Transcripts For CSPAN2 Capitol Hill Hearings 20130817

Rather changes. Host and if in one of your books you write it was almost a mistake that britain helped found israel. A little tongue in cheek. Guest certain people in the british ruling class would think rather a mistake that they helped bring it about. And, indeed, my own opinion is they both helped and then did their damnedest to stop it from coming about. But that is really another issue of immense complication for another time maybe. Host final email from gary in lexington park, maryland. I have to comment on todays guest. When the interview started, iowy intelligent woman could have such obviously wrongheaded opinions on topics such as Global Warming. However, as the show progressed, i came to realize i greed with everything agreed with everything you had to say except Global Warming. [laughter] and that will be the last word. Melanie phillips has been our guest for the last three years. The divided house was her first book. All must have prizes, the sex change society, americas social revolution, the assent of woman, the world turned upside down and, finally, Guardian Angel is being published today at mbooks. Com, its her autobiography. Melaniephillips. Com is her web site. This is booktv on cspan2. In broadcasting the you president ial debates in 2016 for of that move came during the rnc summer meeting in boston after members voiced concerns to air programs have focused on potential democratic candidate hillary clinton. For more insight we talked to a reporter about the decision. Joining us from boston James Hohmann and National Political reporter for politico what is behind the rnc to bar nbc and cnn from future president ial debates . It is the project both networks are working on one for nbc the other featurelength documentary. But really what is going on the Republican Party wanted to get control of the debate process that they felt was out of he and 2012 the 20 debates the first started in may before the Iowa Caucuses in january and they did not like the moderators were from the mainstream media. They passed a resolution natalie preventing nbc and cnn from sponsors sanctioning a party debate but we need to go to fewer debates with friendlier moderators. There is widespread support for all of those. Host in your piece in politico you write this is the fallout of the 2012 election a decision made earlier this year to have broader things in the party for the next election. What other issues is the party looking at as an autopsy of 2012 . Guest what people have been talking about the last three days is to get the primary challenger under control even after it was clear who would be the nominee more people wanted the opportunity that they feel of the governing body that may romney had to move to the right like nuking rich but now there are a series of committees and place to think what they do on the calendar side for next time. Host reported about the possibility of other moderators be introduced into the next round of debates. Who are they considering . They want more conservative people they dont want those that believe in evolution or contraception that that the party is not far away about conservative talkradio host but if you talk to the Top Republicans they liked the idea of the luminaries luminaries, people who served in past did ministrations or other republican politicians may be speaker of the house or conservative types. Host in terms of our reach for the Republican Party how good is it for them to also like telemundo or cnn espagnole . They feed on this because with that spanishlanguage News Organization they say it is the desire with speaking out with the questions they want to or not to engage john know question a lot of regular people think it is helpful to understand where these candidates are coming from and part of that party that was rushed to the way it played out. Host you said there were 20 debates during the 2012 cycle when are the first g. O. P. Debates expected to begin and how many will they have . Guest they want to cut it down at 10 the first debate no earlier than september 2015. We will see if that happens but what they will have sanctioned debates for both candidates they can do whatever they want the Republican Party cannot tell Chris Christie that he cannot participate in the us cnn debate that is not sanctioned. That is why here in boston they want to create penalties so the state partys four candidates that are involved would lose delegates at the national convention, that is something they could do if they voted but some think that is a little too far. Host National Political reporter for politico following him onlians James Hohmann. Thank you immigrants for joining us today into the audience those who are here and watching us live it is like a stream that bush center did toward also to those who are joining us. As mentioned we are here in texas which is the especially relevant topic but especially here in the lone star state. With interesting comparison we try to get the u. S. Gdp double the rate it is now about 2. 5 per year we know that is too slow and we know we can do better because with the elite four over six years rials of 04 growth as possible was states like where we are today is growing that door even more. Growing fourpoint 8 during the last calendar year so we know we can do better than there are elections that show that we are here today to talk about immigration as well. And we have said we know there is a relationship between immigration and growth. So another thing that we take so the 4. 2 Million People that means to percent and could of all immigrants in america are in texas behind california or new york so that means 16 percent of the population or one out of six that is quite a bit and in america as well. So we were just here in Dallas County it is one out of four. Severe in a much better place to have this discussion right now i am joined by a fabulous panel of experts known throughout texas and nationally we have steven moore you have seen him on tv as an Editorial Board member of the wall street journal and writes about immigration and other things and i am sure you have read his articles and he has been a scholar on immigration also with the wall street journal is a privilege to have you here. Thank you for coming. Something you do well so what is the state of the economy . First of all, when i was asked to come here to speak at the Bush Institute i leapt at the opportunities a way of such an admirer of george w. Bush. You stole my fender a little bit talking about 4 growth but i dont think we can accomplish i think it is a precondition but the only way that i have a problem with that is that we could do that of the fourth year of the non recovery there is no reason it cannot be growing much faster than it is even a five or six or 7 percent growth this is interesting if you look at the period of a quartercentury unprecedented growth that was a period when we have the average of almost 4 percent growth over the same time period unprecedented immigration well over 12 lead americans and people say that it would depress rage wages but the actual evidence shows the opposite the biggest boom was also the biggest immigration that doesnt mean they caused it but it is substantial evidence. The second point is with respect to states, at the wall street journal the least 10 it editorials comparing california and texas, it is good. Those moving from california to texas. So what you have seen over the last five years is 1 million new jobs in the state of texas over the last five years. Roughly 1 million lost jobs in the state of california. What we have seen as one of the great wealth transfers geographically like my home state of illinois and this is one reason to be very bullish. It is interesting as the two highest immigration states texas does a much, much better job to economically assimilate immigrants it is a welfare state at a much higher pace and people come to texas and four jobs people come to california for welfare so you see the differing economic outcomes. Texas is the model that should be emulated. I would urge all of you if you have not read our editorial this morning about immigration. I was lucky to get here today because i was working late last night but the United States of america has such an Incredible Opportunity that is so much larger than any other nation because that they were talented and skilled thchoice oy want to go to this come to the United States. Did want to go to israel or germany or france or japan they want to come to the United States. We have such and Incredible Opportunity and that is what this immigration debate is and should be about battery have an immigration policy good for the immigrants but also good for american citizens . I am very worried this immigration debate in washington is migrating in the wrong direction. The last point, i hear 100 times per day what will we do for the immigration problem . Immigration problem . We have an opportunity and an advantage that is something that needs to we exploited when they say china will surpass the United States i said china will not pass us economically because ours chinese are smarter than their chinese. [laughter] so we have to exploit that so they give for having us. Sometimes with a vigorous there is a lot of growth going away from states like california or new york but louisiana, mississippi. That is the important point the interesting immigration graphic you would hear from the experts later but traditionally immigrants have shunned the south of man has been a problem that now use the dixies like North Carolina wednesday with the biggest percentage increase is georgia. That has become the highgrowth state to the point where people ask our immigrants more attracted to a state with high Welfare Benefits or to the state that has jobs . What we have found is on balance democrats are more likely to go to low Unemployment Rates than with high Welfare Benefits which is the important timing because people are coming here because they want a job the. And it does make sense if you leave your country. It does make sense but there is so many people on the other side of this issue that the immigrants come here for welfare. Some do but the vast majority do not. A very important point. So now with the International Experts the author of a chapter of the Bush Institutes solutions looking at growth and immigration and evidence she has a fabulous book but also at the Federal Reserve bank of dallas so cynthia, what is the growth of the texas economy coming from . When i talk to the media i tried to use simplified by saying there are three main components but those components are geology which is a huge right now. We have a conference in september. And then also. Hold on and so we can actually hear you. We thought you were going to tell us that ben bernanke was going. Used all my stuff that i have more. With International Trade of big component more recently as was traditionally so not on a and i immigration population for this day but also migration it is interesting in the recent years it became extremely important than the recent years domestic migration a hit shows even more immigration for this day it just shows the growth that in fact, the 4 growth project his house like a lofty goal but to be in the economic recovery act and actually it all averaging over 4 percent growth so the states of texas, yes. Especially now over time time, the texas economy took off but there has been a big transformation going from the 1970s to before then theyre really not until the 80s are the 90s that we had the modern Industrial Service sector economy and this transition is thanks to two factors in one was 10 oil if you remember the late 90s. That decimated the gas industry and forced us to change the that is also because of the immigration. So high skill with the best of a shortage for them to have High School Degrees but but who could disagree with that . What do they claim . But with texas it is all good news and special aid now when you look at immigrants while 60 percent they are from mexico so that is true and greasy that but what is amazing when you look more closely at the immigrants they have much lower Unemployment Rates but especially compared. The rate is falling. Right to. So what has turned up in the last couple of years with the shale boom turning up in texas so that Success Story but the bet longterm we have a lot of immigration that has contributed tremendously. Just for a moment so is it better with the high skill the industrys . Echoes further back than that to talk about the transformation that is absolutely crucial that we thought basically as the commodities based commodities but now that has changed and they have been instrumental with the research and development and health care and education for those that are high skilled. Soviet estates Hispanic Chamber of commerce we heard numbers and percentages so then you can tell us about the businesses you represent . First of all, thank you for having me and also to the ambassador what the institute is doing what we are thankful to be a part of this part of United States represents 3. 1 million hispanics in the country that together contribute about 465 billion to the economy every year. The fastestgrowing segment of the Hispanic Business Community we also advocate on behalf of 198 major corporations with the network of over 200 late want local chambers across United States but we are particularly proud we advocate of the practitioners. We advocate on behalf of Business Owners but it is thrilling to me to we practitioners i am very happy to have members of the association here we have four of those firms is that i cannot see them here but i know theyre in the crowd. First of all, patricia is with us today and began a Company Called Alamo Travel Group headquartered in san antonio, texas last year her company did 138 million of topflight revenue she employs close to 100 texans. Another person here today also emigrated from mexico his company is in dallas and if you have never crossed said the default Trinity River bridge or if you visited jerry jones house or stayed there. We all wish. His company did 122 million of top wide revenue. We have with us all the nonhispanic the grandson of a german immigrants that came to this day looking for opportunity today he manages over 3200 acres of land in texas and then we have from dallas running in ecuador last year did a quarter of a billion dollars and employs 3700 people about 1,000 are texans so these are the practitioners theyre driving the texas economy and at the end of the day with this is about is what they do every day. I cannot see you but if you would stand of to be a acknowledged. [applause] that is the american tree right there. Every one of them could have chosen any state in the nation right there. And the fact is they chose texas for all the right reasons and they are living proof to show with the state has to offer the. Buffer in merganser other people to go to that type of lovell. That with these four individuals thiamine no position to speak for them but i could surprise that you look at their sectors of technology, services, constr uction and agriculture. Looking for people who want to work. Those spectrums in terms of skills, very highly technical positions such as the jobs to by the way i would not say the most skilled with very differently skilled in the construction sector but in all these cases this is a state where workers are ready and willing and able for them to get engaged to build their own individual wealth but at the same time hope that enterprise continue to grow. One more followup. It always seems it is conventional wisdom we have to have these protections of the worker it facilitates the myth that they will come and take jobs even leaders said washington and feel content to buy into that. What do you say that immigrants take jobs . We would do well to look at what has transpired in other states, and neighboring states like alabama recently that state passed a fairly draconian antiimmigrant piece of legislation the fact of the matter is when it is all boil down they have 40,000 workers just get up and leave the state. So they lost 10 billion of revenue and half a billion dollars of taxes that had those workers stayed in the state to work in the construction sites there is a lesson learnt that sentiment is part of what happened did alabama. I hope that will never be the case of the state of texas and governor bush and president bush really demonstrated leadership with his understanding of the immigrant communities of the work that they come here to do. I remember very fondly of the president of mexico and a clear minded understanding that immigrants make to the states of texas. So when you study of what has happened in states that theyre there to take their jobs they do the jobs of people left unattended. But with the demographics but we need is some help. To talk about the growth of this country and texas has had so much growth and whenever people whod disagree they say people go to Southern States because of the nicer climate it is interesting. I guarantee as wonderful as the dallas is, people are not moving from san diego to dallas. [laughter] i think this is fascinating. Why is it that texas does such a better job assimilating immigrants in society in a much better way than in california . I think it is something we need to study because it has that Free Enterprise mentality like some states like california do not. To talk about hispanic immigrants, i live in washington d. C. We see a big increase in the coastal states when you go to the beach towns or the resort towns on the east coast 75 for 80 of those Service Workers are eastern europeans and russians, a polish, and it is an amazing phenomenon that they take over those occupations. It used to be whites or blacks now going to eastern europeans but the Washington Post did a big story ironic i am quoting the Washington Post. [laughter] but they interview these people some were very new and i thought it was fascinating their attitude. Several of them said the great thing about america is all these jobs. Another thing is that if you work hard you can get ahead in this country. Also a Small Business the driver was the immigrant he said when i arrived is like i was woken up to all these opportunities. That this was just available to me. It is the ambitious drive unique to immigrants. Face it 99 percent of the people never moved more than 100 miles from where they grow up so that 1 percent that are ambitious and courageous enough to leave their homeland is very courageous thing to do. I just think this is one of the inmate advantages of the immigration is they are preselected for economic success in getting back to my point about china is in the United States, is that we are a melting pot and i believe it gives us a huge Competitive Edge i was out in microsoft in seattle it is like a College Campus it is so huge i gave a lunch lecture there it is like the United Nations people from every country of the world know where else do you have that i think that is a bigger deal why did you think they do so good into the economy and society but if you live here in laundered to get more education . I think in texas it is a microcosm that the u. S. Does a lot of things right to but they had a horrible protest recently and then around a stockholm i looked at the u. S. And they think water redoing right . It is to put the people to work all countries take different perspectives with the of refugees deliberately to come out of the labor market are prohibited from working so they were deliberately put their specifically german or swedish workers were taken out of the labor force. So the best way to assimilate is to get them to work. Again when they say we cannot assimilate immigrants because they are not not learning german so they devised these german instruction and then they say you can speak whatever language you want people go to their web sites and theyll learn english on the job. They get along that way and a value that society there in because it is benefiting in a tangible way. So starting to come around to understand the significance of immigration not just u. S. Businesses but it is the best way to assimilate and appreciate what they can come into. You represent different businesses across the country but to tie this together is what we see in taxes happening in other states . Where should we be watching . I think there are other states starting to emulate what we do in texas but to go back this is a place where emigration of every corner of the globe comes imagine trying to start each day and another nation or yacht coup in afghanistan. They come here for a reason. If you study the impact our economy, and historically some of the most iconic france were created by emigrant on to producers and 47 percent of the fortune 500 corporations were started by the immigrant and if you look at that phenomenon the iconic brands like bank of america and the bay, googles, yahoo , all started by immigrants here in the United States so to bring that back down through the states of texas we are leading the way it is the number one state and it is important to recognize because of the leadership shown by george w. Bush that if you look at a state like arizona not to pick on them but if youd get arizona if memory serves it exploits 50 billion per year. We export 206 billion per year and 35 percent of those go directly to mexico i think george w. Bush understood that relationship that has to exist with our neighbors to the south. With the key was very strategic and smart to foster that relationship over time. Today texas is benefiting from his leadership with a large proportion of the hispanic owned firms and minorityowned firms are actually owned by mexican nationals. This did not happen by accident but because of a very strategic Visionary Leadership happened a decade ago and now we benefit from that. Created an environment. Absolutely it does not happen overnight. Now we are seeing other states start to recognize this and they try to study what is happening here to learn how to harness his point of the opportunity the immigrants represent to the nation. Of course were really hoping as economistses, as texans, looking to mexico and saying theyre talking about energy reform. Can you imagine . This shale in south texas extended into northern mexico so that would be really good for the texas economy. So were already hitting records in terms of our exports of natural gas to mexico. So everything good in mexico is paying off in spades for texas, and were just so excited about more good things to come. Let me just say one thing. One of the things that really bothered me about this im in washington so im involved every day with his immigration debate, and some of you in this room may not agree with me but we the United States senate just got the bill to put 30 billion more in basically, quote, securing the border with i dont know if they want to build a berlin wall or what. The whole idea of the integration of the texas and mexican economy is such a positive thing and i hate this idea were going to wall off america from central america, because the integration of these economies has been a positive thing. [applause] im glad somebodiesome of you agree with that. Nobody some washington does. Me a i may i add a point . I feel the same way as steve. I cant be at irreverent at steve but i appreciate the plainspoken truth. I had an opportunity to speak to president obama right not the president right as he is departing to mexico, and of course we talked about immigration refor i, of course, wanted to talk about it from an economic perspective, and that was fantastic, and so i said, mr. President , the reality is you wouldnt be mr. President were it not for the hispanic votes. Never in the history of this country has the Hispanic Community played such a Critical Role in electing an american president. Perhaps more interesting than that is never again will there be an american president without courting the hispanic vote. The reality is that as leaders of the nation, implore you to please begin to change the narrative that has for time immemorial defined the relationship between mexico and latin america and the United States. Not just with mexico. We forget the trade. Absolutely. Open up our opportunities and participate in these world markets, everybody benefits. Everytime i hear about it these are the facts but everytime i hear about it, the narrative is got words like illegal immigration and drug wars and border crossings and so forth, and, again, that is true, and were not turning a deaf ear or a blind eye to that. But the reality is mexico is still the second largest trading partner to the United States and has been for decades and will be for decades to come, bigger than england, france, brazil, japan, and india, and yet we never hear about that. The reason texas is in the position its in, it had a governor at the time that knew of the importance and courted pat partner, that Economic Business partner. Today were reaping that benefit. If the shale becomes what it could be and without george w. Bush we wouldnt be able to take advantage of the opportunity, but as nation we would do well to recognize the economic importance of the relationship between mexico and the United States. Thank you. Thank you also for making that point. Thats something that we all need to remember more. We now have some time for questions from the audience, and wed love to hear from you. We have such a great panel here and we want to take full advantage of them with the time we have left. So if you can raise your hand. We have microphones around the room. Please give us your name and if youre here with an organization, let us know, and i just ask you to please ask a question, rather than give a long statement. We dont have that much time but were happy to take questions. While were waiting for the first question, when you asked me about where immigrants are going, the state over the last two years that has had the biggest percentage increase in immigration has been north dakota because its the state with we talk about four percent growth. Anyway, its interesting that you have this state that you have mexican immigration into north dakota now. And just demonstrates the point that immigrants go where the work is. Absolutely. Okay. First question. My name is dean gentleman jack Deanna Jackson with the dallas womens foundation. With immigration being such an important engine for texas greg and our path, im very concerned about our issues with educating many of her hispanic youth in this country, both through k through 12 as well as through the College Stage and is that going our inability to provide a strong education going to be a hinderance in the future . Tia, you want to jump in . Sure you hit on a very important point, we absolutely need to touch on in this conversation, and i think that just as we benefit tremendously from nims texas in terms of economic growth, immigrants that tend to come in are working age and theyre already educated and pretty much their education is done. And so the job for us becomes to educate their children, which will be our future. So, that is very important task, and i think thats something where, with growth comes all these responsibilities to fund to a greater extent obviously education and health care. And i think that is something probably the legislature has been fiddling with in putting together the budget. Easier this time than last time. When you have so much population growth every year our population grows over 400,000 people. Half of those are immigrants with some of them with large families, and i think we have to have a clear understanding when we grow this fast and attract this many people, this comes with large points, education and health care and even infrastructure, roads and water. Steven . Ill add a point to that. I think when you look at the issue of immigration, theres a huge correlation between or an intersection between Immigration Reform, business, and education and business. First of all, the United States Hispanic Chamber, were not a political organization. We dont take sides. Were a business association. So its about free trade, economic growth, job contraction, creation, and we struggle whether we should have a voice in education, but in the Hispanic Community theres a real challenge in terms of getting our youth to the proverbial next level in terms of secondary education. If you look at it, education is an economic issue. It is a business issue. As a nation, i think the sooner we begin to grapple with the notion that we have to have a prepared and educated nation, which means educating the kid that come after us, were not going to be the economy that we are. And at the end of the day the greatness of this country to a large extent, rests on the fact we have a phenomenal economy. The economy that the rest of the world comes to and where all innovation or majority of innovation happens but at a very concerning rate, we are running out of educated and trained and prepared individuals to take us to the next growth opportunity. And so i think that there is a place for business to take ownership of the education challenge. Im very pleased when i see organizations, by the way, at t, by the way, member of the usatc and headquartered in dallas, texas. I believe through their investment, to help stem the tide of high school dropouts, theyve invested some 300 million this year alone to try to help that. But i think its critically important. I think its going to take all of the players in our community, including your organization, which is obviously at the lead of trying to create the thought process that is going to get us there. But i dont think well get to the solution we need as a nation unless business gets involved, and texas, again, i think, is leading the way and ill stating illustrating that businesses businesses and Business Leaders see the correlation and are investing real dollars in helping solve the problem. The issue of class of immigration and education and children. Those are issues for state especially with a big surge in immigration. Looking at the big picture, one of the reasons immigrants are such a huge economic advantage to the United States is because most if you look at the most recent census data, about 65 of immigrants come to the United States between ages of 18 and 35. Theyre right in the sweet zone. Right . Right when theyre at the start of the work life. So if an immigrant comes to this country at the age of 20. Its like reverse foreign aid. Its like theres the home country, spent all this money educating these immigrants and then they come to the United States. If you view a human being as an investment, the first 15 to 20 years of a person0s life is all cash and during the working years you get the payoff. The reason immigration is such a huge as set we dont have to pay for the education, the sending country does, and the values is behind hundreds of billions of dollars and the fact is immigrants have more children than americans do, so education for that, so immigrants are actually contributors to Public Education system, not the opposite. I totally agree. I just want to add a couple of things. You to the we just got recent data about increase in High School Graduation rates among hispanic so thats true for texas and also true for the nation, i believe. So thats really good news. Were still trying to understand and process those because the increases are large, and so i think were trying to understand how its happening. But its suggesting that the projections might be way off in projecting 30 years from now, still 20 of nativeborn hispanics are going to drop out of high school. So thats hopefully changing and were seeing the beginning of that change, and the other thing i want to say quickly, we foes cuss a lot of education but we did an interesting study on poverty the on poverty and poverty gap and looking at natives and immigrants and the fascinating thing was we focus so much on education but the biggest discrepancy, the biggest explanation for high poverty rate was english and i poked fun at the germans and ill take that back because we found that not being able to speak english well or fluently explained over half the poverty gap between hispanic immigrants and natives. So that was huge factor. Thats really, really important and, the we could do more there and that doesnt get as much attention. Another question, please. My question is, what would you have done had you lived next door to the u. S. And you cant supply your family with food, clothing, shelter, education, transportation . But you knew a country that the ratio of economics for the minimum wage was ten times greater in this country next door . What would you have done for your family . Thank you. So, i think that gives us to a good point. People kind of by chance are born in one country or another and it seems natural they want to follow the opportunity. I would have bothered god yet again with yet another request and i would have gone to that neighboring country. I think lets talk a little bit about so some of the barriers and theyve written about this we dont have good ways to come here. Thats part of the donate washington. We dont have to get into the specifics but what are in of the problems about not having a way to get in the country . Thats a good point. You feel the border with mexico and lets be honestthegreat majority of them come here for work, and those Work Opportunities are going to be open and how are they going to be filled . Filled with legal immigrants or come from canada or on boats . Its interesting to think if youre not going to fill the void with some workers that a void previously being filled by unauthorized immigrants coming cross the u. S. Mexico border, hough is thats going to play out . What are the unintended consequences of doing what theyre planning to do. Steve, what are some other whats the most sort of progrowth way we can provide a way for people to come here and work . Well, first of all issue think this gentleman has a great point. I was in west texas hunting im not a very good hunter but i was hunting with a group in the middle of nowhere in west texas. Not too far from the mexican border. And at night, some of these migrants would come to our door and they would want water or just some basic food, and thats incredibly to me just an incredibly heroic act, that people would take the chance to come across the border and put their life at risk to come into this country, and i just think its just an important point we remember. People always ask me, when will we know that america is in decline . And its win a Million People want to leave here rather than come here. And people with risk their life to come here, is a something we should admire about our country and the people who come. So to answer your question, how do we that migrant family that wants to come here, how do we allow them a legal channel. We have written a lot about this the wall street journal. Theres no question that illegal immigration i a function of Job Opportunities here. If we get economy growing, at 4 , and get this Unemployment Rate down to 5 , theyre going to come. So the very reason you said, sir. And so what we need to do is make sure there are ways they can come here legally, and the idea of setting up an Agricultural Work Program one program has a lot of negative con know tates and a lot of connotations. A program in the 50s. You want to know the singling most Effective Program in the history of this country in reducing illegal immigration it was the guest Worker Program. We reduced illegal immigration by 90 by having a plan where people could come here legally. The immigration bill before the congress does that and that would be much more effective than building these surveillance towers and putting triple fences and things on the border. Letting people come here in legal ways is the way to do it. Great. Do we have another question . How about down here in the front. Please just wait for the mic. Thank you. I was just curious. Great panel. Talked a lot about how the texas economy has been in fact if you compare to arizona or alabama, because of the hospitality and the political environment has been so favorable for it and helped the economy, are you worried about the harsh rhetoric starting to come out from people who are elected about how sort of antiimmigrant, that will affect your economy in any way . Javier . Injury again, without getting political, think that the fact of the matter is that we see a lot of very harsh rhetoric, and illconceived legislation that often times is very draconian toward immigrant communities, and we have seen this in florida and georgia and arizona certainly. And at the end of the day it really kind of in our mine we look at things from a particular perspective and its about commerce and economics. This kind of antiimmigrant sentiment that leads to the antiimmigrant legislation is not only bad for the immigrants. We need to consider that its bad for the immigrant, its bad for business, and that makes it bad for america. And that correlation is its like 100 . Everytime you rook at these bills, and those that have passed in states like alabama and arizona, the economies of those states have gone from bad to worse. That is a matter of record. Theres nothing emotional about this. Its clinical. And so i think every state in the nation kind of needs to be very clearheaded about what attempting to do here. It is an emotional subject on both ends of the spectrum, but as an organization that kind of tries to put the camel through the eye of the needle, if you will, the best thing we can do as an association is continue to remind people theres important economic and commercial implications to this type of draconian legislation. Thats our focus here, too. We think as americans they agree on immigration a lot more than we hear about and a lot more than a lot of us realize, and especially when we talk about these economic contributions. A lot of times the third or fourth thing someone thinks about when they think about immigration. So were trying to do with our discussion and with our work and you guys as well, bringing those facts to the people, to americans so they can have more informed debate on the topic. Yes . An interesting place where texas is very different from most other states and i think in 2010, although we did bring the 2010 legislature had lots of bills introduced but some of the harsh rhetoric like bills in arizona were being considered here. I dont think anything ended up happening. However it works in austin, worked to the benefit of the texas economy, i would say, to eject those types of bills, and it was an astounding demonstration just how Different Things are here, and so not saying again that there arent supporters of those the harsh rhetoric but i think in some cases texas is at demonstration how different we are here and how its interesting and its also also has significant meaning for the economy. I think we have time for one last question. If there is one. Please. Wait for the microphone. In talking to people that come here illegally just to work, in talking to people in mexico legally or illegally. Both legally and illegally. This is the sentiment. People want to come to work here but they want to go back home because theyre family is over there. So our Worker Program is something that would be very beneficial because they really dont want to stay. Many of them stay here because if they go back they can never come back, and im sure you know that one worker may be supporting three or four families in mexico with the money that they are earning in the state. But theyre longing to go back. So, i think facilitating their return of the workers would open the doctor of opportunity the door of opportunity for other people to come and go back and they would not stay and become a burden, like they calls sometimes, and i think that is something very provocative that should be experimented on because i, myself, when i come here, i was longing to go back for ten years. I adopted myself and made myself so happy. I dont want to go back because i this is my home, but if the work visa for one year it would be very, very good. Right. Wonderful. I think were about out of time. Before we go, i just want to thank the panel one last time. I think a key message we learned from this discussion is that people are an asset, and a lot of time wes forget about that. We think about different kinds of assets and we forget people, are assets and help drive the economy. The only regret is i wish that paul krugman had been here because he seems to think texas dismiss kind of backwater state without indoor plumbing. See what is going on here. This is what drives us crazy, actually. Thank you for putting this on. Please thank the panelists. [applause] were standing inside Hard Scrabble, which is a twostory building for families in 1856, she does not like it one bit. She has found it crude and homely. But true to her nature, she will make the best of it as a young married woman some we wouldnt to have her own home. She just thought that he could have built something as nice as white haven and was a little perturbed her father talk grant into building a wood structure. She would have brought her finer things because as a privileged child she would have had fine china and Fine Furniture that would have been comfortable chairs, and a broad table, because you had at this point five people eating in this dining room. But what is important about Hard Scrabble for them and even though they do not live in it very long, this represents their very first home together. Julia gained a great deal of confidence as a wife and mother, and it starts at Hard Scrabble. Next were the encore presentation of our original series, first ladies, influence and image, looking at the public and private live0s of the nations first lady. Next week, julia grant to caroline harrison, next week at 9 00 eastern on cspan. More now from the george w. Bush institute with a look at the naturalization process for immigrants. Panelists highlight the circumstances that might discourage immigrant is from applying for citizenship and how the process could be improved in the future. This discussion is an hour. A pleasure to be here. I work very closely with pressure pressure when with president bush when he was trying to advance Immigration Reform in the has battle and its a pleasure to be back in his beautiful new house, talking about immigration. So thank you to the institute. I want to hark back as we get started to the ceremony we saw this morning, that incredibly moving ceremony, because were going to talk about here today not just how immigration is good for america, but how naturalization and citizenship actually even ups the ante and makes the immigrants even more beneficial for the United States. Its a benefit for themselves and also a benefit for the country. So very people we saw this morning, when they came in the door, they were greatle asset for america and as they went out to the door theyre even more, going to be even more of an asset and well delve deeper into that. As moderator 2009 frame what were talking and not talking about and how citizenship fits into the process. So were not talk about the debate in washington, not talking about comprehensive Immigration Reform, not talking the Illegal Immigrants or unauthorized immigrants term. Were here to talk about legal immigrants who have come to the country and are on visas and decide to make the transition to be citizens. So hold on to the words, legal, legal, legal, what part of legal dont you understand . What i would like to do before we get started is talk about how people become citizens. When youin focus groups and talk to ben about citizenship you hear again and again, just go down to the post office and pick up their papers. As if citizenship is just something that you that happens like that. Its not just something that happens like that. The process can be very people come on a visa, sometimes they come an 0 longterm series sacker a permanent series sacker sometimes a shortterm visa like a student visa, and eventually graduate to a permanent visa or green card. Then once you have a green card you wait in the country for a while you. Have to wait at least five years before you can apply to become a citizen. Many wait five years, many wait ten years, some wait 15 years. Some people remain in the country and never become citizens and just stay here on these legal permanent series saturday, and a legal permanent visa allows you to live and work and travel but not vote, not serve on a jury, not serve in Public Office and different public benefits. The question is why people make that step and what happens when they make that step. But what you have to understand is within the population, about a third, a third, third. If you watch tv you would think all the manipulates were unauthorized immigrants were unauthorized. But in fact its a third, a third, and a third. 37 of the immigrants in the country are citizens. 31 are people with permanent visas who could become citizens but havent done it yet, and 28 are unauthorized immigrants. So the picture you see on the news is incredibly misleading. The question before us today is what about this third that could become citizens and have not yet . Thats eight Million People. A lot of people, eight Million People. I was looking at the numbers. Its a long line. Its four times dollar dallasfort worth, all the people. Eight Million People could become citizens tomorrow but havent chosen to do it. One question is why and how to encourage them . Because it would be an incredible economic bob economic boon for the country. And the other last point i want to make is citizenship is part of a long process of integrating or assimilating, right . Integration and assimilation, takes a whole lifetime for many immigrants. Sometimes two generations. And has many different types of bases. Everything from coming here and getting a job and finding your first apartment thats part of assimilating to eventually learning english and perhaps marrying an american and risings up in your job and serving in the military. Assimilation means Different Things. Some objective, like getting a job and rising up educationally. And some subjective. Like coming to believe you belong here and you love america and that we, its we not they, and citizenship is the capstone of that process. Citizenship is what people do when they decide i belong here and i want to join the family formally. So we want to step back from that emotional side of it and talk about the economics of this. Making that decision to join, what does that mean for you economically and what does that mean for the country economically . I have a terrific panel here. We have a terrific panel to lead us through this and im going introduce them as i ask them a first question. So lets start with you. A richard, youre an economist by training. Youre prefer emeritus as Ohio University and a fellow here at the Bush Institute. Lets talk about the big picture. Before we get to citizenship, can you help us understand what happens economically when people go through the long process and become integrated . What happens to their incomes to their education levels, what happens to Home Ownership . Wealth creation. What happens as people settle and put down roots here. Excellent question. And im thinking of something jim glassman said a minute ago. He said immigrantses get it. But immigrants dont get it overnight. It takes time for immigrants to get it. And immigrants come in the United States and earn 6 or 70 of what typical immigrants earn. 12, 15 years later theres some argument about the length of assimilation. We dont get into that debate. Most of them have more or less caught up with the native born americans in terms of income levels. Takes a little longer to catch up in terms of wealth, and usually by the time their children come along, the Second Generation often outdistance native born americans in terms of earning, and this is true. So, its a is it an assimilation process, but assimilation is something native born americans have. When a kid graduates from college or high school and goes to work, may make x and 20 years later theyre making twice as hey learn on the job. Immigrants have the same problem but they have double problem. Because they come in, they have less Language Skills and Language Skills are particular live critical. The single most important determinant of increasing income among immigrants. They learn on the job. They learn in the work place. The best way to learn english is to speak it and to work and have to talk it. They learn work discipline. Some people come from countries where getting to work at 8 00 may mean 8 20 or 8 30. In the United States, it means 8 00. So, we learn work displain. Theres discipline. Theres a whole host of things. Thing outsides you dont learn in english classes or the germans in german classes in germany. And so it is an assimilation process, and it takes quite a number of years. A lot of it is learning labor market information. To learn about occupational choices. You come to the country, youre limited. You have friends and relatives who help you get the first job. You may take the first thing that comes along but your choices are very limited. So, over time you build up. And one way of course you build up is through education, and so immigrants tend to go to school at night and so forth to further their education. Back to the credentialing. I think the c credentialing process of naturalization is not entirely different from the credential of getting the College Diploma in another slightly different context. A College Diploma tells an employer, gee, this person is fairly bright. Probably speaks english language well. Probably is going to get to two, on time. Probably is not a drug addict, probably fairly productive. Therefore we pay a premium for college graduates. Similarly i suspect naturalization has a similar impact. A person who is known to who can say that i am a naturalized citizen is a person who is saying, im making a commitment to this country. I want to be a member of the family. I and probably in the employers minds, i think this person is a little more committed, a little more disciplined, a little more capable of doing what i want done, and therefore im willing to pay a premium. The next speaker will speak more to thus but there is a premium. Maybe 10 or so. Ill let others speak to that. But so you patiented a painted a picture, its harder for them to do assimilation than americans about they do catch up within 10, 20 years. Yeah. Thats the bottom line. Is that the same as what was it like in the past . You hear people say, my grandmother spoke english overnight and now all you hear in the supermarkets spanish. How are immigrants today assimilating compared to immigrants in the past and what is the economic payoff today compared to the past . Thats a wonderful question. I love to talk about sunrise be careful. Im a prefer with tenure so i talk forever. Its the same now as it was 200 years ago. The thing that is commit some ways their nationalities change, the accents have changed, the kind of dresses changed. Benjamin franklin in the 1760s complained about how pennsylvania was being germanized. That is the germans were take discovering theyre just not the same as the english, not as good as the english, not as smart as the english and so forth. In the 1850s and 1840s, we had the irish immigration in the United States, the irish are theyre alcoholics, secondly, theyre catholic, et cetera, et cetera, and all of these things were bad because the catholics wont be able to integrate with the president tess stands and the alcoholics wont be able to integrate unless theyre sober. But the economic benefits back to the question. The nonothingings said 21 years to be naturalized. A party got 20 of the vote in 1867 on the antiimmigration policy. So the current generation is not as good as the previous one. Its been through true throughout history and the economic benefits have been true in 1909 the Immigration Commission said immigrants to the United States make 80 of what nativebosh nativeborn, which isnt too much different than today, and that group as an agenda that wasnt al so pro immigrant. But basically bottom line was, by the end of their lives, by the end of their career you look at their children they assimilate like crazy. Theyre productive. They move ahead. They get it, as jim glassman said. Great setting for where were going next, which is to manual. Youre a professor of sociology and american studies studies std ethnicity at the university of southern california. You honed in on a part of this. Terrific study where you look not just at the economic benefitses of assimilation the economic benefits of naturalization and citizenship. So walk us through that study in two parts, lets first talk about the benefits benefits to e individual immigrant. Let me start by first saying that i want to push back on one thing you said, which is that some degrees do signal youre a drug addict. So you want to be careful about that. And then id actually thought that it would be very graceful, because im from california, im in texas to start by talking about the state rivalry and making fun of california but apparently that was done already and i guess the only thing were hoping is that now that your governor is retiring, he wont get usc to become the ust. The university of south dallas. So dont let that happen. So we did a report about a year ago by the Knight Foundation called citizen gain. A really great title. When you tell young people citizen gain, its like, what does that mean . What we looked at was what were the gains in particular just to naturalization, and the interesting thing was, for those who are new here, we tried to control english language ability, recent si of migration you have to explain this by using the word regression analysis. You have to explain it without that word. Im an economist, i cant make it without a regression. But basically we tried to control everything that should explain the difference between citizens and noncitizen immigrants and we still found that citizens made about 8 to 11 more than noncitizens by virtue of becoming citizens. Now, why the gain . The gain seems to be because when youre a citizen you have a wider range of jobs you can move into, number one. Number two, when youre a citizen, you have made a commitment to the country and that commitment you made to the country leads you too make much more u. S. Specific investments in your human capital, your education and fits better with the labor market. And its the credentialing and employers see that as standing up for a lot of markers youre talking about, discipline, english language ability, knowing the civics of the country, et cetera. Now, lets say a couple other things like this, which is why you should have stateness these states in the numbers. A certain type of person becomes a citizen. What is interesting when you do longitudal studies looking at the same person overtime, you find that its still a about an eight to 11 gain, and we used the American Community server, the big census data and we had information of the year that people naturalized so we could assimilate what the gains were over the time. Second thing you should be aware of which is that this is not a gain from legalization because we in california, have been able to estimate who in that sample is unauthorized, who is authorized but not a citizen and who is citizen, and actually very little of the gain comes from authorization. More of the gain comes from making a final step to citizenship, and that is absolutely crucial in this current debate, because the act of including the road map to citizenship is about making sure that you can actually capture the economic gains that come from this, and these gains i know you are going to ask me a question, im filibustering. These gains are not just for individual workers. So next question. Eight to 11 for the individual. Those people who were here his morning, they can go out and a s for an eight to 11 raise. Take it now this where is you were going the bigger society. Whats the gain for america . Not just for the immigrant getting the bigger gain. What this gain for the rest of us . And improvings your school, improving your community, improving their neighborhood. Just stop for their immigrants and families. We estimate its an increase in their earnings, and therefore, their spending power over about ten years. If we can simply take the and naturalize half of them. I know, you are very texasfocused. Its 1 to 2 billion gain a year if you move the naturalization rate up. Its a marc economic gain and essentially. You take half of the 8. 5 million that could naturalize and get 21 to 45 billion over what amount of time . Over ten years. Most coming because one of the thing you need to realize is bean, by the way, if theres naturalized this morning dont go ask for a gain tomorrow. You probably wont get it. Bhat data shows us the gain happen other time. Five six years to get the initial boost and probably peak at eight to ten years. What we know what we do with this if we assimilate over time we get the gain. Its an incredibly important thing that is, you know, we have been working with immigrants who need to do more to encourage naturalization. We need to be thinking. What stands the way of people. Were coming back to that. Were coming back to that. So talk just where he was going. Let talk about the obstacle. What are some of the obstacles here . Why the hard process and what is getting in the way of this . I want to thank the institute. The naturalization process and the Immigration Law is more complicated than any other set of laws within the federal government. And oftentimeses people say its more complicated than tax law if you can imagine that. For an individual to go from, you know, entering the country on a student visa, than to adjust to legal permanent res den and blank blag take anywhere from seven to fifteen years. Thats a big range. Within that range comes a significant cost and criteria. I think rich, civic, or skill to jaw the status. T not something you can go to the post office and pick up the paperwork. And the other thing is that just thinking more spskly about english, for example, theres a survey cone done in 2002 where nearly 90 of immigrant surveyed said that they want to learn english. And that they believe that economic their economic success depended on their english proficiency. And i think Previous Panel mentioned that when you look at dat. Half of that. The obstacle here is one of access. What about english. Let focus on the english piece. What do you we know of the benefit of learning english. What else do we know . I would argue a lot of growth found in the study that 8 to 11 growth for individuals wealth can be attributed to english proficiency. And the fact that you come and have additional skills to present to an employer. This has been the interesting part about the work we have been doing. When you talk to employs whether they are big employers. Small employers they are looking for individuals with english skills. And frankly theyre starving for ways to improve the english skill. Whether its bringing in a community college, you know, the Tuition Reimbursement program. Theres incredible amount of innovative model that facility the learning english. Let talk about what you do with the project does. How are you helping people learn english and become citizens. The story in 1915 pfs it was the First Company in america to provide english classes. We think 1915 those are the good old days. Yes, they were. But the fact is that one of the reading institutions appropriations in america said, okay, we have an immigrant work force that need to learn english. Lets help. We have been going businesses across the country and have asking employer like marriott, the intercontinental hotel, american apparel, l. A. Chamber of commerce. Are you modern day beth bethlehem steel . Help them learn english and help. They said yes they love the idea of being stand up to and tell america these are immigrant workers contributing to the bottom line. Learning english, and becoming americans. So this sort of again invast model of connecting the employer to their employee in a different way than serves both needs. Its not just they want to satellite the good guy. Bottom line. Right. Do you speak english. Let me keep going ill come back. You move up on the job and then business retains you and more product i productive. When we first started to think about the idea in 2004 in boston, we looked the Boston Redevelopment Authority looked at the growth in the hop talty and health care and found actually that growth in occupations was going to come in area and jobs required a higher level of english skill. You saw the work force at that point have low level english skills. Until that plan was reached you had a work force that actually could have the english skills that are necessary for the future of the economy, you know, the regional huge amount of trouble. Er rick, eric. Youre leading the new national new America Campaign that we were thanking for support. And support from some of the people in the add yent audience to streamline access to Naturalization Services i want to ask you what you do in a minute. Youve been working for more than a decade. Help us get to the reality of this. Let put a face on it a little bit. Weve been talking number and historical trends. Tell us about some of the people you encountered who want to become citizens have and gone on the basis to become successes. Tell us a couple of stories. Sure. Thank you for inviting me and having this. Im a natural evangelist and im like a kid in the candy store. Its a whole day devoted to the topic. T wonderful. I have a fond impression of institute and dallas because of this. I want to introduce you to two people, but actually three, one is a couple. I think abel is typical of someone naturalized. They might be similar in similar circumstance. He and his wife are in the process of naturalizing. They came to a workshop at the new America Campaign run. I was at the workshop and met with him. At the workshop there are 200 people interested in applying natural san diego. We help most. There are over 100 volunteers. Its wonderful. His wife is from mexico. Abel is from guatemala. His wife works a file clerk at the medical certainly at university of california. Did f you dont already know thats one of the premiere hospital and medical school in the world. They have three children. One is tiny. Three. The other two are in college. One is studying a the the university of california Santa Barbara and plans on being a lawyer. The other child at pepper dime university. He fled guatemala in 1988 near the end of the civil war there. He came to the states and became a house painter. He came unauthorized. Since 1998, hes owned his own house painting business. He has 189 employees and does both commercial and residential painting. He has contractors license, fully bonded and insured and Workers Compensation for the employees. He made sure to tell me that. Does everything by the book. Additionally he and his wife are homeowners. Which and owned the home for almost ten years. You exist its expense toif buy a home in San Francisco. He told me why he wanted to become a citizen. He said, first of all, i want to vote. Second of all, i want to take the last step of becoming fully integrated and part of the united because i dont plan on moving back to guatemala. I want to plant my stakes in the ground here. And when i told them why i was, you know, after i helped him with the application i said you would be a great person. Going to the thing at the Bush Institute can i interview you and talk about your story. Sheer. Sure. He want , the united a great country we have lot of opportunities and youre allowed to express your opinion. S a free country. I want to become a united citizen that lives here for the rest of my life for those. Hes a good example. I want to quickly, if i could. The benefits do you have a story of somebody reaping the benefit. I do. They are both from mexico and married. They came to the United States at young ages. She got her green card through the program in the 1980 and he through family ties. They both naturalized in their 30s which was about ten years ago. Went to college at university of san diego. Where they met. Went to graduate school at stanford university. They are homeowners in San Francisco, once again a big thing. And they own several invested property in san diego area where they are leasing out the the investment property. They have newborn twins and helping to support the diaper industry in a significant way. He is a lawyer, employer, and Small Business own we are offers in San Francisco and san jose. Shea shes a phenomena expert. She oversees a staff of over 50 an annual budget of over 10 million. Since she arrived she helped raise over 100 million for building preserving lowincome housing. That to me was impressive. She oversees a management of 1100 unit if seven cities. Shes also on our board of directors and on a committee and finance committee and really helps us be on the up and up. We are an 8 million organization with 2 employees. They told me they both feel being u. S. Citizens helped them provide financial security, they wouldnt have bought a house had they not been u. S. Citizens. Not purchase Investment Properties and didnt want to miss out on the financial stunts. They, once again, i want to put their stake in the ground permanently in the united. Thats very important. That sense of if youre going stay and know youre going stay invest in a whole different way financially and in yourself. I want come back to what you do and broaden the conversation first. Were talking about a good story. But also some way a story. The benefit and uplift and how it benefits them and us. The numbers are sobering 8. 5 Million People who could be doing it who respect right now. And, you know, the gain youre talking about and when you look overall that half of the immigrants nonmexicans who could have done it. Only a third of the mexicans who could have naturalized. Let talk a little bit more about what can be done to encourage this; right. So i know both of your organizations are involved. Why dont we start with you and come this way and everyone talk about what, you know, this is a great story for the people who do it. What about the people not doing it. How do we get to them and get them on the train . Is it okay to talk about the new america. Briefly. Theres an exciting National Program called new America Campaign. Our goal is to help as many people naturalize as possible. They want to do it effectively and efficiency. They are create an impact in the diverse community. Catholic charity are what we have done is help them with financing and with support in large part by the carnegie corporation. To provide financing best practices innovation here in dallas and forth worth to as many people go through the legal process. The legal process. Theres a lot of. Learning english, learning civics. All that stuff. You help with the piece the filling out the paperwork and getting to the exactly. They refer people and partner with lots of adults school, english language learning school, civic learning schools. Even banks and lending to get the 680 fee. They partner with a lot of those organizations as well. Are they helping them with the legal forms . Ill use the example and washington, d. C. , were working with the our first session with the housekeeping staff. It was an incredible moment we met two women who had been working at the marriott for ten years. They had been eligible for naturalization for nearly that amount of time. The one reason why they hasnt taken the final step. They had an hour commute on the train every day each way. So they lived in suburban virginia. They said, you know, im working eight hours a day. Take me two hours to get back and forth home. I have thingses to do when i get home. Its a big thing. They were so happy to be able to come work and the marriott to say were going extend your lunch hour so you can get the tan you need for to complete the paperwork. Thats one piece creating that time and space. Another thing that needs to be done we have to look at the process. People can go from the naturalization in a reasonable amount of time. Thats the problem thereto government theres a long backlog. Wait until you look at naturalization process. Talk a little bit more about that. You have a great number in your report what happened when the fee went up. Yeah in 2007 the fee went up to essentially cost somebody about 680. Because they have to pay a fee and do a exam. Thats an understatement for cost reason we can talk about. In that year, we friend about 1. 5 million applications, to 500,000 the next year. When you take a look what happened it hit less educate folks who have less money. For us 680 probably didnt feel like that much money. Its about two and a half weeks of take home pay for minimum wager. You probably want to consult a lawyer and get the right number of english classes. The costs to do it are even bigger. What are the real costs . My best guess they should be put aside about 3,000. They want to check with a lawyer as well as make sure theying fees. You have a family for lowincome folk it is means theyre facing a liquid constraint. There a couple of other things. The other difference is between immigrant and nonimmigrant. Her citizens to noncitizen immigrants is pretty large. Let me play it out. 15 in getting to english proficiency. You get a 15 boost in the wages and not counting that to 8 to 11 citizenship. Exactly. Theres a lot of gabs here. Gains here. Its good to see how business is reaching out. Its good to see the programs being talked about before. The Los Angeles Public library created a lot of immigrants and kids go. They wind up taking their kid. Theres a corner to tell them how they become a citizen. They face the fee. Another Interesting Program is the Microloan Program that city corp. And casa maryland put together to borrow the money to pay for the fees. When they see the economic benefit if somebody can give them the money upfront and let it pay out over time. Were talking about how we help people pay them. Thats one thing. Theres a lot of benefits that suggest we should subsidize. If even if we werent we might consider changing the fees by reuping for a green card. Green card is a permanent visa. You have to renew it every ten years. Or each one being the those thingses are basically sold out. You can raise the fees there. Lower the fee for naturalization and encourage something we all say we think is important. Listening to the conversation if you weigh the cost and benefit of naturalization to the potential sorry to use the 8 to 11 . From the time of naturalization you have 25 more years of work. You may talking about 3,000 or 4 ,000 extra North Carolina. Income. Thats 100,000. The costs are still relatively small in relation to the benefits. We should try to find ways to overcome those costs to lower them. I strongly agree with them that maybe we ought to auction off there are ways to phenomena the 860 times a million is what . 680 million. Its trivia in the because of the gain. It could be cheaper. Yes. Let go back to the business. I worked closely with businesses. I understand how businesses see a real bottom line benefit in english. Im not sure how they get a bottom line benefit in citizenship. We talk about an economic benefit of the individual, the economy. But if im running my flower stand or my chain restaurant or whatever. What is the benefit to me of having the people work for me be citizen . Its a great question. Frankly when we were starting the project had to talk people through it. The first question is what if my workers are arent eligible for citizenship. Are they here legally . Yes, take a deep breathe. The hr people got anxious. First an was okay what is the citizenship process . Once we answer that question people realize through the process they learn additional skills. That bottom line impact gets back to the tangible kills that are built over the course of naturalization and comes down every business at the end of the day theres a bottom line impact. They want to be a part of the story. They want to tell a good story. They want to a story to the work force and the customer base. They are able to create time in the workday. That benefit is to be able to engage their work force. That feel more invested. Thats an economic benefit. Thats one of the key things. You talk employee loyalty. One of the interesting things a lot of firms that hire immigrant workers i think sometime when they initially hire them it they think these are hard working folk. That we want to be able to keep. Its one way to be able to retain people because of the loyalty of Senior Company need you to become part of the American Society and the benefit of that has for your kid. Thats something that is a wrong determine. They are almost competing with each other. I bought the breast on. And my workers are happy. Its nice to see businesses say sign me up. I want to be able to engage my work force. Let another hard question and go to question with the audience. A lot of, you know, the skeptic you do the focus groups and talk tv and people say, you know, they become want citizen they want the welfare benefit. Even legal immigrant dont get much in the way of benefit. What is the an for that . What do we say to that . Mostly an exaggeration that immigrants crave welfare benefit. There are period in history that you get difficult result. T true for some immigrant group. The incident of welfare usage is a little higher than not now. Generally speaking. Immigrants are low welfare users. They are if many cases for legal reasons. The once that are here legally are have extremely high rate of work participation. This is another thing that is they work. They are hard workers. They prefer work welfare. When you back citizen you are eligible for other benefits. Ive never seen an immigrant to say thats why theyre naturalizing. There are skeptics. One of the things that feed to the skepticism when the welfare reform and the 1990s passed there were a lot of folk who shifted over to citizenship from the legal lawful permanent resident status to access benefits they were losing under the welfare reform. I dont think any serious economists believe its a mag innocent for immigrant nor when you look data do they use it extensively. The second thing, the rate of mobility over time. One of the things we found in california that is striking, imimmigrant immigrants longer here have a higher they want to make investment and be independent. Even its not much money. I was going to add something to the business. I used to work with someone who owned the manufacturing. He made wedding dresses. Hemented everyone to get legal and get legal status and naturalize. He felt it was a higher retention opportunity for him. He trained all of these people. He wanted them to stay with him as employees. He thought it was great they went through the process. Great. This is terrific. A rich conversation. Let open it to others in the room. We love to hear your questions and [inaudible] we love to hear who you are and your afghanistan. And please, make it a question if you can. Yes. [inaudible] [laughter] we have a new app out which is very exciting. My question is we talk about the economic benefit, which is fantastic. Can you talk about the benefit of Civil Society and the fabric of the country in term of what imgrant immigrants offer . To put it in perspective, can. The economic. I was going do a little bit of disclaimer. I think its important people are not wig et. And we dont want to think about immigrant as widget. Its painful to limit it this. You dont wantnt person who think about the bottom line. You dont want to be the person who dont think about the bottom line when you think about immigration. What is in term of why they become citizens. They want the full right and opportunity and protection because of citizenship. So when president bush said the most important title is u. S. Citizens that means something to people. It means something to their neighbors. Its somewhat intangible but incredibly important when people are dealing with whether its state or local or federal government to be able to say yes im a u. S. Citizens. Thats who we are as a society. I believe thats why they become citizens. Despite when increase. One thing we see is a pattern of data tap when immigrant community feel like the antiimmigrant rhetoric is heated or the tone is negative, they move forward naturalization and engagement. So one of the things i think is a main benefit of natural station is you learn about u. S. Sieve tsh civic. You get nor confidence to say i belong here and should be to be have a choice and a civic life. We have folks in economic thats what we are talking about. These are full people looking to really gate full handle on being part of a american experiment. My experience being a naturalization ceremony over years and asking people why theyre doing it. People do it when they finally feel they belong. They dont actually do they feel when they have got ton the other side of the fence and belong here and are a part of the family and say i want to that speaks to the fact we should create opportunity for those not yet citizen to voice in the Public Policy process. To encourage them to participate in all sort of debate. Thats another whole debate we might differ. You ive seen that in action with people i helped. They become more engaged in their kids education and pta and neighbor watch programs. The new America Campaign is doing a lot of work around integrating technology and innovation to the process. As said theres a new app. What does it do . The new app can had help you figure out if you plugin your zip code where the closest location is. It can help you in the naturalization process and learn the civics question. Go an english test. Requirement. Et. If you get to a real computer you go through and get screened for naturalization, and complete your Application Online with a popup with a turbo tax type of thing. Wonderful process. Another question . You dont need to identify yourself. You need a microphone. While waiting just a followup on what was said earlier. The economic benefit of the immigration have spill overeffects that go beyond what we might call traditional economic. Very important. You talk little bit about what the process is like learning english and civic. I didnt hear any comment from whether thats a good process or not. In an economic sense or generally integration sense. Would you [inaudible] i was involved a couple years ago with redesigning the death. I challenge anyone in the room to take the test and pass it. We think we went through high school civic and history. Its harder than you think. Theres a lot we should know and dont know. Its a real test. You have to study. The idea of the redesign during the Bush Administration was not to make it easier but more relevant and study and i think they improved it. Two thing. One is right now this proses is is much more stream lined. If we were in the conversation fifteen years ago and started with president clinton but accelerated with president bush in stream lining the process now. You can go its a green card holder. A current residence dont a citizenship. To have the citizenship in sometimes as little as four months or six month. Fifteen years ago, we were talking sometimes two and a half three years. Thats one positive, positive part of it. I think the process is elongated. I think that five years is a long time to be here to put your roots in. I would be a bigger fan of three years. It would help economically if you just to be clear. At five years you apply and the processing can get done in six months. People do the process involves, you know, a legal hundred. Its like studying for the sat or what have you. People are learning history. I would agree the naturalization process itself has gotten better over the last few years. Thats the short window of time. The shortest window of time. Im more worried about has to take it before to get to a dwroan card status. Thats entering the country on a family visa, on any one of the million of work visa. To be to be access that legal point of entry. Is incredibly difficult and competitive. In some ways its good and some ways not. They can be stream lined in way that meet the interest of the country. The streamline window and get the shorter window. The final economic benefit the country is greater. A requirement we speak english to become a citizen a great thing. It means we should flood the zone with the english second language classes. The fact immigrants are highly involved in the work force they need more Community Base and evening classes. When you look at adult ed classes teaching people english you see two type of people getting in the class. People want to learn english we should be trying to make it more available. Its a good investment in the economy, citizenship, and civic engagement. That was a great study. Four month and two years people wait for the class. People saying why are the people in the focus group say why dont they learn english . They cant find a class. I think you had a the Million Dollar question to us and new America Campaign other people doing the work on the front line why isnt there 8. 5 Million People. How can we add them to the section . Part is too hard to apply. It theres a fear of applying. Its too companyive. All of those things are factors that are really working against our economy. Anyone study that yet . Number one, english language and the fear of english. You dont have to be a College Professor to pass an exam. But the fear of how much english you need to know. Its really a working english. A lot of people can do it. Number two, the 6 80 fee. Okay. Number three is there is some people arent ready to take that step yet. Its the english and thats a huge impediment to people to get over. The other is the fee. People also selfrate their english lower. Other people its a question of fear of confidence. I know elderly in its a huge barrier. They dont feel like they can learn english at their age. I want to make two brief points. And get to a question. And a question. Right. When we look at welfare use. We typical look at the household and foreign born headed households have much higher welfare usage and the reason is that, you know, they tend to be poor and tend to lack Health Insurance. Their children get state Health Insurance benefit. From talking to people ive heard that naturalize in order to use the family reunification. They can sponsor family for immigration. Can you comment on that . Thats a big reason why people take the step to become naturalized. Ive been doing the work for twenty five years. I found in the late 80s and the early 90s that was the major reason. As a u. S. Citizens you can e petition for your relatives more quickly than a lawful resident. But since proposition 187 in my home state of california and the antiimmigrant sentiment more and more people have been accelerating naturalization to vote. Im a journalist and have the last session going to be lightening round. You get one or two sentences each. I want do you back up away from the benefits from the immigrants and think about the benefits to the u. S. What is your sum up bottom line. Why is naturalization a benefit for the country as whole . Let start with you. Okay. Because it promotes democracy. Promote our way of democracy. Include more people, more people allow to participate and thats what we want. Okay. I think of small town in texas or midwest. Those not only need more immigrants but more citizen. Thats the vitality of who we are. You, richard. Higher income, greater welfare for people other than immigrant. Search better off. Naturalization attitudes that process. That process no longer effect on the general population. Great. I was at the movie naturalization ceremony like so many of you. I realized watching it made us aware in which you can become american by understanding what the prin. S of a country are. That says so much about who with we. It goes far beyond the other kind we have. Thank you so much. Terrific panel. Thank you very much. Stay there. Dont leave. Well take break. I want to say when i first heard this panel propose, i thought it is a strange subject. I really didnt think, frankly, there was any difn between somebody who came here and got a green card and worked in the and naturalized other than the citizenship, the porn importance of promoting democracy. When you realize how much it helps the economy it raises important policy questions about whether we should burden perspective naturalized citizens with a 3,000 fee maybe or help them learn english. It bringses to surface a lot of issues that dont people think think about. Is it a path to citizenship . Do we want to change for unauthorized immigrant or is it a path to legalization being able to work in america. In this panel, i think its quite convincing on that point. It helps america if people get naturalized and become citizen. Were going it take a ten minute break and come back and talk at the lot panel about how immigrants serve america. Great subject as well. Thank you. Thank you panelists. You did a great job. [applause] [inaudible conversations] Washington Post reported earlier today that the nsa violated procedure regarding Data Collection program in thousand of unreported cases dating back as far as 2008. The revelation were part of dow. S the newspaper obtained from an internal government audit of the nsa. In reaction to the news, vermont senator and other lawmakers have called for more hearings on the agencys Surveillance Program. For more on that and the story from the post, we talk to a capitol hill reporter. We are joined by jennifer martinez. Another round of hearings on the nsa. Hes doing that in the wake of report published by the Washington Post late thursday. That revealed that nsa has repeatedly broken privacy rule and overstepped the authority for years. And so leahy came out today with a statement saying that he remains concerned that congress is still not getting straight he hopes to hold another hearing when Congress Returns to get the how bad was the report they published on thursday. Its pretty damning. And just in worse physician than it was. With the survey less than program. And it also calls in to question the statement that the president made last week at thes press con friday at the white house or other statements that Administration Official have made. And the report showed that the nsa had procured private communications thousand of times without proper authorization. The Washington Post did an analysis and found that most of the incident were unintended and that involved an unauthorized surveillance americans or foreign target in the united. Senator leahy when Congress Returns in september going hold a where is congress on this . How far have they got ton the issue . Is there any legislative solution to the thash is in the works . There have been a lot of hearings in the wake of the revelation over the nsa Surveillance Program after Edward Snowden released document to the Washington Post and the the guardian about the programs we have seen the judiciary including both hearing. We have seen a bunch of legislation. You had senates widen, you udall, introduce a set of three bills the week before congress broke for recess that would reform how the fisa court which oversees some of the nsa Surveillance Program operates. And then leahy himself is introduced a bill that would narrow the Data Collection program which operates under section 215 of the patriot act. Basically what the bill would do is make sure when the Intelligence Community is trying to seek phone records for an investigation they have to prove theyre only going after a terrorist group or a foreign target. The closest they come to see Congress Vote on something is the house had a proposal that the house voted on that would rain in phone it fails but it was a close vote. And so it sort of shows that congress is concerned about the Surveillance Program, and whether they are violating americans privacy. Jennifer writes for the hill reporting today on the planned hearing by the Senate Judiciary committee. You can follower on twitter. Her reporting at jen martinez. And also read her reporting online at the hill. Com. Thank you for the update. Thank you so much. What is interesting about washington in this age once you have the tight even if its very short tight, even if you have been voted out after one term, you can stay in washington and be a former chief of staff. A former congressman. A former chief of staff to congressman x or y. That itself is marketable. You are in the club. Thats a striking departure from the day which people come to washington to serve serve a little bit and go back to the farm. I guess thats how the founders intended. Theres a new dynamic now. A lot starts money and Resources Available for people do well. Sunday night an inside look at business of government, politics and media in washington. Now a conversation with author and columnist melanie philips. Shes the author of nine books. She taunts those experience and her thought on issues pertaining to tro. , education, and health care. I am simply alfred and mabls daughter. A jew who repairs in the who believes in speaking truth to power. Are you on the right or the left. Are you one or the other . And, you know, this is just silly. Life more complicated than that. Most people are neither right nor left. They are just ordinary folk who are getting on with living their life in the best way that can. And seat world as it is. And what i found tell it as i see it to be. Other journalists. I was trained to look at the facts. Look at the evidence. Arrive at the conclusion. Tell people my conclusion, tell people facts, and my conclusion. And, you know, a lot of people today who kind of thought the other way around. They start with a conclusion, then they say lets make the fact and the conclusion. And from my work at the journalist i know theres a lot of people out there in the kind of sensible center, who i like to think of them are completely plugged in to reality who think with a are the people telling me . I cant make any sense of it. And so thats all i am. Im kind of dealing with the world as it is. Ie you left or right . Im telling it as it is and connecting with people who live life as it is. Host in your last two books especially you use the term follow the evidence. And the world turned upside down. Guest thats right. Indeed and sometimes the evidence takes which are uncomfortable. It tells us things that are going on, which we dont like to know about. Because they frighten us. They perplex us or whatever. I believe that is what you have to solve when you start with the and you dont pretended that thing are not as they are. You dont to try make the evidence and remaining reality what you hope it should be. You start with what is there. I came from very modestly modest kind of background where my whole family were people who would be considered to be on the left of the spectrum. They are people who had a particular view of the world. The world was divided to, you know, the first class and the middle man. We were the middle man. That is was brought up. I had a fairly conventional student experience. This is the 19 70s. You may not find easy to believe. I had very long wild hair at the time. And i had a kind of feud. I read english literature. I hung out with people like that. I never thought of myself as the leftwing. Never. I thought of myself as what we called in britain little. Which is, you know, middle of the road. Wanting the best of my fellow human being. Wanting to make a better world and stand up for the vulnerable. Im still like that. I worked for the Guardian Newspaper. Its the leftwing media in britain. And i worked for Guardian Newspaper for about twenty years. What happened while i was there, possibly because i was working at the guardian, and my political views did change. I still believed in standing up for the vulnerable in society, in making a better world, in trying to improve the fellow human beings. But what i came to realize while i was working there were the people i saw on my side on the great endeavor were actually on the other side. They were not concerned with bettering a lot of their fellow human beings. They were concerned with bettering themselves, and concerned only with their own reputations, and with their own sense of themselves as being noble and virtuous. Why related they were on the other side, and actually had i thought very intolerant view despite what they said and didnt actually care about the people on the bottom of the heap. The little people. Thats when i realized that actually we were on different sides. And so as i say, i still think that i believe in all things i did believe in. What changed from the end was a dramatic change. Was that i came to believe that the people who were on my side were not, and the reasons why the world was as it was was rather different than what i originally thought it to be. Host back to Guardian Angels. Just published fap. Thats correct. Host i had not yet realized the left aggression toward nidis sent or challenge is essentially defensive. They are either guilty about what they are doing because they know its wrong or else some level at least they know their intellectual position is built on sand. Guest one of the political i did course on the left of politic, certainly in britain im not sure its quite the same in the united. Is the extreme aggression with which they conduct the discussion. They dont have an argument. They dont say to me your argument is wrong and this is why its wrong. And here are the following facts which show you wrong. They dont have that discussion at all. They simply use abuse. And the purpose of the abuse is to shut down the argument. Its to believe the person they are disagreeing with and more important than that. Its to tell other people this person dont go there. Dont listen to what shes saying. Shes really dangerous. Shes really horrible. Shes really of no account at all. So you call that a discussion of the left. And so i thought about this for a long time. And it seems to me the reason why people want to shut down a debate before it start they are frightened of having it. If they were confident, then we would have an argument. We would be having a civilized argument. I would say something, you would strategic, we would agree to disagree. It might get heated. We have an exchange of views. These people that im talking about theyre too frightened to have the exchange of view. What are they frightened of . Over the years it seem to be what theyre frightened of they will lose the argument. They dont have the confidence of their own conviction. They dont have the qict they can win an argument. I find that very curious and strange. It means that i look at them differently as a result because i can see they are its deafennive. They shot down the argument in case they lose it. It was built on sand. Host in your 2010 book, the world turned upside down, 2011 book, you write what have the issue of antipa not a lot you might think. They all involve the promotion of belief that report to be unchallengeable truths that are in fact ideologies in which evidence is manipulated, twisted and distorted to support and prove their governing idea. Yes. Ii believe in an era the idea of truth, objective truth has been to a very large extent replaced by ideology. There was a Great Movement of it originated some years ago were in a post model age. And post model meant there was no such thing as objective truth. If you think there is such a thing as on objective truth you are stupid. Youre not properly educate. Its clever that everything is a matter of opinion. You say this is the pace, i say it its not. Thats your opinion. Well, if there no such thing as truth. Theres no such thing of lies and consequence. Were lifing in an era people are suggestible to lies and propaganda. They can no longer distinguish between truth and lies. That has preoccupied me a great deal. Everything is a matter of opinion. Im going to show my view of the world is going to win over your view of the world. So it becomes a contest of power grid, if you welcome. And all of these ideologies are power groupings. Signtism, the belief theres absolutely nothing in the world universe or beyond that cant be explained by imper call fact and evidence. Theres nothing beyond the material world. But people who believe in this isnt like sciencetism they start with the conclusion and say the evidence has to be to fit. And there are numerous example of this actually happening to the extent it becomes literally fraudened where so called reputable academic is have basically told people lies of what the evidence is in order have a different conclusion. This is a terrible thing. It causes such confusion in our society. Most people have no idea they are being lied to. What theyre being told isnt actually following it. Its coming to the conclusion and the idea its actually true. T not true. And so its like its its lonely in the media. You know what . They know when something isnt know when they are being and i have found that if i write these thing i get bell yiewjed by people saying thank goodness somebody in the public sphere is saying i thought to be the case. I thought i was going crazy. But now i find im the crazy one after all. Its extraordinary thing so many millions of people are sitting there thinking am i this crazy or the world is crazy. The answer is you havent gone crazy. Sister my part. The media. The public sphere. Host you detail your incident at the guardian. How lonely did it get at the end . You served a incident as news editor. Guest yes. I was the news editor. I was in charge of the news room of the reporters for three years. It was uncomfortable when i was there, because it operates a kind of family. Everyone feels they belong to a wonderful organization. Its colleague it. Im afraid, you know, i when i started to say and write things. There can no be amovuation from the lie. You have to and it makes strike people as a little crazy it took me so long to separate myself from all of that. But i was very attached to it. It took me a long time to work out that it wasnt just a few issue we were having the problem with it. It was a whole way of looking at the world, and human human beings and our place in the world. And it was a fundamental divergent. I couldnt carryon so i left. I learned a lot. I the guardian made me who i am today, really. They may not like the thing that part they played in my life, but they were in the very important. Host if you column you have written that . Guest i write now a Opinion Column for the daily mail. Which is arguably britains most influential newspaper. Why . Its almost uncannily has an intuitive sen of what they are thinking. It plugs in to that and represents. Its the voice of what we call middle britain. It represents very are butly a view of the world which is grounded in reality and grounded in in the real aspiration and concern of real people. Its the yin and yang of the guardian. They are polar opposite in the british media. They are great warrior paper of either side. Of a division how we view the world. One considered on the left. One considered to be on the right. They both have a capacity for reflecting their value of the core constituency. So the guardian reflect the value of the intellectual intelligence with a we call chattering classes. The political elite. The daily mail represents little britain. Host the former by director and playwright david. He writes, well, new religion as she teaches, is secular humanism. Which although it lacks logically consistent preaccept, contains innumb rabble sanction and taboo of the latter the most observed is a loud and clear. Do not tell the truth. Fought the same kind of fight i have been involved in. He came to more recently and he himself been somewhat victimized by this. And what he he has come to real is like i was saying is that people particularly on the lesser political divide are gripped by a variety of aid yotle. Which mean they say thing as true. Which are actually reflect the world as they would like it to be. But theyre not true. And believe such a thing is true. And that is what he finding all the time himself over a variety of issues. And its changed the way, i think, he looks at the world as changed what is in his place. Host back to the world turned upside down you spend a lot of time on israel, iraq, and islam. One of theism you talk about is the, they declared war open thewet. It embody the freedom of the individual and the negation of though karattic authority in a globalized world its viewed as contain on. Yes. This is, you know, preoccupied me for several years and obviously preoccupied all of us more and more. And i think that is said theres a problem here with the slam slammic world and the religion at the root of islamic world. Its important un, i think, in all of this that when one talk about the concern theyre not talking about just piece of britain. There are have many who come as immigrants precisely because they want to sign up to british or western value. They wanted to prosper and have good job. They want to live in freedom. Freedom is very important to them. Nay wanted to be treated as equal. They wanted to be want we all want. Freedom, peace, prosperity. Theyre not hung up on the reasoning use precept that are causing us in the western world so much trouble. In the islamic world they have been interpreted in a way which come out of the religion. And can is now dominant. And that is the say that the view of the world which says that the world has to be remade according to slammist precept. There is, you know, they are enjoying the freedom that must be pulled back. They must be peaked to conform to a very, very narrow authoritarian conservative complication. That is gone. The view that the west must be brought to heal for the vision the interpretation of islam is relevant. Thats what i call slammism. Islamism. T a madeup word. In order to look for the fact there are muslim who are not extreme who do want to sign up for western value. We must ab knowledge that and there are american who dont. Those cho dont and i call and other call islamist. They are trying to impose it on people who are not muslim and trying impose the most high found antifreedom interpretation of religion at the mo narrow on muslims. And so i call those people islamist. They are a threat to us. They sate the whole time what the intention is. Recreate the old muslim empire to go beyond that and conquer, you know, britain to conquer america. They are explicit. And to impose the rule of islam ib law. A poem anywhere that muslim live. Those are islamist. Some are violent. Some are equipment filled with the war of terrorism. And some are not violent but believe they can conquer the west through the culture cheep, if you like. A culture takeover. We should be extremely glorified them. They are islamist. Some are violent some are not. On the other hand there a lot of muslim who are not islamist. We must be keeping both in our mind. Theres a difference between those who interpret it in a way that threat,s us and describe to islam who are muslim who are themselves threatened by these islamists. And we must keep those two things, i think, in our mind at the same time. Thats what i try to do. When i read the book that was about what i could see to be the case which was is the way to which my great horror fear the British Class was giving in to islamism. The attempt to take over. To the attempt undermine britain and encroachment. And the british saw for a variety of reasons basically say lets go along with it. Thats why i wrote it. I was extremely careful. We must be to acknowledge. There are many muslims who find this equally frightening and worrying. Nothing do with it. Host were you branded racist after that book came out . Guest i dont think i was branded a racist. Thats the particularly i think rabbit thing to say. Islam is not a race. Its a religion. I find it hard to see even if you want to impend a negative racist is not the way to do it. People found other ways of being rude. There was no shortage of creative imagination when it comes to dispensing of insult. Host in the book you talk about multiculturalism. What is your view on British Society and politician . Guest i think multiculturalism is one of the misunderstand. One of the most misunderstood because people assume it must be a good thing because its about being tolerant in life to people in other cup cultures. No. If thats what we should be respectful difference and tolerant of other people, religion, and culture. Thats not what it is. It says that all cultures are equal. Therefore no culture can uphold the value and preferable to any other. What it mean for the west. We in the west cannot if we are multicultural and true lo multiculturallist we cannot uphold our core value of freedom, tolerance, equality for women, and so other. Over those culture which dont uphold freedom, tolerance, equality for women and all the rest of it. That is what multicullism means. Britain went down the road and said we cant talk about that is their cultural. We had cases in britain which there was one case if particular where a black child abused over many years and finally died. The most apaypaling circumstance at the hands of her mother and mothers lover. The social worker couldnt bring themselves to intervene to stop the childs or torture and murder because they said this is their culture. To me thats racist. Thats racist. A black child is the same expectations of life and liberty as the rest of us. Because their culture. Thats obscene. Its wrong to torture and neglect a child. Its thats a culture. Thats their multiculturism does. Thats kind of it lends itself to a kind of paralysis. When you get islamist violence and when you get a boston mas consider. When you get the recruitment of young men born in britain. The recruitment of those young men to islamic radicalism. Multicultural society said we cant say anything about it. Because it would be racist and prejudice because we are multiculturallist. This is western society. Saying we cant uphold freedom, peace, liberty, equality, decency. Are we really saying that . Of course not. Of course not. It seem like so many of these other difficulty were in, you know, so much of this has to do with what i consider to be. I think i have written it somewhere, rather. The hijacking of hang wage. You know, across the Terrible Division of left and right. Most of us, hopefully, believe in things like freedom and being tolerant and respectful of other. Its not crawled we think the same thing but the language of being kind of hijacked. Notions such adds, you know, justice and toll ran and compassion. These are twisted its a terrible confusion. I would like to see us reclaim the language from the hijackers so we can all basically speak to each other if term we can all understand and actually reflect what were trying convey. Host youre watching cspan2. Specifically our month indepth program. We invite one author to talk about i had or her book. Its the first sunday of the month and a live call in program. We want to hear from you as well. Melanie philips is our guest this month. A columnist of daily mail. And the author of nine books. Here they are. Make a comment or question for melanie flip. You can send in a tweet booktv. Finally at email booktv at cspan. Org. Who published it . Host well, this is frightening for me. I published it. That is to say its one of five tight i published. I turned myself to a publisher of electronic books. This is going to be a platform, not justice for me but al people who think boldly like me. They connect with reality too. To publish books in an electronic format. The reason for this publishing is changing. Some more people have e readers. They download books on kindle and the ipad. And the capacity to reach so many more people is enormous. I have found my own imprint. There are five books being publish the this week. Which my memoir is but one. I hope they will bring my view of the world, which is shared by so many to a very large audience who wants to find out my same to expand Public Domain. A load of information, opinions, which is not easily found because its not generally published. Or to correct to provide another were looking at things i think information is out there but needs to be corrected. Also something which i have never been able to do. Which is exciting for me as a journalist. I spent my empire career being commentator. This is how the world is. Basically you dont like it . Thats tough. Theres nothing i can do about it. Im telling you how it is. Get on with it. And people have said to me over the years they said im glad youre writing what youre writing. But, you know, i feel so powerless. Dlaiskly they will say, you know, i have teen kids, and my goodness everything youre writing the impact of social media. The capacity to be bullied on facebook or turned to a bully on facebook and drugs out there and, you know, sex, drug, rock and roll. What am i to do as a parent . I said i say, look, as a journalist. I cant help you. All i can do is tell you. Im sorry you feel that way. Theres nothing i can go. Now i have a digital platform and books where i can put to Public Domain stuff that can help people. For example, one of the books im publishing today is a book by a head mitt trees who was a Public School which was an independent school. She runs very excessive school. People pay a lot of monies and benefit from our wiz dont over a period of time. Her wisdom about what you do with terne girls and how you approach them. Now i have kind of bottled that and put it to a book. Host 21st century daughter. Guest how to decode your 21st century daughter. How wonderful that im able to do that suddenly. I never thought i would be able to do that. One of my many aids for the imprint is where possible say to people you dont have to feel quite so hopeless. Its not like me telling you this is how the world is. Were also telling you how good things are happening and how you have handle on things that worry you and make life a bit better. In books the its spelled with a capital m. M is sounds like m for melanie. Then my company is actually melanie electronic media. The website you can download it from my website. You also on my website get more of me. And m because there is video stuff. Theres video interviews. It was a smash hit in london and came to broadway. Now very interesting thing is richard is a man on the left. Had had has written play in the past which tackled topic of Global Warming and. In a openminded way. He became a terrible target. We had an interesting conversation which im going to put up on my website. Its difficult to have a between people who dont necessarily agree on everything at all but we can both grow on a number of things. We can have a civil civilized discussion. What a terrible thing it is. Its a like a closing of the mind going on in the west. Its what i find frightening. Its reputuation of reason. Its really fright. And as well as im going to try to open it up a bit more and public debate and hopefully create help create with the aid of the people who will be reading and watching. Help create a civilized space where we can all come together and disagree. We can coso in a way that expands Public Information and accordingness and bring us together instead of driving us apart. Host one more issue before we go to calls and tweets, emails. 1998 all must have came out. Child centered education entails the destruction of childhood. Guest absolutely. Absolutely. Host what does it mean . Guest it sounds very par dock call. Its actually straightforward. It originated with [inaudible] who was a thinker of the enlightenment. With a when a child brings to the classroom experience is more important than anything the adult world can give to the child. The child is like a you have to water it gently then the plant grows. Anything the adult world gives the child is a constriction of that growth. When the child comes to the classroom they brick the ability to learn by himself. What the other sort of the teacher has to do is take a backseat and gently water it but not actually feed it. Not to give them information or knowledge. It will cripple him forever