Transcripts For CSPAN2 Key Capitol Hill Hearings 20141122

And equipment is going through and we know this stuff. We have the proof and i know that some people dont want to do that. And i think that we have to be part of this and i would talk about the misfortune to read this blog and feel the stuff that they have put out about that, including very recently, we understand what has happened and i think that that has to be with no ifs, ands or buts. And i think that thats where you start. And my second point goes to the longerterm question of some of my colleagues have said what we see as part of his reactions what is happening its not only that they are putting themselves forward in a new conservative international appealing to traditional stakes were we have traditional family values, but its almost a revolt against this and obviously we all understand the what they need to do is talk about this. A lot of this is what is appealing and they sort of dont want to be in the 21st century. So if he is in power for another 10 years as it likely. We have to think about where the next generations of people who are going to be coming in to power at some point when hes no longer in the kremlin. And we have to do everything that we can while we are still dealing with this crisis to build up longerterm and continual contacts with those who do not fear modernity. Thank you and you get the last word. I think ambassador is the ambassador is going to get the last word because his Climate Change wisecrack was terrific and is going to be out there trending. And i bet it is already trending. So i just want to pick up on something that angela just said which i think goes to the meta point here which is we are together almost every day, it seems, on this subject. She made a very good point that the russian word for security means absence of danger. So if we want to emphasize and be under standards of vladimir putin, we need to understand where he sees the danger coming from. He sees it coming from the west and that is the only point of the compass from which the danger is not coming to russia. So what they want to see is basically the following. A modern economy and globalized economy. Not being the poster child for this resource but a healthy population, which it doesnt have. And an open society, which it doesnt have. And since it has 14 continuous neighbors, it should have 14 friendly neighbors. And in fact what it is doing is inspiring or engendering fear and loathing in 13 of the 14 and we know what the 14 says, loathing but aspirations for russian territory and we have to hope that these future leaders will recognize. Thank you very much. I want to thank everyone who is here and i hope that for all of you in the room and certainly those watching on cspan, people believe an objective and serious nonpartisan discussion of issues and that is what the Strategy Group is about. Nonpartisan discussion. If youd like to know more, i would say that the book is available on amazon. Com. Thank you very much to all of the panelists and the ambassador of denmark and estonia and lafayette. Thank you all for being here. [applause] on this weekends newsmakers, we have a congressman is our guest. He was elected in the next session of congress and he talks about the committees priorities when republicans are in full control of congress in january. Watched the interview on sunday at 10 00 a. M. And 6 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan. Cspan2 provides live coverage of the u. S. Senate floor proceedings and key Public Policy events. Booktv, the only Television Network devoted to nonfiction books and authors. Cspan2 created by the cable tv industry and brought to you as a Public Service by her local cable satellite provider. Watch us and like us on facebook and follow us on twitter. Coming up tonight on cspan2, an encore presentation of q a with evan osnos, who was recently named the winner of this Years National book award for nonfiction. Then a look at Irans Nuclear program as talks here monday deadline for reaching an agreement. Author evan osnos is among the recipients of this Years National book awards. He was recognized for his nonfiction work age of ambition, which looks at rising conflicts between the individual and Chinese Government. Earlier this year, he discussed the book on q a. This weekend, our guest is evan osnos. He discusses his new book, age of ambition chasing fortune, truth, and faith in the new china. In your new book, under the ottomans come you start out by saying that none of my grand parents to see this book, but they are responsible for its conception. Can you tell us more . Guest my grandparents on my fathers side came from pole poland great they were polish jews who left at the beginning of world war ii. On my mothers side, my mothers father was an american that matt sent to hungary and was in fact keep down and accused of being a spy, which he wasnt. And in some ways, these stories, the experiences being ejected from poland or hungary, formed a kind of backdrop in our family story about life under authoritarianism and it was not an explicit part of our conversation. But i think that it always i was always interested in what it felt like to live in a country in which there were fundamental constraints on what you could care about and what your values were. And so when there was a moment in my life when i could go to a place and try to dig into that, china was the place that fascinated me. So that story was part of my interpretation. Cspan when you enter in 1996, could you speak chinese . Guest i started the Previous Year and i was learning it. Oftentimes i think that if anyone told you how hard it would be coming you would never undertake the process. But that wasnt your and i ended up taking about four Years College chinese before i ended up moving to china. I was just starting in 1990s and went for the first time. Cspan i will ask the question a question in english and i want you to answer. What is this book about . Guest you would say in chinese. [speaking in native tongue] and what i mean by that is this book is about ambition, which is about the wild heart and that is the term that people use in chinese to describe ambition. For longtime in chinese it was an unimaginable idea. If you were accused of being ambitious and chinese, that was a death sentence and professionally it could damage your family. Immensely put this before anything else that you put yourself before the group. For chinese history, that was totally unimaginable either under the confucian period were the socialist period and when i got there, things were beginning to change in a deep way and when i began to hear more around me, i heard people talking about themselves, not in a self glamorizing way but a self protective way and in a way that they would say that it matters what i want and the world that i wanted to find for myself. So even this for myself was transforming and people were getting comparable using it. In the United States we talk about the me generation in which we started to focus on ourselves too much and in china it was a revolution in our conception of what it meant to be a person. In the past people would talk about this, which is us, a group, the factories and all of a sudden beginning after 1979 when the country embarks on this economic transformation, people had no choice but to think about themselves and that became the fundamental dynamic the began my eight year fascination in investigation. Cspan you married in this, how did you meet your wife . Guest i met why ought my wife in beijing. And she went over to china for a year and she met me. Cspan dishy speak chinese . Guest yes, she does, she learned it work in an alternative environment, the only foreigner working in a modern environment at at the time. An all day long she was surrounded by tiny speakers, she would take them on the road to go to places like italy and she was there link to the rest of the world and so she had a natural kind of understanding of how people talked daytoday rather than learning it in the classroom which is more formal. Cspan what difference does it make in trying to write this book working for the new yorker, writing about china, that you spoke the language . I couldve done the kind of work that we did at the new yorker if i didnt speak the language and in the simplest sense that so much of what makes a story ultimately makes this book is the kind of minor strokes of conversation and the little choices that people make when they use an expression when they choose an idiom and that sort of the wild heart. That would be inaccessible to me if i hadnt studied chinese. Thats one of these processes that on your whole life and there are still times when i go with a translator for an interview because i know that a person is going to be speaking about something technical or using a dialect. Or gives me a cushion and it means i can think about what is on the wall behind them or how they are holding themselves and with their emotional experiences like. It buys time and this is one of the great things. Working with a translator. So one of the experiences that was a big part of my life was going out in any tour of europe with these chinese tourists. And it was an idea that came where they said we didnt really know how to go out and i thought, maybe i would just die now do this and go with them and see it through their eyes. And there were two are denying tourists and me. And from the getgo they were incredibly welcome. I often felt that if the roles were reverse, how would we respond. I would like to imagine that we would be just as welcoming. I spent this, five countries, 10 days, we almost entirely chinese food in all these countries in europe, they were speaking to each other in chinese and mandarin and the ability to be able to purchase it in a conversation without it being put in some without them trying to get through it in english is the only way that a story like that becomes possible. Cspan would you learn about them being on that trip to and had you been to those places before . I was born in london and we lived there when i was a kid. But flying to germany with them, almost entirely leaving asia for the first time, there was one guy that had been out of asia and he was fond of all the information that they relied upon and then there was a guy who was much more than a guide. He was like a storyteller, an authority figure, the first thing he was to do when we got onto the buses to synchronize our watches because we were going to miss a single second of europe. So we went country to country and i think in some ways our imagination when we think about china at this point in history, we think about it as being this muscular figure starting to make its way in the world, and it feels brave and strong in ways that we dont in this moment. But the truth was that there was a great sense of selfconsciousness and vulnerability as they made their way out into these very unfamiliar places. Sometimes he would go to chinese restaurants. And i thought, why did we do this . Why would we go to wonderful places like france and italy and eat this type of chicken. But the truth was it was like americans going to paris and eating a hamburger. There is a deep insecurity venturing out into the world. That applies also politically and economically with the way that china conducts themselves, which as it has not acclimated to having the body of a superpower but yet it doesnt have all the experience that comes with them. So one of the things was quite striking about that experience is that they also looked at some of the things in europe and they were not impressed. They would look at this and say, why is there graffiti everywhere . Why is it that these people are on strike. They are on strike because they want to work less . And this is a radical notion for a chinese tour group. But really what they brought it home with them was the power of the western Education System. This includes the power of creative thinking and i think that more than anything else is the thing that appeals to Chinese People today about what we have in the west. Its not a physical infrastructure and not wealth because they see themselves on the path to that but that we have this culture in which people are able to pursue idiosyncratic intellectual ideas in a way that they havent yet figured out how to do stand your ground you wrote in your book about china stand out. What is the story behind this video . Guest it is the chinese equivalent of youtube which emerged in 2008 just before the olympics in beijing. The olympic torch was making its way around the world. As a winter became a symbol of china and people used it as an opportunity to talk about human rights abuses and things like that. Its stored in a normas nationalist response particularly among young people. This very proud and defensive response to world criticism of china. And its second only to a tv blooper in a newspaper doing something and some things are universal about the internet. And its clearly an attempt to express an idea that i didnt recognize. And this idea was becoming much more powerful and chinese vice and it was a response to criticism in the west and i said that i have to figure out who made this. Cspan who made it . Guest it turned out not to be a guy that i expected. I had an image of who would be, somebody that was angry, somebody that was isolated from the west. Some of it was probably living in the proverbial parents basement, unaware of what it means to be on the left. And a chinese friend helped me to trace this video back and there was no name attached to it. And before i left i actually said to friends and im going down to meet this guy, this almost militant video that he made and if you dont hear from you for a couple days, ring the bell. So i got there in the first thing he did when i arrived was try to pay for my taxi fare and his name is [inaudible] and he is a graduate student studying western philosophy. He was dressed the same as i was and wearing khakis and blue shirt and he was studying the work of edmund hershel, 80 phenomenal guy, very esoteric elements and he said youre familiar with this and i said of course. Naturally all americans are familiar. And i wasnt familiar at all, had to go back and i looked it up on wikipedia. [laughter] what was interesting is that he spoke german and english and he was studying ancient greek and latin and he was deeply literate. His room was this personal library that had everything from the crown to modern western economic theories treated and yet it had not made him distinctively affectionate towards the west but heightened his sense of and that includes a whole generation of talented successful young Chinese People. A dominant factor of their interpretation of the world which was that china could only go so far. Cspan the two names. Lets show some of it. And how many people have seen this . Guest i was just couple weeks after happen there were up to a million. He remains a kind of manifesto for this community that calls itself the angry youth. And its sort of a stripe of Chinese Society that is angry for all kinds of reasons and the thing that draws them together is that they are proud of what china is then on the other hand frustrated by their own sense of their own lives being limited. Cspan they have to read quickly, it sounds like, and theres a script right below and you will see. And by the way, the music. Guest it is this great orchestral thing and he said this is something that i tied it into the emotionally resonant music and it pointed them to an artist artemis. It was called 1492 and he writes that this was about globalization in another sense. Cspan didnt he also deuterium to fire . Guest yes. That is correct. Cspan when we go back to the beginning, we saw this chairman. But after that is that imperialism will never abandon it the intention to destroy us. Do they really think that he meant. Guest fundamentally i think that they do. The language has changed we no longer talk about imperialism unless it is in the context of this kind of thing where weve really tried to register the contempt for what the west was doing. But they do feel that the west well that they will never allow this without putting up a fight. And that has become a key element of the way that not just ordinary Chinese People but also chinese leaders see this moment with a very anxious moment. They see a certain inevitability as being one of the great civilizations and in the world. And at this point they now see that when you look back over the course of the last 2000 years that whenever a country has emerged to challenge an incumbent power and in this case the United States, most of the time it has led to conflict and both sides are aware of this. Both sides talk about it. They read about and write about those that identify this when athens and sparta were the two dominant civilizations of the time and they ended up in a conflict that lasted 30 years and really ruin both of them. So they recognized the threat of this moment. And this is an important point that this concept that they encounter from the rest of the world has become a very important part of the Education System over the last 25 years. And that was not an accident. And the creator of this video was in a time in which china was searching for the bang that would hold people together and you remember the socialism in the rearview manner and they realize that was not economic salvation. In 1989 there was a tenement square uprising which we are celebrating the 25th anniversary we are marking this spring. That is political idea and they need to pull people together in some way. And they said we will rely on two things. This includes the failure to inspire people and so this young man, many in his generation have grown up being told about the ways in which western countries have sought to keep china down and they are not wrong. They were, as they like to say, carved up like a melon and that is the term that they use to describe the way that foreign powers to control at various points and they talked about a century of humiliation. This is topics was early that china has weathered this the wind from the mid19th century to the mid20th century at the end of world war ii and eventually that was the dominant factor when you think about chinese history. And that includes preventing china from being humiliated again. Lets watch more from that video cspan lets start with the last part there. Then has to reform Million People at the most . Guest yes, that territory has a very sparse population. Cspan how many billion people today have in china . Guest 1. 4 billion people. Cspan why is there so much fuss over this . Guest in some ways they call it an administrative region, and uptown is independent administrative region. They really do believe that if they lost to bed, if somehow it was able to achieve independence, and that independence, that would lead to similar secessionist movements elsewhere. China has 56 ethnicities which goes back to this history that looms so large in peoples minds. If they allow themselves to be compromised, they would eventually lose everything. That is why they draw this very hard line on any kind of independent movement. In the face of that. Cspan why do we americans, why is there so much fuss . Interesting in many ways, and accidental celebrity of history. I history. I spent some time writing about him a few years ago. He he is a fascinating figure for a few reasons. He left china when he was young, but he never left asia until he was in his mid 30s. A guy who lived very much the life of his predecessor and his predecessor before that. He realized at a certain. That if he did not turn the tibetan cause into a charismatic issue, if he did not allow himself to become the face of something people would emotionally connect with, i mean, tibetans are not the only culture and the phone in the world who have what they claim to be a claim a claim on greater independence within the borders of the country. Part of it is, americans have invested mystical significance in tibet, mountains, buddhism, and astonishing culture, but he has been an extraordinary spokesman in a way that i do not think i do not think people would have predicted. He was chosen as the top, said to be the reincarnation of the predecessor and has turned out to be the principal opponent of the Chinese Government in the world today. In some ways the role that the pope played has become the role that the dalai lama pl. Versus china. Cspan how much of the Financial Support comes from america . Guest we dont know. The conspiracy theories in china, a cia operative, the truth is probably a lot simpler. Enormously effective at being able to put himself into a conversation in the west that tibet would not naturally occupy. He has written dozens of books which range from obscure doctrine all the way to things about neuroscience and getting toward the selfhelp genre and as a result a result he has made himself popular. Cspan back to the beginning. It said, we provide by lowcost commodities but our people still have a rough time. Guest they are talking about the goods that china sends abroad. They are right. I should say, by the way, selfconscious because it was rough and raw and he was angry. It became a phenomenon before he could correct his grammar. He would want he would want me to say that. What they mean is china has become the factory to the world sending products around the planet in a way that makes our lifestyle possible. And now increasingly elsewhere in southeast asia. Yet the standard of living remains only about one sixth of what is in the United States which is a a source of frustration because people realize that we work hard, participate in the global economy, played by the rules and are not enjoying the quality of life. What i think is so interesting is for most of chinese history people had no idea what life was like outside. Chinese people can sit on a computer and have a pretty accurate understanding of what it feels like to live in washington dc. So that heightens this conflict. Cspan one more clip from the movie, and movie, and then we will move to other stuff. Cspan all of the western media, their behavior has educated a whole generation of young chinese. Guest there had been a series of video a series of video clips they found that had played on western television, cnn, German Television on which people had made mistakes. They identified a they identified a protest in nepal has being a protest in tibet. The reason why this mattered, the reason why they fixated was they found evidence of an embedded antipathy toward china which is what this was really about, i generation about, generation of young chinese, very successful Chinese People that had gotten into the best schools, great jobs, bankers, successful young professors and discovered that their image of china, this country that had given them all this opportunity was not the image they had a broad. We focused on their political culture, culture, abuses of human rights, failure of rule of law. And and in that discovery, disappointment was enormous energy released. So when they say that they think these western news organizations there was irony because a lot of these young people go online every day and get outside of the filters the Chinese Government has put on the internet and go out in search of information and take pride in their curiosity and ability to ferret out this information. But when they but when they found some of these depictions were not accurate in their minds that was in essence humiliating because it said that these western news organizations that we put our faith in, allowed ourselves to believe in did not live up to our expectations, so in so many ways this moment, this national uprising, there will be moments when the chinese public, particularly the young rise up to oppose what they see as the west and its mistreatment of china. One of the things that i think is key is so many of these young people who talk about nationalism and stand up in defense of the communist party often times are doing this because it is the available vocabulary. You you are allowed to go out into the street in certain circumstances and say, down with japan were down with the United States. You cannot you cannot go into the street and say, i am frustrated as i cant get the job that i thought i was going to have when i paid for this expensive education or im frustrated by environmental pollution. There is an opportunistic quality to some of these protests. Cspan the latest number i could find is i could find is as many as 200,000 Chinese Students in the United States. They have states. They have sensors on the internet, but allow 200,000 students. They can obviously have access to everything here. Guest there is a recognition on the Chinese Governments part that they cannot afford to cut themselves off from sending young people abroad. The abroad. The young people who went overseas and got economics training were essential to them being able to develop the kind of Financial Markets and institutions that were vital to succeed as an economy. When they go abroad there is a risk. When you open the window mosquitoes can fly in. He was willing to accept that idea. Appeal for democracy and things like that. The reality that. The reality has turned out to be pretty complicated. Often times they become even more vitriolic about china, more defensive. It is logical. I hear people criticizing china and say it is my responsibility to stand up. That is part of it. Cspan we do not know who it is, but they are Chinese Students talking about the United States and democracy. At think the problem is, we have an evolution of democracy on its own. The most witty thing about American Government is that they put personal liberty. The americans tend to picture an american soldier on the streets saving people and i think whenever there is a dictatorship the us tend to think that is their job to save those people. They have not realized that a democracy is an absolute value. It might be not that absolute in other countries. Cspan how much do young people their want democracy . Guest the word itself is toxic in no a way because it has been identified as a threat to the gains Chinese People have made. If you ask someone out right you will get very few people who say, i think it is a terrific idea. A terrific idea. What you find is when you dig beneath that, the ideas we consider it essential to an open society are very much in demand. Rule of law, the ability to pursue an issue in court, the kind of thing that did not matter 40 years ago but all of a sudden people have accumulated a nest egg, a house, car, and if someone is able to abuse their power in order to take that, that has inspired a sudden and urgent respect for the institutions that can help you. So you hear that they want rules of law. In some way it has been decoupled from the democratic objective. The other thing that they think of, and this has a lot more resonance is justice. If you ask people, do you do you think your system delivers justice, i think he would have had a lot more, there would be a long pause because a long pause because they know that there is not right now for vast numbers of people. This is why we see unrest. The numbers are quite remarkable. The chinese today contend with about 500 ask of civil this obedience per day. People day. People are not doing it because it is convenient. In fact, it is dangerous. They are doing it because they have deep grievances about how it is that the system will protect what they have acquired. Chinese people have worked unbelievably hard. But as they look around and try to figure out what we need in the society, the first answer is not democracy but often our court system, and accountability system to maintain supervision on the leaders so that people particularly low and medium are not able to take advantage. Cspan someone that you write about some time back. There was an exhibit. We will we will show you a little bit. Do you know him . Guest i do. He is an artist who does a whole lot of different kinds of art, some sculpture, some video. He spent some time as a portrait painter. A very unusual man. He is, his background is important. The son of arguably chinas most important poet who was at one point below and at other points cast out in the western regions of the country. So he grew up in this environment in which he saw clearly what happens when you end up on the receiving end, when you are a political target. Cspan you can see that he has some strong feelings, and i will ask you about this. Particular moments, a a voice to change the way that people think. Guest in some cases they call him a specific name online. Basically they consider him a god. Guest that is a very dangerous description and china. [inaudible conversations] do you think you have the power to stop a dictatorship . Nobody can change china. He is probably the only chinese artist who deep down really cares about this country and what happens to it. He has put his life on the line. The americans and europeans fear china. I mean, how to make people believe. Cspan what did you see there . Guest he has become over the course of the last six years especially the face of a certain kind of energy which is this belief that people individually deserve a chance to define what they think is cool and matters and is politically important. I should explain in practical terms. In 2,008 his life changed. He had been an emerging artist, tense but ultimately legal relationship with the government, hired to be an artistic consultant for the olympic games. In the course of that process he concluded for himself that there was something wrong about the way that china was going about its production. He believed it was becoming an advertisement. He called it a fake smile. He meant it was disguising internal troubles, these inequities in power and not justice that was meaningful. That put that put him at odds with the government. He was detained on what they called tax charges. They described him as being out of step. He has put himself ahead of the people. They accused him they accused him of the sorts of things you could be accused of in a a cultural revolution. This was a polarizing moment because were some people, they looked at this guy and said, he is nothing like us. He speaks english. He comes from this great, illustrious, politically connected background, able to speak his mind because he knows no one will harm, but there was another pocket of people all over the country. He spends every day all day online, probably 11 hours a day. All of these people and little villages and towns who dont naturally have any reason to find something in common, but in his message about individual dignity they found something powerful. He did a project which was quite remarkable which got a lot of attention. He commissioned the creation of 200 million of these tiny ceramic sesame seeds, Sunflower Seeds. I was with him in his studio when he had just begun work. He only had a few thousand. I said, what will you do with these . He said, i have said, i have no idea. Each one was individually painted. To have it became a kind of grand metaphor in which you had all of these people look the same, but each one is different and distinctive and worthy of respect which became this iconic image for a certain kind of young, politically animated person. People started writing to him saying, saying, send me a sunflower seed. People started repainting Sunflower Seeds like graffiti. He became an enormous irritant and threat not because he would ever be able to undermine the Chinese Government, but what he represented which was a certain kind of electricity, the power of the individual mind was unsettling. Cspan i want to ask you to be short about this because there are too many to mention. You have all kinds of characters. I will mention i will mention a couple. Who is michael . Guest he probably taught me more than anybody else i have ever met. Michael is the name he has chosen for himself. He is the son of a coal miner. He worked as a Security Guard on the edge of this english learning. He worked as a Security Guard because he cannot afford to go to the camp. He was desperate. He decided that if he decided that if he could learn english it would transform his life. He could go anywhere. It was much larger than the language itself. It took over his life. China has no state religion, no single dominant faith but the opportunity for people to choose for themselves what matters. For him, english became everything. It was the, it was an obsession, yet it was also a pathway to do Something Else what he taught me was, as he said to me once, just because i was born to a poor family why should i be like everyone else . And in that single statement was a powerful idea, this idea that just simply by the fact of being who he was, he had a right to strive and be ambitious. So he is an important person cspan who was or is the street sweeper. Guest someone i met at i met at the tail end of my years in china, a revelation for me. My wife and i lived in a house in a chinese neighborhood. These are little alleys. The actual street we were on was called the ally of National Studies which was a grand term. It was in the heart of this historically important area of National Studies, and it was right next to the temple devoted to tibetan buddhism and the confucius temples. It would it would be like living right next to the lincoln memorial. Cspan didnt you say there was music all day long . What do they call that . Guest it is a a confucius temple, a 1700 year old shrine, a large pavilion a large pavilion with a golden roof. A beautiful place. I loved it. It was like living act up against the edge of the great cathedral. One day out of nowhere a a speaker crackled to life and all of a sudden they were reciting confucian lines from the classics, philosophy. Played for 20 minutes and then again. Maybe this maybe this is just a festival, but it became an all day every day affair. They were in need of a state philosophy, an idea that would give people something to hold onto because they dismantled socialism. There was no organized religion. For the sake of discussion and did not see itself as a confucian society. We have this great tradition so confucius was revived 2,500 years after his death. The temple became active. People were learning, being taught how to pray toward his statue. Cspan did you work . Guest i i did. I had to get used to the sound. I went outside and asked my neighbor. Do you hear it in your house we hear it all day long. It is driving me nuts. He said, you should go complain. Why me . Why me . You are a foreigner. They will listen to you. Cspan sorry to interrupt, the street sweeper. Guest one of the crew of guys who wore these outfits. I could not tell them apart. All all day long they would go around the neighborhood. One day i was standing out there talking with the same guy, and one of the sweepers came up and said, can you see on the face of that rock is the face of the emperor. And he spoke with a strong provincial accent and he said, come back to us when you have learned how to speak and he wandered back off. The sweeper said, you know, people dont respect me. They think i have no education. They dont know that i am a poet, the super king. If you if you go online you will find information about me. I went online and he looked completely different. In his late 50s. He looked older and was wearing in outfit that made him indistinguishable from others, but he had an in higher in her life that was impossible 20 years ago. He found people just like him in faraway places who had taken an interest. Some some of it was an accessible, not great, but some was wonderful and thrilling and terrific to imagine that this person who would have had no ability to identify the cultural community, he had found that for himself which was one of the defining facts of the time i describe in this book the internet had awakened people. You can go out and define what you want to be. Cspan who is glenn . Guest he started his life and was a young lieutenant in the army of taiwan. In the late 1970s you have to remember they were in effect at war with each other and had been. He had grown up, a real star in the taiwan army posted to this incredibly sensitive. In the conflict, this island close to the chinese mainland. It was, americans would have recognized it. It it. It was known as the lighthouse of the free world he was posted there to defend taiwan from chinese aggression. At this. When they got there they were not fighting but he made privately a dangerous judgment and said, if i am going to make an imprint i i need to go to Mainland China this is 1979. And on top of it, china was poor than south korea per capita. He said, if. He said, if i am going to make something in this world i need to get to china, and the way he would get there was by defecting from the army and swimming to the mainland which was only a distance of about a mile. If he was caught he would be shot on sight and tried as a traitor. Cspan how much time have you spent with him . Guest i have interviewed him many times. He changed his name when he got to the mainland and has turned out to be quite a prominent figure. The chief economist of the world bank which is amazing when you think about what his life has traversed. His life was a kind of metaphor. He woke up on a certain day, a certain hour a certain hour and decided, im going to change my life. They eventually reunited. He he became one of the first people to go get a western phd in economics, the university of chicago and came back armed with this education and began moving up the ranks. Ranks. He could never get into the highest ranks because people fundamentally wondered if he was a taiwanese spy because he made this completely audacious defection. He ended up becoming the most ardent spokesman for his adopted country. Cspan the video. This is just, you know, the scene of a train wreck that happened. Just to remind the audience what it looked like, it is on the screen here right now when did this happen . Guest in the summer of 2,011. It became a signal moment for the chinese middle class because this was one of chinas new, fast trains, and they are amazing. China has built more highspeed rail than the rest of the world combined and continues to plan to build an enormous network. They have been a symbol of backwardness, not of modernity. All of a sudden they built this enormous engineering triumph. Two trains collided. Part of the train fell off of an overpass and it instantly became a symbol for the frustrations of many people, particularly this new middle class. You have to have money. People bought these tickets. She said, i feel like on flying home. And when these two trains collided, it became a kind of grand symbol of the ways in which Chinese People felt they were not being told the truth. All of a sudden shortly after the crash one of the first things that happened was the government said, we will bury the train car to make it easier for the rescue operation. People. People said, that does not make any sense. It became for the first time people were able to exert pressure on the government. Thousands and thousands of messages going back and forth by text message there was a clear process. First people demanded prosperity. As they assembled, they got money and property and could no longer afford to be uninformed. They needed to know what was going on. And so this became a symbol of that. I went back and looked at how it happened and what became clear was this enormously important project was riddled with corruption the minister of railways himself was a kind a kind of walking manifestation of chinese ambitions. Cspan unfortunately, we unfortunately, we are out of time. The name of this book is age of ambition. You are in washington now. How how long do you expect to stay here . Guest we will be here for a few years. For free transcripts or to give us your comments, visit us at q a. Org. Also available as podcasts. Book tv recently covered the 65th annual National Book awards. You you can watch portions of that event including interviews sunday at 10 00 p. M. Eastern. The Miami Book Fair is this weekend. Join us both days for live coverage. Best selling authors talking about nonfiction books, and we will take calls, emails, and tweets. The Miami Book Fair, live coverage all day saturday and sunday. Negotiations are set to end this coming monday. Leaders from the National Iranian American Council brief congressional staffers on the National Security and economic methods of a potential deal. The us is among six countries currently working on an agreement. This is just under an hour and a half. [inaudible conversations] 8q everybody for joining us tod. Thank you for joining us today. We have a briefing on the regional benefits. The key for sponsoring this briefing end today we are here at a very important timeor after states, for europe with the of p5 plus one countries as well as iran. After 25 years venomous said mitchell of the hostility and the threat of war and threat of not a constraint constraint, we are sitting at the cusp of a potential nuclear deal it as we seek Foreign Ministers letter gathered in vienna to hopefully hammer out what will be a final Nuclear Agreement between iran and p5 plus one to ensure it does not develop Nuclear Weapons and with 6 inches under crippling karans economy. As we go into this pivotal weekend for what may or may not be announced, there are several important dynamics to what a deal may entail. Not all of these are discussed as much as they should be. There is the congressional dynamic, but as well as the forces inside iran. How will that play out . Then there is the regional dynamics what does the Nuclear Agreement made for the middle east for those challenges that confront United States as well as iran . How will this impact those challenges . And finally the economic component. It is not talked about very much what will of the deal and reentry into Energy Market what does that mean for the United States economy . We know our rea benefits from a sanction relief there is significant benefits for the economies of to discuss these issues we have the best experts to talk about these issues. We have the president of the council and author of two books and he will be discussing the political element. Next had suzanne and she has been involved many years now and engaged directly with their radian side and she is part of the initiative from the new America Foundation and recently authored a piece of our Foreign Policy discussing with the region looks like one year after. An article that got a lot of attention in the hope to expand on those topics today. Then rehabed david hale a chicagobased economist from the economics and recently wrote discussing potential economic benefits of the deal how i ran three entry into international Energy Markets be the equivalent of 400 billion tax cut for when they could benefit from an action. So first of all, give it to david to talk about the benefits. Those economic sanctions that is suffering from weak have major consequences. Iran could probably increase help but output by widely barrels a day at a time and then to generate a 400 billion tax cut japan, india, western europe even though we produce a lot more we could still import because our demand is so great. For every 10 decline can boost global growth. This is time of deficits with the major budget problems for the other oilproducing countries have problems with those geopolitical consequences the russia right now get 60 percent of its exports of oil and gas. 45 of tax receipts from oil set would be a major fiscal shot shock when it declined 85 of beryl the finance ministers said publicly we cannot afford to increase spending if Oil Prices Keep declining. It would put the russian economy into a bad recession. With prices fell when it is 40 a barrel to 48 a barrel at the time of the Global Financial crisis. Curley ready a fiscal deficit of 18 percent gdp but that number could move in this Venezuelan Bank would have to fund the government at that point to save the risk of Oil Subsidies now right now with 2. 2 billion to build lowcost rail to cuba, nicaragua and other countries of the west indies if we have the price scale all programs would be at risk the third great benefit would be the iranian economy itself. It has 80 Million People the ppp adjusted gdp is 1. 2 trillion dollars. Iran it actually has large resources with huge oil reserves so that output going back a 2. 2 Million Barrels a tivolis alito a threeyear 4 Million Barrels over the next five years. Even the copper reserves with the largest iron ore reserves. And of course, in a factory industry. That i could see western investment for business across the board but also has a capitalization of 100 and 50 billion. At the current time for investors dont 0. 1 of the stock market. The turkish stock market is 50 per cent foreignowned if we end the sanctions with this stock market is a rush of the new boom made possible. In the fact that it tracks Foreign Investment straight in the hands of reformers of the hardliners. The revolutionary guard does not want to deal as a make money smuggling their repeople go that. Dont like the fact they have the pariah states that is why they voted for rodney as president their way to end this session is to open of the economy to get the message of globalization after that it would reinforce the process. Fake you very much. Thanks to the congressman for helping us to organize this and also to the National Iranian American Council for your leadership for another meeting issues that matter to reid and americans. Many thanks to all of you for joining us today what arguably is not only the biggest Foreign Policy challenge but the biggest Foreign Policy opportunities facing our country today. U. S. Diplomats are in vienna working tirelessly to reach an agreement by November November 24th but also avoid a war in the middle east. Ive been asked to make brief remarks on the proliferation of benefits above Prospective Nuclear deal i think we should recognize the interim agreement the joint plan of action reached by a the p5 plus one group and iran in 2013 almost one year to the day has resulted in key and important progress for the counter proliferation goals. Firstever in has seized uranium enrichment at that level is easier to what denies and since the agreement went into effected has had enriched uranium over 5 . It is eliminating the entire stockpile a 20 which is often noted because it could quickly be purified to the weaponsgrade. Has refrained from advancing of the construction and in the history of the Nuclear Nonproliferation effort a proliferation treaty. So is it the implementation of the agreement to verify the compliance with a compliance since the deal was implemented last january. So it has stopped the development of the Nuclear Program and for a diplomatic solution. For a final agreement would retain all of the limitations of the iran Nuclear Program that i just described. But negotiations are ongoing the final elements are of a noted is hard to predict at this stage. But there is widespread agreement that theyre general contours of the good deal would establish verifiable limits on irans program that taken together would limit the size of the stockpiles and the number of centrifuge that iran could keep that this nomination would leave approximately one year away from producing the enough highly enriched uranium for the bob. For research and development and modification to the heavy water reactor to make sure it is no longer capable for the plutonium necessary to make a nuclear weapon. Into these counter proliferation benefits with the Nuclear Weapons and would result in another key benefit in the arms race also the global nonproliferation system the npt to the nuclear disarmament. And the peaceful use of the Nuclear Energy to provide the a big boost in the lead up to that. And to disclose asian and hostilities with the Ongoing Nuclear talks with the p5 plus one context have provided the United States with the diplomats with those bilateral communications for the first time in over three decades. With that taboo is days ago and again when for diplomacy. It is finally tested in the initial results are promising. Reaching a comprehensive deal could unlock a challenge for broader discussions between both countries on issues were both have compelling common interests particularly in the middle east and south asia. If such a deal is reached and the iea ada should continue the way for washington to engage on to security prior days that they hold in common purpose of the first is the fight against the Islamic State in syria and iraq and second is stabilizing their government in afghanistan poses a risk of explicitly stated in a nuclear deal must be completed before direct bilateral coordination on these issues can take place. But since 2014 between washington and tehran with the p5 plus one Nuclear Talks Iraqi Government is acting as intermediary to facilitate communications we could expect these to assess discussions to direct the bilateral talks this could provide an opening for coordination and cooperation in bet with the fighting as isis. U. S. Officials have already acknowledged that iran has influence to convince maliki to step down. This led to us in this transition. The leading United States to be a better position to press the reagan to share more power this adult to approve a fragile situation in represented by the baghdad governments but vitiates. To play a constructive role for a situation to syria. It would be meaningless. Washington could support irans participation in the geneva three gathering at organized under the auspices of the united nations. Within this context to press iran to play a role in the humanitarian crisis particularly by a humanitarian access. Is not clear at this point how far to run would go to bring about political settlements that indeed to the departure of a side. But once iran has a seat at the table it will be forced to show the cards rather quickly. With this plan is the ceasefire the formation of National Unity government constitutional revision process with a new election that offers a good starting point for discussion. Clearly there are strong overlapping interest in afghanistan. And nuclear deal combined with the presence in afghanistan would set the stage and then under the president s with the full implementation to the strengthening of the institution. Also the capable Afghan Security force with the effective strategy for narco trafficking. Washington and should set as a high priority a developing coalition of countries to support afghanistans transition to a renewed leadership and then to insure the territorial integrity and Economic Growth of afghanistan. To support afghanistans transition makes a great deal of sense. Those countries worked together with a Transitional Government following 9 11. I presented to areas there is a difficult and overlapping of security interest. However i want to of this size i am not suggesting fallaway a nuclear deal lot makers are suddenly going to join hands touse saying. Even with a nuclear deal profound differences will basis between iran and the United States. And it will likely support designated terrorist groups enabled the of proxy and the nuclear deal to heighten concern among the gulf states to feel more vulnerable to iranian pressure. All this makes it difficult for the United States to pursue a more strategic relationship. What i have outlined is a potential for the calculated engagement of specific key issues where washington holds compelling interest to a nuclear deal to open the way for cooperation for tactical objectives that would serve to a dance u. S. Security interests. So just to conclude to prevent a nuclear arms to iran to avoid a military confrontation is vitally important. I am happy that you organized this discussion because we need to take a bigger view and when redo it is clear to unlock the channel for a broader dialogue on issues where revolt, interest is also an enormous achievement. Thanks to all of you give the room and all of you often cspan. One is the impact of the potential deal on the politics as well as the civilrights situation as well as the consequences and implications of the failure to get it deal. I thought the presentation is extremely important because it touches on that important aspect that has been completely overlooked of the economic implications. In july we released a report that calculated using the gravity bottle the cost of sanctions. Lot of conversation how much it has cost the economy and also on the sanctions. The report shows United States has lost the trade 1305 and 175 billion very conservative estimates on the loss of export revenue. That number is likely a much higher with export revenue and it is a large amounts because that amounts to approximately 1 million lost Job Opportunities based on the governments calculations. I strongly encourage you to take a look. The consequences of the deal is very important at the end of the day it was never just about enrichment or a centrifuge. What this deal will do is define who will determine the policy of iran for the next decade to come . Hardliners which is of a deer died with his rhetoric for moderates . This deal will determine their political future for the next decade or two to have significant implications on the region and also implications what happens inside of iraq. As a result they recognize they cannot open the World Without entering assuring the humanrights. We have not seen any noticeable change it remains negative but if you listen to the human rights defenders on the ground they support said deal because it reduces is animosity to give those internal actors push for more respect for human rights greater space to do with all they they cant do. Nobody can do this for them but they need that extra space it is next to a costabile to have a Successful Campaign as well as greater respect for human rights under the circumstances as well as crippling sanctions and has caused so much damage they care far less about humanrights and more about the day to day ability to survive economics. They need this to make their case. Beyond that it will open opportunities for longterm political change it and iran because if you have a scenario where a companies have the ability to cut into iran imagine if 1994 United States did not impose sanctions and by 2009 you would have a starbucks or a mcdonalds it you would have been a busy and americans and american companies. Du think his ability post fraudulent elections would be more or less . Without any americans. The u. S. Ability to have the impact on what happens post 2009 elections was close at 20 to give an opportunity to change that to move iran and the right direction. Is very much depends how the deal collapses. It doesnt reach said deal then it is difficult to predict exactly which way it will go. How the deal collapses will determine who will get the blame. And into a very different consequences. The countries of p5 plus one divers and russia as china or europe put their signature on this agreement. To the u. S. Congress either sabotages directly or doesnt implement the obligations that has the effect to break the International Consensus built by the Obama Administration said that is the fault is on the area inside and the Community Works close together without a Certificate Division to get an agreement in which they cannot split if you have a scenario that they all agree to a deal but the u. S. Congress does not that it will shift to the blame of the west and the consequence is you will see the sanctions regime slowly but surely falling apart because many countries reluctantly agreed to the sanctions and they have paid a heavy price for our image and our city from july the cost of sanctions to u. S. Economy for the europeans has been more than twice between 2010 and 2012 the u. S. Has lot of lot of lost a lot of revenue. If the deal is struck but then collapses as a result then you will see the sanctions regime collapsed in as the pretext of the constraints in iridescence to get relief without having any constraints feet carefully because the biggest benefactor is the hard lighters because they dont want the constraint on the Nuclear Program. This would provide essential relief and i will stop there before we get into a followup it is beneficial to talk about this state of play today so talk of little bit of the gaps remaining and what we would expect if there will be of a deal on monday . The press is reporting will love all of the enrichment to have the centrifuge of the one hand and the process and the timing of the sanctions to correspond to that. The third is the duration of the deal. Is remarkable throughout the whole process their very few leaks about what is going to be discussed by the negotiators. That conveys the seriousness that the countrys push it toward the effort. If we see an announcement by november 24 we could see something of a couple of days later and whether not it is the full deal or another interim agreement or a partial deal to outline Going Forward all hope they could conclude the final comprehensive deal but realistically a partial deal at this stage that is the current restriction on the iran program which by the way to about two very limited sanctions relief is for the p5 plus one. I do not see a complete breakdown of these negotiations so we either get a big announcement next week or something partial. It seems every utterance is now examine to get clues and the truth is there is a lot of speculation but it is a tightly controlled process but it does seem there is increased flexibility some of the areas where p5 plus one did not seem eager but some of those have broken down that shows indications of movement. To you agree with that . It means you go to the last possible minute but as we have heard the iranians have come up from that opening bid of 1500 to something around 4500. Im sorry it is the opposite. That would be something. The iranians have come down at 8,000. And apparently they have offered to deal with a resulting stockpile that would allow them to have more centrifuge so it is fluid with all negotiations. To save the atmosphere is cordial but constantly looking over their shoulders but it shows the reaction in backhaul clearly the president has issues when it comes to a Convincing Congress and which is the support without collapsing and the iranians have as a mother problem that they will try to do everything they can because it is too costly if they are blamed the blood to be sure it is not a political win two major it is a political decision but for them to have it deal at all the distinctions relief there relatively quickly adds a benefit so the criticism from the hardliners that people are sensing tangible benefits but to lift those sanctions is not something that theyre willing to offer or may not be able to offer and that shows how they can be a tremendous leverage they could turn into an obstacle if you dont have enough control in the swift manner as part of the negotiation this is where congress has moved away from a highly effective Good Cop Bad Cop this destructive. So talkedabout oil dropping to 50 or 60 a barrel. You say some losers could be russia or venezuela. What is the impact on the regional players . How does that impact isil that profits of of smuggling . Isil does make money by smuggling. But saudi arabia and the gulf states have massive Foreign Exchange reserves but iraq relies on the International Price exporting 2 Million Barrels right now so iraq could be vulnerable as well but there could be a lot of letters. The ap did you did and u. S. I could see gas lead prices going at 230 or 240 right now just under 3 but if we did have a major shock recheck gasoline prices fall further and that would be politically appetizing. Could you repeat that . Gasoline prices could drop further if we drove the a global price down a 55 a barrel we already saw 115 it is now over 80. That is 30 it has taken about 60 or 0. 70. Now we are a bit below three so if we have a further drop that could drive the price down so it is said 330 or 340. That has reverberations. Of course,. The price decline we have already had is increasing average income of 50 that is not a lot of money for someone who is wealthy but it will help to give the good christmas when people can spend this money. This is why they time their rights before black friday. [laughter] because were on the hill one of the major considerations is Congress Response where there is said deal some say the United States can impose sanctions and iran would not walk away is in such dire straits it would remain at the table. What do you think . Would it sit there and allow sanctions imposed whole to be imposed . I think it could lead to a collapse would be difficult for the iranian negotiators to continue their job when the boss is back home are suffering more seditious they will not stand for that they will feel compelled and clearly the easy thing to do is pullout of the negotiations but beyond that look at the upcoming budget with they have pledged in that does not included a sanction relief so they are proceeding with what they call a persisted a cautery so for their economic planning they have not factor did what sink actions so that gives an idea what theyre willing to do to get you the deal that they think is fair. As for Congress Keep in mind the rees said these negotiations have happened is because it has levirate leveraged sanctions and their other factors when they dropped the regime change language and the United States had some level of enrichment to be acceptable but make no doubt Congress Played an Important Role in that that at this point well there at such a critical moment would simply a undermine the United States position and i just down see when were so close with a good deal of what is close at hand. So now the thought to undercut the implements is not the time to think about this. To you have thoughts about the importance of congress . We know the sanctions cannot be lifted without an act of congress the president plans to use authority to temporarily suspend the sanction there is talk about that that coulds bills in have the psychological effect companies and banks unwilling for those trade sanctions to be forthcoming. What about the role of congress . It will depend how people perceive the sanctions using his own authority. But it may be hard for them to realize that price of gasoline is very popular. But if Congress Passed to enact this i do think said danger in then you get a boom in the iranian trade and investment. And then with the trade opportunity. So there is pressure to end sanctions. To renegotiate an entry into the market if they have the lines of a good deal. But all measures of reciprocity of proportionality that means a permanent concession for what it is reversible and has to be matched something that is equally permit. Waivers that last only 90 days is fundamentally that has a risk to cause the iranians to only put on something at the table that is irreversible and attractive. Based on what they were willing to put on the table there was of willingness to be flexible to go far and that is part of the reason with something that we have seen acceptable on the american side. Correct me if i am wrong but one of the components is the implementation of the Additional Protocol . That would require would that be something tied to reciprocal actions by United States congress . To voluntarily implement stops because the deal falls apart. But that would require action by the parliament is similar to the political wind that is blowing their. Now will open to audience questions raise your hand. We have a microphone. Earlier this month obama ascent of a letter asking for formal coordination and against isis but that offer has been rebuffed as part of a separate negotiation it does seem like it would be a great opportunity. As that letter then rebuffed . But what could potentially . That was my first point we dont know what was in the letter it was a private letter from obama to the Supreme Leader. Even though certain reporters seem to think he knew what was in the letter i doubt he did. This is not news for years now iran and u. S. Seven machine chain letters there was a phone call between obama and romney. I would not venture to guess what was in the letter it would seem that obama would be so explicit into the Supreme Leader to offer coordination on isis especially to talk about things discreetly. But looking ahead that nuclear deal to have it implemented it is the first area where iran could start working with the u. S. Both the militaries are now operating in that area and it is the height the responsibility not to coordinate with each other. We dont know what is on the letter but it was not an offer of working together and it opens up the opportunity for potential collaboration. We dont know what the response at this crucial moment in addition not be surprising but at this stage the willingness to trust the deal to take the risk to say yes, which is something the u. S. And iran