticket is by making campaign competitive if you walk that back how do you make it competitive . By drawing contrasts and doing things that the Hillary Campaign probably wont appreciate. I dont want that puts you in a position to be Vice President. Its more likely that nobody who runs against her is considered and people like Steve Bashear orris Chris Van Hollen or somebody outside of washington who can give a different rook to the ticket would be a stronger candidate than somebody who ran against her. Host what is john podestats roll . Guest to be the grown up in the room to make sure Campaign Staff isnt bickering, to try to control to the ex tent possible. But it will ultimately be impossible the leaking that occurs naturally in a campaign. Its going to be, you know to make sure that all of the is are dotted and the ts are crossed. Tell delegate states in montana and idaho and in the states that come late and that dont that most people here in washington dont focus on until the end, all of those delegate slates and other details are taken care of. Things that we want done last time. The fact of the matter is, you know even after senator clinton or then former senator clinton action secretary clinton now, started to make her comeback in the campaign against the president in primaries in 2008, it was by the numbers, it was too late. She could have won a number of those later states and still not been the nominee bays the Obama Campaign at the time had done a better job. John podesta is going to make sure that doesnt happen again. Host peter joining us from florida, good morning. Democrat, republican or independent . Where do you put yourself peter . Caller a little of each. I am a retired veteran in crystal river, florida. I will turn my t. V. Off right now. Host okay. Caller i would like to say. Host host are you with us . Caller they talk about the republicans being for the upper part of people with the bids and the lower ones being for the working man, the party. How can you go to work if you are in the lower group of Business People or the upper Business People to put you to work . A poorman cant put to you work. Thats all ive got to say. Host thank you for the xhoecht. Guest there is no question that businesses and actually, its not big businesses usually. Its Small Businesses in this country create the overwhelming number of jobs. In many cases, they arent wall street titans making 9, 10, 15 million a year as big companies. They are running mall businesses. A lot are familyowned businesses. Thats the backbone of the american economy. Its the back bon of job creation here in america. I think, you know, you can be for the i would guy and the little guy includes the Small Business owner and the employee of the Small Business as well as the large business. You or for the big guy ceo the Hedge Fund Manager making, you know, maybe 100 million a year and paying a Capital Gains tax rate while people who work every day with their back and do labor are paying much more. Thats the conversation at a time president is trying to encourage, not about the big business or the Small Business as much as it is about where the capitol and income flows and whether enough of that capitol income is flowing to the workers who are producing it and then how the people who are paying taxes are being treated and are they being treated he can quitbly and fairly . The conversation that i think he started with the state of the union speech. I think its a conversation that folks out there are going to hear a lot more about in the next couple of years. Host Steven Schweitzer asks what about Brian Schweitzer . Is he considering a bill . Host Brian Schweitzer is like omalley omalley. He was out there quite a bit last year but he is really not been heard from much over the past few months. He has said that he is, you know maybe interested. I think he probably is a little bit more than maybe interested. But again, a lot of these folks are sitting back and they are waiting to see what Hillary Clinton does because the presumption is that she is running and every indication is that she is running and that hiring john podesta would suggest she is running. Until she says she is running, people are saying wait. What about me including the Vice President. Host joseph says, marcy cantor from ohio should run for president. Most knowledgeable and fair person i have seen. Lets go to stephanie joining us from Missouri Democrats line. Good morning. Caller good morning. Thank you for taking my call. I am quite excited to see Hillary Clinton for the next president. My second pick would be joe biden. I think he would be a refreshing, figure for us. Host let me ask you about Hillary Clinton. If she runs like many suspect, what should her message be . What should she campaign on . Caller i think she could bring a lot to the table as far as Foreign Policy is concerned. I think she has a Good Business sense. I think sxlik that she would definitely be good. I think that we saw a lot of her. I dont want to make it as if she was with bill. I mean, you know, they were separate. But i think they were also a package. I think we saw that. I personally Elizabeth Warren i appreciate Elizabeth Warren being honest and wanting to stay where i think she feels she can do the most benefit. And with them trying to dismantle doddfrank, i think thats incredibly important. I love her honesty in want to go stay genuine to what she feels she can do the best benefit for us. I travel the United States for my business and what i do notice a lot is that in the republican states, you find that fuel and gas are higher and, and there is an enormous amount of poverty. So, i am listening to all of the callers. I think the callers actually made more sense tonight or today than what i saw from the Freedom Summit unfortunately. I think on the republican side and the democratic side the callers seem to be quite sensible. But what i would appreciate from all of the callers that are listening, is if they could go to the library of congress right here on cspan action you see the debates, go on the internet. Check out records. Check out the voting history. Check out how your representatives have been doing within the state, you know, and take a ride. Gas is cheaper now. Take a ride outside of your own town, outside of your own state and see whats going on. Too many people dont get out of that i be own bubble. I find this a lot. He specially the northern west. Im sorry. To the people who live up there there is very little communication up there. Host okay. I will stop you there because we are short on time. A few minutes left with our guest. We will give him a chance to respond. Thank you. Guest i think stephanie said Something Interesting and smart among other things that she said that were really interesting and smart. Take a look at whats happening out there that stephanie just mentioned. One of the things i think republicans are going to finds challenging is when people look at whats happening out there, you are seeing gas at about 2 bucks a gallon in washington and the obama care experiment begin to work and so the economy is creating more and more jobs and unemployment is going down. The republicans who are counting on the economy that was faltering and obama care that wasnt working that was unpopular and a general sense that things arent going well in this country may be surprised in 2016 if the economy continues to roll if gas prices remain low and consumers have more money to spend and the Economic Growth numbers pick up if unemployment goes down, if the job creation continues to expand. It may be a much more difficult environment for the republicans in 2016. Therefore, a lot easier for Hillary Clinton if she is the nominee. After all, the republicans wants to run against hillary as the third term of barack obama. She is obviously going to make that challenging jut by running her own independent campaign but if the economic circumstances make it more challenging and then youve got the Electoral College and democrats start usually with about 240 of the 270 they need, its going to be a pretty difficult thing for the republicans to get over and get past f there are more steve king like space minutes and more of the republicans moving the mainstream of the party to the right, its going to be even more difficult. Host on this weekend, Iowa Republicans going to the meeting by steve king. Long time strategist of Purple Strategies. A minute or 2 with your phone calls. Bob from pawpaw, michigan good morning caller i am interested if you have any idea of candidates viable candidates that will not be 70 years old by the time they take office with the Democratic Party. I feel like the vetting process really needs to be very strict in terms of health because this is a really highenergy job any more in washington. And we have had examples and you know them very well over the years, where an older person like that is just the energy just isnt there. Host let me ask yous not only Hillary Clinton as the nominee. She would be 67 but the democratic leadership in the house and senate nancypel pelosi, do you think that poses an image problem for the democrats . Caller do i . Yeah. Host Steve Mcmahon guest i have a slightly different view. Bobs question is a legitimate one. You can make the case that typically when you move on in politics from one generation to the next, it gets younger, not older. And that has been historically the case. I dont think so you have seen a candidate as well qualified as Hillary Clinton or joe biden despite their age in a long time. Hillary clinton, as you mentioned will be 67 when she is nominated, assuming she is is going to probably live by the numbers another 25 years. I think she could serve the country treat quite well and joe biden is in exactly the same position. I am not as concerned about the age of the party, of the nominee or even the candidate or the president. I am more concerned about what it is they want to do and how it is they think they are going to detthat accomplished. Host let me conclude with this point from the from the l. A. Times times piece. The republicans said their convention would be sometime between late june and mid july so that the republicans will be july 18th, the 21st. The democrats, july 25th through the 29th. Back to back conventions again. Guest yeah. What you are seeing are the conventions coming sooner. It used to be, you know conventions would actually creep later in the calendar they would be limited to 70 million. They opt out of that public financing. They can raise and spend as much as they want as long as its within campaign laws. They want to get it settled sooner and raise the bill yon dollars they are going to need to run campaign effectively beginning as quickly as possible. I am not surprised they have moved it up. I am surprised it took this long to get here because its been moving in this director quite some time. Back to back conventions versus a week or two in between, whats the thinking behind that . Guest i dont think Neither Party wants the other to get a head start on the general election. They were nearly back to back. Host into early september. Guest not only back to back but back in july and its just like the starting gun is going off sooner. Votesers are probably going to be more disgusted than ever host steve on the next washington journal, Michele Flournoy document the need for greater security and bipartisan support. Then nina olson discusses her report that says budget cuts is produced problems with the irs customer service. Washington journal live at 7 00 a. M. Eastern on cspan. Monday night on the communicators, reclassifying rod band as a utility and other key issues facing the federal communications commission. I believe the bipartisan consensus that has been in place for almost two decades has served us well. In 1998 they decided it would be an information service. It was the chairmanen of both Political Parties who recognized that text regulation was the best way to incentivize broadband. I think members of both parties recognize that light text regulation is the way to go. But starting with the president s announcement in december, we are now poised to consider what is called title two, common carrier legislation. And it is my view that that type of legislation developed decades ago would be a mistake. Next, a House Committee hearing on internet regulations. After that q a with andrew keen. The house energy and commerce subcommittee on communications and technology convened wednesday on Net Neutrality. Former sec chair Michael Powell and baker were among the witnesses. This is just over three hours. Welcome and i can think of no issue within our jurisdiction to consider at this time and our responsibility as legislators to set internet policy for the country. That is why we put forward legislation to serve consumers what they deserve without choking off investment and innovation. We have made this available publicly and invited witnesses to give us their view on this draft proposal. We have a very important choice to make between letting three smart and capable, but unelected people at the fcc, use a statute written for another era to cobble together a regulatory scheme and undoubtedly we will end up in court for years in litigation. Providing no protections and much uncertain. Or we can do our job and grant a new law for this century. We have come together before in this committee to graft legislation and frankly it is now a good law. It is the only way to bring clarity and certainty to internet governance. Less than four years ago, the fcc was in Court Pending its first attempt to regulate the practices of an isp. Since then they have gone to court twice in defense of Net Neutrality and twice the court has rejected their rules. Since they seem to have been given a third time is the charm roadmap, the commission preparing to invoke the nuclear option. Reclassification under a set of aging and inapt rules adjusted adopted under the age of railroads and adapted for the telephone. We have a duty to those who manage the internet and use the internet to provide Consumer Protection and clarity for investment. What we are offering today is an age flowed from fcc attempts to shoehorn the policy that it wants to fit the authority that it has. Our discussion draft is largely based on the 2010 open internet order. It draws from the legislative proposal put forward by henry waxman. Some pundits raise concern that it curtails the newfound authority the courts have read in 706 to the telecommunications act. It was written in 1976 and instructs the fcc to promote the employment of broadband networks. Until recently come it was understood that it meant the fcc should use its authority to promote broadband deployment. However, last year, the courts for the first time interpreted section 706 to permit the fcc to take any action to promote rod band so long
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