The continued building of our virginia class at the rate of two a year at some point will child finally with the ohio replacement program. In my view, we need to continue building those two virginia class submarines every year. The New York Times story thats been mentioned to you in the course of this morning is only the latest evidence of the increased emphasize of our adversaries on undersea warfare capability, not just the russians but the chinese. I think in the course of that, article 1 of the comment from one of our military leaders was we are back to in a sense the cold war competition undersea. I would like to know your views and, general richardson, if you want to comment, youre welcome to, whether this program continuing our building of two virginia class submarines every year with the ohio replacement are important, in fact, vital to our national defense. Yes, senator. I defer the numbers et cetera to the services responsible for that. But i can say personally i think we have dominance undersea today, that it is our asymmetric advantage and its very important that we continue to maintain that advantage particularly in light of the challenges you noted. I think both of those improvements to our submarine classes are necessary. Sir, i would just echo what general scaparrotti said. I know ive heard it said from that very place, from others, general robinson, and i know that you share the views strongly that we should have an asymmetric superiority in this area, but i think the specifics are very important. Its not enough to generalize about it. I hope that when you say youll defer, you bring, both of you, a lifelong expertise and experience to these views that i think are very, very important for our civilian leaderses. Sir, i probably then misspoke and said i agree with what general scaparrotti said. I apologize if i said i defer. No, i think he said he deferred. And i guess what im asking very bluntly is that you not defer. And i know thats also easily said than done. But i have such respect for both of your views that i hope our civilian leaders hear them. And i hope that you will emphasize that this asymmetric advantage in undersea warfare is vital to our future. So i think ive talked enough and i defer to you, general robinson and general sir, if i could be clear. What i meant by that was its a really a service decision, but i assure you that if confirmed, i will be clear in my advice and needs to the cno with respect to those programs and particularly after i have a close look, if confirmed, as the ucom commander of my needs there. I appreciate your views, thank you very much. Thank you for your service to our nation. Very briefly, general scaparrotti talking about the undersea capability and the increase in Russian Submarine activity. I was in iceland last fall and was really struck by what a strategic place, its one of the most strategic places on earth keflavic, as you know, were now putting p8s back in there. I hope that might be an area you will be an active consideration of further reinvigoration of that capability subject, of course, to the working with the people of iceland, but it sits right astride the greenland iceland uk gap and its, as i say, i cant imagine more strategic place than i hope we can focus some attention there. The facility is amazing. And i think it would be one that would be we would do well to do some concentrating on. Senator, i agree with your concern, and i agree with the importance of the location and our capabilities in that gap that you described. Mr. Chairman. Look forward to moving your nominations through the United States senate. This hearing is adjourned. Thank you, chairman. Thank you, chairman. Democratic president ial candidate senator Bernie Sanders is in kentucky today. Cspan has live coverage of his Campaign Rally in louisville at 7 30 eastern. Indiana voters go to the polls today. That state has 57 republican delegates and 92 democratic delegates that stake. Cspan will be live tonight with primary results, condition spee candidate speeches, and your reaction. Cspans washington journal live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. Coming up wednesday morning, paul egan, reporter for the Detroit Free Press will join us by known to talk about president obamas trip to flint, michigan, where hes expected to meet with Governor Rick Snyder and address the water crisis thats been affecting the region for two years. Then james jay, Vice President for the heritage foundation. Hell be on to talk about the navy s. E. A. L. Who was killed this week as a result of fighting in iraq against the islamic state. Also, former green party and independent president ial candidate ralph nader will be on to talk about the latest from campaign 2016. And his upcoming book, breaking through power its easier than we think. Be sure to watch cspans washington journal beginning live at 7 00 eastern wednesday morning. Join the discussion. Yesterday, voice of america director Amanda Bennett delivered remarks on communication, leadership, and policy. It was her first major public appearance since being sworn in as the new voa director on april 18th. She also spoke about the future voice of america agenda and the challenges of u. S. International broadcasting. Its 45 minutes. Online and watching on cspan television. Aname is adam powell. President of the Public Diplomacy council and i am the director of washington programs for the usc center on communication leadership and policy. Theres a green light on. Its too far from your mouth. Communication leadership, usc. Edu. Theyre hosted by the American ForeignService Association at afsa. Org. Our guest today is Amanda Bennett, the new director of the voice of america. She has a long and distinguished journalistic career. Buy yog fe on the reverse of your programs. Hes won two Pulitzer Prizes, one at the oregonian in portland and the second at the wall street journal and what she said two weeks ago when she was sworn in, we must change, we need to change in a big way. So change is coming, change is here. Amanda bennett. Lets test the technology before i start. Is this working . Can everybody hear me now . Thats terrific. Now im going to okay. Thank you. Thank you very much, adam, and thank you, everyone, for coming here. I look out in the audience and i see all kinds of friends and colleagues out here. I so appreciate you coming and i cant thank all of you for being here so im going to single out one person from the voice of america, alan hyle, whose great history of the voice of america kept me from making an error in this speech im about to make, so i need to thank him right now, and then second, id like to acknowledge my predecessor as the director of the voice of america, david enser, who has been as helpful and warm to me as any human being can be in helping prepare me for this big job. Id like everyone please to acknowledge david enser. So as adam says, if you want to know my bbiography, flip the pae over and read it yourselves. Id like to tell you a couple of things you might not know because im of an age that i was part of a movement that cheap airfares and curiosity about the world sent all of us out around the globe in, you know, migration that i dont think had ever happened in the United States before when it wasnt associated with a war, so as a result of this, when i was in high school, i was an Exchange Student in the philippines. When i graduated from college, i worked as an o pair in paris taking care of six children and two bulldogs. I spent the early years of my rear in canada and lest any of you have any misunderstandings, canada was then and is now way more than a foreign country than any of us acknowledge. Later i was the second wall street journal correspondent in china at a time when the fewly opened country was most definitely a foreign country. Since then i worked at five different Media Organization and ive had the really, really good luck to be there when nearly all of them were at their peak of their journalistic power and reach and all of them known for their seriousness and integrity of principles. So for all this, i am way, way more of a journalist than a diplomat. As a matter of fact, im going to say, im all journalist, no diplomat. Many of you in this room who have followed voice of america, led voice of america, worked for or with voice of america, are way more expert than i am at the diplomatic purpose of voice of america. But im here to say to you that i think that we are very much more alike than we are different and that great journalism is, in fact, great Public Diplomacy. So let me remind you just briefly whats happened recently and the changes that have already come to voice of america. Under the leadership of new ceo john lansing, who is the ceo of the broadcast board of governors of which voa is the largest part, weve shifted to five strategic focuses. One is that well target our resources toward five specific geographic areas and issues that are vital to u. S. Foreign policy. China, russia, iran, cuba, and violent extremism wherever you find it in the globe. Well accelerate a dramatic shift to digital and social media, emphasize impact and hold ourselves accountable for success. Enhance strategic cooperation across the five independent networks that make up the broadcast board, and curate, and acquire external content. Not on the do i completely agree with these goals, i also believe these issues reflect in large measure the challenges felt by news organizations all around the world and also being felt inside voice of america. So curating and cooperation. These are hallmarks of the modern media scene. Competition once ruled journalism because multiple Media Operations were competing for audience. Fighting against each other to distinguish themselves with scoops, yet for more than a decade, news organizations have all realized they must share resources in order to succeed. Partnerships proliferate. Nonprofit organizations partner with forprofit organizations. Radios partner with newspapers. All digital organizations partner with print and. And even as weve seen recently with the panama papers, the creation of a multiorganization, multiplatform, multicountry coalition that bound itself into a virtual investigation team. So it only makes sense then in this environment we do our best to bend over backwards to collaborate with our partner organizations, radio free europe, radio free asia, radio sawa, and the office of cuban broadcasting. As for impact, what else has journalism been about in the last 40, 50 years . Ever since watergate, all Media Organizations, all journalists have strifen to have an impact. Domestically to protect our children, to eliminate abuse. To expose corruption. To expose inequities. Internationally, to work to explain and root out terrorism, genocide, couphuman suffers wher you find it. So in the area of digital, just this morning i had the great pleasure of announcing we will have our first Deputy Director of voice of america in more than two decades, sandy sugararu will be joining actually has just joined voice of america, and she comes to us from a robust media and digital background. She was critical to the newsrooms move to a digitalfirst organization at the washington post, reorganizing the entire news operation to support that goal. And at trove, a new startup based on social sharing, she was the managing editor who learned how to use all different platforms to curate and combine content in order to reach different audiences and her aim will be to help accelerate our move to popular and emerging technologies to engage as many people around the world as possible. Especially in places where there is no free press. We need to neat our audiences where they are. Now, i saved the Biggest Issue for last which is actually being the voice of america. Most American News organizations are already covering america. Telling americas story. They just dont realize thats what theyre doing. We need to cover foreign policy, of course, but we also need to cover america. We need to cover america for the benefit of the people around the world were trying to reach. And to do that, we need to use the amazing resources. We have most of them inside the Cohen Building right down the street. To create unique, interesting news and to speak to the vital interests of the people were trying to serve. So what does that mean . It doesnt surprise me at all that one of the most popular features of our Russian Service is a video dictionary of american political terms. Little videos explaining whats a soccer mom, what happens when you filibuster, what does canvassing mean . And how about the bible belt . And one of the most popular stories coming out of the Russian Service was a feature on a 90yearold california woman delivering groceries to her neighbors which within minutes of it being posted drew 900 shares and comments. The comments being, i wish we had that in our country. I love seeing the picture of a normal american society. How about other topics that are of great interest to the audiences were trying to target . Well, i dont know if it will surprise you as it surprised me to discover that iran is crazy for entrepreneurialism. So we need to create a robust coverage of entrepreneurialism which is a hallmark of our society, to cover Silicon Valley, to help connect the ideas that come out of Silicon Valley with the young entrepreneurs in iran who need to know and want to know so much about that. These will be stories that appeal to people who aspire to have the kinds of startups and success that you find coming out of Silicon Valley and to many others of them around the world. How about American Business . I dont think its any accident when you think about what china is like now to realize that a rock star in china is warren buffett, so we need to beef up our coverage of American Business and incidentally of american philanthropy which is probably the most robust of any in the world, and write about these as topics, not just as feature, but serious topics of interest to our audience around the world. We need to build up exciting, unique, content that speaks about our assets in the United States in ways that our audiences want to hear and can relate to. Like education. From the wealthiest high officials child, to the child of the poorest nigerian or rwandan or ugandan or tanzanian, every parent of those child realizes that education is the key to their better lives. We need to put our Heads Together inside voice of america to figure out ways to Cover American education in ways that will speak to these hopes and desires. Then theres medicine. People may fly to other countries to get their faces lifted, cheap treatments, medical tourism, but they come to us when they want to save their lives and the lives of their loved ones. Our coverage of medical issues like zika and ebola literally does save lives and expanding that coverage to coverage of medical advances, the cost and availability of drugs, and simply our knowledge of the best ways to keep our families healthy will help translate the things that are wonderful about this country to our audiences. In africa, in asia, in afghanistan, there is a huge hunger for news and information about women. About their education. About their business success. About their striving for independence. About the things that lead to their development and growth in the World Economy and the forces that are holding them back. We need to devote our resources and our thinking to helping to explain and encourage that movement and that information and that knowledge. So we need to cover everything about america. We need to cover the good and the bad, as William Harlan hale said in february of 1942, just days after the beginning of our entry into world war ii, he said in the first voa broadcast, as you all know, the news may be good, the news may be bad, we will tell you the truth. Well cover the country honestly and fairly, its troubles and its shortcomings, but it wont be a fair picture unless we cover all the other things about america as well. Its people. Its energy for change as well as its force to resist change. Its generosity as well as its greed. Its hope equally with its despair. The striving for a just society as well as the failures to achieve it. Theres an amazing amount of resources and passion and commitment inside the Cohen Building, and among our brave and dedicated correspondents around the world who face danger every day to bring us and the rest of the world the news of their struggles, i believe we can show the world the Amazing Things we can do and in doing that we can truly be the voice of america. Thank you. I will now subject myself to questions. Please wait for the microphone and identify yourself. I thank you very much for an excellent presentation. My name is greta morris and im a retired Foreign ServicePublic Diplomacy officer. And thank you especially for talking about the various issues and subjects that the voice of america is covering. I wonder if you could talk just a little bit about the media because obviously the media of voice of america has changed a lot since 1942, what, with voa television and also digital media. If you could just comment a little bit about that and how you make the choices about which kind of media to use. Thank you. I will be happy to answer that question. I first need to make an unpaid Political Announcement which is adams deep persuasion brought me here at the end of my second week in the office, and i want to say that im here, im happy, but its really not fair. So, but actually, actually, you know, coming in to the voice of america makes me understand how much the struggles inside the voice of america mirrors the struggles around the world. Theres actually very little thats unique about the process of moving from one technology to another because you have the exact same issues of trying to protect your legacy means of tradition at the same time as moving as quickly as you can to new technologies. This is a very difficult, very complicated and often very expensive balancing act because you cant just say, you know, because all this group of people is moving to this kind of ways of taking the news that were just going to throw away this kind. This is a subject that all media have grappled with, you know, for the last two decades and i dont think its going it get any easier because what were finding is just as soon as we get up and we think were at the cutting edge of technology, a week later technologys moved so i think what we need to do is try and figure out how best to reach our audiences with news and information where they want it, how they want it, and in the platform they want it and do the best we can at doing that and that means becoming much more nimble and much more attuned to the way our audiences consume media. Thank you. Sorry, theres somebody behind you. Hi. I used to work at npr and still work there occasionally as a commentator. Welcome, colleague. Thank you. My question, as you talked a lot about news and information, and mentioned nothing about culture or music or comedy or any of the other things which commercially sort of are the voice of america worldwide and are very, very powerful and also theres a lot of success on the record of voice of america in doing music and other culture expressions. Have you any plans for that . For not only cultural coverage, but for transmitting cultural expression . You know, i have to say i completely acknowledge and know that part of the history of voice of america is a history of its culture. And i think i have some ideas in the back of my head. Actually i think theres some kind of interesting stuff going on out there that would be of very great use to the voice of america. I dont want to talk about these because a lot of these require negotiations with other parties, but it involves bringing parts of American Culture out to the rest of the world that have never seen them before. But i have to say that, yes, youre absolutely right, its not my forte, but i certainly recognize that this is an extremely important part of voice of america. This woman here was next. And then you, sir. The mikes back here, though. Oh. No. My apologies. This woman here comes next after you, okay . We got to get the microphone up front. Paul delaney. I spent most of my career as an editor and reporter at the New York Times. On the way over, i ran into a nun, white nun, africanamerican citizen. I apologize, im having trouble hearing you. I dont think the microphone is on. Aisle not getting what youre saying. Maybe im not yeah. On the way over can you hear now . One, two, three, four. Okay, go ahead. Ill try. I ran into a nonwhite, nonafricanamerican citizen and when i told them where i was coming, he said, i heard of voice of america, what do they do, what is it . Is there any way that you can explain to americans what voice of america is . What it does . Introduce them to the average american who has never heard of vice of america. And ill answer that in two ways. One is, as those of you with a deep knowledge of the history of voice of america know, part of the historical roots of voice of america coming right about the time of world war ii, there was a prohibition on voice america broadcasting its content into the United States for obvious reasons. You didnt want to create a government competitor to what was then a robust organization. I think that given the fact of the pervasiveness of social media and people getting their information on social media, its obviously almost impossible and certainly irrelevant to block that content from the United States. Its not competing with anybody. In fact, in todays media environment, i feel like we have a great deal to offer to the citizen of the United States. So thats one way of answering it. The second way of answering, saying, i was considering this job from christmastime until when i took the job two weeks ago, and i was paying a great deal of attention to what was broadcast, what was written, what was on the website, what was on the app. I was listening to things as i went for walks. And it wasnt until i got inside the building that i realized how much awesome stuff is being produced inside there. Its its for some reason not getting out in ways that we can easily consume and appreciate. So making people around the world more aware in different ways of what the terrific content is being produced, i think is going to be one of our Biggest Challenges because theres almost more stuff going out there than you can squeeze into a single app or single newscast or single web app, and so i think we need to figure out how to use our content over and over and over again. In fact, i dont know if this has been done, and i dont know whether hell ever actually do it, but you know that video that video presentation of the american political terms that was done in the Russian Service . I thought itd be really awesome to subtitle it in english and say, heres what the russians have to tell us about what our political system means. Just put it on youtube. See what happens. You know . I mean, why not . Why not try things in a bunch of digit w different ways . Why not take our content we are producing and use it in as many dig different ways as we possibly can . I think theres a big job to be had there. Seriously, theres much more interesting stuff going on in voice of america than even i realized. Now this theres the microphone. Yeah. There you go. Thank you. Im with the heritage foundation. Uhhuh. I was struck and very much appreciated the third point you made in your presentation about the mission of voice of america which is to talk about america. To cover stories within the United States. All different kinds. But i was born in another country. I come here as an immigrant because i found it to be a fantastic place to live and raise a name. So im glad to hear you wanting to cover those positive aspects of this great country as well as the negative ones which are very easily covered by anyone who opens the newspaper. Bad news is always easy to find. Do you expect to find any controversy within voice of america for those kinds of stories that show the whole picture because journalists by their nature gravitate toward bad news and because you dont want to seem like a propagandist in any way. Well, and i would like to emphasize that i am not talking about writing positive stories. Im talking about writing interesting and important stories and the way i would say it is if anyone were to object to this, id say when i was in my late 20s, i covered the american automobile industry. We just covered the american automobile industry. When their sales were going up, we were writing about why. When their sales were going down, we wrote about why. When the japanese were eating their lunch, we wrote about why. It was a beat. It was a beat. We were covering a beat. We were writing stories about a beat. Some of them wound up being good. Some wound up being bad. Some wound up being neither good or bad. Why were managers being laid off . Why were the factories closing . What was going on . And i think thinking about the United States of america as the biggest, most interesting, most vital beat you could possibly think about would be the way i would ask a journalist to look about this look at this. Im not saying go out and cover positive stories. Im saying go out and cover all stories and go out dont transcribe news you hear from events that are happening out there. Go out and make news. Make news by finding out stuff we dont know about and telling us about it. Thats the way i would explain it. Now this gentleman. Mike anderson, retired Foreign Service officer. We all know that the commercial American Media have had to reduce their overseas presence. Theyve cut back their boroughs around the world almost consistently. Has this same trend happened to voa . And could you talk a little about where you have correspondents and do you have enough of them and just some thoughts on the need for americans to be overseas reporting directly from respective countries. If you dont mind, two weeks in ill probably get away from the issue of budget and resources and what we need except to say if you ask a journalist, do you need more resources, the answer is probably not going to be no. Thats the first thing. Yes, i see two things being a tremendous opportunity for us. One is the necessary reduction of overseas assets by american and, indeed, pretty much all american and western european news operations all over the world. And also the pouring in of similar assets by those we might consider our target audiences. And so i think putting those two things together mean that if we use our resources wisely and well, which i believe that we are, can, and should be doing, i think that we could use every single piece of an asset that were given and use it to our great advantage. So im afraid thats not exactly as precise an answer as youd like but come to any again in six months. Microphone. Gwen, im the retired head of the Africa Division at voice of america. Oh, im so glad to meet you. Nice to meet you. So im sure its too early really for you to answer this, but do you have any sense of how much of voas worldwide audience accesses it exclusively through digital devices and then could you talk a little bit about the implications of the phrase, Digital First in News Coverage . Yeah, im afraid i cant give you a precise answer to that first question except to say i know that is something thats being counted in our services around the builds and needs to be counted much more robustly because its something we need to know. I think you can i think you can safely say if you look at the projections of the way people will be accessing not only news, but information, commerce, you know, all kinds of things, conversation around the world, it is going to be its going to skip over all the intermediate steps and go right to digital, largely probably digital on feature phones, not smartphones because thats the way t the inexpensive way it going do be spreading throughout the less developed world, so its a thing we have to be absolutely thinking about is going to where our readers, listeners im trying to figure out whats a good word of calling it . Its just audience, right . Where our audience is. In terms of precise percentages in different places, i think it varies quite substantially by exactly where you are. And thats part of the challenge. I think and then you next. This gentleman next. Thank you. Brian carlson, retired Foreign Service as well. Ive often wondered, well, let me put it this way. I other morning i heard a cbs radio report on an event in bangladesh and the report was done by their bureau chief in london. Now, if i have my geography right, thats kind of like asking somebody in alaska to talk about an event in richmond. So is there do you think there is room, or do you think is there room for more cooperation . Youve been now youre on the government side, but you used to be in the private media, private industry side. Is there room for more cooperation and collaboration with American Media and voice of america correspondents and vice versa . Can you pick up can you find arrangements where you can pick up really good stuff from the post, the Los Angeles Times or something and can american institutions use voa correspondence the way you hear npr picking up things from the guardian correspondent, whatever . I think its what i meant about how in the old days, we saw people as competitors and we strove to distinguish ourselves in an audience with breaking news and scoops that other people didnt have and you didnt want to talk to your competitors. I would say that you see that far, far less and i think there is an ton fopportunity for us t this. I dont see in this time of limited Media Resources why you want five different, six different news giving you the exact picture, event. My idea for voice of america is tell me how youre going to do it better. And doing it better doesnt mean, you know, a much more nicely crafted first paragraph. It means tell me what your value added is going to be. What are you going to give to your audience that reflects the richness of our knowledge of our global audience . And if we can do that, then we should go first. If we cant do that, why waste our time . Why waste your time doing something that anybody else can do . You know, theres certain things theres certain things that are, you know, socalled commodity news i dont think anybody that doesnt mean some of the things that the basic, simple news thats being produced by our services around the world, these are not commodity news. Theres nobody else doing this. That we ought to be doing in a very robust fashion. But if theres things where theres five or six different sources of it and all of them are pretty much the same, i think we should move to something where we can use our intelligence, our expertise, our deep knowledge of our countries that were involved in, and do really amazing work. That would be my view. Im joe johnson. Im an instructor at the Foreign Service institute. My question is also about collaboration, but maybe with other organizations. Ive noticed a number of very valuable reports in the washington post, for example, with the center for Public Integrity. And other ngos. I wonder if youve heard of any ventures that the voa would undertake with outside organizations, other nonprofits, that have an educational or research, some related purpose to your journalism . Well, now this is interesting because it depends on how you look at you would call the center for Public Integrity an ngo, i would think of it as a journalistic organization. It was actually one of the major conduits of the panama papers. So i would consider it a journalistic organization, so it falls right around the umbrella of this gentlemans question, and i think, you know, when i talk about what i like voice of america to do, im simply reflecting back what everyone else is already doing. This is not this is not something im discovering. So, execution is going to be everything. I dont i dont want to as a matter of fact, i cant overpromise. Im just telling you whats the media landscape i see coming in from the outside and where do i see everyone else going . I think in some ways i think we can benefit from being able to piggyback onto everyone elses pain and suffering. So we dont have to go through it quite as much ourselves. I went through enough pain and suffering in my previous jobs. Dan, retired Foreign Service officer. And i also had the privilege of working several years at the voice of america with language services. A request and a question. The request is when you talked about the important the themes, the areas of coverage that have large audiences and potential audiences abroad, entrepreneurship, women, one other area is learning english. And some of the most popular programming in voice of america has been both the regular learning English Division or section, and then the learning english programs. You mentioned the Russian Service. The mandarin service. Just as another area for continued support i hope. More broadly, voa and the question of english as part of voa has gone back and forth in very drastic fashion over the last 20 years or so in Different Directions so how do you see english fitting in to the voice of america . What is the what should be the role of voa in englishlanguage content . Well, if now you just added a little qualifier on there, english language content. So i think about it a little bit more broadly than that, which is if youre going to cover the United States, youre probably going to do it in english. You know, there probably is not a way you can cover voa directly. So i see the english language section also it has value going out to the rest of the world because a fair number of the rest of the world does, in fact, speak english. Thats good. If we could accentuate it, with our language services, to use the expertise of our language services, knowing what the audience wants in demand and using abilities of our english lange wang service to report and develop beats, subject of beats, i see this all eventually converging on some subjects. I see it as an incredibly useful partnership to have both halves of this equation right in the same building. Hi. You guys have a lot of questions, man. Since the former npr crowd. Welcome. Jeff rosenberg, npr. One of my jobs and my in my 38 years there was as head of npr worldwide, which is the International Distribution side. It doesnt come to as david can tell you, it doesnt come to the attention of the government unless its occasionally has some friction with the government. That is an interesting way of putting it. Fortunately, that hasnt happened in quite a while. But my experience does bring to mind the question i thought i heard early on that you i thought i heard the word commissi commissioning. Did i not here that . Commissioning. Not commission in a commission that is hearing as a testimony, commissioning as in causing things to happen. As in having someone make something for you. Yes. Good. All right. The point being there, i was very pleased to just hear that slide by because the experience with particularly the bbc domestic product in radio and television, that is the product that is being turned out for them by very, very talented people, there is any number of radio programs on radio 3 and 4 and 2 in the u. K. And then in the United States, in the last ten years, there has been an explosion in the output of independently produced audio material. I think everybody is familiar with the occasional podcast that goes viral. And there is there is really a tremendous amount of talent out there. There is some things that have already been created for a domestic audience or an internet audience that might be of appeal or there could be organizations that are turning out murray mentions the cultural side. Given that they are not going to create a great many new staff positions inside of the Cohen Building, would it make sense in your mind to develop a more active commissioning desk, editors and people to work that side. And of course that would apply to language programming as well. Would you see that as a possibility. Yes. [ laughter ] i apologize for what we call a german question. [ laughter ] you did great. Im ken mosque, retired Foreign Service. I would follow up by what the speaker just said, jeff and murray, which is apart from including culture and American Music for the quality of the content itself, if you just recall, reality check is pretentious, but you go around the world and you go to the country and listen to the country and most of it is music and most of it is pop. So people dont listen to npr type of music or npr type of radio broadcast which is what were used to hearing in the Washington Area but it is music with a newscast which could be a vehicle for voa to get into the audiences and sound Like International radio. There is a wealth of expertise out here in the audience that i definitely am pleased to listen to. Im glad because youre giving us useful feedback. Mitchell moss, mfso at ndu. My first tour was in nigeria. I didnt know what the voa did until i learned that most of the sahell set its clock by the housa language news broadcast. Doesnt that give you goosebumps to think about that. Seriously. It just struck me that there is both the the resources invested and then the impact that those resources have. And i hope that as those decisions get made, even in regions that perhaps that are less populated, although the sahell is approaching 100 million now, the thought is given to impact and not duplication. And let me pause here for another unpaid Political Announcement, which is this is aspirational, this is directional. I do not want anybody to mistake this. This is not going to be easy. Ive been through similar things at other news services. News services with big, historic storied traditions, dedicated workforces, plenty of resources. It wasnt easy there. It is not going to be easy here. And i just im reading davids mind over there. Im sitting here and im watching him and hes saying, yeah, right. Good luck with that, hes thinking. You see, i know what hes thinking. And so i want to make sure that you understand that the old saying, no plan survives the first battle. Were going to have a lot of that. This is aspirational and directional and will require a lot of help, a lot of patience, a lot of forebearance and a lot of good will because it isnt going to happen overnight. Thank you. Lynn while, formerly with bbg, former journalist and capitol hill staffer and back on the hill again now. Just wanted to emphasize two things you just said. There is a lot of expertise in this room. And there is a lot of good will as well. And i hope youll consider this a community that you could call on because a lot of folks here have been through in various positions what you are about to go through and what you are going through and some are still in it. You have a few of your International Colleagues here. Now that im back in congress as a staffer, i could tell you that the atmosphere on the hill is not going to get any easier in the coming years. And while you look to make changes, i would like to advise you to look to speaking to the members of congress who represent the people who work for you. That coalition can be very helpful in supporting you. Not just the ones who are directly involve the with foreign policy. Thank you. That is excellent advice. And how about how many more do we have out here . One or two. This is an easy one. Connie lund, still a reporter after 48 years. I want to second what she said, there are a lot of good people out there. I had five years in freelancing and i find the voa reporters are the brightest in the world and the ones that work on the overnight shift should be lauded. It is very, very difficult. And wondered are you ever going to make a legal push to change the charter so voa could be broadcast and listen to in the u. S. I know you could get it on the internet. But what about changing the charter . Thank you very much. Thank you. And i accept every ounce of good will that is sent my way. And im sure im going to have to use every ounce of it. Thank you. One more. Anybody . Oh, sorry. Somebody beat you to it. I guess im the last person. David henderson, former cbs news. I started in radio as a kid over at arlington, virginia, doing a saturday program on the voa. About a hundred years ago. But i love your use of the word cooperation. I would also say collaboration. You have, within voa, which ive been very curious about, wonderful organizations like radio free europe. Outstanding talented people. Is there any economy of scale to use some of their resources with voa. Absolutely. And im looking over your shoulder at my one of my new colleagues and that is what weve been talking about doing, is how we make the best use of the resources that we have and not overlap any more than we have to. Absolutely. So thank you but one more person i cant resist putting him on the spot. David ensore. [ laughter ] what advice, good, bad and indifferent, would you have for your successor . Please be merciful. This is amandas day and im so thrilled. I cannot tell you how thrilled i am to have a successor of the stature of Amanda Bennett. It is its a compliment to the voice of america that you are taking the job. And as you said, it isnt going to be easy. But boy, it the sense of mission that the people have that work for you, i dont know whether to envieh you or not envy you. Im not sure. But it is a wonderful job youve taken on. And i think that with john lansing as ceo, youre going to have an easier time than i did. Im going to have a much easier time than you did. And youll be able to focus more on the mission as opposed to the politics. Which would be great. Yes. I just wish you well, amanda, thank you, david. And he is the greatest supporter and i totally appreciate the work hes done to help me. Join me in thanking our guest. Thank you very much. [ applause ] our next first monday, monday june 6th with the head of the british counsel paul smith, until then, we are adjourned. Thank you. Coming up on cspan, American History tv and prime time features programs marking the 100th anniversary of the Pulitzer Prize. First, american artifacts with Pulitzer Prize winning photographs. After that, the Pulitzer Prize centennial celebration. Each week american artifacts takes viewers into archives and museums and Historic Sites around the country. We visits the Pulitzer Prize photograph